#Socialist Workers Party UK

[savage-kult-of-gorthaur]

"...VICIOUS, MINDLESS VIOLENCE THAT OFFERS NOTHING NEW."

PIC(S) INFO: Mega spotlight on a vintage, late '70s era SWP Socialist Workers Party UK "Pogo on a Nazi" (Anti-Nazi, Anti-fascism, punk rock) pin-back button/badge.

Source: www.etsy.com/listing/1281713691/vintage-late-70s-swp-socialist-workers.

[komsomolka]

Since the early days of the Soviet Union, the Bolsheviks and later communist parties everywhere placed a great emphasis on culture and on the contribution cultural workers could make to the building of socialism. One of the first things the Soviet Army of occupation did at the end of the war, was attempt to resuscitate cultural activity in a war-ravaged and demoralised Germany. The one thing the Russians could never get their head around was how a country with such a high level of culture, a nation that had produced a Bach and a Beethoven, a Goethe and a Schiller could have carried out such barbaric crimes in other countries. The Soviet army had cultural officers attached to each battalion and the war had hardly ended before they began seeking out cultural workers and encouraging them to take up their batons, musical instruments, pens and paintbrushes again. Temporary cinemas were established, orchestras formed, theatres opened and publishing houses set up.

In contrast to West Germany, in the Soviet Zone and later in the GDR, there was also an early emphasis on making films about the Nazi period as a means of educating and informing a nation ignorant of or in denial about what had happened. [...]

The GDR had more theatres per capita than any other country in the world and in no other country were there more orchestras in relation to population size or territory. With 90 professional orchestras, GDR citizens had three times more opportunity of accessing live music, than those in the FRG, 7.5 times more than in the USA and 30 times more than in the UK. It also had one of the world’s highest book publishing figures. This small country with its very limited economic resources, even in the fifties was spending double the amount on cultural activities as the FRG.

Every town of 30,000 or more inhabitants in the GDR had its theatre and cinema as well as other cultural venues. [...] Subsidised tickets to the theatre and concerts were always priced so that everyone could afford to go. Many factories and institutions had regular block-bookings for their workers which were avidly taken up. School pupils from the age of 14 were also encouraged to go to the theatre once a month and schools were able to obtain subsidised tickets. [...]

All towns and even many villages had their own ‘Houses of Culture’, owned by the local communities and open for all to use. These were places that offered performance venues, workshop space and facilities for celebratory gatherings, discos, drama groups etc. There was a lively culture of local music and folk-song groups, as well as classical musical performance.

Stasi State or Socialist Paradise? The German Democratic Republic and What Became of It by Bruni de la Motte & John Green with Seumas Milne (Contributor), 2015.

[txttletale]

What are your criticisms of Chavismo and Maduro just out of curiosity?

now i'd like to preface this with a disclaimer that any opposition ghoul would do nothing but sell the country out to the USA and UK every which way in a heartbeat--maduro is better than any alternative, whether that's guaidó or whichever neoliberal puppet they prop up to replace him.

anyway, there were two key problems with chavismo. firstly, it's fundamentally a national-bourgeois led social democratic movement. obviously in an imperialized country like venezuela this made it profoundly progressive, and the achievments of the bolivarian revolution were incredible--chávez cut malnutrition in half, cut unemployment in half, sent millions of children to school and gave millions of elderly people pensions. however, this project of wealth distribution ultimately had to accomodate the national bourgeoisie. which of course on one hand you can argue was completely necessary, but on the other hand allowed the parasitic classes to entrench themselves firmly within elements of the state apparatus and made chavismo as a project entirely incapable of confronting the national bourgeoisie or corruption.

these of course are the realities of 'democratic socialism', of sweeping a socialist into office in a bourgeoise democracy. through some extremely clever political structures, such as the new constitution, communes, and bolicarian circles--he was able to move much more radically than most in his position. but ultimately, he could not escape the fundamental limits of the source and constraints of his power.

the second is that--and this is a very tawdry and obvious piece of analysis--while it is of course admirable and correct that he seized the nation's oil wealth and enriched the country with it--the way he did it was obviously shortsighted. without a sovereign wealth fund, worker's democratic control of the oil industry, or a solid and far-ranging investment plan, he laid the groundwork for some of the current crisis on the assumption that oil prices would stay high forever.

maduro inherited these faults and added far more of his own. during the crisis that began in earnest in 2016, the other shoe dropped wrt oil prices at the same time as the US tightened their murderous sanctions regime. faced with economic crisis, maduro has broadly chosen to move from chávez' strategy of accomodation with the national bourgeoisie to a full on alliance. social programs have been slashed, pensions cut, wages have plummeted, and worst of all, maduro has sold off countless state enterprises in the hope that oft-prayed to benevolent deity, "foreign capital" would miraculously heal the economy. in the course of this he made an enemy of many early chavistas, as well as the leftmost wing of chávez' coalition -- he has mobilized the full force of the bourgeois state against the country's communist party and other genuinely revolutionary movements, most gallingly the marxist-leninist movimiento tupamaro.

so, tldr: chavismo was genuinely radical compared to even your average third-world social democracy--however it remained fundamentally constrained in what it could accomplish by the lack of an actual proletarian state, was unable to rid itself of reliance on the national bourgeoisie for that same reason, and made some very avoidable mistakes in the handling of the nation's oil wealth--maduro inherited those flaws but has been much more accomodating to both national and international capitalists to the detriment of the people of venezuela.

[mesetacadre]

hi, love your blog! have you heard of "maga communism"? i personally find it pretty silly, but it does open up some questions and conversations about reactionary/conservative beliefs within communist movements and individual communists (can you call a reactionary a communist?). most "maga communist" and similar tendencies i have seen were pretty exclusively on twitter so far, for example individual self-described communists being homophobic (talking about "bourgeois decadence" and all that, you know the story), but its also rather concerning considering the recent transphobic course of the CPGB, or the homophobic statements of the KKE. how to deal with such tendencies in the movement? are such tendencies compatible with communist thought? (i personally dont think so, but how do you change such tendencies?) would love to hear your thoughts on that!

MAGA communism is a US-specific subset of "patriotic socialism", patsoc for short. MAGA communism in particular peddles republican and other reactionary positions via pseudo-communist rhetoric. This isn't something new, almost if not all factions of the bourgeois political establishment use workerist rhetoric to some degree, such is their function to mislead the working class. The only thing that stands out to me from this sect is the outright self-labelling of being communists. Take even a shallow step into their positions however, and you'll find run-of-the-mill reactionarism and nationalism.

This is a very different phenomenon from actual communists taking some reactionary positions but who are otherwise quite "normal", and from actual socialist countries fostering some kind of patriotism.

Regarding the latter, the example I'm most familiar with is Cuba. Following their triumph in both national liberation from colonialism and the socialist revolution, one aspect of Cuba's strategy for security and that also was a natural rationalization of their victory was the proliferation of pride in the Cuban revolution. Critically, this form of pride is not like the usual (bourgeois, as in, the emergence of nationalism within the rise of capitalism) nationalism, but the expression of international solidarity with all peoples and honor in being one of the groups of workers who achieved self liberation. It's a pride of the Cuban revolution, not the Cuban nation in itself. There are no traces of superiority over other peoples in this kind of patriotism. This is categorically very different from what the patsoc types express.

"Normal" communists taking reactionary positions comes from a vestige of the capitalist culture that is hammered into every single one of us emerging because of an unfinished education in marxist philosophy. The solution to this is very simple, that is to continue the development of our mistaken comrade, and adequate punishment if those beliefs resulted in harm.

I also want to make dedicated points about the CPGB and the KKE. The CPGB, like most other historical Communist Parties in Western Europe, folded themselves into reformism within liberal democracy following the eurocommunist current that arose in the second half of the 20th century. The fact that the CPGB has adopted reactionary positions is a consequence of having embedded itself into parliamentarism, as the political consensus amongst bourgeois parties in the UK right now is that of transphobia and racism, they are following the same general shift that Labour has.

The KKE is a different story. I have talked to a (trans) militant of the KKE about this, as well as with another (cishet) militant. They say that the KKE's opposition to the introduction of homosexual marriage in the Greek parliament (which was thankfully passed) comes from a non-homophobic critique that was, however, badly communicated. The KKE has repeatedly proposed separating marriage itself from the legal and financial benefits that it carries. For example, instead of only being allowed to visit someone in a hospital if you're family or married, the KKE proposes that people should be able to authorize anyone to have these sorts of benefits without also having to marry them.

The voting against homosexual marriage was done on the grounds that the institution of marriage involves unnecessary state involvement in interpersonal relationships and abuse, since these benefits also sometimes lead to couples who can't afford to divorce. Was voting against gay marriage the best course of action? No, and the militants I've talked to agree. But it was never about the KKE believing that homosexuality is "bourgeois decadence", like some media outlets have twisted it, just like most ML Party positions are twisted in some way or another.

It also does not help that translations from Greek aren't that simple, and that can also lead to misinterpretation in subjects where nuanced language is very important, such as trans people. There are no separate words in Greek for "sex" and "gender", even though in English they are complicated terms with a lot of drawbacks, it is immensely useful to have separate words. So discussion in Greek about this, and more importantly translation, can very easily be misinterpreted or deliberately misconstrued.

I am not saying that the KKE is free from reactionary tendencies and that it's a paragon of absolute social progress, but just like it isn't that, it is also not comparable with crypto-fascists or glorified socdems playing into transphobic or racist tendencies. This leads me to a broader point about general reactionary thought in the past.

There is no doubt that people like Stalin or Lenin, or more appropriately the vast majority of ML parties in the past were homophobic (I'm using this term to also include transphobia and similar discriminations) and that they instituted policies that specifically hurt queer people. No serious communist today abides by those positions and those actions. And just like we can understand that an individual communist today may be insufficiently educated and express reactionary views and hurt people because of this, I think the analogy can be made that these past communist people and parties hadn't yet been sufficiently educated by practice and theoretical discussions. We can't ignore the harm that they did, but we can recognize that it was in no way necessary, and that it was counterproductive, so we can acknowledge those mistakes, carefully separate those elements from the rest of their achievements, and learn about them.

A good example of this evolution is Cuba. In the times of Che and Fidel, queer people were discriminated against and sometimes sentenced to forced labor, nobody denies this. But this was 50 years ago, and not only did Fidel recognize this mistake in this lifetime, he began the process of improving the party line on this which has resulted in one of, if not the most progressive laws regarding homosexuality in the world, in the form of 2022's family code, which you can read here in Spanish. I have copied part of article 4 below, which regulates the rights of people within a family, along with my own translation just below:

Artículo 4. Derechos de las personas en el ámbito familiar. a) Constituir una familia; b) la vida familiar; c) la igualdad plena en materia filiatoria; d) que se respete el libre desarrollo de la personalidad, la intimidad y el proyecto de vida personal y familiar; e) que las niñas, los niños y adolescentes crezcan en un entorno familiar de felicidad, amor y comprensión; f) la igualdad plena entre mujeres y hombres, a la distribución equitativa del tiempo destinado al trabajo dom��stico y de cuidado entre todos los miembros de la familia, sin sobrecargas para ninguno de ellos, y a que se respete el derecho de las parejas a decidir si desean tener descendencia y el número y el momento para hacerlo, preservando, en todo caso, el derecho de las mujeres a decidir sobre sus cuerpos; g) el desarrollo pleno de los derechos sexuales y reproductivos en el entorno familiar, independientemente de su sexo, género, orientación sexual e identidad de género, situación de discapacidad o cualquier otra circunstancia personal; incluido el derecho a la información científica sobre la sexualidad, la salud sexual y la planificación familiar, en todo caso, apropiados para su edad; h) la protección a la maternidad y la paternidad y la promoción de su desarrollo responsable; i) una vida familiar libre de discriminación y violencia en cualesquiera de sus manifestaciones; j) una armónica y estrecha comunicación familiar entre las abuelas, abuelos, otros parientes, personas afectivamente cercanas y las niñas, los niños y adolescentes; k) la autodeterminación, voluntades, deseos, preferencias, independencia y la igualdad de oportunidades en la vida familiar de las personas adultas mayores y aquellas en situación de discapacidad; y l) al cuidado familiar desde el afecto.

And the translation (OC)

Article 4: A person's rights in the context of the family a) To build a family; b) to family life; c) to full equality in filial matters; d) for the free development of personality, intimacy, and the personal and familiar life project to be respected; e) for the boys and girls and adolescents to mature in a familiar environment of happiness, love, and compassion; f) the full equality between men and women, the egalitarian distribution of domestic work and care between all members of the family, without overburden to any of them, and for a couple's right to decide if they want descendants and the number and time to do so to be respected, preserving, in every case, the right for a woman to decide over her own body; g) the full development of sexual and reproductive rights in the familiar environment, independently of their sex, gender, sexual orientation, and gender identity, disability, or any other personal circumstance; including the right to scientific information about sexuality, sexual health, and family planning, in every case, suitably for their age; h) the protection of maternity and paternity and the promotion of its responsible progress; i) a familiar life free of discrimination and violence in whichever of their manifestations; j) a harmonious and close communication between grandmothers, grandfathers, other relatives, people who are affectionately close, and the girls, boys, and adolescents; k) the self-determination, wills, desires, preferences, independence and equality of opportunity in the familiar life of adult people and those in a situation of disability; and l) to affectionate familiar care.

[scottishcommune]

One thing I've realised I've not seen enough of in the wake of the massive weekly Palestine solidarity protests across the UK is warnings to younger and newer folk attending a protest maybe for the first time not just about security culture but about the fucking SWP. If you've never heard of them (I envy you) they're the Socialist Worker Party and they'll likely be found selling newspapers or handing out branded placards. Apart from being generally parasitic to movements and extremely hierarchical, the SWP have a history of rape apology and cover ups that isn't hard to find out about online. So once again, protect yourself and others, here's a link with pretty much all the information you need about them.

[anarchotolkienist]

People are sharing lots of Stand Up to Racism things and promoting their events, and I don't blame them because the utter implosion of the non-Party left (and the party Left to be fair, but they had a head start) in the UK has left us completely unable to present an alternative that is at all coherent, and people do desperately need to confront the far right, that is getting increasingly obvious to even the most casual of lefties. But it is worth stating that they are a front group entirely controlled by the trotskyist Socialist Worker's Party, who aside from the cultishness common to all Communist parties in the UK lost two-thirds of their membership about ten years ago over the rape apologism of the Party's core structures and central committee members, who all united to defend 'Comrade Delta', a member of the central committee who raped a female party member employed by the committee for secretarial duties. Those who are left either are apologists for rape or joined afterwards in ignorance. If there's nothing else, then yes, attent their events to try and outbalance the fascists and pogromists - numbers means a Lot in the present moment - but if you have to engage with them do so carefully, please.

Again, I don't blame anyone really for sharing their things, at the moment there really is no alternative - and this is our (UK autonomists') fault.

[antifainternational]

Hi, are you aware that SUTR is a front for the SWP, a famously trash org most well known for the rape case they covered up that already claimed credit for Southport counter protests earlier this week despite causing more confusion and putting ppl in danger for no reason, on top of not being the originators of the counter protest, undermining local response and muddying coordination

People should absolutely join a local counter demo but SUTR is not a reliable org to direct people towards

Knowing specific national context is a bit of a pain but the SWP is generally to be avoided whenever the UK is mentioned, thanks for the work that goes into this blog though !

Thanks for the heads-up about SUTR (Stand Up To Racism) and the SWP (Socialist Workers Party). Unite Against Fascism (UAF) is a similar SWP front org. We are aware of this. Whenever we know of a non-SWP group organising or promoting an antifascist demo or action on the same day in the same place, we will post the non-SWP link. If we only know of the SUTR/UAF one we'll still post that. In the future we'll try to also link to this post so people can inform themselves. It is important to know this context for UK antifascists, and to keep these things in the back of your mind when you are at a demo with a SWP front group, we agree.

But we also think that if you have the choice between going to an antifascist demo organised by a group you dislike or sitting at home, it is still the right choice to go to the demonstration. Even better of course would be to first check out your local antifascist groups or refugee solidarity orgs to see if theyre actually the ones organising that demo, and joining up with them. In our experience you will usually find the actual organisers / the right kind of antifascists (if you dislike the SWP) to join up with at the demo by looking for the people carrying antifa flags, or just the people who dont all have similar printed out placards with the SUTR/UAF logo on it somewhere.

[sourcreammachine]

look even if u ignore the new centrist government, this election was a brilliant result for the UK left

five socialist MPs, four green MPs, and brilliant isolated damage to bad labour candidates. the ultraconservative “Workers’ Party” crushed in favour of democratic progressive people’s socialism. there is a movement. votes have been WON. this is historic this is a victory this is only the start

please, please, five socialist MPs, band together and push together. you are a movement. become the political face of it, you deserve it

[probablyasocialecologist]

Britain’s Conservative government has issued notices to the media to suppress reports of the operations of the Special Air Service (SAS) in Gaza. On Saturday, the Socialist Worker, newspaper of the Socialist Workers Party, revealed it had been sent a “D Notice” Saturday morning from the Defence and Security Media Advisory (DSMA) Committee requesting it not publish information relating to the operations of the SAS. D Notices are used by the British state to veto the publication of news damaging to its interests.

[...]

An article by Socialist Worker editor Charlie Kimber notes, “Specifically this ‘D notice’ concerned British special forces operating in the Middle East.” The e-mail to the media was from the DSMA secretary, Brigadier Geoffrey Dodds, he added. Dodds states, “Reports have started to appear in some publications claiming that UK Special Forces have deployed to sensitive areas of the Middle East and then linking that deployment to hostage rescue/evacuation operations. “May I take this opportunity to remind editors that publication of such information contravenes the DSMA notice code. I therefore advise that claims of such deployments should not be published nor broadcast without first seeking Defence and Security Media advice”.

[afeelgoodblog]

The Best News of Last Week 🐧

1. ‘Robin Hood’ energy strikers give free power to French schools, hospitals, low-income homes

Amid national strikes in the energy sector, some workers in France have found a novel way to protest. On Thursday, "Robin Hood" operations – unauthorised by the government – provided free gas and electricity to schools, universities, and low-income households throughout the country.

Among the facilities provided free energy were public sports facilities, daycare centers, public libraries, some small businesses and homes that had been cut off from power. 

2. UK scientists discover method to reduce steelmaking’s CO2 emissions by 90%

Researchers from the University of Birmingham have developed an innovative method for existing furnaces that could reduce steelmaking’s CO2 emission by nearly 90%.

The iron and steel industry is a major cause of greenhouse gasses, accounting for 9% of global emissions. That’s because of the inherent carbon-intensive nature of steel production in blast furnaces, which currently represent the most-widely used practice.

3. Watch this cargo ship fly a giant kite to save fuel and cut emissions

The 2,700-square-foot parafoil is helping to tow the cargo ship and lessen the workload of the massive diesel engines — reducing the ship’s use of dirty fuel.

4. Scientists discover emperor penguin colony in Antarctica using satellite images

A newly discovered emperor penguin colony has been seen, using satellite images of one the most remote and inaccessible regions of Antarctica.

The colony, home to about 500 birds, makes a total of 66 known emperor penguin colonies around the coastline of Antarctica, half of which were discovered by space satellites. Emperor penguins are the only penguins that breed on sea ice, rather than land, and are located in areas that are very difficult to study because they are remote, inaccessible and can experience temperatures as low as −60C

Kowalski, analysis!

5. Dungeons & Dragons Scraps Plans to Update Its Open Game License

Wizards of the Coast, publisher of Dungeons & Dragons, announced yesterday that it will no longer be pursuing deauthorization of the Open Gaming License 1.0a. The deauthorization of the OGL 1.0a was a huge sticking point for fans and third-party publishers who made a living using a license that was granted nearly two decades ago.

6. Turning problem sea algae into a replacement for plastic

Excessive outbreaks of seaweed and microalgae are clogging up waters from the Caribbean to the Baltic. Now both are being harvested alongside farmed crops to create ingredients for cosmetics and food products.

7. German parliament officially commemorates LGBTQ victims of Nazi regime for first time.

The German parliament for the first time on Friday focused its annual Holocaust memorial commemorations on people persecuted and killed over their sexual or gender identity during World War II. Campaigners in Germany have worked for decades to establish an official ceremony to commemorate the LGBTQ victims persecuted under the Nazi regime.

“Today’s hour of remembrances focuses on a group of victims which had to fight for a long time to achieve recognition: people who were persecuted by the National Socialists because of their sexual orientation or their gender identity,” Baerbel Bas, president of the Bundestag lower house, said while opening a ceremony marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the anniversary of Auschwitz’s liberation.

- - - 

That's it for this week. If you liked this post you can support this newsletter with a small kofi donation:

Buy me a coffee ❤️

Have a great week ahead :)

[vague-humanoid]

Britain’s Conservative government has issued notices to the media to suppress reports of the operations of the Special Air Service (SAS) in Gaza.

On Saturday, the Socialist Worker, newspaper of the Socialist Workers Party, revealed it had been sent a “D Notice” Saturday morning from the Defence and Security Media Advisory (DSMA) Committee requesting it not publish information relating to the operations of the SAS.

D Notices are used by the British state to veto the publication of news damaging to its interests. The slavish collusion of the mainstream media ensures that such notices function as gag orders. A high level branch of the state, the DSMA’s chair is Paul Wyatt, Director General Security Policy at the Ministry of Defence. Other committee members include the Deputy National Security Adviser, Cabinet Office; Director National Security at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office; Director National Security at the Home Office; and the Director National Security at the Ministry of Defence.

An article by Socialist Worker editor Charlie Kimber notes, “Specifically this ‘D notice’ concerned British special forces operating in the Middle East.” The e-mail to the media was from the DSMA secretary, Brigadier Geoffrey Dodds, he added.

Dodds states, “Reports have started to appear in some publications claiming that UK Special Forces have deployed to sensitive areas of the Middle East and then linking that deployment to hostage rescue/evacuation operations.

“May I take this opportunity to remind editors that publication of such information contravenes the DSMA notice code. I therefore advise that claims of such deployments should not be published nor broadcast without first seeking Defence and Security Media advice”.

He added, “This Notice aims to prevent the inadvertent disclosure of classified information about Special Forces and other MOD units engaged in security, intelligence and counter-terrorist operations, including their methods, techniques and activities.”

[lepartidelamort]

UK: Teachers to be Taught to Crush “Whiteness” in the Classroom

Snake Baker

It took them long enough, but the British are finally moving to use the public school system to crush the white race once and for all.

When whites have been completely destroyed, then and only then will we finally have peace on this racist earth.

GB News:

Teachers across Britain are set to be taught to challenge “whiteness” in schools. According to a best-practice document, educators will be instructed on how to “disrupt the centrality of whiteness” in schools. The aim of this is to ensure that future teachers are “anti-racist” and be prepared to implement this in the classroom. Documents claim that encouraging “anti-racist” teacher training will help to maintain a diverse teaching workforce and will help to close the gap between white and non-white students. Additional concepts such as “meritocracy”, “objectivity” and “individualism” should be questioned, according to the guidance.

The documents also state that white student teachers should also be helped to develop and project a “positive white racial identity”.

Separate guidance has been developed in Scotland and England, with both documents having been endorsed by the National Education Union and by universities offering teacher training. The Scottish “anti-racism framework” states that changes to the way in which teachers are taught will “disrupt the centrality of whiteness and enable different ways of seeing, thinking and doing.” It aims to tackle racism in education and to create a more diverse teaching workforce. This process may involve references to colonialism and racism in lessons, and instilling an understanding of the “impact of whiteness”. This will help teachers project a “white racial identity grounded in reality and allyship” in the classroom, free from “false notions of superiority”. … General Secretary of the National Education Union, Daniel Kebede, told GB News: “Teachers play a vital role in delivering a curriculum that challenges discrimination in all its forms. “The recent, racist rioting on our streets demonstrates more than ever that high-quality initial teacher training courses should address anti-racism so that our teachers are equipped to challenge prejudice where necessary.”

Well, that nigger doesn’t sound like a communist at all.

Oh…

This is the Socialist Workers Party’s Marxism conference from 2022. One of the participants is Daniel Kebede, general secretary of the biggest teacher’s union in Britain.

[mensfactory]

Unrestored 1934 Mercedes-Benz 500 K Offener Tourenwagen,

The name Offener Tourenwagen, or “open touring car,” in Mercedes-Benz parlance often brings to mind the vast and weighty 770 Ks of the late 1930s. On their sibling supercharged 500 K chassis, however, it referred to something entirely different: a very attractive two-door open model, with a rather low, subtly curving beltline, that recalled the powerful Sports 4 style of earlier K and S-type models. It was a very sporting automobile and one of the most masterful creations of the factory coachbuilders at Sindelfingen, who finished each body with the superb craftsmanship and quality materials for which they were renowned.

Chassis 105355, is one of only five surviving examples of this style on the 500 K chassis. According to its original Mercedes-Benz kommission sheet, a copy of which is on file, this car was originally delivered in late 1934 to Rudolf Hess of Berlin, one of the highest ranking members of the ruling National Socialist German Workers’ Party. Hess famously flew solo to Scotland in 1941 in a failed attempt to get the UK to exit the war. Instead, he was taken prisoner and convicted. To the victors, however, go the spoils: The 500 K was eventually commandeered at the end of WWII, and like so many of its brethren, wound up being used by American GI’s in Germany, then afterward came to the US.

As early as 1955, the car was in the ownership of V. Link Milsark of Vienna, West Virginia; a copy of a West Virginia title in his name, dated that year, is on file. Known to friends as “The Mayor of Rose Holler,” Mr. Milsark was an auto mechanic, aviator, model train collector, and a genuine character in every sense of the word. He is not known to have shown the 500 K in his decades of ownership but was nonetheless an enthusiastic owner, maintaining membership in and listing the car with the Classic Car Club of America for decades.

Mark Smith acquired the long-hidden Milsark 500 K in 2005 through what can only be described as one of his characteristic transactions, involving multiple cars and parties. He was undoubtedly pleased with the acquisition, which remained one of the great centerpieces of his collection ever after.

Retaining its original, numbers-matching chassis and engine per factory records, as well as the original typenschild on the firewall, the car remains startlingly original, never restored, and “improved” only as necessary over the years. Mr. Smith kept it much as he acquired it, with sensitivity towards preserving the condition in which it had been left by its long-term prior owner. At some point the bottoms of the front seats were replaced and covers were fit over the seat backs; the balance of the interior, including the door cards and rear seat, is that fitted at Sindelfingen in 1934. A 1955–1956 West Virginia DMV inspection sticker is even still intact on the windshield.

Mr. Smith exhibited his 500 K in the Prewar Preservation class at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance® in 2006, and at the Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance in 2019, where it received an Amelia Award in the exclusive 500 K/540 K class. Due to its high degree of originality and fascinating history, it ought to be a welcome entrant into many other concours, recognizing what its longtime owners saw in it: a very special automobile, made only more so by its passage through time.

Mathieu Heurtault, courtesy of Gooding & Company.

[georgefairbrother]

Bill Brand was a 1976 political drama series in 11 parts, written by Trevor Griffiths and produced by Thames Television. Starring Jack Shepherd in the title role, it tells the story of a first-time Labour MP, Brand himself, a revolutionary socialist, elected to a northern constituency where a large amount of local employment relies on the ailing textile industry.

Bill Brand, a polytechnic lecturer in liberal studies, soon finds himself at odds with his old-school, working-class, socially conservative constituency party, and with the governing Labour Party over trade, social welfare and defence policy. He proves that he is not afraid to defy the party whips, and vote and act in accordance with his conscience and beliefs, particularly in support of his constituency textile workers. He aligns himself with a far-left party faction, the Journal Group, but at times seems even further to the left than they are.

Political integrity aside, Brand is not a totally sympathetic character; he is brazenly conducting an extramarital affair and seems aggrieved that his wife (Lynn Farleigh) is unwilling to sustain the façade of domestic stability for the purpose of his public image and for his standing within the local Party.

According to BFI online;

"...Bill Brand (ITV, 1976) was an epic attempt to lay bare the nature of political power in the UK, and more specifically to analyse if, and how, the socialist struggle could be furthered by the parliamentary Labour movement…Griffiths examines the political rifts within the Labour party, and, with uncanny foresight, dramatises the ideological conflicts that would eventually lead to the formation of the SDP..."

"...Bill Brand is a breath-taking series. Transmitted during the boiling summer of 1976, at peak-time between World in Action and News at Ten, it engaged with contemporary politics in a dramatic way, but remained consistently intelligent, and far from talking down to its viewers, assumed that they were a vital part of the political processes described, and as committed to understanding how things might therefore improve…"

There is a very strong supporting cast, including Geoffrey Palmer, Nigel Hawthorne, Rosemary Martin, Cherie Lunghi, Colin Jeavons, Allan Surtees and Alan Badel.

One of the most interesting cameos is from Arthur Lowe, a subtle and poignant performance as the exhausted and ill Labour Prime Minister, Arthur Watson, in the dying days of his leadership and on the verge of retiring on health grounds. Harold Wilson had unexpectedly resigned three months before the series went to air, but after it had been written.

When Bill Brand was transmitted, Lowe was on tour with the stage production of Dad's Army.

[jayeltontoro]

I want the Tories gone.

I want a socialist agenda in the uk

I don't want a labour government run by a lying backstabbing right wing prime minister.

This is actually more achievable in the UK than people realise. You see, we don't vote for a prime minister in the UK. We vote for an MP. Which means that in England if you want a labour government you vote for your local labour candidate.

So vote labour if they are best placed in your area to get rid of a Tory. And if they are not, vote for the candidate (independent - socialist agenda/ green/ lib dem if needs be) best placed to beat them.

But if you are in Holborn & st pancras constituency vote for another than sir Keir backstabber. Andrew feinstein is up for it, standing on a labour 2019 platform.

We can get rid of the Tories and not have a continuity Tory (sir kid starver) imposed on a workers party. He's only leader of the labour party because of Rupert Murdoch and the establishment's approval. He lies and contradicts betrays but still we don't see him held to account for it, much like he's already a Tory minister.

Come polling day let your fingers do the talking and tell these b*stards to f*ck off.

[hazardous-waste-containment]

Left-fascism: A generic term for fascisms that actively try to incorporate socialist egalitarianism and economic radicalism, and often to recruit from and even build bridges with the wider ‘Left’. Some might be best described as ‘fascists of the left’ (Ba‘athists, Ethnocacerists), others as the ‘left of fascism’ (Strasserists, Italy’s national syndicalists). There’s an argument to be made that only those deliberately and explicitly borrowing from the left count as left-fascist, which would generally exclude Strasserists.

Strasserism: A form of National Socialism — that is, fascism based on biological racism and antisemitic conspiracy theory — espousing a preferential role for the working class and something like guild socialism, inspired more by a medievalist völkisch ethos than by modern revolutionary doctrines (they were friendly to the USSR but so was Moeller van den Bruck). As always, read Postone.

It should be noted that while Otto was a fringe ultra who was expelled from the NSDAP in 1930 and went on to found his own paramilitary Black Front, Gregor was a high-ranking Nazi elite who ultimately distanced himself from his brother, actually tried to strike a deal with the conservatives behind Hitler’s back, and was assassinated mostly for threatening Hitler’s authority; i.e. the notion of a coherent left-wing ‘Strasserite’ faction in the NSDAP as late as 1934 is largely erroneous. That said, the idea of Strasserism has definitely exerted a strong influence on neo-Nazism, such as in the 1980s British National Front.

National Bolshevism: A term for a number of related phenomena: 1) a clique of White Russian émigrés who reconciled themselves to the Bolshevik state as a worthy continuation of Imperial Russia under new management, and later played a role in the development of Soviet patriotism under Stalin; 2) a tendency in Conservative Revolutionary circles gathered around Ernst Niekisch, a former socialist who moved right and saw the Russian Revolution as the recipe for an organic national rebirth; 3) a late Soviet tendency, both in and out of official Party channels, toward overt antisemitism, ethnic nationalism, and the rehabilitation of Russian national heroes within the framework of the Communist regime — today reflected in the ultra-nationalism and social conservatism of Zyuganov’s CPRF; 4) a neo-fascist political tendency founded by Aleksandr Dugin and Eduard Limonov in 1993, inspired more or less by all of the above and fusing expansionist Russian ultra-nationalism, nostalgia for the USSR as a bulwark against the West, and a provocative and eclectic style drawing from communism, anarchism, Nazism, and punk.

Russian National Bolshevism has been the inspiration for, among other things, ex-Strasserist Matthew Heimbach’s reformation of the Traditionalist Workers’ Party along radically anti-capitalist lines and attempts to infiltrate the progressive left, and the small Brotherhood group in Ukraine which is interesting for its intense Christian religiosity.

I do not know remotely enough about Francis Parker Yockey to discuss him adequately here.

Third-Positionism: What fascists would simply call the Third Position. It is often conflated with ‘nazbols’, but in fact third-positionists make no claims to having anything to do with the left, certainly not with communism. Developing in postwar Western Europe (originally Italy, later France, the UK etc before spreading elsewhere) under the influence of Julius Evola, the Strasser brothers, the European New Right as well as Perónism and other Third World national liberation movements, it advocated a European and global rebirth by carving out a holistic national alternative to the twin evils of capitalism and communism.

The goal is to reveal the bankruptcy of the political spectrum itself: apparently progressive issues were actually nationalist all along and apparently reactionary ones are actually revolutionary, right and left must both be dissolved and transcended in the organic unity of the nation (a very old fascist argument). Presumably the third-positionist adoption of causes like ecologism, anti-capitalism, anti-globalization, Third Worldism, and in at least one case (Mexico) even indigenous liberation is what makes people automatically conflate it with red-brown stuff, but — with the exception of Dugin’s revealingly-named Fourth Political Theory — there is almost never any actual ‘red’ involved (unlike for a National Bolshevik like Limonov or Heimbach): there doesn’t need to be because fascism is already a ‘third position’ in their eyes.

The National Front in its ‘Strasserist’ phase, mentioned above, is a good example and it’s telling that they were so infatuated with Qadhdhafi as to basically regard the Green Book as their political program; ‘International Third Position’ was a later breakaway from the NF led by Roberto Fiore of the original Italian Terza Posizione. IME the Third Position is often explicitly Christian, but there’s a very small Albanian group that’s neo-pagan (and probably better examples I just haven’t seen).