Tariq Ali and the Suicide of the New Left Review

By Alex Constantine

Tariq Ali, whose voice is frequently heard on the Pacifica network, is an editor at the NEW New Left Review, a once-radical journal that has undergone a marked shift from editorial policies of old ...

The character of the New Left Review completely changed in the year 2000.
For 40 years, Boris Kagarlitsky writes, "discussions of fundamental importance revolved around views expressed there," but "times change, and so do fashions. As a counterweight to utopian calls for changing society" - is this UNDESIRABLE? - "and to hopes of revolution" - undesirable? - "Perry [leading editor] offers 'uncompromising realism.'"

What is the essence of this realism? ACCEPTING THE TRUTH OF ANY GARBAGE AT ALL, PROVIDED IT IS PUBLISHED IN THE WALL STREET
JOURNAL, sanctioned by the NY Times ...

This is the main concern that I and others on the left have with the work of Tariq Ali and his academic colleagues at NLR - refusing to view politics from any other vantage point than the establishment's own.

If constricting the scope of discussion led to "the suicide of the NLR," will it not have a similar effect on the left as a whole if Ali and otherslike him, adopting the same "uncompromising realism," succeed in making it a staple of left-wing activism?

[Originally posted at: http://www.leftgatekeepers.com/update.htm]