>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 03/14/01 12:22PM >>>
G'day Mark'n'Chas,
Doug describes his intention for the book (no book can do it all, but this bit
certainly needed doing) as attempting 'to get down and dirty with how modern
American finance works and how it's connected to the real world'.
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CB: Hey Rob, yes and subsequent to his book, in a talk to the recent conference in
Essen _on_ Lenin, he said Lenin's theory of imperialism has nothing to teach us about
finance today. If that was his attitude in writing _Wallstreet_ it has to cast heavy
suspicions as to whether he could really get down and dirty with how modern American
finance works and how it's conected to the real world".
Then a couple of times on these lists he has told me directly that he thinks that
Lenin's understanding of finance capital does not include the stockmarket institution.
That seems a rather strange thing to say. If the stockmarket is not an institution in
which finance and industrial capital merge, what is it ? It seems some kind of
willful blindness not to see the current importance of Wallstreet as a roaring
confirmation of Lenin's thesis. I have to suspect it as typical left-liberal hate of
Lenin.. Before I even discussed this with Doug, upon reading his book, I was thinking
, wow, this is good empirical confirmation of Lenin's thesis. Doug once said that his
book was in the CPUSA bookstore window, and he didn't understand why. I don't know
whether to take that as innocent naivete or willful denial of the obvious fact that
his work supports, doesn't contradict Lenin's imperialism thesis, in order to
disassociate himself with communists. He basically ignores Lenin's main definition of
his thesis, and points to some minor side comment Lenin makes to claim that Lenin
mispredicted the direction of imperialism as not developing in the direction of the
stockmarket. Do you know any Marxist or Leninist who thinks that the stockmarket is
not a finance capital institution, or that its recent prominence does not fit Lenin's
thesis ? It is almost silly to deny as Doug does that _Wallstreet_ supports Lenin's
thesis.
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Then he
ends his thoroughly enlightening, thoroughly well written, thoroughly
researched and thoroughly comprehensive book with a prescription for market
socialism in light of the notion that 'a future society has to emerge out of
this one, on the basis of experimentation and struggle'.
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CB: That's great. He also, in response to me on email thoroughly says "monopoly" or
"state-monopoly" are not apt ways of describing capitalism today, so it is difficult
to see how he could thoroughly understand capitalism today. It may be a simple point ,
but it's very fundamental to not apprehend monopoly and state-monopoly if you are
going to espouse expertise on American finance capital 2001. It is also thoroughly
misleading to those who might admire his good work in other areas.
Also, on email, he very much vacillates on whether he is definite about the idea that
capitalism has to go. I guess that is sort of implied in his call for market
socialism.
Marx did not call for market socialism. In that regard, Lenin is closer to Marx than
Henwood is.
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Oh, and in between, he explicitly recommends that Marx's point about the
contradictions in corporate capitalism creating the conditions of possibility
for its own transcendence should be recovered.
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CB: Recovered ? Most Marxists I know never lost it. This very posturing as if Marxists
had lost track of this is the same fake , willful ignorance of Leninism. I must have
ready the same formulation you say he uses ten times in Soviet literature. It really
starts to tick me off when liberal lefts first pretend that Lenin has nothing to
offer, and then these same liberal lefts plagerize something from Lenin. Didn't he or
you ever here about imperialism's increased socialization of production laying the
groundwork for socialist organization ? For that matter, you never heard that
capitalism creates its own gravediggers ? How is the above anymore than a paraphrase
of this famous dictum from The Manifesto , and how the hell is anyone claiming that
Marxists lost track of this and it needs to be recovered. This is willful slander of
the Marxists since Marx.
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A point Keynes's economics
occasionally (depending how you read him) hints at from a safe distance,
perhaps - but then he retreats much more explicitly than he had ever
approached (see the concluding notes to his *General Theory*, for instance) -
and Keynes's articulately avowed social theory, scientistic bigotries and
Bloomsbury aesthetics certainly recoil at the very idea.
So put me down as one who sees the book as much closer to a Marxian text than
a Keynesian one. Not that a few left-Keynesians in positions of authority
wouldn't be a wondrous thing right now ...
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CB: Yea, it's Marxian , but not Marxist. The aggravating aspect is the implication
that _Wallstreet_ is closer to Marx than _Imperialism_. This is a gross
misrepresentation, the pretense that the eclectic use of bits and pieces of Marx is
closer than Leninism.
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Anyway, for my part, I'll start criticising when I do something half as useful
for people looking for a cogent and accessible analysis of the driving
institutions in our lives - and to people to whom the possibility has dawned
that what's wrong is radically wrong, and in need of radical social transformation.
Or even if I move a WSJ editor to call me 'scum' just once ...
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CB: As I say, Doug's analysis and book are as good as far as they go. He should be
praised for what is good, and criticized for what is bad in it, don't you think ? Why
because he made a contribution should he be exempted from criticism for his
shortcomings ?
There have always been left liberals. Proudhon and Lasalle radicalized many with
their writings and work, but , as we know, Marxists have to go beyond those writers.
Kautsky and Plekanov's writings radicalized many, but beyond the point at which they
were good, they had to be criticized. Marxism has a very high standard. Similarly
with Doug. His book and speeches help to radicalize some, but it is necessary also to
criticize him for the shortcomings, and specifically not let him get away with
anti-Leninism, especially because potential Marxists and communists listen to what he
says.
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