Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 01:22:23 -0400
From: malecki-AT-algonet.se (Robert Malecki)


COCKROACH! #79

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1. Nationalism..

2. Hair raising or the shrinking middle class.

3. Reply to the LP  on the women's question!

4. The Teresa Ebert thread.
 

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Nationalism

Zeynep wrote;
>Someone summed up what happened for two centuries in a few paragraphs,
>concluding with;
>
>>>This sums up the revolutionary heritage of  Marxism, Bolshevism and 
>>>Trotskyism on this question today. It enables us to explain why in 
>>>times of crisis, nationalism comes to the fore, as rival national or 
>>>ethnic leaders compete for influence over terrritory which they can 
>>>offer to imperialism as its local agents. 
>
>With half a paragraph about what's happening today. I won't reproduce the
>whole post to spare the agony.
>
>That's exactly what I was referring to when I said "in this cyberseminar if
>we get big abstractions, we'll have nothing".

Is political clarity on such and important question which has caused so much 
blood to be shed "nothing"?
>
>I find this attitude incredibly stupid and unfruitful. Say we have a
>complicated problem like the rise of political islam and its attraction to
>many working class people and the urban poor in various islamic capitalist
>nations? "Religion is the opium of the masses". What else do we need to know
>anyway.

Well, if you want to have a discussion on the if and why's of this I think 
it would be fine. we could start for example with the Iranian "revolution" 
and the role it played in this religious revival and Islam.
Not to mention the key role that the Iranian left played in the victory of 
the Islamic fundementalists. In that perhaps lies the key to finding clarity.

It could have gone the other way you know if the Tudah party and various 
"maoist" influenced organisations had not taken the political path that they 
did. We could have had and Iranian October and then perhaps we would not be 
talking about ythe revival of Islamic fundementalism. 
>
>The author says:
>
>>The result is the emergence of imperialist proxy wars in which whole 
>>populations are mobilised by appeals to  nationalism  [Croat vs 
>>Serb], ethnicity [Tutsi and Hutu], religion [Hamas vs Zionism] behind 
>>the formation of bourgeois mini-states offering themselves up for 
>>super-exploitation.. 
>
>Right. That explains the whole phenomenon. No need to worry about the
>details. The Hamas kids throwing rocks at Isreali APCs and getting shot want
>to offer a bourgeois mini-state to imperialism, HADEP women marching with
>the colors of the Kurdish flag are also in the line to offer a bourgeois
>mini-state to imperialism.
>
>I remember something about the Marxist method. You're supposed to start from
>the concrete, before abstracting. This kind of stuff looks more like
>abstract -> abstract -> abstract -> abstract (boring -> boring -> boring).
>

Zeynep, the above is very touching, (especially about the Hama kids throwing 
stones! Well, I have thrown my fare share of stones and in fact fire bombs. 
But it does not change the fundementals of trying to forge a political 
leadership that not only have the correct political line but can allso 
deliver the revolutionary practice! Whether it be in the form of a small 
propaganda group, a national party in a specific country or a International 
with pretentions of leading struggles in many countries.

For example the above paragraph which is quite politically correct but makes 
you sick because you are thinking about the little kids throwing rocks or 
the Kurdish Women marching under a certain flag.

The point is translating the political correct position both into propaganda 
that can be understood by the masses and lead to action which moves the 
struggle forward. Thus with the little kids throwing stones and their 
fundemental wrong idea of the jews being the enemy must be combatted with a 
line of "not Arab against jew, but class against class!"
so that the jewish and Arab kids start throwing the stones in the right 
direction.

Now Lenin I am sure was pretty aware that the trenches in World War One for 
example were certainly a far more dangerous place to be in then let say the 
west bank at present. And I am quite sure he understood the horror of it 
all. But it did not stop him from taking on the then dominant line of the 
Second International and struggling for political clarity! His line was Turn 
the Imperialist war into a class war and he certainly did not have a great 
following to go hopping out in those trenches to tell people about it.

The truth is that history has show that there are people throwing stones 
(and much worse) all the time just as women have marched under all kinds of 
flags. But the point is in which direction are they throwing the stones and 
what color are the flags and banners marching under.

This anti-theory outburst is unfortunately not going to help those little 
Hama kids or Kurdish Women one bit! Or do you think that Lenin for example 
was doing a bunch of empty sloganeering when he raised the slogan
"Turn the imperialist war into Proletarian Revolutions!"?

I am quite sure that you think that Dave's excellent article on the basics 
of the National question are quite boring when you feel your whole body 
itching to get out their and march with those Kurdish women. But the point 
is that in order to march I hope that we have a theory which can back up all 
this activity in heading towards the goals that we set and not just activism 
that leads to new blood baths and new rounds of defeats under new flags. 
That is why Marx made the correct assumption that the working man/women have 
no country and the only thing that they have to lose is their chains...

Warm regards
Bob Malecki
--------------------------------------------------------
hair raising or the shrinking middle class


On 13 Apr 97 at 9:09, Robert Malecki wrote:

> Sounds to me like the cry of the middle class who think that the
> special conditions after the second world war which created enormous
> amount of wealth in order to rebuild half of the world that was
> destroyed in the last world war. However in order for another
> generation of middle class people to develop we will unfortunately
> need a new world war because now we are on the backside of the hill
> and racing down it at full speed! For the first time in history
> since the end of the second world war the middle class is being hit
> by cutbacks, downsizing and unemployment which for years was only
> for blue collar workers. And now when the capitalist and imperialist
> system once again is showing its complete bankruptcy of being able
> to provide a decent living for all people the middle class who are
> also under attack by this system elect to kick down on the ladder
> instead pointing the finger at the real enemy... 


I have to agree with you Bob.  It is the middle class cry.  America 
is experiencing its first generation that is not going to be able to 
outdo the last.  I also agree it would take a major war to develop 
another middle class in America.  I was just reeading in today's 
"Parade" Magazine that America ranks #11  in the World in taxing 
individuals and #70 in taxing its' corporations. The myth was that by 
reducing Corporate taxes, wages to all worker's would increase 
but what has happened in reality has been that salaries and bonuses 
to upper-management have been the only wages to increase.  The middle 
class is slowly being eliminated and they (the middle class) are 
blaming their elimination on government taxes only rather than the 
natural result of Capitalism/free-market enterprise.  They just 
don't/can't see that if they don't have the money right now, today, 
they don't have a snowballs chance in hell of obtaining and 
maintaining a middle-class life style comparable to what their 
parents had.   

America has extolled the virtues of Capitalism and many don't realize 
that the information they learned in school was just as much a form 
of state propaganda as what we were taught Russians received.  One of 
the major things I've learned in Anthropology was that *all* 
governments and religions use institutions such as schools to 
enculturate the citizens into the prevailing societal mores or iow, 
promote thought control.    

> Well, we will have to see how this all turns out. I am rather new
> here and certainly do not want to make any predictions. However I do
> notice that the hair on a couple of peoples necks appears to be
> rising (is it rage? or fear?) with the arrival of Malecki. Now Deb I
> certainly do not include you in the above. YET! :)


Include me in what?   ...the screaming middle class?  I've never been 
middle class to mediocre, I've always been high class.  <g>

Zeph
-------------------------------------------------------
Reply to the LP  on the women's question!

In a letter today and LP woman accused that horrible Malecki for talking 
down to people in a typical male chavinist way. Promising never to speak to 
Malecki again. OK That is and honest accusation and reply to my accusation 
that the LP is sucking up to the Democratic Party.

However in my defense I should mention that I am a member of the 
"Kommunal"Workers Union and the bigest union in Scandinavia. We have a 
majority of about 80% of women in our trade union. And it is in fact one of 
the more radical trade unions on the left wing of the Social Democracy. 
Another radical trade union is the second largest in Scandinavia and it is 
called "Handels" which also is on the left wing of the Social Democracy. 
Note I said Social Democratic and not Communist.

In fact they stand on the front of the barricades on the struggle for a six 
hour working day, against discrimination, low pay work, and a number of 
other key issues facing the working class and women today.

In fact many of them would laugh at the incredible cowardness of the LP in 
regards to its electoral support to the democratic Party and would be in the 
front lines of the battle on issues like "welfare", childcare, healthcare, 
and not in the least the struggle for women in their struggle against dubbel 
oppression.

Why don't we discuss some of these issues in regards to the LP and see who 
is the real defenders of women in the coming struggles. Who knows you might 
even be able to expose that horrible Malecki. And some of the right wingers 
in the Labor Party can tell us that Malecki is not only one of those 
horrible ultra left Trotskyists and a nut but also a women hater and male 
chavinist pig.

I certainly would be willing to take this discussion. Let's say some fairly 
Social Democratic demands that these women are fighting for. The six hour 
working day. State subventions of heathcare and medicine based on income. 
Daycare centers for ALL children as a right in every state in the country, 
equal pay for the same work, a minium garanteed welfare program for all as a 
garantee!, The right to 1 year pregancy leave and one year more if the man 
in the family stays home with full pay.

Now there are a few points that we can start the discussion here with. Now I 
just can't wait to here how are pro democratic party people take this kind 
of discussion. these are fairly simple Social Democratic slogans and 
programs that are either goals or reality today. It would seem to me that 
any serious LPers should see most of the above demands as a "minimum" 
program to mobilise women in support of an independent LP that breaks with 
the democrats and begins fighting at least for some elementry Social 
Democratic politics.

We could go even futher. We could start talking about fighting for women to 
become leaders and fighters both in the LP and the unions linked to a 
program that *really* fights in the interests of poor and working class women. 

Some of the above would be a real step on the way to a mass labor party. 
They say that Clinton got elected by the women's vote. Just think of the 
possibilities the LP would have if they boldly came out with a radical 
Social Democratic program which posed the question of who really represents 
poor and working class women.

Naturally one could fiance some of the above with a progressive tax based on 
income and a sales tax on all items except clothes and food of let's say 20%..

Then we could begin to talk about economic democracy. Thus all inheritances 
would have a 50% tax on it. Extra taxes on the stckmarket for every stock 
that is bought and sold..

This is fairly normal Social democratic praxis here in order to fianance 
these kinds of welfare reforms for poor and working class people. In other 
words nobody on the United States should starve, not have a roof over their 
head, be without child care or very cheap health care and almost free state 
subventione medicine. One could in fact take in the right for all children 
under the age of 16 be given free dental care.

These are some of just elementary stuff on the women*s question going on 
here. So come on now my friends in the LP. Why not talk about these things. 
Why not get out their and begin fighting for the above which I consider a 
minimum program. I naturally want to go much futher in giving real rights 
and real freedom for poor and working class women. But the above and a clear 
declaration by the LP that they say Break With the Democrats and fight for a 
*real* workers party in the United States would certainly be a great step 
forward!

Or are you people to afraid to go out their and fight in the interests of 
poor and working class women in the United States? Are you afraid that you 
will alienate the pro democratic party trade union leaders (mostly men) by 
declaring that the LP fights for the above Social Democrastic politics? 

Come now people you accused Malecki for talking down to you and being a nut, 
communist sectarian crazy. Well, these are the kind of things that the women 
here everywhere are discussing if they are not already a reality and the 
struggle is around defending some of this stuff from being cutdown..This is 
everyday stuff that every women is interested in 
fighting for in there quest for a better life for themselves and their children.

I think that I stand beside these women on the barricades. I say honestly to 
them that I want to go much much futher then you but i am prepared to stand 
side by side in your struggle. What are the LPers in the states really doing 
for women? I know you are very vocal in the struggle to defend free speech 
for fascists and ban the horrible coackroach from the LP list. But the 
gaunlet is thrown. 

It is the LP who is sucking up to the Democratic Party that is not 
interested in really fighting around the *real* needs of women in the United 
States today. It is certainly not Malecki..Please by all means prove me 
wrong. I in fact would be quite happy to see that the LP has a program along 
the above lines. We could even add a few more. My trade union has a whole 
list of burning demands if you people run out of ideas. However I do not 
thing it is the ideas that are the problem. The problem is that the 
leadership is not interested in really fighting around a radical Social 
Democratic program that would be a great step forward for women if realized! 
What the leadership is interested in is mindless activism that does not go 
beyond the bounds of the Democratic party and especially its left wing 
bureaucracy in the trade unions.

Now who is it that is really pissing on womem? Is it Malecxki or is it the 
LP leadership. Now you got a real chance to expose that horrible Malecki for 
the male chavinist pig and womem hatere that he really is..

I shall patiently await your replies and try to answer them in the best way 
I can. And the best way I can would be to get the women in the LP to nail 
the LP leadeship to the wall for their anti women pro democratic party bluff..

Warm regards
Bob Malecki
--------------------------------------------------------
The Teresa Ebert thread

>Louis wrote:
>>What's interesting is that they have appropriated the political culture of
>>"Marxism-Leninism" but grafted it onto the style and discourse of academic
>>Marxism. Lenin is invoked to support a body of ideas that demands
>>familiarity with a range of thinkers who are inaccessible to the average
>>person.
>
>Exactly! It is this strange admixture that made them look so ridiculous as
>to become beyond, or beneath, serious critique.
>
>>What is sad is that Teresa Ebert deserves the widest audience. She has a lot
>>to say, even if her prose is filled with jargon and neologisms. Yet her
>>acolytes are giving people the impression that there must be something fishy
>>going on in the narrow academic circles of upstate New York. When people
>>start to associate the names of people like Steven Tumino with Teresa Ebert,
>>the unfortunate reaction might be the grating of teeth and raising of the
>>hair on the back of the neck. She deserves better.
>
>I agree that Ebert should be read. But I have some objections to her
>reliance on people like Masao Miyoshi in her critique of what she calls
>"globalism," "transnational bourgeoisie," "global civil society," etc. I
>think she made a fatal short-cut by not thinking through the current
>conjuncture on her own.
>
>Her call for workers' internationalism is good, but she doesn't have much
>to say about how it can be squared with her criticisms of what she calls
>anti-statism. I am not saying that they are necessarily contradictory. (As
>your commentary on her article indicates, they don't have to be.) But she
>needs to theorize the relationship between the two. In her book, I got a
>distinct impression that she was too busy fighting postmodernism to
>articulate a marxist theory of her own that truly confronts the
>complexities, difficulties, dangers, and possibilities in the current
>situation.
>
>Yoshie Furuhashi

Well Yoshie,

I must admit I never even heard of her until Louis gave his presentation and 
how he was attracted to her. Unfortunately I think you are being to kind to 
both Louis and her. 

I say this in the first place because I think Louis is using her to justify 
anti-imperialist popular front politics and tail ending just about any kind 
of "Nationalist" movement confronting us either today or in the future.

On the other hand Leninisn/Trotskyism which poses the question more 
corrrectly in their ideas under the header "The State and Revolution" which 
I think rightfully counterposes all this kind of crap which only leads 
towards a *real* political practice of Stalinism and Menshevism.

In the final analisis it is only by the state being wripped out of the hands 
of the bougeoisie's by and independent proletariat led by the party of World 
revolution and the proletarian vanguard which sets up the dictatorship of 
the proletariat which can show the way forward.

If you want to go back to the nation state as something progressive. Then 
you have to read Marx on the question and how he describes this struggle 
which played a posivitive role perhaps in the 18th century.

But Lenin's "The higest Stage of capitalism, Imperialism" was written quite 
a long time ago and was valid then and even more so today.

So if Louis or yourself want to take on the task of defending this women 
then link her analisis to a program of tactics and program that can fight in 
the interests of Proletarian rule. I see NO way that this is possible.

Because from beginning to end she obviously is defending the bougeois state, 
states in regards to being something progressive in regards to globalism. 
This kind of stuff is wrong and completely anti-marxist and specifically 
anti-Leninist as I see Lenin's work on this subject as a direct continuation 
on Marx's work.

I think Lenin's state and revolution and Trotsky's Permanent revolution 
directly are counterposed to this women's ideas. She wants to find an angle 
which will justify popular front politics and certain national states 
(national bougeois states and bougeoisies) as being progressive.

In fact to me her theory's (presented by Louis) seem to be a rather slick 
form of classical maoist and to a certain extent Stalinist politics.

Perhaps what we are seeing is the bougeois followers of the preceding 
Stalinist era in history are now trying to find and expression for this kind 
of shit without a Stalinist state power to back them up on as being some 
sort of liberals who must find a new way to play what they have alwaws 
thought as a proggressive (tea party liberal progressive role).
However I think a quite utopian pipedream. With the disappearance of the 
deformed and degenerated workers states Ebert is trying to find something to 
replace them with.

So yes by all means read her. Then read Lenin and Trotsky on the subject and 
then take Eberts book and use it for something which I think would be far 
better then believing any of this stuff she is expousing and takes the leafs 
of paper and wipe you ass with it the next time you take a shit. Then and 
unfortunately then I am afraid one can find a good use for her theory.

Warm Regards
Bob Malecki 
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