THE WAGES OF POLITICAL PURITY

I’ve been fuming since I saw the photo above yesterday. Fuming about the stupidity of youthful idealism, and then thinking about how I voted for Richard Nixon and the Second American War in Vietnam and everything else that happened afterwards to today, back in 1968, out of the stupidity of youthful idealism.

No, I didn’t walk into a voting place and step into a booth and mark a ballot for Nixon. I voted for him in 1968 when I didn’t vote that year, so I could show Hubert Humphrey and the Democrats how unworthy they were of my vote and support.

And by not voting for Humphrey, who only lost the popular vote by around 50,000+ votes, I voted for Nixon and his “secret plan” to end the war. I voted for more division at home that ultimately led to the resurgence of the Right with all that meant over the next 50 years, for 59,000 more American deaths in the next four years, for the disruption and dislocation of all of Southeast Asia and the deaths of millions while Nixon and Kissinger did everything they could to not have to accept the same damn deal that LBJ’s negotiators had finally said yes to in the fall of 1968, just before the election, the deal that was sabotaged by Nixon to insure his election as president. I voted for all of that in an act of political pique. And by so doing, I got exactly what I didn’t want when I look at the way things are today.

My point in raising this memory is to make the point that the antiwar movement back then and the campus protests against the Gaza War now are very hot-house environments, environments where people can come up with surprisingly bad ideas that somehow make sense to them in the moment.

Act in haste; repent at leisure.

1968 was an inflection point in American history. Two very different futures were offered: one in which the government would be controlled by a political party that was far from perfect, but was committed to keeping the social contract that had been made in 1932, the social contract that had made the country the most successful, middle class country in history. The other future would be dominated by people dedicated to destroying everything that had been achieved since 1932.

And we in the movement dedicated to making America live up to its founding ideals made the wrong choice. We got exactly what we didn’t want.

As was certainly the case in the 1960s, meritorious protest actions on college campuses often mutate into romanticizing “revolutionary action” and the drama of occupations.

One thing they never do is actually solve the problem the student revolutionaries are protesting.

The Columbia protesters made a major strategic mistake when they occupied Hamilton Hall. Up to that point, the protesters were winning in the forum of public opinion by posing questions: Why are you claiming this protest is a big crisis? We’re just here in our tents on a campus green. We’re not being violent and we’re taking steps to police our group’s activities.

They were winning that argument, in the court of public opinion and on other college campuses, as shown by the spread of protests and encampments. Occupying the building, including the property destruction and violence that always accompanies such action, lost the argument. In the forum of public opinion, employing force to end that occupation - and the others across the country - received approval, and the protesters became caricatures in Right Wing media - the new “antifa” and “BLM.” Maybe visuals of the NYPD coming in to clear the building were what the the extremists among the protesters wanted. But it gave force to the argument that the university had a legitimate public safety issue to contend with.

People get wound up into fantasies that they’re part of some kind of revolutionary action or moment. And in so doing, they always manage to defeat themselves in accomplishing the goal they say they want.

Now, The College Democrats of America, that claims to represent over 100,000 students across the country, calling itself “the official collegiate arm of the Democratic National Committee” has issued an ominous warning to President Joe Biden. Tuesday, the group released a statement expressing support for students protesting the war in Gaza and criticizing the administration over how it is managing the conflict.

The statement read, “Since the beginning of this conflict, College Democrats and students from every walk of life have had the moral clarity to see this war for what it is: destructive, genocidal, and unjust. As College Democrats we are committed to the reelection of President Biden. The White House has taken the mistaken route of a bear hug strategy for Netanyahu and a cold should strategy for its own base and all Americans who want to see an end to this war. Each day that Democrats fail to stand united for a permanent ceasefire, two-state solution, and recognition of a Palestinian state, more and more youth find themselves disillusioned with the party.”

On Wednesday, they upped the ante, declaring on Xitter: “College Democrats’ votes are not to be taken for granted by the Democratic Party. We reserve the right to criticize our party when it fails to listen to us. If you keep ignoring us, keep giving us the cold shoulder, you risk losing your own base, and then in turn, the election.”

Criticisms of President Biden’s position in support of or opposition to almost every issue relating to the Middle East has quickly transformed into an oblique threat: “If Biden doesn’t do or say XYZ, he will lose the support of - fill in the blank - Young voters, college students, Muslims, Jews, centrists, independents, law and order voters, persuadable Republicans, and anti-war protesters from the 1960s (at least those among the latter who learned nothing from their experience).

Threatening to abandon Biden over his Middle East policies implies a willingness to abandon support for: women’s reproductive liberty and equality; the right of Black voters to equal access to the ballot box; protection of the environment; protection of healthcare and retirement for Americans on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid; continuation of affordable healthcare for all Americans; due process for 10 million immigrants who will be “rounded up” and placed in camps before summary deportation; Muslims who will be denied free transit to and from countries where family and friends reside; LGBTQ people whose right to marriage and civil rights equality is under attack; scientists and teachers who want to pursue knowledge and educate others free from political retribution.

That these political 6-year olds threaten to turn their backs on fellow citizens and these urgent issues is - in the words of my friend Josh Marshall at TPM - a “burn it all down” strategy that will injure hundreds of millions of Americans.

The threat by these over-privileged pre-schoolers is an implicit promise to support Trump. Just like my “vote” in 1968 was a vote for Nixon and every evil thing that Fount of Evil tried to do in the next four years, as well as a vote for every evil thing that Republicans have done since with the power they gained in the 1970s by opposing everything we said we were in favor of.

2024 is an inflection point in American history as surely as 1968 was, only this time the choice is even more meaningful, more important than it was 56 years ago. Like it or not, in 2024 we face a binary choice: democracy or tyranny, liberty or subjugation, dignity or degradation, equality or injustice, order or chaos.

Threatening to support depravity as a pressure tactic is political idiocy on the part of anyone who says they are committed to the ideals the protesters claim they are.

This time the choices include one that leads to the obliteration of the democratic constitutional republic we have lived in all our lives and its replacement with a theocratic fascist dictatorship that guarantees the people of the planet Earth will not be able to successfully confront and deal with an existential crisis that doesn’t listen to arguments or philosophies of government, religion or society. That existential crisis is climate change, which just might lead to the extinction of life on Earth as we have known it, certainly of our species.

The truth is that these protests have become an in-kind contribution to Trump’s campaign. They will not save one single life in Gaza.

They will insure that you get exactly what you say you do not want.

Yesterday, Representative Virginia Foxx - a real “piece of work” far right Republican fron North Carolina - announced that the Congressional antisemitism investigation will expand into a Congress-wide crackdown on colleges. Speaking at a press conference, she had a clear message for “mealy-mouthed, spineless college leaders. Congress will not tolerate your dereliction of duty to your Jewish students. American universities are officially put on notice that we have come to take our universities back.”

I’ve seen this happen before. Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Inquirer noted that right-wing politicians jumped on the Kent State shootings of May 1970 to defund colleges and universities, while a “law and order” backlash helped give Republican president Richard M. Nixon a landslide reelection in 1972. Basically, I was stupid enough to vote for the bastard twice, even though in 1972 I did go to the polling place and cast a ballot for McGovern.

Right now, the GOP and certain conservative Democrats (find them under “the usual suspects”) have gotten a vote in the House on a bill to define anti-Semitism so that government agencies can apply that definition to political activities by American citizens exercising their First Amendment rights, which will allow punitive measures to be taken against those who are found to have engaged in “anti-Semitism” as defined in the bill.

The definition of anti-Semitism they intend to use includes political criticism of the government of Israel.

In other words, every post I have made here since October 7 on the Gaza crisis, and nearly every comment made by you, the subscribers to That’s Another Fine Mess, in which the Netaqnyahu government was criticized, could be considered “anti-Semitism” under this law (if it is passed as is in the Senate, which is likely). I am sure that Substack would enforce such judgement if a complaint was made about any posts or comments here or on any other page, which would mean the end of That’s Another Fine Mess or any other blog reported for similar posts.

This is merely the most certain of the negative events that are likely to happen as the result of actions taken by a bunch of over-educated, under-intelligent student “revolutionaries,” who congratulate themselves on their high political awareness and committment to “justice” for the oppressed.

The stakes this time are far higher than they were when we “political purists” fucked up in 1968.

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