- Top Features:
- War Room
- Glenn Greenwald
- Broadsheet
- Joan Walsh
- Camille Paglia
- Since You Asked
- Follow Salon:
Read other letters about this article
There will be no revolution from the left in this country. Period. Libertarians will argue themselves to death before they revolt. Incrementalists are advocates for the status quo; why shouldn't they be? Plenty of people have quite a stake in the way things are. and the direction they're going, toward autocracy, whether brutal or mild, it doesn't really matter, it's still autocracy. But why rock the boat? No, better to push for changes around the margins, particularly "changes" that make things... erm... work better. Yeah. That's the ticket.
No, Revolution, if it comes (again) to this country will come from the Right, not from the left, and not from the disputatious Libertarians, and not from the squishy middle (even as that middle is squeezed dry.) In fact, the argument should be made that the Rightist Revolution began with Reagan, has been unrelenting ever since, and is now very nearly complete -- with a Centrist Democrat poised to ascend to the White House and finish what Reagan started. He's putting it all together as we speak.
Why do you think the rabid right wing is cooing their delight with him?
And why would DiFi and Wyden suddenly go wobbly on prohibiting torture? Could it be that the "pragmatists" and the "incrementalists" moving into the White House have sent out a message that, well, it's gonna take a while to reverse the Bush outrages, and, you know, there are priorities, and, sorry, what happens to captive brown people isn't one of them. Fit in or sit down and shut up.
What did Obama say about his FISA reversal? Oh yeah, "...going forward, some of you may decide that my FISA position is a deal breaker. That's ok." Which was taken as a "Get with the Program or scram" statement at the time and it still is by some diehards.
But for those few extremists on issues like torture and domestic spying and constitutional self-government, marginal things all, most have gotten with the Program. Why not? What's to lose?
But on the frothing right, especially in the South, but not limited to it, real rebellion, perhaps even an armed uprising, is brewing. Even as the new Regime does everything imaginable to placate the wild and angry rebels, their fury fumes ever hotter. Anything, literally, could trigger their outbreak of actual, take-to-the-barricades revolution. Even Rush can't seem to keep them under control.
There's nothing even remotely like that on the real left (what little of it there is) let alone on the so-called "left" of the Blogosphere (most of which is dominated by reformed Republicans.)
And if an outbreak of Rebellion/Revolution from the Right does occur, what are the rest of us going to do?
Condemn it, of course. Right? Join the Northern Command forces to put it down? No! Certainly not! Listen to the inchoate rhetoric and calls to arms from the rebels, hear their cry, and try to understand? Maybe.
Join them? Never.
Just don't be surprised if it happens. Be grateful if it doesn't.
