Marxist in Nebraska
29th April 2005, 08:11
I am forwarding this article from the New York Times, by the sometimes valuable Bob Herbert. I include the text in full, because the article is no longer available for free through the Times' website. I sincerely hope there is no legal problem over this... I am making fair use of it for a purely non-commerical format.
To me, this article is a textbook example of a common liberal phenomena... namely giving all credit for progressive reform to a benevolent master in the Democratic Party. Herbert even mentions in the article how "conservative" Democrats (read: more consistent defenders of the ruling class) were often at odds with FDR's political agenda. There is no discussion, however, of how and why FDR acted in the way he did even against parts of his own party. We are simply told that Roosevelt was such a great guy, such a humanitarian, that he gave to the needy for entirely selfless reasons.
Herbert even fashions FDR a "radical." Someone who is utterly non-existent in politics today... That is untrue. There are still "New Deal-type" politicians in Washington, like Representative Dennis Kucinich (D-OH). There has been a populist faction in the Democratic Party ever since the New Deal, if not before it. The difference is that the populist wing of the Dems doesn't get its members elected president, or even treated as "serious candidates" in the primaries anymore. Why?
Well, let's start with the differences between the fraternal twin wings of the Business Party--Republican and Democrat. The ruling class seems to prefer Republicans--the GOP is always on the offensive, taking as much from the workers as is within their power at any given moment. They are the "bad cop" in the "good cop/bad cop" game of American power politics. Democrats are less reliable in their offensive skills, though the DNC types are closing the gap very quickly. The Dems are far more valuable as the good cop, the illusion of a democratic choice... a roach motel disguised as a sanctuary from the Spanish Inquisition. But to be an effective good cop, the Dems sometimes have to offer concessions. Bourgeois forces hate concessions... they cut into the profit margins. So, Dems are kept around "just in case", and Republicans are in power as much as possible.
There is a similar distinction between the business and populist wings of the Democratic Party. Populist politicians like Kucinich and Cynthia McKinney serve the Democratic Party, and thus the ruling class, by keeping potential threats to the ruling class using "proper channels" within the Democratic Party. Working within the system must work... "look, Dennis Kucinich is preaching a quasi-socialist agenda and is in the House of Representatives thanks to the great and wonderful Democratic Party... the Party of We the People." But these types would make too many concessions, they would endanger our streak of record-profit years, so the ruling class prefers the DNC to Kucinich and McKinney. But they need the good cops around, just in case...
Getting back to FDR:
The Depression had to be a scary time for certain sectors of the ruling class. Some of them were making a lot of money, sewing the seeds of future business empires picking over the corpses of small and mid-sized competitors that couldn't weather the storm. But, if any of them paid attention to the workers, they had to be noticing growing resentment up to and including real fear of revolt as the workers grew more miserable. Concessions had to be made, to stabilize the system and dull the pain that could drive workers to revolt. The extraordinarily dire circumstances called not just for the "Good Cop Party", but a member of the good cop faction of the Good Cop Party.
Herbert continues,
"But the truth is that during the 1950's and 60's the nation made substantial progress toward his wonderfully admirable goals, before the momentum of liberal politics slowed with the war in Vietnam and the election in 1968 of Richard Nixon."
First of all, Nixon was in practice less right-wing than Reagan or even Clinton. Michael Moore jokingly calls Nixon the "last liberal president." Many of our most cherished measures of workers' safety and environmental protection were signed in the early '70s by Nixon. And, of course, much of the progress made in the '50s came under the administration of Republican Dwight Eisenhower (who even championed an income tax that was simply confiscatory on the top brackets). So much for the liberal myth of Republican bogeymen.
The "substantial progress" noted by Herbert was slower and less significant than reforms made under FDR's New Deal, but did continue into the early 1970s (again, beyond LBJ into Nixon). Why? Again, Herbert is silent on the question, only hinting that the liberals who followed FDR had a spark of his saintly inner fire.
In reality, people's movements mobilized beginning in the 1950s. The civil rights movement and the labor movement were on the scene earliest, followed into the '60s by feminist and anti-war movements. These movements were perhaps better organized than in the 1930s, but due to the fact that they weren't starving, they weren't seen as nearly as significant a threat to the continued dominance of the ruling class. Yet, these movements did have real and growing power. Thus, Republicans like Eisenhower were kept on a short leash and Democrats continued to offer concessions, though no longer on a New Deal scale.
Herbert does not make a single reference to any mass movement at any point in his longing for the return of some mythical "golden age" when the Democrats were truly a party of the people. Just like some kind of fundamentalist Christian, he rambles with a kind of quasi-nostalgia for the "ressurection" of the liberal "messiah."
Next, he addresses the right-wing reaction starting with Reagan. Again, he declines to note the impact of people's movements declining, and how that weakness allowed the ruling class's counter-offensive to reduce workers' standard of living to 40-year lows (perhaps my number is even too low... 50 years? 60?). It is evident that the ruling class is arrogant enough to return the world to the heyday of robber baron capitalism, about 1900. I have every reason to believe they will continue to push us back to that point, unless we organize and fight back.
***
A Radical in the White House
By Bob Herbert
The New York Times
Monday 18 April 2005
Last week - April 12, to be exact - was the 60th anniversary of the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. "I have a terrific headache," he said, before
collapsing at the Little White House in Warm Springs, Ga. He died of a massive cerebral hemorrhage on the 83rd day of his fourth term as president. His hold on the nation was such that most Americans, stunned by the announcement of his death that spring afternoon, reacted as though they had lost a close relative.
That more wasn't made of this anniversary is not just a matter of time; it's a measure of the distance the U.S. has traveled from the egalitarian ideals championed by F.D.R. His goal was "to make a country in which no one is left out." That kind of thinking has long since been consigned to the
political dumpster. We're now in the age of Bush, Cheney and DeLay, small men committed to the concentration of big bucks in the hands of the fortunate few.
To get a sense of just how radical Roosevelt was (compared with the politics of today), consider the State of the Union address he delivered from the White House on Jan. 11, 1944. He was already in declining health and, suffering from a cold, he gave the speech over the radio in the form of a fireside chat.
After talking about the war, which was still being fought on two fronts, the president offered what should have been recognized immediately for what it was, nothing less than a blueprint for the future of the United States. It was the clearest statement I've ever seen of the kind of nation the U.S. could have become in the years between the end of World War II and now. Roosevelt referred to his proposals in that speech as "a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all regardless of station, race or creed."
Among these rights, he said, are:
"The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation.
"The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation.
"The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living.
"The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad.
"The right of every family to a decent home.
"The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health.
"The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident and unemployment.
"The right to a good education."
I mentioned this a few days ago to an acquaintance who is 30 years old. She said, "Wow, I can't believe a president would say that."
Roosevelt's vision gave conservatives in both parties apoplexy in 1944 and it would still drive them crazy today. But the truth is that during the
1950's and 60's the nation made substantial progress toward his wonderfully admirable goals, before the momentum of liberal politics slowed with the war in Vietnam and the election in 1968 of Richard Nixon.
It wouldn't be long before Ronald Reagan was, as the historian Robert Dallek put it, attacking Medicare as "the advance wave of socialism" and Dick Cheney, from a seat in Congress, was giving the thumbs down to Head Start. Mr. Cheney says he has since seen the light on Head Start. But his real idea of a head start is to throw government money at people who already have more cash than they know what to do with. He's one of the leaders of the G.O.P. gang (the members should all wear masks) that has executed a wholesale transfer of wealth via tax cuts from working people to the very rich.
Roosevelt was far from a perfect president, but he gave hope and a sense of the possible to a nation in dire need. And he famously warned against giving in to fear.
The nation is now in the hands of leaders who are experts at exploiting fear, and indifferent to the needs and hopes, even the suffering, of
ordinary people.
"The test of our progress," said Roosevelt, "is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."
Sixty years after his death we should be raising a toast to F.D.R. and his progressive ideas. And we should take that opportunity to ask: How in the world did we allow ourselves to get from there to here?
To me, this article is a textbook example of a common liberal phenomena... namely giving all credit for progressive reform to a benevolent master in the Democratic Party. Herbert even mentions in the article how "conservative" Democrats (read: more consistent defenders of the ruling class) were often at odds with FDR's political agenda. There is no discussion, however, of how and why FDR acted in the way he did even against parts of his own party. We are simply told that Roosevelt was such a great guy, such a humanitarian, that he gave to the needy for entirely selfless reasons.
Herbert even fashions FDR a "radical." Someone who is utterly non-existent in politics today... That is untrue. There are still "New Deal-type" politicians in Washington, like Representative Dennis Kucinich (D-OH). There has been a populist faction in the Democratic Party ever since the New Deal, if not before it. The difference is that the populist wing of the Dems doesn't get its members elected president, or even treated as "serious candidates" in the primaries anymore. Why?
Well, let's start with the differences between the fraternal twin wings of the Business Party--Republican and Democrat. The ruling class seems to prefer Republicans--the GOP is always on the offensive, taking as much from the workers as is within their power at any given moment. They are the "bad cop" in the "good cop/bad cop" game of American power politics. Democrats are less reliable in their offensive skills, though the DNC types are closing the gap very quickly. The Dems are far more valuable as the good cop, the illusion of a democratic choice... a roach motel disguised as a sanctuary from the Spanish Inquisition. But to be an effective good cop, the Dems sometimes have to offer concessions. Bourgeois forces hate concessions... they cut into the profit margins. So, Dems are kept around "just in case", and Republicans are in power as much as possible.
There is a similar distinction between the business and populist wings of the Democratic Party. Populist politicians like Kucinich and Cynthia McKinney serve the Democratic Party, and thus the ruling class, by keeping potential threats to the ruling class using "proper channels" within the Democratic Party. Working within the system must work... "look, Dennis Kucinich is preaching a quasi-socialist agenda and is in the House of Representatives thanks to the great and wonderful Democratic Party... the Party of We the People." But these types would make too many concessions, they would endanger our streak of record-profit years, so the ruling class prefers the DNC to Kucinich and McKinney. But they need the good cops around, just in case...
Getting back to FDR:
The Depression had to be a scary time for certain sectors of the ruling class. Some of them were making a lot of money, sewing the seeds of future business empires picking over the corpses of small and mid-sized competitors that couldn't weather the storm. But, if any of them paid attention to the workers, they had to be noticing growing resentment up to and including real fear of revolt as the workers grew more miserable. Concessions had to be made, to stabilize the system and dull the pain that could drive workers to revolt. The extraordinarily dire circumstances called not just for the "Good Cop Party", but a member of the good cop faction of the Good Cop Party.
Herbert continues,
"But the truth is that during the 1950's and 60's the nation made substantial progress toward his wonderfully admirable goals, before the momentum of liberal politics slowed with the war in Vietnam and the election in 1968 of Richard Nixon."
First of all, Nixon was in practice less right-wing than Reagan or even Clinton. Michael Moore jokingly calls Nixon the "last liberal president." Many of our most cherished measures of workers' safety and environmental protection were signed in the early '70s by Nixon. And, of course, much of the progress made in the '50s came under the administration of Republican Dwight Eisenhower (who even championed an income tax that was simply confiscatory on the top brackets). So much for the liberal myth of Republican bogeymen.
The "substantial progress" noted by Herbert was slower and less significant than reforms made under FDR's New Deal, but did continue into the early 1970s (again, beyond LBJ into Nixon). Why? Again, Herbert is silent on the question, only hinting that the liberals who followed FDR had a spark of his saintly inner fire.
In reality, people's movements mobilized beginning in the 1950s. The civil rights movement and the labor movement were on the scene earliest, followed into the '60s by feminist and anti-war movements. These movements were perhaps better organized than in the 1930s, but due to the fact that they weren't starving, they weren't seen as nearly as significant a threat to the continued dominance of the ruling class. Yet, these movements did have real and growing power. Thus, Republicans like Eisenhower were kept on a short leash and Democrats continued to offer concessions, though no longer on a New Deal scale.
Herbert does not make a single reference to any mass movement at any point in his longing for the return of some mythical "golden age" when the Democrats were truly a party of the people. Just like some kind of fundamentalist Christian, he rambles with a kind of quasi-nostalgia for the "ressurection" of the liberal "messiah."
Next, he addresses the right-wing reaction starting with Reagan. Again, he declines to note the impact of people's movements declining, and how that weakness allowed the ruling class's counter-offensive to reduce workers' standard of living to 40-year lows (perhaps my number is even too low... 50 years? 60?). It is evident that the ruling class is arrogant enough to return the world to the heyday of robber baron capitalism, about 1900. I have every reason to believe they will continue to push us back to that point, unless we organize and fight back.
***
A Radical in the White House
By Bob Herbert
The New York Times
Monday 18 April 2005
Last week - April 12, to be exact - was the 60th anniversary of the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. "I have a terrific headache," he said, before
collapsing at the Little White House in Warm Springs, Ga. He died of a massive cerebral hemorrhage on the 83rd day of his fourth term as president. His hold on the nation was such that most Americans, stunned by the announcement of his death that spring afternoon, reacted as though they had lost a close relative.
That more wasn't made of this anniversary is not just a matter of time; it's a measure of the distance the U.S. has traveled from the egalitarian ideals championed by F.D.R. His goal was "to make a country in which no one is left out." That kind of thinking has long since been consigned to the
political dumpster. We're now in the age of Bush, Cheney and DeLay, small men committed to the concentration of big bucks in the hands of the fortunate few.
To get a sense of just how radical Roosevelt was (compared with the politics of today), consider the State of the Union address he delivered from the White House on Jan. 11, 1944. He was already in declining health and, suffering from a cold, he gave the speech over the radio in the form of a fireside chat.
After talking about the war, which was still being fought on two fronts, the president offered what should have been recognized immediately for what it was, nothing less than a blueprint for the future of the United States. It was the clearest statement I've ever seen of the kind of nation the U.S. could have become in the years between the end of World War II and now. Roosevelt referred to his proposals in that speech as "a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all regardless of station, race or creed."
Among these rights, he said, are:
"The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation.
"The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation.
"The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living.
"The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad.
"The right of every family to a decent home.
"The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health.
"The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident and unemployment.
"The right to a good education."
I mentioned this a few days ago to an acquaintance who is 30 years old. She said, "Wow, I can't believe a president would say that."
Roosevelt's vision gave conservatives in both parties apoplexy in 1944 and it would still drive them crazy today. But the truth is that during the
1950's and 60's the nation made substantial progress toward his wonderfully admirable goals, before the momentum of liberal politics slowed with the war in Vietnam and the election in 1968 of Richard Nixon.
It wouldn't be long before Ronald Reagan was, as the historian Robert Dallek put it, attacking Medicare as "the advance wave of socialism" and Dick Cheney, from a seat in Congress, was giving the thumbs down to Head Start. Mr. Cheney says he has since seen the light on Head Start. But his real idea of a head start is to throw government money at people who already have more cash than they know what to do with. He's one of the leaders of the G.O.P. gang (the members should all wear masks) that has executed a wholesale transfer of wealth via tax cuts from working people to the very rich.
Roosevelt was far from a perfect president, but he gave hope and a sense of the possible to a nation in dire need. And he famously warned against giving in to fear.
The nation is now in the hands of leaders who are experts at exploiting fear, and indifferent to the needs and hopes, even the suffering, of
ordinary people.
"The test of our progress," said Roosevelt, "is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."
Sixty years after his death we should be raising a toast to F.D.R. and his progressive ideas. And we should take that opportunity to ask: How in the world did we allow ourselves to get from there to here?