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"... fascism in power is the open terrorist dictatorship of the most reactionary, most chauvinistic and most imperialist elements of finance capital." 13th Plenum of the International Committee of the Communist International, November 28, 1933. |
I just came across this interesting essay by Glen Greenwald (appended) in the January 30 edition of Salon. It is the best description I have seen of the real meaning of "bipartisanship." He references a good example of it from the Washington Post which you can read by clicking here.
I always wince when I hear the term (I've never heard it used anywhere but in the US) because for me it means "one party state." It's doubly distressing because I sense that this euphemism for totalitarianism is received favorably by the public.
However, Greenwald's analysis is far more significant than I think he himself realizes. What he has discovered is a political technique, currently in use, for implementing capitalist totalitarianism in a two party state under the cover of a constitutional democracy.
The backbone of the capitalist totalitarian state is the Republican party, which is normally a minority party. The majority party is the Democcratic party. With the collusion of that party's leadership, the majority party is spiked with a minority of ideological Republicans (Republicrats). On issues critical to the totalitarian leadership, the Republicrats will vote with the Republican backbone and thus, on those critical issues, the state is totalitarian. On other issues the vote is mixed and the Republicrats are given an opportunity to maintain their ideological cover within the Democratic party. The overall functioning of the system gives it the appearance of a democratic state.
This is an entirely new tactic compared to the totalitarianisms of the last century. In Germany, the one-party Nazi state was achieved almost overnight by physically destroying the left parties (Communist and Social Democratic party members were arrested in mass sweeps and placed in the newly-prepared concentration camps, Dachau and Sachsenhausen) and by having the traditional capitalist parties voluntarily dissolve themselves as being, in the absence of the left parties, superfluous.
Since totalitarianism was, of necessity, discredited by Allied propaganda in World War 2, this direct approach is no longer available. The answer to this dilemma is the manufactured bipartisanship documented by Greenwald.
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Wednesday January 30, 2008 07:50 EST What "bipartisanship" in Washington means(updated below)
Graham purports to list a slew of problems suffering from a lack of bipartisanship -- "huge gaps in national and homeland security"; "Nearly 50 million Americans still have no health insurance"; crumbling infrastructure; high gas prices; and a lack of a brighter future for the next generation -- and then proposes a litany of shallow process "solutions" such as a bipartisan cabinet, changes to the format for presidential debates, and regional primaries. Those "solutions" are total nonsequiturs. How would they resolve any of the intense differences over those policies? They manifestly wouldn't. But more importantly, "bipartisanship" is already rampant in Washington, not rare. And, in almost every significant case, what "bipartisanship" means in Washington is that enough Democrats join with all of the Republicans to endorse and enact into law Republican policies, with which most Democratic voters disagree. That's how so-called "bipartisanship" manifests in almost every case. Many people, especially partisans, always believe that their own side is compromising too much and that the other side is always winning, so it's best to consult objective facts in order to know how "bipartisanship" works. Here are the vote breakdowns by party over the last couple years on the most significant and contentious pieces of legislation, particularly (though not only) in the area of national security. In almost every case, the proposals that are enacted are ones favored by the White House and supported by all GOP lawmakers, and then Democrats split and enough of them join with Republicans to ensure that the GOP gets what it wants. That's "bipartisanhip" in Washington: To support the new Bush-supported FISA law: GOP - 48-0 Dems - 12-36 GOP - 0-49 Dems - 24-21 GOP - 46-0 Dems - 7-40 GOP - 49-0 Dems - 8-38 GOP - 46-2 Dems - 30-20 GOP - 49-0 Dems - 23-25 GOP - 44-0 Dems - 20-28 GOP - 48-1 Dems - 16-33 GOP - 53-0 Dems - 12-34 GOP - 54-0 Dems - 34-10 GOP - 54-0 Dems - 18-25 GOP - 48-1 Dems - 29-22 Leaving aside how shallow and, shall we say, unserious is this endless
chirping for more "bipartisanship" -- as though it's a magic feel-good
formula for resolving actual policy differences -- it's hard to imagine
how there could possibly be any more "bipartisanship" in Washington even
if that were the only goal. Other than formally disbanding as a party --
or granting a permanent proxy of their collective vote to Mitch McConnell
-- how could Congressional Democrats possibly be more accommodating than
they already are? |
