Can You Afford A Revolution?

Excellent post by Richard at the Commie Curmudgeon blog about the ridiculousness of the ISO charging $100 for a ticket for their Socialism 2006 Conference that is coming up this weekend in New York.

As someone who has been known to help out with the SPGB stall at the British version of this recruitathon down the years, I was more than interested in checking out the American version, and wondering how it contrasts with the British version (I do the same with American vs Pop Idol), but I wonder if the ISO are genuinely interested in attracting workers, students and the rest of us to their event when the price of a ticket is so prohibitevly expensive?

Shame that. 'cos I would have been interested in the answers to the following questions:

In the American version, would the Sparts - collective term: a rant - be operating in close formation whilst selling their newspaper and simultaneously denouncing the IST tradition the Fifth International the International Bolshevik Tendency every other bastard for something they said in a footnote to a leaflet written in 1978 like their sister organisation does in Britain? And would it be the case that all the Spart cadres would have British accents?

Who are the American version of the AWL or the CPGB with their primitive accumulation of cadre technique of telling the select few that cross their path on the way to the bar:"The average SWPer/ISOer isn't that bright. Didn't you know that less is more"? Which perhaps explains the size of their membership (yeah, I know, an SPGBer should talk!)

Would all the baby trots be crowding around the one anarchist stall outside the venue 'cos, in their hearts of hearts, they all really want to be anarchists but they prefer David Rovics over Anti-Flag?

How many times do you have to tell an ISOer in increasing decibels: 'No, I don't want to subscribe to your fucking paper'. before they finally take the hint and fall back on asking you: "Well, do you want to join the organization then?"

If I was doing a stall would I be approached by a dishevelled bloke in late middle age, who is carrying plastic bags full of freebie political literature and library books, and who hits me with the opening riff of: "Oh, the SPGB WSPUS! Are you lot still going? I used to read the Socialist Standard Western Socialist in my local public library 25 years ago. Is Steve Coleman Issac Rab still a member?" And who then proceeds to tell me his top 25 conspiracy theories for the next 45 minutes, whilst he looks out the corner of his eye for someone more interesting to hassle than a sucker from the SPGB WSPUS?

So many questions that will have to be left unanswered for this year.