alanjjohnstone
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It is even worse in the USA where individual states are competing for supplies
The election of any Republican emboldens the Right.
But yes, DJP, Trump’s rhetoric resonates more strongly with the extreme Right, than say, Ted Cruz.
I don’t think he drives their agenda but he himself bounces off their beliefs. How often does he re-tweets the talking points of Fox News?
He needs a strong base to control and perhaps intimidate and threaten the conservative-minded Republican party machine.
But the question being raised is Trump more dangerous to the working class that we must urge then to hold their noses and vote for Biden.
What we must ask ourselves this, DJP, would a re-elected Trump be more effective in dampening down future working class resistance than a Democratic president such as Biden would be?
Once again it, I suggest, it will be all about the lesser evil.
Unions and grassroot organisers will be told, swallow the medicine despite the bad taste because ultimately it is good for you. The alternative will be another Trump (Ivanka?) they will be told.
And to ensure there won’t be, the Democrat president must appeal (appease) to the “moderate” Republicans which means a right-wing shift in policies, not the adoption of Sanders radical reforms. After all, the lesser evil approach has guaranteed the liberals support so no need to adopt the left’s agenda other than a few token gestures to placate them, probably in line with international norms such as climate change agreements.
As socialists we cannot vacillate and sacrifice principle for temporary opportunism. We are that little voice of conscience – which says – “Told you so”.
Of course, all the above is pure speculation and as I already said, i’m more often wrong than right.
Another scenario is Biden as president will embolden the left such as AOC and the Justice Democrats who will pressure Biden into offering more concessions on M4A and the GND and the free college education. Perhaps working class organisations might feel they have more leverage and extra confidence and increase their demands.
But to tell the truth, i think the side-effects of the pandemic rather than the choice of president will have had a lot more influence on the militancy of workers.
In many ways who is in the White House is an irrelevancy
We shouldn’t make the mistake of thinking that Trump was the cause of right-wing populism in the USA. Rather his election was the symptom of it. Like all demagogues Trump feeds off their discontent. He offers simplistic scape-goats for their troubles. Like all good “leaders” he follows the mob, echoing their sentiments.
His supporters, in their own minds, feel justified in being alienated from the identity politics of the Democratic Party, that ignored their economic plight and offered the politics of tokenism.
Biden lacks the arguments that Sanders made about improving the standard and quality of life for working people.
Nostalgia for a fictitious past is not a vote-winner. Biden is going to lose. (please note all my other earlier predictions and their failure have failed to materialise.)
The Left will place their faith in the 2024 run for AOC but by then i confidently predict she will be comfortably ensconced in the Democratic Party establishment.
Richard Wolff again on capitalism and coronavirus
Not how often he uses the term “private” capitalism as if this re-defines what capitalism is
https://www.dw.com/en/opinion-coronavirus-brings-europes-borders-back/a-53134507
“The most astonishing thing about the coronavirus pandemic is how easily borders can come back.”
“Everything else is futile.”
As the Borg say, Matt, “Resistance is futile”
No, i’m not in agreement that for the working class it is only socialism and nothing else.
We need an effective class struggle and that and resistance are not futile.
Americans (and other workers) need to re-build their unions in one shape or another, bring back its militancy and conduct class war against the ruling class. They need to form alliances with other social movements such as the environmentalists.
It is no guarantee of success, no guarantee of automatic appearance of socialist consciousness, but without self-organisation, without the courage to engage in class battles, working people may not acquire the confidence to protect themselves from the encroachments of capital. They may not acquire an expectancy of victory and give rise to the vision of establishing socialism.
What will the legacy of Bernie Sanders be?
He can be rightly credited as bringing the idea of socialism back into the popular political discourse once again (no matter how flawed the definition might be)
He talked about the working class
He galvanised the proponents of the welfare state safety-net against the advocates of libertarian/neo-liberalism, the redistributionists against the trickle-downers
He created an efficient elaborate net-work of campaigners and supporters
He built a fund-raising structure for a political organisation that wasn’t dependent upon a few big donors.
Where does he go from here? Is he going to be the “Tony Benn” of America
“Lesser evil is still as evil.”
A typo – it meant to read
Lesser evil is still an evil”
“Really though, what I think is more important is what people do on the hundreds of other days when there is no election.”
And we can agree on that.
It will be interesting to see if the Justice Democrats and the Sanders Movement would metamorphise into an independent and organised opposition and resistance to a Biden government.
But I don’t think Biden will win and if Biden loses, they’ll blame the left, just as they did in 2016 and choose another “electability” candidate in another right-wards shift. (mere guess-work on my part)
Then I disagree, DJP
In every electoral cycle it is always a debate about the lesser evil. 2020 American election is no different.
It is difficult to challenge that premise without coming across as some sort of pro-Trump. But in key areas Trump is better than Biden.
Trump shares Sanders protectionist criticism of the NAFTA-type trade deals and in particular with China. (He only proved, however, that in the art of making a deal he wasn’t as good as he thought he was)
In military affairs Trump has been less hawkish than Obama and Biden were. I doubt in foreign affairs he diverges from conventional American military and diplomatic strategy. (except in regards to Israel and Palestine)
On crime Bill Clinton passed laws that put more minorities behind bars.
On immigration, Obama deported record numbers of undocumented.
Tax breaks – do we forget Obama’s QE policies that permitted corporations to engage in share buy-backs
Trump failed to keep his promise to “drain the swamp”, Biden has no intention of doing so, being a Washington/Wall St insider. Take a look at who is speculated to be in Biden’s cabinet.
Is Trump a right-wing populist? No doubt but that appealed to a strong section of disenchanted working class voters in the “rust states” who in 2016 Clinton didn’t even bother visiting in her campaign.
The fake news is often fake news. The “liberal” media is as much biased against Trump and pro-Biden as Fox News is pro-Trump. I’ve never seen an interview with Biden which hasn’t been soft-ball questioning. They are self-censoring criticism of Biden.
Compare the media treatment of the allegations against the assaults by Brett Kavanaugh and the current one against Biden. The #metoo movement is conspicuous in shifting the goal posts when it comes to reporting Biden’s sexual assault.
Russiagate and Ukrainian impeachment, political posturing by the Democratic Party rather than any genuine constitutional crisis.
Is Trump intellectually on par to Obama or Clintons? Obviously not.
But it was Gerald Ford who was accused of not being able to walk and chew gum at the same time. And, of course, we had Ronald Reagan, the first of the TV Reality Show presidents.
But it is the whole principle of voting for the lesser evil that has to be challenged, even if the likes of Chomsky and Bernie are in favour of it.
I’ve been watching a lot of The Hill Rising recently
https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising
And they have expressed the flaws in the vote for the lesser evil rather well and why they decline to fall in line and vote for Biden. It is bad political bargaining to guarantee unconditional support as it means there is no need whatsoever for any horse-trading over compromises or concessions in policies.
Our only power is the vote, whether to grant it or to with-hold it. The lesser evil argument is that we give it away for gratis, based upon image and presentation.
They said Hillary was the lesser evil in 2016 – but she was already a proven evil and Trump could campaign that he was the lesser evil. (And it is idle speculation to say whether he was or not but I’m for one not at all convinced that Hillary would have been a better president.)
The Green Party are accused of being spoilers but Sanders did have the option in 2016 and now in 2020 of being invited to stand as their candidate. With the prospect of such a third party splitting their vote, I think he could have extracted promises on GND and M4A from the Democrats. (Biden’s only concession has been reducing Medicare eligibility to 60 – Hillary went further in 2016 offered 50 yrs of age)
As for the pandemic and Trump’s response. How dissimilar is it to “progressive” Sweden or Boris Johnson’s earlier response of herd immunity? As for opening up the economy, many countries are doing just that right now. It is a calculated risk they are willing to take.
No politician or nation stands out as being particularly astute on their approach to it. All were slow to respond and all ill-prepared.
It was Biden, btw, who for political advantage, pushed for the go ahead of physical voting in Democratic primaries when there was a high risk of contagion and many did catch it.
Lesser evil is still as evil.
Dementia Joe or Demented Don?
In what way, DJP, is this not a normal situation?
Do mean the pandemic?
Or the nature of Trump’s presidency?
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/17/coronavirus-deficit-american-economy
“The Covid-19 crisis has clearly demonstrated what should have been obvious already: provisioning society – whether with food, disinfecting wipes, toilet paper or medical supplies – is not a financial issue. If we can’t produce enough masks, ventilators or food, finance will not help. Society’s capacity to produce real output is what limits its ability to provision itself.”
Richard Wolff on the recession
COVID-19 Was a Trigger, But Capitalism Caused the Economic Crash
Despite his Marxist credentials where he rightly draws attention to the already instability of the economy before COVID-19, he then props up Sanders FDR policies
I think, Matt, as we always explained, when the prospect of the end of capitalism approaches, the capitalist class will offer all manner of reforms, ameliorations and palliatives to stave off the inevitable.
As The Who said, it is up to us not to be fooled again
Compassionate capitalism and coronavirus?
“investors in 15 big pharmaceutical companies have called on the drugmakers to set aside rivalries and short-term interests and cooperate on finding solutions to the coronavirus.”
