"The hard left"... you know what is so damn comical about this statement?

[nadinbrzezinski]

It is tendentious and it is based on zero facts. The United States does not have a hard left. The last version of that died with the New Left of the 1960s. The approved range of what politics is in the US qualifies anywhere else in the world anywhere from (I will be nice) from center to hard right. Left really does not exist in any organized fashion in this country.

So it is kind of hilarious to read posts about the left, or the hard left, or the damn commies.

I will say it right now, our approved political conversation has moved so far right that it is down right dangerous and fascist.

We have gotten rid in textbooks of whole swaths of US History, including the history of labor (talk about left). We have also made things like workers rights to be almost revolutionary. I mean silly shit like the 40 hour week, things workers died for.

This propaganda campaign has been so damn effective that we really have no organized opposition to the new corporate state that has risen. Yet, we still read these attacks, which are down right hilarious. What left do you speak off?

This is all I have to say to those who keep using that term at this point.

[CrispyQ]

1. The scariest thing you wrote:

...we really have no organized opposition to the new corporate state that has risen.

~kick

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. I know

It is starting to percolate. But that is what fusion centers are for

[roguevalley]

59. hard left is a slur in my opinion equal to tea party

[nadinbrzezinski]

60. Except that tea party is self chosen

and you do not dare say otherwise at a tea party event.

[roguevalley]

61. true that.

[merrily]

84. No Labels. They expressly equate, not the hard left, but traditional Democrats, to Teabaggers.

At DU, too for that matter. Or Paulites. It's ludicrous.

The Big Lie.

[merrily]

83. Any thoughts on what can be done about that?

What about a website for the "left of the left," both a US version and an international version?

Then, we could stay up to date on what matters to us and action items, local, nationally and globally.

I don't know about you, but I don't even hear about demonstrations far enough in advance to get to them. A day in advance is just not enough time for me to get to D.C. Sometimes, I don't even hear about them until the day after.

The two exceptions were the October 6 movement, which got pre-empted by Occupy Wall Street, and the Stewart-Colbert centrism demonstration, which, though I love them both, I had no interest in attending.

The PTB unite globally. We need to do that much more than they do.

[Hotler]

121. " no organized opposition " the Left has no fight.

It is far easier to sit behind the keyboard and bitch and moan and say we'll vote them out at the next election than get fighting mad and take to the streets by the thousands and protest, begin a national strike and shut this country down for 6-8 months. The biggest weapon we have is our wallets and purses. Stop buying shit (cars, TV's, shoes, clothes, appliances etc.). except for food, booze, smokes. Turn off the cable for a year. Get rid of your fucking cell phones. Stop going out to eat. Stop using you credit cards. Us little people will survive better than the rich. The rich may have more money but, they also have huge bills to pay and if we stop spending there will be no money coming in for them to pay their bills and they will start crying and the bill collectors will come knocking on their doors before they come knocking on ours. We don't have any money anyway. Our founding fathers had to sacrifice to form this country and we have to sacrifice to gain it back. Some of us will have to take a hit for the team, I will. You get me three million people camping out on the Washington mall and I will stand in front and take the first baton strike from the cops. The first bean bag shot. The first bullet, tear gas. We had a chance to really put the fear in the PTB with Occupy Wall Street and only a hand full of people supported it.
I now return you to Duck Dynasty and the Kardashian's.

[malaise]

168. +1,000

100% correct

[Javaman]

2. The only "left" that is left, is that which is "left behind"

a good metaphor, no?

[Raksha]

8. Yeah, I say that all the time too: "There is no Left left."

[merrily]

85. There is a left, but the PTB, including media, pretend there isn't.

If you label an idea or a candidate liberal, he, she or it is doomed because both Democrats and Republicans have worked hard to discredit the term and anyone or anything associated with it. However, if you just poll people on an idea, without labeling it Democratic, Republican, conservative or liberal, it polls very well

Right after Obama was elected, over 70% of Americans of both parties polled thought taxes should be raised on income of over $250K a year and about the same number wanted a public option.

But then, the well oiled, well funded propaganda machine digs in.

And, under Obama, the USG got authority to propagandize Americans .

I don't fully understand that, because countries, including the US, have always propagandized their own citizens and politicians have always done that as well. But, I don't think that new law bodes well for anyone, especially the left.

[hobbit709]

3. you nailed it, Nadin.

[dembotoz]

4. thought that is what you got if you cut one of those ed pills in half

but the poster is correct
what is considered left is what centrist used to be.

[bemildred]

6. Name calling is all they have.

So of course they over-work it.

[merrily]

86. Well that, and money and the country's political power.

[bemildred]

115. No, that's what they get.

Name calling is the only argument they have, though it has many faces, because in fact they are just the same as the rest of us, if not worse, so there is no reason they should get all the loot.

[merrily]

116. And, after they get them, they have them. And they got them, keep getting them, now have them and

keep getting, and therefore having, more of them by the day.

[bemildred]

117. Which is how they have set things up for themselves. nt

[merrily]

118. Which is my point. And we helped. At least I did.

Voted, volunteered, donated. Got the T shirts (literally).

[bemildred]

120. Well, I can say I've been voting against it all of my life.

After brief flirtations with splinter parties and whatnot in my youth.
But it's not like I had any effect.

Some of my brothers are/were conservative.
Others are/were more leftie than me.
My little brother went all the way from right (ROTC, Yay Vietnam) to pinko left, like you perhaps?

But we don't talk politics unless we already know we agree.

[merrily]

123. Don't know your definition of voting against the corporatists,

but the T shirts to which my post referred were mailed to me on behalf of Obama Biden.

[bemildred]

129. I've had no use for Biden since the Anita Hill hearings.

If that was not corrupt, I don't know what is. But the entire system is riven with corruption. It pervades the system. They still pretend to serve us, a little.

I supported Obama, and still do, until a better alternative comes along. I still have a bumper sticker.

My apologies for suggesting you might be conservative.

[merrily]

133. I did not think you were suggesting that.

I thought you were suggesting that by voting Democratic, you had been voting against the corporatists all your life. That's all I thought you were suggesting.

[bemildred]

137. I mostly vote Dem, because that's all there is most of the time, that I can stomach.

Occasionally there are pleasant surprises, but not often. When change comes, it will not be from the top.

[merrily]

142. Why would change for the better come from either the top or the bottom if

neither the top nor the bottom is changing its conduct for the better?

[bemildred]

143. Have a nice day, I have to go. nt

[merrily]

144. Thanks. You, too.

[Raksha]

7. Yeah, tell me about it! I regularly describe my politics as "hard left" or "far left"

and more recently as "socialist" or "anarcho-socialist." But the truth is that my beliefs haven't changed much since the 1960s. I've pretty much always been a pro-labor New Deal Democrat or democratic socialist.

What HAS changed--radically--is the political context, where such beliefs fall outside of the approved political spectrum. You are so right that for all practical purposes, there *IS* no "Left" in this country.

[merrily]

87. Please don't label yourself incorrectly.

You are very slightly left of mainstream Democrats in the 1960s and maybe even slightly to the right of mainstream Democrats in the 1930s. If that is "hard left," what would a communist fomenting overthrow of the US government by force be called?

[War Horse]

161. I agree, in many ways

Why label oneself as something as extreme as an "anarcho-socialist" when you simply believe in things like labor rights and a living wage?

Because of frustration and exhaustion, would be my guess.

[Raksha]

210. I didn't realize "anarcho-socialist" was extreme.

Isn't that how Chomsky describes himself? Since I agree with him about most things, I assume the description fits me too.

Yeah, I can't deny that frustration and exhaustion have a lot to do with what could be a kind of self-caricature. I just don't want anyone to think even for a minute that I'm a "centrist" or "moderate" because of the connotations of spinelessness those words have taken on in recent years.

[merrily]

221. It shows how powerful words=and the Big Lie strategy are, that people even label themselves

incorrectly, simply because others do so persistently. I refuse. I am not a New Democrat. I believe in the values in which the Democratic Party professed to believe before New Democrats took the Party over. Values to which even New Democrats profess to believe from time to time. I refuse to submit to the Big Lie or to brainwashing and label myself incorrectly.

If that causes some fools that are ignorant or disingenuous or both to insist that I am really a Republican or a Paulite, so be it. I'll try to figure a way to help the deluded or dishonest. Meanwhile, sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me--unless I let them make me lose sight of the truth.

[Raksha]

209. Can what was "hard left" in the 1930s even exist in this country any more?

Probably not for very long. A communist fomenting overthrow of the U.S. government by force would be labeled a "terrorist" and treated accordingly.

The only people with fantasies of overthrowing the U.S. government by force are the extreme RW militia groups like the Bundy Ranch loons. Lefties could never get away with such fantasies--and aren't that suicidal.

[merrily]

219. I am not advocating for violent overthrow of government or even hard left.

I am not suicidal either, or even very brave, but I am willing to die for a good cause. Not pointlessly, though. And not by suicide.

[laundry_queen]

9. Good post, spot on

It would be laughable really, if it wasn't so sad. Some people need to take a poli sci 101 course. There is no "left" in the US. Not only that, what is considered "left" is now firmly where the center-right used to be even 10 years ago. Anyone who doesn't understand this can't claim politics as a hobby or passion.

[JDPriestly]

37. I was shocked at a dinner some years ago.

At my side was a young woman who had graduated with honors from an outstanding American university and had taken a government course in high school and at least one in college. She was not sure what the names were of the two houses of our Congress.

She was educated after Reagan.

The break was Nixon. Children educated after Nixon became president have a less thorough education in government in general.

We who were born pre- during and post-WWII until Nixon were pretty rigorously educated about government and politics. Now kids have to be interested in the subject or have an exceptional teacher if they are to learn government and politics. We even had to learn to read stock market reports as well as know the Constitution backwards and forwards. That is no longer the case.

[blackspade]

42. I think the education extended into the early 80s.

I had civics classes nearly every year through the mid 80s. It was mandatory.
Ounce in college though...what a joke.

[laundry_queen]

43. That's a crazy story

Even here in Canada they teach that - my daughter in high school knows the 2 houses in the US.

I actually took a poli sci 101 course recently as an elective for my degree, because I've been on DU and immersed in US politics for awhile and wanted to learn a bit more about our Canadian system.

Practically the whole course concentrated on US examples of politics, or comparisons between US and Canada. Let's just say I got an A+ without even opening my textbook, LOL.

So the running joke here in Canada is we know more about your system than you do .

But really, there needs to be more taught about civics, politics and government in general on both sides of the border. So many people just have no clue. When I was younger, there was a huge emphasis on how it was our duty as citizens of a democratic country to participate. A friend of mine whose birthday was the day after mine went with me to register to vote the week of our birthdays (an election was later in the month). We were very excited to do so. I go to university with many students in their 20's who haven't ever voted or can't be bothered. One friend of mine said she didn't participate because her parents came from Vietnam and she's been there and it's so much worse there, and that we have it really good here so everything must be going fine, so she feels there's no point in her changing things. I tried to impress on her that people like her need to help KEEP it 'fine'. I got her to vote in her first election. But there are so many more like her.

I'm pretty impressed that you had to know the constitution so well...even in my poli sci class they didn't spend much time on our Canadian constitution. I learned more about our constitution and charter of rights in my business law course.

BTW, I'm pretty sure you 'get' why they don't want people so educated on the manner...easier to manipulate, right?

[JDPriestly]

47. Yes. I get why schools are doing such a bad job teaching civics.

[awoke_in_2003]

51. Do a youtube search on...

George Carlin it's a big club. They don't want intelligent people capable of thought, they want obedient workers.

[DebJ]

81. That is why the plan of NCLB was to focus first on reading and math and

then science ...social studies classes were effectively eliminated, especially in poorer districts
where the students struggle,and where certainly the powers that be do NOT want them to vote,
nor to understand the power they DO hold with that vote. The middle school children I taught for
a year couldn't handle any geography whatsoever except some knew the continents. But nothing
about what is on which continent nor anything else. Yet many had relatives in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I gave them a weekly quiz, which they could always retake to improve their scores, and gave prizes
for 100 percent scores, on basic geography. Since it was Ancient History, every one of the 80 students
could find Iraq, Iran,etc the middle east on a map and a globe before my teaching job was cut. They
knew Africa was not a country. They knew how to find their home town on a map. What does a news
story mean to anyone, when they have no idea where these places even are?

That's why NCLB left all social studies knowledge for dead last ... so that it NEVER gets done, at all.

Some pre-NCLB years ago, the fifth and sixth grade students had a social studies class every day. As of
a few years ago when I was teaching, they had 15 minutes twice a week. Whether they needed it, or not.
The sad thing to is that a child not skilled in math or even reading can still learn about the world, about power structures in the world, about how to make a difference ... more easily learn that today than ever before. The power of the internet, videos, etc... there is no reason for at least 85 percent to get a good grasp of social studies...even if they can barely read.

[merrily]

88. Just wait until you talk to someone educated after

Michele Rhee Arne Duncan.

[merrily]

95. Yes and no. Please see Reply 85.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025024257#post85

[villager]

10. Exactly. But it's used by the rightwingers here busily recalculating "the center" to fit their

...reactionary politics.

According to them, Hubert Humphrey would be "hard left."

[Iggo]

11. It's used by the right wingers.

It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.

That can't be pointed out enough.

[bvar22]

28. As soon as someone calls this old mainstream FDR/LBJ Democrat "Hard Left",

I KNOW where they stand on the political spectrum.

It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers.
It's used by the right wingers....

AND, they are HERE!

[Enthusiast]

33. AND, they are HERE,

masquerading as Democrats.

[FiveGoodMen]

38. ...and ignored by MIRT

[Maedhros]

46. Left, right, whatever.

The important thing is: are they part of our tribe, or the other tribe? Because that other tribe is bad, and our tribe is good - regardless of what policy positions they may take.

Are they against needless war? If they're from the other tribe then they're WRONG.

In favor of warrantless, blanket surveillance? If they're from our tribe then they're RIGHT.

[L0oniX]

66. Those that accept warrantless, blanket surveillance do not deserve to be free.

[Maedhros]

74. If OUR TRIBE is in power, we will be FREE.

They promised.

[L0oniX]

75. It would seem that the NSA is not the only liar.

[Maedhros]

76. I'm sorry, I'm being a bit snarky.

I have exhausted my ability to tolerate the nonsense.

[L0oniX]

77. *

oh I wasn't implying anything about you ...I agree with you. Your on our side.

[merrily]

90. Is it really that based on ideas? Or is more loyalty to Democrats and, for some, mostly to Obama?

(I have to point to Obama, because I've seen one Democratic politician and Democratic icon after another thrown under the bus, if it seems to a poster that something is reflecting badly on Obama. That does not rise to the level of even blind party loyalty. That seems more like the DU contingent of OFA.)

[hrmjustin]

152. We can only deal with new trolls or those under 100 posts. the rest are up to the admins.

Last edited Sat May 31, 2014, 12:17 PM - Edit history (2)

If they are over 100 posts we can not act.

[villager]

177. They *are* MIRT, aren't they?

[L0oniX]

65. Dino's ...centrists ...3rd way ...corporatists ...lovers of the rich ...what's the difference.

[merrily]

89. Not only rightwingers here. They are only faint echoes of what is going on in the real world.

If it were only posters here, I'd shrug. Not even.

[OnyxCollie]

12. The Hard Left, in conjunction with the Liberal Media...

[TBF]

13. It died pre-60s -

Palmer (Wilson administration) did the initial sweep & McCarthy got whomever he missed.

The official communist party that remains in this country is very watered down - to the point that they endorsed Obama.

It needs rebuilding & labor needs to do it.

[nadinbrzezinski]

23. Why I wrote the last version

As to labor...it first needs to wake the fuck up. It is not middle class. It is working class

[TBF]

24. Agree - people making 20-40K

a year think they are "middle class" because they sit in a cube with a tie on or maybe manage a fast food restaurant. They're not. They are workers.

And you've nailed the big disconnect. Until they realize that class is the issue & they are not on the way to becoming billionaires nothing will be accomplished.

[merrily]

96. Polls show almost every individual has his or her own definiton of "middle class."

So, it's an all but meaningless term. (Which may explain why politicians are so love with it.)

[merrily]

91. The hard left may have, but the left is alive and well. Please see Reply 85.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025024257#post85

[houston_radical]

14. Yes! You are correct (to state the obvious)

I think the core liberal values are:
- Human rights
- Social justice
- Economic fairness

Assuming these are correct, then the last "true" liberal president was LBJ (as you noted).

Since then the democratic presidents have drifted away from the left:

- Carter, although a fine man, deregulated everything in sight - the banks, airlines, rails etc.

- Clinton was basically an Eisenhower republican - NAFTA, so-called welfare reform, and don't forget repealing glass steagall

- Obama, although we love ACA (why not single payer?), has governed in the style of the DNC Clintons, spies on US citizens

If we think of the core (Goldwater) values of conservatives:
- Fiscal responsibility
- Avoid foreign entanglements
- "Stay out of my bedroom"

Then the last "true" conservative president we've had was Coolidge.

- Hoover - the great depression, hardly fiscally respondible

- Eisenhower (a Clinton-Obama-esque Centrist) - outspoken against the military-industrial complex, Civil Rights Act of 1957

- Nixon (a liberal by today's standards) - established OSHA, EPA & The Endangered Species Act, froze price and wages, outspoken in favor of affirmative action, went to USSR and China (Nixon wouldn't even qualify for democrat by today's standards!)

- Reagan, Bush Sr & Bush Jr, these guys are neocons, not conservative at all - spend money like crazy, love to invade other countries, and (at least Bush Jr) love to spy on us

So since Reagan, after Carter, conservatives have moved to the right as well.

Ok, I imagine that there might be some disagreement about the details here, but the overarching idea is that our entire political spectrum has been moving to the right since 1970s.

[Ccarmona]

22. The Biggest Right Wing

move Clinton made was to de-regulate the Media. It has allowed the contraction of media ownership so that we have very little in diversification in what we hear and see. The Internet is the last bastion of independent thought, and the FCC is trying its damnest to throttle this medium.

[TBF]

25. Clinton had 3 big issues -

deregulating the media, repeal of Glass–Steagall and NAFTA

These things all hurt the working class of this country.

[bvar22]

30. Don't forget "Welfare Reform" accompanied by the proclamation that,

"The Era of Big Government is OVER!!!"--Bill Clinton

But the Old Dog is in trouble.
It won't be as much fun being the 2nd Best Republican President EVER.


[font color=firebrick][center]"There are forces within the Democratic Party who want us to sound like kinder, gentler Republicans.
I want a party that will STAND UP for Working Americans."
---Paul Wellstone [/font][/center] [center] [/font]
[font size=1]photo by bvar22
Shortly before Sen Wellstone was killed[/center][/font]

[merrily]

94. Yep. That was a gem.

(Do you need the sarcasm smilie?)

[mountain grammy]

151. The real leaders who appeal to the working people of America seem to die young..

Wonder what's causing that?

[merrily]

93. DOMA and DADT were not exactly liberal, either.

He really is the Teflon President, luckily for Hillary, as it turns out. Except for getting impeached by Republicans, of course.

Though Obama has done pretty well with Democrats, too.

[merrily]

92. I might have said repeal of Glass Steagall, but Obama's FCC put the nail in the coffin of the

Fairness Doctrine (as well as, of course, pursuing the end of net neutrality). Funny what happens when you appoint lobbyists to the FCC, including the legal department and the chief.

[suffragette]

15. Excellent post.

K&R

[frylock]

16. knr

[Solly Mack]

17. K&R

[Phlem]

18. Big K&R

Another most excellent post.



-p

[nashville_brook]

19. exactly right.

[Glorfindel]

20. Tragically true

Thanks for an outstanding post.

[valerief]

21. K&R

[bvar22]

26. Mainstream-Center FDR/LBJ Democrat here,

...routinely labeled a "Fringe Leftist" for still believing in the Traditional Working Class Policies of the "Old" Democratic Party that built the largest, wealthiest, and most upwardly mobile Working/Middle Class the World has ever seen.

I haven't changed.


[font color=firebrick][center]"There are forces within the Democratic Party who want us to sound like kinder, gentler Republicans.
I want a party that will STAND UP for Working Americans."
---Paul Wellstone [/font][/center] [center] [/font]
[font size=1]photo by bvar22
Shortly before Sen Wellstone was killed[/center][/font]

[nadinbrzezinski]

27. You have not

But the allowed political conversation has.

It started before Reagan. It accelerated during. And the last generation it went into overdrive.

[Enthusiast]

32. Me too.

[bobthedrummer]

29. K&R#70 n/t

[Enthusiast]

31. K&R! This post should have hundreds of recommendations!

Read it once then read it again. Especially you DUers complaining about the American far left.

[Scuba]

34. Nailed it.

[MisterP]

35. it's like the "purity purge" they claimed to fear 2006-8: with Capitol Hill blue

we'd be able to start kicking out the rightmost members while retaining a majority--but that was well before Cegelis, Lamont, McKinney, Halter, Romanoff, Sestak, Grayson, Kucinich, Buono, Rev. Manuel Sykes, Wendy Davis showed them for what they are

"racism" didn't work when the NSA stories broke; now it's "swiftboating"

[merrily]

97. I know some of those names, but not all their agendas. However, as to Lamont and Sestak,

I don't think they were especially liberal. Yes, they were more liberal than the Republicans they were running against, namely Lieberman and Specter, but they were not very liberal when viewed out of that context. That the Democratic Party supported Lieberman and Specter over them should have given some Democrats a lot of pause, IMO.

[bvar22]

176. MisterP has been paying attention!

I was personally involved in the Halter v Lincoln Democratic Primary.
It wasn't pretty.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024586209

[MisterP]

184. in Spanish it's called "oficialismo" where party leaders grossly favor status-quo candidates

even to the point of deliberately allowing their own party to lose (of course a conservative Dem leader would rather work with the GOP than a Dem who'd even fight their own party to get things done, no matter how good those things are)

party leaders say it's just voter preference, but it's really a dedocracia--"rule by finger" where a candidate is favored/nominated, or an extant member promoted within the party or legislature

it's quite easy if you think about the Dems as a party with structures and factions, and not some army of 100M Paladins fighting the Debbil for a better world

Cegelis, Lamont, McKinney, Halter, Romanoff, Sestak, Grayson, Kucinich, Barbara Buono, Rev. Manuel Sykes, Wendy Davis weren't/aren't tanked or redistricted away because the DNCC thought they'd do worse against the Pub than their darling!

the past is important: people go to war over it, bleed it out their bodies: hence Orwell's Memory Holes to keep people entirely in the present, undermining their sense of roots or even ability to look backwards instead of downwards

[JDPriestly]

36. So true.

My mother is an FDR Democrat. FDR was president when she was a teenager.

On the political topics we have discussed, she pretty much agrees with me with the exception of one issue. I support Israel. She is more on the side of the Palestinians. She is very religious and far, far, far from far left.

I'm pretty much an FDR Democrat and, on certain issues, a Teddy Roosevelt Progressive (but not with Teddy on a number of issues). I like Teddy Roosevelt's stance on monopolies.

[progressoid]

39. But but but...the far left gave the House to the Republicans!11!

And that's a fact! Cuz I was told that by the real (and sensible) liberals that reside here.

[L0oniX]

68. That was some funny shit.

[merrily]

98. The fact that neither of the 2 largest parties does what it should for Americans

causes Americans to seesaw. After FDR, Democrats (who would now be considered stealth communists) pretty much controlled D.C. for 40 years. Until Reagan, whom many Democrats now seem to rank as one of the 10 best Presidents of the US ever. And those rankers include incumbent President Obama and his 2008 primary opponent, Presidential anointee Hillary Clinton--and Hillary had only 9 slots to fill, too.

[blackspade]

40. Exactly correct.

The notion that we have a viable 'hard left' in this country is a joke.
I consider myself a leftist, but I am milk toast compared to those of the 1920-40s.

Anyone here complaining about the hard left is either ignorant or disingenuous.

[merrily]

99. You are a traditional Democrat, period. Extreme left is a communist advocating violent overthrow

of the US govt. However, because the Democratic Party has gone so far right, some term other than Democrat became necessary to describe those who adhere--and in more than lip service-- to the traditional principles of the New Democratic Party, which is essentially center right (at most). So, I, too, often describe myself as leftist.

However, I think the Party may be starting to get the message that it has to stop going right. Hence Warren and Sanders have become so visible. (Even though Sanders is not a Democrat, he never faults them, only Republicans. If that were not so, I don't think we'd see him on MSNBC as often as we do.)

[blackspade]

147. The irony is that I'm to the left of Sanders on a lot of thngs.

And I'm still a Democrat!

[merrily]

153. Sanders is in a complicated situation.

It takes a lot of money and clout and person power to win and keep a Senate seat, the kind that typically comes from having one of the two largest political parties and their employees and volunteers behind you, and their popular pols like Bubba or Obama campaigning for you when the going gets really tough for you.

When Sanders ran for Mayor of Burlington, Vt., he had no party behind him, yet he kept winning .At one point, the Democrats and Republicans were both so determined to oust him that they both backed a single candidate against him. (Sadly, not the only time something like that has happened.) And he won against both massive machines anyway.

Then, he got to the House. But a Senate seat is tougher than a House seat--and he won that, too. But, fundraising and fighting both parties all your career ain't easy, especially if you are over sixty. In any event, Bernie has made a bargain with Democrats: He votes with them on procedural matters and they don't run anyone against him in Vermont. So says wiki, anyway.

Is that all that is to the deal? I don't know. Probably all. But, I do know that I don't really hear Bernie criticizing both sides a lot. He confines his negative remarks to Republicans, even though I know he has to be seeing faults with both sides. So, I don't know how independent he really is, or how really independent he can be if he wants to keep his Senate seat.

Does that reflect his innermost thoughts? I don't know that either. How could I? Maybe his ideology has changed as he aged. That often happens. Maybe he's just tired of fighting them both. Who can know?

[blackspade]

192. I wasn't knocking him in the slightest!

I was just noting that as a Democrat, I'm to the left of a so-called 'pinko commie socialist.'

That is what continually amazes me.

[merrily]

193. I didn't thinkyou were knocking him.

I was only trying to say that we may no longer know how far left Bernie actually is or isn't these days and I explained why we might not know.

[blackspade]

201. I gottcha!

We're on the same page on this.

[merrily]

205. Good!

[treestar]

41. If you mean extreme left

that would be actual, real communists or left-anarchists. I don't see that here. Maybe the occasional post you can take as being from an anarchist due to having no solution to the problem under discussion other than disbanding whatever government agency is involved and enforcing no law.

It is usually right wingers who will label you a communist for being slightly to the left of center, or even being in the center, because they refuse to recognize reality. They refuse the concept of liberal democrat, socialist, or communist being each a bit further to the left. Yet call them Nazis because they are on the right and suddenly they recognize positions along the line (and claim the Nazis were socialists).

[socialist_n_TN]

54. So all of my propagandizing on DU has been in vain?????

Actually, there are several folks on here that are self-avowed communists or revolutionary socialists. Yes actual dues paying, card carrying Classic Reds. And my sense of it is that anti-capitalism is a growing trend at least on DU and really throughout the country.

Now that anti-capitalism can take a few different forms, but at it's base it's the realization that capitalism will NEVER work for the majority of the people over the long term. When you have that epiphany, there are only a few ways to go with it.

[blackspade]

202. I'm definately an anti-capitalist

It needs to go the way of slavery and feudalism as a dominant economic model.

[socialist_n_TN]

214. Well if you haven't already, join us in the Socialist Progressives group....

on DU. Although not all are anti-capitalist, most I think are. Lots of good high level discussions on there.

[blackspade]

216. Thanks! I'll check it out.

[merrily]

100. Sorry, plenty of us have been labeled hard left or extreme left right here on DU by

Obama loyalists and/or Party loyalists. (And by loyalists, I mean unconditional loyalty.) And even Obama and White House spokespersons have found it necessary to distinguish us from Democrats and to speak derogatorily of us. Except, of course, during primary season and whenever they expect us to show up at the polls and vote Democratic, despite their not always disguised contempt and condescension.

[antigop]

44. k&r. The Third Way sycophants are a pathetic lot. nt

[bvar22]

175. They are old "Reagan Democrats" or even Republicans...

...with enough intelligence to see that the Clinton/Obama wing of the Democratic Party gives them everything a moderate Republican ever wanted.

The Problem is that in the 80s,
I worked very hard FOR The Democrats because I OPPOSED "Moderate Republican Policy".
Why should I suddenly start supporting "Moderate Republican Policy" NOW?

....BECAUSE OBAMA!!!!

[antigop]

188. and they probably benefit from the status quo. nt

[bvar22]

189. BINGO!

*

[stupidicus]

45. yep

as I've long seen and argued it, we have the brownshirts and the brownshirts-lite.

The only diff between them and their old counterparts is that they are largely confined to beating us up (perhaps more accurately, try to) rhetorically as opposed to with the clubs they use to favor.

I may be the left they speak of, but I'm nowhere near being a socialist or commie.

[blkmusclmachine]

48. The Corporate sock puppets, Third Way types, work DU regularly. They keep trying to push the Left to

the right. But some of us see thru their phony 11 dimensions of rightwing BS

[mikeysnot]

49. I always chuckle when RW use "the far left"

I said to someone flinging that label around as if it bolstered his point and said "as apposed to the far right" and he was like.

"what are you talking about" with an blank expression on his face.

I said right back at you.

"far left" is saying boo to scared uninformed fools.

[nadinbrzezinski]

50. Good answer

[merrily]

101. I have not finished reading this thread yet, but I have read at least two posts by

leftists who say that they have labeled themselves "hard left," even though they are in reality to the right of mainstream Democrats of the 1930s. So, words have power.

[Raksha]

212. I'm one of those who labels herself "hard left,"

because my positions on most issues have been so labeled not only by righties but by self-proclaimed "centrists" aka Third Way Democrats. I don't think I'm to the right of anyone except for the communists of the 1930s. I'm not sure what mainstream Democrats believed in the 1930s--I'm going to need a refresher course in that area.

I have recently started questioning the whole concept of capitalism, and that was the point where I began calling myself a socialist. I've been reading a lot about Thomas Piketty's book "Capital in the 21st Century" in essays by Krugman and others. It seems to be making a lot of waves, and I'm looking forward to reading it.

[merrily]

218. In the 1930s, FDR, with help, created the New Deal, in which not only mainstream Democrats, but

most of America believed at the time. Federal jobs when lack of work amounts to a national emergency, not only in road construction, but also to keep up national parks, do art work for federal, state and local govt, etc . Unions. Welfare for those who were unable to work or for whom no jobs existed. Social Security for those who had worked. Etc.

Even most Americans in the 1930s (and earlier) who attended Communist meetings were not prepared to plot for violent overthrow of the US government, so you would probably also be to the right of Russian Communists, who did just that. Then again, we are not under a Tsar, though we get closer and closer to a Tsar class, it sometimes seems. New Tsars, as it were.

One problem with advocating socialism is that we have successful models of socialist measures that work, but no example of a modern totally socialist society that works.

Another is that decades of bipartisan and nonpartisan propaganda, since the first Russian revolution, very early in the last century, propaganda in the US and in many other countries, discredited socialism in the minds of voters even more than bipartisan discrediting of the term liberal. You see what goes on, even in DU and the Democratic Party when the term "liberal" rears its head. And that's before we get to those who admit they are conservatives. Just imagine trying to convince someone who practically spits at the mention of "liberal" that going from what we have today to socialism is best. It doesn't matter if it would be best or not, just imagine the reaction. How are you going to fight all those decades? And now, the USG has formally authorized itself to propagandize its citizens. (I kind of shudder as I try to imagine what it wants to do in that regard that it had not already been doing, to the extent that it thought it needed a new law about the subject, but I'm pretty sure the new law is not about leftist propaganda.)

A third problem that I have is that I am not sure what, if anything, US socialists are doing toward their goals. Seems to me that the first thing they have to think about is getting the military and state and local law enforcement on their side and unionizing people beyond government employees, getting right to work laws off the books, etc. At least those to the left of Democrats have a national party, for better or worse, namely the Green Party. (And look how even that does on election day.)

A fourth problem is exactly what I've been discussing here. Is a people that sneers at the term liberal and can't bring itself to vote Green going to go from where it is now to socialism in one fell swoop? Getting people to accept liberal/quasi socialist measures is hard enough--and I don't mean only the politicians, either.

My fifth problem is the perennial problem of the left. Seems as though people who differ on one thing see no alternative for themselves but to start a new party and cease all support for existing parties. And that works very well for the PTB. I don't why we are not willing to walk and chew gum at the same time, namely vote one way, while working at building at least one additional party.

[socialist_n_TN]

52. Yet there are still a few "far leftists" out there.......

And I have a feeling the sentiment IS growing. It just takes a while for the marginalization to wear off and for people to decide, "Yep. Marx was right and I'm not going to deny it anymore."

[nadinbrzezinski]

53. I cannot read the future

but fusion centers were extremely effective.

[merrily]

102. http://www.dhs.gov/state-and-major-urban-area-fusion-centers

I don't know if links are live in the subject matter area, so here it is again:

http://www.dhs.gov/state-and-major-urban-area-fusion-centers

First hit that came up when I googled fusion center, too.

Homeland Security

[baldguy]

55. Especially hilarious since the "hard left" keeps using RW libertarians talking points.

At least on DU.

[merrily]

103. Yeah, that's posted a lot here and it's almost always total bs.

Pathetically laughable, desperate, disingenuous and/or ignorant bs.

[baldguy]

110. So, when we get posts in breathless, loving prose

detailing the doings of people who donate money to Ron Paul including links to give him more money, and of people who call Obama a dictator, and when we get uncritical posts showing despicable cartoons straight from Tea Bagger web sites depicting the Pres as a puppet, or the devil or mindless buffoon, that's just bullshit?

You're either out of touch & uninformed, or .....

[merrily]

112. Take your innuendo and stick it somewhere. No one close to sane thinks I am rightist of any kind.

Or, for that matter, that I am uninnformed.

Meme on.

[baldguy]

186. And yet, here we are dealing with all the RW bullshit attacks on Democrats

from people who claim to be on the left - just like you. And who claim to be well informed - just like you.

Funny how that works.

[merrily]

194. Please refer to posts 103 and 110.

And feel free to take both personally.

[baldguy]

195. You can't defend the RW attacks on Democrats from the phony "hard left", so you don't try.

Good.

[merrily]

196. LOL. Please refer to posts 103 and 110. They'd tell any half way sane person why I didn't bother.

[baldguy]

197. Right. No sane person can defend the RW attacks on Democrats from the phony "hard left".

That's the gist of my post #110.

[merrily]

198. Time to settle down, dear. I'm sure they'll be bringing your pudding soon.

Sorry, this has to be my last post on this topic. It's just too tedious.

[baldguy]

200. Yes, Snowden & Greenwald are tedious. As is seeing their RW libertarian screeds rehashed on DU.

There is no defense for them, I'm glad you agree.

[Puglover]

215. LOL!

"Bring your pudding soon." Perfect.

[merrily]

217. Thanks! Feel free to use it whenever.

I just stole "He couldn't have missed the point more if he had been trying to win a point-missing context" from redqueen. And "hope you can bereave in" from I have forgotten whom. I once even stole "Ahmahdidajob" (for the then President of Iran) from a Republican poster on an "all views welcome" political board from which I ultimately fled. So, I'd be the last to complain.

[vlakitti]

56. Does anyone still think that Marx's theory

of the "immiseration of the working class" is incorrect or overblown any longer?

That's pretty much what Elizabeth Warren and Thomas Pinketty have been arguing (using somewhat different terms, of course) and lots of people here would seem to agree with them.

Thank you for this post.

[nadinbrzezinski]

57. That is WAY TOO MUCH inside baseball

and that has evolved. Read Picketty.

[merrily]

104. We now lead the world in income inequality and at the highest point ever.

And the acceleration of those truths has been the fastest ever during the last few years.

Yet, Democrats won four of the last six Presidential elections and controlled both houses of Congress from January 2007 through January 2011.

[ConservativeDemocrat]

58. Graphical representation of nadinbrzezinski's nonsense

The political chart according to nadinbrzezinski, "centrist", and those who upvote him:


(LEFT)
NOBODY
|
| You (centrist)
|
| DUers (shills, except for you and a tiny handful of people upvote each other constantly)
|
| "liberal" Dems (GOP lite)
|
| Centrist Dems (authoritarians)
|
| Independents (nearly NAZIs)
|
| Moderate GOP (total NAZIs, why they're going to massacre us any day now!)
|
| Firm GOP (NAZI/Fascist/Poopyheads - poopyheads I tell you!)
|
| Tea Party (run out of adjectives)
RIGHT


See? You're not an extremist. You're the center! Just with nothing on the other side for balance. You hate the vast majority of the Democratic party, what with liberal Democrats giving President Obama 85% favorables.

And this is all because you're just a nice FDR Democrat. Or at least your illusion of him. Since he was able to push through all sorts of economic programs with 80% of Congress in Democrats hands, including racist-dixiecrats, that means Obama should too! Lynchings and Work Camps for Japanese - if we just returned to that, we'd stop being so authoritarian!

Your ignorance is sadly humorous.

- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community

[treestar]

62. Right wing nonsense of the same type

FAR LEFT: any liberal Democrat
LEFT: A centrist
Moderately left: George Bush
Centrist: them
Right: Nobody. The totalitarian USSR was communist of course, and that makes it on the left. The Nazis were socialists - it is a word in their acronym, so no arguments.

[ConservativeDemocrat]

73. Absolutely agree

The Tea Party is filled with lunatics. But at least they have an excuse: they're senile and stupid.

- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community

[merrily]

105. http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025024257#post103

[blackspade]

203. Giant fail.

Unless you were trying for hilarity, in which case, total win!

[TransitJohn]

211. Lol

[L0oniX]

63. A People's History Of The United States - by Howard Zinn

http://www.historyisaweapon.com/zinnapeopleshistory.html

There's some real left for you.

We have gotten rid in textbooks of whole swaths of US History, including the history of labor (talk about left). We have also made things like workers rights to be almost revolutionary. I mean silly shit like the 40 hour week, things workers died for.

I admire his work.

[woo me with science]

64. K&R

[m-lekktor]

67. I saw somebody on another thread blame the "hard left"

for Eric Shinseki resigning!! this place is comedy gold!

[merrily]

106. Shinseki resigned because Obama asked him to.

He would not have left his post otherwise.

And Obama said that distractions from the right were part of the reason for the resignation.

So, either those blaming the alleged hard left (lmao) are ignorant or indifferent to the facts or this is one of the very rare occasions when they disagree with Obama. Because message board agenda trumps even devotion to Obama (I guess).

[nadinbrzezinski]

122. Facts do not matter to these people

they really do not.

Com'on, we have quite the obsessive active thread over a toon... they cannot get it, and therefore it is an attack, arble garble...darble

Thankfully the man they defend at the pass has a thicker skin than they do.

[merrily]

124. Sorry, no clue about the thicker skin.

[nadinbrzezinski]

125. Ok a link might help

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=5026909

I promise, the President has a thicker skin. At that level, they have to.

[merrily]

126. Respectfully, I don't think you can make that promise.

[nadinbrzezinski]

127. Given I cover politics, I think I can

Lower level pols are far more ahem, sensitive to criticism, than higher level pols. They do develop a rhinoceros skin, or thicker.

Alas, that is a problem, for other reasons.

[merrily]

131. Again, respectfully, I don't think covering politics

enables you to read Obama's mind.

He has made a number of derogatory comments about his critics on both the left and on the right, as have very high white house officials, and they have done so without apology from him and without having been made to apologize themselves.

Moreover, there are fleets of people on MSNBC, on this board and elsewhere who get their bread buttered by protecting his image and by mocking and insulting those who insult him, so he doesn't have to do it himself each and every time, which is one of the many perks of being President.

None of that speaks to me of a thick skin.

[nadinbrzezinski]

134. And I think that is a trait of high level pols

sorry.

As to what you said about people getting their bread buttered, absolutely, which is also a problem.

A good free press that questions all pols regardless of party and policies is what we need. Not the sycophantic, non free, corporate press we have.

As to Obama making his comments, as well as his aides, it is part of a long standing campaign to weaken and destroy whatever remains of the FDR democratic coalition as the Dems continue to switch into the party of business.

[merrily]

140. Yes, I got that the first time, but I don't think high level politicians are fungible, nor do I

think insults, even disagreement, rolls off all their backs.

As to Obama making his comments, as well as his aides, it is part of a long standing campaign to weaken and destroy whatever remains of the FDR democratic coalition as the Dems continue to switch into the party of business.

Yes, that certainly has been going on for a long time, but it doesn't have to be the only motivation. It certainly hasn't been the motivation when reacting to criticism from the right. I've seen the petulance and the petty tit for tats in pressers and speeches. And his jabs at things like being criticized for not shmoozing people on the right and left of Congree more really have nothing to do with ideology. Perhaps you interpret his words and demeanor differently than I do.

You don't have to say you're sorry. Our perceptions about how Obama has reacted, directly and indirectly, to criticism differ is all.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

145. Right wing toons aren't allowed on DU...

How hard is that to comprehend?

[nadinbrzezinski]

146. You mean toons on the Editorial page of the Washington Post?

one speaking about HACKING on the US, which has become a damn joke around the world? I promise NOT to post any of the very funny toons in Excelsior and Universal in Mexico City. I would have to reach for the smelling salts, we would have mass faintings.

I am sorry you guys have such a thin skin that a cartoon has to be explained to you.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

149. A right wing toon on the editorial page of the WaPo

is still a right wing toon. And it's a year old as well.

I don't need it explained, I see what's happening. The Chinese hacked the teleprompter, and Obama is too dumb to notice. THAT is what it means. It's a fucking right wing toon, and you are defending it tooth and nail.

[nadinbrzezinski]

158. It is a cartoon

Speaking of hacking. There is this thing you guys keep missing called context. And it is on purpose. Or are you so delicate that a toon regarding hacking hurts your feelings that much?

This reminds me of the RW screaming over cowboy boots and dubya. It is quite hysterical actually.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

160. Yes, the Chinese hacking thing is current events...

It was NOT current events a year ago. That would be the context.

It doesn't hurt my feelings one bit. I'm glad that bullshit got hidden. This is DemocraticUnderground, not ConservativeUnderground.

[nadinbrzezinski]

165. So you are that delicate that we must hide from current cartoons

since you really cannot abide by a cartoon in the WAPO you do not agree with.

Please do not faint, these are toons from Mexico regarding US policy. Promise not to faint.

http://www.felatraccs.org/portal/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=673 bama-humor-belico&catid=31:fotorara

(I need to convince the public that war is now different, and distinct)



And here, from the world view on our spying.

There are days I think you guys really take offense way too easily.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

185. It's ok, you've openly admitted to being OK with GOP talking points and humor.

I'm sorry, I thought this was DemocraticUnderground. Where there's a TOS which states no posting Republican bullshit.

Was I wrong?

[nadinbrzezinski]

191. Not exactly

I am not a delicate flower that wants to hide my head in the sand. You are free to do such.

And those two toons have like zero to do with GOP talking points. Unless of course I missed my cue and Mexico is the 51st state.

[bobduca]

69. Fuck the right wingers here who switched parties but kept their (R) values

fuck off & go back to your Republican party.

[merrily]

108. The RWers here are nowhere near as important as the RWers

controlling the New Democrat Party. (I used that because it is how they referred to themselves in the House and the Senate--the New Democrat Caucus in both houses, not the New Democratic Caucus. So, they went right along with Rove--yet, we're supposed to be the ratfuckers.)

But no one had to switch parties because the Party itself switched. It had always had a conservative wing, of course, back to the 1800s--especially in the South. However, after the DLC formed--by a bunch of white, Southern male Democrats, including Bubba and Gore, plus Hillary and Lieberman--and Clinton won, their takeover of the Party was completed under Clinton. Every presidential nominee of the Party after Reagan has been the one endorsed by the DLC. (It had endorsed Lieberman, but no one serious thought he was going to get the nomination. Once he dropped out, the nom went to Kerry, not a founding member of the DLC, but a founding member of the Senate New Democrat Caucus.)

[bobduca]

164. All true

but since I got a hide last night for calling out our favorite thin-skinned group here, I'll just be calling them Republicans.

the alert swarm can go fuck itself.

[butterfly77]

70. Yes,and most of the so called Dems are...

really republicons they get voted in and on most every issue they vote for what republicons want they talk big talk and are usually afraid of losing their seats..

[raindaddy]

71. Great Thread

Thanks for posting this!!

[nadinbrzezinski]

80. You welcome

[RoccoR5955]

72. There is NO Left in the mainstream media.

If there was, they would be talking about the failure of capitalism, and calling for alternatives, and an END to capitalism as we know it.
Besides, all the mainstream media outlets are OWNED by capitalists!
The US has turned into a fascist police state in the past 30 or so years.
Don't kid yourself into thinking otherwise!

[Mnemosyne]

78. K&R for more visibility. nt

[elzenmahn]

79. You nailed it...

...because the "Left" has no political backstop or support in this country.

Chris Hedges' Death Of The Liberal Class lays it all out. I suggest moseying on over to your library or independent bookseller and picking it up.

[Joe Shlabotnik]

82. K&R

Words matter and context has been thrown to the wind in this modern era of soundbites and truthiness.

[Warren DeMontague]

107. because half the drivers in this country don't understand to PULL FORWARD INTO THE INTERSECTION?

Oh, sorry, different left.

[merrily]

109. Thank you, nadin, for a good OP. I was sorry to

see posters focusing on the board, rather than on the real world.

What happened to our Party is so much more important than what happens on this board, which only echoes the former (sometimes because some posters are on one payroll or another).

I really see that too often here; and from all sides of the political spectrum. Sometimes, I get sucked into it as well. When I do, I hope someone reminds me of this post.

But none of that has to do with your OP, which was right on the money.

[carolinayellowdog]

111. "authoritarian" on the other hand refers to a very real phenomenon

Have been noticing a ridiculous false equivalence where the silly epithets thrown at progressives here by self-described centrists are equated with the word `authoritarian' -- which is a perfectly legitimate term to describe what any social scientist familiar with it would agree is indeed authoritarianism.

[bobduca]

119. exactly, they trot out that false equivalence here all the time

The Third way alert swarm can go fuck itself.

[carolinayellowdog]

132. related to the false equivalency between `libertarian' and `Libertarian'

what a confusing mess to have a rightwing extremist political party coopt (by capitalization) a word that in fact describes most people who are left-of-center, in its original sense of anti-authoritarian. If we all did the Political Compass test, I reckon that 90% of DUers are closer to the libertarian than to the authoritarian end of the scale, whereas not 1% has any sympathy with the Libertarian Party. So there we have a 1) legitimate term that has been 2) distorted by overt rightwingers into a caricature of itself when capitalized and 3) then turned into a lower-case abusive epithet by centrists here to use against those to their left.

The funhouse mirrors of distortion!

[Raksha]

213. That "swiftboating from the left" meme was a new low.

Just because the subject was John Kerry. Who did they think they were kidding?

[woo me with science]

148. I wrote a post about this: the attempt to discredit the word, "authoritarian."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=3171893

woo me with science (26,100 posts)
25. Ah, the attempt to discredit the term, "authoritarian." I predicted this OP.

I've seen this tactic in several posts lately and figured it would be used for an OP. Authoritarians don't like being called what they are, and since they can't yet prohibit words and restrict others to an approved Newspeak Dictionary, they settle for flailing at and attempting to discredit the individual words they dislike.

This tactic, used less slickly and more openly as elsewhere in this thread, is most amusing in one-to-one settings. When someone uses an accurate word to describe what you are doing or advocating, just put the word in quotation marks, add some exclamation points, and try to neutralize it by pretending it's an epithet instead of an accurate descriptor. We have all seen it here 1,000 times. A person's politics are described as Third Way, and he or she rears up in indignation, expressing shock at the "namecalling."

Well, no. "Third Way" means something. It is not an epithet, but rather descriptive shorthand for a clear and specific set of political values and policies. You can see what "Third Way" means by going to the Third Way website, where the goals and policies - liberal on the social issues unimportant to the One Percent but corporate and authoritarian on virtually everything else - are clearly delineated.

Those who embrace the policies don't want to admit it, so they try to make the term an epithet...something to be banned by a jury so that it can't be accurately applied to them on the forums. And now we are hearing the same sort of defensive attempts to discredit the word when authoritarianism is called "authoritarianism."

Of course "authoritarian" means something. Brazen defense of a government's spying on its own citizens is indisputably authoritarian.

I always picture an indignant poodle rearing up in outrage and exclaiming, "What?! You called me a DOG?!"

Orwell was right. Defending against authoritarianism *requires* defending language, because authoritarians will try to twist, discredit, or take away the words that are necessary for us to describe what is being done to us.

[carolinayellowdog]

150. well worth repeating your closing lines here

Of course "authoritarian" means something. Brazen defense of a government's spying on its own citizens is indisputably authoritarian.

I always picture an indignant poodle rearing up in outrage and exclaiming, "What?! You called me a DOG?!"

Orwell was right. Defending against authoritarianism *requires* defending language, because authoritarians will try to twist, discredit, or take away the words that are necessary for us to describe what is being done to us.

Good to see the pushback in multiple threads, against abuse of language in multiple threads.

[leftstreet]

166. Oh you and your little "facts"

I guess your "facts" trump all the sincere blustering, obfuscating and name-calling

But you just keep posting your "facts," you factoid!



I missed your original post. Nicely done

[mgardener]

113. Hard left?

I think if we had a "hard left" then we would have an equivalent to Fox news, with real news and a strong liberal flavor.
We don't despite what the right thinks.

We don't force our views on others. We don't tell them what to think and how to act. The right does The hard right does it forcefully and constantly.
We are not trying to take over the government and the world. We don't force a religion on people.

Hard right? really?

[mopinko]

114. occupy needs to seek out the old hippies before they are gone.

teach em how to organize without a cellphone so next time they dont draw the pinkertons a road map.

[nadinbrzezinski]

128. I am in search for a good ol' fashioned

machine that does not require a net connection. Hmmm might just take that typewriter home.

[merrily]

157. But, once typed, how do you disseminate? Snail mail is subject to inspection, too.

So is email. So are message boards and pms. Then, there are mikes on the streets and mikes than can "hear" inside your home from outdoors. (Justice Brennan let that one drop, so they've had those for a long time, but now FISA courts will okay anything and everything.)

May as well shout your message and plans from the rooftops.

[nadinbrzezinski]

159. There are ways.

Mimeographed would be more effective. But the Russians managed during the height of the ussr.

[DeSwiss]

130. K&R

"Political language... is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind." ~George Orwell

[Turbineguy]

135. CNN

is "hard left".

[nadinbrzezinski]

136. Are you watching Aristegui on CNN Mexico?

That is the closest you get to anywhere near left. Of course in the Mexican context Carmen Aristegui is center left, in the US, she would be seen as hard left. So I get why you type that.

Oh, I think you are watching CNN US edition though, which is center right corporate press.

[Turbineguy]

204. I forgot the

thingy

[nadinbrzezinski]

208. Sorry about that

But I have been actually enjoying watching real press



Alas tomorrow back to the routine and yes, I watch her when I come visit

[RKP5637]

138. If there is any "hard left" in the US, it's surely not the one I grew up with in the 60's. I think

of many Americans today as robots, just moving along in the established ruts. ... for many, they seem too lazy to even have a mild interest in seeking truths rather than spoon fed propaganda.

Maybe many have just given up. Maybe for some life is just so F'en hard it's difficult to rise from the grindstone to analyze the political landscape. For others, maybe they just do what the authoritarians in their lives tell them to do. Others probably feel they have very little influence in the political machinery in USA, Inc.

[Lint Head]

139. I feel helpless every day. It's like trying to shout at a giant boulder because it impedes progress

[nyabingi]

141. Let's face the truth here everyone...

...the United States government has always been far-right bordering on straight fascist (corporatist) since it was created.

I would disagree with the idea that there is no organized left in this country, but unless you actively seek these organizations out personally, you'd think the don't exist. If you look at the enemies designated by the US security establishment for surveillance and intimidation (COINTELPRO), they have always been leftists and others on the left (communists, socialists, environmentalists, civil rights activists, etc). Our schools have always demonized the left and the corporate media doesn't allow the views of the left on their programs. No one can be blamed if they think the organized left died when the Soviet Union died, because our government wants us to believe that.

The fact that Republicans continually accuse the Obama administration of being Marxist shows just how far to the right this political spectrum is in this country.

[vast-left-wing]

154. We know that there is a far right element in this country

[mountain grammy]

155. "The hard left" like "big labor" is, unfortunately, no longer a force in America

but we'll be back. The renaissance is coming and hope I live long enough to see it. A real "American Spring" is in order.

[Blanks]

156. Inigo Montoya is not the character that said that...

In the 'Princess Bride.' It was Fezzik (Andre the giant).

Incorrect recycled BS. Ironic really, based on the topic of the OP.

[reddread]

163. wrong

[cyberswede]

170. Inigo said it

[nadinbrzezinski]

171. Yes, yes he was

and it is quite a funny movie, even today

[Blanks]

173. I stand corrected.

I read the book, so I was pleased when they made it into a movie, and it's among my favorite movies.

I was so sure that Andre the giant said it on the boat. So, sure in fact that I didn't bother looking it up on YouTube. Which only took 5 seconds after I received 4 responses (and my query came up with the same video you posted).

My apologies - now y'all can go back to complaining about the disappearance of the 'far left.'

[nadinbrzezinski]

178. Not a problem

We all make mistakes.

It happens to be one of my all time favorite movies

[Blanks]

180. It's disappointing that I made such a blunder...

I disagree with the premise of the thread, but having started on bad footing - I'm reluctant to pursue my difference of opinion.

[nadinbrzezinski]

182. It's ok

Realize, I am not just coming from US history. Starting with the Palmer raids the left has been decimated. But also grew in a country with a real left that is well organized and loud.

We do not have that, except that is, in the boogeyman presented by the RW.

[bobduca]

172. WRONG

do you ever get tired of being wrong?

[Blanks]

174. Sometimes, it can be humbling at times. eom

[War Horse]

162. When I think "hard left" I think of the black blok types

and the anarchists. The folks Doris Lessing described.

[nadinbrzezinski]

167. And they are not quite hard left either

anarchism can, like true libertarian thought, span a whole slew

[War Horse]

169. Well, they more than often enough describe themselves as such

As a variation of "the left", that is. At least in my experience. But the body text of your post is true, I certainly can't argue with that.

[wyldwolf]

179. I know I'm late for this thread. I'll comment.

When I've used the term 'hard left' I was using it as a pejorative but I wasn't necessarily speaking in terms of policy positions or ideology. MOST people on DU agree on about 96% of issues so there really isn't any 'far left' or 'conservative' Democrats on board here. To me, 'hard left' has always meant firmness or rigidness in policy - an unwillingness to compromise or bend. It's the stance that the Democratic party SHOULD do A,B, or C and any variation is unacceptable.

There are times - many times - when that is commendable. Issues like civil rights and economic justice should never be compromised on. On those rare occasions in recent years when Democrats have held the entire congress and the Presidency there is no good reason why more liberal legislation wasn't passed - especially since those policies are much more often than not supported by a large percentage (or majority) of the American people.

But then we have those times when we only have the Senate or the House or the Presidency or some combination where it isn't possible for us to have our way. That's when this rigidness - this 'hard left' mentality - can be a detriment. No one likes to compromise when she believes she is correct but sometimes when you're not in a position to have your way you have to give a little up to get a little of what you want. Now we can argue all day how much is too much to compromise on BUT threatening withhold votes for Democrats or promising to work against Democrats in a political environment where any given candidate simply cannot deliver the liberal brass ring is dangerous.

And that's my opinion.

Here is another about 'the hard left.' There is a lot of outspoken liberals who have a misguided and skewed view of what the Democratic party's history is. They speak of the progressive movement as the only 'true Democrats' or 'traditional Democrats' never realizing or believing they have much more in common with Henry Wallace and other third party candidates than FDR/Truman/Kennedy. They create these really bizarre narratives to support their world view. And I'm sorry if that's offensive to anyone but there have been some really crackpot theories here about Democratic wins and losses that comes from just being human and wanting history to support their beliefs. I feel compelled to point out the follies of those when it happens as do many people on DU.

So I'll close with this. After the 2008 Democratic primaries, I was very disgusted with the way I, we, you - A LOT of us acted in the eventual nomination of Barack Obama. I vowed to try and stay out of such intra-party scuffles in the future. If we have a 2016 primary race, I'm only going to post good things about the candidates and defend all of them if an attack seems over the top or patently false.

I'm also done using pejorative labels to paint a large segment of the left.

[nadinbrzezinski]

181. The problem is that this mythical

Left does not exist. Full stop, end of discussion. It is a RWterm used to slander liberal democrats.

[wyldwolf]

183. that's a fact

Hell, I've supported many centrist democrats and the right paints ME as far left. But the unbending nature of some of us when faced with a divided government and impossible odds in passing liberal legislation is dangerous and I'll stick with that point. I believe it's cost us and nearly cost us dearly in the past.

You and I agree, I'll bet, on most issues and I probably agree with some of your points on all issues.

[nadinbrzezinski]

190. But surrendering the language

Is a problem

[Uncle Joe]

187. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, nadinbrzezinski.

[pauliedangerously]

199. I obviuosly had it wrong...

I thought it was a passive aggressive way to remind people of the high prevalence of erectile dysfunction experienced by right wingers.

[oldandhappy]

206. Yes our country has been drug sooo far to the right.

Eisenhower would not be a Republican in today's world.

[burrowowl]

207. To paraphrase

Gore Vidal

America has 2 right wings.

What hard Left?

[Art_from_Ark]

220. About the only thing that constitutes a "hard left" in the US

is when you have to sharply turn your steering wheel counterclockwise.