[Peace-discuss] [OccupyCU] [sf-core] Out of Occupy, a New Populist Political Party Forms

[C. G. Estabrook]

Some of us who were around in the Eisenhower years know how the wells have been poisoned in regard to a discussion of socialism. 

Here's a comment from 1986 - roughly equidistant from Eisenhower and us - on why a serious discussion is so difficult:

"When the world's two great propaganda systems agree on some doctrine, it requires some intellectual effort to escape its shackles. One such doctrine is that the society created by Lenin and Trotsky and molded further by Stalin and his successors has some relation to socialism in some meaningful or historically accurate sense of this concept. In fact, if there is a relation, it is the relation of contradiction.

"It is clear enough why both major propaganda systems insist upon this fantasy. Since its origins, the Soviet State has attempted to harness the energies of its own population and oppressed people elsewhere in the service of the men who took advantage of the popular ferment in Russia in 1917 to seize State power. One major ideological weapon employed to this end has been the claim that the State managers are leading their own society and the world towards the socialist ideal; an impossibility, as any socialist -- surely any serious Marxist -- should have understood at once (many did), and a lie of mammoth proportions as history has revealed since the earliest days of the Bolshevik regime. The taskmasters have attempted to gain legitimacy and support by exploiting the aura of socialist ideals and the respect that is rightly accorded them, to conceal their own ritual practice as they destroyed every vestige of socialism.

"As for the world's second major propaganda system, association of socialism with the Soviet Union and its clients serves as a powerful ideological weapon to enforce conformity and obedience to the State capitalist institutions, to ensure that the necessity to rent oneself to the owners and managers of these institutions will be regarded as virtually a natural law, the only alternative to the 'socialist' dungeon.

"The Soviet leadership thus portrays itself as socialist to protect its right to wield the club, and Western ideologists adopt the same pretense in order to forestall the threat of a more free and just society. This joint attack on socialism has been highly effective in undermining it in the modern period..."

Rest of the article at <http://www.chomsky.info/articles/1986----.htm>.  

--CGE 


On Mar 14, 2014, at 3:00 PM, David Johnson <davidjohnson1451 at comcast.net> wrote:

> Astrid,
>  
> You must be referring to communism, which is a one party bureaucratic dictatorial State where the government performs most if not all economic activity and is the sole owner of most everything.
> Socialism is economic and political democracy, where the government owns some industry and Worker owned cooperatives and individual Workers own most everything else, and decisions are made by the people both in the Workplace, in the city where they live and at the regional and national level through elected representatives.
> No pure form of a Socialist government has ever existed.
> Sweden WAS the closest on the capitalist side of the spectrum, and the old Yugoslavia was the closest on the State Managed side of the spectrum.
> Republican Spain during the mid 1930's had some fledgling local examples that were pretty close, until the Fascists won the civil war.
> Today, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador are moving in the direction of real Socialism albeit some problems and Cuba is transitioning, but time will tell if it goes the disasterous route that the old USSR did ( From bad to worse ).
> The biggest problem with Socialism is defining it.
> Ask ten people on the street to define it and you will get at least nine completely different definitions.
>  
> David Johnson
>  
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Astrid Berkson
> To: David Johnson
> Sent: Friday, March 14, 2014 1:10 PM
> Subject: Re: [sf-core] Out of Occupy, a New Populist Political Party Forms
> 
> those of you who weren't around in the eisenhower years with managed capitalism here and socialism in several countries don't realize that both capitalism and socialism stink and that a managed mix works. until we get a free press and money out of elections, nothing will work
> "May this be the worst day of your life". 
> Old Irish blessing.
> 
> On 3/14/2014 11:38 AM, David Johnson wrote:
>> 
>> Out of Occupy, a New Populist Political Party Forms
>> 
>> <Mail Attachment.jpeg>
>> By Dennis Trainor Jr, www.PopularResistance.org
>> March 13th, 2014
>> Carl Gibson, co-founder of U.S. Uncut, is joining with other Occupy Wall Street organizers to launch a new populist political party. While more details (including the name of the party and the identities of other key organizers) will be available when the group launches on March 20, the party will be explicitly anti-capitalist.
>> Says Gibson: “A new party that actively opposes capitalism and unites people around the basic ideas of meeting human needs would be widely respected and immediately acknowledged. This new party could stand apart from the two corporate-owned parties by refusing to take campaign donations from corporations, banks and developers, standing up for the rights of immigrants and indigenous people, calling for sustainable energy and development, making education for all a top priority, and believing in universal access to healthcare as a human right. While it would take time, focusing on building power first at the local and county level is the surest way to make lasting change.”
>> 
>> In this interview with Resistance Report host Dennis Trainor, Jr., Gibson acknowledged that the Green Party is already working along a parallel path, but feels his (soon to be launched) party will do a better job of engaging young people and focusing on local politics as a way to build power.
>> 
>>