Re: Pratt Pack

[Bradley Mayer <concrete@xxxxxxxxx>]

>               Mr. Mayer,
>
>
>
>
>       You asked:
>
>
>       "What, CONCRETELY, is the strategy to 'build a
>truly independent working class basis..', that would present an
>alternative for workers not only to Buchanan, but to the entire existing
>bourgeois political regime?"
>
>
>
>       First, you have to learn something from your betters.  If Buchanan is
>striking a chord with workers qua proletariat, then you had better find out
>what that is.  First, I would say that Mr. Godena is not far from the nut.
>Pride - not subsumed in the leadership or the commune - is a key factor.
>Workers have to see socialism as a way to get their much-needed self-respect
>back.  If you don't think that this is needed and important, watch the
>capitalists try and exploit it on late-night TV.
>
>
>       Second - money - workers are much more savvy about money than they
>ever have been.  Money is not a dirty word to them, nor should it be.
>Socialism has got to show workers how they will make more money and have
>more control over a money system that is out of control.
>
<snipped the rest since it is an answer of sorts to the question I poset>

Thanks for your answer. Three things of note:

1) While your answer to my question was generally agreeable, it
misunderstands what I mean by "concrete". I need references to the actual
institutions of and forces acting within the existing political regime:
in the case of electoral politics, the two party system, the candidates,
the forces behind the candidates, trade union support for the Democrats,
Left support for the democrats, etc., etc., the whole rotten mess.

2) It doesn't require a "better" to tell you that white workers who might
support Buchanan (a note of caution: I havn't seen any hard figures on
the extent of this support, have you?) are simply responding to his
demagogic appeals to their economic distress.  We certainly have
something to learn from the far Right and fascism about strategy and
tactics - fascism has learned much since the 1930's, and they are
certainly are better at it then we are right now.

3) Your paragraph on money is just plain wrong - you ever hear of this
guy named Proudhon?

                        -Brad Mayer


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