Vote with Your Mind, Not Your Wallet.

In the days since the Chancellors debate, we have seen major captains of industry come out in support of the Conservatives. The mass-media coverage of this recent development is particularly informing of the nature of British politics. That's an interesting theory in itself, upper-class people backing the Conservatives must mean that the working-class do too. They tell us, we the people are supporting the Conservatives because the rich are supporting the Conservatives. They have even compared the support of the Tories to the support New Labour received in the run-up to their victory in 1997. The dependency of the political class and the establishment on "Big Business" for power, this is reflected by the way the media has claimed that corporate support is reflective of mass-support from the working-class. This is just like the scandal surrounding Lord Ashcroft and Lord Paul, the political class is reliant on wealthy backers and that is a major problem. The difference is that we are told this instance is a positive sign that we should embrace, as it means the Conservatives have our best interests at heart apparently. The fact that the Conservatives are aiming to demolish poor estates in West London doesn't seem to register.


It should be noted that a few of these businesses used to support New Labour, while the most have been staunch supporters of the Conservative Party all along. And that all of this just days after Tony Blair popped up out of nowhere to support Brown, which may suggest the publicity of the rich backing the Tories is in reaction to Blair's appearance. Though, support from a war criminal like Blair is hardly going to gather much support. It is also significant, that the wars for oil have been largely ignored and the focus has been on the economy, taxes and public spending etc. It is insulting to the 1 million dead Iraqis and the thousands killed in Afghanistan that our politicians choose to bicker over taxes than confront real issues like war and mass-murder. The same was done during the run-up to the 1993 Presidential Election in the US, the debate was turned towards the tax system. In which, Bill Clinton ran against George HW Bush. The Republicans accused Clinton of intending to raise taxes, but ultimately lost the Presidency because Bush had raised taxes in direct contradiction of his electoral manifesto. Bush had publicly stated "Read my lips: no new taxes." Never mind the thousands slaughtered in South America.


The discourse around the upcoming election has been shifted toward aspects of the tax system. The Liberal Democrats are running on a claim of being the only party that intends to cut taxes for those who deserve it. This is a traditional Conservative claim, though it is widely believed that the Tory Party cuts taxes for the wealthy. Whereas, Labour is stuck with the reputation for raising taxes to "unjust" rates. Of course, what no one is saying, what no one dares to say, is that people abhor taxes because they have no say in what their hard-earned money is spent on. It is perfectly understandable that the public hates the idea of their money being used to cover MPs expenses, bail-out banks and provide bonuses for Canary Wharf. And the idea that our money is being spent on wars that corporations benefit from is even more unsettling and unpopular. If we lived in a truly democratic society, most of us would view paying taxes in a positive light if we felt politicians were actually representative of us and that our money is going to a causes which are beneficial to our society. But the right-wing media needs something to exploit in order to further the country's descent into neoliberalism.


Instead of seeking to reform the political system, the mainstream media focuses in on taxes that effect the well-off. The stated reason for the corporate backing of the Conservatives is the increase in national insurance by Labour. But what goes unsaid is that part of the Conservative Party's economic policy is to "incentivise" business. "Incentivise" being a euphemism for subsidies and tax-cuts for the wealthy, combined with deregulation. The subsidies will be paid for with the funds cut from spending on the public sector. There has been no mention of this, as "Big Business" has flocked to the side of Tories, which says something we all already know about the Conservatives. It says the "need" the wealthy have for tax-cuts, subsidies and deregulation are not only imperative, but that "need" does not even require commentary. As "incentivising" business is so essential it cannot be challenged or even mentioned, nor can the dedication of the Conservatives to these policies. The practices of the Labour Party over the last decades, which have been nothing out of step of the Thatcherite orthodoxy, are also ignored by the commentators and the media.


This election is not going to result in a government representative of the populace if the real issues go on ignored. Thus, the debates should not be personality driven and the media's focus should not be on the campaign posters and the populist slogans, essentially spin cooked up by a public relations firm. The parties may use rhetoric about fighting poverty and building community spirit and so fourth, but where is the substance behind the rhetoric? The media should be pushing for the details of policy. The parties are still hiding the substance of these policies behind deceptive language like "incentivise" turning subsidies and deregulation into a something which no one would oppose. But sadly, it would seem as though this is going to lead to yet a lower voting turnout than in 2005. There is no optimism around this election or any of the parties. It could be said all that is being offered to the public is austerity and more of the same that we've seen over the last 30 years. If anything these elections may accomplish the continuing devaluation of the right to vote.

The Scapegoat for Hitlerism.

Better Dead than Red.

The American Right has been desperate lately to promote the view that fascism, particularly the notorious Hitlerite variant known to us all as Nazism, was and is a left-wing movement. There is a tendency on the American Right to try and scapegoat the Left as the source of all problems. And the motivations of this, appear to be strictly partisan as usual and are probably part of the "culture war" that conservatives have waged since the early 1990s. Though, it could be more than just partisan politics, this could be an attempt of the American Right to distance themselves from the "dirty word" of fascism and turn the word against the liberals, who are all too enthusiastic to hurl it against the likes of the Bush administration. Some have even gone as far as distorting the political spectrum, so that left and right are determined according to the statism and individualism of the ideology. This would mean that fascism and socialism are both left-wing, as they are ideologically statist, whereas conservatism and libertarianism are right-wing because they are supposedly anti-statist and individualistic.

There are more flimsy arguments in favour of this view, such as the fact that the Nazis' full title was the National Socialist German Workers' Party and from that we should conclude that the Nazis were socialists. According to that logic, North Korea is democratic as it's official title is the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. The Nazis viewed communism as part of an international Jewish Bolshevik conspiracy. Though, it is true that the national socialists were opposed to laissez-faire capitalism, as they regarded it as "decadent" and associated it with Judaism. It should be noted that fascist movements tend to utilise socialistic titles, slogans and rhetoric in order to gain popular support from the working-class. This is particularly true of the fascist movements of the 1930s, as socialism still carried a considerable moral weight and appealed to many working-class people. The same can be argued in regard to national syndicalism, the labour movement associated with the Italian Fascists, the official ideology of the Falanges in Spain.

It was in 2008 that a conservative writer named Jonah Goldberg published a book entitled Liberal Fascism. Since then the pundits at Fox News, as well as radio hosts Michael Savage and Rush Limbaugh, have jumped on the idea. Though, Michael Savage once called George Bush a "fiscal socialist" and referred to the Republicans as Mensheviks, the smaller faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party that ultimately lost to the Bolsheviks. So it's not surprising that Savage has leaped on this argument. Whereas, Rush Limbaugh has used it to attack Obama's health-care reforms drawing a comparison with the National Socialist policy on health-care. Though, what Limbaugh neglected to mention in his rant is that every developed country in the world except for the United States and South Africa has some form of a national health service. The same can be said of Glenn Beck, who has even promoted a documentary The Revolutionary Holocaust which draws comparisons between Stalinism and National Socialism.


In regards to the arguments that draw analogies between fascism and communism, based on the similarities between the actions of fascist and communist states, there is a major flaw which is often overlooked. According to Marxist theory, revolution could only occur within developed capitalist societies and this would exclude Tsarist Russia, as it was not a fully developed capitalist society when the "October Revolution" took place. Lenin was well aware of this, but the "Revolution" he led in Russia was not intended to take the country into socialism, it was intended as a "holding action" to prepare the society for the "Revolution" which would take place in the most advanced capitalist country. To Lenin, Russian society required a vanguard which could "push" society through capitalism to socialism and eventually to communism. This is the reason that Lenin utilised tools of oppression to crush political opposition and to destroy instruments of workers' democracy such as unions, worker councils and even soviets ironically. Therefore, it could be said that Marxist-Leninist regimes are not communist states.

In a rebuttal to his numerous critics, Jonah Goldberg has claimed that no one has successfully "rebutted" the argument that fascism is left-wing as it rejects traditionalism and laissez-faire capitalism, while embracing statism. First of all, to claim that fascists rejected traditionalism is a simplistic generalisation. Goldberg is ignoring the way in which fascists "intervened" in culture. In the case of Nazi Germany, this included the banning of so-called "degenerate art" and the creation of "Positive Christianity", which was a form of Christianity compatible with national socialism. Let alone, the persecution of homosexuals, banning of birth control literature and abortion that was typical of fascist states. Though, abortions were permitted and "encouraged" as part of Nazi eugenics for the stated purpose of "racial hygiene". Under fascist governments, women were marginalised to the role of housewives, the importance of child-bearing was emphasised greatly. Surely, these practices only differ from traditionalism in that they are more extreme.

Better Blue than You.

This may be because fascism is more of a palingenetic ideology, which Roger Griffin differentiates fascism from the rest of the Right, palingenesis is the "rebirth" or "reincarnation" of something. In fascism, it is the rebirth of a glorious imperial past, with an emphasis on cultural, military and racial superiority. This is the reason that Nazi Germany was referred to as the Third Reich as it was seen as the Third reincarnation of the Holy Roman Empire, the Second Reich being the German Empire. It could be argued that Italy's invasion of Ethiopia was palingenetic, as it was an attempt to recreate the Roman Empire in the 20th Century. The same could be said of Franco's struggle to hang onto the remnants of the Spanish Empire. There is no such palingenetic characteristic among socialist and anarchist movements. The only exception that comes to mind, is the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia. Though, it should be noted that the Khmer Rouge ideology was more of a radical combination of communism and nationalism than communism; the aim of the Khmer Rouge was to return Cambodia to it's glorious past as an invaluable part of the Khmer Empire.

In the symbolism of the fascist movements, which is typically nationalistic, there is evidence of this palingenetic tendency, as it relates to the past of the country. The colours red, white and black that are used in Nazi symbolism originate in the flag of Imperial Germany. The Swastika has it's roots in pre-Christian mythology and folklore of Europe. The word fascism derives from the Latin word "fasces" meaning "bundle". But the symbol fasces, which consists of a bundle of rods tied around an axe, which was included on the Fascist Italian flag, was a symbol of authority in Ancient Rome. The symbols of the Falanges, a bunch of arrows tied together by a yoke, and the Greek Fascists, a double-headed axe once used in Ancient Greece, are also palingenetic. Communist symbolism like the hammer and sickle carry connotations of the industrial and agricultural working-class. The colour red was chosen for communist flags as it is symbolic of the blood of the working-class spilt in the class struggle.

Now let's assess the notion that fascism is left-wing as it is a statist and totalitarian ideology. If we define the Right as focused on individual liberty and a small government consistent with a market economy, where does this leave right-wing dictators like Augusto Pinochet on the political spectrum. The Pinochet regime in Chile stood for individual liberty and small government when it came to the economy, but socially the regime has often been compared to fascist states. The Chilean people were totally oppressed, unions were crushed, dissidents were tortured and killed. All the while, Pinochet pursued the privatisation of state-industries, the dismantling of the welfare state and the liberalisation of the markets. On one hand, Pinochet was a monster who killed thousands of his own people; he brought about an economic miracle. In a sense, there is no point at which Pinochet can be placed on this spectrum, as he can be seen as both a fascist and a liberal. It would seem that the Left-Right spectrum, as defined simply by individualism and statism, is overly simplistic as it cannot accommodate neoliberal dictatorships.

On a more sophisticated spectrum fascism could be placed near on the centre-right economically and socially on the authoritarian far-right. There was a great deal of central planning under fascist regimes. However, there was a place for private property and corporations, whereas trade unions and the labour movement were harshly repressed, under such regimes. An exception being Fascist Spain, where there was room for unions but they were subject to state-control.  These fascist regimes had typically corporatist economic policies, which they promoted as a "third way" to capitalism and communism. These policies, some of which today would be regarded as Keynesian, were directed at boosting demand and decreasing unemployment. Mussolini was adored by the business community, the same was true of Hitler and Franco. In fact, corporations like General Motors, Ford, BMW, IBM and Coca-Cola flourished in Nazi Germany. Coca-Cola launched Fanta for the German market and IBM created a traffic management program for the concentration camps.


Perhaps, the American Right are worried about the similarities that can be drawn between the Tea Party Movement and the fascists of the 1930s. Though, we should not mock them, for they are people who have legitimate reasons to be angry, just like the people of Weimar Germany. But the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage and Glenn Beck are not spreading anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. Instead, they are telling them that there is a "liberal elite" - which have infiltrated the government and the media - that is "clogging" the functions of the free-market and preventing the whole country from flourishing. This is similar to the 2006 demonstrations against the Socialist Party in Hungary, the participants of these demonstrations believed that Hungary had yet to achieve "true capitalism". For them, the only way to realise capitalism is to "purge" society of all communists posing as captains of industry. Just like the Hungarian populists, which aimed at repeating the "Velvet Revolution", the Tea Party Movement aims to embody the spirit of the Boston Tea Party and the "American Revolution" through palingenesis.

Significant Links:

Definitions and Double Standards by Jonah Goldberg 

The Revolutionary Holocaust

The Corporation

The Life of Pol Pot
War on Democracy: Chile.
Tea Party Patriots - Official Home of the American Tea Party Movement.
Noam Chomsky on the Tea Party Movement 

The Tyranny of the Individual.

In JS Mill's 1859 piece On Liberty, which is essential reading for any liberal today,  Mill presents and explores the concept of the "tyranny of the majority". The gist of this concept is that democratic procedures can lead to tyranny over minorities, who disagree with the majority but cannot oppose them as they lack the sufficient voting power. As a concept, the "tyranny of the majority" reflects the individualistic tendency of Classical Liberalism. To liberals of Mill's ilk, it is the rights and freedoms of the individual that face potential threats from society, as a collective, in a democracy. The concept itself predates On Liberty and was probably borrowed from Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America, which Mill reviewed. Though, de Tocqueville called it by another name, the despotism of the majority. Regardless, it remains a popular concept with right-wing intellectuals, the Objectivist philosophy of Ayn Rand and her followers being a typical example. Whereas, the majority of liberals today, who are social democrats or at least have social democratic leanings, are not so fond of the concept.

Mostly due to the Chicago School of Economics as well as the Austrian School, who have influenced right-wing politics in the West, there has been a resurgence of Classical Liberal ideas. Though, the return of laissez-faire politique over the last 30 years has been in relation to the global economy and has come in the form of neoliberalism. Even as Thatcher and Reagan "rolled back" the state and "liberated" the markets they still kept to "moralising" social policies that restricted gay rights. These reactionary social policies clashed with the permissive economic theories they preached. The economic theories that came out of the Chicago School and the Austrian School were laissez-faire - in the sense of libertarian and even anarcho-capitalist in some cases - in content. These theories were characterised by an overwhelming trust in private-power and distrust of state-power. But within these theories there is also a deeply cynical view of human nature, that we are fundamentally selfish and ego-driven creatures. This is why the trust of private-power only makes sense if one assumes that private vices reap public benefits. It's easy to see how such a permissive attitude to economics can clash with the repressive vision of a "good way" to live.

This assumption originates in Bernard Mandeville's The Fable of the Bees, in which he argues that private vices reap public benefits in the sense that even a libertine's indulgent behaviour has the potential to employ tailors, servants, perfumers, cooks and prostitutes. The spending of these individuals in turn employs more people like bakers and carpenters. In this sense, private vices are publicly beneficial as a whole. Though, JS Mill's writings on the economy became more left-wing, than anything Chicago School ever produced, it was On Liberty that would be his most influential work. Nevertheless, this assumption has been combined with the simple idea of individual liberty, as laid out by JS Mill, without any regard of the corrosive effects on society. The idea that we can all contribute to society by living life to the full, while at the same time assuming that the market functions best when left to it's own devices, is naive. For one thing, it fails to take into account externalities, which is when the true cost of an act is left for others to pay for. Like pollution, the true cost is being externalised for our descendents to pay for.


Thus, the ideal of individual freedom, of the untrammeled variety pursued by Friedman and Hayek, may be more suitable to an environment of isolation and desperation. A desert island, perhaps, on which one man is stranded and has to fend for himself. He must pursue his own self-interest in order to survive against all odds, the perils posed by the local wildlife and the forces of 'Mother Nature'. It is imperative that he build something that can shelter him, he must also find food and drinkable water. There is no nanny state to coddle him and no society for him to consider. His needs are the only needs that matter and his desires are the only desires that matter. Under these circumstances, greed is good and the alternative may mean death. But Western civilisation is not a network of isolated islands with desperate individuals stranded on them. We all know, our civilisation is more than that. It is an collection of complex and diverse societies, in which there is an intermingling of individual wants and desires. Worryingly, this may mean that the most primal view of humanity may rest at the centre of neoliberal ideology.

There is a tendency in liberal thought to view society as a mass of atoms, an arrangement between individuals, all of which are pursuing their own separate needs and wants. This is ignorant of the importance of society and that individuals play roles in society. Society is not subject to the whims of individuals, it is made up of individuals that interact with one another constantly. Since all actions concern oneself and others in society, it seems far too simplistic to view individual liberty as the paramount ideal of our civilisation. According to the concept the "tyranny of the majority", this ideal should even be placed above the ideal of democracy in our civilisation. Because democracy may threaten the freedom of the individual it should be restricted, so that democracy is extended to the things that don't really matter. Milton Friedman once lambasted democracy with a "straw man", in which 49% of the population are shot just because 51% of the population voted for it, to support his argument that individual freedom ought to be put above liberal democracy. Though, there appears to be something more being said here.

It could be that the concept presented in Mill's work is a "straw man" argument, used to attack what could be influenced through democratic procedures e.g. private property. We would all agree that Mill is right to argue democracy should not be extended to the personal tastes of individuals, a point he made using the example of the banning of pork in Islamic states, or the lives of individuals as Friedman argued. But these are ridiculous points, as no rational human being would extend democracy to such vital aspects of human life. Even with the example of banning pork, politicians may enact legislation to outlaw certain products and services, but they are usually not acting as representative of the majority of people in society. So it does seem logical, that the "tyranny of the majority" is really about protecting the wealthy minority from the kind of policies the poor majority would enact. Of course, this refers to the redistribution of wealth and the construction of the welfare state, which would benefit the poor majority. In this sense, the individual liberty that Mill and de Tocqueville wrote of is a bourgeois freedom - conceived of for the wealthy few.


This individual freedom, that liberals have fixated upon for centuries, could also be referred to as negative liberty. As negative liberty is the freedom of the individual from constraint, to live and act as one chooses. Though, liberals would propose the limits of negative freedom should be at the harm of others. It is this robust freedom for the individual, including a variety of rights such as the right to private property and the right to vote, which has made liberalism a prevalent political philosophy today. But it could be that this is an outdated political philosophy that panders to bourgeois needs, such as the right to private property, and is based on a atomistic and primal vision of mankind. In it's place, what may be needed is a positive liberty that encompasses the values equality and solidarity within society, as well as leaving room for the freedom of the individual on a social level. This would involve constraining the destructive capacities of individual freedom, which may lead to massive inequality and environmental disaster, while leaving room for the individual to live autonomously.