Friday, January 21, 2005
Is the left reactionary?
John Powers says so, in the alt press LA Weekly. I concur, but it's worth reading the article even if you don't.
Whether it’s rewriting the tax code or privatizing Social Security to solve an imaginary "crisis," the right has become the agent of change.
In contrast, the left has become — there’s no other word for it — reactionary.
Still unable to accept that the right has dominated our national life for the last quarter-century, the left hasn’t done the hard, slow work of thinking through what it means to be progressive during an era of ultraglobalized capitalism in which the only successful Democratic president in the last 35 years, Bill Clinton, followed policies that even he compared to Dwight Eisenhower’s. Far from proposing bold new ideas that might seize the popular imagination, the left now plays the kind of small-ball that Dubya disdains. Even worse, it’s become the side that’s forever saying "No."
What the left lacks is not a galvanizing messenger but a positive message, a set of energizing ideas and values. It’s not enough to oppose the invasion of Iraq or Bush’s plans for Social Security. That’s merely to react against someone else’s agenda. We must reverse the great (and startling) historical flip-flop in our political iconography. Forty years ago, the left represented the future — it crackled with pleasurable possibility — while the right symbolized the repressive past, clinging to dead traditions like shards of a wrecked ship.
These days, all that has been stood on its head: In the wake of September 11, the right claims it wants to free oppressed people — why, democracy is on the march! — while the left is too often caught saying "I told you so" about the mess in Iraq, even as that country speeds toward an election that any decent human being should hope goes well. In 1968, who would have believed it possible that the left would be home to the dreary old "realists" while the right would be full of utopians?
These are not new ideas. Peter Beinart wrote probably the best piece on this subject . One of the more interesting ideas that I'd like to see taken on by the left is federalism, which could be recast as a progressive way for all us to just get along. Obviously federalism has more relevance to domestic issues than to foreign policy, but I think federalism has been unfortunately miscast as a right-wing philosophy. Given Bush's apparent contempt for states' rights and circumscribed power in the federal government, federalism is now a philosophy of government without a true home. So lefties everywhere, maked a nice nest for it, it will reward you.
- posted by Anonymous @ Friday, January 21, 2005
Comments:
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This is the heart of the problem not just for "the left" but for those of us who oppose Bushite Republicanism.
Federalism in the sense that you mean it is historically enathema to liberals because of civil rights. In a nutshell: I could never be proud to be an American as long as there were whole states in which blacks were essentially disenfranchised. Now, obviously, some of the ground has shifted and maybe a strong case can be made for the left taking on state's rights, but I would like to see you develop that arguement more.
The strongest arguement, as far as I see it, is that the kind of bigotry that would flourish in the South if it was left to its own devices would result in eventual economic collapse.
Federalism in the sense that you mean it is historically enathema to liberals because of civil rights. In a nutshell: I could never be proud to be an American as long as there were whole states in which blacks were essentially disenfranchised. Now, obviously, some of the ground has shifted and maybe a strong case can be made for the left taking on state's rights, but I would like to see you develop that arguement more.
The strongest arguement, as far as I see it, is that the kind of bigotry that would flourish in the South if it was left to its own devices would result in eventual economic collapse.
I stand by my statement that reinstuting state's rights would result in a regression towards oppressive and bigoted behavior in the American south, and my statement that this would in turn result in the economic collapse of the south, beginning with a measurable excess of productive citizens.
The old attitudes of the south remain startlingly entrenched just below the surface of polite society. The shift that I noted in the Republican party has happened at among its elites and elites, even Republican elites, fully internalize new patterns of thought long before the man on the street has even begun to confront them.
Joe Blow has learned what he can and cannot say in public, but surprisingly little has changed about what he will say in private. Don't forget, I live down here.
I believe that a reversion to the old southern culture would result in economic class because I believe that political and economic freedom are, in the end, inexorably connected. This is one of the reasons that I think that Bush's inagural address was equal parts dishonest and just plain stupid. The China Experiment, started by Nizon and pushed forward most effectively by Bill Clinton is perhaps the second greatest test of the theory of Open Societies in the history of man. We do not confront the tyrants in China because we believe that the free market will eventually open up the political sphere. Since we can't go to war with them, this is really our only option.
If you accept, for the moment, my contention that the south would revert to its old ways, then the pattern of collapse is fairly easy to map. Highly productive citizens whose lifeestyles or skin color places them on the loosing side of regressive norms would move away, as would pregressive minded productive citizens (like you, I don't doubt that there are plenty of productive citizens who aren't progressive minded and would be perfectly happy to stay put. Huge swaths of the market for southern goods would dry up (Europe). Perhaps most importantly, the same ineficiencies that would have torn the south down eventually without the Civil War would come into play now. The productive core of free markets is mobility: social mobility and mobility in work. These would both be stymied in the regressive south. More later.
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The old attitudes of the south remain startlingly entrenched just below the surface of polite society. The shift that I noted in the Republican party has happened at among its elites and elites, even Republican elites, fully internalize new patterns of thought long before the man on the street has even begun to confront them.
Joe Blow has learned what he can and cannot say in public, but surprisingly little has changed about what he will say in private. Don't forget, I live down here.
I believe that a reversion to the old southern culture would result in economic class because I believe that political and economic freedom are, in the end, inexorably connected. This is one of the reasons that I think that Bush's inagural address was equal parts dishonest and just plain stupid. The China Experiment, started by Nizon and pushed forward most effectively by Bill Clinton is perhaps the second greatest test of the theory of Open Societies in the history of man. We do not confront the tyrants in China because we believe that the free market will eventually open up the political sphere. Since we can't go to war with them, this is really our only option.
If you accept, for the moment, my contention that the south would revert to its old ways, then the pattern of collapse is fairly easy to map. Highly productive citizens whose lifeestyles or skin color places them on the loosing side of regressive norms would move away, as would pregressive minded productive citizens (like you, I don't doubt that there are plenty of productive citizens who aren't progressive minded and would be perfectly happy to stay put. Huge swaths of the market for southern goods would dry up (Europe). Perhaps most importantly, the same ineficiencies that would have torn the south down eventually without the Civil War would come into play now. The productive core of free markets is mobility: social mobility and mobility in work. These would both be stymied in the regressive south. More later.
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