Rightwing talking points and the Progressive Sociologists Network

Posted to www.marxmail.org on May 30, 2004

Many of you might be aware of a mailing list called Progressive Sociologists Network (PSN) that resides on the same server as Michael Perelman's PEN-L. It has well over 800 subscribers to my knowledge. I subbed to it briefly but unsubbed in disgust with the tendency of the 3-person moderation board to lose track of posts. Since every post is premoderated, you have to rely on their ability to keep track of things to make sure that your post hits the list. Given the absentmindedness of our academic brethren, you can understand what a problem this might be.

I was also wary of the susceptibility of one of the moderators to "accidentally" lose track of certain posts that might clash with his own political agenda. I am speaking here of Lauren Langman, a professor at Loyola University who has held a myriad of impressive posts, including head of the Marxist section of the American Sociological Association.

For my money, Langman is a rightwing horse's ass, despite all his posts, publications and awards. During the war hysteria following 9/11, he posted a link to a website that had an animation of Uncle Sam fucking Osama bin-Laden in the ass. When you think about Abu Ghraib today and what led to that, you really have to wonder about the qualifications of such an individual to lead a progressive mailing list.

Although I don't subscribe to PSN, I try to keep up with the discussions on their archives there. Occasionally, there are thoughtful posts by Alan Spector, who works overtime responding to some of the more idiotic things that show up there (I am cc'ing him and a couple of other PSN regulars, including Langman himself.)

Yesterday, Langman informed PSN that if peace comes to Iraq, it might be as the result of the conquest of power by Islamic fundamentalists who are obviously little different from the Taliban that he also urged war against in the days following 9/11.

If you go to:

http://csf.colorado.edu/mail/psn/2004/msg00948.html

You will find his prefatory remarks accompanying an article from the AP that states among other things that:

>>Fallujah resembles an Islamic mini-state - anyone caught selling alcohol is flogged and paraded in the city. Men are encouraged to grow beards and barbers are warned against giving "western" hair cuts.<<

I read this post yesterday morning and sort of filed it in the back of my mind as a Kiplingesque suggestion that the US military might be the only guarantee against native backwardness. But only a half-hour later, while listening to WABC radio in the shower, did I discover that this business about Talibanesque developments in Fallujah was part of a well-orchestrated campaign to bolster support for the occupation of Iraq.

On Monica Crowley's show (she was Foreign Policy Assistant to Richard Nixon from 1990 until his death in 1994), her guest was Frank Gaffney, who was Assistant Secretary of Defense under Reagan and to the right of Attila the Hun. He spent at least a half-hour talking to her about the same fucking AP article that Langman posted to PSN with the intention to show how important it was to "stay the course" in Iraq. If we abandon Iraq to the resistance, then soon it would look like Afghanistan under the Taliban.

The academic left in the USA is in terrible shape if a leading light such as Lauren Langman and Frank Gaffney converge.