And in this talk, he says many things that crypto-socialist Bernie Sanders wouldn't argue with. Especially care and concern for the working class. That I agree with, cause I think they've been forgotten by all parties.
A reader comments, below the fold...
No system is perfect and can address all social problems. At the moment, we are going through the technological / digital revolution that will change our way of life forever. Society is at the most unstable and vulnerable stage in time of such kind of fundamental change and liberal democratic system is currently going through a system stress testing period.
Bannon is a populist, a political activist, cleverly identified some real issues and concerns in the system and has been using them as his political tools (as he said himself).
He follows the textbook tactics as a political activist:
first- you pick up issues that become stressful to people in time of change;
second- you identify an enemy (for him - it is immigration and China) so to give these people an easy answer to “their problems”; and
third- you position yourself as their voice and group them rallying around you so you can push your agenda (he saw Trump as his tool but he lost control of him.)
In the turning of the 20th century, the world was going through major changes as result of the industrialization. The systemic stress led us into the world wars among competing nations, huge human suffering and set Europe backwards- including the demise of seven royal houses (linked with each other as an European alliance).
Large population was perished during the conflict, more than ever before in any conflict in human history. However, the solution to rebuild the world was not to reverse it back to an “agriculture utopia”. Marxism or fascism or nationalism was certainly not and should never be the answer, especially in the much more connected world.
Every technological advancement would and will make the Pareto distribution more and more profound. If the enlarged social gap were not be dealt with ahead of the speed of change, we would likely unleash an explosion of angry mass against elite.
British found an intelligent way to deal with the social disparity through capitalism reform (including social welfare etc) that helped Europe to defeat the raise of communism after the war and; America was lucky to have a great leadership to develop an effective economic policy to mange through the Great Depression, and to grasp the opportunity of power vacuum post the world wars.
Russia and China were not so lucky- they ended up with communism because they had not yet been fully industrialized and had not yet established strong institutions to manage the transition.
Fascism and communism are two sides of the same coin. Both fascism and communism want an “equal outcome “. It is why fascism was appealing to the working class poor Germans after War I and communism was appealing to the peasants and poor farmers in Russia and China after War II.
Both ideologies looked for and used an equalizer to achieve this goal, and we all know what happened afterwards - a mob led by a dictator.
Bannon reminded me these political activists just like him using the same tactics in Germany, Russia and China during those difficult times when the societies struggled to deal with uneven wealth distribution.
His agenda and proposals are mixed bag of BS - destructive and counterproductive to the technological innovation and social progress. For him, it is all about winning elections. His economic proposals -(eg he wanted increase tax to 44%!) sounds like Sanders, a socialist (nearly a communist). Instead of “giving the land back to the farmers”, a carrot used by the communism 50-70 years ago, he wants to resurrect manufacturing jobs for the “rust-belts”, turning America backwater into a developing world “supply chain” manufacturing base (while the far left social agenda is the healthcare for all but no idea how to finance it).
His immigration agenda mixed with nationalism is another funny argument. The debate on illegal immigrants is served as a disguise for his true objective- exclusion of any perceived enemies, for example, he already proposed who (non Americans) should go to American universities. It is not hard to see how far he would go if he were in power.
Racism was a tool for fascism, a twisted tribal desire which was used to get an equal outcome (eg as long as “we are the same kind of people”). Communism used “working class values” as the equalizer. Bannon disgusts his whatever BS with “citizenship” because racism is so out of mainstream fashion. The left doesn’t know any better and doesn’t know how to argue with him because they also want to equalize the outcome which would also lead to tragedy as history told us.
Bannon thinks that he is not a fascist or racist because he says he doesn’t mind those non-white people (eg he said he sees the Latino, black and Asian the same as the white as long as they are the “citizens”). He doesn’t understand the difference between his hawkish “American populism” and the European “populists” nostalgia, and he can’t see his own similarities on the economics with Sanders’ (except Sanders is a more honest person - it is why young idealists love him and hate Bannon).. Luckily, Bannon doesn’t have a comprehensive ideology (unlike those who carried out fascism and communism) and the democratic institutions today are stronger than these in the turning of the last century,
In the end, the arguments between the right and the left are not really the point. Because none of them can address the real issues everyday people are facing because none of them understand what is really going on in the economy, the technology, and the global financing and trading system.
Our specie is confronting a challenge created by digital revolution to our own existence that requires multilayered understanding and solutions. We need time to digest the change and look for solutions.
I am not sure that we have enough time because of the speed of change. I am pessimistic. There are some great thinkers with clarity in their way of thinking- historically, philosophically and economically but it seems that they are traveling alone and not quite together, and they don’t have enough political voice.
I do really hope the world gets lucky again this time in the turning of the 21th Century.
Roman Empire was an earlier version of globalization (in Mediterranean). China had its own continent. The Roman system had lasted many centuries but followed by the thousand years dark ages until Renaissance to revive the west which led it to industrialization and world domination (but China missed out the industrialization because it was isolated on its own continent).
This time, I don’t know if there would be a renaissance for anyone because we are entering a completely new world.
People like Bannon would only make the situation worse.
