(From FB)
THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY, THE THREAT OF FASCISM, AND THE SOCIALIST FUTURE
Here are a few notes about the here-and-now, and about the future.
Several stark realities stare us in the face. As I reflect on them in
the summer of 2020, I do so from the standpoint of those in the United
States who want to see a democratic, humane, socialist future. What I
see includes: the immediate awfulness of Donald Trump’s Presidency; the
coronavirus pandemic made so much worse by that Presidency; the dramatic
economic downturn which was already brewing but has now surged forward
with the pandemic; the heightened racist/anti-racist conflict; and the
looming environmental catastrophe that threatens to engulf our planet
within the next two decades or so. Also, we are facing the threat of
fascism.
WHAT TRUMP IS, AND WHAT HE IS NOT
Let us begin with the extreme destructiveness and dangerous threat posed
by the most reactionary elements of the ruling-class gathered around the
demagogic, self-absorbed, bigoted, bullying phony in the White House.
Those who shrug this off as being no worse than anything we have
experienced before are not facing reality.
On the other hand, those denouncing this self-absorbed bully as a
fascist are quite wrong – because fascism is not simply a label to use
against very bad politicians, even those as bad as Donald Trump. Fascism
is a morbid and potentially horrific reality that is germinating and
growing stronger within our society. To say we are experiencing a
fascist regime now deflects our attention from what might actually
develop soon. The threat of fascism has, however, been strengthened by
Trump’s bigoted demagogy, by his coddling nascent fascists, and by his
flirtation with tactics and conceptualizations that are at the core of
full-blown fascism.
Another thing that Trump is not is the representative of the capitalist
class. That class – whose most powerful elements encompass less than 5%
of the population – is not a monolith. Those who are capitalists are
concerned with maintaining big businesses which ensure their wealth, but
they have different notions on how best to accomplish this. They are
reliant on (and generously supportive of) full-time political experts
and politicians, although in some cases they themselves are actively
involved.
As a class they are intolerant of those who pose a threat to the
capitalist system, but they are disunited over the best way to advance
their interests in the present political context. Some are more inclined
toward tolerance of dissenters and protesters, and toward offering them
at least partial concessions, in order to absorb them into an order that
will maintain the capitalist status quo. Others see this as a slippery
slope that is best avoided. In certain cases, such conservative
resistance is fairly flexible and moderate; in other cases, it inclines
toward being rigid and extreme. In times of crisis, some are even
willing to gamble on a self-absorbed bully, or even a fascist.
DEFINING FASCISM
Since the term “fascism” is thrown around and utilized (over-utilized)
in various ways, it makes sense to define how it will be used here.
Fascism means more than reactionary politics, more than bigotry or
bullying or authoritarian policies. It includes such things – but
historically it has involved the coming-together of such politics and
policies with a comprehensive anti-democratic ideology, nurtured by
powerful economic and political forces, which connects in an organized
way with the psychology and enthusiasm of masses of people, establishing
its domination in society’s political life through force and violence –
at first through organized paramilitary groups, ultimately through state
institutions. It has crystallized in combat against those who many
perceive as “outsiders” – in some cases left-wing working-class
movements pushing to end their oppression from traditional or capitalist
hierarchies; in some cases marginalized racial or ethnic groups
struggling for their human rights.
Social and economic crises generate left-wing and human rights upsurges,
and along with this also generate upsurges in what we are defining as
fascism.
DISLODGING TRUMP – OR NOT
There is absolutely no way to dislodge the bullying phony in the White
House and his enablers and allies except through a Democratic Party
victory at the polls this November. Anyone who denies this is
delusional. Anyone who says it really doesn’t matter is, as already
suggested, not facing reality. Saying this is not the same thing as
saying that one should therefore campaign for or vote for the Democrats.
It is just taking note of the reality.
The result of a Democratic Party victory will be a partial reversal of
some of Trump’s most destructive policies. But it will by no means whisk
away the multiple problems we face, including the threat of fascism.
This threat has been strengthened by some of what Trump says and does,
but it has been growing independently, and will continue to grow
independently, of Trump.
The result of a Democratic Party defeat will most likely be a
continuation and acceleration of Trump’s most destructive policies,
which will also help to intensify the multiple problems we face,
including the threat of fascism.
An essential element in this U.S. variant of fascism-in-the-making is
racism, which has been a key element in the evolution of the United
States since its very beginnings. Throughout history we can see that
every struggle against racism generates anti-racist solidarity and
anti-racist gains – but also racist backlash, with concerted efforts to
more strongly develop racist ideology, rhetoric, and organization.
Sometimes anti-racist gains have pushed racist reaction under the
surface, but it should be obvious to everyone paying attention that
racist reaction has never been eliminated from the American reality.
In 2020 we have been living through the immense promise of the
spontaneous anti-racist mass upsurges in the wake of the police killings
of George Floyd and others. This was not planned or organized or
coordinated by any substantial organizations on the Left – there are no
such organizations anymore, just fragments and husks and disoriented
clusters. As with the nationwide Occupy Wall Street movement, as with
the earlier incarnation of the Black Lives Matter movement, as with the
Million Woman March and the “me too” movement, as with the various local
labor insurgencies, there is no revolutionary or socialist force having
the capacity to outline and mobilize around a strategy for positive
social change.
The amazing anti-racist upsurge has been so momentous that it has shaken
our society to its core, crystallizing and giving voice to an
anti-racist consciousness that has broken past previous barriers and
challenged the status quo more powerfully than anyone ever expected. In
contrast to the Occupy movement and earlier Black Lives Matter movement,
there are clear demands, the most popular having truly revolutionary
implications: the escalating crescendo of de-militarize the police,
defund the police, dismantle the police. To the extent that this
movement wins the hearts and minds of more and more people, in multiple
ways it pushes back both the power of Trump and the threat of fascism.
Yet both Trump and the would-be fascists have been engaging in their
predictable counter-mobilization. In this, they are able to draw on a
limitation of the mass upsurge – the raising of potentially
revolutionary demands that the movement does not actually have the
strength or organization to implement. Understandable rage and angry
self-expression have often been predominant, but by themselves these are
incapable of bringing about desired changes, whether reformist or
revolutionary. What is missing, to a significant degree, is an effective
strategic orientation capable of actually getting us from the “here” of
the problems we face to the “there” of solutions to the problems.
To the extent this is so, the result will be disorder without
resolution, with eventual weariness and demoralization among protesters.
At the same time, “law and order” demands from Trump and others will
find resonance among many frightened people. A significant element in
the mix can be found among the police departments throughout the
country, whose layers of recruits over the years and whose very
traditions and sub-culture seem to nurture a quasi-fascist network that
can easily come together with armed “militia” networks of far-right
militants. Trump has been making noises that go in the direction of
suspending elections and securing his continued power through
declarations of “national emergency,” etc. Of course, there are also
powerful forces resistant to such stuff. They fear that Trump being
allowed to go too far could result in a social explosion whose outcome
is uncertain.
There is a fluidity in the balance of forces we can see in society.
Working against the Trump regime are multiple factors: the deepened and
expanded anti-racism within our country; the understanding by many that
Trump has badly mishandled the coronavirus plague; the growing
perception that he is organically connected with greedy rich people; the
growing economic crisis that his boasts and promises have failed to
reverse; and more. The polls indicate Trump is in serious trouble.
On the other hand, the other day a radical-minded student complained to
me about her mother. The mom is a recently retired nurse who was a
leader in her union local and avidly supported Bernie Sanders in 2016.
Subsequently she has become a firm Trump supporter, absolutely
distrusting the Democratic Party and all it represents. This story does
not seem completely out of kilter – I sense some Trump support among
some of my neighbors in the predominantly white working-class district
that I live in.
Yet there is much of the working class around me that sees Trump for
what he is and knows him as an enemy. The only path for getting rid of
him is to vote for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. And many will do so.
WHAT THE DEMOCRATS REPRESENT
The Democratic Party has been helped powerfully by the mass
radicalization that has been unfolding in the United States. The
resulting developments have taken its elected representatives, not to
mention its corporate-liberal leaders and controllers, by surprise. But
the Occupy movement, the Black Lives Matter movement, the
socialist-oriented campaigns of Bernie Sanders and others, have all
combined to give a leftward tilt to the political mainstream, and this
has pushed back what seemed a right-wing Republican Party juggernaut in
U.S. politics, to which the corporate liberals had themselves been
previously adapting (for decades).
Many who hoped that socialists and “genuine progressives” might somehow
tear the Democratic Party from the grip of its corporate-liberal elite
now acknowledge this was out of line with reality, but the radical
ferment has certainly given the party new life. Many protesters and
radical activists also feel there is no place for them go than to the
place where so many of them have now ended up: inside an
unapologetically pro-capitalist party (with an imperialist foreign
policy), sporting an array of half-measures that “speak to” but for the
most part cannot actually resolve the crises of our time.
It is very likely that the Democratic Party, if it controls the
Presidency and the Congress, will coordinate a far more effective effort
than was attempted by the Trump regime to end the death-grip of the
coronavirus. It is possible that they will be willing to place, once
again, more substantial taxes on big business in order to ensure funds
for a social safety-net to prevent the unemployed and the poor from
suffering as much of the indignity and inhumanity as perpetrated by the
Trump regime. They may raise the minimum wage, push for some kind of
police reform, and push back against some of the right-wing’s racist
policies. There will be more positive rhetoric and policies on behalf of
women, gays, the environment, etc. All to the good.
On the other hand, they will be unable to control the business cycle
related to the current economic downturn, and will be unwilling to put
the human needs of the working-class majority before corporate profits
of the wealthy elite. The police departments will remain as a bulwark of
the capitalist order, more than likely still permeated by authoritarian
and racist policies and ideologies. Economic injustice intertwined with
racial injustice will persist, as will militarism and war, and a form of
globalization that enhances the wealth and power of the very rich at the
expense of the rest of us, all around the world. There will be no
enactment of a genuine Green New Deal to guarantee good living standards
for all while ending the corporate-capitalist devastation of the global
environment. The climate crisis will get worse, as will so many of the
other problems afflicting us.
The corporate-liberalism of the Democratic Party – amid declining living
conditions and multiple crises – will be once again discredited.
Increasingly distressed, frightened, desperate people will urgently seek
solutions to the problems they are facing. The only “practical”
alternatives available by substantial forces will be those offered by
demagogic right-wingers, some of whom may be far more disciplined,
consistent, and effectively fascistic than what we are experiencing today.
And then the later stages of the climate crisis will close in on us.
But what of the socialist future that some of us have hoped for,
believed in, talked about, and – to the best of our abilities –
struggled for? Most of my life has in some way been devoted to this, as
have been the lives of people I have known spanning three earlier
generations.
PERHAPS THERE IS NO SOCIALIST FUTURE
We have little to show now except words, whether sectarian backbiting or
stimulating panel discussions, whether “practical-minded” reformism or
revolutionary posturing and sweeping rhetoric.
From what scientists are telling us, we have less than two decades to
do better than that, to create a coherent and strongly organized
left-wing movement where none exists now, a movement capable of
mobilizing millions around a program that will bring a fundamental power
shift from the wealthy elites to the laboring majorities.
It has seemed to me that the hope for the future will be a serious
struggle for a genuine Green New Deal (in contrast to a diluted phony
version) that – without genuinely lethal compromises – will provide what
we need for a livable environment and decent living conditions for each
one of us.
I think that makes sense in terms of actual human needs and a guarantee
for humanity’s survival. It necessarily goes in the direction of putting
human need before corporate profits, establishing democratic control
over our economic policies and resources, in a way that will make more
and more sense to increasing numbers of people, with a potential for
building a mass movement and power-shift – especially as environmental
crises continue to accumulate and intensify.
Perhaps there is something better to do that we can actually do. We can
debate, argue, and devote ourselves to words – or just shrug with a
laugh. But we are running out of time. And as Bertolt Brecht once put
it: Because things are as they are, they will not stay as they are.
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