The Ruling Class and its Discontents

A recent op-ed piece by William Rivers Pitt of Truthout celebrates, in no uncertain terms and with more than a touch of gallows humor, the decline and fall of the Bush dynasty as exemplified by the miserable failure of Jeb Bush, who has dropped out of the presidential race. His essay can be found here:

http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/35193-please-clap-the-bush-dynasty-has-been-broken

A word of caution is in order, however. At least one commentator has speculated that Jeb, who notoriously stated that his strategy was to somehow win the nomination despite losing the primaries, is being held in reserve by the Republican powers that be, ready to “parachute in” to the convention and save the day – i.e. snatch the nomination away from Trump and Cruz (pushing lesser mortals like Kasich aside like so many dust bunnies, of course). The idea, apparently, is to fit Jeb with a pair of tights, a cape, shiny boots, and flashy headgear, and style him as some kind of superhero whose sole mission is to save the Republican Party. (“It's a bird! It's a plane! It's Bushman!” Oh... wait...)

Well... lots of luck with that, is all I can say. But in this wackiest of all wacky election seasons, who knows? The Republican establishment is certainly acting desperate, and grasping at straws – resurrecting Romney from the political graveyard to do a hatchet job on Trump (which, of course, backfired very badly; they should have left Mitt in the toy store with the other Ken dolls) and cooperating with the Democrats to send rent-a-mobs to any and all Trump rallies.

Now, the immediate revelation from all of this, for those who hadn't already figured it out, is that there is, in fact, only one “establishment”, and it consists of the power structure of both of the major parties. Trump is, if nothing else, the ultimate anti-establishment candidate, since he doesn't care who he offends from anywhere along the spectrum. What counts above all is to preserve the integrity of the establishment and keep it in charge, little matter which party is nominally in power. This is the kind of insight that is normally avoided by maintaining the faux kabuki drama of the election season, in which the parties pretend – like professional wrestlers – to be in dire opposition, when they really are in one accord on nearly all points. But these are desperate times, and they clearly feel that it's worth letting the cat out of the bag – at least on this occasion, counting on the brain-dead electorate to go back to sleep and forget all about what they are now hearing and seeing, like the guys in “Men in Black”. It's a strategy that has worked time and time again, so why not give it another shot?

But there are other implications to all of this, and they should not be overlooked. One is that the power structure – the ruling class – operates in subtle and surprising ways at times; they are more agile than we give them credit for. One would think, for example, that an elite bunch like the Bushes would want to keep their name in lights and to win at all costs. They are, after all, part of the perennial power structure, and they want to keep it that way – or so one would think. And yet even those at the top of the heap have to make sacrifices once in a while; someone has to be picked, when the need arises, to “take one for the team”. Consider, for example, that the Rockefellers, who are indisputably at the very top of the hierarchy (at least in this country), nonetheless feel obligated to offer up some of their members on the sacrificial altar of politics -- with mixed results. Consider that the Kennedys had to offer up some of their sons to the gods of war, and that one of them didn't come back alive. This is all along the lines of maintaining some sort of credibility with the impulsive, delusion-prone American public, who – enamored as they are with “American royalty” -- are nonetheless still a bit resistant to the idea that we have rulers like unto the royalty and nobility of the Old World. The delusion of democracy must be maintained – or at least it has been so far, but it has started to seriously erode of late. And the ruling elite are not – as irritating as it must be at times – completely immune from the requirements and needs of “democracy”; lip service must be paid, even if from their lofty perches, to “the people”, lest “the people” start to murmur, and resist, and even – heaven forfend! -- rebel.

The age of revolution is, of course, over with and long gone... and ruling elites around the globe are no longer in the sort of danger that engulfed the hapless Romanovs, for example... or the Chinese dynasties... or the French aristocracy. We are now in the age of the technocrat... the pragmatist... the globalist (another talking point for Trump)... and are ruled by a centralized power whose main tentacles are not so much armies as banks, stock exchanges, and “defense” contractors. But it is precisely because the trappings and prerogatives of ancient royalty are a thing of the past that control by other means must be maintained – through instruments such as the media, the “entertainment” industry, “free trade”, and the dominance of a vast array of rackets from agribusiness to big pharma, big medicine, prisons, centralized food distribution, consumerism run amok... and all the modern equivalents of the “games and circuses” and “free bread” of old. Empires, in short, do what they have to do, and they do, in fact, have to adjust to the times.

Consider, for example, that there are no longer any “idle rich”; they are nowhere to be found. The richest people on earth nonetheless have to work for a living, after a fashion. Society has been restructured to the point where a hundred years ago you had the working poor and the idle rich, and we now have the working rich and the idle poor. And yet, ultimately, the same people are in charge now who were in charge then, and the vast majority of them are – gasp! -- white men. We can fantasize all we want about “diversity”, and “access to power” by “minorities” of all stripes... and, certainly, the Regime knows how, and when, to throw a few bones out now and then... but the basic hard facts remain the same. Any boy born in a log cabin, figuratively speaking, can rise up in the system to where he is invited to weekend retreats at Sea Island, Davos, Mackinac Island, Bilderberg, the Bohemian Grove... wherever... but despite their feeling of having been anointed, they are, ultimately, tools, poodles, and window dressing... and, most importantly of all, dispensable. (And scapegoats, when the need arises – as witness George W. Bush.) Surely you don't think that once Hillary Clinton, for example, has outlived her usefulness she won't be dropped, along with her reprobate husband, into the Regime's dumpster; it has happened before, and it will happen again. In fact, this could be said to be the case for nearly all politicians and, frankly, all “world leaders”.  More often than not they are tools, lackeys, and sock puppets -- and the puppet masters are the faceless few at the very top – and they are, and remain, faceless for a reason.

But (with all due respect to the conspiracy community, of which I am a member anyway) there is no such thing as perfect control, and the world remains full of surprises. Did any of them anticipate, for example, the rise of militant Islam? Sure, no doubt they are using this phenomenon to their maximum benefit... but their jobs would have been easier if the scales had not fallen from the eyes of the Islamic world (albeit decades after the end of formal, classical colonialism). Did they anticipate the rise of the Internet and “social media” as, not only a tool for thought control of the masses, but as a means by which the masses (some of them, at least) would start to ask questions and connect the dots? Thus, another irritant that has to be dealt with – and we see in the news every day evidence of their exertions to do so.

So yes, “uneasy lies the head that wears a crown” -- or whatever the modern-day equivalent of a crown is (and do not doubt that some of the actual remaining “crowned heads” of Europe are very much participants in this struggle). Plus, we have the natural paranoia that inevitably haunts the very few when they are confronted, in whatever form, by the very many. The mob... the masses... the rabble... are greater in number than they have ever been in recorded human history, their demands are becoming harder to meet (because they keep upping the ante), and they are showing signs of restlessness. You can award some of them membership in the middle class, which is a guaranteed neutralizer... but that still leaves quite a few – a majority, in fact. You can even allow them to, occasionally, have a voice – from the social media right up to the ossified and dysfunctional United Nations – but, again, you're not really solving anything, only postponing the consequences.

And yet, power remains – as it has down through human history – the ultimate narcotic. Better than sex, better than money (although these are, let's admit, universally fringe benefits). To sacrifice people by the million, and even entire nations, for the sake of power, is nothing new – and to hold onto it once it's gained is nothing new. What changes and evolves is the means... the mechanisms... the tools... the iconography... the narrative. Every culture has its myths, legends, and fairy tales – that's a given; that's human nature. It's what people believe – what they are led to believe – that determines outcomes, and those outcomes become solidified into what we call “history”. Once in a while people become more sophisticated, slightly better informed, and more skeptical – and so the means, mechanisms, and tools have to evolve as well, and morph into a new mythology. We tend to forget that not only do power and control go together, they are the same thing. How can you have one without the other? And yet we go around worshiping men (and women) of power, but chafing at the control they exert on us. One consolation, at least – perhaps the only one – is that even the power elite... the ones at the end of every string and binding chain... have to pay their dues as well. The fate of Jeb Bush – a very small person in this grand scheme – provides an example of this, and it may serve as small comfort. 

But he may be down and out, but he's not “out out”, despite Pitt's optimism, so to speak.  Just be prepared for, somewhere down the line, the moment when you hear someone say “they're baaaaaack”.

Big Nurse or Bush III

The media are already making preemptive strikes against any and all potential Republican candidates for president – because, after all, 2016 is just around the corner – on Hillary's behalf. First it was Big Boy, i.e. Chris Christie, who was sent to the principal's office for practicing New Jersey politics as usual. Now it's Jeb Bush's turn – and I admit I know absolutely nothing about the guy except that he's a Bush, and that's apparently enough for the media, the Democrats, and everyone else (including me, BTW). One wonders how many other clay pigeons will be put up for swift and certain destruction even before the 2016 primaries get off the ground. In any case, the conventional wisdom is that Hillary is not only the “inevitable” candidate (the way she was in 2008, ahem) but the inevitable next (and first woman) president. (Let's overlook, for now, the fact that she advertised herself as “co-president” during Bill's time in office. This could actually be turned into a Constitutional issue if anyone were interested.)

I can only compare it to Attila the Hun – everyone knew he was coming, it was only a matter of time, and all agreed that he couldn't be stopped. And it is curious in a way. The most common “feeling tone” (a little psychotherapy lingo, there) about Hillary is that she's scary as hell. Does anyone really like her? I mean, anybody? And yet there she is – Godzilla, rising out of the depths of the sea and making a bee-line for Tokyo.

And, let's admit, Hillary does have one strength that other potential candidates don't have – namely, that all the possible “dirt” on her has, as far as we know, already been thoroughly revealed, exposed, discussed, and dealt with. She is the ultimate political survivor – more so than her husband, even. She has survived Whitewater, cattle futures, Travelgate, Vince Foster, Waco, “borrowing” furniture from the White House on the way out the door... and any number of other annoyances. She has survived a spotty, at best, time as senator and secretary of state. She has even survived that “vast right-wing conspiracy” that threatened to do her in, even though all she ever wanted was to serve the American people, and “the children”, etc. Oh, and let's not forget her less-than-hospitable reception in Tuzla, where she was racing around on the tarmac dodging sniper fire like a character in some action movie. And how about narrowly missing being knocked out cold by an airborne shoe? She is, truly, Superwoman – in the, dare I say it, Margaret Thatcher mode... or, stretching the metaphor a bit, in the Vladimir Putin mode. She's indestructible, and maybe that's the key to her appeal.

See, we have passed the point (assuming we ever were at that point) where we want the president to be the leader of a free people. It's a sign of our deterioration as a nation and as a culture... it's the reductio ad absurdum, if you will, of the American Experiment. We have now become like pretty much every other nation, society, or empire in history – we crave a strong hand... a tyrant, a dictator... someone who will set things right. The Russians came around to that point quite readily after the Soviet Empire broke up; they had enough insight into their own national character to put Putin in charge.

Ah yes – the masochistic craving for “discipline” -- for being taught a damn good lesson at every turn. (Is it really so hard to imagine Hillary in black leather wielding a riding crop? Be honest, now.) This is what characterizes most societies most of the time. The American Experiment was, conceptually, a noble venture, except that it ignored the primary need of people in groups, which is to have a leader – not just someone who is vaguely in charge, like a committee chairman, but someone who “takes names and kicks ass”. And thus we have Hillary, who is the woman of our collective dreams – the ultimate Big Nurse, cold and ruthless, but at least you know where you stand. It is this craving which is overlooked by the commentariat, which is still enchanted by this vision of a “free people”. (After all, didn't the terrorists who attacked us on 9/11 do it because they hated our “freedoms”? I rest my case.) Well... given that we are all dependent on the government now... all entitlement junkies... all scared of our own shadows owing to political correctness... it's no surprise that we would naturally fly, as a moth to the flame, into the arms of the female version of Big Brother. This will be the subtext of the next presidential election, and I promise you that the media will continue to do battle with viable Republican candidates, unlikely Republican candidates, and downright straw men right up to Election Day.

And yet... if Hillary is so “inevitable”, why do they even bother? The Democrat base is secure, and she has scared away all the known competition (unless there comes an Obama clone). But you have to remember that if there is truly a “paranoid style in American politics”, the Democrats/liberals exemplify it as readily as anyone else. If there is perceived to be even the ghost of a chance that she might be seriously threatened, it has to be nipped in the bud... slain in the cradle... and the sooner the better. As pathetic as the Republicans are, they are still perceived as a threat, because who knows? They might actually succeed in implementing voter I.D. laws, or in keeping illegals from voting, or in “suppressing the black vote”, or even in stealing votes (a process with which the Democrats are all too familiar). So, better safe than sorry. What Hillary needs is not just a “close election” in 2016, or a “squeaker”, or some farce that has to be settled by the Supreme Court, but an overwhelming victory – a “mandate” that will allow her to do pretty much anything she wants (kind of like Obama, for that matter). The great presidential tyrants of the past – Lincoln, Wilson, FDR, LBJ – will stand in awe when they behold what Hillary will have wrought (on behalf of her higher-up handlers in the Regime, of course). And it will all be richly deserved.