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After the Future

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The Two Rights

There are two factions within the American Right: the plutocratic right, for which Romney is a kind of caricature; and the cultural right, whose identity is so deeply entwined with…

There are two factions within the American Right: the plutocratic right, for
which Romney is a kind of caricature; and the cultural right, whose identity is
so deeply entwined with values have been under attack since the dawn of the Enlightenment and are being pushed over the cliff now by consumer capitalism.
These two factions should be enemies, but the first faction
realizes that it needs the second, and many of its members pretend to share the second faction's traditional values despite not caring at all about them. (Former Baine partner and Romney supporter, Edward Conard, on Chris Hayes's show
admitted as much last weekend.) And so the mythos of the Republican Party is the
mythos of the cultural right. It has to be to hold the alliance between these factions together.

The characteristic they both share is the feeling of being
(in very different ways) an embattled minority that is vulnerable to be swept
away by a hostile majority. They both (in their different ways) fear for their
survival. Those on the plutocratic right fear that in a democracy the
non-plutocratic majority will vote for its own economic interests at the
their expense, and for that reason feel
that they must take a stand on No New Taxes. It's as if they have their collective finger in
the little hole in the dike that as soon as it's removed the flood will come
that will sweep them away. The cultural right, on the other hand, fears that secular liberalism is
destroying its mythos and with it
everything they believe is meaningful and important. It's very similar to the
fears that excite traditionalist Muslims.

I think there are some in the plutocratic right who share
the cultural right's mythos, especially where they overlap in the rugged
individualist frontiersman narrative. But there are a lot of people on the
plutocratic right who share little with the traditionalist cultural right but
see an alliance with it as essential to make it competitive in elections.

It
will be interesting to see if that alliance can be maintained in the GOP if in
fact the GOP has to broaden its appeal to accept groups that do not embrace the
cultural right's  narrative.  Another kind of survival is at stake here, that of the GOP. 

Comments

7 responses

  1. JP Avatar
    JP

    “It will be interesting to see if that alliance can be maintained in the GOP if in fact the GOP has to broaden its appeal to accept groups that do not embrace the cultural right’s narrative.”
    I’m thinking that the answer is no.
    So if the plutocrats try to do this, then they will erode their base faster than they can attract a new base to shore it up.
    In any event, it’s now being noticed that economic growth has limits. Who knew?

    Reply
  2. Jack Whelan Avatar
    Jack Whelan

    It’s this kind of dilemma for the GOP that might actually force a realignment along the lines I wrote about it last week:
    http://afterthefuture.typepad.com/afterthefuture/2012/11/michael-lind-on-realignment.html
    The demographics are forcing the GOP’s hand; something has to give, and it could be that Romney/Conard one-percenters will realign themselves with neoliberal Democrats that dominate the Senate, especially, but are found everywhere in Washington to form a party that looks a lot like the Republican Party of the fifties and sixties–the party of Rockefeller, Lindsay, Eisenhower, flinty New Englanders, small businessmen, doctors, Ross Perot and Ron Paul Libertarians and other Main Streeters who obsess about self reliance and feel that all the takers are going to expropriate everything they have worked for. There are a lot of people who voted for Obama who would vote for this new/old GOP if it wasn’t associated with the extremist right.
    They’d still be a minority, but they will have enormous power to influence the inside game with their money. And assuming that the left continues to be unable to get its act together for reasons Jonathan points out, they can still dominate with an economic right agenda coupled with a moderate/tolerant social agenda that is already embraced by the Libertarian wing of the GOP.
    Fox News could pivot to support this ecoomic right agenda and move away from all their nonsense about the war on Christmas, etc., and the cultural right will become increasingly irrelevant in mainstream politics and move to the margins where militia types and other rightwing extremists now reside. Once the MSM stops feeding right wing cultural extremism, it will wither in its political relevance.
    At least things will be clearer if that happens, and it opens a space for a progressive left movement to occupy. It could happen, but it won’t be impelled by what Hedges calls the “liberal class”; it will have to come from some other cultural/political constellation within American society that has not yet formed. Stranger things have happened.

    Reply
  3. Jonathan Avatar
    Jonathan

    I don’t know, Jack. I’m not convinced a class struggle doesn’t still lurk behind your several hypothetical schemata. In a capitalist democracy, class struggle plays out within parties. The parties do not themselves separate into one of the money’d and one or more parties of the rest. I’m not sure I have a problem with that. If I may wax Wildean, the only thing worse than having the money on your side, is not having the money on your side. Really, I can’t even conceive a moneyless party. Once a political party loses the support of at least part of the plutocracy, it’s no longer a viable political party. It may be a revolutionary party, though. But like I’ve said, I don’t think we have the spunk for it. I guess I don’t have a problem with that, either.
    Still, it’s probably better to be hot or cold, rather than lukewarm. The scenario you outline above sounds very nice and clear — maybe too nice, partly because a “progressive left” movement will by definition these days be lukewarm. Lukewarmth, if you will, is the rallying cry of the progressive: he strives to make a bland world where everyone is blandly happy. (His counterpart the rightwing moralist strives to make a bland world where everyone is blandly good.) The hedonist and the moralist are both disasters, and their utopias are disastrous. But, mercifully, we instinctually do everything we can to avoid them.

    Reply
  4. JP Avatar
    JP

    I think I want to do a historical documentary on the Puritan war on Christmas.
    That would be fun!

    Reply
  5. JP Avatar
    JP

    The classes aren’t supposed to be struggling with each other.
    They’re supposed to be working in harmony, which means that the upper classes do their job and the lower classes do their job and everybody fits in where they feel comfortable.
    Meritocracy just means that you’re supposed to find your own level.

    Reply
  6. Jack Whelan Avatar
    Jack Whelan

    JP–what century are you living in, dude? Some times you’re right on, and other times. . .?
    Jonathan–I think there will always be a faction among wealthy elites that have a social conscience, and will help to bankroll social justice movements. FDR was considered a traitor to his class, as was in many ways his cousin TR. There are lots of retired microsoft millionaires out where I live who want to do good, meaningful things, but there is no clarity about what to do. The waters are too muddied by the Democrats being dominated by the corporate neoliberal types who are driving policies that work against the economic interests of most of the people in the party. Kick them out, and let them ally with Romney-style moderate Republicans so there can be some clarity about who stands for what.
    I”m not saying it’s going to happen, but I’m inclined to think we’d be better off if it did happen.

    Reply
  7. JP Avatar
    JP

    You mean the meritocracy comment thingy I just wrote?
    I’m pretty sure that it’s the way that the Best and the Brightest think in today’s modern finance consumer capitalist system. They got to their place of awesomeness through their own merit and everyone finds their own level.
    So, it’s more performance art than anything else.
    I do, however, want to do a historical documentary on the entire puritan problem with celebration in general (back during the heyday of puritanism a few centuries ago).

    Reply

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