Our opponents are only human.
Lots of articles are coming out lately about Trump and Bannon playing some sort of tenth-dimensional chess, in which the nation’s largest mass spontaneous demonstrations against their policies somehow play into their plan to escalate a constitutional crisis and neuter popular opposition through fatigue. (While history suggests mass action begets more action, not less.) Or even, perplexingly, stage some sort of coup despite having already secured the Executive, showing no interest in diminishing the separation of powers between Legislative or Judicial, and possessing no Party, clique of junior military officers, or paramilitary organization to seize control of those branches.
Much of this analysis is the natural result of shock and unfamiliarity with our situation. It is highly unlikely our opponents possess the kind of tactical sophistication or even staff capacity necessary to game out all these scenarios. Just like the fantasy of Obama as some sort of superhuman analytical engine was invented to demobilize his constituents, when history demonstrates he was quite easily misled by his naivete, philosophical commitment to compromise, and his faith in liberal democratic institutions to weather reactionary backlash.
In fact, Bannon is in a totally unique historical situation, as are we. And assuredly he has to do his best to stay ahead of the game. For his part, he is trying to balance the competing interests of the Congressional and Republican party apparatus he needs to craft, pass, defend and implement his policies, the intelligence and security apparatus that is skeptical about his foreign policy, and a ruling class of tech, finance and capitalist enterprise that are pleased to loot this Government, but averse to threats to long term profitably from both wasteful protectionist policies like the wall, and civil unrest.
Now let us enter the field as a left popular majority. Aware of the odds being against us but in no way superstitious about our opponents, who, riven with competing personalities and alliances, are trying to overcome their structural weaknesses with sheer momentum. Let us prevent that from happening, isolate the regime from the support it needs to function, surround and implement a democratic state of emergency that makes it impossible for the Right to corral its interest groups, and destabilize a rogue, unconstitutional Executive Branch.
“…isolate the regime from the support it needs to function, surround and implement a democratic state of emergency that makes it impossible for the Right to corral its interest groups, and destabilize a rogue, unconstitutional Executive Branch.”
It is the flexibility, class analysis, and visionary nature of revolutionary fascism that has allowed it to be so adaptable and successful, not any special or formidable brilliance on the part of its practitioners. And it is the maneuverability, class analysis, and visionary nature of the revolutionary left — expressed through the collective imagination of millions of practitioners — that will allow us to be more adaptive, more maneuverable, and more effective than our opponents.
The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the ‘state of emergency’ in which we live is not the exception but the rule. We must attain to a conception of history that is in keeping with this insight. Then we shall clearly realize that it is our task to bring about a real state of emergency, and this will improve our position in the struggle against Fascism. One reason why Fascism has a chance is that in the name of progress its opponents treat it as a historical norm. The current amazement that the things we are experiencing are ‘still’ possible in the twentieth century is not philosophical. This amazement is not the beginning of knowledge — unless it is the knowledge that the view of history which gives rise to it is untenable. -Walter Benjamin
