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What you want to say – 27 February 2019 February 27, 2019

Posted by WorldbyStorm in Uncategorized.
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As always, following on Dr. X’s suggestion, it’s all yours, “announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose”, feel free.

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1. Starkadder - February 27, 2019

Does anyone have a list of good studies from a left-wing perspective
that analyse and criticise racism ?

Off-hand, I can think of:

“Mistaken Identity Race and Class in the Age of Trump” by
Asad Haider, which is a good analysis of the black radical tradition of
the 1960s and how it can be used to build solidarity today;

“Racecraft :The Soul of Inequality in American Life” by Karen E. Fields and Barbara J. Fields is a book I’ve heard good things about. Anyone
others?

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Michael Carley - February 27, 2019

David Roediger is good on the development of racism, especially the chapter on Irish Americans in The Wages Of Whiteness.

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CL - February 27, 2019

“Theodore W. Allen’s classic book: The Invention the White Race: Volume I Racial Oppression and Social Control and Volume II: The Origins of Racial Oppression in Anglo-America.”
https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/04/06/pawns-no-more/

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Starkadder - February 27, 2019

The Allen book sounds fascinating (and indeed is cited in the
Haider book).

“Staying Power: The History of Black People in Britain” by Peter Fryer has much information on anti-slavery and anti-racist movements in Britain.

Also, although the writer was not a leftist, I am fond of
“Nationalism” by Rabindranath Tagore, which contains acerbic attacks on imperialism, racism and caste prejudice.

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2. Tomboktu - February 28, 2019

Any reports of scandal or rioutous behaviour from the pub meeting this evening? Has the revolution been planned?

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Michael Carley - February 28, 2019

Revolution postponed: revolutionaries sleeping off planning meeting.

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WorldbyStorm - February 28, 2019

It was very good, old and new faces and great to meet them all and thanks to all who came along. Possible next one early Summer?

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lcox - February 28, 2019

Lovely evening all round!

As far as planning the revolution it might be a case of “As soon as this pub closes…”

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Bernadette Barrington - February 28, 2019

‘Possible next one early Summer?’ Post-electoral outcome, it’s dah best idea!

Or maybe walks and talks in the Autumn.

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Joe - February 28, 2019

Great evening. Sorry I had to go early. Great suggestion from BB. Solvitur ambulando – it is solved by walking. I reckon if the comrades present last night all walked together up and down Dollymount strand, left unity would be within our grasp (across the channel in Howth, maybe).

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WorldbyStorm - February 28, 2019

Post-electoral outcome – definitely! That’s a great idea. And walks and talks, that’d be something to expand upon. I think people would be well into that.

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3. Paddy Healy - February 28, 2019

Seamus Healy TD Speaking on Brexit Bills in Dáil Full Speechhttps://wp.me/pKzXa-tz
The problems now arising due to Brexit are consequences of the failure to create a united and sovereign 32-county Ireland. The danger to Irish people of allowing part of the island of Ireland to remain under British sovereignty now and in the future could not be clearer…. The 1916 leaders were right. We should ensure that a 32-county sovereign Republic is built and we should set our sights on that from now on.
The imposition of a hard border by Britain, the EU or the Government will be met by mass mobilisation. Hardening of the Border will simply not be accepted. I also believe that Britain should be told that there will be no dumping of radioactive waste on the island of Ireland. It appears that the UK Government has earmarked a site near Newry .
There is nothing, in this legislation to protect living standards. Those living on State pensions and other social welfare payments, as well as low-paid workers, would be very badly hit in that situation. People in those categories spend almost their entire income on everyday purchases, including food. Price rises will have to be matched, at a minimum, with increases in pay and welfare payments. The minimum wage must be sharply increased. This legislation, omitting such provisions, demonstrates to me that this Government has a continuing bias towards the wealthy in our society.

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Jolly Red Giant - February 28, 2019

Tell me Paddy – was it by accident, or on purpose, that the word ‘socialist’ seems to be missing from the ‘united and sovereign 32-county Ireland’?

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4. CL - February 28, 2019

‘The Good Friday Agreement of April 1998 succeeded where Home Rule failed: a living truce, if not a complete peace, enabling those who could barely share the same room to countenance sharing a government. It not only parked the imperatives of victimhood and paranoia; it actually pacified a war that stretched back all the way to the Tudor colonisation….
all that is imperilled by the magical thinking that somehow Brexit Britain can have, simultaneously, a borderless Ireland; and the maintenance of Northern Ireland within a United Kingdom cut away from the single market and customs union that was the sustaining condition of the agreement….
the very rhapsodies of “independence” that sustain the Brexit crusade harden into the rock of resistance on the other side of the Irish Sea ..”-Simon Schama
https://www.ft.com/content/68c8efa8-39df-11e9-b72b-2c7f526ca5d0

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5. Jim Monaghan - March 1, 2019
Gavin - March 3, 2019
6. GW - March 1, 2019
The Stormy Petrel - March 1, 2019

And look at many of the responses; today’s Facebook left- not a notion about history and like flies around shite when it comes to conspiracies

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WorldbyStorm - March 1, 2019

I would love to know what the dynamic behind that you point to Stormy Petrel is. It’s very true what you say.

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kestrel - March 1, 2019

Am I wrong in saying that in late 19th/early 20th century, many academic people, of all backgrounds, among which were some jewish people, in Germany, were pro-communism. could this be even a more a reason why they were targeted. dunno.
but I do know that security industry now with their ‘paperless office’ command centres, with their integrated ‘computers that “talk” to each other’, are the troops of pure capitalism. paid by the wealthy to control all people possible.

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Daniel Rayner O'Connor - March 2, 2019

While the Anti-Semites used the post-1917 Communist threat as an extra-justification to ‘get ridda the Yids’ (c.O.Mosley), they concentrated more on the pure and simple race factor. (The old religious crucifixion thing coloured their positions, but was felt to be inadequate for most of them; those who claimed to be Christians would argue that Jesus was not Jewish.) The religious argument was mixed in with a conspiracy myth based on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, themselves based on an attempt to prove Napoleon III was Anti-Christ.

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Daniel Rayner O'Connor - March 2, 2019

Actually, the communist scare was used by Anti-Semites as an extra justification of their positions, the core of which lay in pure racism. (The original religious excuse for anti-Semitism, the allegedly Jewish responsibility for the crucifixion, was downgraded for the newer, more ‘scientific’ excuse.) Though the Jews were blamed for Communism, the social ‘theory’ of Anti-Semitism linked them simultaneously to finance capital.
But all this was of minor importance, the dedicated anti-semite was prepared to beat up any Jew, regardless of class or politics, or, indeed, in the case of the assimilated converts, religion.

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Alibaba - March 2, 2019

The Momentum video makes a forceful argument against anti-Semitism. But I wonder is it confusing anti-Zionist sentiment with anti-Semitism when it is said the term “Zionist ” can be used as “a code for Jews who control things”?

Criticising the political ideology of Zionists is not anti-Semitic. The historic supporters of a Jewish nation sold Zionism to Jews on the basis of a lie: that they would be moving to “a land without a people, for a people without a land”. Their insistence of the right of the Jewish people to establish sovereignty in their ancient homeland was used to trample on the rights of the local population who had lived there for more than a thousand years. Driving Palestinians from their lands was and remains ethnic cleansing, as well as the continual denial of their basic rights.

It would seem any criticism of Israel is classified anti-Semitic. We must unreservedly oppose anti-Semitism while also opposing those Israelis that aggressively defend their privileged status over Palestinians on the basis of their religion. That’s why we should “call it out”.

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kestrel - March 2, 2019

@dro’c. prob. it was out of simplicity, that those people said that Jesus was not jewish. After all, he was called “a’ king of the Jews, and, far as I understand it, ‘king’ may have been a Hellinistic and thus, democratic approach in civic society?; and quite opposed to the Judaen referral to high priests (was that the Pharisees?).

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Daniel Rayner O'Connor - March 2, 2019

Frankly bums like the Nazi ideologist Rosenberg were not simple when they said Jesus was not Jewish, tho’ no doubt many of those who believed them were.
As for Jesus’ royal title being ‘hellenic’, there may have been some idea of synthesising this in the minds of those who proclaimed him, but the prevailing concept with which it was to be synthesised was that he was the rightful heir to the throne of Israel once occupied by Saul, David & Solomon. (See Matthew 1).

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GW - March 4, 2019

It’s very complex kestrel.

Because Jews were excluded from many ways of earning a living for so long, especially state employment, those who had the resources placed a high emphasis on education. As a result the number of teachers, academics etc. after they were allowed into teaching jobs could be disproportionately Jewish. And tended disproportionately to become socialist activists, or generally to espouse socialist / humanist values.

However one of the misconceptions is of Jews being more middle class as a consequence of education: there was a huge poor Jewish working class (disproportionately ‘Ost-Jüde’: people recently fled from the pogroms of Eastern Europe to Western Europe) living in extremely precarious conditions. I don’t know whether they themselves were disproportionately involved in the working class socialist movements.

There was certainly class and West- versus Ost-Jüde tensions within Jews in Western Europe at the end of nineteenth century and the beginning of the 20th.

The resentment of first-generation “up from the country” non-Jews of Jewish academic achievements was certainly a factor in the poisonous brew of antisemitism.

The historian Götz Aly is particularly good on this.

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GW - March 4, 2019

Phil X has one of the best nuanced of anti-semitism and the British left here.

The problem is partly with those (self-identifying) leftists who mistake ‘New World Order’ type conspiracy theorists for some kind of ally.

They aren’t and neither are the ‘reconnect with the white working class’, ‘give a little on anti-immigration’ or ‘return to the nation’ left.

And people should define what they mean by Zionism before they go on about it.

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7. CL - March 2, 2019

From time to time there has been some controversy on this site about Stalinism, mostly making historical references. But Stalinism hasn’t gone away you know.
Renowned academic Dr. Sebastian Gorka, at the Conservative Political Action Conference, (CPAC) taking place this week in Washington, D.C. “warned that progressives are seeking to “take away your hamburgers,” and that this represented Stalinism in its purest form.”
https://news.yahoo.com/aoc-supplants-clinton-and-pelosi-as-conservatives-greatest-foe-191424885.html

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/sebastian-gorka-ocasio-cortez-green-new-deal-cpac_n_5c78657ee4b087c2f294a61f

President Trump, known to enjoy a hamburger or three, will address CPAC, on Saturday. It will be interesting to see if the Commander-in-Chief addresses directly the Stalinist threat to his favourite food.

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8. Paddy Healy - March 2, 2019

Torture of Returned Refugees in Libyan Detention Camps https://wp.me/pKzXa-Ut
Ireland shares responsibility due to Europe’s joint actions to strengthen the capacity of the Libyan coastguard to intercept people and return them to Libya-Amnesty International (Ireland)
Migrants returned by EU tortured in Libya Philip Willan, Rome March 1 2019, The Times
Hundreds of migrants have been returned to Libya since the right-wing coalition government took over in Italy
The European Union has been accused of complicity in torture in Libya after horrific new images of violence in migrant detention centres were broadcast on British television.

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9. Starkadder - March 2, 2019

Absolutely shameful. Sean O’Grady of the UK Independent says
Salman Rushdie’s “The Satanic Verses” should ” banned under today’s anti-hate legislation. It’s no better than racist graffiti on a bus stop.”

Remember when liberals and socialists used to oppose banning
things , instead of supporting them?

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10. Joe - March 2, 2019

Local election news from Cabra Glasnevin. Two candidates held launches last night. Micheál Kelliher, a young beardy, for Independents for Change held his launch in my local with speakers Maureen O’ Sullivan and Lynn Ruane. Launch followed by quiz.
And Sean McCabe (could have that name wrong, if so I’ll fix it later), independent, launched his in a pub in Phibsboro. Launch followed by quiz. His slogan is ‘Focus on Phisborough’ which will go down really well with voters in Phibsboro but perhaps not so well in Cabra and Glasnevin where the vast majority of the voters live :).

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11. EWI - March 3, 2019

Inside Raheem Kassam’s ‘Transatlantic Right Wing Spring Fling

[…]

Guests were greeted by cardboard cut-outs of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jussie Smollett. There were other political figures from the wacky world of transatlantic conservatism. Representatives of the Irish anti-EU ‘Irexit’ movement were there as well Georgia Melloni from the Brothers of Italy party.

https://spectator.us/raheem-kassam-cpac-rager/

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WorldbyStorm - March 3, 2019

‘movement’ eh?

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12. Starkadder - March 3, 2019

If I may take a detour into pop culture, “Leaving Neverland”, the
documentary where two of the late Michael Jackson’s friends accuse
him of repeated sexual abuse-is due to air on Channel 4 soon.

I have not seen “Leaving Neverland”, and do not know if Mr. Jackson
was guilty or not guilty of the horrific crimes the documentary accuses
him of. But perhaps a word of caution might be in order, if this review
of “Leaving Neverland” is accurate:

https://ew.com/tv-reviews/2019/02/21/leaving-neverland-review/amp/?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=social-share-article&__twitter_impression=true

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13. yourcousin - March 4, 2019

Glad to see the SDLP/FF partnership working so well beyond just putting a boot into SF.

🤣

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-foyle-west-47445933

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14. Joe - March 4, 2019

Elections activity building here in Dublin. Posters going up again advertising all kinds of public meetings – with candidates and prospective candidates.
Interesting to see a younger generation of candidates emerging in the locals.
And the line-up of candidates in Dublin for the Euros – worth noting that FF, FG, Lab are so far light on female names.

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Joe - March 5, 2019

Oops. Frances Fitzgerald.

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15. CL - March 5, 2019

“Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, …Because she questions our habits of fossil-fuel consumption and industrial agriculture, her opponents reason, she can’t possibly be trying to head off global catastrophe. She just wants to steal your Chevy Colorado and your Big Mac….
Moderation, to say nothing of science denial on the right, has certainly done far too little to head off the catastrophic effects promised by climate change in our time. …
But what has the Republican Party offered, other than a phony restitution of a coal economy and a withdrawal from the Paris climate accord?…
it’s to her credit that, in such a short time, she has helped change the terms of the debate….
“I can see Trump being enormously upset that a twenty-nine-year-old Latina, who is the daughter of a domestic worker, is helping to build the case to get his financial records….”
https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-is-coming-for-your-hamburgers

““I guess WSJ Editorial Page takes pride in their ignorance of our nation’s history of slavery, Jim Crow, & mass incarceration; willful doubt on the decades of science on climate change; targeting of indigenous peoples, and the classist, punitive agenda targeting working families.”
Ocasio-Cortez hit the bigoted nail on the head with that.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/02/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-republicans-ignorance

“Joe Crowley, the ex-congressman and former Queens Democratic leader who just landed a job at a powerhouse DC lobbying firm, is holding a St. Patrick’s Day campaign fundraiser March 9 as if he’s running for another office….
Tickets to the March 9 Crowley fundraiser at the Globe Tavern in Sunnyside, Queens, are going for $40 to $250….
The Transport Workers Union donated $25,000, the largest contribution.”
https://nypost.com/2019/02/28/former-rep-joe-crowley-is-still-fundraising-even-after-becoming-a-lobbyist/

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WorldbyStorm - March 5, 2019

One of the most entertaining and educative things about AOC is how she points up how little serious challenge those on the right/Republican side have had from Democrats in the past – the arguments they’re putting out against her approaches are the kind of bar-stool stuff many of us would have heard during the 80s and 90s any time any even somewhat left of centre approaches were aired. Her forensic voice is certainly generating a response and showing up much of the previous criticism of her as misplaced.

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CL - March 5, 2019

Its no longer business as usual, so the right wing is out to destroy her.
An interesting piece by Jane Mayer on how Fox News is the propaganda wing of the Trump regime.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/03/11/the-making-of-the-fox-news-white-house

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GW - March 5, 2019

I found this interview with Brad DeLong fascinating.

He maintains that, politically, Clinton Democrats no longer have a ‘centrist’ Republican side of the house to collaborate with. Therefore they’re better off working with the new democratic socialists in the party.

Shows what a genuine commitment to the ‘democratic’ in democratic socialism might achieve in terms of building hegemony.

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CL - March 5, 2019

Interesting, yes.
A neoliberal, de Long, admitting that he’s a neoliberal, that too is somewhat unusual.

” How would you describe the conditions that have pushed you toward a more-left oriented position than you had before?

I’d say we learned more about the world….
The world appears to be more like what lefties thought it was than what I thought it was for the last 10 or 15 years.”-Brad DeLong

Of course, neoliberals will never admit that they are greatly to blame for the conditions that have given rise to the extreme right; that being a large part of the problem they cannot be the solution.

The neoliberals havn’t gone away. But with the social democratic push of Sanders and AOC et al, they are now more tentative in their extreme centrist position.

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