What Happens When We Don't See the Tipping Points

[Joanne98]

For OpEdNews: Bernard Weiner - Writer

By Bernard Weiner, The Crisis Papers

Often in our busy daily lives, we miss the significance of a piece of news. Sometimes it's not until years later that we realize how very important that news event was in shifting the paradigm.

For example: In 1981, President Reagan fired all 11,000 striking air-traffic controllers, and the liberal left didn't really organize itself to respond forcefully. That breaking of a labor union was the linchpin for much more anti-liberal mischief at the hands of the Reaganite conservatives for the next eight years -- and beyond. And the liberal left, as personified by the Democratic Party, remained confused and toothless in its opposition.

But that was then, when the rightwing was in flower. Now we supposedly have a liberal in the White House and the Democrats control both houses of Congress. So surely there aren't such tipping-point events happening now.

Not so fast. Let's take a look at a few candidates and see the possible ramifications for the body politic.


THE DESTRUCTION OF ACORN

Highly analogous to the Reagan-era attack on the air-traffic controllers was what happened to one of this country's most effective community-aiding organizations, ACORN. For more than four decades, ACORN had been highly effective in helping low-income citizens register to vote. Those poor and minorities tended to vote Democratic. As a result, Karl Rove and his acolytes made ACORN their number one target. Indeed, the firing of all those U.S. attorneys around the country derived from the unwillingness of a number of U.S. attorneys to go after ACORN right before an election on phony accusations of voting fraud.

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http://www.opednews.com/articles/What-Happens-When-We-Don-t-by-Bernard-Weiner-100407-307.html

[JuniperLea]

1. We allow lies...

When lies are heard first, they are believed even after the truth comes out... as evidenced by the anti-Acorn signs seen at TeaBagger events.

[Warpy]

2. There might be another reason for not going after the last administration

and that is a reluctance of setting a precedent for a change of party in the White House signaling investigations of the previous party's administration. You know what the GOP would do with that, can we all say "witch hunt?"

Eventually, the last administration will have to be brought to justice, but not by the first administration to follow them.

Remember, it takes a long time to get some monsters. It took a decade to get Pol Pot and it took three decades to get Pinochet. We will likely have to wait for GOP power to fade still farther until we can even think of going after Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Perle, Feith, Rice, Addington, Woo, and the rest of the merry scumbags. Cheney will likely be long dead, but the rest will still be there.

The major tipping point that the author didn't cite happened in the last administration. It was the bungling of the Katrina aftermath, so hideously bad that even Pox News couldn't ignore it. It was at that point that the GOP started to die.

[ThatPoetGuy]

3. This is a prescient, important article.

I think it's crucial for us as Americans, for us as patriots, to examine where the anti-American movements are likely to go next. Abetted by a media intent on avoiding the "liberal" label, a few treasonous scumbags perpetrated a hoax and managed to take down a community organization that was a force for good. Where are they going to strike next? How can we prepare for it? If we can't respond, quickly and forcefully -- if we're not prepared to defend the institutions that help people -- then America is lost, and the coalition of aristocrats, white supremacists, and fundamentalist Christians has won.

[barbiegeek]

4. should we fundraise to save ACORN?