FirmhandKY
Posts: 8948
Joined: 9/21/2004
Status: offline
|
quote:
ORIGINAL: philosophy
........actually i'm not so sure i can dismiss the media pundits as easily. We live in an era where spin and perception have become major forces in a way they never used to be. IMO the media are as much a part of the political process as the elected officials. What they say matters. So when Rush Limbaugh or Ann Coulter says something it becomes part of that political process, it has an effect.
If indeed you find the press that important, then you might want to read this.
quote:
ORIGINAL: philosophy
This whole thread is based on the idea that what you or i say matter too. If i call you a Nazi, or if you call me a Communist, then we are helping to sustain a climate where politicans (with their noses in the wind and the finger on the pulse) feel they have to be as partisan, as polarised, in order to capture our votes. In the long run, power runs uphill, not downhill. So, no-one gets to duck the responsibility to debate responsibly. Not you, not me, not Sanity, not Synergy, not Ann Coulter, not Michael Moore, not Nancy Pelosi, not Sarah Palin.........we're all a part of the problem, so we're all a part of the solution.
Nice sentiment, and I agree. Except for the fact that I don't think one side being civil will any longer ameliorate the situation on the wider scale. The adoption of Alinsky-ist tactics by one political party wholesale, it's adoption into the very core of "how politics are done" make it an integral part of the Democratic leadership. Simply put, they don't have any interest in doing anything else. It apparently has worked for them, and the odds of a leopard changing its spots are pretty slim.
On a personal level, I don't use the NCFS as any part of my stock in trade, although several times I've supported some posters who are accused of doing so.
quote:
ORIGINAL: philosophy
quote:
I said that cheapened discourse has become the standard and that that standard originated on the left. I base this on the fact that much of the left's philosophical underpinnings about debate and public discourse relate to the philosophical roots of the Alinsky types, who advocate just such cheapened debate in the effort to "win", and now control the US government.
...if i'd ever heard of Alinsky i might agree with you, but i haven't. So i did a little googling.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saul_Alinsky
(for those like me who hadn't heard of him)
http://www.itvs.org/democraticpromise/legacy1.html
(and more.....)
Got to be honest, nothing i read on those sites leads me to see him in the light you do. What i read was not about left/right per se....more about disenfranchised and establishment as a dichotomy. Indeed the first site said that Alinky hated liberalism.
The tactics in the rules for radicals i've seen employed across the political spectrum.
quote:
As I've said before, respected conservative leaders had William F. Buckley as a role-model, as a conservative example in how to conduct the public debate. The left has had Alinsky, Chomsky and such.
Now, at the apex of Democratic power are the people who were brought up in the the Alinksy school of public discourse, and it shows.
Firm
Well, i had to look up Buckley as well......
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_F._Buckley,_Jr.#Views_on_modern-day_conservatism
Interesting man, and i certainly respect that he moved away from a racist position of segregation. That takes courage. However i can't see anything that makes him the obvious person to compare to Alinsky. Did he write something like the Rules for Radicals but from a right wing slant?
i'd compare Buckley to Tony Benn from the UK. Both passionate and intellectual thinkers. Different sides of the left/right ideological divide, but both respectful and respected debaters.
i'd compare Alinsky to Karl Rove.......
Alinsky has long been the radical left's dirty little secret.
Obama grew up in his politics immersed in his philosophy:
Sen. Obama was trained by Chicago's Industrial Areas Foundation, founded in 1940 by the radical organizer Saul Alinsky. In the 1980s, Obama spent years as director of the Developing Communities Project, which operated using Alinsky's strategies, and was involved with two other Alinsky-oriented entities, Acorn and Project Vote.
On the Obama campaign Web site can be found a photo of him teaching in a University of Chicago classroom with "Power Analysis" and "Relationships Built on Self Interest" written on the blackboard — key terms utilized in the Alinsky method.
"Community organizer" is an Alinskyism:
"Barack Obama's training in Chicago by the great community organizers is showing its effectiveness," the author continued. "When executed meticulously and thoughtfully, it is a powerful strategy for initiating change and making it really happen. Obama learned his lesson well.
"I am proud to see that my father's model for organizing is being applied successfully beyond local community organizing to affect the Democratic campaign in 2008," the author said. "It is a fine tribute to Saul Alinsky as we approach his 100th birthday."
The person who signed the letter, Lee David Alinsky, a longtime public TV producer in the Boston area, is indeed the son of the late radical. Alinsky no doubt felt compelled to make the tribute on behalf of Obama because Obama refuses to even acknowledge his Alinsky training in public.
He is quick to say that the community organizing he did in Chicago was "the best education I ever had, better than anything I got at Harvard Law School." But he never tells us who educated him, not even in the two memoirs he's written. He also fails to disclose who hired him. Obama claimed in the recent national service forum at Columbia University that he worked for "churches" while organizing on the South Side of Chicago.
... Obama in fact worked for a subsidiary of the radical Gamaliel Foundation, a Chicago-based Alinsky group, and he was paid by the radical Woods Fund, which supports Gamaliel. Gamaliel's Web site and history page make plain that it evolved from the Alinsky school of organizing. Its training methods acknowledge an "agitational" style of organizing.
Obama also fails to disclose that he himself became a trainer of community organizers for the radical Gamaliel network. He also won't disclose that he contributed to a Chicago forum called "After Alinsky," where he argued for a "systematic approach" to community organizing and more "power" to bring about social change.
Serving on Gamaliel's board of directors is John McKnight, who wrote a letter of recommendation for Obama to Harvard. McKnight is a noted "student of Alinsky" and former ACLU director who now teaches at Northwestern University.
Hillary Clinton has studied him in depth. Others on the left have done so as well.
It's now become part of the weft and weave of the powerful in the Democrat party, and - as I said, really does not bode well for any type of return to civil discourse.
Your comments about Alinsky not liking "liberals" was only because he didn't think liberals were radical enough. They actually wanted to participate in the system, not destroy it.
If radicals were to be in the vanguard of the movement to transfer power from the Haves and the Have-Nots, Alinsky's first order of business was to define precisely what a radical was. He approached this task by first distinguishing between liberals and radicals. Alinsky had no patience for those he called the liberals of his day -- people who were content to talk about the changes they wanted, but were unwilling to actively work for those changes. Rather, he favored "radicals" who were prepared to take bold, decisive action designed to transform society, even if that transformation could be achieved only slowly and incrementally. Wrote Alinsky:
"Liberals fear power or its application.... They talk glibly of people lifting themselves by their own bootstraps but fail to realize that nothing can be lifted except through power.... Radicals precipitate the social crisis by action -- by using power.... Liberals protest; radicals rebel. Liberals become indignant; radicals become fighting mad and go into action. Liberals do not modify their personal lives[,] and what they give to a cause is a small part of their lives; radicals give themselves to the cause. Liberals give and take oral arguments; radicals give and take the hard, dirty, bitter way of life."
***
The short list of Alinky's rules:
RULE 1: "Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have." Power is derived from 2 main sources - money and people. "Have-Nots" must build power from flesh and blood. (These are two things of which there is a plentiful supply. Government and corporations always have a difficult time appealing to people, and usually do so almost exclusively with economic arguments.)
RULE 2: "Never go outside the expertise of your people." It results in confusion, fear and retreat. Feeling secure adds to the backbone of anyone. (Organizations under attack wonder why radicals don't address the "real" issues. This is why. They avoid things with which they have no knowledge.)
RULE 3: "Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy." Look for ways to increase insecurity, anxiety and uncertainty. (This happens all the time. Watch how many organizations under attack are blind-sided by seemingly irrelevant arguments that they are then forced to address.)
RULE 4: "Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules." If the rule is that every letter gets a reply, send 30,000 letters. You can kill them with this because no one can possibly obey all of their own rules. (This is a serious rule. The besieged entity's very credibility and reputation is at stake, because if activists catch it lying or not living up to its commitments, they can continue to chip away at the damage.)
RULE 5: "Ridicule is man's most potent weapon." There is no defense. It's irrational. It's infuriating. It also works as a key pressure point to force the enemy into concessions. (Pretty crude, rude and mean, huh? They want to create anger and fear.)
RULE 6: "A good tactic is one your people enjoy." They'll keep doing it without urging and come back to do more. They're doing their thing, and will even suggest better ones. (Radical activists, in this sense, are no different that any other human being. We all avoid "un-fun" activities, and but we revel at and enjoy the ones that work and bring results.)
RULE 7: "A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag." Don't become old news. (Even radical activists get bored. So to keep them excited and involved, organizers are constantly coming up with new tactics.)
RULE 8: "Keep the pressure on. Never let up." Keep trying new things to keep the opposition off balance. As the opposition masters one approach, hit them from the flank with something new. (Attack, attack, attack from all sides, never giving the reeling organization a chance to rest, regroup, recover and re-strategize.)
RULE 9: "The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself." Imagination and ego can dream up many more consequences than any activist. (Perception is reality. Large organizations always prepare a worst-case scenario, something that may be furthest from the activists' minds. The upshot is that the organization will expend enormous time and energy, creating in its own collective mind the direst of conclusions. The possibilities can easily poison the mind and result in demoralization.)
RULE 10: "If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through and become a positive." Violence from the other side can win the public to your side because the public sympathizes with the underdog. (Unions used this tactic. Peaceful [albeit loud] demonstrations during the heyday of unions in the early to mid-20th Century incurred management's wrath, often in the form of violence that eventually brought public sympathy to their side.)
RULE 11: "The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative." Never let the enemy score points because you're caught without a solution to the problem. (Old saw: If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem. Activist organizations have an agenda, and their strategy is to hold a place at the table, to be given a forum to wield their power. So, they have to have a compromise solution.)
RULE 12: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it." Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions. (This is cruel, but very effective. Direct, personalized criticism and ridicule works.)
***
Karl Rove was a piker compared to Alinsky.
We can talk about William F. Buckley, Jr if you wish. He wrote a lot of material, and founded the National Review.
But his main accomplishment was in setting the tone of conservatism for many years. For a long time, if WFB Jr wasn't in your court, you were toast.
From the Wiki link that you yourself gave:
Buckley was "arguably the most important public intellectual in the United States in the past half century", according to George H. Nash, a historian of the modern American conservative movement. "For an entire generation he was the preeminent voice of American conservatism and its first great ecumenical figure."[6] Buckley's primary intellectual achievement was to fuse traditional American political conservatism with laissez-faire economic theory and anti-communism, laying the groundwork for the modern American conservatism of U.S. presidential candidates Barry Goldwater and President Ronald Reagan.
Firm
_____________________________
Some people are just idiots.
|
RE: Could we kindly cut the nazi/communist crap? - 
Profile
?
New Messages
No New Messages
Hot Topic w/ New Messages
Hot Topic w/o New Messages
Locked w/ New Messages
Locked w/o New Messages
Post New Thread