The gold standard

 

Lindsey Graham believes that Cuba is next on the list. I suppose that could be a problem for the, ahem, US Socialist Workers Party...

Cuba is next

Ibrahim Traoré Speaks

 

Credit: RIA Novosti 

This is a bit esoterick, but...could the American SWP plz explain the difference between this guy and Thomas Sankara?

Ibrahim Traoré

The Burkinabé fashion revolution

 

Burkina Faso´s leader Ibrahim Traoré bans wigs. Supposedly. I don´t know, I get the impression that the Burkinabé revolution has fallen on hard times. And where is Jack Barnes??? 

Case dismissed

 

Alan Gelfand recently passed away, and the Socialist Equality Party now admits that he was a leading member of their party and a frequent contributor to their website under the pen name "Alan Gilman". It´s never stated when he joined the SEP (then the Workers´ League) but it´s implied that it was around 1986/87. For a background, see the links to earlier blog posts of mine on the Gelfand case. 

Alan Gelfand: A fighter for socialism and historical truth

Gelfand has no case

A case for Judge Judy

Healy needs a new pair of shoes

Our strangest assets

 

The (US) Socialist Workers Party (not to be confused with its UK name-sake) is trying to be both pro-Israeli and anti-American/anti-Trump simultaneously. It isn´t working. Compare: the Hua-hugging Maoists of the late 1970´s. But thanks for the support, I guess...

Hamas murders Palestinians

The origins of Hamas connected to Nazis

"There is no peace in Gaza"

Socialist Workers Party National Committee statement

Soviets or campus debates?

 

Three small leftist groups react to the current political situation in the United States. How should Trump be stopped? By workers´ councils and a general strike? Or campus debates exposing Charlie Kirk´s ideas on affirmative action? Or...not at all?

For your information. Links don´t imply endorsement. 

Stop Trump´s military deployment to Portland!

Trump declares war on American cities

Kirk still needs to be proved wrong

Woke "left" hails violent attacks

Bombed to oblivion?

 

The increasingly bizarre Socialist Workers Party (US) attempts to support Israel ´s attack on the Iranian regime while opposing the United States when it did exactly the same thing a week later (to back its ally, obviously). That, and a few other contradictions. 

SWP National Committee statement  

Israel deals blow to Iran´s nuclear weapons threat

A new stage

 

SWP shaking hands with Trump capitalista?

I´m old enough to remember when the U.S. Socialist Workers Party *supported* the ANC and *opposed* the State of Israel. Look now...

I´m also old enough to remember (last year) how the SWP condemned the Biden administration when *it* tried to cajole Israel into a ceasefire agreement with Hamas. But now, they claim that the Trump-brokered ceasefire is "a new stage in the fight to defend Israel"?!

In plain English: the Communist (?) SWP tacitly supports Donald Trump!    

South African government condemns immigrant coal miners to die

Ceasefire is new stage in fight to defend Israel as refuge for Jews

Footnote for historians

 

The US Socialist Workers Party on the recent pro-abortion referendum in Ohio. Not sure if their weird and eclectic position is some kind of sectarianism-at-any-cost, or whether they are getting closer to actually opposing abortions...

What if the SWP becomes a right-wing group in all but name within ten years or so?

Pro-abortion referendum blow to the working class?

"Call for cease-fire is support for Hamas"

 

Front line report from the U.S. Socialist Workers Party. The SWP has become more "hard" in their Zionism than even the British AWL (which supports a cease-fire)!   

Call for cease-fire is support for Hamas

Our most recent ally

 

I suppose it´s official now. The US Socialist Workers Party supports Israel´s war against Hamas (or Gaza, if you wish). What I frankly can´t fathom is why people who must have opposed Israel most of their politically active lives can change their line of march so drastically. 

While the line change seems to have happened already in 2009, most current SWP-ers were presumably recruited circa 1968. 

I know from my own experience that the Israel-Palestine issue isn´t just *any* issue but *the* central one for many leftists, indeed, I sometimes get the impression that it´s more controversial to support the IDF in any context, than to support the US military! One reason is (surprise) that many leftist radicals in the US are Jewish, and supporting the PLO or Hamas as a Jew must be rather taxing, but Gentiles have the same Pavlovian reflexes towards this particular conflict, presumably because of the Holocaust. 

Ask any radical leftist why he can´t stand the British AWL and something tells me it won´t be their support for Peter Kilfoyle in the Walton by-elections or even their opposition to an immidiate British withdrawal from Northern Ireland. Nah, it´s their support for Israel, it´s always Israel.

So the idea of an entire political party (albeit a small one these days) on the left changing their line from anti-Zionism to Zionism is weird...and fascinating, after a fashion.

They are Commies, but they are now "our" Commies!  

Fight Jew-hatred! Support the right of Israel to exist!

Ghosts of the past

 

This recently came to my attention. It´s an article by a former Canadian supporter of the U.S. Socialist Workers Party, posted in 2014, arguing that the SWP changed its line on Israel (and de facto on Zionism) already in 2009. That is, before my heated argument with a SWP supporter on Amazon´s custom review pages circa 2012. Unless I´m completely confused over the exact date - could it have been in 2008 or early 2009? 

The Canadian writer, Art Young, correctly predicts that the SWP´s line on Israel will become central to the group´s "degeneration" (or fundamental shift), which he sees as - at bottom - an "adaptation to US imperialism". Indeed, it seems that the SWP just the other week came out in full support of Israel´s war against Gaza, with arguments even somewhat "to the right" of the US establishment, if you read their articles carefully!

Clearly, I missed something...  

The SWP-USA´s final embrace of Zionism

Home to Zion

 

About ten years ago, I was reamed out by a supporter of the U.S. Socialist Workers Party at one of Amazon´s review pages when I criticized the SWP´s anti-Zionism and support for the PLO. Sure wonder what happened to the old comrade, since the party´s current stance is...well, almost the exact opposite of what it was back in the days! 

Indeed, it´s even implied in the articles below that the SWP supports the Israeli war effort and opposes a two-state solution (but you have to read them carefully to see this - or not so carefully in the third case linked below). It´s also interesting that they use the more in-your-face terms "Jew-hatred" and "Jew-hating" rather than the more usual "anti-Semitism" or "anti-Semitic".  

Now, I happen to think that the SWP is right to defend Israel´s right to exist, but I sure wonder how this squares with their "revolutionary Communist" stances on other issues, such as support for Cuba, North Korea and so on. And where is the never-ending resolution with the self-criticism of the past 50 years or so of staunch anti-Zionism? 

Next year in Jerusalem... 

Biggest massacre of Jews since the Nazi Holocaust 

SWP says Hamas pogrom in Israel is threat to all workers

Defend Israel´s right to exist!

Wtf! Whence and whither the SWP?

The U.S. Socialist Workers Party has moved very far "to the right" in recent years. They support Ukraine against Russia, defend Israel (including the US-brokered Israel-Arab peace agreements), oppose the "witchhunt" of Donald Trump and his supporters, and even seem to defend the Electoral College and the Senate! They have also come out in support of nuclear power, and in one of the articles linked below defend a private business against "woke" "anti-racist" protesters. 

The SWP are not necessarily wrong, but it *is* astonishing to see this hard Communist group (they still support Cuba!) take positions such as these. Some kind of ultra-popular frontism? One sure wonders how far they are willing to go. About seven years ago or so, a SWP supporter was shadowing me on Amazon´s American site, accusing me of being a nefarious Zionist when I supported the right of Israel to exist. Today, SWP seems to have adopted my old position (after a fashion)...

Some highlights from the articles: 

>>>The liberals’ anti-working class angst leads them to target any part of the Constitution that provides an avenue for workers to put their stamp on politics, however indirectly. This is what is behind their hysterical campaign to get rid of the Electoral College and change the number of senators allocated to each state to be proportionate to the population.>>>

>>>Another Hamas leader, Saleh Al-Arouri, called the attacks a response to the March 28 summit of top government officials from Israel, the U.S, Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco and the United Arab Emirates, held in the Negev desert, the first such meeting on Israeli soil. It was a direct outgrowth of agreements made in 2020 between the Israeli government and four Arab governments that ended decades of treating Israel as a pariah state. Advanced by the Donald Trump administration, the pacts were tied to building a common front against the expanding military influence of the regime in Iran, which opposes Sunni Arab governments and calls for the destruction of Israel. The pacts led to greater trade and other relations. They also opened the door to more travel and contact between Israeli and Arab workers, which can advance their unity and solidarity in defending working-class interests against attacks by bosses and their governments.>>>

>>>In a relatively rare statement, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the terror attacks, saying, “The killing of Israeli and Palestinian civilians will only lead to a deterioration of the situation ahead of Ramadan.” But if Abbas wanted to help put an end to these deadly assaults he could end the so-called Palestinian Authority Martyrs Fund, which makes monthly payments totaling millions of dollars to the families of residents of the West Bank who die in the course of carrying out exactly such killings.>>>

Islamist groups launch terror attacks against Jews in Israel

Amid scramble for oil, fight for nuclear power is the road to electrification

Defend independence of Ukraine! For defeat of Moscow´s invasion!

Capitalists attack political rights workers need

Court ruling for the Gibsons is a victory for working people

The times they are a´changing

About 10 years ago, a supporter of the SWP was almost stalking me at another forum, accusing me of being a brazen lier for defending Israel´s right to exist, etc etc. 

Look now...

"Israel is, will remain, a Jewish state" says Palestinian leader

Old news

A little reminder in case you missed it. Original link, though! 

Democrats´ claim Trump "a Russian puppet" exposed as big lie

Critical Race Theory: An attack on the working class?

A short leftist criticism of "Critical Race Theory". Note also the attack on Antifa! 

From "The Militant", published by the US Socialist Workers Party.

Rulers use "racial sensitivity" programs to attack working class

Communists for Trump?

Not everyone agrees…

OK, not really, but here is a somewhat different tack on the Trump impeachment campaign, from the Socialist Workers´ Party (SWP).

Why working people shouldn´t join the liberals´ impeachment crusade

Different goals

“The Lesser Evil?” is a book published by the U.S. Socialist Workers Party (SWP) in 1977. At the time, the SWP was a Trotskyist organization and had fraternal relations with the Fourth International. The book features three debates on what strategy progressive activists should take towards the Democratic Party. The debates were held in 1976, 1965 and 1959, respectively. The SWP opposed all electoral support for candidates running on a Democratic ticket. This included participation in Democratic Party primaries. (This is still the SWP's position, even after ideological changes on other topics.) Their opponents in the various debates argued for some kind of intervention in the Democratic Party.

The main item in the book is the 1976 debate between SWP presidential candidate Peter Camejo and DSOC chairman Michael Harrington. At the time, both SWP and DSOC (the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee) were important forces on the American left. Both had opposed the U.S. war in Vietnam. DSOC subsequently became the DSA (Democratic Socialists of America). The 1976 presidential elections pitted incumbent Republican Gerald Ford against Democratic challenger Jimmy Carter. Camejo got 90,986 votes or 0.11% of the total. Harrington's Democratic Socialists voted for Carter. (As a side point, let me note that Camejo later left the SWP. He was independent candidate Ralph Nader's running mate in the 2004 elections. The Nader-Camejo ticket got 465,161 votes or 0.38%.)

The next item is a 1965 debate between Jack Barnes, who later became National Secretary of the SWP, and Stanley Aronowitz, whose strategy was similar to that pursued by many pro-Sanders leftists today, who want to combine running in Democratic primaries if possible with independent political action if necessary. The 1959 debate is between leading SWP cadre George Breitman and Carl Haessler, described as being “closer to the Communist Party”. Haessler supported labor (or was it Big Labor?) in Michigan, including Walter Reuther (who definitely wasn't close to the Communists), and argued that it effectively controlled the Democratic Party at state level.

Despite the debate format (which can be tricky), I think “The Lesser Evil?” does clarify the differences between the SWP (and similar hard left groups) and the broader or softer left, with its orientation towards the Democrats. The question is obviously still highly relevant! But who is right? In a sense, they both are.

The SWP is absolutely correct that the Democratic Party cannot be transformed into a radical workers' party. If it's revolutionary change along Leninist-Trotskyist lines you want, the Democrats are indeed a graveyard. But then, “liberals” don't want such a transformation of the United States to begin with. Harrington's arguments make perfect sense, if you drop the man's socialist pretenses: it's easier for left-liberals to pressure a Democratic administration than a Republican ditto. Radical leftists like Aronowitz or crypto-Communists like Haessler, who may think they are being smart and tactical donning Democratic hats, are simply the fifth wheel under reformist Harrington, who in his turn is the fifth wheel under, say, Eugene McCarthy or Teddy Kennedy. And while it's difficult for somebody like Sanders to capture the Democratic Party and its machine, it doesn't seem intrinsically impossible either. In that sense, Harrington is the “winner” of this debate. The Democratic Party really is the lesser evil…for a liberal!

As Rosa Luxemburg said: Revolution and reform aren't two paths to the same goal, but two paths to very different goals. If the SWP's revolutionary goal is desirable, is another question entirely…

The end of the Fourth International

This pamphlet reprints several documents from the so-called Vern-Ryan Tendency within the U.S. Socialist Workers Party (SWP). The documents were originally written in 1952-53. At the time, the SWP was a Trotskyist organization in political solidarity with the Fourth International. I know next to nothing about the dissidents Sam Ryan and Dennis Vern apart from this material. Their opposition group is often accused of being “pro-Stalinist” in its analysis of East Europe. However, the Vern-Ryan Tendency is most famous for its criticism of the Trotskyist party in Bolivia, the POR of Guillermo Lora. Most of the material reprinted here deals with this issue. 

In 1952, the nationalist MNR took power in Bolivia. What began as a classical coup soon turned into a virtual revolution, as the labor union federation COB mobilized thousands of armed workers in support of the MNR. The nationalist cabinet consisted of several different factions, its left wing represented by COB leader Juan Lechín. Eventually, the revolution entered a more moderate phase (or was “betrayed”) as the MNR center faction around Victor Paz Estenssoro got the upper hand.

What made the Bolivian situation almost unique was the important role played in the events by a Trotskyist party, the previously mentioned POR. While the POR was numerically weak, it did exercise a strong influence within the COB leadership and the MNR left wing. POR leader Lora was Lechín's secretary, Lechín's speeches were written by POR cadres and Lechín himself was briefly a member of the Trotskyist party. The mineworkers' union FSTMB (likewise headed by the ever-present Lechín) had adopted a Trotskyist-sounding program. The POR also had several parliamentary deputies, elected as part of a FSTMB-backed union ticket. When the MNR took power backed by COB, FSTMB and Lechín, POR naturally acted as a ginger group on the MNR left wing.

The Fourth International supported Lora's policy, while the Vern-Ryan Tendency accused the POR of selling out the revolution to the nationalists. Instead, Vern and Ryan argued, the POR should have mobilized the working masses against the “bourgeois” MNR government, like Lenin's Bolsheviks had mobilized the Russian masses against the provisional government of Kerensky. Lora's failure to do this was a “betrayal” of the Bolivian revolution. I admit that I find their analysis surreal, but that's another show. Part of the disconnect is that the Vern-Ryan Tendency assumed that the POR was a mass party with a strong working class base, and hence resembled the Bolsheviks in that respect. But as we have already seen, Lora's group was actually quite small. They were influential precisely because they *didn't* oppose the MNR lefts, but rather mingled with them. Mainly, however, we are dealing with a political problem, Vern-Ryan opposing all nationalism (including Third World nationalism) to begin with.

In 1953, the Fourth International split. Neither the “orthodox” International Committee (dominated by the SWP) nor the “revisionist” International Secretariat (led by Michel Pablo) criticized Lora's policies in Bolivia. This is what makes the Bolivian issue so contentious for Trotskyists. If the International Committee was the true embodiment of revolutionary Trotskyism, how could it fail to notice that one of its member parties (POR supported the Committee) had betrayed a working-class revolution? From this, some really hard line Trotskyist elements eventually drew the conclusion that Vern-Ryan had been right, and that the entire Fourth International ceased to be a revolutionary organization in 1952-53. The International died on the Altiplano. These groups either call for the creation of a Fifth International, or the recreation of the true revolutionary Fourth International. This pamphlet is published by such a group, the small League for the Revolutionary Party (LRP) in New York City.

This material clearly isn't for the general reader. However, if you are interested in Trotskyist splits and fusions, “Bolivia: The Revolution the `Fourth International' Betrayed” may be a useful addition to your collection.