Though we've never led the cry of "Corn on the Boomers!" we do understand the annoyance so many (including Barack Obama) have expressed towards a number of them as they refuse to let go of past, as they refuse to live in present day times and as they refuse to recognize realities. Take Cesar Chelala, an ass who self-embarrasses and should have headed into retirement a long, long time ago. Like many a tired Boomer, Chelala is a closeted radical (we know what he is but saying so would lead to boos and hisses from the Supreme Fat Ass Boomer online -- we'll assume most know who we mean). Chelala is 70 years old this year and all he has to show for it is hatred of women, hatred of people and a never ending desire to lie in order to 'prove' racism.
Like Laura Flanders lying about the post-Superbowl violence, Chelala wants to insist, "Threats against President Obama have increased by 400% since President George W. Bush left office, the highest numbers on record." Can we get a source for that? No, we can't.
It can't be sourced because it's not true. Ava and C.I. were at the hearing when this oft-repeated lie was mentioned in Congress -- during a Committee on Homeland Security hearing when Eleanor Holmes-Norton asked the Secret Service Director Mark J. Sullivan about the claim and he explained to her that it wasn't true, that Barack was not receiving more threats than either George W. Bush or Bill Clinton.
We covered this February 23rd. C.I. covered it in the December 3rd snapshot, the day the Committee held their hearing. All this time later, Cesar Chelala is still repeating the LIE. Why?
Because he likes it. Because it gets him hot and horny. The same way the idea of women being beaten in greater numbers after the Superbowl helped get Laura Flanders off.
It's lying and it needs to stop and we're all so damn sick of it. Mainly we're sick of the political closet cases. Socialist or Communist (depending upon her mood) Frances Fox Piven got a little attention from Glenn Beck last week and was time for all the political closet cases to inch a toe out of their closets and cry, "UNFAIR!"
You know what's unfair?
How these lying s**t heads influence the world today.
Monday on WBAI's Out-FM, guest Bettina Aptheker told some truths (no surprise, Bettina's long been a truth teller) and we're sure she shocked the socks off a number of listeners. Below is an excerpt of the interview Tricia Spoto and Naomi Brussel conducted and, for those unfamiliar with Bettina Aptheker, she's the author of many books, a professor at University of California at Santa Cruz and the daughter of Fay and Herbert Aptheker.
Out-FM: I found that quote in the book and you say that it became apparent to you that "I could not hold on to the foundations of Marxism and still see women as the co-equals of men in the making of history" and that seems to be a critical turning point for you.
Bettina Aptheker: That's right. Intellectually, that was a critical turning point for me. The other thing that happened for me was that when my book, Women's Legacy, was ready for production, it had been commissioned by the Communist Party publishing house and then they refused to publish it. And I think the reason -- they said it was "too feminist" -- but I think that from what I understand now from conversations with people it was really because I was a lesbian in a committed lesbian relationship.
Out-FM: And they knew that.
Bettina Aptheker: And they knew that and the party was extremely homophobic.
Out-FM: Would you say that that was like your first indication or your first like breaking away from the party? That was your first indicator of moving away.
Bettina Aptheker: Which? The --
Out-FM: That -- them refusing to publish --
Bettina Aptheker: Oh, yes. That was the cause. Because psychologically I was very committed to the Party and very committed to trying to change its structure and you know make it more democratic and trying to develop Marxist ideas, trying to be very creative. And there were other comrades, you know, who felt the same way I did. I wasn't the only person floating around in there -- a lot of people felt that way. We were all working in that direction. But once they wouldn't publish my book, then-then it just didn't work for me. You know, I couldn't maintain my membership. I got the book published elsewhere.
Out-FM: And did you formally disconnect from the party?
Bettina Aptheker: Yes, I did. I wrote a letter of resignation. It was a hilarious scene with my father when I did this. I wrote this -- I wrote this formal letter and I typed it out. And I brought it to my parents because I thought they ought to see it before I resigned, you know?
Out-FM: Because it was going to impact on them.
Bettina Aptheker: Yeah. Yeah. And so my-my father read this typed letter and he said to me -- he said, "You can't, you can't send this." And I said, "Why not?" That was the least that I expected, that "you can't send this." And he said, "Because The New York Times might get a hold of it!" [Laughter.] I thought, "Why would The New York Times care?" Anyway I --
Out-FM: What do you think he was afraid of?
Bettina Aptheker: Well he just couldn't understand it, you know. It's the only time he ever really shouted at me.
Out-FM: Really.
Bettina Aptheker: When he was really angry. And my mother was the one who-who intervened and said "Enough, if that's what Bettina needs to do, then that's fine." I mean, she had been -- Her relationship with the Party had always been much more ambivalent than my father.
Out-FM: But she was a Communist longer, right?
Bettina Aptheker: Yeah, she was. She joined the Party long before he did. But-but the bureaucracy and a lot of the policies bothered her. So sometimes -- and also she would have personality conflicts with some people. I mean, everybody does. She stopped going to her club meetings for awhile. So she was more attuned to the psychology of what was going on, while my father was totally locked into the ideology of what was happening.
Out-FM: Do you think that those feminist ideas that you kind of were -- resonated with her also and that was part of her ambivalence?
Bettina Aptheker: She liked what I was doing. She was very aware of my work. But I have to say my father did also, from an intellectual point of view. He was very helpful with the book Women's Legacy, he was outraged that the Party refused to publish it. And he stopped publishing with International Publishers after that -- which was the Party's house. So he was in a lot of solidarity with me about it, really if you think about it. That was a big statement for him to make.
Out-FM: And how did the party react to your resignation?
Bettina Aptheker: Well the Chairman of the Communist Party in Northern California refused to accept my resignation and wanted to have a meeting -- [Laughing] Let's just have a meeting. Let's have a meeting. I was too through with this.
Out-FM: There were many people who were leaving the Party at that time.
Bettina Aptheker: Yeah people --
Out-FM: It has been happening in waves.
Bettina Aptheker: -- for a very long, long time. Yeah. Right.
Out-FM: Since the '30s.
Bettina Aptheker: Since the '30s, right. One of the things that really amazed me since I've been in New York, especially New York, is I've done some of these public talks, Naomi, you were at one of them. And the room was packed. And the place was filled with a lot of people who used to be in the Communist Party and --
Out-FM: We're still arguing with each other. [Laughter.] About what was the correct position. And what really happened in Cuba.
Bettina Aptheker: And what really happened in Cuba, yeah. So the thing is, you know, I think that's very much part of the cultural fabric of the United States. I think people don't actually think about this. Is tens of thousands of people were in and around the Communist Party who are still living.
Out-FM: And are still activists. And are community organizers and are union organizers --
Bettina Aptheker: Absolutely.
Out-FM: They're professional debate --
Bettina Aptheker: And if I might add, they're gay, lesbian and queer organizers as well. So it's just very -- it's just very striking. And we tend to discount the influence of the Communist Party which, on the one hand, in and of itself is a very small organization but it has had a lot of impact on people and its ideas.
Out-FM: And on generations. I actually asked you earlier if you would make a little comment on this. My impression has been -- as a left, queer activist over the last 30 years or so -- that the Parties that came out of the Trotsky movement were more open to queer politics, more active within queer groups and were more willing to acknowledge that this was part of life and that sexuality was part of life. Is that your impression as well?
Bettina Aptheker: Yes, and there's documentation for this. Christopher Phelps was going through some archival sources of the Socialist Party and very early and I don't know the year now but very early he found an interesting document. It was mimeographed and it was in the archive and it was unsigned but it was the Socialist Party -- did I say that? -- and it was affirming the importance of gay people to Socialist life and to Socialist movement. And there was actually a whole forum around it that the journal New Politics put around it a few years ago and people commented on this and it was extremely interesting.
Out-FM: But how do you account for this difference? I mean was it Stalin was different than Trotsky or what --
Bettina Aptheker: Well part of it you have to realize is that homosexuality was outlawed in the Soviet Union by 1933.
Out-FM: Although it had been decriminalized right after the [1917] revolution.
Bettina Aptheker: That's right. And then you can just see, if you look at Soviet history, it's outlawed abortion -- it's outlawed in '36. And then you get this terrific repression that's taking place which involves sexuality as well as -- obviously -- a great many other things. And the Communist Party in the United States was very much aligned with the Soviet Union. Unlike the Trotsky groups which had split, you see. So that influenced how people were thinking about this particular issue.
Out-FM: That they could respond differently?
Bettina Aptheker: Yeah. The other thing is I've been in the Party's archives.
Out-FM: Which party?
Bettina Aptheker: The Communist Party, sorry. There's only one Party [. . . Laughter] Anyway, the Communist Party archive. And it's been very, very illuminating to go through it. And one of the things that's clear --
Out-FM: This is very recently?
Bettina Aptheker: Very recently. I've been at the Tamiment Library while I'm here in New York. And one of the things that is clear is that the Party glorified the idea of a working class family and of course they never -- they never analyzed the idea of patriarchy. So it's a glorification of working class family that's being corrupted by outside forces like 'perversions' They talk about economic pressures which is, of course, very true. But they also talk about 'perversions' and homosexuality is one of the 'perversions.' So it was within that context, that framework that there's this extreme homophobia.
Out-FM: So queerness is part of the decadence of capitalism?
Bettina Aptheker: Yes, that's right. And it's amazing to me that as late as 1985, at the Party convention in 1985, and I was already out of the Party then, but there was a national convention, they reaffirmed that gays and lesbians could not be members of the US Communist Party. The position really didn't change until the early 1990s, in terms of membership.
Except during fundraising drives (when the schedules change), Out-FM airs on WBAI each Monday from eleven in the morning until noon. Past shows can be heard for up to 90 days after airing at the WBAI Archives. Monday night in "Out FM and Ricky Martin," Ruth wrote of Out-FM as she often does at her site. Some Third readers had already heard the show and written this site, others heard it at the archives after Ruth wrote about the interview. The thrust of the e-mails were that it was a great interview and it was great to hear someone say on the air what Ava and C.I. have long said here.
To which Ava and C.I. reply, they've read Bettina's books, they've heard her speak publicly and they've spoken to her one-on-one. "Bettina lived it," they say, "just because you only heard it on the radio last week, don't think we're the creators of the history. She has much more of a right to it than either of us or anyone and she's long told this history."
When Ava and C.I. tell the history here, regular readers find it informative. Drive-bys attack Ava and C.I. as "liars" and other, stronger terms.
But that's reality. The Communist Party was hugely homophobic. And you call Ava and C.I. liars or call everyone pointing to that history a liar, it doesn't change the fact. And grasp that in 1985 -- a time when Ronald Reagan was silent as AIDS decimated the US gay male population -- the Communist Party was again publicly refusing to accept gay and lesbian members.
When Ava and C.I. talk this history, they do it to illustrate the problems of today. And as you read the above excerpt from Out-FM, we hope you grasped the historical echoes on your own.
We hope you realized, for example, that Lt. Dan Choi not being loudly praised at the websites of The Progressive, The Nation, the US Socialist Worker and elsewhere had a lot to do with the not-so-distant homophobic past of the Communist Party.
We hoped you grasped how women -- any woman, Hillary Clinton to Kathyrn Bigelow -- can be attacked so viciously by the so-called left.
These prejudices are never examined. Forget examined, they aren't even noted. And as they remain hidden, they do considerable damage.
It's why, for example, to return to Cesar Chelala, a man can write at Information Clearinghouse about all the evils of the world . . . but sexism doesn't make his list. This while he refers to former Governor Sarah Palin as "Mrs. Palin." And let's be really clear on this, Palin pops up in one sentence and only one sentence. In that sentence, she's referred to as "Mrs. Palin." Yeah, f**ker, that's sexism. He's attempting to demean her. He robs her not only of her title, he robs her of her first name, he attempts to reduce to "wife of." It's sexism.
The dirty history of the Closeted Communists is as destructive to the left today as anything a Corporatist War Hawk in the White House could do. And that's not going to change until people can get honest about the 'criteria' they rank with and where they learned it from. A lot of people are holding on to a lot of prejudices and refusing to examine their actions.
We don't have time for it. We don't have time for your baggage. This is today and we declare freedom and equality for all. Notice how few rush to join in on that cry.
