Maybe now that terrorism has replaced communism as the major threat to the established order we can take another look at the ideas of Karl Marx and his descendants. What better place to start than with the most brilliant political tract ever written, The Communist Manifesto. Even if you are a champion of capitalism, the Manifesto is worth a read for the beauty of its prose.

Here is how Marx and his comrade and co-author Fredrich Engels describe the coming to power of the new ruling class:

The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his "natural superiors," and has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous "cash payment." It has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervour, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation.

In fifty pages, the Manifesto describes the emergence of capitalism from feudalism, analyzes the economic and political system, explains how the workings of capitalism create the working class that will be the tool of its destruction, outlines a ten-point communist program, polemicizes against other left tendencies, and issues a call to arms.

More than 150 years after its publication, its insight into the workings of capitalism are stunning. Marx and Engels foresaw globalization: "The need of a constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeois over the whole surface of the globe. It must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, establish connexions everywhere."

Young global-justice activists may think they discovered the enormous power of big corporations over government, but in 1848, the Manifesto said, "The Executive of the modern State is but a committee for managing the affairs of the whole bourgeoisie."

A friend of mine once said that Marx is a great analyst but not much of a therapist. His analysis of capitalism, most accessible by reading the Communist Manifesto, is still strikingly accurate. The method of understanding social change through analyzing social forces rather than through utopian dreaming or psychological analysis of human behaviour is a welcome antidote to a lot of the postmodern claptrap that passes for theory today.

But Marx and Engels severely underestimated the capacity of capitalism to adapt to the demands of the working class and other social groups that have since emerged. The stirring last line of the Manifesto—"The proletarian have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win"—is no longer true in the developed world.

The two most importan observations of Marx in The Communist Manifesto:

1. That all history is the history of class struggle.

2. That social class is determined by one's relation to the means of production.

What Marx failed to understand, both in the Manifesto and in his other writings, was how the subjegation of third world workers by the first world Bourgeoisie (globalisation) would allow for reforms in Capitalism in the first world. These reforms have obviously included higher wages and benefits, as well as reforms brought about by governments. Marx did forsee globalisation, but he did not foresee its consequences.

Italian marxist Antonio Gramsci wrote brilliant analyses of the mdern Capitalist System. His theory of "Hegermony" explains how the capitalist class keeps the working class complacent through the reforms that it offers workers.

Though many reforms have been wrested from the Capitalist class by first world workers, these reforms have been under attack since the early 1980's. At this time, the industrial capitalism of the 20th Century reverted to the mercantile capitalism of the 19th century, albeit with computers and the internet. Thus Marx's prediction of two social classes, one filthy rich, the other dirt poor, may well yet come true.

[edited to fix typos]

[ 04 March 2005: Message edited by: Left Turn]

[ 23 April 2005: Message edited by: Left Turn ]

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Originally posted by Judes:
The stirring last line of the Manifesto—"The proletarian have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win"—is no longer true in the developed world.

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Gosh, I didn't get the memo yet that informed me of my wealth, just waiting to be picked up.

It's still true, even in the developed world. But, there's been enough money floating around since about WW1 in order to buy people off, anti-communist/pro-capitalist propaganda has been going non-stop for well over a century, and workers haven't really had enough of the sort of class-conscious education many of them used to have, to help make working people think otherwise.

The problem now I think is: what with the slowly declining help from the government that lifted the boats of so many workers, who's going to educate workers (no matter where they live) on matters like their chains first? Right-wing demagogues, backed and/or blessed by the bourgeois of all strata, who'll scream for scapegoats and/or religion even as they help workers cut their own political throats, or a tiny disunited, disarrayed left (composed largely of reformers, well-wishers, and people who think "power" is a dirty word)?

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:

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Originally posted by Judes:
The stirring last line of the Manifesto—"The proletarian have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win"—is no longer true in the developed world.

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Gosh, I didn't get the memo yet that informed me of my wealth, just waiting to be picked up.

It's still true, even in the developed world. But, there's been enough money floating around since about WW1 in order to buy people off, anti-communist/pro-capitalist propaganda has been going non-stop for well over a century, and workers haven't really had enough of the sort of class-conscious education many of them used to have, to help make working people think otherwise.

The problem now I think is: what with the slowly declining help from the government that lifted the boats of so many workers, who's going to educate workers (no matter where they live) on matters like their chains first? Right-wing demagogues, backed and/or blessed by the bourgeois of all strata, who'll scream for scapegoats and/or religion even as they help workers cut their own political throats, or a tiny disunited, disarrayed left (composed largely of reformers, well-wishers, and people who think "power" is a dirty word)?

Excuse the rant, but I find myself terrified, contemplating the next fifty-some-odd years of my life.

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It is actually never true in the absolute undifferentiated value of one's life. The prospects of revolution are yet a risk to be taken, not a gaurantee of divine right. But the times of Marx were so enraging and outrageous that the sense of righteousness came more easily than today.

What if one said 'you have nothing to lose but your shame'? Would someone say that this is wrong and that we should live proudly in our poverty? In our time the estrangement from self is so severe we can no longer be critical of 'more wiser people than our self in leadership'. The distrust of leadership is projected against all people of all ideologies. The battle is no longer over ideology but who is the 'better man' at the time, not who knows the injustice of the ignorant, but who would take the freedom to dream that better life. That is why revolutionary realists never make points with the dreaming public; you disturb their sleep. They do not need education on their 'chains'; they are comfortable with them that they fear losing their stability of them.

In these times of post USSR and the diluted, mislead communist nations, history being what it is, we need a movement based in the analysis of that history and a theory as to why it was not as good as wanted (sometimes so far from that it was horrific). Apparently dispite all the lethal repression of counter revolution they ended up 'reforming' from within. The national communism can not stand the test of time, it seems, with perhaps the exception of Cuba. Therefore I have decided to become a reformist before the 'revolution' rather than after. My rewrite found below:

1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.

[The abolition of rented property in land.]

2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.

[Yes, with a formulae governed by a yearly vote.]

3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.

[Not neccessary after rent property in land reformation/abolition.]

4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.

[Not confiscation but the application of the federal graduated tax to extranationalization of personal money and material value.]

5. Centralisation of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.

[Opposite to that: break down of national banks into regional competing banks.]

6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.

[The state requires that all public communications give 33% portion of all publication time and space. Transportation may be a mixture of both private and state ownership through land property partnership.]

7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.

[Worker share investments in the means of production. Cooperative innitiative programs. Any portion of shares of a company is one vote for each shareholder]

8. Equal liability of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.

[Freewill in labour and work for welfare.]

9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.

[?. Live where you want.]

10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, &c, &c.

[These ideas have, for the most part, been enacted by this state, but there has been a little errosion. Rather than limit free education to children, free education to all.]

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch02.htm

[ 13 March 2005: Message edited by: LeftRight ]

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A spectre is haunting this House - the spectre of Communism. All the Powers of orthodoxy have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: Catholic priest and Jewish Rabbi, Liberal and Conservative, Quebecois separatist and Alberta redneck.

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...or words to that effect. 150 years after the fact and nursery tales are still being told about communism. I think the rumours of its death are greatly exaggerated.

Bwa-ha-ha! Those google ads are hilarious. The one at the top of this thread is advertising "Marx brothers" stuff. Hardy-har-har.

[ 05 March 2005: Message edited by: N.Beltov ]

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Originally posted by LeftRight:
In these times of post USSR and the diluted, mislead communist nations, history being what it is, we need a movement based in the analysis of that history and a theory as to why it was not as good as wanted (sometimes so far from that it was horrific).

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"Not as good as we wanted?"

What did you expect? Someone to push a button and there's a freshly baked communist society, all perfect and shiny?

The French and English Revolutions weren't pretty either, and the most horrendous reactions did their damndest to destroy them. Would you rather people had given up when matters turned out less than contemporaries expected, rather than stain their lily white hands with the hard work of turning it into something better?

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Apparently dispite all the lethal repression of counter revolution they ended up 'reforming' from within. The national communism can not stand the test of time, it seems, with perhaps the exception of Cuba.

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Time isn't finished yet . . . .

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Therefore I have decided to become a reformist before the 'revolution' rather than after.

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>snort< You're hardly the first to scurry to the bourgeois.

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My rewrite found below:

1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.

[The abolition of rented property in land.]

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So private property remains private, just owner occupied. And I suppose the buying and selling of private land is acceptable?

quote:

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2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.

[Yes, with a formulae governed by a yearly vote.]

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So the big property-owners can use their accumulated wealth and influence to swing things their way . . . .

quote:

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3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.

[Not neccessary after rent property in land reformation/abolition.]

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Allows for accumulation and concentration of land in fewer hands . . . .

quote:

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4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.

[Not confiscation but the application of the federal graduated tax to extranationalization of personal money and material value.]

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So, once again, the owners get to keep their means of production by paying a modest "rent".

quote:

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5. Centralisation of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.

[Opposite to that: break down of national banks into regional competing banks.]

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Read the history of the booms, busts, and scandals of private, competing banks in the 19th century of the USA. Creating even the loosely-governed centralization they have now is a godsend compared to an even further marketization of securities.

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6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.

[The state requires that all public communications give 33% portion of all publication time and space. Transportation may be a mixture of both private and state ownership through land property partnership.]

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Do some research on what P3s are doing nowadays.

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7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.

[Worker share investments in the means of production. Cooperative innitiative programs. Any portion of shares of a company is one vote for each shareholder]

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How is worker ownership possible when there is a mixture of both private and state ownership?

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8. Equal liability of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.

[Freewill in labour and work for welfare.]

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Each contradicts the other.

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9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.

[?. Live where you want.]

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Marx' point was to eventually abolish landed power and the state of peasantry in the countryside. It had nothing to do with "telling people where to live"; you've been watching too many of those old red-scare commercials.

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10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, &c, &c.

[These ideas have, for the most part, been enacted by this state, but there has been a little errosion. Rather than limit free education to children, free education to all.]

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Originally posted by LeftRight:
It is actually never true in the absolute undifferentiated value of one's life.

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If it's never true, then how did revolution happen?

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The prospects of revolution are yet a risk to be taken, not a gaurantee of divine right.

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Who said they were?

But when the choice gets clearer (like it used to be): either socialism or barbarism, I think few will decide they'd rather be beautiful souls.

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But the times of Marx were so enraging and outrageous that the sense of righteousness came more easily than today.

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Where did that "sense of righteousness" come from? From seeing the results of untrammeled property rights. People outside of core countries see that every day. It's one reason why, for example, every so often the US needs to pick a poor country and toss it against the wall to show capital means business.

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What if one said 'you have nothing to lose but your shame'? Would someone say that this is wrong and that we should live proudly in our poverty?

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I recall a certain well-regarded Jewish man from long ago giving that harebrained advice. It's pretty popular, even now.

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In our time the estrangement from self is so severe we can no longer be critical of 'more wiser people than our self in leadership'. The distrust of leadership is projected against all people of all ideologies.

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South America would beg to differ with you.

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The battle is no longer over ideology but who is the 'better man' at the time, not who knows the injustice of the ignorant, but who would take the freedom to dream that better life.

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??

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That is why revolutionary realists never make points with the dreaming public; you disturb their sleep. They do not need education on their 'chains'; they are comfortable with them that they fear losing their stability of them.

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Ah! A nugget within the dross!

But you're positing a tremendous amount of knowledge that people already have, allowing them to make a conscious decision to keep their chains on. I can tell you from experience there are _loads_ of people out there who simply don't know any better and are kept that way (inadvertantly and/or not) by the bourgeois media.

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What they 'need' in the way of education is an objective comparison and an acceptable promise for the knowledge of their increasing intelligence. What I mean be this is found at http://chiron.valdosta.edu/whuitt/col/cogsys/piaget.html

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This is a start, but without it being linked to a rigourous class-analysis and action coming out of it, it's so much liberal pap: it's sweet and tasty, and it nourishes for a little while. But one eventually needs solid food to live on.

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In debate a person must be shown in a polite way that have been denied the possibility of a better intellectual life, and therefore a better financial life.

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If you think communism is about a "better intellectual and financial life," you've got another think coming. And a third one if you think there's a necessary link between the intellect and one's finances.

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9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.

[?. Live where you want.]

Marx' point was to eventually abolish landed power and the state of peasantry in the countryside. It had nothing to do with "telling people where to live"; you've been watching too many of those old red-scare commercials.

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As someone who is both a marxist and an environmentalist, I have always found Marx's point number 9 to be rather disturbing. It seems to advocate the transformation of all lands into an endless subrubia. I doubt this is what Marx actually meant, but many people seem to interpret it this way.

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Originally posted by Tim Kennelly:

As someone who is both a marxist and an environmentalist, I have always found Marx's point number 9 to be rather disturbing. It seems to advocate the transformation of all lands into an endless subrubia. I doubt this is what Marx actually meant, but many people seem to interpret it this way.

On Mar'x nine other points I agree wholeheartedly.

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Tim:

Interested in your opinion and others because "time" most assuredly, is not over yet. Simply put: if captialism goes to its logical conclusion as the oil runs out, would this be a point of consciousness in world history to realize that if the earth is going to survive, than some form of collectivism (I'll leave the debate on how pure a form to others) would be our only salvation? I do get the impression that there are a number of communists, socialists and progressives of many stripes who are looking at the coming energy crash with some degree of opportunism. I'm sure you have put your shoulder to the wheel for years and perhaps realize that the bush-wa, as I like to call them, are not going to listen to reason as long as the oil flows, the electricity is on 24-7 and the money is still rolling in.

In my opinion, for what its worth, the critical point for human existance will be whether, when we reach the point where the realization sets in that the consumerist North American lifestyle is toast, whether there will be that consciousness that says "we need to go back and look at seriously consider Marx" or whether a hurt and angry people will go for their guns.

quote:

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Originally posted by Tim Kennelly:

As someone who is both a marxist and an environmentalist, I have always found Marx's point number 9 to be rather disturbing. It seems to advocate the transformation of all lands into an endless subrubia. I doubt this is what Marx actually meant, but many people seem to interpret it this way.

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In recent years John Bellamy Foster has emerged as a leading theorist of the Marxist perspective on ecology. His seminal book Marx’s Ecology (Monthly Review Press, 2000) discusses the place of ecological issues within the intellectual history of Marxism and on the philosophical foundations of a Marxist ecology, and has become a major point of reference in ecological debates.

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Marx's Ecology - John Bellamy Foster

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This historical and philosophical focus is now supplemented by more direct political engagement in his new book, Ecology Against Capitalism. In a broad-ranging treatment of contemporary ecological politics, Foster deals with such issues as pollution, sustainable development, technological responses to environmental crisis, population growth, soil fertility, the preservation of ancient forests, and the "new economy" of the Internet age.

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Ecology Against Capitalism - John Bellamy Foster

I've quoted directly from the MRP website.

[ 06 March 2005: Message edited by: N.Beltov ]

Should I wait til the end of time?

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>snort< You're hardly the first to scurry to the bourgeois.

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Fuck you! http://groups.msn.com/taxationjustice

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So private property remains private, just owner occupied. And I suppose the buying and selling of private land is acceptable?

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Why not? Bourgeois property is bourgeois property because they have exclusive right to it. You think land should continue to be rented? Responsibility should have its rewards.

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So the big property-owners can use their accumulated wealth and influence to swing things their way . . . .['quote]

How? So things change but stay the same? I should have posted my link earlier; obviously you have not seen the page.

3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.
[Not neccessary after rent property in land reformation/abolition.]

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[quote]Allows for accumulation and concentration of land in fewer hands . . . .

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Not at the tax rate.

4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
[Not confiscation but the application of the federal graduated tax to extranationalization of personal money and material value.]

quote:

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So, once again, the owners get to keep their means of production by paying a modest "rent".

---

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Read the history of the booms, busts, and scandals of private, competing banks in the 19th century of the USA. Creating even the loosely-governed centralization they have now is a godsend compared to an even further marketization of securities.

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Well, it wouldn't be neccessary to break them up anyway; the tax is too heavy to continue the draining effect of over enflated personal incomes.

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Do some research on what P3s are doing nowadays.

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I know about those P3s.

[Worker share investments in the means of production. Cooperative innitiative programs. Any portion of shares of a company is one vote for each shareholder]

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How is worker ownership possible when there is a mixture of both private and state ownership?[quote]

[If a worker is payed wages plus a share value per cheque, eventually they own the company or at least a controlling vote share value sum.]

8. Equal liability of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
[Freewill in labour and work for welfare.]
[quote]Each contradicts the other.

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9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
[?. Live where you want.]

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Marx' point was to eventually abolish landed power and the state of peasantry in the countryside. It had nothing to do with "telling people where to live"; you've been watching too many of those old red-scare commercials.

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[So the people would natually do that? Up root and go from the cities? Did anything natural happen in the people in the old USSR? Or was a 'suggestion' given that they do this and that, like the first nation peoples of Siberia and their raindeer business. Did you know they had their own Inuit in Siberia?]

[ 06 March 2005: Message edited by: LeftRight ]

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After 70 years, what kind of bread? Communist bourgeois, KGB and bad international politic. It was easy for the capitalist bourgeois to trash proletariat movements.
Should I wait til the end of time?

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So, your point is that, if it's not perfect right off the bat, it's not worth dealing with? By that logic I guess democracy should be thrown in the trash, too. After all we've been working on that one, on and off, for over a couple of millenia, and we still haven't gotten it perfect.

And of course it was/is easy for the bourgeois to smash proletariat movements: they've got the guns _and_ butter, not to mention not having someone breathing down _their_ necks, intent on eradicating them. And such movements aren't exactly the watchword for working together against a common enemy.

As for your impatience: that's hardly a radical critique.

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Fuck you! http://groups.msn.com/taxationjustice

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Lah-di-fuckin'-dah.

Left-wing liberalism (and the attending radical-sounding phrases duct-taped to minute and toothless reforms) bores me to death.

Just in case it hasn't hit you yet: progressive taxation has been gradually getting rolled back all over the 1st World. What makes you think your scheme would be taken any differently?

As for your PET, it sounds, given the limitations you've put on it (ie allowing banks and agents to work in a continuing market in land), about as effective as the Grameen Bank or Ben & Jerry's at doing anything effective towards poverty reduction.

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Why not? Bourgeois property is bourgeois property because they have exclusive right to it. You think land should continue to be rented? Responsibility should have its rewards.

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Bourgeois property is such because they have pretty much undisputed control over the levers of the law and government, not to mention that little thing about the guns and butters . . . .

I think all human beings by virtue of their humanity have a right to as much an undisturbed life as possible, not just the "responsible" ones.

And, no, I don't think land should continue to be rented. But doing something about that will require a bit more than coy slaps on the wrist of property owners.

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So things change but stay the same?

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Yes. It's called "cosmetic reforms", very different from "revolutionary action".

If you abolish rent but posit that everyone can own their piece of land/home, etc., that's fine, but it doesn't go far enough. I was reading an interesting piece on land reform in Venezuela, how Chavez' plans seem to be different from previous land reforms, which, basically, gave the peasants land gratis but then ignored the circumstances under which the peasants lived. The still poverty-stricken peasants ended up having to sell their land back to the people from whom it had been expropriated because they needed the money for other things, they couldn't compete against large-scale agribusiness, etc.

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/articles.php?artno=1384

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Not at the tax rate.

? Do you know what 'graduated tax' means?

the tax is too heavy to continue the draining effect of over enflated personal incomes.

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WRT progressive taxation, see my comment above. This is, of course, a necessity, but it has to be done within the context of a revolutionary change in social relationships and power.

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I know about those P3s.

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Then you should know better than to make statements like this:

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Transportation may be a mixture of both private and state ownership through land property partnership.

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If a worker is payed wages plus a share value per cheque, eventually they own the company or at least a controlling vote share value sum.

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From Doug Henwood's Wall Street for a take on something very close to what you're talking about:

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The lesson of the Swedish wage-earner funds should be chastening to pension-fund reformers [H. cites one Jonas Pontusson here from his articles in New Left Review of '84 and '87]. The funds were originally conceived of by social democratic economists as a scheme for socializing ownership of corporations. In the original mid-1970s proposal, firms would have been required to issue new shares, in amounts equal to 20% of their annual profits, to funds representing wage-earners as a collective. In the space of a decade or two, these funds would acquire dominant, and eventually controlling, interests in corporate Sweden.

This idea scandalized business, which launched a great campaign to discredit it - a task that was greatly simplified by the fact that the funds never attracted broad popular support. The social democrats and the unions watered the plan down, and a weak version was adopted in the early 1980s. The funds quickly began behaving like ordinary pension funds; their managers, in a vain attempt at legitimation, began trading stocks in an effort to beat the market averages. Eventually, late in the decade, the wage-earner funds were euthanized.

[H. concludes that A) capital correctly acted in its own interests since it knew the initial version was a direct attack on its power, and B) the funds were so abstract they never got popular support. He states, "More direct interventions are required - active public industrial policy and greater worker control at the firm level - if ordinary people are to get interested."]

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Work is labour. If there is freedom from extortion and the choice is yours to work or not, where's the contradiction?

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>sigh< Sometimes I wish I weren't so pithy: I wrote my original response ie about your statement contradicting itself, late on a Saturday night when I was tired, and now I can't figure out what I meant. I'll have to beg off this one.

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So the people would natually do that? Up root and go from the cities?

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NO! Did you read what I said? It's a matter of power, not population. That sort of matter could be taken care of by constitutional means, without anyone having to stir at all.

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Did anything natural happen in the people in the old USSR? Or was a 'suggestion' given that they do this and that, like the first nation peoples of Siberia and their raindeer business.

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I'm not all that much into the history of the fSU, so I can't answer this. Were people moved forcefully? Yes, but not, I'm pretty sure, for the reasons you attribute to Marx. After the Bolsheviks took power, the power of landed aristocracy was pretty effectively gone, so movements such as forced collectivization were more than likely due to something else.

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Did you know they had their own Inuit in Siberia?

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Yes, I read something about that somewhere.

Apparently they also drank treated urine to achieve mystic states:

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The entheogenic use of the fly agaric is believed to have originated in extreme western Siberia and extreme northeastern Siberia, as part of ritualistic use by primitive tribesman. Fly agaric has also been traditionally used by witch doctors of the Lapps of Inari in Europe and of the Yakagir of northernmost Siberia. It has also been suggested that the ancient giant berserkers of Norway ingested fly agaric before participating in their savage fits of madness (Wasson & Wasson 1965). About 3500 years ago, Aryan peoples from the north swept into India, bringing with them the cult of a plant called soma. They deified this plant, calling it a holy inebriant, and drank its juices in religious rites. The Rig Veda, one of four ancient Vedas which have become the foundation of the Hindu religion, included more than a thousand hymns to the soma plant. For over 2000 years, during which the culture of the soma plant was forgotten, the identity of soma remains a mystery. Western scholars have hypothesized many different potential candidates, but none have been conclusively implicated as soma. The primary contender is the fly agaric, which satisfies all of the many descriptive details and evidence gleaned from the Vedic hymns (Wasson & Wasson 1971). However, new evidence suggests that the psilocybin containing mushroom Stropharia cubensis may have been established in Africa, Anatolia, and the Iranian plateau long before the Indo-European invaders arrived. This has led to the hypothesis that the Aryans began to worship soma after they came in contact with the Indian mushroom. Indeed, psylocybin's rapturous euphoria more closely resembles the experiences of the mysterious soma than fly agaric, which due to variability in doses, may not always produce entheogenic states (McKenna 1992).

Siberian ritual use of the fly agaric is documented in the Koryak tribe of the Kamchatka Peninsula (on the Bering Strait). In these rituals, a feast is prepared, and the fly agaric mushrooms are boiled and drank. A celebration ensues, accompanied with frenzied dancing and singing. The poor who cannot afford the expensive mushrooms wait outside the huts of the inebriants, and drink of their urine to attain the same intoxicating effects. The mushrooms were not only for ludible purposes; they were also utilized by Siberian Shamans to get themselves into an exhalted state, so as to be able to speak with the Gods. This state was necessary in order to diagnose and treat illnesses (Ott 1996).

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:
Um, sorry EA: were you talking just to Tim or anyone?

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:

http://sulcus.berkeley.edu/mcb/165_001/papers/manuscripts/_945.html

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http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch03.htm

"....The significance of Critical-Utopian Socialism and Communism bears an inverse relation to historical development. In proportion as the modern class struggle develops and takes definite shape, this fantastic standing apart from the contest, these fantastic attacks on it, lose all practical value and all theoretical justification. Therefore, although the originators of these systems were, in many respects, revolutionary, their disciples have, in every case, formed mere reactionary sects. They hold fast by the original views of their masters, in opposition to the progressive historical development of the proletariat. ****They, therefore, endeavour, and that consistently, to ****deaden the class struggle and to reconcile the class antagonisms. They still dream of experimental realisation of their social Utopias, of founding isolated “phalansteres”, of establishing “Home Colonies”, or setting up a “Little Icaria”(4) — duodecimo editions of the New Jerusalem — and to realise all these castles in the air, they are compelled to appeal to the feelings and purses of the bourgeois. By degrees, they sink into the category of the reactionary [or] conservative Socialists depicted above, differing from these only by more systematic pedantry, and by their fanatical and superstitious belief in the miraculous effects of their social science.

They, therefore, violently oppose all political action on the part of the working class; such action, according to them, can only result from blind unbelief in the new Gospel..... "

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The Other Todd posted:
So, your point is that, if it's not perfect right off the bat, it's not worth dealing with? By that logic I guess democracy should be thrown in the trash, too. After all we've been working on that one, on and off, for over a couple of millenia, and we still haven't gotten it perfect.

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You see Todd, when you view people as eggs to make up an orhtodoxical omelette then it is easy for someone like you to suggest we repeat the mistakes that killed millions(that's not even including non-humans) The fact is a growing number of people in the global justice scene do not want to do anything resembeling that nonsense of the 20th century which gave capitalism another face.

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And of course it was/is easy for the bourgeois to smash proletariat movements: they've got the guns _and_ butter, not to mention not having someone breathing down _their_ necks, intent on eradicating them. And such movements aren't exactly the watchword for working together against a common enemy.

As for your impatience: that's hardly a radical critique

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The Vanguardist state capitalists did as great a job as the liberal capitalists. Look up Kronstadt dude.

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Bourgeois property is such because they have pretty much undisputed control over the levers of the law and government, not to mention that little thing about the guns and butters . . . .

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Kinda like the the Red Beauracrats that Mikail Bakunin warned would come about, and did.

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I think all human beings by virtue of their humanity have a right to as much an undisturbed life as possible, not just the "responsible" ones.

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I would add that humans and non should should have that liberty too. I would hope we finally purge ourselves of humanism. To get there though the state must be destroyed immediately. The withering away bullshit is exactly that.

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Originally posted by Egalitarian American:
Tim:
Interested in your opinion and others because "time" most assuredly, is not over yet. Simply put: if captialism goes to its logical conclusion as the oil runs out, would this be a point of consciousness in world history to realize that if the earth is going to survive, than some form of collectivism (I'll leave the debate on how pure a form to others) would be our only salvation?

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Hmm. Before I start, a point:

Capitalism (and bourgeois governments) has so far shown an amazing adaptability to objective circumstances. Should the oil actually run out, I'd say it's fairly likely other forms of energy would have been marketed and accepted before then, so the chances of some kind of "catastrophe-induced wake-up call" to some kind of collective action (whatever form it might take) succeeding are probably as good now as they would be, all things being equal.

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I do get the impression that there are a number of communists, socialists and progressives of many stripes who are looking at the coming energy crash with some degree of opportunism. I'm sure you have put your shoulder to the wheel for years and perhaps realize that the bush-wa, as I like to call them, are not going to listen to reason as long as the oil flows, the electricity is on 24-7 and the money is still rolling in.

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These sorts of catastrophists have been around as long as capitalism (and not all of them are left-wing types, either; bond-traders, I'm told, are always expecting the next big crash), and little's come of their specific expectations. The best example that comes to mind is that of the cries of "After Hitler, Communism!" that erupted in pre-WWII Germany. We all know how that turned out.

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In my opinion, for what its worth, the critical point for human existance will be whether, when we reach the point where the realization sets in that the consumerist North American lifestyle is toast, whether there will be that consciousness that says "we need to go back and look at seriously consider Marx" or whether a hurt and angry people will go for their guns.

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Unless, leftists get cracking (and the Right makes some _major_ blunders AND people don't accept their apologies and lies), it'll probably be the latter.

But you're assuming there's some "Critical Point" that will be reached globally. One of the most important countries on the planet, the US, has shown an almost hysterical inability to acknowledge the rest of us; I haven't seen any good evidence that's going to change any time soon (more's the pity). If they won't, I can't see others "getting it" any better.

Wouldn't it be a better idea to concentrate on showing and explaining to people crises that happen "closer to home", like why so many people lose their jobs, why so many people work, and work, and work, but can't seem to get ahead, etc? And then linking it to such matters as ecological instability, vanishing species, etc?

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Originally posted by LeftRight:
Now, what is it that distinguishs the critical communist from the struggling and enlivened proletariat?

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To which of those camps do _you_ belong? I'm not entirely sure left-liberals are what Marx was talking about when he discussed Critical Utopians.

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The one who gives snide remarks and insinuates your objectives to be misgiven or dishonest(misgiven, definitately)?

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I don't think I was being snide by pointing out that your "radicalism" isn't all that radical.

Your objectives are fine . . . for a left-liberal. I'm just pointing out that they don't go far enough to do what you seem to want them to do.

And you didn't help matters by refusing to argue your point (and now finding solace in ad hominem attacks only).

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The one who says "you are impure" "unworthy" "stupid" (worth less more likely)?

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Nowhere did I talk about purity or worthiness; I told you you aren't much of a radical, from what I've seen. Why does that upset you?

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You're a fucking bourgeois! Impatience? Like you, you fucking dogmatizer. Go and starve in the street asshole. You're the replacement for the denigrating priest you peice of shit.

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Dogmatizer? I considered your points and found them wanting for very specific reasons; I don't think I said "because Marx said so".

Get used to criticism, kid, if you want to hang around radicals.

The ten demands of the CM, as posted by Yiya, are in fact only interim measures forced on the state by working people as concessions intended to provide a democratic basis for the further change, ultimately the abolition of the state and the economic class divisions that depend on it:

"Ultimately wresting in varying degrees more of the means of production in to the hands of the proletariat organized as a class."

Further: "when all of the means of production are sufficiently socialized into the hands of the proletariat, it will have abolished the state (which Marx defined as the oppression of one select group--or "class"--of people over everyone else) and its own supremacy as a class."

Keep in mind that this is very esoteric writing, also badly translated from 19th century style German it was written in.

This is better explained the Critique of the Gotha Program, by Marx and Engels, where they outline in more practical terms what the CM advocated and what socialist movements of their time were pushing for. These include things like community-based enterprises run via democratic free cooperative associations interacting and trading freely, universal ballot elections (which at that time were rare), setting of basic standards via referendum voting, independent judiciary, etc.

Remember that the CM was inspired by the large number of communes in Europe (where the term "communist" comes from). These were democratic self-governing cooperative townships that for generations have fought against totalitarian feudal tyrannies only to be put down by the rising power of the equally totalitarian capitalist class of the industrial revolution, and being absorbed into the large growing urban working class.

The CM and later the Gotha Program were inspired by efforts to develop similar type of economy and government of the communes on a much larger national or even international scale.

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You see Todd, when you view people as eggs to make up an orhtodoxical omelette then it is easy for someone like you to suggest we repeat the mistakes that killed millions(that's not even including non-humans) The fact is a growing number of people in the global justice scene do not want to do anything resembeling that nonsense of the 20th century which gave capitalism another face.

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Did you even read what _anyone_ in this thread has written so far? Nobody, not LR and certainly not I, is talking about what's been done and a need to repeat it.

We're on about time, patience, and perfection. To whit: at what point and why should a person cease to support an idea?

Now, since I'm snide, I can't resist, of course, asking the obvious to an anarchist: why don't you abandon an idea that hasn't even come close to working in theory, never mind in reality? It's a really stupid, hurtful question, I know, but, you see: I'm snide (and I really have this low tolerance for idiots who don't read a thread before tossing in their two bits).

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The Vanguardist state capitalists did as great a job as the liberal capitalists. Look up Kronstadt dude.

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I'm sure I will at some point.

But for now, Sonny, I'll say that Lenin had something important to say about infantile Leftism.

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Kinda like the the Red Beauracrats that Mikail Bakunin warned would come about, and did.

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Given that, in real life, transitions are just that, rather than the magical, instantaneous disappearance of one society to be magically replaced by a new, perfect one, it's not surprising Marx warned of that too.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1874/04/bakunin-notes.htm

"In support of his motion calling for separation, Marx said inter alia the following which is given here verbatim:

“The point of view of the minority is dogmatic instead of critical, idealistic instead of materialistic. They regard not the real conditions but a mere effort of will as the driving force of the revolution. Whereas we say to the workers: ‘You will have to go through 15, 20, 50 years of civil wars and national struggles not only to bring about a change in society but also to change yourselves, and prepare yourselves for the exercise of political power’, you say on the contrary: ‘Either we seize power at once, or else we might as well just take to our beds.’"

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1853/revelations/ch01.htm

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I would add that humans and non should should have that liberty too.

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Enjoy foraging for your brussel sprouts to roast over your camp fire.

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I would hope we finally purge ourselves of humanism. To get there though the state must be destroyed immediately. The withering away bullshit is exactly that.

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What do you mean by "humanism"?

" . . . as the proletariat still acts, during the period of struggle for the overthrow of the old society, on the basis of that old society, and hence also still moves within political forms which more or less belong to it, it has not yet, during this period of struggle, attained its final constitution, and employs means for its liberation which after this liberation fall aside. Mr Bakunin concludes from this that it is better to do nothing at all... just wait for the day of general liquidation -- the last judgement."

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Hopefully more and more Marxist will read the likes of John Holloway this century and throw the likes of Lenin and company to the intellectual trash heap not to be recycled in any form,only forgotten. A museam perhaps.

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:

Unless, leftists get cracking (and the Right makes some _major_ blunders AND people don't accept their apologies and lies), it'll probably be the latter.

But you're assuming there's some "Critical Point" that will be reached globally. One of the most important countries on the planet, the US, has shown an almost hysterical inability to acknowledge the rest of us; I haven't seen any good evidence that's going to change any time soon (more's the pity). If they won't, I can't see others "getting it" any better.

Wouldn't it be a better idea to concentrate on showing and explaining to people crises that happen "closer to home", like why so many people lose their jobs, why so many people work, and work, and work, but can't seem to get ahead, etc? And then linking it to such matters as ecological instability, vanishing species, etc?
.

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I'm trying! I'm trying!

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:

Dogmatizer? I considered your points and found them wanting for very specific reasons; I don't think I said "because Marx said so".

Get used to criticism, kid, if you want to hang around radicals.

When you come up with some better ideas, I might take notice.

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You see Todd, when you view people as eggs to make up an orhtodoxical omelette then it is easy for someone like you to suggest we repeat the mistakes that killed millions(that's not even including non-humans) The fact is a growing number of people in the global justice scene do not want to do anything resembeling that nonsense of the 20th century which gave capitalism another face.

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I think it is time to interject with a bit of a history lesson, so that we can understand where the Soviet experiment in socialism went wrong, how it got overthrown, and how Stalin was able to perpetrate his horrible crimes against humanity.

The overthrow of the bourgeois democratic government of Russia in October 1917, which was itself established after the overthrow of the Tsarist regime of Nichoals II, was never the problem. Lenin, architecht of the October revolution, was not responsible for killing millions of Russians. What Lenin was responsible for was overthrowing a bourgeois government that was continuing the opression of the masses in Russia, and was indiscriminately sacrificing Russian soliders on the battlefront by continuing Russia's involvement in a war it had already lost.

After the October revolution, Lenin set about to establish a communist government in Russia. He abolished private property, he redistributed land to the landless peasants, took Russia out of the First World War, and abolished all political parties except the Russian Bolskvik Pary (later renamed the Communist Party of the Soviet Union). The Russian peasantry and proletariat largely supported his actions, since they made real, though small, improvemnts in the lives of ordiary Russians. Later in 1918, Lenin changed renamed the country the Soviet Union.

The western Caitalist countries were not willing to tolerate the existance of a Socialist republic, and they wanted to invade the Soviet Union and conqer the communist government. the United States actually did invade Russia in February, Landing at the northern Russian port of. Yet the United States was unable to commit fully to the invasion of the Russia, as it was more concerned with bailing out its allies in France, whom it needed to win the Great War so they could pay back the money the US had loaned them to finance their fight against the Germans. Thus the attack fizzled.

The former aristrocratic class of Russians was also trying to dispose of the Soviet government. The aristrocratic class had its land confiscated by the Soviet government after the October Revolution. In 1918, the aristrocratic class formed the White Army, and set about to defeat the Soviet government and reestablish the Monarchy (though not Nicholas II, as the Soviet government had executed him for being a tyrant). The United States provided money to the White Army.

To defend the Soviet Union, the Soviet government formed the Red Army, and thus began the Russian Civil War. The Red Army was made up of workers and peasants sympathetic to the cause of Socialism, yet much of its command structure was made up of officers with no commitment to proletarian revolution (these were the only people with sufficient training to lead an army). As leaders of the Soviet Army, they automatically became members of the Soviet Communist Party. In fact, the requirements for joining the Communist Party of the Soviet Union were so lax that by the time the Russian Civil War ended in 1922, over half the members of the party were not commited to Marxism.

The Red Army won the Russian Civil War. Yet the Russian Civil War totally destroyed the Russian proletariat upon which the October revolution had been predicated. Russia's economy was in tatters, and Lenin knew that his revolution would not survive unless it were extended to the advanced capitalist countries of western Europe. Thus Lenin enacted the New Economic Policy (NEP), which reestablished limited small scale capitalism, but kept heavy industry under state control. Lenin hoped that the NEP would help the Soviet economy recover after the double shock of the Great War and the Russian Civil War. he also believed that the conditions were ripe for a proletarian revolution in Germany, where rampant inflation was making worker earnings virtually worthless. To promote the cause of world proletarian revolution, Lenin created the Third Communist International, and the other communist parties that had been established since the Great War joined it.

Lenin became ill in 1923, and he died in 1924. Even before his death, a power struggle emerged within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union to chose his successor. Most of the generals who had led the Red Army to victory in the Russian Civil War had become senior bureaucrats in the Soviet government. They were not interrested in Lenin's world revolution. Rather, their primary concern was to build the economy of the Soviet Union, and to build a Soviet army capable of defending against what they believed was an inevitable invasion by the western capitalist countries. This plan would allow the bureaucrats to live a life of luxury.

The bureaucrats chose Joseph Stalin as their choice to succeed Lenin. However, Lenin wanted fellow comrade Leon Trotsky, who also believed in worldwide proletarian revolution, to succeed him. Yet by the time Lenin died, the Stalinist faction within the party had already aquired much power. The Stalinist faction began preaching the mantra of "Socialism in One Country", a contradictory doctrine that abandoned the principles of Marxism and Leninism. Trotsky and a minority of the party opposed Stalin, but to no avail. Stalin instructed the other communist parties that their primary goal was to help ensure the survival of the Soviet Union. Since Trotsky opposed the measures being taken by the party, he was labelled a traitor. The Communist Party of the Soviet Union condemmed the Trotskyist faction of the party, and it instructed that all Communist Parties in the Communist International had to denounce Trotsky in order to stay in the Intrnational. Beginning in 1925, all Communist Parties in the international voted to condemn Trotsky. Only the Communist Party of Canada held out, eventually caving in three years later. The leaders of all the communist parties were taken to Moscow to be schooled in the Stalinist school of thought, which was a perversion of the ideas of Marx and Lenin.

The Soviet Union also dictated what policies the Communist Parties of the Third International should follow. These policies were erratic, veering from hard left sectarinism to right-wing class collaboration, and back again. They were predicated on what seemed best for the defense of the Soivet Union, and set back the goal of proletarian revolution.

Stalin wanted to fuly nationalise the economy of the Soviet Union. But first he had to defeat his opponents. Trotsky was expelled form the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1928, and the "Left Opposition" within the party which he led disintigrated. In 1929 Stalin expelled Bukharin, his other rival in the party. Though Bukharin opposed world proletarian revolution, he also opposed abandoning the NEP.

Once Trotsky and Bukharin were out of the way, Stalin was virtually the dicatator of the Soviet Union. Stalin abandoned any remaining vestiges of the policy of proletarian revoultion, resulting in the overthrow of the Russian revolution. He Then set about to implement full nationalisation of the Soviet economy. The Soviet economy had recoverred from the Great War and the Russian Civil War, but Stalin believed that only full nationalisation, followed by a rapid industrialisation, would allow the Soviet Union to surive the invasion from the west that he believed to be inevitable. Under full nationalisation, Stalin abolished private property once again, and he collectivised agriculture. He put in place five year plans designed to fully industrialize the Soviet Union in the course of one decade.

Stalin did succeed in industrializing the Soviet Union in 10 years, and this allowed the Soviet Union to survive the Nazi invasion in World War II. Yet Stalin's plan created much opposition, since Stalin's five year plans focused on heavy industrial production that would benefit the state, not on the production of consumer goods to benefit the people. Stalin's obsession with making the Soviet Unuion ready to withstand a western invasion led him to purge the Communist Party of anyone who dared question him, even those who had belonged to the Stalinist faction of the party. The people Stalin purged were forced to admit to crimes against the Soviet state in public "Sham" tirals, and then they were executed. Stalin also ordered that anyone who was believed to be standing in the way of successful implementation of the five year plans should be sent to prison labour camps in Siberia called gulags. Over a million Soviet citizens are rumoured to have died in the gulags during the 1930's.

[ 12 March 2005: Message edited by: Left Turn ]

[ 23 April 2005: Message edited by: Left Turn ]

But we should also get a few economic facts in order about this as well.

First, it wasn't "full socialism" (whatever that means) that was set up after the revolution, but in fact state capitalism, admitted to and outlined by none other than Lenin himself. And the power struggles within that new structure started right from the beginning of the post-revolution period.

First, and Lenin admitted, that the people of Russia and the other republics were simply not educated or well organized enough to take control of the businesses and industries and create a democratic economy, at least not on a broad national scale. That’s why the whole supposedly "transitional" state capitalist measures came up.

This included setting up large state owned corporations based of the nationalized assets of the Czars and the private capitalist class, and then, in many cases, re-appointing these deposed tyrants as the senior bosses to run them (see Lenin's State Capitalism During the Transition of Socialism and Introduction to the New Economic Policy).

Almost immediately, these new bureaucracies began to clash with local and regional efforts to develop socialistic ventures. One of the most high-profile clashes was the Kronstadt rebellion, and another large-scale fight in the Ukraine, which saw the first massacre in the post-revolutionary era. Lenin obviously sided mostly with the new corporate class.

That was a bad move, since these new bosses largely got behind Stalin's coup efforts. The rest is history.

(This is very well documented and explained in numerous historic accounts, including The Rise of Stalinist Imperialism by Eric Haas, Barbarism with a Human Face by Gustav Bang, Arnold Peterson's Marxism vs. Soviet Despotism and Paul Cardan's The Great Lie).

There is literally buckets of information, historical archives, testimony and competent and thorough analysis of the Soviet and Chinese economies to show this is exactly what happened.

As Tim points out, after Stalin's coup, the move was to rapidly industrialize the economy to catch up with the western powers. That wasn't done my empowering workers and communities with democratic control over industries and wealth, but rather through vicious exploitation of these in order to capitalize these state agencies as quickly as possible.

That's why, for example, agricultural exports rose dramatically under the Stalin regime as farmers were forced to work for practically nothing and the local consumption needs of people were sacrificed, leading to the mass starvation and persecution.

It's also why unions were suppressed, as wages fell in order to sell metals and industrial equipment abroad to raise money to capitalize the corporate bureaucracy.

Also, I don't agree that Stalin "abolished" private property. It's true the government made it illegal for workers to own property. But, according to Hass, in themid-1030s, inheritance laws were re-introduced to senior bureaucrats and executives, who were also permitted to hold huge personal bank accounts, both in Russia and abroad, as their salaries and bonuses rose immensely during Stalin's reign.

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First, it wasn't "full socialism" (whatever that means) that was set up after the revolution, but in fact state capitalism, admitted to and outlined by none other than Lenin himself.

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However, Lenin wanted fellow comrade Leon Trotsky, who also believed in worldwide proletarian revolution, to succeed him.

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Originally posted by quagmire:
I noticed they don't need a wall to keep the people in anymore, what's up with that?

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Oh, there are millions in the States and Canada who can't afford a Greyhound bus ticket to even the next city, state or province, never mind another country.

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Originally posted by LeftRight:
I don't see where you are refering to any points from the taxation justice web-site. I shall repost the link for your convenience.
http://groups.msn.com/taxationjustice

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I didn't refer to it explicitly because this is a thread discussing the CM, not your website or even tax reform. I said about as much as I felt the situation warranted for this thread.

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:

I didn't refer to it explicitly because this is a thread discussing the CM, not your website or even tax reform. I said about as much as I felt the situation warranted for this thread.

If you want me to go through your site and critique it thoroughly, I will. Say the word, and I'll get around to it.

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As for your impatience: that's hardly a radical critique.

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Fuck you! http://groups.msn.com/taxationjustice
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Lah-di-fuckin'-dah.

Left-wing liberalism (and the attending radical-sounding phrases duct-taped to minute and toothless reforms) bores me to death.

Just in case it hasn't hit you yet: progressive taxation has been gradually getting rolled back all over the 1st World. What makes you think your scheme would be taken any differently?

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Really, and there was no reason for myself to be moved to an 'adhominal attack'. For a person who didn't want to refer explicity to it, you? What kind of reference do you call that? You're a two faced jackass.

I'll shall start a another thread entitled 'The other Todds critique of Taxation Justice', with your blessing of course..... I could have called it 'The federal workers tax and property law amendment'....hmmm

[ 13 March 2005: Message edited by: LeftRight ]

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Originally posted by LeftRight:
Really, and there was no reason for myself to be moved to an 'adhominal attack'.

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I take it you're referring to this remark of mine:

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And you didn't help matters by refusing to argue your point (and now finding solace in ad hominem attacks only).

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I wrote that after reading your little list of insults here:

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The one who gives snide remarks and insinuates your objectives to be misgiven or dishonest(misgiven, definitately)? The one who says "you are impure" "unworthy" "stupid" (worth less more likely)? You're a fucking bourgeois! Impatience? Like you, you fucking dogmatizer. Go and starve in the street asshole. You're the replacement for the denigrating priest you peice of shit.

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Not one argument in that, either to improve your position or to knock down what I wrote. Stuff like, "fucking bourgeois", "fucking dogmatizer", "asshole", peice of shit" all count as ad hominem. At no point did I say you had no reason to take a hairy (although I did and still do wonder why you're offended by being called a left-liberal). My critique stands.

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For a person who didn't want to refer explicity to it, you? What kind of reference do you call that?

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I said that I didn't want to refer explicitly to your web-page ie I didn't want to waste time and space on something that this thread isn't on about. Here's what I said about your page:

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Lah-di-fuckin'-dah.

Left-wing liberalism (and the attending radical-sounding phrases duct-taped to minute and toothless reforms) bores me to death.

Just in case it hasn't hit you yet: progressive taxation has been gradually getting rolled back all over the 1st World. What makes you think your scheme would be taken any differently?

As for your PET, it sounds, given the limitations you've put on it (ie allowing banks and agents to work in a continuing market in land), about as effective as the Grameen Bank or Ben & Jerry's at doing anything effective towards poverty reduction.

. . .

WRT progressive taxation, see my comment above. This is, of course, a necessity, but it has to be done within the context of a revolutionary change in social relationships and power.

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Given the circumstances, I think that was enough said about what you wrote on your website.

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I'll shall start a another thread entitled 'The other Todds critique of Taxation Justice', with your blessing of course..... I could have called it 'The federal workers tax and property law amendment'....hmmm

[ 13 March 2005: Message edited by: LeftRight ]

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:

If that's what you want to do, go right ahead. I was planning on just sending you the crit privately; I didn't see the point in publically embarrassing you further, or stoking your ego any more than I have to. But >shrug< . . . .

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(although I did and still do wonder why you're offended by being called a left-liberal). My critique stands.

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The Other Todd:
But for now, Sonny, I'll say that Lenin had something important to say about infantile Leftism.

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Yeah, bolshevic leftism is the only leftism to follow. Sounds like the fuckin catholic church for hecks sake.

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Now, since I'm snide, I can't resist, of course, asking the obvious to an anarchist: why don't you abandon an idea that hasn't even come close to working in theory, never mind in reality? It's a really stupid, hurtful question, I know, but, you see: I'm snide (and I really have this low tolerance for idiots who don't read a thread before tossing in their two bits).

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The thing is Todd. It has come true. You just have to open your overly mechanistic mindset to realize this. I've been bringing Chiapas up too much recently but I will again. They Zaps went in there, kicked the ranchers out,and set up a stateless society. That simple(but not simple of course) There was no talk of this bullshit transition. No big question of 'what is to be done'. They just did it. You don't seem to like that action but it worked. It probably hepled not to have any bullshit intellectuals dictating things. To this day they've maintaned a directly democratic society on some level. If all Mexican communites decided that enough is enough and they wanted to duplicate Chiapas, that would end the Mexican state. You don't realize how fragile power can be. If the people are fed and the rulling class loses control that's all she wrote. This nearly happened in France 37 years ago. It happened in the Soviet Union. It looks like Mexicans may elect a Social Democrat a year and a half from now. It would be nice if they did something more lasting as the indiginouse people of Chiapas have done. Other examples of anarchistic existance of course are indiginous groups and tribes(your people have a thing for screwing them)we can learn alot from them. They'd wonder what's so hard about living in a similar way as them and why is the way there muddled with 'what is to be done'. there are also communes that exist right now. Christiana in Denmark being an example. They don't need to be lectured on 'what is to be done'. FUCK 'WHAT IS TO BE DONE'! Destroy the state and be done with it. People like you have ignored the dangers of the state to many peoples peril.

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What do you mean by "humanism"?

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Fidel:
I think Moscow has more billionaires now than any other city in the world.

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Originally posted by Vigilante:

I mean humancentric thinking. The idea that human life is paramount to all others. With so many other lifeforms out there this position is obsurd. This is a view that enslaved us as well for my mind. It was the original rulers who no dount constructed the word human for themselves and proclaimed that this thing is paramount to all others. It's since been applied to many more, however the original intention was illigitimate and it came at the expence of so many non-humans. Thousands of species have gone extinct because of this. We are not truly free unless other life around us is free as well.

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Originally posted by LeftRight:
In the case of the other Todd it is Todd centrism,,,oh no, it's the other Todd centrism. Since Todd can not have his neccessary revolution he gets he jollies pissing people off. Rather anti-social and most certaily not leading to his personal satisfaction. He's probably in a straitjacket somewhere typing with his toes. Intellectual attack is all that's 'left' for him, the freaking sadist.

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awwwWWWWW . . . !

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:

awwwWWWWW . . . !

Did Big-Bad-Todd piss da widdle baby off? Did da Big-Scary-Man make da widdle baby cry because he pointed out holes a semi could do a bootlegger reverse through in his argument?

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:

awwwWWWWW . . . !

Did Big-Bad-Todd piss da widdle baby off? Did da Big-Scary-Man make da widdle baby cry because he pointed out holes a semi could do a bootlegger reverse through in his argument?

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"But also when I am active scientifically, etc. – an activity which I can seldom perform in direct community with others – then my activity is social, because I perform it as a man. Not only is the material of my activity given to me as a social product (as is even the language in which the thinker is active): my own existence is social activity, and therefore that which I make of myself, I make of myself for society and with the consciousness of myself as a social being.

My general consciousness is only the theoretical shape of that of which the living shape is the real community, the social fabric, although at the present day general consciousness is an abstraction from real life and as such confronts it with hostility. The activity of my general consciousness, as an activity, is therefore also my theoretical existence as a social being. "

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Originally posted by The Other Todd:

If that's what you want to do, go right ahead. I was planning on just sending you the crit privately; I didn't see the point in publically embarrassing you further, or stoking your ego any more than I have to. But >shrug< . . . .

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