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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: cosmicforce who wrote (8428)	3/14/2001 10:55:05 AM
From: Neocon	Respond to of 82486

I already distinguished between the more general term, Marxism, and the more particular term, Communism, and also distinguished between little "c" communists and Communists. What more do you want? Communism as an historical movement was distinguished from socialism by following Lenin's interpretation of the need for revolution and the dictatorship of the vanguard party on behalf of the proletariat. The socialist parties were distinguished by their preference for peaceful reform within the context of democratic norms. Eventually, most Communist Parties developed electoral capabilities, for tactical reasons, but the assumption was that they were maneuvering while waiting for the revolutionary moment. By the way, as I mentioned earlier, many democratic socialists were anti- Communist. George Orwell, it turns out, helped MI5. The crowd around Dissent magazine fit the bill, as did the overlapping Partisan Review crowd. In 1980, the Social Democrats voted to support Reagan, causing a split and the formation of the Democratic Socialists......

To: cosmicforce who wrote (8428)	3/14/2001 11:16:48 AM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

Social Democrats, USA - What We Believe -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Social Democrats, USA is the movement of Eugene V Debs, Norman Thomas, A. Philip Randolph, Bayard Rustin and countless others who have worked and continue to work tirelessly to extend the benefits of freedom and economic justice to all Americans and to people the world over. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Social Democrats, USA, has a long and proud tradition of supporting democracy in every sphere of life -- political, social and economic. Our tradition rests solidly on a philosophical core that is integral to Social Democrats, USA. That core is our profound respect for the individual. We detest the intimidation of the powerless by the powerful. We recognize, as a central truth, that when the powerless band together to limit the powers of the strong, they improve not only their own lives but the lives of all who live in that society. Put that way, Social Democrats seem only like civilized people, indistinguishable from any other civilized people. The American Revolution was founded in part on those truths, and we do in fact draw strongly on those ideas that were revolutionary in the 18th century and remain so today. But while our central core puts us firmly in the American tradition of egalitarianism and democracy, it also distinguishes us from many in the political world. We are not conservatives, who say that there have always been and will always be the weak and the strong, and that the role of civilized people is to vitiate only the most vicious aspects of that reality. Nor are we liberals, who say that the role of civilized people is to protect the weak from the strong. That chivalric impulse ultimately weakens those protected, making them dependent on the good will of the powerful -- a good will that cannot be depended upon. Instead we see our role as helping to create institutions that make the powerless strong -- not so that they can in turn bully and intimidate, but so that they can act as equals in negotiating and bargaining with the strong. It is that central core that animates our actions. It is what leads us to be firm opponents of all tyranny, including those most tyrannical of all political systems, fascism and Communism. This central core leads us to be among the strongest supporters of labor unions. It led us to be in the forefront of the American civil rights movement. And it is what leads us to a variety of positions on issues which; to those who do not understand our central core, may seem conservative in some cases, liberal in others, and radical in still others, but which we see as all part of a piece. To begin with the first -- our opposition to tyranny -- we believe that each individual has the right to be heard and represented. We have never subscribed to the notion that only some people are fit to have a democratic government or that those who live in Asia or Africa, Latin America or Eastern Europe, or wherever there is or has been tyranny, are not yet "ready" for democracy. Although a democratic culture is a complicated nexus of relationships and institutions, and needs to be carefully nurtured, it is best developed within democracies. Our opposition to tyranny is what led us to be among the West's strongest opponents to Communism. It may seem so obvious today as not to need restating that Communism was (and remains, in China, North Korea, Vietnam, Cuba and a few other outposts) a tyranny of the Communist Party elite over everyone else in society -- no other institutions permitted, no dissent allowed, no civil or political rights of the individual acknowledged. These are all facts acknowledged by almost everyone today, after the democratic revolutions of 1989 and 1991. But it was not always so. There were many on the left who were confused by the rhetoric of revolution. Many were fooled by the Communist Party's claims that it was creating a "workers' state" where "the people" ruled. Social Democrats were never fooled by that language. We saw that the regimes were prisons for most of the individuals living there, and we never failed to state our opposition. Although this put us firmly in the mainstream of American polities, it was the cause of our ostracism on the American left. We didn't simply oppose Communism in theory. We found ways to help the powerless in Communist countries find havens where they could band together, ultimately forcing the powerful to deal with them. We were, for example, unflinching in our support of Poland's Solidarity trade union movement. And we can take some credit for the fact that during that long decade in the 198Os, when Solidarity was abandoned by almost everyone in the West, we remained steadfast in our support for the organization that played such a pivotal role in the demise of the Soviet Union and the very idea of Communism.... socialdemocrats.org