CDR: Re: would it be so much to ask..

[James A. Donald]

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At 06:08 PM 9/21/2000 +0100, Tiarnan O Corrain wrote:
 > However, the Solidarity movement, instrumental in bringing down the
 > Polish tyranny, was also a form of socialism.

You commies always find socialists everywhere.  Supposedly Lincoln and Adam 
Smith were socialists.

The leader of the solidarity movement, elected to power, defined his 
primary task as implementing and restoring capitalism, a view that appeared 
to have the entire support of his movement.

 > It's interesting that unions were banned in the USSR (because they
 > were unneccessary, all property was owned jointly by the People,
 > doctrinal truth, blah, blah) and badly messed up in the US because
 > they were socialist.

The Unions in the US have never been socialist.  The greatest anti 
communists, most famously Ronald Reagan, came out of the US Union 
movement.  The US union movement has often been active in international 
working class organization, acting as the US government's right arm against 
non violent forms of communist political struggle.

Way back in the 1870 - 1890s there was a broad power struggle in the US 
between the class war unionists, who stood for socialism, and the "bread 
and butter" unionists, who aimed to embourgeois the American working 
class.  Some of the class war unionists committed unspeakable crimes 
against "scabs", discrediting their movement and their brethren.  They lost 
power decisively, and never regained it.

During 1900--1920, the US socialist movement lost its working class 
character, and came to resemble the modern American trust-fund kid 
socialist movement.

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          James A. Donald
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