This article is massive clickbait, but I'll comment anyway.
Trump and Sanders are manifestations of a long-term trend that has been building at least since the 2008 Financial Crisis. People are dissatisfied with the options they are presented politically, and economic participation is at historically low levels. We have never been more prosperous, but at the same time that prosperity and wealth gains are not only not very evenly distributed(they never really were), but large swaths of society are completely left out of them. In the early half of the century, it was a democratizing effect that everyone was drinking a 10c glass of Coke. This is just one example, you can also see it with iPhoneistas vs cheap Android phones, etc. etc. Now the hip drinks are craft beers and fine wines, and a former factory worker forced to work menial part time jobs is looked down upon for drinking what he can afford, Bud lite and coke. There are major class shiftings and reorganizations going on, and people living in and near large prosperous cities have largely been immune and isolated from it.
We dismiss and ignore their rise at our own peril.
>Now the hip drinks are craft beers and fine wines, and a former factory worker forced to work menial part time jobs is looked down upon for drinking what he can afford, Bud lite and coke.
Two related articles that may inform your discussions of this topic:
For context, and lest anyone think I'm taking a cheap shot at liberalism or progressivism, I definitely see myself in the first article. Particularly in my teens and early twenties, I was about as smug as they came. Then I went meta-smug by posing as an angry libertarian, and was utterly insufferable. These days, I think and feel much the same, I just don't go out of my way to socially advertise it (or I put more effort into not making others feel small?).
>There are major class shiftings and reorganizations going on, and people living in and near large prosperous cities have largely been immune and isolated from it.
One place a prosperous urbanite might bump into this shift is when a city winds up with a commuter police force due in part to high rent.
Those are both good articles that express much better than I the trends I am seeing. Particularly, in the Vox article, when it talks about G.W. Bush being a "dumb hick", you can see shades of this with Trump and his rhetoric today.
Thank you for sharing these articles. The first one from vox really feels like it underlines not only the smugness that's crept into liberalism, but also its tone is exasperated and at times even pleading.
It feels like a reflection of the mood of our general political discussion, where people are pissed off with the echo chamber and not getting the empathy that's needed from either direction to make livable decisions. This feels like one of those situations where human nature hasn't changed, but the internet has fundamentally altered social dynamics.
It goes back to at least the descent from peak manufacturing back in the late 70s. In the eighties it was inconographied by the sledgehammer destruction of imported cars.
That was the working class shouting out loud, hey, we're losing our jobs in the name of globalization, but we're not seeing benefits only turmoil (and in retrospect cheap consumerization of goods).
So, by and large, the blue collar working class have shouldered the repercussions from the gains enjoyed by the upper middle class and the wealthy -gains made possible through globalization.
In addition to that working class whites feel that they have shouldered most of the cost of equalization of justice and economics. That's to say when society addresses past injustices its remedy is not equally shared by the upper middle class and the wealthy. In other words when the seriously aggrieved are given a chance at success it's not at the cost to upper middle classers or the wealthy but mostly the working class.
It's not that they are bigots and are racists and begrudge success of classes historically disadvantaged, it's that the upper middle class and wealthy never contribute to the cost of justice.
I think after decades of pandering from Repubs and Dems who just patronize them they have had it and are asking for their money back. I think this is what you see.
> a long-term trend that has been building at least since the 2008 Financial Crisis
A good chunk of Trump voters didn't really benefit from the "90s boom" either. As a small army of dot-com millionaires were being minted, the Rust Belt continued to rust.
The actual founding was laid even earlier in the Clinton administration people are blaming 2008 crisis for the current anti establishment sentiment are being myopic. The trade deals and removal of banking restrictions supercharged the Us economy and US reaped the benefits for the decade after but that is also the point that wealth started shifting to the top from the middle class and it has kept going on till the middle class has started to revolt.
An open world market is good in theory but can really work only if the laws in all countries are the same. Today we get cheap stuff produced from third world countries because those countries do not have the same worker protections etc available.
Bush and Republican spending trillions on wars instead of spending that money at home on infrastructure has made things worse.
> Trump and Sanders are manifestations of a long-term trend ... 2008
8 years is a long-term trend now?
My impression over the past 30+ years being in US (and reading up on history) is that there is a clear downward trend in terms of 'quality' across the board, whether in 'establishment', or 'fringe'. For example, for black radicals we had people like Malcolm X, and then we ended up with Sharpton. Out goes JFK, in comes Billy from Arkansas. Out with Nixon, in with Reagan. If this is a collective bottom-up phenomena, then clearly 'we' are giving ourselves the collective finger.
If we're talking about political cycles, then yes that counts as long-term. I agree though this has been going on a lot longer than just since 2008, but 2008 was when I think the tide really started turning.
That's the enigma in our 2 party election system. Republicans somehow convince "the other 99%" (more realistically, the middle/lower class) to vote AGAINST the economic policies that would benefit them the most (those coming from the Democrats).
That's exactly the problem. For the 1st time in recorded history of democratic societies, the sons will live in worst conditions than their parents. This didn't happen even when after major armed conflicts.
1st world has increasing economic output but most people of the new generation also in the 1st world are starting to live and will live their life in worst conditions than their parents.
These are the most favorable grounds possible for revolution.
> For the 1st time in recorded history of democratic societies, the sons will live in worst conditions than their parents.
This lie needs to stop being told.
The Greatest Generation was born in the 1915 era, grew up in the "Roaring Twenties", the largest economic boom in the US to that date. When they became of age ~18 (1933), the USA was hit with twin economic disasters:
* The Great Dust Bowl eradicated entire farms across entire states. Forcing many farmers to move to the city to look for labor. When the farmers got to the cities, they found...
* The Great Depression. `nuff said
The "Greatest Generation" wandered around with 20%+ unemployment level for YEARS while "old money" sat comfortably enjoying the benefits of new-fangled technology like air conditioning and ice machines.
When the economy was finally doing well, the USA joins World War 2 and virtually every working male is drafted into the military. If you didn't die in the war period in the 1940s, you came back to 90% tax rates so that the US could pay off their debt. It wasn't until 1950 or so, when the post-war economic boom started to positively affect this generation, when they were well into the age of 35 or older.
-----------------
Yes, the "Greatest Generation" had a crappier life than their parents. And then the "Greatest Generation" set up huge amounts of programs (invented Social Security, Medicare, started paying incredibly for education) to ensure that their children would have better lives than they did.
Come on, basic history people. THINK when these politicians shout words to you. Don't just parrot out their lies.
I mean, cripes. Just look at the literature that was written in the 1930s by the Greatest Generation. "Of Mice and Men" is about vagabonds looking for farm-work. While "Their Eyes were Watching God" is about a woman who was beaten by multiple suitors before being forced to kill the man she loves because a hurricane wiped out a region and a rabid dog have him rabies.
Common in both stories? Hard, hands-on work, and vagabond living. "Casual Homelessness", as these people travel from town-to-town on foot looking for a way of life. Everyone is a nomad and homeless, and not a big deal is given to it.
In contrast, the "Great Gatsby", written one generation earlier in the 1920s is about rich people doing rich things, and is literally about a new rich person not being respected by older richer people. While the main character gets a new house "modestly" and watches across his Long Island lake property at the "actual rich people" and moral bankruptcy of the parties they hold.
And exactly as the article states, there was a revolution exactly at that time because of the effects of the great depression and the lives of those people ended up better than their parents after that same revolution took place.
A revolution doesn't need to be an armed revolution.
I care about your ridiculous claim that's being lamented by certain politicians who have nothing better to do than lie at your face.
> For the 1st time in recorded history of democratic societies, the sons will live in worst conditions than their parents
Can people PLEASE stop saying this line? The article notes a cycle, which is closer to my understanding of history. But none of this "first time ever" crap. I swear, every time Marco Rubio said this line I wanted to punch him in the face.
> The article notes a cycle, which is closer to my understanding of history
That's because either your understanding of history, your written comprehension, or both are quite bad actually.
The article notes a cycle that is always corrected with some kind of revolution, armed or not.
The article also notes that in open societies sons never end up living worts than their parents (in general, not with your naive example of a particular case where a son ends up living a worst life than his parents because of some hurricane) because either society functions properly and that is not a issue, or if it doesn't revolution takes place.
To be fair, the "New Deal" regime was perceived to be failing circa 1970.
For instance, the New Deal left racism intact in the South, there was the Vietnam war, the "Spirit of '68", high inflation, a huge expansion of regulations leading to more problems (for instance the 1974 model year of automobiles were awful because they had to satisfy stricter emission standards without a perfected catalytic converter, etc.) There was the cult boom and the strange fact that "The Greening of America" sold millions of copies.
In 1979 Merril Lynch was a penny stock, in many ways capitalism seemed to be on the ropes. If you don't believe me look at "Legitimation Crisis" by Habermas.
One contemporary diagnosis of the condition was that there was "too much democracy" and if you look at what happened, all of a sudden the door got slammed on people like Ralph Nader and the range of what you could ask Washington for diminished over the 1980s, with the 1990s sealing the deal -- at that point the lobbying system became almost entirely focuses around tax breaks for special interests with an occasional scam like "Medicare Advantage".
For instance in the 1980s you still saw environmental legislation being passed, but once Clinton got in the Republicans ran fanatical resistance until getting solid control of the House and since then there has been gridlock.
People like the Koch brothers threw unlimited money at promoting right wing ideas, Fox News has a 24 hours hate whenever there is a democrat in the White House, etc.
This has led to a new condition of ungovernability which is as much a riot of the rich (who funded 17 losers to run for the Republican party because Conservatism makes them feel warm and fuzzy) as a riot of the middle class.
"Boaty McBoatface" sealed the deal for Brexit because it symbolizes what "democracy" is about these days. They ask your opinion, because they want to look legitimate, but they don't honor it.
> "Boaty McBoatface" sealed the deal for Brexit because it symbolizes what "democracy" is about these days.
What does that even mean? I hope you don't honestly think that that poll had any effect on the brexit situation?
I tend to side with the bookies over listening to polls, and the bookies odds are on staying[1]. Apart from recent football mishaps they seem to be on the ball, they saw Khan coming a mile off for example.
I guess what he means is that more substantive issues work the same way as the boat naming thing -- they ask for your vote but then if they don't like the result they'll toss it.
Good point. I'll be controveraial and point out that there are parallels to Prop 8 in California here. And the immigration legislation in Arizona that was overturned.
Tell me that doesn't feed into the Trump candidacy.
Well, IMO the biggest thing is the economy -- people feel like they were sold a bill of goods with the experts coming in and telling them that free trade would be great and make them more prosperous and now they live in towns that are shadows of their past selves and suffer under- and unemployment.
It's not the poll, it is the reaction to the poll. It's the outright insult to the people who participated it and the attitude on the part of management it betrays.
A lot of people in Europe don't believe in democracy and that "important" decisions shouldn't be left to the people. That people are stupid, and will never vote to advance things. So other methods must be found.
This comes from a series of disappointments: that the formation itself of the EU in the first place was rejected democratically, that the establishment of a mostly pro-forma EU parliament was rejected, that a lot of projects were rejected, that the outlawing of free plastic bags at supermarkets (for the environment) was rejected ... the list goes on. These democratic decisions were overridden and many see them as great accomplishments. They certainly make life easier, but one might criticize that they only make the life of the rich easier : people who get more advantage from being mobile in Europe and don't get destroyed by the mobility of cheap labour (e.g. from Poland). Without this antidemocratic behavior there would never have been a Euro, or open borders.
I personally just can't bring myself to believe that the people who have advanced things have anything but their own best interests at heart ... And there are other major criticism of these "accomplishments" of the antidemocratic measures. Frankly the EU state can rightfully be called undemocratic and it is true that, to put things mildly, it is pro-business and anti-working class. I would agree with the assessment that people who think that placing an undemocratic super-state above the country governments in Europe is going to help them are deluding themselves, to put it mildly. I feel like this state could very easily either fall apart, or worse, turn into tyranny. Technically it already is tyranny, but it is not felt like that by those part of the upper middle class (ie. "skilled labour"). It is most definitely felt by manufacturing workers, or tradesmen, shopkeepers or shop assistants and the like. Since more and more people are feeling the unpleasant side of Europe, this seems likely to get worse over time.
To offer a different perspective, we also had the cold war during this period. This was an era where the US was successfully outspending USSR militarily. I would argue, as others have, that if we hadn't dedicated significant resources to our military then those resources could have been applied to society and possibly avoided the crisis of democracy.
Or to put it simply the hawks in power manufactured our own crisis to stop us from focusing on domestic and social improvements.
I find somewhat hilarious that the supposed harbingers of this "collapse" are staunch members of said "oligarchy" (an elitist billionaire and a career politician).
Of course they're coming from within the oligarchy. How is an "outsider" going to succeed, when you need massive campaign funding to even make an impression in the primaries?
We might see a more diverse background in revolution leaders if people take it one step further and ignore the democratic process.
I think even within the oligarchy there are people who are not amused to see the wife of a former president competing with the son and brother of two other former presidents. You don't have to be out to dislike this system.
That wasn't my point. I'm not saying that all oligarchs are in line with current policy. In fact, quite the opposite: Trump is clearly an oligarch, and Sanders is at least upper class.
Obama was an "outsider". It's been a while since campaigns are not won by just money. My theory is the rich elites don't want to wield their power through governments anymore.
The campaign raised much of its cash in small donations over the internet, with about half of its intake coming in increments of less than $200.[53] Both major party campaigns screened regularly for patterns of abuse and returned or rejected donations in excess of legal limits, from overseas, from untraceable addresses, or from fraudulent names
and his second campaign had 3 times larger user base.
Marie Antoinette would disagree, if she could only find her head...
Certainly many so-called "revolutions" are really just one group of elites fighting another, but "always" is just wrong. Do you think ISIS was formed by elites?
I have absolutely no idea. But I'd venture a wild guess and say there are probably a lot of Ba'ath Party people and ex-Saddam Hussein cronies running ISIS behind the scenes. Those people used to be "elites" back when Saddam ruled.
> Marie Antoinette would disagree, if she could only find her head...
Not really, the Jacobins that were the main leaders of the French Revolution were elite politicians both from the formal aristocracy and the high ranks of the mercantile/intellectual class.
Trying to do what his limited view of the right thing is. There's a lot of good stuff there, but a blanket "make everything better for everyone" ignores a lot of the nuanced problems of inequality.
For example: free healthcare and college — great, that's what a civilized country should have... but while that reduces an economic burden on the poor, it also keeps dollars in the pockets of the rich and our tax system is so broken that it doesn't necessarily mean you can recover that money.
While much less appealing, Clinton's criticisms of Sanders for giving free college to the rich seems fundamentally rooted in the reality that while yes, eventually al“l of these things should be public services — but in the immediacy it's not really helpful to help everyone out the same amount because that's keeping everyone in the same place.
He's taken his fair share in corporate and special interest money e.g. agriculture, has a notable record of pork barreling for his home state, is one of the few candidates in recent history not to release a reasonable number of tax returns and his campaign has a very concerning amount of illegal donations.
Every candidate is incredibly weak and flawed this election including Bernie.
Actually, most revolutions are led by disaffected members of the elites that rally the masses, not by the downtrodden masses. There are exceptions, of course, but generally its the elites that have the material resources, the leisure, and the social networks to plan and mobilize revolutionary forces.
>"What we’re now facing is a combination of: 1) people who still believe; and 2) people who doubt, but: a) would have to sacrifice their livelihood to act on it; or, b) are willing to leave the system but don’t necessarily know what comes next."
We're approaching a tipping point where one of these groups is bigger than all the others . . .
I like that someone is taking a systems perspective on this but the '26 abandoned cities' stuff doesn't seem relevant.
Yes every underclass represents a threat of revolt. But describing this oligarchy as rich stealing from the poor is not completely accurate.
The mesopotamians had a 'palace economy' where a large portion of the wealth (i.e. grain) was brought to a central city to be redistributed to non-farmers by the priests. (hence the word 'hierarchy'). The current global economy is to some extent a palace economy (explains the higher salaries and prices in cities) but our economies are no longer 70% agricultural, 30% stonework and a small slice 'prayer services'. More of the economic work than ever is concentrated at the 'top' -- maybe not in the top slice but certainly in the top fifth. If the bottom half of mesopotamian society disappeared the priests would starve. If that happened in, say, switzerland their economic metrics would blip up.
Not saying that's a good or a bad thing but it defies the article's definition of oligarchy.
Not the end of the world, but I do see him historically as the beginning of the end for the Republican Party. I was in college when I first heard of Rush Limbaugh. Before him, Republicans were these very stuffy folks like William Buckley Jr, who came to our campus and bored many to tears with highly-intellectual and logical arguments that were extremely challenging and generated a great deal of cognitive dissonance for me. Republicans were considered the intellectual party back in those days.
Then Limbaugh came along, never referencing anything he said or wrote, constantly contradicting himself and making offensive cracks like calling a 12-year-old Chelsea Clinton the White House dog. My young Republican friends loved him, chanted slogans like "Rush is Right!" and labeled themselves "dittoheads." Anyone who pointed out Limbaugh's contradictory logic or took issue with his offensive statements was dismissed as being "politically correct."
Flash forward 25 years and Limbaugh is now considered tame in comparison to Coulter, Savage, and some of the other voices that have followed in his footsteps. I was sad to hear that William Buckley, who I still admire intellectually even if many of his positions are anathema to me, was largely forgotten and ignored in his final years. Trump's nomination would not be possible without Limbaugh laying the groundwork for him two and a half decades ago.
Some on the left are gloating about it, but it frightens me. America needs a plurality of voices debating issues and policy logically in order to thrive. We can't let it become one party of power on the left and an easily demonized opposition party on the right, but with the Republican party falling apart... that's the way it seems to be going.
In Limbaugh's lexicon, feminists turned into "feminazis" because advocating for equal rights for women was somehow equatable to a group advocating genocide.
Early in his career, Rush Limbaugh was funny and made political news worth listening to. Yes, he was heavily biased towards the right.
Later (when Clinton won the Whitehouse in '92), he became bitter and hateful ... I stopped listening to him when I realized that hearing that content for three hours a day (while at work) was making me bitter and hateful too.
As an aside, the eight years of the Clinton presidency look pretty good compared to the last 16 years.
As your neighbour to the north you make it sound like the Republican party has fractured into two groups. Those that are conservative (the Buckley Republicans in your example), and those ignorant masses that respond to jingoist and politico-entertainment rather than well thought out political debate. (I'm shocked that anyone would label them self a dittohead, implying that they have no independent thought, rather in my mind's eye that is a hurtful label that I'd reserve only for my worst enemy).
From what I've observed in this election cycle I can't disagree with your assessment, though I am deeply saddened at this realization.
For now though the Republican party controls congress and in 30 states[1] they control both legislative houses and the governorship: for a party that is 'falling apart' they are doing much better than the Democrats.
The irony with that is Rush never really endorsed Trump during the primaries. It was very uncomfortable for him, he at times refused to even talk about Trump.
> ...and stops enforcing antitrust laws; Economic elites argue we need to modernize finance by getting rid of Glass-Steagall; Tax rates on the wealthy plummet while infrastructure crumbles; The Supreme Court supports Citizens United and guts the Voting Rights Act; Gerrymandering increases.
For those interested in the relevant history that lead the US to this point, may I suggest American Character by Colin Woodard [1].
The ideology that drives the oligarchy (and arguably modern libertarianism) is descended from that which informed the founding of the Carolina and West Indian slave colonies.
I'm very hopeful this election gives the third parties a boost. Unless I suffer a terrible stroke between now and the election I know I will be voting libertarian simply because I couldn't live with myself voting for Trump or Hillary.
I would like to see a coordinated effort from those of us who won't vote for the mainstream candidates.
If any 3rd party candidate gets over 5% of the vote, they must by law be included in the debates next time around. We know that a 3rd party will not win the presidential election this time around, so coordinating our votes to get one over 5% in order to inject a new voice into the process seems like a win, even if the party is one I am generally opposed to.
IMHO it will do the exact opposite. People basically vote to keep the other candidate from winning. More radical / "scarier" candidates shore up the party lines.
I strongly believe Trump and Sanders signal to the rabid balkanization of media (aided by proliferation of web, mobile, and social media), rather than an oligarchy on the brink of collapse. It has never been easier to read clickbait radical news that provides ample confirmation bias. Globally speaking, Americans have by far one of the best quality of lives anywhere in the world. But hearing Sanders - Trump, you would think we live in some war ravaged developing country.
Trump and Sanders are manifestations of a long-term trend that has been building at least since the 2008 Financial Crisis. People are dissatisfied with the options they are presented politically, and economic participation is at historically low levels. We have never been more prosperous, but at the same time that prosperity and wealth gains are not only not very evenly distributed(they never really were), but large swaths of society are completely left out of them. In the early half of the century, it was a democratizing effect that everyone was drinking a 10c glass of Coke. This is just one example, you can also see it with iPhoneistas vs cheap Android phones, etc. etc. Now the hip drinks are craft beers and fine wines, and a former factory worker forced to work menial part time jobs is looked down upon for drinking what he can afford, Bud lite and coke. There are major class shiftings and reorganizations going on, and people living in and near large prosperous cities have largely been immune and isolated from it.
We dismiss and ignore their rise at our own peril.