Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
suits soces find uh... breakdown american liberalism
into two
that camps welfare liberals and technically i had craddock liberals
uh... tell us ah...
reiterate that distinction for us
right
though
offensively
uh... my argument in that uh...
welfare liberals
had been not remain deeply committed to the media paradigm
and i'd it with a five added
searching for
equality of opportunity they believe in collective bargaining around they
believe an expanded social safety net
uh... they call for higher taxes they want to restore union density they
oppose austerity
they knew faintly instinctively in other words
wendy at chicago teachers strike
was raring last fall
which side ever on these are very quick
you know uh...
answer they come up with one when their struggle like that
and on the other hand there is this
desk and i think we identify these people are talking about big core of the
democratic constituency i'm sure many of your listeners many of the news readers
of the nation
and i think there's a huge disconnect between the people and the people who
that basically
been entrusted to be the idea is people of the federal left the progressive
coalition your answer climb to the world
and that
i think that
dada among technocratic liberal view that democratic leadership council poets
and other types
are very i'm keen to you
discard huge element to this old new deal coalition
for the state of being competitive
so it's not necessarily a matter of ben
the really theoretically bankrupt
but with the uh... like real structural change in the economy
industrialization uh...
uh... globalization
other the global impact that social moxy as a whole
and that in america
american liberalism the welfare state of the whole
cat in the nineteen seventies
yourself
eccentric right into the agency or people on the federal apple wondering
what coalitions or doreen q
uh...
he popped in power
and in pursuit of idea
uh... votes from
uh...
middle-class stratas and other in other areas
development
these
uh...
center-left leaders in thinkers have
more like abandoned everything that made them if liberals to begin with
and i think that the huge dividing disconnect between
the technocratic liberals
a lot of people or the idea of people of orbit ah... abyss rubin
and the pay for their rely on she actually enact policy
a bit of ida bell labs can exploit and maybe exploits uh...
the wrong word to use their but i just came back to give an it job and build
new coalitions
and i
sort of point two
different emerging alliances that
saw that at play whether it be liberal support for the occupied movement
uh... d broad community support for the uh... chicago teachers union strike
which was actually ob
yet at the union again support perot corporate our member of the democratic
party and uh... rahm emanuel
so i think there's um... there's plenty of other um... examples of this but
essentially this would mean the reconstitution of some kind of
probable left lubin and also
at the court
i class politics
and that would mean a lot in the american context i mean in many respects
that uh...
um... the relationship with uh... between
some of those um...
president obama is indicative of that split and india
a hughes's has
theoretically is technocratic and centrist i think as as uh... you know
maybe not more so than uh... bill clinton may be maybe more so in some
respects but that high and i think that illustrates
to divide the you talking about
right yes i think that out and that the blanket support but the problem i
brought support i think that he he's gotten from arm from libero compared to
repeat
uh... israel the uh... symptomatic a bit this by the doesn't make any fan like
uh...
you know i i i hate to use uh... guitar a graphic example by the united states
we just
um... you know being abused by fell one and possibly you know being um... being
data for our own as buffet with them i mean i think the example of abu
of obama is really uh...
is really unfortunate because
if not jess that uh... laugh
uh... the american liberals are
choosing to uh... um...
justin uh... his cab for grudgingly but
uh... hiking segments of these uh... publications that another out there i
think there's a lot of among american liberals aren't even
volunteer kirti
offend so it's not just a matter of um... unit tactically choosing to stay
and a coalition but it did uh...
you know why link this to go on with that really robust repeat
fear ron paul making the most
uh... parade and and always stanford and uh... drones and and these other um...
you know policies of obama
and that he had to really should have been taken up by american liberals
dea i mean i think um... amitai
and i'm not if i would agree with the characterization of of paul
but these he certainly filled a void uh... that
that she uh... vacuum that that should have been filled by by people on the
left it with that with that
impolitic to completely opportunistic and i think you can
many ways uh... more despicable than the other members of his party
but it anyways that did that need attention and that critique
uh... was invaded by someone else
and i think it could have easily bent
what do you think i mean you know as you know uh... i have a tough time wrapping
my head around this because i think many of my
critiques
both of if these are the way do you do any aidid uh... uh... welfare loot
the welfare state liberals in technica craddock liberals uh...
uh... certainly things that i have
uh... echoed uh... and
but at the same time what do you think
let me ask you what what do you think gave rise to that technocratic liberal i
mean what was it simply because this seemed to have happened
you know someone once it stands i think the
the democratic party
for lack of a better vehicle uh... has been
indeed the called liberalism
uh... in this country and it began to on tether itself from from labor
or i think is early is uh... you know
early seventies in many respects um... brought up
right i would like to get a little bit after that i would
say that the uh...
that had really happened in the first carter um... target
*** only carter administration um... and that yeah i i think that part of it
were diverted at the level of economic river structural crisis for the
seventeen th
um... economic
prices that on get a lot of
the american welfare state at helping our great neoliberal isn't um... and
essentially neoliberal proven success
was um...
political fix that
decrypted that that existed then
with force it upon the working class in the middle class and profitability rate
for the wealthy
were restored while the rest of us stock with stagnating real wages
but
i think he i think that that divide really um...
it affect occurred around then and and at that point and i would argue the
aspirations of
do you know these are liberal politics right
and the aspirations of the voting bloc did decide to rely on the are really
really just politically uh... striking
so
you know i i uh... there's corollaries elsewhere in the world the uh... third
way politics in britain people like tony blair and gordon brown
arm and the reason why perhaps that
ob the democratic party moved further to the right than some of these european
parties will further to the right was that it was um... yep pitched ed
uh... further to the right to begin with
you know are for those left in this country social liberalism not social
democracy
all welfare state was always more fragmented unless universal than what
they had
in europe
and um... you know elsewhere in the event apples world
so were just enough like me
situation uh... now
and
think that maybe now that near liberalism has really been shown to be
bankrupt in
everyone got out of ideas and ever uncovered same problem it's wise
political agency
we will look at the right in the country
and the uh... divide that our merger the republican party over immigration and
other he issues
and really just shows ever on
wondered about the campaign for the republican party is wondered about
demographic
and about the fact that the trampled horrible and there
political prospects of the national level don't look back at even though
because of the way you know uh... our system of fact i've given this portion
our weight q uh... two thirteen states
um... they might
continue be contenders in the house and the uh... defendant at the presidential
level palace in great for them so there's a request of their party and
about political agency
who's going to book for us to push through our agenda
and on the left worse dealing with the same problem
anyone can say
yet this is what we should do anyone could write a program
that at some respect what i did manet schumer's pretty
e_t_ right it be that the things that we want
here from broad coalition of the could make it happen
where the actual details about how
the actual details about the alliances and it sort of stuff
yeah this is really difficult to accept
that's affecting everyone so the seller cattle obama coalition very cold
the right can request it together
and has not yet
opting to merge around uh... don't laugh
that were really just had an impact
up politically in the country and so let's let me let's let's get to that i
mean in terms of
you know what the
um...
the prescription is and into
the question being emi because you know many of the critics at least in the
context of of this piece um... that you you wrote in the nation and uh... in it
in obviously you know there
they were parameters here in terms of what you were here are trying to achieve
but
of the critiques
critiques
you know a lot more or less or for the sake of argument today a self-identified
liberal by has been making with the
liberalism
or quite some time i mean the uh...
where do we go from here and what is it what
the radical left
to the table short of the act
helps the will on the last
well i think that there's for delivery to the developer promoted terminator i
agree with that the lapd party
the left party
if the coalition party um... between disgruntled off social democrats who
thought that the
uh... term interest democratic party
whichever even moved this far right is it that the democratic party that fits
had betrayed it its historical mission and trade union at the time other people
who who are uh...
who have been disillusion with that party
and also um...
old communist and um... truck yet another radical left
forces and uh...
in germany
and they form give the left party
and i think in in this kind of way there and uh... directed are definitely
broadest swath of agreement between social democrats and and you know myself
i'm an act of identified democratic socialist especially when it comes to
you
what we need to do
today
and what we need to do in the short term
though when i think that you know we need to um...
we need a new economic bill of rights of some sort of the short term
when i think that we need to defend phil security what i think we need universal
child care
and we need universal health care general referral pair system
and we need to defend our mother
important social good that we would have on the books
now these are things that i would imagine lots of american liberals would
agree with and that thing
good measure
i think that the left has
um...
past offer basically ah...
a deeper understanding
uh... be structures of capital from the why these reforms have been so hard to
to almanac an office in spain once they've been enacted
in some ways here's the cold dot marxist critique of um...
of i think if you apply this q
d broke reformist liberals to and initially written in a different context
but um...
at baker the myth of active surface
and having him having to rolled the boulder up the hill
everyday going to have it periodically fallback
upon them
to some extent that's been the d history of of efforts cheever form capitol them
from within
but that is
europe
creating a different balance of forces more in favor of the working class and
another and other community
you're doing so in a way that structure brief still leaves the levers of power
in control of arm in the control of capitalist
so i can get them to read from abroad rations for our a dramatically
transformed this idea since i did it
and you know more craft agree in primary operated
some men than powers um...
you know workers in another
and other people
it's one that uh... that i can give a big differentiation free radical as
amend and liberally from
but uh... but essentially even if you want
um... more modest out rations
these are
i guess to use a cliche you know bridges that will cost will be come to them
and
being that if you look at six that full
aperture form capitol in europe and and elsewhere you know if you look at
sweden which welfare state reached its peak in the seventies and eighties
uh... bees were coalitions there were really built
between social democrat and radicals
to their last
uh... they work
coalition belt between
people just
you know one degree to the weapon center and there
friendster centrist technocrat
you know the american coalition the a_t_t_ culturally compromises and failed
at every turn because to view the people actually involve actually wanted to
tackle change and not enough to actually pressure coerced
cap with the people in power
those sometimes i mean i think there's merit in more radical demands
and uncertain yourselves with more radical
doctor just depends on onto and i'm a uh... a member of the guy democratic
socialist of america in addition to you by other work are more or less just a
paper member but if you look at the orientation of people like michael
harrington
uh... maury people currently involved with organizations like cornel west in
france *** event i think you'd find that i'm eric and i democratic first was
it was quite sophisticated and also have a complex understanding of
of liberalism in the way in a forward which is in jest we need revolution
tomorrow and obviously we want radical change but uh... at certain level we
need to be um... you operating in the world that i think that
and trying to push our program
and uh... push our goals
from the standpoint of reality itself so those two
new agenda is and in the insert the my guest
the fish or
earlier in the long term are they at yeah a day-long
once with each other and other words youth of one
engages in a and i know that you've written in uh... than jack and then
uh... that
the socialists and radicals need to sort of to do to start
to be aware of their context overused uh... again after being on the
mapelmacae train as a uh...
as a metaphor
archivos to
agendas and can you can you hold those simultaneously and how do you go about
doing that in other words uh... you know if you're if you're participating
the process as it stands now in the world as it is now
um... r_u_ undercutting
your ability to implement more radical change
right well
i think that uh...
today there are few people in america are are out there for you know this is
going to come as no surprise to any of your listeners
barack tough identified socialist
but i think that all of the quarrel any future relevant socialist movement would
be from people who are
essentially self-identified liberals who run politicized you're different
colleges that attracted to ideas to will get politicized through your basic
sorrow spirited union struggle to any of these i mean you wide struggles through
um outburst like occupier than other groups that's not it's i think to some
extent
on the uh...
the future
by elected banner
are people who
don't quite have
completely formed politics yet so i'm sure they'll be plenty of people who
will print to bleed project socialism or principally reject even
you know liberal format for it
uh... from but the basis of knowledge and experience but
right now the rubin thirty-fifth and even as intellectual and and
cultural current they're very um...
small marginalized
think that there are underlying tensions between the liberal of u_n_ a more
radical worldview
i think that underlying tensions in the the open
goals and ambitions
but i think the attention to something that will kind of resolving bells
overtime and at the very least where far away from
from that point
and uh...
i defer those are good contradiction detection fast
you know i only wish for example that we were we deal with um... come the debate
about having a big the greek
for example
paragraph between social democrat than than men radicals increases questions of
what we do you want to empower where we do ones uh... were brought in profits go
to recruit consistently polling information opposition party and group
and they come very close to former government
and windows unite contradictions that have been a generation or two on the
uh... on the american left to right