DEFEAT FASCISM BEFORE FASCISM DEFEATS YOU
“What’s Past is Prologue…”
All,
THE REAL NEXUS BETWEEN 'RACE AND CLASS' IN AMERICAN POLITICS TODAY IS THAT THE DOCTRINE AND PRACTICE OF WHITE SUPREMACY AS A MAJOR IDEOLOGICAL, STRUCTURAL, INSTITUTIONAL, SYSTEMIC, AND MATERIAL FORCE AND REALITY WITHIN THE LARGER CONTEXT OF GLOBAL CAPITALISM ITSELF IN ALL OF ITS DIMENSIONS IS AS ALWAYS INEXTRICABLY CONNECTED AND MUTUALLY DEPENDENT FORCES IN THE UNITED STATES.
THUS WHAT REALLY NEEDS TO BE OPENLY ACKNOWLEDGED AND SAID TODAY BECAUSE IT IS THE WHOLE DAMN TRUTH AND NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH IS THE FOLLOWING:
This country is in much deeper trouble than it actually thinks it is. The most fundamental and horrifying fact is that in the last two elections in 2016 and 2020 a whopping 58% of ALL WHITE VOTERS nationally across the board in every single individual class group from the poor to the working class to the middle and upper middle classes as well as the wealthy throughout the entire country have voted overwhelmingly for Trump TWICE and in spite of everything (e.g. two impeachments, four major criminal indictments totaling 91 counts of felonious criminality, electoral insurrection and an attempted coup, numerous civil suits for sexual assault, personal defamation, massive criminal financial fraud in the hundreds of millions of dollars, a torrential and frankly psychotic onslaught of lies and endlessly virulent and violent fascist invocations in the name of dictatorial demands for and promises of public 'retribution') STILL openly and shamelessly support him for the presidency in 2024
THE MOST IMPORTANT, TERRIFYING, BUT ALMOST NEVER PUBLICLY COMMENTED UPON FACT IS THE FOLLOWING:
Trump has won more votes over the course of two elections than ANY OTHER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE FROM EITHER PARTY IN AMERICAN HISTORY. Trump received a total of 137 million votes in the last two elections (63 million in 2016 and 74 million in 2020) which is a record previously held by Barack Obama who received 134 million votes combined in 2008 and 2012. The huge difference of course is that Obama only received these many votes because 95% of black voters and 70% of Asian and Latino voters voted for him. I keep trying to remind people that Obama (like every other Democratic party candidate in the last 60 years (!) received only a paltry 41% of the white vote (43% in 2008 and an even more dismal 39% in 2012). For example Hilary Clinton only received 37% of the white vote nationally in 2016 and Biden only received 42% of the white vote in 2020. This means of course that Obama, Clinton, and Biden between them only received 40% of the national white vote in this country in the last four elections. This means that ALL of them lost the white vote by a landslide.
Reminder: The largest national voting demographic in the country are white Americans who constituted 65% of all American voters in 2020 and were 70% of voters from 2008-2016. Which means as always that the white share of the voting public is larger than ALL OTHER racial/ethnic groups--male and female combined!
BTW the single largest voting bloc in the entire country is WHITE FEMALE VOTERS who make up 33% of all voters in the U.S. today—WHITE MALES now stand at 32%
.
ANOTHER ABSOLUTELY HARROWING STAT THAT SHOULD NEVER BE IGNORED: In the last 70 years of presidential elections since 1952 (a total of 18 elections overall and counting) a majority of white voters have voted for a Democratic party candidate ONLY ONCE (1964).
What all this means in a larger sense is that because the GREAT MAJORITY OF WHITE AMERICAN VOTERS in GENERAL SINCE 2016 HAVE ACTUALLY IN FACT openly supported and most importantly have continued to vote for Trump FAR MORE THAN ANY OTHER CANDIDATE IN THE ENTIRE COUNTRY we are all in very big trouble come 2024 and that the actual political prospects for what happens not only to the presidency but even more importantly Congress (as well as civil society in general) is the worse than at any time since the horrendous 1980s…
Kof
“What’s Past is Prologue…”
All,
THE REAL NEXUS BETWEEN 'RACE AND CLASS' IN AMERICAN POLITICS TODAY IS THAT THE DOCTRINE AND PRACTICE OF WHITE SUPREMACY AS A MAJOR IDEOLOGICAL, STRUCTURAL, INSTITUTIONAL, SYSTEMIC, AND MATERIAL FORCE AND REALITY WITHIN THE LARGER CONTEXT OF GLOBAL CAPITALISM ITSELF IN ALL OF ITS DIMENSIONS IS AS ALWAYS INEXTRICABLY CONNECTED AND MUTUALLY DEPENDENT FORCES IN THE UNITED STATES.
THUS WHAT REALLY NEEDS TO BE OPENLY ACKNOWLEDGED AND SAID TODAY BECAUSE IT IS THE WHOLE DAMN TRUTH AND NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH IS THE FOLLOWING:
This country is in much deeper trouble than it actually thinks it is. The most fundamental and horrifying fact is that in the last two elections in 2016 and 2020 a whopping 58% of ALL WHITE VOTERS nationally across the board in every single individual class group from the poor to the working class to the middle and upper middle classes as well as the wealthy throughout the entire country have voted overwhelmingly for Trump TWICE and in spite of everything (e.g. two impeachments, four major criminal indictments totaling 91 counts of felonious criminality, electoral insurrection and an attempted coup, numerous civil suits for sexual assault, personal defamation, massive criminal financial fraud in the hundreds of millions of dollars, a torrential and frankly psychotic onslaught of lies and endlessly virulent and violent fascist invocations in the name of dictatorial demands for and promises of public 'retribution') STILL openly and shamelessly support him for the presidency in 2024
THE MOST IMPORTANT, TERRIFYING, BUT ALMOST NEVER PUBLICLY COMMENTED UPON FACT IS THE FOLLOWING:
Trump has won more votes over the course of two elections than ANY OTHER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE FROM EITHER PARTY IN AMERICAN HISTORY. Trump received a total of 137 million votes in the last two elections (63 million in 2016 and 74 million in 2020) which is a record previously held by Barack Obama who received 134 million votes combined in 2008 and 2012. The huge difference of course is that Obama only received these many votes because 95% of black voters and 70% of Asian and Latino voters voted for him. I keep trying to remind people that Obama (like every other Democratic party candidate in the last 60 years (!) received only a paltry 41% of the white vote (43% in 2008 and an even more dismal 39% in 2012). For example Hilary Clinton only received 37% of the white vote nationally in 2016 and Biden only received 42% of the white vote in 2020. This means of course that Obama, Clinton, and Biden between them only received 40% of the national white vote in this country in the last four elections. This means that ALL of them lost the white vote by a landslide.
Reminder: The largest national voting demographic in the country are white Americans who constituted 65% of all American voters in 2020 and were 70% of voters from 2008-2016. Which means as always that the white share of the voting public is larger than ALL OTHER racial/ethnic groups--male and female combined!
BTW the single largest voting bloc in the entire country is WHITE FEMALE VOTERS who make up 33% of all voters in the U.S. today—WHITE MALES now stand at 32%
.
ANOTHER ABSOLUTELY HARROWING STAT THAT SHOULD NEVER BE IGNORED: In the last 70 years of presidential elections since 1952 (a total of 18 elections overall and counting) a majority of white voters have voted for a Democratic party candidate ONLY ONCE (1964).
What all this means in a larger sense is that because the GREAT MAJORITY OF WHITE AMERICAN VOTERS in GENERAL SINCE 2016 HAVE ACTUALLY IN FACT openly supported and most importantly have continued to vote for Trump FAR MORE THAN ANY OTHER CANDIDATE IN THE ENTIRE COUNTRY we are all in very big trouble come 2024 and that the actual political prospects for what happens not only to the presidency but even more importantly Congress (as well as civil society in general) is the worse than at any time since the horrendous 1980s…
Kof
HAPPY LABOR DAY!
September 4, 2023
“What’s Past is Prologue…”
[NOTE: The following commentary and open letter to a friend and colleague was originally posted here on November 11, 2016]
"It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have."
--James Baldwin
“One cannot change in one’s head that which can only be changed in society.”
—C.L.R. James
I know your intentions are good and you accurately recognize from a theoretical and analytical standpoint the integral and indispensable role of the fundamental materiality of corporate capitalism and its corresponding political/ideological identity of neoliberalism. That’s all fine and absolutely necessary to any coherent and productive analysis of contemporary politics and culture in the 21st century as far as it goes. However from a larger, more nuanced, and detailed analytical perspective it’s absurd and inherently counterproductive to act as though a thoroughgoing critique of the severe social, economic, and cultural fallout (and the informed civic rage which animates it) that is the direct result of over 60 million citizens openly endorsing and electing an authoritarian wealthy white rightwing “populist" to lead the country is not equally important and necessary as well. After all white supremacy, misogyny/patriarchy, and class exploitation are all joined at the hip at the levels of both material reality and ideological/social values and identity in this society (and always were). This means among many other things that a “purely” economic class analysis alone (what many and various Marxist theoreticians and scholars from George Lukacs to Antonio Gramsci have all for very good and sound reasons thoroughly critiqued as “economism”) is not only inadequate and irrelevant, but undesirable. My larger point here is that ideological and “cultural” factors having to do with “race", gender, sexual identity, and a broader intersectional critique of the dialectical (and dialogical) tension between these categories are essential to and more importantly inseperable from the still broader political, economic, and ideological critique of global capitalist hegemony that hovers over all of these various social and economic relations. Thus no myopic/reductive/sophist analyses by either fundamentally nationalist, populist, or even analytically reductive quasi-Marxist tendencies and theoretical frameworks are inherently sufficient in themselves and that means one must always be especially vigilant in actively interrogating and challenging these constructs on the levels of not only theory, but strategic and tactical dimensions as well. Kapiche? Comprende? Dig?... Good…
Love & Struggle,
Kofi
