The Nation publishes an open letter to Obama, a warning shot, if you will, from the Left. The letter includes this paragraph:
"Since your historic victory in the primary, there have been troubling signs that you are moving away from the core commitments shared by many who have supported your campaign, toward a more cautious and centrist stance--including, most notably, your vote for the FISA legislation granting telecom companies immunity from prosecution for illegal wiretapping, which angered and dismayed so many of your supporters."
Signers include: Barbara Ehrenreich, Tom Hayden, Eric Foner, Studs Terkel, Katrina vanden Heuvel, Gore Vidal, Howard Zinn, et al.
As if all the Freeze Dried Hippies won't vote for him anyway.
I saw an interview with Chris Hedges of the Nation on CSPAN where he was talking about his new book on soldiers participating in war "atrocities" (inadvertant ones) in Iraq. He was saying that he couldn't vote for Obama in good conscience. He's a good Naderite. But it is true that most on the left will take the less bad course (from their point of view).
After I posted, I thought, "Unless some of them vote for Nader."
But I saw a piece on Nader and the 2000 election on PBS, I think, and most of "The Nation" types were describing Nader in terms that made Hitler look like a fine fellow. They now hate Nader deeply and passionately because they blame Bush's presidency on Nader having taken votes from Gore.
So, maybe not. :)
The Howard Zinn endorsement is extremely meaningful. The guy wrote a book about the history of the United States. I don't know what United States he lives in, but it is not the same history of the United States that I live in.
Unfortunately, Zinn's history is frequently assigned in high schools. Now, of course, you could argue that the students don't read it, or much of anything else, but there's the principle of the thing.
I wonder which one of the "signers" is the "us" in this section:
"A response to the current economic crisis that reduces the gap between the rich and the rest of us through a more progressive financial and welfare system;"
Most of those listed would qualify as pretty "rich" to me, certainly richer than us, er... I mean me.