First Published: A Letter to the editor in The Call, Vol. 10, No. 4, June 1981.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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As an independent socialist, I’ve been asked to participate in the debate the CPML is having.
Now-a-days many in the CPML are saying “the masses, the masses what they say has got to be right.” This comes after years of deciding for the masses, and acting accordingly. But now it’s all “masses,” and no “cadre superstructure.”
Let’s not dump the cadre with formerly too elitist dirty bath water.
One person says, in essence, the Peace and Freedom Party is a socialist party and therefore unsuitable for the “working class” because their more or less average autoworker friend sneers at it. The person goes on to suggest that maybe a Citizens Party or a DSOC would really hit the spot. The person claims, in essence, “the working class is not ready for socialism” (my quotes). What is appalling is that the person is talking really only about white auto workers with relatively good pay and seniority. The person is talking about a very small section of the less than 20% that belong to unions in this country.
Part of the problem is most of the cadre going for the flip-flop plan have had virtually no intimate, daily, decades-long life with the non-union working poor, the 80% of the working class. I have. This 80% gets angry at flip flops. To the working poor, a talky “half socialism” will sound exactly like just another liberal politician’s scam.