My grandmother's maiden name was Emma Connolly, and she lived near Providence, Rhode Island. She had fiery red hair and refused to divorce her husband to get unemployment benefits for the family. Rhode Island was the last holdout to deny benefits to "intact" families.
They placed her children in foster care when she and her unemployed husband couldn't provide adequate food for them in the depths of the Great Depression. The following year, Rhode Island relented and began providing benefits to "intact" families, but it was too late for my mother and her four siblings. You have to be careful not to help lazy people, you know.
Every time my mother heard a car coming down the country road of the foster parents' home, she watched it go by, hoping it was her parents. She was only seven years old when taken. Her parents never afforded a car. Mother was always proud that her parents refused to sign away their rights to their children.
If Kamala had emphatically promoted Medicare for All, she would have won, even though she abandoned the people of Gaza, a tragedy of catastrophic proportions.
By the way, I recently heard about a single mother I've known for over twenty years who has worked as a waitress the entire time and had her son put in foster care because he had bad teeth that she couldn't afford to fix. The State will say there is a way to get free dental care if you can figure it out. They're still blaming victims for child negligence to cover for a failing economy.
The band Black 47 introduced me to James Connolly. I’ve come to believe he represented the best of Ireland’s martyred patriots. He lived in Troy NY for a time. The starry plough!
I’ve long called myself a Connollyist. He’s great, his daughter Nora is great, and he has a great space as being a theorist, someone who spoke for the poor countries, and someone who could speak for the working people of the rich countries.
An under appreciated thing is also his work on culture. While certainly not a libertine, his debate with DeLeon underlined what you show here: a profound wisdom in trusting the people instead of getting lost in what one might think should be the case.
This is a wonderful piece, which is why I hate to disagree (with parts) of it. I believe the assessment that "the seat of progress and source of revolution is not in the brain, but in the stomach." is "the key to not just successful socialist politics, but all politics." is in itself a worrying sentiment on multiple levels. As someone from the Middle-East, I have found that it was neither the brain nor the stomach that were the result of revolution, but always the heart (and I believe it should always be the heart). People in the middle east have no problem starving for their ideologies (religion), and religion has always been the mover on political topics, not the price of bread. This, to me (and it is a position I am unsure how to defend), is more reassuring. If the stomach is the source of revolution, then what would happen to a people who are well-fed? Will they become apathetic to animal cruelty, environmental disasters, or simply anyone who does not share their stomach? How would we convince them to vote to end wars that benefit their own filled stomachs? I think the success of all politics, ideally, should come from compassionate people who feel for others even when their stomachs are full, or, in the best of cases, even at the cost of sacrificing their own stomachs.
My grandmother's maiden name was Emma Connolly, and she lived near Providence, Rhode Island. She had fiery red hair and refused to divorce her husband to get unemployment benefits for the family. Rhode Island was the last holdout to deny benefits to "intact" families.
They placed her children in foster care when she and her unemployed husband couldn't provide adequate food for them in the depths of the Great Depression. The following year, Rhode Island relented and began providing benefits to "intact" families, but it was too late for my mother and her four siblings. You have to be careful not to help lazy people, you know.
Every time my mother heard a car coming down the country road of the foster parents' home, she watched it go by, hoping it was her parents. She was only seven years old when taken. Her parents never afforded a car. Mother was always proud that her parents refused to sign away their rights to their children.
If Kamala had emphatically promoted Medicare for All, she would have won, even though she abandoned the people of Gaza, a tragedy of catastrophic proportions.
By the way, I recently heard about a single mother I've known for over twenty years who has worked as a waitress the entire time and had her son put in foster care because he had bad teeth that she couldn't afford to fix. The State will say there is a way to get free dental care if you can figure it out. They're still blaming victims for child negligence to cover for a failing economy.
That is an incredible story. It takes true strength to survive something like that!
Thank you for putting this piece together, Joe. I am especially relating to what Connolly said in Let Us Free Ireland!
Thank you for reading!
The band Black 47 introduced me to James Connolly. I’ve come to believe he represented the best of Ireland’s martyred patriots. He lived in Troy NY for a time. The starry plough!
Where O where is our James Connoly? He’s in a Mamdanu speech!
Excellent piece. Thank you!
Thanks for reading!
Happy St. Patrick's Day.
🙏
I’ve long called myself a Connollyist. He’s great, his daughter Nora is great, and he has a great space as being a theorist, someone who spoke for the poor countries, and someone who could speak for the working people of the rich countries.
An under appreciated thing is also his work on culture. While certainly not a libertine, his debate with DeLeon underlined what you show here: a profound wisdom in trusting the people instead of getting lost in what one might think should be the case.
Thanks for writing this!
This is a wonderful piece, which is why I hate to disagree (with parts) of it. I believe the assessment that "the seat of progress and source of revolution is not in the brain, but in the stomach." is "the key to not just successful socialist politics, but all politics." is in itself a worrying sentiment on multiple levels. As someone from the Middle-East, I have found that it was neither the brain nor the stomach that were the result of revolution, but always the heart (and I believe it should always be the heart). People in the middle east have no problem starving for their ideologies (religion), and religion has always been the mover on political topics, not the price of bread. This, to me (and it is a position I am unsure how to defend), is more reassuring. If the stomach is the source of revolution, then what would happen to a people who are well-fed? Will they become apathetic to animal cruelty, environmental disasters, or simply anyone who does not share their stomach? How would we convince them to vote to end wars that benefit their own filled stomachs? I think the success of all politics, ideally, should come from compassionate people who feel for others even when their stomachs are full, or, in the best of cases, even at the cost of sacrificing their own stomachs.
Maslow’s hierarch of needs.