Saturday, November 24, 2007

Churchill not quoted

The Militant has an account of the five-day "rolling panel discussion" on “United States: A Possible Revolution” at the third Venezuela International Book Fair in Caracas last week. Ward was there, but apparently got lost in the revolutionary shuffle. No worries, there was plenty of idiocy from other particpants. Quote:
“I’m going to take issue with what every one of you has said,” stated Amiri Baraka, a poet from Newark, New Jersey, speaking from the audience. Baraka, a panelist on the closing day of the event, has been active in Black nationalist, Maoist, and Democratic Party politics since the 1960s. Attacking [Socialist Worker "labor editor" Lee] Sustar for not identifying himself as a “Trotskyite,” and falsely accusing fellow panelist George Katsiaficas of introducing himself as a former member of the Black Panthers, Baraka’s intervention was the first time in four days of sharp debate that the tone of civil discourse was breached.
The tension must have been palpable.

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