This all makes a lot of sense. I view the Republicans and Democrats as different aesthetics of the consenting neoliberal economic arrangement, and agree with a notion of post-politics to describe this situation, where politics becomes increasingly engaged in cultural issues since your arrangement in the political economy is no longer up for debate. The neoliberal system is what’s in crisis and is basically running on fumes at this point, no longer sincerely believed in by determining actors within it. As the systemic stresses of degrading neoliberal capitalism turn inward it manifests in different ways politically. Trump doesn’t happen from nothing, there are real systemic anxieties underlying that, the problem for Democrats is any serious acceptance and solution of those anxieties is in conflict with the forces that keep them legitimate. The Republicans accept the brutality of the system as necessary and the Democrats try and put a good brand on it.
This all makes a lot of sense. I view the Republicans and Democrats as different aesthetics of the consenting neoliberal economic arrangement, and agree with a notion of post-politics to describe this situation, where politics becomes increasingly engaged in cultural issues since your arrangement in the political economy is no longer up for debate. The neoliberal system is what’s in crisis and is basically running on fumes at this point, no longer sincerely believed in by determining actors within it. As the systemic stresses of degrading neoliberal capitalism turn inward it manifests in different ways politically. Trump doesn’t happen from nothing, there are real systemic anxieties underlying that, the problem for Democrats is any serious acceptance and solution of those anxieties is in conflict with the forces that keep them legitimate. The Republicans accept the brutality of the system as necessary and the Democrats try and put a good brand on it.