[P2P-F] Fwd: [CommonGood] FYI: Interesting view on American Elections

Sat Nov 12 19:59:48 CET 2016

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Birgit Daiber <bir.dai at hotmail.com>
Date: Fri, Nov 11, 2016 at 6:48 PM
Subject: [CommonGood] FYI: Interesting view on American Elections
To: "commongood at listi.jpberlin.de" <commongood at listi.jpberlin.de>

------------------------------
*From:* Daniel Cirera <dcirera at gabrielperi.fr>
*Sent:* Friday, November 11, 2016 12:34 PM
*Subject:* Fwd: Quick Reflections on the November 2016 Elections

Bonjour.

Pour information ces premières réflexions à chaud d'un ami américain, sur
les élections de ce mois de novembre 2016. Bonne journée. DC

<http://portside.org/>

Quick Reflections on the November 2016 Elections
<https://portside.org/2016-11-09/quick-reflections-november-2016-elections-0>

Bill Fletcher Jr.
November 9, 2016
billfletcherjr.com
<http://billfletcherjr.com/2016/quick-reflections-november-2016-election/>

*It is important to recognize that the Trump victory was far from a
slam-dunk; the election was very close. One might not get that impression,
however, when one looks at news headlines as well as Electoral College
maps. Bill Fletcher shares some quick reflections. *

, Pablo Martinez Monsivais / Jacobin
<https://www.jacobinmag.com/2016/11/trump-victory-clinton-sanders-democratic-party/>
,

Had it not been for the Electoral College, at this moment we would be
discussing the plans for the incoming Hillary Clinton administration.
That’s right.  She actually won the popular vote.  Thus, once again, that
institution created by the founding slave owners has risen from the grave
and prevented our exit from the cemetery.

I begin there to put the election into context and to suggest that
commentary needs to be quite nuanced.  No, I am not trying to make lemonade
out of lemons.  But I do think that it is important to recognize that the
Trump victory was far from a slam-dunk; the election was very close.  One
might not get that impression, however, when one looks at news headlines as
well as Electoral College maps.

What are some of the conclusions we can arrive at from this election?

*The election was a referendum on globalization and demographics; it was
not a referendum on neo-liberalism*:  It is critical to appreciate that
Trump’s appeal to whites was around their fear of the multiple implications
of globalization.  This included trade agreements AND migration.  Trump
focused on the symptoms inherent in neo-liberal globalization, such as job
loss, but his was not a critique of neo-liberalism.  He continues to
advance deregulation, tax cuts, anti-unionism, etc.  He was making no
systemic critique at all, but the examples that he pointed to from wreckage
resulting from economic and social dislocation, resonated for many whites
who felt, for various reasons, that their world was collapsing.

It was the connection between globalization and migration that struck a
chord, just as it did in Britain with the Brexit vote.  In both cases,
there was tremendous fear of the changing complexion of both societies
brought on by migration and economic dislocation (or the threat of economic
dislocation).  Protectionism plus firm borders were presented as answers in
a world that has altered dramatically with the reconfiguration of global
capitalism.

*The election represented the consolidation of a misogynistic white united
front:* There are a few issues that need to be ‘unpacked’ here.  For all of
the talk about the problems with Hillary Clinton-the-candidate and the
failure to address matters of economics, too few commentators are
addressing the fact that the alliance that Trump built was one that not
only permitted but encouraged racism and misogyny.  In point of fact, Trump
voters were prepared to buy into various unsupported allegations against
Clinton that would never have stuck had she not been a woman.
Additionally, Trump’s own baggage, e.g., married and divorced multiple
times; allegations of sexual assault, would never have been tolerated had
the candidate been a woman (or, for that matter, of color).  Trump was
given a pass that would only be given to a white man in US society.  All
one has to do is to think about the various allegations, charges and
history surrounding Donald Trump and then ask the question:  *had the
candidate been a woman or of color, what would have happened?*  The answer
is obvious.

Also in connection with this matter is that for all of the talk about
economic fear, there is this recurring fact that many people seem to wish
to avoid.  Just as with the Tea Party, the mean income of the Trump base is
higher than the national mean (and was higher than the mean for Clinton
supporters and Sanders supporters).  Thus, we were not dealing with the
poorest of the poor.  Instead, this was a movement driven by those who are
actually doing fairly well but are despairing because the American Dream
that they embraced no longer seems to work for white people.

This is critical for us to get because had the Trump phenomenon been mainly
about a rejection of economic injustice, then this base would have been
nearly interchangeable with that of Senator Sanders.  Yet that was not the
case.  What we can argue, instead, is that this segment of the white
population was looking in terror at the erosion of the American Dream, but
they were looking at it through the prism of race.

*Hillary Clinton, as candidate, was flawed but we should be careful in our
analysis:*  Though Clinton had expected a coronation, the Sanders campaign
pushed her to be more than she expected.  The platform of the Democratic
Party was shifted to the left in many important respects.  Yet Clinton
could not be champion of an anti-corporate populist movement.  Yes, she
correctly argued to tax the 1%.  Yes, she articulated many progressive
demands.  But in the eyes of too many people, including many of her
supporters, she was compromised by her relationship with Wall Street.

That said, what also needs to be considered is that Trump had so many
negatives against him.  Yes, he was an outsider, so to speak, and used that
very skillfully to argue that he would bring another pair of eyes to the
situation.  Yet, this is the same person who is in the upper echelons of
the economy; refused to share his tax returns; has numerous allegations
against him for bad business with partners and workers; and engages in the
same off-shoring of production as many of the companies he criticized!
Yet, none of that haunted him in the way that various criticisms haunted
Clinton.  Fundamentally this was a matter of sexism, though it is certainly
true that Clinton’s being perceived as an insider did not help.

*We don’t know whether Bernie Sanders would have done any better but we do
know that his message is the one that needs to be articulated:*  It is
impossible to accurately predict whether Sanders would have done better in
the final election.  He certainly would have been subjected to an immense
amount of red-baiting and suggestions of foreign policy softness.  Yet his
message did resonate among millions, especially younger voters.  And it was
younger voters who did not turn out in force to back Clinton.

In entering the Trump era it is the movement that Sanders was part of
coalescing that becomes key in building a resistance that has a positive
vision.  One of the weaknesses of the Sanders message was its failure to
unify matters of class with race and gender.  This is not an academic
exercise.  This is about telling the right story about what has been
happening in the USA.  It is also a matter of taping into significant
social movements, e.g., Occupy; immigrant rights; LGBT; environmental
justice; movement for Black Lives.  These are movements that are focused on
the future and a future that is progressive.  This, in fact, is where the
hope lies.

******

I have argued for some time that right-wing populism—with the Trump
campaign exemplifying an aspect of this—is a revolt against the future.  It
is a movement that is always focused on a mythical past to which a
particular country must return.  In the case of the USA, right-wing
populism seeks a return to the era of the ‘white republic,’ and it is this
that the Trump campaign was so successful in articulating.  It did so
through disparaging Mexicans, suggesting them as a source of crime,
completely ignoring criminal syndicates that have historically arrived in
the USA from Europe.  It did so through demonizing Arabs and Muslims,
suggesting them as sources of terror, completely ignoring that the greatest
sources of political terror in the USA have been white supremacist
formations.

Right-wing populism has grown as a result of both the ravages brought on by
neo-liberal globalization as well as the demographic and political changes
within the USA.  It is the latter—demographic and political changes—that
have unfolded over the decades as previously disenfranchised groups have
asserted themselves and articulated, to paraphrase the poet Langston
Hughes, *we, too, sing America.*

Yes, let us lick our wounds and reflect on the future.  This election
result was one that more of us should have anticipated as a real
possibility.  In either case, that the results were so close and that we
did not have the ideal candidate to represent the new majority emerging in
the USA remains for me a source of immense hope.

The struggle certainly continues.

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-- 
Co-editor of "Claim No Easy Victories:  The Legacy of Amilcar Cabral"
See:  http://www.codesria.org  and http://www.daraja.net
Author of "'They're Bankrupting us' - And Twenty other myths about unions"
See: http://www.beacon.org/Theyre-Bankrupting-Us-P916.aspx
Co-author of "Solidarity Divided:  The Crisis in Organized Labor and A New
Path Toward Social Justice"
See:  http://www.ucpress.edu/books/pages/11121.html
Follow me on Facebook and at www.billfletcherjr.com

-- 
Daniel Cirera
Secrétaire général
du Conseil scientifique
Fondation Gabriel Péri
Tour Essor
14, rue Scandicci
93500 Pantin
France
Tel: 33 (0) 1 41 83 88 50
Fax: +33 (0) 1 41 83 88 59
www.gabrielperi.fr

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