Letters to the Editor

• @ aka

  [Read the article: Why Jeremiah Wright is so wrong]
  [Read more letters about this article: Here]

  Thanks for an engaged response, as always.

  Even assuming that America has moved a half-a-inch leftward, do you really think most of America is willing to ditch the buzz word of patriotism for the perception that we were somehow justly attacked on 9/11?

  I honestly don't know. I fear the answer is no, but I'm hoping that's just my cynicism talking. What I do know is that America will never be willing to do this if liberals won't even attempt to make a stand for an alternative way of seeing the world. To not stand up for an alternative way of seeing the world is to undermine it, to tacitly admit you believe it's not legitimate.

  Personally, I say thus far and no farther. I'm all about compromise and reconciliation and meeting people where they are, but there comes a point where you have to draw a line and commit to something. I think that liberals should, at the very least, be committed to rejecting these sorts of attack-tactics as illegitimate. To me, tactics define liberalism as much as concrete goals.

  You hit on the difference between us aptly when you write: "You want to teach a seminar. I want to win. I will ask my question again: Is providing Obama victory in the primary and defeating Clinton in the primary more important to you than winning the General Election?"

  It's a bit of a distortion, because I want to do both (if by "teach a seminar" you mean "stand up for intellectual honesty and "liberal" values"). I want to win, but no, not at all costs.

  I think the long-term goals of liberalism are undermined by this mentality. I think that if we believe in the justice and wisdom and practicality of liberalism as a governing ideology or ethos, we ought to act like it.

  I think it's important not that liberalism remain "pure," I'm not an ideologue, but that core tenets only be rejected after serious consideration of the consequences.

  I've determined that ceding certain frames of the debate render liberalism unrecognizable and unsustainable in the long-run, so I'm not willing to do anything for the short-term win.

  But again, this is basically my critique of the Clinton years and I understand it depends on one's point of view.

  This is mine, is all.

  "Why should I? Have you forgotten that I support Hillary? At this point, Obama's problems are his own. I don't see any Obama supporters working to assure that Hillary has a better chance of winning the General Election. That's just politics."

  Yeah, that's a difference between us. I think Obama's problems are America's problems. If Obama is being unjustly attacked or criticized, it's not a political or partisan problem to me, it's a social problem. I'm not committed to Obama, I'm committed to Obama inasmuch as he champions "liberalism." No, he's not the ideal liberal, but he's the closest thing in a viable candidate I've seen since, I don't know, Mario Cuomo, maybe?

  Is America so static that we can't have an honest conversation about this? Why do not we, as liberals, work to argue that this is a non-issue rather than conceding so much ground?

  Obama supporters wanted to have an honest conversation (they said!) about race when the Wright story first broke and Obama gave his speech. Were they being disingenous? My first post was about having such a conversation. Or must all conversations be somehow directed by Obama supporters such as Hutman and burlydee, rather than the freeform creature that true conversations really are?

  I'm missing your point here.

  How does one ever change the status quo if one refuses to stick one's neck out? Why not work on refining our arguments and making them resonant for why this is a non-issue?

  The Democrats stuck their neck out a bit in 2004. They lost.

  I'd argue that the Democrats lost in 2004 because they didn't stick their necks out nearly enough. What are you referring to, because I saw a party of rank capitulation and one paralyzed by fear of failure.

  Why should the Wright issue be framed as a non-issue. That is the tactic Obama always uses. He used it after his guns and religion comment to do damage control but there is little evidence that it worked? Just because you want to say something is a non-issue does not mean that it is a non-issue to other Americans.

  By "non-issue" I mean irrelevant or hyped up issue. I'm not saying it doesn't exist, I'm saying its consequence is being vastly inflated for political rather than intellectually honest purposes. There's no serious analysis of the ways in which Obama's association with Wright might impact his decisions as president.

  If you want to have that conversation, fine, that's fair. As long as the purpose is an honest effort to evaluate the candidate's likely performance in office, ideological orientation, etc., then fine, but that's a conversation that requires homework.

  "Your problem is that you cannot see that the issues of other people on things like guns, religion, abortion, are as important as your issues.

  This is untrue. I see that they are important, I just don't believe they should be. This is not my agenda as a liberal or whatever (I'm really more of a radical, but I believe in compromise, so liberalism right now is good enough for me) so I'm not interested in a representative who panders disproportionately to these issues.

  Of course other people's issues are important.

  Important to them, perhaps, but that doesn't make them important from a historical perspective.

  None of these things mean a thing compared to the spectre of global warming. I'm not prepared to allow people the delusion that their issues are as important as other issues, like the environment, war, peace, the global economy, etc.

  (continued)

  Permalink Sunday, April 27, 2008 06:03 PM