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ATLANTIC ARTICLE AND FOLLOWING DEBATES
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Michael Meeropol
Hi All ---- I want to take off from Mark's following comment The quite standard idolatry of the free market is quite sufficient
to get us here. By the 1980s, the Republicans--and, yes, the Democrats,
too--embraced that notion that what's good for the market is good for
the society. This deepened over the next twenty years into systemic
faith that capitalism means that greed is a social good--and, conversely
rationalizing draconian cruelties inflicted on those who were least
able to protect themselves. This converged with a corporatized
Fundamentalist Christianity to create a religion of cruelty with the new
century. I am mostly (not quite 100 %) a supporter of the SSA (Social Structures of Accumulation) analysis of the stages of capitalist development in the US political economy. My book actually tried to straddle the two "left wing" macro-economic analyses (SSA vs. Monthly Review "stagnation" thesis) because I wanted to make the case that there was such a thing called the "Reagain Revolution" in the US political economy that was ENABLED by the Clinton Administration --- (Shameless self-plug -- book entitled SURRENDER, HOW THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION COMPLETED THE REAGAN REVOLUTION -- should be available on line for free) We have lived through almost 20 years since Clinton and during that period we had both the financial meltdown and the emergence of TRUMP and TRUMPISM --- which (you all know) I consider a particularly American version of fascism. I am now convinced that the best explanation for the last 20 years is that the neo-liberal SSA entered a period of crisis FROM WHICH IT HASN'T EMERGED. According to the traditional ("classical") Leninist version of Imperialism (I'm more a W.A. Williams guy but forget that for a moment ...), as hegemons (read British Empire) get challenged (read Germany) we get "wars of redivision" (read WW I) ---- Germany and Italy demanded a "do-over" (sorry if that seems flip -- I certainly don't mean to be) and so we had WW II --- which led to the emergence of a new hegemon --- 45 years of COld War (with hot wars all over the place but SOMEHOW --despite the Cuban Missile Crisis -- no civilization ending nuclear war) led to the demise of the Soviet Union but the FAILURE of the United States to consolidate its hegemonic status and so we now have the emergence of CHINA as the new challenge --- US CHina military confrontation is obviously something they both want to avoid -- but look for a LONG period of hostile "competition" .... Meanwhile, internally, neo-liberalism failed to deliver the goods which accounts for the emergence of the populist RIGHT (leading directly to Trump and OTHER authoritarian versions elsewhere in the world) and SOME left wing challenges (Sanders, some true left wingers in the Congress --- I would argue first of their kind since Marcantonio) ---- In the US this has meant that the Roosevelt Coalition that created the US political economy from 1945-say- 1980 completely fell apart ---- and Mark's quote with which I stated this post became appropriate. Where I think I disagree with folks is I don't think "the left" had much to do with this --- we played a major role in forcing an end to the Indochinese Wars and clipping the wings of American imperialism -- at least partially -- but with the end of the draft and the failure of the Soviet Union to be a MODEL for alternatives to western style capitalism, the way was opened for the ideological victory of neo-liberalism -- (David Kotzs book THE RISE AND FALL OF NEOLIBERAL CAPITALISM is the book that informs me most about this). We on the left had nothing to say about this--- in some nooks and crannies (fighting against welfare reform....) we may have had some marginal influence ---- with the end of the draft and the implosion of the "new left" into the various groupuscules --- Weather Underground, October League, RCP, you name it --- we were pretty irrelevant until the Bush Administration decided to take advantage of 9-11 to go after Iraq, (later Iran and North Korea --- remember those "promises") and CHOKED on that imperial overreach. Unfortunately, despite all this HISTORY that has occurred since the 1960s, we on the left are almost exactly where we were --- not very relevant to make real change --- and forced to choose between standing on the sidelines and criticizing or getting involved in supporting the imperial corporate democrats to defeat what some of us fear will be real honest to God fascism (and let's not go there --- we've all rehearsed the arguments ad nauseum). The only glimmer of hope were the Black Lives Matter demonstrations over the past years --- starting small in Ferguson --- building to a tsunami after George Floyd was murdered --- AND the various wildcat teachers strikes which showed the power of working class self-activity. The fact that NBA athletes forced a (short) postponement of games in support of the Black Lives Matter movement should be celebrated not denigrated --- If Trump stages a coup after November 3, we are going to need professional athletes to shut down sports along with flight attendants, teachers, you name it .... That would open space for "the left" while hopefully squashing the attempt to bring fascism to the US. So sorry this was so long --- hope it was somewhat useful in clarifying some points -- Solidarity, TUCK FRUMP, Mike
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Clarence Wilson <clarence.wilson@...>
Viewing this from Canada, it's hard not to think that everyone in the U.S. has gone mad. If this were happening in another country (for you), if Trudeau was badgered by reporters asking if he would recognize the results of the election, and refused to take their bait, would people in the U.S. say he was preparing to stage a coup?
One person cannot stage a coup.
Sent: Monday, September 28, 2020 at 6:48 AM
From: "Michael Meeropol" <mameerop@...> To: marxmail@groups.io Subject: [marxmail] ATLANTIC ARTICLE AND FOLLOWING DEBATES If Trump stages a coup after November 3, we are going to need professional athletes to shut down sports along with flight attendants, teachers, you name it ....
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Michael Meeropol
Trump has Barr He has his shock troops of demonstrators ready to “protect” voting integrity. And he has Fox News.
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Mark Lause
I hate to break it to Mike, but he seems to be agreeing with me. :-) Why Trump saying things isn't the same as Trudeau saying things is Trump's superpower. He built a career on bullshit. He regularly contradicts himself and most of the time he's saying what he says just for effect. Or even if he knows. He is, after all, an unbelievably stupid man. The coup stuff is being widely hyped. It says something that he's even posed it. And it's worth noting and good grounds for discussing the need for us to have the mechanisms necessary for a general strike (excuse me, I'm going tro need a minute to recover from a laughing fit). However, this particular threatened overreach seems to have persuaded elements of the power structure to push back.
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fkalosar101@...
I was a "folk" blaming the anti-vietnam-war libertarian left for what I still see as the legitimation of the false idea that you can have a left "movement" without serious socialism. You can to this day find this fossilized crap in the pages of (ugh!) Rolling Stone. Lause, Meeropol, Proyect and many others may be personally Not Guilty here, but the left as a whole fell for this like a bag of coprolites.
Of course, as Meeropol points out, there is a bigger picture--how not if one is any kind of Marxist?--but the "folk" AFAIK were speaking of a development in left ideology specifically, as manifested in The Movement so called, not of the broader ideology of American exceptionalism. This was the mother of all Lesser Evilisms and "we" (so to speak) IMO need to come to terms with this unless "we" want to leave the future to a bunch of airheaded autonomists who will inevitably go away sooner or later. Trump is a luftmensch who has a history of vacillation and of pulling his punches. But whether by accident or cunning, he has identified what a computer person might call "exploits" that can be used to hack the tottering Constitution to death--with the hyperventilated Hails of Ms. Rabbit and her fellow animals on the Supine Court. I don't believe that Trump could function competently as a dictator, but if he can get the Court to bless it, it remains conceivably within his grasp to seize that power anyway. The hacks are essentially done. Of course he would be overthrown by some clearer-headed person or cabal. But that would only seal America's fate. The left would then face a force comprising the Proud Boys and other militias in open and official alliance with the police and the federal government, with the terrifying might of the US military in reserve. Could this be fought with general strikes? Maybe. But how could that lead to the necessary seizure of state power? And how could general strikes be fought without an armed power in reserve given the force that would be brought to bear against them? If we are not to collapse because we have no army, no air force, no firing squads, and no prison camps for the thousands of armed counterrevolutionaries who will have to be put in their places by force, there had better be something in process as we speak to prepare the ground for what is to come. We may see "business as usual" in some form if Trump wins, but it will be business with its mask off--not "normalcy." 'movement"
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Clarence Wilson <clarence.wilson@...>
Trump and Barr? A two-man coup?
There are no shock troops. That's just Democrat fear-mongering.
Sent: Monday, September 28, 2020 at 11:04 AM
From: "Michael Meeropol" <mameerop@...> To: marxmail@groups.io Subject: Re: [marxmail] ATLANTIC ARTICLE AND FOLLOWING DEBATES Trump has Barr He has his shock troops of demonstrators ready to “protect” voting integrity. And he has Fox News.
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