My new blog
Left-wing highlighting of the most relevant recent news stories.Saturday, December 21, 2002
An article in the Times today by Edward Rothstein declares that terrorism has created 'hard times for the left'. Funny, I thought the left was thriving. Books by Michael Moore, Barbara Ehrenreich, and Noam Chomsky become surprise bestsellers. Websites like Get Your War On and Counterpunch thrive. The anti-war movement picks up pace. As it turns out, and this should come as no surprise for readers of the Times, what Edward Rothstein means by 'the left' is not what I've described above. Instead, its a George McGovern article in Harpers, and, for the 800th time this year, Michael Walzer's slanderous denunciation of the left in Dissent. McGovern is critiqued for trying to be a liberal, while Walzer is praised for basically saying that one should give up trying to change the US so long as there are any countries out there where liberal principles (narrowly defined) do not rule. One more time--the left is the people who are opposed to capitalism, imperialism, etc. Walzer (and Todd Gitlin, the Times other favorite thinker on 'the left') are basically revamped versions of what used to be called 'cold war liberals', who in theory want to improve things slightly for the downtrodden, but mostly police the borders of legitimate discourse. It would be nice if the Times actually wrote about the left when it is denouncing it.
Friday, December 20, 2002
Wal-Mart found guilty of not paying its workers for overtime.
Thursday, December 19, 2002
The screw turns: Americans are now forced to choose between higher taxes and locking up more of the poor. Guess which they prefer?
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