M-L-M Mayhem!

Here is the final page of the Tao of Mao ABCs .  Although it might not be the strongest ending (Z was difficult––I almost went with "Zinoviev"!), at least it's finished.  Now I can get back to writing substantial entries without having to worry about finishing this project.  Who knows when this sad little comic strip will return. Letters W - Z [If you have enjoyed this comic series, or even passed it along to friends out of sheer disgust, please feel free to donate to this blog !]

[I'm temporarily suspending my last page in the Tao of Mao ABCs to write this post––but do not despair!  The final letters are already written, and only require lay-out, and the alphabet will be finished.] In the past month more than one troll has wandered unto this blog to gleefully inform me that marxism was a failure, that any adherence to marxism is akin to religious dogmatism, and that maybe I wasn't aware that past communist revolutions have never delivered on their promises.  Indeed, the most recent trolling happened on the comment string of a post about dogmatism in the left , a typical example of someone who imagines they are brilliant parachuting themselves into a theoretical terrain they have no interest in exploring and declaring themselves the authoritative representative of common sense. "I will convince you that I am brilliant and you are stupid." To be honest, I'm a little confused as to why people who are so avidly devoted to bourgeois ...

Here is the fourth page of the comic, offensively humorous as usual.  Only one more page after this, and then I will return to more substantial and sober-minded posts.  Just remember: if you're offended, it's probably about you! Letters  R to V.

Due to the time it takes to lay-out this [hopefully] hilarious alphabet, I figure that I can get several posts out of it and thus save me the time of having to write something sober and substantial this week.  Although I provided two pages for the first post––mainly because it had been years since I provided interested readers with a return to the Tao of Mao  comic strip––each successive post, including this one, will be a single page.  Hence: five pages in four posts. So here is page three which consists of the letters M  through Q.   Enjoy! Tao of Mao ABCs: letters M - Q

The other day I encountered a lefty ABC s board book aimed at children entitled "A is for Activism".  After perusing its contents and discovering that it was generally left-liberal nonsense, with some abstract anarchism here and there ("Z is for Zapatista"), I decided I would write my own ABC  rhyming book where the letters accorded to more precise leftist concepts.  After all, I have a daughter and I would like an ABC board book capable of teaching her difficult concepts, or at least with funny rhymes that would make her want to discuss these difficult concepts, from the hard left tradition. While I was writing my ABC s book, however, I kept thinking up semi-sectarian, leftist in-joke rhymes that were generally inappropriate for the kind of book I wanted to write.  I mean, I wanted a book that would introduce my kid to general concepts of the communism to which I ascribe and not filled with arcane movement jokes and insults.  Even still, I couldn't help think...

If there's one thing that Rob Ford's temporary removal from office has taught me, it is that so many pundits believe that a crude notion of democracy is the highest good. [For those readers outside of Toronto or Canada, Rob Ford is the conservative mayor of this city who was ordered to leave office at the end of 2012 due to a breach in conflict of interest but who was reinstated at the end of January after winning his appeal.]  That is, there is often this a priori assumption that an unqualified notion of democracy––based only on the electoral equation of 50% + 1 ––is the most important moral value, and it is this value that separates capitalist democracies from all the terrible "totalitarianisms" that we have been taught to fear as evil and undemocratic. Directly following the 2011 court decision that was intended to push Ford out of office (he spent municipal money on the football team he coaches, then he voted to uphold this decision in council after being warned...