The candlelight vigils are over for another year and the Ed Sullivan Show TV clips have been returned to the archives. It is only now that the true legacy of the man begins to emerge.

It was the 30th day of November 1999. The place was Seattle. Against the backdrop of a meeting of the World Trade Organisation, a gathering of mainly young people had come together to protest and demonstrate against global capitalism and its dreaded storm troopers: the international corporations. It was the genesis of a dream. The type of energy last experienced during the '60s civil rights and anti-war movements had been tapped. At last, a new social and political movement had burst on to the world stage. The revolutionary genie was out of the bottle. A new rebellious spirit had been let loose upon the world.

Previously, the movements of the '60s had culminated with angry protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. This was the same year that Elvis Presley launched a career comeback and released the single A Little Less Conversation.

It was the eighth day of January 1935. The place was Tupelo Mississippi. A baby called Elvis Aaron had just been born. It should have been a joyous day, but it was not. Presley's twin brother Jesse Garon had not survived. Presley's parents were like most folk from East Tupelo - dirt poor - struggling to cope with the effects of the Great Depression. Yet, despite the uncertain beginnings, Elvis Aaron would emerge triumphant.

Since the Seattle experience, the anti-corporate inspired, technology driven, Transnational Protest Roadshow (TPR) has wheeled its way, albeit roughly at times, through Davos, Washington, Prague, Melbourne, Nice, Davos-Zurich, Quebec City, Barcelona, Gothenburg, Genoa, New York, and now had its highly professional sights set on the ski-resort town of Kananaskis in Alberta, Canada.

The new revolutionary protestor is a person who worships the art of conversation - well, as long as it is her own. After all, activists, public intellectuals and assorted graffiti artists have, in a short three year period, created a media whirl-wind of debate and discussion, which exuded an impression of freshness and imagination, as they continuously circled the globe, mirroring the movements of official world trade events. Behind all this international travel, the stated purpose was to educate the population of the western world, by giving them an encounter with the truth. The underlying idea was to unmask the real villains of our time. And so, the mantra went out: "Organise. Disrupt global governance." With all this conversation, the protestor has made it very clear what she is against. However, quite surprisingly, she seems quite vague, and almost borders on being downright elusive, when it comes to the small matter of indicating what she actually stands for. I guess it's always easier to criticise something than put up an alternative agenda.

The early twentieth century Marxist theorist, Karl Kautsky, seems to best reflect the revolutionary sentiments of the new Seattle-styled, anti-corporate protestor. Kautsky believed that the proletariat, by the natural movement of history would overthrow the bourgeoisie. A supporter of parliamentary democracy, Kautsky believed that by political organisation and direct revolutionary action, power would fall like a ripe fruit into the hands of the parties of the working class.

With a hidden agenda, the TPR organisers were always convinced of their ability to deflect serious criticism of the remodelled movement. After all, their followers were alert, educated and very media savvy. So, you can imagine the movement's surprise, when at the 2002 World Cup, they were suddenly hit head on by the re-emergence of the Elvis phenomena. The counter-revolution had begun. The result was inevitable. When a digitally remastered King teamed up with football's most esteemed event, on a pitch encircled by a kaleidoscope of sparkling international corporate logos, in a stadium packed to the rafters with singing fans, you knew that a knock-out blow had been delivered. The boy, with strong links to Sun Records, RCA and the Crown Electric Company was back. The revolutionary idea had been smashed - its remains were secretly transported back to a diminishing socialist homeland. The revolution was dead: long live The King.

And the slogan of the counter-revolution: "A little less conversation. A little more action."

These views are solely the opinions of the writer, regardless of how close to the truth they may be.

The above article was posted by John Cavanagh to this site on the 25 August 2002