[NLA] but wait, there's more--USDE web site

[Mary Lynn Carver]

AAA-Mennnn!!
MLCarver
Gurnee, Illinois

"George E. Demetrion" wrote:

> On Wed, 27 Nov 2002 13:27:56 -0500 "Debbie Yoho" <dwyoho at earthlink.net>
> writes:
>
> But my point was that in American politics the system is designed for one
> point of view to prevail--for a time--and for better or worse. The trick
> is to insure the system protects the rights of those who have points of
> view that are "on the outs" at the moment. But I don't look to the
> reigning party for that protection. I may differ from some on the list
> who,
> like me, would call themselves liberal, but at age 51 I still have some
> cockeyed
> >faith in both my fellow citizens and the political system we live  with.
>  Another day will come. In the meantime, I have to consider myself  among
> the loyal opposition--unhappily opposed, but nonetheless loyal, at least
> to the
> >process.
>
> Debbie and others:
>
> I see your point here, though I'm troubled by a politics that is far from
> as usual these days.  As I recall the Clinton administration, that
> represented anything but the domination of democratic liberalism.  One
> thinks in the early days of Clinton's backing off of the issue of gays in
> the military and the nominee of Lanie Gaunier for Atty General, where
> Clinton pulled both of these in response to Republican pressure.  One
> also thinks of the failure of his early domestic reform--the emphasis to
> be placed on job training as the quid pro quo for globalization and
> welfare reform.  And then the incompetent fiasco of his health care plan
> which did more than anything else to usher in the 104th Contract  With
> America Congress, which threatened to eliminate adult literacy education
> as we have known it.  Then, Clinton's rightward turn in 1996 on what is
> euphemistically referred to as "welfare reform," which also gave us the
> Workforce Investment Act.  Then, finally, all that impeachment furor over
> that Monica stuff.  Let's say that throughout the Clinton administration,
> conservative forces more or less effectively checked any liberal agenda
> that might have issued forth from the "New Democrat," William Jefferson
> Clinton."  From a more detached point of view, one might interpret such
> stalemate as the typical checks and balance operative through much of the
> relationship between the Presidency and Congress.
>
> I think we're in a fundamentally different mode at this time, and that
> any analysis of what might be perceived as politics as useful needs to be
> carefully sifted through the ideological forces that are currently
> operative in the political culture.  The most fundamentals factor as I
> see it is a very intentional and methodical right wing agenda which
> dominates the White House and has sufficient power (now) in Congress to
> freely impose its will on the nation.  This will soon be followed by a
> federal court system that will be heavily weighed toward the conservative
> agenda and its impact will be felt for years.
>
> The Hartford Courant reported today that major corporate financial
> support in the industries of the pharmaceuticals and insurance (and
> others) are shifting their contributions much more decidedly to the
> Republican Party, where up now it had been more equitably distributed
> between the two parties.  Then there is the nightly rantings of
> conservative television news programs (and not just Fox TV), drawing
> millions of viewers and playing a major role in shaping the agenda of
> what gets perceived as news and right thinking.  Night after night, the
> drumbeat of the conservative agenda, combined with bashings of the "far
> left" and claims of liberal bias in the media, and by this they mean
> Peter Jenning!!, gets aired, with nary a centrist, never mind a "far
> left" counter voice of any substantial proportion.
>
> Thus,with such a potent source of political power in place, the political
> fundamentalism of the Bush administration has attained a powerful
> hegemony which spans the gamut of right thinking (double entendre
> intended) from phonics to geopolitics.  Given this power, the Hartford
> Courant has also reported that the GOP conservatives intend to push their
> conservative social agenda very far, which will include some major
> restrictions on abortion and, as I gather,. some major public funding for
> faith based initiatives.  If I have this right, some time ago, the Pat
> Robertson foundation was awarded a major grant.
>
> So the question becomes where are the checks and balances either within
> the government itself, within the fourth estate (the press), or in
> citizenry grass roots activism from below?  In 1964 Barry Goldwater said
> extremism in the cause of virtue is no vice.  Now we have such extremism
> in the White House, in the dominant forces in Congress, in the federal
> courts, and on cable television news.  Rather than politics as usual, I
> see this as politics in a new, virulent key, where the Administration's
> capacity to effectively stifle, marginalize, and repress public dissent
> over the President's Iraqi policy is symptomatic of a broader political
> intention to destroy any  vestiges of progressivism (or apparently even
> centriism) as a contemporary political force and to impose right thinking
> on the nation in the areas of education, culture, religion, social
> issues, civic responsibility,  and foreign policy. While they're not
> likely to attain their full agenda, there's very little on the horizon by
> way of check to blunt the full impact of a very powerful effort to
> reshape culture and politics as we have known it in the United States.
> And this will be done in the name of patriotism and imposing leadership
> and bringing back respectability to the President.
>
> May I hear an a-men!
>
>  And to top it off, such ideology is buttressed by the allegedly
> anti-ideological stance of scientific based research in the areas of
> health, education, and God knows what else as a tool to impose the Bush
> agenda on the American people, many of whom seem quite willing to embrace
> it--as they can really hear no other message.
>
> An essential part of the process of US democratic politics is vigorous
> dissent when it is warranted.  The times they are before us.  Even if the
> logic of my thinking leads me to exaggerate at time or even if at times I
> get it wrong, better to speak up, I say and self correct on the fly
> rather than to keep silence in the face of this hegemonic onslaught of
> conservative ideology.  A stout defense of the First Amendment and the
> vitality of US democracy itself demands such a stance.
>
> >In terms of advocacy for the AELS, there's nothing like an ogre on the
> horizon to unify the troops. Perhaps in the next few years the NLA
> will>truly develop into a force to be reckoned with. We've made a start.
>
> That's certainly my hope too.  After reading the Action Alert on the AERA
> web site, one wonders to what extent NIFL will allow unfettered free
> speech on the listservs it hosts.  That's something to keep an eye on.
>
> George Demetrion
> sophocles5 at juno.com
> >Debbie
> >
> >Deborah W. Yoho
> >Co-moderator, NIFL-Health Listserv
> >President, SC Adult Literacy Educators
> >Executive Director, Greater Columbia Literacy Council
> >2728 Devine Street, Columbia, SC 29205
> >803-765-2555 Fax 803-779-8417 dwyoho at earthlink.net
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
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> >
>
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