[PEN-L:7389] J. Donald Hughes on Mayan collapse

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

Doug:
>Is it apolitical to express shock and disapproval for your arrogant
>dismissal of Jim O'Connor? Maybe so, maybe it's just bourgeois personalism
>or some such failing. If it is, I plead guilty. But, as Bob Fitch says,
>socialism should be social.

Maybe there's something I don't get here. Jim O'Connor is considered one of
the top five or so Marxist intellectuals in the US, while I am a computer
programmer who has never had a book published and who is known by
practically nobody outside the Internet. And you feel the need to defend to
defend O'Connor against me? This is really not about O'Connor and me. It is
about Doug Henwood and me, isn't it?

>Sorry. I do find it interesting that people often
>develop deep interests in issues far from them in time & space as a way of
>compensating from their withdrawal from politics in their own part of the
>world.

Withdrawal from politics in their own part of the world? Why would you want
to attack me this way, Doug? I have not attacked you. I think the work you
are doing each week interviewing people on your radio show is extremely
valuable. LBO is an important part of the left. You are a tremendous asset
to the left.

>I've been reading CNS since its first issue, and I've always found it to be
>serious, rigorous, enlightening, and original. When it covers material I
>know about, I never get the feeling that I'm reading some highly distorted
>caricature. When I read Proyect on material I know about, I often get that
>feeling. So pardon me if I don't accept your characterization of the
>literature on the Mayans.

Another gratuitous attack, and an invitation to a flame war which I refuse
to answer.

>So don't confuse wounded narcissism with political principle then.

Well, there were never any political principles involved at all. The open
letter to O'Connor wasn't meant to open a serious thread of any sort, but
you jumped in, didn't you. Still don't understand why. I have never
pretended to be anything different than I am, which is a ordinary worker
who uses the Internet for both personal and political musings. Perhaps you
felt the need to bring decorum to PEN-L in the way that Jerry Levy used to.

>Those are all very fine things you did. Why spoil them with a completely
>unwarranted slur against Jim O'Connor?

As I said, this is no longer about O'Connor. It is about you and me.

Louis Proyect

(http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)