Trumped Up

Time to Abolish Politics.

The American presidential elections have gone by. I have waited until the chicken squawk about it all has died down a little before making some pertinent comments on it. The outcome has been in no doubt for months, yet people act surprised about it, especially the losers.

I live in Canada. The politics up here is different in many ways. There are some cultural differences. Our political system is different.

Yet many of the same dynamics at work in the American electoral wars are also at play in Canada. Many of them are the same in any country using an electoral representation system. These are oligarchic, not democratic, systems.

It is mere speculation to talk about how all this would work in a real democracy. There are no real democracies, at least not national democracies, in the modern world. The empire crushes any attempt to launch one.

Thus, all western countries live under oligarchy. People get a vote on the candidates the oligarchic factions put forward. Only limited attention is paid to what the voters think they want, or what is in the public’s interest.

In America in the age of neoliberalism, from about 1980 on, the idea of the public having any voice has been sharply suppressed. This has been the policy in most English speaking countries, including Canada. It is not pursued as harshly here.

I have often noted in my blogging that most politics in the Anglosphere is a fight between the Financialist and Industrialist factions of the oligarchy. For awhile after the last world war, the power of financialists was weakened. The industrialists engaged in some productivism and incidentally increased our living standards greatly.

Since the Reagan/Thatcher/Mulroney age, Financialism has been back in control. Their policies have generally been called neoliberalism. That is, disdain for productivity and focus on concentrating ownership of rent generating assets.

That, plus the ridiculous wars the financialists/globalists engage in to maintain their worlds empire, has led to a decline in productivity and living standards, and in equality and social stability, in western countries. It is especially bad down in The States, which is heading for a serious crisis. It has not got so bad yet in Canada.

To insure against resistance to neoliberalism, the globalists have gone flat out in America to suppress any left political movement. Most of what is presented as the ‘left’ is really a phony left. They are full of ideas that actually repel normal people.

The usual result of the lack of a populist left is the growth of a populist right. However, no populist tendency goes anywhere without something to unify it and give it an aim.

It is the industrial capitalists who have stepped up to mobilize anger in the American public against neoliberal arrogance and deteriorating conditions. They have realized where neoliberalism is taking them. They support aggression against China, the world’s new workshop, but they also want to reindustrialize America.

We can call these people the “new productivists”. They believe productivity can expand indefinitely, regardless of resource or environment limits, or even need or demand. They have taken control of the Republican Party as their vehicle.

Sagacious types who say there is no difference between the two American parties, that they are really a uniparty, do not know what they are talking about. They are thinking of the previous century.

The donkeys and elephants in these times represent two factions of the ruling class, with conflicting interests and ideologies. They do have points of agreement. In particular, they continue to want any kind of actual left suppressed in their country.

The Trump Republicans have mobilized the ‘under class’ in America. Of course they are providing a ‘Judas Goat’ leadership. These are the people the elites have always considered as garbage, but in frustration out of losing, the Democrat president has now openly called them by that term.

Much of the garbage which might have been left ‘garbage’ have moved over to join the centre and right garbage because there is nothing on the left addressing their issues. Trump is happy to get in his garbage truck and pose as their leader. Under his administration they will still be on the garbage heap but they will be happier about it.

It seems that the new industrial capitalists have now taken control in the USA. The old neoliberal order is exhausted. It will be very difficult for them to reassert control.

The new Republicans will also have control of both legislative houses. They will be able to put through their ‘plan 25’. This will restructure the federal government to create a fully fascistic state, and which will put through the industrial elite’s program.

They want to reindustrialize the USA and reopen markets for American goods. In their minds this means attacking the Chinese. This policy will fail catastrophically.

The USA has ruined its education system and no longer has the competent people who would enable it to reindustrialize. They cannot consider raising corporate taxes to repair infrastructure, or instituting economic planning and public banks. If it got into a direct conflict with China in the military or economic spheres, it would be clobbered.

So, in the USA Fascism has won but it will not be able to govern. This is how Fascistic type governments usually go. They are good at getting power, but they always destroy themselves with it.

The interesting question is, what comes after them. The financial capitalists seem like a spent force. They will likely not be able to rejuvenate and come back once the Fascistic interlude has played out.

Usually in such situations a left group emerges and tries to create a social government. They are usually impaired by generations of persecution. They lack organizational experience and a coherent vision of what they want to create.

Immediately after World War Two, in some countries, notably Italy and Greece, communist partisans were able gain control briefly. They were crushed by the allies. However, the partisans of Albania and Yugoslavia were better armed, and able to establish themselves.

If the USA is ever to recover, some sort of realistic left group needs to get control and move everything over toward the left. Such a group would have a very tough task. The three compadres of Russia, China, and Iran would be wise to offer them all possible assistance.

But this post is not to predict how antifascist revolutions in the future will unfold. It is about the situation we now have in the USA. So to the developing situation in Canada.

The Canadian Liberal party has long been the vehicle for global financial capitalism in this country. It has been in power for most of the country’s existence as a semi independent state. It has been roughly aligned with the US democratic party.

The conservative party has been the vehicle for industrial capitalism in Canada. Productivists have never been as powerful in Canada as in the USA. The economy here has been based more on export of commodities.

We have had a somewhat stronger left impulse in Canada. Our social structure, while not up to the standards of the most advanced countries, has been comparatively better than the Americans. The liberals have generally preferred to co-opt, rather than than suppress, social impulses.

The Canadian mentality makes us easy to co-opt. The main left vehicle has been the New Democratic Party (NDP). It is called that because at some long ago point, some people admired some initiatives of the American Democrat party of the time and thought we would identify with that.

The NDP takes credit for almost everything positive about the Canadian state, most of which it really did little to bring about. It seems to function for the Liberals as a kind of sounding board, to determine the minimum level of social provision that will buy off serious dissent. This has never taken a lot.

Canadian conservatives have traditionally been less conservative than American conservatives or British conservatives. That began to change after neoliberalism. They have been helped by the very weak governmental structure of Canada, which gives the provinces unjustified power.

A very aggressive form of Conservativism is steadily taking power in Canada. It has been boosted by several conservative provincial governments which never should have been allowed to get away with what they did. The conservative Harper federal government, from 2006 to 2015, was also a disaster for the country.

This kind of conservatives do not try to gain support beyond their core supporters. They focus on ‘breaking’ left and liberal Canadians. They try to neutralize any institution around which opposition to them could be rallied.

This is much like a more sophisticated version of the Fascists of old. The American Trumpians could learn from it. In fact, after losing office as prime minister, Steve Harper helped found the International Democratic Union.

This IDU provides support and expertise to conservative movements in many countries, seeking to establish these neofascist governments. Harper’s students have been successful in many of these countries. They are specifically opposed to anything ‘socialist’, which they identify with the Globalist financialist empire.

Canada is now about to fall under conservative government again. This time the productivist, libertarian, neofascist impulse will be much more powerful. Most of Canada does not want them and their ideas, but they have set up a situation in which it is them or nothing. The Liberals, even more so than globalists elsewhere, have been induced to self destruct.

As with the American democrats, the Canadian Liberals simply cannot believe they are losing to something as loathsome as Pierre Poilievre and his conservatives. They cannot understand why most people do not believe them when they insist that the economy is doing great. They are bewildered that the public is unimpressed with their minimalist efforts to respond to public demands for solutions.

The next federal election in Canada is due in a year. The exact date is not set. The polls suggest that PeePee and friends will landslide it.

As with the Democrats down south, that will almost certainly be the end of the Liberals in Canada. So too with their little echos, the Federal NDP. Twice in living memory, the Liberals have been clobbered in elections, but have recovered.

It will be different this time. People are sick of Liberalism and the phoney left. Some will hold their noses and vote conservative. Many will simply not vote at all until there is something to vote for.

We are already seeing this work out in provincial politics. People are given only the choice between two right wing parties. The openly right wing wing party wins, and the pretend moderate party loses.

The truth is, whatever the PeePee conservatives do will not be much worse for the country’s population than what the Liberals will do, or refuse to do. The same is true in The States, as people choose Trump over Harris in the absence of any better, more serious options. They go with whoever is willing to make at least a show of addressing the quality of life issues which actually concern voters.

As in The States, Canada is going to go through a period of neoFascism, or Fascism light. It will be calamitous but will not last long. And as in America, it is what comes afterward that is the question.

We could recover and rebuild our societies on a sounder basis. We could then live in a new golden age. Or, we could become set in some permanently reduced condition.

All this will depend on whether the polities of North America are capable of finally raising up a serious left populist movement.

Building a new age after fascism would be harder in the USA than in Canada. Building the socialist movement and party which could implement it would be harder. There, the suppressive forces are more hardened and violent, the indoctrination against anything ‘social’ more deep set.

In Canada the bigger problem would be the culturally driven-in passivity and conformism, and the pervasive rationalism. This is the idea that all the ‘progressive’ people have to do is talk endlessly and engage in some demonstrative behaviors, and finally everyone will be enlightened and the right things will magically happen. This has no basis in experience or any rational assessment of how change happens in the real world.

It has been observed that almost all human progress has come about through political revolutions. They came about through violence or at least the willingness to use violence. It is a constant of historical study that ruling classes do not give up power without a fight, and never stop trying to regain it.

What is unique about the present transitional period is that the ruling class is not only becoming unable to rule. It is fighting among itself about the basic theory of ruling over the population. The ruled-over thus have a big advantage if they can use it.

The problem with civil societies in North America is they are at present totally defeated and disorganized. They have no idea of what they really need. They are full of nonsense ideas drilled in by liberalism and ‘liberal education’.

Yet models are available for how to construct a better society. They do not require tearing everything down and rebuilding it. They mostly require getting rid of the assumptions of liberalism, the most destructive of ideologies.

Many people in Canada are noticing that many other countries are now much better run than the nations of the Atlantic world. They find that ‘democracy is overrated’. In fact, to repeat, there are no real democracies in the world.

All the best run countries are one party states. Of course, not all one party states are well run. But the best, with the best quality of life and the most real freedom, are not democracies in the western understanding of the concept.

Yet these countries are the closest the world comes to actual democracies. People have rights that matter. There are standing systems of popular assemblies in which the public is consulted and actually heard.

As political theorists from Plato up to Montesquieu tell us, voting is about oligarchy. This is one of the worst forms of government. It is about privileged factions trying to build followings in order to protect their own interests, but not allowing the public any real power.

The worst thing about this is that it leads to the idea of ‘free speech’ and ‘free press’. This is about elite factions spinning their own narratives so as to create and control their own factions. In a functioning society, the truth must be generally accepted.

We need to end politics. This idea really baffles a lot of people. They are addicted to the idea that the public sphere can only be about endless arguing between special interests and ideological camps.

Rather than a one party state, we should abolish political parties altogether. A uniparty could become the framework for a system of public assemblies. Participation should be restricted to those who are focussed on what is best for all.

If we want a real democracy, our present oligarchy must be overthrown while it is defeating itself. We need to heed the examples of better run countries. These countries really should be helping to launch serious socialist transformations in Canada and the USA, and acting to prevent violent suppression of them.

No democracy, or even good government, is compatible with capitalism. Of course, we do not need to replace capitalism with extreme forms of centralized control, and with state ownership of everything. All socialism means is that a government, serving the public’s interest, has control over business organizations instead of private interests controlling government.

Once capitalism is dismantled, many things can become possible. A basic income, an allowance for everyone to cover basic living expenses, could become a realistic idea. But especially, a real democracy could become possible.

As long as capitalism is rampant, democracy will be impossible. The people with the money will control the media and public discourse. The public will be split into multiple factions, all with their own separate facts and reality.

The Americans are about to get the Trump Republican’s peculiar set of facts rammed down their throats. The factions around the Democrats will be doing everything to obstruct them. However, there will be not much there to defend the American public.

In Canada, the beautiful world of Prince Justin is coming to a close. We will soon be subjected to Mister PeePee’s ideas.

Poilievre could be more destructive than Trump. In The States, they do have a division of powers. In Canada, with a parliamentary system and power centralized in the cabinet, we are more open to abuse of office by a Prime Minister.

For most North Americans, life is about to get more brutish, nasty, poor, and short. The way out of it is for the public to organize itself and fight back against the forces of darkness. There are no political solutions.

Enough said.