I tend to agree with Mr. Brociner. The ad hominem attacks have become the natural way to do things. There is no way to assign which side “started it” but both the right and left have become ugly. As left as I am, there used to be a time that I would be willing to listen to the rights’ point of view. I can’t even take a few minutes anymore. Maybe the rise of right wing talk radio has been the instigation for the equal response from the left, but more than likely it’s simply the dumbing down of America. Our TV culture needs conflict for “entertaining drama” and name calling is conflict.
Not that this stuff wasn’t going on even back in the days of our earliest elections, but TV needs it to gain viewers and thus to gain advertisers. I’m so amazed to see any of the cable news channels bring on their guests for one or two minute debates, and think the audience is gaining some sort of insight. But of course they don’t think that, they want us to get riled up enough to sit through the four or five minutes of commercials until the next useless mini-debate. True debate has been replaced by show debate.
But what is the answer? Force everyone to learn proper debate? Maybe, it’s time for hosts to be trained in formal debate and required to conduct it properly. Maybe it’s time for guests to be penalized with silence if they break formal debate rules. Nah, it will never happen, just a personal fantasy. And of course formal debate wouldn’t address columnists and talk radio/TV that don’t do anything but spout opinion ad hominem ad nauseum.
There is a possible solution. Bring back the fairness doctrine they used to have for TV/radio.
Posted by Jon B on Jun 24, 2008 at 7:02 AM
Yo Ken -
You withdrew from our excellent discussion on a previous thread, to our mutual detriment, but I am intrigued by some of your comments here.
I note that democratic political entities that encourage discussion and dissent tend to have fierce internal conflicts before they go out and stomp whomever and whatever needs to be stomped. Israel is the leading practitioner of this dynamic, with the United States as a distant but capable second. This process, often thought of as inefficient, is actually a key component of successful democracies throughout the world. I therefore think the current fierce discussions within your “Progressive” ranks and in the overall electoral process are entirely beneficial and healthful for our democracy. The distillation of personalities and policies in the electoral process will result in a high-proof democratic result.
This is in marked contrast to the non-democracies, where the winner of internal debates eliminates his opponents, and then proceeds to eliminate the populace: Stalin, Mao, the Kims, Pol Pot, Saddam, and Mugabe are prime examples.
<blockquote>... I am often downright embarrassed by how one-dimensional and superficial our
Posted by scorp on Jun 24, 2008 at 11:12 PM
As a radical progressive I got a good laugh from Ken Brociner’s essay. Ken, you haven’t presented anything that progressives can learn from Obama. Obama says “we have to be careful not to slip into playing the game as it is customarily played,” and then he goes to AIPAC and plays the game completely customarily and his flip-flop cave-in on Telecom Imunity is completely customary politics, just to name two examples.
Ken, in case you didn’t notice, Petraeus did betray the USA, and Sirota is right that Obama is keeping hush on important issues. Ken, Obama is the best choice among what the two party machines have to offer, but after observing Obama’s first two weeks as the nominee and his rush to the center, only uncritical admirers of Barack Obama can still believe he has a genuine desire to transcend old political habits.
As you can see I’m not at all enamored by Barack Obama’s candidacy. His speech at AIPAC the day after achieving the nomination was an abomination and supreme display of pandering at its worst. Self-styled progressives like Ken Brociner leave me wondering if there is a political label that Democratic centrists won’t try to usurp?
Brociner discusses issues of political campaigning style and does not provide any examples of the “alternative philosophical outlook” that Obama is supposed to have developed. So it appears that this alternative philosophical outlook only extends to trying to be a “nice guy” campaigner.
The underlying difference is whether we are talking policies and principles or merely vague political rhetoric.?
The problem that progressives have with Obama is not as Broiner alleges that we don’t trust his motivations, it is that we don’t trust his politics. So far he appears to be nothing more than a better window dressing on the Democratic Party. Brociner wants us to believe that every political “enemy” be they vanilla liberal Democrat or rabid neo-con really sincerely believes “they are working to make the world a better place.” So? Perhaps Brociner’s view is the problem. What are we to make of people who believe they are working to make the world a better place but who are doing so in a manner that makes it worse? Okay, assuming George Bush and Dick Cheney really wanted to make the world a better place by lying to the public and illegally invading and occupying Iraq, how does that “new philosophy” help us?
Assuming that Barack Obama really wants to make the world a better place when he goes to AIPAC and kisses their shoes regurgitating their false talking points right back to them, while Israel contiues its illegal and inhumane appartheid occupation and blocade of Palestine, how does that express a new “philosophical outlook” in political policy or principles?
It is not progressives who have a one-dimensional analysis, it is Brociner who is presenting a cartoonish version of reality by erasing the facts from the picture.
Obama is the one who is adding to the dishonest tone to the election when he supports an assault on the Constitution and calls it a good deal for the people. The fundamental dishonesty to the Democratic Party is that Obama is conceding that he has no argument against the Republicans on national security. He can’t say Telecom Immunity has NOTHING to do with national security. And on top of that, Obama’s basic message is even though George Bush has the power now, don’t worry when Obama is president he will exercise it responsibility. That is not a new philosophy of government; that is the oldest political scam in the world. What Obama needs to learn from progressives is to quit the political con game and keep it real.
You can’t have a critical mass for change if you don’t have a mass of criticism about what needs to be changed.
Gregory Wonderwheel : ‘... Self-styled progressives like Ken Brociner leave me wondering if there is a political label that Democratic centrists won
Posted by anarcissie on Jun 25, 2008 at 12:22 PM
Reader Comments
I tend to agree with Mr. Brociner. The ad hominem attacks have become the natural way to do things. There is no way to assign which side “started it” but both the right and left have become ugly. As left as I am, there used to be a time that I would be willing to listen to the rights’ point of view. I can’t even take a few minutes anymore. Maybe the rise of right wing talk radio has been the instigation for the equal response from the left, but more than likely it’s simply the dumbing down of America. Our TV culture needs conflict for “entertaining drama” and name calling is conflict.
Not that this stuff wasn’t going on even back in the days of our earliest elections, but TV needs it to gain viewers and thus to gain advertisers. I’m so amazed to see any of the cable news channels bring on their guests for one or two minute debates, and think the audience is gaining some sort of insight. But of course they don’t think that, they want us to get riled up enough to sit through the four or five minutes of commercials until the next useless mini-debate. True debate has been replaced by show debate.
But what is the answer? Force everyone to learn proper debate? Maybe, it’s time for hosts to be trained in formal debate and required to conduct it properly. Maybe it’s time for guests to be penalized with silence if they break formal debate rules. Nah, it will never happen, just a personal fantasy. And of course formal debate wouldn’t address columnists and talk radio/TV that don’t do anything but spout opinion ad hominem ad nauseum.
There is a possible solution. Bring back the fairness doctrine they used to have for TV/radio.
Posted by Jon B on Jun 24, 2008 at 7:02 AM
Yo Ken -
You withdrew from our excellent discussion on a previous thread, to our mutual detriment, but I am intrigued by some of your comments here.
I note that democratic political entities that encourage discussion and dissent tend to have fierce internal conflicts before they go out and stomp whomever and whatever needs to be stomped. Israel is the leading practitioner of this dynamic, with the United States as a distant but capable second. This process, often thought of as inefficient, is actually a key component of successful democracies throughout the world. I therefore think the current fierce discussions within your “Progressive” ranks and in the overall electoral process are entirely beneficial and healthful for our democracy. The distillation of personalities and policies in the electoral process will result in a high-proof democratic result.
This is in marked contrast to the non-democracies, where the winner of internal debates eliminates his opponents, and then proceeds to eliminate the populace: Stalin, Mao, the Kims, Pol Pot, Saddam, and Mugabe are prime examples.
<blockquote>... I am often downright embarrassed by how one-dimensional and superficial our
Posted by scorp on Jun 24, 2008 at 11:12 PM
As a radical progressive I got a good laugh from Ken Brociner’s essay. Ken, you haven’t presented anything that progressives can learn from Obama. Obama says “we have to be careful not to slip into playing the game as it is customarily played,” and then he goes to AIPAC and plays the game completely customarily and his flip-flop cave-in on Telecom Imunity is completely customary politics, just to name two examples.
Ken, in case you didn’t notice, Petraeus did betray the USA, and Sirota is right that Obama is keeping hush on important issues. Ken, Obama is the best choice among what the two party machines have to offer, but after observing Obama’s first two weeks as the nominee and his rush to the center, only uncritical admirers of Barack Obama can still believe he has a genuine desire to transcend old political habits.
As you can see I’m not at all enamored by Barack Obama’s candidacy. His speech at AIPAC the day after achieving the nomination was an abomination and supreme display of pandering at its worst. Self-styled progressives like Ken Brociner leave me wondering if there is a political label that Democratic centrists won’t try to usurp?
Brociner discusses issues of political campaigning style and does not provide any examples of the “alternative philosophical outlook” that Obama is supposed to have developed. So it appears that this alternative philosophical outlook only extends to trying to be a “nice guy” campaigner.
The underlying difference is whether we are talking policies and principles or merely vague political rhetoric.?
The problem that progressives have with Obama is not as Broiner alleges that we don’t trust his motivations, it is that we don’t trust his politics. So far he appears to be nothing more than a better window dressing on the Democratic Party. Brociner wants us to believe that every political “enemy” be they vanilla liberal Democrat or rabid neo-con really sincerely believes “they are working to make the world a better place.” So? Perhaps Brociner’s view is the problem. What are we to make of people who believe they are working to make the world a better place but who are doing so in a manner that makes it worse? Okay, assuming George Bush and Dick Cheney really wanted to make the world a better place by lying to the public and illegally invading and occupying Iraq, how does that “new philosophy” help us?
Assuming that Barack Obama really wants to make the world a better place when he goes to AIPAC and kisses their shoes regurgitating their false talking points right back to them, while Israel contiues its illegal and inhumane appartheid occupation and blocade of Palestine, how does that express a new “philosophical outlook” in political policy or principles?
It is not progressives who have a one-dimensional analysis, it is Brociner who is presenting a cartoonish version of reality by erasing the facts from the picture.
Obama is the one who is adding to the dishonest tone to the election when he supports an assault on the Constitution and calls it a good deal for the people. The fundamental dishonesty to the Democratic Party is that Obama is conceding that he has no argument against the Republicans on national security. He can’t say Telecom Immunity has NOTHING to do with national security. And on top of that, Obama’s basic message is even though George Bush has the power now, don’t worry when Obama is president he will exercise it responsibility. That is not a new philosophy of government; that is the oldest political scam in the world. What Obama needs to learn from progressives is to quit the political con game and keep it real.
Posted by Gregory Wonderwheel on Jun 25, 2008 at 11:21 AM
You can’t have a critical mass for change if you don’t have a mass of criticism about what needs to be changed.
Posted by Gregory Wonderwheel on Jun 25, 2008 at 11:27 AM
Gregory Wonderwheel : ‘... Self-styled progressives like Ken Brociner leave me wondering if there is a political label that Democratic centrists won
Posted by anarcissie on Jun 25, 2008 at 12:22 PM