[Xmca-l] Re: That other political crisis

[David Kellogg]

Yes, I remember Aznar won by a small margin and the Popular were eventually
repudiated by a HUGE popular movement (when they tried to pin the Madrid
bombings on ETA just before an election). The same thing is now happening
in South Korea: we are starting to emerge from the same dark tunnel which
America has just entered:

http://askakorean.blogspot.com.au/2016/11/the-days-ahead.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook

I think that every far right movement (including Hitler's) is salad
dressing. It's an  emulsion of two basically incompatible fluids:
extra-parliamentary mass terror and stable, board-room corporate
bureaucratism, and you can shake these things together for a while with
money and power but they will start to separate out almost immediately.
There is already some question in my mind to what extent Trump is a sincere
white nationalist and to what extent he just thinks he can harness the
white nationalist whirlwind as his fellow Republicans tried to harness him.
We know, for example, that Trump's anti-Semitism is quite insincere--a real
anti-Semite would not allow his daughter to marry a Jew and convert to
Judaism.

He can't harness them, of course; but he can and he will protect them, and
they will commit outrages that will turn the whole country against the lot.
Wasn't it amazing that the ambush of police officers in Iowa by a WHITE
nationalist did not make the national conversation, did absolutely nothing
to alter the outcome in a key state? It was a vital opportunity to drive a
wedge between Trump and the white nationalists, and the Democrats and the
media simply let it go. THAT would not have happened in Spain or in South
Korea.

David Kellogg
Macquarie University







On Fri, Nov 11, 2016 at 1:46 AM, Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>
wrote:

> I meant "I do think the voters perceived ... as quite moderate"
> ________________________________________
> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> on behalf of Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>
> Sent: 10 November 2016 15:39
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: That other political crisis
>
> Hi David,
>
> yes, Spain has moved to the right after socialist governments in what in
> Spain we refer to as bi-partidism: always two main options (in Spain, as I
> believe in most of Europe, the colours are reversed as compared to US, the
> socialist-inclined party is red and the right-ish party blue).
>
> I see the point of your comparison, but I should say that when Aznar's
> government won, his campaign, and the way the party (which, you are right,
> was formed by the most direct heritors of Francoism) presented itself was
> very different to the now spread populist far-right campaigns. I read now a
> post at "El Pais" from 1996, a then socialist inclined newspaper (today
> totally submitted to other powers), which referred to Aznar and his party
> as "centre-right." Although today PP's (Aznar's party) heritage and profile
> are evident to everyone in Spain, I do not think the voters at the time
> (and note that they won by a small margin) perceived Aznar and his party as
> quite moderate, and even sophisticated, and not as the extremes that the
> other more clearly fascist-like cases (Trump, Le Pen...) are perceived
> today.
>
> For good or for bad, today's Spanish political landscape is more
> colourful, with at least two new big forces (one to the left of the once
> socialists, and one to the right of the latter; the socialists no longer
> knowing well who they are). So that now there are four colours, purple,
> red, orange, and blue. We could be closer to the rainbow, though.
>
> Alfredo
>
>
> ________________________________________
> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> on behalf of David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com>
> Sent: 09 November 2016 20:47
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: That other political crisis
>
> Thoughtful and care-full as always, Mike. The link you sent wasn't full of
> errors, but it also wasn't very full of information: it faithfully
> reflected the questions that most people have (Why, for example, should a
> friendship between two women be a matter for scandal and street
> demonstrations?). It also didn't really answer them.
>
> But maybe this one will (Greg--if you are not following the scandal through
> Mark's work on Cheondoism then you might want to give this to your
> students):
>
> http://askakorean.blogspot.com.au/2016/10/the-irrational-
> downfall-of-park-geun-hye.html
>
> Last night I was thinking to myself, with some astonishment, that 2016
> represents the first time since 1933 that a major Western country has voted
> in a far right government with a violent, extraparliamentary base. When
> Marine Le Pen began "Euro-fascism", I had thought it would probably happen
> in France or Austria or Switzerland first. The fact that it has happened in
> the USA (and that it happened through social media but largely without a
> parliamentary "ground game" of the sort that people on this list were
> engaged in) astonished me, and I fell asleep thinking that xmca might want
> to revisit the PPTization of intellectual arguments, the nature of media
> like twitter, and the ways in which Trump's speeches were constructed on
> the fly, in order to really understand it. (I keep thinking of his uncanny
> ability to end every sentence on a fall, except when he is constructing
> a speech act around a vacuum--"I'm not sayin', but I'm just sayin',
> y'know?")
>
> But this morning when I woke up I realized that it has happened before, and
> that Alfredo can probably tell us a lot about it. Spain, after years of
> Francoism, underwent an eight year experiment with social democracy and
> then voted in a neo-Francoist party under Aznar. Similarly, South Korea,
> after years of murderous repression under the current president's father
> and his military academy juniors (Jeon Duhwan and Noh Tae-u, the "Class of
> 56", who succeeded Bak Jeonghi when he was assassinated) underwent a ten
> year experiment with something like social democracy--this coincided with
> my own rather carelessly made decision to settle there--before voting in
> the current president on a similar neo-authoritarian platform. Something
> there is about a frantic petty bourgeoisie that loves a wall.
>
> Mutatis mutandis.
>
> David Kellogg
> Macquarie University
>
>
> On Wed, Nov 9, 2016 at 4:27 PM, mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu> wrote:
>
> > Having worked until time was up, I have had time to go back and read some
> > of what has been discussed.
> >
> > The outcome of the election is there for all to consider and experience
> in
> > the weeks and months ahead.
> >
> > I attach an article for those who do not (like me) know much about the
> > current political crisis in South Korea. David will correct the errors in
> > it i am confident, and it appears to give at least a hint of the turmoil
> in
> > that part of the world.
> >
> > it can be found here, last time i looked  http://www.nytimes.com/2016/
> > 11/06/world/asia/south-koreans-ashamed-over-les-secretive-adviser.html
> >
> > FYI
> >
> > mike
> >
>
>