Re: [Marxism] Fwd: The left can oppose Russian intervention in Syria without capitulating to our own rulers | REDFLAG

[Lüko Willms via Marxism]

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on Donnerstag, 15. Oktober 2015 at 05:54, Clay Claiborne via Marxism wrote:

SM>> Tartus in Syria is the only remaining Russian naval base outside Russia

> Sure, now that they've annex Crimea.

  The Krim peninsula has been ruled by Moscow since the 18th century, except 
for the short span of 23 years after the dismemberment of the Soviet Union and 
the separation of Ukraine. 

  
 
Cheers, 
Lüko Willms
Frankfurt/Main, Germany
http://www.mlwerke.de
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[Marxism] Time to recall that the enemy is at home

[Lüko Willms via Marxism]

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Since it has become a sport on this mailing list to pinpoint people and powers 
which "join the axis of resistance", i.e. do not submit themselves to the 
imperialist politics of the world dictatorship exercised from Washington, it 
has to be recalled that the revolutionary workers movement has always held 
hight the simple truth, that our enemy is at home, is "our" own government and 
its policies. 

Look up Karl Liebknecht on this topic, 
> https://www.marxists.org/archive/liebknecht-k/works/1915/05/main-enemy-home.htm
>  

>  The main enemy of every people is in their own country!
>
> The main enemy of the German people is in Germany: German
> imperialism, the German war party, German secret diplomacy. This
> enemy at home must be fought by the German people in a political
> struggle, cooperating with the proletariat of other countries whose
> struggle is against their own imperialists.
>
> We think as one with the German people – we have nothing in common
> with the German Tirpitzes and Falkenhayns, with the German
> government of political oppression and social enslavement. Nothing
> for them, everything for the German people. Everything for the
> international proletariat, for the sake of the German proletariat and 
> downtrodden humanity.
>
> The enemies of the working class are counting on the forgetfulness
> of the masses – provide that that be a grave miscalculation. They
> are betting on the forbearance of the masses – but we raise the vehement cry:
>
> How long should the gamblers of imperialism abuse the patience of
> the people? Enough and more than enough slaughter! Down with the war 
> instigators here and abroad!


and consider also Lenin's 1916 short article on "German and non-German 
chauvinism", 
> https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/may/31.htm 
of which I allow myself to quote some paragraphs 

>  One of the characteristics of German chauvinism is that
> “socialists” -- socialists in quotation marks -- talk about the
> independence of nations, except those which are oppressed by their
> own nation. It does not make much difference whether so directly, or
> whether they defend, justify and shield those who say it.
>
> The German chauvinists (who include Parvus, the publisher of a
> little magazine, called Die Glocke, among whose contributors are
> Lensch, Haenisch, Grunwald all the rest of the crew of “socialist”
> lackeys of German imperialist bourgeoisie) speak at great length and
> very eagerly, for example, about the independence for the peoples
> oppressed by Britain. It is not only the social-chauvinists of
> Germany, i.e., socialists in words, chauvinists in deeds, but the
> whole bourgeoisie press of Germany that is trumpeting with all its
> might about the shameful, brutal and reactionary, etc., fashion in
> which Britain rules her colonies. The German papers write about the
> liberation movement in India with great gusto, malicious glee, delight and 
> rapture.
>
> It is easy to see why the German Bourgeoisie is full of malicious
> joy: it hope to improve its military position by fanning the
> discontent in the anti-British movement India. These hopes are
> silly, of course, because it is simply impossible seriously to
> entertaining the influencing the life of a multi-million people, and
> a very peculiar people at that, from outside, from afar in a foreign
> language, particular when the influence is not systematic, but
> casual, only for the duration of the war. Rather than the desire to
> influence India the efforts of the German imperialist bourgeoisie
> are more of an attempt at self-consolation, more of a desire to fool
> the German people and to divert their attention from home to foreign parts.
>
> But this general, theoretical question automatically arises: What
> is at the root of the falsehood of such arguments; how can the
> hypocrisy of the German imperialists be exposed without unerring
> certainty? The correct theoretical answer pointing to the root of
> falsehood always serves as a means of exposing the hypocrites who,
> for reasons all too obvious, are inclined to cover up their
> falsehood, to obscure it, to clothe it in flowery phrases, all sorts
> of phrases, phrases about everything in the world, even about
> internationalism. Even the Lensches, Südekums and Scheidmanns, all
> these agents of the German bourgeoisie, who, unfortunately, belong
> to the so-called “Social-Democratic” Party of Germany, insist that
> they are internationalists. Men must not be judged by their words,
> however, but by their deeds. This is a home truth. Will anyone in
> Russia judge Potresov, Levitsky, Bulkin and Co. by their words? Of course, 
> not

Re: [Marxism] Fwd: Top Cuban general, key forces in Syria to aid Assad, Russia, sources say | Fox News

[Lüko Willms via Marxism]

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on Donnerstag, 15. Oktober 2015 at 02:54, Louis Proyect via Marxism wrote:

> Who's next to join the axis of resistance? Monaco? The Westboro Baptist
> Church? Richard Dawkins?

  Sources will join, as your article itself already says. Unnamed, that is. 

  What do you think? All the world is going after you, I mean the US of A. Bad 
guys, those humans. 

 
Cheers, 
Lüko Willms
Frankfurt/Main, Germany
http://www.mlwerke.de
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[Marxism] Zinoviev's 'The war and the crisis of socialism'

[Philip Ferguson via Marxism]

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I'm not a Zinoviev fan, but this book was a classic.

I've just stuck up on Redline a 1981 appreciation of it by German marxist
Sabena Norten:

https://rdln.wordpress.com/2015/10/15/marxist-classics-an-appreciation-of-zinovievs-the-war-and-the-crisis-of-socialism/

See also Sabena on WW2:
https://rdln.wordpress.com/2013/11/18/world-war-ii-the-real-story/

Phil
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Re: [Marxism] Fwd: The left can oppose Russian intervention in Syria without capitulating to our own rulers | REDFLAG

[Clay Claiborne via Marxism]

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On Wed, Oct 14, 2015 at 8:10 PM, Stuart Munckton via Marxism <
marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:

> Tartus in Syria is the only remaining Russian naval base outside Russia
>

Sure, now that they've annex Crimea.
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Re: [Marxism] Fwd: The left can oppose Russian intervention in Syria without capitulating to our own rulers | REDFLAG

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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On 10/14/15 9:10 PM, Stuart Munckton wrote:

It mention Russia more through out it. You can disagree with what Green
Left says about Russia's intervention,  but you cannot -- without being
utterly dishonest -- pretend it has said nothing about it! Perhaps the
reason is Green Left's attitude to Russia's intervention doesn't fit Red
Flag's cookie cutter approach that likes to deal with grossly offensive
defences of Russia's actions by the likes of Mike Whitney or Socialist
Unity (does anyone still pay attention to that site?)


I accept that SAlt lied about what Tony Iltis wrote (weird that they 
didn't even include a link to the article.)


But there are huge problems with the article.

As I stated when I first read it, this is nonsense: "The evolution of 
this uprising into a civil war was largely the result of Western 
interference." That is baloney. It evolved into a civil war because the 
Baathists began killing peaceful protestors.


Tony writes immediately afterwards:

"After Assad resorted to military force to crush the uprising and some 
officers in his army defected to the opposition, the West began arming 
opposition militias. This took place directly through the CIA and 
indirectly by US allies in the region, in particular via Saudi Arabia, 
Qatar and Turkey."


In fact throughout the early stages of the war, the FSA got its weapons 
from armories it overran, on the black market, or they made them 
wherever there were machine tools and welding equipment as C.J. Chivers 
reported in the NYT on August 28, 2012:


	As the midsummer sun blazed over this partially deserted Syrian city 
one recent afternoon, two young men appeared in a pickup truck in an 
alley near several auto repair workshops. Protruding from the truck’s 
bed was a steel pipe about three feet long and two and a half inches 
wide, resting on a simple frame.


	The pipe was not for plumbing. It was a locally made mortar that had 
been used in July in the battle for Azaz, a city in northern Syria where 
antigovernment fighters drove away the army of President Bashar al-Assad.


	Now we have three or four of these, but we need to make more,” said 
Mustafa, one of the men who had assembled the weapons in small machine 
shops where since last year a key aspect of the revolution against 
Syria’s government has been waged by men who do not themselves often 
carry guns.


In explaining Hizbollah's entry into the war, Tony has this novel 
explanation:


	Hezbollah can no longer rely on Syria as a source of weapons and 
logistical support against Israel. Instead, the Shia-based group has 
been increasingly drawn into the Syrian conflict in defence of the 
regime, largely because many of the Sunni armed groups in Syria have 
links with Hezbollah's Sunni opponents in Lebanon.


Do you comrades really believe that it was motivated to intervene 
because of Lebanese politics? The least you can do is provide some 
documentation to back up this far-fetched theory.


This one is really the corker, however:

	Russia's entry into the “War on ISIS” in Syria, however, is legitimised 
by an invitation from the Assad regime, which is still recognised by the 
United Nations.


I don't know whether to laugh or cry at this idiocy.


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[Marxism] Fwd: Can Israel benefit from sheriff Putin policing the Middle East? | The Times of Israel

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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The deployment last month of Russian warplanes in Syria laid bare 
Moscow’s readiness to use force to punish leaders who would challenge 
its authority — as in Ukraine, from which it annexed Crimea in March 
2014 — and to defend its strategic allies, like Syria’s embattled 
president, Bashar Assad.


During the Cold War, Kremlin intervention generally meant bad news for 
Jews, who were second-class citizens, of sorts, in the Soviet Union — 
and for Israel, which the USSR regarded as an extension of its American 
rival. But observers of Russia’s current bid for greater influence in 
the Middle East say it may be a boon for Israel, which has strived in 
recent years to stay on the good side of Russian President Vladimir Putin.


“The main risk for Israel is not Assad but chaos” amid Syria’s bloody 
civil war of the past four-plus years, Ksenia Svetlova, a Moscow-born 
Israeli Labor party lawmaker, told JTA. “If the Russian deployment 
prevents it, then it can be a positive development.”


full: 
http://www.timesofisrael.com/can-israel-benefit-from-sheriff-putin-policing-the-middle-east/

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Re: [Marxism] Fwd: The left can oppose Russian intervention in Syria without capitulating to our own rulers | REDFLAG

[Stuart Munckton via Marxism]

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"Green Left Weekly takes this to its logical conclusion by not mentioning
Russia’s involvement in Syria at all. Those wanting to understand the
events in Syria will likely leave the website scratching their heads."

This article was published on October 13, yet on October 10 Green Left
Weekly published a feature article ,
which was the back cover article of the current issue, the first Green Left
issue to be published since Russia began its bombing campaign, which begins:

***

Russia followed the lead of Western powers on September 30 and began direct
military intervention in Syria – using the same form (air strikes) and the
same declared enemy, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.

Russia's campaign, aimed to shore up the beleaguered regime of Syrian
dictator Bashar Assad, will also target the al Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front
and other armed groups fighting the dictatorship.

Russia's entry into the fray has dramatically heightened tensions between
Russia and the West and further complicated the already confused,
multi-sided conflict in Syria.

Russia's intervention mirrors the West: use of air strikes with involvement
on the ground limited to military advisors and weapons supplies to allies.

For Russia, the question of allies on the ground is straightforward. Syria
has been a long-term ally of Russia. Since 1991, when the Soviet Union
collapsed and the US, through its first war on Iraq, asserted its primacy
in the Middle East, Syria has been Russia's closest regional ally.

Tartus in Syria is the only remaining Russian naval base outside Russia and
gives the Russian navy access to the Mediterranean.

***

It mention Russia more through out it. You can disagree with what Green
Left says about Russia's intervention,  but you cannot -- without being
utterly dishonest -- pretend it has said nothing about it! Perhaps the
reason is Green Left's attitude to Russia's intervention doesn't fit Red
Flag's cookie cutter approach that likes to deal with grossly offensive
defences of Russia's actions by the likes of Mike Whitney or Socialist
Unity (does anyone still pay attention to that site?)



On 15 October 2015 at 11:58, Louis Proyect via Marxism <
marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:

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> *
>
> The response to all of this by some on the Western left has been dreadful.
> For some bizarre reason, while the cynical and imperialist manoeuvres of
> the Western powers are, rightly, denounced, Putin gets a
> get-out-of-jail-free card.
>
> This takes several forms. For starters, there is the straightforward
> pro-Putin propaganda. Socialist Unity in Britain blares, in a triumphant
> Islamophobic stupor, “The barbarians are at the gates and Russia alone is
> heeding the call to intervene in order to save not just the Syrian
> government or Syria, but civilisation itself”.
>
> The nominally left wing US website Counterpunch has an article by Mike
> Whitney, which proclaims: “That’s how you fight terrorism if you’re serious
> about it. Bravo, Putin”.
>
> Neglected is the fact that most of the people brutally murdered by Russian
> bombs so far have been conspicuously not-ISIS. Indeed, they have been
> people fighting against ISIS. But then, I guess Russia has to warm up first
> before it can hit its targets. Or perhaps destroying all opposition to ISIS
> is all part of a master plan. ISIS will be overconfident, and that’s when
> Putin will ride in naked on a bear and save the day.
>
> Another set of arguments is tied to the notion that, even if Putin is in
> it for his own cynical gain, somehow Russia being involved will just
> magically make the situation better. Because if there’s anything that makes
> people’s lives better, it’s more bombs and missiles.
>
> Patrick Cockburn, whose writings on the Middle East have been widely
> circulated on the left, argued: “The US-Soviet Cold War, and the global
> competition that went with it, had benefits for much of the world. Both
> superpowers sought to support their own allies and prevent political
> vacuums from developing which its opposite number might exploit”. I suspect
> this statement might raise a few eyebrows in Vietnam, among many other
> places.
>
> Political cartoonist Carlos Latuff, well known for his pro-Palestinian
> cartoons, defended Russia by saying that at least it doesn’t want regime
> c

[Marxism] Fwd: The left can oppose Russian intervention in Syria without capitulating to our own rulers | REDFLAG

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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The response to all of this by some on the Western left has been 
dreadful. For some bizarre reason, while the cynical and imperialist 
manoeuvres of the Western powers are, rightly, denounced, Putin gets a 
get-out-of-jail-free card.


This takes several forms. For starters, there is the straightforward 
pro-Putin propaganda. Socialist Unity in Britain blares, in a triumphant 
Islamophobic stupor, “The barbarians are at the gates and Russia alone 
is heeding the call to intervene in order to save not just the Syrian 
government or Syria, but civilisation itself”.


The nominally left wing US website Counterpunch has an article by Mike 
Whitney, which proclaims: “That’s how you fight terrorism if you’re 
serious about it. Bravo, Putin”.


Neglected is the fact that most of the people brutally murdered by 
Russian bombs so far have been conspicuously not-ISIS. Indeed, they have 
been people fighting against ISIS. But then, I guess Russia has to warm 
up first before it can hit its targets. Or perhaps destroying all 
opposition to ISIS is all part of a master plan. ISIS will be 
overconfident, and that’s when Putin will ride in naked on a bear and 
save the day.


Another set of arguments is tied to the notion that, even if Putin is in 
it for his own cynical gain, somehow Russia being involved will just 
magically make the situation better. Because if there’s anything that 
makes people’s lives better, it’s more bombs and missiles.


Patrick Cockburn, whose writings on the Middle East have been widely 
circulated on the left, argued: “The US-Soviet Cold War, and the global 
competition that went with it, had benefits for much of the world. Both 
superpowers sought to support their own allies and prevent political 
vacuums from developing which its opposite number might exploit”. I 
suspect this statement might raise a few eyebrows in Vietnam, among many 
other places.


Political cartoonist Carlos Latuff, well known for his pro-Palestinian 
cartoons, defended Russia by saying that at least it doesn’t want regime 
change in Syria. Well, no, it doesn’t. It wants to kill many people to 
allow a murderous tyrant to remain in power so Russia can continue 
exercising influence in the region. That’s not a positive thing. You’d 
think this didn’t need to be spelled out.


Finally, there’s the variety of responses which only want to focus on 
Western intervention. They may be shocked to find that one can indeed 
walk and chew gum at the same time.


Green Left Weekly takes this to its logical conclusion by not mentioning 
Russia’s involvement in Syria at all. Those wanting to understand the 
events in Syria will likely leave the website scratching their heads.


full: 
https://redflag.org.au/article/left-can-oppose-russian-intervention-syria-without-capitulating-our-own-rulers

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[Marxism] Fwd: Top Cuban general, key forces in Syria to aid Assad, Russia, sources say | Fox News

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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Who's next to join the axis of resistance? Monaco? The Westboro Baptist 
Church? Richard Dawkins?


http://www.foxnews.com/world/2015/10/14/cuban-military-forces-deployed-to-syria-to-operate-russian-tanks-say-sources/
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Re: [Marxism] David Horowitz joins the axis of resistance

[Gary MacLennan via Marxism]

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It was a year ago, September
a day I well remember
I was walking up and down
in drunken pride
when my knees began to flutter
and I fell down in the gutter
and a pig came by and lay down by my side

As I lay there in the gutter
thinking thoughts I could not utter
I thought I heard a passing lady say,
"You can tell a man who boozes
by the company he chooses..."
And with that, the pig got up and walked away.

On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 10:09 AM, Louis Proyect via Marxism <
marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:

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>
> Indeed, growing numbers of Americans who have no special love for Russia
> or Orthodoxy—from billionaire capitalist Donald Trump to evangelical
> Christians—are being won over by Putin’s frank talk and actions.
>
> How can they not? After one of his speeches praising the West’s Christian
> heritage—a thing few American politicians dare do—Putin concluded with
> something that must surely resonate with millions of traditional Americans:
> “We must protect Russia from that which has destroyed American society”—a
> reference to the anti-Christian liberalism and licentiousness that has run
> amok in the West.
>
> full:
> http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/260372/russia-declares-holy-war-islamic-state-raymond-ibrahim
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[Marxism] David Horowitz joins the axis of resistance

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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Indeed, growing numbers of Americans who have no special love for Russia 
or Orthodoxy—from billionaire capitalist Donald Trump to evangelical 
Christians—are being won over by Putin’s frank talk and actions.


How can they not? After one of his speeches praising the West’s 
Christian heritage—a thing few American politicians dare do—Putin 
concluded with something that must surely resonate with millions of 
traditional Americans: “We must protect Russia from that which has 
destroyed American society”—a reference to the anti-Christian liberalism 
and licentiousness that has run amok in the West.


full: 
http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/260372/russia-declares-holy-war-islamic-state-raymond-ibrahim

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[Marxism] Citizen

[John Passant via Marxism]

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Citizen

Why do you ask
Citizen 973822001?
Surely the mandate is fun?

To read the whole poem click here

http://enpassant.com.au/2015/10/15/citizen/

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[Marxism] Rosalyn Baxandall, Feminist Historian and Activist, Dies at 76

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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NY Times, Oct. 14 2015
Rosalyn Baxandall, Feminist Historian and Activist, Dies at 76
By WILLIAM GRIMESa

Rosalyn Baxandall, a feminist historian who was among the first to bring 
scholarly attention to the historical role of women in the workplace and 
to expand the meaning of “women’s work,” died on Tuesday night at her 
home in Manhattan. She was 76.


The cause was kidney cancer, her son, Phineas Baxandall, said.

Ms. Baxandall served on the front lines of the feminist movement in New 
York in the late 1960s.


She helped create Liberation Nursery, the first feminist day care center 
in New York. As an early member of New York Radical Women and 
Redstockings, she picketed the 1968 Miss America pageant in Atlantic 
City, one of the most visible of the feminist protests of the ’60s, 
forever associated with a symbolic burning of restrictive women’s 
clothes that mainstream publications referred to as a “bra burning.”


She played a prominent role in the abortion “speakout” in the West 
Village in 1969, a forum at which women described in public their 
experiences in obtaining illegal abortions.


While teaching American studies at the State University of New York at 
Old Westbury, she, Linda Gordon and Susan Reverby assembled primary 
documents, including letters and diaries, that offered a sweeping 
history of women and labor. Their book, “America’s Working Women: A 
Documentary History, 1600 to the Present” (1976), was acquired for 
Random House by Toni Morrison, then a young editor there.


It remains a foundational text for students of American labor history 
and gender studies.


“That book was and continues to be the text that defines the contour of 
women’s labor history,” said Eileen Boris, a professor of feminist 
studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. “It recovered 
the voices and the actions of many kinds of women and many kinds of 
occupations from the early colonial period to the late 20th century.”


Rosalyn Fraad, known as Ros, was born on June 12, 1939, in Manhattan 
into a radical household. Her father, Lewis M. Fraad, was a Communist 
who worked for the Communist International, or Comintern, in Vienna in 
the 1930s and later became the chief of pediatrics at Albert Einstein 
College of Medicine in the Bronx. Her mother, the former Irma London, 
was a Communist lawyer and the niece of Meyer London, who was elected to 
Congress on the Socialist Party ticket in 1914.


“We threw Tampax at the F.B.I. agents who parked outside of our home for 
two days after my father refused to speak with them,” Ms. Baxandall and 
her sister Harriet wrote in an essay for “Red Diapers: Growing Up in the 
Communist Left” (1998), edited by Judy Kaplan and Linn Shapiro. “We 
giggled dirty words into the phone when told that it was tapped.”


Her mother’s deep unhappiness at suspending her career to raise children 
made a profound impression on her.


Ms. Baxandall attended Riverdale Country School in the Bronx and Hunter 
High School in Manhattan. As a teenager, she picketed the nuclear 
submarine base in Groton, Conn., with the Committee for Nonviolent 
Action, took part in peace campaigns by the American Friends Service 
Committee and agitated for civil rights and abortion rights.


She enrolled at Smith College but after a year, she transferred to the 
University of Wisconsin, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in French 
in 1961. She met and married a fellow student, Lee Baxandall, a leftist 
literary critic, whose enthusiasm for Marxism and European theater took 
them on an extended tour of East Germany, Hungary and Poland.


The marriage ended in divorce. Besides her son, she is survived by her 
sisters, Harriet Fraad Wolff and Julie Fraad, and two grandchildren.


After returning to the United States, Ms. Baxandall earned a master’s 
degree from the School of Social Work at Columbia University in 1963. 
She began working for the Mobilization for Youth, a social service 
organization on the Lower East Side, and then plunged into radical 
politics and the women’s movement, the subject of her book “Dear 
Sisters: Dispatches From the Women’s Liberation Movement” (2000), edited 
with Ms. Gordon.


Recalling those days in an interview with the feminist activist 
Jacqueline Ceballos in 1991, Ms. Baxandall said, “The one thing that I 
do have against the books that are written is they talk about all the 
politics and the splits, et cetera, but they don’t talk about the joy 
and fun we had.” She added, “We knew were changing history, and it was 
terrific.”


In 1971 she began teaching in the American studies department at the 
State University of New York at Old Westbury. She la

[Marxism] Don’t join a union, pop a pill

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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London Review of Books Vol. 37 No. 20 · 22 October 2015
Don’t join a union, pop a pill
by Katrina Forrester

Happiness Industry: How the Government and Big Business Sold Us 
Wellbeing by William Davies

Verso, 314 pp, £16.99, May, ISBN 978 1 78168 845 8

‘What’s on your mind?’ Each day, the 968 million people who log in to 
Facebook are asked to share their thoughts with its giant data bank. A 
dropdown menu of smilies invites you to update ‘how you’re feeling’. 
‘Excited’ is the first option, ‘happy’ is the second. If they don’t fit, 
you can scroll down and pick from 120 other moods, including ‘fed up’, 
‘anxious’ or ‘stuffed’. Facebook has made no secret of the fact that it 
passes our personal information and preferences to ad companies, 
branding agencies and governments. In 2014, we learned that it also 
gathers data about our moods, and ran experiments in manipulating them 
by tailoring users’ newsfeeds to be more happy or more sad. By 
translating subjective expressions of feeling into objective data, 
Facebook is in the business of making what goes on in our heads 
knowable, legible and marketable.


Facebook’s capacity for surveillance may be unparalleled, but its 
interest in measuring, monitoring and managing our feelings isn’t. 
Psychologists and behavioural economists gather data about feelings from 
a range of sources, online and off, in an effort to understand and 
better predict people’s decision-making. Their findings are used by 
companies to help them sell things and by governments to make policy. In 
2010, the Cabinet Office set up a Behavioural Insights Team (or ‘Nudge 
Unit’), which used behavioural research to ‘design policies or 
interventions that can encourage, support and enable people to make 
better choices for themselves and society’. Now a partly privatised 
company which sells its research to government departments, the Nudge 
Unit has been adopted as a model in the US and Australia. Behavioural 
scientists in such institutions are particularly interested in 
monitoring levels of ‘happiness’. The view that happiness can’t be 
quantified – that emotional life is not the stuff of politics, economics 
or science – is not shared by what William Davies calls the ‘happiness 
industry’, that constellation of psychologists and economists seeking to 
maximise happiness; neuroscientists developing increasingly 
sophisticated tools for measuring it; doctors and psychiatrists 
prescribing drugs to induce it; and publishers filling their lists with 
books telling you how to achieve it.


When governments today take an interest in happiness, Davies says, they 
continue a project that began 250 years ago with Jeremy Bentham’s 
conviction that political decision-making should be based not on empty 
philosophical notions – ‘rights’, ‘obligation’, ‘duty’ – but on ‘real 
entities’, specifically pains and pleasures, which can be apprehended 
directly. As Davies sees it, Bentham was the inventor of ‘evidence-based 
policy-making’. The 18th-century forebears of utilitarianism and 
classical political economy like Hume and Adam Smith had doubted that we 
could understand much about other people, but didn’t think that that 
mattered much. Common psychological characteristics could be assumed, 
and social conventions and rules of exchange would serve to co-ordinate 
human behaviour and improve citizens’ wellbeing. Bentham was more 
optimistic: he believed it was possible to get reliable knowledge about 
human psychology. Happiness in particular, unlike the intangible 
philosophical categories that he dismissed, had a largely physical 
basis, its quantity determined by the presence of pleasure and the 
absence of pain. He proposed a classification of 12 ‘pains’ and 14 
‘pleasures’, which could in principle be measured, compared and 
aggregated according to his ‘felicific calculus’, which was to be used 
by legislators to devise policy in accordance with his utility 
principle: that the ‘greatest happiness for the greatest number … is the 
measure of right and wrong.’ The reference to the ‘greatest number’ was 
the salient part of the principle: what benefited the majority mattered 
more than individual happiness (one thing he thought would increase the 
general happiness of London was a proper sewage system).


Partly because he was as interested in social reform as in individual 
psychology, Bentham paid more attention to the classification of 
pleasures than their measurement. But, according to Davies, the 
solutions proposed by Bentham and his more mathematically minded heirs 
to the problem of how to measure our inner thoughts ‘set the stage for 
the entangling of psychological r

[Marxism] Fwd: A resource guide for understanding Syria | Louis Proyect: The Unrepentant Marxist

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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I was prompted to post this article for two reasons. When I was 
discussing Syria with a very old friend the other day, it soon became 
apparent that the dominant narrative largely shaped his views on the 
war, namely that Bashar al-Assad was a “lesser evil”. He was preoccupied 
with ISIS but when I pointed out to him that the vast portions of 
eastern Syria that it controlled were thinly populated, he seemed 
surprised. There are two cities (Raqqa, Deir al-Zour) each having 
220,000 or so residents but Palmyra, the third and most infamous, only 
has around 7000. Most of the conflict is in the west of the country 
where ISIS is not much of a presence. Of course, I only knew this 
because I try to keep abreast of Syrian politics on a daily basis. So, 
to help him get up to speed, I thought I would pull together a list of 
websites I consult.


Although I can hardly describe him as a friend, it occurred to me that 
John Wight could use such a list as well since he posted a comment on my 
blog the other day that supposedly proved that the Sunnis supported 
Assad. When I clicked the link in his comment, I was directed to the 
West Point Anti-Terrorism Center. I wrote my “idiot’s guide to 
‘anti-imperialism’” in jest but apparently Wight was recommending such a 
resource in earnest. I advised him to read the Middle East Research and 
Information Project instead, a journal written from a left perspective. 
Although I doubt that he will bother, my inclusion of that website and 
others will surely prove useful to those trying to understand Syria in 
terms other than as a conspiracy hatched in CIA headquarters.


full: 
http://louisproyect.org/2015/10/14/a-resource-guide-for-understanding-syria/

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[Marxism] Vietnam's reaction [Linux Beach] Where are the anti-war protesters now?

[Clay Claiborne via Marxism]

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FYI: After I took *Vietnam: American Holocaust* to Vietnam in 2009, got 
it shown on VTV4, won the 
support of Vu Xuan Hong , 
Member of the National Assembly of the S.R. Vietnam and President of the 
Vietnam Union of Friendship Organizations, and was the guest of honor at 
a banquet hosted by Tran Dac Loi [ Deputy Head of the Party Central 
Committee's Commission for External Relations] Who suggested I do a doc 
on Vo Nguyen Giap, after what was then my then current project Vietnam: 
People's Victory, and promised me special access in completing those 
projects. I was planning a Vietnam Trilogy with the Giap bio as the 3rd 
part before the Arab Spring broke out and caused a change in plans.  Bui 
Van Nghi has been my appointed contact point to both party and state 
since then. As Giap's health was failing, he tried to arrange a return 
trip to interview him, but that never happen. However I was promised 
special access to their archives and have already gotten materials and 
permissions to use from him.


Oh, well.



me & Loi
 Forwarded Message 
Subject:Re: [Linux Beach] Where are the anti-war protesters now?
Date:   Wed, 14 Oct 2015 17:38:20 + (UTC)
From:   bui nghi 
Reply-To:   bui nghi 
To: 	Clay Claiborne , vah...@linuxbeach.org 






Dear Clay

As they know that the US policy created  IS and migration crisis.

The US just droped some dozens of tons of weapon to 'so-called" moderate 
rebellian in Syria. Do you know  they are moderate or they are or will 
be IS men.


US want to put burden on EU and Russia and then enjoy the fruit!!!  The 
USpolicy always think about itself first, cause manageable "chaotic 
situation" to enjoy the interests/profist and then sell weapons to both 
sides. the nature never change.


RUSSIA is a real peace-keeper and friends of Middle East now!



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[Marxism] Where are the anti-war protesters now?

[Clay Claiborne via Marxism]

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/Republished on Linux Beach:/


 Where are the anti-war protesters now?
 


Russia’s recent military intervention in Syria doesn’t seem to 
have provoked the same reaction worldwide as the one the US faced 
 
against Assad in retaliation to the chemical gas attacks in Syria in 
August 2013. While the demonstration against the US airstrikes brought 
together the left and the right in major world cities, Russia’s 
intervention hasn’t prompted a strong reaction even from those who 
are considered ‘friends of Syria.’ This is not the first time that 
the reactions of anti-war coalitions and peace movements differ on the 
Syrian conflict, based on the actors calling for them. Iranian support 
to the Assad regime, for instance, with armed militias, weaponry, 
money, military experts, etc., has also gone unnoticed.


This selective approach by anti-war movements to foreign military 
interventions raises many questions about what they consider a war to 
be. Should we consider all military interventions bad? Does the 
actor’s identity matter more than the action itself? Can we be 
selective about acting upon our principles? When is it acceptable to 
favor someone’s interests over the miseries of others? 
*More...* 

Also, the list of signers to our statement of opposition to Russian, and 
all military attacks on Syria, is growing by the hour. Will you join with:


*Bill Fletcher, Jr*. (Writer/Activist, Former President, TransAfrica Forum)
*Yassin al Haj Saleh* (Syrian Writer Living in Exile, Istanbul)
*Hussam Ayloush* (National Chair, Syrian American Council)
*Juan Cole* (Professor of History, University of Michigan & Blogger, 
Informed Comment, USA)

*Robin 'Roblimo' Miler* (IT/Science Reporter and Editor)
*Louis Proyect* (Writer, CounterPunch film co-editor, New York City)
*Robin Yassin-Kassab* (Writer, Scotland)
*Rt. Hon Sir Gerald Kaufman, MP* (longest serving MP in the House of 
Commons, UK)

*Muhammad Idrees Ahmad* (University of Stirling, Scotland)
*Danny Postel* (Center for Middle East Studies, University of Denver)
*Thomas Pierret* (Lecturer, University of Edinburgh, Scotland)
myself and over a hundred others in saying:


 "Hands Off Syria" Applies to Russia Too
 




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[Marxism] REVEALED: The boom and bust of the CIA’s secret torture sites

[Dennis Brasky via Marxism]

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https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2015/10/14/revealed-cia-torture-black-sites-history-boom-bust/
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[Marxism] Fwd: Cure for cancer might accidentally have been found, and it could be malaria | Science | News | The Independent

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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A fascinating article. In George Johnson's excellent "The Cancer 
Chronicles", he explains that the reason it is so hard to find a "cure" 
for cancer is that it is a disease that is closely related to life 
itself--the growth of cells. In this instance, scientists learned that a 
malaria treatment had a big drawback--it attacked the placenta of 
pregnant women. Their research also stumbled across the fact that the 
treatment also attacked tumors. Placentas...tumors--what an interesting 
connection.


full: 
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/cure-for-cancer-might-accidentally-have-been-found-and-it-could-be-malaria-a6693601.html

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[Marxism] Grand Canyon Waters, at the Abyss

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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NY Times Op-Ed, Oct. 14 2015
Grand Canyon Waters, at the Abyss
By MARK UDALL

Eldorado Springs, Colo. — I RECENTLY reunited with an old friend — not a 
person, but a place in Arizona, the state where I was born. It is a 
timeless place of great antiquity, a shrine of the ages that President 
Theodore Roosevelt said “man can only mar.”


Roosevelt proclaimed the Grand Canyon a national monument in 1908. In so 
doing, he specifically intended to prevent mining and tourist 
development from harming one of our nation’s most treasured landscapes. 
“Keep it for your children, your children’s children and all who come 
after you,” he said, “as the one great sight which every American should 
see.”


But mar it we have. An abandoned uranium mine on the canyon’s South Rim 
has cost taxpayers more than $15 million to remove toxic wastes from the 
surface. And contaminated water — flowing underground through the mine’s 
radioactive ore — continues to poison a spring-fed creek deep within the 
canyon. It is a permanent loss at an unconscionable cost that should 
never be borne again.


Roosevelt’s proclamation set aside only a fraction of the Grand Canyon 
as a national monument. His decision rankled mining and tourist 
businesses in the booming Arizona territory. Local politicians and 
profiteers fought the postage-stamp-size monument’s further protection 
as a national park in 1919.


In 1975, Congress nearly doubled the park’s size, declaring that the 
entire Grand Canyon “including tributary side canyons and surrounding 
plateaus, is a natural feature of national and international 
significance.” Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona, a Republican, 
introduced the bill. My dad, Congressman Morris Udall, a Democrat from 
Arizona, helped unite bipartisan support to better protect Arizona’s and 
America’s most famous natural wonder.


The Grand Canyon Enlargement Act, signed into law by President Gerald 
Ford four decades ago, returned more than 100,000 acres of federal land 
to the Havasupai tribe. It also effectively banned the building of two 
new dams in the canyon’s upper and lower gorge. But it, too, fell short 
in protecting the Grand Canyon in its entirety.


Today, four uranium mines operate within the watershed that drains 
directly into Grand Canyon National Park. Arbitrary boundaries and 
antiquated rules permit these mines to threaten hundreds more 
life-giving seeps and springs in the desert basins below. Thousands of 
new mining claims on public lands that surround the canyon were put on 
hold by a 20-year moratorium imposed in 2012 by Ken Salazar, then the 
interior secretary. The National Mining Association and the Nuclear 
Energy Institute are suing in federal court to end the ban.


Achieving this hard-won hiatus on new uranium claims took more than five 
years and one of the broadest coalitions ever aligned to protect the 
Grand Canyon. The Havasupai, “people of blue-green water,” whose sole 
source of drinking water is at risk, led the way. They were joined then 
by county supervisors, chambers of commerce, ranchers, hunters, 
bird-watchers, artists, scientists, Arizona’s governor, game and fish 
commissioners and business owners. All united to stop uranium mining 
from permanently polluting the Grand Canyon and undermining the region’s 
tourism-driven economy.


But the 2012 victory to halt new claims was temporary. Our challenge now 
is to rebuild that coalition and make the ban permanent. There’s no 
reason to wait. President Obama can protect it now.


Congressman Raúl Grijalva, a Democrat from Arizona, plans to introduce 
the Greater Grand Canyon Heritage National Monument Act next week. It 
was written in collaboration with Havasupai, Hualapai and Hopi leaders. 
The Navajo Nation, which banned all uranium mining on its land in 2005, 
joined in support along with Zuni, Paiute and Yavapai leaders.


The bill aims to protect 1.7 million acres of historical tribal 
homeland, including water sources and sacred sites. It would preserve 
the Grand Canyon’s rich heritage of “biological, cultural, recreational, 
geological, educational and scientific values.” It would make permanent 
the 20-year ban on new mining clams but would allow hunting, grazing, 
recreation and all other uses to continue under existing laws.


Unfortunately, there’s almost no chance that the legislation will gain 
approval in today’s gridlocked Congress. But the 1906 Antiquities Act 
gives the president unilateral authority to set aside federal lands as 
protected national monuments to stop the looting of archaeological sites 
and for reasons of “historic or scientific interest.”


This past summer, President Oba

[Marxism] Fwd: Where are the anti-war protesters now?

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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This selective approach by anti-war movements to foreign military 
interventions raises many questions about what they consider a war to 
be. Should we consider all military interventions bad? Does the actor’s 
identity matter more than the action itself? Can we be selective about 
acting upon our principles? When is it acceptable to favor someone’s 
interests over the miseries of others?


full: 
https://now.mmedia.me/lb/en/commentary/566053-where-are-the-anti-war-protesters-now

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[Marxism] Fwd: Don’t let the Nobel prize fool you. Economics is not a science | Joris Luyendijk | Comment is free | The Guardian

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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Perhaps the most pernicious effect of the status of economics in public 
life has been the hegemony of technocratic thinking. Political questions 
about how to run society have come to be framed as technical issues, 
fatally diminishing politics as the arena where society debates means 
and ends. Take a crucial concept such as gross domestic product. As 
Ha-Joon Chang makes clear in 23 Things They Don’t Tell You About 
Capitalism, the choices about what not to include in GDP (household 
work, to name one) are highly ideological. The same applies to 
inflation, since there is nothing neutral about the decision not to give 
greater weight to the explosion in housing and stock market prices when 
calculating inflation.


full: 
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/oct/11/nobel-prize-economics-not-science-hubris-disaster

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[Marxism] Fwd: Debate: “Goodbye to Chavismo”? | venezuelanalysis.com

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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On September 28, long time Venezuelan revolutionary Roland Denis 
published an article entitled “Goodbye to Chavismo” on the left wing 
public media forum Aporrea.org. Denis argues that Chavismo as a movement 
has reached its end point, corroded by the structures of the 
bureaucratic state, which Chávez failed to transform. With nearly 44,000 
reads, the article sparked a heated controversy, provoking dozens of 
responses from across the spectrum of the Venezuelan left. One such 
response by Luigino Bracci aims to show through the power of a real life 
anecdote that Chavismo remains an emancipatory horizon for much of 
Venezuela’s poor and downtrodden who regard the corrupt, bureaucratic 
petro-state as part of the oppressive legacy bequeathed by the 
oligarchic Fourth Republic that must be overcome. In what follows, VA 
presents translations of both articles.


full: http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/11545
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[Marxism] Documentary on Matzpen

[Ken Hiebert via Marxism]

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I have just begun to watch this.  Looks very worthwhile.
ken h
 
https://youtu.be/hfcFno2pqJg
 
 
"Matzpen" - the anti-Zionist Israeli socialist organization, has never had more 
than a few dozen active members. Still, at the end of the sixties and beginning 
of the seventies, it was considered a real threat to the Israeli political and 
social consensus. Most of Matzpen's members were Israeli born, coming from the 
core of Israeli society. Their fight against Zionism and against the 
occupation, as well as their contacts with Palestinian and European left-wing 
activists, were the cause of threats, slander, as well as political and social 
isolation. The film touches on the main issues of the Zionist-Palestinian 
conflict, through the eyes of some of the organization's prominent figures, 
their ideas, opinions and activities, then and today.

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[Marxism] Fwd: Why Do We Love Henry David Thoreau? - The New Yorker

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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An interminable attack on Thoreau from a magazine that has also trashed 
Vandana Shiva and John Muir. This was once a magazine that had the 
pioneering journalism of Rachel Carson. That's what happens when a creep 
like Si Newhouse takes over.


http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/10/19/pond-scum
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[Marxism] Fwd: Review of Paul B. Wignall, "The Worst of Times: How Life on Earth Survived Eighty Million Years of Extinction" | Inside Higher Ed

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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Reading Paul B. Wignall’s The Worst of Times: How Life on Earth Survived 
Eighty Million Years of Extinction, from Princeton University Press, can 
induce something of that perturbed feeling. It did in me, anyway, as I 
tried every so often to picture a timeline of the catastrophic events 
that Wignall and his colleagues have reconstructed. (The author is a 
professor of paleoenvironments at the University of Leeds.)


The geologically unsophisticated layperson will probably anticipate new 
ideas or evidence about what killed the dinosaurs. But that’s an index 
of how limited an impact Lyell has had. We still imagine change on too 
constricted a scale. The rise and fall of Jurassic wildlife are, for 
Wignall, something like last week’s news might seem to an ancient 
historian: interesting enough, sure, but the author would really prefer 
to stay focused on the past and not get sidetracked chattering about 
recent trends.


full: 
https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2015/10/14/review-paul-b-wignall-worst-times-how-life-earth-survived-eighty-million-years

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[Marxism] Fwd: Putin’s model of success - The Washington Post

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

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Western officials who pronounce themselves puzzled about Vladi­mir 
Putin’s intentions in Syria are missing some big clues. There is a clear 
model for the campaign Russia is pursuing on behalf of Syrian dictator 
Bashar al-Assad, a legacy that is Putin’s pride: Chechnya.


The Muslim republic in the North Caucasus and the decade-long war that 
Putin launched there in September 1999 have mostly been forgotten by the 
outside world since the dictator installed there by Putin, Ramzan 
Kadyrov, consolidated control in the late 2000s. But the Kremlin regards 
it as a “good, unique example in history of [the] combat of terrorism,” 
as Dmitry Medvedev, Putin’s prime minister, put it. Chechnya, Medvedev 
said last year, is “one of the business cards of Russia.”


What are the components of this winning formula? First, define all 
opposition to the prevailing regime as terrorist, indistinguishable from 
the most extreme jihadists. That enables a fundamental political aim: to 
eliminate alternatives. In Syria today, moderate and secular opposition 
forces arguably are getting harder to find. That wasn’t the case in 
Chechnya in 1999. The country’s nationalist president, Aslan Maskhadov, 
had won a democratic election, defeating an Islamist opponent by 59 to 
23 percent. His predecessor, Dzhokhar Dudayev, was so secularized that 
he was unaware how many times a day Muslims pray.


Russia killed them both, along with every other moderate Chechen leader 
it could find, both at home and abroad. One was murdered in Vienna; 
another in Dubai. When Western leaders pressed Putin to negotiate with 
Maskhadov and other secular moderates, he invariably responded angrily. 
“Would you invite Osama bin Laden to the White House . . . and let him 
dictate what he wants?” he demanded of one group of Western visitors.


full: 
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/putins-model-of-success/2015/10/11/4cb3a592-6dcd-11e5-aa5b-f78a98956699_story.html

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[Marxism] The tax affairs of Australia's Prime Minister, Malcayman Turnbull

[John Passant via Marxism]

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The tax affairs of Australia's Prime Minister, Malcayman Turnbull

Australia's Prime Minister is not any ordinary taxpayer. Malcolm 
Turnbull should make all the information about his Cayman Islands' 
arrangement public so we can judge whether he is avoiding any Australian 
tax or taking advantage of special rules that reduce or exempt his 
income from Australian tax. His government should also withdraw its 
attempts to shield information about the (likely very small) amount of 
Australian income tax the private companies of the likes of Gina 
Rinehart and James Packer pay.


http://enpassant.com.au/2015/10/14/the-tax-affairs-of-australias-prime-minister-malcayman-turnbull/

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Re: [Marxism] Fwd: The Sanders Phenomenon | Online Only | n+1

[Gary MacLennan via Marxism]

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I thought Schlozman's was a brilliant article: indeed one of the best
written pieces on politics I have seen for a long time.  Much of the
information in it was new to me and that was all to the good.

I place the Sanders phenomenon in the same category as the Corbyn
campaign.  Both are old lefties who are left over from the time before
neoliberal ascendancy that is pre-1973/1979.  Sanders is a latter day New
Dealer, and Corbyn is straight out of the era of Clement Attlee. They speak
magic words to the educated working class youth who have known only Reagan
and Thatcher and the shabby capitulations of Clinton and Obama and the
Blair and the Brown governments.

To say that Sanders is not a true Socialist and that Corbyn represents an
un-electable distraction is to miss the point entirely.  They have a mass
following, and in these dark days of defeat after defeat that is almost
unbelievable.  Ben Okri put very well the longing that drives those who
have flocked to Sanders and Corbyn:

Can we still seek the lost angels
Of our better natures?
Can we still wish and will
For poverty’s death and a newer way
To undo war, and find peace in the labyrinth
Of the Middle East, and prosperity
In Africa as the true way
To end the feared tide of immigration?


For many Sanders and Corbyn represent the only possibility of a new world.

Though I share that hope and certainly I welcome without major reservations
the Corbyn and Sanders phenomena, I would like to essay not a note of
caution, but one which endeavors to explain when Corbyn and why Sanders and
why not the Leninist Left.

Drawing upon Bhaskar's analysis of Hegel's master slave dialectic, in his
great book Dialectic: the Pulse of Freedom,  I would say that what Corbyn
and Sanders represent is the dialectics of reconciliation between the
classes.  What they offer to the elites is mutual love and forgiveness.
They offer a world where the bosses and the worker are friends.   That, for
me, is the source of their strength. That, for me,  explains their appeal
to those who are new to politics.

Now we revolutionaries,such as Bhaskar, seek a world without master-slave
relationships. We would abolish wage slavery and therefore abolish all
masters.  But it is reconciliation that holds the appeal for youth.

By contrast with us and the following of Sanders and Corbyn, the
Clintons,Obama, the Blairites,  and  Shorten the Labor leader in Australia
all  offer capitulation and that is why the youth have spat them out.

To sum up, we offer Revolution.  Corbyn and Sanders offer Reconciliation.
Obama etc offer Capitulation.  The big question: do we "Play the long game"
and wait until the Sanders and Corby phenomena founder?  My feeling that is
that would be a tragic mistake.  We must work along side those who seek
reconciliation.  This is no time for lofty abstentionism.

My final comment is something of a disclaimer. I so  wish we were faced
with the contradictions of a Sanders or a Corbyn here in Australia.

comradely

Gary

On Wed, Oct 14, 2015 at 12:31 PM, Gary MacLennan 
wrote:

> Below is the link to the article on Bernie Sanders.  It comes highly
> recommended.
>
> ae
>
> Gary
>
> Most profiles of Bernie Sanders describe him as something like a
> “1930s-style radical.” They are correct, but underspecified. Sanders is
> neither strictly a New Dealer, in the lineage of those public-spirited men
> whom Felix Frankfurter sent down from Harvard to build the administrative
> state, nor a Popular Fronter. Instead Sanders still grapples, as we have
> not since, with the question of how much power the economic elite should
> hold in a democratic society. Sanders has spent his years in public life
> pushing against both the New Deal’s political settlement and its policy
> settlement. The former ardor has cooled. Sanders, like the right wing of
> the Socialist Party in 1936, has finally bowed to the inexorable logic of
> the electoral college and subordinated the third-party dream to the
> Democratic Party.
>
> full:
> https://nplusonemag.com/online-only/online-only/the-sanders-phenomenon/
>
>
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