Okay serious answer, no I don’t think democracy is not feasible, I think that democracy is crucial and the inherently oligarchic elements of American democracy, in particular, and to a lesser extent parliamentary democracy, are exploitable in a way that is especially problematic in the context of the post-1980s “shareholder value” type of corporate governance that has become so common. I think that democracy needs to be restructured in a way that is bottom-up on a sub-municipal level. I know that sounds soviet but that’s not what I mean, it should be an open system which is NOT premised on a vanguard party or anything like that. I think that would work in an American context is something more like a Rojavan or Zapatista type of structure, but with higher level protections on a federal level for certain rights, which should include positive rights instead of just negative ones. I also think, unlike democratic confederalist systems currently, there does need to be a separate, yet democratically accountable, judiciary that operates on the basis of stare decisis.
Ultimately, these are very long term and difficult changes, so for the time being I think that building some kind of dual power is a good goal, although to show the viability of this kind of democratic structure rather than, as is usually the goal, trying to somehow smother the state in its entirety. I think site difficult, but actually somewhat feasible, goal should be to enact a third founding, the first being the typical “founding” of America and the second being the reconstruction amendments, which fundamentally changed both the federal structure and almost all federal legal analysis immediately. A third founding, I think, is the only way to do things like enshrine positive rights, abolish the senate or make it proportional, repeal the amendment limiting the size of the House, etc, although making the states themselves bottom-up rather than unitary will require similar, parallel action on the state level.
For the more immediate future, the answer is not, I think, founding some kind of socialist party, but it does require making Democratic Party politics much more democratic and populist. This isn’t that hard, relatively speaking. Parties are pretty easy to structurally change. We can’t win if we keep attacking anybody going against the establishment consensus and accusing them of fictionalism for being leftist and criticizing the DNC’s actions. This thinking is what kills one party states and it will kill the Democratic Party too.
Sorry I’m being such a dick, I just hate seeing such a resurgence of Democratic groupthink at a make or break moment when we reeeeeeeally need to do some internal soul searching and serious self criticism. And most importantly stop trying to uphold norms of decency and reasonableness. It won’t work, we unfortunately have to get in the mud and play dirty back. There’s no valor in losing on the high ground when democracy itself is at stake.
Okay serious answer, no I don’t think democracy is not feasible, I think that democracy is crucial and the inherently oligarchic elements of American democracy, in particular, and to a lesser extent parliamentary democracy, are exploitable in a way that is especially problematic in the context of the post-1980s “shareholder value” type of corporate governance that has become so common. I think that democracy needs to be restructured in a way that is bottom-up on a sub-municipal level. I know that sounds soviet but that’s not what I mean, it should be an open system which is NOT premised on a vanguard party or anything like that. I think that would work in an American context is something more like a Rojavan or Zapatista type of structure, but with higher level protections on a federal level for certain rights, which should include positive rights instead of just negative ones. I also think, unlike democratic confederalist systems currently, there does need to be a separate, yet democratically accountable, judiciary that operates on the basis of stare decisis.
Ultimately, these are very long term and difficult changes, so for the time being I think that building some kind of dual power is a good goal, although to show the viability of this kind of democratic structure rather than, as is usually the goal, trying to somehow smother the state in its entirety. I think site difficult, but actually somewhat feasible, goal should be to enact a third founding, the first being the typical “founding” of America and the second being the reconstruction amendments, which fundamentally changed both the federal structure and almost all federal legal analysis immediately. A third founding, I think, is the only way to do things like enshrine positive rights, abolish the senate or make it proportional, repeal the amendment limiting the size of the House, etc, although making the states themselves bottom-up rather than unitary will require similar, parallel action on the state level.
For the more immediate future, the answer is not, I think, founding some kind of socialist party, but it does require making Democratic Party politics much more democratic and populist. This isn’t that hard, relatively speaking. Parties are pretty easy to structurally change. We can’t win if we keep attacking anybody going against the establishment consensus and accusing them of fictionalism for being leftist and criticizing the DNC’s actions. This thinking is what kills one party states and it will kill the Democratic Party too.
Sorry I’m being such a dick, I just hate seeing such a resurgence of Democratic groupthink at a make or break moment when we reeeeeeeally need to do some internal soul searching and serious self criticism. And most importantly stop trying to uphold norms of decency and reasonableness. It won’t work, we unfortunately have to get in the mud and play dirty back. There’s no valor in losing on the high ground when democracy itself is at stake.