Friday, May 06, 2011

Professional Left Podcast #72

ProfessionalLeft
A healthy democracy requires a decent society;
it requires that we are honorable, generous, tolerant and respectful.


-- Charles W. Pickering




Links for this episode: our appearance on The Matthew Filipowicz show, at the 9:10 minute marker.

Thanks again to Frank Chow for the graphic at the ProLeft website and Heather at Crooks and Liars Video Cafe for their help. And don't forget, our archives are available for free with no downloads at Professional Left.







7 comments:

Mister Roboto said...

Wow, can of worms, can of worms. The problem with that whole argument at the end is that at some point, you have to have some standards, or else you're just a doormat. I think Barack Obama crossed that line a while ago. But I guess I'll be voting for the d-bag in 2012 anyway because I e-mailed the White House and said that he could have my support back on the one condition that he end the torture of Private Bradley Manning. The worst of Private Manning's ordeal has been brought to and end, so I guess I have to suck it in and vote for Obummer now. Though it was most likely the objections of the UK government (Manning is also a citizen of the UK because his mother is from there) that tipped the balance here more than domestic protest.

It also doesn't help that the Tea-Party right has shown itself to be hateful and morally bankrupt and whacked out of its fucking mind beyond anybody's wildest imaginings.

And as for crashing the system, it's going to crash anyway and there are probably no political solutions for that, but there's no point in getting into that here.

Mister Roboto said...

And just as long as I'm venting spleen, I would also say that I am continually amazed by how utterly stupid, bigoted, and hateful right-wing talk-radio makes too many people, in addition to petulant, butt-hurt would-be victims. FU-U-U-UCK those fucking wankers!

steeve said...

Obama doesn't suck because he's imperfect. He sucks because he spent the whole 90s sound asleep and has never once performed an act of political learning.

It's not utopian to want a president who watched the news during any 5-minute period of 1998.

K. Ron Silkwood said...

Would someone please tell me how to comment in iTunes on the podcasts?

I'm too miffed with the iTunes Help function to look any more.

Mister Roboto said...

Sorry to comment-hog so much, but as long as I mentioned collapse, I may as well also say that I don't think some kind of idyllic utopia will follow collapse, and yes, it will suck. I flirted with such utopianism in my thirties, but then I realized what a bunch of true-believer fantasy-Kool-Aid that was. But the fact remains that you simply can't have infinite growth on a finite planet.

Anonymous said...

http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/2011/05/bbg_20110508.mp3


David Brooks, a leading political analyst for the New York Times and PBS NewsHour, has come to some surprising conclusions after years of observing political life. He says politicians place too much value on reason, and not enough on social relationships, emotion and morality. Politicians can only develop successful policies if they learn the skills of intuition, sympathy and restraint. Also in this program, some analysis from Michael Scheuer, formerly chief of the Bin-laden unit on what motivated Osama bin Laden. Both from the Commonwealth Club in California

Fran / Blue Gal said...

K. Ron, if you search for "Professional Left" on I-tunes and go to the podcast page, (which lists episodes) the place to comment is at the BOTTOM of that page. And yes, it is not self-evident.

DG - regarding your Mother's Day post? Back atcha.