Good Trot / Bad Trot

[mk12]

Would you deny that the majority of the 15,000 people that voted for Galloway were working class?

 

[Louis MacNeice]

Would you deny that the majority of the 15,000 people that voted for Galloway were working class?

On that basis the BNP (not forgeting the Tories, Lib Dems and New Labour) is more effective in gaining working class votes than either Respect or the IWCA...excepting of course that while working class people vote for them (The BNP), their appeal is not made on the grounds of class but ethnicity...it's an important distinction (the one between where your votes come from and the basis on which you ask for them) don't you think?

Cheers - Louis Mac

 

[cockneyrebel]

it's an important distinction (the one between where your votes come from and the basis on which you ask for them) don't you think?

Not according to tbaldwin.

 

[Louis MacNeice]

Not according to tbaldwin.

Ah yes, but he has limited the notion of working class rule to the arena of electoral politics; perhaps it's just a knee jerk reaction to those sections of the left (for want of a better word) who dismiss electoral politics altogether?

Cheers - Louis Mac

 

[mk12]

Have you read the BBC article after the election of Galloway, trying to find out why Bethnal Green voters voted for him?

Smiling broadly, 36 year-old Sultan Ali agrees that the war in Iraq played a major role in his decision to vote for Respect.

"George is a sincere person and I like his policies," says Mr Ali.

But he denies the suggestion that, as a Muslim man, he was largely drawn towards the former Labour MP because of any attempt by Mr Galloway to court his community.

And again:

The suggestion that a vote for Respect was a rejection of the New Labour project is a recurring theme.

And again:

"Galloway represented a more socialist, old Labour-style, programme. His campaign expressed a cynicism about private finance initiatives, which I liked"

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4521935.stm

 

[Louis MacNeice]

Have you read the BBC article after the election of Galloway, trying to find out why Bethnal Green voters voted for him?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4521935.stm

Nice choice of quotes you made there Matt; I suggest people go and read the whole article rather than relying on your severely buffed up version of the appeal of George's supposed pro-working class credentials. His absenteeism, his playing the race card and his prioritisation of the war above the immediate concerns of those living in the constituency are all cited by voters as being reasons not to support him.

Cheers - Louis Mac

 

[cockneyrebel]

Matt this is from Galloway's own mouth in the run up to polling day:

'I have religious beliefs and try to live by them,' Galloway tells me. 'I have all my life been against abortion and against euthanasia - in fact, on Question Time two weeks ago I was the only panellist to inveigh against the creeping euthanasia in our society. I am not surprised if my position on these issues strikes a chord.

 

[mk12]

You claimed that Respect campaigned based on ethnicity. Although others in that constituency (who were loyal to Oona King, it must be made clear), said that this was the case, surely the fact that people who voted for him denied they chose him because he "represented Muslims" proves you are wrong?

cockneyrebel: One quote by Galloway doesn't prove that Respect solely campaigned based on ethnicity. If you read that article, you'll see that people voted for him because of his anti-war stance, because he was anti-PFI, and anti-New Labour.

 

[cockneyrebel]

It's not just that quote though, is it. There were the leaflets headed "RESPECT is the party for muslims".

You can't just use a few quotes in a BBC article to dismiss the fact that RESPECT was clearly campaigning on a non-class basis. Galloway, above, openly admits that!

 

[mk12]

That leaflet, admitedly bad, also included other left-wing policies on it.

Surely using quotes by the people that actually voted for him helps my case?

 

[Louis MacNeice]

You claimed that Respect campaigned based on ethnicity. Although others in that constituency (who were loyal to Oona King, it must be made clear), said that this was the case, surely the fact that people who voted for him denied they chose him because he "represented Muslims" proves you are wrong?

No matt I said Respect made faith, not ethnically, based appeals (there is ample evidence of such appeals being made...or do you deny that?); I also pointed to the strong correlation between self-identified Muslim populations and Respect's electoral performance. In response you post up less than a hand full of carefully selcted quotes from an already selective article in an attempt to prove George's pro-working class credentials. You fail to make the case. What you can get out of the material you have posted is that Galloway got support for his opposition to the war in Iraq (people may have had many and various reasons for opposing the war not neccessarily anything to with class...does it's a war against Muslims ring any bells?), and the offer of a watered down version of 'old Labour' which seems to have struck a cord with a magazine editor. Doesn't sound too good does it.

Cheers

 

[cockneyrebel]

It's only a handful of people. And the point remains that Galloway clearly states on what basis RESPECT was campaigning on. You can't get any more blatant than him saying his religious views would get him votes, and on Question Time he was stating his religious views to get votes!!

 

[mk12]

Have you looked at all of the electoral literature around that election? It is based on local issues (fire engine), education, pensions, PFI, hospitals, the war etc. Or should we ignore these?

 

[cockneyrebel]

But Galloway saying he was using Question Time (probably when he got a bigger audience than at any other point in the election campaign) to express his religious beliefs to get votes is pretty damning. And, to be honest, from the SWPs point of view, campaigning on an old labour ticket should be a little worrying as well.

 

[Chuck Wilson]

Chuck im not been funny but arent you a trot as well

SWP-REDACTION-IWCA

Smacks of trottery you are in the family so to speak no matter how much you bang on about trots this and trots that

Trots= vanguard party,party programme, democractic centralism, permanent revolution,lets re run the Russian Revolution just one more time

Whereas Wilsonism= no vanguard party, get working class communities to decide what issues they want to fight on , IWCA constitution, no gesture politics, if I hear about a revolution that happened 80 odd years ago that went pear shaped any way as being the solution I will puke over your revo papers.

Never been in Red Action.Prior to me joining the SWP I guess I had dipped in and out of different political views. I didn't like the idea of state control but liked the idea of workers control,thought the miners strike to exciting but not as important as Darlington versus Hartlepool when I lived up there,liked the idea of direct action ,only ever knew anything about Vietnam from MASH, went to a few Labour party meetings and found it tedious, When I was asked once to join IS and told the full timer I was a libertarian socilaist he said 'so are we' so I went to a few meetings .I even went to an IMG meeting but couldn't follow what they were on about. Never liked the idea of Stalin and Russia , found there members boring and too respectable.I joined SWP some years later the night I was released from the Police station when I was arrested on the first mass picket of Grunwicks.It was simply that they had brought the most pickets down, that they had other building workers like me at it that I had come across in UCATT, that they were always involved as workers in local disputes,that we argued in the cells to pass the time, Big Brian Higgins , who was a member at the time belted out Republican and Socilaist songs from another cell to keep us all amused,that they waited for the prisoners to be released and that the meeting they advertised was how can we win Grunwicks. I thought we could. So I went straight to the pub with their members who had been released and had a few pints and went to hear John Deason. I signed on the line and they bought me a drink. They are not for me now but I have been intoxicated by working class politics from that day.

 

[audiotech]

This is an urban myth. IMG members certainly spent a lot of time in the 1970s in internal meetings, such is the price of democracy - but they were more deeply committed to their 'action relating to the outside world', which is why they built groups like the National Abortion Campaign, international solidarity campaigns and the women's liberation movement, that did have a genuine impact far beyond the (small) membership of the revolutionary left.

My recollections of the time saw the IMG follow a deep entryist path into the Labour Party from where they've never surfaced.

 

[Chuck Wilson]

Whatever about the rights and wrongs of Workers Powers internal regime, the madness of their political positions back in the early 1990s certainly brings a smile to my face. Does anyone want to explain what a "moribund workers state" is?

Some more observations on the lunatics asylum of Trotskyism that is Workers Power:

The term "workers’ state" remained in the lexicon, but only as a category without content. For Harvey a "workers’ state" could be ruled for a decade by an anti-Communist regime and have a market economy controlled by private and multinational capitals. In Yugoslavia, the LRCI said that a workers’ state was ruled by fascists, even though fascism is a movement that smashes any element of working class organisation in the interests of finance capital. Until July 1997 the LRCI described all the states east of Germany as workers’ states, and one month later it accepted that eight of them had become bourgeois states.

28 days later ???

Obviously this is all before Cockers joined and sorted it all out.

 

[Chuck Wilson]

My recollections of the time saw the IMG follow a deep entryist path into the Labour Party from where they've never surfaced.

They were the main movers in Socialist Unity in the mid to late 70s which although was supported bu some Labour party members was certaintly not an entryist group and they stood against Labour!

 

[JHE]

...only ever knew anything about Vietnam from MASH...

MASH was set in the Korean war.

 

[Chuck Wilson]

MASH was set in the Korean war.

 

[Herbert Read]

Trots= vanguard party,party programme, democractic centralism, permanent revolution,lets re run the Russian Revolution just one more time

Whereas Wilsonism= no vanguard party, get working class communities to decide what issues they want to fight on , IWCA constitution, no gesture politics, if I hear about a revolution that happened 80 odd years ago that went pear shaped any way as being the solution I will puke over your revo papers.

Never been in Red Action.Prior to me joining the SWP I guess I had dipped in and out of different political views. I didn't like the idea of state control but liked the idea of workers control,thought the miners strike to exciting but not as important as Darlington versus Hartlepool when I lived up there,liked the idea of direct action ,only ever knew anything about Vietnam from MASH, went to a few Labour party meetings and found it tedious, When I was asked once to join IS and told the full timer I was a libertarian socilaist he said 'so are we' so I went to a few meetings .I even went to an IMG meeting but couldn't follow what they were on about. Never liked the idea of Stalin and Russia , found there mebers boring and too respectable.I joined SWP some years later the night I was released from the Police station when I was arrested on the first mass picket of Grunwicks.It was simply that they had brought the most pickets down, that they had other building workers like me at it that I had come across in UCATT, that they were always involved as workers in local disputes,that we argued in the cells to pass the time, Big Brian Higgins , who was a member at the time belted out Republican and Socilaist songs from another cell to keep us all amused,that they waited for the prisoners to be released and that the meeting they advertised was how can we win Grunwicks. I thought we could. So I went straight to the pub with their members who had been released and had a few pints and went to hear John Deason. I signed on the line and they bought me a drink. They are not for me know but I have been intoxicated by working class politics from that day.

your confession makes me feel a bit dirty

I was more talking about the family tree of the IWCA.