For anyone who was involved in leftism when George W. Bush was president...

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Immortal Technique - The Cause of Death (2003)
youtube.com/watch?v=3u3JSEqNtlg

This is the impression I get, too, though I was only around it and didn't really participate in theory at all.

Go on..

I miss the days of fearing America would turn into an Evangelical version of Iran, that's way more positive and transcendental than anything Trump has to offer, which feels like Qing dynasty levels of obvious dumbfuckery and bullshit

I'm almost 30 and became radical back in 2006-ish, so I feel qualified to speak on this topic.

I remember how pre-financial collapse being a Marxist was considered useless. The idea was very much that capitalism was the end of history, that all we needed was a "good capitalism" run by SocDems and have it universalized. Granted, most of my activism up until the collapse was limited to anti-war/anti-imperialist/pro-Palestine stuff so the bulk of what was discussed was centered around US foreign policy. The thing is, while those groups were predominantly leftist, there were always rightists (namely Ron Paul libertarians) who would sneak in and try to change the narrative - "the FEDERAL RESERVE/AIPAC is behind imperialism, IT'S NEVER PORKY!" We were told that since Marxism was dead, the "true" revolutionaries were Palestinians, undocumented immigrants (as if they aren't the working class), and other "societal deviants" like American Muslims, black women with natural hair, and whatnot. Now this wasn't nearly as bad as it became post-Occupy but the seeds of that shit were definitely there.

Then the 2008 collapse hit and almost immediately Marxism became back in fashion. All the anti-imperialist groups whose activities were mostly limited to anti-Iraq war/pro-Palestine stuff (ISO and PSL being the two I remember) began having study sessions on Marx in order to better understand the collapse and how it and western imperialism stem from the same root.

This TBH.

I LOVED the anti-war demos. I LOVED the anti-Bush slogans. I LOVED running around in a keffiyeh screaming "fuck Zionism". But my mind was theoretically dull, just some Chomsky and Zinn.

The Bush presidency was the absolute nadir of the American Left, especially before Katrina. The entire country got whipped up into a war mentality that destroyed what little class consciousness Americans had previously. The most leftists actually accomplished were anti-war protests that were paltry compared to Vietnam ones. Katrina, in my mind, represents the beginnings of revival. However, it wasn't until the financial crash that any real cracks in neoliberal ideological hegemony started to show. Hell, back then, no-one used 'neo-liberal' since it was the assumed, un-named status quo.

Daily reminder to read theory 24/7 so you will not have to catch up with brainlet-tier knowledge by the next financial crisis.

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What's wrong with wearing a keffiyeh screaming fuck zionism?

In the United States? My understanding is that the protests around the world leading up to the Iraq war were the biggest ones in history.

Key word there: world.

it's cathartic but ultimately ineffectual, since most western democracies have adapted to protest tactics that were disruptive back in the 60's

I'm not singling you out dude, I'm maybe a year younger than you and I freely admit I was worse. If I could go back in time I'd slap 17 year-old self upside the head for reading so much crimethinc and tell him to go organize for a labour union or a genuinely left town council candidate.

Epic GET dude, but were they really? I don't remember them beating their dicks to anime trump and praying to frog gods back in the bush era

You’re right they were about the same but the Obama years were far more dystopian whereas the Bush years were like 8 years of one long ass gag. Bush, Rumsfeld and Cheney were history’s greatest Trotskyist comedians

If boycotting Israel was useless how come BDS is being made illegal in several states?

Don’t expect a serious reply other than “muh Chinese trade deals” and “muh Wonder Woman” see anti-Zionist thread for reference

So it's not useless. Also, pro-Palestine demos are banned in multiple countries.

I'm literally just referring to the tactic of going out in the streets and shouting at people. It's what we did in the bush era because we all thought we'd recreate the 60s and shut down the Iraq war by getting stoned and marching with placards in the street. Your time would be better spent just handing out literature at your local university or talking to people one-on-one about BDS

Yeah, but according to the Hasbara leftists here it’s very racist to point out that it’s Jewish power that makes it possible for “free” Western democracies to blatantly ban pro-Palestinian rallies and BDS.

According to Sookie tho these demonstrations are outlawed because of unruly college kids and not because of anything like the pressure of the Jewish bourgeois or the agents of Zionist state.

BO confirmed controlled opposition!

Ya being a loudmouth doesn’t really solve anything. The Left needs to work on being more eloquent and paying attention to their appearance in public. Also it’s as you said education and recruitment efforts typically trumps just getting mad and yelling in the long run.

I hate to sink into my armchair on this one but protests and riots have become integrated into late-capitalism. Their actuallly anticipated by the state and I’d say the ruling elite actually banks on the fact that they can be cathartic without changing anything. It helps the police and miliatarh sharpen their skills in dealing with domestic insurrection and in the short-run at least it often alienates people.

We have to think about what works and what doesn’t and not give into just-do-something activism.

You think BDS is good for exposing Zionists and helping Palestine?

kek, it seems I'm not the only one crimethinc did some psychological damage to as a teenager.

On the contrary, mass protests such as those under Bush did help to rejuvenate that sense of solidarity into the class-struggle.

Basically what

Said, right down to Chomsky articles. In many ways it was tremendously shit - but any kind of American "left" unity that was had during this time was basically lost during Obama. During Bush, we knew what we stood against - war, mass surveillance, cronyism, religious zealotry, blind patriotism, the police state.

But by Obama's second term I was seeing people defending the Patriot Act while calling anyone who dared oppose the dubious trade of privacy for "security" selfish liberals. Though the admitted liberals were seldom any less ready than intersectional "leftists" to abandon opposition to Bush-era policy once it passed hands. And for years there was this idpol war between ineffectual liberals and loud "anti-capitalists" who didn't actually care about dismantling capitalism's survival mechanisms.

Immortal Technique - Apocalypse (2008, probably)
youtube.com/watch?v=lxmvNIVpPCg

Ah, the good ol' days.

This thread reminds me of just how much the world has changed since 2000's. The world seems more haggard and complacent.

Damn I miss those times.

Looking back, there is no reason not to up or at least bring back the propaganda from around a decade ago considering that, to paraphrase Rafiq from a whole other context, Donald Trump is George W. Bush on cocaine.

Because it's just a narcissistic circle jerk that literally doesn't do anything except make you feel good. The fact you even asked asked the question kind of sums up what's wrong with the left then and now.

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That isn't quite true all the time about hyperbolic protesters during Bush.

Those would have been even bigger wastes of time. Syndicalism is long dead in the U.S, and getting some succ-dem into office is ineffectual. We have a socialist in office where I Iive in Seattle and it just boils down to muh $15 minimum wage. Which is also ineffectual since when you have some of the most expensive rent in the country, all it does is subsidize the landlords and punish people on fixed incomes, like those with disabilities or in public housing.

It was being memed quite heavily during that time

articles.latimes.com/2004/aug/02/entertainment/et-rivenburg2

Anyone know any good Bush-era protest videos?

Right Wing Nickle Back is way funnier than a bunch of sad nerds imo

Back then the American left thought warrantless surveillance was an attack on the constitution, that the NSA and CIA were not to be trusted, that wars in the Middle East and elsewhere should end and that demonizing Russia was right-wing red-baiting.

My how things have changed.

Any time someone tried to protest against W. Bush, fucking Alex Jones would come out of nowhere armed with a military grade loudspeaker and myriads of signs about 9/11 inside job and aliens are satan's cousins investigate toto africa etc.
It was painfully obvious that he was hired to destroy every bigger demonstration with his circus tricks and it fucking worked too.

They were anti-war, liked the constitution, afraid of martial law, hated mass immigration(saw them as exploited scabs that displaced labor unions) and didn't like free trade. They unironically watched Alex Jones too, since he made a lot of documentaries on the police state and imperialism. Heck, AJ was at the WTO protests back in the 90s.

Libertarians are just the white male gen X'er leftists that the idpolers kicked out of their social circle, stopped smoking weed and started paying taxes.

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youtube.com/watch?v=Q-jOujNLGBw
Thousands protest Bush's 1st Inauguration (2001)
youtube.com/watch?v=7Ud3DkRb1yU
USA: USA: GEORGE W BUSH INAUGURAL PARADE: PROTESTS
Early protests against President-Elect Bush back in 2001. Second video shows an anarchist contingent of protestors installing red and black flags.

She wants to introduce rent control which from my understanding has never worked to reduce the average cost of rent in a city.

Not to mention the ever increasing amount of homeless that are coming here that must be accounted and budgeted for so much so that they want to start a city income tax.

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Should we revive any Bush-era slogans?

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dude… what if blink 182 wrote we didn't start the fire and it was about ……bush!

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I think there's a lot more genuine class-based discontent over Trump recently, tbqh.

They were stale back in the day.

We need to get the Right Brothers back together
youtube.com/watch?v=uDSK98Y2FNg&ab_channel=childofgod512

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They were good times. Everyone was liberal. No nazis or this political climate.

Can you substantiate that?