Its the final instalment of the Revolutionary Strategy reading series! Jack and Dan finish the book and use Mike Macnair’s 14 point outline of his strategic outlook as a frame for their discussion. Drawing on the contents of the book as a whole, and particularly the final three chapters, the lads outline the contents of the Kautskyism Plus strategy presented by Macnair. Macnair is broadly in alignment with Kautsky when it comes to his advocacy of a strategy of patience. Building a workers party ...
Nov 19, 2021•1 hr 27 min
Alright FINE we'll stop talking about Brenner and Meiksins-Wood for a minute, but ONLY A MINUTE. Today our fine chunky chaps talk world systems theory in an effort to broaden their horizons and understand how class operates on a systemic level. Or something like that. Reading: The Rise and Future Demise of the World Capitalist System: Concepts for Comparative Analysis (1974) by Immanuel Wallerstein and THE CRITIQUE OF WORLD-SYSTEM THEORY: CLASS RELATIONS OR DIVISION OF LABOR (1984) by Albert Ber...
Nov 12, 2021•1 hr 8 min
On this weeks show Jack and Dan read two essays written by C. L. R. James. James analyses the rise and historic significance of Nazi fascism from a Marxist perspective. He makes the case for seeing Nazism, not as a unique political and economic system in contrast to a broader European political economy, but instead reads it as an outgrowth and extension of broader capitalist society. German fascism is presented as a reaction to the crisis of capitalism, a response of the capitalist class to the ...
Nov 05, 2021•1 hr 9 min
This week we decide once and for all just what the left is and who we should be excluding!! Just kidding, but we do talk the problem of left unity. You've got to draw a line somewhere. Also up for discussion is the question of how to relate to our nation's various imperial wars and the international nature of the working class. Woo hoo! Reading: Revolutionary Strategy: Marxism and the challenge of left unity by Mike Macnair (2008) archive.cpgb.org.uk/assets/files/re…trategy%202.pdf
Oct 29, 2021•1 hr 7 min
Whilst waiting for their guests to arrive Jack and Dan sit down for a chat about their podcasting journey so far. One year in, have they learnt anything. The lads talk Corbyn and Sanders and tease out the extent of their ongoing relationship with the radical Social Democratic politics of the kindly grandads of the parliamentary anglophone left. Jack and Dan talk about the somewhat disparate topics discussed on the podcast so far and work on putting the pieces of the puzzle together. They talk: t...
Oct 22, 2021•1 hr 10 min
Well folks with strikes in the air in the United States your shimmering podcast hosts dive into Rosa Luxemburg's classic study of 1905 Russia and the mass strike as a strategy for revolution. McNair calls Luxemburg part of the left tradition, but Dan and Jack separate the wheat from the chaff and figure out just what it is about Luxemburg that makes her part of the 'left' tendency, Reading: The Mass Strike by Rosa Luxemburg (1906)
Oct 15, 2021•1 hr 5 min
This week we decided it was about time to have a gander at some history. Turns out, history is pretty brutal. Reading: Chapter 1 "Lust for Gold, Lust for Silver" from The Open Veins of Latin America (1971) by Eduardo Galeano.
Oct 08, 2021•1 hr 4 min
The long awaited "baseball episode" is finally here, folks, as today we're joined by Bobby Wagner of the socialist baseball podcast Tipping Pitches. Today we talk the looming deadline for the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the players in the MLB and the owners of the teams, the exploitation of minor leaguers and why the Giants are bad. Huge thanks again to Bobby! Go check out his show! And buy a shirt!! Links below!!!! CONSUME: https://tippingpitches.myshopify.com/ ENJOY: https://open.s...
Oct 05, 2021•1 hr 2 min
Following on from last weeks discussion of Hal Draper's strategy of the Marxist centre, Jack and Dan consult another canonical text of contemporary Marxism this week; Mike Macnair’s Revolutionary Strategy. With an emphasis on the Second International, and the German SPD more specificity, Macnair outlines the differences in strategy that defined the key debates within turn of the century Marxism. What does it mean to be a centrist in the context of the Marxist movement? What defines the politics ...
Oct 01, 2021•1 hr 9 min
This week the lads once again humble themselves at the alter of the ever apposite font of revolutionary wisdom; Hal draper. This time Jack and Dan explore the ins and outs of the sect, that inescapable nadir of left political organisation. What is a sect, why do they come about, are they inescapable, and what is their historical impact and legacy? The sect, it turns out, is not the way to build and support an active workers movement; history has proven this to be the case. So now what? Draper of...
Sep 24, 2021•1 hr 6 min
Boy revolutions can be a nasty business, eh? Especially that French one. It was kind of a pain in the neck, but once it was over it was a weight off of a lot of people's shoulders, am I right? This week rotund podcast hosts Dan and Jack take a look at Marx's writings on the French Revolution in an effort to understand what political revolutions can and cannot accomplish. Is there ever a right time for revolution? Or will they always end in bloody tragedy? Reading: "The French Revolution and the ...
Sep 17, 2021•1 hr 9 min
All good things must come to an end...no we don't mean our old friend JFK (or RFK for that matter) we mean the time has come to put The Devil's Chessboard to rest. This is our final episode on David Talbot's classic tome and it's left us with some questions: what was the class composition of the fellas that killed JFK? what place does this type of crankery have in socialism? where have all our beautiful independent researchers gone? This episode is sponsored by Dresser Industries in cooperation ...
Sep 10, 2021•1 hr 18 min
Alright here it is friends, the episode where we solve the JFK assassination. Not much else to say. Think we solved this one forever. Not that complicated tbh. This was recorded in a marathon podcasting session and next week's episode will be the fourth and final part on our series on The Devil's Chessboard. But don't worry, we'll be back with more crankery sometime down the line. We barely even talked about the B*shes! Reading: Part III, The Devil’s Chessboard (2015), David Talbot
Sep 03, 2021•1 hr 19 min
This week, we sat down to watch BBC's Cuba! Africa! Revolution!, a documentary all about Cuba's internationalist adventures in the African continent. And tell you what, we here at Auxiliary Statements are not above admitting this is the first time we've been exposed to this absolutely kick ass era of history. Turns out Cuba was involved not only in helping out Congolese freedom fighters after friend of the podcast Patrice Lumumba was assassinated, but they also got involved in Burkina Faso and A...
Aug 24, 2021•1 hr 16 min
Those few faithful listeners will know we've been flirting with the idea of worker's parties and how on earth we're supposed to build a mass movement recently...and we haven't really gotten anywhere those questions. So we did the sensible thing and brought on someone who actually knows what they're talking about. That's right everybody we got the one and only Cliff Connolly to talk about two articles he wrote for Cosmonaut Magazine - "Build a Mass Party!" and "Revolutionary Discipline and Sobrie...
Aug 20, 2021•54 min
Jack and Dan continue their adventure through the classical Marxists modes of production. This week the lads find themselves in the slave states of ancient Athens and Rome once again under the trusted tutelage of Ellen Meiksins Wood. To what extent does this ancient civilisations mode of production deserve the descriptor ‘slave’? To what extent was production dominated by slavery and how did the peculiar and unique civil, legal and political status of the free citizen affect class relations. Con...
Aug 13, 2021•1 hr 10 min
Jack and Dan might well be flirting with primitivism once again this week as the lads find themselves asking the question, was the Neolithic agricultural ‘revolution’ ultimately a mistake for human civilisation; a back step and not the moment of its genesis? For it turns out, according to Marshall Sahlins, Palaeolithic humans may well have had it made! For Sahlins, pre-agricultural life, far from being haunted by want, hunger and privation, was in fact a form of life that provided both food and ...
Aug 06, 2021•1 hr 11 min
Another 10 episodes, another recap. Well folks, we like to think we've come a long way since out first few episodes. This week we talk about what's changed our thinking in the last ten episodes, specifically in regard to the system of socialism outlined in the Fundamental Principles of Communist Production and Distribution. How do we materialize working class anger? How can we help bring the class struggle to its conclusion? Well, Dan and Jack sit down this week and attempt to answer just those ...
Jul 30, 2021•1 hr 12 min
What is it with all these billionaire and why do they keep going to space? Your stalwart hosts have decided its long passed time we put a stop to these antics! How you ask. By putting an end to the dictatorial reign of capitalism that enforces the conditions necessary for the existence of your Bransons and your Bezoses and by implementing a new class based regime in its place, one that will set the conditions necessary for socialism. That’s right, this week Jack and Dan discuss the concept of th...
Jul 23, 2021•1 hr 7 min
The third and final part of our Emmy award winning Fundamental Principles of Communist Production and Distribution series HAS ARRIVED! It's been a dang good read folks, and in this ep you'll hear our concluding thoughts on this whole communism thing, just how viable it is, how much faith we have in the general system of councils and what the Dictatorship of the Proletariat might actually look like. We also apologize for killing Donald Rumsfeld with our bad vibes and set that energy to work in ot...
Jul 16, 2021•1 hr 30 min
Well folks for the first time in Aux Statements history we won't be bringing you our scheduled programming. However! Fear not. Jack is bringing you a half-assed Adjunct Statements to give you something. In this ep, Jack reads an essay he wrote for no discernible reason about discontentment with capitalism in fantasy. He compares Ursula Le Guin's "A Wizard of Earthsea" with Tolkien's "The Silmarillion" to make the point that yeah...we all hate capitalism. Reading: Some crap. Read it here - https:...
Jul 09, 2021•46 min
You've been waiting long enough, folks...here it is - part 2 of our episode on the dang CIA. Have we gone loopy? Have we become conspiracy chuds? Tbh not really. In this episode we try and parse the faff from the not-faff as we uncover the hidden purpose behind American Cold War foreign policy. Turns out it wasn't that great! It was pretty bad, in fact! Reading: Part II, The Devil’s Chessboard (2015), David Talbot
Jul 02, 2021•1 hr 32 min
Waaaaay back many episodes ago, dear listener, your meek and humble podcast hosts watched a movie from Errol Morris all about that evil idiot Robert McNamara. Well here we are today watching another Errol Morris movie but this time all about Donald Rumsfeld and let's just say...this is one evil SOB. In this episode we ask what role those unelected civil servants play in politics, how they manage to stay around so long, and just what it means to find evil distilled in one smarmy, Ivy League, conn...
Jun 25, 2021•1 hr 29 min
Holy guacamole the lads are at it again. This book continues to impress as we dive into the second part of our Fundamental Principles reading series - this time covering a spectrum of topics ranging from why everyone left of the councilists are idiots to how we would consume life's necessities and luxuries under communism to why accounting and equal "wages" are absolute fundamentals. Not sure what else to say here other than that your portly and faithful podcast hosts have continued to have thei...
Jun 18, 2021•1 hr 27 min
This week, self professed Marxists on the internet Jack and Dan do that rarest of things, they read some actual Marx! As an appendix to their continuing engagement with the very excellent text ‘The Fundamental Principles of Communist Production and Distribution’, the lads took a look at Karl Marx’s withering and often times pedantic commentary on the 1875 founding programmatic document of the German Social Democratic Party; published posthumously in 1891 by Engels as ‘Critique of the Gotha Progr...
Jun 11, 2021•1 hr 11 min
Yeah yeah this one SOUNDS boring but what if I told you we'll be covering...labor time calculation??? Alright that may also sound boring but if we want to be calling ourselves commies and running around calling for an end to capitalism we've got to have an idea of HOW our new world will function. And gosh darn it that is exactly what these people did with this here book. Ever wonder how production/distribution will operate without exploitation? What would an economy look like without coercion? W...
Jun 04, 2021•1 hr 6 min
This week the fellas interview.....a former member of parliament?? Boy how'd they con their way into that one. You read that right folks, this week we sat down to talk to Thelma Walker, a one time UK Member of Parliament who, after Corbyn had his so-called "whip" removed, had the guts to do what some of us couldn't...leave the Labour Party. But Thelma's career didn't stop there! She recently sat as a candidate for Hartlepool's by-election under the socialist Northern Independence Party and is wo...
May 28, 2021•1 hr 3 min
In our newest installment of the beloved "everyone is an idiot except me" reading series, we bring you a rushed and perhaps cursory analysis of the CLASSIC Hal Draper joint "The Two Souls of Socialism." Are anarchists as bad as Hitler? Are the Fabians just Stalinists? Is William Morris our F R E A K I N G king?? Some of them sure, yes and hell yes are the answers to those questions posed by Draper as your frowzy and unkempt podcast hosts tackle the dichotomy of Socialism From Above VS Socialism ...
May 21, 2021•1 hr 31 min
Here we are folks, another arbitrary milestone, episode 30! As it’s another episode with a zero at the end you know what that means, another high energy low effort clip show. The boys are oh so proud of their little show and want to take this opportunity to take stock. Where is the podcast going, where did it come form, is it coming or going? No one really can say. Topics for discussion include, current Labour Party woes and whether the party can ever serve socialism, the possibility of a future...
May 14, 2021•1 hr 16 min
Wait a minute, you're telling me America was founded by the same syphilitic capitalists who ruined England?? This week the boys dust off some Foner to take a look at the role of labor in the founding of these here United States. Was the War of Independence a fully bourgeois revolution? Or did labor power and class struggle have something to do with it? Methinks they did. Reading: Chapters 1-3 of "History of the Labor Movement of the United States" (1947) by Philip S Foner.
May 07, 2021•1 hr 24 min
