Political theater, or, Where's Jesse? Probably the most socially meaningful, certainly the most engaged, of the various things I did in my grad-student days to procrastinate my dissertation was to work as an organizer for Yale's fledgling TA/student labor union (GESO, the Graduate Employees and Students Organization—still have my old union card in my wallet). I wouldn't be able to itemize all the rallies and job actions we held in the years of my involvement, in the late 80s - early 90s. One thing I can remember distinctly, though, is a gray late-winter day on the gray-white expanse of Beinecke plaza, the endpoint of a large, heartening march and rally, where as the program was winding down I got to shake hands and exchange a few quick words with Jesse Jackson. He wasn't there for us that day—though he would be on other occasions—he was meeting with the administration, over what (probably labor-related) issue I can't remember, but seeing the crowd couldn't forbear interrupting his quick walk from the limo over to Woodbridge Hall. For all that the event was winding down, for all that Jesse had other business that day, his presence on the plaza sent a palpable stir into the air.

Jackson has been pilloried throughout his career as an opportunist: well, show me a politician who isn't. Show me a politician who doesn't need to be. What I knew back in my union days was that Jesse Jackson was the one national Democratic figure who could be counted on to show up—the one who would reliably be there when working people put bodies on the street to agitate for their rights. None of the rest of them gave a fuck. With what admixture of calculation and principle he did it, it would have been impossible to say: perhaps there was no real disentangling principle from calculation anyway, in someone who had built his political career and his constituency the way Jackson had. It didn't really matter: however you cut it, Jackson's was an enlightened opportunism. When you needed him, Jesse was there on the line. And that earned him, in my case, a gut-level loyalty that lingers even now, fifteen years on.

Which brings me to the question of the day: where are the enlightened Democratic opportunists now, and what's keeping them from being on the line at Camp Casey?

Put it another way: do we have any national Democrats who understand the uses and virtues of political theater? I notice in commentary here and there, among the more weak-kneed of our brothers and sisters (weakness of knee seeming to increase in direct proportion with nearness to the political center, or to D.C.), a tendency to disparage the Cindy phenomenon as "merely" theatrical, a political stunt. Though it's a touch less on point than it might be, this post by Ezra Klein is near enough (and near to hand), and besides it really sticks in my craw:

John Cole's right, this Michelle Malkin post, digging into the court records of Cindy Sheehan's divorce (which happened after Casey's death), is pretty damn vile. But in some ways, it's comforting. Michelle Malkin is doing her absolute best to clarify who is good and who is evil here, and she's doing it by being a vicious, repulsive, and base as she possibly can. I'm a little uncomfortable with Code Pink's involvement and the general explosion of Sheehan's encampment, but Malkin's actions seem custom designed to keep my support from flagging. Wherever that evil hack stands, I know I want to be on the other side.

"A little uncomfortable": my, Ezra, how delicate we are! For myself, I don't need some extraordinary vileness from Michelle Malkin to remind me what fucking side I'm on in this one—it was never in doubt.

Every so often I'm brought up short by the "discomfort" within the operative class, current or wannabe, toward political demonstration—as if it would be slumming to stand on a hot tarmac with a bunch of sweaty people holding a sign; as if it showed a lack of that so-prized seriousness to speak in and with symbols, rather than engaging in policy debate. As Cindy Sheehan is reminding us, we don't especially need policy debate right now. What we need, very badly need, are stories: and story is just what the theater of Camp Casey is giving us. The right-wing talking point—that Cindy Sheehan doesn't really want to engage in dialogue with George Bush, that her demand for the dialogue he won't give her (and wouldn't, even if he were improbably to meet with her) is a sort of playacting—is accurate, but beside the point. The relations of power are difficult to conceptualize, and can be even for people trained to do that sort of thing. There is nothing difficult, on the other hand, about the mother of a dead soldier standing ignored at the end of the man's driveway who sent her son to be killed, waiting stoically in the Texas sun for an answer she knows will never come. Nor is there anything about it that doesn't speak volumes of truth to the ugly situation in which we find our country, five years on in the Rove/Cheney regime.

I'm flabbergasted that anybody on the left has even a moment's hesitation about this, has the least qualm about making use of the gift of symbol Cindy Sheehan is presenting us. As far as I can tell, no elected Democrat other than Maxine Waters has showed up in Crawford to stand with Cindy, not even for a day—not even for an hour. Aren't they all on vacation now? What better things could they possibly have to do? The question at the head of this post isn't literal, of course: Jesse's not what he was in the days of his Presidential candidacy, or near-candidacy, and he seemingly has other fish to fry. And with all due respect to Rep. Waters, she's not where the action is either. But I imagine the electricity if someone with genuine star power and national presence—say, Barack Obama—were to make his way to Arlington West to pay a tribute. I imagine what it would do, the stir it would make, if someone with that kind of stature were to go down there and say, simply, I'm here for as long as Cindy is.

Forget principle. The people at Camp Casey are easy: as I can attest from my own brief activist career, a little love goes a long way. Isn't there a Democrat out there who wants to win some elections, and knows a bargain when he sees it? Isn't it worth trading a day's sweat for a place in the story, and the unending loyalty of Cindy Sheehan's base?

posted by michael  5:13:46 PM  
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