Date: 01 Mar 96 22:13:20 EST
From: Jon Flanders <72763.2240-AT-compuserve.com>
Subject: buchanan, labor party


 >>  I don't think a labor party can be successfully organized
 without the participation of major elements of the elected
 officials, and they won't do it until they're forced to.
 I think it's clear that right now they don't feel much
 pressure to do it.
   What seems to be happening is that some progressive and
 radical groups within the labor movement have gotten
 impatient and want to launch a labor party now. But if
 they do, it will most likely fizzle. There's just not
 enough political ferment to make it work. <<Jim Miller

 How do you get a majority of the labor officials? You have to start
somewhere. I was living and working in Burlington when Bernie Sanders first
ran for mayor. Now please, no lectures on liberalism, I know what his
evolution has been. I also know that what he did at the time took a lot of
chutzpah. There is a lot to learn from what he did.

 He had one group of "labor" supporters, the Burlington police union. Pretty
questionable from a marxist standpoint, but you have to remember this is small
city politics. The point is that he ran against the Democratic machine and the
Republicans without major union support. He won, and since then has become a
favorite at every union function and rally in the state. The majority of the
officials support him now.

 What you have to look at is the dynamics of the situation, how the ball gets
rolling. I saw it closeup then, and haven't forgotten it. After he won CISPES
meetings took place in City Hall, and the rally for the PATCO strikers took
place in the city council chambers.


 Maybe some of our British comrades can comment on their history. I will go
back and take a look at it myself. The point being that to my knowledge, there
was a number of years in which a battle went on between the majority of the
labor organizations and a minority led by socialists over participating in the
Liberal party and breaking away to form the Labour Party. Then there is the
question of the ILP and so on.


 What Jim says is true, its a judgement call. I think it is worth taking a
shot at and that the conditions are relatively favorable. I am still left
confused by the rhetoric in the Militant about Buchanan, fascism and war.

 Best, Jon Flanders



  E-mail from: Jonathan E. Flanders, 01-Mar-1996




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