----- Original Message ----- From: "Wojtek S" <wsoko52 at gmail.com>
[WS:] The last time I checked, radical leftists aiming to wipe out the capitalist state got themselves wiped out by the fascist reaction (cf. Spain and Italy), whereas moderate socialists and social democrats aiming to gain concessions from capitalists achieved a remarkably long lasting, if moderate, institutional successes (e.g. the Scandinavian welfare state - which certainly is not chopped liver.) I understand that bread and butter for the proles are beneath the concern of academic purists or self-styled radicals who do not have to earn their own living - but at least let's be honest about the outcomes, whatever their ideological value.
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This is disingenuous at best. The welfare state rose in the shadow of the Soviet Union and upon the rubble of (temporarily) defeated fascism, and now that the threat of communism is gone, they are dismantling it as fast as they can, everywhere.
Joanna