[Peace-discuss] "Inverted totalitarianism"

[C. G. Estabrook]

Hedges is an hysteric, which leads him to overstate things that are basically 
true, thus bringing them into disrepute.  The piece quoted is a good example:

[1] "The America we celebrate is an illusion." Nation states are unusual forms 
of social organization, originally associated with ethnic migrations (e.g., 
Attila the Hun). And the US is an unusual nation state, in that it is presumed 
to be founded not on ethnic solidarity but allegiance to scriptural doctrine 
(Declaration of Independence, 1787 Constitution, speeches of A. Lincoln, etc.). 
As an ideal, it is of course an illusion, which is not bad.

[2] "Our government and judiciary have no real sovereignty." The former manages 
to kill people with alacrity; the latter, constituted to constrain movements 
toward democracy (judicial review is not in the 1787 Constitution), produces 
displaced outrage but probably no effective opposition when it re-states the 
Constitution.  Getting away with things like that looks like sovereignty.

[3] "Our press provides diversion, not information."  Our press provides 
diversion and information, which is almost always there, even though you have to 
dig for it. No other capitalist state has a press as free.

[4] "Our organs of security and power keep us ... as fearful as most Iraqis." 
Overstate much?

[5] "Capitalism, as Karl Marx understood, when it emasculates government, 
becomes a revolutionary force." Actually, he said it the other way around: 
capitalism arose as a revolutionary force ("all that is solid melts into air") 
and generated its own form of government ("an executive committee of the 
bourgeoisie"). Modern history is an interconnected series of bourgeois 
revolutions, from the Dutch (16th c.) to the Chinese (20th c.), by way of the 
English, French, Russian, etc.

[6] "And this revolutionary force ... is plunging us into a state of 
neo-feudalism..."  Feudalism was a pre-capitalist social formation that lasted 
for a millennium in Europe.  (A similar system existed for centuries in Japan.) 
To us it seems to collapse the distinction between public and private: society 
is thought of as a non-egalitarian set of familial relations - an entire society 
organized like the Mafia. Twentieth c. fascism - a much more limited phenomenon 
- is a break-down product of capitalism and contains at most some patronage 
elements that may look feudal. Twenty-first c. capitalism (perhaps an 
equivocation) is absent the essential feature of feudalism: the responsibility 
of the superior for the inferior.

[7] "The Supreme Court decision is part of our transformation ... from citizens 
to prisoners."  Straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel: the US imprisons a 
larger proportion of its population than any other industrialized country - but 
not because of the First Amendment. It's a form of social control made necessary 
by the extreme economic exploitation of the population, impossible in any other 
industrialized society.


Brussel Morton K. wrote:
> This is the concluding paragraph in an article by Chris Hedges. It expands on
> some of the conclusions of Sheldon Wolin, retired Princeton  Professor,
> regarding our current dire political predicament, i.e., our false "democratic
> republic".
> 
> http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/01/25
> 
> /…The civic, patriotic and political language we use to describe ourselves
> remains unchanged. We pay fealty to the same national symbols and
> iconography. We find our collective identity in the same national myths. We
> continue to deify the Founding Fathers. But the America we celebrate is an
> illusion. It does not exist. Our government and judiciary have no real
> sovereignty. Our press provides diversion, not information. Our organs of
> security and power keep us as domesticated and as fearful as most Iraqis.
> Capitalism, as Karl Marx understood, when it emasculates government, becomes
> a revolutionary force. And this revolutionary force, best described as
> inverted totalitarianism, is plunging us into a state of neo-feudalism,
> perpetual war and severe repression. The Supreme Court decision is part of
> our transformation by the corporate state from citizens to prisoners./
> 
> --


-- 
This message has been scanned for viruses and
dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
believed to be clean.