INTERIM REPORT

I have started editing the one hundred page section of the book on my grandparents dealing with my grandfather's political career as a Socialist, and once again I am struck by how much simpler and purer that age was.  It was a time when one could be a dedicated socialist and a fighter for workers' rights without hesitation or apology, without ritual nods to the "middle class," without the pretense that being rich in a society of poor working men and women is perfectly all right and imposes no obligation on you to work for the rights of all.  I know that old people always think the time of their youth is better [the myth of the Golden Past], but despite the enormous gains we have made in racial and gender liberation, in some ways it was a better time.  Perhaps posting this section of the book will help younger readers to get a sense for what it was like then.