Date: Thu, 27 Mar 1997 00:20:37 -0500


COCKROACH! #48

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1. Bordigists! Sheep in Wolves Clothing...(Part 2)

2. Who was Pavlik Morozov? What actually was his story?

3. Cockroach Supplement!
 

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Bordigists! Sheep in Wolves Clothing...(Part 2)

malecki wrote;
>" I mean the Transitional program is still quite and effective weapon."

Aaron replied;
>
>        Not exactly, the transitional program is quite obsolete, unions
>today are not merely poorly lead but are more interested in disciplining
>workers and maintaining their control of working class dissent. In World
>War 2 the unions and the state both acted to control workers struggles by
>means of the no-strike pledge and the national war labor board, this was
>done in the name of the holy war against fascism but didn't end with the
>war. The unions(AFL, CIO, and Independent) used the no--strike pledge to
>make workers have no choice but to except the leadership of people the
>likes of John L. Lewis(who hated all leftists). The unions by the nineteen
>fifties had almost stopped organizing non-union workers, today unions see
>non-union labor as a threat. They also champion nationalistic "buy
>American" campaigns. Unions today only represent around twelve percent of
>the workers in this country at the most. Not much use to the rest of the
>working class.

Aaron, stop being so one country orientated around the trade unions. In fact 
the American trade unions are hardly the trade unions Internationally and in 
fact the reformist (Social Democratic) and Stalinist lead unions 
Internationally are mass organizations of the proletariat who organize 
millions of workers. And even on the American trade unions you are wrong. 
Because usually trade union organization is quite flexible in its ups and 
downs. Workers tend to ignore these organizations in times of relative class 
peace and show far much more attention to them in times of crisises. And 
much depends on who is leading what where in these organizations that will 
decide partially the outcome of every struggle. 

>Your fairly consistent work in the trade unions consists of tail ending
>unions leaders like Sweeney.

Now Could you please come with some proof where Trotskyists support Sweeny..

>Trotskyists support Union hacks by telling militant workers to participate
>in organizations that do little more today than take union dues as
>protection money from workers.

Paying union dues to participate in unions or pay their dues is surpose to 
be protection money? Is that why workers join unions? I doubt it..

>You missed the point here the problem of unions is not one of leadership
>but one of the nature of the trade union itself, today unions are a part of
>the capitalist state the shop floor cops of the ruling class. I have seen
>dozens of good people elected as shop stewards just to realize that the
>institution of the union itself is beyond reform.

That is the whole point. You can not tell the difference between an 
organization of the proletariat, despite its leadership. Just as you could 
not tell the difference between a deformed or degenerated workers state and 
capitalism. In your world their are no contradictions, no living class 
struggle, and no tactics except everybody is in the pay of the capitalist 
state. So instead of trying to break the unions from its pro capitalist 
leaders and turn these organizations into real class struggle unions you 
write off both the unions and all the workers in them. Just as you do on the 
question of the degenerated and deformed workers states.

>Unions today do little more than to bargain for the lesser evil in the form
>of concessions to the employers under the umbrella of the NLRB.

Maybe the union leadership does do that. Well the whole point is to change 
the leadership.

>Unions today are no longer mass organizations, I have enough accusations of
>"going off into the desert screaming smash the unions," or the name calling
>of ultra-leftism.The unions, like the "deformed and former degenerated
>workers states" are a part of the capitalist system itself. Your
>degenerated workers states are nothing more than a bloc of national capital
>ruled by a ruling class in the form of a political party that claimed to be
>the friend  and leader of the working class. Then every capitalist party
>claims to be a friend to working class people. You should read Ibsen's an
>enemy of the people.

This is bullshit. Perhaps in the United States the procent of people 
organized in unions is low. But here in many countries in Europe we are 
talking about anything from 75 to 90 % of the working class is organized in 
unions..
>
>"Not really. And furthermore "Soviets" are not just a means to and end. Thus
>the equation Soviets=revolution. But who leads those Soviets is naturally
>the decisive factor!"
>
>In answer to your mistakes here I suggest that you read the 
>transcriptions of the first two congresses of the Communist Third
>International, hopefully it might clear up some of your obsolete
>social-democratic thinking.fd

Oh please enlighten me on my Social Democratic deviation..


>Your hostility here is unwarranted, the IWW was far more revolutionary than
>the trotskyists ever were, your trouble again is that you consistently see
>workers as merely needing an effective leadership, then everything will be
>all right. This is wishful thinking at best, the real trouble is that the
>majority of the working class exists outside of your proletarian
>organizations, "in the desert" as you would say.

Not true on either count. Perhaps in your American centered world..
>
>"I mean the Social Democrats were already written of by the Third
>International. So naturally to do like you is just a belated cheap shot
>which tries to make cheap points that can't be made. In fact the blame must
>be put on the left splits moving towards the Third International and the CPs
>which did not have the cadre or maturity to use the situations to take the
>revolutionary helm and lead it to victory."
>
>Here you again refer to leadership as a magical panacea for the ills of the
>workers movement, you then proceed to blame the problems of the third
>international on left splits. Not exactly the case, in fact the communist
>left stuck with the Third International until it became impossible to
>remain as a part of it, particularly the Italian Communist Left of Bordiga
>and Damen who remained as active parts of the International until 1926. In
>fact the Communist left were overwhelmingly friendly to Lenin and the
>Bolshevik party. It was the Bolshevik party which attacked every one that
>even slightly disagreed with their august program. Trotskyists still
>insist on viewing the first four or five congresses of the Third
>International as being"revolutionary". Left Communists view only the first
>two congresses as being revolutionary. Trotskyists are distinguishable from
>the Stalinists in name only. The other question I must raise with you about
>your Trotskyism is why his Fourth International excommunicated Trotsky's
>daughter Elena Sedova? One reason, Trotskyists are unforgivably nationalist
>and they themselves went "screaming off into the desert" when they formed
>the Fourth International, they never even bothered to inform the Italian
>Communist left that they were forming an International(History of the
>Italian Communist left, ICC, 1992).

What you forgot to say is that the Bordigists put themselves outside of any 
kind of serious revolutionary struggle already in the early 20ties with the 
politics of anti-parlimentarianism and ultimatism. Formally they took this 
position at the second world Congress. They rejected the struggle for 
democratic slogans. They rejected any kind of United Front with the Social 
Democracy. This by the way was a predecessor to Stalin's "Red Front" period. 
And basically put themselves into a ultra sectarian position of abstention 
>from creating a Communist International.

And So what we have here are just the remnants of a bankrupt ultra left 
tendency which never made any impact on either Italian politics or 
International politics. Nothing can really change that because in fact you 
have put yourselves outside of any kind of serious class struggle. And 
blowing revolutionary farts in the faces of the tremendous class struggle 
and dialectics going on every day including the present will not change 
anything. The Bordigists and there defenders on this list are still just 
blowing a lot of hot empty air. No tactics, No program. and definitely will 
never lead a revolution with their program of no to everything.. Why even 
the anarchists are more well known Internationally in the International 
Workers movement then the Bordigists ever were or will be. And in fact the 
anarchists did actually make and impact on events in Spain unlike the 
Bordigists who never accomplished anything except abstentionism.. 

Malecki wrote;
>" Its just that you have no program, a bankrupt political history of a
>plague on both your houses type
>and you have no future. That is unless you find a
>Bolshevik-Leninist-Trotskyist organization who can teach you some
>revolutionary history and tactics. Then maybe you can be part of the future.
>However along the path your are walking is only the desert Neil!"

Aaron replied;
>Neil is not alone here, we have a program, it is clearly outlined in the
>transcripts from the Congresses of the Communist left as available from the
>ICC, or you can find our platform in Socialism or Barbarism as published by
>the Communist Workers Organization.

Well You have a program and I bet it is a modern version of Bordigist 
abstentionism of any kind of class struggle. But please don't be shy, 
present it here for the readers
of the list and we can discuss it. I mean I  honestly that people should 
not buy the pig in a sack. Let us have a discussion the program of the TP 
verses the Program of the Bordigists! 

Or we can just take even parts of political tactics and program to start 
with. For example "critical support" in elections. The United front with 
reformists or Stalinists.
Trade Union tactics, the question of parliament, the party as the vanguard 
question whatever. 

Let us see where it goes. Perhaps some rather stupid romantic fool might 
even believe you after such a discussion. 

Bob Malecki
--------------------------------------------------------
Who was Pavlik Morozov? What actually was his story? 

Remarkably, neither I nor my wife can recall even most
basic facts about him. No wonder. We both were brought up and 
educated during the years of all-embracing reaction in the SU. 
Neither the Soviet family nor the State were interested in discussing 
the significance of Pavlik's deed, let alone in appreciating its 
revolutionary character. 

He was a son of a wealthy peasant (kulak) in Tambov Province. He was also
a Young Pioneer, a member of the communist youth organization, created on
the initiative of Krupskaya in 1922. Was it then or during the first years
of collectivization that Pavlik went over to the side of the new world
of socialist collective against the old one of blood ties? Did he tell
his comrades that his father was hiding grain while workers starved in 
the cities? Or did he uncover a counter-revolutionary organization
of which his father was a member during the Tambov rebellion led by
SRs? But is it really important? All we know that soon after his father 
had been arrested Pavlik was brutally murdered by kulaks. 

Like all legends, that of Pavlik Morozov preserves for historical 
memory only the essential: a son who turned against his father in
struggle for a new world. Is this "monstrous"? It surely is from
the standpoint of the values of the old world, its understanding of
what is human or not. But from the standpoint of revolutionary
morality, Pavlik is a hero.  

In this country - which is the beacon of bourgeois morality and the
promised land of the family - there is a war going on between 
parents and children. Most of it is under surface. Only the apalling
statistics on the family abuse of children *and* the elderly, together
with the publicised cases of specially horrid family violence, indicate
what kind of hell exists behind the hypocritical mask of bourgeois family.
Isn't *this* monstrous? Perhaps, not. After all, the war between fathers
and sons is a norm - a reflection of their society's morality. Nick's
account of how this morality of the jungles was imposed on the 
working class families under the threat of unemployment is right on
the point. The proper word for it is HORROR. We experience the 
feeling of horror in the face of a danger to regress to the most archaic
forms of man's prehistory, some primeaval animal-like horde. Capitalism
is what always keep this threat for us just around the corner. The Soviet
people have discovered this truth only now. 

The formation of the bourgeois family and strengthening the institution of 
family in general in capitalist Russia has been a singular concern of the 
ruling clique. Their constitution proclaims family as the foundation of
bourgeois society.  Their laws codify its patriarchal form.  Their 
ideology extolls family as a more reliable bulwark against
communism than the Pope and the Nato together. 

Russian family is glorified: therefore, Russian women are degraded and
brutalised, thrown into misery and made to prostitute themselves in the
international slave-market.  Russian family is strengthened: therefore, 
Russian children starve, rot in the street and sell themselves to wealthy
pedophiles and straight family men. Russian family prospers: therefore,
millions of the "heads of families" enter the murderous war of cut-throat
competition of everyone against everyone. And could it be any different!

Only now, from the inside of this tremendous catastrophe, we can fully
appreciate the depth of Trotsky's analysis of Soviet society 60 years 
ago.  The restoration of the family as ideology and social institution 
under Stalin had served a stepping stone for the social consolidation of 
the new ruling stratum and its eventual transformation into a new 
ruling class.

"The right of inheritance is inseparable from that of private property."

The ruling class, in a strict sense of this concept, cannot exist without
a mechanism that insures its continuous reproduction and grounds it
in the relations of social production. Family and private property are
one. The next socialist revolution will learn this truth again, and
let us hope it will be more radical, more thorough in overcoming both
than those before.

Vladimir
--------------------------------------------------------
Cockroach Supplement!

Cockroach is now running a special supplement on 
Children of America. As the document is quite long 
it has been set up at the homepage of Cockroach. 

Warm Regards
Bob Malecki
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