Photos of vandalism at the artwork for the Abraham Lincoln Brigade

This "Action" seems designed to instigate distention between politicized progressive groups. The sacrifice in the "premature" fight against fascism is not tarnished by the ultimate betrayal of the collectives by the Soviet. The anti-Franco people, native and foreign volunteer alike were lending a shoulder to the struggle. The political manipulations at higher levels are well documented and were not clearly understood in the front lines. Yes the Soviets betrayed the peoples struggle. Flaming the monument is a weak and off target effort reminiscent of Counterintelpro or Mikey Sabage. Check on the dinky dong website of the "Protest Worriers" Sorry "Warriors" to see whether those Lighmbaughtimized loonies have claimed credit yet (they have verbal diarrhea...)

First off, who's "Durriti"? His name was DURRUTI. Careless misspellings are a sure sign of false flag operations, aren't they?

Second, Stalinists are the enemies of all autonomous working class tendencies and movements, and they know it. The rank and file knew it in the 1930s, and their heirs know it today. All moments of working class self-organization are targeted for co-opting into the CP or its various (popular) front groups, or destroyed. Rank and file party cadre are instrumental in diverting the move for self-organization into the disciplined avenues laid out by the party hierarchs. That you tepid self-described progressives don't understand how Stalinists (and a host of other Leninists) operate is to your detriment; some of the rest of us know that the involvement of rank and file party members in anything but an individual capacity (if such a thing is even possible in the fist place) is the kiss of death to any kind of autonomy, self-organization, and individual initiative.

Eli, if you really believe that Stalinists, Trots, Maoists, and any other Leninists are the potential allies of those of us not interested in Party Communism, then you need to read some history of how those folks (hierarchs and rank and filers both) actually interacted with anarchists and other autonomous non-Party communists. I'll give you a hint: it was a homicidal relationship. They kill us whenever they can. Oh yeah, but they're still our potential allies, right? Fuck you.

This is shameful. Self-involved, historically myopic and gross.

No one should blame anarchists for the shitty, freelance cointelpro activity here documented. No anarchist group or individual will go on record supporting this. It looks like some right-wing creep pretending to be an anarchist to provoke sectarian nonsense.

It won't work. Socialists, anarchists and communists – along with all freedom loving people won't buy these dirty tricks any more.

The scum who did this tried to brag on NYC Indymedia – not one person or group has supported it there either.

http://nyc.indymedia.org/en/2008/07/98727.html

There are no more protest warriors in the bay area- even they realized the war was a big mistake.

I'm surprised they didn't paint HELTER SKELTER all over the monument. Some disease.

My grandmother was a part of the anti-fascist resistance, a social democrat or Pink as she says. No doubt these dubious anarchists would support killing her too, because she doesn't buy their fanatical hatred of anyone who isn't a PURE REAL ANARCHIST!!!!!

This stuff impresses nobody. It's adolescent and hateful, and a real distortion of what happened in Spain and throughout the war.

Kevin Keating is a long-time Bay Area lunatic who confuses his own dementia for a political analysis. According to a post on libcom.org, Keating has been complaining about this memorial for a long time:

http://libcom.org/forums/history/popular-front-spanish-civil-war-be-commemorated-san-francisco

My suggestion? Treat Keating to the same paint job he dished out. Paint "Long Live Durruti and Orwell" across his face, and let him wash his own shame off.

Keating is universally reviled by anyone who is involved with anti-authoritarian movements as an anti-social jerkoff. Don't blame anarchists for this one, comrades, the cat is out of the bag.

I doubt the deft and witty revolutionaries who did this were out to win a popularity contest with a bunch of losers like the ones posting most of the stuff on this thread.

Orwell and Durruti rock -- drop dead, Stalinophiles.

The problem with this type of vandalism (and a lot of the vandalism recently in santa cruz) isn't that it violates some sort of moral code or that it is "illegal", it's that tactically and strategically it makes no sense.

The first problem is the choice of target. With war profiteers offices all over downtown, army recruitment offices, police stations, corporate fast food chains, banks, etc, etc, you choose a memorial to paint? And you choose to paint over a memorial to people fighting fascism? As other posters have already said, the people that choose to go fight fascism weren't necessarily aligning themselves either with the anarchists or the stalinists, they just understood that there needed to be resistance.

The second problem is the choice of tactics. While spraying graffiti on a wall or memorial might be fun and could even get your heart racing a bit, actually thinking that it will affect society is a bit foolish. The problem with the anarchist movement in North America is that almost all of it's activity tends to be focused on spectacular actions, ones which look good on footage and in front of cameras, but that the movement refuses to do any concrete organizing and do the 'dirty work' of building a revolutionary/insurrectionary movement (i.e., organizing meetings/councils, organzing your neighborhood, creating parallel structures to the current oppressive ones).

Hopefully all of the excitement that went into doing this action can be channeled into more productive anarchist organizing.

-an optimistic anarchist

p.s. - anarchists are nonheirarchical, and working with stalinists/trotskyists/etc would be hypocritical.

The ALB was stop lossed for six months, even though they were told they would be serving for a year.

I don't think anyone is dying to work with the misanthropes of the Kevin Keating variety. If you think working with people who don't share your hyper-particular ideology is bad, then fine. Associate with the circle of people who think like you.

All this "stalinist" talk is just right-wing, dehumanized rhetoric dressed up in anarchist drag. It's David Horowitz pre-conversion. We've seen it, we can smell it a mile away.

I'll work with anyone for democratic rights.

I am a socialist. I've never met or heard of anyone, ever, who calls themselves a Stalinist. That's right-wing bullshit talk for anyone who believes in food stamps or free education or taxing rich people.

This is demented. I'm not really into the state, but politics are a fact and recognizing that doesn't make me responsible for the loss in Spain. I would have fought, just like the Abraham Lincoln Brigades fought. So would 99% of the people who read Indybay. It was a political fight to get recognition for these heroes, and it takes a real jerk not to understand the history of these veterans and what they had to endure even after making it back from the fields of Spain. Blacklisting, prison for some and exile for others. All while being called "Stalinists" for defending democracy.

I've worked side-by-side with people who called themselves anarchists as long as I've been politically active. Some were great, others self-involved permanent adolescents. The philosophy never made any sense to me but I don't judge those who have it. However, not one of them would ever do something as reactionary and self-involved as this.

I remember and respect the Abraham Lincoln Brigades. We should all respect those who fought fascists and refuse to use the very terms fascists invented to de-legitimize the political fight for social equality. Nobody is attacking anarchists, and all this talk of "slaughter" makes it really seem like this person is a deranged sociopath with a library card and hateful bloodlust in his heart. You're not doing anyone any favors.

In fact, go to Spain and see how the International Brigades are respected and admired. I have.

"I doubt the deft and witty revolutionaries who did this were out to win a popularity contest with a bunch of losers like the ones posting most of the stuff on this thread."

Deft and witty?

Methinks you are talking about yourself. Kevin, get help. You're going to end up hurting yourself.

I just wanted to say that I’m not an anarchist, and I apologies if from what I wrote it seems that I am one.

I still think that the action does not make sense and that it hurts the Anarchist movement more then anyone. I also think that people from different political background can unite and work together on different issues, and most importantly define the real enemy.

Mike writes: <i> if you really believe that Stalinists, Trots, Maoists, and any other Leninists are the potential allies of those of us not interested in Party Communism, then you need to read some history of how those folks (hierarchs and rank and filers both) actually interacted with anarchists and other autonomous non-Party communists. I'll give you a hint: it was a homicidal relationship. They kill us whenever they can. Oh yeah, but they're still our potential allies, right? Fuck you.</i>

When Emma Goldman was deported from this country, she was received as an honored guest in the Soviet Union, then in the period of intense turmoil and civil war. She was employed, and could travel and speak at liberty. Eventually she did not want to be associated with the revolution, and did not support the Bolshevik seizure of power. Then she left, which she was free to do.

Huh. Then again, Prince Peter Kropotkin himself died of old age. At his funeral, the anarchist political prisoners were literally released from their incarceration to attend the funeral. 10,000 marched. Kropotkin was buried as a hero in Soviet Russia.

History is not so simple.

The times in which we live <i>today</i> demand the best of us.

San Francisco's contemporary sculptural panegeric to the Stalinist big lie about the Spanish Civil War is built for authentic anti-capitalist commentary.

Anyone who hates capitalism and the murderous service provided to capital by global Stalinism in the 20th century should jump in with paint or other communications tools and continue the process of nailing this despicable monument to counter-revolution, imperialist war, police terror and mass murder.

Three cheers for Durruti and Orwell! And double that for anarchist workers who killed Stalinists during the May Days of 1937!

And for all the grossly historically ignorant ones posting here, try to expand your historical consciousness; you have plenty of room for growth. Go read "Homage to Catalonia" and "Between the Bullet and the Lie." Read about members of the International Brigades who were murdered by the secret police of the International brigades, and the International Brigades torture center and charnel house for dissident IB's in Albicete.

Is the "wingnut" weenie a certain former IWW "organizer" of soiled hanky picker-uppers at a certain South of Market meat-rack bar?

I try to imagine a better world in how you interact with the crappy one we've got – and I don't see it. This is sterile. You are out of time, not only anti-socialist – but downright anti-social.

Paul Robeson's statement on the memorial:

"The artist must take sides. He must elect to fight for freedom or for slavery. I have made my choice. I had no alternative."

Just so nobody is confused, this is from the monument that was defaced. This was the message and spirit condemned. This is what it was built to say.

Is this a lie? Is this sentiment a lie?

What are you about?

All movements have equally fucked up members doing pretty much equally fucked up things.

Any movement that claims to have some more moral highground has probably never been in a position to really assert itself. Anarchism is in some ways a contradiction. As a real political ideology it is perhaps a variant of socialism mixed with a bit of modern conservative libertarian views around the edges. As an anti-ideology it benefits from tautology and the hall or mirror one can get when one uses the socratic method with no real beliefs of ones own (reducing all other movements to their worst elements and when their labels were used in the worst possible contexts).

The USSR would have been horrible to have lived in and did exist only two decades ago but it has very little real relation to Communists in the US today no matter how much both Communists and Anarchists wish to believe otherwise. The Spanish Civil war is of interest to those in such movements for the same reaso the Civil War is of interest to Civil War buffs or ousting of is interest to those in the SCA. The current struggles are real and good and all but the ideology is an anarchonistic overlay with the sectarian conflicts being akin to Star Trek fans slashing the tires of Star Gate fans at a Sci Fi convention.

There is a real world out there with bosses abusing workers, countries invading and killing those in other countries, police shooting people, global warming, ethnic cleansing and the like. Walk down the street and talk to a homeless person and see if your conflicts with each other mean anything to them (it might but if one side in your conflict disappeared their lives would still not be impacted).

Robeson was a stone Stalinist hack -- check out his bloviations on behalf of the results of the Moscow Trials.

But then you probably don't know what "Moscow Trials" refers to, do you.

You well-meaning souls need to lay off the Xanax. Try reading a book instead.

Hooray for Orwell and Durruti.

First off, my name is Miles, not "Mike." You imply that the anarchists who were let out of prison to attend Kropotkin's funeral were not put back into prison right after, but they were. Right after, where most of them continued to be tortured and killed by the Leninist political police.

Second, Paul Robeson, a non-party member, was as fanatical about suppressing "Trotskyites" as anyone who was a member of the CPUSA, also supporting the various acts of Moscow in the '50s (suppression of the East Berlin workers, invasion of Hungary, etc). People who supported the policies of the Comintern from 1926-1942 were de facto Stalinists, constantly harping on the brilliance of the Glorious General Secretary of the Party. Remember that thing called Cult of Personality? Right-wingers didn't invent that analytical category. Anyone who fawned over the achievements of Stalin as an individual and as Party Secretary was a Stalinist; anyone who uncritically supported the twists and turns of Comintern and later Moscow's policies was a Stalinist. Anyone who currently supports any of the domestic and foreign policies of Moscow from 1924-1956 is a Stalinist. Ask your Leftist pals whether or not the Soviet invasion of Hungary in October 1956 was justified; ask them whether or not the suppression of the self-organized striking workers in East Berlin in 1953 was justified.

People who supported all that shit called themselves "progressives," and said they were fighting for "democratic rights" or some other sub-bourgeois bullshit. You can fight for democratic rights all you want, but you'll never be an anarchist or an authentic anti-state/anti-capitalist revolutionary. Democracy means the state, and progress means the continued domination of machines over people.

Not everyone who hates authoritarian leftism is a right winger.

And finally, the authors of the short blurb claiming responsibility for the act of artistic enhancement NEVER claimed to be anarchists. Go cry on somebody else's shoulder you creeps.

You guys destroyed everything vital about anti-authoritarianism as a coherent movement after Seattle. Dipshit scenesters and nutso anti-leftists. Look around you and see where you are.

If anything, the Abraham Lincoln Brigades show that the American Party Line of "communism = Stalinism" is stupid propaganda for simple minds. I think this is police activity or it might as well be.

The Bridages fought fascism, fought Franco and Hitler and received arms from the Soviet Union. The communists were the only ones who organized support for the Spanish Republic and that's just a fact.

So blow it out your ass. Nobody will sign their name to this action, you hide behind the name "anarchist" like it means anything more than the hateful words you preach.

I honor the men who fought in Spain, and I honor the communists of that time who put fact to the promise of international brotherhood instead of nationalism, fear and hate. Not one anarchist group will go on record supporting these kinds of sectarian habits because people are better than this, bother to read history beyond anarchist glory tracts and really want to fight this government not the ghosts in their head.

Sign your name. Or be considered a cointelpro pig.

Haha, yeah, Yeah, your individual anecdote about Emma Goldman being allowed into the soviet union sure disproves everything the stalinists ever did against the anarchists. Or maybe not. Its all in your head kids, nothing to see here, everything was good, and everything is good now. Lets forget our history and fight together again. No. Never again. We have nothing in common. We fight for the end of capitalism. You fight for your partys managment of capitalism. Your fight is not ours. You are our enemy.

Typical fake anarchism. Act out historical dramas and identity games in self-righteous frenzy. You are the disease.

Will this "anarchist" be attacking the state? Bet not, that involves real risk and a real fight. No, instead this jerkoff replays cardboard theatrics of 70-year old fights and right-wing histrionics that make socialism the crime of the century.

Why don't you just skip the whole anarchist thing and go right to the fascist stage that's just brewing inside your murder fantasies?

I think you want to be hated, because you hate people, and when you are disdained for the authoritarian games you play in attacking people and spreading defensiveness and misery – you think yourself all the better for not being one of the stupid masses. So tiresome. I'd think this was a 15-year old confused, but I suspect its a freak who goes back and forth between Debord's wanking and Orwell's propaganda and thinks he really knows something.

Oh, another fact: this was done by a man with a major stick up his ass. For some reason, women are never prone to this kind of jeroff stuff.

First, let get things straight. The ALB were not “premature anti-fascists.” This is a myth concocted by members of the ALB:

http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/antifascism-klehrhaynes-1913

They were actually de-facto “pro-fascists” while Stalin and Hitler had their non-alignment pact. Stalin was not anti-fascist until after Nazi forces invaded the USSR. Prior to that moment the greatest enemy (according to the Stalinists) was liberalism and social democracy or “social fascism” in COMINTERN speak.

Second, it’s a shame Bay Area anarchists engage in these sorts of meaningless symbolic actions while, at the same time, failing to confront the Stalinists in the streets. Where are the Carlo Trescas of today?

Third, why is vandalism so readily dismissed as “COINTELPRO” activity. It might be juvenile but many militants are juvenile.

“I would have fought, just like the Abraham Lincoln Brigades fought. So would 99% of the people who read Indybay.”

Yes, but there were more brigades than the ALB or other “International Brigades” controlled by the USSR. Most anarchists/libertarian socialists did not serve with the Stalinist International Brigades. For example the POUM and CNT-FAI had their own militias.

All of this information is well documented in the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives (ALBA) at NYU. One incredibly valuable resource is the microfilmed records of the International Brigades that were taken to the Soviet Union after the Spanish Civil War. These records list eye/hair color, etc. as well as political affiliation, was the volunteer a communist, a "good party member," etc.

The ALB were volunteers for socialist totalitarianism.

If this effort was "juvenile' why do the Stalinist zeros shit themselves so enthusiastically over it? This sounds like Lenin calling authentic revolutionaries an "infantile disorder." The message has clearly struck an intended nerve.

Stalinism is counter-revolutionary, just like fascism and parliamentary democracy. Stalinists were and are the enemy in any credible revolutionary struggle. Authentic revolutionary struggles,like in Spain in the 1930's, show that no quarter can be offer to the politics of capital, in this case in a fake left-wing form.

"You fight for your partys managment of capitalism. Your fight is not ours. You are our enemy."

If you say so, but who is this royal "we" you speak on behalf of? And what world do you live in where me (or whoever) is fighting for "my party's management of capital?" I guess you're the type of anarchist who thinks the FDA and OSHA are authoritarian plots.

But I'll take you're word for it that we're enemies. What's you name, and I'll make sure to not try and cooperate or anything. Oh, that's right. You're a coward looking to stoke attacks between opponents of the REAL government and the REAL state... in other words you are a pig or so deranged you might as well be.

Stupid cointelpro tricks don't work anymore. No one will think this action represents anarchists. Your hateful rhetoric shows you for what you are.

"First, let get things straight. The ALB were not “premature anti-fascists.” This is a myth concocted by members of the ALB: http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/antifascism-klehrhaynes-1913"

Sure, just keep in mind that the New Criterion is one of the main Neocon cultural journals, written and edited specifically to enforce a hard right-wing agenda and force communists, socialists and anyone who threatened US imperialism out of public life. Their whole argument, which this Horowitzian anarchist has bought hood-line-and-sinker is that any progressive agenda is a really a mask for "totalitarianism" and so on.

In other words, this kind of ideological bullying is exactly what Stalinism looks like, though in this case it wears an anarcho-liberal veneer.

Some people fight fascists, others, well – their actions speak plainly enough.

Visit this memorial and read the words on it. Then get back to me about "Stalinism". It seems this person thinks everyone on earth is an enemy. Put another way, I'd like to hear about what they are doing to bring this "real" and "authentic" revolution into being....

...but we won't hear jack about that because this is cop/cointelpro behavior.

Aww, did i destroy your attempt to smooth over history and create a artificial "unity" between people who have nothing in common? My bad.

I live in the real world, thank you very much. And if you actually believe all your own lies, you live in revisionist world, equal to the nazis denying the holocaust.

You guys are so deluded, so cornered, that you are forced to believe your own deluded fantasies about the stalinist movement and the horrible consequences it has brought to this world. Noooo, its all rightwing, mchartyist propaganda! As if nohting has happened since then. As if nothing exists outside stalinism, and everyone who criticise them are rightwing provocateurs. As if criticism of stalinism has its base in the reactionary society of the fifthies!

Who is being devisive here.

They kicked your monkey asses.

Anyone who thinks the people who fought Franco betrayed the anarchists is missing something important. This guy is just like those "anarchits" – and that's why they were supressed. The anarchists were totally disorganized, narrow, localist and stupid. They demanded guns from the Soviet Union, which they got – and they still cry about it.

Spain was the best the anarchits ever had it, and they acted like this fool, attacked their allies and ended up sabotaging the anti-fascist war so that Franco won.

Fucking idiots. The one good news is that they always, always, always lose. That's all they do. Anarchism is being a loser and then blaming the winners for your own pathetic existence.

No communist in the USA has done anything to stop anarchists. But they still run around crying persecution. It's a mental disorder. They attack, they defame, and then have the nerve to act like they are victims.

There's no such thing as an anarchist movement. This is the proof.

Yeah, the anarchists sabotaged the stalinists attempt to save democracy and capitalism from the big bad communist revolution. How bad of them. Doesnt this belief once and for all demonstrate the reactionary nature of these tendencies? Doesnt that say it all about their goals and aspirations? I think so.

Very creative way of describing the events from burningman by the way. This is what the stalinists are best at: re-inventing history. This is another great example of this.

And ofcourse anyone who doesnt buy the stalinist party-line is now a insane. First we were rightwinger, cointepro. But when that doesnt work they use the old accusation of insanity. Anything to discredit the messanger from what s/he is saying. Can you smell the panic, folks?

Reducing every progressive cause in the 20th century to "stalinism" is exactly the trick that the far-right enforced in America when it fired every communist teacher, artist, worker, unionist who wouldn't become a snitch... like Orwell.

The idea that Stalinists run San Francisco is hilarious. The cowardice of these fake anarchists is plain.

Fight the state or shut the fuck up.

Most people in the real world (outside of your stalinist sects) consider your "great wins" as terrible, horrendous losses. Thats why the workingclass is in the sad state that it is right now. Thanks alot, jerkoffs.

In the Spanish Civil War, as in many other places, there was no qualitative difference between the Stalinists and fascists. They were murderous enemies of the revolutionary movement, and they had to be violently destroyed.

here's a foot in your asses, Stalinist scum.

There's no foot in anybody's ass. You're a smack-talking fool and nobody is buying.

There was a difference between democracy and fascism in Spain.

There is a difference. If you don't get it, or you think there were millions of people there who thought like this, then you would be mistaken.

There was an election, the Social Democrats won, the fascist revolted, and a popular front united around a program of democracy was launched. It included anarchists and everyone. You can't change that fact.

You are also so obviously a white boy who can't tell the difference between the program of white supremacy that Hitler, Roosevelt and Churchill all agreed on... and the internationalism and brotherhood that the Abraham Lincoln Brigades fought for.

There's no argument – you are a coward who hides behind a flag, picking fights you can't back up. Nobody else wants to play so you threaten murder. Knock yourself out. There are no "stalinists", and even if there were you're obviously afraid to fight anyone with actual power. That's why you don't go after the state or your boss or whatever.

Yellow bastard, fake anarchist. I smell cointelpro.

There you go again. You stalinists cant help but re-inventing history, can you? Creepy.

I've never met one, but apparently this obsessive-compulsive sociopath thinks they are everywhere.

Fight racism? Stalinist!

Stand up for a democracy in spain in the face of a fascist military coup? Stalinist!

Think people who disagree should still try to find common ground? Stalinist!

So the people who fight fascists are bad, because Stalinists are bad, but the kind of dope who spraypaints a memorial to people who sacrificed their lives fighting fascism in a volunteer army are the bad guys?

You are either a cop, a sociopath or a shut-in. You are a fake anarchist. You're cointelpro. You want people to get wrapped up in sick, hateful head trips.

Unity, brotherhood – and the good fight. I won't let the neo-con/Horowitz/fake anarchist dingbats confuse the issues, now or in history.

And seriously, George Orwell was a snitch who turned leftist intellectuals and writers over to British intelligence.

But I bet you already knew that and like him all the more. People who love snitching should sign their name so they are known for what they are.

But NOBODY has signed their name to support this attack. Not one person. Because nobody does support it and you are a coward who hides behind a flag. Chump.

Watch yourself. Just because your nuts doesn't mean your activities won't catch up with you. Word is out.

Advice: leave the city and keep your mouth shut for a while.

For those who don't know obscure ephemera of the Bay Area, Kevin Keating is an obsessive who attacks other people regularly... for years. He's a random fanatic and is liable to let his mouth overload his ass. Nobody important, lonely and kind of pathetic. Acts out to get attention. Not a teenager. Previously involved with advocacy of attacking "yuppies" who could be identified by possessing cell phones. He also sabotaged activist efforts around a proposed Muni fare strike.

Those who have dealt with him believe that he is also a police agent. Everywhere he's gone, he's been chased out under suspicion of collaboration with police.

Oh my god, you guys are starting to sound like a broken record. You know, you can repeat it as much as you like - it still wont be true. Funny how some stalinist poliruck like burningman says something, and then all you fools just repeat what he says over and over again. I guess the stalinists got a tighter grip on the leftist ghetto than even i thought.

Yawn, you are starting to bore me.

But its most likely just burningman and his friends writing all these posts to make it look like many diffrent people. That would be my guess actually.

...that maybe the points Burnigman makes are true? At least about this.

I get my orders from the International Communist Conspiracy.

"Pretend to fight fascists so you can make zine collectors use Microsoft products".

I must obey.

Hold your tongues for just one second (insert appropriate insult here)!

First and foremost, the people who vandalized the memorial to Stalinists (whether out and proud or dupes) have NEVER EVER claimed to be anarchists. So all the insults about "fake anarchist" this and "fake anarchist" that are plain stupid and DISHONEST. Get your insults straight.

Any time somebody does or says something an authoritarian leftist disapproves of, and who then cannot come up with any coherent argument about why it makes him cry, that steel-minded leftist will immediately cry "cointelpro!" Why? Because it ends all possibility of discussion (heated or polite). The authoritarian leftists know that authentic discussions will expose their duplicity, brutality, and dishonesty for all to see, so they shun it as if it were some medieval plague. Orwell knew this, and portrayed it quite well in "1984," which all aspiring authoritarian leftists should read in order to bone up on their manipulative bullshit.

The idea that anyone or anything could be positive for humanity and not be under their control makes them nuts, as can be seen from the tone of the so-called conversations here. You know who you are.

And a goofy footnote, for the real world activoid: why do you have such a hard-on for persons unknown to admit to a crime? Sounds like a cop tactic to me. Baiting persons unknown with the charge of cowardice in the hopes that a macho response/admission will be forthcoming. It won't, but keep banging on that tired drum if it makes you feel better. Why don't you sign your name to your posts? There's nothing either illegal OR dangerous in them, so what's your excuse?

If what you say has any credibility, why do you pull this cowardly stunts while hiding behind a fake name? If this guy is the bad news you make him out to be, show that you have the honesty and integrity to openly proclaim it. Stick up for what you believe in.

You won't because you are a cowardly worm and wannabe police snitch, and you prove it with this.

This was an attack on a monument to democracy, internationalism and anti-fascism. Kevin Keating most likely did this, and nobody really cares. But because it was such an awful thing to do, apologists will hide behind fake names and right-wing, McCarthyite propaganda to act like they did something brave.

Go fight the state. No, you won't. Because you are cowards and reactionaries.

Thousands of Americans volunteered to fight fascism in Spain on the eve of WW2. Many of them were committed communists, and they should be honored for the service they provided. Many gave their lives. This nutjob who spouts every right-wing lie and distortion of what the communist movement is and was are no threat to anyone save themselves.

It very much seems like Kevin Keating, who has denounced and attacked every political group in the Bay and previously urged physical attacks on "Yuppies" instead of "Stalinists". How could these yuppies be identified? According to Keating the use cell phones.

Starting to get the picture?

You'll start to see what this vandal hates: international solidarity, anti-fascism, commitment to democracy.

Just read the words he painted over with his ode to a police snitch.

Well anyone can talk about "international solidarity", "anti-fascism", "commitmen to democracy" (in relation to a burning social revolution, mind you!), and yadda yadda. Bush can say that. What matters are their actions.

The words at the memorial is irrelevant.

Go look it up on his web site.

Dr. Feel has to lie to back up his crap politics. No surprise there.

"You'll start to see what this vandal hates: international solidarity, anti-fascism, commitment to democracy."

You'll start to see what the anti-vandals hate: false internationalism, stalinism, commitment to the extension of capitalism. Allow me to explain, and I'll use small words so even the most dense popular frontist can get it. The supposed international solidarity promoted by the Comintern was completely dependent on the foreign policy directives of the CPSU leadership (viz. Stalin)--they twisted and turned month by month on some occasions. For several years, until 1935 with the adoption of the Popular Front strategy (usually attributed to Comintern chief Dimitrov), the Comintern policy was to fight primarily against what they called Social Fascists: social democrats and liberals. When it became clear that this policy was alienating too many from the Soviet cause, the Comintern did a 180, and the Popular Front strategy explicitly wooed and courted those exact same "social fascists": social democrats and liberals in a "progressive" front against fascism. That is what "anti-fascism" means: collaboration with the class enemies of workers to struggle against what the Comintern bosses decided was a greater enemy. Anti-capitalism was put on the back burner (if it had ever really been part of the Comintern project in the first place), as was any action that could be considered revolutionary or subversive of Western European and American democracy. The CPUSA slogan during that time was "Communism is 100% Americanism." Disgusting. The peddling of pure Stalinism (circa 1936) as some kind of relevant 21st century activist strategy is as absurd as it is dishonest and manipulative. Why dishonest and manipulative? Because it relies on the same vague, feel-good (Dr Fill indeed!), unexamined slogans of American liberalism and social democracy. But they are our allies right? What a bad joke.

Well said, miles. I'm not familiar enough with what the people in the International Brigades actually thought about Stalin, how much exposure they had to the ideas of the CP, what their take on vanguardism and political bosses was in general. My guess is that some were quite well informed about the counterrevolutionary drift in the USSR and continued to call it liberation, and that they believed the machinations of the Soviet state were simply "pragmatic" communist praxis rather than plain old capitalist geopolitics under the guise of a red flag. But more were probably ill informed, yet courageous people who didn't figure out the sectarian bs and its impact on the real revolutionary momentum in Spain. I don't know. Regardless of that, and regardless of whether the revising of the Brigades memorial was a worthwhile action (I think it at least sparked some thought about these issues), the detractors here appear to be the same types that rationalized reaction from the liberals and Commies back in the thirties: namely, smooth talking apologists for the central committee line who treat anarchists and other radicals as their biggest enemy (rightly so!), and relatively clueless antihistorical left liberals who get hot over talk of "popular fronts" and unity because they think everyone has the same milktoast good intentions as them.

Considering that the overwhelming majority (upwards of 80% according to most objective sources) of the IBs were members of their respective national CPs, I'd have to say that this overwhelming majority if the IBs were completely exposed to the ideas of the CPSU. That does not necessarily mean that they were well-informed, but it does mean that CPers were plenty informed and made the choice not to object to the policies of the CPUSA and their respective national CPs. Many IBs decided to join the Comintern Army because they were promised better arms than what was available to the Spanish militias (and their international volunteers), and a better way to get into Spain.

Good intentions don't excuse bad politics. As a materialist, I am only really interested in the actual effects that people have in the real world not their intentions. Remember what paves the road to Hell?

Regardless, there were a lot of volunteers who fought against fascism in Spain who were not part of the IBs or the Lincoln Battalion. But they didn't then and don't now have a PR apparatus that could help raise funds for their medical costs (if they were injured) and their legacy of "anti-fascism." So they don't get any monuments here. If well-intentioned anti-fascism is the criterion, then all the volunteers in the US Army after 1941 were just as anti-fascist as the "Lincolns." But the US Army has a not so proud political history for radicals and Leftists, so they don't count.

I recommend reading this essay about the relationship between liberal democracies and fascist regimes, and how the latter have been welcomed into existence by the former when capitalist crisis reaches a breaking point,when order must be restored to ensure new rounds of profitmaking. That is when brutal class war is waged upon the actual revolutionary forces in a given country by capitalists of all stripes, whether democratic, fscist, or state driven Bolshevist.

http://libcom.org/library/fascism-anti-fascism-gilles-dauve

Thankfully I know real, live anarchists who aren't fucking morons.

You think everyone but you is a fascist, even those who actually fought and died to defeat fascism.

You are the reason anarchism is idiotic, and why I don't believe in. Self-righteous turd. You are a punk who hides. You dish it out but you can't take it. That's alright. Your day will come, just not how you think.

In the 1800s and 2900s Anarchism and Communist can claim many victories in effect but one could just as easily see just labels appearing amidst movements resulting directly from societal change and claiming credit because of the vanguardist tendency of intellectuals.

In the last 20 years or so Anarchist and Communist can claim little except perhaps scaring many groups away from activist movements. Do you think destroying public art will win many converts or just scare people away? One could just as easily paint over an Orwell memorial to make a statement about his being a racist but what would that prove? Speaking of Orwell its strange to see Anarchist kissing up to him so much when we definitely wasn't an Anarchst and got quite conservative near the end (perhaps even if you trace his scene it was the one that produced the neocons and Blair?)

Activists become Communist or Anarchist by accident. Usually its based off friends and organizations one bumped into in college or organizing around some specific cause. The conflict between groups isnt over who killed who 100 years ago its about showing how much one loves one's own team and hates the other team today.

Dipshit said:

"Thankfully I know real, live anarchists who aren't fucking morons.
You think everyone but you is a fascist, even those who actually fought and died to defeat fascism.
You are the reason anarchism is idiotic, and why I don't believe in. Self-righteous turd. You are a punk who hides. You dish it out but you can't take it. That's alright. Your day will come, just not how you think."

You don't seem to be the best arbiter of who is a fucking moron and who isn't. First of all, I never said I was an anarchist, in fact I would not label myself as one although I take a lot of inspiration from the history of anarchism. I would call myself a communist if push came to shove, a communist in general agreement with the anti-Bolshevik left communist tradition. Your reading comprehension is severely limited if you gathered from my post that I thought everyone was a fascist. Hereyou go brains: Not everyone is a fascist! Fascism is an extreme version of capitalism, as most people anywhere in the left universe would agree. And state communism is a more overt form of authoritarian control over people's lives, and particularly over the work process. These systems are in opposition to revolutionary movements that may contain elements of anarchism, decentralized communist impulses, etc...I dont understand why you wrote such a venomous and silly rant in response to me posting a link to an essay that is totally relevant to this discussion.

Our problem with the stalinists are just as much about today, as yesterday. You think it was just an accidnet that the marxist-leninists became the counter-revolution and crushed any and all hopes of communism in a flood of blood? Ofcourse not.

Therefore its not about in something as shallow as rooting for the hometeam. Our hatred towards marxist-leninists is based on actual theoretical and political understanding of history, the class struggle, as well as these two tendencies roles in them. I suggest that you get yourself such an understanding too, or you will sound ignorant and naive.

It's too late; he already sounds ignorant and naive. I'd add even more and say that he sounds like a stupendously idiotic ahistorical anti-intellectual, ready willing and able to fall for just about any authoritarian leftist manipulation and guilt-mongering.

This is not about some notion of purity or rooting for the hometeam. It's about knowing who the enemies of self-organized oppositional moments and experiments are, why they are our enemies, and what we can learn from the troubled history of the interactions between their authoritarian and statist schemes and our anti-state, anti-hierarchical strategies. I don't care what you call yourself. If you are for self-organized and autonomous projects in contestation with the smooth operations of capitalism and the state, you're my comrade. If you're interested in taking over the cops and jails so you can repress your current enemies, then you're not my comrade. Cops wearing hammers and sickles are still cops.

"This is not about some notion of purity or rooting for the hometeam."

How isn't it? Everyone justifies why they hate competitors after the fact, but it is always interesting to see how religious groups hate sects very similar to themselves the most since such groups pose the greatest threat for group membership (and often resulted from splits). If you go to Iraq, Afghanistan or Somalia I doubt you would find anyone worried about Communists in the US or even find them relevent. Hell, if you walk down the street and randomly talk to 10 people I bet you wouldn't find many who would even really know that Communists and Anarchists exist. The reasons Communists are a threat to you is that they exist in the same social niche as you and pose a competetive threat among the small number of people who are likely to either choose their or your ideology. Plus hating on Communists helps with Anarchist group building (sort-of like Cal students yelling about Stanford or punks hating on hippies).

"It's about knowing who the enemies of self-organized oppositional moments and experiments are"

Are you saying your enemies are small Communists groups with no chance of ever gaining power and threatening you? Do you think the FBI, Christian Right, Republicans, Neo-cons and the like are less of a threat than middle aged artists who dis-agree with your views on a war that took place on the other side of the world almost 100 years ago?

"why they are our enemies"

Would that be purity and rooting for the hometeam?

"troubled history of the interactions between their authoritarian and statist schemes and our anti-state, anti-hierarchical strategies."

In Spain, there was fighting between groups that were struggling for power (and against Fascists). You are comparing that with groups that help organize large singe-issue protests but don't have any sizable support base for their ideologies beyond attendance at protests whose immediate aims are very reformist. Such groups only get in the way of your organizing in that they are willing to be reformist and get a broader membership when acting on single issues than you can get for your causes. While the ISO (which is definitely not pro-Stalin and even not even pro-USSR at any point) does get in the way of some radical organizing on campuses that is largely because they are good at organizing not because they are communists or authoritarian. I mean, the really really reformist Obama people (as well as environmental groups and Unions) can organize on campuses even better and the ISO and RCP front groups don't get in their way.

"I don't care what you call yourself. If you are for self-organized and autonomous projects in contestation with the smooth operations of capitalism and the state, you're my comrade."

Lots of buzz words, but how is any action by any group not "self-organized" and "autonomous"? Not sure if public art or destroying public art has anything to do with the smooth operation of Capitalism and also don't really see how anything being done by any Anarchist or Communist groups is "in contestation with the smooth operations of capitalism." Selling books at Book Faires, promoting bike sales, organizing oppositions to ineptly run wars and the like all seem like they aid "the smooth operations of capitalism" rather than hindering it. Capitalism wasn't running smoothly before Communists and Anarchists helped push for checks to the power of corporations.

"If you're interested in taking over the cops and jails so you can repress your current enemies, then you're not my comrade. Cops wearing hammers and sickles are still cops."

So you think the RCP, Socialism & Liberation or ISO is trying to infiltrated the SFPD to help arrest you? Do you seriously think Tod Chretien or Gloria Lariva is ever going to control a police force or setup a jail? While the idea of Socialism and Communism is less opposed in theory to state power, in practice there isn't much of a difference between Anarchists and Communists. Self policing at protests or conferences (or websites) looks about the same among both groups. If Communists tried to show up and protest at an Anarchist Book Fair they would likely face just as many restrictions as if Anarchist tried to disrupt some Communist convention. Authoritarianism and the corruption of power usually doesn't result from people wanting such for ideological reasons it comes from immediate problems with hierarchies and authoritarianism growing out of the immediate emergencies. Trotsky became what Anarchists hate not because of his original ideas but because of compromises and changes in ideology growing out of war. Anarchists in similar situations probably would have acted the same way. Communists in the US will never be in a position to take over government. Anarchists will never be in a position to threaten the state as an institution.

There are right-wing groups and organized crime groups that do infiltrate the cops and prison guards. Right-wing non militaristic groups that help promote and justify prisons are obviously the main threat, but if you want to go pick on people capable of taking over the police directly you would be much better off doing a graffitti attack against the Aryan Brotherhood, Latin Kings, Hells Angels or Gangster Disciples than Communists. Or is the idea that it is fun to step on people who don't have the power to really defend themselves since it makes you feel more powerful (sortof like bullies beating up nerds at school or frat guys beating up homeless people)?

And here comes the ignorant liberal thinking he has said something important and clever. But in reality he has just showed his intellectual and practial laziness by denouncing everybody as pretty much the same. Sort of like the ignorant fool who says that communism and fascism are the same thing.

Dude, if you dont understand what we are talking about - stay out of it!

By the way, Trotsky didnt become an "authoritarian" because he was forced to (as if it was a matter of mere "good" and "evil"). The marxist-leninists counterrevolutionary essence comes out of their theories and understanding about capital and the state, the way they were/are organised and the way they intervene in the struggles. It was no accident, and it was not because of "circumstances outside of their control", or some other such nonsense. (That was prolly also why the CNT ended up joining the state in the end, but thats another story.)

If you dont believe that there is such a thing as the class struggle, fine. But anyone that does can never say that marxist-leninists are not a threat to the movement - at any point in time. Prolly until we get rid of capitalism itself. So again, its not about purity or rooting from ones own team. Its not about recryting members. It is about the actual struggle that goes on now and everyday. And which is threatened now and everyday.

"By the way, Trotsky didnt become an "authoritarian" because he was forced to (as if it was a matter of mere "good" and "evil")."

I dont really believ in good or evil but I do believe that people try to micromanage and become overly security concious when peopel are trying to kill them. The dynamic that leads to purges, attacking those as seen as helping teh enemy etc.. are not Communist in nature but part of human nature. How do you deal with suspected narcs? How do you deal with disruptions at events? Many of the dynamics that lead to authoritarianism exit at all scales.

"The marxist-leninists counterrevolutionary essence comes out of their theories and understanding about capital and the state, the way they were/are organised and the way they intervene in the struggles."

I don't really see how Communist organizing relates to the ideology. You could say that it is more vanguardist than what Anarchists do but most Anarchists I know and Anarchist actions like this attack on a Socialist art-work are very vanguardist in a way (at least in the sense that you are forbidding a form of public art since it isn't in line with your ideological views and opinions on Spanish history) It also has the feel of picking on the powerless in that an attack on the Frida exhibition (she was proTrostsky and even proStalin near the end) at MOMA or the like is not possible but attacking a smaller artwork less likely to get repaired can happen since the artists probably have fewer funds.

"But anyone that does can never say that marxist-leninists are not a threat to the movement - at any point in time. Prolly until we get rid of capitalism itself."

What is the "movement"? Do you mean people who call themselves Anarchists? Do you mean people protesting environmental issues? Protesting the war in Iraq? Protesting police brutality and the patriot act? Communist groups have been good at organizing protests around many single issues but they are only good at it when they leave their Communist in the background (hence World Cant Wait losing people at their protests when they seem culty with messages about their leader) Most of thise who show up and care about single issue protests are not even radical. Many of the Vets against the war don't even see themselves as left-wing. Some Communist groups probably alienate such people from seeing connections across issues but that has every little to do with getting in the way of Anarchists since bad organizing by Communists doesnt exclude good organizing by Anarchists.

"It is about the actual struggle that goes on now and everyday. And which is threatened now and everyday."

What "actual struggle"? Anarchists as a movement are mired in lifestylism where the struggle all groups engage in to support themselves (appropriated as mutual aid by middle-class kids) becomes something revolutionary and different from groups that engage in the same type of work without seeing it as radical. Outside of lifestylism you have your pedanitic academic Anarchists who define their selfworth by putting down everyone else as being stupid and uneducated for not knowing as much Anarchist history trivia. There are some Anarchists who do good organizing and that could be seen in the Bay Area when Anti-War Action and then DASW were more active. In DASW's case the appeal was that they were less sectarian than most Communist groups and the message of the protests was at one level broad but in terms of its mass appeal mainly antiwar (hence many Liberals who go arrested in DASW actions). In AWA's case it was somewhat anti-ANSWER but there was a symbiotic relationships where the mass protests were needed for the breakaway marches and for permit reasons ANSWER had to disagree with the breakaway marches but they did provide for a less boring environment for youth and allowed people to avoid WWP speakers.

If you look at lifestylism, Communists are pretty much irrelevant. I cant really see how their existence undermines anything since they don't usually try to take over collective houses, community gardens or soup kitchens (although maybe the RCP would have years ago...). The same is sortof also true in terms of the animal liberation and earth liberation portion of Anarchists (Communists just don't care about it as an issue for the most part).

If you look at academic Anarchists, Communists pose little threat since the main thing that destroys the appeal of getting involved is the ego of the people involved (and academic Marxists may push people in the direction of Anarchism more than they pull people away since they face the same problems in terms of dogmatic thinking and ego driven trivia pissing contests).

In terms of anti-war protests DASW managed to take more people away from World Can't Wait protests on the war anniversary than the other way around so its hard to see Communists as getting in the way or doing organizing any harm. Breakaway marches did get flack from ANSWER in 2003-2005 but the marches depended on the large protests too so its hard to say the Communists were hurting the Anarchist organizing...

A last thing on Liberalism. Anachism and Communism today are not about overthrowing the government or anything like that. They are radical in the sense of diversity of tactics when confronting specific issues causes but that has little to so with Revolution. You can see this confusion in the stated goals in the protests in Argentina vs what actually happened (it was a middle class movement and the appeal of Community councils and the like had much more to do with immediate needs and tactics than it did with a mass desire for rule by popular councils). In Nepal Maoists are taking over and one can guess that despite all the Marxist ideology they talked about while fighting, the resulting society will be no more Communist than India or Pakistan. It isnt that people want Capitalism, it is more that they don't want instability and restructuring an economy quickly is dangerous and most people just want to live their lives without fear. Showing people a way to slowly move from here to some future utopia is perhaps the semi-realistic part of Communism and Anarchism but it isn't working anywhere and thats partly due to some basic flaws in the ideologies (mainly that the names and histories are damaged in terms of public opinion beyond repair). You may think of me as a "liberal" if I do not think a class struggle based revolution in the US (beyond the election of a right-wing Christian working-class populist) is possible in the next 100 years but the dismissal of nonbelivers always seems to me like cult-like behaviour more than a political difference. Ignore what one thinks is realistic and focus on desires for political change and without the possibility of a Communist or Anarchist revolution, current groups mainly appear different in terms of style and social group appeal.

It makes sense to dislike liberals; all one has to do is look at how many mainstream liberal institutions (from some of those who wrote for the Nation to Air America ) supported the Iraq war or side with the police when they "accidently" shoot people. But the wishywashiness of the Progressive, Liberal, Social Democrat and other such labels doesnt mean the only alternative is mellenialist thinking where in spite of all evidence one has to be more worried about how groups will act after the mythical Revolution than immediate concerns (and there are a lot right now).

Well, i dont have the time or energy to respond to your liberal rantings. The human nature excuse sounds fitting for someone with a complete lack of analysis and/or understanding of the event in Russia (and in fact; the history of capitalism) and shows a great deal of idealism on your part. Human nature? Hardly, but it is the acts of a state which want to speed up the accumulation of capital. Thats the short answer.

Well, we have allready established that you dont really think class struggle exists, and you show that with outmost clarity in your attempt to discuss what "anarchists" and "communists" do (as if all anarchists do is gardening and other lifestylepolitics by the way). You show your inability to see what exists outside of the ghetto, which is prolly why you are so conserned about holding the left together. This prolly include the liberals in the democratic party, which would make sense since they will be the only ones who benefit from it (and maybe sometimes stalinists depending on the situation). You are blinded by the spectacle, sir.

Maybe you were once a radical, but your weak understanding of reality is what has made you old and cynical, and unable to see what the situation really is. I feel sorry for you. But im not here to convince you of anything.

I obviously have nothing to discuss with you because our basic views are so diffrent. But let me just tell you again; its not a fear about some distant future "after the revolution"- it is about after the revolution, during the revolution, and before the revolution. The threat of marxist-leninist recuperation exists right now and in every struggle against capital. It doesnt matter how small or immediate. They are the enemy of the workingclass and its self-organized struggle against capital (what, you dont think it exists just because people arent joining the CP?!). That fear (and possibility!) is a real one that exists right now.

Obviously that doesnt mean that they are the only enemy we should be concerned with. Rather, they are part of an overall challenge to the movement against Capital. They should be combated just like all other capitalist expressions in this society. There is no contradiction in this.

Ok, that was my own little rant. Enjoy!

Some Gilles Dauvè could be helpful. Prolly not, but..
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/3909/elenin.html
http://troploin0.free.fr/biblio/east/
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/3909/whenidie/index.html
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/3909/undercurrent/class.htm

I never said anything about class struggle. I'm not sure I would disagree with a proposition that he structure of how one works determines ones ultimate political motivations more than most other factors, but perhaps you mean more than that.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding your views but are you saying that what unites you and Communists under the umbrella of radical is an idea that the violent overthrow of the US goverment is possible in the next few decades and that anything who doesnt think this is likely or possible isn'ta "radical"? if this isn't hat you mean can you define "radical"? Almost all organized Communist and Anarchist groups I know would no longer fall under that umbrella (although most feel that in some much longer term future it is likely) because it is so obviously unrealistic.

I don't really care if I'm "radical" or not but there really is something cult like when you have arguments that can't be made to the general public because the general public doesn't accept some idea of an inevitable future that also happens to be the desired goal of your ideology. This is especially problematic when the future you want requires convincing the general public to support your ideas rater than just convincing them that Communists suck.

Perhaps the issue with "radical" is not a belief in Revolution as an immediate possibility (which seems like the only belief that justifies the hatred of Communists on your part), but ties in to your original thing about me not beleving in "class-struggle". I guess it would help if you define a few things on that account and would be curious to see how many modern Communists and Anarchists would agree with the definitions from the 1800s where a CEO might not be considered part of the Capitalist class unless most of their earnings were not from wages. i agree with Marx's generalizations and the need for them in trying to understand an economy but the world really is much mreo complicated today and those complications are what makes Unionization and other types of class struggle much more difficult.

Viewing class in a traditional Marxist sense of lumpen, proletariat, petit-bourgeoisie, bourgeoisie and nobility where would you put the following professions:
-worker at McDonalds making just above minumum wage
-low level manager at McDonalds making just above minumum wage
-day laborer working illegally
-day laborer working as an independent contractor
-day laborer who has declared themselves a small business but has no employees
-day laborer who has declared themselves a small business and ocassionally hires friends as independent contractors
-small bookstore owner
-computer programmer making $140,000 a year salary
-computer programmer making only slightly less but with few legal rights because they are on an H1 Visa
-mid-level manager in an office in the financial district making less than $100,000 a year
-skilled factory worker who mainly works but also helps manage less skilled employees
-unemployed factory working who manages to get unemplyment for awhile
-independent contractor or small single worker business unable to find work due to the bad economy
etc...

When Marx was looking at class things were simpler and in Europe class was much more like a caste system where one knew where one stood. Today you could define salary worker in a rung above hourly workers but without taking compensation into account you might end up putting a well paid lawyer in a rung above someone doing data entry on a very low salary.

Economic inequaliy is worse than ever. Most peopel hate their jobs and their bosses. Government is largely run by the rich and laws tend to work in their favor. Structurally "Capitalism" is responsible for more of the problems we have today and no matter how progressive a leader gets elected from Obama, to Nader to McKinney, it wont make much of a difference in the everyday lives of most workers. Still, class-struglgle as a vague concept seems a bit outdated if only because he only modern wordings that get traction are more ones about rich and poor or elitists and everyday people (the rightwing use tends to be anti-intellectual)

In response to links you provided:

Being a guerilla whenm fighting against a dictatorsip in Greece makes sense and worked. Forming cells and engaging in acts of violence or at least peoperty damage now in the US could make sense in some contexts but risks drawing on the wrong motivations. The desire to be a guerilla is a mainstream desire feed into you by the military industrial complex through films like Rambo and Red Dawn. Its useful for the state when it makes it easy to get special forces soldiers to risk their lives for some imperialist war but also expresses itself in rightwing militias and left wing guerilla wanabes. The motivation aside from stated goals is usually adrenaline and testosterone mixed with a Don Quixote like desire to be part of something exciting and epic.Bringing something important to public attention of actively forcing changes in industry and government can at times make sense but when you dig into motivations you often find something a bit different.

well, if the success of this action is measured by the discussion it has engendered, i would have to say the action was unsuccessful.

There was three text before the one about armed struggle and that was all you got out of it?! And judging by your response you didnt even understand that text especially well. Pretty amazing.

Also; is your class defined by how much you make or your relation to work/production? You seems confused. Im going to post another text that explains it. I hope you read it better than the other ones.
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/3909/ecapcom1.html

Yes, the class composition has obviously changed since Marx. Duh. But that doesnt mean that you cant use his methods as analysing as a tool to understand classes and find areas of struggles. Its not hard at all.

But to get up to speed with todays society (beyond just being dejected), you need to take your nose out of those outdated books by lenin. The thruth is out there, maaan!

Kevin Keating is the one living in the past. He is the one recycling the most outrageous lies directed at the thousands of Americans who volunteered to fight in defense of a democratic republic in Spain. Half of them died – not fighting ultra-leftists, as Kevin Keating would have it – but Franco's very real fascist armies.

Kevin – get help. Even if people disagree on the particulars of history 70 years ago, why don't you get your "nose out of the books" that you treat like bibles and put your ideas into practice. Oh wait, you can't – you're a toxic jerk who sends people running and then you blame everyone else for your own bi-polar misanthropy.

I beg to differ. The people who've organized the construction of the monument to Stalinist dupes are the ones living in the past and trying to bask in the supposed glory of fighting against Franco and for what you correctly point out was "a democratic republic in Spain." From a revolutionary perspective, there's nothing worth fighting for in a democratic republic. That's apparently where you disagree, being a Popular Frontist and all. Defending democracy from fascism makes no sense, considering that fascism is the choice strategy of a democracy in crisis.

How many in the ALB and in the IBs as a whole died from fascist bullets, and how many died from the bullets of their IB commanders and commissars, and how many from the bullets of the NKVD agents who were in Spain to find all the saboteurs, spies, wreckers, shirkers, deserters, and other unreliable types? How many died due to the incompetence of their officers, loyal followers of the Comintern line and hide-bound order-takers? Don't you know that the ALB commander Oliver Law was killed by his own men rather than be led by him into even more suicidal missions? As was the case with most IB battles, the propaganda advantages were more important than the military considerations. Law was the first Black man to be an officer in charge of whites, and that was far more important for the PR of the IBs than Law's military experience (which was nil). Similarly, several major battles of the CP-controlled Popular Army were undertaken with non-military goals, which meant that the civil war was prosecuted poorly and with little overall effect for the continued existence of your precious democratic republic. Any objective military history of the civil war discusses that. The documents from the Comintern and CPSU archives also make it clear that defending the democratic republic was not a serious primary consideration for Stalin and his pals.

So go ahead and blame Kevin Keating (or more accurately, your demented image of him) for all the problems associated with Stalinist hagiography and the continued mythologizing of the ALB, but don't be surprised when others of us have a few things to say that having nothing to do with Keating (or your warped notion of him as some lone paintman).

That's real bright -- don't read books or pay attention to history.

You are one hell of an American, Yummy.

"From a revolutionary perspective, there's nothing worth fighting for in a democratic republic. That's apparently where you disagree..."

It's apparently where I, along with the people of Spain and most of the world disagree. Revolution is not a fantasy in your head. Democratic rights matter, and if you don't understand why then go to Spain and tell them why now is no different that when Franco ran the country. "nothing worth fighting for" – you obviously hate real people. Jerkoff anarchists.

Uhmm, there is a reason why Spain managed to go from dictatorship to democracy without any bloodshed. If you cant grasp these basic notions you dont really have any buisness calling yourself a revolutionary anything.

Again; there was a social revolution going on. To fight for democracy in that context is nothing but a counter-revolution.

If you didn't already know it, there was an authentic working class revolution occurring in almost half of Spain during the 1930s. The attempted military coup led directly to workers taking over (expropriating) many industries--especially in Catalonia--and peasants taking over land--especially in Aragon--under the auspices of the two largest union formations (the Socialist UGT and the anarcho-syndicalist CNT) with approximately 3 million total members.

Your precious democratic republic tried to curtail, weaken, and ultimately succeeded in destroying this movement against capitalism (whatever criticisms we can make of the fits and starts, and retreats and betrayals, it was a social revolution) even before Franco's forces marched into Madrid and Barcelona. In such a situation, revolutionaries take the side of the workers who are trying to dismantle oppressive relationships based on wage labor and private property, and anyone who sides with the oppressors of workers and peasants is a counter-revolutionary. Those who were invested in supporting the democratic republic were counter-revolutionaries then as they are today.

We who are for revolution (expropriation of private property in land and other resources, overthrow of the state and the abolition of legislative and juridical institutions, real non-representative based decision making in general assemblies, general arming of workers, etc) know that your calls for democracy and rights are just so much bullshit. Who and what is the guarantor of democracy and rights? The state of course. By what mechanism are we supposed to invest the state with the ability to arbitrate conflicts between workers and bosses? The vote of course. Who is supposed to be both wise and ethical enough to judge our conflicts? Our elected representatives of course. Where have we heard all that before?

Democracy is the fantasy--a bourgeois fantasy. Nobody is saying that contemporary Spain is no different from when Franco ran things. But that's just a question of degree, not substance.

I only hate people who claim to be against capitalism who are really nothing but pimps for the status quo. Capitalists at least have enough respect for our intelligence to tell us their fucking us--wankers like can only have the smugness of being their ass-kissers.

I need more sleep. That last bit should read: I only hate people who claim to be against capitalism who are really nothing but pimps for the status quo. Capitalists at least have enough respect for our intelligence to tell us they're fucking us--wankers like you can only have the smugness of being their ass-kissers.

Well spoken, I had to read to the bottom of the page before somebody came up with an accurate picture of what was happening in Spain at that time. There was a social revolution going on, the Republican Government didn't want it one bit and the orders from Moscow were followed. Those involved in the social revolution in Spain at that time had to contend with fighting two fronts, Franco one one side and the Republican government on the other.
ann arky http://www.radicalglasgow.me.uk