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TechnoratiWhere Have All the Protests Gone? US Students in Limbo
"There's a lot of apathy and a growing disconnectedness to what's going on in world affairs," the frustrated Howard University junior told AFP as some 200 people, including a handful of students, gathered for the march.
![[An anti-war protester holds a peace flag on the eight-year anniversary of military action in Afghanistan (AFP)]](http://www.commondreams.org/files/article_images/wherehavealltheprotestsgone.jpg "wherehavealltheprotestsgone.jpg")
"Students are more interested in trying to get a job and make money. That's essentially the bottom line."
With the US military several years into two faraway wars, American students like Amen are taking to the streets less often -- and to less effect -- than their Vietnam-era predecessors who were the vanguard of the anti-war movement in the 1960s and early 1970s.
Mounting economic and academic pressures on today's youth, intimidation by authorities, online distractions and conflicted views about the "good" war in Afghanistan, not to mention other causes such as health care and slashed school budgets clawing for attention, have conspired to snuff out anti-war activism on campus, experts and students say.
They acknowledge, too, that US President Barack Obama has paradoxically hampered the movement because many of the largely leftist protest groups haven't wanted to openly oppose him so early in his first term.
"There's this trust that he's going to fix it all," said Shara Esbenshade, 19, a sophomore at Stanford University and member of Stanford Says No To War.
She says there are no anti-war marches on her campus, only vigils, educational events and occasional protests against Condoleezza Rice, who has returned to Stanford after serving as George W. Bush's secretary of state.
"We'd really like to start doing more about Afghanistan," she added. "But students here rising up? I really don't see that happening."
At Kent State University, where in 1970 four unarmed students were shot dead by the Ohio National Guard, Andrew Ruminas, 20, a member of the Kent State Anti-War Committee, said "we're not even doing any demonstrations now."
Perhaps, according to 1960s protest icon and political activist Tom Hayden, that's because the single most important act to silence student dissent -- the privatization of conflict -- occurred a generation ago.
"Students were the bulwark of the anti-Vietnam war movement because students were being drafted, full stop," Hayden, a founding member of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) in 1962, told AFP.
"Ending forced conscription radically diminished the possibilities of future student anti-war protests."
Hayden, one of the "Chicago Seven" charged with inciting to riot at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, said students have "rechanneled" their activism, notably into Internet campaigns including the one last year that helped sweep Obama into the White House.
Many of today's students are marching with their fingers instead of their feet, signing online petitions, reading or writing blogs and planning anti-war agendas on the Web.
Stanley Aronowitz, a Vietnam anti-war organizer, insists online petitions do nothing but entrench users in the "anti-reality" of Internet activism.
"I don't believe petitions do anything," he said. "They are what middle-class people and intellectuals do to convince themselves they're getting somewhere."
Aronowitz, now a sociology professor at City University of New York, acknowledges that new social technologies on the Web -- Facebook, Twitter, YouTube -- have mass mobilization potential.
"But they also privatize people's lives to much more of a degree than when people had to go to meetings and act collectively."
As society has digitized, the American left has splintered, Aronowitz says, losing the confidence to mobilize people as it did in early 2003 when millions protested the looming Iraq invasion.
As a result, "many people have put their faith in electoral politics rather than direct action."
Jonathan Williams, who runs Student Peace Action Network, says it's not just a matter of apathy or a shift to campus issues like soaring student debt; there has been what he calls a "criminalization of dissent."
Williams said he was arrested along with other activists and journalists at a demonstration at last year's Republican National Convention and detained for four days.
In 2007, police used an electro-shock Taser on a student causing a disturbance during an address by Senator John Kerry. Videos of the event have been seen on YouTube more than seven million times.
"After seeing that, are you going to speak out?" Williams asked.
As US support for the Afghan mission retreats -- a CNN poll on Wednesday suggested 58 percent of Americans are now against the war -- Obama is mulling whether to approve a request to send up to 40,000 more troops.
Todd Gitlin, a former SDS president in the 1960s who now teaches at Columbia University, says a "critical mass" of youth against the war has not materialized to bring huge numbers out in protest.
Should Obama approve the Afghan troop request, Gitlin cautions, "that might be the trigger."
77 Comments so far
Show AllThe elite have learned to ignore all protest because there's no impact or influence over a contiguous monoparty like the Red&Blue Corporate Party. The monied elites have engineered a bloodless coup of the public mind by appealing to greed while feeding the patient candied gibberish. They have illegally excluded any opposition through: advancing corporate personhood rights, stealing elections, writing confusionist and self-subsidied legislation, abandonment of policy platforms, and mass misinformation via corporate media including PBS.
Political suggestion? Read the Green Party Platform...
http://www.gp.org/platform/2004/2004platform.pdf
... and start using it as your platform and run for office.
Ecotopian suggestion? Relocalize your life, boycott everything corporate, urban gardenize, organize your blocks to share and start your own economies and currencies, and create car-free cities that are safe, sane and fun!
When Palpatine in power was, many young people joined the Imperial military, received training on weapons, logistics, tactics, and then went awol and joined the Rebellion, their skills against their former employers they employed. Instead of planning protests, those against the Empire were organising and planning, long term, for an armed geurilla campaign to oust the Imperials and establish a new democratic Republic.
Palpatine never paid much attention to protests. But notice he took when his own weapons were directed against the Empire!
"The remnants of their 'liberalism' appeared in literally 100s of articles criticizing white working class people for their presumptive racism and Christian fundamentalism with this truly weird fixation on central Pennsylvania where, nevertheless, they've likely never trod even once in their lives. I guess they needed a follow up to the ubiquitous 'southern strategy.'"
It's kind of like how right-wingers make inner city black people out to be violent predators, welfare queens, uncivilized, etc. yet won't dare go into the 'hood or actually speak to any of them.
"Todd Gitlin, a former SDS president in the 1960s who now teaches at Columbia University, says a "critical mass" of youth against the war has not materialized to bring huge numbers out in protest."
My, what a hypocrite. If I recall correctly, Todd Gitlin was on the horn just about every week in the run up to Iraq, preaching *against* war protests, part and parcel of the neo-con sonspiracy of silence of the time.
I seem to recall him stating that he preferred "teach ins" starring himself, (and this should be familiar as all his cultural productions star himself) down at Columbia--which, as we know, is always wide open and welcoming to the general public.
It seems to me that there are anumber of people from that 60s generation, answering to certain demographic, who still profess to be "liberals" but who have quietly and subversively gone over to David Horowitz.
Gitlin is one of them.
I should add that these people are among Obama's early adopters and his loudest promoters.
The remnants of their "liberalism" appeared in literally 100s of articles criticizing white working class people for their presumptive racism and Christian fundamentalism with this truly weird fixation on central Pennsylvania where, nevertheless, they've likely never trod even once in their lives. I guess they needed a follow up to the ubiquitous "southern strategy."
Who needs this? We live in a fascist state, and the fascists are not hangin' out in the rust belt.
Time to snap out of it.
There's nothing paradoxical about 0bama's election dampening the antiwar movement.
0's sponsors hired a black face and suave tongue to convince people to not resist while he pursues policies that earned Bosh 20-something % approval ratings and Congress less than that.
Let's quit imagining that this is at all accidental. These people do hire publicity departments, after all. What else could it ever possibly be for?
There's one reason that lobbyists are in Washington. To effect change for their clients.
The people can only effect change with direct action. A movement can't move without people taking to the streets in collective direct action. A million people marching in the streets of Washington will have an impact--it will put the people in power on notice.
how does one protest one's own way of life, without understanding the need for another?
protesting portions of this life does nothing to address fundamental issues like property ownership and housing...the economics of land and power...religions that favor delayed gratification at the whim of another rather than independent responsibility for thought and action, coupled with understanding and respect for one's very real ties to the living world surrounding one...the violence that holds our current life in place...
these are not causes for protest, an appeal to another to redress, but causes for change...withdrawal...an erasing and redrawing...
we need to shake the big etch-a-sketch of life, folks, and come down loving this planet and all of the living things upon it, and keeping it as pure as we can...which, by the way, means alot of cleaning up...
what is needed is not protest, but true change in way of daily living...
Global Start Date: September 22, 2012...acoustic (no more electricity), agrarian...grown up...you take care of you, and you take care of the planet...
let's get those gardens growing...
Why protest when it comes to naught? The best answer I've heard to that question is that no one should protest with the expectation of effecting change. One should protest when it is the right thing to do.
This looks like a good time for a shameless plug for some photos I made during the sixties. Maybe they can play a small part in inspiring others of this generation:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=131879&id=560671722&l=8b6b5432e5
Bring America Back !!!!
****where have all the protests gone?
****gone to websites everywhere.
****where do all the lefties hang?
****only at digitals do they harangue.
****where are all the peaceniks throngs?
****don't taze me bro', I'll move along.
****where can all the love childs emote?
****nowhere man, jackboots got their goats.
Many problems here.
1. Much of the US left has signed itself to the Democratic Party. The Democratic party is, in the areas where it matters, center-right, corporate, militarist.
2. Poor education system in the US leads to a poor understanding of our true history, the struggle between the masses and the rulers, the alternative systems available to us, or that alternative systems can even be considered. This helps explain #1 as well.
3. US doesn't really have a left. We have people who support left points of view, anarchists, etc, but there is no threatening cohesion to make the left any sort of force here. Other countries have far more powerful and diverse unions (including anarchist), stronger left parties and a multitude to choose from. Instead, we have activist/hippy sort of things like infoshops, food not bombs, etc. that serve more as a social gathering for a subculture of "activists".
4. So, activism as a subculture is dependent on capitalist social trends. When the hyper-consumer cool kids are into the activist identity, suddenly, the left is on the rise again in America, or so everyone believes. Well, for about 2 years until the cool kids are too cool for it again, it becomes co-opted by the mainstream, resold as a consumer product, etc.
Instead of social organizing in areas where people can threaten power, the US left creates its own scene that other people must be converted to join, or decide to join based on social trends.
5. Bush wasn't cool at all. Obama is still cool. Cool kids don't get anal about politics right now. Better to focus on showing off your music collection and number of people you know. Again, this wouldn't matter at all if there were a true US left (as a cohesive threat to capitalist power).
6. The US left has been fixated on 60s anti-war activism and has largely forgotten the "old left" (radical trade unions, political parties, strikes, protests, etc.). Doesn't help that these things (excluding protests) are labeled with such a dismissive name. The anti-globalization protests in the US were very 60's-protest-esque in their nature, and the comparisons were abundant. The fixation with the 60's anti-war movement can also be seen when people seriously argue we should re-instate the draft to force people to become radical as if it will play out exactly as it did during the Vietnam War. Have you not asked yourselves, is the left in other countries dependent on military drafts and their country being at war in order for there to be a left? No. This is a lazy, deadly band-aid solution to a much deeper problem. It's time to stop worshiping 60's activism.
I think these are the main issues.
In countries where a true left exists, people become more agitated and participatory in hard times. In the US, they have no left to turn to, so they just keep hoping things magically get better and in the meantime fight to get/keep a job and entertain away their worries via TV, the Internet, clubs, and drugs.
"bakunin2", I think is partially right. The draft made the war "real" to the youth. If you look at most countries, the marching populace is usually initiated by the youth. Many countries, after the protests of France and the United States, from the 60's & 70's, moved their newer universities into the suburbs.
But you don't need a draft to make the war real, you need media that's a true watchdog. Media that is a bit alarmist. How many times has Katie Couric interviewed Noam Chomsky or Amy Goodwin? What did FAIR report about the pre-Iraq invasion bias? Remember the "Pentagon Pundits"? Remember what Jim Lehrer said about that criticism? "We didn't want to appear negative". What happened to Phil Donahue when he wanted to debate the legitimacy of the decraceful claims of Bush?
In a way, "Suspect" is right. We no longer have a true Left in the MSM. Hell, we really don't have newspapers anymore. The Democratic party now appears mercenary - as they ignored even discussing "Single Payer", Obama's team was making deals with Big PHARMA and the insurance companies.
Considering the amazing power of the idiotic rantings of Beck, Rush, Savage, Hannity, Kristol, O'Reilly, etc. I'd say we need a more powerful leftist media on public airways - AM radio, not just the Internet. We used to have AirAmerica on the radio, but it was starved out by corporate lack of funds. Without corporate sponsorship, I don't know how the Left can regain a presence in MSM.
What came first, the chicken or the egg? Do you think the existence of a "left" in other countries inspires the people to embrace their principles? Or did their embrace of principles inspire the organization?
It would seem to me that a pre-existing organization would uninspire people to live their principles, because they could continue their addictions to the carrots, cheese and other opiates dangled by the elites, while at the same time joining a party to pretend they're doing something. It's like the druggie voting for the ballot initiative to escalate the war on drugs, thinking that will get him off drugs.
Instead of that we could inspire the people to LIVE their principles, through grass-roots inspiration/influence. Then we can truthfully say: Look this movement is authentic as it gets eh? Yep. Look, the next step, obviously, is to organize to defend what we now have a stake in, eh? Yep. What we didn't have a stake in before, we NOW have a stake in, and a motivation to defend it. No hierarchy, nothing to attract elite pathogens. Nothing to fuel distrust. Nothing to argue with. Simple too. Easy to do. Change your demands in the markets and in politics. Demand local value, and the organization will build naturally, to protect it.
I'm an anarchist too, but I personally feel the somewhat prevailing US anarchist argument is sort of an easy way out. We don't have these things in the US, we don't need them, we'll somehow magically awaken everyone, somehow build a counter, hierarchy free shadow society, and it will all crumble. It just isn't happening. I see a dwindling anarchist subculture really (in the US), and one that often gets caught up in infighting over finite details.
IWW and radical unions aren't carrots and they're forms of organization people who are hardly politicized can plug in to and be a part of. Having help run an infoshop and FNB myself, I know these ideas are completely different. They require people to adapt some of the lifestyle of the existing participants or else they feel out of place or treated suspiciously. The participants need to be more politicized and in tune with the same thinking as other participants.
www.NotOneMore.US
Don't support any candidate if they don't support peace and justice. Take the pledge, send the pledge to your local elected officials.
Now is the time to mobilize, not after the election.
www.NotOneMore.US - Pledge for Peace
"One big reason for shrinking protests that's missing from this article is that the antiwar movement has been ignored for about eight years. Eight effing years."
True, yet the teabaggers get most of the coverage.
Maybe the students dont want to be confused with Teabaggers...
Todays students' lack of activism may be less a matter of current academic and economic conditions than their merely being products of prevalent modern child-rearing practices, which depend heavily on the use of pharmaceuticals to modify and regularize the behavior of a shocking percentage of young Americans throughout their educational years - for at least a generation now, control of "aberrant conditions" like hyperactivity, ADD and ADHD to "normalize" children's behavior can begin as early as pre-school, and continue through high-school and beyond, even connecting seamlessly with adult treatments that utilize mood-modifiers like anti-depressants and anti-anxiety drugs - these days individuals can age well into adulthood without ever knowing themselves as the individuals they really are, or would be without the chemical balancing required to produce the "orderly", calm, quiet, cooperative citizens that currently populate our colleges and universities - they aren't less idealistic, only less motivated to be disruptive, unruly and obstreperous, because they're "medicated" -
Yeah! Maybe were all too medicated to know right from wrong! that sux. I'm throwing away my Lexapro and going on a shooting spree!
Look, it's not OUR war, it's THEIR war, to make THEM money...
We are little more than cattle, and customer to our corporate bosses.
Protests mean nothing, the only effective response is domestic terrorism (at least it makes the papers) like the kid in seattle or the muslim shrink at the cannonfodder farm.
The rest is just wishful hopeful, self righteous self congratulation.
Gandhi? MLK? SO what? End corporate personhood, reinstate the draft, dig a hole to china. save the whales... Kiss your babies. Be nice to your lover, meteor shower tonight.. all we have is now.
One big reason for shrinking protests that's missing from this article is that the antiwar movement has been ignored for about eight years. Eight effing years.
Obama comes into office and he continues the wars. He actually escalates them. People were so afraid of the Repugs that they voted for Obama even though he promised during the Presidential campaign to attack Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Loyalist Dems continue to engage in magical thinking that Obama is some kind of antiwar President - far from it. Even Tom Hayden quoted in this article proposed such absurd views.
Had alternative parties done better in the last Presidential election, that might have brought some pressure in Washington, D.C. As it is, the Dems and Repugs agree on continuing the wars, and no organized party has the political power to challenge them.
I think that's the most important reason. What difference would a letter to your war-supporting Congressperson make? What difference did those occupations of Hillary Clinton's Senate office make? Since mass protests were largely ignored by the corporate-owned press, most people didn't even know the protests were ongoing.
This article was by Agence France Press, but in France, various parties have representation. Not here. We have two corporate parties that both support the wars. And we've got a stupid public that continues to vote for them year after year.
-TIA
On Nov. 16, 2009 at least 150 people old, young, and middle age protested locating drone aircraft at a local Airfield. We held signs that said NO WAR: NO EMPIRE; NO OCCUPATION and WOULD DRONES CONVERT YOU TO DEMOCRACY?; EXECUTIONS WITHOUT TRIALS; among others . I did not see any disrespectful signs such as the ones the tea baggers carried.( They had a demonstration a few days before ours that protested any laws that would help immigrants in America.) My friend who was celebrating her 80th birthday was quoted in the local paper today that she " worried civilian casualties would prompt a response like the insurgency in Iraq. When they see their families getting killed, it makes them angrier at our country. It is not making anything better, it's making things worse."
Today a former Mayor of N.Y. city said that having the trials of the terrorist in N.Y.City courts will risk the lives of New Yorkers, nonsense! I believe there is a far greater risk that having a drone command center in our backyard will risk our lives. We signed a petition letter to be given to the Base Commander and handed it to her replacement,a security guard. The Peace Councils message was that:"We do not want Central N.Y. to become part of the global battlefield"
Media
A google of Drones and Syracuse brings up no mention of drones in a newspaper or tv website. Plenty of comment about their deployment on blogs.
Gee, wonder why the press didn't catch the congressman's praise for drones at the airport?
"new social technologies on the Web -- Facebook, Twitter, YouTube -- have mass mobilization potential."
Mass mobilization meaning to blog more loudly.
The article itself mentions "online distractions."
If these technologies were limited to phones, we may have had a tool to use to our advantage, maybe. But in the US, the Internet consumes all your time, from social networking services, to keeping up with celebrities and musicians, following the endless stream of new music hundreds of bands and artists continually release and remix, downloading and watching TV shows and movies, watching endless Youtube clips. These are all distractions. People have been over stimulated and can't get off it.
And the PTB (police, NSA, FBI) monitor them all to PREVENT exactly such 'spontaneous' gatherings....
Perhaps if this message from my button were to be implemented there might be a noticeable lack of interest in starting and maintaining more acts of aggression:
"DRAFT THE RICH-IT'S THEIR WAR[S]"
>>Exactly right, bakunin. There will be NO anti-war movement in this country until the draft is reinstated.<<
And that is precisely the reason it will never happen. I understood that in 2003. Who is going to install the draft? Certainly not congress or the war profiteers who bribe them with piddling campaign contributions while the war profiteers rake in $billions. And certainly not the Executive branch. They and other influential people in Washington (only a small handfull) who COULD do something have no muscle. The vast remainder just sit back, twiddle their thumbs, tickle their secretaries and pile up the campaign contributions toward the next election.
Why draft? Just impoverish the population, then wait for the recruits to come filing in....
Protest is when the people with money buy the mayor, who ropes you into a tiny cage away from anything significant, where you can "protest". Furthermore, the people with money threaten to yank their advertising from the papers, which ignore you. Or better yet the papers are already bought by wingnuts anticipating that you will protest. Oh, and then there are the beatings with clubs, with tear gas, with tazers. Furthermore, there are reports of the police taking young men and throwing them into the hardened side of the prison for a night of gang rapes. I just heard of a guy whose life went bad after that night.
The government plants encourage violent revolt. Note: expect a really short guy with monstrously long hair (a wig) to do the dirty work of smashing windows and slashing tires.
What a country! Sue them in court.
Right. The protests stopped because they didn't do any good. I don't really see what tactics would do any good at this point. But I do think we need to organize. When the poll numbers on the occupation go from 58% against to 78% against, we will at least have the possibility of effecting some small changes.
yeah...riiiiiiight
A sad comment on this country today.
Yes, the oppressors have won.
If I had the abilities and proportional strength of a spider along with a sixth sense and a mask so that I can't be recognized, I would partake.
"In 2007, police used an electro-shock Taser on a student causing a disturbance during an address by Senator John Kerry. Videos of the event have been seen on YouTube more than seven million times.
'After seeing that, are you going to speak out?' Williams asked."
He nailed it. And that's not counting the number of vigilantes/betrayers within the rank and file.
There was a ton of that here in Pittsburgh back in late September. I remember seeing an elderly man on TV that day in Lawrenceville standing in front of his small, modest home saying to the shock troops, "Go kick some ass guys!"
And yes, I am still conflicted over the fact that I stayed home.
Tell me how to defeat an army of goons and get away with it. Does it involve grappling hooks, smoke bombs, shurikens, an armored vehicle, and a few years of martial arts training in a Tibetan temple?
Yeah, I know about passive resistance. I'm not letting some asshole who wouldn't be shit on his own sans weapons and got picked on as a kid manhandle me to prove a point.
Hayden has it right. Re-instate the draft, now!
Whatever it takes to bring the brutality of our foreign policy home to the twittering jackals now calling themselves students.
Get out there. Don't wait for your laptop to tell you to, just get up, go to your post office, talk about the bullshit done in YOUR NAME around the world, SAY NO!!!
What's the point of protest? Unless it's organized by Fox it won't be covered, thus is completely ineffective. Wasted time and energy. Maybe we should all chip in and buy a bigger chunk of the media.
Yes, we should chip in and buy a chunk of the media.
War mongers, those who sell war instead of fish, saw what defeated their war marketing. The nightly news brought unpleasant images to everyone, bodies, our soldiers bloodied, the little girl burned, burning monks and defenseless kids protesting. The draft put fear into even the privileged wealthy families.
The war marketing arm revised its plans, bought newspapers, tv networks and radio. Bought congress via campaign funds, changed laws like the fairness doctrine, media ownership rules, banking and interest laws started many propaganda factories called think tanks. The result has been probably a thousand fold increase in their wealth. The unions should have done the same, acquired media and been on the defensive with educational campaigns, but Reagan won a victory by defeating the air traffic controllers union, but the battle should have been taken on by the unions then, stressing the risks of corporate abuse returning.
The health care and credit card/banking battle is a struggle to recover from the brink of economic serfdom. Good luck to us, many Democrat representatives are voting on the side of corporations, it's where their money comes from. Money buys votes, no money, no votes.
As an aging baby boomer, it's easy to wax nostalgic over the 60's and 70's -- they were bewildering and scary times, but also hopeful. We thought we could change things-- and I guess we did-- but there are always new Goliaths to battle.
It feels more out of control now-- those with money simply control SO much.
And, I think it also true that the majority of us are still just too comfortable. We might not like our particular socio/political locations much, but we are far too well fed and physically secure to risk anything quite yet. Like the story of the frog in the pot of hot water, it hasn't gotten hot enough yet to make us get the hell out of the pot. Once it IS hot enough... too late. We're cooked.
I agree with those of you suggesting that a universal draft/ universal service would help-- nations always fight wars with the bodies of the poorest and least powerful. When privileged kids are at risk too, perhaps their parents will take a bit more interest.
For a different sort of take on the "powers that be"-- those systems that have "lost sight of their divine vocation", read Walter Wink's Power Trilogy.
Disagreement is not significant. By identifying with and continuing to work towards their future in the USA while the country is embroiled in this war against the citizens of the world, American citizens are effectively becoming accessories after the fact.
To paraphrase a famous GW Bush inanity, either you are against them or you are with them.
The USA must be dismembered. As a country it has has no further legitimacy. The USA is history.
well said...I suggest September 22, 2012...global citizenry returning to local, natural, and individually-accountable living...
Corporate capitalism has complete ownership and/or control of all the institutions of indoctrination and power that working people in the U.S. would be normally be educated and influenced.
For decades the "leaders" of the organized labor movement have acted as "business partners" to corporate capitalism. Thus the labor movement usually works against the economic interests of it's own members and against the unorganized working people. Thus the steady decline of the numerical strength and political influence of the labor movement and working people in general.
Thus the newly elected President Trumka of the AFL-CIO supports Obama's "Health Care Reform" even though the recent convention in September voted unanimously in favor of "single-payer" Medicare for All. This bill will cut over half a trillion dollars out of Medicare, will not cover non-citizen immigrants, and will even fine working people who do not sign up for one of the gangster corporations.
The unions, for decades, have slavishly supported the Democratic Party. Now, under Obama, and with control of Congress by the Democrats, the unions continue supporting the Democrats even though Obama is continuing the Bush wars, the destruction of public education and public health, refusing to seriously deal with Global Warming when it affects the profits of corporate polluters.
There is no voice in any national media that expresses the concerns and survival needs of working people. The labor movement today refuses to express any anti-capitalist perspective essential to the creating an economy that supplies the needs of all the people, rather than just maximize profit and wealth to a few.
Nothing is done about the loss of millions of jobs through Globalization. For the last 30 years wages have, at best remained steady, if not actually declined for millions of working people. With this decline in income, unable to maintain essential living standards, credit card debt has now overwhelmed working people.
WHAT FACTOR UNDERLIES ALL OF THE CRISES FACING WORKING PEOPLE AND HUMANITY, THAT IS FORBIDDEN TO BE DISCUSSED IN 'PROGRESSIVE MEDIA" AND CERTAINLY CENSORED FROM ALL COMMERCIAL AND PUBLIC MEDIA?
The reality of the long term decline and now collapse of U.S. and global capitalism has become the forbidden perspective among public discourse . Socialist perspectives, analysis, critical thought will never be aired on "Democratcy Now!" nor will it appear in The Nation magazine, or here on CommonDreams.
Working people have been the victims of this collapse of capitalism. And nowhere is there readily available critical discussion, no development of political strategies to build a new political party, to create new mass media, to remove from power all the corrupt politicians who have supported this economic rape of the people and the planet.
For one source of vital socialist perspectives and anti-capitalist Marxist analysis, read and subscribe to the free daily World Socialist Web Site newsletter:
http://www.wsws.org
Agreed. It is interesting that DN! is willing to devote generous time to radicals of the past like this week's show on Yip Harburg, but seem much less willing to devote serious time to the radicals of today. To be fair, David Harvey (a socialist) was interviewed by Amy, but this is rare - and brief.
The main problem with the in-activism of the anti-war movement is that its energy got sucked into the Democratic Party and dissipated. This happened in 2004 when the anti-war movement was "forced" to support another pro-war candidate: John Kerry. But this is not new.
In "The Democrats: a Critical History", Lance Selfa (a socialist) shows that the Democratic Party has lured social movements to join their ranks with rhetoric of progressive change only do nothing in the end. His book demonstrates that time after time that "the Party of the People" has been, and continues to be, the "graveyard of social movements." Code Pink, UFPJ have aligned themselves with the Dems. This is suicide for the anti-war movement. If our movements are to be effective they MUST be independent of both factions of the "Business Party."
Why are social movements more potent in other countries? Simple, they actually have parties that represent the interests of working people.
Nov 17, 2009
KOREAN MODEL TRIUMPHS OVER WEST
By Ian Williams
The resurgence of the South Korean economy as Western countries, most notably the United States, struggle to emerge from financial crisis should put paid to long-standing criticism of the Asian country's chaebol- (or conglomerate-) based approach to growth.
In the most recent quarter, South Korea surprised even its own forecasters by achieving 3.9% annual economic growth, helped by a 4% increase in exports to China. That followed on the previous quarter's 2.6% growth, the highest in the 30-member Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Underlining the strength of the economy, Korea's jobless rate rose in September at the slowest pace among the world's major
economies - up by 0.4%, to 3.4%, compared with a year earlier, indicating its employment conditions remain relatively better than others in the face of the economic slowdown, a report from the Paris-based OECD showed on November 10. The OECD average rise was 2.3 percentage points.
Despite being a member of the OECD and of the Group of 20, nominally the successor to the Group of Eight leading industrialized nations, Korea has not really been regarded as a full member of the industrialized nations club.
For example, Korea was accepted into the OECD in 1996, yet it was only late last year, just before the global meltdown, that it was promoted from the FTSE emerging markets indices - and that was only after the admission of Israel raised some eyebrows.
article continued
=======================
Ironically, it's the aspects of Korea's business and economy that led Western business pundits to look down on it and caused reservations about its "developed" status that appear to have given the country its comparative advantage during the crisis.
The role in the economy of chaebol (or conglomerates, often family-based and with interlinked shareholdings), an emphasis on actually making things that people want, and the years of government protection and coordination on which key industries were built, now seem to be paying off.
Even before the financial crisis broke last year, the United Nations Development Program's Human Development Index, which takes into account education, longevity and other factors besides gross domestic product, placed Korea in its "Very Highly Developed" group. The International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and other compilers showed the country as the world's 15th-biggest economy.
As a measure of Korea's progress, its export strength to China is not goods for finishing and re-export, a feature of much of, for example, of Taiwan's and other East Asian economies' export industry, nor were they low-quality "cheap" goods in the pejorative sense. South Korea produces high-quality but economical goods that Chinese consumers demand.
Chinese consumers are not alone in being attracted to these products, as rising sales of Hyundai cars in the United States during the "cash for clunkers” program this year testify. Hyundai Kia Automotive Group's October sales in the US not only jumped nearly 50% from the same month last year, according to the automotive industry publication Ward's Auto; the increase rates of the two carmakers was the largest among light-vehicle brands, and nearly 14 times higher than the average increase rate for foreign brands.
At home, Korea's Industrial Production Index increased 5.4% in September from the previous month and 11.0% from the year before, according to Statistics Korea.
More impressively, and demonstrating that Korean manufacturers have money and confidence to invest, September's Equipment Investment Index surged 18.8% from the previous month and 5.8% from a year earlier. The government has also locked up money to spare, with currency reserves in October, at US$264 billion, reaching their second highest level ever.
In contrast, the Anglo-American consensus, which saw manufacturing and engineering as synonymous with rust-belts and obsolescence, is now suffering. Former British premier Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, his chancellor of the Exchequer and now prime minister, and former US president George W Bush were alike seduced with the charms of the service economy, where the population exist by lending each other money and selling (on credit) to each other things other people have made in less-blessed and sophisticated countries. Iceland is the extreme example of where that attitude can get you. Whaling might soon be their only source of income.
In any case, the economic advisers to both Prime Minister Brown and US President Barack Obama now seem to be reconsidering the previous neglect of manufacturing after years in which American and British governments reinterpreted and applied the commandment to it in the poet Arthur Hugh Clough's words:
Thou shalt not kill
But need'st not strive
Officiously to keep alive.
Similarly, years of Western hectoring of the Koreans about their lack of transparency as compared with Western corporate governance suddenly look more than a little foolish, in light of the opacity and indeed mendacity of Wall St and the City of London that has now brought the world to the brink of economic collapse.
Korean success has also been achieved without the widening of the income gap between richest and poorest that the bonus-collectors of the West tell us is an inescapable concomitant of economic growth. The country's Gini coefficient, used as a gauge of the wealth gap, with a lower figure indicating a smaller divide between rich and poor, was 31.3 in 2007 in South Korea, compared with 45 for the US the same year, according to CIA data.
Recent events might suggest that Seoul is committing itself to the broader principles of the Anglo-Saxon "Washington Consensus" on economic strategy. [1] It recently signed a free-trade agreement with the European Union, the world's biggest such deal since the North American Free Trade Agreement between Canada, the US and Mexico came into force in 1994. The US Congress is also under pressure to ratify a Korea-US free-trade deal.
But the newfound attachment to free trade comes at an appropriate time. The Asian tigers, just like the US and Germany before them, grew their industries to maturity in the greenhouse of protectionism before exposing them to competition.
Those allegedly inefficient and old-fashioned chaebol have grown into world-class companies, whose flexibility, innovation and nimbleness the crisis has demonstrated. Hyundai, Samsung, LG and others are global leaders in their fields, with clear success in marketing their wares.
Yet there is more to Korea's progress than that. Its government did not abstain from discussion about which direction the economy should take. The rapid turnaround from the recent financial crisis was in part because the size of its stimulus package, starting with US$11 billion last November, and the quickness with which it was passed and implemented by the government, but also because of a degree of social cohesion that allowed the stimulus package to be targeted more precisely.
"In times of crisis, Koreans come together," said one analyst, contrasting it with Washington, where a crisis is an opportunity to eviscerate one's political enemy.
Seoul's response as the economy turned around was not to let the economy coast along on the same, renewed trajectory, but to direct massive funding towards green and energy-conserving technologies, which seems to be meeting a response from the companies involved.
Similarly, its Development Bank is playing hardball with struggling General Motors over the future of its Korea-based Daewoo unit, demanding guarantees on future production and technology transfer before committing funds to the GM subsidiary, which is the US company's main producer of export model cars but which is excluded from Washington's bailout package.
Korea still needs to resolve tensions between the permanent and temporary workforce; it also needs to expand its service sector. Probably, it needs to rebalance its export sector to lessen its dependence on the US economy, to build on its comparative advantages in China and the developing world, and even to exploit the EU free-trade agreement.
This latest crisis, however, means that Korea, and indeed other Asian economies, should have even more self-confidence to develop in the direction that the empirical evidence indicates is successful, rather than burning sacrifices at the altar of an economic deity - the Anglo-Saxon Washington consensus - that has so spectacularly failed.
Note
1. The term "Washington Consensus" has come to be associated with fundamental free-market policies, with limited state interference in industry and trade.
Ian Williams is the author of Deserter: Bush's War on Military Families, Veterans and His Past, Nation Books, New York.
(Copyright 2009 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us about sales, syndication and republishing.)
Give and take on North Korea
(Oct 7, '09)
South Korea shows recovery skills
(Sep 11, '09)
Goodbye chaebol, hello small business (Jan 5, '08)
1. US finally wise to Pyongyang's ways
2. Sino-Indian rivalry fuels Nepal's turmoil
3. Which big country will default first?
4. A witches' cauldron brews in Yemen
5. Plots seen in Thaksin's Cambodia gambit
6. No country for gold men
7. Welcome home, war
8. Japan: A new battle over Okinawa
9. Afghans fear infiltration from Iran
10. US air supply drop turns deadly
(Nov 13-15, 2009)
==========================
teddy comment:
incidentally,,,although i am NOT korean -- i have had many korean friends over the years. and this CHAE-BOL - cultural system they have is true. it is actually LARGER than just 'family' - it can extend between friends and others that are interested in joining in a "collective" endeavor - EMPHASIS being on collective - but EACH being RESPONSIBLE for his or her part when his or her time to "show up" has arrived.
for example:
it is common among korean expatriates - to come together and find ways to collaborate so that INDIVIDUALS that need help will be helped by a group..they will formally - though without need for "legal documents" simply by word of honor and reputation in society - agree to - say:
EACH contribute 100 dollars per month. say-- 12 people.
MINUS ONE MONTH to one member. because that month which that member does NOT contribute is the month that the person will RECEIVE THE ENTIRE 11 months' collection --
1,200 dollars (12 people at 100.oo each) x 11 months collective money (12 people for 11 months) equals 112,000 dollars - for ANY purpose that person wishes the money for...a small business opening, kid's dental work, whatever..
the rest of the year in the cycle - that person must pay the 100-per-month.
this is why many koreans who are ready and willing and can KNOW that they are earning enough , somehow, to set aside 100 per month for 12 months (some will indeed borrow to cover holes ,so there are difficulties) - if that is the "level" of that group's agreement - tend to be STABLE whereever they have a certain quantity of koreans together.
after a while - they open small businesses, send kids to college, buy a house, etc...
they tend to always have "someone to run to" in the society...
CHAE-BOL being one form of it.
I have witnessed this personally among them.
in a sense then - this KOREAN "CHAE_BOL"
is , if one were to think of finance .. like having a "self-owned" or "wholly owned by stakeholder" BANK. it exists for its own reason only in order to give each member a chance to have a BIG "capital" formation that might be needed or useful for an enterprise of any sort.
and after a certain period - should the members decide - they can dissolve it . or if it is NOT sustainable because some are too irresponsible - they have of course the force of "social pressure" to correct a person..usually -- shame or the potential of it, being enough...and if a person can NOT sustain participation - out of respect for the others - will often VOLUNTARILY suspend participation and just pay off the rest of the obligations for the stated period he agreed to be part of.
sometimes - i had seen it - if the person still can not do that - the rest just basically "shrug" it off - and it is "cost of business". the understanding being that some people are just having too much of a hard time in life for the moment for this kind of participation and maybe should try a "smaller amount" Chae-bol.
something of that nature.
but i have NEVER witnessed or heard of CHAE-BOLS that demand
"interest" payments even from those that owe from back "contributions" . it is always
CLEAN - the PRINCIPAL is all there is. \
unlike the Western "banking and finance" system of Compound Interest.
if any ever come to acquaintance and friends with koreans - on this matter - i can generally assure people - as a NON-KOREAN that had very close friendships and involvement with them and their culture - Koreans are about as "honorable" as one can find..
and money in such things will generally be in good hands...for no other reason than HONOR.
they are TOUGH people, and VERY tough to deal with and with very subtle things that can rub off offensively to some because they can be very clannish or "strict" - but in things like these - IMO - koreans are among the most honorable people i have ever had the privilege of knowing.
i will also add - that from what I witnessed over many years - OFTEN - these chae-bols - even very large money ones - are run by WOMEN .
they are often the ones that really get things started and MAINTAINED...keeping the monthly connections alive. etc.
outwardly koreans are a very "patriarchal" society - but i have seen that the women - are often very powerful "behind the scenes".
I know this for a fact from having friends among them and from getting acquainted many many years ago with one of the most powerful and richest korean women .. who ran her "enterprises" like a dowager.
I think in their history - One of Korea's most powerful leaders was a woman, in fact...a queen. ..although PUBLICLY - they allow the men to be "master" where the woman , even very educated should NOT sound or look "too intelligent" ABOVE her husband. something like that.
hehe, very clever society, i think.
CORRECTION - my math:
11 months x 100 dollars from EACH of the 12 persons =$ 1,200
$ 1,200.00 x 11 months = $12,200.00 that the group gives to the person who is "due" to receive his or her "month" award for 12 month participation.
so - compare this with "western banking" - you put in 100.00 dollars with 5 percent interest in savings which they penalize you for taking out after a year ...or other "conditions"...
and yet in the end of a year you get just a little over
$ 1,200 dollars from the bank for your 100 dollars per month
which is the same amount as CHAE-BOL participants each give.
the Financial banks however have THOUSANDS, MILLIONS of depositors giving 100 dollars per month. EACH OF THEM getting only THEIR little money back.
and the bank runs laughing all the way to "the bank". by promising them 5% earnings on their 100 dollars per month.
WHICH IS BETTER and more honest? and MORE PROFITABLE? if one has to sacrifice the SAME 100 dollars per month?
hehe.
As many commenters have pointed out, the youth of today are loath to get out in the streets and the universities to protest the occupations because they do not have to fear what I and hundreds of thousands of others had to contend with and that was a military draft. Most males of a certain age back then were in terror of receiving a particular letter that began with the ominous word Greetings. But instead of worrying about their own self-interest, the antiwar movement [what there is of it today] should perhaps try a different approach in attempting to galvanize the masses and that would be the radical idea of actually trying to get the American people today to empathize with the people of Afghanistan and Iraq. Articles should be handed out at colleges and word passed out on the Internet concerning the many Afghan and Iraqi deaths that have occurred due to 500 lb. American bombs being dropped on those people. Have photos given to college kids depticting the many Afghans and Iraqis who have been the victims of those bombs and have them shown with their legs and arms blown off and their faces horribly burned and their eyes missing from their sockets.
It is probably just a forlorn hope but perhaps this might finally jolt so many apathetic Americans out of their lethargy.
"Articles should be handed out at colleges and word passed out on the Internet concerning the many Afghan and Iraqi deaths that have occurred due to 500 lb. American bombs being dropped on those people. Have photos given to college kids depicting the many Afghans and Iraqis who have been the victims of those bombs and have them shown with their legs and arms blown off and their faces horribly burned and their eyes missing from their sockets."
This is a good idea, and a simple one. There is so much information and distractable -from-the-issues programs and activities ... and the computer ... that too many folks are totally unaware of what's going on.
A few people getting together where they live to design handouts with photos and articles and sharing the costs of printing and standing in a Wal-mart parking lot or at the town supermarket parking lot and handing these handouts out ; - ) might help turn a corner.
Sort of like a local newspaper that comes out every couple of weeks in little chunks of neighborhoods with dedicated people to do it and who can share printing and paper costs.
THE HANDOUT MOVEMENT. Why not? Safer than protests with local cops now all twitchy and rarin' to go with their new taser toys and riot gear.
Consider creating a website, Erroll, or an interactive blog to share issues to focus on and members can then plan a steady blitz. A FREE YAHOO GROUP Board with messages on the board or sent to members would work too, with photograph capability. I'm in. [My older computer, finances, and very slow landline doesn't allow for great creativity and technical logistics, but I've done this before myself for local issues years ago with just a typewriter and a print shop to add a photo or two. Why not focus on the major issues that are so distorted in favor of the U.S. on TV and which so many folks don't even know about or know there is an alternative viewpoint?
Television reporters or news agencies won't even pay attention to a few people doing handouts, which in this instance is a good thing.]
Underground newspapers on campus and from local organizations was one of the publicity/educational/informational vehicles used effectively back in the Vietnam era.
What's good about this is that often when you do leafleting/handouts, people will be interested enough to stop and talk.
Anyway, think about it or anybody else.
/cm
"get the American people today to empathize with the people of Afghanistan and Iraq"
The idea makes perfect sense, perfectly coherent with and integral to the far-left's ultimate agenda - localism, shifting of production back to the local communities where it belongs. Naturally, the people will want to know that the same great approach is working elsewhere in the world. A world of local communities untethered to elite control centers, for the security of all. It's obvious. It's inevitable. And it's coming faster than the elites think!
Jonathan Williams says that the "criminalizing of dissent" has chilled/crushed the anti-war movement. 4 days in jail is small price to pay in comparison to what dissenters have paid throughout history.
He should read some -- including the histories of the civil rights movement, the 60's anti-war movement and the G.I. rebellions at home and abroad, all of which came together to help end the US wars in Southeast Asia.
Not to mention the resistance of Southeast Asians of numerous nationalities themselves, who died -- quite literally -- by the millions, fightng off the same imperial forces that bring us the wars of occupation in Afghanistan/Pakistan, Palestine/Israel and Iraq.
I never was a protester. I just enjoy watching the insane Mickey Mouse world the Europeans built upon their stolen Indian land of money money money. The nuclear waste cash register people.
Difficult to figure out how the Tribes lived for 1000's & 1000's of years without the insanity of Europeans & their world.
Life is good. What an experience! It's always best to forgive.
Indians didn't own land. Not in the European sense. There was a sense of territoriality--hunting and fishing rights were fought over and defended. Things weren't especially wonderful back in the 1600's before the Europeans became dominant. A lot of wars between tribes--Iroquois and the Anishnabe, for example. You can't blame all of this misery on Europeans. It belongs to humankind. Shadowdancer--you imagine a time of the noble savage that never existed. You see the past through the eyes of modern people, not through those of greatgrandfathers. Whites brought much suffering and a few good things, but the past you imagine is built from values foreign to those that actually lived the past.
I think, drosera, that's a broad leap to speak for Shadowdancer and his people.
The Native American values and spirituality are alive and well.
Look up on Google: Native American Wisdom.
I live near a reservation and go to meetings there sometimes, and am always impressed by how well the Seneca take care of their people and also generously open all their facilities to the public, whether an Olympic-size swimming pool, the incredibly beautiful library, the laundromat, walking on the land, and also themselves if you want to talk.
Forty years ago the reservation housing was pretty bad and the evidences of a lot of extreme poverty were apparent. Alcoholism was heavy duty. And education ... it turned out that the Federal funds for the local mainstream schools that were to be used for native students, and which included all kinds of supplies, were being dipped into big-time by the administration. The attitude, even by teachers [and I was a new teacher and appalled] included such remarks as "Those Indian boys need to be put in cages." This was the most "Christian" of Christians talking in that self- righteous tone that I have come to know so well in a town with many steeples. Many Indians are Christian because of the missionaries, and frankly, I cannot understand why they remain so.
The Smoke & Gas Shops and other professional services changed the economy, and there has been a lot of changes in various tribal entities working together, and some at a national level. Of course, the State goes nuts and tries to collect taxes on the cigarettes and gas, but the Senecas as well as other tribes have been recognized as separate nations. The cigarette wholesalers who are non-indian are now taxed and thus the price of cartons of cigarettes for the shop sales have more than doubled. Also the State wanted i.d. badges or cards indicating who was native and who was not in order to pay taxes or not pay taxes in their shops, which include a restaurant sometimes and Indian clothing and jewelry, etcetera. That idea was protested away.
The Senecas also managed to get some of their land back and get paid for what was taken or used without payment. The Pine Ridge Indians are still in a state of pitiful poverty, on land that is the worst they could have been given, and many tribes, despite very strong legal actions, are still waiting for the royalties on gas and oil discovered on the reservation land, amounting to billions of dollars.
Over-all much more organization with other tribes, and healthy-sized organized protests, including locally on the State Thruway which cuts through Seneca land without original permissions or any payment for tolls or use of the land, have yielded some postive results.
I am always struck that in my interactions with the Seneca, their over-all spiritual philosophies show through. Acceptance, a lack of animosity, a general, gentle kindness, and a kind of dignity that comes from knowing, perhaps, one is part of The ONE and everything and everyone are ALL OUR RELATIONS.
When I pray now, having left all the white man's, underline Man [and male-oriented], divisive religions behind quite some time ago, it is to The Great Spirit, creator of all that lives and exists, even the rocks which are considered living entities.
Yes, there were particular warring tribes, but remember a lot of our Constitution and princples of nationhood derive from the Iroquois Confederacy, ackowledged and studied and adopted and adapted by some of our own "Founding Fathers."
So much for the cultureless, uncivilized, dumb savages.
ALL OUR RELATIONS ... everything and everyone ... what a philosophy and spiritual teaching that honors the natural world which includes humans, but not as superior or inferior. Everything is equal and comes from the same source and everything is to be revered, respected and cared for, especially the vulnerable.
What a world this would be if the rest of us saw it that way.
And this is not to idealize because all humans have flaws and go off the deep end sometimes, but there have been no civilizations more destructive and arrogant than the White Man's Judeo/Christian culture not only with the endless wars, but with the decimation of our home planet and its natural wonders.
Honor the sacred.
Honor the Earth, our Mother.
Honor the Elders.
Honor all with whom we
share the Earth:-
Four-leggeds, two-leggeds,
winged ones,
Swimmers, crawlers,
plant and rock people.
Walk in balance and beauty.
Native American Elder
peace, cm
Figs to Gitlin; et tu, Williams Aronowitz, Hayden, Ruminas, Esbenshade and, Amen. Why must it be the young, lives already on our line? The Eternal Flamers (aka baby boomers, but for 58,209) are still here; today's yanks are still "Over There". What are WE waiting and they WASTING for? Just(ly) COME HOME.
In the Viet Nam war, the students ran the very real risk of having to give up their cushy future lifestyles and go fight, kill and die for the corporations they were about go to work for.
Those lucky enough to be members of the white, wealthy Elite could get deferment after deferment (Dick Cheney) or cushy State-side National Guard postings they could go AWOL from (George W, Bush).
How many politicians children actually made it to combat, where they could have been maimed or killed? How many from the scions of the Corporate Elite?
The cost of war, as always, was borne by the poor and the middle class.
Now the West uses their indigent poor and Third World mercenaries to do the killing for them. Their hands, and those of their spoiled offspring, are clean.
An important factor is simply the deep demoralization and depression among those of us who were engaging in vigorous protest from 1998 until about 2005. If we would be honest with ourselves, we wouldfind that we are hobbled with deep deep shame about our marginalization. This article helps:
http://www.zcommunications.org/zmag/viewArticle/23030
I was a part of that.
I became radical near the end of high school, and the tipping point from questioning everything I had believed in to becoming an activist was seeing the London protests on June 18th on TV. I had already started making "activist" type friends, but had still been a bit distant from it until that point. I had closely followed preparations for the Seattle protest and wanted to go, but was broke and had school school (really far away). I was able to attend anti-IMF protests in DC and anti-FTAA in Miami, but the "movement" had clearly been on decline by then (in the US). I never got into the anti-war "movement" as it had quickly been dominated by authoritarian, protest-centric groups, and the decentralized approach that had been developed for globalization never materialized against the war, rather groups just joined the date called upon by the authoritarian groups. These protests were too organized, played by all the rules, were boring, easily ignored, and forgotten. Of course the US media would not cover them much or favorably, so that should never be a goal. These groups then stopped holding protests and viola, the protest "movement" was suddenly gone.
I seriously felt prior to September 11th that there was something major happening as each protest grew stronger (there was even a massive protest being built up against the IMF meeting in DC a week later, we had a bunch of new people in our city interested in going), suddenly it seemed everything was interconnected. But the fact it disappeared so quickly revealed it was a bit of an illusion, that no solid foundations really existed in the US to sustain such a movement, especially if it were to face a shock like September 11th and the subsequent change in public psyche. I still believe in protests, but there are major fundamental problems that are more important for the US "left" to start working on rather than how many people show up, or how frequently people protest now. Protests hardly matter when people just go home at the end of the day anyway while nothing has changed to threaten any major power structure.
Todd Gitlin didn't want you inadvertently tossing bottles through the windows at Starbucks as it might adversely affect his retirement portfolio.
Now you know... So go throw some at Goldman Sachs.
No draft. Hundreds of thousands of students and parents don't have to worry about lives interrupted and possibly lost or ruined.
Professional army, called up reservists, and contractors quietly do what they signed up for. Its a job. We pay their salaries. Obama promised some changes. We went along.
In spite of IEDs, torture... the Iraq and Afghan wars don't hold a candle to the barbarism (on both sides) and mass destruction of the Viet Nam war.
The only protests I see are the of the trumped up with spin, exaggeration and lies tea party type.
bbr 5:40 A million dead Iraqis, Afghanis and Pakistanis competes with the worst of historical crimes.
DU,WP,Predators,Blackwater, --- I guess you had to be there.
Without a military draft to radicalize the present generation of the young there will be no mass youth movement against the wars or for affordable health care and the other reforms the society is desperately in need of. Right now we are in the position of a vehicle which has been in an accident on a perilous mountain road. We are now headed for the 600 ft sheer drop but we haven't gotten quite yet to the road's edge. Nothing is there to stop the momentum that will send us over the edge. We are experiencing the adrenalin rush of the initial impact, but we haven't had time to move into the second stage--total fear. That will come on when we reach the road's edge and start our fatal descent. Leaving the metaphor aside, the real world catastrophes which await us are: decisive defeat in Afghanistan and Iraq and national bankruptcy when the the next phases of the financial meltdown take place. The United States has been on the path of national suicide since the 60's or before. Now we are at a very late stage before the final collapse. China is waiting in the wings prepared to take up the role we will soon abandon of hyperpower.
Exactly right, bakunin. There will be NO anti-war movement in this country until the draft is reinstated.
The fact that Obama and Congress have not reinstated the draft tells me that this whole meatgrinder in the Middle East has nothing to do with our national security.
If we were really were in danger, they'd sign all the young, poor kids up.
Who needs a draft when you have Third World mercenaries working for Blackwater/Xe? Who needs more boots on the ground when your logistics and laundry are done by Haliburton/KBR?
Who needs a draft when an economic Collapse greater than the 1930's is driving ignorant young people into the arms of the military because it's the only job left with any pay at all and lousy benefits?
This is isn't accidental.
You don't have to call it a draft if your cannon fodder volunteers...
'You don't have to call it a draft if your cannon fodder volunteers...'
True...call it 'daft'...
"may you live in interesting times"
I know that boy. He graduated, found no job prospects, so joined the marines.
There'll be a big student action at UCLA (and UCB) next week Nov 17-19. See ucstrike.com (!) for links.
Don't pick on the kids for not doing anything and then pick on them when they do something. More than one has stated that they find this aggravating, and I don't blame them.
I like some of the things the CA students are saying. Let them think, let them do it, let's hope they exercise good judgment (and unless demonstrated otherwise believe that they can), and let Todd Gitlin stay home.
300 students, tops. UCB students did (almost) nothing when Yoo was employed. Spending too much time hiding behind their iPod and iPhone (TM), of course.
Ah, but will the MEDIA cover any of it? Most likly the police won't let the cameras down to the "free speech" zone, and if anybody becomes disobedient, out come the tasers, tear gas and media hit men to document the heroic actions of the police over an overwhelming number of students, bent upon distruction, not constructive talk.... catch 22
I hope it is evident to Hayden, Gitlin, and all these former SDS'ers that it's certainly abundantly clear today that when Obama told us, before the election, that Bill Ayers #3 of SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) had absolutely no influence on him, that he was telling the truth ---- because Obama has "sure as hell" not been doing anything to fight for a 'democratic society' (against economic oppression, racism, imperialist wars, etc. etc.).
Obama never mentioned anything, before we 'gave him' our votes, about the ruling-elite corporate/financial imperialist war-machine, racist tyranny, and working-class economic inequality that SDS fought against in the late 1960's --- and which, in the last 40 years, has gotten worse.
Obama was being truthful with us when he totally ignored the very existence of this ruling-elite corporate/financial Empire that controls our country by hiding behind the facade of its two-party 'Vichy' sham of democracy, and he was being totally truthful when he said nothing about this Empire that he himself was auditioning to become the best 'front-man' for.
It's just that we were too stupid, before the election, to ask him, "Hey, what about this Empire that is killing our country and the world? Will you represent this deceitful and hidden corporate/financial Empire or will you represent us?"
We never asked him about which side he was on in our battle with Empire --- so he wasn't lying when he said, and now has done, EXACTLY NOTHING.
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
I guess all this means that "We The People" are too busy and too distracted to involve ourselves in participatory democracy. When people think that democracy occurs every 4 years on the second Tuesday of November, then we are lost.
Who will notice when the US passes into totalitarianism?
WTF, correction, "passed into Empire".
No, he's quite right. Totalitarianism is the right word for the way the us gov't works. Certainly not the old form of the ideology, where you'd be shot if you disagreed with the state. They've refined it a fair bit. When you protest(about Iraq, Afghanistan, real health care), it is not reported; when an enemy protests(Iran), that is reported.
Should you be effective at protesting, you'll lose your job, or be unable to find one. Rather than kill you outright, they let you starve.
Think of the topics that are still not talked about seriously. Not just the ones that would bring about an end to the wars launched by Bush, but also the wars against drugs, against poverty, against corruption. Do people speak of the class divide in the usa, or do they mention it to dismiss it as fiction? Do the talking heads ever question the idea that the usa is the greatest country in the world? Do they ever consider the fact that not everyone wants to be a citizen of the usa anymore (as if they ever really did)? Is any discussion ever allowed on the tube which deals with the aggression of the usa in a serious and honest manner?
There is a show put on by the talking heads that does try to give the impression that your voices still matter, that the votes cast are actually counted, that there really is (honestly) a real difference between the Republicans and the Democrats.
P T Barnum would have recognized the show, but for most of your countrymen that is not a connection they're willing to entertain.
If students are too concerned with getting a job and making money to protest I can understand them not protesting war. I can't understand why they are not protesting against Obama's extortion-based "health care reform" that assures that millions of boomers will delay their retirements 5, 10, 15 or more years, thereby reducing the number of job opportunities for millions of college grads.
[protesting against Obama's extortion-based "health care reform"]
They think they'll get jobs in the 'reformed' health care sector. Of course to keep their jobs in that sector they'll have to lose whatever tie they ever had to humanitarian ideals. Fortunately, as they're not out protesting the killing of innocents, well... I don't think they'll have much problem with working for the devils.