Why The Berniecrats Aren't Going To Back Down

The houses above, like tens of thousands of others in Detroit, obviously used to look very different. But then came the advent of what was at first seriously referred to as "free market capitalism," followed by what was initially called "job-creating" free trade, followed by what was at least honestly referred to as the Great Recession. Throughout these developments, most in Detroit and America overall have seen the opposite of freedom or job creation. They've seen their livelihoods taken away for the benefit of a few corporate executives. They've seen their tax dollars used to fund unending wars (the volunteers for which largely came from poor areas of color like the one pictured), along with trillion dollar bailouts for the billionaires who caused the economy to crash. They've seen the system be redesigned to make it much harder for people like them to live happy, secure lives.

They've also seen the way those responsible for their misfortune have overwhelmingly responded to it: by blaming the victims. Just like hatred towards blacks had to be propagated for slavery (and the parts of its legacy) to be widely accepted, hatred towards the poor has been instrumental in selling the neoliberal enterprise. Thus the countless statements over the last few decades from corporatist politicians, right wing media figures, and thus tens of millions of ordinary people about how poor people aren't trying hard enough, how they aren't entitled to anyone else's money, how they should be self-reliant, etc. At no point has the majority of the population accepted this classist ideology, but the fact that it's been pushed so aggressively has had the desired effect: everyone who's grown up in lower class lifestyles throughout the last forty years or so is familiar with the view that people like them shouldn't be complaining about their situation.

The unintended problem with this is that when people are told their struggles are illegitimate and they should just accept the status quo, they do the opposite of become compliant. Except in the statistically rare cases where they've shown to fall for this neoliberal gaslighting, those left behind by the current system have overwhelmingly come to reject the oligarchy's agenda in recent years. This is clear in how the majority of Republicans now support single payer health care, higher taxes on the rich, and ending neoliberal trade despite their different views on these things in the recent past. More importantly, this awakening has shown in the emergence and so far spectacular success of the Bernie Sanders revolution, with tens of millions of people now actively working towards bringing the changes our society desperately needs.

But once again, while the dissenters represent the majority, we haven't been able to do our work for this movement without intense disdain from within the beltway. The attacks against us involving Stalinism have thankfully been relatively rare, but the more mainstream anti-Sandersisms, as articulated by outlets like the Washington Post, haven't been any less disingenuous: Bernie Sanders and his supporters are fringe, are purist, are unrealistic, etc. When the majority of the country backs Sanders and his ideas, the best the oligarchs can do is try to convince those in that majority that they're naive. And once again, as I'll illustrate, such tactics have a way of backfiring.

To the rank and file establishment loyalists, corporate news columnists, and occasional Goldman executives that denigrate what we're doing, I'll say it in a more complete and direct way than I've said it before: the Berniecrats will not back down. Just like we wouldn't accept that the status quo shouldn't be challenged, we will not accept that challenging it is naive.

We will not accept that a party which has hurt people of color through mass incarceration more than Reagan did, reordered the global trade system to benefit large corporations, caused the Great Recession by deregulating Wall Street, made the difference in Senate votes for the Iraq War, set us up for a new crash by refusing to adequately re-regulate Wall Street, escalated Bush's wars, took us to the brink of climate collapse, and so much more is an adequate alternative to the GOP. Nor that this party did not undeniably and directly steal the Democratic nomination from Bernie Sanders, who the majority of the Democratic base has embraced.

We will not accept that goals like keeping corporate money out of politics, ending the paradigm of perpetual war, and single payer health care are unrealistic when all of Bernie's agenda is not just practical, but politically attainable due to the revolutionary dynamics that are emerging amid staggering economic inequity. Nor that the American people, who are found in every public opinion poll to support these reforms, will reject Sandersist candidates in the coming years for offering them.

More to the point, we will not accept that those on the receiving end of the destructive policies Sanders' critics often champion shouldn't see their concerns addressed. We will not tell the Detroit workers who've lost their homes because of neoliberal trade and Wall Street greed that they're naive for wanting these things stopped. We will not act like the tens of millions of Americans now living in third world conditions because of lack of an adequate minimum wage, lifetimes worth of student loan debt, and an outrageously racketeered health care system aren't realistic for wanting these problems alleviated. We will not dismiss the struggles of the millions of people who've been unjustly incarcerated, the tens of millions who can't afford their obscenely overpriced prescription drugs, or the countless families throughout the global south who've been literally torn apart by the U.S. military empire because anyone says doing so would be impractical.

The political establishment essentially used this strategy of telling disadvantaged groups that their concerns are naive as a means to beat Trump last year. As a result, enough lower class and nonwhite people chose to opt out of voting for Hillary Clinton, and enough downtrodden Rust Belt residents chose to vote against Clinton, that the unthinkable happened. And now, as the majority's concerns continue to be sneered at by the members of the McResistance, an insane specter looms: when a major U.S. terrorist attack inevitably occurs sometime soon, and the Trump regime no doubt lays the case for totalitarian lockdown in response, most Americans, I predict, will jump on board the push towards nationalistic fanaticism. Because at least the faux-populist right wing extremists in the White House are different from the "moderates," who mock the very idea of change and barely even pretend to care about the needs of ordinary people.

Society is on the brink of willing self-destruction because of the political establishment's condescending and callous attitude towards the have-nots, and Berniecrats aren't going to stand for it. We will continue promoting our progressively populist message as an alternative to the Trump team's reactionary temptations. It may not be what Paul Krugman wants us to do, but it's what the people who used to live in the houses above would probably want us to do.

It Gets Worse

When thinking back to what the political climate was like in the early years of Obama's presidency, one gets a sense of deja vu. Amid the Great Recession, most felt betrayed by the political and economic establishment and strongly desired to change it, but in a lot of cases, this populist energy was going in the wrong direction; a political vacuum had appeared, and as often happens with political vacuums, demagoguery filled much of the empty space.

That era, as you remember, involved a surge in support for movements like the Tea Party, the rise of divisive media figures like Glenn Beck, and (somewhat below the surface) a growth of membership in far-right groups. The country had seen phenomenon like that before in recent decades, but in this instance, one person had reason to believe that such events reflected a far deeper and darker societal trend than usual.

In 2010, reports Chris Hedges, Noam Chomsky gave a disquieting assessment of the state of the nation, saying that the current situation "Is very similar to late Weimar Germany," the regime which preceded the Third Reich. As was the case in early 1930's Germany, he explains, faith in established institutions and the ideological center was eroding due to widespread economic inopportunity, and that opened up the door for political monstrosities to arise.

"The United States is extremely lucky that no honest, charismatic figure has arisen," he said. "Every charismatic figure is such an obvious crook that he destroys himself, like McCarthy or Nixon or the evangelist preachers. If somebody comes along who is charismatic and honest this country is in real trouble because of the frustration, disillusionment, the justified anger and the absence of any coherent response. What are people supposed to think if someone says 'I have got an answer, we have an enemy'? There it was the Jews. Here it will be the illegal immigrants and the blacks. We will be told that white males are a persecuted minority. We will be told we have to defend ourselves and the honor of the nation. Military force will be exalted. People will be beaten up. This could become an overwhelming force. And if it happens it will be more dangerous than Germany. The United States is the world power. Germany was powerful but had more powerful antagonists. I don’t think all this is very far away. If the polls are accurate it is not the Republicans but the right-wing Republicans, the crazed Republicans, who will sweep the next election."

Such an event failed to transpire in the the election immediately following Chomsky's prediction, but ominous signs indeed began to appear. In the early stages of the 2012 Republican primaries, some abnormally extreme candidates like Michelle Bachman and Herman Cain were close to being the favorites at one point. It was only after then, of course, that things really started to get crazy.

Donald Trump, who may have become president in 2012 had he not put off running, is regarded by many as just the type of person Chomsky warned about. "Be very afraid," warned James Kunstler late last year. "Donald Trump isn’t funny anymore. He’s Hitler without the brains and the charm." Chomsky's reaction to Trump's victory is similarly dire: "For many years, I have been writing and speaking about the danger of the rise of an honest and charismatic ideologue in the United States, someone who could exploit the fear and anger that has long been boiling in much of the society, and who could direct it away from the actual agents of malaise to vulnerable targets. That could indeed lead to what sociologist Bertram Gross called 'friendly fascism' in a perceptive study 35 years ago. But that requires an honest ideologue, a Hitler type, not someone whose only detectable ideology is Me. The dangers, however, have been real for many years, perhaps even more so in the light of the forces that Trump has unleashed."

This may sound ludicrous, but I do not believe Trump is the person he's talking about.

Chomsky's assessment of the factors behind Trump's rise is entirely accurate; exit polls in both the primaries and the general election show that Trump voters are generally resentful towards the political (though not quite so much economic) establishment, and the promise of change was for the most part what lead to Trump winning.

In this piece, I'm going to explain why I think that Trump, awful as he is, is just the prelude to a larger horror that's looming on the horizon. And first on my list of reasons for this is the fact that Trump's intentions have more do to with satisfying his own ego than changing the country. As Michael Moore very plausibly claimed in August, Trump's decision to run for president was originally more of a publicity stunt than a scheme to usher in an era of tyranny:

Trump was unhappy with his deal as host and star of his hit NBC show, “The Apprentice” (and “The Celebrity Apprentice”). Simply put, he wanted more money. He had floated the idea before of possibly running for president in the hopes that the attention from that would make his negotiating position stronger. But he knew, as the self-proclaimed king of the dealmakers, that saying you’re going to do something is bupkus — DOING it is what makes the bastards sit up and pay attention.

Trump had begun talking to other networks about moving his show. This was another way to get leverage — the fear of losing him to someone else — and when he "quietly" met with the head of one of those networks, and word got around, his hand was strengthened. He knew then that it was time to play his Big Card.

He decided to run for president.

Of course he wouldn’t really have to RUN for president — just make the announcement, hold a few mega-rallies that would be packed with tens of thousands of fans, and wait for the first opinion polls to come in showing him — what else! — in first place! And then he would get whatever deal he wanted, worth millions more than what he was currently being paid.

And though this cynical tactic to exploit the political process has evidently morphed since then into a genuine effort from Trump to become president, given the information above I have little reason to believe that he intends to commit to the job-or to his campaign promises.

Firstly is the issue of trade. One of the few legitimate problems that Trump has promised to address, the injustice of having corporations abandon American workers for higher profits is something that has famously made Trump win over many people who feel it hurts the economy. And yet Trump's actions so far have not matched his words; his VP pick of staunch neoliberal trade advocate Mike Pence was the first sign that he can't be trusted to confront this issue, along with the fact that all of his economic advisors seek to serve the interests of the corporations that benefit from the current trade system.

And then comes Trump's promise to "drain the swamp" of political corruption. In addition to how Trump is the most corrupt presidential candidate in history, this claim is made very hard to believe by the cabinet picks he's made so far, which include numerous lobbyists and former corporate donors to his campaign.

Other things that Trump has vowed to accomplish but likely won't is deport all undocumented immigrants, which he's decided not to attempt since being elected, and impose a ban on Muslims from entering the country, which the system won't allow him to do whether wants to or not. None of this is to say that he'll be unwilling or unable enact the other sinister policies that he and his aides have embraced-a return of waterboarding, a strengthened police state-but for the most part, it seems the authoritarian strongman that Trump supporters are looking for will not turn out to be Trump.

But if these failures of Trump's principle and integrity don't turn off his fans, who are extremely committed to remaining loyal to him, his handling of the economy will likely be what does in his initial support. Those in the bottom 99.9% of the income bracket, who are already very much feeling the financial consequences of forty years of neoliberal policies, will predictably become even poorer under the economic policies of Trump and the Republicans in the House and the Senate. And finally, the most dramatic way that Trump will betray his promises to improve the quality of life of Americans is by failing to adequately regulate the financial sector, which is sure to cause a new financial crisis that's likely to hit sometime within the first half of his term.

In short, though whether Donald Trump is charismatic is a matter of opinion, he is certainly not honest in his intentions. He may be a tyrant-in-the-making, but his inexperience, poor judgement, and lack of core values all make him destined for political failure. I can easily imagine that in time for the next election cycle, a great deal of Trump's former supporters will no longer view him as the appealing outsider who gave them hope in 2016, but as exactly what he is: another establishment politician. As Chomsky said, most demagogues and deceivers ultimately defeat themselves, and Trump will be no exception.

Unfortunately, this is where the opportunity will appear for the rise of something far worse than Trump.

While the extreme unpopularity of Trump circa the 2020 election cycle will of course make it easy for the left to win against him, the same will be true for the extreme right. It's a real possibility that after Trump has politically destroyed himself, a new demagogue who possesses far more skill and principle will beat him in the 2020 Republican primaries (or even upstage him while running third party) and become the next face of the ever more sinister American fascist movement.

If this sounds implausible, think of what author Umair Haque wrote last year regarding the direction that the political environment has been headed in for the past several years: "If I’d told you last Christmas that the leading contender for President of the richest and most powerful country on the globe had openly said that he was OK with armbands, internment camps, extra-judicial bans, and blood rights, unless you were a card-carrying member of Conspiracy Theorists International, you probably would have laughed at me."

And we may well see such an upset again, except this time it will represent something that genuinely resembles the Third Reich. No one illustrates my point better than John Feffer in his piece The Most Important Election Of Your Life Is Not This Year, the following quote from which, though I've used it before, is entirely appropriate for this article:

The real change will come when a more sophisticated politician, with an authentic political machine, sets out to woo America B [conservative America]. Perhaps the Democratic Party will decide to return to its more populist, mid-century roots. Perhaps the Republican Party will abandon its commitment to entitlement programs for the 1%.

More likely, a much more ominous political force will emerge from the shadows. If and when that new, neo-fascist party fields its charismatic presidential candidate, that will be the most important election of our lives.

As long as America B is left in the lurch by what passes for modernity, it will inevitably try to pull the entire country back to some imagined golden age of the past before all those "others" hijacked the red, white, and blue. Donald Trump has hitched his presidential wagon to America B. The real nightmare, however, is likely to emerge in 2020 or thereafter, if a far more capable politician who embraces similar retrograde positions rides America B into Washington.

While I used to think such an event would only materialize if Hillary Clinton had won, I now realize that the dark political energy capable of producing it has the ability to manifest itself regardless of whether a Democrat or a Republican is in charge. Either way, the factors which are causing these fascist, reactionary sentiments will continue to antagonize the public, inching the nation ever closer to tyranny.

And when it gets to that point, we'll no doubt look back fondly on Glenn Beck and the teabaggers.

Revolutionaries In Waiting

In a May 13 article, decidedly observant person Walter Bagman made a good observation: Hillary Clinton's Democrats are America's next Republicans. He says that they tend to be older and more affluent, and that they have "Decidedly negative views of Bernie Sanders, and the kind of economic populism he is promoting." He says that because of their comfortable economic position, their ideology "rests on the belief that nuance dictates moral ambiguity." And so from their perspective many issues, aside from those having to do with social justice, are not deserving of their concern. That includes income inequality, neoliberal trade deals, and destructive foreign policy.

There's one thing it doesn't mention, though: not very many of the "New Republicans" actually exist.

Bagman is not talking about Hillary Clinton's supporters in general. He isn't talking about the millions of middle and working class citizens who supported her in the primaries not because they wanted more unnecessary wealth for themselves, but because she promised to give them the amount of wealth they deserved. The same should be noted when criticizing Republicans; the vast majority of those who defend status quo politicians and policies are not benefiting from them.

As of this month, income inequality has reached a point that's literally unprecedented in American history. 75% of the wealth is owned by the top 10% of the population, and 90% of it is owned by the top 0.1%. And according to the most recent poll (taken in January, before Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump alienated many in their parties), Republican membership is at 26% and Democratic membership is at 29%.

When you put those facts together, just how inconsistent the interests of American voters are compared to the people they're voting for becomes perfectly clear.

And the polls prove it. Though most Americans aren't informed enough about the TPP to oppose it, only 28% of voters think that free trade deals like it have had a positive impact on the economy. Around 60% want to replace Obamacare with a single-payer system. 61% think that upper income citizens pay too little taxes. 63% think wealth should be distributed more equally. And though those numbers show that not everyone who isn't part of the financial elite support a fair deal for themselves, a highly appropriate 78% want the obviously unfair Citizens United law overturned.

But it's that population of Americans that are hurting from economic inequality, and yet aren't willing to address it, that the ones at the top rely upon to keep their power. And I'm not just talking about the economically disadvantaged people who accept their own poverty as merely a side-effect of capitalism, which are very much in the minority and will soon no longer be a large enough part of the electorate to have much influence. The main focus of this article is on those who understand that the system needs to be reformed, and yet choose to support politicians that have no intention of reforming it.

According to those opinion polls I provided links to, almost 75% of Democrats favor single-payer, 83% want wealth to be more evenly distributed, and 75% think that the rich pay too little taxes. And though I couldn't find a poll showing how many of them oppose the TPP, the fact that Hillary Clinton has had to lie about her position on it should give us a clue.

It's for all the reasons above that I believe the Democrats will soon diminish as much or nearly as much as the Republicans.

For as long as the party has existed in its modern, neoliberal form, its largely liberal base have accepted it as simply their only option. That is not going to last forever. As I've said in other articles, Democratic identification has been steadily decreasing since the start of Obama's first term, clearly for the reason that more people have become unsatisfied with he and the rest of the party elite's non-progressive method of "progress." In contrast, by the end of Bill Clinton's second term, Democrats were the most popular party by far.

The reason Obama wasn't able to sustain his party while using the same faux-liberalism and excuses for his failures that Clinton used can be easily explained: Americans no longer want excuses. As they see their living standards continue to decrease because of the almost consistently elitist actions of corporate politicians from both parties, it becomes harder and harder for them to put up with tired explanations like "we had to compromise" or "you don't have any alternative."

Soon the problems of inequality, lost jobs, lack of social services, and climate change will loom too large for voters to ignore, not even the ones who supported Hillary Clinton in the primaries and still see their party as a force for good. In time they will abandon it and its excuses for avoiding change, simply out of self-preservation.

As Bagman says, we are seeing a realignment. At the end of the article, he predicts that as time goes on, the more affluent Democrats will pivot towards the Republican Party. When adding what I've mentioned, it seems like this migration will take place as the Democratic Party diminishes to irrelevance, giving the upper-class minority a new political perch to try to promote their agenda. But after that, the Republicans will of course be overtaken by a populist third party, most likely the Greens.

If you think that's too much to assume, keep in mind that the "Demexit" has indeed only begun.

We Need A Cure For Trumpism

"Carrier [US air conditioning company] is moving to Mexico. I would go to Carrier and say, 'You're going to lay off 1,400 people. You're going to make air conditioners in Mexico, and you're trying to get them across our border with no tax.' I'm going to tell them that we're going to tax you when those air conditioners come. So stay where you are or build in the United States because we are killing ourselves with trade pacts that are no good for us and no good for our workers"

"The TPP is a horrible deal. It is a deal that is going to lead to nothing but trouble. It's a deal that was designed for China to come in, as they always do, through the back door and totally take advantage of everyone. It's 5,600 pages long, so complex that nobody's read it. This is one of the worst trade deals. And I would, yes, rather not have it. We're losing now over $500 billion in terms of imbalance with China, $75 billion a year imbalance with Japan."

"I am all for free trade, but it's got to be fair. When Ford moves their massive plants to Mexico, we get nothing. I want them to stay in Michigan."

If you started to get a feeling that something wasn't quite right about those statements despite agreeing with them, your intuition is correct; they're Trump quotes.

Human beings have two emotions from which all others branch out: love and fear. Distinguishing from them sounds easy, but in situations of stress, we often fail to. As the world reacts to record numbers of refugees, economic inequality and the possibility of another financial crisis, it's essential that we recognize Donald Trump and others like him represent a paradigm of fear.

And Americans know it. 63% of them dislike Donald Trump, 60% disagree with his goal to build a wall to keep Mexican immigrants out, and there is of course a majority sentiment that his irrational ideas of hate and division no longer have any place in society.

Or is there?

What I'm about to tell you might come as a big surprise: most Americans agree with Trump's plan to bar Muslims from entering the country. This was found out in a March YouGov/Huffington post poll that showed 51% of the country sides with him on that issue.

In case you think I typed that number wrong, I'll do it again: 51%.

When I first saw that statistic, I assumed that anti-Islamic sentiments are still held by a minority of Americans, and that so many believe Muslims should be shut out simply because they're confused about the right methods to stop terrorism.

I was wrong again.

The most recent poll shows that 58% of the country holds an unfavorable view of Muslims. To assure you again that I typed that correctly, it's 58%.

To make you feel a little better, the majority of Americans still have a positive view of immigrants, but the strength of Trump's message of hostility towards the other should not be underestimated. And what many in the media have failed to notice is that the main appeal of Trumpism doesn't even have anything to do with bigotry.

Someone more qualified to reveal just why Trump is succeeding is Thomas Frank, who wrote on March 7 that

Stories marveling at the stupidity of Trump voters are published nearly every day. Articles that accuse Trump’s followers of being bigots have appeared by the hundreds, if not the thousands. Conservatives have written them; liberals have written them; impartial professionals have written them. The headline of a recent Huffington Post column announced, bluntly, that “Trump Won Super Tuesday Because America is Racist.” A New York Times reporter proved that Trump’s followers were bigots by coordinating a map of Trump support with a map of racist Google searches. Everyone knows it: Trump’s followers’ passions are nothing more than the ignorant blurtings of the white American id, driven to madness by the presence of a black man in the White House. The Trump movement is a one-note phenomenon, a vast surge of race-hate. Its partisans are not only incomprehensible, they are not really worth comprehending.

But that is not the case. Or at least not entirely. Aside from those who support him because they are genuinely bigoted or because they want to remain loyal to the Republican Party, many are drawn to him for his positions on trade.

"In each of the speeches I watched," wrote Frank, "Trump spent a good part of his time talking about an entirely legitimate issue, one that could even be called leftwing. Yes, Donald Trump talked about trade. In fact, to judge by how much time he spent talking about it, trade may be his single biggest concern – not white supremacy. Not even his plan to build a wall along the Mexican border, the issue that first won him political fame."

And it's paid off. I have to confess that even I in a way see him as preferable to Hillary Clinton for the reason that he won't pursue the TPP if elected (or at least it's not likely that he will-he's lied about a lot of other things). And largely, the professional class that makes up those in the major media have either ignored this fact or divisively used it as a method to make those who oppose free trade appear non-serious and paranoid. (For example, Time columnist Joe Klein, in a clear reference to Trump's opposition to free trade deals, once condescendingly dismissed the concerns of the anti-neoliberal left. "What remains of conservatism?" Wrote Klein. "I’m tempted to say: only the nasty bits–nativism, isolationism, protectionism. But a broad swath of the Democratic Party is every bit as nasty. Bernie Sanders’ supporters eschew nativism but adhere to the latter two isms, and socialism as well.")

The same is the case for the other Trumpist movements around the world, such as the pro-Brexit campaign, whose core argument aside from fear of immigrants was resisting globalism. (Sadly, they ignored that what they were pushing for was not in fact against free trade but for it, and it backfired.) And while the issues that politicians like Trump bring up are indeed in the interest of keeping people's jobs, their followers are not supporting the greater good. Trumpism calls for wasting time and resources on controlling scapegoated racial and religious groups, neoliberal goals like the merging of corporation and state, and the violation of civil liberties out of obsession with national security. Trump may be right about a few things, but he and his political type do not care about the needs of the people.

Trump supporters that call themselves part of the silent majority may not be kidding themselves after all-the population is poor, rightfully angry at the neoliberal policies of leaders like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, and therefore vulnerable to Trump's propaganda.

And the effort to resist it may not even necessarily involve keeping Trump himself out of the White House, which will become only harder from here as his opponent's poll numbers continue to drop and she undergoes another FBI investigation. If he does defy the demographics and win, he'll be an ineffective president with congress mediating his every move and the opportunity for an unstoppable progressive counter in 2020. It's the longer term war of ideas that Trump must lose.

This country is ripe for a revolution. Income inequality is at a record high, millions of people are lacking higher education and health care, and the financial and political elite are allowed their own set of laws. But unless the disadvantaged masses address these problems with a rational and level head, Trump and others will twist all of our populist energy into support for the implementation of a fascist dictatorship.