02 Apr 1998 11:04:42 -0400 (EDT)
Date: Thu, 02 Apr 1998 11:08:27 -0500
From: Wojtek Sokolowski <sokol@jhu.edu>
Subject: Re: Paula Jones Case
In-reply-to: <Pine.GSO.3.96.980402003812.10549A-100000@sunlight.ccs.york u.ca>
To: valeries@yorku.ca, Arthur Wilke <wilkeas@mail.auburn.edu>,
        psn@csf.colorado.edu
At 01:16 AM 4/2/98 -0500, you wrote:
>
>I have been following the coverage of the dismissal of the Paul Jones case
>for most of the day and I was curious what other PSN'ers might be thinking
>about it.  All I am going to offer here are a few preliminary thoughts
>before I take off on vacation for a week.  First, let me premise this by
>saying that I am definitely no fan of Slick Willie--not by a long shot,
>but I have been equally appalled by some of the women involved in this
>fiasco--that has gotten me into some hot water with some of my fellow
>feminists, so be it--I'm no essentialist!!!  In any case, I have to say
>that I found myself laughing out loud this evening upon hearing Jone's
>Rutherford Institute lackey attorney claiming that their aim was to
>encourage women who had been sexually harassed to speak out, that they
>were trying, basically, to further the objectives of the women's
>movement. How very noble of them--puh-leeze!! If anything, institutes like
>Rutherford and other right-wing institutes/think-tanks have been engaged,
>for almost two decades now, in a sustained effort to roll back, if not
>obliterate, many of the gains made by the women's and civil rights
>movements.  To hear these right-wingers express their desire to advance
>"the" feminist cause was at once laughable and deeply disturbing. By
>adopting a feminist-sounding rhetoric, these institutes and their lackeys
>obscure the ways in which they themselves have been complicit in fostering
>and sustaining the backlash against feminism.  Don't get me wrong, I am
>not trying to dismiss the seriousness of the alleged charges, nor am I
>suggesting that Slick Willie is innocent by any stretch of the
>imagination. Rather, what I am trying to do is think about this whole
>fiasco in much broader terms.  I'm no conspiracy buff but I can't
>help but notice one thing in all of this--and that is how the right (at
>least in this case) is now attempting to position itself as a defender of
>women's rights and a champion of feminist issues--could this be because
>they know they need to capture more of the female vote? I'm just musing at
>this point and I've made no effort to offer a sustained "sociological" 
>analysis, but there are just many things about this whole fiasco that
>"bug" me beyond belief. Like I said, just musing at this point. Anybody
>out there have any thoughts on this mess???  
>
>


It is obvious that the Paula Jones case is the product of the
'claim-and-grievance-manufacturing industry" that is mushrooming in this
country.  The fact that this was a product of the looney-right  sector of
that industry should not detract us from a broader inquiry into the working
of that industry.

The claim-and-grievance-manufacturing industry is the plethora of various
political and professional groups, as well as the media, who want to sell
some solutions, invariably involving the reliance on some broadly
understood technology they are controlling, and are in the dire need for
problems to which those solutions apply.  Thus, they are eager to
manufacture those problems, usually through fear mongering and
manufacturing grievances.

For true Marxists on this list, this is an extension of the Baran-Sweezy
"monopoly capital' argument to the production of cultural commodity.  The
excess productive capacity -- i.e. too many lawyers, politicos,
professionals, NGO leaders, or just leaders ("too many chieftains too few
Indians") -- results in the need for manufactured demand for their services.

In the country that has spent trillions of dollars on several generations
of nuclear missiles, not to mention mountains of lesser war equipment, to
"protect" itself from a manufactured threat, the abnormalities like the
Paula Jones case -no matter how improbable - are good enough to be the
material for manufacturing a grievance for some wacky group.  

That, BTW, is not limited to the right-wing causes, although the Right has
more money to pay for such commodity.  The so-called Left is in the same
business, although on a somewhat lesser scale due to the paucity of funders.

Regards,