Jim tried to discuss this with me offlist. I see no reason to do so. My point remains that Jim seems to have singled out al Qaeda as the clerical fascists and has thus been operating in accordance with the propaganda machine. Jim's basic reply is that just because he did not also call the House of Sa'ud clerical fascists does not mean that he does believe that it is not. Which may be logically true. But since fascism is not an analytical concept but a fighting word in a world at war, it matters politically who is and who is not EXPLICITLY called fascist. So I'll leave it at that.
I tried to change the topic: ps I read David Laibman's book on capitalist macrodynamics last night. it's very good. He has thought hard and long. What i appreciate is that he very keenly understands the critique by the non equilibrium thinkers who are challenging the use of simultaneous equations in the analysis of technical change (in particular Alan Freeman). He understands that such an equilibrium methodology cannot be ontologically justfied in the sense that the economy never exists in equilibrium but he justifies its use epistemologically (he does not say that input prices have be set at output prices for the simultaneous equations to become solvable). But then his epistemological defense just brings back the ontological justification--there exists in fact a real tendency, albeit never realized, towards equilibrium. At any rate, Laibman is quite honest in recognizing why his critics are challenging him. By the way, I agree with you Jim that even if you use a temporal concept of value you cannot prove that the cheapening of capital goods will not neutralize upward pressure on the OCC. Even with a temporal concept of value OCC may still not rise. Plus, if the OCC is rising very slowly while the rate of exploitation is rising, the fall in the rate of profit may be so gradual that the mass of surplus value may become insufficient only some time before the sun burns out. That is, the temporal concept of value does not guarantee that the falling rate of profit will in fact be an important force. But the point is that it is possible for viable technical change to result in a rising OCC if one uses a temporal concept. Even with a constant real wage. The Okishio Theorem says it's impossible (Duncan Foley says the same thing), but it assumes input=output prices. Of course by setting constant the rate of exploitation instead of the real wage, Laibman and Foley do show that viable technical change can indeed result in a falling rate of profit. Since both Freeman, et al and Laibman, et al want to limit the robustness of the Okishio Theorem--one by dropping the equilibrium assumption, the other by dropping the assumption of the real wage--one wonders why Marxist academics are now at odds with each other. Rakesh
