[lbo-talk] Re: How Americans would respond

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Sat Apr 30 12:17:30 PDT 2005


Turbulo at aol.com wrote:


>There's an old story about a Communist recruiting pitch, delivered
>before a meeting in the 1930s. The speaker says something like:
>
>"Our Italian comrades languish in Mussolini's dungeons! Our German
>comrades are working their lives out from dawn to dusk at
>Buchenwald, under the unrelenting gaze of brutal Nazi kapos! Our
>South African comrades are being stangled to death with chicken wire
>in their cells! Brothers and Sisters, join the Communist Party!

Yup. There's a version of that in Cockburn's Corruptions of Empire. As I recall, he asked, "Why not, 'White slavers on the run in South Africa!'?" And as much as subscribe to the "tell no lies, claim no easy victories" line, he's got a point. But just recall the complaints when I quoted Chomsky's claim that the US is "incomparably more civilized" than it was a generation ago. No, no, can't be! Things have gotten so much worse!!

Doug



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