The Fundamentalist Religion of The Modern Right Wing

Many of us have seen fundamentalists argue in debates: they advance the same, tired, debunked arguments as though they have never been refuted. From the cosmological argument to the laughable idea that the new testament gospels are independent eye witnesses. Those advancing these arguments either do not know, or do not care, that they have been thoroughly and completely debunked and hold no water. But this is not important: the truth is less important than getting the talking points out there. The preconceived ideas and the agenda are what is important. Reality bends to their ideas, not the other way around.

There is something very similar going on with what passes for Conservatism in the 21st Century. They, too, do not care about reality, facts, science, knowledge or empiricism: ideology trumps reality. Examples abound of this petulant, arrogant in its ignorance anti-intellectualism, but the two best are climate science and trickle-down economics. Regardless of how many times trickle-down is shown *not* to produce the domestic growth that its advocates promise, or how many scientific studies (done by, you know, scientists) *prove* that the earth is warming and that catastrophic milestones have been passed, the right-wing simply ignores them, or derides them as, by any other name, heresy. What you said goes against our preconceived ideas, therefore you are a bad person.

That last clause was phrased carefully: they do not attack the *argument* being advanced, since they would lose, but rather they attack the individual making the argument. Not quite an accusation of being in league with *SATAN*, but in the same field of ideas. It is no coincidence that many of the worst offenders in this situation are, in fact, religious (Scott Morrison, Tony Abbott, US Senators James Inhoffe and Ted Cruz etc).

Such people in government are dangerous. They lack the characteristic the job requires most: mental flexibility. They do not change their position in accordance with the evidence and reality. Arguing with them is like playing chess with a chicken: even if you win, the chicken will knock over all the pieces, crap all over the board and strut around like he won.

It is for this reason that people such as this should be removed from government. I mean that. Unless you can show that you will listen to experts and change your position according to the evidence, then you are not wanted in government. Resign, or do not run.

CA

The American Revolution – Part Two

Time for another Rome-America parallel. Increasingly, the American Republic is looking like the Roman Republic of the First Century BC. As usual, the Roman background will be followed by the American parallel.

We start with the Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla (Sulla). He was a politician in the late second and early first centuries BC. A staunch traditionalist, he did not approve of the new direction (as he saw it) of the state. From time immemorial, the Senate had been the politically dominant body in the state, but there were two areas of specific control: state finances and foreign affairs.

To challenge the dominance of the nobiles (notables – an inner clique of Senators within the wider group) in these spheres was practically revolutionary. These men, so the logic went, had earned the right to be listened to due to generation of service to the state by their ancestors. You may recall from my previous post (The American Revolution) that the Gracchi brothers had challenged the aforementioned Senatorial dominance, and paid the price. Now we have another example of this ‘interference’, and a terrible response.

Sulla had been Consul (one of two chief executives elected annually) in 88BC, and had been assigned a command in the East by the Senate, which was the traditional way that such commands were allocated. However, Sulla’s personal enemy, Marius, desired the same command, and used a Tribune to pass a law granting it to him. This was intolerable for Sulla, who was gathering his forces in the south of Italy. Upon hearing of the granting to Marius what he considered to be his command, he marched his troops on the City.

When the Senate learned of Sulla’s intentions, a delegation was sent out. This is a useful example of the sheer impotence of the civilian government, but back to the plot. The members asked Sulla ‘why are you doing this?’. Sulla’s response is indicative ‘To free her [Rome] from her tyrants’ he said. The tyrants of this comment are the Tribunes and Marius, who, in Sulla’s mind, had usurped his command. He took the City by force, settled the affairs of state as best he could, and set out for the East. It is what happened upon his return that is most important, though.

When he returned, Sulla marched on the City again, since, in his absence, his enemies had taken it over. When he achieved final victory, he was elected Dictator, an extraordinary magistracy not held in more than 150 years. It was designed for emergencies. The Dictator was an individual appointed to see to a specific crisis, usually identified in his mandate. His term of office was six months, or until the task was completed, whichever came first. Sulla’s Dictatorial mandate was usefully broad. He was Dictator legibus scribondis et rei publicae constituendae or ‘The Dictator for the writing of laws and the reconstitution of the state’ – in other words – over everything.

Sulla used his Dictatorship to institute proscriptions of his opponents. A proscription is effectively a death list, the writing up in a public place of a name. Such a condemned individual could be killed with impunity, regardless of rank. Thousands perished in this purge. Sulla then went on to institute a reactionary, conservative agenda designed to legislate the pre-eminence of the Senate. Sulla had used authoritarian tactics in defence of the status quo.

This set a terrible precedent: the involvement of the army in politics would be the death knell of the Republic. Sulla had used revolutionary tactics to defend the established order. That this sort of political violence was even an option suggests this point as the true death of the Roman Republic. The next fifty years, down to the victory of Augustus at Actium in 31BC, was simply  matter of determining the details of what would replace the Republic.

Now to the American parallel. Earlier this week, Maine Governor Paul LePage said that America needed

Donald Trump to show some authoritarian power, to bring back the rule of law. We’ve had eight years of a President that…he’s an autocrat, he does it on his own, he ignores Congress, and every single day we’re slipping into anarchy, and I just think that four more years of a similar mentality is gonna destroy this nation

Ok – a translation. Rule of law means government by Republicans. Mr. Obama as ‘an autocrat’ refers to the Executive Order on Immigration, which came about only because of Republican inaction and obduracy on the issue. Finally, four more years of a similar mentality means continued government by Democrats under Mrs. Clinton.

But did you catch it there at the start? Authoritarian power to bring back the rule of law. This is precisely what Sulla did: use authoritarian tactics to reinstall the Senate as the chief wing of the state. This is what Mr. LePage is suggesting that Mr. Trump do: rule as an autocrat to re-establish ‘rule of law’- yes, because the establishment and the rich have just been crushed under the Nike shoe of the Gangsta Street Agitator and Chicago Thug in Chief.

Grow up you child – can you not see the terribly destructive precedent this sets? The invocation of autocracy, the very concept to which America is anathema, as a means to save it? Lose to win, sink to swim, escalate to disengage

In related news, a woman told Mike Pence, Mr. Trump’s VP Nominee, that she wanted ‘a revolution’ if Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Kaine were elected in November. Now, to Mr. Pence’s credit, he reacted appropriately by telling her ‘Don’t say that’ in an almost visceral way, but the mentality is there, from both the elected officials in Mr LePage, and from the rank and file in this woman.

This is extremely dangerous: there is a crack in the dam and people are burrowing into it.

CA

Marriage Equality: A Missed Opportunity

It is now official: the marriage equality plebiscite is dead. Following a Labor vote to oppose it, the concept is now dead for the foreseeable future. This is being celebrated on the left. This celebration strikes me as politically myopic and cutting off the nose to spite the face. Let me explain

A brief recap: the conservatives who run the Liberal party (and hence the nation) never wanted marriage equality, so they created their own success by approaching this reform in a non-binding way: if the plebiscite passed, they would ignore it,and if the Greens and Labor should scuttle it, so much the better. So I realise that the conservatives are the bad guys here, I understand that. The plebiscite was derided as fostering hate and giving a voice to bigotry. A far more legitimate criticism, I wrote in a previous post, was the fact that we don’t vote for rights (or at least we shouldn’t).

Now we see the celebration of the death of the plebiscite. *sigh* – how was the fact that this was a huge *opportunity* for the left missed so blatantly? Think about it: marriage equality has widespread support (some 70%) in the country and would, in all likelihood, have passed with relative ease. If the conservatives ignore the result, as some said they would, so much the better: you take that and you break them with it! They ignored the will of the people. They are tyrants. They are fascists. They hate democracy. They hate the Australian people. You hammer and hammer and hammer on that to a landslide at the next election.

But no. The seeming unwillingness to call the bully’s bluff has resulted in the conservatives getting their way yet again, without even the prospect of political consequences. The utter lack of strategic vision, the limiting of the focus to the news cycle (not even the election cycle) has resulted in a major missed political opportunity for the left. Chances to throw the conservatives’ own hubris back in their faces and have it explode should be leapt at, not squandered by woefully misguided partisanship or the fear of hurting people’s feelings. This is the new civil rights movement: movements for rights often involve blood, sweat and, yes, the occasional tear or two.

Anything that is worth achieving is never easy, and if you had been able to see the forest instead of sitting on tree branches, you could have turned this to your political advantage quite easily. Instead, the hard rights gets its way with no political fallout and a major political opportunity has been squandered.

CA

The Abbottoire Reopens

Evidently, former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott believes he can return to office as Malcolm Turnbull’s popularity, intra and extra-LNP, appears to be on the decline. *sigh*.What follows is not intended as partisan bashing of the former Prime Minister, but a defence of stable government.

Mr. Abbott told a group of his fellow conservatives in the UK (what being in the UK has to do with serving his constituents in Warringah is not quite clear) that he has a reasonable chance of returning to the Lodge. This was reported by the media, and Mr. Abbott’s response is telling: he criticised the journalist for ‘making things up’ (try not to laugh) without, and here’s the kicker, actually denying the statement. He did not explicitly say that the journalist (I believe it was Latika Burke) was incorrect in reporting his words, but merely criticised the media because he’s a Tory and that’s what we do.

It is fair to say that the former Prime Minister never got over being forcibly removed from power. Despite his use of the seemingly definitive phrase ‘dead, buried and cremated’ in reference to his leadership ambitions, Mr. Abbott has been regularly undermining Mr. Turnbull both in the former and current terms of parliament. It is also noteworthy that that phrase, ‘dead, buried and cremated’ means nothing coming from Mr. Abbott since he used it in reference to so-called Work Choices and then brought back the same bill, either with slight modifications or a different name.

Mr. Abbott in the background as Mr. Turnbull serves as the puppet of the hyper-conservative wing of the LNP does not bode well for stable government: an alternative, viable or otherwise, is waiting in the wings to replace Mr. Turnbull if he moves one foot out of line. It is for this reason that I propose the following: if there is a leadership challenge, in either party, the loser, whether the challenger or the Prime Minister/Opposition Leader, must resign from politics. This approach has two main advantages: if the potential challenger knows that their political career is on the line, they may be less likely to challenge. Second, the removal of the loser lessens the opportunity for undermining and sniping, thus making government (theoretically at least) more stable.

So long as Mr. Abbott remains in politics, the LNP cannot provide stable government. It is for this reason that he must resign

CA