Little Britain
What kind of publication should Green Left Weekly be? Clearly Dave Riley and I have very different opinions on this, if his review of the Little Britain TV show (GLW #662) is anything to go by.
I have also pondered the character of that TV show — for a few minutes. It often amuses me (but who cares?) — it's often puerile and occasionally one or two of its characters send up bigotry.
Riley's lengthy attempt to put a progressive sheen on the show is an indulgence. His formulation that it is "an extraordinary exercise in contemplating sex and gender, class and ye olde establishment" is an absurd exaggeration.
Yes, the caricatures are cleverly played. Yes, the show has gained a cult following, although I notice it's now been given the Michael Parkinson imprimatur of "official" British culture. But don't try to tell me that Little Britain is some sort of progressive artistic achievement. Riley offers few comprehensible justifications for that view apart from the fact that it gives him some armchair belly laughs.
Is that all Green Left Weekly has to offer in the field of "cultural dissent"?
Lachlan Malloch
Lilyfield, NSW
Petras
Federico Fuentes's comment on James Petras (GLW #662) was on the mark. Petras swallowed the dominant mainstream corporate media's line on Venezuela, hook, line and stinker. He went on the New York-based Democracy Now syndicated TV and radio program the morning after the April 2002 coup and declared that Hugo Chavez had resigned because he'd lost the support of the people. His comments remain online and can be listened to at the Democracy Now website where Chavez's alleged crimes include providing "ideological and economic support for Fidel Castro".
Walter Lippmann
(Via email)
Bolivia
I would like to commend Federico Fuentes on what I thought was an excellent article on Bolivia and whether or not Morales has sold out (GLW #662. In my opinion, too much of the left tend to make a judgement on how revolutionary a government is by taking a static picture of the current state of institutionalised affairs — social relations, government policies and particular people in positions of power and ignoring the trajectory of events.
However, for me, a more accurate picture must take into account much more than this criteria. People should also
examine:
(a) The institutional framework which governments are operating inside of and how they are attempting to reforge that framework so as to strip power away from the dictatorship of a US-backed oligarchy;
(b) Is the government willing to implement a reform package that will spark rather than dampen class struggle (whether it be the whip of the counter-revolution or the working class struggling to deepen structural change); and
(c) Is the government willing to facilitate, assist and lead the transformation of the working class into the revolutionary subject of power — and in doing so allow institutions of worker-power arise. That complex mechanism known as the class struggle both alters and is altered by the institutional framework.
The Bolivian government is reforging the institutional framework through the creation of a more democratic constitution and constituent assembly. The Bolivian government is willing to implement a mild reform package that is unacceptable to the oligarchy and the US and which will spark class struggle.
Can a government which has made some early concessions to the oligarchy and imperialism out of institutional weakness, armed with a mild reform program be transformed into a revolutionary government with the simultaneous transformation of the working class into the revolutionary subject of power? Only the struggle will determine this.
Chris Kerr
(Via email)
[Abridged]
Terror
Last night I saw and heard on ABC TV the image and voice of terror itself. It was glamorous, articulate and its message was lunatic. Ms Rice, during her interview with the 7.30 Report's Kerry O'Brien, insisted that the "UN" and the "global community" also shared responsibility for the lie that Iraq had "weapons of mass destruction" and the subsequent invasion. Her own country, bulging with its nuclear armoury, now intends to invade Iran. She has come to order us, once again to share the guilt of ab evil enterprise. Thousand of people killed, their cities reduced to rubble, all in the name of "democracy".
The hypocrisy is breathtaking, the cynicism immoral. We should resist it.
Mairi Mckenzie
Maylands, WA
From Green Left Weekly, April 5, 2006.
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