>On Nov 6, 2004, at 6:04 PM, Todd Archer wrote:
>>Why not get a look at them through looking at their class position, among
>>other things?
>Well, I'm all in favor of looking at the political situation by means of
>class analysis, but then you have to account for the fact that a heck of a
>lot of working class voters were for Bush, i.e., the most reactionary force
>in contemporary politics.
>What are we supposed to do about that?
I was talking about that section of the Bush supporters you and Shane were talking about, not the working class as a whole (I think we're pretty well aware of where they're going, generally speaking).
The impression I get is that these people are a solid core of foot soldiers for the bourgeois via the Republicans, especially the neo-con elites in the party. I was throwing out the idea of observing where those foot soldiers are going, materially-speaking, and possibly doing something with that rather than playing their morality games. Like, can we expect them to start crumbling when Bush's business agenda for this term kicks in?
I have little doubt a heck of a lot of Bush supporters were working class: there's something of a dearth of leftists to the left of the Democrats in America and political training's damn hard work to begin with. FWIW, I'm not sure how this is related to my critique or what you were talking about earlier.
As for what we're "supposed to do", I'd say hunker down for a long winter for starters, watch, listen, research, talk, and talk, and talk and wait for opportunities to come along. BuschCo will do something that will get them tossed and/or their opposition will get its act together. Shit'll happen.
Don't, for God's sake, go into some public, quasi-nihilistic suck-fit as demo'ed in Katha Pollit's latest column.
Even if it does feel good to unwind that way.