[lbo-talk] George Will on Thomas Frank

[Wojtek Sokolowski]

> The Left, At a Loss In Kansas
> 
> By George F. Will
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A35560-2004Jul7.html
> Frank regrets that Bill Clinton's "triangulation" strategy --
minimizing
> Democrats' economic differences with Republicans -- contributed to the
> erasure. Politics would indeed be simpler, and more to the liking of
> liberals, if each citizen were homo economicus, relentlessly
calculating his
> or her economic advantage, and concluding that liberalism serves it.
But
> politics has never been like that, and it is becoming even less so.
> 
> When the Cold War ended, Pat Moynihan warned, with characteristic
> prescience, that it would be, like all blessings, a mixed one, because
> passions -- ethnic and religious -- that were long frozen would come
to a
> boil. There has been an analogous development in America's domestic
> politics.
> 
> The economic problem, as understood during two centuries of
> industrialization, has been solved. We can reliably produce economic
growth
> and have moderated business cycles. Hence many people, emancipated
from
> material concerns, can pour political passions into other -- some
would say
> higher -- concerns. These include the condition of the culture, as
measured
> by such indexes as the content of popular culture, the agendas of
public
> education and the prevalence of abortion.

WS:  It is scary to agree with George F. Will but he might be up to
something.  Populism is the fundamental article of faith of the post New
Deal left - but that article of faith is contradicted by empirical
evidence.  "The masses" tend to be reactionary, not progressive or even
liberal - and the leftist are at loss trying to explain that
inconsistency with the dogma.  Variants of bourgeois conspiracy theory
is the best they can do.  

Yet that explanation does not seem plausible because there is plenty of
cross-national evidence that brainwashing and propaganda alone cannot
sway the masses.  The necessary ingredient of propaganda to work is a
synergy between popular beliefs and sentiments, no matter how silly, and
the ideological content of propaganda.  In other words, propaganda can
still the pre-existing sentiments into a desirable direction, but cannot
create them ex nihilo.  The Bolsheviks did that in Russia, Hitler did in
Germany, Reagan did it in the US - but the US left is unlikely to do it.
Why? Because of its naive touchy-feely populist faith.  

Most people are by nature stupid, selfish, vain, and lazy - they demand
rights for themselves and want them handed on a silver platter with no
effort on their part, but are unwilling to extend those rights to
others, especially those seen as their "inferior."  They will even
resist any effort to extend the rights they have to other because they
see it as undermining their own status and prestige, and their vanity
will not let that happen.  They are too stupid and lazy to take on a
long term struggle to improve their own lot, but they will undertake
heroic efforts to thwart improving the lot of others.  That is why the
Ku Klux Klan thrived in this country and still is alive and kicking,
while virtually all leftists parties were either still born or died
shortly after their birth.  

Conservatives understand that fundamental principle of human nature and
exploit it to their full advantage.  Leftists are ideologically blind to
it and cannot understand why their calls for "justice and prosperity for
all" fall on deaf ears.  Touchy-feely populism is the death trap of the
left.  If the left wants to come close to the halls of power it must
abandon it for influence with strategically positioned elites.

Wojtek