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The Forum > General Discussion > When is a Revolution necessary?

When is a Revolution necessary?

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At what point should a populace take it upon themselves to overthrow a clearly corrupt and despicably evil regime? How far should a Government be allowed to go before violence becomes a practical solution. Even when things are clearly going badly and the authorities are out of control the brave souls who instigate a revolution will always be called Traitors by the regime in power. Fiji has recently had a military coup to address Government corruption and the Fijian public has been very blase about the whole affair. I suspect they knew that their Government deserved to be booted out. I wonder how much we Australians could put up with before taking similar action. Either through the military turning on our corrupt politicians or a popular public uprising.

As far as I'm concerned the sooner it happens the better. The history of politics in Australia is a long list of conspiracies and rorts. The AWB scandal for instance. When a country becomes as over regulated and poorly run as this one has then starting over from scratch is probably the best thing.
Posted by WayneSmith, Friday, 15 December 2006 3:05:23 PM
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A Revolution, Election

It is when the people finally open their eyes and make a real change instead of

Well my family votes for, or i with the union and vote--
and so forth.

When they decide for change it will come otherwise they just do as they are told.
Posted by tapp, Saturday, 16 December 2006 1:15:08 PM
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Years ago Governments in the West were seriously concerned about the possibility of public revolt. Especially in times of recession. Today they seem to take public support for their rotten to the core systems for granted. Probably because the media gives them more control over us. So long as the economy is going ok people will ignore things like being unable to afford a house, work being outsourced overseas, black deaths in custody, lack of justice unless you happen to be rich, hospital waiting lines, water etc.

Do we really need Government? Without it we wouldn't need to pay huge taxes, wade through mountains of red tape to get anything done, have to carry Id papers or be arrested, get harassed by police if we become a threat to their power, have a rich elite who steal nearly all of the wealth and fat lawyers helping greedy judges pretend there is a workable justice system at our expense.

We didn't always have these parasites telling us what to do. People managed perfectly well without cameras on every street corner and wasteful politicians throwing away hard earned tax dollars. Why should they care how stupidly the money is spent? It's not theirs. I think the best thing would be to round up all the politicians and public service people, then place them in an open field so they can be strafed by the airforce. Governments take control over our lives and tell us what is best for us, but none of us were born with a choice. We'd be better off without these criminals. The only good politician is a dead one. Governments are by their very nature evil. The whole system is designed to favour the best liars and conmen.

The old system of each community deciding how best to run its own affairs was best. State and Federal Governments have had their shot at running international trade and military actions. Look where it has gotten us! The military would do a better job without these civilian blowhards telling them how to keep our nation secure.
Posted by WayneSmith, Saturday, 16 December 2006 2:38:43 PM
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Q: At what point should a populace take it upon themselves to overthrow a clearly corrupt and despicably evil regime?

A: When democratic means are taken away from them. This was not the case in Fiji.
Posted by freediver, Saturday, 16 December 2006 3:36:53 PM
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Wayne.... you are advocating basically feudelism, with anarchy as its pathway.

There would be no other result mate..

Freediver. Respectfully, I have to disagree. The right to vote ? Democracy is a very strange animal and it is most strange in tribal/multi racial societies. The right to vote never guarantees good government in these places. There is so much by way of 'deals' and bribes and enticements.. I used to get such an incredible laugh at the news reports in Malaysia which would sometimes say things like "The Police have been given the green light to investigate the collapse of such and such a building society" whihc of course was code for "Negligable well connected Malays are involved, mostly just greedy chinese so.. its ok to bust them"

If I had a dollar for each time I heard "Datuk ChingChong has, after careful reflection and thought, decided to join the government (from Opposition) prior to the upcoming election. He will be given such and such portfolio"...I'd have a mansion now :)

cheers.
Posted by BOAZ_David, Saturday, 16 December 2006 7:48:09 PM
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Excellent Answer freediver.

Australia and the modern western economies all have respected and functioning democratic processes to hand.

Similar democratic practices are being exported across the world, much to the dislike of despots and despots in waiting of all hues.

As for WayneSmiths “The media gives them more control over us” Really ? You may think the media controls you. How does the media control me?

As for “Do we really need Government?”
Before anyone suggests doing away with something they better have a really good idea about what will fill the void.

So exactly what alternative do you suggest?

Now “I think the best thing would be to round up all the politicians and public service people, then place them in an open field so they can be strafed by the airforce. Governments take control over our lives and tell us what is best for us,”

And who has authority to order the airforce to shoot civilians?

Without due process of law we have anarchy.

I would note “the terror” refers to the events which followed the French revolution, not those which initiated it. That revolution lead directly to the establishment of Emperor Napleon Bonaparte, who turned Europe into a battle ground.

“The whole system is designed to favour the best liars and conmen.”

I would share similar sentiments and vote for them to receive less power, not more.

Whilst the extent of governmental power and control is higher than what I would choose, I hanker for the “small government” espoused in the libertarian values and as advocated by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher.

However, would I promote or seek to follow the path of revolution to inflict my view on my fellow citizens? – No.

That you might dislike the government which the majority elected to govern is too bad. It is not just about you.

It is about respect for a system which “works imperfectly”, rather than revolutions which “fails perfectly”.

Churchill said “democracy is the worst form of government; except all the others that have been tried.”

I sincerely believe Churchill was on to something there.
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 17 December 2006 10:43:22 PM
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"Wayne.... you are advocating basically feudelism, with anarchy as its pathway."

Not exactly. Local Governments only. Elected by a local vote. Thats essentially how tribes operate. If the Chief screws up he is simply replaced. Federal and State Governments are incapable of understanding all the complex problems across the country and providing a fair or balanced treatment of them. So we do away with these wasteful regimes. The country need only collaborate when threatened by external forces. Feudalism is unlikely in a world where outside threats would unite us.

"The right to vote never guarantees good government in these places. "

Quite the opposite in fact. People always vote for the biggest liar.

"Australia and the modern western economies all have respected and functioning democratic processes to hand."

LOL.

"As for WayneSmiths “The media gives them more control over us” Really ? You may think the media controls you. How does the media control me?"

By distorting anything you might say to them in order to portray it in a more sensational light. As a pressure group they control the Government through fear and you via the Government.

"And who has authority to order the airforce to shoot civilians?"

Popular consensus. The people tell their local chieftain and he passes it along to the other chieftains who then let the military decide. Its all self governing. Nobody is obligated to do anything at all. Just like in the old days.

"I hanker for the “small government” "

Exactly.

"Churchill said “democracy is the worst form of government; except all the others that have been tried.”"

So lets do away with all of them and keep it small.
Posted by WayneSmith, Monday, 18 December 2006 11:27:07 AM
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WayneSmith, enjoy seven years behind bars.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_sedition_law#Current_Law
Posted by Steel, Monday, 18 December 2006 12:42:18 PM
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“By distorting anything you might say to them in order to portray it in a more sensational light. As a pressure group they control the Government through fear and you via the Government.”

I think that sounds like paranoia. It is certainly delusional.

“People always vote for the biggest liar.”

That sounds like cynicism. I suggest WayneSmith is speaking for himself because he is not speaking for me.

“"And who has authority to order the airforce to shoot civilians?"
Popular consensus. The people tell their local chieftain and he passes it along to the other chieftains who then let the military decide. Its all self governing. Nobody is obligated to do anything at all. Just like in the old days.”

Who pays the airforce, you know the ones who shoot the civilians?

Does this airforce negotiate independently, collectively (with other tribal leaders) or do they simply tell tribes how much they will take for not killing or for killing selected individuals? It all sounds a bit like the Mafia in the making.

Churchill was being complementary to the democratic process, he was not knocking it.

“So lets do away with all of them and keep it small.”

David_BOAZ is correct, you are planning a feudalistic social order with a very strong likelyhood that a Bonoparte will evolve. Maybe from this airforce which you want to arm but cannot control.

I note you have not replied to one of my comment “It is about respect for a system which “works imperfectly” (democratic elections), rather than revolutions which “fail perfectly”. (WS proposal).

I might come back to this thread but quite honestly, if this is the best debate you can muster I think I will go clip my toe nails, such an pursuit will have great consequence than bothering to post on this thread again.
Posted by Col Rouge, Monday, 18 December 2006 12:53:12 PM
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If you are talking about the US, then they needed a revolution 6 years ago!
Fiji -- anybody notice that everybody from the UN down has had a piece of them, threats to throw them out of the Commonwealth, threats of a trade embargo, yet this is a very much, their concern, it is nobody elses affair with, so far as I have heard, no bloodshed, no violence.
Britain and Australia joined the US in an illegal invasion of Iraq, the country has been trashed, at least half a million slaughtered, --- where is the UN? why haven't Britian and Australia been slung out of the Commonwealth, why no trade sanctions?
If Fiji needed a revolution, then it is long past the time when most western governments should have been thrown out!
Posted by petere, Monday, 18 December 2006 8:20:03 PM
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I am all for a revolution. I do not think it will achieve much but it will upset that wind bag - Col Rouge - thats more than enough reason.
Posted by YEBIGA, Wednesday, 20 December 2006 4:51:59 PM
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YEBIGA “I am all for a revolution. I do not think it will achieve much but it will upset that wind bag - Col Rouge - thats more than enough reason.”

Oh nothing you do would ever upset me YEBIGA,

My political philosophy supports the notion that you are at liberty to express your opinions.

The nearest to any “concern” I might have is the revolution which you are so eager to support would, if you could get it up enough for anyone to notice (and I don’t think they have manufactured enough Viagra to achieve that), would be that your revolution might render silent the freedom of speech you are presently indulging.

As has been true of most revolutions, those at the heart of it, the early disciples, invariably end up the victims of their own success, for instance, Marat of the French Revolution and Trotsky of the Russian.

So I would watch out before proclaiming too much support for any “usurper cause”, lest you find yourself getting up close and personal with the modern day equivalent of Corday’s knife or Mercader’s ice pick.

Oh finally, as a “wind bag” you would rate 1 out of ten, as significant as a flatulent gerbil.
Posted by Col Rouge, Thursday, 21 December 2006 8:25:33 AM
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Dear Lord,

I am very sorry, it is many years since my last confession.I have been less than generous to people. You know the saying, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, well lord some people annoy me. They are so inconsistent that what they say in one sentence is contervailed in the next. They have an ability to express the most shallow thought in the most profound manner and then proudly and obliviously say the exact opposite. In short, lord I am not patient with paradox.

Please lord help Col or smite him.
Posted by YEBIGA, Thursday, 21 December 2006 4:44:48 PM
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I love revolutions: French, Russian, English or American – well reading about them anyway.

They always require certain pre-conditions: widespread poverty and corruption, desperation, revolutionary leaders, and a score of others. We are a long way off having the necessary pre-requisites. What would be required is the total collapse of the global corporate capitalist system - not entirely out of the question. Something like global warming could trigger a series of catastrophes, which conceivably could prepare the ground for revolution - but it is some way off.

There is a point, where a democracy loses its legitimacy because the incumbent government acts outside the limitations of its own constitution. I think the Howard Government has not quite crossed this line; thou many of its actions are borderline. For now, they remain the government and have legitimacy.

But once the Howard Government is defeated, many possibilities present themselves; David Hicks or a score of other refugees and citizens may charge Phillip Ruddock or even Howard in the International Criminal Court or the Human Rights Commission; Iraqi's may charge senior figures in the Bush administration for willfully obfuscating evidence to conduct an illegal war. Prisoners subjected to US interrogation/torture/rendition may lay charges for crimes against humanity.

This folly has many ramifications. Having charged into Iraq in the most reckless manner and created this mess, there really is no exit - not for the USA - not now and not in 5 years from now. Leaving Iraq is for the USA not just embarrassing but impossible. It would embolden the Muslim extremists. Global US influence would suffer to an unacceptable degree. The American Century seems to be over before it begins.

The US population does not appreciate this yet. It will have to and when it does, there will be much self-flagellation and finger pointing.

The sensible option in Iraq is a 3 state solution. We have seen examples of this in the Balkans - messy but it works. We are a long way from even considering real solutions. In the mean time, the death toll grows.
Posted by YEBIGA, Thursday, 21 December 2006 5:12:10 PM
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Steel wrote:
"WayneSmith, enjoy seven years behind bars."

If sedition means speaking freely then I guess I'm guilty. Our Government is useless. Federal Politics is about defence and trade. The Iraq war and AWB scandal clearly demonstrates that the bumbling fools in office can neither be trusted or relied on. I have asked at what point a revolution would be justified. If you are saying that a revolution is never justified and the Government can do no wrong then clearly you know nothing of history.

Col wrote:
"I think that sounds like paranoia. It is certainly delusional."

That sounds antagonistic. It certainly sounds insulting. The media no longer cares about the truth. I have first hand experience of how corrupt and despicable the media is. Governments have been made and broken by the likes of Murdoch and Packer. You too need to read up on a little history.

"Who pays the airforce, you know the ones who shoot the civilians?"

It would be my preference to cull the politicians. In fact I'd simply create an open season and sell licenses. One license per kill. Say about $5. Some people will want to bag half of Parliament but we don't want them getting greedy like that and leaving nothing left for anybody else. Abbot's head mounted over the fireplace would be a great conversation piece. If there ever was a revolution and small local governments replaced the insane monstrous octopus of fat pollies and public servants now operating then the military would likely consist of local militias paid for by the towns they are recruited from. Chiefly to guard their home area but ready to defend the nation too. It might be worthwhile combining police with the military.

"David_BOAZ is correct, you are planning a feudalistic social order with a very strong likelyhood that a Bonoparte will evolve."

This is all straight off the top of my heasd. I have no cache of weapons or maps of Canberra. Its merely a topic of conversation. Do grow up.
Posted by WayneSmith, Saturday, 23 December 2006 11:36:12 AM
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Wayne you need to read Animal Farm to gain some vague insight into how revolutions evolve into monsters that eat up the most vulnerable and the most gullible. It is a delusion to think that leaders of even small groups are immune from acting dishonestly or out of self interest.
The technology that allows you to communicate via this medium would never have evolved in the sort of world you seem to crave.
Might I suggest you contribute in a meaningfull manner to promoting honest and responsible government. Try joining a political party of any persuasion and pressing for what you think is right. Do not always expect to get your own way, only dictators can achieve that.
Democracy is imperfect because human beings have some rather base instincts but do not expect these to disappear from smaller aggregations of individuals.
Evolution is far superior to revolution.
Posted by Logical?, Saturday, 23 December 2006 2:45:38 PM
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YEBIGA “Please lord help Col or smite him.”

That is a first.

The first time someone has invoked the Almighty in absence of debating prowess.

YEBIGA, “I love revolutions: French, Russian, English or American – well reading about them anyway. “

I have lived through a technological and socials revolution. You are doing the same too.

However, you might like to use your imagination and try to consider how you would feel if what you read about “revolution” happened to you in reality. How do you feel about having half your family killed off because of their political view or the corruption of some local warlord?

The irony with the term “Civil War” (Britain did not have a revolution like France or Russia and the USA revolution was the “war of independence” and then their own “civil war”) – there is nothing “Civil” about it, quite the opposite.

What transpired after both the French and Russian revolutions was as bad if not worse than what preceded them. The terrors invoked against ordinary people by Robespierre and Stalin was horror of the first order.

The interesting thing is after the English Civil War, Cromwell appointed himself the "Great Protector", he disbanded parliament and ruled as a dictator. After his death he was posthumously beheaded by the Charles II, who was invited to return by parliament (when Cromwell’s son was seen to lack the (Machiavellian) ability of his father).

But there is hope, you read. Try spreading your topics. Go to biography and start with few of the wealthy people who used their wealth to improve the lot of their fellow man. Lots of examples exist of English personal philanthropy in Victorian England. It should help you gain a better perspective and read some of the tales of victims of other revolutions. China and Cambodia spring to mind. They should be a warning to everyone who reads to work to strengthen and sustain the rule of law, rather than indulge in fantasies of “heroic anarchy” (oxymoron).
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 24 December 2006 8:54:29 AM
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WayneSmith “It would be my preference to cull the politicians. In fact I'd simply create an open season and sell licenses. One license per kill. Say about $5.”

You should go into politics Wayne, I will even vote for you and support your elevation on that manifesto.

Oh, I will make sure I am first in line for one of those licences too. Open season on WayneSmith would be too good to miss!

Unlike your contributions here which, really, would not be missed.

As for “This is all straight off the top of my head. I have no cache of weapons or maps of Canberra. Its merely a topic of conversation. Do grow up.”

It reads more like you are talking through your backside.

And if you think what I wrote previously was “antagonistic”, there is lots more where that comes from.

Make stupid comments and introduce stupid ideas and “antagonism” and “insult” is a predictable response.

Logical or 1984, George Orwell based the character of the national leader on the post WWII ascending Stalin.

Did you see the SBS program on Mao Tse Tong? The cult of the personality and China’s cultural revolution, worth watching and a few good lessons in how communist conformity oppressed and crippled people. Working in the worst Chinese charnel house would be better than having to recite the teachings from the3 little red book of “the great helmsman” every day.

Oh and “Evolution is far superior to revolution.” I agree with that and “Democracy” is the only “Evolutionary” based political system that I know of.
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 24 December 2006 8:57:57 AM
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Col I missed the point of "logical or 1984". Orwell's Animal Farm and 1984, as well as some history, should be compulsory reading for Wayne if he wants to understand where revolutions may end up.
As you point out my use of the word "evolution" applied to the development of systems of government. It was not being used in a biological sense. Unfortunately my promotion of evolution is undermined by Wayne being one of evolutions disappointments.
Posted by Logical?, Sunday, 24 December 2006 9:53:59 AM
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Logical

Yes, not my finest day for grammar (reading too many MichaelK posts).

I should have written

logical: "or 1984".

Referring to it as another Orwellian source for consideration of the "darker side" of "social organisation".

Anyway, as we approach the day may

I wish you and other posters here a Merry Christmas

I consider Christmas to be time for family.

So Peace and tranquility to all and your families.
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 24 December 2006 1:29:45 PM
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YEBIGA

“They-always-require-certain-pre-conditions:-widespread-poverty-and-corruption,-desperation,-revolutionary-leaders,-and-a-score-of-others.-We-are-a-long-way-off-having-the-necessary-pre-requisites.-What-would-be-required-is-the-total-collapse-of-the-global-corporate-capitalist-system---not-entirely-out-of-the-question.-Something-like-global-warming-could-trigger-a-series-of-catastrophes,-which-conceivably-could-prepare-the-ground-for-revolution---but-it-is-some-way-off.”

It might be closer than you think, and hopefully it is.

The distribution of wealth in the US is extremely polarised and elsewhere it is becoming more and more so. The CEO of Goldman Sachs is receiving a $53 million bonus this Xmas, while the average household income in the US is about $40K. – he could support more than 1000 families per year on his bonus.

US Capitalism is in major crisis. They can no longer dominate economically so they are forced to do so militarily. Hence the illegal invasion of Iraq.

But the US ruling class is heading for a confrontation with the population. Masses of people came out to vote against the war 6 weeks ago, but the Administration and the Democrats are now talking about increasing troop numbers and intensifying the conflict, rather than pulling out. The Government is ignoring the will of the people. The democratic system, having been trashed in the 2000 stolen election, is in serious decay. The ruling classes are acting with impunity, a little reminiscent of “let them eat cake”. Bush is even now talking about increasing the size of the military. Given that they can’t meet their recruitment targets now, how will they recruit even more people? The only way is conscription – the idea has even been floated by a Democrat.

But yes, we need revolutionary leaders, and to build a mass party of the international working class. The Socialist Equality Party in the US ran in some states in the recent elections and got strong support considering the odds against them – people are consciously voting for socialism which is pretty significant. People are knocking on their doors to join. There is an Australian Section.

WayneSmith you need to distinguish between a military coup and a revolution. A military coup will solve nothing. Nor will rounding up the current crop of politicians. Don't worry about them. After the revolution, if they haven't gone stark raving mad, we will give them a job and a council flat.
Posted by tao, Sunday, 24 December 2006 4:06:48 PM
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Tao,
Agree with you about the incongruity of CEOs & the like getting paid disproportionate bonuses, even in cases where companies perform poorly, or worse, fail.

Agree with you about the often, but not always, parasitic born rich, many of whom actually are (ironically ) closet lefties.

But the prospect of a directorship of those who are envious of the rich, but lack the initiative or perseverance to make it themselves, is equally unpalatable
Posted by Horus, Sunday, 24 December 2006 8:43:52 PM
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Horus,

Why is it that someone who can barely feed their family on a week’s wages but thinks that they should be able to is called “envious” by people like you? These people, just like you, want a comfortable life, and to give their family a future. Where is the envy in that?

Why is it that when someone believes that the current state of affairs where the majority of the world live in abject poverty despite us having the technology to feed, clothe, house, water and educate them all, while a small percentage accumulate massive wealth at their expense, and live in luxury, is unjust and inequitable, do people like you call them “envious”?

Your propensity to jump to the conclusion about other people’s “envy” says more about you than it does about them.
Posted by tao, Sunday, 24 December 2006 9:52:59 PM
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And Horus,

To be one of the top 5% of people with “initiative or perseverance to make it” in capitalism means that a person would have to exploit at least 95 other people’s labour. It means that that person would be required to use force to subjugate the 95% and enforce their “right” to profit (not necessarily directly but through the use of the State).

I would much rather have a dictatorship of the 95% of people who don’t exploit others.
Posted by tao, Sunday, 24 December 2006 10:08:54 PM
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Fine sentiments from the latest contributors. May I remind them that socialism via revolution is by definition Communism. Please refer me to the Communist nirvana that is putting bread equally on everyones table.
The experiment with Communism resulted in wealthy ruling elites, abject poverty for most citizens and millions killed by their own governments. Give me Capitalism with its imperfections any day.
Social democrats aspire to a more equitable distribution of wealth but do not choose revolutionas as the means of achieving that goal.
Third world aid that props up despotic governments is also unhelpful to the long term interests of the downtrodden. Start thinking about genuine free trade and the encouragement of democracy around the world.
Posted by Logical?, Sunday, 24 December 2006 10:18:53 PM
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Horus “Agree with you about the incongruity of CEOs & the like getting paid disproportionate bonuses, even in cases where companies perform poorly, or worse, fail.”

There are 680,000 companies listed with the ATO. Maybe you can list how many of the CEO are paid “disproportionate bonuses”.

“parasitic born rich, many of whom actually are (ironically ) closet lefties”

If they are “closet lefties” how do you know they are?

Tao “To be one of the top 5% of people with “initiative or perseverance to make it” in capitalism means”

that those 5% contribute a significantly greater portion of their income in taxes than anyone else.

Further, through their organizational skill and risk capital they provide the jobs which the other 95% are employed in and from which the most significant wealth transfer takes place (called wages and salaries).

I would further note, it is entirely possible and reasonable for anyone to aspire and take on the role of CEO. It is not a role which is defined by class but by application (application of effort, acquisition of appropriate experience and credentials, acceptance of commercial risk and sometimes by simply application to an advert for the job).

You are deploying “wedge politics” to feed the envy of the less suited for the reward of those with scarce and valued skills.

“I would much rather have a dictatorship of the 95% of people who don’t exploit others.”

I would rather have a democracy. All dictatorships fail. They are held together by repression and corruption. They exist to entrench the lifestyle of the dictatorial elite by rule of the gun and torture.

Do you really think a dictator will be more “benevolent” than a government which relies on being elected by popular vote every few years?

That you could countenance a dictatorship displays your stupidity, unless, of course, you view yourself in the role of “the great protector” or “the great helmsman”, in which case, see a shrink, you are likely suffering a Napoleon complex.

Logical “Start thinking about genuine free trade and the encouragement of democracy around the world.”

Excellen
Posted by Col Rouge, Monday, 25 December 2006 12:34:05 AM
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Tao,
A valuable principle for anyone to learn is:
"Cut your coat according to your cloth".
As politically INcorrect & insensitive as it will be portrayed,
if you can only adequately support one child, don’t have 1+.
Each according to his/her capacity,
rather than each according to his/her wants .

Col Rougue
"How do I no many of the rich are closet lefties".
The contributor list to such groups as the ALP, Democrats & Green parties is a insightful starting point as are the views they are ( occasionally) overheard to express .

As well as considering the taxation levels.
You need also to consider the level of subsidies/benefits some sectors/classes receive-directly or directly.
Posted by Horus, Monday, 25 December 2006 5:13:26 AM
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Why are some people still naive enough to believe in the concept of a benign dictator?
In a democracy you have constraints on the exercise of power. The ACCC can block a monopoly that would hold the community to ransom. An independent judiciary can deliver a reasonable standard of justice. We even offer legal aid to those with inadequate resources to pursue a grievance.You can change leaders if they are not implementing the broad wishes of the community.
Contrast the above with living in a society where you toe the party line or suffer the consequences. Death or life in a gulag (hard to choose which is better)is not the same as being on the bottom of the heap in a Western democracy.
We offer all sorts of social security backups which could be even more generous if you could avoid abuse by those who perceive such entitlements as a right i.e. that participating in the workforce is optional. Bring in compulsory work for the dole. Sickness benefits are a different issue.
Being part of a community means contributing to the best of you abilities. There are obligations as well as rights. I will address myself to so called poverty traps at a later date.
Meanwhile Merry Christmas to all. Please no reminders that it is not so merry for some. I know that and want a more just society but it does not come from looking down the barrel of a dictators gun.
Posted by Logical?, Monday, 25 December 2006 7:14:12 AM
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Logical: “May-I-remind-them-that-socialism-via-revolution-is-by-definition-Communism.-Please-refer-me-to-the-Communist-nirvana-that-is-putting-bread-equally-on-everyones-table.”

I have written this elsewhere on this forum, but for those of you who haven’t read it, here it is again:

Marxist theory posits that following the international working class revolution (i.e. socialist revolution), workers will dominate society, suppressing capitalist classes, and reorganise society on the basis of human need, eliminating privilege (i.e. classes). Once privilege has been eliminated, a classless society will exist, the State will no longer be required to enforce inequality and will wither away. This final classless society with no state is what is considered “Communism”.

So Logical, you are incorrect that “socialism via revolution is by definition Communism”. There has never been a “Communist State” because by definition, the term is a nonsense, and there has never been “Communism” in any country.

Another tenet of Marxist theory is that the socialist revolution must be international. Socialism, and Communism, require that all resources, and human labour, be directed to the benefit and improvement of humanity. Socialism cannot be built in one country, and therefore communism will not exist in one country. This is a fundamental point. The leaders of the Russian Revolution knew that the success of the Revolution was dependent on it spreading to surrounding countries, particularly Germany (which didn’t happen because the 1919 uprising was put down after its leaders chickened out). Stalin however, came up with his theory of “Socialism in one Country” in direct contradiction to Marxist theory. Stalin and Stalinism was counter-revolutionary. Anyone who suggests that any one country can build socialism, or be socialist or communist, is actually taking up Stalin’s argument.

Of course on reading this, your initial reaction will be to tell me I am wrong. This is natural, we have been told all of our lives that various “States” are “Communist”. However, before dismissing my argument, you should examine where this information originates from, how it is propagated throughout our society, and why. You should also study Marx, Engels, Lenin & Trotsky – with an open mind.
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 26 December 2006 4:20:25 PM
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cont...

“The-experiment-with-Communism-resulted-in-wealthy-ruling-elites,-abject-poverty-for-most-citizens-and-millions-killed-by-their-own-governments.-Give-me-Capitalism-with-its-imperfections-any-day.”

What is different under Capitalism?

We have wealthy ruling elites, they are just hidden behind a “democratic” façade. Most of the world’s citizens live in abject poverty. Even in rich countries there is abject poverty. According to a UNICEF report last year, in the US, 21.9% of children live in poverty. According to Forbes, the combined wealth of the richest 400 individuals is $1.25 trillion.

How many millions of people have been killed in capitalist wars – WW1, WW2, and now Iraq, among others? In the two world wars it is estimated that between 60 and 100 million people were killed.

How many millions of people die every day under capitalism for want of food, fresh water, or medicine? According to a UN Human Development Report, every-year,-10.7 million children die before their fifth birthday. Every-hour more than 1,200 children die. And before you suggest poorer countries should not be counted when measuring capitalism’s success, remember that capitalism is a global-economic-system, the poorer countries are engaged in it and often are the worst-affected because they are exploited by the rich of wealthier countries.

“Social-democrats-aspire-to-a-more-equitable-distribution-of-wealth-but-do-not-choose-revolutionas-as-the-means-of-achieving-that-goal”

The objective function of social democrats in the capitalist system is to delude the working class into thinking that capitalism can be made fairer, or be “reformed”. They pretend to offer an alternative to revolution but all they really do is lead the discontented working class back into the capitalist “democratic” system.

“Start-thinking-about-genuine-free-trade-and-the-encouragement-of-democracy-around-the-world”.

Good Idea.

Which sort of democracy would you like? US Democracy?. The American people just came out to vote against the war in Iraq, yet both parties are planning on increasing troop numbers and intensifying the conflict. The US government commits torture, denies habeas corpus, spies on its people, lies to its people and wages aggressive illegal wars.

Free trade? The aim of the Iraq war was to secure US control of the oil in the region against the competition of its economic rivals, China, Japan, Russia, Europe etc. The US can no longer dominate economically or “freely”, they must do it militarily. Free trade out of the barrel of a gun.
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 26 December 2006 4:21:37 PM
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Col, Col, Col,

“that-those-5%-contribute-a-significantly-greater-portion-of-their-income-in-taxes-than-anyone-else.-

Further,-through-their-organizational-skill-and-risk-capital-they-provide-the-jobs-which-the-other-95%-are-employed-in-and-from-which-the-most-significant-wealth-transfer-takes-place-(called-wages-and-salaries).”

Yes, the most significant transfer of wealth does take place FROM THE 95% WHO PRODUCE THE WEALTH TO THE 5% who take possession of the things that are produced by the 95%. They then pay a smaller amount back to the 95% in wages and keep the rest. What they keep is the “profit” which they then pay tax on, although less and less these days.

You pretend that the 5% are doing something noble in risking “their” capital, however capital is nothing more than stored labour from past exploitation. If you disagree with this, explain how capital came into existence.

“You-are-deploying-“wedge-politics”-to-feed-the-envy-of-the-less-suited-for-the-reward-of-those-with-scarce-and-valued-skills”.

“That-you-could-countenance-a-dictatorship-displays-your-stupidity,-unless,-of-course,-you-view-yourself-in-the-role-of-“the-great-protector”-or-“the-great-helmsman”,-in-which-case,-see-a-shrink,-you-are-likely-suffering-a-Napoleon-complex.”

Again the unfounded accusation of “envy” which is your stock in trade.

Again, the unfounded accusation that I want to be a dictator.

Accusations of stupidity and insanity.

Where would your arguments be without personal untruthful attacks on those who disagree with you? Are you unable to argue on the facts?

”I-would-rather-have-a-democracy.-All-dictatorships-fail.-They-are-held-together-by-repression-and-corruption”

”Do-you-really-think-a-dictator-will-be-more-“benevolent”-than-a-government-which-relies-on-being-elected-by-popular-vote-every-few-years?-“

You deliberately misrepresent what I mean by a dictatorship of the 95%. The “dictatorship of the proletariat” is not a dictatorship of one person, it is democratic, with workers controlling their workplaces, electing delegates or leaders who are subject to instant recall.

A dictatorship of 95% of the people does not mean a dictatorship of “elites”. If you are referring to the Soviet Union, you are being intellectually dishonest if you claim that the Soviet Government started out as a dictatorship of one person.

The Bolshevik Party, the Russian Revolution and its subsequent degeneration into a dictatorial regime can only be understood within the context of the objective economic, political and social conditions, both internal and external, which influenced the Revolution. It should be noted that one of the major contributing factors was the interference by imperialist powers in supporting the counter-revolutionary White Army, and the killing of hundreds of thousands of the most class conscious workers (i.e. Communists) during the civil war.

“They-exist-to-entrench-the-lifestyle-of-the-dictatorial-elite-by-rule-of-the-gun-and-torture.”

What do we have now but a bourgeois democracy that exists to entrench the luxurious lifestyle of the few by gun and torture?
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 26 December 2006 4:32:07 PM
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Horus,

“As-politically-INcorrect-&-insensitive-as-it-will-be-portrayed,
if-you-can-only-adequately-support-one-child,-don’t-have-1+

So you are arguing for a one child policy, only dictated by economic circumstances rather than a dictatorial regime. The rich can have as many children as they like, but the poor must limit their desire for a family to their economic position.

In Australia, the birth rate has been naturally falling, presumably because of the very fact that people can’t afford to have children. Yet our government wants us to have one for mum, one for dad, and one for the country. They are even paying people baby bonuses to have children. How do you explain this paradox?

Capitalism depends on growth Horus, and it requires a lot of people desperate enough to take any job available at low wages. Your solution will not work.
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 26 December 2006 4:35:34 PM
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Tao , My apologies for adopting a definition of communism that coincides with the reality of how states who supposedly intended to follow marxist doctrine actually conducted their affairs.
Do you think the system would end up any different if it were able to set up simultaneously around the world? If your answer is yes then I fear you delude yourself. What positions do you think all these gready capitalists, that you rail against, are going occupy in this new world order. Can I suggest they might aspire to being the "communist" leadership.
I think you lack insight into human nature and the corrupting influence of power and greed. Perhaps your solution is to purge those that don't pay at least lip service to your ideals. How do you figure out who is an honest communist (using your definition)? Who is charged with making such decisions? How do you suppress black-markets when they inevitably spring up? Do you kill or imprison the non-believers?
Wars between competing countries and ideologies are bad enough but murdering your own citizens en masse is even more disturbing.
Past attempts to establish communism as you define it have been a dismal failure. Blaming the West for past failures is convenient but you have to explin how next time you would succeed with a revolution without being even more repressive than past exponents of your philosophy.
I think we are destined to never reach agreement on the best mechanism of achieving a more equitable society. The best we might do is agree that we both genuinely aspire to a fairer distribution of resources than currently exists.
Posted by Logical?, Tuesday, 26 December 2006 6:58:54 PM
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Tao,
Actually the universal rule seems to be that the poor have more children than the rich.
( i.e. those who can least afford -have more).

And strangely those countries with the best social conditions/welfare etc (eg Germany, France,Sweden) have fewer children than those of the third world with much poorer/adverse conditions.So it's not issue of “economics” -though perhaps it should be!

Capitalism has faults but it is a work-in-progress we can evaluate & adapt.
Where is there an example of a functioning communist society for us to take a look at?
Posted by Horus, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 4:04:13 AM
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Tao “FROM THE 95% WHO PRODUCE THE WEALTH TO THE 5%”

The distribution of total sales revenue between a businesses wages bill and its retained earnings after tax, would, see far more being expended on “employee benefits” than on “employer benefits”. The 5% who pay the 95% are clearly entitled to reward for risk and reward for creating the ventures which employ people.

“You pretend that the 5% are doing something noble in risking “their” capital, however capital is nothing more than stored labour from past exploitation. If you disagree with this, explain how capital came into existence.”

Those who risk their “capital” in ventures of commercial trade which employ others, provide the jobs from which employees benefit. If these employers were not to risk their capital, there would be significantly less “employment”.

Part B Explaining where did capital “come from”.

Thrift was one source.

The practice and choice of many generations of individuals was and is to save some of what they earned.

The thifty chose to put away part of their available consumption for a future eventuality, instead of spending it all immediately.

Rather than storing it in a tin or a mattress, some chose investment into income producing assets. Some joined and risked their funds with other like minded venturers, thus the first joint-stock companies with formed.

The Quaker / Puritans placed a particularly high value on “thrift”. They also placed a particularly high value of treating their fellow man with courtesy and respect.

Instead of building grand churches and cathedrals and offering fealty to the Pope or King, they worshipped simply and built businesses like Cadbury and employed people to work in them.

These “Quaker capitalists” were seen as the very best of employers for their worker care programmes and ethical employment values. Oh, they also built the early colonies which eventually joined with other colonies to become USA.

You could learn a lot from Quakers, tao.
Posted by Col Rouge, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 8:04:00 AM
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tao “dictatorship of the proletariat”.

Too many vested interests and lack of objectivity to ever make the “hard decisions”.

“The Bolshevik Party”

The Bolsheviks defeated the “White Russian Army”. Attempting to blame the Whites and their imperialist supporters 10 years later for the butchery of Stalin does not work.

As Lenin said “The goal of socialism is communism.” And we have seen the rise and collapse of communism. Communism was eaten away from the inside by its own corruption and incompetence and deserved to die sooner than it did. It sustained itself by denying its people basic human rights and freedoms.

Your airy-fairy theories of collectivism would be the first victims of communism. Just as the Kulaks were among the first victims of Stalinism (you know, Stalinism, the natural consequence of communism).

As for “What do we have now but a bourgeois democracy that exists to entrench the luxurious lifestyle of the few by gun and torture?”

Tell me, where will you find more guns and torture used to enforce “social order” of the streets of Melbourne or the Street on Pyongyang?

Are people forbidden to emigrate from Australia or from Cuba (except when Castro is emptying the gaols) ?

Was the Berlin Wall built to stop Westerners going into East Germany or to Stop East Germans escaping?

Tao, your “theories” are the tried and failed theories which denied generations of Eastern Europeans a decent life.

You, yourself, are the indulged product of Capitalism.

One day you will learn that no system is perfect.

That “Capitalism in Practice” is a lot “less imperfect” than every other system, regardless of every theoretical aspiration.

As for
“Again_the_unfounded_accusation_of_“envy”_which_is_your_stock_in_trade.
Again,_the_unfounded_accusation_that_I_want_to_be_a_dictator.
Accusations_of_stupidity_and_insanity.”

The envy is your claim the 5% are not worthy of what the 95% have not planned or saved toward.

You have to see yourself as “leading”, tell me, who else would you follow?

As for the stupidity and insanity, it was Lenin who named people like you “the useful idiots”.

Your views lead to Stalin, who said “One death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic.” And he knew!
Posted by Col Rouge, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 8:39:59 AM
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Good work Col! Have a look at my post on "Freedom of the press versus civil liberties". The battle with freeranger is warming up.
Posted by Logical?, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 10:23:16 AM
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"Wayne you need to read Animal Farm to gain some vague insight into how revolutions evolve into monsters that eat up the most vulnerable and the most gullible. It is a delusion to think that leaders of even small groups are immune from acting dishonestly or out of self interest."

Our Government is already rapidly turning into a monster that eats up the most vulnerable and gullible. Some would argue that it already is. look at hospital waiting lists and the exhorbitant costs of legal representation. Our capitalist nation starves the poor in order to pamper the rich. I'm just wondering how much worse it will get before the downtrodden react.

I used to live in Eveleigh Street Redfern. I've seen public resentment fuel fighting in the streets. Last year in Cronulla we saw another taste of it. A match can start a forest fire.

I have a certain knack for predicting possible future events.

Giant Squid Capture.
http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=317

I've noticed an increasing degree of hatred towards politician of late. Not unreasonable hatred either in light of recent events. Thought some of you might have also noticed the small changes going on around you. Perhaps I'm just a little more observant because I don't watch television.
Posted by WayneSmith, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 3:18:45 PM
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Wayne. How can someone bring you back to reality and away from anger? Communist states have not delivered the standards of health care or judicial independence enjoyed by all Austalians. Have you heard of legal aid and class actions against big buisiness?
Can you appreciate what life is like with a State-controlled press. Please do not run the line about Western press barons. There is a diversity of media outlets in Australia, both electronic and print. Even you and I can have our say without being penalised.
Of course there is always room for improvement but to suggest we would fare better under a communist dictatorship is absurd. The experiment has been run and it was a dismal failure for millions. You have not offered any basis for believing that your revolution would be any more successful than the past failures.
Perhaps you can tell us in general terms how, while awaiting your revolution. you currently contribute to the welfare of your fellow citizens. Is participation in this terrible capitalist system you have been landed in beneath you? Do you refuse to pay taxes because they are propping up our capitalist society? Would you seriously consider moving to Cuba for your health care? I think a reality check is in order.
Posted by Logical?, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 4:19:42 PM
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Wayne “Our Government is already rapidly turning into a monster that eats up the most vulnerable and gullible.”

Maybe a few examples. Oh whining about changes to pension rights does not count, those who are in receipt of government handouts hardly qualify as being “food for a monster”.

“look at hospital waiting lists” Run by socialist state governments – who are you complaining about?

“exhorbitant costs of legal representation.” Run by the legal profession, not government.

“. I've seen public resentment fuel fighting in the streets. Last year in Cronulla we saw another taste of it.”

People who express racist issues are not the responsibility of “government” their bad manners would better be treated with serious prison sentences or are you going to come out with “prisons contain a disproportionate number of kooris” largely because they have an absent sense of social responsibility (I would take away the handouts and make them the same as everyone else), why do we tolerate the immoral and inappropriate demands of a conquered minority?

Assimilate or expire, simple choice. No more affirmative action.

“I have a certain knack for predicting possible future events.”

I trust you will be putting your money where your mouth is and fluttering on the megadraw this weekend? You might win and come back to complain about how much tax you are paying on your investments

I predicted the fall in interest rates in 1996 (not a Herculean task, it stuck out like the testicles on a greyhound) and cleaned up on buying real estate.

“I've noticed an increasing degree of hatred towards politician of late.”

I think it has abated, lets face it 3 years ago Latham was promoting his own brand of vilification and hated through the media, breaking arms, being obnoxious, doing everything he could to lose an election.

When you have a real issue, one which stands up to scrutiny, come back and present it. Until then, you come across as not having the brains or the bottle to start a punchup in a pub, let alone a revolution.

Well said Logical
Posted by Col Rouge, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 6:47:45 PM
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A Revolution well we can call it democratic elections.

Isnt it time we dealt a blow to these corrupt and decietful party's or just stick your head in the sand.

We could always place the bible on an altor and have 12 public servants to ensure policy is by the way of god, screw the rest of the people.

Do We need to see the rest of australia being sold off by labor and liberal to fund their mistakes and promises.

Should we have people from our own electorate representing us and not a political party based agenda.

Are we not Australians or are we just and ignorant and stupid bunch of people who wont stand up and be representative just like labor and liberal take us for.

And in the end if you dont stand up for change this is just pointless.
Actually just like this forum as all people do is winge and are not interested in solving australias problems but their own political agenda since most people here hide behind a facade to who they really are
Posted by tapp, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 7:00:15 PM
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Logical,

“My-apologies-for-adopting-a-definition-of-communism-that-coincides-with-the-reality-of-how-states-who-supposedly-intended-to-follow-marxist-doctrine-actually-conducted-their-affairs”.

No need to apologise, just study what you are talking about, and don’t repeat your mistake.

Given your eagerness to define communism for everyone, I thought it might be important to you that your definition was correct. The alternative is to say whatever you feel like whether it is right or wrong, as long as it serves your purpose. The easiest thing to do is to parrot what you have been told all of your life without questioning it.

What you seem to be saying here is that as long as a despotic-leader of a state says that they, and-their-state, are Marxist, it must be true, because a despotic-dictator must be telling the truth. So because they say they are Marxist, and they are telling the truth, everything they do is an example of Marxist-theory.

There is obviously no need to study Marxist-theory to see if there is a difference, the despotic-leader says there isn’t, and he must be telling the truth. So you will just adopt the despotic-leader’s definition.

“Do-you-think-the-system-would-end-up-any-different-if-it-were-able-to-set-up-simultaneously-around-the-world?”

“Past-attempts-to-establish-communism-as-you-define-it-have-been-a-dismal-failure.-Blaming-the-West-for-past-failures-is-convenient-but-you-have-to-explin-how-next-time-you-would-succeed-with-a-revolution-without-being-even-more-repressive-than-past-exponents-of-your-philosophy”

Firstly, no-one can predict the future. Secondly, in order to succeed in the future, we have to study the reasons for the failure of the Soviet Union and all other attempted socialist-revolutions. What you call “Blaming the West” is not merely “convenient”, the course of the Russian Revolution was affected by many factors, internal and external. We need to study these factors and learn the lessons of the Revolution.

“How-do-you-figure-out-who-is-an-honest-communist-(using-your-definition)?-Who-is-charged-with-making-such-decisions?”-

You study Marx, Engels, Lenin & Trotsky for starters. Then you make the decisions. But don’t take the word of a dictator, or a capitalist. Make up your own mind.

“Wars-between-competing-countries-and-ideologies-are-bad-enough-but-murdering-your-own-citizens-en-masse-is-even-more-disturbing.” This is simply an apology for capitalist murder. As long as it doesn't happen to you, its OK with you.

“The-best-we-might-do-is-agree-that-we-both-genuinely-aspire-to-a-fairer-distribution-of-resources-than-currently-exists.”

If you do genuinely aspire to a “fairer-distribution-of-resources”, then aren’t you obliged to study, without-prejudice, the ideas of men and women who made it their lives’ work, and in many cases, died for their work and ideals?

Or are legal aid and class actions against big business the pinnacle of your ideal of fairness?
Posted by tao, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 7:34:32 PM
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As usual Col, idyllic little fairy stories.

“Those-who-risk-their-“capital”-in-ventures-of-commercial-trade-which-employ-others,-provide-the-jobs-from-which-employees-benefit.-If-these-employers-were-not-to-risk-their-capital,-there-would-be-significantly-less-“employment”.

“Part-B-Explaining-where-did-capital-“come-from”.

Thrift-was-one-source.

The-practice-and-choice-of-many-generations-of-individuals-was-and-is-to-save-some-of-what-they-earned.-

The-thifty-chose-to-put-away-part-of-their-available-consumption-for-a-future-eventuality,-instead-of-spending-it-all-immediately.-

Rather-than-storing-it-in-a-tin-or-a-mattress,-some-chose-investment-into-income-producing-assets.-Some-joined-and-risked-their-funds-with-other-like-minded-venturers,-thus-the-first-joint-stock-companies-with-formed.”

You answers are so-predictable. Marx tore your little theory to shreds long ago:

“This primitive-accumulation plays in Political Economy about the same part as original-sin in theology. Adam bit the apple, and thereupon sin fell on the human-race. Its origin is supposed to be explained when it is told as an anecdote of the past. In times long gone-by there were two sorts of people; one, the diligent, intelligent, and, above all, frugal-elite; the other, lazy-rascals, spending their substance, and more, in riotous-living. The legend of theological original-sin tells us certainly how man came to be condemned to eat his bread in the sweat of his brow; but the history of economic original sin reveals to us that there are people to whom this is by no means essential. Never mind! Thus it came to pass that the former sort accumulated-wealth, and the latter sort had at last nothing to sell except their own skins. And from this original-sin dates the poverty of the great majority that, despite all its labour, has up to now nothing to sell but itself, and the wealth of the few that increases constantly although they have long ceased to work. Such insipid childishness is every day preached to us in the defence of property. M. Thiers, e.g., had the assurance to repeat it with all the solemnity of a statesman to the French people, once so spirituel. But as soon as the question of property crops up, it becomes a sacred duty to proclaim the intellectual food of the infant as the one thing fit for all ages and for all stages of development. In actual history it is notorious that conquest, enslavement, robbery, murder, briefly force, play the great part. In the tender annals of Political Economy, the idyllic reigns from time immemorial. Right and "labour" were from all time the sole means of enrichment, the present year of course always excepted. As a matter of fact, the methods of primitive accumulation are anything but idyllic.” Marx, Capital
Posted by tao, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 7:38:51 PM
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...cont...

The truth behind the fairy tale is one of conquest, enslavement, robbery and force. Marx goes on to explain “The-capitalist-system-pre-supposes-the-complete-separation-of-the-labourers-from-all-property-in-the-means-by-which-they-can-realize-their-labour”.

How would this precondition be met in a feudal society in which people where guaranteed the right to work the land, and to the product of their own labour?

“The-process,-therefore,-that-clears-the-way-for-the-capitalist-system,-can-be-none-other-than-the-process-which-takes-away-from-the-labourer-the-possession-of-his-means-of-production;-a-process-that-transforms,-on-the-one-hand,-the-social-means-of-subsistence-and-of-production-into-capital,-on-the-other,-the-immediate-producers-into-wage-labourers.-The-so-called-primitive-accumulation,-therefore,-is-nothing-else-than-the-historical-process-of-divorcing-the-producer-from-the-means-of-production.”

And how to make it palatable for the fairy tale?

“Hence,-the-historical-movement-which-changes-the-producers-into-wage-workers,-appears,-on-the-one-hand,-as-their-emancipation-from-serfdom-and-from-the-fetters-of-the-guilds,-and-this-side-alone-exists-for-our-bourgeois-historians.-But,-on-the-other-hand,-these-new-freedmen-became-sellers-of-themselves-only-after-they-had-been-robbed-of-all-their-own-means-of-production,-and-of-all-the-guarantees-of-existence-afforded-by-the-old-feudal-arrangements.-And-the-history-of-this,-their-expropriation,-is-written-in-the-annals-of-mankind-in-letters-of-blood-and-fire.”

So the capital that is risked by our fearless 5% has its origins in the forcible removal of masses of people from the land which they WORKED to maintain their existence. And any capital growth has come as a result of the accumulation of the labour of people forced to WORK for others because they are still denied ownership of the means of production, a denial enforced by the bourgeois state.

Any attempt to deny this is simply delusion, or lies.

“The-Bolsheviks-defeated-the-“White-Russian-Army”.-Attempting-to-blame-the-Whites-and-their-imperialist-supporters-10-years-later-for-the-butchery-of-Stalin-does-not-work.”

(you-know,-Stalinism,-the-natural-consequence-of-communism).

You simplistically attempt to draw a straight line from Marxism to Stalin in a manner that is intellectually dishonest.

My comments on the White Army merely illustrate that there were many factors which contributed to the degeneration of the Bolshevik party and the usurpation of power by Stalin. The Civil War was one of them. Hundreds of thousands of the most class conscious workers were killed in the Civil-War, while there was an influx of petty bourgeois opportunists into the party uneducated in Marxist theory. The economy, rudimentary and technologically backward prior to WW1 (under the Czar and the weak bourgeoisie), was devastated by war (both WW1 and Civil), blockaded by the West, and the workers were exhausted. After his stroke and before his death, Lenin had tried to warn the party about the growing bureacratisation, and was preparing to move against Stalin. However, after Lenin’s death, Stalin was able to consolidate his power.

The question you might try to answer is - Why were the imperialist powers so interested in destroying the socialist revolution? They had just spent millions, of dollars and lives, on WW1, Europe was destroyed and destitute. Why didn’t they just leave Russia alone to succeed or fail on its own?
Posted by tao, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 7:40:37 PM
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...cont...

“As-Lenin-said-“The-goal-of-socialism-is-communism.”-And-we-have-seen-the-rise-and-collapse-of-communism.”

You persist in perpetuating this lie, originated by Stalin mind you (and other dictators), that there is such a thing as a “Communist State” or “Socialism in one Country”. As I have already explained and, if you bothered to do some research you would see, we have never seen communism as envisaged by Marx and Marxists, it has never existed. Socialism has not reached its goal.

But go right ahead and blindly repeat Stalin’s lie.

”Tell-me,-where-will-you-find-more-guns-and-torture-used-to-enforce-“social-order”-of-the-streets-of-Melbourne-or-the-Street-on-Pyongyang? “

Actually, I see the use of guns and torture in Iraq, and Afghanistan, and tanks. In London and Paris earlier this year, I saw lots of army and police with machine guns enforcing “social order”. People actually get shot by police on the underground in London, don’t you know? In Australia our Attorney General denies that sleep deprivation is torture. The government has increased its powers to call out troops domestically against “domestic violence” or threats to “critical infrastructure”.

Are-people-forbidden-to-emigrate-from-Australia-or-from-Cuba-(except-when-Castro-is-emptying-the-gaols)-?

Actually, I see a US base in Cuba where its inmates are denied habeus corpus, access to lawyers, and are tortured. And I see that children trying to flee strife torn areas to Australia are locked up on islands and in the desert.

Was-the-Berlin-Wall-built-to-stop-Westerners-going-into-East-Germany-or-to-Stop-East-Germans-escaping?

I see there is now a wall being built on the US Mexican Border. Whatever happened to “Bring me your tired, your poor, and your hungry”. The US’s client state Israel is also building a wall.

But of course, “Capitalism in Practice” is a lot “less imperfect”. Indeed, bourgeois democracy is becoming a lot more imperfect as time goes on. Yes, lets not worry about it at all.
Posted by tao, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 7:42:58 PM
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Tao. You still fail to offer any reasons why a future revolution would not go the same way as prior attempts. By your own admission there was "failure of the Soviet Union and all other attempted socialist-revolutions". You score top marks for optimism but very few for learning from history.
The writings of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trysky may well set out some interesting and in part appealing theories but implementation is what matters in the final analysis.
Let us all know when you have figured out a benign way of controlling the behaviour of millions of individuals. That includes how you are going to control all those latent capitalists.
My discussion of murdering ones own citizens en masse was not an apology for capitalist murder and I fail to see how you have drawn such a conclusion. Perhaps you think all wars are between competing capitalist societies and I seek to sanitise such monstrous events by comparing them to the greater crime of turning on your own people. No such sanitising was implied or intended.
Your comment about what constitutes the pinacle of my ideal of fairness is a cheap-shot and belittles your ability to engage in rational debate. Logical thought does not support the proposition that discussing a point raised by another individual (in this case the high cost of gaining legal redress)carries an implication that one's horizons do not extend beyond that issue.
Posted by Logical?, Wednesday, 27 December 2006 10:48:01 PM
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Tao “Marx tore your little theory to shreds long ago”

I see my “theories” in PRACTICE every day.

I see you wailing about “capitalist practices”, everyday.

I see Marx and the beast of his imagination as having being consigned to the cesspool of failed theories years ago.

Marx has been dead a hundred years or so, I hate to tell you, he is tearing up nothing, he is just pushing up daisies in a London Cemetery.

Your final question (I ignored the excessive verbage and rant in the middle) “Why didn’t they just leave Russia alone to succeed or fail on its own?”

Because Russia was not disposed to leave the West along to “fail on its own”.

Russia, China and their minions were actively exporting their versions of “Animal Farm” across the globe.
As Stalin wrote “Everyone imposes his own system as far as his army can reach.”

Re “You persist in perpetuating this lie,”

You use Lenin’s professed strategy. Keep it up tao, as he said “a lie told often enough becomes the truth”

Whilst you are at it try this one from Stalin (the consequence of Lenin)

“The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.”

A contemptible attitude from the mind of one of your “bedfellows”.

“Indeed, bourgeois democracy is becoming a lot more imperfect as time goes on. Yes, lets not worry about it at all.”

All systems can exist with a high degree of imperfection, we have the communist system (the natural consequence of socialism) which had more imperfections than any other system and it survived for 70 years, before it was torn down by the people it oppressed.

“bourgeois democracy” has been evolving for 400 years and continues to evolve.

As far as “usable life” is concerned, I am happy to suffer the imperfections of bourgeois democracy. It has served more people for longer than even your system of oppression managed to butcher.
It has developed more than your system has copied.
It is a paragon of liberal virtue, compared to your cesspit of state control.
Posted by Col Rouge, Thursday, 28 December 2006 6:52:50 AM
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"It is a delusion to think that leaders of even small groups are immune from acting dishonestly or out of self interest."

Small groups don't wield as much power and power corrupts.

"The technology that allows you to communicate via this medium would never have evolved in the sort of world you seem to crave."

Better technology would have developed. One of the great failings of "all powerful" national Governments is that they create across the board uniform laws which inhibit creativity. Look at bug infested Microsoft. With freedom to pursue local experimentation comes creativity. The backbone of progress. Instead we have monopolistic super conglomerates.

"Might I suggest you contribute in a meaningfull manner to promoting honest and responsible government."

There is no such thing. Whenever you add the human factor you have to multiply it by the corruptibility and conspiracy variables.

"Try joining a political party of any persuasion and pressing for what you think is right. Do not always expect to get your own way, only dictators can achieve that."

I did. The Liberals. A Dictator would be better. Atleast then it would be official.

"Democracy is imperfect because human beings have some rather base instincts but do not expect these to disappear from smaller aggregations of individuals."

It wouldn't eliminate corruption. Just reduce it.

"Evolution is far superior to revolution."

If the Dinosaurs hadn't been largely killed off then we wouldn't be here now. I myself wouldn't shed a tear if our Dinosaurs in Canberra were to suffer a similar tragic demise.

"Wayne. How can someone bring you back to reality and away from anger?"

I'm not angry. I can see the writing on the wall. Even if you can't. The Redfern, Cronulla, Palm island riots and Pauline Hanson are just little tremors preceding the big earthquake. People have been talking about revolution in Australia for decades but theres a more widespread and serious tone to it nowadays. Personally it won't bother me much. I'll disapear out bush until its all over. I'm not an activist. Just realistic. I listen to people.
Posted by WayneSmith, Thursday, 28 December 2006 1:58:05 PM
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Logical,

“You-still-fail-to-offer-any-reasons-why-a-future-revolution-would-not-go-the-same-way-as-prior-attempts”

Do you want a promise that a future socialist-revolution would not turn out as it did in Russia? I can’t do that, and no-one can do that. It is impossible to predict what will happen in the future. What I can say, is that humans, individually and collectively, learn from experience.

Every progressive-step that humankind takes, it takes without really knowing for sure what the future-holds.

We have sent men into space. In order to do so, we have used knowledge accumulated through hundreds and thousands of generations of human existence. We have had failures. We have had disasters. Does that mean that we stop trying to send men into space? No. It means we go back to the drawing board, analyse where we went wrong, and try again.

To say the space-shuttle burnt up on re-entry, therefore all space-travel is doomed to disaster, so we will cancel the space-program, and don’t bother even trying to find out what went wrong, is shutting off an entire avenue of scientific knowledge and human progress.

The same goes for Marxism. To say that a theory which offered a scientific explanation for poverty and social inequality which stands as the most comprehensive-explanation to this day, and which offered a practical guide for action to those wanted to improve the world, should be disregarded after a setback in its implementation, and don’t even bother trying to find out what went wrong, is to shut off another avenue of scientific knowledge and human progress.

It is not for me to guarantee that there will be no more “failures” of socialist-revolutions. But it is for me to ask what went wrong? Why did the implementation of a theory, embodied in the Russian-Revolution, which gave hope to many millions around the world, go the way it did? What were the factors involved, and how did they interact. Is there any way that it can be done differently? What should we be aware of for the future?

Cont...
Posted by tao, Thursday, 28 December 2006 9:07:24 PM
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It is only by asking the questions with an open-mind that we can learn the lessons we need to learn. But it is these questions that capitalists do not want us to ask or think about seriously, and so we ought not listen to their answers.

If you don’t believe a revolution is necessary or possible, why would you choose to contribute to a thread entitled “When ---is-a-revolution-necessary?” Why have you found it necessary to post here, actively discouraging people from revolution?

You have already partly answered this question:

“Social-democrats-aspire-to-a-more-equitable-distribution-of-wealth-but-do-not-choose-revolutionas-as-the-means-of-achieving-that-goal.”

And indeed, you are playing the objective role of social-democrats throughout history (and one of the reasons for the failure of the German-Revolution), which is to block the development of an independent political movement of the working-class. Social-democratic parties like the ALP here and the Democrats in the US posture as friends of the workers and channel discontent back into bourgeois-democracy thereby subordinating them to the capitalist-system.

Once subordinated to the capitalist-system, workers are forced to accept the logic of the capitalist framework which insists that workers must compete with each other, locally and internationally, for a smaller-and-smaller share of the pie.

Humankind has produced more than it ever has done, we have better technology than we ever have had, yet we are constantly told that there isn’t enough money for proper health-care, education, retirement etc, or even for decent wages. Billions of people around the world live in abject-poverty. Yet companies are making record-profits, and their executives are making record salaries, and our politicians cut their taxes. We are spending record amounts on war. It doesn’t make any sense. It is not “logical”, yet this is the “logic” of capitalism.

But as I said, the objective role of social democracy, and people like you, is to subordinate people to the “logic” of the profit system. They do this by saying we don’t need a revolution, we’ll just fix capitalism, vote for us. But as we have seen from a century of the ALP, which has betrayed workers over-and-over again, this is completely bankrupt. It disorients and weakens the working-class.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 28 December 2006 9:08:34 PM
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…cont…

Hence your comments “How can someone bring you back to reality and away from anger?” The reality is that the anger is real. The reality is that ordinary working people can’t afford proper medical treatment. The reality is that people can’t afford proper legal representation. Legal aid is a band-aid, and its funding is constantly cut. And anyway, we are in the bosses’ courts, being meted out the bosses’ justice.

There is justifiable anger about many things in our society. But you want to deny this anger, deny the necessity for real change i.e. a revolution, and channel it back into social democratic tinkering.

I put it to you that you will never admit publicly that a revolution is necessary or possible. If that is the case then your answer to the question posed by this thread is “never, because everything is fine as it is”, and there is no need for you to continue posting here.

Yet you persist, and you even side with one of the most vicious reactionary right wing posters on this forum – Col Rouge – e.g. “Good work Col!”. Col Rouge doesn’t want a fairer distribution of wealth, he argues for the right of some people to accumulate obscene wealth while the majority live in poverty. Col is so irrational, that when he is shown to be incorrect on important points, he can’t admit it or revise his ideas, but his posts take on the tone of a hysterical rant in order to distract people from the content of what has been said (just read the last few posts between us).

So as a social democrat, despite protestations of wanting a “fairer” distribution of wealth, you end up in the camp of those who actively work against it, and unfortunately, by deluding others that there can be a “fairer” capitalism, you take others with you.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 28 December 2006 9:09:28 PM
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WayneSmith “Small groups don't wield as much power and power corrupts.”

That is a truism. It is also true to say in “small groups” everyone is either related or close to everyone else. In large groups it is the absence of relationship which induces people to act corruptly (who we do not know we do not care about or at least care less about).

“Better technology would have developed.”

Prove it or at least specify how.

" national Governments is that they create across the board uniform laws which inhibit creativity.”

And what will your revolution create?

Or after the revolution, of those who are left, how are you going to stop the growth of opposing power groups recalling, you have no national arbiter to regulate their growth?

I set up a company a year ago, after 4 years of product development. We now sell that developed product and a number of others. I embraced “creativity” without inhibitions imposed by government.

If you mean having national standards, a lot of those are to protect consumers from unscrupulous merchants, where things like TV and radio waves are concerned, the federal government licences their use, as arbiter on behalf of the community. Your complaint about Microsoft – go buy an Apple. I would further note Linux, Java and Open Source is here. The US Trade Commissioners (a function within US Federal Government) are still fighting Microsoft to break it up and their success, whilst long coming, will eventually win through.

“I did. The Liberals. A Dictator would be better.”

Exactly what would a dictator do better than a democratically elected government, remembering that only power matters to dictators, welfare issues do not?

“I listen to people”
I do not think you do, I think you classify and codify people according to your own values set, as most of us do but listen to them, selectively maybe but objectively, no.

And don’t get seduced by anything tao says, you are complaining about practical problems with democracy, tao’s “solution” is a bunch of impossible theories requiring more central power and resulting in more corruption.
Posted by Col Rouge, Friday, 29 December 2006 9:31:50 AM
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Logical, WayneSmith,

Col Rouge said: “And don’t get seduced by anything tao says, you are complaining about practical problems with democracy, tao’s “solution” is a bunch of impossible theories requiring more central power and resulting in more corruption.”

As I said Logical, capitalists don’t want us to ask the questions or think seriously about them. If what Col is saying about my “solution” is true, then wouldn’t you find out for yourselves through your study anyway? What is the harm in finding out? Why is he so determined to stop you? Why does he assume that if you pay attention to what I am saying you are being “seduced”?

In my opinion, you have the ability to weigh up the evidence and make up your own minds.

And WayneSmith, you should trust your own eyes and ears about what people are thinking – I agree with you that there is a shift occurring. The media likes to portray everything as rosy, as do politicians, however the reality is that it is not.
Posted by tao, Friday, 29 December 2006 12:20:11 PM
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Tao “Col Rouge said: “And don’t get seduced by anything tao says, …. “
response”As I said Logical, capitalists don’t want us to ask the questions or think seriously about them.”

Nothing I have ever written has ever suggested anyone should not ask questions nor think seriously about things.

I would note what I espouse is the free exchange of ideas. What happens when the practice of tao’s theories occurs is central control of all resources, censorship, repression, torture and murder of individuals.

I would implore everyone to think seriously about the values which encourage people to be their best and make choices for themselves and to think equally about the consequences of an alternative, the control from the central committee, which tao supports.

What is closer to the “smaller government” which you want to see WayneSmith? The centralization of resource and collective ownership by the state or through everyone making their own decisions?

Tao seduces with offers of a false expectation when he suggests “In my opinion, you have the ability to weigh up the evidence and make up your own minds.”

My question for you to consider and to see what tao really is

Part A in Australia under this Liberal (capitalist) government, how long will it be before you will be allowed to vote for a non-liberal government?

Part B After the revolution which you were espousing which we will assume results in a communist government of the style tao has prescribed, with the Bolsheviks in power, controlling everything, including what you are allowed to ask questions of and what you are allowed to think, how long will it before people were allowed to vote for a non-Bolshevik politician?

Answer Part A at a maximum of 4 years
Answer Part B based on USSR, 70 years.

And between part A and Part B which system has the biggest dissident prison camp system?

I will finish with a profound quotation

“Beware for what you wish because sometimes wishes come true”

Honesty is what tao cannot tolerate, he knows the truth yet his arrogance demands he defend the indefensible
Posted by Col Rouge, Friday, 29 December 2006 3:30:05 PM
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Col,

Your line of argument can be summed up thus:

The Russian Revolution, the only revolution in which the working class took power, ended in Stalinism. Therefore IT IS INEVITABLE THAT every other revolution in which the working class takes power is destined to end in Stalinism. Therefore, the working class should not bother to again attempt to gain control of their lives.

Which is analogous to:

The space shuttle flight ended in burning up on re-entry. Therefore, IT IS INEVITABLE THAT every other space shuttle flight is destined to burn up on re-entry. Therefore, we should not bother to again attempt to send humans into space.

Even more simply:

Col is from England and he is obnoxious. Therefore IT IS INEVITABLE that all English people are obnoxious. Therefore, don’t bother talking to English people

In all arguments, the result of one incident is being generalised to all potential occurrences.

But this attempt at drawing an inference is not the most sound logic. We wouldn't accept it in relation to the space program or English people, so why would we accept it in relation to socialism?

Just as in the space program, where NASA goes back and examines what went wrong, and attempts to address the causes of the problems, so should the working class go back and examine what went wrong, and attempt to learn the lessons of the October Revolution.

And just as in the space program, one setback does not put an end to space travel, neither should one defeat mean that the working class do not try again.

“Honesty-is-what-tao-cannot-tolerate,-he-knows-the-truth-yet-his-arrogance-demands-he-defend-the-indefensible”

I would be foolish if I judged all English people on the basis of my experience with you Col, I would have missed out on the company of a lot of very pleasant English people.

Equally, I, and anyone else, would be foolish to take advice from you on the basis of your logic illustrated above. But you are arrogant enough to think others should.
Posted by tao, Friday, 29 December 2006 11:01:02 PM
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Tao. To use your exploration of space analogy. After the shuttle failed astronaughts were not expected to climb aboard the next one until there was certainty (within the limits of human endeavour) that the past problem had been identified and corrected. In simple words the next flight was not to be a wild gamble with astronaughts' lives even if they were brave enough to jump on board with a burning desire to futher the interests of mankind.
I am happy for the goal to be freedom for the working class. That freedom includes escape from the perverse behaviour of some but not all capitalists. Remember your jibe about not characterising all Englishmen on the basis of meeting one or even several of them. It also includes freedom from the behaviour of the sorts of people who, at multiple levels of seniority, ended up controlling the daily lives of individuals in the various "communist" states.
You keep talking about studying past errors and pursuing the goal. I keep asking what conclusion have you drawn from your study and what plausible solution do you have for correcting past problems. I am not obliged to do the study for you and to find the solution to why past revolutions have failed. Revolution is not a line of endeavour that I see as being productive.
Thus far you have remained silent on offering a solution. You have limited yourself to abusing people like myself who accept incremental change (I think you called it tinkering). You have labelled my ilk (social democrats)as gullible fools who inadvertently do the dirty work for our capitalist masters. Again your propensity to lump everyone into a basket that suits your line of argument.
Your earlier statement that if I was not interested in a revolution I should not have joined this thread was arrogant. I am entitled to join it to try and convince others that the pursuit of revolution is unwise and that our efforts may be better directed.
(continued)
Posted by Logical?, Saturday, 30 December 2006 7:52:01 AM
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I again challenge you to put forward a plausible non-violent mechanism whereby a socialist state can protect itself from the incideous effects of the black markets that would seek to undermine it.
As a self professed civil libertarian (see my thread regarding freedom of the press versus civil liberties)your solution cannot include the argument that the violence of any new socialist state would be less than the violence of the existing capitalist regime. That is a very slippery slope to the concept of "The ends justify the means". We have all seen where that leads us.
Posted by Logical?, Saturday, 30 December 2006 7:52:56 AM
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Sorry about the gh in astronauts. What was I thinking about? Also got incidious wrong.
Posted by Logical?, Saturday, 30 December 2006 9:38:43 AM
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Logical

”-I-am-not-obliged-to-do-the-study-for-you-and-to-find-the-solution-to-why-past-revolutions-have-failed.-Revolution-is-not-a-line-of-endeavour-that-I-see-as-being-productive.”

“I-am-entitled-to-join-it-to-try-and-convince-others-that-the-pursuit-of-revolution-is-unwise-and-that-our-efforts-may-be-better-directed.”

Of course you are “entitled” to join this thread. But if you don’t believe revolution is necessary or possible, then why do you even bother to? I would suggest that the only reason to do so is because you think it might be possible, and that people might think it is necessary, and you want to make sure that they don’t.

Whether you are “obliged” to study “for yourself’ and “for others” all depends on whether you really aspire to a fairer distribution of wealth or whether you just wish to pay lip service to the concept.

You don’t feel obliged to study what happened to the first revolution in which the working class took power, and how they were defeated. But you still feel that you are entitled draw a conclusion from your limited knowledge of it, and to convince others of your unstudied view on revolution. And you call me arrogant!!

You say you want a “fairer distribution of wealth” and that “incremental” change via social democracy within capitalism is the way to do it. Given that social democracy has been in operation for over a century, you must be arguing that it “works”. Well here are some figures that illustrate how capitalism and social democracy “works” to redistribute wealth “incrementally”.

Earlier this year he Australian National University’s Centre for Economic Policy Research released a paper The Distribution of Top Incomes in Australia tracking the history of income distribution of top income “earners”.
During the period 1921 to 1980 the share of income going to the wealthiest taxpayers declined e.g. from the top 1% receiving 10% of total income in the 1920s to 5% in 1980. The share if income received by the top 0.5% fell from 9% to 2.95%. The top 0.1%’s income dropped from 4% to 1%.
But from 1980 to 2002 the share of the top 1% rose from 5% in 1980 to 9% in 2002. The top 0.5%’s share doubled from 2.95% to 6% and the top 0.1%’s more than doubled to over 2% by the end of the 1990s.
Posted by tao, Saturday, 30 December 2006 11:17:06 AM
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The authors noted that within the general income distribution trend from 1980 on, “there is a distinct spike in 1988, following a large reduction in the top marginal tax rate (from 60 percent in 1985-86 to 49 percent in 1987-88) and the property price boom of the 1980s”. The Hawke-Keating governments cut the top marginal personal tax rate even further in 1990, down to 47 percent.
The introduction of the “imputation system” in 1987 by the Labor government was another major factor in the enrichment of the top 10 percent of taxpayers. In this system, the report explained, “part of any corporation tax paid is treated as a pre-payment of personal income tax”.
The imputation system, combined with a subsequent cut in the corporate tax rate from 47 percent to 36 percent meant that billions of dollars flowed to the wealthy, who rapidly increased the proportion of income they derived from non-salary sources such as dividends, and reduced the proportion coming from salary and wages. The increasing non-salary income underpinned the overall increase in the share of income going to the top 10 percent.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/sep2006/ineq-s18.shtml

The trend has now continued under the Howard Government.

So from an overall decline in the preceding 60 years, in just over a third of that time, due to the policies instigated by a “Social Democratic” government, the top income earners have restored their share of income, and the trend continues. That is some “incremental” change.

If you are “not obliged-to-do-the-study-for-you-and-to-find-the-solution-to-why-past-revolutions-have-failed” then are you at least obliged to find out why a Social Democratic government has facilitated a massive increase in wealth to the top 10% before championing Social Democrats as being able to deliver a “fairer” distribution of wealth? Why has Social Democracy failed? And why should anyone believe that it is the solution to our problems?

No doubt there are other "reasons" we should consider for these remarkable statistics.

More on the prospects for revolution later.
Posted by tao, Saturday, 30 December 2006 11:19:23 AM
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Tao. Of course I think a revolution may be possible and I have previously openly stated that I was happy to discourage others from seeing it as an effective solution to social woes in the West. If the populace want to rebel let them do it through the ballot box. I do not feel ashamed of advocating what I believe in. Democracy allows that I may prefer the retention of capitalism.
You can spend the rest of your days listing numerous examples of corporate greed that I no more approve of than you do. Democracy has the ability to react to social injustice though the pace may not meet your expectations. There will be periods of regression followed by steps forward. There was a period when we did not have an ACCC. There was a period when government social security was non-existent. Shareholders, via the superannuation funds which they own, are starting to rebel against the excesses of CEOs.
The achievements of capitalism are not a nett negative. I am happy to categorise prior attempts to introduce a socialist state as a nett negative and the populaces have rebelled against it. Stop worrying about my incremental approach failing because over the long haul it has not failed.
Try answering my requst that you provide a plausible non-violent mechanism whereby a communist state could protect itself from the insideous effects of the black markets that would seek to undermine it.
Indefinite railing against capitalism's excesses is not a defence of Marxist ideology, it is only a rationale for change which we both agree is warranted. Just start by telling us how your system is going to work without recourse to violence and restraint of free speech.
Posted by Logical?, Saturday, 30 December 2006 1:04:52 PM
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Logical,

You ask how a future socialist revolution has a better chance of succeeding than the Russian Revolution - ‘non violently’.

To start with, workers must recognize the role played by Social Democracy in previous revolutions, and make a decisive break with them.

The German Social Democratic Party started out as a socialist party, part of the Second International. At the beginning of WWI, the parliamentary wing of the SPD voted in parliament for war funding, enabling German capitalism to begin a war that led millions of the working class to slaughter. The left wing of the party, rightly considering the War as an imperialist war in the service of German capitalism, resigned from the party and formed the Spartacist League.

Note here, that German Social Democracy voted for war. Hardly non violent!

From then on, the SPD devoted itself entirely to the maintenance of the bourgeois order and saw itself as responsible for the suppression of any revolutionary change. When the Russian Revolution gave a powerful impulse to the socialist movement at the end of the war and the Kaiser was deposed in Germany, the SPD’s official party organ Vorwärts published advertisements for the counter-revolutionary Free Corps—the paramilitary war veterans organisation that later produced many of the leading Nazis.

While the SPD’s chairman and future president of the German Reich, Friedrich Ebert, cooperated with the military high command, his party friend Gustav Noske, as head of the military department, organised the bloody suppression of the Spartacist rebellion and allowed thousands of revolutionary workers to be slaughtered. The most prominent victims were Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht.

This was followed by the refusal of the SPD to fight alongside the communists against Hitler and the National Socialists. After Hitler’s rise to power, the social democratic trade union leaders offered to cooperate with the fascist regime, though this failed to save them from the concentration camps. Leon Trotsky wrote in 1932: “The most decrepit layer of decrepit capitalist Europe is the social democratic bureaucracy.” Extracted and quoted from http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/may2003/germ-m30.shtml, which I recommend you read.

cont...
Posted by tao, Saturday, 30 December 2006 7:08:18 PM
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Note here, the SPD didn’t just disagree with revolution, it actively recruited for a counter-revolutionary paramilitary organization which produced later Nazis, and organized the violent suppression of a revolution. Later it refused to fight with the communists against Hitler and co-operated with them. So not only, did the SPD pave the way for WW1, they enabled Hitler’s atrocities.

Now, it must be remembered that the leaders of the Russian Revolution (as international-socialists) took power of the technologically backward and undeveloped Russia on the basis that they believed that a revolution in more industrial European countries would follow, particularly Germany. However, the German Social Democrats (claiming to be socialist remember) actively played a counter-revolutionary role with “violence” directed against the working class. The defeat of the German Revolution was one of the factors in the isolation of the Soviet Union which eventually led to the usurpation of power by Stalin.

So that is the heritage of Social Democracy to which you claim allegiance.

As we can see, one of the most important factors in ensuring the success of future revolutions is recognizing that “Social Democrats”, despite pretensions of being friends of workers, are actually in the service of the bourgeoisie, the enemy of workers, and will use violence against them in the maintenance of private property and privilege.

So, if the bourgeoisie and their faithful servants, the Social Democrats, are prepared to use state violence against a revolution, what should workers fight with, books and proclamations of love?

And what of the “peaceful” option of voting for change? Workers voted for the ALP in 1983 and what happened? Hawke and Keating implemented policies that saw the top income earners increase their share of income. The other side of this is that the bottom income earners DECREASED their share of income. Apart from the tax changes previously described, the ALP and the union leadership entered into the Accord and deregulated the labour market – against the wishes of the workers mind you, paving the way for the current Workchoices legislation of the Howard Government.

But workers should stop worrying according to you.
Posted by tao, Saturday, 30 December 2006 11:17:57 PM
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Tao. I do not have allegiance to the history of German "social democracy" any more than you have (or so you say) allegiance to the history of "communist" Russia. I seek social change via democratic institutions rather than down the barrel of a gun.
Your claim that I support the proposition that "workers should stop worrying" is a fabrication.
I am enjoying reading "The Triumph of the Airheads" by Shelley Gare. It is an indictment of many aspects of capitalist society. It alerts the complacent to the need for reconsidering what is important. The key question is how to respond and that is where our paths diverge.
You finally answered my earlier question about how a future socialist revolution might have a better chance of succeeding than the Russian revolution, without recourse to violence and reduced civil liberties. You state "...what should workers fight with books and proclamations of love?". In other words you condone the use of violence to achieve your ends while condemning those who use violence to perpetuate their capitalist ends.
Your argument is that they started it so you can justify violent retaliation. You remain on that slippery slope that killed the Russian revolution and millions of its own citizens.
The definition of who constitutes the bourgeoisie and who are the incidious counter-revolutionaries keeps changing to suit the purposes of those who are willing to be the most vicious and most intent on achieving their goals. It becomes irrelevant whether their goals coincide with what I, and hopefully you, would regard as the legitimate expectations of the average man.
Your declared support for civil liberties is incompatible with your stance on how a revolution should occur. You deny the power of the word and of the leadership of individuals with genuine moral strength. Try Nelson Mandella as an example. Yes I know there was a period where Mandella supported armed insurrection. The final victory was however not based on the power of the gun. Martin Luther King also springs to mind. "I have a dream" will live on. Your impatience is the lifeblood of future dictators.
Posted by Logical?, Sunday, 31 December 2006 9:43:03 AM
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Tao
“one of the most vicious reactionary right wing posters on this forum – Col Rouge”

Boo hoo, Learn to Love and Embrace Free Speech.

“Reactionary”. The antonym is “progressive, radical”. I see nothing “progressive” or even “radical” in you.

If I read over your posts and my post, I see me as repeatedly recognizing the inevitability and benefits of change and you clinging, romantically, to the failed theories of a bloke who died over 100 years ago. In fact, if either of us is “reactionary” it is you.

“Reactionary” is simply a word which you, as you do best, miss-ascribe as a result of your small minded envy and vain attempts to antagonize.

You should open your mind to new ideas tao, instead of clinging to the past.

There have been other revolutions.

The French was followed by the Terror and ended in Bonaparte, whose rape of Europe spanned almost 15 years from Spain to Moscow. How close a comparison can be made between Stalin and Bonaparte? I would think, pretty close, Stalin’s rape of Eastern Europe and his support for oppressive dictatorial regimes, with their secret police torture chambers and gulags, was more brutal than Napoleon.

The Chinese Civil War saw the Communists prevail. Was Mao a demi-god?

He certainly was and a despot who enslaved the people his war was supposed to liberate. Controlling their reading and thoughts. Torturing, murdering and imprisoning those who dared think differently.

Let’s think about the Hungarian Revolution (or “1956 uprising” as it is better known). When Hungarians vainly fought to remove the fetters of their USSR masters.

Or Czechoslovakia’s “Prague Spring” in 1968.
That was a peaceful revolution, mercilessly crushed by “Stalin’s Successors”.
Although Moscow’s butchers had less success against the “Velvet Revolution” in 1989.

What about the Romanian Revolution of 1989, where did Ceaucescu end up?

I feel a Cuban revolution in the air. Something to purge the memory of that defiler, Castro from Havana.

North Korea will follow too. The bastardry of Kim Jong Il to be erased and the suffering of the North Korean people ended.
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 31 December 2006 12:33:19 PM
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Logical? Well posted.

I think you are right, the wealth and liberties which capitalism brings can be easily eroded by those who feel some form of envy which can be left to fester into an “anarchistic romance”
.
The capitalist state has, by its nature, fewer instruments of control over its citizenry than the communist / socialist (which demands central government and state control at the expense of individual liberty).

In this way, capitalisms greatest strength, freedom of the individual (from which flows personal wealth innovation and inventiveness), is its greatest weakness (jealousy of those who contribute more and are rewarded appropriately).

Just as communism / socialism’s greatest strength, strict control of individuals (stifling individuals and their ideas), is its most offensive and detrimental attribute (economic and social stagnation enforced with murder and torture).

As for “Your impatience is the lifeblood of future dictators.”

Brilliant, I wish I had penned that. I will borrow it (and credit you – no plagiarism) in the future.
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 31 December 2006 12:53:01 PM
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Logical,

Do you think capitalism came into being non-violently?

Do you think the millions of people who made up the ‘original’ working class of Europe left the land by which they sustained themselves of their own free will? Do you think millions of them just up and decided that they would leave the land which they were entitled under Feudal society to work, and their homes, to go and be propertyless labourers in industrial capitals, living in slums with no guarantee of an income, a roof over their heads and food on their table?

No - they were driven from their land by force. And to this day they remain separated from the land, and the means of production to sustain themselves, which they are still rightly entitled to as human beings, by state force. The means of production of the entire world are privately held in the hands of a small section of society. The only way this can ultimately be maintained is by the threat of violence, and the actual use of violence.

They are not going to give it up “peacefully” through voting or anything else. They have put in place the “democracy” which works to serve them. They own the media which propagates the ideas that they are entitled to private property and the poor have only themselves to blame. They decide which political parties are acceptable and deny the rest media coverage. They control the education system which propagates their version of society and history. They control the police and the armies, the courts and the “institutions”. They will use all the ‘democratic’ tricks they can muster – “social-democracy” is one of those tricks, and if that fails they will use violence.

In ‘Their Morals and Ours’ Leon Trotsky pointed out that “history has different yardsticks for the cruelty” of the oppressed and the oppressor. “A slave-owner who through cunning and violence shackles a slave in chains, and a slave who through cunning or violence breaks the chains – let not the contemptible eunuchs tell us that they are equals before a court of morality!”
Posted by tao, Sunday, 31 December 2006 1:04:44 PM
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You, in your “committed” civil libertarianism, could probably see that the only way a man could have become a slave is through a denial of his “civil liberties”, through violence, or threat of violence – a slave wouldn’t willingly be shackled. And the only way he could remain a slave is by the propagation of “ideas” that he is somehow inferior to a non-slave, and that the slave holder is therefore justified in “owning” a sub-human being like an animal. And the ultimate way of keeping him in slavery is through violence or the threat of violence, and the lack of any other options (i.e. society considers slave-holding legitimate and will use collective violence in the maintenance of the slave system, making a ‘freed’ slave a marked man).

Would you begrudge a slave using whatever means necessary to free himself? Would you “condone” his use of violence? Or would you tell him he should submit to the “legitimate” authority of the slave-holder and the slave-holder’s ‘laws’ and ‘morality’? Would you tell him to use books and words, when books were denied him and dissenting words were punished with a whipping.

Indeed the end to slavery in the US was won through the ‘violence’ of civil war, even though a ‘democracy’ existed. Do you think the northerner’s shouldn’t have used violence? Should they have only used ‘peaceful’ means against systematized violence?

The acknowledgement that violence is sometimes necessary is not the same as advocating violence. And using violence to free oneself from oppression is an entirely different thing than using it oppress.

The Russian Revolution spontaneously began by people – women actually - taking to the streets demanding bread (you know – to eat), an end to autocracy, and an end to war. Reasonable requests, and hardly ‘violent’ - “legitimate expectations of the average man” I would have thought. And the movement grew from there.

But violence was used against them – in an effort to deny their demands for bread, an end to autocracy, and an end to war. How do you explain and justify that?
Posted by tao, Sunday, 31 December 2006 1:09:35 PM
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Tao. Your paranoia about all our institutions is showing through.I have not excluded the possibility that violence can occasionally be morally justified. However I have a strong preference for the ballot box, reasoned argument and civil disobedience. The latter actually work in democratic states. They do not exist or work in dictatorships where dissent is ruthlessly and routinely supressed.
You have repeatedly refused to explain what features your revolution would have that would stop it morphing into yet another totalitarian state.
At this juncture I intend to leave this thread. Feel free to interpret this as admission of defeat if that helps your ego. I can only hope that if others have being silently following this thread they will adopt evolution over revolution. In the mean time you remain free, in this wonderful democracy, to support actions that would pull it asunder.
Posted by Logical?, Sunday, 31 December 2006 2:50:40 PM
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Logical,

Of course, you are free to leave this thread. Free to end “reasoned argument” in which you have failed to offer detailed analysis of why social democracy has resulted in a redistribution of wealth towards the rich. Free to end reasoned argument as to why social democracy voted for war, and why it turned on workers. Free to end reasoned argument about why the first revolution in which the working class took power was defeated through violence with the aid of social democracy. These things are not unrelated, and require extensive study and elaboration, but you choose not to do so.

I on the other hand, you require me to provide simplistic answers to a question that is extremely complex:

“You-have-repeatedly-refused-to-explain-what-features-your-revolution-would-have-that-would-stop-it-morphing-into-yet-another-totalitarian-state.”

On the contrary, I have explained to you reasonably, that such a guarantee cannot be made, but that, as in all human endeavours, we have to learn from past experiences, and that a setback is no reason to give up and accept the massive social inequality that exists in, and is perpetuated by the capitalist system. I have also provided examples of things that affected the course of a revolution, which are out of the control of those who carry it out.

You somehow think that I can, in the course of a few days, with a limit of 1400 words per day, sum up all of the problems faced by the working class in the 20th century, and how they can avoid the traps in the future.

Perhaps that is the method by which Social Democrats operate with a few trite slogans “its time” and “no child will live in poverty by 1990”, “the ladder of opportunity” and “a bridge too far, but not far enough”. However, Marxists engage in much more in depth study of events and examine more than their superficial appearance and then as Lenin insisted, “patiently explain”.
Posted by tao, Monday, 1 January 2007 12:47:06 AM
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Given that I have had to spend much of my word limit refuting the most basic errors in your (and Col’s) conceptions, assumptions, and simplistic statements (another demonstration follows below), I have hardly had the space to elaborate on anything else. But by all means, feel free to leave now and end our “reasoned debate”.

“However-I-have-a-strong-preference-for-the-ballot-box,-reasoned-argument-and-civil-disobedience.-The-latter-actually-work-in-democratic-states.”

Really? Before the start of the Iraq war, millions took to the streets all over the world (in civil disobedience) against the war. Did it work?

Reasoned argument was obliterated with lies and fabricated “intelligence” and simplistic cries of good versus evil. Did it work?

Recently, the US people came out to vote against the war, but both parties (including the equivalent of social democracy) in their “democracy” are now preparing to escalate the war. Did the ballot box work?

What option do the American people, and indeed the world’s people, have now? No doubt you will (if you bother to stay on this thread) come up with some more excuses for bourgeois democracy, which will need refuting. At the very least they must build a new mass party of the international working class.

“I-have-not-excluded-the-possibility-that-violence-can-occasionally-be-morally-justified.”--“In-other-words-you-condone-the-use-of-violence-to-achieve-your-ends-while-condemning-those-who-use-violence-to-perpetuate-their-capitalist-ends.”

Actually Logical, you appear to condone the use of violence (by cowardly ignoring and avoiding discussion of it) by capitalists as “morally justified”, but condemn those who use it to free themselves.

And hopefully anyone who has been “silently following this thread” studies Marxists, particularly Trotsky, who unswervingly struggled against Stalinism and for Marxism until the end of his life (killed by Stalin’s henchman). Hopefully, at the very least, if they find themselves in a revolutionary situation, they remember to look below the surface of what is said by social democratic politicians to what they actually do.

So by all means, escape this thread and end our “reasoned debate”. “Feel-free-to-interpret-this-as-admission-of-defeat-if-that-helps-your-ego”. No, I don’t interpret it as an admission of defeat. More like a cowardly withdrawal in the face of possible defeat (a la Whitlam), something social democrats do all too well.
Posted by tao, Monday, 1 January 2007 12:52:35 AM
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Tao “Before the start of the Iraq war, millions took to the streets all over the world (in civil disobedience) against the war. Did it work?”

No but hundreds of millions, who supported the governments did not “take to the streets”

And those who did “take to the streets” - they were disobeying the capitalist governments which they participated in elections to govern.

Did the capitalist governments open up with guns and shoot them?

Did their government send in tanks and crush them?

I recall

Beijing 1989, the communist government crushed people with tanks.

I recall Hungary 1956, the communist government of Russia crushed people with tanks.

I recall the anti-communist uprisings in Ukraine, Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Romania, Bulgaria and a dozen more, where people took to the streets and the communists regimes collapsed.

Why did the communist regimes, with their secret police, fail in the face of public protest and the capitalist regime, without the same “offices of oppression”, sustain the dissent of what you claim were the “millions took to the streets all over the world (in civil disobedience) “ ?

I look forward to seeing your answer to that tao.

Seems to me, tao, you have a very limited and selective memory regarding social revolutions.
Posted by Col Rouge, Monday, 1 January 2007 7:16:09 AM
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Col,

I see little point in continuing any discussion with you because, at some point in a debate, there should be agreement on certain points, otherwise the discussion will continue at cross-purposes.

In this particular discussion I consider that a fundamental issue is the definition of “communism”. Marxist theory conceives of communism as an international (or probably more precisely a world community in which there are no nations), classless society in which the state has withered away i.e. there is no state. From this conception it follows that there has never been a communist state. It seems reasonable that, if we are going to be discussing the consequences of “Marxism”, then we ought to be using Marx’s conception of socialism and communism.

You however, persist in referring to certain past or existing states or regimes as “communist”. You are using a different definition to the Marxist conception. It is impossible to go on unless we recognize this difference and come to an agreement about what we are actually talking about.

Further, Marxist theory does not lump all states, or revolutions, in the same basket. It analyses the social composition of each, its internal contradictions and antagonisms, and its relation to other states and the global economy. It also doesn’t use static definitions, but analyses the various stages and aspects of phenomena.
Posted by tao, Monday, 1 January 2007 1:41:36 PM
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..cont...

For example (a little simplistically), the Russian Revolution was a socialist revolution because the working class took power i.e. the Boleshviks’ social support was the working class. However, the Chinese Revolution was not a socialist revolution because Mao’s social support was the peasantry, in fact thousands of the working class were slaughtered. The Cuban Revolution was not a socialist revolution because Castro’s social support was the petty bourgeoisie – Marxists consider Castro a petty-bourgeois nationalist. And none of the resulting states can be considered a “communist state”.

Marxist theory is above all a scientific method of analysis and a guide to action. In a scientific discussion, if the molecular formula of water is H2O, confusion will ensue if someone believes that the composition of water is H2O2 (which is actually hydrogen peroxide – or bleach). And in practice, there will be a remarkably different result if you apply H2O to your hair, or H2O2. It is important that we know the difference.

So as you can see (I hope), unless we can come to some agreement on some basic issues, further discussion is futile.

If you would like to continue this discussion then please begin by suggesting how we might come to some agreement.

Happy New Year.
Posted by tao, Monday, 1 January 2007 1:44:45 PM
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Tao “You are using a different definition to the Marxist conception.”

I believe you are referring to some textbook definition.

I am working on an understanding of what actually happens (interpretation of actual events).

It is like the bumble bee, theory is the size of bumble bee's wing is insufficient to generate lift to allow it to fly.

Yet, bumble bees fly.

In the context of collectivism, communism, socialism, fascism and most other theories for organizing mankind into the most efficient form; the success of the theory : practice to the bumble bee is opposite.

The theory says it works.

The practice is, it does not, except, sometimes, in small groups where all participants are close to one another and bound by more than geographic proximity.

“You however, persist in referring to certain past or existing states or regimes as “communist”.”

I am describing those states known as “communist” as those who claimed, in practice, to be “communist”.

I describe those states who are basically capitalist (free and private ownership of property and means of production) as capitalist.

“Marxist theory is above all a scientific method of analysis and a guide to action.”

There in lies the problem.

Your Marxist theories ignore the “Art of Man”.

Science is “logic”, “reason” and based on “proven” testing and observation.

“Communism” is result of testing and observation of “Marxist theory”.

Mankind is more than logic, reason and the result of tests. He is subjective, artistic and contrary. He is less motivated by reason than he is by emotion.

Mozart will always inspire more folk than Marx.

“Marxism” is a fatally flawed theory which presumes to simplify and qualify the “chaos of the inventive / creative mind” in attempt to harness its energy.

An analogy: generate electricity from a lightning bolt.

It only works if you know where and when the next lightning bolt will occur and have some method to store the resultant energy resource, for later practical use.

Capitalism allows for any individual to risk his own resources in speculating where the bolt will strike and benefit from its collection.
Continued
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 7:39:48 AM
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Capitalism is an intuitive social system. Everyone responds individually to their perceived circumstances. They decide, as individuals, which choices to make and which paths to take.

Some will succeed and others will fail.

Some will benefit from inherited material wealth, most of us will not.

Some will grow wealthy and others will not.

BUT

Because everyone is dealing with their own decisions and not decisions imposed upon them, even those who fail can gain personal growth through the trial and error of their own choices.

Ultimately, we are here to fulfill our individually definitions for the “pursuit of happiness”.
Marxism cannot define what someone’s “happiness” is.
Capitalism does not attempt to bother.

Capitalism recognizes that sometimes rules need to be adopted and enforced, example, rules against lying and cheating and rules (capitalist example Enron) against abuse of power (capitalist example Standard Oil (Esso)).

Capitalism recognizes that to curb the excesses of too much power, government needs to be a regulator.

Communism (the practical result of Marxist theories), demands the concentration of all power in the one authority. The same corruption which produced Enron and Esso is hidden from public scrutiny because the corrupt State also controls the media and all means of communication.

So tao, “If you would like to continue this discussion then please begin by suggesting how we might come to some agreement.”

I am happy to defend theoretical and practical Capitalism and recognize the consequences of its shortcomings (disproportionate wealth, need for intervention against Monopolistic power and the Enrons / HIH / FIA etc).

I suggest you stop cherry picking and trying to distance the theories of Marxism from the negative outcomes of Marxism in practice.

I am an accountant. Reason and logic are my stock in trade but I know that an ounce of emotion will weigh heavier than a tonne of reasons
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 7:49:24 AM
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All human advancement has been achieved by individuals with an emotional investment in their success (Edison and the light bulb etc), regardless of the logic and reasoning of the "emotionally uninvolved", who would have given up or not bothered.

The energy and benefits of that emotional investment is completely lost in societies ordered by Marxist theories.

The energy and benefits of that emotional investment is rewarded in a capitalist system.

And the greater overall benefits derived form those inventive souls is either lost (communism) or shared through commerce (capitalism).

Sharing, disproportionately, the benefits

is better than sharing nothing, equally.

That said, this OLO gives you choice to continue or retire. I choose to continue, you can do as you wish.

I too wish you all success in 2007 for every aspect of your personal life (but not in your aspirations for social order :) ).
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 7:54:07 AM
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Col,

“Tao “You are using a different definition to the Marxist conception.”

I believe you are referring to some textbook definition.

I am working on an understanding of what actually happens (interpretation of actual events).”

The central question is – do you acknowledge that the USSR, China, Cuba, North Korea, etc. do not accord with Marx’s conception of communism? It is not difficult for you to find out what he and other Marxists believed communism would be like – here are a few examples http://marxists.anu.edu.au/glossary/terms/c/o.htm#communism

I am not asking for your understanding of what “communism” means, or Margaret Thatcher’s understanding of what it means, or even Stalin’s understanding of what it means.

I am asking whether you can agree that Marx’s and the Marxist conception of communism IS NOT REFLECTED in the Stalinist form of the USSR etc.

A simple question really, one which a person of your obvious intelligence should have no problem with.
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 9:11:35 PM
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tao "The central question is – do you acknowledge that the USSR, China, Cuba, North Korea, etc. do not accord with Marx’s conception of communism? "

Asked and Answered

I repeat

"I am working on an understanding of what actually happens (interpretation of actual events).”

That is what matters, what actually happens not what MArx theorised should happen.

I could have a theory about turning lead into gold. I could document that theory and receive acclaim for it. Then I die and are buried in Highgate Cemetery.

Then 100 years later people at OLO argue my theory, regarding turning lead into gold and one of them identifies some of the failed attempts to produce gold from lead and notes that not one practical test has ever worked.

That is what you are doing tao, arguing in support of a "theory" which the test of "practical experience" has proved just does not work.

The old saying is very true, Power Corrupts, Absolute power corrupts Absolutely. The centalisation of all power within a single organ of state, away from individual power, produces the "absolute".

Using your source reference I quote

"Empirically, communism is only possible as the act of the dominant peoples "all at once" and simultaneously, which presupposes the universal development of productive forces and the world intercourse bound up with communism. "

Unfortunately, as we saw with Stalin and every other communist dictator, the "dominant peoples", once thay have wielded power, are reluctant to share or surrender it.

I like practical things, theories which analyse, quantify and describe what actually happens.

Newton, gravity and apples falling on heads.

According to you Marxism represents a set of theories, which have never been practiced, only corruptly misrepresented.

The nearest test of Marxism in practice is communism as it occured in USSR, China, Cuba, North Korea, etc.

We both know another "test" of the theory will be as corrupt and horrific as those tests.

Better we all have individual power and bugger the collective.
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 2 January 2007 9:54:42 PM
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So predictable Col, I knew as I posted the link which quote you would cherry pick.

And I knew you would take it out of context and misconstrue its meaning – your modus operandi it would seem.

Your religious aversion to providing a simple honest answer to a simple question merely indicates how aware you are that your argument is built like a house of cards.

There is no point continuing a discussion with someone who evades such a small question, but such an important one.

You can evade all you like, but it doesn’t alter the truth, and it doesn’t make you honest.

As Trotsky once wrote in response to mealy mouthed protestations of the lack of “democracy” in Russia:

“we have never and nowhere denied that our regime is one class of revolutionary dictatorship, and not a democracy, standing above class, relying upon itself for stability. We did not lie like the Georgian Mensheviks and their apologists. We are accustomed to call a spade a spade. When we take away political rights from the bourgeoisie and its political servants, we do not resort to democratic disguises, we act openly. We enforce the revolutionary right of the victorious proletariat. When we shoot our enemies we do not say it is the sound of the Aeolian harps of democracy. An honest revolutionary policy above all avoids throwing dust in the eyes of the masses.”

Bush & Co. are still spreading the Aeolian harps of democracy.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 4 January 2007 12:46:58 AM
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... cont...

Bourgeois “democracy” is merely the disguise of the dictatorship of the capitalist class.

As for what Marxist theory leads to in practice, I recommend that you read the following 1919 and1920 reports on Russia’s development, and the prospects of bringing down the Soviet Government, written by Arthur Ransom, a British MI6 Agent
http://www.marxists.org/history/archive/ransome/works/1919-russia/index.htm
http://www.marxists.org/history/archive/ransome/works/crisis/index.htm.

The reports offer an interesting insight into conditions in the early Soviet Union, the reality of which seems quite different from your absolute, unconditional portrayals.

Interestingly, with regard to your comments on Stalin’s similarity to Bonaparte, this little comment was included as a postscript to the second report:

“Should a Russian Napoleon (an unlikely figure, even in spite of our efforts) appear, he will not throw away the invaluable asset of a revolutionary war-cry. He will have to fight some one, or he will not be a Napoleon. And whom will he fight but the very people who, by keeping up the friction, have rubbed Aladdin's ring so hard and so long that a Djinn, by no means kindly disposed towards them, bursts forth at last to avenge the breaking of his sleep?”

It appears that the British bourgeoisie and their allies consciously wanted, and actively worked toward, a Bonapartist regime.

Funnily enough, this indicates two things:

1) British capitalists knew enough to know that would it require much more than Marxist theory to create a Russian Bonaparte, such as outside financial and military intervention slaughtering and causing hardship and death of many people, and economic blockades to keep the people in poverty.

2) The representatives of British capitalism demonstrated a complexity, and astuteness, of economic, social and political thought not possessed by you.

It appears the capitalists got what they wanted. And as it turned out, Stalin rendered greater assistance to the maintenance of capitalism than he did to socialism.

Another case of spreading the Aeolian harps of democracy.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 4 January 2007 1:05:35 AM
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...cont...

Bourgeois “democracy” is merely the disguise of the dictatorship of the capitalist class.

As for what Marxist theory leads to in practice, I recommend that you read the following 1919 and1920 reports on Russia’s development, and the prospects of bringing down the Soviet Government, written by Arthur Ransom, a British MI6 Agent
http://www.marxists.org/history/archive/ransome/works/1919-russia/index.htm
http://www.marxists.org/history/archive/ransome/works/crisis/index.htm.

The reports offer an interesting insight into conditions in the early Soviet Union, the reality of which seems quite different from your absolute, unconditional portrayals.

Interestingly, with regard to your comments on Stalin’s similarity to Bonaparte, this little comment was included as a postscript to the second report:

“Should a Russian Napoleon (an unlikely figure, even in spite of our efforts) appear, he will not throw away the invaluable asset of a revolutionary war-cry. He will have to fight some one, or he will not be a Napoleon. And whom will he fight but the very people who, by keeping up the friction, have rubbed Aladdin's ring so hard and so long that a Djinn, by no means kindly disposed towards them, bursts forth at last to avenge the breaking of his sleep?”

It appears that the British bourgeoisie and their allies consciously wanted, and actively worked toward, a Bonapartist regime.

Funnily enough, this indicates two things:

1) British capitalists knew enough to know that would it require much more than Marxist theory to create a Russian Bonaparte, such as outside financial and military intervention causing hardship and death of many people, and economic blockades to keep the people in poverty.

2) The representatives of British capitalism demonstrated a complexity, and astuteness, of economic, social and political thought not possessed by you.

It appears the capitalists got what they wanted. And as it turned out, Stalin rendered greater assistance to the maintenance of capitalism than he did to socialism.

Another case of spreading the Aeolian harps of democracy.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 4 January 2007 1:09:16 AM
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Sorry,

I didn’t mean to repeat the last post. I am on holidays and the computer I am using is playing tricks on me.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 4 January 2007 1:29:08 AM
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I had undertaken to abandon this thread because I could not extract from you an explanation of the steps you would take to avoid a repetition of the failures of prior revolutions. I remain of the opinion that it is pointless debating you because you cannot get beyond talking of the need for further study and learning from the past. After all your study you remain unwilling or unable to offer one concrete suggestion that would result in a future revolution not decending into depravity.
Col has put the same proposition to you with his "lead into gold" analogy and you again refuse to offer a rationale for wanting to repeat, yet again, a failed experiment. It is not as if past failures have been free of human cost.
My return as a contributor is solely to alert any onlookers to your breath-taking hypocrisy. I have no expectation that you will ever answer why the experiment should be re-run. Nor, given your hypocrisy, would I trust you to abide by some new guiding principle that you might espouse for the next revolution.
(Continued)
Posted by Logical?, Thursday, 4 January 2007 10:13:55 AM
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What is the proof of your hypocricy? In your last post you quoted and approved of the following sentiments of Trotsky:
“we have never and nowhere denied that our regime is one class of revolutionary dictatorship, and not a democracy, standing above class, relying upon itself for stability. We did not lie like the Georgian Mensheviks and their apologists. We are accustomed to call a spade a spade. When we take away political rights from the bourgeoisie and its political servants, we do not resort to democratic disguises, we act openly. We enforce the revolutionary right of the victorious proletariat. When we shoot our enemies we do not say it is the sound of the Aeolian harps of democracy. An honest revolutionary policy above all avoids throwing dust in the eyes of the masses.”
This sentiment is utterly incompatible with professing a genuine interest in civil liberties for all citizens. In your post to my thread on "Freedom of the press versus civil liberties" you posture as a protector of the civil liberties of Jihad Jack Thomas when you raise the legitimate question of whether he is a victim of double jeopardy. Your dishonesty in feigning an interest in the fundamental rights of the individual, versus the State, while supporting Trotsky's sentiments is breath taking.
Posted by Logical?, Thursday, 4 January 2007 10:14:41 AM
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Hello Logical,

Welcome back.

I explained to you that no-one can guarantee anything in the future. Yet you seem to be sure that social democracy will work, although it has, up until this point, despite ample opportunity, “failed” to guarantee a fairer distribution of wealth, and in fact reversed earlier gains of workers.

I also explained that, as I had been refuting your repeated uninformed errors, I hadn’t had enough space to elaborate. If you would care to hang around, I would be happy to explain the difficulties faced by the first workers’ state, some of the reasons for its defeat, and things that could be different in the future. But I’d guess you don’t have the patience for that and will run away again.

Further to your accusations of hypocrisy, I suggest you calm down, and take a look in the mirror.

As for my supposed “posturing” as a protector of civil liberties, I merely entered your thread to ask you, a professed “committed civil libertarian” your view on double jeopardy which is as you say, a legitimate question. I was interested in whether, as a “committed civil libertarian” you would find the overturning of a longstanding protection of an individual’s rights against a malignant State alarming.

As I suspected you would, you defended the actions of the State to overturn a protection of the individual against it.

Has it not gone unnoticed to you that a lot of civil liberties are flying out the window at present? New sedition laws, ant-terror laws which enable people to be locked up virtually at the behest of the government, “secret evidence”, control orders, mandatory detention (including of children), and deportations of Australian residents/citizens. Not to mention David Hick’s five year denial of habeas corpus and our government’s failure to secure his release, or a speedy trial.

All of this in a climate in which our government has launched an aggressive war in contravention of international law, based on lies, which has resulted in the deaths of more than 650,000 people.
Posted by tao, Friday, 5 January 2007 10:45:57 PM
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…cont…

The erosion of our civil liberties is being done in the name of protecting our democratic way of life.

And yet you see nothing wrong with throwing out another civil liberty.

Breathtaking!

As for your accusation that I am in “feigning an interest in the fundamental rights of the individual, versus the State”, “dishonestly” no less, lets see if you can follow my position:

I “honestly” take an interest in the rights of the individual against the State because I recognise that concepts such as habeus corpus and double jeopardy are progressive steps taken by smarter and more experienced people than me to protect individuals from all powerful Monarchs, and States which actually exist to protect the interests of the few. Such democratic measures are a progressive aspect of bourgeois democracy.

The fact that bourgeois democracy is now systematically repudiating its own laws and protections is an indication that the economic basis upon which bourgeois democracy arose, and exists, is in serious crisis. It is no longer able to guarantee civil liberties, and must take measures to stifle and even eliminate dissent. Whether or not Jack Thomas, or David Hicks are guilty of what they are accused of is in some ways irrelevant (and of course they have not yet been proven guilty), centuries old principals of law are being violated. (For the record, I am horrified on both a personal and political level that they have been treated the way that they have).

As to my “interest” in civil liberties being incompatible with my support of Trotsky’s sentiments, I return you to the point on which you scarpered last time. There is a difference between violence used to oppress and violence used to break free from the oppressor.

Many bourgeois democracies only came into being through the violence of revolution. Revolutionaries, and the economic class for whom they are fighting, establish their dominance through violence, and then set about building their new order. In order to secure their conquests, they must eliminate the relics of the old.
Posted by tao, Friday, 5 January 2007 10:46:29 PM
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… cont…

They would prefer to do it non-violently, but if it comes to a choice between violence and counter-revolution, to protect their gains they will use violence.

In fact the American Revolution was the birth of the greatest bourgeois democracy in the world. In the Declaration of Independence, the American founding fathers recognised the right of the people to overthrow their government if it becomes destructive:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.—That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, —That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”

And this is the basis upon which the Russian Revolution, and other attempted socialist revolutions have taken place. The Russian Revolution did not occur in a vacuum, and the socialists formulated their views from the horrific conditions of workers and peasants in Europe. After the senseless slaughter, destruction and deprivation of WWI (the epitome of the destructive government which needs replacing), the workers of Europe themselves rose up, wishing to reorganise society on the principals they thought most likely to effect THEIR safety and happiness.

But the capitalist “democrats” wouldn’t let them, and used various “undemocratic” means, including violence, in their counter-revolutionary efforts. This is the basis on which Trotsky wrote his words to the Social Democrats who “democratically” voted for the violent slaughter of millions in WWI despite being elected to parliament on a platform of no war, and who financially and militarily aided counter-revolutionary remnants of the decayed and despotic Tsarist order which slaughtered workers and peasants:
Posted by tao, Friday, 5 January 2007 10:47:18 PM
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…cont…

“we have never and nowhere denied that our regime is one class of revolutionary dictatorship, and not a democracy, standing above class, relying upon itself for stability. We did not lie like the Georgian Mensheviks and their apologists. We are accustomed to call a spade a spade. When we take away political rights from the bourgeoisie and its political servants, we do not resort to democratic disguises, we act openly. We enforce the revolutionary right of the victorious proletariat. When we shoot our enemies we do not say it is the sound of the Aeolian harps of democracy. An honest revolutionary policy above all avoids throwing dust in the eyes of the masses.”

Trotsky did not deny the necessity for violence, and he didn’t make excuses for it, nor did the Bolsheviks hide behind the cloak of “democracy”.

And before you interject with your protestations that this was a sure path to Stalin, remember that the capitalist “democrats’”, through their constant ‘violent’ attacks and economic blockades, violent suppression of revolutions in neighbouring countries, all in the service of the very same violent oppressors which plunged Europe into war, isolated and further impoverished the already devastated Russia, ultimately creating the conditions for the usurpation of power by Stalin. (See my earlier post to Col (the repeated one) about the British MI6 Agent, and read his reports). Trotsky fought against Stalin and paid with his life.

I suggest Logical, before wading in with your unfounded and uneducated assumptions about revolutions, with your abstract concepts of non-violence, civil liberties, and democracy which you are happy to dispense with at the suggestion of the State, and your supercilious moralising, you study some history. A starting point would be that of your political orientation, and of its role in the making of war, and in revolutions.

And if you should happen to pipe up again, with your flying swipe at me, have the guts to stick around and “reasonably” argue out the points you make.
Posted by tao, Friday, 5 January 2007 10:47:49 PM
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Tao, yes Trotsky did fight against Stalin and the one good thing which Stalin did do was to disempower Trotsky (maybe having him murdered was going a bit far but as we all know, Stalin had a flair for that sort of thing, give or take 50 million people, but as he said, “one death is a tragedy, a million a statistic”).

Trotsky’s notions of eternal revolution were as mad as Mao’s “cultural revolution” agenda and likely as manic, egocentric and obsessive.

Basically you are not responding to questions asked, all you do is get up on your high horse and scream communist jibberish at us as if you think we read it all and be instantly converted.

I suggest try challenging my “alchemy” analogy!

I return to my basic percept of what actually happens when a socialist / communist government gains power

1 murder the educated, the land and property owners and all other “running dogs of capitalism”, (as in USSR, China, Cambodia, Cuba, Eastern Europe etc) and forcibly re-educate and censor the ideas of the rest.

Compare that to what happens when political parties change in Capitalist countries – well nothing, business as usual on day two, tickle the national agenda to fall in line with the party manifesto but very few people murdered of sent to be re-educated (soft-speak for concentration camp)

2 reduce the living standards of those who are left, to fund a disproportionate amount of resource spent on recruiting secret police to route out dissenters.

So, do the supposed benefit of Marxism warrant the millions murdered, interned, exiled and dehumanized?

Since I would certainly be one of the exiled (if not murdered) I would suggest no, the supposed benefits of Marxism do not warrant the risk of being dead.

And don’t suppose your position would be that rosey either if we were ever to go down a communist path, the first people who Stalin bumped off were the central committee and anyone who could even remotely challenge him.

Just remember, it is not only the workers but the bourgeoisie who have rights too.
Posted by Col Rouge, Saturday, 6 January 2007 4:01:14 AM
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Tao, I do not lack the courage to debate you but their comes a point of recognising that you will never supply any detail of how your desired revolution would turn out differently to prior attemts to impose universal socialism. Your indefinitely railing against the shortcomings of capitalism and social-democrats does not constitute an answer to the above question, it only presents your rationale for change by violent means.
I return to your original quote from Trotsky:
“we have never and nowhere denied that our regime is one class of revolutionary dictatorship, and not a democracy, standing above class, relying upon itself for stability. We did not lie like the Georgian Mensheviks and their apologists. We are accustomed to call a spade a spade. When we take away political rights from the bourgeoisie and its political servants, we do not resort to democratic disguises, we act openly. We enforce the revolutionary right of the victorious proletariat. When we shoot our enemies we do not say it is the sound of the Aeolian harps of democracy. An honest revolutionary policy above all avoids throwing dust in the eyes of the masses.”
You remain unable to recognise that, until you can answer my above question, the victorious proletariat will become Stalin and his ilk. Calling it revolutionary dictatorship does not subtract from it being, at heart, a dictatorship. Even the most benign dictatorship is incompatible with universal civil liberties.
Your tirade against how civil liberties have been infringed by capitalist societies does not explain your inconsistency of supporting the above sentiments of Trotsky while professing that:
"I “honestly” take an interest in the rights of the individual against the State because I recognise that concepts such as habeus corpus and double jeopardy are progressive steps taken by smarter and more experienced people than me to protect individuals from all powerful Monarchs, and States which actually exist to protect the interests of the few. Such democratic measures are a progressive aspect of bourgeois democracy."
(continued)
Posted by Logical?, Saturday, 6 January 2007 7:32:12 AM
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Your seem unable or unwilling to recognise that "States which actually exist to protect the interests of the few" are spawned by dictatorships, Whether the State's guiding star is a belief in capitalism or in socialism becomes irrelevant once it is allowed to be a dictatorship. Dictatorships are fertile ground for those who seek power for powers sake and their personal benefit. We return as always to your inability to explain why your dictator will be any different to past dictators.
You have a few choices. 1)Continue to be a hypocrite for the reasons I have outlined or 2)Acknowledge you had not realised that dictatorships and civil liberties were inherantly incompatible or 3)Explain to us how your dictatorship will not destroy even basic civil liberties as has occured with all prior attemts to establish your goal.
Stop telling us about how your enemies have always tried to thwart you just tell us your solution to those obstructions and how that solution is compatible with civil liberties existing 50 years down the track.
Your other quote:
"As to my “interest” in civil liberties being incompatible with my support of Trotsky’s sentiments, I return you to the point on which you scarpered last time. There is a difference between violence used to oppress and violence used to break free from the oppressor."
An acknowledgement of this proposition does not absolve you from the obligation of explaining how having "brocken free" you stop turning into the new oppressor. The concept that this is achieved via an ongoing dictatorship strikes me as absurd. Precisely how does a dictatorship avoid oppression? I suppose it reaches that happy state once it has killed all those who believe the dictatorship's edicts represent oppression. Oppression actually includes civil liberties as well as material goods.
Posted by Logical?, Saturday, 6 January 2007 7:33:13 AM
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I was looking for something else when I came across this website - SOVIET POLITICAL JOKES

http://www.geocities.com/troys_tales/jokes.html

From which I extracted the following (conveniently translated from the Russian”)

“'Tell me-is this already communism or will it be worse yet?'”

OR

A socialist, a capitalist and a communist agreed to meet. The socialist was late. 'Excuse me for being late, I was standing in a queue for sausages.'
'And what is a queue?' the capitalist asked.
'And what is a sausage?' the communist asked.
OR

(Darker)

Will there be KGB in communism?
No, by then people will have learned to arrest themselves.
OR
'Is communism a science?'
'No. If it were a science, it would have been tested on dogs first.'

Try
What nationality were Adam and Eve?
Most certainly Russian! Only Russians can run about barefooted and bare assed, without a roof over their heads, where there is only one apple for two and nevertheless cry out that they are in paradise!

Maybe

Why have the newer models of TVs been equipped with screen wipers, similar to the windshield wipers on a car?
Because people are frequently spitting at the screen.

But this is my favourite

Why is the Soviet Sun so joyful in the morning ?
Because it knows that by evening it will be in the West.

On a more chilling note I grabbed this from wikipedia
Every nation is fond of the category of political jokes, but in the Soviet Union telling political jokes was in a sense an extreme sport: according to Article 58 (RSFSR Penal Code), "anti-Soviet propaganda" was a potentially capital offense.
As in
A judge walks out of his chambers laughing his head off. A colleague approaches him and asks why he is laughing. "I just heard the funniest joke in the world!" "Well, go ahead, tell me!" says the other judge. "I can't - I just gave a guy ten years for it!"
This is the reality of what you want tao, a society where being overheard telling a joke can mean a death sentence. The Reality, not the pie-in-the-sky theory.
Posted by Col Rouge, Saturday, 6 January 2007 10:23:11 AM
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Logical,

I can see that I am going to have to go back to basics. I hope you have the patience to see it through. Human history (at least what I know of it) is a rather complex thing.

But first, I note that in your renewed attack on my “hypocrisy”, you ignored the fact that you, a self-professed “committed-civil-libertarian”, defend the right of the State to overturn a longstanding protection of the individual against it.

I would like to know whether, in the context of eroding civil-liberties across the board, you now see that the overturning of double jeopardy is a dangerous thing, with a greater significance than can be ascribed to it when viewed as an isolated event.

Can you see the significance of capitalist-democracies repudiating their own laws and protections which guarantee civil-liberties, one after the other?

You may think this is irrelevant, but it is not.

I understand that you only want to argue on the basis of the difference between the ideals of “democracy” and its methods of advancement of civil-liberties (the “Rule of Law”), and a revolutionary “dictatorship’s” method of repudiating civil-liberties. But it is not as simple as that.

It is received-wisdom in our culture that “democracy” in the bourgeois-parliamentary-sense with all of its free-and-fair-elections, multiple-parties, separations-of-powers, and checks-and-balances, in-and-of-itself, advances and guarantees civil-liberties. The majority of people, having been told all of their lives that it is true (because how else would they know), believe that it is true. And the evidence is there – capitalist-democracies advanced civil-liberties and the rule of law which protects them. .

It is also the received-wisdom in our culture that Socialist-Revolutionary-Dictatorships, in-and-of-themselves, result in the wholesale denial of civil-liberties. This may or may not be true, depending on which way it is analysed, but suffice to say, the majority of people, having been told all their lives that it is true (because how else would they know), believe that it is true.

…continued...
Posted by tao, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:03:13 PM
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The most obvious explanation for this is that by repudiating “democracy” in the bourgeois-parliamentary sense with all of its checks-and-balances, tyrannical-dictators are unleashed who, without those checks-and-balances, hungry for power, have free reign to lock up, torture and kill anyone who disagrees with them in order to maintain their unchecked-power. And of course, the evidence is there – Stalin, Mao, Castro etc. all repudiated civil-liberties.

And most people, particularly in rich-Western-democracies after the post-war-boom, once the above is explained to them by their parents and teachers and relatives and friends and politicians and the TV who all believe it too, who have food in their bellies and a roof over their head and decent prospects of employment, have no real reason to question the received-wisdom. The majority of people accepting this received-wisdom, go about their lives, free in their knowledge that their democratically-elected-representatives do-the-right-thing, and that if they don’t, the democratic-system, although-not-perfect, is there to check their excesses and guarantee civil-liberties and, if-all-else-fails, next-time they can elect someone-else.

I’d say that was a fair-snapshot of what you believe Logical. It was what I believed for a long-time too.

It all boils down to pretty simple conceptions. Capitalist Democracy protects and advances civil-liberties, and Socialist-Revolutionary-Dictatorship denies civil-liberties. Capitalist-Democracy good, Socialist-Revolutionary-Dictatorship bad. Received-wisdom. Other forms of government have been tried and failed – no need to look any further.

So, for argument’s sake, I am going to agree with you that the only “reasonable” conclusion I can come to on the basis of all the “evidence” is that Socialist-Revolutionary-Dictatorships can only lead to the denial of civil-liberties, and that Capitalist-Democracy protects and advances civil-liberties.

However – what if Capitalist-Democracy starts stripping away the protections of the individual against the State that it has previously put in place? That is, the people who we have democratically-elected to run our State by the ‘rule of law’, start using the power vested in them to change the laws or overturn them in practice.

This we have been seeing a lot lately. Just look at the “anti-terrorism” laws:

…cont…
Posted by tao, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:04:05 PM
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Federal and State police have unilateral-powers to lock us up for 48 hours. A hand-picked “judge” operating in a “personal capacity” (i.e. not as a court, but as part of the executive) can then rubberstamp the detention for up to 14 days in an “ex-parte” hearing (i.e. the suspect doesn’t have to be present). Goodbye habeas-corpus.

The suspect doesn’t have the right to know why he or she is being detained. Any conversations with their lawyers can be monitored. Anyone - including family-members, lawyers or the media – who reveals their detention can be jailed for five-years. Parents can’t tell each other if their child is being held. Goodbye lawyer-client privilege. Goodbye freedom of speech. Goodbye public scrutiny. Goodbye journalistic freedom.

Specially designated “issuing courts” can grant control-orders – which can include, house-arrest, personal tracking devices, bans on employment and all formal communication – without any initial notice or hearing. Detainees can be barred from telling anyone and can only challenge the orders, possibly weeks-or-months later, in the same special-courts. The laws mean that governments and their security-agencies can lock someone away based on what they allege the suspect MIGHT do in the future. Goodbye presumption of innocence. Goodbye right to earn a living. Goodbye freedom. Goodbye social relationships.

I could go on.

You may say that these laws are only to be used with terrorists, however the definition of terrorism has also been expanded so that it is broad and vague and covers pretty-much-anything. The reality is that they can be used on anyone the government doesn’t like. How will we know anyway, its all secret?

You may say that the laws have not yet been used on a mass-scale, and they aren’t “evil” enough to do anything with them, however that doesn’t change the fact that our “legal” protections are GONE and our government has taken them away.

Lawyers, judges and civil-liberty-groups, and anyone concerned, consider the laws a framework for a police-state, and a violation of international-law.

Prior to the laws being passed, the Government’s own Human-Rights-and-Equal-Opportunity-Commission president Jon Von Doussa, said on ABC Radio “If-you-think-about-the-nature-of-a-police-state,-it-is-police-officers-exercising-the-executive-power-of-the-state-without-their-actions-being-subjected-to-review-through-the-legal-system.-That-is-exactly-what-is-proposed-here.-It-is-proposed-that-the-executive-can-exercise-restraining-powers-that-put-people-in-detention-for-up-to-14-days-with-no-realistic-opportunity-of-questioning-that-through-the-court-system.”

…cont…
Posted by tao, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:05:44 PM
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He also told a parliamentary-forum in Canberra that the federal-government was seeking extraordinary-powers to deprive people of their liberty while asking to be trusted not to abuse that authority. “The-difficulty-of-that-approach,-as-experience-has-shown-not-only-in-places-like-South-Africa-but-here-in-Australia,-is-that-reality-turns-out-otherwise.-The-revelations-of-the-Palmer-report-demonstrate-how-abuses-of-power-can-occur-where-there-is-no-acceptable-and-realistic-way-that-people-can-question-what-is-happening-to-them.”

If you still think they are not really serious about it, they have also expanded their powers to call-out the military domestically, and they are expanding its size.

You may say that we can vote for someone-else, however the laws were formulated by Howard in conjunction with the State and Territory leaders – all ALP. This was necessary because the laws contravene the Constitutional protection against being punished or locked up without a properly constituted court, and the States are not strictly bound by the constitution! The laws were also passed in federal-parliament by the-ALP.

No doubt you think I’m paranoid, but these are FACTS, and this is a world-wide-phenomenon. Remember that Hitler was elected democratically, and he did much the same things.

You and I have very few “legal” civil-liberties left. The only remaining “protection” of our civil-liberties is the fact that capitalism has not yet plunged into another depression and world-war.

Received-wisdom appears to be wrong, and we end up in a similar position to evil dictatorships.

Now perhaps you can apply your own criteria to yourself:

“You-have-a-few-choices.-1)Continue-to-be-a-hypocrite-for-the-reasons-I-have-outlined-or-2)Acknowledge-you-had-not-realised-that-dictatorships-and-civil-liberties-were-inherantly-incompatible-or-3)Explain-to-us-how-your-dictatorship-will-not-destroy-even-basic-civil-liberties-as-has-occured-with-all-prior-attemts-to-establish-your-goal.-
Stop-telling-us-about-how-your-enemies-have-always-tried-to-thwart-you-just-tell-us-your-solution-to-those-obstructions-and-how-that-solution-is-compatible-with-civil-liberties-existing-50-years-down-the-track.”

You-Logical, “have-a-few-choices”. 1) continue to be a hypocrite by claiming to be a “committed-civil-libertarian” while defending the erosion of civil-liberties by the state. 2) Acknowledge that you had not realised that bourgeois-democracies no more “inherently” guarantee civil-liberties than dictatorships. 3) Explain to us how bourgeois-democracy does not, under certain conditions, destroy even basic civil-liberties as is happening here and all over the world.

Don’t-bother trying to blame your enemies, the-terrorists, “just-tell-us-your-solutions-to-those-obstructions-and-how-that-solution-is-compatible-with-civil-liberties-existing-50-years-down-the-track”.

It’s a bit difficult isn’t it? Particularly without being able to rely on the assumptions of received-wisdom, or explain it within a broader-context.

I doubt you can provide a simple explanation and solution, so why should I be required to?

If you care to hang-around, I will begin my explanation of revolutionary-dictatorships etc. in my next posts.
Posted by tao, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:06:16 PM
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Tao. Please do not misquote or guess what my position is on a variety of issues.
You say:
"I note that in your renewed attack on my “hypocrisy”, you ignored the fact that you, a self-professed “committed-civil-libertarian”, defend the right of the State to overturn a longstanding protection of the individual against it. I would like to know whether, in the context of eroding civil-liberties across the board, you now see that the overturning of double jeopardy is a dangerous thing, with a greater significance than can be ascribed to it when viewed as an isolated event." (Continued)

To my knowledge Australian courts have not abandoned the concept of double jeopardy. It is your interpretation of what is happening in the Thomas case that convinces you that he is a victim of double-jeopardy. I have previously explained why I do not think the Thomas events represent double-jeopardy. If Thomas is a victim of double-jeopardy then no doubt the courts will uphold any further appeal he makes on those grounds. Such reassurance is useless to you because you have expressed the view that all our courts are the handmaidens of the government.

I have previously acknowledged the fundamental value of the concept of double-jeopardy but can envisage situations where its application only serves to leave a dangerous criminal loose in the community. e.g. I can justify a re-trial where DNA technology clinches a conviction in a murder case decided by a jury, as not-guilty, prior to the availability of that technology. The case for re-trial would be even stronger if the murderer was continuing to kill and was leaving his usual "calling card".
Contemplating a revision of current double-jeopardy laws, to cover the sort of example outlined above, does not constitute abandoning the importance of the principle which undoubtedly protects individuals from a potentially malicious state. Please do not try the line about once you abandon an absolute position you are automatically on a slippery slope.
At this stage I am unaware of any modifications to double-jeopardy provisions. So I cannot comment on what my position on them might be
Posted by Logical?, Sunday, 7 January 2007 6:44:51 PM
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Tao, you also ask:
"You-Logical, “have-a-few-choices”. 1) continue to be a hypocrite by claiming to be a “committed-civil-libertarian” while defending the erosion of civil-liberties by the state. 2) Acknowledge that you had not realised that bourgeois-democracies no more “inherently” guarantee civil-liberties than dictatorships. 3) Explain to us how bourgeois-democracy does not, under certain conditions, destroy even basic civil-liberties as is happening here and all over the world.

ANSWER to 1)
I have not defended an erosion of civil liberties by the state. It is your misrepresentation of my position on double-jeopardy and your assumtion about what my position is on the recent anti-terrorism laws.

Answer to 2) and 3)
My position has been that democracy has a higher probability of retaining basic civil-liberties. Only a fool would suggest that civil liberties are never under challenge in a democracy. I remain of the opinion that a major erosion of civil liberties is an inevitable consequence of attempts to impose universal socialism by a revolution. I have left open the possibility that I could be wrong if you could provide a satisfactory response to Col's lead-into-gold analogy.

You have also stated:
"I doubt you can provide a simple explanation and solution, so why should I be required to? If you care to hang-around, I will begin my explanation of revolutionary-dictatorships etc. in my next posts.

Answer. You are not obliged to do anything. You instigated the discussion about revolutions and have received repeated requests to explain why our fear of the past repeating itself is unfounded.

It does not strike me as an unreasonable question to have answered if you want people on board your revolution. Perhaps having the temerity to ask questions singles Col and me out for early eradication rather than incorporation.
(continued)
Posted by Logical?, Sunday, 7 January 2007 6:50:55 PM
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Tao, whether I hang around will depend on the quality of your responses.

So far you have only provided a rationale for a more equitable sharing of wealth. I have previously stated that was an undisputed objective. It was all about whether the goal was reached by revolution or evolution via the ballot box.

You can spend forever telling us about the shortcomings of capitalism but I am not getting on your ship until you answer my question. You are the one trying to sell your product. I already have mine albeit with its unhappy imperfections. Call them monstrous imperfections if you like but in my opinion small fry compared with life under Stalin or Mao.
Posted by Logical?, Sunday, 7 January 2007 6:55:35 PM
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Logical,

“Answer-to-2)-and-3)
My-position-has-been-that-democracy-has-a-higher-probability-of-retaining-basic-civil-liberties.-Only-a-fool-would-suggest-that-civil-liberties-are-never-under-challenge-in-a-democracy.-I-remain-of-the-opinion-that-a-major-erosion-of-civil-liberties-is-an-inevitable-consequence-of-attempts-to-impose-universal-socialism-by-a-revolution.-I-have-left-open-the-possibility-that-I-could-be-wrong-if-you-could-provide-a-satisfactory-response-to-Col's-lead-into-gold-analogy.”

Sorry-Logical, not-good-enough. Playing by your-rules, if I am not allowed to blame my enemies for thwarting me, you are not allowed to blame yours. Fair’s-fair you-know. You are also relying on assumptions of “received-wisdom” which we already know can-be-wrong. Nor have you provided ANY solution let alone a satisfactory-one.

No matter, the point of my asking you to follow your own criteria was to illustrate to you that it is impossible to debate what led to Stalinism without understanding external and internal, objective and subjective, factors. Nor is it possible to guarantee anything in the future – because YOU can’t either.

As for applying Col’s lead-into-gold-analogy, maybe it should be applied to capitalist-democratic-theory, the results of which are in major decay all-over-the-world. Maybe what you thought was gold, was only fools-gold. Or maybe, in the “practical-experience”, there were things that were not previously understood or accounted-for which now need to be studied in the light-of-experience. I’ll think about this and get back to you.

Now that you acknowledge that bourgeois-democracy no more inherently guarantees “universal civil-liberties” than a dictatorship, I will begin to illustrate how my interest in, and defence of the rights-of-the-individual-against-the-State are not inconsistent with my support of Trotsky’s comments and defence of socialist-revolutionary-dictatorships.

You will no doubt object to aspects of the following, and it will probably require extensive elaboration, however, to begin:

It should be remembered that Trotsky’s words were written before Stalin’s usurpation and consolidation of power (which I will discuss in later posts), and were not a defence of Stalin’s later crimes, but about the actions of the Bolsheviks in defending the revolution against counter-revolution.

Trotsky-says: “we-have-never-and-nowhere-denied-that-our-regime-is-one-class-of-revolutionary-dictatorship-and-not-a-democracy,-standing-above-class,-relying-upon-itself-for-its-stability”

Capitalist “democracy” is actually a dictatorship of the capitalist-class. It protects the rights of capital (or the small percentage of people who own it i.e. the “capitalist-class”) to appropriate to itself the surplus wealth produced by the whole of society. There might be more than one capitalist, and there is limited social-mobility between-classes (only by the use of various-tools of capitalist-exploitation), but it is essentially a dictatorship-of-capital, or accumulated-wealth – the capitalist-class.
Posted by tao, Sunday, 7 January 2007 11:40:24 PM
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It uses “democracy” to cloak its dictatorship in concepts like the guarantee of “universal civil-liberties”, “democratic rights” “freedom”, and “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”.

As we have now seen however, bourgeois “democracy”, in and of itself, does not guarantee those things. What it does “guarantee” is the right of capitalists to accumulate wealth created by the labour of workers and peasants, and at their expense. The politicians that we have the opportunity to “elect” have already proven themselves willing to do the bidding of the bourgeoisie in one form or another, any surface differences are of a tactical nature, they all acknowledge and defend the right of the MINORITY CAPITALIST-CLASS to DICTATE every aspect of our lives (the majority), ACCORDING TO ITS NEEDS. I believe it was Marx who called parliamentary democracy the “boardroom of the bourgeoisie”. And, as in the case of Hitler, Mussolini, Franco etc, if “democracy” does not work, state violence and oppression will be used, and war will be used to expand its markets.

But the illusion that we have, and which is constantly promoted to us, is that bourgeois-“democracy” governs for all of us, or as Trotsky says “standing-above-class,-relying-upon-itself-for-stability” when in reality it governs for the capitalist-class.

In a nutshell, Russia had a belated capitalist-development compared to other European-countries and its capitalist-class was very weak and relied on the autocratic-feudal-regime of the Tsar (feudal class) to protect its interests, and had previously not been able, or found it necessary, to carry out a bourgeois (capitalist) revolution. At the outset of the Revolution the initial-demands of the women-workers were bread, an end to autocracy (i.e. democracy), and an end to war. At this point the Mensheviks (social-democracy) had majority-support amongst workers, and the Bolsheviks had been driven underground, e.g. Lenin, Trotsky and others had been exiled or jailed.
Posted by tao, Sunday, 7 January 2007 11:40:52 PM
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In all bourgeois-revolutions, the capitalist-class requires the assistance of the worker and peasant classes to overthrow the old regime, and appeals to them with slogans of “freedom, liberty, equality”. Once the revolution has been carried through, they then violently suppress, or delude, those same workers who assisted them and institute “democracy” to protect their own-interests.

This is basically what happened in Russia, except that the capitalist-class was extremely weak, and the workers, peasants and army gradually went over to the Bolsheviks because they were the only ones who had consistently told them the truth and fought for THEIR (the workers etc.) interests against the Tsar and the-bourgeoisie.

The Mensheviks tried to limit the revolution to a bourgeois-one and refused to give up control, despite the Bolsheviks having overwhelming majority-support of the Soviets (sort of trade-unions, but of citizens which democratically-elect delegates to represent them at the congress) at the Second-All-Russian-Congress in October-1917. But as Trotsky said “Fortunately,-we-had-behind-us-not-only-the-former-majority-of-the-Congress,-but-the-whole-garrison-of-the-capital.--This-saved-us-from-being-dispersed,-and-enabled-us-to-give-the-Mensheviks-an-object-lesson-in-Soviet-democracy.”

So, after the revolution there was a DICTATORSHIP of the PROLETARIAT-AND-PEASANT CLASS, i.e a DICTATORSHIP of the MAJORITY. The Bolshevik leadership, resting upon the support of the working class and peasants (i.e. not “standing above class, relying upon itself for stability” which is in reality impossible) were the representatives of the dominant CLASS, and advanced and protected its CLASS interests against other classes (who, don’t forget had sent millions to the “violent” slaughter of WWI).

The Trans-Causacas however, was a bit of a stronghold of the Mensheviks, and many Tsarist loyalists (military officers etc) and Russian-Mensheviks retreated there after the revolution forming a bloc. However they also did not have majority support at their Congress. To cut a long story short the Mensheviks did same thing they tried to do at the Russian-Congress, but this time, when the revolutionary masses moved, the Mensheviks were prepared, and hired counter-revolutionary robber bands to disarmed them and the army – except for the loyalist Cossack regiments. The disarming turned into pogroms and battles where thousands died.
Posted by tao, Sunday, 7 January 2007 11:41:44 PM
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They then declared two independent-“democratic”-republics, first of Trans-Causacas, then of Georgia, within the space of five-weeks (neither-time consulting-the-population by-referendum), invited in the German-army, then the British. A “Special-Detachment” violently suppressed peasant-uprisings, burnt-down villages, summarily-executed Bolsheviks, banned their newspapers and broke up their meetings. In-other-words, they violently liquidated all opposition to their “democracy”. Only after that had been done, NINE-MONTHS AFTER declaring Georgia independent, did they THEN convene a Constituent-Assembly in which they had the majority.

From Georgia, the “democratic”-Mensheviks and the Tsarist-loyalists, claiming “strict-neutrality”, with the assistance, and in the assistance, of the “Great-Powers”, staged counterrevolutionary-attacks against the Soviet-Union.

Mind-you, the argument of the-Mensheviks’ (“democrats” who claimed to want socialism i.e. social-democracy), and their British apologist-equivalents the Labour-Party and Fabians, was that all-of-this “democracy” was done in-the-name of saving the bourgeois-revolution so that the socialist-revolution can be carried out at a later date!

Hence-Trotsky’s-words:

“We-did-not-lie-like-the-Georgian-Mensheviks-and-their-apologists.-We-are-accustomed-to-call-a-spade-a-spade.-When-we-take-away-political-rights-from-the-bourgeoisie-and-its-political-servants,-we-do-not-resort-to-democratic-disguises,-we-act-openly.-We-enforce-the-revolutionary-right-of-the-victorious-proletariat.-When-we-shoot-our-enemies-we-do-not-say-it-is-the-sound-of-the-Aeolian-harps-of-democracy.-An-honest-revolutionary-policy-above-all-avoids-throwing-dust-in-the-eyes-of-the-masses.”

My interest in civil-liberties is not inconsistent with my support of Trotsky’s words, or a socialist-revolutionary-dictatorship. Nor am I a “hypocrite”.

I see “democratic” civil-liberties as elementary-protections of the majority-oppressed-class against the minority-ruling-capitalist-dictatorship, however they are not “universal”, the ruling-class decides WHEN-AND-IF they will apply, and what is done with the surplus-wealth created by the labour of the whole-of-society.

A socialist-revolution is the overthrow of the dictating-capitalist-ruling-class by the oppressed-class. A socialist-revolutionary-dictatorship of the formerly-oppressed-class will decide what form their “democracy” will take, and what sort of liberties they will allow their former-oppressors, and what they will-do with the surplus-wealth created by their own labour.

Finally, as-I-have-demonstrated, we currently do-not-have any civil-liberties which are protected by the “rule-of-law” in our bourgeois-“democracy”. We are now reliant for our personal-safety on the “benign” nature of those-people who have a) legislated-them-away and b) launched illegal-wars on the basis of lies, and-then, when their lies were exposed, changed their reason to “spreading” the very same “sound-of-the-Aeolian-harps-of-democracy”. Terrific! Just ask the 655,000-DEAD-Iraqis if they are pleased that they have the kind of NON-EXISTENT civil-liberties we have (not that the Hussein-regime was a socialist-dictatorship, just your garden-variety US-client-state-dictatorship). So I fail to see how a dictatorship denying-them is of any consequence.
Posted by tao, Sunday, 7 January 2007 11:54:00 PM
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Tao “Col’s lead-into-gold-analogy, maybe it should be applied to capitalist-democratic-theory,”

Cheap Deflection. Answer the question!

My claim is “Stalinism/Maoins” is the falsehood of the Marxist Alchemy, Now defend Marxism.

Your attacks on Capitalism are unjust when capitalism has produced and distributed of greater wealth from which all have benefited, unequally than the “equal distribution of nothing” under Marxism/communism.

I ask you how many people have been forcibly “Re-Educated”, Executed, Exiled or Imprisoned by the pursuit of Capitalism?

Whilst I suspect you will claim a few have been imprisoned or even murdered.

You will find no where near the 30 million victims of Marxism as implemented by Stalin.
Nor the 60 million victims of Marxism as implemented by Mao (http://www.clearharmony.net/articles/200611/36584.html) or
the 3 million victims of Marxism as implemented by Pol Pot.

All up, around about 100 million people (http://www.heritage.org/Press/Events/ev080206a.cfm)

Need I go on or do you agree with Stalin – one death is a tragedy, a thousand deaths is a statistic?

Finally, communist elections: what is the point in voting when there is only one name on the ballot paper?

Tao you have lost the debate when you cannot answer challenges and merely attempt to deflect them

Either answer the questions or put up.

Writing 4 posts a day of drivel simply wastes your time and bores the rest of us.
Posted by Col Rouge, Monday, 8 January 2007 2:30:04 AM
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Tao. As Col says you keep raising diversions. You have had ample opportunity to study history. We do not want it recited to us along with further examples of the shortcomings of our present capitalist society. We want to know what NEW ELEMENT you are going to inject into your revolution to stop it going the same way as past attemts to create a universal socialist state. Just answer Col's lead into gold analogy.

Tao you said:
"Nor is it possible to guarantee anything in the future – because YOU can’t either."
I am not looking for guarantees. Life involves backing the odds. When you go to cross the road do you look up for falling bricks or left and right for passing cars? I am simply asking for your "new element" that will make your revolution worth consideration as an option for myself and society in general.

Tao you said"
"Now that you acknowledge that bourgeois-democracy no more inherently guarantees “universal civil-liberties” than a dictatorship, I will begin to illustrate how my interest in, and defence of the rights-of-the-individual-against-the-State are not inconsistent with my support of Trotsky’s comments and defence of socialist-revolutionary-dictatorships."
No I did not "acknowledge" any such thing. I stated that civil liberties were under threat in all systems of government and that the greatest threat resided in revolutions that tried to establish universal socialism. If you satisfactorily answered Col's lead into gold analogy I would consider coming to a different conclusion.

Tao you said:
"At the outset of the Revolution the initial-demands of the women-workers were bread, an end to autocracy (i.e. democracy), and an end to war. At this point the Mensheviks (social-democracy) had majority-support amongst workers, and the Bolsheviks had been driven underground, e.g. Lenin, Trotsky and others had been exiled or jailed."
(continued)
Posted by Logical?, Monday, 8 January 2007 8:32:40 AM
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Continued from this am.
Tao, do I understand you correctly? There was majority support among the workers but they must have been duped and therefore they should be ignored.
It seems the only time the peasants and working class get it right is when they slavishly follow the dictates of the initial "victorious proletariat".
You ignore the possibility (I would say probability) that the initial proletariat contains innumerable individuals whose ideals are centered on self-interest (even call them capitalists if you like). There will certainly be many in the initial proletariat who argue that "the cause" requires the suspension of civil liberties. "We enforce the revolutionary right of the victorious proletariat." Great stuff Tao. Sits comfortably with an interest in civil liberties?

If you cannot answer Col's analogy you are either deluded or a hypocrite It is insufficient to simply claim " My interest in civil-liberties is not inconsistent with my support of Trotsky’s words, or a socialist-revolutionary-dictatorship. Nor am I a “hypocrite." I take the word interest to mean interest in preservation of rather than destruction of.

Tao you state:
"Finally, as-I-have-demonstrated, we currently do-not-have any civil-liberties which are protected by the “rule-of-law” in our bourgeois-“democracy"."
You have not demonstrated any such thing. Your proof is based upon a belief (better categorised as the delusions of a conspiracy theorist) that all of our courts are the handmaidens of government.

"Any civil liberties" is an all encompassing term. Specific anti-terrorist legislation does not emasculate all our other rights of legal redress or even all the rights of an accused terrorist. The power of a free press has not been abolished by the reduced civil liberties afforded to those accused of terrorist acts. But of course you do not accept that we have a free press. Your stance appears to be that the media exposure for our causes is only enough to lull us into a false sense of security while we are raped. In my opinion we have not slipped down to the level of Stalin's show trials though I acknowledge the need for vigilance.
Posted by Logical?, Monday, 8 January 2007 8:48:20 PM
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Well posted logical.

Tao needs to answer questions about his agenda / option / manifesto and not just try and deflect into criticism of capitalism. It is the old commie game, a lie becomes the truth if you say it often enough.

I have seen it before but now I have come to understand, Marxism / communism is a political philosophy built on lies and abuse of the individual. Promise the peasants the sky and bury them face down in the earth. Grab power and terrorize or execute anyone who might challenge you.

Deny freedom of speech whilst claiming to protect the peasants from the bourgeoisie. In fact set the peasants against the middle class on a platform based on fear and envy.

In short Marxist/communism means simply “Butcher and murder at will in the name of the revolution and grab whatever you can wrest out of the hands of your victims.
The only difference to Hitlers treatment of the Jews is the Marxist / communists, treat everyone as if they were Jewish
Posted by Col Rouge, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 7:09:09 PM
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Logical,

Tao,-do-I-understand-you-correctly?
“It-is-insufficient-to-simply-claim-"-My-interest-in-civil-liberties-is-not-inconsistent-with-my-support-of-Trotsky’s-words,-or-a-socialist-revolutionary-dictatorship.-Nor-am-I-a-“hypocrite."-I-take-the-word-interest-to-mean-interest-in-preservation-of-rather-than-destruction-of.

Obviously you don’t, or won’t, understand. I did not “simply” claim anything. I repeatedly and comprehensively explained that our civil-liberties have been taken away by the state, there is nothing to preserve. My socialism and interest in the preservation of civil-liberties stem from the same root - protecting ordinary people from the malevolence of the capitalist-state. Just because you cannot understand this, doesn’t mean I am inconsistent, just that you need to do some intellectual work.

The level of your debating style is expressed in following exchange, the pièce-de-résistance of backsliding,

Tao:-“2)-Acknowledge-that-you-had-not-realised-that-bourgeois-democracies-no-more-“inherently”-guarantee-civil-liberties-than-dictatorships.”

Logical:-“Answer-to-2)-and-3)
My-position-has-been-that-democracy-has-a-higher-probability-of-retaining-basic-civil-liberties.”

Tao:-"Now-that-you-acknowledge-that-bourgeois-democracy-no-more-inherently-guarantees-“universal-civil-liberties”-than-a-dictatorship”

Logical:-“No-I-did-not-"acknowledge"-any-such-thing.

So, what are you saying? - That bourgeois-democracy DOES inherently guarantee universal-civil-liberties?

Or is a “higher probability” of “retaining” “basic” civil-liberties essentially different to saying “no more inherently guarantees universal-civil-liberties’?

To hide your complete intellectual bankruptcy, you cling to Col’s stupid analogy:

“I-could-have-a-theory-about-turning-lead-into-gold.-I-could-document-that-theory-and-receive-acclaim-for-it.-Then-I-die-and-are-buried-in-Highgate-Cemetery.

Then-100-years-later-people-at-OLO-argue-my-theory,-regarding-turning-lead-into-gold-and-one-of-them-identifies-some-of-the-failed-attempts-to-produce-gold-from-lead-and-notes-that-not-one-practical-test-has-ever-worked.”

There are many reasons why Col’s analogy is completely inadequate, but the main one is a quite relevant difference between lead and humanity.

Lead is an inanimate substance, an element which has, relative to organic-life on earth, and human-life in particular, remained essentially unchanged from when it was formed during the formation of the universe. Lead is not conscious, it does not starve, it does not feel pain, and it does not strive to survive or improve itself. Lead has no need to turn into gold. Nor do we need to transform it.

Humans are complex-organisms, and humanity itself is a complex-organism. In humanity, nature has, through its own internal-laws, raised itself from a murky-soup of elements, through progressive-stages to the highest-complex-form at which point it became conscious of itself and could consciously manipulate its environment to improve its chances of survival. Humanity has further progressed and has come to the point where, to a certain extent, it can consciously understand, and even control, the-forces-of-nature, by putting them to use, or at least protecting itself from their effects. Humanity now has the understanding and the technology to produce more than enough for its needs, which could be used to further improve itself.
Posted by tao, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 8:16:42 PM
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But we don’t. Our-“leaders”, the 1% of people who own 40% of the worlds’ wealth, use it to design-and-build means of destroying-ourselves, in order to maintain-and-increase their share. They are consciously opposed to change. However, through their efforts they will drive humanity to a point where change must happen. The polarisation-of-wealth in the world is extreme, and getting worse, and is impossible to maintain indefinitely. It is like a tsunami which quickly sucks all-water out-to-sea - it must at some point reach the limits of natures-laws and come crashing back to land with all of its pent-up force. The difference of course is that we can’t-control the conditions which create a tsunami, but we can control the polarisation-of-wealth.

What the result of the economic-tsunami will be will depend upon whether humanity can consciously overcome the man-made economic-contradictions that created it. The 1% who own 40% of all wealth don’t have a need to, and they will consciously employ their resources to protect their own-interests through war-and-destruction. And they have the means to protect themselves from the effects. But the 50% of people who collectively-own 1%, and the 90% who-collectively own 15%, and even much of the 99% who collectively-own 60%, will be the hardest-hit. They have a reason to consciously-understand and overcome the contradictions.

Marx was not the first-man to ponder the contradictions, but he was the first to devise a comprehensive-method by which to understand and analyse-them in their historical-context, and recognise them, which enables us consciously act to overcome them. He raised the consciousness of humanity from that of looking at itself atomistically and anarchistically, as Cols says: “Capitalism-is-an-intuitive-social-system.-Everyone-responds-individually-to-their-perceived-circumstances.-They-decide,-as-individuals,-which-choices-to-make-and-which-paths-to-take”, to one of looking at itself as a whole and examining its own contradictions and antagonistic-forces, and giving it the tools to consciously and progressively, not reactively as-with-capitalism, decide how best to resolve them.

This does not mean that humanity is guaranteed to “succeed” by the use of Marxist theory. But if dialectical materialism hadn’t been devised by Marx, someone else would, at-some-stage, have to do it if humanity has any chance of breaking through its current impasse.
Posted by tao, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 8:18:14 PM
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There is little that can be added to dialectical-materialism except the wisdom and knowledge gained from the experience of those who have applied it and thus far been defeated, and the beauty of it is, that it also holds its own key to understanding its first defeat. No one can predict or control the precise combination of the forces that will oppose humanity’s progress to a higher-stage of development, but in Marxist-theory, humanity has given itself a better chance to succeed.

To return to the analogy, lead is not humanity. Lead does not have a history of improving its situation, humanity-does. Lead doesn’t need, or have the capability, to improve itself, humanity-does. Humans don’t need to turn lead into gold, but they do need to find a solution to their own problems.

I can’t look into the eyes of a lump of lead. But I can look into the eyes of a human, and I can see in them humanity’s hopes and fears, and pain and suffering, and a striving for improvement, and in those eyes I can see my own hopes and fears. And I hope for a better future for all of humanity, and I think I have found the only path by which we can consciously work to make it happen.

And so, I consciously (although sometimes not-so-well) work for socialism. I work for a time when all of humanity consciously works towards its own good. When accumulation of money and wealth is not the measure of success, or happiness, or creative worth, or their reward, and its preservation is not the reason for wars. In socialism, everyone will contribute as their skills enable them, according to their ability, and according to their own internal motivation, not the compulsion of a profit driven overlord. There will be a certain societal compulsion to do necessary work, but as the wastage of war, and of capitalist production anarchy is eliminated, and our efforts are concentrated on improving our technology and production, and everyone does their share, it will be minimal
Posted by tao, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 8:18:45 PM
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We will rationally plan the use of our resources to ensure that there is no starvation, lack of clean water, lack of medicine. As a worldwide community, we will solve the AIDS crisis, not to make profit for drug-companies, but because aids-sufferers are human. We will not have to worry about the roof over our heads and our family, because as humans, we are entitled to shelter and there is enough for everyone – no one will take it away from us. Society will provide the means by which everyone can develop to their fullest-potential, without having to fight others for their existence.

When it comes down to it, I have no problem dying at the hands of a counterrevolutionary-Stalin while consciously fighting the good-fight for socialism and humanity, even with its inevitable setbacks.

The other option is to live parroting the platitudes of those who find their ultimate representation in a man, a capitalist no less, who thinks that the French do not even have a word for “entrepreneur”, and who says he is directed by God. The imbecile that is George-W.-Bush is the concentrated-expression of the advanced state-of-decay of US-capitalism and its masters - a ruling elite that can spend billions on an illegal war killing hundreds of thousands and destroying the cultural repository of the cradle of civilisation, but-cannot, despite more than four-days notice of Hurricane Katrina, harness its resources to evacuate 100,000 of its most vulnerable-citizens from New-Orleans prior to its landing. And despite decades of warnings that the levies would breach, allowed one of America’s own cultural-jewels, and contributions-to-humanity, to be destroyed.

So you can “get on board” if you want, I don’t care. Given the current level of your argumentative honour, I don’t even want you on board. Working-class people have more inherent honour in their little finger than you do in your word-twisting sophistry - you would be dead-weight that needs to be cast-off, a boil that needs lancing.

As I have already recommended, study some history.

See you on the next thread.
Posted by tao, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 8:19:19 PM
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Tao. Your response was predictable. As usual it fails to address the legitimate question asked of you. Why will your revolution succeed where others have failed?

Your claim that I have been backsliding is nonsense. My last post indicated that I remained convinced that civil liberties would be better protected under our current system than in the universal socialist state you envisage.

As a point of logic I left open the possibility of having to change my stance if new evidence indicated the need to do so. Thus far you have remained unwilling to introduce any new evidence.

Railing against the iniquities of capitalism is only a rationale for change not evidence that a further flirtation with Marxist theory will work as he intended.

Tao you said:
"Obviously you don’t, or won’t, understand. I did not “simply” claim anything. I repeatedly and comprehensively explained that our civil-liberties have been taken away by the state, there is nothing to preserve". Unfortunately I can only categorise "nothing to preserve" as delusional hyperbole.

Col's analogy is not extinguished by drawing attention to the fact that lead does not posess any human characteristics. I suspect Col actually knows that. Col's analogy equates the futility of trying to turn lead into gold, by using a longstanding theory, with the futility of relying on Marxist theory to achieve universal socialism via a revolution.

You dispute that further experiments with forcefully implementing a socialist state are futile even though all prior attempts have ended in misery for those who were supposed to benefit.
(continued)
Posted by Logical?, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 11:06:24 PM
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Tao, you have been asked what new elements you would introduce to avoid a repetition of these past failures. You have not offered one concrete suggestion. You have not explained why your initial proletariat will be benign, let alone remain benign, in its attitudes toward the workers.

Your responses thus far have been limited to claiming a monopoly on compassion for your fellow man and a respect for civil liberties. I quote your parting comment to me "So you can “get on board” if you want, I don’t care. Given the current level of your argumentative honour, I don’t even want you on board. Working-class people have more inherent honour in their little finger than you do in your word-twisting sophistry - you would be dead-weight that needs to be cast-off, a boil that needs lancing."

The latter words are those of the typical bully who resorts to invective and violence when loosing an intellectual argument. I have not engaged in word-twisting sophistry. You have not rebutted the arguments advanced or indicated where my propositions are not honourable. Clearly if one does not agree with you they are defined as lacking honour and compassion and should be disposed of. You are an excellent Stalin in the making.

Fortunately you will not attract enough followers to lance this particular boil. I am pleased that it is irritating you. Your desire for surgery is a sure sign that rational debate has failed to achieve your goal of convincing us of the worth of your cause.
Posted by Logical?, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 11:07:56 PM
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Oh tao, you are deflecting again, deliberately moving from the analogy and trying to construct an answering as a literal. Either that ir you are, to use a single word, thick.

Somehow I think you are not thick but deliberately avoiding giving an honest answer because you know what the truth is and cannot bear to admit that your theories are based on the same lies and deflections which you are practicing here.

As for the wailing about the eyes of humanity, crocodile tears. A prequel to “look at how humane I am, now gimme power and I will tell you what you are allowed to do”. In which we see the classic and inevitable morphing of Marxism into Communism.

As for “I hope for a better future for all of humanity, and I think I have found the only path by which we can consciously work to make it happen.”

Think again.

You said “and I can see in them humanity’s hopes and fears, and pain and suffering, and a striving for improvement,” followed by “I think I have found the only path”

All improvements came from the ideas, innovation and invention of individuals. Your collective “would be solution” is based, in the practice of actually suppressing the individuals who invent and denying them the right to benefit from their ideas and innovations.

Other paths allow individuals to benefit from their innovation and from the implementation of innovation all of society benefits. Example, Edison invented the light bulb, all of humanity benefits from no longer being limited by the tyranny of darkness.

Edison tried a thousand times to produce an incandescent light globe.
Its invention was not the result of some government committee of stout party faithful. They would have given up on attempt 10, unless their families were being held in a gulag somewhere as an “incentive” to do better. A common practice in the reality of your “only path”!
Posted by Col Rouge, Thursday, 11 January 2007 8:54:17 AM
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Now “We will rationally plan the use of our resources to ensure that there is no starvation, lack of clean water, lack of medicine. As a worldwide community, we will solve the AIDS crisis,”

Tried and failed. Stalins 5 year plans failed, your rousing words are hollow.

You are talking the talk.

The way to walk the walk would be to tell us “HOW” you would ensure there was

“No starvation” recalling the 1920 famines in USSR.

How you would ensure plentiful supplies of clean water, noting the environmental disaster of the Aral sea thanks to collectivism.

How you would ensure no lack of medicines. Which system of innovation and invention develops medicines? Removed that model of development and you remove the ability to develop them.

AID’s a political solution to a pandemic. Interesting. The best change is we all end up looking as ugly as a 60 year old babushka so no one wants to f**k anyone else.

I would note USA and nuclear energy, the pinnacle of capitalism brought us “3 mile island”. You might say “See the failure of capitalism” and I would simply say “Chenobyl”.

The failure of capitalism pale into insignificance beside the failure of Marxist/Communism.

Back to Edison, a capitalist inventor. He invented many things. His success was that he was not deterred by a failure but learned and moved on.

If he were alive to day I am sure he would say something like “Marxist / Communism, tried and failed. Learn from it and move on.”

Your “Only Path” is a road to nowhere. It is, as political and human organization models go “a failure”.

I believe there is great merit in people studying human organization. Study the mistakes of the past and learn to build better in the future. Marxism and Fascism should be studied by those impassioned individuals who seek to understand human interaction and human development. They should be studied as “case studies” in how things fail. That is how we do not forget and how we err to the cautious in future.
Posted by Col Rouge, Thursday, 11 January 2007 9:00:44 AM
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Tao “Humanity has further progressed and has come to the point where, to a certain extent, it can consciously understand, and even control, the-forces-of-nature”

It progressed as and through individual understanding. It will continue to progress through individuals.

You see, in your own words “an Only Path”.

Interesting, I see multiple paths and each person walking the one of his or her choosing.

I see the growth of man as the opportunity for us each to grow as a person with greater individual fulfillment which we can achieve by exploring and expressing our own love and compassion for each other. Not simply in the materialism which your “Only Path” is fixated on.

Individuals cannot grow in love and compassion if they are forced to surrender their natural freedom of expression and compassion to an organ of the state.

I am compelled to comment on a telling statement “So you can “get on board” if you want, I don’t care. Given the current level of your argumentative honour, I don’t even want you on board”

“I don’t even want you on board”

You reject a person because they do not follow YOUR party line?

So, if all power were vested in the Marxist / Communist state and you were representative party member, you would say to a member of the citizenry “I don’t even want you on board” ?

Where does that citizen go?

How does citizen Logical, in this case, experience justice or address wrongs under this “benevolent” system of yours?

“Benevolent” my arse!
Posted by Col Rouge, Thursday, 11 January 2007 9:32:03 AM
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Tao, before you get bogged down responding to the specific examples given by Col please address yourself to the fundamental question of what new-element your revolution will introduce to avoid it going the same way as past attempts.

Please tell me where I would be obliged to live in your new state if I persisted with my current belief in civil liberties and exercised it verbally to try and obstruct any of your plans that I did not agree with.

Your last desciption of me was " dead-weight that needs to be cast-off, a boil that needs lancing". Unfortunately I am a human being, with children and grandchilren, who has the temerity to see things differently to you. For these sins I am to be disposed of either literally or effictively via a gulag equivalent.

You talk of an interest in civil liberties. You are a hypocrite. I was too generous to think that you might have a new-element to inject that would at least exhonerate you of the charge of hypocrisy.

I think Col is right when he says you are not a fool. You are just a malignant force that masquerades as someone interested in civil liberties and the fate of the working class. You want power for yourself and those that think like you.

Your attitude toward me encapsulates your core belief of buggar what happens to innocent people along the way. You are the classical advocate of the philosophy of the ends justifying the means.
Posted by Logical?, Thursday, 11 January 2007 12:39:45 PM
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Logical,

UNBELIEVABLE!

“You-have-not-explained-why-your-initial-proletariat-will-be-benign,-let-alone-remain-benign,-in-its-attitudes-toward-the-workers.”

The proletariat IS THE WORKERS. Your comment just proves you have not read a word of Marxist-theory, or any credible history of the Russian-Revolution. How can you possibly know what happened?

The right of the revolutionary proletariat which Trotsky was talking about enforcing is the right of the WORKERS to take ownership of the means-of-production, and the product of their-own labour.

But here is the answer you are looking-for and I guarantee that if it happens this way, it will absolutely-work:

The way to ensure that a socialist revolution will be non-violent and not degenerate into oppression is for capitalists all over the world to BENIGNLY stand down their police force and their armies and allow workers and peasants to peacefully take over the factories and mines and offices and farms and public-utilities and banks and schools and hospitals at which they work, and run them on the basis of human need, not profit.

Do you think capitalists will be benign in their attitude towards the workers?

“You-have-not-rebutted-the-arguments-advanced-or-indicated-where-my-propositions-are-not-honourable.”

As far as I-can see, throughout this-argument, while agreeing that a more-equitable sharing of wealth is an “undisputed-objective”, you have advanced three main absolute-conceptions as to why that objective should not be brought about by socialist-revolutionary-change and why-incremental-“democratic”-change is preferable, which can be broken-down as follows:

1. We should stick with Capitalist-Democracy instead of Socialist-Revolution because:

(a) More-equitable distribution-of- wealth should come through non-violent means i.e.-any violence is unacceptable.

(b) Socialist-revolutions are inevitably-violent.

(c) Capitalist-Democracy, and in particular Social- Democracy, is a non-violent way to achieve-change.

2. We should stick with Capitalist-Democracy instead of Socialist-Revolution because:

(a) In reaching our objective of more equitable sharing-of-wealth, universal civil-liberties must be are protected, i.e.-any loss of civil-liberties is unacceptable.

(b) Socialist-revolutions result in “dictatorships” which inevitably lead to a loss of civil-liberties, i.e. dictatorships are inherently incompatible with universal civil-liberties.

(c) Capitalist-Democracy protects universal civil-liberties.

3. We should stick with Social-Democracy within Capitalism instead of Socialist-Revolution because:

(a) We ought to effect a more equitable sharing-of-wealth by a method that works.

(b) Socialist-revolutions do-not-work.

(c) Social-Democracy does work.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 11 January 2007 10:17:25 PM
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Throughout the discussion I have showed you that:

1. Capitalist-Democracy, including Social-Democracy, is not any less violent than Socialist Revolution, or a revolutionary dictatorship.

Your premise 1(c), and hence your conclusion, fails

2. Capitalist-Democracy, including Social Democracy, is not inherently better at protecting civil-liberties than Socialist Revolution, or a revolutionary dictatorship.

Your premise 2(c), and hence your conclusion fails.

3. Social Democracy certainly does not guarantee improvement in the equitable distribution of wealth, and in fact, actively works to reverse gains previously made.

Your premise 3(c), and hence your conclusion, fails.

Each of your major reasons for sticking with Capitalist-Democracy, and not-look at Socialist-Revolution as an option, is based on at least one incorrect-assumption and is thus false.

Your entire-argument fails….. without even having to examine Socialism’s-failings.

You have repeatedly told me how, if I can only explain to you how I can ensure that a socialist-revolution will be non-violent and not involve a loss of civil-liberties, then you might get on board.

I have maintained throughout that I cannot do what you are asking. And I have demonstrated that you cannot even ensure in your system what you are asking of me in mine:

I have shown you that violence is sometimes necessary, which you acknowledged.

I have shown you that you cannot ensure that Capitalist-Democracy is not violent. You have not demonstrated that you can, you just ignore the violence of Capitalist-Democracy. Worse, you rationalize it as somehow better for us than Socialist Violence. If you disagree, name me one Capitalist-Democracy which did not either come into existence through violence, or use violence during its history.

I have shown you that you cannot-ensure that Capitalist-Democracy protects civil-liberties. You have not demonstrated that it can, but suggest without proof that it has a higher-probability. We must somehow just accept your word for it despite the evidence of history, or the present, before our eyes. If you disagree, name me one Capitalist-Democracy that has not at some point, denied basic civil-liberties, including the basic right to life itself, to someone in the world, at some point in time.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 11 January 2007 10:18:11 PM
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On your own absolute-criteria, Capitalist-Democracy, your preferred-option, fails. In the face of these truths, your absolute criteria shifts to relativity and probability.

But for socialism to be a credible-alternative it must be absolutely non-violent, and adhere strictly to the preservation of universal civil-liberties!

You have one standard for Capitalism, and one for Socialism, and you insist:

-“what-plausible-solution-do-you-have-for-correcting-past-problems”

“Thus-far-you-have-remained-silent-on-offering-a-solution”

“I-again-challenge-you-to-put-forward-a-plausible-non-violent-mechanism”

“After-all-your-study-you-remain-unwilling-or-unable-to-offer-one-concrete-suggestion-that-would-result-in-a-future-revolution-not-decending-into-depravity.”

“you-will-never-supply-any-detail-of-how-your-desired-revolution-would-turn-out-differently-to-prior-attemts-to-impose-universal-socialism”

“explain-to-us-how-your-dictatorship-will-not-destroy-even-basic-civil-liberties-as-has-occured-with-all-prior-attemts-to-establish-your-goal”

“precisely-how-does-a-dictatorship-avoid-oppression?”

Then you have the hide to say you don’t want guarantees!

But-still, I must give you guarantees, or the “new-element” which will guarantee.

Further, you artificially restrict the criteria by which I am entitled to explain my position.

I am not-allowed to discuss the conditions in Europe prior, during, and after the revolution, the devastated Russia which preceded socialism, the violence used by 14 capitalist countries against it, the economic blockades used by those countries to destroy the-economy, the millions of the youngest-and-fittest men that were killed in WWI, the hundreds-of-thousands of the most advanced socialist-workers killed in the counter-revolutionary-civil-war with the capitalists, the duplicity and treachery of some of those claiming to be socialists, in short, the social-and-economic conditions which allowed Stalinism to develop.

In effect you are asking me to explain how to stop a balloon popping loudly, without being able to examine and discuss its composition, the-atmosphere, gases, air-pressure-differentials, a pin, a flame, sound-waves, eardrums etc. What credible explanation could I give you without being able to discuss those things?

What you fail, and-refuse, to understand is that socialism is not an isolated idea that came down from the sky with inherent evil. It is a product-of-capitalism, which is the product of feudalism etc, which is the product of humanity, which is the product of nature. Capitalism was then, and is now, a global economic-system, anything that struggles against it does so because it is there. Capitalism came into existence by violence and spread-globally by the violent-subjugation of colonial-populations, and continues to subjugate of the majority of people to the demands-of-profit. The contradictions of Capitalism create resistance, the conditions and necessity for revolution, and revolutionaries that attempt to consciously resolve the contradictions.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 11 January 2007 10:19:13 PM
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You pluck socialism out of context, and imply that everything bad that happened was inherent in socialism and a product ONLY of socialism. You are denying reality.

And now, it is evident that you have not even bothered to study Marxism, or the Russian-Revolution. You don’t even know that the proletariat IS the working-class.

You insist on me providing you with a “new-element” and you don’t even know what the old ones are! Even if I did tell you something, how would you even know if it was a “new-element” or not! INCREDIBLE!

You claim to be a civil-libertarian. Not just an ordinary civil-libertarian, but a “committed” one. Yet you have now rationalised the anti-terror laws! Specific laws denying civil-liberties of terrorists are OK with you because the government says they are terrorists, so they must be terrorists! Don’t you understand the presumption-of-innocence? Civil-liberties groups, human-rights-groups, press-associations, lawyers-groups all consider the-laws an erosion of the civil-liberties of ALL-OF-US, not just the terrorists’, because once accused of something, rightfully-or-wrongfully, we are all presumed-guilty, locked-up, and denied a fair-trial. But-you, in all your “committed- civil-libertarian”-wisdom, know better than those with expert-knowledge. You can’t have even read THEIR positions in-detail to say the things you do.

You insist on “universal” civil-liberties in a socialist-revolutionary-dictatorship, yet you excuse the lack of it in your system-of-government. In response to this-assertion, you will no-doubt insist that you mean “basic” civil liberties. And you call me a hypocrite!

No doubt you will doggedly-insist, again, that I have avoided the issue. I haven’t avoided the issue – you just don’t have the intellectual-honesty to find out for yourself what the real-issues are.

I have no intention of continuing this discussion with you.

If you genuinely have a commitment to civil-liberties and their preservation and advance, and to understanding the problems of socialism, I recommend you study the following:

http://www.wsws.org/history/1996/oct1996/lect.shtml (Equality,-the-Rights-of-Man,-and-the-Birth-of-Socialism)

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/apr2002/corr-a04.shtml (Democracy-and-the “dictatorship-of-the-proletariat”)

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/jan2003/corr-j20.shtml (Questions-on-socialist-organisation-and-planning)

http://www.wsws.org/exhibits/trotsky/trlect.htm (Leon-Trotsky-and-the-fate-of-socialism-in-the-20th-Century)

A-selection-of-Submissions-to-a-parliamentary-committee-on-the-anti-terror-laws:

Law-Council-of-Australia
http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/legcon_ctte/terrorism/submissions/sub140.pdf
http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/legcon_ctte/terrorism/submissions/sub140a.pdf

NSW-Council-of-Civil Liberties
http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/legcon_ctte/terrorism/submissions/sub161.pdf
http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/legcon_ctte/terrorism/submissions/sub154a.pdf

Australian-Centre-for-Independent-Journalism
http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/legcon_ctte/terrorism/submissions/sub184.pdf

The-full-list
http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/legcon_ctte/terrorism/submissions/sublist.htm
Posted by tao, Thursday, 11 January 2007 10:20:36 PM
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Still no response from tao!

Tao “I can see in them humanity’s hopes and fears, and pain and suffering, and a striving for improvement, and in those eyes I can see my own hopes and fears. And I hope for a better future for all of humanity, and I think I have found the only path by which we can consciously work to make it happen.”

I am sure when he was looking deep into “those eyes”, he was looking into the eyes of an individual.

Individuals have the sovereign right to follow a different path to Tao.

Tao, I will say thanks for the exchanges. You posturing, deceit, authoritarianism and contempt for individuals has reinforced why my views -

support individual liberty,
recognize servility of the state to its electorate,
support comparative merits of Capitalism and
support freedoms, which we so often take for granted

They are not only right but ethical, fair yet whilst possibly imperfect, are changeable and capable of improvement / development.

The practical outcome of Marxism is an abomination, a blight on humanity, an unnatural disaster.

Marxism is a system which

crushes individuals underfoot,
treats the electorate with contempt,
has a central planning system which serves an anonymous state and not the people.
Survives by suppressing freedom of thought, speech and choice.
Is locked into a monolith of unchanging bureaucracy, incapable of recognizing its own flaws and thus incapable of change or development.
Is a horror, something to be challenged at every opportunity.

Quote “All that is needed for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing”

Thank you Logical for being a good man and returning here to debate, instead of doing nothing.

Personally, having my views tested in debate is invaluable in clarifying and honing exactly what I believe and value. Be it abortion or capitalism, I will always support the individual and treat individual sovereignty as paramount.

Since we are into Suggested Reading
http://www.economic-justice.org/asmith.htm
http://australianlibertarian.wordpress.com/
http://www.isil.org/
http://www.john-daly.com/
http://www.ipe.net.au/ipeframeset.htm
http://www.ldp.org.au/
http://www.liberal.org.au/

My political system allows tao to express his dissatisfaction with it.
Tao’s political system would deny me right to disagree.
Posted by Col Rouge, Thursday, 11 January 2007 11:38:21 PM
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Tao. Sure the proletariate is by definition the workers. I said:
“You-have-not-explained-why-your-initial-proletariat-will-be-benign,-let-alone-remain-benign,-in-its-attitudes-toward-the-workers.”
Your response:
"The proletariat IS THE WORKERS. Your comment just proves you have not read a word of Marxist-theory, or any credible history of the Russian-Revolution. How can you possibly know what happened?"

Let me clarify what I was attempting to say in the above post. My concern is that the working class (proletariate) gains power with highminded ideals and then, via a bad choice of elected representatives, turns upon the workers. It would have been clearer had I inserted the words "the leadership of" between "why" and "your".

The words "YOUR INITIAL proletariate" were also intended to convey the probability that not all people in the working class would want to participate in your endeavour. You speak of the workers as being some homogeneous group that all want to change their lot in the world. We come back to an earlier question about who determines the cut off point for qualifying as a worker? Who might be masquerading as a worker?
Tao you said:
"The way to ensure that a socialist revolution will be non-violent and not degenerate into oppression is for capitalists all over the world to BENIGNLY stand down their police force and their armies and allow workers and peasants to peacefully take over the factories and mines and offices and farms and public-utilities and banks and schools and hospitals at which they work, and run them on the basis of human need, not profit."

You know as well as I do that given human nature and greed this is a crazy pipe dream. Accordingly you are committed to violent struggle against the capitalist. The new-element I am wanting you to inject into your revolution is something that has a serious prospect of avoiding it morphing into what occured under Stalin and Mao. I am quite happy to lower the bar for you from "guarantee" to high probability. I think I have previously acknowledged that no one can guarantee the future one can only back the odds. Remember my falling brick analogy?
Posted by Logical?, Friday, 12 January 2007 12:02:16 PM
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Tao you said:
"Do you think capitalists will be benign in their attitude towards the workers?" Presumably by capitalists you mean those higher up the pecking order in a capitalist system. The answer will be some yes and others no. The fact remains that the system overall has not produced the depravity exibited by prior attemps at establishing a universal socialist state.

You choose to classify the latter statement as proving that I am an apologist for all that is bad about capitalism. I contend that is not the case and I believe, on the basis of history, that the pursuit of change via the ballot box remains preferable to your desired revolution.

Tao you claim "Throughout the discussion I have showed you that:

1. Capitalist-Democracy, including Social-Democracy, is not any less violent than Socialist Revolution, or a revolutionary dictatorship.

2. Capitalist-Democracy, including Social Democracy, is not inherently better at protecting civil-liberties than Socialist Revolution, or a revolutionary dictatorship.

3. Social Democracy certainly does not guarantee improvement in the equitable distribution of wealth, and in fact, actively works to reverse gains previously made."

In my opinion you have not established any of these three points. It is not dishonourable for me to choose to disagree with you about the conclusions I reach from history about which is the greater evil: capitalism or attemps at establishing a universal socialist state. My arguments do not fail because you declare you have established certain facts.

Tao you state "I have no intention of continuing this discussion with you." I am perfectly happy with that proposition. I see no prospect of changing you aspirations. I think it is unlikely that you will produce some facts that will change my general support, not unqualified support as you claim, for our current system of government.

Your comments when I previously signed off on this thread (scampered etc) remain unwarranted. Australia is a great country to live in and I am not interested in seeing it dismembered in the pursuit of your dreams. Your path would really destroy our current civil liberties.
Posted by Logical?, Friday, 12 January 2007 12:08:36 PM
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To balance Tao quotes of Marx and Trotsky, I include a few from another quarter

They are from a national leader who challenged the Marxist spawn and prevailed.

Tao’s idealist notion of “equality”

"When all the objectives of government include the achievement of equality - other than equality before the law - that government poses a threat to liberty."

Regarding attempts to reinvent Marxism without the stigma of past failures

"Socialists have always spent much of their time seeking new titles for their beliefs, because the old versions so quickly become outdated and discredited."

How True and we see it here again in Tao’s drivel.

Regarding Capitalism

"Capitalism has known slumps and recessions, bubble and froth; no one has yet dis-invented the business cycle, and probably no one will."

The following bears thinking about as to what works and what doesn’t

“"When we hear (as we sometimes do) that (Russia's) economic output is about half the level of a decade ago or that real incomes have fallen sharply, it is worth recalling that economic statistics under the Soviet Union were hardly more reliable than any other official statements. Moreover, a country that produces what no one wants to buy, and whose workers receive wages that they cannot use to buy goods they want, is hardly in the best of economic health."

This is especially for Tao and his “revolution”

"Left-wing zealots have often been prepared to ride roughshod over due process and basic considerations of fairness when they think they can get away with it. For them the ends always seems to justify the means. That is precisely how their predecessors came to create the gulag."

I guess Margaret Thatcher knew you personally Tao.

Finally

“"Individualism has come in for an enormous amount of criticism over the years. It still does. It is widely assumed to be synonymous with selfishness...But the main reason why so many people in power have always disliked individualism is because it is individualists who are ever keenest to prevent the abuse of authority."

Cherish individualism, it is the most anyone can aspire to become.
Posted by Col Rouge, Friday, 12 January 2007 9:43:26 PM
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Logical

I was not going to continue this discussion but will answer your despicable word-twisting slander:

"Accordingly-you-are-committed-to-violent-struggle-against-the-capitalist."

You paint yourself as a peace-loving, civil libertarian social democrat, but your deliberate-distortion of my position proves you have no interest in the truth.

I am committed to the working-class taking back ownership of the means of production and the product of their own labour which is rightfully theirs and has been taken from them through violence, or the threat of violence. This is done through raising their conciousness through discussion and education. If capitalists resist violently, I uphold the right of the workers to defend themselves. In defending-themselves against violence, I defend their right to use force.

Anyone who makes a comment like yours has not read socialist literature and has swallowed hook, line, and sinker capitalist propaganda. I note you haven’t denied that you haven’t read Marxist-theory, or history – again – how would you know what the truth is?

As to the possibility of capitalists being benign, you yourself said:

"You-know-as-well-as-I-do-that-given-human-nature-and-greed-this-is-a-crazy-pipe-dream."--"The-answer-will-be-some-yes-and-others-no.-"

If it is a crazy pipe dream that capitalists will be benign due to greed, why do you think we should trust them?

So its OK for capitalists to be violent is it? Should we let them run things.

"My concern is that the working class (proletariate) gains power with highminded ideals and then, via a bad choice of elected representatives, turns upon the workers"

Was Hitler and the Nazi-party a bad choice of elected-representatives? How about Mussolini? Both Hitler and Mussolini turned upon the workers.

How about the stolen 2000 US election?

How about the recent US mid-term election where the majority of people just voted against war, and 2 months later their government is going to escalate it? A Democrat has just introduced a conscription bill.

How about the ALP bringing in the military against the pilot-strikes?

How about the new industrial-relations-laws?

Your feigned concern is sickening. Capitalist-democracy doesn’t protect workers.

"The-fact-remains-that-the-system-overall-has-not-produced-the-depravity-exibited-by-prior-attemps-at-establishing-a-universal-socialist-state"

How about the depravity of Abu Ghraib? Extraordinary rendition? Cluster-bombs? Napalm? Agent-Orange? Phosphorus bombs? Hiroshima? The Mai Lai Massacre? And of course the capitalist-gulag, Guantanamo-Bay?
Posted by tao, Saturday, 13 January 2007 7:12:14 AM
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WWI, WW2? Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Pinochet, US-backed Saddam Hussein? How about the depravity of colonial-oppression of indigenous0populations? What about pornography – people filming vulnerable women having sex and selling the result for profit - a gazillion-dollar-industry whose major players are Disney – you know, the Wonderful World of Disney, and Fox – the media-empire which owns cable channels variously promoting Christian-“values”, George-Bush, and selling porn – all in the name of money?

What about the depravity of 1% of people owning 40% of all of the worlds’ wealth while every year 10.7-million-children die before their fifth birthday? 1,200 die every hour from poverty-related-causes. What about the depravity of the top 400 people in the US owning 1.25 trillion-dollars of assets while 21% of US children live in poverty? What about children in the “developing-world” working in sweatshops for a pittance to make shoes with a swoosh on them which are sold for $250?

If you don’t see all of these things as depraved then that just proves how depraved our society has become that they are considered OK. But they are the inevitable-product of dehumanizing capitalist-social-relations.

You conveniently ignore all of these things when choosing the conclusions you reach from history. How can your debate be honorable when you dismiss aspects of reality which do-not-fit with your argument? In debate this is dishonorable, and in life it is dangerous. The people it is most dangerous for is the working-class because they will be the first ones on the scrap heap and the first-ones sent to die. You talk about looking out for unexpected falling-bricks, the most stupid thing to do would be to watch them falling around you and believe you won’t get hit.

"I-am-quite-happy-to-lower-the-bar-for-you-from-"guarantee"-to-high-probability.-I-think-I-have-previously-acknowledged-that-no-one-can-guarantee-the-future-one-can-only-back-the-odds.-"

Here’s a tip for your flutter on humanity’s future – it is odds on that capitalism will outdo itself in depravity in the coming period. I’ll guarantee it.

Col,

Margaret Thatcher considered military dictator Pinochet, a man who ran roughshod over due process and peoples lives, a great friend of Britain, and helped him avoid the due-process of the law. Quoting her is laughable.
Posted by tao, Saturday, 13 January 2007 7:13:44 AM
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Thanks Tao. The littany of horrors produced by various forms of government ,including theocracies, is indeed appaling. You are wrong when you say that I refuse to see it and/or adequately disapprove of it.

The following is lifted from your last post:

"As to the possibility of capitalists being benign, you yourself said:

"You-know-as-well-as-I-do-that-given-human-nature-and-greed-this-is-a-crazy-pipe-dream."--"The-answer-will-be-some-yes-and-others-no.-"

If it is a crazy pipe dream that capitalists will be benign due to greed, why do you think we should trust them?

So its OK for capitalists to be violent is it? Should we let them run things."

My answer to your question about trust is that I do not trust capitalists. Nor do I trust those who claim to represent the workers after a revolution to establish a universal socialist state.

It is no more acceptable for capitalists to be violent than for socialist states to be violent. In both instances the violence may be internal (citizens rights) or external (war).

I despair of the greed that seems to be part of the biology of human beings. Pecking orders seem to be the norm throughout nature. One can only hope that education and the ability to communicate with larger groups will allow us to move from family groupings, beyond tribalism and nationalism to a unified humanity. Unlikely in my time? Yes.

Meanwhile we are stuck on this planet and have to make the best of the options on offer while working toward overall reform. I am sorry that we cannot agree on how that reform may be achieved.

There may be situations where violence can be justified. unfortunately you often do not know whether the "facts" encouraging you to participate in violence are correct until years later. Capitalist and socialist leaderships both have a history of trying to dupe their own constituency.

Unfortunately our children are constantly receiving the message that "if you are right" you should assert your rights with physical force. Hopefully we can move toward teaching people how to negotiate and how to respect the rights of others. That tolerance however does not extend to the acceptance of intolerance.
Posted by Logical?, Saturday, 13 January 2007 10:26:44 AM
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Logical,

I will respond to your comments on greed etc later, I will be out for the large part of this weekend.

However I noticed that on Tuesday night at 8.30pm on SBS's Cutting Edge they will be showing a documentary called "How to buy an election". Its about George W Bush and Tom DeLay. (in Melbourne...I don't know about anywhere else).

It certainly won't be a marxist analysis, but it will no doubt be interesting in light of our discussions. Hopefully I will get to watch it, and recommend you do too.
Posted by tao, Saturday, 13 January 2007 10:48:58 AM
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Tao “Margaret Thatcher considered military dictator Pinochet, a man who ran roughshod over due process and peoples lives, a great friend of Britain, and helped him avoid the due-process of the law. Quoting her is laughable.”

Far from it. I have great respect for Margaret Thatcher who lead the public opposition to the despicable activities of totalitarianism.

That she supported Pinochet might be because she was more aware than you or I of the consequences of not supporting Pinochet, as I seem to be saying regularly, “a common enemy makes for strange bedfellows.”

I note you cling to her support of Pinochet as if it were a cathartic event in Margaret Thatcher’s contribution to the shaping of the world and her public service; It is not.
Therefore it is not a reason to discount the tremendous work she did in preserving your and my freedom at a time when democracy was under tremendous pressure from the evil of communism.

Margaret Thatcher supported your right to dissent with her view when she had the power to direct national military forces into action.

Ironically, the politics you support would treat any hint of your dissent as treason and lock you up in a gulag, or worse.

What you point out about Margaret Thatcher and her support of Pinochet is merely another of your deflections from her contribution to humanity.

She wrote

“My job is to stop Britain going red. “

The reason you seek to discredit her is simple, you are still scared of her today.

She wrote “Socialists cry "Power to the people", and raise the clenched fist as they say it. We all know what they really mean—power over people, power to the State.“

The danger to you of Margaret Thatcher is that

She saw through to the deceit and deflections you used when challenged for explanation.

Your cowardly attacks confirm her greatness. She knew you. She forsees the evil of your politics.

Difference Margaret Thatcher-Tao, Margaret Thatcher is worth quoting. Tao is not.

The Iron Lady is a communist's nightmare. Long live the Iron Lady.
Posted by Col Rouge, Saturday, 13 January 2007 11:16:35 AM
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Col,

Do you actually read what you write before you post? As usual the contradictions in your argument abound.

According to you Thatcher “lead the public opposition to the despicable activities of totalitarianism” by supporting a fascist military dictator.

She “supported your right to dissent with her view when she had the power to direct national military forces into action” by supporting a fascist military dictator who overthrew an elected government by military coup and had an estimated 50,000 “dissenters” executed or “disappeared” in the first year of taking power. Other “dissenters” had electrodes attached to their testicles, their fingernails torn out, and their tongues cut out.

“The reason you seek to discredit her is simple, you are still scared of her today”

I don’t need to discredit her, she discredits herself, or more correctly, reveals her true nature, and that of the ruling class she served. Is it not true that she championed Pinochet’s cause and helped him evade “due process”? Am I making it up?

You can’t have it both ways Col. You can’t say – she was doing the right thing … and that by me revealing the truth about that “right thing” I am discrediting her.

If she was doing the right thing I can’t possibly be discrediting her … can I? Her loyalty to Pinochet is a testament to her character surely?

“you are still scared of her today”

I most certainly am scared of her and her type today. What her affinity to the fascist Pinochet shows is that the ruling classes are prepared to use any means to protect their interests, including fascism. You may recall that the British ruling classes also flirted with Hitler at one stage.

The ruling classes have already begun preparing the ground with anti-terror laws denying civil liberties etc. As the crisis of capitalism comes to a head, they will resort to fascism, just as they did with Pinochet.
Posted by tao, Monday, 15 January 2007 10:05:18 PM
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Tao regarding “You may recall that the British ruling classes also flirted with Hitler at one stage.”

Oh they flirted with everyone tao.

The thing with a democracy, people are free to flirt with who they like. It is a personal choice thing, not directed by government. Not suppressed by locking people into psychiatric hospitals, regardless how misguided they may be but no one can claim a blameless life, certainly no commie.

Some dullards even flirted with Lenin and his Bolshevik butchers, he called them “his Useful Idiots”, a cynical phrase but lets face it, he was a communist, cynicism comes as an indispensable part of the kit, just as we see your slimey protests to “the workers” here, just a cynical catch phrase to pretend you actually care when we know, from the fate of the Kulaks, that you would turn on the workers faster than a capitalist if it suited your agenda.

As for “The ruling classes have already begun preparing the ground with anti-terror laws denying civil liberties etc. As the crisis of capitalism comes to a head, they will resort to fascism, just as they did with Pinochet.”

Ah the good old wedge politics, divide and conquer. Sorry tao, the wall was torn down 15 years ago. Your style of politics is more discredited nowadays than at any other time. Russians, Germans, Poles, Hungarians and Czechs the all have enough memories of how your politics work to fill the rest of their lives with nightmares.

The secret police coming in the night. Family member disappearing into gulags.

The practical tools of your communism. No one elected a communist government into power, they all arrived either by revolution or were imposed by Stalin.

Oh you claim Guantanamo Bay is a “gulag” well how many people, citizens of the worker paradises, were living in gulags before the fall of communism?

You can name one American prison, does anyone know how many gulag prisons there were in Russia between 1920 and 1990?

Too many, on a scale unimaginable and incomparable to a handful of American Military prisons.
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 6:41:55 AM
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Oh tao, Margaret Thatcher, by being a bulwark against the evil empire has done more for millions of people in Europe than you or I could even dream of achieving.

As for your little fixation on Margaret and Pinochet.

She would have known more about the alternatives to Pinochet as the socialist lead Chile into economic and social meltdown than you or I will ever know.

As for your supposed “50,000 dissenters” that is nothing compared to the politicians of the system you would see us suffer. Stalin alone was 50,000,000
I would say 50,000 in “communist terms” would represent an average month.

We know the cynicism of communists, in communist terms 50,000 is a mere statistic.

The Marxist/communist alternatives to Pinochet would have likely lined up 5 million. How many have the Peruvian Shining Path alone butchered?

So Margaret’s credibility is still intact. That you try but cannot discredit her effectively merely shows your personal inadequacies. The inadequacies of your politics is easy to prove, just ask any Pole, Lithuanian, Estonian, German, Czech, Hungarian, Bulgarian or Romanian over the age of 25

Your failure to answer direct questions, like my Alchemy analogy, which you shy away from every time and Logical’s question regarding where he would be in your social order which is too confrontational for you ro deal with, (confrontational = requires an honest answer and not some snake oil spruker spin) compares you unfavourably to Margaret Thatcher.

Questions, Margaret would answer on the wing, like the eagle. You, scratch around in the dirt and hope they will go away, like a chicken.

Well tao, it is plain to see, it is your own inadequacies and petty jealousy which makes you so envious of Margaret Thatcher as you see her soar on the wing, looking up, from the dirt of your chook pen.

Oh come back with the alchemy and Logicals social positioning questions before you inflict any more of your rant upon us. You are getting seriously boring.
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 7:10:27 AM
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I am off on a fortnights holiday without computer access. I will be interested to see if anything has been resolved by the time I return. I will not be holding my breath.

Persisting in lining up who has been responsible for the worst atrocities in the past is unlikely to result in an answer to the question of how our affairs might be better structured in the future.

Such a score card of attrocities only polarises opinions and serves as a diversion from addressing the shortcomings of your preferred mode of government.

It might be more constructive for:
a) Col and I to concentrate on how the checks and balances of a capitalist Western democracy can be maintained, and hopefully improved, while still confronting the intolerance of radical Islam (or any other fascist ideology that might seek to impose itself upon us), and
b) Tao to explain how his version of universal socialism is going to incorporate any lasting checks and balances.

In answering b) I have a belief that Tao's intentions should include my right to exist and continue being logical or illogical.

The purpose of the ? in my name is to leave open the possibility that my current opinions might be wrong or my arguments ill-conceived.
Posted by Logical?, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 8:08:49 AM
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Col,

I am not going to continue this conversation with you as you have still not been honest enough to acknowledge that Stalinism is not same as the Marxist conception of communism. When Logical gets back I may continue, however I see no point debating someone as dishonest as you.

As for your comments.

“As-for-your-little-fixation-on-Margaret-and-Pinochet.

She-would-have-known-more-about-the-alternatives-to-Pinochet-as-the-socialist-lead-Chile-into-economic-and-social-meltdown-than-you-or-I-will-ever-know.”

My comments on Thatcher were merely to highlight her hypocrisy, and the hypocrisy of those who idolise her.

What you are saying is that you – Col - think it is acceptable to overthrow by military coup a democratically elected government and impose a fascist military dictatorship, which eliminates and tortures those who oppose it, in the service of capitalism, just because you don’t like the politics of the legitimately elected government.

“economic-and-social-meltdown-than-you-or-I-will-ever-know.”

No, we will never know what would have happened under Allende because he was murdered and his government was overthrown. So whatever you say is unsubstantiated speculation, or more correctly, right wing spew.

As for social and economic meltdown what we DO know is that, in decade following the US-backed coup, Chile’s unemployment rate soared from 4.3 percent to 22 percent, while real wages plummeted by 40 percent. During the same period, the share of the population living below the poverty line more than doubled, reaching 44.4 percent.

Chilean workers are among the most exploited in the world. Part-time and temporary jobs and contract labour are the norm, with most workers putting in 48-hour weeks. Children are compelled to seek employment as early as possible. By 1992 only 2.5 percent of the population had more than seven years of formal education, a third as many as in Argentina and half the number in Brazil or Mexico.

Of course, the rich did very well from Pinochet’s “economic miracle” - the smashing of democratic-rights and labour organisations, and any opposition to the dictates of the “free” market.

No wonder Maggie loves him so much.

It doesn’t matter what you accuse me of Col, or what excuses you make, nothing can hide the fact that Maggie unabashedly supports fascist-military-dictatorships in defence of capitalism.
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 11:43:40 PM
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Tao “I am not going to continue this conversation with you as you have still not been honest enough to acknowledge that Stalinism is not same as the Marxist conception of communism.”

That your recipe for “angel cake” tastes like dead cockroaches means that regardless of what you call it, people are going to associate it with what it tastes like, not the name of the recipe.

As for honesty is, your “recipe” for Marxism has ended up tasting like Stalinism, Pol Potism Maoism Kimism etc. regardless that yo call it "Marxist angel cake".

As to continuing, please your self, we live in a democracy. If your system prevailed one of us would be off to the gulag anyway.

Whilst on the topic of honesty, Logical asked where is your solution for Stalinism not happening again? Something you have avoided ansering.

Who gets to vote against communism under your system?

Regarding Margaret. She was a practical politician, elected to power in public election and who was so recent, I had the privilege to vote for.

Marx, who you seem to idolize, has been dead 150 years and never held public office. His system of government has only ever been implemented by revolution and bloodshed over the bodies of the innocent bystanders.

As for as anyone’s hypocrisy is concerned, whine all you want. Thatcher to Marx we are talking real people versus theories, it will always be easier to find fault with real people, unless you had the honesty to include Stalin in with Marx, being the actual manifestation of Marxism then we could compare real “hypocrisy” in the mix.

I was thinking the other day, Here I am, what many would call politically a "conservative". I am debating with a supposed “radical”.

Yet this conservative supports a political system which changes with public needs and the radical clings, vainly, to the crackpot theories of a bloke who is died 150 years ago and for a political system which, except for two small patches, collapsed and has been rejected by countries who used to suffer it.

So who is the “conservative”?
Posted by Col Rouge, Wednesday, 17 January 2007 6:34:33 AM
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“It doesn’t matter what you accuse me of Col, or what excuses you make, nothing can hide the fact that Maggie unabashedly supports fascist-military-dictatorships in defence of capitalism.”

I am sure the history of South America is terrible, compared to life in a Siberian Gulag.

I wonder if every Cambodian who died in Pol Pot’s reeducation camps would not have swapped places.

We can tell how Margaret Thatcher “unabashedly supports fascist-military-dictatorships”,

Tell me who launched the British expedition to remove the fascist-military-dictatorship occupancy from the Falklands, In the face of socialist opposition?

You know I recall how stupid socialist can be, despite an agreement not to politicize the Falkland war, the following general election Healey of the left, reneged on that agreement and went and put it into a speech. It secured Maggie’s future. She was voted back on a landslide.

Nothing I can say will change your mind, tao. Nothing you say will change mine. I have seen your lies and deceits a thousand times before. Theories which do not stack up. The alchemist lead into gold, which you have still not responded to.

Think what you want, you are, under the political system which I support free to do so but think on this, under your system you would not be free to think, let alone express a view. How is that for hypocrisy ?

I hope others might consider what is written here, particularly people who might think that marxism sounds like a nice idea and I hope they are prompted to understand what happens when it is in place. Stalin, Mao, Kim, Pot Pol, Caucescu. The KGB, Stasi, repression, economic stagnation. The Legacy of Marxism is for all to see. Except it seems for you, oh deluded one

I will finish with a Quote from Margaret Thatcher, quoting a Russian. Oh Logical, have a happy holiday!

“As the former dissident Vladimir Bukovsky remarked, referring to the Russian proverb to the effect that you cannot make an omlette without breaking eggs.

He had seen plenty of broken eggs, but had never tasted any omlette."

Margaret Thatcher 'Statecraft'
Posted by Col Rouge, Wednesday, 17 January 2007 6:48:05 AM
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Col,

To my comment:

“It doesn’t matter what you accuse me of Col, or what excuses you make, nothing can hide the fact that Maggie unabashedly supports fascist-military-dictatorships in defence of capitalism.”

You said:

I am sure the history of South America is terrible, compared to life in a Siberian Gulag.

I wonder if every Cambodian who died in Pol Pot’s reeducation camps would not have swapped places.”

“We can tell how Margaret Thatcher “unabashedly supports fascist-military-dictatorships”,

Tell me who launched the British expedition to remove the fascist-military-dictatorship occupancy from the Falklands, In the face of socialist opposition?”

Comparing Pinochet’s fascist military dictatorship, which overthrew an elected government and murdered its leader, “disappeared” and tortured thousands, to other atrocities in an attempt to make it SOUND BETTER than it was, is a truly desperate tactic.

Thatcher’s war against Argentina was fought to protect British Imperialism’s interests (and divert the British peoples’ attention from the social chaos at home). Had Argentina not threatened territory which Britain considered its own, Thatcher would have been happy to leave the CIA backed Argentinean fascist military dictatorship alone.

All this proves is that Thatcher chooses to support the fascist military dictatorships which further British capitalism’s interests.

I repeat Col, it doesn’t matter what you accuse me of, or what excuses you make, nothing can hide the objective FACT that THATCHER SUPPORTS FASCIST MILITARY DICTATORSHIPS in defence of capitalism when it suits her.

Obviously, given your defence of her, so do you.

You - Col Rouge - support fascist military dictatorships.
Posted by tao, Thursday, 18 January 2007 10:37:58 PM
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Tao “You - Col Rouge - support fascist military dictatorships.”

So you claim. Not that anything you say can be relied upon.

Stalin’s apologist.

Strange as this may seen, my views of the Pinochet dictator makes stuff all difference to anything.

Whine all you want, we know your strategy.

If you make enough supposedly critical claims, it will deflect you from having to answer the outstanding questions which Logical and I have asked of you

Why Marxism is like an alchemists trick of turning lead into gold and how Logical would fair under the dictates of the peoples collective.

I guess you are playing the Lenin card, you know
“A lie will become the truth if you say it often enough”

Fact, I suspect Margaret Thatcher knew more about what was really happening in South America and the reason she chose to support Pinochet was because the socialists were about to sell the people out to Castro and the Russians, as was happening in Africa and some other continents at the time.

Fact Margaret Thatcher Launched the Falklands War and Prevailed over a South American Dictatorship.

Fact, Lenin was a liar.

Stalin Was a liar

Marx was deluded and politically impotent, he lived (and died) in London because he thought UK would be the centre of his revolution. It was convenient though, I was happy to piss on his grave when I lived in London.

As for “overthrew an elected government and murdered its leader”

I guess you are going to suggest Marxist-communism ever did such a thing?

The Czar would disagree with you and a load more too.

Quotes

Lenin “One man with a gun can control 100 without one.”

Margaret “We want a society where people are free to make choices, to make mistakes, to be generous and compassionate. This is what we mean by a moral society; not a society where the state is responsible for everything, and no one is responsible for the state.”

Lenin would kill to force his view, Margaret wanted people decide for themselves.

That is WHY Margaret Thatcher prevailed over Lenin’s successors.
Posted by Col Rouge, Friday, 19 January 2007 12:09:38 AM
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Col,

You wrote: “Tao “You - Col Rouge - support fascist-military-dictatorships.” So you claim. Not that anything you say can be relied upon.”

If my claim is unreliable, why don’t you just demonstrate it is not true by denouncing Pinochet’s fascist military dictatorship? If you don’t denounce it then it is reasonable to conclude that you do support fascist military dictatorships. Perhaps my claim is not so unreliable after all. Go ahead – condemn Pinochet, his regime, and its supporters.

You wrote “Stalin’s apologist” which I presume is an accusation that I approve of Stalin and his regime.

What evidence do you have to support this claim? I have never expressed support for Stalinism, Stalin, or his actions, nor have I apologised for them. I have in fact stated that Stalin and his policies were counter-revolutionary, criminal and not Marxist – they were a betrayal of Marxism, the Russian Revolution, and the international working class. I defend Marxism and the Russian Revolution, but I condemn Stalin and Stalinism.

On the other hand you have expressed support for Stalin’s actions in liquidating opposition within the Soviet Union itself: “the first people who Stalin bumped off were the central committee and anyone who could even remotely challenge him”. “Trotsky did fight against Stalin and the one good thing which Stalin did do was to disempower Trotsky.”

So apparently you not only support Pinochet’s oppressive tactics, but also Stalin’s.

You wrote: “Strange as this may seen, my views of the Pinochet dictator makes stuff all difference to anything.”

Actually, they are quite important. Your support and defence of Pinochet’s fascist military dictatorship, overthrow of an elected government, thousands “disappeared” and tortured at his command, is quite revealing of your character and the unprincipled nature of your beliefs and political orientation.

They demonstrate that your professed ideals of freedom, individualism etc. - “a-society-where-people-are-free-to-make-choices,-to-make-mistakes,-to-be-generous-and-compassionate.-This-is-what-we-mean-by-a-moral-society” – “Think what you want, you are, under the political system which I support free to do so”, are obviously nothing more than trite phases, based on little substance, that disappear like a puff of smoke when push comes to shove.
Posted by tao, Saturday, 20 January 2007 12:51:24 PM
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Unless of course Pinochet was being generous and compassionate when he had his opponents “disappeared” and tortured. Perhaps he was allowing them to think and say what they want when he had their tongues cut out. As you say, “think on this, under your system you would not be free to think, let alone express a view. How is that for hypocrisy ?”

And of course you keep saying this “Fact, I suspect Margaret Thatcher knew more about what was really happening in South America”. Whether or not Thatcher had legitimate reasons for supporting Pinochet at the time (which she didn’t, except the interests of capitalism – she obviously wasn’t doing it for “democracy”), or perhaps did not realise the extent of his crimes (which I doubt), this does not excuse her campaigning AFTER she and everyone else knew of his ‘alleged’ atrocities (i.e. 2000 onwards) for him to escape being tried for those crimes and atrocities in a Court of Law. Or in Col/Maggie world, does not the Rule of Law apply without fear or favour to everyone?

So:

“I repeat Col, it doesn’t matter what you accuse me of, or what excuses you make, nothing can hide the objective FACT that THATCHER SUPPORTS FASCIST MILITARY DICTATORSHIPS in defence of capitalism when it suits her.”

And:

It doesn’t matter what you accuse me of, or what excuses you make, nothing can hide the objective FACT that YOU – COL ROUGE – support fascist military dictatorships.

And far from making “stuff all difference”, your evident support of fascist military dictatorships should always be kept in mind when weighing up the credibility of your professed love of freedom, individualism, choices etc.

“Margaret wanted people decide for themselves.” - at the point of a gun, or an electric current to the testicles, obviously.
Posted by tao, Saturday, 20 January 2007 12:52:27 PM
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Tao “If you don’t denounce it then it is reasonable to conclude that you do support fascist military dictatorships.”

I will respond to your "Commands" only after you have answered the the "Lead into Gold" alchemists issue and Logical’s question regarding how he would fare under the dictatorship of the proletariat.

You do not get answers until you are prepared to respond to direct questions.

The other conclusion anyone will draw is that you are merely deploying more of your inelegant deflections away from giving an honest answer.

Back to some more quotes to illustrate Western Democracy versus Marxism

I could use more Margaret, there is lots to draw on and Lenin, well that malignant troll came out with some wonders but I will go back to your icon, Marx

We could start with “All I know is I'm not a Marxist.”

That seems reasonable, who would want to be associated with the “political run off from a toxic waste dump”?

oops, that is what you are promoting tao, how indelicate of me!

“Revolutions are the locomotives of history.”

And 50 million were run over by the Marxist locomotive when Stalin was at the controls.

Here is a good one from the other side, JFK, the one who faced down Khrushchev over the Cuba missiles

“A nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.”

Why did every Marxist-Communist government deceive its own people, use terror and torture on a scale unimagined, even by Piniochet, to hide truth from them?

Oh as for “obviously nothing more than trite phases, based on little substance, that disappear like a puff of smoke when push comes to shove.”

My “smoke” has prevailed and outlived the winds of the Communists, Marxists and Trotskyites.

Tao your politics are like a man with emphysema.

Struggling around but lacking the power (of reason) to produce enough puff to “push or shove” my “smoke”.

And obviously have no future either
Posted by Col Rouge, Saturday, 20 January 2007 1:28:16 PM
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LOL Col

You wrote: “I will respond to your "Commands" only after you have answered the the "Lead into Gold" alchemists issue and Logical’s question regarding how he would fare under the dictatorship of the proletariat.

You do not get answers until you are prepared to respond to direct questions.

The other conclusion anyone will draw is that you are merely deploying more of your inelegant deflections away from giving an honest answer.”

LOL

What an absolute cheek you have to accuse me of deflecting from giving honest answers. You introduced your lead-into-gold-analogy in order to avoid answering a direct question and have clung on to it for dear life:

LOL

You wrote:

“tao "The central question is – do you acknowledge that the USSR, China, Cuba, North Korea, etc. do not accord with Marx’s conception of communism? "

Asked and Answered

I repeat

"I am working on an understanding of what actually happens (interpretation of actual events).”

That is what matters, what actually happens not what MArx theorised should happen.

I could have a theory about turning lead into gold. I could document that theory and receive acclaim for it. Then I die and are buried in Highgate Cemetery.

Then 100 years later people at OLO argue my theory, regarding turning lead-into-gold and one of them identifies some of the failed attempts to produce gold from lead and notes that not one practical test has ever worked.

That is what you are doing tao, arguing in support of a "theory" which the test of "practical-experience" has proved just does not work.”

LOL

You still have not directly answered the central question posed.

LOL

As to whether I get “answers”, in the form of you denouncing Pinochet, or not, I really don’t care. Your refusal to do so speaks for itself. As I said “If you don’t denounce it then it is reasonable to conclude that you do support fascist military dictatorships.” I can draw the appropriate conclusion, as can everyone else.

LOL LOL LOL chuckle-chuckle lol-lol-lol LOL LOL LOL giggle-giggle *sigh* giggle-giggle LOL LOL LOL Ow,-my-tummy-hurts LOL LOL LOL
Posted by tao, Saturday, 20 January 2007 3:13:45 PM
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Tao “What an absolute cheek you have to accuse me of deflecting from giving honest answers. You introduced your lead-into-gold-analogy in order to avoid answering a direct question and have clung on to it for dear life:”

Another of comrade tao’s examples of tell a lie often enough and it becomes the truth, learnt at the shrine of the pustule, Lenin.

And another deflection from answering

As for the rest of your inane girlish giggles, (you must have practiced that with all your Barbie dolls).

Dearest Margaret said “I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left. “

I guess your thought that the incessant use of “LOL” would be wounding, otherwise why use it?

It says a lot about you tao.

I have never asked you how you earn your living, some tenured soft-spot in cloistered academia I expect or maybe a librarian, a lot of pent up emotion in librarians, raging anger about people who put the fiction in with the reference section. You come across as a librarian, even if your not, I am sure your temperament would make you a good one.

I am sure I could find some appropriate Lenin comment to describe you, beyond “useful idiot”, of course but I think if I type any more Lenin my fingers will drop off in protest.

The reality is we live in a capitalist democracy where we each choose what we do.

“Capitalist Democracy” is a tolerant system, the best system, the system which I support.

Your system requires several things starting with a revolution (lets face it no one has every voted a communist system into government)

Be it the nature of revolution of the corrupt nature of the proponents, communist revolutions have always been imposed by a bunch of economic retards exercising a absolute ruthlessness and a “depraved indifference” to the needs of the ordinary, individual people they hold court (central committee) over
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 21 January 2007 8:45:30 AM
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I have often thought people who seek control of other people are suffering some form of extreme mental dysfunctionalism.

Be it theologians who believe in an authoritarian religious state, Catholic or Muslim or be it atheists, who substitute Communism for religion, they are all the same, dysfunctional extremists.

They are chronically insecure.

They seek to control their “dysfunctional inner world” by dictating to the real world around them and everyone else who inhabits that real world, regardless of the wishes of those other inhabitants.

It is a bit like the obsessive-compulsives who organize their sock drawers or arrange the kitchen cupboards with the tins of beans all lined up, labels facing front.

These extreme obsessive-compulsives demand the population of the nation be arranged equally, to a master plan of regularity, efficiency and economy (exactly like the communist 5 year plans).

The problem they see with Capitalism is the chaos, the inefficiency and the inequality of capitalism.

What they do not see is that from what seems like chaos comes forth individuality, creativity, inventiveness and solutions to the blights of man.

Repress individuality and you repress inventiveness and creativity which solves the problems which challenge access to the better life for all mankind.

Stalin used to dictate what Russian composers were allowed to compose, Shostakovich hated living under Stalin and lived in fear of being exiled.

Would Mozart’s unique brilliance been seen as “bourgeoisie” and he denied access to play or compose music?

“Capitalist Chaos” simply reflects the individuality of people and their personal priorities. which mean nothing to you but is paramount to them.

“Capitalist Inefficiency” is people creating and inventing solutions which might not be exactly what a committee would choose but at least an imperfect solution is better than the alternative of no solution.

“Capitalist Inequality” is a function of individual profligacy of thrift. If you were to equally distribute all “wealth” and leave people to trade and barter, within as little time as 7 years, certainly within a generation, 10% of the population would be control 90% of the productive resources.
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 21 January 2007 8:48:02 AM
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Take your Marxist theories and burn them. That way they will, at least, keep you warm for a moment instead of gathering dust.

Try to impose your rubbish Marxist theories and they will, as they have done all times before, fail.

Since we all have unique DNA and DNA defines the arrangement and nature of our natural appearance and ability, expect everyone to be unique, be individual and thus, be unequal.

What seems like inequality is the physical manifestation of individuality.

Margaret Thatcher wrote “Let our children grow tall, and some taller than others if they have it in them to do so.”

Some naturally tall some short, some gifted some not so gifted.

Children are not socks or tins of beans, to be directed and arranged into orderly, economic and efficient plans for the future.

Children are the future. A playground is the first example of children “organizing themselves”. A playground is “chaos”, kids naturally form groups, boys v girls, runners v sitters, natural empathy and natural antagonisms define the groups and who children befriend.

Children are unique individuals and so too will be the adults they will grow into.

Marx’s obsessive-compulsive theories are doomed to fail before they are implemented and all that is left after the revolution is what fills the void of failure; the ruthless, depraved indifference of Communism. What a waste of individuals and the unique contribution they might have made had they been free to explore their individuality and inventive creativity.

Margaret Thatcher also said “We want a society where people are free to make choices, to make mistakes, to be generous and compassionate. This is what we mean by a moral society; not a society where the state is responsible for everything, and no one is responsible for the state.”

Lenin said “Under socialism all will govern in turn and will soon become accustomed to no one governing.”

With “No one governing” we have a state which no “one is responsible for”. More communist deflections tao. More lies and deception from the Lie Master, Lenin, as exposed by Margaret Thatcher.
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 21 January 2007 8:58:33 AM
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As you are so insistent on your little analogy, my comments follow:

Col’s lead into gold analogy:

"I-am-working-on-an-understanding-of-what-actually-happens-(interpretation-of-actual-events).”

That-is-what-matters,-what-actually-happens-not-what-MArx-theorised-should-happen.

I-could-have-a-theory-about-turning-lead-into-gold.-I-could-document-that-theory-and-receive-acclaim-for-it.-Then-I-die-and-are-buried-in-Highgate-Cemetery.

Then-100-years-later-people-at-OLO-argue-my-theory,-regarding-turning-lead-into-gold-and-one-of-them-identifies-some-of-the-failed-attempts-to-produce-gold-from-lead-and-notes-that-not-one-practical-test-has-ever-worked.-

That-is-what-you-are-doing-tao,-arguing-in-support-of-a-"theory"-which-the-test-of-"practical-experience"-has-proved-just-does-not-work.”

Arguments from analogy basically draw a conclusion about one thing by comparing it with another thing. Arguments from analogy “work” if the things which they are comparing are sufficiently similar, or don’t have negatively relevant differences which count against the conclusion we are drawing.

In this analogy, Col is comparing Marxist theory to his own “theory about turning lead into gold”.

The similarities we are provided with are that:

1. They are both theories

2. Col and Marx documented their theories and received acclaim.

3. They both die and are buried at Highgate Cemetary.

4. 100 years later people on OLO identify attempts to put both theories into practice which “did not work”.

The conclusion which we are led to (which is not explicitly stated) is that it is futile to attempt to apply the lead into gold theory again, therefore it is futile to attempt to apply Marxist theory again.

So, if we are to accept the conclusion, the primary subject (Marxist theory) and the analogue (Col’s lead into gold theory) the positively relevant similarities must outweigh the negatively relevant differences.

To do this we must examine the similarities and differences. So we begin:

As to similarity (1) in the analogy they are both “theories” and in that they are “similar”. However there are relevant differences:

Firstly, Marxist theory was devised over a period of 50 odd years by a real person, on the basis of all human knowledge to that point (150 years ago), from examination of the real world, for the purpose of understanding the real world, and ultimately to change it.

The lead into gold theory was devised NOW by Col on the basis of all human knowledge to this point, but attributed to a fictional ‘Col of 100 years ago’ who didn’t really exist then, for the purpose of making a point in a debate that is taking place NOW.

Cont…
Posted by tao, Sunday, 21 January 2007 4:03:29 PM
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Secondly, as theories (real or not), there are many relevant differences in the actual subject of the theories - inanimate matter versus complex organic organism, unconscious versus conscious, inactive participant versus active participation and the motives that entails, chemical alteration versus socio-economic alternation, core physical structure atoms versus socio-political organisation, scale, time etc. They are hardly comparable.

*As to similarity (2) in the analogy both theories were documented and received acclaim and in that they are “similar”. However there are some relevant differences:

Firstly, Marxist theory is a real theory which really was documented 100- 150 years ago. He received acclaim from some people but fierce opposition from those he exposed.

The lead into gold theory wasn’t a real theory and wasn’t documented 100 years ago. We only have Col’s word for it that there ever was a theory, and that it received acclaim.

Secondly, because it is documented, we know what Marxist theory is, and it can be objectively studied now.

The lead into gold theory is not described anywhere, either by Col in the analogy, or by Col 100 years ago – it could be medieval alchemy, or it could be nuclear physics. There is no way we can tell, and we can’t objectively study it now.

*As to similarity (3) – this is completely irrelevant to the validity of the theory.

*As to similarity (4) in the analogy 100 years later people on OLO have cited examples of the “practical experience” which showed that the theory “does not work”, and in that they are “similar”. However again, there are relevant differences, and the term “does not work” needs to be defined.

Firstly, unless you can point out where people are discussing the lead into gold theory on OLO, and are providing the examples that “do not work”, again, we are just taking Col’s word for it. On the other hand, someone did start this thread called “When is a revolution necessary”? And we are discussing it.

Cont…
Posted by tao, Sunday, 21 January 2007 4:04:18 PM
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Secondly, because we don’t know what the lead into gold theory is, and it hasn’t been documented, we don’t know if it really didn’t work. There is no way of objectively measuring the success of a non existent theory using non existent “practical experience” to test it. How do we judge if a non existent theory “does not work”? We just have to take Col’s word for it.

We do however know what Marx’s theory was (if we bother to read it), and can objectively measure whether it “does not work”. However the theory is far more complex and variable to put into practice and measure its success than a fictional theory about turning lead into gold. Satisfactory analysis of it and “its” results requires a lot more work than simply taking Col’s word for it that it “does not work”.

Out of interest, if Col’s theory was indeed based on nuclear physics, 100 years ago Rutherford was working on nuclear theory and later converted nitrogen into oxygen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Rutherford. Building on nuclear theory, in 1980 Seaborg was actually successful in changing lead into gold http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glenn_T._Seaborg. So a REAL lead into gold theory does actually work in “practical experience”.

In fact the “practical experience” of Seaborg’s theory of turning lead into gold is a little analogous to Marxism. He was able to turn several thousand lead atoms into gold, however the gold atoms lasted less than 5 seconds before breaking apart. Nuclear theory has the explanation for this, which is that the gold atoms were unstable isotopes. The energy expended and the microscopic quantities produced meant that it was not financially viable to further develop and apply the theory to make stable gold. Nonetheless, his lead into gold theory worked. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemy

Marxism and the Soviet Union are similar. Marx’s theory “worked” – the working class took power. Marx’s theory also explains the instability, degeneration, and tragic defeat of the first attempt, and that it won’t be the last.

Cont…
Posted by tao, Sunday, 21 January 2007 4:04:48 PM
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A difference between the two theories is whether we think that humanity can and should do better than capitalism with its wars, environmental destruction, poverty and starvation, and hence whether it is worth looking at Marxism again. As I have previously stated, lead doesn’t need to change into gold, and we don’t need it to. But we do need to change our society.

As to the conclusion we are encouraged to draw from Col’s analogy (i.e. that it is futile to apply Marxist theory again), I would suggest – don’t bother – the differences far outweigh the similarities. Further, we can see that even a cursory study of lead into gold theories, reveals that studying reality is far better than relying on Col’s fictional word – which would be a far better conclusion to draw.

Analogies can be useful (in a limited way) in debate to illustrate a point, but only if we compare the thing we are explaining to something tangible and real. Col’s fictional theory was not tangible and the conclusion he invited us to draw, as usual, had no basis in reality.

In fact he says himself – “That is what matters, what actually happens” But Col’s example didn’t actually happen. “I am working on an understanding of what actually happens (interpretation of actual events)”. Rather than giving us an understanding of what actually happens, he uses fictional analogies to prop up his own fictional “interpretation of actual events”.

I think we can safely say that it would not be wise to draw any serious conclusions about Marxism from Col’s fictional 100 year old theory, other than that we should find out the truth for ourselves. It is a non sequitur.

Col,

As for your last little diatribe, I note you still have not condemned Pinochet’s regime.

You wrote: “Children-are-unique-individuals-and-so-too-will-be-the-adults-they-will-grow-into.” Under capitalism, 10.7 million children per year die before their 5th birthday - that is 1200 per hour who will not “be the adults they will grow into”.
Posted by tao, Sunday, 21 January 2007 4:05:23 PM
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WOW look at that tao, four posts in one hit again, surely a sign of an obsessive compulsion.

And that from someone who wrote on, Tuesday 16 January “I am not going to continue this conversation with you”

Lets ignore the crap and focus on two phrases among the dross of your multi-part post

“But we do need to change our society.”

Here we come back to Marx and Capitalism.

What you repeatedly fail to recognize is this

“Capitalism” is constantly changing.
It does respond to changes in every individuals expectations not only for material goods but for life-qualitative expectations, desires and worth.

So why should “changing capitalism” change to meet your lunacy?

Why would anyone pretend that another run at “Marxism” is not going to end up in “the gulag archipelago” ?

If we were to consider Marxism, which was tried and failed in too many countries, regardless of the expectations of the people, maybe we should have another go at Fascism.

There is practically no difference between the two systems, Both are despotic, both murdered people by the million, both repressed the aspirations of individuals. Stalin (the practical outcome of Marxism) did his deals with Hitler to carve up Poland and Eastern Europe.

If we were to try Fascism first we would all get smarter uniforms to wear.

I am sure you would leap at the chance to wear something with a cute deaths head on the cap.

As for “Under capitalism, 10.7 million children per year die before their 5th birthday”

Maybe you could qualify that number. The infant mortality rates of Western Democracies is a lot less than that. If you are including Africa and the third world, a lot of those places have gone backward since they were de-colonized.

And I wonder how much higher the 10.7 million would be if it were not for capitalist developed medicines and capitalist nation aid programs?

Then, of course, how many were dying under Stalin and Mao when their whims held sway? A lot more than 10.7 million a year.

Tao, You have lost. You are lost
Posted by Col Rouge, Sunday, 21 January 2007 11:55:42 PM
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Col,

“Lets ignore the crap and focus on two phrases among the dross of your multi-part post.”

So what you mean is lets ignore the fact that your fictional analogy, which you have insisted that I respond to, is exposed on analysis to be feeble non sequitur. You told me to put up or shut up - I put up - and now you want to shut up.

“What you repeatedly fail to recognize is this

“Capitalism” is constantly changing.
It does respond to changes in every individuals expectations not only for material goods but for life-qualitative expectations, desires and worth.”

On the contrary, I recognize that capitalism is constantly changing - for the worse.

“As for “Under capitalism, 10.7 million children per year die before their 5th birthday”

Maybe you could qualify that number. The infant mortality rates of Western Democracies is a lot less than that. If you are including Africa and the third world, a lot of those places have gone backward since they were de-colonized.

And I wonder how much higher the 10.7 million would be if it were not for capitalist developed medicines and capitalist nation aid programs?”

A 2005 UN Human Development stated that every year, 10.7 million children die before their fifth birthday. Every hour more than 1,200 children die, which is equivalent to three (2004 Boxing Day) tsunamis a month, every month, hitting the world’s most vulnerable citizens—its children. The causes of death will vary, but the overwhelming majority can be traced to a single pathology: poverty.”

Whether or not Africa & the third world have “gone backward since they were de-colonized”, they are still under the umbrella of the global capitalist economic system e.g. capitalist corporations still exploit their resources, property in the means of production is privately owned.

As for Western Democracies, the report explains that “health outcomes in the United States, the world’s richest country, reflect deep inequalities based on wealth and race.”
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 23 January 2007 12:01:58 AM
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The UN-Development-Program report includes what it calls a “human-poverty-index” for the 20 wealthiest countries, to “better reflect the extent of human deprivation that still exists” among the populations of these major economic powers. By this measure, the US ranks next to last among the top 20, only ahead of Italy. On such indices as life-expectancy, and especially infant-mortality, the world’s “sole-superpower” lags significantly behind many other countries.

UNICEF also presented a report in 2005 on the growth of child poverty in OECD countries. According to the UNICEF definition, the countries with the largest proportion of children in poverty are Mexico (27.7%) and the US (21.9%). In the EU, Italy has the highest proportion of child poverty, with 16.6 percent, followed by Ireland (15.7%), Portugal (15.6%) and Britain (15.4%). These countries are followed by Canada, Australia and Japan, each with more than 14% of children growing up in poverty.

Yes, 21.9% of children live in poverty in the richest country on earth, that exemplar of capitalism – USA. And inequality is increasing.

As for “capitalist” medicine and “aid”. Capitalist countries don’t even meet their own targets of 0.7% of GDP. A 2004 UNAID Report concluded that worldwide an estimated $12 billion would be needed to combat AIDS by 2005, increasing to $20 billion by 2007. This would provide antiretroviral therapy for over six million people, support for 22 million orphans, HIV voluntary counseling and testing for 100 million adults and include education for 900 million students.

Total funding in 2003 was less than $5 billion, not even half of the amount required. This includes all AIDS spending—the UN Global Fund to Fight AIDS, western governments, nongovernmental organisations and private individuals. In 2003 only 400,000 patients—seven percent of those needing antiretroviral medicines in low and middle-income countries—actually received them. The report explains that even those that did get drug treatment may not get the necessary advice and treatment to make it effective.
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 23 January 2007 12:02:48 AM
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So, $20 billion will be required this year, and Forbes recently reported that the richest 400 people in the US are worth more than $1.25 trillion. A measly 1.6% of their combined assets should do the trick! The richest 1% of adults in the world own 40% of the world’s $125 trillion worth of assets – or $50 trillion – an even more measly 0.16% of their assets would do the trick.

And apparently it would cost $80 billion to get clean drinking water to every person in the world. A mere 0.64% of the assets of the world’s richest 37,000,000 adults, or 6.4% of the assets of the US’s 400 richest people.

By the way, if you work it out, 400 rich Americans is 0.000006% of the world’s population, and they own 1% of the world’s wealth. And 21.9% of US children live in poverty.

In order to protect this obscene accumulation of wealth and stave of its impending economic catastrophe, the US ruling classes (and allies) have launched a series of illegal wars/invasions for the sole purpose of controlling the world’s oil supplies. Against the express wishes of the US population, and that of the majority ordinary people of the entire world, they are preparing to escalate the bloodbath in Iraq, and launch incursions into Iran and Syria, and will probably use nuclear weapons. To suppress and intimidate any opposition and resistance from their own populations to their criminal actions, the US and other countries all over the world have systematically dismantled democratic rights and civil liberties. At the same time they are stripping ordinary people of working and social benefits won by previous generations in order to pay for it. Inevitably, they will attempt to conscript ordinary people to go and fight a war they already oppose - a Democrat Senator has already introduced legislation. If the US bombs Iran, you can bet China, Russia, Europe and Japan are going to have to do something to protect their own interests and oil supplies. It could be the opening salvo of World War 3.
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 23 January 2007 12:03:34 AM
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”Then, of course, how many were dying under Stalin and Mao when their whims held sway? A lot more than 10.7 million a year.”

As I previously said, attempting to make capitalism’s atrocities look better by comparing them to other atrocities, which were themselves a product of the global economic system of capitalism is a desperate tactic, and doesn’t change the fact that atrocities are being committed by capitalism as we speak.

You again repeat the blatant lie that I want a Stalinist system, when it is you who has still not denounced Pinochet, and you who approves Stalin’s oppressive tactics, namely the elimination of opposition, particularly Trotsky.

You also repeat the lie that Stalinism was Marxism. The reason Stalin hated Trotsky, and capitalists hate Trotsky is exactly the same – Trotsky and Trotskyism was the revolutionary alternative to Stalinism, and the continuation of Marxism. That is what you, with your bluff and bluster, personal attacks, and fictional analogies, are trying so hard to stop anyone from finding out. However I think anyone with an ounce of curiosity, and intellectual honesty, should be able to see by now that taking your advice is not wise. Hopefully, they will do their own study, particularly of Trotsky and the Left Opposition.
Posted by tao, Tuesday, 23 January 2007 12:05:19 AM
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Tao, the world is an imperfect place.

Capitalism is not a “perfect solution”. It is, like democracy, an imperfect solution which works better than any other solution thus far tried, including Marxist-Communism.

The overwhelming body of evidence has proved the Marxist theories which you actively promote have, compared to capitalism, produced worse outcomes and instantly decline into corrupting communism.

Your beating of breast and pulling of hair about wealth distribution is not going to change that.

As for “However I think anyone with an ounce of curiosity, and intellectual honesty, should be able to see by now that taking your advice is not wise. Hopefully, they will do their own study,”

I hope they do study ALL the options. They can decide for themselves, as I have decided for my self.

Capitalism encourages study and inspection of ALL alternatives.

Marxist-Communism demands fealty to unwavering single ideas, without options.

The evidence is there.

Those who dissent with “Democratic Capitalism” are protected by your notions of individual freedom, including speech.

Those who dissent with Marxist-Communism used to end up in a psychiatric hospital, in prison, in a gulag or one of Stalins 50 million dead.

Trotsky was deluded. Full of theories of world revolution and no idea about feeding people or giving them a better life.

Trotsky failed worse than communism.

If you continue to waste your time idolizing Trotsky, expect to die a failure like him (with or without an ice pick).

You have lost. You are lost.
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 23 January 2007 6:30:42 AM
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Col,

Sometimes I wonder if you actually consider the meaning of what you say.

“Marxist-Communism-demands-fealty-to-unwavering-single-ideas,-without-options.”

What is “unwavering single ideas”?

Are you suggesting that the best idea is a wavering one? Is there such a thing as a “multiple” idea?

The word “ideas” is plural. You can have a single idea, or a number of different ideas. If you have a number of ideas then, automatically they are not a single idea. If you think Marxism is just one single idea, then it should be easy for you to tell us what it is. Even a cursory glance at Marxism would show that it is not one single idea, but a complex theoretical system derived from the real world in all of its complexity. Frankly, what you are saying is nonsense.

Marxist-philosophy is variously called scientific-socialism, dialectical-materialism or historical-materialism. Essentially it combines the philosophy of materialism with dialectics and history.

To begin with Marxism is a materialist philosophy. Its fundamental premise is that the material world exists outside of human-consciousness, and that ideas (human-or-otherwise) arise from of the material-universe. This differs from idealist philosophy which posits that an “idea” existed before the material-universe, or that the material-universe arose out of some idea (i.e. of God etc).

Dialectical-thinking analyses all things and phenomena in their continuous change, rather than as fixed abstractions. Formal logic says that A is equal to A, or a kilo of sugar is equal to a kilo of sugar. However the reality is that a kilo of sugar is never exactly equal to another kilo of sugar – a more delicate-scale will reveal a difference. A kilo of sugar isn’t even equal to itself over time – a kilo of sugar in a litre of water is still the kilo of sugar, but it is also different to a dry kilo of sugar. Within certain limits we can use an axiom that A is equal to A, but dialectical logic seeks, by closer and closer approximation and corrections, a more concrete but flexible understanding of what is, and the point at which A no longer equals A..
Posted by tao, Sunday, 28 January 2007 11:02:10 PM
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The study of history is also a necessary component, because without it, we are unable to see that the stage of development humanity is at is just one of many stages of development through which we have passed. Each stage of economic development, and its ideas, has arisen out of the material conditions of a previous stage. Consciousness grew out of unconsciousness, psychology out of physiology, organic out of inorganic etc.

Darwin’s theory of evolution is an example of the dialectic – it explained the evolution of species through quantitative transformations passing into qualitative – a new species. This was a development from previous systems, which had as their starting point the immutability of species, and so were limited to the description and classification of things according to external characteristics. Description and classification are useful in themselves, but a better understanding of the laws of nature is arrived at through Darwin’s theory. We understand now that within a species, there are contradictions and antagonistic forces, which are also acted upon by outside forces, to produce a qualitative change, a higher stage of development – a revolution. We can see contradictions and antagonistic forces in all of nature.

Marxism, through dialectic logic, seeks to understand and explain human societies, the development of their productive forces, and the structure of the relationships of ownership which constitute the anatomy of society. Capitalism in general, or in the abstract, is not equal to capitalism at a given stage of development with its specific internal contradictions and antagonisms. To have a better understanding of capitalism we are entitled to ask, what is the specific stage of capitalism through which we are passing? What is the significance of the dismantling of the Bretton Woods system? What is the significance of the US moving from world creditor to a massive debtor? What do these factors, and many others, mean for the conduct of US, and world capitalism
Posted by tao, Sunday, 28 January 2007 11:02:44 PM
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Marxism, being a materialist-philosophy, considers that our ideas about our society arise form the material-conditions. The extent of capitalist “democracy” corresponds to the given stage-of-development of capitalism itself. The apparent “universal” ideals of democratic-rights, civil-liberties etc, may have been, at some stage of capitalism, reflected in, or a reflection of, the material conditions of society, or they may have only been the ideal to which we were striving. Currently, capitalism holds up those ideals as what it is fighting to spread to the Middle-East, but the reality is that they don’t exist in the Middle-East, and they are being legislated away in those countries in which they did exist. When you say “Those-who-dissent-with-“Democratic-Capitalism”-are-protected-by-your-notions-of-individual-freedom,-including-speech”, we are entitled to ask - do they apply to everyone? Just ask David Hicks if they do. And if they are denied to one of us, or 100, or 5000, at what point do we say that they don’t exist at all?

And we are entitled to ask, at what point does “Democratic-Capitalism” become a fascist-dictatorship? Is it when an illegal aggressive war is launched? Or when people are locked up without-charge for five years? Perhaps it is when the majority of people vote in an election against a war, which the executive subsequently escalates. Or when the executive is no longer subject to democratic-oversight and control? At a recent Senate-Judiciary-Committee hearing on the use of data mining to spy on citizens, US-Attorney-General Albert Gonzales refused to answer questions from the committee members. A witness, former Republican-Congressman Bob Barr said “Data mining presents many serious threats to the First, Second, Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution. That is nearly half the Bill of Rights! Where will this end? With the repeal of the Constitution so that the White-House won’t have to worry about those inconvenient and troublesome laws anymore?” Similarly, the anti-terror laws here contravene our Constitution. At which point does our Constitution become not worth the paper it is printed on? When do democratic “notions” no longer have any relationship to reality? When do we cease to be protected by them in reality?
Posted by tao, Sunday, 28 January 2007 11:03:21 PM
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Similarly, when you say “Marxist-Communism-demands-fealty-to-unwavering-single-ideas,-without-options”, we are entitled to ask what are “unwavering single ideas”? Does “Marxist-Communism” really demand fealty to such things? If the Soviet Union did demand such fealty, say under Stalin, was it always that way? If it wasn’t always that way, at what point, and why, did it become that way? If it wasn’t always that way, which is truly “Marxist-Communism”, and which isn’t?

A simple description of a Marxist is one who subscribes to the philosophy of dialectical materialism, and uses it as a guide to revolutionary action. If a person does not subscribe to dialectical materialism, then they are not “Marxist”. To know whether someone is a Marxist, you need to know what dialectical materialism is, how to use it, and work out whether or not that person is using it. If you haven’t studied dialectical materialism, then you can’t “know” whether someone is, or is not a Marxist, therefore you can’t say that they are with any authority.

My argument here, is that Stalin did not use dialectical materialism as a guide to action, therefore he wasn’t a Marxist, therefore what happened to the Soviet Union was not purely the result of “Marxism”. In addition there were many internal and external factors, not caused by “Marxism”, which contributed to the degeneration of the Bolshevik Party, and the Soviet Union (just as there are many factors which are contributing to the degeneration of “Democratic Capitalism”). The Bolshevik Party, and the Soviet Union, did not exist in a vacuum (just as a species does not exist in a vacuum) and all factors must be taken into account when attempting to understand the “evolution” of the Soviet Union, and indeed, of capitalism. Study will further our understanding.

On the other hand, saying something banal like “the-world-is-an-imperfect-place” doesn’t further our understanding of anything, and essentially, doesn’t mean anything.
Posted by tao, Sunday, 28 January 2007 11:05:01 PM
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