Saul Alinsky loves using Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine as examples of radicals. If anybody hasn’t noticed the Tea Party is essentially a Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine based crowd. It is personally upsetting to see that Thomas Paine is being commandeered by the crazies on the right, we named this blog after his revolutionary work. The Tea Party crazies are being dismissed by the Liberals and Liberal crazies as having astroturf grassroots efforts, maybe the dumbest beliefs on the left is that astroturfing is “bad”. Saul Alinsky wrote that “power is with numbers”. If you pack a room filled with cameras and disrupt everything you’ve accomplished an important step in organizing. The Tea Party crazies not only did that once they did that almost every time. The left on the other hand sat at home and complained, angry at their own party and angrier at the far right and yet unwilling to do anything. For Americas sake, don’t dismiss people who are not only organizing, but organizing well. If you are afraid or you are angry or if you complain all the time go out, go make something of your anger, fear, and discontent.

Saul Alinsky would be disappointed to see that business has fooled the unemployed, tax paying voter. The far left is down, but it is not out. I used to be a far left crazy, now I consider myself a radical heart with a very pragmatic cerebral. The radical and the pragmatist in me wants to see balance brought back to the great American Democracy. Please, lefties get up and get loud. Grab “Rules for Radicals” or “Reveille for Radicals”, grab your Che Guevara shirts, grab your canvassing bag, and most importantly grab your clipboard and organize. Democrats have lost that street smart spirit and have lazily done nothing. Volunteer for a progressive candidate or a progressive cause, Rachel Maddow and Jon Stewart are great but they are figures on TV and are making their own difference and taking some sort of action. Instead of watching a talking head, do something. Its time we bring balance back to this country, bring change through sheer numbers.

Robert Peters

These coming weeks will test whether a new era of big government has come. We have a health care summit and a creation of a jobs bill that will test our patience and especially test our leaders. This is big governments moment, its chance to return to America gloriously. The public option within the health care bill is facing a slight revitalization as more Senators, including Majority Leader Harry Reid, have come to support reconciliation as a viable option for the contentious component. If the public option is included within the bill it will be a momentous occasion that will only help Democrats as they prepare to get America working again.

We need our government and where we need it most is to protect us when the free market can’t. For too long the argument has been “free market vs. socialism”. I never understood why the wingers in both parties ridiculously framed arguments this way, especially on the left (where it has failed for three decades). What makes America most efficient is when it takes supposedly competing policies and force them to compromise and work. Yet, we have seen that the ideas that require more government have been ignored. We have seen a lack of competition. the left doesn’t frame the Keynesian argument and we have failed to recognize the successes behind much of Keynesian economics.

Americans rather not pay taxes for increased bridge, road, train, and levee maintenance, but they are willing to pay taxes for fire and police departments. With the argument being that they are necessary for American safety. Yet, as Hurricane Katrina and the Minnesota bridge collapse showed, we need government even at the most overlooked structures. We need a jobs bill that will work  on our roads, bridges, and levees. We need a bill that is essentially a second stimulus package, this time fast acting infrastructure spending. We need government and we need to return to Keynesianism, which is not and should not be confused with socialism. Lets makeover big government by giving us, America, a fair health care system and getting us back to work. If we do this, big government will be something to appreciate and there isn’t a better time for us to do that than now.

-Robert Peters

The Focus of the Political Media

This is his lead story. At a time when bills concerning health care, financial reform, energy, and jobs are being debated and discussed, Halperin find a story about a potential 2012 Presidential Race most compelling. WE HAVEN’T EVEN HAD THE 2010 MIDTERMS YET. There is no reason to report on “opening volleys” of the 2012 race. Unless, of course, you are Mark Halperin and a member of the Washington Media that loves politics but could care less on policy discussion that would actually inform people about the merits/flaws of legislative reform.

Inspiring stuff, Mr. Halperin.

-Sparty

-Sparty

When I was a freshman in college in 2004, Facebook and Myspace were the hippest, coolest thing around. It was as if the internet expanded from email or instant messaging, porn, and illegally downloaded music to freely expressing yourself to all your good (and not so good) friends. On Facebook, I could put up a cool photo of me or create a funny “about me” and have everyone laughing. On Myspace, I could show everyone my favorite music or artists and have a hip wallpaper background. Instead of hiding away looking at porn or downloading the next great album of the year, I was checking facebook and checking and checking and checking.

Facebook kept evolving, but not because it was necessarily forced to evolve, but because Mark Zuckerberg realized that cash can be made from the site. Twitters rapid growth from small and oft-ignored site in 2006 to a huge and highly important virtual gathering place in 2008 forced Facebook to change, to evolve, to become essentially aTwitter wannabe. Twitter had it all, the cool wallpapers, the hip micro-blogs, and the movie stars. The Twitter rise has forced Facebook to become…Twitterbook. 

What has really brought Twitter to the forefront is the recent protests in Tehran, Iran. Demonstrators are using Twitter to communicate and the US State Department had asked Twitter to delay routine maintenance just so they could see what was happening inside Iran and so the demonstrators could continue to communicate effectively. It is as if it is proving the old adage that the “revolution won’t be televised”wrong, because the revolution will be “tweeted”. 

Twitter is also the new social gathering place for the Republican Party. Newt and the Gang have been “tweeting” there displeasure since the Presidents speech before Congress. This has helped them communicate to the younger faction of the Republican Party and helped them look relatively “hip”. I think this is what Michael Steele was talking about when he mentioned his plans for making the Republican Party more “Hip-Hop”. Honestly, “tweeting” is not a bad plan, but the GOP must be careful those “tweets” could come back to haunt them. 

Twitters rise is a little more surprising than I imagined, it has shockingly reduced our already little attention spans even more and proved that with the internet there will always be a boom somewhere. It is playing a role in changing Iran (These demonstrations HAVE changed Iran already), changing a political party, and changing social interaction. This is either a fad or an era defining communication tool and whatever it is, it is important right now.  

-The Graduate

The Republicans alienated Latin-Americans with the immigration fight and the recent Sonia Sotomayor “Racialist” rhetoric. This affects states like Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, and Texas, once GOP strongholds that are moving more and more to the middle. Republicans have also alienated the moderates in states like Pennsylvania, Iowa, and shockingly Virginia and North Carolina. 

The Latin-American population in America is higher than blacks and will grow exponentially larger in the next 20 years. With such a large base comes a larger influence and one that will change the political map in this country for generations. The Republican Party once the rising party of choice for many Latin-Americans, is now the party of purely right wingers and that has driven out much of the moderates. The more Republicans allow people like former Congressman Tom Tancredo to speak, the more they alienate a much needed base and ignore the needs of people who want health care and jobs, you know, just like everyone else. Many Democrats see opportunities in Texas and even Georgia and Republicans there are playing it carefully. They do not want to be associated with the bigotry and hatred being spewed by a party that has moved away from anything moderate.

Texas would be what pundits call a “game changer”, this is why Republicans fear the census. Since they refuse to hold back on their harsh rhetoric and refuse to adjust to the changing times, they would rather make the census a virtual impossible act to complete. They decreased funding during President Bush’s administration, they have held up the nomination of the Census Director, and they understand very well the difficulties of performing the constitutional deed in the first place. When redistricting takes place in Texas and even Georgia, Democrats will have the most to gain. Texas especially will be free from the Tom Delay gerrymandering that hindered Democrats and local politics for a decade. The Republicans have dug a deeper hole with the inane rhetoric against Judge Sonia Sotomayor. Judge Sotomayor is of Puerto Rican descent and is very proud of her heritage and culture, this sparked some nasty words from people like Karl Rove, Newt Gingrich, and Rush Limbaugh. They and many others on the right accused Judge Sotomayor of being a racist, power hungry, and lacking the intelligence to lead. Let the social and political alienation begin. 

Under Nixon, Democrats faced an exodus from Southern Democrats to the Republican Party  which damaged the party for generations. Under Obama, Republicans are doing their best to alienate the moderates and push them into the Democratic Party. This will have a profound effect on politics in states like Iowa, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, Indiana, Ohio, Texas, Arizona and so on. With new census data there comes redistricting and with most of these states having large urban-suburban sprawl, families that seem to be struggling about the fall of both rust belt and the sun belt “empires” have had to hear the Republican reaction to government be a resounding No. Many of these families are trapped in districts that are unproportional and violate the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and because of those on the far right, they maybe there for another decade or so. These are moderates trapped in a bubble and it is extremely unconstitutional to prevent the census from happening. America wants change, well this is how change happens.

-The Graduate

-KSU

The idea that any country can fight terror with war was an insult to foreign policy leaders and educators. It created a wall of separation between our allies and made far more enemies than friends. The harsh rhetoric of the Bush Administration has been officially cast as ignorant and arrogant. The post 9/11 era was marred by failure and bad consequences and it did more harm to America than Dick Cheney or Rush Limbaugh are willing to admit. I for one am glad to see the term “War on Terror” abolished and put to rest. 

With the current economic troubles of the last year and a half, this move will present a clear bridge to a new era. An era that will be responsible and careful in identifying its most dangerous of threats and a reduction in the xenophobic nature of American foreign policy. If we want to ensure that our allies are behind us we must not force them into actions or bully them into decisions that undermine their authority and their standing in their countries. The situation in Pakistan and Afghanistan, where most Americans think the “War on Terror” is, cannot be summed up with such simple wording. The war for which we are fighting must be broken down to us and made transparent so that we as Americans can better understand our foreign conflicts and so our allies are more willing to support our ideas and beliefs after we have failed them. R.I.P “War on Terror”, America is trying to build a new and smoother bridge today. 

-KSU

Americans have become FDR crazy, but they are looking at the wrong Roosevelt. President Obama should be more like Teddy Roosevelt and speak loudly from the bully pulpit at both the Democrats and Republicans. Teddy made sure that the opposition knew what he wanted and how he wanted it done. He was able to garner broad support during an era of great division. President Obama has to show fire, this is not a campaign anymore, this is a time where every word he says and every meeting he makes affects billions of people. Sure, President Obama will be quoted as saying “I won”, but now he needs to say “I won, shut up and listen”, because the men who did the most changing in this country, good and bad, forced it on the opposition. They weren’t looking for a two party plan, they were looking for what they thought was best for the country. 

Some people fear that it is the same approach George W. Bush had when he took office, but Bush did not have this severe recession, two wars, and such a damaged infrastructure. The Fed cannot cut interest rates anymore than they already have and having more tax cuts will only increase an individuals savings accounts by a very limited amount. President Obama is not Bush, but he isn’t Jesus, Gandhi, or King either. He must be willing to tell the opposition to get out of his way. If he fails to do this he falls in line with the rest of his fellow Democrats, bullied and weakened. This is an opportunity to send a message. For years Republicans have done what they wanted, Democrats must realize that it is their time to bully the opposition. Hope and Change is great and uplifting rhetoric, but it’s the legislation that does the most uplifting. President Obama must wield his power and do what is right for America.

-KSU

UPDATE:

From Sparty:

CNN’s new poll out today has Obama with a 76% approval rating. So much for the narrative that the stimulus package and Daschle nomination hurt his popularity among Americans. The stimulus package also continues to garner a majority of support, with 54% of the public favoring the bill despite the constant derision of it by members of the GOP and the media. Obama has a lot of political capital right now…maybe not with conservative Republicans or the conventional wisdom loving Washington press, but he is quite popular with the American people. He should have demanded more infrastructure spending and useful social and economic programs be put/ kept in this bill.