Carrol,
I agree to some extent, but I think you (and Chomsky) both underestimate the degree to which people in elites can convince themselves they're doing the right thing - and I think they really believe that for the most part (and even when they realise they're doing the wrong thing, they justify it as the lesser evil, difficulties of leadership, etc). I think its very difficult for most humans to do evil consciously - rather they have to construct justifications for what they do. Be it neoclassical economic arguments for selfishness, or the justifications for what we did in Iraq during the 90s. Arguably a major job of the court philosopher is to provide comforting lies to enable the Clintons of the world to sleep easy.
There's also the way in which the 90s changed the dynamic of mainstream debate, where it was taken for granted that welfare caused dependency, the market was better, etc. Clinton being more interested in power, than principal may just have been swaying with the wind. In a different intellectual climate, he may have responded differently. In general Clinton took the path of least resistance. I dunno, but I get very uncomfortable assigning motives to people I've never met.
Cian
cian wrote:
> >
> >
> > Note, none of the events described by Parenti happened in secret. It all
> > involved the organisations you would suspect, and the discussions took
>place
> > in public. The more interesting question (and one that Chomsky, amongst
> > others, have tried to answer) is how they can take place so openly, and
>yet
> > be ignored.
>
>(I agree that _all_, not just some, of the important and interesting
>conspiracies take place in the open, and can be discovered by anyone who
>reads the major capitalist newspapers.)
>
>I don't think there is one answer to Chomsky's question. I will suggest
>one reason that accounts for why one large group of liberals and
>leftists ignore them. See how often Democratic Party positions (or the
>position of this or that DP politician) is explained on the basis of the
>"cowardice" or the "dishonesty" of DP politicians. That is, consider the
>huge number of leftists and left-liberals who are unwilling to accept
>the fact that the DP's actions are in more-or-less perfect accord with
>its intentions. They believe that the DP is "really" on our side but
>simply lacks the courage to do what it knows is right.
>
>Clinton destroyed public aid because he intended to destroy public aid,
>_not_ because he was afraid to defend it and _not_ because he wanted to
>gain votes, but because he was against public aid in principle. In
>principle he really wanted more americans to suffer, because that was to
>the long-run advantage, he believed, of "The Nation" (i.e., an important
>sector of the ruling class).
>
>And Clinton destroyed the lives of millions of Iraqi citizens and
>prepared the way for Bush _not_ because he was afraid the Republicans
>would gain votes but because he really believed whole-heartedly that in
>order to maintain u.s. hegemony it was necessary and desirable to
>inflict visible pain on the people of any nation whose leaders did not
>leap to the u.s. will. He wasn't stupid. He knew Sadaam was no threat.
>He knew that u.s. oil supplies were safe regardless of who ruled in
>Iraq. But he believed that the whole world had to be taught a lesson,
>and that only large pain and misery for the people of Iraq could teach
>that lesson.
>
>And the majority of left liberals and far too many radicals and
>revolutionaries cannot recognize that open conspiracy because they have
>to believe in the basic good intentions of the DP. Just as people
>believe in a conspiracy to assassinate Kennedy because they want to hold
>on to their belief that some day, some where, there will be a DP
>President who will follow a progressive policy, and faith in Kennedy is
>a candle in the darkness to maintain that faith.
>
>Carrol
>
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