Deadbeat…It’s not a matter of ‘right’ or left’ or ‘up’ and ‘down’ – Progressive, Liberal, Green, Purple …they are all just labels.
IT’S THE VOTERS. Once someone goes into a voting booth and casts a ballot, they have done an action that will affect the lives of others; therefore, a moral or immoral act. I am not using the word ‘moral’ in a religious sence. I am thinking in terms of humanity, honor, and ethics – empathy, which demands that we do no harm to others.

Nader is in it to win; but, winning isn’t everything. I am a candidate for State Attorney General. I hope to win – but if I don’t, I will have raised the consciousness of others about Justice and why Justice is sometimes more important than food. “Where there is no Justice, nothing else matters.” (One of my campaign slogans.)

First up … hi RMJ! This is ‘expendable’ Andy.

I see there’s a kind of debate about the article going on so I apologize in advance for going back to simple statements. I just want to talk generally about Michael Moore.

I find Michael Moore to be both an inspiration and a frustration.

First up, the bad. Michael seems to pin a lot these days on getting results through a kind of reforming of the democrats. Encouraging people to vote and pressuring the better options into more responsibility is a legit way to go about it, but I think it’s hopelessly playing into the system.

What Michael does well, and what he constantly provides great examples for, is direct action. Michael’s work is a great example of how we as people can just go at the issues themselves and find our own creative ways to inspire and inform our communities. His early work like Roger and Me or some of his TV Nation show, or getting the ammo off the shelves in Bowling for Columbine shows how we can try to go to the source of problems ourselves in a forceful but non-violent way.

Taking the shooting victim into the store in that particular scene is bringing the truth of the matter into the open.

When Michael was doing this kind of work, which he still does at times, for example Sicko, I felt that someone was taking back the media. We know he is doing something right when the media world shuffle their feet and start using words like ‘heavy-handed’, ‘preachy’, ‘political’ and ‘didactic’. They can’t suffer even one movie in three years or so that is issue based because in our so called enlightened, democratic society it is still ‘bad form’ to talk about issues in the open – outside of sanctioned political talk by the establishment, that is. And in a way that begs action, not just nostalgic contemplation.

I feel that trying to engage well-bred system acolytes such as Kerry or Obama will only have limited results and I see where frustration might come with Moore lately. I do hope we can still see what a real shining light he has been over the years though, for the spirit of getting up and doing something.

Hope this didn’t over simplify or patronize the previous comments.

Andy

Huey Long, yep!

An inconvenient Truth was accurate for its science (though I feel it was dishonest and discouraging with its solutions that amounted to letting people like him off the hook)

Strange thing that developed is that those who hate Gore for all the wrong reasons used that hatred to further entrench their disbelief for man’s contribution to climate change. I’m no fan of circumstantial ad hominem but with the stakes so high, could he not have just quietly funded the project? The science was solid without his cheaply bought Nobelity.

we need to forcibly take private money, electronic voting machines, unequal media coverage, and other impediments to democracy out of play.

Nice rhetoric but who is “we”? The problem with your rhetoric is that the “people” is too atomize and there is no cohesive coherence among the “people”.

There is no such thing as “the left,” there are only individual people, and those that actually organize themselves into groups, and those members of such groups who support the outcome reached.

Oh yes there is and it is “organized” to such a degree that is sabotaged Nader and diffused the anti-war movement.

If you would be just as fine with a homophobic, racist pro-poverty Barr administration in place, then the green party simply is not with you, and clearly you have other disagreements with Mckinney.

Neither Barr or McKinney will achieve power so your rhetoric is demagogy.

There is no such thing as “the left,” there are only individual people, and those that actually organize themselves into groups, and those members of such groups who support the outcome reached. If you would be just as fine with a homophobic, racist pro-poverty Barr administration in place, then the green party simply is not with you, and clearly you have other disagreements with Mckinney.

Deadbeat you talk about a left like it represents a thing rather than the very public you seem to be eliminating from your landscape of who elects from these limited choices.

Max you seem to be interjecting your own strawman to construct an argument. The fact is that YOU want to deny that the Left has been destructive to building the kind of campaign, base, and support that Nader needs to reach the American people. Clearly most of my critique is about the Left therefore how can you say that I seem to be “eliminating” them from the landscape when in fact I’ve argued that the Left is not passive actors as you like to make them out to be.

On the one hand, I agree that there is a kind of left, represented most aptly by Mr. Moore who has forsaken the progressive movement. He along with millions of other so-called progressives have chosen to align with the Dem Party and its candidate.

Max you haven’t shown why progressives who DO NOT support the Democratic Party are in fact “progressives”. As I have pointed out the Green Party supports as their standard bearer someone who voted for the WAR in Afghanistan. Never before has the Green Party ever made such compromises. In fact numerous progressive changes has been achieved through the Democratic Party such as Civil Rights Laws, Social Security, Women Rights, Gay Right, etc. So your argument is a fallacious since they are contradicted by historical facts. If there was a stronger “Left” then there would be a “better” Democratic Party. The irony is that there is a much STRONGER popular revolt coming from the RIGHT.

I think Rosemarie and others here agree, as does Mr. Mayer, that those liberal/progressives became duopoly partisans and with it are buying the “lesser of two evils” paradigm.

The reason why there is a “lesser of two evils” is because there is NO better alternative. As I have pointed out Nader COULD HAVE BEEN in a stronger position for 2008 had the Left not sabotaged his 2004 campaign and had the Left not diffused the anti-war movement.

Therefore critical analysis is needed to observe the actions on the “Left” rather than BLAME “generic voters” like Rosemarie. It is counter productive and shift the focus AWAY from the Left’s role in creating the current void that allowed Obama to emerge.

But it seems your beef is not with the likes of Moore, and those he represents, but rather some “other” left. And it is this “other” that is at once illusive and seemingly the basis of nearly all your rancor.

Max, I’ve been very clear of the “Left” that has been at the basis of my critique. My response to Rosemarie was not about Michael Moore but about Nader’s being in the wilderness rather than front and center due to the betrayal by the “Left”. Moore clearly was part of that “betrayal” but Moore is to the “right” of much of the “Left” that abandoned Nader and weakened the anti-war movement in 2004. Thus setting up Nader to be today about where he was four years ago.

As I stated to Rosemarie, Nader should be polling at LEAST 10+% had he grew the Green Party’s base and that he would pull in COATTAILS. Especially with the current Financial Crisis exposing the corruption of both the Democrats & Republicans. Unfortunately there is a corruption of the Left that you want to deny, dismiss and obscure.

I’m not as quick to “blame” the American voters per se because Nader is not in this race to win as much as to be one essential voice that challenges and changes the established narrative that the duopoly sprews forth every four years; the one that has a strangle hold on the world.

The point is Max, that you DO NOT seem to understand is that I am arguing is that in 2008 Nader would have a shot at “WINNING” and if not he would be a position to win COATTAILS had he not been sabotaged by the “Left” in 2004!

US political and economic problems are deep structural issues which no single candidacy will change. It will take a progressive movement strong enough to take on the challenge of collapse when it happens, otherwise, fascism will have the last word.

The problem as I see it is that the Left would LOVE to see the emergence of Fascism (represented by a McCain victory) as a organizing tool since the Left seems incapable of building solidity and has done a great job of retarding it because it has failed to adhere to core principles of truth, justice, equality, fairness and democracy.

“The Rich Are Staging a Coup This Morning”
By Michael Moore
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article20891.htm

So, is anybody currently planning some serious “torches and pitchforks” demonstrations in opposition to the relatively inevitable “compromised compromise” version of this giant rip-off scam?

If Thomas Jefferson actually DIDN’T say the following — the attribution is contested — he certainly should have!:

“When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.”

Hue Longer: Absolutely! But I may have overstepped my “powers of perception”. I at least assumed your “moniker” was a direct reference to THE Huey Long. No?

Without going into a lengthy discourse on Gore — I’m certainly not any Gore “expert” — my credibilty comment was based primarily on his documentary “An Inconvenient Truth”. For all the flak it has indeed taken, it IS remarkably sound in its scientific assertions, and highly commendable for its overall persuasiveness. I can’t fault that one in the least, and I DO have a background in environmental science.

But on other Gore issues, aside from his legitimacy as the actual winner of the 2000 Presidential election, I’m not terribly “conversant”, I’m afraid. (Frankly, I wonder if we’ll EVER have a truly elected President during this Orwellian Century.)

Yes, I didn’t mention Israel and I assure you it wasn’t intentional. I’m curious what credibility you believe Gore possesses…

That this guy could attach himself to climate change and force a personal defense is not a good thing. The silly hatred of his benighted Republican voting enemies aside, he has real shortcomings as a human being. Just on Climate change, Gore was anything but green: Two faced Kyoto killer, NAFTA’s spokesman, and quiet enabler of the precursor to the “Healthy” Forests scam.

Cheers and I liked the Huey Long bit (was that directed? well done)

Just wondering. :)

Thom Hartmann talks with Mark Crispin Miller, 19 August 2008
http://www.thomhartmann.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=951&Itemid=119

‘ Mark Crispin Miller [NYU professor and author of "Fooled Again, How the Right Stole the 2004 Elections" and "Loser Take All: Election Fraud and The Subversion of Democracy"] talks about an unimpeachable whistleblower on Republican election theft; Stephen Spoonamore, a lifelong Republican and erstwhile member of the McCain campaign until he discovered so much about the Republicans’ election fraud that he resigned, and a prominent expert on computer crime. …’

It would seem that if one goes along with your premise, liberals must always vote for the Democrats because they have the power and/or all Americans must vote for either the Democrats or the Republicans because these two parties have the power. This certainly seems reminiscent of Orwell’s Animal Farm- two legs good, four legs bad. In this case, one can vote for anyone one wishes just as long as that candidate is either a Democrat or a Republican. As for me, I prefer to think for myself.

Premise: SICKO and Michael Moore’s subsequent Washington visit implies that Michael Moore wants to play a role in designing a new health care system in the US.

Fact: Only those in power can bring such a thing to realization.

Premise: Michael Moore wants power, so that he can push his proposed system (and perhaps other propositions he might come up with).

Fact: Michael Moore has aligned himself with the Democratic party.

http://dennisperrin.blogspot.com/

It’s unfortunate when people like Moore attain a level of influence that could be used to promote third parties or pressure powers that be to address issues but let “celebrity” go to their heads, or, lack the cajones to buck the system. With Moore, I think it is a little bit of both.

I tuned out Moore in 2004 when he campaigned for empty suit Wesley Clark. No surprise he is now up Obama’s butt. He should update his “Stupid White Men” book with a chapter devoted to himself.

Deadbeat: The scenario you invoke could EASILY be remedied in this country by the introduction of “instant-runoff” voting, as utilized in Britain and recommended by former US candidate John Anderson several years ago. Of course, the duopoly is HARDLY interested in eroding its own coercive power by allowing such an admirably democratic, “second choice” voting scheme that would assure an electoral majority. Members of both major parties would much rather wield the “spoiler” rhetoric, in the hopes of intimidating voters into conforming to the srarus quo’s preferred, 2-party-ONLY scheme.

As to whether a vote for an alternative candidate would assuredly benefit McCain, I’m not entirely convinced of that myself, since both “mainstream” candidates are now similarly bellicose and fictitious in their claims and are rapidly becoming virtually indistinguishable in their actual “platforms”. I don’t doubt that Obama would actually appeal to a good many paleo-Conservatives, who should rightly view the McCain-Palin ticket with grave alarm.

Regardless, the public will never break free of that “Republocrat” stranglehold on democracy UNTIL it simply ignores the “conventional wisdom” and vigorously supports the would-be “spoilers” it desires rather than kowtow to the fear that this will cause the “other side” to win. Besides, what would lead you to believe that ANY of our 21st-century E-lections thus far were truly representative of the “will of the people”?? (It certainly wouldn’t be the Exit Polls!)

Hue Longer: At first that one eluded me (re “these guys”). But NOW I understand entirely. Yes, the bogus rhetoric of both mainstream candidates, devoid of the slightest basis in factuality, is decidedly out there in La-La Land and makes them “quite a couple”.

Plus, don’t forget the many other red herrings gratuitously spewed for public consumption: our secretly nuclear-armed “staunch ally” Israel can do NO wrong, whereas Iran’s nuclear POWER program represents a genuine “threat”; Iran’s exceedingly mannerly, soft-spoken leader, Ahmadinejad, is the latest (since Saddam’s demise) incarnation of “Adolf Hiltler”; and so on, and so forth, piled high and deep.

While I’d disagree regarding Gore’s credibility and Moore’s “Fahrenheit 911″, which I value immensely for those things it DOES glaringly reveal — NO 9/11 expose’ to date can be regarded as “complete” — it’s hard not to instantly like a commentator whose namesake’s speeches I so deeply admire. As Randy Newman might pen it, “Huey Long may have been a scoundrel, but he was OUR scoundrel!” Hooray for the Kingfish, without whom the US government might never have implemented the desperately needed “safety net” of Social Security, among other programs, during the Great Depression.

On the one hand, I agree that there is a kind of left, represented most aptly by Mr. Moore who has forsaken the progressive movement. He along with millions of other so-called progressives have chosen to align with the Dem Party and its candidate.

I think Rosemarie and others here agree, as does Mr. Mayer, that those liberal/progressives became duopoly partisans and with it are buying the “lesser of two evils” paradigm.

But it seems your beef is not with the likes of Moore, and those he represents, but rather some “other” left. And it is this “other” that is at once illusive and seemingly the basis of nearly all your rancor.

Perhaps some day you’ll explain.

I’m not as quick to “blame” the American voters per se because Nader is not in this race to win as much as to be one essential voice that challenges and changes the established narrative that the duopoly sprews forth every four years; the one that has a strangle hold on the world.

US political and economic problems are deep structural issues which no single candidacy will change. It will take a progressive movement strong enough to take on the challenge of collapse when it happens, otherwise, fascism will have the last word.

Now it is up to the voters. One thing is for sure. They will get the kind of government they deserve.

Rosemarie, I have the utmost respect for Ralph Nader and his run. I was an ardent supporter of Nader in 2004 but who are the “voters” that you speak of Rosemarie? Do they include the “Left” who abandon Nader in 2004 and collapsed the anti-war movement thus forcing Nader to run outside of the institutional support he helped to construct in 2000.

Your “blaming the voter” leaves the “Left” off-the-hook and there is no self-assessment on how the “Left” needs to be reconstructed and reconstituted in order to present a stronger front to voters.

Had the Left supported Nader and built upon the his 2000 run in 2004 he would be in a much stronger position for this year. Nader is only polling at 2% (same as Bob Barr).

What you are suggesting is that voters vote for a candidate who cannot win or effect any change thus opening up the opportunity for a McCain victory. And then label those voters as “irresponsible”.

The real problem Rosemarie is on the Left not and not with the mainstream voters behind Obama. In fact I argue that Obama’s emergence was aided by the Left due to their abandonment of Nader’s 2004 campaign.

As you say Rosemarie, Nader is on the ballot on 45 states. This is a 50 state campaign not a 45 state campaign. Had the Green Party not sabotaged Nader he would be running as a Green and on the ballot in ALL 50 states with perhaps a 10+% in the polls and there would be coattails for other Greens on the ballot like Cindy Sheehan.

So again I ask WHY are YOU blaming “voters” when the “Left” is to blame for where it finds itself today and it is the “Left” that has constricted the choices for voters.