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When someone posted a link to Ben Norton’s attack on George Orwell, my first reaction was to shrug my shoulders and let it go. Ever since the lad got fired from Salon for violating their rules against writing for other publications, he has lost his bully pulpit for spreading Assadist lies. (I assume he was canned for writing an article for Intercept rather than incompetence even if Salon’s bar is set rather low in that regard.) Although I have my own problems with Orwell, I was more interested in Norton’s rather stupid and reactionary take on Trotskyism that amounts to a defense of Stalin’s betrayal of the Spanish revolution. It has been quite a few years since I have had to bother with writing about the Spanish civil war. To kill two birds with one stone, I hope to demonstrate how Norton has capitulated to Stalinism as well as to make some points about how Franco achieved his victory. Considering the fact that Bashar al-Assad is today’s Generalissimo Franco, it is not surprising that Norton can get Spain so wrong.
full: https://louisproyect.org/2016/12/26/ben-norton-completes-his-stalinist-turn/
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