Post Election Thoughts #1

The events leading up to and after the 2020 United States presidential election have confirmed a suspicion that many, myself included, have had concerning the majority of so called “socialists,” that suspicion being that most of them are either not really “socialists” in the proper marxist sense, and that they simply do not have knowledge of revolutionary theory and praxis; or, alternatively, that they are knowledgeable of revolutionary theory and practice, but that it is simply against their perceived class interest to advocate for and espouse it (these we would call “bourgeois socialists”).

It is likely that you have seen and heard the talking points espoused by these people; how couldn’t you? They dominate the majority of left wing discourse online, and in mainstream discourse, they are the only “socialists” who are ever actually listened to and taken seriously. They say things like “Biden won’t end capitalism, but he will make it easier for us to advocate for what we want,” or “shouldn’t we participate in electoral politics to at least try and improve the material conditions?” to which we should reply, “improve the conditions of what? Capitalism?” Because isn’t that what is being “improved”? Productivity, political stability, security; these are all things that aid capitalism, things that maintain it. Not only that, but they are exceedingly fleeting, illusory; the moment they arrive, they’re gone, like a dream or a specter. However, just because they are fleeting and illusory does not mean that they do not hold sway over people; on the contrary, just like a dream, they linger in the mind even after it has woken, their effects remaining long after concrete memory of the dreams content has dissipated. It is thought that, maybe, some lucky night, the dream will return, and that its effects will stay forever, even though this will of course not happen.

This, of course, was the impact that Obama had, and the impact that Clinton had, and it is the impact that Biden’s presidency will have. Biden’s presidency, despite what many liberals seem to think, is not a break with establishment politics. It does not signal “a new era in American politics.” Quite the contrary, it is nothing more than a continuation of the political cycle that America has been in since the Vietnam War, and very possibly before it.

Contrary to what many among our ranks think, Trump was not the vile archnemesis that he appeared to be; quite the opposite, in fact. We could not have put in a better instigator in office, even if we had utilized all the manpower of the leagues upon leagues of russian hackers who supposedly live among us in cyberspace!

Who has done more to destabilize political and economic life than Donald Trump? Who, with his idiotic comments and reactionary posturing, fueled the fires of the nation wide popular rebellions than Trump? Who did more to delegitimize America’s political system and economic establishment than Trump? Under his presidency, Covid 19 has run rampant throughout the nation; businesses have shut down, the Dow Jones crashed, the economy froze, and for the first time in a very long time, we saw a nation wide working class movement rise and organize; tenants unions, striking workers in the service industry, protests and rebellions all over the country, all fueled by economic insecurity, the covid pandemic, and flaring racial tensions, all of which were only worsened by Donald Trump’s incompetence and his inability to keep his mouth shut. We saw the rise of autonomous zones defended by armed working class and radical left militias, we saw the storming and torching of a police precinct in a major urban city (Minneapolis). Why did it happen? What led to it? Many things, certainly. But would it have gone on for so long if it wasn’t for Trump’s actions and his rhetoric? I doubt that it would have.

Despite all this, despite the mass movement that occurred before our very eyes, on our very own soil, liberals and bourgeois socialists still insist that such a movement could never take on an organized, militant form (even more than it already was); they deny the possibility of a united working class movement that could engage in a revolutionary guerrilla war against capitalism. Not only do they deny it, but they argue that such a thing is undesirable! It is blatantly obvious that they are wrong on both fronts, but the fact that they are wrong doesn’t matter; they have power, both economic, social, and political, and are able to easily broadcast their views to the entire nation. They are able to, and they did. Their propaganda succeeded, and with the election of Joe Biden, they pushed the radical, conscious part of the movement out of the public eye. Then, the moderate aspects of the various movements; liberal BLM supporters, the Democratic Socialists of America, and the mass of unaffiliated people all took to declaring that the fight was over, and that “we” had won. And people, for the most part, fell for it.

But what, really, has Biden’s victory brought us? It has brought us the end of the mass movement that began with the death of George Floyd. It has pacified many who otherwise would have become radical. And it has brought us a president who pretends to be “progressive,” but in reality is nothing more than a fascist enabler and a preserver of the current state of things.