> I think you're counting on Kerry producing suffucient disillusionment
> among progressives to promote radicalization. On the other hand
> it is quite possible that liberals and progressives will stick with
> Kerry, regardless of what he does, especially if he come under
> assault from the rightwing attack machine, just as they did with
> Clinton. In which case, Kerry will have a free pass to move further
> to the right.
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The potential for cooptation of a Democratic base by a Democratic leadership
is there, but it can be exaggerated. That most trade unionists were
Democrats did not prevent the great strike wave and birth of the modern US
labor movement under FDR. That blacks, pacifists, and feminists were mostly
DP supporters did not prevent the development of the civil rights, antiwar,
and women’s movements under JFK and LBJ.
Powerful social forces underlay these developments, but in some cases the way was smoothed by protective Democratic legislation like the Wagner and Civil Rights Acts. Marxists saw such legislation as designed in large part to contain these movements within the framework of the existing system, which is certainly true, but that doesn’t negate that they still produced the necessary reforms which Marxists also fought for and supported.
It is unlikely these reforms would have happened when they did without the access of the social movements to Democratic administrations, and their ability to apply apply pressure on those who depended on them for reelection. There is no such access or potential for pressure on Republican administrations. Systemic need may eventually cause even Republicans to make concessions, but not at the same time or in the same manner. This is the major difference between the two parties.
The same logic applies to defensive as well as offensive struggles - which is more likely to characterize the coming period. There will be greater potential in the Democratic party to defend against cutbacks in social spending, notably social security, if Kerry rather than Bush is elected.
A corrolary is that this potential for mass resistance will increase relative to the presence of left organizers at the base of the party, as in the case of the earlier movements described above. It compliments rather than contradicts activity on the outside. The initiatives of the Clinton administration reflected the weakness of the left inside and outside of the DP, conditions which the Bush regime has since helped to change.
Marv Gandall