In the last 15 hours I was surprised by the relative flood of hits on the first instalment of our new series entitled How Do We Get Socialism? There was a three-fold increase in the number of accesses that usually take place at this time in the week. Most of these hits have come from Russia... and this got me thinking.
I had noticed that in Putin's reasoning for his "annexing" of the Crimea, he had surprisingly referred to the Bolsheviks in a positive way. Why would a neo-capitalist do that? Also, why should "The West" react so strongly to this event? Russia is now a capitalist power just like them. Why should they react similarly to how they did when Russia was a socialist state?
There has to be more in this than meets the eye!
I immediately recalled the circumstances of Margaret Thatcher's re-invasion of the Falklands Islands in 1982, after they had been invaded by the Argentines. Not only was Argentina reacting to a political crisis at home, but so was Thatcher, with recession returning to the UK.
Could Putin be reacting to domestic problems in Russia with similarly nationalistic moves? For the increasingly positive reactions to Marxist articles on SHAPE and this blog, from this part of the world, seem to indicate that in that country there is now mounting support for a socialist Russia: this time in accordance with its original intentions, and not the Stalinist distortion.
Interestingly the other major number of hits came from the USA - either this indicates a surprising interest in Marxist revolution among the American populace (unlikely?), or maybe increasing activities of their spy-services in monitoring such subversive ideas on the internet - and have passed on their conclusions to their masters, who are now "acting accordingly"
I have also noticed a marked increase in interest from another country - in the Ukraine itself! Though I have a feeling that the "listeners" in the USA and the Ukraine have very different motives.
What do you think?
No comments:
Post a Comment