Right on Chuck!
As I was wending my way through graduate school, I also ran into a lot of "leftist"... some even so-called Marxist academics who were very eager to convince me that 1) there was no working class 2) capitalism was inevitable 3) Marx was simple minded 4) there was no empire ...and a lot of other very fuzzy, weak, would-be poetical shit that didn't actually stand up to any inspection. A lot of this was due to the shifting winds of neo-liberal change and the bootlicking nature of most intellectuals; some of it was due to the fact that almost no one in academia knew anything about working class life, or, for that matter, anything outside of academia....and that they were looking for ways to make themselves comfortable and to justify the status quo.
The only working class graduate student in English I knew committed suicide in his third year.
But, hey, if the parallel they draw between Augustus and the U.S. is correct; we're in for some interesting times.
Joanna B.