[Peace-discuss] Re: [Peace] Public Square advert for 4/30 Panel with Paul Street

[C. G. Estabrook]

But the working group did in fact "limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion" by 
excluding from the panel anti-war opinion outside the liberal consensus on both 
the right and the left.  "On the one side, the position of Chomsky, Cockburn, 
and the Black Agenda Report is unrepresented. On the other, that of Ron Paul, 
Bill Kauffman, and Antiwar.com is absent."  --CGE


Jan & Durl Kruse wrote:
> I would like to clarify that this is not Mort's panel.  I'm not sure why 
> Mort is singularly being targeted. The members of the panel, along with 
> a number of others who were considered, were decided upon by consensus 
> of the AWAREPresents working group.  It was the collective intent and 
> desire of the working group to not limit the spectrum of acceptable 
> opinion but rather to compose a panel with somewhat diverse views and 
> perspectives to appeal to a broader community audience.  The working 
> group believes that a vigorous and lively discussion of Obama's first 
> hundred days will occur and hopes the public will be interested in 
> attending and participating in the discussion.
> Durl
> 
> 
> On Apr 23, 2009, at 6:45 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
> 
>> "The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly 
>> limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate 
>> within that spectrum -- even encourage the more critical and dissident 
>> views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going 
>> on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being 
>> reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate. " ---Noam 
>> Chomsky
>>
>> For all Mort's fulminations, he can't escape the fact that that's 
>> exactly what he's done.  By excluding radical and (paleo)conservative 
>> anti-war views from his panel (not for the first time), he is 
>> "strictly limiting the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allowing 
>> very lively debate within that spectrum" -- with the results Chomsky 
>> describes.  No one who's followed the debates over "framing" Obama 
>> within AWARE will be surprised.
>>
>>
>> Morton K. Brussel wrote:
>>> What a curious diatribe. Carl Estabrook could have been present at 
>>> AWARE Presents meetings, but I suppose out of purity of conscience(?) 
>>> he did not deign to participate. It is rather late to be now terribly 
>>> disappointed in what we've set up. Who from AWARE would Carl have 
>>> liked on the panel? Who could possibly win his approbation? More 
>>> Libertarians --- himself included?
>>> Which representatives of Chomsky, Paul, Cockburn, etc., and how many 
>>> of these points of view, should we have invited? It points in only 
>>> one direction. There is no doubt we could have chosen other respected 
>>> panelists, but I believe we have a critical and diverse panel, which 
>>> will produce spirited discussions, despite Estabrook's canard that 
>>> they were  "vetted for conventional opinions". Is that which is not 
>>> Estabrook-like a definition of "conventional"? Yes, Paul Street does 
>>> gain Carl's grudging admiration, he the keynote speaker who will 
>>> speak at least half the time on the dais. But I suppose Carl would 
>>> have liked more /guaranteed/ polemical devastating appraisals of the 
>>> first 100 days. Carl arrogantly knows what Bob Naiman will say, or 
>>> what Carol Ammons will say, not to speak of Paul Diehl and Brian 
>>> Gaines: All timorous people voicing timorous opinions? Will Carl come 
>>> to the event?  After all, he could there vent his contempt for 
>>> whatever vetted opinions may be expressed. We do elicit audience 
>>> participation. I'm afraid that if the purpose of the panel would 
>>> /only/ have been to expose "our" opinions about the Obama 
>>> administration, we would have less opportunity to reach a wider 
>>> audience. Need this be explained?
>>> Why has Carl waited until now to voice his objections?  Our plans 
>>> were not concealed.
>>> --mkb
>>> On Apr 23, 2009, at 1:17 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>>>> I'm afraid this panel will be regarded as observing and attempting 
>>>> to enforce the limits of allowable debate. There are no AWARE 
>>>> members; fifty percent of it are academic political scientists, a 
>>>> group thoroughly vetted for conventional opinions.
>>>>
>>>> Much more seriously, it excludes anti-war opinion from both the 
>>>> right and the left.  On the one side, the position of Chomsky, 
>>>> Cockburn, and the Black Agenda Report is unrepresented.  On the 
>>>> other, that of Ron Paul, Bill Kauffman, and Antiwar.com is absent.
>>>>
>>>> One may argue that Paul Street's position is that of the first 
>>>> group, but the panel is certainly a timorous corrective to that.  
>>>> The advertising even promotes a sanitizing time barrier between 
>>>> Street's talk and that of the panel.
>>>>
>>>> One shouldn't be surprised. "AWARE Presents" ran a panel on Israel 
>>>> two years ago that was equally subservient to the narrow limits of 
>>>> received academic opinion (with one lone outsider as an example of 
>>>> what we used to call "repressive tolerance"). AWARE members with 
>>>> dissenting views weren't included.
>>>>
>>>> Perhaps the Anti-War Anti-Racism Effort should put together a 
>>>> program critical in principle -- and not just "pragmatically" -- of 
>>>> the administration's efforts to kill people in the Middle East and 
>>>> restore the fortunes of the American elite.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Morton K. Brussel wrote:
>>>>> This has been submitted, in haste,  to WILL's /Public Square. /It 
>>>>> may be modified in the presentation. Hello, I’m Morton Brussel, 
>>>>> speaking for AWARE. We are sponsoring a significant event, namely 
>>>>> an appraisal of the first 100 days of the Obama presidency. This 
>>>>> will take place at 7pm on Thursday, April 30, at the Urbana City 
>>>>> Council Chambers, and will be televised on UPTV local cable channel 6.
>>>>> The review will be discussed first by historian, journalist, 
>>>>> activist Paul Street, author of a recent book about Obama, followed 
>>>>> by a panel of varying viewpoints, consisting of Champaign County 
>>>>> board member Carrol Ammons, UIUC Professor of Political Science 
>>>>> Paul Diehl, UIUC Professor Brian Gaines, and Just Foreign Policy 
>>>>> coordinator and activist Robert Naiman.
>>>>> Paul Street will speak for 45 minutes. Each panelist will give ten 
>>>>> minute presentations, and then there will be time for questions and 
>>>>> comments, interchanges between the panelists and the audience.
>>>>> We expect that this will be an important discussion serving to 
>>>>> illuminate how successful the present administration has been in 
>>>>> these first 100 days in dealing with the serious questions 
>>>>> confronting it, on foreign and domestic policies, how the actions 
>>>>> of the administration and President Obama have been received by the 
>>>>> American public, by allies of the United States and by those with 
>>>>> whom we confront in the wider world.
>>>>> Clearly on the list of pressing topics that might be discussed are 
>>>>> the policies of the administration concerning 1) the wars and 
>>>>> occupations in Iraq in which we are engaged, 2) policies with 
>>>>> regard to our relations with other countries [e.g., Iran, 
>>>>> Israel/Palestine, North Korea, Pakistan, Venezuela, Cuba, Russia, 
>>>>> China, India, Somalia, etc.] 3)  the economic situation at home and 
>>>>> administrations actions to deal with it, 4) Civil rights at home 
>>>>> and for our prisoners—habeas corpus and the issue of torture, 
>>>>> environmental policy, including how climate change is considered, 
>>>>> energy,
>>>>> The list of issues that can be addressed will certainly be greater 
>>>>> than time will permit, but we expect an informative, stimulating 
>>>>> appraisal of what has been accomplished, what needs to be 
>>>>> accomplished, what is most important to accomplish, and what are 
>>>>> the chances for success based on what we now know of Obama’s 
>>>>> actions and statements.
>>>>> Please come and listen or watch: 7pm on Thursday April 30 at the U. 
>>>>> City Council Chambers on vine Street U. --mkb
>>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------