Yesterday, the Democrats lost the most expensive House of Representatives election in history–a special election for Georgia’s 6th district (Cook PVI R+8). Georgia’s 6th district consists of the conservative suburbs of Atlanta; it is largely made of upper-middle-class suburban right-wing white people. The Democrats backed candidate Jon Ossoff heavily, gathering $23.6 million in aggressively-solicited donations and $7.6 million from groups including the party’s purse (for a total of $31.2 million); he ran on a right-wing platform of (in the words of no less an elite institution than the New York Times) “economic development and fiscal restraint”. Ossoff lost to the Republican, Karen Handel, who had raised $4.5 million in donations and received $18.2 million from groups including the party’s purse (for a total of $22.7 million), by a 4-point margin. [1] There were three other special elections between a Republican and a Democrat in 2017 that have completed, all of which the Democrats have lost: one in Montana’s at-large district (the Democrat was Rob Quist), one in Kansas’s 4th district (the Democrat was James Thompson), and one in South Carolina’s 5th district (the Democrat was Archie Parnell). None of these elections received any fundraising attention or financial support from the DNC; all were run in traditionally heavily Republican seats (Cook PVIs being R+11, R+15, and R+9, respectively)–yet despite this, they achieved single-digit margins: 6 points, 7 points, and 3 points. Quist and Parnell both ran on a platform which, though still thoroughly liberal, was relatively to the left of Ossoff (indeed, despite Parnell’s ties to Goldman Sachs)–and one could even make the same case for Thompson, though perhaps with less strength. Quist in particular ran a remarkably progressive campaign for the US, endorsing single-payer healthcare, progressive taxation, an end to the drug war, dropping military spending, and pay equity and reproductive rights for women. One must ask the following question if one thinks at all: why did the Democrats pour so much money into an uninspired right-wing candidate when faced with such golden opportunities–who they didn’t fund at all?
When one considers the political context–that of a Democratic establishment seeking to crush all leftward internal dissension–the motivation becomes clearer. The establishment’s line has historically been that yes, they agree with their base, but they must be pragmatic and win elections (even though they’re doing neither, and recently have started openly attacking their base’s preferred policies) by appealing to the supposedly massive demographic of upper-middle-class white home-owning right-wing suburbanites who, according to their narrative, decide everything. It has been clear for two years now that the Democrat formula of pandering to this mythical demographic has failed, yet the Democrats have, if anything, hardened their right-wing position–bitterly attacking their left flank and refusing funds, as noted above, to candidates who wish to take a different tack, even if the opportunities for electoral success are much brighter than the avenues chosen by the establishment. Behind the bleating that “there is no alternative” we see once more the hidden hand of ideology, yet no longer can this charm millions. I suspect that the Democrats are on their way to becoming what I call a permanent loyal opposition, like the Democratic Party of Japan or the Communist Party and Liberal Democratic Party of the Russian Federation–any pretense of pragmatic shifts to win elections is gone.
When I use the term “loyal opposition” here, I’m not referring to the compound noun used in British politics to refer to the chief opposition party (the meaning there being that the opposition can oppose policies but defer to the state), but rather to denote that the opposition is loyal to the policies it claims to oppose, not merely the state that enacts them. It only seeks to undermine the dominant party to the extent that this could add to its legitimacy among its base–and then, only in appearance, almost never in substance, if at all possible. Like all parties, a permanent loyal opposition functions largely to control the political expression of its base rather than to reflect it in policy. What makes the permanent loyal opposition different is that it no longer seriously attempts to take power; it exists solely to make dominant-party rule unchallengeable (and thus acceptable, if not palatable) while retaining formal democracy. All other functions have been sacrificed for the main function of suppressing dissent and manufacturing consent.
This formation is also closely related to the constriction of non-electoral political action; the permanent loyal opposition wishes that all non-electoral political action take two forms: the rally (though it may be disguised as a protest march or a strike, the simple fact that it generally does not constrict capital or make any real demands means that it is merely a rally) and contacting legal representatives. These two forms are, of course, favored precisely because they are useless in forcing action in accordance with the wishes of their participants but are useful in building the legitimacy of the permanent loyal opposition. Consider also the ever-expanding definition of violence in reference to deeds of the people (as opposed to deeds of the State and its armed representatives, which are never considered illegitimate or violent)–first, harm against people, then, harm against property, now, simply being at a rally.
That the Democratic Party serves mainly as a vehicle to manage its base’s political expression and not as a vehicle to express the base’s ambitions in policy is not new; what is new is the possibility that it may be done almost entirely from opposition. Indeed, the former notion in a more general form is not a new theory; elements of it were recognized by Leftists as far back as the 19th century, and it was expressed as a theory by Antonio Gramsci (and later by Nicos Poulantzas, among others) in the mid-20th century. I hope it is more obvious now that the masks of consent have begun to slip, revealing the fists of force.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/20/us/politics/georgia-6th-most-expensive-house-election.html
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