Response to "Democracy in America Is a Useful Fiction" by Chris Hedges

And this was a well written response to the debaucle in the Supreme Court's ruling for corporate power over people power by an unknown to me:

----------

By writeon, January 25 at 6:02 am #
(Unregistered commenter)

Inverted totalitariansm is not exactly a catchy phrase, or a particularly easy concept for most “ordinary” people to get their heads around, is it?

I wondered, after having read Wolin’s excellent book a year ago, if it all was too subtle for mass consumption, but then I suppose that wasn’t the market Wolin was aiming at? Or was he? Clearly his concern about the “death” of demcracy, in it’s modern form in the United States, was his main motivation; but how on earth does one get such a message across in this day and age?

Even my phrase, “Corporate Totalitarianism” isn’t much better, and “fascism” in it’s corporate state version seems inadequate too. Fascism sounds so old fashioned doesn’t it, like something from the distant past; one thinks of Hitler and Mussolini, not our friendly leaders in their nice, neat, suits?
Today, “fascism” has been given a total brand makeover, so recognising it is much more difficult. Strip the militeristic garb and style, from old-school fascism and what does one have?

We have a new type of state. A state where the market is at the centre. A state where the market and the state have become close to one, total, entity. And this state is powerful. It’s a state with the military at its centre controlling a vast empire.

Are their any solutions to the challenges we face, can this process be rolled backwards? The short answer is negative. The “democratic process” will not succeed. We are on a historical tragectory and vast forces are under way, moving. Things will, unfortunately, have to run their course. The current, corporate totalitarian state, is simply way to powerful, successful, strong, and unchallenged. There is, after all, no real political opposition, not in the country and certainly not in Congress. The overwhelming, vast, crushing, majority of Congressmen are, in reality, members of the same party or club. Change won’t come from that direction.

Most empires, or autocratic ruling elites, seem to rot from within and fall in on themselves, they don’t reform themselves before it’s too late and the revolution becomes inevitable, unfortunately there is an awful lot of suffering and pain waiting down that particular road. It’s a shame that ordinary people are so reasonable for so long, before they are forced by circumstances to react to gross misrule, and tear the old system down. It’s a shame there isn’t a short cut to real and substantive, structural change in society. What’s also sad is that even when the old system collapses on itself, under its own rotten weight, there is no law that says that things will automatically end for the better, there is often decades of instability to look forward to.

---------------

Well said my friend!