The People Are Not Fighting Over Ideas
The seismic shift within the Democratic Party to determine its political direction for the next generation has taken place. Zohran Mamdani, flush off of his mayoral victory in New York City, supported two democratic socialists and another left populist in the recent Democratic primaries in New York. All three of Mamdani’s favorites won, with one defeating the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. Then last week another democratic socialist, reminiscent of Anastasia Ocasio-Cortez’s victory in 2018, beat a 15-term incumbent in the Colorado primaries. And in Michigan, a state where Democrats must hold a Senate seat held by a retiring incumbent, Ocasio-Cortez has endorsed a self-proclaimed ‘progressive’ in the Democratic primary against a moderate Democratic House of Representatives member.
The Democratic Party establishment is beside itself seeing these results. On Sean Hannity’s Fox Network show Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman described the situation as the ‘dancing days of the dirt bag left’ and wondered why more Democrats in Congress aren’t calling out these ‘communists’ who have appropriated the Democratic brand. [1] Long-time Democratic strategist James Carville has gone as far as saying that Darializa Avila Chevalier, who is against interracial marriage and has allegedly said Israel doesn’t have a right to exist some years ago should not be allowed to caucus with Democrats if elected.[2]
Carville and Fetterman’s response to democratic socialist successes in the primaries are sad but predictable. On Fox Carville admitted socialism was a broad body of ideas and breezily alluded to Scandanavian socialism, but he never talked about the principles that are central to socialism that might make a socialist outlook plausible for voters. Fettermen called democratic socialists communists, a reach that anyone following my posts knows is grossly inaccurate.
‘Socialism broadly is belief in any set of policies that tax or regulate the private sector of the economy in the name of collective well-being.’ Unlike Soviet-styled state socialism democratic socialism retains the private sector of the economy, and taxes and regulates it ‘to pay for health care, education and other social services.’ [3]
Carville, Fetterman and the rest of the Democratic establishment are social liberals. They say they want the same things as democratic socialists: affordable gasolene, groceries and housing, access to quality health care and education, etc. But after a second more blatantly anti-democratic and inhumane Trump administration, democratic socialists and the rest of the populist left want more aggressive stances by Democratic candidates, and more robust policy once in power.
I want to make two points here that may seem at odds with one another, but illustrate the range of responses Democratic leadership can marshall toward a base that sits further to its left on the ideological spectrum. First, it would be possible to define democratic socialism in ways that show that it’s not so different from mainstream (social) liberalism. In the context of the current political landscape, they both want ‘affordabilty,’ Democratic socialist may want more assertive policies that require more government intervention (and more taxes, ‘cause somebody’s gotta pay for it!), but socialists and liberals want the same outcomes.
But the democratic establishment doesn’t wish to have a full-throated public conversation about socialism, because they feel the mere acknowledgement of socialism would discredit the party in the public eye. But the Dems have to find it within themselves to embrace those voters, brash as they may be, who want the same things they want!
Establishment Democrats would do well to heed the advice of former President Barrack, already a venerable elder despite his relative youth (64 years old). In a recent interview with Stephen Colbert, Obama, talking about the challenge presented by Zohran Mamdani in New York, said Mamdani ‘just wants people to be able to afford housing in New York. Obama added that ‘he ‘assume(s) liberals want the same thing.’ What Obama is more concerned about with Democrats is ‘do you just know how to talk to regular people like you’re not in a college seminar?’[4]
Amilcar Cabral, the Cape Verdean revolutionary that you’ve seen me quote before was a Ph.D. agronomist steeped in theoretical Marxism when his party organized peasant communities to fight Portuguese colonialism. Yet Cabral in speeches before his party leadership cautioned them that ‘the people are not fighting for ideas, ... They are fighting to win material benefits, to live better and in peace, to see their lives go forward, to guarantee the future of their children.[5]
When people band together in common cause, whether it be to fight ICE abductions of community members, protest racism in the criminal justice system, or food desserts in urban working-class communities, they may come from a variety of world views, or political understandings. For some it might be systemic racism, or the contradictions of capitalism. For others it could just be that certain people are being treated unfairly. Let them talk about what motivated them to act as they come together fighting for material benefits to craft a better future for themselves and their families.
Affordability is a useful term for capturing the crisis of our system that covers a host of issues in our everyday lives. The only isms that matter these days are a humanism which centers the satisfaction of human needs and pragmatism which hammers out practical policies that address those human needs. Everyone from mainstream liberals to democratic socialists, noblesse oblige conservatives and libertarians can contribute to these debates.[6] The community organizers Obama and Cabral understand this. Come on Democrats! What are y’all waiting for?
[2] Carville, James Carville says socialist Democrat shouldn't be in the party, calls her views 'a bridge too far'. I dug around before writing this, and all I can find on Chevalier’s views on Israel is that she calls Israel a settler colony who occupied its current territory and dispossessed the Palestinian people. She (I’m guessing) would argue that a people under occupation always have the right to fight to alleviate that condition; a position that I share. I would add (and maybe she would) that Hamas extremism might never have had the chance to flourish if the US had muscled Israel into the creation of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza after the 1967 Six-Day War.
[3]‘MSNBC Distortion of Democratic socialism.’ https://drvernondamanijohnson.substack.com/p/msnbc-distortion-of-democratic-socialism
[4] Joseph A. Wulfsohn, ‘Obama, Colbert gush over Zohran Mamdani as they discuss Democratic Party's future.’ Fox News Channel, https://www.foxnews.com/media/obama-colbert-gush-over-zohran-mamdani-discuss-democratic-partys-future?msockid=38f4baaeba1965361d70b49cbbaa6496
[5] Amilcar Cabral, ‘Tell No Lies,! Claim No Easy Victories! Revolution in Guinea. Monthly Review Press, 1969, p. 86.
[6] ‘Noblesse oblige’ is French for the ‘obligation of the nobility’ in a medieval aristocracy. It has been used to describe modern conservative elites who prefer less government, but recognize the obligation of the wealthy to give back to those less privileged than themselves in the name of the public good.
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