RE: Camejo's last words in last night's debate

["Walter Lippmann" <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

In this specific situation, one can take the choice
which Peter offers, or simply make other choices.

In this race, a more complete socialist propaganda
message is being advanced by the Socialist Workers
Party and the Socialist Equality Party. Because neither
has succeeded in getting any media attention that I've
observed, they're likely primarily to serve as vehicles
for their own organization's propaganda. It's possible
that PFP's campaign will do better since it's a long-
established group with ballot status in California.

This specific electoral event is but a moment in time,
a step in the broader process of the development of
class consciousness in society. While I'm sure that
Peter could and should have said more about foreign
policy and, specifically, the $87 billion Bush wants for
the Iraq occupation, which could sink the entire US
economy, Peter didn't do that. He was simply trying to
speak within the linguistic framework of the exisiting
political system. That's what his use of the term "we"
signified as well. 

Peter Camejo remains the same man I met in 1962
who recruited me to the Young Socialist Alliance.

He's also had 40 years of experience and learned 
a few things since then, so his message is more in
tune with these times. The Green Party is not an
organization like the Socialist Workers Party nor is
it a proto-revolutionary party of any kind. While I'm
not suggesting it's a pre-cursor to a revolutionary
party, I'm convinced that those who place primacy
on programmatic declarations will naturally reject
Peter's campaign as they rejected Fidel's program
because it consciously did not advocate a break
with capitalism. You'll recall that the US Socialist
Workers Party rejected the program of the Cuban
July 26th movement on programmatic grounds as
late as a year after the 1959 triumph...
======================================
José wrote:

That, when you think about it, is what the Bolsheviks did in 1917.
Peace, land, bread and to get them, all power to the soviets. His
central message needs to be that concrete, short, to the point. Don't
cut back, tax the rich, and to get that organize into our own party.
That sort of thing.

A campaign really aimed at a broad mass audience, such as the working
class is in the United States *today*, can only carry so much freight.
We should not fool ourselves into thinking working people can assimilate
huge amounts of messages, they can't, not through this kind of exercise.
The likely effect of overloading on message is going to be to come
across as fringe people living in another world not really connected
with the problems and situation facing people in the state.



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