While many nationally famous intellectuals from the left have found their way to Fort Bragg for Alliance for Democracy Friday night events, few would be called “controversial” by partisan crowds who cheered them.
But Alexander Cockburn, co-editor of the Website CounterPunch who also writes a column for the Nation, is controversial in pretty much any setting. A scalding wit, he uses an authoritative handle on history to etch uncompromising stands about a dizzying array of topics.
Fort Bragg Town Hall was packed to standing room only for the Jan. 19 visit, and the crowd got to hear Cockburn”s assaults, particularly on Democrats not doing enough to stop the war.
Cockburn is no stranger to the Mendocino Coast, having often contributed his words to the Anderson Valley Advertiser. Four years ago he participated in a Town Hall debate. John Fremont reminded Cockburn that the speaker had said at that debate that there was no difference between Al Gore and George W. Bush.
“Are you now prepared to eat those words?” Fremont asked.
Cockburn said he was willing to “nibble on” but not quite eat the words, persisting in his point that Republicans and Democrats alike have done everything possible to keep the United States in a perpetual state of war.
Gore was also in favor of the Iraq War, he pointed out.
“I”m not saying that Gore would have done everything Bush has done. He couldn”t possibly do that. Bush has turned out to be a very, very bad president. You see I”m nibbling around on this.”
Cockburn bashed conspiracies, snobby liberals and especially Israeli power in America. An Irish native, who has been part of the American political scene for 30 years, he hit more with blustery blasts than smart bombs.
Cockburn excoriated Democrat Joe Biden, whose reason for being, according to Cockburn, was to help eliminate bankruptcy protection to the doom of average people and to the boon of irresponsible Delaware-based credit card companies.
He pushed an effort to stage sit-ins in February against those who won”t block all funding for the war — which would mean 100 out of 100 senators who voted for the most recent appropriations bill.
“The Democrats are not going to vote against the appropriations, that was the story in the Vietnam war … You vote for the appropriation, your office will be occupied.”
He advocated supporting the troops by bringing them home.
“The [Democrats] say we can”t vote against the appropriations and then be accused of leaving the people in the field without a buck to buy a shield or gun … You can buy them a plane ticket home. It would be cheaper.”
He lumped the neo-cons and neo-liberals into a group whose ideas aren”t new at all, but merely window dressing for the wishes of the power elites.
He remembered days when good ideas like the Freedom of Information Act could actually pass Congress, before both parties were owned by “big money.”
He identified Daniel Patrick Moynihan”s narrow 1976 defeat of Bella Abzug in a New York senatorial Democratic primary that also included Ramsey Clark, as a turning point in history, away from bold, progressive leftists to indecisive, flip-flopping soldiers for the ruling elites who march to the same tune as Republicans.
Such turning points in history aren”t forced by conspiracy, he said. That narrow defeat of Abzug is traced to one of the most infamous moments in journalism history, when New York Times publisher Punch Sulzberger rewrote the editorial board”s support of Abzug. As a result, John B. Oakes, a revered journalist and member of the family who founded the Times, resigned the board and the paper.
“Suddenly we had a prime neo-con as the senator for New York, as the middle 70s started to plunge toward neo-cons and neo-liberals,” Cockburn said.
His message was that true progressives too can effect action when they realize they can think big and take advantage of unexpected circumstances.
“Twenty years ago people had ideas,” he said, recalling a day when Democrats took their advantage of an election rush to seek to impose plans to break oil companies ownership of refineries, gas stations and coal mines.
“We are thinking small these days. In the end we have to think big again,” he said.
Like his writing, Cockburn”s speech combined humor with a cynical view.
“The other side thinks big. Let”s redefine organic to mean the irregular administration of poisons. Wal-Mart is going organic!””
But overall there was more gloom than laughs.
“The situation is very, very perilous. The people in charge are deeply, deeply dangerous, and their backs are to the wall,” he said. “The left is demoralized in terms of ideas as much as I had ever seen it.”
“Most older men seem fairly pathetic in their response to the emerging consciousness change,” said Bernie MacDonald of Albion, who also came of age during the Vietnam war era.
“I think Susan Lightfoot spoke significantly (and had the loudest applause) about local needs and even withholding federal tax dollars, to take care of our communities,” MacDonald said.
Lightfoot is a local activist for localization who said in an interview after the meeting, “I feel completely powerless when we talk about the larger picture, the president, Congress, nuclear demise, etc., but I feel completely engaged, empowered and hopeful when I work on local issues, where I can see and tangibly experience positive change, right here in my own community.
“If things continue in this way for a few years to come, then we should collectively stop paying federal taxes and put all of that money into local city and county government. I don”t want to pay for the war machine to continue to wreak havoc upon the human race and the planet, and that”s exactly what some 60 percent of our federal tax dollars go to. I”d be happy to give that money to the coast hospital or Fort Bragg schools instead,” she said.
The event was co-sponsored by Mendocino Parents for Peace, the group behind the November vote by Mendocino County residents to bring troops home from Iraq. Cal Winslow of Parents for Peace read the numbers in favor of Measure Y, culminating with an 87 percent yes vote in Point Arena and 88 percent in Albion.
