Democrats and Revolutions
Many years ago back in my college days I took a class on revolution taught by an Israeli marxist. Even though my politics have shifted rightward from where they were back then, I haven’t forgotten what I learned in that class and recognize it as being one of the better ones I had during my 6 years in academia.
One of the important things I learned was that it is the nature of revolutions to turn on themselves. In the end, the revolutionaries always turn into that which they revolted against in the first place. The rebels become the regime, and during that process they inevitably turn on their leaders. The death warrant of Danton is inevitably signed by Robespierre who in turn is guillotined by those he once led.
Every revolution follows this cycle, and its presence indicates that a revolution is in progress. By this measure it is clear that the Democratic party is in the final stages of a revolution begun by the so-called “Deaniacs” three years ago. Howard Dean’s candidacy was energized by liberal bloggers, who organized a grass roots campaign that resulted in a juggernaut behind Dean’s candidacy. Don’t forget that at one point, Al Gore, Bill Bradley and Jimmy Carter supported Howard Dean’s candidacy and recommended that other candidates unite behind Howard Dean in January 2004.
However, the Democratic powerbrokers including the Clintons’ man Terry McAuliffe , head of the DNC, stymied this revolt temporarily as he engineered John Kerry’s candidacy.
After Kerry lost the ‘04 election, the revolutionaries took power with the usurping of McAuliffe in Feb 05, and have since pushed the national party leftward under the leadership of Howard Dean.
We are currently in a stage of ideological “purification” – think Mao’s Cultural Revolution here – where the troops all carry their little red books, don red scarves, and rat-out their parents as “counter-revolutionaries”. The most visible attacks are centered on Joe Lieberman, who has suffered some of the nastiest attacks I’ve ever seen in a democracy – let alone in a liberal-on-liberal attack. That’s monstrous stuff – beyond the pale of even the most enthusiastic Rove-fan. Now other Democratic politicians are running scared, afraid to find themselves in the cross-hairs of the “purification cadres”. Others inevitably will find themselves in that position before the ‘06 election is over in 4 months. 4 months is plenty of time for careers to be shortened, reputations ruined.
But the cycle of revolution will not stop. Eventually the moderates who survived the purges eventually retake power in the stage known as Thermidorian Reaction (Marx is big on stages) after the revolutionaries weaken their cause by destroying themselves.
When will that happen?
There are two possible points:
1. the November ‘06 Election - The Deaniacs demand an oath of fealty to their belief that the Iraq War is a failure – just at a time when the war is petering out and the Iraqis are taking care of themselves. Should the war fail to be the defining issue in November, their “ideological” candidates will be trounced at the polls. This will force Dean to quit the DNC and leave the Deaniacs stunned, disheartened, and eventually apathetic – allowing the moderates to take back the party.
2. the November ‘08 Election - Should the Deaniacs survive the midterm elections, they will be even more energized and place a McGovern-type presidential candidate at the head of their party. While Americans may not like the Iraq War, the odds are that they will like an ideological candidate even less. Expect a landslide victory for the Republicans along the lines of ‘72 or ‘80.
Americans aren’t very ideological. Most are too busy to be energized by any one particular issue. Given the conditions of a growing economy and a war that is successful in its aims in Iraq, as shown by the failure of the anti-war movement to gain traction during the past 5 years, then it is likely that the revolutionaries will fail; it’s only a question as to when.
I’ll predict November ‘06 as of today, July 10, 2006. If I’m wrong, be sure to stop by and view my apology which I will hyperlink to here if and when it is necessary.
Dean's World:
Face Up On the Guillotine – The Democratic Revolution
I have written a lengthy piece on the revolution that is happening in the Democratic party. It explains why Joe Lieberman is being targeted by the current powerbrokers of the party, an…
10 July 2006, 10:05 amMartin L. Shoemaker:
I guess I’m missing something in your starting thesis: when and how did the American revolution turn on itself? If you’re going to paint such behavior as inevitable, it seems like you have to explain why no such event happened in our own revolution. I mean, the Articles of Confederation and all that was a bit of a mess, but hardly “turning on itself”. It was all just civil debate. And the American Civil War, coming two full generations later, seems a little late to call “turning on itself”.
10 July 2006, 10:43 amAdministrator:
The American Revolution was not a revolution. It was a war of independence. Our system of government didn’t change all that much, and therefore it is not considered to be a “true” revolution like the English Revolution of Cromwell, the French, or Russian.
10 July 2006, 10:51 amDave Schuler:
And he’ll also leave the DNC broke. I think that’s why Rahm Emmanuel, for example, is so angry. He’s busily out there drumming up contributions from high-rolling backers and Dean is even more busily squandering the dough via financial mismanagement.
10 July 2006, 11:32 amMartin L. Shoemaker:
But then by that measure, can what’s happening in the Democrat Party possibly be called a “true” revolution?
On the one hand, we have a shooting war, allies dragged in, and the birth of a new country; but because the new country’s government falls in the same general class as the old country’s government, it’s not a “true” revolution.
On the other hand, we have an overwhelmingly non-violent (there may be fringe violence, but not enough to notice) squabbles over money, and alliances and falling outs, and endorsements and refusals to endorse, and influence peddling, and dueling press releases, and book and magazine articles, and interviews, and lots and lots of blogging; and when all is said and done, the names and faces may be different (or may not), but I expect the Democrats will still have the same party structure, the same rules for primaries and caucuses, the same everything. If that’s a a “true” revolution, I just can’t see how a shooting war and a new country doesn’t count as a “true” revolution..
10 July 2006, 12:35 pmKrsitian:
The American Revolution was not a revolution. It was a war of independence. Our system of government didn’t change all that much, and therefore it is not considered to be a “true” revolution like the English Revolution of Cromwell, the French, or Russian.I beg your pardon, did you really say ‘Our System of Government didn’t change all that much’? From a near despotic monarchy to the representative democracy is ‘Not all that much’? By that reasoning, nearly all the Revolutions are not really worthy of that appellation.
Further, remember the articles of confederation failed badly. ‘Tis true that the leaders that survived the war for independence, as a rule, did not turn on each other. But there was some bitter, bitter political infighting. The genius of those men is that they either were superior men whow could rise above those petty bickerings to work for the common good, or that they devised a system that could survive those confilicts (or a bit of both).
10 July 2006, 12:45 pmAdministrator:
Krsitian & Martin
I think you might be catching me on some vestigial Marxist dogma. Here’s the logic:
The American Revolution wasn’t a revolution because the monarchy was not “despotic” (although from the colonist perspective it was due to the fact that Parliament didn’t represent them). We went from a parliamentary democracy to a republican democracy, which doesn’t “count” as a revolution. Revolutions by definition were complete changes from feudalism to capitalism (Cromwell, French Rev) or from Feudalism to Communism (Russian).
I agree with you that this view does diminish the truly revolutionary aspects of the American Revolution (eg the only successful government that came out of the Enlightenment).
So you may have caught me there. If so, good job! I’m all for deprogramming the bits of academia that have survived my own experiences outside of the Ivory Tower.
10 July 2006, 1:02 pmMartin L. Shoemaker:
Thank you, both for the forthrightness and for the education. Indeed, I wondered if this might be some “vestigial Marxist dogma”, but I wasn’t sure. It seemed to me an awful lot like defining the terms narrowly enough to “prove” a point by excluding any counter example; and since you’re usually a lot more cogent of a thinker than that, I wondered if this was a bit of Marxist Theory rather than real empirical data.
I think the general theory fits a lot of historical situations; it’s just the “always” and “inevitable” parts I had trouble with. The Marxists like to dress their Theories up in the trappings of science and predictive power, when all too often the Theories are closer to wishful thinking.
And since “inevitable” is off the table, that means there’s hope for the Democrats that they can hold a revolution without significant internecine warfare. We can hope…
10 July 2006, 1:28 pmTony Zbaraschuk:
One thing to keep in mind is that the American Revolution was “Revolution 2.0”—the colonial and English political system had seen the revolution come and go in the English Civil War; lots of Americans did not want their revolution to go that far.
Particularly Washington—we owe that guy an amazing amount.
11 July 2006, 4:01 pm