[Marxism] Gloria La Riva 16-city speaking tour

[Aaron Aarons]

>Date: Fri, 10 Oct 2008 04:24:50 -0400
>From: "Mark Lause" <markalause at gmail.com>
>
>If, as Ruthless asserts, a U.S. Left consisting of SLPs (Socialist Lilliputian Parties) is a good thing (because "diversity" is good, right?), then the entire international movement should be kneeling worshipfully to learn at the feet of the super-successful American radicals.

The fact that all the socialist groups in the U.S. are small is a reflection of the weakness of socialist ideas in the U.S., not the cause of that weakness. Even in countries with a large milieu of self-described socialists, there are a wide variety of socialist groups. The difference is that the variety includes some larger groups.

>Then, there's the view of Karl Marx and most American Marxists that mass working class party of any sort would be an improvement over no working class party at all...or lots of these SLPs.

Even a pro-imperialist party?

>The very fact that I have to write this kind of an email on a Marxism List is a tribute to the stupifyingly retarded nature of radical politics in the US.

You don't "have to" write this kind of an email on this list, but, since you chose to do so, you might have come up with at least one example of a mass working-class party in an imperialist country that was or is a positive force in the struggle against capitalism and imperialism. I can't think of one myself, and I doubt that you can, but I can think of plenty of mass working-class parties that have helped keep their own working class tied to the capitalist order when that class made moves toward breaking from it. France in 1968 is the best example, but hardly the only one.

>ML

 - Aaron