Palin's Face, Klein's Language and the Problem of Self-Diagnosis
Sharon August 5th, 2009
I don’t like Sarah Palin, and I do very much admire Naomi Klein, whose book _The Shock Doctrine_ was one of the most important books of the decade. Had you asked me a few days ago whether I’d write an essay criticizing Naomi Klein for, among other things, her representation of Sarah Palin, I would have suggested that the odds were, to say the least, extremely low. And yet I find myself doing precisely that, which just, as they say in the song, just ”goes to show you never can tell.”
The problem with Naomi Klein’s essay, originally given as a speech, is not that we disagree about many of her basic observations about the problems we face, but rather that I think she’s allowing a cheap shot, and a false description of a moment to blind her to the scope of the real problem, and to throw up barriers to what needs doing. In the end, Klein and I agree about a lot – but the devil is always in the details, and in this case, her use of details troubles me.
Klein begins her essay using Sarah Palin as the embodiment of a moment in time, as the human version of the idea that our culture can go on as it is forever. She writes:
“I usually talk about the bailout in speeches these days. We all need to understand it because it is a robbery in progress, the greatest heist in monetary history. But today I’d like to take a different approach: What if the bailout actually works, what if the financial sector is saved and the economy returns to the course it was on before the crisis struck? Is that what we want? And what would that world look like?The answer is that it would look like Sarah Palin. Hear me out, this is not a joke. I don’t think we have given sufficient consideration to the meaning of the Palin moment. Think about it: Sarah Palin stepped onto the world stage as Vice Presidential candidate on August 29 at a McCain campaign rally, to much fanfare. Exactly two weeks later, on September 14, Lehman Brothers collapsed, triggering the global financial meltdown.
So in a way, Palin was the last clear expression of capitalism-as-usual before everything went south. That’s quite helpful because she showed us—in that plainspoken, down-homey way of hers—the trajectory the U.S. economy was on before its current meltdown. By offering us this glimpse of a future, one narrowly avoided, Palin provides us with an opportunity to ask a core question: Do we want to go there? Do we want to save that pre-crisis system, get it back to where it was last September? Or do we want to use this crisis, and the electoral mandate for serious change delivered by the last election, to radically transform that system? We need to get clear on our answer now because we haven’t had the potent combination of a serious crisis and a clear progressive democratic mandate for change since the 1930s. We use this opportunity, or we lose it.
So what was Sarah Palin telling us about capitalism-as-usual before she was so rudely interrupted by the meltdown? Let’s first recall that before she came along, the U.S. public, at long last, was starting to come to grips with the urgency of the climate crisis, with the fact that our economic activity is at war with the planet, that radical change is needed immediately. We were actually having that conversation: Polar bears were on the cover of Newsweek magazine. And then in walked Sarah Palin. The core of her message was this: Those environmentalists, those liberals, those do-gooders are all wrong. You don’t have to change anything. You don’t have to rethink anything. Keep driving your gas-guzzling car, keep going to Wal-Mart and shop all you want. The reason for that is a magical place called Alaska. Just come up here and take all you want. “Americans,” she said at the Republican National Convention, “we need to produce more of our own oil and gas. Take it from a gal who knows the North Slope of Alaska, we’ve got lots of both.”‘
And to a degree, all of this is true. But the problem with holding Sarah Palin up as the embodiment of business as usual, is that it is a cheap shot. I don’t like Sarah Palin, and I sure as heck don’t want her to be in charge of anything bigger than the local Elks Club. But if we are going to use Sarah Palin as the embodiment of our failure, to imply that our doom comes from the right, we need to ask what alternatives the left has proposed? That is, who isn’t Sarah Palin? Is there someone out there who stands up as the essence of this new, progressive movement that Klein claims is in progress, and that undermines our situation?
The logical candidate, of course, would be Obama. And while I am always a fan of the lesser of two evils, and give Obama sincere credit for some of his actions, I think an attempt to imply that our disaster comes from an ignorant right is a deeply false and troubling one. The contrasting figure, Obama, was a senator from the midwest, fully complicit in the massive ethanol boondoggle that helped create a new starving class worldwide, as cars competed with people for food. He is and was an advocate of so-called “clean coal” – despite the fact that there is no such thing, despite the fact that carbon capture and storage is a non-starter. He is certainly an advocate of continued economic growth, and I find myself queasily forced to admit (since I like George W. Bush a whole lot less than Sarah Palin) that I think Bush’s stimulus package, which at least put money in the hands of ordinary people who needed it, was more populist, more successful and more humane than Obama’s funding of the auto industry and a whole lot of re-paving and highways projects.
It would be just as accurate, and far less petty for Klein to state that the figure that represents business as usual, going on as we are, is Barack Obama. And in giving a speech to a group of people at a celebration of _The Progressive_ it would have been a whole heck of a lot more honest and more just. That is, the problem is not just the world vision embodied by the people you already don’t like, it is the problem embodied by the people you do, and in fact, by the people you are.
Klein claims that last August, we were actually “having that conversation” about the urgency of dealing with our ecological crisis. After all, polar bears were on the cover of Newsweek. I’m casting my memory back to last summer, and trying to recall a sense of invigorated national dialogue on the subject of climate change. I’m not finding it. If the subject was coming up in discussion more, which it probably was, although not nearly as much as Obama’s birth certificate or McCain’s fits of temper, or who would be VP, well, great. But the terms in which the discussion was occurring were still completely unrelated to the scale of action that we must function on to address climate change – and they still are. Yeah, there were polar bears on the cover of a national magazine – why not, they are cute, and as long as the issue is framed in terms of how much we care about fuzzy bears, it is conveniently placed outside of our own future and our own survival.
Now Klein goes on to frame our discussion in precisely necessary terms – she turns us to the basic idea that we have to end growth, that we can’t live on a planet that engages in the kind of rapine, endless growth modern capitalism that we have. I’m thrilled that she did so, and I think this is the important essence of the discussion – and Klein’s use of her platform to have it matters a great deal. She says,
“The President tells us he wants to look forward, not backwards. But in order to confront the lie of perpetual growth and limitless abundance that is at the center of both the ecological and financial crises, we have to look backwards. And we have to look way backwards, not just to the past eight years of Bush and Cheney, but to the very founding of this country, to the whole idea of the settler state.Modern capitalism was born with the so-called discovery of the Americas. It was the pillage of the incredible natural resources of the Americas that generated the excess capital that made the Industrial Revolution possible. Early explorers spoke of this land as a New Jerusalem, a land of such bottomless abundance, there for the taking, so vast that the pillage would never have to end. This mythology is in our biblical stories—of floods and fresh starts, of raptures and rescues—and it is at the center of the American Dream of constant reinvention. What this myth tells us is that we don’t have to live with our pasts, with the consequences of our actions. We can always escape, start over.
These stories were always dangerous, of course, to the people who were already living on the “discovered” lands, to the people who worked them through forced labor. But now the planet itself is telling us that we cannot afford these stories of endless new beginnings anymore. That is why it is so significant that at the very moment when some kind of human survival instinct kicked in, and we seemed finally to be coming to grips with the Earth’s natural limits, along came Palin, the new and shiny incarnation of the colonial frontierswoman, saying: Come on up to Alaska. There is always more. Don’t think, just take.
This is not about Sarah Palin. It’s about the meaning of that myth of constant “discovery,” and what it tells us about the economic system that they’re spending trillions of dollars to save. What it tells us is that capitalism, left to its own devices, will push us past the point from which the climate can recover. And capitalism will avoid a serious accounting—whether of its financial debts or its ecological debts—at all costs. Because there’s always more. A new quick fix. A new frontier.”
Why on earth am I quibbling with someone who gets so much right in this speech? She goes on to call our modern economic models a leaky pirate ship, and suggests we need to destroy the ship and buid a whole new vessel. And she’s absolutely right – that is, our economic models, our whole way of life, our assumptions that there are always more resources, have to change – they will change, one way or another, by virtue of climate change and energy limitations. Our only choice for a softish landing is to change them voluntarily, before we have no other options, and our window for doing so is getting very, very, very narrow. And the only possible option is to change as we must – that is, not as we want to, not as we are comfortable with, not as would be easy for us, but as the facts demand. And that change is going to be quite profound.
Klein gets the problem right. She gets that we can’t continue to live this way. But she still is attached to old enlightenment political categories that simply do not function well in the face of our crisis. She imagines a rapine right, selling the Business As Usual model, and a at least partially critical left. There is some truth in this analysis (and there is often some truth in the criticisms of the left from the right) - but not enough to take us where we need to go. Because the left has been complicit in creating other myths, just as false. It is the left who created the idea that we could buy our way out of this, simply because we want to retain our identity as consumers. It is the affluent left that has told us that if we just buy better products, if we just recycle more, it will be enough.
It is leftist environmentalists who have understated the scope of the problem, and who have told us over and over again that our economy will grow again, this time with plenty of green jobs for everyone, that sacrifice is not necessary. But when you look closely at the studies that support this idea, they all involve radically lower emissions cuts than those that are necessary, radically longer time frames, the viability of technologies that do not presently fully exist and the assumption that we have all the energy in the ground and all the money in the world to do it. All of those assumptions are fundamentally false – they are still working with old numbers, often with 450 ppm rather than 350 ppm, and without acknowledging that many of the things we thought we had a lot of time for – the melting or arctic ice, the leaking of methane out of the permafrost – are happening now, decades or centuries before even the IPCC reports expected them.
Left and right, working together, have conspired to create a culture of denial, have declined, for the most part, to offer clear terms to the general public. The right has claimed that we can drill our way out, the left that we can build solar panels in the desert and capture our coal emissions. Neither one has a remote handle on climate change, much less climate change intersecting with peak oil and economic crisis.
And this is why her talk bothers me so much – she gets the answers right. But until you frame the discussion correctly, we’re back to banging on the same old drums – back to arguing over who is better, Obama or McCain. Sure there’s a difference, and an important one, but that’s not the central question – the central question is how do we get to a leader who will actually deal with realities. Sarah Palin is one face of our disaster. Barack Obama is another one. And all of us wear that face too – every one of us who does not want the solutions to be too hard, too extreme, and thus, declines to fully understand the evidence in front of our faces; every one of us who desperately wants the solutions offered on both sides to be true, and thus, chooses lies over truth.
We do have to end growth. We do have to sink the pirate ship and build again. We also have to acknowledge the true state of our ability to do that – the pressing limitations on our capacity to rebuild. We do have to acknowledge what that actually means, and find a way to make it politically palatable to people on both sides of the aisle, because it is the vast middle, those people who are mostly neither left nor right, but who move with our political tides towards where they think their future lies, that matter most. As a leftist, of course, I’d prefer that wasn’t true – but we don’t have the time to change the world in every respect before we deal with the impending crisis. So the question becomes this – in what terms do we speak? How do we move the majority in the direction of the painful and necessary alterations that we face? And I don’t think we do it by making Sarah Palin the rhetorical face of our failure. Not when that wears so many other familiar faces.
Sharon
- America , citizenship , climate , peak oil
- Comments(49)
“It would be just as accurate, and far less petty … to state that the figure that represents business as usual … is Barack Obama … it would have been a whole heck of a lot more honest and more just.”
Stoutly said. And why is it that the only sorta-alternative we have is the so called “progressives” whose name comes from “progress”? You know, same old same old progress as usual, greened at the edges? The whole political game is bankrupt. The leaky pirate ship is carrying the progressives too.
In a fiat economy, such as the one the United States has, all are to blame. The only President, in recent years, to have actually helped our economy, such as it is, was Clinton. He lowered taxes, lowered the deficit, and tried to rein in our rapacious spending. We can look to Nixon as the one who severed us from real worth, based on something tangible like gold, and placing us on supposed worth…the strength of America as a concept.
So what is our value now? Hence the reason our worth is slipping.
When you have a society that believes it is owed something…and will go out to get it, regardless of the cost, indenturing itself and future generations…it matters little who, really, is the “face” of such a time. The face is the one in the mirror, for which one of us has not used a credit card, taken out a loan, or exercised usury in one form or another? We know (or care) little about stewardship: saving against that proverbial “rainy day”; using up or wearing out, making do or do without; canning, preserving, mending, sewing.
Anyone besides me know of a 29-year old couple who filed bankruptcy and had to sell their boat, their houses, their Escalades, and their other toys? Or is this just a West Coast phenomenon of gimme-gimme-gimme?
America is going the way of all once-Empires. The difference today, however, is that today’s myriad crises are not so much natural as they are manufactured for a purpose. There is little about these constant Level Oranges in today’s life that are real or natural. So real answers are limited. There is an agenda out there, and the agenda is to “take-over” everything that was once privatised; as if lawyers and political scientists know more about corporate life than, well, corporate managers and CEOs. See the 60-odd percent that the “gubmint” now owns of once privately-held GM…not to mention Canada’s stake in it as well (and China’s ownership of the Hummer-brand with it’s proprietary technology). Hmmm…I wonder if a stay-at-home Mom could run a bank???
I hope we can live with this change we can believe in. As for me and my house, we will continue to serve the Lord…
“It would be just as accurate, and far less petty … to state that the figure that represents business as usual … is Barack Obama … it would have been a whole heck of a lot more honest and more just.”
Yep.
Sharon writes:
“And the only possible option is to change as we must – that is, not as we want to, not as we are comfortable with, not as would be easy for us, but as the facts demand. And that change is going to be quite profound.”
The old adage applies:
“Understanding something is nearly impossible if your income depends on not understanding it.”
Now imagine applying that to an entire culture of consumption; to an empire of debt and war.
The change is going to come but not as a result of a collective understanding of the facts. It will come when the piper takes his payment.
Thank you Sharon for this well timed and thoughtful criticism of Naomi’s essay. I couldn’t get through it all simply because the very first few paragraphs seemed so mean spirited. I don’t like Sarah Palin as I’ve seen her portrayed by her own friends and family either, let alone the media, but it’s not fair to use her as a scapegoat in the way Naomi did.
DH and I got into several arguments during the campaign because I posited that BO was a tool of the corporations in a much more insidious way than JMC; I told him I hoped I was wrong, wanted to be proved wrong (I didn’t vote for either of them). Now to my sadness I’m proved right more and more every day.
Excellent post, Sharon. Completely nailed it, as far as I’m concerned.
Arthur
Thanks for the unvarnished truth, Sharon. You are so right, and I am so afraid. I’ve been preparing for World 2.0 for a couple years now, but I know I will still be sideswiped by the changes that are bearing down upon us. Thank goodness I seem to be able to grow potatoes.
Klein simply doesn’t like Palin, which is quite understandable, and I think she got carried away by her distaste.
You’re right about Obama continuing to be in the service of status quo…
The problem is that the status quo isn’t about to allow the change we need. They’ve got too much invested and too much payouts coming from The Way Things Are right now.
Almost everything geared toward mass consumption in this culture is engineered to keep us either fat and quiet or mad at something other than what could change our realities.
I kinda enjoy the turmoil. Makes life interesting.
I read this post, thinking that one of the more powerful factions in America isn’t even mentioned. The labor unions that B. Hussein Obama is so adamant to re-empower are completely and unequivocally invested in business as usual. And B. Hussein Obama is the face of the unions today, not Sarah Palin.
Perhaps even more important than convincing the “captains of industry” of the need for change, is getting support of the labor unions. Or, possibly before B. Hussein Obama, managing the ability of organized labor to oppose Transition and adapting. But look where we are now – Congress is diverted about spending a billion here, a couple billion there, on Cash for Clunkers – a federal subsidy to market cars for the companies they own (with the labor unions).
Current legislation proposals like HR 2749 Food Safety Act (Passed by the House July 21, ’09) and other pending legislation create new bureaucracies that embody even more inertia to continue as business as usual.
Sarah Palin’s appearance on the national scene last year was indeed a symbol – a symbol of hope for real change. Regardless of Mrs. Palin’s words and positions or even her record, it was her outsider, rustic background, her fresh voice, and her distance from the good-old-boys network that created a symbol that things didn’t have to continue as they had. Just reminding the nation and the world about Alaska, about resources that were not in the process of being consumed, that reminds us that there are other views than “well, we got that mountain mined out pretty good!”
I don’t defend Sara Palin as having any particular virtue. Like Sharon, though, I don’t think picking a widely know, currently weak political face and shrieking “There is the enemy!” is a useful tactic. It works for ACORN, I know, and labor unions, and I imagine for organized crime. For the people needed to support and fund the changes needed, though – well, I sincerely hope that shoddy political hack tactics don’t work for them.
given the insane level of resistance to something as obviously needed as health insurance reform – I can’t imagine what would happen if Obama tried to seriously take us in a no growth – sustainable economy direction – I can’t imagine anyone who could be successful in doing that. Consider the thugery going on now at town square meetings re: health insurance reform. Those events are a foretaste of what will come when things get worse. Not encouraging at all.
I fear change will come because as said above – the piper will demand payment. And even then you will still have the deniers and those who will respond violently.
Sarah Palin – with her energy policy of “drill baby drill” represented those deniers. I have no enimity towards her – it is what that mentality means in terms of any chance for a smooth transition that I dislike. There was a moment during the cap’n'trade discussions in Congress which summed up what we can expect from government – a Republican Congressmen got up and claimed global warming did not exist – and he was applauded by his fellow congress people. That says it all.
Sharon -
I’m fairly new to your blog, but really appreciate it. My husband and I operate an organic farm in upstate NY as well. I, too, admire Naomi Klein and I, too, increasingly believe there is virtually no difference between Rebublicans and Democrats. Both parties are for the status quo, albeit with slightly different methods of maintaining it. I am curious about one thing and wonder if anyone else has noticed it: Naomi Klein is a Canadian as are (I think) Stoneleigh and Ilargi at The Automatic Earth. Why so many enlightened Canadians?
Thanks for your hard work!
Brad- I’m completely open to the idea of unions having a stake in business as usual (although I’d also say that on an individual level most of us here in the US or other privileged areas of the world have a vested interest in wanting our lives to remain “easy”, as they have been in the last squandering 50 years or so, regardless of the disastrous future consequences incurred. It’s the human condition to desire more, and to fear change.) I also, like most on this website, have big problems with Prez O’s economic policy (and a few others). However, what the heck is with insisting on using the “Hussein” middle name thing every time you refer to Obama? Is it the silly “he’s a scary muslim” thing? Seriously, who cares? The racist implications drown out any point you might make, and, if true, are repugnant. If you said it once, ok, whatever, but honestly, every time?
President Obama is not the person I thought he would be and the change he promised is wilting like many of our tomato plants. He is trying very hard to maintain the status quo by throwing money at a multitude of problems solving none of them.
Sharon, you said: “Left and right, working together, have conspired to create a culture of denial, have declined, for the most part, to offer clear terms to the general public. The right has claimed that we can drill our way out, the left that we can build solar panels in the desert and capture our coal emissions. Neither one has a remote handle on climate change, much less climate change intersecting with peak oil and economic crisis.”
That is the very scary truth. Unfortunately, if we (99.9% of us) want a clear portrait of the climate problem we should simply hold up a mirror.
Thanks for this article.
Even if Obama were to come out against BAU in a speech tomorrow, and try to push for a fully sustainable economy, Congress would shut him down in an instant. People would tell their congressmen (from both parties) not to bother running for re-election if they went along with him.
No, the problem is not Obama or Palin, the problem is us. We want more and more, and the politicians are only too happy to give it to us.
Cecelia, you are absolutely right. President Obama has been in office for just a few months.
However, even the relatively modest changes he proposes are met with unbridled opposition. Your example of health care is spot on. Our challenges are enormous and the greatest one is to persuade and convince the public so that they in turn demand of their leaders accountability and visionary leadership in the area of sustainability.
We also have to learn to keep the dialogue civil and characterizing the president by his unfortunate middle name doesn’t get us anywhere. Nor do shots at Sarah Palin do the trick.
These are difficult tasks indeed and worthy of our best efforts. Strong leadership is absolutely necessary. Our job is to convince others that unless we change our behaviors drastically and fast, calamity is just around the corner. Be also aware that elected leaders generally don’t lead so much as they reflect the atttiudes of those they serve.
I’ll respond to Alane’s comment about “enlightened Canadians” … from the perspective of one who doesn’t feel particularly enlightened, just utterly confused by American politics in general.
As an outsider looking on, I must confess that I am amazingly puzzled by the majority of the American political content that I read. The whole idea that someone would have all their beliefs fall into one of two buckets just seems so … well, I don’t know, I guess it’s obvious to Americans, but Canadians are more accustomed to shades of gray, I think. We have a whole political spectrum to choose from … there are two main parties, yes, but there’s a smattering of minor parties in various positions along the spectrum, and perhaps having those options available keeps us aware of the mutliple constellations of opinions people might have, and encourages us to look at each issue apart from any others. I gather that in the US, if you declare your stance on one issue people make automatic assumptions about what your other beliefs must be on completely unrelated issues. Here, we tend to tackle each issue separately rather than lumping them into ‘left’ and ‘right’. When you are free to take whatever stance seems reasonable on a given issue (without fear of being branded as belonging to one group or another), I think that makes objectivity less expensive.
Because I don’t have the appropriate US political context stored in my brain, I don’t even see the references to ‘typically left’ or ‘typically right’ ideologies, and so blame and finger pointing goes right over my head. I read the original article and missed all of the points Sharon makes here about painting people on one side or the other with various brushes: I saw the parts about Sarah Palin as simply one example of a person who holds to the ‘myth of constant discovery’. I read the bit about Washington throwing money at the financial problems and thought “yup, that’s a mess all right.”
I’m not saying that the subtext isn’t there – it’s clearly very obvious to people like Sharon and other readers here – but when you lack the political context, the subtext disappears entirely, and without it, the original article has a whole different tone.
Maybe that explains something about the Canadian perspective … or maybe it’s just the Canadians-who-haven’t-got-a-clue-about-the-American-political-scene perspective … Stoneleigh and Illargi and others are much more up on all this, I am very, very certain.
Perhaps this wasn’t one of Klein’s better performances. Given how well she has generally spoken on the need for real participatory, proportional democracy, I think we can chalk this up to nobody being perfect, rather than to Klein herself representing some structural flaw the way Palin most definitely does.
(And of course the notion that it’s possible to be “mean” to Palin or “cheap-shot” her, somebody who seeks to rouse a rabble who would KILL us if they could, is beyond absurd.)
What I really don’t understand about this piece is the way it apes MSM political terminology. Someone who didn’t know any better would think the left has actually had an opportunity in recent decades to put any of its ideas into effect, as opposed to being completely disenfranchised.
Obama, “liberals”, and mainstream environmentalists are, by any historical measure, including American history, right of center.
(To the extent I’m still an environmentalist, I still have the EarthFirst! spirit, thanks. Believe it or not, there are some of us left. So to see corporate collaboration called “environmentalism” as such, let alone “leftist”, is an insult.)
So what we have is the hard right vs. the moderate right. The “left” is not even in the picture. Just look at the health care “debate”, including the MSM’s way of framing it, for a complete example. Keeping the status quo, or perhaps making it worse, is called the “centrist”, “moderate” position, an anodyne moderate reform like a real public plan is called “left” or “liberal”, while single-payer is not part of the discussion.
That’s the framing Sharon parrots here.
Mind you, I’m not saying the right-vs.-left frame is necessarily a useful one in general, and I’m always happy to hear suggestions on how to transcend it. But since this piece sees fit to use it in the conventional way, I’m doing so as well.
Certainly the structural problem is financialized corporatism, and there is currently no political alternative to it in America. Reps and Dems, conservatives and liberals, present one bleak panorama. And among the left there are also some who don’t understand Peak Oil, resource depletion, environmental limitations.
But it’s ONLY on the left that, to the extent these concerns are being politicized at all, you’ll find them politicized. So the key task is to organize a new politic around this, not to lazily say “everyone sucks” and do nothing.
To the extent I can own the term “leftist”, I’d first like my turn at bat, please, before I’m marked down as having struck out.
As an American who emigrated to Britain, I’m happy to get away from the Republican-Democrat continuum. Not that Brits haven’t happily taken on every gods-forsaken aspect of America that that they possibly can, including car-madness, maniac consumption and obesity.
But until you give up on all that political stuff, you will never free your minds.
There are only two groups: those that “own” almost everything and the rest of us. Arguing over the relationships between the folks in the first group wastes time.
Look around you — you’re surrounded by people in the second group. Get to work. Not “job,” work! We’ve got a lot to do. That includes you, Sharon!
Sharon,
Very nice. It’s good to see you break the “tribal politics” boundaries — there’s not enough of that going on these days.
peace,
Zach
Russ,
(And of course the notion that it’s possible to be “mean” to Palin or “cheap-shot” her, somebody who seeks to rouse a rabble who would KILL us if they could, is beyond absurd.)
This is entirely irresponsible, and I’m going to cry “foul”. The legions of “soccer moms” who felt that Palin was “one of them” and were energized by her campaign are not a bloodthirsty mob howling for blood, and is it slander to paint with such a brush.
The notion that someone is so bad that it’s impossible to be unfair to them would be called “demonization”, if someone on the Right did it.
Someone who didn’t know any better would think the left has actually had an opportunity in recent decades to put any of its ideas into effect, as opposed to being completely disenfranchised.
I am … astonished … at how both those on the committed left and committed right are convinced that The Other Guys™ have them entirely disenfranchised.
That’s a lot of disenfranchisement going on. You might want to ponder that.
peace,
Zach
My middle name is Mark, but I have no association with the gospels. So when others ridicule my atheism should they call me B. Mark? Seems a bit childish, as very few of us chose our names.
When the theory that no politician can say scary things (eg “lead”) ’cause he’ll be kicked out of office I have a one word reply – Churchill. Maybe he just had good speech writers, but here are two of his most famous quotes which have application today.
“The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays, is coming to its close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences. ”
“I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat. We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many, many months of struggle and suffering. ”
In thirty words each he wrapped up the situation. Hardly sounds like he was pandering to the unions and corporations, or the whims of a pampered public. And it worked.
Indeed, he was not re-elected immediately after WWII – but how many people know that part?
When his wife suggested that his party’s defeat might prove to be a blessing in disguise, he replied, “If that is the case, it certainly is well disguised.”
I don’t have any particular hero-worship for Churchill, I’m just using him as one example that there is such a thing as a “leader”, though it may be impossible for a person of that description to be elected to political office in the USA.
Russ, I think you overstate the “would kill us” bit, much as Klein overstates Palin. Were there some true assholes at Palin’s rallies of the right wing base – sure. But let’s not go overboard. Which “us” would they kill?
I agree with you entirely that we haven’t had a meaningful left in this country for a long, long, long time. I’m a leftist, not a liberal, and such a thing has not fully existed in political power in my lifetime, or my father’s lifetime. That said, however, the reason I’m using MSM political categories is that Klein sets those terms – she uses Palin and then goes to Obama’s win linguistically – she, a person of the left is positing Obama as a representative of the public left. I agree with you that we don’t really have a meaningful left.
But I guess I get tired of leftists whining about that – and yes, I do it too sometimes. It is worth remembering that in the 1930s, the Republican base states were all hotbeds of leftism – that is, the exact same people who would kill you, me and everyone, according to you (or their grandparents) were burgeoning young labor movement and socialists – Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska, for example, were three places where leftist movements were growing. Some of the failures belong to the right. But some of them belong to the left, and always have – I grew up in the leftist community, and I watched the “we’ll have it on our terms or none at all” nonsense, and the foot shooting, the obsessive division into little sub-categories. Since there’s not a single major political figure on the left in the US, I don’t think we can put up a logical contrary to Sarah Palin – Bernie Sanders can’t carry all the weight in the country
. So what other discussion categories are there “ok, the face of our failure is this guy who 70 years ago would have been a viable candidate but now doesn’t even exist?!?!” The very fact that Klein has to go to Obama as a contrast in her essay proves the point – there’s nothing there to represent the left as a major political figure. My own theory of dealing with our crises is that I only have time to deal with the essence of the thing – the problems are too serious otherwise. And re-establishing a meaningful American left that can appeal to the general public is beyond the scope of that project. But if you want to do it, I’d be thrilled.
Brad, I’m with Sylvia – what the heck was that nonsense?
Sharon
I should say I’m with Bryan – I think the claim that Obama can’t possibly do better is nonsense – there have been political leaders with the capacity to explain a vast crisis and call for sacrifice. The failure of our leaders to do so is a failure of their capacities. Saying that no one would let them lets them off the hook far too easily. The left blamed George W. Bush for not calling for sacrifice after 9/11 – if he was responsible to do so, so is Obama – period. Maybe he’d fail. Maybe he wouldn’t. But he’s failing already – perhaps he’d succeed, and if he did fail, he’d go out honorably, rather than dishonorably. And this bailout is dishonorable.
Sharon
Zach, I notice you don’t offer any examples of these alleged “left” programs you claim have been enacted (or have even been part of the “mainstream”, i.e. rightist, discussion).
Here’s what I see:
corporate welfare, continued consolidation toward monopoly in every sector, bailouts, war, tax cuts for the rich (which Obama and the Dems clearly intend to continue is they can), astronomical and rising weapons budgets, continued decimation of social spending, union-busting, alleged “reform” as a travesty and farce on every front (financial sector, carbon mitigation, “food safety”), the continuation of every Bush program and attitude regarding civil liberties and repression (even on torture itself it’s clear Obama just regards that as an ineffective tactic; he’s clearly not outraged by it or anything), I probably missed a bunch of things…
So what major thing did I leave out? It looks like a clean sweep to me: right-wing across the board.
So I await with great anticipation for you to explain to me how I’ve gotten it so wrong all these years. How everything I listed there is just a hallucination. How we’re really living in a participatory social democracy.
Sharon,
It just seems to me that it’s bad enough that the MSM engages in this fraud without what’s supposed to be the alternative media doing it too, because it seems to be the path of least resistance.
You think it’s a stretch to say that if they could these rightists would use their “enemy combatant” concept against political enemies within this country? You think all their “traitor” rhetoric is just rhetoric? You seem rather optimistic.
I’d have to go back and reread the Klein piece. Reading it last week I didn’t get any impression that she was seriously upholding Obama as an exemplar. I was more skeptical about her trying to represent Palin as a potential face of normal Republican corporatism, when it seems to me she’s more likely (or would be more likely if she weren’t so scatterbrained) to represent some kind of insurgency from the fascist base (the hard-core 20% who still support Bush).
It’s pretty clear that’s the way mandarin Republicans see and fear her.
Klein usually calls for new bottom-up organization, explicitly as an alternative to the political congealment both here and in Canada. So if she now really has started using Obama as her signpost of the “left”, that’s a new development.
I’m aware the left has made all too many mistakes, back when it did have clout. But that’s secondary to the rightist assault since the 70s, in explaining why the situation is so abysmal today.
It’s terrible having to work under these citrcumstances. As they say, “If I wanted to go there I wouldn’t start here.” But I at least hope Peak Oil will force some cracks in the corporate wall, since it’s precisely that wall which must come down of its own weight.
But if the stranglehold on the pseudo-debate enforced by the corporate media becomes the status quo of the blogosphere as well (e.g., as you can see my comment immediately attracted a flat-earther with the idiotic “both sides are the same”, temporally and morally, MSM meme), the embargo becomes complete.
It seems like I’m seeing this more and more, as the green-shoots-Obama-saved-us meme becomes more entrenched.
I will confess, if you had asked me six months ago how things would be in America by now politically, I would’ve thought something different from what we have today.
So who knows; maybe the few strong voices like Klein are temporarily retrenching. But I sure don’t like to see it.
In your last claim, Russ, we agree completely.
Given more time, I’d be more into the project of rebuilding a viable left – I have some hopes that one may emerge as a result of PO, but I think it far more likely a new far rightest movement will be the result, at least given the efforts so far of the American left. And the reality is that while we don’t have to get the whack-jobs on the farest right, we do have to get the vast middle, who mostly don’t care about ideology – they care about other things, mostly about how leaders and certain ideas make them feel. I think the left could get them – but not with the kind of incrementalism that Klein seems to me to be advocating – it would have to offer a real break with the past, and the language of heroism.
The American left has the crappiest agitprop on the planet – it drives me absolutely nuts. But waiting for that to get fixed before we deal with the crisis seems like a losing situation. I’m increasingly disinterested in enlightenment categories for politics, because there are people on the right and in the center I can work with. I realize this has risks, but the major risk (or likelihood) of working from the left is failure, and that’s not a risk I think we can take. I watched my father and others in my family fight for the left for literally their entire lives – I was taken in backpacks to demonstrations as an infant, I fought that battle from my childhood. And I watched it lose, and lose and lose. I’d still be doing it, though, if we could afford to keep losing, just for being right.
Sharon
While the left and right fight over how to change the burned out, but still flickeringm proverbial lightbulb in the basement, it’s refreshing to see there’s a level-headed and honest voice for change who is willing to say, enough already, we don’t need anymore talk, we don’t need to switch it out to a CFL, what we need is to leave it alone, let it fail, join hands, and walk out into the light of day.
This system is never going to change and no amount of window-dressing or lipstick will dress it up enough to hide the ugly truth at its core.
The only thing we can do is try to take the hands of the people we love and walk away from it. Not because walking away will fix what’s left behind. But because walking away is the only rational act we have.
Pissing in the wind is always said to be a bad thing…but I say go for it. A bladder infection hurts a hell of a lot worse than some wet shins.
Sharon-
It would have to offer a real break with the past, and the language of heroism.
I’ve long believed this is exactly right.
Obsession with “pragmatism” and dumbed-down language and goals is not only craven, but it’s less likely to achieve any meaningful reform than shooting for great goals. It’s actually less “politically practical”.
I’ve been sick for so long over how it’s so long been conventional wisdom that Bush squandered some tremendous opportunity right after 9/11, and then Obama came into exactly the same situation, and perfomed the exact same squandering.
(Of course the big difference is that Bush’s actions have always been consistent and made sense from his class perspective. Whatever else we say about him, Bush was always crystal clear on whose president he was, which America he represented, and always maintained focus.
But unless he was a purely malevolent liar from the outset, Obama’s actions are just inexplicable from any point of view other than that of cowardice and simply being in over his head.)
You’re right that there will be a new kind of right-wing movement as it adapts itself to Peak Oil and resource depletion. The main goal will be to preserve power, wealth, and the fossil fule-type lifestyle for elites as long as possible. It will be completely “reactionary” in the literal sense. The major resource policy blocks of this, as we’re seeing already, will include agrofuels, agricultural land grabs, and unconventional oil. Mainstream environmentalism may be enlisted as a feature, if that seems politically useful.
I call this “resource fascism”, others who have written on it call it “nationalistic environmentalism” (Alexis Zeigler), or “war socialism” in Jay Hanson’s version, although Hanson seems way too sanguine that the exploited won’t include the vast mass at home as well.
“This system is never going to change and no amount of window-dressing or lipstick will dress it up enough to hide the ugly truth at its core.”
I am with Daniel. Joe Bageant has a nice rave on “the bastards” vs the rest of us. There is something to be said for that. But mostly, we have a “dead system walking.” And “the left” is part of the walking dead, dontcha fool yourselves.
As an Illinois resident let us clarify – Obama is not “from the Midwest” he is from Chicago which is very different. Neither he nor our two senators represent a large portion of the state of Illinois. We may be liberal or conservative leaning but we certainly are not socialist and do not support the takeover of our health care system, our auto industry, banks or whatever the current administration has set their sights on next. Pardon my rant.
Jean,
First off, it’s quite an undertaking, speaking for the entire midwest.
So you’d have preferred “your” auto industry to fail along with all of its suppliers, then? This is a serious question, would you have preferred to see the big 3 along with all their suppliers? Does medicare offend you? How about government healthcare for veterans? What do you suggest the powers that be should have done instead?
Best,
Juliet
I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware that Chicago had been moved. Look, I don’t always share interests with New York city, but I don’t pretend we don’t share the same state, for cripes sake.
Sharon
Sorry to offend you all. Since you asked, I am not in disagreement with many of your opinions and conclusions and have learned much here. But Chicago is it’s own machine and the rest of the state doesn’t have much say. Ask any Illinoisan outside of Chicago. It’s a touchy subject here lately.
I don’t have an argument with anyone here. Least said, soonest mended.
Sharon, “I’m a leftist, not a liberal, and such a thing has not fully existed in political power in my lifetime, or my father’s lifetime.”
Really? Have you forgotten the Soviet Union? What is communism, if not “the left”? For 50 years one-sixth of the world was a hungry prison where most of the people lived in daily fear. What is Cuba, if not ruled by the left? I don’t know your father’s age, but he was probably alive when the National Socialists ruled Germany and planned to rule the world.
Those of us who read history can see the remarkable similarities to the rise of Mussolini and of Hitler and Peron to what Obama and the left wing of the Democratic party is attempting to push through as quickly as possible. One of the most effective tools of all of them was/is the cult of personality.
Bryan, “Maybe he just had good speech writers,”
Winston Churchill was a prolific writer. Churchill received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953 for his numerous published works, especially his six-volume work The Second World War. At the ceremony he was awarded the prize “for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values”.
He wrote his own speeches.
The discussion about Chicago vs. the rest of Illinois touched a nerve with me. As an upstate NY resident I often wish upstate NY and New York City were different states. As it is now upstate exists for downstate to plunder, exploit, and dump their trash. I also live within the boundaries of the NYC watershed, which NYC basically believes to be their own personal fiefdom to manipulate as they please regardless of the effects on the local residents.
Annl,
“Those of us who read history can see the remarkable similarities to the rise of Mussolini and of Hitler and Peron to what Obama and the left wing of the Democratic party is attempting to push through as quickly as possible.”
Sorry, that’s total donkey doo. It’s also insulting to insinuate that the other folks on this board don’t read history. Shame on you.
You had the last 8 years to watch fascism brewing. Having a majority of one party in the legislature that facillitates action is not fascism. Single payer healthcare is not fascism, either. Get your ism’s straight and try again, troll.
Juliet, please address the issue and counter it with an argument of your own rather than calling names.
I will say this – dont know why because I am sure I will be ignored here as usual – But Sharon, there is a 3rd alternative hardly ever brought up, and that is the issue of spiritual evolution.
The reason the human race is in this mess is because we have remained at a childish, immature level of spiritual evolution. We have the capacity to spiritually evolve light-years beyond our present level but…exoteric religion will not allow it because that would be the end of their power. And, the human beings committed to exoteric religion will not allow it because it is an affront to their egos that spiritual evolution goes light-years beyond their level of functioning.
It was obvious to me looking at my parents and the people around them, in 1974, that humanity is sick on a mass scale and that humanity was headed for disaster in one form or another. Research in transpersonal psychology, comparative esoteric spirituality and psychedelic research has shown conclusively that we are presently living at a mere larval level of existence compared to what we can be. But this is never mentioned.
So Sharon, the obvious question would be, how come more people dont know about all of this as the REAL solution to our problems?
Annl,
Saying Obama is the head of fascist cult of personality like Hitler is not an arguement worth responding to. It’s insane. Conversation over.
I know that this conversation is basically over, but I have been reading your blog for a month or so now, and I find your lifestyle and opinions so varying, that I find it hard to believe that you lean exclusively to the left. Oh course, you have the peak oil, and global warming beliefs that are very left leaning, but then you are a farmer. You know the great value of being self sufficient. You seem to believe that our needs should first be met by ourselves, then our families, then our religious community, then our local community. From this, I would think that you believe in local government control, and limited government. To me, limited government is talked about almost exclusively on the right, and leftest politicians talk about grand social programs that are national in scale. As mentioned earlier about labor unions, today they are much less about protecting the workers against the mean capital owner, as protecting bloated systems or business as usual. I don’t see how you can see these as good, even if they give the workers a “living wage”. As a homeschooling mom, I would also think that you might be in favor of charter schools, and giving local communities opportunities to try different types of schools for different types of children outside the traditional school system. I really enjoy your blog, especially the farming, and community posts. Just wondering if you feel that you are a libertarian even some of the time
Ilargi wrote 19 August TAE re US ‘Health Care’
“While these ideas are inevitably bound for head-on failure, what the present events meanwhile tell me is that there is a very real possibility that screws and nuts like Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck will be serious contenders for the White House.”
Some sort of continuity for the muddled masses I guess.
phil
sorry- typo, see my first comment, should be 9th August The Automatic Earth (TAE)
I’ve not gone entirely through the many comments on this steam so what I have to write will be read by few. THERE ARE FAR TOO MANY OF US. GET THAT! We have left far too little room on the Earth for other life forms. I was thinking, “what will happen when our society breaks down”. Specifically, how will we choose our leaders? How did tribal societies choose their leaders? We are headed for very hard times, and many of us will die, and we should be very clear about how we choose those who will succede us. Only a thought.
Wonderful articles! appreciate for sharing your knowledge around! Hope to read more of your stuff!
I’ll gear this review to 2 types of people: current Zune owners who are considering an upgrade, and people trying to decide between a Zune and an iPod. (There are other players worth considering out there, like the Sony Walkman X, but I hope this gives you enough info to make an informed decision of the Zune vs players other than the iPod line as well.)
I think that Sony needs to get their act together, if they desire to hold their customers !