[Peace-discuss] Zinn, Election Madness

[C. G. Estabrook]

Right on, to coin a phrase...

Morton K. Brussel wrote:
> Zinn reiterates that that is needed for change is activism from below.
> 
> …Today, we can be sure that the Democratic Party, unless it faces a 
> popular upsurge, will not move off center. The two leading Presidential 
> candidates have made it clear that if elected, they will not bring an 
> immediate end to the Iraq War, or institute a system of free health care 
> for all.
> /
> /
> /They offer no radical change from the status quo./
> /
> /
> /They do not propose what the present desperation of people cries out 
> for: a government guarantee of jobs to everyone who needs one, a minimum 
> income for every household, housing relief to everyone who faces 
> eviction or foreclosure./
> /
> /
> /They do not suggest the deep cuts in the military budget or the radical 
> changes in the tax system that would free billions, even trillions, for 
> social programs to transform the way we live./
> /
> /
> /None of this should surprise us. The Democratic Party has broken with 
> its historic conservatism, its pandering to the rich, its predilection 
> for war, only when it has encountered rebellion from below, as in the 
> Thirties and the Sixties. We should not expect that a victory at the 
> ballot box in November will even begin to budge the nation from its twin 
> fundamental illnesses: capitalist greed and militarism./
> /
> /
> /So we need to free ourselves from the election madness engulfing the 
> entire society, including the left./
> /
> /
> /Yes, two minutes /[…the time it takes to complete your ballot]/. Before 
> that, and after that, we should be taking direct action against the 
> obstacles to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.…/
> /
> /
> /
> The full article, from /The Progressive/ magazine,  is at 
> http://www.progressive.org/mag_zinn0308
> 
> /