Sure, I understand there are unfavorable circumstances which arise out of the paradigm of representative democracy itself, but even Shalom believes you have to have some sort of voting system in place when worse comes to worse. We're also not just talking about where we eventually want to get to; we're also talking about how we can, in the meantime, at least improve the current system to the greatest extent possible since we haven't yet been presented with sufficient opportunity to completely restructure the fundaments of society. All I'm saying is that I'm concerned instant-runoff voting isn't the most representative of an electorate's preferences out of all the proposed alternatives to the abysmal first-past-the-post system.

Eric Bogan I think you make excellent points and analogies (I'd forgotten about Moore's affair with Clark...not a good moment for that often wonderful filmmaker). I also heard people I thought were left express admiration for the dangerous rightist John MCain. Victor if you see the Silverstein piece you will find rapid confirmation for your (I think accurate) thesis that nobody gets to Obama's position without having first been vetted by (and having sold their soul to) the corporate-financial power "elite." Here's the last paragraph of Silverstein's excellent article, which follows a couple of paragraphs in which he explains that it is really the money-dominated structure of U.S. politics that's most at fault, not Obama: "All of this has forged a political culture that is intrinsically hostile to reform. On condition of anonymity, one Washington lobbyist I spoke with was willing to point out the obdious: that big donors would ne be helping out Obama if they didn't see hims as a 'player.' The lobbyist added: 'What's the dollar value of a starry-eyed idealist?'" That just about says it all. You are corrupt the moment you say want to be part of it (as Martin Luther King, Jr. knew when he said no thanks to even making a symbolic presidential run...see the second ZNet piece I pasted in) It will take a damn-near revolution (imagine) to blow up that swamp down there, situated BTW in the most unequal city in the industrialized world's most unequal nation. Finally, I need to step back a little from my first comment. I just read a 2003 piece by Bruce Dixon ("in Search of the Real Barack Obama," Black Commentator, June 5 and 2003) and some other stuff that makes me think Silverstein is more right than wrong to emphasize discontinuity between the state-level Obama and the federal Obama. The discontinuity is probably not about any change in Obama's character but about the difference beteween (i) having a relatively safe State Senatorial seat in a predominantly black and therefore left-leaning South Side Chicago district and (ii) running for expensive statewide and now national office in a white majority and of course corporate-dominated nation. On the other hand, it is hard to understimate the toxic and reactionary impact of a Harvard education. Ivy League (and especially Harvard and Yale) education and socialization is a really big and heavily ideological Establishment/ruling-class filter and has been for quite some time (you should see how it works in the admittedly less relevant realm of academia, where Ivy Leaguers just rule by fiat).

thanks for your essay mss suyi e.

Did you ever see this article by Steve Shalom?

[I put up a reply on saturday but must have edited it one too many times 'cos I got a message saying that the administrator regards it as spam and would have to look at it. The post hasn't reappeared yet so i'll just put the points here again]

• There's the mainstream view of the 'Founding Fathers' and then there is the view gleaned from such works as Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United State. (that links to a scan of the book. the relevant chapters for this discussion are 4 & 5 but you would do well to read the whole book if you've never done so before. Get the hardcover version if you can 'cos it has the footnotes). Needless to say, my current views align more with Howard Zinn's.
• Obviously the 'Founding Fathers' had no intent of establishing real democracy. For a moment let's ignore slavery and oppression of women. Democracy was restricted to the elite; the system was designed to split power amongs the elite. But even within these restictions there were some, James Madison for one, who argued that only the betters (i.e. the richest) of the elite should have power. This shows the farce of the argument that once the oppressed groups got the right to vote, all became well with the system (ignoring how the elite have made the system even more undemocratic through the years).
  
• Furthermore, we should critize the Founding Fathers for not getting rid of slavery (wage and chattel), oppression of women, etc. It is no good to say that they were merely men of their times and that we are judging them on our own cultural standards -- there were many movements for 'real' democracy that the Founding Father crushed. More pertinently, there were radical movements in the 17th century that advocated systems for 'real' democracy (especially the Diggers). See Christopher Hill's The World Turned Upside Down for more info...

p.s. I'd like to know what you think after you read those recommended chapters.

The best research site on power in America http://www.uoregon.edu/~vburris/whorules/

Paul, I brought this up a little while ago when we were talking about alternative voting systems before. Are you familiar with the critique of instant-runoff voting regarding how it can conceal a preference in a voter's list in the case that higher-ranking candidates are eliminated after the elimination of candidates expressed in a preference located lower down on the list? What do you think of that critique, and what do you think of Condorcet systems?

take the lead, illuminates us..educates us..

while the third person immediately reminded me of those nuts who post on every chomsky blog, i started reading this hoping for some interesting stuff to come out of disagreement. 

then i got to "Unfortunately, with no person leading the way, we become aimless," yawned, and stopped reading. 

Paul wrote: I really don't mind intelligent scrutiny from non-leftists, but Craig's essay just doesn't come close to fitting the bill.

Paul , Craigs is no fun , i think Craigs want us, (readers) to believe that you would like to bring bac k the ghost of Stalin.. (lol)

Paul, Thorstein Veblen's "Absentee Ownership and Business Enterprise" is a particularly incisive take on some of the issues being discussed here (e.g. some of the things suyi e writes about above). In my opinion Veblen was the most brilliant and incisive observer of American "Capitalism" ever (and sadly understudied). Also see his "Theory of Business Enterprise"; I think both are better and more serious than his "Theory of the Leisure class", for which he is better known (the latter was somewhat tongue in cheek, which a lot of people miss).

I won't say I know much about the 'Founding Fathers.' I've gotten the standard rosy picture from the mainstream culture. However, my current impressions come from Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States (the relevant chapters for this discussion are 4 and 5, the whole work is seminal. that website has the whole book scanned. buy if you can though)

The Founding fathers were you typical 'Rich, White Men'. Many people forget that when the 'Fathers' were designing their system they didn't even take into account the "human cattle" (all of whom could not vote back then), and that their primary concern, i feel, was to figure out how to share power amongst the elites. Some felt that the elites as a whole could be relied on to govern. Others felt that even within the elites some (i.e. the richest) would have to take charge. Neither view bodes well for real democracy.

It's no good to say that they were not as 'enlightened' as we are now. For one thing the poor people of that time also pressed for democracy - they were crushed. Also lets us not forget that there were already movements in the 17th century calling for real democracy (see Christopher Hill's The World Turned Upside Down). Well, if you find time, read those chapters and tell me what you think.

Suyi E wrote: hmm. I don't know for sure! I'm not basing my ideals or actions for change on the 'Fonding Fathers' though... That's an interesting statement. Would you care to expand? I would be interested in your view of the Founding Fathers, and the Why's and Wherefores of what they did in founding this nation and its guiding principles as exemplified in the Constitution and their various writings and lifestyles.

Who Rules America sounds very much like a book I recently read "Who Runs This Place" by Anthony Sampson, an analysis of just who are the true king makers in British society. One point that I feel needs expanding upon concerning Corporate influence upon society has been missing in all comments thus far in this thread has been the issue not of CEO's and Corporate Management, nor of shareholder complicity, but what I feel is the most important issue of all - the Corporate Board of Directors. These fellows hire the CEOs. These folks "speak for" the shareholders. These folks are the REAL elite of America and most of the G8 world. They form a group of people with their own exclusive culture. They rule. They REALLY rule. And I believe it is these folks who are behind the scenes in all major political decisions, at least in the Western world. Note that I said "culture", not conspiracy. They all have the same mindset, the same world view, the same contempt for the Great Unwashed, the human cattle (ourselves). If the Left truly wanted to strike a dagger at the heart of evil in this world, they would press for the immediate dissolution of all Corporations, everywhere.

I did not anticipate having high speed Internet access on my travels. I't would be better if I didn't, but here goes. Not good, Craig.

CRAIG: I am certainly no fan of Obama. Since he has been elected to Congress he has spent more time on what appears to be self-promotion than his primary job of representing the people of Illinois. In two years Obama has accomplished the almost unthinkable, authoring two books, traveling to Africa, Iowa, Indiana, and Louisiana – all while holding his day job as U.S. Senator. Simply, how can Obama be doing his job when he's doing all these other things? Obama's distractions, however, do not appear to be Paul Street's contention with his Junior Senator.

STREET: I voice no particular opinion on Obama's “distractions” and don't find those things “unthinkable” since I held a full-time job and did two books (and about 300 articles) and traveled to all of places those areas except Africa (and I'd probably give him some credit for going there) in two years. My critical take on the self-promotion is fairly evident.

CRAIG: Paul prefers to focus on abstractions, often contradicting himself when stating his own desires for good government. Thus, the reader is left with the impression that Paul doesn't really know what he wants, desires chaos, or just likes to complain.

STREET: The abstractions charge is incorrect: the 2 pieces pasted in contain numerous references to specific policies, positions, and statements etc. The alleged substance for the claim of self-contradiction will apparently come later so we'll see what Craig says about that below.

Nobody except Craig (and I received literally hundreds of message on the first piece) has ever communicated to me the impression that I don't know what I want. The piece and the responses I got were admittedly part of an essentially intra-left discussion (most ZNet readers are left) so it basically took place in an environment of assumed radical egalitarianism/anti-authoritarianism and there was just no confusion among readers with whom I interacted. Craig might want to make possibly legitimate criticism of incestuous conversation on the left but that's a different topic. I personally think left wing people can write to and for left wing people on certain key matters (and left confusion over Obama is a good example of an appropriate instance) without that meaning that they think leftists should only and always talk to fellow leftists.

 The purported impressions of “desiring chaos” and “just liking to complain” is just standard centrist and right-wing slander that is about aprioristic rejection of radical criticism. I am afraid I don't take those impressions very seriously.

Craig is naturally free to have those impressions but I think they are terribly wrongheaded. A lot of my writing on ZNet is essentially political commentary from a distinctly non-mysterious radical-left perspective and I am free to undertake such commentary without having to always spell out full-blown alternative left programs for the re-ordering of society along democratic, participatory and egalitarian lines. But I am happy to be associated with a web site where such radical restructuring is a core project (as with Mike Albert and others' wonderful and impressive work on and for parecon). It's like Chomsky says somewhere in his last book (Failed States), the charge that radicals have no alternative has a useful translation: “They have an alternative and I don't like it.”

CRAIG: A constant theme in Paul's writing is that as a leftist he is offended by and sense of inequality. Paul states, “I am opposed to social inequality in and of itself, whatever its origins. The massive socioeconomic disparities that scar American and global life would be offensive to me - and supremely damaging to democracy and the common good in my world view - even if all at the top of the pyramid had risen to their positions from an equal position at the starting line of a "level playing field." Paul even invokes the infamous union organizer Eugene Debs to say that we are not to rise from the masses, but to rise with the masses.

STREET: This is really strange. Craig's description (quotation) of me here is accurate. I stand guilty as charged. But Craig's critique here amounts to saying that “Paul is consistently anti-capitalist and radically egalitarian and I don't like that.” Well, ok, Craig, you don't like that. Calling Debs an “infamous union organizer” is amusing. He started out as I think the president of the American Railway Union (ARU) and led a great strike I would have supported (a great-grandparent of mine did) --- the Pullman Strike of 1893 (or 1894…my mind is fading), but Debs then went on to be the regular presidential candidate of the Socialist Party between 1900 and 1920. “Infamous” to whom? The capitalist Robber Barons of the late 19th and early 20th century, I suppose…but I doubt that more than 1 in 200 ordinary Americans could identify Debs today.

CRAIG: Paul appears to show disdain for any form of leadership here because a leader is “at the top of the pyramid.” Instead, Paul infers that society should move as a school of fish with no one out in front, letting the tides and currents determine our direction. Unfortunately, with no person leading the way, we become aimless. We become stagnant. For if anyone hints at a direction in which society should turn, that person is attempting to climb the pyramid. He is no longer trying to rise with the masses, but rise from the masses, even if he has society in tow.

STREET: This doesn't remotely capture what I wrote. And if I advocate that society move off of carbon emissions and embrace green production, home-heating, and transportation methods (as I do) or if I advocate radical economic leveling (I do) then (a) I am embracing authoritarian hierarchy (with me as the big boss) and (b) this contradicts my embrace of directionless stagnation? This does not add up.

CRAIG: More disturbing is the possibility of how Paul seeks to enforce total equality. Unfortunately history has shown that when the total equality of a society is sought, all pigs are equal but some pigs are more equal than others. Thus, someone is at the top of the pyramid. There will always be an enforcer. But, because Paul emphasizes the masses, the image of the masses with pitchforks and torches on one's doorstep to keep that person in line is conjured up. Surely this is not what Paul wants, so how does he propose equality be enforced? Unfortunately, Paul is guaranteeing oppression by requiring total equality. He does not allow individual choice to exist because that choice may elevate someone above the masses. Thus, a paternalistic government is mandated which will decide what is best for individuals rather than allowing individuals to choose for themselves what is best. Paul has taken away “choice,” both in business or politics by putting the society in front the individual. Most disturbing is that if this is taken to its extreme, it allows individuals to be removed from society if the society deems they are not a benefit or constitute a hindrance. This way the masses will always remain on a level playing field. Just like in Che envisioned, Pol Pot practiced, and Kim Il Jong and the Iranian mullahs practice.

STREET: This is all just the standard timeworn ideological totalitarianism of watered- down (and this case pretty weakly presented) bourgeois ideology: class hierarchy is inherent in human nature; opposition to such hierarchy equates with Stalinism and Pol Pot, Big Brother, etc. Whatever.

The left-libertarian tradition is invisible and unknown. Craig needs to link on the parecon sections of the ZNet and read Mike Albert and others on the left who are articulating an anti-authoritarian and participatory and democratic vision of a non/post-capitalist.

CRAIG: Oddly, Paul disparagingly claims our American society is closer to the outcome of his ideal without realizing his contradiction. Paul states, “America doesn't score particularly well in terms of upward mobility measures, compared to other industrialized states.” He even goes so far as to call American the most strictly hierarchical nation in the industrialized world. (Apparently Paul is not familiar with the educational systems of England, Germany, or Japan where children are placed on college or “trade” tracts prior to high school.)

STREET: The second sentence (the one quoting me) and third sentences amount basically to saying that “Paul said this and I don't like it.” Okay, Craig, you don't want to hear that, but it's an empirical question. If you are interested in some of the facts please take a look at the article I did on this topic I did (I think it was last year) titled “From Rags to Rags.” There's actually (imagine) research (done by OECD and other respectable outfits) on these comparisons.

 I know about authoritarian schooling abroad – it's a problem – but it doesn't change the broader point. Craig ought to investigate the authoritarian separate and unequal educational system (with “college prep” for some kinds and “prison prep” for others) in the United States. I wrote a book about that very problem – apartheid education in America. If Craig cares about the actual facts in this matter he can order that book, titled Segregated Schools. He can also look at a better book on the same topic by Jonathan Kozol.

CRAIG: Either Paul wants the masses to be equal or he wants upward mobility. One cannot be sure. If America lacks upward mobility as Paul claims, then he cannot account for the last one hundred years of history. He cannot account for the Irish, Jewish, and Italian masses moving out from their ghettos. Paul cannot explain the success of Asians in America. Nor can he explain why thousands of immigrants come to our shores every year. Instead it seems Paul would actively encourage Mexicans, Poles, Russians, Africans and others from coming to America for they would truly be better off if they stayed home. On the other hand, when America does provide upward mobility, for example with Larry Ellison of Oracle, President Clinton, or even President Regan, those individuals automatically become elites who are to be disparaged and criticized for leaving the masses behind. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

STREET: The degree of upward economic mobility in the contemporary U.S. and the way that mobility compares with such mobility in other industrialized states is an empirical question, ok? Craig should see my article “Rags to Rags."

Did I say that no ethnic groups had ever achieved historical upward mobility in the U.S. or that numerous immigrants have no reason to think they would do better in the U.S. than they would do Mexico or Poland? No, I did not and there's nothing in the logic of my argument that implies any of that.

Beyond all this incredible nonsense, while my position on behalf of literal socioeconomic equality (which is supposed to make me into a Pol-Pot) is clear, I do not in fact have to have a position for or against upward mobility. I was simply advancing a fact-based critique of Obama's assertion that the U.S.A is the beacon of upward mobility. And there's no assault in my article on Larry Ellison and the others…more absurdity.

CRAIG: Even in electoral politics Paul extols the virtue of the masses. For him, a society will only properly function where one-person equals one vote and there is equal policy making for all. To Paul, America's representative democracy is nothing but a sham where a small circle of elites is placed in a higher position of elitism through a poorly participated in vote. Unfortunately, we live in a country of 300 million people. Paul himself lives in a city of 2.8 million people. Society would cease to function if all we did was sit around and vote. This is exactly the reason why a representative democracy exists. It allows a society to get on with their lives. Paul also disregards the fact that in America, the masses largely are represented in the two largest political parties, the Republicans and Democrats. The fact is, to the rest of the world, the Republicans and Democrats do represent the masses with their centrist views instead of being fragmented in parliamentary systems filled with representatives appointed by their parties and not the people with dozens of interest groups from the Greens to the Christian Democrats and Labor to many others,. It is only because Paul does not hold a centrist view that he is outside of the masses and thus unhappy with the status quo. Thus, Paul's contradiction is self-evident. He wants the masses to rule but is unhappy that the masses hold views contrary to his. It is not only an arrogant inference on Paul's part to suggest that his views will serve the masses needs more appropriately, but it is also elitist to infer the masses are sheep to follow the two major U.S. political parties instead of the real leftist's agenda for how to achieve utopia. In this Paul should become his own worst enemy. Paul's view of the world is a series of contradictions. Upward mobility is good except that upward mobility creates elites, which are bad. The masses know what is best, except when they actually decide in a manner that best serves the most number of people. One thing is clear. In Paul's perfect world he hopes “for children who regularly and richly question authority and subject the nation and its leaders/mis-leaders to constant critical scrutiny.” If all 300 million of us cannot sit around and vote, maybe we can sit around and complain instead.

STREET: Craig reduces the left critique of corporate dominated winner-take all narrow spectrum U.S. “dollar democracy” (plutocracy) to wanting to have people "sit around and vote all the time." Actually people on the left have all kinds of interesting and practical ideas (proportional representation, public financing, cascading voting systems, instant run off, and much more) about how to reduce Big Money influence and move closer to one-person-one-vote. Craig must not be paying much attention to current political news if he thinks Americans feel even remotely adequately represented by the two dominant business parties. The line about the “rest of the world” is bizarre and unclear. Actually I've done a few pieces showing that many core left views are actually quite mainstream (imagine that) in the U.S. The lines about “self-evident contradictions” and “arrogant” utopianism and “sitting around and complaining” are insulting and unwarranted.

I really don't mind intelligent scrutiny from non-leftists, but Craig's essay just doesn't come close to fitting the bill.

.

I am certainly no fan of Obama.  Since he has been elected to Congress he has spent more time on what appears to be self-promotion than his primary job of representing the people of Illinois.  In two years Obama has accomplished the almost unthinkable, authoring two books, traveling to Africa, Iowa, Indiana, and Louisiana – all while holding his day job as U.S. Senator.  Simply, how can Obama be doing his job when he's doing all these other things? 

 

Obama's distractions, however, do not appear to be Paul Street's contention with his Junior Senator.  Paul prefers to focus on abstractions, often contradicting himself when stating his own desires for good government. Thus, the reader is left with the impression that Paul doesn't really know what he wants, desires chaos, or just likes to complain. 

 

A constant theme in Paul's writing is that as a leftist he is offended by and sense of inequality.  Paul states, “I am opposed to social inequality in and of itself, whatever its origins. The massive socioeconomic disparities that scar American and global life would be offensive to me - and supremely damaging to democracy and the common good in my world view - even if all at the top of the pyramid had risen to their positions from an equal position at the starting line of a "level playing field."  Paul even invokes the infamous union organizer Eugene Debs to say that we are not to rise from the masses, but to rise with the masses. 

 

Paul appears to show disdain for any form of leadership here because a leader is “at the top of the pyramid.”  Instead, Paul infers that society should move as a school of fish with no one out in front, letting the tides and currents determine our direction. Unfortunately, with no person leading the way, we become aimless.  We become stagnant.  For if anyone hints at a direction in which society should turn, that person is attempting to climb the pyramid.  He is no longer trying to rise with the masses, but rise from the masses, even if he has society in tow. 

 

More disturbing is the possibility of how Paul seeks to enforce total equality.  Unfortunately history has shown that when the total equality of a society is sought, all pigs are equal but some pigs are more equal than others.  Thus, someone is at the top of the pyramid.  There will always be an enforcer.  But, because Paul emphasizes the masses, the image of the masses with pitchforks and torches on one's doorstep to keep that person in line is conjured up.  Surely this is not what Paul wants, so how does he propose equality be enforced?

 

Unfortunately, Paul is guaranteeing oppression by requiring total equality.  He does not allow individual choice to exist because that choice may elevate someone above the masses.  Thus, a paternalistic government is mandated which will decide what is best for individuals rather than allowing individuals to choose for themselves what is best.  Paul has taken away “choice,” both in business or politics by putting the society in front the individual.  Most disturbing is that if this is taken to its extreme, it allows individuals to be removed from society if the society deems they are not a benefit or constitute a hindrance.  This way the masses will always remain on a level playing field.  Just like in Che envisioned, Pol Pot practiced, and Kim Il Jong and the Iranian mullahs practice.

 

Oddly, Paul disparagingly claims our American society is closer to the outcome of his ideal without realizing his contradiction.  Paul states, “America doesn't score particularly well in terms of upward mobility measures, compared to other industrialized states.”  He even goes so far as to call American the most strictly hierarchical nation in the industrialized world.  (Apparently Paul is not familiar with the educational systems of England, Germany, or Japan where children are placed on college or “trade” tracts prior to high school.)  Either Paul wants the masses to be equal or he wants upward mobility.  One cannot be sure.   If America lacks upward mobility as Paul claims, then he cannot account for the last one hundred years of history.  He cannot account for the Irish, Jewish, and Italian masses moving out from their ghettos.  Paul cannot explain the success of Asians in America.  Nor can he explain why thousands of immigrants come to our shores every year.  Instead it seems Paul would actively encourage Mexicans, Poles, Russians, Africans and others from coming to America for they would truly be better off if they stayed home.  On the other hand, when America does provide upward mobility, for example with Larry Ellison of Oracle, President Clinton, or even President Regan, those individuals automatically become elites who are to be disparaged and criticized for leaving the masses behind.  Damned if you do, damned if you don't. 

 

Even in electoral politics Paul extols the virtue of the masses. For him, a society will only properly function where one-person equals one vote and there is equal policy making for all.  To Paul, America's representative democracy is nothing but a sham where a small circle of elites is placed in a higher position of elitism through a poorly participated in vote.  Unfortunately, we live in a country of 300 million people.  Paul himself lives in a city of 2.8 million people.  Society would cease to function if all we did was sit around and vote.  This is exactly the reason why a representative democracy exists.  It allows a society to get on with their lives. 

 

Paul also disregards the fact that in America, the masses largely are represented in the two largest political parties, the Republicans and Democrats.  The fact is, to the rest of the world, the Republicans and Democrats do represent the masses with their centrist views instead of being fragmented in parliamentary systems filled with representatives appointed by their parties and not the people with dozens of interest groups from the Greens to the Christian Democrats and Labor to many others,. It is only because Paul does not hold a centrist view that he is outside of the masses and thus unhappy with the status quo.  Thus, Paul's contradiction is self-evident.    He wants the masses to rule but is unhappy that the masses hold views contrary to his.  It is not only an arrogant inference on Paul's part to suggest that his views will serve the masses needs more appropriately, but it is also elitist to infer the masses are sheep to follow the two major U.S. political parties instead of the real leftist's agenda for how to achieve utopia.  In this Paul should become his own worst enemy.   

 Paul's view of the world is a series of contradictions.  Upward mobility is good except that upward mobility creates elites, which are bad.  The masses know what is best, except when they actually decide in a manner that best serves the most number of people. One thing is clear.  In Paul's perfect world he hopes “for children who regularly and richly question authority and subject the nation and its leaders/mis-leaders to constant critical scrutiny.”  If all 300 million of us cannot sit around and vote, maybe we can sit around and complain instead.

Suyi E, the Carpenter flick in question is not gross except maybe one funny scene. The JFK analogy is dead on. On the Time article, I'll have a look (so thanks) for bigger piece I'm doing. In the meantime here's some other journals where you can now see Barockstar: Vanity Fair, Marie Claire, Vogue, etc. Part of the presidential packaging that the big money campaign consultants have B.O. doing involves him basically bing a male model in fashion magazines; it's just pathetic. I don't get the dichotomy between being a left activist and getting information (ala Domhoff et al.) on key ruling-class players. You have to know your enemy and some basic research into "power elite" can bring good strategic background for planning various actions. If I had more time I'd get into the shareholders/managers thing but will just say the managers are legally required to serve the leading shareholders' bottom line interest and tend to actually pursue profit interets more rapaciously than many owners do. I'm away from computers for a few days so anyone who doesn't get a repsonse from me should not be offended.

I'm not a fan of horror movies (I'm scared enough already, so why pay somebody to give me an extra jolt) but that one sounds interesting. Nice article...

One thing I notice is that everybody seems to forget the shareholders i.e. the owners. Granted you might find them in Forbes and many owners do serve as board directors or even as CEOs but there should be a theoretical distinction between the owners and their servants. Afterall my biggest 'buggle the mind' fact about corporations is that the shareholders can keep recycling CEOs to do their dirty work (laying off workers, polluting environment etc) and nobody bats an eyelid. The Enron scandal is an example. Few people said much about Enron's destruction of California electricity supply but made much noise about the ripping off the shareholders (actaully they used the populist appeal about lost pensions). Anyway my point is are the shareholders still relevant; do people run the system or does the system now run the people?

About the "lost left sociological tradition" I must confess that I lost interest when I became a radical. As a progressive all that was very interesting to me. Then I belived that 'the system' had capacity for good and great capacity for bad and these people kept taking it down the bad path. If only we could force good people in there (and kick them out after a 5yr corrupting influence) . But once I read Manufacturing Consent and a couple of Mike Albert's critiques I don't feel the need to put in the effort to find out who specifically is carrying out the dictates of the system.

edits:

p.s. I never even got to your original post. You missed Obama on the cover of Time; he really is getting a big push in the media. That issue also contains an excerpt from his book.

I'll say this about Obama: he is a real liberal, of the JFK mould. He's got the ideology down pat. It's just that the ideology is still capitalist... I really do believe that he wants to raise minimum wage etc. He'll probably atleast try, then there'll be capital flight and he'll buckle down. I compare him to JFK specifically because many progressives have their blinders on about him too (radicals should pass out copies of 'Rethinking Camelot' at progressive rallies). He'll energize the base, the people who belive you have to work through the electoral system will vote for him. but I don't think he'll be effective...

pps, In the Time article it says that he "confessed" to having dabbled in socialist theories when younger. Like it's some sort of sin..

ppps, the article also mentions that conservatives supported him at Harvard Law (he was the editor of the Harvard Review). That was to show how willing he is to work with both sides...

Unfortunately the website doesn't include major shareholders. Also wish the Federal Reserve was included... but thats just nitpicking.

Okay, I'll tackle question 3 now:

First, see Paul Street's reply, well, whs. On Harvard itself, you'll want to read How Harvard Rules by John Trumpbour(editor). It came out in 1990, so it is outdated in names, but not in critique. What made me buy it was the blurb:

“[T]hey see our universities as having been taken over by the military and business establishments.… Obviously they live in a world of fantasy.”—Nathan M. Pusey, President of Harvard University, 1953–1971

I wish other radical books dispensed with the posititive sounding clips from NYT and used this format instead, or atleast in tandem.

On the education system in general, I would say Disciplined Minds by Jeff Schmidt (That's a link to a review). In the footnotes of Disciplined Minds I read about this delightful essay by Jerry Farber. The book by Farber is also recommended reading. That disabused me of the notion that if only everybody had 'adequate' schooling this world would be a better place...

For question 2:

hmm. I don't know for sure! I'm not basing my ideals or actions for change on the 'Fonding Fathers' though...

If you are a social democrat, read up on the French Socialist's tactics, cumulating in their victory in 1981.

If you are a pareconista (is that what we say now?) read up on the spanish anarchists...

Very interesting and informative website. Definitely useful for research. Also, an interesting way of presenting the technical interface. Thanks very much indeed.

Victor can also read G. William Domhoff Who Rules America? - part of a seemingly lost left sociological tradition (an early example was C. Wright Mills' The Power Elite) of concretely examining the ruling class...like who's in it and what institutions it uses to reproduce itself and its hegemony. It's interesting that social science produces large numbers of monographs and articles on the so-called "underclass" and its terrible,frightening, and "dysfunctional" lifeways and culture but relatively little on our horrifying democracy-disabling "overclass" --- the main culprit in the deepening crisis of American life. I wonder if "They Rule" is a play on John Carpenter's wonderful left science-fiction/horror cult film "They Live," (if you have not seen it yet rent immediately...it's a classic, very appropriate for the Halloween season, and has a good wacky take on corporate globalization and the manufacture of consent) which I found useful and instructive in an early Z Magazine article titled "They Speak." 

Gents I certainly appreciate the comments so far. However, the one thing that shouts for attention over and over is the hopelessness of the current American situation. There is no way - I repeat, NO WAY - that anyone without connections to the highest special interests can make their way to the lofty heights of the Dark Empire's Mount Olympus. Neither Senators, nor Representatives (though perhaps more of a chance here), nor Presidents, nor high political office appointees can be expected to succeed without formidable backing from the elites. It's the structure that needs changing, not the politicians. In my mind, the simple rule to follow, is don't vote for any of them - if they made it that far in today's system, they're your enemy, never your friend. By the way, I have three questions: 1. Just who ARE the elite? Everyone (including myself) always refers to "them", but just who are "they" - names, please! 2. How can we change the structure short of armed revolution as the Declaration of Independence advocates? 3. Have you ever noticed how many of our leaders come from Harvard? I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but for God's sake... ;-)

Paul, great to read both your posts on this reactionary acolyte of one wing of the business class, Barak Obama. There's nothing remotely 'progressive' about this wannabe Lieberman-esque politico: his shameful fealty to the aparthied, colonial-settler state of Israel, his advocacy for another invented "conflict" with Iran over trumped-up, phoney assertions by this messianic tyrant in the White House, and his overall acquiesence to the dictates of state-corprotist power and the American Empire Project belies the ridiculous fawning behavior of too many liberals and progressives, who are under the mistaken belief that this guy would be some savior in a totally rigged game called "elections" in America(more like, as Chomsky has pointed out ratifying decisions already made as 'choices' between two wings of the ownership classes). While not similar, this infatuation with Obama disturbingly reminds me of the love-fest that these liberals had a few years ago with the odious authoritarian John McCain, and the idiotic rantings of Michael Moore in favor of General Wesley Clark.

     As long as weak-minded progressives continue to buy into the carefully crafted personality cults of people like Obama, and hold them up as some sort of liberal knight in shining armour, this will take us away from the task at hand: building a political and economic movement for justice that will take more than believing the hype of the next liberal rock star like Obama, or entering into yet another cirucular firing squad over a third party candidate(Nader)in the upcomming "quadrennial extraveganza" called presidential elections.

 

 

eb

I actually had not read the Silverstein article when I asked you about it. Saw it at the local bookstore  (finished the artlicle earlier today). Another hypothesis about Obama is that he was somewhat progressive even after his Harvard days but at some point his ambition trumped his progressivism (amateur psychoanalysis here). Genuine progressivism would obviously have precluded success in national party politics. What ticks me off sometimes is the fact that how so-called progressive liberals could trust someone who promises to maintain and better manage U.S. global primacy (you and I know what that entails and I would have thought that self-proclaimed progressives would too).

I actually had not read the Silverstein article when I asked you about it. Saw it at the local  bookstore (finished the artlicle earlier today). Another hypothesis about Obama is that he was somewhat progressive even after his Harvard days but at some point his ambition trumped his progressivism (amateur psychoanalysis here). Genuine progressivism would obviously have precluded success in national party politics. What ticks me off sometimes is the fact that how so-called progressive liberals could trust someone who promises to maintain and better manage U.S. global primacy (you and I know what that entails and I would have thought that self-proclaimed progressives would too).

nemo, I'm glad you agree: you should see the liberal/progressive scowls I get for critizing holy B.O. It's like telling a 5 year old on an egg hunt that the Easter Bunny is a hoax. It's very similar to the response I get from certain nice olderliberals when I dare to criticize the legacy of the terrible corporate-pragmatist and militarist JFK (good studies include Bruce Mirrof's Pragmatic Illusions and Chomsky's Rethinking Camelot). You are referring to the Ken Silverstein piece ("Barack Obama, Inc.") in the November Harper's. Funny you mention that as I just read most of that article in a coffee shop about 20 minutes ago. There's some very good information in that piece (as one would expect from Silverstein) relating to Obama's intimate relationship with special corporate interests,lobbyists, blue-chip law firms and the like. The dark corporate neoliberal culprits behind the new national "Obama machine" include Archer Daniels Midland (an Illinois ethanol connection), Henry Crown and Company (with big investments in "defense" [empire/"forward global force projection"]and "telecommunications"), Skadden, Arps, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase. It's all pretty disgusting and Silverstein's article contains vital information for anyone who wants to understand how Obama became a nationally known household world practically overnight, but of course it it exactly what anyone with a decent American "dollar-democracy" bullshit detector should know about in advance. If anything, I find Silverstein insufficiently critical of Obama; he seems to buy too much into the whole populist outsider "Mr. Obama Goes to Washington" (title of David Sirota's decent piece on Obama in The Nation a few weeks back or so) notion of a "true progressive" politico who is now getting tragically sucked up into the corporate-plutocratic swamp of Washington. I have a more cynical perspective relating no doubt to my experience in and around Chicago and Illinois politics prior to Obama's national ascendancy. That ascendancy was predicated of course on his being vetteed and approved by Silverstein's super-empowered special interests. That's how it works in this dangerous land. And Silverstein (whose work I admire) unfortunately (in my humble opinion) refers to Obama's "stirring and widely lauded speech at the 2004 Demcoratic National Convention" (p. 31). For the hundreds who wrote me after I did the July 29 2004 piece ("Keynote Reflections") I pasted in above, the speech was nauseating in the extreme...for the reasons I give. I think Silverstein and also Sirota may overplay the progressivism of Obama's statehouse career and so then have perhaps too much discontinuity between his days in Springfield (Illinois) and his days in Washington. My sense is the guy has been a corporate-"Hamiltonian" from Harvard days on.

Could'nt agree with you more Paul. Have you read the recent Harper's article about Obama? I'm glad you sat through Obama's speech at the DNC... I have developed a very bad allergy to politicians' (both Democratic and Republican) b.s. patriotic speeches (often turn off the t.v. when they are on). Their sheer provincialism and ignorance (feigned or real) about the rest of the world baffles me (this can happen only here in the U.S of A, etc; I find this attitude among rank and file Democrats irritating as well; I can come up-off the top of my head- with the names of over ten presidents and Prime Ministers of various democratic countries who rose from abject poverty. The fact that a few individuals rising from poverty  is altogether irrelevant does not occur to anyone).