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Wednesday, May 07, 2014
Thursday
Tuesday, May 06, 2014
The Latest From The United National Anti-War Coalition (UNAC) Website- Immediate, Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S./Allied Troops, Mercenaries, Contractors, Etc. From Afghanistan! Hands Off Iran! -Hands Off Syria! -Hands Off Ukraine!
Click below to link to the United National Anti-War Coalition (UNAC) website for more information about various anti-war, anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist actions around the country.
https://unacpeace.org/Markin comment
Every once in a while it is necessary, if for no other reason than to proclaim from the public square that we are alive, and fighting, to show “the colors,” our anti-war colors. While, as I have mentioned many times in this space, endless marches are not going to end any war the street opposition to the war in now fading Afghanistan or whatever else the Obama/Kerry cabal has lined in the Middle East, Ukraine or the China seas as well as protests against other imperialist adventures has been under the radar of late. It is time for anti-warriors to get back where we belong in the struggle against Obama’s wars. And his Drone strategy to "sanitize" war The UNAC appears to be the umbrella clearing house these days for many anti-war, anti-Drone, anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist actions. Not all the demands of this coalition are ones that I would raise but the key one is enough to take to the streets.
Immediate, Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S./Allied Troops, Mercenaries, Contractors, Etc. From Afghanistan! Hands Off Iran And Syria! No Intervention In Ukraine!
Immediate, Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S./Allied Troops, Mercenaries, Contractors, Etc. From Afghanistan! Hands Off Iran And Syria! No Intervention In Ukraine!
BostonUNAC.org | 781-285-8622 | BostonUNAC(S)gmail.com
***Coming Of Age In The 1950s Night-J.D.
Salinger’s Franny And Zooey
Book Review
From The Pen Of Frank Jackman
Franny and Zooey, J.D. Salinger,
Little, Brown and Co. New York, 1955
As a person who came of age in the 1960s
filled to the brim with all kind of angst and alienation about a world that I
had not created, that I had no say in creating, and that did not look like
anybody was going to ask my opinion of the only thing that I can think of that might
be worse is to have faced those conditions in the hard dead red scare cold war 1950s
night. And that is the fate that befalls the characters, particular the Franny of
the title, in J.D. Salinger’s lesser classic Franny and Zooey (his main classic
being Catcher in the Rye) about
youthful angst and alienation in that decade.
Of course every thoughtful coming of
age generation, or at least some members of it are going to face the hard coming
of age reality that the world is less than perfect and that members of it, members
who cross one’s path, are not going to measure up, are going to be a
disappointment, are going to have feet of clay. And that is the fate that
befalls the main character here Franny Glass (the main character except the “elephant
in the room” the deceased brother Seymour) who finds out, find out after a
tough childhood in the spotlight, that all that things that mattered to her
school, boyfriend, artistic endeavors cannot fulfill that gnawing want that she
has developed as she turns the ripe old age of twenty.
Yes, Franny is caught up in that search
for some spiritual meaning, some method, some system that will give some meaning
in an apparently meaningless world. And she drives herself, her mother and her
brother, Zooey to distraction in trying to get her to snap out of the funk she
is in. Along the way Salinger investigates religion, Christ, truth-seekers, charlatans,
children survivors of stunted childhood, perfidy and about twelve other maladies
that before any youth can figure out he or she must confront. Salinger made a writing
career out of such investigations, and wrote well about the whole phenomenon.
Kudos.
***Sitting On The Rim Of The World- With The Son Of The Neon Wilderness Nelson Algren In Mind-Take Three
He wrote of small-voiced people, the desperately lonely, alienatedpeople who inhabit the Nighthawk Diner (artist Edward Hopper’s or Tom Waits’ take your pick), the restless, the sleepless, the shiftless, those who worked the late shift, those who drew the late shift of life, those who worked better under the cover of night in the dark alleyways and sullen doorways.
He wrote big time, big words, about the small-voiced people, big words for people who spoke in small words, spoke small words about small dreams, or no dreams, spoke only of the moment, the eternal moment. Waiting eternally waiting to get well, to get some kicks. Waiting for the fixer man, waiting for the fixer man to fix what ailed them. Not for him the small voice pleasant Midwestern farmers proving breadbaskets to the world, the prosperous small town drugstore owners, or of Miss Millie’s beauty salon (although one suspects that he could have) for in the pull and push of the writing profession they had (have) their muses. Nor was he inclined to push the air out of the small town banker seeking a bigger voice, the newspaper publisher seeking to control the voices or the alderman or his or her equivalent who had their own apparatuses for getting their small voices heard (although again one suspects he could have, if so inclined, shilled for that set). No, he, Nelson Algren, he, to give him a name took dead aim at the refuge of society, the lumpen as he put it in the title of one short story, those sitting on the rim of the world.
And he did good, did good by his art, did good by his honest snarly look at the underside of society, and, damn, by making us think about that quarter turn of fate that separated the prosperous farmer (assuming as we must that he, secretly, was not short-weighting the world), the drugstore owner (assuming as we must that he, secretly, was not dispensing his wares, his potent drugs, out the back door to a craving market) , Miss Millie (assuming as we must that she, secretly, was not running a call girl service on the side), the banker (assuming as we must that he, maybe secretly maybe not, was not gouging rack rents and usurious interest), the newspaper editor (assuming as we must that he, very publicly, in fact was printing all the news fit to print), and the politician (assuming as we must that he, secretly, was not bought and paid for by all of the above, or others) from the denizens of his mean streets. The mean city streets, mainly of Chicago, but that is just detail, just names of streets and sections of town to balance his work where his characters eked out an existence, well, anyway they could, some to turn up face down in some muddy ravine, under some railroad trestle, in some dime flop house, other to sort of amble along in the urban wilderness purgatory.
Brother Algren gave us characters to chew on, plenty of characters, mostly men, mostly desperate (in the very broadest sense of that word), mostly with some jones to work off, mostly with some fixer man in the background to wreak havoc too. He gave us two classics of the seamy side genre, one, the misbegotten Frankie Machine, the man with the golden arm, the man with the chip on his shoulder, the mid-century(20th century, okay) man ill at ease in his world, ill at ease with the world and looking, looking for some relief, some kicks in that mid-century parlance, and, two, that hungry boy, that denizen of the great white trash night, Dove Linkhorn, who, perhaps more than Frankie spoke to that mid-century angst, spoke to that world gone wrong, for those who had just come up, come up for some place where time stood still to gain succor in the urban swirl, to feast at the table,come up from the back forty lots, the prairie golden harvest wheat fields, the Ozarks, all swamps and ooze,mountain wind hills and hollows, the infested bayous and were ready to howl, howl at the moon to get attention.
I remember reading somewhere, and I have forgotten where now, that someone had noted that Nelson Algren’s writing on Dove Linkhorn roots was the most evocative piece on the meaning of the okie–arkie out migration segment of that mid-century America ever written, the tale of the wandering boys, the railroad riders, the jungle camp jumpers, the skid row derelicts. Hell, call it by its right name, the white trash, that lumpen mush. And he or she was right, of course, after I went back and re-read that first section of Walk On The Wild Side where the Linkhorn genealogy back unto the transport ships that brought the first crop of that ilk from thrown out Europe are explored. All the pig thieves, cattle-rustlers, poacher, highwaymen, the “what did some sociologist call them, oh yeah, “the master-less men, those who could not or would not be tamed by the on-rushing wheels of free-form capitalism picked up steam, the whole damn lot transported. And good riddance.
The population of California after World War II was filled to the brim with such types, the feckless hot rod boys, boys mostly too young to have been though the bloodbaths of Europe and Asia building some powerful road machines out of baling wire and not much else, speeding up and down those ocean-flecked highways looking for the heart of Saturday night, looking for kicks just like those Chicago free-flow junkies, those twisted New Orleans whoremasters. Wandering hells angels riding two by two (four by four if they felt like it and who was to stop them) creating havoc for the good citizens of those small towns they descended on, descended on unannounced (and unwelcomed by those same good citizens). In and out of jail, Q, Folsom, not for stealing pigs now, but armed robberies or some egregious felony, but kindred to those lost boys kicked out of Europe long ago. Corner boys, tee-shirted, jacket against cold nights, hanging out with time on their hands and permanent smirks, permanent hurts, permanent hatreds, paid to that Algren observation. All the kindred of the cutthroat world, or better cut your throat world, that Dove drifted into was just a microcosm of that small-voiced world.
He spoke of cities, even when his characters came fresh off the farm, abandoned for the bright lights of the city and useless to that short-weighting farmer who now is a prosperous sort, making serious dough as the breadbasket to the world. They, the off-hand hot rod king, the easy hell rider, the shiftless corner boy, had no existence in small towns and hamlets for their vices, or their virtues, too small, too small for the kicks they were looking for. They needed the anonymous city rooming house, the cold-water flat, the skid- row flop house, the ten- cent beer hall, hell, the railroad jungle, any place where they could just let go with their addictions, their anxieties, and their hunger without having to explain, endlessly explain themselves, always, always a tough task for the small-voiced of this wicked old world. They identified with cities, with city 24/7/365 lights, with Algren’s blessed neon lights, city traffic (of all kinds), squalor, cops on the take, cops not on the take, plebeian entertainments, sweat, a little dried blood, marked veins, reefer madness, swilled drinks, white towers, all night diners (see it always comes back to that lonely, alienated Nighthawk Diner just ask Waits), the early editions (for race results, the number, who got dead that day, the stuff of that world), a true vision of Edward Hopper’s Nighthawk for a candid world.
He spoke of jazz and the blues, as if all the hell in this wicked old world could be held off for a minute while that sound sifted thought the night fog air reaching the rooming house, the flop, the ravine, the beer hall as it drifted out to the river and drowned. Music not upfront but as a backdrop to while the steamy summer nights away, and maybe winter too. Strangely, or maybe not so strangely, he spoke of a small-voiced white world, residents of white slums and pursuers of white- etched dreams and only stick character blacks but his beat, his writing rhythm made no sense without the heat of Trouble In Mind or that cool blast of Charlie Parker, Miles, Dizzie be-bopping, made absolutely no sense, and so it went.
He spoke of love too. Not big flamed love, big heroes taking big falls for some hopeless romance like in olden times but squeezed love, love squeezed out of a spoon, maybe, but love in all its raw places. A guy turning his woman into a whore to feed his endless habit love, and her into a junkie love. A woman taking her man through cold turkey love. A man letting his woman go love, ditto woman her man when the deal went wrong. When the next best thing came by. Not pretty love all wrapped in a bow, but love nevertheless. And sometimes in this perverse old world the love a man has for a woman when, failing cold turkey, he goes to get the fixer man and that fixer man get his woman well, almost saintly and sacramental. Brothers and sisters just read The Last Carousel if you want to know about love. Hard, hard love. Yah, Nelson Algren knew how to give voice, no holds barred, to the small-voiced people.
From The Marxist Archives -The Revolutionary History Journal-Draft Programme of the Polish Socialist Party (1934)
http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/revhist/backissu.htm
Peter Paul Markin comment on this series:
This is an excellent documentary source for today’s leftist militants to “discover” the work of our forebears, particularly the bewildering myriad of tendencies which have historically flown under the flag of the great Russian revolutionary, Leon Trotsky and his Fourth International, whether one agrees with their programs or not. But also other laborite, semi-anarchist, ant-Stalinist and just plain garden-variety old school social democrat groupings and individual pro-socialist proponents.
Some, maybe most of the material presented here, cast as weak-kneed programs for struggle in many cases tend to be anti-Leninist as screened through the Stalinist monstrosities and/or support groups and individuals who have no intention of making a revolution. Or in the case of examining past revolutionary efforts either declare that no revolutionary possibilities existed (most notably Germany in 1923) or alibi, there is no other word for it, those who failed to make a revolution when it was possible.
The Spanish Civil War can serve as something of litmus test for this latter proposition, most infamously around attitudes toward the Party Of Marxist Unification's (POUM) role in not keeping step with revolutionary developments there, especially the Barcelona days in 1937 and by acting as political lawyers for every non-revolutionary impulse of those forebears. While we all honor the memory of the POUM militants, according to even Trotsky the most honest band of militants in Spain then, and decry the murder of their leader, Andreas Nin, by the bloody Stalinists they were rudderless in the storm of revolution. But those present political disagreements do not negate the value of researching the POUM’s (and others) work, work moreover done under the pressure of revolutionary times. Hopefully we will do better when our time comes.
Finally, I place some material in this space which may be of interest to the radical public that I do not necessarily agree with or support. Off hand, as I have mentioned before, I think it would be easier, infinitely easier, to fight for the socialist revolution straight up than some of the “remedies” provided by the commentators in these entries from the Revolutionary History journal in which they have post hoc attempted to rehabilitate some pretty hoary politics and politicians, most notably August Thalheimer and Paul Levy of the early post Liebknecht-Luxemburg German Communist Party. But part of that struggle for the socialist revolution is to sort out the “real” stuff from the fluff as we struggle for that more just world that animates our efforts. So read, learn, and try to figure out the
wheat from the chaff.
********
B. Drobner, W. Kielecki & H. Swoboda
Draft Programme of the Polish Socialist Party
The rigidity of the Stalinist parties during the ‘Third Period’ and their failure to react to the coming to power of Hitler obliged the more active sections of the working class in the early 1930s to seek expression elsewhere. The example of the armed resistance of the Viennese and Asturian workers put new life into Social Democracy in Spain, France, Britain and even the USA, producing centrist currents within it or sizeable splits outside, such as the Independent Labour Party and the Norwegian OSP (Independent Socialist Party). The Trotskyist movement took a decision to enter the Social Democratic organisations as an international strategy to make contact with and influence this development. In Poland this took the form of entry into the Bund and the Polish Socialist Party.
The Twenty-Third Congress of the Polish Socialist Party in 1934 decided to convene a special conference with the task of changing the party programme. The ferment inside it is reflected in this document, which was submitted as a draft on behalf of the left to the Party Programme Commission, and it provides a necessary background to the entrist activity of the Trotskyists at the time. It was translated by Ian Birchall from the Cahiers Léon Trotsky, no. 16, December 1983, pp. 120–5, and we tender our thanks both to Comrade Birchall and to Professor Broué for his permission to include it here. |
THE TWENTY-THIRD Congress of the Polish Socialist Party in 1934 agreed to convene a special congress with the task of changing the party programme.
On this occasion comrades B. Drobner, W. Kielicki and H. Swoboda submitted to the Party Programme Commission a draft on behalf of the party left wing, drawn up by a group of comrades.Draft Programme of the Polish Socialist Party
The Polish Socialist Party, being the mouthpiece of the needs and aspirations of the urban and rural proletariat, takes as its aim the emancipation by means of class struggle of the whole working population from the yoke of capitalist society. To this end, the Polish Socialist Party, closely linked to the working class movement of the whole world, is carrying on the struggle for the total transformation of the social order. The Polish Socialist Party aims for the creation of a Polish Socialist Republic bound by ties of close cooperation with other Socialist republics.
The Socialist Republic will take possession of the means of production (land, mines, factories, means of communication), which in the hands of the capitalists are the means of exploiting and oppressing the working masses, and will make them into social property. By suppressing the division of society into classes, the Socialist Republic will put an end to the exploitation of man by man, and will make it possible for all men to enjoy the fruits of their own labour. The Socialist Republic will be the expression of the will and the interpreter of the interests of the working population in town and country.The Polish Socialist Party, basing itself on the evolution of social relations, justifies its aspirations and makes concrete its methods of struggle in the programme set out below.
The Struggle for Power
1. The economic bankruptcy of capitalist society confronts the working class with the necessity of the immediate struggle for Socialism.
Despite the progressive disintegration of the capitalist economy, capitalist society will not collapse spontaneously. This is because it is supported by the apparatus of the capitalist state which preserves the bourgeoisie’s class rule, by using means of material force (army, police, administration, courts) and means of moral power (school, press, church). The overthrow of capitalist society is possible only in a situation where the capitalist state is broken up and smashed.It is therefore the conquest of power by the proletariat and the establishment of a workers’ and peasants’ government, which is the fundamental condition for the achievement of Socialism. As the bourgeoisie will not abandon its class rule voluntarily, the workers’ and peasants’ government can be established only as the outcome of a determined revolutionary struggle.
The struggle for the workers’ and peasants’ government requires the unity of the whole proletariat on a revolutionary class platform, and the gathering round the working class of the broadest masses of the working population: intellectuals, petit-bourgeoisie and peasants.
The working class movement aims to extend its influence over the whole working class. The division of the working class movement is the factor which can make the effectiveness of its action difficult and on occasion impossible. It is therefore essential to overcome the internal division which exists at the present time. But, in Poland, there exists alongside this split the division of the Socialist movement itself into a number of national parties. It is necessary for all the Socialist parties to be united by the bonds of the closest possible cooperation.
The proletariat constitutes a revolutionary vanguard. It allies itself in its struggle for the workers’ and peasants’ government with the peasants, and it draws along with it the undecided elements of the middle classes. Under the slogan of the struggle for the workers’ and peasants’ revolutionary government, the Polish Socialist Party mobilises all the oppressed and exploited layers of capitalist society.
2. The continuing disintegration of the capitalist economy, growing poverty, and the ever harsher oppression exercised by big capital, are provoking the discontent of the broadest masses.
The task of the party is to exploit these feelings, giving them a clearly anti-capitalist character, channelling the spontaneous expressions of discontent and revolt into a united, conscious and resolute class struggle.A consistent and revolutionary policy on the part of the party, showing the masses a concrete objective in the form of the workers’ and peasants’ government, will raise the level of activity of the proletarian and peasant masses, and will enable the party to become their authentic leader.
Since the utopian programmes of Fascism cannot in any way be put into practice, the masses of petit-bourgeois and intellectuals who have been under Fascist influence will move closer to the working class movement. Conflicts are ripening within the Fascist movements, as a result of the contradiction between, on the one hand, the aspirations of the Fascist masses who had been lured by the pseudo-radical and allegedly anti-capitalist phraseology, and, on the other, the actual policies of the Fascist dictatorship. These conflicts will inevitably lead to the growing disillusion and demoralisation of the masses in the face of Fascism. In this situation, the Socialist Party, by revealing the true class face of the Fascist dictatorship, will accelerate the process of moving the intermediate strata away from Fascism and bringing them closer to the working class movement. The masses of petit-bourgeois and intellectuals oppressed by poverty and disappointed in their social and political hopes by Fascism will turn to the working class movement as the only truly anti-capitalist movement, while the last links with capitalist society and the capitalist state are broken in their minds.
The revolutionising of ever broader sections of the working masses will produce a shrinking of the social base of capitalist society and the capitalist state. As the military and police apparatus of the state is formed, in the overwhelming majority, of working class, peasant and petit-bourgeois elements, the revolutionising of these will lead to the break-up of the apparatus of oppression which maintains capitalist society.
3. At the present time the fundamental task of the party consists in the struggle for the workers’ and peasants’ government. But the party, while subordinating all its policies to this primary aim, defends the remnants of democratic freedom which survive in capitalist society; at the same time it encourages any action aiming to extend them. The struggle for democratic freedoms for the working masses is for the party a struggle to create more favourable conditions for political activity. Political democracy within the framework of capitalist society cannot in any way be considered as a purpose for proletarian action for its own sake, but solely as an arena in which the masses organise and prepare for proletarian struggle. The party leads all expressions of anti-Fascist feeling by the masses in an anti-capitalist direction and transforms them into a revolutionary struggle against the present social order.
4. The Fascist dictatorship intensifies the oppression of national minorities. This oppression takes particularly harsh forms in states comprised of several nationalities. Separatist movements are formed among the oppressed peoples, which more or less violently break up the states formed of several nationalities.
The working class movement, adopting the principle of the self-determination of peoples, and observing that national conflicts have a revolutionising influence on the masses, supports movements for the liberation of the oppressed peoples. The working class movement aims to link these movements to the social programme of Socialism, directed simultaneously against the possessing classes and against the reactionary and chauvinistic tendencies within the national minorities.
5. In the epoch of imperialism there is a permanent danger of armed conflict. The growth of militarist and nationalist tendencies within the Fascist states increases the danger of war. The international institutions created by the capitalist states with the intention of preventing wars and settling international conflicts in a peaceful fashion, have revealed a total inability actually to eliminate the danger of war. They are simply a means of masking by their diplomacy the true imperialist tendencies of the states.
The working class movement must react by all available means against the outbreak of war. It leads to the mass slaughter of workers, it means an intensification of oppression, and produces the worst levels of poverty among the working masses.In conformity with the interests of the working class and of all working people, the party is resolutely opposed to overt or covert imperialist policies, to militarism, and to armaments. The party realises that the only effective way to struggle against war is the threat of proletarian revolution. If war were nonetheless to break out, the workers’ movement would attempt to transform the imperialist war into proletarian revolution.
The Dictatorship of the Proletariat and Socialist Construction
1. The revolution achieved by the working masses under the leadership of the proletariat and its party, overthrowing the bourgeoisie’s class rule, will put power into the hands of the revolutionary workers’ and peasants’ government, as the expression of the dictatorship of the urban and rural proletariat. But the revolution is not complete at the moment of the seizure of power. The seizure of power is only the means which makes it possible for the working class, and the working masses allied with it, to achieve Socialism. The period of the dictatorship of the proletariat will be that of the revolutionary transformation of capitalist society into Socialist society.
From the social point of view, the dictatorship of the proletariat will be based on the working class and on the peasant masses, as well as on the sections of the petit-bourgeoisie and of the intelligentsia which support the revolution.From the territorial point of view, the dictatorship of the proletariat will cover the whole of the territory on which the revolution has been carried out. But the working masses belonging to territorial national minorities will have the right to determine for themselves the form of their political existence and their relations with the Polish Socialist Republic.
The first task of the workers’ and peasants’ government will be to deprive the possessing classes of the economic basis of their rule. To this end the workers’ and peasants’ government will immediately and without compensation expropriate the banks, mines, factories, workshops, means of communication, principal commercial firms, insurance companies, rented houses and large estates. At the same time, this will be an introduction to the organisation of the economy on the basis of Socialist principles.
2. The dictatorship of the proletariat will have the character of proletarian democracy. The workers’ and peasants’ revolutionary government will exercise its power in conformity with the will and under the supervision of elected representatives of the workers and peasants. Persons compromised in the Fascist period, and all those who act against the interests of the Socialist revolution, will be deprived of political rights.
The workers’ and peasants’ government will have, in the period of the consolidation of the dictatorship of the proletariat, special powers which are indispensable in order to crush entirely all attempts at counter-revolution and sabotage, and in order to ensure the stability of the power that has been won, so as to lay the bases of the revolutionary state machine and to get the productive apparatus functioning again. As the dictatorship of the proletariat is stabilised, and the dangers of counter-revolution and of foreign intervention are suppressed, the special powers of the revolutionary government will be progressively relaxed.
3. The Socialist Republic will be a free society of all workers. All power will belong to elected representatives of the workers and peasants.
The Socialist Republic will guarantee to all its citizens (except those persons deprived of rights):- The right to vote and be elected, based on the following principles: universality (above the age of 18), equality, secret ballot, the right to recall delegates;
- Freedom of the press, of assembly and of organisation;
- Freedom of conscience;
- Freedom to develop national languages and civilisations; full cultural autonomy will be granted to national minorities remaining within the frontiers of the Polish Socialist Republic.
The Socialist Republic will abolish the death penalty and repressive measures which degrade human dignity. The Socialist Republic will carry through the separation of church and state, and will abolish the privileges of religious bodies.
The Socialist Republic, by overthrowing the social rule of the bourgeoisie, will abolish the privileges of the possessing classes in the sphere of education and culture. The Socialist Republic will guarantee to its citizens free secular education at all levels. The urban and rural proletariat will be raised to the highest level of culture, free education being made available, and maintenance provided for workers and peasants during their studies.The Socialist Republic will guarantee the freedom and independence of scholarly research; it will support the development of science, and sponsor artistic production.
The Socialist Republic will make available to everyone the products of past culture and civilisation.
4. The Socialist Republic, whilst suppressing the exploitation of human labour, will consider work as a civic duty. The Socialist Republic will provide work for all its citizens.
The Socialist Republic, raising labour to the level of a civic duty, will guarantee decent working conditions to all workers. In particular, the Socialist Republic will introduce:- The reduction of working hours to the necessary minimum required by social needs and the demands of productive techniques;
- A minimum wage allowing the satisfaction of normal human needs;
- Care in the event of sickness, or accident at work, or total or partial disablement making work impossible, and old age insurance;
- Protection for women workers;
- A ban on work for minors; and it will strive to ensure the highest standards of safety and hygiene at work.
5. The proletarian revolution and the changes introduced by it have as their aim the transformation of the capitalist system of production and distribution into a planned Socialist economy.
The banks, the mines, the factories, the workshops, the means of communication, the main commercial firms, the insurance companies – all expropriated immediately after the revolution – will be recognised as social property.The organising and setting in motion of the socialised economy will be the fundamental tasks of the workers’ and peasants’ power.
The general management of the socialised economy will be in the hands of the Central Economic Council.
In the sphere of finance and credit all banking establishments will be socialised. Bank accounts, apart from small savings, will be confiscated. The socialised credit apparatus will be directly under the authority of the Central Council of the Economy.
Socialisation will not include the tools of self-employed workers who do not employ wage-labourers. All categories of artisan production and home-based production will retain their freedom of economic activity. The state will support voluntary organisations of artisans and of home-based producers set up on the basis of the principles of cooperation. Industrial establishments of smaller size which are not ready for socialisation will be placed under social supervision.
The large commercial firms which have been expropriated will be replaced by the organisation of a national distribution mechanism. The existing cooperative apparatus will enjoy the same rights as the national distribution mechanism.
Arable land expropriated together with buildings and livestock, grazing land and meadows, will be divided among the agricultural proletariat and peasants owning little or no land. The state will guarantee to peasants the resources necessary to improve the cultivation of the land. Some of the expropriated lands will be taken over directly by the state for experimental and scientific purposes, as model agricultural economies. Larger stretches of forest-land, lakes and waterways, being of general concern, will be managed by the state.
In the sphere of international economic policy, the Socialist Republic will establish close cooperation with other Socialist republics, in order to include them in the same economic plan. The monopoly of foreign trade will be introduced in relations with capitalist states. The Socialist Republic will not recognise any commitment entered into by governments of the former capitalist state with regard to other capitalist states.
The act of expropriation and socialisation, carried out consistently and vigorously according to an established plan, will become the basis for the development of the new Socialist economy, erected on the fullest and freest satisfaction of the needs of the broad masses of society.
Socialism
The victory of the working class, the destruction of the economic and social bases of the possessing classes, the putting into practice of the principles of the planned Socialist economy – all these will lead to the creation of the classless society, where there will be no exploited or exploiters, nor class struggles, and all the efforts of society will be deployed to the common good.
From the moment of the internationalisation of the revolution and the establishment of the classless society, external and internal dangers will cease to threaten the Socialist Republic; this will make possible the complete achievement of Socialist democracy and the abolition of all the political restrictions which were necessary in the period of the dictatorship of the proletariat and of Socialist construction. Society will then determine for itself the forms of its confederations and its organisational structure.The victory of Socialism means the emancipation of all humanity. Socialism will create not only the new economic and social order, but also the higher civilisation and morality of free mankind.
In Honor Of International Workers’ Day- May Day 2014 -Ancient dreams, dreamed-The Risen People?-Frank Jackman’s War-Take Five
From The American Left History Blog Archives –May Day 1971
Endless, dusty, truck heavy, asphalt steaming hitchhike roads travelled, Route 6, 66, maybe 666 and perdition for all I know, every back road, every Connecticut highway avoiding back road from Massachusetts south to the capital for one last winner-take-all, no prisoners taken show-down to end all show-downs. And maybe, just maybe, finally some peace and a new world a-borning, a world we had been talking about for at least a decade (clueless, as all youth nations are clueless, that that road was well-travelled, very well- travelled, before us). No Jack Kerouac dharma bum easy road (although there were dharma bums, or at least faux dharma bums, aplenty on those 1971 roads south, and west too) let- her-rip cosmic brakeman Neal Cassady at the wheel flying through some Iowa/Kansas wheat field night fantasy this trip.
No this trip was not about securing some cultural enclave in post-war America (post-World War II so as not to confuse the reader) in break-out factory town Lowell or cold water tenement Greenwich Village/Soho New Jack City or Shangri-La West out in the Bay area, east or west, but about mucking up the works, the whole freaking governmental/societal/economic/cultural/personal/godhead world (that last one, the godhead one, not thrown in just for show, no way) and maybe, just maybe sneaking away with the prize. But a total absolute, absolutist, big karma sky fight out, no question. And we, I, am ready. On that dusty road ready.
More. See all roads head south as we, my girlfriend of the day, maybe more, maybe more than a day, Joyell, but along this time more for ease of travelling for those blessed truck driver eye rides, than lust or dream wish and my sainted wise-guy amigo (and shades of Gregory Corso, sainted, okay), Matty, who had more than a passing love or dream wish in her and if you had seen her you would not have wondered why. Not have wondered why if your “type” was Botticelli painted and thoughts of butterfly swirls just then or were all-type sleepy-eyed benny-addled teamster half-visioned out of some forlorn rear view mirror.
Yah, head south, in ones, twos, and threes (no more, too menacing even for hefty ex-crack back truckers to stop for) travelling down to D.C. for what many of us figure will be the last, finally, push back against the war, the Vietnam War, for those who have forgotten, or stopped watching television and the news, but THEY, and you knew (know) who they were (are), had their antennae out too, they KNEW we were coming, even high-ball fixed (or whiskey neat she had the face for them) looking out from lonely balconies Martha Mitchell knew that much. They were, especially in mad max robot-cop Connecticut, out to pick off the stray or seven who got into their mitts as a contribution to law and order, law and order one Richard Milhous Nixon-style (and in front of him, leading some off-key, off-human key chorus some banshee guy from Maryland, another watch out hitchhike trail spot, although not as bad as Ct, nothing except Arizona is). And thus those dusty, steamy, truck heavy (remind me to tell you about hitchhiking stuff, and the good guy truckers you wanted, desperately wanted, to ride with in those days, if I ever get a chance sometime).
The idea behind this hitchhiked road, or maybe, better, the why. Simple, too simple when you, I, thought about it later in lonely celled night but those were hard trying times, desperate times really, and just free, free from another set of steel-barred rooms this jailbird was ready to bring down heaven, hell, hell if it came down to it to stop that furious war (Vietnam, for the later reader) and start creating something recognizable for humans to live in. So youth nation, then somewhat long in the tooth, and long on bad karma-driven bloody defeats too, decided to risk all with the throw of the dice and bring a massive presence to D.C. on May Day 1971.
And not just any massed presence like the then familiar seasonal peace crawl that nobody paid attention too anymore except the organizers, although the May Day action was wrapped around that year’s spring peace crawl, (wrapped up, cozily wrapped up, in their utopian reformist dream that more and more passive masses, more and more suburban housewives from New Jersey, okay, okay not just Jersey, more and more high school freshman, more and more barbers, more and more truck driver stop waitresses, for that matter, would bring the b-o-u-r-g-e-o-i-s-i-e (just in case there are sensitive souls in the room) to their knees. No, we were going to stop the government, flat. Big scheme, big scheme no question and if anybody, any “real” youth nation refugee, excepting, of course, always infernal always, those cozy peace crawl organizers, tried to interject that perhaps there were wiser courses nobody mentioned them out loud in my presence and I was at every meeting, high or low. Moreover I had my ears closed, flapped shut closed, to any lesser argument. I, rightly or wrongly, silly me thought “cop.”
So onward anti-war soldiers from late night too little sleep Sunday night before Monday May Day dawn in some vagrant student apartment around DuPont Circle (I think) but it may have been further up off 14th Street, Christ after eight million marches for seven million causes who can remember that much. No question though on the student ghetto apartment locale; bed helter-skelter on the floor, telephone wire spool for a table, orange crates for book shelves, unmistakably, and the clincher, seventeen posters, mainly Che, Mao, Ho, Malcolm etc., the first name only necessary for identification pantheon just then, a smattering of Lenin and Trotsky but they were old guys from old revolutions and so, well, discounted to early rise (or early stay up cigarette chain-smoking and coffee slurping to keep the juices flowing). Out into the streets, out into the small collectives coming out of other vagrant apartments streets (filled with other posters of Huey Newton , George Jackson, Frantz Fanon, etc. from the two names needed pantheon) joining up to make a cohorted mass (nice way to put it, right?). And then dawn darkness surrounded, coffee spilled out, cigarette bogarted, AND out of nowhere, or everywhere, bang, bang, bang of governmental steel, of baton, of chemical dust, of whatever latest technology they had come up with they came at us (pre-tested in Vietnam, naturally, as I found out later). Jesus, bedlam, mad house, insane asylum, beat, beat like gongs, defeated.
Through bloodless bloodied streets (this, after all, was not Chicago, hog butcher to the world), may day tear down the government days, tears, tear-gas exploding, people running this way and that coming out of a half-induced daze, a crazed half-induced daze that mere good- will, mere righteousness would right the wrongs of this wicked old world. One arrested, two, three, many, endless thousands as if there was an endless capacity to arrest, and be arrested, arrest the world, and put it all in one great big Robert F. Kennedy stadium home to autumn gladiators on Sunday and sacrificial lambs this spring maypole may day basket druid day.
And, as I was being led away by one of D.C.’s finest, I turned around and saw that some early Sunday morning voice, some “cop” voice who advised caution and went on and on about getting some workers out to join us before we perished in an isolated blast of arrests and bad hubris also being led away all trussed up, metal hand-cuffs seemingly entwined around her whole slight body. She said she would stick with us even though she disagreed with the strategy that day and I had scoffed, less than twenty-four hours before, that she made it sound like she had to protect her erring children from themselves. And she, maybe, the only hero of the day. Righteous anonymous sister, forgive me. (Not so anonymous actually since I saw her many times later in Boston, almost would have traded in lust for her but I was still painted Botticelli-bewitched and so I, we, let the moment passed, and worked on about six million marches for about five millions causes with her but that was later. I saw no more of her in D.C. that week.)
Stop. Brain start. Out of the bloodless fury, out of the miscalculated night a strange bird, no peace dove, these were not such times even with all our unforced errors, and no flame-flecked phoenix raising but a bird, maybe the owl of Minerva came a better sense that this new world a-bornin’ would take some doing, some serious doing. More serious that some wispy-bearded, pony-tailed beat, beat down, beat around, beat up young stalwart road tramp acting in god’s place could even dream of. But that was later. Just then, just that screwed-up martyr moment, I was longing for the hot, dusty, truck driver stop meat loaf special, dishwater coffee on the side, road back home even ready to chance Connecticut highway dragnets to get there.
*********
The spring of 1971 had been like the previous couple of years in the escalating anti-Vietnam War struggle. There was the inevitable massive peaceful protest planned for late April in Washington, D.C. as the mainline organizers of these now semi-annual events (others took place in the fall) put on the word in the media and on the street. The expectation of the organizers, the strategy, at least the public strategy, was driven by the idea that ever-increasing numbers on the National Mall would in short order whip the war-mongers. In short more housewives and mothers from Jersey taking the trek south would do the trick. There were at this time, as usual when the commonplace strategies to make political change do not work, others, mainly students and young unaffiliated radicals who had other ideas about stopping the madness of the Vietnam War. In little collectives, known as May Day collectives for the day of action, small clots of like-minded brethren were committed to major acts of civil disobedience. In their parlance-‘if the government does not shut down the war, we will shut down the government.” It was with these different concepts in mind that Frank Jackman, his girlfriend Joyell, and a couple of other of her friends from Cambridge hitchhiked to Washington, D.C. that spring.
Frank, having only a couple of months previously had been discharged from the U.S. Army as a conscientious objector after serving almost a year in the Fort Devens, Massachusetts stockade, was intrigued by the thought of massive direct action to stop the war. His own evolution on the subject of effective political action had started from his perception that more than mass marches were necessary to stop the slaughter. His own actions in the Army while individualistic were done with the thought of spurring fellow soldiers into active opposition to the war. In time he saw that more than acting as a model was necessary and was therefore intrigued by the idea of mass civil disobedience to shut down the war machine.
Frank and Joyell had had many argument over the question of direct civil action, “street violence” she called it mentioning the wild and wooly radical types from Cambridge and elsewhere who were touting the May Day actions. Frank thought every such option was up for grabs with the never-ending war and so his objections were strictly personal. He was not sure that he wanted to go through another jail term, potentially long, so soon after his previously stint. The pair argued (along with those two friends) all the way do to Washington about the subject of the right strategy. In any case Frank and Joyell “decided” before the trip that while Frank would stay for the May Day action as a witness at least Joyell would travel back to Boston once the large Saturday rally was over.
On the Saturday of the mass rally the National Mall was overflowing with people of every physical description, fashion statement, race, creed, and the rest. From the platform every self-interested politician and grouping got their moment in the sun. What Frank noticed and which only confirmed his suspicions about every greater masses of people gathering to force the war issue was the essentially festive nature of the event, This motley would not “storm heaven” and so as the day wore on, tired, almost exhausted he began to toy with the idea that, yes, come Monday morning he would be out in the streets. The ante had been upped.
That was why Frank Jackman, late of the U.S. Army, had been sitting on the National Mall around a blazing campfire, tired, a little hungry, and doing a little quiet thinking through his options on the Sunday night before May Day 1971...
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