Schadenfreude? Avoid.

[imomus]

If I had to identify the biggest disappointment of the 21st century so far, it would be America's swing to the right. I loved Bill Clinton's 1990s dot com boom America so much that I moved there in early 2000, taking up residence in Manhattan Chinatown. Perhaps things were already swinging by then. Clinton had already come under attack from the very people who would soon take over. The Republicans hounded him for some minor sexual peccadillo, and their opportunistic puritanism, astonishingly enough, nearly got him impeached. Then the digital culture boom—which had seemed to position the US as the most future-oriented civilization on the planet—collapsed as "irrational exuberance" was replaced by the sound of bursting bubbles and plunging indices.

The 2000 presidential election revealed that Americans may have enjoyed Clinton's Slick Willy persona more than his Democratic policies; Gore was seen as a "policy wonk", lacking Clinton's popular touch. The theme of the 2000 election debates became a problem which any nation would love to have: what shall we do with our record budget surplus? It looked like there were two answers to that question: spend it on a socialized healthcare system and other moderate social leveling, or give it back to consumers (mostly very rich ones) in the form of a tax cut.

But it seems that America wasn't going to become either moderately socialist or even just a big, rich, effeminate consumer culture. After the debacle of election stalemate, in came Bush. He made his promised tax cuts, but, after 9/11, what he mostly did was turn the US's massive surpluses into massive deficits by fighting wars all over the world. I got the hell out. America became the problem, not the solution. The election of 2004 was the final blow, proof (unless we believe the conspiracy theory that the Diebold machines were rigged) that the Bush presidency hadn't just been a Supreme Court fix, but had genuine popular support.

Ever since Hurricane Katrina wrecked New Orleans, though, there have been signs that the Bush presidency is crumbling. In the last week, the president's misfortunes have reached critical mass. Bush's "brain", Karl Rove, came under critical investigation. Bush lackey Harriet Miers's nomination for the Supreme Court was shot down. Former ally Berlusconi yesterday tried to boost his election chances in Italy by saying he'd tried to talk Bush out of invading Iraq.

But before we throw a schadenfreude party, let's note that these are not attacks on Bush from the left. They do not signal a change in the national mood which will automatically see Hillary Clinton swept to power in 2008. Bush's setbacks come from the right. Out goes Miers, suspected by the right wing of the Republican party of moderately liberal views, in comes Alito, a conservative. Even Berlusconi's "betrayal" is in the interest of strengthening the right wing — in the form of his own continued rule at home in Italy.

Although I no longer call the US my home, my life is intricately and intimately tied up with the country. I'm writing more and more journalism for magazines, and they're almost exclusively American ones: Wired News, Index, AIGA Voice and ID. I've invited an American (Rusty Santos, a New Yorker from Arizona) to produce my next album. I recently pitched a book to an American publisher about an American artist (Laurie Anderson). And it looks entirely possible that I'll spend the first five months of 2006 in the US, engaging in art-related activities (I can't tell you the details yet).

All this is happening because, in selected areas, America is still the most creative nation in the world, and creativity is my biggest interest. In the design, art and music fields America still has amazing energy and enthusiasm. It's still a cosmopolitan, generous and outward-looking nation: recent or forthcoming articles I've published in American magazines include two pieces on Japan-based designers, a piece about global biennials, a piece about a German designer, and a piece about a Scottish artist. (But, come to think of it, three of my commissioning editors are actually America-based Brits!)

It's utterly dismaying, though, to see that outward-looking, generous and creative America (the tolerant, secular, gay-friendly blue-state America of Richard Florida's "creative class") marginalized and impotent, or, worse, linked reluctantly to a boneheaded regime. And, while it's great to see the first signs that that regime may be disintegrating, the fact that it seems to be splitting into two factions, and that the dominant faction is even further right than Bush sends a chill wind right through me. Let's keep the celebrations on hold; we don't yet know that something even worse isn't on the way.

Comments

[seanthesean.livejournal.com]

the nineties weren't real... we went from a totally cynical, slacker culture to an insanely hard working money oriented (& cynical still, but bolstered by wealth) culture while the housing prices tripled. all that talk about the "creative class" is a cheap marketting technique to identify a new market of hard working, poor artists who follow trends as if they were lines of cocaine. it was all a big build up to get internet systems up through the whole country & computers in every home in the shortest amount of time while making the most money possible. that is most likely a good thing, cos these computers are quite nice... but all of that romantic stuff is just totally delusional. the nineties were shit.

i would also argue that in terms of the american imperial agenda which has existed for a hundred years or so, all of what bush is doing is just part of the larger plan & would be done regardless of what party was in power. they are taking the fall for all this, it's a total set up.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I don't mean to chide you personally, Sean, but I really resist this "it's all the same" kind of thinking. That's another thing I should have made a deadly sin last week while I had the chance, this sort of thinking in which "postmodernism has always existed, albeit under different names" and "the Democrats are just the Republicans under a different name". (I guess it's a blend of "moronic cynicism" and "pompous universalism"... shall we call it "cynical universalism"?)

Whatever happened to the butterfly syndrome, whereby even the tiniest action can make a huge difference to the outcome?

I Ching

[tassellrealm.livejournal.com]

Hexagram 61.

Inner truth moves even pigs and fish and leads to good fortune.

[seanthesean.livejournal.com]

cynical universalism, ha! that's probably lurking in my brain a bit too much. but, i agree with you, my point isn't really that the political parties are the same, because they are obviously different in some key areas. however, they are also incredibly large political bodies operating in the same country which has a larger historical agenda that is non-partisan. these political parties play good cop//bad cop or recession//boom (those things are obviously different as well, but play the same game), so in politics we get republican//democrat & they have to switch off or the country wouldn't work "properly". they also can't have third parties introduced because it would muck up the formula too much. i think the UK has it different in that there is a cultural continuity involved with the monarchy, who doesn't have to contend with the same insatibility as the ordinary government does. even though they have no power, it still provides an even surface for all the political machinations involved.

so yes, sure the butterflies stir things up & make a windmill fall over which kills the duke & then there is a war, but... the political parties have to react to that also. they are two political formula being fed the same set of variables, operating in a larger, more complex formula which they could be easily booted out of if they got out of line.

[(Anonymous)]

I don't mean to chide you personally iMomus, but the end result of both wings is the same. They essentially operate under the guide of the same principle, albeit the rhetoric is different and the mode of actions are different. They both work the centralize control. The lifeline of both parties is the tight gov't reliance (either directly, deomcrats, or indirectly, republicans) over the people. Traditionally, Republican chanted the slogan "less gov't" however, they continued to work to tighten the relationship between government and corporations to the point where really all new legislations that come out of the Hill are ones to appease them. And most markets rely on governments to stay alive, the transportation industry, arms industry, and entertainment and software industries to name a few.

As for the "butterfly syndrome" I could only assume you are talking about Lorenz and his attractor. However, one should know that one does not live in an isolated environment. The tiniest perturbations in the input does create huge difference in outcome in many dynamical systems, however, those effect are rubbed out when you have thousands and thousands of these perturbed systems vying for a voice, and (destructively) interfering with each other. Be careful of metaphors. They can make you claim strange things and construct a strange reality that do not jive with your perceptions. A better metaphor I think would be something like a network of locally coupled system. Like for example, if you've ever been to a concert or an event. Listen to the applause, each person unconsciously syncs up with the people next to them and this synchronicity propagates out through these local couplings, where there's a moment that the applause becomes one gigantic clappings. local effects can propagate out to be global, however, no isolated actions can achieve this - it must be social in nature - community building.