by AnnaLivia » Wed Nov 09, 2005 6:31 pm
To StarmanSkye and thrulookinglass,<br><br>Sorry sorry sorry! My bad bad bad!<br><br>Thanks to you guys, I realize that I left out two crucial words, and I see how that caused an entirely regrettable misunderstanding of my meaning. Lesson learned! I should have written <br><br>…part of the part of…<br><br>instead of just<br><br>…part of… <br><br>Also, I would have been more accurate or clear to type “the American left”, instead of, the American “left”.<br><br>To me, when something is put between quotation marks in a case like this, it indicates the term is meant far differently than when it is NOT in quotation marks. The Q-marks are meant to say: I do not take this literally, nor mean it literally, so don’t you take it literally. So maybe that error was smaller, but also contributed to my making myself misunderstood. <br><br>So anyway, the sentence should have been "I’m glad I can stop worrying that you are part of the part of "the American left" which keeps shooting itself in the foot. i can talk to a republican who loves what is good about america and who is just badly misinformed, better than to a "leftie" who has been duped into hating all things american.”<br><br><br><br>Having said that<br><br>I do NOT believe that all who would be referred to as “lefties”, hate America...and I think I should have been given the benefit of your doubts. I really think I have earned better than that around here. I should have been asked to clear up what was unclear, rather than being painted a color I damn well don’t deserve. You wrote as if i stand in favor of the things you are against!<br><br>Am I invisible, or what? Dang if it doesn’t feel that way after reading your posts. Have the bulk of my own posts by now, not clearly announced me as someone who sees the perceived left/right divide as a false construct? Isn’t it clear by now that I am CERTAIN the divide is top/bottom?? Do I not work to show others the falsity of ‘left vs. right’, and do I not try over and over to demonstrate that the danger of buying into that construct is that it keeps us from uniting against the real enemy? And have my posts not identified me as someone who knows very well indeed, that “the American bathwater is truly filthy now”, but who stresses “the American baby” is worthy to be saved when we throw the water out? Have I truly failed so miserably to make my beliefs clear? Perhaps I should just throw in the towel, if this is the case. <br><br>What riles me about the attitude coming from, for example in this case Eric144, is its self-defeatism. The attitude that the whole system is worthless, is what I’m against. Hey, when a drunken driver runs a car off the road, should we blame the CAR, or should we blame the DRUNKEN DRIVER? <br><br>Are you guys seriously going to try to tell me that you don’t hear, from a significant segment of “the left”, a LOT of contemptuous, emotively vigorous bashing of ‘sheeple’…’Joe SIXPACKS’…’the evil American empire’…etc.? Are you going to tell me you don’t hear a LOT of ‘we’re totally screwed’…’why bother’…’nothing ever helps’…’human nature is violent’…’we’re just a bunch of animals, after all’?<br><br>You don’t hear a LOT of ‘it’s all America’s fault!’…’there’s nothing good about America’? Well, I hear it. And yes indeedy, I DO hear it far more from “the left” than from “the right”, my friends. (and again, those terms are in Q-marks precisely because I wholeheartedly agree they have come to be hugely misunderstood…rendered meaningless if not worse.)<br><br>I remind that you do not hear ME use those terms WITHOUT the Q-marks…as you don’t hear me refer to ‘workers’, with its overtones (undertones?) of communism which Americans, at least, react badly to... but rather to ‘working people’…and you don’t hear me refer to ‘the poor’ without the word ‘working’ in front of it (accurate as all get-out)…and you don’t hear me refer to ‘J Sixpack’ (derisive) but rather to ‘J Workingman’ or ‘J Public’ (dignifying)…and you don’t hear me refer to ‘taxpayers’ but rather ‘citizens’.) Etc. I simply avoid as much as possible the use of ‘liberals’, ‘conservatives’, ‘left-wing’, ‘rightwing’…and I make a clear distinction between ‘Democrats and Republicans’ and ‘DINOS and RINOS’…the In Name Only crowd…which includes about 95% of the current congress-critters, imo! I also don’t use ‘rich’.<br><br>The terms I use are purposeful. They strive to make it clear that wealth and power are not separate, but one. Wealthpowerful. Sometimes Uber-wealthpowerful. The baddies are not Republicans or conservatives in my lingo, they are Cheap-labor Predators! These terms are not fanciful; they are accurate! They are Spot-on, Dead-on, Balls-on ACCURATE.<br><br>My whole point was that all the negativity is the very reason why people who actually agree very much with progressive positions, don’t turn out to vote at all. Can we save electoral politics? I don’t know! But isn’t the alternative really to return to the caves eep eep oop oop?! we MUST have majorities to win elections. The disparagement and negativity does not draw people in, does not inspire them and give them determination and confidence to make change happen…it just pushes them away. Is that a winning strategy??? I can tell you who knows that it’s NOT, and I can tell you where they are. (hint: look in the white house.)<br><br>Can you really say to me that a significant part of “the left”, does NOT shoot itself in the foot? Was I really so far off base to say such a thing…even in the “loose” manner in which I expressed it? (again, I DO regret making the initial mistake, and I really do appreciate being called on it so I could attempt to clear this up!) <br><br>I hope this explains the problem I have with the attitude expressed by Eric. I see that attitude as an enemy to us all. Yes, a big, dangerous enemy that needs to be stopped dead in its tracks. I have a very strong suspicion that were Eric and I to find ourselves sitting next to each other on a plane, we would be happy to meet and talk like friends! But nevertheless, I feel absolutely compelled to battle the attitude he espouses. <br><br>I think there’s an old cliché that is actually very profound: If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem! Same, really, as the Chinese saying: The man who says it can’t be done should get out of the way of the man doing it!<br><br>Somebody please tell me what is better than struggling-for-change, with a positive attitude and a belief that success is possible…and with good strategy and tactics?<br><br>i think people know things are wrong, and even what's wrong. i think it's better for us to tell them how they got so wrong, and how to right things.<br><br>Personally, I do easily understand why people turn to anarchism, socialism, anti-capitalism, and a host of other ideas, in their own attempts to create not only a better America, but a better world. I just happen to disagree that their proposals are the way to go, but I do recognize that we desire the same outcome.<br><br>I cannot foresee a time when I will believe there is a better system of government than a balanced blend of democratic and socialistic principles. I do not wear labels well, but whatever term is commonly given a creature who believes in taking the best ideas from both of those systems and running them through the blender; that’s me.<br><br>I may yet reach the point where I think capitalism must be discarded instead of properly “tweaked”, properly regulated…but I sure don’t think that way yet. I believe capitalism is not an evil unto itself, but rather more like a good workhorse, being worked badly. I believe there is no such thing as a perfect system, and any system people can create, people can also “get around”. Gee, the term ‘ever-vigilant’ comes to mind. I think our problems within our systems of government and economics both, have escalated to the current extremes because we have not been vigilant. As time and technology, (what other words go here?) progress, flaws are exposed that must be dealt with. Will people know what I mean if I say I think we are often making mountains out of molehills??<br><br>(How I long for the skills and the vocabulary some of the rest of you around here have, in order to express all of this better! My attempts fall so short of the excellence needed in this endeavor! Woe is me, but I’ll continue a bit farther here, praying I am being understood at least somewhat. Do I get a few points for trying? LOL!)<br><br>The question for me is not what systems should replace what we have, but what changes must we make to the current systems. For example; are privately-owned, for-profit vehicles the way to deliver such things as insurance and healthcare? Hell no! It’s a fact that for what we’re already spending, we could ALL have affordable healthcare and insurance. But should the government own the factory that makes shoes? Sorry, I don’t see the advantage there at all.<br><br>I’m hardly an economist, nor an expert on all the isms and ologies. But damn if some of the best ideas don’t just seem self-evident to me. <br><br>Free-market? For all the talk of it, we’ve never seen one, have we? From what I understand, it really IS a good idea, and what we rightfully rail against is what we have now; a grotesque perversion of a free-market system that is actually nothing of the kind...purposefully skewed to benefit the interests of the few...of the top 1%. Markets operate, well, as markets operate. The way supply and demand work, for instance, cannot be escaped.<br><br>What CAN be escaped, is how the wealth produced from all this commerce we’re engaged in, is distributed. Here comes that term again, that we desperately need to make part of our vocabulary: MAXIMUM WAGE. I also think it is perfectly accurate to say money falls into one of only two possible categories: money is either SELF-earned, or it is OTHER-earned. And THERE is the nugget of our troubles: the money in the hands of billionaires and trillionaires is OTHER-earned wealth, and the world is by and large embroiled in the ceaseless, violent struggle of the robbed trying to get back what is theirs.<br><br><br><br>Well. I’ve certainly gone off-track of this thread, and even off-track within this post. to try to bring it back around at least to the point of where I was responding to SS and tlg: <br><br>To sum it all up…or boil it all down, I guess I basically think we can either beat ourselves up, or we can lift ourselves up. It’s not, for me, a case of “America, right or wrong” nor “America, love it or leave it”.<br><br>It’s a case of “America, you have neglected your health and are now suffering sickness. Here, take your medicine, and take it now. BECAUSE YOU ARE WORTH IT AND I LOVE YOU.”<br><br>As a last thought, and this really just this moment danced into me widdle brain: Would the term ‘revolutionary reform’ be an oxymoron? And even if so, could it actually perfectly describe what we need? Hmmm… <br><br>End mother noises. End sermon. <br> <p></p><i></i>
