This duplicitous liberal-left is nothing but a straw man

[T_i_B]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2002287,00.html

On the occasions I have been a studio guest on Radio 5 Live, one particular caller has often brightened my day. His name might change, but his take on the world is pretty constant: he is male, usually quite posh, and very angry about a monstrous entity he calls "the left". He will probably not be reading this, but should he pick up a discarded Guardian, I hereby advise him to go out and buy the Observer columnist Nick Cohen's much-discussed new book, What's Left? Our man may not find any stuff that backs up his habitual claim that his enemies are somehow anti-British, but he'll like its central tale. It's of a piece with the voguish fixation with the British far left that was reflected in last year's BBC4 series Lefties, and Tom Stoppard's theatrical hit Rock'n'Roll, and which bubbles forth in the writing of a handful of former Trots and communists who make up the so-called pro-war left - such as Christopher Hitchens and David Aaronovitch, these days happy allies of a motley neocon crew, including Melanie Phillips and Michael Gove, and backed by the troika of literary belligerents, Martin Amis, Salman Rushdie and Ian McEwan.

For the pro-war lefties, their old credo's various failures are a kind of founding myth. In Cohen's story, the left had its compass broken by the fall of communism and the triumph of the free market. Stumbling into the 21st century with only a hatred of the US to light its way, it not only marched against the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's "fascist" regime, but responded to its aftermath by making serial apologies for Islamist terrorism (aka "Islamofascism"). Did you see what he did there? The tradition of Spain and Cable Street is crushed, and a once-proud movement now offers de facto support to the far right it once opposed. Worse still, it has taken gullible middle-class liberals with it. Socialism, reckons Cohen (echoed by Martin Kettle on these pages), is certifiably dead: these moral contortions represent conclusive proof.

At times, reading What's Left? is like being sprayed by the polemical equivalent of a dropped hosepipe. Its targets endlessly shift, from those misguided souls inspired by long-dead Russian revolutionaries (Robin Cook gets two brief mentions; Gerry Healy, founder of the tiny Workers' Revolutionary party, is dealt with over 16 pages), to "liberals", and on - via the kind of synthesis any fan of Marxist theory would recognise - to a "liberal-left" that amounts to a great big straw man: a catch-all leftie multitude with a history of duplicity.

So where to start? Thankfully, there is another left, perhaps a little too moderate for dramas and documentaries, but some distance from breathing its last. Its basis is the political tradition in which thousands of us were raised: more Methodist than Marxist, and replete with its own sacred tenets - equality through redistribution, internationalism, a gentle faith in Fabianite gradualism. Contrary to the claim that socialism is now over - though in order not to scare the horses, we tend to call it social democracy these days - it is still here, its importance in Britain now reflected in the fact that most of the declared candidates for Labour's deputy leadership at least pretend to dance to its tune. And let's not forget: people from this background opposed the war not in spite of their history, but because of it.

[papau]

1. Well said n/t

n/t

[LeftishBrit]

2. This article makes good points

Despite Blair, Socialism of the traditional, British, pragmatic sort still lives; and a good thing too.

I don't plan to read "What's Left?" as I have read enough of Cohen's articles to be able to guess what it's like. I dislike his know-it-all, preachy journalistic style, and I dislike his hawkish, pro-neocon attitudes.

[T_i_B]

3. The main problem I have with the article...

...is that it does portray the British left as being in a far healthier state then it actually is. The British left, having been dumped by the Blair's Labour party is in a very real mess.

That said, the article does a good job on Cohen, we all know about him from his writings in the Observer, Evening Standard and new Statesman (not to mention the Euston Manifesto, so beloved of Labour party blogs) and even though he does sometimes make good points about what's wrong with the left he has some massive flaws.

The thing that triggered his reaction against the left was Iraq, where he (rather late on) decided that invasion was a good thing. This did not square with his previous strong opposition to the war in Afghanistan but Cohen was ploughed on, regardless of the mess that has ensued in Iraq. And what's worse is that his articles on the subject have increasingly become little more then a series of ad-hom attacks. Where once his writing veered between very good and utter cack, it's now increasingly utter cack for most of the time with Cohen

[Briar]

4. I liked Edward Peace's rebuttal even more

"Putting his case on Start The Week, on BBC Radio 4, Cohen imagined another bombing à la July 7. "And what would the Left do?" he asked rhetorically. "It would blame America." It would be absolutely right to do so. Nick and Martin should consider the pre-invasion interview given on BBC2's Newsnight by Kenneth Adelman, fully paid-up neo-conservative, member of the President's Council on Defense. Adelman talked about the US doing its duty by imposing "democracy" and its own authority. "So what about other cases - Syria?" "Certainly." "Iran?" "Absolutely." "Saudi Arabia?" asked the interviewer, a hint of shock in his voice. "Why not?"

"On his own admission, Adelman wept with happiness when the war actually started, but his fearful candour has never registered as it should have. It contains all the real motives. "Shock and awe", a fascist expression if ever there was one, was launched in the hubristic delusion that a gloriously strong US could move into another uncomprehended world, impose virtue and acquire more power. There was no threat, nor weapons, only an imperious wish, having great power, to use it.

"Given the familiar consequences, it amazes me that Nick Cohen can contemplate a broken Middle Eastern nation, where American and British military adventuring has blown the bonds of restraint and all the devils of sectarian hatred now fill the air. How can he observe an American-conceived venture leaving the dead everywhere underfoot, and say to the people who opposed it, "You are anti-American." Listen. All of this, every death, every amputation, is the fault of the American government.

"To denounce revulsion at the whole brazen undertaking, as he does, is to court a word often used about the historic far left - from which Nick and his friends come. People over-tolerant of Soviet "excesses" were commonly dismissed as "fellow-travellers". Russia then, the United States today: handy dandy, who are the fellow-travellers now? The term should catch on..."

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/edward_pearce/2007/01/post_1015.html

[T_i_B]

5. That article starts off with a gross misrepresentation

as it accuses Martin Kettle of praising Cohen's book int the below article, which is a gross distortion of what the article actually says. Yes Kettle agrees with some of Cohen's analysis about the state of the modern left (I totally agree that the left of the political spectrum is in a total mess as it happens) but that's not the whole story. On points such as Iraq he actually quite critical. And furthermore Kettle's criticism here is consistent with his previous criticism of the Eustom Manifesto.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1999730,00.html

Very few people reading Cohen's book are likely to see themselves precisely reflected in it. Moreover, those who think like him have explaining to do. This book would have been easier to write four years ago. Cohen saw the Iraq war as a drive to replace tyranny with something approaching justice. That was a reasonable thing to believe once, but it has turned out disastrously wrong - an all too familiar pattern on the left. Iraq does not necessarily invalidate the policies of humanitarian intervention or internationally sanctioned regime change - and it certainly does not negate the power of much of what Cohen writes. But Robert Burns would surely have seen Iraq as a classic foolish notion - or worse - and it sure as hell carries lessons to which the believers have not yet faced up.

[Briar]

6. Kettle's positions are often complicated and obfuscated

by his support of Bliar and New Labour. I seem to remember his championing of Lloyd's demand the media be respectful of Bliar and give politicians the benefit of the doubt! That's why he accuses the left of being a total mess. It can be very confusing to try to triangulate genuine leftist positions with that infatuation with choice and the free market characteristic of New Labour - so like Cohen he attributes his confusion to those who disagree with him.

[T_i_B]

8. Well the left is in a total mess

I don't think there's any doubt about that. The left has been abandoned by the Labour party and has become a shambles, lacking any leadership or purpose. I don't think there's anything wrong with saying that as it's quite blatantly true.

Just look at the electoral record of the left in the past 30 years, one defeat after another and when Labour did win big, it's Tony Blair moving as far away from the left as he possibly can. The nearest thing the left has to political representation in parliament these days is a rump of Labour rebels (who are highly unlikely to reclaim Labour) and the Lib Dems at a pinch. The abysmal electoral failures of the left alone are enough to tell you that something is up.

One thing that the left did get spot on though, was Iraq. We should never have gone in and Kettle does admit this and he does point out that the likes of Nick Cohen got this one very badly wrong and have a heck of a lot of explaining to do. Kettle's writings on Cohen's exploits do reflect this, and I do wish that people would actually bother to read those articles before fobbing them off. (cos Edward Pearce doesn't appear to have read the article properly before mouthing off)

The trouble is, Iraq is the issue that has sent Nick Cohen over the edge and lead him to start bashing the left. Some of what he's said in the past about what's wrong with the left is true, but some of it is about as far wide of the mark as you can get, and as a result Cohen tends to resort to hurling insults at those who disagree with him in a fit of desperation.

For a better analysis of what's wrong with the left I would recommend a book titled The Rebel Sell by Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter instead. I've even started a thread on the subject in the Non-fiction forum for anyone who's come across the book themselves. The left has lost it's way, and there is a heck of a lot wrong with the left, but the likes of Nick Cohen are hardly part of the solution.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=209x4976

[Briar]

7. Another rebuttal

Nothing left of Nick

Cohen's new book is a brazen effort at distraction from the commentator's colossal error over the war in Iraq.

Andrew Murray

...

Cohen's error - in using his liberal platforms in the Observer and the New Statesman to cheerlead for the Iraq war - has been a colossal one. He campaigned for a policy for which hundreds of thousands of people have paid with their lives, and which was opposed, on grounds now abundantly shown to have been correct, by most people in this country at the time. The psychological consequences have been appropriately severe.

Many writers and some politicians who took the same pro-war position in 2003 have admitted their mistake and tried to move on. Cohen has instead mounted a sustained and abusive campaign against those who were - there is no way of gilding the lily - right on the most important issue of world politics this century when he was wrong.

In fact, his journalism of 2003 and since has been more notable for its snobbish contempt for those who demonstrated against the war - "Pinters, Trotskyists, bishops, actresses and chorus girls" and "masses can't work out why they're not being addressed by someone they've seen on the telly" (that's you he's talking about, dear reader) - than for any arguments he deployed in favour of the Bush-Blair aggression.

He has since talked only to friends. They include Paul Wolfowitz, the one-time Pentagon architect of the war, who took Cohen out to dinner. Presumably that was payback for Cohen's 2002 touting of Pentagon favourite (and convicted fraudster) Ahmed Chalabi as Iraq's answer to Nelson Mandela (I'm not making this up). That is indeed the same Chalabi that secured no seats in the last Iraqi elections.

...
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/andrew_murray/2007/02/nothing_left_of_cohen.html

(I suppose I keep reading these because I had to listen to Cohen being feted and encouraged on Radio 4 on Monday morning. Short of throwing my radio out of the window, I had no means to express my outrage. Hearing his dishonest and spiteful arguments countered provides some degree of relief!)