The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
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    PROGRESSIVES FOOLED BY RIGHT WINGERS AGAIN

    By tmccarthy0 on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 9:55am |

    WAKE UP PROGRESSIVES, YOU ARE BEING TAKEN FOR A RIDE BY NIXON'S MESSENGERS BECAUSE THEY THINK YOU ALL ARE JUST DUMB ENOUGH TO FALL FOR IT.

    Have you seen this website? Protest Obama, I suppose many of you have signed the letter, right? Hah, you've been taken by Republicans! Do you know the man who runs this web site, the one with his name attached? Do you?

    Their media contact is one Media contact: Joshua Frank according to their web page. Do you even know who this is? Yes I thought you didn't so I want to tell you who it is and what these folks are actually doing.

    Joshua Frank writes for Pat Buchanan's paleo-Conservative site. Antiwar.com

    http://antiwar.com/who.php

    "The founders of Antiwar.com were active in the Libertarian Party during the 1970s; in 1983, we founded the Libertarian Republican Organizing Committee to work as a libertarian caucus within the GOP." They are fooling you, they are fomenting anger among progressive to hurt not just the President, but this country. They want this President to be one term and will employ any methods to do accomplish this, and they knew it would be easy. And it has been.

    You will find Justin Raimondo, a Pat Buchanan acolyte at both places, but he runs www.antiwar.com. He is the editor there.

    http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2004/08/23/buchanan-against-the-empire/

    http://www.amconmag.com/search.html?v&m=2&search=Justin+raimondo&start=0&end=25%EF%BB%BF

    http://phillyworkersvoice.wordpress.com/2010/08/19/socialists-answer-justin-raimondo's-attacks/

    (if that link doesn't work just do the search for Justin Raimondo, at phillyworkersvoice it will come up)

    "Justin Raimondo, a contributor to numerous ultra-right media outlets and editorial director of the mis-named “Antiwar.com,” has now chosen a new target for his diatribes. At the end of July and early August, for two weeks running, he has concentrated his fire on the organized antiwar movement in the United States—claiming that it is dominated by the socialist left.

    Raimondo singles out Socialist Action as a major culprit, accusing the organization of trying to “pack” the United National Antiwar Conference (UNAC), held July 23-25 in Albany, N.Y. It is not the first time that Raimondo has seen fit to belittle the antiwar movement in his columns, but his Joe McCarthy-style red baiting has now taken these tactics to new depths."

    That is right folks Pat Buchanan's acolytes are attempting to undermine this President. This my friends is  the definition of ratf*cking:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirty_tricks#Watergate-era_dirty_tricks

    "The Nixon Committee to Re-elect the President (CRP), a private non-governmental campaign entity, used funds from its coffers to pay for, and later cover up, "dirty tricks" performed against opponents by Richard Nixon's employee, Donald Segretti. Segretti famously coined the term 'ratfucking' [1] for recruiting conservative members to infiltrate opposition groups to undermine the effectiveness of such opposition."

    Research given to me by Cain S. LaTrans

     

    Comments

    The initials for Nixon's Committee to Re-elect the President wasn't(CRP)..it was better known as(CReeP). Much easily to identify him with.

    As for the content of your post, I'd have to say the GOPer's are assuming liberals and progressives who are disenchanted with Obama and Democrats would willing jump ship without giving a second thought if the new ship is more seaworthy than the one they're abandoning. I may be annoyed with both, but I wouldn't be so tea-bagged minded as to throw my fortunes to the wind with them at the helm thinking they had my best interests at heart.

    It is odd that GOPer's are still using the same old Nixon playbook effectively. That says a lot about the inability of the public to differentiate between service for the common good of the public as a whole to retreating into the world of GOPer private convictions (lifted from DickDay's post) of prejudice for personal selfishness at the expense of the common good.


    by Beetlejuice on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 10:53am

    Interesting post T.  Hope you're well.

    I had not seen this, and don't doubt you regarding who a couple of the people are that you mention.  But does their mere presence or association negate the content of what is being said in that letter?  I see that there are some pretty well known bonafide lefties on that list giving me reason to give this some thought before denouncing the effort being made.  Are you sure this effort is not some sort of coalition between some on the right and some on the left?  I don't know one way or the other but the presence of Noam Chomsky's name on that list, for example, makes me wonder.  And the first name is that of a former Democratic Senator who was/is a very liberal/left figure.  Cindy Sheehan the famous antiwar Mom is on there too.  I, of course, don't agree with Pat Buchanan on any subject normally but I do know that Buchanan and a number of other docrainaire  old line conservatives long ago came around to the antiwar and oddly enough anti-imperialist viewpoint.  They have recognized rightly that the empire saps the strength of the American Republic, undermines it, and saps the strength of our economy for no good reason.  They believe the imperial military machine is unnecessarily bloated and that we have far too many bases flung around the globe that serve no useful purpose to the nation.  It's hard to argue with those points regardless of one's perch on the political spectrum.  As I say, I don't know what the deal is with this mix of people listed and my guess could be wrong but I think there's at least a chance that the politics of the moment has simply created some odd bedfellows.  I hope this isn't an instance of Nixonian ratfucking but I suppose time will ultimately tell.


    by oleeb on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 10:59am

    Excellent alert, tm. I knew a guy who was one of the world's finest, but also had no guile. As an executive in a family company he wrote a check to Creep, was later investigated and in essence it ruined his life.

    Here's a hunch I have about the next election which fits into the information above. I think if the Republicans manage to get a moderate like Jeb Bush through the primaries they will not come at Obama on a frontal attack like the Tea Party has done. I think they will attempt to make swing Democrats feel embarrassed about Obama, that he's been punched around, well-meaning but not up to the rigors of Presidency. As much as I love Bernie Sanders, I voted for him once, all of his rhetoric will be inter-woven with whatever phraseology Frank Luntz comes up with showing Obama to be from "away", the "other", the Stranger in the Kingdom (great book by Howard Mosher, a Vermont writer)


    by Oxy Mora on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 12:03pm

    The petition may a whole 'nother matter, but I love antiwar.com.  Their list of contributors is awesome, and lots of them cross-post at many sites. 

    By your logic, I guess I shouldn't be glad that Ron Paul's dream of investigating the Fed is closer to reality, or that he supports Wikileaks?  Huh?


    by we are stardust on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 12:41pm

    Star, I am with you about antiwar.com and on issues of our current and recent wars I am with Raimundo. I haven't really read much else by him except a couple of excellent sports commentaries.

     You are probably aware of "War in Context" bt if not you might like to check it out too.

    http://warincontext.org/


    by A Guy Called LULU on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 12:52pm

    Thanks, Lulu; I just put up a video from their site, though I only got shown the site last night.  Lots of good stuff there.  Hell, Pepe Escobar and Gareth Porter, Englehardt,  blog at antiwar.com; and many others.  War and the Fed may be all I agree with Paul and the shiver-inducing Buchanan on, but I ain't gonna poke em in the eye on those subjects.


    by we are stardust on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 1:15pm

    Another great post, Teri.

    I'm always leery of sites, blogs, commenters who pay lip service to Democratic principles while advocating very unDemocratic approaches. Also, when there's a lot of "throwing the baby out with the bathwater" solutions involved. So they're unhappy with Obama's style? That's fair. But it's also necessary to place his actions and policies within a fair context: the president is hamstrung both by conservative Democrats in Congress and by the daily siege of racist, irrational, outrageous attacks from Republicans and their media acolytes.

    Like many Democrats, I'm unhappy with the president's civil liberties record and his escalation of the war in Afghanistan. But I am smart enough to know that if he showed any weakness or hesitation in these arenas, the G.O.P. would blast him to kingdom come as being soft on terrorism and national security. I personally think Dems should fight back on these falsehoods and offer policy issues which don't pander to that mentality. But I understand the political realities involved here, and if the administration in its first term took on these battles, they would accomplish nothing on any front.

    Anyway, your piece is an important reminder to people to take a buyer-beware approach when considering the political marketplace of ideas.

     

     


    by Linda Tilsen (not verified) on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 1:13pm

    "the G.O.P. would blast him to kingdom come as being soft on terrorism and national security."

    Absolutely and without question the worst possible reason to go along with the kind of thuggery, immoral and illegal activity Obama has agreed to continue.  I am mortified every time I see someone declaring themselves somehow wiser and in possession of real political saavy for excusing such inexcusable conduct on the part of our elected officials particularly when they explicitly campaigned against these very  things.  It is an utter disgrace.


    by oleeb on Sun, 12/12/2010 - 1:11am

    One of CREEP's soldiers was Rove of course.

    Same ole, same ole I suppose.

    Yeah there are going to be many faux organizations and websites.

    But think about the message of the repubs during the last campaign cycle. Get rid of lobbyists.

    And the new members of Congress, the new heads of the power structure all hire lobbyists.

    And the tea partiers could care less.

    I don't get it. How can the electorate eat dirt like this and then blame everything on the President?


    by Richard Day on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 1:16pm

    Apparently it is you that didn't do your homework. According to the guy's wiki page, he's a "progressive". Your conspiracy theory is dead!

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


    by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 1:22pm

    Well if he says it, it must be so, huh.


    by Linda Tilsen (not verified) on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 1:27pm

    Yeah; I think you and T are right: the dude's trying to pass.  'Course, then there's this:

    http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/140988.Joshua_Frank  And it's not nice to have mixed politics; then we have to actually judge what the dude writes on its own merits.  No fair!

     


    by we are stardust on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 1:46pm

    This guy does a lot of bellyaching about Clinton and Obama but has surprisingly nothing to say about Bush. Plus, excuse me, how does anyone put progressive in the same sentence as righties -- not to mention Pat Buchanan, whose rantings, as Molly Ivins noted, "sounded better in the original German."

     

    I see the guy's Wikipedia page was update just last week. Well, you know if Wikipedia says it, it's the Gospel truth. (Not)


    by Linda Tilsen (not verified) on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 2:13pm

    You are reaching, he actually signed the letter, his site is here: http://www.greenmuckraker.com

    Seems to me he's a fair minded environmental journalist. I didn't know conservatives were so green!

    Here's also a couple things he wrote that makes me think he didn't think too highly of Republicans:

    http://dissidentvoice.org/2008/01/why-bush-wants-to-legalize-the-nuke-tr...

    http://www.zcommunications.org/hillary-and-george-two-warmongers-in-a-po...

    He writes for some pretty progressive publications: Truthout, Alternet, CounterPunch. Antiwar.com also runs things from the left side of the political spectrum. Take a look at some of their contributors: Chomsky, Tom Englehardt, Kathy Kelly, Norman Solomon and many more.

    Again, your conspiracy theory seems to be dead in the water.


    by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 2:40pm

    Anonymous is correct. CounterPunch, Z Magazine, Truthout, and Alternet are all bona fide leftist publications. Joshua Frank does not seem to fit easily into a box, but if you want to put him in one, he's in the Nader corner, a gadfly to the Democrats and the center-left.

    TMc, I think that you should admit that you got this one wrong. If you still think he's a fake, you need a lot better evidence than him having associated with a website that has associated with Buchanan.


    by Michael Wolraich on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 3:00pm

    What crap. They opposed the Bosnian War. They opposed the Iraq II War. They oppose the surge in Afghanistan. Consistently against war - what's the problem?

    They publish Noam Chomsky. Juan Cole. Alexander Cockburn. Ron Paul. Pat Robertson.

    Ron Paul, you might note, is defending WikiLeaks from the tyranny of government secrecy. Most mainstream Democrats are ducking behind guilty-until-proven-innocent rhetoric. As is of course the Democratic president.

    Bob Barr, a Republican right-winger, has done very good work with the ACLU.

    In these times of Democrats selling out to corporate interests (and I'm far from anti-corporate, but don't need the top oligarchy propped up with trillions stolen), reaching across party lines for reasonable voices is entirely appropriate. Not just hoping they'll turn reasonable, but in response when they do say something reasonable.

    Anyway, this post is a dredge.Until Obama starts turning somewhere close to a reasonable direction, all his hedging, conspiring and "compromising" deserves attack from all quarters.

     


    by Decader on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 2:03pm

    Question occurs to me: If you cannot support your opponents when they are right on an issue, how do you propose to have any credibility when standing in opposition to them when they are wrong?

    Just wunnerin', I guess.

    As to your last paragraph, I definitely agree. Obama puts the "D" in "compromised." Gotten pretty good at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory - so much so that one wonders who he actually sees as his constituency here. The ones who voted for him, or the ones who paid for the campaign?


    by SleepinJeezus on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 2:31pm

    I gave the max to Obama's campaign and maybe the reason I'm hanging in there is not to feel myself a chump for doing so. I give him a few more months.


    by Oxy Mora on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 2:41pm

    Interesting. So ... even if someone agrees, we shouldn't SAY we agree ... because these people might be Libertarian. So, they aren't necessarily fooling folks into doing/saying something they disagree with ... but you wouldn't want to be caught agreeing with THOSE people! Democrats are funny ... in a catty Jr. High cheerleader sort of way.

    Let me just be sure I'm understanding your premise here. Frank is the media contact on this. As a (purported) Libertarian, he dares to write for AntiWar occasionally. Now, at this point you figure if the guy is publishing we could look at HIS work to judge him. But that would be too easy ... instead let's play six degrees of Bacon! So. AntiWar.com is a web site run by this other guy ... since we don't have any legit dirt on the first dude .... look at what this other guy who runs the website the first guy writes for occasionally did! Obviously, by the transitive power of double-associations we should certainly give the first guy FULL CREDIT for having done everything ever contemplated by both Raimondo and Buchanan ... and Richard Nixon. And this argument makes total sense because we all know Greg Sargent should be given full credit for anything Fred Hiatt ever says or does.

    The argument given here against this is just lame. Not one word if Frank's own work or point of view was used to make the case against him.

    I'd further argue that a better way for Democrats to undermine the ability of their traditional rivals to peel off members would be to do things Democratic voters like so they aren't inclined to sign open letters of protest for what their leadership is doing ... call me crazy. Democrats SUCK right now. That isn't the fault of anyone but Democrats. Of course any politically active person who thinks their point of view has something to offer is going to be trying to attract the disaffected. It's not their fault Obama isn't tending his flock ... and it isn't a voter's fault if they turn away from a party that calls them Fucking Sanctimonious Retards and start to look at those making an effort to attract them.

    Now as to this specific campaign. Ultimately the open letter asks more mainstream activists to specifically support a Veterans for Peace rally next Thursday in D.C. I actually think the rally they are promoting looks like a good thing and would encourage anyone in the DC area to attend if they are able. It will be featuring Daniel Ellsberg, Cindy Sheehan and a veritable who's who of the peace activist community. THEY ARE PROMOTING SOMETHING GOOD.

    I know for a fact Libertarians are against the wars. So this isn't even promoting something that goes against their own ideology. Likewise with these tax cuts: polls are overwhelmingly against extending them for the wealthy ... you don't get that without Libertarian-leaners agreeing with you. Why the hell would you try and suppress support for an upcoming VFP protests just because the people promoting it don't agree with you 100% on everything else? Are you seriously saying you are against this rally?


    by kgb999 on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 3:03pm