Mr. Schmitt Goes To Washington

(There’s also some Schmitt in that link, btw.)

Not sure I get the point of this post. Having read the Schmitt article that was quoted first, above, I see that you really cherry-picked a quote. Immediately before the section you quoted:

“It is not easy to answer the question whether the president, acting in this gray area, is “breaking the law.” It is not easy because the Founders intended the executive to have — believed the executive needed to have — some powers in the national security area that were extralegal but constitutional.

Following that logic, the Supreme Court has never ruled that the president does not ultimately have the authority to collect foreign intelligence — here and abroad — as he sees fit. Even as federal courts have sought to balance Fourth Amendment rights with security imperatives, they have upheld a president’s “inherent authority” under the Constitution to acquire necessary intelligence for national security purposes. (Using such information for criminal investigations is different, since a citizen’s life and liberty are potentially at stake.) So Bush seems to have behaved as one would expect and want a president to behave.”

Given that, I can only conjecture that your post is trying to say: “Bush is in ‘gray area’, but its really not ‘gray area’ because some people (Josh Marshall, for instance) don’t like it. Actually, its pretty bad. And Carl Schmidt was a fascist, and said that governments would grow. Therefore, Bush is a fascist.”

Interesting argument that starts with an article that states, in essence, that Bush actually didn’t even break the law.

Steve

Can someone answer a question for me (whose relevance to the current post should be obvious).

A while back, Allawi declared a state of martial law. Initially, I think, this was for 60 days, but then (as memory serves) it was extended until (you guessed it) the current ’emergency’ was over.

Does anyone know if martial law was ever revoked in Iraq? Extended websearching leaves me none the wiser.

Thanks, John; this is exactly the conceptual link that pulls it together for me. And the possibility that Zizek is on the same track makes it that much more interesting. I’ve been tossing around some thoughts on fascism for a while; I think, between this post and Matt’s most recent TPM offering, plus a little help from Aristotle, a complete diagnosis of our present predicament is pretty much obvious.

Wait a minute, are you guys suggesting that a doctrine of permanent war relies on a normalization of the state of exception, the same state of exception that is so difficult to sever from the very foundations law and democracy itself? And that it may even be quasi-fascist? Say, didn’t Derrida also have some things to say about Schmitt?

A wonderful, and timely post.

Bill Kristol should read http://www.randomhouse.com/features/bamford/home.html
before offering up the sillyt example to make a case in favor of Bush. In fact, NSA would have been on top of things in that situation–if calls had been made to the US–and nothing that NSA has not been doing for some years now would have been an issue. What does seem at issue then is that NSA has been allowed to do things NOT covered up till now. And what might that be? Well,spying upon citizens internally with no calls going in or out of the country or email not going in or out of the country. All elelcltronic materials going out of America or coming into America can be monitored by NSA under their guidelines, and thus this is not an issue.

“Steve, I think what you are missing is basically that there is a difference between what Josh Marshall ‘doesn’t like’ and what he ‘has reasoned objections to.’ (The latter is the more consequential factor.)”

I think what you are missing is basically that there is a vast gulf between what Josh Marhsall ‘has reasoned objections to’ and a descent into fascism. So vast, in fact, that the difference between ‘doesn’t like’ and ‘has reasoned objections to’ is inconsequential in comparison.

Steve

s/can/can’t

Also, since I’m an anal-retentive person, it becomes really grating to click the comment link and be left on the top of the individual post page — is there some way to fix that? I’m using Mozilla 1.5, but it has happened with every other browser I’ve used, too.

No one needs your reasoned discourse anymore. This is not the country you grew up in. The Constitution’s gone, unraveled, and you have to decide. What will you give up to get it back? Your livelihood, your home, your freedom, your comfortable life? Restoring the rule of law is going to take treason.

I wonder if John Yoo goes on holiday to Spain whether Garzon might make a grab for him on the basis of the torture memos?

Well, this is all crazy timing, but through those “radical militant librarians”, I managed to get ahold of Gopal Balakrishnan’s The Enemy: An Intellectual Portrait of Carl Schmitt, which I can’t recommend highly enough. It is both an excellent discussion of Schmitt’s political thought as well as history of the Weimar political scene from the 1919 revolutionary period to the Nazi gleichschaltung. If one thing has become evident in reading this book, it is how Schmitt, a conservative with deep reservations about the Weimar constitution and its institutionalization of corporatism (the trade unions, the church, business groups: what whould now be considered “special interests” residing in civil society), could conceptually slide down a path towards a full acceptance of Nazism. Indeed, during its first year or two in power, he became its preeminent jurist and legal theoretician. According to Balakrishnan, Schmitt came to the view that it is only the executive power that could come to define the state of exception and hence be sovereign. Sovereignty did not reside in the legislature as that body which represents the will of the people. This type of thinking, it seems to me, gets rather close to much of the legal thinking that the attorney general has produced in the rendition and torture memos. John Yoo, I believe, has come close to this type of thinking when he states that the constitution grants the president the power to declare war, whereas the legislatures power in war making comes down to appropriations to finance the war.

John-

Quoted from NationalReview.com

“The Department of Justice believes, and the case law supports, that the president has inherent authority to conduct warrantless physical searches for foreign intelligence purposes,” Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee on July 14, 1994, “and that the President may, as has been done, delegate this authority to the Attorney General.”

“It is important to understand,” Gorelick continued, “that the rules and methodology for criminal searches are inconsistent with the collection of foreign intelligence and would unduly frustrate the president in carrying out his foreign intelligence responsibilities.”

Executive Order 12333, signed by Ronald Reagan in 1981, provides for such warrantless searches directed against “a foreign power or an agent of a foreign power.”

If I accept your words as genuine: that Bush is, just objectively (not politically, and not rhetorically) following Schmittian (and thus, at least indirectly, Fascist) tendencies, will you accept, objectively (not politically, and not rhetorically), that Clinton obviously did too (as did Reagan-who signed the original law, and we can safely presume that Bush I did as well)?

If you do accept this, aren’t you stuck with either 1) Bush = theoretical Naziism but Clinton/Reagan/Bush I not= theoretical Naziism (note: suspiciously selective) 2) Bush = theoretical Naziism, Clinton/Reagan/Bush I= theoretical Naziism, or in other words, for 25 years or more, bipartisan US policy = theoretical Naziism, or (note: really? US = theoretical Naziism? I mean, seriously?) or 3) Bush not= theoretical Naziism, Clinton/Reagan/Bush I not= theoretical Naziism (probably the most reasonable choice).

If I take you seriously, and you ARE just letting the facts lead where they may, I think you have to choose 1, 2, or 3. Well?

Steve

Schmitt’s ideas don’t specifically authorize or advocate setting up factories to exterminate undesirables. That is what the Nazi party did with the authority to which, in Schmittian terms, it was legitimately entitled, but it’s not at all as though Schmitt said: “Sovereign is the one who decides the state of exception, therefore let’s kill all the Jews.” In point of fact, Western democracies in general have tended toward government by executive order and using the legislature as a rubber stamp (or not) for presidential policy proposals — that’s why the Gingrich revolution was so bizarre, because it was Congress taking it upon itself to set the legislative agenda (something I would support in principle, even if the agenda in this specific example was stupid).

In the United States, we have the added wrinkle of an independent judiciary, which I would argue is the last thing holding us back from total barbarism — the scary thing about Bush’s judicial nominations is not just the social issue stuff, important as that is, but the way in which he is trying to pack the court to back up the executive power grab (not unique to his administration in kind, but arguably in degree — note that this is the only plausible rationale behind nominating Meiers).

Steve Kyle-
I made none of the assumptions/confusions that you argue that I did. In fact, my entire post could be rewritten and substitute fascism, naziism, genocidal mania, or any other philosophy, and choices 1, 2, and 3 would still be relevant. To express them in simpler terms, you have to either say 1) Bush 2 is doing IT (whether fascist, nazi, corporatist, or whatever) but noone else did-in spite of the fact that Reagan and Clinton clearly had the same attitude towards domestic intelligence collection (the practice in question that motivated this post)-in which case you are being, frankly, hypocritical 2) that Bush 2 as well as Bush 1, Reagan, and Clinton were corporate/fascist/nazi/genocidal/whatever, in which case you have a pretty odd view of the US (because, lets face it. We’re not talking about ‘whatever’ here. We’re talking about fascism/naziism or some milder variant of it), or 3) neither Bush 2 nor Clinton/Reagon/Bush 1 were nazi/fascist/genocidal, in which case, you are a pretty reasonable person.

In other words, the definition of the -ism being discussed is irrelevant to the argument; its the consistency with which you apply your judgements that is at issue.

Steve

The standard spelling is Nazism, not Naziism. The latter looks ridiculous.

Schmitt, Bush etc…
The more important issue is the Weimarization of American culture and the separation of academic culture from the rest of the society, whether based on science or pseudo-science. I’m tired of hearing pedants yell at mystics about thugs.
Pedants by their nature don’t know what the problem is because, well… they’re right arent’t they?

We need a discussion of that more than anything.
The definition of a pedant is a scientist discussing politics

Adam Kotsko in 28: “note that this is the only plausible rationale behind nominating Meiers”. Nice Fehlleistung!
The brilliant “Mr Schmitt” joke it the title post will have us all talking about the Busch administration, von Rumsfeldt, Dr Kondi Reisz, Karl Rowa, etc.

I have not seen anyone latch onto the clear and future danger these abuses tend to exacerbate.

FISA was enacted as a direct result of the abuse
of Executive privilege by Richard Milhouse Nixon.

The congressional rollbacks which everyone claims ham-strung the Intelligence community prior to
9/11 was a direct result of Reagan’s abuse of
his executive powers.

Now we have another republican rounding the corners of the law, if not breakin’ it off.

What happens when unilateral, quick response time is hampered in a real emergency?

Constitution … Constitution … This will be especially true in times of war.

I would remind Kristol that, Constitutionally, we are not at war (and have not been since 1945). But Kristol knows that. As with the rest of his “argument,” it’s nothing but dishonest hand-waving.

The president confessed on national TV yesterday morning. Removing him from power is now only a matter of time.
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Forgive the crudity, but #41 is some funny shit.

Well given Steve’s certainty at how vast the gulf is between present concerns and the final descent into fascism, I guess we should just stop worrying about it. At least until Steve lets us know what we should expect that descent to look like…

A number of countries in history have gone through it–and several are going through it as we speak. If you can’t identify them, or have trouble distinguishing them from America under the current administration, then I really don’t think you’re familiar enough with this topic to participate in a discussion of it.

[I suspect Steve, like so many, labors under a comic book conception of fascism, where the descent to fascism comes through a great riot of armed militants that install a new authoritarian government, or perhaps the rise of a single demagogue who single-handedly crushes democratic opposition.]

Well, fascism is usually associated with a “single demagogue”, and he has to rise to power by either violent or non-violent (i.e., democratic) means. So I’m curious to know how the “descent to fascism” can occur via paths other than the “comic-book” variants described above.

Of course, if you redefine “fascism” sufficiently radically, then you can treat actual current or historical examples of “fascism” (Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Nasser, Peron, etc., etc.) as mere “comic-book” corner cases, and declare the more typical case to be whatever government you happen to dislike the most at the moment. But surely nobody around here–even those who really, really dislike the current president–would ever be so silly as to describe him as an actual fascist. Right?

“A dictatorship would be a heck of a lot easier, there’s no question about it.”
– President George W. Bush, July 26, 2001.

“If this were a dictatorship, it’d be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I’m the dictator.”
– President-elect George W. Bush, December 18, 2000.

“You don’t get everything you want. A dictatorship would be a lot easier.”
– Texas Governor George W. Bush, July 1998.

Dan, the problem with your oddly obtuse response is that it responds to an argument that I never make, and you know it. I have never claimed Bush is a fascist, nor has anyone else in this thread. That Bush embraces a Schmittian state of exception founded in what amounts to unbridled wartime excutive powers is the topic of the thread, and that this exception carries with it, either structurally or historically, something we might call fascist, is the discussion at work in these comments. Hence the third paragraph of my comment, which you deliberately don’t quote, since doing so would make the dodginess of your argument obvious.

Still, let me at least note, regarding the rest of your comment, that you’re sublimating fascism as an ideology and movement to the empirical ascension of fascism as a realized government. I suspect you know those two things are different, and I would hope you’d agree that, as I indicated, it’s a rather useful idea to investigate the contours of the former until it manifests as the latter.

Thanks Craig – best account of the debate on Schmitt and Nazism that I know of is by my mate Carl Caldwell. Ref:

bq. Carl Caldwell, “Controversies over Carl Schmitt: A Review of Recent Literature,”Journal of Modern History 77 (2005), 357-87.

I don’t have a copy of State of Exception handy, but doesn’t Agamben actually argue that basically ubridled exceptional power concentrated in the hands of the executive began at least as far back as Roosevelt in the U.S.? It would be quite easy to show how every president since has made increasingly extensive use of presidential orders etc. (which I think Agamben does as well). All the hand wringing as if things have gone down the shitter with Bush on this issue and a Democratic regime would save us are repugnant. America was lost to totalitarianism a long time ago and it can not and will never be rescued. Agamben’s argument in State of Exception is so brilliant because it refuses to play partisan politics in the seven or so countries he analyses as Schmittian in the first chapter. Euro-American politics is permanently bankrupt and fascist to the very core and Agamben has no bones about saying such.

Welcome to the game… a bit late. Balkinization’s been making the same comparison for some time, I jumped on the bandwagon a few days ago, etc. etc. Great minds? Collective stupidity? Overeducated twits? Who knows.

Indeed, the call for papers for the new journal International Political Sociology lists the “state of exception” as one of its themes (PDF). So I suppose this interpretation of the “War on Terror” has been around for some time.

The concepts that Schmitt develops do not necessarily only apply to a fascist regime, although for the purposes of developing the theory, a fascist regime has everything “out in the open,” whereas in other non-fascist regimes (such as our current mutation of American Constitutional democracy), it might be more difficult to make out. To point out the ways in which Schmitt’s paradigm might apply to the current sovereign of the US is not to call him Hitler. So claiming that Bush isn’t Hitler is kind of beside the point.

Fascism refers to an historically specific configuration, involving among other things, an intensely modernistic anti-modern reaction coupled with a hodge-podge irrationalistic ideology without coherent sense, but mobilizing at once populist-authoritarian resentment with an incorporation of dominant business interests in a scheme of militarist-nationalist imperalistic expansionism. By contrast, just to stick to the right of the spectrum, there are other modes or categories of dictatorship or tyranny, e.g., authoritarian traditionalism, military-nationalist authoritarianism, or phalangism. In the subsequent Latin American instances, there is no clear cut instance of fascism, though there might arguably be a fascistic strain mixed in with the other components. Historical thinking is a matter of analogical reasoning from perspicuous examples, which does not imply any deterministic schemas or strict categorical identities. Thus the point about the Bushista administration and its idealized model of a self-perpetuating regime, is not that it’s actually and successfully “fascist”, but rather that certain distant analogies can be drawn: e.g. the mobilization of populist resentment, via “culture wars” and the activist de-legitimation of law as “judicial activism”, coupled with the promotion of selected corporate interests; the consolidation of domestic political power through the identification of “foreign” enemies; the aggressive “defense” of national “interests” through “preventative” war; and the exultation of executive authority over legal and constitutional procedures and public-political processes. But really more to the point, rather than juvenile accusations of “fascism” or liberal objections to the violations of the sacred ideal of the “rule of law”, -(which, in terms of practical-rhetorical politics, will get you exactly nowhere),- the main point, from a putatively left-Schmittian perspective, is that the usurpations or evasions of sovereign-constitutional authority perpetrated by the Busheviks open up the very Schmittian paradoxes and abysses of political legitimation that they at once lay claim and succumb to. Personally, I would wish nothing better than that the Busheviks experience their own “extraordinary rendition” to The Hague. But that’s an un-Schmittian thought.

It would seem that Buish is not the onbly president in recent times to do exactly what Bush is now accused of doing:
http://www.drudgereport.com/flash8.htm

Also, one needn’t go back to far in US history to percieve the perils of hysterically conflating distinct if related categories e.g. Russian imperialist, Vietnamese nationalist, left-populist, revolutionary communist etc.

Why are strict constructionalists strict constructionalists except when it comes to Executive Powers?

Steve–Drudge backs be up!!! Wow thats some class! Of course that wasn’t US Citizens but hey its good enough for the small minded and easily distracted!

Thought the following debunking of the right-wing talking points concerning Carter/Clinton authorization of electronic surveillance would be useful (from georgia 10 at Daily Kos).

You know the shit is about the hit the fan when the wingers turn to Clinton to try and excuse King George’s behavior. We saw it with the illegal invasion of Iraq (“but..but…CLINTON said Saddam has WMD!”) and with the nuclear option (“but…but…you hated the filibuster when the Clenis was in power!”). But no distortion is more blatant, I think, than the one being circulated now that both Clinton and Carter authorized warrantless searches.

Think Progress does a quick and painless job of eviscerating the myth. Let’s take a closer look and put this lie to rest. Yes, both Clinton and Carter issued executive orders pertaining to foreign intelligence surveillance. But neither of these even remotely authorized warrantless searches of American citizens, as Bush’s order does.

CLINTON DID NOT ORDER WARRANTLESS SEARCHES OF AMERICAN CITIZENS
Here’s what Clinton signed:

Section 1. Pursuant to section 302(a)(1) [50 U.S.C. 1822(a)] of the [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance] Act, the Attorney General is authorized to approve physical searches, without a court order, to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year, if the Attorney General makes the certifications required by that section.

You don’t have to be a lawyer to understand that Clinton allowed warrantless searches if and only if the AG followed section 302(a)(1). What does section 1822(a) require?

the “physical search is solely directed at premises, information, material, or property used exclusively by, or under the open and exclusive control of, a foreign power or powers.” Translation: You can’t search American citizens.

and there is “no substantial likelihood that the physical search will involve the premises, information, material, or property of a United States person.” Translation: You can’t search American citizens.

Moreover, Clinton’s warrant waiver consistent with FISA refers only to physical searches. “Physical searches,” as defined by 1821(5), exclude electronic surveillance.

CARTER DID NOT AUTHORIZE WARRANTLESS SEARCHES OF AMERICAN CITIZENS
And now, Carter’s turn:

1-101. Pursuant to Section 102(a)(1) of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (50 U.S.C. 1802(a)), the Attorney General is authorized to approve electronic surveillance to acquire foreign intelligence information without a court order, but only if the Attorney General makes the certifications required by that Section.

Here, Carter refers to “electronic surveillance,” rather than “physical searches” like Clinton. But again, Carter limits the warrantless surveillance to the requirements of Section 1802(a). That section requires:

the electronic surveillance is solely directed at communications exclusively between or among foreign powers. Translation: You can’t spy on American citizens.

there is no substantial likelihood that the surveillance will acquire the contents of any communication to which a United States person is a party. Translation: You can’t spy on American citizens.

Section 1803(a)(2) requires that the Attorney General report to Congress (specifically, the House and Senate Intelligence Committees) about whether any American citizens were involved, what minimization procedures were undertaken to avoid it and protect their identities, and whether his actions comply with the law. Hot damn, that sounds like a check and balance to me!

Steve:

Newsmax, the Chicago Tribune, and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Trailer Park), have also been convulsively distributing the same effluent.

Apparently, that’s what they’re for.
.

To the extent that I can make any sense of the term ‘fascist’ at all (other than as a smear), it denotes civil government modeled on the military: a centralized hierarchy supporting a ‘mission’ that is the defining purpose of the state. As such it is inherently nationalistic and authoritarian.

In the Bush administration’s assertion that a wartime President’s status as Commander-in-Chief puts him outside of statutory control, we do see a weak parallel to fascism, since it claims military precedence over civil government. But he is still limited by the Constitution; he cannot, for instance, use the War on Terror as a reason to suspend Congressional elections, and he is still subject to court orders citing Constitutional authority.

Moreover, Bush has not made the WOT a national mission; it is important but not defining. And he certainly has not succeeded in controlling the Congress or the Courts, which makes any centralized hierarchy of his rather less centralized and rather less hierarchical than fascism requires.

So I think accusations of ‘a fascist government’ are a little overdone; I don’t like the idea of a President who puts himself above the law, even if only in some circumstances, but as a practical matter Bush isn’t claiming to be above that many laws, and can cite other Presidents’ actions which may or may not have been Constitutionally valid but don’t seem to have done any long-term harm.

Yes, it’s something to keep an eye on, but there’s no shortage of willing eyes.

Both Steve and personfromporlock are bringing up the “wartime” aspect of all of this, which prompts the big elephant in the corner to once again stir from its slumber.

If I understand the argument correctly, it runs as follows:

1) We are at “war” because the President says we are.

(Of course, there are specific instances in which we are not, actually, “at war”: whenever those pesky, quaint Geneva Conventions are brought up, for instance. Alternatively, the argument has been made that this “war” is unlike any other “war” in the history of humankind, and that such differences can only be fully grasped and acted upon by the President.)

2) The enemy in this “war” is whoever the President happens to label as such. The person so labeled has no right to contest the label, the President’s power in this respect being absolute.

3) There being no actual enemy foreign power capable of surrendering, the “war” will be over when the President says it’s over.

Now comes my favorite part:

4) It’s all about spreading the benefits of democracy and freedom.

I hope it won’t derail this thread on Gary Schmitt and Carl Schmitt too much to point out that John Schmitt Schmidt (associate attorney general under Clinton) has an op-ed piece in today’s Chicago Tribune in which he says that “President Bush’s post- Sept. 11, 2001, authorization to the National Security Agency to carry out electronic surveillance into private phone calls and e-mails is consistent with court decisions and with the positions of the Justice Department under prior presidents.”

John C. Halasz is talking about ‘phalangism’ as a category equal to ‘fascism’, but does an average person even know the word ‘phalangism’?

To me ‘phalangism’ is Spanish fascism, ‘nazism’ is German fascism, “black colonels” is Greek fascism, Pinochet’s regime is Chilean fascism and so on. It’s not scientific, but, I think, common enough.

Joseph Biden: “I happen to be a professor of Constitutional law. I’m the guy that drafted the Use of Force proposal that we passed. It was in conflict between the President and the House. I was the guy who finally drafted what we did pass. Under the Constitution, there is simply no distinction … Louis Fisher(?) and others can tell you, there is no distinction between a formal declaration of war, and an authorization of use of force. There is none for Constitutional purposes. None whatsoever. And we defined in that Use of Force Act that we passed, what … against whom we were moving, and what authority was granted to the President. “

Of no great consequence, but as a pendant to Zizek’s obeservation about the Paraguayan state of emergency, the Dail – the Irish parliament – instituted a state of emergency at the beginning of WWII – a period referred to by most irish people as ‘the emergency’ – which was never actually rescinded until 1976 – in order to allow for the institution of a replacement state of emergency to deal with the perceived threat from IRA terror; I’m not actually sure if that has ever been rescinded…

abb1:

Phalangist movements are more traditionalistic and less totalitarian than fascism proper, relying on a reactive alliance of existing traditionalist class/caste groups rather than mass mobilization through all-encompassing novel ideology and correspondingly are less expansively agressive in their assertion of nationalist claims. Many strains nowadays on the far right would be more usefully described and analyzed in terms of phalangist tendencies rather than in terms of fascism proper: an organization such as, e.g., the American Legion, might at times express such tendencies. The basic point I was making was that fascism emerged an historically unique juncture of the development of socio-political affairs in Europe and it is little likely that we will ever see the re-emergence of full-blown fascism ever again, while it’s highly likely that we will witness much that is woeful or abusive. Using “fascism” as an epithet to label any authoritatian, dictatorial, tyrannical or otherwise oppressive and abusive tendency, whether only on the right or on the left, as well, just muddles the issues, whereas a more differentiated categorical vocabulary in interpreting and analysizing different political-historical situations might more usefully provide some sense of orientation in these “interesting” times. Someone else above gave a good example of the effects of such conflations, but I’ll add another one of my own: the Cold War identification of Nazism/fascism with Stalinism/communism under the rubric of “totalitarianism”. There were, of course, analogies between the two, with strong similarities in terms of mass mobilization through an all-encompassing, totalizing ideology, combined with the extensive and intrusive deployment of state-organized terror. But there were just as strong differences in the historical situations, aims and complexions of the respective regimes. But, of course, the conflation was a deliberate ideological trope, mobilizing the fight against and opprobrium of fascism for the aggressive “containment” of communism, stigmatizing any effort at mutual accommodation, peaceful coexistence or gradualism between the two “blocs” as “appeasemnt”, while disguising/justifying, that is, denegating, oppressive or imperialistic alliances or manoeuvres on behalf of the “free world”. (This is not to deny, of course, that there was much that was oppressive, culpable or dangerously inept on the other side, as well. It’s just to emphasize the importance of clarifying the ideological dynamics and power diffentials operating in various situations.)

Carl Schmitt might have been a nasty piece of work, but his work still constitutes a useful reminder against complacent assumptions, such as that “liberal democracy” is somehow the natural or inevitable political estate, condition or terminus ad quem of mankind, that law and legal proceduralism are somehow a self-grounding and “transparent” medium, that the substance and limits of politics consist solely in representational processes, and that authoritarianism and democracy are simple opposites. His agonistic definition of the political as being determined and organized by the distinction between friend and foe is, of course, an analytic statement,- (though keeping in mind, as Bateson put it, the “report/command” structure of every statement),- that, though weak on understanding how a political community is “internally” constituted, does usefully bring out the issues of the competitive/oppositional organization of power that all but inevitably ensues. As for the Busheviks, though Bush is definitely a divider and not a uniter and is unstinting in his arrogant, corrupt, and reckless usurpation of power, it would be difficult to attribute to them anything like the cold and stark clarity of the Schmittian outlook. Were Schmitt alive today, though I doubt he was known for his sense of humor, I suspect the Iraq invasion would have provoked him to gales of Mephistophelian laughter. (Perhaps he is, in fact, so laughing in unheard realms.)

But once we’re on the topic of “political theology”, perhaps a glance back at the first such analyst might be of some interest: Spinoza’a contention, based on his metaphysics on the “conatus essendi”, that right extends as far as power. That was precisely not an identification of right with power, “might makes right”, but an assertion that rights could not meaningfully be talked of without the capacity to sustain them. In fact, he deployed the claim to criticize, from a “democratic” perspective, Hobbes’ theory of sovereignty based on an authoritarian social contract. That men would voluntarily transfer the whole of their right to a sovereign in exchange for protection and survival and that they would adhere to their contractual obligations as moral duties when the sovereign proved abusive of the putative contract Spinoza regarded as weak claims that reasonable men would not sustain and that could have no causal/rational- (the two were identical for him)- explanatory force. In other words, he turned the Enlightened critique of superstition on Hobbes’ own claim to establish a bold new “science” of politics. Following up on that, I’ll just remark that it might be more useful to delineate the realm of politics as the expression, for better or for worse, of the relational nexuses that comprise social life processes, including the power differentials that are constantly negotiated in them, rather than analysing it in terms of the utilitarian calculation of interests, since it is the resulting “values” and their conflicts, (which can be “internal” to positions, as well as, occurring ‘externally” between positions), that frame the perception and identification of “interests” by actual individual and group agents. Interpretation and analysis in terms of such an expressive conception of the political might better capture the real force of the interests at play in the organization of effective power than programmatic analysis based on the imputation of “objective” interests, with its denegation of the very agency it ostensibly appeals to. But still the question remains, hanging over us like the Sword of Damocles: what is power?