> All of which is to say, the heterodox viewpoints offered by Corbyn and Carlson don’t represent the usual conflict between Left and Right. Rather, it’s an example of both poles making common cause against the center.
So, the center view seems to be support fot the war? Doesn't make sense to me.
> On the Left, opposition to the West’s support for Ukraine isn’t difficult to explain. Leftist figures such as Corbyn, Noam Chomsky, and Australian journalist John Pilger generally view the United States (and the West in general) as the main engine of evil in the world
Maybe it's written from a European view point? Their left is so extreme that to them, the American left is considered center, isn't it? So our left's support of the war is being called center?
In the USA, President Biden leads the Democrats and Mitch McConnel leads the Republicans, and both of them have been eager to send tens of billions of dollars to Ukraine, so it seems the center of both parties support Ukraine, and therefore it seems reasonable to say that the center of USA politics supports Ukraine.
Extremism, regardless of ideology, tends to eventually evolve into the same final form—autocracy. By nature ideologues put their ideals above all else and are uncompromising in their world view. If you are unwilling to compromise your only choice to reach your desired goal is through autocracy.
Some see compromise as weakness, it isn’t. Our political polarization and gridlock is a lack of empathy.
This part is an accurate description of both parties on the far left and far right:
"But any objective observer can see that there are a number of ideological elements—a tolerance for street violence; a desire to censor opposing viewpoints; a weakness for powerful strongmen; a disdain for due process and democratic politics; and a tendency to lionize foreign autocrats as offering some viable alternative to liberalism—that really do answer to horseshoe-theory analysis."
These parties tend to gain power when the centrist parties are seen to have failed to manage the economy, or when there has been widespread social collapse, such that one needs extra-legal means to govern. This is how Fiona Hill and Clark Gifford describe the rise of Putin:
"However, if he was to deal with the oligarchs, Chubais would need muscle. His team was made up almost exclusively of academic economists. They were young and had no experience dealing with seasoned Soviet–era politicians and officials or with the ruthless businessmen who now owned most of Russia’s wealth. Chubais realized that something more was needed. He turned to his former St. Petersburg colleague, Alexei Kudrin. Chubais’s memo specifically recommended bringing Kudrin in from St. Petersburg. It did not mention Vladimir Putin, but Putin nonetheless came along with Alexei Kudrin."
In other words, in a chaotic and lawless society, the reformers needed a tough guy who could bring some muscle. That is exactly what Putin brought. He also brought some keen insights about when to use violence and when to "work with people" using blackmail. He was the perfect person for the moment, which perhaps explains how he came out of nowhere and yet rose to the top of the Russian government in just a few years.
And why was there a crisis? Because of a lack of tax revenue. And why was their a lack of tax revenue? Because the state was weak. And why was the state weak? Because of a lack of tax revenue. And how was this cycle to be broken?
Mao Tse Tung said "Power grows out of the barrel of a gun." But Karl Marx had said that, in any era, the government is an expression of the underlying economic reality. So which is it? With an army you can use the threat of violence to raise taxes, which can then pay for the army. Or, if you have revenue, you can use it to create an army, which you can then use to raise taxes, which would allow you to build a bigger army. So which comes first? Do you need any army to get money, or do you need money to raise an army? If you don't have money, how can you create an army? If you don't have an army, how can you get money? What is the starting point?
I'd suggest the starting point has to revolve around the ability of a person to make people believe that they will have resources they can hand out in the future. In a word, it comes down to a kind of charisma. And the task, in those primitive and early moments, is similar to the task of an entrepreneur, in the early days, trying to get other people to trust their vision, when don't yet have any resources behind that vision. And these political entrepreneurs tend to be ready to break the rules of civilized society. But such people can be either of the left or right.
So, the center view seems to be support fot the war? Doesn't make sense to me.