Sam Smith on the Greens
[Saw this on a list. Sam Smith is consistently one of the most perceptive and empathetic commentators on the Greens … I still love his comment that the Greens are the only constituency that the Democrats think they can win over by insult. -Thomas]
Sam Smith of the Progressive Review has written an excellent critique
of politics-as-usual (http://prorev.com/halfway.htm)
Here’s an excerpt:
The carpenters of a new America remain the Greens, weak and troubled
as they are. Their own struggle with whether to stay with Nader or try
something new has put a great strain on the party. The strategy of
concentrating on non-battleground states inevitably has hurt their
chances, some of the Naderites have been remarkably nasty, and the
fundamental decency of the Green approach has not been reciprocated in
any fashion by the Kerry campaign or given respect by the media.
The Greens, at the very least, deserve a vote or two at the state and
local level from every Democrat who ever said a mean word about Ralph
Nader’s run in 2000. They deserve the admiration of everyone who
believes we need not only to hate George Bush but to create something
we can love. Green presidential candidate David Cobb deserves respect
and praise for having weaved a humane path between moral absolutism
and immoral acquiescence. And in states where either Bush or Kerry are
preordained he also deserves a vote.
There are many things the Greens could do better, starting with a
short hard-hitting list of populist goals that makes clear that Greens
believe humans are part of ecology, too, but even with all their
idiosyncrasies and shortcomings you’re not going to get any closer to
the color of hope than Green.
Almost all great changes in American politics and culture have had
their roots either in the countryside or among minorities within the
major cities. From the religious ‘great awakenings’ to the
abolitionist movement, to the labor movement, to populism, to the
1960s and civil rights, America has been repeatedly moved by viral
politics rather than by hierarchal change promulgated by the elite and
its media. It has happened because of small groups of people
discovering that they are not alone. Part of the job of the Green
Party is to introduce these people to each other and giving them a home.
Successfully confronting the Bush disaster will require far more than
attempting to serially blockade its serial evils, necessary as this
is. There must also be a guerilla democracy that defends, fosters, and
celebrates our better selves - not only to provide an alternative but
to create physical space for decent Americans to enjoy their lives
while waiting for things to get better. It may, after all, take the
rest of their lifetimes. We must not only condemn the worst, but offer
witness for the better. And create places to live it. This, at their
best, is what the Greens are about.
