Recently at a gathering of 15 top conservative leaders, the question was posed: What does America think of the present political condition? The conversation rocked back and forth, reviewing the state of education, the wokeness of big business, the extremism of the Democratic Party, the politicization of sports, the disintegration of civil society, the war on religion, the assault on the family, and the like. Frank Cannon, chairman of American Principles Project, sat silent but finally erupted.
“What the hell is going on here?!”
The guests looked at him surprised, more than one certainly taken aback at his impatience with the discussion. Cannon then smiled, reading faces.
“The American people are thinking: ‘What the hell is going on here?!’”
He had hit the nail on the head. Tens of millions at home and hundreds of millions outside our borders (such as they are) have that very question of the United States of America.
For those seriously interested in that question, Mark Levin has provided the answer with his new book, American Marxism.
As opposed to the chatterboxes on talk radio or television (or both) who beat into dust their worn out talking points or confine their knowledge to others’ telepromptered talking points (or both), Levin is a serious man, and American Marxism is serious scholarship.
The unthinkable is happening. America is not just threatened by Marxism, America is quickly becoming Marxist, and Americans have been astonished by what Levin calls “the unremitting, harmonized and ferocious blitz” of this revolution. The political hurricane has hit so hard and so rapidly that we have time to focus only on the flooded streets and damaged levies while we await the next storm surge. We are so stupefied we seemingly cannot even label our opponents correctly. “Liberals” overnight became “progressives” who morphed into “leftists” who we renamed “radicals,” then “socialists”…
… and yet clearly that is now insufficient.
It is upheaval. What Black Lives Matter and Antifa want is not a full divorce from an existing system, as was the imperative of the Revolutionary War, nor separation with an option for reconciliation, as in the Civil War. The goal is nothing short of the destruction of the West with America as the crown jewel.
Know thy enemy. It is the singular message of American Marxism. It’s a masterful history lesson that exposes today’s radicals as true Marxists — in every sense of the word. But it isn’t Levin personally positing that argument. He convinces because he relies on the revolutionaries themselves to make it for him.
The argument is linear, originating with Jean-Jacques Rousseau, George Wilhelm Hegel, and the most consequential of them all, Karl Marx. The 2oth century saw the continuation of the intellectual revolution, with the likes of professors Frances Fox Piven and Richard Clowland taking to the pages of the far-left Nation magazine to argue for civil disruption; avowed Marxist Herbert Marcuse taking to the lecterns at Columbia, Harvard, and Brandeis to argue that “economic freedom would mean freedom from economics [and] political freedom would mean liberation of the individuals from politics over which they have no effective control” (Levin swats that one away, easily: “Is there a Marxist regime anyplace on earth that is not a police state? China, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuela?”); and Herbert Coy founding The New Republic and proclaiming that the “better future which Americans propose to build is nothing if not an idea which must in certain essential respects emancipate them from the past.” Thus America must be prepared to reject its “pride and congratulation” for her history.
Levin points a damning finger at academia as the incubator for this revolution. One could argue that this is perhaps the most successful political movement in history for the simple reason that what is taught as its justification – ending American “oppression” – does not even exist. Systemic racism? There is not a state nor a city in this country where racism flourishes. Equity? That is what someone demands as ransom when he is unwilling to work sufficiently. Diversity? What nation on earth is more diverse than the United States? What Black Lives Matter and Antifa posit as goals are counterfeit, but for the dissimulation to work they must rely on their allies in the equally leftist “news” media to do their bidding and their social media comrades to censor any voices of opposition.
A movement to destroy America must welcome Marx. Enter the Critical Race Theory movement which “openly disdains and rejects mankind’s progress over the centuries.” It must embrace Coy. Enter the 1619 Project, “intended to offer a new version of American history” revolving around slavery and white supremacy. It must emulate Piven and Clowland in overturning the underpinnings of civil society. And it must heed Marcuse’s clarion call for revolution. Enter Antifa and BLM.
American Marxism is a devastating new book and arguably Levin’s most important work, whose most powerful statement comes not in the conclusion but as the header for its very first chapter: “It’s Here.”
L. Brent Bozell III is the Founder and President of the Media Research Center.
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