Posted on 07/27/2006 6:53:55 AM PDT by PDR
In the Sixties, if truth be told, a lot of students joined the anti-war movement for two fundamental reasons: that's where one found the best drugs and the hottest hippie chicks. How else were nerdy, unathletic upper middle class guys going to score? Let's face it, even today -- though Conservatism has come a long way -- not many girls get turned on by a Dick Cheney black light poster.
Patrick Korte wasn't born till midway through the Reagan Administration, but his sudden notoriety is proof that some things never change. Korte is one of those earnest upper middle class high school kids who hopes girls will make out with him if he plays the political radical in the Che Guevara T-shirt. Late last year Korte, a senior at Connecticut's tony Stonington High School, organized a group called "World Can't Wait: Drive Out The Bush Regime," but apparently the name was too dorky even for Stonington High School girls. So Korte did what comes natural to high school students. He plagiarized a few lines from an old history book.
Korte judged it would be cool to resurrect the moribund Students for a Democrat Society, the Sixties anti-establishment movement that in 1969 splintered into Maoist and terrorist factions, before ultimately self-destructing. The Connecticut teen styles himself as the reincarnation of SDS founder Tom Hayden (I know, he only seems dead) sans the movie star ex-wife. No slouch when it comes to academics, Korte has expertly memorized all the Left's usual cliches and gripes: U.S. imperialism, racism, sexism, poor education in the inner cities, pollution, homophobia, the prison-industrial complex, etc., etc. Naturally Korte and his new/old organization have no original ideas to resolve these issues, just the conventional strategy of attacking the current "authoritarian" administration.
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
The future is now.
And a lot of these kids are wearing IBA and Kevlar.
And they are to be found, where? :o)
Am I the only former member of SDS here? I belonged circa 1964-5 when Civil Rights was the main cause. We didn't despise America, though there was plenty of socialist nonsense being spouted.
My experience with "participatory democracy" was that it involved endless, boring meetings. Inevitably, the big decisions were made by the people who hung around longest and ended up going to dinner together. These were people who had no lives outside of the organization -- the nuttiest and most extreme. Hence, within a few years only the crazies were left.
I disagree with this. I mean, not Cheney perhaps, he's more of a grandfatherly figure. But the hard core, the cutting edge, is on the conservative side. And that's what attracts people, especially young people. We ARE the counterculture. That attracts people too. The "System" is stupid. The kids have been fed sh!t sandwiches their entire time through the academic process, and they know it didn't taste good. That's my only hope for the future, really, is that kids have good BS detectors, and people resist being indoctrinated. Heck, that's why the cultural revolution of the sixties got broad appeal -- we were perhaps a bit too regimented. We were bored, and the world opened up like a flower petal blooming, with technology, other cultures, other spiritualities, you name it. Now people with a brain see what that's done to us. I don't think the left can stop us from reclaiming our birthright, but they can impede us and get a lot of us killed. In fact, it's possible they can tie us up enough for the mexican socializts to tear us apart, or the world-wide jihad to bring us into chaos. THAT's what scares me looking at our future. Not the tired old sixties has beens and wannabes.
Similar to the People's Front of Judea, I'd imagine.
JUDITH: I do feel, Reg, that any Anti-Imperialist group like ours must reflect such a divergence of interests within its power-base.
REG: Agreed. Francis?
FRANCIS: Yeah. I think Judith's point of view is very valid, Reg, provided the Movement never forgets that it is the inalienable right of every man--
STAN: Or woman.
FRANCIS: Or woman... to rid himself--
STAN: Or herself.
FRANCIS: Or herself.
REG: Agreed.
FRANCIS: Thank you, brother.
STAN: Or sister.
FRANCIS: Or sister. Where was I?
REG: I think you'd finished.
FRANCIS: Oh. Right.
Not to worry, plenty of conservative children, I might say even a return to morality in the coming generation.
Looks like it to me.
No, I do not forgive old Leftists even if they post on Free Republic. Forgiving such people is the same as forgiving Richard Speck or Albert Fish or the Nazi death camps. Perfectly, exactly, the same.
"No, I do not forgive old Leftists even if they post on Free
Republic. Forgiving such people is the same as forgiving Richard Speck or Albert Fish or the Nazi death camps. Perfectly, exactly, the same."
Come on, lighten up. I was 25 in 1965 and in Berkeley and into much of that crap. I moved to a commune in New Mexico then back to reality and grew up. By 1972 I was designing nuclear power plants were I belonged having grown up in Berkeley in the shadow of the E.O. Lawrence family.
Pardon me, but I don't think I need your forgiveness, and I certainly don't deserve comparison to Richard Speck. All I did was attend a few Civil Rights marches. I was only 21 in 1967 and already turned off by leftist politics. David Horowitz, whom I consider a friend, was a lot more radical for a longer time -- and more vocal -- than I ever was.
I tend to agree that "extended babyhood" and a desire to feel important had a lot to do with the course SDS took. For all the attention SDS received, the core of radical activists was a tiny group. What amazes me more than anything, in retrospect, is how much de facto support they were given by the older generation of liberals, notably the MSM. The NY Times continues to fawn over the likes of Bernardine Dohrn, and universities are happy to give her and her husband teaching positions, degrees, etc.
My personal experience in Columbus Ohio was of drugs, group sex and grotesquely skanky "feminists".
From Animal House:
Pinto: "I hear Dickenson girls are fast! How should I handle it?"
Otter: "Just mention modern art, civil rights or folk music, and you’re in like flint."
Flounder: "I hope I score! Oh, boy!"
sorry, but it's "In like Flynn," a reference to screen idol Errol Flynn.... good call nonetheless.
It is almost ironic that the two major political parties actually end up in support of their namesake as the form of government for America.
The framers gave considerable thought and discussion to what form of government America would have. The Constitution clearly provides that America is a Republic.
Article 4, section 4 - The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government
Today the Democrats favor America becoming a Democracy whilst the Republicans favor America remaining a Republic. The Democrats favor bringing about change by re-interpreting the words of the Constitution rather than amending the words to reflect who and what the nation is. The Republicans favor bringing about change by amending the Constitution to reflect who and what the nation is.
I favor America remaining a Republic with representatives democratically elected for their industry rather than America becoming a Democracy with representatives democratically elected to fulfill the promise of the polls.
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