A Radical Response to the

Regressive Resurgence

By Peter E Fowler

Problem Statement: In some Western countries, right-wing populism has been able to channel much of the anger caused by the Financial Crisis and its effects. Why has the Left been marginalized? How can this be overcome?

Locating the Problem

The essay question presents the problem in terms of a resurgence of right-wing populism “in some Western countries,” and the subsequent marginalization of the Left. While the author comprehends the global nature of the current crisis, for the purpose of this essay I will limit my analysis to the historical and contemporary situation in the United States. I recognize that the symptoms of the regressive resurgence are not limited to the United States, that indeed many Western nations appear to be in the grips of an atavistic ideological assault. But I will limit my analysis here to the social situation with which I am most familiar, and I will not assume universality in the nature of the socio-historical preconditions of the current crisis extending to other societies. Contrary to assuming a universal context, I contend that the situation in the United States is unique and so ought to be examined separately from an ambiguous bloc of “Western countries.” Then in formulating a strategic response, I will look to current and historical events from the international stage, as a global perspective is imperative for moving forward in the struggle.

For the sake of clarity, I also wish to bring to the reader’s attention at this point certain terminology I employ in this discussion. Rather than repeatedly describing mainline media outlets as right-wing and/or corporate-owned media, I simply use “Media,” as its role as an “ideological State apparatus” is a given.[i] When referring to extreme right-wing and reactionary ideology, groups, or individuals I will use “regressive” or “regressivism,” as the terms “conservative” and “conservativism” are no longer intellectually honest in describing the political-ideological disposition at issue. I use “Domination System” in an attempt to capture that difficult to define and amorphous, institutional manifestation of Power Over – hegemony, exploitation, inequality, and oppression – that is sometimes called the System, the Establishment, the Apparatus, or the Man, that may include but not be limited to global capitalism/finance, the military-industrial complex, law enforcement, public education, Media, etc. Lastly, I use “Americanism” to describe a complex ideology comprised of American values, ideals, and worldviews; and “Narrative Americana,” or simply “Narrative” refers to the primary rhetorical vehicle for conveying and reinforcing Americanism.

Now we can turn our attention to the question at hand, and I submit the following assessment of the origins of the situation:

The Great Financial Crisis began somewhat inconspicuously in late summer 2007 with the failure of two Bear Stearns hedge funds, and then went from bad to worse over the following year despite countless attempts by governments to halt its progress. It is now universally recognized as the worst economic crash since the Great Depression.[ii]

We are now two years on from that observation by John Bellamy Foster and Fred Magdoff, and although perhaps the epic financial collapse of 2007-08 has passed, in its wake the real living conditions of working people in the US have continued to go “from bad to worse.”  The crisis exploded fully on the American people in 2008 and, despite Media’s parroting of White House propaganda about “recovery,” the crisis is still devastating the American working class in mid-2011. The federal government’s response to the debacle was to issue the now infamous “bailouts” of the very financial institutions that were largely responsible for the financial meltdown. These bailouts, in conjunction with the continuation of Bush-era tax cuts, facilitated a massive transfer of wealth upward, from the majority of American families to the wealthiest 1%.

While the federal government was employing unprecedented measures to rescue private financial institutions with public monies, millions of Americans were losing their homes, their jobs, their pensions and/or savings, and every other piece of the American Dream for which they had worked and sacrificed. To make matters worse, what was left of a social safety net was being shredded, as unemployment benefits ran out and the government targeted Medicare and Social Security for deep cuts or even their total elimination. The government that was supposedly “of the people and for the people” had been exposed as being of the oligarchs and for the corporations, as hard-earned tax dollars were lavished on the crooks and liars who were responsible for the crisis in the first place.

Understandably, the outrage generated by this monumental betrayal swept through the population and eventuated in a groundswell of political mobilization.  A new brand of right-wing populism emerged and spawned the nefarious tea party movement. Tea party groups sprung up around the country and rallies drew crowds of angry protesters. These seemingly spontaneous meetings and rallies coalesced into an organized political faction, which ran dozens of candidates in local, state, and national elections, usually on Republican Party tickets. The influence of this group and the electoral success of several of its candidates reflect the resurgence of regressivism in mainline American politics. The election of regressive Scott Brown to the late Edward Kennedy’s Massachusetts Senate seat and “Tea Party darling” Sharon Angle’s narrow defeat to Harry Reid in Nevada are two of the more startling demonstrations of this right-wing momentum.

But upon close examination, one can plainly see that the tea party phenomenon was anything but a grassroots movement. What appeared to be a groundswell of righteous indignation was in reality a headwater of regressive and corporate interests. The liberal media aptly labeled this fraud “Astroturf,” after the fake grass that may resemble the real thing but is in reality an inadequate and potentially harmful fabrication. Meanwhile, even the smallest tea party rallies made headlines, as Media gave maximum exposure to any and every flag-waving crowd of regressives that claimed to be indignant about “big government” and its profligate liberal enablers, i.e. Democrats. At the same time, progressive events were largely disregarded by Media. Just one example of Media’s disproportionate coverage was the Tea Party Convention in Nashville in February 2010, which drew less than 600 attendees, yet was headline news for every major Media outlet. Contrast this to the US Social Forum held in Detroit five months later that drew over 10,000 leftists and liberals. This latter event was virtually ignored by American Media, as were anti-war marches and rallies protesting draconian immigration legislation in several states. The contrived nature of the tea party has been exposed since then in numerous publications, periodicals, blogs, and books, with titles like Crashing the Tea party: Mass Media and the Campaign to Remake America (by Paul Street & Anthony DiMaggio).

While the complicity of Media with regressive and corporate interests in propelling the tea party into national prominence cannot be denied, and resentment of “big government” is a longstanding feature of right-wing politics, the current resurgence of regressivism cannot be properly understood without what is arguably its most salient feature: racism. It is not mere happenstance that the rise of ultra-regressive politics coincided with the ascendancy of Barack Obama to contender for the Presidency of the United States. The timing of the Great Financial Crisis was a convenient diversion for white nationalists (i.e. racists) to emerge and organize to “take our country back” – from the black Muslim socialist who wasn’t even born here and his cohort of radicals bent on destroying America. Throughout 2008 the Obama phenomenon overwhelmed national politics, and the Senator from Illinois gradually eclipsed all Democratic contenders, save former First Lady Hillary Clinton.

Obama’s ascendancy was a unifying and uplifting experience for black America. And obviously, he needed a significant portion of white voters to support him to attain the Presidency. White liberals were feeling vindicated in their idealism as they propelled their non-white, anti-war, Democratic change agent toward victory to finally repudiate the tyranny of the Cheney-Bush cabal. However, much of white America could not (and cannot) tolerate an African-American in the White (man’s) House. In addition to the Obama candidacy and Presidency being groundbreaking historical events, they were (and are) earth shattering social disturbances for regressive and racist white America. So white America became sharply divided, and the tea party became the acceptable vehicle for white nationalists to express their revulsion toward Obama by proxy targets such as “big government.” Again, voluminous research makes plain the reality that tea party rank-and-file is deeply delusional and thoroughly racist, and that corporate interests are exploiting this to the utmost in pursuit of their regressive agenda.

Why Has the Left Been Marginalized?

Ideologically: Americanism and Narrative Americana. We must be clear at the outset that the silencing of voices on the Left is not a sudden or inexplicable phenomenon. Its roots go much deeper than the current crisis of the Left. Rather, it is the unfortunate but not unexpected result of over two centuries of right-wing attacks on liberalism. The American Narrative is founded on right-wing platitudes such as rugged individualism, individual “rights,” American exceptionalism, and the hackneyed exhortations of the so-called Protestant work ethic. The fledgling nation established a legal precedent of crushing dissent in passing the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798. In antebellum America, the Left struggled mightily against the conservative establishment to topple the institution of slavery. The industrial revolution brought the struggle for organized labor and humane working conditions. Throughout the 19^th century these struggles were waged against three branches of the federal government that supported the plantation aristocracy and the captains of industry at every turn. The 20^th century ushered in a new era of regressive rhetoric and reactionary witch hunts, the Espionage and Sedition Acts of 1917/18 setting the tone for a new century of repression. Shortly after World War I the federal government created an office that would evolve into a massive domestic policing apparatus bent on crushing leftist and militant black groups – the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

The FBI spearheaded a relentless campaign of rabid anti-communism that over time became part of the fabric of regressivism and one of the major themes of the Narrative. Generations of Americans were being indoctrinated into a delusional ideology that demonizes socialism/communism as an aggressive, inhuman, and “godless” attack on freedom and democracy. Any liberal/leftist individuals or groups could be slandered with the “communist” label and be instantly discredited and even prosecuted. The FBI spawned the Counterintelligence Program, or COINTELPRO, to attack leftists and black radicals over several decades under the guise of fighting communism. By 1980 the FBI had effectively crushed the Left in America through any nefarious means at its disposal, including murder and assassination.[iii] With the election of Ronald Reagan, regressivism had thoroughly taken hold at every level of society, the culmination of the Goldwater conservatives’ nearly 20-year drive to restore regressivism not only to the pinnacle of American politics, but to the core of the American psyche. The table was set for Reagan to launch attacks on workers at home, prosecute wars abroad, and redouble the arms race against “the evil empire” (USSR), and otherwise set in motion an aggressive reactionary agenda to further marginalize liberalism in America.

Now, thirty years after Reagan’s first inauguration, the regressive resurgence is at its zenith, led by the erstwhile “liberal,” Democratic President Barack Obama, who is pursuing a reactionary agenda that Reagan could never have imagined attempting. Meanwhile, the irony and idiocy of white nationalists continuing to lambaste the melanic President for his “socialist” agenda is further evidence of a deeply delusional citizenry. The American body politic is largely comprised of people who either 1) believe the absurdly incongruous “logic” brewed up by tea partiers, or 2) are unwilling to challenge the ignorance and racism of those who propagate such nonsense. This current predicament points up the efficacy of the Narrative in purveying right-wing ideology for generations, spewed out over decades by Media and codified in public education curriculum.

The venerated status of this particularly repugnant brand of Americanism transcends even its position as dominant political ideology.  Since the demolition of the World Trade Centers in September 2001 and the ensuing war on reason, regressive Americanism has taken on axiological meanings. Americanism and fundamentalist Christianity have been conflated into a new moral worldview in which right and wrong are inseparable from America’s national interests, as defined by the market and the military. We are seeing the proliferation of churches with names like “Church USA” whose tripartite authority consists of the Bible, the Constitution, and “the free market.”[iv] It is within this ideological maelstrom that liberalism has been not merely marginalized, but demonized, and leftists equated with “evildoers.” A definitive example of this Orwellian world is the relentless attacks on WikiLeaks for (gasp) exposing the brutal reality of American militarism. With radical right-wing ideology having thoroughly saturated the American Narrative and penetrated every level of public dialogue, regressives can now boast of having achieved full-spectrum ignorance in American political discourse.

 

Institutionally: Permanent War, Corporatism, and Capitulation. In addition to the right-wing ideological offensive waged for the minds of Americans (such as they are), several recent institutional developments are worth noting, as well. Firstly, the oligopoly of Media conglomerates has all but eliminated non-corporate voices from the airwaves. The Federal Communications Commission has given Media behemoths free reign on gobbling up as many outlets as possible, creating a Media monolith that not only manufactures consent among the masses, but also manipulates policy direction at the highest levels of government. The current scandal within the Murdoch Media Empire has exposed the thorough corruption of the democratic process itself. It is true that, as of this writing, the Murdoch scandal is located primarily within the United Kingdom. But the ongoing operation of Fox News (sic) is daily evidence of the seamless connection between American Media and right-wing politics. And now, thanks to the Citizens United ruling by the Supreme Court in 2010 that has firmly entrenched corporate power at the helm of the American political process, Media and the rest of the oligarchy can legally purchase public office.[v]

Secondly, America is indisputably in an era of permanent war. The US is now embroiled in multiple, long-term foreign wars and occupations that have no ends in sight (as ending a war would be a cowardly act of “cutting and running”). The number of military bases and militarized “embassies” around the globe is well over 700. Military spending is the one component of the federal budget that, even in an age of “austerity,” continues to grow. Militarism is becoming the defining element of American culture and the cultural rhetoric, the Narrative, has evolved to support it. The lessons of Vietnam were not lost on the war makers. No longer do newsreels bring the bloody horrors of war into our living rooms, and no longer are returning soldiers berated and spat on for besmirching America’s image. The Domination System has sanitized war for the rest of us, and has elevated soldiers to the status of demigods.  More than this, it has transformed wars of aggression over resources into a cosmic struggle of good versus evil in which America alone defends freedom, liberty, and democracy from the jihadist hordes and the “axis of evil.” In this surreal environment opposing war is “un-American,” and is grounds for persecution – we have seen numerous cases of peaceful anti-war groups being infiltrated by government spies. So the Left is further marginalized under this onslaught of mindless jingoism. It is the war resister who is berated and spat upon in this New American Century. Any documentation of the bloody horrors of war is contraband, found only at controversial Internet sites, while those who dare expose the atrocities are not heroes but pariahs (e.g., Bradley Manning, Julian Assange).

Any conversation about the American war machine is incomplete without a discussion of the ongoing and escalating war within the borders of America, on American citizens and undesirable immigrants. I am referring to the meteoric rise of the prison-industrial complex and the incarceration of ever-growing numbers of Americans. In 2011 there are over 2.3 million men and women in prison or in jail in the United States, a staggering rate of roughly 1 in 99 adults. No other nation on earth incarcerates its citizens with such zeal and frequency, even as violent crime rates have declined. The real criminal enterprise facilitating this explosion of incarceration is found not in the streets amongst gangs and drug lords, but in boardrooms and party headquarters amongst conniving capitalists and their complicit politicos. Detention and penal facilities make enormous profits for the corporations that build and operate them, and now, as a result of privatization, for shareholders who trade stock in them. Could there be a more inhumane and parasitic enterprise for the naked accumulation of profit? Yet the logic of Americanism supports this domestic war on its own people, just as it does foreign wars on the cultural other. So the domestic police state preys on the poor and people of color to populate more and more prisons and to fuel this new “market.” It must also be noted that incarceration has been for several decades the preferred method of silencing dissent, so America, the “land of the free” and  protector of freedom of speech, is warehousing hundreds, perhaps thousands, of political prisoners whose only crime was refusing to be silent.[vi]

Obviously, this has a deleterious effect on the vitality and viability of the Left. And with the corporate-military takeover now underway in America’s public schools, another generation’s indoctrination into regressive ideology is further secured for the Domination System. Wall Street is already setting the agenda for restructuring public education, and the Pentagon has free reign for recruiting in America’s schools and universities, as well as in funding science and technology while arts and humanities disappear. Military-themed charter schools are on the rise and Junior ROTC programs are ubiquitous in urban school systems. Another lesson learned by the Domination System: Conscription breeds resistance, but an all-volunteer military is above reproach. That most of these “volunteers” have been coerced into service due to lack of post-graduation options and embellished recruiters’ tales of “seeing the world” and “be all you can be” is, of course, excluded from the Narrative.

Finally, another disastrous development directly connected to the Obama phenomenon must be considered as part of our equation. Since Obama’s ascension and election, liberals have been in a predicament over their savior’s predilection for continuing, and even expanding, regressive Bush-Cheney policies, from foreign wars to domestic taxes. Liberals had the audacity to hope, despite a paucity of evidence, that Obama would end the wars abroad, fight for the working class at home, and generally reverse the resurgence of regressivism.  So to present a united front of support for candidate Obama then and President Obama now, liberals have squelched their anti-war protests, effectively self-censoring the movement. Other noteworthy perpetrators of this hypocritical double standard have come from the black Left. In order to support our black President, much of black America has refused to criticize even the most egregious of Obama’s policy follies. As black America flounders in the mortgage crisis and staggering amounts of black wealth is annihilated, Obama acts not. As black unemployment skyrockets and the racialized wealth gap widens to historic proportions, Obama acts not. As the military and prison industries devour young black and brown men, decimating communities of color, Obama acts not. Yet much of black liberal leadership refuses to raise a criticism of this President. When Cornel West did wake up and confess his deep sense of betrayal and disappointment, he was roundly criticized by black punditry. While Al Sharpton announced he would never criticize President Obama, and he was rewarded handsomely by Media (MSNBC in particular).  The Left can ill afford this kind of acquiescence and capitulation among its own ranks.

How Can This Be Overcome?

Philosophically: Raising a Radical Consciousness. We cannot expect to effect significant change that translates into better living and working conditions for the majority of human beings within the capitalist system. Capitalism itself must be overthrown. All of the attendant issues that account for unfathomable human misery are merely symptoms of this greater problem, this underlying social pathology of global capitalism. To attempt to formulate a response to the resurgence of regressive politics within the existing superstructure, to seek to reform some wayward or misguided elements of an otherwise well-functioning system is more than a grave error in judgment – it is to remain under the delusion that the USA really is what its Narrative claims. This is the classic approach of liberalism, the esteemed junior partner in the Domination System, and functions only to perpetuate the oppression of the working class and divert the struggle for human liberation. No, the System itself must be overthrown; capitalism in all its malignant mutations must be crushed and replaced with more humane systems.

The ideological battle can be waged only once we critically assimilate Marx’s observation that the prevailing ideas of society are the ideas of the ruling class. With this revelation, leftists are equipped to expose the multitudinous myths, lies, distortions, and deceptions, indeed to deconstruct the entire American Narrative. In short, we must take up the task of rejecting Americanism. For this un-brainwashing to happen, we must undertake several crucial tasks. First and foremost, we must expose capitalism for what it is – a caste system based on wealth that inevitably leads to gross inequalities in living standards while robbing the worker of the wealth s/he produces. Capitalism must be exposed as the source of the state of perpetual war, at home and abroad, mentioned above, and as an unsustainable system that has already brought humankind to the brink of ecological catastrophe.  This is fairly easily accomplished through a rational study of political economy and a critical review of the historical connections between the accumulations of the few and the exploitation of the many. It is fairly easy… when one is divorced from Americanist ideology.

Secondly, we must expose the nature of the current economic Crisis. It is the inevitable result of, among other things, the financialization of the US economy and the wholesale deregulation of the financial industry. This means that there will be no recovery, that high unemployment and low wages are here to stay. This also means that the US economy is built on personal debt and perpetual war – a house of cards, indeed. Similarly, we must expose the regressive political agenda for what it is – a right-wing counterrevolution to roll back over a century of progress for working people, to consolidate wealth and power in the clutching hands of the already super-wealthy and unduly powerful. We are even now enduring the birth pangs of the new economic order – the destruction of unions, the elimination of benefits, and the liquidation of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid.   This is a global phenomenon that is devastating the economies of nation after nation, from Ireland and Iceland to Greece and Spain. It is the same monstrosity that continues the centuries-long looting of the African continent, and previously devastated economies (and ecologies) throughout so-called Latin America and the Caribbean.

Finally, having exposed the problem, we must offer some potential solutions, some alternatives to the rapacious system of plunder and exploitation we call capitalism. It is a matter of establishing the fact of viable, alternative realities and communicating the imperative of implementing one. One of the greatest deceptions of the Domination System is in convincing people that there are no alternatives, that “the free market” was, is, and ever shall be, forever and ever, Amen. This is the great lie and must be repudiated. So our task is to raise up a critical consciousness amongst the working classes. This is, of course, easier said than done.  But if social circumstances do determine consciousness, then we are fast approaching a time when mass radicalization may be possible, and we can then turn toward developing structural capacity for change to occur.

Structurally: Building Solidarity and Organizing Politically. Solidarity among the masses of working people is essential for confronting the Domination System. Unfortunately, the reigning ideology of Americanism precludes the selfless and xenophilic disposition necessary for building solidarity across the various boundaries of color/ethnicity, class, trade/profession, etc. The American ethos emphasizes selfishness and xenophobia, both of which undermine solidarity at any stage of struggle. The history of labor and unionizing in the US demonstrates how capitalists have depended on racism to divide and conquer. For decades, black laborers were exploited (sometimes literally shipped en masse to factories in boxcars) by ownership and management to break strikes and undermine organizing because white workers refused to open their unions to blacks. This same racist strategy is in play in the 21^st century as American workers are convinced that “illegal aliens,” the reproachful epithet for undocumented workers (or for virtually any Spanish-speaking person), are “taking their jobs.” It never dawns on the obtuse Americanist that unskilled immigrants are in no position to “take” anything, much less decide who gets a job. And all the while the short-shifted worker continues to support the corporations that actually do offshore, outsource, downsize, and hire immigrant labor.  But, again, such is the logic of Americanism.

Also hindering solidarity among American workers is the hyper-materialism of Americanism. The so-called American Dream is an essential component of Narrative Americana that functions to instill in Americans the unquenchable desires for material acquisitions and upward social mobility.  The pursuit of that Dream, i.e. accumulation of ever more material wealth and upward social mobility, has trumped all other priorities and has left the broad masses of Americans in a veritable suburban captivity. Therefore, even the concept of social “struggle” is absent from the lexicon of Americanism.  I detail this reality to underscore the imperative of rejecting the tenets of Americanism that subvert solidarity and stymie struggle. In identifying the methods of the ruling class for deluding workers and diverting dissent, we can reject the values, ideals, and aspirations of the Domination System.

Labor activist Gregg Shotwell insists, “We need a labor movement with a worldview independent of the corporation. We need a labor movement that can organize around the principle of solidarity rather than complicity with the corporate agenda.”[vii] Shotwell’s statement is a reminder that the worldview, or consciousness that prevails within the struggle is integral to its chances of success. One task, then, is identifying those forces that promote the corporate agenda and subsequently stand in opposition to the struggle.

Recent events in workers’ struggles are instructive here. The uprising in Wisconsin in February and March of this year has been described as “the greatest surge in labor activism and class consciousness in the United States in at least sixty-five or seventy years.”[viii] But just four months later the struggle has virtually disintegrated, and disastrous anti-worker legislation has been ramrodded through several statehouses. Also in recent years we’ve seen various groups in struggle across the country, such as teachers, nurses, immigrants, homosexuals, and others. Each group organized, mobilized, and fought for their rights to various degrees of success. Yet all these, and other, factions have not the consciousness to consolidate along class lines.

This is where the Left must seize the opportunity to overcome these recent shortcomings, and commit to a truly global solidarity, joining the revolutionary uprisings that are shaking other parts of the planet. Not only must we take the initiative to organize the various factions in the domestic struggle, but it is imperative that the struggle transcend national boundaries and incorporate the movements in Egypt, Tunisia, Greece, Palestine, France, Venezuela, Bolivia, and beyond. Only an international anti-capitalist movement can hope to challenge the global Domination System.

Conclusion

How can we begin to overthrow the Domination System and slay the beast of global capitalism through which it operates? It seems like a hopeless endeavor, like mission impossible. But we presently have in more than one region of our global village the stirrings of what could potentially evolve into a worldwide anti-capitalist movement. Ironically, after having set out to examine the particularities of the crisis in the American context, we are left looking outside of the US for an alternative vision for the future. It is difficult to be optimistic about the prospects for rapid change within the United States. But the Left must be prepared to exploit any and all opportunities created as human immiseration and social unrest escalate. The movements in South America toward “socialism for the 21^st century” over the past decade have been nothing less than miraculous and can serve as models or at least as inspiration to the pursuit of a more humane society. The revolutionary eruptions in North Africa in 2011, the “Arab Spring,” are not explicitly anti-capitalist, but the struggles are against the same capitalist forces of exploitation and inequality. Other viable models of the anti-domination struggle of recent past are to be found in the history of the African anti-colonial struggles of the 20^th century, and even the Civil Rights Movement in the US.

 

The toppling of capitalism is an idea whose time has come. To that end, the work of crafting an honest counter-narrative is imperative. The rhetoric of anti-capitalism is commonplace outside of the US where the financial crisis has cut deep and “austerity” measures have cut people even deeper. This dialogue can be taken up within the United States when Americans join forces with each other and with their comrades, their fellow human beings, around the world. Within the context of organized and politicized struggle, this is entirely possible.