Monday, May 16, 2016

Ian Welsh — Seven Rules for Running a Real Left-Wing Government


The question is whether a left wing government not brought to power through revolution can do all this.

Ian Welsh
Seven Rules for Running a Real Left-Wing Government

2 comments:

Dan Lynch said...

Ian's post ties in well with @Tom's comments on the other thread.

Ian suggests boning up on Machiavelli. I would only add that Huey Long might also be a good role model. Instead, much of the American "left" disses Huey, which might say something about why the left keeps losing.

Kaivey said...

So we need a wage scale to stop people getting too rich. It seems impossible, but those very clever academics on the left might know how to do it. What we have now is a system of the self perpetuating rich, people who get even more very rich while they sleep.


'Too many left-wingers try to play by what they think the rules are. “We have a fair election every X years and the losers accept the result and don’t sabotage the winner (or do a coup).”

Those aren’t the real rules. If the right is really losing, they will cheat and cheat massively. They will think nothing of running death squads, making a deal with the US to support guerrillas, and so on.

You directly threaten their wealth and power if you are a real left-winger. Even if all you want is a 50s style social democracy with racial and gender equality, that would destroy almost all of what they have. They remember what FDR did to them, even if you don’t. They remember all the lost power and fortunes.

It is not possible to have a fair, egalitarian, prosperous society, and have very rich and powerful elites. It cannot be done. Brandeis was exactly right when he said you can have democracy or great wealth in the hands of a few, but you can’t have both.'