Re: US On The Road To Fascism?

At 01:19 PM 11/25/00 -0500, Peter Grimes quoted the World Socialist website:

>The frenzied response of the Bush campaign and its allies in the media
>to Tuesday's ruling by the
>Florida Supreme Court has highlighted a political fact of immense
>significance: the Republican Party
>has become the organ of extreme right-wing forces that are prepared to
>use extra-parliamentary
>and violent methods to achieve their aims.

Peter, didn't Benjamin Britten write an opera about you? One of my
favorites, I must say.

I wouldn't worry too much about fascism emerging out of the ballot fight in
Florida. Fascism only becomes a real possibility in the context of
proletarian revolution. In the USA, the average worker comes home from a
hard days work and the last thing he or she has on her mind is overthrowing
the bourgeosie and becoming a new ruling class over collectivized property
relations.

Small (tiny, actually) Trotskyist groups always tend to overproject the
actual tempo of the class struggle which is understandable. Their members,
driven to unrealistic expectations, will not work themselves to the bone
unless there is something like a ten year time frame for socialism. In
reality, a Gramscian chronology makes much more sense lasting over many
decades, involving skirmishes and trench warfare over shifting battle-lines.

The fight in Florida is essentially over electoral spoils, involving
millions of dollars worth of sinecures to the winning party. Think of it
more in terms of a battle in a corporation over who becomes the new CEO.

Louis Proyect
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