The problem with the left and their political parties
Michael Tomasky makes an excellent point:
If you boil my 6,000 words down to one sentence or idea, it would be that I want people to stop saying things like if only Obama were tougher like FDR and LBJ, we’d have a climate bill by now or a union-friendly card-check bill or we’d have had a public option or any number of other things. That’s an extremely naive point of view and ultimately a kind of toxic one that leads to liberal despair, because it makes progressives think that the only thing preventing their desires from becoming reality is that their leaders are selling them out. There are many things Obama could have done differently up to now, no doubt. But the above view just doesn’t reflect the more complex reality. American liberals need to think about deeper systemic reforms and forms of pressure.
What makes this worse is that right-wingers, even crazy ones like the Tea Party movement, are far more pragmatic and strategic when it comes to pushing their projects.
In about a year from now all those socialists going around saying the Labour party and the Tories were essentially the same will be eating their words.
Coincidentally, Hopi Sen made a similar point a few days ago:
So if David wants Labour to be the repository of the “reasonable hopes of reasonable people”, perhaps one place to start would be admitting that the total transformation that progressive politics promises is often an illusion. The consequence of great dreams and high standards is great dissappointment. A certain modesty would be attractive in modern progressive politics. We cannot fix all. We can only seek to improve a little.
True, true. But there’s two (somewhat contradictory) reasons why the Left does this badly. Firstly, some lefties within party politics place too much emphasis on Westminster without looking at how the wider Left movement could be mobilised to put pressure on politicians. Leaders can sometimes set the tone on an issue and lead us, but mostly they’re just reacting. Plus, people are paying less attention to politicians nowadays.
The second problem is that Lefties outside Westminster politics don’t pay enough attention to the machinations of Parliament. Many of them act like those people camping at Democracy Village: with lots of intentions and nice, fluffy words but no coherence in their place and no strategy on how to take it forward. They’re angry. They just don’t know what to do about it.
The Tea Party movement’s potency comes from the fact that it’s a grassroots movement but it’s very focused on trying to destroy the Democrats. Many on the left are actually happier arguing and fighting against other Lefties because it’s easier than looking outwards to the real enemy.
The liberal movement in the US assumed that with Obama elected their job was done. No, you dimwits, it had just begun. Politics is war: you have to fight constantly and continuously. You have to fight the other side to immobilise them, and you have to fight your side to make them go further.
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RT @jamesgraham A lot of good sense here from @sunny_hundal: 
Seems like Labour don’t even know there is a fight on e.g. Ed Miliband:
Pathetic.
“You have to fight the other side to immobilise them, and you have to fight your side to make them go further.”
Yes, but when you’re done kicking the bad guys in the balls and kicking the good guys up the arse all you have is an overdeveloped leg muscle and a jerky knee.
Indeed.
Sunny – Yes, indeed. The last (some would say only)person in the Labour Party to realise that you have to fighy continuously was Tony Blair.
That worked so well for the left that we have just had a budget that I will politely describe as Thatcherism on steroids, in no small part because the left thought that a spell in opposition was a worthy thing.
Out of interest Sunny, who are you backing in the Labour leadership contest?
Yes, but when you’re done kicking the bad guys in the balls and kicking the good guys up the arse all you have is an overdeveloped leg muscle and a jerky knee.
haha!
MM – I haven’t completely made up my mind yet. Am meeting with David Miliband people later this week.
Fair enough Sunny. I know that you have not been much of a Burnham fan in the past – personally I hope that you reconsider.
“The second problem is that Lefties outside Westminster politics don’t pay enough attention to the machinations of Parliament. Many of them act like those people camping at Democracy Village: with lots of intentions and nice, fluffy words but no coherence in their place and no strategy on how to take it forward. They’re angry. They just don’t know what to do about it.”
This is true, and I know it because I am probably one such leftie – divorced from Westminster, etc, and impatient with (rather than ignorant of) the machinations of parliament. The thing is – you can’t inspire people with the ‘modest achievement’ rhetoric that Mr Sen promotes. The majority of people exist outside the Westminster bubble and they want policy that impacts directly, and positively, on their lives. I think it’s wrong for the left to start to feel that downgrading hopes and expectations is acceptable – especially if the downgrading is done with a view to protecting the likes of Obama from (rightwing) criticism. Great things have been achieved round the world in concert with great rhetoric – civil rights, the vote for women, the NHS, social security in the Antipodes, the end of apartheid in South Africa. It doesn’t hurt for the average punter to dream and expect. Perhaps the left needs better confidence in its rhetoric, rather than promoting the watering down of it.
I’d also take issue with the argument that the left ought to stop fighting other lefties. The right fights the right all of the time – half of Cameron’s own Conservatives want him dead and I won’t even begin on the very public divisions within the Lib Dems. Half of the left at the moment wants to get closer with the Lib Dems and prepare for a future coalition, while the other half would rather die. Those discussions and fights need to be had.
‘The right fights the right all of the time.’
Yes, and not withstanding that they still voted for Cameron, and managed not to bring him down despite a Coalition with a pro-European party. The right do fight, they just do it better and smarter.
Incidentally, those on the left who want to cosy up to the Lib Dems are either blind or stupid, either way, they need a copy of the Orange Book very urgently.
Don’t know if they do it smarter. They just use the sledgehammer rhetoric – public sector bad, private sector good, foreigners bad. They also have a soundbite, rightwing media helping them out. Lefties need equivalent soundbites and an equally helpful media.
With you on the Lib Dems, though. Asswipes.
A certain modesty would be attractive in modern progressive politics.
Indeed. Progressives have a very great deal to be modest about. This recent call for humility would be more convincing if it had been issued before, and not long after, the election of a man who claimed that the seas would cease their rise upon his taking office.
half of Cameron’s own Conservatives want him dead and I won’t even begin on the very public divisions within the Lib Dems
Not really. His ratings among Tory voters are at 96% – see latest YouGov polls. Just because the Norman Tebbitt and Simon Heffer types are annoyed doesn’t mean there is a lot of infighting.
In fact, there is remarkably low infighting. And plus, the point is that even the Tory right gets things down through strategic brute force – not abandoning Westminster politics.
Kate:
Great things have been achieved round the world in concert with great rhetoric – civil rights, the vote for women, the NHS, social security in the Antipodes, the end of apartheid in South Africa.
Yes but those were iconic battles. Right now, other than action on climate change – I can’t see easily crystallised battles (other than making poverty history?) that get ppl to take strong positions.
Lastly, it may not be inspiring but it’s the truth. Far better for the left to figure out how it can sustain itself as a movement to improve people’s lives locally than demanding instant change at national level.
and lastly – all those battles you cited took decades to win, not immediately. So the original point still stands.
And to add to that – if the left isn’t realistic and strategic, there is a real danger we end up letting the right win.
I think there are three different sorts of “compromise” that end up being made in the name of realism, though, and only one of them is of the sort that the left should be making.
1) “We’d like ABCD, but we only have the votes to get A, so we’ll do A and work on improving the political climate to get BCD later, and in the meantime see if we can do other things to improve the situation for people harmed by the absence of BCD” (nothing wrong with this)
2) “We’d like ABCD, and we have the votes for them, but we don’t want to move too fast, so we’ll only do A” (too cautious and makes it easier for what improvements are made to be reversed later)
3) “We like ABCD, and dislike WXYZ, so we’ll do W in exchange for support for A” (trades off one group of your supporters against another and fragments the left)
Sunny – yep, of course those were iconic battles, but that’s not the point. The point is you need something a little better than ‘we’re not as a bad as the Tories’ to inspire people on the ground. Doesn’t matter how true that line is. You need something better on the ground.
Look – when I was right in the middle of Unison activism, the pressure on us to cut the Labour link was enormous – and that was pressure from the membership.
Even back in 2006 (before the local government election at Hammersmith, where I was based) the grassroots loathing for New Labour was already manifest – privatisation, the Iraq War, PFIs, the failure to repeal anti union legislation, ALMOs, point-blank ignoring of conference decisions – we’d have branch meetings attended by a hall-full of members screaming bloody murder about New Labour’s betrayal of them.
Towards the end of 2005, the Labour leadership of Hammersmith and Fulham council called us in and said – look, you’re going to have to support us, or the Tories will get in. The thing is – we knew we couldn’t sell that line to the membership. There was absolutely no way. The grassroots spoke of Labour with hatred. There were a few triumphs to pass on to people (the modest achievements Hopi refers to) – Sure Start, the minimum wage, etc – but anyone who tried to fly those kites was shrieked down (rightly, in my view). The ‘vote for Labour, because the Tories will be much worse’ line just wasn’t a starter.
People expect more from Labour, because they believe(d) that Labour ought to be their party of representation (Cruddas recently talked about the tacit covenant that should exist between Labour and its natural constituents, and that’s what I’m getting at).
Of course the examples I picked out above were iconic and took a long time in the making. A lot of people died waiting for most of them. The point I’m making, though, is that you can’t inspire people with softly-softly, half-cooked rhetoric about small wins. People expect Labour to be a party of big wins – big wins for them, not the likes of Capita, or BT, or even George Bush.
The Tories are animals – I know that, and you know that, and we’ve both been writing about it for longer than I care to remember. That doesn’t change the fact that people expect their politicians to work for them and will not stomach the lowering of their expectations. There is no way Obama could deliver on expectations, but in some ways, that’s not the point. As you rightly point out, these things take time. What he did was inspire.
. The point is you need something a little better than ‘we’re not as a bad as the Tories’ to inspire people on the ground. Doesn’t matter how true that line is. You need something better on the ground.
Agreed, and I did that during the election.
For example though, a High Pay Commission – mutualisation of banks, better agency workers support would be good.
But those aren’t iconic battles that will get people on the streets excited…
. There is no way Obama could deliver on expectations, but in some ways, that’s not the point. As you rightly point out, these things take time. What he did was inspire.
But the problem is that the charges of betrayal come once Obama gets into power… or people get demoralised. And so the next time they don’t want to get involved.
I think it’s a problem. We want more radicalism from Labour but that would make it difficult for them to be elected and then deliver it.
How do you propose we square the circle?
‘How do you propose we square that circle?’
LOL – god knows -
but in all seriousness, I think the left is getting many aspects of its act together, particularly online. There’s a lot of very cohesive analysis of coalition policy and A-grade blogging and assessment of deficit issues and of the right’s tired rhetoric. I personally find this aspect of things inspiring, and while there’s a million miles to go and a lot of them will be backwards, things have come along amazingly – compare where we are now to where we were five years ago.
But you’re talking particularly of the electoral process, which is fair enough. This is the place where things take time, and where the great moments come along only rarely, when the time and the people are right.
The thing with the recent election is that the time wasn’t right (to say the very least) for Labour as it was and is. I think the fact that Labour did as well as it did (personally thought it’d be pushing to get even 200 seats) was testimony to the people who did put the work in on the ground. Fact is, though, that that wasn’t not an election where the timing or the people were right. There was no way a morgue-dweller like Brown was going to inspire and sweep the nation with Brown fervour. His campaign can’t be compared with Obama’s.
I think the answer lies to an extent in your last statement – we want more radicalism from Labour but that would make it difficult for them to be elected and then deliver it.
The thing is – would it? Was it a lack of radicalism that saw them lose the last election, or was it the lost connection with natural constituents?
I know what everyone will rush in and say – that a crazy leftist programme sank Labour in the polls until 1997 and returning to the mad commie era will return Labour to the wilderness forever.
Thing is, it depends on your definition of lefty radicalism and whether or not you think then equates to now.
Things have moved on a bit since the 1980s – environment is a real concern, the gap between rich and poor grows ever wider, the radical hatred of global corporations has seeped a little closer to the mainstream – there are quite a few things there that the left may comfortably hang its hat on. Problem is – the shadow of the romance with middle England (and middle wherever) looms large across the PLP. No young politician with his/her eye on the future has really stepped forward to inspire with such a programme. None of the Labour leadership candidates comes within a bull’s roar of that sort of freshness.
If they ever do, there’s a great many reasons to feel positive – or at least more positive – about the way the future might look. There are, as I’ve said, a great many good people online now (and that number will only grow) who are really writing well about policy and politics, and are increasingly in good positions to defend (or even attack) the charges of betrayal. The mainstream press is on the decline, as well – in another five years, that press may well be even less influential than it is now. That’ll open the field up even more for intelligent analysis.
It’s obvious that you feel frustrated enough to blow a gasket – but as you’ve said, these things take time, and when you look back five, and definitely ten, years, you see the extraordinary way in which things have opened up. It could be argued that Obama owes much of his electoral success to the online revolution – he really may not have been a starter five years ago without that reach.
Which is all a long way of saying that we square the circle by keeping on. I know you’ll laugh at that (won’t everyone) but things have come along. We have a major communications tool, which a lot of very good people are using. We have an unstable government which was half-elected with a real up-yours signal from the voting public. We have an oil company singlehandedly proving to the world why large corporates are likely to kill us all. We have a lot more than we did, so we keep using it to make the case.
hangbitch – ‘There were a few triumphs to pass on to people (the modest achievements Hopi refers to) – Sure Start, the minimum wage, etc – but anyone who tried to fly those kites was shrieked down (rightly, in my view).’
Well, I disagree. The left often takes the view that it is the role of government to deliver the land of milk and honey, the problem is that that does not survive a reality test. The right have shrieked about the EU for 40 years, but have managed to build narratives around this.
My view is the left got obsessed with Iraq in a very unhealthy way, but that will never fly on here.
1997-2000 were some of the best, most progressive government we have ever had, yet, ‘shrieking people down,’ it seems matters more than anything. Out of interest, why is the fact that the tories are worse not a factor in this?
You talk about a tacit covenant – that is politics. Government is different. Cruddas will never be in government, hence he can pander to you with ideas like, ‘tacit covenants.’
Sunny – ‘I think the left is getting many aspects of its act together, particularly online.’
With respect Sunny, what you are talking about is a lot of people who like to sit around patting each other on the back and congratulating each other on how ‘radical’ they all are.
I say this with all respect. A lot of articulate people on the internet is not a coherent campaign, it really is not a sign of a latent left radicalism, and deep down I think you know that you are clutching at straws. And, please don’t pin your hopes on the eco-crowd, they will never survive a brush with people who are not online only.
The stark reality is that this conservative moment has arrived, as the Guardian might have said.
Really good and thought-provoking piece.
I think the media is instrumental in furthering this problem. It doesn’t really tend to pay that much attention to politics outside of Westminster.
Maid:
The stark reality is that the conservative moment is always here – there are very few points when it is not. It becomes, as it has always been, a question of pushing against that, or not. I prefer to push.
I’M PROUD OF YOU LABOR!. Keep standing up. The lives and health of all the American people and the World are in serious jeopardy.
Further, unemployment healthcare benefits are critically needed. But they should be provided through the Medicare program at cost, less the 65% government premium subsidy provided now to private for profit health insurance.
Congress should stop wasting hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money on private for profit health insurance subsidies. Subsidies that cost the taxpayer 10x as much or more than Medicare does. Private for profit health insurance plans cost more. But provide dangerous and poorer quality patient care.
It’s over. Tell congress to get the healthcare Merchants of death and injury out of the American peoples lives for good. 2010 is about THE PUBLIC OPTION!
And that CORRUPT! UNDEMOCRATIC! filibuster must GO! NOW!
Alan Grayson Honors The Dead http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TV9TRoYMtjs&feature=player_embedded
Alan Grayson on Healthcare http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPpQ2MNaSDo&feature=player_embedded
Ron Sparks HealthCareReform http://youtu.be/kqlBFRJh4Cw
John Garamendi – The Public Option http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyBTEke68aQ&feature=player_embedded
I want to commend all of you for working so hard and being so strong at helping the whitehouse and congress begin to address our U.S. and Global healthcare crisis. You have been AWESOME! my fellow Americans and peoples of the World. America and the World is better and safer for it. My greatest pride is the knowledge that I am one of you. And that you really get it. You really understand the importance of it all.
There are some potentially very good things in the healthcare legislation. Especially with the reconciliation fix’s. The Democrats, Bernie Sanders and the Whitehouse did a GREAT! job of fighting to produce the best healthcare legislation that they could. They have earned all our strong support. And we should give it to them.
But it was your relentless pressure and hard work that made the difference. Whatever good comes from this healthcare legislation, America and the peoples of the World will have each of you to thank. You were smart, creative, courageous and relentless. You fought together for the best legislation possible. And when you had to, you fought alone. No matter who stumbled and fell you continued to push and forge ahead. Fighting for the lives and health of the American people and the World. YOU SHOULD BE PROUD OF YOUR-SELVES
It may come to pass that future generations will look back on us and say that we were ALL Americas Greatest Generations. And that healthcare reform was our finest hour. You should be proud of our leaders President Obama, Speaker Pelosi, Majority Leader Reid and the many other Democratic and independent fighters for the people in congress. They proved them-self worthy of the leadership of a GREAT! PEOPLE.
But we are not done yet. This was just the beginning of healthcare reform, not the end. WE THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES, ARE NOT! divided on healthcare legislation. The vast majority of you have been consistently crystal clear that this legislation does not go far enough. You want a strong Government-run Public Option CHOICE!! available to everyone on day one. And you want it NOW!
YOU MUST NOT ALLOW AN INDIVIDUAL MANDATE TO STAND WITHOUT A STRONG GOVERNMENT-RUN PUBLIC OPTION CHOICE! AVAILABLE TO EVERYONE.
WE THE PEOPLE have been crystal clear that we want an end to dependence on for-profit healthcare and the for-profit proxies called private for non-profit healthcare. The American people want the CHOICE! of a strong Government-run Public Option to replace their need or dependence on healthcare providers whose primary motivation is profit. Rather than providing the highest quality, easiest accessible and most affordable medically necessary healthcare possible. This is what the rest of the developed World has. And the American people want it too. They want healthcare ASSURANCE! Not, for-profit health insurance. And they want it NOW!
Now is the time to continue the push for a strong Government-run Public Option CHOICE! available to everyone that wants it on day one. Rationally it’s clear what we have to do to get this done. SUPPORT THE DEMOCRATS that supported you with a Public Option choice, and REMOVE as many republicans as you can. Not one republican in congress was willing to step across the isle to support a strong Government-run Public Option CHOICE!! available to everyone on day one. NOT ONE! Let no candidate prevail this November that does not support a Strong Government-run Public Option.
47,000 AMERICANS die each year from lack of healthcare. 120,000 die from treatable illness that don’t die in other developed countries. Hundreds of thousands of you are dieing from medical accidents in a rush to profit. And Millions of you are injured. Millions more are driven into bankruptcy. All for the privilege of paying two to three times as much as any other people in the developed world for healthcare. HOGWASH!
Additionally, tens of thousands of you and your children were killed and millions sickened and injured from a terror attack with H1N1 (swine flu). Released on the American people and the World by the for-profit healthcare industry. All in an attempt to panic and frighten you into accepting the oxymoronic criminal enterprise of private for-profit healthcare (The most costly, deadly, dangerous, and disgraceful product sold in America). H1N1 is still sickening people and killing them. Especially children, the young and the middle aged. And there will be a third wave. These are the terrorist you need to worry about the most. Even the so-called international terrorist would not do something so INSANE! But greed driven medical profiteers would and did.
Apparently as far as republicans in GOVERNMENT are concerned, YOU! my fellow Americans – CAN JUST DROP DEAD! Including their own family members. Fools!… Hundreds of thousands of you, and possibly millions of you will die from the long-term effects of your infection and poisoning with H1N1.
So my fellow Human Beings. Rest-up, Take good care of the basics (Balanced nutrition, hydration, exercise, rest and POSITIVE emotional supports). Then wade back into the FIGHT! for a strong Government-run Public Option CHOICE! available to everyone on day one. Drug re-importation, Abolishment or strong restrictions on patents for biologic and prescription drugs. And government controlled and negotiated drug and medical cost. You must take back control of your healthcare system from the Medical Industrial Complex. You MUST do it NOW! This is a matter of National and Global security. There can be NO MORE EXCUSES.
God Bless You My Fellow Human Beings. I’m glad to know of you. And proud to be one of you.
See you on the battle field.
Sincerely
jacksmith – WorkingClass