November 10, 2020 - 3:39pm
Begrudging. Sulky. Alienated. Angry. No, not Donald Trump’s demeanour over the last few days — but the attitude of the radical Left to Joe Biden’s victory.
Owen Jones set the tone in The Guardian with a big bucket of cold water. Then there was Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, interviewed by the New York Times, and sounding less than overjoyed: “I’m serious when I tell people the odds of me running for higher office and the odds of me just going off trying to start a homestead somewhere — they’re probably the same.”
I guess you can’t blame them. If you were expecting to get Bernie Sanders into the White House and Jeremy Corbyn into Downing Street and you end up with Sleepy Joe and Bumbling Boris… well, it’s the hope that kills you.
However, there’s one comrade offering more than existential angst — and that’s Yanis Varoufakis. Writing for The Guardian he makes the excellent point that the Biden Presidency better not be a return to normality, because that’s what got Trump elected in the first place.
What Varoufakis means by normality is encapsulated in his perfect summary of contemporary capitalism:
He then points out that Donald Trump not only exploited the unhappiness of American workers, he did something about it — in his own deeply flawed fashion:
His aversion to war was another bonus.
Varoufakis is still glad that Trump was beaten. Indeed, in his interview with UnHerd, he made it crystal clear that the Left must not go down a national populist path. Nevertheless, he admits an uncomfortable truth: “The tragedy of progressives is that Trump’s supporters are not entirely wrong.” What they realise is that “the rich Democrats behind the Biden-Harris ticket won’t ever truly change conditions for the poor.”
We’ll soon see if that’s right. But one thing we can say about Trump is that he did challenge the system. He did so inconsistently and incompletely — and there was a whole load of other rubbish we could have done without. Yet, in respect to both domestic and foreign policy, he showed us all that a different world is possible.
As another problematic man once said when likening a “woman’s preaching” to a dog walking on its hind legs, “it is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.”
Peter Franklin is Associate Editor of UnHerd. He was previously a policy advisor and speechwriter on environmental and social issues.
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SubscribeAlbeit a few years too late, I am currently racing through Thomas Frank’s ‘Listen Liberal’, an excellent account of the way in which the Democrats first moved away from, then utterly betrayed, the American working classes. The betrayal, of course, took place during the Clinton and Obama years. In that sense, Biden will indeed be a ‘return to normal’.
Trump gave hope to working people with an aversion to pointless wars. The media, Big Tech, Wall St and various other parties conspired to destroy that hope by working so relentlessly and dishonestly against Trump.
I’d recommend Victor Davis Hanson’s “The Case for Trump”, sympathetic but not a hagiography, it illustrates some of the reasons for Trump’s success
Hanson should stick to Greek history.
Everything you post seems to be rubbish. Can you change the tune?
My opinion, nothing else.
it is rubbish because you don’t like it.
A curious man, Varoufakis. It is only a cultic devotion to his own identity as a “leftist” which prevents him from becoming a sensible Conservative.
It seems to me that he’s an old-school Socialist that believes in redistribution of wealth but has a healthy cynicism about the ‘progressive/liberal’ political class that holds so much power in the West.
Alas, that scepticism seems to fall short of actually attempting to blunt or limit its power.
What would you like to see him do?
I should like to hear him say the following: practical measures are always in opposition to the Marxist Utopia; therefore the latter always involves levels of suffering which make it a nonsense and a non-starter. With this point in mind, arising from the logical understanding of experience, I propose the immediate dismantling of another Utopian project: the EU as it currently stands. It should be reduced to a number of trade preferences and all its pretensions to statehood should be annulled. Moneys lavished on its bloated, duplicate bureaucracy should be used to lower tax, pay debt and assist the poor, whilst helping to fund the necessary defence of Europe against invasive levels of migration. Migration control is among the most important protections of the poor in the real world. It prevents the cheapening of labour; it devotes public service to the people who have paid for it and it allows for the creation of a skilled, settled, contented workforce. In addition, we should recognise that purist free trade touted since the nineties has outsourced jobs and left western economies dangerously lob-sided and denuded of necessary resources in times of danger. Any nation must be prepared to defend its people given the dangers inherent in this world; and this means a degree of protection, allowing for local heavy industry and local production of food – falling well short – of course – of any attempt at total self-sufficiency. However, we should stop those economic policies which enrich our enemies and impoverish our own. We should above all bear in mind Corelli Barnett’s advice that a nation needs to recall its status as a collective enterprise, pivoting between doctrines but giving way to none of them in their unrealistic entirety. The world will always be more complex than a theory. That’s what he should say, at least, for that is where the tendency of his observations appears to be leading.
Thanks, I’ll bear that in mind when trying to fathom his ideology.
I don’t think the EU is really a utopian project. I think it’s more a kind of “anti-dystopian” project.
You could say that about the old Ottoman Empire. There are a lot of similarities, beginning with smothering bureaucracy on top of sluggish bureaucracy. The cause of death was entropy..
I think it was intended to stop the countries that became its members from going to war with one another yet again by encouraging interdependance. However most leave supporters devy that and deny the EU -and predecessor organisstions any credit for the longest period of peace in western europe in hundreds of year,
Stuck between the USA and China, which are on a totally different scale to any western european country, clubbing together as a Union and free trade area is the only sensible course of action. The cost of the Commission and Parliament on a per capita basis is peanuts and abolishing that wouldn’t result in meaningful tax cuts for anyone. Indeed the UK is now within spitting distance of having spent as much money preparing for Brexit as the totality of our contributions to the EU over 40 years.
Still- we’re out and come next year we’ll see how that works in practice. My bet is it will be a total train wreck, but who knows?
“Migration control is among the most important protections of the poor in the real world. “
Exactly. The introduction of robust immigration controls is, in the UK at least, a matter of urgent humanitarian necessity. and a large part of the reason why I voted to Leave in 2016.
He’s pro-open borders so don’t get carried away.
The population of sea resorts towns (c.70% of the pop.) like Blackpool didn’t vote Leave because they uniquely (and correctly) understand the impact of Lisbon Treaty on UK Constitution. They voted Leave because their life sucks.
The populists are very good at banging on about “left behind” but what are they going to do about Blackpool, Skegness, Clacton, etc.? Make vacations in Spain illegal?
If you ask Trumpist what they like about Trump they UNIVERSALLY talk about judges. Well….were those judges beamed from space?
They were found and nurtured – a long term process – by the “system” (Federalist Society) and shepherd through the process by the ultimate insider Mitch McConnell. Trump and his minions were too busy triggering the left on Twitter and making money on Fox News….
But hey, planning (Brexit), system management is for losers. Real men (and women to be PC) tweet!
My experience of a seaside town, Great Yarmouth, is that it could well have voted leave because every boarding house, usually for summer occupancy by holiday makers, is stuffed with homeless immigrants.
.
Anecdotal.
LSE (google it) research on Yarmouth and Brexit vote was that the people’s needs (economic & social) were ignored by Brussels, Westminster and Local Government.
May be Yarmouth (the People) should govern directly and not rely on mandarins in the local councils. They can decide about trash collection through referendums.
I’m not sure that you’ve contradicted Bob Green at all there. In fact, you’ve pretty much said the same as him, but in different words.
My comment was based on LSE study about Yarmouth. Anecdotal stories are anecdotal.
Some academicians arrive, ask a few questions and in your book can fully understand the feelings of the local populace.
Good luck if you believe that.
I have a friend from London who came to teach in an east Norfolk school 20+ years ago. Early on she was told by her (native) headmaster, “If you work here for 10 years you’ll never understand how these children think”
Eventually she had to agree.
You make the assumption that the gentle and polite people of Norfolk told the LSE researchers the truth.
As a native I beg to differ.
So if the “population of sea resorts towns (c.70% of the pop.) like Blackpool
didn’t vote Leave because they uniquely (and correctly) understand the
impact of Lisbon Treaty on UK Constitution. They voted Leave because
their life sucks.
So the logical conclusion from that was that the Lisbon treaty, as correctly understood by the whole of Blackpool etc was not something that motivated a “leave” vote from them. It was their quality of life. So now, or rather post January 2021 their life is going to get miraculously better following a thin trade agreement or no deal? Is that what you are saying?
If it is I think you have got it badly wrong. Deprived of much of our trade with the EU their lives will get markedly worse. In part because the folk behind the leave vote will use their newly regained sovereignty to make it worse, by reducing labour standards, environmental standards and anything else that gets in the way of exploiting those people as cheap labour.
Interesting man caught between the reality, which he acknowledges, and his left leaning beliefs. The rich class that occupies both side of the political spectrum in the USA cannot break away from the financial realities because they are just that. So each one takes a turn at churning the economy. Trump got a short term rally going and Biden may well do the same, but both will have come at the cost of $trns of new debt. This is not a problem whilst the $ is the worlds reserve currency. However, at some point in the future this may no longer be the case.
As usual Freddie another interesting interview.
Personally I hope Varoufakis sticks to his principles – and hence is never elected as Prime Minister of Greece.
He mentioned how Mussolini start out as a Socialist and ended as a Fascist, this is what seems to happen with most dedicated Socialist.
I have always wondered why?
Most socialists are fascist they just don’t realize it
Varoufakis isn’t alone saying this; it seems obvious to me. It may be breaking some kind of etiquette, but a similar point was made here The Democrats’ Four-Year Reprieve.
I can’t understand why “Trump got some things right” is seen as such a minority view when it fits the facts better (and more comfortably for those of committed to democratic government) than “half the country are unpleasant morons who should be denied the right to vote.” Varoufakis is right about Trump’s glaring faults too. (There, I’ve annoyed everyone, and it’s not even lunchtime.)
This I why I consider myself a Ghengis Khan Socialist.
No clear line of analysis here, just a collection of incoherent thoughts. Trump’s great achievement is that he destroyed NAFTA and then put it back together again with only minor changes – wow. That’s telling them. In the meantime he showered the upper reaches of capitalist society in the US with tax cuts, low interest rates and massive injections of borrowed money into the economy. It is true that Trump converted the “deep state” into a “shallow state”, destroying the capacities of the state precisely when they were needed most and created a government that was world-beating for its lack of knowledge, skill and competence. What got Trump elected was to appeal to people’s grievances and then promising that he could solve all their problems. He had no actual interest in doing anything about it. Even his pet project, the wall, remains a sorry fragment of his lack of interest in public policy of any kind. No sign of his great infrastructure projects or amazing healthcare system. His greatest achievement in global trade was to destroy the foreign markets for American farmers and then be forced to pay massive compensation. If you interview someone like Varoufakis, it would be great to get at least some decent analysis out of it.
Trump did challenge the establishment in a lot of ways, but in regard to the chained CPI he just followed the established wisdom, but pushed harder than his more timid predecessors were willing to go. US Fed Chairman Allan Greenspan touted the C-CPI-U, more commonly called the chained CPI in congressional testimony in February 2004, noting that because it reduced the upward bias in the CPI measures then used for upratings, had it been used instead it would have cut the cumulative deficit of the US government by $200B. Two years before that, in the same year the C-CPI-U was to be published, the Panel on Conceptual, Measurement, and Other Statistical Issues in Developing Cost-of-Living Indexes chaired by Charles L. Schultze concluded: “It would be feasible and appropriate to calculate cost-of-living allowances provided for social security and other programs from an advance estimate of the BLS published superlative index”, i.e. the C-CPI-U, with its so-called superlative Törnqvist formula. Also: “Any divergence between that estimate and the superlative that appears 2 years later could be incorporated as a correction to the cost-of-living allowance provided for that year.” This was because, unlike the no-revision CPI-U and CPI-W series, the chained CPI has a two-year revision period.
In spite of this support from the experts, use of the chained CPI for upratings never occurred under President Bush or Obama, but had to wait on President Trump’s tax reform, where it came to be used for upratings of income tax brackets and other elements of the tax code. At the time of the election, Trump’s Office of Management and Budget was also studying a proposal to use the chained CPI to be used for uprating of the Official Poverty Measure.
As Vice-President of the United States, Joe Biden actually promoted the chained CPI for uprating of Social Security as part of a grand bargain with Republicans to get the 2011 budget passed. However, he jettisoned this idea in his 2020 election program, instead favouring upratings of Social Security with a CPI for those 62 years of age and older, a CPI-E. The CPI-E is calculated very much like the CPI-U or CPI-W, differing only in its target population, so shares the same upward bias that is corrected for in the chained CPI. Of course, one could calculate a chained CPI-E rather than a CPI-E, but this was not Biden’s promise.
Trump could have moved more quickly to introduce the chained CPI for upratings of federal programs perhaps, but he has made much more progress than either his Republican or his Democrat predecessor. Biden seems a very inferior sort of dealmaker compared to Trump. He proposed the chained CPI in 2011, but abandoned it in 2020. This, from someone who brags about following the science. Does he have any principles at all? In any case, if Americans are so unlucky as to see him sworn into office, by that time his brain will be fried, and he won’t know the C-CPI-U from C-3PO.