Do you most prefer the politics of Los Angeles, NYC, or Seattle?

[Crumpets]

Is their any chance of electoral reform in Seattle, with the success of the Socialists?

Also what breed/tendency are these Socialists? I thought Sawant was an SEP goon for some reason, but I just googled and she's Spcialist Alternative (the wsws had a typically wsws article on her).

Socialist Alternative is the US affiliate of the Committee for a Workers' International, which grew out of the Militant tendency of the Labour Party. The UK equivalent is the hilariously named SPEW (Socialist Party of England and Wales), which operates through it's front group, er, 'coalition', the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, whom I'm sure you're familiar with. They're social democrats who like to quote Trotsky, for the most part. They've more or less endorsed Sanders and more or less endorsed Chuy Garcia when he ran for mayor of Chicago.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Is their any chance of electoral reform in Seattle, with the success of the Socialists?

Also what breed/tendency are these Socialists? I thought Sawant was an SEP goon for some reason, but I just googled and she's Spcialist Alternative (the wsws had a typically wsws article on her).

Socialist Alternative is the US affiliate of the Committee for a Workers' International, which grew out of the Militant tendency of the Labour Party. The UK equivalent is the hilariously named SPEW (Socialist Party of England and Wales), which operates through it's front group, er, 'coalition', the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, whom I'm sure you're familiar with. They're social democrats who like to quote Trotsky, for the most part. They've more or less endorsed Sanders and more or less endorsed Chuy Garcia when he ran for mayor of Chicago.

Class traitors! To the guillotine!

[TNF]

Socialist Alternative on the whole is pretty bad, yes. But there are of course good comrades in every organization, albeit ones with confused politics. I'd reserve the 'class traitor' title for groups like the ISO or the SWP in the UK, though, given their open support for the destruction of the Soviet Union and the eastern European deformed workers' republics in the late 1980s and present day Sinophobia

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Don't forget the covering up of rape and the toadying up to Islamist conservatives!

[TNF]

Don't forget the covering up of rape and the toadying up to Islamist conservatives!

Yeah, the Cliffites seem to have a real problem with rape. Their (former) US branch, the ISO, was also in the same sort of controversy about a month or two after everything came out in the UK.

[Simfan34]

Seattle may soon become a two-party city of Democrats vs. Socialists, and even if you don't like that prospect, it is certainly the most intriguing of any of these cities.

You mean Democrats and one socialist.

Yes, for now, but the Socialists definitely have a very strong presence in the city, particularly in neighborhoods like Capitol Hill and the U-District. Republicans almost never run for city-wide office anymore, but Socialists do all the time, even if they have only won one election. I can easily see someone like Jess Spear winning an open-seat race, and Nick Licata and Pramila Jayapal are both pretty much on par, if not to the left of Bernie Sanders, even if they identify as Democrats. It's not a huge leap to see the Socialists making a play for their seats when they retire.

Jesus. I see there is more than one Socialist. Time to impose direct rule?

Of course, Seattle still hasn't matched Milwaukee, which, if I recall correctly, regularly elected Socialist mayors for several decades.

Socialist Alternative on the whole is pretty bad, yes. But there are of course good comrades in every organization, albeit ones with confused politics. I'd reserve the 'class traitor' title for groups like the ISO or the SWP in the UK, though, given their open support for the destruction of the Soviet Union and the eastern European deformed workers' republics in the late 1980s and present day Sinophobia

At least they are advancing the "Proletarian Cause". Your faction is doing...?

[TNF]

I wouldn't say they're advancing anything other than petty bourgeois liberal reformism, personally. I don't belong to any party at the moment (that will hopefully change whenever I can land one (as opposed to two) jobs and have some actual free time, so I can't speak for 'my faction', although as far as the left goes, most of the organizations that claim the mantle of Marxism would be unrecognizable for even the New Left, given their thinly-veiled support for the Democrats (CPUSA, chiefly), the Greens (the ISO, SAlt) and lack of roots in the working class (literally all of them).

I'm something of a 'new' Old Leftist, so there really aren't a lot of organizations open to me, because joining any of the extant ones means straitjacketing your politics to hashtag activism, non-intervention in the labor movement, and not doing real work in working class communities. If the party that I'm interested in joining is as big of a disappointment as the others in terms of activity, I may try and start something myself. But I assume that wherever I am (in terms of the Left), I'm going to be a minority in my thinking, given that the 'Left' of 2015 is a hodgepodge group of sanctimonious college students, undead New Left academics, anti-science crackpots, dumpster divers and politically correct neo-anarchists.

[Simfan34]

Wait, are you actually saying your views are so ideosyncratic that there's no left-wing splinter group that matches your views? I mean, you have Maoists out there! (I don't know if one can still find any Hoxhaites.) Surely there must be something?

As for a group with roots in the working class, well... I wish you luck. I know quite a few socialists and such. Not a single one of them came from anything less than an upper-middle class background.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Wait, are you actually saying your views are so ideosyncratic that there's no left-wing splinter group that matches your views? I mean, you have Maoists out there! (I don't know if one can still find any Hoxhaites.) Surely there must be something?

Yeah, that's pretty hilarious.

[TNF]

Wait, are you actually saying your views are so ideosyncratic that there's no left-wing splinter group that matches your views? I mean, you have Maoists out there! (I don't know if one can still find any Hoxhaites.) Surely there must be something?

As for a group with roots in the working class, well... I wish you luck. I know quite a few socialists and such. Not a single one of them came from anything less than an upper-middle class background.

No, there are groups that share my views. The International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist) and/or the International Bolshevik Tendency come closest.

[Simfan34]

Then join those, if they float your boat.

While I speak in good faith all the same, I have to say that it would be simply hilarious if you were to go and found your own Socialist group because you didn't like all the other options. It would be a bit... typical. As well as incomprehensible to those of us who put up with their parties! I suppose the stakes are lower when one deals with something less momentous than the swift and total transformation of society.

Either way, I hope you can find something...

[Mr. Illini]

Seattle may soon become a two-party city of Democrats vs. Socialists, and even if you don't like that prospect, it is certainly the most intriguing of any of these cities.

Chicago has essentially become this, just working within the Dem party. There's never a Republican on the Mayoral ballot.

NYC not so because they still have Staten Island and some moderates to hold up the GOP in the city.

[Yelnoc]

Wait, are you actually saying your views are so ideosyncratic that there's no left-wing splinter group that matches your views? I mean, you have Maoists out there! (I don't know if one can still find any Hoxhaites.) Surely there must be something?

As for a group with roots in the working class, well... I wish you luck. I know quite a few socialists and such. Not a single one of them came from anything less than an upper-middle class background.

No, there are groups that share my views. The International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist) and/or the International Bolshevik Tendency come closest.

I thought you had joined ISO. Did that not pan out?

[YaBoyNY]

Seattle may soon become a two-party city of Democrats vs. Socialists, and even if you don't like that prospect, it is certainly the most intriguing of any of these cities.

Chicago has essentially become this, just working within the Dem party. There's never a Republican on the Mayoral ballot.

NYC not so because they still have Staten Island and some moderates to hold up the GOP in the city.

Nah, NYC too.

There's like 3 Republican's in NYC's government.

[TNF]

Wait, are you actually saying your views are so ideosyncratic that there's no left-wing splinter group that matches your views? I mean, you have Maoists out there! (I don't know if one can still find any Hoxhaites.) Surely there must be something?

As for a group with roots in the working class, well... I wish you luck. I know quite a few socialists and such. Not a single one of them came from anything less than an upper-middle class background.

No, there are groups that share my views. The International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist) and/or the International Bolshevik Tendency come closest.

I thought you had joined ISO. Did that not pan out?

No. I almost joined Socialist Alternative, though.

[Yelnoc]

Wait, are you actually saying your views are so ideosyncratic that there's no left-wing splinter group that matches your views? I mean, you have Maoists out there! (I don't know if one can still find any Hoxhaites.) Surely there must be something?

As for a group with roots in the working class, well... I wish you luck. I know quite a few socialists and such. Not a single one of them came from anything less than an upper-middle class background.

No, there are groups that share my views. The International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist) and/or the International Bolshevik Tendency come closest.

I thought you had joined ISO. Did that not pan out?

No. I almost joined Socialist Alternative, though.

Oh, gotcha.

Just did some googling on the Sparts; I'm not sure what about them attracts you, but whatever floats your boat. I found it interesting that them and DSA have a shared history through Shachtman.

[TNF]

Wait, are you actually saying your views are so ideosyncratic that there's no left-wing splinter group that matches your views? I mean, you have Maoists out there! (I don't know if one can still find any Hoxhaites.) Surely there must be something?

As for a group with roots in the working class, well... I wish you luck. I know quite a few socialists and such. Not a single one of them came from anything less than an upper-middle class background.

No, there are groups that share my views. The International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist) and/or the International Bolshevik Tendency come closest.

I thought you had joined ISO. Did that not pan out?

No. I almost joined Socialist Alternative, though.

Oh, gotcha.

Just did some googling on the Sparts; I'm not sure what about them attracts you, but whatever floats your boat. I found it interesting that them and DSA have a shared history through Shachtman.

Yeah, it is kinda weird that they have a common history. Shachtman was a bastard though.

[Boston Bread]

Seattle of course!

I like having 3rd parties (even if they're too left for me) and I dislike corruption and authoritarianism.