Did I say "RW"? My bad.
Kurovski (31,534 posts)
Why Chris Hedges Believes That Serious Revolt Is the Only Option People Have Left
"... We are seeing the conscious and deliberate creation by the corporate state of a permanent, insecure and terrified underclass within the wider society. They have had a lot of practice in refining these techniques in the sacrifice zones, such as West Virginia, we wrote about. The corporate state sees this permanent and desperate underclass as the most effective weapon to thwart rebellion and resistance as our economy is reconfigured to wipe out the middleclass and leave most of us at subsistence level. Huge pools of unemployed and underemployed effectively blunt labor organizing, since any job, no matter how menial, is zealously coveted. The beating down of workers, exacerbated by the refusal to extend unemployment benefits for hundreds of millions of Americans and the breaking of public sector unions, the last redoubt of union power, has transformed those in the working class from full members of society, able to participate in its debates, the economy and governance, into terrified people in fragmented pools preoccupied with the struggle of private existence...
...The electoral process has been hijacked by corporations. The judiciary has been corrupted and bought. The press shuts out the most important voices in the country and feeds us the banal and the absurd. Universities prostitute themselves for corporate dollars. Labor unions are marginal and ineffectual forces. The economy is in the hands of corporate swindlers..."
http://www.alternet.org/books/why-chris-hedges-believes-serious-revolt-only-option-people-have-left?page=0%2C0
Viva_Daddy (338 posts)
1. Maybe "The Hunger Games" was "prophecy" rather than fiction.
teen titty fiction = prophecy?
go drown yourself in a tub full of chainsaws
cali (73,800 posts)
2. whatthe****ever, chris.
I'm poor. I'm disabled. [unemployed? --Sgt SB] You can go **** yourself with a rake, Hedges. You're an elitist piece of crap. You don't give a shit about people so stop with the pretense.
If Romney and Ryan somehow make it to the White House and repubs hold the house and take the senate, the most vulnerable, the poor, the middle class are so ****ed.
And frankly, I think YOU, dear OP, should not be posting pleas not to vote- and of course that's what this is, but as I started out with this post: whatthe****ever.
Variation on the "they're just the same theme" #5,372.
and yes, I read the whole lousy polemic. gad, he's full of shite.
starroute (9,801 posts)
10. There's no "logic dictates" about it
Last edited Tue Sep 4, 2012, 01:37 AM USA/ET - Edit history (2)
Let's start by assuming Obama is the man we thought he was in 2008. Let's assume that what he promised during the campaign was what he truly wanted to do.
Then compare those dreams of hope and change to what we've actually gotten. It's only a fraction of what we were promised -- and even that fraction is partial and compromised.
If even Obama -- who, let us agree, is the best person we could possibly have elected -- is incapable of defying the military-industrial complex, the national security state, and the CIA. If even Obama is incapable of getting a truly progressive agenda past a Congress of lockstep Republicans who can always pick off a few Blue Dog Democrats. If even Obama has to wear a flag pin, play the rah-rah patriotism game, and lend his presence to national prayer breakfasts.
Then what hope is there, really, in voting -- except the negative one of holding at bay the forces that would dismantle us entirely and sell the pieces off to the highest bidder?
In that sense, voting may not be an entirely pointless exercise -- but it's certainly useless when it comes to making the genuine changes we need if we and the planet are to survive.
That's what I take to be Hedges' message.
And if you think differently -- if you think that voting alone, in the age of Citizens United and Karl Rove's $1 billion war chest, really will get us out of the hole we're in -- I hope you can explain the scenario by which this miracle is going to be accomplished.
stopbush (10,612 posts)
26. Obama delivered only a fraction of what we were promised? Like, what? 85%?
Seriously, Obama has gotten more major legislation through Congress than just about anyone. You sound like a Rethug.
Interesting.
They are torn between Obama's impotence and Obama's greatness.
bhikkhu (6,668 posts)
8. Anyone who advocates revolution as a better alternative than electing sane politicians...
Is an asshat. I don't care if he's left or right. It would be so much easier to fix things at this point - enforcing Dodd-Frank, the Volker Rule, an easy national ID system and voting reform, hiking the minimum wage, etc, etc...
I'd challenge anyone to give an example of a revolution in a complex developed economy that didn't wind up with one chaotic emergency and unplanned disaster another. Long-term declines in health, chronic poverty, infrastructure loss, are all much easier to wind up with once you start smashing things.
Kurovski (31,534 posts)
12. Do you feel that the Occupy Movement are a bunch of asshats?
The article clearly states peaceful means.
You think we should not revolt in any manner against citizen's United?
limpyhobbler (3,300 posts)
20. Hedges isn't taking about a "revolution" in the same sense you are using it. He is talking about
using non-violent civil disobedience such as was advocated by Martin Luther King. To confront power and demand fixes. It's pretty clear to a lot of us that voting alone is no longer enough.
Your talk about "smashing things" shows you are not familiar with what he advocates. Did you even read the article?
Like the Cleveland 5 and the guy who shot-up the FRC?
And on it goes.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021263837
