Sending in the troops into Little Rock
TGSCUNY
I have to disagree with comrades Louis and Rob. Two bases for this:
1) From what I understand, the federal troops and certainly the FBI played
a conservative role behind the scenes. The FBI supported the Klan for a
long time. Did the troops unambiguously help the black militants? I find
this very hard to believe. Perhaps someone who's lived a bit longer and
has read the history can tell us more details. But my guess it they
repressed black militancy even when they forced Wallace and other
reactionaries to back down.
2) When you see only what the federal troops did, you fail to see what an
actual working class movement, spearheaded by the SWP, could have done.
Fraser called for a national march--but on Mississippi, not on D.C.. What
kind of results would THAT have produced? "Send Federal Troops to Little
Rock" blocked other, far more radical and potentially revolutionary
alternatives from happening. Just like what Bob talked about with the
"Bring the Boys Home" or "Out Now" slogans, such a demand stops people from
driving such militancy off the tracks of bourgeois liberalism onto those of
socialist revolution.
Tom
David Stevens
Louis Proyect wrote:
>
> The true political mood of the American working class is an
> inconvenience
Well, at least that is the pretext Comrade Proyect cited
in his work at Fort Dix.
But seriously, Louis: I cannot imagine you, under *any*
circumstances, calling for the defeat of your own ruling
class. (I can barely imagine you even agreeing that the
main enemy is at home, but only as a rationale for proceeding
to disregard that very fact). Is this a failure of my own
imagination, or of yours?
Revolutionary defeatism is usually associated with
Leninists. Here is a non-Marxist example, from the
American abolitionist Garrison during the 1846-1848
imperialist war with Mexico.
"Every lover of Freedom and humanity, throughout
the world, must wish them [the Mexicans] the most
triumphant success ... We only hope that, if blood
has to flow, that it has been that of the Americans,
and that the next news we shall hear will be that
General Scott and his army are in the hands of the
Mexicans ... We wish him and his troops no bodily
harm, but the most utter defeat and disgrace."
-- [William Lloyd Garrison in "The Liberator"]
- David Stevens
David Stevens
In <Pine.SUN.3.95L.97082...@ahnnyong.cc.columbia.edu>,
Louis Proyect said his penis is thirteen inches erect [*].
Now he says I'm a Peter Pan.
Something does not fit. Maybe Krakoff or Diamond
can tell us if this is merely proyection.
- David Stevens
[*] Louis asserted in his same 24 August message
that this penis was also "big," suggesting
he may not have reviewed available resources
at http://www.askisadora.com/
David Stevens
Louis N Proyect wrote
[a story we never heard before, about bravery
in the rain and cold, cooking a dead cat over
an alcohol stove and eating it, even risking
arrest (or worse) by the cops. In addition to
being smart, Louis has to be the bravest guy
ever to sell a paper or post on the Net].
> You were at home smoking weed and
> listening to the Grateful Dead, weren't you?
In 1968, I campaigned for Richard Nixon in the
South, so it was Wallace supporters, not GIs
and cops, beating me up. My man had a "secret
plan" to end the war, you know.
HHH was part of the war machine. My man Tricky
was cool. He appeared on Laugh-In. (That was
before I smoked marijuana, but I had a younger
sister who was able to tell me what was cool).
He was an alternative to Humphrey and Wallace,
just like Nader is an alternative to Clinton.
You SWP folks used to tell me that you had nothing
to do with communism, but I didn't believe that.
I believe it now, of course.
- David Stevens
Louis N Proyect
Not only is satire what dies on Saturday night, you are not very good at
it as well. It is a defense mechanism that allows you to duck the hard
questions. What is the bullshit about dead cats, Richard Nixon, the SWP
and communism? Can't you string together 3 coherent thoughts without
smirking at your own sophomoric cleverness? You are in your forties or
fifties, I assume. When do you plan on growing up?
Louis
Christian Camacho
Louis N Proyect (ln...@columbia.edu) wrote:
: Not only is satire what dies on Saturday night, you are not very good at
: it as well. It is a defense mechanism that allows you to duck the hard
: questions. What is the bullshit about dead cats, Richard Nixon, the SWP
: and communism? Can't you string together 3 coherent thoughts without
: smirking at your own sophomoric cleverness? You are in your forties or
: fifties, I assume. When do you plan on growing up?
==> Stevens is an anarchist, and an awfully thin-skinned one
at that! His "non-aligned Marxism" is an infantile rationalization
for his apparent inability to subordinate his swelled, fragile
ego to the dictatorship of an organized majority.
He claims that the reason he's a "non-aligned Marxist" is
that all the parties calling themselves socialist do not
measure up to his standard of "democratic centralism."
One has to wonder, if everything out there *really* stinks, as
our poor, much maligned non-aligned "Marxist" suggests, why isn't he
working to build a party that actually represents the interests
of the working class as he understands them? Why does he actually
defend his "non-alignment" as the correct thing (knowing full
well that Marxism is a philosophy of organization not of isolated,
individual effort), instead of building, or helping to build a
party of revolutionary workers?
Could it be that David Stevens is such an egotist that he'd rather
stay high on dope in his little cyber corner than come out and
actually face the real world?
Flaterer that he is, he starts out by calling people "comrade"
as if just because one claims to agree with marxian socialism
he is automatically qualified to call himself one's comrade!
One's *comrades* don't just hang out on the Internet and shoot
the shit about which party is doing what; one's comrade is
the man or woman who goes out with you to pass out leaflets
to striking workers and gives them a copy of your party's
newspaper and a word of encouragement; one's comrade is someone
who helps to set up discussion meetings and lectures and
does all he or she can to bring in interested workers to
hear what socialists have to say about the problems workers face and
how they should go about solving them.
Of course, being the much maligned non-aligned "Marxist" that he is,
David Stevens sneers at leafleting and passing out newspapers and
having meetings because he never does that stuff, or if he does,
he ain't saying for whom or for what!
Our poor non-aligned "marxist" attacks Louis Project and calls him
a poseur, but who really is the poseur? David Stevens is the
poseur. But the more he talks and the more he squirms, the more
apparent is his dishonest anarchy.
--
"Nowadays, atheism is itself *culpa levis*, as compared
with criticism of existing property relations."
Access The People on-line by using our
gopher on the Internet at gopher://gopher.slp.org:7019/
Access our web page at http://www.slp.org
--
"Nowadays, atheism is itself *culpa levis*, as compared
with criticism of existing property relations."
Access The People on-line by using our
gopher on the Internet at gopher://gopher.slp.org:7019/
Access our web page at http://www.slp.org
Christian Camacho
David Stevens (phyls...@worldnet.att.net) wrote:
: In 1968, I campaigned for Richard Nixon in the
: South, so it was Wallace supporters, not GIs
: and cops, beating me up. My man had a "secret
: plan" to end the war, you know.
==> So from sucking Dick's tricks you went on to
become a much maligned non-aligned Marxist-Leninist,
or was there an even lower stage in your political
evolution? In short, how did you become the life form
that you are?
Christian Camacho
Stephen R. Diamond (steph...@mindspring.com) wrote:
: (Christian Camacho) wrote:
: <<One has to wonder, if everything out there *really* stinks, as
: our poor, much maligned non-aligned "Marxist" suggests, why isn't he
: working to build a party that actually represents the interests
: of the working class as he understands them?>>
: I tried that once. Really? The hardest thing about it is that even if one
: knows all the parties are dead wrong, one won't necessarily get it right
: oneself.
==> So, if I understood you correctly, fear of failure in
party building is the reason you are an abstentionist?
: Ore does getting it right just not matter to you. I wouldn't have thought
: that for you, like Proyect, the "doing" is all that matters.
==> Not at all. But "getting it right" is often a matter of trial
and error. It's not as if there wasn't already considerable
guidance on how to build a politically sound organization.
: I don't think it is necessarily unprincipled to conclude that no party in
: right enough to join, but that one doesn't have the ability to construct
: the party either.
==> If it's not unprincipled, it most certainly is evidence of
a lack of faith in the correctness of the principles you
claim to espouse and lack of confidence in the ability of
workers to understand and act upon their own class interests.
We in the SLP, despite our financial poverty, believe in the
soundness of our principles and have faith in the intelligence
and incipient courage of the working class. "The principle and the
party are one," is the slogan we have adopted to illustrate
our belief that the organization must be a reflection of
the principles it espouses.
We are confident that workers will come around to our
program because it is the correct one.
That is why we persevere: We have confidence in the scientific
correctness of our principles and faith in our class.
: Then one does what? Discusses on the net, maybe, doing
: what one can? How can that suddenly become a huge moral failing.
==> There is nothing wrong per se with discussing on the net
with other people about ideas and history and sociology.
But it is no substitute for actually addressing workers
at work (as I often do), on the street (with leaflets and
newspapers, as i always do), at PTA meetings (as many of our
members do), etc.
: It seems you middle class radicals are just looking for moral failings to
: bait. Were you all preachers' kids or something?
==> I am the son of a worker. I have been an ironworker longer
than I've been a socialist. Presently, I work as a structural
steel layout man. My arms are beefy, my hands are big, calloused
and often dirty. I earn wages from my work and, thanks to
the intellectual and moral edification that the SLP has given me,
I have earned the respect and admiration of most of my fellow
workers, who all happen to know that i am a Marxist. At work even the
dumbest ones know that I am on their side. I conduct my socialist
agitation at work more patiently and craftily than I do on the
streets. It is a necessity in order to keep my job, the sole
source of support that I have. I consider myself 100% proletarian.
Thanks to the SLP, I am classconscious and know exactly what to do
with my working class consciousness.
The SLP is not perfect (far from it!), but, in my opinion,
there is nothing better out there. When something better comes up,
I'll be the first one to sign up.
Chris Faatz
On 3 Sep 1997, Christian Camacho wrote:
> David Stevens (phyls...@worldnet.att.net) wrote:
> : CHAMP has a pamphlet about this I will mail to any
> : serious querant, serious being defined as not Louis
> : and not Christian with his malignant maligned jokes.
>
> ==> This is very funny. Is it the marijuana that makes you
> so irritable or is it that you've become tired of waiting for
> the messiah's party?
You know, Christian, you're quite funny yourself. You're *in* the
Messiah's Party, and you're still cruel enough to taunt someone on a
personal rather than a political level. Takes real balls, doesn't it,
buddy. Tell me: how did DeLeon define "socialist morality"?
Hey, you going to answer my other post or not?
Christian Camacho
: Camacho) wrote:
: >==> This is very funny. Is it the marijuana that makes you
: > so irritable or is it that you've become tired of waiting for
: > the messiah's party?
: >--
: Not as tired as we are waiting for you to answer Faatz's issues about SLP
: electoralism.
==> So you're actually *waiting* on me for a response?! How utterly
flattering!
I posted something in response to Sayan that maybe sufficient to
cover the Faatz question.
: It is a sad day when ANY Marxist is stumped by Faatz, or when an SLPer
: refuses a golden opportunity to abstractly propagandize.
==> Indeed it would be if my silence were the result of "being
stumped" by Faatz's rather naive question and inaccurate analogy.
He made our insistence in civilized methods analogous with the
World Socialist Party's pure-and-simple parlamentarianism.
The analogy is a specious one because we don't just call for
a socialist ballot, but we also maintain that a ballot that is
not backed by the workers' organized industrial might is,
in De Leon's words, "a thing of air."
What makes me wonder about your assumptions about my silence
is that you didn't right away run out and get a selection of SLP
literature and find the answer for your little self instead
of idly waiting for the prophet's response.
: What's your problem with Stevens? We know Proyect's problem, of course.
: The stuff about satire gives it away. Stevens is funnier than Proyect, and
: Proyect resents it, like Solomon, who he might be, avyway.
==> Yes, Stevens is funnier than Project. So are rhesus monkeys.
Stevens is a nice guy. He also flatters himself into believing
he is some kind of witty polemicist. His jokes are obscure and
in most cases the product of bitterness. Recently he made the
revelation that he felt most people thought of him as an asshole.
He must know whereof he speaks.
: But you? Oh yeah, the one party Stevens did give a try was the SLP! That
: must be it, heh?
==> Did he tell you that? Maybe Stevens can enlighten us about that
claim. If he was a member of the SLP, that can be easily
corroborated. In fact, the circumstances of his separation
from the SLP (if ever there was a close relationship between
himself and my party) can be asertained.
Maybe our much maligned non-aligned "Marxist"-Leninist
should jump in at this point. That would be good!
Chris Faatz
On Tue, 2 Sep 1997, David Stevens wrote:
[clip]
>
> Revolutionary defeatism is usually associated with
> Leninists. Here is a non-Marxist example, from the
> American abolitionist Garrison during the 1846-1848
> imperialist war with Mexico.
>
> "Every lover of Freedom and humanity, throughout
> the world, must wish them [the Mexicans] the most
> triumphant success ... We only hope that, if blood
> has to flow, that it has been that of the Americans,
> and that the next news we shall hear will be that
> General Scott and his army are in the hands of the
> Mexicans ... We wish him and his troops no bodily
> harm, but the most utter defeat and disgrace."
>
> -- [William Lloyd Garrison in "The Liberator"]
You realize, of course (he said delightedly), that when Garrison
wrote this he was a radical Christian nonresistant--as were most of
the left of the Abolitionist and other "reform" (Emerson's word, not
mine) movements of that time.
The interesting thing is how they were able to use nonviolent means
to so deeply effect public opinion as to create mass support for the
suppression of slavery--and the extension of industrial despotism,
of course.
And, in the end, Garrison came out in support of the Civil War.
Chris
redflag
David Stevens wrote:
> I, as David Stevens, have never claimed in this forum
> to have been a member of the [US] SLP.
==> So does that mean that you've made the claim under
a different name?
> Diamond, having himself been the victim of unwarranted
> assumptions, seems not to have lost his sense of irony.
==> Or completely lost his memory?
--
mailto:red...@bellsouth.net mailto:red...@dc.seflin.org
--
Access The People on-line by using the SLP's web page
at http://www.slp.org
--
"Knowledge is proud that he has learned so much;
Wisdom is humble that he knows no more."
Chris Faatz
On 3 Sep 1997, Christian Camacho wrote:
>
> : In article <5uibn6$f...@nntp.seflin.org>, red...@dc.seflin.org (Christian
> : Camacho) wrote:
>
> : >==> This is very funny. Is it the marijuana that makes you
> : > so irritable or is it that you've become tired of waiting for
> : > the messiah's party?
> : >--
> : Not as tired as we are waiting for you to answer Faatz's issues about SLP
> : electoralism.
>
> ==> So you're actually *waiting* on me for a response?! How utterly
> flattering!
> I posted something in response to Sayan that maybe sufficient to
> cover the Faatz question.
Didn't see it. Would you mind forwarding it?
>
> : It is a sad day when ANY Marxist is stumped by Faatz, or when an SLPer
> : refuses a golden opportunity to abstractly propagandize.
Or when someone pays much attention to the Stirnerite egoism of Diamond.
But, that's beside the point.
>
> ==> Indeed it would be if my silence were the result of "being
> stumped" by Faatz's rather naive question and inaccurate analogy.
> He made our insistence in civilized methods analogous with the
> World Socialist Party's pure-and-simple parlamentarianism.
Not if he remembers accurately. He pointed out a parallel, he didn't
say they were the same thing.
> The analogy is a specious one because we don't just call for
> a socialist ballot, but we also maintain that a ballot that is
> not backed by the workers' organized industrial might is,
> in De Leon's words, "a thing of air."
But, you still believe you can "capture" the state electorally, and
this is your program--right or wrong? The quotes were from your own
literature, which I already had, Christian. Why no answer if my comments
were so naive and specious?
> What makes me wonder about your assumptions about my silence
> is that you didn't right away run out and get a selection of SLP
> literature and find the answer for your little self instead
> of idly waiting for the prophet's response.
Who needs a prophet? We've got David.
Anyway, you speak for the SLP--defend them against the charges that have
been raised, or I figure that you'll be admitting that the charges are,
in fact, unanswerable.
That would be too bad, really. There are parts of what the SLP stands for
that are quite excellent, imo (I'm with Mike more than with the others on
this group, btw, being a DB habitue). For example:
"For the SLP, socialism is not a vagary. It describes a society created
by the classconscious activity of the workers themselves [i.e., "from
below," to use Draper's term]. It implies a society in which class
divisions have been abolished and in which the mass of workers
democratically administer all aspects of society through their own
classwide economic organizations. *It signifies a society in which power
flows from the bottom up rather than the top down and one in which
the state as an instrument of ruling-class oppression has been
eliminated.* [my emphasis]"
This is from a 1979 article on Cuba from the People. No argument (except
it raises, once again, questions regarding internal regime, factions,
differences, etc., and their connection to a radically democratic end).
BTW, this also provides a rebuttal to Mike's reply (which I unfortunately
have only seen via a forward from a friend) to my comments on the SLP and
Cuba. I argued that, as with the USSR, the Cuban revolution was seen as a
"progressive" event in that, by breaking from US imperialism, it could
begin to lay the groundwork for the necessary development of industry to
bring about real socialism--from the SLP vantage point, the SIU-based
society.
From the same pamphlet, "Is Cuba Socialist?," page 4:
"To question Cuba's claim to socialism is not to deny the fact that the
Cuban revolution had a definite progressive character. Even if it did
nothing else, the Cuban revolution overthrew a brutal dictatorship and
freed the island from the oppressive grip of US imperialism--*a
necessary step for Cuba to develop economically and move a step closer
to the social and economic development prerequisite for socialism.*"
[again, my emphasis]
I didn't say the SLP said Cuba was socialist. What I said was the above.
Chris
David Stevens
Chris Faatz wrote:
>
> [a bunch of boring stuff, followed by SLP on Cuba]
> I didn't say the SLP said Cuba was socialist. What I said was the above.
Actually, they stop short of saying anything about
why the Cuban revolution was "progressive" except
that (1) they say so, and (2) it overthrew a brutal
dictator. To an historical materialist, this view
misses something vital about the Cuban revolution.
After all, the SLP also said that the Iranian
Revolution was "progressive" because the same
two conditions applied: (1) the SLP asserted
as much in "the People," and (2) it overthrew
the brutal Shah (a rather larger subcontractor
of imperialist oppression than Batista was).
Why, I think that even Louis Proyect could provide
a better explanation of the nature and importance of
the Cuban revolution, just as I'd expect him to look
to me for a better explanation on why I agree the
Cuban revolution attained significant gains and was,
as a matter of material fact, progressive.
This SLP line, in fact, shows the very *method*
which is criticized in the 1978 WV series I cited
here some weeks ago. Their line on the Russian
Revolution was always based upon idealistic
impressionism -- Hi, Chris -- and their relations
with other left groups. I can hardly believe it,
but it looks like Faatz has not followed up on
the most important reading recommendation I've
ever given to him. <sigh>. Here it is again.
[This all comes from WV bound volume No. #8]:
10 Feb 1978 WV #192 "Was De Leon a DeLeonist?"
also: "SWP Invites SLP to Build Party
of the Whole Swamp"
24 Feb 1978 WV #194 "The SLP and the Russian Question"
also: letter from a former SLPer
10 Mar 1978 WV #196 "The Dictatorship of the Proletariat"
[Spartacist, Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10116].
Chris, you had better read this stuff. It seems
fair and appropriate to give Mike Lepore some time
to catch up on his reading. He only recently arrived
on this small moving planet of ours, after all. But
you, who just dubbed me a prophet <blush> when I
cannot even make a profit, have *no excuse* not to
obey all of my recommendations, when I make them
janitorially Ex Cathedra this way. I will e-mail
you a three-dollar bill <g>, if I have to. But while
you wait for the mail, I won't promise all of my
customary gentleness in discussing the issues.
Some of this gets old after ... well, the WV
pieces are not even twenty years old, but this
stuff gets tiresome for me, you understand.
I admit that you [Faatz] are better read on the
Lenin side than any DeLeonist, and better equipped
on the DeLeonist side than ... well, better than
many. Of the three articles above, an orthodox[*]
DeLeonist would IMO start article number one by
disagreeing a bit and finish article three by
disagreeing a whole lot. Faatz, I think, doesn't
have the same deficiencies as some vulgarians.
The SLP and the Russian Question (second) article
would be the one I'd use to beat Faatz on the
head with, for example.
That series of WV articles establishes a frame of
reference between DeLeonism and Trotskyism which
is 'way in advance of the way this is going, Chris.
The only problems are minor:
(1) It accepts the SLP view that DeLeon was a
craven constitionalist; I disagree that
DeLeon was anything of that sort.
(2) It says that DeLeon accepted LaSalle's "Iron
Law of Wages," but WV does not give any source
for that. I have a DeLeon scripture that I can
produce (if required <yawn>) where DeLeon argues
*against* that LaSallean theory.
(3) These are early 1978 articles, so they cover
the Great Line Change to trendy, but lack
reference to the [August 1978] "Nature of
Soviet Society," or to "After the Revolution:
Who Rules," a response to the Proyect-like
"Marxist-Leninists" around Silber's old
Guardian newspaper.
These are really big, detailed articles, treating
not only the SLP line throughout history but --
much more successfully that we at a.p.s.t. or the
SLP in pamphlets have done -- addresses from a
Marxist (materialist) standpoint the need for
a dictatorship of the proletariat, properly
called, even in the most advanced of the Western
industrial countries.
Among other things, the SL advanced their
answer to whether a Marxist party in power
might allow itself to be peacefully voted
out of office. [They said, "Yes."]
Maybe some maroons will criticize what they haven't
studied up on, but these back issues are inexpensive
enough, so that shouldn't be an excuse.
- David Stevens
[*] I incorporate by reference all the irony
previously noted by Sayan Bhattacharyya
in applying "orthodox" to Trotskyism.
David Stevens
I don't call Chris Faatz a reformist, but I do say
he has a crummy ISP, just like Frantz and Cohn.
>
> On Tue, 2 Sep 1997, David Stevens wrote:
>
> [clip]
> >
> > Revolutionary defeatism is usually associated with
> > Leninists. Here is a non-Marxist example, from the
> > American abolitionist Garrison during the 1846-1848
> > imperialist war with Mexico.
> >
> > "Every lover of Freedom and humanity, throughout
> > the world, must wish them [the Mexicans] the most
> > triumphant success ... We only hope that, if blood
> > has to flow, that it has been that of the Americans,
> > and that the next news we shall hear will be that
> > General Scott and his army are in the hands of the
> > Mexicans ... We wish him and his troops no bodily
> > harm, but the most utter defeat and disgrace."
> >
> > -- [William Lloyd Garrison in "The Liberator"]
>
> You realize, of course (he said delightedly), that when Garrison
> wrote this he was a radical Christian nonresistant--as were most of
> the left of the Abolitionist and other "reform" (Emerson's word, not
> mine) movements of that time.
Yes, yes, I am glad to cede this point,
because Garrison later improved, just like
Eugene Debs did and just like [Stephen
Diamond please note] Chris Faatz will
someday come over to revolutionary
Marxism-Stevensism.
> The interesting thing is how they were able to use nonviolent means
> to so deeply effect public opinion as to create mass support for the
> suppression of slavery--and the extension of industrial despotism,
> of course.
Wonk? Before I agree, wasn't there a small group here,
a DeLeonist and a personalist and an SLP man and a DB
supporter and an ostensible friend of Brandon and a
troll and two anti-Leninists -- making a total of two --
for whom "industrial despotism" may have a peculiarly
specialized (and anti-materialistic) meaning?
Wage slavery in Massachussetts circa 1860? Industrial
despotism. Hitler's Germany? An industrial despotism.
Stalin's Russia? Another industrial despotism. Ever
helpful, the SLP discovered also elaborated Stalinism
as a "bureaucratic state despotism" as well as a
"bureaucratic statism." This helps us to tell it
apart from all the other kinds of despotism where a
political state is not involved. (Presumably).
Offhand, the only non-state despotisms I can think
of are the ones run by the Jack Barneses, the Arnold
Petersens, the Gerry Healys, and the Nathan Karps.
Right away, you can see how useful such "industrial
feudalism" is to the vital socialist measure of saying
that something isn't merely bad, but really, *really*
bad. This term is vital to the idea of DeLeonism as
an anti-Leninist alternative, just like the exclamation
point on Robert Malecki's keyboard is vital to Bob.
> And, in the end, Garrison came out in support of the Civil War.
As I have faith in you, my loving Brother.
The Mexican War shows resoundingly the dishonesty
of Louis Proyect's pretense that the US Army, even in
the 19th Century, was a progressive institution.
Did it "serve a progressive role," if not always by
choice, during the Civil War and Reconstruction? Of
course it did. Was imperialism invented in the 20th
century? Of course not. Zinn points to 103 foreign
military interventions between 1798 and 1895, from
Argentina to Japan and from China to Angola. But
there was a qualitative difference afterwards.
Proyect equates the Army of the Potomac with the
imperial war machine that paused for layover between
Korea and Vietnam. If imperialism could ever play a
progressive role, that would be a good thing.
If we had some bacon, we could cook some bacon and
eggs for breakfast, if we had eggs.
- David Stevens
Louis N Proyect
On Fri, 5 Sep 1997, David Stevens wrote:
> Proyect equates the Army of the Potomac with the
> imperial war machine that paused for layover between
> Korea and Vietnam. If imperialism could ever play a
> progressive role, that would be a good thing.
>
I do not make any equation whatsoever. Troops in Detroit during the 1967
rebellion played one role; they played a completely different role in
Little Rock in 1957. The role they played in Little Rock was to defend the
democratic rights of black Americans that had been trampled upon for
nearly 100 years. In Detroit, it was attempting to suppress the next stage
of the black struggle. How confusing. Why can't everything be simple. Why
must we face such contradictory phenomenon? Damn the real world. Let me
open up the pages of an old Trotskyist internal discussion bulletin and
flee from all this horrible complexity into a place where everything is
black and white.
Probably the only way this can be resolved is to delve into the history
books and study the reaction of the black community in Little Rock and
Detroit to the presence of the soldiers. The record is clear. They were
viewed as protectors in 1957 and as an occupying army in 1967.
The stupidity of Steven's reasoning would be exposed if you apply the same
logic to the murder of activists like Schwerner-Goodman-Chaney. When the
cops and the Ku Klux Klan murdered these young idealists, would the
correct Marxist position be to reject FBI investigation of the crime? The
FBI, after all, is part of the machinery of the capitalist state. Not only
that, the FBI was actually complicit in some of the provocations against
the civil rights movement and dragged its feet in these investigations.
Of course not. The correct position is to demand that the bourgeois state
offer equal protection to all of its citizens, black and white. Black
schoolchildren have the right to attend segregated schools without having
their heads bashed in. Civil rights workers have the right to register
people to vote without being murdered in their sleep. Who else is going to
defend these democratic rights except the state? The workers defense
guards that existed in Dick Fraser's hallucinatory brain? The Red Army?
Juan Posadas's flying saucers?
Louis Proyect
David Stevens
Contempt for Oppressed: Leninism vs DuhLeonism
I hope that Mike Lepore understands that the
term "DuhLeonism" has political relevance here.
Daniel DeLeon was a Marxist. Vladimir Lenin was
a Marxist. If Marxism is *really* a science,
DeLeon himself observed, two plus two should
always equal four; not three, never five.
It makes a religion of Marxism to express it in
denominational terms: Marxist-Leninist, -DeLeonist,
libertarian Marxist, Marxist-feminist, and so forth.
If these are ideologies which can actually arrive
at different political conclusions under the same
set of objective historicomaterial circumstances,
then the sad fact is that, as doctrine, no more
than one, and maybe zero, of these doctrines can
possibly express the science of Marxism.
It's meaningful to speak of Leninism, only as
the aspect of Marxism which provided the most
highly developed views on the Party question.
It's meaningful to speak of DeLeonism, only as
the aspect of Marxism which provided the best
native US expression of revolutionary industrial
unionism.
It's meaningful to speak of Trotskyism, only as
the aspect of Marxism which best explains our
failures in the developing world to solve the most
elementary tasks of a national bourgeois democratic
revolution in the age of imperialism.
If they arrive at different answers under a single
set of concrete objective conditions, then not all
of these doctrines can be a science.
We have a number of politically-charged, if non-nice,
expressions for that kind of pseudo-Trotskyist Mike
Lepore spoke of in an earlier posting. Me, I like to
call them "swamp Trots," "chia Marxists," or, just
to be the professional pedestrian I am, "reformists."
Likewise, not every professor of DeLeonism is a
DeLeonist (nor indeed any Marxist at all). I do not
ascribe to Comrade Lepore any of these views lampooned
below, which are DuhLeonism, not DeLeonism.
Leninism says: the Party of the working class must act
as a tribune for all the oppressed. It is precisely the
fact that the workers wield the effective social power we
do as a class, which requires our highest organizational
to act on behalf of all the oppressed -- the unemployed
worker, the disabled worker, the retired worker, the
worker (or even a capitalist) who is a victim of racial
discrimination (remember Dreyfus?), victims of national
and linguistic oppression, poor subproletarians, peasants,
and protoproletarians unrepresented by any Party but ours.
Counterposed to Leninism is that contempt for oppressed
exhibited by some old-style maximalists (to use a Second
International expression). They say: wait until the social
revolution, then we will worry about racial equality, or
national rights, or womens' liberation. Well, you can't
do that. If you want to build a socialist party, you
cannot countenance race discrimination in your own
organizations, of course. But you cannot *ignore* it in
society, either. In practice, this is concession to
backwardness, as two examples of DuhLeonism show.
I'm posting this message to backtrace to the Christian
Camacho (SLP) posting of Date: 3 Sep 1997 00:41:10 GMT,
<5uibn6$f...@nntp.seflin.org>, "Re: Sending in the
troops into Little Rock."
Here is the Socialist Labor Party response to my citation
of cannabis enemas for "people lucky enough to have cancer or
AIDS ... [but] unlucky about whether they can avoid puking":
> ==> This is very funny. Is it the marijuana that makes you
> so irritable or is it that you've become tired of waiting for
> the messiah's party?
To a Leninist, the idea that people are vomiting
too violently to consume their medicine orally would
not be considered "very funny."
Here is another example of DuhLeonism, this time
from Sam Brandon's old newspaper (the same issue):
+ "... I was elected to the executive committee and
+ sent to Chicago as a representative, at the Tom
+ Mooney convention. Here I was again in total
+ disagreement with the antics of the Communist Party
+ which was trying to link up the Scottsboro case with
+ that of Tom Mooney. That the Scottsboro case was not
+ a labor case, or that by bringing it up at that
+ convention the case of Tom Mooney might be injured
+ did not deter the Communists at all. They were
+ determined to utilize the occasion to build up
+ their own following by attracting the Negro element.
+ I was thoroughly disgusted.
Perhaps not more disgusted than I was to read that
passage by M.Bindler. [This article, "Metamorphosis of
a Communist into an Industrial Unionist" is half of
page two in Volume II, No. 5, of the "Industrial
Unionist," October 1933].
Why do I look 'way back to 1933 to see how Sam Brandon,
Louis Lazarus, and Arnold Petersen were wrong? Because
they are still wrong today. DuhLeonists aren't DeLeonists.
They aren't really even Marxists at all.
They promise pie in the sky, by and by -- but really offer
contempt for the sick and the racially oppressed.
- David Stevens
creb...@antares.com.br
In article
<Pine.SUN.3.95L.97090...@kiaora.cc.columbia.edu>, Louis
N Proyect <ln...@columbia.edu> wrote:
>
> On
> The stupidity of Steven's reasoning would be exposed if you apply the same
> logic to the murder of activists like Schwerner-Goodman-Chaney. When the
> cops and the Ku Klux Klan murdered these young idealists, would the
> correct Marxist position be to reject FBI investigation of the crime? The
> FBI, after all, is part of the machinery of the capitalist state. Not only
> that, the FBI was actually complicit in some of the provocations against
> the civil rights movement and dragged its feet in these investigations.
>
> Of course not. The correct position is to demand that the bourgeois state
> offer equal protection to all of its citizens, black and white. Black
> schoolchildren have the right to attend segregated schools without having
> their heads bashed in. Civil rights workers have the right to register
> people to vote without being murdered in their sleep. Who else is going to
> defend these democratic rights except the state? The workers defense
> guards that existed in Dick Fraser's hallucinatory brain? The Red Army?
> Juan Posadas's flying saucers?
>
> Louis Proyect
That's a fine point I'm afraid Stevens somewhat misses.You must not only
show people that their present condition is wretched, but also to show
then that what they might want follows naturally from the ideal framework
of burgeois democracy- and also follows dialetically from the necessity
of having socialist democracy as a "negation of negation".You must
present what you are demand not as some pipe-dream but as something that
is connected to the actual experience of common people.Otherwise you can
only sow the kind of run-for-your lives cynicism that flows from
desperation.
Carlos Rebello
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
redflag
A Victorian Story in Which True Political Virtue is Discovered in a Pool of
Stevenesque Vomit After a Delightful Session of Marijuana Enemas:
David Stevens, in a fit of angst, wrote:
[Some previous pontification snipped]
: Leninism says: the Party of the working class must act
: as a tribune for all the oppressed. It is precisely the
: fact that the workers wield the effective social power we
: do as a class, which requires our highest organizational
: to act on behalf of all the oppressed -- the unemployed
: worker, the disabled worker, the retired worker, the
: worker (or even a capitalist) who is a victim of racial
: discrimination (remember Dreyfus?), victims of national
: and linguistic oppression, poor subproletarians, peasants,
: and protoproletarians unrepresented by any Party but ours.
==> Alas, but for our non-aligned "Marxist" "our"
party exist somewhere in cyberspace!
Perhaps the fact that Stevens fails to say
what "highest organizational" thing is required
is indicative of his detached muddledness.
What did he have in mind? Discipline? Heaven forbid!
Party discipline means that socialists have to
submit to the majority of their comrades' will
and to the mandate their elected officials are
charged to carry out. Non-aligned "marxists" such
as Stevens could never be expected to submit to
majority will!
Perhaps a poignant violin solo should be inserted
where Stevens sobs about "victims of national and
linguistic oppression, poor subproletarians, peasants
and protoproletarians" followed by a cymbal and drum
crash when he says "by any Party but ours."
In one sentence Stevens unwittingly captures the
essence of Chaplinesque humor. He can squeeze a tear
from our jaded lachrimose glands and followup with
a gag that leaves us choking in laughter.
One wonders if "our Party" referred to by Stevens
has any relationship to anything substancial or
if it's just a sinsemilla induced halucination.
But I suppose you'd have to smoke an awful lot
of sinsemilla to be able to conjure up Stevens'
Party and still remain a non-aligned "Marxist."
: Counterposed to Leninism is that contempt for oppressed
: exhibited by some old-style maximalists (to use a Second
: International expression). They say: wait until the social
: revolution, then we will worry about racial equality, or
: national rights, or womens' liberation. Well, you can't
: do that. If you want to build a socialist party, you
: cannot countenance race discrimination in your own
: organizations, of course. But you cannot *ignore* it in
: society, either. In practice, this is concession to
: backwardness, as two examples of DuhLeonism show.
==> Racism is bad. Social chauvinism is wrong.
Socialism, genuine socialism, cannot co-exist
with those social evils. They cannot be tolerated
and are, in my party (this one really exists),
grounds for censure and, if not rectified and repudiated
by the offending comrade, grounds for expulsion.
It is a mistake to believe that socialist opposition
to reform measures intended to address racism equals
racism.
Consistent with De Leon's dictum that reforms
are concealed measures of reaction, De Leonists maintain
that nothing short of a complete overthrow of
the cause of racism (capitalism and its need to pit
workers against each other) will bring about an
end to this evil.
Trammeled by the antiquated Leninist conceptions,
born from the backwardness of pre 1917 Russia, where all
revolutionary demands had equal footing with those
of the urban proletariat, Stevens cannot help but repeat
the old slogans that the SWP (a true Leninist party) con-
tinues to repeat despite their anachronistic timbre.
That is why Leninists of all stripes sooner or
later fall in the degeneracy of reformism. For them,
ethic and rural grievances have the same priority as the
workers' demand for emancipation.
: I'm posting this message to backtrace to the Christian
: Camacho (SLP) posting of Date: 3 Sep 1997 00:41:10 GMT,
: <5uibn6$f...@nntp.seflin.org>, "Re: Sending in the
: troops into Little Rock."
: Here is the Socialist Labor Party response to my citation
: of cannabis enemas for "people lucky enough to have cancer or
: AIDS ... [but] unlucky about whether they can avoid puking":
: > ==> This is very funny. Is it the marijuana that makes you
: > so irritable or is it that you've become tired of waiting for
: > the messiah's party?
: To a Leninist, the idea that people are vomiting
: too violently to consume their medicine orally would
: not be considered "very funny."
==> And here is the same response in its correct context:
:: David Stevens (phyls...@worldnet.att.net) wrote:
:: CHAMP has a pamphlet about this I will mail to any
:: serious querant, serious being defined as not Louis
:: and not Christian with his malignant maligned jokes.
: ==> This is very funny. Is it the marijuana that makes you
: so irritable or is it that you've become tired of waiting for
: the messiah's party?
==> Stevens probably left out what I was really responding to
in order to mislead the reader into believing that
one is not sympathetic to those who puke more than they
can take in.
Perhaps Stevens can find a way to avoid contaminating his
posts with the bitterness of his vomit. Much like the
vomit he alledgedly spews from his mouth, what he writes
is, more often than not, a mish-mash of half-digested
history and indigested truth.
His appeal to sympathy for his alleged malady, in the context
of a humorous dissertation in which "subproletarians,"
"protoproletarians" and assorted oppressed nationalities
are elevated to the importance of the industrial working class
and its need for an organized political expression, is
evidence of Stevens' inability to separate himself from
his own vomit.