I read part of that article before I decided that I didn't have time for
it. I am still trying to catch up on email after my power outage and
more email just keeps coming in. But what you describe as the lumpen
proletariat is not the lumpen proletariat. The lumpen proletariat is
better described as the criminal class. A certain level of unemployment
is necessary under capitalism or else the cost of labor tends to be bid
up until the point comes that the capitalists can no longer make a
profit after paying for the labor. There will develop a section of the
unemployed that is so chronically unemployed for long enough that they
have to turn to criminality to survive. Yes, this tends to be the most
uneducated layers and they have other strikes against them. They fall
into that lifestyle as a way to make a living. I think a common term
that tends to describe them is gang bangers. But that is what the lumpen
proletariat is.
---
Voltaire
“ Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities. ”
― Voltaire,
On 7/1/2019 3:25 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
So, I posted a speech given by Chris Hedges at the Left Forum recently and
although I understood pieces of it, I'm not sure what his point was, and
there's a whole lot that I couldn't absorb. But I noticed that he talked about
the lumpen proletariat, and I know who they are. They're the ignorant working
class, and he says that. He also says that they naturally turn to violence and
right wing solutions to their problems. They were the Brown Shirts in Nazi
Germany. They're the working class voters who voted for Trump. He says that the
revolution has to be led by intellectuals, at least I think that's what he
said. So basically, the working people, those who are uneducated and poor, do
not naturally know what is in their best interests. People with superior
intellect and knowledge have to organize and lead them. This is the Marxist
view of humanity? It is very much like what The Age of Surveillance says that
Big Tech's view of humanity is. The only difference is the goal. Marxist
Socialism leads, theoretically, to some far future classless society when each
contributes according to his or her capabilities, and receives, according to
his or her needs, sort of like heaven. The goal of Big Tech is to manipulate
humanity so that with Artificial Intelligence's input, society will run
smoothly, just like a machine, to the benefit of Capitalism.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Monday, July 01, 2019 10:36 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Sanders's Speech Presents a Conundrum for New
Left's Socialist Strategy
From the very inception of this Great Experiment, the United States of America, the Working Class,
those people left out of the Constitution, were sold a Fairy Tale about the "Rugged
Individual", the ability to pull oneself up by their own boot straps, the self made
man...notice in all of this sales pitch that women were not included? It was not
"Lady-like" for women to stand alone on their own two feet.
We are even fed Fairy Tales about "self made millionaires".
Yet, do we ever look closely at our Great American Oligarchy? Its members,
while always bickering among themselves, always come together to protect their
right to rule. And that Right is given to them by the very Constitution they
drafted.
You and I are told that "Real Men" take care of their own. They can "take it on the
chin". They jeer those who join together in unions, shouting that these yellow bellied wimps
are acting like babies...like girls!
But the Oligarchy has no such confusion when its members are threatened. They
call out the police and the National Guard. Their daily newspapers call out
for courts to punish these unAmerican rioters who threaten our democracy. And
the White lackey preachers spring to their pulpits, calling on God Almighty to
strike down these Devil Spawn.
And far too many of our Working Class brothers and sisters buy into this false
reality. The roads are strewn with the maimed, crushed and disfigured bodies
of those brave Souls who believed that crawling into the bosses coal mine, or
climbing the girders of the bosses new tower, or striding into the forest
alone, when there should have been a team.
And the bosses? Like today's generals, they never leave the comfort of their
secure quarters to lead their people. In their private, secluded clubs they
cackle and sneer at the foolishness of the people they send out to do their
work.
And over and over they tell us that our dream is to be rich, like them. The real truth,
that which they hide from us, is that wealth can be Hoovered up and taken back by those
who "hand it out". Riches are only temporary. What is the real mark of
success is Power.
Control. And the Ruling Class has that well under control. They own the
factories, the railroads, the shipping lines, the airlines, the high rise
buildings, the Land on which those buildings stand, and the vast Lands we call
America. Maybe there are instances where the little guy won out over the big
guys, the churches love the story of David and his little sling. But the very
fact that it is a story told over and over simply points to the fact that David
was the exception to the rule.
What ever happened to the old saying, "There is strength in numbers"?
Or, "United we stand, divided, we fall"?
Carl Jarvis
On 7/1/19, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
And we have American culture which includes The American Dream. The
goal is to have material success and become wealthy. It is not for
everyone in America to have a comfortable home, nutritious food, and
to have their medical needs met. It is not for everyone to have an
opportunity to do meaningful work and earn a living wage. It is for
you, one person, to work hard enough so that you will become rich and
can retire early, if you so choose.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Sunday, June 30, 2019 9:36 PM
To: Roger Loran Bailey <rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx>
Cc: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Sanders's Speech Presents a Conundrum
for New Left's Socialist Strategy
As I see it, there are many Americans who do not trust their own judgement.
They assume that if they can't trust themselves then they kcan't trust
those people around them. This leaves the very wealthy.
They are considered to be successful because we have been conditioned
to believe that Wealth means Success. And the more that the Wealthy
are empowered, the more they appear to be successful, and thus,
qualified for leadership.
It's a vicious circle.
Carl Jarvis
On 6/30/19, Roger Loran Bailey <rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx> wrote:
The only reason I see that it is so difficult to understand is that
so many people do not understand what socialism is. That is largely
due to deliberate right-wing distortions. But how about this? If you
ever use Wikipedia you will know that any user can edit each article.
There is also a discussion page for each article and that discussion
page is for discussing proposed edits for improving the article.
Well, on the discussion page for an article on the Freedom Socialist
Party someone apparently misunderstood the purpose of the discussion
page while at the same time misunderstanding what socialism is. She
wanted to start a discussion on why would anyone use the words
freedom and socialism in the name of one party. She seemed to think
that was a complete contradiction in terms.
---
Carl Sagan
??? Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. ???
??? Carl Sagan
On 6/29/2019 9:07 PM, Carl Jarvis wrote:
Capitalism and Socialism cannot coexist.
Socialism and democracy can coexist.
Why is this so hard to understand?
Carl Jarvis
On 6/29/19, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
The answer to your question is that you just go ahead and organize
that socialist party outside of the existing power structure. The
question, however, seems to be assuming an incorrect idea of what
should be done with that socialist party organized outside the
capitalist electoral system. First, running socialists inside a
capitalist party defeats the whole idea of socialism. How is it
going to bring about socialism to work for and ensure that a
capitalist party continues in power? Then, since the electoral
system is rigged to ensure that only capitalist parties ever get
elected then what is the point of running candidates who will
compete for votes with the capitalist parties? If a socialist
party, socialist in reality and not just in name, runs candidates
the whole point in running them is to get a platform to get out
socialist ideas. That is, take advantage of those cracks in the
system to turn it against itself. The main goal of a real socialist
party, though, is to encourage and help organize strikes, marches,
demonstrations and other forms of mass action. Again, when you try
to change the system from within the system you are the one who
gets changed, not the system. That has been proven over and over so
many times that it is amazing that anyone still tries to change the system from
within it.
But people still do and they just keep failing.
---
Carl Sagan
??? Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. ???
??? Carl Sagan
On 6/26/2019 9:48 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
This article makes Roger's case for him. There are some problems
like, in America, how could you convince people to vote for open
borders and, given our election laws, how do you actually
construct a powerful working socialist party outside of the
existing structure?
Miriam
Sanders's Speech Presents a Conundrum for New Left's Socialist
Strategy
Sen. Bernie Sanders delivers remarks at a campaign function at
George Washington University Democratic presidential candidate Sen.
Bernie Sanders delivers remarks at a campaign function in the
Marvin Center at George Washington University on June 12, 2019, in
Washington, D.C.
Sarah Silbiger / Getty Images
By Ashley Smith, Truthout Published June 25, 2019
In the U.S., the failures of capitalism are being refracted in the
race for the White House, just as they were in 2016. On one side,
President Trump is rallying his predominantly middle-class voters
to re-elect him based on his program of economic nationalism and
bigotry that has wreaked havoc at home and abroad.
On the other side, Democrats are in a battle for their party's
presidential nomination to challenge the bigot billionaire in 2020.
Predictably, the party has banded together, at least for now,
around the establishment's favored candidate, Joe Biden, who
defends the existing capitalist order, albeit with minor reforms.
His challengers, however, have moved to the left, adopting
(however honestly or dishonestly) much of the program Sen. Bernie
Sanders put forward in 2016, while at the same time, rejecting
Sanders's self-proclaimed democratic socialism. They all know, including Sen.
Elizabeth Warren, that to win the party's support if Biden
stumbles, they must toe its pro-capitalist line.
Worried about Sanders and the growing popularity of socialism,
Trump and bottom-dwellers for the Democratic nomination like
Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper have red-baited Sanders, trying to
discredit his politics by associating him with Stalinist regimes.
Recently, Sanders took his detractors head-on in a landmark speech
at George Washington University.
He argued that the threat from authoritarian oligarchs like Trump
cannot be defeated by centrist neoliberals like Biden and
Hickenlooper, but only by democratic socialism. He defined that as
an extension of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal through a new
economic bill of rights that would include a right to a decent
job, health care and secure retirement.
Sanders also integrated the fight against climate change and all
forms of bigotry as essential parts of the struggle for socialism.
He underscored that he could not win any of this on his own but
only as part of a political revolution in which millions of people
join the political process, take over the Democratic Party and win
control of the government to transform the priorities of U.S.
society.
Predictably, the establishment in the media and both parties
brushed off the speech. The Washington Post's Robert J. Samuelson
called Sanders a "refugee from the 1930s." Senator Warren - who
recently proclaimed she's "capitalist to my bones," perhaps an
electorally foolish mistake that may alienate Sanders's supporters
- reacted with laughter when asked about his speech.
Some on the left have also dismissed the speech as merely
Sanders's attempt to woo radicals back into the Democratic Party.
Others breathlessly celebrated it as the most profound and
transformative speech since those delivered by Martin Luther King
Jr. and rejected criticisms of Sanders as missing the forest for the trees.
The left should not reduce its role to cheerleading Sanders's
speech and gloss over its weaknesses, because what's at stake is
the politics, aims and strategy of the new socialist movement.
But these responses on the left fail to grasp the contradictory
nature of the Sanders campaign, his electoral strategy in the
Democratic Party, and his conception of democratic socialism. In
contrast to Sanders's ultra-left detractors, radicals must
appreciate that, for the second consecutive presidential primary,
an open advocate of socialism is in the running for the Democratic
nomination.
Of course, those who credit Sanders for creating the new socialist
movement are exaggerating his impact; his popularity was made
possible by the Great Recession, the capitalist parties' bailout
of banks, and the popular resistance to austerity and scapegoating.
Nevertheless, it is important to recognize that Sanders has
encouraged this resistance and given a name to its politics -
socialism - and helped fuel the rise of the Democratic Socialists
of America (DSA).
We should celebrate his attacks on "unfettered capitalism," the
oligarchic billionaire class, authoritarians and fascists, as well
as his full-throated defense of socialism as means to achieve
freedom for workers and oppressed people.
Moreover, Sanders's proposed economic bill of rights raises the
stakes for all of us to fight for an agenda that puts people
before profit. That a mainstream candidate is putting forth such
demands should be grasped as an opportunity and used to advance
social and class struggle in order to achieve them.
At the same time, though, the left should not reduce its role to
cheerleading Sanders's speech and gloss over its weaknesses,
because what's at stake is not Sanders per se, but the politics,
aims and strategy of the new socialist movement. His speech
exposed three key problems we must overcome in order to win the
systemic change we so desperately need.
The Democratic Party: The Graveyard of the Left
First, Sanders's strategy of pursuing a political revolution
through the Democratic Party, however much it may raise the
profile of socialism, is a trap. As everyone from House Speaker
Nancy Pelosi to many (if not most) members of DSA recognize, the
Democratic Party is a capitalist and imperialist party, not a
labor party rooted in unions like that led by Jeremy Corbyn in Britain.
The Democratic Party is a capitalist and imperialist party, not a
labor party rooted in unions.
It is tightly controlled by a bureaucracy and elected officials,
both of which depend on the bosses for funding. That does not mean
it is no different than the Republican Party, which has
historically been the capitalists' "A Team" that openly serves
their interests and espouses conservatism.
The Democrats are the ruling class's liberal "B Team" that appeals
to workers and oppressed groups by promising change within the system.
Capitalists send them onto the field only when the "A Team" has
played badly and are in danger of losing.
The Democrats' function in the political game is two-fold: to
co-opt the left and prevent it from building a workers' party; and
to confine class and social struggle to tinkering with capitalism
instead of replacing it with socialism. That's why Marxists have
always called the Democratic Party the graveyard of social
movements and the left.
Every attempt to use the capitalist's "B Team" has backfired, from
the Communist Party's popular front during the Great Depression,
to Michael Harrington's realignment strategy that tried to turn it
into a labor party in the 1960s and 1970s, to the Maoists' similar
effort in Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition during the 1980s. Each
time the left was co-opted, movements demobilized in support of a
party that then took them for granted and moved to the right,
betraying their promises in the process.
Today, the Democrats are in a stronger position to co-opt the new
socialist left. As Kim Moody documents,
The party has become a well-funded, professionalized, multitiered
hierarchy capable of intervening in elections at just about every
level. It selects candidates, provides funding, furnishes
endorsements, offers media relations, and supplies computer and
digital campaign and get-out-the-vote services. In Congress and
most state legislatures, its leaders impose a high level of party
discipline, such that for the last two decades 90 percent of floor
votes in both houses have been along strict party lines.
Sanders's run in 2016 exemplifies the ruling class's stranglehold
on the party. Although he electrified a new generation with his
call for socialism and did better than he or anyone expected, he
was, in the end, stymied by the bureaucracy, elected officials and
capitalist funders. While they treated him politely in public,
they ensured that their anointed candidate, Hillary Clinton, won
the nomination.
The Democratic establishment is even more prepared to neutralize
Sanders this time. Now backing Biden, it has encouraged a host of
pro-capitalist progressives to split Sanders's vote and greenlit
Hickenlooper and others'
redbaiting. The party will try to persuade voters desperate to
kick Trump out of office to play it safe, take no risks on
Sanders's socialism, and vote for Biden or some other "electable"
candidate who is moderate enough to win over conservative voters.
Even Anita Hill, who suffered the worst sexist discrimination from
Biden and has every reason to oppose him, has accepted this logic,
telling reporters, "Of course, I could" vote for him. These
tactics have successfully driven down Sanders's poll numbers over
the last couple of months with Warren in particular gaining at his
expense, proving yet again the difficulty of advancing socialism
in a capitalist party.
Socialists, regardless of their position on Sanders's campaign,
must unite to organize an exit from the Democratic Party and build
a new independent socialist party.
While DSA has endorsed Sanders, its left wing understands that the
Democratic Party cannot be taken over, but rather must be replaced.
Instead
of backing third parties now, though, one of its most prominent
caucuses, Bread and Roses, supports a dirty break strategy of
using the Democrats'
ballot line to run socialist candidates, project its program,
encourage class struggle, win office and build an organization
within the Democrats to eventually split off and set up a new
workers' party.
While this strategy has led to some stunning breakthroughs, like
the election of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to Congress, as well
as candidates for state and city council offices, Sanders does not
support it.
Instead
of
advocating taking over the party, he has already promised that if
he loses, he will campaign for whichever Democrat wins the
nomination in the general election.
The left must challenge his argument, especially because he has
the greatest influence over the trajectory of our new movement. To
avoid the fate of our left-wing predecessors, socialists,
regardless of their position on Sanders's campaign, must unite to
organize an exit from the Democratic Party and build a new
independent socialist party.
Socialism Not Liberalism
Second, as part of his accommodation to the Democratic Party,
Sanders - who used to extol Eugene Debs's Socialist Party as his
model - now explicitly associates socialism with Franklin Delano
Roosevelt's New Deal. While he may do that to reach a popular
audience, as some on the left have argued, it both sows illusions
about Roosevelt's program and limits the horizons of socialism to,
at best, reformist management of capitalism.
Let's be clear: Roosevelt was, as he declared, "the best friend
the profit system ever had" and the "savior" of "the system of
private profit and free enterprise." FDR's aim was not to
institute socialism through the New Deal, but use government
programs to revive the system, stabilize it through social reform,
and co-opt a workers' movement that threatened to break with the
two-party system and challenge capitalist rule.
As much as Sanders raises expectations for social reform, he
narrows the vision of democratic socialism below even that of
social democracy.
Even FDR's call for an economic bill of rights, which Sanders
resuscitates, never threatened to nationalize capitalism's means
of production.
That's
why
169 capitalist countries - including Germany, Australia and France
- ratified the U.N. version of it called "The International
Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights."
That's where many on the left are mistaken, confusing liberal
tinkering with actual socialism. Norman Thomas, the longtime
leader of the reformist Socialist Party, was right when he wrote,
"What Mr. Roosevelt has given us is State capitalism: that is to
say, a system under which the State steps in to regulate and in
many cases to own, not for the purpose of establishing production
for use but rather for the purpose of maintaining in so far as may
be possible the profit system with its immense rewards of private
ownership and its grossly unfair division of the national income."
Thus, as much as Sanders raises expectations for social reform, he
narrows the vision of democratic socialism below even that of
social democracy to New Deal liberalism. Classic social democracy,
whatever its weaknesses, at least promised to use nationalization
to socialize and democratize control of the economy, whereas
liberalism merely promises adjustments to capitalism, not its
transformation into workers' democratic control of society, which
is the goal of socialism.
Compromising Socialist Internationalism
Third, Sanders's speech failed to uphold socialist
internationalism on today's central questions of immigration and U.S.
imperialism.
This failure flows from his collaboration with an imperialist
party, as well as the nationalist logic of social democracy, which
has always put use of the state for domestic reform for workers at
home above international solidarity.
It
was thus not an accident that he delivered the speech before a sea
of U.S.
flags.
Of course, Sanders rightly denounces Trump's attacks on immigrants.
But he opposes open borders as an idea hatched by the Koch
brothers, and instead supports the Democrats' preferred "solution"
to the "problem" of undocumented immigrants - Comprehensive
Immigration Reform (CIR). At best, this is a lesser evil; it
includes increased policing of the border to stop further
immigration, onerous conditions for legalization, and
pro-corporate guest worker programs.
As Lucy Herschel argues, in practice, this policy was responsible
for "a reign of terror on immigrant communities that former
President Obama himself elevated to a high art during his eight
years in office. For the past decade, CIR has required the
deportation of more than 100,000 people a year, the detention of
hundreds of thousands more in inhuman conditions and the
terrorization of millions of families - all in exchange for
comprehensive legislation that never came and now seems further
away than ever."
Socialists should reject CIR and instead demand amnesty for all
undocumented immigrants and open borders. Our slogans should be
those Jesse Myerson
advocates: "No penalties, no electric fences, no drone
surveillance, no papers, no fear. Instead, universal human rights,
consecrated in struggle, enforced by solidarity. The unification
of the world's workers demands this."
Such internationalism also requires opposition to imperialism -
something Sanders strangely left out of his speech. Socialists
must remember that the U.S. is not just any other state. It runs
an informal empire that reproduces and enforces global capitalism;
it is in competition with other imperialist powers, especially
China; and it oppresses weaker nations throughout the world. Under
the misnomer "national defense," Washington's war machine gobbles
up hundreds of billions of dollars a year on conventional and
nuclear weapons, troops, and over 800 military bases around the world.
Of course, Sanders has rightly opposed George W. Bush's occupation
of Iraq, Saudi Arabia's U.S.-backed war in Yemen, and Trump's
threat of war on Iran.
But he voted for the war in Afghanistan and war budgets that
funded the occupations of both Afghanistan and Iraq.
Underlying this mixed record is his mistaken belief that the U.S.,
under progressive leadership, could play a positive role in the
world, especially in forging what he calls an international
alliance in defense of democracy against authoritarian rulers like
China's Xi Jinping, who he explicitly singles out in his speech.
Such a position risks giving left-wing cover for Washington's
confrontation with Beijing, an inter-imperial rivalry driven not
by the politics of either regime, but their capitalist economies'
competition for domination over the world market.
The new socialist movement should instead follow the lead of
Martin Luther King, Jr. who viewed the U.S. state not as a
potentially benign force, but "the greatest purveyor of violence
in the world today." King further called attention to how the
massive expenditure on the war machine killing people abroad
drains funds and resources that could otherwise go to workers and
the oppressed at home.
That's why he spoke out against the Vietnam War and argued that
the poor people's movement he initiated near the end of his life
had to oppose what he called the "triple evils of racism, economic
exploitation, and militarism." The new left should heed this call
and build an independent mass movement to confront all of the
system's inequalities at home and abroad.
To win that struggle, we must build a new party of our own, uphold
fierce internationalist opposition to all imperialisms, organize
international solidarity from below, and challenge both parties of
capital not only in the ballot box, but more importantly, in the
streets and in workplaces where we have the power not only to win
a political and social revolution for socialist democracy in the
U.S., but throughout the world.
We don't have much time left.
