Bolshevik, Menshivik, Socialists, Anarchists, social dems

Welcome to left wing politics. We've always splintered along "purity" lines whenever we gain a little momentum. It makes it easy to marginalize us. Don't have an answer, just an observation.

One of the periods of the left's strongest growth was when Moscow allowed communists in the US to organize in cooperation with non-communist progressive organizations. It resulted in stupendous growth of progressive movements with everyone working together. That largely ended after Stalin's non-aggression pact with Hitler. Along the same lines, the socialists who made the greatest impact in US history are those who focused on movement/issue organizing rather than creating a splinter political party.

Ideological dogmatism can be just as crippling for the left as it is for the conservative talk radio crowd. Alinsky's community organizing approach is called apolitical but it's more a matter of not letting ideological hang-ups get in the way of practical organizing decisions. Obama's campaign instilled that philosophy among its young volunteers and I think the rising generation gets it. I'm encouraged that they may work in a more politically savvy and productive way than previous generations.

I guess I'm just kind of pessimistic this morning. I'm not usually that way, but the splintering I see on here just reminds me of the splintering that ALWAYS seems to happen to the Left when the momentum starts to swing our way.

I fail purity tests although I'm pretty darn left. I fail them because I'm pragmatic. I'll vote for a centrist Dem who's MARGINALLY more left than a RW shill. I'll vote (and support) as left as I can UNTIL IT COMES TO MY PERCEPTION OF VIABILITY. I won't vote for the SWP candidate if that vote gives the Republican/Nazi the win in the general election.

The far right is indeed extreme and finds new ways to slide to the right seemingly daily. Meanwhile, the "fringe left" contain few hard core ideological leftists. There aren't any significant numbers of communist, Marxists, or anarchists and certainly nothing resembling such folk holding office in more than the most random and isolated cases.

Talking left and right in America is willfully creating a false equivalence. It pretends something that isn't and then applies that invention to about anyone more liberal than Richard Nixon.