Rampton, Sheldon and Stauber, John. Banana Republicans: How the Right Wing
Is Turning America Into a One-Party State. New York: Tarcher/Penguin, 2004.
264 pages.
Rampton and Stauber run the Center for Media and Democracy in Madison,
Wisconsin, and are best known for previous books criticizing the public
relations industry. Here they wade into politics more directly by examining
the views and organizational tactics of "movement conservatives." The back
cover sums it up: "For the first time since 1932, the Republican Party
controls every major institution of the federal government.... The GOP
leadership maintains its hold on power through the systemic manipulation
of the electoral system, the media, the lobbying establishment, and the
political culture at large."
After dozens of pages proving that the right-wing is running the
entire show in America, the last chapter concedes that this is partly a
victory by default. Liberals are outgunned due to their disorganization,
and their inability to match the right-wing's use of information technology
and political tactics. We would add that thirty years of "the personal as
political" and "identity politics" on the Left have undermined any sense of
class identity. It's just possible that the GOP has more real understanding
of grassroots sentiment by now than the Democratic Party, at the same time
that the GOP's agenda is thoroughly self-serving and anti-populist.
ISBN 1-58542-342-4
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