The Shape of Days

Anybody remember Pablo Paredes? Back in December, Pablo refused to board his ship for deployment to the Persian Gulf. He was variously lauded as a hero of the anti-war movement and excoriated (there’s my favorite word again) as a deserter. Citizen Smash covered the story admirably.

Well, Pablo’s back, and Smash is there. He starts by noting the forum in which Pablo has decided to reach out to his loving fans: Socialist Worker, the weekly newspaper of the Trotskyist International Socialist Organization. (Trotskyism, for your edification, is considered to be to the left of Stalinism on the political spectrum. This is a group that Joseph Stalin would have looked at and said, “Woah, guys. Let’s move back toward the center, huh?” The only reason the International Socialist Organization describes themselves as socialist is because “communist” has taken on a certain stigma since, oh, 1950 or so. Can’t have silly prejudices getting in the way of the underlying message, can we, guys?)

Smash … well, smashes Pablo’s whiny, self-serving interview. He starts with the idea that Pablo didn’t want to go to war, pointing out that Pablo’s ship, the Bonhomme Richard, was among the ships sent to Sumatra to provide aid to tsunami victims. Then he calls Pablo on his assertion that he was tricked into joining the Navy with the promise of college tuition; full-time tuition at Pablo’s school of choice would only have been $1,400 per semester, an expense that Pablo could easily have covered with a part-time job pulling down minimum wage.

And it really goes on from there. Smash, who let Pablo have it without mercy or remorse when the story first flared up last December, does a real number on the anti-war movement’s latest poster boy. It’s a fun read. Go check it out.

• Smash to deserter: You suck
• Necessary Music
• Eat your heart out, Pablo Neruda