So perhaps it was just political unfeasible then, but feasible now. The image of Obama as a the sly pragmatist *does* seem to clash with his willingness to do something this unpopular just before an election.
Bourgeois rule in a "democracy" like ours is a state of contestation.
Obama's range of action isn't *just *limited by popular mobilizations and the like, but to a degree by opinion alone. Voters don't like this and it seems to me like political insanity. It makes sense to try to at least speculate on the political logic behind our ruler's madness.
On Wed, Jul 27, 2011 at 9:18 PM, Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu> wrote:
> On 7/27/2011 3:30 PM, Doug Henwood wrote:
>
>>
>> On Jul 27, 2011, at 3:11 PM, Eric Beck wrote:
>>
>> I think you have to accept that or
>>> accept that he really does want to cut MC and SS.
>>>
>>
>> He does. It's the elite consensus, and he represents nothing if not elite
>> consensus.
>>
>
> I had missed this when I wrote my post making the same point.
>
> I do think the reasons for the consensus (the conditions that trigger it)
> are not clear -- unless it is simply Marx's point that the will of the
> capitalist is to reduce wages as much as is possible, and the question is
> not that drive but what are the limits on that power. Marx seems to think
> the only limit is us! If we (workers) don't limit that power, there is no
> end to the degradation we will experience.
>
> Carrol
>
>
>
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