Anyone for a sweepstake on when he’ll mention “running dogs”?
Surprisingly Maoist turn of phrase from Cheney:
Vice President Cheney yesterday accused critics of engaging in “revisionism of the most corrupt and shameless variety.”
This brings up an interesting point about neo-conservatism, though. I can almost imagine Cheney attacking “running dogs of…” Well, that’s the problem: running dogs of _what_? Obviously the old Maoist classics aren’t going to work; “running dogs of capitalism,” “the bourgeoisie,” “reaction” (let alone “yanqui imperialism”), would all be the wrong targets; but what exactly _is_ the enemy against which neoconservatism defines itself?
k-punk, on France, mentions the discourse of inevitability employed by capitalist ideology. However, maybe we need to introduce an extra detail into this analysis. Unlike Thatcher’s claim that There Is No Alternative (a modernist position of a sort, in that it posited the inevitability of progress, albeit ‘progress’ only on capital’s terms), the Third Way claims precisely to _be_ the alternative (and thus is postmodernist; rather than asserting what the future will be, it simply abolishes the future by claiming to instantiate it).
And this is the strategy of the neo-cons — permanent revolutionaries of a revolution they know to have no content. It’s common to accuse the neo-cons of inventing an enemy to take the place of the USSR after the Cold War, but I think they’re cleverer than that. Rather than create a new enemy, they have retained the form of revolutionary politics but stubbornly refused to give it any substance; thus, any group can be given the role of enemy indifferently and opportunisticly, despite the fact that “everyone knows” they are not the real enemy at which the revolution is aimed. I think this may go some way to explaining the strange alliance between the neo-cons, New Labor, and the washed-up ex-Marxists of the pro-war left.
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“I think this may go some way to explaining the strange alliance between the neo-cons, New Labor, and the washed-up ex-Marxists of the pro-war left.”
Two things:
1) Dude. It’s New *Labour*. Damn your yankee spelling!
2) Is it really as strange as the alliance between supposedly “progressive” left-wingers and bigoted homophobes, such as Respect’s largest donor Dr Mohammed Naseem?
From his magazine:
“As far as Islamic law is concerned, the rules are that the state does not interfere in the privacy of people’s homes, but it would need to safeguard public decency by preventing any public advocacy for homosexuality. Such activity would come under the heading of public incitement. The death penalty the questioner mentions only applies to a public display of lewdness witnessed by several people.”
Would any self-Respecting (DYSWIDT?) socialist want to appear on the same platform as this nutter, never mind enter a formal electoral alliance?
I was going to link to an Outrage! press release but their site appears to be down at the moment.
Not that I’m accusing you personally of approving of this alliance, just as I hope you wouldn’t accuse me of being a Marxist, let alone an ex- one :)
Comment by Marty @ 11/23/2005 8:56 am
Philosophers have interpreted the world…
I think Jodi Dean is right to lose patience with some of the positions Zizek adopts in his recent ‘writings’ on the French riots. (The inverted commas are Jodi’s, but well-merited for a mode of textual production that is best…
Trackback by k-punk @ 11/24/2005 4:58 pm
Tim,
This post made me think about the Gleneagles G8, Make Poverty History and Live8. Where you write:
“the Third Way claims precisely to be the alternative (and thus is postmodernist; rather than asserting what the future will be, it simply abolishes the future by claiming to instantiate it).”
During the G8 you had the weird, surreal, Neo-Stalinist situation of the appearance of massive pro-summit, pro-government demonstrations, with the government effectively declaring what the the protesters demands where and instigating a huge police operation against anyone who dissented.
Comment by Keir @ 12/5/2005 7:43 am