[lbo-talk] The Democrats and the Bush tax cuts

[Alan Rudy]

But this isn't fair either.  There have been many intelligent and critical
discussions of the TPers here.  The discussion in these last three threads
has been on whether the prevailing representation of the US as an inherently
center-right country is accurate or not.  Folks, I think like you, who
stress the dominant role of the TP/Far Right tend to emphasize the right.
Folks like Marv and I, who see the TP as a pretty seriousl nightmare argue
that, while it is sure that any reasonably consistent Democrat was going to
drive the right wing right up a tree, the intensity of the right, much of
the character of its coverage and a good portion of the swing of
moderates/independents rightward comes from the failure of the Obama
administration to fight back.  In any event, I don't see how its necessary
to hone a critique of the TPers - they are a melding of hyper-libertarians,
hyper-xenophobes with hyper-inaccurate readings of the Bible, science and
just about everything else.

On the one hand, criticizing them is like shooting fish in a barrell.  On
the other hand, criticizing them only intensifies the motivation of their
grass roots... which would be fine if it were a calm, cool, and devastating
de(con)struction of the contradictions of their positions.  I do it all the
time in my classes... I feel no need to do it here.

On Wed, Nov 10, 2010 at 3:56 PM, c b <cb31450 at gmail.com> wrote:


> I criticize, not vilify, the ultra-lefts (who
> emphatically characterize themselves as not-Democrats ) for not
> developing the rhetoric and arguments against the ultra-right. They
> reach this bizarre conclusion of only criticizing Democrats, and think
> nobody notices that they don't criticize the right and Reps as much as
> they criticize the Democrats. This is objectively rhetorical unity
> with the Republicans and right-wing, i.e backing into right-wing
> political discourse in this concrete situation.  They have horrible
> concrete analysis of the concrete situation; they are  very
> non-Leninists.
>
> ___________________________________
> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
>

-- 
*********************************************************
Alan P. Rudy
Dept. Sociology, Anthropology and Social Work
Central Michigan University
124 Anspach Hall
Mt Pleasant, MI 48858
517-881-6319