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Presidential Election 2024
"Neither is qualified. Both deserve to lose."
Video: Prof. Jeffrey Sachs Q & A at Cambridge Union as published on Oct 30 2024
Starting at 48:06 min (automated transcript, slightly edited):
Sachs:
I will not vote for a candidate that doesn't meet the minimum threshold for being president of the United States and we have two candidates, lead candidates, that don't. And so I decided I'm not voting – period. Because I want a candidate that actually has some possibility of doing something.
Now maybe they will but not based on what they say every day.
It is a profession of love for Israel's murderous reign in the Middle East. Okay, by itself I wouldn't support that. That's enough for me because Israel is committing a genocide in Gaza and it's sickening and it's obvious and we see it every day. And if a candidate can't figure out to say something about then I can't support them. Period.
But then Kamala Harris, who would normally be my candidate because I was a lifelong Democratic Party voter. Although with great disappointment whether they won or lost. Because when they won I was disappointed with what they did. When they lost I was disappointed that my candidate lost. So I've never been happy for a while about us politics.
It's been five miserable presidents as far as I'm concerned from Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump, Biden, awful all of them. They brought us to the brink of nuclear war. I can't forgive them for that kind of recklessness.
But when it comes to Ukraine Harris says we stand with Ukraine. Just everybody understand what does it mean to stand with Ukraine, like Boris Johnson stands with Ukraine. It means 2,000 Ukrainians killed or wounded severely every single day. That's not standing with Ukraine. That is standing with the destruction of Ukraine. It's exactly the opposite. And so that's a purely Orwellian idea that we're standing with Ukraine by continuing this war.
And that's what she says because she doesn't seem to have any idea other than what she's told to say or she says her ideas. And either way I can't vote for her.
And with Trump – don't even get me started.
So the answer is I don't see either of them based on what they're saying right now doing much.
But I think there's another point that is important in this. I'm not without hope for a quite different reason and that is that our politics is not determined by American presidents. Our politics is determined by the Security State apparatus. And what is happening right now is not in America's security interest and so they could change their mind.
President Putin said something actually very interesting in an interview in 2017, I think in Figaro. By the time he had three presidents as his counterparts, Bush, Obama and Trump, and he said to this French reporter in 2017.
He said: "You know I've dealt with three American presidents. Now they come into office with ideas but then men in dark suits and blue ties come to tell them how the real situation is and you never hear of those ideas again."
And this is from a very tough-minded leader who was himself KGB he understands how the American system works very well. He understands what the CIA means for American foreign policy. He understands that American foreign policy is very deeply rooted.
It's not this one wins then Obama changes everything and then Trump comes in and changes nothing like that. By the way this has been a consistent foreign policy arguably since 19 certainly since 1991 and arguably since 1945.
– end of Jeffrey Sachs quote
He said: “You know I’ve dealt with three American presidents. Now they come into office with ideas but then men in dark suits and blue ties come to tell them how the real situation is and you never hear of those ideas again.”
And this is from a very tough-minded leader who was himself KGB he understands how the American system works very well. He understands what the CIA means for American foreign policy. He understands that American foreign policy is very deeply rooted.
It’s not this one wins then Obama changes everything and then Trump comes in and changes nothing like that. By the way this has been a consistent foreign policy arguably since 19 certainly since 1991 and arguably since 1945.
Did not trouble to follow the link: Whatever moral reformation Sachs may have undergone since the restoration of capitalism in Russia, it is the value of his ideas that merits our attention to him now. Or doesn’t: Sachs had no deep insight into reality back in the 90s and I know of no reason today. (Sachs only had “ideas” useful to the restoration of capitalism in Russia, at least in regards to selling them.) The concluding sentences in the citation show this I think. Sachs implicitly denies there is an American ruling class! Quite aside from Sachs’ record, this alone is enough reason to justify ignoring him. The deep roots of the continuity in US foreign policy are the deep roots in the ruling class, not the CIA. That’s Deep State BS, a propaganda construct* intended to deflect and deny the reality of classes.
Any ruling class, like every real world social phenomenon of any, is heterogeneous to a degree, split by rivalries, without formal membership, its de effective composition subject to the vicissitudes of individual careers, marriages, business alliances, large structural changes in the economy which means the property the rulers own changes and their effective power with it, change churning up new member families while some families lose their previous significance. But when all is said and done it is the inheritance of property by ruling class families which gives the ruling class fundamental policies a continuity that lasts beyond the ever changing political vicissitudes. That’s why even “the CIA” (which didn’t even exist in 1945, much less for the post-war planning that began before 1945!) with its top levels under presidential control cannot by itself provide that continuity. The continuity is the shared class interest in serving the most universal needs of ruling class property despite individual rivalries. Even Sachs is vaguely aware of this, hence the weasel wording “arguably” to avoid openly admitting he is saying the effect—policy continuity—preceded the alleged cause—“the CIA.” Apparently not even Sachs is shameless enough to openly claim temporal retrocausation?
This fundamental continuity spans generations because the ruling class spans generations, just as the nobility spanned generations in previous times. (Fragments still do, by the way, see land holdings of the English monarchs for one.) You can’t even save the “Deep State” propaganda construct by baldly asserting, the “Deep State” is the ruling class and the ruling class is the “Deep State.” The reason is that in the US almost all of the main ways the ruling class binds the state to their purposes, makes bourgeois democracy their dictatorship of capital, are mostly “public”—-but not publicized and always mystified. You can’t abolish the “Deep State” by having some deranged billionaire firing people because a system that creates billionaires is a ruling class system. The power of billionaires is ruling class power and giving more power to billionaires is serving the ruling class (despite any factional differences between rival ruling class members/families.)
As to the “men in dark suits and blue ties,” my view is this should be thought of as the production team explaining the facts to the sales team. It’s like a general explaining that no, the US cannot invade Iran and win or a mid-level bureaucrat explaining that what the upper level guys want to do is illegal. That’s not a conspiracy to obstruct the (fascist?) Hero of the People, that’s the world. The fact is that the economy is under the control of the ruling class and “politics” is about a sales team managing to sell the policies needed. The actions of a president matter very much in very many ways, but the presidents don’t control the economy, they just get blamed for it. The actual ruling class continuity in the economy is fundamentally irrational because their system, capitalism, is contradictory and there is no rational solution that serves the majority. It mostly serves them very well, as it should since it’s their political weapon (the bourgeois democratic state.) They don’t have a crisis until they lose money, it’s just the rest of us who do.
And that’s why such idiocy as the “Deep State” are such a useful diversion. Picking a faction of the ruling class in the name of fighting the “Deep State” is stooging for the ruling class. It’s not an accident that not voting is invariably interpreted as endorsing the status quo. And it’s no accident that so many people are effectively disenfranchised in the US. What is appalling the number of people who pretend or worse, really do, think voting for a ruling class (fascist?) Hero is opposition. No, it’s endorsement of the ruling class.
*The Deep State may be a thing in countries where the bourgeoisie is very weak, so weak that generals or strong man politicians in a corrupt political system is essential to building up their family wealth. The US bourgeoisie is not weak. (It should be notorious that Musk and Bezos in particular rely on government contracts. That’s why exalting Musk to save the US is insane in terms of the purported goal. Musk rampaging would be a genuine case of “Deep State” nefarious victory.) Countries like Egypt or Turkey may have real Deep State. There’s a prima facie case Putin and his (and Yeltsin’s) siloviki are the Russian Deep State that re-established capitalism, but I’m not sure that would hold up under a thorough investigation.)
Lastly, the increasingly open anti-Semitism of so much of the MoA commentariat is appalling. Sure some Jews are in the ruling class, most are not. Most ruling class members are not Jewish. “Jews” are not all powerful behind the scenes. There are many conspiracies in history, but history is not a conspiracy. And for the umpteenth time, the tail does not wag the dog.
Posted by: steven t johnson | Nov 5 2024 15:02 utc | 366
Posted by: suzan | Nov 5 2024 16:25 utc | 376 Thanks for kind words. As to political tactics and strategy about the best way to organize, I can’t pretend to be authoritative. Mostly I’m too vain to comment much on things I haven’t studied and seen much history for. (For instance, when I wrote about post-war planning preceding the CIA, but nevertheless laying down the fundamentals of foreign policy for decades, I was influenced by the work of Gabriel Kolko The Politics of War in particular.) I can only offer my personal biography as a resident of a rural Red state. Organizing in low population density areas is structurally difficult and often depends on some openings provided by national policies where concentrations of workers do open better opportunities for influence. That in my opinion is the animus against “coastal elites,” by which local elites mean the urban population, not the “elites.” True elites are pretty cosmopolitan in their social lives, traveling to elitist enclaves—like Mar a Lago for instance—and socializing with their equals, at least so far as I can tell, being an outsider unlike some MoA commenters. My experience tells me that national Trumpery would be terrible for the majority of rural people, a massive reinforcement to their local class “elites.” They mostly control rural politics and that’s why rural states/areas are Red, I think. Trump was Roy Cohn’s apprentice, but he plays the boss now. And the boss is not our friend. The final three paragraphs are what I think as of this moment. If facts change, my opinions may change too. Sorry if that sounds wishy washy.
All I can really say is that historically, “accelerationism,” the notion that things devolving into violent chaos is good pickings for revolutionaries or reformist, only really “works” in the aftermath of a major defeat in war. Even the Junkers had to reform Prussia after Napoleon kicked their asses (strongly influenced by French revolutionary reforms exported to the Rhineland, as I understand it.) The costs of such a thing are still enormous yet victory is not guaranteed. Worse, the Italy’s Red Summer was defeated. Weakened by defeat, the bourgeoisie consolidated Mussolini’s fascism to mover forward—for them, as they saw it. Similarly, the German Revolution was defeated by 1923. And the German bourgeoisie to move their goals “forward” (against the rest of us,) installed Hitler. In general, a political defeat is a backward step, away from victory, not towards it. Or so I see it. I can’t believe in Trump: Chaos Agent of Accelerationism.
As to Harris, Harris is Biden’s VP. Biden is a terrible president in many ways, mostly because of his many bipartisan compromises with Trumpery. And his populist efforts, like his pro-labor pretenses, are invariably too little, too late, because of his bipartisan commitment to the status quo. As to what Harris the president would do? It’s like asking what Hubert Humphrey would have done: Nobody knows, nobody can know. Who knows, maybe Harris would grow up and remember she’s her father’s daughter, not just her mother’s. Not the way I would bet, to say the least! But maybe possible? Nixon went to China. Nonsense about a coup putting Harris in a candidate is just that. The profoundly undemocratic aspect is that not just that nobody really knows what Harris would stand for when she was president and voting for her is like signing over a blank check. This business of the nominee selecting someone on a whim is entirely objectionable I think. We can’t tell by Biden, because VPs don’t do independent policy (not even Cheney, who came the closest in recent decades, not so far as I can tell.) Since Biden is not really a lame duck until we know who his successor will be, we can’t even tell now.
The thing is, given Trump’s commitment to lying, voting for him is every bit as much as signing over a blank check. The Trump worshippers are like every other religion, they have their own private interpretations of what the True Faith is. That means just as much for them as any other religion, nothing. The undemocratic aspect of a nominee picking a VP at whim holds here too. Given Trump’s age and mental deterioration (visible I think to objective eyes) Vance has an excellent chance to become president. I could imagine Peter Thiel et al. bankrolling a 26th Amendment. My impression from MoA commentariat is that only the most partisan hacks among even the Trumpers are truly committed to Vance.
Posted by: Turk 152 | Nov 5 2024 15:39 utc | 371 “So do you think the people in burning tents in Gaza are antisemitic?” If I was the personally being bombed by the IDF, I would definitely be tempted to think all Jews are personal enemies who have to be killed. And I would no more condemn this emotional reaction than condemn the victim of any other crime for being angry. But there’s a reason why it’s better to have a jury of non-victims render the verdict. In return, what do the people in Gaza think of the Palestinian Authority? And, how would it help anyone to simply blame “Jews?”
Posted by: steven t johnson | Nov 5 2024 17:19 utc | 386
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