Bernie Sanders Sucks — Now Love Him

Another guest post by John Wolfe, the theoretician behind the post that has been trending on Reddit since it was first published, and reigns as the second-most read BAMF post (behind my response to Federici) of all time. From the philosopher you love to love: 

Some Things We Know

Leftists usually display three personality traits: a certain romanticism, a deep cynicism, and boundless anger. Every time major elections roll around, the last two are deployed against the first. We all know the reasons—that elections in a capitalist republic amount to choosing which member of the ruling class will represent and oppress us, and that the choices involved are largely illusory and a poor way to affect real change. Further, simply participating in this tiresome ritual of the ballot box lends legitimacy to the illusion.

This cynicism has found a new target in Bernie Sanders. A number of articles devoted to informing leftists that Sanders is not one of us and his campaign promises no real change have been circulating lately. Given that the contemporary left has such a problem with overcoming sectarian bickering, it is almost a hopeful sign when the Ortho-Trots of the World Socialist Web Site, and the...whatever they are at Jacobin...can unite in denouncing the genial little socialist.

Of course, they are correct. Sanders is from the right flank of the Democratic Socialists of America. He is a card-carrying follower of the Socialist International. Who would expect this man could be anything other than a U.S. version of Hollande? Anybody who has looked into his stance on Israel knows that he is no anti-imperialist. The remarkable thing about the anti-Sanders commentary from the left is that people feel the need to so stridently point out the glaringly obvious.

Elections as Desire-Forming Events

Yet, I still think we have good reason to stump for Sanders. This is the case even though he is little more than a pre-Clintonian Democrat. This is the case even though he will most certainly lose the primary. This is the case even though, if by some miracle he wins the general election, he would most likely continue his party-line Democrat ways. This is the case even though, if by some greater miracle he becomes a radical, the political establishment would prevent him from doing much good. This is because elections should not be conceived as being about the candidates at all, but as about the people.

Presidential elections are marked events in the psychic life of the U.S. Elections of all sorts are frequent in the mess that is the U.S. political system. Local and state elections form the background noise of U.S. political life. However, no one cares much about these—and who can blame them? There is nothing in a school board or soil commissioner race that promises anything different. These elections are, for the most part, the equivalent of changing the oil in your car or flossing, and are neglected* in the same way.

But when presidential elections roll around, there is a real shift in the consciousness of the U.S. population. People become politicized. They feel a sense of agency and ownership over the political process. They begin looking to the future and thinking in terms of what a desirable society might be. The political imagination gets fired up, and new possibilities are disclosed. In short, they feel the intoxication of democracy.

This is, of course, largely an illusion. However nothing whets the appetite for the real thing like a good simulation.

Candidates succeed in elections, insofar as they do, by generating a vision of a possible future society which appeals to the public. Barack Obama did an excellent job of this. His half-African identity betokened an end to the traditional power structure. His vaguely progressive talk of change allowed people to see the possibility of a future without endless wars and assaults on the poor. The election of Obama legitimated a certain set of expectations for the future. He did not deliver, but the expectations remain entrenched in the public consciousness to such a degree that Hillary Rodham Clinton now has to unconvincingly attempt to portray herself as a populist who will uphold Obama's "legacy." 

But it is not the case that presidential campaigns merely appeal to existing voter preferences—presidential campaigns are rather desire forming. In this way they are much like advertising. No one wanted an iPhone until Steve Jobs unveiled them in a glitzy press conference; then half the population “discovered” that they had always wanted one. Likewise, as left-liberal as Seattle is, very few people there would have wanted an openly Leninist on the city council until Kshama Sawant mounted her effort and they discovered that they did. The visions presented by advertisers and politicians reveal new possibilities for the future which verify and reshape people's pre-existing desires.

Presidential elections are pure theater, it is true. But one of the main functions of this theater is to set the boundaries of what people can legitimately expect of their future. Between Clinton and the various Republican contenders, the boundaries are currently set at life under the boot of neoliberalism with a patriarchal and religious flavor, or a return to the days of Clintonian neoliberalism. 

Directive: Stump for Sanders, then for Stein

It is in this context that we can see the significance of a Sanders candidacy. He has the ability to portray a future outside the neoliberal consensus as both achievable and sensible, and he has the position and the funding to reach more people than a thousand Marxist bloggers. It is not much, but it pushes the political horizon further left. The anti-Sanders crowd seems to think that support for Sanders will transform genuine leftists into tepid reformists while there is very little, if any, actual danger of this. There is, however, a very real possibility that support for Sanders will cause the population as a whole to begin to accept some leftist goals as desirable and, more importantly, as achievable. More liberals will discover that they are actually socialists, a precondition to building any kind of mass movement in this country.

So support Sanders.

Then, when he loses the primary, stump for Jill Stein.

Then smash the bourgeois state. 


*BAMF fully supports flossing and does it regularly. Oral health affects total health, and we need our health optimized for the struggle. However, we do not disregard or discount the worth of those with poor dental or overall health.
**As always, this submission has been slightly altered stylistically by BAMF; this includes the addition of headers and links, among other slight changes. 

On Left Unity

A guest post by John Wolfe. 

One of the most fraught topics on the Marxist left is the ideal of “left unity.” We have all heard it called for more than once, and most hope for it in some form or other. However, it again and again fails to materialize. The factionalism of the left remains fodder for bitter jokes within and amusement from without. Further, we all know whose fault it is—those other people. “Sectarian,” like “hipster,” is a label that is never self-applied. This problem is so endemic it is worth analyzing in some detail, and here I will take a feeble stab at beginning such an analysis.

Once, in the not-so-distant past, there was a country known as the USSR heading up a block of nations experimenting with socialism in one form or another. Sometimes, as with much of what went on in the Twentieth Century, it is hard to believe that this actually happened, that a worker's revolution ushered in a situation where half the world was busily engaged in trying to build an alternative to capitalism. These experiments had mixed results to be sure, but at least they were happening, and happening on a grand scale. 

When the USSR existed, one's choice of party was truly significant. To join an official communist party was to literally ally oneself with Moscow and follow their dictates. It was to take a definite side in a war that was far from cold. Even as Eurocommunism and like developments made this relationship slightly more distant, the connection with Moscow remained essential. To join a Trotskyist party, on the other hand, was to take a stand against the USSR, to join a conspiracy to either undermine or radically transform (depending on how one looks at it) the state socialist counties. To join one of the “Marxist-Leninist” parties that blossomed in the US In the Seventies was to side with neither Moscow nor its would-be saviors, but rather to side with a China that was still recognizably anti-capitalist.

In Republic of Silence Sartre famously states that “We were never more free than under the German occupation.” This superficially odd statement simply indicates that substantial freedom requires that one's choices be recognized as meaningful, that they have real consequences. Under Nazi occupation the choice to support the resistance or become a collaborator carried with it life or death consequences for oneself, one's family, and one's associates. This is the ultimate validation of political activity.

Before 1991, a leftist's choice of party had such significance. It represented a substantive commitment to one or another international movement and, in many times and places, carried with it a real risk of imprisonment, death, loss of employment, or any number of bad consequences. Things were very real indeed.

The situation now, twenty some years after the collapse of the Eastern Bloc, is unrecognizable by comparison. Despite the recent popular insurrections throughout Europe, despite the continued existence of many, largely stalled, guerrilla movements, and despite even the stunningly vibrant and heartening activities of the Bolivarians, a harsh neoliberal capitalism reigns throughout the world. The power of labor is in retreat, and what victories we win are largely Pyrrhic. In this situation, our activities and theoretical positions have been robbed of consequences and significance. These days, a communist can't even get arrested.

In this depressing situation, in developed nations like the US, leftism becomes more of a lifestyle than anything else. It is a posture one adopts, of little more meaning than becoming a goth, listening to dubstep, or shopping at Whole Foods. Despite one's best intentions, choosing a side in sectarian debate becomes little more than a way of carving out a personal identity. For, let's face it, whatever your opinion on the NEP, the particular historical situation that gave rise to it is not going to repeat itself, and nothing remotely like that situation will arise, until we are well into a revolutionary process. Until then, all activists on the Marxist left are engaged in nearly identical objectively reformist issue advocacy and labor organization efforts.

At this point, sectarian “enemies” come to the rescue. They keep the left alive by convincing its members that their choices are significant. Without that vocal sectarian opponent attacking everything you hold dear, you would have to face the harsh fact that no one gives a damn what you think of the Kronstadt rebellion, and frankly that it does not matter. However, deep down, we need that—and this is the problem. Just as Marcuse observed that modern society sustains itself by creating false needs, I would maintain the left sustains itself by creating false disputes. We need a way forward that minimizes this. I hope we can find this way, but all I have seen so far indicates that that this hope has little foundation.

Sectarian disputes then are both a pernicious phenomenon self-cannabalizing the left and stunting its effectiveness and a vital means by which the left sustains itself and avoids absorption into liberalism. We cannot hope to overcome petty squabbling until such time as we begin to score real victories. Until then, the best solution is to realize that there is little harm in embracing a diversity of tactics, gritting our teeth, and enduring the unstable mutually-sustaining antagonism we now have.

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the NSA

Our first guest post, by John Wolfe.

The recent leak of NSA documents by Edward Snowden has confirmed what nearly everyone has long suspected about the extent of the surveillance conducted by the U.S. Government. The public reaction has been predictable. On the one hand, many are outraged. This outrage is interesting in itself. It cuts across the nominal political affiliations dividing society, uniting libertarians and leftists, as well as significant fractions of mainline Democrats and Republicans. On the other hand, supporters of the current administration have deployed rhetoric which, although it for the most part falls short of outright defending NSA activities, seeks to minimize the importance of the leak. A rather unsystematic and impressionistic survey of internet chatter about the case reveals two main strategies of minimization. One is the pose of the jaded cynic. Those who are upset by the contents of the leaked information will be told that everyone has already known about this for years, and asked why they are so upset now. This is uninteresting, and ignores the distinction between well-founded suspicion and undeniable confirmation. The second strategy is to ask what the difference is between the recently revealed government data mining, and the corporate surveillance we have all endured for years. After all, we have become accustomed to, if not exactly comfortable with, extremely elaborate and invasive data collection and synthesis from the likes of Facebook, Google, and even our local supermarkets for years now. What does it matter if the government gets in on this game? This objection, unlike the first, deserves some examination.

It is certainly true that we have been always been surveilled by internet providers, marketing departments and others well into the past. However, I would argue that something markedly different is going on here. What we have is nearly complete, real time, identifiable data on everyone. It was disturbing enough to know that this data was collected and utilized by various corporations. But this kind of polycentric surveillance is different from having all of this data funneled into one central authority, an authority controlled by the entity that deploys the more violent forms of power in our society.

To restate the above in a slightly different way, there is a qualitative difference between being surveilled by a thousand petty authorities, often acting at cross-purposes, and having one major authority collect nearly all of this data. The very centralization is significant in its own right. However, the petty authorities and the central authority have different agendas. As pernicious as corporate surveillance was and is, it really was not about us. What Wal-Mart and CVS wanted to accomplish was selling more of their products and the data collected on individuals was merely instrumental. What Google and Facebook want is to increase their profits, and they want to hawk the data the collect to people who want to sell more things in order to do this. Their activities are merely avaricious, not malicious. What the NSA and its associated agencies want to accomplish is about us. They are policing the general population. Gathering as much data on individuals as possible is itself the purpose. 

It is sometimes additionally said by liberal defenders of these programs that since we are just dealing with surveillance, rather than grosser “rights violations” there is little to worry about. Observation is not control. However, this is a naïve view. We have known better for years. One of the central insights of Foucault's work, particularly Discipline and Punish, is that observation itself functions as a system of control. Under surveillance of any sort people are understood, and come to understand themselves, not as agents but as sites for the generation of data. Under this self-understanding people come to internalize the surveillance, deploy it against themselves. More simply, if one knows that they are always under observation, they will alter their behavior accordingly. Now if this kind of surveillance is a form of control, then to call these NSA programs "totalitarian" is not the least bit hysterical—it is to pay attention to the conventional meaning of the word, namely the use of state power to control every aspect of life.

What is most remarkable here is the ways in which corporate giants like Verizon and Google simply rolled over and acceded to the government's demands. Make no mistake, this was clearly against their individual business interests. Google, for example, has constructed its public image as a defender of internet freedoms, with, for example, their staunch opposition to CISPA. All these companies do international business, and to run the risk of being revealed as effectively agents of the U.S. government is to risk the worst kind of damage to reputation and profits. We have become used to a situation where civil government becomes a puppet of corporate interests, yet here we see the reverse, corporations placing themselves at the disposal of the government for no clear gain.

Now, of course, we have witnessed a stream of carefully worded denials from the companies concerned and assorted government spokespeople who attempt to assure us that the extent of surveillance is not what the leaked documents indicate, and the cooperation of the named companies is far more limited. There may be an element of truth to this, but, at the same time, we must realize that of course this is what they would say. When interpreting secret and sinister activities, one must give more weight to the documents that the actors wish you hadn't seen, rather than to the polished presentations they want you to see. 

So, on the face of it, we see a major integration of corporate power into the state in a way which creates a new totalitarianism. The question then becomes, what does this mean for the left. I argue that, counterintuitvely, this is very good news indeed.  

Traditional leftist theory always centered around the state. Whether the objective was reform, seizure, or abolition, the state was always the main target. However, since at least the time of Marcuse, and accelerated by the failures of the May '68, leftists have come to regard the formal apparatus of "the state" as irrelevant. We have come to analyze the exercise of power in terms of broader systems of power. Herbert Marcuse, for example, made a monolithic, homogenizing entity known as “Advanced Industrial Society” the central actor in his story. Foucault spent his entire career elaborating a theory detailing the ways in which a decentralized power not vested in any one individual or group shapes everyone in a society. When one is fighting a system so broad, the options are limited. “The state” can be pressured or seized, “Advanced Industrial Society” cannot. 

Such a totalizing system leaves only two options. One may settle into a sort of quiescence, as Marcuse and his Frankfurt School compatriots seemed to do at their worst moments, or one may seek alternative forms of resistance. I think here of those currents within Occupy who regarded the primary purpose of the protests as “modeling a new kind of society” and showing people that “another world is possible.” Of course, few people were impressed by a “new kind of society” centered around sleeping on pavement and relying on the largesse of others for food. Theatrical strategies such as this seemed doomed from the outset.  

However, now, at least in the U.S., the state seems to be reasserting itself as the central organ of class power, which is an event of historical significance. The means of this reassertion is the apparatus of "security" in general, and surveillance in particular. The other organs of bourgeois power, the multinational corporations, are submitting themselves again to the formal apparatus of the state, at this point, only behind closed doors, but it may become more explicit in the future. 

We may still lack a suitable unified revolutionary subject, but our enemies have conveniently reunified themselves. As consolidation in one side of a conflict tends to lead to consolidation of the other side, we have every reason to hope for greater popular unity. So let's get back to targeting the state while the opportunity is ripe.