Voters of Wisconsin!

[Originally posted in Marx's Theory of Revolutions on March 13, 2011]

Voters of Wisconsin! Whom have you elected?

The class analysis of revolutions would no doubt provide valuable insights into Governor Walker’s “revolutionary” budget. Of course, it’s not truly a revolution because he hasn’t used violence – yet.

Also, it’s never the case that counter-revolution could ever be revolution. Revolution is always on the side of the little and the many; counter-revolutions are carried out against their gains by the big and the few. We believe history favors the many in the long run – but is this just something it is pleasant to believe?

The great mystery of democracy is how the few could ever command more votes than the many. There is a short answer: fear and ignorance.

I guess there are some people who have figured out the mystery and put the freedom of speech in the awkward position of obscuring rather than guaranteeing the truth even in the long run. That is, under this evil spell the people seem to become more rather than less ignorant the more speech they hear about a matter. Speeches are for sale, after all.

It’s a nice superstition that truth is like a jewel, and always and finally remains or becomes visible to the faithful.

It’s also a palpable truth that civilizations decay and fall. Maybe ours will be the first to die of ignorance –

–  Isn’t this foolish talk? Yet it is undoubtedly the case that a sufficient proportion of the many have been induced to vote against their real interests to elect Governor Walker – at least I don’t doubt it. And if you try to decide whose ox is gored by each and every dollar he is still planning to cut from the budget…

…Or just write “working poor” alongside each item. (Not to mention those who besides have lost rights formerly protected by the law.)

Problem is, the working poor are especially vulnerable to fear and ignorance, even when they summon up enough spirit to vote at all.

There’s another strange class, with hardly enough education to be considered petit bourgeois of the professional stripe, who don’t run their own businesses but own their own homes, and who are bought into the capital markets just enough to be afraid of losing it all some way or another. So they’re not petit bourgeois on any of those accounts.

These people make just enough money to complain about taxes, and begrudge the money going to public purposes, because they’d rather have it for private purposes – to buy those things they envy the real petit bourgeois for having, and for which they occasionally go far too deeply into debt.

And so the passions of envy and frustrated self-indulgence amplify the still deeper ones of fear and ignorance in these unfortunate souls. They can’t identify with the unions, whose members they also envy. They begrudge every dollar government spends on the working poor, when really the only difference between the two classes is that they actually make a living wage – and own their own homes.

That’s crucial, because they also pay property taxes. Governor Walker has made a career out of this specific manipulation.

There’s much more to be said about this.

One thing is that, where there is tension between classes, like as not it is between classes that are very near to each other, as between the sub-petit bourgeois I have been talking about and union members, or between the working poor and (legal or illegal) immigrants. The nearer the threat, the larger it looms. This phenomenon tends to obscure any actual identity of interests that may exist between two such classes. Instead they oddly find themselves rivals, and the rivalry is easily exploited by the few to cover up real disparities of interest, which if recognized, would otherwise lead voters to vote against the interests of the few.

Another thing is the naiveté of the tea party about politics. This has been remarked upon by many pundits.

This might also be connected to the particular sub-petit bourgeois class I am talking about. Where would this class possibly get the generous and liberal ideas normally associated with social progress? From the internet? From the entertainment media? From the pulpits of their evangelical preachers? Maybe at the corner tap.

And then they “vote for the man, not the party” – really just for the impression of the man. It’s actually possible to form, for example, the impression that the quitter former Governor Palin is clever and knows that she is talking about. Or that being able to form an impression of a public figure is a substitute for sound, reflective, genuinely independent judgment.

But I digress…

…And maybe here speculative philosophy gets beyond itself. Maybe no principled reason can be given why this particular class is politically naïve. But it’s not speculation to infer that naïve beliefs are for sale to whoever can buy the most impressions to put in front of the naive. And again, speech may be free, but speeches are for sale.

And this is how it’s possible for a people to elect a Governor and a legislature so destructive to the rights of the many – and now openly so, and not under the shadow of fear cast by an out-of-balance budget.

But there’s a sequel. Could the courts possibly settle this, at the highest level, by restoring the rights of the many?

Voters of Wisconsin! Whom did you elect to your Supreme Court? A man whose lies about the candidate who ran against him suited fearful and ignorant prejudice; a woman who blithely heard cases against her husband’s companies in her court, and ruled in his favor. At least she accepted the richly deserved censure the court itself was unable to agree to levy against him.

But these morally defective figures are not going to help form a majority in favor of pulling your chestnuts out of the fire.