If I could piggyback on this thread.... I was wondering if there are any substantial ties between the improv musicians in Europe and socialism/communism. A week or two after purchasing one of Paul Rutherfords ISKRA cds, I came across the word ISKRA in Lenin's "Left-Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder." Apparently it is the name of a pre-Revolutionary journal edited by Lenin, Plekhanov, and others. Anyone have more info (maybe Bill Ashline if he is still around)? I grew up in the 80s and recall sitting in a movie theater watching "Rocky IV" and the whole audience erupted in a "USA! USA!" chant during the big fight. But even that seems naive when compared with to the pre-Fascist times we live in now. I am addicted to news punditry and like to check out right-wing talk shows when travelling. The worst I've heard is Michael Savage, who advocates imperialism (his words) in the Middle East and South Africa (which he claims is the world capital of "infant rape". Apparently in the Savage world, Nelson Mandela is a "thug", and while he (S) is not for apartheid, clearly "these people don't know how to run their own country"). The Arabs are "diaperheads" who run around in "dirty bedsheets" and the college students against the war "Should go back to their bathhouse, we know what their agenda is." Thanks, Ben
From: "Caleb T. Deupree" <cdeupree@erinet.com> To: "Benito Vergara" <bvergara@sfsu.edu>, "Zorn List" <zorn-list@lists.xmission.com> Subject: Re: books on my bedside table (no JZ content) Date: Thu, 06 Jun 2002 19:37:29 -0400
For my recent non-fiction slogging, I'm slowly working through Francois Furet's Passing of an Illusion, a history of the idea of communism. I grew up in the USA in the 50s and 60s, where the worst thing you could call someone was a commie. This book gives me an extremely interesting context for that attitude, although so far (just finishing WWII) it has been much more Eurocentric than directly related to events in the US. It's a very nice addition to the series of 'history of the 20th century' books I've been reading over the last few years, including the likes of Hobsbawm and Johnson.
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