The Iron Rule of Bureaucracy strikes again. In a country as large as the United States, why have so much centralization? It's my anarchism showing, but wouldn't the PSL members be better served, or at least more resilient, with a more confederated approach that is more grounded in each chapter's locality? Why should a scandal in the Philadelphia group bring down such distant groups like Anchorage? I do think this much centralization prevents the PSL from gaining a foothold outside of major population centers because the chapters don't have enough room to maneuver and buried in paperwork.

I honestly feel bad for the rank-and-file :PSL: comrades. It takes so much work organizing locally, on top of the bullshit paperwork from HQ, and then shit like this happens.

The PSL had roughly 4,000 members in 2025. ... Prior to 2016, the U.S. left existed in a period of defensive struggle, not offensive. There was no mass base to be accountable to. So the Party became accountable only to itself, keeping alive the embers of socialism until the working class is ready.

I had more written, but this made me feel like I was kicking a dog. But this dog's leadership sexually assaulted a comrade, so I will say to the leadership that those numbers, after two major campaigns, is pathetic. If this were 2005, during the War on Terror and deep inside Capitalist Realism, I could understand those numbers. Those numbers in 2025 are completely unjustifiable. Leadership should step down in shame.

The 2026 CC report explicitly connects Marissa's essay to "the hidden hand of state forces," to COINTELPRO, to NSPM-7.

With leadership like this who needs :fedposting: :porky-happy: