we dovish lefties will happily march alongside with you and you might learn a thing or two about who your friends are - more so than you will grumbling on the interweb anyhow. Do something -- anything constructive -- but please don't sit on your hands anymore complaining bitterly about everyone else's inaction because neither the left nor the right's anti-war crusaders have had much success in shutting down the hawks in this country in recent years and that spells serious capital 'D' Disaster for the whole lot of us.
c) I humbly submit that it's time, RickR30, for you to regain your American D.I.Y. spirit (we may not be very circumspect or self-examining true - but we are nothing if not do it yourself-ers). Also: I hate to break it to you but we don't live in an ideal world by any wild stretch of the imagination. If you are seriously waiting around for Hollywood (celebrities? really?) and for NY's wealthy limousine liberals to join the antiwar fray and put the (financial, star-power, etc.) screws to the DLC blue-dog goons their Obot/Oborg apologist contingent then you are guilty of some rather delusional/wishful thinking and simply must snap out of it and soon. Please don't forget that you already have a growing majority of people supporting your cause! The time to act is now - not later on when you've finally convinced the remaining hold-outs (wealthy elites w/their heads up their butts, etc.) to join your anti-war bandwagon as well. Organize a protest if you don't like what's going on. .
b) In reality anti-war democrats are also not 'presently in power' as you indicate, either. If only that were so! Faux democratic DLC/Neo-con stooges are running the show now instead, unfortunately. In Barack, it seems, we have elected not a true 'progressive' (if this word has any more meaning at all at this point) but a Liebermanesque (neo-liberal?) D.I.N.O. who is completely unresponsive - if not downright hostile to his own liberal base. What's more you (and this site by extension) are not the only ones to have noticed this rather troubling transformation in our president or to call him or his minions out over this sad state of affairs, though the more the merrier when it comes to dumping on our Prez. I say. I'm not a fan of his, either. On the other hand, though, you can keep mistakenly appealing to the anti-war left's principles or apparent lack of principles until the cows come home but such pursuits won't accomplish much in the end because, you see, ultimately the antiwar left is just as powerless and marginalized as is the antiwar right. Sorry to bust your bubble.
(contd)..
I'm sorry (@ Rick) that you're having problems understanding my criticism. I'll attempt to address the points you raised:
a) I know what you are trying to say, but Antiwar democrats aren't exactly 'causing this catastrophe' as you have put it. In fact, many anti-war democrats are still quite opposed to this "war" (or 'never-ending occupation') - hence the statistics that Justin cites in the above article. Strictly speaking it is the PRO-WAR democrats who are 'causing this catastrophe.'
(contd)..
Perhaps my broken record analogy wasn't sufficiently clear. I wasn't saying that you shouldn't ever cover this subject -- just that you seem to be covering this same topic over and over and over again - ad nauseum. OK we get it. "Democratic leadership" and "progressive principles" have become oxymorons. This is not news to anyone at this point. So now what? Fingerpointing and blame shifting of this sort (it's the anti-war dem's fault!) will only get you so far. You've identified the problem just fine -- but what's your solution? Keep in mind - as you point out in your article above. . a majority of people (Democrats & Republicans & otherwise) are already with you on this. We're convinced already. Good job. So where to next, though? The needle keeps skipping here. If all we're going to do is sit around and whine about how 'code pink' and moveon.org or Votevets (and all of the other fauxgressives) aren't doing enough to stop the war, then we are truly lost as a movement. Let's get down to business already!
Also: Justin -- (and this is coming from someone who normally holds tremendous respect for ((and is a supporter of)) you and this site) I'm sorry but you're really starting to sound like a broken record in your columns. Attempting to blame ANTI-WAR dem's for failing to hold the new admin's feet to the fire sufficiently and/or stop Obama's idiotic continuation/escalation of Bush's imperialist policies is like people trying to blame you for your failure to stop Bush's eight years of overreach. I don't recall hordes of antiwar right-wingers crowding the streets in protest over the past eight years, either, that is to say . . only a few lonely voices on the right crying from the margins of your party (such as yourself).
Such counter-productive fingerpointing/infighting coming from within the anti-war movement only serves to further marginalize, divide and demoralize our ranks not spur them on.
Was antiwar.com also at fault for failing to stop the war under Bush for the past near decade? Was your beloved Ron Paul to blame for failing to reign in the more extremist members of the GOP during Bush's reign? It's not as if you guys were so much more effective at stopping your own party from starting and escalating these wars in the first place when your side was in power--or at putting together large scale right-wing anti-war protests.
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