On Jul 18, 3:58 am, John Holmes <jhol...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> This is a genuinely interesting and intelligent piece of gossip from
> the pro-American-imperialist Shachtmanites of this AWL group. Who I
> hear are Zionists to boot.
>
> Shachtman was always good at gossip, all his life. And got soft on
> Zionism in the '50s, to say nothing of where he went later. The WP was
> not unique in this. Isaac Deutscher, Pablo's true theoretician, was
> also soft on Zionism in the early 1950s, a mistake he later corrected.
>
> This is a perfect apst posting, I hope we can see more like it. Told
> me a lot about the French left I didn't know.
>
> It is pretty convincing that the LO does indeed think that Russia, in
> some vague metaphysical way, is still a "workers state," or rather
> that the ultra-pragmatists of LO don't see any practical utility in
> changing their old line they are so very used to at this point.
>
> In fact, from their POV, their correct recognition--unlike the AWL and
> this Debat group, which sounds to me basically like a right split from
> LO and not a left--that 1991 was a world-historic defeat for the
> workers *should* lead them to want to change their old line. Just not
> in the direction the Debatters wanted!
>
> Now that the LO is *dropping* their historic opposition to allying
> with Social Democracy, likely they will find it useful to change their
> line on Russia in a social-democratic direction of some sort.
>
> The LO minority basically seems to want to maintain the old traditions
> of the LO going back to Barta vs. the op****tunism of the LO majority,
> who want to trash whatever was good about the LO in the past. It is
> not so much a leftward moving group as a group that wants to stand
> pat, while most of the LO races to the right.
>
All leftwing groups are zionist one way or another. Whether its left
or right wing zionism, the positions of the AWL on all the major
issues are INDENTICAL to everybody elses.
This point was for Walters who argued incessantly that only nutters
like us argue that capitalism hasn't been restored in Russia. LO on
its own is bigger that all the Anglo-American trotskyoid groupings.
And as Walters is obssessed by size not by positions as he cant argue
against them, he has to show me where LO are defending the view that
capitalism has been restored.
For what reason they hold the position I do not know, but they are
more astute when it comes to the role of Russia than the standard
tripe that goes for state capitalism. Now if Lambers grouping has the
same position as them that means a majority of the French groupings
have our position on Russia.
The Anglo-American position therefore is a minority amongst ostensible
trotskyists like I argued previously.
SRD can verify this is what we were arguing some while back.
vngelis
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