[lbo-talk] WEATHERMAN: Racists & Spoilers of Unity

[Carrol Cox]

Good enough. Your memory of my using "Platonic" is probably to soem post
in which I was arguing that criticizing past errors does not help avoid
those er rors now or in the future, since they always appear in new
condtions and in new forms, or else those who repeat them will argue
that because the conditons are different, that errorisn't an error now.
But that is not to deny or evendemphasize history. And in the case of
Weather, romanticizing them obscures understanding of what was going on
and wht was achieved in the '60s.

One othe rdetail comes to mind. Neither Jan nor I can remember what the
occasion was, but for some purpose or other she drove to Panther
headquarters in hicago to drive two Panthers back to Bloomington. What
she _does_ remember is their tension, especially at the sight of any
Chicago police car, until they got well away from Chicago. It must have
been hard on the nerves being a Panther.

Incidentally, the reason Mark Clark was in Chicago to be murdered is
itwelf interesting. It seems that the Chicato medi were doing too good a
job recruiting for the Panthers; that is, presenting the Panthers as a
bunch of thugs made them look attractive to tose who WERE thugs, who
would then join. A general purge of those elements was proceeding, and
Mark Clark was up there to be checked out. If you google "Mark Clark"
you should find a web site concerning him. He had been a leader of the
Peoria NAACP.

Carrol

SA wrote:
> 
> Carrol Cox wrote:
> 
> > Let's have some context.
> >
> That's an interesting story - I always like hearing those stories - and
> I withdraw my Weathermen crack.
> 
> SA
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