What we're reading

File Under "Know Thy Enemy": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Schmitt

Schmitt changed universities in 1926, when he became professor for law at the Handelshochschule in Berlin, and again in 1932, when he accepted a position in Cologne. It was in Cologne, too, that he wrote his most famous paper, "Der Begriff des Politischen" ("The Concept of the Political"), in which he developed his theory of "the political". Distinct from party politics, "the political" is the essence of politics. While churches are predominant in religion or society is predominant in economics, the state is predominant in politics. Yet for Schmitt the political was not an autonomous domain equivalent to the other domains, but rather the existential basis that would determine any other domain should it reach the point of politics (e.g. religion ceases to be merely theological when it clear distinction between the "friend" and the "enemy"). The political is not equal to any other domain, such as the economic, but instead is the most essential to identity.

Schmitt, in perhaps his best-known formulation, bases his conceptual realm of state sovereignty and autonomy upon the distinction between friendand enemy. This distinction is to be determined "existentially," which is to say that the enemy is whoever is "in a specially intense way, existentially something different and alien, so that in the extreme case conflicts with him are possible." (Schmitt, 1996, p. 27) Such an enemy need not even be based on nationality: so long as the conflict is potentially intense enough to become a violent one between political entities, the actual substance of enmity may be anything.

Although there have been divergent interpretations concerning this work, there is broad agreement that "The Concept of the Political" is an attempt to achieve state unity by defining the content of politics as opposition to the "other" (that is to say, an enemy, a stranger. This applies to any person or entity that represents a serious threat or conflict to one's own interests.) In addition, the prominence of the state stands as a neutral force over potentially fractious civil society, whose various antagonisms must not be allowed to reach the level of the political, lest civil war result.

How the Union Resurgence Got Quashed by the Union Leadership in Wisconsin: http://gmfbrown.blogspot.com/2011/03/i-still-exist.html

After that, the movement completely died down at the precise moment when it should have been at its peak. Suddenly everything became about recall campaigns and legal challenges. The legal challenges to the bill were based, not on the content of the bill, but on a technicality about how it was voted on. As such, they can just vote on it again if it gets thrown out. And by the time any recall campaign can take effect, the bill, having passed will effectively destroy the public sector unions. And then, at best, we'll replace the party funded by the anti-union Koch brothers with the party funded by the anti-union Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. And yet, this strategy was deemed to be "reasonable" because apparently "reasonable" and "passive" are the same thing.

I'm More and More Convinced It's the End of the World (As We Know It): http://www.amazon.com/Combined-Uneven-Apocalypse-Luciferian-Marxism/dp/1846944686/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1303488895&sr=1-1

The world is already apocalyptic, and .... there is no event to wait for, just the zones in which these revelations are forestalled and the sites where we can take a stand ... to refuse either a sense of reconciliation with this world order or an illusion of the ease of bringing it down.

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Those of us who still find dignity in the idea of the human spirit - who even now consider ourselves as part of "the Left" - ought to discard these reactionary tendencies to hold onto the crumbling past and prepare for the ruins of the future.

Let the corporate bidding begin!

The most active sector of society has shifted to the right. And I'm not talking about the Teabaggers.

I'm talking about this report from the Washington Post re: corporate donations to the Grand Ole Party. So we're pretty much assured a shift to the right come November.

Don't get me wrong: it looks like it's going to be close at this stage. Obama's victory is still a perceived landmark for the little-f-left, despite the fact that the man and his administration have left ample space in every issue for criticism among every stripe of supporter. A lot of people still believe in what he fundamentally stands for - hope, change, all that jazz. And he's still African-American, although he's a Kenyan-American, basically, and doesn't exactly come from the tradition of "black America." He's just very much a hand-holding liberal politician, which makes him a corporate puppet when all is said and done.

The economic crisis and the mandate of a new President, however, has put a little bit of fight back in the left's diverse forces. (Just a little bit.) The future seems grim indeed, but there are other sectors of the left getting ready to fight back against the attacks on their standards of living - the nurses who care for us when we are ill (the battle in Minnesota has been foreshadowed by the struggle in Philadelphia), and the teachers whose responsibility it is to groom our generations despite lack of funding and backwards legislation.

These are the two places where struggle is very likely to break out in the near future. We aren't done reclaiming our country from the grip of the last administration's mistakes. (Boy howdy, there were a lot ... have we even gotten started yet?)

Unfortunately, the unions will continue to throw money at the Democrats with the misguided hope that they can possibly compete with corporations like the finance industry, like big oil and big weapons industries that basically ensure they get their man.

They tossed a black man on top of the bureaucracy heap and called it "socialism." Without further explanation, and with tiny reforms that could have taken place under anyone, right or left, the media and political system has again villainized left ideas and government oversight and allowed the rabid right to appear credible and heroic.

So come November we will indeed see some fucking nutty Republicans, maybe even some far-right independents where the Republicans can't accomodate the clueless constituents. We will see Democrats continue to crumple spinelessly. Hopefully the mountains of cash from corporate America doesn't tip the scales entirely, but the real catalyst for change rests as usual on the shoulders of the American working class.

Tempest in a Teapot

My international network of Marxist socialists informs me of two protests at the Washington State Capitol yesterday, superficially for or against "raising taxes." In a nutshell: the first group were Teabaggers, those beloved right-populists who draw on the stock imagery of the Revolutionary War to make their stand against unfair taxation. The character of this group, which is getting national media coverage disproportionate to their numbers (as can be seen in the above article), appears to be mostly nationalists, conservatives from the working class, and supporters of small business. It's a movement backed, essentially, by politicians and the wealthy.

The second group in Olympia was a coalition of education workers, rank-and-file AFSCME (representing state, county, and municipal workers), and dozens of other unions and progressive organizations. While this group didn't have a strong slogan - something like "no more cuts" doesn't really challenge the "no more tax" slogan that strikes a reactionary chord in the red-white-and-blue heart - there were numerous signs showing a more piercing solution: "Tax the rich," "Money for jobs, not war."

Straining to move its money-oiled muscles, the Republican populists drummed up 3,000 people. Then AFSCME and other unions just peek up their head and the grass-roots progressive come out with minimum summons: over 5,000 strong. Chances are good that if a broader coalition of labor came out with a more progressive stance - pressuring the Democrats to raise taxes on the rich, for example - even more supports would fall in and join their voice to the movement. The Teabaggers are so bankrupt in ideology that they must round out their strength with cold hard cash. They rely on their novelty, their patriotism, their big names and their batshit crazy eccentricity to bag them media coverage. If CNN ignored them for two months, they and their numbskull mouthpieces would have gone the way of "the Macarena" after last April's Tea Party hissy-fits.

Speaking of Sarah Palin, her address to the "National Tea Party" this month seems like a good direction to take this analysis. What she said there in Nashville deserves to live on in history, because history will make sure she lives to regret her big fat mouth.

"America is ready for another revolution and you are a part of it."

When I saw that she said that, that those actual words came out of her actual face, I couldn't believe it. Revolution. That is a rather large word for Palin - and a dangerous one at that. The ruling class of politicians - Republican or Democrat, right or center right - doesn't want the working class waving signs in the streets unless it can be very carefully controlled. Olympia's progressives were given just enough media coverage that they could feel warm and fuzzy about their part in the political protest but they were by no means lauded in the newspaper. It isn't policy to encourage that sort of pro-active behavior. (Imagine if Democrat politicians had called for national strikes and walk-outs in favor of the President's public option - 'nuff said ... for now.) If you must have a march, you are given a permit and a police escort, a blurb and a pat on the back, and then sent right back into work, missy, and don't you worry, Washington has you covered.

The establishment doesn't want the masses out on the streets. It wants to keep public discourse wrapped up in bureaucratic channels so that policy in pursuit of profit can be very delicately managed. To them, a protest is a barometer. It's maybe a step above getting letters in the mail. Note where Washington state governor Gregoire says, "Let's have a good discussion, let's be respectful of each other." Using this parliamentary language with either side is an exercise in futility. Calling the people into the street is asking the djinn out of the bottle: something is going to be done. The cards are down. It is a measure of power, not the high school debate team. (During a labor strike it is yet more so a measure of power, but that is a discussion for another time.)

And that is, perhaps, the ironic thing about Palin's speech ... that is, perhaps, the ironic thing about the Teabagger movement in general. It isn't significant when a politician or a corprocrat comes to a rally. They have ulterior motives; they are playing the fame game, a popularity contest. And what a dangerous line it is to walk, because calling the people into the streets gives them a taste of agency. The working class by nature is revolutionary - nothing in this nation or any other runs, flies, ships, drives, or rolls off an assembly line without the hands and heads of the working class. I do not mean by this that every working class movement is a progressive movement, merely that if workers are called to the street and get a taste of power, they make or break a political movement.

Palin and her peers would be well served to remember this. Actual revolutions are not a sentimental thing. No true movement would think twice about throwing her to the wayside to realize its own character. And she, and her movement, are practical bereft of any but the most sentimental demands. In the coming months and years we will see how this plays out - and how, presumably, the Republicans will sell out what few confused grass-roots supporters they have.