NDP Socialist Caucus Supports Niki Ashton as Next NDP Leader
The NDP Socialist Caucus (SC) is a group of left-wing New Democrats aiming to move the NDP to the left and create a more democratic and activist party.
Over the past month, members of the Socialist Caucus throughout the country have debated the leadership race and several proposals on who the SC should collectively support as leader. After days of voting by email, on Facebook and by phone, the majority of SC members supported the position which urges a vote for Niki Ashton, with no recommendations for a second, third or further choice.
In contrast to the other candidates, Niki campaigns for closer NDP identification with the working class. She excoriates any electoral pact with the parties of big business. She denounces the imperialist war drive, insisting that Canadian troops "be brought home now." While Ashton does not advocate public ownership, she praised the successful effort of the Socialist Caucus at the NDP federal convention in Vancouver, in June 2011, to keep "socialism" in the party's constitution. In answer to a question, Ashton cited Manitoba's practice of no public funding for Catholic or any religious schools as a model for Canada.
Frankly, we like Ashton's willingness to rock the boat. She did that when she challenged an NDP incumbent MP in 2005 who opposed equal marriage rights for same-sex couples. Niki won the nomination, and was elected MP in 2008 and 2011. In our book, her age, 29, and her bold feminism, add to her appeal, and increase the potential for her to move the NDP to the left.
Read the full statement on the Socialist Caucus website.
Expect insults and cheap shots to come.
Whatever one's issues with the SC, though, it is in my view to Niki Ashton's credit that she attended.
The usual chortling chorus from NDP apparatchiks about socialism and the socialist caucus can keep to itself in this thread.
...more like 15 or 20 people...essentially Barry Weisleder and a gaggle of his acolytes with delusions of grandeur.
It wouldn't be a babble discussion on the NDP without cheap shots and personal attacks from Stockholm. FYI, about "15 or 20 people" have joined the SC Facebook group in the last two weeks alone.
I applaud the caucus for finding a positive role in the campaign. I am sure that a significant group will be taking a second look at Ashton because of your discussion.
Why does this warrant a seperate thread, with a moderator stamp of approval. I thought the point was to reduce the level of threads. Surely the Socialist Caucus is not so important it deserves something seperate. I support having a lot less of these leadership threads, I'm sure I am not alone in thinking that.
How about a whole string of threads.
Ice cream lovers endorse Thomas Mulcair
People who like bikes endorse Brian Topp
If you like 8 year old cheddar you'll love Paul Dewar says cheese loving group
People who live alone with cats endorse Nathan Cullen
Peggy Nash wins the support of farmers who prefer green work pants over blue ones
Simply the best says Yogurt with Fruit Coaltion of Martin Singh
Wow, the antipathy toward the SC on babble is really astonishing. I'm not a member (I agree with some of their ideas, but there's a serious mismatch in temperaments), but I'm proud to share a party with them and am glad they're there. I'd find it very disheartening if they ever picked up shop and went elsewhere.
Thank you for your kind words, IP. You'd be amazed at some of the garbage people throw at the NDP Socialist Caucus. A vast majority of SC supporters have been members of the NDP for decades, and many of the ideals we hold (such as withdrawing Canada from NATO or a reducing of the workweek) have been on NDP policy books for over thirty years. Yet for some reason, we're referred to as "radicals."
Funny, isn't that what the corporate media always says about the NDP?
I can vouch for that statement - I remember serving with Sean on ONDY nearly two decades ago!!!
No kidding. It seems nobody recognizes that the SC are a dedicated group of New Democrats working to advance the party's progressive (more traditional CCF) values. Obviously not everyone will be in agreement with them, but the hostility is akin to what New Democrats recieve from conservatives in the Globe and Mail comments section. I would have thought better from a group of progressives/activists
Sean we are all radicals because we support or belong to the NDPee! I miss Jack.
Sigh. Stockholm, stay out of this thread once you're done patting your back for that "brilliant" cheap shot.
Hi Jan! How are you? Actually, I've never thought of myself as beign radical. In fact, I've always believed that growing inequality, poverty and millions of people suffering from hunger were the result of a radical, extreme form of global, corporate capitalism.
As socialists and social democrats, we just want to see an end to that. That just sounds like common sense.
And yes, I miss Jack, too!
Who is this Barry Weisleder? What brand of "socialism" is espoused by the "socialist caucus". Way back in the NDP of the 1970s, I recall hearing that the party still had an interesting mix of remnants from Maoists, to Trotskyites. Do they have a favored "pure socialism" criteria and does Niki Ashton abide by that thinking?
People want to know such thiings...
Well, I would agree with that! I absolutely abhor the use of public funds to indoctrinate children in religion using public taxes. Parents who are religious zealots canare free to send their kids off for religious indoctrination after school and on weekends.
Niki moves up a notch!
Except that Niki and the SC are both wrong when it comes to Manitoba's policy of funding for religious schools. Religious schools of ALL denominations are eligible for public funding (link):
In other words, Manitoba's official policy is the same policy that John Tory proposed for Ontario two elections ago.
I was just about to point that out Winston. Moreover, why should parents who want their children to receive religious (especially but certainly not exclusively Catholic) instruction face greater financial barriers in providing that? (which is what ending public funding for denominational schools would entail) I have to say, the Socialist Caucus sounds less socialist and more like the Orange Lodge on this point. Niki Ashton's comment on the matter is also puzzling, I wonder if she was misquoted.
Prairie Lefty:
I'm not so sure that Niki wasn't out to lunch on what Manitoba's official policy was. I saw her on CBC television with Evan "Bob Rae" Solomon and she did not even seem to know what the actual and historical rates of corporate taxation were when he queried her on the details of her tax "plan".
That's actually my biggest criticism of her (and to a lesser extent, Nathan and Peggy too) - they seem to have a shallow policy depth. By that, I don't mean that they are not releasing policy papers or that they are not very well-versed on some issues. What I mean is that their PERSONAL breadth of knowledge in many public policy areas does not seem to be very deep. I believe this explains the tendency to talk a lot in terms of values and slogans but not so much in details.
That was just one of the elements of the SC statement that caused concern.
Manitoba's "progressive" policy originated with the Manitoba Schools Act of 1890, which abolished funding of Catholic schools and banned French as a language of instruction (yeah). It was part of sealing the defeat and humiliation of the Metis and the supremacy of the neo-colonial regime in Ottawa. Decades later, the law still in force, there were measures to get around it by "sharing services" with private schools. Then Georges Forest went to the Supreme Court with his parking ticket, and everything changed. Franco-Manitobans started emerging from the shadow along with their culture and language. And as Winston pointed out above, it is simply erroneous to say what the SC said, and what they attributed to Niki Ashton.
I've already commented in another thread about other offensive aspects of their statement. But the most offensive part is praising one candidate to the skies and smearing and defaming each and every other one. It's the spirit of the hatchet job which is even more disturbing than the content, which is bad enough. They don't want the party "obsessing over Harper". They don't want public funds helping to save the auto industry (nor any others I must gather). They crap on the coalition of 2008, which exhibited the profound spirit of non-partisanship and unity that IMHO won the NDP 59 seats in Québec. But it's the sectarian spirit that shines through the most.
I can't trash the SC, because I don't know them. I don't have any problem at all with the word "Socialist". It's rather the concept of "Caucus" that disturbs me. If this is how they operate within the party, then they must surely be a force for division. The very concept of polling caucus members and having a majority vote to decide which candidate to support in another majority vote exhibits that divisive spirit well. Are the caucus members expected to vote with the caucus recommendation? If yes, are they expelled from the caucus if they don't? If not, then what is the significance of the caucus's "endorsement" of Niki?
I have no doubt that SC members are dedicated activists. But I hope I have the right to call their joint actions and statements as I see them. I'm not known for holding back when it comes to the NDP and its actions (am I?). I expect to be as vocal with the SC as others.
Which reminds me. I have asked several times, on this discussion board, for Barry Weisleder to explain his statement from about one year ago, wherein he called on the Canadian government to demand the "opening of Libya's borders" so that the "rebels" could receive arms. If you need the link to his statement which he posted here, I'll find it. I have never received a response. Moreover, the SC statement endorsing Niki properly condemns Paul Dewar for supporting the aggression against Libya, but seems to forget that Niki Ashton and all the others did likewise. It is tendentious arguments like that one - many of them - which put this statement on my recycle list.
ETA: Here is Weisleder's post from last April, which I note was made on behalf of the Socialist Caucus. I'd like an explanation, please.
double post
I am not impressed either. I am not a member of the SC or any other caucus, so I too speak as an independent socialist. I joined the NDP because its values set it apart from the other two parties. The hostility toward Dippers who wish to save the founding core values of the party is quite uncalled for, even if these individuals of the SC don't come across as particularly pleasant themselves in their discourse. Perhaps people should step back, as a couple of moderators have suggested, and cool the rhetoric and can the insults before resuming their debate.
BTW, I happen to agree with the Socialist Caucus' view on education funding. I believe that everyone should go to the same public schools, and that no other schools should receive ANY public funding. School is where our children learn respect and tolerance of each other; sending people of different faiths to different schools harms social cohesion and solidarity, and if religious schooling becomes prevalent can lead to sectarianism, intolerance and violence.
This is not a radical proposal. Indeed, it is exactly the policy in Newfoundland and Labrador, since they passed a referendum to defund the Catholic school system. It was also courageously proposed by the Green Party in Ontario in the last two elections.
Actually yes I would have if I had dropped by when they were near the top of the active topics feed. Because as a casual observer and participant I find scrolling through piles of easily related threads, instead of just a few rather annoying and a drawback of babble. Satisfied.
I think a lot of people here are sympathetic to the views of the socialist caucus, because a lot of us have socialist (anti-imperialist, pro-labor, pro-mixed economy, pro-worker control) leanings.
But an endorsement from an NDP caucus that attacks 6 out of 7 NDP candidates suggests to me that this "caucus" is more interested in dividing the party than building support for their views, or building any kind of consensus at all.
I was going to vote for Niki Ashton anyway. But the SC's endorsement isn't a positive factor in that.
Why shouldn't parents who want religious or any other kind of special instruction bear the costs themselves? Churches, temples, mosques, synagogues, etc. are available for religious instruction. All children should attend the same public schools in which they will hopefully learn tolerance and acceptance along with the usual curriculum. School and religion should be kept separate.
I disagree. Winston, you're making the exact same argument against denominational schools as the Scottish Tories and the right-wing, Protestant fundamentalist DUP in Northern Ireland do. I challenge your claim that religious schooling-particularly in Canada leads to "sectarianism, intolerance and violence", where is your evidence in asserting this? I think a much greater threat to tolerance is promoting a monoculture where the children of families for whom faith plays an important role are deprived of receiving religious instruction. In that respect, your proposal sounds rather divisive. I agree, it is not a radical proposal, it is a reactionary one.
P.S. Unionist, your brief history of education policy in Manitoba was very well stated.
Well then, we'll agree to disagree, I suppose. For the record, I did not say that separate schooling WILL lead to sectarianism, intolerance and violence, I said it CAN, thus implying the possibility not the inevitability.
I'm not arguing for a monoculture (far from it); I'm arguing for a true multi-culturalism, where people meet and understand people from different backgrounds. If all children are segregated from each other along faith-based lines, that becomes a lot more difficult. We certainly wouldn't argue that rich kids should have separate schools from poor kids (i.e. division along socio-economic lines), so why should we do so along sectarian ones?
Beyond that, as a secular humanist, it offends me that my tax dollars should go to support someone else's superstitions. As a gay man, I am very deeply offended by the thinly-veiled hatred that sometimes rears its ugly head in our publicly-funded, faith-based "independent" schools. As a feminist, I am thoroughly disgusted by the anti-choice indoctrination that occurs in them.
That all said, I agree with you that this discussion is potentially very emotional for some, and I would much prefer to focus on issues that we can all work together on, so this issue is of a very low priority for me. I do prefer Manitoba's system to Ontario's, where they fund only a separate system for the Catholics. In my view, it's only fair to fund all of them (as here in Manitoba) or none of them (as in Newfoundland). In other words, I am fine to live with the Manitoban status quo, however much I disagree with it.
Here in Winnipeg, we have public schools that offer billingual programs. (Hebrew and Ukrainian immediately come to mind). Neither of them are official languages, should parents be forced to hire a tutor if they would like their children to receive instruction in these languages? Language and religion are important aspects of the cultural identity for many Canadian families and I see no reason why we should be preventing the children of said families from attending schools which help foster that sense of identity.
Yes, religion and public schools should be kept seperate. Yes, religious schools must (and do) follow the public curriculum. I completely reject what you are implying however, that religious instruction runs counter to tolerance and acceptance. The two can and often do go hand in hand. I fail to see the hostility of some on the left towards religious education (and I'm a secular-humanist myself). Should we shun Charlie Angus for sitting on a Catholic school board?