Thomas Hobbes and the Twisted Genius of Open Carry

An interesting blog post that ties together a bunch of things I've mentioned here:

Open Carry is a stalking horse for a kind of DIY Governance whose goal is to systematically erode and ultimately destroy public trust in government — to return America to what the conservative movement imagines is its “pure,” pre-federal government state of nature

When the Founders looked for inspiration for the Declaration of Independence, they found it in the works of John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, and the Baron de Montesquieu — the so-called “Social Contract” theorists. These men argued that humans existed in a State of Nature where every man was his own judge and jury and where, therefore, little good was ever accomplished.  It was stable government — or, as they called it, “Commonwealth” — that provided the basis for economic, political, or social progress.

What the gun nuts and Second Amendment absolutists are determined to do, in alliance with the Tenth Amendment fetishists, is to fundamentally undermine America’s social contract and the government upon which it depends – devolution to Hobbes’ description of life without government, a “war of all against all:”

…a time or war where every man is enemy to every man…wherein men live without other security than what their own strength and their own invention shall furnish them withal. In such condition there is no place for industry, because the fruit thereof is uncertain, and consequently no culture of the earth, no navigation nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea, no commodious building, no instruments of moving and removing such things as require much force, no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time, no arts, no letters, no society, and, which is worst of all, continual fear and danger of violent death, and the life of man solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

Which is just the way the Gun Lobby likes it. Because nothing pumps up gun sales like continual fear and danger of violent death.

The whole thing is well worth a read

Gun Control Issue from the Wisconsin AFL-CIO's Report on the Right Wing

Gun Control Issue from the Wisconsin AFL-CIO's Report on the Right Wing

The Right also sees the gun control issue as a means to divert workers from voting according to their economic interests and that of their families. The Right sees it as a particularly clever way to prevent workers from following the candidate endorsements of their union, which are made based on economic interests of the members. Neal Knox, a former head of the National Rife Association (NRA), said as much:

"[The gun issue] is the one thing that will spin the blue-collar union member away from his union."26

The NRA conducted a massive get-out-the-vote effort on behalf of George W. Bush. Chuck Cunningham, a former director of voter education for the Christian Coalition, led that effort for the NRA. Before working for Christian Coalition, Cunningham was executive director of the anti-union New England Citizens for Right-to-Work.27

Charlton Heston, former president of the NRA, supported the National Right-to-Work Committee in 1994 when it lobbied Congress to defeat S.55 / H.R.5 Anti-Strikebreaker Bill. This would have prohibited employers from permanently replacing striking workers (an act which is illegal in other industrialized countries). Heston appealed to union members to "put freedom first" and support NRA-endorsed candidates, and yet the right to strike is a most basic and essential freedom. Heston personally appealed to members of Congress to defeat pro-worker legislation that would prohibit strikebreakers and produced a video on behalf of the National Right-to-Work Committee, which called him their "world famous ally."28

In 1996, Charlton Heston championed the most serious threat to the very existence of labor unions. He assisted the National Right-to-Work Committee in a $260,000 ad campaign to lobby Congress to pass a National Right-to-Work Bill which had been introduced.29 Right-to-Work legislation would prohibit unions from negotiating any union security clause in their contracts. Union membership would be totally voluntary, though all workers must receive the wages and benefits negotiated in the union contract and they must be legally represented in any grievances. It has nothing to do with a right to work, but is part of a larger corporate strategy to financially weaken and eventually eliminate unions. Now deceased, Heston was a very effective spokesman for the NRA in distracting workers from the Right’s real agenda.

The report points out:

• The American Right, as it has evolved over the past four decades, is determined to undo all the progress made on behalf of the working class and middle class since the 1930s. This is when President Franklin Roosevelt responded to the misery of the Great Depression, and a vocal movement on the Left, to vastly expand the role of government to serve the people. He created a legal framework for union organizing and collective bargaining through the National Labor Relations Act, formed reliable economic support programs such as Social Security, and regulated business to protect the common good. Ever since, the Right has been on a campaign to demonize government and erode public confidence in its ability to have a meaningful impact in their lives. This is because the people are defenseless in the face of corporate power without government as an ally to protect their interests. 
• Over the last 40 years the Right has been transformed from small fringe groups of John Birch Society zealots and ineffective Goldwater-type politicians, into a powerful anti-worker, anti-progressive movement to enhance corporate power. The American Right of today has an extensive political infrastructure that  is immensely more sophisticated and well-funded than at any period in our country’s history.
• Corporate America could care less about gun control, traditional family values or abortion (or the latest useful single issue-of-the-day), nor does it feel totally comfortable with the extremism of the religious front for the Right, but the overall movement serves corporate economic interests perfectly.
•   The Right has developed an extensive infrastructure of national and state-level think tanks, legal advocacy groups, magazines, columnists, social media, its own Fox TV network and conservative commentators. They are magnified by the numerous conservative radio talk shows which create an "echo chamber" and give a false impression there is a public mandate for Right Wing policies.
•  The opinion of any individual on a given issue should be respected. However, unions have a duty to represent workers’ economic interests and inform members of any threats to those interests. Members must be alerted to the Right’s "bait and switch" tactics -- the use of certain single issues and religious faith to distract voters from the Right’s anti-worker, anti-union, anti-democratic political agenda. All voters must understand that it is dangerous to make a decision about a candidate based on a single issue, given that a movement hostile to middle class and working class economic interests is cynically manipulating emotional issues.
•  Ideas have consequences. The Right aims to repeal decades of progress in improving labor standards, civil rights, environmental and consumer protection, women’s status, gay rights, public education and economic support programs (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, etc.). The very existence of unions as effective organizations to represent the economic interests of working families is threatened. This is a sophisticated, determined, corporate-funded Right Wing movement that will not automatically be swept back by some hoped-for political pendulum. It will not dissipate on its own. It needs to be challenged and defeated.

Footnotes:
26. "The NRA Wants You", The Nation, May 29, 2000.
27. The Nation, May 29, 2000; “The Right Wing and Labor”, UAW Solidarity, September 1995.
28. National Right to Work Committee Newsletter, July 1994; “Right to Work Targets Senators in Campaign to Defeat S55”, Labor Relations Week, May 25, 1994; Group Research Report, June 1994.
29. “Reject ‘Right to Work’ Bill” editorial in Capital Times, July 9, 1996.

Wingnuts Week in Review - Religion in Politics

many thanks to Terry

Cenk on the Rise of Right Wing Extremist Groups

Right Wing Violence

Chris Brown of Media Matters sent us the link to this wonderful article by his colleague David Hothouse, which contains a compendium of Right Wing activity.

The attempted MLK Day bombing in Spokane was hardly an isolated incident. Right-wing domestic terrorist plots and extremist violence are on the rise in America. Earlier this year the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) released a report analyzing domestic terrorism statistics reported by the FBI and other crime agencies since the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The MPAC report shows that since 9/11, right-wing extremists including neo-Nazis and other white supremacists have been involved in 63 domestic terror plots, while radical Muslims have been involved in 45.

Naturally the pro-gun bloggers try to ignore the fact that guys like these comprise a significant percentage of their ranks, let's think of them as the lowest level. Then you've got the less extreme but equally hateful stratum. Above them there would be the apathetic ones. These three layers combined make up about 90% of the gun owners.  What's left is the 10% who are truly responsible.

Now please don't confuse this with the other, more widely known 10%.  That's another discussion, which may very well need to be updated.


It's a serious problem and restricting guns to dangerous and unqualified people is part of the solution.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Paul Krugman on the Politics of Spite

Paul Krugman wrote a wonderful op-ed piece for the New York Times called The Politics of Spite. Citing the highly publicized conservative reaction to the Olympic decision, in which right-wing leaders actually cheered when the U.S. bid lost out to Brazil, Mr. Krugman draws the following conclusion.

... the episode illustrated an essential truth about the state of American politics: at this point, the guiding principle of one of our nation’s two great political parties is spite pure and simple. If Republicans think something might be good for the president, they’re against it — whether or not it’s good for America.

I think he's hit the nail on the head. We've seen example after example of this, perhaps without naming it as such. In reading his description it seems to fit the current political situation perfectly. The biggest, and perhaps the most important example is the health care debate.

How did one of our great political parties become so ruthless, so willing to embrace scorched-earth tactics even if so doing undermines the ability of any future administration to govern?

The key point is that ever since the Reagan years, the Republican Party has been dominated by radicals — ideologues and/or apparatchiks who, at a fundamental level, do not accept anyone else’s right to govern.

For example, Krugman points out, during the Clinton years, Rush Limbaugh suggested that Hillary Clinton was a party to murder, Newt Gingrich shut down the federal government in an attempt to bully Bill Clinton into accepting Medicare cuts and the Republican-driven obsession with President Clinton's indiscretions and lies captivated the entire world.

The only difference now is that the G.O.P. is in a weaker position, having lost control of Congress. Furthermore, the public no longer buys conservative ideology the way it used to; "the old attacks on Big Government and paeans to the magic of the marketplace have lost their resonance. Yet conservatives retain their belief that they, and only they, should govern."

The result has been a cynical, ends-justify-the-means approach. Hastening the day when the rightful governing party returns to power is all that matters, so the G.O.P. will seize any club at hand with which to beat the current administration.

It’s an ugly picture. But it’s the truth. And it’s a truth anyone trying to find solutions to America’s real problems has to understand.

What's your opinion? Does Paul Krugman make sense? Has the entire Republican Party fallen into the trap of vilifying their opposition even at a terrible cost to themselves? Does this remind you of the gun debate?

Please leave a comment.

The September 12th Protest March

Thanks to Skyewriter for the following incredible video. She's posted two others, also well worth the time.

I was reminded of what I read yesterday on Weer'd Beard's blog. At his request I'm not providing a link, but here's what I'm talking about.

I am 100% behind these people and their cause, and I get goosebumps seeing HUGE crowds of people all carrying American Flags, and Gadsden Flags, and signs and chants against policies I'd like to never see come to fruition.

I'd love to say that those HUGE fucking crowds will tip off the creeps on capitol hill that a LOT of people disagree with them, and for every head there is down in the streets, there are many more heads, like mine, nodding in agreement.

Skye called it "Live from Jupiter," as in "what planet are you from?"