From The Pen Of American Communist Party Founder And Trotskyist Leader James P. Cannon-The decision to join the trotskyist camp in 1928

From The Pen Of American Communist Party Founder And Trotskyist Leader James P. Cannon-

http://www.marxists.org/archive/cannon/works/index.htm

Click on the headline to link to the James P. Cannon Internet Archives.

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Markin comment on founding member James P. Cannon and the early American Communist Party from the American Left History blog:

If you are interested in the history of the American Left or are a militant trying to understand some of the past mistakes of our history and want to know some of the problems that confronted the early American Communist Party and some of the key personalities, including James Cannon, who formed that party this book is for you.

At the beginning of the 21st century after the demise of the Soviet Union and the apparent ‘death of communism’ it may seem fantastic and utopian to today’s militants that early in the 20th century many anarchist, socialist, syndicalist and other working class militants of this country coalesced to form an American Communist Party. For the most part, these militants honestly did so in order to organize an American socialist revolution patterned on and influenced by the Russian October Revolution of 1917. James P. Cannon represents one of the important individuals and faction leaders in that effort and was in the thick of the battle as a central leader of the Party in this period. Whatever his political mistakes at the time, or later, one could certainly use such a militant leader today. His mistakes were the mistakes of a man looking for a revolutionary path.

For those not familiar with this period a helpful introduction by the editors gives an analysis of the important fights which occurred inside the party. That overview highlights some of the now more obscure personalities (a helpful biographical glossary is provided), where they stood on the issues and insights into the significance of the crucial early fights in the party. These include questions which are still relevant today; a legal vs. an underground party; the proper attitude toward parliamentary politics; support to third party bourgeois candidates; trade union policy; class war defense as well as how to rein in the intense internal struggle of the various factions for organizational control of the party. This makes it somewhat easier for those not well-versed in the intricacies of the political disputes which wracked the early American party to understand how these questions tended to pull it in on itself. In many ways, given the undisputed rise of American imperialism in the immediate aftermath of World War I, this is a story of the ‘dog days’ of the party. Unfortunately, that rise combined with the international ramifications of the internal dispute in the Russian Communist Party and in the Communist International shipwrecked the party as a revolutionary party toward the end of this period.

In the introduction the editors motivate the purpose for the publication of the book by stating the Cannon was the finest Communist leader that America had ever produced. This an intriguing question. The editors trace their political lineage back to Cannon’s leadership of the early Communist Party and later after his expulsion to the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party so their perspective is obvious. What does the documentation provided here show? I would argue that the period under study represented Cannon’s apprenticeship. Although the hothouse politics of the early party clarified some of the issues of revolutionary strategy for him I believe that it was not until he linked up with Trotsky in the 1930’s that he became the kind of leader who could lead a revolution. Of course, since Cannon never got a serious opportunity to lead revolutionary struggles here this is mainly reduced to speculation on my part. Later books written by him make the case better. One thing is sure- in his prime he had the instincts to want to lead a revolution.

As an addition to the historical record of this period this book is a very good companion to the two-volume set by Theodore Draper - The Roots of American Communism and Soviet Russia and American Communism- the definitive study on the early history of the American Communist Party. It is also a useful companion to Cannon’s own The First Ten Years of American Communism. I would add that this is something of a labor of love on the part of the editors. This book was published at a time when the demise of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe was in full swing and anything related to Communist studies was deeply discounted. Nevertheless, for better or worse, the American Communist Party (and its offshoots) needs to be studied as an ultimately flawed example of a party that failed in its mission to create a radical version of society in America. Now is the time to study this history.

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James P. Cannon

The decision to join the trotskyist camp in 1928

May 27, 1959

This is a letter sent to Theodore Draper, a historian of the American communist movement.
The entire series of letters sent from Cannon to Draper has been published under the title "The first ten years of American communism" by Lyle Stuart Inc, in 1962.
It was later reprinted by Pathfinder Press.

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It seems to me that I have already written myself out on "The Birth of American Trotskyism"-in which I played the central role because I just happened to be standing there at the time and there was no one else to do it. I couldn't add much to what I have already written in the History of American Trotskyism, in my letters to you, and in the big article - "The Degeneration of the Communist Party-and the New Beginning" in the Fall, 1954 issue of Fourth International. That's my case. If I were to write about it again I could only repeat what I have already said.

You'll find a better and fuller exposition there than I could write again today. I have the faculty, which for me is a happy one, of pushing things to the back of my mind once I have written them out. In order to write a fresh report on the origin of American Trotskyism, I would have to force myself back into a semi-coma, recalling and reliving the struggle of 31 years ago. That is too much for me to undertake again.

* * *

The only thing I left out of my extensive writing about that period, which I try to leave out of all my writing, was the special element of personal motivation for my action-which cynics would never believe and research workers never find in the files and cross-indexes. That is the compulsion of conscience when one is confronted by an obligation which, in given circumstances, is his alone to accept or to evade.

In the summer of 1928 in Moscow, in addition to the theoretical and political revelation that came to me when I read Trotsky's Criticism of the Draft Program of the Comintern, there was another consideration that hit me where I live. That was the fact that Trotsky had been expelled and deported to far-away Alma Ata; that his friends and supporters had been slandered and expelled and imprisoned; and that the whole damned thing was a frame-up!

Had I set out as a boy to fight for justice for Moyer and Haywood in order to betray the cause of justice when it was put squarely up to me in a case of transcendent importance to the whole future of the human race? A copy-book moralist could easily answer that question by saying: "Of course not. The rule is plain. You do what you have to do, even if it costs you your head." But it wasn't so simple for me in the summer of 1928. I was not a copybook moralist. I was a party politician and factionalist who had learned how to cut corners. I knew that at the time, and the self-knowledge made me uneasy.

I had been gradually settling down into an assured position as a party official with an office and staff, a position that I could easily maintain-as long as I kept within definite limits and rules which I knew all about, and conducted myself with the facility and skill which had become almost second nature to me in the long drawn-out factional fights.

I knew that. And I knew something else that I never told anybody about, but which I had to tell myself for the first time in Moscow in the summer of 1928. The foot-loose Wobbly rebel that I used to be had imperceptibly begun to fit comfortably into a swivel chair, protecting himself in his seat by small maneuvers and evasions, and even permitting himself a certain conceit about his adroit accommodation to this shabby game. I saw myself for the first time then as another person, as a revolutionist who was on the road to becoming a bureaucrat. The image was hideous, and I turned away from it in disgust.

I never deceived myself for a moment about the most probable consequences of my decision to support Trotsky in the summer of 1928. I knew it was going to cost me my head and also my swivel chair, but I thought: What the hell-better men than I have risked their heads and their swivel chairs for truth and justice. Trotsky and his associates were doing it at that very moment in the exile camps and prisons of the Soviet Union. It was no more than right that one man, however limited his qualifications, should remember what he started out in his youth to fight for, and speak out for their cause and try to make the world hear, or at least to let the exiled and imprisoned Russian Oppositionists know that they had found a new friend and supporter.

In the History of American Trotskyism, p.61 I wrote:

"The movement which then began in America brought repercussions throughout the entire world; overnight the whole picture, the whole perspective of the struggle changed. Trotskyism, officially pronounced dead, was resurrected on the international arena and inspired with new hope, new enthusiasm, new energy. Denunciations against us were carried in the American press of the party and reprinted throughout the whole world, including the Moscow Pravda. Russian Oppositionists in prison and exile, where sooner or later copies of Pravda reached them, were notified of our action, our revolt in America. In the darkest hour of the Opposition's struggle, they learned that fresh reinforcements had taken the field across the ocean in the United States, which by virtue of the power and weight of the country itself, gave importance and weight to the things done by the American communists.

"Leon Trotsky, as I remarked, was isolated in the little Asiatic village of Alma Ata. The world movement outside Russia] was in decline, leaderless, suppressed, isolated, practically non-existent. With this inspiring news of a new detachment in far-away America, the little papers and bulletins of the Opposition groups flared into life again. Most inspiring of all to us was the assurance that our hard-pressed Russian comrades had heard our voice. I have always thought of this as one of the most gratifying aspects of the historic fight we undertook in 1928-that the news of our fight reached the Russian comrades in all corners of the prisons and exile camps, inspiring them with new hope and new energy to persevere in the struggle."

In Moscow, in the summer of 1928, I foresaw such a possible consequence of my decision and action. And I thought that that alone would justify it, regardless of what else might follow. Many things have changed since then, but that conviction has never changed.

 

From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin-From The "Ancient Dreams, Dreamed" Sketches-An Unexplained Interlude

Twenty come and gone, dead. Old new uniform, resplendent college joe uniform complete with white-socked penniless loafers, gone, passed on to some Goodwill basket and mercifully back to all- weather, all-season patterned, usually, brown though, flannel shirts (yes, summers too, despite whacked out metabolisms that are out of synch, sweating, okay, perspiring, but we have been through that all before and the writer will just continue to write just as related to him, write through rums sweats and wine sweats and whiskey neat sweats, gone are the slugfest whiskey working-class brave beer chaser days, and the quarters to pay for them too, and take his chances, black chinos and, as if to put paid to those who wondered at the change and made surly comments about beat-ness, beatitude and such, moccasins, comfortable, soft-feel moccasins, in a sea of penniless (mainly) white-socked loafers. Topped off, and gladly, since junior high Frankie Larkin king hell king of the junior league corner boy night times, remind me to tell you sometime about that mad man and his mad escapades as Markin regaled me for many hours telling me him about but not now because we are discussing somber moods, midnight sunglasses to keep the rubes, the cheerleaders, and the plain nosy at bay.

New uniform too. Drunk, whisky high-shelf drunk, when in the chips, whisky back alley low shelf liquor store rotgut whisky drunk, when on the bum, drunk in some atlantic bayside bar, complete with mushrooming arrivisite boats of all sizes and descriptions although most look as seaworthy as the Titanic, looking at delicious nubile sights all dressed, or rather undressed in bikinis, halters and shorts, or any cool and look-able combination which I am too weary, too eye-candy weary to fully describe just now.

Or some Southie hard week’s work done and quarters clinking gents only bar (ladies by invitation and accompaniment only so mostly manly rough-house and steady-handed drinking the rule ) no adornments, nothing but hard stools and wet mahogany countertops with pickled eggs and other strange jerky things to work up hard thirsts, as if the thirst that he (and not just him) came in that unadorned, unpainted door (squeaky too) to quench needed aphrodisiac drunk, with beer chasers (just plunk down the extra quarter and bang).

Or some mondaytuesdaywednesdaythrursday hangover drunk night spent neon-lighted in Kenmore Square chick-heavy dives like Skirt-Chaser’s Pub, High Heaven Angel Cafe, or Come And Get It Brother, If You Can Club (don’t Google look those names up but I don’t need to draw you, you of all people, a diagram that here were meat market-worthy establishments filling the night with bare flesh, plenty is the hope, up from nowhere hope, high-end whiskeys (in the chips or don’t bother), and early morning romps along the Charles.

Drunk and no memories of old time North Adamsville, Irish town, faux Little Dublin town, Irish granite city old time quarries and sweat town, back in the day old time Wasp city of presidents but not lately town, simple storefront father and older brother bars used simply to get a few quick ones before home and bed, or after some convenient excuse softball games until one in the morning (or maybe two depending on blue law local rules for public houses versus cafes versus, hell, bowling alleys and brothels).

And no memories of the first time his Uncle Jim set him up for an underage wink, wink drink and the first few tastes went down hard, and he almost threw up and then the beer chaser (clink those quarters, please), settled him, and sleep, head on countertop sleep. And the shawlies howled at the moon for days (and secretly wink, wink proclaimed manhood, poor Uncle Jim’s sister, his mother, there will be hell to pay before that young lad is done, no question) and then some midnight scandal between Miss Molly somebody and a very married (and child heavy) Mister Midnight Rider somebody took all of their attention away from some half-arsed (no sic here) teenage boy trying to quickly to raise manhood’s bar. That scene, that Uncle Jim who was held in bad odor for other misdemeanors by the shawlies on his own hook, would be filed for future reference and sixteen forms of comparison with their own sparkling white just gone to confession (daily confession it seems now that I think of it, why?) johnnies (before the rage for Seans set in) and kathies.

And damn if they were not right, maybe not future reference right but right on the basics the named bars, Joe’s, Jim’s, Irish Pub, Dublin Grille, Café, Club, to infinity, Artie’s Bayside Club, The Sea ‘n’ Surf (and six forms of cuddle up dancing, drunk as a skunk, but cutting a figure, and best, walking out midnight doors, hand in hand with some foxy red-headed twist out for just the night and heading to some small town home in the morning, some dark-eyed, black-haired beauty with dancing eyes and loose morals who was slumming just then looking for ocean-aired adventure and not kansas hayseeds and she, yes, she, and I quote, hit pay dirt, or some skinny brunette with a hollow leg who just wanted to walk along the adjacent beach but who for one more hollow leg drink, some gin and tonic thing, could be persuaded to watch the “submarine races”), The Shakers (strictly high-end WASP Philly girls looking for shanty irish thrills before marrying some third cousin stockbroker and bliss).

Names, nameless, no legion. Girls and gin get it, no gin no girl, no girl no gin, get it and no bliss and no dreams, no endless night dreams of dainty curves and longing caresses, get it. Endless dreams and endless longings. And whiskey, whiskey with fewer beer chasers.

And the 24/7/365 years fell down drunk. Then some staggered midnight vista street, some 1967 staggered midnight, no dough having spent the last quarters on some fruitless pina colada senorita no go, walking drunken streets cabs stopping for quick jack- roller fares, or funny, real jack rollers coming up empty and mad, maybe killing mad. Walking, legs weak from lack of work and hour on hour of stool-sitting and stewing over pina colada no gos, brain weak, maybe wet, push on, push on, find some fellaheen relieve for that unsatisfied bulge, that gnawing at the brain or really at the root of the thing. A topsy-turvy time, murder, death, the death of death, the death of fame, murder, killing murder, and then resolve, wrong resolve and henceforth the only out, war, war to the finish although who could have known that then. Who could have known that tet, lyndon, bobby, hubert, tricky dick war-circus thing then. And not drunk, get it.

From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin- As The Afghan War Enters Its Twelfth Year - The People Are War-Weary, Very War Weary Although There Is No End In Sight- Five-Immediate Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S./Allied Troops From Afghanistan!

Joshua Lawrence Breslin comment:

Several months ago Peter Paul Markin, my old merry prankster pal from the 1960s who has been through many a political struggle with me, compared notes about the condition of the struggle against Barack Obama’s Afghan War policy and the “beneath the radar” opposition to that policy. This past week-end we attended a couple of events in Boston that have only reconfirmed the initial appraisal (see repost below).

The first event was the now monotonously familiar 11^th annual anti-war commemoration of the start of the war in Afghanistan. The most noteworthy aspect of that event was that, with the demise of the Occupy movement that energized the larger crowds seen last year, we are back to the hard core political activists. (Unfortunately hubris, and about ten other factor contributed t to that result but I would only add here it did not have to play out that way).

Second was our participation in the Honk! Parade that ran from Somerville to Cambridge, two liberal-oriented cities just outside of Boston. For those not familiar with a Honk! Parade (as I was not before this year) this is an event where every known band, faux band, pick- up band, finger clapper or stick beater around puts on some kind of costume (the more outlandish the better) and makes music for the people along the route. Great color, great costumes, great fun, dare I say it, great people’s fun in the older medieval sense. I will give Peter Paul the last word though, since he marched with the Veterans for Peace contingent. The same great respect for VFPs as vets was exhibited (as elsewhere, see below) but also the response to the slogans of no more war, no more war especially as Iran looms on the horizon. The people are weary, very war-weary. Let’s stop the madness.

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Repost from the American Left History blog, June 2012:

Recently my old back in the 1960s days friend, Peter Paul Markin, himself a war veteran, were comparing notes about the virtual “under the radar” place that American imperial war policies (there is no other name for it with over 1000 bases in the world and over 700 billion plus dollars eaten up by the war budget each year) has taken in this year’s presidential campaign. And, additionally, the almost total lack of organized public outcry about those policies, most notably the lingering death sore of Afghanistan. That despite the fact that some far-sighted, hell, even some jaded bourgeois commentators have placed the odds of civil war in that benighted country (I will not even dignify such a war lord and mercenaries run place as a state) after the alleged American troop draw down scheduled now for 2014 at two to one in favor of civil war. Even by the American government’s own self-serving estimates the forecast is almost as grim. I ask; what gives? Where are the mass rallies against the beast?

The reason for Peter Paul and me comparing notes on this subject was simple enough. Between the two of us we have attended over the past several months in various capacities a whole series of parades and marches only one of which I will mention more on later that was specifically a peace parade. I will describe our purpose in using those settings as a way to bring the anti-war message home below. However right now I can state that we have come to agree, without a doubt, there is a vast war-weariness that if not organized in a public way runs pretty deep just under the surface among the plebeian masses of this country.

For those who do not know, Peter Paul, over the past decade going back before the beginning of the Iraq War in 2003 has attempted to move might and main along with his fellow Veterans For Peace (VFP)to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (and lately to urge no war with Iran) to no avail. I, although not a veteran, have attempted in various journalistic endeavors and on the streets to make those same basic points to no avail as well. Those “no avails” though have never stopped us from continuing to push the rock up the mountain when the cause is righteous. And the struggle against these particular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is righteous and has brought us closer together of late. That has not always been the case, as Peter Paul tends to take a harder anti-capitalist look at the wars as systematic of the need to bring down the whole damn American house of cards and I more from a more anti-imperialist perspective of just trying to hold the American military monster in check. We united on one idea earlier this year and that was the need to continue to get the anti-war message out to the general public. By any means necessary.

That is where the parades idea came in play, although we claim no originally for the idea, none at all. The parades notion actually kind of hit us in the face as a way to bring any kind of peace message to the folks whom we do not normally run into in our rarified big city radical circles. Of course the original focus started out last year in 2011 with Peter Paul’s chapter of Veterans for Peace in Boston, the aptly named Smedley Butler Brigade (“war is a racket”), attempts to march in the “official” South Boston Allied War Council’s Saint Patrick’s Day Parade. Without going into all the particulars of the denial of permission for VFP to march (involving reams of material from a 1995 U.S. Supreme Court decision permitting such exclusions for“private” parades) that organization was shut out of the official parade. Needless to say these resourceful vets (mainly long-in-the-tooth Vietnam era vets who cut their teeth on such symbolic actions) just created their own peace parade to follow the official parade to let those who came to South Boston know there was another voice to be heard from on the questions of war and peace.

That parade in 2011 is where a first tentative recognition of war-weariness came in. Now for those not familiar with South Boston (“Southie”) this is, or was, according to Peter Paul, the last bastion of Irish-centered working class pro-war (or at least don’t question war policy) sentiment left in the world ( a little hyperbole from him, but I am used to it). His family roots stem from that community and I will defer to his analysis (although I would argue that my own hometown, Olde Saco up in Maine filled with grateful immigrant French-Canadians and old time Down East Yankees, would give his Irish a run for his money on unquestioning patriotic sentiment). Expecting the worst all were surprised by the positive reception in Southie.

This spring when we marched (yes, I marched with Peter Paul and his VFP brethren like in olden VVAW times) the response by those same plebeian masses was even more cordial to say the least. Not in the “down with the war, slay the dragon, down with the war budget, take care of things at home” sense that we have “preached” to high heaven about in this space, and others but in the tap of the fingers to the head salute, the ubiquitous throwing up of peace signs, the response when we called for troops out, and enough is enough, as we passed by. Salutes of the VFP flag by hoary old war veterans decked out in their military attire just put icing on the cake. And that is how the Breslin-Markin antiwar “spring offensive” (with, ah, a little help from VFP and others obviously) took off.

A Dorchester Day Parade just south of Southie in one of the more ethnically diverse Irish/Vietnamese/Latino/ Brazilian you name it neighborhoods of Boston (although neighborhoods like Southie that have provided more than their fair share of troops to America’s imperial adventures) produced an even more cordial response. Here some even took up our chants from the sidewalks, shook hands, and offered vocal support as we passed by. Ditto at several Memorial Day services in the area where there was much gnashing of teeth by those who have lost loved ones in the last decade’s wars (and over the post-service stresses that are only now coming to light in huge streams). More recently parades in affluence Rockport and working- class Portsmouth, New Hampshire have only confirmed the cordiality, openness to anti-war messages, and the war weariness. That last one, Portsmouth, by the way, held in a town that depends (read: would not survive) substantially for its local economy on naval appropriations for the huge shipyard there.

So the disconnect between American governmental war policy and the genuine war-weariness of the masses is real enough. But real enough as well, despite the openly expressed sentiments, is any sense of one being able to do anything about it other than patiently waiting for withdrawal due dates. And that is where my simple suggestion comes in.

I, as well as other honest and knowledgeable anti-warriors, have recognized that we did not have any serious effect on Bush-Obama war doctrine in Iraq and have had precious little thus far in Afghanistan. There is one place, and one thing that we can do to turn that around right now. Call on President Obama, who has the built-in executive constitutional power to do so, to pardon Private Bradley Manning now being held in pre-trail detention in Fort Leavenworth Kansas pending charges that could amount to a life sentence for the young soldier. For the forgetful Private Manning allegedly passed sensitive information about U.S. atrocities against civilians and other cover-ups in Iraq and Afghanistan to Wikileaks who then passed it on to a candid world. Thus Private Manning is the “poster person” for opposition to all that has failed, all that is wrong, all that was (and is )atrocious, and all that was (and is) criminal in Bush-Obama war policy. So raise the cry with us-Immediate Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S./Allied Troops From Afghanistan! President Obama Pardon Private Manning!

From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin-From The "Ancient Dreams, Dreamed" Sketches-A New World A-Borning

For Jack-Again

North Adamsville teenage hometown mucks break-out, crying to be broken out of, desperately crying to be broken out of, aided and abetted by break-out musical sensibilities where the message and the messenger were at one. And who were trying to break out of, desperately trying to break-out of the piddle paddle language and the paddle piddle beaten note formulae that had been solid gold guaranteed to thrill, thrill to the marrow, every red-blooded generation of ’68 parent. The kids, well, the kids fell asleep, fell transistor blazing asleep in the cool night dreaming of adventure car hop hostesses, james dean shadow boys, and seaside lore pillowed back seat fogged window noches siestas.

Only at that moment, just that confused and unformed moment, break-out worthy or not, maybe unformed or not, others were trail-blazing after all we were, truth, clueless as to how far that music would take us, and how many acid-etched Dixie cup magic elixirs would have to be consumed before the music died, died of old age, old age at five or ten, and hubris, queen of the downfall night. And we danced, hampton beach surf danced, high building new york city tenement danced, iowa cornfield danced, some tulsa good night two-step danced, rockymountainhigh danced, taos caverns ancient flame shadow ghost-danced, and slipped in oblivion big sur danced, and danced, and died of old age and hubris at five or ten.

That break-out by the way, maybe not so much the physical break-out as getting mentally de-rutted, you know box out, get ahead, go ahead, don’t make many waves, maybe a couple of faux waves for laughs, nothing serious and not taken so, just kid’s stuff done since kids eternity, get schooled, get married, get white picket fence housed, make fewer waves, have two point three kids, make fewer waves, have them do likewise and fade into that tepid splash apologetic wave of some long ago, ancient battered to smithereens clam shell stone cold night at Adamsville beach edge. So, yes, maybe not physical far break-out but far psychic break-out from small town, really small neighborhood, irish neighborhood, and ever those don’t air your dirty linen in public grapevine tap-tapping before the larcenies, adulteries, christ, using the lord’s name in vain, and you know what and whose lord, and worst, not church-going non-scared sacred heart parish show-ups that had the“shawlies” in a stew, gone done.

Gone, strangely gone, that minute anyway gone, as well was last year’s beat, really faux-beat style- which played to the rubes (and inflamed the ”shawlies”) AND fit very nicely, very nicely indeed, with midnight Harvard Square journey haunts, but that was last year, and big cloud puff imitation james dean shadow teen angst and alienation was the style. So gone also, like I said, this minute gone, were those all-weather, all-season (yah, summer too) brown-checkered flannel shirts, those mandatory, Frankie Larkin mandatory, king hell king of the schoolboy beat, ah faux-beat night, black chinos, uncuffed, of course, and those hades-bent work boots, clodhoppers really, although not gone, gone gone, those midnight sunglasses to protect against angst, alienation and barbs.

New age aborning new look. New minute look, so be forewarned. Multi-colored schoolboy jock, okay, okay, faux-jock, jacket worn, raider red and black, black and red, some combination reflecting old time glories, or promises of glory, won by default for long running service and not for glory, not for glory but for slows, but keep that between us, plaid shirt, all the possible shades of plaid if they exist purchased in the bargain center, pre-Wal-Mart night by frugal Ma but for once she hit it right, slacks, with cuffs, thank you, and loafers (sans pennies). Yah, strictly a college guy and no more mister nobody from nowhere but a guy who fit in, and he did, all the girls, all the blue-eyed, blond eight-million people weary Long Island transplants, all the dark-eyed senoritas tired of their own backwater small town grapevine whispers, all the Philly somebodies from somewhere out of a John O’Hara high society novel, were crazy to “check out” this specimen, this talk all night rap, rap irish boyo. And most importantly, most importantly for this boyo, check out or not, they were all not North Adamsville and shames, hidden desires and blunt candid-less-ness Irish girls.

New inner look too, cool, not beat cool but joe college cool, disaffected, looking off to far reaches and not suffering fools gladly cool, learned at Humphrey Bogart’s knee and perfected by some cat on a hot tin roof Paul Newman puffing madly to forget lost dreams of youth but who knew, although the newspapers were full of warning, hell we were going to live forever, cigarette, Winston or Marlboro, filtered, natch, just in case, just in case we were not going to live forever, not by mortality but by bomb boom boom in the cold war night. Yes, cool man jack cigarette, hanging from off the lip at some jagged angle, drawn deeply in and circles and smoke dreams created. More, amused girls also puffing to prove some equality, and some reflected man cool in that sexed-up, sex- maddened free time.

And get this, a cup of coffee, if coffee was the drink, black, black against all advise, black since late schoolboy Hayes-Bickford Harvard Square drowses searching for that next word, and the next break-out, literary, political, hell, even social, in hand, a glad hand either way, look right, look left, a gentle nod, a hard stare, a gentle snarl if such a thing is possible beyond the page. But mainly a look, a look of cool distain, of remove, of next please in the never-ending look game. Soon wearied of, very wearied, although not of looks, and glances.

One’s act, fitfully, artlessly but rightly was thereafter moved onto Boston fresh streets, and a little fame. Joe College minute gone, vanished like so much train smoke, and bad dreams. Dressed in blue flannel shirt, blue denim, moccasins and midnight, eternal midnight sunglasses, and dressed, ah, in freedom but no one saw that. Finally, that one minute, no not fifteen, not fifteen at all, and not necessarily of the fame game, local fame, always local fame but fame. And then the music stopped, the crowds thinned out, the hardened Long Island transplants kept looking at guys in multi-colored jackets (although not always red and black), the Philly girls turned inward to their own crowd and began to dream of stockbroker mansions and riviera suntans, and the dark-eyed senoritas only knew of one night remembrances, and lust. Then sunk in the abyss of non-fame, non- recognition and not seen snarls, gentle or otherwise. A tough life lesson learned, very tough. And not yet twenty.

The Struggle In Spain -A Forum In Boston

The Struggle In Spain- A Forum

An Analysis Of The Chicago Teacher Strike From The Revolutionary Organization Of Labor, USA

Let’s Redouble Our Efforts To Free Private Bradley Manning-President Obama Pardon Bradley Manning -Make Every Town Square In America (And The World) A Bradley Manning Square From Boston To Berkeley to Berlin-Join Us In Davis Square, Somerville –The Stand-Out Is Every Wednesday From 4:00-5:00 PM

Click on the headline to link to the Private Bradley Manning Petition website page.

Markin comment:

The Private Bradley Manning case is headed toward a mid- winter trial. Those of us who support his cause should redouble our efforts to secure his freedom. For the past several months there has been a weekly stand-out in Greater Boston across from the Davis Square Redline MBTA stop (renamed Bradley Manning Square for the stand-out’s duration) in Somerville on Friday afternoons but we have since July 4, 2012 changed the time and day to 4:00-5:00 PM on Wednesdays. This stand-out has, to say the least, been very sparsely attended. We need to build it up with more supporters present. Please join us when you can. Or better yet if you can’t join us start a Support Bradley Manning weekly stand-out in some location in your town whether it is in the Boston area, Berkeley or Berlin. And please sign the petition for his release either in person or through the Bradley Manning Support Network. We have placed links to the Manning Network and Manning Square website below. ********
Bradley Manning Support Network http://www.bradleymanning.org/

Manning Square website http://freemanz.com/2012/01/20/somerville_paper_photo-bradmanningsquare/bradleymanningsquare-2011_01_13/


Remarks From The Pardon Bradley Manning Rally At Downtown Boston Obama Headquarters-September 6, 2012

Welcome one and all and I am glad you could be here for this important struggle. The Smedley Butler Brigade of Veterans for Peace proudly stands in solidarity with, and defense of, Private Bradley Manning and his fight for freedom from his jailers, the American military. Now usually when I get before a mic or am on a march I am shouting to high heaven about some injustice. Recently I was called strident by someone and when it comes to the struggle against this country’s wars, the struggle for social and economic equality, and for freedom for our political prisoners I am indeed strident. But I am looking for something today something personally important to me and so I will try to lower my temperature a bit- I want, like you, for President Obama to pardon Bradley Manning so I will be nice, or try to be.

Bradley Manning is in a sense the poster person for all of us who have struggled against the wars of the last decade. He stands charged with allegedly leaking information about American war crimes and other matters of public concern to Wikileaks. We, and we are not alone on this, do not see whistleblowing on such activities as a crime but as an elemental humanitarian act and public service. Private Manning has paid the price for his alleged acts with over 800 days of pre-trial confinement and is now facing life imprisonment for simple acts of humanity. For letting the American people know what they perhaps did not want to know but must know- when soldiers, American soldiers, go to war some awful things can happen and do. He has also suffered torture at the hands of the American government for his brave stand. We have become somewhat inured to foreign national being tortured by the American government at places like Guantanamo and other black hole locales. We have even become somewhat inured to American citizens being tortured and killed by the American government by drones and other methods. But we know, or should know, that when the American government stands accused of torturing an American soldier for not toeing the war line then we private citizens are in serious trouble.

Why does Private Manning need a pardon? Did he give away the order of battle or the table of organization for American military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan? No. Did he give away the design for drones and such weapons? No. He simply blew the whistle on something that is a hard fact of war- war crimes by American soldiers through release of the Collateral Murder tape and what have become known as the Iraq and Afghan War logs. This is what the American government had tried with might and main to cover up. And what needed to be exposed. All talk of bringing democracy, or national building, or having a war to end all wars, and the million other lame excuses for war pale before the hard fact that in the heat of war the real strategy is to kill and burn and let god sort out the innocent from the guilty. That is what Private Manning exposed.

I, and I am sure many other veterans from previous wars who saw or knew of such things and did nothing about it, are glad that such things were exposed. If for no other reason Private First Class Bradley Manning deserves presidential pardon for his service. To insure that event we urge everybody to ramp up their efforts in behalf of Bradley by signing here or online at the Bradley Manning Support Network site the petition to the Secretary of the Army for his release and to call the White House, the telephone number is listed on the flyer we are handing out, and demand that President Obama pardon Private Manning. Today’s event is the start of our fall campaign of behalf of Private Manning who at this time is expected to go to trial next February. We want to build toward that trial, assuming President Obama (or President Romney) has not pardoned him by then. We have been holding weekly stand-outs in Davis Square in Somerville outside the MBTA Red Line stop Wednesdays from 4:00to 5:00 PM and urge you to join us. Or better yet start a Free Bradley Manning stand-out in your own town square. Thank you

From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin- No Job For Amateurs –Lana Turner’s “Portrait In Black”

 

 

 

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for Lana Turner’s Portrait In Black

DVD Review

Portrait In Black, starring Lana Turner, Anthony Quinn, Sandra Dee, Universal Pictures, 1960

Let’s face it murder, and by this I mean planned murder not some blood simple, spur of the moment, heat of passion thing that could befall anybody, is not job for amateurs. More than a few who have failed to observe this rule have faced the gallows for thinking that they could cheap the hangman, or the odds. Of course that is the premise, the odds against premise, of the film under review, the1960 thriller Portrait In Black, in which the characters play with fire in disregard of that very sound advice just provided, just provided for free. 

More importantly love and murder do not mix, do not mix at all. Also advice provided gratis courtesy of viewing many noirs and thrillers. But as humans will do when the love bug gets its nasty side hold on people there is no telling what will happen, or where it will lead. And that is exactly what happens to our unlucky couple in this thriller. They tempt the fates and those angry gods and goddesses in acts of pure hubris smash them like bugs.   

 Let me provide a few details just to prove my point, although if you too have seen enough noirs and thrillers you already are in my chapel. One unhappy (but rich) San Francisco wife (played by Lana Turner last seen by this reviewer serving them off the arm down at Nick’s Dinner further down the coast and also plotting, amateur plotting with a besotted highway tramp, John Garfield, to murder old Nick for love and money in the film adaptation of James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice) of one very sick and ruthless man wants to move on, move on with her husband’s doctor (played by Anthony Quinn).

Naturally the lovers want to be happy and happiness cannot wait upon the timely demise of the husband. The husband is therefore a very long gone daddy after a little work by the good doctor. Perfect crime. No somebody is onto their caper. And that someone is also a goner. All done, right. No, no once this thing gets going it snowballs out of control. See, the husband’s daughter (played by Sandra Dee) by his first wife tumbled onto the lovers who thought they had everything under control. So, naturally, naturally now that the blood lust is up, she has to go. Almost. But the main mantra of any thriller or any noir is that crime does not pay. And that is the case here. And you wonder why I say murder is no job for amateurs. Got it.

Veterans For Peace Demand Peace And Justice- Today-October 7, 2012- New York City

Click on the headline to link to the Veterans For Peace website.

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At 10 p.m. on May 1,2012, the New York Police Department closed the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, driving out members of the Occupy movement who were holding a nonviolent General Assembly. Eight members of the Veterans Peace Team and two members of Occupy Faith were arrested for standing their ground. A small metal sign has been posted at the park stating that it closes at 10 p.m. This was Vietnam vet Paul Appell's reaction:

"Plato wrote 'only the dead have seen the end of war.' War veterans, loved ones of the fallen, and certainly those living in war ^ones do not have the option of closing down their memories at 10p.m. There is a good reason why suicide is an attractive option for many. It is truly the only sure way of ending the memories. For a memorial to shut down at some convenient time for the city is an insult to all those who do not have the luxury of shutting down their war memories at a specific time. I know that many want us war vets to go out of sight and nof bother them, except when we are needed for some parade. Some of us are not going away at 10 p.m. or any other time. If they do not like it, maybe they should have thought of that before they sent us to war."

From #Un-Occupied Boston (#Un-Tomemonos Boston)-What Happens When We Do Not Learn The Lessons Of History- The Pre-1848 Socialist Movement-From The Pens Of Karl Marx And Friedrich Engels-The Struggle For The Communist League-Letters of Marx and Engels, 1846-Marx To Pierre-Joseph Proudhon In Paris- And Proudhon's Reply

Click on the headline to link to the Occupy Boston General Assembly Minutes website. Occupy Boston started at 6:00 PM, September 30, 2011.

Markin comment:

I will post any updates from that Occupy Boston site if there are any serious discussions of the way forward for the Occupy movement or, more importantly, any analysis of the now atrophied and dysfunctional General Assembly concept. In the meantime I will continue with the “Lessons From History ’’series started in the fall of 2011 with Karl Marx’s The Civil War In France-1871 (The defense of the Paris Commune). Right now this series is focused on the European socialist movement before the Revolutions of 1848.
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An Injury To One Is An Injury To All!-Defend The Occupy Movement And All Occupiers! Drop All Charges Against All Occupy Protesters Everywhere!

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Fight-Don’t Starve-We Created The Wealth, Let's Take It Back! Labor And The Oppressed Must Rule!
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A Five-Point Program As Talking Points

*Jobs For All Now!-“30 For 40”- A historic demand of the labor movement. Thirty hours work for forty hours pay to spread the available work around. Organize the unorganized- Organize the South- Organize Wal-Mart- Defend the right for public and private workers to unionize.

* Defend the working classes! No union dues for Democratic (or the stray Republican) candidates. Spent the dough instead on organizing the unorganized and on other labor-specific causes (good example, the November, 2011 anti-union recall referendum in Ohio, bad example the Wisconsin gubernatorial recall race in June 2012).

*End the endless wars!- Immediate, Unconditional Withdrawal Of All U.S./Allied Troops (And Mercenaries) From Afghanistan! Hands Off Pakistan! Hands Off Iran! U.S. Hands Off The World!

*Fight for a social agenda for working people!. Quality Healthcare For All! Nationalize the colleges and universities under student-teacher-campus worker control! Forgive student debt! Stop housing foreclosures!

*We created the wealth, let’s take it back. Take the struggle for our daily bread off the historic agenda. Build a workers party that fights for a workers government to unite all the oppressed.

Emblazon on our red banner-Labor and the oppressed must rule!

*********

From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin-From The "Ancient Dreams, Dreamed" Sketches-Last Chance To Glance

Main street walked, a brand new just off the assembly line wild dream 1964 Mustang just passed by (dark green, complete with sally, sassy blonde-haired sally from down the street, with big breasts and no brains, according to shawlie grapevine lore, but still with that green devil of a mustang paid for by some smitten man out for her midnight romp of local manhood, or men-hood according to Frankie Larkin school boy corner boy lore, and he should know). Cursed no car night shade walked, no dough for car walked, no dough for nothing walked, his poor Pa out of work again. Out of work as the ships that keep North Adamsville afloat are now being built in more exotic locales, foreign places like Taiwan and Malta, wherever that is, and so he, unskilled, last hired, first fired, and built for hills and hollows coal mine childhoods and no waterlogged ocean belts, has no dough to spare. Nada.

So he walked, and only dreamed of cars, not some big deal car like Sally’s Mustang or the “boss” ’57 Chevy of his dreams (nothing but a girl magnet car, and choices too, take a number, girls), and the stuff of hard corner boy chieftain Billy Bradley’s reality but just something to get around in, something to make the girls raise their heads when he passed by, and not keep them pavement-bound while his flannel-shirted in all climes, black chinos un-cuffed in all climes, Chuck Taylor sneakers in all weathers, and midnight faux- beatnik sunglasses at all hours passed them walking by (all by his lonesome, except when Frankie decides he has had enough of main squeeze Joann, or corners).

And not something, some car not girl, too complicated, mechanically complicated, either so that he would have to spent his time and his no dough down the street at Stewball Stu’s homegrown garage waiting on his lordship to fix some silly thing in about one second like tightening something loose with the flick of a wrench, endlessly talk about his latest conquests (plural is correct, girl conquests, of course, what else could Stu talk about, and for real, he know because they, the girls, and not dogs either, talk about it at school, and giggle, giggle that giggle that meant more than tender smooches, jesus), smell his stinking whiskey breathe (rotgut Johnny Walker something but not top shelf but more like Adams River streaked water, and his oil stained, oil-stained everything (clothes, tee-shirt, kitchen table, Christ, how can a guy live like that). Some girl magnet, who knows how or why but they take numbers to ride the curve with Stu, but that was just him being jealous because a couple of times he got Stu’s “left-overs.” So thanks, Stu, for the favors.

But see his Pa out of work meant no telephone, and no dough to put in a telephone or keep it at the ready that is how close to the vest the family had to play it when Pa got his slip, not even a cheapjack two-party line that they, AT&T, practically give away. So this night he was not just walking, Main Street walking for the hell of it, but to rub a few dimes together and find the nearest public telephone to do his talking into. What it’s was about, the talking, he would get to in a minute he said but he wanted to tell me that this nearest phone was located right next to the Minute Motel. Come on, don’t you get it, that was not the real name of the place but do I have to draw you a picture? This is strictly for the “high society” crowd that does their business by the hour, or less. Day and night it seemed, there were always cars pulling in and out. Not ‘57 Chevies, those and their Billy Bradley corner boy owners are down at Adamsville Beach or at Squaw Rock down across from the far end of the beach watching the “submarine races” at midnight for free but more old guy cars. Buicks and Pontiacs. And seeing the traffic going and out of that joint, and why, what goes on, only made his “job” for this evening that much harder.

See he had been walking this night for a while, a couple of hours, trying to get up enough courage to call this Diana, a girl classmate for a date. Diana, a greek goddess wholesale (although he didn’t think she was greek or wholesale but he had her headed that way, that pedestal way), on this atlantic ocean strictly from hunger working class town means streets is who has him walking (and truth to tell kind of muttering to himself, she was that kind of girl). Naturally, Diana was not her real name just like that hotel, motel, no tell was not really called the Minute Motel, I don’t want any trouble okay, and I will tell you why as I get along with what he wanted to talk to her about. Don’t worry it won’t be long.

This Diana and he have been talking, hard and kind of deep talking in school about world issues, music, poets, crazed poets like mad monk Allen Ginsburg and not so crazed T.S. Eliot (they had read Wasteland together in class, wow). Hard talking about the big break-out they knew was coming, about how things are going to be totally different for them when their time came with no Pa out of work and always no dough, or not enough, and they wanted to be part of it. (See, she told him in confidence, her Pa was on the chopping block down at the shipyards too so she knew about no dough, and sniffed dreams too.) So he took her seriously, and she, he thought, took him seriously although she never had had anything good to say about Frankie, Frankie Larkin, his corner boy, but that was because he tried to give her a tumble, he thought, and she knew he was always ball and chain to Joann, or corners. That part isn’t important anyway. What is important is that he dreamed of her, no, I’d better say she disturbed his sleep the way he described it and be closer to the truth.

And here is why. Diana, blonde, naturally blonde, Diana, filled out a cashmere-sweater nicely thank you, white tennis –shoed like every other girl in town but showing off some very nice, well-turned legs, thank you. So you can see where she might disturb his sleep because usually he went for girls (and this I know from first-hand experience) who wanted to be part of the great breakout, just like him, but who well, since I am trying kind and he was trying to keep his emotions in check before he made this call were only “cute,” at best. Although they too wear those white tennis shoes while reading their James Joyce or Albert Camus (yah, it was that kind of crowd he ran with over in Harvard Square when he had his fill of North Adamsville squares, excepting Diana). See he was making this call, this midnight big time call to ask Diana to go on over to the Square with him, just as friends, see.

Right now as you can sense I bet he was only talking to stall, stall having to do this call, cold call really, because he didn’t know that much about her personally and his intelligence network (Sunday night corner boy guys hanging around the boys’ lav on Monday morning speaking of conquests, and other lies) has run cold to the ground. All he really knew about her was that she wanted to break-out and that was good enough for him, and good enough to disturb his sleep lately until he played his hand out.

So he was seeking this public telephone, or rather courage-seeking, nickel and dime courage as it turned out; nickel and dime courage when due to no fault of his own (or his Pa’s really when he thought about it) home provided no sanctuary for snuggle-eared delights. Maybe a date, maybe just a swirl at midnight drift, maybe a view of local lore submarine races, ah, to dream, no more than to dream, walking down friendly aisles, arm and arm along with myriad other arm and arm walkers on high school senior errands. Diana

He dropped the dime in ring, ring, ring. Hi, Diana, hi spiel, and then, and then nothingness. No way, no way, damn intelligence no way, see she had a boyfriend, a college guy, probably all done up in plaid shirts, slacks, be serious, slacks, and pennied loafers, and that is where her dream break-out was running. And then dead of night red-face right away, sorry, he didn’t know, alas, red-faced the next day, red faced until parted june freedom fly-out.

And in the telling red-faced even forty years later. Wow.

From The Pen Of Joshua Lawrence Breslin-From The "Ancient Dreams, Dreamed" Sketches-“Hayes-Bickford Breakout 1962”

Peter Paul Markin in his own words:

Here I am again sitting, 3 o’clock in the morning sitting, bleary-eyed, slightly distracted after mulling over the back and forth of the twelve hundredth run-in (nice way to put it, right?) with Ma that has driven me out into this chilly October 1962 early morning. And where do I find myself sitting at this time of morning? Tired, but excitedly expectant, on an uncomfortable, unpadded bench seat on this rolling old clickity-clack monster of a Red Line subway car as it now waggles its way out past Kendall Station on its way to Central Square and then to the end of the line, Harvard Square. My hangout, my muse home, my night home, at least my weekend night home, my place to make sense of the world in a world that doesn’t make much sense, at least not enough much sense. Sanctuary, Harvard Square Hayes-Bickford sanctuary, misbegotten teenage boy sanctuary, recognized by international law, recognized by canon law, or not.

That beef with Ma, that really unnumbered beef, forget about the 1200 I said before, that was just a guess, has driven me to take an “all-nighter” trip away from the travails of the old home town across Boston to the never-closed Hayes-Bickford cafeteria that beckons just as you get up the stairs from the Harvard subway tunnel. Damn, let me just get this off my chest and then I can tell the rest of the story. Ma said X, I pleaded for Y (hell this homestead civil war lent itself righteously to a nice algebraic formulation. You can use it too, no charge). Unbeknownst to me Y did not exist in Ma’s universe. Ever. Sound familiar? Sure, but I had to get it off my chest.

After putting on my uniform, my Harvard Square “cool” uniform: over-sized flannel brownish plaid shirt, belt-less black cuff-less chino pants, black Chuck Taylor logo-ed Converse sneakers, a now ratty old windbreaker won in a Fourth of July distance race a few years back when I really was nothing but a wet-behind-the ears kid to ward off the chill, and, and the absolutely required midnight sunglasses to hide those bleary eyes from a peeking world I was ready to go. To face the unlighted night, and fight against the dawn’s rising for another day. Oh yah, I forgot, I had to sneak out of the house stealthily, run like some crazed broken field football player down the back of the property, and, after catching my breathe, walk a couple of miles over bridge and nasty, hostile (hostile if anyone was out, and anyone was sniping for a misbegotten teenage boy, for any purpose good or evil) Dorchester streets to get to the Fields Corner subway stop. The local Eastern Mass. bus had stopped its always erratic service hours ago, and, anyway, I usually would rather walk, in any case, than wait, wait my youth away for those buses to amble along our way with their byzantine schedules.

Right now though I am thinking, as those subway car wheels rattle beneath my feet, who knows, really, how or why it starts, that wanderlust start, that strange feeling in the pit of your stomach that you have to move on, or out, or up or you will explode, except you also know, or you damn well come to know that it eats away at a man, or a woman for matter, in different ways. Maybe way back, way back in the cradle it was that first sense that there was more to the world that the four corners of that baby world existence and that if you could just, could just get over that little, little side board there might be something better, much better over the horizon. But, frankly that just seems like too much of a literary stretch even for me, moody teenage boy that I am, to swallow so let’s just say that it started once I knew that the ocean was a way to get away, if you needed to get away. But see I didn’t figure than one out for myself even, old Kenny from the old neighborhood in third grade is the one who got me hip to that, and then Johnny James and his brother filled in the rest of the blanks and so then I was sea-worthy, dream sea-worthy anyway.

But, honestly, that sea dream stuff can only be music for the future because right now I am stuck, although I do not always feel stuck about it, trying to figure my way out of high school world, or at least figure out the raging things that I want to do after high school that fill up my daydream time (study hall time, if you really want to know). Of course, as well, that part about the ocean just mentioned, well there was a literal part to the proposition since ocean-at-my-back (sometimes right at my back) New England homestead meant unless I wanted to take an ill-advised turn at piracy or high-seas hijacking or some such thing east that meant I had to head west. Right now west though is Harvard Square, its doings and not doings, it trumpet call to words, and sounds, and actions in the October Friday night all-night storm brewing.

The train now rounds the squeaky-sounding bend out of Central Square and stops at the station. So now I leave my pensive seat and stand waiting, waiting for the driver to release the pressure to let the sliding train door open, getting ready to jump off the old subway, two-step-at-a-time my way up the two flights of stairs and head for mecca to see if things jump for me tonight. The doors open at last. Up the two-stepped stairs I go, get to the surface and confront the old double-glassed Hayes door entrance and survey the vast table-filled room that at this hour has a few night owl stranglers spotted throughout the place.

You know the old Hayes-Bickford, or one of them if you live in Boston, or New York City, or a few other places on the East Coast, don’t you? Put your tray on the metal slider (hey, I don’t know what you call that slider thing, okay) and cruise down the line from item to item behind the glass-enclosed bins of, mostly, steamy food, if you are looking for fast service, for a quick between doing things, pressing things, meal. Steamed and breaded everything from breakfast to lunch to dinner anytime topped off by dishwater quality coffee (refills on demand, if you feel lucky). But this is not the place to bring your date, certainly not your first date, except maybe for a quick cup of that coffee before going to some event, or home. What this is, really, is a place where you can hang out, and hang out with comfort, because nobody, nobody at all, is going to ask you to leave, at least if you act half-way human. And that is what this place is really about, the humans in all their human conditions doing human things, alien to you or not, that you see floating by you, as you take a seat at one of the one-size-fits all wooden tables with those red vinyl seat covered chairs replete with paper place settings, a few off-hand eating utensils and the usual obligatory array of condiments to help get down the food and drink offered here.

Let me describe who is here at this hour on an early Saturday morning in October 1962. I will not vouch for other times, or other days, but I know Friday and Saturday nights a little so I can say something about them. Of course there is the last drink at the last open barroom crowd, said bar already well-closed in blue law Massachusetts, trying to get sober enough by eating a little food to traverse the road home. Good luck. Needless to say eating food in an all-night cafeteria, any all-night cafeteria, means only one thing-the person is so caught up in a booze frenzy that he (mainly) or she (very occasionally) is desperate for anything to hang the name food on to. Frankly, except for the obligatory hard-dollar coffee-steamed to its essence, then through some mystical alchemic process re-beaned, and served in heavy ceramic mugs that keep in the warmth to keep the eyes open the food here is strictly for the, well, the desperate, drunk or sober.

I might mention a little more about the food as I go along but it is strictly to add color to this little story. Maybe, maybe it will add color to the story but this is mainly about the“literary” life at the old Hayes and the quest for the blue-pink night not the cuisine so don’t hold me to it. Here is the kicker though; there are a few, mercifully few this night, old winos, habitual drunks, and street vagabonds (I am being polite here) who are nuzzling their food, for real. This is the way that you can tell the "last drink" boys, the hail fellows well met, who are just out on the town and who probably go to one of the ten zillion colleges in the area and are drawn like moths (and like wayward high schools kids, including this writer) to the magic name, Harvard Square. They just pick at their food. Those other guys (again, mainly, guys) those habituals and professional waywards work at it like it is their last chance for salvation.

Harvard Square, bright lights, dead of nights, see the sights. That vision is nothing but a commercial, a commercial magnet for every young (and old) hustler within fifty miles of the place to come and display their “acumen”. Their hustle. Three card Monte, quick-change artistry, bait and hook, a little jack-rolling, fake dope-plying, lifting an off-hand wallet, the whole gamut of hustler con lore. On any given Harvard Square weekend night there have got to be more young, naïve, starry-eyed kids hanging out trying to be cool, but really, like me, just learning the ropes of life than you could shake a stick at to set a hustler’s heart, if he (mainly) or she (sometimes) had a heart.

I’ll tell you about a quick con that got me easy in a second but right now let me tell you that at this hour I can see a few con artists just now resting up after a hard night’s work around a couple of tables, comparing notes (or, more likely, trying to con each other, there is no honor among thieves in this little night world. Go to it boys). As to the con that got me, hey it was simple, a guy, an older guy, a twenty-five year old or something like that guy, came up to me while I was talking to a friend and said did I (we) want to get some booze. Sober, sixteen years old, and thrill-seeking I said sure (drinking booze is the coin of the realm for thrills these days, among high school kids that I know, maybe the older set, those college guys, are, I hear, experimenting with drugs but if so it is very on the QT).

He said name your poison, I did, and then he “suggested” a little something for himself. Sure, whatever is right. I gave him the money and he returned a few minutes later with a small bag with the top of a liquor bottle hanging out. He split. We went off to a private area around Harvard Yard (Phillips Brook House, I think) and got ready to have our first serious taste of booze, and maybe get rum brave enough to pick up some girls. Naturally, the bottle is a booze bottle alright but it had been opened (how long before is anyone’s guess) and filled with water. Sucker, right. Now the only reason that I am mentioning this story right now is that the guy who pulled this con is sitting, sitting like the King of Siam, just a few tables away from where I am sitting. The lesson learned for the road, for the future road that beckons: don’t accept packages from strangers without inspecting them and watch out for cons, right? No, hell no. The lesson is this: sure don’t fall for wise guy tricks but the big thing is to shake it off, forget about it if you see the con artist again. You are way to cool to let him (or occasionally her) think that they have conned you. Out loud, anyway.

But wait, I am not here at almost four o’clock in the Hayes-Bickford morning, the Harvard Square Hayes-Bickford morning, to talk about the decor, the food if that is what it is, about the clientele, humble, slick, or otherwise. I am here looking for“talent”, literary talent that is. See, I have been here enough, and have heard enough about the ”beats” (or rather pseudo-beats, or “late phase” beats at this time) and the “folkies” (music people breaking out of the Pop 40 music scene and going back to the roots of America music, way back) to know that a bunch of them, about six in all, right this minute are sitting in a far corner with a light drum tapping the beat listening to a guy in black pants(always de rigueur black), sneakers and a flannel shirt just like me reciting his latest poem. That possibility is what drove me here this night, and other nights as well. See the Hayes is known as the place where someone like Norman Mailer has his buttered toast after one of his “last drink” bouts. Or that Bob Dylan sat at that table, that table right over there, writing something on a napkin. Or some parallel poet to the one now wrapping up his seventy-seven verse imitation Allen Ginsberg's Howl master work went out to San Francisco and blew the lid off the town, the City Lights town, the literary town.

But I better, now that the six-ish dawn light is hovering, trying to break through the night wars, get my droopy body down those subway stairs pretty soon and back across town before anyone at home notices that I am missing. Still I will take the hard-bitten coffee, re-beaned and all, I will take the sleepy eyes that are starting to weigh down my face, I will even take the con artists and feisty drunks just so that I can be here when somebody’s search for the blue-pink great American West night, farther west than Harvard Square night, gets launched.

A MODEST LABOR PROPOSAL-RECRUIT, RUN INDEPENDENT LABOR MILITANTS IN THE 2012 ELECTIONS.

IN THIS TIME OF THE ‘GREAT FEAR’ WE NEED CANDIDATES TO FIGHT FOR A WORKERS GOVERNMENT.

FORGET DONKEYS AND ELEPHANTS - BUILD A WORKERS PARTY!

In the summer of 2006 I originally wrote the following commentary (used in subsequent election cycles and updated a little for today’s purpose) urging the recruitment of independent labor militants as write-in candidates for the mid-term 2006 congressional elections based on a workers party program. With the hoopla already in full gear for the 2012 election cycle I repost that commentary below with that same intention of getting thoughtful leftists to use the 2012 campaign to further our propagandistic fight for a workers’ party that fights for a workers government.

A Modest Proposal-Recruit, Run Independent Labor Militants In The 2012 Elections

All “anti-parliamentarian”, “anti-state”, “non-political” anarchist or anarcho-syndicalist brothers and sisters need read no further. This writer does not want to sully the purity of your politics with the taint of parliamentary electoral politics. Although I might remind you, as we remember the 75th anniversary of the beginning of the Barcelona Uprising, that your political ancestors in Spain were more than willing to support the state and enter the government when they got the chance- the bourgeois government of a bourgeois state. But, we can fight that issue out later. We will, hopefully, see you on the barricades with us when the time comes.

As for other militants- here is my modest proposal. Either recruit fellow labor militants or present yourselves as candidates to run for public office, especially for Congress, during the 2012 election cycle. Why? Even a quick glance at the news of the day is calculated to send the most hardened politico screaming into the night. The quagmire in Afghanistan (and unfinished business in Iraq and threats to Iran), immigration walls, flag-burning amendments, anti -same-sex marriage amendments, the threat to separation of church state raised by those who would impose a fundamentalist Christian theocracy on the rest of us, and the attacks on the hard fought gains of the Enlightenment posed by bogus theories such as ‘intelligent design.’ And that is just an average day. Therefore, this election cycle provides militants, at a time when the dwindling electorate is focused on politics, a forum to raise our program and our ideas. We use this as a tool, like leaflets, petitions, meetings, demonstrations, etc. to get our message across. Why should the Donkeys, Elephants, and the other smaller bourgeois parties have a monopoly on the public square?

I mentioned in the last paragraph the idea of program. Let us face it if we do not have a program to run on then it makes no sense for militants to run for public office. Given the political climate our task at this time is to fight an exemplary propaganda campaign. Our program is our banner in that fight. The Democrats and Republicans DO NOT RUN on a program. The sum of their campaigns is to promise not to steal from the public treasury (or at least not too much), beat their husbands or wives, or grossly compromise themselves in any manner. On second thought, given today’s political climate, they may not promise not to beat their husbands or wives or not compromise themselves in any untoward manner. You, in any case, get the point. Damn, even the weakest neophyte labor militant can make a better presentation before working people that this crowd. This writer presents a five point program (you knew that was coming, right?) that labor militants can run on. As point five makes clear this is not a ‘minimum’ program but a program based on our need to fight for power.

1. FIGHT FOR THE IMMEDIATE AND UNCONDITIONAL WITHDRAWAL OF U.S. TROOPS FROM THE MIDDLE EAST NOW (OR BETTER YET, YESTERDAY)! U.S. HANDS OFF THE WORLD! VOTE NO ON THE WAR BUDGET!

The quagmire in Afghanistan and elsewhere in the Middle East (Iraq, Syria, Libya, Palestine, Iran) is the fault line of American politics today. Every bourgeois politician has to have his or her feet put to the fire on this one. Not on some flimsy ‘sense of the Congress’ softball motion for withdrawal next, year, in two years, or (my favorite) when the situation is stable. Moreover, on the parliamentary level the only real vote that matters is the vote on the war budget. All the rest is fluff. Militants should make a point of trying to enter Congressional contests where there are so-called anti-war Democrats or Republicans (an oxymoron, I believe) running to make that programmatic contrast vivid.

But, one might argue, that would split the ‘progressive’ forces. Grow up, please! That argument has grown stale since it was first put forth in the “popular front” days of the 1930’s. If you want to end the wars in Afghanistan and elsewhere fight for this position on the war budget. Otherwise the same people (yes, those 'progressive Democrats') who almost unanimously voted for the last war budget get a free ride on the cheap. War President Barack Obama desperately needs to be opposed by labor militants. By rights this is our issue. Let us take it back.

2. FIGHT FOR A LIVING WAGE AND WORKING CONDITIONS-UNIVERSAL FREE HEALTH CARE FOR ALL.

It is a ‘no-brainer’ that no individual, much less a family can live on the minimum wage (now $7/hr. or so). What planet do these politicians live on? We need an immediate fight for a living wage, full employment and decent working conditions. We need universal free health care for all. End of story. The organized labor movement must get off its knees and fight to organize Wal-Mart and the South. A boycott of Wal-Mart is not enough. A successful organizing drive will, like in the 1930’s; go a long way to turning the conditions of labor around.

3. FIGHT THE ATTACKS ON THE ENLIGHTENMENT.

Down with the Death Penalty! Full Citizenship Rights for All Immigrants who make it here! Stop the Deportations! For the Separation of Church and State! Defend abortion rights! Down with anti-same sex marriage legislation! Full public funding of education! Stop the ‘war on drugs’, basically a war on blacks and minority youth-decriminalize drugs! Defend political prisoners! This list of demands hardly exhausts the “culture war” issues we defend. It is hard to believe that in the year 2012 over 200 years after the American Revolution and the French Revolution we are fighting desperately to preserve many of the same principles that militants fought for in those revolutions. But so be it.

4. FIGHT FOR A WORKERS PARTY.

The Donkeys, Elephants and other smaller bourgeois parties have had their chance. Now is the time to fight for our own party and for the interests of our own class, the working class. Any campaigns by independent labor militants must highlight this point. And any campaigns can also become the nucleus of a workers’ party network until we get strong enough to form at least a small party. None of these other parties, and I mean none, are working in the interests of working people and their allies. The following great lesson of politic today must be hammered home. Break with the Democrats, Republicans!

5. FIGHT FOR A WORKERS AND XYZ GOVERNMENT. THIS IS THE DEMAND THAT SEPARATES THE MILITANTS FROM THE FAINT-HEARTED REFORMISTS.

We need our own form of government. In the old days the bourgeois republic was a progressive form of government. Not so any more. That form of government ran out of steam about one hundred years ago. We need a Workers Republic. We need a government based on workers councils with a ministry (I do not dare say commissariat in case any stray anarchists are still reading this) responsible to it. Let us face it if we really want to get any of the good and necessary things listed above accomplished we are not going to get it with the current form of government.

Why the XYZ part? What does that mean? No, it is not part of an algebra lesson. What it reflects is that while society is made up mainly of workers (of one sort or another) there are other classes (and parts of classes) in society that we seek as allies and could benefit from a workers government. Examples- small independent contractors, intellectuals, the dwindling number of small farmers, and some professionals like dentists. Yes, with my tongue in my cheek after all my dental bills, I like the idea of a workers and dentists government. The point is however you formulate it you have got to fight for it.

Obviously any campaign based on this program will be an exemplary propaganda campaign for the foreseeable future. But we have to start now. Continuing to support or not challenging the bourgeois parties does us no good. That is for sure. While bourgeois electoral laws do not favor independent candidacies write-in campaigns are possible. ROLL UP YOUR SHEEVES! GET THOSE PETITIONS SIGNED! PRINT OUT THE LEAFLETS! PAINT THOSE BANNERS! GET READY TO SHAKE HANDS AND KISS BABIES.

OCTOBER 6 ACTION AGAINST WARS ABROAD

OCTOBER 6 ACTION AGAINST WARS ABROAD

AND POLICE STATE ATTACKS ON CIVIL LIBERTIES AT HOME

Eleven years ago on October 7, the U.S. unleashed a never-ending war on Afghanistan.

Join us in a march and rally to protest the dangerous escalation in threats of military action

against Pakistan, Syria and Iran and increased racist violence and repression at home.

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 6, 1:30 PM, PARK ST.

LET’S STAND TOGETHER IN UNITY AND SOLIDARITY. TOGETHER WE ARE POWERFUL!

HANDS OFF SYRIA AND IRAN!

NO TO RACISM, RAIDS, AND REPRESSION!

NO TO ISLAMOPHOBIA!

United National Antiwar Coalition, United for Justice with Peace, International Action Center

Women’s Int’l League for Peace and Freedom, Boston, New England United, Committee for Peace & Human Rights, Boston

Rhode Island Mobilization Committee, Veterans For Peace, Smedley D. Butler Brigade, Code Pink, Greater Boston

Occupy Boston Action for Peace Working Group, American Iranian Friendship Committee, A.N.S.W.E.R. Boston

Women's Fightback Network, RI Peoples Assembly, Polo Democratico Alternativo of Colombia, Boston

BU Antiwar Coalition, Muslim Peace Coalition, Boston Coalition for Palestinian Rights, Burma Task Force-USA

Chelsea Uniting Against the Wars, Green-Rainbow Party of Mass.-Greater Boston,

International Socialist Organization, Occupy Boston, Military Families Speak Out