Progressive vs Center Left Not - It's Class vs Identity
If it were, Warren's faltering voters would all go to Sanders, not Klobuchar, and Biden's certainly wouldn't go to Sanders. It's class versus identity, and the good angel over my shoulder hopes class wins out. Policy wise Biden is a long way from Sanders, not a 180 degree difference but close to it, but Biden grew up working class and it shows, gaffs and all. People feel that in a gut reaction kind of way.
Class includes all races, all sexes, all ethnicities, orientations and favorite ice creams. Class is unifying except for billionaires, and quite a few of the 1%.. Identity breaks down into ever smaller divisions of intersectional entitlements, or appeals to all the various isms.
I get real confused when pundits start calling one portion of Dems left and the other portion not as left. Both Democrats and Republicans are neoliberals, except for Sanders, yet Bloomberg the oligarch has birthed the pre eminent anti gun group in America, and Warren puts an X after the word Latin, but Sanders ends every screed with a homage to the working class, and I'll tell you what, Sanders is believable.
My only reservation is that despite today's ever growing demographic of people who find themselves up against it, there is a large quotient of folks who figure it's all beneath them, because of education, or birth, they figure those of us who are the unwashed are not folks. Neoliberal economic policy has actually worked out well for those of us who own businesses via the stock market or otherwise. If your income is determined by how much publicly owned companies earn, well, you have done ok.
Today I voted for Sanders in Colorado via mail in ballot.
Comments
guess I missed the
class vs. identity
analogy
bernie has class
poly pistions in general
tend to represent class
but have little
identity may be class based
but I think that is more of personal
objective
the great divide now is the election
of established wealth
or people powered reps
Politics of division
The oligarchs have devised many ways of dividing people so that they don't act in their economic self interest. When the Democrats and Republicans both became neoliberal, essentially acting in the interests of the wealthy, they needed mechanisms to divide people and stir up anger to prevent them from unifying and they chose social issues. Abortion, attitudes toward, race, sexuality, etc. became the chosen battlegrounds. In 1970 abortion was not a party issue, Republicans were not more racists than Democrats, and both discriminated against Gays.
The MSM has muddied the terminology.
The terms liberals and progressives have been so diluted that a Blue Dog dem might even fit into the category. They state that all the candidates are considered center-left with the exception of Bernie who is a communist. Give me a break!
This is confusing to a majority of the public who don't have the time or the inclination to stay informed and thus be manipulated from choosing the candidate who would best serve their interests.
But what about the PMC?
They vote proportionately more than the wc, although they are numerically far fewer.
And they disproportionately vote for the likes of Buttigieg, Biden, Klobuchar, Bloomberg and Warren.
Only 20% of registered Dems vote in primaries.
Working class people, especially in primaries, disproportionately stay home or aren't even registered.
What does it take to get the wc to vote in primaries?
Is there any way to make PMCs aware they are being used as tools?
From Wikipedia:
You're right.
I'd only add two caveats:
1)I own what seems to me to be a lot of stock in a very successful company, though to somebody like Bloomberg or Romney both the amount and value of the stock would seem small potatoes indeed (maybe qualifying me for the position of their personal assistant or housekeeper). And I don't feel that neoliberalism has served me well at all. Its impact on the climate alone...well, if I were going to make an analogy it would be that some guy burns down my house, and every subsequent house I try to live in...but gives me an extra $500/month in compensation. It's nice to get an extra 6K per year, and for some people that might make the difference between life and death. But it's not being given to those people--it's being given to me, the person to whom it merely means I have a bigger financial cushion, perhaps making me able to take a nice vacation once a year. Meanwhile, this SOB keeps burning down my house. And I'm supposed to feel kindly toward him because of the extra 6K/year.
Members of the top 10% who are not part of the top 1% should really raise their consciousness a bit. Hell, even younger members of the 1% might ought to do that, unless they fancy living in a bunker...or on a space station.
I'm not even going to get into the danger of nuclear war that neoliberalism thrives on and exacerbates. More assholes finding different ways to burn down all the houses.
2)I'd feel a lot better about this "class vs race" or "class vs gender" or "class vs sexual preference" frame that the media keeps serving me if I actually felt that Elizabeth Warren or Hillary Clinton gave a shit about the well being of women other than those she personally knows. That is hard to believe when they are willing to support policies that burn down everybody's houses--in Hill's case, both energy and foreign policy that does so. Put that on top of the fact that they are also willing to write off all the women whose lives are being destroyed by their economic policies, and I'm not really sure what their feminism amounts to, apart from "Every girl child born to the upper or upper-middle classes deserves the exact same opportunities afforded to her brothers." This pattern becomes even more visible when you apply it to race. I mean, if you actually give a shit about the well-being of black people in America, wouldn't you at least have to prioritize (a bloodless word inadequate to the situation) getting the lead out of the water in Flint? Rather than, essentially, making a deceitful joke out of the issue? Wouldn't you have to offer the black teenagers of Ferguson something other than a field trip and a photo op? If you don't take meaningful action on those issues, or at least try to, then which black people are you actually concerned about? Seems like it's just the black people who are wealthy enough that they won't have to drink lead, and have a higher than average chance of not being blown away by a cop like their less wealthy brothers. Pete Buttigieg is gay and that's wonderful, right? Why is it wonderful? Because it proves that as long as a gay man is willing to be the elites' shield and buckler, he can rise to prominence? Or am I supposed to think that Pete Buttigieg cares about gay men who can't afford a roof over their heads, can't afford the cocktail if they test HIV-positive? Why am I supposed to think that, when, in his own autobiography, he doesn't even mention the large homeless population that lives near Harvard? If he's so on fire to promote LGBTQ rights, shouldn't that include the rights of those LGBTQ people who are poor? How about the ones who can afford a roof over their head and access to medicine, but can't afford to attend Harvard no matter how good their grades are? Do they matter? In fact, are there any LGBTQ people who *do* matter, other than the ones so privileged in wealth and social position that their *only* concern is anti-LGBTQ prejudice?
Sorry--I really do think this is a good essay and I'm in agreement with you, but damn, I'm pissed off at the people who have distorted civil rights and anti-bigotry movements and turned them into a mask behind which they can cavort like demons playing with a corpse.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
It's a class war
not sexuality, skin color, country of origin or all the other caveats the dividers like to
add to the distraction. The poor don't count in the equations.
The wealthy rulers are not focused on providing basic goods
such as clean water, shelter, heath care or food for the lower 50%.
The election season inconveniently exposes this.
Fight back, raise awareness, yell like hell.
Strike, assemble and explain the options
with truth and intelligence.
Good to see ya, brother.
And you're right.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver