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Today's
Stories
November
1, 2004
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
How Bush Was Offered Bin Laden and
Blew It
Dave
Lindorff
Bulgegate Confirmed; Press Yawns
Greg
Bates
Nader Voter Survey Results
Roger
Morris
Novel Politics: Only Fiction Can Do
This Election Justice
Diane
Christian
Death Tolls
Lenni
Brenner
Secularists Be Warned: Christlike Kerry Roams Spiritual Universe
Christopher
C. Conway
Can the Left Sink Any Lower?
Francis
Boyle
Legal Elites and the Iraq War: the Nazis Had Their Law Professors,
Too
Jason
Leopold
Rummy's Failed War Plan
Website
of the Day
Dylan Resurrects "Masters of War"
October
30 / 31, 2004
JoAnn
Wypijewski
The Long March and the Million Worker
March
Winslow
T. Wheeler
Spartacus Tells All
Bruce
Anderson
Notes from the Big Empty: When the Hippies Invaded NoCal
Vicente
Navarro
They Worked for Franco: How Sec. of State Cordell Hull and Nobel
Laureate Camilo Jose Cela Collaborated with the Fascist Regime
Robin
Blackburn
How Monica Lewinsky Saved Social Security
Greg
Bates
A Question of Character: What Makes Nader Tick?
Nancy
Welch
The American Health Care Crisis: an Interview with Dr. David
Himmelstein
William
Lind
Election Day: Which Menendez Brother Will You Vote For?
Brian
Cloughley
Uzbekistan and Bush Hypocrisies
Suzan
Mazur
Oops They Did It Again: the NYTs the Paper of Record and Rip-Offs
Greg
Moses
Standing at the Graves of Iraq
John
Chuckman
Osama's Endorsement
Richard
Oxman
Why Not Accept Osama's Offer?
Ken
Avidor
Landscape of Fear: When Ugly is Suspicious
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Bush, Ba'ath and Beyond
Hope
Bastian
Strangling Cuba's Economy
P.
Sainath
Tower of Gabble: Toward a Sustainable Rhetoric
Dave
Zirin
Bush League: Why MLB Owners Support the Prez
Jon
Swift
The Dry Drunk Thang: Put a Cork in It
Ron
Jacobs
The Joke's on Me: a Review of Bob Dylan's Chronicles Vol. 1
Alexander
Billet
Taking Theatre Back: Are the States Ready for "Stuff Happens"?
Poets'
Basement
Jones, Laymon, Norris, Ford and Albert
Website
of the Weekend
The Origins of Halloween
October
29, 2004
Harry
Browne
No Justice for Peace Activist in County
Clare
October
28, 2004
Forrest Hylton
"The Gas is Ours:" Bolivia's
Ghosts of October
Col. Dan Smith
Rebellion
in the Ranks
Alan Maass
Jon Stewart v. the Pundits
Ron Jacobs
Ecstasy
in Red Sox Nation
Alexander
Cockburn
Kerrycrats and the War
October
27, 2004
Jules
Rabin
Crammed with Distressful Politics
Dave
Lindorff
Bulgegate: the Lies Continue
Katherine
Van Tassel
On the Home Front: Both Parties
Ignore Working Parents
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Bi-Partisan Politics of Oil
October 26,
2004
Brian Cloughley
Three
Weddings and Lots of Funerals: Atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan
William Blum
Fear
Factors
Lenni Brenner
The
1964 Berkeley Free Speech Movement: Lessons for 2004
Ben Tripp
The
Chicken Salad Election
Fidel Castro
After the Fall
Greg Bates
The Nation's Flawed Calculus
Walter Brasch
Gag the Public: the War on Dissent
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
An Open Letter to Pat Buchanan
Mickey Z.
Rumble in the Jungle at 30: Ali, Foreman and the Congo
Amir Taheri
The Boom in Conspiracy Theories
Alexander Billet
Say It Ain't So, Bruce!: the Boss Endorses Kerry
Doug Giebel
The Religion of G.W. Bush
Kathleen Christison
Why
I Liked Thomas Friedman's Latest Column Before I Didn't
October 25,
2004
Ralph Nader
Letter
from a Minnesota Highway
Werther
West
Texas Wahabbism
Dave Zirin
Boston's Killer Cops: Death of a Fan
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: Oregon Revokes Dr. Leveque's License
Omar Barghouti
Executing Another Child in Rafah
William J. Nottingham
Lori Berenson's Story
John Chuckman
A Foolish Consistency
Uri Avnery
On
the Road to Civil War
October 22
/ 24, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
You
Can't Blame Nader for This
Rev. William Alberts
On Bended Knee: Faith-Based Deceptions
Willliam A.
Cook
Killing for Christ
Saul Landau
George W. Bush: a Man of His Words?
Bill Quigley
I Held the Bullet in My Palm: Masked Haitian Police Shoot Children
While Arresting Priest
Christopher Brauchli
Seal It With a Frown: What Compassionate Conservativism Really
Means
William S.
Lind
Fallujah and the Moral Level of War
Sharon Smith
Guilt Trippers for Kerry
Greg Bates
Kerrynomics: "Hurt the Ones Who Vote for Us"
Justin E.H. Smith
Is Lesser Evilism a Compromise with Evil?
Rebecca Evans
Tarnished Legacy: Pinochet and the Chilean Military
Mike Whitney
Al Hurra TV: the Second Invasion
M. Junaid Alam
Purchasing Individuality in America
David Krieger
Nuclear Non-Proliferation: Examining the Policies of Bush and
Kerry
David J. Ledermann
The Emperor's New Crumbs
Lawrence Reichard
Same Old FBI Story
Website of
the Weekend
Lie Girls: the Real Coalition of the Willling
October 21,
2004
Ben Tripp
The
Undecided Voter Examined
Joshua Frank
Kerry
and the Environment:
It's Not Easy Pretending to be Green
Stan Cox
What
the Left Doesn't Get About Small Businesses
Bill Martinez
State
Depart and Cuban Visas: Only Anti-Castro Agitators Need Apply
Mark Engler
The War and Globalization
Lina Britto
and Lucia Suarez
Bolivia:
a Year After the October Insurrection
Website of the Day
Two Pampered Children of Wealth
October 20,
2004
Yitzhak Laor
"Did
You Two Squabble?": a Bullet Fired for Every Palestinian
Child
Jason Leopold
Sinclair
Broadcasting's Air War: a Long History of Journalistic Deception
Jesse Sharkey
A
Teacher's Account of How Military Recruiters Prey on High School
Students
Col. Dan Smith
Choking
Free Speech About the Draft
Dr. Teresa Whitehurst
Using My Religion
David Vest
If
Bush Wins, Blame Me
Jack Random
The Jackson 17: Reflections on a Mutiny
Ron Jacobs
Time
to Kick It Up a Notch
James Brittain
Plan Patriota and the FARC: a Change in the Countryside?
Christopher
Dols
Bombing Madison: Michael Moore's Fright Fest
Dave Lindorff
First They Came for the Nurses...
Website of
the Day
Banana Republican Catalogue
October 19,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
Party
Favors: the Political Business of Terry McAuliffe
Jeff Taylor
Confessions
of a Swing State Voter
Matt Vidal
American
Myopia: "More Money in Your Pocket"
Victor Kattan
"It's Not Who You're Against; It's Who You're For":
Palestine Takes Center Stage At Euro Social Forum
William Loren
Katz
What Goes Around Comes Around
Sean Carter
O'Reilly Should Shut Up About Extortion Claiims
CounterPunch Wire
Who's Really in Bed with Republican Funders: Kerry or Nader?
October 18,
2004
Saul Landau
Facts
and Lies; Slogans and Truth
Dave Lindorff
Bulletin
on the Bush Bulge
Diane Christian
Sheep
and Goats: On the Language of Goodness
Greg Bates / Dave Lindorff
Betting on War: a Wager on the Fallout of a Kerry Presidency
Uri Avnery
Ariel
Sharon's Philosophy
Peter LaVenia
Leaving the Greens So Soon? a Response to Josh Frank
Mike Whitney
O'Reilly at the Whipping Post
Elaine Cassel
The Other War: Civil Liberties Three Years After 9/11
October 16
/ 17, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
The
Free Speech Movement and Howard Stern
Leslie Brill
Unmerciful Judge, Merry Executioners: the Death Penalty as the
True Measure of Bush's Character
Jules Rabin
Reckoning Deaths in an Agitated World
Dave Lindorff
About the Bush Bulge: Was There a Pucker in That Jacket or Was
the President Just Glad to be There?
Peter Linebaugh
Judging Judges: a Few Pages from The Mirror of Justices
Gary Leupp
Iran and Syria: How to Effect Regime Change and Expand the Empire
M. Shahid Alam
America, Imagine This!
Ron Jacobs
Trying to Cross Lake Champlain
Fred Gardner
The Flu Vaccine Question: How Bush Blew It
Jenna Orkin
The Toxic Legacy of 9/11
Dave Zirin
Name the DC Baseball Team: Contest Results
David Hamilton
Alone and Exposed: Bush as a Strong Leader?
Ralph Nader
Criticizing Israel is Not Anti-Semitism
Doug Giebel
Thinking the Unthinkable
Mark Engler
Crimes in Freedom's Name: Dick Cheney's El Salvador
Derek Tyner
Blacks Didn't Get the Vote by Voting: an Interview With Clarence
Thomas on the Million Worker March
Evan Jones
Gimme That Ole Time Religion: Cash and "The Mind of the
South"
Poets' Basement
LaMorticella, Klipschutz and Albert
Website of
the Weekend
No More Bush Girls
October 15,
2004
Paul Craig
Roberts
Where
Did These "Conservatives" Come From?: The Brownshirting
of America
Laura Carlsen
Wal-Mart
vs. the Pyramids of the Sun and Moon
Greg Bates
Empire of Insanity: Kerry's Iraq Troop Numbers
Michael Donnelly
News from a Swing State: Does Anyone Here Have a Spine?
Katherine Lahey
The Venezuelan "Threat": Why Do Kerry and Bush Fear
Hugo Chavez?
Robert Jensen
/ Pat Youngblood
Election Day Fears
Leah Caldwell
From
Supermax to Abu Ghraib: the Masterminds of Torture and Abuse
Website of
the Day
An Anti-Billionaire Policy? Why That Would Be Economic Racism
October 14,
2004
Darcy Richardson
The
Other Progressive Candidate: the Lonely Crusade of Walt Brown
Willliam A.
Cook
Turning
Myths into Truth
Laura Santina
Water, Women and War
Evelyn Pringle
Free Speech Banned by Big Pharma: What You Can't Say About Drug
Importation
Alan Farago
Lessons
from Nature
Rep. Maxine Waters
A Letter to Colin Powell on Haiti
Nicole Colson
Maimed
for Oil and Empire
October 13,
2004
Bishop Thomas
Gumbleton and Bill Quigley
Aftermath
of a Coup: The Other Disaster in Haiti
Sharon Smith
Barak
O-Bomb-a?: Democrats Target Iran
Christopher Brauchli
God and the Bush Administration
Mike Whitney
The Real Meaning of the Hamdi Case
Paul de Rooij
Amnesty
International: a False Beacon?
Website of
the Day
Operation
Truth
October 12,
2004
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
"Indian
Country"
Greg Bates
The Year of Voting Dangerously: a Survey Request of Nader Voters
in Swing States
Steven Conn
Progressives as Pawns: Kerry's War on Nader
Jason Leopold
Under Cheney, Halliburton Helped Saddam Siphon Billions from
UN Oil-for-Food Program
Security Scholars
for a Sensible Foreign Policy
Time for a Change of Course
Timothy J. Freeman
Dying for a Mistake
Pierre Tristam
Deconstructing Bush
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The 2nd Debate: the Blurring of Act and Audience
Bill and Kathleen
Christison
Israel as Sideshow
Website of the Day
John Kerry's Personal Off-Shore Tax Shelters
October 11,
2004
Robert Fisk
Iraq:
Unforgivable Betrayals and Broken Promises
Kevin Pina
The
Untold Story of Aristide's Departure from Haiti
Patrick Gavin
Rethinking
Columbus Day
Chris Floyd
Tribes with Flags in the New Afghanistan
Daniel Wolff
Radioactive Money: Entergy, Political Cash and America's Most
Dangerous Nuclear Plant
Walter Brasch
The Only Ones Who Believe Saddam Had WMDs are Bush, Cheney...and
40% of All Americans
Mike Whitney
The Phony Afghan Elections: Ballot of the Disappearing Ink
Ari Shavit
"He Talks to Condi Rice Every Day": an Interview with
Sharon's Lawyer
Paul Craig
Roberts
The
Debates and the Big Lie
Website of the Day
Dylan's Greatest Recording?
October 9 /
10, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
"There
Are No Innocents"
Paul de Rooij
Northern Ireland is Still the Issue: a Conversation with Gerry
Adams
M. Shahid Alam
Making Sense of Our Times
Laura Carlsen
Protest and Populism in Latin America
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: ASA Goes to Court
Col. Dan Smith
Bush's Credibility Gap
Paul Craig
Roberts
Faith-Based Economics
Greg Bates
What If Nader Critics Get What They Demand?
Joshua Frank
Cobb, the Greens and the Collapse of the Left
Felice Pace
Wilderness, Politics and the Oligarchy: How the Pew Charitable
Trust is Smothering the Grassroots Environmental Movement
Walter A. Davis
Of Pynchon, Thanatos and Depleted Uranium
William A.
Cook
The Agony of Colin Powell
Phyllis Pollack
Twas No Crank Call Love Affair: London Calling, 25 Years Later
Poets' Basement
Klipschutz, Albert, Ford
Website of the Weekend
Abu Ghraib: the Taguba Annexes
October 8,
2004
Jennifer Loewenstein
The
Israeli Invasion of Gaza
Moshe Adler
Edwards' Gambit: He Hoped No One Would Notice the Similarities
David Swanson
Media Blackout: Press Continues to Ignore Labor's Opposition
to Iraq War
Dave Zirin
CounterPunch Contest: Let's Name the New DC Baseball Team!
Rep. Ron Paul
The Draft is a Form of Slavery
William S. Lind
Keeping Our SA Up
Samar Assad
Kerry v. Bush: No Difference When It Comes to Israel / Palestine
Jim Ingalls
and Sonali Kolhatkar
The Elections in Afghanistan
October 7,
2004
Dave Lindorff
All
Out of Volunteers: A Draft is in the Air
Masha Hamilton
Fear in Kandahar
Christopher
Brauchli
Master of Corruption: the Ripening Scandals of Tom Delay
Jason Leopold
Is There Still Time to Impeach Bush?
Bruce K. Gagnon
Bombing the Panhandle: Fighting the Pentagon in Rural Florida
Meredith Kolodner
Where
is the Urgency?: The Anti-War Movement's Election Year Challenge
October 6,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
"Please,
Dude, Can I Take Them Out?": Targeting Civilians in Fallujah
Ron Jacobs
Going
Nuclear: the Ghost of Edward Teller Lives
Michael Colby
The National Flip-Flop: Suddenly Bush is Unfit to Lead?
Tarif Abboushi
More of the Same: Israel Wins the Debates
Matthew Behrens
Canadian Firms Profit from Iraqi Blood
Mike Whitney
Rethinking WMDs
John Pilger
Stealing Diego Garcia
Ben Tripp
Kerry's "Triumph"
Kevin McKiernan
Cheney's Poison Lab: Wrong Time, Wrong Target
Patrick Cockburn
Elections
Will Not End the Fighting in Iraq
Website of the Day
Is There an Islamic Problem?
October 5,
2004
Anthony Loewenstein
Rupert
Murdoch and the Marginals: "Personally Creating Outcomes"
Mark Clinton
and Tony Udell
The
Suicide of an Iraq War Veteran
Greg Bates
Trading
Idiots: an Open Letter to Eric Alterman
Dave Lindorff
What's
the Frequency, Karl?
Norm Dixon
Why Washington Won't Save Darfur Villagers
Larry Kearney
God Talk and Burning Children
Bill Linville
Dirty Politics in the Land of "Clean" Government
Gary Leupp
What
Edwards Should Ask Cheney
Website of
the Day
A Guide to Halliburton for Tonight's Debate
October 4,
2004
Diane Christian
The
Gates of Hell
Joshua Frank
An Interview with David Cobb
Doug Giebel
Incurious George: What If Bush Didn't Lie?
John Chuckman
Strange Victory: Sen. Obvious and the Pathetic Lump
Ramzy Baroud
Reverse the Picture: Anatomy of a Palestinian Outrage
Julia Stein
Remembering Mario Savio and the FSM
Sean Donahue
Outsourcing
Terror: Kerry and Special Forces
Website of
the Day
Mapping
Mt. St. Helens as She Rocks
October 2 /
3. 2004
Paul Wright
John
Kerry on Criminal Justice
Kathleen and Bill Christison
An Exchange with Israeli Historian Bennie Morris
Kathie Helmkamp
My Son Trent: a Marine Who Doesn't Want to Kill
Phillip Cryan
Indigenous Mobilization in Colombia
Lenni Brenner
The First Ex-Catholic Saint: Memories of Mario Savio
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: In Case You Missed "Montel"
Ron Jacobs
It Did Happen Here: When Neo-Nazis Terrorized Olympia
Ben Tripp
Sticker Shock
William S.
Lind
The Grand Illusion: Iraqi Security Forces
Dave Zirin
The Swindle of the Century: Baseball Comes to DC
Dave Lindorff
Lies from the Great Debate
Luscon Pierre-Charles
Haiti's Elections: a High-Tech Sham is Underway
Zoe Moskovitz
& Sasha Kramer
Separating Lies from Truth About Haiti
Nelson P. Valdes
Habana Night vs. Latin American Scholars in Vegas: 61 Banned
Cuban Academics
Alan Farago
The "Ownership Society" and the End of the Everglades
Nancy Haley
What is the Historical Jesus Trying to Tell Us?
Alex Billet
Long Live The Clash: London Still Calling After 25 Years
Steve Fesenmaier
Save and Burn: The War on Libraries
Poets' Basement
Smith, Holt, Albert
October 1,
2004
Steve Breyman
Kerry's
Missed Opportunities
Rose Gentle
My
Son Died for a Lie
Lee Sustar
Iran
in the Crosshairs
Ralph Nader
What
We Didn't Hear at the Debate: Where's the Exit Strategy?
Walter Andrews
We Are Less Secure Now Than Ever
Mike Whitney
Pandora's
Government
Mickey Z.
Debate
This
Saul Landau
The
Iraq Invasion: Lessons from the Pinochet Cases
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
November 2, 2004
The Wrong Side
Wins
Democratic
Elections in Historical Perspective
By
GARY LEUPP
In April 1848, the French held a national
election based upon universal adult male suffrage. This seems
unremarkable today, but at the time, it was a bold innovation.
Neither Britain nor the United States had ever held such an election;
in even the most enlightened western countries, property
requirements limited the franchise. In France, a country
of 30 million people, only 170,000 had been eligible to vote
under the constitutional monarchy of Louis Philippe. In this
election, nine million voted.
The petite bourgeoisie and
wage-workers of Paris had rebelled in February, toppling Louis,
and brought to power a provisional government, influenced by
socialist thought. It took a series of measures quite radical
for the time. It abolished the death penalty, banned slavery
in the French colonies, limited the workday to 10 hours, lifted
restrictions on the press, promulgated the "right to work"
and established "national workshops" to support the
unemployed. Tens of thousands of Frenchmen trekked to Paris to
find work in these establishments. Universal male suffrage was
only one component of an ambitious program of social change,
which resonated in radical circles throughout Europe and helped
trigger uprisings in Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy. These
were heady times; a month before the rebellion in France, Karl
Marx and Friedrich Engels had authored the Communist Manifesto.
The April election was unprecedented
in its democratic legitimacy. Unfortunately the wrong side won.
The victors rejected rather than embraced social reform. The
French peasantry voted on Easter Sunday, after attending mass.
Given the Church's role in primary education and village life
in general, it played a crucial role in creating public opinion---and
the Church was profoundly reactionary. Influenced by sermons
hostile to the reforms, the masses of peasants brought to power
political parties that were determined to check the emerging
power of the Parisian proletariat. These parties wanted to retain
the democratic gains of the French Revolution of 1789, and prevent
the return of absolute monarchy, but they feared the consequences
of empowering the working class. The new regime thus excluded
significant worker participation, and eliminated the national
workshops, ordering workers who had applied for jobs in these
to instead enlist in the army. This prompted a worker uprising
that Alexis
de Tocqueville called "the most extensive and most singular
insurrection that has occurred in our history..."
In the "June Days"
tens of thousands of workers rose up to reject the results of
the "democratic" election. The conservative National
Assembly in response awarded dictatorial powers to General Eugène
Cavaignac, commissioned to suppress them. (His forces killed
about 3,000 of the insurgents, and deported 4,000 to the French
colony of Algeria.) The Assembly revoked the universal suffrage
which had brought itself to power, and paved the way for the
nephew of Louis Napoleon, nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, to win
the presidency in December. Three years later, the president
seized dictatorial powers, and as Napoleon III restored the Empire.
But after his capture in battle in 1870, and the announcement
that the Prussians would march on Paris to accept the French
defeat, the workers of Paris again rose up, repudiating empire
and monarchy and calling for a republic rooted in the toiling
classes. This time they actually held power for two months before
their Commune was drowned in blood.
"Parliamentary
Cretinism"
The moral of the story is this:
elections (even the freest) do not necessarily have anything
to do with freedom. The freely cast vote of an individual whose
opinions themselves are shaped by an oppressive social structure
may easily become a vote for more oppression. The Weimar Republic
in Germany (1919-1933) was from a constitutional standpoint among
the most democratic the world had known, but it morphed into
the Third Reich through the legal electoral process. Good decent
people, not knowing what they do, can vote in the worst sort
of leaders, including fascists. In November 1932, Adolph Hitler's
Nazis won 30% of the vote in Germany, more than any other party.
Hitler was soon appointed Chancellor.
The promotion of "democratic
elections" as an end in itself can mask support for highly
repressive social systems. The U.S. State Department routinely
validates as "democratic" polls held throughout Latin
America, while always singling out Cuba as an antiquated tyranny.
So long as a nation conducts polls involving more than one party,
resulting in a leadership acceptable to Washington, it's either
a democracy or making strides to become such. It doesn't matter
how undemocratically wealth is divided. It doesn't matter if
some parties are banned, or targeted for legal or extra-legal
attack, or if a handful of media moguls and corporate sponsors
shape the vote. Perhaps people are required by law to vote, even
if they find the balloting a farce; this allows one to boast
of "record turnouts" validating whatever outcome.
Marx, among the most astute
commentators on the French election of 1848, dismissed faith
in "democratic elections" in class-divided societies
as "parliamentary cretinism, which holds its victims spellbound
in an imaginary world and robs them of all sense, all memory,
and all understanding of the rough external world." He called
it "a disorder which penetrates its unfortunate victims
with the solemn conviction that the whole world, its history
and future, are governed and determined by a majority of votes
in that particular representative body that has the honor to
count them among its members" He certainly supported workers'
demand for universal suffrage, suggesting (somewhat too optimistically)
that in England, since the proletariat (as of 1852) formed "the
large majority of the population," the "inevitable
result" of suffrage would be "the political supremacy
of the working class." But he emphasized that the voter's
views are themselves produced by a surrounding power structure
that constrains the "freedom" of any ballot.
Herbert Marcuse, the doyen
of New Left scholars in the 1960s, examined the U.S. as a "one-dimensional"
society, in which citizens seduced by a consumer culture possible
only in an advanced capitalist society could rest content with
the delusion that they were truly free, and that their political
choices (pro-capitalist Democrat versus pro-capitalist Republican)
were adequately diverse. "Under the rule of a repressive
whole," he wrote, "liberty can be made into a powerful
instrument of domination. Free election of masters does not abolish
the masters or the slaves. Free choice among a wide variety of
goods and services does not signify freedom if these goods and
services sustain social controls over a life of toil and fear---that
is, if they sustain alienation."
The dominant paradigm in Marcuse's
heyday was "the Free World vs. Communism." "Freedom"
was shorthand for free markets and capitalism, and so the Free
World could comfortably include Suharto's Indonesia, Mobutu's
Zaire, Franco's Spain and a host of brutal dictatorships. But
political democracy (freedom in the exchange of ideas) was considered
the optimal corollary for capitalism (freedom in the exchange
of commodities, including labor-power). It is the same today.
The often-repeated U.S. policy goal is to promote political democracy
and free markets, although not necessarily in that order. Since
capitalism (in China, for example) is held to inevitably lead
towards American- style political institutions, the flourishing
of markets receptive to foreign capital is itself reason for
cordial diplomacy, businesslike relations, and the discreet handling
of "human rights" issues. The freedom of U.S. capital
almost always trumps the freedom of the Third World proletarian.
In this country, your location
and economic status consign you to school systems where your
thoughts and attitudes are largely formed. The needs of capital
determine your job options and hours. Such factors shape how
much attention you can pay to the news ---the whole world outside
your immediate circumstances---and how critically you digest
what you consume. A handful of corporations feed you the news,
accompanied by assurances that this transmission is "fair
and balanced." Meanwhile popular culture generally suggests
you should be "proud to be an American, 'cause at least"
you "know" you're "free"---even
if you'd be very hard-pressed to argue that you're freer than
a Swede, New Zealander or Japanese. Influential religious voices
(in today's America and the France of 1848) preach that God Himself
opposes significant social change, and wants you to vote for
His chosen candidate.
Over 40% of the American people
describe themselves as fundamentalist or "born-again"
Christians. Over 40% believe George W. Bush deserves a second
term. Over 40% believe, because they have been misled or simply
want to believe, that Saddam Hussein was involved in 9-11. There
is probably much overlap among these categories of believers,
who receive much encouragement from sectors of the "free"
press and powerful well-funded bodies who exercise their freedom
to influence voters. So too, of course, do a comparable percentage
of anyone-but-Bush voters. However deeply they differ about the
issues, including the war, they have been persuaded by the system
that the system is valid, and deserves the support that they
provide it by voting. Any vote, after all, is a vote for the
system.
The Hypocrisy
of the System
But some of those best served
by elections, and publicly staunch advocates of voting, have
in fact worked to skew electoral results. The 2000 presidential
fiasco is just one conspicuous instance. Bush's political advisor
Karl Rove
began his career with dirty tricks designed to affect the democratic
process in favor of his candidate for state treasurer in Illinois.
The very Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, William
Rehnquist, strove to keep African-Americans from voting (Democratic)
in Arizona in the 1960s. The loyalty of such people is not to
Jeffersonian ideals of political participation, but to getting
the right men serving their kind of people into power.
This surely applies overseas.
Henry Kissinger, as Richard Nixon's national security advisor
and friend of Latin American juntas, treated the choice of the
electorate in Chile, one of this hemisphere's most longstanding
bourgeois democracies, with contempt. As the Marxist politician
Salvadore Allende rose to power in 1970, he snapped, "I
don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go Communist
due to the irresponsibility of its people."
Why indeed? A CIA-backed coup
toppled the moderate socialist and produced a fascist alternative
warmly embraced by the freedom-loving American leadership (as
would an alternative to the democratically elected Hugo Chavez
in Venezuela). U.S. pressure has sidelined the democratically
elected Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. In U.S.-occupied Iraq,
last year, proconsul Paul Bremer III observed that, "Elections
held too early can be destructive," adding that while there
was "no blanket rule" against democracy in Iraq, and
he wasn't "personally opposed to it," it had to take
place "in a way that takes care of our concerns" and
is "done very carefully." It's obvious that the U.S.-prescribed
path to democracy to date, in both Iraq and Afghanistan, has
nothing to do with empowering the masses but merely covering
neocolonialism with a fig leaf of "free elections."
One final example of this disparate
phenomenon, "democracy." Our word itself comes from
Greek (democratia, rule by the people), and from the political
system in ancient Athens, where any adult male citizen could
vote in the agora. No fallible equipment cast doubt on the accuracy
of the poll. Voting was direct and open. But this admirable form
of "popular" rule excluded women and slaves. Two and
a half millennia later, in most places, full adult suffrage is
the norm; men and women of all classes perform the ritual of
casting ballots for those who claim to represent them. Whether
or not the vote is "fair" from a Carter Foundation
or Human Rights Watch perspective, it is conditioned by a class
structure limiting its legitimacy every bit as much as slavery
limited Athenian democracy.
Who is party to the discussion,
allowed to publicly debate? Who pays to ensure that a candidate's
voice is heard? Who markets the "facts" under discussion,
decides what questions get asked? CNN routinely polls its viewers
(democratically, you might say), posing questions like "Who
do YOU think should be the next target in the War on Terrorism?"
plainly indicating to the masses that the war by general consent
is really a war on "terrorism" and really should continue
and the informed viewer really ought to prefer one or the other
war expansion choices. Such polls never give one the option of
saying, "Your question is loaded; I reject all the options
you give me." Similarly the U.S. political system, harnessed
to corporate power, provides options between which those questioning
corporate power itself have little reason to choose. One might
of course prefer slow poison to hanging, but why should one have
to select between such alternatives? Humanity can do better.
Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University,
and Adjunct Professor of Comparative Religion. He is the author
of Servants,
Shophands and Laborers in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan;
Male
Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan;
and Interracial
Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900.
He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's merciless chronicle
of the wars on Iraq, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia, Imperial
Crusades.
He can be reached at: gleupp@granite.tufts.edu
Weekend
Edition Features for October 30 / 31, 2004
Winslow
T. Wheeler
Spartacus Tells All
Bruce
Anderson
Notes from the Big Empty: When the Hippies Invaded NoCal
Vicente
Navarro
They Worked for Franco: How Sec. of State Cordell Hull and Nobel
Laureate Camilo Jose Cela Collaborated with the Fascist Regime
Robin
Blackburn
How Monica Lewinsky Saved Social Security
Greg
Bates
A Question of Character: What Makes Nader Tick?
Nancy
Welch
The American Health Care Crisis: an Interview with Dr. David
Himmelstein
William
Lind
Election Day: Which Menendez Brother Will You Vote For?
Brian
Cloughley
Uzbekistan and Bush Hypocrisies
Suzan
Mazur
Oops They Did It Again: the NYTs the Paper of Record and Rip-Offs
Greg
Moses
Standing at the Graves of Iraq
John
Chuckman
Osama's Endorsement
Richard
Oxman
Why Not Accept Osama's Offer?
Ken
Avidor
Landscape of Fear: When Ugly is Suspicious
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Bush, Ba'ath and Beyond
Hope
Bastian
Strangling Cuba's Economy
P.
Sainath
Tower of Gabble: Toward a Sustainable Rhetoric
Dave
Zirin
Bush League: Why MLB Owners Support the Prez
Jon
Swift
The Dry Drunk Thang: Put a Cork in It
Ron
Jacobs
The Joke's on Me: a Review of Bob Dylan's Chronicles Vol. 1
Alexander
Billet
Taking Theatre Back: Are the States Ready for "Stuff Happens"?
Poets'
Basement
Jones, Laymon, Norris, Ford and Albert
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