General Politics Discussion [ARCHIVED] • Page 270

I agree. I didn't see tonight's town hall, I'm about to watch it now, but I remember the first one I liked his answers way more than Johnson. He was answering them straight forward and was knowledgeable, but Johnson seemed to be dodging questions left and right.

 

An Eight Point Brief for LEV (Lesser Evil Voting)

The broader lesson to be drawn is not to shy away from confronting the dominance of the political system under the management of the two major parties. Rather, challenges to it need to be issued with a full awareness of their possible consequences. This includes the recognition that far right victories not only impose terrible suffering on the most vulnerable segments of society but also function as a powerful weapon in the hands of the establishment center, which, now in opposition can posture as the “reasonable” alternative. A Trump presidency, should it materialize, will undermine the burgeoning movement centered around the Sanders campaign, particularly if it is perceived as having minimized the dangers posed by the far right.

A more general conclusion to be derived from this recognition is that this sort of cost/benefit strategic accounting is fundamental to any politics which is serious about radical change. Those on the left who ignore it, or dismiss it as irrelevant are engaging in political fantasy and are an obstacle to, rather than ally of, the movement which now seems to be materializing.

Finally, it should be understood that the reigning doctrinal system recognizes the role presidential elections perform in diverting the left from actions which have the potential to be effective in advancing its agenda. These include developing organizations committed to extra-political means, most notably street protest, but also competing for office in potentially winnable races. The left should devote the minimum of time necessary to exercise the LEV choice then immediately return to pursuing goals which are not timed to the national electoral cycle.

It's Chomsky, so you probably know if you agree or disagree with him by now.

Here's the 8 points:

1) Voting should not be viewed as a form of personal self-expression or moral judgement directed in retaliation towards major party candidates who fail to reflect our values, or of a corrupt system designed to limit choices to those acceptable to corporate elites.

2) The exclusive consequence of the act of voting in 2016 will be (if in a contested “swing state”) to marginally increase or decrease the chance of one of the major party candidates winning.

3) One of these candidates, Trump, denies the existence of global warming, calls for increasing use of fossil fuels, dismantling of environmental regulations and refuses assistance to India and other developing nations as called for in the Paris agreement, the combination of which could, in four years, take us to a catastrophic tipping point. Trump has also pledged to deport 11 million Mexican immigrants, offered to provide for the defense of supporters who have assaulted African American protestors at his rallies, stated his “openness to using nuclear weapons”, supports a ban on Muslims entering the U.S. and regards “the police in this country as absolutely mistreated and misunderstood” while having “done an unbelievable job of keeping law and order.” Trump has also pledged to increase military spending while cutting taxes on the rich, hence shredding what remains of the social welfare “safety net” despite pretenses.

4) The suffering which these and other similarly extremist policies and attitudes will impose on marginalized and already oppressed populations has a high probability of being significantly greater than that which will result from a Clinton presidency.

5) 4) should constitute sufficient basis to voting for Clinton where a vote is potentially consequential-namely, in a contested, “swing” state.

6) However, the left should also recognize that, should Trump win based on its failure to support Clinton, it will repeatedly face the accusation (based in fact), that it lacks concern for those sure to be most victimized by a Trump administration.

7) Often this charge will emanate from establishment operatives who will use it as a bad faith justification for defeating challenges to corporate hegemony either in the Democratic Party or outside of it. They will ensure that it will be widely circulated in mainstream media channels with the result that many of those who would otherwise be sympathetic to a left challenge will find it a convincing reason to maintain their ties with the political establishment rather than breaking with it, as they must.

8) Conclusion: by dismissing a “lesser evil” electoral logic and thereby increasing the potential for Clinton’s defeat the left will undermine what should be at the core of what it claims to be attempting to achieve.

 

Related (sorry, catching up a lot of reading) from another John Halle (co-authored the above piece) post:

Any serious defense of a vote for her needs to begin by conceding that the positions Clinton has endorsed over the years have been reprehensible and that much of what she will do in office will be no less so.

Two good books on the subject here and here.

That does not mean-as a matter of elementary logic-that Trump could not, and almost certainly will-be much worse.

 

And lastly, I finished this today: "Listen Liberal", it's good.

It is a widespread belief among liberals that if only Democrats can continue to dominate national elections, if only those awful Republicans are beaten into submission, the country will be on the right course.

But this is to fundamentally misunderstand the modern Democratic Party. Drawing on years of research and first-hand reporting, Frank points out that the Democrats have done little to advance traditional liberal goals: expanding opportunity, fighting for social justice, and ensuring that workers get a fair deal. Indeed, they have scarcely dented the free-market consensus at all. This is not for lack of opportunity: Democrats have occupied the White House for sixteen of the last twenty-four years, and yet the decline of the middle class has only accelerated. Wall Street gets its bailouts, wages keep falling, and the free-trade deals keep coming.

 

Something like the statement 16/24 years isn't really a telling accurate representation of Democratic "control," power, or influence. We have a system designed to ensure that one individual doesn't control an agenda. All you have to do is look at the past 8 years for an example.

Not saying the arguement is totally flawed on the premise, but rather the justification is not completely accurate. Democrats can and should be more progressive.

Haven't read the book, so this is based alley on the clip you quoted before anyone gets upset that once again I'm defending Democrats.

 

Trump is firmly in the Reagan tradition:

Fears of Trump as Fascist Echo Similar Warnings Against Ronald Reagan - The New York Sun

 

I'd vote for Caleb McLaughlin. That kid is so incredibly witty.

 

First Map Of Thawed Areas Under Greenland Ice Sheet

 

"
As Trump lurches closer to the presidency, it feels apt that more and more American spaces look like Atlantic City. Many cities and states have legalized gambling rather than raise taxes — Iowa in 1991, Detroit in 1999, Philadelphia in 2010, and Cleveland in 2012. These developments produced Atlantic City’s present fiscal apocalypse: why go to Atlantic City when Atlantic City has come to you?

Even where gambling is illegal, American cities’ postindustrial landscape is littered with shopping malls, gated communities, and glittering convention centers. Atlantic City’s model of a plush, self-contained casino abutting a ruined neighborhood has become a synecdoche for the last forty years of American urban development.

As a high-profile pioneer of this new kind of city — responsible for changing how urban spaces look and feel — Trump’s candidacy marks its coming of age: fortified, privatized, relentlessly white, offering a frenzied, speculative, and ultimately false model of social mobility, and set behind a giant, thick wall.

One can’t help but think that Trump’s Atlantic City casinos are the inspiration for his candidacy, a window into how a Trump presidency would shape the country’s future."

When Donald Comes to Town | Jacobin

 

"When offered a choice between two politically intolerable alternatives, it is important to choose neither. And when that choice is presented in rival arguments and debates that exclude from public consideration any other set of possibilities, it becomes a duty to withdraw from those arguments and debates, so as to resist the imposition of this false choice by those who have arrogated to themselves the power of framing the alternative."

Philosopher: Can’t stand Hillary or Trump? Here’s what you must do.

 

Debating going there this weekend but for a city on a rapid descent into oblivion hotels still sure are expensive!

 

What are the general thoughts on Ajamu Baraka here?

What I've read about him suggests to me that he's not a guy I care for.

 

When I first turned 21, I played enough poker down there to get free rooms at Harrahs Sunday-Thursday all year round haha.

 

Yeah man, 3 or 4 years ago we would always have free weekday rooms, and major discounts on weekends. And I'm only a very causal gambler.

Now they haven't even given me a BOGO buffet in like 2 years.

 

BOGO Land and Sea Buffet >>>>>>>

Me and my girlfriend pigged out on that 2 or 3 years ago. I was never so disgusted with myself in my life.

 

Not familiar but did see this article recently, granted I haven't had time to check out all of his blog posts.

Ajamu Baraka doesn’t like Beyoncé, Bernie Sanders | Fusion

 

A lot of what I've read from him (very little) reads like tankie crap. But idk

 

Same. Most of them are good at social issues, but terrible at foreign policy, eg, Assad is a legitimate leader and ISIS is a creation of the west.

 

Even on domestic policy, he strikes me as the type to demean Debs for being too cooperative with labor management, instead of pontificating in a corner.

 

So ... he lied.

 

People giving Obama a nice bounce too.