Webb has used this article to demonstrate what he is doing so we have a responsibility to discuss what he says in the article.
Perhaps the most noteworthy statement in this article is this:
Hardly a stereotypical Bolshevik, he (Webb) says he, "wants to bring the party into the American mainstream." But first, he'll have to, "shake the legacy of Gus Hall."The fact is, Webb is destroying the very foundation--- a very firm and good foundation--- that we need to build on.
The article then goes on to clearly state where Webb wants to mislead us to:
Even as the left's agenda became increasingly defined by feminism, environmentalism and gay activism, Hall demanded an international factory-worker-led revolution.If some on the "left" choose to ignore, along with Webb, industrial workers they do so at their own peril and as a disservice to not only the left, but the left's most important and vital constituency: the working class.
And the article continues:
Webb gets vague when asked how socialism will come to pass.In fact, Webb has been very vague about just about everything; vague to the point of being dishonest.
But, what is new about revisionism. As we have been saying Webb's intent has been all along to liquidate our Party. In rejecting the working class as the main engine of social change, Webb has rejected the very basics of the basis of scientific socialism.
After reading this article from 2002, we now have a better understanding why Sam Webb liquidated and dumped Gus Hall's books.
Webb stated he is:
"not bothered by the party's obscurity."
This is quite apparent.
As Sam Webb goes trotting across the globe in quest of fellow revisionists, real Communist Parties are finding cooperation with the Communist Party USA to be elusive. International cooperation and solidarity are part of what Webb intends to jettison along with Marxism-Leninism, the real legacy of our Party which Gus Hall steadfastly and properly defended; it is this very legacy we need to retain.
We now have some insight as to why Sam Webb, Scott Marshall, Erwin Marquit, Mark Froemke and Dean Gunderson have tried to create obstacles to organizing a campaign for public ownership to save the St. Paul Ford Twin Cities Assembly Plant and Hydro Dam- they despise and fear the working class.
If in fact Webb was sincerely for "Bill of Rights socialism" he would be insisting working people have a say in the future of the St. Paul Ford Twin Cities Assembly Plant- but he isn't.
It is not Webb's media savvy which needs some work; it is his thinking which requires attention.
Keep smiling Sam, your corporate masters appreciate your work.
Revisionism is based on being vague and dishonest; Webb is definitely a revisionist and needs to be sent packing- Just don't send him to Minnesota, we already have enough problems.
Rita
Communist Party Chair, Sam Webb (on left)Communist Party USA toils in Manhattan obscurity
By Kerry Burke
2002-02-21
Hardly a stereotypical Bolshevik, Sam Webb, the Communist Party USA chairman, says he wants to bring the party into the American mainstream. But first, he'll have to shake the legacy of Gus Hall.
Most passers-by barely notice the Unity Book Center. The titles in the window, however -- "Capitalism in Crisis," "Another World Is Possible" and "Russian Peasants' Soviet Power" -- aren't on any best-seller list. The storefront, inside a former family court building in Manhattan, is the public face of the Communist Party USA. Upstairs is the party's national headquarters.
Sitting in the cafeteria hidden behind the bookstore, Sam Webb, national party chairman, says he is not bothered by the party's obscurity.
"A disinformation campaign by the ruling class tied America's communist party to the now dissolved Soviet Union," said Webb confidently. "But we've adapted and will continue to change with the times."
Webb, 56, presides over a party whose most newsworthy figure, Gus Hall, died two years ago. The married father of two grown daughters, Webb is easygoing, bespectacled and a dedicated reader of The New York Times. Hardly a stereotypical Bolshevik, he says he, "wants to bring the party into the American mainstream." But first, he'll have to, "shake the legacy of Gus Hall."
"Hall's party came out of the struggles of the Great Depression, Franco and Spain, Hitler and World War II, " said Webb wistfully. "But that generation was getting old. We needed to make a transition -- not only at the top, but every level. We're still in the middle of it."
Over the four decades he led America's communists, Gus Hall was the party. The son of an impoverished Minnesota miner, Hall outlasted steel mill insurrections, World War II, McCarthy era imprisonment, Cold War isolation and even the dissolution of his beloved Soviet Union. Admitting to absolutely none of socialism's shortcomings, Hall remained a stalwart Stalinist right into the post-Communist world.
Even as the left's agenda became increasingly defined by feminism, environmentalism and gay activism, Hall demanded an international factory-worker-led revolution. He waxed nostalgically for the old Soviet bloc and called famine-stricken North Korea an "economic miracle." In 1994, the New York party splintered, with much of the membership bolting after Hall refused to step down.
It's Webb's job to pick up the pieces. He has to offer a viable political party to a public that barely knows it exists and without disowning communism's core principles.
Webb preaches "Bill of Rights Socialism," a phrase Hall coined but that Webb is trying to make currency. "Socialism in this country has to reflect American history, habits and traditions," he said on a recent morning at 9 a.m., an hour before the party's student employees and senior citizen volunteers arrived for work. "The Bill of Rights was attached to the Constitution because people wanted certain rights protected that weren't covered by the constitution as written over 200 years ago.
"We think those protections should continue in a socialist society, although we think they should be extended to include decent jobs, affordable housing and health care," he explained.
Since Webb's election, the party has also gone high-tech. Well, sort of. "Workers of the World, Log In!" invites the home page -- but the site's only features are excerpts from party publications and past convention speeches. One thing you can do, however, is join online. Workers at party headquarter could not provide accurate numbers for either site "hits" or new e-members.
Webb says there are over 15,000 communists nationwide -- down from a peak of 66,000 in 1939 -- although no independent figures exist. The majority, he said, live in New York City. The party's roughly 15 full-time employees, including its chairman, make the same $350 weekly salary, a paltry sum in a city where studio rents can start at $1,700 monthly. Webb lives on Manhattan's gentrified Upper West Side where he has a cut-rate sublet from a comrade.
Webb gets vague when asked how socialism will come to pass.
"Eventually the American people are going to -- based on their own experience, not imposed by us or anyone else -- realize that socialist society will be a better alternative than capitalism," he said in his gruff but gentle native Maine accent.
But Webb's media strategy will need some work. Victor Navasky, publisher of The Nation, a prominent weekly left-wing journal, said he had never heard of chairman Webb.
"My sense is that a party still exists," said Navasky. "And that they're putting on a brave front."
