Why Create New Communist ORG's if There Are Already Existing Ones?

I wanted to write this post to answer the simple question of: "Why are people creating new communist organizations instead of joining the existing ones?" This is a good question for people new to the movement here in the states to ask. When I first walked onto the socialist scene I had a problem understanding why there were so many different groups when every one believed in a general idea (socialism).



I soon was to be crushed when I found out what a fractured and broken socialist movement we had here in the US. I was further crushed when I later learned that most groups in the US are fakes and wish to do nothing more use reformism to replace one ruler with another under a false banner of socialism or the false claim of "a party run by the working class". Then there are the parties who only seem to want to write polemics about other groups and do nothing else. Some parties exist only for opportunist reasons when they could easily join with other groups that share their same platform and politics but they do not merge because that would mean sharing money, resources, and membership.



There is actually a good reason why new ORGs emerge and if the sixties are any implication then we should see a growth in communist recruitment into the different parties. The creation of new parties is a sign that the existing parties are out dated and are being ineffective in doing mass work. This is the reason why we see groups such as the Kasama project, the LLCO and a few other groups emerging from the darkness. The founders of these groups don't see protesting and signing petitions as a way to build and carry through a revolution. They know that new and original theory's are needed to carry the communist movement forward. They are trying to fill a void by carrying communist slogans and moving the cause forward as a whole.



I think we should embrace this new outbreak of new groups here in the united states. It is obvious all the old parties and most of the "new" trot parties are set in their ways and are ineffective and outdated. Maybe the communist movement needs a revolution inside the communist movement itself?

The New Red Scare!

It was apparent as of last night on Nov second that the second republican revolution was underway and that American politics were about to shift back to neo-conservative in control of the house and a much more favorable number in the senate. But why did this happen? Was it because the young voters stayed home? Was it because America is coming down off of its hopeamine high? And what does this mean for the communist and other leftist in America?


So why did the republicans win so big in these midterms? The answer is easier than most would give. The simple answer is that when the democrats were in charge of all of the major branches of government they still didn't accomplish anything other than selling the masses out to the medical insurance companies and bailing out big banks before bailing out the people. So really the democrats are the ones who demotivated their base and even to a point encouraged their base to stay home on election day. Not to mention the fact that most people in this country are fed up with the system all together.


The Tea Party should also not be discredited with the role they played in this election cycle. The tea party energized and motivated the ultra right wing (along with some ignorant moderates) back to the voting booth. These are the same people who didn't go to the polls during the Obama election because they thought McCain to be too moderate. This coupled with the self de-motivation of progressives and leftist with in the democratic party clearly explains the huge loss suffered by the democrats.


Is the country just coming down off of their hopeamine high? Yes, when Obama ran for president he not only had his main democrat base excited but he also had many moderates, progressives and even some people on the left excited about his campaign. But it didn't take long for that high to wear off. Many progressives and leftist were in disarray when Obama followed Bush in bailing out the Banks and leaving the people to starve and go homeless. Shortly after that the health care bill came up. And the more and more the democrats and Obama compromised with the right the more and more progressives started fleeing from the Obama/democrat camp. The democrats took less than a year to prove to the voters that thought they were voting in a party of the people and change that they were in fact voting into power nothing more than corporate party with no back bone. The people felt and still feel betrayed by the democrats. This is a lesson that the masses will hopefully not soon forget though I feel that it will take little to no time for the voters to forget the democrats betrayal.


What does this mean for communist and other leftist in the US? Well that is up to us, we can keep doing what we have been doing, (which except for a few groups) and keep doing things that have proven to be ineffective. Or we can really start to unite the different parties and organizations and start to have one party with different tactics. Because as we are in this country (all separated and using different tactics) it is obvious that one tactic or the other by itself will not do the trick. We need a united party that works in the activist circles, that works in the unions and on peoples empowerment issues. All we have right now is a bunch of different parties all running in different directions claiming they have the right tactic, but since none are gaining any real ground it doesn't matter. And the few that are gaining ground as parties or ORGs (meaning members wise), they mainly are gaining members with false and liberal slogans.


If the left ever needed to unite and fight together then this would be it. But I'm sure that that will not happen due to different believes in what happened and should have happened in Russia in the beginning of the 1900's. But remember that this is our future and if we don't unite and fight back than this is what we can look forward to:

Written by:Dustin Slagle

Originally posted on The Hong Se Sun November 3 2010

Are we communist lying to the working class?

I'm going to take the liberty of guessing that if you are reading this on a computer that you probably do not live in conditions the same as you see here on this photo. In fact there is a good chance you do not even know anyone who lives in these conditions.




In this post I would like to discuss some things that the "communist"/socialist parties of the US promise the working class and if these promises are realistic or not.



First of all it is important to point out that it would depend on if there was a world revolution or simply a revolution here in the United States for the purpose of building socialism to achieve communism. Because that would create two very different scenarios.



We must stop telling the US worker about how horribly he/she has it in the world. Almost 99% of US Americans live above the world poverty line. In fact the government had to create a different poverty line specifically for our country. In the rest of the world if you live off of less than one dollar a day then you are in poverty according to UNICEF. Now in the US (according to our government) people living under 7 dollars a day are considered to be living in poverty. That means there are more than one billion five hundred million people in extreme poverty in the world (people living on less than one dollar a day). That is more than five times the population of the US. Most panhandlers get more than a dollar a day in this country. So it is very incorrect to tell anyone making thirty thousand dollars a year that they are bad off.



If there was a REAL international communist revolution the living standards in the US would actually go down. I mean we would have free health care, free education, nutrition rations for the poor to ensure malnutrition was wiped out, a right to work. But a lot of the little extra things that we are used to would have to stop in order to serve the greater masses of the earth. There are almost seven billion people in this world. Out of that seven billion the USA only has around three hundred and six million people and the US consumes 1/3 of the worlds resources. Now do the math. Three hundred million is not one third of the worlds population, there for if we had a egalitarian world socialist economy there is no way that the people in the US could keep up their current living standards with out keeping another part of the world under exploitation.



One thing that US socialist parties like to do is attack budget cuts when the government cuts their budget from education or public jobs etc. Which is good and understandable seeing as those government jobs are some peoples livelihoods and indeed our children's education is the most important thing after people not starving. But here is the problem; when the US government and state governments across the nation announced huge job cuts for public works the socialist parties were in an uproar and attacked the US government furiously calling out "Hands off public workers!" and "fight back against the budget cuts!". Which I would like to say again makes sense and this was correct in the most part to carry these slogans.



However we quickly see where these parties hearts lye when Cuba announced that it planned to cut almost one million jobs over the next couple of years (some parties only highlighted half a million scheduled this year and left out the rest). That is almost 1/11 of their entire work force in that nation. Go divide the US population into 1/11 and see how many people that would be getting laid off. Yet many "communist" parties simply brushed it off as necessary to keep the economy from falling. They seemed to miss (on purpose) the part where Raul said he planned on opening up the market for investors and private businesses. There was little critique put out by any party with any political sway in this country. This is simply a case of "four legs good, two legs better" when a capitalist government cuts jobs it is a "crime against the working class" but when a country that the "socialist" parties support it is "necessary" in "preserving socialism on the island". So why is it okay for Cuba to make job cuts on a huge scale? And why is it not be called a "attack on the working class"?



It is a simple answer; do as we say, not as we do. Why should the working class in the US believe that the socialist parties would seriously make "a right to a job" a constitutional amendment? When they support the job cuts in Cuba even if they do say it is to "preserve socialism". I once had a "socialist" say to me that "a right to a job, free education, and free health care are not necessarily a necessity in a nation being socialist/building socialism" this was what was said during a conversation about rather or not China was still socialist and this was the reason he gave for why he still sees China as socialist. And this was a man in a power position with in a larger socialist party.



I guess what I am trying to say is that it is ultra confusing to an average person when a group supports one nations right to budget cuts but calls another nations budget cuts "an attack on the working class". And these people are correct to be confused, especially when a group is claiming to be internationalist yet constantly spouts tankie slogans and is constantly taking tankie stances. It is anti-dialects to simply support anything and everything waving a red flag and to be an apologist for anything claiming to be socialist or anti-imperialist. Some times anti-imperialist end up support social imperialist in the name of anti-imperialism.

Why should the people of the United States of America want a socialist society if we can not iron clad promise them that we will deliver what a capitalist country can't? Isn't one of our most rallied around slogans "People before profit"? Then I say it is only correct to attack the Cuban state and the Chinese state for their putting profits over the peoples needs. Although obviously Cuba still does a much better than China at this seeing as they still have their nutritional food rations that have helped eliminate childhood and adult malnutrition on the tiny impoverished island nation. Also they have many great peoples program's in Cuba and this post should not be seen as an attack on Cuba seeing as there are indeed many progressive things about Cuba. I'm simply using Cuba to point out the tankie politics of some socialist parties.



Another thing that I have personally seen turn people off of politics in the US is the call for revolution. Now it is not the call for revolution that turns people off of socialism it is the contrary. Most people are draw to the call of revolution. But they shortly after joining a group become disillusioned with the socialist movement because parties in the US have hijacked the word revolution to mean whatever they want it to. It used to mean something to be a revolutionary socialist, simply that you believed in revolution to overthrow the capitalist/feudal/colonial government to be replaced by the dictatorship of the proletariat. Now every group claiming to be socialist is "revolutionary" even while their platforms and actions are no more than that of a simple reformist.



It may break a lot of socialist hearts to hear this but participating in elections, calling for the formation of a labor party, carrying liberal slogans, creating front groups that carry forward liberal agendas, selling news papers (training paper boys), protesting, asking reactionary unions to split with the democrats, all these things are not and do not make a group revolutionary. They are lying to the masses and are as one man put it so well; "paper tigers". Carrying liberal slogans means that when it is time to revolt for workers democracy that the few communist will rush forward guns in hand and all the liberals they attracted with their parties liberal slogans will sit around in a circle singing "coumbia my lord coumbiaa" while the communist are gunned down.



To groups like that we should say "If you want to carry liberal slogans then join the liberals and do not waste the masses time". If you are a communist group or are claiming to be one, don't be worried that no one will pick up your slogan. It is better that a few pick up your correct communist slogan than it is for many to pick up your misleading liberal slogan. As Lenin said "better fewer, but better" meaning it is better to have a good few than it is to have a shitty lot. It is also better and a communist duty to be truthful and strait forward with the masses and not be misleading.


Stop carrying liberal slogans!

Struggle with in your group to put a stop to liberal slogans and liberalism as a whole.

Stop lying to the people you are trying to recruit!

Communist must carry communist slogans and put "politics in command!"



Written by; Dustin Slagle originally posted on The Hong Se Sun