Voting, not OWS, will change America

[dtotire]

Voting, not OWS, will change America


A low progressive turnout in 2010 got us into this mess. We can't let that happen again
By Frank Viviano, New America Media


Take a close and objective look at the angry demonstrators now gathered on Wall Street, and at similar protest encampments burgeoning from San Francisco to Madrid. What you see is not simply a vast expression of rage at the crisis enveloping the world of democracy.

The demonstrations also frame a fundamental contradiction – a profound source of strength that has been transformed into a disabling weakness.

They deserve enormous credit for drawing a global spotlight to the perpetrators of that crisis: a sinister cabal of financial scamsters and right-wing politicians, backed by the dubiously “grass-roots” electorate of the Tea Party. What almost no one, on the right or left alike, wants to talk about is that the cabal was empowered by the very people who are now denouncing it.

Progressives, out of a mixture of political correctness and embarrassment, carefully avoid the subject. The Republicans are delighted at the silence, because it masks what should be fatal weaknesses in their own position.


more:
http://www.salon.com/2011/10/18/voting_not_ows_will_save_america/singleton/

[RoccoR5955]

1. Only voting AND OWS can bring about real change. n/t

[Zoeisright]

32. Yep.

And actual vote-counting.

[AverageJoe90]

37. Amen to all you guys. =) nt

[izquierdista]

2. Voting for Obama sure changed a lot

Voting only works when there are differences in the candidates.

[elocs]

3. The Nader meme of 2000. No difference between Bush and Gore.

Really? So how did that work out for us?

[izquierdista]

7. We'll never know

If Al would have been as big a disappointment as Obama has been. I kinda think not.

[libinnyandia]

8. Better than McCain

I still would much rather see Obama in the White House than McCain. And Nader will have a horrible legacy-all the evil Bush and Cheney did. Whenever those on the left don't vote or vote for someone like Nader the Republican will be able to wage wars and strengthen corporations. We know that Gore would never have appointed Roberts and Alito. Enough said.

[Fuddnik]

10. And Biden wouldn't confirm Scalia and Thomas.

Oh, wait........

[libinnyandia]

17. SCOTUS

There is a difference between nominating and confirming. Gore and Obama would never nominate extreme rightwingers.

[Name removed]

18. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[libinnyandia]

20. Nader

Can anyone tell me what Nader hoped to achieve by his attacks against Gore in 2000? Anyone who lies and tells people that it did not matter who was elected in 2000 is a liar. Nader lied, thousands died. A person has to take responsibilty for their actions. Nader and his apologists never will.

[certainot]

21. what is really stupid - RW radio kicks internet ass

all this shit and more and much of it because there is no organized opposition to the right's most important weapon, from swiftboating anita hill and gore, making excuses for thomas and bush, making excuses for the election theft and attacking anyone in the media who suggested it, and blaming nader to the point where half the country still believes it.

[Crunchy Frog]

24. And our party let them get away with it, including our vice presidential candidate,

Lieberman.

Can you imagine, in your wildest dreams, the Repugs letting our side get away with something like that if the shoe were on the other foot?

[Sam Hain]

31. Or President Sarah

We've all seen how the pressures of the presidency have aged Obama. They'd have killed McCain.

[certainot]

23. the RW radio machine was a little less effective then but still swiftboated gore and made bush

acceptable while the left ignored it.

and even today it kicks internet ass while the lazy naive left blames obama for their own failure to even engage the right wing's best weapon, while it messages over everything and short circuits necessary feedback mechanism, while it takes free pot shots at the reps whose backs the whiny left promised to get.

[Charronxyz]

30. I'm sure Lieberman would have made a great vice president

and no doubt Gore would have found more people of his caliper to work in his administration, but we will never know for sure...

[Voice for Peace]

4. It's a nice idea but until elections are safe from theft, and money is taken out of politics,

and people have equal fair access to voting, I'm not sure our votes mean very much.

[They_Live]

13. + 1000

[MindandSoul]

5. OWS can motivate a LOT MORE people, especially youths, to vote!

[Fuddnik]

6. If voting made any difference, it would be illegal.

Sounds like the Barney Frank whine on Maddows show the other night. "Where were all of you people in 2010?"

Better question: Where were you Barney and Waxman and Conyers from 2006-2010? You guys talk a good game when you're in the minority, but don't do shit when you've got the majority.

We're still at war.
Bankruptcy "reform" is still on the books.
Still no single payer.
Corporations still setting their own rules.

Watch this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzULm4d8h8w

[CanSocDem]

36. That is a great video.

I guess I sort of understand why it isn't on the video page. Thanks for the link.

.

[JayhawkSD]

9. Voting will not change America.

Democrats brought us the MCA, a renewal of the Patriot Act, a renewal of the Bush tax cuts, a continuation of DOMA, another war in Libya, drone wars in Yemen and Somalia, Guantanamo still in business, "health care reform" which excluded drug price negotiation by Medicare, single payer option, and the "public option" and with implementation delayed until Obama would be safely into his second term. The list goes on.

"Occupy Wall Street" will not do it either, because Wall Street is the recipient of the corruption and not the engine of it. Government passes the laws which benefit Wall Street, and government is what must be brought down.

Wall Street is, in any case, by far the smaller problem. It received $700 billion of taxpayer money one time. The military-industrial complex receives $1 TRILLION of taxpayer money every single year, and the military-industrial complex, which Eisenhower warned us against more than half a century ago, is centered at the Pentagon in Washington DC, not on Wall Street.

Instead of "occupying Wall Street," we should be surrounding the Pentagon.

[sce56]

11. But the MIC is run by Wall Street! The CIA is always linked to Wall Street! The Banksters run the US

[burning rain]

16. Fee, fie, fo, fum, I smell the blood of a libertarian.

.

[TBF]

25. Really good points here. nt

[swilton]

35. The Pentagon is the Enforcement Arm of Wall Street

It's a toxic symbiotic relationship - one has the strategy, the other the tactics....I think it makes sense to occupy both.

[Doctor_J]

12. At this moment in time voting is nearly useless

Between the voter purges, electronic theft, old-fashioned theft (like finding votes 3 days after the election), and corrupt courts, electoral remedies to our situation will not be forthcoming, period.

[SkyDaddy7]

14. THANK-YOU!!!

I was beginning to wonder if anyone realized this little FACT.

[burning rain]

15. The tea party didn't win in 2010 by sitting at home & saying "We'll vote on election day."

Think about it.

[Beartracks]

28. Excellent point. n/t

[abq e streeter]

19. Uh, I'm pretty sure that both can be done . Hit the streets en masse, AND vote

including ,sadly, our often pitiful choice of a lesser of two evils. That's still lesser. Doesn't mean hitting the streets a la OWS isn't at least equally as powerful in its own way as voting however.

[Name removed]

22. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Dj13Francis]

26. Wrong.

As long as votes are "counted" on unverifiable hackable voting machines whose source code is protected by the voting machine companies and our courts... voting will remain an exercise in futility.

There are many places in this country where the votes are simply what the companies say they are. And those places are getting more numerous. And voter suppression becomes more odious as well.

Direct action is the key.

[txlibdem]

27. Haha... hahahahahaha... hahaha. Good one.

[roody]

29. Voting has not worked lately.

We cannot even count on our votes being counted.

[AverageJoe90]

38. If we can get enough of a majority, there's a damn good chance vote rigging won't work. nt

[Sinti]

33. If you don't get a real choice

because basically they're vetted who you get to choose from (the chicken (demos) or the fish (publicans),) what if we don't want to choose from industrial dinners and want fresh, wholesome choices? And that's before you talk about the vote machine theft, the new laws to prevent the ability of people to vote, etc.

Voting alone will get us nowhere...that was proven in 2008. We need more and more of the OWS version, we need to work on the ground, in the communities, for ourselves. No one is going to hand it to us by voting. Voting for the fashion show is just so you can say you tried, but nothing will change. They're not real...there's nothing behind the mask but more of the same.

[Bennyboy]

34. Voting?!?! Rigged machines, hackers, hanging chads, the Supremes

why bother?

[tigerfang]

39. The U.S. wasn't born from a vote

If any real change is to ever occur, it will be through mass protests. Hopefully peaceful.