FotM Is 1! Taste the Revolution!

I had hoped to post something on December 1, which marked the actual first anniversary of this column, but I was out of the US at an anti-war conference in the UK and am now in Norway to attend a seminar being held in memory of Tron Øgrim, the Norwegian Red and polymath I mourned here in May.

It actually stunned me when I realized that in this short year, my two fellow Fire on the Mountain bloggers and I have posted 126 entries here. Not too damn shabby, if I do say so myself. And in the true five year plan spirit, we pledge to exceed this impressive rate over the coming year! (I can make this pledge without knowingly lying, because I have ready to go a several part piece by the excellent Morten Falck defending the Norwegian new communist movement against attacks from those eager to write it out of history, and the promise of a fabulous new addition to the FotM stable of bloggers.)

In my first post, I made the following mild declaration:

"I know, there is in Socialist Party circles an assembly of mockers. They deride aught that savors of sentiment. But we heed not their scoffing. We will not permit them to outface us. A songless Socialism is a wrangling, contentious, dismembered thing. A singing Socialism will be a socialism triumphant."
Bouck White, Letters from Prison, 1915

As the above suggests, this blog will try to avoid dry dogma and nit-picky polemic, plus which it will have a bunch of stuff about music, and culture more broadly.

Let us know in the comments section if you think that vow has been kept, and what else you'd like to see in future posts.

And in the meantime, enjoy these ads for Taybeh Beer, started by Palestinians who returned from the US to Ramallah after the Oslo accords to help jumpstart the Palestinian economy, and who have persevered in the face of unbelievable pressure from the Israeli occupation. (No, I haven't tried it and only heard of it from the splendid Sissel Henriksen, journalist at Klassekampen, Norway's finest daily newspaper.)