Neil Kramer on leveraged idealism: music edition

The Manics

     

     Every so often Chigblog goes a little dark.  Akin to Dan Carlin’s (and Winston Churchill’s) “Black Dog Depression”?  From the end of the, um, grim song “Of Walking Abortion” by the Manic Street Preachers:

Little people in little houses

Like maggots small blind and worthless

The massacred innocent blood stains us all

Who's responsible - you fucking are

Who's responsible - you fucking are

Who's responsible - you fucking are

Who's responsible - you fucking are

Who's responsible

     And another chunk of lyrics from Black Sabbath's "Cornucopia":

Let them have their little toys

Fast sports cars and motor noise

Exciting in their plastic place

Frozen food in a concrete maze

You're gonna go insane

 I'm trying to save your brain





     Not so little people these days, nor such little houses, but perhaps yes to the rest, frozen food, fast food and endless car commercials.  Where is the hope in this view – none needed: pure fact and realization, uttered succinctly and piercingly.

Neil Kramer

     Checked out Neil Kramer again recently.  (For another interview check out Neil’s talk with the terrific Jasun Horsley – awkward . . .)  I’ve liked what Kramer has talked about since I first heard him though there is a flicker on my bullshit meter.  But hey, the same could be said for just about everyone right?  (Chris Hedges is awesome but still the flicker – this is bizarre.)  Anyway, he was on fire talking with James Tracy.  We have just had our record breaking caucus here and Mr. Kramer name dropped the source – or the representative – of all that interest.  Here is his quote:

There are two, essential different worldviews in America and Europe at the moment. […] The first worldview holds that the government is democratic, does some good things, does some stupid things and is kind of struggling under difficult circumstances with a lot of bureaucracy and red tape but it is nevertheless freely elected and is a decent representative body to administrate national and international affairs on our behalf – the best thing we have right now.  […] An empire leverages that dream, for those people who buy into that, it leverages that idealism – Bernie Sanders being a great example of that – and it provides hopefulness to naïve people I would say, quite frankly.  […]  The second worldview, much simpler. A view which arises from a very stark realization that the government is utterly broken, deeply corrupt and quite beyond reform.  Not something that in any way can be reversed engineered or progressively adapted to meet the need of modern society.  And, in fact, one cannot help but conclude that the government is not at all in the business of representing the people.  It never was.

     So what do we do?  Listen to grim tunes? What can break the mold that these rock bands so ruthlessly skewer?  I appreciate that in Kramer's interview he compared Napalm Death to George Michael.  Michael was a commercial success delivering risqué pop songs while Napalm Death was relatively unheard of singing about the dark realities of the world.  Perhaps its time to break out Jared Diamond's Collapse and ruminate on the impermanence of it all.  To end with some lyrics to Stereolab's "Wow and Flutter":

I thought IBM was born with the world

The US flag would float forever

The cold opponent did pack away

The capital will have to follow

It's not eternal, imperishable

Oh yes it will go

It's not eternal, imperishable

The dinosaur law

Stereolab

The Lion of Idaho series: the principles of Borah

Sen.William E. Borah

     To me, William E. Borah seems an anomaly.  A legendary figure: a man serving the state of Idaho as Senator who became known and beloved nationally.  Known for his ability to deliver rousing and mesmerizing speeches, he used the speaker’s podium as a means of presenting his bold and unwavering views.  I try to imagine a Senator today being regarded so well – a Republican, Borah had the support of the Democratic Party in some of his re-election campaigns.  No one from Idaho now lives in that spotlight. 

     And to imagine the world where speeches were not only routinely well attended but also were reprinted in the leading papers of the day.  Definitely not the world we live in today.  In this series I hope to further explore these differences and, as I make my way through the book Borah of Idaho by Claudius O. Johnson, hope to note how, if in any way, Borah evolved over his life and career.

     His principled reaction to a pork-laden bill in the Senate – one that had a healthy chunk of pork for Idaho in fact – is indicative.  The River and Harbors Act of 1914 “carried an appropriation to deepen and clear the channel of the upper Columbia River” (158).  The bill would throw money at projects in wasteful way and Borah thought the Columbia project could be carried out in a more cost-effective way.  When the Commercial Club of Lewiston asked Borah why he would not support the bill, he replied:

“It is indefensible both as a matter of policy and by reason of the notoriously bad items or projects covered by the bill.  Anxious as I am to see a rivers and harbors bill passed, I find myself unable to compromise upon a measure which to my mind is indefensible from the standpoint of official decency and public morals. {…] I would like to feel that I have the support and endorsement of the people of Lewiston . . . But whether I have the support of the people at home or not, I must oppose this bill in its present form.”

     Later the revised bill passed and Lewiston got its project – perhaps Borah knew the next bill had a better chance of getting passed and used the first bill as an opportunity to grandstand.  But he was the one, allied with others, who did the work to change the bill.

     Still, a public pronouncement of his intent with reference to “official decency” and “public morals”.  And he was listened to.  American citizens today don’t even like politicians, let alone take what they say at face value.  As we move forward, let’s see if what Borah says remains to be held in high esteem by the public.

Two worlds collapse

     Thoughts of China Mieville’s The City & the City – overlapping worlds existing one on top of the other.  People of the other world there but not there, seeing them being illegal.  Law requires the other denizens – physically there, geographically overlapping – to be unseen.  Diplomatic proceedings are needed to interface with the other city.  Basically the United States now.

     I’m all for the idea that perception forms our reality, that our experience of reality is mediated and therefore is constrained by that mediation – not just sight and hearing but, more importantly, the intricate, sophisticated ways the mind forms reality.  The mind sells the product that it produces as concrete, cold-hard reality – “no, not mediated – that sure is reality you’re seein’”.

     Different realities, different worlds, overlapping.  The two worlds of Trump.  The polarities are so interesting – the passions enflamed on both sides.  A savior on one side.  A Hitler on the other.

     So what happens when these worlds collapse and synthesis is made?  Recently pundit David Brooks gave some insight into a sort of forced bridging of the gap:

NPRs ROBERT SEIGEL: [. . .] you wrote an anti-Trump column today - not your first, I should note. And on the subject of not having seen Trump's appeal early on, you wrote this - (reading) for me, it's a lesson that I have to change the way I do my job if I'm going to report accurately on this country. Elaborate.

DAVID BROOKS: Well, you know, I didn't - I wrote many columns saying he would not get the nomination.

SIEGEL: And you did mention that here as well.

BROOKS: Yeah. And I have probably said on this microphone many, many times. And so it looks like I was wrong. And I think it's because I wasn't socially intermingling with the sort of people who are Trump supporters. So I knew they were hurting. I didn't know they were hurting - they were going to express their hurt by supporting Donald Trump. And so in the years ahead, I've got to spend a lot more time with different sorts of people.

     At first it seems amazing that Brooks would have this gap in his worldview.  Perhaps it was a game of wishing the world to be a certain way.  As a voice of the political establishment, Brooks has been used to accurately representing the world as it is.  Now the dominant world must take into account a secondary, co-existing world.

David Brooks

     On the other hand the is Thomas Frank, who has specialized in analyzing how people vote against their own interests.  In his What’s the Matter with Kansas he looks at two worlds in conflict: the rich and poor, the establishment and the progressives, during the Great Depression.  I’d like to conclude with a quote from his new book Listen, Liberal: Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People?  It goes a long way in describing the economics of the two worlds now:

There was a time when average Americans knew whether we were going up or going down – because when the country prospered, its people prospered, too.  But these days, things are different.  From the middle of the Great Depression up to 1980, the lower 90 percent of the population, a group we might call “the American people,” took home some 70 percent of the growth in the country’s income.  Look at the same numbers beginning in 1997 – from the beginning of the New Economy boom to the present – and you find that this same group, the American people, pocketed none of America’s income growth at all.  Their share of the good time was zero.  The gains they harvested after all their hard work nil.  The upper 10 percent of the population – the country’s financiers, managers, and professionals – ate the whole thing.  The privileged are doing better than at any time since economic records began.

First foray: The Trump rabbit hole

     Okay, I’ll take the bait – it seems like it is a big deal anyway . . . the presidential election.  And Trump has risen to the top both in his party and on the scales of controversy.  The emotions simply swirl around this man – is it possible to be a fence sitter when it comes to Trump?  Those emotions would be: “meh”, “so what”, “don’t care”, etc.  It’s not interesting though this position is kind of my default.  Then, on the extremes (the only seeming options besides the uninterested middle): pride, fear, “I identify strongly with him”, “I hate him”, love, disgust, “he’s evil”, “he’s what America needs”.

     So, let’s get right to it: how much does Trump matter?  People talk of the imperial presidency, that the power of the president has changed, grown over the years.  What will he do and what is he capable of?  Will he enact some crazy policies – will Mexico start building the wall?  Can’t see the future, don’t know – yet, terrible vs. great, the future-gazing lines up on the two extremes.

     We can’t know what he’ll do or what he’ll be allowed to do.  But, I’ll cede that it is important to talk about it.  At the moment what Trump says is either menacing or empowering, again, dependent on which extreme you’re on.  This is rhetoric, something any speaker must be aware of and capable of.  So do we have to buy it?  Isn’t a grain of salt required – no – isn’t a huge grain of salt basically implied?

     So those opposed to Trump – kind of reminds me of the reactions when Obama got elected.  There was a lot of talk from Republicans about moving to Canada.  (And now 28% of Americans say they’ll head north if Trump is elected.  That’s only 89 million people.)  Think of the emotions involved.  Same on the pro-Trump side.  Let’s consider another way of looking at Trump’s candidacy.

     This is the idea that his candidacy is a referendum.  I like this idea as it gets into semiotics – what is the meaning of the Trump candidacy, what does it represent?  Now we can really get into it.  It goes something like: Trump is a reflection of issues in people’s hearts.  In a postmodern sense, Trump exists as a collection of personified emotions/opinions.  For many people, supporting Trump has become the only way to express themselves.  And, conversely, on the contra-Trump side, hating Trump has become a very satisfying way of expressing oneself.

     And what are the issues?  They are legion.  Trump suddenly becomes the only way to make America great again.  He becomes the person who is ushering in unspeakable repressions.  But I like taking that step back, becoming a spectator.  I admit that Trump does matter, but it is in the sense of the symbolic.  Trump’s presidency may make it okay – in someone’s mind – to go ahead and commit that hate crime.  Or he may make you move to Canada.  The facts are out the window.  This is the realm of the emotional.

I(rony) have a dream?

King, Jr. speaking at anti-Vietnam War rally, 1967

Martin Luther King Jr. holds a special place in the American pantheon – a place that apparently can’t be described as “well known”.  Not anymore.  This article from the Institute of the Black World breaks down what has become called the “The MLK Whitewash”.  The simple point being that King was a man with well-developed views about important topics who became reviled by his allies later in life because of those views.  But now, in the realm of the sound bite, his life and message have been boiled down to hope, or the concept of overcoming.

So my interest (ire) was piqued recently seeing a Boeing commercial seeking to thank America which includes a brief clip of King in the course of its montage.  What’s not right about this?  For one, King was opposed to the Vietnam War while Boeing provided craft for the US side.

Boeing CH-47 Chinook in action, Vietnam

This cements the idea of King being “whitewashed” – a peace activist, a proponent of non-violence.  Nice co-option for the second largest defense contractor in the world!  King’s image is perhaps already co-opted, though.  “Brazen” comes to mind but that time has already past.  The fact that King’s image can show up in an ad for a military contractor shows a pretty high level of complacency on the part of the audience – Boeing isn’t breaking any barriers or breaking any hearts in using his image.  It’s okay, say their focus groups, if the ad company that made the commercial even saw a need to gauge the response of King’s presence.  He’s just part of the great American story – part of the past, you know, when they/we/he overcame.  Now all is copacetic.

Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial

The co-option runs a little deeper, though.  It turns out that Boeing has given $2 million dollars to the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial in Washington, D.C.  A benevolent corporate donor.  “Peace, brought to you by war.”

A small excerpt from the speech:

"Somehow this madness must cease. We must stop now. I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. I speak for the poor of America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home, and death and corruption in Vietnam. I speak as a citizen of the world, for the world as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I speak as one who loves America, to the leaders of our own nation: The great initiative in this war is ours; the initiative to stop it must be ours."

Gettin’ blanded out, roboted out: Is everything political? Is everything politicized?

"They're only gonna bland us out, robot us out."

     Have you heard of this idea – that everything is political?  Every choice you make is laden with political baggage – which you may embrace or ignore.  Is that right?  It’s an important question because it can have important effects. 

     Sonny Bunch helps clarify this idea, marking a difference between a political life and politicized life.  For him a political life is merely taking an interest in politics, recognizing that important questions are raised and important decisions are made in this realm.  But then there’s the politicized life:

A politicized life is a different beast, however. It treats politics as a zero sum game or a form of total warfare in which the other side must be obliterated. It alters every aspect of your being: where you shop; what you watch on TV; what sort of music you listen to; who you associate with. If you’re not with the politicized being, you’re against him—and if you’re against him, he is well within his rights to ruin you personally and economically. You, the political other, are a leper to be shunned, lest your thought crimes infect the rest of society.

     Damn.  I agree and I do see this occurring around me, people taking up the banner of their (political/politicized) tribe.  The behavior is that of jerks as Bunch describes.

     But I think there is more going on.  I think the politicized person has come to a decision, based on their experiences, life lessons, and influence of their (politicized) social group.  That is fine: thinking is fine.  Thinking is great.

     But what if everything is political?  That means everyone lives a politicized life and if you say that you aren’t political or politicized you just aren’t paying attention.  Money makes a difference and economics goes a long way in determining how our lives are lived.  Here are some charts.  And please for the love or everything righteous and holy do yourself a favor and listen to this: Richard Wolff!

Dr. Richard Wolff.  Throw his lecture on your mobile device and go for a stroll.

     Yet we sally forth each day, making our proud decisions . . . in a politicized world.  A world of illusion?  Where we don’t recognize a deeper meaning to our behaviors . . .



Live 1984, photo © Eyeneer Music Archives



     Let’s use Joe Strummer’s model for voting to approach the idea from another angle, a long quote but, God, worth it for Joe’s lingo and vision:

     So it occured to me that since my real vote is useless, null and void, therefore we ain't gonna start runnin' down the street burnin' and a-lootin' either 'cause our ass is gonna get canned. So that leaves the only vote anybody's got, this dollar bill. All I'm trying to say is, when I wanna buy a record, I'm gonna take my dollar bill and go to some corner guy with his weird, kooky little shop. I'm not giving this to Virgin Megastore. The same when I'm going to buy some clothes- I ain't gonna go to Gap no more. I wanna go to Ditsy Louie's Junk Clothing Box. I'm using my vote here, this dollar bill is my vote. I'm not gonna go to a fast food joint. I'm going to go to a place where people own it, where the owner is standing behind the bar, picking his teeth.

     This is my new philosophy. Use your vote, your dollar bill is your vote. It's time we stopped giving it in the bucket-loads to these giants corporations. They're not to be trusted with that amount of money. They're only gonna bland us out, robot us out. They're gonna crush us and pulverize us. All they want is our money. They'd rather that we just sat on the pavement, saying nothing and giving them dollar bills. That's what they want the world to be while they have their cocaine and champagne. The dollar bill is your only vote. That's my new vibe.

     A car with a Republican sticker.  A car with a Democrat sticker.  The stickers are different but they’re both on cars.

The proper headspace for the ritual of meat consumption

    Imagine two people talking – shooting the bull – about their buying burgers at the burger franchise of whoever’s choice.

Person 1: Nah, man I just go to fill my belly.  Really, bacon is good on anything but on a burger, mmm, mmm, mmm!

Person 2: But yeah, don’t you kind of go to show off your wealth, a little bit?  That’s why I go – it shows I’m part of the club.

P1: What?  No. What am I going to cook a burger myself?

P2: Well, by going to the burger barn you show you don’t have to cook for yourself.

P1: Um, okay, like I’m just going to whip together a triple bacon cheeseburger?

P2: And it shows your dominance in the food chain – farming has become an industry that caters to our need for burgers.

P1: Bro, you’re harshing my mellow.

     Anyway, something like this is what goes on in so many facets of life.  Do you ever see a luxury car go by and the driver looks like they think they are in a luxury car commercial, and you, not at that level of affluence, feel cars should be utilitarian and not unnecessarily ostentatious?  No?, Just me?

     I feel that our relation to cows is one of the cornerstones of our society, the meaning of which has shifted over the years.  Let’s compare eating a hamburger in 1970 to eating a hamburger today.  What do those different burgers represent?  In 1970 it is a celebration of an American meal hard-earned through the due diligence of the Cold War.  When the person met the plate in 1970 they have a solid, American job, say in a factory.  They celebrate the novelty of driving-through a place to get the burger, a melding of a quintessential American meal and the quintessential American pastime, driving.  The concept of factory farming and the effect of farming on the environment was in its nascence and did not even exist in the back of this diner’s mind.

     And today?  A lot has changed since 1970.  The environment is omnipresent in the news – the Kyoto Protocol dates to 1992.  People drive more and more of necessity: homes are located far from shopping and even farther from the workplace.  Now the celebration and ritual of the fast food meal is a necessity of the time-crunched individual.  The concept of nutritional value is something that is everyone’s minds now too, unlike the past when average American body type tended more towards the lithe.

     Today I think the meat we eat is imbued with a different spirit then it was in 1970’s.  Along the lines of the differences illustrated above let’s look at more of what the world of beef consumption says about us.

     Life has sacred divisions – the burger-flipping caste is there to serve me. After all it is a rite of passage all on its own.  In America you can start as a fry cook and work up to CEO.  The minimum wage is the divine allotment to this class.  Koan: are the lives of those who clean other’s houses also too short to clean their own houses?

     The sacred car must be understood as part of the ritual.  This is the hunk of metal/mode of conveyance that almost everyone takes part in.  This is how we interface with drive-throughs, the sacred vestment that you must be in to receive meat-of-a-thousand-cows through the small window.  A purchase of drive-through burger says, “I accept the role of the car in American life.  I support our procurement of the holy-unguent of oil – our actions in the Middle East are justly sanctioned.  I accept and make holy the debt incurred and the holy bondage to this debt – everyone is doing it”.

     And lastly, beef consumption shows that we have ritualized, well, ignorance.  Is that ignorance when we now something is detrimental but ignore it? – there is a little bit of knowledge there.  We suppress it.  We have created a ritual that lets us partake in something that on some level we know is bad – but not feel bad about doing it.  This is something smart phone users must face and suppress when they hear about poor working conditions in smart phone subcontractor factories.  This is now a virtue, the decoupling of how we view ourselves and the real way that we act in the world.  This is the craze for authenticity, a need generated in world where action and intent have been separated.

The metaphysics of meat



     “What does it say about us?” – that idea.  What does it say about us that we idly consume products made with misery?  I’m talking about mass production of beef in the world.  Harm to the animal, harm to world and harm to us.  Usual disclaimer: I do eat meat.

     This is an old argument.  Who wants to hear it?  Lines already drawn.  What have I to offer to the conversation?  Well, I offer to explore the idea of something being imbued.  Malcolm Gladwell (love him or hate him or be indifferent to him) covered something similar to this concept in Blink, where you have the phenomenon of experts of, say, Greek sculpture being able to discern professionally-rendered fakes at a mere glimpse.  This ability comes from years of experience and dealing in a very material specialty – that which is carved in stone.

     So too beef, where animals stressed at the time of slaughter have higher levels of adrenaline which transferred to the meat and effects the taste and quality.  This is a very real.  This is the taste of fear – imbued in the meat.

     What of the vibe?  Here we go metaphysical, which means leaving the materialist crowd behind, though, well, alas, yes it means leaving them behind.  But if you’re religious or spiritual or just feel a connection to nature, then hear me out.

     Our actions are recorded on what we touch and on things we interact with.  For an extreme example, think of a murder house and how you would feel being given the keys and told it was yours to live in – never mind if it was haunted or built on a cemetery.  Even muting the spiritual or religious, isn’t it still creepy?

     So apply that to meat, beef.  There’s a time in a factory farmed cows life when all is well, say, sunrise on a warm day, the trough freshly filled.  Then there is the crowded conditions, the abuse suffered at the hands of violent workers, and the eventual, walk into a facility resounding with scared, spooked fellow creatures, terror building until – stunned – and killed.

     Then the meat, with terror tangible in it, is processed in fluorescent-lit environments by employees treated like cattle themselves, put into/onto plastic and Styrofoam, frozen, shipped and put into containers with images decrying a that what is seen is only a serving suggestion.

     Are all these steps in the process imprinted in the meat?  Are they imbued?  At the very least the meat as an artifact itself does represent the industry, those types of jobs, and the economic system as a whole – an economic system that endorses and abets this production method.  Are these concepts recorded in the meat?  There is the leap.  But a purchase of the meat by an individual is, like the government, a condoning of all those systems and behaviors – massive fossil fuels intensive farms, exploitative shift-work and the blurring of the lines when it comes to the health of a populace and the health of the industry.

Revisiting What's the Matter with Kansas?

     Reading Thomas Frank’s What’s the Matter with Kansas? was a watershed moment for me – finally a reason was given for the perverse behavior of poor people voting for Republicans.  Of course these are the same politicians that were passing laws that saw the same poor people grow even poorer.  Frank’s argument, in brief, is that people vote based on politician’s social policy and not that politician’s economic policy.  A Kansan, or whoever else, will vote for someone who is pro-life (a social policy) even though that same elected legislator is pro-shipping American jobs overseas.  And, frustratingly, this happens in a state with such a wonderful progressive past.

     The code had been cracked – so simple, so obvious.  Reduce funding for public schools so much that they can only afford one book then legislate that the book purchased must be the bible.  Put another way: “The existing economic order is beyond question: it's just there as if it were the will of God.”

     In the last few decades there hasn’t been a popular progressive movement – in the sense that would see significant numbers of progressive candidates put into office.  The official parties, Democrats and Republicans (together which, of course, comprise the War Party) haven’t had to alter their platforms and grapple with internal dissension as they did in the Progressive Era, 1890-1920.  In the rearview mirror the Occupy Movement fizzled out despite being comprised of wide ranging interests.  The War Party attacked Occupy and Occupy had its own internal limitations.  Also, the most famous progressive politician of late, Bernie Sanders, is an Independent, only nominally a Democrat for this election.

     Why no movement?  I swear I’ve seen T. Frank being confused by this apparent lack of basic common sense.  Let’s try to answer why, let’s critique his argument.  The best critical review I’ve found states it simply that things don’t boil down to pure economics:

 Frank's book is remarkable as an anthropological artifact. Although not terribly successful at explaining the cultural divide, it manages to exemplify it perfectly in its condescension toward people who don't vote as Frank thinks they should. Call this the Aretha Franklin version of the culture wars: people want respect, and they're more likely to vote for the party that gives it to them. More than that, people are unlikely to vote for a party that shows contempt for them.

     A simple kindness can go so far, just a little respect: “Call this the Aretha Franklin version of the culture wars: people want respect, and they're more likely to vote for the party that gives it to them. More than that, people are unlikely to vote for a party that shows contempt for them.”  Frank underestimates the power of a little bit of ego stroking.

Thomas Frank

     I still think Frank’s view has merit.  I would just add one more factor and that is the overall health of the economy.  Like, overall.  Being objective – which is a very, very, very tough thing to consider and which must take in factors to the n^th power.  Consider that the average American is in the top 1% . . . globally.  So during their time of apparent evisceration, the Rust Belt Americans that Frank talked about where not really reaching rock bottom.  But now maybe are – remember during the Great Depression people starved.

     Maybe now people are facing really hard times and that is being reflected in people’s political behavior – maybe what was the matter with Kansas was times weren’t quite tough enough, not like the populist heyday of the late 19^th – early 20^th c.  As John Michael Greer writes:

The problem with plutocracy, in turn, is that it embodies the same fixation on short-term personal advantage that gives it its entry to power, since the only goals that guide the rich in their increasingly kleptocratic rule are immediate personal wealth and gratification. Despite the ravings of economists, furthermore, it simply isn’t true that what benefits the very rich automatically benefits the rest of society as well; quite the contrary, in the blind obsession with personal gain that drives the plutocratic system, the plutocrats generally lose track of the hard fact that too much profiteering can run the entire system into the ground  A democracy in its terminal years thus devolves into a broken society from which only the narrowing circle of the privileged rich derive any tangible benefit. In due time, those excluded from that circle look elsewhere for leadership.

Perhaps the system is finally being run into the ground and that is what is waking people up.