# what's the *worst* lefty paper?



## Pickman's model (Jul 28, 2004)

by 'lefty' i mean leninist/trotskyist/stalinist/maoist.

what lefty rag would you not read, even if it were the last readable thing?


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## Top Dog (Jul 28, 2004)

Pickman's model said:
			
		

> by 'lefty' i mean ...maoist.


 this one


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## charlie mowbray (Jul 28, 2004)

Workers Hammer followed by New Worker, followed by the American SWP paper sold over here by the British section of it(the one that claims to be Cannonite, nothing to do with the British SWP)


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## rednblack (Jul 28, 2004)

worker's hammer, newsline, millitant(the one charlie means),socialist news, FRFI, the socialist, socialist worker, in that order worst to least worst

ones i actually read - solidarity (the awl's one, havent seen it for a while though), morning star, scottish socialist voice, weekly worker, campaign group news


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## Top Dog (Jul 28, 2004)

aaawwww, cant I include Catholic Worker?


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## Pickman's model (Jul 28, 2004)

^ just this once!


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## flimsier (Jul 28, 2004)

Newsline. I was on the front cover once.

Workers Hammer

The Socialist.

All for different reasons.

(There may be worse, but these are my least favourites of those I've seen or read more than a few times)


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## Idris2002 (Jul 28, 2004)

The Guardian.


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## Japey (Jul 28, 2004)

Sinistral Weekly - www.sinistral.co.uk.   There really isn't enough news about left-handedness to justify a weekly paper.  Their annual review is okay though.


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## Idris2002 (Jul 28, 2004)

Back in the 80s there was an attempt to set up an Irish left wing weekly called _Z_.

I don't think it was connected to any party, but it was truly bad.


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## DaveCinzano (Jul 28, 2004)

the slp youth paper 'the spark' is/was a bit rubbish.


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## Idris2002 (Jul 28, 2004)

There's an episode of Futurama where Fry shows the gang round his old neighbourhood.

Fry: 'And on this corner, a guy with a big bushy beard used to hand out a socialist newsletter'.

Bender: 'Was it poorly xeroxed?'

Fry: 'You bet!'


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## Japey (Jul 28, 2004)

Being serious, the worst ever lefty paper was probably Die Argentinie Arbeitsung - a weekly leninist newspaper for the Argentinian German minority community between 1954 and 1957, with a brief resurrection in 1962, and in October 1963 (circulation 200).  It's widely regarded as unreadable tripe - although this is partly because the print quality is so bad.   The 1962 issues are passable though and are worth flicking through if you can get hold of them


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## joshjosh (Jul 28, 2004)

i think the worste one is probably workers hammer, it seems to all be written by the same person (theres always common themes running through it, like they've just read something else and are applying the same piece to everything) but because its so bad i'm always tempted to read it (nutty sparts and their endless spiel about china usually put an end to that though)


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## Ozymandias (Jul 28, 2004)

*which hand am I holding up? ;-)*




			
				Idris2002 said:
			
		

> The Guardian.




*GUARDIAN???? * That's not a lefty paper!


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## flimsier (Jul 28, 2004)

You again. Fuck, no-one realised that. Thanks for pointing it out. Can you repeat your joke please?


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## crimethInc (Jul 28, 2004)

its gotta be the ICC paper (they hand them ont every month outside camden station every 1st weekend of the month) i think the issue i got was titled "to the barricades..." needless to say i didnt see barricades


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## silentNate (Jul 29, 2004)

Did no-one say Class War? 

_*backs away from thread slowly*_


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## Flavour (Jul 29, 2004)

the spark

workers hammer


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## Idris2002 (Jul 29, 2004)

crimethInc said:
			
		

> its gotta be the ICC paper (they hand them ont every month outside camden station every 1st weekend of the month) i think the issue i got was titled "to the barricades..." needless to say i didnt see barricades



If you build it, they will come.


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## butchersapron (Jul 29, 2004)

Not if the ICC build it they won't.


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## Fozzie Bear (Jul 29, 2004)

alternatively, if you build it, there is a good chance that the ICC will come and tell you that you've done it wrong.

I quite like all their stuff about parasites, "the historical mission of the working class" and the swamp though - mad X-Files shit. 

Fave headline "alien ideologies penetrate the workers movement".


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

The Socialist this week is quite amusing.  

Has a big piece about the Save our special schools candidate in Leicester South getting 204 votes which the SP declared 'a good result'.  They felt Respect should have stood down for the SOSS candidate, and have a bit about how Galloway and the SWP showed 'no respect' to the SP during a hustings.   

However, what The Socialist ignores are the following two quite crucial and interesting facts:

1.  The SOSS candidate polled less than not just the SLP but also the Monster Raving Loony Party.  So while they point out 204 people braved 'the wind and the rain' [yes, but it was in July!] to vote for their favoured candidate, more 'braved wind and rain' to vote Monster Raving Loony and SLP.

2.  Respect polled 12.7 % of the vote, or over 4,000 votes to about 0.6%  for the SP candidate.  The Respect result is _not even reported _ - presumably there was not space amid slagging off Galloway and the SWP to mention this, despite it being an unprecedented result for a left wing party in a byelection for decades.  So much for objectivity.


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## october_lost (Jul 29, 2004)

Check out - The Guardian 
Also Rednet News


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## ernestolynch (Jul 29, 2004)

The 'Social Worker'. Give me 'Northstar Compass' anyday.


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

Below is the article from "the socialist" that rebel warrior is carping about. Let's take his whining point by point:

1) It is not an analysis of the byelection results, but rather a report about the Save Our Special Schools Campaign. Thus not a word about the Liberal Democrats result or that of Respect or New Labour or anyone else at all.

2) It does not describe the vote that SOSS got as "a good result". In fact it says that it may be supposed that supporters would be disappointed because he "only got 204 votes". In fact the campaigners are not disappointed with their result. They hugely raised the profile of the schools campaign and in fact forced most of the parties to claim that they supported the aims of the campaign.

I'm well aware that RW has never been much interested in mere facts, but he might perhaps learn something if he actually read the article. Respect for instance voted to keep the Socialist Labour Party off hustings during the campaign. I have no love for the SLP, but unlike Respect they were putting a socialist and working class message out, something which I'm not surprised at all that Respect wanted to silence.

The second report details what happened at a Respect public meeting when a member of the Socialist Party asked Galloway if he supported the idea of a new workers party. Not only did he not get an answer, all he got was a brief rant about Respect should have nothing more to do with the evil SP. At the end of the meeting he was shoved out the door by SWP members - quite a way to deal with political criticism.

It seems like such a shame to have to explain this to a supposed "Marxist" but socialists don't stand in election primarily to gain votes. It's about socialist ideas and working class political activity. Remember?

Save Our Special Schools campaign
"It's Been A Real Education"
JUST OVER three weeks ago Save Our Special Schools (SOSS) was a small local campaign that few outside the schools knew much about. But, as SCOTT HERBERT from Leicester reports, in the recent Leicester South by-election it made its mark.

SOSS WAS started after the local education authority (LEA) came up with proposals to close Leicester's six special schools last October. They have since been campaigning to get the LEA and the council to listen to our concerns and even look at new ways forward into the education of special needs children.

However, after many months of campaigning it felt that its main aim was still being ignored. So, with the support of the group, Pat Kennedy decided to stand in the by-election.

Although the Socialist Party had initially decided to stand, we decided to stand down and assist SOSS and we urged other Left groups like the Socialist Labour Party and Respect to do the same. We felt that one candidate supported by the Left on such an issue would have a bigger impact than three standing separately.

At a Leicester Social Forum meeting, the Muslim group, friends of Al-Aqsa, asked for a meeting to be convened to decide a "left of labour" candidate for the election. Their representative indicated that they would be able to deliver 5,000 votes to whomever it was agreed would stand.

When the meeting took place everyone from the Left in Leicester, including the Greens, attended, except Respect - who had initially indicated they would participate.

Socialist Party member Steve Score proposed to the meeting that Pat Kennedy be the candidate. After some discussion over whether or not a single-issue candidate was a good idea there was a consensus to back Pat as the unity candidate.

Almost immediately after the decision a Respect representative - a member of the Socialist Workers' Party - burst in and demanded we reverse our decision and support a Respect candidate.

Hard work
FOR THE next two weeks a lot of hard work was put in by the SOSS campaign and Pat who had claimed at the start of the campaign: "I know nothing about politics". He soon learnt.

At the first hustings meeting of the campaign - organised by friends of Al-Aqsa - Yvonne Ridley voted against the SLP candidate's request to answer the questions. Yvonne Ridley claimed to be the only anti-war candidate but both Pat and the SLP candidate were opposed to the Iraq invasion and occupation.

On election day 204 people went out in the wind and rain to vote for Save Our Special Schools candidate Pat Kennedy.

It may be thought that because Pat only got 204 votes his supporters may have been disappointed. But when I asked SOSS members if they had a good time the reply was: "It's been a real education. It's so unfair that the media only takes any notice of you if you've got lots of money to throw at an election!"

The Save Our Schools campaign have learnt a lot in the last two weeks, not only about the media and mainstream politics but about the attitudes of the different groups on the Left as well.

This is only the end of an election campaign as far as SOSS is concerned. And they will still be there campaigning to save special schools in Leicester when all the other parties and media circus have gone.




---------------------------------------------------------------------



No Respect
DURING QUESTIONS from the floor at the Respect hustings in the Leicester South by-election, Socialist Party member Tim Lessells asked George Galloway if he supported the establishment of a new mass workers' party, preferably on a socialist programme.

He also asked George about how he would see the development of such a party taking place in Britain. Part-icularly, he asked what approach should Respect take towards sections of the working class who enter political struggle even on a single-issue or a limited programme, such as SOSS.

Tim pointed out that the Scottish Socialist Party had stood down in the Stobhill by-election to support local hospital campaigners.

Tim received a warm response and was clapped. However, George Galloway's response to this legitimate questioning was extremely hostile.

He said: "The gentlemen is a Socialist Party member who doesn't support Respect and his question is disingenuous''. He added that at the next meeting of the Respect executive he would recommend that they had nothing more to do with the Socialist Party!

Although the SWP members present gave this a huge round of applause, other people in the audience couldn't comprehend or accept Galloway's hostility. SWP members followed this with a torrent of abuse against our members, leading a woman, who was in no way allied to the Socialist Party, to say that it was a free country and we were right to say what we wanted.

After the meeting Socialist Party members were harassed out of the door by SWP members.


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

Anyway on the worst left paper question I can start with much the same list as for degrees of madness -

1) Green Anarchist and other primitivist bollocks.
2) Red Flag - Revolutionary Workers Party (Posadist)
3) Economic and Philosophic Science Review
4) Anything from the ICC or IBRP.

After that? Various Spart and spartoid publications (IBT, Internationalist Group) but not the Spartacist magazine which sometimes has interesting stuff in it.

Then Newsline, the WRP's daily colour paper. On the upside it has a tv guide and sports coverage. On the downside, well there are only so many articles ending in "... the solution to this crisis is build powerful sections of the International Committee of the Fourth International in [insert country x] and across the world to lead the struggle..." that anyone should be expected to take.

After them? Here it gets tricky because we start coming to things that are just bad rather than outright mad. I think I would probably go for Bolshy the unreadable youth rag from the AWL.

Following that, it would have to be Socialist Worker. How can anyone bear to be quite so thoroughly patronised? Condesceding to its readership, hysterical in tone, politically useless. Maybe Socialist Review should be ranked ahead of their paper, though. The revelation from some SWP national meeting that it is modelled on New Internationalist made a lot of things fall into place on that one. Again, like the Sparts, their "theoretical" journal, the ISJ, doesn't belong on any worst of lists.

Lastly, the incredibly dull Morning Star. A dose of fawning on the antics of trade union bureaucrats every morning, courtesy of Britain's last remaining Stalinists.


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> 1) It is not an analysis of the byelection results, but rather a report about the Save Our Special Schools Campaign. Thus not a word about the Liberal Democrats result or that of Respect or New Labour or anyone else at all.



Did The Socialist cover this election result elsewhere.  Surely the fact Labour lost a safe seat to the Lib Dems over the war is worthy of note somewhere?



> 2) It does not describe the vote that SOSS got as "a good result". In fact it says that it may be supposed that supporters would be disappointed because he "only got 204 votes". In fact the campaigners are not disappointed with their result. They hugely raised the profile of the schools campaign and in fact forced most of the parties to claim that they supported the aims of the campaign.



The fact that other parties, including other socialist parties like Respect and presumably the SLP took on the aims of the campaign might have led some to believe it was not worth standing against them maybe? 



> I have no love for the SLP, but unlike Respect they were putting a socialist and working class message out,



Why stand against the SLP then?  Also if you read the leicester respect newspaper you would be hard pressed to find a more 'socialist and working class' message being put out - it read like a SA leaflet, only better as it was more rooted in the community than the SA.




> It seems like such a shame to have to explain this to a supposed "Marxist" but socialists don't stand in election primarily to gain votes. It's about socialist ideas and working class political activity. Remember?



So Respect should still have stood aside for the SOSS then Nigel? Even though Respect is explicitly socialist while SOSS or 'Independent' as he appeared on the ballot seems to be not really 'explicitly socialist' in the same way?  

Can you have a genuine mass workers party that polls less than the Monster Raving Loony Party?


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## Top Dog (Jul 29, 2004)

nigel and webel. This is boring


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

The thread itself was never going to set the world alight though TD.  

Pseudo anarchist tries to get everyone to slag off socialist newspapers.  Fun for all the family.


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## butchersapron (Jul 29, 2004)

...ah that good old trot sense of humour shines through yet again...you can't miss it...


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## cockneyrebel (Jul 29, 2004)

> Even though Respect is explicitly socialist



But SWP leaders have said that RESPECT is not overtly socialist and they are against it being overtly socialist.

Could you explain to me the difference between explicit and overt?!

PS As for humour, I haven't found in general anarchos, liberals or any other people involved in political stuff to be any better......


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## Top Dog (Jul 29, 2004)

rebel warrior said:
			
		

> Pseudo anarchist tries to get everyone to slag off socialist newspapers.  Fun for all the family.


er, which one of you is the pseudo anarchist then?


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

rebel warrior said:
			
		

> Did The Socialist cover this election result elsewhere.  Surely the fact Labour lost a safe seat to the Lib Dems over the war is worthy of note somewhere?



I can't find my print copy of the paper right now, but I would imagine it was only mentioned in passing. Nothing happened in the byelections that was significantly different from the Euro elections. The Lib Dems did well, the Tories did not. Respect repeated its vote in Leicester and lost votes in Birmingham. New Labour did badly. Much the same as a few weeks ago, when we published lengthy and detailed analysis, which you can read at the Socialism Today website:

http://www.socialismtoday.org/85/britain.html






			
				rebel warrior said:
			
		

> The fact that other parties, including other socialist parties like Respect and presumably the SLP took on the aims of the campaign might have led some to believe it was not worth standing against them maybe?



Missing the point as usual. The campaign stood to raise its profile and the profile of the issue, something they achieved. We supported their decision to stand (and stood down for them) because we take a position in favour of encouraging groups of workers involved in a struggle to add a more political dimension to their fight. I realise that the SWP don't understand that there is more to involving workers in politics then rigging up a front and ordering them to step aboard, but we do.

That means that when the SWP used the Socialist Alliance to stand against the Campaign Against Tube Privatisation because they were under the delusion that they could get Paul Foot on the London Assembly, they were acting in a sectarian manner. It means when they used the SA to stand against a Hackney Shop Stewards candidate they were acting in a sectarian manner. It means that when they tried to bully tenants activists in Southwark into standing as SA candidates they were acting in a sectarian manner. And yes, when they try to force workers and other left forces to stand aside for Respect they are also acting in a sectarian manner.

It comes down in all of these instances to failing to understand that independent working class political activity is worth more than votes in a byelection. Particularly in the case of votes for Respect, where the only attraction of its candidate is her religious conversion. If Respect had done better than just repeating its Euro vote and had actually won the election on the basis of a religious communal appeal and that would not have been a "breakthrough" for socialists or for working class politics in any sense.





			
				rebel warrior said:
			
		

> Why stand against the SLP then?



Because the SLP were making exactly the same sectarian mistake as the SWP, despite the fact that they were standing on a socialist platform. Something that can't be said for Respect.




			
				rebel warrior said:
			
		

> Can you have a genuine mass workers party that polls less than the Monster Raving Loony Party?



Of course not. And polling 14% or so across Coventry doesn't make a mass workers party either or the guts of 6% across Dublin. For that matter, the Scottish Socialist Party isn't a mass party. Neither can you have a "left alternative" that gather support chiefly on the basis of religious conviction.

Of course nobody in the Socialist Party or in the Save Our Schools campaign deludes themselves into thinking that we have a mass party of the working class. The same can't be said for SWP and Respect members with regard to Respect and religious conviction though. The idea that a member of a supposedly "Marxist" organisation would describe the Respect platform as socialist almost beggars belief. Its as if words lose all meaning to you.

So again:

Anything to say about Respect voting to keep the SLP off hustings?


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

cockneyrebel said:
			
		

> But SWP leaders have said that RESPECT is not overtly socialist and they are against it being overtly socialist.
> 
> Could you explain to me the difference between explicit and overt?!



Well, given 'Respect are the new cockney rebels' - (see this weeks socialist worker) I would have thought you would have been able to tell me this.

Still, it looks like it is dictionary time again for some on U75.  

Overtly - Respect is not overtly socialist, it does not come across at first sight as socialist, if it was, it would be called something like - Respect: The Socialist Unity Coalition.  See?  

Explicitly - It is actually a socialist party as the letter S in  RESPECT stands for socialism.  Do you see this now CR? 

As for Nigel - no, your paper afaik did not cover leicester or brum byelections which was interesting.  One wonders what would happen if Respect wins the council election this evening in Tower hamlets or does very well - will it be airbrushed out as well?  One suspects that would be the case...


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## butchersapron (Jul 29, 2004)

"Explicitly - It is actually a socialist party as the letter S in RESPECT stands for socialism. Do you see this now CR? "

That's a rather loose and broad definition of socialism RW - anyone that claims they are is it? This makes Labour a socialist party - are they? If not, surely the claim that because the word soclialism is included in official titles or constitiutions is enough to define a party as socialist falls - as does your claim above. You'll have to find some other basis on which to argue that RESPECT is explicitly socialist.


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

rebel warrior said:
			
		

> One wonders what would happen if Respect wins the council election this evening in Tower hamlets or does very well - will it be airbrushed out as well?  One suspects that would be the case...



One suspects that you've been talking to Chris Nineham rather too much recently. Or maybe to the grandson of Sir Richard M. Lyon-Dalberg-Acton, 2nd Baron Acton of Aldenham and Maria Anna Ludmilla Euphrosina von und zu Arco auf Valley.

As for whether or not we will cover a council by-election in Tower Hamlets, I'd be surprised. We don't often cover council by-elections where there is no working class or socialist force standing.


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

Point taken butchers.  

Why respect is explicitly socialist:  From what 'We stand for' (Respects founding decleration):



> We want a world in which the democratic demands of the people are carried out; a world based on need not profit; a world where solidarity rather than self-interest is the spirit of the age.



Implies democratic collective control instead of private profit...surely that is good enough to test whether Respect is socialist?


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> As for whether or not we will cover a council by-election in Tower Hamlets, I'd be surprised. We don't often cover council by-elections where there is no working class or socialist force standing.



The candidate is a PCS branch secretary ie a leading trade unionist.  Surely he is a working class candidate Nigel?


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## joshjosh (Jul 29, 2004)

rebel warrior said:
			
		

> Implies democratic collective control instead of private profit...surely that is good enough to test whether Respect is socialist?



so, RESPECT explicitly implies socialism then?


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## belboid (Jul 29, 2004)

rebel warrior said:
			
		

> Point taken butchers.
> 
> Why respect is *explicitly* socialist:  From what 'We stand for' (Respects founding decleration):
> <snip>
> *Implies* democratic collective control instead of private profit...surely that is good enough to test whether Respect is socialist?


Do you understand the difference between explicit and implicit RW?


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## butchersapron (Jul 29, 2004)

Brilliant RW!


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

rebel warrior said:
			
		

> The candidate is a PCS branch secretary ie a leading trade unionist.  Surely he is a working class candidate Nigel?



Well you might pull that little confused smiley face at me, RW. The candidate could be a coal mining, whippet eating, horny handed son of toil and it wouldn't make the organisation he is standing for a socialist or working class force. Unless you think that the various trade unionists who have stood for the Tories over the years make the Conservative and Unionist Party into the cutting edge of working class politics too?

Ever get the feeling you are arguing with the kid in the class who eats crayons?


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

If it only implicitly implied Socialism it would not have the S standing for Socialism.  As it does, that explicitly implies that Respect is socialist.


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## butchersapron (Jul 29, 2004)

Even better!


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## redsquirrel (Jul 29, 2004)

, keep digging RW


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## belboid (Jul 29, 2004)

Worst papers ever:

EPSR - still homophobic, as wel las idiotic and unreadable
Living Marxism - or rathger dead moralism.  Just shite in every way. Tho very profesionally laid out shite.
New Worker (I think thats the name of the ICP one, ultra-stalinist WRP splinter)


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> Well you might pull that little confused smiley face at me, RW. The candidate could be a coal mining, whippet eating, horny handed son of toil and it wouldn't make the organisation he is standing for a socialist or working class force. Unless you think that the various trade unionists who have stood for the Tories over the years make the Conservative and Unionist Party into the cutting edge of working class politics too?



Yes - but since when have Tories stood such working class candidates that have been so proud of the fact in their literature that they have led strike action etc, and are proud to be trade unionists?  If all their candidates were such working class fighters I doubt they would still exist as the Tory party to be frank...


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

As this seems to have turned into the "any random stuff you are thinking about thread", rebel warrior detailed perusal of the socialist may well have revealed to him the good news that... the SLP's only councillor has joined the Socialist Party.


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## belboid (Jul 29, 2004)

Explicitly implicit!  Of course!!

Comrades, we are failing to understand the dialectic again....


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> As this seems to have turned into the "any random stuff you are thinking about thread", rebel warrior detailed perusal of the socialist may well have revealed to him the good news that... the SLP's only councillor has joined the Socialist Party.



Eh?  Talk about changing the subject when you are caught out talking shit...


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## belboid (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> ... the SLP's only councillor has joined the Socialist Party.


fucking hell, he didn't last long!!  He was only elected last in may wasn't he?


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

rebel warrior said:
			
		

> If all their candidates were such working class fighters I doubt they would still exist as the Tory party to be frank...



And if all Respect's candidates were such working class fighters, rather than say privatisating councillors or religious converts, then I doubt they would still exist as Respect to be frank...


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

belboid said:
			
		

> fucking hell, he didn't last long!!  He was only elected last in may wasn't he?



Yes. I think he joined the SLP on a first-thing-you-see basis combined with an admiration for Scargill. He wasn't best pleased about the Stalin stuff.

And RW, I have some tasty crayons for you.


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## WP member (Jul 29, 2004)

*Crayon munching*

It is clear from RW'spost and most of the recent SWP literature on the subject thaty socialism is not a political force that is a guide for action by the oppressed masses in the world, but it is simply a letter, one of other letters that you can use as a buzz word.  RW claims that RESPECT is implicitly socialist because one of the letters in its name stands for Socialism.  Great.  
He then backs this up with a quote from their founding, ahem... manifesto... that is about as vague as you can get.  A perfect sentence constructed to appease SWP members and their hangers on whilst not offending liberals, monarchists and whoever else is involved in your political party, sorry...  coalition.

It is insulting that socialists, workers and revolutionaries have died, and indeed are dying for the principles, politics and ideas of revolutionary socialism, for the politics of Marx, Engles, Lenin and Trotsky, whereas some revolutionary groups in the UK think they can take the entire tradition, strip it of all its revolutionary content, stick it in parliamentary elections, claim they can change the world from westminster and say they are still standing by their principles.  Hey at least the S stands for socalism, right?!

BTW the funniest quote form Marxism has to be the Callinicos one when he argued with Albert.  A comrade told me that Albert accused Leninists of being stuck in the past and having no new ideas, Callinicos comes back and says - 
"No, look at the writings of Marx, Lenin and Trotsky, you will not find anything like RESPECT in any of their works."  No comrade, but try reading Stalin!


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## Top Dog (Jul 29, 2004)

belboid said:
			
		

> Explicitly implicit!  Of course!!
> 
> Comrades, we are failing to understand the dialectic again....


dunno what you mean. RW has given us an unqualified response (with, of course, a few qualifications. Naturally)


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## rebel warrior (Jul 29, 2004)

WP member said:
			
		

> It is insulting that socialists, workers and revolutionaries have died, and indeed are dying for the principles, politics and ideas of revolutionary socialism, for the politics of Marx, Engles, Lenin and Trotsky, whereas some revolutionary groups in the UK think they can take the entire tradition, strip it of all its revolutionary content, stick it in parliamentary elections, claim they can change the world from westminster and say they are still standing by their principles.  Hey at least the S stands for socalism, right?!



Forget chewing on crayons mate, you need something far more potent to chew on!


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## ernestolynch (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> As this seems to have turned into the "any random stuff you are thinking about thread", rebel warrior detailed perusal of the socialist may well have revealed to him the good news that... the SLP's only councillor has joined the Socialist Party.


Fucking right-deviationist.


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

WP member said:
			
		

> BTW the funniest quote form Marxism has to be the Callinicos one when he argued with Albert.



What's this "Callinicos" business. Show the man due respect. That's Alexander Lyon-Dalberg-Acton, to you or Alexander von und zu Arco auf Valley if you qualify as a friend.


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## belboid (Jul 29, 2004)

rebel warrior said:
			
		

> Well, given 'Respect are the new cockney rebels'


Cockney Rejects shorely?





(sorry, rather slow on that one....)


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## JoeBlack (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> That's Alexander Lyon-Dalberg-Acton, to you or Alexander von und zu Arco auf Valley if you qualify as a friend.



I don't get this.  Explain!


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

A left wing journalist called Dave Osler stumbled across Callinicos in a book on the British peerage. His interest was piqued and he did a bit of digging around and discovered that Alex's family consists of most of the nobility and royalty of Europe. His grandparents include Richard M. Lyon-Dalberg-Acton, 2nd Baron Acton of Aldenham and the brilliantly named Maria Anna Ludmilla Euphrosina von und zu Arco auf Valley.

Poor old Paul Foot used to get some stick about his father being Governor General of Jamaica, but if people are going to be unfairly mocked for having an aristocratic family it seems to me that the fun should be spread around a little.


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## Japey (Jul 29, 2004)

Come on, be fair to RW.  They've got a socialist unionist as their candidate.  Half the people in the ward might be muslims, but this shouldn't stop all you reds from preferring him to the labour candidate - should it?  Or are you so bound up in tribal loyalties?


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## belboid (Jul 29, 2004)

'poor old paul foot' - your attitudes changed a bit sudenly! 

There never was any hiding of Callinicos' posh background - major landowners in Zimbabwe, and a relation of Lord Acton. The Maria Anna Ludmilla Euphrosina von und zu Arco auf Valley is a new one to me tho - and is marvellously ludicrous.


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 29, 2004)

belboid said:
			
		

> 'poor old paul foot' - your attitudes changed a bit sudenly!



Eh? I was being quite nice about him on the other thread, I just wasn't treating him as a secular saint.


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## redsquirrel (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> the brilliantly named Maria Anna Ludmilla Euphrosina von und zu Arco auf Valley..


If this was my name I think I'd use it.


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## Japey (Jul 29, 2004)

Japey said:
			
		

> Come on, be fair to RW.  They've got a socialist unionist as their candidate.  Half the people in the ward might be muslims, but this shouldn't stop all you reds from preferring him to the labour candidate - should it?  Or are you so bound up in tribal loyalties?


 you never know - after a few months, he might defect to your party


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## Top Dog (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> Maria Anna Ludmilla Euphrosina von und zu Arco auf Valley.


Phew, that's a tough one...



can I have a consonant...?



another consonant...




another consonant...




a vowel...


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## redsquirrel (Jul 29, 2004)

Imagine if his parents had decided to hyphonate their names,
Alexander Lyon-Dalberg-Acton-von und zu Arco auf Valley


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## rednblack (Jul 29, 2004)

belboid said:
			
		

> New Worker (I think thats the name of the ICP one, ultra-stalinist WRP splinter)



it's the paper of the new communist party


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## flimsier (Jul 29, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> Respect repeated its vote in Leicester and lost votes in Birmingham.



You didn't explain your assertion that RESPECT had lost votes in both places. Now you say they repeated it in one. 

Can you explain what figures you are actually comparing here, and how you come to these conclusions?

I fully expect this request to be ignored again.


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## flimsier (Jul 30, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> We don't often cover council by-elections where there is no working class or socialist force standing.



Interesting, because the other article you just cut and paste described RESPECT as left wing. 

I suspect it can't be that then.


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## Nigel Irritable (Jul 30, 2004)

Respect got 9% across Leicester and 7% across Birmingham in the Euro elections. I gather from Respect supporters amongst others that those percentages were concentrated to some degree or other in the constituencies that were being contested in the by-elections. 

From that perspective it seems clear that Respect at best held their vote in Leicester South, something of an achievement given the change in electoral system, and certainly lost votes in Birmingham. I wasn't aware that this was a contested opinion. Do you think that they got less than 6% in the Birmingham electoral area, for instance?


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## Pickman's model (Jul 30, 2004)

belboid said:
			
		

> There never was any hiding of Callinicos' posh background - major landowners in Zimbabwe


not any more, i suspect.


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## Ted Maul (Aug 2, 2004)

There's a lot of good socialists in Britain but somehow they've never managed to come up with a decent paper (although News on Sunday might have been the right paper at the wrongest possible time, Thatcherism's high water mark).

Workers Hammer is unintentionally hilarious - always worth a read just to see who's being denounced.
Weekly Worker, and the AWL's mag are tiresome and dull.
Socialist Worker is, as others have said, cringingly patronising, but is at least well designed.
I've rarely read The Socialist, though Militant was pretty bad.
I've got a bit more time for the Morning Star to be honest - it's frequently dull and there's obviously some bits I just don't agree with (stop calling North Korea "people's Korea" you fucking weirdos), but at least it actually tells you the fucking news sometimes, rather than just shout slogans at you. It's also, for a mag semingly run by Tankie control freaks, more prepared than most lefty rags to give a bit of space to differing strands of left opinion.


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## Zonk (Aug 3, 2004)

Well I'm disgusted with the anarchist types on here. Socialist Worker is FANTASTIC!!!!










For setting fire to, starting fires with, and wiping your arse on. Excellent!


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## Charlie Drake (Aug 8, 2004)

What about the SPGB's tergid old 'Socialist Standard'?


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## flimsier (Aug 8, 2004)

Charlie Drake said:
			
		

> What about the SPGB's tergid old 'Socialist Standard'?



I forgot about that. It nearly put me off left politics for life (I once asked for free copies through the NME as a kid - and they sent me it free for 3 years [and maybe still do - I moved])


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## butchersapron (Aug 8, 2004)

Why didn't you have the courtesy to tell them you no longer wanted it? That's a serious question - these thing cost money and come out of members own funds.


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## flimsier (Aug 8, 2004)

I believe I did, but not repeatedly. 

Apart from that, I was young and didn't really think about it.

The ad ran '99% of politics is crap. Read about the 1% that isn't. Contact:....'

They are loaded (in terms of cash) - but that's not an excuse.


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## butchersapron (Aug 8, 2004)

No, they're potentialy loaded...different thing...


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## flimsier (Aug 8, 2004)

Yes, but that wasn't my answer anyway.

They must have had a significant amount of money to have advertised in the NME every week/ other week for over 2 years.


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## butchersapron (Aug 8, 2004)

All their outward budget was probably thrown into it. One little classified ad is not even that much, even in the nme - yes -i saw it as well.

You're first line bears no relation to my point - or a very loose one at best. Please cease this impressionistic rubbish masqerauading as points - it makes you look stupid 

Really though, it does.


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## flimsier (Aug 8, 2004)

The stuff about them being loaded wasn't my answer to your point. 

WTF is wrong with you? I made the point that it was terrible and they wouldn't stop sending it to me. You seem upset that I didn't go out of my way, at the age of about 14, to stop them sending me that and other junk mail.

I explained why I didn't, and you seem to want to Labour a point. Then you say it makes me look stupid.


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## ernestolynch (Aug 8, 2004)

I'm still awaiting his answers.....


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## flimsier (Aug 8, 2004)

What to?


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## ernestolynch (Aug 8, 2004)

LOL u no


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## butchersapron (Aug 8, 2004)

flimsier said:
			
		

> The stuff about them being loaded wasn't my answer to your point.
> 
> WTF is wrong with you? I made the point that it was terrible and they wouldn't stop sending it to me. You seem upset that I didn't go out of my way, at the age of about 14, to stop them sending me that and other junk mail.
> 
> I explained why I didn't, and you seem to want to Labour a point. Then you say it makes me look stupid.



Your line "Yes, but that wasn't my answer anyway." - when it was it exactly that is what makes you look stupid  - twice. Once for getting it wrong first time round and then a second time for pretending that this was not your first point - when it's plain to see that it was.

I've got no problem with you trying to make a point - but please try and make that point. Unconnected vague wafflings in which the logical or substantive points only exist in your head (i.e not expressed or articulated in public on here) does not an argument make.


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## flimsier (Aug 8, 2004)

The last pm from you had only one question in it.

(from memory): 'Do you really think I'd remember one conversation in a pub with a student teacher from 5 years ago?'

I didn't reply to that because I just took it as a denial that you remember anything, but said I'd stick to what I said I would do, and I pmed you that. (for others: just that I'd not engage because I will get wound up)

Now I don't know if you've posted stuff on another thread, but I presume you are referring to your last pm - which contained just one question, as above.


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## flimsier (Aug 8, 2004)

butchersapron said:
			
		

> Your line "Yes, but that wasn't my answer anyway." - when it was it exactly that is what makes you look stupid  - twice. Once for getting it wrong first time round and then a second time for pretending that this was not your first point - when it's plain to see that it was.
> 
> I've got no problem with you trying to make a point - but please try and make that point. Unconnected vague wafflings in which the logical or substantive points only exist in your head (i.e not expressed or articulated in public on here) does not an argument make.



The first two sentences were my reasons. 

The last sentence was 'not an excuse' as I said. I apologise if you thought that was a reason or excuse. I didn't know they were loaded at that time.


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## ernestolynch (Aug 8, 2004)

Do you want it or not? Shall I dig up that post I addressed to you that you shyed away from?


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## ernestolynch (Aug 8, 2004)

a) - you have not worked in my school, just so everyone knows. You did your college placement there which involved you doing a small part of someone's timetable especially selected for you and writing some daft essay.

b) - no matter what you may think about everyone confiding in you - noone can remember who you are. Unlike another username of U75, who knows mains (or is it milesy?)and a few others very well, who also was a student teacher at our place, did a grand effort at a very tough placement, and is now working in a PRU. We remember him well, went for a meal on his last day, and often ask about him, respect to A. You don't fucking register pal.

c) - you may have been asked to come down to the pub after work one Friday during your month's visit. If we'd have known you were there compiling a report on the conversations and attitudes of a group of stressed-out public servants getting pissed at the end of the week, I doubt you would have been accommodated so fucking graciously. Small wonder you don't go out with your work at the end of the week/term.

d) - I was probably going through my SWP stage when you were there. Isn't it amazing how I still can't recall ever seeing a Trotty student at my work. A few anarchists, yeah, even a Stalinist ex-CPGBer once, but your presence doesn't register (yet again)

e) - you have publicly claimed on these boards to have met two of my ex-colleagues, yet when asked TWICE by me via PM, you have not expanded upon this. As PCG stated, this is low and a bit shite really.

f) - you are a gobshite, son. More later.
http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=2013856#post2013856


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## flimsier (Aug 9, 2004)

What do you want to know?

(a) apologies if I misled anyone by using 'worked'?
(b) that's fine. I'm not sure about the 'confiding' bit.
(c) Yes, ok.
(d) I don't think you were (going through the SWP stage), considering the conversation we had. I just remember you holding some very dodgy views. I didn't realise that was actually you (I thought you were someone else) until recently. I have told you why I remember you now, and why I remember you (much much more than I thought I remembered you). I remember wondering if it was ok for a teacher to hold those views (obviously naively at that time). I also remember it being the conversation that partially led to my 'flounce' from your school - taking the last two weeks off 'sick'. (As I said a fair few times, it was the most difficult school I taught in, and I didn't like anything about it at all). This was also the conversation I very much recalled when writing my ill advised public attack on you when returning from a night at the pub, and fairly drunk.
(e) Not biting, sorry. But I apologise for writing 'worked' again. One was offered a job, there I believe.

I'm not sure what you wanted.

Just for reference. I hadn't seen this post until I just searched for it.

But that's it mate. Any more and you'll wait a long time. I don't want to come on here to repeat this laundry stuff - and shouldn't have before.

But the 'not engaging' stands and I hope to stick to it. I presume you will have no problem with that.


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## ernestolynch (Aug 9, 2004)

Have you or have you not met a couple of my ex-colleagues and in what circumstances? Who?

How can anyone expect to confide in you if you claim to have told stuff to your mates (the b, silentnate etc) about another poster, but refused to meet the consequences?

Tell me who...initials please.

(I have been told already)


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## flimsier (Aug 9, 2004)

ernestolynch said:
			
		

> Have you or have you not met a couple of my ex-colleagues and in what circumstances? Who?
> 
> How can anyone expect to confide in you if you claim to have told stuff to your mates (the b, silentnate etc) about another poster, but refused to meet the consequences?
> 
> ...



The only way I think you can know is through JC - who is married to an older HoY who used to be a HoH at my first teaching practice school - but I'm not sure exactly who (though you never told me he was working there - you only told me about your head - who was a HoH with him)

The only person even related to your school that I believe either of these people still know - and that's because she was in the support staff at my first school. Only one of them had a good experience.


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## flimsier (Aug 9, 2004)

As for names, no.


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## ernestolynch (Aug 9, 2004)

YOu said that you met two ex-colleagues of mine who slagged me off. I have proof of this from other posters here. Yet when I asked you to substantiate you prevaricate and pussyfoot around. You're the queen of arsery, FLI. Put up or shut up.


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## flimsier (Aug 9, 2004)

I told you as much as you need to know. 

If you still think I'm lying, carry on, though you claim to know, so...


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## ernestolynch (Aug 9, 2004)

So what you are saying is 'dont tell me anything because I, FLI, are an untrustworthy judas'?


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## flimsier (Aug 9, 2004)

If you like. I'm a bit  but I want out of this as you know.


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## butchersapron (Aug 9, 2004)

Shouldn't have opted in then mate.


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## ernestolynch (Aug 9, 2004)

Don't play with fire if you don't wanna get your fingers burned.


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## ernestolynch (Aug 9, 2004)

flimsier said:
			
		

> If you like. I'm a bit  but I want out of this as you know.



I only know as much as you believe I *need to know*


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## Idris2002 (Aug 9, 2004)

I was looking at the Northern Star - published by the remnant of the British and Irish Communist Organisation - and it really has gone off the deep end.

There's a piece by Angela Clifford which makes some good points about the way the RPF regime in Rwanda may  be exploiting the genocide of 1994 for its own ends - but that piece then went over the edge into David Irving territory.


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## butchersapron (Aug 9, 2004)

How does it go? Bico - The Peking Branch of the Orange Order.


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## blamblam (Aug 9, 2004)

ernestolynch said:
			
		

> I only know as much as you believe I *need to know*


lol get a room you two!
(I love seeing trots fight each other)


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## Idris2002 (Aug 9, 2004)

I suppose they overreacted to the uncritical Irish nationalist perspective of much of the left of the time.

Wasn't Alexei Sayle a member?


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## butchersapron (Aug 9, 2004)

Idris2002 said:
			
		

> I suppose they overreacted to the uncritical Irish nationalist perspective of much of the left of the time.
> 
> Wasn't Alexei Sayle a member?


 Might have been, though the bulk of their membership always seemed to be academics of one stripe or another. One of them is/was Trimbles senior adviser i believe.


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## blamblam (Aug 9, 2004)

sayle was in the YCL


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## rednblack (Aug 9, 2004)

sayle was in the relatively sane hoxhaite cpb-ml, if i recall correctly


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## ernestolynch (Aug 9, 2004)

Long Live Comrade Enver Hoxha!


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## Idris2002 (Aug 9, 2004)

You should meet my supervisor, Ern.

She told me once she went on a party tour of Albania.

They were shown a collective farm where cows had the music of Scarlatti played to them in the milking station, to increase yields. . .


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## scawenb (Sep 7, 2004)

Nigel Irritable said:
			
		

> Then Newsline, the WRP's daily colour paper. On the upside it has a tv guide and sports coverage.



I understand that they have unfortunately stopped printing this now. But does the WRP still exist? 

Most interesting is a constant unsolved mystery - did they really get their money from Libya and is that the reason for their recent demise? And if if they did how and why? Is they really any actual evidence?

Questions, questions, questions....


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## belboid (Sep 7, 2004)

Yes  - and they still print it most days!
Yes, as well as Iraq.
No - their demise was because they were off their heads.

Use the search button thing for WRP & several threads will come up detailing answers at length.


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## scawenb (Sep 8, 2004)

belboid said:
			
		

> Yes  - and they still print it most days!
> Yes, as well as Iraq.
> No - their demise was because they were off their heads.
> 
> Use the search button thing for WRP & several threads will come up detailing answers at length.



Can't really find any conclusive proof. Every group suffers accusations of secret funding or infiltration.

What I don't really understand is why such funds, and they must have been big to fund the worlds only Trotsyist daily newspaper which was also in FULL COLOUR for years, should have gone only to the WRP. It must have been the most ineffectual Party on the left.


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## stevendurrant (Sep 8, 2004)

Older posters may recall anorgancalled "News On Sunday" a popularist left-wing tabloid in the late 80s.

I only have a dim recollection so cant say how good /bad it was for sure, but it bombed pretty sharpish.

Does this ring any nostalgic bells?


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## Nigel Irritable (Sep 10, 2004)

The WRP were the only relatively large, non-Stalinist, socialist organisation willing to whore themselves out to dictatorships. That's why they got the money and not say, Militant or the SWP.

As for the BICO, Butchers is thinking of Paul Bew I suspect. According to the possibly not entirely reliable Brendan Clifford (BICO's main leader) Bew was associated on the quiet with the Workers Party rather than BICO. Bew went on to be an advisor of David Trimble's, but some of his earlier work with Patterson and Gibbon is well worth reading. It was heavily influenced by Althusser, which isn't always a recommendation and it has obvious political biases but there hasn't been all that much serious Marxist scholarship on Irish history. Another BICO alumnus is John Lloyd.


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## 80sHair Revival (Sep 10, 2004)

Socialist News, the paper occasionally put out by Scargill's fan club is absolutely dire. I've never come across a more boring paper.

Hot on its heels are the Morning Star and New Worker. You actually feel cheated if you've paid for either of these sorry rags.

And at a risk of offending Brian The Socialist is a terrible newspaper - just like its Socialist Worker rival. I do not understand why so many groups feel the need to talk down to "normal" working class people. It's sad that even the Sun is a better written and interesting paper than much of the "radical" press.


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## Groucho (Sep 10, 2004)

stevendurrant said:
			
		

> Older posters may recall anorgancalled "News On Sunday" a popularist left-wing tabloid in the late 80s.
> 
> I only have a dim recollection so cant say how good /bad it was for sure, but it bombed pretty sharpish.
> 
> Does this ring any nostalgic bells?



Yes it was John Pilger's project. Advertised as a paper with no tits but plenty of balls. The first edition broke the official secrets act by publishing an MOD canteen menu in a gesture to show that the act was a stupid infringement of free speach. We all desperately tried to like it but it was dull. It died because it got no advertising revenue to speak of - effective boycott by business. But it was launched at a diffcult time anyway and, as I said, it was sadly a little dull.


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## boxinghefner (Oct 29, 2005)

'Newsline', the Workers Revolutionary Party newspaper, is really quite bad.

As is 'Workers' - the paper of the Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist).

And I can't read 'Socialist Worker' no matter how hard I might try.


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## kasheem (Oct 29, 2005)

Is The Morning Star any good? I see it being sold everywhere in corner shops, must be popular. Never read a lefty rag yet.


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## boxinghefner (Oct 29, 2005)

> Is The Morning Star any good? I see it being sold everywhere in corner shops, must be popular. Never read a lefty rag yet.



It's fine enough, largely news-stories and sometimes articles from left labour MPs and their friends.


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## Chuck Wilson (Oct 29, 2005)

boxinghefner said:
			
		

> 'Newsline', the Workers Revolutionary Party newspaper, is really quite bad.
> 
> As is 'Workers' - the paper of the Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist).
> 
> And I can't read 'Socialist Worker' no matter how hard I might try.



Sometimes it helps if you put a ruler underneath the words........


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## justuname (Nov 2, 2005)

stevendurrant said:
			
		

> Older posters may recall anorgancalled "News On Sunday" a popularist left-wing tabloid in the late 80s.
> 
> I only have a dim recollection so cant say how good /bad it was for sure, but it bombed pretty sharpish.
> 
> Does this ring any nostalgic bells?



There's a book about News on Sunday called 'Disaster' that's brilliant, really funny. I think it quickly panicked at low circulation and ran a sex scandal about a tory mp. Pilger might have been able to save it but they wouldn't let him.


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