Radical media, politics and culture.

Electoral Politics

October 2, 2004 - 2:58pm -- jim
Analysis & Polemic
Electoral Politics

Putting the Right Under a Microscope:

An Interview with Chip Berlet, Political Affairs

[Editor's note: Chip Berlet is a senior analyst at Political Research Associates and has written, edited and co-authored numerous articles on right-wing activity and government repression for The Boston Globe, The New York Times, The Progressive, The Nation, The Humanist, and The St. Louis Journalism Review. Berlet edited Eyes Right! Challenging the Right-wing Backlash (PRA and South End Press, 1995). He is also co-author with Matthew N. Lyons of Right-wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort (Guilford Press, 2000).]

PA: What are the main political forces that compose the right?


CB: You can probably divide up the right into three broad categories: the secular right, the Christian right, and the xenophobic right. Everyone to the right of the Republican Party is sometimes lumped together in a variety of ways. And although they overlap, they really make up different sectors that sometimes can agree on an agenda and sometimes can’t. So coalition-building is crucial to their success.

September 28, 2004 - 9:03am -- jim
Analysis & Polemic
Electoral Politics

"Ed Koch: Only Bush Can"

Nathan Guttman, Haaretz

The former Democratic mayor of New York explains why he has embarked on
a campaign for a Republican president as the candidate who will not
abandon Israel.

NEW YORK — Ed Koch will spend a lot of time next month on the New
York-Florida shuttle. The former mayor of New York and one of the most
prominent American Jews, Koch is setting out to persuade the Jews of
Florida that this time they should vote for George W. Bush.

Even he
himself, a sworn Democrat who was elected on his party's ticket for a
number of public positions over decades, has been persuaded that this
time it is necessary to cross the line and support the Republican candidate.
Koch, who will turn 80 in December, is considered the classic Jewish
Democrat. In his most prominent position as mayor of New York for three
straight terms between 1978 and 1989, and before that as a member of the
U.S. House of Representatives, he toed the traditional party line and
was punctilious about all the domestic issues that are so important to
Democrats, especially the Jews among them.

September 20, 2004 - 9:10pm -- Stenglander
News
Electoral Politics

A strident minority: anti-Bush US troops in Iraq


Though military personnel lean conservative, some vocally support Kerry - or at least a strategy for swift withdrawal.

By Ann Scott Tyson | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor

Inside dusty, barricaded camps around Iraq, groups of American troops in between missions are gathering around screens to view an unlikely choice from the US box office: "Fahrenheit 9-11," Michael Moore's controversial documentary attacking the commander-in-chief.

"Everyone's watching it," says a Marine corporal at an outpost in Ramadi that is mortared by insurgents daily. "It's shaping a lot of people's image of Bush."

September 10, 2004 - 12:35am -- nolympics
Electoral Politics

The Politics of Darkness: North / South
On the Road in Gringolandia
John Ross

The ambiance inside the Garden was as toxic as an Al Qaeda bioterrorist Jihad. In the spotlight, a smugly chortling Bush lip-synched doom to 20,000 beardless Caucasian conventioneers. "This will not happen on my watch" the President pandered from the podium while the Twin Towers crumbled on the big screen behind him, apparently so brain-damaged that he did not remember that it had already happened. The Caucasians zeig heiled appropriately. "Four more years!" they regurgitated.

"Four more wars!" I screamed hoarsely and my colleagues in the press corps backed off to avoid contamination by my alarming lack of journalistic objectivity. An agitated gnome in an elephant's head hat two rows in front of me who had been haranguing the sky boxes where Al Franken and Michael Moore were quarantined to prevent a public lynching, lunged at me menacingly when I refused to stand up and cheer the bilious Bush.

September 4, 2004 - 8:23pm -- Stenglander
Analysis & Polemic
Electoral Politics

Anonymous Comrade submits:

Wolfowitz Corrupts Directive Regulating Political Activity by Military


Department of Defense directive 1344.10 regulates political activity on the part of active-duty military personnel. On August 2, Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of Defense, amended directive 1344.10.

A comparison of the previous and revised versions of 1344.10 can be found on the Daily KOS, a blog frequented by Democratic Party activists and professionals/operatives:


More on Active Duty Military Attending the RNC

Additional Daily KOS commentary and discussion

August 26, 2004 - 9:33am -- hydrarchist
News
Electoral Politics

mmmoongoddess writes:

This is from the Inter-Press News Service
www.ipsnews.net

"'Terror' Election Barring Voters Could Stand, Says Government Memo"
Ritt Goldstein

STOCKHOLM, Sweden, Aug 19 (IPS) — A recently unearthed government memorandum prepared for the U.S. Congress addresses the power of the administration to postpone elections. But more notably, it reviews actions the executive branch might take that could preclude large numbers of Americans from casting a ballot in the coming presidential vote.

August 21, 2004 - 8:10pm -- nolympics
Analysis & Polemic
Electoral Politics


The Trouble With Electing Caesar


John Chuckman


America's campaign for Emperor is becoming nasty.


What shameful accusations are being tossed around: an ambitious, privileged young John Kerry, who spent a brief stint in Vietnam beefing up the hero section of his resume, never actually did some of the things he claims or at least didn't do them under the circumstances he claims. Since his heroic deeds included chasing after a wounded man and shooting him in the back and skippering a machine gun-mounted speed boat that ran up and down rivers shooting peasants desperate enough to appear in their own fields, there is reason for concern.

August 20, 2004 - 12:58am -- nolympics
Reviews
Electoral Politics

Moore: Bush 'Didn't Tell the Truth'

Tuesday, August 03, 2004

BOSTON — This is a partial transcript from "The O'Reilly Factor," July 27, 2004 that has been edited [by fox, ed] for clarity.

It was a match-up the media and political observers have longed for. No, not George W. Bush against John Kerry. It's Michael Moore (search) against Bill O'Reilly.


Moore, the director who made "Fahrenheit 9/11" (search) and created one of the election season's biggest uproars, said he wouldn't go on "The O'Reilly Factor" until O'Reilly saw the entire movie. And he said any conversation would have to be aired without any editing and with the opportunity for Moore to ask O'Reilly questions.

August 17, 2004 - 7:24am -- hydrarchist
Analysis & Polemic
Electoral Politics

This is beautifully produced and provocative, check it out. For full coverage of the RNC check out our dedicated feed.

midwest unrest writes: A new 10-page comic book attack on the elections. Read and laugh. Print out and distribute. Available at http://www.taktic.org/~grafikatak/

http://www.midwestunrest.net/comic.pdf

low res version for web viewing:
http://www.taktic.org/~grafikatak/comicbook.pdf

hi res version for printing:
http://www.taktic.org/~grafikatak/comicbookhires.p df"

July 31, 2004 - 3:51pm -- nolympics
Analysis & Polemic
Electoral Politics



Hope is on the Way

The Disturbing Words of John Edwards


John Chuckman


I heard several lines from John Edwards' convention speech on the radio before I clicked it off. Anymore and I would have vomited.


As it was, I experienced a horrible flashback to being a twelve-year old at the Midwest Baptists' Camp Sycamore, sitting in the sweltering cinderblock meeting hall, shirt stuck to the back of a card-table chair, while a strutting little preacher sprayed beads of sweat and globs of spit into the twilight yelling about hell.

Pages

Subscribe to Electoral Politics