Rolling Stone: Moveon.org hasn't moved anyone

[trumptman]

Keep them doggies rolling... (http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/_/id/7048293?rnd=1109806026130&has-player=unknown)

Like so many other Internet start-ups, MoveOn has raised -- and burned through -- tens of millions of dollars, innovating without producing many concrete results. Any reasonable analysis shows its stock may be dangerously overvalued. Those banking on MoveOn had better hope it is more Google than Pets.com. Because should the group flame out, the Democrats could be in for a fall of Nasdaq proportions.

Great and accurate article from an unusual source. It brings up some really interesting and key arguments, especially now that Dean has been elected as head of the DNC.

The contention of Moveon.org is that the energy of the left can be harnessed without generating a shrillness that drives off folks less comfortable with such extreme rhetoric and views. That you can direct energy toward energizing the base, and growing into the middle ground as well.

While I think this is entirely possible, and in fact has been accomplished fairly well on the right, I don't believe this is possible with the current left half of the political spectrum. Too much of their language and actions show that any disagreement is actually disguised malicious intent and dissent within the party orthodoxy cannot be tolerated. I mean you have people actually glad for example that Catholics are leaving the party because they prefer ideological purity instead of say, 80% agreement and common goals.

Interesting reading,

Nick

[BRussell]

Originally posted by trumptman
The contention of Moveon.org is that the energy of the left can be harnessed without generating a shrillness that drives off folks less comfortable with such extreme rhetoric and views. That you can direct energy toward energizing the base, and growing into the middle ground as well. That is a good article.

I'm not sure where this idea that MoveOn is so extreme and left wing comes from. They're just a pretty basic Democratic activist group. What have they done or what positions have they taken that are so extreme leftist?

[groverat]

By agreeing to take the "extreme leftist" label lying down they are allowing the Republicans to frame the debate. That is ludicrous.

"Liberal" needs to be taken off the "bad word" list and you can't do that by shying away from it. If the leading apologists for the right-wing control structure are upset by it we, as value-driven liberals, should not be put-off.

[pfflam]

Originally posted by BRussell
That is a good article.

I'm not sure where this idea that MoveOn is so extreme and left wing comes from. They're just a pretty basic Democratic activist group. What have they done or what positions have they taken that are so extreme leftist? they allowed themselves to be defined by the Rove-Machine . . . and guess how they ended up looking: 'extremists way out of the 'mainstream''

:no:

[tonton]

If you're not already aware that RS has always leaned right then I guess you're not very observent.

[trumptman]

Originally posted by BRussell
That is a good article.

I'm not sure where this idea that MoveOn is so extreme and left wing comes from. They're just a pretty basic Democratic activist group. What have they done or what positions have they taken that are so extreme leftist?

I believe the article cited several examples..

It failed to remove two entries that compared Bush to Hitler from its online ad contest, and its expensive television spots barely registered in the campaign. One conservative commentator, alluding to MoveOn's breathless promotion of Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11, branded the group the "MooreOn" wing of the party.

Tom Matzzie, MoveOn's twenty-nine-year-old Washington director, says the ads are aimed at the president, whom he bluntly calls a "son of a bitch."

This kind of closed feedback loop is indicative of a larger problem: the group's almost hermetic left-wing insularity. "We don't get around much," acknowledges Boyd. "We tend to all stay in front of our keyboards and do the work."

So who is MoveOn? Consider this: Howard Dean finished first in the MoveOn primary. Number Two wasn't John Kerry or John Edwards -- it was Dennis Kucinich. Listing the issues that resonate most with their membership, Boyd and Blades cite the environment, the Iraq War, campaign-finance reform, media reform, voting reform and corporate reform. Somewhere after freedom, opportunity and responsibility comes "the overlay of security concerns that everybody shares." Terrorism as a specific concern is notably absent. As are jobs. As is health care. As is education.

There is more of course, but that should be a good taste.

Now as for their positions. I hate to break this to you BRussell and some of the others here, but the reason that Kerry had to talk so much out of both sides of his mouth last fall is because the Democrats were split on the security issue relating to terrorism. Moveon.org for example could see it only one way, entirely bad and entirely wrong. This, believe it or not, I know it might be hard to see past the self-affirming group on these boards, is a minority, almost extreme view. Clearly if it were a majority view, or even a well understood mainstream view, Bush would not have been elected. It is Dean and Moveon.org that made Kerry hvae to "vote for the war before he voted against it" for example.

Nick

[trumptman]

Originally posted by groverat
By agreeing to take the "extreme leftist" label lying down they are allowing the Republicans to frame the debate. That is ludicrous.

"Liberal" needs to be taken off the "bad word" list and you can't do that by shying away from it. If the leading apologists for the right-wing control structure are upset by it we, as value-driven liberals, should not be put-off.

Nice post, but I don't recall using the word liberal? I believe I used left-wing just as you do right wing.

Originally posted by pfflam
they allowed themselves to be defined by the Rove-Machine . . . and guess how they ended up looking: 'extremists way out of the 'mainstream''

:no:

Pfflam, any group that doesn't stand for something in particular, or that attempts to hide what it stands for is ripe for being defined by someone else. Moveon.org could suffer from this because they have no core values beyond "let's be the Democratic attack dog." They were created to fight the Clinton impeachment. Since then they have rallied to a number of causes. Yet you go to their website today and you get no sense of what they stand for or what issues or values they hold important. They are an issue de jour group and that allows them to be open to the process you complain about.

Originally posted by tonton
If you're not already aware that RS has always leaned right then I guess you're not very observent.

Jerk that knee. Please dismiss without allowing any critical thought to enter your head.

Nick

[pfflam]

Originally posted by trumptman
Pfflam, any group that doesn't stand for something in particular, or that attempts to hide what it stands for is ripe for being defined by someone else. Moveon.org could suffer from this because they have no core values beyond "let's be the Democratic attack dog." They were created to fight the Clinton impeachment. Since then they have rallied to a number of causes. Yet you go to their website today and you get no sense of what they stand for or what issues or values they hold important. They are an issue de jour group and that allows them to be open to the process you complain about.



Nick Perhaps, but that doesn't make it any less true.

And that list that you posted that is somehow supposed to paint moveon as extremists?!?!

haha

yeah, they sit at their computers amd work . . . 'damn leftists!!'

Howard Dean was also painted as an extremist way beyond his perspectives . . . thus anything that he had to say, or, any reall good that he accomplished as a politician was immediately discounted . . . .

Its an effective strategy that the RoveMachine has used since its inception: work on image and not on substance . . . it does understand the minds of its target audience though: they have you-all beguiled by the superior force of image: the image of principals rather than real principles: the image of authenticity in the guise of an old pick-up truck, a ranch and just common-folk malapropisms . . .

[Yevgeny]

Originally posted by pfflam
Perhaps, but that doesn't make it any less true.

And that list that you posted that is somehow supposed to paint moveon as extremists?!?!

haha

yeah, they sit at their computers amd work . . . 'damn leftists!!'

Howard Dean was also painted as an extremist way beyond his perspectives . . . thus anything that he had to say, or, any reall good that he accomplished as a politician was immediately discounted . . . .

Its an effective strategy that the RoveMachine has used since its inception: work on image and not on substance . . . it does understand the minds of its target audience though: they have you-all beguiled by the superior force of image: the image of principals rather than real principles: the image of authenticity in the guise of an old pick-up truck, a ranch and just common-folk malapropisms . . .

Read the comparisons of the interests of MoveOn's members with the general population. MoveOn is at the very least out of step with what most Americans feel are priorities.

Given that their top two nominees garnered what, no votes? A few votes? So few votes that I can't remember the sum of the votes of two candidates combined the Democratic primaries, don't you think that this is an indicator that they aren't quite with the mainstream of the Democratic party, let alone the republican party, don't you think it is fair to categorize them as being well left of center?

Love them or hate them, you really need to acknowledge that they are well left of center in America. If you don't then you just hurt yourself in the long run.

[Yevgeny]

Mostly I view MoveOn.org as a non profit orginization with three goals:

1. Make videos that feed the rage of MoveOn's members towards Bush.

2. Console members by offering a group where people think the same.

3. Make money for the people who run MoveOn.org. What a great job! Nobody cares how successful anything you do is and your base keeps giving you money as long as you give them some red meat.

[BRussell]

Originally posted by trumptman
I believe the article cited several examples.. OK, but I basically see them as a standard Democratic advocacy/fundraising group rather than a thinktank-type group that actually takes positions on things.

What gets me is this meta-theory about the 2004 election that Democrats were too extreme or too mean to Republicans, and that's what turned people off from voting for Kerry when they weren't too thrilled with Bush. I think pretty much the opposite is true. Republicans have a ton of these groups, and they fire up their base. IMO, that's why Republicans have been winning.

If that's true, it sure seems to me that Dems need more of these groups, and they need to be even tougher. In short, they need to learn a little from Repubs.

[pfflam]

Its idiotic to feel the need to rush to the center . . . especially since the center has run far to the right . . . so much so that Nixon would be decried as a leftist these days

[FormerLurker]

Originally posted by pfflam
Nixon would be decried as a leftist these days What, are you kidding? Nixon went to China and created the EPA and OSHA - he obviously wasn't a conservative, which means he was definitely a liberal.
:smokey:

[Yevgeny]

Originally posted by FormerLurker
What, are you kidding? Nixon went to China and created the EPA and OSHA - he obviously wasn't a conservative, which means he was definitely a liberal.
:smokey:

Oh no, Nixon would be a good warmongering Republican. Let's not forget Operation Linebacker II (http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/linebacker-2.htm) whose sole goal was to bomb the North Vietmanese back to the negotiating table by knocking out all their bridges, power plants, water facilities, etc. Hardly the thing a leftist does, and something LBJ didn't have the guts to try.

Oh, and Nixon went to China to triangulate China out of the Soviet union's grasp. By going to China, Nixon isolated the USSR and "split" communism.

[Yevgeny]

Originally posted by BRussell
OK, but I basically see them as a standard Democratic advocacy/fundraising group rather than a thinktank-type group that actually takes positions on things.

Agreed. A very well funded advocacy group or PAC.

Originally posted by BRussell
What gets me is this meta-theory about the 2004 election that Democrats were too extreme or too mean to Republicans, and that's what turned people off from voting for Kerry when they weren't too thrilled with Bush. I think pretty much the opposite is true. Republicans have a ton of these groups, and they fire up their base. IMO, that's why Republicans have been winning.

Yes, Republicans did a better job of firing up their base. To be honest, I think it is because Republicans had a candidate that they could more easily sell to their party, whereas Kerry was a tough sell. Too many people who voted for Kerry were really "Anyone but Bush" people which ultimately doesn't fire up one's party for one's own candidate. For example, see the highlights in this article (http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:TiYtcB80CoIJ:www.cpusa.org/article/articleview/486/1/102/+%22Referendum+on+Bush%22&hl=en) and note that the author views the election as a referendum on Bush, rather than an election between Bush and Kerry. The wording is important because rather than promote your own guy in an election, you basically are just running on hatred of the other guy. Saying "This is a referendum on Bush" is pretty much the same as saying "The guy we like can't reccommend himself, so we think the best way to win is to bash the other guy".

Also, the Democratic party had a dificult time addressing the Iraq war. Do you come out against it, or for it, or against it and for it? The Democratic base was split on this with centrists being about 50/50 and the leftists (no insult intended) being 95/5 against it. Kerry had the nearly impossible task of trying to satisfy the left leaning portion of his base while not pissing off the centrist portion of his base. This was a tough position and let to all sorts of odd statements by him that made him look like a "flip flopper".

Originally posted by BRussell
If that's true, it sure seems to me that Dems need more of these groups, and they need to be even tougher. In short, they need to learn a little from Repubs.

Sure. I think PETA is one such group and we all know how they will draw people to the polls.

[BRussell]

Originally posted by Yevgeny
Yes, Republicans did a better job of firing up their base. To be honest, I think it is because Republicans had a candidate that they could more easily sell to their party, whereas Kerry was a tough sell. Too many people who voted for Kerry were really "Anyone but Bush" people which ultimately doesn't fire up one's party for one's own candidate. For example, see the highlights in this article (http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:TiYtcB80CoIJ:www.cpusa.org/article/articleview/486/1/102/+%22Referendum+on+Bush%22&hl=en) and note that the author views the election as a referendum on Bush, rather than an election between Bush and Kerry. The wording is important because rather than promote your own guy in an election, you basically are just running on hatred of the other guy. Saying "This is a referendum on Bush" is pretty much the same as saying "The guy we like can't reccommend himself, so we think the best way to win is to bash the other guy". Sure, I think that's going to be the case any time you have an incumbent. Did Republicans really vote for Dole in 1996? But I think you're right that Kerry had muddled positions, and that made the election even more about Bush than it normally would have been.

Where I disagree is with this idea that Democrats were therefore about "hate" as you put it. I know I'm biased, but I don't think there's any comparison between the "hate" rhetoric of liberal and conservative groups.

Let's remember the Clinton years: It was quite common in the media to talk about how Clinton had murdered the White House counsel. Clinton was regularly referred to as a "draft dodger" even though he wasn't. A sitting Republican Senator essentially threatened that Clinton would be assassinated if he came to North Carolina. Anything was fair game on Clinton, in a way that was completely unlike anything Bush has been subjected to.

And Republicans had plenty to say about Kerry, lest we forget what was going on just a few months ago. Swiftboat vets for truth ring a bell? Kerry is a traitor to the country? Kerry lied about all of his medals? Remember Kerry has botox and an orange face and looks like lerch? That was all very standard fare among conservative groups and internet sites, and widely talked about in the mainstream media. Bush, as part of his regular stump speech, openly made negative statements about Massachusetts and about liberals. Kerry did not make corresponding statements about Texas, and I can't imagine him doing so. It's standard practice for conservatives.

Yeah, heated rhetoric happens on both sides, but to say that Democrats are doing this so much that it lost them the election is ridiculous. I'd argue that it's the mainstream acceptance of conservative "hate" rhetoric against liberals that makes them win.

Also, the Democratic party had a dificult time addressing the Iraq war. Do you come out against it, or for it, or against it and for it? The Democratic base was split on this with centrists being about 50/50 and the leftists (no insult intended) being 95/5 against it. Kerry had the nearly impossible task of trying to satisfy the left leaning portion of his base while not pissing off the centrist portion of his base. This was a tough position and let to all sorts of odd statements by him that made him look like a "flip flopper". I agree with you there. It's very hard to go against an ongoing war, even if people don't like the war.

Sure. I think PETA is one such group and we all know how they will draw people to the polls. PETA, are you serious? Are they a Democratic group?

[tonton]

Originally posted by Yevgeny
Sure. I think PETA is one such group and we all know how they will draw people to the polls.

Just a guess, but I suspect that if you poll PETA supporters you'll find a pretty evenly split political affiliation.

[Yevgeny]

Originally posted by tonton
Just a guess, but I suspect that if you poll PETA supporters you'll find a pretty evenly split political affiliation.

Not in the US. PETA here is uniformly left leaning.

quote from the About PETA web page:

"Since its inception, PETA has helped countless animals escape a sad fate arbitrarily assigned to them: a life at the end of a chain,..."

So these folk are against me having my cat (http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=augustinethecat). I suppose my cat would be happier out in nature where the food was erratic and he had to fight other cats.

...

I'm not saying that all vegetarians are left leaning, just that the membership of PETA is uniformly left leaning here in the states. The last PETA person I talked to told me that Chickens were people too.

Anyhow, I leave you with this wonderful article (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/03/04/cows_bear_grudges/) from our good frends at The Register (http://www.theregister.co.uk)

[addabox]

Originally posted by Yevgeny
Not in the US. PETA here is uniformly left leaning.

quote from the About PETA web page:

"Since its inception, PETA has helped countless animals escape a sad fate arbitrarily assigned to them: a life at the end of a chain,..."

So these folk are against me having my cat (http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=augustinethecat). I suppose my cat would be happier out in nature where the food was erratic and he had to fight other cats.

...

I'm not saying that all vegetarians are left leaning, just that the membership of PETA is uniformly left leaning here in the states. The last PETA person I talked to told me that Chickens were people too.

Anyhow, I leave you with this wonderful article (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/03/04/cows_bear_grudges/) from our good frends at The Register (http://www.theregister.co.uk)

I wouldn't be surprised if most PETA members are left leaning, but I'm not sure how the things you're citing suggest that.

You seem to be saying that the basic rational of PETA (that animals have rights) is "leftist" on the face of it. I don't think that's necessarily true.

Do you?

[Yevgeny]

Originally posted by addabox
I wouldn't be surprised if most PETA members are left leaning, but I'm not sure how the things you're citing suggest that.

You seem to be saying that the basic rational of PETA (that animals have rights) is "leftist" on the face of it. I don't think that's necessarily true.

Do you?

I would say that people who claim that animals have rights equivalent to humans and that it is unethical to have a pet are generally left leaning.

Anyhow, this is getting into a tangent.