further on Stan Goff

[Mark Lause]

Friends,

I don't know that any of the people critical of Goff are ex-SWP, while
all the ex-SWPers that I do know on the list that have clocked in on
this issue have tended to defend the broadest possible coalition.

Still, the problem's real enough, though it goes way beyond Trotskyists
or Leninists, etc.  The radicals of the 1960s were convinced that we
understood how those old radicals of the 1930s generally missed the
point.  And, in turn, the Communist-centered Left of the 30s disparaged
the achievements of the IWW and Socialist Party...who, in turn, scoffed
at the utopianism of the Populists, Single Taxers, Socialist Laborites.
The drive to be novel and scientific has dismembered our perceptions of
a much more genuinely coherent radicalism in the US.  With roots deep
into all parts of our people

Unfortunately, the medium tends to exaggerate the tendency to make
Marxism a mere abstract intellectual exercise.  A 13-year old Trekkie in
his Klingon pajamas to enter an AOL chatroom as anything he wants.  So,
too, a list like this will always tend to generate a certain portion of
subscribers who will want to present themselves as neglected
geniuses...Cyberlenins.

Solidarity!
Mark