> There is no view I have so endlessly repeated as the precise view you
> here state as your own. Since 1990 or so my position has been, and I
> begin to state this on marxism in the late '90s and on this list from
> the beginning, that it is incorrect to criticize "the left" for its
> failings for two reasons: a) "The Left" does not exist as a coherent
> force, and hence there is nothing to criticize and b) that the weakness
> of leftists, their inability to form a left, was NOT due to any errors
> on their part a function of the strength of capital. I have moreover a
> number of times used a metaphor from tennis, in which they speak of
> forced and unforced errors, and I have insisted that the errors of
> leftists over the last 35 years have been _forced_ errors, a function of
> what you call "current historical conditions."
>
> I want an apology for this part of this post by you.
>
> Carrol
===============================
I'm sorry you feel I distorted your position, Carrol. But I simply don't see
you as being among those who have "endlessly repeated" that "it is incorrect
to criticize 'the left' for its failings...that the weakness of leftists,
their inability to form a left, was NOT due to any errors on their part..."
My strong impression has always been the contrary: that, in fact, you think the US left - or, at least the largest part of it - has effectively been shilling for the Democrats and thereby reinforcing the illusions of American working people in capitalism and imperialism. You've endlessly derided these leftists as "ABB'ers" ("anyone but Bush") and if you don't consider them treacherous, at best you regard them as hopelessly naive. I have in mind contributors to lists like this one; supporters of groups like MoveOn.Org, United for Peace and Justice, the Progressive Democrats of America, Committees of Correspondence, etc.; activists in the trade unions and social movements; and well-known independent radicals like Cindy Sheehan, Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore, and Howard Zinn, all of whom have encouraged the deep discontent in the Democratic party with both the dangerously reckless Bush administration and their own opportunistic leaders who have waffled on Iraq and other major domestic and foreign policy issues. If these leftists see electoral contests as an opportunity to strengthen their ties to this large antiwar DP constitutency and to help move it forward - which necessarily means favouring the likes of Kerry over Bush - you see it as a trap and call on them to instead concentrate their fire on those who support Democrat politicians ahead of Republican ones.
You must think this is important - that the US left is somehow missing an historic opportunity to break the masses away from the DP - or else you wouldn't be as insistent and vehement about it. I don't know where it is you believe you could lead the masses in this period - to the Greens? the tiny left groups or Chuck's infoshop? away from electoral politics altogether? - but you must have some alternative in mind or you wouldn't be so urgently calling on the US labour and social movements to abandon their support of the Democrats as the only means they presently have, however limited, to advance their demands in the legislative arena. Of course, you may not attach much weight to this latter since many of those demands may not be as immediate a concern for you as for others.
I'm sure we'll continue this debate, but is fair to say the above is a serious mischaracterization of your views which demands an apology?