Posted on 08/03/2004 12:09:31 PM PDT by dead
Opening Statement
Dear FRiends:
I once suffered two great frustrations in being a freelance political writer. First, the loneliness: you put an article out there, and you might as well have thrown it down a black hole for all the response you get. Second, the ghettoization: when you do get response, it would be from folks you agree with. Not fun for folks like me who reliish--no, crave and need--political argument.
Then came the Internet, the blogs--and: problem solved.
I have especially enjoyed having my articles in the Village Voice posted on Free Republic by "dead," and arguing about them here. The only frustration is that I never have enough time--and sometimes no time--to respond as the threads are going on. That is why I arranged for an entire afternoon--this afternoon--to argue on Free Republic. Check out my articles and have at me.
A little background: I am a proud leftist who specializes in writing about conservatives. I have always admired conservatives for their political idealism, acumen, stalwartness, and devotion. I have also admired some of their ideas--especially the commitment to distrusting grand social schemes, and the deep sense of the inherent flaws in human nature. (To my mind the best minds in the liberal tradition have encompassed these ideals, while still maintaining that robust social reform is still possible and desirable. My favorite example is the Protestant theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, author of the Serenity Prayer and a great liberal Democrat.)
Lately, however, I've become mad at the right, and have written about it with an anger not been present in my previous writings. It began with the ascension of George Bush, when I detected many conservatives beginning to care more about power than principles. The right began to seem less interesting to me--more whiny, more shallow--and, what's more, in what I saw as an uncritical devotion to President Bush, often in retreat from its best insights about human nature.
I made my strongest such claim in a Village Voice article two weeks ago in which I, after much thought, chose to say conservatism was "verging on becoming an un-American creed" for the widespread way conservatives are ignoring the lessons of James Madison's great insights in Federalist 51 that in America we are supposed to place our ultimate trust in laws, not men.
Finally, in what I see as the errors of the Iraq campaign, I recognize the worst aspects of arrogant left-wing utopianism: the idea that you can remake a whole society and region through sheer force of will. I think Iraq is a tragic disaster (though for the time being the country is probably better off than it was when Saddam was around--but only, I fear, for the time being).
I am also, by the way, a pretty strong critic of my own side, as can be seen in my latest Village Voice piece.
So: I'm yours for the day--until 7:10 pm CST, when I'm off to compete in my weekly trivia contest at the University of Chicago Pub. Until then: Are you ready to rumble?
Respectfully,
Rick Perlstein
Where is the concern from the anti- war left for Afganistan? Kosovo? Haiti? Where was it for Somalia?
Well, he MUSt be off to his Pub thingy and to answer my question will take time and research to actually GET THE FACTS...that takes actual work...
G
Bump!
I've been reading a few of your responses, and it appears to me that many of your answers would only satisfy the politically ignorant.
I've been on this board since early 1997, and was in the thick of the impeachment wars.
My response to your representation of Bush's "control" over Congress?:
Yeah, just look at the way the White House has rammed through their choices for the federal judiciary! Snort!
Good God, Perlstein! And this:
Worst lie: After the September 11 attacks, the EPA told New Yorkers it was safe to live and work near Ground Zero.
Were they going to shut down the freaking city? Do you realize what sort of economic impact an out-of-control EPA would have had at that moment in time?
Of course not. City people like you don't have the vaguest idea what the actual costs of the "First World solution" are .
If Bombay had had the same thing happen to it, very few people would be getting their undies in a bunch about the natives breathing the toxins of a Ground Zero.
People like you just have the luxury of doing that.
If the Al-Katies are successful, the constant procession of trucks and ships into America's Blue Zone plantations would dry up, and those areas would revert to Third World status and conditions so fast it would make your head spin.
Not a country, a terrorist...A radical muslim group. Surely you knew I meant that??
We MUST introduce democracy to these people. Let them see what freedom is all about. Teach them that we're not the great satan.
Which is more important to the life of America???
Which one will support the Constitution and the American way-of-life better???
Guess I better start the mower.........
redrock
Raising hand
To your assertion that "fixing inequality and stagnating incomes" should be at the center of liberal political appeal, I reply "it is". Income redistribution is high on the list of priorities for most liberals, taking money away from people who have worked to earn it, and giving it to people who have not.
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Then why did Clinton pass a capital gains tax cut? Why does Kerry promise to lower taxes on 99 percent of American companies (when 60 percent already pay no taxes!).
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I also assert that making this "income equality" the center of liberal political appeal is dangerous, considering what we are facing now in the world. Focusing on destroying terrorism should be the primary focus of any political party in this day and age and anyone that doesn't see that is blind. How can we redistribute the incole if we're all dead??? Priorities...priorities...priorities
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Well, that is why I think we shouldn't have distracted ourelves from the struggle against Al Q with an invented grievance against Iraq, thus turning Iraq INTO a terrorist haven.
>Republicans control both houses
No, they do not. The Senate has a tenuous Republican majority at best. Bush has not enjoyed anything close to having everything rubber-stamped he wants, or needs.
don-o now falling on his sword for being such an ignormamus.
Got the link?
Hey what number are you up to, I've been waiting patiently for my hard rolls and pastries.
Nothing. And even that's been selective. Here's some Perlstein pieces that reveal his real agenda:
Suffice it to say "most", particularly in the first 300 replies or so.
And I guess I should have included this in my original comments, but I assumed you would take it for granted...
Not just a nuke but anything...Serin gas, small pox, any kind of weapon that could be easily delivered by some suicidal maniac who's been taught that we're the root of all evil. We must get those people educated!!
Kay said Saddam was a bigger threat than we imagined. The presstitutes, as per usual, took a little bit that they liked and ran with it. Cf. today's NY Times on the "old" intel. Traitors to the Fourth Estate, the lot of them....
these didn't trip my "field specialist" detector.
this, otoh, did:
...particulate air monitoring in the area and have the statistical timeweighted 8h/day maxima for personal exposure with and without safety gear.
I suspect Perlstein's alarm went off, too. I disagree with him, but I don't think he's an idiot.
many conservatives beginning to care more about power than principles
What I saw in '94 was great chortling of the Liberals as they perceived that they were about to get a strong majority and would finally get control and make the people do this and that. Oh, yeah. Such happiness!
I don't see the Conservatives doing any such thing. What I see is Conservatives strung out over the 50-50 chance that we are going to go back to the Democrat majority and find our natural and Constitutional rights eroding at a rapid pace again. We are close to the razor's edge right now, and we could just slip right over and end up in either 1984 or Brave New World or Walden II, or all of those collectivist, socialist Utopias put together.
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Here's something I wish conservatives would undestand. The Republican congress, both Senate and House, and especially the Senate because of its thin Republican majority, have STOPPED HOLDING OPEN HEARINGS on bills, have shut out the opposing party from conference committees, have radically cut out the deliberate aspect of legislation. This is terrible for the country--and terrible for conservatives. If you really don't trust Democrats as much as you all say you don't trust Democrats, what happens, as is eventually possible given the normal cyclical nature of poltiics, when the Democrats take back control of Congress and continue the anti-democratic precedents the Republicans have set?
It's the same argument for NOT TORTURING--because if you get captured, you have no moral force in keeping THEM FROM TORTURING YOU.
I repeat. The longest the previous Democratic House held open a vote for "arm-twisting" was 15 minutes. This Congress has held votes open for three hours.
"Well, that is why I think we shouldn't have distracted ourelves from the struggle against Al Q with an invented grievance against Iraq, thus turning Iraq INTO a terrorist haven."
Rick, respectfully, the "grievance" with Iraq is not invented. I, personally, don't think we should have let them go on shooting at our planes. Act of war comes to mind. But you must see that this "war" is more than just Al Quaeda. There is a huge network of various terrorist networks out there, loosely linked, and they are all a problem. Hussien supported them as he could, and that included the Palistinian homocide bombers, to whose families he sent large sums of money. It is hard to wrap your mind around the extensive nature of this struggle, but it is important to do so.
I'm aware of this plan too. They had it up on the web. I beleive Fox News reported it. If I were a Democrat thinking of protesting the RNC and MY SIDE suggested I do something that despicable, I'd be dropping out and seriously wondering just how much I had in common with these people.
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