Ask A Red V: The Five-Year Plan

[_random_]

I was wondering what the portraits of non-Americans were doing there, communists or not.

See that makes sense in light of the notion of proletarian internationalism and the close ties between the CPUSA and the CPSU. Lincoln, while pretty rad, was unambiguously a capitalist. I suppose he is symbolic of liberation in American iconography, and also Marx was a fan. Still seems kind of strange.

 

[Hygro]

Sure, it's just like, you still gotta win.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

So what's with the big Lincoln portrait in that CPUSA picture?

Also, the Henry Wallace question still stands.

I was wondering what the portraits of non-Americans were doing there, communists or not.

See that makes sense in light of the notion of proletarian internationalism and the close ties between the CPUSA and the CPSU. Lincoln, while pretty rad, was unambiguously a capitalist. I suppose he is symbolic of liberation in American iconography, and also Marx was a fan. Still seems kind of strange.

Yeah Lincoln is seen as a progressive hero in American history. The man obviously had his problems (his views on race were not the best, and even while freeing Afro-American slaves his government was ruthlessly pushing forward with colonization of Indian lands in the West), but he was also responsible for crushing the intensely reactionary Old South and destroying one of the last remaining bastions of human enchattlement on the planet. He thus played a progressive role in history (Alexander Hamilton is seen in much the same way). Marx hailed Lincoln as the "single-minded son of the working class" and certainly thought very highly of him.

An interesting contrast is that in the same year as that Lincoln picture, American Nazis held a similar rally, and guess which president they chose to hail:

The president who owned slaves vs. the president who freed all slaves. It's a no-brainer for me, and it was a no-brainer for the millions of Americans who supported the CPUSA during the Popular Front years.

 

[_random_]

Is that Washington? The picture is too small for me to tell. Also, that's not the George Lincoln Rockwell ANP is it? I don't think that existed at the time. What organization is it?

 

[Lexicus]

Lincoln, while pretty rad, was unambiguously a capitalist.

Hmm, I'm not so sure that's true. Possibly it is if you adopt the dogmatic Marxist-Leninist definition of capitalist which says anyone who's not for the abolition of private property and the dictatorship of the part of the proletariat is a capitalist, but I have a hard time imagining any modern-day "unambiguous capitalist" saying something like this:

It is not needed nor fitting here that a general argument should be made in favor of popular institutions, but there is one point, with its connections, not so hackneyed as most others, to which I ask a brief attention. It is the effort to place capital on an equal footing with, if not above, labor in the structure of government. It is assumed that labor is available only in connection with capital; that nobody labors unless somebody else, owning capital, somehow by the use of it induces him to labor. This assumed, it is next considered whether it is best that capital shall hire laborers, and thus induce them to work by their own consent, or buy them and drive them to it without their consent. Having proceeded so far, it is naturally concluded that all laborers are either hired laborers or what we call slaves. And further, it is assumed that whoever is once a hired laborer is fixed in that condition for life.

Now there is no such relation between capital and labor as assumed, nor is there any such thing as a free man being fixed for life in the condition of a hired laborer. Both these assumptions are false, and all inferences from them are groundless.

Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights. Nor is it denied that there is, and probably always will be, a relation between labor and capital producing mutual benefits. The error is in assuming that the whole labor of community exists within that relation. A few men own capital, and that few avoid labor themselves, and with their capital hire or buy another few to labor for them. A large majority belong to neither class--neither work for others nor have others working for them. In most of the Southern States a majority of the whole people of all colors are neither slaves nor masters, while in the Northern a large majority are neither hirers nor hired. Men, with their families--wives, sons, and daughters--work for themselves on their farms, in their houses, and in their shops, taking the whole product to themselves, and asking no favors of capital on the one hand nor of hired laborers or slaves on the other. It is not forgotten that a considerable number of persons mingle their own labor with capital; that is, they labor with their own hands and also buy or hire others to labor for them; but this is only a mixed and not a distinct class. No principle stated is disturbed by the existence of this mixed class.

An important thrust of the Republican Party's program, often understandably forgotten given the whole slavery thing, was against the class of traders and financiers who were understood by the Republicans, much like the Southern slaveowners, to profit from the work of others. This is IMO a fundamentally anticapitalist stance.

More anticapitalist sentiment from Lincoln:

The world has never had a good definition of liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in need of one. We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing.

With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men’s labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name — liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names — liberty and tyranny.

The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as a liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty, especially as the sheep was a black one. Plainly the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of the word liberty; and precisely the same difference prevails today among us human creatures, even in the North, and all professing to love liberty. Hence we behold the processes by which thousands are daily passing from under the yoke of bondage, hailed by some as the advance of liberty, and bewailed by others as the destruction of all liberty.

 

[Hygro]

It's really interesting to think that the Communist Manifesto was written 12 years before the Civil War and its ideas were already fairly widespread in this country.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

It's really interesting to think that the Communist Manifesto was written 12 years before the Civil War and its ideas were already fairly widespread in this country.

It is!

In one of Harry Turtledove's alt-history novels, Abe survives and goes on to become a communist; I didn't understand how this could be until I found out what you just posted.

Do you think any of that had something to do with people looking up a word they'd heard associated with Bernie Sanders and Yanis Varoufakis?

You're right but so was Cheezy. It's a fairly huge deal that Bernie is being taken seriously at all given his own self-branding. It was unthinkable that a serious presidential candidate would even use the word socialism in a non-insulting manner (much less brand themselves one) 10 years ago. Huge deal.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

It's really interesting to think that the Communist Manifesto was written 12 years before the Civil War and its ideas were already fairly widespread in this country.

Before the First World War, the United States had such strong labor and socialist movements that it was widely believed that it was where the worldwide socialist revolution would begin. Much of that predates Marx, too, so it's not as if the world had to be informed of Marx's thoughts in order to Think Of Socialism.

 

[Lexicus]

It's really interesting to think that the Communist Manifesto was written 12 years before the Civil War and its ideas were already fairly widespread in this country.

You might be interested in this paper by a former professor of mine

In one of Harry Turtledove's alt-history novels, Abe survives and goes on to become a communist; I didn't understand how this could be until I found out what you just posted.

Another Turtledove fan? I love that whole series.

Before the First World War, the United States had such strong labor and socialist movements that it was widely believed that it was where the worldwide socialist revolution would begin. Much of that predates Marx, too, so it's not as if the world had to be informed of Marx's thoughts in order to Think Of Socialism.

Precisely. Socialism and worker democracy are indigenous to the US.

 

[_random_]

Before the First World War, the United States had such strong labor and socialist movements that it was widely believed that it was where the worldwide socialist revolution would begin. Much of that predates Marx, too, so it's not as if the world had to be informed of Marx's thoughts in order to Think Of Socialism.

So why do you think that turned out so wrong? At this point, the US is known among western powers as the only one with no major party that grew out of the labor movement, and for having weak unions and a weaker political left. Where did we go wrong?

 

[Lexicus]

So why do you think that turned out so wrong? At this point, the US is known among western powers as the only one with no major party that grew out of the labor movement, and for having weak unions and a weaker political left. Where did we go wrong?

Part of the answer is that corporations became more powerful and more organized in the US than they did elsewhere. That's probably not the whole answer though.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

So why do you think that turned out so wrong? At this point, the US is known among western powers as the only one with no major party that grew out of the labor movement, and for having weak unions and a weaker political left. Where did we go wrong?

A variety of factors, from an intensely divided working class along racial lines to the "pressure valve" of the West, to very militant bourgeois repression.

 

[Lexicus]

A variety of factors, from an intensely divided working class along racial lines to the "pressure valve" of the West, to very militant bourgeois repression.

The "pressure valve of the West" has traditionally been offered as an explanation for why class struggle never took on European-style militancy, but that isn't really accurate. The most militant worker resistance actually coincided in time with the period of Western expansion.

Obviously racism was a big factor, but I also don't see bourgeois repression as being more militant in the US than it was elsewhere (though I'm open to being shown otherwise on that point).

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Was racism less prevalent in Europe at the time or did they have significantly fewer minority members of their population at the time than the US did?

 

[_random_]

The latter was more of a factor I'd say. European nations never imported African slaves en masse for plantation labor after all.

 

[Lexicus]

In Europe the working class divided along ethnic and nationalist lines rather than racist ones, that's all. And yes, it was not because Europeans weren't racist but rather because Europe was not really a multiracial society in the same way the US is.

Of course, this is all rather arbitrary since race is a completely made-up construct.

 

[_random_]

Yeah Lincoln is seen as a progressive hero in American history. The man obviously had his problems (his views on race were not the best, and even while freeing Afro-American slaves his government was ruthlessly pushing forward with colonization of Indian lands in the West), but he was also responsible for crushing the intensely reactionary Old South and destroying one of the last remaining bastions of human enchattlement on the planet. He thus played a progressive role in history (Alexander Hamilton is seen in much the same way). Marx hailed Lincoln as the "single-minded son of the working class" and certainly thought very highly of him.

It's certainly not the worst bit of historical iconography appropriated by the America's radical left:

I'm sure that seemed like a good idea at the time.

 

[mech654]

I am curious what the red panelists think of the current crisis in Brazil. Is it a just a temporary setback for the PT, or a return of neoliberalism?

 

[W|M]

PT is neoliberal

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

It's certainly not the worst bit of historical iconography appropriated by the America's radical left:

I'm sure that seemed like a good idea at the time.

Looks like the Young Patriots. Bad symbolism, but good work. They grew out of SDS. BPP worked with them and the Young Lords to create the Rainbow Coalition, a joint-venture socialist, anti-racist action group.

I am curious what the red panelists think of the current crisis in Brazil. Is it a just a temporary setback for the PT, or a return of neoliberalism?

PT is neoliberal

While PT certainly has its problems, and is guilty of some minor austerity measures, I don't think it's fair to call them neo-liberal because they are not so snivelingly subservient to First World capital like Temer and his gangsters, who it is impossible to dispute the neo-liberal credentials of.

In my opinion Brazil is in a bad place, and will be for the next several years. There's a likelihood that Dilma could return, and I think some of the other parties are mildly upset about the government reshuffling and have threatened to end their support for Temer, but even if that's the case foreign capital has shown its hand. The reports coming out of Brazil from comrades are neither optimistic or encouraging.

On the other hand, the coup forced Maduro to react very defensively and proactively, and I think there are good signs that PSUV is beginning a new leftward push to deepen the roots of Venezuelan socialism to guarantee widespread opposition to any attempted coup d'etat. I personally hope they will finally destroy Venezuelan capital for good, but it's a toss-up as to whether or not they will risk such a venture after such a stinging defeat for Latin American leftism in Brazil.