Cornel West Leaves MPP For Green Party
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhC5PXnPJsU
Kudos to Katie Halper for breaking the story on YouTube with a personal interview of Cornel West.
My first reaction: Hot damn!
My second reaction: Hallelujah!
My third reaction: the Bernie Sanders movement has now engendered Marianne Williamson within the Democratic Party and Cornel West in the Green Party. I could not be happier than having TWO (count them TWO!) strong proponents of Progressive policies.
Laissez les bons temps rouler!
In contrast, and for your reading pleasure, here are two opposing comments from two of our own TN Green Party members:]
COMMENT 1: From the managerial perspective, nominees should rise from the membership, then undergo a serious examination similar to the 64,000 dollar question for a week so members can evaluate the candidates properly, followed by a selection process based on one person one vote for those in the top four (2 highest males and 2 highest females) who passed the testing. The selected candidate will more truly represent the people.
Face recognition should not play a part during the testing. Using alternative names and a sanitized photo (no sex id and no photo so even color or age make zero difference), and a committee summarizing and presenting questions to each individual. Those being tested can be allowed to pose 1 question to each opponent based on a transcript of candidate responses.
If we seek caring, competence, and relative experience data regarding achievements not years of experience should be public before the testing.
A failed candidate from another party does us no good.
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COMMENT 2:
To be completely candid with you I find it only passingly interesting. I'm sure many people are interested and buzzing about this and that is great, it just isn't groundbreaking news to me.
Cornel West, after a very cursory glance at his career (i.e wikipedia), definitely has a lot of academic, social, and political chops. He seems like a genuinely smart and engaging guy, and probably a refreshing change of pace from our current politicians.
Cornel West is not the problem though, for me the reason I am patently unexcited by this news is that it paints the picture of the Green Party as struggling along and hoping that someone famous throws them a bone, declaring they will run on their ballot. The way I saw the email seemed like people are expecting a miracle cure, or a quick fix all.
The Green Party won't win the 2024 election, I think we should all be truthful that this won't happen (yet). Cornel West could be a very cool means of the green party getting a not insignificant amount of votes among african americans, academics, and the philosophically minded.
But that to me doesn't save the world, or the party
What WILL save the party (and possibly the world) is a massive body of work, many volunteers and people running and supporting those campaigns, community outreach and education, increasing brand recognition and engagement, and truly embracing the grass roots nature of the party. (big run-on sentence, sorry)
We won't be winning the presidency this election, most likely not the next election either, BUT winning local elections and influencing city budgets in a pro-environmental and pro-socialist direction are VERY attainable. Working in communities to mobilize and organize the impoverished and marginalized. Creating these local party "strongholds" makes the party bigger than the person. The party and the movement need to take center stage.
Sorry for the tirade. I guess my comment would be that its very cool, but I think it makes very little actual impact.
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Back to Mike Guth:
I may be Cornel West's biggest fan within the TN Green Party. If anyone else wants to self-identify as West's biggest fan, please let me know.
Share your opinions with us: [email protected]
Michael Guth
Digital Communications Coordinator
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