Re: [Marxism] Islamophobia and France's NPA
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 16, 2010, at 10:04 PM, S. Artesian wrote: > > Christ on a crutch I'm sick this infantile posturing. Hey Dan, what > d'ya > think? When the KKK nightriders go out and burn down black > churches, we > should stand aside and let them, applaud them? because after all > we're > anti-religion? etc.. Is it really so hard to defend the rights of religious idiots not to be persecuted for their idiocy while recognizing that they are indeed religious idiots? Shane Mage "When we read on a printed page the doctrine of Pythagoras that all things are made of numbers, it seems mystical, mystifying, even downright silly. When we read on a computer screen the doctrine of Pythagoras that all things are made of numbers, it seems self-evidently true." (N. Weiner) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] How American Class Struggle Works
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 14, 2010, at 11:18 AM, Greg McDonald wrote: > > http://leninology.blogspot.com/2010/11/how-american-class-struggle-works.html Its a statistical fallacy to claim, as this article does, that labor productivity has increased so wonderfully and therefore workers have been made to work that much harder. When unproductive workers are laid off, production is completely unaffected but the official statistics of labor input (which take no account of the basic difference between productive and unproductive labor) show a decrease in aggregate labor time. That's for one. And when productive workers are laid off in a recession the ones preferentially laid off are those the employer considers relatively less productive (those working in an obsolescent plant, for example). Again, statistical productivity increases without any worker actually becoming more productive. Under depressed economic conditions, as in the present depression, official productivity statistics need to be taken with an ocean's worth of salt. Shane Mage "All things are an equal exchange for fire and fire for all things, as goods are for gold and gold for goods." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr, 90 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Does Liu Xiaobo Really Deserve the Peace Prize?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 13, 2010, at 10:55 PM, S. Artesian wrote: > > It's a disgrace to the memory, and the legacy, of MLK to compare him > to > Mandela. Ah, but what would you have written about him had Mandela been assassinated on the morrow of his Nobel? Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Does Liu Xiaobo Really Deserve the Peace Prize?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 13, 2010, at 9:52 PM, Joaquín Bustelo wrote: > == > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > == > > > On 12/13/2010 4:01 PM, Shane Mage quoted me: >>>> WTF does that mean? MLK "bourgeois democratic?" > > On 12/13/2010 4:01 PM, Shane Mage replied: > >> That his political program, if realized, would have made the >> capitalist regime (much) more democratic but would neither have >> overthrown it nor made "despotic inroads" on capitalist private >> property. > > This is *exactly* the response I thought my comment would evoke. > > Because my position is that it is NOT about "program." It is about > *movement*. But the question was not about movements. It was about individuals, since these awards were to individuals though all of them (plus, even especially, Liu Xiaobo) symbolized movements. And all those individuals, whatever the nature and potential of their movements (antifascist, civil-rights, antiapartheid, buddhist, anti-corruption) were and are in their self-conception bourgeois democrats. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Does Liu Xiaobo Really Deserve the Peace Prize?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 13, 2010, at 3:00 PM, Jim Farmelant wrote: >> >> I wonder why the more meritorious Mumia Abu-Jamal HASN'T received >> the Nobel award... > Doesn't the question answer itself? Consider > some of the people who have won the Prize: > Teddy Roosevelt, Henry Kissinger, Yitzhak > Rabin, and Barack Obama, war mongers all. And consider some who have: Carl von Ossietsky, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, and Aung San Su Kyi, bourgeois democratic political prisoners all. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Does Liu Xiaobo Really Deserve the Peace Prize?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 13, 2010, at 1:45 PM, Vladimiro Giacche' wrote: > > I wonder why the more meritorious Mumia Abu-Jamal HASN'T received > the Nobel award...This also should MATTER a little bit, if we are > talking of a Nobel PEACE Price... > Can you explain me this strange fact, comrade Shane? The Nobel Committee are *bourgeois* democrats. Mumia is a revolutionary democrat Liu is a bourgeois democrat. The Chinese Stalinists made him an unavoidable cause celebre. Comprends-tu? >> The Nobel was properly awarded not for Liu's own merits--I'm >> sure that Mumia Abu-Jamal is more meritorious--but because the >> Chinese >> government felt, with good reason, so threatened by public demands >> for democracy (Charter '08) that they made him the most prominent >> and symbolically important political prisoner in the world. *Not* >> awarding the Nobel to Liu would have been even more craven and >> disgraceful than was awarding it to Obama. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Nader is losing it
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 12, 2010, at 3:48 PM, Matthew Russo wrote: > > Looks like I have to withdraw my Bloomberg scenario... > Michael Bloomberg rules out running for US president Bloomberg also "ruled out" running for a third term as Mayor--and when election time came he forced a change in the law to allow him to run. December 2010 is way premature to start the campaign, and a more equivocal answer than " not looking at the possibility of running...No way, no how,” would be what is called putting his toe in the water. Just remember the old saying about running for president: If a politician says no he means maybe. If a politician says maybe he means yes. If a politician says yes he's the incumbent. Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures." Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Nader is losing it
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 11, 2010, at 5:04 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > == > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > == > > > On 12/11/10 4:37 PM, Shane Mage wrote: > >> How is he "losing it?" > > Mainly by omitting any reference to how Bloomberg sexually harassed > women at Salomon Brothers. I know about this first-hand because I did > work for this skunk in 1975. But don't you agree that in a three-way election among a skunk, a viper, and a basilisk the skunk would have a pretty good chance to win? Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Nader is losing it
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 11, 2010, at 4:18 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-12-09/ralph-nader-21-reasons-michael-bloomberg-can-be-elected-president-in-2012 "This following commentary doesn’t imply any endorsement, support or alignment. They’re simply my observations of why New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg would be a competitive independent presidential candidate in 2012" How is he "losing it?" Every point in his analysis is simple political common sense. I've thought the same for many months now. All the more reason why, if a "Left" exists at all in the USA, it is absolutely imperative to organize, right now, our own independent campaign against the three capitalist candidates. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Pressure mounts for European fiscal union
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 6, 2010, at 2:47 PM, Marv Gandall wrote: > > But so far it's only the public brainchild of the governments of > Luxembourg, Belgium, and Italy. I wasn't aware that Belgium *has* a government. Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] A comment by Diana Johnstone on "A Serbian film, " Croats and Muslims, and the left
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 1, 2010, at 6:56 PM, Paddy Apling wrote: > > I spent several years of my youth in Venezia Giulia, as a junior > office in the British Army... > ...I knew very well that...they had only begun the Second Front (D- > DAY) BECAUSE OTHERWISE THE WHOLE OF Western Europe would certainly > be liberated from the Nazis by the Red Army... I was a bit younger than Paddy, but I remember, in 1942-43, reading the Daily Worker and PM, listening to Johannes Steel and Elmer Davis on the radio. For two years the whole of Stalinist/fellow-traveler propaganda centered on one and only one point: the demand for an immediate Second Front. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] ASorry, Frank. I paid for them and I can see them if I want to.
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Dec 1, 2010, at 3:53 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > > http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/9953/ > > "This idea that the publication of private conversations and communications is in the public interest" So the official, publicly funded, communications of the most militarily powerful state apparatus in the world are "private conversations and communications!" Sorry, Frank. We paid for them and we have a moral right to see them if we want to. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Making a Mockery of the Real Crime of Rape: Assange Beseiged
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Nov 21, 2010, at 9:39 PM, Ambrose Andrews wrote: > > On 22 November 2010 12:50, Intense Red wrote: > >> I don't think this has been posted to the list, but considering the >> Assange discussion, this oddly-written article which makes a link to >> Assange's "rape victims" and the CIA is worth reading: >> > > Some good points in the article's content, but "Israel Shamir" is a > very dubious character. Yes. I was gasping at his totally irrelevant invocation of the arch- antisemitic stereotype *Judas*. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] If only....
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Nov 12, 2010, at 5:00 PM, Lajany Otum wrote: > == > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > == > > > Shane Mage writes: > >> >> "Protection" has nothing to do with it. Its a matter of who has a >> right to what. Why should the claimed rights of police-state regimes >> (Egypt, in the instance) trump the rights of peaceable museum >> custodians? Let alone those of museum visitors? >> > > According to bourgeois law, such as it is, dealing in the proceeds > of crime, however peaceably one does so, is itself a crime Ever heard of the statute of limitations? Once all the landed property in the USA has been returned to its rightful aboriginal proprietors, we can discuss the ownership of millennia-old artifacts. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] If only....
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Nov 12, 2010, at 11:12 AM, S. Artesian wrote: > perhaps you should consider invading Iran to protect those antiquities "Protection" has nothing to do with it. Its a matter of who has a right to what. Why should the claimed rights of police-state regimes (Egypt, in the instance) trump the rights of peaceable museum custodians? Let alone those of museum visitors? >> >>>> When the state religion of Egypt ceases to be that of the Arabians >>>> and returns to that of the Egyptians I will consider sympathizing >>>> with >>>> that demand. But until they can return to a home that honors them >>>> and is not ruled by the desert iconoclasts, these antiquities, >>>> the common >>>> heritage of humanity, should rest safely and comfortably right >>>> where >>>> they are now. >>>> >>>> Shane Mage >>>> >>>> Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there >>>> are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the >>>> only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] If only....
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Nov 12, 2010, at 8:25 AM, Intense Red wrote: > > Does this mean the Egyptian people do not have the right to change > their > religion without losing their historical treasures? The Egyptian, and European, and American, and African peoples never changed their religions. They were all violently suppressed by Christian and Muslim conquerors and the rites of the monotheists were imposed on them. >> But until they can return to a home that honors them and is not >> ruled by >> the desert iconoclasts, these antiquities, the common heritage of >> humanity, should rest safely and comfortably right where they are >> now. Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] If only....
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Nov 12, 2010, at 8:34 AM, S. Artesian wrote: > > Right, so in the meantime, you sanction the theft of the artifacts, The "theft" of the antiquities, if theft it was (who were they then "owned" by?) took place long ago. So how and by whom are the long- dead "thieves" to be "sanctioned?" > and their display for the benefit of the [long-dead] thieves Museums, as far as I know, are open to the public (though it is possible that various mafias have private museums in which stolen *european* artworks are displayed for the benefit exclusively of thieves). > Making judgements on state religions It is indeed my judgment that the state religion of modern Egypt holds the Gods to whom these antiquities were devoted in utter contempt. Is there anything wrong about that judgment? Isn't it obvious? > in order to support the religion of looting. The only devotion to the religion of looting visible here is that of Mr. Hawass, who seems devoted to the religion of looting museums open to the people of the world in order to lock the loot up in the museums of the Egyptian Islamic state. (And the same goes for those contemporary Greeks who seek to lock the Hellenic antiquities devoted to the Olympian Gods in the museums of the Orthodox Christian Greek state--its not as if they will ever restore the Parthenon as a functioning temple for Pallas Athene!) >> When the state religion of Egypt ceases to be that of the Arabians >> and >> returns to that of the Egyptians I will consider sympathizing with >> that demand. But until they can return to a home that honors them >> and >> is not ruled by the desert iconoclasts, these antiquities, the common >> heritage of humanity, should rest safely and comfortably right where >> they are now. >> >> Shane Mage >> >> Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there >> are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the >> only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] If only....
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Nov 11, 2010, at 9:55 PM, S. Artesian wrote: > > Cairo--Zahi Hawass, Egypt's larger-than-life antiquities chief, is > hunting for treasures from some of the richest known troves--the > world's prominent museums. > > ...Dr. Hawass is lobbying international museums to return some of > Egypt's most important archeological artifacts. These include the > Rosetta Stone, displayed for more than 200 years in the British > Museum, and the Zodiac of Dendera, housed in the Louvre in Paris.. When the state religion of Egypt ceases to be that of the Arabians and returns to that of the Egyptians I will consider sympathizing with that demand. But until they can return to a home that honors them and is not ruled by the desert iconoclasts, these antiquities, the common heritage of humanity, should rest safely and comfortably right where they are now. Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Lenin's Tomb on Hayek
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Nov 11, 2010, at 9:12 AM, Louis Proyect wrote: Richard Seymour wrote: "In chapter three of The Constitution of Liberty, Hayek lays out of the neoliberal conception of 'progress'. In this, he was consistent with previous rightist thought by conceiving of 'progress' not as a movement toward a desired end, but as the constant, rapid accumulation of capital in its various forms, with no agreed end " There is nothing "neoliberal" about that--it is simply Marx's theory of the driving force of capitalism, "accumulate, accumulate--that is Moses and The Prophets"--and his justification of this progress (and it is progress in the sense of Marx's definition of historical progress as the increase in the productive power of social labor) is nothing but Hegel's profound conception of the "List des Vernunfts" whereby History produces progress through the unconscious operations of human stupidity and destructiveness. What he and all capitalist apologists miss is the Hegelian/Marxist concept of the *higher rationality of History* whereby human struggle is to produce, out of the charnel house of history, the collective self-consciousness of a human race no longer a biological species *an sich* but the active (*an und für sich*) species-being called on to direct (in the next historical phase) the ongoing growth of planetary consciousness. Hayek is orthogonal to Hegel and Marx. In Hayek the world is neither standing on its head not on its feet--it lies prone in the mud. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Gene Debs
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == >> >> ML wrote : >> >> "Guy Fawkes: the only man to enter Parliament with honest >> intentions". >> >> That's fucking brilliant. >> >> epoliticus >> I love the joke, too. But the history itself is not without interest. Fawkes was a subaltern in a Roman Catholic (or Papist, as it was then called) conspiracy, covered by the Earls of Percy and Northumberland, to overthrow the Protestant monarchy and restore a Papist reign like Bloody Mary's. The plot never had the least chance and Fawkes was allowed to get into the cellar of Parliament only because Walsingham's intelligence service had soaked the gunpowder so it could never explode. Fawkes was the chosen centerpiece for a show trial. But popular history, as always, had the last laugh. Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Lincoln Elected 150 Years Ago This Day
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Nov 6, 2010, at 1:14 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote: > > I think you should reconsider your support for Lincoln. > > Read, if you haven't, William Marvel, /Mr. Lincoln Goes to War/ > (2006). A book that can indeed be judged by its cover (where the title is displayed). Mr. Lincoln didn't go to war--the war went to him. Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures." Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Turning the "Financial Question" On Its Head--Is There An Answer Here?
==
Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
==
On Oct 30, 2010, at 2:10 PM, michael perelman wrote:
>
> The first wave of populists, before they were captured by the money
> cranks, did question the distribution of wealth.
The 1930's wave (Long, Townsend, Sinclair) certainly challenged the
distribution of wealth ("Every Man a King, Every Gal a Queen!")
Shane Mage
The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each
according to his need.
The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each
according to his greed.
Joe Stack (1956-2010)
Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu
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Re: [Marxism] Larry Clark censored in Paris
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Oct 17, 2010, at 4:13 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: NO POLANSKI STUFF On Oct 17, 2010, at 4:33 PM, S. Artesian wrote: > > Hey Shane-- have I ever told you what a disingenuous jerk you are on > the > Polanski issue?... Our moderator had already spoken. "...else I should answer from a full-flowing stomach..." (King Lear, Act V, Scene III) Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Larry Clark censored in Paris
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Oct 17, 2010, at 3:07 PM, Erik Toren wrote: > ...Polanski rape(sic) of a minor... >> (recall the obscene >> delight taken by some in the persecution of Polanski) Thanks for illustrating my point. Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Larry Clark censored in Paris
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Oct 17, 2010, at 2:09 PM, David Thorstad wrote: > > Gay socialist mayor of Paris as censor... "Delanoë defended his decision by saying that "what was easy (to show) 20 years ago causes problems today." In a letter to the Greens last week, he said a ban for youth was the only way "to allow a great artist to show in a great Paris museum." Considering how much puritanical and prurient sex-hysteria has been fostered worldwide by the uncultural right in the past twenty years, even infecting many subscribers to these lists (recall the obscene delight taken by some in the persecution of Polanski), and considering the Giulianiish fascist tendencies of Sarkozy's regime, more understanding of Delanoë's defensive posture might be in order. I suspect that the word among museum staff is "surtout, pas de zèle!" Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] Fwd: Call for pot
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Begin forwarded message: > From: Michael Whitney > Date: October 14, 2010 4:36:40 PM EDT > To: Shane Mage > Subject: Call for pot > Reply-To: a...@firedoglake.com > > > Prop 19 needs your help to pass. Can you pledge a few minutes of > your weekend to call young voters for Prop 19? > > Click here to pledge to call voters this weekend and help pass Prop > 19! > Shane - > > There’s just 19 days left for Prop 19, and the drug warriors are > coming out in force to flood the airwaves with "Reefer Madness" > propaganda. > > You may not be able to vote in the California election. But you can > beat back the drug warriors’ anti-pot offensive and make sure young > Californians turn out to vote for Prop 19. > > We’re organizing a big event to call voters across California this > weekend. Can you pledge to call young voters for Prop 19 sometime > this weekend? > > Click here to pledge a few minutes of your weekend to call voters > for Prop 19. > > (Don’t have time to call this weekend? Please chip in $10 to our > campaign to pass Prop 19 instead.) > > California's Prop 19 could be the turning point for bringing an end > to marijuana prohibition, sending a chain reaction through states > across the country in 2012. But If Prop 19 fails in California, > it’ll be that much harder for every other state to legalize > marijuana in the future. > > We know for a fact that people between the ages of 18 and 29 are > overwhelmingly likely to support Prop 19, and that they're much more > likely vote if they know that real people like you are cheering them > on. > > Calling voters for Prop 19 is really fun, and super simple. Plus, > there’s some awesome prizes for people who make the most calls this > weekend! > > Can you pledge to take a few minutes out of your weekend to call > young voters for Prop 19? Click here to pledge to call this weekend. > > (Can’t call this weekend? Please donate $10 to our campaign to pass > Prop 19.) > > Want to know how bad the crazy is going to get in California? > Senator Dianne Feinstein is the co-chair of the No on 19 campaign, > and she's been having a media freak-out about pot brownies. That's > right, pot brownies. > > The drug warriors are bringing out every trick in their “Reefer > Madness” handbook, and the only way to shut them up is to flood the > zone with new, young voters who the pollsters aren’t counting to vote. > > We need you to help pass Prop 19. Please pledge to make a few phone > calls to California voters and let them know just how excited you > are about Prop 19, and that you're rooting for them to vote. > > Click here to pledge to call young voters in California this weekend > for Prop 19. It’ll just take a few minutes > > Thanks so much for your help to pass Prop 19 and legalize marijuana > in California. > > Onward, > > Michael Whitney > JustSayNow.com > > Contribute to Just Say Now to support marijuana legalization. Click > here: > > > > > > > This email was sent to: > shm...@pipeline.com > > To unsubscribe, go to: > http://action.firedoglake.com/unsubscribe Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] "First things first" [Re: Positive development in Ecuador?]
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Oct 13, 2010, at 11:40 AM, Nestor Gorojovsky wrote: > > This answer must always be an, er, one-sided single answer in a > particular sense. Vladimir Lenin...did not question himself > whether the German people would rise, as he expected. He did what he > had > to do. First things first: revolt Russia and then hope the Germans > revolt as forecasted. On the contrary--the dispute over Brest-Litovsk between Lenin and Trotsky centered on whether the German people would rise and so whether or not to sign the diktat. Lenin was right. Then two and a half years later The same sort of issue came back between Lenin and Trotsky. This time Lenin thought that the Polish people would rise if the Red Army marched on Warsaw and so it was wrong to sigh the favorable peace then on offer. Trotsky disagreed and he was right (if Stalin had not deliberately sabotaged the campaign the defeat would still have occurred but it would have been less of a disaster than it was). In neither case was it a matter of "first things first'--it was a matter of dealing with a complex situation in its full complexity and no simplistic solutions were apparent at the time. Which, in revolution, is always the case (Bukharin, who Lenin said "never understood the dialectic," had a simple approach--"toujours l'audace!"). Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Imperative mandates
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Oct 11, 2010, at 2:28 PM, Dan wrote: > == > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > == > > >>> ""Imperative mandate" is an idea as undemocratic as the > US Senate. Every modern society would involve a multiple of thousands > of diverse groups if all were small enough for everybody to > participate in debate and election (Aristotle was right about this > size limit). If the "mandated" individuals then carry out their > mandates the final decision will be by majority of mandates, not > majority of the people--because the minority mandates might well be > conferred by overwhelming majorities and the majority mandates > conferred by tiny minorities." > > > I don't see why that should be the case. > > It stands to reason that whenever several groups (workers' councils) > federate and co-ordinate their actions at a higher level, then a > council > that represents 40 people will have less weight than a council that > represents 200 people. When the delegates from each council meet and > debate, each scrupulously following the imperative mandate he/she > holds > from his/her council, then the imperative mandates from a bigger > council > will carry more weight than those from a smaller council. So the unanimous mandates from four "councils" will have less weight than a 50.1% mandate from the fifth. My point exactly. Not to mention that this "democracy" disfranchises everybody unable to attain active membership in one of those councils. I repeat: the only possible democracy in a non-tiny community is choice of the governing authority by random selection among the entire population. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Americans hate "big government" but love what it does
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Oct 10, 2010, at 2:40 PM, David Thorstad wrote: > > ...Ray Dunne used to say that during the 1934 Minneapolis > strikes, > even Catholic workers ran out into the street during a > government-supported anti-union march to rip the cross off the neck of > the monsignor in the parade, demonstrating that during times of social > crisis and struggle, ideological beliefs, including religious faith, > can > quickly fall away... Seems to me that, far from dropping their religious faith, they were actively demonstrating it. Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Imperative mandates
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Oct 10, 2010, at 5:06 AM, Dan wrote: > >>> "If it is possible to gather all the population of an electoral > district into one place to debate issues and mandate their delegate, > then on those issues the people might as well vote in a referendum and > have their vote recorded" > > This is exactly what an "imperative mandate" is. The people gather > together, debate an issue, make a decision on that issue, "have their > vote recorded" and mandate someone to carry out their decision > faithfully and in a given time-frame. > "imperative mandate" is the precise opposite of representative > government. That's right. "Imperative mandate" is an idea as undemocratic as the US Senate. Every modern society would involve a multiple of thousands of diverse groups if all were small enough for everybody to participate in debate and election (Aristotle was right about this size limit). If the "mandated" individuals then carry out their mandates the final decision will be by majority of mandates, not majority of the people--because the minority mandates might well be conferred by overwhelming majorities and the majority mandates conferred by tiny minorities. Paul is right (though I think long--but staggered--terms are much better than short ones). The only democratic way to govern a large community is selection *by lot* (the basic practice of Athenian democracy) of a statistically representative governing body enabled to debate public issues absolutely in public, to control the public administration, and to propose laws that would go into effect only after referendum of the entire community. Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures." Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Jihadist ecology
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Oct 10, 2010, at 8:45 AM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/30/world/middleeast/30binladen.html Having failed pathetically to put out any "Osama Bin Laden" videos that were not laughable frauds, the "Osama Bin Laden" industry for a long time now has been putting out only audiotapes whenever it chooses to discredit some idea or person or to bolster some new nonsensical scare propaganda. Shane Mage The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed. Joe Stack (1956-2010) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] English Bronze Age boy grew up in the Mediterranean
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 28, 2010, at 3:11 PM, Dan wrote: > > Fascinating discovery by British archeologists, according to the BBC > News website. > > A child found in a late Copper/early Bronze age grave spent his > childhood ... in the Mediterranean (Southern Alps). This startling > conclusion stems from strontium isotope analysis of the child's > enamel. > > So, in the early Bronze Age, groups of people were moving VERY rapidly > across Europe, for a Mediterranean born child to end up in Southern > England. > "Bronze Age" implies the use of *tin* to allow with copper. Cornwall has always been a major source of tin. The boy was part of a trading expedition, not a rapid transeuropean migration. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Miliband: living wage for reduced labor hours
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 28, 2010, at 2:39 PM, Ralph Johansen wrote: > > Not to be forgotten: back in the 60s, Beyond the Fringe (Jonathan > Miller, Dudley Moore, Peter Cook and Alan Bennett) had a skit where a > small group of the faithful ascends to the mountain top to await the > end > of the world. When the time comes, when they have counted down to zero > and nothing has happened, their leader says, "Same time tomorrow, > lads, > we're bound to get a winner one day." They were plagiarizing an old American cartoon, dating from the 1930s or earlier. In the cartoon the tag line was "Better luck next time." Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] General Strikes in France
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 24, 2010, at 6:05 PM, Mark Lause wrote: > > Dan, > > I'm just back from over there. While we were looking around and > seeing all > the evidence of possible political troubles over this question, I kept > wondering about the impact on all this for those young workers > looking for > jobs? it seems to me that they'd be more interested in raising the > retirement age than those workers facing the addition of more years > to the > end of their working lives... Don't you mean *not* raising the retirement age? This is a point that seems lacking in the Left and union statements that I've seen on France 2. What can be more stupid, at a time of enormous youth unemployment, then to force workers eager to retire to work two more years and so condemn their young eventual replacements to an additional two years of unemployment? That's neoliberalism for you. Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Did Trotsky bring a lawsuit in Switzerland against Dimitrov in ...
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 22, 2010, at 4:42 PM, waistli...@aol.com wrote: > Trotskyism is a cult, with fanatical advocates. > I maintain that the question of Stalin is raised 9 out of 10 times > on this > list by "Trotskyites." etc. Since this, like other of his posts, cannot be discussed without entering into what is not discussable on this list, why is WL not on moderation? Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] dissemination of false information
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 19, 2010, at 1:24 PM, Manuel Barrera wrote: > > A mon frère, Lajany, tout ce qu'ils faut a dire est, Vive La Terre > de Lafayette... Fidel Castro et le Marquis de La Fayette diregeants révolutionnaires! Let us recall a little history. Playing on his prestige as Louis XVI's agent in supporting the American slaveholder rebellion against his Brittanic rivals, de La Fayette at an early stage of the Revolution became leader of the "moderate" monarchist wing of the National Assembly and, as head of the Garde Nationale, the leading figure in the regime. His followers were known as the Fayettistes. His greatest exploit in his brief period of power was the Massacre of the Champs de Mars. It was also his undoing as the Parisian masses, led by the Jacobin and Cordelier clubs (Brissot, Robespierre. Danton, Mme. Roland, Camille Desmoulins) with the backing of Philippe Égalité, drove him back to America and impelled the revolution in its definitive antimonarchist direction. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] dissemination of false information
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 19, 2010, at 12:41 AM, Lajany Otum wrote: > You're just a racist scum... Why is vile insulting language like that permitted on a list where even appropriate use of the word "b..ch" is regarded as outrageous? Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Why is gu..no lover C..A stooge danan still on the list?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Why is vile insulting language like that permitted on a list where even appropriate use of the word "b..ch" is regarded as outrageous? Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Autumn of the Driveler
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == > > On Sep 17, 2010, at 8:18 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: >> >> On 9/17/10 8:13 PM, Shane Mage wrote: >>> >>> Perhaps if the Cuban revolutionaries had read their Trotsky they >>> would >>> have learned that the Stalinist "USSR" was a totally >>> counterrevolutionary regime whose "aid" was motivated by imperial >>> interests, just as much as was the hostility of the Americans, and >>> that by accepting a political quid pro quo for that aid they were >>> effectively sabotaging their own revolution. >> >> But, Shane, you don't really distinguish Castro from Stalin so your >> point is rather specious. > On Sep 17, 2010, at 8:31 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > On 9/17/10 8:25 PM, Shane Mage wrote: >> >> I have consistently referred to Castro as a real (however national) >> revolutionary, and to Stalin as an Okhranik villain who restored a >> red- >> tinted Tzarist regime. What more distinction is needed? > > Oh, there must have been another Shane Mage who wrote this. My > apologies: > > Trotsky long ago diagnosed Stalinism as "the syphilis of the labor > movement." This heap of Stalinist filth--which even non-masochists > ought to read in its entirety--demonstrates how the Cuban leadership, > infected with that disease shortly after the revolution, now has > entered its tertiary phase, general paresis. Do you know the meaning of the word "after?" The "political quid pro quo" in my message of today is precisely the "infection" I was referring to in that earlier post. (By the way, when Gorbachev so clumsily tried to restore a modicum of rationality to the bureaucratically paralyzed economy of his "really existing socialism," he at least decorated his policies with phrases about a "return to Lenin." Raoul and Fidel Castro seem incapable of even that much). Shane Mage "All things are an equal exchange for fire and fire for all things, as goods are for gold and gold for goods." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr, 90 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Autumn of the Driveler
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 17, 2010, at 8:18 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > On 9/17/10 8:13 PM, Shane Mage wrote: >> >> Perhaps if the Cuban revolutionaries had read their Trotsky they >> would >> have learned that the Stalinist "USSR" was a totally >> counterrevolutionary regime whose "aid" was motivated by imperial >> interests, just as much as was the hostility of the Americans, and >> that by accepting a political quid pro quo for that aid they were >> effectively sabotaging their own revolution. > > But, Shane, you don't really distinguish Castro from Stalin so your > point is rather specious. I have consistently referred to Castro as a real (however national) revolutionary, and to Stalin as an Okhranik villain who restored a red- tinted Tzarist regime. What more distinction is needed? Shane Mage "All things are an equal exchange for fire and fire for all things, as goods are for gold and gold for goods." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr, 90 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Autumn of the Driveler
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 17, 2010, at 7:29 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > Perhaps if the Cuban > revolutionaries had read their Rudolf Rocker, they would have learned > how to migrate the island to an egalitarian communist galaxy where > such > problems do not exist. Perhaps if the Cuban revolutionaries had read their Trotsky they would have learned that the Stalinist "USSR" was a totally counterrevolutionary regime whose "aid" was motivated by imperial interests, just as much as was the hostility of the Americans, and that by accepting a political quid pro quo for that aid they were effectively sabotaging their own revolution. Shane Mage "All things are an equal exchange for fire and fire for all things, as goods are for gold and gold for goods." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr, 90 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Cuba headed in the same direction as China and Vietnam?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 14, 2010, at 12:23 PM, Nathan Weinstein wrote: > > Source of Trotsky's recommendation of NEP? See *My Life," pp. 463 ff. > On Sep 13, 2010, at 3:05 PM, Shane Mage wrote: >> >> On Sep 13, 2010, at 5:53 PM, midhurs...@aol.com wrote: >>> Finally taking Lenin's model 90 years on >> Actually 89--Lenin proposed it in 1921. It was Trotsky who first >> proposed it, in 1920. Shane Mage "All things are an equal exchange for fire and fire for all things, as goods are for gold and gold for goods." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr, 90 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Cuba headed in the same direction as China and Vietnam?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 13, 2010, at 5:53 PM, midhurs...@aol.com wrote: > > Finally taking Lenin's model 90 years on Actually 89--Lenin proposed it in 1921. It was Trotsky who first proposed it, in 1920. Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures." Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] New Communist Movement vs Trotskyism, without the rivers of blood
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 12, 2010, at 2:35 PM, Ethan Young wrote: > > In truth, some activists radicalized in the civil rights movement, > the Chicano movement, the Puerto Rican movement, etc., did become > Trotskyists. Just not as many as became Maoists. > > The question is not: Why didn't more of them identify with Trotsky, > but rather: Why would they? > The simple. short, and precise answer: they were and are opportunists. The Stalinized "USSR" and Mao's China were, relatively to any country but the US (not to mention any section of the workers' movement internationally), superpowers at the head of a seemingly mighty "Socialist Camp." Opportunists flock behind power. To identify persistently with a persecuted, slandered, murdered revolutionary, whose followers represented nothing more than a tiny, disorganized (by its own fault) and disoriented (by its own opportunist attempts to identify with dictatorial capitalist regimes presented as "degenerate workers' states" and "colonial revolutionary regimes") minority, takes a certain idealism, courage, devotion to truth, and intellectuality. That these qualities were generally lacking among those willing to be apologists for any form of Stalinism is only to be expected. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] General Strike in France tomorrow
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 6, 2010, at 4:24 PM, Mark Lause wrote: > > And what chances, if any, are there for this to get out of hand...to > run > longer than 24 hours, to spread, to detonate broader social reactions? none Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Daniel Estulin and the phony 'Bilderberg conspiracy'
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 2, 2010, at 2:10 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > On 9/2/2010 2:00 PM, David Thorstad wrote: >> Maybe Louis doesn't have any friends who are in hock to >> simplistic >> conspiracy "theories" (which all seem to have proponents with a >> fascist >> tinge: e.g., Trotsky was an agent of the Rothschilds; the French and >> Russian revolutions were creations of the Illuminati, and only the >> American Revolution was not under their control...), but all such >> nonsense, which the Internet amplifies and spreads to nooks and >> crannies >> it never would have reached earlier, is a more serious problem of >> daily >> life than his rather cavalier dismissal suggests. > > Well, after all, I am acquainted with a chap named Lee Smith. I didn't know you were a Cub fan! Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Michael Heinrich on Capitalism and the State
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Sep 2, 2010, at 3:11 PM, Angelus Novus wrote: > > Shane Mage: > >> And how could anyone, after Marx devoted so much exposition to the >> category of "relative surplus value," the main source of profit, >> claim >> that that profits (as distinct from ground and monopoly rents and >> ?interest) "have little to do with performance?" > > Here on Earth-Prime, relative surplus value usually refers to > lowering commodity value by decreasing socially necessary labour time. > > Maybe you can elucidate a bit upon this daring new Mage-ian notion > of relative surplus value tied to "performance". How is the "decreasing" of socially necessary labour time (the increasing of the productivity of social labor) brought about? By investment in improved means of production. Duh. What does "performance" of entrepreneurial capital mean? Investing in improved means of production. Double Duh. Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures." Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] after "we" "leave"
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == In todays NYT the inef...f...able Thomas Friedman writes: "The president will not be remembered for when we leave Iraq but for what happens after we leave. That is largely in Iraqi hands, but it is still very much in our interest. So we need to retain sufficient diplomatic, intelligence, Special Forces and Army training units there to promote a decent outcome." Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] cricket lovely cricket
==
Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
==
On Aug 29, 2010, at 6:54 PM, Gary MacLennan wrote:
>
> I have CLR James' well known love for cricket as a defensive shield
> against
> all those comrades who roll their eyes when I talk about cricket. I
> have
> followed the game for over half a century and truly I have spent
> more time
> watching and listening and reading about it than practically any other
> topic.
>
> So the news yesterday that the Pakistani cricket team had been
> bribed to
> "perform" for the benefit of the bookmakers caused me no end of
> dismay...
Whatever the outcome, I can assure you that it will be nothing like
the catastrophe that befell American Baseball in 1919 when several
players on the Chicago White Sox were bribed by the gambling mafia to
lose the World Series. The "Black Sox Scandal" led not only to ending
the career of one of the most talented young outfielders ever
("Shoeless Joe" Jackson) who had in fact not accepted the bribe and
had performed brilliantly throughout the series--that was the least of
it. The disaster was the establishment (by the owners' cartel) of a
"Commissioner" of Major League (white) Baseball with dictatorial
powers over the game, and the appointment of a fascist racist, Judge
Kenesaw Mountain Landis (who had sent many leftists to jail during the
Wilson Red Scare)--resulting in a quarter-century of imposed Jim Crow
(until Landis finally died in 1945), and the extraordinarily
exploitative "reserve clause" (a lifetime contract binding the player
to perform only for the team originally owning the contract or
whatever team that the contract was sold or traded to) which Judge
Landis's professional colleagues on the Supreme Court enforced by
declaring that Major League Baseball, alone among sports businesses,
was exempt from the Anti-Trust laws. That privileged status remains
in force even now, although the reserve clause was abolished when the
players finally unionized in the early 1970's.
Shane Mage
"Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64
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Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == >> "God" is the label we put on the answer to the >> question: "Why is there anything instead of nothing?" "Boojum Stew Pot" is the label we put on the vessel in which the snark will be cooked--once we've caught it. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 14, 2010, at 4:53 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote: > > He quotes Wittgenstein, "Not how the world is, but that it is, is > the mystery." The former is the province of science. "God" is the > label we put on the answer (which he insists we do not know) to the > question about the latter: "Why is there anything instead of nothing?" > Wittgenstein maintains that the task of philosophy is to show the fly how to get out of the bottle. The bottle is the question "Why is there anything instead of nothing?" The way out is to answer the question posed by Mr. Clinton: It depends on what the meaning of "is" is. Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == > > On Aug 14, 2010, at 3:37 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote: > >> http://newsfromneptune.com/2010/08/14/god-and-creation/ >> > His whole discourse strikes me as meaningless wordplay. But that's > not the point. Whatever he's talking about it's certainly not any > "Abrahamic" concept (the aborted sacrifice of Isaac was a manifest > intervention of Jahweh into the universe). He makes no reference > whatever to any concept of deity found in the Bible, the Koran, or > the Gospels. > > >> > On Aug 14, 2010, at 2:43 PM, Shane Mage wrote: >> >> >> >> On Aug 14, 2010, at 1:56 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote: >> >> >> >>> But neither of the "two essentially different concepts" >> is an >> >>> account of the Abrahamic (Judeo-Xn-Islamic) notion of >> deity. >> >> >> >> As I pointed out below, the "Abrahamic (Judeo-Xn-Islamic) >> notion of >> >> deity," has two senses: the "Demiurge" of Genesis 1 who >> brings >> >> order out of chaos and the "Zeus" of popular religion to >> whom >> >> Sacrifices are due. >> >> >> >> If a concept different from these is to be found in the >> Bible, the >> >> Gospels, or the Koran please spell it out... > > > > Shane Mage > > > This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it > always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, > kindling in measures and going out in measures." > > Herakleitos of Ephesos > > > > Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Global warming
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 14, 2010, at 3:31 PM, Morton Skorodin wrote: > > Several objections were raised regarding my July, 2010 report, > "Nuclear > Energy causes Global Warming", particularly the ideas that the > effect of > direct heat pollution would be strong enough to be an important > factor in > global warming and that CO2 is a minor factor. > "Somebody's crunched numbers. Small globally, noticeable regionally: Nearly all energy used for human purposes is dissipated as heat within Earth's land–atmosphere system. Thermal energy released from non- renewable sources is therefore a climate forcing term. Averaged globally, this forcing is only +0.028 W m−2, but over the continental United States and western Europe, it is +0.39 and +0.68 W m−2, respectively... significant increases in annual-mean temperature and planetary boundary layer (PBL) height occur over gridcells where present-day AHF exceeds 3.0 W m−2. PBL expansion leads to a slight, but significant increase in atmospheric residence time of aerosols emitted from large-AHF regions. Hence, AHF may influence regional climate projections and contemporary chemistry-climate studies." The contradiction is so crying--if waste heat is a significant factor raising global temperatures why then is the greatest warming taking place precisely in the region--the arctic--where waste heat plays virtually no role? Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures." Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 14, 2010, at 2:43 PM, Shane Mage wrote: > > On Aug 14, 2010, at 1:56 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote: > >> But neither of the "two essentially different concepts" is an >> account of the >> Abrahamic (Judeo-Xn-Islamic) notion of deity. > > As I pointed out below, the "Abrahamic (Judeo-Xn-Islamic) notion of > deity," has two senses: the "Demiurge" of Genesis 1 who brings order > out of chaos and the "Zeus" of popular religion to whom Sacrifices > are due. > > If a concept different from these is to be found in the Bible, the > Gospels, or the Koran please spell it out. >> >>> On Aug 13, 2010, at 10:24 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote: >>>> >>>> That sort of god - a Zeus, or demiurge - is rather far from the >>>> Judeo-Christian notion (as elaborated in the West by Augustine and >>>> Aquinas). >>>> >>> A Zeus and a Demiurge are two essentially different concepts. A >>> "Demiurge" >>> is an artisan, the shaper of an ordered world out of chaos, the >>> lawgiver to a >>> lawfully unfolding cosmos. That is the "God" of Genesis. "Zeus," >>> (especially as Jupiter) is impersonal energy, symbolized as the >>> thunderbolt >>> (the planetary connection is here particularly à propos) and >>> participating in >>> the life process in the "do ut des" fashion--invoked through ritual >>> sacrifices. That is the "God" of popular religion--Allah, Jesus, >>> Adonai. >>> For the philosophers, though, the impersonality of the cosmic >>> energy flow is >>> what counts: "It consents and does not consent to be called >>> Zeus"(Herakleitos). > > > > Shane Mage > > Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there > are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the > only offering acceptable is silence. > > > Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == > > On Aug 14, 2010, at 1:14 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote: > >> Rowan Williams - an Anglican bishop, poet, and theologian (and the >> current Archbishop of Canterbury) does not regard the story of >> crucifixion "as an edifying fable" (and surely not that it "must be >> recaptured from the mass of Pauline falsification"). >> >> John Shelby Spong once accused Williams of being a "neo- >> medievalist," preaching orthodoxy to the people in the pew but >> knowing in private that it is not true ... Williams responded: "I >> am genuinely a lot more conservative than he would like me to be. >> Take the Resurrection. I think he has said that of course I know >> what all the reputable scholars think on the subject and therefore >> when I talk about the risen body I must mean something other than >> the empty tomb. But I don't. I don't know how to persuade him, but >> I really don't." > > Whatever Williams's innermost secret thoughts might be, Pullman > certainly treats the Gospel narrative as an edifying fable and > Williams fully accepts that as the basis for his criticism when he > likewise treats questions of historical fact as irrelevant. If the > narrative is not based on historical fact, what can it be if not > edifying fable? That Williams is (by virtue of his job) compelled > to assert belief in "the Resurrection" > is no surprise (do bears shit in the woods?). But if he had any > remotely rational grounds for belief that the "Resurrection" story > is historically accurate he would have found it easy to persuade > Spong that he, rightly or wrongly, actually believed it. > > >> >> On 8/13/10 10:40 AM, Shane Mage wrote: >>> ...the story that Pullman and Williams treat as an edifying fable >>> rather than >>> a historical event ... must be recaptured from the mass of Pauline >>> falsification. > > > > Shane Mage > > Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there > are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the > only offering acceptable is silence. > > > Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 14, 2010, at 2:00 PM, Joseph Catron wrote: > > On Sat, Aug 14, 2010 at 9:02 AM, Shane Mage > wrote: > > So "Christianity" (pace Aquinas) discards *logic*??? Or is it "god" >> that is an illogical concept? >> > > Neither, but logic does not demand dualism (and usually suffers from > it). > Buddhist/Hegelian logic is polyvalent. But Christian (Thomistic/ Aristotelian) logic, affirming the "excluded middle" postulate, is dualistic. So is the logic governing the digital computer you are reading this on. >> "Science"="Big Bang"??? >> > Oh, right - you're some kind of a heretic here, no? Exemplifying the case that the Big Bang (with it's implied Big Banger) is religion (from which deviation is heresy) and not science. Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures." Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
==
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==
On Aug 14, 2010, at 1:01 AM, Joseph Catron wrote:
> ==
> Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
> ==
>
>
> True, I didn't make it though all 583 comments, but I certainly
> wouldn't buy
> yours. For one thing, it entails the kind of dualistic logic
> (complex/simple) Christianity discarded in about 208...
>
So "Christianity" (pace Aquinas) discards *logic*??? Or is it "god"
that is an illogical concept?
Mine was a strictly logical argument in the terms posed by the
Christian philosopher.
It dealt with the concept of "creator" of complexity being inferred
from the observed complexity of the creation.
> Arguments that if God is one thing, he [not "He"???] necessarily
> cannot be another, generally miss the point of what God is,
> hypothetically or not, by definition...
So what is your Christian definition of the word "God?" Does it amount
to anything other than "that which cannot be defined?"
> And it seems to me to
> attack science as much as theology; certainly there could be few
> things less
> complex than the content of the universe immediately prior to the
> Big Bang.
"Science"="Big Bang"??? ("the content of the universe immediately
prior to the Big Bang" was "without form and void" (Genesis 1) but
then the Big Banger got to work...
Shane Mage
This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it
always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire,
kindling in measures and going out in measures."
Herakleitos of Ephesos
>>
>> The creator of a complex system, to create it, must initially have
>> that
>> complexity in its consciousness (otherwise there would be something
>> in
>> that complex system which was not the work of that creator, and
>> therefore the system *as a whole* was not the work of that creator).
>> So the complexity of creation must also be complexity within the
>> creator. Therefore either: the creator having something existent
>> about
>> it that is over and above the complexity of the creation is to that
>> extent more complex than the creation; or: there is nothing about the
>> creator that is not present in the creation (pantheism) and therefore
>> a separate creator is otiose.
>>
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Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 13, 2010, at 10:24 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote: > > That sort of god - a Zeus, or demiurge - is rather far from the > Judeo-Christian notion (as elaborated in the West by Augustine and > Aquinas). > A Zeus and a Demiurge are two essentially different concepts. A "Demiurge" is an artisan, the shaper of an ordered world out of chaos, the lawgiver to a lawfully unfolding cosmos. That is the "God" of Genesis. "Zeus," (especially as Jupiter) is impersonal energy, symbolized as the thunderbolt (the planetary connection is here particularly à propos) and participating in the life process in the "do ut des" fashion--invoked through ritual sacrifices. That is the "God" of popular religion--Allah, Jesus, Adonai. For the philosophers, though, the impersonality of the cosmic energy flow is what counts: "It consents and does not consent to be called Zeus"(Herakleitos). > Christians were prosecuted (correctly) during the Roman principate > for atheism - > for not believing in any such god. Not so. Their *belief* was never at issue, and every sort of *belief* was current and tolerated in the Republic, Principate, and Dominate until the Christians, progressively from Constantine to Theodosius, outlawed and persecuted every form of belief (including dissident Christian) that deviated from their orthodoxy. What was prosecuted in Roman law was seditious conduct--that of a secret society systematically subverting the *do ut des* cosmic relationship of the Republic with the "gods" it invoked through public sacrificial ceremonies. (Pliny the Younger's letters express that distinction very well). Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 13, 2010, at 7:37 PM, Joseph Catron wrote: > == > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > == > > > The Times ran an interesting online essay along these lines > Wednesday, which > has caused me to partially rethink my own approach to Dawkins and > his ilk: > > "Religious believers often accuse argumentative atheists such as > Dawkins of > being excessively rationalistic, demanding standards of logical and > evidential rigor that aren’t appropriate in matters of faith. My > criticism > is just the opposite. Dawkins does not meet the standards of > rationality > that a topic as important as religion requires." You evidently didn't read far enough, because my comment posted in that thread completely refutes the author's criticism of Dawkins: "You are wrong to dispute Dawkins argument about complexity. The creator of a complex system, to create it, must initially have that complexity in its consciousness (otherwise there would be something in that complex system which was not the work of that creator, and therefore the system *as a whole* was not the work of that creator). So the complexity of creation must also be complexity within the creator. Therefore either: the creator having something existent about it that is over and above the complexity of the creation is to that extent more complex than the creation; or: there is nothing about the creator that is not present in the creation (pantheism) and therefore a separate creator is otiose." Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 12, 2010, at 10:37 PM, Joseph Catron wrote: > Jesus' competing genealogies in > Matthew and Luke - that is to say, rather beside the point. The point is that each and any Messiah had to be descended from David. The two genealogies establish descent one through the foster father, the other through the mother. They complement, not compete with, each other. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 12, 2010, at 10:00 PM, Joseph Catron wrote: > > From this review I infer that Pullman is as oblivious as Williams to >> the central fact about Gethsemane: that the disciples were *armed* >> > > I would say the central fact about Gethsemane, which too many > parties today > are wont to forget, is that Jesus genuinely didn't want to go > through with > it. What's the "it" that he "didn't he want to go through with?" > That said, wouldn't *anyone* lurking around the countryside at > midnight in > first-century Palestine, who wasn't an unmitigated halfwit, have > been armed? The Mount of Olives is not the countryside. Its the middle of Jerusalem. > What's your point about it? Presumably not that this guaranteed their > successful ambush of a Roman legion! It wasn't a legion, it was a cohort. But the point is--they didn't expect the Romans at all. Judas had been sent to fetch the Temple Police, plenty of whom were presumably secret followers of the Messianic movement who would change sides as soon as the swords were drawn. But not with Romans lurking behind,. as Judas had whispered in Jesus's ear. So Peter was told to put down his sword and all but Jesus fled. Ask yourself--they were all safe in a secret location in Jerusalem. Nothing prevented them from praying all night if they wanted to. Why did they all go to the Mount of Olives and make sure the Temple Police were informed? Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] self-indulgence
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 12, 2010, at 9:36 PM, Joseph Catron wrote: > > Anyway, as far as clerical review of Pullman go, I highly recommend > Rowan > Williams' to anyone who hasn't yet read it: > > http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/apr/03/good-jesus-christ-philip-pullman From this review I infer that Pullman is as oblivious as Williams to the central fact about Gethsemane: that the disciples were *armed* Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Arch-Zionist claims that Israel will bomb Iran's nuclear facili...
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 11, 2010, at 9:12 PM, Jay Moore wrote: > ... I think the flashpoint is going to come when the > U.S. tries to board and inspect an Iranian-flagged ship in the Persian > Gulf, claiming that it has been authorized by the UN to do so... The UNSC resolution explicitly refuses such authorization. Iranian ships can be inspected only if they consent. Involuntary inspections are authorized only for third-country hips. All this warscare talk is just hysteria propagated by a senile Cuban. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] evolutionary psychology and socialism?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == > > On Aug 8, 2010, at 12:18 PM, Shane Mage wrote: > >> Does EP >> generate testable predictions? Does EP advance our *practical* >> knowledge of human nature? > > Well, I haven't really looked hard yet, but I actually came upon > this just yesterday: > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUd8XA-5HEk&feature=youtube_gdata Not exactly double blind--or even single blind--is it? Anyway, since nobody of any species gained knowledge of even elementary mathematical statistics from evolution, its absence in two primate species doesn't exactly tell anyone very much (unless the existence of casinos and hippodromes indicates some "EP" selection for the virulence of this sort of ignorance among humans--I'm sure some EP scientist can come up with a hypothetical "advantage" which that particular stupidity conferred on our ancestors sometime a few million years ago). Shane Mage "All things are an equal exchange for fire and fire for all things, as goods are for gold and gold for goods." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr, 90 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] evolutionary psychology and socialism?
==
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==
On Aug 8, 2010, at 11:09 AM, Mechphisto wrote:
>
> But as I mentioned in a previous reply to someone, science is a tool
> to describe the natural world.
The point is not "description." Scientific knowledge, like all
knowledge, is a means to *grasp* ("comprehend") the world--and as Marx
and Hegel insisted, knowledge is manifest only in practice. Does EP
generate testable predictions? Does EP advance our *practical*
knowledge of human nature? Thems the only questions that matter.
Shane Mage
This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it
always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire,
kindling in measures and going out in measures."
Herakleitos of Ephesos
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Re: [Marxism] Victory for Same Sex Marriage in Federal Court
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 4, 2010, at 10:29 PM, Shane Mage wrote: > > On Aug 4, 2010, at 10:09 PM, Les Schaffer wrote: >> >> one of the more interesting and well argued legal decisions i have >> seen >> in a long time ... >> >> Shane, Fred, your take? >> >> Les > > I thought it was brilliant--as good an attempt at irreversability as > could be. The quote from Scali's dissent makes it virtually > impossible for the SCOTUS to reverse him without reversing themselves > on the whole gay-rights issue. A further thought: This may not even be appealable unless Schwarzenegger decides to do the appeal (Brown is on record that Prop 8 is unconstitutional). The State of California was the defendant and the "proponents" were there by permission of the Court. How would that give *them* the right to appeal an order to the State of California to stop enforcing Prop 8? > > Shane Mage > > Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there > are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the > only offering acceptable is silence. > > > > > Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu > Set your options at: > http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/shmage%40pipeline.com Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Victory for Same Sex Marriage in Federal Court
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 4, 2010, at 10:09 PM, Les Schaffer wrote: > > one of the more interesting and well argued legal decisions i have > seen > in a long time ... > > Shane, Fred, your take? > > Les I thought it was brilliant--as good an attempt at irreversability as could be. The quote from Scali's dissent makes it virtually impossible for the SCOTUS to reverse him without reversing themselves on the whole gay-rights issue. Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Stalinism and Bakuninism
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 2, 2010, at 9:49 AM, Tom Cod wrote: > ...surely we're treading on thin ice in getting into the > Jacobins, but if you must raise this issue, I suggest those who are > interested check out Thomas Paine's defense of the French > Revolution, "The > Rights of Man"... And when you do, just remember that it was Thermidor which liberated Paine from the prison where he was about to be sent to the guillotine by Robespierre. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] "Animal Connection" Helps Separate Humans From Other Species
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 1, 2010, at 10:33 PM, Dennis Brasky wrote: > > By Kate Shaw > > For centuries, people have tried to pinpoint what makes > humans unique... Every animal species is unique in multiple ways. > ...The most current scientific theory > suggests that three main qualities separate Homo sapiens > from other animals: the construction and use of complex > tools, the use of symbolic behavior including language, > art, and ritual, and the domestication of other plants > and animals... Homo Sapiens have supposedly been around for more than two million years but there is no evidence that these three "qualities" have been characteristic of homo sap for more than some ten thousand of them... > ...However, in a new paper in Current Anthropology, Dr. Pat Shipman > suggests a fourth trait unique to humans. Shipman cites humans' long > history of learning about and understanding animals as a unique > trait, calling this > tendency "the animal connection."... What is the difference between this and "quality" three--"domestication of other plants and animals?" > ...She claims that this relationship is the common unifying factor > that > underlies each of the other three previously recognized > human traits, and has played a major role in human > evolution over the last 2.6 million years... And just how is a "relationship" for which there is no evidence dating more than a few millennia supposed to have influenced evolution starting 2.6 million years ago? Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Stalinism and Bakuninism
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 1, 2010, at 8:20 PM, Tom Cod wrote: > ...like I was saying that was a good thing. > Obviously not...revolution and civil war are not perfect and...many > unsavory things occur... Oh. You were talking about "necklacing" *suspected* informers in South Africa (where there was, in the proper sense of those words, neither a revolution nor a civil war going on) and described all references to such facts as "right-wing horror stories." I took that as manifesting a certain, all-too-common, attitude toward the Robespierres and Jeffersons and their Revolutionary successors. Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures." > Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Stalinism and Bakuninism
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Aug 1, 2010, at 4:09 PM, Tom Cod wrote: > ...sanctimoniously recycling right wing horror stories about the > mistreatment of suspected > informers. What was tarring and feathering like? it was more than G > rated > Disney pageantry with the Tory victim often dying... Suspicion is not evidence, let alone proof. In that one word-- *suspected*--the devil's heel becomes visible. The Inquisition, citing "vehement suspicion of heresy" showed Galileo to its chamber of torture. The Robespierrist Terror, which decimated the French revolutionaries and led directly to Thermidor and Bonaparte (which found their historical justification in it), was "legally" based on the "Law of Suspects." What if not "suspicion" was the justification for the enslavement and killing of millions during the Stalinchina? What if not "suspicion" does Obama cite to justify the imprisonment and torture of thousands at Guantanamo Bay, Bagram, and all the unnamed "black sites?" To cite the torture of "Tory victims" (members of the majority who stayed loyal to their legal government) by the slaveholder-led minority terrorists of the American "Revolution" is to promise similar actions (and on grounds of "suspicion," not proof) in any future revolution that this writer and his cothinkers have anything to do with. A "Leftist" can do no better were he actually endeavoring to discredit the very idea of revolution. Shane Mage The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed. Joe Stack (1956-2010) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] The march of idiocy
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Today in Barcelona a coalition of carniverous imbeciles, opportunists, and separatist demagogues farted in the face of a three-millennial Mediterranean tradition of celebratory taurine sacrifice by outlawing the *corrida* anywhere in Catalonia. The authors and supporters of this blasphemy all deserve, and will surely receive, the suitable penalty: their next two rebirths will be as bull-calf, once to be destined for the veal stall and once for the abattoir. Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Why Misogynists Make Great Informants: THANK YOU MY BROTHAH!!!!!
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jul 18, 2010, at 7:00 PM, pat costello wrote: > ... It pains me to read, for example, marxists on this site > defending Roman Polanski's rape of a young girl... It should pain anyone not a prurient philistine to see anyone claiming "feminism" pitch in with the LA DAs and Rush Limbaughs in their (thankfully futile--but at what cost) jihad to send a great artist who is also an elderly Holocaust survivor, victim of the atrocious murder of his wife and unborn child, and extortion victim into the dungeons of the California penal system, prey (as a supposed "pedophile") to the violent whims of any antisemite or racist inmate or guard. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] A question to mathematicians on this list
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jul 12, 2010, at 9:17 PM, reg wrote: > > 1/2^8 assumes the probabilities are identical and unbiased for each > trial. > However, I believe that 8 of the trials included the German flag, > one of the > trials included both the German and the Spanish flag, and the last > trial > included the Spanish flag. Let's assume that the clever pulpo > preferred the > Spanish flag to all others, and preferred the German flag next., > Symbolically p(Spain)>p(Germany)>p(all others). Then the odds of > being > correct on all trials could be much greater than 0.003. > > Just sayin'. That's easily testable. Just keep repeating with only those two flags without the soccer context. If the preference exists it will show clearly. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Fwd: Re: Calculating Octopus (Was: A question to mathematicians)
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jul 12, 2010, at 6:25 PM, johnaimani wrote: > > <> >> Can anyone calculate the probabilities that Paul the octopus has >> reached his results by chance? > > 1/28 = . 0039 > > Statistically significant at the 99.6 % level. > > Sheldrake strikes again!>> > > Since there is a disagreement between the number above and my number > below, I will demonstrate my reasoning. > Unfortunately for your reasoning, Paul was only tested eight, not nine, times (three games in the first round, one game in the round of 16, one game in the quarter-finals, one game in the semi-finals, one consolation game, and the final game). It doesn't matter much--a 99.8 percent significance level is not significantly different from a 99.6% level. > > On 11:59 AM, johnaimani wrote: >> 2 to the 9th power Shane Mage "The sibyl, with raving mouth, uttering things mirthless unadorned and unperfumed, reaches over a thousand years with her voice." (Herakleitos, fr. 92) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Polanski is Free!! (NYTimes.com: Swiss Reject U.S. Request to Extradite Polanski)
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jul 12, 2010, at 12:05 PM, Dennis Brasky wrote: > > A rapist Libelous language in the strict sense of the word. Despicable language in every sense. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] A question to mathematicians on this list
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jul 12, 2010, at 9:30 AM, Néstor Gorojovsky wrote: > > Yes, I had made the same calculation myself, and the result was > unbelievable. That is why I need a mathematician before I start > believing Octopus Paul really understands fútbol. >> >> On Jul 12, 2010, at 12:01 AM, Néstor Gorojovsky wrote: >>> >>> Can anyone calculate the probabilities that Paul the octopus has >>> reached his results by chance? >> >> 1/2^8 = . 0039 >> >> Statistically significant at the 99.6 % level. >> >> Sheldrake strikes again! >> There is no implication that Paul understands fútbol, just as there is no implication that the Pythoness understood her predictions. The implication is that the greatest "understanding" resides in a collective superconscious field into which some individual animals (even human ones) sometime attain a subconscious attunement, producing real results that a mechanistic world view dismisses as anomalous. >> >> Shane Mage >> >> "The sibyl, with raving mouth, uttering things mirthless unadorned >> and >> unperfumed, reaches over a thousand years with her >> voice." (Herakleitos, fr. 92) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Formulating a path to abolish the working class - isn't it already too late?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jul 6, 2010, at 6:59 AM, Angelus Novus quoted Marx: "As soon as labour in the direct form has ceased to be the great well- spring of wealth, labour time ceases and must cease to be its measure, and hence exchange value [must cease to be the measure] of use value. The surplus labour of the mass has ceased to be the condition for the development of general wealth, just as the non-labour of the few, for the development of the general powers of the human head. With that, production based on exchange value breaks down, and the direct, material production process is stripped of the form of penury and antithesis. The free development of individualities, and hence not the reduction of necessary labour time so as to posit surplus labour, but rather the general reduction of the necessary labour of society to a minimum, which then corresponds to the > artistic, scientific etc. development of the individuals in the time > set free, and with the means created, for all of them." Between this moment and that blessed state there exists...historical time. Marxian politics deals with what happens *during* that epoch. About which Angelus seems to have scarcely anything to say. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Black bloc stupidity
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 28, 2010, at 9:49 AM, Mikhail Rodsky wrote: > > I know what some of the BB think; while most of them are "hostile" to > Marxism they are still temporary allies in the current struggle... Nonsense. They (those of them who are sincerely deluded and not themselves paid provocateurs) are permanent, not temporary, allies of the forces of repression. In Athens, in Toronto, whenever and wherever they raise their (masked) heads they serve as media propaganda vehicles to stigmatize every mass protest and justify apologetics for every action of mass repression. That's *all* they are and no worthwhile action can tolerate them within its ranks. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] News from France
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 23, 2010, at 4:26 PM, dan wrote: > == > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > == > > > 1) Again football. All the French media seem to be able to talk > about is > one of the player's swearing : "Go f*** youself, you son of a b". Not quite an exact translation--it was even gamier. What Anelka said (in the general direction of Domenech, who seems to have been the rat who gave the phrase to the press, was "Va te faire enculer, fils de pute." Literally: "Go get fucked in the ass, whoreson." By the way, in an interview some four or five months ago, Daniel Cohn- Bendit already predicted that Les Bleus would crash and burn unless Domenech were immediately fired (as any major-league manager in baseball would have been with a performance half as bad). Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Something else about Vargas and Fascism
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 23, 2010, at 12:18 PM, Carrol Cox wrote: > ..."Democracy"and "Human Rights" in the so-called "Third World" > equal "Imperialist" > domination. Independence of such nations can be maintained only with > an > authoritarian regime (either "left" or "right"). As soon as democracy > breaks out in such nations it immediately adopts policies > subservient to > the interests of the core capitalist natins. Put another way, any > democracy outside the core nations is CIA controlled. A truly magnificent epitomization of Stalinist ideology updated for the post-1990 world! Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Bonapartism
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 21, 2010, at 6:53 PM, Tom Cod wrote: > > Bonapartism has always been a pretty vague and ambiguous term that > gets > thrown around a lot... "Bonapartism" ain't no concept--its a suggestion of some analogy that will get some point across among folk whose response will not be subverted by detailed knowledge of the names and institutions being analogized. Like most analogies. Shane Mage Porphyry in his Abstinance from Animal Flesh suggests that there are appropriate offerings to all the Gods, and to the highest the only offering acceptable is silence. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Prospects
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 21, 2010, at 6:26 PM, dan wrote: > > ...There just seems to be no major technological change on the > horizon that > can affect production. Unless of course scientists find a way to > create > cheap, boundless energy... Scientists will never find a way to create energy, because energy is conserved, can neither be created or destroyed. But that cheap (actually free) boundless energy is already with us as it always has been--its called the sun. And the basic technology for its unlimited capture (at the very start of its learning curve) is already with us in the form of solar photovoltaics and wind turbines. What "costs" is the investment to make it universally available. And that cost is the guaranteed monetary return on investment demanded by capital before the investment is permitted. The capitalist mode of production thus today stands as the absolute barrier to its own reproduction. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Turkey, The Kurds and The Gaza Flotilla - A Call For An End To Double Standards
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 21, 2010, at 11:28 AM, Dennis Brasky wrote: > > ...I don't recall Jack L ever denouncing the Cubans for accepting > military and financial support from the Kremlin... But that support came at a price...Castro's endorsement of the counterrevolutionary Stalinist invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968--an act of betrayal for which the Cubans have *never* apologized. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Christian Fascism in the USA?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 20, 2010, at 11:32 AM, Michael Smith wrote: > == > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > == > > > On Sun, 20 Jun 2010 09:35:50 -0400 > Shane Mage wrote: >> clear definition of terms >> (ability to answer the question "What do *you* mean by that word in >> this context?") is absolutely indispensable > > One often hears this said, but I suspect it's more a piety than a > practice... Most of the Platonic dialogues commence with exactly that question. > ...Apart from mathematicians [,philosophers] and (sometimes) people > in the > physical sciences, communication nearly always proceeds without any > clear definition of terms being made or, in many cases, being > possible. > And therefore nearly always terminates in confusion, misunderstanding, or empty consensus. Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Christian Fascism in the USA?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 20, 2010, at 12:13 AM, Michael Smith wrote: > > Of course they have, but it's amazing how people can > sorta-kinda communicate even though they don't define > the terms they use in the same way...Vague poorly-defined terms > are what language practice is all about. But what practice are we supposed to be engaged in? "Sorta-kinda" communication or rational discourse? In the former, grunts and swear- words (like "fascist" or "revisionist") can get some (blunt) points across. But for the latter, clear definition of terms (ability to answer the question "What do *you* mean by that word in this context?") is absolutely indispensable and refusal to do so is tantamount to intellectual testimonium paupertatis. Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Christian Fascism in the USA?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 19, 2010, at 10:02 AM, Mark Lause wrote: > Remember the 1916 argument that socialists needed to vote for > Woodrow Wilson > because he "kept us out of war"? The Left helped elect the pompous > segregationist fossil, who had his second inauguration March 6, 1917 > and took us into the world war on April 6. I don't "remember" that, because I never heard such a thing. I always thought the Left (Socialist Party, IWW, anarchists) was either firmly behind Debs or against participation in elections. Who among them was pro-Wilson? Shane Mage The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed. Joe Stack (1956-2010) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Roseanne Barr says Israel must end their blockade and occupatio...
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 17, 2010, at 4:51 PM, waistli...@aol.com wrote: > > marcelthemao...@gmail.com writes: > > She supports a "two state "solution"". > This should be clear enough for most of us. > > Reply, > > Unless of course this is a joke? A maoist? Maoism is just a (very bad) joke. Shane Mage The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed. Joe Stack (1956-2010) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Cockburn Joins Right Wing POW-MIA Hysteria
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 13, 2010, at 5:14 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote: > == > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > == > > > No, he didn't. Why not cite what he actually wrote? You'd see that > he's quoting > Sydney Schanberg, whose reporting is by no means infallible, but > does raise some > interesting questions. <http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn05282010.html > >. > Cockburn puts them in the context of undoubted press cover-ups. > > Or are you simply defending John McCain against the suggestions that > he wasn't > much of a hero? I read it, and it was *totally* on target. I didn't know that McCain Sr. was the architect of the USS Liberty coverup. Shane Mage The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed. Joe Stack (1956-2010) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Is Imperialism a different mode of production?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 6, 2010, at 5:15 PM, Joaquín Bustelo wrote: > > No, it's because no matter how many arguments, modes and analysis you > pile on, you're not going to convince me that the world is not divided > between oppressor and oppressed nations. > > You don't want to believe it, fine, don't believe it. > > It is, nevertheless, true. It would be interesting to know where you draw that line. You might help by answering a few questions: Is India an oppressed or oppressing nation? If the first, who is oppressing it? Kashmir, as virtually all the Kahmiris know, is clearly an oppressed nation--who is oppressing it? Is China an oppressed or oppressing nation? If the first, who is oppressing it? Tibet, as virtually all the Tibetans know, is clearly an oppressed nation--who is oppressing it? Is Saudi Arabia an oppressed nation? If so, who is oppressing it? etc. Shane Mage > This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it > always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, > kindling in measures and going out in measures." > > Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Is Imperialism a different mode of production?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Jun 5, 2010, at 6:52 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > Sounds about right. Too bad they are not interested in the concrete > reality of relationships between countries like the USA and India > involving the WTO, Bhopal, and other messy details. In asserting that the "relationships" are between *countries*, rather than among divergent and competing capitalist interests, aren't you begging the question, by asserting of the validity of the term "imperialism" as descriptive of geopolitical relations without reference to the categories of political economy defined and determined in Das Kapital? Shane Mage The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed. Joe Stack (1956-2010) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] Who are the real "crazies" in our political culture?
nce, even on a single issue, with someone in the Crazy Zone. That's because breaking down those divisive barriers can be uniquely effective in enabling ideologically diverse citizens to join together to weaken power factions, as Alan Grayson proved when he teamed up with Ron Paul to force the uber-secret Fed to submit to at least some version of an audit (backed by several leading progressives joining with Grover Norquist and other Crazies to support it), or as Al Gore proved when he brought substantial attention to Bush's war on the Constitution by forming an alliance with Bob Barr and other right-wing libertarians. Preventing (or at least minimizing) those types of ad hocalliances through use of the Crazy smear ensures a divided and thus weakened citizenry against entrenched political power in the form of the two parties. Obviously, the more stigmatized it is to stray from two- party loyalty, the stronger the two parties (and those who most benefit from their dominance) will be. If one wants to argue that Ron Paul and others like him hold specific views that are crazy, that's certainly reasonable. But those who make that claim virtually always hold views at least as crazy, and devote themselves to one of the two political parties that has, over and over, embraced insane, destructive and warped policies of their own. The reason the U.S. is in the shape it's in isn't because Ron Paul and the rest of the so-called "crazies" have been in charge; they haven't been, at all. The policies that have prevailed are the ones which the two parties have endorsed. So where does the real craziness lie? * * * * * Just to preempt non sequiturs, this isn't a discussion of Ron Paul, but of the irrational use of the "crazy" accusation in our political discourse and the effects of its application. UPDATE: I'll try this one more time: for those wanting to write about all the bad things Ron Paul believes, before going into the comment section, please read and then re-read these three sentences: There's no question that Ron Paul holds some views that are wrong, irrational and even odious. But that's true for just about every single politician in both major political parties . . . My point isn't that Ron Paul is not crazy; it's that those who self-righteously apply that label to him and to others invariably embrace positions and support politicians at least as "crazy." This is a comparative assessment between (a) those routinely dismissed as Crazy and (b) the two party establishments and their Mainstream Loyalists who do the dismissing. Assessing (a) is completely nonresponsive and irrelevant without comparing it to (b). UPDATE II: One other point: intense, fixated mockery of marginalized, powerless people has the benefit of distracting attention from the actions of those who are actually in power. Shane Mage The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed. Joe Stack (1956-2010) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] The Overwhelming Odds Against Darwin
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On May 16, 2010, at 8:56 PM, Ken Ranney wrote: > > Please do not confuse our paper with fundamentalist > Christianity. The fact that Darwin was wrong does not mean that God, > if indeed there is a God, created life. We simply do not know how > life came into being. Then why not admit, *like Darwin* that we simply do not know in any full sense the various mechanisms producing inheritable variation? Shane Mage > This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it > always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, > kindling in measures and going out in measures." > > Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Lenin's Imperialism, was: Question on the Far Right
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On May 16, 2010, at 10:43 AM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > In my view, there is nobody more committed to "Marx's method" than > Henryk Grossman who wrote the following: > > "In effect price formation on the world market is governed by the same > principles that apply under a conceptually isolated capitalism. The > latter anyway is merely a theoretical model; the world market, as a > unity of specific national economies, is something real and concrete. > Today the prices of the most important raw materials and final > products > are determined internationally, in the world market. We are no longer > confronted by a national level of prices but a level determined on the > world market. In a conceptually isolated capitalism entrepreneurs with > an above average technology make a surplus profit (a rate of profit > above the average) when they sell their commodities at socially > average > prices. Likewise on the world market, the technologically advanced > countries *make a surplus profit at the cost of the technologically > less > developed ones*." In a global, as in a partial, "conceptually isolated capitalism" it is not *countries* but *innovating capitals* that gain "surplus profit"-- as an above-average share of the total surplus value produced in their respective industries. The surplus is necessarily eliminated over time as the innovative techniques are adopted by competitors. "Intellectual property" rights slow the process of equalization, transforming surplus profits into temporary monopoly rents, but never for very long. Surplus-profit supplying innovations, like computer chips, are quickly transformed into "commodities" that over time provide, on the average, only average profits. Imperialism is only mercantilism writ large. Shane Mage > This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it > always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, > kindling in measures and going out in measures." > > Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] The Overwhelming Odds Against Darwin
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Sorry for the accidental post. Evolution is not driven by random mutation and Darwin never said that it was. Shane Mage > This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it > always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, > kindling in measures and going out in measures." > > Herakleitos of Ephesos Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] The Overwhelming Odds Against Darwin
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On May 13, 2010, at 8:48 AM, Ken Ranney wrote: > > Comrades- > As all signs indicate that the capitalist ruling > class will prevent publication of A Note on the > Role of Chance in Darwin's Natural Selection..., a > paper of which I am a co-author, I am sending you > information about it, and will be pleased to send > it to you as an attachment on request. I believe > that the paper is of interest to all who prefer > to draw their own conclusions rather than > accepting them on faith, especially to those who > care about the world and would like to change it for the better. > > Some highlights of the paper follow: > > The essence of Darwin’s theory of natural > selection is that variations/modifications occur > by chance in living organisms. Darwin holds that > these modifications are (mostly) inherited and > that they give an advantage in competition with > other organisms, supplanting and/or exterminating > them, thus becoming the dominant organism. > > But we now know that modifications, all of them, > require new proteins. These can occur only as > the result of extensive changes in DNA > (mutations). Our paper, co-authored by a > professor of mathematics, ( E. A. Maxwell, M. > Sc., Ph.D. (Toronto), Professor Emeritus of > Mathematics, Trent University.) uses formulas > which take into account both the biochemistry of > DNA mutations and protein structures determined > by X-ray crystallography performed within the last ten years. > > New information has been applied to an old > theory. We have found that the odds against new > proteins occurring by chance are extremely > high. For hemoglobin, for example, the odds > against a mutation for this protein at least > once, from the beginning of life 3.8 billion > years ago, are 7.76X10^320, or 776 followed by > 318 zeros, to 1. For serum albumin, the odds are > even greater—8.55X10^728, or 855 followed by 726 > zeros, to 1. The chance that the DNA mutation > necessary for serum albumin could occur is equal > to the chance that a person could flip a coin and > get 2,422 consecutive heads.(1) The time required > from the beginning of life to give at least a 1% > chance of at least one random occurrence of a > mutation for insulin, a small protein, is > 20,328,161,837,402,083,808,654,651 years. For > hemoglobin, it is 296 trillion, trillion, > trillion, trillion... (27 times) years. Our > paper reveals that Darwin seriously overestimated > the possibility that life could have developed as > he imagined. His idea will not do; there is no > scientific explanation for life. > > Note > (1) In a paper in process, the probability of the > spontaneous occurrence of the DNA to produce 10 > coagulation factors, all of which are required > for blood to clot, over 3.8 billion years, is > equal to the chance that a person could flip a > coin and get 18,747 consecutive heads > > *** > The abstract of our paper follows: > > Darwin’s theory of natural selection involves > chance modifications of living organisms. Each > modification requires one or more new proteins. > Synthesis of a protein requires a string of DNA > codons specific to that protein. We conducted an > investigation of the intuitive belief that the > chance factor in the occurrence of a new protein > is not complete randomness by exploring a basic > probability model applied at the stage of the > formation of a DNA sequence. We considered the > premise that a protein in a mutation is formed > completely at random from all > possibilities. Under this premise, probabilities > were calculated for the spontaneous occurrence of > the DNA code required for the production of 14 > sample proteins. The resulting odds against > mutations, not just as single events but over 3.8 > billion years, for the 14 proteins were found to > be so extreme that we conclude that the premise > that a protein in a mutation is formed completely > at random from all possibilities is indeed false. > > > > Ken Ranney > 434 Hillcrest Ave > Peterborough, Ontario > K9J 6H6 > (705) 743 2939 > "Ultra-rich men are in charge of the world; they > have no idea how to run it, and many of their > actions, including climate-change denial, are crimes against > humanity." > > Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu > Set your options at: > http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/shmage%40pipeline.com Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Is this a Trotskyist list, Or what limits
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On May 10, 2010, at 12:25 PM, Louis Proyect wrote: > > Mark Lause wrote: >> I think myself that a homegrown American socialism would have to >> understood >> as coming from American conditions. >> > > This is exactly the basis upon which Camejo launched the North > Star network in 1981 or so. And I think that a homegrown American socialism is as much a will-o'- the-wisp as the "bolshevization" of American socialism imagined by the Third International. Socialism in the degenerate capitalist epoch of global environmental crisis verging on catastrophe must be consciously global or it will be nothing. National exceptionalism--especially American!--is suicidal. Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Is this a Trotskyist list? Or, what are its limits?
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On May 9, 2010, at 4:38 PM, Joaquín Bustelo wrote: > == > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > == > > > Grover Furr asks: "Is this a Trotskyist list? or, a list for the > discussion of Trotskyism?" > > No this isn't a "Trotskyist" list. There are many who consider > themselves Trotskyists, and others (like me) who, even though > trained in > that tradition and still influenced by it, nevertheless don't describe > themselves that way. For my part, I would rather be termed a "Trotskyite" (accepting Trotsky as a primary historical/political/intellectual source) but not a "Trotskyist" (identifying with any of the organizational manifestations stemming from the abortive "Fourth International"). Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64 Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Marxism and capital sources
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Apr 28, 2010, at 10:31 AM, David Critchley wrote: > > I am attempting to find out whether the FORM and SOURCE of capital > has been theorised. In particular, what's the theoretical position > in Marxism of capital that comes from illicit or criminal sources? > In other words, illegitimate capital. How does Marxism address that > particular type of capital, and why would it be stigmatised over > other sources of capital? Thanks. Capital is a social relationship, and the capitalist is capital personified. The personifications of that relationship have ranged from a Robert Owen to a Bernie Madoff, passing by the various Rockefellers and Thyssens--from the highest idealism to the deepest depravity. For *capital* none of that matters. If there were such a thing as "illegitimate" capital than *all* capital would be illegitimate, since all derives in the last analysis from the criminal process known as "primitive accumulation." *Pecunia non olet* Shane Mage The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed. Joe Stack (1956-2010) Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] The Party's Role
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Apr 25, 2010, at 11:26 PM, "Christian "wrote: > > Peter Camejo _was_ a renegade. If whoever was posting this slander were not a putz he would have chosen some less offensive pseudonym. Shane Mage "L'après-vie, c'est une auberge espagnole. L'on n'y trouve que ce qu'on a apporté." Bardo Thodol Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
