RevolutionZ
RevolutionZ
Ep 301 NAR #16 2048 and Beyond
Ep 301 NAR 16 is the last episode in the Next American Revolution sequence. In it Senator and then President Malcolm King, Governor and then Vice President Celia Curie, Lydia Luxemburg, and Bert Dellinger discuss the benefits and debits of electoral participation and the purpose and features of RPS's 2048 campaigns and their major victory in 2048 ushering in the birth of RPS transition.
This one time, below is what the AI associated with the platform I upload podcast episodes to, Buzzsprout, offered as its summary of the episode, spit forth upon its listening to the material. I employ it so you can see the kinds of writing AIs now generate.So here it is:
"Unlock the secrets to navigating the complex world of electoral politics with our final chapter in the Next American Revolution sequence, "2048 and Beyond." Have you ever wondered whether running for political office can truly bring about transformative change, or does it come at the cost of compromising core values? Join us as we explore the real-life experiences of Malcolm King and the multifaceted challenges he faced, from the pressures of fundraising to the struggle of staying connected to grassroots movements. This episode offers a candid look at the intricate dance between visibility, change, and the risk of self-aggrandizement.
Dive into the strategic depths of electoral work with compelling historical and personal anecdotes. Hear untold stories from the early days of Hugo Chavez's presidency to Celia Curie's courageous run for Governor of California. Their journeys highlight the moral tightrope walked by leaders striving to remain true to their principles amidst the temptations of political victories. Lydia's insights as the RPS shadow government president further illuminate how institutional structures can either hinder or help the path to meaningful progress. Discover the critical importance of leveraging popular support while navigating the institutional landscape to achieve far-reaching policy changes.
As we examine the nuanced relationship between radical movements and existing institutions, Miguel and Bert provide invaluable perspectives on working within flawed systems without losing sight of transformative goals. Revisit the pivotal moments that led to RPS considering a presidential run, culminating in President Malcolm King's transformative UN speech in 2049. Reflect on the broader struggle between revolutionary change and entrenched power through the lens of Malcolm's fierce debate and his vision for an equitable society. This episode promises to leave you with a deeper understanding of the intricate balance between electoral ambitions and grassroots activism."
Hello, my name is Michael Albert and I am the host of the podcast that's titled Revolution Z. This is our 301st consecutive episode and the 16th and last in our Next American Revolution sequence. Episodes in that sequence have been remember chapters from an oral history of well, a future revolution, and as well they have included some comments from myself, called for identification purposes as I go along. Interjections as in I interject, and all that is true this time too, as we here complete the last chapter and thus the last episode in this sequence. This one is a more manageable length than some of the others in this sequence. This one is a more manageable length than some of the others, which means I can take some time at the end to offer some of my own thoughts and feelings about the whole 16 Next American Revolution episodes or chapters, and I will do just that before signing off. I hope you'll still be plugged in to hear it and perhaps react. At any rate, in this last episode titled 2048 and Beyond.
Speaker 1:Senator and then President Malcolm King, governor and then Vice President Celia Lopez, lydia Luxem, malcolm and I interject. This question was clearly taken from an interview years before running for president, one of your various campaigns and holding office as a senator in Massachusetts taught you about the pitfalls and the benefits of elections and even electoral office. Personal desires aside, someone seeking to renovate society runs for office for one or more of three reasons. One to win and use the power of the office for change. Two, to educate in order to improve prospects for winning change. Three, to pressure other candidates in positive ways. I think all those motives are fine and I think the benefits from the first two can be quite large. Running for office can provide massive public access for communications and also it can open many paths to instituting changes. My Senate campaigns in Massachusetts, for example, did quite a lot to help RPS gain visibility and to help its ideas gain acceptance, and my time in office there has been similar In the case of a senator, unlike an executive position, you can't enact changes yourself, but you can sponsor bills, fight for them and use your visibility to support and aid movement pressures, all of which can be highly valuable.
Speaker 1:But what about the debits, asks Miguel? These are more subtle, miguel, but also very important, and there are many. It is all too easy to get caught up in the tallying aspect of elections and to then lose track of larger educational and organizing issues and possibilities. This can even happen to excellent left candidates who start with an overarching agenda. They initially see the election as just one part of, but then, under the pressure of campaigning, they may start to see winning votes as the only virtue. Pressures are so strong that they can even happen to people who are literally, while it is happening, decrying the same tendency as it has affected other people.
Speaker 1:A second damaging dynamic is for a candidate to become too enamored with him or herself and again to lose track of larger forces at play. This typically causes a candidate to start feeling that his or her will needs to be followed without dissent. You there say whatever might assist me, do whatever might assist me. Next, because of the dynamic between a candidate and all those supporting the candidate, you often get a situation where advisors and campaign workers bend their words to suit what the candidate wants to hear rather than to convey accurate assessments. Just as the candidate starts to feel him or herself to be more important and brilliant than is true, the people around the candidate start to feel a kind of junior version of the same thing and want to preserve their access and sense of importance. They then often function more to do that than to pursue broader agendas. Or sometimes the dynamic beyond the candidate is just as bad as its effects but more benign in its causes, as when people around a candidate try to maintain access only to be able to have a good effect, yet the possible good effects wind up sacrificed in practice to maintain the access, kind of catch-22.
Speaker 1:So suppose you're in a group of 10 who have the ear of a candidate. He is personally reeling a bit morally and politically under all the pressures and he is getting very pushy in the group of ten, chairing every session, scowling at news he doesn't like, praising news he does like and finally kicking someone out of the inner circle for bearing bad news or being critical. You are in the circle. You feel he is moving backward from worthy political priorities toward unworthy self-aggrandizement and elite habits of one sort or another. You feel you should try to reverse that trend. But you know that you will lose your seat in the inner circle if you go too far. So you curb your inclinations out of the perfectly sensible desire to have any positive effect at all, not out of some junior elitist or self-serving pursuit. Your motivations are sincere but the result is the same as if they weren't, the candidate drifts toward elitist self-exaltation and the inner circle slides into abetting the pattern, and the inner circle slides into abetting the pattern.
Speaker 1:Of course, the fixation at fault in such trends need not be on vote tallying per se or on expanding the candidate's authority. It can also be on money. Elections in the US are expensive affairs and an incredible percentage of the effort expended in any election and even in any term of office turns out to be nothing but pursuit of dollars. You can imagine what that can lead to when those delivering the bigger dollars have their own agendas. Candidates or officials wind up bought off. But even when the fundraising is from a base of supporters making small donations, the perpetual need to get money, making small donations, the perpetual need to get money, the kinds of pressure one feels to write letters and make appeals geared to succeed by saying whatever getting money requires and not by whatever is the full truth, is again overwhelming and can lead to devolution of the benefits of running.
Speaker 1:All in all, I think RPS has approached the whole thing wisely, probably not the only good way, but one good way. We have welcomed excellent candidates, running, educating, winning and using office, but as an organization we have taken no direct organizational part in the electoral process, focusing instead always on grassroots organizing, movement building and pressuring elites of all kinds, including elected politicians, to make desired changes. Often many in RPS will work hard on a campaign Certainly, my own campaigns were staffed overwhelmingly by RPS members but the organization never collectively and officially gets involved and thus never gets caught up in the dynamics. It doesn't give or raise money for candidates. Perhaps before too long we will be in a position to have an RPS member run for and even become president. If so, hopefully everyone will know just exactly what that means and what they are getting into. Know just exactly what that means and what they are getting into. But even in that case, while I would imagine virtually every RPS member would to some degree aid the campaign, often with incredible outlays of time and effort, I think the organization as a collective entity will still clear, and rightly so. But, malcolm, what about the problem of focusing on electing one person and missing that? A single person alone is effectively powerless. I think we should certainly be aware of the fact that an electoral approach, like any other approach, requires numbers to be most effective. But that is different from saying that a lone victory is worthless. It just says that the more truly desirable candidates we have in office and the more those candidates have mass grassroots activist connection and support, the better.
Speaker 1:Suppose we go back to the time when Bernie Sanders attempted to become president. What if he had gotten the Democratic Party nomination and then beaten Trump? Some would suggest, and did suggest at that time, that it would make no difference. They weren't denying that Sanders was honest and sincere, or even arguing his agenda wasn't maximal and nothing short of maximal matters. Oh, some were doing both, I suppose, but most not Most with this view were saying something more subtle and to some degree echoing Sanders, who himself said pretty much the same thing. That is, if Sanders had won, he would have been president, yes, but nearly all the governors, senators, congresspeople, police chiefs and officers, military command and on and on would still have been wedded to existing social relations. So, said these analysts, sanders could have done nothing fundamental. Now if, like Sanders, they had said that to accomplish much he would need massive popular support, that would have been true. With such support even if he built lots of it while in office, of course he could have improved the life conditions of diverse constituencies in the present, while also warding off continuing slides toward hell. By combating global warming, he could work to create more support, awareness and commitment at the grassroots and to galvanize that into campaigns for critical reforms to help people and also pave the way for further actions. He could have very significantly sped up the emergence of RPS.
Speaker 1:Consider Chavez years earlier winning the presidency in Venezuela. It is not an exact analogy, but not too far off for the point we are discussing. He had Miraflores then, as well as White House, but he had no governors, a few mayors out of hundreds and a very few legislators, as well as nearly no local police. And yet he did a ton which could have gone much further, but for various mistakes, I believe, as well as very substantial outside factors, but that is for another time. The point is a sensible approach to electoral work should focus on a wide array of offices, many local, fewer statewide and still fewer national, just as we have been doing for the past 20 years. But if you manage to win the more encompassing positions or even just one of them and you don't succumb to the various pitfalls of the process, then holding that office can be very helpful indeed.
Speaker 1:Miguel turns to Celia. This is also from an interview years before she ran for vice president. Can you tell us a bit about running for and becoming governor of California? What did you take from that electoral experience? We had to traverse the state over and over to get out our message. We talked directly to huge numbers of people and then our public gatherings, speeches, tv addresses and the debates reached still more.
Speaker 1:Throughout the process we extolled the RPS program and we urged RPS involvement by our supporters. We constantly indicated not only the programs and policies we would try to rapidly institute, but also where we hoped the changes would lead. The truth is, when we started, I at least, didn't anticipate winning. We ran as a way to organize very widely, to perhaps put pressure on whoever would win and to develop organization for future runs and policy campaigns as well as for grassroots organizing. We thought that we could use the process to broaden understanding of and support for RPS ideas and aims and to literally build new organization and membership advancing movements. At every step along the path we literally swore to one another, literally, that we wouldn't compromise any of that to win office. Winning office was only relevant, we told ourselves over and over, if it happened in the flow of our overall effort, not by way of compromising our overall effort. Our definition of winning the election was to do all that we intended without compromise and then, if by some chance, we actually got most votes, terrific.
Speaker 1:Even with that overt commitment, it wasn't easy to keep in mind and not forget our main agenda. The pressure grew enormous as support came from all kinds of directions, and the pressure to compromise and play games to win came not just from the media or various pundits and potential donors or endorsers, but from inside the campaign as well. The prospect of victory was like a drug it often diverted minds from the prospect of actual success. I mean, you're about to give a speech to some large crowd or perhaps members of some constituency or organization. What do you do? Approach one you describe your actual intentions, beliefs, values and agenda, making your strongest case for them. Approach two you examine polling results to determine what your audience is thinking and then you tailor your words to try to win your audience over. These two approaches typically diverge, and it isn't the case that someone who is pursuing the second is necessarily doing it for self-serving reasons, though in time you do tend to become what you are doing.
Speaker 1:I think what kept us overwhelmingly on the first approach wasn't just good people, having my ear and delivering criticism without fearing that I would dismiss them, but also the mindset we developed from the outset, which was that an election would be hollow or even counterproductive if seeking victory caught us up in traveling an elitist path and we stuck to our priorities. I was in office only a week when we had begun implementing, without the slightest hesitation, our full program. We didn't at any point think, okay, let's get that important gain short of our full aim by way of this or that compromise. No, we said, let's get everything we laid out, and more by way of popular power, not backroom compromise. If we did have to compromise at times and we did we did it openly, said it was what we were doing and why we had to do it. I should say, though, I think this was far less hard than it might have been due to the scale and commitment of public support we had for our full program and due to the obvious upward trajectory of that support. Without so much support and its tendency to steadily increase, we would have always been afraid that not compromising would win nothing, rather than always feeling that minimizing and being open about compromising was the way to win everything.
Speaker 1:Lydia, you were RPS shadow government president, did it give you a feeling for the benefits of holding office? Do you look forward to RPS actually fielding a real president, a societal president, in the near future? In office, miguel, you learn quickly that the main determinants of the biggest policies and directions are institutional features. Even in a shadow government, indeed, even with a dictator, that is largely the case. But with anything even remotely like a democratic system, it is certainly true, the structure of the governing bodies is critical, but so too, of course, are the concentrations of power in various other places, mainly corporations, military churches, unions and so on. So you learn that, short of transforming all institutions, which is of course the ultimate goal, you have to have sources of power, pressure and creative innovation beyond your office, or what you win will be nothing remotely like what you desire to win. So even in the shadow case right off, we could either abide existing relations in our mirror of the US government, abide existing relations in our mirror of the US government, just proposing policies and agitating for them, or we could also seek institutional changes in our own version of the government, partly as a model for things to seek in the broader world and partly so we could do more good in our own work. If I was younger, much younger, and for some unfathomable reason it made sense for me to run for actual president in a campaign aimed to win, I would certainly do so.
Speaker 1:There are many on the left who understand that existing institutions, including the government, are bent into shape structurally, accommodating the rich and powerful and also incorporating strong aspects of other oppressive relations like racism, sexism, classism, etc. They take from that insight one correct conclusion, and sometimes one incorrect conclusion, at least in my view. The correct one is that we need new institutions. This explains the ongoing and by now overwhelming growth of support for RPS vision. The incorrect conclusion, which is now largely overcome but was perhaps predominant at the outset of RPS, is that we should have nothing to do with flawed institutions. That was wrong, but back then substantial. It was a little like saying we want a new society for the whole population, but we don't want to relate to the population. We want a new society spanning all the defining institutions, but we don't want to battle within those institutions. We want to criticize existing institutions and rail at them from without or replace them by building from scratch, but we don't want to engage them from within, ever Railing at them from without is certainly essential, and so is creating alternatives from scratch that can serve as models to raise consciousness and even serve as seeds of the future.
Speaker 1:But suppose someone said to radical working people we want a new economy, so stop operating in this one, you can see. I hope that that is utterly absurd. First, it means ceding that terrain to those who are not radical. Second, it means giving up one's job. And third, it loses access to all the lessons that can be gleaned by operating within existing institutions, not only lessons about what is wrong with them, but lessons about what is needed in their place. And finally, most important, it also forgoes victories inside those institutions that would make people's lives better. Now it often even acts as though such victories wouldn't matter, which can become a very callous stance. It may be harder to see, but the government is similar to the economy in all those regards, and there are added aspects as well. Corporations are entirely places where nothing non-profit seeking can be done other than by applying pressure. Government is at least somewhat different. The deck is certainly heavily stacked, and the structural pressures to compromise and become what you don't want to be are enormous. But it is also true that there is some real room to maneuver and that there are many games we can win simply by changing minds, much less winning elections or using levers of power to influence outcomes. At any rate, my feeling is that there are very serious and dangerous pitfalls not at all easy to avoid, but to not try is to forgo still larger gains able to be won. And yes, I think we have gotten to the point where our support is so broad and, even more important, so deep that we can now win at the highest level.
Speaker 1:Bert, you too were an RPS shadow president after serving as vice president with Lydia. Do you see the situation similarly? Yes, miguel, very much so. If I had to suggest a difference, I think I may be just a hair more sympathetic to those who are so caught up in rejecting reformism that they go overboard and think it requires literally avoiding reforms and steering clear of working within mainstream institutions. I get the sentiment hell in my bones as a feeling, but only as a feeling. I even share it. The levels of hypocrisy rooted in conforming to injustice are so intrinsic to existing structures that it is hard, though not impossible, to avoid getting sucked in, chewed up and spit back out different. One should try to navigate the shoals of government. A trick, however, can help.
Speaker 1:We don't think it is inevitable, or even a very strong prospect, that if you, as an activist, get a job on an assembly line, you will become an advocate of wage slavery. But why not? If you work there, you have to navigate the idiocies and injustices, so why won't you be bent in accord? Well, you may be, and aspects of such a job certainly push people toward becoming accommodating and resigned. But since your role in the corporation is that of victim of its ills, you may retain integrity and operate in its bounds, but without becoming its advocate. Suppose, in contrast, you're in an elected office in national or local government, or, for that matter, suppose you take a job as a manager in a workplace. The situation is now different. You are, or at least can be, recipient of some significant benefits and purveyor of some hurtful ills. So the trick is this Even as you take office, you must define yourself to be an opponent of your position and your role. You have to literally see yourself as a fifth column from, without beholden to those outside and only operating inside to pursue interests defined outside, or at least that is how I see it.
Speaker 1:I should say as well that even in the shadow government, the effects of greater support and more clarity mattered greatly. In the years I was VP serving in Lydia's administration. We made great headway, but it was quite hard. Instead of mainly working on change, much, and sometimes even most, of our energy had to go simply to developing our methods and procedures and filling out posts. By the time I became Shadow POTUS I love that ridiculous phrase our structures and procedures were quite stable and effective. As a result, we could give more creative energy and time to elaborating our own positions and battling for them in society, and while much of our program was about economic and social issues, we also addressed matters of policy. Building campaigns to transform from the elitist electoral college approach to direct voting with multi-party preferential balloting was obviously a massive victory that we were quite elated about. And yes, I think that and other gains and mainly massive advances in popular awareness and desire have gotten us to a place where an RPS-identified candidate can now not just become president but take office with a large mandate and with fellow RPS advocates occupying positions all over the country. Positions all over the country.
Speaker 1:Malcolm interviewed, remember a few years before running for president do you anticipate an RPS candidate winning the 2048 election. Well, it is still nearly four years off, so we are on thin ground predicting anything. But with that caveat, yes, I think we will win outright and with our full politics on display. Yes, I think we will win outright and with our full politics on display, with over 60% support and perhaps even more than that. We have had a number of progressive administrations that negotiated with us in good faith, that sided with many of our reform efforts and that had to give in on much of the rest of what we sought as well, due to the scale of popular pressure. I think the population is now ready and eager for the start of more complete fundamental transformation.
Speaker 1:Sometime back when New York, california, minnesota and, surprisingly, texas elected not only progressive but RPS governors and did so by large margins, and when those governors proceeded to aggressively aid RPS efforts at the state and local levels, the result was incredibly positive for nearly everyone and the die was cast. The momentum became undeniable and, at least to my eyes, irreversible. I think the biggest consciousness shift was perhaps back in 2024, when working class votes for right-wing reaction fell off dramatically, fear of immigrants and minorities, plus warranted skepticism of Democrats and hope for upheaval to yield good had earlier polarized millions into conservative votes, but that significantly collapsed. People had come to understand that the real source of pain and suffering for working people was profit-seeking and other oppressive structures as well, and people were enjoying steadily growing racial and gender solidarity. So it was confusion that had started to melt away, not the anger and desire that had already existed.
Speaker 1:By 2028, and then especially by 2032, the class antagonism toward coordinator elitism and their material advantages had also largely transformed. It didn't disappear, of course, but it became highly informed and it switched from opposing liberalism or progressivism to opposing coordinator obscurantism and elitism aimed at maintaining coordinator dominance. It had grown to understand the division of labor and the need for allocation of resources to education for all. In 2040 and 2044, those trends continued, but I think the tipping point change was the growing popular belief in a viable alternative system. We move from people siding with RPS views and values in their hearts but not believing that RPS could actually deliver, and thus not being willing to seriously support RPS program for the country as a whole, to steadily more people having informed faith that a new society is possible and worth winning, so that supporting a candidate offering RPS program would be a step forward.
Speaker 1:So I think in 2048, the campaign and debates won't have to spend much time arguing the ills of mainstream approaches or the virtues of our preferred candidate as dignified, capable, inspiring people or, for example, as a potential president. There will be instead pretty much one pivotal issue If I vote for a revolutionary, am I voting for an idea I like, but unlimited chaos and civil strife that ultimately won't usher in a new society because opposition to a new society will be too strong to overcome? Or am I voting for a careful but unrelenting struggle that, despite repressive opposition, will culminate in implementing a new society at every level? And I think the answer will now finally come down as the latter for an overwhelming majority of our population. So we will win the election handily, and I think that winning the presidency even if we don't get Congress and the Senate too, though I think we will get both will greatly speed up our long march through the institutions, both changing them from within and replacing them with complete alternatives. It will be far easier and quicker to finish that process with the government actively abetting every step, rather than with the government as a receptive but very cautious listener, as has been true for recent administrations or, as earlier, as a very powerful opponent. Just think of a new president using executive orders to support workers, taking over companies even beyond what we've already accomplished. Or think of a new president transitioning military production and bases to social uses, not just in grudging response to mass movements, case by case and a little at a time, then always trying to revert. Not just in grudging response to mass movements, case by case and a little at a time, then always trying to revert, but as a matter of positive desire and principle across the world. Or think of a new president aiding creating the infrastructure of a new society, not simply from above, but responding to pressure from movements, while welcoming that pressure and aiding its development. We still have to be alert to the kinds of disruptive issues that arise, not least to the dangers of a new administration losing touch with the self-managing desires of the population and thinking its own views must dominate. But honestly, given the emergence of RPS insight and commitment throughout society, I think that such danger will be quite possible to curtail here.
Speaker 1:Miguel jumped forward to a 2049 interview after the 2048 electoral victory. Malcolm, do you remember first considering and then finally deciding to run for president? I first thought about it when I won for senator, and every so often thereafter, I saw being senator as a way to aid movements and help generate new policies sought from below, and I thought of the presidency that way too. Only more so. But running for president became more than daydreaming.
Speaker 1:One night, while I was talking with some good friends, celia, bill, lydia and Bert were all over and we got to talking about 2048. I can see it and reproduce it pretty much word for word for you, like it was yesterday and I had your recorder to help me, please do. Says Miguel, we were just chatting, enjoying being together, which was rare, and Lydia said something like it is wonderful to be together and I hope you won't mind that Bert and I see it as an opportunity to consider something we have all heard circulating around RPS. And then it got serious. Bertie that's what I call him said the three of you are the highest elected officials in the organization Senator of Massachusetts, governor of California and Mayor of New York City. What Lydia and I want to ask is should one of you run for president in 2048?, 1948. Bill replied I hear people talking about that too, but is the topic really worth any of our time here together? Bert said come on, of course it is. Bill replied I am not so sure.
Speaker 1:Rps is making incredible strides all over society at the base. So why not keep building and, when needed, pressure the ever more progressive but non-RPS presidents who take office, without us entering the corrupting arena ourselves? The complications of running for mayor, much less winning, have been daunting in New York. Imagine how entangling and corrupting the complications after winning the White House would be. Why not just keep winning? More grassroots institutions, more grassroots support? Why change our policy now? Lydia entered, but you use Gracie Manchin brilliantly. You build movement and you help win movement gains that we all celebrate. You aren't entangled, you aren't corrupted. Bill replied I'm not co-opted, perhaps, but I am exhausted and, more important, I am not sure what overall gain our winning office has achieved.
Speaker 1:Imagine that every RPS person in New York government, who is now partly just keeping the current system from unraveling, was instead working in grassroots organizing to build our new system. Imagine in their place in government, receptive though less RPS-ish folks, were in the positions we hold. Would that be a net loss? Avoiding the corrupting pressures of holding power and also tallying allies and especially keeping the old aspects of New York running has been incredibly consuming For the White House and federal government. The number of people sidetracked from grassroots work would be vastly greater. Celia wasn't put off, but imagine the extra outreach, the burst of energy which, if done right, can persist and, in the event of winning, the consciousness raising and major changes able to be far more quickly and easily promoted around still unaltered parts of society, with an allied rather than a neutral or hostile president and national government, not to mention the restraints on police, with all that possible, I think maybe we have gotten to a point where it would make sense to run for the presidency, where the debits are outweighed by the benefits.
Speaker 1:Bill had more doubts, but would running undercut popular participation in building and federating councils? Could we focus as much on a candidate as an election would require and then on governing as winning would require, without sacrificing more basic efforts? Burt got back into it. If we field a good candidate, I think we could attract 10 million super-motivated volunteers While campaigning. I think we would all work harder and with greater outreach, not less hard and more narrowly. We know we could have massive grassroots funding with no need for big donors. I think we could win, which would tremendously help every campaign and struggle that's now underway and so many more to follow.
Speaker 1:Once in office, I think we could all work full-time with incredible resources. Why couldn't we then emphasize and enlarge participation? Why shouldn't we try, bill? Honestly I wouldn't want to run. New York was very nearly too much for me. Celia said as Bill turned toward her Don't look at me, I would feel a fool trying. I am an actress turned governor for my home state. If I won, it would be like Reagan or Trump, a media personality taking office. I don't want that. Rps doesn't need that. And finally, malcolm got into it too. Well, I think the country would greatly benefit if it got you. Your governorship has been exemplary.
Speaker 1:I think a campaign done with an unswerving focus on our full participatory vision could advance our views enough to be worth the time, effort and resources it would require. And in office, far from draining already overflowing grassroots energy, I think we could enlarge and aid it. Bill replied what about the reaction if we win the presidency? I worry about violent coup attempts. Malcolm answered. I think we could handle what violence might be tried After winning the presidency. Resistance to progress would get nowhere Because of how we won our decades of grassroots organizing, our widespread, informed, organized support.
Speaker 1:I think our hands-off electoral policy has been right, but things are different now. Okay, look, we alone can't decide this, of course, but how about we think about telling RPS as a whole that we think we should run in whatever order finally makes sense? And we table this discussion for now, before it gets even more tortured? And then Celia surprised us all. Okay, and I will think about VP, if you will think about P. So that small gathering was when running became more than a pipe dream gossip. It was something to decide on and perhaps plan and do. Okay, malcolm, when did you first think you might actually run? I came to believe we might elect a full-on, uncompromising RPS president and keep the office, whoever it might be.
Speaker 1:In 2043, during the general strike, like everyone, I saw cities shut down, plants empty stores and malls, empty streets full of marching workers. I watched police join the marchers ending at huge statehouse rallies. We couldn't experience the incredible power of workers stopping the country and showing such an incredible depth of commitment to revolutionizing society and not feel that one part of what was to come would be taking over the government and putting it in service of the fundamental change that was blooming all over the country in homes, neighborhoods, churches, schools and workplaces. I was amazed, inspired, but also humbled. The crowds were enormous. It felt like victory, says Miguel.
Speaker 1:I even thought we could take over government right then. I believe you were right, replies Malcolm. We could have surged into government offices all over the country, including in Washington. That much was possible already in 2043. But then what? We weren't ready to staff much less fundamentally redefine all the agencies and handle much less redefine all the tasks. And in any case we didn't want to usurp government with a unilateral act. And finally, while we could have done it, could we have held it against violent efforts to oust us? We didn't have a full program developed from our base and that we had altogether discussed and refined at anything like the scale we would need if we were to use the government to effectively help and promote ongoing activism to transform all of society.
Speaker 1:We realized that if we were going to protect, maintain and grow participation in rebuilding society, we had to win office and change government in an accountable, participatory way, not by charging into office with no plan. We didn't have time to do that by 2044, so it would be 2048 earliest. Until then, and thereafter as well, we had to keep creating new institutions and winning changes in old ones. We had to build popular support and clarify, not only for taking over workplaces, schools, hospitals, local agencies and also the national government, but to then ward off elite attempts at reversing the steps taken while we retooled and renovated the government to become the desired participatory polity based on federated assemblies. And yes, I realize we had to run. So you ran to win. Yes, we ran to win, but with an absolute commitment that we would not compromise RPS views to seek votes. When did you begin to think you really would win? You know, we just worked day after day, trying not to think ahead to winning or not, until, for me at least, at the debate in early October, when lies failed and reasoned passion prevailed.
Speaker 1:Your closing statement says Miguel was like a lightning bolt of truth for the country. You took the gloves off. Do you remember it? All, of course, but first I had to hear my opponent attack me. Would I have gotten as aggressive as I did without that? I don't know. So I guess maybe we have him to thank for the lightning I threw back.
Speaker 1:Here were his remarks. He said Senator King, how can you possibly have the audacity to stand before the American people and say they should elect you president. You a man who anarchistically aims to overthrow our government. A man who socialistically wants to obliterate our property rights. A man who, femi-nazi-like, threatens to topple society's family fabric. A man who would cravenly reduce our armaments, armed forces and police to passivity. A man who would make our country pitifully weak. A man who denies religion, attacks individual creativity, promotes soul-destroying collectivism and denigrates our foundational white roots. You are a traitor disguised as a candidate. It will be a pleasure to ship you and your movement's pathetic power envy and psychotic, animalistic anger back to the fringe communities that spawned it. I happily cede to you my remaining time. Take as long as you like to reply. Your words will only deepen the horror our audience already feels at your vile intentions. He left me no choice and so, as you say, I took the gloves off. I replied. You have no more to say. No more vague, wild assertions, nothing positive to offer. Okay, I will gladly use your remaining time.
Speaker 1:You wonder at my wanting to anarchistically overthrow our government. I plead guilty. Unlike you, I don't want to preserve elitist, centralizing, mind-numbingly anti-democratic bureaucratic structures against participation by the American people, just to preserve the power of centralizing psychophants like yourself who unaccountably hunger to control the destiny of millions. I prefer popular self-management. You decry my socialistically opposing few hands holding productive property and I again plead guilty. Unlike you, I am not enamored of enriching property holders beyond the wildest dreams of past kings. I do not think being born with a deed in your hand is the highest form of human achievement, or that it is any achievement at all. I reject that people like yourself should own societies, rivers, lakes, resources, machinery and places of production, much less rule over them like tinpot dictators. You ought to be aware, however, that you missed a further target to ridicule. I also oppose a relatively small sector of the population about a fifth monopolizing empowering work. I want to share work more equally so everyone is prepared by their work to participate in economic and social decisions.
Speaker 1:Unyike you. I want equitable incomes for all. I want empowering, dignified work for all. I want people able to decide their own working lives. I would say it is a wonder that you don't want these gains for all humanity, but your attitude isn't a wonder. It is unmitigated, self-seeking, antisocial greed. Under it is unmitigated, self-seeking, antisocial greed.
Speaker 1:You say I want a feminazi-like topple the family fabric of civilization. Why? Because I want young and old people to have a say over their own lives. Because I want families and all living units to freely nurture the next generation, without imposing on them preordained definition of what boys and girls have to become. Because I want parents and children and extended families to have optimal health care, empowering work and shared responsibility for their own and for all social life. Because I want women respected and empowered. Because I want sexual preferences to be whatever free people prefer. Because I reject turning back the gender clock a century in your misogynistic, homophobic, transphobic harassing mode.
Speaker 1:The human nurturing family fabric of society is already at risk. People like you don't see its deep scars, despite your own broken homes and the bedlam so visibly endured by so many all around you. You can't see the truth of our times because your heart is a cash register and your paranoid eyes perceive only profit, potentials and threats. I want to restore and enrich society's fabric. You want to rape and plunder society. I see all families as repositories of love and sources of wise, confident participation. You see most families as sources of cheap, obedient labor. I see society's countless communities as allied and equal centers of creative diversity. You see all but your own community as fringe targets to ridicule, restrain and repress.
Speaker 1:You say I would disarm the country, neuter the police and leave us helpless. Because I reject siphoning society's wealth into useless and pointless weapons that, were they used, would destroy all humanity. You say I would neuter the police because I want properly paid and empowered justice workers that serve the public, not power, and I want our children's and our children's children's human potentials to develop free from war, pestilence, coercion and restriction in a world of shared peace and plenty. I am guilty again. You're absolutely right that I want all that. You call it making our country weak and defenseless. I call it making our country worth defending.
Speaker 1:You say I deny religion and sublimate the individual to the collective. Why? Because I want all religions, races, ethnicities and nationalities to be free of fear of imposition and negation from without, and because I want individuals and collectives prepared and in position to self-manage their destinies without having to submit to the whims of the rich and domineering elites that you serve. You're right again. I do reject your racism, your sexism, your homophobia. I'm guilty as charged.
Speaker 1:You say that it was a pleasure to have run against me and that it will be a pleasure to ship me and revolutionary participatory society's pathetic envy and psychotic, animalistic anger back to the fringe dwellings that spawned it. Well, I have some news for you. Those fringe dwellings are the soup kitchens, apartment buildings, private homes, schools, hospitals, ball fields, churches and workplaces of America. Fringe to your gilded billionaire lifestyle? Yes, I suppose so, but we will see soon enough what goes away and what goes forward. Will the American people vote against RPS and our own futures and, less relevantly, against Celia and I, or will they not only elect the two of us but continue their steadily escalating popular participation in revolutionizing all sides of all of our lives?
Speaker 1:After your display here tonight, I too feel ready to predict the outcome. I predict that some folks will vote for you due to fearing make-believe demons that you and your media moguls have manufactured, and I predict some will vote for you to defend their elite interests with no concern for society. But I predict most people will see past the confusions and prejudices that have historically allowed the likes of you to win office. You were about as venal as was, say, donald Trump 25 years ago. Your ignorant posturing, your bullying, your pathetically hypocritical life and your self-serving views all, admittedly, more eloquently expressed than Trump could ever manage have lost too much of their deceiving power for you to push anything aside, much less to push aside RPS, the most grassroots, democratic, participatory, multi-focus movement this country has ever seen. Good luck with that. I wish I could be a gentleman and say it was a pleasure to run against you, but I can't.
Speaker 1:It has been a bore because you are an empty vessel of hate. It has been depressing because even in one lonely body, such an amalgamation of narcissistic evil as you embrace is seriously depressing to behold. We will soon see what the country decides. Will it opt for you and your hate and fear and the billionaires who pray that you will prevail, to help them keep and even amass still more millions and billions, millions and billions? Or will it opt for me, celia and RPS program, for our hopes and thoughts and for the women and men, boys and girls, movements and activists who work for our campaign to prevail, so we can, in turn, aid their efforts to build a vastly better future? Time is on our side. Your day is slip-sliding away. Good riddance All through that.
Speaker 1:The place was on fire, says Miguel, and so was my living room Watching it, and millions more all over the country, and I bet the world too. Pandemonium broke out. Okay. So really, when did you absolutely know it was over that you and Celia would win? Okay, so really, when did you absolutely know it was over that you and Celia would win? I suppose it would show appropriate modesty, miguel, to say only when the ballots were counted, but it would be a lie. I knew for certain we would win at the Houston rally just a week after the debate. I mean, I thought it was over after the debate, but I was nervous that maybe I had gotten too aggressive. I didn't know for sure. But then to have a million people and even more greet us in Texas on the streets of Houston, clearly aware of and supporting our program, and not just us, was incredible. I looked at Celia, she looked at me and we both knew the vote would be the landslide it was.
Speaker 1:And then we did some interviews in the Oval Office with you and then we appointed you press secretary and then you gave your first briefing about the UN session. Do you remember that? Yes, of course I do. It was my first press briefing as press secretary and what a jolt being appointed was. I remember the briefing word for word. Good morning. As press secretary, I have a lot of ground to cover, so let's settle down and begin. If you will bear with me a minute, I would like to offer a few words before taking your questions.
Speaker 1:As you know, yesterday President Malcolm King spoke to the UN General Assembly in the world. His speech was simple, emotional and blunt. It reflected unfolding events and aspirations here in America. For any of you who may have missed it in the first part he apologized. In the second part, he promised. In the third part, he celebrated. In the conclusion, he embraced. Okay, it was just a little bit ago. What? Early January 2049? Do you remember it, malcolm? I want to hear it if you would. Of course I remember, miguel.
Speaker 1:I felt a little odd at the podium of the UN wearing my RPS hat, but I said fellow citizens of the world, in the name of my country, I apologize for our military and fiscal role in international mayhem and injustice, from Latin America to Asia and from Europe to Africa. I apologize to Korea, the Philippines, indonesia, guyana, vietnam, cambodia, laos, the Congo, zaire, brazil, the Dominican Republic and Cuba. I apologize to Chile, greece, east Timor, nicaragua, grenada, el Salvador, libya, panama, iraq, afghanistan, haiti, yugoslavia, iran, venezuela, somalia, syria and Palestine. I apologize for our support of dictators, for our exploitative extractions, for our armed shipments and our arms use. I apologize for threats, boycotts and destruction, for massacring Native Americans, for slavery and racism, for sexism and sexual predation, for Hiroshima, nagasaki and more, and I remember that I continue to address the assembled press, says Miguel, echoing his voters and RPS.
Speaker 1:King promised we would together reverse our history of exploitation and violence toward others and, in its place, enact a new agenda of sharing and respect. He promised we would study war no more and instead foster solidarity and mutual aid with the same energy and effort that we previously put to war-making and profit-seeking. He promised and evidenced an entirely new and compassionate internationalist mindset. He celebrated transforming our domestic defining institutions of polity, economy, culture and kinship and our relation to the natural environment to remove hierarchies of wealth and power and to attain a sustainable new historical beginning. He promised to aid and learn from all those who have already or who will now take up similar aims as they deem suitable worldwide. And he continued at the UN quote amidst our tremendous, sustaining and enriching diversity, we need to embrace our shared universal humanity. We need to celebrate and apply our shared values of human liberation, solidarity, diversity, equity, self-management, international peace and environmental balance to all our own countries, each in mutual aid with the rest. We must reject greed and profit seeking. We must reject self-aggrandizement and power-wielding. We must embrace our natural home, our planet, to replenish it, not to spoil it. We must usher in a new era of empathy, a new time of joyous exploration of our collective capacities. As an emissary and servant of the revolutionary people of the United States, and in accord with their wishes and learning from their incredible grassroots endeavors in our workplaces and neighborhoods, I embrace all around the world who will do so, and I embrace the UN itself as a valuable tool for the task. And then Miguel continued his press conference.
Speaker 1:Now, if you have questions, yes, leslie, why don't you begin? And that's it. That's the end of the current incarnation of an oral history of the next American Revolution 16 episodes. Why did I say current incarnation? Well, I hope I intend to try to get the 16 chapters published as a book, a novel, I guess, a future fiction novel. We'll see what happens.
Speaker 1:But why did I even do this project at all? Well, in the first place and remember this was years ago I started this because I wanted to find another way to communicate about the possibility of winning, not so much the vision itself. I've done that a gazillion times. It's not enough. I do think it's necessary. I do think people's morale and sustainability of struggle I guess we could call it depends upon vision. And I also think, you know, planting the seeds of the future and the present, orienting oneself, etc. Depends upon vision. But vision without a belief that it's possible to win can be sort of like asking people to martyr themselves. What's the point of seeking an unattainable vision, no matter how good it is, if you can't win?
Speaker 1:So I took up the project, so to speak, against all odds. It's not my inclination, this kind of thing, to find another way to communicate, communicate Once I had written it. The truth is I wrote it as a novel, then I tried to turn it into a screenplay with some help. Then I set it aside, then I went back to it, started working on it as a novel again. So why do the podcast sequence? Well, partly the same reason, but honestly, more to get feedback.
Speaker 1:I had hoped didn't really work out. I had hoped that creating it, putting it in a podcast and also having articles on Z-Net would yield ideas, criticisms, suggestions, alternative formulations, whatever, something to make the case more compelling. That's the same reason I added the interjections as I was reading the thing, I did have reactions and I thought it was another kind of I don't know novelistic twist to get fully into the mindset of I was channeling future formulations by future characters in a future revolution. It was actually not that hard for me to do because the truth of the matter is, as I read it, I was in the mindset that I was reading something that had been delivered to me, and so I did have comments and reactions. I tried to keep them not too frequent and not too much, and I called them interjections. What did I hope to accomplish? Well, again, I hope to elicit advice, to elicit suggestions and criticisms.
Speaker 1:What's next for the material is I hope it'll get done as a book. We'll see. I'll submit it. I admit I think the odds are relatively low. I think that publishers who publish nonfiction will say it's fiction, michael, what are you talking about? It's not for us. And publishers who publish fiction will say come on, michael, this is obviously nonfiction. You're trying to communicate the way you communicate in a nonfiction book. It's not art, it's not a novel, and so everybody will have a good excuse for rejecting it. Maybe it deserves rejection, maybe it's not that good.
Speaker 1:I'll admit to you that as I read it I liked it, I thought, on two counts. I liked what it said and I thought that it might be able to communicate where I hadn't been able to communicate before. It's not too late to impact the result. I'm now going to work on it again. I'll tell you I don't know how many of you have the experience, but working on the same material over and over and over is not fun and it does get tiring and it does get kind of diminishing returns after a while. But if people email me with ideas and with literal suggestions, you know, in chapter four, when you say this that sucks, can you do something more like this other possibility, that kind of stuff will yield results. I am very relaxed about making changes in something that I've done when I have concrete suggestions of what to do. So, all that said, this sequence is over. We'll see where things go next. And thanks for listening to it. This is Mike Albert signing off until next time for Revolution Z.