The challenge now is not to walk down memory lane but to strategize about building the future in an imperfect world.
Perhaps the disillusion now building on the left will lead to direct challenges to the ‘Obama style and approach’. On the other hand, it could lead to fatalism and a dropping out of politics by people previously mesmerized by presidential candidate Barack Obama’s charisma; and naïve about how politics really works. If that happens, the ‘right’ will dominate the discourse and try to retake Congress. We have seen this before ─ 36th President Lyndon Baines Johnson’s forsaking butter for guns; 42nd President William Jefferson Clinton’s taking refuge in the corporate centre.
Liberals have not invested in media institutions to reach the mass audience. Neither have they rallied to the realization that the United States needs channels like Al Jazeera to build larger-world awareness through mass media where parochialism and propaganda are rife.
How can 'progressives' reenergize an outside-in strategy? How can they/we start re-framing issues, building a base and then mobilizing it? Will there be a return to the streets or more co-optation by the illusions of power in the suites?
'Progressives' need a new strategy
To remake the Democratic Party into something more democratic
To resist the power of big money in politics
To readopt a populist message along economic lines
To champion millions out of work before they become millions out of hope.
Danny Schechter (‘The News Dissector’) is a television producer, independent filmmaker, blogger, and media critic who writes and lectures about the media in the United States and worldwide. Schechter is a graduate of Cornell University and the London School of Economics. He was a Neiman Fellow in Journalism at Harvard University and an adjunct professor with Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. In the 1960s, he was a civil rights worker and communications director of the Northern Student Movement and worked as a community organizer in a War on Poverty program. His media experience is considerable and includes work at Boston radio station WBCN (the start of his ‘News Dissector’ production), producer for the ABC newsmagazine 20/20 receiving two Emmy Awards, producer with CNN’s start-up staff in Atlanta. Schechter has reported from 49 countries.
Sources and notes
“Obama: One year on - Has Obama become Bush II?” views of Danny Schechter were posted at Al Jazeera English by News dissector Danny Schechter (editor of Mediachannel.org, author of The Crime of Our Time on the financial crisis as a crime story; See also plunderthecrimeofourtime.com; dissector@mediachannel.org. Views of the author “do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial policy.”
“Has Obama become Bush II?” (Danny Schechter), January 20, 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/obamaoneyearon/2009/12/2009123012137152985.html
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