posted
Last summer, the Village Voice published an interesting commentary by Michael Grecan, a community organizer. It's an interesting look at what he takes to be the disengagement of both parties from the general population. He relates it to his own roots as a working-class kid working his way through Yale in the 1960s.
At the time, this was written, Howard Dean was the obvious frontrunner in the Democratic Party, so the article focusses on him as a former Yale attendee. But John Kerry was also a Yale attendee. Not only that, he was and is (it's a lifelong membership) a member of the elite Yale club "Skull and Bones."
quote:Alongside the old elite of prep-school cronies, frat types, and secret-society selectees, a new elite was developing. I experienced this new group during meetings and gatherings of students opposed to the war in Vietnam. One night, in another college dining hall, a large gathering pontificated about how stupid, slow, corrupt, and ineffective the American military was. One student, a tall freshman, a coed at that, didn't say a word for a while. Then she told the tableful of smug upperclass critics that we didn't know a thing about the military, hadn't grown up, as she had, in a military family, didn't have loved ones, as she did, who had served overseas, and were in no position to judge. She left. And left me impressed. *** What I heard and sensed in some of these anti-war "leaders" was what many hear and sense in the Democratic Party "leaders" to this day—a contempt for the common woman and man, a distaste for all the flawed institutions that conserve traditions or beliefs or cultural patterns (family, congregation, party, military), and a profound faith in their own intelligence and savvy and expertise. Even at Yale, they were smarter and sexier than everyone else. They could talk without notes—about Southeast Asia, or global economies, or a new health care system—for hours on end. They didn't have the time or patience for churches or political parties or marriages that might not work so well. They would replace the protracted play of essential social institutions with brilliant legal arguments and complex governmental programs and overwhelming personal charisma. And if their intricate theories and elegant decision trees didn't quite work out, there would always be someone else to blame and someone else to mop up the mess.
The old elite—the Bush types, for example—despised this nouveau crowd, but knew that the majority of them would wise up and put away their bell-bottoms and bongs and find their way to professional school. They would all meet someday under the tents, on a balmy June evening at alumni weekend, and have a good chummy chuckle over the excesses of the past.
But another cadre—the geeky, awkward, young Republican crowd—was truly horrified by the emergence of this upstart elite. Today, they still rage for hours at dinner parties, impassioned and enflamed, about the cultural decadence generated by the '60s. They see themselves as no less smart, and far tougher, than the upstarts. They view Dean and Rodham Clinton as callow and cavalier, as the latest incarnations of Abbie Hoffman and Jane Fonda. They personally resent the attention, acclaim, wealth, and status attained by what has essentially become a second, progressive establishment in this country. They have felt demoted, rejected, spurned. Their hurt and hostility are as fresh and real as if it were still 1968. *** Both parties are led by women and men who believe it's their God-given right to make more messes—from the Yale Commons, to blighted cities, to White House sleeping arrangements, to failed health reform, to bankrupt companies, to gutted industries, to post-war Iraq. They count on a wide and appreciative following in the media to report their antics and a silent servant class to clean up the wreckage. *** American politics is ripe for reconstruction and renewal by institutions and individuals who can imagine new structures and healthier dynamics. It's a landscape still largely occupied by decent, tolerant, moderate Americans. They are not waiting for a white knight. They could care less about the 40-year feud between one privileged left and two privileged rights.
posted
Yeah, when Lieberman left the pundits talked about a fantasy Lieberman/McCain ticket.
P.S. Uncle Orson's article this week touches on the same problem, the excessive of ideology on both sides. For those of you who can't figure out in what way he is a Democrat.
posted
Thanks for the heads up on OSC's latest. I wish he'd do more of those, just to remind us all he really isn't a total fan of the current administration (not to be confused with being an opponent of it).
I run across articles like this every once in awhile. There are all too few of them, IMO. Of them all, Grecan's is my favorite of the ones I've seen in that it comes closest to how I tend to see the world.
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Please let me know what you think. I think the article reflects not only some of my own feelings about current politics, but is also similar to what I've seen posted by a lot of people here on Hatrack.
(I keep fiddling with the title to see what might draw a little more attention to it.)
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quote: They have only one major problem: They don't know what in the world—in the bigger, broader world where most moderate Americans live and work, play and pray, and try to raise their kids—they are for.
This is the question that I think really has blown the wind out of the sails of both parties. The Republicans are still paddling, but I think the Democrats are waiting for the people to give them a purpose and floundering, but both suffer from the same lack -- what, in effect, do they really do? They're in the PR business and morale is strongly lacking.
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posted
I'm afraid I'm not getting how that article is useful? It's basically a vague rant with little concrete evidence to support its claims and no solution. For instance, what about Clinton and Reagan? They were both self made men who weren't born into wealth.
The whole 'power elite' phenomenon has been known about forever. What's the solution? Meritocracy and universal education is the only thing that I can think of.
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quote:The whole 'power elite' phenomenon has been known about forever. What's the solution? Meritocracy and universal education is the only thing that I can think of.
Yep - power is nothing new in politics. What has changed over the years is the diminishment of the grassroots organizing. That can be changed with work and commitment.
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I feel like someone has taken the breath out of my lungs, and turned it into ink to write what I might have said.
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posted
I've said it before and I'll say it again... both parties are throwing out lackluster candidates and the fringe parties... well, they're a lil too heavy on the wackos.
Could we just have, for once, a REAL presidential candidate from either the Dems or the Repubs? Right now we've got a choice between two very similar folks wearing two different jerseys.
Is it really coming down to: Do I like donkeys or elephants better?
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posted
It is a rant-- an articulate rant-- that expresses very well how I feel about the parties.
I feel cheated by the Republicans, put down by the Dems, and the new movments by both (the religious reconstruction on the right, the secularist/populist movement on the left) leave a bad taste in my mouth.
Darn it, I want my Mr. Smith!
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posted
But when were the parties really any better? The idea that there isn't any grassroot organizing doesn't really ring true to me--we just witnessed one of the greatest grassroots efforts ever in the Dean presidential run, didn't we? Everyone complains bitterly about special interests and the amount of money in politics, and what are they if not coming from 'the grass'? edit: A lot of the money, anyways. Obviously, some of the money is coming from wealthy individuals or groups that aren't very large in the sense of having a lot of people.
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