Reagasm!

This week a statue of Ronald Reagan was unveiled near the US Embassy in London on American Independence Day, it was built to commemorate the man who supposedly "won" the Cold War without firing a shot (at least not at Russians). Apparently the Iron Curtain fell because Reagan stood up and asked Gorbachev to "tear down this wall", it had nothing to do with the internal situation of the Soviet Union. Though we know that the Berlin Wall fell because of people power, it had nothing to do with American foreign policy, the Soviet Union was a house of cards and it collapsed from within. The statue will stand beside Franklin D Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower, who look left-wing compared with the wasp-ish ferocity of Reaganomics. Supposedly the 10ft Reagan will remind us of the "power of freedom", which the Reaganites loved so much they supported Apartheid and Nikolae Ceaușescu right up until the bitter end. The irony being we have a statue of Nelson Mandela in Parliament Square, Mandela was condemned as a "terrorist" by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher.

I have written about the deification of Ronald Reagan in the past and now the time has come to remind people about the reality of Reaganism as the media fawn over him once more. We can read at Sky News about how Thatcher shared his "idealism and conviction". In the comments you'll notice references to a "golden era" heralded by the Reaganites, for which there is no substance. You have to notice that the praise of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan is always particularly shallow and characterised by vague language, preferably with the Union Jack and the Old Glory in the background to symbolise trans-Atlantic unity. Back in February, President Obama praised Reagan for the way he "restored" a sense of optimism in America and "transcended" politics. It seems as though people are a bit lost as to why there should be a statue to this man in London. The reasons range from a centenary (in which case it's only 5 months late) to Reagan accomplished "Peace through Strength" by killing thousands of Latin-Americans and propping vile despots all over the world.

Thatcher's words were read out by William Hague "'Ronald Reagan was a great president and a great man - a true leader for our times. He held clear principles and acted upon them with purpose. Through his strength and his conviction he brought millions of people to freedom as the Iron Curtain finally came down." The Reagan years were marked out by a slaughter of thousands of people in Latin America and the Middle East, whilst dictators oppressed millions more on his watch. The Iron Lady finished with this "It was a pleasure to be his colleague and his friend and I hope this statue will be a reminder to future generations of the debt we owe him." The only debt incurred by the Reagan era was in the form of a $3 trillion debt which turned the US from the biggest creditor to the largest debtor in the world. All of it was used to pay for enormous tax-cuts for the rich, unprecedented protectionist barriers to foreign competition and a bloated military budget. The fawning British press is a disgrace.

It is appropriate that this man joins other overrated and misguidedly praised politicians as John F Kennedy and Jan Smuts as immortalised statues. Though it is most unfortunate that we build statues of such people in juxtaposition to statues of great men like Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill. It is more of a testament to the warped age in which we live, I suppose in twenty-odd years we'll be building statues of George Bush and hearing about how he fought so valiantly for freedom and democracy against Islamo-fascism. We find ourselves in Britain worried to death about the fucking Eurocrats in Brussels whilst Trident is a part of the US nuclear command system and we have been led into six "humanitarian interventions" in the last 20 years. Have we even made an independent foreign policy decision since Harold Wilson refused to send British troops to die in Vietnam? We are America's Trojan Mule in Europe, the British elite are aware that without the "special relationship" we have no role in world affairs.

Revolution and Reaction.

A Rich man's Revolution.

In a nostalgic moment, John McCain once described himself as a "foot soldier" in the "Reagan Revolution". The tenure of Ronald Reagan is often described as a revolution for the Republican Party, but it should be considered part of an ongoing counter-revolution against the American working-class. Gore Vidal once said "Class is the most difficult subject for American writers to deal with as it is the most difficult for the English to avoid." The political discourse in the US is framed as if there is only one class, the middle-class, which involves anyone who owns a car. But the fact that there is a middle-class presupposes that there is an upper-class and a working-class. The global shift in paradigm from social democracy to neoliberalism, a counter-revolution in itself, that commenced with the changes to monetary policy made by Paul Volcker under Carter after Nixon pulled apart the Bretton-Woods system.

With the famous adept timing of the Reaganites, the US government was able to seize on the overwhelming disillusionment with government. The source of this disillusionment went back to the 1960s when the US embarked on the war in Indochina and President Kennedy was assassinated. The Democrats had made a desperate lunge to capitalise on a disillusioned electorate and pander to the radicals roused by the Vietnam war. Jimmy Carter  was put forward as a candidate for President as token to the generation of Americans who protested against Vietnam, Carter would serve one term and made some gestures to black people and the poor. But overall the Carter administration abandoned New Deal liberalism and paved the way for the Reaganites. The Reagan administration, with the Democrats in Congress, merely furthered the transition to neoliberalism. Thus, no one but reactionaries should idolise Jimmy Carter.

From 1978 to 1990 the richest 1% of the American population accumulated $1 trillion, $840 billion of which was a result of massive tax-cuts as part of an active attempt by the Reagan administration to "starve the beast" in order to justify massive cuts in public spending. In 1984 alone the tax-cuts amounted to $190 billion, the majority of which went to the wealthy, in the same year that $140 billion was cut and defence was increased by $181 billion. In the 1960s and 70s led to the share that the richest 1% held of assets collapsed dramatically to almost 20%. In the late 1970s the share of assets for the wealthiest Americans began to increase, a trajectory which was furthered throughout the 1980s and eventually peaked at around 1990 at 40%. Since this explosion can be traced back to the Carter administration, out of a partisan agenda Forbes have written off the inequality produced by "Reaganomics" as the consequence of Carter's economic policy.

In the US Budget of 1986 we can see that out of $794 billion in tax-revenue a total of $294 billion was to be spent on social security. $286 billion was spent on defence, $12 billion for foreign arms to client states and $8 billion on energy (e.g. nuclear weapons). $27 billion on benefits for war veterans and $142 billion for interest on loans on money spent to prop up the national security state. So out of the remaining $500 billion, left over once social security is taken out of the picture, $475 billion was spent on the national security state and fed the military-industrial complex. Other federal spending came to $177 billion, which would contribute to the size of the deficit. Naturally Alan Greenspan, a devotee of Ayn Rand, called for social security and medicare to be slashed in order to balance the budget. The billions poured into wars is a sacred cow no politician is willing to slaughter to avoid confronting the military-industrial complex.

During the "Reagan Revolution" it was not just a "revolution" in domestic and economic policy but in the discourse itself. The Fairness Doctrine, which was introduced in 1949 to ensure liberals and conservatives would be given a fair amount of airtime in political commentary, was repealed in 1987 and we're still living with the consequences. The rise of Rush Limbaugh and the Right would lay claim to talk radio in the 1990s. Lee Atwater and Roger Ailes injected the political debate with right-wing populism that championed the GOP through campaigns of appeals to bigotry, vilification and red-baiting. The same tools are used today, we can see them in the accusations hurled at Obama. Fox News was launched as the propaganda wing of the Republican Party as the so-called "liberal" media is complacent and sets the limits on criticism of government. The lack of meaningful discourse has hollowed out what little hope elections held for Americans.

Throughout the 1980s the Republicans succeeded in transforming the federal judiciary into a conservative institution and had filled over half of federal judgeships with right-wingers by 1991. This was a way for the Reaganites to overturn the rulings of liberal judges and harden a reactionary base along populist lines, which have had a long-term impact on the discourse particularly the attempt to appoint Robert Bork. Whether it takes fundamentalist or nationalist forms, in rulings it takes the form of supporting the death penalty, opposing affirmative action, gay rights and abortion. Following this transformation the death penalty was reinstated, the constraints over police power reduced whilst the legal protections of unions have been dismantled. Education was deemed not to be a "fundamental right" so poor people had to pay for public education. A recent ruling by Supreme Court removed the limits to how much corporations can spend on campaign donations.

30 years after Ronald Reagan came to power, the man's legacy can be clearly seen but is rarely understood for what it is. The vast gulf between the rich and the poor has led to social deprivation on a massive scale, from the way drugs have become a substitute for welfare to fear-driven politics that have led to lone-wolf terrorism and skyrocketing rates of gun crime. Again and again the GOP revives the notion that the government is the source of problems and not the solution as the economic system becomes increasingly dysfunctional and unconstrained. Millions of Americans are now superfluous, left jobless and abandoned by the government with no sufficient medical care and barely enough welfare to get by. The counter-revolution has succeeded in rolling back social democracy and pouring billions into warfare.

The Myth of Ronald Reagan.

Fact and Fiction.

February 6th 1911, exactly 100 years ago today, Ronald Reagan was born in an apartment in Tampico, Illinois into a devout Christian working-class family. Ronald Reagan, or "Dutch" to his friends, went on to become the 40th President of the United States and is considered by some as one of the greatest Presidents. Since he took power in 1981, Reagan has been a subject of adulation by Republicans and is widely revered on the American Right. Reagan is now being held up by the Tea Party as a figure of immense integrity and ideological purity. The Tea Parties emphasise small government and fiscal responsibility, family values and a strong defence. For the Tea Party, Reagan belongs to the most noble of political traditions going right back to the American Revolution. This is the first of a series of articles that are aimed to dispel the myth of Ronald Reagan through a critique of the impact of Reagan's policy in foreign, economic and social spheres.

For the GOP Ronald Reagan is an icon of American conservatism and have succeeded in crafting a folkloric Reagan, to an extent which would impress Kim Jong-il. Take the story in which Reagan invites a black family to his home for the night, having dinner and breakfast with them, because they were refused rooms in the local inn. This is a story for anyone eager to glorify Reagan as a man ahead of his time. In reality Ronald Reagan opposed the Civil Rights act, tried to veto the Civil Rights Restoration act, on the grounds that the acts imposed too much regulation on small business and churches. He also opposed the Martin Luther King holiday but reluctantly voted for it given the level of popular support. Reagan later added Nelson Mandela to a list of terrorists in 1988 as he propped up Apartheid. These facts mean much more than the story of the anonymous black family and the friendly white man, which would have us believe he was everything we'd want from a President.

Reagan is often described in glowing terms as a man of humble origins who earned his privileged position in society through sheer hard-work. Of course, the fact that Reagan was a star of the B-movies who became the biggest corporate spokesman of the 1950s is downplayed. As a politician Reagan began his career as a Democrat and was a proponent for the social democratic policies of Roosevelt's New Deal. But in the 50s he made the transition to the right-wing of the Democratic Party, endorsing Eisenhower and Nixon along the way, before completing the transition and defecting to the Republican Party in 1962. Reagan began to espouse the core principles of American conservatism: small government, free-markets, anti-communism, family values and individual freedom. Reagan's success as a politician was down to his ability to present policies favoured by "Corporate America" as good for all sectors of society.

Ronald Reagan is still revered as an apostle of the free-market, small government and fiscal responsibility. There is a clear difference between the Reagan dreamed up by the public relations industry and Reagan the man. Even though under Reagan the size of the federal government increased relative to GDP, enormous protectionist barriers were hoisted up against foreign competition, whilst corporations were allowed to close plans all over North America and spending on the military increased rapidly under his administration. The systematic deregulation of the financial sector led to the Savings and Loans crisis, to which the Reaganites responded with bailouts for companies that were "too big to fail". In foreign policy the Reagan administration led a brutal crusade of violence and terrorism in the name of promoting democracy, which thousands in Latin America and the Middle East slaughtered.

The last 30 years have been heavily influenced by the events that took place in the Reagan era. The discourse was redefined in the 1980s by the likes of Lee Atwater and Roger Ailes, who created the GOP playbook of mudslinging and outrageous lies, we have them to thank for right-wing media - e.g. Fox News and Rush Limbaugh - that has crudified debate. Millions of Americans don't even vote because the elections look meaningless, as the candidates smear one another as "Nazis" and "anti-Americans". The culture wars are still raging in America, wedge issues like abortion and immigration remain a rallying call against liberals on the Right. At the same time "Reaganomics" has led to an enormous gulf between the rich and the poor, with the most basic aspects of the welfare state being torn up for the sake of "small government" and the "free-market".

The Shining and the Slaughter.

The Genius of Kubrick.

The 1980 film The Shining, adapted from the Stephen King novel, directed by Stanley Kubrick  is a cinematic masterpiece of psychological horror. Today tales of madness and isolation, telepathy and the supernatural, are commonly churned out of the Hollywood machine in such a manner that it can only be put down to the profit motive. But The Shining is one of few great films in the horror genre that has not been diluted by the "invisible hand" that pushed out The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and then squeezed out as many sequels as possible, before resorting to remaking the entire bloody saga. Though it could easily be asserted that The Shining is of a superior standard of art and film, by comparison the slasher flicks of that era appear exploitative and devoid of the intelligence which refined King's story into a classic that stands the test of time. Even 30 years after it's release, the film can be watched and appreciated on many different levels due to the polysemic nature of the story.

To the displeasure of Stephen King fans everywhere, Stanley Kubrick altered the plot of the story, cutting away a great deal of back story, and in doing so diminishing the themes developed throughout the novel. For instance, Jack Torrance is a much more sympathetic figure in the novel and has a moment of redemption as the plot concludes. Whereas, Kubrick's Jack Torrance is devoid of such qualities and in that respect may have more in common with Alex DeLarge of A Clockwork Orange. Perhaps this is indicative of the pessimism often associated with Kubrick's films. Though similar arguments have been made regarding Kubrick's preceding adaptations, notably A Clockwork Orange and Lolita, but the completed projects were some of the most innovative and enthralling contributions to modern cinema. Though there is another side of The Shining that is often overlooked, no pun intended, the political themes and messages in the film that most horror films are simply devoid of.


What should not be ignored is the way in which Stanley Kubrick littered his films with socio-political messages. For instance, in 2001: A Space Odyssey the HAL 9000 computer represents IBM. Each letter of the acronym "HAL" is one letter ahead of the letters that make up "IBM". But there are other references, towards the end of the film while HAL is being dismantled the computer begins to sing 'Daisy Bell'. The first ever synthesised computer speech was produced by an IBM 704 computer which first sang 'Daisy Bell'. It was at a lab in Urbana, Illinois that this demonstration first took place in 1962. While being dismantled HAL makes reference to this historic event by naming the same location as the place of which HAL was built. The scene in which HAL cheats during a chess game may imply that Kubrick distrusted and was suspicious of IBM. Kubrick had good reason to be, IBM had devised a traffic management system, centred around punch-cards, for the concentration camps of the Third Reich.

Sins of the Nation.

If we accept that the work Stanley Kubrick is typically littered with politicised symbolism and messages, it seems highly likely that The Shining also carries such symbolism and messages. The idea that The Shining could be interpreted as commenting on the slaughter of Native Americans is nothing new. It goes back to an essay written by Bill Blakemore and has recently been explored in great depth by film analyst Rob Ager. Today this is still a commonly neglected interpretation of the film and is no doubt an interesting view of the story. Arguably, the major political theme of The Shining is the suppression of a violent history. At the time, Kubrick was planning to make a film about the Third Reich and the Holocaust. He would later abandon the project after Schindler's List was released in 1993 and the overwhelmingly depressing research that he had undertaken in pursuit of his goal. It could be that Kubrick focused on political themes relating to war and ethnic cleansing in his films, like Full Metal Jacket and The Shining, out of an obsession with producing a film about the Holocaust.

The way in which the United States was "created" is often described in semi-biological terms which distort the magnitude of the slaughter and displacement of Native Americans, what is understood in terms of genocide and ethnic cleansing today. The genocide of Native Americans was downplayed for over 150 years, while Hollywood capitalised on the slaughter by churning out dozens of Westerns featuring the typical "Cowboys-and-Indians" dynamic. It wasn't until the 1970s that there was even a real debate on the issue that there was once an advanced civilisation consisting of over 80 million people, around 95% of the Native population had been exterminated by the mid 17th Century. It was following the American Revolution that Thomas Jefferson, an advocate of assimilation and acculturation of the Natives, first proposed the idea of an "Indian Removal Plan", a precursor to the Indian Removal act of 1830 which Andrew Jackson put in place and used to drive many tribes to west of the Mississippi.


As Rob Ager points out in his analysis of the film, there are numerous references to Indians and settlers throughout. The music, as Jack Torrance is making his way to the Overlook Hotel by car, is at one point reminiscent of Native American chanting. Jack and Wendy are informed by Ullman that the Overlook Hotel, itself riddled with Native American artwork and symbols, was built on an Indian burial ground and a few attacks by tribes had to be "repelled" to complete construction. In the car, with his wife and son, Jack tells a story about a group of settlers who get lost in the wilderness and resort to cannibalism to survive. The Hotel is littered with art that appears to be Native American in origin, the paintings above the fireplace for instance are Native American sand paintings. The 'Gold Room' is the place in which Jack goes to get away from his wife and first encounters the mysterious bartender. The room is a clear reference to the days of the gold rush which motivated many to head west in search of prosperity.


The twin girls, who were killed by the caretaker Grady, have parallels in Navajo folklore in which twins were used to depict the duality between "father sky" and "mother earth". There is also symbolism which suggests that Wendy is representative of a Native American wife. The way she dresses and braids her hair is very similar to that of a Native American woman. Many Native American women had to marry white men to gain citizenship in the US. But also many slave women were exploited sexually by their masters, which is a reason that many African-Americans have white ancestors. So it is possible that Wendy represents either a Native American woman or an African-American. The river of blood that rushes out of the elevator could quite conceivably represent the blood of Native Americans that the Overlook Hotel was built upon. The colours red, white and blue are seen in several scenes, on clothing worn by Wendy, Danny, Jack and Ullman. These are the well known colours of the American flag, which also appears in several scenes and carries patriotic connotations and indifference to the ethnic cleansing that the Republic was built upon.


The character Dick Hallorann may represent the Otherness, composed of both African and Native Americans, which was destroyed. Hallorann is juxtaposed with a can of baking powder that has a stereotypical "Indian Chief" as its logo. It could also be argued that Hallorann is resembles a Native American in terms of his facial features. As Jack is talking to the phantom bartender and sipping a glass of bourbon he refers casually to the "white man's burden", a reference to Rudyard Kipling's poem on imperialism. It isn't until Jack meets Delbert Grady that the implicit racism of the characters spills out onto the floor for all to see. It is done so  suddenly, Grady casually drops the deeply repugnant slur "nigger" with a look of complete hatred about him. Interestingly, the conversation takes place in a gentleman's toilets which is decorated entirely in white and red, the toilets are also immaculate. This reflects the decades of white supremacy that the US went through and the blood that it was predicated on. Hallorann is later murdered by Jack with an axe, he dies on a floor made up of tiles with a pattern similar to fabric seen in Native American culture. 


Delbert Grady describes the killings of his daughters and wife in terms of doing his "duty" and "correcting" them. Presumably, Grady believed the duty to protect the Hotel outweighed his responsibilities as a father and husband. Similarly, Jack rants at Wendy about his "responsibilities" and emphasises the importance of the "contract" which he signed freely and in doing so accepted such "responsibilities". This is just after Jack caught Wendy looking through what he has been working on for so long. The idea of a "social contract" was a liberal idea associated with the philosopher John Locke. Locke's work inspired many of the ideas expressed in the US Constitution and in the Declaration of Independence. In this sense, it could be that the "writing project" that Jack Torrance was working on for so many months was symbolic of the Declaration of the Independence. An implication of this may be that Jack represents Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration, who had a relationship with Sally Hemings, a slave who bore him a child.

 Time to Shine.

The Shining was released in March of 1980, which would place it in the limbo nearing the end of Jimmy Carter's time in office just before the "Reaganite Revolution" that heralded a new era in American politics. Carter was elected as a figure of "hope" in the aftermath of the scandalous Nixon era, which decimated the public belief and trust in politicians, but disappointed and left largely a failure after just one term. This led the way for the Reaganite zeitgeist of 1980s America to fill the void left by the perceived failure of "liberal politicians" in the 1960s. This is the source of the prevalent disdain of liberals on the American Right and the demonising of liberalism that has taken place in the US over the last 30 years.  But on the back of the failure of Democratic administrations under the likes of Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, the Republicans have continued to reinvent themselves and have led populist "rebellions" against the "liberal elite" who want to destroy the American way of life.


It could be argued that the story of The Shining is indicative of this transition from liberal disillusionment with politics to reactionary anti-politics. Jack Torrance is a hard-working blue-collar guy and the primary breadwinner in a nuclear family. The reason Jack took on the job as a caretaker at the Overlook Hotel is to find the time and seclusion he needs to complete a novel. The inspiration for the story came from the months Stephen King spent writing in isolation at an almost totally empty hotel.  Though the risk posed to his son Danny and Wendy's instant reaction, to get Danny to a doctor as soon as possible, are obstacles to Jack's writing ambitions. In a sense, it is his self-interest that he sees blocked by the interests of his family. This is much like the clash between conservatism and liberalism in America, the latter representing individualism and the former being social democracy. What should be kept in mind is that conservatism and liberalism in the US differ greatly from the traditions of conservatism and liberalism.


Perhaps Jack's murderous rage and delusions of a glorious past represent the most vicious and reactionary tendencies in what is commonly referred to as "conservatism" in the US today. A precursor to the angry white men who emerged in the early 1990s, at first it was to seize the House of Representatives and the Senate from the Democrats. But a much more ugly side to this phenomenon has emerged, the oldest example being shooting sprees targeting civilians. A more "modern development" is the killing of abortionists being primary examples. Let alone the thousands of private armies, commonly mislabled as "militias", who are preparing to take on the Federal Reserve, the UN or the Devil. The culmination of years of neglect that led to the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995, an act of terrorism perpetrated by men with extreme right-wing views and sympathies with the militias. Today it is the Tea Party Movement, which is another figment of the angry white male phenomenon, and is doing it's best to stifle the moderate changes proposed by the Obama administration.

Significant Links:

The Shining analysis by Rob Ager Part 1 
HAL = IBM

Noam Chomsky Meets the Pioneer Spirit 
A People's History of the American Empire  
Noam Chomsky on "anti-politics"

The Truth about Free-Market Fundamentalism.

Ride the Wave.

The reaction to the financial crisis of 2008, and the controversial bail-outs, have consisted mostly of populist arguments against government intervention in the market. We have seen this on both sides of the Atlantic. In America, the nationalist Michael Savage accused George W Bush of being a "fiscal socialist" for pouring $700 billion into Wall Street. The pundits of Fox News, and by extension Rupert Murdoch, have continued to accuse Barack Obama of being a "socialist" for bailing out yet more needy corporations. In Britain we have seen similar tactics, although far less overt forms of populism, from the media. In a nutshell The Sun has stabbed New Labour in the back. It appears that the Conservatives and the Republicans are attempting to surf their way to power on a wave of right-wing populism. Apparently, these free-marketeers are here to save us from the horrors of the free-market. But it seems doubtful that working-class British and American people truly feel that the Right represents them. A lot of Americans and Brits are simply angry, disillusioned and apathetic with the Establishment and the parties that be.

On both sides of the Atlantic, we have seen one rhetorical question posed endlessly by the media: "Why should tax-payers flip the bill?" The obvious answer they hint at is: "There is no reason we should reward failure!" But as most things, this is not a simple and necessarily correct answer. This answer has been given by the same breed of free-market fundamentalists responsible for the financial crisis in the first place. These are the same individuals who want the separation of market and state. Remember, the Conservatives were the politicians who have been demanding greater deregulation and tax cuts under New Labour. Which is something often neglected deliberately by the media, who have instead resorted to condemning Labour's rampant spending. It is almost as if they believe the government should be focused with having something left over. It is as if they think governments should be run like businesses, aiming to have something left over at the end of the day - namely, profits.

The fact is that this financial crisis was caused by a flawed system, a banking structure that had been deregulated, that had benefited greatly from massive tax cuts which simply rewarded bankers who were running amok. But naturally, the flawed system will not be changed. Instead, the media will chew up the current incumbents like dog meat. Offering the rabble what they might consider a brief but stimulating catharsis. Instead of satisfying real demands for substantive change. Of course, the Randian dinosaur that is Alan Greenspan is partly to blame for the current debacle. It was "Saint Alan" who made the mistake of trusting bankers to have a rationally self-interested approach to lending. A rational egoist would not be looking for the kind of wild speculation - the short-term propellant that is doomed to end in a crash - that the bankers looked for. What "Saint Alan" failed to take into account was the fact that the bankers can afford to take stupid risks, because they can always count on the state to bail them out. But if Greenspan hadn't made this mistake, someone else would have. No one will seek to restructure this fundamentally flawed system and on it shall go without the dinosaurs.

Greed is Good.

The laissez-faire crowd of libertarians and fiscal conservatives in American politics are mostly all talk when it comes to the free-market. Take William Weld as an example. In 1991 Weld became the first Republican Governor of Massachusetts, since 1975. Weld has been referred to, in the past by the Boston Globe, as a "libertarian with a religious belief in free-markets." Though, the description had clearly been made in ignorance of Weld's true policies. It is true that Weld decreased the size of government in Massachusetts, but for the poor - specifically cutting Medicaid by 15% and decimating worker's compensation, thus doing considerable harm to the people in need of health treatment. As he was "rolling back" the state, for the poor, Weld deliberately increased subsidies to corporations and businesses active in Massachusetts before slashing taxes and regulation in their favour. As an "odd side-effect" of Weld's policies Georges Bank was closed off because a large amount of fish had been wiped out. Which is an "odd side-effect" of subsidising and deregulating prosperous fishing companies. Weld was soon in Washington, looking to his fellow politicians for a federal bail-out and a stamp of "natural disaster" onto a mess that he was responsible for.

The kind of "free-marketeering" perpetrated by the likes of William Weld is not unusual. We can see the big difference between reality and rhetoric under the likes of Blair and Bush, Major and Clinton, Thatcher and Reagan. There is a tendency in the media to ignore the subsidies, massive tax cuts, deregulation and protectionist policies promoted by many of these politicians. This is particularly true of the Thatcherites and the Reaganites in the 1980s, who are often described as being heavily influenced by the work of Adam Smith, but they were more influenced by Friedrich Hayek, Milton Friedman and Ludwig von Mises. We're not told of the fact that both Thatcher and Reagan favoured devolution to the extent that was beneficial to "Big Business". It is easier for businesses to intimidate states with threats of leaving for another state, in order to get what they want, when there is little interference from centralised government. Which is probably why Thatcher favoured devolving power to local government and stood in opposition to the European Union. For corporations, doing business in Europe is worth billions in revenue, but if power was centralised in Brussels it would be harder for corporations to say "We're going unless you'll give us a tax cut." Everything about Thatcherism and Reagonomics is geared to benefit private enterprise.

The supply-side policies pursued by Thatcher and Reagan essentially led to high unemployment and social deprivation, for the poor. For example, privatisation is the process by which Thatcher removed numerous aspects of British industry, from the public sector, and handed them over to the private sector. The most well known example being the mines, most of which have been closed since because they were not profitable. An institution of the public sector can hire more workers, since they aren't focused on profit. But a company in the private sector cannot function without making a profit, at least not for too long. For these companies to make a profit they will pursue low wages and high work hours, for the workers that they can't afford to make redundant. But for businesses to possess the power to do such things, unions must be weak and workers must be desperate. This is the reason behind the war waged against unions and welfare by the Thatcherites and Reaganites a like - to ensure profitability for private power. By 1990 British workers had been subjected to some of the biggest wage cuts in the Western world. Though, American businesses had succeeded in accomplishing the same goal about 5 years earlier thanks to the Reaganite Revolution, as illegal firings increased by a third as the state "failed" to enforce the law.
 

Country First.

We all know how patriotic our politicians can be, in times of war and remembrance for those who fought for the freedom we enjoy today. "Country First" was one of many slogans used by the McCain-Palin campaign team in 2008. Millions of dollars, that should have gone to the Third World in the form of food aid, were cut so that the bail-outs could be pursued in Western states. In Britain, we've seen striking workers demanding "British jobs for British workers". In Greece, police resorted to firing tear gas at farmers who were determined to receive even more subsidies. Even though typically governments do utilise policies which protect goods and capital that is in their country's economy. However, this is not necessarily the kind of activity which protects the jobs of working people and as previously stated the government is usually not on the side of the working women and men. Which is why 1% of the American population gained $1 trillion dollars between 1978 and 1990, thanks to Reagan and Bush who chiselled down taxes on rich from 70% down to nearly 25%.

The Republic of Mali has been described as a landlocked West African nation, it is the seventh largest country in the African continent and has a population of around 13 million. Around half of the population live on less than $1.25 a day. The life expectancy in Mali is at 48 years for Men and 52 years for women. 90% of the population are Muslim, 1% are Christian and 9% adhere to an "indigenous religion". Like most African nations it has been the subject of political instability, coups and anti-communist dictatorship. And yet it would appear that there are Malian Politicians who actually believe in the free-market. The Malian economy is "built" on agriculture, specifically cotton in the South and cattle in the North of Mali. Unfortunately, the politicians of the United States and the European Union are far less faithful to the free-market ideal, despite all their rhetoric. As a result, Malian beef and cotton producers cannot compete on a level playing field with their European and American counterparts.

Why would such a thing happen? Because the US government subsidises American cotton farmers with more money than the Malian government spends in it's entire budget. Nor can the Malians compete with the Europeans, since the EU subsidises each farmer with 500 euros per each cow and that is even more than the per capita GDP in Mali. The Minister for the Malian economy once said: "We don't need your help or advice or lectures on the beneficial effects of abolishing excessive state regulation; please, just stick to your own rules about the free-market and our troubles will basically be over." His words fell on deaf ears in America and Europe. Thus, Mali's economic woes are far from over. But Mali is merely one example of the devastation reaped by American and European protectionism. The politicians placing tarrifs on imported goods and restrict imports by establishing administrative barriers often claim to be "putting country first". But "putting country first" has a price - which will be paid exclusively by the Third World.

First as Tragedy, Then as Farce - by Slavoj Zizek (2009)
Free-Market Fantasies: Capitalism in the Real World - by Noam Chomsky (1996)