Galloway document: first thoughts
Posted on Friday 31 August, 2007
Filed Under Respect
The post below details what little is so far known of an eight-page critique of the SWP’s role in Respect, penned by none other than the solitary Respect MP, George Galloway. Here’s a couple of initial observations on the development.
First question: why did Galloway write it? Given that he has connived actively with the SWP’s undemocratic administration inside their common front organisation throughout the four years of its existence so far, the assumption must be that he has been happy enough with the set up until now.
Most observers felt that he had little interest in building it into a real political party, as his intention was to serve one further term in parliament and before permanent departure for the netherworld of b-list celebritydom.
If he now wishes it function in a manner that incorporate independently-minded activists and perhaps even other leftist groups, does that imply a shift towards a more long-term perspective?
Second question: why has the SWP made all this public at such an early stage, instead of trying to keep word of the document under wraps? Does this indicate that this is more than a minor spat?
UPDATE: The full document is now available on Liam Macuaid’s blog. It would be superfluous to repost the whole thing, especially as the bulk of it is rather tedious. Instead, I’ll just offer up a taster and encourage those interested to check out Liam’s site:
Relations between leading figures in Respect are at an all-time low and this must be addressed. I have proposals to make which are not aimed at a change of political line, still less an attack on any organisation or section within Respect.
They are aimed at placing us on an election war-footing, closing the chasm which has been caused to develop between leading members, together with an emergency fundraising and membership drive to facilitate our forthcoming electoral challenges. Business as usual will not do and everyone in their heart knows this.
The crossroads at which we now stand can take us either down the Shadwell route or the road to Southall. Instead of three MPs and a presence on the GLA we could have no MPs and no one on the GLA by this time next year. A few honest moments thoughts should suffice to calibrate where that would leave us. Oblivion.
I cannot imagine that any member of the National Council wants to see us arrive at the destination where now lies the wreck of left-wing politics in Scotland and so I hope that these proposals will be considered with the best interests of the Respect project uppermost in our minds.
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200 Responses to “Galloway document: first thoughts”
a bit off topic, but there are so many experts here, I thought I’d ask:
who exactly are/were the International Bolshevik Tendency??
were they very old Russian Bolsheviks? or re-animated clones of them?
or were they a few middle-class ex-students playing at the Tooting Popular Front?
it strikes me that a lot of these miniscule grouplets have names which are inversely proportional to their socio-economic makeup, eg. so a make-believe International Proletarian Party would, of course, be full of Tarquins, Sebastians, etc who were probably kicked out of the aristocracy, wouldn’t know a worker if one fell on them from above, and hold their meetings on a solitary park bench
its a bit like hotels, those with the most grandiose names often turn out to be dumps
what a pile of jokers
And Ian again fails “head on” to tackle the questions
An alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood precludes you from using th term “left wing” Ian.
And a spiv chat show host on the take from Bagdhad is not a revolutionary.
And thats why the split is happening.
Ian,
If this was my blog I would delete the likes of Tim but I know that Dave’s hardcore libertarian stance will preclude him from adopting such a position so the only option left is some sort of co-existence.
I find ignoring to be the best option in these circumstances.
Lets face it, if the idiot tim is really a prime example of ”a professional anti-communist witchhunter” then communists have very little to worry about!
communists have very little to worry about.
Haven’t read that line in a while.
Dave wrote:
“If you can’t hack freedom of speech on a blog, I fear that many of us wouldn’t fare too well in any dictatorship of the proletariat you have a hand in.”
To which Ian Donovan replies:
“So presumably, every left-wing blog that doesn’t allow racist and pro-war trolls is akin to Stalin’s gulag? ”
It is so charming to see in action the spartacist style of logic. I’m sure we could all come up with that destructive daisy-chain of reasoning which leads from defending loose control of a blog (a fucking blog, Donovan, you fool) to the same thing as accusing dissenters from that as being no better than advocates of concentration camps.
Calm down, as a keen supporter of Respect I’m sure you will come across views far more problematic than those ‘allowed’ on this blog.
Ian, just out of interest: have you got a blog we can have a look at? Ta.
Sorry Ian, saw your comment about not having time to keep your blog up & running. Fair enough, my mistake.
“It is so charming to see in action the spartacist style of logic. I’m sure we could all come up with that destructive daisy-chain of reasoning which leads from defending loose control of a blog (a fucking blog, Donovan, you fool) to the same thing as accusing dissenters from that as being no better than advocates of concentration camps.”
This would be very amusing, except of course that it was not me who made this equation. It was Dave Osler, with the following remark:
“This is a blog, buddy. If you can’t hack freedom of speech on a blog, I fear that many of us wouldn’t fare too well in any dictatorship of the proletariat you have a hand in.”
So I think your rant against me for bringing up the question of Stalinism, dictatorship, concentration camps, and the like would be better directed at him. I only mentioned HIS point in order to refute it.
You are a hypocritical arse, aren’t you?
Hah. ‘Pinkie’ even quotes Dave Osler’s remarks implying that my objections to reactionary trolls mean I want a police state, before attacking ME for mentioning police states, gulags and the like.
Which poses these questions. Does Pinkie actually understand elementary logic? Does Pinkie have a brain? Sorry to be so rude, but when I get slagged off for something someone else said then it is justified.
Simon Hughes:
“Lets face it, if the idiot tim is really a prime example of ”a professional anti-communist witchhunter” then communists have very little to worry about!”
Well, it’s Dave Osler’s blog and he can do what he likes. but having said that, what is astonishing about this discussion is the amount of abuse that is directed at me for objecting to the presence of racist/pro-war trolls (not from Simon, I might add). It actually makes my point for me. There is actually more political sympathy for them here than there is for my views.
Tim may be a pathetic specimen, more rat-like than human actually. But he does actually represent Little Green Soccerballs (a.k.a Harry’s Place), a website that is an organising centre for a particular species of racist witchhunters and is a transmission belt from left to right. When Osler accuses me of being some sort of wannabe dictator for merely objecting to racist witchhunters on a left-wing site, it means he agrees with Little Green Soccerballs that the left are totalitarian monsters.
These people are agitators for state repression against the left and the anti-war movement, and want to fight Bush and Blair’s wars to the last drop of blood of the conquered peoples. It would actually be accurate in this regard to call them genocidaires. Yet if I object to their anti-democratic shite on a left website, I am potrayed as a wannabe dictator. You couldn’t make it up.
LOL – Only someone with Spart political training could equate a bunch of liberal geeks from the “pro-war left” with “genocidaires”. Of course their views shouldn’t be barred from this site; Dave’s right. I’ve never heard anything so stupid other than from people who basically believe that media should be outlets for propagandist rantings, and not fora for debate. Which obviously brings me back round to the Sparty thing.
On topic, I think the Galloway document is just another sign that the SWP have lost control of the monster that they created. They can no longer summon sufficient numbers to direct Respect in its core areas, hence Harun “what’s a trade union” Miah in London and Yasar “I’ll sort it for you” Idris in Birmingham’s defeats of SWP backed candidates. The SWP are now beginning to reap what they sowed, and if the whole thing slips from their grasp, ceasing to be even the pathetic facade of a “left” project that it is now, then they will richly deserve it.
Ian,
you seem to use “racist” as a kneejerk reaction with no substance, yet do not apply it to your allies in the far right MB.
Why?
Ian Donovan 2003
Indeed, SWPers involved in this often manage to unconsciously parody the anarcho-types themselves. Such silliness as middle-aged SWP cadres (and to some extent Workers Power too), bobbing up and down brandishing placards declaring ‘F**k capitalism’ must really only provoke ridicule. Such daring radicalism – they do not even dare to spell out the word ‘fuck’. The more knowledgeable anarcho-youth snigger, privately or more crudely in public, at these antics. But this kind of accommodation to a new épater le bourgeois, shock-your-parents ethos really does not advance the socialist cause one iota.
Of course it is absurd to equate the ‘pro-war left’ with ‘genocidiares’. After all, genocidaires are black Africans, these nice pasty-faced liberals who happen to want to nuke Iran are ‘civilised’ people, like ‘us’, aren’t they? (See the Oliver Kamm propaganda posting on this on HP a few weeks ago). The metaphor about Muslims in Respect being akin to a ‘monster’ is revealing in the same way.
And since when did trolls have anything to do with debate? As an AWL supporter and Jim Denham crony, he has a nerve complaining about me not wanting ‘debate’. Its not just ‘trolls’ who get their contributions removed from the AWL’s comments section, is it? Even out-of-favour AWL supporters are now forbidden to post.
Love the quote Ian.
Ian,
Does the phrase “I fear that many of us wouldn’t fare too well in any dictatorship of the proletariat you have a hand in” imply that you would support methods akin to Stalin’s gulag?
Perhaps that was Dave’s intention but, put simply, I think you are over-reacting.
(Is this comment also a ‘rant’?)
“We haven’t suddenly started talking about the cricket…”
More’s the pity, frankly.
Again, I have to concur with everything written by comrade Donovan.
And lest we forget that a few years back “Dave” Osler (member of the genocidal labour party) wrote a wretched screed against comrade Galloway and this was published by the semi Matgamnaite cpgb centrist cretins. That’s the same cpgb who refuse to back the objectively anti-imperialist shia sectarian death squads in Iraq! Such outrages will NEVER be forgotten.
In addition “Dave”, alongside fellow liberal ex-leftist fakers Tatchell and Mcdonnell, advocates a UN peacekeeping force to prevent genocide in Darfur! Real Leninists are for a military victory for the janjaweed militias!
Take notes reformist scum!
Seconded!
Am I correct in remembering that Roger Dark was one of the pseudonyms used by ian Donovan when he was a member of the CPGB writing for Weekly Worker?
Are these posts satire?, no wonder the Left is failing and failing, today in the guardian, yet another report, in fact a amazing Inequalities Atlas’ has come out about the massive inequalities here in the UK, surely that should be the mega-thread on this blog?.
‘Where you live can be crucial to your future
· Pioneering atlas reveals increasing social divisions
· Researchers identify areas of riches and disadvantage
Lucy Ward, social affairs correspondent
Saturday September 8, 2007
The Guardian
Britain is becoming increasingly segregated across all age groups by wealth, health, education and other factors, according to a pioneering atlas based on people rather than geography. The cradle-to-grave “atlas of identity”, to be published on Monday, provides a visual representation of the stark social contrasts now dividing different areas of Britain, and even adjoining neighbourhoods.
http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=221184&page=2
Oi, Ian are you still there?
No problem with your insults, but can you explain how “I fear that many of us wouldn’t fare too well in any dictatorship of the proletariat you have a hand in” in fact implies nothing more than “my objections to reactionary trolls mean I want a police state”.
Well you can’t, can you? (How about ‘I am concerned by the dangerous implications of your views’ equals ‘you want to put me in a concentration camp where I may well die of starvation or over work’ – doesn’t work, does it?)
“Does Pinkie actually understand elementary logic? Does Pinkie have a brain?” – sorry but I do on both counts.
Can you not understand that the point I am making is that you recast the arguments of others in the worst possible light and then argue against the caricature you have created?
You can take the man out of the Sparts, but not the Sparts out of the man, it seems.
“No problem with your insults, but can you explain how “I fear that many of us wouldn’t fare too well in any dictatorship of the proletariat you have a hand in” in fact implies nothing more than “my objections to reactionary trolls mean I want a police state”.
Nah, couldn’t be arsed. If you dont understand that point, youre just a twit. Seems there are quite a few twits here now, people who have lost the actual political argument but are twittering around posting bizarre apolitical rubbish as a smokescreen. This is what you get when you say ‘trolls are welcome here’ – you encourage everyone who loses an argument to behave like trolls.
“[Y]ou encourage everyone who loses an argument to behave like trolls.”
Then why do it, Ian.
BTW Pinky and the brain was a good cartoon.
“[Y]ou encourage everyone who loses an argument to behave like trolls.”
Then why do it, Ian?
BTW Pinky and the brain was a good cartoon.
“[Y]ou encourage everyone who loses an argument to behave like trolls.”
Then why do it, Ian?
BTW Pinky and the brain was a good cartoon.
Whoops! Sorry for multiple postings – purely by mistake.
Ian, what bollocks. If you can point me towards an act of genocide committed by a poster from Harry’s Place then I’ll happily retract. But until then I say you’re talking bollocks, and anyone reading this can see it. What I said had nothing to do with race, although your Sparty instincts evidently took over again. No great surprise there, mind.
As for “an AWL supporter and Jim Denham crony”, I fail to see what this has to do with anything at all. If you’ve ever seen me censor a political view from Shiraz Socialist, then please feel free to mention it now. Except you won’t, because I haven’t. Jim incidentally is if anything even more libertarian in terms of commenters than I am. Ergo, you’re talking bollocks twice over.
Ian Donovan wrote:
“When Osler accuses me of being some sort of wannabe dictator for merely objecting to racist witchhunters on a left-wing site, it means he agrees with Little Green Soccerballs that the left are totalitarian monsters.”
OK, Mr Logic, can’t you see there are problems with your method of argument here? Can’t you see why some people might find that method potentially dangerous? (Potentially dangerous, but fortunately in your hands as dangerous as a rabbit with an AK47.)
Criticism of you, fair or otherwise, is not criticism of ‘the left’.
“If you can point me towards an act of genocide committed by a poster from Harry’s Place then I’ll happily retract.”
The Iraq war is itself genocidal. These chickenhawks would run a mile from all the armed conflicts they cheer from a safe distance. But all the same, they are for fighting the ‘war on terror’ to the last drop of other people’s blood. They are also for nuking Iran. Obviously, you see little wrong with that, otherwise you wouldnt be defending them.
“Except you won’t, because I haven’t. Jim incidentally is if anything even more libertarian in terms of commenters than I am. Ergo, you’re talking bollocks twice over.”
I notice you dont deny the censorship of the AWL’s own supporters on AWL’s own official blog facility.
“Criticism of you, fair or otherwise, is not criticism of ‘the left’.”
What wierd logic this is? Pinky obviously thinks Dave is even more paranoid than I do. I only think he fears ‘dictatorial’ tendencies on the left. Pinky thinks that he fears ‘dictatorship’ grows from *individuals* whose views he dislikes.
Of course, Pinky doesnt think that. He is just pissing about with words to divert attention from the real issue – the tolerance and welcome for pro-war, racist witchhunters on ‘left’ blogs.
Funny also to see Mike Pearn accuse me of ‘trolling’. A bit rich considering he has posted silly stuff under at least three different names in this thread alone, beating Tim at his own game.
What a shame, I’ve helped divert this thread from simply being an anti-Respect bitch fest, as some would have liked, not by trolling, but by simply arguing a dissenting view.
Actually Ian,your SWP quote did that job just fine.
Ian, one last try:
“Criticism of you, fair or otherwise, is not criticism of ‘the left’.”
What this means is that to criticise you is not to criticise the entire left. This is not ‘weird logic’.
“When Osler accuses me of being some sort of wannabe dictator for merely objecting to racist witchhunters on a left-wing site, it means he agrees with Little Green Soccerballs that the left are totalitarian monsters.”
Criticising you for being some ‘wannabe dictator’ (your words not Dave’s) does not mean he is agreeing with Little Green Soccerballs (who?)in any way, nor does it mean agreeing with the statement that ‘the left are totalitarian monsters’.
You are confusing yourself with the entire left, why can’t you see that?
Ian;
This is becoming tedious but I’ll try once more to reach whatever remaining shreds of rationality may be left within you in spite of the ravages of years spent in the Spart/IBT underworld of politics.
Firstly, supporting a war is not the same as calling it, directing it or fighting it. Ergo, people who write on Harry’s place are not committing genocide by writing on a blog.
Secondly no, the fact that I do not consider them perpetrators of an act of genocide, does not mean that I support their views on the war.
Thirdly, if you want to discuss the AWL’s blog moderation policy (a particularly sad topic of conversation) then email the fucking AWL. You can see perfectly well what my own stance is from the way in which my own blog is moderated as lightly as humanly possible. You, on the other hand, are moaning on someone else’s blog about people being allowed to put political views that differ from your own.
Fucking hypocrite.
Incidentally, you’ve actually turned the thread from a discussion about respect into an everyone-giving-ian-donovan-a-kicking thread. Equally enjoyable, albeit of less political worth.
Maybe Ian intended to do that.
The SWP underlings have been told not to engage on the Galloway stuff.
Being fucked by Galloway and Jamaat isn’t on the freshers form.
Ian,
I haven’t posted here in anything but my own name.
Pinkie
“You are confusing yourself with the entire left, why can’t you see that?”
Perhaps because I haven’t been smoking what you have. Have you anything *political* to argue?
voltaires priest
“supporting a war is not the same as calling it, directing it or fighting it. Ergo, people who write on Harry’s place are not committing genocide by writing on a blog.”
Invent a position, then refute it. Doesnt help much in the real world, though does it? The fact that these people are cowards who dont dare to fight themselves does not mean they are not genocidal racists by inclination, and by the policies they advocate. Advocating nuking Iran, as Oliver Kamm did on their site, for instance, is a genocidal policy.
“Secondly no, the fact that I do not consider them perpetrators of an act of genocide, does not mean that I support their views on the war.”
No, you just defend them against accusations of being genocidaires in terms of the policies they advocate, which is the accusation actually made (as opposed to the one you invented).
“Incidentally, you’ve actually turned the thread from a discussion about respect into an everyone-giving-ian-donovan-a-kicking thread. Equally enjoyable, albeit of less political worth.”
Good to see you admitting to your pathological inclinations. But you flatter yourself. No-one has given me ‘a kicking’, least of all you. To give me a ‘kicking’, you have to refute what I say, not your own inventions.
“You, on the other hand, are moaning on someone else’s blog about people being allowed to put political views that differ from your own.”
I’m objecting to witchhunters, warmongers and racists with genocical inclinations being treated essentially as ‘comrades’ by people like you. You still dont get this elementary point. You still defend them against the accusation that they have genocidal inclinations, that they are laptop genocidaires.
Mike Pearn
“I haven’t posted here in anything but my own name.”
Love the pork-pie hat, Mike
Silly boy.
To my comment:
“You are confusing yourself with the entire left, why can’t you see that?”
Ian ‘la gauche, c’est moi’ Donovan replied:
“Perhaps because I haven’t been smoking what you have. Have you anything *political* to argue?”
Well, I would have thought that pointing out the false ‘logic’ of your political arguments was political, but I suspect that for you ‘political’ means no more than what you care to define as such.
Get well soon.
So no politics then.
Actually, if “voltaires priest” wanted to argue against me on this, he could demur that Kamm’s piece (a syndicated piece that also appeared on the Guardian’s CIF blog) did not *openly* advocate the nuking of Iran. It rather justified the nuking of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and purported to be ‘historical’. However, as many pointed out, Kamm is a propagandist for war against Iran and a ‘neoconservative foreign policy’ (his words) and in context, his essay is quite clearly part of a propaganda preparation for war with Iran, and for the likelihood that this may involve the use of nuclear weapons.
He could, I suppose, make the point that some of the inmates of Harry’s Place were too squeamish to be seen to baldly endorse this kind of mass murder. They also printed some material from Atila Hoare disagreeing with Kamm. Though many more of the regulars were with Kamm than were critical of him. What this says about the actual political centre of gravity of Harry’s Place is rather obvious.
One ‘Harry’s Place’ regular who is well known, and once had a reputation for being on the left, is Brett Lock, of Outrage. Here is his take on the well-known hypothesis that the real reason for the A-bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was as a ‘warning’ to the USSR not to get too big for its boots at the end of WWII:
“… why was putting a restraint on Soviet ambitions not a legitimate consideration? We’re talking about Stalin, a man who was prepared to murder 40 million of his own people. If he was restrained in the slightest as a byproduct of America’s demonstration [i.e. the destruction of two Japanese cities - ID], we should be rejoicing!”
“Rejoice” about the nuking of Japanese cities, says Brett Lock, responding to a piece that was really about using ‘historical’ argument to justify threatening nuclear war against Iran.
This is the same Brett Lock who baldly advocated that the Israeli army should massacre unarmed Palestinian women. In an incident prior to the recent mini-civil war in Gaza, when the Israelis threatened to attack a house that contained some militants Israel was seeking to capture or kill, a whole crowd of women protestors surrounded the house in order to stop the Israelis from attacking it. Brett Lock wrote on Harry’s Place that it would be perfectly legitimate for the Israel army to shoot the women, as they were ‘unarmed combatants’.
Still want to argue that Harry’s Place people don’t have murderous, racist, genocidal aspirations?
Christ Ian,
You actually are ill aren’t you?
Really, really ill…
Ian, you are an embarrassment, a mirror image of the worst of ‘Harry’s Place’.
Shut the fuck up and do something useful – stuffing envelopes or something.
Ian;
If you seriously think that by the above delusional rant you’ve “won” the argument, then you are living in a world of cabbages and kings. Furthermore it suggests you’re so far beyond rational that it probably isn’t worth having this debate.
I echo the two comments above.
Interested in this piece, *The Genisis of Pabolism*.
Assume ‘comrade’ Donovan is familar, in great detail, with Michel Rapitis’s works, published in Greek, but mostly in French. Oh, and not translated into English.
Has our universal guru of Leninism discovered a hidden linguistic talent?
And so our great fighters for socialist democracy show that the only response they can come up with to political points they can’t refute is ‘shut the fuck up’ and similar examples of high-minded political repartee.
Carry on with the effing and blinding and all the apolitical crap. It’s all water off a duck’s back to me, and the more you indulge in it, the more the uncommitted reader will conclude that that is the only response you are capable of.
Love and kisses
Andrew ‘The Genesis of Pabloism’ is the Spartacists attempt at an historical analysis of the degeneration of the FI in the post war period. As such it is worthy of a read although it has little to say about Pablo as such. It also evades the point that the Sparts retroactively endorse Pablos own perspectives for the FI up to the split between the IC and IS. A split with no real political meaning which cannot but deny by omission the Sparts own very real ‘Pabloism’.
Mike, I hope you’re coming back to the UKLN – sin bin time must be nearing its end.
We sorely need you.