ALB
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Interview here by a Russian-speaking member of the World Socialist Party (US) of a member of an opposition group there:
http://www.wspus.org/2020/11/whats-going-on-in-belarus/
Not all oppositionists favour the introduction of liberal capitalism which they recognise would lead to the rule of oligarchs as in Russia and the Ukraine.
Bit of a scoop, actually,
Actually his comments were rather offensive.
But the main point was that the panel didn’t accept that IHRA’s tendentious definition that to criticise the foundation of the state of Israel is itself anti-Semitic.
“Imagine waking up and seeing $1,000 in your bank account. Imagine the good feeling when you can pay your rent, or put gas in the car or buy food and after your needs are met, you calmly think about how to move on with life. Imagine knowing your child will never have to go hungry, or your grandparent without medicine. Imagine another world is possible.”
Sone people lack imagination.
A rare judgement that anti-Zionism is not anti-semitic.
No change in Syria either:
As we know, at one point Trump wanted to withdraw US troops from Syria but the military/foreign policy establishment wouldn’t let him. Biden won’t need any persuasion as what not to do. US capitalism’s geopolitical interests will be safe in his hands, safer in fact than in Trump’s who was a bit of an isolationist. Some might even describe him as a “lesser evil” for this !
I listened to this programme on bbc radio 4 last week as I was driving. The one called Tom questions the usefulness of the concept of “white privilege” in the same sort of way as we would and also makes some other good points against the proposition under discussion:
That’s a coincidence as today’s papers are reporting that Scientific Reports has done a U-turn on this claim:
Fuller version here I think.
Apparently it might turn out to be true but only over 500 years as if anyone could say anything about what things will like then or what will happen in between (surely socialism would have been established in the meantime !).
It looks as if the backlash against alarmist claims about global warming is underway. In any event, nobody can claim that capitalist states are not taking measures to try to stop it, inadequate and unco-ordinated as they might be.
That’s very interesting as in 1977 our then French-language group brought out a leaflet addressed “Aux Ecologistes”, specifically those campaigning against the construction of nuclear power stations in France, (published in Socialisme Mondial No 8, Spring 1978) which contained the following. Single issue campaigns, it pointed out
“can be co-opted to serve the interests of groups of the capitalist class. We don’t suppose for a single moment that this is actually the case, but it is not inconceivable that the ‘oil lobby’ could make a financial contribution to anti-nuclear campaigns such as yours as it would be the beneficiary of their success under capitalism. In any case, the anti-nuclear struggle must be seen with an approving regard by the giant oil companies” (rough translation from the French).
If the headline to the article above is true, then we were more right than we thought. On the other hand, how can we be sure that the above article wasn’t inspired, even financed, by the ‘nuclear lobby’? Under capitalism, a rational energy policy is not possible, precisely because of different groups of capitalists trying to protect their vested interests.
Just ploughed through this. I suppose it could be said to be interesting. The other description that comes to mind is pretentious. What will be more interesting is how the modern translation it introduces turns out.
Our pseudo-trot is all over the place, to a large extent because he hasn’t mastered the principles of logic.
His basic position is that if you didn’t vote or didn’t advocate voting for Biden you are a fascist. But that takes in a lot more people than us.
1. It takes in all those who voted for the Green Party candidate (so even if you did go and vote that doesn’t let you off his hook).
2. Then there are the third of the electorate that did not vote (most of whom will have decided not to because they felt, on the basis of past experience, the outcome would make no difference to their lives and so was irrelevant).
That’s an awful lot of “fascists” in the US. In fact, with those who voted for Trump it’s well over a majority of the electorate. Which is absurd.
In logic this is known as the disproof of a proposition by reductio ad absurdum. Which is where his search for fascists under the bed leads.
I’ve had an email from my MP, who is a Liberal Democrat (not quite sure how I got on her mailing list), but here’s her comment on the US presidential election;
”I was very pleased to see Joe Biden confirmed as the next President of the United States over the weekend. I believe his policy priorities reflect what our government’s priorities should be here: competence and compassion in the fight against Covid-19, a strong programme to combat climate change, a commitment to fight racism and prejudice, and an economy that works for everyone. I respect President-elect Biden’s honesty and integrity and am relieved to see the return of decency to the White House.”
I suppose he could be described as a liberal Democrat (and I suppose LT would have campaigned and voted for her rather than the Labour Party as she was the best placed candidate to defeat the “greater evil” of the Tories,)
An economy that works for all? Making the capitalist economy work for all, that’s mission impossible. Capitalism can only work as a profit-making system in the interest of the profit-takers.
LT is not even a Trotskyist let alone a socialist. He is just a common or garden petty reformist.
The Trotskyist position on reforms is that their vanguard party should aim to get a mass following by putting forward unrealistic reform demands in the expectation that, when the masses realise that capitalism can’t grant these reforms, they will turn to to the vanguard party to lead them in a mass insurrection against the capitalist state.
In practice this does not work as workers realise that the demands are unrealistic (under capitalism to which they see no alternative) and don’t follow the vanguard. Or the Trotskyists themselves come to believe that the reforms are realisable and to concentrate on trying to get them, and so end up as leftwing reformists. Maybe this is what has happened to LT.
Anyway, the arguments he puts against campaigning for socialism are those of any old reformist, including those who seek merely to “humanise” capitalism or to “knock off its rough edges”.
In fact he is not even arguing for an improvement but only against things getting worse and saying that we should vote for a capitalist party to try to stop this — and accusing us of being “fascists” for not going along with him.
Our argument is about what socialists should do to further the cause of socialism, not what reformists should do to try to reform capitalism. Since we are socialists and he’s a reformist no wonder we are at cross purposes.
“Only the fascists want the ACA struck down. And there are many on this site. They want to see the working class suffer more than they already are. In other words, take what little they have and let them starve and die.”
Another example of absurd scaremongering (just to get people to vote for a reformist party and politician). It’s historically inaccurate too. Why would any government want that? A starving working class would not be able to produce the same amount of profits as a better fed one. Nor would it provide fit enough recruits to serve in the armed forces. In fact, historically this was why state health insurance schemes were introduced first in Germany under Bismarck and then in other countries.
Capitalism could not function properly with providing some health care coverage for workers, if only to get them back to producing profits again as quickly as possible as well as to make them more productive. The argument amongst politicians is not over whether there has to be some health care for workers but over how to pay for it.
The irony of this absurd claim is that the ACA was, if LT will recall, denounced by some of its opponents as “fascist”.
Yes, that had occurred to me BD. On looking closer I now see that the blue plaque next door is saying that Nancy Mitford, the one of the sisters who was a notorious fascist, did something there. Don’t tell LT.
