An extensive history of the term but not helping me understand what is meant by those who use it today.
It seems today to be a term used in a derogatory manner to describe the beliefs of some others, if I get that article and usage context right, to declare the person so identified has the “primary agenda of facilitating global capital accumulation unburdened from any legal regulations aimed at assuring welfare of citizens.” Identified as “neoliberal” is Milton Friedman.
Is that the meaning you mean camille? If so who do you include as current neoliberals, whose age is over?
I really am ignorant here and could use some help understanding what is meant by the term. I’ve only begun hearing it this cycle myself (around the same time as I began hearing the phrase cuckservative interestingly enough).
Btw, the search function, even the advanced search, leaves something to be desired. You can’t go directly to the relevant post. I had to Ctrl-F the entire thread to find it.
camille, do you happen to have an opinion about whether or not many Sanders supporters would feel they “won” in a hypothetical circumstance of almost but not catching up in the pledged delegate count, losing the popular vote by more, but having what they perceived to be momentum and what they believe to be significant wins in significant states with some of Sanders losses in states being those he did not really try hard in? In your opinion is asahi correct that failure of the supers to, as a group, go for Sanders and tilt the result to him, overriding the pledged delegate and popular vote majorities, would cause a major rift?
Reading more, but obviously still only a little, the context of use for “neoliberal” seems to be typically as here:
IOW, a shorthand in-group way for some progressives to characterize Democratic leadership, from Carter through Obama, as having a primary agenda to give corporations unfettered unregulated ability to accumulate capital globally at the expense of public welfare.
Does that seem right? It is admittedly based off of reading only a relatively little so may not be a fair representation.
Excuse me if I am being dense … are you stating that the DLC and anyone identified as “third way” is a neoliberal?
I am sure those essays are fine, but I am hoping that my questions can be answered a bit more concisely. Skimming them they do not seem to offer up any straightforward answers to what I asked.
Is my sense that “neoliberal” in current usage is a derogatory term to imply a lack of interest in the general economic welfare, a strong interest in as much deregulation and free market as possible with as little oversight as possible, and in general lumping, as the article I quoted from does, most Democratic leadership, from Carter to Obama as having having that as their primary economic agenda correct?
To those who use that word with regularity Clinton’s proposals for improved regulation are “neoliberal” - and reinstating the Glass-Steagall Act to clearly separate commercial banking, investment banking and insurance services, is “progressive.” Is that a correct understanding?
Neoliberal - menshevik, Republican Lite, Blue three-legged dead dog. Too clever by half, think old school organizers like Saul Alinsky are quaintly old-fashioned. Consumer capitalism is a bright shiny toy they want to improve it, fix it, tinker with it long enough, and they can transform a steam-driven people pulper into a solar-powered rainbow extruder. Like the Italian saying, they want their wife drunk and their wine bottle still full.
Obama - a man who can be labelled “a socialist” by the GOP and “a neoliberal”, a free market hardliner whose prime agenda is deregulation to benefit corporations at the expense of general welfare by progressives, at the same time. I knew there were reasons to love that man! (Boy the results you get google searching “Obama neoliberal”!)
I really do appreciate the explanation. It does seem to me, based on that simplistic understanding, to be the progressive’s “cuckservative.”
No, I think you are demonizing and/or strawmanning with that description. For the most part, they don’t consider themselves hardliners, and they don’t think of it as benefiting corporations at the expense of general welfare.
Well, Sanders has won what, 8 of the last 9 contests? If he continues that ratio of wins, even if he falls short in pledged delegates, he can point to his better polling against Republicans and to the fact that Democrats are getting increasingly behind him to try to sway superdelegates. Probably won’t work given his total lack of connection to the Democratic Party, but there could be a case to be made at the convention.
“Let them eat microloans.”
It would be a miracle if Sanders were to win New York. I remember the 2008 primary:
Count All the Votes!
February 19, 2008
By LEE SPEIGEL
It’s like the Florida recount, but in Harlem.
Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., was shortchanged hundreds of votes in several largely African American precincts in New York City, the New York Post reports.
Eighty election districts in New York City didn’t record a single vote for Obama. Thousands for Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and hundreds for former No. Carolina Sen. John Edwards, somehow did.
As the New York Times reports, in one largely black district in Brooklyn, the initial tally was 118 to 0, a Clinton sweep. A review showed the actual result was 118 for Clinton, 116 to Obama.
Officials are blaming it on human error.
Human error that somehow almost entirely worked against Obama.
I’m certain Clinton and Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., will get right on the case!
Human error. Whatcha gonna do?
I certainly can see how someone who has an extant perspective that the mainstream of the Democratic Party, that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, and the efforts of the Gates Foundation supporting ground up female entrepreneurship across the globe, is in fact actually motivated by a desire to maintain existing power relations, someone who wants to blame current Democratic leadership for changes in the world’s and the nations economies such that many small cities like Decatur are having a hard time, would read those articles with a “Can I have an Amen?!”
But illuminating for those of us who want to see increased oversight of the finance industry and see wealth inequality and the hollowing out of the middle class address in more than simplistic terms, to see actual progress made? No.
Demonstrating that the term “neoliberal” is anything other than the progressives’ “cuckservative” - a Tea Party style tactic to attack those who are not as “pure” as being sell out toadies, who may even be too stupid or deluded to even realize what hardline toadies they are? No. It reinforces that understanding.
I appreciate that you think my understanding is simplistic and that you have a different perspective.
Well, probably assume that it WAS in error since the alternate theory is that Camp Clinton is simultaneously both looking to fix an election while being so inept that the best plan they can come up with is “suspiciously eliminate every opposing vote making it blatantly obvious that something is wrong”.
Those were also, per the NYT article your link cites, unofficial tallies. In other words, the preliminary tallies which are then checked for errors. They found errors, the errors get corrected, the system works. From the NYT:
What? There were districts with zero Clinton votes? Welp, looks like the fix is in for Sanders!
I find this piling on of the “neoliberals” to be somewhat ridiculous. I know people have wondered where have the moderate Republicans gone. There were quite a few of them not very long ago. I mean, Hell, 20 years ago the GOP nominated one for President. It seems quite evident that as the party went more to the right under George W. Bush, the moderate Republicans found a home in the Democratic Party. Senators Jeffords and Chafee weren’t just one off instances.
If the Democratic Party decides to go all Tea Party with Progressive purity tests and whatnot, that neo-liberal core is going to find itself as Kingmakers - because where-ever they decide to put their support is the group that will win. Or they may just form a new party, which would be bigger than the Progressive Purity Test Democrats and the Conservative Purity Test Republicans. I would definitely join that new party.