Alex Callinicos/SWP vs Laurie Penny/New Statesman Facebook handbags

I never liked him or his overblown prose an example of which burst forth onto the thread in the post by phildwyer that is above this one; but that is a flawed, illogical, tortuous, and tautalogus dare I say argument; worthy of a weasal with a dictionary.

Its the sheer stupıdıty that gets me. A ''more modern world'' ındeed. How easıly he adopts the narratıve of progress, wıth Western lıberal democracy the most ''advanced'' form of socıety, so that ıt ıs our duty to drag the ''backward'' heathen ınto modernıty, by force ıf necessary.

Lord Palmerstone couldn't have put ıt better. And thıs from the man held up to us as the spokesman for the postcolonıal world. ''Sır Salman'' ındeed.

Laura must've joined Labour around the start of the invasion, or at the height of the war. Smartest kid in a smart school.

And 'a flawed war'. Does he have any examples of not-flawed wars?

I fucking hate armchair generals.

Especially arm-chair generals who are better hidden than Bin Laden....

bah, and I really enjoyed 'Moors Last Sigh'. no more heros etc

possibly the finest writer in the english language. But what the hell, the King James bible is beautifully written, doesnt stop it being full of shit. And Lenin was a dreadful writer, but said the odd decent thing.

Novelists are (sometimes) okay when they try to incorporate politics into the chaotic world of their novels but usually come unstuck when they make pronouncements in the real world. Celine* was one of the best novelists that ever lived and look where he ended up. And Wyndham Lewis.

* A prize for the first one to post up a picture of Celine Dion.

PD blogpost 'cobbled' together from the little bit communism gags. Radical Cobblers. Any objections, suggestions etc.

That's very good. But, a bit too much common sense for PD.

Stuck for ideas see. The next one can have much less common sense then. No harm in mixing it up a little. Stealing other people's words off forums and sticking them up on your crap joke blog - that's a bit communism.

...Maybe you should do a two-column thing next with 'Very Communism' down the left side (natch ) and 'Not so Communism' down the right side.... Maybe....

Very Communism: Tank Rush through the Fulda Gap / Not so Communism: Flogging off the state tank works to private arms companies...

Very Communism: Building the Miyun Reservoir in high revolutionary dudgeon; Not So Communism: Letting the newly privatised chemical enterprises pollute every single river in the country.

Dostoevsky. Best wrıter ın the unıverse evah, but an arch-reactıonary and Great Russıan ımperıalıst. He's the only one who made me thınk there must be somethıng ın such ıdeas ıf he held them, but then I realızed ıt was all a psychotıc reactıon to beıng put up ın front of the fırıng squad.

Yes. The opening section of Notes From Underground is pretty much the final word on political idealism, whatever direction it may come from, but seems to have affected his political interventions in the real world hardly at all.

(And yes, I do understand the difference between characters in novels and the authors who invent them.)

And Devıls ıs the most accurate satıre of polıtıcal radıcals I've ever read. He was obvıously drawıng on hıs long and bıtter personal experıence of such revolutıonary groupuscles. I've often thought there are several posters on here who seem to have stepped straıght out of ıts pages.

No prızes for ıdentıfyıng Peter Verkhovensky. But who ıs Stavrogın?

genius

its ok, she is en route to Greece reading Fifty Shades of Grey, we can all stop panicking

Verkhovensky is based on a third, nay, fourth-rate ideologue and bullshitter with a pathetic need to impress, and who in reality wasn't taken that seriously by the radical intelligentsia. But was Dostoevsky really aware of the facts pertaining Nechaev's reputation?

Speakıng of whıch, can anyone guess the tosspot who authored thıs lıttle gem back ın '99 (wıthough Googlıng obv)...:

''The Kosovo war, despite its many flaws, established the notion that all the countries of the democratic world have a vital interest and an obligation to act where human rights are being violated. Whether it was effective in preventing those violations (a topic which remains a moot point), another vital precedent was set that creates its own dynamic. Once the global justice argument has been let out of the bag, no rhetorical manoeuvring can put it back...''

Gotta love that ''despıte ıts many flaws.'' ''Flaws'' lıke people beıng kılled and that, presumably.

Yes he was. He followed the case very closely as ıt was happenıng.

I meant his actual stature, rather than puffed up notoriety (some of it deserved of course), among the ranks of the radical intelligentsia, and not just the above.

For example, while on the run in Russia he sometimes used to dress in the overalls of a locomotive engineer, this masquerading deliberately calculated to impress people, particularly those of a higher class. Such workers in the nineteenth century could be held in a kind of awe at their involvement in cutting edge technology, like pilots or astronauts in the twentieth. A sad little man, really.

I'm sure the revolutionaries of Dvorianstvo origin had a good sneer, in between sips of tea.

Well I wouldn't go that far. He lıved a pretty extraordınary lıfe by anyone's standards, and he certaınly had Bakunın fooled. Maybe not quıte the evıl genıus of Dostoevsky's ımagınatıon, but certaınly a shrewd, hard, psychopath who mıght easıly have got hıs mıtts on power ıf thıngs had gone just a lıttle bıt dıfferently.

Went to see a stage adaptation of this down in Wimbledon a few months back. We had never been to the theatre there before, but arrived early and bought some drinks at the bar. There was a group of women dressed up in silver capes with sparkly make-up on gathered around. I remember thinking, quite a lively, party atmosphere for a work by Dostoevsky. Anyway, turns out we were in the wrong theatre and were in fact about to witness the opening act of Dancing Queen.

Bakunin, lol. Plenty of facepalm moments. By using the pissed up fool to gain access, Nechaev tried to play on his reputation and get inside the knickers of a snooty Natalie Herzen, but failed.

I think you're wrong about Nechaev with regard to power largely because his conspiratorial brand of revolutionary methods was for a time out of fashion, in Russia at least, when he was active. It was the turn of the Lavrovists and the like, and the eventual, awfully naive 'going to the people.' There was a Bakuninist, insurrectionary wing of the wider movement, but the Russian Jacobin tradition, of which Nechaev was a part, wouldn't make a comeback until a few years later, when he was languishing in the Fortress. And those that took up such struggle in the People's Will refused to help break him out.

[quote="Captain Hurrah, post: 11318520, member: 47466]... Nechaev tried to play on his reputation and get inside the kickers of a snooty Natalie Herzen, but failed.
[/quote]
On top of everything a foot fethishist?

I was bullied into it.

She'd need a peerage if she wants to rise above her class.

(((Laurie's self-awareness)))