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The perspectives on this web-site may seem novel or eccentric to some readers. But they haven't emerged in a vacuum. The main theoretical influences on my politics are The Situationists, left-communism, and anti-syndicalist class war anarchism. My descriptions will be short and not too sweet --

The SITUATIONIST INTERNATIONAL was an avant-guard and ultra-left tendency in Europe in the 1960's, active mainly in France. The Situationists were the most sophisticated radicals in the global social movement of their day. Their politics were a synthesis of the better elements of ultra-left Marxism and anarchism. The S.I.'s methods of subversive agitation played a significant role in the May 1968 events in France. This was the last time that a major industrialized democracy came close to being overwhelmed by revolution.

A work by a prominent San Francisco housing activist in a context of ongoing defeat for San Francisco renters

THE ANARCHISTS AND SPAIN: "COULDA, WOULDA, SHOULDA..."

In 1964, a courageous young Scottish anarchist named Stuart Christie was arrested in Spain for taking part in an effort to assasinate dictator Francisco Franco. If the attempt on Franco's life had succeeded it would have been one of the most emotionally satisfying political killings of the 20th century. But alas, like many earlier efforts against the Generalissmo this attempt failed, and Christie's role in this failure had several aspects. First, shortly before going to Spain, Christie participated in a television inteview where he made it clear he thought killing Franco would be desirable. Along with the obvious lack of discretion demonstrated by Christie, it later turned out the journalist interviewing Christie, Malcolm Muggeridge, had been involved with British intelligence services during World War Two. This compounded the fact that it was neither the time nor the place for Christie to voice his fiery sentiments.

As I write this, in early March 2003, the rulers of the United States are about to attack Iraq. If the prevalent guesses are correct, the American empire will rapidly defeat and destroy Saddam Hussein's regime, seize Iraqi oil fields, and occupy major urban centers. This will probably be accomplished with an initially low number of US military casualties, and a very high number of deaths among Iraqi civilians and military personnel. The United States will attempt to cobble together a client regime analogous to that of Karzai's in Afghanistan, and it will be at this point, the high-point of an apparently overwhelming and inexpensive US military victory, that a real, enduring defeat for the United States may begin.

By Kevin Keating

A Sleepwalker's Guide To San Francisco

In 1983 I became involved in sustained political activity outside of conventional leftism. I joined an anarchist group, ``Workers Emancipation,'' which was nominally focused on the class struggle and published a magazine called Ideas and Action.

"Richard Laubach" was the proprietor of the magazine. Of the oscillating membership of 5-15 people in the group, Richard had the most coherent idea of what he wanted and where our efforts should go; he became the group's de facto leader and his vision or lack thereof defined our efforts. We went to peace marches and demonstrations against US intervention in Central America, functioning as an orderly, cooperative tail to the rest of the left. Our group had no theory. We haggled endlessly over a nebulously worded statement of principles. The statement denounced the evils of capitalism while leaving capitalism itself undefined.

This article was originally written to refute lies about the history of 20th century revolutionary movements peddled by the comically obnoxious Trotskyoids of the Spartacus League, in their newspaper Workers Vanguard (sic). Fearing that they may be losing ground to an admittedly incoherent contemporary anarchism, and hungry for fresh cannon fodder, the Sparts ran an occasionally informative series of articles by Joseph Seymour, titled "Marxism vs. Anarchism", tracing the historic differences between anarchism and the Sparts' version of "Marxism".

In part 7 of this series, (W. V., page 7, 8/30/1996), the part dealing with the Russian Revolution of 1917-1921, Seymour claimed:

"The most significant counterrevolutionary force under the banner of anarchism was the Ukrainian peasant-based army of Nestor Makhno, which carried out pogroms against Jewish communities and collaborated with White armies against the Bolsheviks."

It's the holiday season, shoppers -- That time of year when commodity fetishism goes ballistic, expressing what our most fundamental duty as obedient American citizens is: feeding the profit-hunger of our master's economy! Quick now, buy something! Buy anything, buy it all, and buy all that it implies! From plastic reindeer on suburban lawns and corporate office parties, charity concerts from millionaire rock stars and mawkish television specials...to all this, I say "Bah Humbug!"

But the death-trip of the market economy that the Christmas Shopping season expresses in frenzied form finds opposition from pissed-off proletarians every day of the year. As Harry Cleaver noted in Reading Capital Politically:

(The Real Food Company is two expensive natural food stores in San Francisco’s Russian Hill and Marina District neighborhoods. I was employed as a cashier at the Polk Street store from March 2012 to March 2013. After I got fired I wrote this leaflet. A friend and I distributed about 1500 of them to customers outside both stores on a series of Sunday and Monday evenings in June and July 2013. Sunday and Monday evenings are the busiest periods at the stores.

As a former employee of Real Food who left on good terms with my fellow wage slaves, my perspective had credibility with my former co-workers. And as someone who was no longer employed here I could now act with a complete impunity that is unavailable to people still employed there.

Like everything else that I generate in this vein, this is part of a larger everevolving template for anti-state communist action embedded in the everyday life concerns of mainstream working people.)

In early spring of 2012, announcements appeared at various internet sites calling for a “Workers Against Work -- Precarious and Service Workers Assembly,” ostensibly connected to or an outgrowth of the Occupy movement in Oakland, California.

The first leaflet I saw for it said this: