[PEN-L:283] Re: German SDP II

[valis <valis@xxxxxxxxxx>]

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> > How big is the "left" of the SDP?
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> The answer[], based on what I saw of the Soc Dems on my European tour,
> [is] "large but powerless" (the rank and file SPD and most ordinary Germans
> loathe capitalism, but don't realize their leaders are selling them out),
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Good to see you back, Dennis.  How about expanding on both clauses of the
parenthetic comment above.  Bully on die deutsche for loathing capitalism,
but the why of it certainly calls for a few paragraphs, no?  Will we find
them decked out in Frankish regalia after the sale is consummated?
Goodbye European revolution, if that's to be the case.

> Germany voted against neoliberalism, but that's not -- yet -- the
> same thing as reining in Eurocapitalism. For once, the tired cliche is
> right: the class struggle is indeed heating up in Mitteleuropa.

NPR's Talk of the Nation ("nation": another somebody who slept through
Anthro 01) had a show on the election yesterday.  At the very end a caller
asked whether there was a conscious pattern to European voting over the
past year or so.  Robert von Rimscha of Berlin's Tagesspiegel simply said
Of course: the Europeans want protection from the shocks of globalization,
so they are electing left-center governments.
Although this is cosmic genius relative to American couch potatoes and
their regular world perspectives, I see in such a view - if accurate -
only expedient class collaboration by peoples strong enough to shield
themselves but not willing to attack the storm.
Will all this action ultimately go to waste or worse?

                                                                   valis