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Aside from the fact that I am gratified that the discussion seems to revolve around the true nature of differences in understanding and supporting Cuba and not around Fidel's purportedly "less than fresh" commentaries (I confess, I am not really sure how to analyze those commentaries and the present discussion doesn't seem to be helping), I would like to know where these "specious","immature", "idealist" drivelers are coming from? I do have difficulty with idealism applied to heartless anti-Castroism regardless of its scientific basis; I consider myself an idealist in that I will not accept this ridiculous society as the "best of all possible worlds" and believe that there is a better, more ideal, world to make and which I believe Cuba is on that road more than the Mages and dans. dan makes the charge that if we look "down the road" in the future, we will see Cuba as a failure to socialism. . .??? Well, sure, maybe if the international working class and its oppressed "nationalist" allies don't help them out! I thought that was the brutal lesson of the Russian revolution, among others (Or did "we" forget our history of the Paris Commune, the counterrevolution in southern reconstruction after the U.S. Civil War, or Nicaragua and Grenada for that matter? I don't know 'bout you, dan and Shane, but I think it would be a really good thing if we could find our way to overturning capitalist property relations throughout the world so that our sisters and brothers in Cuba aren't left to eventual demise as your legacy of self-fulfilling prophecy. Again, can someone let me know the political orientation being expressed here? Please don't get me wrong, I am not really baffled as I have heard this kind of drivel from gusanos in Miami and New York. I'm just . . .perturbed. . .to see it here. Manuel > From: shm...@pipeline.com > Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2010 20:53:01 -0400 > Subject: Re: [Marxism] Autumn of the Driveler > To: mtom...@hotmail.com > > ====================================================================== > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > ====================================================================== > > > > > > On Sep 17, 2010, at 8:18 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > >> > >> On 9/17/10 8:13 PM, Shane Mage wrote: > >>> > >>> Perhaps if the Cuban revolutionaries had read their Trotsky they > >>> would > >>> have learned that the Stalinist "USSR" was a totally > >>> counterrevolutionary regime whose "aid" was motivated by imperial > >>> interests, just as much as was the hostility of the Americans, and > >>> that by accepting a political quid pro quo for that aid they were > >>> effectively sabotaging their own revolution. > >> > >> But, Shane, you don't really distinguish Castro from Stalin so your > >> point is rather specious. > > > > On Sep 17, 2010, at 8:31 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > > > On 9/17/10 8:25 PM, Shane Mage wrote: > >> > >> I have consistently referred to Castro as a real (however national) > >> revolutionary, and to Stalin as an Okhranik villain who restored a > >> red- > >> tinted Tzarist regime. What more distinction is needed? > > > > Oh, there must have been another Shane Mage who wrote this. My > > apologies: > > > > Trotsky long ago diagnosed Stalinism as "the syphilis of the labor > > movement." This heap of Stalinist filth--which even non-masochists > > ought to read in its entirety--demonstrates how the Cuban leadership, > > infected with that disease shortly after the revolution, now has > > entered its tertiary phase, general paresis. > > Do you know the meaning of the word "after?" The "political quid pro > quo" in my message of today is precisely the "infection" I was > referring to in that earlier post. > (By the way, when Gorbachev so clumsily tried to restore a modicum of > rationality to the bureaucratically paralyzed economy of his "really > existing socialism," he at least decorated his policies with phrases > about a "return to Lenin." Raoul and Fidel Castro seem incapable of > even that much). > > > Shane Mage > > "All things are an equal exchange for fire and fire for all things, > as goods are for gold and gold for goods." > > Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr, 90 > > ________________________________________________ > Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu > Set your options at: > http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/mtomas3%40hotmail.com ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
