“Gutting the middle class, eliminating the social safety net, and “restoring order” to society is still
the conservative mantra, now heavily overlaid with racist tropes and rightwing Christian
ideology.”
I would put the right-wing Christian ideology and racist tropes and the authoritarian impulse at the forefront and portray the gutting of the middle class, elimination of the social safety net, and “restoring order”, along with promoting oligarchy as being overlaid on those more fundamental belief systems instead of the other way around. I believe that the focus has to be on the widespread influence of these reactionary concepts among the people and the unconscious bias in that direction to stop the steamroller that is crushing democracy. Until we see how ignorance and fear and backward thinking are perpetuated by our institutions, we will continue to slide backward.
Bernie knows and has said it, and the money powers were frightened.
The problem is class warfare. There is a ruling class and they are using their money and political power to stay at the top
All else, race, religion, civil rights, social equality are a subset of this class warfare.
How does one keep the rabble, the demos, occupied, and thus mitigate the threat, you do it by having them at each others throats, squabbling for crumbs.
This is what struck me most strongly about Thom's post: he is documenting that it is the oligarch class that despises (and wants to degrade the welfare of) the "regular working-class, "real Americans." Yet the enduring triumph of Rush Limbaugh, I think primarily, is in persuading the "regular" folks that it's the liberal "Left-Coast Elites" that oppress them! ("Flyover Country.")Talk about the Opposite of Everything is True! But I have read a lot about British society, and there was an equilibrium based on profound internalization of the scale of rank by the populace; everybody knowing his/her place according to birth status. This is still a complicated and finicky influence in Britain. The mirror image of "Consent of the Governed." Self-policed by the victims! Now there's some reverse snobbery: celebrities wouldn't dare talk "posh!" That part is operational here across the Pond: fear and loathing of the "overly" educated. Exhibit A: Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy, whose hick act for the benefit of his sucker constituents drives me high up the walll!
“Gutting the middle class, eliminating the social safety net, and “restoring order” to society is still
the conservative mantra, now heavily overlaid with racist tropes and rightwing Christian
ideology.”
I would put the right-wing Christian ideology and racist tropes and the authoritarian impulse at the forefront and portray the gutting of the middle class, elimination of the social safety net, and “restoring order”, along with promoting oligarchy as being overlaid on those more fundamental belief systems instead of the other way around. I believe that the focus has to be on the widespread influence of these reactionary concepts among the people and the unconscious bias in that direction to stop the steamroller that is crushing democracy. Until we see how ignorance and fear and backward thinking are perpetuated by our institutions, we will continue to slide backward.
Bernie knows and has said it, and the money powers were frightened.
The problem is class warfare. There is a ruling class and they are using their money and political power to stay at the top
All else, race, religion, civil rights, social equality are a subset of this class warfare.
How does one keep the rabble, the demos, occupied, and thus mitigate the threat, you do it by having them at each others throats, squabbling for crumbs.
This is what struck me most strongly about Thom's post: he is documenting that it is the oligarch class that despises (and wants to degrade the welfare of) the "regular working-class, "real Americans." Yet the enduring triumph of Rush Limbaugh, I think primarily, is in persuading the "regular" folks that it's the liberal "Left-Coast Elites" that oppress them! ("Flyover Country.")Talk about the Opposite of Everything is True! But I have read a lot about British society, and there was an equilibrium based on profound internalization of the scale of rank by the populace; everybody knowing his/her place according to birth status. This is still a complicated and finicky influence in Britain. The mirror image of "Consent of the Governed." Self-policed by the victims! Now there's some reverse snobbery: celebrities wouldn't dare talk "posh!" That part is operational here across the Pond: fear and loathing of the "overly" educated. Exhibit A: Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy, whose hick act for the benefit of his sucker constituents drives me high up the walll!