-Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Just a couple of weeks ago, Reverend Jeremiah Wright's lecture on "Anti-Imperialist African-American Hermeneutics" had many supporters of Barack Obama scratching their heads in bewilderment and frustration. Why, oh why, would the Good Shepard deliver the Hope of the Flock to the wolves? He certainly couldn't have believed his warmed over course in radical-chic was going to boost Barack's chances in Indiana, an old-timey stronghold of the Klu Klux Klan, could he?
And indeed, Obama lost Indiana, and the issue of race is now front and center, reinforced by Hillary's latest comments concerning her broad, white, blue-collar base. It is now part of the conventional wisdom that even if Wright's comments didn't hurt as much as they might have, they will be a factor in the fall, as the Republicans make hay out of them and other lefty skeletons in Obama's closet. So why did the good Reverand do what he did, when he did?
The standard explanations for what commentators from both the left and the right dubbed "sabotage" ranged from "revenge"-for Mr. Obama's alleged snubbing of Mr. Wright as he prepared to announce his candidacy- to "vanity." On Fox News, Juan Williams opined that
Reverend Wright committed this willful treachery because if a black American won the presidency, it would disprove all of the Reverend's beloved (and no doubt benighted) theories that America is racist!But because of a fundamental error in our political understanding, even the most well meaning analysts have missed a more likely explanation, the one we would see immediately were we a bit less credulous as a people: that Barack's well-connected spiritual father was acting on orders when he unaccountably chose to step into the spotlight at this "critical juncture" in the campaign.
Not on orders from Hillary, as some in the blogosphere have claimed (though she plays her part) but from the party leadership itself. And with the complicity and consent, given gladly or not, of that most sacred of demagogic cows, (not to mention groomed product of Chicago machine politics), Mr. Barack H. Obama.
"What!?" I hear you say, "Why on earth would Barack be complicit in his own takedown? Is he not an ambitious man? Doesn't he truly seek the highest office in the land? Does he not have his own power base, derived from the good wishes and millions in small donations from his many supporters, multiplying like so many loaves and fishes across the nation? How could such a man be anybody's tool?"
Before we answer that, let's consider for a moment. Why would Barack' s pastor of 20 years, the man who married him and his wife, who baptized his children, have chosen this critical moment to alienate a close friend who might soon occupy the highest office in the land? As New York Times editorialist Bob Herbert wrote of the Reverend, "he is no fool." He is also extremely well connected politically in Chicago. When the young Barack began casting about for a church to provide him with his religious bona fides, an essential component to a political career in America, he didn't choose Wright's church out of a hat. It was a calculated, political choice.
Especially now that Barack has "weathered the storm" in the estimation of many pundits (who repeat each other's thoughts and are easily directed), more possibilities come into view: by encouraging the Reverend to give free reign to his theories, Barack can have it both ways. Since many Americans (not just Rosie O'Donnell) consider a lot of what the pastor has been saying to be true (The American government has in fact committed terrorism around the world and against many groups within our borders), the pastor's radical vibe can rub off on his prodigal son, even as the son publicly renounces the teachings he formerly absorbed on any given Sunday.
And doing it now, as the Times has gone on to point out, has made Barack stronger for whatever office he ends up running for. I am going out on a limb here, as it is always hard to predict what our oligarchy has in store for us, but I would argue that the Party mandarins have laid plans for Barack to be Vice-President to Hillary's President, and that achieving this goal has been the main purpose behind the presentation of "Bittergate" and the Wright imbroglio. In order to reconnect us to the system, they have inflated our hopes with some high-sounding rhetoric. Now, how to back out of the deal?
END PART ONE. TO BE CONTINUED...
THEATER OF POLITICS , PART TWO:
In Part One, I proposed that Barack Obama, under orders from the machine politicos who underwrite him, has done things to deliberately throw the primary to Mrs. Clinton, like act his part in the drama of Reverend Wright. I will now go into the historical reasoning behind my speculation, which I hope will suggest that if Barack is not acting under orders, he would be the first major presidential candidate in modern history to come so far without party backing and control..Barack Obama, like Hillary Clinton and John McCain, are creatures of their parties; they would be nowhere without the vast patronage machine. And their parties are both, Republicrat as much as Demublican, in thrall to the American Ruling Class. It's not so much that there's "no difference" between Republicrats and Demublicans, its that they are both at the highest levels under the control of an oligarchy made up of elites from various overlapping worlds: military, financial, corporate, etc.
Sometimes the hardest thing for this bunch to pull off, as the political historian Walter Karp once wrote, is to lose an election. John Kerry managed it in 2004, against all odds, against a fellow Bonesman acting out another caricature, the "misunderestimated idiot." How do you loose to that? Kerry nicely scuttled his own Swiftboat for the sake of four more years of Bush.
Howard Dean had handed it to Mr. Kerry early on, after having acted as that season's candidate from hope. On orders, one imagines, from the Democratic National Committee and God knows who else, he obligingly had a spaz attack in full view of a nationwide television audience. Now he's chairman of the DNC.Back in 2000, Al Gore worked hardest of all to lose. He had to actually preside, as president of the Senate, over the certification of an election that was stolen from him in full public view! He seemed to smile as he gaveled away the entreaties of the small group of honest congressmen and women who were fighting for him, a candidate who strangely didn't seem to want to win!
(But of course, the 2000 election was really just Nader's fault. Another case where "vanity" would appear to explain it all).
The myth that allows these charades to continue is among the most enduring in our political life, namely, that the point of running for office is always and everywhere to win.
In Indispensable Enemies: The Politics of Misrule in America, the late great Walter Karp made all this understandable to the ordinary citizen. He showed that, again and again, "behind the hoopla of partisanship, the two parties worked together in collusive harmony." Putting up candidates who blatantly lack appeal, openly supporting the other party's man, putting up no one at all, or spewing constituent-insulting "gaffes"… these and many other tactics of the party leadership are described extensively in Karp's book, and can be readily seen all around us if we only look.
Like Satan, who thought it better to rule in Hell than Serve in Heaven, the losing party apparatus in a given state, municipality, or indeed nation, would rather keep on top of the scraps, and be consulted on every decision, than opt out of the game entirely by running an honest race-- perhaps even losing control to a real insurgent candidate. When that does rarely occur, the party oligarchs gang up on the insurgent in the legislatures to make sure he or she can't reform a thing.Yes, the two Parties regularly throw each other seats. In fact, with gerrymandering, barely 10% of congressional seats are even competitive. And you can bet the overall tally of "red" and "blue" is closely regulated by the Big Chiefs, both at the state and national level, in order to keep them in relative stasis.
For the idea is to play Punch against Judy, with the ultimate goal that nothing gets done. Nothing, that is, for the health and well being of ordinary citizens.
Why? Because if people actually caught wind of their own power, and acquired even the slightest degree of meaningful control over the process, they would become so energized with their ability to make things happen, they would eventually shake off the oligarchy like so many flies from the backside of a donkey. This is the ruling class's greatest fear, and it leads them to commit astonishing acts of mendacity and, indeed, treason.
And like all demagogues past, Barack H. Obama is their guy. With help from the kept press, they placed him on the mountaintop. After eight years in the darkness, they gave us Hope, as they periodically appear to do (think Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton). Yes, it's of a nebulous variety, and when you scratch the surface the tiniest bit, not only is there no difference between Obillary and Hibama's stated positions, they don't really sound so different from Bush's and McCain's. The whole lot of them, for instance, are committed War on Terrorists.
Mr. Obama even openly admired Bush I for his conduct of Iraq War I (the one where they incinerated 100,000 fleeing Iraqis and urged thousands of others to rise up against Saddam only to leave them high and dry, subject to imprisonment and execution).
So how will they break our hearts this time, eradicate all this built up hope? Here's a likely script: after a few more hair-raising twists and turns, the nominating "fight" goes to the floor of the convention. The Revered Wright and other engineered issues of electability will be made to come around in the service of Hillary, as they are already.
Here's another one, from Monday's New York Times: according to Shar'ia and Edward Luttwak, Obama's an Islamic apostate!
The Superdelegates, to whom we were conspicuously re-introduced in this campaign, will make the final, anti-democratic determination. (It's like the movies: if you want to figure out what will figure prominently in a future scene, note the close-ups and cutaways early on).
Disappointment and Demoralization, Part One, for so many: She, another Clinton, will emerge the candidate. And the consolation prize, delivered to all those newly energized political animals? He'll get the number two slot. A crushing blow to some, but --sigh--something.
After more twists and turns, they'll beat old man McCain, as arranged. And then the real fun will begin, as they busy themselves "obliterating Iran," after that old- reliable Indispensable Enemy attacks Israel, or "sponsors" an attack on an American city.Demoralization, Stage Two. I sure hope I'm wrong, but some version of this evil drama is most likely in store for us, for as the crisis of world capital comes to a head, the wars must continue.
And so where's the Hope? I mean the real hope, the change we can really "believe in"? Here's a hint: it's never to be found among the party hacks, no matter how nicely they deliver their speeches. Give up? Don't. It's in you.
