I am really annoyed at the beatification of AOC
AOC = Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. I deeply resent the coverage which pretends that it is she who invented the Green New Deal, that is it she who first touted higher taxes on the rich.
The flea-circus faux socialist website, Jacobin, has not one, but two articles today fawning over the completely phony AOC. I call her completely phony because she went out of her way to praise John McCain, because the bartender meme is a complete fraud - she went to BU and interned for Teddy Kennedy. It seems that this callow thirty year old is being annointed by the fake left wing press (The Nation, Huff Post, Jacobin, etc.) as a genuine voice from the socialist left.
The two articles on Jacobin today are:
Hope and Dread in 2019, which places AOC's very existence as the very first of "13 points of hope". The second point of hope is the Green New Deal, which is portrayed as springing full-born from the brow of Zeus, I mean from the brow of AOC. Gag me with a spoon. The Green New Deal has been around for over a decade. The fawning over this phony woman is sickening.
The other article is This Is How We Do It. Its leadin paragraph is:
Mainstream politicians and media are losing their minds over Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. They're terrified of how her approach could transform American politics.
It sure looks like AOC is going to be the next sheepdog for the leftwing of the Democratic Party, and the obvious Hispanic Woman (pardon me for not using the IdPol "Latinex" word.) lightning rod of the nativist right(which, of course, guarantees her even more publicity). The mainstream media and the fake leftwing media are pulling out all the stops to put this "Obama in a dress" into the public's mind as the spokes-fraud for the "left". Her guaranteed-to-fail opposition to Nancy Pelosi stunt is tolerated by TPTB both because it couldn't possibly succeed and to give her more fake left cred.
The idea here is to "suck up all the oxygen" from anyone on the genuine left, and let this proven phony play sheepdog. I continue to be nauseated. Your mileage may vary.
Cue the obligatory defense of AOC by suckers.
Comments
But she can dance, so that's something....
Latest MSM shiny object. 'Let's get hip with the kids.'
And you're right. All these 'new ideas' have been put forward (and ignored) for years.
And she's in no position to do anything about any of them.
Same thing with Robert O'Rourke. Our presidential saviour (apparently), despite information revealing otherwise. And losing....
(Edited)
Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.
Right, they are flooding the zone
The saintly Beto (married to a billionaire's daughter), and the feisty Latina.
All kinds of sheepdogs in the show. Too bad real lefties, like Dennis Kucinich, have long since been slandered, ignored, and kneecapped (Dennis was redistricted into a fight with Ukronazi lover, Marci Kaptur).
It's not like Kaptur is empowered
to do the things she is good for, like standing up for her constituents who were being thrown out of their houses by non-Nazi fascists (at least, I think most of the banker/DC alliance aren't Nazis.)
Not surprised if she's in on the Ukrainian Nazi thing, though; that seems to be de rigeur for continuing in the Democratic party.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
The Ukie connection is very scary
As I've recounted before, when the CIA hired the Nazi spymaster Reinhard Gehlen, Gehlen turned around and hired the Ukranian Nazi intel shop that he ran during the war. That shop, itself, was staffed the remnants of the White Russian (czarist) intel shop, who hated Russian commies like there was no tomorrow
Just about all of America's intel and opinions about the Soviet Union from this poisoned Ukranian chalice.
Plus, the Ukranian emigre organizations managed to hide lots of ex-concentration camp guards for fifty years. The last of those guys are probably dead; John Demjanjuk died in 2012 at age 91.
The Atlantic Council (who dictates political correctness to Facebook) is run by a Ukranian. The Canadian Foreign Minister's (Chrystia Freeland) grandfather edited a Nazi paper.
The Ukranians are right up there with the Brits, the Israelis, the Saudis, and the Turks in manipulating the US to carry out their policies for them.
Interesting video here you might appreciate
it's a bit off topic but then again
https://www.siliconinvestor.com/readmsg.aspx?msgid=31966312
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3&v=SRtq7KRrPSQ]
I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish
"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"
Heard from Margaret Kimberley
Very interesting and informative video
ggersh. Thanks for posting it.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
Wow!
What an interesting and informative video!
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
Isn't the leader of one of their right-wing parties
actually somebody who returned to his country from abroad to be a character witness for a Nazi war criminal? I believe calling said criminal a hero?
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Something Else Disturbs Me More
I am not disturbed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez or by Bernie.
She is receiving coverage denied to Bernie ... but lavished on our current President ... during the last primary season.
What does frustrate me to no end?
The UTTER FAILURE of other self identified progressives to rally in support of these two "voices crying in the wilderness"
[reminds me of how not one soul within the Obama administration demonstrated support for Wisconsin citizens during the efforts to resist Walker ... all we heard was stone silence or worse]
Few are guilty, but all are responsible.”
― Abraham Joshua Heschel, The Prophets
No
First, as a genuine leftist, I do not find her "a voice crying in the wilderness". I find her to be publicized (no such thing as bad publicity) by the corporate media, and beatified by the fake leftists at Jacobin.
Us leftists have been punked so many times (Howard Dean, Obama, Bernie) that the idea of rallying behind some nobody neophyte with zero track record is rather insulting. Maybe we should rally behind someone who has been walking the leftie walk for a couple of decades.
I'll withhold my judgement
I don't think it's fair to judge her so negatively until she has done something to prove that she is a sheepdog and not sincere in her progressive policies and agenda. So far, she has done a good job of bringing attention to issues of importance to progressives.
Love is my religion.
I am not ready to throw her under the bus yet either.
If she deserves it then I will figure that out soon enough. But it isn't time yet.
Withholding judgement is one thing
but those who withhold judgement probably wouldn't encourage others to rally behind her, and certainly wouldn't blame those who don't.
Not saying you're doing either, but the point should be made.
And btw, that's one of the three reasons my judgement about AOC has already been made. Any time people are being guilted for their lack of support for a politician, my antennae go up. It's one of the tells for establishment tools.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
I'm with you
Yup, she's definitely high on my list of people I like. So is Bernie for that matter although I'll need to hear some answers on both Russiagate and Israel before I vote or donate to him.
Insofar as AOC, she has self-evidently been an utter pain in the ass to the establishment dems at pretty much every turn. She's been the exact opposite of "obedient". She fights. I want to see more like her not less so yes, I'll encourage her.
Really, it's her, Tulsi, and maybe Bernie among the Democrats. Insofar as anyone else, I vote Green but the party is a disaster from an organizational standpoint and I don't think it's ever going to achieve anything. I think they have resigned themselves to the role of "powerless protester" and don't even think about actually winning any longer. From a post here a few weeks back, they seem to have fallen apart in petty internal politics.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
Agreed
When she supported Nancy for Speaker, calling her the most progressive, she lost me.
Well done is better than well said-Ben Franklin
And that's the second reason
my judgement has already been made.
Even if she's absolutely genuine, and not a tool in the slightest, if that's her political methodology, then she is useless except as a means of continuing the status quo.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Who decided you were a "genuine leftist"?
Nobody told me about the election.
Does it occur to you that a good deal of the positive attention received by AOC is created by the intensity of conservative attacks on her? Her supporters didn't release the dance video.
In what way is she a voice crying in the wilderness?
Voices in the wilderness don't get corporate media coverage.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
They do
They do if the establishment is trying to co-opt the "voices in the wilderness". It doesn't mean those voices have to go along with the co-opting.
"Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep."
~Rumi
"If you want revolution, be it."
~Caitlin Johnstone
That wasn't how it worked for Bernie, or Occupy,
or Leonard Peltier, or Mumia Abu Jamal, or the Standing Rock Sioux.
I'm not saying there's a total blackout on any of these people; there's generally a combination of times of blackout, times of brownout, character attacks, and marginalization (perhaps just another form of character attack).
Black Lives Matter is an interesting case, that is closer to what you're talking about, but they didn't get the kind of coverage Ocasio-Cortez is getting; they basically were allowed on TV to the extent that they helped Hillary Clinton's campaign smear Bernie. In a weird way, BLM was allowed coverage so that Bernie could be shut down. But when it came to protesters lying down in traffic, or confronting Clinton about her racism, the media went back to its blackout/brownout/character attacks/marginalization formula.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
I feel that AOC
is speaking out for the people. We need a voice, multiple voices. If she is one of the anointed, I’m willing to give her a chance. We need change - I believe we are all in agreement - she might be that change agent, I don’t know, but it’s better than only focusing on Herr Drumpf instead of the needs of the American people.
She just got there - the shit-show is just starting. I’m not going to rush to judgment.
The 2020 PE is starting, I’m not going to rush to judgment.
Many things are coming down the pike.
We are starting a new chapter, let’s stay active but let’s give it a chance to get going. The government is shut down. There are lots of back door deals taking place. AOC is not a player in that game, but, IMHO, we need voices out there pushing our agenda.
I’m not very eloquent but I feel strongly. Something’s gotta give. I’m willing to give these folks a chance.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
I'm not clear you understand the point I'm making
My point is that AOC is an "annointed" sheepdog. Just like Obama, who made leftwing noises but governed to the right, my fear is that the publicity given to AOC is just a replay of Obama. The fact that TPTB are willing to give her airtime, when they buried and slandered the pre-sellout Bernie, makes me deeply suspicious that she is anything more than the latest sheepdog.
Abbie Hoffman
learned to manipulate the media, to the point where people criticized him as a "media freak". But he got his point exposed to millions who wouldn't be reached by leaflets, manifestos, and the underground press. He had a major impact on drawing people into activity. So there's a chance that she can dance with the media and stay a step ahead.
But Abbie never ran for office. He went underground, instead.
She'll probably wind up going along to get along, hopefully later than sooner. And it's galling that "prog dems" adopt the Green New Deal slogan after Greens truly "cried it in the wilderness" for many years, the same Greens who were blamed as spoilers by the donorcrats, the same Greens who wanted to investigate the election results on their dime while the donorcrats said "oh well". (EVERY election should be secured and double-checked, it's just too easy to finagle. But that would cost almost as much a fighter-bomber or a section of Wall. Just to put priorities in perspective. Democracy=$)
We need symbols. The pipeline struggle was a powerful image in the media, but that's exhausted, by winter, treachery, and military force. The symbol of a dancing, gleeful AOC is very powerful, reminds me of Emma Goldman. Can we use that image ala Abbie, or do we have to concede the ground to the corps?
I keep hoping. Stupid me.
I never liked Abbie
I get that you thought AH did something useful. I disagree.
He was the kind of leftist that gave leftism a bad name. He had been a violent clown since high school. He was an anarchist. He was a caricature of a leftist that tarred the rest of the left with his stupid hijinks. IMHO, every time someone brings him up in a discussion of the 60s, the left's history is further blackened.
The fact that he took his own life at a young age is more evidence that he wasn't very stable. Just someone capable of getting a lot of attention by acting out. He was "an un-hot mess".
Which is always the problem with human symbols
They show their clay feet, soonest for celebrities. Like rock stars. But he drew in a lot of people who were non-political, and the tactic he popularized of street/guerilla theater was useful.
I don't want to hijack the thread over people long-gone. My point is that the media can be manipulated by being entertaining (yeah, help them sell toothpaste, even), and we need to break through the screen wall. Not many people read Hedges or any left theorist, but they're the ones we need to grab.
I think I'm with you
Abbie Hoffman was a clown. He also provoked the government into violent reaction against a collection of clowns. All the peaceful demonstrations in the world did about what the Pink Pussy Hat brigade did. Nothing. If the Yellow Vests did not forcefully make their point, the whole demonstration would end up as a walk in the park and fade away.
That said, if what the Yippees or SDS did today they'd prob. be languishing away in some hole charged as domestic terrorists.
One big different factor today
Is the enormous surveillance capability. Cameras in most public spaces, portable surveillance beepers in every pocket, planes flying over cities and tracking individual movements. And watching and recording what's said on the internet. Even mildly illegal activities such as spray-painting will be recorded and prosecuted.
So action is constrained by:
the increased legal power (Patriot Act) and force-capability (hardware and training) of the state
ubiquitous surveillance
the indoctrination of fantasy-land: tv tropes in everyone's head, the distractions of screen culture, the control and management of the terms of discussion, cooptation by sheepdogs.
So activists will need to avoid jail and bullets and confuse surveillance. But the hardest and first task will be to break through all those rare-earth screens and take back the conversation. Imagination and creative "gorilla" theater is needed.
But time is short. We're knee-deep in the Big Muddy.
All you say about surveillance is true.
Its also true that 1960s America was "another country", a completely different society. A society where the kind of essentially harmless street theater of AH could arouse violent emotions and violent reactions. Today, it would take ten monks self immolating in front of the SCOTUS to generate such reactions.
I accept your rebuttal to the idea of street demonstrations - that such demonstrators will be surveilled and sabotaged, and if necessary arrested, tried, and jailed for exercising their right to protest.
Maybe its time to start preparing for the coming unrest/clampdown that the continued domination by TPTB is bound to provoke whent the economic or military shit we have been getting away with for decades finally hits the fan. The Yellow Vests (not their kindly treatment by the sympathetic French police) are a canary in a coal mine for working and former middle class dissent.
I'm not rebutting the idea
I'm pointing out the increased challenges, and the need for creative tactics. I was in a small tame demo, e.g., where a camera crew kept the lens on me until I moved my sign and exposed my face, then they moved on. Note that many cities are making masks illegal. However, recent mass demos like the climate march made really powerful images of the streets filled and overflowing. The floats were photogenic; that's one of the ways to capture the screens. There is some safety in numbers - as opposed to the smaller numbers of inurination counter-demonstrators who were imprisoned on major felonies. (As I recall a Nam-era saying: it's just as effective to arrest and get people off the street as to convict them.) Organization has succeeded in huge turnouts to rival and exceed the Mobe and Mayday. But the Power gleefully ignored it. The positive effect was for people to meet and see their numbers, a positive feedback loop which should continue.
I'm intensely skeptical of Cortez, but the attention she draws shows that people are ready for a radical message -- even if she herself disappoints us. Is there a way to hijack that aura? People want and need heroes.
Cooptation of mass marches is happening. The corps have bought the science march. Their theme last year was to promote GMO (which will only result in crops becoming corporate intellectual property). And look at the pink hats.
I haven't studied the differences, but I'd lay money that the "progressive" version of the green new deal is a whiter shade of pale compared to the original Green proposals.
Sorry,I'm wandering. Let me return to the point that we need powerful symbols to seize back the lenses. Yes, Cortez is being handled, but consider that it proves how badly people want to believe in change. Even after Obama.
I really like your analysis.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
I agree with you about a lot of things
that you're saying here. I just don't connect those things to politicians.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Politicians rarely count
To reflect back to the topic, I say that the popularity of Cortez and other newbies reflects the fact that people are thirsty for heroes and symbols. This is being exploited by Power for Power purposes. Can we exploit this thirst ourselves for the people, hijack the attention for constructive purposes?
Yes. That is where the importance of symbolism comes in.
TPTB wave around people like AOC the way a matador waves his cape at the bull. Until people just, en masse, tune out the corporate media, the Twitterverse, and Facebook, such cape waving will be exploitable.
Most people haven't got the time or the intellectual distance to observe the completely artificial environment that is today's media world. They never put together that Bezos bought the WaPo, and three months later got a CIA contract worth twice the purchase price. If some conspiracy movie ever registered with them, they probably think no farther into CT than some bad apple manipulating the system. I doubt many folks have a strong grip on how completely corrupt the "mighty Wurlitzer" is and has been for over 60 years.
That's why people (perhaps it is more a Western than an Eastern failing) can be manipulated with symbols.
People don't realize
how good it actually makes one feel to cut these things.
It's because most people are addicted to simple, shiny things that they can all talk about.
Excellent comment by the way.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
But what will it take?
"Until people just, en masse, tune out the corporate media, the Twitterverse, and Facebook, such cape waving will be exploitable. " True.
I just can't see that happening. I'd like to see it. Somewhere I said something about it will take a massive power failure on the order of Puerto Rico after Maria to get people to take the Seashells out of their ears and put away their phones. Silence is beautiful.* To get people to do it voluntarily would take something similar in intensity and fervor to a sweeping religious revival, imo. So I guess this is the material and environment we'll have to learn to use, somehow, without surrendering to the shallowness it entails.
On a similar thought, one of the most ominous developments I've seen is the disappearance of the small weekly free papers. The great advantage of paper is that it's a physical object you can leave lying around for anybody to pick up. It's not confined to a little chamber of the self-selected, the way on-line fora tend to be. And sometimes they would do good investigative journalism of the sort that's quickly disappearing. More and more, news columns are just strings of farts, er, tweets. If I ever hit the lotto, I'd reopen a weekly.
*Again Robinson Jeffers, from a poem about the coastal blackouts during WWII ("Dawn Patrol"?):
Darkness and silence.
The two eyes that see God.
Great, staring eyes.
It would be easy enough to start, at least, a pamphlet series
But the problem with that is twofold: One, we've lost many of the public spaces where people would have picked such a thing up, in particular local businesses and community centers; two, people now have an extraordinary disdain for anything that partakes of older technologies (paper). You should see the contempt that gets expressed even for continuing to want hard copy. It's of the same variety that pro-GMO folks level at anti-GMO folks: you are Luddites, you are throwbacks, you are conservatives or fools. Being Against Progress puts one on the wrong side of most Americans, and that's without the addiction factor.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
The tabloid-size weeklies
had permanent paid staff, columnists, reporters, advertisers, printing arrangements, a solid schedule, press credentials, a distribution system including corner boxes. It takes that amount of infrastructure (and money) to create a local institution. I remember the 'zines, but they addressed a much different function. The weeklies created a sense of local community that the corporate megapapers have lost.
I continue to see right wing free papers
The right always has money for its anti-government propaganda. My local right wing rag, "The Patriot" is full of stories of government corruption, favoritism for minorities, assaults on gun rights, etc.
Even though I have lived all my life in intellectual enclaves like Cambridge, MA, left wing free newspapers were few and far between. One of the biggest disappointments of Cambridge was that the "left" scene was mostly about coffeehouses and music, not politics.
They weren't even "left "papers, per se,
but they helped connect the community in the way that national-scale media doesn't. Sometimes they'd do digging on local police forces, local companies, etc - local issues. They were in streetcorner boxes and libraries, truly public spaces. I used to sneer at our local one, with all the racy ads and trendy articles, but I dearly miss it now.
The right wing freebies are subsidized by the Power, so they're not going anywhere. It's similar to the right taking over talk radio post Reagan.
It's part of the human brain, I think
to be prone to be manipulated by symbols, because we tend to think in symbols. That said, there's no point in deliberately, repeatedly drinking from a poisoned well. Or should I say a well spiked with roofies.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
But Jill Stein and others are not complaining about the
Green New Deal being promoted by the Newbies. They are saying that the corporate leadership aren't making it happen, so the Greens are ready to step in.
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
Not one word about AOC from Jill Stein
Its sorta presumptuous on your part to conjure Stein support for AOC out of nothing.
It's sort of contentious on your part to think
I was responding only about AOC.
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
I really don't want to argue about this.
But the entire thread is about AOC. Why would I not assume that what you posted was in reference to AOC?
I can accept you didn't mean it that way. But how am I supposed to get that given the minimal context you supplied?
Learn to follow the thread.
mine was in reply to
@pindar's revenge .
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
I admit to being confused due to length of thread
I ran this thread for a day and a half, checking back at least once an hour. After a while, just finding the new comments became a pain. If its not a direct response to one of my comments, I have to scroll through the entire list of comments. If the comments spill onto a second page, clicking to that page cancels the "New" tag for comments on the second page. When the new comment is at the very bottom, its easy to get confused and respond to the OP, due to that reply window being right below the bottom comment.
Managing LONG threads on this board is not easy.
Please cut me some slack, as I had to wade through 170 posts. It is work, not pleasure.
Unwieldy format for long busy threads
Arendt, you've done an impressive job managing us herd of cats here. And you've got talent for stimulating discussion. Plus, it's remarkable how calm it mostly is.
I can see how unwieldy it gets, with all the branches; I wrote many of the same points several times in reply to different branches, probably writing too fast to be clear, and started some minor kerfluffle with poor writing. When it gets this busy this fast, it's easy to get frazzled. But I think we did good.
This is a decent format for the majority of smaller essays/threads. At this scale, it starts to break down. Maybe an interim strategy might be to just slow down.
Thanks, everybody, for discussing with me.
Thanks. Its nice to hear others felt it got unwieldy too.
It was remarkably civil for a topic that would instantly dissolve into flame wars on other boards.
Thanks to all for keeping the thread healthy.
Yeah, I mentioned somewhere
that the Greens don't seem to be complaining. They are showing the integrity of believing in the result, not the ownership of the idea.
At the same time, I just wrote that the Blue Deal might not be recognizable as Green.
AOC is no Emma Goldman, yet
thanks, I saw some twitter vid that had side by side dancing with The Breakfast Club movie, starring the brat pack kids of Hollywood. That made me happy and laugh out loud, so right on sister! Be like Emma why not, be careful out there. Don't get deported, I mean Trump is crazy after all. whee
goes around comes around
War Resistance, Anti-Militarism, and Deportation, 1917-1919
RussiaRussiaRussia omg
what change
Comparing AOC to Emma Goldman is like...
comparing Obama to Che Guevara. It is laughable.
Do you realize you do the work of propagandists by making such ridiculous comparisons?
I didn't do it
heh, yes? Dancing propaganda makes me happy, I had to unblock a ton of crap ad servers to even view that silly clip on the Commander in Chief's social twitverse. I'll bet soon Ellen will be seen selling AOC on her tv show, maybe touring live in '20. With Oprah! and the Black Eyed Peas why not. Roaring 20's again. lol Everyone flash mob and sing "Today's gonna be a good good day". Now check under your seat...?
Propaganda of the word, propaganda of the deed. I am reminded of both. Skid Row still exists, the rich still rule the masses, same as it ever was. Putin did it.
peace
Did somebody say Puttin...?
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNXd3wX_USc]
Sorry, Could not resist. Put this one down to PUI.
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
Nope, guilty, I did it (sort of)
Not really comparing her, just bringing out the notion that the myth of the dancing revolutionary is powerful. They're worlds apart in reality.
I get, at some level, that "dancing is important"
Unfortunately, in today's media world, when presented with an unknown new person, its practically impossible to figure out if they are genuine or compromised. The very fact that they are in the corporate media at all makes them instantly suspicious.
William Gibson had a throwaway phrase for this in Neuromancer (1984). He talked about
The man not only could write, he could see where the society was going thirty years before it got there.
So, I remain vigilant about where the media is leading us about AOC. If she actually does something that messes up TPTB, I will reconsider my opinion.
Interesting reference
I still crack up that he coined "cyberspace" on a typewriter. Citing Gibson makes me think in these terms:
We have:
1. The physical space, where street actions, demos, etc., occur
2. The intellectual space, like here
3. The law enforcement/court/legal space, where consequences go
4. The myth space, where the war for the imagination lives. Where yearnings and wishes live, where ideas (like strange attractors) create lumps of belief. Where the process of cooptation happens, and many expensive consultants create propaganda messages. And where we can lose ourselves chasing our tails if we're not careful (little self-nudge there).
The myth space may sound woo, but the idea precedes the action, and most powerful ideas are at least as much emotional as rational.
What myths can the left use as force magnifiers?
edit: and as organizational tools
Your above my philosophical pay grade with that question
I mean, the right has had a field day with mythology. Hitler channeled Norse mythology. George Lucas took Joseph Campbell's "The Masks of God" as a How-to manual. Hollywood is enamored of comic book heroes and minor gods of all stripes.
Mythology that would motivate action on the left? I just don't know any. Most of it is of the Buddhist stripe that striving causes suffering, or the difficult to do Ghandi stripe of non-violent shaming.
The only leftwing mythology that got any traction was Marxism, with its religion like belief in the abstract forces of history; and that religion has run its course.
The environment, Gaia, is about the only thing the left can call their own and rally people against the Capitalocene Extinction that is upon us. Maybe after enough hurricanes, forest fires, droughts, and insect infestations have clobbered America, people might pay attention to what we are collectively doing to our mother, nature.
Capitalocene Extinction
Love it, gonna steal that.
I'm using myth in a looser sense. Call it image, or legend, or ideation, maybe.
We have plenty of myths on the left, mostly of the tragic kind: from Freddie Gray to Joe Hill to the Haymarket Massacre that inspired May Day: the victim, the fallen hero. These tragic myths focus anger and grief, but anger alone can be poisonous, and can drive people away in fear. We also have the myth (the person is different, and private) of Emma Goldman celebrating sexuality and dancing. The media is not simply promoting the image of Cortez dancing, they're stealing the massive desire for joy, for a sunnier myth. They recognize the power of that myth and are busily coopting it; they had lots of practice with BO. We need to take it back. Combine grim warnings with the hope of sunshine, so to speak.
Arendt, you're really good at stirring in the yeast.
J.W. Mason, Marxist geographer coined "Capitalocene"
His articles are pithy and readable. His books and journal papers make me retch with all the neologisms and psuedo-Marxist terminology. His idea of "Cheap Nature" is very good. He pushes the capitalist revolution back to the 16th century and the exploitation of Mexican silver, Baltic forests, Caribbean sugar, and African slaves. Cheap labor, cheap food, cheap minerals.
We've got a lot of mythology
and the enemy is having a field day stealing it from us. Most recently, they've been stealing our myths of 1960s justice movements.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
The myth of a strong woman taking on
the 'old boy' network (and succeeding) is a good symbol to run with.
I don't think it was eyo who made the comparison.
And yes, comparing AOC to Goldman is exactly like comparing Barack to Ernesto.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
The media in the 60s and 70s
was an entirely different animal than the media today.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
So true
We need fresh ideas.
And it was me who made the mistake of mentioning Cortez in the same paragraph as Goldman. No comparison of Cortez intended.
I haven't given up on her. But I will keep an eye on how she
is treated by neo-liberal water carriers. You make a good point. If they are supporting her then we should be cautious.
And that's the third reason
my judgement has already been made.
Remember the coverage Bernie got during the primary?
That's how a non-sheepdog, actual dissident gets treated. That, or worse.
They deny dissidents coverage.
Bernie's coverage (during his campaign) was more like the coverage given Occupy than the coverage currently given AOC.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
2016 coverage
crickets on Bernie and billions for Rump. Funny how that works.
Well, we just get to disagree, then.
I'm not jumping to any conclusions this early in the game. Spin all you like - you've already made up your mind. I am not going to try and convince you otherwise. I'm just not going to rush to judgment at this juncture.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
Agree with you here
Any time the media focus is on progressive ideas and change, it is going to be better than the other crap. Not a purist by any means, but at least using her media darling status to bring up some of the needs of this world -- funding planet disaster mitigation with uber rich wealth -- can be helpful.
I actually don't think so
given that I think the elite's main strategy right now is to field a fake-ass simulacrum "left" that protects elite interests while claiming to fight for justice and equality. The elite also continues to shove various cattle prods up the ass of the craziest portion of the "right" in the hopes that they will do something horrible, perhaps kill somebody, to keep the role of villain securely locked down to someone who looks like they come off Duck Dynasty. All this is to ensure that the guys (and gals) in 500-dollar suits who wander the halls in New York, DC and San Francisco will never be blamed for anything; their crimes will evaporate.
It's all about the relocation of evil and good into convenient receptacles.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
With Trump in the WH, that seems superfluous to do
Besides, its getting harder to tell political crazies from just plain nuts with guns. Ex-marine shoots up bar near Paradise fire. Disgruntled boyfriend shoots up hospital in Chicago. Nice, normal Uber driver in Michigan decides to just murder six random victims. Innumberable mall and school shootings.
At this point, you would have to dress in a Nazi uniform and execute people live on camera while setting the Constitution on fire to come across as more deranged than Donald Trump. I mean he gets to lob cruise missiles at Syria on a whim and shutdown the government in a temper tantrum.
They need to identify the Duck Dynasty types with Trump
which isn't that hard, as many of Duck Dynasty types support him, so that if/when Trump is removed from the stage, they will be able to continue with the same, rather successful, political strategy.
Also, they clearly want the 99% in this country to murder each other, perhaps even have a civil war of sorts.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
I agree, QMS.
Let's give folks a chance to stand up for us. If she proves to be "phony," as the spin-meisters are chomping at the bit to predict, then I'll be the first to say I was wrong.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
What does that mean though, R.A.?
Does that mean people like me and Arendt should keep our mouth shut for 3 months, 6 months? That is very similar to what I was told when criticizing Obama after his first 30 days in office in 2009, that we should wait and give him a chance. In fact, we're still hearing that about Trump.
I mean, that's fine if you and others want to wait and see, but I'm not sure that's reasonable for everyone to do. After all, she is a democratic party politician. I'm not suggesting you're saying that, just that giving her a chance is a personal choice that not all will, or should, follow.
I think the key here is some are giving a warning, like others did about Obama, Bernie, etc. I think that has to be done otherwise we're all just robots.
No one is asking you to wait and see, BA.
I'm the one who will wait and see, but I do get weary of the negativity. It's why we cannot have revolution. Too much spin on EVERYTHING, which cripples folks. Look at the discussion here - people are all over the place. I can't see any cohesion in the discussion. Revolution will not happen without cohesion.
I agree with lots of things you say, BA. If you wish to rush to judgment, it's on you, not me. If I am wrong, I'll be the first to eat that big plate of crow.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
That busted my bubble.
I was just remarking to another individual about how this thread, for it's length, was cohesive and easy to keep up on.
At least I'm still amazed at the lack of animosity.
Great site!
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
Don't burst your bubble.
Maybe I'm not the cohesive one. Maybe I'm the one in left field.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
It is disturbingly similar, Al.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Maybe. But it can also be helpful to the ruling class.
As I explained elsewhere, controlled opposition is when they allow the peasants to talk about something but set it up so the discussion is compromised. I doubt Ocasio-Cortez would be in on that sort of plan, but it happens.
It's like the meme that if Bernie had not brought up wealth inequality and single payer, no one in this country would be talking about it in 2019. No way.
Relative to her suggestion that the uber rich pay for things via taxes, I'm against that and it won't work anyway. I think it shows her naivete and lack of substance and also clearly shows she's not a socialist at all. What she's really saying is that the rich can continue to pile up the billions and trillions while the peasants struggle for 15 bucks an hour, as long they pay for our health care and other things. Nope, not gonna work. We first have to address how the uber rich are getting so uber rich and put a stop to that. In my opinion.
The Reagan tax cuts
If you recall, the massive upward re-distribution of wealth began in the early 1980s. One of the earliest things Reagan did was to slash the high marginal tax rates that had prevailed since the '40s. The tax cuts weren't the only factor in creating the uber-rich, but it was major. Not only did it allow the wealthy to hoard their wealth, it created the environment for a lot of other .01% shenanigans, such as CEOs giving themselves "golden parachutes" and making obscene salaries. The "trickle down" nonsense was the flip side of the tax cuts.
"Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep."
~Rumi
"If you want revolution, be it."
~Caitlin Johnstone
"lot of other .01% shenanigans"-Stock buybacks made legal in '83
Before then they were prosecuted legally as market manipulation.
For the last few years, corporations have spent more on buybacks than they made in profits. They make up the difference by borrowing at 0% interest from the Fed QE.
The result is: no investment in capital or R&D for the future. Instead, the company is being liquidated to the stockholders, who get real, fungible cash in return for shares that have been devalued by non-investment. The company gets loaded with debt - currently at low interest, but guaranteed to rise because the Fed is tightening.)
Even Forbes and the Harvard Business Review are up in arms about out of control buybacks. IMHO, its too late. The looting has already been accomplished. You have major, major companies destroyed by buybacks forced on them by aggressive hedge funds who bought minority control. General Electric was forced to cough up tens of billions in buybacks in the years before it crashed, burned, and was thrown out of the DJI. (BTW, Boston is on the hook for hundreds of millions in subsidies to bring GE HQ to Boston. Way to go Marty Walsh, you corrupt ward healer.)
@Raggedy Ann With you on this,
With you on this, RaggedyAnn.
AOC is charismatic and we do not know with any certainty exactly how Progressive she will be.
I'm all for giving her the benefit of the doubt.
NYCVG
Sigh, the spin on AOC has begun.
It seems impossible to be a person to speak out without others "othering" you.
She's not genuine!
She's a corporatist!
She's a sheepdog!
She's a phony!
When I was the spokesperson for our staff of 5,000, I was othered as well until they realized I was advocating for THEM and not for ME. I'm willing to give her that chance. She will falter - she IS human, after, all. Until and unless she proves otherwise, I'm in her corner.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
No. The spin is that she is our savior
That she, as a very junior representative, has some power in DC.
That we should ignore all her rightwing and neoliberal actions and utterances.
This is a fact-based take on the woman, as opposed to the pollyanna take on the latest corporate-manufactured IdPol distraction.
That’s your spin.
I’m holding judgment on her. Period.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
Its fine to agree to disagree. At least you are open.
Thanks for your participation in the thread.
It's not just that,
more importantly I think, it's that the major issues can be addressed through the democratic party and this current political system.
If I were to step into the limelight as a leader
for the principles we all hold dear, and if I were to do it as a Democratic politician, I would expect serious skepticism and scrutiny. Not only do leaders always come in for some of that--and that's not necessarily a bad thing--the past ten years of American history makes it only logical that people would respond to the next "good Democrat" with skepticism. Obama is a well-poisoner. Blaming people for being unwilling to draw up the next bucket of water, well, it's not something I would do. If Ocasio-Cortez is a viable leader, none of what happens will involve a focus on her hurt feelings or how she's being "othered" by her critics. For goodness' sakes--are we really going to see the critics of a politician as the bad people who other her, and the politician as the good person who needs to be defended?
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
She's certainly being used, the 60 minutes show
proved that. You don't get on the 60 minutes propaganda channel as a politician if you're a danger to the oligarchy.
I'm not a fan of the celebrity culture, particularly for politicians, so it is disappointing to see the fawning over a shallow tool of the democratic party. But what else is new, that's what the partisans do, not unlike a new rookie on a football team. She certainly seems to enjoy it and is playing the establishment's game whether she thinks she is or not. Far from being a socialist, she looks like someone who will be quite rich after her stint as a democratic party politician, as she really says nothing against this capitalist system. Unless she plans on being a career politician, which is even worse imo. I'm strongly against career politicians. Unfortunately I agree, she certainly appears to be being used as a sheepdog, i.e., keeping people tied to the duopoly political process and system which is a dead end to real progress.
"You don't get on the 60 minutes propaganda channel...
...as a politician if you're a danger to the oligarchy."
Yes. Its all about where AOC is allowed to appear. Genunie lefties do not get this kind of access or non-negative exposure.
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