At 20:08 01/02/00 -0500, you wrote:
>>For them it is as important to criticise Bradley as it is to criticise
>>Haider, in fact even more so. The proof of this dogmatist distortion of
>>marxism will be an inability to discuss any developing concrete moves that
>>link theory with practice.
>>
>>Chris Burford
>
>
>Washington Post, February 1, 1987
>
>"Bradley also sets his own course on matters of substance, sometimes to the
>dismay of fellow Democrats. For example, he voted last year for military
>aid to the contra rebels, astonishing liberal colleagues by calling this
>the path of caution: Better to contain the Marxist government of Nicaragua
>by aiding rebels, he said, than to leave it unchecked and later be forced
>to send in troops. The vote brought unaccustomed criticism from within his
>party, but he has not backed down."
I think this post illustrates the point I was making about it appearing
more important currently to criticise Bradley than Haider.
I do appreciate the empirical reference, which I do not doubt. I do allow
for the fact that a "correct" marxist line on what to do about Haider
entering the Austrian government will not be easy to arrive at. I do allow
also that none of the various marxism lists, or marxism sites, that have
emerged can on their own be expected to have the answer to everything.
This is a *process* we are involved in.
Nevertheless I hope that the various marxist sites will forward material on
this crisis in the direction bourgeois democracy is going.
I think Louis Proyect's post implies an explanation for the difference of
perspectives.
I agree even at this stage when Bradley looks much more progressive on the
class question of campaign finance reform, it is correct to be vigilant
about his weaknesses. This avoids the error of tailism and crass
parliamentarism.
But I find the news about Bradley quite unsurprising. Of course US
subscribers will know more about him, but do we not assume from the start
that he has a dual nature, concretely progressive in some contexts and
reactionary in others. (The same incidentally is true philosophically no
doubt of Joerg Haider - and it will be useful in undermining the support he
has if we can be analyse this correctly).
But in this *concrete* conjunction of contradictions, Haider is
reactionary, and Hillary Clinton criticising Haider is progressive.
That is dialectics for you if they really are materialist.
There is no royal road to science.
So I would ask the list generally, what can progressives do to resist the
rise of Joerg Haider?
I do think this is more important on a global scale than criticising
Bradley at the moment. Oddly to concentrate attention on Bradley's
weaknesses accepts the agenda of bourgeois elections that it is about
whether you like or dislike a particular person. That is easily absorbed
and neutralised by the bourgeois electoral system.
Chris Burford
London
