Thursday, December 08, 2022

Will CRT, BLM and The 1619 Project Destroy America?

 
Many Conservatives claim that teaching Critical Race Theory (CRT) will destroy America. It’s not totally clear what they mean by CRT. They seem to be referring to an amalgam of “woke” beliefs about race, like how the legacy of slavery lives on and how racism is still a huge problem in the US. What they’re certainly not referring to is actual CRT, as it’s only taught in grad school.

Black Lives Matter (BLM) has also been targeted by the Right as a radical movement intent on undermining the US of A. The worldwide uprising sparked by the police murder of George Floyd sent the BLM movement into overdrive. But the political effects have been meager so far. Despite what Conservatives have claimed, the calls to defund the police have fallen on deaf ears. A few police budgets have seen minor cuts, while the vast majority have enjoyed increases.

Meanwhile, to no one’s surprise, the social justice movement has found surer footing in scholarship. “The 1619 Project” by The New York Times is just the highest-profile example of the decades-long endeavor to dismantle White Supremacy in the Academy. BLM’s failure to achieve appreciable gains in the legal and political arenas is discouraging, but its ability to convince many Americans (including me) that racism remains pervasive in our society is surely cause for hope.

Conservatives are often cast as hair-on-fire, Chicken-Little alarmists, and, most of the time, they are. But, on the issue of BIPOC liberation, they may be onto something. Confronting these racial issues could very well end America as we know it. After all, this country was founded and built on slavery and racism. What is the USA without racism? In my opinion, it would be a vastly different country that may be unrecognizable to any American living today.

Liberals are playing a dangerous game, I think. They’re pulling at these threads in the fabric of America. They don’t seem to realize how integral racism is to the Republic. Maybe they expect most Americans to come to grips with the horrors on which the Land of the Free was built (not to mention the horrors that continue to sustain it), but that seems awfully optimistic to me. Do Libs even fully grasp these horrors?

The problem is that Libs are still essentially nationalistic (or, if you prefer, “patriotic”). They believe that Uncle Sam is basically good. The BLM movement is their attempt to save America from its past, to redeem it through penance, truth and reconciliation, a la post-apartheid South Africa. But Conservatives don’t want that. They wanna have their American Pie and eat it too.

Why would the Republican base enter a power-sharing agreement with BIPOC people? White Supremacy is the only thing they’ve got left. They’ve been robbed of economic security, meaningful work and community. Libs don’t get that. They’re blind to the plight of their fellow White Americans.

They seem to think that you can just remove racism from America like a burst appendix. But the Home of the Brave may not survive as a cohesive, coherent polity without the glue of racism. The wounds of the Civil War were only “healed” through the North’s acceptance of (and complicity in) Jim Crow in the South. Since then, White Supremacy has remained largely intact nationwide despite the work of the Civil Rights Movement.

“The 1619 Project” and BLM are essential to further humanizing American culture. Still, no one knows what a non-racist America would look like because it has never existed. We don’t even know if it’s possible. We might save America’s soul and lose the patient.

But, in the words of George W. Bush, I say: Bring it on. As I’ve written before, I’m not a fan of the Stars and Stripes. I’d love to see the USA crumble into a million pieces. (The political entity, that is, not the people.) Most people on the planet would benefit. We certainly owe it to them to dismantle the American Empire after all the evil we’ve wrought.

The end of the Empire and the dissolution of the Union would almost certainly lead to violence and suffering. The only question is: Would they result in more or less violence and suffering than their continued existence would? I happen to believe that their end would cause less pain to humanity as a whole than their continuation would.

Liberals say that racism is foundational to America, but their attempt to excise it from the body politic implies that they think it’s just a tumor. They don’t want to destroy America, but they must realize that, if you’re trying to remove a fundamental tenet of the country, you run the risk of bringing down the whole darn thing.

I’m convinced it would be like amputating a limb (or two), and, on some (probably unconscious) level, the Right seems to agree. If Conservatives believed there were still “reasonable, not radical” Libs left, one of them would’ve surely drawn an editorial cartoon with a commie-red devil whispering in a Lib’s ear, telling them to support CRT, BLM and “The 1619 Project” in the hopes of destroying the Red, White and Blue.

I think we on the Far Left should be that devil. It’s not like we can do anything to make the MSM portray us as anything else. The Right keeps calling Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi and all those other milquetoast Democrats “radical socialists.” Let’s show them what real Radical Socialists look like.

We should encourage Libs and whoever will listen to stay on the road to social justice and see what happens. It may be that rooting out racism, sexism, xenophobia, homophobia and transphobia will also bring down imperialism, Capitalism and all those other “-ism’s” that we’d like to get rid of. Let’s keep pulling on these threads until America, as she was originally conceived, is a distant memory.

Sunday, November 27, 2022

The Real Fake News

We’ve been led to believe that the reason America is so fucked-up is because there are so many crazy Americans nowadays. I pretty much agree with that, but what drove us crazy? Is it violent TV, movies and video games? No, there’s always been that kind of entertainment, in peaceful cultures and violent ones. Is it the growth of crazy Right-wing media like FOX News and many online outlets? Maybe, but what motivates people to consume that content and, more important, believe it?

One reason is Fake News, and not the kind that the MSM (Mainstream Media) like to howl about nowadays. The biggest Fake News story of this century so far isn’t “The Big Lie” that Trump actually won the 2020 election (although that is a big lie). It’s Iraq’s WMD’s. That story killed over a million people in Iraq. The Big Lie has only killed a few people so far.

If you take the MSM’s word for it, you may believe that Jan. 6 was the first time we’ve had an attempted coup in the US. The truth is that the 2000 presidential election was decided by a successful coup, but that one was carried out by the Supreme Court, so it doesn’t count. Also, the MSM’s paymasters were happy to endorse the anti-democratic anointing of George W. Bush, hence the absence of outrage in the press.

The MSM are constantly lying to us, about the nobility of our wars and the extent of their death tolls, about the virtues of Capitalism and those who command the heights of the economy. But those lies are considered acceptable, civil discourse. They justify the American Empire and Capitalism. Therefore, they are true, according to the Gatekeepers.

But, increasingly, fewer and fewer Americans are enjoying the bounty of American Empire and Capitalism. As a result, the official pronouncements of the MSM are ringing hollow to more and more people. It was fine for the CIA to go around overthrowing foreign governments in the mid-20th Century. Americans were too well-taken-care-of to question those coups. Now that Americans are struggling, we’re more likely to doubt the nobility of their operations.

This decades-long drumbeat of deception has eroded faith in the press, government and other mainstream institutions. What we decide to believe instead of the Official Version depends on what’s available. Right-wing beliefs have a lot of money backing them up. The Elite tend to be Right-wing, so they support the spread of those ideas. The ideas also support the system that enriches the Elite, so the cycle functions as a positive feedback loop.

The thing about positive feedback loops is that, eventually, they break down, and that’s what we’re seeing right now. The only alternatives to the mainstream narrative that have found purchase in our political system are bat-shit crazy Right-wing conspiracy theories like QAnon. They may not directly threaten the Establishment, but they betray a growing ignorance and incompetence that threaten to bring down the Empire (and maybe even Capitalism with it).

It seems like the only Americans left who are ready and willing to maintain the Empire are either cynical grifters (a la Donald Trump) or fucking nutjobs (like his followers). The Democrats fall into a third category: Liberals who benefit from the System but whose ability to justify it is getting weaker by the day. (I’ll address that in the next essay.) This is not an auspicious sign for continued global hegemony. It’s more like a harbinger of doom.

The Powers That Be are left with a difficult choice: either hand the reins to the grifters and their minions, or let an anti-imperialist coalition take over. It’s basically the same choice the German elite faced in the early 1930’s, and an imperial elite will always pick the Right-wingers, no matter how evil and/or insane they may be. Our job is to make sure the choice is not left up to them.

We Need to Talk about Immigration and Jobs (and Free Trade): Just One More Time (for Now)

I forgot to include one part of this whole mess. The argument is often put forward that immigrants just do jobs that native-born Americans don’t want. I used to believe that, mainly because I didn’t wanna go pick fruit in a hot field all day. That sounds like a horrible fucking job.

Even if that argument were true (which it’s not), what does that say about us? We should just let immigrants do the dirty work because we think those jobs are beneath us? That’s pretty fucked-up (and elitist) in my (current) opinion, but it’s tempting for the reason I mentioned in the previous paragraph.

Really, I think that has been deployed as an excuse for treating immigrant workers like shit. If those jobs are so shitty, why not make them better? There’s more than enough wealth to go around to pay everyone a living wage (and, actually, much better than that). You could even employ millions of people to lighten the load. (Do you think all those office jobs are “essential”? I think the pandemic put the kibosh on that Capitalist propaganda.)

The only reason this doesn’t happen is not because it would lead to a supposedly communist dystopia. It’s because the rich don’t want to give up the smallest crumb of their wealth and power. If corporations didn’t have (esp. undocumented) immigrants to employ, they would have to pay higher wages and treat their workers better. And they don’t wanna do that.

Look at the economy right now. Corporations are raking in profits they haven’t seen since the 1950’s, and they still want the Fed to raise interest rates to crash the economy just to “discipline” workers, i.e., create a recession so we’ll take whatever shitty wages and working conditions the law allows them to offer (and some it technically doesn’t).

The Rich will take whatever they can get away with, including undocumented immigrants and H-1B visas for documented immigrants. This is partly due to their own greed but also due to the legal imperative we’ve imposed on corporations to maximize profits to the exclusion of all other concerns. We have to respond by disciplining the Market to recognize priorities more important than profit.

Sunday, November 20, 2022

We Need to Talk About Immigration and Jobs (and Free Trade): Part 2

Now we’re really in the weeds, the rough waters, the rapids, Whitewater. But that’s because we’re getting to the heart of our economy, and that’s an ugly sight. That’s something the Powers That Be don’t want us looking at, because it’s horrible and, if you knew the truth about it, you’d probably have a lot of trouble going to work to keep the System chugging along.

So, where were we? Oh yes, I was talking about how working-class folks hate competing with immigrants for jobs. It’s been easy for middle-class people to look down their noses at the Joe Six-packs who’ve long made this complaint. This is because middle-class folks haven’t had to compete with immigrants for jobs. Once I got a taste of that competition, my Liberal values quickly abandoned me, as I detailed in a previous essay.

It's not a pleasant issue to wade into because, like turning over a rock, you tend to find some gross shit underneath. You’ll find racism and xenophobia in spades. That’s why people on the Left shy away from this problem. But it has to be confronted and dealt with, because it’s at the root of our political crisis. Nor do I think the grossness of it is an accident or coincidence. That helps keep it out of the spotlight.

It may be hard to believe for younger generations, but blue-collar jobs in the US used to pay really well, offer great benefits and had great job security. You have to go back about 50 years to find this time in history, but it was a given for many Americans that they could go straight from high school to a factory job and spend their entire working life there. It’s not a fantasy or an ahistorical re-imagining of the past (like many other MAGA claims). It was a reality for tens of millions of Americans.

That’s why so many White people are pissed-off these days. Even though most of them can usually make ends meet, they’ve fallen a long way from where they and their ancestors used to be. Their communities have also disintegrated, leaving many of them lonely and desperate for help when they hit a rough patch.

Now imagine the anger they feel when they see immigrants doing jobs that used to be done by them. When I see Latin American roofers, I’m impressed by their work ethic. But, if you’re working-class, you might have a different reaction. You might resent their work ethic for lowering the bar for your own pay, benefits, job security, working conditions, etc. Those blue-collar jobs pay much less now, and whom do the Joe Six-Packs blame for that? Obviously, the employers, but they can’t discipline corporations via politics, because both parties are in thrall to Big Business. So they direct their anger at the only convenient targets: the immigrants.

If the immigrants weren’t there, companies would have to employ native-born people, or so the thinking goes. At one of my old jobs, they brought in people from India to do work that Americans could’ve easily done, simultaneously undermining and reinforcing the hypothesis in the previous sentence. It just goes to show how far companies will go to hire immigrants. Of course, they’re only able to do that because the government lets them, issuing visas for the workers. Even though the Market demands that employers seek out the cheapest labor, this boils down to government policy (as all economic issues do).

The Hormel factory in Austin is a perfect case study. A strike by the workers in 1985-86 led to many of them being replaced by immigrants who were paid less. Before that, the jobs had been well-paying with great benefits and security. Now, they’re not. The unions were broken, and many workers were replaced with immigrants. The immigrants are pawns in this game, but they take the brunt of the abuse because they’re the most vulnerable and the consequences for attacking them are the least.

Is the employment of immigrants in the US the cause of the working class’s impoverishment? No, it’s just a symptom. The American Empire’s internal and external proletariats are being pitted against each other, while my people, the American middle class, have reaped the benefits in cheaper goods and services. But, unless we restore the strength of organized labor and enact more protectionist economic policies, the Market will come for our jobs and wealth next.

Friday, November 11, 2022

We Need to Talk about Immigration and Jobs (and Free Trade)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/Mexico-US_border_at_Tijuana.jpg

PROLOGUE

Now that we’ve gotten through the midterms with the Republic still intact, I think it’s safe to return to my regularly scheduled blog, already in progress. Seriously though, I wasn’t sure if the Union would survive this week. I probably shouldn’t count my chickens just yet. There are still several undecided elections and a runoff to go in Georgia. But the MAGA chuds don’t seem interested in attempting a coup for the GOP in toto like they did for Trump.

We seem to have fallen victim to that ancient Chinese curse (which is neither Chinese nor ancient): May you live in interesting times. But all the drama infecting our lives revolves around the simple fact that our politics no longer addresses fundamental, kitchen-sink issues. The Powers That Be refuse to allow the economic reforms needed, and Everyday People lack the political consciousness and community cohesion to overturn the elites’ programs.

What we need is more money and benefits for workers. But, rather than meet that simple, easy demand, the Ruling Class gives us (by way of the Mainstream Media) boogeymen to distract us and fill us with mind-controlling fear. It was most transparent in the midterm elections’ home stretch. The Republican ads were replete with this fear-mongering. The Democratic ads also fear-mongered, but at least their warnings were legitimate. The Dems have no intention of defunding the police, turning your kids trans or teaching them Critical Race Theory (not that Republicans even know what that is). Meanwhile, the GOP has shown every intention of banning (and criminalizing) abortion when- and wherever possible.

The mystification of US politics has given the rich wealth beyond the dreams of avarice (and corporate profits they haven’t seen since the 1950’s). It has also given the Military-Industrial Complex virtual carte blanche on “defense” spending and overseas operations. But you can always have too much of a good thing, and I think the Establishment has sown the seeds of its own destruction.

Now we have come to a pretty pass. The Elites’ blocking of even minor economic reforms has given an opening to the Far Right, the only fringe political group the Elites will allow in the MSM (and sometimes actively support). A radical bloc is taking over the GOP, with the support of the party’s base, and their agenda is noxious to most of the country, even to the Democrats who, up until now, have been willing to drift Right along with the Republicans. This is causing a national schism so great that I don’t think our current political system can mend it. I think the dissolution of the Union is almost inevitable at this point.

You can bet your sweet bippy that this is the opposite of what the Establishment wants. It wants to keep a lid on all that fear and anger, directing it against useful targets (e.g., immigrants, racial minorities, the poor) when necessary, but still keeping it at a low simmer. Stupidly though, they keep turning up the temperature without letting us vent. Now we’re boiling over.

By indulging their greed, the Elites have broken the Bipartisan Consensus. They had a nice thing going for almost 250 years now: an empire with an internal proletariat that was willing to accept scraps as long as those scraps were big enough to keep them well-fed. But the Powers That Be couldn’t leave well enough alone. They just had to keep expanding their slice of the American Pie, no matter how desperate it made the rest of us.

Now that even the petit bourgeoisie is losing patience with the status quo, the game is up. Economic insecurity and thwarted political energy have reached such levels that mystified expressions of discontent like Donald Trump and QAnon are replacing actual political movements. But, hey, why not indulge in fantasy when no political movement able to materially improve your life seems possible?

The rest of this essay is devoted to one of those kitchen-sink issues that, if addressed, could help us out of our current mess. But, like I wrote in the previous essay, I’m not interested in saving the empire. I just wanna minimize the damage that could result from its breakup.

PART 1

I set myself quite the task in my last essay: saving America, or, more accurately, keeping the whole country from exploding in an orgy of the violence and the death and the blood and the hey-now. (That last part should be read in the voice of Dr. Frink from The Simpsons.) At first, I thought I could tackle the whole subject in one essay. But the more I wrote, the more I realized it was too big a topic. So I’m gonna try and break it up into more manageable portions.

This will be the first part of my series on keeping the country from blowing up. It’s a good topic to tackle first, I think, because it’s one that most Americans seem unaware of. It also explains a lot of the material conditions that are driving us insane. This little bugaboo is trade policy, specifically “free trade agreements,” which have a suitably Orwellian name. These agreements are used to feed “the imperial wealth-pump,” a useful term cooked up by my favorite blogger, John Michael Greer, a.k.a. the Archdruid. (His Right-wing bias has become more apparent in recent years, so, if you read him, just keep that in mind.)

Free Trade sucks the wealth out of the imperial periphery, i.e. the Third World or Global South or whatever-you-wanna-call-it, and funnels it to the imperial core, i.e., the First World: the USA, Canada and Western Europe. Minerals like oil, gold and rare earths are mined with little regard for the environmental effects. Agricultural products are grown in ecologically destructive ways, turning what should be a sustainable or even regenerative industry into an extractive one. Sweatshops and factories are opened by First World-based companies (either directly or indirectly) that work the locals to death at slave wages.

These resources and products are then shipped off to be consumed by the First World. Of course, the spoils are not shared equally among the imperial citizens of the core. The elites get the lion’s share and the rest of us get the scraps from their table. But this is still enough to keep many of us in the US at a higher standard of living than the vast majority of the world. There’s even enough to keep most denizens of the First World satisfied, or at least content and/or atomized enough not to revolt. Perhaps most important, there’s also enough left over to enrich elites in the Third World, in order to bribe them to run the imperial wealth-pump on their end. They’re the overseers in this system.

The Third World is thus impoverished, driving many people to migrate to the First World. This is the part that is completely missing from our political discourse. Conservatives demonize and dehumanize migrants, while Liberals defend them, but they both miss the bigger picture: MIGRANTS DON’T WANT TO BE MIGRANTS. THEY DON’T WANT TO LEAVE THEIR HOMES. It’s not like they were dreaming of America. They weren’t singing that Neil Diamond song. They weren’t yearning for Reagan’s “shining city on a hill.” They don’t think this is the land of milk and honey. They aren’t fucking Fievel. (FYI: That’s a reference to the 1986 animated film An American Tail.)

We’re destroying their economies, wiping out their livelihoods and forcing them to come here. The First World is the only place left for them. They’re just following the wealth we stole from their countries. Of course, that doesn’t work so well for Global Capitalism. While Free Trade drops barriers to the movement of capital, it restricts the movement of people. The US-Mexico border wasn’t militarized until NAFTA took effect in 1994. This is necessary to achieve wage arbitrage, i.e., increasing profits by moving jobs to lower-wage countries.

I actually got to see the border walls in March of ‘94 while on a missionary trip to Tijuana during high school. (I went to a Catholic high school, but we didn’t do any proselytizing on this trip, thank god.) We visited the wall where it met the Pacific Ocean. There was graffiti that said, “Welcome to the new Berlin Wall.” We nodded in supposedly-knowing agreement, though I don’t think I understood the issues at that time. I don’t remember anyone mentioning NAFTA. Maybe they did and I just forgot. But it wasn’t until I was radicalized a decade later that I began to grasp the political economy of the border.

Instead of confronting our responsibility for the deprivation of the Third World, the discourse in the US takes a nationalist turn into the dumpster. Conservatives have a predictably racist and xenophobic angle on the problem. They think migrants come here because their countries suck because their cultures suck because the people suck.

Liberals take a nicer, but still misguided tack. They correctly point out that migrants are just trying to make a better life for themselves. But they completely ignore the fact that we destroyed their old lives. They acknowledge the historical legacy of colonialism in impoverishing the Third World but dismiss or remain conveniently ignorant of the role of the Global Economy in the Third World’s continuing destitution.

Worse, Libs disdain the anger of the working class at having to compete with migrants for jobs. These concerns are disparaged as racism and xenophobia (as in this episode of South Park). This keeps the issue off the table because very few people want to be thought of as racist or xenophobic. Therefore, the legitimate economic grievances of the working class are left to fester in the dark until they turn into real racism and xenophobia and Culture War bullshit. Because we’ve dismissed their justified concerns, now we have to deal with their insanity.

There’s more to say on this topic, but I’m gonna need some time to choose my words carefully because we’re heading into rough waters. Stay tuned!

Sunday, September 25, 2022

The Storm Next Time

File:2021 storming of the United States Capitol DSC09254-2 (50820534063) (retouched).jpg

As much as I’d love to just goof on this shit, we need to start thinking seriously about 2024. I think it’s gonna take way more than a coordinated shadow campaign to get us through the next presidential election. The GOP has made it clear that it won’t accept another loss, results be damned, although that insistence comes from the base, not the politicians. If Republican Congressmembers could just sit on their asses and still get reelected, I’m sure they would.

But they’ve wound up their supporters into such a tizzy that they no longer have that luxury. It’s all the same to the elected officials, as long as their corporate paymasters get a good return on their investment (and the officials get their kickbacks, I mean, “donations and cushy corporate jobs after they retire from politics”). The barbarians at the gates might actually lynch some Congressmembers next time, but I’m guessing the Captains of Industry would see those as acceptable losses. After all, there’s money to be made, by God!

Whether they nominate Trump, DeSantis or someone else, it doesn’t look like the Republicans are gonna accept another 4 years without control of the White House. After the hissy-fit they threw last time, I really don’t see them walking off into the sunset, even in handcuffs. The irony is that the Moneyed Elite is perfectly happy with either party. But the inmates have taken over the asylum that is the GOP. The tail is now wagging the elephant.

Of course, this is a rather inverted conception of democracy. In theory, we would want the masses to tell the politicians what to do. But we’re so brainwashed by the elitist version of democracy practiced in the US that, when presented with a populist version, we recoil in horror. Part of that horror is inspired by the evil ideologies espoused by these masses, but some of it arises from a lack of familiarity with the kind of democracy America is supposed to embody.

The midterm elections should be interesting, but I think the real fireworks will come in ’24 when the states are presenting their electoral votes to the House. Regardless of which party’s in control of the House, the GOP-run swing states will be forced to put up or shut up when it comes to “election integrity.” In other words, they’ll have to present Republican electors to Congress regardless of the vote totals in their states, because, if they don’t, their base might just murder them or, even worse, vote them out of office.

Then the question becomes, will Kamala accept fraudulent GOP electors? If we’re to believe the mainstream narrative of Jan. 6th (and the bill recently passed by the House), the vice president has no power to reject the states’ electors. But I doubt Kamala, or any Democratic veep, would accept such an outcome. Can you imagine the furor on the Right side of the aisle were she to reject the results as presented to her and Congress by the states? I think I can, and it would be deafening. They would surely find it a cruel irony after Vice President Pence’s “betrayal” on January 6, 2021.

Alternatively, say the Electoral College goes for Biden or whoever the Democratic nominee turns out to be. If Congress signs off on it (a big “if”), I think it would spark a serious secession movement.  These Republican voters are mad as hell, and they aren’t gonna take it anymore. It’s not totally clear what they’re mad about, but they’re clearly very upset and the routine operation of US politics (as currently constituted) seems inadequate to mollify them.

If only they knew that Biden has continued many Trump Admin policies, even resuming construction of his precious wall on the Mexican border. But it’s not the same, the Right-wing (and mainstream) media insist. The White House went from Republican to Democratic hands; therefore, most government policies must have changed dramatically. It seems to be one of the MSM’s (“mainstream media”) prime directives that they have to ignore the huge tracts of bipartisan consensus on the most important (i.e., economic, military and foreign policy) issues.

Getting back to the ’24 scenarios: say Congress refuses to sign off on the results. Then what? Constitutionally speaking, we’d really be up a creek. The election would go to the House, where each state delegation would get one vote. (Gotta love those Founding Fathers! What democratic-minded geniuses! Excuse me: republic-minded geniuses!) Given the dominance of Republicans in low-population states, this would favor the GOP candidate and likely put them in the White House.

But who will accept that result? The winners obviously will but surely not the losers. Yet again, if the Republicans get the short end of the stick, I believe they’ll call for secession. Don't believe me? The Texas GOP is calling for a referendum on secession next year. Support for the Union is a mile wide and an inch deep. We're counting on a thread-bare social fabric to hold the country together. Nothing is off the table.

Will the Dems stand idly by and let this happen if they’re the losers? I certainly hope not, although I have my doubts. If they have a backbone (an open question), they’ll mount their own secession movement (after many vain attempts to appeal to the Supreme Court, of course). But they’ll have to rid themselves of their fanatical devotion to the Institutions and Norms. It’ll take an unprecedented mass movement to drag the Dems kicking and screaming into the post-American future, but I think it can be done. We’ll just have to snap them out of their Norman Rockwell daydream.

None of these is a pleasant scenario, but they seem the most likely outcomes of the next presidential election. Of course, the Powers That Be aren’t going to just sit on their duffs and let the Union be dissolved. Oh, no! Far from it! There’s much too much money at stake to allow the American Empire to die. It’ll put all those overseas military bases in danger of closure, not to mention all those “free trade” agreements justifying the expropriation and exploitation of Third World wealth and labor. (I don’t know why I put those two things in the same sentence! Can you figure it out?)

The Power Elite’s first move will be an MSM propaganda campaign the likes of which we’ve never seen before. It will be funneled through the usual outlets, e.g., Anderson Cooper, Rachel Maddow and whichever nobodies are hosting the networks’ nightly news shows these days. They will assure us at all hours of the day and night that our way of life is in peril, that taking the path of secession is tantamount to jumping off a cliff.

There’ll be plenty of Civil War comparisons made, including parallels between latter-day secessionists and their historical precursors, i.e., slaveowners, although I’m guessing that will be deployed most often against the Left. The Captains of Industry will be loath to offend their traditional allies on the Right.

I’m really looking forward to seeing where all those Right-wing grifters come down on this issue. The people who sign (most of their) checks will require them to toe the pro-Union line, but that side will have very little support from their fans. Ben Shapiro and the Daily Wire will have to be pro-Union, no matter how devastating it is to their popularity. They have no other significant sources of revenue beyond Big Daddy Fossil Fuels.

But the rest will have a tough decision to make: either lose their sugar daddies or lose their audience. I can imagine Steven Crowder doing a lovely little tap dance around the issue, trying to assure his viewers that he’s still pro-“Mom, apple pie and baseball” while tepidly pledging fealty to the “pedophiles” in DC.

Alex Jones doesn’t have to worry about that, of course. He’s got his audience pretty much in the palm of his hand. He’ll be free to advocate any insane position he wants. He’ll probably lobby to have Austin declared a Free City in the Republic of Texas or the Neutral Zone or Narnia or wherever he thinks he is by then.

Take it from me, though, the Powers That Be will be super-pissed off about secession. They might even try another Business Plot. Most Americans are blissfully ignorant of this little episode, but in the 1930’s a bunch of business leaders tried to get a retired general, Smedley Butler, to overthrow FDR. Lucky for us, Gen. Butler had more of a conscience than your average American general and tattled to Congress about it. (No surprise here: Even though they found compelling evidence for the conspiracy, Congress did nothing. Because who wants to keep a bunch of rich guys from just havin’ a good time?)

If we can withstand all the sturm und drang that will accompany the end of the USA, I think we can actually come out the better for it. I am an anti-imperial socialist, after all, so I have no interest in preserving Capitalism or the Empire. In my opinion, the dissolution of the Union would go a long way toward ending the latter of those things, and maybe even the former. But I would like to avoid a Civil War. To that end, in my next essay I’ll offer some helpful hints to save America. Stay tuned!

Saturday, February 27, 2021

Fumbling Towards Fascism


In the days following the January 6th Coup or the Insurrection or the Whatever-The-Fuck-You-Wanna-Call-It, I was listening to any Leftist podcast I could get my hands on. I was trying to find a satisfying take on the Storming of the Capitol/Capitol Coup/Riot/Whatever. I was mad and kinda scared and looking for some guidance on how to feel and what to do.

Chapo Trap House, my go-to Leftist podcast (and favorite podcast overall), left me cold with their takes. They persisted in mocking people for freaking out about it, which they really seem to revel in. I mean, yes, they’re right that the Capitol Stormers (I kinda like calling ‘em that cuz it sounds like a cool name for a sports team.) were oafish buffoons who weren’t gonna take over shit, and this isn’t Fascism… yet.

Which reminds me: Hey, MSM (Mainstream Media)! Stop calling them “insurrectionists”! You’re making them sound a lot cooler than they are. I guess it was an insurrection, but the MSM are so fucking oblivious. They really think treating these people like an actual threat to overthrow the government is gonna make the rest of us think less of them.

Don’t get me wrong. The Capitol Stormers were a bunch of fucking idiots who did more harm to their cause than good. They were people who thought Donald Trump actually cares about them and has been fighting for them. Anyone who thinks Trump cares about them is an utter moron, politically speaking.

On the other hand, the MSM (like the rest of us) have to pull off a delicate balancing act. If you treat the Capitol Stormers as a genuine threat to democracy, you risk inflating their power. They’re probably taking some pride in the scare they gave the Establishment. The fact that the talking heads on TV seemed to be shaking in their boots surely gave the Stormers a giddy thrill. This could also give people the impression that the Stormers were effective and are worth supporting.

If you dismiss this mob as a bunch of fucking morons, you run the risk of not taking them seriously enough. Dismissing them could lead to more anger at being ignored by the Powers That Be. This could also lead to ignoring the threat they pose if they continue to grow in strength. It could also make them a cause celebre, since there are a lot of people who already hate the MSM (myself included) and will gravitate to anyone the MSM denounce.

But at what point can we take this shit seriously? When exactly should we be afraid? How far down the road to Fascism do we need to be?

I think I was awaiting marching orders from Chapo. I wanted their permission to hit the streets and start the Revolution. You could say I’m in a similar headspace as the Capitol Stormers. I share their misery and desperation. Granted, the mob wasn’t exactly chockful of working stiffs. There were a lot of rich folks in there, small business owners and the like.

They may be well-off compared to most of the country, but they’re certainly feeling the squeeze with the pandemic and worried about losing their position and being “proletarianized,” becoming workers like the rest of us. (Full Disclosure: These are takes I stole from the aforementioned Leftist podcasts.) The last thing the “small business tyrants” want is to go from being the ones giving the orders to the ones taking them. That prospect must scare the shit out of them, the idea that they could become subject to someone else like them, that they could be at the whim of someone with the same predilections.

But, if you know history (or listen to Chapo), you know that the petit bourgeoisie are usually the driving force behind Fascist movements. They have a vested interest in maintaining the current economic system, which means crushing the Left and any labor movements. The US government, police, military and MSM have spent decades crushing the Left and organized labor, thereby helping to lay the groundwork for Fascism.

Fascism arises in the absence of an effective response to the needs of the majority, what we in the US have called “gridlock” for almost 30 years now. Just as the Weimar Republic was either incapable of or unwilling to relieve the suffering of most Germans, so are the Democrats and Republicans either incapable of or unwilling to relieve the suffering of most Americans. Only policies that address our widespread economic precarity will take us off the road to Fascism.

Cracking down on “disinformation” and “extremism” (as defined by the Establishment) will lead to a further narrowing of acceptable political discourse. Remember: This is the same Establishment that believed Iraq had WMD and the only way to eliminate that threat was war. These people aren’t your friends. Even if they’re condemning FOX News, Newsmax and OAN (One America News) right now, that doesn’t mean they’re on your side, Libs.

The corporate elite still has a stranglehold on political power and refuses to even loosen its grip. As we saw in 1930’s Germany, they would sooner bring the whole thing crashing down on their heads than let go of the Levers of Power. Let’s hope we can steer off this course before they get their death wish.

Friday, January 01, 2021

The Opposite of a Honeymoon

 Donald Trump - Wikipedia

Can't we just revel in Trump's defeat for a while? I'm not ready to start thinking about what ghouls Biden has put forth for his cabinet yet. I'm having too much fun watching Trump and his legal team flail around like walruses on a beach. The schadenfreude is off the charts. 

It is so delicious to see Trump turned into a lame duck by the democratic process. His grip on power is slipping away, and I'm really enjoying it. Whatever the opposite of a honeymoon is, that's what I'm feeling about Trump right now. It's the (however paltry) joy that follows a divorce. (The Germans must have a word for it.) America has dumped Trump, and the rejection is driving him insane.

I'm just luxuriating in the knowledge that he'll soon be out of the White House and will lose his vise-like grip on the news. I've been thinking that no longer being the Center of the Universe could drive him mad, but he might prefer his new position as kingmaker. He can throw bombs from off-stage, criticize politicians and not have to actually do anything. 

He'll still have a cult of personality and maybe even his own TV channel or online media outlet. The MSM will have to pay him heed because of the legions of people who still (bafflingly) hold him in high regard. 

The wild card is his legal trouble. He might have to face the music, but, considering he's gone so long without paying the piper, why would they throw the book at him now? Did he go too far by becoming president? Is he no longer of any value to his creditors? I don't know. 

Maybe he's become more of a liability than an asset to them. It might serve them politically to wash their hands of him. They could take the credit for finally putting him away. There would be a rich irony (and sweet satisfaction) in seeing the man who sailed to the presidency with chants of "Lock her up!" become the first ex-president to go to prison. (I hope it starts a trend.)

I know I reveled in the Establishment's (i.e., Hillary's) defeat 4 years ago, but the Trump Admin has been so emotionally exhausting that I'm over the moon to see it go. At least now we can get back to the much calmer status quo ante of Leftists getting pissed off at a Democratic president while Liberals remain blissfully ignorant (or in denial) of all his crimes. It'll be just like old times.