Re: [Marxism] My favorite passage from B. Traven
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Persons who have read B. Traven's Jungle novels should take a look at Barbarous Mexico, John Kenneth Turner's 1910 account of his journey through Yucatan, the Valle Nacional (Valley of Death) and other parts of Mexico, encountering the enganchado system on the plantations, the labor agents, slaves. Mayans and deported Yaquis. On some plantations the Yaquis were said to live around six months. The early chapters recount one particularly brutal whipping of a Yaqui for not meeting his quota of hennepin leaves. Charles Kerr Company offered a reward to anyone who could rebut the claims of the book and challenged Diaz to respond. It was probably Kerr's best selling book, and the most appalling account of conditions in Mexico imaginable. I don't think Traven could match it. Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Gil Scott heron, RIP
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == There will be no highlights on the eleven o'clock news and no pictures of hairy armed women liberationists and Jackie Onassis blowing her nose. Maybe I'm being naive and Gil Scott Heron had views of the the position of women after the revolution is horizontal type, but isn't it possible that this is a condemnation of the media's portrayal of sensationalist stereotypes - women as crazy hairy armed feminists or glamourous celebrities, with no normal and certainly, especially when he wrote this, no black women? Women pigeon holed as particular kinds of commodities will be an anachronism just as ads for Coke and other vapid crap will be. So maybe that just means TV in all its forms of banality will be irrelevant because people should be out there making the revolution, not sitting on their arses watching it unfold on TV. After all, he did also write that: Black people will be in the street looking for a brighter day. The revolution will not be televised That interpretation would fit with the tenor of the rest of the piece. I'm prepared to be proven wrong of course. Cheers, John Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Traven
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == See Jonah Raskin, My Search for B. Traven (Methuen, 1980). Dan wrote: Travenologists (as they are called) will spend entire congresses discussing who Traven really was, whether he was a German anarchist who spent time in the US and Mexico, or ... Just to say that The Death Ship is definitely a great, and short, novel that is sure to enthrall any young (or older) reader. Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Traven
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On 6/1/2011 10:57 AM, Richard Fidler wrote: See Jonah Raskin, My Search for B. Traven (Methuen, 1980). Dan wrote: Travenologists (as they are called) will spend entire congresses discussing who Traven really was, whether he was a German anarchist who spent time in the US and Mexico, or ... Just to say that The Death Ship is definitely a great, and short, novel that is sure to enthrall any young (or older) reader. Back in the 70s, I used to keep two items on my cubicle wall wherever I worked. One was a copy of the cover of Death Ship. The other was words from Karl Marx's Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844: ...the worker feels himself only when he is not working; when he is working, he does not feel himself. He is at home when he is not working, and not at home when he is working. Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Traven
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == According to Amazon. com The Death Ship tells the story of an American sailor, stateless and penniless because he has lost his passport, who is harassed by police and hounded across Europe until he finds an 'illegal' job shoveling coal in the hold of a steamer bound for destruction. The result is a nightmarish descent into hell and one of the most unforgetable masterpieces of the century The Death Ship is the first of B. Traven's politically charged novels about life among the downtrodden, which have sold more than thirty million copies in thirty-six languages. Next to The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, it is his most celebrated work. Follows the following review : What a surprisingly readable novel! I picked this one up, not knowing anything about the writer, or his work and was completely amazed. It has a very original style of writing, its very light, it sounds more like a conversation than anything else. Traven's got a wonderful sense of humor and slips jokes in on the sly here and there. I loved it. As a real live American Sailor I really enjoyed this book. Traven must have sailed as a merchant marine to have written a book so close to ship life. It was funny and sad at the same time. I take this book with me when I go to work and read once in my four month trip. And yet, I was amazed to discover that the latest English language editions of The Death Ship were published in 1991 and 2007 by comparatively small publishing houses. I thought such a classic had a far greater readership in the US; as it has in Europe. Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] What 5 years of Lexis-Nexis reveals about Libya and the West
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Just around the time that the West began military operations against Libya, there were ex post facto attempts to describe the assault as the culmination of long-standing hostilities. The model for many, especially Diana Johnstone and Jean Bricmont, was Yugoslavia with Qaddafi serving as a Milosevic type figure. This approach struck me as incoherent in light of the evidence that Libya had been pursuing the same type of neoliberal economic policies as post-Milosevic Serbia for the better part of a decade. There was also an attempt to equate the Benghazi-based rebellion as Libya’s version of the KLA. This involved attempts to uncover conspiracies by the West to stir up trouble in the eastern regions of Libya and get the “restless natives” to rise up against a benevolent leader who had showered them with wealth for the longest time. The latest instance of this came to my attention in a post to the Marxism mailing list that linked to an article by Michel Collon that appeared—unfortunately—in Granma Internacional. Collon is a member of the Axis for Peace, a project initiated by the Voltaire Network based in France. Collon described a plot that was hatched by the West well before the February 2011 uprising: What was the role of secret services? In fact, the Libyan case didn’t start in February in Benghazi, but in Paris October 21st, 2010. According to the revelations of Italian journalist Franco Bechis (Libero, 24th of March) it is that day that the French secret service had prepared the revolt of Benghazi. They then “returned” (or perhaps even before) Nuri Mesmari, Chief of Protocol of Gaddafi, who was almost his right hand against him. He was the only one who enters the residence of the Libyan leader without knocking. Coming to Paris with his family for a surgery, Mesmari didn’t meet any doctor there, but on the other side, he would talk to several officials of the French secret services and Sarkozy’s close aides, according to the latest web Maghreb Confidential. On November 16th, at the Hotel Concorde Lafayette, he prepared a large delegation that would go two days later to Benghazi. Pretty good stuff, I must say. If I were to turn this into a movie, I’d cast John Turturro as Nuri Mesmari and Tony Shalhoub as Qaddafi. full: http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2011/06/01/what-5-years-of-lexis-nexis-reveals-about-libya-and-the-west/ Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] British households facing depression
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == This was the humorous Google add under the blog describing the lack of investment. On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 4:08 AM, robert mckee bobmcke...@yahoo.com wrote: http://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2011/06/01/british-households-facing-depression/ -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 530 898 5321 fax 530 898 5901 http://michaelperelman.wordpress.com Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Diane Ravitch op-ed piece on education reform
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == I agree Glenn but I stillthink this is a significant piece not only because where it published but also the content. Between these two factors it represents a very telling attack on the American Educational reform movement as defined by NCLB and Race to the Top. As you have pointed out, glenn, it is also important to work out exactly where the attack is coming from. Ravitch is a conservative and in Gramscian terms she would be a traditional intellectual. That means she wants to preserve the high culture and views the world of capitalism with dismay and even horror. Thus she seems to especially regard the depredations of vulgar capitalists like Bill Gates with fear and scorn. What Ravitch is playing out, probably in a state of unawareness, is the drama between conservatism and right wing radical libertarianism. So far the conservatives have been soundly trounced. But Ravitch is a heavy hitter and the very successes of Duncan and Gates in radically changing American education are alarming more and more people. She wants a distance between the world of business and the world of schooling. That distance she thinks allows a world of sweetness and light to flourish. In some ways she can usefully be regarded as channelling Matthew Arnold. Lots of issues here such as what should be the attitude of we Lefties towards conservatives and behind all this the real questions of our time - Is a non-capitalist modernity possible and what would it look like? comradely Gary Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Sitcoms
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 6:26 PM, Ismail Lagardien ilagard...@yahoo.comwrote: Hi Everyone As some of you may know, I am in-between jobs. For some reason I have been watching a bit of TV between 5-7, while I am cooking or eating dinner. Why waste time with those when you can get the video collection of a classic - The Honeymooners. Every episode features the comic/tragic efforts of loveable buffoon Ralph Kramden to escape from the working class, even to the point of marketing dog food as a delicious mystery appetizer. Ed Norton Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Diane Ravitch op-ed piece on education reform
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == It's not just that she wants the space between the immediate needs of business and schooling, but she sees education as an essential feature of the infrastructure that makes capitalism work as it has in the past. The problem with the current spate of reforms is that they are essentially premised on the idea that education must be cost-effective in some sense immediately evident in profit terms. Capitalist management always tends to be very limited in terms of its ability to recognize a problem not immediately in front of them. It might be wisest to think about this as part of the general decision to have austerity and budget cuts at the price of painting a bridge . . . or other cost-cutting decisions that will ultimately involve severe costs in the long run. ML Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Diane Ravitch op-ed piece on education reform
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On 6/1/11 7:46 PM, Mark Lause wrote: It's not just that she wants the space between the immediate needs of business and schooling, but she sees education as an essential feature of the infrastructure that makes capitalism work as it has in the past. The problem with the current spate of reforms is that they are essentially premised on the idea that education must be cost-effective in some sense immediately evident in profit terms. This relates to the question that has preoccupied me for some time, namely the seeming incapacity of the contemporary ruling class to be able to act in its own long-term interests around a range of questions such as infrastructure, environment, education, etc. Ravitch would seem to be committed to the New Deal project while the social basis for such a project disappeared long ago. Interesting contradiction. Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] Marxist Voices
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == New Post: Marxist Voices http://rustbeltradical.wordpress.com/2011/06/02/marxist-voices/ Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Diane Ravitch op-ed piece on education reform
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == I think louis is correct. Though I see her as an important ally in the fight against the commodification of childrens education. Sent from my iPhone On Jun 1, 2011, at 7:56 PM, Louis Proyect l...@panix.com wrote: == Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On 6/1/11 7:46 PM, Mark Lause wrote: It's not just that she wants the space between the immediate needs of business and schooling, but she sees education as an essential feature of the infrastructure that makes capitalism work as it has in the past. The problem with the current spate of reforms is that they are essentially premised on the idea that education must be cost-effective in some sense immediately evident in profit terms. This relates to the question that has preoccupied me for some time, namely the seeming incapacity of the contemporary ruling class to be able to act in its own long-term interests around a range of questions such as infrastructure, environment, education, etc. Ravitch would seem to be committed to the New Deal project while the social basis for such a project disappeared long ago. Interesting contradiction. Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/ernestleif%40gmail.com Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Diane Ravitch op-ed piece on education reform
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Mark wrote: It's not just that she wants the space between the immediate needs of business and schooling, but she sees education as an essential feature of the infrastructure that makes capitalism work as it has in the past. Hi Mark Ok. So I see her as a traditional intellectual while you are seeing her as an organic intellectual for a period of capitalism which has passed. You are probably right. Certainly in her 2001 article* A different kind of education for black children* she does talk of the need for an education which prepares students for a changing economy. Still for me there is still a strong whiff of the Matthew Arnold about her. If one reads carefully the black children article then one can see a very interesting dialectic at work I think. Ravitch is classically liberal and non-racist in her analysis of the problem in the first pages of the article. She also gives a useful distinction between education for social adjustment and education for social advancement. The former provides an education for low paid jobs. She is for education for social advancement clearly, but she does not spell this out or think through what it would mean in the real world of contemporary capitalism. So it becomes a kind of cliche, like something you would find in a fortune cookie or like something the Dalai Lama would say. Yes we all clean our teeth every day and we are all for education for social advancement. However the bourgeoisie will die in a ditch (hopefully) before they will let any class advance beyond them, so education for social advancement has unstated but very powerful limitations set around it. Liberals have nothing to say here. It is when Ravitch comes to talk of the Counter culture in the 60s that her link to the Arnoldian tradition becomes clearer. Like Arnold in Hyde Park she is terrified of the *jacquerie*. That is probably what drove her to the Reagan camp. Whatever the case now she is faced with the triumph of those forces she worked for. The radical libertarian right could not give a damn for the cultural heritage. Ideologically they also cannot recognize the existence of such as thing as a 'public good'. There is only private profit and that is the alpha and the omega of their interest in education. Can a conservative liberal like Ravitch lead the counter attack? Capitalism needs an education system based on the premise it is a public good. But it is highly doubtful if capitalists can be brought to see that need. There is a distinction of levels here and as Lou has pointed out we do seem to have a dearth of capitalists who can even begin to think of the notion of a public good. comradely Gary T Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Diane Ravitch op-ed piece on education reform
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Ravitch will always be connected in my mind with Albert Shanker, the anti-communist cold-warrior who supported the Vietnam War and led a racist strike in 1968. Ravitch worked at the New Leader magazine, associated with the SDUSA, Shanker's party. She is currently a board member of the Albert Shanker Institute, and received the UFT's John Dewey award in 2005. During his tenure as UFT and then AFT President (when I was a member of both), Shanker was a big proponent of guns AND butter, the belief that we could -- and should -- spend generously on the military and social programs at the same time. Shanker was a big supporter of Henry Scoop Jackson, the Washington State Democratic Senator from Boeing, known for his avid support for increased military spending. Ravitch is a perfect fit for the Albert Shanker Institute, devoted to promoting the glories of American democracy. The Institute's Education for Democracy statement -- signed by such luminaries as Ted Kennedy and war criminal Bob Kerry -- quotes a section of Ravitch's book, The Language Police, which blames American textbooks for being too critical of U.S. occupations and not anti-communist enough. Here's what Ravitch says: The textbooks published in the late 1990's do ... contain a coherent narrative. It is a story of cultural equivalence: All of the world's civilizations were great and glorious, all produced grand artistic, cultural, and material achievements, and now the world is growing more global and interconnected The textbooks sugercoat practices in non-Western cultures that they would condemn if done by Europeans or Americans. Seemingly, only Europeans and Americans were imperialistic. When non-European civilizations conquer new territories, the textbooks abandon their critical voice Some texts present Mao as a friendly, inclusive leader who listened to the peasants and won their support, just like our politicians. Most texts point out the Communist Party killed one million landlords and that at least 20 million Chinese people died because of a famine caused by Mao's disastrous Great Leap Forward. Some mention the humiliation of teachers and professionals during the Cultural Revolution. But it often seems as though these were just unfortunate events that occurred while Mao and the Communist Party were successfully transforming China into a modern industrialized society Students who read these texts might well conclude that the Chinese Communist program had its ups and downs, its good policies and its bad policies (just like ours), but overall produced great gains for the Chinese people. It seems like Ravitch's big fear is that the emphasis on more and more teaching will weaken what she sees as the main mission of American education -- insuring that students understand that capitalism and capitalist democracy is the best possible system and that alien notions like class war, revolution, socialism, and communism should be rejected. I don't see her as an ally of the left. Glenn Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] Nepal to recognise third gender on census
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/05/31/nepal.census.gender/index.html -- “Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is humanity’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.” — Oscar Wilde, Soul of Man Under Socialism “The free market is perfectly natural... do you think I am some kind of dummy?” — Jarvis Cocker Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Diane Ravitch op-ed piece on education reform
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 11:04 PM, Glenn Kissack gkiss...@nyc.rr.com wrote: It seems like Ravitch's big fear is that the emphasis on more and more teaching will weaken what she sees as the main mission of American education -- insuring that students understand that capitalism and capitalist democracy is the best possible system and that alien notions like class war, revolution, socialism, and communism should be rejected. I don't see her as an ally of the left. Well, materialists have to leave the discussion of intentions or motives to the psychics. In materialist terms, we have crappy policies and practices in place...and proposals for crappier policies and practices. The question we face is the old one...Which side are you on? If anyone thinks finds anything remotely progressive in the current tsunami of proposals that put the emphasis on more and more teaching, I suggest they haven't thought about it much more than my pet gerbil Arnie Or do we have Marxists here who seriously think that the problem in the auto industry is that auto workers don't make enough cars, earn too much money and have too much job security (which protects the lazy and worthless workers)? Just as it's the old question of which side are we on, the solution's also the old one...of hanging together or hanging separately. ML Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] Controversy dogs Chomsky as he accepts Sydney Peace Prize
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/controversy-dogs-chomsky-as-he-accepts-sydney-peace-prize-20110601-1fgqf.html -- Shared using Google Toolbar Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
