The Neoliberal economic and cultural program fosters the privatization of public spaces and the destruction of public discourse, while producing the atomization of the population through perverse organizational methods such as consumer conditioning, celebrity worship and branding. There. I said it. The creation of mass distraction and mass indifference to authentic politics through a managed democracy which brands and commodifies people has been largely successful. The people wander through gradations of media spaces created by various technologies, a virtual constellation of communities built around kernals of brands and notions, issues and ideas. In an age of irony and a land of Reality TV that has forgotten how to build actual communities, our considerations and disputations are virtually managed.
All of this takes money. Despite the wishes of a clear majority of the American People, the Senate Republicans--a brand of bastards--this week unanimously killed, for now, the Constitutional Amendment that would have restored limits on money in politics and reverse the radical right-wing Supreme Court's disastrous Citizens United v. FEC decision. In the same week we saw a perfect test case for the effect of money in politics embodied in the Democratic Primary for Governor of New York, where Zephyr Teachout mounted a challenge to Neoliberal Suzerain Andrew Cuomo. Although Andrew had the full might of the New York State Democratic machine and millions of dollars from real estate interests and Wall Street, Zephyr, who had led the Internet marketing efforts of Howard Dean's 2004 Presidential Campaign (the first "Internet campaign"), was able to cobble together 34% of the vote, giving Andrew a bit of a scare in the process.
Errol Louis had a good piece in the Daily News about the vote, "How Teachout Can Build on This". He writes of Zephyr and her running mate, Tim Wu: "They should ask their voters and donors to join or form neighborhood-based Democratic or Working Families Party political clubs. Those who belong to unionized professions should support or run for positions as union delegates." That is the type of actual community-building that is sorely lacking on the left. The Zephyr Teachout brand, a brand that means reform and environmental preservation, is now firmly established throughout a virtual landscape. The everyday progressive liberal, however, is distracted by screens and screens-within-screens, and has not as yet formed an actual, cohesive insurgency in the Democratic Party.
This past primary Tuesday night, instead of watching America's Got Talent on NBC, I decided to stop at a different party at Gabby O'Hara's, your comfortable Irish Pub on West 39th Street, to punch out a quick karaoke with DJ David Swirsky--he of the encyclopedic musical mind--before I went over to Hudson Terrace--one of New York's most exceptional and desirable full-service event destinations--for the Zephyr Teachout-Tim Wu ("A New York for All of Us") Victory Party. I'd been working hard at the real estate churn transforming the City and I needed to blow off some steam before checking out the progressive scene. I, an unusual real estate interest, had donated my hundreds to Zephyr and did what I had time to do like hand out flyers. It's hard to set aside time when you're on a high-pressure slant trying to suck in the dollars before things go south again, while people on the streets ask you to spare some change or food. The glass and steel towers thrust into the sky, pushing through the air, leaving the disposable poor squished on the ground in a layer of human protein. It gets frustrating, when you think about it.
Since I am a frustrated song-and-dance man I look for any opportunity to perform, because I've got it like that. I've got a brand to tend to in the karaoke world--Stephen Patrick Love--and it had been three months since my last session. The polls were closing at 9pm and I knew I could sneak in a few songs before heading over to far West 46th Street, so I strolled in and handed David a piece of paper. Cinnamon Girl. Neil Young is Number 17 on Rolling Stone's list of the Top 100 Rock Guitarists of All Time, and I was hankering to blast it because you see your baby loves to dance. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Gerard
I hit a line-drive triple with that musical girl and returned to sit at the bar with my buddy Gerard of the rock tenor voice and he was sitting before the hanging flat screen--"Samsung, building a better world through advanced technology"-- that's beaming baseball, as the denizens of O'Hara's clapped for me and I think there were a few dudes that were envious of me because I had killed it. I'm a sort of baritone-tenor while tenor Gerard is a union guy on the tech side of show biz. He likes to drink Budweiser, the King of Beers, and he had helped Al Jazeera build their New York studio ops, and now I think Al Jazeera has the best cable news brand, period. They actually practice journalism like CBS News used to do years ago. Gerard was kicking in some karaoke like I was and he had to be someplace pretty soon as well. We talked about his recent cross country drive that conveyed through national park land out West, and now there's some guy named Bob Beauprez, a bastard Republican, running for governor in Colorado saying that he will seize and sell off to energy and mining interests all national park land. The more you contemplate the fact that this guy with the alarming last name is not the only politico out there saying this insane stuff, the more you will trigger an anxiety attack. Out there they drink Coors--born in the Rockies--so Gerard could care less. He prefers the politics that I blast out on Facebook.
Our political sympatico has existed in virtual moments, but now here we were in the flesh, together, karaoke community members, thinking let's have some fun and duet some Bowie with Queen. Under Pressure. Gerard does Freddy Mercury and I do Bowie.
Turned away from it all like a blind man
Sat on a fence but it don't work
Keep coming up with love but it's so slashed and torn
Why, why, why?
We kill it. Applause. Cheers. Then we realize we're both running late and I book it and go west.
I walked, since I could lose some weight. I took a long walk, skirting Times Square because I feared brand-overload. I walked west on 40th Street past the glass and steel headquarters of The New York Times--"All the News That's Fit to Print"--which exposed Andrew Cuomo's shenanigans with his Moreland Commission and refused to endorse him. They actually wound up endorsing Columbia University ("A Leader in higher education nationally and around the world") professor Tim Wu, who coined the term "Net Neutrality". While thinking about all the implications of this campaign, I finally ended up at the place.
Gabriel Tobias, a smart and salt-of-the-earth Teachout-Wu operative whom I had met before, was waiting in the lobby with a small crowd for the elevator to the event space upstairs. I thought he looked tired and strangely shell-shocked. I put on my politician mode and shook hands with everyone in the elevator, which surprised some of the atomic units. When we got upstairs I coaxed Gabe to the bar and I bought him a Stella Artois--"From Belgium, with Love"--instead of a Budweiser because he seems more hipsterish and in need of something approaching a "craft beer". Stella is owned by the same company as Budweiser the King of Beers. (Does Gerard know this?) AB In Bev is symbol ADR on the NYSE and trading at $110.95 per share.
Gabe grabbed his beer and left, thankfully, because he was still busy. But then I found myself in an odd crowd who seemed hell-bent on not really talking to me. I wanted to talk to people, and I kind of did: An African-American scholar who threw a branded idea-vibe agenda then walked away. An amiable-enough guy with glasses and a beard who helped me through a case of mistaken identity. An earnest young reporter, Conor Skelding, a millennial from Capital New York, who never asked me a question. I'm a leader in my field and not a total dick, so I couldn't get the personal unfocused vibe. Maybe the virtual vibes emanating from screens and lenses and eyes all around us enervated the room. I'm not sure. Of course there were people in conversation with each other, but so many untethered folk floating in the neon glow.
Don't talk to me.
I was trying to engage people in a conversation about my ideas to form actual communities or clubs, if you will, a movement that exists outside of individual political campaigns, a dedicated insurgency in the Democratic Party. I had told the guy with the beard and glasses to go to www.prdusa.org to read about my idea. Then he walked away. I've gotta sell my brand! Progressive Reform Democrats! ("Join a new movement to restore democracy in America").
I calmed down and then I just killed time, watching screens. Then it became clear that the reality was a loss to Andrew but then Tim Wu got up and we held up screens and Tim testified and we witnessed it all on our screens.
Screens in the Neon Glow
Watch me, don't watch me.
A NY1 Exclusive
I often wonder what our politics would be like if people invested the amount of time--almost a sports-fanatic amount of time--necessary to transform politics. I work with people who join fantasy sports team clubs online and know every nuance of player statistics in an almost Nate Silverish dedication to data. I witness every day the slavish fascination with brand: Trump, Hermes, X-BOX, Nike, Douglas Elliman, Hillary Clinton. I drink Coca-Cola and I love it. But until we start meeting each other in the flesh and start hashing out these problems we are facing, then nothing will really happen outside of Fashion Week and American Idol.
Isn't everything okay? We have our freedoms. The terrorists hate our freedoms! And they use Twitter too!