If we do not build left-right coalitions on issues such as militarism, health care, a living wage and union organizing, we will be impotent in the face of corporate power and the war machine.
This column is a perfect extension of last week’s ideas about separation by identity politics. I’ve spent a lifetime on what I would call the true left. As a child I listened to my father’s Paul Robeson records, and so I learned about Joe Hill, the Auction Block, and Kevin Barry through art, and through the hard core lessons of Berkeley in the 60’s, (before the fall!)
The left then stood for freedom. I’ve never changed my views. But Chris Hedges is so correct in this column. There’s a long history of great people who have understood these messages. Fred Hampton’s attempt at solidarity with Virginia coal miners stands out. Frederick Douglass writing that every chain has two ends and both ends serve to hold down freedom. Bob Dylan’s great song: “Only A Pawn In Their Game” says all of this.
“We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”
Your "true left" is what me and my best friend call the "OG Left." Having come into voting age during the Obama era, I quickly realized how devoid the Democratic part was of anything resembling a left and have been baffled ever since on how they jump through hoops to avoid class consciousness.
I also believe this is what we have to do to dethrone the fascist corporate masters. Bernie Sanders did a great deal to point out how the true left and the true right have many commonalities. Joining together to return the government to the citizens should be the first goal. Then we can democratically debate solutions. As it currently stands there is nothing to debate, because they do not seek solutions, only ways to increase profits to the corporate overlords.
Keep in mind that "Left" and "Right" in the current American understanding of those terms, really only makes sense, if at all, in the context of contemporary US politics.
This is why liberals and conservatives love to argue over whether German national socialism was "conservative" or "liberal" (you can do either, if you cherrypick data points and ignore others). This is also how Russia is depicted as a Stalinist dictatorship (it isn't) to sell the war to a conservative audience, and as a theocratic fascist state (it isn't) when it comes to getting goodthink liberals on side.
Russia is not even a communist country any more The Stalinist Gorbachev handed it over to capitalism in 1991, which proves what Trotsky said about Stalin was true, that Stalin would be the gravedigger of the revolution. Trotsky was correct.
"Because both political parties are complicit in giving over $100 billion to Ukraine to keep this war going." With almost no debate, and no hand-wringing about deficits, unlike when any social spending that might make the lives of millions of Americans less precarious is proposed. No cries of "socialism" either.
Yup, funny how we never hear "But we can't afford it!" when the billionaires need another bailout at the casino, or it comes time to put another war on the national credit card.
Divide and Conquer has worked out so well for the Corporate Oligarchy. Jim Crow the most effective. Working poor blacks and whites have more in common than not. LBJ with his many faults championed civil rights which changed the Southern Democratic party to the point where Nixon targeted the racists to become Republican in his Southern Strategy. Pure divide and conquer. LBJ put it in a nut shell "tell a poor whit Texan share cropper he is better than a ni--er and you can rob his pockets forever"! The great divide lives to this day even longer than LBJ lamented after civil right laws went into effect "the Democrat's will lose the South for a generation". 4 generations later no end in sight! MAGA supporting whites continue to cut their noses off in spite. When or if they ever unite poor whites and blacks would be a power never scene before!
"War can so easily be gilt with romance and heroism and solemn national duty and patriotism and the like by persons whose superficial literary and oratorical talent covers an abyss of Godforsaken folly."
Most of us listened to mainstream media, who neglected to mention this inconvenient truth. All our wars have been "military actions" since then. So I don't find forceOfHabit's comment unbelievable at all, but celebrate this new awareness beyond the partial truths mouthed by mainstream news shills.
My personal awakening came when I'd subscribed and read my city's newspaper every day for an entire year and then discovered that there was an ongoing crisis throughout that time of which I was entirely unaware.
You don't know how arrogant this sounds? Unbelievable.
As an old blue collar union worker, activist against the Vietnam war, and grandkid of a Wobbly, I've long been suspicious of elitist left dogma. Like "vanguard of the working class." I get it--you think we're too stupid to run our own revolution.
No I don't. But I learned that fact in junior high school (public school), back when the education system actually taught history. It was a civics class about how the departments of government were supposed to work, including the act of declaring war. I come from a family of immigrants and auto workers and I was also an activist against the Vietnam war. You are too quick to accuse me of things that I am not.
"The war in Korea." "The war in Vietnam." Admittedly they were slightly before my time, but I never (to the best of my recollection) heard anyone, main stream media, teachers, text books, left wing anti-war activists, anyone, refer to them as other than "the war in ...".
I'll admit I was a little more aware that our adventures in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria etc were more like "coalitions of the willing" than formally declared wars. And our constant meddling in South America to overthrow democratically elected governments (like Chile) and support murderously oppressive right wing regimes (like Nicaragua), and the decades long illegal sanctions against Cuba clearly never came along with a declaration of war.
But there have been so many "wars" (we even invaded Grenada, and Panama), surely at least one of them was actually done properly? Nope. Apparently not.
Just out of curiosity, where is the last time you read/heard someone point out, as Chris has, that WWII was the last time Congress officially declared war?
In civics class in 1962 or thereabouts. They used to teach us how the government was supposed to work. I agree that there have been so many wars it's hard to keep track, and if you are a young person, there has probably been war every year of your life. The mainstream media is the propaganda arm of government nowadays. I mean, there has always been government meddling with media through the years, but now there are actually CIA personnel working at newspapers and television news outlets. That's not a secret, either. There are many reports about it.
I’ve been trying to get my far right, Trump loving Christian Bible pounding friend to see how they’ve duped us BOTH. That we have more in common than not - and that the neoliberal war machine for profit, with Wall Street , big pharma and
Billionaires robbing our country (and the planet) blind -are our MUTUAL enemy ... and We need to UNITE to Fight
Same here. Living in South Florida, I've seen first-hand the right-wing populism movement take over stronger than even the Obama "Hope and Change" movement in 2008. Problem is that the Right is even more fractured and confused than what's left of the Left. Chris is referring to the anti-war Libertarian faction but how large are they? How do they compare to the MAGA, Ultra-Maga, and Neocons in power? I doubt very much in that Ron Paul's moment came and went but time will tell...
Yay, finally seeing a political shift with a "left-right coalition." The Democratic and Republican parties are essentially the same when it comes to war involvement. Keeping this (Dem and Rep parties) together is the Us vs Them mentality. Finding commonality outside this "split" is super promising. Reading your article though I see the "Divide and Conquer" mentality/power that can wreck a left-right coalition. I think CodePink is making a mistake in not participating (speaker-wise) and is essentially contributing to a Divide and Conquer possibility. Seems as though the Labor movement also disfunctions with divisions - race/class.
Think of Team D as the political manifestation of the PMC (with minorities as junior partners) and Team R as the political expression of Local Gentry, with white Evangelicals playing the role of junior partners.
That said, there is a reason that I call them "Team R" and "Team D". The two parties need each other, the way sports rivals need each other, the way you can make a Batman movie without Robin but take away The Joker and Batman is just a rich weirdo with a disturbing thing for cosplay.
Sure, and that is the beauty of a left-right coalition. I may believe in the right of women to choose her reproductive options and my "brother" may not but we can perhaps believe in the Truth - for example seeing war is a racket and we are all affected by climate change. They get us to believe in Us vs Them, meanwhile we miss the Truth.
I'm liking this but with reservations, because I see the labor movement as one of our greatest hopes. Why do you think it is dysfunctional with regard to race or class? From my perspective this is not true of the labor movement in general, though I do know of a few smaller older unions where the union helped maintain racial segregation, most of these instances of institutional racism have been outed and things are changing.
The "left" groups opposing this are not only motivated by identity politics and "woke" (I hate that word!) culture.
Nick Branna is perceived as a third party organizer and threat to the Democratic Party. Any left-right alliances are also a threat to the Democratic Party (as a threat to the monopoly on political power of what Nader calls the Duopoly).
So, these groups are effectively - and some perhaps intentionally and knowingly - are elevating Democratic Party loyalties over anti-war activism. The exact same thing happened on the Medicare for all issue.
I think that you are perhaps the best intellectual of our time but you've got this one wrong. One has only to look back to the early 1940's to the America First Committee (AFC). Amongst their leaders were Father Charles Coughlin and Charles Lindbergh both supporters of fascism. The AFC was by far the largest anti war group in the country, yet on the left the Socialist Workers Party was also anti war but refused to work with them because they didn't want to be associated with the Nazis. At the February 19 rally there will be a speaker who is a supporter of Lyndon LaRouche, thugs who physically attacked the Communist Party and the Socialist Workers Party in their "Operation Mop Up". This is not to mention Libertarians, people who may be against racism, but who would never pass a law to protect people of color. The anti war movement's way forward is to appeal to the working class and the oppressed and Libertarians and LaRouche supporters are an obstacle not an asset.
Chris made the right decision. This issue involves an existential crisis, the possible extinction of the human race, and the continuing deaths and serious injury of many tens of thousands of people that it makes sense to work with others who are for peace and are anti-war, even though you might disagree with them on other issues.
I do not believe that there can be any "coalition" between the left and right wings of the capitalist political spectrum. Capitalism itself must be overthrown.
No he wouldn't, third position refers to people like National Bolshevists and Strasserists. Third position combines different elements of both far right and far left economics and politics.
People like Ernst Röhm and his SA could be called third positionists because they were—very much unlike the others National Socialists, hence why they were all slaughtered—largely working class Marxists, called "beefsteak Nazis" by their opponents because they were "red on the inside and brown on the outside", arguing a socialist revolution was necessary along with the national one and that only the latter had been fulfilled.
You have to either not understand the term you're using or be seriously off your rocker if you think Glenn Greenwald is third position. He is a liberal.
Thanks for comments Emma. I was wondering what was meant by third position. Will need to investigate more over time, but will take your comments as a starting point.
The Third Position is a set of neo-fascist political ideologies that were first described in Western Europe following the Second World War. Developed in the context of the Cold War, it developed its name through the claim that it represented a third position between the capitalism of the Western Bloc and the communism of the Eastern Bloc.
Between the 1920s and 1940s, various dissident groups presented themselves as part of a movement distinct from both capitalism and Marxist socialism.
This idea was revived by various political groups following the Second World War.
The rhetoric of the "Third Position" developed among Terza Posizione in Italy and Troisième Voie in France; in the 1980s, it was taken up by the National Front in the United Kingdom.
These groups emphasize opposition to both communism and capitalism.
Advocates of Third Position politics typically present themselves as "beyond left and right" while syncretizing ideas from each end of the political spectrum, usually reactionary right-wing cultural views and radical left-wing economic views.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7]
This column is a perfect extension of last week’s ideas about separation by identity politics. I’ve spent a lifetime on what I would call the true left. As a child I listened to my father’s Paul Robeson records, and so I learned about Joe Hill, the Auction Block, and Kevin Barry through art, and through the hard core lessons of Berkeley in the 60’s, (before the fall!)
The left then stood for freedom. I’ve never changed my views. But Chris Hedges is so correct in this column. There’s a long history of great people who have understood these messages. Fred Hampton’s attempt at solidarity with Virginia coal miners stands out. Frederick Douglass writing that every chain has two ends and both ends serve to hold down freedom. Bob Dylan’s great song: “Only A Pawn In Their Game” says all of this.
“We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”
Your "true left" is what me and my best friend call the "OG Left." Having come into voting age during the Obama era, I quickly realized how devoid the Democratic part was of anything resembling a left and have been baffled ever since on how they jump through hoops to avoid class consciousness.
I also believe this is what we have to do to dethrone the fascist corporate masters. Bernie Sanders did a great deal to point out how the true left and the true right have many commonalities. Joining together to return the government to the citizens should be the first goal. Then we can democratically debate solutions. As it currently stands there is nothing to debate, because they do not seek solutions, only ways to increase profits to the corporate overlords.
Yea, verily.
Keep in mind that "Left" and "Right" in the current American understanding of those terms, really only makes sense, if at all, in the context of contemporary US politics.
This is why liberals and conservatives love to argue over whether German national socialism was "conservative" or "liberal" (you can do either, if you cherrypick data points and ignore others). This is also how Russia is depicted as a Stalinist dictatorship (it isn't) to sell the war to a conservative audience, and as a theocratic fascist state (it isn't) when it comes to getting goodthink liberals on side.
They are vacuous terms that conceal more than they reveal.
Russia is not even a communist country any more The Stalinist Gorbachev handed it over to capitalism in 1991, which proves what Trotsky said about Stalin was true, that Stalin would be the gravedigger of the revolution. Trotsky was correct.
"Because both political parties are complicit in giving over $100 billion to Ukraine to keep this war going." With almost no debate, and no hand-wringing about deficits, unlike when any social spending that might make the lives of millions of Americans less precarious is proposed. No cries of "socialism" either.
Yup, funny how we never hear "But we can't afford it!" when the billionaires need another bailout at the casino, or it comes time to put another war on the national credit card.
Divide and Conquer has worked out so well for the Corporate Oligarchy. Jim Crow the most effective. Working poor blacks and whites have more in common than not. LBJ with his many faults championed civil rights which changed the Southern Democratic party to the point where Nixon targeted the racists to become Republican in his Southern Strategy. Pure divide and conquer. LBJ put it in a nut shell "tell a poor whit Texan share cropper he is better than a ni--er and you can rob his pockets forever"! The great divide lives to this day even longer than LBJ lamented after civil right laws went into effect "the Democrat's will lose the South for a generation". 4 generations later no end in sight! MAGA supporting whites continue to cut their noses off in spite. When or if they ever unite poor whites and blacks would be a power never scene before!
The Black Panthers
Those speaking at the rally speak for me.
Good luck and Godspeed.
I can't be there either, but know that you are representing many of us Chris! You speak for us.
"War can so easily be gilt with romance and heroism and solemn national duty and patriotism and the like by persons whose superficial literary and oratorical talent covers an abyss of Godforsaken folly."
George Bernard Shaw
Folly, yes, but accompanied by a Godforsaken elitist anti-humanist pathology that makes one question how such delusional people came to such power.
Well expressed.
"...the last war that was declared by Congress was World War II"
Wow! I did not know that. It speaks volumes on what has become of our political system and its respect for the constitution on which it is founded.
You didn't? Unbelievable.
Most of us listened to mainstream media, who neglected to mention this inconvenient truth. All our wars have been "military actions" since then. So I don't find forceOfHabit's comment unbelievable at all, but celebrate this new awareness beyond the partial truths mouthed by mainstream news shills.
My personal awakening came when I'd subscribed and read my city's newspaper every day for an entire year and then discovered that there was an ongoing crisis throughout that time of which I was entirely unaware.
You don't know how arrogant this sounds? Unbelievable.
As an old blue collar union worker, activist against the Vietnam war, and grandkid of a Wobbly, I've long been suspicious of elitist left dogma. Like "vanguard of the working class." I get it--you think we're too stupid to run our own revolution.
No I don't. But I learned that fact in junior high school (public school), back when the education system actually taught history. It was a civics class about how the departments of government were supposed to work, including the act of declaring war. I come from a family of immigrants and auto workers and I was also an activist against the Vietnam war. You are too quick to accuse me of things that I am not.
Unbelievable? Really?
"The war in Korea." "The war in Vietnam." Admittedly they were slightly before my time, but I never (to the best of my recollection) heard anyone, main stream media, teachers, text books, left wing anti-war activists, anyone, refer to them as other than "the war in ...".
I'll admit I was a little more aware that our adventures in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria etc were more like "coalitions of the willing" than formally declared wars. And our constant meddling in South America to overthrow democratically elected governments (like Chile) and support murderously oppressive right wing regimes (like Nicaragua), and the decades long illegal sanctions against Cuba clearly never came along with a declaration of war.
But there have been so many "wars" (we even invaded Grenada, and Panama), surely at least one of them was actually done properly? Nope. Apparently not.
Just out of curiosity, where is the last time you read/heard someone point out, as Chris has, that WWII was the last time Congress officially declared war?
In civics class in 1962 or thereabouts. They used to teach us how the government was supposed to work. I agree that there have been so many wars it's hard to keep track, and if you are a young person, there has probably been war every year of your life. The mainstream media is the propaganda arm of government nowadays. I mean, there has always been government meddling with media through the years, but now there are actually CIA personnel working at newspapers and television news outlets. That's not a secret, either. There are many reports about it.
I’ve been trying to get my far right, Trump loving Christian Bible pounding friend to see how they’ve duped us BOTH. That we have more in common than not - and that the neoliberal war machine for profit, with Wall Street , big pharma and
Billionaires robbing our country (and the planet) blind -are our MUTUAL enemy ... and We need to UNITE to Fight
Or
Go up in flames as they are hoping
Good news... she’s starting to get it!
Same here. Living in South Florida, I've seen first-hand the right-wing populism movement take over stronger than even the Obama "Hope and Change" movement in 2008. Problem is that the Right is even more fractured and confused than what's left of the Left. Chris is referring to the anti-war Libertarian faction but how large are they? How do they compare to the MAGA, Ultra-Maga, and Neocons in power? I doubt very much in that Ron Paul's moment came and went but time will tell...
Oh yes ..there’s nothing on the so called left that can compare
I actually tend to think we’re in serious /really serious trouble - and we’ve waited till the waters boiling and can’t jump out 🤷♀️🐸
But I have a crumb of hope ( I hope)
Thanks to people like Chris and others -still trying hard 🙏
Yay, finally seeing a political shift with a "left-right coalition." The Democratic and Republican parties are essentially the same when it comes to war involvement. Keeping this (Dem and Rep parties) together is the Us vs Them mentality. Finding commonality outside this "split" is super promising. Reading your article though I see the "Divide and Conquer" mentality/power that can wreck a left-right coalition. I think CodePink is making a mistake in not participating (speaker-wise) and is essentially contributing to a Divide and Conquer possibility. Seems as though the Labor movement also disfunctions with divisions - race/class.
Team D is basically Team R with different identity politics.
You're too generous. Different jerseys that's all.
Think of Team D as the political manifestation of the PMC (with minorities as junior partners) and Team R as the political expression of Local Gentry, with white Evangelicals playing the role of junior partners.
That said, there is a reason that I call them "Team R" and "Team D". The two parties need each other, the way sports rivals need each other, the way you can make a Batman movie without Robin but take away The Joker and Batman is just a rich weirdo with a disturbing thing for cosplay.
Funny--but not nice about the weirdo.
Sure, and that is the beauty of a left-right coalition. I may believe in the right of women to choose her reproductive options and my "brother" may not but we can perhaps believe in the Truth - for example seeing war is a racket and we are all affected by climate change. They get us to believe in Us vs Them, meanwhile we miss the Truth.
I'm liking this but with reservations, because I see the labor movement as one of our greatest hopes. Why do you think it is dysfunctional with regard to race or class? From my perspective this is not true of the labor movement in general, though I do know of a few smaller older unions where the union helped maintain racial segregation, most of these instances of institutional racism have been outed and things are changing.
I replied to you but I must have not replied to you, computer-challenged lol.
Bollocks. This is not good at all. It is a betrayal of true left politics.
Bollocks..."this"...followed by sweeping emotion-provoking statement.
What do you mean? What is "this"?
Notice also the /sweeping/ authoritarian assumption of a dogmatic "true left." Difference yet again denied or by definition considered enmity.
True left politics? Haven't really seen that in awhile.
Awesome article. Would Chris really not go to an anti war rally if it included the Proud Boys? I feel that’s an issue I disagree with Chris on.
The Proud Boys at an anti-war rally is a good clue something is amiss.
The "left" groups opposing this are not only motivated by identity politics and "woke" (I hate that word!) culture.
Nick Branna is perceived as a third party organizer and threat to the Democratic Party. Any left-right alliances are also a threat to the Democratic Party (as a threat to the monopoly on political power of what Nader calls the Duopoly).
So, these groups are effectively - and some perhaps intentionally and knowingly - are elevating Democratic Party loyalties over anti-war activism. The exact same thing happened on the Medicare for all issue.
I think that you are perhaps the best intellectual of our time but you've got this one wrong. One has only to look back to the early 1940's to the America First Committee (AFC). Amongst their leaders were Father Charles Coughlin and Charles Lindbergh both supporters of fascism. The AFC was by far the largest anti war group in the country, yet on the left the Socialist Workers Party was also anti war but refused to work with them because they didn't want to be associated with the Nazis. At the February 19 rally there will be a speaker who is a supporter of Lyndon LaRouche, thugs who physically attacked the Communist Party and the Socialist Workers Party in their "Operation Mop Up". This is not to mention Libertarians, people who may be against racism, but who would never pass a law to protect people of color. The anti war movement's way forward is to appeal to the working class and the oppressed and Libertarians and LaRouche supporters are an obstacle not an asset.
Thank you. I agree completely.
Big and loud Bravo!
Chris made the right decision. This issue involves an existential crisis, the possible extinction of the human race, and the continuing deaths and serious injury of many tens of thousands of people that it makes sense to work with others who are for peace and are anti-war, even though you might disagree with them on other issues.
Surprised G. Greenwald isn't involved. Even if he can't be there in person, could send a statement. Left/Right coalitions are a big part of his niche.
I do not believe that there can be any "coalition" between the left and right wings of the capitalist political spectrum. Capitalism itself must be overthrown.
It's been said that capitalism is not a political system, but an economic system.
Your thoughts?
Yes, he would be what one might call a Third Positioner
No he wouldn't, third position refers to people like National Bolshevists and Strasserists. Third position combines different elements of both far right and far left economics and politics.
People like Ernst Röhm and his SA could be called third positionists because they were—very much unlike the others National Socialists, hence why they were all slaughtered—largely working class Marxists, called "beefsteak Nazis" by their opponents because they were "red on the inside and brown on the outside", arguing a socialist revolution was necessary along with the national one and that only the latter had been fulfilled.
You have to either not understand the term you're using or be seriously off your rocker if you think Glenn Greenwald is third position. He is a liberal.
Thanks for comments Emma. I was wondering what was meant by third position. Will need to investigate more over time, but will take your comments as a starting point.
THIRD POSITION
The Third Position is a set of neo-fascist political ideologies that were first described in Western Europe following the Second World War. Developed in the context of the Cold War, it developed its name through the claim that it represented a third position between the capitalism of the Western Bloc and the communism of the Eastern Bloc.
Between the 1920s and 1940s, various dissident groups presented themselves as part of a movement distinct from both capitalism and Marxist socialism.
This idea was revived by various political groups following the Second World War.
The rhetoric of the "Third Position" developed among Terza Posizione in Italy and Troisième Voie in France; in the 1980s, it was taken up by the National Front in the United Kingdom.
These groups emphasize opposition to both communism and capitalism.
Advocates of Third Position politics typically present themselves as "beyond left and right" while syncretizing ideas from each end of the political spectrum, usually reactionary right-wing cultural views and radical left-wing economic views.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7]
https://archive.is/mAuFI ARPANET WUB
Greenwald is a liberal? What is a liberal? Take a look at Greenwald's past and his comments that Tucker and Bannon are socialists.
But it is his coverage of Brazil that puts the nail in his coffin.