Re: [Marxism] Redbaiting on the left

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

Joaquin Bustelo wrote:
> THIS IS COMPLETE IDIOCY, and for Louis to forward such to the list without a
> word of criticism of the article, or even commentary, is less helpful than
> one would hope for in the best of all possible worlds.
> 

Drink a glass of cold water, please. I often crosspost articles to the 
list without reading them carefully. I read the first few paragraphs and 
they passed muster with me:

The Blackout of the March 21 Mobilizations
Redbaiting on the Left

By JOHN WALSH

The War on Iraq drags on with no clear end in sight.  The war on 
Afghanistan is being escalated.  The war on Pakistan has also been 
stepped up, a war undeclared by Congress, therefore unconstitutional and 
the basis for an impeachment.  All this has happened since Obama took 
office.

 >> And yet with one exception, no national antiwar demonstration has 
been called.  Worse, to a large degree the one demonstration called, for 
this coming weekend, March 21, has been blacked out on the “respectable 
Left.”  This ugly fact was brought home to me quite strikingly yesterday 
at a meeting of single-payer activists, most also antiwar activists.  No 
one with whom I spoke knew about the coming demonstration!  Part of the 
reason is that some have tried to characterize this action as a fringe 
event, because it has been called by A.N.S.W.E.R., about which more 
below and with which this writer is not affiliated.

This mobilization has a list of endorsers which are cannot readily be 
dismissed. For starters: Cindy Sheehan, Code Pink, Iraq Veterans Against 
the War (IVAW), Ron Kovic, Edward Asner, Mimi Kennedy, Ramsey Clark, 
School of the Americas Watch, San Francisco Labor Council (AFL-CIO) and 
many other labor locals as well as Green Party locals.

Despite this, the official peace movement, sock puppets of the Democrat 
Party, like MoveOn and UFPJ, is refusing to join or even to publicize 
this effort in any substantial way. <<

And just a comment on this:

 >>And the 20%-25% "nobama" wing of the population are --let's be 
honest--rabidly racist Republicans and fetishists of the free market -- 
except perhaps a few thousand who consider themselves Trotskyists or 
some other kind of radical or revolutionary.<<

I am not quite sure what "nobama" means but I was noBush before I was 
nobama, and noClinton before that. I just have no use for any Democratic 
Party politician, whatever their race or gender. It is a question of class.

________________________________________________
YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
Send list submissions to: Marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Set your options at: 
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40archives.econ.utah.edu