06-02-2019, 07:15 PM
(06-02-2019, 01:01 PM)Mikebert Wrote:(05-31-2019, 04:14 PM)David Horn Wrote:(05-31-2019, 03:44 PM)Mikebert Wrote: The reality of today has moved beyond the ability of past experience to explain it.
This is the issue we've tried to overcome, or barring that, ignore. So far, we're not doing very well at either level. But history will do a perfect job, 75 to 100 years from now … not that we should care all that much. This feels like a pivotal moment, but totally without direction.
We know what needs to be done, but how? Being an issue warrior tends to generate more backlash than converts. Being passive just allows the current ills to continue. Somewhere in the middle, or somewhere else entirely, there is a solution that escapes me.
The Civil War 4T struggle was over Red vs Blue. The Blue Conservative party won. In the Depression the struggle was over Conservative vs (econ) Progressive. The Red Progressive party won.
Today the term progressive (or liberal) has gotten so tangled up with cultural politics that they can no longer be separated. This is, I think, a core problem. Progressives/liberals are BOTH Blue and progressive while Conservatives are both Red and conservative. So an effort by progressives to advance policy is a war on two fronts, and those usually end in defeat.
The progressives are not pushing cultural values or identity politics. The reactionaries do that!
This time the struggle is between freedom and dictatorship. Don't fool yourself about the poltroon now President; if he goes, then there will be someone else, probably more polished in his political expression and more knowledgeable about the political process. We will need to take out those who enable Trump because those people will enable the next, more dangerous, right-wing demagogue.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.