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I went to a talk by Chris Hedges last week. I took lots of notes. I was wondering anyone would like to give an analysis, a Marxist analysis of it. I like some of what he said, but he calls the Liberals ' a class '. Maybe you can also talk about Liberals, a definition of it. Don't Liberals sort of give justification to the system. They want to try to solve problems within the Capitalist system, reform it. He doesn't talk in terms of the Capitalist system. Maybe its because of his religious background. He said that he comes out of the religious left. Please tell me what you think of this kind of analysis : These are my notes from a talk by Chris Hedges on May 25, on the ' Death of the Liberal Class ' : Chris Hedges : The book started out as a book about the press. But my publishers, Knopf hated it; said it was too negative. Wanted the negativity taken out. Had a mad scramble to find someone to ublish it with the negativity. ( Nation books ) The Press hardly exists in a vacuum. Its a pillar of traditional democracy that has collapsed. The book was broadened to look at liberal institutions, including the Democratic Party and why when they functioned, they made piecemeal reform possible. Going back to the time of WWI and Woodrow Wilson. World War I was the rock on which the popular & progressive movements broke. On the eve of WWI there were lots of political parties like the Socialists & the Communists and various dissenting publications. Towards the end of WWI, with the collapse of Czarist Russia the bankers got frightened. If the British & French were defeated then the loans wouldn't be repaid. Wilson ran on a " he kept us out of the war " campaign. There was a massive campaign to change that. Walter Lippman & others, & the Creel Commission and Lippman's book ' Public Opinion ' talk about manufacturing consednt. There was talk about a system of mass propaganda. They churned out articles. People like Randolph Bourne & Jane adams talk about how people are seduced by war. The intellectual class wanted to ' make the world safe for democracy '. Harsher measures like the Sedition Act hardly had to be used at all. Propaganda made it so that the masses were loyal to the state. The Committee of Public Information studied mass psychology. People are moved not by fact but by emotion. Edward Bernays wrote his book on ' Propaganda;. ( Goebbels used it ). People like Bourne, Adams, Eugene Debs were silenced by traditional methods, like the Red Scares, the Palmer Raids, etc,..... The rest of society was seduced. The Culture of Fear, Permanent War silenced the Left after the War. Radical publications were shut down. There were mass deportations. The day WWI ended, the people on the Creel Commission went to Madison Ave. The " Dreaded Hun " was replaced by the " Dreaded Red ". There was a constant search for enemies. Psychosis of fear. Marx never anticipated the Culture of Fear. People call for their own imprisonment. There was the destruction of traditional values, thrift, regional ethnic culture. Replaced by Consumer Culture. Homogenization of culture. This marked the taking out of the dissent movements. The state shut down radical movements. The Liberal Class was the Middle Ground. The Safety Valve. When the pressure was intense, it allowed piecemeal reforms. It saved Capitalism. The New Deal saved Capitalism. Popular mobilizations. Then liberal figures, like FDR -- Liberal Class. Thats why they were tolerated. With the destruction of radical movements, finalized after WWII, Taft-Hartley, dissemboweling of liberal institutions. Search for (& witchhunts) for Reds. Poster Child of this was Sidney Hook. He went from Trotskyite to Cold Warrior. Thousands were purged from universities. ( I.F. Stone couldn't find work so he started his own weekly newsletter in the basement. Social workers were decimated. They traditionally worked for /organized for their clients. Purges were carried out in all the traditional institutions like the press--NY Times, ACLU.... Careerists seize on this. Forces out people with morals. The destruction of radical movements. Radical movements were the true correctives to American Democracy. ( The Civil Rights Movement never actually got power. It pressured government.) Liberals who were tolerated were constantly warding off charges that they were soft on Communism. This began especially in the wake of WWII. The war ( weapons ) industry continued in the name of national security, consuming half of GDP. Because we were in a battle with Soviet Communism, Capitalism --Good, Communism--Bad, Anything Capitalist is good, defeat the enemy. By the 1970s, the country shifts from an empire of production to one of consumption. Borrowing. Sheldon Wollin's ' Democracy Inc.' -- gives a vocabulary to explain systems of power that we live under. We don't live under classical totalitarianism with a democratic leader. Its inverted totalitarianism. Corporate forces that pay lip service to democracy, seized the levers of power. Its a ' coup d' etat in slow motion.' The process of lifting of regulations by Democrats & Republicans is corrosive to democracy itself. Polanyi : what happens when the marketplace rules unfettered. He quotes Marx correctly. Capitalism unleashed -- revolutionary. Everything is a commodity. Such societies cannibalize themselves til they die. This destruction of radicalism took away from us the vocabulary of class warfare. Took the language to describe our own reality. On all fundamental issues there is no daylight between the two parties. No one challenges the concept of War on Terror, globalization, deficit crisis, etc., actually its a revenue crisis -- the top 25% of Fortune 500 companies pay no taxes. The looting of the US Treasury is bipartisan. Wollin : We no longer live in a democratic state. The will & desires of the average citizens are irrelevant. ( In 2006 the Democrats said they'd end the war. They win but continue the war.) The Clinton Admin. ' feels your pain.' but his policies were NAFTA, collapse of Welfare. They kep extending unemployment. But once you go on Welfare you have to survive on $143/month. The Obama healthcare bill was writen by the lobyists. Got $400 billion in subsidies. In the US its legally permissible to hold sick children hostage while parents try frantically to pay medical bills. Corporatiions shouldn't be alowed anywhere near healthcare. They don't want to provide for chronically ill children. PNHP Harvard study reports : $400 billion would be saved per year if we had Single Payer Healthcare. Its not allowed to be talked about. Nobody from PNHP is making any money on this issue, this position. They're locked out of the debate. All acceptable opinions range from A to B. Real issues like : war in Afghanistan, climate change, poverty, etc. .... not talked about. Radical movements broken, liberals out, no reconfiguring corporate forces., all we have is corporate feudalism & propaganda. A society that destroys its teaching class renders itself deaf, dumb & blind. We're becoming like China --- everything is vocational. No liberal arts in schools. Withering away of the humanities. The humanities are meant to equip students to critique, challenge societyal structures. Hedge fund managers are now interested in inner city education. But that has nothing to do with higher education. Systems of standardized testing, enrichment programs...etc., students define their worth by what authority figures think of them. Need validation of authority figures. Makes them perfect fodder for Wall Street. They're systems managers. A perfect example of such a distorted human being : Lawrence Summers. He's a consumate systems manager. Only knows how to service a dead systems. Since there is no liberal class, the safety valve is closed. the sufferings of the masses is invisible. This parallels the breakdown of civil society in Yugoslavia. The collapse of their economy, Yugoslavia was the buffer state between Eastern Europe & Europe. By the late 1980s we wouldn't renegotiate loans. The currency collapsed. We're trying to monetize our debt -- print new money. Geithner thinks he can control inflation. its a hail Mary response to the crisis. Catastrophic if it fails. If the currency fails, it fails instantly. People can't get cash, its worth 60% less. pensions get wiped out. Gangsters & profiteers become millionaires overnight. Traditional systems of authority are delegitimized. Anger at the traditional elites is really intense now. There is a turn to demogogic figures. ( as when Germany went from Weimar Republic to Hitler. Lenin--Bolshiviks. The American Left forgot that its not our job to take power. How do you stop the power elite from doing so much damage. In 1968, the most powerful figure was Martin Luther King Jr. He denounced the Vietnam War. LBJ was terrified. He took the guards off of King, knew what would happen. Our only hope is to regain that kind of militancy. As long as we keep truusting in the established systems of power, including the Democratic Party, we won't be able to hold our system of anemic democracy & the environment. Wollin : credit disempowered us. Might get a more traditional form of totalitarianism. Get the iron fist. The gestapo broke bones; the Stasi broke souls. Ex. Bradley Manning. Send a message, like with Manning : Don't Do This ! Q & A / Discussion Corporate culture : you have to internalize it. The political Right & Left fear it from both sides. The Right makes you afraid to comply. The Left : afraid to revolt They're are good reasons to be fre4arful, but if you don't rise up, defy the corporate state, we're finished. In my last book ' Empire of Illusions ' : we're the most illusioned society. We're constantly fed illusions : Hollywood, Oprah, etc. Reality is never an impediment to what you want. Focus on happiness; Jesus can provide miracles, etc. You never grow up; you're forever in a state of childishness. Then reality hits, your home is foreclosed, illness, medical bills, etc. When it hits you, it hits you like a freight train. Then you act like a child. When expectations thwarted, fringe movements, fascist type movements arise. These people feel betrayed. They have legitimate anger, rage. The Liberal Class won't recognize it. Gov't. These institutions used to take care of people. The political agenda of movements like the Tea Party are irrational : hate government, but don't touch my Medicare, National Security state. In moments of insecurity these movements have tractiion. The problem : There is No Left. In Wisconsin : The Democrats and the Unions didn't want/didn't have a general strike. Should have had one. Now they're fighting for collective bargaining : Fighting for the right to ask. Hedges comes out of the Religious Left. Recognizes the need of a functional Liberal Class. Nader said that the last liberal President was Nixon. And Nixon hated liberals, but he was scared of movements. We can see how utterly amoral & venal Power is. No morality in power. Obama is a brand. Makes for a passive consumer. lends to consumer passivity. After ge ws elected, Advertising Age gave him an award for Advertising brand of the year. After the Cornell West interview, the Liberal Class went after him personally. Can't address the issues that Kucinich, West, Rev. Jeremiah Wright talk about, so they get turned into freaks. Wall Street : speculators. In the 17th Century, speculators were hung. Now they're completely out of control. Whats driving the Middle East revolts : the people can't buy food. Obama pays deference to Wall Street. Everything is a commodity. Then you embark on a headlong flight to anihilation. Systems of information in Europe : different from ours. We destroyed our own culture, education system. We sever ourselves from print based culture. Depend on corporate images for understanding. In Canada they still subsidize their theater. Re : viability of movements. In Europe there is still high literacy. They haven't totally destroyed their education system (yet). If people aren't trained to think; its very hard to wake people up. In the US, 6 corporations control everything that 90 plus % of Americans see & hear. Can't reach Americans without a critique. Liberals : lost their base. They see the last remnant as the judiciary. The political class answers to their corporate masters. They stacked the judiciary with judges who also serve their corporate masters. You can't reform power from within. Radical movements never achieve power. They have to hold fast on the moral issues. Civil Rights Movement : King & Malcolm scared them into it. America has a long history of killing its prophets. Critical of the ' New Left '. Hedges' father embodied, like Day, discomfit of the Left that played for the cameras. The Radical Left of the 60s fitted to the highs & lows of American life. Society of the Spectacle. King wouldn't let go of the moral core. Out of that tradition, out of the Religious Left, like Berrigan, hold on to the moral core. The old CP, Wobblies, Old Anarchists had it. The moral imperitives. Don't compromise. Because the people you represent don't have that. So much of it -- the drug culture, culture of the self, hedonism -- of the 60s, then a few years later becomes a Wall Street Banker. Left unchecked, nothing checks the corporations. Then get blowback --- violent blowback. Because of the collapse of the Left --- get a violent Right. It targets scapegoats : Muslims, Blacks, undocumented immigrants, etc. We disempowered the Left, the force thats left will be Right, proto-fascist. Corporations only know one thing : More. Its like with Versailles. So much wealth, no longer connected to the real world. Disempowered blacks. As victims, understand White Power. In Camden, NJ, blacks cycle in & out of prison. Can't get a job. 77% of city budget is spent on police & fire depts. 2/3 is like that, thin layer of managers & oligarchy. The Tea Party wants to get government off our backs but they won't stand up to the national security state. Nietshe : You becoem the monster that you fight. The diesease of imperialism. Methods of it is brought back to the homeland. When you get out there and protest, you keep alive another narrative. Hope has to be seen. If we remain passive & complacent; there is no hope. Rebellion is a way to affirm our individuality as a human being. Invisible witnesses. When you stand up for what you know is right; it has a capacity to empower others. ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
