Is the West Experiencing a Left-Wing Drift? (the international left politics activism, news, and strategy thread)

xp aimless are you referring to the 3 part berman piece of the piece that was linked to here? re: anti-Zionism i think you're a little confused. ppl of whom the term is being used here (people who support BDS) often very happily refer to themselves as anti-Zionist. these pieces are not like AIPAC hit jobs on liberal Zionists like Beinart where you'd be right conflating critical of Likud policies w/ anti-Zionism is propaganda. these pieces aren't about democrats who are critical of israel (tho they are) but specifically leftists who support 1SS.

often very happily refer to themselves as anti-Zionist

Self-identified anti-Zionists are in no danger of taking over the Democratic party. Berman can stop fretting.

is that bc you don't think DSA and the left are ascendent in the party or bc you don't think anti-Zionism is prevalent in those circles or what

it's because they are more than several steps removed from positions of power within the Democratic apparatus

also I know you know this but the DSA, the left and anti-Zionists are not interchangeable terms. it's more like a Venn diagram where anti-zionists are the v small intersection in the middle

yes i'm aware and i am not concerned that the dem party is about to become anti-zionist. but it's enough of an issue on the horizon that conservative jews have fodder to troll liberal jews with. ok fine right-wingers always wield nationalism against left-wingers what else is new. i do think tho that the left wing of the party, mostly due to moderate failures in office and electorally, is ascendent and that likely in the near future the party will at the very least be split on the issue of Israel. there are no anti-Zionist POTUS nomination hopefuls afaik. Sanders probably comes the closest and is a for sure liberal Zionist. but yeah a lot can happen in between now and then and i do believe anti-Zionist sentiment is more marginal than it appears. the anti-Zionist left + the right are both motivated to make it seem more impressive for their own reasons.

xp- I think even morbs would quickly concede that anti-Zionism is not "ascendant in the party" and he more than anyone else on ilx would make that admission ruefully. As Οὖτις points out, conflating 'the left', 'DSA', and self-identified 'anti-Zionists' as interchangeable terms is wildly inaccurate.

i'd be curious to hear other opinions on that question tbh inc morbs but i don't think you can have it both ways. if these incoming elected democrats are worth news coverage (and they got tons) then a position many of them share that is currently anathema in the dem party is worthy of coverage too. tho i agree handwriting at this point isn't justified (but of course these articles are concern trolling).

a position many of them share that is currently anathema in the dem party is worthy of coverage too

The mainstream DC news media doesn't think this way. Israel was not the marquee issue in the midterm elections and isn't likely to be in the 2020 election, either. The out-of-the-mainstream foreign policy positions of a few Congressional reps is very small potatoes.

seeing as how we have a non-existent foreign policy at the moment, Israel's pretty far down the list of any foreign policy issues that are gonna be brought before POTUS candidates - things like dealing w Russia, Brexit, NATO, China, N. Korea, Iran deal, Paris climate accord, etc. are all gonna take precedent. that's a long list.

(and Israel's involved on a few of those fronts but you get the idea)

Tucker Carlson’s rag is doubling down to the point of now just making leftist memes:

That's more like it, @AOC! pic.twitter.com/Jg1XkAl8bo

— The Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) January 4, 2019

They're just riding the wave for the clicks.

xp lol

Holy shit they do the “Webster’s defines socialism as..” thing too

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/americans-warming-to-socialism-over-capitalism-polls-show

Socialism, no matter what Webster's Dictionary says, should be defined as the belief that the economic production and resources of a society should be organized so as to support all members of that society, in such a way that their basic sustenance does not directly depend upon their ability or opportunities to contribute to that society's economic production.

Uh, I think that’s social democracy, but a necessary step along the way

I think society owning the means of production would be covered by that definition, too, since that approach is just a means, not an end in itself.

debating what socialism really means is a

https://media1.tenor.com/images/9e1deacb0095a725dafb1802588469dc/tenor.gif?itemid=5589511

from me

Fair enough

Houston DSA Member, Judge Franklin Bynum, updated our chapter last night in front of 82 attendees on his work as judge, announcing that he freed dozens of people yesterday alone during his jail docket.

This is what emancipation looks like.

He announced that the newly elected judges fired the private law firm that argued for jailing the poor, dismissed the federal appeal, and are moving to settle the biggest bail lawsuit in the country. With the leadership of Judge Darrell Jordan, Franklin and the new judges; all people will be released on their misdemeanor cases, period.

No more algorithms, no more cash bail, no more cages for people the law already calls innocent. This is part of our vision of a better society!

“I would never have done this without being a part of DSA.” - Franklin Bynum

https://www.facebook.com/HoustonDSA/posts/1641384789294769

What is the algorythm he is talking about?

could someone break down the "leaked DSA secret plan" fracas that happened a few days ago?

xp https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/2016/05/24/152850/new-assessment-tool-helps-judges-decide-whether-to-release-or-detain-defendants/

could someone break down the "leaked DSA secret plan" fracas that happened a few days ago?

― resident hack (Simon H.), Wednesday, January 16, 2019 9:51 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

so far as i can tell some internal documents from the momentum clique leaked. in these docs they're open that the M4A canvassing they've been driving has essentially been designed as a bait and switch actually intended to build capacity to power a bernie canvassing adjunct. they reply that a bernie presidency is a necessary condition for M4A. no one besides them, so far as i can tell, thinks that's true.

so far as i can tell

thanks HOOS. sounds....about right, tbh

this is.....very far from great, and mcelwee does not come off well

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-young-lefts-anti-capitalist-manifesto/

It was I think Brendan O'Connor who tweeted that if you think the intellectual salon of the anticapitalist left is a media & pol friendly happy hour in Brooklyn, you're telling on yourself

I liked a lot of what McElwee was saying - probably surprising no one - but this is the part that concerns me:

if three years from now Data for Progress has not enacted its vision, has not exercised itself upon the world and its ideas on the world, then we will have failed and we should stop doing this.”

Wasn’t that self-imposed timeline a little quick for broad political change to happen, I asked.

“We’re all going to fucking die of climate change,” McElwee shot back. “We have to accelerate, accelerate, accelerate.”

There's still a lot of people who would love to die of climate change in a hundred years, instead of being shot by police, dying of hunger, etc, and it's concerning if people are going to go away if they don't get their way in three years.

Calling yourself an "Overton window mover" is some straight up delusions of grandeur shit.

Unrelated, but if you're taking the pulse of the new US left and consulting Paul Krugman but no one from (for example) the major chunk of DSA not interested in reforming the Dems, that's pretty fucking weak imho

I'm pretty sure she's not including Krugman as being among the new US left. Might have overlooked that connection, but I don't think it's there.

And the fact that Krugman is thinking about plans to nationalize 25% of the economy is a pretty great indication of the impact the new left has had, imo.

i sorta get grifter vibes from McElwee, but he's followed by some good people not that necessarily means anything

I've seen ppl outright call him a grifter but imo that term implies malice/forethought, imo he's just an activist who got a little media + politician love and let it get to his head (inadvertently minimizing the work of a hell of a lot of other people while he's at it)

and no the piece doesn't lump in Krugman with them, it does something even more annoying and turns to him to say "hmm maybe the mainstream political spectrum IS too limited huh" as though that's not something he could have started doing something about a long fuckin' time ago if he really cared that much about it, and as if tons of ppl haven't been screaming this at the NYT and every other mainstream outlet about their biases for a million years

Yeah, exactly. Which is why it's such a good example to show how the new left has succeeded where others has failed?

idk I just don't think persuading Krugman of the value of our ideas is a super useful measurement of impact

Fair enough. I do.

this is good

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/23/emmanuel-macron-presidency-gilets-jaunes?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

AFA International President Sara Nelson accepted the 2019 AFL-CIO MLK Drum Major for Justice Award, with a call to conference activists from across the Labor Movement to talk with their union leadership about conducting a General Strike to end the Government Shutdown.

look i'm corny as fuck but i teared up at this:

Now listen to me… We can end this Shutdown together.

Federal sector unions have their hands full caring for the 800,000 federal workers who are at the tip of the spear. Some would say the answer is for them to walk off the job. I say, “what are you willing to do? Their destiny IS tied up with our destiny – and they don’t even have time to ask us for help. Don’t wait for an invitation. Get engaged, join or plan a rally, get on a picket line, organize sit-ins at lawmakers’ offices.

Almost a million workers are locked out or being forced to work without pay. Others are going to work when our workspace is increasingly unsafe. What is the Labor Movement waiting for?

Go back with the Fierce Urgency of NOW to talk with your Locals and International unions about all workers joining together - To End this Shutdown with a General Strike.

We can do this. Together. Si se puede. Every gender, race, culture, and creed. The American Labor Movement. We have the power.

https://www.afacwa.org/fierce_urgency_of_now

thank you. i emailed my AFT rep about it. who to email at AFL-CIO?

hell yeah

also i would like to lol @ the bureacratically oriented invitation to "conference activists from across the Labor Movement to talk with their union leadership about conducting a General Strike"

The (literal) money quote from Bill De Blasio in this interview; "If you're not willing to say we need to tax the wealthy more, you're not a part of the Democratic Party anymore." https://t.co/kFSg0rpljE

— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) February 12, 2019

haven't listened to this yet but will later.

venerable marxist prof emeritus Robert Brenner talks about the US Economy on Jacobin Radio with Suzi Weissman

https://www.blubrry.com/jacobin/41771287/robert-brenner-on-the-state-of-the-economy/

nice

Not sure where to slot this exactly, but Tim Faust has a new M4A primer

https://splinternews.com/the-only-guide-to-medicare-for-all-that-you-will-ever-n-1832594853

that link is clarifying a ton of stuff for me, simon, thank you.

Siri, show me the Overton Window moving: https://t.co/KD0dWlIvKh

— Michael T Sweeney (@mtsw) February 16, 2019

is there a good explainer of the ADOS movement/hashtag anywhere? google is failing me

America Dunks On Sunken?