[Boston-editorial] feature this?

[Matthew Williams]

I got this via e-mail. It's a good commentary and I think we have an 
excuse to feature it, since it's in response to something that happened 
locally. Or is the connection too tenuous? What do folks think? -- Matt

Begin forwarded message:

> From: eve.lyman at bostonmobilization.org
> Date: May 5, 2005 12:33:23 AM EDT
> To: mobilizeboston at lists.riseup.net
> Subject: [mobilizeboston] Will Pitt responds to hecklers
>
> Hello All,
>
> Those of you who attended the Dahr Jamail event know that Will Pitt, 
> who introduced Dahr was heckled. This is what he wrote about the 
> incident. I think it is well worth reading, even if you weren't there, 
> because it talks about that terrible phenomena  we deal with all the 
> time - progressives attacking each other. Food for thought...
>
> Stand Up Next to a Mountain
>     By William Rivers Pitt
>     t r u t h o u t | Perspective
>
>     Tuesday May 03 2005
>
>     Don't let me change my heart,
>     Keep me set apart
>     From all the plans they do pursue.
>     And I, I don't mind the pain,
>     Don't mind the driving rain.
>     I know I will sustain
>     'Cause I believe in you.
>
>         - Bob Dylan, 'I Believe in You'
>
>     An interesting thing happened to me last week. I got heckled while 
> giving a speech. Now, don't get me wrong, I've been heckled before. 
> I've given speeches in most of the Red States across the country, and 
> have gotten quite adept at the call-and-raise verbal jousting required 
> when addressing an unfriendly crowd. I've been heckled by irate 
> conservatives in Texas, in Montana, in North Carolina, in Colorado, in 
> Arizona. I've been called a Socialist, a Communist, a Fascist, and a 
> Communist Fascist, my own personal favorite. It's actually fun once 
> you get used to it.
>
>     Last week was a different thing, however. I got heckled by people 
> on the Left.
>
>     I was there to introduce Dahr Jamail, the reporter who is pretty 
> much the only reason we really know what is happening in Iraq. In my 
> talk, I adamantly stated that we have to get American forces out of 
> Iraq, and went into a detailed plan on how that might be done. In the 
> front row were two white guys with Palestinian scarves wrapped around 
> their necks. As I laid out the plan, careful to say at the outset that 
> this was not 'the' plan but 'a' plan, the guy on the left yelled, "Get 
> off the stage with your pro-war (expletive)." His friend wadded up the 
> program for the evening and threw it at me.
>
>     As I said, I enjoy hecklers. I find it personally satisfying to 
> leave little pieces of them hanging from the rafters. This, however, 
> was a whole different thing. In the second after the expletive and the 
> program went sailing past me, I thought: "I wrote a book six months 
> before the war started saying there were no weapons in Iraq and no 
> reason to go to war there; I've written probably half a million words 
> since then to reinforce that truth; I worked for Dennis Kucinich on 
> his Presidential campaign and pushed that message there; I've traveled 
> nearly 200,000 miles to rally people against the war; I've cashiered a 
> good portion of my health and sanity in the process; finally, I 
> believe with all my heart and soul that we have to get the hell out of 
> Iraq. Pro-war?"
>
>     For the first time since I started speaking publicly about this 
> stuff, I was gape-mouthed and silent. The hecklers got me. I staggered 
> through the rest of my speech, introduced Jamail, and scuttled off the 
> stage like a whipped cur. The little resume review that flashed 
> through my mind was not some personal ego-reinforcement, and I didn't 
> feel any outrage about the whole thing until later. I was genuinely 
> confused and hurt.
>
>     A day or so later, I was able to slot that odd and disheartening 
> experience into a larger picture. When all was said and done, it 
> didn't surprise me. The Lefty hecklers were part of a much broader 
> phenomenon taking place within the ranks of liberals and progressives 
> all across the country. To put it bluntly, the Left is in the process 
> of eating itself. I've been watching it happen over the last few 
> months. At meetings, at rallies, in online forums, via email, and 
> among friends and family, the Left is tearing itself apart.
>
>     The war issue is causing a good portion of this. The reason those 
> guys heckled me, for one example, was because I think 'Out Now!' makes 
> a great slogan but isn't nearly enough of an actual plan to get the 
> job done, and thanks to Bush & Co, 'Out Now!' is a pipe dream 
> regardless. They disagreed, vehemently it seemed, and because I tried 
> to go beyond slogans to an actual plan for exiting Iraq, I was somehow 
> empowering the war machine.
>
>     The war, however, is not the only issue dividing the Left. A good 
> portion of the splintering that is taking places stems from a 
> lingering election hangover. Those who backed someone besides Kerry 
> are bitter because they think their candidate would have won, those 
> who backed Kerry are bitter at those who attack him and are likewise 
> bitter at Kerry for the blunders he made in his campaign, those who do 
> not cleave to the Democratic Party are bitter because they see the 
> Democrats as little more than the pro-choice wing of the Republican 
> Party, and even that distinction is getting muddied.
>
>     The root of the infighting, however, is deeper. Beyond the 
> candidate/party squabbling is the feeling that no matter who the 
> candidate may be, the system itself is broken because elections are 
> now controlled by GOP-allied corporations and easily-rigged voting 
> machines. Beyond that is the corporate media, with its 24-hour 
> distraction machine pumping out raw sewage by the long ton while 
> toeing the line for the status quo. Scandals that would have caused 
> previous Presidents to be impeached, imprisoned and then impeached 
> again wither by the side of the road on an almost daily basis.
>
>     Beyond the media is the bleak reality that some of the worst 
> people this country has ever seen now control the White House, 
> Congress, a fair chunk of the Judiciary, the Justice Department and 
> the Pentagon. Combine that with the sense that elections cannot 
> dislodge them because the game is fixed, and further add the fact that 
> a majority of the American people have been made snowblind by the 
> gibberish pouring forth from the media, which protects the powerful 
> from the consequences of the truth.
>
>     The Left is appalled, disgusted, horrified and deeply, deeply 
> frustrated. Right now, the Left feels like it is facing a fortified 
> bunker armed with a slingshot and some small pebbles. Faced with this 
> apparently unassailable foe, and filled with the desire to do 
> something, anything to move the pile, people on the Left are doing the 
> only thing that seems available: They are kicking the crap out of each 
> other. That frustration, that woe, that horror and rage require an 
> outlet somewhere.
>
>     I don't have any solutions for this. Being contrarian, being an 
> island-unto-self, is one of the hallmarks of people on the Left. 
> Permit me a poor analogy: Folks on the Left are like cats. They are 
> loveable, affectionate, strong and independent-minded. They are also 
> pointy on five out of six sides and liable to use their claws at 
> strange and seemingly random moments. It has always been this way and 
> will always be this way, and it cannot and should not be otherwise. 
> Combine that with the thundering frustrations that have accumulated 
> over the last months and years, and the outcome is predictable.
>
>     I don't have a solution for this, but I do have a story.
>
>     Those familiar with the fight against electronic touch-screen 
> voting machines will know the name Andy Stephenson. Andy has spent the 
> last several years traveling from hoot to holler and back to hoot 
> again, trying to inform people of the dangers these machines pose to 
> the fundamental principles of participatory democracy. He even ran for 
> Secretary of State in Washington using this issue as the basis of his 
> platform.
>
>     A few weeks ago, Andy was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, one of 
> the more dangerous varieties of the disease. His doctors told him he 
> needed a Whipple procedure to get at the tumor, and only a few 
> hospitals in America can perform this complicated procedure with the 
> required competence. To compound the problem, Andy shares the plight 
> of millions of others in our disgusting for-profit health care system 
> and does not have health insurance.
>
>     A friend with connections was able to get him a slot at Johns 
> Hopkins, one of the premier medical facilities in America that 
> specializes in Whipple procedures. Johns Hopkins, however, required a 
> $25,000 down-payment before they would let Andy onto an operating 
> table. Furthermore, they required the payment immediately, and wanted 
> another $25,000 once the surgery was done. Andy and his friends 
> spiraled into despair as they faced this seemingly insurmountable 
> obstacle.
>
>     And then, something remarkable happened. Friends of Andy posted 
> the details of his plight on a few Left-leaning websites. Left-wing 
> talk-show hosts Mike Malloy and Thom Hartmann filled their listeners 
> in on the situation. Donations for Andy started to come in, and then 
> pour in, and then flood in. People without jobs, and themselves 
> without health insurance, raided their piggy banks.
>
>     Within 100 hours, Andy Stephenson had the $25,000 down-payment he 
> needed to save his life. It came as nickels, as dimes, as dollar 
> bills, but it came.
>
>     The moral? That which unites the Left is far, far greater than 
> that which divides them. Yes, there are seemingly insurmountable 
> obstacles standing in the way. Yes, frustration and despair are 
> rampant. Yet when the righteousness, passion and strength of the Left 
> are combined, they can stand up next to a mountain and chop it down 
> with the edge of their hand.
>
>     Remember that.
>
>     William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times and internationally 
> bestselling author of two books: War on Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't 
> Want You to Know and The Greatest Sedition Is Silence. Join the 
> discussions at his blog forum.
> PLEASE FORWARD TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW WHO MIGHT BE INTERESTED!
>
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