An independent progressive movement?

[Jackpine Radical]

9. Thanks for the kind words,

and keep up the good fight.

One potential side benefit to your idea is that it would lead to more contact between us & them, which always makes it harder to demonize the people in the out-group. If we can start by agreeing on a few common goals and associate with each other in a positive context, that might make it harder for the likes of Beck & Limbaugh to demonize us to their listeners.

And just writing this was an interesting exercise for me; I was somewhat appalled at the ease with which derogatory language kept emerging as I wrote about the other side.

I envision the Progressives and the Tea Party as Venn diagrams--two circles that have a small intersection (overlap). If we want to accomplish something useful with them, we need to stay within the boundaries of that overlap in our association with them. It is both incredibly tempting and thoroughly destructive to focus on all the areas in which we differ with them. Both sides have to "agree to disagree" about most things in order to move forward in the areas where the goals overlap.

Groups have negative and stereotyped views of each other in direct relation to the isolation between those two groups. Or, to coin a phrase, "Familiarity breeds."

I think it was Jay Gould who commented that he could always hire half the working class to kill the other half. I think the worst nightmare of the .00001% is that the virulent divisions of race, ideology, religion, etc. that they have so carefully nurtured among the common people might start fading. They can exist only by means of keeping the 99+% divided against each other. If we all ever put it together to understand the true source of our troubles, we will have it in our power to remake the world.