The Road to Trumpdom
I always Google my headline ideas to try to avoid the appearance of plagiarism. I was thinking of the title for this post as I was looking at a cartoon adaptation of Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom, originally published by Look magazine in 1945 and subsequently distributed in the 1950s as a pamphlet by the General Motors Corporation. As Ned O’Gorman explained,
“The Look version departed far enough from Hayek’s original text that it hardly merited the same title. Nevertheless it did present the outlines of a popularized version of the neoliberal account of legitimation crisis that Hayek articulated.”
Dick Meyer’s very fine essay The road to Trumpdom: The backstory of the biggest character in politics takes its cue from a Hayek quotation, “As is so often true, the nature of our civilization has been seen more clearly by its enemies than by most of its friends.” Meyer traces the Republican dysfunction to the elevation of the primaries in American presidential politics, the reality TV show vulgarity and celebrity-adulation of American popular culture and ultimately to the long-term decline, since the 1960s, of Americans’ trust in government.
Meyer’s essay concludes with the decline in trust but doesn’t elaborate on the reasons for it. Of course, this has been a well-worn topic, with contributions ranging from Jurgen Habermas’s thesis of Legitimation Crisis to Michel Crozier. Samuel P Huntington and Joji Watanuki’s diagnosis of an “excess of democracy.”
My own view hearkens back to the nominal success of the O,E,C,D, growth target and its substantive failure. Under pressure from the U.S., the newly fledged institution adopted a target of 50% during the 1960s. Inadvertently, they exceeded this target by around 5%. I say “inadvertently” because when they adopted the target in 1961 they really had no idea what it meant. It just seemed like a good idea at the time.
In the meanwhile, all sorts of social, environmental, political and financial difficulties emerged that GNP growth was obviously not solving — some of them growth was exacerbating. And then the decade of the 1970s failed to repeat the economic growth “success” of the 1960s. Economic growth, it turned out, was not the promised panacea. On the other hand, lack of economic growth just made things worse.
Here is were the cartoon version of The Road to Serfdom comes into its own. “The ‘Planners’ promise Utopia…” is the title of panel 3 “…but they can’t agree on ONE Utopia” concludes panel 4.
In the comic book Hayek, this lack of consensus immediately leads to an impasse that can only be resolved by a strongman. In real life, the lack of consensus about concrete Utopias was resolved by targeting economic growth. A rising tide would lift ALL boats. “Everybody will be happier that way,” as Henry Wallich later reaffirmed, because:
Growth is a substitute for equality of income. So long as there is growth, there is hope, and that makes large income differentials tolerable. The environment will also be better taken care of if the economy grows. Nothing could cut more dangerously into the resources that must be devoted to the Great Cleanup than an attempt to limit resources available for consumption.
Well, growth has turned out not to be a “substitute for equality of income.” Most growth for three or four decades has gone to those at the top and large income differentials have just gotten larger and larger and larger — not more tolerable. The expanded resources have not been devoted to “the Great Cleanup” — a not insignificant amount has been devoted to denying the necessity for any cleanup whatsoever. The environment is a hoax.
The latter view is understandable in that the “planners” have taken over the environment with much the same rhetoric that they invested in economic growth. “Green Growth” is predicated on exactly the same growth paradigm. Immigration enlarges the size of the pie — there is not a fixed amount of work to be done, don’t you know — without doing much for the slice that goes to those who aren’t at the top.
Which brings us to the nomination of Donald J. Trump.
Tonight my mother informed me that she didn’t think either Trump or Clinton would become president, because “something would happen” and Obama would use that opportunity to become dictator.
Obama is interested in becoming dictator, you see, as evidenced by his use of executive orders that have subsequently been determined to be illegal.
I give you the 2016 American electorate.
The “road to Trumpdom” is paved by democrat party corruption.
The explanation for Trump and Clinton is corruption.
Vice and oligarchy at 400ACE Roman levels.
And here I thought it was the Democrats who wanted a strong central government.
We, so called “intelligent” humans certainly have had a difficult time figuring out what’s best for all of us in the composite of humanity over time measured in millennia and we are still trying to figure it out.
I conclude from this observation therefore that our “intelligence”, whatever the definition of it, is a self-aggrandizing promotion designed to rationalize a pure belief in human superiority. I place the origins of this with Aristotle’s hierarchy of man which begins with the assertion that humans are better than swine and goes up from there to put the wealthiest land-owners at the top of the human hierarchy, with slaves at the bottom, followed by non-slave laborers, etc. Of course, the wealthy land owners are the ones that paid Aristotle’s way so of course he would put them at the top of his arbitrarily decided hierarchy. Duh! Don’t bite the hand that feeds you.
What I find the most interesting is that over all these millennia how little has actually changed in the human hierarchical scheme.
shit
Why is figuring out Trump’s success so hard?
For more than four decades the GOP has developed an uneducated base of white people that vote Republican because the Dems give money to people of color.
They have won many elections because of their racist policies after they learned with Goldwater in 64 that they had to hide their racism behind welfare queens driving cadillacs and states rights.
The Road to Trumpdom was paved by the Southern Strategy and paid for by Goldwater’s birchers, the Kochs.
And this is a surprise?
Now, they had a candidate that put it all out in the open.. Stone cold racist at the heart of his soul(doubt he has one).
I agree with Longtooth but want to add some thoughts.
Those wealthy landowners from Aristotle’s day are now global plutocrats who own world wide private finance, most corporations, material and land. They represent the “invisible hand” of economics myth that is created to give reason to their decisions.
As long as the myth continues to be perpetuated that economics is other than cover for decisions by Aristotle’s elite, none will think to challenge our outdated form of social organization.
From Feb 2010: Obama, Socialism and Hayek’s Road
And as I said in Comments then, not even dreaming how apropos it would be in the Age of Trumpism:
And no “apocalism” is not a word. But maybe should be.
As to this from Warren:
You miss the point on two different fronts. One Hayek argued that any degree of central planning led to dictatorship. And that this was true whether the first step down the Road to Serfdom took the Left Path or the Right Path, like Goldberg later he saw Fascism and State Communism as two sides of the same coin. Two there was the implication that this was a conscious choice among left ‘liberals’ (Hayek would not have conceded he label to the Left, instead saving it for the Friedman version).
Hayek, at least seen in the OFFICIAL cartoon version (he never renounced this popular version of his thought even as he modified his ideas in later life) refused to accept the possibility that governments could be held in check by democracy. Like most folk now described as ‘neo-liberals’ (who might well describe themselves as ‘classical liberals’) he had a profound disrespect for what those liberals called ‘the mob’. Classical Liberalism was NEVER small d ‘Democratic’, it always valorized property ownership and demonized the poor and landless. We could summarize this is two words: “makers” and “takers”.
So yes Democrats (who traditionally do have faith in ‘democracy’, hence the name) do believe in a strong central government. One ultimately bounded and controlled by the people. As somebody somewhere said:
“Government of the People, by the People, and for the People Shall Not Perish From This Earth”.
I think this article is essential reading. It centers on the thoughts of Avik Roy, “a Republican’s Republican” who has spent much of his life “advancing the Republican Party and conservative ideals.” Roy’s observations on Trump and conclusions on why he has captured the GOP, which has become a White Nationalist party, fleshes out precisely the comment EMichael made. It is well worth reading.
http://www.vox.com/2016/7/25/12256510/republican-party-trump-avik-roy
I found the Roy article enlightening as well. But it rather elides over Buckley’s pre 1964 overt endorsement of white supremacy. That is Roy starts by endorsing (per Beauchamp) this:
and the tries to make the argument that things went off the rails in 1964 with this:
That is on my read Roy is making the claim that Goldwater hijacked the modern conservative movement. But then we have this:
Given this there is no way to justify the two following statements by Beauchamp, the racism he sees starting with a pivot point in 1964 was already imbedded in National Review style conservatism.
Nope. Sorry. This is revisionist revisionism. The racist rot goes right to the core.
“They have won many elections because of their racist policies after they learned with Goldwater in 64 that they had to hide their racism behind welfare queens driving cadillacs and states rights.”
In truth it was Hillary during Bill’s presidency who used a black woman in Ca. on welfare running around in an R&R too cut the social safety net.
Beene do a brother a solid and supply a cite for that? And what the heck is an “R&R”? A Rolls-Royce? A Range Rover?
Bruce, sorry can not find you a url, but it was all over the national news. The car was Rolls-Royce.
Will keep looking and if I find it will post URL.
Thanks, because I have been searching on combos of “hillary clinton” “rolls-royce” “welfare reform” and coming up with nothing.
A welfare mother who drove a Rolls Royce was…
http://www.upi.com/Archives/1983/06/23/A-welfare-mother-who-drove-a-Rolls-Royce-was/2292425188800/
AROUND THE NATION; Coast Woman Admits $377,458 Welfare Fraud
http://www.nytimes.com/1983/03/17/us/around-the-nation-coast-woman-admits-377458-welfare-fraud.html
Somehow I doubt this woman was really typical of welfare claimants at any time. Any system has rats running around, was Bernie Madoff REALLY the poster child for ALL financial advisors/investment brokers?
Return of the ‘Welfare Queen’
By John Blake, CNN
Updated 5:32 PM ET, Mon January 23, 2012
And I am still not seeing Hillary’s name attached to any of this.
The welfare queen idea became an integral part of a larger discourse on welfare reform, especially during the bipartisan effort to reform the welfare system under Bill Clinton.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare_queen
“In the left-wing case against Hillary Clinton for president, a central plank is her support for the 1996 welfare reform bill, passed by a Republican Congress and signed by Bill Clinton”
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/moneybox/2016/06/hillary_clinton_s_role_in_welfare_reform.html
Bruce, thanks for finding the article.
Yes. But nothing connects “integral part of a larger discourse” to Bill Clinton specifically and still less Hillary as regards the specifics of ‘welfare queen’ and ‘Rolls-Royce’.
Did Bill Clinton explicitly reference ‘welfare queen’? With or without reference to Rolls-Royce’s? Was there any instance of Hillary piling on to THIS PARTICULAR TROPE?
And so far the answer is “NO, NOPE, YOU GOT NOTHING”
Connect the dots and we can talk. So far I am not seeing it.
There were positive aspects to the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. Of particular note was the decision to disconnect benefits from unemployment as such and instead connect it to income. That is previously if single mothers had income from any source they were ineligible not only for cash grants but also from health care for their children under Medicaid. Which meant that taking a job, even one with possibilities for advancement might mean years of their kids going without health care or access to adequate food via food stamps. Which was a lot to give up for the opportunity to “pull yourself up by your bootstraps”. Instead the 1996 Bill allowed those mothers to still collect benefits on a graduated scale.
The mistake the Clinton’s made was to believe that Republicans under Gingrich were really willing to act in good faith. Rather than continuing to slash away at benefits.
Gingrich and Bill Clinton both agreed that we needed welfare reform in the worst way. What Bill didn’t understand is that Newt meant “in the worst way possible”. And proceeded to deliver on that.
But there was zero wrong with the idea that mothers could continue to get health care coverage for their children even after getting minimal employment. And that is still a good feature of the 1996 Reform. What Bill didn’t understand was the fundamental sociopathy of the Gingrich Revolution. Which should have been called the Grinch-Scrooge Revolution. Literally. Because Newt was all over Scrooge’s “Are there no workhouses?” with his proposal that poor kids should substitute for janitors in public schools.
Now to what degree Hillary shared culpability with Bill in the ultimate cruelty that resulted from the Welfare Reform Bill is an open question. But saying that she propagandized using “Welfare Queen/Rolls Royce” tropes is simple urban legend/bullshit.
No,
It is simple urban legend/beenelevel/bullshit.
Pops up every now and then.
Aside from being less truthful, corrupt DNC favored democrats differ from [non Trump] GOP only in the openness of their racism, and are less vocal about men using the ladies room.
Didn’t the welfare queen label start with Reagan?
Revealradio.org, in partnership with Market Place Radio, (both public radio programs), recently did an in depth look at how welfare was changed by the 1996 Welfare to Work law.
https://www.revealnews.org/article/welfare-check-less-money-is-going-to-basic-assistance/
For starters, replacing Aid to Families with Dependent Children (what most people think of when they think ‘welfare queen’, I believe), was changed to TANF -Temporary Aide to Needy Families – accent on the ‘temporary’. Here in NC food stamps have been cut severely.
Generally unknown is that the states can also choose (and several do)to use the money for family counseling classes and teen pregnancy/out of wedlock pregnancy programs (no abortion providers, not even referrals to one.)
One private company made millions teaching ‘family skills’. A crisis pregnancy clinic in one city siphons off this gravy train by claiming to help single pregnant women, but refuses to offer even information on anything but having the child, then telling the mother how to apply for benefits.
The amount of money that actually goes to cash benefits today is a drop in the bucket to what’s being taken in by private companies who are making a killing supposedly teaching ‘family values’, while taking food out of the mouths of real children.
I heard this radio report right after reading “Evicted”, which deals with the horrors of being a poor renter in America today.
There no doubt are instances of abuse by people living in poverty, or claiming to. But the REAL takers – on an industrial scale – are not the poor, but the people who make their millions off of them.
“Well, growth has turned out not to be a “substitute for equality of income.” Most growth for three or four decades has gone to those at the top and large income differentials have just gotten larger and larger and larger — not more tolerable. The expanded resources have not been devoted to “the Great Cleanup” — a not insignificant amount has been devoted to denying the necessity for any cleanup whatsoever. The environment is a hoax.”
Brilliant for its recognition of the self evident, and raising the unasked question, why do economists think there is anything rational about human behavior that would allow them to assume such good will outcomes? There is nothing humane in regards to human behavior. We simply continuously accept what are little more than philosophical bromides for the inadequacies of complex human activities, like economic phenomenon.
Welfare Queen?
Ronald Reagan, 1976 campaign. “There is a woman in Chicago…” NY Times: “‘Welfare Queen’ Becomes Issue in Reagan Campaign: Hitting a Nerve Now 4 Aliases Items in Notebook” 15 Feb 1976: 51.
“The problem is that the story does not quite check out.” Reagan claimed that 47-year old Linda Taylor used 80 aliases to embezzle $150,000. In fact, she was being prosecuted for using 4 aliases to defraud welfare of $8,000.
Of course the dog whistle point was that a person charged welfare fraud was somehow representative of all welfare recipients.
“The Welfare Queen: In the 1970s, Ronald Reagan villainized a Chicago woman for bilking the government. Her other sins—including possible kidnappings and murders—were far worse.”
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/history/2013/12/linda_taylor_welfare_queen_ronald_reagan_made_her_a_notorious_american_villain.html
Sandwichman:
You got it and she was driving a pink Cadillac with the fins of course.
I find it interesting that most of the discussion above made a detour from Sandwichman’s central topic, the metamorphosis of the conservative movement/Republican Party top decrepitude of the current Republican Party. We are suddenly once again looking for welfare queens as a wide spread phenomenon. Ain’t true now and ne’er was true ever. Struggles with abject poverty yes. Wide spread abuse of any current or former social support? Nope!!
Sandy Reagan called civil servants “li’l old ladies in tennis shoies”, gutted the civl service outsourced a lot and made it impossible for GS civilians to kil bad weapons because the merit system became “performance based” and no one ever got a good hearing from Merit Protection Bd.
Yeah it is hard to fire a li’l old lady in tennis shoes unless they had a performance plan and could not afford a lawyer and a 10 year fight…..
People we have a choice of two really bad people; so regardless of which we choose; neither is going to help the 90%. So let us inform the democratic leadership that the liberals will no longer vote blindly for maybe the lessor evil.
Remember regardless of third party choices we live in a country that only allows two choices rep. or demo.. We know that changing the republicans which seem hell bent on Liberian agenda is a lost cause if you care at all about the struggles of your neighbor and the welfare of our nation.
Liberian should have been libertarian, in the above post.
If anyone is confused about my above post; defeat Hillary soundly will send the right message.
Brother Beene, you have employed some very slippery reasoning.
For example, there are more than 300,000,000 people in the US. Obamacare has provided health insurance to 20,000,000 who never had it before or couldn’t afford it. But that’s only 15% of the population. So yes, it didn’t come anywhere meeting your standard of 90%. And yet…
Go to your nearest park. Count the number of children playing. In the US today, statistically 1 out of every 4 of them does not when or from where their next meal is coming. Helping hungry children comes nowhere near the 90% standard either. And yet…
I will tell you with absolute certainty — absolute certainty! — Hillary cares for that child. Trump has never thought about her.
Ms 57, we are in agreement, still if you follow all the URLs posted you are well aware it was a democratic president who helped the republicans end a real social welfare program just to stay in office. This same president ran on helping the 90%; and ended according to Woodard almost the day he took office.
Obama care has corrected some abuses by health Insurers, and made possible for those who really need health insurance can get insurance. But it is still based on the private insurance model. Plus our health insurance is almost three time the cost of other nations; and we rank with this extraordinary cost either 37th or 38th in the world for health care.
My apologizes for the comment about Bill turning on 90% the day he took office. It did take longer than that.
Brother Beene, we are indeed in agreement. But there’s one thing that is glaringly obvious yet people never seem to take into account. Obama never once campaigned on what to do with a global financial system in ruins. That catastrophic collapse was happening while he was campaigning. It was only in late September of that year — just 8 weeks or so before the election — when Bernanke and Paulson met with Congressional leaders. Whatever campaign issues had been bandied about, (nearly) all of them went straight out the window on January 21st, 2009. That is the only issue I can think of that rises to the level of helping 90% of the people. Cheers, brother…
Beene, by the way while mentioning your “slippery” reasoning I was engaged in demonstrably slippery math. 20,000,000 is not 15% of 300,000,000. Cheers…
Ms 57, I’m in the minority of how we should finance our government. I agree with H. Brown who wrote Web of Debt.
Basically it would finance government without debt and end the Federal Reserve Bank of NY.
There is a growing number of people who think we should have let the gamblers loose their money and a better result would have resulted from giving those billions to those who would have spent it into the economy.
Run,
I thought the lady in the pink Cadillac was Aretha………………(kidding)
Lover her hat at inauguration.