Reply #173: Wow.... that really sucked. [View All]

[Zorra]

The language I mean. The generalized, blanket "All liberals do this and are bad" theme....ouch. We was framed, I tell ya, framed.

Jeebus, how about "radical airheads" or something, to describe people who scream before they think?

And I don't agree with everything that you wrote, and maybe what you wrote was somewhat about me, and maybe somewhat not, but I really don't give a rat's ass, I still have a right to my express my opinions even if I am a liberal.

"Cope";-)

I do think you have some valid points about lack of centralized agreement, and realize that because you are out there as a political public figure/(target for abuse) that you have dealt with a lot of idiotic unreasonable bullshit from the screaming cosmic airheads of America faction of the "left". Seems like they really pissed you off this time.

Yeah, even some liberals can be off the wall sometimes, and yes, even some liberals in general are usually very difficult to herd, and immediately particularly when asked to support any type of idea that smacks of RW agenda.

You made an analogy to how conservatives used to fight amongst themselves like "liberals" do now.

But to my mind there is a big difference: Liberals face a massive, well financed RW machine/propaganda onslaught, (complete with conservative think tanks that have been active for years, dreaming up ways to bring fascism to America) that is determined to, and indeed already has, shifted the Democratic Party pretty far to the right. We constantly have to deal with blatant, and also subtle, attempts by the RW, including even members of the Democratic Party (notably many DLC founders and members), to accept unethical, undemocratic RW ideas, ideologies, policies, and practices. When folks within the Democratic Party start suggesting that we liberals adopt conservative republican ideas that are unethical, impractical, and are against our principles, we immediately get suspicious - because we have to.

Some of us get unreasonably reactionary, but

There is nothing the RW would like more, (and IMO they actively promote) than the assimilation of the Democratic Party into the Republican Party as the GOP's Junior Varsity. This is even better than the complete destruction of the Democratic Party, because a completely ineffective, "semi-allied to the RW" opposition, is much better than creating the possibility of the rise of an effective opposition that actually opposes and threatens fascist republican policies on all fronts.

So I really, really gotta disagree with this statement:

"Liberals are the reason liberals lose elections nowadays"

I believe that most liberals want to unite within a viable, practical, and reasonable organization that is not corrupted by RW ideology, and the Democratic Party as it stands now is no longer giving us anything like that.

Compromise within the party is fine within a reasonable framework, but if the party framework has termites, you need to either move out or get rid of the pests and the rotten wood or the house will eventually collapse.

Liberals came out en masse to vote, and Greens even willingly abandoned their own candidate, to vote for John Kerry, and/or against Bush. Liberals, despite their faults, never vote republican like "moderate" Democrats sometimes do, and "conservatives" usually do. Liberals never adhere to RW ideals.

It appears to me that it was the "moderates" and "conservatives" who are primarily responsible for helping to select Bush, not the liberals, not even the few "radical airheads of the left" .

And I believe that if you want almost all liberals to agree on one single issue, just yell, "out of Iraq now"....

...and all the liberals will unite and join you on the group liberal bench and pat you on the back and smile and scream "yeah!" and march with signs and sing kum ba yah and then go out and vote for whoever the republican candidate ain't.

Your, Dean's, Kucinich's, (or whoever's) idea on how to get out of Iraq "gracefully" is, IMO, logical and reasonable politically and on paper. And maybe some Dem nominees for Congress can run and win on that seemingly reasonable coherent policy platform in 2006. And 2008. And, maybe again in 2112.

But you stirred a hornet's nest when you suggested that there would be any type of rational policy instituted withdrawal of US forces from Iraq, before the radical airheads stopped listening and attacked you, and before you got to your real point.

It is very possible that many liberals remember, or have studied, the Vietnam era, and all the nifty proposals for ending the war in, and the occupation of, Vietnam, that were kicked around back then, but never came to pass.

What finally actually worked in Vietnam, in practical reality, 10+ years, and 58,000 dead American soldiers and countless Vietnamese civilians too late, was the "Out Now" solution.