AMERICAN LEFT HISTORY

This space is dedicated to the proposition that we need to know the history of the struggles on the left and of earlier progressive movements here and world-wide. If we can learn from the mistakes made in the past (as well as what went right) we can move forward in the future to create a more just and equitable society. We will be reviewing books, CDs, and movies we believe everyone needs to read, hear and look at as well as making commentary from time to time. Greg Green, site manager

Sunday, April 21, 2013

From The American Left History Blog Archives (2006) - On American Political Discourse

Markin comment:

In the period 2006-2009 I, in vain, attempted to put some energy into analyzing the blossoming American presidential campaign since it was to be, as advertised at least, a watershed election, for women, blacks, old white anglos, latinos, youth, etc. In the event I had to abandon the efforts in about May of 2008 when it became obvious, in my face obvious, that the election would be a watershed only for those who really believed that it would be a watershed election. The four years of the Obama presidency, the 2012 American presidential election campaign, and world politics have only confirmed in my eyes that that abandonment was essentially the right decision at the right time. In short, let the well- paid bourgeois commentators go on and on with their twitter. I, we, had (have) better things to do like fighting against the permanent wars, the permanent war economies, the struggle for more and better jobs, and for a workers party that fights for a workers government . More than enough to do, right? Still a look back at some of the stuff I wrote then does not a bad feel to it. Read on.

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YES, THE WAR NEWS FROM IRAQ IS GRIM- BUT THE WAR NEWS FROM WASHINGTON IS EVEN GRIMMER

COMMENTARY

THE TROOPS ARE NOT COMING HOME FOR THIS CHRISTMAS OR ANY CHRISTMAS SOON! NO TROOP ESCALATION IN IRAQ!

FORGET DONKEYS, ELEPHANTS AND GREENS- BUILD A WORKERS PARTY THAT FIGHTS FOR A WORKERS GOVERNMENT

Yes, the subject is Iraq, again. Yes, I have been something of a Johnny-one note on the subject since last spring. But hear me out. Every time I try to move away from the subject and onto more satisfying matters like a book review on some revolutionary struggle something unpleasant happens in Washington to upset my well laid plans. This time it is the apparent ‘victory’ of the “hawks” among the military brass and the neo-cons for the willing ear of George W. Bush over future Iraq War strategy. What we are prepared to get in that direction is not troop withdrawal but escalation. Moreover, there is serious talk in military circles of going after Sadr’s Madhi Army. This by the way is the army that has bloodied the American Army in the past, especially in Fallujah. If the Madhi Army’s backs are again the wall who knows what hell is in store.

Moreover, as Sadr is a major prop of the current wholly owned American puppet Iraqi government, such as it is, the smell of ‘regime change’ in Iraq is also in the air. Apparently the smell of ‘victory’ has once again gotten the better of rationality in Washington. Christ, will this madness never stop. I have noted, a little sarcastically, more than once before that in the quest for ‘stability’ in Iraq the grandchildren of the troops fighting in Iraq now will be joining grandfather and mother over there. With the current news I may not be that far off the mark.

In the wake of the publication of the Iraq Study Group Report (remember that surefire little plan) I have been raked over the coals by my liberal friends for being rather mean-spirited about the recommendations, or rather the chances of implementation. I have even, half-jokingly, stated that they will probably find President Bush’s copy of this document under some couch in the White House when he leaves office. Well, those liberal friends have had a whole week to savor their victory. Apparently I am not so far off on the eventual fate of that plan. It has been found under the couch already.

And if one thinks about it why would the Bush Administration render more than lip service to that report. First, it was congressionally-mandated and not a doctored job coming from the administration. Second, it came from “Poppy’s” crowd. Third, it makes ugly reading for any President six years into his term who is concerned with his place in history. Fourth, and this is the kicker, this is George W. Bush we are talking about. When he says he wants victory in Iraq, that he wants to ‘stay the course’ that is what he means. So grow up, please! Moreover, his place in history is already being etched in stone as one of the most dim-witted experiments bourgeois democracy has faced in its long and shady presidential history. However, unlike Lyndon Johnson and the effect of the Vietnam War escalations he faces no more elections. So why the hell not throw the dice for ‘victory’. After all they are HIS troops. What is the use of being Commander-in-Chief of American imperialism’s military forces if you cannot make sure that the troops are gainfully employed? Anti-war activists better know this and act, and I do mean act, accordingly. The only escalation we want is whatever number of troop transport drivers, humvee drivers, airplane pilots and seaman are necessary for the immediate, unconditional withdrawal from Iraq.

Below I am reposting a blog, written in the week of September 18, 2006 which more fully addresses the question of troop escalation. I stand by its political thrust today.

THE TROOPS ARE NOT COMING HOME FOR THIS CHRISTMAS OR ANY CHRISTMAS SOON!

COMMENTARY

IRAQ LOOKS MORE AND MORE LIKE VIETNAM EVERY DAY-IMMEDIATE WITHDRAWAL OF ALL UNITED STATES/ALLIED TROOPS!

FORGET DONKEYS, ELEPHANTS AND GREENS- BUILD A WORKERS PARTY

This writer for a long time has resisted the facile task route of comparing the situation in Iraq today to the Vietnam of some forty years ago. But it is getting harder and harder to do so. On the face of it the differences are obvious. In Vietnam revolutionary leftist forces were attempting to unify into one state that which by international diplomacy abetted by previous bouts of international Stalinist treachery had been artificial split. Furthermore, the defining concept behind the revolutionary forces there to resolve the agrarian question and the fight for what those forces conceived to be the road to socialism. Today in Iraq there are nationalist/sectarian forces which want to take revenge on the results of the European- derived Treaty of Versailles after World War I and divide this artificially created state-gun in hands. The fact that in Kurdish-controlled areas only the Kurdish flag can fly really says it all. Additionally, as far as this writer can tell, from the little known about murky underworld of radical Islamic politics there are no forces fighting for anything like a secular- democratic much less socialist solution to the problems there. Rather something like an Islamic Republic under repressive and anti-women Sharia law appears to be the favored political solution. However, those differences between the domestic forces in Iraq and Vietnam aside the real way Iraq today looks like Vietnam is the similarities in the role of American imperialism on the ground. The latest news this week, the week of September 18, 2006, coming from the central military command is there will be no draw down of troops any time soon. LET ME REPEAT- THERE WILL NOT BE ANY DRAW DOWN ANY TIME SOON. All those who foolishly believed that draw down would occur and did not take the Bush Administration at its word when it declared empathically that troops would not be withdrawn as long as it drew breathe should ponder this. More on this below.

There are starting to be voices heard, dormant for a while, spearheaded by the editors of National Review and other neo-con sources that the lesson to be learned from Iraq is that to really win in Iraq the Americans must sent in more troops. How much such sentiments are worth from these previous supporters of a quick and cheap airpower strategy is beside the point. What is noteworthy is that this premise is not an isolated sentiment even among alleged opponents of the war. And that, in a nutshell, is where the comparison to Vietnam comes into play. The hubris which led the Bush Administration into the quagmire of Iraq is still very much in play. The notion that in order rectify the original mistake of invasion more mistakes, such as increased troop levels, can solve the problem and bring victory where none is possible is the same mentality that led to all the escalations of the Vietnam era. Against all reason the Bushies of America and the world cannot believe that the situation is lost. Well, hell that is their problem. Militant leftists have other problems like organizing the opposition to worry over.

Additionally, President Bush himself is getting a little testy at the Prime Minister of Iraq. He cannot believe that at this late stage the wholly-owned American puppet government in Iraq hasn’t stepped up to its tasks of creating domestic tranquility. One should remember the names Diem and Thieu from Vietnamese history who got the same kinds of dressing-downs from previous American administrations. With that thought in mind let me ask this question. Is there anyone today on the planet outside the immediate Bush family that believes that the writ of the Iraqi government runs outside the Green Zone (and even that premise might be shaky)? These guys (and they are overwhelmingly men) never led anything, went into exile under Saddam rather than go underground and build a resistance movement and represent no one but themselves.

But, enough of that. The real question is what are we anti-war, anti-imperialist activists going to do about the situation. President Bush has been rightly accused of upping the security alerts during election time to highlight the security question that he has (successfully) used as a trump card to swing the electoral balance in his favor. The least well-known fact is that during the fall of election years, including this year, the leaderships of the reformist anti-war movements close down the nationally- centered demonstrations campaign which are the lynchpins of their politics. It is no secret that this is done to help so-called anti-war Democratic politicians or at least not be a source of embarrassment to their weak parliamentary opposition to the war. In a blog written this summer I wrote an open letter to the troops in Iraq. The thrust of the letter was that the conventional politicians, their own military leadership and the anti-war movement had left the troops in Iraq hanging in the wind. As we enter the fall electoral campaign this is truer than ever. I will repeat here what I stated there- if the troops are to withdraw from Iraq it will have to be on their own hook. Start forming the soldiers and sailors committees now. Militant leftists here must support those efforts. Unfortunately today there is no other way to end the war. FORWARD.

***Growing Up Absurd In The 1950s- In The Heart Of The Last Kiss Night

Scene: Prompted by the cover photograph, the memory cover photograph, which graced an “oldies but goodies” CD in a retro-classic (ouch!) rock and roll series. The photo, all black and white as befits a 1950s Kodak moment from Mother’s family photo album before color splashed photos, film, society after the red scare cold war cultural freeze, as might be expected, shows a he, let’s call him Johnny Riley all suited up, tie and white shirt, shirt collar maybe a little tight for a guy who usually wears open collar shirts (or jerseys when he is busting through the opposition’s line in his hungry search for gridiron glory and a ticket to State after highs school and a big chance to leave the dust of old North Adamsville behind, way behind) and a she, let’s call her Peggy McGuire all in fancy dress and she too maybe just a little uncomfortable in such attire since her daily wear runs to blouses and skirts), so both in formal attire dancing, half-dancing, half-embracing, half-kissing (wait a minute that is too many halves, right?). Kissing that last dance kiss as if their lives depended on it, and maybe it does. Or it had better be so else this scene will turn to ashes.
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Johnny Riley had been thinking, thinking hard about Peggy, Peggy McGuire, all day as he prepared himself in anticipation of his date with her for that night’s school dance over at the North Adamsville High gym. Although they had only gone out a few times, a few glorious down the day time beach, out to the movies, and after school bowling at Jake’s Bowling and pizza at Salducci’s times he was thinking hard about her just the same. Yah, it was getting to be like that. More pressing though was, if she liked him too, and he thought she might, what it would be like on their first kiss. She looked like a good kisser but kissing, although he didn’t have all that much experience at it truth to tell, wasn’t something you could tell about by looking; only doing. With that “wisdom” in mind he planned, planned hard, almost as hard as he was thinking about Peggy on how he would “work”around to that first kiss tonight. Yah, tonight was the night he thought to himself later as he made his final preparations, teeth brushed, check, mouth wash, check, deodorant, check, hair tonic-ed and combed, check. Ready.

And out the door with the keys to father’s, clueless father’s, automobile on loan, on special Johnny loan for this evening because Johnny’s father “liked” Peggy. Johnny wondered, wondered for just a second, whether his father and mother kissed, kissed in the way Johnny was thinking of kissing Peggy not that peck on the cheek early morning out the door stuff. Nah, no way. And as he drove to pick Peggy up Johnny went through his plan in his head one more time. At the dance he was going to dance all the slow dances real close and real physical to get her worked up a little. Then after the dance he would suggest that they go to Salducci’s for some pizza and then down the beach to “watch the submarine races.” Although he wouldn’t say that but more like it was nice night and let’s go down to the beach and watch the moon or something like that. The key though was to get her “in the mood” with that slow dancing.

Well, Johnny picked Peggy up, they talked in the car on the way over, just chitchat stuff, Johnny parked the car, and they went into the dance. No problems that far, and things were going according to Johnny plan because no sooner had they got there than the DJ played Fever by Little Willie John and Johnny “worked” his closeness magic and a few songs later with Long Lonely Nights by Lee Andrews and The Hearts. After intermission the DJ played Ivory Joe Hunter’s Empty Arms, a song, no question, designed to bring lips together. And Johnny could sense that Peggy, every time he held her closer, didn’t try to back off but just followed his lead and stayed close. Yes, this was going to be the night. A couple of songs they sat out as both agreed they were drippy like old foggy Pat Boone’s April Love and Lloyd Price’s Just Because.

Then Elvis’ Love Me came on and they got up again to dance. About two seconds into the dance Peggy gave Johnny the biggest kiss he had ever received in his life, not a long kiss but big, big with meaning, kiss. Right on the dance floor. And then Peggy said she had enough of dancing and since it was such a nice night maybe they could go down to the beach to cool off and “watch the submarine races.” See, as hard as Johnny was thinking about Peggy that day, Peggy McGuire was thinking just a little harder about him, and about why he was taking so long to give her a first kiss like he didn’t want to. So a girl had to take things in hand sometimes. Of course old clueless Johnny only found this out, between kisses, as they were watching those submarine races on that nice night down at the beach. Thanks Elvis.

***Out In The 1950s Film Noir Night-Barbara Stanwyck and Sterling Hayden’sCrime Of Passion

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

Sal Mario was there, there at Sammy Snyder’s Bar over on Wiltshire , the bar where the regular L.A. cops, the regular drinking cops anyway, came after a big case to blow off steam, to have a few quick ones before heading home to the ball and chain, the kids ,the second mortgage and Benny the dog’s latest vet story (and big bill), or to pick up a stray dame or two for company if it was a weekend night, when Bill Doyle came in after he sent her over. Yes, Bill, every inch a cop, an L.A. cop, had sent his wife over, sent her over for the big one, the step- off for the big one. He looked like he would shoot the first person who spoke to him, who offered to buy him a drink, or maybe just looked at him the wrong way. And at six- two and two hundred and twenty pounds of pure man, pure tough cop man he could enforce that, enforce it like he had been doing on the force for over ten years, and before that going back to when he a kid on the block, a block on the L.A. mean streets. Then he sat down at the lonely bar a couple of seats away from Sal’s stool and ordered a couple of quick double scotches, downed them quickly and ordered two more. After that second pair he started to turn around and look at his environment, look at the sights he had seen on many previous occasions when he had been here with her. Then he spotted Sal, Sal the police beat reporter he had known off and on for a few years and called him over. Sal had seen too many guys around too many bars to not know that Bill had something he wanted to spill, to get off his chest, and so he obliged Bill and here, off the record, is the gist of what Sergeant Bill Doyle had to say.

He and the Captain (Captain Tom Allen) had been up in Frisco on the Dana case, the case of a woman who had put three slugs square in the chest of her ever-loving husband and fled to Frisco town with her lover. Sal remembered the case, and remembered that Bill had worked like a dog to find her, and the lover, and bring her to justice and got all kinds of kudos from the department for bringing her back alive. (He also remembered that she successfully pled a crime of passion, the jury bought the argument, the murder two argument, and she therefore did not walk to the big step-off.). It was on that case, and through a tip from a newspaper reporter, that he met his wife, Kathy. She had been the reporter, they had danced around each for a while on that case, then they went out for drinks after the capture of the Dana woman, and they struck it off right away. Bill muttered to Sal some stuff about the stars and soul- mates and stuff like that. Guy smitten stuff that he had heard for a thousand years, stuff that he had said himself at least a half dozen times about a few of his relationships. She went with him to the airport to see him off and they left things like that, well, kind of like that. He couldn’t get her off his mind, and apparently she couldn’t get him off her mind either and so a few days after he got back from Frisco he called her up out of the blue, asked her to come down to L.A. and that was that. They were married a couple of days later. Sal thought to himself that something was awry the minute that he heard that introduction. He had been married three times himself (now single and looking hence his perch at Sammy’s) and knew, knew for a certified fact, that while a man, and maybe a woman too for that matter, could have a slight dalliance, a fling, a couple of hot sweaty L.A. nights based on some star-crossed minute love attachment but getting married on the fly like that, well, well that was not written in the stars.

It started out written in the stars though the way Bill described that first blush of married life but soon a perky, energetic, upscale, striving woman like Kathy felt hemmed in by the stultifying life of the wife of a 1950s rank and file cop. Hemmed in by the ladies’ card game socials, hemmed in by the exchange of the latest recipes, felt hemmed in by the talk of the latest off- the- rack dresses bought on layaway with a cop’s pay, hemmed in by the nine to five do the job, retire and play golf existence. It might be alright for Emmy, Sue, Alice, Fay and the rest of the cop wives but not for one Kathy Doyle (nee Riley, and proud of her feisty Irish heritage). And so she, since she really did love Bill, loved his big brawny big lug ways, loved his, well, pillow talk ways, if anybody was asking, started scheming, scheming her way (Bill’s way) to the top of the heap, to the soft get out of the streets cop life in Central with the big boys who gave the orders and took no chances.

Stop number one was to clear the way for Bill, get the competition out of the way, and so she went after Captain Tom, and as was the nature of things his ever-loving wife. She succeeded in poisoning the partners so much that one night in the squad room they came to blows (and almost to guns). Yes, that Kathy appeared to be able stir up as much trouble as her pretty little brain could muster. That part was easy, that beating down Tom part. They shipped him out to some Central Avenue detail harassing the Mex population. The tougher part was to get to the Inspector, Tony, and his sweet desk job at Central shipping guys out to hot spots and danger while smoking a cigarette and having bottom of the desk shots of whiskey. This Tony was good-looking guy (Sal knew him from the old neighborhood over near the La Brea tar pits and he had the ladies following him even then) and smart, street smart, dame smart (sorry) and so when Kathy took straight aim at him he played the cards that were dealt to him. And that is where Kathy overplayed her hand. Her strategy of bedding him, getting her hooks into him, getting them in good and deep, and then maybe blackmailing him off of the force would have worked on a stup like Bill maybe but Tony had been down this road before and so he took his pleasure, took what he could get of pillows and sweaty nights, and thought nothing of it. He didn’t think that Bill had the brains that god gave geese and he made it plain that he wasn’t moving Bill off the streets, or of moving anywhere that would do the Doyles any good.

Now sometimes when a dame (sorry woman) overplays her hand she just walks away but between love, treachery and desire, the headstrong Kathy could not believe that Tony would play his hand that way. That bothered her, bothered her to perdition, and so she had another plan. Well maybe not so much a plan as a knot in her stomach and brain. Tony must fall, must fall so Bill could live. So she got herself a gun (easily picked up on the mean streets of L.A. where the Wild West had not totally receded into the Hollywood Hills). She made the trek to Tony’s house out in Westwood by the university, confronted him one more time, and then put a quick and thoughtless 38 slug right through his head. Then she coolly walked out the door, got into her car, and went home to bed. Simple, done.

Nah, not simple. The murder of a cop, even a desk-bound cop, calls for vengeance, vengeance to the high heavens and so Bill Doyle, a good leg man in a homicide case, was put through his paces, worked the details out, and it came out Kathy and only Kathy. She planned on that, maybe, not that the finger would point to her right away but that when the shoe dropped Bill would protect her, protect his woman, would shield her from the cold cruel world. Sal thought as Bill finished up that Kathy had certainly overplayed her hand, had forgotten what Bill had told her one night after some sweaty exertions under the sheets, that he was all cop, straight up cop. And that was why he was sitting in Sammy’s sucking up regret scotches and telling his story to Sal. Sal nodded that he understood Bill’s pain. After a parting scotch Bill got up, shook Sal’s hand, and headed to the door. As he was about to open the door he shouted out to Sal, “Maybe if she plays her cards right she can do like the Dana woman did, plead crime of passion, and maybe, just maybe, a jury will buy it. If so I will have many sleepless nights waiting for her to get out, if not and they give her the big step- off well that’s just the way the deal went down.”

***From The May Day 2012 Organizing Archives –May Day 2013 Needs The Same Efforts

Boston's International Workers Day 2013

BMDC International Workers Day Rally
Wednesday, May 1, 2013 at Boston City Hall
Gather at 2PM - Rally at 2:30PM
(Court St. & Cambridge St.)
T stops Government Center (Blue line, Green line)

To download flyer click here. (Please print double-sided)

Other May Day events:

Revere - @ City Hall - gather at 3:pmbegin marching at 3:30 (to Chelsea)
Everett - @ City Hall - gather at 3:pm begin marching at 3:30 (to Chelsea)
Chelsea - @ City Hall - rally a 3:pm (wait for above feeder marches to arrive) will begin marching at 4:30 (to East Boston)
East Boston - @ Central Square - (welcome marchers) Rally at 5:pm

BMDC will join the rally in East Boston immediately following Boston City Hall rally

Supporters: ANSWER Coalition, Boston Anti Authoritarian Movement, Boston Rosa Parks Human Rights Day Committee, Greater Boston Stop the Wars Coalition, Harvard No-Layoffs Campaign, Industrial Workers of the World, Latinos for Social Change, Mass Global Action, Sacco & Vanzetti Commemoration Society, Socialist Alternative, Socialist Party of Boston, Socialist Workers Party, Student Labor Action Movement, USW Local 8751 - Boston School Bus Drivers Union, Worcester Immigrant Coalition, National Immigrant Solidarity Network, Democracy Center - Cambridge, Cambridge, Cambridge/Somerville/Arlington United for Justice with Peace, International Socialist Organization, Community Church of Boston

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Why You (Your Union) Need(s) To Join The May Day 2012 General Strike-Stand Up!-Fight Back!

Wage cuts, long work hours, steep consumer price rises, unemployment, small or no pensions, little or no paid vacation time, plenty of poor and inadequate housing, homelessness, and wide-spread sicknesses as a result of a poor medical system or no health insurance. Sound familiar? Words, perhaps, taken from today’s global headlines? Well, yes. But these were also the similar conditions that faced our forebears in America back in the 1880s when the 1% were called, and rightly so, “the robber barons,” and threatened, as one of their kind stated in a fit of candor, “to hire one half of the working class to kill the other half,” so that they could maintain their luxury in peace. That too has not changed.

What did change then is that our forebears fought back, fought back long and hard, starting with the fight for the eight-hour day symbolized each year by a May Day celebration of working class power. We need to reassert that claim. This May Day let us revive that tradition as we individually act around our separate grievances and strike, strike like the furies, collectively against the 1%.

No question over the past several years (really decades but it is just more public and in our face now) American working people has taken it on the chin, taken it on the chin in every possible way. Starting with massive job losses, heavy job losses in the service and manufacturing sectors (and jobs that are not coming back), paying for the seemingly never-ending bail–out of banks, other financial institutions and corporations “to big to fail,” home foreclosures and those “under water,” effective tax increases (since the rich refuse to pay, we pay), mountains of consumer debt for everything from modern necessities to just daily get-bys, and college student loan debt as a lifetime deadweight around the neck of the kids there is little to glow about in the harsh light of the “American Dream.”

Add to that the double (and triple) troubles facing immigrants, racial and ethnic minorities, and women and the grievances voiced in the Declaration of Independence seem like just so much whining. In short, it is not secret that working people have faced, are facing and, apparently, will continue to face an erosion of their material well-being for the foreseeable future something not seen by most people since the 1930s Great Depression, the time of our grandparents (or great-grandparents).

That is this condition will continue unless we take some lessons from those same 1930s and struggle, struggle like demons, against the 1% that seem to have all the card decks stacked against us. Struggle like they did in places like Minneapolis, San Francisco, Toledo, Flint, and Detroit. Those labor-centered struggles demonstrated the social power of working people to hit the “economic royalists” (the name coined for the 1% of that day) to shut the bosses down where it hurts- in their pocketbooks and property. The bosses will let us rant all day, will gladly take (and throw away) all our petitions, will let us use their “free-speech” parks (up to a point as we have found out), and curse them to eternity as long as we don’t touch their production, “perks,” and profits. Moreover an inspired fight like the actions proposed for this May Day 2012 can help new generations of working people, organized, unorganized, unemployed, homeless, houseless, and just plain desperate, help themselves to get out from under.

Show Power

We demand:

*Hands Off Our Public Worker Unions! Hands Off All Our Unions!

* Give the unemployed work! Billions for public works projects to fix America’s broken infrastructure (bridges, roads, sewer and water systems, etc.)!

*End the endless wars!

* Full citizenship rights for all those who made it here no matter how they got here!

* A drastic increase in the minimum wage and big wage increases for all workers!

·
* A moratorium on home foreclosures! No evictions!

* A moratorium on student loan debt! Free, quality higher education for all! Create 100, 200, many publicly-supported Harvards!

*No increases in public transportation fares! No transportation worker lay-offs! Free public transportation!

To order to flex our collective bottom up power on May 1, 2012 we will be organizing
a wide-ranging series of mass collective participatory actions:

*We will be organizing within our unions- or informal workplace organizations where
there is no union - a one-day general strike.

*We will be organizing where a strike is not possible to call in sick, or take a personal day, as part of a coordinated “sick-out.”

*We will be organizing students to walk-out of their schools (or not show up in the first place), set up campus picket lines, or to rally at a central location, probably Boston Common.

*We will be calling in our communities for a mass consumer boycott, and with local business support where possible, refuse to make purchases on that day.

Watch this website and other social media sites for further specific details of events and actions.

All out on May Day 2012.

***From The May Day 2012 Organizing Archives –May Day 2013 Needs The Same Efforts

Boston's International Workers Day 2013

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May Day 2012

Collective statement of Occupy May 1st, an organizing group calling for

a campaign to build for an international general strike and mass day of

action!

Last fall there were a wave of repressive attacks on, and evictions of,

various Occupy camp sites throughout the country including where the movement

started in Zucotti (Liberty) Park. But even before the evictions and

repression escalated, questions were being asked: what is the way forward for the movement? And the ubiquitous what do we want. We now have glimpses of organizing and action that are leading the way and shining a light for the rest of us to follow: the Oakland General Strike on November 2^nd , the West Coast Port Shutdown actions of December 12^th , Occupy Foreclosures, and other actions most recently support for the struggles of the hard-pressed longshoremen in Longview, Washington. These actions show that, fundamentally, all of the strategic questions revolve around the question of power. The power , put simply, of the 99% vs. the power of the 1%

Although the 99% holds enormous power -all wealth is generated, and the

current society is built and maintained through, the collective labor

(paid and unpaid) of the 99%-, we do not frequently exercise this

collective power in our own interests. Too often, abetted and egged on by the 1% , we fruitlessly fight among ourselves over racism, patriarchy, xenophobia, occupational elitism, geographical prejudice, heterosexism, and other forms of division, oppression and prejudice.

This debilitating phenomena is necessary, along with its control of politics, the courts, the prisons, the cops and the military for the 1% to maintain control because their power is only

exercised by different segments of the 99% actively oppressing and

working against other segments of the 99%, in addition to us neither being fully

>> aware of, nor organizing to utilize, the collective power we have. The

>> result is that many segments of the the 99%- people of color, women,

>> GLBTQ, immigrants, those with less formal educational credentials, those

>> in less socially respected occupations or unemployed, the homeless, and

>> others- deal with overlapping forms of oppression and societal

>> prejudice; all of us remain divided amongst each other; and the 1% continues to

>> increase their power and wealth because of this.

>> Currently, the state of the economy has hit all of us (some facing

>> overlapping prejudice and oppression, harder than others). There are too

>> many people out of work; our pay has barely or hasn’t kept up with

>> rising costs; our social services have continued to be cut; our influence on

>> government has eroded; and our civil liberties have been attacked. This

>> has been going on while the elites of this country have captured an

>> increasing share of wealth; have had the highest decreases in the amount

>> of taxes they pay; have attacked our social services and organizations

>> of popular defense (such as our unions and community organizations); and

>> have consolidated to an even greater degree their power over politics. The

>> Business Insider- ironically- provides one of the more useful series of

>> charts that root the Occupy movement’s concerns in the sobering

>> historical fact that we experience.[i]

>> The way forward must involve building and showing our popular power

>> against that of the elite. But the form of our power must be different

>> from theirs: we must fight fire with water. Where they exercise

>> hierarchical power over us to dominate, control, exploit and oppress; we

>> must build and exercise horizontal, bottom-up power with each other to

>> cooperate, liberate and collectively empower each other. We need to

>> organize ourselves autonomously from all forms of hierarchical power

>> relations in our communities, schools and workplaces to fight

>> collectively for our interests. This must include a rejection of attempts to divide

>> and rule us; a rejection of racism, patriarchy, xenophobia, elitism and

>> other forms of oppression; a rejection of attempts by electoral parties,

>> powerful special interest groups and others to co-opt and control our

>> movement.

>> The camp occupations built the movement and brought global attention to

>> the variety of concerns of the 99%. They inspired many; provided a sense

>> of hope and solidarity; brought economic justice and the problems of

>> power inequality back into spotlight of national conversation; highlighted the

>> need for cultures, societies and institutions of direct democracy based

>> on "power with"- not "power over"- each other; served as a spaces of

>> convergence for sharing ideas and planning action; and in some camps,

>> they even provided a temporary space for those who needed a home and a

>> community where folks could face less harassment than they normally

>> faced. The camp occupations have served a fundamental role in the movement; but

>> it’s time to move beyond them.

>> We need to develop the movement beyond the camp because the majority of

>> the 99% can’t camp out in a city center. The majority of the 99% have

>> obligations and vulnerabilities that prevent them from such

>> time-consuming, geographically-specific action including: work, school,

>> responsibilities in caring for children or other dependents, particular

>> health needs, etc. So in order for us to truly exercise our power as the

>> 99% and to truly be participatory, we need to find ways where all of us

>> can participate, and be valued, in whatever capacity and with whatever

>> time we have to contribute. We need our action to be as participatory,

>> diverse and widespread as possible. We must boldly show and build our

>> collective power.

>> Show Power

To show our power, on May 1st, 2012, we will be organizing for such a

>> mass participatory and bold collective action: a national general strike,

>> mass boycott, student strike/ walk-out and mass day of action. We will be

>> organizing within our unions- or informal workplace organizations where

>> there’s no union or the union isn’t supportive- to hold a one-day

>> general strike. Where a strike is not possible, we will be organizing people to

>> call in sick, or take a personal day, as part of a coordinated

>> “sick-out”.

Those who are students will be walking-out of their schools (or not

showing up in the first place). In the community, we will be holding a

mass boycott and refusing to make any purchase on that day.

This action will necessarily be a symbolic show of power because any

decrease in economic activity that day will likely be compensated for by

purchases and extra work activity the days before and after May 1st. But

it will be symbolic in the way a cannon shot across the bow of a ship is

symbolic: it doesn’t do any damage; but it warns our opponent that we

are willing and able to damage their boat if necessary. And perhaps just as

important as the day itself, the massive organizing and outreach efforts

in the months leading up to May 1st will allow us the opportunity to

talk to our co-workers, families, neighbors, communities, and friends about

the issues of the 99%, the source of our power, the need for us to stand up

to the attacks we are facing, the need to confront the various oppressions

that keep most of us down in one way or another (some of especially so)

and all of us divided, and the need for us to stand in solidarity with

each other to fight for our collective interests, which is structurally,

and therefore inherently, against the interests of the 1%. We can build

our collective consciousness, capacity, and confidence through this

process; and come out stronger because of it.

>> Build Power

In addition to showing our power on May 1st, we need to build bases of

popular, bottom-up, collective, anti-oppressive and anti-hierarchical

power in our workplaces, communities, and schools. So we will be doing a

variety of workshops, building a variety of organizing campaigns, and

engaging a variety of actions on the local level to contribute to the

building of such collective power. Some of the workshops, campaigns and

actions that we will develop and engage in include: organizing new

unions, becoming more active in participatory unions; making our hierarchical

unions more participatory; occupying foreclosures; building tenant

unions; blocking evictions; preventing foreclosures; and creating solidarity

networks, to name a few. We will not be co-opted by electoral parties,

or hierarchical organizations looking to use the movement to serve their

interest while diffusing our power. Instead we will organize, educate,

and agitate where we are at to build power with each other and to fight

directly for our interests: the interests of popular power against the

interests of elite power. All of us must contribute for this effort to

be effective; but, to the greatest degree possible, those contributions

must be collective in nature because our true power is in our solidarity with

each other.

Through this effort we are looking to offer real solutions to addressing

issues of immediate concern where each of us is at, through direct

collective action from the bottom-up. The goal is to continue the

ongoing shift currently happening within the movement from just mobilizing, to

organizing (or to move from mobilization, to massification[ii]).

Mobilizing is necessary, but it is not enough. We can’t just call people

out to engage in action. We need to build the networks, organizations

and campaigns that provide the opportunities for an ever greater number of

people to participate in the decision-making process and functioning of

the autonomous popular organizations we are creating. Our movement is

leaderless, which also means that we all must be leaders. But the

leadership we build is again, with, not over, others. We need to all

truly listen to and support each other in developing our consciousness,

capacities and confidence. We need to see the fights against the various

oppressions which keep folks down and divide the 99% against itself, as

central to, not distractions from, the effectiveness of our struggle. We

must discourage and isolate egotistical, self-serving and movement-killing

tendencies we encounter while encouraging and developing collective,

liberatory and movement-building tendencies. Our participatory,

bottom-up networks, organizations and campaigns will be the way through which we

build our power and make small gains in the medium term. But they will

also serve as the basis for a new world that we are building toward.

This new world in our hearts that we are building and showing, within

the shell of the old one that we are confronting, is one in which people

share power with, not over, each other. It's where workers themselves

democratically control their workplaces; where everyone can find

meaningful, socially-useful and balanced work that is carried out in

comfortable conditions. It's where those who aren't able to work (or who

have put in their share of their lifetime) are taken care of by society;

where we abolish rulers over us and instead societies directly decide

for themselves how to live, develop and grow. It's where our environments

are healthy, beautiful and sustainable; where we all have the educational

and social opportunities to develop and contribute our full capacities to

our families and societies. It's where people can live in nice homes and

safe communities, get their health needs fully taken care of, eat healthy and

well, and not have to worry about meeting their needs or the needs of

their families; where we can all have time and resources to enjoy life;

and where the global human society is driven not by competition,

oppression, exploitation, domination and war; but by love, freedom and

solidarity. We, the 99%, will build our power and show our power until

we've occupied our workplaces, our communities, our schools, our lives,

our world... until we've occupied everything!

>> [i]

>> http://www.businessinsider.com/what-wall-street-protesters-are-so-angry-about-2011-10?op=1

>> [ii] http://libcom.org/library/mobilisation-massification

> "Existence precedes and commands essence." (Sartre)

Saturday, April 20, 2013

***Growing Up Absurd In The 1950s-In The Heart Of The Late Dance Night

*******
“I don’t understand why it took you so long to ask me out, Mr. James Callahan,” murmured Kathy Kelly as they clasped hands in anticipation of the last dance. Jimmy mumbled, or it seemed like mumbling to Kathy, that he was shy, that he was busy, that he wasn’t sure that she even noticed him, or if she did notice him, liked him. Kids’ stuff, typical guy kids’ stuff, thought Kathy. But just now, unbelievably, the last dance, the last sweet time high school dance before facing the red scare Cold War world and whatever it held out in that 1957 night, was to begin. But that world stuff was for tomorrow tonight Kathy has finally, finally, snagged the boy she has been mooning over for, well, let’s leave it as a long time, long before rock ‘n’ roll made it easier for a guy like Jimmy Callahan to ask a girl like Kathy Kelly out on to the dance floor without having to get all balled up in following the leader close dancing, sweaty palms and all. Now though was the time for slow dancing, slow last dance dancing and two-left feet, two left-shoeless feet, heck, two left-snow-shoed feet or not, Jimmy, as Kathy beamed to herself, was snagged.

Kathy looking resplendent in her Filene’s finest formal dress, complete with lacy see-though shawl, and topped off with a Jimmy corsage, a corsage that spoke more powerfully to her victory than ten million dances, and that finally felt that it all was worth it feeling like another ten million. Worth the every trick in the book that she had to pull out of the hat in order that he would “ask” her to their senior prom, the last chance Kathy would get to claim her Jimmy before he left for State later in the summer. Just that hand-clasped moment she hoped, hoped to the stars above, that they played her “they” song, a song that she had been listening to with Jimmy last dance dancing in mind since, well, you already know, a long time.

That right choice might also be the last chance to put her mark on him, although earlier in the evening she sensed something, something unsaid, when they played 16 Candles by the Crests and Jimmy mumbled something about how he was sorry that he couldn’t make it to her 16th birthday party, although Kathy had gone through six levels of hell to try and get him there. Then he kind of backed off when they played Patsy Cline’s cover of Crazy and right after that he said he didn’t understand how someone could keep on “carrying the torch” when the love affair was over. And he was definitely moody when they played I’m Sorry by Brenda Lee, calling it drippy. He lightened up a little when they played in In The Still Of The Night by the Five Satins and said he loved doo wop, proving it by knowing all the words and doing some fine harmony in his deep bass voice.

Suddenly some awfully familiar music started up and the last dance began, the last dance ending with Only You by The Platters. And just as the Platters got into the heart of the song, the heart-felt “only you”part, Jimmy, red-faced, shy, two left-feet Jimmy, asked Miss Kathy Kelly if she would come up and visit him at State in the fall. Ah, very heaven.

On Lenin’s Birthday- THE HANDBOOK FOR REVOLUTIONARY PRACTICE IN THE AGE OF IMPERIALISM

BOOK REVIEW

‘LEFT-WING’ COMMUNISM-AN INFANTILE DISORDER, V.I. LENIN, INTERNATIONAL PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK, 1962

An underlying premise of the Lenin-led Bolshevik Revolution in Russian in 1917 was that success there would be the first episode in a world-wide socialist revolution. While a specific timetable was not placed on the order of the day the early Bolshevik leaders, principally Lenin and Trotsky, both assumed that those events would occur in the immediate post-World War I period, or shortly thereafter. Alas, such was not the case, although not from lack of trying on the part of an internationalist-mined section of the Bolshevik leadership. Another underlying premise, developed by the Leninists as part of their opposition to the imperialist First World War, was the need for a new revolutionary labor international to replace the compromised and moribund Socialist International (also known as the Second International) which had turned out to be useless as an instrument for revolution or even of opposition to the European war. The Bolsheviks took that step after seizing power and established the Communist International (also known as the Comintern or Third International) in 1919. As part of the process of arming that international with a revolutionary strategy (and practice) Lenin produced this polemic to address certain confusions, some willfully, that had arisen in the European left and attempted to instill some of the hard-learned lessons of the Russian revolutionary experience in them.

The Russian Revolution and after it the Comintern in the early heroic days, for the most part, drew the best and most militant layers of the working class and radical intellectuals to their defense. However, that is not the same as drawing experienced Bolsheviks to that defense. Many militants were anti-parliamentarian or anti-electoral in principle after the sorry experiences with the European social democracy. Others wanted to emulate the old heroic days of the Bolshevik underground party or create a minority, exclusive conspiratorial party. Still others wanted to abandon the reformist bureaucratically-led trade unions to their current leaderships, and so on. Lenin’s polemic, and it nothing but a flat-out polemic against all kinds of misconceptions of the Bolshevik experience, cut across these erroneous ideas like a knife. His literary style may not appeal to today’s audience but the political message still has considerable application today. At the time it was written no less a figure than James P. Cannon, a central leader of the American Communist Party, credited the pamphlet with straightening out that badly confused movement (Indeed, it seems every possible political problem Lenin argued against had some following in the American Party-in triplicate!). That alone makes it worth a look at.

I would like to highlight one point made by Lenin that has currency for leftists today, unfortunately. At the time it was written many (most) of the communist organizations adhering to the Comintern were little more than propaganda groups (including the American Party). Lenin suggested one of the ways to break out of that isolation was a tactic of critical support to the still large and influential social democratic organizations at election time. In his apt expression- to support those organizations like a rope supports a hanging man. However, as part of my political experiences in America around election time I have run into any number of ‘socialists’ and ‘communists’ who have turned Lenin’s concept on its head. How? By arguing that militants needed to ‘critically support’ the Democratic Party (who else, right?) as an application of the Leninist criterion for critical support. No, a thousand times no. Lenin’s specific example was the reformist British Labor Party, a party at that time (and to a lesser extent today) solidly based on the trade unions- organizations of the working class and no other. The Democratic Party in America was then, is now and will always be a capitalist party. Yes, the labor bureaucrats and ordinary workers support it, finance it, drool over it but in no way is it a labor party. That is the class difference which even sincere militants have broken their teeth on for at least the last seventy years. And that, dear reader, is another reason why it worthwhile to take a peek at this book.

***When Beat Was Neat - An Angel Elegy In A Dust-Filled World- For Allen Ginsberg

DVD Review

Allen Ginsberg: An Elegy, Allen Ginsberg and assorted “beat” and non-“beat” modern poets and admirers, 2004

If a rough dictionary definition of an elegy is a poem of lament and praises for the dead then this little documentary tribute to the seemingly very inelegant (life-style, unkempt beard, rumpled clothes at least until later in life, the professorial life) Allen Ginsberg is the correct term here in celebration of his life that ended in 1997. I have discussed elsewhere the central role that Ginsberg played in both the “beat” literary movement of the 1950s and the godfather of the “hippie” counterculture “expressive” movement of the 1960s. I have also mentioned the influence that he had (and they over him as more material from this period, especially from his “Journals” have come to publication) on his fellow literary figures from the earlier period, Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs, Gary Snyder, Neal Cassady and too many others to list here properly.

I have also spoken about the influence and affect such classic Ginsberg poems as Howl and Kaddish had on me when I first read and then heard them. No, not at the time they were written and read, especially that famous (or infamous) reading of Howl in that ‘garage’ gallery filled to the brim with wines and wind songs in San Francisco in 1956. What could a ten year old boy from the 1950s housing projects make of a Whitmanesque-driven plea to rethink the contours of modern American industrial society, especially of a then pious Catholic boy in regard to a Jewish writer who swore and talked about homosexuality in a positive sense, to boot? Moreover, Brother Ginsberg did not “speak” to me even during the height of the “hippie” movement but rather a little latter when I actually heard his work read both by himself and others. The essential blues rhythm beat that I believe influenced and drove his work finally meshed with the blues beat in my own head.

And that last point from the last sentence is exactly the point the producers of this effect have tried to reach for by bringing many of the poets from Ginsberg’s time, most importantly Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Gary Snyder, and some of those who were influenced by him to read from his work and share their recollections. Additionally, as seems to be just right for a poet who whatever his vast literary abilities was very aware of the need to play the troubadour to get his work before the public, there are plenty of segments of his reading himself, especially the lyrical Father Death Blues poem which ends the presentation. Kudos to all kinds of people here from the poem readers to those like Anne Charters who have spent their whole academic careers trying to get the word out about the importance of the “beats” to the modern American literary tradition. Yes, beat and blues that is the essential Ginsberg language. It might be underappreciated now, but we need it more than ever as we face the “monster’ of today’s version of the American post-industrial society that kind of snuck up on us after Brother Ginsberg warned us away from that fate.

Honor Vladimir Lenin On His Birthday

HONOR THE THREE L’S-LENIN, LUXEMBURG, LIEBKNECHT

Every January leftists honor three revolutionaries who died in that month, V.I. Lenin of Russia in 1924, Karl Liebknecht of Germany and Rosa Luxemburg of Poland in 1919 murdered after leading the defeated Spartacist uprising in Berlin. I made my political points about the heroic Karl Liebknecht and his parliamentary fight against the German war budget in World War I in this space earlier (see review in April 2006 archives). I made some special points here last year about the life of Rosa Luxemburg (see review in January 2006 archives). This year it is appropriate, at a time when the young needs to find a few good heroes, to highlight the early struggles of Vladimir Lenin, the third L, to define himself politically. Probably the best way to do that is to look at Lenin’s experiences through the prism of his fellow revolutionary, early political opponent and eventual co-leader of the Bolshevik Revolution Leon Trotsky.

A Look At The Young Lenin By A Fellow Revolutionary

The Young Lenin, Leon Trotsky, Doubleday and Co., New York, 1972

The now slightly receding figure of the 20^th century Russian revolutionary Vladimir Lenin founder and leader of the Bolshevik Party and guiding light of the October 1917 Russian Revolution and the first attempt at creating a socialist society has been the subject to many biographies. Some of those efforts undertaken during the time of the former Soviet government dismantled in 1991-92, especially under the Stalin regime, bordered on or were merely the hagiographic. Others, reflecting the ups and downs of the post World War II Cold War, painted an obscene diabolical picture, excluding Lenin’s horns, and in some cases not even attempting to exclude those. In virtually all cases these effort centered on Lenin’s life from the period of the rise of the Bolshevik Social Democratic faction in 1903 until his early death in 1924. In short, the early formative period of his life in the backwaters of provincial Russia rate a gloss over. Lenin’s fellow revolutionary Leon Trotsky, although some ten years younger than him, tries to trace that early stage of his life in order to draw certain lessons. It is in that context that Trotsky’s work contains some important insights about the development of revolutionary figures and their beginnings.

Although Trotsky’s little work, originally intended to be part of a full biography of Lenin, never served its purpose of educating the youth during his lifetime and the story of it discovery is rather interesting one should note that this is neither a scholarly work in the traditional sense nor is it completely free from certain fawning over Lenin by Trotsky. Part of this was determined by the vicissitudes of the furious Trotsky-Stalin fights for the soul of the Russian Revolution as Trotsky tried to uncover the layers of misinformation about Lenin’s early life. Part of it resulted from Trotsky’s status of junior partner to Lenin and also to his late coming over to Bolshevism. And part of it is, frankly, to indirectly contrast Lenin’s and his own road to Marxism. That said, this partial biography stands up very well as an analysis of the times that the young Lenin lived in, the events that affected his development and the idiosyncrasies of his own personality that drove him toward revolutionary conclusions. In short, Trotsky’s work is a case study in the proposition that revolutionaries are made not born.

To a greater extent than would be true today in a celebrity-conscious world many parts of Lenin’s early life are just not verifiable. Partially that is due to the nature of record keeping in the Russia of the 19^th century. Partially it is because of the necessity to rely on not always reliable police records. Another part is that the average youth, and here Lenin was in some ways no exception, really have a limited noteworthy record to present for public inspection. That despite the best efforts of Soviet hagiography to make it other wise. Nevertheless Trotsky does an admirable job of detailing the high and low lights of agrarian Russian society and the vagaries of the land question in the second half of the 19^thcentury. One should note that Trotsky grew up on a Ukrainian farm and therefore is no stranger to many of the same kind of problems that Lenin had to work through concerning the solution to the agrarian crisis, the peasant question. Most notably, is that the fight for the Russian revolution that every one knew was coming could only be worked out through the fight for influence over the small industrial working class and socialism.

I would note that for the modern young reader that two things Trotsky analyzes are relevant. The first is the relationship between Lenin and his older brother Alexander who, when he became politicized, joined a remnant of the populist People’s Will terrorist organization and attempted to asassinate the Tsar. For his efforts he and his co-conspirators were hanged. I have always been intrigued by the effect that this event had on Lenin’s development. On the one hand, as a budding young intellectual, would Lenin have attempted to avenge his brother’s fate with his same revolutionary intellectual political program? Or would Lenin go another way to intersect the coming revolutionary either through its agrarian component or the budding Marxist Social Democratic element? We know the answer but Trotsky provides a nicely reasoned analysis of the various influences that were at work in the young Lenin. That alone is worth the price of admission here.

The other point I have already alluded to above. Revolutionaries are made not born, although particular life circumstances may create certain more favorable conditions. Soviet historians in their voluntarist hay day tried to make of Lenin a superhuman phenomenon- a fully formed Marxist intellectual from his early youth. Trotsky once again distills the essence of Lenin’s struggle to make sense of the world, the Russian world in the first instance, as he tries to find a way out the Russian political impasse. Trotsky’s work only goes up to 1892-93, the Samara period, the period before Lenin took off for Petersburg and greener pastures. He left Samara a fully committed Marxist but it would be many years, with many polemics and by using many political techniques before he himself became a Bolshevik, as we know it. And that, young friends, is a cautionary tale that can be taken into the 21^st century. Read on.

AMERICAN LEFT HISTORY

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Saturday, April 20, 2013

Honor Vladimir Lenin On His Birthday

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