I think one was, there was an idolizing of
unfettered markets.
And much if not most of the intelligentsia
were duped.
I recall traveling with my dear brother Michael
Harrington and talking with brother Stanley
Aronowitz years ago.
And you know, here we're engaged in critiques
of unfettered markets, and it looked as if
we were medieval thinkers.
Everybody was saying, we're followers of Milton
Friedman.
Everybody was saying Frederick Hayak got it
right.
Everybody was saying marketize, commercialize,
commodify, and we were still reading Lukasch.
And Lukasch was saying commodification is
not simply an asymmetric relation of power,
of bosses vis-à-vis workers, so workers are
being more and more marginalized.
Profits are being produced, wealth is being
produced, hemorrhaged at the top, no fair
distribution of that wealth or profit for
workers.
Poor are being demonized because they are
viewed as those persons who are irresponsible,
who will not work, who are always looking
for welfare; i.e., failures in the society
of success.
And we reached a brink, and the chickens came
home to roost.
And a few years ago the unfettered markets
led us off and over the brink.
And all of a sudden, very few intellectuals
want to be honest and acknowledge the greed
with which they were duped.
Don't want to talk about the inequality that
went along with it.
Don't want to talk about the demonization
of the poor that went along with it.
Don't want to talk about the politics of fear
that produced a Republican Party that was
more and more lily-white, using not just race
but also demonizing gay brothers and lesbian
sisters, you see.
Don't want to talk about the indifference
toward the poor, and greed being good and
desirable and so forth.
Now is a very different moment, and it's not,
you know, just about pointing fingers, but
saying somebody's got to take responsibility.
This was a nearly 40-year run.
Who paid the cost?
As is usually the case, you know, poor working
people paid the cost, disproportionately black
and brown and red, you see.
So in the age of Obama, we say, okay, can
we have a different kind of discussion?
And that's what we're trying to do, but of
course you've got two wars going on; you've
got still Wall Street in the driver's seat
in the Obama administration when it comes
to the economic team, you see.
And you've got very -- you know, I think in
some ways unimaginative thinking when it comes
to foreign policy, be it the Middle East or
be it European Union or be it Latin America,
you know, calling Chavez a dictator; the man's
been elected!
If he's calling into question rights and liberties,
criticize him as a democratic president.
We did the same thing for Bush.
Bush was calling into question rights and
liberties; we didn't call him a dictator.
We said he's a democratically elected president
who's doing the wrong thing.
Chavez ought to be criticized.
He's not a dictator; the man's been elected.
But it's that kind of demonizing that obscures
and obfuscates the kind of issues that are
necessary, because Chavez is also talking
about poor people.
So of course I want libertarian and democratic
sides.
I want right and liberties and empowerment
of poor people.
But talking about poor people is not a joke;
it's crucial, it's part and parcel of the
future of any serious democratic project.
The fundamental question of any democracy
is, what is the relation between public interest
and the most vulnerable?
That's the question, you see.
That is the question.
The test of your rule of law is going to be,
how are the most vulnerable being treated?
It's not whether the torturers are getting
off; we know the torturers don't have the
rule of law applied to them.
The wiretappers, they're getting off scot-free.
What about Jamal with the crack bag?
Take him to jail for seven years.
Oh -- so you've got a different rule of law
when it comes to Jamal on the corner versus
your torturers and your wiretappers?
Torture is a crime against humanity; it's
not just illegal.
Wiretapping is illegal, you see.
Now, it's not a crime against humanity, because
I mean, I'm sure I've had my phone tapped
for years.
I don't think they committed a crime against
humanity; they just ought to quit doing it
God dangit.
Well, you -- I think you keep in mind -- I
mean, the demos is always a heterogeneous,
diverse -- got a lot of xenophobic elements
among the demos -- a lot of ignorance, a lot
of parochialism.
You also have a lot of cosmopolitanism, a
lot of globalism, a lot of courage, moral
courage.
So the demos is not one thing.
But when it comes to the ability of the demos
to organize, mobilize and bring power and
pressure to bear, we certainly are in a crisis;
our system is broken.
We've got seventy one percent of the people
who want universal health care, and you can
barely get through a reform bill with a weak
public option.
It's clear lobbyists from the top, pharmaceutical
companies, drug companies have tremendous
influence, much more than the demos from below,
you see.
So that those preferences don't get translated
easily because our politicians are beholden
to that big money and that big influence.
But I mean the demos is still around, thank
God.
You've got your own institution.
Dialog -- dialog is the lifeblood of a democracy.
You've got to allow ideas to flow.
You have to expose people to different visions,
alternative arguments and so on, to try to
keep the torch of the progressive demos alive.
But it's very difficult to organize it.
Complacency is deep; apathy is deep; people
are wondering how can you confront, you know,
big finance, big government tied to big finance,
when all you've got is these little people,
who are willing to talk and so forth, but
have tremendous power bringing serious pressure
to bear.
We can march; you know, we marched against
the war by the millions.
We were ignored by the Bush administration.
Some of us went to jail.
We were ignored; we couldn't translate into
foreign policy.
That happens sometimes.
It was **** Vietnam.
