WISHFUL THINKING
Paris
If it is true that to err is human, some errors nonetheless arise not from misgauging reality in all its complexities but from a mere unhinging of the mind. Healy's Newsletter has just provided an illustration of this. In the issue dated March 11 of this newspaper printed in London, one full page plus an additional column, or more than a fourth of the paper, were devoted to the candidate run in the March 5 elections in France by the OCI [Organisation Communiste Internationaliste], the French organization associated with the Socialist Labour League in an “International Committee of the Fourth International," a sham formation.
Running a candidate like this was not in itself an error. The PCI [Parti Communiste Internationaliste, the French section of the Fourth International] decided not to run candidates only because the effort necessary to conduct a campaign in a single district, or in an inevitably limited number of districts, would not have had sufficient echo on the national scene to make it "pay off" politically.
But you leave the realm of possible differences on this and enter the world of mental aberration when you read the article signed by Peter Arnold in the Newsletter. The title itself indicates the tone of the entire article: "The OCI pose a real alternative to de Gaulle." Here are a few sentences: "The joint campaign by the OCI and 'Revoltes', whatever the number of votes received by Stephan Just in the ballot, has altered the political scene in France.... This has begun a long overdue discussion amongst rank-and-file Communist party members."
The entire article can be put under the heading of "wishful thinking." The Just candidacy did not alter the political scene in France or set off a long discussion in the PCF. At no point would a reader of the Newsletter learn that the main conflict in these elections was -- unfortunately -- between the Gaullists on the one hand, and the FGDS (Fédération de la gauche démocrate et socialiste] and the PCF on the other. Neither would he learn that the Just candidacy did not cause a ripple outside the district in which he ran, and so on.
But the article in the Newsletter is not the product of chance, even taking into account Healy's gross ignorance of everything beyond the shores of Great Britain. The article is an illustration of the sectarianism dominating these groups, which believe that our globe revolves around them and that their screaming is enough to change the world.
The next issue of the Newsletter, dated March 18, has just arrived. There is not even a mention of this candidacy and its results. Of course, in the passages cited above, there was a phrase along the lines of "whatever the number of votes received," but this number -- 227 -- out of more than 53,000 valid votes was too small to be brought to the attention of the readers of the Newsletter.*
Let us note that in a neighboring district, a Posadist candidate received more than 400 votes. However, there are not more than a dozen Posadists in all of France, while the OCI and Revoltes are real organizations, presumably.
The Just candidacy changed the political scene in France -~ in the columns of the Newsletter for exactly one issue! We are willing to wager that by way of self-criticisn, Healy will engage in new slanderous attacks against the Fourth International.
eee *(In the March 25 issue, likewise, the editor of the Newsletter seems to have been unable to screw up sufficient courage as yet to inform his readers on the facts of life concerning the Just candidacy. -- W.O.