The Coming Civil War and Repolarization for Revolution in the Present Era

Just to be clear, I didn't choose this title lightly or
facetiously, but in all seriousness. In speaking to "a coming
civil war" I am "drawing inspiration" from Newt Gingrich (the
prominent Republican politician who was formerly the Speaker of
the House of Representatives), who has made the observation that
what's happening now in the electoral arena and the broader
things that it reflects in U.S. society is analogous to what was
going on in the U.S. in the 1840s and the 1850s, and that this
isn't something that will—I'm paraphrasing, but this is the
essence—this isn't something that will go away. It will only be
decided when one side or the other wins out.

Revolutionary Worker #1274, April
10, 2005, posted at rwor.org

Just to be clear, I didn't choose this title lightly or
facetiously, but in all seriousness. In speaking to "a coming
civil war" I am "drawing inspiration" from Newt Gingrich (the
prominent Republican politician who was formerly the Speaker of
the House of Representatives), who has made the observation that
what's happening now in the electoral arena and the broader
things that it reflects in U.S. society is analogous to what was
going on in the U.S. in the 1840s and the 1850s, and that this
isn't something that will—I'm paraphrasing, but this is the
essence—this isn't something that will go away. It will only be
decided when one side or the other wins out. While, obviously, we
don't take at face value things that representatives of the
ruling class say, we do have to think seriously about this, and I
do think that this reflects—through the prism of Gingrich's own
point of view, it does reflect a very profound reality. We can
look at the alignment in society now and see very profound
polarization—without reducing things to how things fall out in
bourgeois elections, which are shaped by the bourgeoisie after
all, and by the very real conflicts within the bourgeoisie. This
is shaped not simply through manipulation on the part of some
unified bourgeoisie, but by real conflicts within the
bourgeoisie—conflicts that do, more or less, correspond to what
was said in the piece on "The Pyramid of Power" "#footnote1">¹ "footnote1return"> in terms of what is represented by the
Republicans on the one hand, and the Democrats on the other.

So there is something about that Newt Gingrich statement,
there is something about the alignment that you can see, there is
something about what was represented in the New York Times
Magazine article by Ron Suskind "#footnote2">² "footnote2return">, with its representation of the
polarization between "reality-based" and "faith- based"
communities—which, once again, in and of itself and in the way
that it's expressed, represents the conflicts seen through the
eyes of, and more or less proceeding from the standpoint of, the
capitalist ruling class itself, but nevertheless does speak to
something very real in U.S. society at this point.

You really do have two fundamentally opposed forces in
society, in potential; and I'll speak to how we can't leave the
alignment and the polarization as it is now—for many different
reasons and in many different dimensions and on many different
levels it has to be transformed. But you can see that (even while
many people are not fully aware of this yet, though many are
becoming more fully aware of it) there are two camps in
antagonistic conflict with each other. Out of this can arise
different kinds of resolutions, representing different interests,
and ultimately different classes, going to wholly different
places in terms of the future of society and the world.

We have spoken philosophically, drawing from Mao, about how
"irreconcilable" is not a correct philosophical concept because
the opposite would be "reconcilable," and Mao pointed out that
there are no reconcilable contradictions. But nonetheless [
BA laughs ], leaving that aside, these really are
irreconcilable world views and fundamentally irreconcilable views
on what society ought to be based on and what it ought to be
like.

There is something very profound and important going on here,
even though—and this is another fundamental reason why there is
a need for repolarization—the pole of the revolutionary
proletariat, and the forces gravitating to it, are at this
present time woefully small, nowhere near as large and powerful
as they need to be. That has to change—and that's where we come
in. But it is interesting, the comment by this guy Hertzberg from
The New Yorker —to the effect that two bad things are
going to happen because of the Bush re-election: One, all the
terrible stuff Bush and company are going to do; and two, this is
going to lead to, or provide an opening for, the revival (if
you'll pardon the expression) of the radical left. So what people
like that are recognizing, we should not fail to
recognize—and seize on.