The Conservatives have defeated the Liberals - --- - NYTimes

What do you think of the conclusions of this editorialist? Are the conservatives really the "dominant intellectual force" in American politics?
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http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/18/opinion/18WOOL.html

For Conservatives, Mission Accomplished

<snip>
Democrats have come up with all sorts of excuses, from the evils of Richard Nixon's "Southern strategy" to the "stolen" election of 2000. They usually ignore the fact that the right has simply been far better at producing agenda-setting ideas. From welfare reform in Wisconsin to policing in New York City, from the tax-cutting Proposition 13 in California to regime change in Baghdad, the intellectual impetus has, for better or worse, come from the right. As President Bush bragged at last week's party, the right is "the dominant intellectual force in American politics."

Yet many Democrats insist this will change once Mr. Bush is ejected from the White House. This shows how little they have learned. First, the right has a history of advancing its agenda under Democratic executives (welfare reform came about under Bill Clinton). More important, it has organized itself for a much longer battle. Whenever it has been forced into retreat — as after Watergate — the flame has burned eternal at places like Heritage, the American Enterprise Institute and the Cato Institute, and at their smaller cousins in virtually every state.

<snip>
In theory, liberals have more than enough brain and brawn to match conservative America. The great liberal universities and foundations have infinitely more resources than the American Enterprise Institute and its allies. But the conservatives have always been more dogged. The Ford Foundation is as liberal as Heritage is conservative, but there is no doubt which is the more ruthless in its cause.

Now, perhaps, a few liberals are waking up to the task that confronts them. Americans Come Together, a group backed by the billionaire George Soros, already has 20 offices and 450 employees in Ohio alone. John Podesta, a former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, has founded the Center for American Progress, which Democrats are calling "the liberal Heritage." But it still seems that liberals are purely reactive. Barry Goldwater may have been strong meat, but at least he had ideas. By contrast, Americans Come Together's entire raison d'être (like that of the John Kerry campaign) remains negative: to send Mr. Bush back to Texas.

..more

Almost satirical.

Conservatives have been more tenacious with their programs and have successfully sold their ideas in the political marketplace. How else could things like school vouchers, privatizing Social Security (and a whole lot of other ideas if I wanted to sit and spend the time thinking about it) become acceptable to talk about if the RW had not done a much better job of selling their ideas?

As the article states, this didn't just happen. It goes back before Nixon, through Reagan/Bush and now to this Bush. They don't stop, ever. We elect Clinton then sit back and nitpick what he does or doesn't do. The RW is blindly with Bush.

The RW considers itself in a war, a culture war. The libs don't. If you're on a mission in a war you do what it takes to get it done. We as libs don't consider ourselves at war and don't understand why everyone doesn't think like us.

There's a culture war going on around us and we as libs just sleepwalk through the mine fields and the heavy artillery fire. The RW is fighting for the hearts and minds of Americans. We just get pissed when we don't have the hearts and minds of Americans.

And believe me, it takes one to know one...We have the most potential to do good, the best of intentions, the greatest ideas. Yet we lack the ability to organize these thoughts into any sort of coherent plan. And if by some chance we actually DO formulate said plan, the likelihood that we'll not get distracted by something else and see it to fruition are slim/none. The right knows this, and will derail us at every turn. It's easy to be dominant when you're 1 dimensional; you lack the depth to think beyond your small scope of what you set out to accomplish.

we also have to admit that the left is far too fractured. Instead of coming together, united, to work for our common goals, we're much too divided. We demand ideological purity on every single issue from every single member of every single liberal/progressive group, and if every single person doesn't fall into line, then let the bickering and squabbling and fighting begin.

Many on the left also have no sense of realism at all, they let their pure idealism blind them to the reality of the political situation. I could go on and on, but you get the picture.

crappy ideas, stuff that goes against the self interest
of average Americans. The culture war is a distraction
from the fascistic tendencies of corporatism, the real
ideology of these bastards.

Um, and point of fact, judging by the vote totals in
2000, we libs do have the hearts and minds of Americans,
naturally and rightly.

They show that the left is too divided and unorganized. Something like Nader wouldn't happen to the right today.

And by controlling the media, the right in a sense, control the intellectual debate in this country.

We're not divided any more. We are united as never before now,
to defeat Bush. After the election, it could splinter again. But
that's then. We have to get there first.

And amazingly enough he still has supporters that could potentiall kill us in swing states.

the left outnumbers the right.

I still can't wrap my brain around Nader's motives.
My mom is convinced that Nader has been bought by the
Republicans. If he keeps this up, I'm going to start
to believe her.

I'm just saying that if we were remotley organized, we should win in a landslide. The fact that we'er not 10-20 points ahead speaks volumes about the level of control and organization that the right has in this country.

herding cats? lol. Getting liberals organized is about
like trying to herd cats. Liberals and other lefties are
too independent-minded to be roped into an authoritarian
concept like the RWingers.

But we will get together when faced with a dangerous enemy.
(Like now.)

head.

The conservatives will not let truth get in the way of the results they want, and will destroy anyone who gets in their way. But I think the old days of "intellectual conservativism" are long past, what with people like Limbaugh and Colter now carrying the flame of knowledge for them.

Liberals are not as aggresive at marketing their ideas. Liberals admit if they've made a mistake. Liberals tend to admit that (at least on occasion) their opponents have made good points.

However, this is bad when trying to sell your product (Ideas, in this case). Admiting that someone was a mistake destroys your credibility with the weak minded. Admitting your opponent has a good point when your opponent will not return the favor makes your ideas appear weak. People often mistake the right wing tactic of never backing down, never admiting a mistake, and never letting anything change their mind as confidence based on information and logic.

The problem is that many of the right wing causes are not based on logic, information, reasonable concepts, proven theory, or much of anything other than scripture (often times misquotes or taken out of context) and propoganda.

Because the left backs down and lets the right wing get away with this, much of the general populace simply assumes that the right wing people are so dogged because they can back up their ideas.

Look at it this way- How likely would you be to bet someone $1000 on a provable historical fact (Such as the final score of the '84 Superbowl) if you weren't absolutely positively sure beyond the shadow of a doubt as to the answer.

Since politics is such as high stake game, I feel many of the gernal population see the bets taking place, and assume that the right would never bluff with the stakes being that high. Thus, they beleive the crap coming from a bunch of dishonest faux intellectuals simply because they appear confident.

If you still aren't convinced, ask yourself how many right wing people you know who still see King Shrub The Lessor as a confident ans decisive leader with a postive vision for America? Then ask yourself how many things he has been wrong about (well, pretty much everything that has come out of his mouth has been probably and demonstrably wrong). So then why do people beleive him? Because he never backs down, never admits a mistake, and never lets pesky "facts" get in his way. People mistake pigheaded stuborness as being a virtue, not a weakness.

This is correct. It is not the weight of their ideas, but merely the blunt force with which they wield them.
The Professor

Brute force backed by $. http://www.mediatransparency.org/

... that the fascists were the "dominant intellectual force" in post-WW I Europe.

David Brooks
Judith Miller
Tom Friedman


THESE are the "intellectuals"???????

Im rolling on the floor fucking laughing my ass off.

I would add to the piece that one reason that the Right has been so much more successful than the left in winning the war of ideas is because they take their opposition seriously. Perhaps you would do well to learn that this argument will not be won simply by calling people "slimes".

I didn't call anyone "slimes". It is my pet name for the formerly great newspaper, the NYS.

You need to add a little more "disdain" ink to your computer. It stopped dripping from your post after five minutes.

Hey, and I'm glad you are so fond of that newspaper. Someone has to read it.

And I'm still struggling to see how you treat our opponents seriously.

Limbaugh, Hannity, Coulter. Real intellectuals, those.

I'm sorry, this is just wrong. Conservatives have been more successful recently because they always appeal to people's worst inclinations: greed, racism, jingoism. It's a lot simpler to do that than to get people to think like a community and care about something larger than their immediate family. And their current ascension is because the spoiled self-centered baby-boomers have gotten to an age where they run virtually everything. If you look at the attitudes of much younger people these days, they are far more leftist than these bastards.

I'd go with delusional.

the world is safe for effete bow-tied blithering idiots!

it's based on a lack of thinking -- a return to the days of yore, being against rather than for particular things, dividing the world into "us" and "them." what's terribly intellectual about that?

and qc's right: this is a group that counts rush limbaugh and ann coulter among its intelligentsia. what further proof would anyone need of the anti-intellectual tilt?

and, finally, bush can't even spell "intellectual," much less brag about how the right has become an intellectual force. that entire scenario must be made up.

Just because you come up with four things that the republican's have "invented" in the last 25 years, doesn't mean they are dominant. Then there is the fact that "New York City policing" translates into a human rights farce for the homeless of New York, and the regime change in Baghdad... well, I won't even go there.
Wow, how amazing! Let us all bow to the the power of the right, and hope they don't kick us in the ass before we can stand back up.

of the Fairness Doctrine and the rise of the right wing agenda. They always had the money to control the propaganda but they never had the authority or the means until the Fairness Doctrine was decimated. Not making any excuses, but I think their "rise" in American politics is not on the strength of their ideas but on the srength of their propaganda behind their ideas...Jus my opinion.

They control the message at every turn. Worse, they have ABSOLUTELY NO CONSCIENCE about the fact that their "message" is nothing but deliberate lies and distortions.....to justify their results of defrauding the people of their tax dollars and social security payments, to give toward corporate welfare, the military/industrial complex, the powerful and the wealthy....the same ones who spin the message.

:kick::kick:

And we see today just where these "ideas" have gotten us. And they could never have gotten to this point without the aid and assistance of the self-interested corporate media.

It's a triumph of propaganda and muscle, more than ideas. Culturally, they've been beaten 7 days from Sunday. Worse for them, a large and growing segment of so-called conservatives ("South Park Republicans") have internalized and amplified a lot of the old liberal cultural causes -- free expression, free association, free sex -- and will not tolerate constraints on their "bad as they wanna be" behavior. If 50s/60s conservatives could see the society they would ultimately spawn, they'd probably throttle their movement themselves.

That WAS, INDEED, the beginning of the end. When the broadcasting BUSINESS - repeat - BUSINESS was told it NO LONGER HAD TO offer equal time to opposing points of view, that paved the way for rush limbaugh - a limbaugh UNRESTRAINED by anybody setting the record straight after he made it all crooked.

That is a HUGELY important first priority - REINSTATING THE FAIRNESS DOCTRINE.

Another bad liberal habit I've seen is a tendency to cariacture the opposition, and then attack the caricature -- leaving people who are mainly just trying to solve a problem feeling they're concerns have been misrepresented and they've personally been crapped on and attacked, and they identify "liberals" as the people who did it.

Sometimes it was practically a tragedy of errors: parents who had a beef with some school program or course would get rebuffed as a "right-wing nutcase", because that's who the teachers were used to having object to them, and didn't recognize when they'd strayed into more mainstream turf. The parents would get mad as hell and organize; the teachers would get backup from their union, and battle-lines became drawn. Some college- and career-women would show a not-so-subtle distain for anyone taking a more "traditional" route (this was also a class matter, as the "traditionals" were more likely to be from poorer families), and the "traditionals" remembered it and resented it -- remember the whole Hillary "cookie" flap in '92?

The point is that liberals have had a hand in the fierceness of some of the feelings against us. Corporate/conservative media didn't create that -- though it did distill and focus it as a weapon against us, while diffusing opposing sentiments as "class warfare whining" and such.

A lot of those trends have burnt themselves out, but they're not all gone, and understanding how they affected people are some of the keys to pushing the pendulum back.

its a big part of it. If you control the propaganda machine, you can even convince people you were fairly elected, even though by any historical standard, you stole the election with the assistance of a partisan Supreme Court. Then you can convince people that the liberals are only "whining" about the election they lost fair and square. Get over it!, they say.

No point in arguing if we're just highlighting different facets of the same bug's eye.

to always say the opposing candidate is "stupid". And that we are not perfect in our diplomacy and many times we may say things that bring name-calling and mudslinging back on us. We are not faultless. But, we are passionate and we are more honest, in my opinion. I believe our ideas are better for our country as a whole. (Otherwise, why would I be a liberal?) But, I think we should never underestimate the power of propaganda. It's akin to the old saying about fighting battles with those that buy their ink by the barrel...

I cannot, in my wildest dreams, believe that the American people would buy the ideas of modern-day conservatism, unless they were waxed and shined and presented as something they really aren't. They are fake. They are dishonest. They are plastic. See! I've fallen into the the same trap! Honesty.

No, it has not been just since the demise of the Fairness Doctrine. Wasn't Rush Limbaugh made an honorary Republican Member of Congress on Bush 1 or early in the Clinton years?

The Reich Wing has been busy slowly evolving the nature of the political discourse in this country for over 30 years now. 30 years ago, nobody could have imagined a Fundamentalist being elected to statewide office. But, through hard work and starting with town councils and school boards, the Religious Reich have worked their way from those small local places to statewide offices and now all the way to the Presidency and they also have several national senators in their pocket like Rick Santorum and Sam Brownshirt.

Maybe the demise of the FD accelerated the rise of the Reich, but they were still on the rise. Places like Faux News would have gotten around it by just having on a bunch of Alan Colmes like liberals on the air that would not get a word in edgewise, or use Zell Miller and Joe Lieberman for the Dem side of things to respond to the rants of Santorum or Hatch or Brownback.

The problem is that the Left has not really seen the monster for what it truly is until recently – I am sure people like Rupert Murdoch, Conrad Black, the Coors family, Scaife, etc. – are secretly laughing at the $15 million from George Soros, as they have given billions to the Right over the years and $15 million is pitiful compared to that. We have our 1 sugar daddy in Soros, while the Reich Wing has a huge supply of them.

at the end of the Reagan years. Limbaugh got his "honorary membership" after the 1994 Congressional rout. I agree with much of what you say, but don't underestimate the effect of the Fairness Doctrine, compulsory broadcast of opposing views went a long way toward countering the power of moneyed Republican interests.

and among other things, to spawn the Arkansas Project.

that they are better at brainwashing... making a bunch of hooah about non-issues.

And better, also at flat out lying. NOT something I would like to see the liberals compete with and win.

I don't know how much hope there is in talking sense into people... esp. people who believe that dinosaurs lived 6000-5000(?) years ago.

http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/qa.asp

People who believe that could believe just about anything, I guess.

They also consider it an example of "liberal" media when there are news reports of anything discovered that was believed to have existed before 6000 years ago. :eyes:

then why did Gore and Nader got almost 3 million more votes last election, forcing The Bush Crime Family to steal it?

With very little reaction from the Democrats.

Saw this today in Ebert's review of Moore's new film:

"Much of the material in "Fahrenheit 9/11" has already been covered in books and newspapers, but some is new, and it all benefits from the different kind of impact a movie has. Near the beginning of the film, as Congress moves to ratify the election of Bush after the Florida and Supreme Court controversies, it is positively eerie to see 10 members of Congress -- eight black women, one Asian woman and one black man -- rise to protest the move and be gaveled into silence by the chairman of the session, Al Gore."

http://www.suntimes.com/output/eb-feature/cst-ftr-cannes18.html

has caught us off guard I admit. As far as their ideas having merit I just laugh. The only reason they have gained any ground is because of their constant lies. The truth will come out and when it does they will be found to be abhorent creatures with no moral standing. They may gloat but Truth will win out.

Politics is never 'over' - no one ever wins the war, only today's battle.

...are economists for The Economist and while writing for a British journal forces them to be far more intellectual than is common for conservatives over here, they're also the counterparts of the sort of intellectuals who would explain to you in 1930 why Kensainism and the New Deal could never work, but guess what happens a few years later...

the right is "the dominant intellectual force in American politics."

there is plenty to agree with. To whit:

1. The right has advanced their agenda under Dems.
2. The right has taken the long view, as compared to Dems.
3. The right has been more dogged.
4. RW thinktanks are more ruthless
5. Liberals seem purely reactive.

etc...(bugmenot is down or I would access the rest of the article)

And since we're at it, the conservatives are currently being defeated by the neocons who have become the biggest bully on the block.

The biggest strength of liberals (in my personal opinion) is also our biggest weakness...a very strong sense of ethics. I believe many of us have a true sense of right and wrong while also understanding and having compassion for the many shades of gray. Many of us are truly shocked with how the neocons seem to only see things in black or white: welfare is bad, war is good, taxes are bad, corporate interests are good, etc.

However, we often refrain from fighting the way the neocons do. Part of us see the need win at all costs, but I think most of us don't want to become like them in the process (one of my biggest fears). There lies our dilemma. The more we struggle with this, the more our party splinters. We should be more united now than we have been in a very long time and yet we're not...we ALL disagree with the current administration and yet we can't come together and agree on our own platform.

There are some gems of wisdom in the muck.

The Conservatives are in power. How are we going to destroy that power?

--bkl

I had a repunk acquaintance return my unread copy of Krugman's "The Great Unraveling" spouting that very meme.

I guess it's all just an attitude thing.

...we get labeled as unrealistic dreamers and get crapped on anyway.

With these all white, mostly male, mostly southern, ALL CONSERVATIVE old farts strangling the Democratic Party from within, there's little the traditional base can do to take the debate back. These bastards agree with much of what the right wing is doing, and will continue to force the party to the right until we can managed to boot them out of power.

Dean was the main challenger to DLC power, and you see what was done to him.

The DLC is a sure loser, as has been shown by Gore's narrow win (which should have been a landslide) and the dismal showing in 2000, again which should have gained seats, not lost them. The DLC has sold out the working class base, and the result is that working folks tend not to put forth the effort it takes to disrupt their schedules on election day. Why should they? The DLC has supported the skewing of the tax code to shift the burden of government away from the rich and onto their backs, and the DLC sill continue to support the variety of unfree "free trade" that is stealing their livelihoods.

Until the rest of the party rises up and wrests control from these thugs, the conservatives will continue to be able to pat themselves on the back and say they've won.

the dominant media-spin force.

Conservatives are the most dulusional people in this country. They buy their way into power and then say they were popularly elected.

Why do republicans raise more money? Because they can and money buys influence.

It really bugs me that they co-op words like "heritage". Heritage has nothing to do with conservatism.

send your own here: letters@nytimes.com

The fact is, conservatives have managed to seize more power
than their numbers in the population would normally warrant.
In 2000 for example, Gore and Nader together gathered nearly
52 percent of the national vote.

How is it then that the minority population (those right of center)
hold all the power? Their money, their organization, and their
willingness to steal elections if necessary to get their way.

It also helps that the corporate media is in their pockets. Imagine
any of the crimes commited by this administration taking place
with a Democrat in the White House. The Republican attack
machine would be working overtime, screaming at the top of
their lungs.

What arrogant, self-congratulatory bilge.

Regards,

The RW succeeds in framing the parameters of debate to the extent that their frames are even accepted by the Democratic Party.

The mainstream news media, being the followers that they are, use this frame of reference to describe the debates of the day.

When a piece points these realities out, rather than heed its warnings while rebutting some specific over-the-top points (like conservatism being the "dominant intellectual force" in American politics today), it's more effective to wring one's hands and bemoan it as "arrogant, self-congratulatory bilge".

Yeah. That sounds productive to me. :eyes: I guess we'd better all resign ourselves to a continuing dominance of conservatism in politics.

The dismissal of our efforts is enough to dismiss this
as bilge. "We're just reacting, get Bush out." That's
a lie. It makes it sound like we're still where we were
in 2000, and we're not. Everybody's aware of the RW attack
machine, and we're working our *sses off to counter it.

The characterization of the piece is that we may as well
lie down and take it, there's nothing we can do about
it.

And I take exception to the "wringing of hands." If I
were less of a nice person, I would insult you the same
way.

But I'm a nice person.

The Republicans have been working their *sses off since 1964. Now they virtually control the media. They know how to win elections. They are so well organized that they've convinced most Americans that they actually won in 2000.

It'll take more than a couple years of working our *sses off to catch up to the organization of the conservatives. Heck we'll be lucky to catch up in a decade.

and people fundamentally know that. The voting public is
on our side. We don't have to be tricky, we don't have to
sell things that aren't what we say they are. We don't have
to come up with deceptive advertising.

The truth always wins, and people eventually do wake up.

With the rise of corporate power, and the embrace of that by both the GOP and the DLC-wing of the Democrats, policy differences between the parties -- especially for the members of the working class and working poor -- have narrowed considerably. This has helped fuel the rise of social wedge issues as determining factors in elections -- much to the glee of the Right Wing.

I thought about this a lot while watching a piece on NOW a couple of weeks ago that profiled a small city in IL, and the way that their manufacturing industries have collapsed over the past decade or so. The city is staunchly Republican, and many of the people voted for Bush. I'd like to think that they'd vote for Kerry out of economic interests, but the more I think about it, I have to ask myself, "How would Kerry's policies make their lives that much different?"

They wouldn't. These people would still see corporate interests send their jobs overseas. These people would still see an uncertain future. In the end, they still buy into the Republican philosophy of "leaving people alone", because the Democratic Party, they feel, doesn't really offer them a significantly brighter alternative.

Of course, with the entrenchment of corporate power, no one person is going to roll back the juggernaught. But it also cannot be denied that the Democratic Party helped fuel this embrace of corporatism, turning the government from a watchdog of corporate interests to cheerleader, going back to the days of Carter.

If we want to win over people like this, we have to be bold. Unfortunately, caution seems to be the watchword of the day.

another day. I'm happy to have it with you, as
I have my own problems with the DNC/DLC and the
corporate takeover of our government.

But in the mean time, Bush and the Thugs have done so
much damage to the country in the past four years it
will take that long to undo it.

(As for our policies, fiscal responsibility, reproductive
freedom, responsible environmental policy, alternative energy
research, affordable health care, the list goes on and on.)

It's an argument of historical context. The Democratic Party of FDR's "New Deal" and alphabet soup, through to LBJ's "Great Society", bears little resemblance to the current Democratic Party that has embraced the "market uber alles" attitude promoted by corporate interests.

This isn't to say that the party should rely on the past for its solutions. It is to say, however, that it has drifted quite far from honestly being a party interested in the progress of the masses, at least when that progress at any time comes into conflict with the dictates of the "market".

Do you realize that voting turnout in Presidential elections is something like 10% less of the eligible voting public than it was 40 years ago? And this is even after the success of the civil rights campaign and the overturning of Jim Crow. This is largely due to the fact that a great portion of the public sees politics as not really offering them anything -- especially the growing ranks of the working poor -- so they have no reason to vote. The Democrats have been complicit in extending this phenomenon.

That said, we have to use our current competitive advantages
the best way that we can. We have to defeat our common enemy
before we can begin our internal reform.

People vote their self interest. If people are happy, they
stay the course. If they're unhappy, they'll jump ship.
We know how bad the Thug policies are--silk purse, sows ear,
all of that. No amount of marketing can sell a pile of
crap, because it's still a pile of crap, and people eventually
will smell it.

I have to have faith in the collective wisdom of the
people in the country. Otherwise, what's the point?

If it did we would have won every election since the beginning of this century.

By any reasonable measure we should be at least 15 percent ahead in the polls, but were not. We're tied to only 5 percent ahead right now. It is by no means inevitable were going to win.

The fact that the right can get away with stealing the 2000 election and winning others with horridly deceptive advertising shows (all with remarkably little outrage) illustrates that the right does a very good job at convincing people to vote on hot-button cultural issues (gay rights, abortion, racial issues), instead of the economic ones like health care and workers rights, in which we have an advantage.

yeah, it does. The corporatist Thugs are arrogant beyond
measure, believing their power to be permanent. That arrogance
leads inevitably to mistakes, and I think that we are ready
this time to capitalize on them.

Also, I'm a firm believer in the pendulum swing, that it
has swung far, far right, and is due for a swing back our
way.

I don't. I certainly hope we do. In terms of momentum, Bush has been losing it all this year. It really can't get much worse for Bush.

Unfortunately, we're going to have to keep this up for the next six months.

We also haven't even seen the worst of the Republican attack machine yet. If the polls still look like this in September, I'd be bracing for some of the worst personal attacks in American history against Kerry.

And I would put nothing past the Thugs. I'm a LIHOPer,and
I think they have a big October Surprise in store for us.
But I have to have faith in the American system, and our
resolute dedication to our cause.

I read it as an assessment of the political landscape, one that strayed over the top in a few instances, but for the most part described the current situation quite accurately. Hell, if liberals were organized half as well as conservatives, we'd be beating them by at least 25 points. That's why when races are run on an honest discussion of ideas, Democrats win. The right doesn't have good ideas -- they just have vastly superior organization. Sure, money is a big part of it, but hardly the whole process.

I also didn't perceive the article as attacking many of the new think-tanks on the left, like the Center for American Progress. It was giving an honest (and I believe accurate) criticism that the work done by these groups is still largely reactive to what the RW is doing. For liberals to gain the offensive, they have to stop doing this.

The groups I see actually going on the offensive are the grassroots ones, like MoveOn.org. They're the ones who immediately take it to the RW in no uncertain terms. But for their efforts to be successful in the long haul, the think-tanks need to do their job with going on the offensive on ideas and talking points. Once again, an honest observation.

The characterization of the piece is that we may as well
lie down and take it, there's nothing we can do about
it.

Personally, I think you made that characterization because that's the characterization you wanted to make.

And I take exception to the "wringing of hands." If I
were less of a nice person, I would insult you the same
way.

I could care less if you take exception to my criticism. If you don't want criticism from those who view your efforts as misguided or counterproductive, then don't post. Like I said above, you gave no specific criticism of the piece, just an overarching condemnation. If your purpose was only to rally people who think just like you do, then your mission is accomplished. If, however, you wanted to get people to think critically about the piece, your letter failed miserably.

But I'm a nice person.

Good for you. But nice doesn't necessarily sway people. Sometimes being more direct and not shying away from unpleasant truths has a better overall effect.

(I'd appreciate it if you kept the personal comments
down to a minimum and talked about the ideas and the
problems. Thanks so much. I guess you didn't take the
first HINT very well.)

The problem here is that the article sings the praises
of the conservative efforts without examining the consequences.
Conservatives have the power and they have the organization,
but is what they're doing good for the country?

Did you see that anywhere in the article?

Did you see any examination of the political track these
organized, united, corporatist whackjobs are on? No,
you didn't.

So, accurate as it may be as far as it goes, it does not
tell people about the real problems with what the conservatives
have done in their self-righteous zeal. (Budget deficits,
killing state budgets, church-state separation, militarism,
racism, etc., etc., etc., etc., etc.)

Like I said before, most of the American people agree with
liberal policies, and this article makes it sound like liberalism
is dead, nonexistent, a dream, a memory. And that's simply not
true.

Politics is about WINNING. Republicans are dominating the the means to winning elections. Through both the control of the news media and their advertising they essentially control the debate in this country. So instead of talking about universal health care, and raising the minimum wage. The media is discussing defense, national security, and gay marriage.

It really doesn't matter who is correct. It matters who wins.

They don't win on the up and up, though. They win by
cheating--voting machines, redistricting, SCOTUS. Their
arrogance leads them to believe they are entitled to win
by any means necessary, and we can exploit that fatal flaw.
(Without the stolen election, I would still be blind
to the way all of this works. So would a lot of people.
They sowed the seeds of their own undoing with that crime.)

... the authors were frankly unable to expand it into a broader view of the consequences of Republican policies, as you would wish. If they were writing a 25,000 word piece for the New Yorker, they could have done this. However, considering that their piece had some rather strict restrictions on length, such an effort would have been just impossible. If the purpose of your letter was to highlight the disastrous nature of GOP policies (something I'm in full agreement), you could have written it much more constructively by acknowledging the success of strategy pointed out in the piece while showing how that success is actually a disaster for the nation at large.

I'm glad that you at least are acknowledging now that the article raises some good points. That was the purpose in my post, something that I perceived you as rejecting initially.

Lastly, I didn't realize this was personal -- unless you're counting my criticism of the letter you wrote that you decided to post as "personal". Like I said, if you have a problem with your ideas being criticized, then you should refrain from posting them. I didn't think that criticism of ideas was considered as a personal attack here.

us, and I have had enough of that to last me a
lifetime. As I pointed out in the letter, there's
something strange about people holding power in a
democracy who don't represent the views and interests
of the majority of the population.

I did say that quite clearly.

Please do not play semantic games here. If you want
to go into the etymology of how personal the image
of "wringing of hands" is, that's fine, but I don't
think you'll win that argument.

While I don't agree with the assessment that conservatism is the "dominant intellectual force in American politics" (there's very little that's "intellectual" about American politics anymore), the authors do an excellent job at pointing out the areas in which conservatives have overtaken liberals -- and how many in the liberal establishment remain clueless to this.
- Controlling message / framing of issues
- Marketing
- Remaining on the ideological offensive at all times
- Organizing

The DNC is essentially a fundraising organization that comes together every four years to hammer out a platform based on caution and completely bereft of bold initiatives. I'm not going to say that it's the DNC's responsibility to do more, but they also don't have anybody really BACKING them, either. On the right, they have AEI, Heritage, Cato, Americans for Tax Reform (Norquist's group), etc. hammering out these talking points each and every day. While groups like Americans Coming Together and the Center for American Progress should be lauded for starting up, they still are operating in frames pre-designed by the Republicans rather than creating their own frames -- hence giving credence to the "reactive" label assigned to them in the piece.

And the PPI/DLC seems more interested in actually making the frames designed by the Republicans more concrete and entrenched, rather than actively challenging them.

This article, while a bit over the top in a few places, is still something that should be read and digested by many of us on the left. I must express my dismay for the manner in which so many others on this thread are rejecting it out of hand, it makes me wonder if they even bothered to read it, let alone reflect on its context....

In the media, they began to dominate after the fairness doctrine took a hit combined with deregulation which allowed them to snatch up all the available airwaves to reproduce themselves. Rush Limbaugh could have never survived with a fairness doctrine in place.

They also succeeded in the gerrymandering game. The outcome of the Gingrich revolution was that they got their feet planted both on the national and state level right on time for the 2000 census which determined districting in the heartlans states...if the Gingrich revolution occurred in 92 rather than later, it would not have had this effect.

Yet, in public opinion polls, the majority of Americans still favor medicare, NOT PRIVATIZING social security, allowing civil unions but not gay marriage, and a number of traditional Democratic party ideals. Therefore, the conservative domination is a mile wide but an inch deep.

The MAIN point you make is that conservatives used their advocacy orgs as (sorry to use the phrase) "trickle down" institutions where a "parent" ideal org. created tenacles down to the community level to get their feet woven into being..the left's organizations are national, centrally dominated and have NOT made the impact at the community level that they could.

Furthermore, organizations traditionally associated with the left such as the ACLU, actually protect the right (KKK rallies as free speech) as much as they do the left, based on the NATURE of their existance...you won't find anything similar on the right.

The right has done a far better job in getting their message out and persuading voters. They have been organizing with the singular mission of gaining power since 1964, and now they know how to get power and use it for their objectives.

Nearly every right-wing interest group (NRA, Heritage Foundation, AEI, etc.) understands that to win elections, you have to control the message on local, state, and national levels and persuade people to vote Republican by any means necessary.

Just look at today. By any reasonable analysis, we should be 15% or more ahead in the polls. But instead, were only tied to 5% ahead. Why?
Because the conservatives control the media that well.

... such as the conservatives developing new and expanded forms of political machines at a time when the Democrats were in large part dismantling theirs in the name of civil rights, equal access, and a more democratic process.

The old "smoke-filled back rooms" which unified decision-making also dicriminated against women and non-whites. To compensate, primaries were made more open and more important, but that began the chase for money, and we all know the charming effect THAT has had on politics...

They're even more closely aligned with Corporate America than the modern Democratic party, and therefore own the media. Period.

Ask the average American what they think about national health care, social security, a living wage, labor issues, etc., etc. You'll get overwhelming support for these (very liberal) ideas.

The population of the country is not conservative. They're liberal in almost every way that matters. Conservatives conrtol the US government, but they do *not* represent the political thinking of the average American.

Republicans have convinced voters not to base their vote on economic policies, but on SOCIAL ISSUES.

Scaring generally religious voters with issues like gay marriage, abortion, 60's hippie counter culture, and in the South, just out-and-out race-baiting. That's how they've managed to turn a New Deal-Great Society nation (1964) into the mess we have today.

The authors fail to address the basic difference between liberals and conservatives. THE basic conservative ideal is: ENTITLEMENT. Or, as I like to call it, MORE FOR ME.

More money, more power, more influence over events, more control over other people, more freedom of religion and speech, more respect and adulation, more, more, more, more, more.

EVERY conservative program, initiative, idea, think tank, book, etc. is geared toward this ultimate ideal. Scrape the surface of ANYTHING conservatives are pushing and you'll find the MORE FOR ME underneath.

Conservatives believe, if they believe in anything, in the zero-sum game. They are firmly convinced that there is a finite amount of everything valuable on this earth, and they have made up their minds to have as much of it as they can rake to themselves in their time here, and pass on to their kids after they're gone.

"But the real flavor of the event was captured by what the president called the "fine group of decent citizens" gathered at the tables in front of him — members of the N.R.A., the Heritage Foundation, the Family Research Foundation and countless other groups that make up Conservative America. "

Which can all be crowded into one hotel ballroom comfortably...How many of those "groups" have Grover Norquist infesting them?

And it's telling that for all this puffery and chest thumping, the only two "ideas" that the authors can mention coming out of this "braintrust" are "no taxes for the rich" and "we hate gay people."

For a somewhat more amusing account of this klavern meeting, here's a sane person who snuck in....

"Hey, who wouldn't want to go to the black-tie gala of the nation's oldest modern conservative organization? It's like a Young Americans for Freedom reunion! They killed HillaryCare! Bob Novak will be there! And did we mention the President is speaking? Serious stroking of base action. How could we say no?...
<snip>
NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre (pictured...) gives a speech and says -- could not make this up -- that it's NRA tradition to "honor" those who have served the cause of Second Amendment rights by giving them a firearm. (Curious: What is the message that sends? We think people may try to kill you? Kill yourself? You look like you need a surrogate penis?) Tonight, they want to present a firearm to ACU prez David Keene. . . but there's a ban on handguns in the District. So they give him a big photo of one. Female NRA exec holds up pic over her head and walks around the stage like Vanna White. This is hysterical. And the gun? It's a Charleton Heston "Peacemaker" replica. OMG. I'm dying. They're going to give him the real one in Virigina, "where people care about the Second Amendment." Yes! "

http://www.wonkette.com/archives/american-conservative-union-40th-anniversary-party-report-004086.php

aspect of society...from the shamelessly low wages and benefits paid to workers, to the price gouging oil companies, to the planned privatization of the military, public schools, Post Office and Amtrak, to exploiting and polluting the environment for personal gain.

The conservatives will forever be united, to preserve it's capitalistic, imperialistic ways. They will lie, cheat, smear and kill to insure their profits. With the money, comes the power and the ability for the conservative owned corporate media to spin and distort without any limitations or repercussions.

The liberals, will always have the (so many) progressive in-groups fighting each other for survival and money and media exposure. Each group offering different plans or ways to attack the conservative machine...that it eventually becomes futile and goes nowhere.

The conservatives throw out bones to liberal groups here and there...As the money staved liberals fight each other for those bones, the conservatives are united. The conservatives all have the same goal and agenda, exploiting for money and power, so they protect each others back, in order to protect themselves.

Divide and conquer, the conservatives will always be masters succeeding at it...because it's good sound business and very profitable, And it keeps complete control over the liberals.

Its not a question of intellectual strength. Its not a question of being right. It is a question of human nature and power.

The left is represented by those that see the world as a complex thing. Complex but understandable. You just have to work at it a bit. Sometimes its not that comfortable. Its this that makes the left the more difficult road. To difficult path is not the one chosen most often.

As we delve into the workings of our society our understanding of it becomes more complex. This is true of nearly everything we study. It can become quite frustrating for those without the inclination or ability to follow all the twists and turns. This complexity is easily discarded in favor of easy answers that address their emotional rejection of their conclusions.

Further complicating this is the fact that much of the lefts position sits in direct opposition to structures of power. Specifically the rising power of Corporate entities. These things have risen as new feudal lords in our land. No one dares cross them for fear of facing an army of lawyers. Meanwhile they promote the notion that the left is a litigious bunch of crybabies further silencing any struggle against their advance.

The Corporations have so entwined our society that any notion of striking them down or limiting them in any way has become associated with communism or unamerican thinking. Yet if We The People ever wish to champion a progressive idea it is these powers that we must confront. But the lefts own indescision has left it numbed to how to proceed so it can only limp along in name only and hope to win a few election by not being the republicans. Sooner or later we are going to have to wake up and wrestle this beast to the ground. And the longer we wait the more horrible the fight will be as it continues to grow stronger with each passing day.

to this editorial and tell me which one makes the most sense? Which one is closest to the truth?

and less intelligent ppl outnumber more intelligent ppl

the repubs use religion and other forms of false propaganda to push their agenda

:) No one likes to be called stupid.....even if they are...

Its really a question of whether one embraces uncomfortable social change or not. The left embraces social change as a positive thing. No social advance has ever come easily. But the left focuses on the positive aspects of it while the right focuses on the negative.

Consider women's liberation. To us it seems a natural course of events. You acknowledge a wrong and address it. But the right looks at all the upheaval such a change will create. It destabalises society to make such a change. It is the end of civilization as we know it...literally. The difference is in if you believe this to be a good thing or a bad thing.

We on the left have a bind spot. We assume that if we correct a social wrong that the society will continue to function. No matter how deeply seated that wrong is in the structure of our society. The right meanwhile looks at the society as functional and thus dreads changing it for fear of unbalancing it so far that all benefits from it collapse.

Thus when we champion gay marriages we see it as fighting for a right they deserve just as much as anyone else. But the right sees it as shaking the very foundations of civilization. And there will be changes. Very real changes in an economic sense. If we go full tilt into this we will drastically alter the financial balance of the insurance industry. They will suddenly find themself with a massive influx of new individuals being covered without any increase in income. They will be unbalanced. While for some of us discomfort for the insurance industry is not such a bad thing it is a real effect. It will have wider repurcusions.

Major changes in the social structures have major consequences in other areas. This along with phobias and prejudices not easily given up come together to give a strong voice to the right. They are able to combine these fears into one concentrated attack. Because there are economic interests backed by social fears they can get all the funding they desire to counter the left. Meanwhile all we have is that their position is wrong according to our constantly shifting moral position.

Maybe you can compare them to the terrorists, who keep coming, and coming, no matter how many we kill?

Like Gore who agreed with Bush in the debates, I fear Kerry is too much
of a diplomat to fight the ruthless Neo Cons.

Even at DU if you are too bold and aggressive people just ignore you.

Randi roads is on OUR side!!! Yet, I believe many would put her on ignore here at DU.

I agree - Gore went easy on Bush in the debates when he could really have hammered him on so many things.

And, most Democrats are too meek and still think that we can all get along & work together, while the RepubliCONs are playing for keeps and want a 1 party state. Here in Connecticut, it has been mostly Republicans criticizing our sleazy governor. Most Democrats have been silent, probably trying to appear fair & balanced. However, if the shoe was on the other foot and it was a Dem governor - do you think the Republicans would be so quiet?

He came across as "mean"..???

But, there were several times where Gore could have really hammered Bush with a proverbial knockout punch (or, to use Rummy's term 'a body blow'), but instead acted like a novice debater. Didn't Gore shine against Perot & Kemp previously?

"unpresidential"! That comment proves just how much influence and power the right wing has over the minds of America.

Dubya kept sucking wet snot up his nose... snnrrrxxx. But natch, they hammered Gore for unpresidential sighing and eyerolling.

Those that promote tolerance have a difficult time reacting to intolerance. Particularly when the intolerance seems to derive from a set of beliefs held by the particular group.

When faced with such dogmatic prejudice post modern systems find themself flumaxed by their own rhetoric of tolerance for others beliefs. The only way to deal with such dogmatic hatred would be to squash the belief. But this is unacceptable in the post modern thinking.

It's clear that the media is so completely controlled by corporate interests that there is no reason to expect they will change and start functioning as a real press.

It's also clear that the various think tanks liberals have started are not on the offensive. They're not championing the bold new ideas that we MUST communicate to people if we're ever to see a widespread understanding of the benefits of having a more liberal hand at the wheel of governance.

I agree with another post above that MoveOn and grassroots organizations like it are doing the best work on that front, but it's clearly not enough. We have to start talking to people, and selling ideas like a living wage, single-payer healthcare (although that's pretty much already sold now, thanks Kooch!), and election reform. The sad thing is that it's not swing voters or republicans we need to convince of the worthiness of these ideas -- it's our fellow democrats we need to convince first, if we're ever to be rid of the DLC and their corrosive influence on the party. :(

The right is NOT controlling the game now because of their "intellectual force," but rather their muscle. Their greed has gotten them where they are -- both with corporate America and in controlling the flow of information.

Their theories are based on prejudices and greed. They advance them through institutions in place as well as beating them into the consciousness of people through repetition and wording (especially since their advancement in radio talk the last decade).

Whenever it has been forced into retreat — as after Watergate — the flame has burned eternal at places like Heritage, the American Enterprise Institute and the Cato Institute, and at their smaller cousins in virtually every state.


In many ways, I think liberals have failed because we tend to talk past conservatives. The fault is certainly one that is shared on both sides, but there are serious flaws in the conservative ideology. In order to convince conservatives of these flaws, though, we have to be willing to listen to what they say and to speak to their issues and fears.

I think that we have to start phrasing questions differently... like how can we do this (liberal thing) while at the same time preventing that (conservative fear) from happening.

I do see that a lot of times conservatives aren't able to say exactly why they think as they do. They sometimes say things like "any reasonable person can see that it's obvious why..." or "that's how things are supposed to be done." Still, maybe if they think that liberals are actually listening (as opposed to formulating an answer even while they are talking), they will try to explain themselves more clearly and, although their focus is on "conserving" the way things are, even they have left the horse and buggy behind for the car. I think they can be persuaded to change if they are persuaded that their own interests will benefit from the change.

It's not easy to talk to them, though. That's for sure!

but they brag about being intellectual. Talk about Orwellian Doublespeak.

This is just designed to soften up the electorate to cheap-labor values. Just pure propaganda. Nothing more.

..gone down in technicolour FLAMES?

So the NYT is reduced to "Whistling past the Graveyard" now?

OK, so the Left has think tanks and institutions at LEAST equal to the Hundson Institute and the rest of the Neo-Con think tanks, but you wanna know what the Right has that the Left doesn't have anymore?

The MEDIA.

I saw one of their representatives on TV complaining about the Iraq war, which I think Cato was against from the start.

they've also been critical of some of his other colossal failures.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=18395

Think of a "marketplace of ideas" where the products are policies, positions, and issues all competing for dominance. On the surface, this may seem like the stuff of dreams for "free market" conservatives, but it turns out it's a nightmare. You see, what we find is that in this marketplace, Democrats actually have the better product and Americans prefer the policies of Democrats by a wide margin to those of the GOP. In the realm of ideas, just as in any marketplace, the superior or preferred product usually wins out, but not always. An inferior product can dominate in the market when it has superior marketing, and this is precisely what we have seen come to pass in U.S. politics over the past two decades.

When we fail to view the world through the conservative business lens, we can easily see all of this as a vast rightwing conspiracy. However if we recall the frame of the marketplace of ideas, then we see it for it is: a well-run operation that recognized its weakness – a less desirable product – and figured out a way to dominate in the marketplace through an incredibly successful, integrated marketing strategy. Branded by the right and blind-sided by the conservative marketing machine, for more than a decade Democrats have been running to the right and abandoning core progressive issues and values in an attempt to keep pace with conservatives. This has been completely the wrong response.

It is time for the Democratic Party to recognize that they cannot stem the conservative tide by moving further to the right, by going about business as usual, or by denying the importance of marketing. Progressives have been betamaxed by conservatives, and the first step to recovery is recognizing the problem. If we want progressive ideas and policies to dominate in the marketplace of ideas then we have to start fighting fire with fire and thinking strategically like conservatives in terms of marketing.

The DLC and some Joe Lieberman, John Breaux types took our Party to the right when we should have been going left as a response to the Repub marketing....

By the way, is Kerry going to pick Breaux as his VP...I hope not, but...

That's the real issue.

this very subject will be the basis of our loss.This topic can be extended into every aspect of our party and campaign for the election.
Jonathon Altar(sp) expresses it perfectly from my perspection. Pure and simple "Liberals are simply not as committed as Republicans" He is a liberal the last time I checked.