Lorna Salzman: Progressive Pundits & Their Shameless Speculations
As we try to plow through the dense declarations of doubters and the
endless beard-stroking of Green elders, all predicting the demise of the
Green Party if it has the temerity to stick to its principles, we may this
evening have one moment of celebration with the likely success of Matt
Gonzalez in San Francisco. But even if he loses, the Green Party will come
out ahead, so in the broader sense it is a win-win situation. Between
Gonzalez and his new-found supporting coalition, and the hard work and
professional presence of Peter Camejo in the gubernatorial campaign, the
Green Party has achieved a position of prominence. It no longer a party
that can be dismissed as radical counterculture upstarts. Camejo and
Gonzalez will, if we take the opportunity, usher in an era where Green
leaders of their caliber will start popping up all across the country to
take their place in the public arena. There is no turning back now.
But what of the progressive pundits…The Nation, Atlantic Monthly, Michael
Moore, DSA stalwarts, Z magazine, and their centrist comrades in arms? What
of John Rensenbrink, one of the initial Green thinkers and founders? What
of all these folk whose writings and pronouncements have dominated the
purportedly progressive media for these long dark decades since Reaganism?
From whence comes their anger?
We can understand the anger of the Dems. They are scared witless and
shitless. They have made themselves impotent, irrelevant and untrustworthy.
They have refused to hold their own party accountable for its disgraceful
abasement before Bush, the corporations and the moneyed class. In chaos and
confusion they have decided to blame it all on the dog - that is, on the
Green Party, as they insinuate that unless the Green Party withdraws from
the 2004 election and/or supports the Democratic presidential nominee,
fascism will descend upon this country. If you kick the dog hard enough,
its whines and howls will drown out the accusations against the Democratic
Party. If you fabricate enough lies, Big Lies, they will drown out the
doubters.
But what about the anger of the Michael Moores? Of the left? Of the
self-proclaimed progressive media? Surely they dont have a huge personal
stake in the survival of the Democratic Party, do they? Surely they dont
identify with the Dems to the point where they are willing and able to
overlook the vast failures of the Democrats in congress? Surely they have
not invested their principles in the Democratic Party to the point where
the party’s loss of reputation and success would cause them profound
misery and mourning? I dont think so.
So what is motivating their concerted, perhaps orchestrated, outrage over
the prospect of a Green Party candidate, whether Ralph Nader or someone
else? What could be driving their thought processes and critiques? What is
it precisely that has stung them to the core, almost to the point of
hysteria?
Well, first of all we know it isnt the principles or objectives of the
Green Party per se. The Green Party’s platform and positions reflect
identically all the things that these pundits have supported and promoted
in their professional careers. Opposition to war, economic justice, fair,
affordable and equitable health care, environmental protection, support for
prison reform, for education, for renewable energy, for worker rights,
women’s rights, an ethical humane foreign policy, an end to discrimination
based on race, gender, ethnic origin, etc. They know what the Green Party
stands for. There are no principled differences…with one exception: a
multiparty system of proportional representation. More on that later.
Now, if you read the tirades against Nader and the Green Party, you would
think that the disagreement is ONLY about whether a GP presidential
candidate will cause the Dems to lose or Bush to be re-elected. Under
ordinary circumstances this might be a reasonable argument. But we need to
remind ourselves that no one - Dems, progressives, greens, the left - has
any inkling of how the election will actually turn out - how many people
will not vote at all, how many dems may not vote at all, how many greens
will vote for the Democratic candidate, how many independents will vote for
the Green Party candidate, etc. All of this is being argued ad nauseum but
in the end amounts to little more than a hill of beans. It is all
speculation by individuals, each with his or her own analysis. There is no
final exam that can be given, and no certain answers, until after the
election. Between now and then, therefore, we have little to go on…except
principle, if the anti-Green, anti-Nader forces will allow this.
No, there is more at work behind the foaming rage of those berating and
intimidating the Greens. What are the forces that drive their anger? My
opinion is only conjecture but I believe it needs consideration. It is
this: that the progressive pundits and media have for too long been allowed
to become the intellectual and political tastemakers in the liberal
community. They have gone unchallenged in their views, analysis and
projections. They have become the kingmakers, in a sense, of the liberals
and progressives. By expressing the predictable liberal homilies and
positions, they confirm and strengthen the belief of their readers that
they are good, moral people, on the side of justice and The Good. When your
readers and listeners are given this blessing - go my friends, you are good
just and moral people and you will prevail in the end - they are not blood
likely to turn around and doubt the proclamations that have rewarded them
in their moral stance. They are not likely to question the reasoning behind
the proclamations of the opinion makers. They are not about to rock the
boat of the accepted, hand-me-down political and ethical judgments. The
relationship is therefore complete and u nlikely to be shaken up.
So it is with The Nation and its accomplices. That The Nation has long been
the leading centrist publication in the progressive community is now
abundantly clear to those who never realized it before. Some of us did,
especially environmentalists; with a few exceptions over the past thity
years, The Nation has kept its distance from any radical environmental
analysis. Like much of the US left, it regarded environmentalism as an
aberration that must be tolerated because lots of good folk partake in it.
But it never adopted it as part of its agenda.
Now the Green Party appears, and in fusing environmentalism with social
justice, has arrived at a critique that goes deeper and farther than any
group or movement in either the left or liberal community in this country
has ever gone, or ever WANTED to do. All of a sudden the Green Party is
saying that the incremental reform of liberal democracy is not enough, that
the supposed democratic values of the constitution are not sufficient to
assure either social OR ecological justice, and that the hallowed two party
system that has eaten away at democracy is at the heart of the problem.
And that those liberals who worked within that system for the hallowed
progressive values preached by the self appointed progressive pundits are
in fact aligned with the enemy as long as they oppose the only kind of
political reform that can save this country: a multiparty system of
proportional representation. Representation that could allow not just
Greens but libertarians and others to actually have their voice heard. Good
grief, say the liberals! How can we risk allowing these troublemakers,
rednecks, counterculture, radicals into our political system? What will
become of our country if we allow such people and movements to actually be
REPRESENTED in the halls of public office? It could become messy,
contentious. We need to keep our constituents and movements pure, liberal,
homogenous. If we dont, then no one will listen to US anymore!
And the Greens havent been listening for a long time. And fewer and fewer
will listen as time goes on, as these pundits desperately strike out at the
nearest target, the Green Party that seeks to actually implement the
objectives and values that these same progressives have themselves
promoted. Self preservation is the name of the game, not principle, for
these pundits. And it can only be assured by destroying the main threat:
the Green Party.
Lorna Salzman
Lorna Salzman
718-522-0253; 631-653-3387
lsalzman@rcn.com
“To me the question of the environment is more ominous than that of peace
and war….I’m more worried about global warming than I am of any major
military conflict”. (Hans Blix, chief UN weapons inspector, March 2003).
“We are already fighting World War III and I am sorry to say we are
winning. It is the war against the earth” (Raymond Dasmann)
