And yet you're watching... LOL!
Perhaps I'll see if I have any photos to post. But last weekend was so dismal in the photography department... cheers, frank On Tue, Nov 17, 2015 at 9:14 PM, Darren Addy <pixelsmi...@gmail.com> wrote: > A thread like this is the conversational equivalent of everyone > marching in wearing their overshoes and opening their raincoats to > reveal that they are wearing nothing underneath. It's not a pretty > sight. > > On Tue, Nov 17, 2015 at 7:57 PM, knarf <knarftheria...@gmail.com> wrote: >> "They called themselves Communists." >> >> The former East Germany called themselves the German Democratic Republic. >> What's in a name? >> >> "Lenin was the orthodox Marxist." >> >> At the risk of oversimplification, Lenin was about the Party, and >> centralizing power. I suspect he may have considered that a necessary >> interim measure but he did that. There's a reason they called it >> "Marxist-Leninist"; he changed marxism . >> >> "Mao was an orthodox Marxist." >> >> He was just an evil totalitarian dictator. He used Marxist-Leninist jargon >> and catch words but he was basically a Stalinist. >> >> "Stalin maintained Lenin's system." >> >> See Mao. I mean, he basically wrested power from Lenin (Trotsky was the heir >> apparent) and turned the USSR into a full-on State-Capitalist economy. He >> was an evil dictator. He was all about power. He turned himself into a god, >> a cult leader to be worshipped and adored. There was nothing of a communist >> about him. >> >> Look, I said earlier that there's never been a communist state. And I don't >> think there ever will be one. I think that one of the downfalls (perhaps the >> biggest one) of communism is that it almost necessarily devolves into a >> dictatorship, with a single-party, totalitarian government led by a >> megalomaniac who tries to turn himself into a god. >> >> It's happened enough times, hasn't it? >> >> I'm a lefty but I'm no commie. Nice concept, nice theory but it'll never >> fly. The vacuum left during or after the revolution will always leave the >> opening for the above to occur. Always. >> >> But whatever criticisms you have of the evil regimes you mention, they're >> evil for reasons other than their putative communism. >> >> Cheers, >> >> frank >> >> >> >> On November 17, 2015 2:50:01 PM EST, Collin B <coll...@brendemuehl.net> >> wrote: >>>>There has never been a communist state. After the Revolution the USSR >>>may >>>have been moving that way but never got there. However close they may >>>(or >>>may not have) come, >>>>they were completely derailed by Stalin. >>>> >>>>The USSR and every other so-called communist state were actually >>>State-Capitalists. That is they were in fact capitalist however the >>>means of >>>production were owned by >>>>the state rather than individuals or corporations (who are, as we all >>>know, >>>legal persons). >>>> >>>>So whatever happened to the USSR and the Warsaw Pact states, it wasn't >>>happening to commies. >>>> >>>>Cheers, >>>> >>>>frank >>> >>>In the West we like to over-simplify or idealize communism as some sort >>>of >>>communalism. >>>Nothing could be further from the truth, John Lennon not being excused >>>for >>>his "imagination." >>> >>>They called themselves Communists. Lenin was the orthodox Marxist. >>>Mao was an orthodox Marxist. Stalin maintained Lenin's system. >>>Stalin killed 60M. Mao, at least 30M. Hitler, 10M+ >>>Those three killed about 1/20 of the world population of the mid 20th >>>c. >>>Communism is about power. It was never about a touchy-feely community. >>> >>>Reading Marx' "Capital" he did not entirely oppose the existence of >>>capital >>>but the system under which it was managed. >>> >>> >>>We just don't learn from history. Malthus was foundational to Marx. >>>Though his predictions have failed on numerous occasions they are still >>>being proposed as workable (eg, Sanger & the modern green movement). >>>Lenin just couldn't make things work. (To his credit, though, he did >>>clamp >>>down on organized crime.) >>>Look at PROC & Cuba? They survive because the feed off capitalism, just >>>as >>>do other forms of socialism. >>>N. Korea, on the other hand, presents the world something much closer >>>to >>>Stalin's USSR. >> >> -- >> >> "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept." -- Henri Cartier-Bresson >> >> Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity. >> >> -- >> PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List >> PDML@pdml.net >> http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net >> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and >> follow the directions. > > > > -- > Life is too short to put up with bad bokeh. > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > PDML@pdml.net > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. -- "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept." -Henri Cartier-Bresson -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
