Operational Frameworks
Between Zero and One there are Infinite Choices
“The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society.” — Marx & Engels, (1848) “The Manifesto of the Communist Party.”
The Democratic Party is dead. Their model of representing “the people” in all their forms equally, but for the proletarian form that links them all, has failed. They walked away from labor decades ago and seem shocked that their ongoing bluff of, “What other choice do you have?” in the face of Republicans openly favoring capital and—increasingly—fascism, was called.
But…but…but…We told you it would be the end of democracy!
Sorry, but that officially came with the Citizens United (2010) decision, which Dems railed about and swore up and down they were gonna do something about it, someday. Did the party ever advance or promote a constitutional amendment that might do so? Of course not. To do so would be to cut their own throats, as a dedicated corporate capitalist party. They might seem out of touch, but they are not stupid. Nor are the folks who did not vote for their candidates in ‘16, ‘20, or ‘24, even though the Republicans promised nothing to address the problem, either.
FWIW, in my lifetime, the Republican party has been the more honest one. They say, “Fuck the poor!” and then they put in policies to do that. The Democratic party promises Hope and Change, and delivers economic recoveries to their sponsors while selling it to the proles as as good as an economy gets.
Labor-power, not tea, was the first globalized commodity and guaranteed the American version of it (once elite) to regress in pricing toward the global mean. Neoliberalism moved this along, with blurred borders among trade-partner nations, speeding the flow of capital to where production was cheapest. Meanwhile, the quality of life in America began to decline as people could no longer afford middle-class class necessities such as houses, cars, and education without taking on substantial loans that locked them into promises of future production (e.g. 15-year mortgages grew quickly to 30-year mortgages), where they would find their wages stagnated while costs of living continued to increase.
Predatory financiers set upon them, not the least of which was their own government, which ran a massive grants program to institutions of higher education (accredited and unaccredited), funded by guaranteed loans made to students, who would be held responsible for repayment without the option of declaring personal bankruptcy when they did, indeed, go bankrupt. They went bankrupt in many cases because consumer credit card companies set up shop on college campuses to throw “free” shirts and hackey sacks at fresh arrivals, in exchange for signing up for usurious rates on purchases.
Proletarianization, which began to hit the professions directly with the advent of HMO’s, rendered physicians into employees who were to follow a business model of providing care, rather than using personal skills and discretion. “Managed care” means managed care providers. We’re more than fifty years into this process, and now AI is being advanced to take over much of the remaining tasks in the legal, engineering, educational, programming, and medical fields that have not been captured by capital.
Every generation is promised that the technology of their time has improved their lives, over the generations that preceded it and who were forced to live without it. But technology is literally the means of production, and if we are to test the proposition put forth as the foreword of this piece, then we would expect to see radical changes in the relations of production, and in the society itself, as bi-products.
It’s what the tech bros called “disruptive.”
Faced with skyrocketing costs of maintaining class position (and inevitably struggling more and more), the middle class and formerly-middle-class, have had enough. People are motivated to vote for one reason: They believe their vote will make a positive difference in their lives. Schadenfreude, regardless of morality, feels good. Trump has been pounding this chord for a decade, and the DNC and assorted liberals sneered at his hate-rally attendees, called them names, and said their voters were better than that. Smug superiority has been the hallmark of the Democrats—Hillary Clinton radiated it as a candidate.
Meanwhile, right under their noses was Bernie Sanders and his supporters, both of whom the Democratic party called names and said could not win. In retrospect, killing Sanders’ 2016 primary platform, and then spending the next 8 years avoiding Medicare for All, tuition-free higher education, and raising the federal minimum wage (as well as any real step to counter Citizens United), like they were losing propositions, was the Democratic party revealing We don’t give a fuck about you, either.
Here’s what the “Progressives” of the DNC—those whacked-out, wild lefties—have for their 2024 postmortem:
The Democratic Party messed up in the 2024 election, says Rep. Greg Casar of Texas, the newly elected chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and it needs a dramatic course shift to rediscover its brand and put winning “above being right.”
…“The progressive movement needs to change. We need to re-emphasize core economic issues every time some of these cultural war issues are brought up,” Casar said. “So when we hear Republicans attacking queer Americans again, I think the progressive response needs to be that a trans person didn’t deny your health insurance claim, a big corporation did — with Republican help. We need to connect the dots for people that the Republican Party obsession with these culture war issues is driven by Republicans’ desire to distract voters and have them look away while Republicans pick their pocket…
“The core of the Republican Party is about helping Wall Street and billionaires. And I think we have to call out the game,” Casar said. “The Democratic Party, at its best, can hold people or can have inside of its tent people across geography, across race and across ideology. Because we’re all in the same boat when it comes to making sure that you can retire with dignity, that your kids can go to school, that you can buy a house.”1
Geography, race, ideology, “core economic issues”…anything but “social class,” you talk around that or you sound like Crazy Bernie. Blame corporations, but only peripherally—claim they could not practice class war without “Republican help.” See if the voters believe you this time around. Do not mention that there are ways to practice social medicine that denies no one claims.
We had a health care-rationing corporation CEO shot dead on a NYC sidewalk, news outlets are focusing on the hunt for the shooter, and meanwhile most of America—MAGA and Harris voters alike—is rooting for his escape, and hoping “they” never find him. And the thought leaders on the right are spinning this into an anti-Democrat/anti-Deep State conspiracy that the Dems will never counter, because they too have to pretend class warfare does not exist every single moment in the United States, and that this represents one of the rare times the common folks got a win.
It is all in front of their faces, but the DNC is never going to betray their funders. In the same breath when they say they support the people, they claim they cannot win without elite sponsors because of that damned Citizens United that nothing can ever be done about. To emphasize this, they point to the parties that do not take corporate sponsorship—the Democratic Socialists and the Greens—and lay blame on them for “stealing” votes from Democratic candidates who offer nothing but empty promises that simply do not fit the operational framework of American politics in the 2020’s. You’re simping for corporate capital and have no protections to offer from it.
People Before Profit. That’s the winning policy position of 2024, but the Democrats dare not speak it aloud.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/democrats-must-combat-trumps-culture-wars-new-progressive-chair-says-rcna182509. Accessed: 12/7/2024.