Monday, November 17, 2003
(9:51 PM) | Adam Kotsko:
The Revolution was televised
Paul Krugman, about a month ago, wrote a nice long article in the Times magazine about the tax cut crusade. He claimed that it is a purposeful, fully thought-out attempt to defund the federal government and effectively reverse the New Deal and the Great Society (Social Security and Medicare). That is, instead of insuring that the nation's elderly don't wind up on the street and that the elderly and disabled can afford decent medical care, the government would return to the kind of stuff it should be doing: killing people, putting people in jail, and subsidizing the auto industry (maintaining roads).
We should oppose this stuff, because it shows a callous disregard for those who most need help while flagrantly furthering the interests of those who are already miles ahead of everyone else. It offends against even the elementary idea of justice that a three year old could develop over the course of a mildly Socratic dialogue. So far, so good.
Then I read Jared's post about "revolutionary defeatism," and it appears that this conservative revolution is also the only opportunity for a genuine socialist revolution. Things have to get worse before they can get better, and if they get way worse, then they can get way better. A couple decades of abject misery for the American people (the very wealthy, as always, excepted) could produce a variety of good results: to take one example, the consumer market in the US would collapse, thus reducing incentives for corporations to exploit third-world labor, and opening up the space for a revolution in those nations once corporate power evacuated. In addition, in the face of growing hopelessness and decreased government funding, marijuana and a variety of harder drugs might finally be legalized. The environment could be so horribly corrupted that even the very wealthy couldn't escape the consequences. I could extend the list further.
It might sound like I'm parodying this idea, but I'm not -- and I should be clear that Jared is not unambiguously supporting this position. The moment of greatest hopelessness is identical with the moment of greatest hopefulness. One thing we're possibly forgetting, though, is that the Republicans are extremely good at what they do--which is not telling the truth. They have a small but vocal base of populist support. They have a ready-made scapegoat in "the liberals" and appear to have no qualms about picking out a minority group if necessary. They will do absolutely anything to maintain power and shape society into the desired form.
Of course, it is possible that once the other shoe drops, American society (and subsequently the rest of the world) will face an unprecedented crisis--much like Marx, the typical conservative ideologue does not seem to know what we're all going to do "after the revolution." Then hopefully some other political faction, perhaps led by Howard Zinn, would arise with ready-made plans for a brand-new society. Maybe they're already planning, deep in the bowels of the anti-American humanities departments that litter our nation.
Whatever happens, though, I hope that I'll be able to get and keep tenure, keep doing my blog, and enjoy unfettered access to a wide array of consumer goods. Because isn't that what we're really after here?
