Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Albert Einstein, Paul Robeson and Israel
I think the Soviet material support came in the early 1950s, to better arm and get ready for even more fighting Better correct myself on that. For example, see this (the site even has a photo of a Messerschmidt that went to Israel). It seems like a fairly pro-Israeli source at that. The aid was cut off by 1953. http://www.tamilnation.org/books/International/israel_soviet.htm From Chapter 3: Czechoslovakia and the First Arms Agreement ISRAEL'S declaration of independence on May 14, 1948, was a spontaneous and emotional commitment made in the midst of international diplomatic maneuvering and fruitless negotiations. In fact, the war had begun many months before. As early as November 30, 1947, the day following the momentous partition resolution in the United Nations, armed Arab bands were active all over Palestine. Despite the presence of 100,000 British troops and the fact that a Jewish state would not come into existence for another six months, the widespread terrorist attacks on Jewish settlements reinforced the convictions held by David Ben-Gurion and the majority of Palestinian Jewish leaders that a full-scale invasion by six well-armed Arab armies was inevitable. The inescapable odds in population were 65o,000 Jews against 40,000,000 Arabs.' An immediate campaign was initiated to bring the Haganah, the Jewish underground army, to fighting capacity to unify the various political factions it contained, and to augment its dismally small and antiquated supply of arms and munitions. In 1947 Ben-Gurion had made a thorough investigation of the Haganah's total underground arsenal, and found the following: 10,073 rifles (8,72o in the settlements for local defense; 336 in reserve; 656 with the Palmach Brigade; 361 with the field force) 1. An unofficial estimate placed the military strength of the Arab League armies at over 120,000 men, with Egypt alone allocating $72,000,000 for defense. Arab News Bulletin (Washington, D.C.), no. 13 (September 27, 1947), p. 2. 1,90o submachine guns (785 in the settlements; 424 with the field force; 13o with Palmach; 561 in reserve) 186 machine guns (31 in the settlements; 35 with the field force; 5 with Palmach; 115 in reserve) 444 light machine guns (338 in the settlements; 37 with the field force; 33 with Palmach; 46 in reserve) There was not a single cannon, and only one heavy machine gun. There was no anti-tank weapon, or anti-aircraft gun, no armored car, and nothing at all for naval or air combat. There was no communications equipment.2 As if the situation were not dismal enough, the Palestinian Jews were well aware that the six major Arab states were heavily equipped with modern weapons and were busily obtaining more, both on the open market and through the sympathy of the several British military commanders in the Middle East. It became imperative to the very survival of the as-yet-unborn state to secure the arms—from any available source and at any cost—necessary to repel the imminent invasion. As chairman of the Jewish Agency executive body, Ben-Gurion turned to the dedicated and experienced Haganah to obtain the weapons. The Haganah grew out of the early pioneer settlements in Palestine and expanded with the periodic influx of refugees as the only Jewish defense force against roaming Arab bands. Declared illegal under the British Mandate, the Haganah continued to protect Jewish settlers... Ben-Gurion dispatched dozens of special Haganah agents all over the world to buy anything they could—obsolete aircraft, machine guns, rifles that were barely usable, damaged tanks, and anything else that was for sale. The major problem revolved around the fact that the Jewish Agency represented an underground army and not a legitimate government. The FBI and British authorities, therefore, maintained steady pressure on these emissaries and made frequent arrests—a problem that did not face Arab buyers of military equipment. The young Haganah agents invented all kinds of stratagems to get their purchases out of the country of origin and to hide them in various places in Europe, ready to be dispatched to Palestine. In the United States, for example, the Schwimmer Aviation Company of Burbank, California, Service Airways, Inc. in New York, and an airline of Panamanian registry called Lineas Aereas de Panama, were used as cover organizations for purchasing planes and flying them to Latin America, from where they could be dismantled and smuggled into Palestine. In England, a legitimate film company was persuaded to make a war documentary in order that disguised Haganah pilots could obtain permission for a number of their planes to take off—planes which did not land again in England. The Haganah agents involved in the film company and their British accomplices were later tried and convicted for their parts in the illegal export of aircraft and arms to Israel, as well as a complicated side-issue involving the death of a Jewish car dealer and the disposition of his body. [See
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] 2 paragraphs; seven sentence explanation of financial crisis
2 paragraphs; seven sentence explanation of financial crisis I said back in 2001 that so-called risk diversification and management just meant the crash would be big next around (that was on Duff Henwood's hostile LBO Talk list). Some wanted to believe that risk had been eliminated. Duff himself seemed to think recessions were merely orchestrated by interest rate policies of the fed. He also said the regular business press had covered the .com and Enron bubbles well. Right, they did such a good job we find ourselves in 2008 being led by the same clueless people who managed those crises. However, it's interesting to see that we had a huge run-up in the speculative 'price of oil' until July 2008. So the explanations here look simplistic. What is the connection between the stock markets and futures markets doing what they did after July 2007 to July 2008? CJ ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Albert Einstein, Paul Robeson and Israel
See also http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2008/921/ee2.htm excerpt: After Czechoslovakia, now the Czech Republic and Slovakia, was liberated from the Nazis by the Red Army, it became a socialist republic, and its relations with the Middle East lurched in an even stranger direction. In 1948 Stalin ordered it to sell arms to the new state of Israel, a policy which was lauded by David Ben-Gurion himself as key to Israel's survival. At the time the West was refusing to send arms to either the Jews or the Arabs, hoping to force them to settle the issue of dividing Palestine peacefully. This fateful aid to Israel 60 years ago is also being celebrated this year with an exhibit, curated by the Israeli historian Shosh Dagan, at the Military Museum in Prague. Ironically, given charges against the Communists for airbrushing inconvenient events out of pictures, Dagan admits she is also doing some airbrushing. It is no longer acceptable to acknowledge that it was Stalin who ordered the help, or that the Czech government was not acting on its own initiative. The war planes and arms which the Czechs provided played a very important role in halting the Egyptian army's advance south of Ashdod, at a place now called the Ad Halom Junction. Even less to cheer Egyptians in this historical reminder. When Israel turned to the West, shunning the socialist bloc, Czechoslovakia embraced the Arab, in particular, Egyptian cause. A watershed event in Middle East history was when Czech arms arrived in Egypt in September 1955, which allowed Egypt to stare down the British and French during the nationalisation of the Suez Canal. Following the Arab defeat of 1967, Czechoslovakia again came to Egypt's aid. This period was the high point in Czech-Egyptian relations according to Czech Cultural Attaché Andrea Kucerova. The stunning Czech Embassy is a legacy of this, with its handsome architecture and beautiful gardens. Though relations cooled when President Anwar El-Sadat ended friendship agreements with the socialist bloc in the 1970s, he was nonetheless beholden to those countries for military aid that let Egypt defeat Israel in the 1973 War. Kucerova admitted that Czech-Egyptian relations hit a low point after that, but was happy to say they are flourishing today. After more than 40 years when historical events were filtered through a pro-Soviet lens, it is natural that events of the past would be given a fresh perspective. As the three events mentioned here show, there is not much yet which might spark Egyptians' interest. Perhaps Marhoul might want to reflect on how his hero, Johnny Lieberman, probably slipped away from the Czech army when it was stationed in Palestine in 1942, joined the Irgun as a terrorist, and then became a pilot of one of the Czech planes in 1948, killing and driving hundreds of thousands of Arabs into exile. Living under the shadow of the Holocaust took on a whole different meaning for the Palestinians and Egyptians when Czech arms helped defeat them in that decisive year. In any case, Kucerova insisted that the republic no longer exports arms to anyone here. At least that page in Czech history is closed. And Marhoul, for all his apparent lack of awareness of Arab sensitivities, was clearly motivated by a deep antipathy to war, commenting in the discussion: One day you may be a hero and the next a coward. I tried to show the horror of war, how the poor soldiers were mostly waiting -- waiting for death. Cairenes can visit the embassy near the Urman Gardens in Giza for concerts throughout the year and the annual Czech film festival in March. Let's hope that as the republic rediscovers more lost pages in its history, it will be able to celebrate Czech support for Egypt and the Middle East in their struggle to achieve a worthy place among the family of nations. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Albert Einstein, Paul Robeson and Israel
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_Independence_(Israel) Eleven minutes after the Declaration of Independence was signed, President Truman de facto recognized the State of Israel, followed by Iran (which had voted against the UN partition plan), Guatemala, Iceland, Nicaragua, Romania and Uruguay. The Soviet Union was the first nation to recognize Israel de jure on 17 May 1948, followed by Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Ireland and South Africa.[11] The United States extended official recognition on 31 January 1949.[12] The declaration was followed by an invasion of the new state by troops from Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria, starting the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, known in Israel as the War of Independence (Hebrew: מלחמת העצמאות, Milhamat HaAtzma'ut). Although a truce began on 11 June, fighting resumed on 8 July and stopped again on 18 July, before restarting in mid-October and finally ending on 24 July 1949 with the signing of the armistice agreement with Syria. By then Israel had retained its independence and increased its land area by almost 50% compared to the partition plan. http://www.al-awda.org/zionists2.html The British role was significant in facilitating the Zionist project. Chaim Weizmann, the architect of the Zionist-British relationship, got acquainted with C. P. Scott, the editor of the Manchester Guardian. On 12 November 1914, Weizman wrote a letter to Scott stating, …should Palestine fall within the British sphere of influence, and should Britain encourage a Jewish settlement there, as a British dependency, we could have in twenty to thirty years a million Jews out there, perhaps more. They would develop the country, bring back civilization to it and form a very effective guard for the Suez Canal. According to Weizmann, Herbert H. Asquith, then British Prime Minister, wrote the following in his diary on January 28, 1915. I received from Herbert Samuel (who was later appointed as the first British High Commissioner for Palestine) a memorandum headed 'The Future of Palestine'. He goes on to argue at considerable length and with some vehemence in favor of the British annexation of Palestine… He thinks we might plant in this not very promising territory about three or four million European Jews and that this would have a good effect on those who are left behind… I confess I am not attracted to this proposed addition to our responsibilities… Asquith later added, Curiously enough, the only other partisan of this proposal is Lloyd George. And I need not say he does not care a damn for the Jews or their past or their future, but thinks it will be an outrage to let the Holy Places pass into the possession or under the protectorate of 'agnostic and atheistic' France. (A detailed account of the Zionist activities and contacts leading to the Balfour Declaration was given in: Chaim Weizmann, Trial and Error, Chapters 7-18, pp. 93-208) The Balfour Declaration, promising support for a Jewish National Home in Palestine, which was issued on 2 November 1917, resuscitated the Zionist Dream and launched a state of cooperation between the World Zionist Organization and the Imperialist powers. This close cooperation was enhanced following WWII under U.S. patronage. U.S. relationship with the Zionist-Arab conflict started as early as WWI. Its position began as a neutral power interested in the application of self-determination to all ethnic groups as advocated by President Woodrow Wilson. This relationship developed into supporting Britain in its designs for control and hegemony in the Middle East as a result of the discovery of oil in the area. It was further developed into supporting Zionist plans in Palestine that gradually enhanced into a strategic alliance between the U.S. and Israel.. Palestine was not an empty land waiting for the Zionists to build up their contemplated state. Dispossessing the Palestinian Arabs of their lands and driving them out of their country provoked the inevitable reaction of a people attached to their land. The Palestinians realized the implications of the combined Zionist-Imperialist invasion and began a long and unrelenting resistance against the colonial settlers and their Imperialist supporters. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Aronson's guide for the godless ( comments)
Aronson's guide for the godless A WSU prof contemplates America as a not-so-religious nation MT Photo: Kim Heron http://www.metrotimes.com/culture/story.asp?id=13588#comments Comments On 1/7/2009 7:36:55 PM, jazzbutcher said: As I look at the scientific revolution I am disgusted on how nowhere is science applied to human behavior. We have scientific psychology. It goes against societal presuppositions so it is rejected. Conditioning is the only way to explain this. Rejection validates behaviorism, but evidence is ignored while superstition is reinforced. That is predictable. That is tragic. That is irony. We continue to hold people responsible for their behavior instead of realizing we have to responsibly make changes in the environment to change people. People are not stupid, lazy, perverted, violent, etc... People are people. People develop a repertoire of behavior based on the contingencies of reinforcement. We must change the contingencies to change the people. We have to move beyond judgement and move towards understanding in order to actually improve the world. Unfortunately the science of human behavior isn’t being learned and superstition continues to be reinforced. I therefore hope people will be responsible and read About Behaviorism by B.F. Skinner. Of course they won’t because people only read what reinforces their world view, but anyone that wants personal responsibility will only find ways of perpetuating it by reading this book. Understanding the science of human behavior and other sciences is the only way we will get a better world. Scott Colby On 1/8/2009 8:52:14 AM, Bumpadrum said: Satan has tools everywhere, and this self important hippie is just another narcissist staring at his reflection in a mud puddle. So what? but he ceases being a harmless fool when he states that the seperation of church/ state is clear in the U.S. Constitution. Where? Just because you don't believe in God doesn't mean you can just make stuff up. I will pray for your enlightment. Bumpadrum On 1/8/2009 1:43:52 PM, shinealight said: I'm shocked, shocked to find a university professor who is inclined toward atheism/agnoticism/secularism. Really, yet another book on the subject? Methinks Aronson stuck his finger in the air and decided he better jump on this bandwagon and make some money on a book while the political mood was still in his favor. I thought for a histroy professor, his thoughts and comments on this movement had huge gaping holes historically that left a lot to be explained. How do we go from Sam ingersoll in the 1880's to a 1966 Time cover to Imagine as if they all sort of have some connectedness? As for the so-called optimism of his youth and the optimism he spoke of in the early 60's do you really think it was because we as a society were becoming MORE secular? Where do you pull this assertion out of? Where's the evidence? Just admit you're trying to cash in on a movement that's already passing you by and soon to flicker out like most academic trends. Why not address the question why so many of the athiest/agnostic/secularist authors/spokespeople/notables are white males? I think the article and author mention Cornel West and Susan Jacoby as a sort of preemptive defelction of that criticism, but the question is there. And as cliche as it sounds why not also address the question as to why so many athiests are people who have had little or bad relationships with their fathers? Granted I'm no academic, but how about a little self-analysis of your own movement before you go around criticising and lableing those who do believe in a God. Lastly(I promise), why is it always when athiests talk or write a book or have a discussion, they essentially argue against the Christian concept or belief in God. Funny, I never see these types taking their arguments to a black church, synagogue or mosque, or anyone of those beliefs. I'd love to see you take on someone other than your ususal straw man, especially islam. On 1/8/2009 2:41:37 PM, Mark T said: If you want to continue this discussion in real life. The Center for Inquiry Michigan is hosting Dr. Aronson at the Redford public library on January 21 from 6:30 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Details can be found at http://www.cfimichigan.org/events/event/living-without-god-se/ Mark Thompson Southeast Michigan Coordinator Center for Inquiry Michigan On 1/8/2009 2:56:08 PM, skarris said: This is in response to Aronson's guide for the godless. I think Aronson's argument is full of holes, which makes his prowess as a seasoned university professor questionable. I feel that he fails to make the distinction between being religious and belief in God, which any true believer or even any godless intellectual will tell you is distinct. This clear distinction is what makes believing, nurturing and fulfilling to 92% percent of the population who may or may not prescribe to any ritualistic worship or political power-mongering. His meager attempt to pinpoint the small
[Marxism-Thaxis] Natural Science and the Spirit World[1]
Engels’ Dialectics of Nature http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1883/don/ch10.htm Natural Science and the Spirit World[1] THE dialectics that has found its way into popular consciousness finds expression in the old saying that extremes meet. In accordance with this we should hardly err in looking for the most extreme degree of fantasy, credulity, and superstition, not in that trend of natural science which, like the German philosophy of nature, tries to force the objective world into the framework of its subjective thought, but rather in the opposite trend, which, relying on mere experience, treats thought with sovereign disdain and really has gone to the furthest extreme in emptiness of thought. This school prevails in England. Its father, the much lauded Francis Bacon, already advanced the demand that his new empirical-inductive method should be pursued to attain by its means, above all, longer life, rejuvenation - to a certain extent, alteration of stature and features, transformation of one body into another, the production of new species, power over the air and the production of storms. He complains that such investigations have been abandoned, and in his natural history he actually gives recipes for making gold and performing various miracles. Similarly Isaac Newton in his old age greatly busied himself with expounding the revelation of St. John. So it is not to be wondered at if in recent years English empiricism in the person of some of its representatives - and not the worst of them - should seem to have fallen a hopeless victim to the spirit-rapping and spirit-seeing imported from America. The first natural scientist belonging here is the very eminent zoologist and botanist, Alfred Russell Wallace, the man who simultaneously with Darwin put forward the theory of the evolution of species by natural selection. In his little work, On Miracles and Modern Spiritualism, London, Burns, 1875, he relates that his first experiences in this branch of natural knowledge date from 1844, when he attended the lectures of Mr. Spencer Hall on mesmerism and as a result carried out similar experiments on his pupils. “I was extremely interested in the subject and pursued it with ardour.” He not only produced magnetic sleep together with the phenomena of articular rigidity, and local loss of sensation, he also confirmed the correctness of Gall’s map of the skull, because on touching any one of Gall’s organs the corresponding activity was aroused in the magnetised patient and exhibited by appropriate and lively gestures. Further, he established that his patient, merely by being touched, partook of all the sensations of the operator; he made him drunk with a glass of water as soon as he told him that it was brandy. He could make one of the young men so stupid, even in the waking condition, that he no longer knew his own name, a feat, however, that other schoolmasters are capable of accomplishing without any mesmerism. And so on. Now it happens that I also saw this Mr. Spencer Hall in the winter of 1843-4 in Manchester. He was a very mediocre charlatan, who travelled the country under the patronage of some parsons and undertook magnetico-phrenological performances with a young girl in order to prove thereby the existence of God, the immortality of the soul, and the incorrectness of the materialism that was being preached at that time by the Owenites in all big towns. The lady was sent into a magnetico-sleep and then, as soon as the operator touched any part of the skull corresponding to one of Gall’s organs, she gave a bountiful display of theatrical, demonstrative gestures and poses representing the activity of the organ concerned; for instance, for the organ of philoprogenitiveness she fondled and kissed an imaginary baby, etc. Moreover, the good Mr. Hall had enriched Gall’s geography of the skull with a new island of Barataria: right at the top of the skull he had discovered an organ of veneration, on touching which his hypnotic miss sank on to her knees, folded her hands in prayer, and depicted to the astonished, philistine audience an angel wrapt in veneration. That was the climax and conclusion of the exhibition. The existence of God had been proved. The effect on me and one of my acquaintances was exactly the same as on Mr. Wallace; the phenomena interested us and we tried to find out how far we could reproduce them. A wideawake young boy of 12 years old offered himself as subject. Gently gazing into his eyes, or stroking, sent him without difficulty into the hypnotic condition. But since we were rather less credulous than Mr. Wallace and set to work with rather less fervour, we arrived at quite different results. Apart from muscular rigidity and loss of sensation, which were easy to produce, we found also a state of complete passivity of the will bound up with a peculiar hypersensitivity of sensation. The patient, when aroused from his lethargy by any external stimulus, exhibited very much greater
[Marxism-Thaxis] The Legacy of Vicente Guerrero, Mex ico’s First Black Indian President
http://www.williamlkatz.com/Essays/BookReviews/LegacyGuerrero.php Essays | Book Review The Legacy of Vicente Guerrero, Mexico’s First Black Indian President Author: Theodore G. Vincent Publisher: University of Florida Press, 2001 Reviewed by William Loren Katz Vicente Guerrero has been a towering figure in the Americas, masterfully commanding Mexico’s liberation army during much of its independence movement in the early 19th century, and in 1829 assuming his country’s presidency where he again fought off foreign invaders. Born poor to a Black Indian family and growing up without formal schooling, he taught himself to read and write as he trained his troops in the Sierra Madre mountains. He was able to help write Mexico’s constitution, free its slaves, take steps to educate and elevate its poor and people of color, and serve as his country’s first president of African and Native American descent. Guerrero at 27 was a hard-working mule driver until the spirit of freedom moved him to action along with tens of thousands of other men and women of his racial and economic background. In 1810 he cast his skills and offered his sacred honor in the struggle against a Spain that dominated his country and most of Latin America. African American historian J.A. Rogers called Guerrero the George Washington and Abraham Lincoln of Mexico an assessment that indicates the man’s stature. Now, Theodore G. Vincent, no stranger to Mexican cultural development or the African American experience, has written a thorough study of this important figure, The Legacy of Vicente Guerrero, Mexico’s First Black Indian President. More than just the biography of a public figure, Vincent weaves an inspiring addition to the freedom-fighting heritage of the Americas and uncovers the untold story of Mexican cultural nationalism. In 1810 Guerrero joined the struggle in which he would fight in 491 battles without a defeat and began his rise from the ranks of other pardos or people of mixed races. His attributes included an ability to speak many indigenous languages and a command of military tactics. When first given command, Guerrero had 500 unarmed troops, but he soon remedied this with a midnight cavalry attack on a Spanish fortification that gained his men, guns and ammunition. In his first year when he was elevated to Captain, he was able to convince many Indian men of military age to support the revolution. The Mexican Independence war was one of the first modern guerrilla wars against an imperialist army that burned villages. It was also one of the first instances where guerrilla fighters without an urban base maintained a political base. The revolutionaries lacked enough guns and ammunition, and had to battle against local militias determined to settle old scores. Roadsides were marked by crucifixes bearing the rotting bodies of bandits and insurgents. Guerrero had to make it up as it came along. Guerrero’s humanitarian impulses, close identification with his soldiers and public speaking skills helped cement a relationship with his pardo army. When he won a victory he would claim he was a soldier in the ranks and, It wasn’t me . . . but the people who fought and triumphed. He appointed Pedro Ascencio Alquisiras to be the first Native American General in Mexico’s army-and this when more citizens considered not Africans but Indians as the lowest rung of the social and political ladder. Vincent is carefully tuned to the complicated racial structure of Mexico caused by the Spanish invasion, and he paints a vivid and sharp picture of the changing social relations caused by the revolution. He points out that the great liberator, Jose Maria Morelos y Pavon who mentored Guerrero, was also a Black Indian as were many other high officers. By 1800 Africans were a majority of settlers in Durango, Sinaloa, Sonora, and California and Acapulco was 95% pardo. By 1820 the Independence movement boasted only one standing army, the dark freedom-fighters under the command of Guerrero. Spain’s obsession with race led to laws that denied people of color advancement, but permitted many to bribe their way up the caste ladder. Even the first revolutionary Constitution of 1812 included article #22 that excluded African Americans from benefiting from many reforms such as political rights and freedoms. But this only mobilized Guerrero and others to see that the overthrow of Spanish officials also included an agenda of freedom and equality for all. Guerrero also had to defeat efforts of the white elite of Mexico to highjack the revolution won by his dark-skinned soldiers. Terms such as pardo, zambo, mulatto lobo were erased from the Mexican language. In 1823 he declared, We have defeated the colossus, and we bathe in the glow of new found happiness. True freedom, he declared is living with a knowledge that no one is above anyone else, and that there is no title more honored than that of the citizen and this applies equally to soldier, worker, official,
[Marxism-Thaxis] Vicente Guerro
The US war against Mexico soon after Guerro's Presidency makes more sense now from the logic of Gringo imperialism and colonialism CB http://www.frenchcreoles.com/CreoleCulture/famous%20people/vincenteguerrero.htm Vicente Guerro Mexican Liberator and Mulatto President (1782-1831) Vicente Guerrero a mulatto ex-slave, was the George Washington and Abraham Lincoln combined of Mexico. He freed his country and then freed its slaves. Guerrerowas born an Ixtla, Mexico, in 1782 of mixed white and Negro parentage with an Indian strain. His father, Juan Pedro Guerrero, and his mother, Guadelupe Saldena, were both of humble origin, the lowest of the low, degraded by law, custom, and prejudice. No Negro woman could wear any kind of ornamentation, jewels, trinkets, or linen. Guerrero started life as mule driver. Unlike Abraham Lincoln, he hadn't the slightest opportunity to learn to read or write. He was nearly forty before he knew a letter of the alphabet. But within his breast was an unquenchable desire for freedom and a spirit of love and justice for his fellow man. Therefore when the struggle for Mexican Independence began in 1810, led by a valiant, Hidalgo, he was one of the first to enlist. The upper-class Mexicans who oppressed by Spain. They could not trade with foreign countries and Mexican manufacture was forbidden. When Hidalgo planted grapevines to make his own wine, government officials tore them up. Wine had to be imported from Spain, with a high tax. At this time, also, Mexico was ordered to pay a tribute of an additional $45 million to Spain. The grievances of the American colonists against George III were insignificant compared to those of Mexico against the King of Spain. Declaring Mexican independence, hidalgo had called upon all his countrymen to follow him. Guerrero distinguished himself so well in the first battle that he was made a captain. In the first stage of the struggle the Mexicans were successful, but Spain, sending reinforcements from home, soon crushed the insurgents. One by one the leading Mexicans - Hidalgo, Allende, Aldama, Jiminez, Mina - were slain or made prisoner. The remainder accepted the king's pardon - all except Guerrero, who fought on. Villasenor says of him, Forsaken by fortune, betrayed, without money, without arms, with only his willl-power left, he was at this time of desolation and despair, the only supporter of the cause of independence, displaying valor, prudence, profound sagacity, indefatigable activity and heroic constancy. Even in the darkest days of the long revolution, says Rives, he was the leader of a little body of unconquered men, who kept alive the cause of independence. The government, in an effort to win Guerrero, sent his father Pedro to offer him lands and wealth. But Guerrero scorned the offer. He had pledged himself no rest until the hated Spaniard had been driven into the sea. Spain sent her best general, Iturbide, against him. Guerrero defeated him in two battles. Itubide, who secretly had resolved to desert Spain and make himself master of Mexico and had been winning over the army to himself by bribes, now made overtures to Guerrero, promising to revolt against Spain provided he had Guerrero's support. The latter, not seeing through his duplicity, consented. Joining hands, the two defeated General Santa Ana, Spanish commander. Iturbide was named President of Mexico, Guerrero stepping aside though he was the more popular of the two. As ruler, Iturbide showed his true colors. He proclaimed himself emperor and with the landed classes continued the exploitation of the masses of ignorant natives who had born the brunt of the struggle for independence. Guerrero thereupon declared war against Iturbide, captured him, and had him shot. Another was elected president with Guerrero as vice president. But the struggle between the landed classes and the masses went on. The opposing sides carried on their activities through freemasonry, which had lately been introduced into Mexico. The rich were in the Scottish rite; the poor, the York rite. Guerrero was head of the Yorks. At the next presidential election the candidates were Guerrero and Pedraza, the former bakced by the common people, the latter by the rich. Pedraza won, ten electors declaring for him against eight for Guerrero. Revolt over the nation followed. The York's issued a proclamation naming Guerrero president. It said, The name of the hero of the South is echoed with indescribable enthusiasm everywhere. His valor and constancy combined have engraved themselves upon the hearts of the Mexican people. He is the image of their of their felicity. They wish to confide to him the delicate and sacred task of the executive power. Finally the government surrendered and Guerrero became president in April, 1825. Guerrero at once set about improving the conditions of the masses, composed of Indians,
[Marxism-Thaxis] JP Morgan, finance capitalist: corporate finance and industrial consolidation during his time.
P. Morgan From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (Redirected from J.P. Morgan) Jump to: navigation, search This article is about the person. For today's banking institution, see JPMorgan Chase. For other people by this name, see J. P. Morgan (disambiguation). J. P. Morgan Born April 17, 1837(1837-04-17) Hartford, Connecticut, U.S. Died March 31, 1913 (aged 75) Rome, Italy Occupation Financier, Banker Religious beliefs Episcopalian Spouse(s) Frances Louise Tracy Children Louisa Pierpont Morgan, John Pierpont Jack Morgan, Jr., Juliet Morgan and Anne Morgan Parents Junius Spencer Morgan and Juliet Pierpont John Pierpont Morgan (April 17 1837 - March 31 1913) was an American financier, banker and art collector who dominated corporate finance and industrial consolidation during his time. In 1892 Morgan arranged the merger of Edison General Electric and Thompson-Houston Electric Company to form General Electric. After financing the creation of the Federal Steel Company he merged the Carnegie Steel Company and several other steel and iron businesses to form the United States Steel Corporation in 1901. He is widely credited with having saved or rescued the U.S. national economy in general-and the federal government in particular-on two separate occasions. He bequeathed much of his large art collection to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and to the Wadsworth Atheneum of Hartford, Connecticut. He died in Rome, Italy, in 1913 at the age of 75, leaving his fortune and business to his son, John Pierpont Jack Morgan, Jr. Contents [hide] 1 Childhood and education 2 Career 2.1 Early years 2.2 Later years 3 Personal life 4 Collector of art, books, and gemstones 5 Legacy 6 Popular culture 7 See also 8 Notes 9 References 10 External links [edit] Childhood and education This section does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. (August 2008) J.P. Morgan was born in Hartford, Connecticut to Junius Spencer Morgan (1814-1891) and Juliet Pierpont (1816-1884) of Boston, Massachusetts. Pierpont, as he preferred to be known, had a varied education due in part to interference by his father, Junius. In the fall of 1848, Pierpont transferred to the Hartford Public School and then to the Episcopal Academy in Cheshire (now called Cheshire Academy), boarding with the principal. In September 1851, Morgan passed the entrance exam for the English High School of Boston, a school specializing in mathematics to prepare young men for careers in commerce. In the spring of 1852, illness that was to become more common as his life progressed struck; rheumatic fever left him in so much pain that he could not walk. Junius booked passage for Pierpont straight away on the ship Io, owned by Charles Dabney, to the Azores (Northern Portuguese islands) in order for him to recover. After convalescing for almost a year, Pierpont returned to the school in Boston to resume his studies. After graduating, his father sent him to Bellerive, a school near the Swiss village of Vevey. When Morgan had attained fluency in French, his father sent him to the University of Göttingen in order to improve his German. Attaining a passable level of German within six months, Morgan traveled back to London via Wiesbaden, his education complete. [edit] Career [edit] Early years J. P. Morgan in his earlier years.Morgan entered banking in 1857 at his father's London branch, moving to New York City the next year where he worked at the banking house of Duncan, Sherman Company, the American representatives of George Peabody Company. From 1860 to 1864, as J. Pierpont Morgan Company, he acted as agent in New York for his father's firm. By 1864-72, he was a member of the firm of Dabney, Morgan Company; in 1871, he partnered with the Drexels of Philadelphia to form the New York firm of Drexel, Morgan Company. During the American Civil War, Morgan was approached to finance the purchase of antiquated rifles being sold by the army for $3.50 each. Morgan's partner re-machined them and sold the rifles back to the army for $22 each. While it became a scandal, the military knew it was buying back its own guns and Morgan never even saw the guns, acting only as a lender.[citation needed] Morgan himself, like many wealthy persons, avoided military service by paying $1000 for a substitute.[1] After the 1893 death of Anthony Drexel, the firm was rechristened J. P. Morgan Company in 1895, and retained close ties with Drexel Company of Philadelphia, Morgan, Harjes Company of Paris, and J. S. Morgan Company (after 1910 Morgan, Grenfell Company), of London. By 1900, it was one of the most powerful banking houses of the world, carrying through many deals especially reorganizations and consolidations. Morgan had many partners over the years, such as George W. Perkins, but remained firmly in charge.[2] Morgan's ascent to
[Marxism-Thaxis] JD
John D. Rockefeller From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search John Davison Rockefeller John D. Rockefeller in 1885 Born July 8, 1839(1839-07-08) Richford, New York, USA Died May 23, 1937 (aged 97) The Casements, Ormond Beach, Florida, USA Occupation Chairman of Standard Oil Company; investor; philanthropist Net worth ▲$318.3 billion, according to Wealthy historical figures 2008, based on information from Forbes - February 2008. John Davison Rockefeller (July 8, 1839 – May 23, 1937) was an American industrialist and philanthropist. Rockefeller revolutionized the petroleum industry and defined the structure of modern philanthropy. In 1870, he founded the Standard Oil Company and ran it until he officially retired in 1897.[1] Standard Oil began as an Ohio partnership formed by John D. Rockefeller, his brother William Rockefeller, Henry Flagler, chemist Samuel Andrews, and a silent partner Stephen V. Harkness. Rockefeller kept his stock and as gasoline grew in importance, his wealth soared and he became the world's richest man and first American billionaire, and is often regarded as the richest person in history.[2][3][4][5] Standard Oil was convicted in Federal Court of monopolistic practices and broken up in 1911. Rockefeller spent the last 40 years of his life in retirement. His fortune was mainly used to create the modern systematic approach of targeted philanthropy with foundations that had a major effect on medicine, education, and scientific research. His foundations pioneered the development of medical research, and were instrumental in the eradication of hookworm and yellow fever. He is also the founder of both The University of Chicago and Rockefeller University. He was a devoted Northern Baptist and supported many church-based institutions throughout his life. Rockefeller adhered to total abstinence from alcohol and tobacco throughout his life.[6] He married Laura Celestia (Cettie) Spelman in 1864. They had four daughters and one son; John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Junior was largely entrusted with the supervision of the foundations. Contents [hide] 1 Early life and business career 2 Standard Oil 2.1 Monopoly 3 Philanthropy 3.1 Poem about his life 4 See also 5 Bibliography 6 References 7 External links Early life and business career Rockefeller was the second of six children born in Richford, New York, to William Avery Rockefeller (November 13, 1810–May 11, 1906) and Eliza Davison (September 12, 1813–March 28, 1889). Genealogists trace his roots back to French Huguenots who later fled to Germany in the 1600s.[7][8] His father, a traveling salesman who the locals referred to as Big Bill, was a sworn foe of conventional morality who had opted for a vagabond existence. Throughout his life, William Avery Rockefeller expended considerable energy on tricks and schemes to avoid plain hard work.[9] Eliza, a homemaker and devout Baptist, struggled to maintain a semblance of stability at home as William was frequently gone for extended periods. Young John D. Rockefeller's contemporaries described him as articulate, methodical, and discreet. When he was a boy, his family moved to Moravia, New York and, in 1851, to Owego, New York, where he attended Owego Academy. In 1853, his family bought a house in Strongsville, a town close to Cleveland. In September 1855, when Rockefeller was 16 he got his first job as an assistant bookkeeper. Working for a small produce commission firm called Hewitt Tuttle, the full salary for his first three months' work was $50. At that time he promised when he retired he would give one tenth of his money to charity. In 1859, Rockefeller went into the produce commission business with a partner, Maurice B. Clark. Their firm, Clark Rockefeller, built an oil refinery in 1863 in The Flats, then Cleveland's burgeoning industrial area. The refinery was directly owned by Andrews, Clark Company, which was composed of Clark Rockefeller, chemist Samuel Andrews, and M. B. Clark's two brothers. In February 1865, in what was later described by oil industry historian Daniel Yergin as a critical auction, Rockefeller bought out the Clark brothers for $72,500, and established the firm of Rockefeller Andrews. In 1866, John D. Rockefeller's brother, William, built another refinery in Cleveland and he was brought into the partnership. In 1867, Henry M. Flagler became a partner, and the firm of Rockefeller, Andrews Flagler was established. By 1868, with Rockefeller borrowing heavily and reinvesting most of the profits while controlling cost and utilizing his refineries' waste, the company owned two Cleveland refineries and a marketing subsidiary in New York, and it was the largest oil refiner in the world.[10][11] Rockefeller, Andrews Flagler was the predecessor of the Standard Oil Company. Standard Oil Main article: Standard Oil John D. Rockefeller ca. 1875By the end of the Civil War, Cleveland was one of the five main refining centers in the U.S.
[Marxism-Thaxis] Thousands Expected to Protest NATO Summit
http://english.farsnews.com/newstext.php?nn=8710210833 Fars News Agency January 10, 2009 Thousands Expected to Protest NATO Summit TEHRAN - More than 20,000 people are expected to take to the streets of the German town of Baden-Baden and the French city of Strasbourg, both of them being venues for hosting NATO's 60th anniversary, to demonstrate against the western military alliance. The aim is to prevent the summit which is slated for April 3 and 4, organizers of the protest camps announced Friday in the southwestern German city of Offenburg. There are plans for mass protests and blockade, according to German press reports. According to the Islamic Republic News Agency, two major camps, hosting up to 18,500 protesters, will be set up in Strasbourg and its neighboring German town of Kehl. A broad spectrum of demonstrators, ranging from Christian to radical leftist groups, will take part in the anti-NATO demos. More than 20,000 police are to protect the NATO summit amid mounting fears of riots and terror attacks, press reports said earlier. German police will closely coordinate its security measures with their French counterparts to ensure a peaceful NATO summit as around 3,500 political representatives from 35 countries are expected to take part in the high-profile event. === Stop NATO http://groups.yahoo.com/group/stopnato To subscribe, send an e-mail to: stopnato-subscr...@xxx Archives: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/stopnato/messages http://lists.topica.com/lists/ANTINATO/read This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Speculation
American capitalism is such that a speculative stock market dominates the policies of businesses. by Lawrence E Mitchell AlterNet (December 22 2008) Editor's Note: The following is an edited excerpt from The Speculation Economy: How Finance Triumphed Over Industry (2007), Lawrence Mitchell's definitive history of the rise of American finance and analysis of how it shaped corporate behavior in the modern era. During the rise of the speculation economy in the early years of the 20th century, business' focus on production was replaced with business management's focus on stock prices. That goal might be consistent with healthy, sustainable and responsible business practices, but it also might not be. Understanding the complex development of American corporate capitalism can help us better improve and sustain the strength of the American economy. While our current economic crisis is frequently compared to that of the Great Depression, its roots and causes go further back in history - to the development of the modern American stock market at the turn of the 20th century. Contrary to popular belief, the public market for industrial securities didn't finance industrialization - industrialization had already taken place. Instead, it exploded into existence as a result of trust promoters and investment bankers trying to restrain competition through the creation of giant combinations of corporations and at the same time getting rich quick by dumping the overvalued securities of these giant corporate behemoths onto an emerging middle class eager to share the wealth. The first major industrial stock market crash followed fast on the heels of its birth. The formative era of American corporate capitalism took place between 1897 and 1919. The American business landscape of the late 19th century had been characterized by independent factories. No matter what their size, they typically were owned by entrepreneur industrialists, their families and perhaps a few business associates. But in the first decades of the 20th century, American business transformed into a vista of giant combinations of industrial plants owned directly and indirectly by widely dispersed shareholders. Business reasons sometimes justified these combinations. But they might never have come into being if financiers and promoters had not discovered that they could be used to create and sell massive amounts of stock for their own gain. The result is a form of capitalism in which a speculative stock market dominated the policies of American business. The result is the speculation economy. Historians have studied virtually every aspect of the Progressive Era, including the social and philosophical changes that took place in Americans' ways of living and thinking about their world, the dramatic technological and economic developments that occurred, the rise of big business, the growth in importance of the federal government, the fitful creation of American industrial policy, the establishment of the bargain between labor and capital, the changes in political relations between government and big business, the development of new styles of regulation and America's assumption of its turn as the world's dominant economic power. Many have provided rich pictures of different aspects of the dramatic and related economic, social and political transformations that occurred during that period. The story I tell in The Speculation Economy: How Finance Triumphed Over Industry (2007) is the economic equivalent of the political creation of the republic. It is a story that needs to be told for many reasons, not least of which is that the corporate economy that emerged during this era has been beset with problems ranging from short-term management horizons that can damage the long-term health of business to the increasing willingness of corporate managers to externalize the costs of production for the benefit of their stockholders. A recent survey of CEOs running major American corporations revealed that almost eighty percent would have at least moderately mutilated their businesses in order to meet financial analysts' quarterly profit estimates. Cutting the budgets for research and development, advertising and maintenance, and delaying hiring and new projects are some of the long-term harms they would readily inflict on their corporations. Why? Because in modern American corporate capitalism, the failure to meet quarterly numbers almost always guarantees a punishing hit to the corporation's stock price. One lesson of the formative period is that meaningful reform can be achieved only by reforming the market, by reforming finance itself to create the incentives for stockholders, and through them the market, to re-learn the lesson that profits come from industrial production, not from the breeze that blows toward tomorrow. It is a lesson that was often forgotten during these early years, and many times since. Finally, the story of the creation of American
[Marxism-Thaxis] Gus Hall
http://reds.linefeed.org/bios/gushall.html Gus Hall (1910-2000) Long-time American Communist Party leader. Hall was born Arvo Gus Halberg on October 8, 1910, in the Mesabi Iron Range of Minnesota. His parents were Finnish immigrants who were involved in the IWW and would later be charter members of the Communist Party in 1919. His father, Matt Halberg, recruited him into the Young Communist League (YCL) when he was 17. Working for the YCL, young Arvo traveled to mining towns in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. In 1931, he spent two years at the Lenin Institute in Moscow, learning the political ideology of Joseph Stalin and other Soviet leaders of that period. In the 1934 Minneapolis Teamsters strike (led by Trotskyist Farrell Dobbs), Hall was one of the young activists involved. During this period, he became blacklisted and could not find a job, forcing him to change his name to Gus Hall. The YCL moved Hall to Ohio where he led the 1937 Little Steel strike of Warren-Youngstown. He became a staff member of the Steel Workers of America, and ran for mayor of Youngstown, Ohio, on the Communist Party ticket. He volunteered for the US Navy during World War II and was elected to the Communist Party's National Committee while in the Pacific in 1944. He became a close aide to Eugene Dennis and was consequently elected to the National Executive Board in 1946. Under the anti-communist Smith Act, Hall was indicted in 1948 and convicted one year later to a five-year prison term. He fled to Mexico and was elected the Communist Party's National Secretary in 1950. In Mexico City, US authorities apprehended Hall in 1951 and was given three additional years of prison time. Upon his release in the 1960's, he became the General Secretary of the Communist Party and worked to rebuild the party after years of devestating decline. He ran for President in 1968 with Charlene Mitchell, but received only 1,075 votes. As he rebuilt the Communist Party, Hall retained many characteristics of the Party's Stalinist past, and entered the New Left to gain young activists with the YCL (now known as the W.E.B. DuBois Clubs). He managed to draw in many young militants with the help of the likes of Charlene Mitchell and Angela Davis. Hall ran again four more times. The highest number of votes he received was when he was paired with Jarvis Tyner in 1976. In the '76 election, he received 58,992 votes. During his Presidential campaigns, Hall made familiar the slogan People Before Profits. He took part in the last CP Presidential campaign in 1984 (gaining 36,386 votes). In 1988, he steered the CP into full support for the Democratic Party when he suspected left-Democrat Jesse Jackson would win the Presidential primaries. In 1991, he led the anti-Gorbachev, pro-CPSU establishment in the Communist Party — parting ways with former allies (such as Angela Davis and Charlene Mitchell). Hall continued to lead the Party until the end of his life, maintaining the popular front with the Democrats against the right — even as Democrat Bill Clinton pushed Free Trade and Wellfare reform. He passed away on October 13, 2000, and was replaced as General Secretary by his lieutenant, Sam Webb. Hall's wife and family received condolences from as far away as the Communist Party of Vietnam. Hall was a prolific writer, publishing numerous books for the layman worker, including: The Energy Rip-Off: Cause Cure (1974) ; Basics for Peace, Democracy Social Progress (1980); Fighting Racism (1985); and Working Class USA: The Power and the Movement (1987). Gus Hall From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search Gus Hall Born Arvo Gustav Halberg October 8, 1910(1910-10-08) Cherry Township, Minnesota Died October 13, 2000 (aged 90) Lenox Hill Hospital Manhattan, New York Known for Communist Party USA Communist Party Campaign Poster: Gus Hall for President; Jarvis Tyner for Vice-President (1976)Gus Hall (October 8, 1910 - October 13, 2000) was a leader of the Communist Party USA and its four-time U.S. presidential candidate.[1] As a labor leader, Hall was closely associated with the so-called Little Steel Strike of 1937, an effort to unionize the nation's smaller, regional steel manufacturers.[2] Contents [hide] 1 Background 2 The Little Steel Strike 3 Indictment during the 'Red Scare' 4 Later years 5 Quotations 6 References 7 Writings [edit] Background Hall was born Arvo Gustav Halberg to Finnish parents in Cherry, a rural community on Northern Minnesota's Iron Range. Hall's parents had been involved in the Industrial Workers of the World and were founding members of the Communist Party.[1] At 15, Hall left school and went to work in the North Woods lumber camps, where he spent much time studying Marxism. At 17, he joined the Communist Party and became an organizer for the Young Communist League. In 1931, Hall travelled to the Soviet Union spending two years at the Lenin Institute in Moscow.[1] [edit] The Little Steel
[Marxism-Thaxis] Several Conclusions
Vladimir Lenin’s Left-Wing Communism: an Infantile Disorder Several Conclusions The Russian bourgeois revolution of 1905 revealed a highly original turn in world history: in one of the most backward capitalist countries, the strike movement attained a scope and power unprecedented anywhere in the world. In the first month of 1905 alone, the number of strikers was ten times the annual average for the previous decade (1895-1904); from January to October 1905, strikes grew all the time and reached enormous proportions. Under the influence of a number of unique historical conditions, backward Russia was the first to show the world, not only the growth, by leaps and bounds, of the independent activity of the oppressed masses in time of revolution (this had occurred in all great revolutions), but also that the significance of the proletariat is infinitely greater than its proportion in the total population; it showed a combination of the economic strike and the political strike, with the latter developing into an armed uprising, and the birth of the Soviets, a new form of mass struggle and mass organisation of the classes oppressed by capitalism. The revolutions of February and October 1917 led to the all-round development of the Soviets on a nation-wide scale and to their victory in the proletarian socialist revolution. In less than two years, the international character of the Soviets, the spread of this form of struggle and organisation to the world working-class movement and the historical mission of the Soviets as the grave-digger, heir and successor of bourgeois parliamentarianism and of bourgeois democracy in general, all became clear. But that is not all. The history of the working-class movement now shows that, in all countries, it is about to go through (and is already going through) a struggle waged by communism — emergent, gaining strength and advancing towards victory — against, primarily, Menshevism, i.e., opportunism and social-chauvinism (the home brand in each particular country), and then as a complement, so to say, Left-wing communism. The former struggle has developed in all countries, apparently without any exception, as a duel between the Second International (already virtually dead) and the Third International The latter struggle is to be seen in Germany, Great Britain, Italy, America (at any rate, a certain section of the Industrial Workers of the World and of the anarcho-syndicalist trends uphold the errors of Left-wing communism alongside of an almost universal and almost unreserved acceptance of the Soviet system), and in France (the attitude of a section of the former syndicalists towards the political party and parliamentarianism, also alongside of the acceptance of the Soviet system); in other words, the struggle is undoubtedly being waged, not only on an international, but even on a worldwide scale. But while the working-class movement is everywhere going through what is actually the same kind of preparatory school for victory over the bourgeoisie, it is achieving that development in its own way in each country. The big and advanced capitalist countries are travelling this road far more rapidly than did Bolshevism, to which history granted fifteen years to prepare itself for victory, as an organised political trend. In the brief space of a year, the Third International has already scored a decisive victory; it has defeated the yellow, social-chauvinist Second International, which only a few months ago was incomparably stronger than the Third International, seemed stable and powerful, and enjoyed every possible support—direct and indirect, material (Cabinet posts, passports, the press) and ideological — from the world bourgeoisie. It is now essential that Communists of every country should quite consciously take into account both the fundamental objectives of the struggle against opportunism and Left doctrinairism, and the concrete features which this struggle assumes and must inevitably assume in each country, in conformity with the specific character of its economics, politics, culture, and national composition (Ireland, etc.), its colonies, religious divisions, and so on and so forth. Dissatisfaction with the Second International is felt everywhere and is spreading and growing, both because of its opportunism and because of its inability or incapacity to create a really centralised and really leading centre capable of directing the international tactics of the revolutionary proletariat in its struggle for a world Soviet republic. It should be clearly realised that such a leading centre can never be built up on stereotyped, mechanically equated, and identical tactical rules of struggle. As long as national and state distinctions exist among peoples and countries—and these will continue to exist for a very
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] [A-List] Natural Science and the Spirit World[1]
Engels was, course, quite right to debunk belief in ghosts and mediums. In fact there were some political reasons behind this. At the time that Engels wrote this, spiritualism was quite popular within the IWMA, especially in the US and UK. In the US, one of the leading figures in the IWMA, Victoria Woodhull, was also a famous medium, whom both Marx Engels very much disapproved of (perhaps unfairly). On the other hand, it should also be pointed out that Engels does go off the rails on a few points in his essay. Engels poked fun of the idea of a fourth dimension. But even in his day, n-dimensional geometries were already quite well established and respectable. Later on, physicists like Albert Einstein would show that such geometries could be useful for understanding aspects of physical reality. Engels poked fun of the notion of imaginary numbers, that is numbers that were derived from the square root of -1. But both imaginary numbers and complex numbers were already, in Engels's time, a quite respectable part of mathematics. And physicists and engineers were already using them in analyzing such things as wave phenomena, for instance. While Engels generally had a good grasp of the science of his day, he was behind the times in his understanding of mathematics (he was also deficient in his understanding of the latest work on the foundations of the calculus) and that led him to making a few whoppers in his writings. His assertion that empiricism was lacking the intellectual resources for battling belief in the paranormal is open to question too. Probably the most important critique of belief in miracles ever written was David Hume's essay, Of Miracles, (http://www.bartleby.com/37/3/14.html). Hume, of course, was an empiricist philosopher. If Engels wished to show the inadequacies of empiricism as a basis for refuting the paranormal, then he should have discussed Hume's essay and showed where Hume went wrong. Jim Farmelant -- Charles Brown charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us wrote: Engels’ Dialectics of Nature http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1883/don/ch10.htm Natural Science and the Spirit World[1] T Click here to find the right business program for you and take your career to the next level. http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL2141/fc/PnY6rw1UFte6Gs1QHlNzmzloOuJ9Ur0FG1ThDK2aLQMJDl716W3AV/ ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] [A-List] Natural Science and the Spirit World[1]
I think that Engels was overall quite perspicacious in the passage cited, one of my favorites from Engels. The 4th dimension was quite a fad in the late 19th century, in addition to its strictly mathematical function. I'm not sure whether anyone dreamed of applying it to natural reality, but to fantasy and supernaturalism, yes. Zoellner was quite famous in attempting to use the fourth dimension in his apology for spiritualism. I first learned of this as a teenager in a column by Martin Gardner anthologized in one of his books, maybe his fourth book on mathematical recreations. I think the article was called The Church of the Fourth Dimension. On a more benign and entertaining level, Edwin Abbott and Charles Howard Hinton wrote fantasies (still available from Dover Books, I'm sure), about two-dimensional universes, manifesting the contemporaneous interest in the subject. It would be interesting to see how Engels would have incorporated Hume's essay on miracles. But note that Hume's position was essentially agnostic, not materialist, and it never helped Hume develop a decent theory of history or disabuse him of his prejudices. There is something conservative as well as radical about Hume. Furthermore, Engels is correct about the naivete of empiricism as an ideology in practice. At 11:06 AM 1/12/2009, farmela...@juno.com wrote: Engels was, course, quite right to debunk belief in ghosts and mediums. In fact there were some political reasons behind this. At the time that Engels wrote this, spiritualism was quite popular within the IWMA, especially in the US and UK. In the US, one of the leading figures in the IWMA, Victoria Woodhull, was also a famous medium, whom both Marx Engels very much disapproved of (perhaps unfairly). On the other hand, it should also be pointed out that Engels does go off the rails on a few points in his essay. Engels poked fun of the idea of a fourth dimension. But even in his day, n-dimensional geometries were already quite well established and respectable. Later on, physicists like Albert Einstein would show that such geometries could be useful for understanding aspects of physical reality. Engels poked fun of the notion of imaginary numbers, that is numbers that were derived from the square root of -1. But both imaginary numbers and complex numbers were already, in Engels's time, a quite respectable part of mathematics. And physicists and engineers were already using them in analyzing such things as wave phenomena, for instance. While Engels generally had a good grasp of the science of his day, he was behind the times in his understanding of mathematics (he was also deficient in his understanding of the latest work on the foundations of the calculus) and that led him to making a few whoppers in his writings. His assertion that empiricism was lacking the intellectual resources for battling belief in the paranormal is open to question too. Probably the most important critique of belief in miracles ever written was David Hume's essay, Of Miracles, (http://www.bartleby.com/37/3/14.html). Hume, of course, was an empiricist philosopher. If Engels wished to show the inadequacies of empiricism as a basis for refuting the paranormal, then he should have discussed Hume's essay and showed where Hume went wrong. Jim Farmelant -- Charles Brown charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us wrote: Engelsâ Dialectics of Nature http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1883/don/ch10.htm Natural Science and the Spirit World[1] ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Imaginary numbers
Engels poked fun of the notion of imaginary numbers, that is numbers that were derived from the square root of -1. But both imaginary numbers and complex numbers were already, in Engels's time, a quite respectable part of mathematics. And physicists and engineers were already using them in analyzing such things as wave phenomena, for instance. While Engels generally had a good grasp of the science of his day, he was behind the times in his understanding of mathematics (he was also deficient in his understanding of the latest work on the foundations of the calculus) and that led him to making a few whoppers in his writings. CB: It's still not clear to me that saying that imaginary numbers involves a dialectical contradiction is a whopper. Most of the mathematicians who made the later advances were deficient in dialectical logic or used unconsciously. I'll forward the thread where we discussed this before. CB This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Russell vs Hooks
Second Phase of Moral Response: Above-Ground Tests of Hydrogen Bomb In the second phase of philosophical response, debate on the extinction thesis received increased attention and participants included several philosophical luminaries. During the 1950s, the earlier hope for international control of atomic weapons was displaced by the harsh realities of the Cold War: the Baruch Plan had been rejected, the hydrogen bomb had been developed, the Chinese Revolution had succeeded, and the Korean War had begun. Against this backdrop, in 1958 Bertrand Russell and Sidney Hook carried on a heated exchange with each arguing from opposite extreme positions. Russell argued nuclear war would destroy all humanity, and Hook argued Soviet communism would destroy all freedom. In the heat of their political fervor, Russell lost sight of the fact that not all of humanity would surely perish in a nuclear war, while Hook lost sight of the fact that no society, not even in the Soviet Union, was completely devoid of freedom. Nevertheless, their extreme, though untenable premises, made arguing for their conclusions rather easy. Russell, of course, was the philosopher who spoke most extensively about the nuclear war throughout this period. He made a dramatic broadcast against the hydrogen bomb for the BBC, initiated the anti-nuclear Pugwash movement, contributed to the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and in 1959 published his classic Common Sense and Nuclear Warfare. William Gay, “Nuclear Warfare and Morality,” Global Studies Encyclopedia, eds. I.I. Mazour, A.N. Chumakov, and W.C. Gay (Moscow: Raduga, 2003), pp. 3740377. Nuclear Warfare and Morality William Gay UNC Charlotte http://www.philosophy.uncc.edu/wcgay/pubnucwarandmoral.htm This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels
Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Hans G. Ehrbar ehrbar at lists.econ.utah.edu Thu Mar 3 12:21:52 MST 2005 Previous message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Next message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] Abraham Robinson's nonstandard analysis adds more numbers, infinite numbers and infinitesimal numbers, to the numbers line. Just as Margaret Thatcher says that society does not exist, modern mainstream mathematics is based on the dogma that infinitesimals do not exist. Robinson showed, by contrast, that one can use infinitesimals without getting into mathematical contradictions. He demonstrated that mathematics becomes much more intuitive this way, not only its elementary proofs, but especially the deeper results. I understand that the so-called renormalization problem in physics, according to which certain physically relevant integrals become infinite and somehow have to be made finite again, has a much more satisfactory solution in nonstandard analysis than in standard analysis. The well-know logician Kurt Goedel said about Robinson's work: ``I think, in coming years it will be considered a great oddity in the history of mathematics that the first exact theory of infinitesimals was developed 300 years after the invention of the differential calculus.'' When I looked at Robinson I had the impression that he shares the following error with the ``standard'' mathematicians whom he criticizes: they consider numbers only in a static way, without allowing them to move. It would be beneficial to expand on the intuition of the inventors of differential calculus, who talked about ``fluxions,'' i.e., quantities in flux, in motion. Modern mathematicians even use arrows in their symbol for limits, but they are not calculating with moving quantities, only with static quantities. Robinson does not explicitly use moving quantities, he uses more static quantities, and many mathematicians criticize nonstandard mathematics because it simply has too many numbers. The Chinese manuscript you just sent to the list seems to have a much more dialectical view of nonstandard analysis than Robinson himself, and in addition it makes a bridge between Marx's Mathematical Manuscripts and nonstandard Analysis. This is very exciting News to me. Can we find out more about this? Hans. -- Hans G. Ehrbar http://www.econ.utah.edu/ehrbar ehrbar at economics.utah.edu Economics Department, University of Utah (801) 581 7797 (my office) 1645 Campus Center Dr., Rm 308 (801) 581 7481 (econ office) Salt Lake CityUT 84112-9300 (801) 585 5649 (FAX) This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels
[Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Jim Farmelant farmelantj at juno.com Thu Mar 3 11:52:44 MST 2005 Previous message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Power to the People ! Next message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] Below is an interesting abstract I found concerning the reactions of Chinese mathematicians, during the period of the Cultural Revolution, to publication of Marx's mathematical manuscripts. - DOCUMENTA MATHEMATICA, Extra Volume ICM III (1998), 799-809 Joseph W. Dauben Title: Marx, Mao and Mathematics: The Politics of Infinitesimals http://www.math.uiuc.edu/documenta/xvol-icm/19/Dauben.MAN.html The ``Mathematical Manuscripts'' of Karl Marx were first published (in part) in Russian in 1933, along with an analysis by S.~A. Yanovskaya. Friedrich Engels was the first to call attention to the existence of these manuscripts in the preface to his Anti-D\uhring [1885]. A more definitive edition of the ``Manuscripts'' was eventually published, under the direction of Yanovskaya, in 1968, and subsequently numerous translations have also appeared. Marx was interested in mathematics primarily because of its relation to his ideas on political economy, but he also saw the idea of variable magnitude as directly related to dialectical processes in nature. He regarded questions about the foundations of the differential calculus as a ``touchstone of the application of the method of materialist dialectics to mathematics.'' Nearly a century later, Chinese mathematicians explicitly linked Marxist ideology and the foundations of mathematics through a new program interpreting calculus in terms of nonstandard analysis. During the Cultural Revolution (1966--1976), mathematics was suspect for being too abstract, aloof from the concerns of the common man and the struggle to meet the basic needs of daily life in a still largely agrarian society. But during the Cultural Revolution, when Chinese mathematicians discovered the mathematical manuscripts of Karl Marx, these seemed to offer fresh grounds for justifying abstract mathematics, especially concern for foundations and critical evaluation of the calculus. At least one study group in the Department of Mathematics at Chekiang Teachers College issued its own account of ``The Brilliant Victory of Dialectics - Notes on Studying Marx's `Mathematical Manuscripts'.'' Inspired by nonstandard analysis, introduced by Abraham Robinson only a few years previously, some Chinese mathematicians adapted the model Marx had laid down a century earlier in analyzing the calculus, and especially the nature of infinitesimals in mathematics, from a Marxist perspective. But they did so with new technical tools available thanks to Robinson but unknown to Marx when he began to study the calculus in the 1860s. As a result, considerable interest in nonstandard analysis has developed subsequently in China, and almost immediately after the Cultural Revolution was officially over in 1976, the first all-China conference on nonstandard analysis was held in Xinxiang, Henan Province, in 1978 This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Barkley Rosser's Home Page: Aspects of Dialectics and Nonlinear Dynamics
Marxism-Thaxis] Barkley Rosser's Home Page: Aspects of Dialectics and Nonlinear Dynamics Charles Brown cbrown at michiganlegal.org Thu Mar 3 15:14:44 MST 2005 Previous message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Next message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Power to the People ! Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] Barkley Rosser used to be on this list. http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/ CB Barkley Rosser's Home Page Barkley Rosser CV http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/Barkley%20VITA.doc COMPARATIVE ECONOMICS IN A TRANSFORMING WORLD ECONOMY ftp://ftp.mitpress.mit.edu/pub/DESIGN/Emily/Rosser4.jpg Research papers for view: click on the title Chaotic Hysteresis and Systemic Economic Transformation http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/chaohys.2.doc State-Space Estimation of Rational Bubbles in the Yen/Deutschemark Exchange Rate http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/Papaer1(BUBBLE)%2010-8-98%20WA1.doc Aspects of Dialectics and Nonlinear Dynamics http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/DIANONL.DYN.doc Divergent Distributional Dynamics in Transitional Economies http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/DIVYDYN.WRD.doc On the Complexities of Complex Economic Dynamics http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/GENERIC.CPX.doc The New Traditional Economy: A New Perspective in Comparative Economics http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/NEWTRAD.IJS.doc Self-Fulfilling Chaotic Mistakes: Some Examples and Implications http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/SELFCHAO.ISR.doc Volatility via Social Flaring http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/VOLATILE.FLR.doc Alternative Keynesian and Post Keynesian Perspectives on Uncertainty and Expectation http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/UNCRTEXP.ECT.doc s Implications for Teaching Macroeconomics of Complex Dynamics http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/TEACHCM.PLX.doc Integrating the Complexity Vision into Mathematical Economics http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/mathecon.doc Forms of Complex Dynamics in Transforming Economies http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/CMPLXFRM.TRN.doc Evidence of Nonlinear Speculative Bubbles in Pacific-Rim Stock Markets http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/qref%20revised%20draft%20May%204,%201998.doc The Mathematics of Discontinuity (book chapter) http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/CHAP2.CCG.doc Everything I Might Say Will Already Have Passed Through Your Mind http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/ecophil2.wpd The Risky Business of New Austrian Business Cycle Theory http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/austrian.rsk Consistent Expectations Equilibria and Complex Dynamics in Renewable Resource Markets http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/homros.pdf Book Review of The Economy as a Complex Evolving System II http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/ARTDURLN.REV.doc References: From Catastrophe to Chaos: A General Theory of Economic Discontinuities, 2nd Edition (incomplete) http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/REFS.CCG.doc Income Inequality and the Informal Economy in Transition Economies http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/jceineq.doc Book Review of Economics of Space and Time: Scientific Papers of Tönu Puu http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/Puupapers.bkrev.doc India: The Elephant Walks (from Comparative Economics in a Transforming World Economy) http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/India,Elephant.Walks.doc Complex Ecological-Economic Dynamics http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/probecoecoglob.dyn.doc and Environmental Policy Nonlinear Bubbles in Chinese Stock Markets in the 1990s http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/chinabub.doc The Transition between the Old and New Traditional Economies in India http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/oldnewtransindia.doc Multiple Unofficial Economy Equilibria and Income Distribution Dynamics in Systemic Transition http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/multunoffinc.trans.doc Emergent Volatility in Asset Markets with Heterogeneous Agents http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/Investor3.dat Between Cambridge and Vienna: The Risky Business of New Austrian Business Cycle Theory http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/austrian.rsk Failure of the Washington Consensus on Inequality and the Underground Economy in the Transition Economies http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/Failure%20of%20the%20Washington%20Consensus%20o n.doc Complex Coupled System Dynamics and the Global Warming Policy Problem http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/ecoleconcmpxdyn.doc Implications for Fisheries Policy of Complex Ecologic-Economic Dynamics http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/cmplxecolecon.doc Fisheries Management and Complex Dynamics http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/fishcomplx.doc Between Cambridge and Vienna: The Risky Business of New Austrian Business Cycle Theory [corrected version] http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/Cambridge.Vienna.doc A New Perspective on Economic Discontinuity http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/A%20NEW%20PERSPECTIVE.doc Paradigm Lost: The Transformation of Comparative Economics (Part I) http://cob.jmu.edu/rosserjb/PARADIGM%20LOST.1.doc Emergent Volatility in Asset Markets with Heterogeneous Agents (corrected version)
[Marxism-Thaxis] Lenin on Dialectics
[Marxism-Thaxis] Lenin on Dialectics Charles Brown cbrown at michiganlegal.org Wed Mar 9 07:53:10 MST 2005 Previous message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Dialectics of Nature Next message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Lenin on Dialectics Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] KARL MARX A Brief Biographical Sketch with an Exposition on Marxism http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1914/granat/ch02.htm#s2 By Vladimir Lenin -clip- Dialectics As the most comprehensive and profound doctrine of development, and the richest in content, Hegelian dialectics was considered by Marx and Engels the greatest achievement of classical German philosophy. They thought that any other formulation of the principle of development, of evolution, was one-sided and poor in content, and could only distort and mutilate the actual course of development (which often proceeds by leaps, and via catastrophes and revolutions) in Nature and in society. Marx and I were pretty well the only people to rescue conscious dialectics [from the destruction of idealism, including Hegelianism] and apply it in the materialist conception of Nature Nature is the proof of dialectics, and it must be said for modern natural science that it has furnished extremely rich [this was written before the discovery of radium, electrons, the transmutation of elements, etc.!] and daily increasing materials for this test, and has thus proved that in the last analysis Nature's process is dialectical and not metaphysical. [6] http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1914/granat/ch02.htm#n6 The great basic thought, Engels writes, that the world is not to be comprehended as a complex of ready-made things, but as a complex of processes, in which the things apparently stable no less than their mind images in our heads, the concepts, go through an uninterrupted change of coming into being and passing away... this great fundamental thought has, especially since the time of Hegel, so thoroughly permeated ordinary consciousness that in this generality it is now scarcely ever contradicted. But to acknowledge this fundamental thought in words and to apply it in reality in detail to each domain of investigation are two different things For dialectical philosophy nothing is final, absolute, sacred. It reveals the transitory character of everything and in everything; nothing can endure before it except the uninterrupted process of becoming and of passing away, of endless ascendancy from the lower to the higher. And dialectical philosophy itself is nothing more than the mere reflection of this process in the thinking brain. Thus, according to Marx, dialectics is the science of the general laws of motion, both of the external world and of human thought. [7] http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1914/granat/ch02.htm#n7 This revolutionary aspect of Hegel's philosophy was adopted and developed by Marx. Dialectical materialism does not need any philosophy standing above the other sciences. From previous philosophy there remains the science of thought and its laws -- formal logic and dialectics. [8] http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1914/granat/ch02.htm#n8 Dialectics, as understood by Marx, and also in conformity with Hegel, includes what is now called the theory of knowledge, or epistemology, studying and generalizing the original and development of knowledge, the transition from non-knowledge to knowledge. In our times, the idea of development, of evolution, has almost completely penetrated social consciousness, only in other ways, and not through Hegelian philosophy. Still, this idea, as formulated by Marx and Engels on the basis of Hegels' philosophy, is far more comprehensive and far richer in content than the current idea of evolution is. A development that repeats, as it were, stages that have already been passed, but repeats them in a different way, on a higher basis (the negation of the negation), a development, so to speak, that proceeds in spirals, not in a straight line; a development by leaps, catastrophes, and revolutions; breaks in continuity; the transformation of quantity into quality; inner impulses towards development, imparted by the contradiction and conflict of the various forces and tendencies acting on a given body, or within a given phenomenon, or within a given society; the interdependence and the closest and indissoluble connection between all aspects of any phenomenon (history constantly revealing ever new aspects), a connection that provides a uniform, and universal process of motion, one that follows definite laws-these are some of the features of dialectics as a doctrine of development that is richer than the conventional one. (Cf. Marx's letter to Engels of January 8, 1868, in which he ridicules Stein's wooden trichotomies, which it would be absurd to confuse with materialist dialectics.) This message has been
[Marxism-Thaxis] MIA searches
Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Robert Cymbala rcymbala at marxists.org Thu Mar 10 14:23:53 MST 2005 Previous message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Next message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] Waistline2 wrote: I don't recall Lenin stating that the Russian October Socialist Revolution constituted a leap or change in the mode of production - however one defines it. For your information: By the end of this year (I hope), all 45 volumes will be digitized in two formats: - HTML (.htm files) - plain ASCII text (.tgz files) This should facilitate searching. Instead of trying to remember whether or not Lenin stated something, one will be able to do an electronic search and scan the results. More to come. -- REFERENCES: http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/cw/index.htm Who said that? http://marx.org/admin/volunteers/biographies/rcymbala.htm This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Practicing physicist on Goedel
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/pipermail/marxism-thaxis/2005-March/018429.html
[Marxism-Thaxis] Les Shaffer on Kurt Gödel
Jim Farmelant farmelantj at juno.com
Wed Mar 16 11:40:48 MST 2005
Previous message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Does Gödel Matter?
Next message: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Les Shaffer on Kurt Gödel
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- Forwarded message --
From: Les Schaffer schaffer at optonline.net
To: Marxmail marxism at lists.econ.utah.edu
Date: Wed, 16 Mar 2005 11:37:41 -0500
Subject: [Marxism] Re: godel etc (was ...)
Carlos A. Rivera wrote:
I argue that incompleteness in mathematics and uncertainity in
quantum
mechanics actually point to materialist dialectics. As dynamic,
never-ending systems, they exhibit the same continous struggle that
dialectics call, while firmly footed on a materialist grasp on
reality.
Yeah, postmodernists eat your heart out!!!
the thing that impresses me this time around is expressed nicely by R
B
Braithwaite in his Introduction in the Dover edition of Godel's paper:
... Godel, in this paper which established his two great theorems by
methods which are constructive in a precise sense, on the one hand
showed the essential limitations imposed upon constructivist formal
systems (which include all systems basing a calculus for arithmetic
upon
mathematical induction), and on the other hand displayed the power
of
constructivist methods for establishing metamathematical truths.
Godel's efforts in 1930 depended on a clever arithmetization of
metamathematical statements (so-called Godel numbering), which
Braithwaite likens to Descartes handling of problems in geometry by
the
introduction of coordinate systems and a reduction to algebra. by
(crudely speaking) mirroring arithmetic in statements about
arithmetic,
he was able to establish limitations in the formal program of Hilbert
and others. In some fundamental sense human (mathematical) activity
cannot be reduced to formalism alone, such formal systems are
incomplete.
Somehow this incompleteness was interpreted by philosophers and
popularizers as a fundamental attack on the structure of mathematics
itself. but is any marxist here surprised to learn there is more to
sensuous (mathematical) activity than formal reasoning? i doubt it. in
some way what Godel really demonstrated was that the formal
metamathematical systems created at the turn of the 20-th century were
not so meta and outside of the system they were judging, so-to-speak,
as
had been supposed. it takes more than arithmetic to practice true
arithmetic.
The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human
thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question. Man
must prove the truth - i.e. the reality and power, the
this-sidedness
of
his thinking in practice. The dispute over the reality or
non-reality
of
thinking that is isolated from practice is a purely scholastic
question.
one of the intriguiging aspects of Godel's paper was the construction
of
a __formally__ undecidable proposition that was demonstrably __true__.
Braithwaite again:
The undecidability of some arithmetical propositions within the
deductive system S may be classed among the syntactical
metamathematical
characteristics of the system S (represented by the calculus P [Les:
the
formal system P]) for the reason that this undecidability derives from
the undecidability of some formulae within the calculus which
represents
S. Deductive systems, unlike calculi [Les: formal systems] have also
semantical metamathematical characteristics; in particular their
propositions have or lack the semantical property of being true --
what
Godel in his introductory Section 1 calls being correct as regards
content (inhaltlich richtig). Connecting the syntactical property of
being provable with the semantical property of being true ... gives an
additional kick to the undecidability in S of g {Les: g is the
formally
undecidable but true proposition] -- by adding that g is true. ...
This
metamathematical argument, which combines semantical with syntactical
considerations, establishes the truth of an arithmetical proposition
which cannot be proved within S.
In his introductory Section 1 Godel intermingles semantical with
syntactical considerations in sketching a proof of the undecidability
of
g ... The distinction between what is syntactical and what semantical
was not made explictly until a year or two later (by Tarski, whose
work
included rigorously establishing unprovability theorems that were
semantical) ...
while thinking about Godel's work this afternoon i was reminded of
long
lunches i had with a computer science professor at Cornell back in the
mid-80's. he had a ton of $ from the US military for investigating
programming systems that could be proven errorless via machine. this
was
at the time of Reagan's Star Wars and the (rather
[Marxism-Thaxis] Marx conceiving of nature dialectically: debate
Marxism-Thaxis] Another Old Thread: Marx conceiving of nature dialectically Charles Brown cbrown at michiganlegal.org Sat Feb 19 14:54:39 MST 2005 Previous message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Old Thread: Dialectics of Nature Next message: [Marxism-Thaxis] Applied Dialectics of Change Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] Here's some of the later thread debating the dialectics of nature. CB ^^^ M-TH: Re: Abstract concrete people/s Charles Brown marxism-thaxis Mon, 07 Dec 1998 09:57:08 -0500 * Andrew Wayne Austin aaustin at utkux.utcc.utk.edu 12/06 7:22 PM List, I don't know what is relevant about Godena expelling people on Marxism-Sciences. He didn't expel me, anyway. As I recall people were expelled because they broke the rules. But, again, who cares about this. I left the list because people were advancing absurd theories employing dialectics to explain astronomical phenomena Charles: Everyone is familiar with the term the fixed stars in the sky. It is interesting to me how the develop of astronomical science recently has demonstrated less and less fixity to the stars. This is a development in the direction of a dialectical structure. Second, as Bhaskar and others have pointed out, while the concept of contradiction might be used as a metaphor for any sort of tension or strain, its specific meaning, not only for Marx, but generally, refers to human action and human things. Why muddy the water by creating a self-sealing line of reasoning? _ Charles: I am trying to figure our whether you are saying that Marx and Engels have a different position on this issue . Are you ? In his Scientific Realism and Human Emancipation, Bhaskar notes four broad sorts of contradictions (I think it is found in here, but it has been a while since I read this book): (1) logical inconsistencies (traditional logic only recognizes contradiction in logical operation) (2) oppositions between tendencies inherent in social forces of relatively independent origins (3) historical/temporal contradictions, oppositionals that emerge from the operation of some thing or situation (such as class struggle) and (4) structural/systemic contradictions, involving contradictions between things that exist at two different levels of reality. The latter two are dialectical. These are all present in Marx's work, and they possess two features generally: (a) they are real oppositions and (b) they can be described in terms of oppositions. While I have my problems with Bhaskar's own theory of society (it is too subjective), his interpretation of Marx's work is pretty good. Bhaskar has been an important figure in stressing the fact that what was unique about Marx's theory was what concerned with history and society. _ Charles: For a contrary view see. _Dialectical Contradictions: Contemporary Marxist Discussions_ Marxist Educational Press 1982 and Lenin's Philosophical Notes On Dialectics. Third, following Carver's argument, while Marx admired Darwin's argument, particularly because it showed how biological science could advance a process of change non-teleologically, he did not adopt this logic for his own study of society (except for metaphorically in some places in Capital), nor did he appear to think that his method had much to help with Darwin's argument.Indeed, it was *Engels* who made the parallel after Marx's death. ___ Charles: No, we discussed this on LBO. I believe Marx wrote a letter that directly contradicts you. For now in the Afterword to the Second German Edition to Vol.I of Capital Marx, quotes a Russian reviewer of Capital who said in his (Marx's) opinion ever historical period has laws of its own... As soon as soiciety has outlived a given period of development, and is passing over from one given stage to another, it begins to be subject also to other laws. In a word, economic life offers us a phenomena analogous to the history of evolution in other branches of biology... Marx says, Whilst the writer pictures what he takes to be actually my method, in this striking and [as far as my own application of it] generous way, what else is he picturing but th dialecical method ? See also, Karl Marx's Study of Science and Technology by Pradip Baksi in Nature, Society and Thought Vol. 9, No. 3 (Believe I saw a brief article of Andy's in that journal once) The importance of understanding this is that it shows that Marx held that an evolutionary theory that operated on a logic different from the logic of historical development in the social realm was completely (or nearly completely) valid. Charles: Don't see this demonstrated. __ Charles: The dialectics in both is that they see the world as changing rather than fixed. The basis of change ,the contradiction, is different in each. Had Marx believed that the dialectic was a
[Marxism-Thaxis] Aronson and the issue of certainty
Here we get back to the issue of agnosticism vs. materialism, or as Engels termed agnosticism , it shamefaced materialism and importantly in philosophy Kantian dualism/agnostocism. Liberalist attitude toward God is neo- or continuing Kantianism. By it, liberals chastise Marxists for their certainty. Today's secularists on the left reveal their liberalism and neo-Kantianism, as opposed to materialism in their shyness about being certain that there is no God. Lenin focuses Engels' arguments against shamefaced materialism in _Materialism and Empirio-Criticism_.. On Thaxis , this argument took the form of accusing Engels of _a priorism_ and metaphysics. Andrew Austin and I debated it at length. I'll find the threads. I realized that it is important to point out that Engels and Marxists' posture is that atheism and dialectics are _a posteriori_ presumptions ( to use the legal concept of presumptions) , not claims of absolute truth. Lenin reiterates Engels arguments against the idea that we have absolute truth, but rather we _do_ have relative truths, in the dialectic of absolute and relative truth , again in _Materialism_. I have argued often that there is a need for a significant degree of certainty in the truth of our beliefs or else there is not the will for decisive action as required to effectively struggle for revolutionary change. The level of belief and certainty that maybe capitalism must go and socialism come is insufficient to get through the trials and tribulations of serious revolutionary struggle. As Aronson implies, you can't get people to go to the barricades without a high level of certainty about their beliefs that the system must be changed to socialism. This non-liberal, higer level of certainty in beliefs that Marxists (classical followers of Marx, Engels and Lenin's theories) hold is slandered as religious , dogmatic , authoritarian, rigid, Stalinist, totalitarian, uncritical thinking, anti-intellectual, bureaucratic, outdated, old fashion and many other terms in many arguments by liberal intelligentsia and academics, including most self-declared leftists and many Marxists. The slander in this way of Marxism as religious dogma is the central mainstay of left anti-Communism. Whereas, right anti-Communism attacks Communism's atheism, certainty of atheism greater than agnosticism. Charles Charles ARONSON: So now here we are after the turn of the next century and the world doesn't seem to have gotten better. In many respects it has gotten worse, and people's optimism about the future seems to have gone away. Part of the reason for that optimism for many sophisticated, educated, politically hip people was that religion was ending. But religion didn't end, the world didn't get better. And people like me, I think we became timid. Plus the religious right, starting with Reagan, spawned this sense of feverish certainty on the part of religious people. I just happened to be listening to a right-wing talk radio station yesterday, and they were talking about lesbian parents and their sinfulness, and there was this amazing sense of we are right. I don't know anybody from the center on over to the left who believes with that kind of certainty anymore. I believe in science. I believe in history. I believe in logic. I believe in human beings, through discourse, getting to what's true. But I can't thunder down and pound my fists and say, You guys are wrong. I just don't do that. -clip- MT: You mentioned earlier the certainty of believers compared to what you see as timidity on the part of nonbelievers. On one side there is this authoritarian mind-set — these are our rules and everybody's going to follow them. Whereas liberals, in the broad sense of the word, have this attitude of live and let live. ARONSON: So, are you going to go to the barricades with that outlook? That's our political issue. Actually, I talk about that in the last chapter of this book, and that stays with me, I think, into my next book. The question for us is, how do we have as much passion and strength of conviction and willingness to struggle? In terms of writing the book, I was convinced that a religious worldview does not give you any more powerful convictions than a secular one. It's just that, if we're secular, we're not supposed to be sure, and we agree with live and let live — but we're not supposed to feel as strongly and we're also supposed to be taken in a little by someone like Camus, who says that we're on our own as individuals, and that the world is absurd and we can't really make sense of it. Part of why I wrote the book was to say that's wrong. We don't have to believe in God to see the world as meaningful and coherent. We can be as committed, and our lives can be as powerfully directed, as anyone who has the most powerful belief in God. This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Aronson's guide for the godless
Aronson makes some interesting points. Too bad most of the commentators are religious idiots. That level of retardation befits BlackPlanet.com. Interesting that Aronson doesn't hesitate to criticize Obama but not Cornel West. At 05:22 PM 1/11/2009, Charles Brown wrote: Spirituality Aronson's guide for the godless A WSU prof contemplates America as a not-so-religious nation MT Photo: Kim Heron http://www.metrotimes.com/culture/story.asp?id=13588#comments SEE ALSO More Spirituality Stories City mission (7/30/2008) Young Mormons on the move Alms Tithe (5/28/2008) At Zakat, Big Brother's the enemy and there's an escape from despair Wright and the truth (4/30/2008) Controversial pastor is warm, smart as hell and deeply intellectual. By W. Kim Heron Curt Guyette Editor's note: Readers can discuss this interview and the questions it raises in the comment section at the end of this article. Author Ron Aronson will be checking our comment board for a dialogue with readers in the coming days. It began seriously with publication of The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason, which became a best-seller for a previously obscure neuroscience grad student named Sam Harris. And it's grown into what Wayne State University professor Ron Aronson calls a remarkable intellectual wave. What it is doesn't have a simple name, but involves questioning and sometimes attacking religion; it especially involves a questioning of the increasing role that religion has taken in American public life in recent decades. The wave includes philosopher Daniel C. Dennett calling for the scientific investigation of religion in Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. It includes the acerbic journo Christopher Hitchens (God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything) and the Oxford biologist Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion). Bill Maher recently added his two cents with the film Religulous. Living Without God (Counterpoint), Aronson's contribution to the wave, was published late last year. It brooks no argument with religion as religion, but it challenges how the religious right has warped our politics in recent times. Mostly it considers how folks on the liberal left who aren't religious can nonetheless root their politics and passions in something larger themselves. It's a book that's won blurb-praise from both the activist-theologian Cornel West and the aforementioned Hitchens, as well as from author Barbara Ehrenreich. http://www.metrotimes.com/culture/story.asp?id=13588#comments ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Aronson's guide for the godless
Ralph Dumain rdum...@autodidactproject.org 01/12/2009 2:33 PM Aronson makes some interesting points. Too bad most of the commentators are religious idiots. That level of retardation befits BlackPlanet.com. Interesting that Aronson doesn't hesitate to criticize Obama but not Cornel West. CB: Cornel West is a colleague of his ,no doubt. I remember working with Aronson during the anti-Apartheid movement , 20 years ago plus. The commentators let us know that we aren't to the atheist promised land yet by a long shot ( smile) CB At 05:22 PM 1/11/2009, Charles Brown wrote: Spirituality Aronson's guide for the godless A WSU prof contemplates America as a not-so-religious nation MT Photo: Kim Heron http://www.metrotimes.com/culture/story.asp?id=13588#comments SEE ALSO More Spirituality Stories City mission (7/30/2008) Young Mormons on the move Alms Tithe (5/28/2008) At Zakat, Big Brother's the enemy and there's an escape from despair Wright and the truth (4/30/2008) Controversial pastor is warm, smart as hell and deeply intellectual. By W. Kim Heron Curt Guyette Editor's note: Readers can discuss this interview and the questions it raises in the comment section at the end of this article. Author Ron Aronson will be checking our comment board for a dialogue with readers in the coming days. It began seriously with publication of The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason, which became a best-seller for a previously obscure neuroscience grad student named Sam Harris. And it's grown into what Wayne State University professor Ron Aronson calls a remarkable intellectual wave. What it is doesn't have a simple name, but involves questioning and sometimes attacking religion; it especially involves a questioning of the increasing role that religion has taken in American public life in recent decades. The wave includes philosopher Daniel C. Dennett calling for the scientific investigation of religion in Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. It includes the acerbic journo Christopher Hitchens (God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything) and the Oxford biologist Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion). Bill Maher recently added his two cents with the film Religulous. Living Without God (Counterpoint), Aronson's contribution to the wave, was published late last year. It brooks no argument with religion as religion, but it challenges how the religious right has warped our politics in recent times. Mostly it considers how folks on the liberal left who aren't religious can nonetheless root their politics and passions in something larger themselves. It's a book that's won blurb-praise from both the activist-theologian Cornel West and the aforementioned Hitchens, as well as from author Barbara Ehrenreich. http://www.metrotimes.com/culture/story.asp?id=13588#comments ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Proletarian _Inter_nationalism
Marx's expression of species-being (solidarity with all the people of the earth, i.e. globe) was expressed in the terms proletarian internationalism. The first Party was The International. Workers of all countries, unite ! The Internationale From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search For the 1990 folk album, see The Internationale (album). The Internationale L'Internationale in the original French. International Anthem of International Socialist Movement International Anarchist Movement International Communist Movement International Democratic Movement Also known as L'Internationale (French) Lyrics Eugène Pottier, 1871 Music Pierre De Geyter, 1888 Adopted 1890s Music sample Russian version of The Internationale Problems listening to this file? See media help. The Internationale (L'Internationale in French) is a famous socialist, communist, social-democratic and anarchist anthem and one of the most widely recognized songs in the world. The Internationale became the anthem of international socialism. Its original French refrain is C'est la lutte finale/ Groupons-nous et demain/ L'Internationale/ Sera le genre humain. (Freely translated: This is the struggle final/ Let us group together and tomorrow/ The Internationale/ Will be the race human.) The Internationale has been translated into many of the world's languages. It is sung traditionally with the hand raised in a clenched fist salute. The Internationale is sung not only by communists but also (in many countries) by socialists or social democrats, as well as anarchists. Contents [hide] 1 Original French lyrics and copyright controversy 2 Translations into other languages 2.1 Russian lyrics 2.2 English lyrics 3 Instrumental recordings 4 See also 4.1 Other language versions 5 References 6 External links [edit] Original French lyrics and copyright controversy The original French words were written in June 1871 by Eugène Pottier (1816–1887, previously a member of the Paris Commune)[1] and were originally intended to be sung to the tune of La Marseillaise.[2] Pierre De Geyter (1848–1932) set the poem to music in 1888.[3] His melody was first publicly performed in July 1888[4] and became widely used soon after. In an unsuccessful attempt to save Pierre De Geyter's job as a woodcarver, the 6,000 leaflets printed by Lille printer Bolboduc only mentioned the French version of his family name (Degeyter). In 1904, Pierre's brother Adolphe was induced by the Lille mayor Gustave Delory to claim copyright, so that the income of the song would continue to go to Delory's French Socialist Party. Pierre De Geyter lost the first copyright case in 1914, but after his brother committed suicide and left a note explaining the fraud, Pierre was declared the copyright owner by a court of appeal in 1922.[5] Pierre De Geyter died in 1932. His music of the Internationale may be copyrighted in France until October 2017. The duration of copyright in France is 70 years following the end of the year when the author died, plus 6 years and 152 days to compensate for World War I, and 8 years and 120 days to compensate for World War II respectively.[6] However, the applicability of the wartime copyright extensions is a matter of current litigation.[7] In 2005, Le Chant du Monde, the corporation administering the authors' rights, asked Pierre Merejkowsky, the film director and an actor of Insurrection / résurrection, to pay €1,000 for whistling the song for seven seconds.[8] However, as the Internationale music was published before 1 July 1909 outside the United States of America, it is in the public domain in the USA.[9] Pierre De Geyter's music is also in the public domain in countries and areas whose copyright durations are authors' lifetime plus 75 years or less. As Eugène Pottier died in 1887, his original French lyrics are in the public domain. Gustave Delory once acquired the copyright of his lyrics through the songwriter G B Clement having bought it from Pottier's widow.[10] Wikisource has original text related to this article: The Internationale (Pottier, French)French lyrics Literal English translation First stanza Debout, les damnés de la terre Debout, les forçats de la faim La raison tonne en son cratère C'est l'éruption de la fin Du passé faisons table rase Foules, esclaves, debout, debout Le monde va changer de base Nous ne sommes rien, soyons tout |: C'est la lutte finale Groupons-nous, et demain L'Internationale Sera le genre humain :| Arise, wretched of the earth Arise, convicts of hunger Reason thunders in its volcano This is the eruption of the end Of the past let us wipe the slate clean Masses, slaves, arise, arise The world is about to change its foundation We are nothing, let us be all |: This is the struggle final Let us group together, and tomorrow The Internationale Will be the human race :|
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Gus Hall
I voted the CPUSA ticket, led by Gus Hall back in 1976, along with the SWP candidate for governor of the state of Michigan in 76 or 78. The party I was a member of - Communist Labor Party, tended to not instruct members of who they should or should not vote for, if they were not running a candidate for that office. I knew many comrades who would never vote for Gus Hall, but these comrades generally did not vote along with the overwhelming majority of the American working class. Actually, one would find it virtually impossible to place a discussion of who to vote for on their party organization agenda as such. The party supported and opposed no one in 1976 for president. Hall was a warrior cutting his teeth in the same basic time frame as William Z. Foster. Both men had impeccable street credentials and given the culture today, both men would be held in high regard (hero) having served prison time at the request and authority of our degenerate bourgeoisie. Both were most certainly organizers of men and stand out as amongst the best of industrial organizers of union and non union activity. One hundred years from now history, as written history, will in all probability speak of these leaders, with their short comings stated as short comings. Socialism in America will come through the ballot box. - (Hall) in an interview with the Cleveland Plain-Dealer (1996) It's is hard to make heads or tails of the above statement, much less its meaning. First it is virtually impossible to determine what Hall means by socialism. Everyone argues over the meaning of a socialist regime in America. Some advocate the continued existence of the stock market and the future markets as institutions of planning. The right wing of communism demands jobs for everyone because their is some intrinsic value to having a job. Some advocate all kinds of romantic notions of workers collectives, running industry. The use of the term ballot box rather than electoral arena is even more confusing. Overall the CPUSA has never had a coherent vision of the path to power and generally reject Lenin's conception of insurrection, and the party as an insurrectionary force. Apparently insurrection means violence to the bourgeoisie and the CPUSA. Consequently, the ideological struggle tended to pivot on an electoral path to state power or the uprising as the basis of armed insurrection. At the extreme is the idea of forming a Peoples Army, which is absurd, given the organization of power in the big cities and the absence of an opposing army - foreign or domestic, as the primary social prop of the bourgeois order. If an army is not the primary social and military proper of American bourgeois political rule, then why would one entertain a vision of forming an army? On the right wing of communism is the peaceful transition to state power, which is not a conception of violence vs non-violence, but rather a vision of the role of the electoral arena, or more precisely an evaluation of the parliamentary form. This vision is a vision, rather than a strategic conception of the revolutionary process, because there is no historical precedent for a transition of state power (the commanding heights of power) from one class to another class, as the basis for reorganization of society's social relations and suppression of the power of individually owned capital. The issue of state power appears to our bourgeoisie in the land of legalese as asking the communists if they advocate the violent overthrow of the government, knowing fully well that governments cannot be overthrown violently or non-violently as such. As if the aspiration of the communists is to overthrown the Social Security administration or HUD or the House of representatives. Governments can and do collapse. The state does in fact polarize and turn in on itself as the essence of the revolutionary crisis. And then a section of the state as state, passes over to the revolution. The insurrection is the act of seizing the commanding heights of power and all insurrection involved arms by definition of the state being an armed body of men. When a decisive section of the state passes over to the revolution, these folks do not give up their arms and go vote. At any rate the vision of a ballot box path to power can only means voting or confirming that the leaders of the proletariat are in fact their leaders. Anything else is laughable. This does not mean one opposes work in the electoral arena. WL. In a message dated 1/12/2009 10:59:47 A.M. Eastern Standard Time, __charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us_ (mailto:_charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us) _ (_mailto:charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us_ (mailto:charl...@cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us) )writes: _http://reds.linefeed.org/bios/gushall.html_
[Marxism-Thaxis] US's Negative Net Worth at $59.3 Trillion
US's Negative Net Worth at $59.3 Trillion by Paul Craig Roberts CounterPunch (January 12 2009) According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, nonfarm payroll employment declined by 3,445,000 from December 2007 through December 2008. The collapse in employment is across the board. Construction lost 520,000 jobs. Manufacturing lost 806,000 jobs. Trade, transportation and utilities lost 1,495,000 jobs (retail trade accounted for 1,120,000 of this loss). Financial activities lost 145,000 jobs. Professional and business services lost 713,000 jobs. Even government lost 188,000 jobs. Only in health care and social assistance has the economy been able to eke out a few new jobs. Many analysts believe the job losses will be as great or greater during 2009. Moreover, the reported job losses are likely understated. Noted statistician John Williams (shadowstats.com) reports that biases in measurement have understated the job loss over the last twelve months by 1,150,000 jobs. Williams reports the unemployment rate as it was measured prior to reforms designed to minimize the measured rate of unemployment. According to the methodology used in 1980, the US unemployment rate in December 2008 reached 17.5 percent. Yes, our government lies to us about economic statistics, just as it lies to us about terrorists, weapons of mass destruction, building freedom and democracy in the Middle East, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. An objective person would be hard pressed to find any statement made by the US government that is reliable. The collapse of the job market means even harder times for last year's and this year's crops of college graduates. The offshoring of professional jobs and the widespread use by US corporations of H-1b, L-1, and other work visa programs for foreigners have left many recent American university graduates without careers. Recently, Bill Gates of Microsoft was pleading with Congress to allow even more foreigners in on work visas. According to Gates, there is a shortage of American workers despite a 17.5 percent unemployment rate. I personally know American computer engineers, both seasoned and recent graduates, who cannot find jobs. What Gates and American corporations want is cheap labor, in effect indentured servants, unprotected people who don't demand an American standard of living and who have no student loans to repay. If Congress expands the work visas as US unemployment mounts, we will have one more piece of evidence that our representatives have no sympathy for the American people. Where were America's leaders while the economy slipped over the precipice? Our leaders were telling us lies in behalf of special interests into whose pockets Washington was pouring the taxpayers' money. Our leaders engineered wars that put billions of dollars into such disreputable pockets as Halliburton's, the firm of the American outlaw, Dick Cheney, and into Blackwater, supplier of the overpaid mercenaries that the Bush Regime uses to beef up its military force in Iraq. Some of the taxpayers' billions, of course, recycled into our representatives reelection campaign funds. Our leaders were too busy making trips to Israel to reaffirm their support for Israel's ongoing theft of Palestine and for wars that enable this theft. Our leaders were too busy serving financial interests by dismantling regulatory barriers to over-leveraged greed. The extraordinary level of leveraged debt and the fraudulent financial instruments resulted in annual compensation for hedge fund managers and investment bankers larger than a king's ransom. When the leveraged mortgages went bust, the banksters declared a crisis and Congress responded by ripping off the American taxpayers for another trillion dollars. More is to come. Credit card debt, car loans, and commercial real estate mortgages have been securitized, too. There is little doubt there are derivatives based on this enormous pile of debt. As each crisis unfolds, it will mean more bailout rewards for the crooks who deep-sixed the US economy. It is not implausible that by the end of this year the unemployment rate, honestly measured, will be as high as during the Great Depression. Few in Washington think there is any cause for alarm. Obama is calling the situation serious not because he believes it is but in order to get another trillion dollar stimulus package on the taxpayers' books. Stimulus will do the trick, economists say, and, moreover, the Federal Reserve has already extended $2 trillion in loans, but won't say to whom the money has been lent. This massive expansion of new debt, economists think, is going to fix the economy and put people back to work. They think the solution to excessive debt is more debt. The federal government budget deficit for the 2009 fiscal year will be $2
