How Sandes defines socialism
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Bill
Jul 19, 2015, 9:20:48 PM7/19/15
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Andrew Gunderman
Jul 23, 2015, 6:22:57 PM7/23/15
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Thanks. Sanders cited Debs, the perennial candidate of the SPA, as his hero. Plus a quote therein, item 2, You reach a certain age when you start reading reasonably widely, and you find ideas that reflect your gut feeling about something. I think that’s usually the process -- you find what you’re looking for. I had that feeling when I first read Eugene Debs, for example. If you read what Debs said about the goals of socialism, it’s no different from what I’ve been saying: that all socialism is about is democracy.
Greg Guma, the author of The People's Republic: Vermont and the Sanders Revolution, pays tribute to Sanders and Debs in his blog yesterday, in which he says, B.S.
has a plaque honoring Eugene Debs on the wall of his Senate office in Washington. It's an abiding admiration, stretching back decades. Before becoming Burlington mayor in '81, but after four third party races for statewide office in the 70's, he produced and narrated a 28-minute documentary, Eugene V. Debs: Trade Unionist, Socialist, Revolutionary, 1855-1926.
A century ago American politics was dominated by men who could command a public stage, telling jokes and stories with ease, making arguments and issuing indictments in long speeches. Of course, most of them relied on prepared remarks, but Eugene Debs seemed to speak from the heart. No tricks or effects, just electrifying straight talk. Much like Bernie Sanders, Debs could inspire a crowd. He could be angry and funny, sarcastic and sentimental, sometimes poetic or prophetic...
Although Debs didn't get as far as Bernie Sanders in persuading Americans to join a political revolution and consider socialist solutions, he began the dialogue. He provoked a national debate about the meaning of the First Amendment. In a post-war age of conformity, he sparked the birth of the civil liberties movement and convinced many people that society should better protect those who dissent, especially when they refuse to support the majority in the heat of war.
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2015/07/14-things-bernie-sanders-has-said-about-socialism-120265.html#ixzz3gkolrom4
Date: Sun, 19 Jul 2015 18:20:48 -0700
From: wsha...@gmail.com
To: workers-internation...@googlegroups.com
Subject: How Sandes defines socialism
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Greg Guma, the author of The People's Republic: Vermont and the Sanders Revolution, pays tribute to Sanders and Debs in his blog yesterday, in which he says, B.S.
has a plaque honoring Eugene Debs on the wall of his Senate office in Washington. It's an abiding admiration, stretching back decades. Before becoming Burlington mayor in '81, but after four third party races for statewide office in the 70's, he produced and narrated a 28-minute documentary, Eugene V. Debs: Trade Unionist, Socialist, Revolutionary, 1855-1926.
A century ago American politics was dominated by men who could command a public stage, telling jokes and stories with ease, making arguments and issuing indictments in long speeches. Of course, most of them relied on prepared remarks, but Eugene Debs seemed to speak from the heart. No tricks or effects, just electrifying straight talk. Much like Bernie Sanders, Debs could inspire a crowd. He could be angry and funny, sarcastic and sentimental, sometimes poetic or prophetic...
Although Debs didn't get as far as Bernie Sanders in persuading Americans to join a political revolution and consider socialist solutions, he began the dialogue. He provoked a national debate about the meaning of the First Amendment. In a post-war age of conformity, he sparked the birth of the civil liberties movement and convinced many people that society should better protect those who dissent, especially when they refuse to support the majority in the heat of war.
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2015/07/14-things-bernie-sanders-has-said-about-socialism-120265.html#ixzz3gkolrom4
Date: Sun, 19 Jul 2015 18:20:48 -0700
From: wsha...@gmail.com
To: workers-internation...@googlegroups.com
Subject: How Sandes defines socialism
From Politico:
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Matthew Andrews
Jul 25, 2015, 10:32:49 AM7/25/15
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Comparing Sanders to Debs is insulting. If Debs were alive today he
would not have any sympathy for Sanders or his ilk. Read anything Debs
ever wrote or said and that should be clear. Many try to claim his
popularity and tame it - just as they do with all radicals who cannot be
erased from history. But let Debs speak for himself. This is from his
1918 antiwar speech in Canton, Ohio:
"They who have been reading the capitalist newspapers realize what a
capacity they have for lying. We have been reading them lately. They
know all about the Socialist Party—the Socialist movement, except what
is true. Only the other day they took an article that I had written—and
most of you have read it—most of you members of the party, at least—and
they made it appear that I had undergone a marvelous transformation. I
had suddenly become changed—had in fact come to my senses; I had ceased
to be a wicked Socialist, and had become a respectable Socialist, a
patriotic Socialist—as if I had ever been anything else.
What was the purpose of this deliberate misrepresentation? It is so
self-evident that it suggests itself. The purpose was to sow the seeds
of dissension in our ranks; to have it appear that we were divided among
ourselves; that we were pitted against each other, to our mutual
undoing. But Socialists were not born yesterday. They know how to read
capitalist newspapers; and to believe exactly the opposite of what they
read."
Bernie Sanders is a "respectable" "patriotic" socialist. He is confusing
and dividing socialists to protect the Democratic Party. Had he been
alive in Debs' day, he would have led us into WWI, just has he has led
us into Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine.
~Matt
> ______________________________________________________________________
would not have any sympathy for Sanders or his ilk. Read anything Debs
ever wrote or said and that should be clear. Many try to claim his
popularity and tame it - just as they do with all radicals who cannot be
erased from history. But let Debs speak for himself. This is from his
1918 antiwar speech in Canton, Ohio:
"They who have been reading the capitalist newspapers realize what a
capacity they have for lying. We have been reading them lately. They
know all about the Socialist Party—the Socialist movement, except what
is true. Only the other day they took an article that I had written—and
most of you have read it—most of you members of the party, at least—and
they made it appear that I had undergone a marvelous transformation. I
had suddenly become changed—had in fact come to my senses; I had ceased
to be a wicked Socialist, and had become a respectable Socialist, a
patriotic Socialist—as if I had ever been anything else.
What was the purpose of this deliberate misrepresentation? It is so
self-evident that it suggests itself. The purpose was to sow the seeds
of dissension in our ranks; to have it appear that we were divided among
ourselves; that we were pitted against each other, to our mutual
undoing. But Socialists were not born yesterday. They know how to read
capitalist newspapers; and to believe exactly the opposite of what they
read."
Bernie Sanders is a "respectable" "patriotic" socialist. He is confusing
and dividing socialists to protect the Democratic Party. Had he been
alive in Debs' day, he would have led us into WWI, just has he has led
us into Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine.
~Matt
Andrew Gunderman
Jul 25, 2015, 1:58:58 PM7/25/15
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Ok ,now let's see ...Comparing Sanders to Debs is insulting. If Debs were alive today he would not have any sympathy for Sanders or his ilk. Bernie Sanders is a "respectable," "patriotic" socialist.
I got that it's insulting to be politically respectable, a widely shared belief these days. But according to Matt, only an understudy of Debs can explain exactly why this is so. The quick quote doesn't seem to help make it any more clear,
This implies that only a wizened Socialist i.e. Debs himself, would be able to interpret a newspaper. Even Sanders who cites Debs as his hero, then misses the point.
I got that it's insulting to be politically respectable, a widely shared belief these days. But according to Matt, only an understudy of Debs can explain exactly why this is so. The quick quote doesn't seem to help make it any more clear,
Capitalist newspapers have a capacity for lying [and as a result their readers know all about the Socialist Party/movement] except what is true...
[But we] Socialists were not born yesterday. [We] know how to read capitalist newspapers... and believe exactly the opposite of what they read!
This implies that only a wizened Socialist i.e. Debs himself, would be able to interpret a newspaper. Even Sanders who cites Debs as his hero, then misses the point.
> Subject: Re: How Sandes defines socialism
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> Date: Sat, 25 Jul 2015 10:32:47 -0400
> From: peopl...@verizon.net
> To: workers-internation...@googlegroups.com
> Date: Sat, 25 Jul 2015 10:32:47 -0400
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