[Peace-discuss] Left and right

[Chas. 'Mark' Bee]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "C. G. Estabrook" <galliher at uiuc.edu>
To: "John W." <jbw292002 at gmail.com>
Cc: <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
Sent: Monday, July 16, 2007 3:53 PM
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] Left and right


> Dear Roughly the Same as Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, and the Dalai Lama:
>
> If "ultimately labels are relatively unhelpful in political discussion," 
> why do you bother with your "tests"?
>
> I suggested a consistent usage for the terms "Right" and "Left" in order 
> to try to make clearer what we're talking about in politics.  There are a 
> lot of attempts to make that unclear -- e.g., Barack Obama has risen to 
> prominence on his ability to obfuscate.
>
> Such a usage might lead us to see why the Democratic party is not on the 
> Left, since they've worked vigorously since last November to frustrate the 
> democratic demand for an end to the war.  That raises the questions, Why 
> did they do that?  Whose interests are they in fact serving, if they 
> aren't serving the expressed will of the voters? An inquiring nation wants 
> to know, and the answers are being kept from them, in part by the form of 
> the discussion.
>
> The proposed usage also makes it plain how the political Right can 
> occasionally act for justice.  Authoritarians can see the need for social 
> peace.  E.g., social security was invented by Bismarck, who was no 
> democrat.
>
> Many discussions of "the Left" and "the Right" make the logical error 
> called "undistributed middle," in which true premises lead to a false 
> conclusion, e.g.,
>
> 1. All men are mortal;
> 2. Socrates (my dog) is mortal
> 3. Therefore my dog is a man.
>
> The middle term, mortal, is "undistributed" because neither premise, 
> though true, refers to all mortal entities.  Similar arguments are quite 
> common in politics (hello, Robert?), e.g.,
>
> 1. Traitors don't support the war;
> 2. The Left doesn't support the war;
> 3. Therefore the Left are traitors.

  Or:

  1.  The Administration doesn't want to do what you want them to in order 
to end the war.
  2.  The Democrats don't want to do what you want them to in order to end 
the war.
  3.  The Democrats are an arm of the Administration.

  While it's admirable in a way to see you deride your own tactics when 
others use them, Carl, it might be seen as more ethical if you were to 
forswear them yourself.  However, you'd lose almost your entire schtick.  ;)