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I didn’t attend the Left Forum this year (or last) and Ken Brociner’s article didn’t give me any information about what I might have missed. It did tell me how uncomfortable Ken feels in certain left circles, but that in itself is not particularly interesting, unless perhaps, you know Ken personally (I don’t). Maybe the idea of Ken listening to a panel on Venezuela or Iraq is inherently funny. Who knows? A different, more interesting article would have covered the two conferences with the same attention to detail. Keynote addresses could have been compared. We could have been treated to an overview of panel topics, or what the two conferences understood to be the major issues of the day. Presumably the US presidential election is not the only thing that deserves attention in this world? But that other article would have meant focusing on something other than personal discomfort.
Posted by MenacingToad on Apr 20, 2008 at 7:10 PM
This is an awful article. I absolutely agree with Menacing Toad’s sentiment. The author offered nothing but a caricature of the Left Forum and his own ideological drivel, which clearly rests in his own blind spot. In These Times has to do better. I am in full agreement that any left movement has to mix ideology and pragmatism, but this authors rabid pragmatism and belief in electoral politics as the only avenue for change, is wrongheaded. Moreover, it discounts the LONG history of movement building in the US and beyond that has happened out side of electoral politics. We need to do better then Mr Brociner if we are to build a thoughtful, flexible and growing left movement that is able to have a political understanding of the world while building party and network apparatuses that operate both within and beyond electoral politics.
Posted by twolfson on Apr 21, 2008 at 5:58 AM
I write as a member of the Board of Directors and the program committee of the Left Forum. Bogdan Denitch and I were the founders of its predecessor, The Socialist Scholars Conference. Both of us spoke on panels at this year’s Left forum. Ken Brociner’s piece on our conference is a fairly accurate reflection of the discomfort a left-liberal might have experienced at our conference. Yes, it is a conference of radicals, but also includes some folks traditionally associated with the politics of Democratic Socialists. A representative group of participants was there from the Village Independent Democrats, AFL-CIO union staffers and officers, and I said hello to some Dissentniks and members of the youth section of DSA as well. In short, it was as ecumenical as any of previous conferences, but did have a preponderance of panels and speakers of the radical left. They included plenary speakers like best-selling author, the anti-slavery historian Adam Hochschild, Mamoud Mondani. professor of middle eastern studies at the left-wing Columbia University, Naomi Klein, whose book on neo-liberal economics has struck terror in the hearts of Democrats as well as Republican Friedmanites, and the well-known utopian Grace Lee Boggs. Also Amy Goodman of Democracy Now and Tariq Ali.
Our board includes Bill Fletcher Jr. and the social movement theorist Fran Piven, an ardent left-Democrat as well as Rick Wolff and Bill Tabb whose economics surely violate the precepts of free market ideology. Board member Julia Wrigley is acting provost of CUNY Graduate Center and Nancy Holstrom is a Rutgers University Philosophy Professor. Michael Smith is an active civil liberties attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights.
The conference organizers certified that 2300 people registered, not 1100( brociner’s numbers recall shades of the notorious NY Times report on anti-war demonstrations) and we had 110 panels ranging from discussions of financialization that featured Robin Blackburn, among others, feminist theory and practice, issues of race and class and extensive panels on US foreign policy, including, but not limited to the war against Iraq.Some of the panels would have shaken the liberal imagination. Others were a bit one-sided But the committee encouraged panel organizers to display differences. Thus many of the panels were debates rather than expositions and extreme left-wing publications such as the New York Review of Books had book and journal exhibits.
I hope this provides some detail as to the nature and activity of Left Forum 2008.
Posted by saronowitz on Apr 21, 2008 at 8:46 AM
Part 1 of a reply by Ken Brociner:
Menacing Toad
Posted by kenbrociner on Apr 21, 2008 at 7:15 PM
Part 2 of Ken Brociner’s reply:
Stanley Aronowitz points out that there were some people at the Left Forum who do think it is important to actively support efforts to elect Democratic candidates to office. Of course there were. But he doesn
Posted by kenbrociner on Apr 21, 2008 at 7:19 PM
Let’s get an important issue out on the table: the war in Iraq. Participants at The Left Forum are opposed to the war. Participants at the Take Back America conference are placing all their bets on the Democratic Party, believing that replacing pro-war Republicans with Democrats (any Democrats, even pro-war Democrats) is a great step forward. I don’t know Brociner, but I am familiar with the writers at Dissent. Many of them are hawks on the Iraq war (e.g., Marty Peretz). No wonder Brociner attacks the Left Forum for their “shrill ideological pronouncements.” Pronouncements like “stop the war!” for example.
The mobilization of voters by the Democrats is indeed impressive. It has happened before: In 2006, Democrats mobilized, the Republicans got creamed at the ballot box, and the Democrats seized the Senate and the House. Did the Democrats end the war? No, of course not. They have the power to cut off funds for the war, but they refuse to do so. Both Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama have joined John McCain in voting to fund the war.
I expect that in 2009, the Democrats will control the White House, the Senate and the House. What excuse will the Democrats give then for continuing to fund the war?
Mr. Brociner doesn’t mention the Iraq war in his essay, not even once. Brociner denounces the Left Forum as “politically irrelevant”. Hmmmm….
Posted by Nevada_Ned on Apr 21, 2008 at 11:34 PM
Part 1 of Ken Brociner’s reply (due to space limitations it will carry over to the section directly below this one):
Nevada Ned raises several important points. I’ll address them one by one. Most of the activists and organizers who attended the Take Back America Conference are not “placing all their bets on the Democratic Party” in order to end U.S. involvement in the war in Iraq. In fact, as I indicated in my column, the multi-faceted movement of activists that came together at the conference generally sees itself as being independent of the Democratic Party. What I did not mention - and in retrospect I see that I should have - is that a number of the speakers at the conference expressed their frustration with the Democrat’s failure to move more quickly to end the war. The horrendous human tragedy and enormous cost of the war was one of the most widely disussed topics throught the three days of the conference.
Apparently Ned isn’t as familiar with Dissent as he thinks he is. While Marty Peretz is one of the 42 people on the Editorial Board, he doesn’t write for Dissent. And to state that “many” of the magazine’s writers are hawks on Iraq is just plain wrong. The overwhelming majority of the people who have written for Dissent since the war began have been strongly opposed to it.
Posted by kenbrociner on Apr 22, 2008 at 9:31 AM
To reiterate what I said in my column and in response to some of the comments that have been posted, any conference of leftists that meets less than 8 months before a pivotal election that all but ignores both the election and a campaign as important as Obama’s has turned out to be - deserves the label of ” mostly irrelevant”.
Ken Brociner
Posted by kenbrociner on Apr 22, 2008 at 9:37 AM
Hi Ken
I hate to be rude, but, I have to say it is not the Left Forum which is irrelevant but rather your very BAD, uninformed, ideological analysis. An analysis I might add, which shows a lack of understanding of the rich complex history of the left and more importantly the varied paths to social change. Moreover your responses to other people’s comments are much like your original story. They are defensive, and they lack an ability to engage with the actual statements people made, and I believe this is the case because you have a closed mind. Again, I think it is unfortunate that In These Times gave you a space not because of your position but rather because you don’t seem to have the ability to justify your position.
Todd Wolfson
Posted by twolfson on Apr 22, 2008 at 9:44 AM
Todd,
This is an election year. In a few short months, the American people will make a decision that will have enormous consequences for our country along with the rest of the world.
All I am saying is that any conference of leftists that meets during the run-up to the election should be spending considerable time and energy trying to figure out how to have an impact on the results of the election. In this case that means - first and foremost - how to defeat John McCain in November.
I see this as a no-brainer. You seem not to. As for my alleged lack of understanding about the fact that not all political change occurs in the voting booth - do any of the organizations that I listed in my column work exclusively on elections? Does MoveOn? Does the AFL-CIO? Does ACORN? None of them do. They all work year-round organizing their constituents to march in the streets, walk picket lines, write and call politicians in support of progressive legislation etc etc.
Ken Brociner
Posted by kenbrociner on Apr 22, 2008 at 10:20 AM
If one wing makes the mistake of viewing Obama as irrelevant, perhaps the other wing makes the mistake of viewing him as anything other than another centrist Presidential candidate, although possibly a better one than we have sometimes had.
Posted by DeanOR on Apr 22, 2008 at 11:10 PM
Thanks for your thoughtful responses, Ken. But ultimately the problem with the article is that you covered one conference as a booster for their agenda while using the other as a straw man to attack. A little more balance could have left a progressive reader with the sense that this is a period of ferment on the Left. There is a lot to talk about (and do) on the immediate horizon and on the medium and long term as well. I guess that’s the article I hoped to see.
Posted by MenacingToad on Apr 23, 2008 at 7:32 AM
To many (perhaps most) ITT readers, the US invasion and occupation of Iraq is a war of aggression, an attempt by the US to seize control of the oil of the Persian Gulf.
However, Ken Brociner belongs politically with Dissent magazine. The editors of Dissent (Michael Walzer and Mitchell Cohen) signed the Euston Manifesto (http://eustonmanifesto.org/?page_id=132)
which proclaims that liberals and leftists ought to support the US occupation of Iraq. Here’s the key paragraph of the manifesto:
“the proper concern of genuine liberals and members of the Left should have been the battle to put in place in Iraq a democratic political order and to rebuild the country’s infrastructure, to create after decades of the most brutal oppression a life for Iraqis which those living in democratic countries take for granted
Posted by Nevada_Ned on Apr 25, 2008 at 7:19 AM
Nevada Ned has got to kidding. All anyone has to do is to read the entire paragraph that he takes that quote from to see how shamelessly he distorts what the Euston Manifesto actually says.
Right before the excerpt that Ned deliberately lifted out of context (see the URL in his comment to read it for yourself) the Manifesto allows for the fact that while signers of the Manifesto may have disagreed on the meriits of the US invasion (and the overwhelming majority opposed it), once Sadam’s regime had been ousted, “the proper concern…” ...[ read the rest of the quote above].
If the Bush administration had actually taken the advice offered here (which it, predictably, did not), what part of it would Ned have opposed?
I marched aginst the war before it began - and have opposed it ever since. The majority of people associated with Dissent magazine have also been opposed to the war since day one.
Hey Ned, the next time you want to distort/fabricate other peoples’ political positions, you might try being a bit more clever about it. Cause you really blew it this time.
Posted by kenbrociner on Apr 25, 2008 at 9:36 AM
Dear Ken Brociner:
Here’s the thrust of the Euston Manifesto: not every signatory supported the US invasion of Iraq before it started, but after the war started, they appeal to support the US occupation now.
Take the case of Michael Walzer. As war loomed in spring 2003, he wrote an article in the April 22, 2003 New York Times “What A Little War in Iraq Could Do.” Instead of the Big War that Bush waged, Walzer proposed instead “to intensify the little war that the United States is already fighting”: to extend the no-fly zone to the entire country of Iraq, implement “smart sanctions” against Iraq, and sanctions by Washington against any countries tha don’t cooperate. Expand the UN monitoring system…bringing in United Nations soldiers (to guard military installations after they have been inspected). Of course if this were really implemented, Iraq would cease to be a sovereign nation, and would in effect become a colony of the US. But Walzer says “America has already drastically reduced Iraqi sovereignty, so this would not be anything new.”
Writing in the New York Review of Books (Mar 13, 2003 issue), Walzer admitted that extending the no-fly zones to the entire country of Iraq
“is a risky and costly business, and if it is ‘short’ of war, it isn’t far short.”
Before the war started, then, Walzer verbally opposed the war while supporting measures that would only avoid war if Iraq surrendered without a fight.
But after the war started, Walzer swung around to support the occupation. In “Just and Unjust Occupations” (Dissent, Winter 2004) Walzer writes “The positions we took before the war don’t determine the positions we take, or should take, on the occupation. Some people who opposed the war demand that we immediately “bring the troops home.” But others argue, rightly, it seems to me, that having fought the war, we are now responsible for the well-being of the Iraqi people; we have to provide the resources-soldiers and dollars-necessary to guarantee their security and begin the political and economic reconstruction of their country.”
Dissent’s other editor, Mitchell Cohen, is more straightforward. In the most recent issue (Winter 2008), Cohe, describes himself as someonw who “was a left hawk, (and is now an unhappy one).”
The judgment of the World Socialist Web Site seems sound
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/may2006/eust-m24.shtml
We’re just not going to agree, except on one point: readers should read the Euston Manifesto, read what Dissent says about the war, and make up their own minds.
Posted by Nevada_Ned on Apr 25, 2008 at 3:54 PM
Ned is right - readers should check out the Euston Manifesto - but, I would add, read it in its entirety - not only for what is says about Iraq. If they do, most readers will find it to be one of the most thoughtful documents produced in recent years.
Posted by kenbrociner on Apr 25, 2008 at 4:09 PM
Enough has been said in these comments about differences between liberals and radicals on the Iraq war. But there are other differences worth mentioning:
—neither Democratic candidate has departed substantially from the administration’s Israel First doctrine. Even as rhetorically it supports a two state solution neither Bush nor the Democrats dare call for the dismantling of all Israeli settlements on the West Bank and Gaza as a condition for a peace agreement. Nor have they been willing to place any blame on the Israeli government’s apartheid policies and stubborn refusal to even talk to Hamas. As Jimmy Carter is excoriated by Israeli politicians and the American Right, the liberals stay silent.
—The Democratic response to the recession is feeble. Clinton and Obama have urged $30 billion to address foreclosures but remained silent about the unconscionable bailouts of Bear Sterns and many banks amounting to hundreds of billions of dollars. Nor have they proposed a real extension of jobless benefits and restoration of income supports for those who have exhausted their benefits or do not qualify for them. Needless to say cutting working hours is not on union or Democrats’ agendas. Amazingly, the huge disparity of black and white jobless rates which are getting worse has not managed to detain either candidate.
In sum while Clinton knows how to talk the class talk(a rhetoric that Obama’s language is only a work in progress) the liberals do not even rise to the standard of traditional New Deal programs. They are dedicated neo-libs, slightly modified Friedmanites. Thats the real problem. Why should the Left devote much time to this campaign except to provide analysis. That the Left Forum did not adequately do, but I must say that the move of “Progressives for Obama” is eerily lacking in serious critique of his campaign.
Posted by saronowitz on Apr 27, 2008 at 3:44 PM
Stanley Aronowitz seems unaware of the fact that in 2005 all Israeli settlements in Gaza were totally dismantled - and all of the settlers moved back to Israel.
As for the West Bank, he seems similarly unaware of the fact that the Geneva Iniative - the unofficial peace accord reached between moderates on both sides - allows Israel to keep the large settlement blocs that are situated near the Green Line - as long as the exact same amount of land that is now part of Israel is transferred to a new Palestinian state.
It is widely known and accepted by partisans on both sides that this exchange of territory will be incorporated into the final peace agreement that one day (hopefully) will actually be agreed upon and implemented.
As for what the Left Forum should have done and what other leftists should be doing in the run-up to Nov 2, Aronowitz seems to think that all that needs to be done is “analysis” - which he implies should be aimed at showing how totally inadequate the Democratic Party’s program really is.
Posted by kenbrociner on May 4, 2008 at 3:20 PM
I certainly agree that the platforms that Obama and Clinton are running on are hardly up to the task of adequately addressing the huge problems that this country and the rest of the world now face. Nonetheless, it seems to me that it is absolutely essential that those of us who identify with the left do all we can to prevent McCain from continuing the ruinous policies of the Bush administration for another four years.
“Analysis” is all well and good. But without a hell of a lot of activism between now and November, we will be leaving ourselves open to the accusation that due to our own political purism we sat on the sidelines and let the Republicans win yet another presidential election.
Based on his past record of supporting third party candidates, I suspect Aronowitz wouldn’t be bothered by this in the slightest.
Although perhaps by now - after eight years of George W. Bush - when we could have eight years of Al Gore if Nader hadn’t run run in 2000… maybe -just maybe - Aronowitz has come to realize that sitting on the sidelines or worse, supporting third parties ,is both politically and morally irresponsible.
Posted by kenbrociner on May 4, 2008 at 3:50 PM
We have a rotten capitalist system on the skids to oblivion and a combined force of some 5,000 “leftists” in two conferences from across the country can’t find a way to deal with the real problems the working class is experiencing.
The Take Back America Conference is stuck in the rut of trying to properly “frame issues” without considering real solutions.
There is something drastically wrong with the “left” when it can’t come up with real solutions to the problems working people are experiencing like losing their jobs to plant closings; coming together to build a powerful movement for single-payer universal health care while saying it is a step towards what is really needed—- socialized health care, and the “left” sits in silence as Obama peddles nonsense about “affordable” health insurance with premiums people losing their homes, can’t pay heating and electric bills and losing their jobs won’t be able to pay.
We have millions of workers at poverty wage jobs. When is the “left” going to come out and declare once and for all that if a job needs to be done that job should pay a real living wage to the worker doing that job. The minimum wage should be based upon the scientific calculations made by the United States Department of Labor and its Bureau of Labor Statistics not some phony figure pulled out of some politician’s hat at election time.
The war in Iraq needs to end now so the resources can be allocated to things that people really need in accordance with what the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights states.
On the issue of plant closings the left needs to mobilize around the issue of public ownership… if the capitalists aren’t going to keep these plants operating then public ownership is going to have to be the solution.
The mortgage problem is fairly simple and the “left” ignores the immediate solution… millions being foreclosed on and evicted from homes that can’t be sold… the demand has to be to allow people to continue living in their own homes indefinitely until the swindlers and culprits who created this mess are brought to justice at which time the loans can be renotiatiated after these corrupt bankers and politicians pay back what they have stolen. One of these swindlers is helping Obama find his running mate right now.
Why is it so difficult for the left to come up with real solutions to the problems working people are experiencing and get back to rank and file organizing where people work and good solid grassroots organizing in the communities where working people live.
We have some two-million American workers going to jobs in some four-hundred smoke-filled casino operations at poverty wages without any rights under state or federal labor laws in the Indian Gaming Industry controlled by a bunch of mobsters using the most Draconian management techniques to beat workers into submission… these right-to-work-for-less colonies created by “Compacts” have now become clubs over the heads of every worker in this country. The solution: Organize.
Education. Education. Organization. Unity. United Militant Action. This has been and always will be the key to successful working class struggles and if we take socialism off the table as some are suggesting, our movements aren’t going to go anywhere.
We need to challenge this rotten capitalist system by always bringing forward the socialist solution.
It’s time for the left to get back to basics by bringing people into struggle around real solutions to their problems.
For those so enamored with Obama he hasn’t proposed one single solution to any problem working people are experiencing; Obama hasn’t attempted to define “change” and he hasn’t said what “Yes we can” is all about… but, he sure spelled out his position regarding the situation in the Middle East real well to AIPAC.
Maybe its time to find out what Barack Obama’s mentor, Frank Marshall Davis had to say?
Alan L. Maki
Director of Organizing,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council
http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/
Posted by alanmaki on Jun 10, 2008 at 9:26 PM
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Reader Comments
I didn’t attend the Left Forum this year (or last) and Ken Brociner’s article didn’t give me any information about what I might have missed. It did tell me how uncomfortable Ken feels in certain left circles, but that in itself is not particularly interesting, unless perhaps, you know Ken personally (I don’t). Maybe the idea of Ken listening to a panel on Venezuela or Iraq is inherently funny. Who knows? A different, more interesting article would have covered the two conferences with the same attention to detail. Keynote addresses could have been compared. We could have been treated to an overview of panel topics, or what the two conferences understood to be the major issues of the day. Presumably the US presidential election is not the only thing that deserves attention in this world? But that other article would have meant focusing on something other than personal discomfort.
This is an awful article. I absolutely agree with Menacing Toad’s sentiment. The author offered nothing but a caricature of the Left Forum and his own ideological drivel, which clearly rests in his own blind spot. In These Times has to do better. I am in full agreement that any left movement has to mix ideology and pragmatism, but this authors rabid pragmatism and belief in electoral politics as the only avenue for change, is wrongheaded. Moreover, it discounts the LONG history of movement building in the US and beyond that has happened out side of electoral politics. We need to do better then Mr Brociner if we are to build a thoughtful, flexible and growing left movement that is able to have a political understanding of the world while building party and network apparatuses that operate both within and beyond electoral politics.
I write as a member of the Board of Directors and the program committee of the Left Forum. Bogdan Denitch and I were the founders of its predecessor, The Socialist Scholars Conference. Both of us spoke on panels at this year’s Left forum. Ken Brociner’s piece on our conference is a fairly accurate reflection of the discomfort a left-liberal might have experienced at our conference. Yes, it is a conference of radicals, but also includes some folks traditionally associated with the politics of Democratic Socialists. A representative group of participants was there from the Village Independent Democrats, AFL-CIO union staffers and officers, and I said hello to some Dissentniks and members of the youth section of DSA as well. In short, it was as ecumenical as any of previous conferences, but did have a preponderance of panels and speakers of the radical left. They included plenary speakers like best-selling author, the anti-slavery historian Adam Hochschild, Mamoud Mondani. professor of middle eastern studies at the left-wing Columbia University, Naomi Klein, whose book on neo-liberal economics has struck terror in the hearts of Democrats as well as Republican Friedmanites, and the well-known utopian Grace Lee Boggs. Also Amy Goodman of Democracy Now and Tariq Ali.
Our board includes Bill Fletcher Jr. and the social movement theorist Fran Piven, an ardent left-Democrat as well as Rick Wolff and Bill Tabb whose economics surely violate the precepts of free market ideology. Board member Julia Wrigley is acting provost of CUNY Graduate Center and Nancy Holstrom is a Rutgers University Philosophy Professor. Michael Smith is an active civil liberties attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights.
The conference organizers certified that 2300 people registered, not 1100( brociner’s numbers recall shades of the notorious NY Times report on anti-war demonstrations) and we had 110 panels ranging from discussions of financialization that featured Robin Blackburn, among others, feminist theory and practice, issues of race and class and extensive panels on US foreign policy, including, but not limited to the war against Iraq.Some of the panels would have shaken the liberal imagination. Others were a bit one-sided But the committee encouraged panel organizers to display differences. Thus many of the panels were debates rather than expositions and extreme left-wing publications such as the New York Review of Books had book and journal exhibits.
I hope this provides some detail as to the nature and activity of Left Forum 2008.
Part 1 of a reply by Ken Brociner:
Menacing Toad
Part 2 of Ken Brociner’s reply:
Stanley Aronowitz points out that there were some people at the Left Forum who do think it is important to actively support efforts to elect Democratic candidates to office. Of course there were. But he doesn
Let’s get an important issue out on the table: the war in Iraq. Participants at The Left Forum are opposed to the war. Participants at the Take Back America conference are placing all their bets on the Democratic Party, believing that replacing pro-war Republicans with Democrats (any Democrats, even pro-war Democrats) is a great step forward. I don’t know Brociner, but I am familiar with the writers at Dissent. Many of them are hawks on the Iraq war (e.g., Marty Peretz). No wonder Brociner attacks the Left Forum for their “shrill ideological pronouncements.” Pronouncements like “stop the war!” for example.
The mobilization of voters by the Democrats is indeed impressive. It has happened before: In 2006, Democrats mobilized, the Republicans got creamed at the ballot box, and the Democrats seized the Senate and the House. Did the Democrats end the war? No, of course not. They have the power to cut off funds for the war, but they refuse to do so. Both Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama have joined John McCain in voting to fund the war.
I expect that in 2009, the Democrats will control the White House, the Senate and the House. What excuse will the Democrats give then for continuing to fund the war?
Mr. Brociner doesn’t mention the Iraq war in his essay, not even once. Brociner denounces the Left Forum as “politically irrelevant”. Hmmmm….
Part 1 of Ken Brociner’s reply (due to space limitations it will carry over to the section directly below this one):
Nevada Ned raises several important points. I’ll address them one by one. Most of the activists and organizers who attended the Take Back America Conference are not “placing all their bets on the Democratic Party” in order to end U.S. involvement in the war in Iraq. In fact, as I indicated in my column, the multi-faceted movement of activists that came together at the conference generally sees itself as being independent of the Democratic Party. What I did not mention - and in retrospect I see that I should have - is that a number of the speakers at the conference expressed their frustration with the Democrat’s failure to move more quickly to end the war. The horrendous human tragedy and enormous cost of the war was one of the most widely disussed topics throught the three days of the conference.
Apparently Ned isn’t as familiar with Dissent as he thinks he is. While Marty Peretz is one of the 42 people on the Editorial Board, he doesn’t write for Dissent. And to state that “many” of the magazine’s writers are hawks on Iraq is just plain wrong. The overwhelming majority of the people who have written for Dissent since the war began have been strongly opposed to it.
To reiterate what I said in my column and in response to some of the comments that have been posted, any conference of leftists that meets less than 8 months before a pivotal election that all but ignores both the election and a campaign as important as Obama’s has turned out to be - deserves the label of ” mostly irrelevant”.
Ken Brociner
Hi Ken
I hate to be rude, but, I have to say it is not the Left Forum which is irrelevant but rather your very BAD, uninformed, ideological analysis. An analysis I might add, which shows a lack of understanding of the rich complex history of the left and more importantly the varied paths to social change. Moreover your responses to other people’s comments are much like your original story. They are defensive, and they lack an ability to engage with the actual statements people made, and I believe this is the case because you have a closed mind. Again, I think it is unfortunate that In These Times gave you a space not because of your position but rather because you don’t seem to have the ability to justify your position.
Todd Wolfson
Todd,
This is an election year. In a few short months, the American people will make a decision that will have enormous consequences for our country along with the rest of the world.
All I am saying is that any conference of leftists that meets during the run-up to the election should be spending considerable time and energy trying to figure out how to have an impact on the results of the election. In this case that means - first and foremost - how to defeat John McCain in November.
I see this as a no-brainer. You seem not to. As for my alleged lack of understanding about the fact that not all political change occurs in the voting booth - do any of the organizations that I listed in my column work exclusively on elections? Does MoveOn? Does the AFL-CIO? Does ACORN? None of them do. They all work year-round organizing their constituents to march in the streets, walk picket lines, write and call politicians in support of progressive legislation etc etc.
Ken Brociner
If one wing makes the mistake of viewing Obama as irrelevant, perhaps the other wing makes the mistake of viewing him as anything other than another centrist Presidential candidate, although possibly a better one than we have sometimes had.
Thanks for your thoughtful responses, Ken. But ultimately the problem with the article is that you covered one conference as a booster for their agenda while using the other as a straw man to attack. A little more balance could have left a progressive reader with the sense that this is a period of ferment on the Left. There is a lot to talk about (and do) on the immediate horizon and on the medium and long term as well. I guess that’s the article I hoped to see.
To many (perhaps most) ITT readers, the US invasion and occupation of Iraq is a war of aggression, an attempt by the US to seize control of the oil of the Persian Gulf.
However, Ken Brociner belongs politically with Dissent magazine. The editors of Dissent (Michael Walzer and Mitchell Cohen) signed the Euston Manifesto (http://eustonmanifesto.org/?page_id=132)
which proclaims that liberals and leftists ought to support the US occupation of Iraq. Here’s the key paragraph of the manifesto:
“the proper concern of genuine liberals and members of the Left should have been the battle to put in place in Iraq a democratic political order and to rebuild the country’s infrastructure, to create after decades of the most brutal oppression a life for Iraqis which those living in democratic countries take for granted
Nevada Ned has got to kidding. All anyone has to do is to read the entire paragraph that he takes that quote from to see how shamelessly he distorts what the Euston Manifesto actually says.
Right before the excerpt that Ned deliberately lifted out of context (see the URL in his comment to read it for yourself) the Manifesto allows for the fact that while signers of the Manifesto may have disagreed on the meriits of the US invasion (and the overwhelming majority opposed it), once Sadam’s regime had been ousted, “the proper concern…” ...[ read the rest of the quote above].
If the Bush administration had actually taken the advice offered here (which it, predictably, did not), what part of it would Ned have opposed?
I marched aginst the war before it began - and have opposed it ever since. The majority of people associated with Dissent magazine have also been opposed to the war since day one.
Hey Ned, the next time you want to distort/fabricate other peoples’ political positions, you might try being a bit more clever about it. Cause you really blew it this time.
Dear Ken Brociner:
Here’s the thrust of the Euston Manifesto: not every signatory supported the US invasion of Iraq before it started, but after the war started, they appeal to support the US occupation now.
Take the case of Michael Walzer. As war loomed in spring 2003, he wrote an article in the April 22, 2003 New York Times “What A Little War in Iraq Could Do.” Instead of the Big War that Bush waged, Walzer proposed instead “to intensify the little war that the United States is already fighting”: to extend the no-fly zone to the entire country of Iraq, implement “smart sanctions” against Iraq, and sanctions by Washington against any countries tha don’t cooperate. Expand the UN monitoring system…bringing in United Nations soldiers (to guard military installations after they have been inspected). Of course if this were really implemented, Iraq would cease to be a sovereign nation, and would in effect become a colony of the US. But Walzer says “America has already drastically reduced Iraqi sovereignty, so this would not be anything new.”
Writing in the New York Review of Books (Mar 13, 2003 issue), Walzer admitted that extending the no-fly zones to the entire country of Iraq
“is a risky and costly business, and if it is ‘short’ of war, it isn’t far short.”
Before the war started, then, Walzer verbally opposed the war while supporting measures that would only avoid war if Iraq surrendered without a fight.
But after the war started, Walzer swung around to support the occupation. In “Just and Unjust Occupations” (Dissent, Winter 2004) Walzer writes “The positions we took before the war don’t determine the positions we take, or should take, on the occupation. Some people who opposed the war demand that we immediately “bring the troops home.” But others argue, rightly, it seems to me, that having fought the war, we are now responsible for the well-being of the Iraqi people; we have to provide the resources-soldiers and dollars-necessary to guarantee their security and begin the political and economic reconstruction of their country.”
Dissent’s other editor, Mitchell Cohen, is more straightforward. In the most recent issue (Winter 2008), Cohe, describes himself as someonw who “was a left hawk, (and is now an unhappy one).”
The judgment of the World Socialist Web Site seems sound
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/may2006/eust-m24.shtml
We’re just not going to agree, except on one point: readers should read the Euston Manifesto, read what Dissent says about the war, and make up their own minds.
Ned is right - readers should check out the Euston Manifesto - but, I would add, read it in its entirety - not only for what is says about Iraq. If they do, most readers will find it to be one of the most thoughtful documents produced in recent years.
Enough has been said in these comments about differences between liberals and radicals on the Iraq war. But there are other differences worth mentioning:
—neither Democratic candidate has departed substantially from the administration’s Israel First doctrine. Even as rhetorically it supports a two state solution neither Bush nor the Democrats dare call for the dismantling of all Israeli settlements on the West Bank and Gaza as a condition for a peace agreement. Nor have they been willing to place any blame on the Israeli government’s apartheid policies and stubborn refusal to even talk to Hamas. As Jimmy Carter is excoriated by Israeli politicians and the American Right, the liberals stay silent.
—The Democratic response to the recession is feeble. Clinton and Obama have urged $30 billion to address foreclosures but remained silent about the unconscionable bailouts of Bear Sterns and many banks amounting to hundreds of billions of dollars. Nor have they proposed a real extension of jobless benefits and restoration of income supports for those who have exhausted their benefits or do not qualify for them. Needless to say cutting working hours is not on union or Democrats’ agendas. Amazingly, the huge disparity of black and white jobless rates which are getting worse has not managed to detain either candidate.
In sum while Clinton knows how to talk the class talk(a rhetoric that Obama’s language is only a work in progress) the liberals do not even rise to the standard of traditional New Deal programs. They are dedicated neo-libs, slightly modified Friedmanites. Thats the real problem. Why should the Left devote much time to this campaign except to provide analysis. That the Left Forum did not adequately do, but I must say that the move of “Progressives for Obama” is eerily lacking in serious critique of his campaign.
Stanley Aronowitz seems unaware of the fact that in 2005 all Israeli settlements in Gaza were totally dismantled - and all of the settlers moved back to Israel.
As for the West Bank, he seems similarly unaware of the fact that the Geneva Iniative - the unofficial peace accord reached between moderates on both sides - allows Israel to keep the large settlement blocs that are situated near the Green Line - as long as the exact same amount of land that is now part of Israel is transferred to a new Palestinian state.
It is widely known and accepted by partisans on both sides that this exchange of territory will be incorporated into the final peace agreement that one day (hopefully) will actually be agreed upon and implemented.
As for what the Left Forum should have done and what other leftists should be doing in the run-up to Nov 2, Aronowitz seems to think that all that needs to be done is “analysis” - which he implies should be aimed at showing how totally inadequate the Democratic Party’s program really is.
I certainly agree that the platforms that Obama and Clinton are running on are hardly up to the task of adequately addressing the huge problems that this country and the rest of the world now face. Nonetheless, it seems to me that it is absolutely essential that those of us who identify with the left do all we can to prevent McCain from continuing the ruinous policies of the Bush administration for another four years.
“Analysis” is all well and good. But without a hell of a lot of activism between now and November, we will be leaving ourselves open to the accusation that due to our own political purism we sat on the sidelines and let the Republicans win yet another presidential election.
Based on his past record of supporting third party candidates, I suspect Aronowitz wouldn’t be bothered by this in the slightest.
Although perhaps by now - after eight years of George W. Bush - when we could have eight years of Al Gore if Nader hadn’t run run in 2000… maybe -just maybe - Aronowitz has come to realize that sitting on the sidelines or worse, supporting third parties ,is both politically and morally irresponsible.
We have a rotten capitalist system on the skids to oblivion and a combined force of some 5,000 “leftists” in two conferences from across the country can’t find a way to deal with the real problems the working class is experiencing.
The Take Back America Conference is stuck in the rut of trying to properly “frame issues” without considering real solutions.
There is something drastically wrong with the “left” when it can’t come up with real solutions to the problems working people are experiencing like losing their jobs to plant closings; coming together to build a powerful movement for single-payer universal health care while saying it is a step towards what is really needed—- socialized health care, and the “left” sits in silence as Obama peddles nonsense about “affordable” health insurance with premiums people losing their homes, can’t pay heating and electric bills and losing their jobs won’t be able to pay.
We have millions of workers at poverty wage jobs. When is the “left” going to come out and declare once and for all that if a job needs to be done that job should pay a real living wage to the worker doing that job. The minimum wage should be based upon the scientific calculations made by the United States Department of Labor and its Bureau of Labor Statistics not some phony figure pulled out of some politician’s hat at election time.
The war in Iraq needs to end now so the resources can be allocated to things that people really need in accordance with what the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights states.
On the issue of plant closings the left needs to mobilize around the issue of public ownership… if the capitalists aren’t going to keep these plants operating then public ownership is going to have to be the solution.
The mortgage problem is fairly simple and the “left” ignores the immediate solution… millions being foreclosed on and evicted from homes that can’t be sold… the demand has to be to allow people to continue living in their own homes indefinitely until the swindlers and culprits who created this mess are brought to justice at which time the loans can be renotiatiated after these corrupt bankers and politicians pay back what they have stolen. One of these swindlers is helping Obama find his running mate right now.
Why is it so difficult for the left to come up with real solutions to the problems working people are experiencing and get back to rank and file organizing where people work and good solid grassroots organizing in the communities where working people live.
We have some two-million American workers going to jobs in some four-hundred smoke-filled casino operations at poverty wages without any rights under state or federal labor laws in the Indian Gaming Industry controlled by a bunch of mobsters using the most Draconian management techniques to beat workers into submission… these right-to-work-for-less colonies created by “Compacts” have now become clubs over the heads of every worker in this country. The solution: Organize.
Education. Education. Organization. Unity. United Militant Action. This has been and always will be the key to successful working class struggles and if we take socialism off the table as some are suggesting, our movements aren’t going to go anywhere.
We need to challenge this rotten capitalist system by always bringing forward the socialist solution.
It’s time for the left to get back to basics by bringing people into struggle around real solutions to their problems.
For those so enamored with Obama he hasn’t proposed one single solution to any problem working people are experiencing; Obama hasn’t attempted to define “change” and he hasn’t said what “Yes we can” is all about… but, he sure spelled out his position regarding the situation in the Middle East real well to AIPAC.
Maybe its time to find out what Barack Obama’s mentor, Frank Marshall Davis had to say?
Alan L. Maki
Director of Organizing,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council
http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/
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