What part of what I write, HR, don’t you understand? It seems like pretty much everything. So, my suggestion is don’t respond to what you don’t get.

Why don’t you start a US party? Tell us where to send our donations.
thnx

Thanks for your thoughtful response. I’m not convinced that a third party is the solution. Why? Because such a party would have to perform some real magic – how NOT to be marginalized before it even got off the ground?

I could imagine a party that came out of a movement. It would be self-organizing and not hierarchical. The problem with top down organizing is that it inherits the very destructive seeds you are trying to get away from. Such a party would not be like the Dems or Repubs and therefore would not be like the Labor Party Myles envisions.

There are organizing principles which work. They are messy, when compared to top down organizing. Since the empire version is all about order and control, it is attractive to many when they consider an alternative party like Myles has discussed. It is, however, dangerous, to simply replace (if that’s even possible) one party with another using the same structural underpinnings and funding mechanism.

I appreciate the desire for a true alternative means of voicing a powerful progressive governance. But too frequently, progressives follow the path laid down by empire. Violence is the ultimate submission to empire. So, violent revolutions backfire only proving empire’s model as the ultimate winner and not moving using fundamentally along.

I agree that the change needs to come from outside the system, and needs to be made with what we have – people. Change is much more likely on a smaller scale. Self-organizing is what creates authentic movements and from there change. Such organizing is unstoppable. MLK and Ghandi both prove the power of such self-organizing. It is how nature works. It is the only way real authentic change can happen.

Parties are artificial structures. If they are extensions of a movement they can have purpose, but they tend to take on a life of their own, leaving most everyone else behind. Hierachical parties are simply a swap from one empire party to another.

The point, the one I made and was utterly mangled by your buddy – Deadbeat – is that a Labor Party is not the solution when it uses as its model the empire structure which is what Brandy and Myles were proposing.

Huey Long has absolutely NOTHING to do with my point, but Deadbeat – and you are amplifying it – interject Long into the discussion. Long was not part of a Labor Party. Yes he was a populist. No one is denying that. He may have forced – along with many other factors – FDR to move more to a progressive position within the New Deal.

Again, has absolutely NOTHING to do with my point. Do any of you guys READ or just pick up on a word and run off at the mouth as if you got some kind of great IDEA?!?!

If you want to respond to my posts – please don’t shift the conversation to something that has NOTHING to do with what I stated.

Thank you
Max

Huey, along with midwest populists in “congress” did cause FDR to move farther to the left than he was originally inclined to move. Huey also, in the context of the reality of the LA politics, was a progressive, one who became feared by the national ruling elite. The response was to brand him a demagogue, something bad according to their definition, which is far from the original definition of the word: someone who champions the cause of the people.

He should be required study, if only to point out the contrast between what media and “historians” portray as real and what is truly real.

Your comments lack total substance as usual.

You are of the old school which thinks the “new” way forward is through the prism of the old empire.

The New Deal saved the fundamental structure of empire and allowed it to become what it is today – the world’s most egrecious violator of human rights via mass invasions.

The New Deal did save capitalism, and did nothing for the so-called left. But the problem is not left/right. It is a systemic problem that has been thoroughly documented – you, Deadbeat just need to READ. It may be too nuanced or perhaps too blunt for you. In any case, you’ve got your usual specious argument that is baseless.

Siding with this Labor Party two-some simply supports the weakness of their case.

Saying my arguments lacks nuance is simply your usual way of saying NOTHING. Sure, Huey Long changed America! Now that would be a surprise to Louisiana that bastion of progressivism. The most corrupt state (perhaps second to Illinois) in the terribly corrupt union of the USA.

Deadbeat, since when is Huey Long must read for American Empire history? Only in your little world.

It is the Left’s ineffectiveness at building solidarity that created the environment for Barack Obama NOT the other way around. The Left today is NOT offering an alternative to the duopoly. Also Max needs to do a better review of history. One of the reason why Roosevelt had to offer a new deal was due to the challenge he was getting from his Left flank and especially the “Share the Wealth” campaign of Huey Long who was murdered just prior to his 1936 challenge. Unfortunately Max is not a very good student of history.

Obama is a perfect case in point. If a party must “compete” within the system it is forced to live within it. The parameters are clear.

Nader was the exception this time and last as he ran as an independent. This has the advantage of not playing by the empire’s rules but the disadvantage of being totally shut out.

This is not about a person. It is about a culture and economic system which fosters an imperial empire. All of our institutions reflect this structure. To simply add another one creates the illusion of alternative – as did Obama for some people, without the fundamentals changing at all.

The New Deal preserved the empire. At that moment in time we could have taken a different course, but instead the system was patched and sent on its way to become ever more what it was then a uni-super imperial empire.

The American polity, culture and economics must all be redirected. At the national level this is a massive – pretty much futile undertaking. It is only at the local level, human-scale, that we can make the kind of profound changes needed.

John Andrews on another topic brought up this Free Democracy is a solution. http://www.freedemocrats.co.uk.

Sounds like an interesting place to consider some action coupled with some other grass-roots transformation.

You and your friend, Brandy, seem to have it all figured out with Labor Party.

Bozh,
I don’t think the American empire invented empire or war. So, let’s not get too carried away with the perfections of non-US Imperialism is better than US Imperialism.

Seems the US has a monopoly on the endless war but the US is simply the seed of European empire rule.

I don’t know that anyone in the US votes for war (at least not the majority).

I think you’d need to expand on your idea of how 2 parties assure that the plutocracy doesn’t rule. After all the duopoly plays at being two parties, what makes you think that another party who plays by the plutocratic rules doesn’t just become another faux alternative?

There is just so much that can and needs to be done. Parties are limiting. They keep you away from the real work, work that is not fruitless but yields real results.

My community is embarking on several different non-hierarchical models of local businesses, a new local food system and changing the fundamental way land is used in urban centers.

I won’t go on, but this kind of work requires organizing, but not party organizing.

Parties are very problematic because they create a political cynicism which is divisive when you’re looking to transform what’s going on.

But I gather that you and Brandy are pretty satisfied with the power structure and just see an opportunity to get a new party going.

Have fun. Maybe if you put a tenth of the effort into getting land value tax passed in Maryland you’d really be accomplishing something for the people of Maryland (contact the Maryland Land Value Tax project)…but I got it, you need to start a party.

To say “needing money is a joke” is absurd when dealing with a movement. I’m sorry, but singing “Joe Hill” will not get people to magically materialize flyers, billboards, phone banks, street work.

I was embarrassed to be part of the Greens in MD who some felt that for a state-wide race asking for a very limited amount from individuals was the only way of showing that they’re Green.

You think Brandy is ‘living a delusional fantasy’ but what kind of life are you living? Do you contribute to anything? Do you put limits on what you give for fear that the receiver might become corrupted by your extra bucks?
Do you do anything that makes a difference or do you blog? Is your reality around a computer screen, or as research has shown, like Brandy’s who has been a candidate for a state office and involved in many leftist campaigns, doing real street work.

To all reading this, anyone in the State of Maryland who would like to attempt to start a Labor Party please contact me directly and we can try and start something new. Reality is what we make it. If some think it’s delusional then exert your energy elsewhere, but I hope it’s in a productive direction.

Myles

The rest of us have work to do.