Last night I attended a well-attended and fascinating panel discussion
at the Brecht Forum in New York on the Obama campaign. With the
exception of Doug Henwood, all the panelists were for voting for Obama
to one extent or another. During the Q&A, there were some extraordinary
contributions from the floor. The meeting was being videotaped as well.
If it ever ends up the Internet, I will make sure to publicize the URL.
All the speakers were limited to five minutes in their initial
presentation and Doug, unlike the others, read from a prepared text.
Let’s hope that it is available online at some point since he had some
very interesting insights, as you might expect. Basically, he called
attention to the rather insubstantial character of the Obama “movement”,
which rests on his charisma and built-up disgust with the Republican
Party more than anything else. He also spoke about Obama’s turn to the
right following his nomination, a familiar pattern with Democratic
nominees for President. In a follow-up, Doug made a very useful point.
He said that Reagan, unlike Obama, had a real movement behind him.
Reagan was part of a well-organized conservative movement, while there
is no counterpart on the Democratic side this year. That being the case,
what sense did it make to talk about the “movement” keeping Obama honest.
Next to speak was Gary Younge, a Black Briton who is the Guardian
correspondent based in New York and a contributor to the Nation
magazine. Younge has been one of the most enthusiastic supporters of
Obama and rather than trying to summarize what he said last night, I
will instead refer you to one of his articles. Younge also made a point
that was a leitmotif throughout from the panelists and the audience,
namely that since the left was so weak it had no other option except to
back Obama. We were impotent while Obama attracts 75,000 people to his
rally. Fortunately, according to Younge, Obama was far better than the
average Democrat so we would not be compromising ourselves so much. He
saw the role of the left as organizing itself so as to keep pressure on
him to hew to the left, even if we were kind of impotent.
full:
http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2008/06/20/a-panel-discussion-on-obama/
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