Any revolution that seeks to remove an oligarchy while trying to replace it with something smaking of democracy would end up in bloodshed. The American "revolution" was the action of an emerging oligarchy against the perceived actions of a tyrant. But one thing they didn't want was democracy:
On the morning of May 29, 1787, in the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia, Edmund Randolph, governor of Virginia, opened the meeting that would become known as the Constitutional Convention by identifying the underlying cause of various problems that the delegates of thirteen states had assembled to solve. “Our chief danger,” Randolph declared, “arises from the democratic parts of our constitutions.” None of the separate states’ constitutions, he said, had established “sufficient checks against the democracy.”
The Gander should look into Aristotle's description of political systems: oligarchy, tyranny, democracy and his analysis into those, as well as the two Davids' "The Dawn of Everything" to have a sense of the potentiality existent....
Excellent article, thanks for sharing! And yes, the State is quick to bear its teeth every time the plebs get uppity. To be fair, when the plebs succeed in getting uppity, it can get ugly. There are plenty of examples, as I'm sure you know.
Good suggestion re: a dive into Aristotle's view of political systems...could help place where we are in his view of social cycles and compare to others. Haven't read The Dawn of Everything but looks interesting.
“Look — we told you about these problems and you didn’t do anything about it. We tried to be reasonable, but that failed, so now we have to escalate.” Sounds like what Putin said to the US/NATO.
To me the problem is dealing with the sociopathic personalities who populate leadership positions - whether corporate or political. Like a narcissist one cannot reason with them - they don’t do positive-sum games - only zero-sum and they never seem to have enough.
Sorry to sound so pessimistic in the face of your hopeful writing that a peaceful way out from the increasing oppression can be found - I can’t help but think that the horse had already bolted and the new unofficial power structure is implanted. It’s been decades in the making.
My concern is that the US (and NATO) is going to implode under its debt burden and chaos will ensue (chaos is already here in the cities). That void will be filled by an opportunist - and in my reading opportunists are seldom forces for the common good.
The US has been through similar times a century ago and put in place laws and organisations to prevent recurrence - these laws have been rescinded under successive presidencies (thanks to lobbying which should be banned), Citizens United should be repealed, and NATO (whose sole purpose was to defend against the USSR) should have been dissolved when the USSR fell.
I agree with a large part of your assessments, including that we have to deal with sociopathic personalities and that the US and other developed countries are about to walk off a cliff fiscally. We should indeed get rid of Citizens United and dismantle NATO, though a higher priority for me is restructuring our monetary system by deleting fiat-fiend central banks.
And I can see how you'd be pessimistic, but that doesn't warrant defeatism. One key reason I'm suggesting aiming for reform is we need to build our muscles and muscle memory for protecting what liberty we have — since doing so does indeed take practice and is learned behavior. In other words, we need to move from problem identification to solutions, but solutions will require an immense amount of effort.
Edit: One reason I wrote this post to begin with was to answer an unfortunately deleted but excellent comment on a previous post asking just how one resists the tend towards centralized, unelected power and government overreach. I understand how easy it is to feel helpless in the face of apparently monolithic entities, but optimism and strength come from action. Any action to preserve liberty is better than inaction, even if it's just a conversation.
Thank you for you comment and I don’t mean to sound defeatist - it’s more frustrated. I live abroad and have done for 33 years so perhaps my perspective sounds too direct. I just know from talking to family - once they acknowledge what’s going on I can be confronted with a quote from Platoon, ’the rich have always screwed the poor’ - that’s not to excuse it, but just to acknowledge it’s the way. Maybe the bi-partisan system needs rethinking to a more proportional representation like in Ireland - then the full spectrum of the people are represented and there’s plenty of debate on policy.
As has been said by others more knowledgeable than me, change has to be done at grassroots level - get the right city leaders in, then state and upward we go - not easy as you say. It strikes me (again from abroad) Americans are burdened with just trying to survive so not time to think ‘bigger’ Considering all thee above, I find myself partial to the Fourth Turning theory - that it has to be razed to the ground so green shoots can develop - maybe then our young people will shine. I will say, I take heart in the character of my boys and their friends - no doubt there are peers over the pond in whom we can place our faith too - the world has managed for thousands of years after all! Thanks again.
I think, really, we must go through a period of suffering to come out stronger the other side. So, in short, I'm pessimistic short-term, but optimistic long-term. The next few years or perhaps even decade aren't looking pretty. But the upside here is that hard times do make strong men, and the heroes we'll celebrate in the future are probably absolute nobodies right now. The Fourth Turning theory makes plenty of sense in that context.
Also, the rich do always screw the poor — always have, always will. Things were different, however, when leaders had skin in the game instead of having no accountability for their mistakes. I'd rather have a monarch that fiercely protects his country than an elected official who sells his countrymen out.
Whereabouts are you these days? I've been out of my country most of my adult life so I know the feeling. In Vietnam now.
I agree with all you say. And I think at some level the majority in the US know the leaders are no longer ‘public servants’. Trump said as much but unfortunately he’s just a corrupt opportunist.
Vietnam - wow - I hear it’s a beautiful country - the Vietnamese must have an interesting view on what’s (really) going on in Ukraine.
I’m in Ireland - met an Irishman in Boston doing graduate work - moved here in 90 when every Irish person I met at the time said ‘why in the world would you move here from America? We’re all trying to go there.’ Indeed Ireland was a bit third worldish back then. Sadly now, young Irish people who are the age I was when I emigrated tell me they enjoy visiting the US, but would never want to live there. We gotta fix that 😉
PS. Just listened to an interview with RFK - he talked about the CIA and the growing discontent with what it’s become (starting with Truman). The CIA could be the first boil to lance off the American people.
I thought one of the reasons for having 'a well furnished militia' was to correct 'government over-reach'?
But your picture of the US constitution and the US 'revolution' is a rose tinted one.
The constitution was originally set up to benefit the propertied classes only. Working classes and women were purposely excluded. And the revolution allowed and led to the genocide of the Native American population. The constitution and revolution have led directly to the present unquestioning praise of unfettered capitalism and its stranglehold on US governance, the rise (or rather, more complete grasp) of an oligarchy, the denigration and elimination of leftist and socialist organisations and work-place organising, the introduction of a permanent kleptocratic war economy, and a whole host of other negative results for the US citizenry.
Pardon, I'd missed this comment before. I think, perhaps sooner rather than later given the US debt situation, the hard times that will require a fundamental restructuring of our governance will come sooner rather than later. We've riding the steep slope of an exponential curve and, well...that doesn't end well. That makes the hard times necessary to force changes.
An assertion: The next US golden age will only occur after the US has withdrawn from Eurasia
This is really thoughtful and thought provoking, so thank you for writing. I do find the references to “government overreach” a little jarring 50 years into the neoliberal ascendancy — while I appreciate that there are flagrant examples, such as the engagement in censorship on the part of the “alphabet agencies,” the bulk of what appears to me to be the cause of America’s social corrosion is unconstrained capital and the inevitable corruption associated with empire.
I'm with you entirely, and honestly I'm glad you found it jarring because it was meant to feel a bit anachronistic. The Blob of finance, pharma, arms, etc is in effect the government far beyond a wag the dog scenario. One of my goals here was to trigger a bit of muscle memory in pushing back against government overreach, hence that term. The solutions we're looking for require wide-scale action, and I hoped to offer a familiar foe. Taking down financial interests will be far more difficult than suing an alphabet agency, and we have to work ourselves up to that rather than just jumping in the deep end right away.
I agree with you on your first point that campaign finance must be re-worked. I'm in favor of abolishing political parties in the U.S., or at least dismantling the rotten institutions we currently have.
Don't agree on point two, though. The entire point of the Supreme Court is to remain as free of politics as possible. "As possible" is far from ideal and there could be reform within the nomination process, but nailing down the specifics there is no easy feat.
I don't think political parties as a whole can be abolished since people naturally tend to form coalitions. But the current political parties we have need to be removed root and stem, and then maybe we can start over. Cutting off the flow of money would indeed be the way to achieve that, but just how that's achieved can lead to one hell of a discussion.
Hah I like that requirement. I could also imagine randomly selecting people for Congressional duty like jury duty. Would probably work better than the system we have now.
I also think for every new law that is passed, an old one must be removed. That or consider the sunset principle, where laws automatically expire after a given amount of time and have to be re-voted upon. As it is, we have far too many laws, and as Tacitus put it, "The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."
It's nearly impossible to get people to indict themselves for crimes like corruption. So, we have to start doing it for them, I guess.
What positive impacts do you see from reforming the Supreme Court? I'm curious.
Any revolution that seeks to remove an oligarchy while trying to replace it with something smaking of democracy would end up in bloodshed. The American "revolution" was the action of an emerging oligarchy against the perceived actions of a tyrant. But one thing they didn't want was democracy:
On the morning of May 29, 1787, in the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia, Edmund Randolph, governor of Virginia, opened the meeting that would become known as the Constitutional Convention by identifying the underlying cause of various problems that the delegates of thirteen states had assembled to solve. “Our chief danger,” Randolph declared, “arises from the democratic parts of our constitutions.” None of the separate states’ constitutions, he said, had established “sufficient checks against the democracy.”
https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/democracy/our-chief-danger
The Gander should look into Aristotle's description of political systems: oligarchy, tyranny, democracy and his analysis into those, as well as the two Davids' "The Dawn of Everything" to have a sense of the potentiality existent....
Excellent article, thanks for sharing! And yes, the State is quick to bear its teeth every time the plebs get uppity. To be fair, when the plebs succeed in getting uppity, it can get ugly. There are plenty of examples, as I'm sure you know.
Good suggestion re: a dive into Aristotle's view of political systems...could help place where we are in his view of social cycles and compare to others. Haven't read The Dawn of Everything but looks interesting.
“Look — we told you about these problems and you didn’t do anything about it. We tried to be reasonable, but that failed, so now we have to escalate.” Sounds like what Putin said to the US/NATO.
To me the problem is dealing with the sociopathic personalities who populate leadership positions - whether corporate or political. Like a narcissist one cannot reason with them - they don’t do positive-sum games - only zero-sum and they never seem to have enough.
Sorry to sound so pessimistic in the face of your hopeful writing that a peaceful way out from the increasing oppression can be found - I can’t help but think that the horse had already bolted and the new unofficial power structure is implanted. It’s been decades in the making.
My concern is that the US (and NATO) is going to implode under its debt burden and chaos will ensue (chaos is already here in the cities). That void will be filled by an opportunist - and in my reading opportunists are seldom forces for the common good.
The US has been through similar times a century ago and put in place laws and organisations to prevent recurrence - these laws have been rescinded under successive presidencies (thanks to lobbying which should be banned), Citizens United should be repealed, and NATO (whose sole purpose was to defend against the USSR) should have been dissolved when the USSR fell.
I agree with a large part of your assessments, including that we have to deal with sociopathic personalities and that the US and other developed countries are about to walk off a cliff fiscally. We should indeed get rid of Citizens United and dismantle NATO, though a higher priority for me is restructuring our monetary system by deleting fiat-fiend central banks.
And I can see how you'd be pessimistic, but that doesn't warrant defeatism. One key reason I'm suggesting aiming for reform is we need to build our muscles and muscle memory for protecting what liberty we have — since doing so does indeed take practice and is learned behavior. In other words, we need to move from problem identification to solutions, but solutions will require an immense amount of effort.
Edit: One reason I wrote this post to begin with was to answer an unfortunately deleted but excellent comment on a previous post asking just how one resists the tend towards centralized, unelected power and government overreach. I understand how easy it is to feel helpless in the face of apparently monolithic entities, but optimism and strength come from action. Any action to preserve liberty is better than inaction, even if it's just a conversation.
Thank you for you comment and I don’t mean to sound defeatist - it’s more frustrated. I live abroad and have done for 33 years so perhaps my perspective sounds too direct. I just know from talking to family - once they acknowledge what’s going on I can be confronted with a quote from Platoon, ’the rich have always screwed the poor’ - that’s not to excuse it, but just to acknowledge it’s the way. Maybe the bi-partisan system needs rethinking to a more proportional representation like in Ireland - then the full spectrum of the people are represented and there’s plenty of debate on policy.
As has been said by others more knowledgeable than me, change has to be done at grassroots level - get the right city leaders in, then state and upward we go - not easy as you say. It strikes me (again from abroad) Americans are burdened with just trying to survive so not time to think ‘bigger’ Considering all thee above, I find myself partial to the Fourth Turning theory - that it has to be razed to the ground so green shoots can develop - maybe then our young people will shine. I will say, I take heart in the character of my boys and their friends - no doubt there are peers over the pond in whom we can place our faith too - the world has managed for thousands of years after all! Thanks again.
I think, really, we must go through a period of suffering to come out stronger the other side. So, in short, I'm pessimistic short-term, but optimistic long-term. The next few years or perhaps even decade aren't looking pretty. But the upside here is that hard times do make strong men, and the heroes we'll celebrate in the future are probably absolute nobodies right now. The Fourth Turning theory makes plenty of sense in that context.
Also, the rich do always screw the poor — always have, always will. Things were different, however, when leaders had skin in the game instead of having no accountability for their mistakes. I'd rather have a monarch that fiercely protects his country than an elected official who sells his countrymen out.
Whereabouts are you these days? I've been out of my country most of my adult life so I know the feeling. In Vietnam now.
I agree with all you say. And I think at some level the majority in the US know the leaders are no longer ‘public servants’. Trump said as much but unfortunately he’s just a corrupt opportunist.
Vietnam - wow - I hear it’s a beautiful country - the Vietnamese must have an interesting view on what’s (really) going on in Ukraine.
I’m in Ireland - met an Irishman in Boston doing graduate work - moved here in 90 when every Irish person I met at the time said ‘why in the world would you move here from America? We’re all trying to go there.’ Indeed Ireland was a bit third worldish back then. Sadly now, young Irish people who are the age I was when I emigrated tell me they enjoy visiting the US, but would never want to live there. We gotta fix that 😉
PS. Just listened to an interview with RFK - he talked about the CIA and the growing discontent with what it’s become (starting with Truman). The CIA could be the first boil to lance off the American people.
I thought one of the reasons for having 'a well furnished militia' was to correct 'government over-reach'?
But your picture of the US constitution and the US 'revolution' is a rose tinted one.
The constitution was originally set up to benefit the propertied classes only. Working classes and women were purposely excluded. And the revolution allowed and led to the genocide of the Native American population. The constitution and revolution have led directly to the present unquestioning praise of unfettered capitalism and its stranglehold on US governance, the rise (or rather, more complete grasp) of an oligarchy, the denigration and elimination of leftist and socialist organisations and work-place organising, the introduction of a permanent kleptocratic war economy, and a whole host of other negative results for the US citizenry.
Pardon, I'd missed this comment before. I think, perhaps sooner rather than later given the US debt situation, the hard times that will require a fundamental restructuring of our governance will come sooner rather than later. We've riding the steep slope of an exponential curve and, well...that doesn't end well. That makes the hard times necessary to force changes.
An assertion: The next US golden age will only occur after the US has withdrawn from Eurasia
This is really thoughtful and thought provoking, so thank you for writing. I do find the references to “government overreach” a little jarring 50 years into the neoliberal ascendancy — while I appreciate that there are flagrant examples, such as the engagement in censorship on the part of the “alphabet agencies,” the bulk of what appears to me to be the cause of America’s social corrosion is unconstrained capital and the inevitable corruption associated with empire.
I'm with you entirely, and honestly I'm glad you found it jarring because it was meant to feel a bit anachronistic. The Blob of finance, pharma, arms, etc is in effect the government far beyond a wag the dog scenario. One of my goals here was to trigger a bit of muscle memory in pushing back against government overreach, hence that term. The solutions we're looking for require wide-scale action, and I hoped to offer a familiar foe. Taking down financial interests will be far more difficult than suing an alphabet agency, and we have to work ourselves up to that rather than just jumping in the deep end right away.
I agree with you on your first point that campaign finance must be re-worked. I'm in favor of abolishing political parties in the U.S., or at least dismantling the rotten institutions we currently have.
Don't agree on point two, though. The entire point of the Supreme Court is to remain as free of politics as possible. "As possible" is far from ideal and there could be reform within the nomination process, but nailing down the specifics there is no easy feat.
I don't think political parties as a whole can be abolished since people naturally tend to form coalitions. But the current political parties we have need to be removed root and stem, and then maybe we can start over. Cutting off the flow of money would indeed be the way to achieve that, but just how that's achieved can lead to one hell of a discussion.
Hah I like that requirement. I could also imagine randomly selecting people for Congressional duty like jury duty. Would probably work better than the system we have now.
I also think for every new law that is passed, an old one must be removed. That or consider the sunset principle, where laws automatically expire after a given amount of time and have to be re-voted upon. As it is, we have far too many laws, and as Tacitus put it, "The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."
It's nearly impossible to get people to indict themselves for crimes like corruption. So, we have to start doing it for them, I guess.
What positive impacts do you see from reforming the Supreme Court? I'm curious.