We had better be right!!!

[nels25]

I am reading an alternative history book written by Harry Turtledove concerning his AU take of WW2.

In it one junior commander tries to tell his senior commander (who is in charge of pending major offensive) that his plan may be all and good but has he considered what the enemy may do and have that factored into account. In his arrogance the senior commander assures him that all all is well, as you may guess nothing goes according to plan.

In real life it rarely does go according to plans.

My point is that we as progressives have all these grand plans and we expect them to go just so.

Iran will be able be dealt with in a positive manner that will mean a peacefully pull out of Iraq and that they also will not menace Israel.

Chavez will now be willing to negotiate and talk/work nice with us.

China and Russia will adjust their own agendas to more of a match to that of the west.

All of our economic approaches will be successful and so Will or trade policies to bring back jobs to the US and encourage more positive unionization, and enviromental policies both here and overseas (frankly I personally find China buying into that to be a very difficult proposition, but hey stranger things have been know to happen).

I believe that Neo-Cons and GOP types believed that all of their approaches/plans would work, and the result is for all practical purposes a destroyed party in the short term (any one who believes it will not rebuild and bounce back would be wise to take a look at the history books).

Believe me by 2012 or 14 the GOP will become viable again.

In closing for those of you who have ever seen the movie Patton, at the end Patton is walking down a cobble stone avenue, and stating about how a great Roman legionnaire always had with him a page or adjutant warning him of the danger of hubris.

That is why we had better be right, and it would be of immeasurable help if we mixed in a little humility to the way we govern.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

1. I don't think...

That hubris is gonna be a problem for a while. We've slapped a turd out of ourselves.

[Dhalgren]

2. Bwahahahahaha!

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:


That was a hoot!


:rofl:

[didact]

4. Think Putin was impressed with that speech?

:rofl:

[nels25]

5. You may not realize it

but your post is helping make my point.

We are so very sure we are right?

What if God forbid we turn out to be wrong on some things?

Think we should be forgiven for any mistakes??

I wish some here would think about this.

Being cocky and arrogant never goes over well with the broad populace.

We who are oh so sure we are arrogantly superior or knowledge and intellect than the so called sheeple and other derogatory adjectives referring to any one of a so called or perceived lower class than the poster may indicate may end up having to learn a hard lesson in humility.

It is not out of the realm of possibility.

IMHO Obama's approaches to the economy and foreign affairs are far superior to those of the GOP and he gets the part about humility (or at least I thought he did until this foreign trip).

Some on DU do not.

Think before you talk down to people (it tends to piss them off).

[Dhalgren]

15. Think before you talk. Period.

Basing any opinion of reality on Turtledove's fiction is pretty funny, I don't care who does the "basing". I don't talk down to anyone, but I won't use baby-talk, either...

[Winterblues]

16. Do you know anything of history at all?

Look at what has worked in the past. Diplomacy has scored at the top while arrogance to the enth degree has never faired so well. Republicans believed arrogantly that they could bully the world because of our superpower status. I have never ever heard a Democrat say they wish to bully the world or say "my way or the highway" or say "the USA can stand alone and does not need the world". Those beliefs have proved out for what they are. So has Diplomacy and Respect. History is most definitely on our side..

[mediaman007]

3. Every cause has effects. The problem is that the effects also

have effects. You are right. We should govern with a light hand. This election will allow us to address both Social Security and Medicare on our terms. But we shouldn't exclude ideas because they come from conservatives. America deserves good government, not payback. Good government will shut the right wing out for a long time.

We also need to discover the Democrats who will be lining their own pockets (Feinstein?) and get rid of them quickly. Just because a person is a Democrat isn't a reason allow misuse of power. Obama should take that position as soon as possible.

[nels25]

6. Thank You for you comments

" We should govern with a light hand. This election will allow us to address both Social Security and Medicare on our terms. But we shouldn't exclude ideas because they come from conservatives. America deserves good government, not payback. Good government will shut the right wing out for a long time."

We can also address other issues in a positive an meaningful way. But if we practice the art of pay back than we had better remember the reverse of that coin which is: "Pay back is a bitch" and do not think for one minute the GOP will not have a long memory.

We as a party treated them as a party in a very shabby manner from the 60 thru the early 90's than bitched when they returned the favor. For the love of God what did we expect>

As mediaman correctly states good governance will go along way to keeping the GOP out of hair (done and practiced correctly we could/should hold off the GOP until the mid 20's or later).

However to much of what I read and see (and Pelosi makes me quiver) looks like a payback lust burns deep inside the Democrats heart. Not a good way to play the game.

We play it this way and add a good dollop of arrogance for flavor and we will be very lucky to hold our congressional majorities past 2012, 2016 at the latest.

It is up to us, like I said we had better be right.

[Greyhound]

7. Don't worry, the Corporacrats will keep the republiks viable

no matter how badly they have to fuck us over to do so. The illusion must be maintained at any cost.

[nels25]

8. It does not have to be that way

I honestly think it does not.

[Greyhound]

9. No, it doesn't have to be that way, but until a significant number of people understand

the reality of the situation, who is really in charge and what they are working toward, nothing will change it.

[readmoreoften]

13. Of course it doesn't. But those who trade functional international relations for profit

disagree. So either we stop them at great sacrifice or they keep going. And that's just the way it is.

[Firespirit]

10. I find it interesting that you are concerned that "our" ideas will be wrong

After the utter disaster that was the Bush administration, I think we can safely conclude that NOTHING, no policy of theirs, is right. And when you have universal, catastrophic, miserable failure, you don't try a "lite" version of the same thing. You try something totally different, something, preferably, that has worked before.

Your concern is noted, however.

[mediaman007]

11. When we start big programs with lofty goals, we open ourselves to

the same type of fraud that the Republicans were involved in. Too much can go wrong if a new program is not manageable. Perhaps one of the best things that we can do, is to reign in the massive amounts of money that we send to the military.

[readmoreoften]

12. Well if that's how liberals see the world, then those liberals will absolutely fail.

"Iran will be able be dealt with in a positive manner that will mean a peacefully pull out of Iraq and that they also will not menace Israel."

Iran doesn't have to be "dealt with" now anymore than it had to be "dealt with" in 1953, 1973, 1983, or 1993. Unfortunately we assassinated their elected leader in 1953 because he vowed to nationalize Iranian oil. Then we installed the Shah as our puppet, complete with SAVAK, the Shah's torture police. The Shah was so unpopular--beyond repression, he destroyed acres of beautiful Persian architecture in Tehran and replaced cultural landmarks with functionalist concrete skyscrapers--that communists, feminists, and liberal humanists joined together with the Islamic movement to get rid of our puppet. Then, when the Ayatollah took power, he executed the communists, feminists, and liberal humanists who helped the Islamists overthrow the Shah. He also took some Americans hostage in retaliation. This is the only thing most Americans know about Iran.

Want real diplomacy with Iran? How about publically apologizing for assassinating their elected president in '53. And apologizing for Bush calling Iran "the Axis of Evil" after they were eager to help us in the wake of 9-11.

"Chavez will now be willing to negotiate and talk/work nice with us."

Negotiate what? Chavez nationalized Venezuela's oil wealth. Venezuela's elite and their American elite backers are pissed because now they can't suck the nation dry. Then our corporate owned media began to produce propaganda to run on private stations in Venezuela. The Chavez government pulled it off the air and then we cried that he wasn't allowing "a free press"--"free" meaning that the highest bidder is free to decide the truth. Then we staged a coup by abducting Chavez, framed Chavez's supporters as murderous fanatics through camera editing (which was later disproven by international reporters who had filmed the same event) and ran the phony footage over the freshly abducted Venezuelan airwaves. Then the army itself, loyal to Chavez, deposed the U.S. backed cronies and restored Chavez upon his release.

As far as I can tell, Chavez is working with the American people. In fact, Venezuela donates heating oil to impoverished New Yorkers. But he isn't very nice to our elected leaders. I wouldn't be either if they abducted me. The only thing Chavez has done is nationalize Venezuela's oil. But hey he's lucky that he wasn't assassinated like Iran's Mossadeq or Allende in nearby Chile where we installed the fascist monster, Pinochet. Wait, how is he supposed to work with us?

"China and Russia will adjust their own agendas to more of a match to that of the west."

And that means what? Outsourcing their bloodlust and fantasies of control instead of inacting them on their own people? Well let's hope not.

[johnaries]

14. Actually, what we are doing is returning to policies that HAVE worked

time and again in the past.

BTW, I love Turtledove. Have you read any of the series where aliens decide to invade in the middle of WW2? Excellent!

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

17. Politics is highly overrated as an agent of change.

The world changes due to other factors other than politics. Politics, and politicians, are largely reactive to change.

Sometimes we get lucky and the politicians don't fuck it up as badly as they usually do.