[Marxism] Russia Without Putin by Tony Wood review – myths of the new cold war | Books | The Guardian
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/dec/27/russia-without-putin-by-tony-wood-review _ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Russia without Putin
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * Louis, My postings never get through. I get a message that my post is under moderator's approval and it never gets posted. It happened a number of times. I do not know what might be the technical problem. That is why I am posting to you. You may please post in the group.Regarding the subject cited above, here is my reaction: "I had the opportunity to visit Russia on the invitation of my Indian friends in Moscow in August 2018. I had spent 2 weeks there and had discussions with a cross section of Russians. In an informal get together, with about a dozen Russians and a few Indians, the conversation turned to politics. They wanted to know what I think of Russia, after collapse of USSR. I replied that it is saddening to see that the welfare programs are being withdrawn. I told them that they should preserve what was good in Soviet times.One Russian lady, who is married to an Indian, asked me, "when are you going to get rid of Modi?"I said, the opinion polls indicate that he may not ride back to power in 2019."Don't be fooled. Our Putin and your Modi, will never step down. Whether we want or not, Putin manages to win elections. So is the case with Modi."As I understood from their conversation, they have nothing against socialism, but want socialism with democracy.In the regional elections held last month, the opposition, including communists have won more votes in many places, but strangely, Putin's candidates were declared elected. The vote percentage of Communists had gone up from 19.5% to 40% in many places. I cam back with a distinct feeling that Russia is set for a change.Vijaya Kumar Marla _ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Russia Without Putin
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * Wood's book sounds great. See also Holmstrom and Smith: https://monthlyreview.org/2000/02/01/the-necessity-of-gangster-capitalism/ > > _ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
Re: [Marxism] Russia Without Putin
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * Tony Wood's book certainly sounds like worthwhile reading. Another excellent book is "House of Trump, House of Putin" by Craig Unger. Unger is no Marxist, but he does an excellent job of tracing the history of the Russian criminal gangs that became such an essential part of the new Russian capitalist class that rose up after the collapse of the Soviet Union. He explains how these gangs actually had their roots in Tsartist times, how they developed through Stalin's gulag, how they then formed an embryonic capitalist class when Khruschev released hundreds of thousands from the gulag, including those prison gangs, and how they then linked up with the former Soviet bureaucrats who stole all the Russian state enterprises for a song. Unger also explains how Putin arose from this heap of dung to become the capo di tutti capo. John Reimann -- *“In politics, abstract terms conceal treachery.” *from "The Black Jacobins" by C. L. R. James Check out:https:http://oaklandsocialist.com also on Facebook _ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
[Marxism] Russia Without Putin | Louis Proyect: The Unrepentant Marxist
POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. * For the longest time Vladimir Putin has assumed the role of an Ian Fleming super-villain in the imaginations of both liberal and neoconservative pundits. Like one of those well-worn set pieces in a James Bond novel, he sits opposite our British super-spy in a chess game with the world hegemony awarded to the winning side. Or in the case of a draw, multipolarity. Any book on Putin and Russia that departs from these stereotypes would be most welcome. When it turns out to be a first-rate Marxist analysis, it should be added to your must-read list for 2019. The good news is that book has arrived in the form of Tony Wood’s Russia Without Putin: Money, Power and the Myths of the New Cold War, a ground-breaking study that departs from the lurid personality-driven narratives that are the stock-in-trade of MSNBC or the Washington Post. Additionally, for those on the left whose ideas are shaped by Stephen F. Cohen’s pro-Putin apologetics, the book will serve as a wake-up call to return to a class rather than a chess analysis. If Rachel Maddow is for the chess-master playing white, there is no reason to uncritically root for who is playing black. In keeping with the palette analogy, it is worth recalling Lenin’s citation of Mephistopheles’s words from Goethe’s Faust in his 1917 Letter on Tactics: “Theory, my friend, is grey, but green is the eternal tree of life.” full: https://louisproyect.org/2018/12/28/russia-without-putin/ _ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
