> Yes, this is exactly right.
>
> This is the thing progressives (or anyone paying
> real
> attention) must demand of Kerry if he replaces Bush
> --
> the complete dismantling of the 'War on Terror'
> apparatus which is built upon the cosmically insane
> notion the United States can prevent the possibility
> of a tactic -- terrorism -- being used against it
> through some eternally applied combination of
> aggressive actions.
>
>
> Kerry's first job should be deconstruction -- this
> is
> what Zizek, in a somewhat different context, was
> driving at in his essay, "The Iraq War, Where Is The
> True Danger?" If we accept the premise of total war
> for total defense the Bush admin has sold time and
> again, then it won't matter if Rumsfeld, Ashcroft,
> Wolfowitz et. al. stay in place or not because the
> new
> norms they've created will outlast them.
I couldn't be more in agreement. I can't help feeling that mainstream discourse (including Kerry's) has fallen into the trap that Bush et al set after Sept 11. It's now a cliché to claim that 'everything changed after 9/11' (and so there needs to be a new global configuration, etc.). I think that statement needs to be rewritten to acknowledge that 'Bush changed everything after 9/11'.
>
> Isn't this what made Augustus important in Roman
> history, this creation and soldifying of previously
> unacceptable norms? Augustus, if memory serves,
> made
> real the fears of the Senators who assasinated
> Caesar,
> he created the very tyranny -- gave it flesh and
> bones
> -- they thought they were intercepting.
>
In other words, the battle between Dem & Rep is being fought on Bush's territory, which dooms the Democratic position from the start. I think the essential point is that Bush's pseudo-revolutionary, law-breaking step of invading Iraq created its own conditions of possibility. Was the invasion of Iraq even on the agenda before the Reps put it there? It was quite impossible! Once they did, there was no question of the Democrats, having taken on the neocon formulation of the 'changed world', not voting for it.
> Kerry's relatively liberal voting record, 60's era
> anti-war protest arrest and general un-Bushness will
> mean very little if he takes no steps to undo the
> real damage done.
Zizek has often warned of the danger that is posed by liberals who condemn right-wing policies and them take them on as the legitimate concerns of the population. (http://www.newleftreview.net/NLR23603.shtml) I contend that, if enough righteous panic is fabricated, the public is malleable enough to take anything on as a 'legitimate concern'.
You are correct that, unless Kerry can reverse these changes then the world is done for. But it we shouldn't phrase it in the passive voice: Kerry himself will do the damage.
Simon
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