If we do not stand for the weak, we stand for nothing good. In our own individual weakness we can be strong in solidarity if we know what we stand for and aren’t afraid to say it. We must be living, deeply breathing democrats in a plutonomic world that has taken and will take our votes as needed to maintain control of us.
How do we effectively oppose, using the endlessly frustrating and rusty tools of constitutional democracy, the hegemony of undemocratic plutonomy? For starters, we must not yield these tools to pseudo plutonomy-slayers. How easy to abandon these tools and let a demogogue do the job for us of “opposing Wall Street,” a surely trustworthy one with yellowing hair, orange face, and a red hat perhaps. He’s sure to drain the swamp, and only he can do it no less.
Difficult conundrum we find ourselves in as we begin year two of “very stable genius” Trump crypto-fascist world superimposed upon and nearing the end of decade four of the true epoch: the Don Regan/Ron Reagan era of Christian fundamentalist-aided plutonomy. I am reminded as a multi-tendency democratic socialist who also happens to be a hardworking Democrat in a ruby red portion of a southern swing state that, for all its many past and current failings, the Democratic Party represents the only realistic hope for a better country. But it cannot make that hope reality without a clear and simple positive agenda of theory and practice, which shouldn’t be hard to find but apparently is.
I am recovering from a cold and yesterday lying in bed watched Michael Moore’s 2009 film Capitalism: A Love Story. Perhaps in moments of physical weakness we can find our true democratic strength because we realize most dramatically that we can never make it on our own—and nor should we want to.
The film ends with the severely ill FDR’s challenging yet hopeful ending to his last state of the union speech, a speech he was physically unable to go to Congress to give. He went on camera to conclude the address by unveiling his proposed second bill rights. He did not have to hire a team of pollsters to tell him what the economic core of a decent society must include. Neither should the Democratic Party of today. So the theory part should be easy. The reason it is not is because of a major undemocratic flaw in practice.
To have the courage of our economic convictions, we must also acknowledge that much of our party elite is awash in the same culture of Wall Street financial corruption that not only controls the Republican Party but also fundamentally subverts democracy. And, if we dare to tell the truth, we too may aspire to creature comforts that the plutonomy only hands out to its mercenaries.
We cannot just say no to plutonomy without divesting our own party establishment of its plutonomic support and privileges, even when it funds our own chosen heroes. It is this expectation that heroes will save us that keeps seducing even us on the left. We must insist that our candidates and party organizations say no to corporate cash. That means not only campaign donations and the host of indirect corporate paid advertising groups but also the special loans, financial favors, and revolving door Wall Street employment that Moore documents.
Finally, to assure that our theory and practice never forgets the hegemonic culture of divide and rule which leaves some more oppressed than others, straight white males must become and remain aware that it is time for women, Persons of Color, and LGBTQs to lead, not follow. They’ve waited a long time. This is not about adopting an Emily’s List approach to candidate selection. Elizabeth Warren was plainly speaking truth to power in Moore’s film and still is. When Trump makes fun of her or her heritage, it is not only because he is a misogynistic bigoted demogogue but mostly because she as a women with a partial Native American ancestry speaks up for the weak against the powerful. I’m with her because of that not because of her gender or ethnicity per se. But her gender and ethnicity may help her to have heightened sensitivity to the intersections of oppression in our society. Women, Persons of Color, and LGBTQs of the left are increasingly leading and the rest of us on the left are increasingly following—and only should take leadership roles when needed, not because of our own personal needs to lead.
WE shall overcome. And “we” leaves no one out, especially not “the least” of our sisters and brothers and trans and others who has been systematically disenfranchised for millennia.
One person, one vote, and make it count, citigroup be damned. As Moore demonstrates the best he can, but admits he’s only one person and cries for help, it’s time for the peasants to make a mass citizens’ arrest of capitalism and substitute democracy. We thought we had that chance with President Obama but we were deluded. We failed to seize the moment, or rather it was seized from us by the very people who got the million dollar bonuses for wrecking the economy, paid for by us.
I am proud of President Obama on multiple levels, but we cannot trust any one leader to lead us to democracy and must only trust our own theory and practice as full and equal democratic citizens of the world. Democracy will not be given to us. It must be seized, and the continuous, unending act of seizing must itself be consciously democratic, of, by, and for the people. This is our collective right and duty. Let the seizure begin and never end. Alone we are weak, together we are strong.
Happy New Year!
In solidarity and tender comradeship,
Galtisalie
P.S. Please be sure to look at last Sunday’s beautiful music piece for Anti-Capitalist Meetup by greenandblue as we celebrate our life of solidarity in song! www.dailykos.com/...