The strategy of the Popular Front.

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In my former country, the Communist Russia the official title of the ruling group was "an unbreakable    block of communists and non-party members'.   That emphasized that although the majority of the populous did not belong to the ruling party, all the people wanted to become the members of it and so far maintained the full alliance with the leadership. Obviously, there were no other parties and such "unbreakable unity' prevented ones from appearing.   It was a perfect     mechanism at least theoretically and it served its purpose quite well for a long time. That is until the iron grip loosened and the opposition sprung out. The opposition was basing itself on the only possible     ideology in the country where all the ideological leverages were in the hands of the government- on local nationalism.   That ancient     force seemed to be the only spiritual power not only to counteract the governing ideology but also to make it possible for the different nationalistic groups and movements to work together from all sides on the destruction of the central government.   The demise of the Soviet Union was accomplished   through   the coordinated   action   of nationalistic mosquitoes who could not offer   anything economically   better but   promised   to the "non-party members'   that   from now on they would be nothings no more. Just by birth, not by merit or anything tangible they    were assigned a membership in the group forever. The push the for     the self- identity overpowered the faceless internationalism.    

Nationalistic groups called themselves Fronts.   The title    is referring to the workers' Fronts or Popular Fronts of the 1930s. Front means    a unity of a group of people for the common goal. The people of the Front can     differ in their ideology but there should be something common for them all, something which brings them together. In this case it was a proclaimed goal of national independence. That slogan in many cases was demagogic and wrong,   it was sometimes ridiculous   and   nearly always mean, but it appealed to the very fabric of the people who for many years were deprived of   their face, lumped   up into a conglomerate with no definition other   than "non- members'. That was the political strategy of the nationalists and as soon as their leadership believed     in the cause they were up for success. The whole approach was   in structuring every request of every demonstration as a request to secede, not the request    to improve.   Nationalists thrived on non- confidence;

That's how the nationalists won.   They prevailed even more so because the "unbreakable block' lost. It lost because its leadership    got tired of lying.   They were in power too long and abused it too much. They themselves were the source of the destruction because in reality there had not been any alliance between the ruling elite above and the unnamed masses below. They, the rulers were actually the first people to abandon the ruling system, to betray it on every corner.   With all the power in their hands they could mount a considerable ideological counter- attack; they could mobilize the people    to the patriotic marches, they could     condemn the nationalists as national traitors, they could threaten people with the haunting of the Civil War, they could unleash the media, etc. etc.   But the whole morbid secret was that it was them who were weary inside and even fearful of the communist ideology because even in power they had to follow it formally, to hide their looting and their perversions, to lie to themselves. Their power    was     not secure and in order to gain that security they desperately rushed to the destruction of the country. That's how the internal     interests of the elite coincided with external interests of the local nationalistic structures and the    civilization collapsed.

Mind you,    I am not exercising any moral judgments here but rather I am showing a mechanism, a technology of taking on and winning over something "unbreakable'. As such we can see that         those who want to overcome must     believe     in their cause and willing to recruit the allies from anywhere.   On the contrary, those who    are there to defend the old order are to be indifferent and even hostile to their cause, ready to sellout to the highest bidder.   Now, don't we see some symptoms of     this in our current situation, in the country ruled by the "unbreakable block of Republicans and Democrats'?

  This country is officially capitalistic and no matter what political group is in    the official power, they all must obey the mantra of capitalism which says unequivocally that "greed is good.'   Of course, the g- word is replaced by something more benign, like pursuit of happiness but as soon as happiness is associated with the certain amount of material possessions, we come to the same root.   Same with independence, security, health and life itself.   It is not an accident that w   have privatized medicine. Privatizing is always associated with goodness, public ownership- with inefficiency to say the least.   I would argue that the famous question of "How much money did Judas receive in the current currency?' had been in the head of nearly every person in the capitalistic environment.   At the same time capitalism in its pure form requires the greedy to work hard to achieve their appetites and thus create    products and services useful for all the society. In a nutshell, pure capitalistic ideology while acknowledging animalistic roots of greed and self- interest wants to put those features of character to the good use.   Honest work for honest pay is a slogan of the capitalistic ideology which hoped to benefit from the human nature by keeping it at bay.   That worked     rather well for a while, during the expansion of capitalism and stopped working with the stage of the stagnation.

Our ruling elite, our 1% had discovered that in order to be rich   and   become richer   perpetually,   they   do not have   to risk and work hard; rather   they have to adjust the human environment   in such a way that it   will be tuned to provide for them and only for   them   forever.    They     found     out that    instead of creating a product benefiting all people they can create a consumer slave cast to benefit only them. That new goal     was much easier to achieve and maintain than to face the perspective of the constant competition and risk. In sorts, if the ruling elite in the Soviet Union got tired of the ideology which proclaimed equality, the ruling elite in the US got     tired of the ideology that proclaimed an eternal struggle. They just wanted to have fun no matter what. As a result they directed their efforts    towards achieving that exact goal which presumes turning the whole world into a large conglomerate of plantations with armies of slaves toiling on them.   I am pretty sure in their dreams they call it an' unbreakable block of slave-owners and slaves.'

As soon as the elite have the goal of destruction it should be only natural that   Fronts should appear promptly like those Langoliers of Stephen King -- to eat the system raw. Only here, in the US there cannot be local nationalistic movements. No matter how much demagoguery is poured on the people about the States' rights, the US as a country is monolithic and diverse. Everyone, even Newt Gingrich understands     that any secession will result in the misery for those seceding far exceeding than they have before.

Thus there should not be many Fronts but one- the Popular Front. It must come out as a patriotic endeavor; to preserve this country as a national entity- to survive as a nation.

National Patriotism can be either destructive or constructive depending on who uses it. It is a hostile and malicious force in the hands of Gingrich and Buchanan.   It can become a powerful force of light in the hands of the new, emerging leadership of the Popular Front, who will revive the former US motto     "E Pluribus Unum'- one from many.   If   Popular Front adopts the OWS as a first step to show that   the youth of the country rejects   greed and destruction in the name of   survival and that   the   diversity of that youth reflects the diversity of the future   US society- that will be the   crucial step to   its formation and ultimate victory.   Popular Front must take over the main political language- it must announce that it represents those 99% and push those 1% to the fringes. The upcoming leadership of the Popular Front must openly proclaim that money and wealth are not the tools of the individual parasitism but are in fact the powerful agents of extended duty to   serve the whole society. They must proclaim that the current elite rulers are traitors   to capitalism and that     it ( capitalism)   has to be restored in its original form. That should     include all trends from libertarians to socialists because the same as real religious faith does not fear atheism, the original capitalism does not fear socialism; it coexists and takes the best from all movements. It is not afraid of    radicals, workers, racial movements, etc.     Popular Front must emerge under the banners of the national emergency, call to duty of all the honest people    when the very survival of the   country is threatened by the rampant looting of the greedy.   And of course, the leadership of the Front must believe in the common cause.

  That's the strategy to use if we want to see the Dawn for our children.

Authors Bio:

The writer is a retired engineer