US communists, ever hopeful, say they're coming back

[heiss93]

US communists, ever hopeful, say they're coming back
Written by Matt Kennard
Wednesday, 28 May 2008

http://greatreporter.com/mambo/content/view/1713/1/


After years in the wilderness, the Communist Party USA is giving itself a public relations and ideological makeover, and, with its new $1 million office, hopes to be running the US within 50 years.

The décor inside the national headquarters of the Communist Party USA, or CPUSA, is more Macy’s than Marx.

Glass walls rise up from the floor to form state-of-the-art work spaces, nontoxic linseed oil burnishes the work-surfaces, and biodegradable blue carpet is underfoot.

Colorful paintings by the renowned artists Boris Taslitzky and Alejandro Romero, depicting the liberation of the Nazi concentration camps and working-class struggle, dot the walls of the expansive open-plan office.

Inside their transparent cubicles, the 21-strong staff tap away on Apple Macs and sip Starbucks coffee.

This is what class warfare looks like in the 21st century.

Last month, the CPUSA officially unveiled its newly refurbished office space in the trendy Chelsea district of Manhattan.

The Reds went “green” for their $1 million overhaul, including various environmentally conscious features in the design.

Huge windows and transparent walls were installed to take advantage of the sunlight and create greater energy efficiency.

They also installed occupancy sensors so artificial lighting would not be wasted, and nontoxic building materials were used to reduce health risks to staff.

The new office is the symbol of a new era in the Communist movement and what its members hope will be the first step in a return from the political fringes.

“It’s a very exciting time for the organization,” said Sam Delgado, a 24-year-old web content developer and spokesperson for CPUSA.

“When I first joined the movement in 1999, there were no young people.

That’s not true any more.

The offices, they were dark and dingy and depressing; now look at it!”

As the new frontman of the Communist Party, Delgado, a New Jersey-native and video production expert, bears a greater resemblance to the Rock than to Che Guevara.

Like the other 20 staff member - whose roles in the office range from the finance department to national leadership - he earns a paltry but equal $26,000 per year.

The Party’s income comes from a combination of donations and bequests—with enough left over for the million dollar renovation.

“We’re part of a new generation,” Delgado said.

“The younger people are re-evaluating our presence and how we put ourselves forward.

We renovated the national office and now we want to create a new digital space.”

With two other young converts to the revolutionary struggle, Delgado has formed a new technology buzz-team, which aims to announce a new Web site at the end of the year.

The Youth Communist League already has a fully operational Myspace page, with 250 buddies with names like “Maoism” and “Socialism.” The Texas branch of CPUSA proudly displays a cartoon of Karl Marx in a cowboy hat on its Web site, and the party has even jumped on the YouTube bandwagon, with a video presentation of the new office set to tongue-in-cheek ’70s music fit for an episode of “Shaft.”

Delgado claims results.

“We have turned a corner recently,” he said.

“We get two or three new members every week.” And while not a recruitment rate that keeps George W.

Bush up at night, it is an improvement for the party, whose current membership nationwide is roughly 3,000.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the ’90s were a troubled time for the party.

But Delgado doesn’t look back, and exudes more than a healthy amount of optimism.

“I believe now we can achieve Communism in America within my lifetime, within the next 50 years.”

Delgado is also quick to dampen any idea of a rift between the new and old guard.

“We definitely support old models of organizing,” he said.

“We’re merely beefing up the Communist presence.” He admits there have been murmurs from the veterans of the party, distrust of new media.

“There’s a tension,” he said.

“Certain members were worried we were going to do away with the newspaper.

But it’s all part of the same space.”

Sam Webb, 62, the leader of the CPUSA since 1998, is a full supporter of the youth movement and has given the political program of the party a similar overhaul in order to make it more appealing to new members.

“The new office and the move into digital communications is all part of a bigger process,” said the 32-year veteran of the party.

“We’ve also updated our political program, which gives us a view of the near-term as well as longer-term.

We now envision a broad coalition of the people of this country as the only way we can move towards socialism.”

Webb believes it is vital to focus only on the “ultra-right” now.

“Instead of fighting corporate power as whole, we made a distinction between one section of it - right-wing extremism based among energy and military industries, and other sections that weren’t quite as reactionary.” According to Webb these new alliances with more moderates have been a major factor in bringing more members to the party.

Alongside this ideological softening, the party has also embraced a new organizational principle called “democratic centralism,” a seemingly oxymoronic new admixture of Joseph Stalin and pluralism.

“Most people think it means top down organizing,” said Webb.

“But it’s not only that.

It does have leadership bodies that make decisions, but the membership is asked to be part of those decisions.

It is democratic; we don’t order anybody to do this thing or that.”

To its own surprise, the party has even found a connection to Democratic golden boy and presidential hopeful Sen.

Barack Obama.

In his autobiography, “Dreams of My Father,” Obama refers to a mentor named Frank, who was recently revealed to be Frank Marshall David, a poet and a CPUSA member.

When asked about the potential president, Webb seemed unexcited.

“The Communist Party doesn’t endorse a candidate at any level.

We have our own particular outlook on things.” Of Marshall Davis and a potential link to the sought-after mainstream, Webb is unimpressed: “I heard the name but I know nothing about him,” he said.

“I don’t even know if he is still living.”

With anti-right and antiwar sentiment riding high among the new generation, the CPUSA hopes to strike a chord among the young.

And despite the public insouciance about Obama, some of the younger people in CPUSA recognize that the senator from Illinois is seen by many of their peers as a timely break from the status-quo.

Lucas Gray, 19, of Knoxville, Iowa, joined the CPUSA a year ago and is a member of the new CPUSA facebook.com group.

“A lot of the positions of the Democrats now, like universal healthcare, are actually the same as the Communists’,” he said.

The Fox News pundit David Horowitz, a former Communist, takes a potential resurgence seriously.

“I’m concerned,” he said.

“Why wouldn’t the CPUSA be having some kind of revival? The left hate the US and its society and that opinion is growing in popularity.”

But away from the rah-rah spirit at headquarters and a few chatty leftist corners of the Internet, a CPUSA revival is viewed as about as likely as Fidel Castro’s coming out of retirement to win the Republican Party nomination for president.

“The CPUSA is completely historical,” said John Earl Haynes, an author on domestic communism at the Library of Congress.

“As a historian, I don’t usually feel comfortable about predicting the future; however, in this case, I’m confident in saying that the CPUSA has absolutely no future in the country.”

The Chinese, the global leader in Communism, are equally disparaging if more polite.

“China has little contact with the Communist Party of the United States,” said Wang Baodong, spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington.

“Communism in this country is not on the screen of my attention or that of my colleagues.”

And even through the zeal of the newly converted, there is a streak of doubt.

“To be honest,” said 19-year-old Gray, “I’m not optimistic at all about the future of the Communist Party to expand or become a dominant political force in the US It’s just not feasible.” Yet he remains dedicated, passing out copies of the Communist People Weekly on street corners, and attending regular meetings of his branch.

“I really appreciate that the Communist Party is trying to appeal to younger people now.” As part of the Communism 2.0 outreach project, Gray been asked to get new converts on the campus of his university, Truman State in Kirksville, Mo.

“I’m the only member at the whole university so it’s hard,” he said.

“I’m still trying my best, although I haven’t got anyone yet.”

[Raúl Duke]

the party has also embraced a new organizational principle called “democratic centralism,”

:laugh:

That's about a 100 years old!


Webb believes it is vital to focus only on the “ultra-right” now.

“Instead of fighting corporate power as whole, we made a distinction between one section of it - right-wing extremism based among energy and military industries, and other sections that weren’t quite as reactionary.” According to Webb these new alliances with more moderates have been a major factor in bringing more members to the party.


:confused:

that's because they're like liberals.


some of the younger people in CPUSA recognize that the senator from Illinois is seen by many of their peers as a timely break from the status-quo.

:rolleyes:

[Organic Revolution]

The CPUSA's position in politics has been null and void since the 1950's, when they dumbed down their politics for McCarthy and gang.

[Rawthentic]

They are revisionist liberals. They are not revolutionary communists.

Irrelevant.

[thejambo1]

how do they expect to be taken seriously!! i would agree with the statement irelevant.

[Mala Tha Testa]

:laugh:i rofl'd

[BIG BROTHER]

this is depressing.

[MarxSchmarx]

Irrelevant.

To their enormous credit, they are doing a hell of a lot more than the corner ISO or Maoist circle. I think there is something to be said for limiting burnout that is so characteristic of much of the serious left.

Still, one million dollar renovations, lattes and macbooks? Perhaps they should have their next meeting at the local WholeFoods. What a bunch of pompous, lifestylist fools.

[Red October]

To their enormous credit, they are doing a hell of a lot more than the corner ISO or Maoist circle. I think there is something to be said for limiting burnout that is so characteristic of much of the serious left.

Still, one million dollar renovations, lattes and macbooks? Perhaps they should have their next meeting at the local WholeFoods. What a bunch of pompous, lifestylist fools.

I'd like to know how they can afford to spend a million dollars on all that shit, they're not that big and I didn't think dues from a few thousand members could pay for all that. Though given their watered down liberal politics, I wouldn't be surprised if they had some well-to-do donors out there.

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

I'd like to know how they can afford to spend a million dollars on all that shit, they're not that big and I didn't think dues from a few thousand members could pay for all that. Though given their watered down liberal politics, I wouldn't be surprised if they had some well-to-do donors out there.

The CPUSA used to receive annual subsidies of up to 3 million during the Soviet years. Some of this was ostensibly saved and invested. Also the Party has some very old members, with many willing large chunks of their estate to the party.

[Comrade Rage]

The official mouthpiece of the revisionist liberal CP is back! Glad to see you, heiss93!*

*=I'd be glad to see you at your trial after the rev, that is.:D

The décor inside the national headquarters of the Communist Party USA, or CPUSA, is more Macy’s than Marx.
You're actually proud to read this? Wow.
The workers don't want to be preached at by yuppies. Of course you'd actually know that if you were a worker.

I'm not saying that evrything should be in dingy offices, but a corporate atmosphere is equally destructive.

Also: the idea of the international communist movement being headquartered in Manhattan's Chelsea district is laughable.

Inside their transparent cubicles, the 21-strong staff tap away on Apple Macs and sip Starbucks coffee.

This is what class warfare looks like in the 21st century.
ROFL.


The CPUSA's position in politics has been null and void since the 1950's, when they dumbed down their politics for McCarthy and gang.
QFT.

Never thought I'd agree with Organic Revolution and anything, but there's a first time for everything.

[BIG BROTHER]

The CPUSA used to receive annual subsidies of up to 3 million during the Soviet years. Some of this was ostensibly saved and invested. Also the Party has some very old members, with many willing large chunks of their estate to the party.

did they invest in stocks or what?:laugh:

[trivas7]

I frankly don't understand the CPUSA bashing. Stalin has been dead some fifty-three years now, by what objective criteria do they qualify as "revisionist liberals"?

[manic expression]

The official mouthpiece of the revisionist liberal CP is back! Glad to see you, heiss93!*

*=I'd be glad to see you at your trial after the rev, that is.:D

:lol::laugh:


Never thought I'd agree with Organic Revolution and anything, but there's a first time for everything.

Making fun of John Kerry Communists unites us all.

[Red October]

I frankly don't understand the CPUSA bashing. Stalin has been dead some fifty-three years now, by what objective criteria do they qualify as "revisionist liberals"?

Because for all intents and purposes, they're just the left-wing of the democratic party. They fully endorse bourgeois elections, renounce armed struggle, and suck up to mainstream liberals all the time. They're also completely irrelevant, more so than most other communist groups.

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

did they invest in stocks or what?:laugh:

Yeah probably. I've worked for left NGOs every now and then and they all invest in the markets. CPUSA is no different.

[BIG BROTHER]

Yeah probably. I've worked for left NGOs every now and then and they all invest in the markets. CPUSA is no different.

oh the irony!

[RHIZOMES]

US communists, ever hopeful, say they're coming back

I'll believe it when I see it.

[Saorsa]

Stalin having been dead for 50 years is irrelevant to this matter. The point is that the CPUSA is a liberal organisation using the word "communist" in it's name. All this signifies a move even further to the right, as they try to appeal to yuppie, middle class liberals rather than workers.


“I believe now we can achieve Communism in America within my lifetime, within the next 50 years.”

Lol they're national spokesperson doesn't know what the word communism means. How fucking sad!:lol:

[bootleg42]

“I believe now we can achieve Communism in America within my lifetime, within the next 50 years.”

Here's someone who doesn't know what communism is. How the fuck will the United States be classless AND stateless with workers controlling their own work in 50 years????????? :confused::confused::confused:

That shit takes generations, whether you call it Anarchy, Communism, whatever. I doubt most people in that party ever read. They probably think communism is the government making everyone somewhat equal.......which it's not.

Although I do agree with the CPUSA that battling the far-right is a priority that the left must take up but at the same time, we must remind ourselves that just voting democrat is not the way to do it.

At least the party is not being dogmatic, unlike many people here........

[Buster Flynn]

:mad: (Marge voice:Mmmmmmmmm.....) A few things.

1. The article was clearly written from a mainstream point of view, and has a human-interest/cat-in-tree type tone-- "oh look, the commies are re-inventing themselves. They drink Starbucks-- just like you!" For so-called better-than-thou leftists to take such a source seriously as political evidence, and then proceed to cast insults based on "analysis"of such a "source"-- what, because your scientific-Marxist thinking is so much more "rigorous"? than that of some copy-writer's patter? Um, think about it a minute, and maybe you'll start to see the koan-like joke, popping out like the reverse of an Escher print. In Other Words, double-check the joke's not on you as much as anyone else.

2. Any leftist group existing above-ground in this type of society makes compromises to last longer, or it lives fast and dies young, as they say. And of course, the longer one lives, the more one carries baggage from past mistakes... particularly political groups, and assuming they've been doing anything at all. To make fun of another group for theirs is to quibble over details-- it is to fiddle while the city burns. In Other Words, what's YOUR group been up to for the last 90 years or so? And how has that gone, relative to plans?

3. Speaking of past activities... if you are an American communist of any stripe, the CPUSA is your great-grandmother, and if you're an anarchist, your great-aunt. She may be batty, hateful, from another time (or just alienated and bitter and you don't really understand her), but you shouldn't go 'round hating on her in public, because that says worse things about you than you could ever say about her. If I may be permitted to extend the metaphor.

PS: Full disclosure prompts me to add that I recently experienced the pride and joy of being one of those two or three a day to 'come home' to the CPUSA, if you will. Some of the reasons are alluded to in this milquetoasty article, some are quite different. However, not least among those reasons is that unlike most of the American left, the CPUSA is committed to getting its message out to masses of people, in terms they can understand, and in their own social context. Unlike so many tiny, new groups, that demand a high level of sophisticated understanding of extremely abstract/rhetorical material before one can even have a conversation about what to do about any of it. And that's not even getting into recent "trends" in the American left, like must-be-fun or heart-art anarchism (for examples).

In fact, one could (and most do) do a much worse job than the balance of rigorous thinking and social openness the CPUSA has achieved, every bit of it the hard way. If it's less than perfect, well, so what?

That said, I'm pretty sure she loves you guys and gals too. So stop picking on grandma, and maybe she can slip you a crucial clue or lend you a political fiver, right when you need it and didn't even know to ask. Yeah, she might also pee in her seat at the restaurant, or talk out loud at your recital. You gonna make her go sleep under a bridge for that? Burn her at the stake? Draw KISS makeup on her and take pictures, blog them maybe, so the humiliation can last and last?

What DO you want from your elders? And how DO you pass off this thread's type of smack-talking as superior political abilities?

xox --Buster

[manic expression]

:mad: (Marge voice:Mmmmmmmmm.....) A few things.

1. The article was clearly written from a mainstream point of view, and has a human-interest/cat-in-tree type tone-- "oh look, the commies are re-inventing themselves. They drink Starbucks-- just like you!" For so-called better-than-thou leftists to take such a source seriously as political evidence, and then proceed to cast insults based on "analysis"of such a "source"-- what, because your scientific-Marxist thinking is so much more "rigorous"? than that of some copy-writer's patter? Um, think about it a minute, and maybe you'll start to see the koan-like joke, popping out like the reverse of an Escher print. In Other Words, double-check the joke's not on you as much as anyone else.

This article isn't why I dislike the CPUSA. It's because they endorse John Kerry and Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama and every other imperialist in the Democratic Party. That, no matter how you look at it, is pathetic and indefensible.


2. Any leftist group existing above-ground in this type of society makes compromises to last longer, or it lives fast and dies young, as they say. And of course, the longer one lives, the more one carries baggage from past mistakes... particularly political groups, and assuming they've been doing anything at all. To make fun of another group for theirs is to quibble over details-- it is to fiddle while the city burns. In Other Words, what's YOUR group been up to for the last 90 years or so? And how has that gone, relative to plans?

This is silly. I don't agree with every revolutionary party, but at least they're fundamentally revolutionary. I think the RCP can come off as very confounding at best sometimes, but I can objectively say that they are revolutionary. Can you say the same for the CPUSA? Didn't think so. Next question.

And on your "old parties are under so much stress" argument, I find that to be naive. The SWP is almost as old as the CPUSA and has went through just as much political repression, if not more. Is it endorsing the Democratic imperialists and making appeals to liberals? No. No revolutionary party ever would.


3. Speaking of past activities... if you are an American communist of any stripe, the CPUSA is your great-grandmother, and if you're an anarchist, your great-aunt. She may be batty, hateful, from another time (or just alienated and bitter and you don't really understand her), but you shouldn't go 'round hating on her in public, because that says worse things about you than you could ever say about her. If I may be permitted to extend the metaphor.

Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but grannie's dead.


PS: Full disclosure prompts me to add that I recently experienced the pride and joy of being one of those two or three a day to 'come home' to the CPUSA, if you will. Some of the reasons are alluded to in this milquetoasty article, some are quite different. However, not least among those reasons is that unlike most of the American left, the CPUSA is committed to getting its message out to masses of people, in terms they can understand, and in their own social context. Unlike so many tiny, new groups, that demand a high level of sophisticated understanding of extremely abstract/rhetorical material before one can even have a conversation about what to do about any of it. And that's not even getting into recent "trends" in the American left, like must-be-fun or heart-art anarchism (for examples).

What hogwash! The CPUSA is getting its message out to liberal imperialists, and what is its message? That's right, support to liberal imperialists.

So gee, if Barack Obama gets in office and bombs Pakistan like he said he would, does the CPUSA get extra revolutionary points for supporting him?


In fact, one could (and most do) do a much worse job than the balance of rigorous thinking and social openness the CPUSA has achieved, every bit of it the hard way. If it's less than perfect, well, so what?

So what? It sucks, that's what.


That said, I'm pretty sure she loves you guys and gals too. So stop picking on grandma, and maybe she can slip you a crucial clue or lend you a political fiver, right when you need it and didn't even know to ask. Yeah, she might also pee in her seat at the restaurant, or talk out loud at your recital. You gonna make her go sleep under a bridge for that? Burn her at the stake? Draw KISS makeup on her and take pictures, blog them maybe, so the humiliation can last and last?

I'm sorry, but she's dead. Please accept it and move on, you're starting to sound delirious.


What DO you want from your elders? And how DO you pass off this thread's type of smack-talking as superior political abilities?

xox --Buster

I'd like a so-called "Communist Party" to act like communists and not water-carriers for avowed imperialists like Barack Obama and Harry Reid.

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

Buster-

Eh? By this logic, one of my orgs, the Industrial Workers of the World (http://iww.org) is your Great Grandma. The CPUSA extensively raided much of the IWW's membership and then pretty well abandoned it once Moscow realized that they couldn't control the wobblies.

There are compromises and there are compromises. The CPUSA is just a democratic socialist group with Stalinist money. They don't stand for revolution, nor do they stand for much of anything too radical these days. There's a reason why we don't like starbucks, they're busting IWW affiliated barista unions. Yet these dips don't seem to notice or care. Odd for "communists" not to read up on that sort of thing. Yeah sure CPUSA is no longer an organization of dogmatic values, and weird line changes, but they've traded in Stalinist idiocy for democratic socialism. Not even the militant kind brought to you by SPUSA, or War resister league types, but the watered down nonsense of the DSA. Stop complaining about us ripping on CPUSA, I'm not the one pumping out pronouncements about Obama's grand advance towards workers utopia.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

The CPUSA is largely irrelevant. Unlike in some of the other countries, this "official" CP doesn't even have much the working class or even the unions. It's not really a force to reckon with for actuall communists in the United States (of course it may be wise to try to win over some of their younger members to an actual communist outlook).

On a side note, what Joe Hill's Ghost says is largely false. I'm a member of the IWW too, and it's unfortunate, but many of today's members have a skewed view of the early days of the organization. Large numbers of members of the IWW were inspired by the October Revolution and the Bolsheviks. Eventually, many left the IWW not because they were duped by red "raiders", but because they wanted to overthrow capitalism, and saw the best opportunity to do so by joining the CP. To say otherwise is to write off early members of the union as sheep were lead astray.

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

On a side note, what Joe Hill's Ghost says is largely false. I'm a member of the IWW too, and it's unfortunate, but many of today's members have a skewed view of the early days of the organization. Large numbers of members of the IWW were inspired by the October Revolution and the Bolsheviks. Eventually, many left the IWW not because they were duped by red "raiders", but because they wanted to overthrow capitalism, and saw the best opportunity to do so by joining the CP. To say otherwise is to write off early members of the union as sheep were lead astray.

eh actually most of the rank and file bled out during the EP split, the CPUSA raided many of the leaders, which only exacerbated the issue. Then it got worse once they created an explicitly political trade union congress, which the apolitical IWW couldn't join, forcing Communist organizers out of the union. And then it all went to shit once Foster and his Fedora thought they could take over the bloody AF of L.

[manic expression]

eh actually most of the rank and file bled out during the EP split, the CPUSA raided many of the leaders, which only exacerbated the issue. Then it got worse once they created an explicitly political trade union congress, which the apolitical IWW couldn't join, forcing Communist organizers out of the union. And then it all went to shit once Foster and his Fedora thought they could take over the bloody AF of L.

The point, that I agree with, is that the CP "raided" no one, and it is simply subjective and anti-historical to claim as much. The people who joined the CP did so on their free will, for they wanted to follow the path that the Russian workers had set. Was it the CP's fault the IWW didn't want to join a political congress? I think you're reaching when you make those assertions.

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

The point, that I agree with, is that the CP "raided" no one, and it is simply subjective and anti-historical to claim as much. The people who joined the CP did so on their free will, for they wanted to follow the path that the Russian workers had set. Was it the CP's fault the IWW didn't want to join a political congress? I think you're reaching when you make those assertions.

Lordy me, beware of those bearing the correct "objective and historical" claims.

The CP followed a cynical strategy of "convert or kill" that sought to neutralize any group that didn't toe the moscow line. Moscow understood that the IWW had the largest repository of revolutionary workers in America, but they snubbed their nose at the IWW, pushing the CP to set up a red trade union. This was rather dumb. The IWW's apolitical stance kept it from dangerous entanglements and they weren't about to abandon it. When that failed Moscow told them to engage in fosterite "boring from within" with the AF of L. A lot of good wobbly organizers jumped ship to engage in these foolish strategies of defeat. Its really too bad becuase a little less meddling from the CP and the EP split might not have happened.

[manic expression]

Lordy me, beware of those bearing the correct "objective and historical" claims.

The CP followed a cynical strategy of "convert or kill" that sought to neutralize any group that didn't toe the moscow line. Moscow understood that the IWW had the largest repository of revolutionary workers in America, but they snubbed their nose at the IWW, pushing the CP to set up a red trade union. This was rather dumb. The IWW's apolitical stance kept it from dangerous entanglements and they weren't about to abandon it. When that failed Moscow told them to engage in fosterite "boring from within" with the AF of L. A lot of good wobbly organizers jumped ship to engage in these foolish strategies of defeat. Its really too bad becuase a little less meddling from the CP and the EP split might not have happened.

You're repeating yourself without dealing with the obvious holes in your argument. As was said, wobblies who joined the CP weren't blindly duped, they did so to follow the example set by the Bolsheviks and the Russian workers. This important point is something you haven't acknowledged. Secondly, the CP, unlike the IWW, was an organization willing to utilize an ideology proven to succeed in making revolution. The IWW did a lot of great things, but greater things were needed IMO.

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

You're repeating yourself without dealing with the obvious holes in your argument. As was said, wobblies who joined the CP weren't blindly duped, they did so to follow the example set by the Bolsheviks and the Russian workers. This important point is something you haven't acknowledged. Secondly, the CP, unlike the IWW, was an organization willing to utilize an ideology proven to succeed in making revolution. The IWW did a lot of great things, but greater things were needed IMO.

I never said they were blindly duped. I said that the CP raided the IWW, which doesn't mean "duped," It means that they culled the IWW for members and then drove those organizers into a deranged strategy set by Moscow. My main issue is that the CP sheepishly towed the Moscow line, when the Moscow line was designed to hurt the IWW above all else. Boring from within never really worked, and the red trade union international was DOA in the US.

The funny thing is that many converts to the CP were disillusioned. Big Bill Haywood fled to Russia, and was so disappointed he drunk himself to death.

[manic expression]

I never said they were blindly duped. I said that the CP raided the IWW, which doesn't mean "duped," It means that they culled the IWW for members and then drove those organizers into a deranged strategy set by Moscow. My main issue is that the CP sheepishly towed the Moscow line, when the Moscow line was designed to hurt the IWW above all else. Boring from within never really worked, and the red trade union international was DOA in the US.

So they made that choice, to join the CP, willingly, no? That's the point, and for you to call it a "raid" implies that this wasn't the case (whether or not you were trying to do so). Your disagreement on CP strategy (not to mention the principle of democratic centralism) is completely tangential to this discussion, but if you want to talk about that we can.


The funny thing is that many converts to the CP were disillusioned. Big Bill Haywood fled to Russia, and was so disappointed he drunk himself to death.

Yeah, I guess that's kind of funny...?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3jj2giVdpM

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

So they made that choice, to join the CP, willingly, no? That's the point, and for you to call it a "raid" implies that this wasn't the case (whether or not you were trying to do so). Your disagreement on CP strategy (not to mention the principle of democratic centralism) is completely tangential to this discussion, but if you want to talk about that we can.

When the IBEW raided the UE, the workers joined the IBEW willingly. Raiding isn't a matter of coercion, its a matter of culling members. Since much of the CP's early leadership was culled out of the IWW, I stated that it wasn't some annoyed child of the CP, but the forbearer of the CP. And it really is too bad becuase the CP debilitated the worker's movement.




Yeah, I guess that's kind of funny...?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3jj2giVdpM

More semantic games. Funny as in, interesting, as in "what's particularly interesting." And damn, I've always enjoyed Goldman pwning John Reed.

[manic expression]

When the IBEW raided the UE, the workers joined the IBEW willingly. Raiding isn't a matter of coercion, its a matter of culling members. Since much of the CP's early leadership was culled out of the IWW, I stated that it wasn't some annoyed child of the CP, but the forbearer of the CP. And it really is too bad becuase the CP debilitated the worker's movement.

That very mindset, that the CP "culled" IWW leadership, reeks of entitlement. The IWW didn't own those members, it needed to convince them that the CP wasn't as good in terms of making revolution; they couldn't, because the path of the Bolsheviks was clearly superior.


More semantic games. Funny as in, interesting, as in "what's particularly interesting." And damn, I've always enjoyed Goldman pwning John Reed.

If I wanted to play semantics, I'd touch upon your use of the term "pwnage".

At any rate, Goldman's ridiculous illusions about revolution are effectively debunked by Reed's meticulous citation of facts. Contrary to the fantasies of anarchists and ultra-lefts, revolution must be made in accordance with material conditions, not some lofty ideal in the sky. The dialogue shows that "disillusionment in Russia" (as experienced by Goldman) was oftentimes nothing more than the unrealistic and unfounded ideals of idealists clashing against the reality of a real revolution. Just like in the First International, it's what divides the scientific socialists from the utopians.

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

That very mindset, that the CP "culled" IWW leadership, reeks of entitlement. The IWW didn't own those members, it needed to convince them that the CP wasn't as good in terms of making revolution; they couldn't, because the path of the Bolsheviks was clearly superior.

Reeks of entitlement? Don't impute emotive content out of thin air. The CP leadership came from the IWW, they saw the shiny light in Moscow and thought it was sweet. Then Moscow decided that it couldn't properly control the IWW and told its people to get out. Then they told the CP to start entryism with the AF of L. I'm stating facts, sad facts, but facts. What annoys me is the enormous potential that was squandered. The IWW grew during the post WWI years, only to get wrecked by the split and the CP.




If I wanted to play semantics, I'd touch upon your use of the term "pwnage".

*shrugs* It seemed apropos at the time, since this is on the internets.


At any rate, Goldman's ridiculous illusions about revolution are effectively debunked by Reed's meticulous citation of facts. Contrary to the fantasies of anarchists and ultra-lefts, revolution must be made in accordance with material conditions, not some lofty ideal in the sky. The dialogue shows that "disillusionment in Russia" (as experienced by Goldman) was oftentimes nothing more than the unrealistic and unfounded ideals of idealists clashing against the reality of a real revolution. Just like in the First International, it's what divides the scientific socialists from the utopians.

And the iron law of CP discussion is in effect! Finally we get to discuss Russia! Anyway, as Goldman said, if free soviets=bolshevism, then there was no bolshevism in Russia. A revolution is no revolution if you institute managers, jail other leftists, set the cheka to commit various atrocities, conscript workers etc. Lofty ideals should not cloud the fields of reality. Nor should political realism salt the earth so that no revolution can grow.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Have you ever read any of the documents from the COMINTERN over things such as "revolutionary unions"? If you have, then you've chosen to ignore their contents. Despite what some ultraleftists claim, work with the wobs was never rejected because its members were "uncontrollable".

I'm not really interested in continuing this argument. I just wanted to put things in perspective a bit for others and challenge the subjective view of history being put forth. If anyone is really interested, the facts are out there.

[Buster Flynn]

I see a lot of nice revolutionary posturing here, but I don't see a lot of alternatives for reaching masses of potentially-convinceable working people in the USA in 2008 out there, and persuading them away from reformism and toward revolutionary consciousness and activity. Of course, a lot of American leftists aren't interested in reaching masses-- they're only interested in building leadership, and some of them say so, and that's fine. Others of them are what we used to call "posers," back in the day.

But among those of us convinced that we'll have to meet those folks at least somewhere in the middle, between where they in fact are and where we'd like to see them go, is the CPUSA. Another major reason for the 'liberalness/reformishness' of the Party is because in its assessment of the current situation, the CP has decided that the first thing to do is to overturn the Reagan Revolution, i.e. the 'ultra-right' atmosphere, and then to reassess and go for whatever's next. That, at the moment, means supporting the Dems, because the Greens and the RCP aren't going to overturn the Reagan Revolution. Like it or not, that doesn't mean the support is uncritical, nor is it for the sake of the Dems. Nor are its goals that of the "popular front," though the tactic looks similar on the ground. Now, like it or hate it, that's a bunch of stuff with precedent in revolutionary history, so you don't get a free pass just for asserting that it equals reformism, and so the CP is dead, and next.

As for the IWW Purity trip, well if that's so, then why is it participating in the NLRA/NLRB system, despite having re-destroyed itself in the 1950s (and violating worker's control in doing so), because it would not be shackeled by the Taft-Hartley "Slave Labor" Laws? Also, I thought the IWW lived and died by its oft-repeated claims that it is non-political, and in fact open to members of all ideological bents/ So, how could a bunch of its members joining the CP equal a "raid," except of course if it were a hostile environment for all but the anarchists it claims it's not a front group for? Something doesn't add up, and so I don't understand the grievance here.

Meanwhile. You know, everyone's got their excuses for why their compromises are okay, but others' are fatal flaws... or else, why they're so tiny, despite being so uncompromising. That's called sectarianism. The CP is both very much alive, whether you agree or disagree with it, and it is one of the least sectarian formations in the contemporary American left. Of course, you'd never notice if you were prejudicial against it for ideological reasons-- you'd have to get close enough, with an open enough mind, to even notice it.

Cheers, --Buster Flynn

[Die Neue Zeit]

And on your "old parties are under so much stress" argument, I find that to be naive. The SWP is almost as old as the CPUSA and has went through just as much political repression, if not more. Is it endorsing the Democratic imperialists and making appeals to liberals? No. No revolutionary party ever would.

Actually, The Socialist Labor Party of America is the oldest socialist political party in the United States and the second oldest socialist party in the world (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Labor_Party_of_America).

I'd like to see a merger between the various parties, thereby forming a United Social Labour organization.

[manic expression]

I see a lot of nice revolutionary posturing here, but I don't see a lot of alternatives for reaching masses of potentially-convinceable working people in the USA in 2008 out there, and persuading them away from reformism and toward revolutionary consciousness and activity. Of course, a lot of American leftists aren't interested in reaching masses-- they're only interested in building leadership, and some of them say so, and that's fine. Others of them are what we used to call "posers," back in the day.

What? There are multiple leftist parties supporting candidates this election cycle who aren't named Barack Obama. Elections must be used as a tool to reach the workers with revolutionary ideas. Instead of doing this, as Marx and Lenin and others promoted, the CPUSA is wholeheartedly supporting an avowed imperialist. It seems the ONLY thing the CPUSA is interested in is shamelessly enabling the American capitalist class instead of pushing for working class state power. Your attempt to deflect from this fact isn't going to work.


But among those of us convinced that we'll have to meet those folks at least somewhere in the middle, between where they in fact are and where we'd like to see them go, is the CPUSA. Another major reason for the 'liberalness/reformishness' of the Party is because in its assessment of the current situation, the CP has decided that the first thing to do is to overturn the Reagan Revolution, i.e. the 'ultra-right' atmosphere, and then to reassess and go for whatever's next.

Not only is that simply based on half-truths, it is the mark of a liberal. Reagan and his goons are not the real problem, they're symptoms of imperialism.

Pray tell, what did the "Reagan Revolution" entail? How did Clinton prove himself better? Clinton, not Reagan, destroyed welfare. Clinton, not Reagan, rammed through free trade agreements which universally hurt the workering class of all countries. Clinton, not Reagan, presided over imperialist adventures into Africa and Iraq (which was bombed on a daily basis). Not only did Clinton NOT reverse the "Reagan Revolution", he CONTINUED IT! To paint Reagan as worse than the Democrats is to believe the impotent liberals, liberals who can't even grasp the FACT that their policies are fundamentally the same as those of the Republicans. Needless to say, you're just as liberal and just as impotent.

The ruling class is growing more desperate by the day as their economic crisis deepens. The working class grows more frustrated by the day. And your answer to all this is...Barack Obama? That's absolutely unforgivable, and every communist on the face of the Earth knows it. Your pro-imperialist cowardice is all too obvious.


That, at the moment, means supporting the Dems, because the Greens and the RCP aren't going to overturn the Reagan Revolution. Like it or not, that doesn't mean the support is uncritical, nor is it for the sake of the Dems. Nor are its goals that of the "popular front," though the tactic looks similar on the ground. Now, like it or hate it, that's a bunch of stuff with precedent in revolutionary history, so you don't get a free pass just for asserting that it equals reformism, and so the CP is dead, and next.

The Democrats didn't overturn the "Reagan Revolution" when they had the chance (hell, they controlled Congress during Reagan's entire presidency), because they aren't really different! A bourgeois is a bourgeois, and it is essentially ignorant and naive and stupid to think that the bourgeois Democrats will help the workers any more than the bourgeois Republicans.

Your John Kerry-Communism is just a thinly-veiled lie to further imperialism. Capitalism must be destroyed, not congratulated.


Meanwhile. You know, everyone's got their excuses for why their compromises are okay, but others' are fatal flaws... or else, why they're so tiny, despite being so uncompromising.

And no matter how many members or cushy offices you might have, you're still a tool of the capitalists, which makes you far worse than any genuine socialist, no matter how isolated and powerless he or she may be.


That's called sectarianism. The CP is both very much alive, whether you agree or disagree with it, and it is one of the least sectarian formations in the contemporary American left. Of course, you'd never notice if you were prejudicial against it for ideological reasons-- you'd have to get close enough, with an open enough mind, to even notice it.

Yes, it's so non-sectarian it supported John Kerry! Bragging about not being sectarian is a senseless distraction when you're a bourgeois agent pretending to be part of the workers' movement. The CP may be alive, but it's kissing the ass of the Democratic imperialists, and thus it is a shill for imperialism itself.

The CPUSA: Because Social Chauvinism wasn't bad enough the first time around.

[Buster Flynn]

Oh, my. What a smorgasbord you offer us. I can't guarantee perpetual responsiveness to gratuitous abusiveness.... but, since I'm relatively new here, and since there is some political content mixed in with the at least borderline ad-hominems, I'll give it a shot. Doing so can at least give a sense of where I'm coming from on certain questions, to those with the eyes to see it. As for those who might be committed to the further-leftie version of the 'politics of personal destruction,' they're gonna hafta wait a little longer, is all I can say.

What? There are multiple leftist parties supporting candidates this election cycle who aren't named Barack Obama.

And those parties and candidates have how much support among the working masses? And talking to their supporters reaches how many people who don't already agree?

Elections must be used as a tool to reach the workers with revolutionary ideas. Instead of doing this, as Marx and Lenin and others promoted, the CPUSA is wholeheartedly supporting an avowed imperialist. It seems the ONLY thing the CPUSA is interested in is shamelessly enabling the American capitalist class instead of pushing for working class state power. Your attempt to deflect from this fact isn't going to work.


Um, yeah... you can lose your job, be barred from entering (or leaving) the country, and get a nice fat FBI file because the CP is so reformist. The feds just hate it when you're given to "shamelessly enabling the American capitalist class." And that's just what the American working class is wont to say, at their leisurely lunch breaks: "You know, Bob, I was reading the People's Weekly World to the kids last night, and it hit me that the CPUSA is so reformist! I was going to vote for Obama, but considering their support of him, I think I'll give Gloria La Riva a try!" (No disrespect of her or the PSL intended or implied.)

Also, the Bolsheviks would never have had anything to do with any Party less radical than themselves. They were definitely ideological purists every step of the way. Nor did any Party that ever came after them, except for the CPUSA. Yes indeed, in Russia, the masses came to Lenin, and then there was the revolution. [Also, we should do the exact same things that worked in Tsarist Russia before and during World War I, because people don't already think we're from another age... but not to digress.]

Reagan and his goons are not the real problem, they're symptoms of imperialism. Pray tell, what did the "Reagan Revolution" entail?

If you really don't know what kind of social forces triumphed with Reagan, you are speaking from a position of relative privilege. For just one off the cuff example, AIDS/HIV research funding didn't really start until Clinton, after which, my friends stopped dying. If that's not difference enough for you, then you're a pretty callous individual.

How did Clinton prove himself better? Clinton, not Reagan, destroyed welfare. Clinton, not Reagan, rammed through free trade agreements which universally hurt the workering class of all countries. Clinton, not Reagan, presided over imperialist adventures into Africa and Iraq (which was bombed on a daily basis). Not only did Clinton NOT reverse the "Reagan Revolution", he CONTINUED IT! To paint Reagan as worse than the Democrats is to believe the impotent liberals, liberals who can't even grasp the FACT that their policies are fundamentally the same as those of the Republicans. Needless to say, you're just as liberal and just as impotent.

Well, if being interested in survival before the revolution makes one a liberal, sign me guilty as charged. But hey, at least I'm reaching out towards the truth. However, I don't understand how we build revolutionary consciousness by discouraging (through name-calling, or hubristic purity demands, or whatever) those who may not be entirely with us yet, but show some interest and goodwill. I mean, do you talk to everyone you might potentially persuade, the way you do to me, here? And we wonder why Americans stay away in droves?

As for Obama, yeah, he's pro-imperialist. One cannot be a viable candidate for the US Presidency, here and now, as an anti-imperialist. However, he's an anti-war pro-imperialist. That will be an interesting contradiction to make further use of. No such opening with McCain, who still thinks he can use words like 'gook' in public.

It's interesting you mention Clinton's many sins, of which I happened to be already aware, thanks. The thing about Clinton, the objective thing, is that he represents a faction in the Dems (i.e. the DLC), and indeed, in the ruling class-- he is a creation, in some ways, of the ultra-right political triumph that Reagan heralded. It took Clinton to pull off NAFTA and Welfare Deform-- not even Reagan and Bush I could quite go that far. (Though it took Bush II to actually shred most of the Constitution. That might be worth functionally resisting, unless you're looking as forward as I am to all the fabulous drag shows in the Blackwater prison camps out in the desert in AZ.)

However, Bush II broke the forever-rightward drift of Amerikan politics through his sheer hubris. The main problem with Gore, and Kerry for that matter, is they wouldn't fight for their own votes, i.e. voters. In Other Words, at the end of the day, you betcha-- these guys care more about the stability of their system then they do the people. Ultimately, that's a part of what makes someone a viable candidate for the U.S. Presidency-- and in that sense, Obama can't help but be more or less different, and can never be a real solution to the problems we want him to help us get a handle on. No one has said otherwise, in the CPUSA anyways. If you really want to know just how much the liberals already believe in him, try Daily Kos. (Now, that's a love-feast of functional delusion.)

In his favor, though, there's the likelihood that Obama can mobilize enough voters to overcome the voter fraud that has enabled the hard-right zombie administration over the last eight years (full of people from Reagan/Bush I, and for that matter, from the Nixon Administration). Also, Obama has been a consistent advocate of the US chunk of the global ruling class pursuing their international-imperialist interests by means other than endless war, torture, and spying on everyone. I think it's pretty clear that Gore would not have invaded Iraq. Kerry certainly wouldn't have left John effin Negroponte in Iraq as a "diplomat."

That these things, small as they are compared to the majesty of our Marxist-Leninist-Whateverist analysis, equal "no difference" to you, shows that you're not as persuaded by the difference these things make to average people's lives, as you might be. I think that we should care about what happens, for example, in those secret, private US prisons, and do something about stopping them ASAP, instead of pointing to them as yet another reason for, and thing we'll abolish after, the revolution. Because deferring people's real-world needs until 'after the revolution' has a long history as a losing strategy, in the U.S. anyways.

The ruling class is growing more desperate by the day as their economic crisis deepens. The working class grows more frustrated by the day. And your answer to all this is...Barack Obama? That's absolutely unforgivable, and every communist on the face of the Earth knows it. Your pro-imperialist cowardice is all too obvious.

Please see above. I'd be a little more discretionary with absolutist terms like "unforgivable," if I were for allowing the Bush people to run things, as you seem to be.

Also, are you one of these comrades who thinks we should let things get as bad as possible, in hopes that the pain of the situation moves people towards revolutionary consciousness? You might as well just say so, and I'll quit wasting my breath, as I'm not (sort of) conversing with a humanist, after all.

The Democrats didn't overturn the "Reagan Revolution" when they had the chance (hell, they controlled Congress during Reagan's entire presidency), because they aren't really different! A bourgeois is a bourgeois, and it is essentially ignorant and naive and stupid to think that the bourgeois Democrats will help the workers any more than the bourgeois Republicans.

I think this is a mistake. There are different kinds of bourgeois leaders. I think the CPUSA has a point, that we are in the relatively unusual situation in that the ruling class has become openly divided, to the point that it is becoming disorganized-- that represents a relatively unique opportunity to intervene and change the atmosphere in which all occurs. That can make a difference in everything from how many African-American men go to prison, for lack of alternatives to crack dealing, to what the average person conceives is even possible to change, lacking only their conviction and participation.

If you can't see how that might make a difference to organizers of any number of revolutionary tendencies, then all I can say is, it doesn't seem like you've done much organizing with people who don't already agree with you, over the last 30 years. That strengthens a hunch I was already having from your sweeping denunciations of me based on tactical differences expressed in, what, my 3rd and 4th posts here, ever.

Your John Kerry-Communism is just a thinly-veiled lie to further imperialism. Capitalism must be destroyed, not congratulated.

These are some clever turns of phrase, I'll give you that. Still... see above.

And no matter how many members or cushy offices you might have, you're still a tool of the capitalists, which makes you far worse than any genuine socialist, no matter how isolated and powerless he or she may be.

You're pretty worried about impotence/powerlessness, aren't you?

Also, what are you saying? That, dingy, energy-inefficient, poorly-staffed (and worse-compensated) offices are somehow superior vehicles for organization? Those offices &c represent not only the hard work and sacrifice of many comrades, they are also living legacies of generations of commitment to this particular organization. Is it sour grapes, or disdain for the dead that make you so despise the fruits of their legacies?

Everyone from the IWW to the SLP to, yes, the CP, used to try to own their own infrastructure, because once upon a time, revolutionary organizations sought a stable material basis from which to do their work. Only in Postmodernlandia, has such a thing become an intellectual liability. (Or as Burroughs put it, a world in which 'Everything is true, nothing is permitted.' Again, not to digress.)

Yes, it's so non-sectarian it supported John Kerry! Bragging about not being sectarian is a senseless distraction when you're a bourgeois agent pretending to be part of the workers' movement. The CP may be alive, but it's kissing the ass of the Democratic imperialists, and thus it is a shill for imperialism itself.

From Kerry's wiki page: "Kerry won 59.03 million votes or about 48 percent of the popular vote; Bush won 62.04 million votes, or about 51 percent of the popular vote." News Flash: that's the overwhelming majority of politically 'active' people in the country, i.e. those who can be bothered to go to their nearest polling place and pull a lever, draw a line, or punch a few squares on a screen. Half can't be bothered to do that much.

You can call me all the names you want-- but it won't touch this fact. And if you call many of these others half the things you call me, well, it's no wonder you're not making much headway with people out there.

That kind of thing leads to powerless impotence, ya know.

The CPUSA: Because Social Chauvinism wasn't bad enough the first time around.

Look, I'm not too worried about my ultimate impotence to make any difference in the universe-- I'm doing my bit of what I can, here and now, with what we got to work with. Some day, when the bitter-rage-projection thing doesn't work for you any more, I hope you'll find some way to join us, those who choose to find some hope in the situation and proceed thus-- wherever such a choice may lead you, in terms of groups or other such personal commitments. Meanwhile, if you can't play nice, please, at least don't go 'round scaring the kids off socialism in the process, okay?

We have enough of the ranter-hater image to live down, daresay.

Peace out, --Buster Flynn

[manic expression]

Oh, my. What a smorgasbord you offer us. I can't guarantee perpetual responsiveness to gratuitous abusiveness....

If you don't like getting heated responses to unsupported positions, you might not like your time here.

What? There are multiple leftist parties supporting candidates this election cycle who aren't named Barack Obama.


And those parties and candidates have how much support among the working masses? And talking to their supporters reaches how many people who don't already agree?

You missed the point. Running SOCIALIST candidates is a way to reach the workers; supporting bourgeois candidates does no such thing. The SWP, the party I support, does reach a lot of people through their campaigns for office, and it's because they have an explicitly revolutionary platform. The CPUSA, on the other hand, does not, and so it will never reach the workers with anything positive.


Um, yeah... you can lose your job, be barred from entering (or leaving) the country, and get a nice fat FBI file because the CP is so reformist. The feds just hate it when you're given to "shamelessly enabling the American capitalist class." And that's just what the American working class is wont to say, at their leisurely lunch breaks: "You know, Bob, I was reading the People's Weekly World to the kids last night, and it hit me that the CPUSA is so reformist! I was going to vote for Obama, but considering their support of him, I think I'll give Gloria La Riva a try!" (No disrespect of her or the PSL intended or implied.)

That's self-aggrandizement that has nothing to do with the CPUSA's program. The facts are clear: the CPUSA is not revolutionary whatsoever, and continuously supports the Democratic imperialists.

And your other comment is pure distraction. So you support Obama because he's more popular than Gloria La Riva? Communists don't support the popular guy, they put forth a platform of working class state power EVERY SINGLE TIME; anything less is nothing but cowardice.


Also, the Bolsheviks would never have had anything to do with any Party less radical than themselves. They were definitely ideological purists every step of the way. Nor did any Party that ever came after them, except for the CPUSA. Yes indeed, in Russia, the masses came to Lenin, and then there was the revolution. [Also, we should do the exact same things that worked in Tsarist Russia before and during World War I, because people don't already think we're from another age... but not to digress.]

Not really. The Bolsheviks worked with the Mensheviks and SR's quite a bit, so you're wrong off the bat. Secondly, the masses didn't just come to Lenin, Lenin won them over by opposing the imperialists and promoting socialism without fail. That is the opposite of what the CPUSA is doing: supporting Obama because it's easier than working within the working class and winning them over to socialism. One is revolutionary, the other is not, I'll let you guess which.


If you really don't know what kind of social forces triumphed with Reagan, you are speaking from a position of relative privilege. For just one off the cuff example, AIDS/HIV research funding didn't really start until Clinton, after which, my friends stopped dying. If that's not difference enough for you, then you're a pretty callous individual.

While we still have don't ask don't tell and astinence only education, that's most assuredly not the point. The problem here is that EVEN IF Clinton was the most pro-GLBT activist of all time, until you accomplish the self-liberation of the working classes, you have no real progress in human society. You will have imperialism and a reactionary ruling class, and if you're satisfied with that, then I suggest you stop pretending to be a revolutionary.


Well, if being interested in survival before the revolution makes one a liberal, sign me guilty as charged. But hey, at least I'm reaching out towards the truth. However, I don't understand how we build revolutionary consciousness by discouraging (through name-calling, or hubristic purity demands, or whatever) those who may not be entirely with us yet, but show some interest and goodwill. I mean, do you talk to everyone you might potentially persuade, the way you do to me, here? And we wonder why Americans stay away in droves?

Survival? No, the CPUSA has already made itself irrelevant by playing into the capitalists' hands. Communists don't "survive" by sacrificing every goal our movement has ever had (as the CPUSA has), that's the opposite of survival. So yes, in a way, looking for "survival" within the capitalist mainstream has made the CPUSA liberal.

We build revolutionary consciousness by promoting revolutionary ideas at every step and every turn. Rocking the vote for Obama doesn't accomplish this at all, and in fact works AGAINST it. We need to expose Obama for the capitalist reactionary he really is and draw them into the ranks of revolution. Again, if you don't agree with that, then stop pretending to be a revolutionary.


As for Obama, yeah, he's pro-imperialist.

That's enough for me right there. The CPUSA supports an imperialist. Well done.


One cannot be a viable candidate for the US Presidency, here and now, as an anti-imperialist. However, he's an anti-war pro-imperialist. That will be an interesting contradiction to make further use of. No such opening with McCain, who still thinks he can use words like 'gook' in public.

Again, your goals are misguided entirely. McCain is a viable candidate for the US Presidency. Does that mean we should support him? Of course not, doing so would be just as ridiculous as supporting Obama simply because he's a viable candidate.

I'll repeat this as many times as I have to: communists do not support candidates because they're viable, they push forth a revolutionary program. If you're unwilling to do that, you're not a revolutionary, you're a liberal reformist, and history has shown precisely where that road leads.


It's interesting you mention Clinton's many sins, of which I happened to be already aware, thanks. The thing about Clinton, the objective thing, is that he represents a faction in the Dems (i.e. the DLC), and indeed, in the ruling class-- he is a creation, in some ways, of the ultra-right political triumph that Reagan heralded. It took Clinton to pull off NAFTA and Welfare Deform-- not even Reagan and Bush I could quite go that far. (Though it took Bush II to actually shred most of the Constitution. That might be worth functionally resisting, unless you're looking as forward as I am to all the fabulous drag shows in the Blackwater prison camps out in the desert in AZ.)

For someone who tries to present themselves as in the mainstream of American politics, you're obviously misled when it comes to the relationship between the Clinton camp and Obama. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama agree on just about every issue; their only arguments were over experience and ability, NOT differences in positions. Find me one issue in which Obama disagrees with the DLC camp, and then we'll talk.


However, Bush II broke the forever-rightward drift of Amerikan politics through his sheer hubris. The main problem with Gore, and Kerry for that matter, is they wouldn't fight for their own votes, i.e. voters. In Other Words, at the end of the day, you betcha-- these guys care more about the stability of their system then they do the people. Ultimately, that's a part of what makes someone a viable candidate for the U.S. Presidency-- and in that sense, Obama can't help but be more or less different, and can never be a real solution to the problems we want him to help us get a handle on. No one has said otherwise, in the CPUSA anyways. If you really want to know just how much the liberals already believe in him, try Daily Kos. (Now, that's a love-feast of functional delusion.)

Barack Obama isn't even that left of a politician, and the polls are still pretty close. The US is still pretty conservative, so I don't agree with your analysis. Also, the "forever-rightward drift of Amerikan politics" (nice use of the K in America there, I usually see that on DemocraticUnderground, but it makes perfect sense that you'd use it, too) is something the liberals have been using for decades to dupe workers into supporting them. They are no more and no less anti-worker than the Republicans, they just disagree on how to best further the interests of the bourgeoisie. Do you know what that means? It means you're supporting the capitalist B team.


In his favor, though, there's the likelihood that Obama can mobilize enough voters to overcome the voter fraud that has enabled the hard-right zombie administration over the last eight years (full of people from Reagan/Bush I, and for that matter, from the Nixon Administration). Also, Obama has been a consistent advocate of the US chunk of the global ruling class pursuing their international-imperialist interests by means other than endless war, torture, and spying on everyone. I think it's pretty clear that Gore would not have invaded Iraq. Kerry certainly wouldn't have left John effin Negroponte in Iraq as a "diplomat."

Obama said he would bomb Pakistan. He's rattling the sabre as much as anyone else, just toward different people. Just like Clinton, who bombed Iraq daily under different definitions, Obama will pursue violence and imperialist war when he sees fit. To believe anything else is in ignorance of Obama's own words.

Furthermore, John Kerry would have certainly continued imperialist war, only with different methods.

Honestly, your argument boils down to: well, these imperialists aren't so obvious about their deeds as the other guys...let's abandon every single pillar of socialism to support them! It's very difficult to NOT call that stark stupidity.


That these things, small as they are compared to the majesty of our Marxist-Leninist-Whateverist analysis, equal "no difference" to you, shows that you're not as persuaded by the difference these things make to average people's lives, as you might be. I think that we should care about what happens, for example, in those secret, private US prisons, and do something about stopping them ASAP, instead of pointing to them as yet another reason for, and thing we'll abolish after, the revolution. Because deferring people's real-world needs until 'after the revolution' has a long history as a losing strategy, in the U.S. anyways.

That you insult Marxism-Leninism in favor of Barack Obama is evidence enough of your impotence and naivete. The average person's life was greatly hurt by the Clinton Administration, the average person's life will be continued to ravaged by the ravages of the imperialist system, the average person's life was not, will not and cannot be helped by the imperialist Democrats. People's real-world needs ARE revolution and the destruction of capitalism; anything else will only enable the perpetuation of capitalist exploitation. You want to help people by introducing yet another group of imperialists, but every communist on this planet knows this to be false. Your platform is nothing but the liberal illusion that capitalism can be made fundamentally less evil.


Please see above. I'd be a little more discretionary with absolutist terms like "unforgivable," if I were for allowing the Bush people to run things, as you seem to be.

First of all, don't be thick, I don't support Bush, I refuse to support any imperialist. You're supporting someone who will change very little about American imperialist policy, and someone who agrees heavily with a politician you've already criticized at length (Clinton). The lesson? You're a shamless shill for imperialists, while I oppose capitalism itself.

By the way, I'd be a little less tongue-in-cheek when you're actively campaigning for someone who'd bomb Pakistan. In that case, I will use an absolutist term: you're absolutely delusional.


Also, are you one of these comrades who thinks we should let things get as bad as possible, in hopes that the pain of the situation moves people towards revolutionary consciousness? You might as well just say so, and I'll quit wasting my breath, as I'm not (sort of) conversing with a humanist, after all.

No, I'd rather that not happen, but capitalism inevitably destroys itself. Supporting a liberal in the hopes of "beating back the right" only helps that very system. History has shown that much (check out the Social Democrats, or as Lenin rightfully called them, the Social Chauvinists, before, during and after WWI).


I think this is a mistake. There are different kinds of bourgeois leaders. I think the CPUSA has a point, that we are in the relatively unusual situation in that the ruling class has become openly divided, to the point that it is becoming disorganized-- that represents a relatively unique opportunity to intervene and change the atmosphere in which all occurs. That can make a difference in everything from how many African-American men go to prison, for lack of alternatives to crack dealing, to what the average person conceives is even possible to change, lacking only their conviction and participation.

The ruling class is not truly divided. If they were, the Democrats would not have approved Bush's budget. They did. In the great show of Washington politics, there is some sound and fury, but in the end, it is sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Even if they were, the OPPOSITE plan is needed. The Black Panthers and Young Lords organized the working class AGAINST the bourgeoisie and brought about real change. What is the CPUSA doing? Trying its very best to shore up support for an imperialist faction, which is by definition against the interests of the workers. Again, one is revolutionary, the other is reactionary.


If you can't see how that might make a difference to organizers of any number of revolutionary tendencies, then all I can say is, it doesn't seem like you've done much organizing with people who don't already agree with you, over the last 30 years. That strengthens a hunch I was already having from your sweeping denunciations of me based on tactical differences expressed in, what, my 3rd and 4th posts here, ever.

It doesn't make a difference, because it's fundamentally an irrational concept. If you support the capitalists, you are working against the workers. It's simple math that goes all the way back to 1848 (and then some), and yet the CPUSA has jettisoned it in favor of the imperialist Democrats. That is more than enough to show us where their loyalties lie: the capitalist system.

My sweeping denunciations have turned out to be spot on.


These are some clever turns of phrase, I'll give you that. Still... see above.

They aren't just turns of phrase, they're what your party is actually doing. The CPUSA is promoting "John Kerry Communism", and that means supporting imperialism and ignoring any semblance of revolutionary organization.


You're pretty worried about impotence/powerlessness, aren't you?

I know it when I see it.


Also, what are you saying? That, dingy, energy-inefficient, poorly-staffed (and worse-compensated) offices are somehow superior vehicles for organization? Those offices &c represent not only the hard work and sacrifice of many comrades, they are also living legacies of generations of commitment to this particular organization. Is it sour grapes, or disdain for the dead that make you so despise the fruits of their legacies?

You're the one that posted a new office as evidence of some resurgence of the "Communist" Party. I touched upon the emptiness of said office when it comes to furthering working class power. Your offices are nothing when you have no revolutionary program. That's the point, and you're trying to dance around it.

Those offices, at present, represent a tool of the Democratic Party imperialists.


Everyone from the IWW to the SLP to, yes, the CP, used to try to own their own infrastructure, because once upon a time, revolutionary organizations sought a stable material basis from which to do their work. Only in Postmodernlandia, has such a thing become an intellectual liability. (Or as Burroughs put it, a world in which 'Everything is true, nothing is permitted.' Again, not to digress.)

See above.


From Kerry's wiki page: "Kerry won 59.03 million votes or about 48 percent of the popular vote; Bush won 62.04 million votes, or about 51 percent of the popular vote." News Flash: that's the overwhelming majority of politically 'active' people in the country, i.e. those who can be bothered to go to their nearest polling place and pull a lever, draw a line, or punch a few squares on a screen. Half can't be bothered to do that much.

News Flash: John Kerry is about as pro-worker as a razor blade. He got most of those votes because the capitalist election system is a complete joke with no real choice, and the rest he got from people who wholeheartedly support capitalism (including the CPUSA, by no small coincidence). Is that a reason for communists to support him? Don't make me laugh.


You can call me all the names you want-- but it won't touch this fact. And if you call many of these others half the things you call me, well, it's no wonder you're not making much headway with people out there.

The names that I'm calling you are all too true. I call you a John Kerry Communist because you're deluded enough to support an avowed imperialist just because it's easier than working for the workers. I call your organization impotent because the only thing it'll ever do is get out a few more votes for a reactionary politician. That's just calling a spade a spade.

And we're making headway, it's just that the revolutionary road is longer and more difficult than pro-imperialist cowardice.


That kind of thing leads to powerless impotence, ya know.

No, it leads to developing revolutionary consciousness; what you do leads to marginal support for capitalist liars. Impotence is not measured in present power, it is measured in potential strength, and potential strength lies in the politics of working class revolution.


Look, I'm not too worried about my ultimate impotence to make any difference in the universe-- I'm doing my bit of what I can, here and now, with what we got to work with. Some day, when the bitter-rage-projection thing doesn't work for you any more, I hope you'll find some way to join us, those who choose to find some hope in the situation and proceed thus-- wherever such a choice may lead you, in terms of groups or other such personal commitments. Meanwhile, if you can't play nice, please, at least don't go 'round scaring the kids off socialism in the process, okay?

You might think yourself the practical one, but look at the results: you will support an imperialist, and you'll get an imperialist. That is a cowardly and delusional position to take on every single level. You're not doing "what you can" for the progress of humanity because your loyalties lie with reactionaries. Meanwhile, real communists are organizing revolutionaries for true change. No one, and I repeat, no one will ever join the CPUSA and contribute to any revolutionary development, for the CPUSA is thoroughly misled and lost. Maybe you'll realize that voting in imperialists gets you imperialism, and that the only solution to humanity's conflicts is working class state power, but if you don't, know that the communist movement will not forget these truths.


We have enough of the ranter-hater image to live down, daresay.

I'm afraid you have another, much more shameful image to live down, and I don't think you will anytime soon.

[Buster Flynn]

is right here:

That is the opposite of what the CPUSA is doing: supporting Obama because it's easier than working within the working class and winning them over to socialism. One is revolutionary, the other is not, I'll let you guess which.

Polemic by imputation of motive, despite discussion to the contrary, effectively equal to straw-person arguments. Also, no: I no longer beat my spouse.

In Other Words, I suppose we'll have to agree to disagree. Good day to you, comrade.

PS: The friend request still stands. :)

[Die Neue Zeit]

Supporting a liberal in the hopes of "beating back the right" only helps that very system. History has shown that much (check out the Social Democrats, or as Lenin rightfully called them, the Social Chauvinists, before, during and after WWI).

Hey! :cursing:

The international proletariat's first vanguard party, the SPD, only started to accommodate in terms of direct bourgeois collaboration (entering into coalitions) AFTER WWI. Yes, they voted for war credits, but that's different from the French experience of coalitionism.

[manic expression]

Polemic by imputation of motive, despite discussion to the contrary, effectively equal to straw-person arguments. Also, no: I no longer beat my spouse.

No, I didn't inject any motive, I got that from your own words:

As for Obama, yeah, he's pro-imperialist. One cannot be a viable candidate for the US Presidency, here and now, as an anti-imperialist. However, he's an anti-war pro-imperialist.

In his favor, though, there's the likelihood that Obama can mobilize enough voters to overcome the voter fraud that has enabled the hard-right zombie administration over the last eight years (full of people from Reagan/Bush I, and for that matter, from the Nixon Administration).

The CPUSA has neither the will nor the motive to advocate working class state power, as any self-respecting communist does at every step. Prove me wrong.


In Other Words, I suppose we'll have to agree to disagree. Good day to you, comrade.Well, I suppose if you're intent on avoiding the issue, there's not much I can do. However, our discussion stands for itself: the CPUSA engages in pro-imperialist liberalism and furthers the interests of the bourgeoisie instead of pushing a revolutionary platform in the interests of the workers. That, my friend, is all one needs to know.

Jacob Richter

The international proletariat's first vanguard party, the SPD, only started to accommodate in terms of direct bourgeois collaboration (entering into coalitions) AFTER WWI. Yes, they voted for war credits, but that's different from the French experience of coalitionism.

What I was referring to was the Social Democrats' support of WWI, which is basically akin to what the CPUSA is trying to do today: support the "right kind of" imperialism. The end result is all too familiar in my view.

[Buster Flynn]

No, I didn't inject any motive, I got that from your own words:

As for Obama, yeah, he's pro-imperialist. One cannot be a viable candidate for the US Presidency, here and now, as an anti-imperialist. However, he's an anti-war pro-imperialist.

In his favor, though, there's the likelihood that Obama can mobilize enough voters to overcome the voter fraud that has enabled the hard-right zombie administration over the last eight years (full of people from Reagan/Bush I, and for that matter, from the Nixon Administration).


...the operant phrase here bing "your own words": I speak only for myself here, and from the understandings that led me to believe the CPUSA to be one of the better choices for my membership and participation-- because the way I see it, they're closer to correct on the issues than, say, the SWP, which I also respect, and to whose paper I subscribed for a while.

Likewise, you earlier conflated me with the original poster of the thread, when I just came to his/her defense. The material is what it is, and someone posted it here as interesting. I refuse to get uptight about it, just because you have. That said...



The CPUSA has neither the will nor the motive to advocate working class state power, as any self-respecting communist does at every step. Prove me wrong.


Well, at all of ten posts here, I can't post links yet, though at this rate, that will change soon enough :D

However, I think if one goes to CPUSA dot org, and has a look at the top of the right-hand column, one will find such documents as "Socialism USA," and "CPUSA Constitution," and "Program of the Communist Party USA." Not only will I let those speak for the Party, I think you'll find in them an orientation and analysis, that will explain how we think revolutionary ends can come from the work we're doing in the world at this particular moment in history.

You can agree or disagree with it, but this side of YOU making a revolution, I don't think you're in a position to say your theory is proved, nor that ours is disproved.

Maybe that's another reason why a variety of groups and tactics on the ground is a good thing, not a bad thing.




Well, I suppose if you're intent on avoiding the issue, there's not much I can do. However, our discussion stands for itself: the CPUSA engages in pro-imperialist liberalism and furthers the interests of the bourgeoisie instead of pushing a revolutionary platform in the interests of the workers. That, my friend, is all one needs to know.


Characterize it as you want, or must. I see nothing more than honest disagreement on tactics in short term strategy. I suppose making bombast out of that is amusing enough, to certain personality types. As for the rest of us, I'm here to listen and learn, as well as to throw in my 2 cents. Believing this to be a democratic, and multi-tendency forum, I think I'll continue to do so, whatever you decide to think of me and mine.

Just like I continue to subscribe to the papers of, and hang out with cadre of, other orgs and tendencies on the broader left, because I think we all have something to learn from one another, and ultimately, any revolutionary movement in the USA will take many different groups/tactics/positionalities, both in and outside the system. Anything less, is to ignore selectively sectors of reality that dont conveniently fit into one's pre-packaged ideology. That sounds not very scientific, which is to say not very Marxist, to me.

Others will disagree. Such is life.




Jacob Richter

What I was referring to was the Social Democrats' support of WWI, which is basically akin to what the CPUSA is trying to do today: support the "right kind of" imperialism. The end result is all too familiar in my view.


You continue to mistake the purpose of the CPUSA's support of Obama. However, there are none so blind, and all that.

Cheers, --Buster Flynn

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

I see a lot of nice revolutionary posturing here, but I don't see a lot of alternatives for reaching masses of potentially-convinceable working people in the USA in 2008 out there, and persuading them away from reformism and toward revolutionary consciousness and activity. Of course, a lot of American leftists aren't interested in reaching masses-- they're only interested in building leadership, and some of them say so, and that's fine. Others of them are what we used to call "posers," back in the day.
Actually there’s a lot of talk of organizing, maybe not enough, but this isn’t really an organizational forum, it’s a discussion forum. I spend most of my time organizing struggle that’s relevant to working people. Struggle is what moves people towards revolutionary consciousness. Voting for obama doesn’t. Voting is ultimately a pacifying act. Rather than take action to solve the issues that concern your everyday life, you take your agency and place it in someone else, Struggle gives us dignity and strength, and reformist programs just reinforce old habits.



But among those of us convinced that we'll have to meet those folks at least somewhere in the middle, between where they in fact are and where we'd like to see them go, is the CPUSA. Another major reason for the 'liberalness/reformishness' of the Party is because in its assessment of the current situation, the CP has decided that the first thing to do is to overturn the Reagan Revolution, i.e. the 'ultra-right' atmosphere, and then to reassess and go for whatever's next. That, at the moment, means supporting the Dems, because the Greens and the RCP aren't going to overturn the Reagan Revolution. Like it or not, that doesn't mean the support is uncritical, nor is it for the sake of the Dems. Nor are its goals that of the "popular front," though the tactic looks similar on the ground. Now, like it or hate it, that's a bunch of stuff with precedent in revolutionary history, so you don't get a free pass just for asserting that it equals reformism, and so the CP is dead, and next. Overturning the Reagan revolution requires greater class consciousness. The democrats and the republicans have been consistently cutting our standards of living. They will continue to do so until working people organize on the job, and in their communities, with sufficient strength. The social welfare state did not come out of ideological feelings, but the activity of workers. The state instituted welfare in response to action. Voting for the dems won’t solve any of our problems. Focusing on the “far right” isn’t a winning strategy. Winning strikes, and weakening the rights of cops is a winning strategy.



As for the IWW Purity trip, well if that's so, then why is it participating in the NLRA/NLRB system, despite having re-destroyed itself in the 1950s (and violating worker's control in doing so), because it would not be shackeled by the Taft-Hartley "Slave Labor" Laws? Also, I thought the IWW lived and died by its oft-repeated claims that it is non-political, and in fact open to members of all ideological bents/ So, how could a bunch of its members joining the CP equal a "raid," except of course if it were a hostile environment for all but the anarchists it claims it's not a front group for? Something doesn't add up, and so I don't understand the grievance here. Purity? It wasn’t about purity, but about the genealogy of the CP. Though it seems like you didn’t read my post properly. I explained how the CP wobs were forced out of the IWW, because Moscow had other plans for American organized labor. Also you should know that as officers in a political party, any CP official had to leave the union, part of the apolitical clause that we “live and die” by.


Meanwhile. You know, everyone's got their excuses for why their compromises are okay, but others' are fatal flaws... or else, why they're so tiny, despite being so uncompromising. That's called sectarianism. The CP is both very much alive, whether you agree or disagree with it, and it is one of the least sectarian formations in the contemporary American left. Of course, you'd never notice if you were prejudicial against it for ideological reasons-- you'd have to get close enough, with an open enough mind, to even notice it. The CP is pretty moribund. They don’t actually do much of anything. They’ve been reduced to advocating a bland, reformist style of democratic socialism. Every year they line up to advocate for the latest democrat, and every year, the democrat isn’t qualitatively different from the republican. If you’re so worried about relevance, why doesn’t the cp invest its formidable resources into building real struggle, rather than silly electoral stunts?

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

A few of the most basic communist principles are directly violated by the CPUSA's actions, and Buster Flynn is serving as an apologist for it. As I said before, the CPUSA is really politically relevant, nor does it have the a base among working people, so there's not a lot of point of challenging them. But, I think some of the questions around communist principle are worth talking about.

- Communists fight for the political independence of the working class from the bosses and their parties.

- Communists understand that imperialist war is a product of the imperialist system, and that only way to stop the current and future wars is to fight against the rule of the capitalists. Communists fight against capitalism in order to fight against war.

"The 'struggle against war' cannot be conducted as something separate and apart from the class struggle itself, from the intransigent struggle of the proletariat against imperialist capitalism, that is, against that social order which inexorably gives rise to imperialist war and oppression and which is inconceivable without twin scourges. Any attempt to conduct a struggle “against war” by means of “special methods” separate or “above” the class struggle itself is at best a cruel illusion and as a rule a malicious deception that facilitates the work of the imperialist warmongers...." - Trotsky

[manic expression]

More dancing around the unavoidable conclusion that the CPUSA has fallen to cowardly reformism.


...the operant phrase here bing "your own words": I speak only for myself here, and from the understandings that led me to believe the CPUSA to be one of the better choices for my membership and participation-- because the way I see it, they're closer to correct on the issues than, say, the SWP, which I also respect, and to whose paper I subscribed for a while.

Supporting imperialism is something NO communist should ever do, for it is against the interests of the workers and is contrary to the progress of humanity. Barack Obama is an imperialist who would bomb any country in an instant if he believed it would help bourgeois interests, and yet here you are, trying to convince us he's worth voting for. That's indefensible.


Likewise, you earlier conflated me with the original poster of the thread, when I just came to his/her defense. The material is what it is, and someone posted it here as interesting. I refuse to get uptight about it, just because you have. That said...

I conflated you with the party you support, which is completely reasonable.


Well, at all of ten posts here, I can't post links yet, though at this rate, that will change soon enough :D

Then maybe you can link us to a single issue where Obama would promote the interests of the vast majority of the population. Since he's an imperialist, you won't, because you can't.


However, I think if one goes to CPUSA dot org, and has a look at the top of the right-hand column, one will find such documents as "Socialism USA," and "CPUSA Constitution," and "Program of the Communist Party USA." Not only will I let those speak for the Party, I think you'll find in them an orientation and analysis, that will explain how we think revolutionary ends can come from the work we're doing in the world at this particular moment in history.

You really are in denial. Every serious communist knows what I'm saying: the CPUSA's pro-imperialist line will never contribute to revolution, nor will it ever help the workers. If you support any faction of imperialism, you abandon the class struggle and aid reaction. In fact, you've offered to arguments to the contrary.

As I said, this is basic math that goes back to Marx.


You can agree or disagree with it, but this side of YOU making a revolution, I don't think you're in a position to say your theory is proved, nor that ours is disproved.

My theory is that of Marx and Lenin. Yours is of Gustav Noske and John Kerry.


Maybe that's another reason why a variety of groups and tactics on the ground is a good thing, not a bad thing.

Supporting imperialism is never a good thing, unless you're a capitalist.


Characterize it as you want, or must. I see nothing more than honest disagreement on tactics in short term strategy. I suppose making bombast out of that is amusing enough, to certain personality types. As for the rest of us, I'm here to listen and learn, as well as to throw in my 2 cents. Believing this to be a democratic, and multi-tendency forum, I think I'll continue to do so, whatever you decide to think of me and mine.

This isn't disagreement on strategy, this is disagreement on principles.


Just like I continue to subscribe to the papers of, and hang out with cadre of, other orgs and tendencies on the broader left, because I think we all have something to learn from one another, and ultimately, any revolutionary movement in the USA will take many different groups/tactics/positionalities, both in and outside the system. Anything less, is to ignore selectively sectors of reality that dont conveniently fit into one's pre-packaged ideology. That sounds not very scientific, which is to say not very Marxist, to me.

Others will disagree. Such is life.

Are you going to wax poetic or make a compelling argument? Your position is completely un-Marxist and un-communist, as I've proven with multiple examples.


You continue to mistake the purpose of the CPUSA's support of Obama. However, there are none so blind, and all that.

You continue to deny the very substance of the party you support. There are none so blind who can't see the truth of their own line.

[Buster Flynn]

Well, I continue to disagree with all of you. But then, I suppose that's why I joined the CPUSA, and not the SWP, or the IWW, or whatever. Self-righteous rhetoric aside, it doesn't look like any of your groups are any more successful than ours, so these days at least, I would suggest that our theoretical differences are making all too little difference-- however large they seem in the fishbowl in which we all swim.

As for this being a discussion and not an organizing forum, point taken.However, I've already posted two events here... so at least some of us are trying to organize, even here :cool:

[redSHARP]

i look at what the RCP did in the bronx, oh wait nothing! i never saw any other political group trying and getting results other than the CPUSA. my one complaint is that their anti-fascist agenda is liberal based and rather lack luster.

[Rawthentic]

Nobody here is saying that the RCP did anything in the Bronx. They don't do anything or get any serious results anyways.

But to think of getting "results" as success in terms of revolution, that is ridiculous. The crucial point here, is, even if the CPUSA was leading people in struggle (which they are not), their reformist politics will lead...nowhere.

The point is not if you are leading struggles, but with what lines and ideology (to paraphrase Lenin).

[Red October]

In my area (Southeast US), I have never seen or heard from the CPUSA in any form at any demonstration, meeting, or other event. Comrades I know in NYC say the CPUSA is only a little more active there. Even though I dislike parties like Worker's World, PSL, etc, they are significantly more active and effective than the CPUSA. Hell, even the local anarchists (who are generally disorganized lifestylists) are more relevant than the CPUSA. I've been active in leftist groups for about 2 years now, and the CPUSA has absolutely no relevancy to the working people I've organized with. The only time they ever come up is in jokes.

[Sam_b]

However, he's an anti-war pro-imperialist.

That is a complete contradiction in terms. Obama's sabre-rattling over Iran shows he's not anti-war in the slightest.

[KC]

Well, I continue to disagree with all of you. But then, I suppose that's why I joined the CPUSA, and not the SWP, or the IWW, or whatever. Self-righteous rhetoric aside, it doesn't look like any of your groups are any more successful than ours, so these days at least, I would suggest that our theoretical differences are making all too little difference-- however large they seem in the fishbowl in which we all swim.

I think it's quite obvious that the vast majority of revolutionary groups (or those claiming to be, at least) are ineffective. That includes yours.

[Buster Flynn]

I think it's quite obvious that the vast majority of revolutionary groups (or those claiming to be, at least) are ineffective. That includes yours.

You can try the best you can
You can try the best you can
The best you can is good enough

This one's optimistic
This one went to market
This one just came out of a swamp
This one drops a payload
Fire for the animals
Living on animal farm

[KC]

You can try the best you can
You can try the best you can
The best you can is good enough

This one's optimistic
This one went to market
This one just came out of a swamp
This one drops a payload
Fire for the animals
Living on animal farm

Dude, just shut up.

You might as well start being realistic and admit that the CP just like every other party is miniscule, completely ineffective and will never become the vanguard party of a mass movement. That doesn't even take a discussion of the CP's politics to realize.

[Buster Flynn]

Dude, just shut up.



That's the spirit! Onward to the revolution.... :rolleyes:

[KC]

Spam fest!

http://noticethings.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/spam.jpg

[Buster Flynn]

Spam fest!


Dear comrade, this is the silliest thing you've said yet. If you really think my participatory posts on the topic are spam, then why are you replying to them?

With all due respect, you don't offer the best of first impressions. That makes me wonder about your track record with non-revolutonaries-- how does this discursive style go over with them? Or do you speak to them differently?

Anyway, I will continue for now to insist that all of our revolutionary organizations have roles to play in any possible revolutionary future-- mine as well as yours. You are certainly not persuading me otherwise....

[KC]

Dear comrade, this is the silliest thing you've said yet. If you really think my participatory posts on the topic are spam, then why are you replying to them?


Your past few posts were spam.

And because I can.


With all due respect, you don't offer the best of first impressions. That makes me wonder about your track record with non-revolutonaries-- how does this discursive style go over with them? Or do you speak to them differently?

"Revolutionary leftists" that take the CPUSA seriously are morons; hence, I will talk to you like you are a moron.


Anyway, I will continue for now to insist that all of our revolutionary organizations have roles to play in any possible revolutionary future-- mine as well as yours. You are certainly not persuading me otherwise....

Except your organization isn't really revolutionary at all...