De-Powering The Corportations

[Barbarella]

It just burns me up that no progressive author has ever bothered to write a book or set up a plan to fight Big Business. Since Big Business is merely a few people and therefore fallible, surely there is a way to defeat them once and for all. There needs to be a book of tips, tricks, consumer plans & political know-how to take the baddies down.

I mean, we're the good guys! Were smarter & more numerous. I can't believe that we are incapable of organizing anything of value! What is it that is preventing the great legions of Liberal & Moderate thinkers & citizenry to put their superior brains together, create some strategies, organize, think-tanks, etc.? It's simple, learn from the Far-Right's playbook! DUH!

We have the tools, the plans, the strategies, the power but WE DON'T USE IT! We don't do what has to be done! We know how propaganda & doublespeak works! We know what the Right did to be successful! Yet, we don't bother to COPY & LEARN FROM THEM & DO WHAT THE DID!

I have yet to find a reason why the more numerous, more intelligent, more-favored-by-karma, Progressive good guys seem so damn neutered! What's wrong with us?! We can't organize & rise as a mighty legion for good, infiltrate & change the political & social landscape! It's like some cosmic force is making us useless!

Perhaps we should move to Plan B, a mass Progressive exodus to Canada, where we can regroup, recoup & reorganize with little far-right interference.

Maybe when the Kochs croak, there will be a vacuum left behind and possible successors will infight & the whole thing will fall apart on it's own. History has shown that if the "little guy" is unable to take down a diabolic regime, the regime usually does it's own self in.

[Sigmaleph]

Please don't take this the wrong way, but you have a tendency to frame everything as a great moral struggle between the good guys and the bad guys. It's oversimplifying.

"Big Business" is not a shadowy cabal of evil people gloating about how they are going to put the little people down. They are people, mostly just like everyone else, who happen to be the ones holding a fair bit of power. They will use that power in their favour, because that's what most people do.

The "good guys" are not being held down by cosmic forces. They are people, each with their own problems, who don't rise up and fight as one because they are not one. They are many. Some of them are just as vile as the worst people in "Big Business", they just don't do much about it because they don't get the opportunity. Some see no immediate benefit in rising up. Some try to do something, but they don't know what. Many have differing ideas as to what to do, and they fight amongst each other, sometimes because of fundamental disagreements and sometimes because of petty differences. You can't expect large masses of people to coordinate spontaneously without some powerful external circumstances pushing them to it. Dictators butchering people in the street will do it, but that's not what's going on, or nowhere close.

And even all this is an oversimplification, because human society is pretty damn complex. I'm not saying that one should give up on changing it, because it can be changed. Slowly, with effort. But your chances of doing so drop if you refuse to face it as it is.

[wrightway]

Now I want to rewatch the Daily Show bit on banks in the U.S. vs banks in Canada.

[Barbarella]

Please don't take this the wrong way, but you have a tendency to frame everything as a great moral struggle between the good guys and the bad guys. It's oversimplifying.

"Big Business" is not a shadowy cabal of evil people gloating about how they are going to put the little people down. They are people, mostly just like everyone else, who happen to be the ones holding a fair bit of power. They will use that power in their favour, because that's what most people do.

The "good guys" are not being held down by cosmic forces. They are people, each with their own problems, who don't rise up and fight as one because they are not one. They are many. Some of them are just as vile as the worst people in "Big Business", they just don't do much about it because they don't get the opportunity. Some see no immediate benefit in rising up. Some try to do something, but they don't know what. Many have differing ideas as to what to do, and they fight amongst each other, sometimes because of fundamental disagreements and sometimes because of petty differences. You can't expect large masses of people to coordinate spontaneously without some powerful external circumstances pushing them to it. Dictators butchering people in the street will do it, but that's not what's going on, or nowhere close.

And even all this is an oversimplification, because human society is pretty damn complex. I'm not saying that one should give up on changing it, because it can be changed. Slowly, with effort. But your chances of doing so drop if you refuse to face it as it is.

Perhaps I've been talking in black & white generalizations. Sorry about that. First off, I wanted to clarify that I do not believe all Big Business is a cabal of evil & not all of the "Little Guy" is good. There's tons of nasty, dumbass average schmoes and plenty of big, super-rich CEOs who are decent people.

I just can't figure out why the Left can't organize anything of real effectiveness. The Right can organize and they have a strong drive and tenacity. They sit down, they strategies,  they use psychology, they organize....why aren't we doing that? We can so easily read up on their history & playbook & implement what they've implemented. But we don't because we're too stuck on being too "nice nice" and afraid that the tiniest thing will be a compromise on our morals.

Where's our shrewdness? Our pragmatism? Our think-tanks? Our strategies? Our 30-year-plans & social-engineering schemes? All we do is march in streets & wave picket signs. That alone is not enough! We can learn from the Far-Right's playbook, we can run for office from the bottom-up. We can have fund-raisers & work with Progressive wealthy & powerful people. You can still be of influence & still be a good person. Being rich or powerful does not automatically turn you into a literal sociopath. Sure, they say "power corrupts" but each person is different & everyone is 100% susceptible.

We should do what the Far-Right did...we should infiltrate & influence the Democratic Party & pull it Left-ward.

I just don't get why Progressives are so defanged in this country. Perhaps this nation isn't as Progressive as I thought. Our morale is in the toilet & we never give ourselves any reason to raise it. We shoot ourselves in the foot with stories of bad news & injustice, come up with no answers & just sit around feeling sorry for ourselves and saying "We're screwed" rather "We'll fight this! We can do it!". No wonder we can't do anything, we're a bunch of downers with no hope or morale. No wonder our efforts are half-baked.

[JohnE]

Talk is cheap, Spuk. If you're so sure there's a solution, get out there are start doing it. Get some results and people will be lining up behind you.

[Barbarella]

I mentioned solutions.

And no one's addressed any of my points.

Am asking questions.

Nobody can say anything. Why is everyone so damn hopeless & wishy-washy.

Answer my questions. Point by point...in detail.

Look, I know I'm the village weirdo on this board. I don't understand why you hate me. I am a good person and I care.

[Barbarella]

Now I want to rewatch the Daily Show bit on banks in the U.S. vs banks in Canada.

Are you implying that we should all move to Canada?

[JohnE]

I don't hate you. I don't think anyone here does.

Yes, you've mentioned some solutions, (usually very broad and nonspecific terms) but as far as I've seen, that's all you do, MENTION them. And that's just talk. You want people to start ACTING, lead by example. Otherwise, you're no different than the do-nothings you rail against.

[Barbarella]

I don't hate you. I don't think anyone here does.

Yes, you've mentioned some solutions, (usually very broad and nonspecific terms) but as far as I've seen, that's all you do, MENTION them. And that's just talk. You want people to start ACTING, lead by example. Otherwise, you're no different than the do-nothings you rail against.

I know.

But it still doesn't answer my question....What happened to Liberals in this country? Where's our bite? Where's our spirit? Our planning? Our strategizing? Sure, we write petitions & wave picket signs but we do do much of else and our attitude is a chicken little "We're screwed". Every time bad news comes from Washington, it's "we're screwed" not "we won't stand for this".

[JohnE]

I actually don't think it's as bad as you make it out to be, but regardless... There are a lot of factors that led to our current state. More than I care to list while typing on my phone, and I'm sure there's a lot more that I don't even know of. But I don't get the importance of the question, besides maybe "don't let history repeat itself."

ETA Frankly, I thought you were being rhetorical.

[Cataclysm]

Where's our shrewdness? Our pragmatism? Our think-tanks? Our strategies? Our 30-year-plans & social-engineering schemes? All we do is march in streets & wave picket signs. That alone is not enough! We can learn from the Far-Right's playbook, we can run for office from the bottom-up. We can have fund-raisers & work with Progressive wealthy & powerful people. You can still be of influence & still be a good person. Being rich or powerful does not automatically turn you into a literal sociopath. Sure, they say "power corrupts" but each person is different & everyone is 100% susceptible.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Constitution_Society

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_American_Progress

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACLU

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MoveOn.org

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Policy_Institute

[Sigmaleph]

Look, I know I'm the village weirdo on this board. I don't understand why you hate me. I am a good person and I care.

I know you're a good person, and that you care. You have a lot of passion, and that's a good thing. It's necessary, even, sometimes.

I also think that you tend to get overexcited about things, that you get angry at people for not being as optimistic as you and that some of your views are oversimplified. That doesn't mean I hate you. It does mean that occasionally you will say something that people will disagree with, and because you tend to be passionate, it will be more noticeable. So, yes, it can be annoying.

You can't expect us to always agree. You can't expect us to never say anything when you type an all-caps post yelling at people for not having anything hopeful to say, because it will stand out. But nobody hates you for it, it's just a minor disagreement.

[wrightway]

Now I want to rewatch the Daily Show bit on banks in the U.S. vs banks in Canada.

Are you implying that we should all move to Canada?

Missing the point a lot today? Banks in Canada are considered friendly and trustworthy, in part because they are heavily regulated. They embrace different values, so they can be all "Capitalism! Yay!" while maintaining a healthy economy. Our system sucks because we allow it to suck on a large scale. We have the system we deserve until we, on a large scale, take care of it. No amount of internet thrashing gets change done. Work on the ground does.

Agitating your allies will not help you. No one hates you, you're just so easily excited.

[Veras]

To answer your original question, there are books like that.  Give Me Liberty, by Naomi Wolf, is the first the comes to mind.  I'm also fairly sure that Ralph Nader has written one as well, but I don't recall the title, and I might be imagining it entirely.

Wolf's book is mostly specifics:  how to organize a protest, how to start a petition, etc.  It's not really a manifesto.  If you want a manifesto, the closest thing that I can think of (other than that one by Marx, which probably won't appeal to you if you're a liberal) is Conscience of a Libeal, by Paul Krugman.  It's a bit dry, but what do you expect, he's an economist?

To your broader point:  Why is the left so... neutered?  Because the right has been much more effective at framing the debate.

"Government isn't the solution to the problem, government is the problem."

What bumper-sticker slogan has the left had in the past three decades that can match the power of that one?  We are the 99%?  What does that even mean?

That's not the only example.  The healthcare debate became about how the evil that the government was going to do.  It was about how government bureaucrats were going to come between you and your doctor, nevermind the fact that insurance company bureaucrats not only do the same thing, but they actually financial incentive to deny care.  The argument that access to medical care is a human right never came up.

Maybe conservative arguments tend to be more simple, which is more effective in the age of the sound bite and twitter.  I don't know.  I can't say why conservatives have been so effective at defining the parameters of the debate and liberals have been so dreadful at it, but they have been.

[Barbarella]

Look, I know I'm the village weirdo on this board. I don't understand why you hate me. I am a good person and I care.

I know you're a good person, and that you care. You have a lot of passion, and that's a good thing. It's necessary, even, sometimes.

I also think that you tend to get overexcited about things, that you get angry at people for not being as optimistic as you and that some of your views are oversimplified. That doesn't mean I hate you. It does mean that occasionally you will say something that people will disagree with, and because you tend to be passionate, it will be more noticeable. So, yes, it can be annoying.

You can't expect us to always agree. You can't expect us to never say anything when you type an all-caps post yelling at people for not having anything hopeful to say, because it will stand out. But nobody hates you for it, it's just a minor disagreement.

I know. I understand. That's okay. We'll get through this, somehow. Perhaps I should do more of my part.

Where's our shrewdness? Our pragmatism? Our think-tanks? Our strategies? Our 30-year-plans & social-engineering schemes? All we do is march in streets & wave picket signs. That alone is not enough! We can learn from the Far-Right's playbook, we can run for office from the bottom-up. We can have fund-raisers & work with Progressive wealthy & powerful people. You can still be of influence & still be a good person. Being rich or powerful does not automatically turn you into a literal sociopath. Sure, they say "power corrupts" but each person is different & everyone is 100% susceptible.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Constitution_Society

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_American_Progress

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACLU

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MoveOn.org

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Policy_Institute

I know about these. You know, obviously money=power in this world. Perhaps we can get together & write petitions & letters to these organizations to suggest cool fundraising ideas (I'd like to see an annual stadium music festival akin to 1980's-era "Live Aid" only for Progressive politics instead of famine relief. Marathons & Walks would be fab, too). We can also suggest that they each publish a booklet in both print & ebook formats that list different businesses & companies and their political contributions, kind of like what the old BuyBlue website did. That way we can avoid the ones that empower the TEAliban & do business with the ones that empower the Progressive/Democratic cause. I confess I'm a bit simplistic in the "ideas" dept. but it's a start.