NEWSHOUR BOOKSHELF - "Listen Liberal"

"New book, ‘Listen Liberal,’ looks at Democratic party schism" PBS NewsHour 6/15/2016

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  The raucous primary season brought simmering tensions and disaffection within the GOP to a boiling point.  But equally severe divisions also surfaced in the Democratic party, centered around Sen. Bernie Sanders’ upstart populist campaign.  Historian Thomas Frank explores the causes and consequences of this schism in his new book “Listen, Liberal,” and joins Judy Woodruff to share what he’s learned.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Tonight, a look at some of the backstory to this year’s raucous political season.

Just as it brought to the surface tensions and disaffection within the Republican Party, so too have divisions in the Democratic Party revealed themselves.

Author and historian Thomas Frank explores all this in his latest book, “Listen, Liberal.”

I sat down with Frank recently in our studio.

Thomas Frank, welcome to the program.

THOMAS FRANK, Author, “Listen, Liberal”:  Good to be here, Judy.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  And we should say the subtitle is “What Ever Happened to the Party of the People?”

You were talking about the Democrats, but just before we talk about what you think is wrong with the Democratic Party now, when was the last time you thought the Democratic Party was doing what it was supposed to do?

THOMAS FRANK:  Well, there’s a — look, there’s still a lot of good Democrats out there, the Democrats that get the — like, the seal of approval from me, you know, that get five stars.  There’s plenty of Democrats that I approve of.

And I will say that I enthusiastically voted for President Obama back in 2008.  So — but, on the other hand, I think that the party has really abandoned its dedication to working-class Americans, beginning in the 1970s, and has progressively abandoned it more and more and more, that sort of traditional Democratic mission.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  I mean, you’re hard.  In your book, you’re pretty hard on President Obama in not fulfilling what you argue was the promise of his presidency.  You’re hard on both of the Clintons, both Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton.

But you also make the striking point that the inequality that we have in this country is something that they think is a good thing?

THOMAS FRANK:  Well, it’s something that — I wouldn’t say that.  Barack Obama called it the — what did he call it?  The great — the overriding challenge of our time.

But, yes, he has a way of putting it, and when he speaks about it in this very eloquent manner, he makes it clear that this is something he deplores, something that, you know, he finds shocking.

However, the Democratic Party, the sort of leadership faction of the Democratic Party, isn’t really at their core bothered by inequality.  They think that, to a certain degree, it reflects the way things ought to be.  This is because the Democratic Party isn’t — the leadership of the Democratic Party is not who we think they are.

MEDIA - Keith Olbermann and MSNBC

Sad Day for America
"Olbermann's Exit Ends Tumultuous MSNBC Affair"
by SAM SCHECHNER and LAUREN A. E. SCHUKER, Wall Street Journal 1/24/2011

Visit MSNBC.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

(Lets see how long MSNBC keeps this video online)

A liberal voice killed by internal business politics of the media business.

As noted by T.J. Walker (audio comment in WSJ article) MSNBC is a struggling network and decides to dump its top-rated personality?!

I see this decision as an example of WHY this network is struggling, decisions made from a board that does NOT really understand the business they are in. You don't dump a rating-magnet just because you don't like him, especially when your network is in trouble. You don't heal to outdated standards when your competition is betting you. What DOES matter to your network is YOUR VIEWERS like him.

NOTE: I just checked The Maddow Blog (at MSNBC) and see no comment from her on this, although she has been a fan and supporter of Keith. MSNBC gag order?

Keith Links: (both open in new page)

Keith on Daily Kos

Keith's Facebook

POLITICS - Olbermann on Tax Cut Compromise

COUNTDOWN
with Keith Olbermann, Special Comment

Visit MSNBC.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

For once, I totally DISAGREE with Keith on the issue of the compromise. To NOT compromise is Republicanism. Obama does NOT like this deal BUT he is not going to take a page out of the Republican Playbook, he is willing to compromise and swallow a bitter pill. Note that Olbermann IS the voice of liberalism, so his view is legitimate in that context.

I absolutely AGREE with Keith's opinion of Republicans AND the rich.

POLITICS - The Core of Liberalism

"WHY DAVID BRODER AND MARSHALL WITTMAN THREATEN DEMOCRACY" by Publius, Legal Fiction

The core of liberalism is the idea that individuals (by virtue of being humans and having dignity) have a sphere of freedom that should be free from government intrusion. Logically following from this bedrock foundation are the other fundamental rights we know and love such as freedom of religion, democratic voting, rule-by-consent, rule of law, right to property, civil liberties, sexual freedom, and so on. All are rooted in the idea of individual freedom or individual consent.

Thus, one of the unifying characteristics of anti-liberalism (e.g., Marxism, religious fundamentalism, fascism) is skepticism and ultimately elimination of this sphere of freedom. To Marxists, the sphere of freedom (and the laws based upon it) facilitates inequality and gives the rich an “ideology” that allows them to protect their property. To religious fundamentalists, individual freedom runs counter to God’s will and must be subordinated to it. Fascism, by contrast, is a religious-like fundamentalism rooted not in God but the state, which essentially takes the place of God. Fascism thus subordinates individual and civil rights to the state, which is a glorified collective and deified entity superior to all other Gods before me nations, rather than a mechanism for protecting individual rights.

To be clear, I’m not accusing the entire American Right of being fundamentalist or fascist or any of the other labels that serve only to distract people from the merits of the debate. But what I am saying is that the American Right — including the Congress, the President, and its sympathetic media — is showing increasingly disturbing anti-liberal characteristics. In fact, anti-liberalism is poisoning the American Right, just as the dark side poisoned Anakin Skywalker.

So well put. Of course, as a Progressive (aka liberal) it states my own stance and ethical belief much better than I have.

Thanks Publius