[lbo-talk] When to Talk About Socialism

[Michael Dawson]

> Ironically, leftists were far more successful politically when they
> were shackled by generally turgid and sometimes unintentionally funny
> jargon than they are today when many of them are masters of
> self-deprecating humor.
> --
> Yoshie

I'm repeatedly surprised by the Idealism of ultras like Yoshie and Carrol.
As if the change in language on the left explains left success/failure!  And
as if a thousand little street demos could ever compete with our
TV-wielding, society-shaping, war-launching capitalists, who, despite our
leftist alarms going off in 1973, are still surfing along on the (soon to
crash?) crest of the greatest wave of upper-class wealth accumulation in
human history.

The left has simply gotten the shit kicked out of us by a successful ruling
class.  And we'd better do a helluva lot better job of getting ready for the
end of our historic wave than the left did during and after WWI.