Jul 09 2009

On A Unified Progressive Agenda

HarlequinNarrowSo a while back budhy posted an essay that kind of asked us how we stood on the major progressive issues of today.

Are you-

  • A Human Rights Progressive?
  • An Economic Progressive?
  • A Constitutional Progressive?
  • An Environmental Progressive?
  • An Anti-War Progressive?
  • A Health Care Progressive?

Can’t say as I have a disagreement with any of you even if you think I’m not inclusive enough or have mislabeled you.

But if you claim to be a partisan, status quo Progressive…

Well, you’re really not very progressive at all.

One Friedman unit into this Administration it is clear that ‘change’ is not much on the agenda, although hope, delusion, and denial are being dangled like so many jingly keys.

In the Corrida a wise bull focuses on the matador and not the cape.

I’m not distracted by bright and shiny objects and you shouldn’t be either.  It is entirely about accountability and whether our Representatives represent the voter or Beltway Special Interests.

Nor am I much in favor of letting apologists, excuse makers, and denialists becoming comfortable in their addiction to partisan power.

If you are not outraged you are not paying attention.

51 comments

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  1. “Status Quo Progressive” is an Oxy Moran.

    Give me people with principles.

    • Edger on July 9, 2009 at 02:35
    • #

    So, so you think you can tell

    Heaven from Hell,

    Blue skies from pain.

    Can you tell a green field

    From a cold steel rail?

    A smile from a veil?

    Do you think you can tell?

    Did they get you to trade

    Your heroes for ghosts?

    Hot ashes for trees?

    Hot air for a cool breeze?

    Cold comfort for change?

    Did you exchange

    A walk on part in the war,

    For a lead role in a cage?

    How I wish, how I wish you were here.

    We’re just two lost souls

    Swimming in a fish bowl,

    Year after year,

    Running over the same old ground.

    What have we found

    The same old fears.



    Wish You Were Here…

  3. Lately I’ve been talking about them to the dog more than anyone else around me.

    Her eyes don’t glaze over.

  4. The way I look at it, the establishment, i.e, the elite, Wall St, Major Corporations, the MIC, lobbies and powerful special interests (such as AIPAC and all the think tanks), are what really controls this country and all the progressive agendas listed above.  No progress will be made on human rights, the economy, war, the environment, health care, etc., without changing this fucking system.  After going thru that, perhaps I’m a constitutional progressive.  

  6. taylormattd turns around.

    Except he doesn’t.

    • Adam on July 9, 2009 at 03:11
    • #

    The root of the word “social” is society. It’s not “communist,” as the right wingers claim. The group everyone is a part? That’s call society.

    The words “social” and “society” are your friends. 🙂

  8. tin foil became so ingrained in the culture. Got to hand it to the propagandists on that one.  They got the left, right and middle with that ploy.  Ever seen Glenn Beck and Keith Olbermann agree, talk about conspiracy theorists.  

  9. it was wrong under Bush and it is wrong under Obama.

     human rights is probably where I disapprove of Obama the most right now. I really do try to aware of complexity and will be quick to admit that I am completely mistaken- but it does seem to me Obama is unwilling to really undo the status quo of many Bush era war on terror tactics.

    At heart I consider myself a democratic socialist- but I just want a world in which corporate interests don’t dominate all our trade policies, food policies, health care policies etc. I’m really sick and tired of the corporate influence on our two party system… And the corporate influence on the Obama administration seems pretty clear at this point.

    Oh well, as Meteor Blades said

    The Abolitionists, the feminists and suffragists, the trade union organizers, the Grangers, the Jim Crow foes, the environment champions, the opponents of unjustified wars, the fighters for gay rights, the human rights advocates – every reform movement – began and continued its struggle outside party politics. Only after years, often decades, did the fruit of those struggles become confirmed by legislation passed by elected officials. Struggles into which people gave up their money, their energy and time, their liberty and, sometimes, their lives before politicians did more than give lip service to the causes they espoused. Without the movements, reforms never would find a place on the national agenda; without sympathetic politicians, they would never be implemented. It’s a difficult, but essential pairing.

  10. Who gave me an essay recommend button?

    Or was it a product of the demote?

    • zett on July 9, 2009 at 04:15
    • #

    burned out. Burned right out. Skimming Greenwald about Obama’s continued indefinite detention garbage doesn’t help.

    You know what depresses me the most? Not that Bushco did what they did or even that ObamaInc continues the same, but the people who call themselves engaged “Progressives” have a shit fit if you suggest there’s a problem with our system of electoral politics in this country that allows Obama and Bush to get by with this crap and it won’t be fixed by just electing more Democrats.  

    Partisans. :spit:

  12. cynical and rabid tree hugging closet Naderite Marxist Anarchists among the Fringe Left ‘s?

    I dont know what I am, label-wise. Most of the time I think I defy all labels. Then I discover some kind of way that I’m incredibly average. Which always disappoints me immensely. But then… being too weird is lonely.

    Civil libertarian progressive, I guess. Aren’t we all?

    Science bores the crap out of me (except Bill Nye).

    Economics scares the bajeezuz outta me.

    I know this: The penalty for being Poor is… it will cost YOU double. or triple.

    Is there a Quiz tomorrow ?

    🙂

  13. I am sort of having a WTF wondering about your motivations ek for showing that thread and bringing it up here.

    Not asking for a justification. Actually what I am thinking is that maybe having worked quite a bit of OT lately it isn’t such a bad thing. Although I do have a work colleague who is convinced we are headingtoward “one world currency”.

    I know you in the end aren’t interested in my opinion but I will offer and you will ignore and that is often the way of things. Leaders just don’t do that kind of thing in which case you might argue you are merely leading yourself and that is fine. Note I never projected desires of perfection on you but really my friend you are better than that.

    Peace. Gotta go to bed.

  14. would require that the basic overriding principle to drive the agenda not just the politics. I don’t think you can separate progress into separate categories. We did have a unifying devise but it has been taken off the table piece by piece. It’s the constitution, the bill of rights and the other structural systems, like checks and balance that kept unity possible. Common good comes to mind also.

    Partisan means nothing when you have no choice other then what the pols decide you are going to have to be part of. The only party they care about is power and maintaining and feeding the too big that own the place by-partisanly. They retain their power because people of good intention, believe that this is all we can get. That real representation is impossible and the insane mantra of ‘don’t let the perfect be enemy of the good…’ For me that says it all.

    It’s a political fiction cooked up by all who get to define both good and perfect and neither is anything close to what is possible if we united behind the overriding principle of democracy and representation. Political unity at this point is impossible. Progressive always struck me as a term that was used when liberal had been  turned into a dirty word. A marketing term used to snare the most people possible in the illusion of moving forward. Progress for the pols and their sponsors is not necessarily progress that involves we the people…                        

  15. We do need a new party.

    This new administration is just the “stealth” version of the old administration.

    What’s the difference?

    Can you honestly say, “Out of all the politicians currently serving-would you suport any of them?”

    • ANKOSS on July 10, 2009 at 18:15
    • #

    Everyone knows the progressive agenda. What is lacking is practical structural mechanisms for advancing it. These will emerge, because huge numbers of people want them. Our opportunity is to accelerate this evolution.

    It took centuries for parliamentary democracy to emerge. This was a STRUCTURAL innovation in governance, not a newly discovered agenda. Now that parliaments have been corrupted by corporations, we need structural political reform launched from the public Internet. This reform should be the pragmatic focus of political blogging: not impotent YELLING LOUDER.

    Yelling louder is just slamming your head harder on a stone wall. A political battering ram is needed, and we must learn how to build it on the Internet.

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