The Morrow of the Revolution

I'm not going to re-write News from Nowhere. No. I am, though, going to relay a scary dream.

I woke in a cold sweat last night, I hadn't dreamt I saw Joe Hill, but instead, that the Socialist Workers Party were in power. There'd been some sort of thing, a thingy thing, leading to a revolt, mass demos, riots, that sort of thing, and in the confusion they had seized power. Chairman Rees appeared on Telvision to inform us all of the new Government - Lindsey German as Internal Affairs commisioner, Chris Harman was made new Director General of the BBC, Foreign Affairs went to Super-Villain Sound-a-like Lexy Callincos.

Terrifying.

Of course, it won't happen any time soon, there is a mass organised resistance ready willing and able to rise up against such an event - the Tory party.

Scoff ye not, look at it this way - there are some 10,679 council wards in the UK, usually with about 5,500 electors and Three seats each. The Tories can and do contest most of those wards. That is, they have enough members active enough to be at least a paper candidate. Further, they have enough people to actually campaign in each of those wards. If we even average that out at 5 per ward, thats 50,000 Tory activists across the country. Add on top of that the networks of Golf Clubs and and Conservative and Unionist Clubs around the country,and you have a strong political movement there.

Think of the impact 1,000 SWP members make now - remembering the inevitable ratio between active and inactive partisans of any movement.

The Tories show us what a mass political party looks like, and shows us the extent to which any advance will require us to be able to match that level of commitment and membership.

Truth be told, I think a Swappy coup d'etat is unlikely, but the truth is, they are going to have to re-apraise their decision to go all opportunist in search of Respect.