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I am enjoying this exchange. It makes such a break from Australian politics, where one has to believe in the Way (Nothing is weaker than water. For wearing away stone, nothing is stronger.) to get any comfort from the quietism that has the Australian working class by the throat. Now as I see it, John was reacting to a news story of a possible threat within the British Army to the advent of Corbyn and the possibility of him becoming Prime Minister. John takes the threat seriously and I think one would be a fool to discount it absolutely. But the significance of the threat is, for me, the underlying fear that it expresses. If Corbyn was truly unelectable there would be no such fear and no subsequent threats. James will forgive me for saying this, but he sounds a trifle "tired and emotional" as *Private Eye* used to put it. Still, I am grateful for the figure of the chiasmus that he has given us. The PLP is faced with two kinds of unelectability - with Corbyn and without Corbyn. But we should not the aesthetic power of this formula to distract us from seeing that Corbyn is of course electable, and all the hysteria around him is testimony to that. He simply has to get the millions who won't vote to vote. I say 'simply' not to convey that the task is easy, rather that it is clear and that makes it possible: hence the hysteria in the media and the mutterings among the officer class. In the mean time, the media will do their thing and their offensive will strengthen Corbyn. Down in the pubs in Tottenham, they may have a different take on things, as James points out, but the thousands who voted for Corbyn will see all the attacks as a justification of what they did. The UK will polarize further and the Blairites will make their move. But should they do so, they risk destroying the British Labour Party, one of the ruling class's prime assets. I will not try to speculate further, except to point out that the Corbyn push is creating movement and potential and is putting an end to the suffocation of the dialectics of stagnation. That is why I am all for it. My own metaphor to describe what is happening is drawn from my experience as a classroom teacher. In a class of say 30, if ten of them were totally opposed to all I as a teacher stood for, the class would be unteachable. Moreover, the possibility of a significant number joining the rebellious ten would make me hysterical with fear. comradely Gary _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
