[Peace-discuss] What do we do now?

[Morton K.Brussel]

I think much of this is nonsense! What does Mahajan recommend aside 
from facile generalities? He seems to be saying that trying to defeat 
Bush isn't worth the effort, because it detracts from other antiwar 
activities; we must be more militant. Evidently, his mind doesn't 
encompass the possibility that people in the antiwar movement can do 
more than one thing at a time; they can march in demonstrations, make 
protests, throw sand in the system, and still work/want to defeat Bush 
in the election. Chomsky, Zinn and many others, evidently, according to 
Mahajan are deflected by meaningless electoral politics to the extent 
that they are rendered ineffective. As Nader has claimed.

Moreover, I am disturbed that many of "us" seem far more intent upon 
castigating and ridiculing Kerry than in being concerned about another 
Bush term. I get the feeling they will feel (smug?) satisfaction if 
Kerry loses, because obviously he isn't their man, and in any case 
their mantra is "not a dimes worth of difference". This seems to be 
fashionable by a segment of what can be called the totally 
irresponsible, almost Machiavellian, left.

Sorry for my venting, but that's the way I feel at this juncture. I 
cannot help but fear for the supreme court, nuclear warfare, women's 
rights, civil rights, and other issues which will put us all in danger 
for an undeterminable future with a new Bush term, and I am not looking 
forward to that possibility in the hopes that the revolution will 
finally arrive thereafter. The social advances In the U.S. in the 30's 
occurred while a Democratic administration was in office, and the reign 
of fascism occurred in Europe at that time came after the malaise and 
disintegration of the 20's.

Apologies to Francis Fox Piven, whom I admire also, but what specific 
actions does she recommend beyond what people are already doing to 
"throw sand in the gears of the war machine"?

MKB

On Oct 9, 2004, at 3:36 PM, Ricky Baldwin wrote:

> Well, we hope so, anyway.
>
> And I think Carl is right.  Mahajan has an excellent
> point, although I think we will need to go a bit
> further to have a noticeable impact.
>
> For example, I just interviewed the respected
> sociologist Francis Fox Piven (Poor People's
> Movements, The Politics of Turmoil, Why Americans
> Don't Vote, etc.), who has made a life's work of
> studying movements, as the subtitle of one of her
> books says, "how they succeed, why they fail."
>
> She pointed out, among other things, that "...what
> that movement did was express opinion.  They marched
> in large numbers, they rallied, and it was a kind of
> voting, voting in the streets.  I think a successful
> antiwar movement has to act in ways that throw sand in
> the gears of the war machine.  Resistance has to be
> more serious."
>
> And in fact that is what her research shows, time and
> again: opinion is one thing and it depends on whether
> anyone cares about your opinion, but disruption is
> impossible to ignore.
>
> Food for thought.
>
> Ricky
>
> --- jencart at mailstation.com wrote:
>
>> Exactly.
>>
>> Plus lemme add that our protests might have an
>> impact on Kerry.  The largest protests in history
>> have had zero impact on Bush.
>>
>> Jenifer C.
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: "C. G. Estabrook"
>> <galliher at alexia.lis.uiuc.edu>
>> Sent: Oct 8, 2004 1:00 AM
>> To: Peace-discuss at lists.cu.groogroo.com
>> Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] What do we do now?
>>
>> Getting the Bush administration out of office is
>> important, but not
>> "irrespective of Kerry's positions and statements."
>> The reductio ad
>> absurdum is obvious: would voting against Bush still
>> be appropriate if
>> Kerry were a Nazi?  But of course he isn't, and on
>> some matters (mostly
>> domestic) the Democrat policies are to be preferred.
>> Moreover, the
>> election is a referendum on the Bush administration,
>> and they shouldn't
>> win it.
>>
>> But Mahajan is no fool. He makes some explicit
>> suggestions of what we
>> should be doing, given that (as Chomsky recently
>> remarked) "elections are
>> a matter of secondary significance: what's far more
>> important is to build
>> a democratic culture, in which they will be
>> meaningful.  But they are not
>> of zero significance.  In a swing state, anything
>> but a vote for Kerry is
>> in effect a vote for Bush.  Those who want to help
>> give the Bush crowd a
>> mandate can do so if they like, but they should not
>> delude themselves
>> about what they are doing."
>>
>> Mahajan writes, "Everything that happens in Iraq
>> should build our base. We
>> must mobilize against bombing of civilian areas and
>> build our base. We
>> must mobilize against torture and build our base.
>> Right now, we must
>> mobilize against Bush administration plans to
>> manipulate the January
>> elections in Iraq (and the upcoming election in
>> Afghanistan). Any election
>> held under military occupation is illegitimate. But
>> we can't stop the
>> elections in Iraq.  Thus, we have to mobilize to
>> ensure that the
>> elections, while remaining illegitimate, are as free
>> and fair as possible.
>> In the process, we bring into the movement people
>> who believe in democracy
>> but were unsure about the occupation; we may even
>> derail plans to fix the
>> elections."
>>
>> Allowing for the unlovely (and faintly oxymoronic)
>> expression "build our
>> base," we can still draw from this exhortation
>> rather specific suggestions
>> about what AWARE's media and publicity campaigns
>> should be about this
>> winter. There's in fact some interesting convergence
>> on the overall goal:
>> see the piece by the eminently middle-of-the-road
>> Stanley Hoffman (as it
>> happens, a former teacher of mine) in the current NY
>> Review of Books ("Out
>> of Iraq," http://www.nybooks.com/articles/17470).
>> He says that the US
>> must treat Iraq as De Gaulle did Algeria -- which
>> would mean "giving up
>> the less-talked-about but central US aim of turning
>> Iraq into a
>> US-dominated satellite, with American bases,
>> American companies in charge
>> of its oil, and a compliant regime" -- a position
>> contrary to Kerry's too,
>> of course, which we should be talking about.  --CGE
>>
>>
>> On Wed, 6 Oct 2004, Morton K.Brussel wrote:
>>
>>> I find articles like this frustrating. As if
>> getting Bush out of
>>> office is not important, irrespective of Kerry's
>> positions and
>>> statements (There is only one way.) If Mahajan
>> believes that he is a
>>> fool.  Moreover, it is one thing to say what we
>> all SHOULD be doing,
>>> as outlined towards the end of his piece, but the
>> main conundrum is
>>> HOW to achieve what he recommends. He complains,
>> but offers nothing on
>>> this HOW question. Should we storm the White
>> House, the local armory,
>>> stop traffic, distribute pamphlets, write letters?
>> What? People are
>>> acting, contrary to his thesis. There is no
>> collapse of the antiwar
>>> movement so far as I can see, but some lack of
>> focus because our
>>> challenge now is how to change an ongoing
>> situation, not how to
>>> protest a specific event such as the start of an
>> invasion.
>>>
>>> MKB
>>>
>>>
>>> On Oct 6, 2004, at 12:31 PM, C. G. Estabrook
>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> [The following is the text of a radio commentary
>> by Rahul Mahajan,
>>>> whose blog Empire Notes is quite good.
>>>> He seems to me here to make suggestions
>>>> of the sort of thing AWARE should be doing this
>> fall and winter. --CGE]
>>>>
>>>> 	Collapse of the Antiwar Movement...
>>>>
>>
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