This is the kind of demsoc I can support. One who understands the concept of solidarity. Something American “leftists” have not yet begun to grasp.
How can you shout at us about unity while simultaneously throwing socialists under the bus by denouncing and distancing yourself from the USSR or Cuba?
In regards to your edit, I think our best strategy is a professional party that hastens national suicide so the hegemonic empire will collapse. Only once this happens will the American masses be susceptible to radicalization. Before this there is too much material benefit from empire and any reformist movement will always turn social-chauvinist and imperialist.
Well it’s dialectical. The colonized world will need to have their own revolutions to throw off American hegemony, which will hasten American collapse. American communists need to fight imperialism (the primary contradiction) to assist those nations struggling for freedom. The two will feed off each other, and we will need to be linked to their movements materially and through solidarity.
A synthetic reformist chauvinist American left will not do. They will kill the communists at a moment of crisis and implement fascism before they let the empire collapse.
The materialist in me realizes the implications of a massive labor aristocracy subsidized by imperial loot.
As Marx put it about the labor aristocracy of England in the 19th century: The proletariat here are a more bourgeois proletariat without revolutionary potential. Only a few very bad years will fix this.
Cuba is one thing but how is it relevant to current solidarity to stake out a position on whether or not a political system that has not even nominally existed for nearly three decades was or was not true socialism? The decisions of the various actors over the course of Soviet history were products of the material conditions of a time and place that no longer exists, conditions that in most respects are entirely unlike those of the present-day United States. I don't understand why people feel the need to have endless struggle sessions about people and events and decisions that bear such little resemblance to the situations they actually face.
Whether you like it or not, the USSR is the face of socialism. You can deal with this by trying to detach the USSR from socialism, or by defending the USSR from the propaganda and smears that have shaped western perceptions of it. You don’t have the luxury of ignoring it, although every ultra and radlib wishes they could.
I wouldn't take a tribute made right after his death before kruschev's speech came out for much. Allende was extremely critical of non democratic action, supporting the Hungarian uprising and Czechoslovakian one.
Plus Allende got his start in a socialist party that was a popular coalition of trotskyists and anarchists, and some social democrats, against the Stalinist supporting Chilean communist party.
I think Rashida is basically AOC, but with better foreign policy. Still not good foreign policy, but at least pro-Palestine and more staunchly anti-war.
Ilhan is also good, but I feel like she's had some yikes takes, though I can't think of what exactly off the top of my head.
All of them are still fairly pro democratic party in a way Sanders clearly wasn't. They all tend to exist in a space somewhere between Sanders and Warren rather than to his left. This said, Cori Bush is absolutely to left of squad 1.0, Nina Turner who had some worse politics than most of these folks previously is also far less afraid of attacking the Democrats head on than AOC/Ilhan/Rashida.
The Squad was clearly more closely mentored by Jayapal than by Sanders, although I do also imagine a big part of this comes from the fact that they are members of the house and not the Senate and it's much easier to have independence as a Senator due to their procedural rules.
I'm with you on this one. I don't know why some folks expect her to start stanning ML states when neither she (nor Bernie!) have ever painted themselves as anything other than social democrats, for all practical purposes.
Like literally, what would make you think either AOC or Bernie are socialists other than the label they occasionally use for themselves? 99.9% of their words and 100% of their actions point to social democracy, and they don't pretend otherwise. And you know what, I think that's ok. Personally I think social democracy represents the outer left limit of what can be accomplished via electoralism in the US.
(btw I will always try and include Bernie whenever AOC is mentioned because even though their politics are exactly identical AOC seems to get a lot more hate for some reason...
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Yes, you are right. Demsocs are Allende or Chavez.
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This is the kind of demsoc I can support. One who understands the concept of solidarity. Something American “leftists” have not yet begun to grasp.
How can you shout at us about unity while simultaneously throwing socialists under the bus by denouncing and distancing yourself from the USSR or Cuba?
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In regards to your edit, I think our best strategy is a professional party that hastens national suicide so the hegemonic empire will collapse. Only once this happens will the American masses be susceptible to radicalization. Before this there is too much material benefit from empire and any reformist movement will always turn social-chauvinist and imperialist.
this is it. The empire has to be taken down so that the rest of the world can breath.
Well it’s dialectical. The colonized world will need to have their own revolutions to throw off American hegemony, which will hasten American collapse. American communists need to fight imperialism (the primary contradiction) to assist those nations struggling for freedom. The two will feed off each other, and we will need to be linked to their movements materially and through solidarity.
A synthetic reformist chauvinist American left will not do. They will kill the communists at a moment of crisis and implement fascism before they let the empire collapse.
yes when I read this by AOC, I see her throwing Rosa's body into a canal. Always remember what our German comrades learned the hard way:
Wer hat uns verraten? (Who betrayed us?)
Sozialdemokraten!
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The materialist in me realizes the implications of a massive labor aristocracy subsidized by imperial loot.
As Marx put it about the labor aristocracy of England in the 19th century: The proletariat here are a more bourgeois proletariat without revolutionary potential. Only a few very bad years will fix this.
If the battle is “is actual socialism good or not” that’s pretty much a necessary rhetorical battle that they can’t shirk on
Cuba is one thing but how is it relevant to current solidarity to stake out a position on whether or not a political system that has not even nominally existed for nearly three decades was or was not true socialism? The decisions of the various actors over the course of Soviet history were products of the material conditions of a time and place that no longer exists, conditions that in most respects are entirely unlike those of the present-day United States. I don't understand why people feel the need to have endless struggle sessions about people and events and decisions that bear such little resemblance to the situations they actually face.
Whether you like it or not, the USSR is the face of socialism. You can deal with this by trying to detach the USSR from socialism, or by defending the USSR from the propaganda and smears that have shaped western perceptions of it. You don’t have the luxury of ignoring it, although every ultra and radlib wishes they could.
I wouldn't take a tribute made right after his death before kruschev's speech came out for much. Allende was extremely critical of non democratic action, supporting the Hungarian uprising and Czechoslovakian one.
Plus Allende got his start in a socialist party that was a popular coalition of trotskyists and anarchists, and some social democrats, against the Stalinist supporting Chilean communist party.
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I think Rashida is basically AOC, but with better foreign policy. Still not good foreign policy, but at least pro-Palestine and more staunchly anti-war.
Ilhan is also good, but I feel like she's had some yikes takes, though I can't think of what exactly off the top of my head.
All of them are still fairly pro democratic party in a way Sanders clearly wasn't. They all tend to exist in a space somewhere between Sanders and Warren rather than to his left. This said, Cori Bush is absolutely to left of squad 1.0, Nina Turner who had some worse politics than most of these folks previously is also far less afraid of attacking the Democrats head on than AOC/Ilhan/Rashida.
The Squad was clearly more closely mentored by Jayapal than by Sanders, although I do also imagine a big part of this comes from the fact that they are members of the house and not the Senate and it's much easier to have independence as a Senator due to their procedural rules.
I'm with you on this one. I don't know why some folks expect her to start stanning ML states when neither she (nor Bernie!) have ever painted themselves as anything other than social democrats, for all practical purposes.
Like literally, what would make you think either AOC or Bernie are socialists other than the label they occasionally use for themselves? 99.9% of their words and 100% of their actions point to social democracy, and they don't pretend otherwise. And you know what, I think that's ok. Personally I think social democracy represents the outer left limit of what can be accomplished via electoralism in the US.
(btw I will always try and include Bernie whenever AOC is mentioned because even though their politics are exactly identical AOC seems to get a lot more hate for some reason...
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You get that none of those states are Socialist and she calls herself a Socialist, right? What is this bullshit excuse making all over the place?