c b <[email protected]> wrote: > ... There is a real contest between the classes for influence within the > Democratic Party. Thus , the New Deal, the Great Society and the Stimulus and > Obamacare. Many of the main "propositions" in the DP represent reforms that > the ruling class doesn't want and the ruled class does want; or are against > the objective interests of the ruling class and in the objective interests of > the ruled class.<
Says who? The "ruling class" (i.e., the capitalist class) is against Obamacare, the Stimulus, or either of the two slogans? Is the ruling class _as a whole_ against them? Are you saying that the ruling class acts as a unified force with unified goals? What evidence do you have for this kind of unity? How can George Soros, Bill Gates, or Warren Buffett be lumped in the same group as the Koch brothers or Peter Peterson? Almost all of the ruling class benefited mightily from the New Deal. As has been said many times, the New Deal saved US capitalism from demoralization, sit-down strikes, veterans' marches, etc. Similarly, the Great Society was aimed at dealing with serious social problems that threatened to cause instability, which is bad for capitalists. It's true that it also involved an escalating war against Vietnam, which undermined stability. But the ruling class can't always get what it wants. As old Maoists used to intone, "there are contradictions." Obamacare -- a.k.a. Romneycare -- is a program that comes from the Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think-tank (aimed, among other things, at fighting Single Payer). For many businesscritters, it's as a good thing since they found that the private insurance system raised their costs and hurt them in competition. Insurance and pharmaceutical companies are profiting from Obamacare or hope to do so. Of course, a lot of GOPsters are making political hay by attacking Obamacare, since it's unpopular with the petty-bourgeois crowd. But thinking that something is good for the "ruled" because some bad people (the Tea Party) oppose it is fallacious. If the Stimulus was a program that the "ruled class" favors and the "ruling class" opposed, why did the Capitalist Congress in Washington, DC, favor it? You should remember that Keynesian stimulus helps business in a lot of ways, by boosting sales revenues, cash flow, and profits. The program works because it helps business. CB: > fundamentally, advances in these areas [ethnic and gender equality] are against the interests of the ruling class. < What are the "interests of the ruling class"? There are at least three definitions. First, there's what you'd find if you did a poll asking ruling-class members "what's good for you?" Many capitalists -- especially the female and minority-group members among them -- would likely answer that ethnic and gender equality are a good thing (all else constant). (Think about Oprah.) Among other things, getting rid of barriers to women and members of ethnic minority groups to rising in the capitalist hierarchy allows in new untapped talent, which can improve the all-important bottom line: remember the way that hiring Jackie Robinson eventually helped the management of the Brooklyn Dodgers (and professional baseball as a whole). Other capitalists would reject such equality, since they want to preserve their own privileges. But why should we choose one group or the other to represent the whole of the ruling class? The pollster might also ask "what's good for the capitalist class as a whole?" But that would likely produce similar results, since businesscritters are so self-centered. Another definition of the interests of the ruling class involves those things that promote the persistence of the societal power of the class as a whole and its legitimacy. What exactly this means is often unknown (especially ahead of time), but I'd say that anything that weakens the working class in terms of organization and consciousness is good for the capitalist class. Often ethnic and gender divisions play this role, via "divide and rule," but such divisions can also be (ahem) divisive in a way that _hurts_ profits. Since there are other mechanisms beside such divisions to promote capitalist power (such as the reserve army of labor), my guess is that capitalists could live without ethnic and gender factors dividing the working class. Yet another definition of the interests of the ruling class would be what's favored by the current power elite in capitalist society, i.e., (currently) the Obama administration. After all, as some old guys once wrote, the "executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie." It may not do a very good job, but the Obama administration is a clearly acceptable management committee to a large swath of the ruling class (who gave large amounts of campaign contributions to its election and reelection campaigns). It's only a small bunch of Tea Party and similar knaves who talk about the need for overthrowing Obama. > Those "enlightened" capitalists, just don't understand their fundamental > _class_ interests or they actually oppose their class interests consciously. > Roosevelt is a big example, but Kennedy and Johnson , too. < Johnson's big act of opposition to the interests of the ruling class was his not winning the Vietnam war (& his stretching it out too long). I don't see how Franklin Roosevelt or Kennedy hurt the ruling class. Please explain, giving specific examples. And please define what you mean by the "fundamental class interests" of the capitalists. CB: > ... originally on this thread you had mentioned "world ruling class" and I asked that we elaborate the idea. The finance capitalists in the biggest imperialist countries constitute a dominant world class, though there is some 21st Century inter-capitalist rivalry with BRIC's.< I'd say that the "finance capitalists in the biggest imperialist countries" instead represent the dominant faction of the world ruling class (which involves a bunch of competitive factions). However, it's often hard to draw the line between the financial and industrial wings of the capitalist class. I'm not sure that the capitalists in the BRICs are that different from those in the richer countries, either. -- Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
