We all change as time goes by, Carl. If you could hear me expressing my
political opinions when I was a teenager and compare them to what they
are now you would think it was an entirely different person. You might
even think that different person was a bit right-wing. However, the way
Miriam brought up that my way or the highway comment was by pulling a
Mustafa on us. She did not like what I was saying, but she had no
refutation for it. So she was at least a bit more civilized than
Mustafa. Instead of insulting me for explaining what I was explaining
she just insulted what I had to say.
___
Carl Sagan
“Every aspect of Nature reveals a deep mystery and touches our sense of wonder
and awe. Those afraid of the universe as it really is, those who pretend to
nonexistent knowledge and envision a Cosmos centered on human beings will
prefer the fleeting comforts of superstition. They avoid rather than confront
the world. But those with the courage to explore the weave and structure of the
Cosmos, even where it differs profoundly from their wishes and prejudices, will
penetrate its deepest mysteries.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos
On 6/11/2020 12:11 PM, Carl Jarvis wrote:
If it's "my way or the highway", then we're in big trouble. I live in
a fluid society. Should "my way" be how I felt at 20, or 30, or 50?
The world in 1985 was not the same as in 2020. Sure, I do hold some
basic beliefs, but I blush at some of the things I thought and did
down through the years.
I understand that many of the folks on this list, along with many
others, dead and alive, do not hold the views of the current
Socialists Party. But even the Socialists can't agree as to who is
the real pure Socialists.
Back in my years with the National Federation of the Blind, we said we
represented all blind people. But the fact was that unless they
followed the "Party Line" they were driven out of the organization.
Hence, the American Council of the Blind.
I admire many of the people on that list. Naomi Klein is an especial
favorite of mine, along with Chris Hedges and Noam Chomsky. Whether I
come to agree or disagree, I learn from them...which is far more than
I do from the likes of Trump or Pence or Limbaugh.
It's my big problem with religions. Even if I don't believe in Life
After Death, I might learn something worthwhile from the Scriptures.
But it has to be exactly the way God told whoever is talking to me.
No, I'm just too damn independent to snuggle up to others, whether
they are right or wrong. I have to live in the world as it now is,
and work toward making it a better place for all creatures.
Can we ever get there? Not in what few years I have left.
Carl Jarvis
On 6/10/20, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
-----Original Message-----
From: Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, June 10, 2020 4:22 PM
To: 'Roger Loran Bailey' <rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx>
Subject: RE: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy]
RE: [blind-democracy] Bernie Sanders, Naomi Klein and More Launch
“Progressive International”
The translation of that is, "My way or the highway". It's a very black and
white view of society, very judgmental, with no subtleties, no complexities.
"You're with us or you're against us". But if the end justifies the means,
it is also greatly influenced by the means.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: Roger Loran Bailey <rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, June 10, 2020 2:46 PM
To: Carl Jarvis <carjar82@xxxxxxxxx>
Cc: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy]
RE: [blind-democracy] Bernie Sanders, Naomi Klein and More Launch
“Progressive International”
As I have explained any number of times, revolutionary socialists are
opposed to violent revolution too. The trouble is that it is forced on us.
Again, when the ruling classes see that movements for democratic reform are
on the verge of succeeding and that they are about to be deposed they will
defend their power and privilege by any means necessary and that includes
violence. The targets of that violence have every right to defend themselves
by any means necessary too and out of that dynamic comes violent revolution.
Let me suggest again that you read Socialism On Trial by James P. Cannon. He
makes the explanation of the dynamic of violent revolution clear. As for
bourgeois liberals, they defend capitalism at every turn anyway. It is to be
expected that they will defend it right up until it is being overthrown and
even after it has been overthrown too. When class contradictions increase to
the point that they do during a revolution a lot of people come to
understandings that they may never come to in more quiescent times and a
good many bourgeois liberals may do so too. They would be welcome over to
the revolutionary side providing that they are not falsely converting as
opportunists. Until that happens, though, they need to be called out as
supporters of the minority who rule society.
___
Carl Sagan
“Every aspect of Nature reveals a deep mystery and touches our sense of
wonder and awe. Those afraid of the universe as it really is, those who
pretend to nonexistent knowledge and envision a Cosmos centered on human
beings will prefer the fleeting comforts of superstition. They avoid rather
than confront the world. But those with the courage to explore the weave and
structure of the Cosmos, even where it differs profoundly from their wishes
and prejudices, will penetrate its deepest mysteries.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos
On 6/10/2020 10:13 AM, Carl Jarvis wrote:
"Jump" probably brings up the wrong image. We didn't get in the mess
we're in in one mighty leap. We slid slowly over many generations.
But always we edged toward a more beneficial position for the Empire's
Ruling Class.
We, the socialists among us, are far too few in number, and far too
removed from the Power Center, to seize control of our government in
event of a violent revolution. I'm very opposed to violent
revolutions. History demonstrates over and over that such eruptions
end up in totalitarianism. Besides, I'm not in agreement that the
folks on that original list are part of the problem. We might better
view them as "persons in transition, leaning toward Progressiveness".
Carl Jarvis
On 6/9/20, Roger Loran Bailey <rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx> wrote:
In my opinion we are not going to jump from where we are today to
socialism at all if we keep putting the jumping in the hands of the
very people who are opposed to jumping. That is like going to the
meat market to get a vegetarian meal.
___
Carl Sagan
“Every aspect of Nature reveals a deep mystery and touches our sense
of wonder and awe. Those afraid of the universe as it really is,
those who pretend to nonexistent knowledge and envision a Cosmos
centered on human beings will prefer the fleeting comforts of
superstition. They avoid rather than confront the world. But those
with the courage to explore the weave and structure of the Cosmos,
even where it differs profoundly from their wishes and prejudices, will
penetrate its deepest mysteries.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos
On 6/9/2020 6:55 PM, Carl Jarvis wrote:
In my opinion, we're not going to jump from where we are today, to
socialism. It will take a transition, a step by step to a more
progressive government. The problem seems to be that once we put a
person like Barack Obama in office, we act as if that's all it takes.
And now we have Joe Biden. And we will choose between a cunning
fool and a buffoon.
Carl Jarvis
On 6/9/20, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Somehow I just don't seem to understand how it is the pragmatic way
to effect social change when you support the candidates who are
opposed to social change.
___
Carl Sagan
“Every aspect of Nature reveals a deep mystery and touches our
sense of wonder and awe. Those afraid of the universe as it really
is, those who pretend to nonexistent knowledge and envision a
Cosmos centered on human beings will prefer the fleeting comforts
of superstition. They avoid rather than confront the world. But
those with the courage to explore the weave and structure of the
Cosmos, even where it differs profoundly from their wishes and
prejudices, will penetrate its deepest mysteries.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos
On 6/9/2020 12:59 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
I think that this is a naive analysis of the intellectual and
political spokesman whom the author is criticizing. People like
Sanders are not supporting Biden because they support the
Corporate Democrats or even Capitalism, they are doing so because
they believe, (whether or not one agrees with them), that this is
the pragmatic, most effective way to effect social change at this
point.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Roger Loran
Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Tuesday, June 9, 2020 11:07 AM
To: blind-democracy <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Bernie Sanders, Naomi Klein and More
Launch “Progressive International”
Bernie Sanders, Naomi Klein and More Launch “Progressive
International”
https://socialistaction.org/2020/06/08/climate-and-social-democrat
-celebrities-launch-progressive-international/
June 8, 2020
By GARY PORTER
On May 10, climate activists, social democrats, anti-imperialists,
left-wing commentators and critics launched a new international
project.
In September, the sponsors will meet for the inaugural Summit of
the Progressive International (PI) in Reykjavik, Iceland. It will
be hosted by the Prime Minister of Iceland and the Left Green
Movement. This new project occurs in the context of a raging viral
pandemic, economic depression, an escalating nuclear arms race,
and rapid global warming that puts humanity on the verge of
catastrophe.
Billionaires force workers back to work, without protection from
COVID-19, by cutting financial support. “Essential” workers who,
it turns out, are often low-paid racialized workers, sicken and
die, as unemployment skyrockets. Hospitals, stripped by 40 years
of neo-liberal cuts, cannot handle the sick. Imperialist drones,
bombs, brutal economic sanctions and assassinations by special
forces never stop.
The contradictions and crises of capitalism multiply and magnify
like gaping wounds, leaving open sores across the landscape.
Witnessing all of this, billions of people are desperate to find a
way out, including those who are forming the Progressive
International.
But the list of 64 members of the PI Council posted on its website
does not include radicalizing youth, the poor or very many
workers. Most are intellectuals and professional politicians. The
rise of authoritarian governments, violence, anti intellectualism,
hostility to science and experts, and the decline of civilized
discourse, strand these intellectuals and parliamentary figures in
darkness and fear. None of them look to the power of mobilized
workers and farmers, or even consider that a serious possibility.
PI appears as an effort to bolster resistance to the tide of crude
ignorance, chaos and destruction represented by Trump, Johnson,
Bolsonaro, Erdogan, Duterte, et al.
Who are these people? From Canada, there is author Naomi Klein of
The Leap Manifesto and Green New Deal fame, together with her
media-savvy partner Avi Lewis. While supporting the BDS movement
against apartheid Israel and for a green transformation of
society, including the elimination of inequality and the creation
of ‘more democratic’ state institutions, Klein and Lewis offer no
clear analysis of class society.
They stipulate no clear commitment to fighting for workers’ power,
to replace the capitalist state, and to institute workers’ control
of the means of production in order to meet human needs, rather
than deliver profits to billionaires. NDP MP Niki Ashton, another
council member from Canada, holds similar views, though she is
somewhat clearer on the importance and potential power of the
unions.
The biggest names from United States are Bernie Sanders from the
capitalist Democratic Party, now a Joe Biden campaigner, and Noam
Chomsky, a long-time critic of the imperialist role of America in
the world, who happens also to be a Democratic Party-Joe Biden
supporter.
Yannis Varoufakis, a former Finance Minister for the Greek social
democratic SYRIZA government, is a member of the Council. To this
add a long list of ministers and legislators from across Latin
America, Europe and Africa. They profess to be on the side of
workers and oppressed peoples, but their record is one of
neo-liberalism and support for global corporations and capitalist
state institutions. Liberal and social democratic journalists and
cultural figures round out the 64-member council.
The PI has no program at this stage. Presumably, that will be
considered at the conference in Iceland.
Where will they stand on the rule of profit over human need? Where
will they stand on imperialist economic and military domination of
the third world and indigenous peoples around the world for the
purpose of super exploitation and robbing them of their resources?
Where will they stand on the need to establish workers’ power and
build a new workers’ state based on the complete destruction of
the legislative, legal, bureaucratic and repressive apparatus of
the capitalist state.
Are they reformers of capitalism, albeit perhaps radical
reformers, or supporters of the end of exploitation by a
worker-led revolutionary overthrow of capitalism and the struggle
for socialism? In the end, do they support capitalism or workers’
power? The record of the individuals involved is not encouraging.
The idea of PI was born in December 2018, when the Democracy in
Europe Movement and the Sanders Institute in the US issued a call
proclaiming “it is time for progressives of the world to unite.”
On the launch of the group Monday, May 10, Chomsky in an interview
with the Guardian said that the urgency created by the COVID-19
crisis has caused a deepening of economic inequalities and the
rise of the far-right.
So, as autocratic neo-liberalism represents one way, “the other
way is to try to dismantle the structures, the institutional
structures that have been created; that have led to very ugly
consequences for much of the population of much of the world,
[and] are the source of this pandemic.”
The activities of the PI initiative are erected on three pillars:
the movement aimed to forge a global network; the Blueprint to
develop a policy for a progressive international order; and the
Wire which offers a communication service to the world’s
progressive forces.
Its stated objectives are “to promote the union, coordination and
mobilization of activists, associations, unions, and social
movements in the face of the advance of authoritarianism.” They
say they aspire to a “democratic, decolonized, egalitarian,
liberated, united, sustainable, ecological, peaceful,
post-capitalist, prosperous and plural” world.
This compendium of liberal and social democratic values serves as
its programmatic foundation.
What do we know about these people?
Fernando Haddad, the Brazilian PT´s presidential candidate, former
Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa and former Bolivian vice
president Álvaro García Linera, were all part of “progressive
governments.” None of them produced fundamental change in their
countries´ economic and social structures, which continued to be
capitalist and dependent, with extremely high rates of poverty, a
growing deterioration of everything public and a retreat
concerning workers´ fundamental rights. This led to their demise,
and opened the door for right-wingers like Jair Bolsonaro, Lenin
Moreno and Jeanine Áñez to come to power in their countries. Some
of them declare themselves defenders of the welfare state and
claim to defend public health, but when they governed, they
weakened public health care to pay external debt to the
imperialists. Rather than defend ecology, they maintained
extractive and polluting models of production to guarantee
extraordinary profits to corporations.
Alicia Castro, union leader of the bureaucratic Argentine CGT and
ex-Congresswoman of the Alianza, brought de la Rúa to power. That
government killed dozens of grassroots activists during its downfall.
The same can be said of Bernie Sanders, who generated great
expectations by speaking of socialism in the heart of the empire
and raising popular proposals, like universal health insurance in
a country where you can die without medical attention if you don´t
have money. His recent support for Joe Biden, a candidate for the
US economic establishment, a racist and misogynist leader of the
imperialist Democratic Party, completes his record, for the second
time as a Judas goat who leads his young followers to the camp of
blood-drenched capitalist politicians.
So, what are the odds that Progressive International will advocate
an end to usurious debts to foreign capital, the nationalization
of banks and resources, and to put foreign trade under social
control, to reverse privatizations, carry out significant agrarian
reforms, or impose permanent progressive taxes on the wealthy?
Isn’t that what an international party on the side of the working
class ought to do? But the record of most of these people shows
that they are defenders of the private property of businesses and
banks, that their model of liberty is the farce of bourgeois
democracy, which they propose to broaden just a bit, at most. They
want to put a human face on the capitalist system, which it is
impossible to humanize, and which is becoming ever more brutal.
Perhaps the rapidly deepening multiple crises of capitalism will
push some of these leaders to the left, toward understanding that
the problem is capitalism, and that workers’ power is the first
step to a solution.
That would be a welcome and very positive development.
But this group is not composed of young militants. As a group they
are mature, entrenched, established figures with developed views
and many years of experience. That experience, for the most part,
is professing policies to reform the most exploitative, oppressive
and brutal aspects of capitalism. When in government, they
accepted the burdens of indebtedness, the primacy of profit over
human needs, and the duty of exacting neoliberal cutbacks.
Revolutionary socialists already know the source of all our
existential crises is the capitalist system, and that the only
force on earth capable of overthrowing capitalism is the
organized, class conscious working class. Only an educated and
experienced revolutionary party, with deep roots in the workers’
movement, will be capable of focussing the uprising of the
workers, when it comes, against the instruments of state power.
We
also know that the struggle is international in scope – it is a
war against imperialism on a global scale.
The Progressive International is not the distillation of these
vital lessons. It is born from the failed and utterly diversionary
effort to reform capitalism, to salvage it from its death agony.
The PI may foster some interesting debates, but its basic mission
is dead on arrival.
Related Articles
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MARTY GOODMAN Today only 51.3% of American adults have jobs – the
lowest number on record, lower than the Great Depression. We have
passed 80,000 coronavirus deaths.
Should Progressives Work in the Democratic Party?
April 14, 2020
Here we reprint part of a 1959 debate between a revolutionary
socialist and a social democrat. George Breitman, a member of the
Socialist Workers Party and longtime editor of The Militant
newspaper, argued the No side.
The Demise of Bernie Sanders
April 9, 2020
By JEFF MACKLER Author’s note: This article was written three
weeks before Bernie Sanders’ April 7 withdrawal from the
Democratic Party primary race.
I see no reason to change a word.
--
___
Carl Sagan
“Every aspect of Nature reveals a deep mystery and touches our
sense of wonder and awe. Those afraid of the universe as it really
is, those who pretend to nonexistent knowledge and envision a
Cosmos centered on human beings will prefer the fleeting comforts
of superstition. They avoid rather than confront the world. But
those with the courage to explore the weave and structure of the
Cosmos, even where it differs profoundly from their wishes and
prejudices, will penetrate its deepest mysteries.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos
