RE: Antiwar movement, WWP, Liberals et al

[Armand Diego <causebellum@xxxxxxxxx>]

Lou Paulsen is on the defensive.  Not need to.  He is
trying to tell us that what we all know, is not true.
IAC/ANSWER is a front group of the WWP which took the
initiative, got the funding and invited everyone to
attend the party.  But not everyone was invited to the
dining section nor everyone thought that the MCs were
particularly great.

Lou Paulsen is trying to deny what we all know about
WWP/IAC/ANSWER: having a list of endorsers a coalition
does not make.  If the movement continues to grow,
which is what we all want, then WWW/IAC/ANSWER will
find themselves either excluded by the backlash of
their own shopkeeping mentality (which we DON'T
WANT)of trying to control the stage and front of the
march (really, they can't do more than that) and will
create a situation in which what they state they don't
want, will happen: pacifists and liberals will smear
them and build an alternative that won't be  NO WAR -
whether the US or UN wanted to have one and NO
SANCTIONS.

The only protection for the WWP/IAC/ANSWER to keep a
prominent role in the antiwar movement is to forge a
truly, authentic, democratic and broad antiwar
movement in which the different positions are heard,
decisions are taken democratically and speakers
represent all sides on the issues united by their
common goal of opposing the war.

But, there is more than that: the politics of the
WWP/IAC/ANSWER are not good, even if they have the
right to spouse them.  Political solidarity with North
Korea or Saddam Hussein or the FARC or whatever is not
the answer for the semicolonial struggle nor for the
antiwar movement. In the left there are other
positions from people who mobilize important numbers.

In many ways, the WWP politics are closer to marginal
groups and have some liberal strain on it.  They have
the right to put it forward, but not the right to
exclude other points of view. Believe or not that is
the most sure road towards extinction.

It is understandable that the WWP/IAC/ANSWER does not
want to give up their capital that they accumulated in
more than a decade in the name of an uncertain future
and/or without the guarantee that their own set of
politics will be heard. This is a legitimate fear and
should be addressed by all of us, but the
WWP/IAC/ANSWER should not make us believe they are so
arrogant as to give the rest of the left movement, and
the pacifists, and the ethnic minorities and the Labor
movement, and the greens, and the rest of the left ...
the finger.

Moreover, there are CONNECTED issues to build a
genuine, mass antiwar movement in the US: gain a
foothold in the working class and labor, outreach to
the Latino and African American comunities and the big
environmental and human rights organizations.  Only a
concerted effort from the ENTIRE LEFT can do that.  By
the same token, no battlefield should be left open to
the Democrats and Republicans and their war drive.
The antiwar and peace movement should build on the
electoral front as well.  It should be a drive to
unite the left in antiwar slates and include the
Greens and everyone else.  Being the Greens the ONLY
national left organization on the ballot, we should
cooperate with them as well.

Taking on US imperialism will take a serie of
approximations from masses of people and certainly the
structure of a front grou- which is OK at times of
relatively inaction by big number of people - became
its opposite once is the start of motion in larger
layers.

You probably do not remember, but the first antiwar
demonstration was organized by PL in the 60s. But they
were soon overcame and left aside as the main
organizers because they made some of the same mistakes
WWW/IAC/ANSWER are doing today.

Lou Paulsen would like to put forward some leftist
rethoric in the sense that liberals and Democrats will
exclude leftists, but that is just a cover for their
politics of giving the individual liberals a platform
without demanding that they mobilize their troops.  In
fact, what the WWP is doing today, will easy the way
for the democrats to capitalize without having to work
very hard, the new antiwar movement.

There is unity and conflict involved in developing a
mass movement.  And conflict and unity.  Without
those, you don't have a mass movement, and that will
be a disservice to those who want to fight against the
war ... genuinely.  There is only so much you can
demand from people without giving them the democratic
right to be part of the decision-making process.



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