Well, assessing a left / right swing is not the same thing as finding out
who is left wing as an act of faith
Loyalty to the Italian Communist Party is hard to reconcile with its
fluctuating electoral performance
Such loyalty clearly doesn't exist in other CPs or we should not have the
current interesting social situations in the east of Europe
Here CP refers more often to personal services than it does to a political
organisation - perhaps someone tried "If one is Communist, one dies as a
Communist" as a recruiting slogan
L
----- Original Message -----
From: "Erminia Passannanti" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: 09 December 2001 14:03
Subject: Re: opinion - left/right ?
On Sun, 9 Dec 2001 12:45:05 -0000, Lawrence Upton
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>How one assesses a right or left wing swing, I don't know. People are so
>volatile and easily manipulable that in some ways it is a meaningless
>exercise. Generally, public opinion follows policy.
>
I know how: to establish and stabilize who is left wing, one should re-fund
the Communist Party (the orthodox Marxist-Leninist working-class one in the
sense of a militant party for social progress with memberships and idea
of contribution). Then one would know who is left-wing and one would hope
they stick to their ideological political choice. If one is Communist, (in
Italy) one dies as a Communist and even gathers the elderly clubs of
Communists, when retired). If one is left-wing it is an entire view of life
that matters to him (like in Brecht's poem, The Cherry Thief). If
Communist, one would never start being worried about his cherry tree
against the reality of the starving young proletarian's needs to feed
himself (exploiting the shared ground of social welt (the cherries)
If left-wing, one would gladly join in a party having such a unity of
action. And one would make this struggle to abolish poverty and
unemployment one's own struggle. One would constantly vote Communist or
Labor, never being tempted to turn to the "right".
We also have straight lines to establish for what reasons some individuals
cannot hold any faithfulness to any creed or ideology, as to be able to
pass from one side to the other. These individuals behave according to
shifting conveniences and compromise their votes accordingly. (see the
disaster of this in Italy, where half of the population voted to
the "right" just to see how things would turn and whether they might gain
something: these people, those who voted for Berlusconi , - be sure of it
prepared to vote against him as soon as they will attest their lack of
interests in his government. I hope, of course, that this will happen soon.
>(In some quarters this is recognised - hence, I believe, the frequent
>assertion that Thatcher's administrations were a tyranny, as if she hadn't
>been elected in a flawed but fairly uncorrupted electoral system - so that
>believing what one was told amounted to be tyrannised)
>
>However, something has changed in the mood, the atmosphere, the working
>memory... Whatever we call it...
>
>You can turn much of almost any large group of people into racists or
>anti-racists by what you tell them, as long as it's simplistic; and the
>potential for racism is in all of us. That potential has just been given
>permission to continue.
>
>It's so much easier to think that everything is caused by an imbalance in
>some inferred or implicit natural order, than to deal with the kind of
>meaninglessness that actually obtains us; they - those who want simple
>answers - should speak to the afghans who have been wondering why nutters
in
>aircraft are bombing them
>
>The Conservative Party were moving to the right under Wm Hague; so that
what
>we are seeing here may not be a response to Sep 11. In fact, I think very
>little either side of the Atlantic is a response to Sep 11. It was just a
>wonderful excuse. The govt is demonstrating that it is strong in many ways.
>Usually, it is saving us from benefit cheats. Dangerous wogs are far safer.
>
>They talk in boilerplated cliches to encourage the others - we had
_American
>resolve_ on here the other day
>
>We are being swung to the right
>
>L
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Candice Ward" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: <[log in to unmask]>
>Sent: 09 December 2001 00:50
>Subject: Re: opinion
>
>
>| What "swing," Dave? Has Britain no history of race riots, no tradition of
>| editorializing about "mogs," "wogs," and so forth?
|