True Leftism vs. Alan Grayson-style Leftism

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

built the American middle class

Explicitly socialist labor movements which had liberal politicians by the balls.

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A pen pal of Karl Marx (not to mention the slaves themselves).

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Soviets.

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And?

[Rockefeller GOP]

When evaluating original Republicans, I think their actual actions, platform and words matter more than some cute letters to one communist, but whatever.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

http://www.occasionalplanet.org/2011/12/16/lincoln-and-the-socialist-roots-of-the-republican-party/

[Chilltown]

Modern day conservatives cannot claim Lincoln as one of their own obviously, but describing Lincoln, much less the GOP of the 1850s as some sort of proto-Marxist band is even more ridiculous.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

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Soviets.

You're both acting intentionally laughable with this one.

[Lief 🗽]

The U.S. labor movement was never really explicitly socialist, and certainly not the one that existed during the passage of the New Deal, the GI Bill, the Great Society, etc., and they never had liberals "by the balls"; Lincoln was not a "pen pal" of Karl Marx, that's ridiculous; the Soviets didn't liberate anyone from anything, just replaced one authoritarian regime with another (I guess you could more accurately say that Alan Grayson-style liberalism liberated Western Europe from Naziism and the threat of Stalinism); and putting a man on the moon is one of the greatest scientific and industrial accomplishments of human civilization, shut up.

[Rockefeller GOP]

Modern day conservatives cannot claim Lincoln as one of their own obviously, but describing Lincoln, much less the GOP of the 1850s as some sort of proto-Marxist band is even more ridiculous.

Can any modern American partisan really, with a straight face, claim anyone from that time period?  Lol, the issues aren't even remotely the same.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

The U.S. labor movement was never really explicitly socialist, and certainly not the one that existed during the passage of the New Deal, the GI Bill, the Great Society, etc., and they never had liberals "by the balls"

FDR was not by any means a leftist--he openly pushed the New Deal to save capitalism and steal the thunder from radical leftist movements which were gaining steam in America. This is best evidenced by his attempt at austerity right after his first re-election. Civil rights gained steam when it did partially to prevent black radicals from gaining more steam and partially to save face against the Soviet Union, which quite rightly used Jim Crow in their propaganda. While the early American labor movement as a whole was by no means socialist, the influence of the far-left (and the CPUSA's early organizing efforts in the civil rights movement) cannot be understated.

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Admittedly little more than acquaintances, but the influence of Marxism on the early Republican Party is undeniable.

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Hard to ascribe the Western Front/Pacific War's success to your idea of liberalism, given that our neutrality ended thanks to Japan directly attacking an American territory and Congress was nearly unanimous in voting for war with both Japan and Germany. And I'm sure the majority of Auschwitz survivors could tell you that the soldiers who freed them were from the east. And of course, post-WWII Western Europe was hardly perfect, given that our main partner in the war had several genocides in its own track record.

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Didn't help anyone on earth. Plenty of important space projects, but that was merely the culmination of an international dick-measuring contest.

[Deus Naturae]

So...you're willingly equating your ideology with Stalinist Russia?

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

I think Stalin was fairly awful on balance and a key figure in the Soviet Union's degeneration into an imperialist oligarchy (albeit a very different sort than the United States was and is).

[courts]

I think Stalin was fairly awful on balance and a key figure in the Soviet Union's degeneration into an imperialist oligarchy (albeit a very different sort than the United States was and is).

what? stalin was comparatively more 'conservative' in the soviet sense than most of his major rivals. look at beria.

[Antonio the Sixth]

I think Stalin was fairly awful on balance and a key figure in the Soviet Union's degeneration into an imperialist oligarchy (albeit a very different sort than the United States was and is).

hahaha

[© tweed]

I think Stalin was fairly awful on balance and a key figure in the Soviet Union's degeneration into an imperialist oligarchy (albeit a very different sort than the United States was and is).

what? stalin was comparatively more 'conservative' in the soviet sense than most of his major rivals. look at beria.

once he eliminated Trotsky and the "left" the policies he adopted re: collectivization and industrialization were anything but conservative.  say from 1928-33.

[© tweed]

The U.S. labor movement was never really explicitly socialist, and certainly not the one that existed during the passage of the New Deal,

many of the organizers of the 1930s, especially with the CIO, were socialists, and during the Comintern's 'popular front' period many people who were deeply involved with the CPUSA worked within organized labor.  I can point you to an Irving Howe essay if you actually care.  you could also read up on the 1934 strikes in Minneapolis, a heroic and bloody effort led by avowed Trotskyists that ended in the unionization of the trucking industry.

[courts]

I think Stalin was fairly awful on balance and a key figure in the Soviet Union's degeneration into an imperialist oligarchy (albeit a very different sort than the United States was and is).

what? stalin was comparatively more 'conservative' in the soviet sense than most of his major rivals. look at beria.

once he eliminated Trotsky and the "left" the policies he adopted re: collectivization and industrialization were anything but conservative.  say from 1928-33.

note the use of the phrase 'in the soviet sense.' bizarrely enough beria was more open to 'liberalization', at least in the sense of more engagement with the west and a return to the relatively more mixed market approach of lenin. stalin might have been a revisionist but the extent is very much exaggerated nowadays

[courts]

sort of bizarre hearing grayson referred to as a "leftist," what is this free republic?

Yes, its really strange, but then again this is a BRTD thread.

if it was from an un-ironic blue or brown avatar, people would be making fun of them for being a stupid teabagger

[SUSAN CRUSHBONE]

true leftism has principles (even if they're dumb principles)

[they don't love you like i love you]

Progressive Democrats like Grayson are obviously leftist. That "The Democrats are really a conservative party!/The Democrats are to the right of all European parties" nonsense is as stupid as True Leftism.

[© tweed]

The U.S. labor movement was never really explicitly socialist, and certainly not the one that existed during the passage of the New Deal,

many of the organizers of the 1930s, especially with the CIO, were socialists, and during the Comintern's 'popular front' period many people who were deeply involved with the CPUSA worked within organized labor.  I can point you to an Irving Howe essay if you actually care.  you could also read up on the 1934 strikes in Minneapolis, a heroic and bloody effort led by avowed Trotskyists that ended in the unionization of the trucking industry.

Jacobin just ran an article on it, making this quite easy for you, Lief.

Red Teamsters: The radical teamsters of Minneapolis showed what democratic unionism looks like.