Re: [Marxism] Fwd: The Fake Left at the Left Forum: The Attack against Ajamu Baraka
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * I used to have a lot of respect for the Black Agenda Report in general, and for Glen Ford in particular. That has changed. The vitriolic and demagogic attack by Haiphong is only the tip of the iceberg. That attack, by the way, reminds me of some of the attacks of the Stalinists of the 1930s and ‘40s against “Trotskyists”, attacks that preceded physical assaults. It would not surprise me at all if the present vitriol opens the way to similar assaults. On the purely political level, the fact that BAR would publish an article that is little but name calling and “imperialist” baiting, an article that contains no actual facts, says a lot about BAR. I was one of those who distributed the leaflet that Haiphong attacked, as well as the author of the DSA article ( https://www.dsausa.org/the_us_turn_to_assad) he mentioned but completely glossed over. Our leaflet was attacked for, among other things, claiming that Baraka supports Trump. That is not what we wrote. What we did write was that both Baraka and Stein had pictured Trump as the lesser evil during the election campaign - a subtle but critical difference. This lesser evilsm stems from seeing the neo liberals as THE enemy, the one and only enemy. A recent article by Glen Ford shows this same tendency: Ford writes about the meeting of Trump and Kim https://www.blackagendareport.com/chaos-imperial-big-house. He seems to be caught between wanting to call Trump the lesser evil and the overt racism and jingoism of Trump. So he vacillates back and forth. On the one hand, he pays tribute to the obligatory denunciations of Trump, calling him “the arch racist and usurper of the Republican Party” and “an intellectually and emotionally retarded spawn of super-privilege”. But then he goes on to attack the Democrats. As one who has not supported any Democratic candidate for office since I was young and uneducated (back in the 1970s), I have no problem with attacking the Democrats. In fact, I’ve done it time and again on my blog, including attacking the “left” wing of the Democrats, Bernie Sanders included. But consider what Ford says: - He says the Democrats “have become overt partisans of the War Party”, as if the Republicans are any better. - He in effect denies the link between Trump and the Russian oligarchs, and praises Trump for his close ties with Putin, praising Trump for his “wholly unexpected appeal for peaceful relations with Russia.” He continues, “If white Republicans were not wedded to the permanent war agenda… then where was the mass constituency for the bipartisan War Party?” The only possible interpretation of this is that the connection between Trump and the totally reactionary Putin regime, an imperialist regime based on chauvinism and reaction, is a positive thing. This does not mean that socialists should support US imperialism in its rivalry with Russian imperialism, but neither should we support collaboration between these two reactionary imperialist powers. - Ford seems to be supporting Trump’s ‘vacillat(ion) on “free trade”. This can only mean supporting Trump’s imposition of tariffs. This is a reversal of everything that socialists have stood for regarding tariffs, and there is a good reason to oppose them. Tariffs are a first step towards outright trade wars, which are a step towards military wars. Instead, socialists should be explaining that neither “free trade” nor tariffs will serve the working class; that the issue of international trade of goods and services cannot be resolved in the interests of workers within the capitalist system; that the problem is the crisis of the very existence of the nation states in the era of global capitalism. It may seem very radical to picture neoliberals and the Democrats as THE enemy, but in fact it is the opposite. Its basis is the idea that neoliberalism is the chosen policy of a wing of the capitalist class. In other words, they have an option. On the contrary, neoliberalism simply is the necessary direction of capitalism at this stage of development. The former position opens up the left to collaboration with the far right; the latter means opposition to ALL capitalist representatives, including Ron Paul. We can see that most clearly in the case of Haiphong, himself: This Assad supporter is most definitely part of the red brown alliance, whose existence he (naturally) denies. The most clear example is his association with the Ronpaulinsitute. (See for example: http://ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2018/april/26/cruise-missile-left-complicit-in-american-escalation-toward-world-war-iii/ )
Re: [Marxism] Fwd: The Fake Left at the Left Forum: The Attack against Ajamu Baraka
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * On 6/13/18 2:41 PM, Mark Lause wrote: Have radicals actually absorbed the tolxicity of the surrounding civic culture so completely that we use terms like "fake left"??? A position is either "left" or its not. And saying that it's a "fake left" conjures images of conspiratories . . .people choosing deliberately to fly under phony colors as a "left' that isn't. Just one other thing on this. I didn't sign the open letter on Baraka, as I have already pointed out. Plus, I value Black Agenda Report even if they are wrong on Syria. In fact, one of my closest friends used to drive me nuts sending me that kind of stuff for a few years. Finally, I have enormous esteem for Bruce Dixon who in a Left Forum workshop on how to build the left talked about the need to avoid litmus tests. If I had applied to CounterPunch in 2013, it would have prevented me from reaching people who were not in my comfort zone--in other words, the small number of people who walked out on Baraka. Politics is about debate. Lenin was not a Marxist at one point. He argued for years with Marxists until he came around. This Syria stuff is easy to stumble over since we have been accustomed to putting a minus where the State Department puts a plus--or vice versa. The only way to overcome this non-dialectical way of thinking is to patiently explain. If you don't have the patience for that, maybe you should rethink your _ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Fwd: The Fake Left at the Left Forum: The Attack against Ajamu Baraka
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * Have radicals actually absorbed the tolxicity of the surrounding civic culture so completely that we use terms like "fake left"??? A position is either "left" or its not. And saying that it's a "fake left" conjures images of conspiratories . . .people choosing deliberately to fly under phony colors as a "left' that isn't. _ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Fwd: The Fake Left at the Left Forum: The Attack against Ajamu Baraka
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * On 6/13/18 1:45 PM, Andrew Stewart via Marxism wrote: The Fake Left at the Left Forum By Danny Haiphong What a funny nom de guerre. When I was in the SWP, I kicked around the idea of using Morris Bolshstein. _ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] Fwd: The Fake Left at the Left Forum: The Attack against Ajamu Baraka
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * Best regards, Andrew Stewart Begin forwarded message: > From: "Ajamu Baraka" > Date: June 13, 2018 at 1:33:22 PM EDT > To: "'Ajamu Baraka'" > Subject: The Fake Left at the Left Forum: The Attack against Ajamu Baraka > > > As some of you may have heard I have been the object of mobilizations from > some sector of the white left over the last few weeks that culminated in an > organized action against me during the closing plenary of the left forum. We > recognize that this is not an attack on me as a person but on those of us > from black liberation movement and the authentic left that have taken a > consistent anti-imperialist stance during the current period of right-wing > ideological retrenchment that intensified under the Obama administration. We > thank comrade Haiphong for his defense and analysis. We will continue to > build and to uphold the tradition of Black/African internationalism. > > > The Fake Left at the Left Forum > > By Danny Haiphong > > https://blackagendareport.com/fake-left-left-forum > > The Fake Left at the Left Forum > “Black Agenda Report and the Black Alliance for Peace have been called > ‘Assadists’ for defending the Syrian people’s rightful decision to determine > who governs them and under what type of state.” > > I was at the Left Forum held on the first weekend of June in New York City. I > did what I’ve done every year that I’ve attended. I spoke at Black Agenda > Report’s panel, chatted with a few comrades I rarely see due to distance, and > attended a few of their panels. More than a few colleagues mentioned to me > that a contingent of so-called “Trotskyists” publicly protested Black > Alliance for Peace founder Ajamu Baraka for his support of the Syrian > government. These so-called “Trotskyist” forces passed out leaflets > condemning Baraka and protested his remarks at the closing plenary in > opposition to “the brutal Assad regime.” A UNAC statement on the matter can > be found here. > > While some were engaged in unprincipled, pro-empire, and chauvinist actions > such as these, others such as myself were using the Left Forum to figure out > who the left is and what it should stand for and do. This is an important > task because the real left in the United States is small. As Glen Ford stated > in Black Agenda Report’s panel,the small size of the real left means that it > shoulders a heavy burden. Not only must the real left in the United States > find a way to develop an organized anti-imperialist, and class-based > opposition to the ruling class, but it must also combat the fake left in its > many forms. Those who participated in slandering Baraka are what the fake > left looks like and sounds like in the flesh. > > “The real left must combat the fake left in its many forms.” > > The fake left at the Left Forum should be distinguished from the fake left of > the non-profit industrial complex. The non-profit industrial complex indeed > hires fake activistsbeholden to government and corporate funders responsible > for the very problems that non-profit activists oppose in the first place. > Fake left activists reside in non-profit organizations such as MoveOn.org and > Indivisible. The fake left I refer to in this piece are perhaps even more > insidious than those paid by foundations and non-profits. This band of > leftists verbally states opposition to imperialism and an embrace of > socialism in theory yet behaves more like amateur soft agents of the US > intelligence services in practice. > > These fake leftists reside in an alphabet soup of so-called Trotskyist > organizations like the International Socialist Organization (ISO). So-called > “Trotskyist” organizations have a long history of supporting US imperialism. > I don’t pretend to know which organization the fake leftists who protested > Baraka belonged to. An attendee told me that the organizers of the protest of > Baraka stemmed from the League for the Revolutionary Party. Thetrend is more > important than the organization. Just days prior to the Left Forum, activists > in the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) wrote an opinion piece claiming > that “The 2,000 US troops in Syria are not there to conduct ‘regime change.’ > They are there to defend the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) in North > East Syria and to oppose ISIS. Trump has made that clear.” One of the authors > of the piece has been active on social media denouncing Baraka and the Black > Alliance for Peace for being so-called apologists for Assad. This falls in > line with the ISO, which has long been known to support US-led operations in > Libya
