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.

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.

... 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.

...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.

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.

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)