Message to the Left-Wing

[malthaussen]

132. I'm getting tired of telling you how much I like your mind.

Can't you rape a sheep on the courthouse steps or something? Give me something to complain about!

Seriously, another fine post. I think there is a reason why ancient wisdom lists politics as among the subjects that should not be discussed. But without such discussion, politics becomes meaningless.

Historically, in areas of great passion such as politics and religion, it seems the only people the believers hate more than the opposition are the heretics. How many times have politcal and social and religious movements been tainted with exclusivity, hatred, and back-biting. I remember Huey Newton (I think it was) saying "The only position for women in the Movement is prone." Allies who do not toe the party line -- whatever the party is -- are intolerable to some people. And there is a reason for that, since faint support can be worse than no support at all.

But what I like most about your thoughts here is how they are grounded in the reality of power relations. No one is going to pay attention to an opinion if it doesn't have some muscle behind it. I am far more concerned that the Democratic Party cannot muster a reasonable turnout to oppose candidates that have made it clear they want to destroy the nation and remake it in their image, than I am about how much money the Koch brothers have, or which rabbit the GOP is going to pull out of its hat for the 2016 Presidential race. We live in a country where Ted Cruz can be elected Senator and Scott Walker win election to governor by good margins. That is alarming to me, not because Mr Cruz and Mr Walker are reprehensible, because whoever is chosen in their role will be reprehensible, but because the electorate doesn't seem to care that they are reprehensible. That we cannot muster sufficient votes to even do the most basic of damage control is a botheration to me. And I suspect that unless we can persuade the electorate that there is a real alternative to the reprehensible ones, they will continue to make themselves scarce at the polls.

-- Mal