RE: Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx new ref # 33417
Title: RE: [PEN-L:33442] Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx new ref # 33417 Joanna writes: But take my word for it, [in the US] there is a level of anxiety, of unrelenting fear and mistrust, the likes of which I have not encountered anywhere else on earth. Michael Moore's BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE suggests that the reason for all the gun shootings in the US is not the prevalence of guns as much as the unrelenting fear and mistrust that we all suffer from. It makes sense: we're all told -- and we all believe -- that if we fail, it's our fault and no-one else's. Each American is every other one's rival in the Great Big Market, unless of course we're uniting around the Flag to beat up some other country. It feels like it's either individual rivalry or national unity, with nothing in-between. BTW, L.A. is pretty bad (as Joanna says) but it has a lot of plays and movies and other culture if you can afford it. Jim
Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx new ref # 33442
At 05:27 PM 12/27/2002 -0800, you wrote: I think emotional structure is key to making left organization. There is a confusion about using text based tools to form emotional structure in left groups. In my email 'Face Blindness' I give some of the crucial elements of emotion structure that the face provides that text either poorly performs or can't do at all. Face to face organizing founders in competition with media emotion structures. Email distribution lists come closer to a model of left organizing that succeeds where face to face is not succeeding. One can belong agnostically to several lists. The group membership is loose, and relatively open to the world. Email suffers like any other text based communication tool with comparison to expressing emotion structure via the face. So for now we continue to confront what you raised as a problem in your remark. I see the problem in my way, but the commonality we share is that emotion structure is the barrier in the U.S. to an effective left. You bring up many interesting and true points. Emotion is key -- and the way in which emotion is not felt in the context of action, but passively is also true. Two variables to mention in connection with that is 1) that to feel an emotion requires time, and Americans are one of the most overworked people on earth: no time = no emotion and 2) as so much of the emotion we feel is constructed by advertising, we have come to think of emotions as things that are subjective/individual/divisive. The notion of an emotion (pride, rage, anger, love) as a binding force is uncommon in the U.S. The closest thing to it is rooting for your football/baseball/basketball team. You also leave out one important social space -- that created by religion. It seems to me that the official religion of the left is atheism and I think this is a huge loss. I think the left needs to recongize that there is a whole spectrum of religious belief in the U.S. -- ranging from the communal meditative practices of Buddhists and Quakers...to extreme Xtian fundamentalism. To put all these practices into the same basket of delusion is a big mistake. It completely shuts out many communities that do believe that the right to life is greater than the right to property, and these communities would well be worth working with. Joanna
Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx new ref # 33417
At 10:57 PM 12/25/2002 -0800, you wrote: In regard to your remark about loneliness, the U.S. has a divided atomized people, does that make them weird? How do you measure loneliness? Some people are and some people aren't in the U.S. culture. Broad generalizations easily become a vehicle for prejudice. Is that what I use to organize someone a concern for their U.S. loneliness? Their degree of loneliness because they live here? Organizing someone is about their network of connections, their work, their social network inside and outside their jobs. And in that there are varying degrees of needs and wants that we want to overcome as reds. I came to this country in 63. I was nine. My parents acted like we were coming to heaven on earth. My own feeling was that we had landed on Mars--- otherwise known as Los Angeles. Up to that point I had lived in Bucharest and Paris. Los Angeles was a cold hell. Because I was a child, the material goods didn't impress me. What stunned me were the empty streets, the superficial make nice...underneath of which was ...nothing. You can't call it loneliness because to do that, people would have to feel lonely; but Americans don't feel lonely because they have no experience of what social warmth and social presence feels like. In the last forty years in this country, I have met some extraordinary Americans. They tended to be leftists. But take my word for it, there is a level of anxiety, of unrelenting fear and mistrust, the likes of which I have not encountered anywhere else on earth. Joanna
RE: Re: RE: The Economist considers Karl Marx
Title: RE: [PEN-L:33297] Re: RE: The Economist considers Karl Marx JKS says:Well, Southern Cal, that's where all the loose marbles go anyway . . . . Haven't you read Nathaniel West's Day of the Lucust? who was it was said that it's as if the whole country had been tipped on its side, so that everything loose fell to California? N. West? I thought it was Frank Lloyd Wright. Bartlett, call your office... Jim in RI
Re: Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
- Original Message - From: andie nachgeborenen [EMAIL PROTECTED] It's a logical impossibility. If there's no state, there's no property or contract law, so no title to anything, and no sanctioned and enforceable exchanges, so no markets. A most rare and strange zone, where law and logic overlap, no? :-) This is a point Cass Sunstein has usefully insisted on over the years. jks === Is there a richer, non-obvious genealogy of CS' claims I can find out more about? Ian
Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
Peter Drucker proclaimed the United States the first truly 'Socialist' country, because workers, through their pension funds own at least 25% of its equity capital, which is more than enough for control. In Drucker's reckoning, socialism was introduced by then head of General Motors Charles Wilson in 1950 to blunt union militancy by making visible the workers' stake in company profits and company success. Drucker, Peter F. 1976. The Unseen Revolution: How Pension Fund Socialism Came to America (NY: Harper and Row): p. 6. On Fri, Dec 20, 2002 at 09:31:41AM -0800, Tom Walker wrote: Oh those proles, the lucky duckies: they own the companies, they tell the government what to do, they choose who rules... and they don't even have to pay taxes! -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
In that case, the Economist and Peter Drucker won't mind if we abolish the wage relationship and private appropriation of returns on capital, turning the factories and offices and farms over to the workers and farmers, who will manage them themselves and collective appropriate the entire fruits of their labor -- nothing left overfor the rentiers.. After all, we're already socialist, so that woukd be an inessential tweak on the fundamental underlying structure. Sheesh. Do these guys believe that shit, or do they expect anyone else to believe it, or to believe that they believe it? Why do they say it then? jks Michael Perelman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Peter Drucker proclaimed the United States "the first truly'Socialist' country," because workers, through their pension funds"own at least 25% of its equity capital, which is more than enoughfor control." In Drucker's reckoning, socialism was introduced bythen head of General Motors Charles Wilson in 1950 to "blunt unionmilitancy by making visible the workers' stake in company profitsand company success." Drucker, Peter F. 1976. The UnseenRevolution: How Pension Fund Socialism Came to America (NY: Harperand Row): p. 6.On Fri, Dec 20, 2002 at 09:31:41AM -0800, Tom Walker wrote: Oh those proles, the lucky duckies: they own the companies, they tell the government what to do, they choose who rules... and they don't even have to pay taxes! -- Michael PerelmanEconomics DepartmentCalifornia State Univ! ersityChico, CA 95929Tel. 530-898-5321E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
Re: Re: Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
- Original Message - From: andie nachgeborenen [EMAIL PROTECTED] In that case, the Economist and Peter Drucker won't mind if we abolish the wage relationship and private appropriation of returns on capital, turning the factories and offices and farms over to the workers and farmers, who will manage them themselves and collective appropriate the entire fruits of their labor -- nothing left over for the rentiers.. After all, we're already socialist, so that woukd be an inessential tweak on the fundamental underlying structure. Sheesh. Do these guys believe that shit, or do they expect anyone else to believe it, or to believe that they believe it? Why do they say it then? jks == They lurk on this list to see if we still read their drivel. Ian
RE: Re: Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
Title: RE: [PEN-L:33272] Re: Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx in common parlance, even among many economists, socialism refers to any government interference in the so-called free market. (For example, the economic historian Peter Temin referred to the rise of state intervention during the 1930s as socialism in many countries.) Even some socialists see socialism as merely referring to state ownership of the means of production, not caring who or what owns the state. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine JKS wrote: In that case, the Economist and Peter Drucker won't mind if we abolish the wage relationship and private appropriation of returns on capital, turning the factories and offices and farms over to the workers and farmers, who will manage them themselves and collective appropriate the entire fruits of their labor -- nothing left over for the rentiers.. After all, we're already socialist, so that woukd be an inessential tweak on the fundamental underlying structure. Sheesh. Do these guys believe that shit, or do they expect anyone else to believe it, or to believe that they believe it? Why do they say it then? jks Michael Perelman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Peter Drucker proclaimed the United States the first truly 'Socialist' country, because workers, through their pension funds own at least 25% of its equity capital, which is more than enough for control. In Drucker's reckoning, socialism was introduced by then head of General Motors Charles Wilson in 1950 to blunt union militancy by making visible the workers' stake in company profits and company success. Drucker, Peter F. 1976. The Unseen Revolution: How Pension Fund Socialism Came to America (NY: Harper and Row): p. 6. On Fri, Dec 20, 2002 at 09:31:41AM -0800, Tom Walker wrote: Oh those proles, the lucky duckies: they own the companies, they tell the government what to do, they choose who rules... and they don't even have to pay taxes!
RE: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
Title: RE: [PEN-L:33279] Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx Aren't governments unownable by definition? Sure some factions/classes may think the government their personal property, but don't we deride that as delusional? officially, the Absolutist kings owned their states (l'état c'est moi!) and appointed the boards of directors (i.e., governments). The equivalents of today's left existing at the time might have seen this claim as delusional, but it was backed by the force of arms. Might may not make right in the moral sense of the word, but it often does so in practice. Non-interference in the market is a legal impossibility, no? Markets couldn't exist without the state, but common mythology (shared by many econo-dunderheads) has it that markets are natural. Jim
Re: RE: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
- Original Message - From: Devine, James [EMAIL PROTECTED] Aren't governments unownable by definition? Sure some factions/classes may think the government their personal property, but don't we deride that as delusional? officially, the Absolutist kings owned their states (l'état c'est moi!) and appointed the boards of directors (i.e., governments). The equivalents of today's left existing at the time might have seen this claim as delusional, but it was backed by the force of arms. Might may not make right in the moral sense of the word, but it often does so in practice. = And how many absolute monarchies still exist today? Isn't that an example of a modicum of progress, a gift from the struggles of the past? Non-interference in the market is a legal impossibility, no? Markets couldn't exist without the state, but common mythology (shared by many econo-dunderheads) has it that markets are natural. Jim === Well, since we have no idea as to what is non-natural, we can chalk that up to insufficient attention to language. Ian
Re: Re: RE: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
Ian Murray wrote: - Original Message - From: Devine, James [EMAIL PROTECTED] [clip] Markets couldn't exist without the state, but common mythology (shared by many econo-dunderheads) has it that markets are natural. Jim === Well, since we have no idea as to what is non-natural, we can chalk that up to insufficient attention to language. Natural takes up about 14 columns in the OED. I don't think we can ground ths argument in linguistics or semantics. I didn't pry into those 14 columns, but I bet they contain abundant (respectable) sanction for the linguistic acceptability of the proposition that Markets are natural. Carrol
RE: Re: RE: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
Title: RE: [PEN-L:33281] Re: RE: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx Aren't governments unownable by definition? Sure some factions/classes may think the government their personal property, but don't we deride that as delusional? I wrote: officially, the Absolutist kings owned their states (l'état c'est moi!) and appointed the boards of directors (i.e., governments). The equivalents of today's left existing at the time might have seen this claim as delusional, but it was backed by the force of arms. Might may not make right in the moral sense of the word, but it often does so in practice. Ian writes: And how many absolute monarchies still exist today? Isn't that an example of a modicum of progress, a gift from the struggles of the past? It's possible we could have Absolutism again. That's where the Bush admin. is heading. Non-interference in the market is a legal impossibility, no? said I: Markets couldn't exist without the state, but common mythology (shared by many econo-dunderheads) has it that markets are natural. Ian: Well, since we have no idea as to what is non-natural, we can chalk that up to insufficient attention to language. I'm only reporting the common myth. Astrology doesn't make sense either, but it's quite popular. Jim
Re: Re: Re: RE: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
- Original Message - From: Carrol Cox [EMAIL PROTECTED] Well, since we have no idea as to what is non-natural, we can chalk that up to insufficient attention to language. Natural takes up about 14 columns in the OED. I don't think we can ground ths argument in linguistics or semantics. I didn't pry into those 14 columns, but I bet they contain abundant (respectable) sanction for the linguistic acceptability of the proposition that Markets are natural. Carrol === Which renders such statements totally innocuous and beside the point. Government is natural. Space flight is natural. Bowling is natural. Ian
Re: Re: Re: RE: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
At 03:59 PM 12/20/2002 -0600, you wrote: I didn't pry into those 14 columns, but I bet they contain abundant (respectable) sanction for the linguistic acceptability of the proposition that Markets are natural. The question is though Markets are natural to what? Joanna
Re: Re: The Economist considers Karl Marx
Ian Murray Aren't governments unownable by definition? Sure some factions/classesmay think the government their personal property, but don't we deridethat as delusional? W once referred --as Dave Barry said, i am not making this up -- to his "investorsm er I mean my contributors." Non-interference in "the market" is a legalimpossibility, no? It's a logical impossibility. If there's no state, there's no property or contract law, so no title to anything, and no sanctioned and enforceable exchanges, so no markets. This is a point Cass Sunstein has usefully insisted on over the years.jksDo you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
Re: RE: The Economist considers Karl Marx
Jim D: but just as the lunatics have taken over the asylum, the looney right wing has taken over the conciousness of much of the US citizenry (at least here in SoCal), along with taking over more and more of the judiciary every day. Well, Southern Cal, that's where all the loose marbles go anyway . . . . Haven't you read Nathaniel West's Day of the Lucust? Of course, in _practice_, there's an amendment that should be made: if the government intervention directly and materially helps businesses, it's not "socialism" but is part of "laissez-faire." This amendment reflects the common contrast between laissez-faire theory (no guvmint!) and laizzez-faire practice (guvmint should help biz, in public/private partnerships). But in common parlance in places where I've lived, ordinary folk may disagree about how much the govt should regulate, etc., without starting to use the S-word. yes, but in much of popular consciousness, state ownership is simply further down the spectrum from state intervention in the "free" market. It's a matter of quantitative change becoming qualitative. There's something to that, no? If the state nationalizes the commanding heights, you might not have a worker's democracy, but you won't have capitalism anymore. jksDo you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
