----- Original Message -----
From: Bruce Leier <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: Victor Milne <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: December 13, 1999 6:31 PM
Subject: Re: Krystallnacht in Seattle
> sniped from V. Milne: 12/11/99 post:
> > I do think your point about the dangers of
> demonizing capitalists is very
> > well taken. I can't think of any definition of
> capitalism that will send
> > Bill Gates to the guillotine while sparing the
> independent plumber with a
> > battered old van.
>
> no need to "guillotine"
>
> > I do not believe that it will ever be possible,
> or even desirable, to
> > eliminate capitalism in the broad sense. There
> will always be those
> > independent plumbers in their battered old vans.
>
> The "plumbers in their battered old vans" that I
> know don't consider themselves capitalists.
> They're just working stiffs who got sick and tired
> of taking orders from bosses. To replay an old
> them - the bosses spend a great deal of time and
> money to convince us that they are on the side of
> and are just the same as the mom & pops ( and
> plumbers etc). To believe that is to give up the
> battle. Most of those folks that I know are much
> closer to the homeless than to Bill Gates.
>
I'm not sure whether people are misreading this by taking it out of
context--I was responding to Ed Weick's concern that very ordinary, humble
people could get targeted as "capitalists", certainly not to argue that Bill
Gates is just doing the same kind of thing as an independent plumber in a
battered old van. He most certainly ain't. How the plumber thinks of himself
is not really relevant to this issue either. No doubt the peasant farmer who
were liquidated in the old Soviet Union did not think of themselves as
exploiters of the poor. The point is that the leaders of the revolution
identified them as such.
Just to clear up one other point, in his original posting Ed Weick mentioned
MacDonald and Starbucks franchisees. From what I know I wouldn't be inclined
to put these people in the same class as "mom and pop" stores.
Victor Milne
PS. On the matter of the guillotine, I have been muttering for the past two
years, "If the capitalists don't smarten up soon, some working class genius
is going to re-invent the guillotine."
