Kos Kommie Calls for 'Direct Action' Against U.S. Democracy

One Pissed Off Leftist at Daily Kos (via Newsbusters):

As our host Wanda mentioned, there is some march or other practically every weekend in DC and it has become old hat for the park police. Limiting access, choking off rebellion, smiting trouble-makers and controlling press coverage is now routine. Aided by a complicit corporate-owned media elite, ignoring and minimizing our protests has become a simple matter. While we once struck fear in their hearts, we barely raise an eyebrow now.



So is the answer to abandon street democracy? It might be ... if there were other realistic avenues. But there aren't many IMO. The electoral system is so corrupt that even those who still believe in it will admit that we have to win in overwhelming numbers to be assured our victory will be acknowledged. And even when we 'win' we don't get what we were promised. That was the entire rationale for the One Nation 'march'.



Republican-owned corporations electronically count our votes and our traitorous SCOTUS has opened the floodgates to unlimited corporate money flowing into the system. So our electoral democracy is every bit as compromised as our street democracy.



So what then is the answer?



I still support One Nation Working Together because we need a peoples coalition, and this seems a promising beginning. I am hopeful but not blindly optimistic. It's a fine thing to form a mighty peoples coalition, but I think we are going to have to go well beyond that. I think we are going to have to act up to get anywhere. Acting up is what the civil rights marchers did. Acting up is what the Vietnam protesters did. I see no way around it - this is what we are going to have to do too.



Teresa Heinz Kerry once told me that if we really wanted to get the government's attention, we should mass on the five bridges leading into DC and shut the city down. I think this is the sort of thing we're going to have to do if we want to have any real impact. Of course they'll freak if we do it and people will be beaten and arrested no doubt. But if we can't face that threat, take that risk and make that sacrifice then we are going to continue to lose. The deck is too thoroughly stacked against us. The only meaningful options left to us, it seems to me, are direct action and wide scale civil disobedience. Without it I fear that we are toast.

OPOL is not contemplating Ghandhian non-violence, as he indicates that traditional rallies and street protests aren't doing the trick. So how will these lefties "assure victory"? Political violence, of course. Recall last night's post: "Leftist Violence and the Los Angeles Times Bombing." Expect more. It's building. The militant D.C. Direct Action News has this: "Reportback from One Nation Working Together." And OPOL's graphic at the post is perfectly telling. See, "A Brief History of the 'Clenched Fist' Image":

Fist images, in some form, were used in numerous political graphic genres, including the French and Soviet revolutions, the United States Communist Party, and the Black Panther Party for Self-defense. However, these all followed an iconographic convention. The fist was always part of something - holding a tool or other symbol, part of an arm or human figure, or shown in action (smashing, etc.). But graphic artists from the New Left changed that in 1968, with an entirely new treatment. This "new" fist stood out with its stark simplicity, coupled with a popularly understood meaning of rebellion and militance.

I'm not going to be surprised when the "militant rebellion" becomes reality in the near future. Folks like OPOL are becoming increasingly disillusioned with traditional protests. Consequently, the methods of left-wing terrorist groups will emerge as the tactic of choice for the growing militant movement. I hope I'm wrong, but should the GOP retake the Congress in November, angry activists may feel they have no choice but to go underground, don the balaclavas, and hoist the Molotovs and Kalashnikovs.