Saturday, September 15, 2018

At a Certain Point, You Can Only Laugh

“The Chapo Guide to Revolution – A Manifesto Against Logic, Facts and Reason,” by Chapo Trap House, 2018

In the U.S., ever since Jon Stewart combined serious politics with penis jokes, a new hybrid of wiggling poli-comedy was born.  It is no longer limited to isolated hippie geniuses like George Carlin, who was stomping on billionaires long before Jon Stewart watched his first mythical episode of Star Wars.  Today we have the dialectical raising of the stakes in that spiral evolution, steaming past the spawn of Jon Stewart – lame-ass rich liberals like Bill Maher, John Oliver, Samantha Bee and Steven Colbert.  Yes, joining the ranks of Lee Camp, Jimmy Dore and others are the Groucho-Marxists of the Chapo Trap House, in all their revolutionary socialist glory, ready to drop political bombs down the stinking hatches of the booshwahzee and their lackeys.
Real 'Loose' With Those Words, Kid

The Traps do podcasts mostly, which figures for people who were brought up with silver plastic iPhones in their diapers.  It’s a book, not a podcast, which means it’s worth a bunch of podcasts.  Like binge-reading podcasts!  From my information, this is the kind of stuff that keeps young members of various left groups in stitches.  Even a dedicated Marxist like myself couldn’t stop laughing out loud – but only occasionally, as I’m still wondering how deep the Chapo Trap House roots in the proletariat go.  Oh well.  They blend pop culture with class politics with techno-speak to the point where you realize – this is V. 4.0 comedy! After all, it’s written by committee.

The Chapo Sticks

In their first chapter, the Chapos give us a quick history of the storied U.S. capitalist empire, ending with the bad mix tape that is Trump and Clinton.  Then a send up of those hapless hypocrites, the American Liberal.  It is incomprehensible how… “in spite of their strong record of liking ethnic food, bombing ethnic countries, privatizing education and gutting welfare they are somehow loathed.”  (I might add ‘jerking off Wall Street at the Met Gala’ but that would be rude.)   But conservatives do not escape their wrath either.  From early semi-erudite proto-fascists like William Buckley to later muscular versions like “Liberty Babe,” who believes that ‘Gentlemen Prefer Guns,” the Chapos leave no thug-type unturned.  In another chapter, the media are discovered to be a nest of lazy bourgeois elites who follow the ‘propaganda model.’  Amazing!  Like Chomsky on weed but funny.  They take a swipe at various internet commentators like Megan McArdle, someone you’ve probably never heard of.  She’s a blogger who would have been an average Republican social studies teacher in Wyoming, but was catapulted into fronting for Wall Street billionaires at Bloomberg.com.  You don’t even have to read Antonio Gramsci’s ‘Prison Notebooks’ to get their chapter on culture – in fact, it might interfere, as he didn’t know much about Aaron Sorkin and The West Wing.  There is even a heavy chapter on working – you know, making profits for other people and liking it.

Some more bits and quotes from the book before we leave:

* The chapter “The World” includes subheads like:  “7 Habits of Highly Effective Empires” and “The Schlock Doctrine.”

* “Mitt was right after all and that a good way to #resist President Cheeto would be to send antiaircraft missiles to the Babi Yar Reenactment Society in Ukraine.”

* On early liberals:  “Social reformers emerged from these dark, narrow New England glens to champion ‘reality-based’ witch trials.”

* Hillary Clinton:  “When we moved in (to the Arkansas state house) I was told that using prison labor in the governor’s mansion was a long-standing tradition, which kept down costs, and I was assured the inmates were carefully screened…”

* After Obama’s smashing victory in 2008, when all of Congress was now controlled by Democrats, “The young and ready president threw off his jacket, rolled up his sleeves and declared, ‘Lets find some fucking consensus.’”

* Conservative G.K. Chesterson “inspired C.S. Lewis to believe in God and write a stilted and punishing fantasy series that ruined the tender minds of a generation of children.”

*  “But the arc of history bends towards justice.”

* “The growth of the internet will slow drastically …” (Paul Krugman, 1998)

* “Pellets of nourishing, ideologically agreeable information…” (Huffington Post)

* “… besides the radical Left, virtually all factions’ boats were lifted by a tide of shit:” (The advent of blogging.)

* “Capital has no problem assimilating pop-cultural rebellion and anti-authoritarian imagery.” (With subtextual thanks to The Baffler.)

* “Simple hero journey’s no longer would do.” (Generic good guy/bad guy ‘myths’ fall short.  Take note, Marvel.)

* “…four hundred pages describing the different kinds of knots and ropes that are used on a whaling vessel.” (Moby Dick)

* “Small business owners are, generally speaking, insane egomaniacs who believe enough in their ‘pizza restaurant with a night-club atmosphere’ to borrow $250,000 and lord it over a workforce of desperate people.”

*  After the mutilation of British rebel Wat Tyler by King Richard II’s men, this convinced “the peasants to return home and agitate for incremental change by working within the system.”

Capitalism has gotten so deadly ridiculous that the naked kings wandering by the dikes, and the NPR people who pretend they wear clothes, escape no one’s observation.  It goes way, way beyond easy targets like Trump.  Only problem is, they are holding guns to our heads and asking 'Do you see the clothes now?"  Buy this book because other people are already coming to the store to buy this book.  Or have bought it already. Or ‘borrow this book’ from them, as that old quote from Abbie Hoffman kind of went.

Other reviews on this comic topic, use search terms in blog search box, upper left:  “Jon Stewart” and “Bill Maher.”

And I bought it at May Day Books!

Red Frog

September 15, 2018

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