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I hope you sent this to the list. I thought your analyses reminded me of the days I distributed the People's Tribune and i credit their center with the best theoretical ed group study ive enjoyed I taught from the big blue intro at u of ala til Reagan. I don't spend as much time as I used to a cp comrade once said, organizing among workers who belong to unions to take the most progressive step the people can take at the time". Actually the comrade who said that Peggy Powell Dobbins Sociology as an Art Form www.peggydobbins.net On Dec 8, 2010, at 2:36 PM, waistli...@aol.com wrote: > ====================================================================== > Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > ====================================================================== > > > > >>> What progressives need to do about Obama's sellout > > What you think is a progressive program for change was only an attempt to > head off real change during the Great Depression. > > After the stunning insult by the Messiah, no doubt progressives are feeling > a bit bewildered and frustrated. There is an easy answer for this: Admit > you are wrong and get it right this time. You are still immersed in the > make-believe world of the 1930s, but life has moved on. > > The GOP and the Democratic Party mainstream are kicking your butt because > they have dumped all their baggage from that period.<< > > > Reply > > Obama is not the Messiah and those voting for him did not understand him as > such. Really. > > Obama's "sell out" means he campaigned on a program of relief to the > American people and to use government as a solution to economic crisis. The > voting section of the American people voted for Obama because they believed > he > was a better choice than McCain and relief was possible and it is. > > The system cannot be fixed, but if the working class understood such we > would not have to have this conversation. In fact the workers would already > be > class conscious and we would be in the first stage of economic/political > communism. The question posed is "the art of the agitation" and where you > choose to engage people in your various contact points. For propaganda and > agitation I use a communist press, communist pamphlets and books in my daily > life activity, rather than confine myself or make on line chat - (important > for ones individual growth), my main political contribution. I suggest > using the Peoples Tribune and Rally Comrades, but you might like other > communist newspapers. I use these because they are not sectarian. > > > II. > > Organize real people is the answer to confront Obama's sellouts. One must > met people as individuals "at their current level of understanding." Join a > group fighting for a single payer health care system or working within the > electoral arena pushing government to make specific concessions to the > working class masses. Screaming about the ills of capital and how all minion > of > the ruling class work for the system will get you no where in a union > meeting, health care forum or demonstration against the local energy > provider. > Teaching people how to fight and understand what they are fighting for is > the art of agitation. Endless pontification about the Democrats being the > party of slaveholder is not agitation or even communist propaganda when it > is > devoid of sharing the experience of striving and fighting together. Get > popular communist literature into their hands, even if it means writing it > yourself. > > I do not confuse agitation, which means engagement and sharing the > experience of striving and fighting together for something as group activity > pressuring government or an employer, with propaganda. Both intermingle but > are > not the same. Propaganda is the role of the communist communist literature > and study circles. > > III. > > I agree, the epoch - (and I do not know what is hard to understand in the > word "epoch") of industrialism, industrial organization of labor, > industrial time frames, industrial models of social life and industrial > everything, as it arose out of manufacture and heavy manufacturing as a > system, and > took shape; specifically the electro-mechanical process as foundation and > cutting edge of the technology regime, is long gone and has given way to a > post industrial revolution. > > Society is undergoing an evolutionary leap from one mode of production to > another based on a post industrial revolution in the means of production. > What inaugurates the leap is revolution in the means of production rather > than political revolution as the so-called "socialist project." Politics > cannot produce a new mode of production, which by definition must begin as > revolution in the productive forces and the means of production in > particular. > Politics open the way for further development of a qualitatively new > technology regime as applied to production. Yes, capitalism remains because > it is > a property relation which has to be overthrown by political means. Capital > is not means of production. > > IV. > > This thing about the deficit is a hard nut to crack amongst a certain > section of the American people because our working class knows only bourgeois > > property, the wage labor form and has been schooled in the theology of > bourgeois economic outlook. The idea that an entire economy and finance - > credit, > is no different from owning a personal credit card, with payments > dependent on being able to hire oneself for wages, is absurd. > > "If government gives money where will it come from" is the insanity of the > bourgeoisie. Money comes from a printing press. > > The most destitute of the proletariat never asks such questions. With the > fundamental collapse of the historical industrial middle class and with it > the historic "political middle," with a specific form of consciousness > formed on the basis of WW II and its political aftermath, we might be able > to by > pass a century and a half of bourgeois nomenclature. The crisis of > liberalism is an expression of destruction of the industrial middle class > and its > corresponding "political middle," rather than Obama selling out people. > > > Yet, money can be understood as credit certificate. Credit is the ability > to obtain something with a price. Credit given can and should be returned > Not to the bank or government, but to someone else that needs it. Government > is not a person but an institution with the ability to print money, but > government does not need money. The people within government need credit. > Through laboring, or doing something that someone else needs, but cannot do > themselves because they are doing something else, a system of credit > allowing consumption can be sustained forever. Marx called this a society of > associated producers. > > Government can issue and spend money - issue sovereign credit and never > incur a debt. Sovereign credit is credit back by "your government" rather > than > a foreign government. > > I do not know how much of anything we will be able to explain but starting > is important. > > WL. > > > > ________________________________________________ > Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu > Set your options at: > http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/pegdobbins%40gmail.com ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
