Two book reviews I’ve done on netroots related stuff that may be of interest to CT readers.
First, a “review”:http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=do_the_netroots_matter for _The American Prospect_ of Eric Boehlert’s and Matthew Kerbel’s books on the netroots.
But the netroots’ discomfiture isn’t mere pique. Nor is it simple anger that Obama has broken his promises to roll back the security state that developed over the previous eight years, although this is surely important. The real worry for the netroots is that Obama is undermining their particular blend of online politics. He has taken the parts of netroots politics that he likes (online organizing and fundraising), while dumping the parts that he doesn’t (a strongly confrontational politics and emphasis on bottom-up decision making). There isn’t much room for the netroots and vigorous online partisanship in Obama’s plans for the future of the Democratic Party.
I think I would modify this a bit now, given the interesting stuff happening around pressure to keep the public option in healthcare reform, but would still stick by my fundamental claim about the basic tensions between the administration and netroots and their allies.
Second, a piece for “Times Higher Education”:http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=407101&c=1 on Matt Hindman’s book on digital democracy.
bq. As his book title suggests, Hindman puts paid to some of the most pernicious myths of democracy and the internet. Lazy libertarian arguments that the internet was going to create radically empowered individuals, an “army of Davids” that would topple government and so-called “mainstream media” with a few well-aimed missiles are simply unsustainable. So, too, are some of the hazier left-wing claims about how the internet would foster “extreme democracy”. The internet is creating new forms of social organisation, but they have their own kinds of hierarchy. And in many cases the old hierarchies are co-opting the new ones. In the US, traditional media and think-tanks are hiring prominent bloggers. Few major bloggers are still independent, and those who are, are mostly trying to create their own miniature media empires. Still, stupid claims for the democratic benefits of technological pixie dust may be too tempting a target. Hindman’s focus on the bad arguments of internet evangelists leads him to make some over-reaching claims of his own.
Comments or criticisms welcome on either or both …
{ 58 comments }
Paul 08.18.09 at 5:55 pm
“Digital democracy” ? Surely you jest !
Steve LaBonne 08.18.09 at 8:01 pm
But that’s exactly what we have! Here’s how it works: working- and middle-class Americans bend over and corporate-whore politicians give them a prostate exam, without benefit of lube.
Oh, you didn’t mean THAT kind of “digital”…
Salient 08.18.09 at 9:37 pm
Few major bloggers are still independent, and those who are, are mostly trying to create their own miniature media empires.
Hmm. Out of the Crooked Timber of humanity, will a miniature media empire ever be made?
John Quiggin 08.19.09 at 1:08 am
I’m surprised by the suggestion that “debate on the internet is less equal than offline media such as newspapers”.
Obviously, the idea of the Internet as a level playing field where everyone has an equal say has proved false, but it seems to me that many more people get some kind of hearing on the Internet than in newspapers, and that there is still substantial room for entry. Can you point to Hindman’s data source?
John Emerson 08.19.09 at 1:23 am
Everyone in print media is obliged to snark about the digital media. Bread, butter.
There’s a systematic opposition between issues movements and party hierarchies. As often as not they’re bitter enemies; often the hierarchy would rather lose an election than let the insurgents into the party. Obama was never an insurgent; he was a Chicago establishment guy making a move up to the national level, with a lot of establishment encouragement, and he also brought the Democrats a lot of internet tools — in sanitized non-ideological form. “Change you can believe in” had almost no specific content.
As far as I can tell, since the civil war the Democrats have never done anything good except when under pressure from insurgents, third parties, and ideological non-party movements.
onymous 08.19.09 at 2:30 am
I thought I already said this on some thread a day or two ago, but now I can’t find it, so: Emerson! You’ve been missed.
(You didn’t go and get yourself a relationship or something, did you?)
Um, sorry for being so off-topic. I’m not at all sure that “the interesting stuff happening around pressure to keep the public option in healthcare reform” is going to amount to much, but one can hope.
David W. 08.19.09 at 4:25 am
“As far as I can tell, since the civil war the Democrats have never done anything good except when under pressure from insurgents, third parties, and ideological non-party movements.”
Lyndon Johnson didn’t have to do anything for Martin Luther King, but did anyway. For that matter, LBJ didn’t have to lift a finger for Medicare/Medicaid either. But he did that too.
You can be very sure that a President Goldwater wouldn’t have done either.
JoB 08.19.09 at 12:56 pm
And what of it? Surely the important thing is that it is possible to be independent and get some view across; whether or not you are personally successful is really immaterial to the benefit of free sharing of ideas. Quite the reverse: once you’re successful & recognized, you’re corrupted by that very success. That’s far from a very novel idea. Applying it to the internet is, hmm, not very inventive.
Marc 08.19.09 at 1:10 pm
I can’t think of any way that John’s claim can be falsified. *Any* political party changes in response to pressures; what does that prove?
Mass fund-raising for targeted donations (this is very different from mail contributions to party clearinghouses) and the ability to mobilize a lot of people quickly in response to events are distinct features of the internet political arena. I think it’s also fair to say that you have a lot more people much more invested in following political news when they have a share in shaping it. There has always been traditional political activism, but anyone who has done that can attest to the enormous “activation energy” barrier. e.g. getting enough people to be able to contact a critical mass of folks about something is very time-consuming and difficult.
One could just say that traditional power brokers have just been replaced by new ones, but the internet is a powerful amplifier if the circumstances are right.
John Emerson 08.19.09 at 1:40 pm
You can be very sure that a President Goldwater wouldn’t have done either.
You have discovered my secret! I was trying to convince people here that Goldwater would have been a better president than LBJ. I can fool most people, but not you.
Lyndon Johnson didn’t have to do anything for Martin Luther King, but did anyway. For that matter, LBJ didn’t have to lift a finger for Medicare/Medicaid either.
What is that supposed to mean? He was under heavy pressure from a dissident non-party movement, which had disrupted the 1964 convention.
I can’t think of any way that John’s claim can be falsified. Any political party changes in response to pressures; what does that prove?
I love obsolete philsophy of science!
Evidence for my argument is, for example, the period between the Civil War and 1965 when the Democratic Party was a segregationist party. Or the period between the Civil War and 1901 when both parties adamantly opposed all progressive and populist reforms.
Nothing good originates in the party establishment. Outside pressure is the only way to influence events. Nobody working for the Democratic Party has suffered during our recent forty years of Democratic feebleness. No Democratic Party pro will suffer if Obama fails on medical insurance. They will fight to the death to retain control of the party, and if they win that fight, they’ll be happy.
Moby Hick 08.19.09 at 2:04 pm
You’re supposed to blame Nixon for his ‘Southern Strategy’ without remembering who all of the racists voted for prior to 1968. Just bad taste otherwise.
bigcitylib 08.19.09 at 2:56 pm
If you as a blogger can create a “minature media empire”, then does that not rate as being “radically empowered”, esp. as compared to a non-blogger with no media empire whatsoever?
As a blogger, I’ve managed to inject stories I broke into a dozen or so media cycles, and made national news during Canada’s last election by forcing one of the government’s candidates to step down during the campaign.
Beats the hell out of writing letters to the editor. Seriously.
bigcitylib 08.19.09 at 3:04 pm
Doesn’t having a “miniature media empire” make you radically empowered, esp. compared to a non-blogger with no media empire whatsoever?
As a blogger, I have managed to inject a story I’ve broke into the Canuck MSM about once a month for the past couple of years. During the last election I forced a candidate from the ruling party to step down in the middle of the campaign, thus making national news.
Beats writing letters to the editor. Seriously.
bigcitylib 08.19.09 at 3:05 pm
Whoopsie. Sorry for double comment.
notedscholar 08.19.09 at 4:55 pm
In many cases the Internet has made people less intelligent, and also more socially isolated. Both of these features are in service to power, as Noami Klomsky regularly reminds us.
So I think positive hopes for any space or form of media should be tempered by the realities of the damaging effects of technology. Neil Postman for example would not be optimistic about the Internet, and wasn’t. But he is dead now and not able to speak.
NS
John Emerson 08.19.09 at 5:04 pm
This is ridiculous. What was American politics like before the netroots came along around 2002? The period between 1994 (the Gingrich takeover) and 2002 was the stupidest period in American politics since the Boss Tweed.
Henry is correct that Obama has shunned the netroots. This should be no surprise, as I said, since Obama is a machine politician. The netroots is learning that it will have to work both outside and inside the Democratic Party, and always against the party machine.
Loyalty is always punished. Look at the way Lieberman and the Blue Dogs still get their asses kissed.
dmh 08.19.09 at 5:37 pm
I’m not going to justify Obama’s actions or the stupidity of both print and online media and the extent of the co-optation. But c’mon, /make him do it/. I’m serious. It’s never been easier to brew a big political stink in a short time cycle and have it get picked up by television however distorted it becomes in the process, all from starting a facebook group or some blogs. The difference here being is that the nutcases produce a lot of work which then get picked up and broadcast out by people in power… But seriously if we make a stink about it they will have to respond, so get on that computer and start busting some right wing / corporate heads!
steven 08.19.09 at 11:50 pm
Is it surprising that POTUS disdains an emphasis on bottom-up decision-making?
engels 08.20.09 at 12:29 am
Whether or not the internet has made people ‘more socially isolated’, I suspect it is true that the subpopulation of people who are active in the political ‘blogosphers’ (as commenters or site-owners) tends to be more socially isolated than the general population–and a fortiori the subpopulation that was involved in traditional forms of political organisation. I would conjecture that this leads to certain biases in political outlook (eg. a marked asocial, individualistic undercurrent which at times verges on misanthropy–cf. the ubiquity of ‘libertarianism’ on the internet but also in more subtle ways), as might the fact that such people tend to be (a) white (b) male (c) American (d) over 35 (e) lower-middle class or middle-middle class. (All conjectural based on my own impressions and I’d be happy to be corrected by someone who knows about the demographics of blog use.)
Moby Hick 08.20.09 at 12:52 am
“male©” Who was able to copyright maleness?
Walt 08.20.09 at 2:31 am
Elvis.
JoB 08.20.09 at 11:08 am
19, thanks, now I know more abour John Emerson ;-)
17, yep.
John Emerson 08.20.09 at 1:08 pm
Are we talking about the same people? To me the “netroots” are Kos, Firedoglake, Open Left, Talking Points Memo, Glenn Greenwald, Digby, Eschaton, Crooks and Liars, Brad DeLong, Think Progress, and maybe Matt Yglesias. The last three of these are establishment figures pure and simple. TPM is professional journalism by any standard, albeit with a political point of view. Only Greenwald has a libertarian streak. (Libertarians were early adopters but haven’t been “ubiquitous” for 3 to 5 years.)
After 2002 or so the internet gave a voice to a whole wing of the Democratic Party which had been suppressed and voiceless since 1988. (The Democratic Party in Oregon where I lived was reorganized specifically for the purpose of freezing out the Multomah County Democrats who provided most of the Democratic votes in general elections). The internet enabled the participation of a lot of people whose voiced were not wanted by the party leaders.
The gap between Obama and the netroots is an Obama poroblem, not a netroots problem. The entire history of the Democratic Party consists of a battle between the party machine and dissident groups of voters. The progressive periods Democrats point to with pride were grudging responses to dissident and third-party pressure.
If you want to know why the US never approached social democracy or a European-type welfare state, one of the places to look is the Democratic Party. Left-liberal Democrats accuse DLC and machine Democrats of betraying the Party’s true principles, but they are wrong. The DLC, the Blue Dogs, and the machine hacks are, if anything, more in line with the Democratic tradition than the liberals are.
Paul Wellstone said he came from “the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party”, but as a Poli Sci prof he knew that that was not true. He came from the Minnesota Farmer-Labor wing of the Democratic Party, just as Feingold comes from the LaFollette Progressive wing. Rahm Emmanuel, Joe Lieberman, and Max Baucus perfectly represent the regular (Tweed) Democrats.
The netroots have empowered the American center-left for the first time in two decades. To me that’s an unmixed good thing. Obama wants to freeze them out, but he can be bargained with if the netroots (and related meatspace groups) show enough heft. Most of the netroots people still are hoping for the dream time when the Democratic Party is good again, but that time never really was.
This sounds like thrid party advocacy, but it isn’t. The two-party system has been institutionalized, nationally at least, and the two parties are like permanent branches of government. During America’s progressive eras, most of the work was done by state-level third parties, independent Senators and representatives, and dissident Democrats and Republicans unsupported by the party machine. The progressives almost always followed an inside-outside strategy and never were more than half successful. That’s what the networks should do.
Keir 08.20.09 at 2:00 pm
If you want to know why the US never approached social democracy or a European-type welfare state, one of the places to look is the Democratic Party. Left-liberal Democrats accuse DLC and machine Democrats of betraying the Party’s true principles, but they are wrong. The DLC, the Blue Dogs, and the machine hacks are, if anything, more in line with the Democratic tradition than the liberals are.
Have you seen what passes for internal party democracy in the British Labour Party? It’s practically how you know a party is a major left wing party, that there’s some guy complaining about the lack of democracy and the careerist hacks. It doesn’t explain the differences between parties.
(But, yes, you have to always push the Established party & remember that the people on the platform aren’t exactly on your side.)
John Emerson 08.20.09 at 2:29 pm
The Labor Party is a left wing party? You’re talking about Britain?
Fifty years ago, maybe. Or sixty, anyway. And the Democratic Party was never as left as the Labor Party — the South always had to be kept happy, and the urban machines were not progressive either.
I wasn’t trying to explain the difference between parties. I was explaining why liberal Democrats, specifically, should quit being surprised by the Democratic machine’s worthlessness, and understand that that’s the nature of the beast, not some terrible betrayal. *
If you subtract 1914-1916, Wilson was not progressive. If you subtract 1934-7, FDR was not progressive. Truman, Kennedy, and LBJ had their moments too, but they all came from the conservative wing of the party but made gestures toward the left. The kennedies supported Joe McCarthy.
Social Security and unemployment insurance may have been FDR’s two greatest accomplishments, but in order to appease the Southern and other conservatives, from the start they were severely flawed compared to the comparable programs in Europe.
*In the same way, Brad DeLong and others should quit whining about the Times and the Post. Sulzburger and Graham run those two papers, and they’re bad guys who will never be good guys. They are adversaries to contend with, not allies who are puzzlingly unreliable, or neutrals who puzzlingly violate their neutrality.
bianca steele 08.20.09 at 2:29 pm
John E.- Fair enough: The Democratic Party has generally been an establishment party (i.e., not a revolutionary or necessarily progressive party), which shared government equably with the Republican Party. Both parties accepted republican rule by an elite more or less indistinguishable from the local elite (which often enough meant a business elite, and more or less excluded populist enthusiasms by definition). This is called the liberal consensus (“liberal” because in Europe and non-Western countries, “liberal” was the label used for something resembling a US form of government, with separation of church and state, broad and broadening suffrage, free speech and an open civil society, usw.).
The progressive periods Democrats point to with pride were grudging responses to dissident and third-party pressure.
Not true of the New Deal. The need for reform was broadly accepted among the elites, and this would have been so even without pressure from (contemporary) popular groups. (By “contemporary” I mean to imply that their ideas may have been influenced by ca. 1880 Marxists, but that they were not motivated primarily by fear of ca. 1933 Marxists.)
The two-party system has been institutionalized
You seem to be implying that the two major parties are objectively indistinguishable, such that there is only one party in the US, and that parties do not operate the way they are “supposed to” (i.e., the way they operate in Europe and the UK) by representing the interests of discrete groups who jockey for influence via parliamentary and civil-society institutions. I think this is a simple inferiority complex on the part of Americans, and entirely unnecessary. I have a lot of respect for the La Follette-Wellstone tradition in the Northwest (what I know about it), but why not see it from a more positive perspective?
Henri Vieuxtemps 08.20.09 at 9:09 pm
Democratic party is a party of technocrats, their idea of governing is management. Republicans are populists, they run on passion. I remember a cartoon I saw somewhere, one businessman saying to another: “Yes, I know, it’s impossible for the top 1% to accumulate all 100% of the wealth. Yes, I know… but you can’t stop one from dreaming… one day, maybe…” But the Democratic party is not a place for dreamers.
Emerson says: “The netroots have empowered the American center-left for the first time in two decades.”
Empowered? In what sense? It’s a bit like saying that the Voice of America empowered those listening to it in their East Berlin kitchens in 1979.
bianca steele 08.20.09 at 9:11 pm
And Obama wants to freeze [the center-left] out: I just don’t see it, not unless center-left definitionally means holding on to those Baby Boomer era grudges.
John Emerson 08.20.09 at 9:50 pm
The need for some kind of reform was broadly accepted among the elites, and this would have been so even without pressure from (contemporary) popular groups.
True as revised, but the 1932 reforms, mostly were limited to stabilizing the economy, with very minimal efforts to soften the blow to the average American. Up until that point Democrats had been as much opposed to federal relief measures as the Republicans had been; this can be documented in the cases of Grover Cleveland (throughout) and Woodrow Wilson (except for the period immediately before the 1916 election. Both were flatly conservative in instinct, and Cleveland stuck to his guns throughout, at considerable cost to himself.
You seem to be implying that the two major parties are objectively indistinguishable
No, just that the cards are heavily stacked against third parties and that the party establishments are very firmly established and able to perpetuate their power. The Democrats lost Congress (1994) and ran two feeble Presidential campaigns (2000 and 2004) but there was little shakeup of the party bureaucracy or even of the party stable of mercenary operatives. Dean shook them up a little, but he’s gone now and Obama isn’t speaking to him.
Why not see it from a more positive perspective?
Is this intended as a serious question? Mostly because the Democrats performed wretchedly betwwen 1988 and 2008, and because Obama seems to be a moron. How could ever have thought that bipartisnaship would work with the actual Republican Party we have (just recently declared nihilistic by the centrist Joe Klein).
And Obama wants to freeze [the center-left] out:
This was just a (pretty close) paraphrase of what Farrell said in one of his articles. The netroots (and other center-leftists) were not on the bus.
Empowered? In what sense?
Against the will of Obama and Emmanuel, we seem at the moment actually to be part of the ball game, for the first time that I can remember. The less nice we are, the more seriously we’re taken. Jane Hamsher is a heroine.
The warnings against overestimating the netroots are well taken, or some of them, but a lot of that (and the claim that the internet tends libertarian) seems four years or more out of date (characteristically, of course for the print media and academica.)
But I’m really baffled by the idea that the netroots have done nothing, and I’ve offered an alternative explanation for the relative scantiness of network results: all party hierarchies are hostile to all polititical forces not controlled by the party.
Republicans are populists, they run on passion.
Populists and con men. But the Democrats’ principled bloodlessness is a major weakness.
Salient 08.20.09 at 9:53 pm
The need for reform was broadly accepted among the elites, and this would have been so even without pressure from (contemporary) popular groups.
I doubt the veracity of this, I just do. I remember reading through many primary sources a few years ago (first located via Zinn’s book) which suggested reforms like Social Security were necessary in order to placate the blasted social’ist rabblerousers who would otherwise demand something much more sweeping and damaging to elite interests.
Salient 08.20.09 at 9:55 pm
Emerson, your #25 owns, especially this:
If you subtract 1914-1916, Wilson was not progressive. If you subtract 1934-7, FDR was not progressive. Truman, Kennedy, and LBJ had their moments too, but they all came from the conservative wing of the party but made gestures toward the left. The kennedies supported Joe McCarthy.
Social Security and unemployment insurance may have been FDR’s two greatest accomplishments, but in order to appease the Southern and other conservatives, from the start they were severely flawed compared to the comparable programs in Europe.
Welcome back, man.
Phil 08.20.09 at 10:27 pm
He came from the Minnesota Farmer-Labor wing of the Democratic Party, just as Feingold comes from the LaFollette Progressive wing.
From right outside the Democratic Party, in other words.
The Democratic Party has generally been an establishment party
I think there’s more to it than that. 100 years ago the Labour Party was the party of the trade unions and the Conservatives were the party of business. They’re both establishment parties now, but Labour still has affiliated trade unions and the Tories still have big corporate backers. Go back 100 years in US politics and the Democrats were the party of the Solid South, while the GOP was the party of pencil-necked urban liberals with fancy ideas about race and sex equality. Lots of things have changed since then – the Progressive split, the New Deal, civil rights, the Southern Strategy – but I don’t think those changes have any inherent direction to them. It’d be a mistake to imagine that the USAn system was developing towards a ‘normal’ model of left-right partisanship – just a few notches to the right of comparable European systems – or that there won’t be any more game-changing moves in the future. For whatever reason, the USAn party model seems more fluid – less anchored? – than most of its counterparts.
John Emerson 08.20.09 at 11:29 pm
My own point wasn’t about comparisons with Europe. It was that in the United States, nothing good comes from the two institutional parties themselves, but always from third parties, independent politicians, non-party pressure groups, and opposition groups within the parties.
The netroots are valuable because they make extra-party politics more possible, and for that reason I find the naysaying highly annoying.
At the same time, the netroots shouldn’t be surprised that they aren’t “on the bus”, because the party machine has always hated extra-party activists, even if they support their party. And Obama and Emmannuel are Illinois machine politicians.
bianca steele 08.20.09 at 11:55 pm
Salient, I believe Zinn’s People’s History should be considered a supplement.
John: Is this intended as a serious question?
Sorry, it isn’t worded very well, is it? I meant to ask about the party system generally, not the Democrats’ recent performance in particular, but you’ve answered both already.
John Emerson 08.21.09 at 12:13 am
I haven’t read Zinn, but Salient’s point squares with the reading I’ve done.
American political history since the Civil War is the history of the suppression and frustration
of left movements ( few of which were Marxist) punctuated with intermittent and brief periods of progress. My difference with Zinn would probably be that he’s too patriotic and minimizes how economically conservative America has always been.
engels 08.21.09 at 2:03 am
If it makes things clearer I didn’t say anything specifically about the ‘netroots’. I don’t read any of those sites. Just making a point that as far as I can see political blogs in general are mostly empowering a specific class of people, which seems to me to be very unrepresentative of the population as a whole not only terms of class/race/gender but also in terms of the personality type of the kind of person who spends lots of time on the internet. I am not denying it can have progressive consequences in the context of US party politics but let’s not confuse it with ‘democracy’, ‘power to the people’, ‘the new public sphere’ or anything like that.
John Emerson 08.21.09 at 2:36 am
Perhaps you should know what you are talking about before you say things. When I figure out a way to divide political influence exactly evenly between 300 million people, I’ll get in touch. Meanwhile, I think that the internet has been a good thing.
Such people tend to be (a) white (b) male© American (d) over 35 (e) lower-middle class or middle-middle class.
As for c.), we’re talking about American politics. As for e.), that’s about half the population. As for b.) and d.), there are plenty of under-35 bloggers and a fair number of women, some of them very influential. I concede a.), but what else is new?
Henri Vieuxtemps 08.21.09 at 7:27 am
But the Democrats’ principled bloodlessness is a major weakness.
What do you mean “weakness” – it’s their essence; it’s a party of technocrats. Read Yglesias: there are goals, there are constraints, the task is to analyze and deliver the least worst solution within the constraints. And that’s a good Democrat; that’s pretty much the best they can offer.
You’re right that if you (or the “netroots”) manage to become a significant constraint, then the Democrats will include you into their magic formulas; but it’s hard for me to imagine how a relatively small group of nerds publishing a bunch of html pages that only they themselves read deserves to be included.
JoB 08.21.09 at 8:08 am
John,
My difference with Zinn would probably be that he’s too patriotic and minimizes how economically conservative America has always been.
I don’t doubt your good intentions but you have to see the irony in that: if the majority is as you say so overwhelmingly for right wing policies than clearly left wing ‘netroots’ are a misnomer, of the most hilarious kind. Also, anybody on the left convinced that the majority opinion is not the normal standard to follow is, well, rather establishment-like (if they shout they’re not, that’s just a subjective data point).
FWIW, a. I do not think that the majority is economically conservative & b. the support in vote for wrong policies is derived from the lack of good critical debate. If something as netroots has an impact, and I think it has, it is because it makes more critical debate unavoidable and i.e. not because people are putting lots of testosterone in their own convictions of right/wrong.
engels 08.21.09 at 12:06 pm
Does anybody have any data on the representation of different classes/genders/ethnicities (age groups/nationalities) among political bloggers/blog commenters/blog readers? On the gender point, my impression is that although there are a reasonable number of female political bloggers their commenters and readers are still mostly male. Likewise there are younger bloggers but I’m guessing their readership is quite a lot older than they are.
Keir 08.21.09 at 12:41 pm
My own point wasn’t about comparisons with Europe. It was that in the United States, nothing good comes from the two institutional parties themselves, but always from third parties, independent politicians, non-party pressure groups, and opposition groups within the parties.
Well yea, but this is a bit one true Scotsman, isn’t it, and further, not really anything new. Everybody knows that the party bureaucracy has to be prodded into doing the right thing. That doesn’t really tell us much. For instance, anybody who thought Obama was anything but a corporate Democrat was kidding themselves & really not worth tuppence to begin with. But at the same time, you had to support him against McCain, and the most effective way to do that was from within the Democratic Party. At the moment, the most effective way to push for left outcomes may be from outside the party, although I think there’s a temptation to put external sexiness ahead of dull work inside the party.
And Emerson, if you don’t want to compare to Europe, don’t bring Europe up as a comparison.
John Emerson 08.21.09 at 2:37 pm
But it’s hard for me to imagine how a relatively small group of nerds publishing a bunch of html pages that only they themselves read deserves to be included.
Obviously you have personal issues with the internet compounding your ignorance. Right now Firedoglake and a number of other sites are working to keep Obama from bargaining away the public option., and they’ve been quite effective though there’s no guarantee that they’ll win. The point I was trying to make is that no one should ever have been surprised that Obama would be using the public option as a bargaining chip, because that’s what Democrats are for.
My difference with Zinn would probably be that he’s too patriotic and minimizes how economically conservative America has always been.
I suppose I should have said “American government” or “institutional America”. I was not conceding that the majority of Americans are conservative. During various periods there have been large radical movements, but the Democrats, the Republicans, and the process have always marginalized them.
If something as netroots has an impact, and I think it has, it is because it makes more critical debate unavoidable and i.e. not because people are putting lots of testosterone in their own convictions of right/wrong.
It’s not either/or, and good luck on your war on testosterone. The critical ideas have been out there forever in low-circulation magazines and faculty lounges. The internet has increased the potency of these ideas.
And Emerson, if you don’t want to compare to Europe, don’t bring Europe up as a comparison.
The conversation was veering off into a thumbsucker about the difference between American and European political parties.
Everybody knows that the party bureaucracy has to be prodded into doing the right thing. That doesn’t really tell us much.
Everybody does not know this. Furthermore, you seem to be assuming that the Democrats are like Labor (back to the comparisons). The 1865-1932 Democrats were not a fake left party; they were an actual conservative party. The 1865-1965 Democrats were not a fake integrationist party; they were an actual conservative party. The present Democratic Party is neoliberal and anti-populist in principle.
As for “everyone knows”, this isn’t true. A lot of Americans have a much more favorable view of the Democrats than history can justify.
Henri Vieuxtemps 08.21.09 at 3:33 pm
Right now Firedoglake and a number of other sites are working to keep Obama from bargaining away the public option., and they’ve been quite effective though there’s no guarantee that they’ll win.
I can see how a website could be a great tool to coordinate, say, a large group of country-wide town-hall hell-raisers and to familiarize them with the current talking (creaming) points. Or to coordinate armed militias or something. But how a website itself can keep a US president from making deals with insurance companies – here, yes, (while I am not conscious of any personal issues with the internet) I do have to claim ignorance. I’d be grateful for an explanation, though.
bianca steele 08.21.09 at 3:34 pm
John:
Zinn’s book, if you’re not familiar with it, is precisely a chronicle of those radical movements.
I don’t agree with a lot of your account of the history. I’m sure you could document it from a certain range of sources and authorities. Really, if I had time to document an alternative account that I believed to be more accurate, I’d write a book, not spend minutes here and there (which I also don’t have, with a 9-mo in the house) sparring with you. In fact, I would bet such a book exists already.
I don’t see that (most) people are trying to compare European and US versions of their political systems. What I see is British people expressing a natural resentment of the US-centric nature of the discussions that usually take place on CT (Henry is not American either, after all), and I totally agree with them that they deserve to have a place for themselves to discuss topics of interest to them.
bianca steele 08.21.09 at 3:36 pm
natural resentment
Not necessarily explicitly on this thread, but IIRC the issue has come up in the past.
John Emerson 08.21.09 at 4:18 pm
Henri, your ignorance is too precious to interfere with. I’m going to leave it as an ignorance preserve for future generations to admire. Go in peace.
Bianca, this thread discusses two articles about American politics, specifically about the role of the internet in American politics. I totally agree that America’s British dependencies should have an their own place on the internet to go to discuss their own little concerns.
Basically my view of the Democratic Party is a merger of two well-known views of American political history: the view represented by Zinn (who I haven’t read, but would probably mostly agree with except for the optimism), and the orthodox technocratic-Democratic view, as first stated by Daniel Bell, Richard Hofstadter, and many others and institutionalized in decades of Pol Sci 101 courses.
Democratic technocrats explicitly do not want popular involvement (“populism”) in policy-making. They want to deal with voters indirectly through such large vote-contracting institutions as unions, the AFT, the TV networks, etc. This is another, quite deliberate step away from direct democracy, piled on top of the indirectness institutionalized in the Constitution.
My difference from the Hofstadter gang is just to say, as Zinn would, that without the populist / leftist / progressive anti-Party movements, the Democrats all along would have been a conservative party pure and simple.
There’s evidence that Hofstadter himself might have ended up having doubts about the technocratic transformation of the Democratic Party he helped define in his three polemical anti-populist books. He hoped for a party where Intellectuals had a major role and the docile, stupid masses were carefully managed, but what we got was a fundraising machine run by wonks and hacks.
To sum up: I think that the internet has had a very favorable impact on American politics, and I am puzzled by the animus that there seems to be against it. I am suggesting that Obama’s unfriendliness to the netroots (not my term, BTW) is in no way surprising. Party leadership is always hostile to anything that seems capable of shaking their control, even if the new forces are initially helpful to the party. And no, I don’t think that everyone knows that. I think that Kos, Hampsher, and many of the others are just now figuring out how hard the line is.
And finally, I’m not proposing a third party, at least not nationally. But progressives have to learn an inside-outside strategy, with a stress on the outside, and should stop being surprised and hurt when their adversaries do them harm.
engels 08.21.09 at 4:49 pm
I do like this idea that everything in the world should be evalutated strictly in terms of its impact on American politics, and if the evaluation is positive it is henceforth forbidden to say anything negative about it for fear of undermining the war effort.
John Emerson 08.21.09 at 4:55 pm
Engels, I just doubted that a detailed comparison between British and American political parties would contribute much to a discussion of the role of the internet in American politics and the nature of the Democratic Party. People were free to continue on that unfruitful, well-trodden path if they so desired.
Phil 08.21.09 at 5:03 pm
The 1865-1932 Democrats were not a fake left party; they were an actual conservative party. The 1865-1965 Democrats were not a fake integrationist party; they were an actual conservative party.
I’ll consider my comment exempt from the ‘thumbsucking’ criticism, then, since this was exactly and precisely the point I was making (except that I also pointed out that the liberalism of the pre-1914 GOP wasn’t fake either). The point of dragging in Europe is that it’s an area where there are identifiable Left and Right parties which are reasonably consistent over time. The two USAn parties aren’t either of those things, which strikes me as unusual.
JoB 08.21.09 at 8:51 pm
JohnE,
You say:
I was not conceding that the majority of Americans are conservative.
Which is nice, but then you end with:
A lot of Americans have a much more favorable view of the Democrats than history can justify.
Meaning probably that you can be sure you’re right on history (and most other points), AND believe that a lot of people can disagree with you on it despite the fact that they’d agree with you if given a proper chance. Or, in your words:
It’s not either/or, and good luck on your war on testosterone.
I’m sure I don’t need luck by the way: testosterone is self-defeating. A winning strategy consists in letting it battle it out with itself, enjoy a good critical rest before quietly and with good humour setting some matters straight whilst it is exhausted. Sure, it’ll rest as well but: not to worry, Rome was not built in a day.
John Emerson 08.21.09 at 10:18 pm
JoB, your theory of politics is worthless, and all too characteristic of a lot of Democrats.
JoB 08.22.09 at 3:08 pm
John, I can’t be a Democrat but I am a democrat. But thanks to award the name theory to a couple of comments.
engels 08.22.09 at 3:32 pm
How many Democratic politicians or supporters are really committed to open critical discussion as the preferred mode of political engagement? And how many Republican politicians are, as Henri Viextemps thinks, driven by ‘passion’? In many ways some of the assertions being made on this thread seem a bit naive…
Henri Vieuxtemps 08.22.09 at 4:16 pm
I don’t think the Republican politicians are driven by passion; it’s that their way of governing is based on passion (fear, hatred); while the Democrats, like I said, usually attempt to act as power brokers and achieve a compromise.
John Emerson 08.22.09 at 4:24 pm
I agree with that. I’m not sure that the Democrats’ cool above-the-battle smarter-than-you approach ever worked, but ever since Gingrich figured out how to play it, it’s been a disaster.
Passion is a tool for Republicans, not a motivator. Part of their game is just manoeuvring the Democrats into looking cold-blooded and gutless — e.g. the Dukakis “What if they were raping your wife?” question.
For a lot of Republicans, liberal moral neutrality and equanimity are a.) infuriatingly wrong and inhuman and b.) a poltical weakspot and c.) a complete justification for the use of unethical political tactics. There is no God, everything is permitted.
engels 08.24.09 at 4:33 pm
WHat struck me as naive was your claim that Republicans ‘run on’ passion and that the Republican party is a party of’ dreamers’. Granted the first assertion, like many of your other formulations, is extremely vague and leaves your would-be interlocutor with the task of trying to pin down you actually do think. If I had been able to guess that you all meant by it was that Republicans are prepared to manipulate the electorate’s negative emotions in order to win and maintain power than I would have passed over your remark without comment.
Anyway, as I said I’m certainly not an expert on US party political tactics and this discussion is a long way from the issues I was interested in thinking about, ie. ideological/class tendencies of political blogging in general (not that there’s anything wrong with that).
belle le triste 08.24.09 at 5:07 pm
I’m not sure that the Democrats’ cool above-the-battle smarter-than-you approach ever worked: ans = getting Civil Rights through
the combo of JFK’s just-martyred brightest-and-best high-technocrat aura with LBJ’s actual vicious old-school street-fighting political skills was for a season or three very powerful and effective
then — catastrophically — LBJ’s nasty but useful gifts were shipwrecked on the war that JFK’s technocracy had bequeathed him: and everything that had (implausibly) worked together turned in on itself…
nixon really did have his revenge on JFK: he turned every part of his legacy into a weapon against kennedy’s own party
John Emerson 08.26.09 at 2:54 pm
Belle: combined with a vigorous popular movement outside the party which put the Democrats on the spot. The Democrats as a party (including the Kennedys) did not support the civil rights movement until not doing so became dangerous.
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