[PEN-L:4692] Re: beltway bunk, cont.

["Max B. Sawicky" <maxsaw@xxxxxxxxx>]

Here we go again.

JDevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>
> I wrote: > ... If there were a mass movement out there on the left,
> the real left, even Republicans like Dole and Clinton would
> listen (as Nixon did before them).<
>
> Max S. asks>> But there isn't, so where does that leave us?<<
>
> we have to ask "what does voting (or working) for Clinton (or
> Dole) do to create that movement in the future? (My answer:
> nothing. Neither of them will do anything to mobilize anything
> except support for themselves.)

Right, but we also have to ask what the right thing to do in the
short term is, and whether that conflicts with some kind of long
term strategy.  In the short term, a Clinton victory means somewhat
more potential for pro-labor policies and somewhat less likelihood
of the other stuff.

> It is imperative (especially in times like these) to have a _long
> term perspective_, rather than focusing on the immediate events
> and Clinton/Dole-type horse-races. (Except for amusement: I'd

I would be curious to know if someone has laid out a long-term
strategy for the left that paints a credible picture of how a
mass movement could arise out of current circumstances, and what
could be done to hasten such a process.  I haven't seen anything,
although I stopped looking in left publications some time ago.  An
example of such a picture is Luxembourg's The Mass Strike, but we
obviously need something a little more up to date.  I don't think
anything short of this is really a "long term perspective."  It's
just the haphazard criticism of whatever is going on married to a
set of positions or policy recommendations the public ain't buying
right now.

> > Clinton is a  disaster on the civil liberties front.<
> >>How's that? For ATF repression of the white proletariat?<<
> I won't dwell on the details. Rather, I'll make two general
> points:

Name a couple of details, why don't you.

> 1) If seen as acceptable, the tactics used against the far-right
> will be applied to the left, as they were in the 1940s & 1950s &
> 1960s & 1970s, when there was a significant left outside
> academia. Remember that the political establishment (including
> Dole & Clinton) equate the extreme left and the extreme right
> and will be perfectly willing to stretch the Bill of Rights to
> suppress them.

I presume this expectation is based wholly on theory.  The only
empirical point I could imagine is Administration cooperation in
suppressing the Zapatista's.  I have zero evidence that this has
occurred, but I would wager it has taken place.  There's also
Cockburn's stuff about Governor Clinton and U.S. counter-insurgency
in Latin America, but that's still in the not-quite-confirmed category
as well.  It's not quite civil liberties either.  Corruption in a vein
such as this is the type that seems most politically salient.

> 2) Clinton seems part of the movement to incarcerate all young
> Black men. He continues the silly and self-defeating (and
> many-incarcerating) "War on Drugs" and paints himself as a
> "Lawnorder Democrat."

That's not civil liberties; young black men are not being
incarcerated for their political beliefs or statements.
There is no such "movement" in any case.  There's a set
of public policies that push black men in low-income
families into the criminal justice system, which is quite
different.  I don't want to provoke a debate on law and
order right now, but I have to say that people who commit
crimes of violence against others ought to be put where
they can't harm anyone.

> >>More seriously, I think one difference between Bill and Bob is
> that the former, if confronted with a left mass-based insurgency
> would exploit it to get a lot of good things done, as FDR did when
>
> But Clinton didn't even try, say, to push up the minimum wage,
> when he had much more support in Congress than he has now. He
> instead used his political capital to fight for NAFTA, GATT, and
> an excessively complicated and bureaucratic and pro-insurance
> company health "plan." He had the beginnings of some grass-roots
> support with "It's the economy stupid" and immediately turned
> around and slapped them with NAFTA & GATT.

As I said to Henwood, health care was supposed to be Clinton's
payback to working people.  You can say that it was a botch job,
but you can't deny that the Administration invested a lot in the
effort.  As I also said to DH, although I opposed NAFTA myself,
it's a little problematic for a left person to fault the Administration
when many on the left, especially those not from North America or
Europe, support free trade themselves.

> Yeah, but what can we do NOW to help that movement develop? (The mass
> movement of the 1930s had its roots in the 1920s; it didn't just spring up
> overnight.) I think telling the truth about Bill & Hill's Big Adventure
> helps. Telling the truth is always important.

Nobody taking a stand here (in PEN-L) for truth-telling
has said why it is such a political imperative, or how history
validates such a posture.  Lots of things are true.  The
political question is which ones advance the struggle, and
the answer to such a question should not be borrowed from the
G.O.P.

> help. Voting for Nader may do so. Imagine if Nader got a million votes
> even though he's not campaigning. It's be a postmodern version of Debs'
> getting a million votes despite being in jail. It might spark some hope.
> Mass movements don't arise without some kind of hope ("rising
> expectations" and all that).

Does anyone know how many votes Commoner got in 1980?  I don't recall
any surge of hope following that effort, noble though it was.

How does hope spring from a protest vote for someone with a limited
grasp of the issues (in Nader's case, by inclination, rather than due
to personal or intellectual failings)?  What's the political process?
Are Perot voters more hopeful now as a result of getting their man
20 percent of the popular vote?  Going back to my reference to the mass
strike, my impression is that more hope in the 20's and 30's resulted
from practical victories in forming trade unions, winning strikes,
electing progressives (socialist or other) to public office, and dis-
electing reactionaries and centrists (e.g., Herbert Hoover).  I don't
claim to have a very firm grip on how this all unfolded, but your
justification, "it might spark some hope" seems flimsy.  Again, I don't
think this is a matter of cynical lack of optimism or faith, but an
analytical question of how good stuff happens.

Beltway Boy


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