“All Aboard! Bolshevik Revolution leaving Trotskyist Platform at 19:17!” Toot toot!

Awesome.

It’s been six months since I updated the Trot Guide, and six months is a long time in Trotskyist politics.

Well… kinda.

Anyway, point is, in May I wrote:

29 1/2) Trotskyist Platform (TP). Status : TP formed in 2006 when no less a person than the editor of the Australasian Spartacist made like a banana… and split. May 2008: He must be hunting wabbits, as he is keeping vewy vewy quiet.

No longer!
Trotskyist Platform has a website!
And a publication!
Two issues of which are available online!
Issue 9 (Feb-May 2008) and Issue 10 (Sep-Oct 2008)!
My favourite article is ‘An Eyewitness Account from The Canberra April 24 Pro-Peoples Republic of China Rally: From The Bright Depths of The Sea of Red’: “There has not been such a huge show of support for a pro-communist flag in this country in at least the last 30 years, perhaps ever.”

How excitement!

TP stands in the tradition of the early years of the Communist International (CI) that was formed in the wake of the October 1917 socialist revolution in Russia. The CI would soon unite together revolutionaries from China to Russia, from France to the U.S. We look forward to the future regrouping of sincere worker militants and leftist youth into a party based on the principles that the Communist International was founded on. We look forward to a future world where there will not only be no subjugation but where every person will be able to, depending on their own interests, reach their full creative, cultural, scientific and artistic potential.

Trotskyist Platform: PO Box 1101, Fairfield, NSW, 1860, Australia
E-mail: [email protected]
Phone (Australia): 0417 204 611
Phone (International): 0061 417 204 611

In other news…

http://www.labortribune.net/ is “Under [Re-]Construction”.

The Communist Party of Australia has had to bid farewell to its General Secretary (1972–2008), Peter Symon, following his death on December 18, 2008. “Peter’s contribution to the Australian and International communist movement was considerable. He ranks with other great Australian Communists such as JB Miles, Dick Dixon and Lance Sharkey.” Lance Sharkey, ‘Stalin — The Lenin of To-day’, Foreword to Foundations of Leninism (1945) by ‘Uncle’ Joseph Stalin:

The trotskyite fascist agents tried to deny Stalin’s theoretical ability. They claimed that their defeat was brought about by organisational measures directed against them. But the struggle against the traitorous trotskyites was, in the first place, a theoretical and political struggle of decisive importance. The question involved was one of life or death, the continued existence of the Soviet Republic, the problem of whether Socialism could be built in one country.

Stalin brilliantly defended and elaborated Lenin’s teaching on the possibility of building Socialism in one country and, with a profound grip of Marxism-Leninism, refuted the “theoretical” arguments of his opponents, who, defeated, later sold themselves as Quislings to the Nazi and Japanese espionage services.

Worryingly, Vanguard, the publication of the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist), does not appear to have been published for some twelve months — or at least, not online. Vanguard Online in 2008! “In its political work, the Party takes into account the hostile position of the pro-imperialist state power and the activities of its repressive agencies. Except for a few leading figures and spokespersons, the majority of Party members do not reveal their association. The current Chairperson is Bruce Cornwall.”

The Democratic Socialist Perspective Socialist Alliance held its Sixth National Conference in Geelong over the weekend of December 6-7, 2008. Without having read any accounts, I can assure readers that it was A Great Success, A Big Step Forward, and that, while The Struggle Ahead is Long and Difficult, The Future for SA is Very Promising.

http://www.fightback.org.au/ is a website which is The Marxist Voice of Labour and Youth. In plain English, that means that one of the Trotskyist Internationals — in this case the International Marxist Tendency (IMT: formerly the Committee for a Marxist International or CMI) has a handful of followers Down Under.

In Australia, Revo appears to have disappeared… but may just be unwell. The Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP), on the other hand, is still kicking seven months after its birth. And while the DSP may lay claim to Action in Solidarity with Asia and the Pacific (ASAP), the RSP has its own Asia Pacific Solidarity Network (APSN). Members of the two parties happily work together in the Australia Venezuela Solidarity Network, however.

Finally, revolutionaries face a tough choice come Easter, 2009. On the one hand, in Melbourne, Socialist Alternative is hosting ‘Marxism 2009’ (April 9–12); on the other, the DSP/Resistance will be critically examining a ‘World at a Crossroads’ (April 10–13) in Sydney. John Pilger will be a special guest at Marxism 2009 and based on his performance at the 2008 London Anarchist Bookfair, at which he reportedly declared himself an ‘anarchist’, chances are he’ll declare himself a ‘Trotskyist’ in Melbourne…

wsws.org awesomeness: Australia: The DSP split and Socialist Alliance—another opportunist debacle, Laura Tiernan, December 6, 2008.

About @ndy

I live in Melbourne, Australia. I like anarchy. I don't like nazis. I enjoy eating pizza and drinking beer. I barrack for the greatest football team on Earth: Collingwood Magpies. The 2024 premiership's a cakewalk for the good old Collingwood.
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55 Responses to “All Aboard! Bolshevik Revolution leaving Trotskyist Platform at 19:17!” Toot toot!

  1. Paul Justo says:

    Australasian Spartacist is out again, no mention of Comrade Michael Jackson in the current issue but they make up for it with a three page spread on Comrade Roman Polanski.

  2. @ndy says:

    The Sparts have obviously softened their position on imperialism in the Asia-Pacific. Hence:

    Partisan Defence Committee
    French Government Represses Anti-Colonial Union Militants
    New Caledonia

    Unlike the articles:

    • Down With ALP Government “War on Terror”! (Racist Dragnet in Melbourne)
    • Defend Overseas Students! (Racist Terror Sparks Indian Student Protests / No Illusions in the Capitalist State!)
    • Defend Chinese Deformed Workers State! For Workers Political Revolution! (Communal Violence in Xinjiang)
    • (Queensland Couple Targeted in Anti-Abortion Witchhunt) Full Access to RU486 Now! For Free Abortion on Demand!
    • (Partisan Defence Committee) Drop the Charges Against Leach and Brennan!
    • Imperialists Hands Off Iran! Down With the Clerical Regime! No Support to “Reform” Mullahs! For a Leninist-Trotskyist Party in Iran to Fight for Workers Revolution!

    NO EXCLAMATION MARKS.

    In fact, in order of importance, I’d go with:

    1. Iranian Government (four exclamation marks, hence twice as important as):
    2/3/4. Deformed Chinese Workers, Queensland Abortions and Overseas Students (two exclamation marks each) and;
    5/6. ALP, Leach and Brennan (one exclamation mark).

    I just hope the IBT is playing as much attention to these revisionist currents on the editorial staff of AS as I am — the masses need the best leadership possible.

  3. Paul Justo says:

    I wonder if they will turn up here –

    http://cartoons.captaincapitalism.com/NRC.html

  4. Lumpen says:

    The Polanski thing beggars belief. I purchased the latest issue of the Australasian Spartacist. My eyes nearly popped out of my head when in the opening paragraph the Sparts pinned the whole thing on a “precocious 13-year-old.”

    Their sister paper, Worker’s Vanguard, has a follow-up in the form of a response to a letter to the editor objecting to the article:

    Our defense of Roman Polanski, like our longstanding defense of NAMBLA (North American Man/Boy Love Association) and others persecuted for not conforming to the norms of bourgeois society, is based on our Marxist program for women’s liberation through socialist revolution.

    😮

  5. @ndy says:

    So.

    Lumpen the petit-bourgeois anarchist is opposed to women’s liberation and/thru socialist revolution.

    Typical.

    Why is the Left silent about this?

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