Carroll Cox wrote:
> The thing is that you can never know in advance what those "right
> circumstances" are or when and under what conditions they will arise.
> That is why it is worth while for as many people as possible to be
> continually banging on that door, because there is no other way to tell
> if it will open but by that banging. In retrospect most of those lives
> are more or less wasted -- except that they leave behind them other wall
> bangers.
Knocking on doors, literally, is one thing; projecting as a realistic near-term objective a general dock strike against the war is something else. Of course, you can never know for certain what will work and what won't. But we don't demand that of ourselves in our daily lives, political or otherwise. Only that we try to make rational assessments of what is likely to succeed, and what not. I don't think there's anything especially admirable about - drawing on the popular metaphors - running around like a chicken with your head cut off or banging your head against a brick wall just to "see if it works".
Carroll:
> While is is unpleasant to lose, it is utterly unacceptable to find out
> after the fact that one could have won but didn't try or wasn't ready.
It's unpleasant but not "utterly unacceptable" to find out that you should have acted but didn't - either because you weren't willing or able to. Again, happens all the time. You reflect and maybe discuss with others why you failed to respond in a particular way, learn from your experience, and either change direction or accept that the circumstances limited your options.
Carroll:
> I'm reasonably certain that Chuck0's envisaged tactics are a real waste
> of time, but I have no objection to his going out and doing it and
> failing. I'm not going to help him raise the troops is all.
So we're both saying exactly the same thing, except you're suggesting I'm passive and defeatist for saying it and you're not, right?
Carroll:
> I also
> disagree (along the lines laid out by Ron Jacobs lately in Counterpunch)
> with those who want to duplicate under current conditions the Mass
> single-issue demos of the '60s -- but those overlap what I see as
> possibilities enough so I'll be with them in their efforts to push that
> strategy, not on the grounds that it will work but that the work will
> constitute the conditions under which new and better possibilities might
> emerge.
>
> There is a very good and time-tested theoretical basis for something
> like but definitely not the same as the "Let's stop talking and do
> something" tendency, a basis enunciated in Napoleon's statement (I
> forget the French) that one does something and then sees what happens.
> _That_ is where new ideas and new theories come from. They don't drop
> from heaven.
I don't really catch your drift here, Carroll, or see how it relates to your point (and mine) that "Chuck0's envisaged tactics are a real waste of time"
MG