On 11/13/12 11:29 AM, Marv Gandall wrote: > And what kind of parties are the Labour and social democratic parties > if not also bourgeois parties?
That being the case, the Trotskyists had no good reason to denounce the Popular Fronts that they saw as class-collaborationist affairs between something like the Radical Party in France and the SP, and CP. I continue to believe that they were justified in their attacks. You, of course, are entitled to your own opinion. > > But please elaborate. What difference do you see between Obama and > Clinton and the Blairs, Milibands, Schmidts, Hollandes, Zapateros', > and Papandreous' of the world? The social democrats openly declare > their political solidarity with the Democrats, and not only at the > level of the leadership, but also at the level of the base, as I can > attest in regard to the NDP here in Canada. My position is that there is little strategic point in backing Western European social democratic parties as well, even though there was in the 1920s or 30s--maybe the 40s at the latest. Lenin argued that until workers had a chance to see these parties in power, it was difficult to convince workers that they would be sold out. My point is not to orient to parties in the Second International but to push for independent class action, symbolized in new formations such as SYRIZA. I put SYRIZA and future such parties on one side of the class divide, and bourgeois and decadent SP's on the other. > Surely ou don't seriously believe that an avowedly social democratic > government would administer the US empire on behalf of global > capitalism any differently than the Obama administration, do you? Or > that it would not equally be preparing to implement Bowles-Simpson in > the US? There will be no such party arising at this time in history. Trotsky and the SWP advocated a Labor Party because they understood that it would have an entirely different trajectory. A Labor Party today will not receive money from hedge fund millionaires. It will be a bold initiative that will draw much more hostility from Nation Magazine liberals than the Nader campaign. I don't know if such a party is in the offing. It would seem that something much more like the Greens is on the agenda. In any case, either such development is undermined by special pleading from Marxists. I am not thinking so much of people like you and Julio but outright charlatans like Bill Fletcher Jr. who has a much bigger audience. You two are merely confused, while Fletcher Jr. has material interests in running his con game. > The social composition of the DP and social democratic parties is > identical: private and public sector unions, representative > organizations of minorities, gays, women, and others fighting for > reforms, liberal intellectuals drawn from the academy and the > professions. When you go pull a lever for Obama, this has nothing to do with "composition". Most workers have about as much to do with the DP that I do with the Lubavitcher Hasidim. On the other hand, you did see much more of a connection between the ranks and the leadership in the British Labour Party before Blairism sunk in. In some ways the RESPECT party is a throwback to those days, even though George Galloway is doing everything possible to thwart its growth through one stupidity or another. > > Finally, any policy differences between the social democrats and DP > you feel are worth highlighting for us? The only social democrats in the USA that I am aware of are the DSA. To my knowledge, they do not favor fracking, nuclear power, la migra crackdowns on undocumented workers, Predator Drone strikes, extrajudicial killings, and gangsters having their way with the American people. They, of course, have the same benighted attitudes on "tactical" voting for the DP, except for Stanley Aronowitz I would add. > > Here is Hollande, BTW, the social democrats' social democrat: > The French SP, according to an NPA member who spoke at the last Left Forum, never had the same class composition as the German SP, which was much more based on the trade unions. Not that this would make any difference to me in the grand scheme of things. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
