to read Norman Birnbaum's 10-page article published on 10/19/2014, click on

http://www.nachdenkseiten.de/upload/pdf/141024_birnbaum_what_is_the_american_left-final.pdf

The greater part of the entire media system functions as if criticism were an eccentricity, if not a pathology... An American left has no difficulty sustaining itself but breakthroughs and ruptures which would alter public consciousness on a larger scale constitute very large tasks for the future.