Rees's in Pieces

I laughed.

The war for David Broder's ear

From the latest issue of the Weekly Worker comes the (unintentionally funny) quote of the day from Mark Fischer:

It is also very much on display in the leadership's attempt tp whip up anger against David Broder and Chris Ford, two comrades who resigned from the AWL (primarily over the organisation's pro-imperialism, but also citing the sect's lack of operative democracy) to form the grandly named International Communist Group, organised around the Commune website . . . . [My emphasis.]

Why is it so unintentionally funny? Only because Mark Fischer is the National Organiser of the equally "grandly named" 30-40 strong Communist Party of Great Britain (Provisional Central Committee).

If I could make this stuff up I'd be writing King of the Hill episodes.

Back To Back

Catching my blogging eye on Crimbo Eve:

We Could Live To Be 1,000 Years Old But For Capitalism? Sounds like something to do with Doctor Who Is it a blog or is it a website? Doesn't matter: the World Socialist Party of United States webspace carries a review of Aubrey De Grey, “Ending Aging”. No, I hadn't heard of him either before now.

Never Apologise, Never Explain Nice to note that 'Freens' of the Scottish Co-operative Wholesale Republic is back on the blogging front. Thought we'd lost him.

Blast From The Past Paul Anderson's Tribune column from the 21 December tells the story of Labour MP, James Lamond, who died last month and who was a visible and vocal part of that sizeable section of the British Left who continued to be apologists of the Soviet Union right up until the first sledgehammer hit the Berlin Wall in the Winter of 1989.

Harvey Pekar, Paul Buhle and a new graphic history of SDS Fascinating post from Louis Proyect that covers Harvey Pekar graphic history of the Students for a Democratic Society, the internecine strife within the (American) Socialist Workers Party in the early seventies and Proyect's remembrance of growing up in the Catskills.

Communist Students Blog Well, the parent body, the CPGB/Weekly Worker continue to be a bit sniffy about this blogging lark, but it's interesting to note that the young guns have struck out with a Communist Students blog and if you check the sidebar of the CSB, you'll see links to personal blogs of Communist Students supporters. I've got a soft spot for James Turley's blog, Tragic Life Stories, with its subheading description of "Neither Matgamna Nor Bambery, But International Socialism!" and blogging labels which has 'sectariana' outscoring 'rightwingers' by 14-2. A scoreline like that can only mean one thing: a future season ticket holder to the Left Trainspotters discussion group.

It Wuz Broon Wot Dun It

We're tagged, they're split

Do you want to try and explain what is currently going on in the current Respect Galloway/SWP fall out? Quick, hurry up and post otherwise there'll be a new post at the Socialist Unity Blog or Dave's Part or Liam Mac Uaid or . . . or . . . from that bloke in Manchester to both up the ante and to contradict what everyone else has been saying in the previous 15 minutes. (Even Lenny's climbed down from his pole to opine again and again.)

The best I can do for myself at this moment in time is to post once again the tags of the main blogging participants, and maybe a few months down the line some sort of sense can be gleaned from them all:

Socialist Unity Blog

Liam Mac Uaid's Blog

Dave's Part

Neil William's Respect Supporters Blog

Lenny's Punchlines

Splintered Sunrise Blog

I'm sure there are other sources worth checking out, but it's difficult enough to keep up with the blogs listed above.

As a funny aside it's patently obvious that the Weekly Worker/CPGB crowd are seriously pissed off with the fact that their niche has been temporarily stolen by various blogs covering these unfolding events. One of their members who regularly posts on UK Left Network recently came over the wrong side of peevishness with the one liner: 'The Socialist Unity Blog is for Christmas, the Weekly Worker is for life'. I think what he meant to write was 'Weekly Worker is for five minutes on a Thursday, Socialist Unity Blog is for every day.' It's all good stuff.

PS - What's the post title all about?

I can't remember on which blog I read it, but I think a particular commentator on the current car crash hit the nail on the head when s/he wrote that what precipitated this bust up between Galloway and the SWP was the fact that Galloway - like the rest of the political class - was expecting Brown to call a snap General Election this autumn and he was seeking to correct what he considered were organisational deficiencies in time for that election.

Remember it is/was Galloway's intention to stand against Labour's Jim Fitzpatrick in Poplar & Limehouse, and there was an outside chance that Respect could retain the seat Galloway was vacating in Bethnal Green and Bow. Add into the mix the strong possibility that Salma Yaqoob could win a parliamentary seat in Birmingham, and we are talking about big stakes on the fringes of British politics.

If the General Election had been called as expected, compromises would have been reached in the fullness of time for the campaign to be fought by a united Respect. By Brown not calling the election as expected, tensions and contradictions that had always existed between Galloway and the SWP in their mutually beneficial lash up have come up for air and there wasn't a readily available external enemy to smother them out.

Milking It

Football and the Far Left - Constructing a False Trail #2

Anybody seen Derby County's Billy Davies and the CPGB/Weekly Worker's Mark Fischer in the same room at the same time?

So that's what John Bridge looks like. I did always wonder.