Thanks for this well-considered essay, and even more, for attempting to stimulate the formation of a more hopeful vision and conditions.
You noted well the Republicans' moves towards fascism, but we must be wary of framing fascism as a purely or even primarily Republican trait. Notwithstanding their attacks on some aspects of civil rights (reproductive choice and other culture-war issues) and democratic principles (the right to vote unimpeded by government or partisan constraints), the Democratic Party has been gradually moving in the same direction. Note that it was the Biden Administration which first put forth the idea (and plan for) 'disinformation control' through a "Disinformation Board" (shades of Orwell's "Ministry of Truth"! ). And it has largely been Democratic Congress-critters who've pushed hardest for censorship on various media platforms. (No thought to the obvious question of who gets to define truth and how, or of how to do it without infringement of Constitutional and implied liberties re. freedom of speech and information flow.)
Your proposal for a "Powell Memorandum" is sound... esp. w/r/t the need to articulate broadly public values and principles. I have for at least a couple decades been trying to sell a similar notion to those I thought might help spread it - though originally I described it as a new Vision and Statement of Principles that should be promoted to and adopted by the Democratic Party.
We're clearly too late for that. The Party was at that time already strongly influenced by and leaning to corporate capital; but it has gotten far worse as the DP got further entrenched in the competition with the GOP for concentrated private capital and the latter's control is far more obvious today.
But we needn't be stymied or limited by the duopoly's condition; and in fact, the only way of changing that dynamic is from the grassroots.
Yet most grassroots activism has to my eyes been very specific, goal-oriented, generally short-term, and divorced from the question of how to change the system itself so as to allow greater possibility to address the existentially important issues and the continual erosion of democracy itself. Furthermore, the occasional movement efforts have been woefully lacking in articulating the principles that are ultimately ALWAYS needed to keep disparate interest groups on the same page, and to help guide strategy as well as goals.
I'd noted over the years that within the spectrum of elected D's reflected some of the worst people and positions possible. How could someone be a Democrat, and vote like Joe Manchin, for example? Did not this suggest that the Party itself lacked any coherent set of principles?
At the same time, within citizen org's I helped lead or support, there was also often a tendency to ignore basic principles of democracy.; or to have factions war with each other over strategy, because there was no basic framework establishing 'how' the org. would achieve its goals.
To that end, many years ago I drafted a suggested Statement of Principles that I wanted to submit to the DNC for consideration. (I had contact with a member of the DNC- but who unfortunately was at the end of her tenure there.) Nothing became of it, of course.
But the principles included a number of points. One was this:
"There is not necessarily or always a clash between private interests and those of the broader public. But where there is, the needs of the latter must always be superior to the former."
That seems even today like a fair and basic starting point.
The Democrats are pro-war, pro-censorship, pro-national security state, pro-empire, pro-surveillance, pro-police state, and corrupted by corporate money. But they still adhere, at least rhetorically, to the principles of liberal democracy and rule of law. But their commitments are more closely aligned with the hollowed out shell of democracy Sheldon Wolin described in "Democracy Inc.". But - and here's where I disagree with you strongly - that is qualitatively different and a far cry from the cultural and political violent fascism openly embraced now by the Republican Party.
The whole point of the Powell Memo was to change the ideological paradigm and develop a strategy. I've worked for 30 years in the environmental community, and they and other progressive left groups have no clue about any of that. None. They are careerist, opportunists, politically naive, lack vision, avoid and are uncomfortable with conflict and struggle, are clueless about history, lazy, unimaginative, and are literally stupid. So, a left Powell Memo is desperately needed and would have to do a LOT of work. Cornel West and Chris Hedges are capable of that heavily lift and they benefit from widespread respect and trust. The campaign could provide an opportunity to build that movement.
Make no mistake: I recognize the differences between the parties. In terms of civil rights in particular, they are significant.
My point is that it would be a mistake to overlook the creeping fascist authoritarianism that has, since they began creating and leveraging Russiagate, greatly accelerated to the point where many liberals don't even question the wisdom or ethics of limiting free speech when it comes to their particular beliefs and preferred narratives.
I don't dismiss the importance of other civil rights- esp. that of equal treatment under the law.
Yet the culture wars have been IMO deliberately exploited for at least a couple reasons:. One is to keep people solidly in their respective camps (Blue or Red); to provide clear proof of either's 'moral' superiority over the other side and the fear that keeps them voting for their camp "no matter who".
Another is to distract from those issues that are most fundamentally (existentially / urgently) critical, i.e. the inexorable rush to climate chaos, and the imperial wars that have increased the likelihood of thermonuclear-driven extinction (and which prevents collaborative, meaningful action on climate destabilization. Furthermore, a focus on the issues of the culture wars, which amplify the differences, also obscures the fact that there is effectively ZERO difference when it comes to foreign policy. The GOP used to be the war party, with the Dems meekly accommodating. Now the D's are clearly happy to be seen as the more hawkish (and 'patriotic').
I've also been an environmental activist- for 4 decades, in fact. I've been a political (and cultural) dissident for longer still. This is why I said what I said and why I agree with your assessment. But that long history / experience has made me ever more clear that we must have some sense of priorities. Given that a perpetuation of the culture wars sucks energy and attention to the more fundamentally important issues (such as noted above, but also of the unraveling of democracy by private, concentrated capital), I continue to urge people not to buy into the lesser-evils approach that I followed for far too long only to discover (late in the game) that I was simply enabling the rightward drift of the Dems, and inadvertently helping the R's to go even farther to the right; and at the same time, giving insufficient time and attention to the need for movement building to change the paradigms altogether.
Thanks for this well-considered essay, and even more, for attempting to stimulate the formation of a more hopeful vision and conditions.
You noted well the Republicans' moves towards fascism, but we must be wary of framing fascism as a purely or even primarily Republican trait. Notwithstanding their attacks on some aspects of civil rights (reproductive choice and other culture-war issues) and democratic principles (the right to vote unimpeded by government or partisan constraints), the Democratic Party has been gradually moving in the same direction. Note that it was the Biden Administration which first put forth the idea (and plan for) 'disinformation control' through a "Disinformation Board" (shades of Orwell's "Ministry of Truth"! ). And it has largely been Democratic Congress-critters who've pushed hardest for censorship on various media platforms. (No thought to the obvious question of who gets to define truth and how, or of how to do it without infringement of Constitutional and implied liberties re. freedom of speech and information flow.)
Your proposal for a "Powell Memorandum" is sound... esp. w/r/t the need to articulate broadly public values and principles. I have for at least a couple decades been trying to sell a similar notion to those I thought might help spread it - though originally I described it as a new Vision and Statement of Principles that should be promoted to and adopted by the Democratic Party.
We're clearly too late for that. The Party was at that time already strongly influenced by and leaning to corporate capital; but it has gotten far worse as the DP got further entrenched in the competition with the GOP for concentrated private capital and the latter's control is far more obvious today.
But we needn't be stymied or limited by the duopoly's condition; and in fact, the only way of changing that dynamic is from the grassroots.
Yet most grassroots activism has to my eyes been very specific, goal-oriented, generally short-term, and divorced from the question of how to change the system itself so as to allow greater possibility to address the existentially important issues and the continual erosion of democracy itself. Furthermore, the occasional movement efforts have been woefully lacking in articulating the principles that are ultimately ALWAYS needed to keep disparate interest groups on the same page, and to help guide strategy as well as goals.
I'd noted over the years that within the spectrum of elected D's reflected some of the worst people and positions possible. How could someone be a Democrat, and vote like Joe Manchin, for example? Did not this suggest that the Party itself lacked any coherent set of principles?
At the same time, within citizen org's I helped lead or support, there was also often a tendency to ignore basic principles of democracy.; or to have factions war with each other over strategy, because there was no basic framework establishing 'how' the org. would achieve its goals.
To that end, many years ago I drafted a suggested Statement of Principles that I wanted to submit to the DNC for consideration. (I had contact with a member of the DNC- but who unfortunately was at the end of her tenure there.) Nothing became of it, of course.
But the principles included a number of points. One was this:
"There is not necessarily or always a clash between private interests and those of the broader public. But where there is, the needs of the latter must always be superior to the former."
That seems even today like a fair and basic starting point.
The Democrats are pro-war, pro-censorship, pro-national security state, pro-empire, pro-surveillance, pro-police state, and corrupted by corporate money. But they still adhere, at least rhetorically, to the principles of liberal democracy and rule of law. But their commitments are more closely aligned with the hollowed out shell of democracy Sheldon Wolin described in "Democracy Inc.". But - and here's where I disagree with you strongly - that is qualitatively different and a far cry from the cultural and political violent fascism openly embraced now by the Republican Party.
The whole point of the Powell Memo was to change the ideological paradigm and develop a strategy. I've worked for 30 years in the environmental community, and they and other progressive left groups have no clue about any of that. None. They are careerist, opportunists, politically naive, lack vision, avoid and are uncomfortable with conflict and struggle, are clueless about history, lazy, unimaginative, and are literally stupid. So, a left Powell Memo is desperately needed and would have to do a LOT of work. Cornel West and Chris Hedges are capable of that heavily lift and they benefit from widespread respect and trust. The campaign could provide an opportunity to build that movement.
Make no mistake: I recognize the differences between the parties. In terms of civil rights in particular, they are significant.
My point is that it would be a mistake to overlook the creeping fascist authoritarianism that has, since they began creating and leveraging Russiagate, greatly accelerated to the point where many liberals don't even question the wisdom or ethics of limiting free speech when it comes to their particular beliefs and preferred narratives.
I don't dismiss the importance of other civil rights- esp. that of equal treatment under the law.
Yet the culture wars have been IMO deliberately exploited for at least a couple reasons:. One is to keep people solidly in their respective camps (Blue or Red); to provide clear proof of either's 'moral' superiority over the other side and the fear that keeps them voting for their camp "no matter who".
Another is to distract from those issues that are most fundamentally (existentially / urgently) critical, i.e. the inexorable rush to climate chaos, and the imperial wars that have increased the likelihood of thermonuclear-driven extinction (and which prevents collaborative, meaningful action on climate destabilization. Furthermore, a focus on the issues of the culture wars, which amplify the differences, also obscures the fact that there is effectively ZERO difference when it comes to foreign policy. The GOP used to be the war party, with the Dems meekly accommodating. Now the D's are clearly happy to be seen as the more hawkish (and 'patriotic').
I've also been an environmental activist- for 4 decades, in fact. I've been a political (and cultural) dissident for longer still. This is why I said what I said and why I agree with your assessment. But that long history / experience has made me ever more clear that we must have some sense of priorities. Given that a perpetuation of the culture wars sucks energy and attention to the more fundamentally important issues (such as noted above, but also of the unraveling of democracy by private, concentrated capital), I continue to urge people not to buy into the lesser-evils approach that I followed for far too long only to discover (late in the game) that I was simply enabling the rightward drift of the Dems, and inadvertently helping the R's to go even farther to the right; and at the same time, giving insufficient time and attention to the need for movement building to change the paradigms altogether.