Bartels' latest public opinion analysis and the limits of public opinion analysis as practiced

I have respected Larry Bartels' analyses over the past twenty years more than most of his perch in political science land. In 2008, Bartels saw how democratic or republican (ideas, not political parties) values were eroding, as the non-coastal parts of the US had been hollowed out by trade deals and automation (although I wonder how he feels about his critique of Thomas Frank these days, especially as one begins to study the Knight Foundation as to who are the primary non-voters). Bartels' latest study (hat tip to a friend who is a retired Political Science professor from the University of California) is about how there is a growing lack of confidence in our public commitment to open government--but how the Republicans who have lost that confidence are more dangerous because theirs is rooted in ethnic and racial prejudices, and apocalyptic civil-war rhetoric. If I read Bartels' analysis correctly, he finds 20-30% of partisans in each political party who openly express a belief that violence is justified, and strongmen/women are required for leadership. He even found anti-democratic values more openly stated as an idea among Democratic Party partisans at least in regards to one question Bartels' study had asked.

Where Bartels does not go, and this is not a criticism of Bartels, is to find out, for example, which group of Dems want to have the president from their party shut down the other parties' controlled Congress. I think Bartels, if cornered, would assume it is more likely the AOC-Berniecrat activist. I would demur to that assumption or hypothesis. My gut is it is more the MSNBC truster who would want Biden to dissolve the entire Congress if the Congress goes fully Republican in 2022 (and it likely will if Biden governs as Biden intends). As an economically left New Dealer, I didn't trust Obama and I don't trust Biden. If they did declare martial law, they would do so to enforce a neo-liberal or corporate economics in a dictatorship, not complete the New Deal. After all, the corporate wing of the Democratic Party has little to no problem with the way in which Google, Disney, McDonalds, Coca-Cola, and other corporations bow to Chinese government censorship, and have no substantive problem with Chinese labor policies that replicate capitalist accumulation period-England, but under a Maoist-Communist banner.  It is why corporate Dems refuse to work to enact card check or other labor reforms, or seek to give more power to the International Labor Organization, unlike their trade tribunals in the various trade agreement regimes created over the past nearly thirty years. The corporate Democrats are the ones who sided with corporate Republicans in establishing the global corporate order through international trade agreements they called "free trade," but which highly regulated intellectual property and agriculture favoring American agribusiness, and pushed manufacturing to lower wage/more exploitable work force nations.

I make this point because, unlike the much more complicated Democratic Party partisan divides, the Republicans who wanted Trump to shut down the Congress are pretty easy to find. And the sources those folks rely on for their world views are talk radio, FoxNews, and increasingly QAnon, NewsMax, and OANN--where there is a grooming for civil war to lead to a white nationalist/Fascist dictatorship to "save" America. Hence, Bartels' concern. It is in these media sources one finds the screaming white cultural grievances, and grooming for Fascism. When the economic populist component is mentioned, it is more where it is couched in language of government assistance for "in-crowd" people, but with harsh criminal laws that tend to more keep down those who are not in the racial or ethnic "in-crowd." 

I remain convinced, not dissimilar to Thomas Frank and Christopher Lasch formulations, an economic populism of a Bernie type can most effectively recreate class solidarity across racial and ethnic lines, and stabilize belief in open government values--IF one is interested in protecting the stability of a society instead of taking care of your own short-term economic needs. The Republican Party's approach is clearly trending toward authoritarian Fascistic class divisions along cultural lines, and ethnic/racial lines. The corporate Democratic Party line believes more in meritocracy and political pluralism, where diversity reigns in superficialities of skin color and gender, but where the elite interests are most protected and promoted--even to the detriment of the many who are increasingly left behind in global-oriented markets. It remains my contention the corporate wing of the Democratic Party has a symbiotic relationship with the Republican fascists, where one side breeds more of the other side.  The fact that many working class people who voted for Trump can conflate Democratic Party politicians with rich people should be enough to ask how and most importantly why that is.

The fact that questioning has been so long ignored (and, worse, denied, as in Bartels' critique of Thomas Frank's major book on American politics) is the purpose of this post. My prime criticism of public opinion political scientist researchers is they so rarely question whether people are able to correctly self-identify "what" they are--meaning left, liberal, moderate, conservative, right. I say this despite the fact political scientists and pollsters have long recognized and documented how the majority of Americans, when asked about specific policy issues, are "liberal"-"left", not "center" or "moderate," at least as how those political philosophy conclusions are defined in corporate media. The disconnect, where people self-identify as "moderate" or "conservative" compared to "liberal," while somehow wanting steep wealth and progressive income and capital gains taxes, higher minimum wages, single payer health care, cancelled student debt, and free college tuition, to take a few examples, has to do more with propaganda techniques which deeply embedded themselves in our corporate-sponsored media-directed discourse that makes opinion surveys akin to asking fish about whether they notice the water.  This blind spot also applies to "journalists," pundits, and political scientists themselves, who, when pushed on structural bias, are wont to yell, "Bias? You must be a conspiracy theorist!"

I have long said a proper public opinion survey (and this goes for overrated hacks such as Jonathan Haidt, a psychologist who studies people's political views and values) should and must apply Daniel Bell's formulation that uses the modifiers "economic," "political," and "cultural" to qualify the spectrum words "left," "liberal," "moderate," "conservative," and "right." Bell called this his "three realms" methodology in his brilliant book, The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism (1976). Applying this methodology to himself, Bell would say to interviewers, "I am an economic radical, a political liberal, and a cultural conservative. So what am I? Liberal or Conservative?"  And he would almost always smile with the recognition of confusing the interviewer.

Too often, most Americans, not able to articulate the structure of their own beliefs, begin, without consciousness, with "cultural" issues to determine if someone is a "liberal" or "conservative," or "far left" or "far right"--without recognizing they are doing so. They rarely cite economical and political theories and policies to define someone as "liberal" or "conservative," nor ask how their own economic or political philosophies or policy views interact with how they evaluate the overall world views. This is most frustrating because, in Daniel Bell's other works, Bell taught us how global corporate capitalism, emboldened with trade treaties, was making economics primary for understanding the world.  He did not, of course, mean we should be listening to economists over sociologists, political scientists, and historians--as he recognized how corporate power capture of college or university economics departments had long occurred. 

This leads to the second problem I have with political scientists' public opinion surveys and analyses: Too often, political scientists refuse to engage with the structural biases in modern official/corporate media. They think, if they do so, they are making value judgments about the media people consume, and worse, becoming "political"--and therefore biased. I agree this is a very real problem in conducting experimental and empirical analyses, and that attempting to quantify the degree to which media sources influence the way voters evaluate their own world views is probably impossible--at least without putting yourself directly into the analysis. However, if a political scientist's public opinion analysis ignores the way in which corporate-owned media outlets, upon which the majority of Americans rely, frame what is or is not discussed, and how various topics are discussed or not discussed, then the political scientist's analyses tend to be self-fulfilling prophecies at best, or, worse, reenforce, under the guise of scholarship, the very propaganda they have ignored. 

Yes, it is harder to do a "press" or "media" criticism within a public opinion survey analysis, but if one begins with the questions using the Bell Three Realms Methodology, one can begin to help improve the way in which readers of political science analyses, and citizens answering the political scientists' surveys, can more effectively and accurately self-identify. This means political scientists should learn how to more effectively recognize how language is used in corporate media presentations, how questions are asked in different ways of different political actors, and where assumptions of legitimacy are made that fall more in line with corporate hierarchies of the media companies themselves--and corporations in general. 

If I was to have an opportunity to speak to a group of political scientists, I would say they should take history of journalism courses that critically review and analyze the works of Will Irwin, Upton Sinclair (The Brass Check), George Seldes (Freedom of the Press), Ben Bagdakian (The Media Monopoly), and Robert Parry (Fooling America), as well as the examples provided in Noam Chomsky/Ed Herman's Manufacturing Consent.  It would greatly help political scientists better formulate how to construct questions in surveys that better control for survey responders' own misunderstanding of the structures of their own world views, and to begin to understand how people are as manipulated in politically-oriented conclusions or opinions they express as they are to prefer Coke or Pepsi. Political scientists may also learn more about how large institutions control for dissent in interview and intern processes, where one has gone to college, etc.  Chuck Todd and Tucker Carlson did not materialize out of nowhere, ya know?

In short, to err on the side of letting people self-identify creates garbage-in/garbage-out analyses that reenforce the very trends that cause even learned people to be surprised at how we got to where we are in American politics. And, too often, political scientists fall prey to recapitulating, under public opinion surveys that ask who is "liberal" or "conservative," the very corporate biases that continue to bedevil and confuse us as a society.

What right wingers understand and The Squad and too many progressive movement leaders do not understand

Notice the difference: 

ON THE ONE HAND: We hear progressives, including The Squad, who won't leverage their power to withhold their vote for Pelosi unless Pelosi lets Medicare for All go to the floor for a vote. They say it is "performative" since they don't believe it will suddenly pass--notwithstanding it would expose the disconnect between people outside Congress and who gets elected in Congress. 

ON THE OTHER HAND: We hear right wingers doing the ultimate performative vote this week to try and overturn the election of Biden over Trump, knowing it will fail--and even knowing the base is delusional about the election results. So why are these right wingers doing this? To please their base, and build their movement power for later elections. They know how performative acts work. They know how performative acts, whether it is black college students defying Martin Luther King, Jr. and civil rights leadership, and deciding to walk into a diner in Greensboro, NC in 1960 and sitting down, or marching to protest Soviet treatment of Jews in Russia/Soviet Union, translates into political power. Unlike progressive leaders, and The Squad, the right wingers in Congress know their performative act builds their own national reputations among influencers and activists.  And they will win elections off of this in places where the Dem brand is already toxic, and make inroads in states Biden won in 2020. This is so even though the right wingers are delusional about what they want to do, which is overturn a legitimate election that rejected their cult leader, Trump.

And yet, progressives won't do what the majority of Americans want, M4A, in a pandemic.

Jimmy Dore is correct, again and again. Yes, I disagree with the way Jimmy calls out Bernie and AOC, and highly disagree with his belief Trump's ties to Russia are a hoax. But, when someone is correct on something like this, as Jimmy is, then we don't throw out the idea because of how we feel about one guy, i.e. Jimmy Dore. If you can't see what Jimmy is saying because Jimmy is saying it, then read this article from Briahna Joy Gray in Current Affairs.

And #Forcethevote.  Sign here.  And call your Congresscritters tomorrow.  Oh, and sign up at the Movement for a People's Party here.

1971-2021: The best albums released in 1971 are turning 50 this year

Oh my. 2021. Fifty years from 1971. This is the year progressive rock flowered, and would remain in the flower mode for another three or four more years, before the wilting began. The albums were mostly complete albums, meaning every song was great. For progressive rock bands of this time through 1975, at least, one saw bands attempt to ensure an album was an experience. 

Jethro Tull: "Aqualung"
Emerson Lake & Palmer: "Tarkus"
Genesis: "Nursery Cryme"
Gentle Giant: "Acquiring the Taste"
Van der Graaf Generator: "Pawn Hearts"
Pink Floyd: "Meddle"
Yes: "The Yes Album" and "Fragile" (UK release was in November 1971; US release Feb 1972)
King Crimson: "Lizard" and "Islands" (latter released in late Dec 1971 in UK, in Jan 1972 in US)
Moody Blues, "Every Good Boy Deserves Favor"
The Who: "Who's Next" (yeah, The Who were in definite prog mode then)
Le Orme: "Collage"
Focus, "Focus II" (with the one big hit that made it to AM radio)
McDonald & Giles: (Self-titled)
Frank Zappa and the Mothers: "Live at the Fillmore East"
Electric Light Orchestra: "No Answer" (first album, most progressive)
Alice Cooper Band, "Love it to Death" (you don't know this one? Just. Get. It. And try to tell me there are not progressive elements throughout this album. Yeah, back then...) and "Killer"
Traffic: "Low Spark of High Heeled Boys"

And that's just the progressive albums. There were so many classic albums released in this year as well:

The Doors, "LA Woman" (last Jim Morrison with the Doors album)

Beach Boys, "Surf's Up" (this has some outstanding tracks on it, starting with the brilliant title track; plus, "Student Demonstration Time")
Led Zeppelin, "L Z IV" (yes, with "Stairway to Heaven")
Humble Pie, "Rockin' the Fillmore" (with the classic rendition of "I don't need no doctor!" Haven't heard it? Look it up)
David Bowie, "Hunky Dory"
Paul Winter Consort, "Icarus"
Detroit, Self-titled (the best rendition of the Velvet Underground's "Rock and Roll" I ever heard; this was Mitch Ryder going sorta prog, but more AOR rock style)
Black Sabbath: "Master of Reality," which may be the truly first pure heavy metal album
Allman Brothers, "Live at Fillmore East" (with the great rendition of "Whippin' Post") and "200 Motels" (soundtrack)
Carole King, "Tapestry" (yeah, THAT album!)
Carly Simon, Self-titled (yup, the first album!)
Paul & Linda McCartney, "Ram"
John Lennon, "Imagine"
Rod Stewart, "Every Picture Tells a Story" ("Maggie May," "Stay with Me," and title track alone worth the album)
Joni Mitchell, "Blue"
Cat Stevens, "Teaser and the Firecat"
The Move, "Message from the Country" (a splendid album. Another: Just. Get. It.)
Don McLean, "American Pie" (album is great, too!)
Harry Nilsson, "Nilsson Schmilsson")
Paul Kanter/Grace Slick, "Sunfighter")
Freddie Hubbard, "Sing Me a Song of Songmy" (God taught me to play the guitar...Just look it up on 

Youtube. Wild!)

And there are more I missed.

Diana's Discontents: WW84 and Beyond

It was exciting to see the first run release of Wonder Woman: 1984 on our 55 inch television, but disappointing to not see it in a communal atmosphere in a movie theater. Warner Bros. should rest assured most of us, including me, would love to see this film again on a large screen in a movie theater--even as we hail HBO/Max for allowing us the opportunity to enjoy Christmas Day seeing the film. 

So, let's get to my, of course, detailed and wandering thoughts. 

Industry stuff

First, from an industry standpoint, it was very powerful for me to see director Patty Jenkins' name above the title, as in "A Patty Jenkins film."  She did not receive respectful treatment from the network suits for the first Wonder Woman film, and it is well known the WB suits initially saw her as expendable and fungible.  This truly was Jenkins' film, as she not only directed, but shared co-writing credit with two male writers, Geoff Johns and David Callaham, the latter who wrote the initial WW film. Second, again, from an industry standpoint, was how glad I was to see Zack Snyder listed with his wife as co-producer, and, in the context of the March 2021 premiere of the Zack Snyder-directors' cut for Justice League, Snyder's rehabilitation is getting into full swing--sooner than I speculated.

Cinematography captures the 1980s

The cinematography was outstanding, as Jenkins, and her cinematographer, Matthew Jensen, truly capture the look and feel of 1980s America.  When they bring us into a mall, I spotted one of those small B. Dalton Bookstores, amidst other mall stores of the era.  The clothes, the hairstyles, and the way in which people spoke, are realistically depicted, so that a viewer may truly feel the time period.

Actors performances were outstanding all around, starting above all with Kristen Wiig

Kristen Wiig remains one of the most underrated actresses, particularly in how she physically transforms herself in various films. Wiig can go, in the same performance, from mousy to rage, and then to worldly and profound--all without losing her audience's trust. As a woman who began in comedy sketches, Wiig retains an underlying sense of humor within a harrowing performance as the gemologist who becomes Cheetah. I also think women audiences had to be thrilled with Wiig's character serving as a stand-in for women's rage at the hands of more physically powerful and lecherous men. Her performance in WW84 essentially stole the show, which should have been impossible based upon the very fact of Gal Gadot being literally Wonder Woman.  

Personally, I have revered Wiig's acting skills going back to the most underrated film of the past decade, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013), the Ben Stiller-led film, which film took a rather flat initial James Thurber story, and made it soar at multiple levels; layered, too, with a brilliant and beautiful soundtrack.  But, I digress. Wiig's performance in WW84 is most worthy of praise, taking nothing away nothing from outstanding performances from Gadot and Chris Pine, who reprises his role as Steve Trevor (And yes, Pine is a hearthrob's hearthrob, who can sing and dance--if you did not see his stellar performance in Into the Woods (2014)). 

Let's also say something about Pedro Pascal's Trumpian performance as the villain, whose personal Joker-upbringing, and peculiarly American archetype of capitalist greed and mental illness, fuels the mayhem, including a cliffhanger that almost leads to nuclear war between the United States and Soviet Union in 1984. Pascal took on a difficult role, as superhero film audiences have become much more sophisticated about superhero genre tropes, where many are now cynically wincing at villains' combination of dumbness and cruelty--and how we know villains are supposed to lose, anyway. The actor, Pascal, is Chilean by birth, and I believe his recognition of American megalomania may come from his upbringing. Pascal's parents were strong Allende supporters, who, shortly after Pascal's birth in 1975, escaped the US-created Pinochet military fascist regime, first to Denmark, and then the United States. Pascal has become a major actor with credits in Game of Thrones and Narcos, and the second Kingsman film. There are various points in his performance where he is clearly mimicking Trump's word style, and movements, which otherwise humanizes a terrorizing mood. Unlike Trump, however, his character Max Lord cared very much for his young son, which....well, I am trying to limit the spoilers and digressions.  

Reagan was portrayed fairly accurately, even as the film avoided full exposure to the odiousness that is Ronald Wilson Reagan

The film writers played Ronald Wilson Reagan (Mr. 666) deliciously befuddled and ignorant. In our our world's history, Gorbachev does not show up as the Soviet Union's Politburo premier until 1985, and of course, the film takes place in 1984, when Reagan was still believing a nuclear war ("exchange") with the Soviet Union was inevitable (the link shows how close the US and the Soviets came to nuclear war in 1983 and Reagan's citation from the Bible to justify a likely war against the Soviet Union). The film depicts Reagan as befuddled and ignorant, which is fine as it goes. Historically, Reagan was, in fact, a befuddled, corrupt, lying informant, ignorant, nasty piece of work, contrary to the hagiographic depictions that even Obama fell into when discussing Reagan.  That Reagan was successful in remaking the nation speaks more about the media protecting him at various points in his presidency, and Reagan's acting ability, which was far better than what people gave to Reagan, as credit. Part of Reagan's defense against corruption was the ability to act like he was only befuddled, as in Reagan's disingenuous testimony to Congress in 1962 regarding the waiver he granted as Screen Actors' Guild president to MCA--something no other Hollywood management or studio entity received--and how Reagan was neck deep with the Iran-Contra scandals, not merely misled by his subordinates. 

Overall, I was good with the screenwriters deciding not to make Reagan as devious as he actually was, as that would have been too confusing to American audiences, and pulled audiences away from the dementedly, broken, deviousness of the film's villain, Max Lord.

The profound side of the film's narrative arc:  Why does Diana continue to have any faith whatsoever in a species so ridiculously selfish and self-destructive?

The overall narrative arc was ultimately a re-affirmation of a significant arc in the first Wonder Woman film, where audiences should have been left wondering why Diana even stays among us humans. She saw the ridiculous and mass murdering waste of human and other life in World War I. Yes, she could still blame the mayhem on Ares, and a few human wartime leaders.* However, in WW84, Diana and we are confronted with something far more damning about human beings: When humans are given a power to make their wishes come true, our first wish-thoughts are not for world peace, a flowing of kindness and decency, or taking a loving care of each other, other creatures, and our planet.  Nope. We just want power over others, lots of money to rule over people in our lives or larger communities, to kill others, and, generally, behave selfishly.  

Cheetah (Wiig's character) is part of humanity's vengeful, selfish cruelty, as it never seems to occur to her to save or help others, rather than exact revenge against others for how cruelly (mostly) men have treated her. Wiig's character has a great moment of self-recognition of Max Lord's crassness and cruelty, when sitting on a private plane with him. However, that moment merely makes her barely want to keep Max Lord alive for the singular reason of maintaining her own physical and mental power, which she will continue to use against and over others. Worse, even Diana herself fails, when Diana is supposed to know better. Diana wish is for Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) to return, and later thinks she can "square the circle," giving Steve a second chance at life while somehow vanquishing Max Lord. Diana is clearly ready to kill Max Lord, and a whole lot of other people, which at least is consistent with the Zack Snyder universe--where we mortals should be wary of even Superman ever behaving badly.**

As we see deeply into Diana's apartment, we see she has been living for over 60 years like a modern-day Candide, just pining for her lost love, Steve Trevor, tending to her own garden--and maybe helping someone on a one-off basis, if need be.  And, at the end of WW84, she appears finally able to accept Steve no longer being in her living life, but it is far less certain how much she has confronted the odiousness that is human nature.

An Amazon woman needs a man like a fish needs a bike

This brings me to what I see as Diana's Discontents, which center on this question: Why does Diana bother to care about Steve Trevor, or really, any mortal man? The Amazon women's origin story has changed over time, but it is still one where the women are superhuman and know better than to waste time, or take any chances with mortal humans--and especially men. There is an old saw from the late 1960s feminists that, for me, describes what should be the Amazon women's motto, "A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bike." It remains a plot challenge that, in the most recent Wonder Woman origin story, the Amazonians appear to be the result of sperm from Zeus, a guy God, and an egg from Aphrodite, the female goddess of love, which means they are initially Amazonian babies, with big eyes so we can all just love them like baby cheetahs. But, really, why do these women even want any mortal man--ever?  Steve Trevor is certainly wonderful, in that classic Cary Grant dashing sort of way, but he is still a knuckle head hot shot in too many instances.  And he is certainly mortal. 

So, yes, let's be blunt. When we see the Amazonian women in their island in the first film, and this film, we can't help but notice there is no sexual desire among them--and even Diana, in the first Wonder Woman film, is sort of like "Kiss? What is that? Ew, seems gross."  I know it complicates the type of narrative arcs most people like, but there is a very ascetic, non-sexual lifestyle among the Amazonian women--where the best that may be said is, Maybe that is why they sublimate with physical skill building and sporting competitions? :) 

I hope we may finally begin to see more young women screaming, Diana is ridiculously limited in her sexual desires and love life! Diana is first and foremost a goddess of strength, beauty, and thoughtfulness. And yet, the narrative arc places her firmly in the mindset of a suburban working woman in a 1995 Hallmark television show, where she can't find love with a stable, reasonably honest guy.  

For the next screenplay, I don't see the most vocal superhero audiences accepting more pining away for Steve Trevor or, really, any mortal guy.

The Wonder Woman Franchise is at a Crossroads, and Must Embrace the Dangerous Narrative Paths

The Wonder Woman writers are at a crossroads, and should at least attempt to overcome the Warner Bros. suits' demands to not discomfit audiences only seeking escape. Yes, it will likely be a bridge too far for the suits to allow Diana to fall into romantic love with a woman (not even the woman who appears in the post-credits...I know who it is, but if you haven't seen it...). The suits may allow Diana to ascend/retreat to a higher ascetic and intellectual plane--but they will get nervous if Diana reaches a decision that what is needed is not vanquishing some individual villainous business or political guy, but instead foster a revolution in people's hearts and minds against the various privileges that oppress us. We see a glimpse of this in the penultimate scene in WW84, where Diana speaks through the villain Max Lord's satellite system with a Gandhian-Adlerian message of kindness and selflessness.  

The problem, though, is it is not as if people forgot the mayhem and violence--and start of a nuclear war--which had been happening until she spoke. If people could just forget, perhaps in that Men In Black way, then the screenwriters can work from a clean slate. However, WW84 does not end that way, as everyone, including the villain and Cheetah, remembers. I am not saying hard right turns are beyond nervous suits who wish for audiences to forget what they just saw. Heck, look at how the X-Men franchise was saved by the cynical dissing of X-Men: III--and the suits laughed all the way to the bank, as the main characters ended up dying or dead anyway in later films.  Yes, I still love X-Men: III--and actually, every X-Men film.

My concern with regard to Patty Jenkins and Gal Gadot blinking in the face of suit pressure, and not embracing a radical narrative arc, has precedent: The writer-director Matthew Vaughn and writer Jane Goldman did grave harm to The Kingsman franchise because they did not explore the Marxian implications of the first film's ending, where the people all over the planet realized how the top 1% had begun to commit mass murder against poor or working class humans in an attempt to forestall the effects of climate change. The second Kingsman film still had a frankly mediocre US president, and there was nothing to show any significant anarchy or revolutionary activity against the top 1% or any economically-based powers, nor any fascist populist movement in the US or other powerful governments. As I kept saying to anyone who would listen, beginning in the midst of the success of the first Kingsman film: Kingsman needed to go "Full Marxist" (yes, "Full Monty" reference) to maintain its credibility. What looked dangerous, i.e. going Full Marxist, presented the surest and safest path for continued monetary success. But Vaughn and Goldman blinked--or more likely, bowed to executive suite pressure--and Kingsman: Golden Circle was a muddled bomb. The next Kingsman is set as a prequel, which shows an inability to take the storyline forward without bumping into nervous film executives and media barons.

My advice to Patty Jenkins is, therefore: Don't take the easy path. You have enough power as the woman above the title--and the suits can't just dump you, as they did with Zack Snyder. Women directors such as yourself are in a rare, but exulted, place these days, as Jenkins is herself recognized as a woman-trailblazer. Jenkins should therefore go for the more profound, and give full reign to Diana's power and desire to heal humanity. Jenkins should not be afraid to be accused of sentimentality as she traverses this path, and not be afraid to explore radical themes. By radical, I mean the term's initial meaning as an adjective, which is to get to the root of a matter. Femininity and sexuality among goddesses is another radical path, and it can easily overlap with the political-social revolutionary path.

If The Daughter is any gauge in her continued Instagram social media reading, the film is already getting pushback among a number of fans.  For us, meaning The Wife, Daughter, and me, we loved the film. I thought the film presented a nice balance between Diana's belief in humans and her recognition of how badly we humans behave. And damn, Wonder Woman flies, and is so awesome in every way!  Oh, and I did mention Kristen Wiig is super as Cheetah, right? :) 

*UPDATE: December 29, 2020: I am noticing people are more critical of WW84 than I expected.  I think this has to do with something not articulated in the Twitterverse and beyond: World War I is a big subject and one that is deeply symbolic. It is a worldwide war.  And it deals with big subjects of which we have only glimpses of understanding. When I say Diana aka Wonder Woman can chalk up the mayhem to Ares and a few generals and leaders, it is only for her benefit to keep wanting to believe in the human race.  On the other hand, WW84 deals with a single rich business person who is part Lex Luthor, part Donald Trump. For the audience, this seems trivial by comparison to a world wide war that is already ongoing. Yes, Max Lord's villainy ends up almost provoking World War III, but, as the audience is not asked to consider this anything like an alternative history, the audience is never invested in believing the nuclear war will occur. It is only afterwards that it hits the audience that we may be into an alternative time line, but even then, it is a muddle for audience comprehension. I think this is why people are more negative about the film, and it is why my conclusions from the other day in this post about taking a more radical approach to the third installment are going to be necessary.

**The film also continues a mischievous exultation of Greek mythical gods, and saying "whatever" to Western monotheism. I remain amazed how right-wing Christian evangelicals are not up in arms about the way the film flips the societal script of whether it is Jesus or even God which are the real myth.  Something else amused me, too, which is the sight of Gal Gadot, an Israeli woman, saving Bedouin children in Egypt.  Considering what the Israelis just did--again--with Bedouins, and knowing Gadot has increasingly separated herself from a monstrous Israeli regime, I was happy to see that scene. 

The professional-managerial class will always counsel defeat because they have too much to risk. It is dangerous to listen to their defeatism any longer.

Here is Digby in a long post about Trump not leaving and wreaking havoc.  She writes, in the context of Trump saying he wants to veto the Covid-19 "stimulus" package unless a $2,000 stimulus check is sent all Americans:

...If Trump wants to wreak revenge on his “disloyal” Republicans by agreeing to send badly needed money to Americans who are suffering from his and the Republican’s malfeasance I couldn’t be happier. However, it’s very likely that this will do nothing but blow up the bill at the last moment, resulting in some very bad outcomes. Had he involved himself in the negotiations and pushed hard for relief he just might have won the election and helped people sooner. But he preferred to pretend the pandemic was over instead. The stable genius blew that one bigly.

Digby uses all her deep intelligence to tell us (a) this will all fail anyway, so why leverage anything in this dire moment; (b) let's make this about Trump personally instead of seizing a moment Trump, by whatever his motivations, has given us.

Meanwhile, Eric Levitz in New York Magazine rips into Jimmy Dore (calling Jimmy a grifter, when Jimmy has said don't give him money during the pandemic, unlike The Young Turks, who just pocketed a couple of million from Jeffery Katzenberg, and still begs for dollars from people like me), and then says we can't demand the hugely unpopular Nancy PLousy bring Medicare for All Single Payer to the floor for a debate and vote.*

Levitz, however, exposes his own defeatist thinking in one of his big points, in a subhead, which he calls: "The case for pessimism of the intellect." Levitz then tries to walk part of the way back his counsel of defeat and despair, but one cannot finish Levitz's long column without concluding Levitz's view is simply: "Nothing good can be done."

What is remarkable is Levitz has to ignore his own contradictions: He first says there is no way a lot of Congress critters in the Democratic or Republican Parties will vote for the M4A/single payer bill. Then, he says they will vote for the bill for performative purposes, knowing the bill will die in the Senate. But, will the bill die in the Senate, if it passes the House? Wouldn't that make some news if the bill did pass the House? Levitz doesn't even try to argue when there would be a better time than now, when we are in a pandemic where 15 million have lost employer-based health insurance. Nope, it's just, Because something can go wrong, it will go wrong; and therefore, just stay quiet.

The problem with those of us in the professional-managerial class is WE are often uncomfortable confronting our bosses or institutions that control us. We in the knowledge-worker class are too afraid of losing what we have. We are forever crouched in a defensive position about what unexplained bad things could happen, instead of leveraging moments where people are positioned by circumstances to agree with us on important public policies. Levitz himself tries to make a case the support for M4A among the population is fragile, but that pre-supposes there is no organized political party pushing for it. People opposed income tax cuts and yet they passed. People actually opposed building a longer wall along the Mexican-US border. Somehow, agitating and performative acts galvanized enough voters to make Trump president and the proposal got to be "mainstreamed." 

The defeatist attitude and way of thinking among people such as Digby and Levitz is also an extension of the old saw from William Hocking from nearly 100 years ago that a man--yes, sexist times back then--can be "so very liberal, that he cannot himself take his own side in a quarrel." Now this self-defeating sentiment has extended itself to what passes for the left in American politics, and even intellectual Marxists at Jacobin magazine, which adds to my own despair about the discourse.

We need to recognize this moment. Trump, in his flailing loser status, has provided our nation the biggest opening to get people $2,000 stimulus checks--and all Digby, Eric, and Jacobin's Ben Burgis want to say is, "Well, yeah, great, but it's not worth doing anything or pushing our congress critters about."  Note how each of them spouts the reactionary or do nothing line, while still trying to impress us how much they supposedly care about fighting for the $2,000 stimulus check or M4A.  

Well, you know what, people of the professional-managerial class? For all your saintly, cynical worldliness, and fear of expressing hope in a manner that may leave you looking foolish with the wine-and-cheese crowd you hang with, each of you suck at negotiations. And you suck at negotiation because you never had to negotiate anything worth your life--unlike Jimmy Dore, who had to negotiate and maneuver to get health care when he was going bankrupt from so many tests, while doctors tried to figure out why his bones were disintegrating and breaking. People who read this blog, well, the few who do, know about my heart issues over the years, and how I had to maneuver through life, and suck up to increasingly ridiculous employment situations, to ensure proper medical coverage for my family and especially me.

And yeah, I know Jimmy would have ripped me for my view that Trump is a compromised Russian dupe (Jimmy calls Trump's relations with Russia a political hoax, which the DNC concocted to avoid their own responsibility for Trump defeating Clinton in the Rust Belt and winning the presidency in 2016). Jimmy would also have ripped me for still loving Bernie and AOC. But he is damn right here, and, as he continually says, this is not about him. However, for too many of our commenters in media and even on the Internet, it is as I said in a recent post about the failures in our discourse, when I said "too many of us don't know how to separate snark from substance, personality from policy, and trivialities from materialities." Just look at how Eric Levitz opened his column. He didn't argue the policy. He just ripped into Jimmy Dore personally, as if the salient issue is not about a political strategy or substance-- just some guy on the Internet supposedly looking for money. Then, look again at how Digby couldn't help but focus on Trump being a grifter and vengeful against Republicans, rather than evaluate how Democrats must step up and leverage Trump's threat against the Republicans to fight for what she claims she wants enacted, which is the $2,000 stimulus check.  Not even a separate post that talked about Democrats leveraging the moment.  It is more important, in Digby's mind, to preen on and on about Trump's personality. 

It is outrageous Dems can't directly seize this moment of Trump's Covid-package veto threat to get more money into the hands of Americans. It is pathetic how Democrats, in the wake of Trump's actual veto of the military budget, cannot seize the moment, and then say out loud, "Hey, America!  Did you know where 60% of the budget goes to, after Medicare, Social Security an internet on the debt? The military. The Empire. And did you know we spend more on the Empire and military than the next 8-10 nations combined?  That's six of every ten bucks!  And that is why you don't get nice things--unlike Europeans we supposedly 'defend' under NATO.  Unlike Israel, which is getting nearly $40 billion from us under a current ten year deal.  Unlike Japan.  Unlike most nations that call themselves civilized."

Last Friday, Irami Osei-Frimpong provided a great analysis of the Maslow formulation about people's motivations, and Irami turns upside down the entire set of Maslow's premises which he offered in a theory in 1943--a theory I have had to learn in my education classes this year in my quest to be fully certified as a high school teacher. It is worth watching Irami's discussion, as Irami makes clear people must place freedom first, and by freedom he means the ability to see a doctor and not worry about paying, and other similar examples.  He also makes the point that people who receive material benefits through a top-down or tyrannical system are going to always say challenges to that system are not worth the risk.  

This moment has exposed not only liberals, but much of the so-called left-wing opining in social media and corporate-sponsored and owned media.  Not all of the liberals and left, thank goodness. However, enough have been exposed so that we should be very wary of what is going to happen over the next two to four years.  These people are not to be trusted in their strategic political judgments. They will always counsel caution and accept defeat-before-we-start. 

The People's Party cannot come soon enough.  #Forcethevote.org.

* Briahna Joy Gray, a professional-managerial class refugee, refutes Levitz type thinking in Current Affairs on this topic. Briahna makes clear why a floor vote is great from a substantive and strategic point of view. 

India should be the leading and most discussed International story. It is not--because corporate media doesn't want you to know.

My headline is more about my previous post about India.  

However, this article from the NYRB shows us how the Modi regime in India is all about moves that are consistent with how Fascists rule. The law discussed in the article reflects the Modi regime's clear intent to divide working class and poor Indians through religion. It is a law designed to promote hate.  For Modi to do this, on top of letting Pakistan know it is interested in a war-diversion against Pakistan, shows how much Modi and the economic royalists fear this workers/farmers' uprising.  It is inspiring workers at an Apple factory in India to stand up--and not be afraid of causing property damage or worse.  

What is happening in India right now is THE international story. The singular fact MSNBC and CNN are not covering what has been happening over the past three weeks (!)--and how they promote themselves as 24/7 news channels tells anyone all they needed to know about the propaganda system in the United States, practiced through corporate media.  What they want you to discuss and know, and what they don't want you to discuss and know.  

But, watch. If there is coverage of what happened at the Apple contractor (I love that, "contractor") factory, the coverage will decidedly tilt toward the corporate globalist perspective.  You can bet dollars to donuts on that.

WEB Dubois speaks.

This post from Erik Loomis at LGM blog is awesome.  I, too, never heard DuBois' voice, and to hear his distinctive enunciation, much in a style that reminds me of FDR, is thrilling.  The substance of DuBois analysis is also more true today than it was than in 1960, when he delivered the speech.  It is a 19th Century voice speaking truth to the power of the 20th Century.