Thank you Mr Norman, for confirming your membership of the Socialist Workers Party/Democratic Socialist Party.
Perhaps you would be good enough to answer these questions.
Can you please confirm if you held any official positions in the SWP/DSP, or any of its auxiliary organisations ie Resistance, Environmental Youth Alliance, CISLAC etc?
Did you ever travel to any socialist bloc countries, including Cuba or Nicaragua during your time with the SWP/DSP?
Did you ever belong to any other political party ie Australian Greens, Labor Party, Nuclear Disarmament Party, while you were affiliated to the SWP/DSP?
In which year did you formally resign your membership of the DSP?
Were you, before 2005, aware of Keith Locke's and Jeanette Fitzsimon's involvement with the DSP?
If you had sincerely renounced Marxism-Leninism, why were you still contributing to a Marxist-Leninist newspaper (GreenLeft Weekly) as late as 1999?
In what year and in what circumstances, did you last have any formal or informal contact with the DSP, its auxiliary organisations or senior personnel?
Thanking you in anticipation for answering these important questions.
I feel somewhat hesitant about responding to Trev’s questions because it does seem a bit McCarthyist. But I shall do my best - it really was a long time ago - but in return I’d like Trev to answer my questions which i shall post separately.
ReplyDeleteTrev. “Can you please confirm if you held any official positions in the
SWP/DSP, or any of its auxiliary organisations ie Resistance,
Environmental Youth Alliance, CISLAC etc?”
I held a few voluntary positions. Never made the chief kahuna I’m afraid.
Trev “Did you ever travel to any socialist bloc countries, including Cuba or
Nicaragua during your time with the SWP/DSP?”
russel
No, never have. Is it ok with you if I travel to Nicaragua now that the Sandinistas lost the democratic elections that they organised?
Trev: “Did you ever belong to any other political party ie Australian Greens, Labor Party, Nuclear Disarmament Party, while you were affiliated to the SWP/DSP?”
Nope.
Trev - “In which year did you formally resign your membership of the DSP?”
Slightly vague on that one I’m afraid - very early nineties - maybe ‘91?
Trev - “Were you, before 2005, aware of Keith Locke’s and Jeanette Fitzsimon’s involvement with the DSP?”
I’m still not aware of it. Speaking to a conference of the Green left magazine (which is what i think Jeanette is being accused of) is hardly invovlement. Sorry I don’t read your blog otherwise I may be more aware of the ins and outs of it. I guess you mean Keith’s connections witht he left in the 1970s…
Trev- “If you had sincerely renounced Marxism-Leninism, why were you still contributing to a Marxist-Leninist newspaper (GreenLeft Weekly) as late
as 1999?”
GreenLeft has a range of writers. John Pilger is no Marxist Leninist. And nor am I. I would happily contribute an article to the Nat Business Review but that doesn’t mean I subscribe to their politics does it?
Trev - “In what year and in what circumstances, did you last have any formal or informal contact with the DSP, its auxiliary organisations or senior personnel? ”
You know you really should get out more. There is no global communist conspiracy. I haven’t had contact with them since I left - except I guess when I emailed the articles to GreenLeft in 1996 and 1999. Nothing personal. There were some really nice people there but I’ve been doing other things.
# Russel Says:
My questions for Trev:
Have you ever been a member of, or associated with, ZAP - Zenith Applied Philosophy? What was your involvement?
Were you aware of the association between ZAP and the fascist Nationalist Workers Party?
When did you last have contact with the people associated with ZAP?
Do you think that fascism had something postive to offer the world?
Do you believe that the holocaust happened?
Is your blog “New Zeal” named after the magazine of the same name published in the late 1980s by the Campaign for a Soviet Free New Zealand? What was your invovlement in the New Zeal magazine?
Did you agree with the New Zeal editorial of April 1989 connecting Ron Trotter, the Todds and the Business Roundtable with pro-Soviet and pro-Stalinist activities such as leading business delegations to the USSR, and having other business connections such as selling “Stalinist oil”? Do you still think that the Business Roundtable is a communist front group?
Did you agree with the July 1989 edition of New Zeal when it accused the Young Nats of being “Marxianised” because they were addressed by a member of NZ Planning Council?
Do you still believe that being a member of the NZ Planning Council made you a Marxist, and if so does that mean that Don Brash is a closet marxist because he was a member of the Planning Council?
If Ron Trotter, Don Brash, the Todds and the Business Roundtable are all part of the communist conspiracy, then what the hell planet are you on?