Socialists for Obama in 2012?

LAST WEEK, I attended a public forum hosted by the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism (CCDS) in San Francisco entitled, "Building the Left and the Progressive Majority."

Speakers included representatives from CCDS, the Communist Party, Freedom Road Socialist Organization, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and Solidarity. Many useful suggestions were presented about the need to focus on concrete organizing work for labor and civil rights as the basis for greater socialist unity (although it was jarring that the panel organizers refused a request by the International Socialist Organization (ISO) to have a speaker, even though we are a large part of the socialist left).

All the speakers stressed the need to build independent social movements to "hold Obama's feet to the fire," something I entirely agree with.

However, with the exception of the Solidarity representative, who argued that the Democratic Party has historically been the "graveyard of social movements," all the other speakers asserted that a central task for socialists was to begin working now to ensure Obama's re-election in 2012. DSA's speaker went so far as to ridicule efforts to challenge Democratic Party hegemony over the left by saying that "third parties are the real graveyards of social movements."

While socialists of all stripes should work together to strengthen labor, civil rights, gay marriage and antiwar movements, it is obvious that those socialists who are prepared to endorse Obama even before seeing what he does, for instance, in Afghanistan, will face a contradiction between their desire to organize in the streets at the same time as they support a president, and the party he leads, who oppose many of the reforms they are fighting for.

As for the ISO, we'll pursue a united front with all progressive and leftist organizations in order to build up our social movements, but we will refuse to sacrifice the independence of those social movements in the interest of any politician's election.

No doubt this will lead to many sharp disagreements in the years to come. As long as these debates are carried on in the interest of advancing the practical fight for a better world, they should be welcomed.
Todd Chretien, Oakland, Calif.