Heh;-) I do read the People's Weekly World of the CPUSA every week. Pick it up in front of the Y in the Tenderloin here. I know the cover says 50 cents but a quarter gets you the paper. I take two and put the other one wedged on top between the rack w/the SF Chronicle. W/O that Moscow Gold anymore, I know that effectively getting 4x or 8x really or 12 and 1/2 cents each paper when I should pay $1.00 for 2 is draining Party coffers, but, I did e-mail Juan Lopez of the No. Ca. CPUSA and he still hasn't replaced the vending rack yet...Course in Berkeley by the downtown BART station the PWW is free so...
Recently the PWW ran a positive review of Roy Medvevev book from Columbia Univ. Press on Yeltsin era Russian politics. However, I doubt they'll review this, "Conversations with Gorbachev: On Perestroika, the Prague Spring, and the Crossroads of Socialism." Mikhail Gorbachev and Zdenek Mlynar
Comrade Dimitrov, again, btw, <URL: http://www.cpusa.org/article/articleview/499/1/104/ > Fascism and the Fight Against It
Dimitrov, George, "Against Fascism & War", Report to the 7th World Congress, Communist International, 1935 (Excerpts)
"But it is characteristic of the victory of fascism that this victory, on the one hand, bears witness to the weakness of the proletariat, disorganized and paralyzed by the disruptive Social-Democratic policy of class collaboration with the bourgeoisie, and, on the other, expresses the weakness of the bourgeoisie itself, afraid of the realization of a united struggle of the working class, afraid of revolution, and no longer in a position to maintain its dictatorship over the masses by the old methods of bourgeois democracy and parliamentarism.
"...fascism in power ... [is]the open terrorist dictatorship of the most reactionary, most chauvinist and most imperialist elements of finance capital. (p.2)
"No, fascism is not a power standing above class, nor government of the petty bourgeoisie or the lumpen-proletariat over finance capital. Fascism is the power of finance capital itself. It is the organization of terrorist vengeance against the working class and the revolutionary section of the peasantry and intelligentsia. In foreign policy, fascism is jingoism in its most brutal form, fomenting bestial hatred of other nations.
"This, the true character of fascism, must be particularly stressed because in a number of countries, under cover of social demagogy, fascism has managed to gain the following of the mass of the petty bourgeoisie that has been dislocated by the crisis, and even of certain sections of the most backward strata of the proletariat. These would never have supported fascism if they had understood its real character and its true nature. (p.3)
"All this, however, does not make less important the fact that, before the establishment of a fascist dictatorship, bourgeois governments usually pass through a number of preliminary stages and adopt a number of reactionary measures which directly facilitate the accession to power of fascism. Whoever does not fight the reactionary measures of the bourgeoisie and the growth of fascism at these preparatory stages is not in a position to prevent the victory of fascism, but, on the contrary, facilitates that victory. "What is the source of the influence of fascism over the masses? Fascism is able to attract the masses because it demagogically appeals to their most urgent needs and demands. Fascism not only inflames prejudices that are deeply ingrained in the masses, but also plays upon the better sentiments of the masses, on their sense of justice and sometimes even on their revolutionary traditions. Why do the German fascists, those lackeys of the bourgeoisie and mortal enemies of socialism, represent themselves to the masses as 'Socialists', and depict their accession to power as a 'revolution'? Because they try to exploit the faith in revolution and the urge towards socialism that lives in the hearts of the mass of working people in Germany.
"Fascism aims at the most unbridled exploitation of the masses but it approaches them with the most artful anticapitalist demagogy, taking advantage of the deep hatred of the working people against the plundering bourgeoisie, the banks, trusts and financial magnates, and advancing those slogans which at the given movement are most alluring to the politically immature masses."Fascism delivers up the people to be devoured by the most corrupt and venal elements, but comes before them with the demand for 'an honest and incorruptible government." Speculating on the profound disillusionment of the masses in bourgeois-democratic governments, fascism hypocritically denounces corruption. (p.5-7) <SNIP>
For more nuanced, alternative marxist readings from the era on fascism see, "Marxists In The Face Of Fascism, " edited by David Beetham and Larry Ceplair's book analyzing and explicating marxist and neo-marxist approaches to fascism from Columbia Univ. Press. Ceplair in this book and a previous on the Hollywood Blacklist was assisted by former CPUSA cadre Dorothy Healey, now of DSA though NAM via her son Richard, who signed one of the Cuba statements.
-- Michael Pugliese
"Without knowing that we knew nothing, we went on talking without listening to each other. Sometimes we flattered and praised each other, understanding that we would be flattered and praised in return. Other times we abused and shouted at each other, as if we were in a madhouse." -Tolstoy