I found this interesting description in a comment left in a TAC article by cka2nd talking about the ethos of the New Left:
For all of the criticism of far left “sects” and their follies, we represent a pretty small proportion of the U.S. Left. The majority of the left flies under the radar while its members:
a) Engage in short-term and largely ineffectual activism as performance or catharsis.
b) Use organizational methods that have grown out of a mix of 70′s radical feminism and anarchism (consensus instead of majority rule, facilitation instead of chairmanship, “none of us are leaders, all of us are leaders” but look behind the curtain and you can readily identify the leadership clique).
c) Delcare that every new reformist activist group is utterly new and unique, a never before seen protoype for a New New Left.
d) Eventually go to work for NGO’s funded mainly by the elite and pursuing advocacy approved by the establishment.
e) And finally, pimp for the Democratic Party.
I’ve worked in both mileaus and while the Old Left has many faults, the newer lefts could learn a lot from it, and not just what not to do.
Politics is at its root about power--about who has it and who doesn't. The Left ethos, insofar as it professes itself to be the party of equality, is not a political movement; it is a cultural sensibility. Its relationship to power derives mostly from its being a faction within the Democratic party that drafts behind those who have power, the wealthy Neoliberal elites, the freedom-for-the-wealthy-to-do-as-they-please faction. As such the cultural sensibility Left abets the foundational inequality problem rather than providing any hope for redressing power and wealth imbalances in this country.
Power draws upon two fundamental resources--money or people numbers. The tiny minority with money holds power over the majority because the majority remains divided along tribal lines. It's that simple. The wealthy minority with power understands this and exploits it by fanning the fires of tribal hostility. This is the rasion d'etre for FOX, which is quite different from the Left tribalism of MSNBC, which, while biased, is never such an egregious exercise in bad faith.
But there's a reason GE gives its lefty talking heads such a long leash. It doesn't matter what people say or think so long as it doesn't lead to organized action.