Uncategorized

New to the left

Each day I list the blogs new to the linklist. Want to be added? Use the
form, Luke.
Entry does not guarantee winning. No purchase necessary. Offer void where
prohibited. You must either be a fiery liberal spirit or in the vanguard of
the workers revolution to participate. At a pinch we’ll take dedicated left
anarchists and the like as well. No wishy washy centrists need apply.
The decision of the judges is final.

Notes on the Atrocities

Like a 100-watt radio station: broadcasting to the dozens… By Emma Goldman.

Perspective on
anti-war fever:

There is a massive buzz about the demos in
Glasgow and London on Saturday. The Scottish
edition of the mirror today featured a lead piece on it
and announced that they would be printing placards for demonstrators to carry. Meanwhile the London
demo will now be graced with the likes of Charles Kennedy and Mo Mowlem and the newspapers have
fashion features about what to wear to
the demo! The BBC have had to issue
guidelines to its
journalists instructing them who can and can’t attend the demo (to protest rather than work)

[…]

Finally top trade-union leaders have warned that strike action against the war is a possibility,
and for the first time there is serious talk about replacing Blair as Labour leader before the
next election.

War ugh! What is it good for? Jacking up GE’s profits, as Ruminate This
explores:

THIS is what deregulation and media consolidation bring us: the same company that profits from war,
is the company that feeds us our news. I want you for one moment to sit back and think about how
“war news” is presented. Think about how it is marketed, and how every network has developed a
memorable meme and logo for war. They’ve even devised…da da dum…a “jingle” or tune that plays
in the background of our fear. War has become commercialized…it’s a product they’re trying to
convince us we want. War will be very profitable for some in the American media.

Cooped Up no longer

Guess who’s back from hiatus and has a brand spanking new domain as well? That’s right, Jeff Cooper. Go and visit him at
http://www.jeffcoop.com/blog/.

From an article pointed out by an commenter at Eschaton,

The Paranoid Style in American Politics written in 1964:

As a member of the avant-garde who is capable of perceiving the conspiracy before it is fully
obvious to an as yet unaroused public, the paranoid is a militant leader. He does not see social
conflict as something to be mediated and compromised, in the manner of the working politician. Since
what is at stake is always a conflict between absolute good and absolute evil, what is necessary is
not compromise but the will to fight things out to a finish. Since the enemy is thought of as being
totally evil and totally unappeasable, he must be totally eliminated –if not from the world, at
least from the theatre of operations to which the paranoid directs his attention. This demand for
total triumph leads to the formulation of hopelessly unrealistic goals, and since these goals are
not even remotely attainable, failure constantly heightens the paranoid?s sense of frustration. Even
partial success leaves him with the same feeling of powerlessness with which he began, and this in
turn only strengthens his awareness of the vast and terrifying quality of the enemy he opposes.

Sounds familiar?