Knowing Your Left From Your Right

Most American "leftists" don't know their left from their right when it comes to political orientations and objectives. Let's get clearer on this matter. There seem to be three basic ideas in circulation as to what "left wing" means in America, only one of which is correct. Let's briefly dissect these three views.

1. The "Old Left" Perspective: Economist Right-Left Polarity. This perspective sees the political left and right as divided fundamentally by their respective approaches to building the U.S. economy. In this view, the basic division between left and right is that between the approaches of economic interventionism (left wing) and laissez-faire capitalism (right wing) toward affecting this commonly-desired outcome of economic growth. "Radical leftists" who hold this view tend to see the Democratic Party as "more progressive than the Republican Party, but just not progressive enough" because the Democratic Party supports policies of state intervention in the economy that seek to proactively defend or to underwrite improvements in the living standards of Americans generally. This outlook has been associated with the "Old Left" in America and the First World generally because it was the most common view of what the left-right polarity was up to the 1960s.

2. The "New Left" Perspective: Social Issues Right-Left Polarity. This perspective sees left and right as divided fundamentally according to degrees of civil libertarianism and civil authoritarianism. In this view, the basic division between left and right is that between support for the maximum range of democratic rights and life-style options (left wing) and support for the minimum range of democratic rights and life-style options (right wing). "Radical leftists"/radical libertarians who hold this view tend to see the Democratic Party as "more progressive than the Republican Party, but just not progressive enough" because the Democratic Party supports policies of liberalizing access to political power and of increasing the range of life-style options open to Americans. This outlook has been associated with the "New Left" because it became the most common view of what left-right polarity was during the 1960s and '70s in the U.S. and throughout the First World generally. Some groups, like America's Libertarian Party for example, have argued that social liberalism is not necessarily left wing because it can theoretically be combined with the laissez-faire economics...although this is almost never done in practice.

Note: These two views of left-right polarity were largely merged in America when Jesse Jackson formed the Rainbow Coalition to promote his election campaign in 1984, thus marrying the "Old Left" and the "New Left" both to each other and to the Democratic Party. The resultant combination remains what our media today typically refers to once again as simply "the left". In each of the above definitions, American politics tend toward the center of whatever range of debate is socially acceptable overall at any given moment, but the said center of gravity tends to gradually move leftward in concert with the ever-expanding wealth of the nation, thus endowing the typical American with a certain sense that their country, while perhaps flawed, is surely among the most progressive on Earth and in world history. The common factor here is an evaluation of "left" and "right" based strictly on the idea of advancing the socio-economic welfare of Americans (or First Worlders broadly, at most), with "leftists" favoring said advancements to be more generalized within this territorial grouping and "rightists" favoring said advancements to be distributed more disproportionately to certain favored demographic groups (i.e. trickle-down economics). There is no room here for a seriously internationalist perspective.

3. The Third Worldist Perspective: Imperialist/Anti-Imperialist Right-Left Polarity. Maoist-Third Worldists, by contrast, recognize that the principal contradiction, the contradiction between the exploiter countries and the exploited countries, the First World and the Third World, is of central importance to understanding the actual polarity of politics in the world. In this view, left wing means opposing imperialism, while right wing means supporting imperialism. To be an authentic and consistent leftist means to pursue the destruction of the imperialist American economy, as well as of all the exploitation-based First World economies, and the complete elimination of the political power of the exploiter First World populations as a whole. Although the principal contradiction is not the only contradiction, and while Maoist-Third Worldists do support the collectivization of life in general, as well as maximizing of democratic rights for the presently oppressed and exploited masses in the Third World, the principal contradiction is the single most essential measure of "progressive" and "reactionary" degrees. "Progressive" and "reactionary" can and should be understood as largely being relative to the principal contradiction. In other words, one is essentially a progressive to the degree that they oppose imperialism and a reactionary to the degree that they support imperialism. By this standard of measure, both the major parties in the U.S. are clearly far to the right. By this standard of measure, it becomes easy to see that neither is qualitatively more progressive or "less evil" than the other.

The consistent historical meaning of "left" and "right" is that "left wing" refers to those who support a new and historically more advanced mode of production, whereas "right wing" refers to those who uphold the old order, whatever it may be in the given situation (feudalism, capitalism, or whatever). We've all heard about the parliamentary seating arrangements during the French Revolution and how that was the origin of the terms "left wing" and "right wing" in association with a political meaning. In that time, it was progressive to support the advent of capitalist democracy and its replacement of the old feudal system and reactionary to, by contrast, defend the old feudal system. In the modern context, the era of imperialism, it is progressive to oppose capitalism (especially in favor of socialism and communism), and in particular its main expression, imperialism, and it is reactionary to instead support capitalism and especially its main expression, imperialism. Those who resist the imperialist system are progressives to the degree that they do so. Those who support it are reactionaries to the degree that they do so.

So what about the various "communist organizations" in America? Where do they lie in this spectrum? It depends on which ones we're talking about. The Leading Light Communist Organization is the only legitimately communist organization in this country and indeed in the world today. All others are fakes. In America, in fact, most of these others are downright reactionary, albeit perhaps to marginally varying degrees. Just about the entire non-MTWist "communist" movement in America is First Worldist and in the Democratic Party camp on one level or another. "In the Democratic Party camp?", you ask? Yes. "In the case of the Communist Party USA, as much is transparent, but what about these other cases where the revisionist parties/organizations don't declare their support for the Democrats up front?", you further inquire? Well I think this is best demonstrated through an example:

I have in the past attended two rallies called by the ANSWER Coalition: one in 2007 and another in 2010. Both of these claimed to be against imperialist war and aggression generally. The one in 2007 had an attendance of about 50,000, while the one in 2010 had an attendance of somewhere in the range of 5,000 to 10,000. So what explains the drop-off? What was the basic difference between the situation in the U.S. in 2007 versus 2010? It wasn't the number of U.S. troops stationed abroad, that's for sure! That figure actually increased between 2007 and 2010, as did the number of U.S. military bases set up around the globe. The difference was which one of the main U.S. parties held the presidency. If your organization loses four-fifths of its active participation as a result of a Democrat winning the presidency, then who is it that really controls this said organization? Formally, the PSL controls ANSWER. They control ANSWER in much the same way though that Hamid Karzai controls Afghanistan. In the latter case, the important thing is who controls Hamid Karzai. Likewise, in the former case, the important thing is who controls the PSL. My experience made the answer to this question obvious to me. For example: in the 2007 rally, the speakers were capable of calling out the president by name. In 2010, this had become an unspoken taboo. This was just one of many interesting inconsistencies I observed between these two events. The nature of the 2010 rally overall was such that Cindy Sheehan, in delivering her speech, felt compelled to inquire of the crowd: “Why are we giving him [Obama] a free pass? We can’t make any more excuses. The Democrats and Republicans are the war party.” I remember that quote quite well, and it was repeated in some of the news coverage of the event in various pseudo-socialist quarters. This was the most poignant and correct assessment that any speaker there made. You'll notice her standard of measure substantially invokes the principal contradiction.

This is just one example of how bogus the general "Marxist" movement in America is. All those pseudo-Marxist elements that fail to recognize the principal contradiction are objectively headed in the same direction: full rapprochement with the Democrats...assuming they have not already arrived at that destination (as the Communist Party has). That is their only alternative. Otherwise, they will die out with their aging constituents. The International Communist Current, one of the most rigidly dogmatic and "classical Marxist" organizations that exists in America, provides us with an example of what I mean. Their American branch has roughly five members, according to one of these members. Yet they speak of how the American system of capitalism is "decomposing". With five or so members, they are practically declaring victory over American capitalism, in other words! How delusional, how far divorced from reality, can you possibly get? It is painfully, painfully obvious which element in question is decomposing.

The Leading Light communist movement is the one with the youth, with the ideas, and with the scientific perspective. It is the future of authentic communism. It is the only legitimate communist movement in today's world.