Patriot Militias, Neo-Conservatives, And Neo-Libertarians (fwd)

[Brad Dolan <bdolan@USIT.NET>]

Highpoints from the 80K piece.

A really fine rant

bd
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Subject: Patriot Militias, Neo-Conservatives, And Neo-Libertarians 


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This essay comes from the june issue of The Leveler, a Los Angeles
Anarchist newspaper. ...

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PART ONE 
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Patriot Militias, Neo-Conservatives, And Neo-Libertarians
by Drifter "Bob" for @nt Press News


1.) ON LIBERTY, MILITIAS AND THE NEW RIGHT

Recently, the long simmering conspiracy theories that have always
existed on the lunatic fringe of the far-right here in America have
been metamorphosing into a variety of surging mass-movements,
organizations, and popular trends, to the great surprise and indeed
alarm of most Americans, especially, of course, those in the center
and left of the political spectrum. The movements associated with this
are growing in influence, power, and militancy, and continue to be
underestimated and misunderstood by the mass-media and the
professional opinion shapers. They may, in fact, reflect general
world-wide trend which could influence the next major series of
transformations of the human condition...

Nowhere can one really find an accurate analysis of these movements in
my opinion, despite the proliferation of simplistic evaluations which
are being bandied about everywhere in the wake of recent events, and I
think it is important for those of us on the far-left, particularly
(small l) libertarians, to try to reach a profound understanding of
the nature of this phenomenon for what it really is. This is true
whether your goal is to fight this thing, to influence it, to benefit
from it's presence, or to anticipate and prepare for it's many
consequences (for anarchists I think there will be many consequences,
both negative and positive).

For about the last year I have been studying the new pseudo 
libertarian right, spending a lot of time reading about it in both the
mainstream and underground media, and also talking to people who are
on the fringes of some of the constituent movements in various forums
on the internet, and other location in 'cyberspace'. Through the
course of hours of virtual arguments interviews and study, as well as
a few face to face conversations, I have formed some opinions of the
real nature of this thing and of our potential role in its
development, existence and influence. I can also guess at some of the
possible outcomes and influences it will have in the future. Before I
describe my own opinions though, I'd like to analyze the ones you are
probably already aware of.

There are basically 4 current views of this thing which are espoused
by the 4 major players who are interested in it: the Establishment
Right; the Establishment Left; the grassroots right (that is to say,
for the most part the militiamen and 'patriots' themselves, as well as
Nazi's and fascists further out on the fringe...); and the grassroots
or far-left. None of these groups in my opinion has an accurate grasp
of the nature of the movements which have arisen, the agendas or
origins of the body of theory that lie behind them, or especially of
the forces which are driving them and giving them all those ideas and
energy, seemingly out of thin air.

2.) WHAT EVERYBODY ELSE THINKS AND WHY THEY ARE ALL WRONG

The Conservative Perspective

The Establishment Right understands it the best probably, though they
of course are missing the point quite a bit so far, thank goodness. In
their opinion (to use their language) this is a popular cultural and
political counter-revolution against the extremes of social liberation
and the resultant breakdown of society, and a fundamental rejection of
the manipulation of the media and the 'cultural elite'. Basically they
see it as the pendulum getting ready to swing very far over to the
right at a time when people thought it was heading to the left, all
the further and harder because it was so unexpected.

By putting this spin on the situation they have been able to 
successfully (so successfully in fact that they may have scared 
themselves.) tap into the stream "anger" and seize a huge amount of
legislative power in the government. By withdrawing the old school
party hacks and presenting more radical, more demagogic new political
candidates who echo some of the buzzwords of the new movement, and by
adopting some issues popular with the grassroots of the right wing,
such as second amendment rights, orthodox Christianity, and various
forms of cultural or racial bigotry, they have managed to seize hold
of the keys to the candy store.

Having been given these keys by the grassroots, the Establishment (or
"Paleo") Right politicians are busy looting it on behalf of their
corporate sponsors, with even more frenetic zeal than you might expect
- as if they were afraid this golden opportunity was nothing but a
dream likely to be snatched out of their greedy hands at any moment.
Their enthusiasm is tempered only by a certain uneasiness about the
powerful and mysterious forces which so suddenly and so unexpectedly
gave them this opportunity, an uncertainty which may prove to be well
founded in the long run.

The Conservative politicians are delighted to pass any number of laws
denying welfare to practicing witches, prohibiting the use of  Soviet
Military vehicles on Interstate Highways, or forbidding members of the
Georgia National Guard from wearing blue helmets and swearing
allegiance to Zionist conspiracies, but eventually their new allies
are going to start wanting some type of action which will lead to an
inevitable conflict of interest. Obviously, any sweeping changes which
will benefit middle and working class  Americans are likely to
adversely effect not just minorities and "special interests" but the
real constituency of the Establishment Right: the Corporate
Plutocracy. When this happens, the shit is going to hit the fan,
because the Paleos won't, of course, be able to move against their
financial backers and the chances are that they won't of course be
able to double-talk the "Patriot" element of their constituency
indefinitely either.

This is the key to the whole thing, which I will explore in more depth
in a minute: some of these people just aren't buying the bullshit
anymore, regardless of how sophisticated or subtle it is - it's not
longer enough, they are going to want concrete improvements in their
lives. If they don't get them, especially when their lives are in fact
made palatably worse as a result of all the Robber-Baron legislative
initiatives sold to them by their friends in the Establishment, they
will turn elsewhere for satisfaction.

The Liberal Perspective

The Establishment Left is even more unprepared and less cognizant of
the nature of this thing. For years the mainstream left has bemoaned
the diminishing levels of popular enthusiasm for or participation in
the "Democratic Process" (i.e. universal suffrage), a fact which they
attribute in a rather elitist manner to the indifference and stupidity
of the electorate in general.

They hold this view in spite of the fact that most of them freely
admit to the rampant ideological stagnation of both parties in the
political system, and to their own personal awareness of the
Machiavellian realities which pull the strings of the power brokers on
the Left as well as the Right.they still expect citizens to
enthusiastically embrace "the lesser of two evils" in spite of the
fact that they know the mainstream left is virtually as bankrupt as
the right.

It never occurred to anyone in the mainstream Establishment, on either
end of the conventional political spectrum, that people were voting by
not voting - that they chose "none of the above" because THEY MEANT
IT, not just because they were trying to be cute. The failure by just
about all politicians other "representatives of the people," such as
the media, to recognize this fact is perhaps due to an unwillingness
on their part to accept the reason for it: many people are beginning
to realize that the current political system is incapable of meeting
their needs, and it is  now starting to look like older techniques of
what Noam Chomsky calls "manufacturing consent" are losing some of
their effectiveness.

Due to their ignorance of and perhaps hostility toward this vast
political, social, and cultural trend, the Establishment Left -
especially the democratic party and the "liberal" elements within the 
media - have positioned themselves as supporters of the reactionary
opposition to it, on the side of government authority.

[...]
One characteristic of this trend is the recognition of a new axis on
the political grid, which may change the shape of political struggle
and ultimately perhaps change the social structures which rule the
world. This new dimension is of course that of liberty versus
authority, which is becoming increasingly important to many ordinary
people, as reflected by some of the strongest new political trends in
the world right now: the libertarian center-right "Northern League"
Party in Italy, which is currently the most important political force
in that country, the left libertarian Zapatista movement in Mexico,
and our own government-fearing right wing "patriots" here in the U.S.,
not to mention various other fairly large left-libertarian anarchist
movements in countries such as Sweden, Denmark, Spain, and Greece.

Adding the libertarians vs. authoritarian axis to the standard 2
dimensional political landscape of the 20th century helps break the
deadlock that ha muddled peoples understanding of political realities
and allowed various governments or other forces to use "lesser of two
evils" rationalizations to support unpalatable agendas. Thus, any
confusion related to such contradictory concepts as the United States
supporting dictatorships in Latin America on the basis that they are
"democratic" due to their opposition to Communism, or from the other
perspective of various "Communist" dictatorships being somehow
revolutionary due to their opposition to Capitalism, can be seen in a
new light: regardless of whether Guatemala is theoretically right-wing
and North Korea is theoretically left-wing, they are both clearly
hellish authoritarian dictatorships which no one in their right mind
would want to live in.

This new distinction is often just as important to regular citizens as
the more traditional economic one (Capitalism vs. Socialism), though
it is normally totally ignored by their political leaders, and they
have finally begun to learn on their own, for some interesting
reasons, that despite the various rationalizations and rhetoric they
are fed to the contrary, the unchecked  growth of State authority in
their own Nation could be as much of a threat as the menace of
Communism or Imperialism from abroad.

The Radical Left

Unfortunately, it looks so far like the majority of organizations and
individuals in the relatively moribund North American left-wing
opposition are no more astute in their reaction to this thing than the
Democratic Party, if anything they are even more enthusiastically
jumping on the LAW AND ORDER bandwagon in their fear of it. This is of
course not entirely without good reason - like many similar populist
trends in the past the current new Right does have some affiliation
with the more rabid Nazi-type groups and political theories.

However, the new movements do not appear to me to be merely a
reincarnation of the John Birch Society. The core of these movements
are not in my opinion highly sympathetic to extreme fascist-type
beliefs, at least not yet, and the size and depth of them probably
preclude simply writing the entire phenomena off as a right-wing
aberration, nor do I believe the grassroots left will greatly benefit
from an alliance with the secret police. After all, gun wielding
citizens militias are not a new thing in this country. They were once
a highly effective tactic of certain progressive groups.
...

... the "Bullshit Gap."

To put it simply, the increasing ability and desire for rapid lateral
communication through such means as the public mail, the underground
press, telephones, fax machines, short-wave radio, and now the
Internet has enabled large sections of the general public to begin to
form their own conclusions about the nature of reality. Perhaps not
surprisingly, these opinions, derived from direct perceptions of the
world, (i.e. research, and observation of individuals), and reinforced
by comparison with the observations of neighbors and friends, differ
to a large degree from the "official" reality paradigms presented by
the Government, the Media, and all the various corporate, social, and
political entities who wish to shape and guide public opinion for
their own ends.

Waco Wake-up

One of the biggest gaps between the officially recognized worldview
and reality as these people see it is in the realm of increasing
government authority and the threat this poses to democracy.
Regardless of whether you may think this is a valid perception, there
is enough information available (especially recently after the release
of government documents to the general public in the early days of the
Clinton administration) to convince hundreds of thousands, perhaps
millions of Americans that there is an increasing danger. Certain
events such as the Waco Texas debacle have dramatically raised the
alarm of common folks from the level of the theoretical to the real
and visceral, much to the confusion of the media and others.

This actually is a common type of reaction historically. It is the
same kind of event that ended an era of hardcore union-busting when
strikers and their families machine-gunned en-masse in the Ludlow
Massacre, forced prison system reforms after the slaughter at Attica,
changed the public opinion of the Anti-War movement after protesters
were shot at Kent State, threw support behind the civil rights
struggle after numerous lynchings and bombings in the Deep South, and
has caused innumerable riots and insurrections throughout the history
of America. Citizens don't like seeing other citizens get killed, once
that starts, it's time to re-evaluate everything they are being told.

The incident at Waco and a few other eerily similar Government acts
over the last few years caused a lot of people to begin casting about
for a new worldview that would not excuse what they saw as Government
murder and oppression. Many folks encountered the increasingly
libertarian leaning body of right-wing conspiracy theories and
urban/rural legend that was already forming a new and fairly
sophisticated if quirky philosophy in the grassroots. The once narrow,
reactionary, intolerant ideology of the far-right had undergone a
quirky evolution which allowed elements of it to find this niche among
the American psyche.

...

[This has been] very frustrating to just about all of their
"representatives" in both political arms of the mainstream, each of whom
views reality through differently colored spectacles and sees these things
as signs of progress. The consensus in the media and the establishment
intelligencia is that the common people are invariably motivated by
short-term greed, backward orthodoxy, or other forms of stupidity, and
are completely incapable of understanding the "Big Picture" or
ultimately even acting in their own self-interests. There is a
universal desire on the part of these folks that the ignorant masses
would stop agitating and causing trouble for their betters and let
them engineer these things for their own good.

The American political and social elite envision an ideal type of
citizen which they have represented in the movie Forest Gump: pious,
loyal, patient, and mildly retarded, with a head full of quaint
colloquialisms and little else, devoted to a lifestyle of family
values, hard work, self-sacrifice, and quiet suffering. A
Gump-American would certainly be willing to forfeit control of his
destiny to the economists and technocrats who have the Harvard and
Yale educations needed to understand the issues of the day, and when
necessary they wold be glad to translate the reasons for the various
austerity measures he will have to endure into amusing Gump-dialect,
so that he could explain them to his family.

[...]
Part of the electorate has seen through some of the weaknesses in the
rather half-hearted arguments of their leaders, and is beginning to
form it's own opinions. Perhaps more ominously, they have developed a
new cynical outlook which insulates them from some of the manipulative
techniques of the past, thus rendering them virtually immune to that
type of influence, for better or for worse.

Thus the American male of the 1990's is in fact turning out to be a
lot different from the wistful fantasy of Forest Gump. The role model
many seem to be emulating is closer to a character from a Charles
Bronson movie: a suspicious, creepy loner with a borderline psychotic
personality which hints at the potential for sudden violence, and 
armed to the teeth with the knowledge and the equipment to be
potentially dangerous. Now many of these guys are getting together in
large groups, broadcasting their dark speculations over the short-wave
radio and the Internet, comparing evaluations of the government and
the ruling institutions, and not liking what they are seeing one bit
through their infrared binoculars.
[...]
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