"Why Marxism?" An Evening at FEE with C. Bradley Thompson

The video above is a lecture by C. Bradley Thompson of the Clemson Institute for the Study of Capitalism.

Hat Tip: Trevor Loudon


Clemson Institute for the Study of Capitalism

The Lecturer

C. Bradley Thompson is the BB&T Research Professor at Clemson University and the Executive Director of the Clemson Institute for the Study of Capitalism. He has also been a visiting fellow at Princeton and Harvard universities and at the University of London.

Professor Thompson is the author of the prize-winning book John Adams and the Spirit of Liberty. He has also edited The Revolutionary Writings of John Adams, Antislavery Political Writings, 1833-1860: A Reader and was an associate editor of the four-volume Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment. His current book project is on “The Ideological Origins of American Constitutionalism.”

Dr. Thompson is also an occasional writer for The Times Literary Supplement of London. He has lectured around the country on education reform and the American Revolution, and his op-ed essays have appeared in scores of newspapers around the country and abroad. Dr. Thompson's lectures on the political thought of John Adams have twice appeared on C-SPAN television.

For more information on why Marxism is so evil: (Occupiers should read this to learn why their movement, if successful, would lead to the deaths of millions of Americans)

Why Socialism, Communism and Marxism Don’t Work and Never Will

Why Marxism Always Fails

How Many People Did Communism Kill?

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Wearing of the Orange on St Patrick's Day

The Orange Order flag, also known as the Boyne Standard, consisting of an orange background with a St George's Cross and a purple star which was the symbol of Williamite forces.

Formation: 1796 in Loughgall, County Armagh, Ireland

Type: Fraternal organisation

Purpose/focus: To promote and propagate "Biblical Protestantism" and the principles of the Reformation. To commemorate via Parades and Orange Walks on The Twelfth the life and the accession of the Protestant William of Orange to the thrones of England, Scotland, and Ireland, during the Glorious Revolution and his victory over Roman Catholic, Jacobite, forces led by James II at the Battle of the Boyne ensuring a Protestant succession to the monarchy.


I always wear Orange on St Patrick's Day to protest the Irish Catholic connection to Communism and Terrorism.

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Stand Against Chaos and Old Night

Addenda: A short 11 minute piece from the John Batchelor Show in defense of capitalism against the wolves at the door. 
Download an MP3 and share with people so they can understand the utter ignorance of those attacking Bain Capital.


No wonder the Republican Party is so fractured with factions. People have forgotten what conservatism really is or where it came from (some have been so clueless as to look in a dictionary instead to Burke or Kirk) and have no clue about what capitalism looks like. They think jobs are a sinecure & an employer should never reduce the number of employees or change the way they do things in order to become more efficient and that buying out the competition is sacrilegious. They fail to see [Facebook Link] that capitalism is basically survival of the fittest and that government intervention in the market (and Wall Street) has distorted market forces and businesses have had to pay out bribes and to politicians and special interest groups...both on the Left and the Right...banks have been forced to give loans to people that should never have gotten loans to begin with and that led to a whole cascade of problems that we still have yet to recover from as illustrated in the video below:






We are in a race between education and catastrophe...

If you dare call yourself a conservative, then you should read "The Conservative Mind: From Burke to Eliot" (Amazon Link) to more fully understand what conservatism is and what it means and how you should apply it in your life. You may decide after reading it that this is not what you are and you have been led astray by other people who were just using conservatism as a buzz word without really knowing what they were saying or allying themselves with. 

This book is also chock full of references to conservative thinkers and books they have written. When you read it, keep a notepad handy to write down names, books and ideas. If you wish to preserve our traditions, to stand against the forces of chaos and old night...this book is the best place to get you started on that path.

"In essence, the conservative person is simply one who finds the permanent things more pleasing than Chaos and Old Night." ~Russell Kirk


And, if I may, I'd suggest that knowing where we came from is very important. David McCullough says it far better than I can, so I'll post a link to a talk he gave at Hillsdale College in February of 2005, an excerpt of that is below:

We are raising a generation of young Americans who are by-and-large historically illiterate. And it’s not their fault. There have been innumerable studies, and there’s no denying it. I’ve experienced it myself again and again. I had a young woman come up to me after a talk one morning at the University of Missouri to tell me that she was glad she came to hear me speak, and I said I was pleased she had shown up. She said, ”Yes, I’m very pleased, because until now I never understood that all of the 13 colonies —the original 13 colonies—were on the east coast.“ Now you hear that and you think: What in the world have we done? How could this young lady, this wonderful young American, become a student at a fine university and not know that? I taught a seminar at Dartmouth of seniors majoring in history, honor students, 25 of them. The first morning we sat down and I said, ”How many of you know who George Marshall was?“ Not one. There was a long silence and finally one young man asked, ”Did he have, maybe, something to do with the Marshall Plan?“ And I said yes, he certainly did, and that’s a good place to begin talking about George Marshall.

We have to do several things. First of all we have to get across the idea that we have to know who we were if we’re to know who we are and where we’re headed. This is essential. We have to value what our forebears—and not just in the 18th century, but our own parents and grandparents—did for us, or we’re not going to take it very seriously, and it can slip away. If you don’t care about it—if you’ve inherited some great work of art that is worth a fortune and you don’t know that it’s worth a fortune, you don’t even know that it’s a great work of art and you’re not interested in it—you’re going to lose it.

Source: Imprimus

Don't take my word for it. Investigate for yourself. Make up your own mind.

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The Right to Work: A Fundamental Freedom

Mark Mix
President, National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation
Guest Commentary 

The following is adapted from a lecture delivered at Hillsdale College on January 31, 2011, during a conference co-sponsored by the Center for Constructive Alternatives and the Ludwig von Mises Lecture Series.

BOEING IS A GREAT AMERICAN COMPANY. Recently it has built a second production line—its other is in Washington State—in South Carolina for its 787 Dreamliner airplane, creating 1,000 jobs there so far. Who knows what factors led to its decision to do this? As with all such business decisions, there were many. But the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB)—a five-member agency created in 1935 by the Wagner Act (about which I will speak momentarily)—has taken exception to this decision, ultimately based on the fact that South Carolina is a right-to-work state. That is, South Carolina, like 21 other states today, protects a worker’s right not only to join a union, but also to make the choice not to join or financially support a union. Washington State does not. The general counsel of the NLRB, on behalf of the International Association of Machinists union, has issued a complaint against Boeing, which, if successful, would require it to move its South Carolina operation back to Washington State. This would represent an unprecedented act of intervention by the federal government that appears, on its face, un-American. But it is an act long in the making, and boils down to a fundamental misunderstanding of freedom.

Where does this story begin?

The Wagner Act and Taft-Hartley

In 1935, Congress passed and President Franklin Roosevelt signed into law the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), commonly referred to as the Wagner Act after its Senate sponsor, New York Democrat Robert Wagner. Section 7 of the Wagner Act states:

Employees shall have the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection.

Union officials such as William Green, president of the American Federation of Labor (AFL), and John L. Lewis, principal founder of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), hailed this legislation at the time as the “Magna Carta of Labor.” But in fact it was far from a charter of liberty for working Americans.

Section 8(3) of the Wagner Act allowed for “agreements” between employers and officers of a union requiring union membership “as a condition of employment” if the union was certified or recognized as the employees’ “exclusive” bargaining agent on matters of pay, benefits, and work rules. On its face, this violates the clear principle that the freedom to associate necessarily includes the freedom not to associate. In other words, the Wagner Act didn’t protect the freedom of workers because it didn’t allow for them to decide against union membership. To be sure, the Wagner Act left states the prerogative to protect employees from compulsory union membership. But federal law was decidedly one-sided: Firing or refusing to hire a worker because he or she had joined a union was a federal crime, whereas firing or refusing to hire a worker for not joining a union with “exclusive” bargaining privileges was federally protected. The National Labor Relations Board was created by the Wagner Act to enforce these policies.

During World War II, FDR’s War Labor Board aggressively promoted compulsory union membership. By the end of the war, the vast majority of unionized workers in America were covered by contracts requiring them to belong to a union in order to keep their jobs. But Americans were coming to see compulsory union membership—euphemistically referred to as “union security”—as a violation of the freedom of association. Furthermore, the nonchalance with which union bosses like John L. Lewis paralyzed the economy by calling employees out on strike in 1946 hardened public support for the right to work as opposed to compulsory unionism. As Gilbert J. Gall, a staunch proponent of the latter, acknowledged in a monograph chronicling legislative battles over this issue from the 1940s on, “the huge post-war strike wave and other problems of reconversion gave an added impetus to right-to-work proposals.”

When dozens of senators and congressmen who backed compulsory unionism were ousted in the 1946 election, the new Republican leaders of Congress had a clear opportunity to curb the legal power of union bosses to force workers to join unions. Instead, they opted for a compromise that they thought would have enough congressional support to override a presidential veto by President Truman. Thus Section 7 of the revised National Labor Relations Act of 1947—commonly referred to as the Taft-Hartley Act—only appears at first to represent an improvement over Section 7 of the Wagner Act. It begins:

Employees shall have the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection, and shall also have the right to refrain from any and all such activities. . . .

Had this sentence ended there, forced union membership would have been prohibited, and at the same time voluntary union membership would have remained protected. Unfortunately, the sentence continued:

...except to the extent that such right may be affected by an agreement requiring membership in a labor organization as a condition of employment as authorized in section 158(a)(3) of this title.

This qualification, placing federal policy firmly on the side of compulsory union membership, left workers little better off than they were under the Wagner Act. Elsewhere, Taft-Hartley did, for the most part, prohibit “closed shop” arrangements that forced workers to join a union before being hired. But they could still be forced to join, on threat of being fired, within a few weeks after starting on the job.

Boeing’s Interest, and Ours

It cannot be overemphasized that compulsory unionism violates the first principle of the original labor union movement in America. Samuel Gompers, founder and first president of the AFL, wrote that the labor movement was “based upon the recognition of the sovereignty of the worker.” Officers of the AFL, he explained in the American Federationist, can “suggest” or “recommend,” but they “cannot command one man in America to do anything.” He continued: “Under no circumstances can they say, ‘you must do so and so, or, ‘you must desist from doing so and so.’” In a series ofFederationist editorials published during World War I, Gompers opposed various government mandate measures being considered in the capitals of industrial states like Massachusetts and New York that would have mandated certain provisions for manual laborers and other select groups of workers:

The workers of America adhere to voluntary institutions in preference to compulsory systems which are held to be not only impractical but a menace to their rights, welfare and their liberty.

This argument applies as much to compulsory unionism—or “union security”—as to the opposite idea that unions should be prohibited. And in a December 1918 address before the Council on Foreign Relations, Gompers made this point explicitly:

There may be here and there a worker who for certain reasons unexplainable to us does not join a union of labor. This is his right no matter how morally wrong he may be. It is his legal right and no one can dare question his exercise of that legal right.

Compare Gompers’s traditional American view of freedom to the contemptuous view toward workers of labor leaders today. Here is United Food and Commercial Workers union strategist Joe Crump advising union organizers in a 1991 trade journal article: “Employees are complex and unpredictable. Employers are simple and predictable. Organize employers, not employees.” And in 2005, Mike Fishman, head of the Service Employees International Union, was even more blunt. When it comes to union organizing campaigns, he told the Wall Street Journal, “We don’t do elections.”

Under a decades-old political compromise, federal labor policies promoting compulsory unionism persist side by side with the ability of states to curb such compulsion with right-to-work laws. So far, as I said, 22 states have done so. And when we compare and contrast the economic performance in these 22 states against the others, we find interesting things. For example, from 1999 to 2009 (the last such year for which data are available), the aggregate real all-industry GDP of the 22 right-to-work states grew by 24.2 percent, nearly 40 percent more than the gain registered by the other 28 states as a group.

Even more dramatic is the contrast if we look at personal income growth. From 2000 to 2010, real personal incomes grew by an average of 24.3 percent in the 22 right-to-work states, more than double the rate for the other 28 as a group. But the strongest indicator is the migration of young adults. In 2009, there were 20 percent more 25- to 34-year-olds in right-to-work states than in 1999. In the compulsory union states, the increase was only 3.3 percent—barely one-sixth as much.

In this context, the decision by Boeing to open a plant in South Carolina may be not only in its own best interest, but in ours as well. So in whose interest is the National Labor Relations Board acting? And more importantly, with a view to what understanding of freedom?

Public Sector Unionism

As more and more workers and businesses have obtained refuge from compulsory unionism in right-to-work states in recent decades, the rationality of the free market has been showing itself. But the public sector is another and a grimmer story.

The National Labor Relations Act affects only private-sector workers. Since the 1960s, however, 21 states have enacted laws authorizing the collection of forced union dues from at least some state and local public employees. More than a dozen additional states have granted union officials the monopoly power to speak for all government workers whether they consent to this or not. Thus today, government workers are more than five times as likely to be unionized as private sector workers. This represents a great danger for taxpayers and consumers of government services. For as Victor Gotbaum, head of the Manhattan-based District 37 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union, said 36 years ago: “We have the ability, in a sense, to elect our own boss.”

How this works is simple, and explains the inordinate power of union officials in so many states that have not adopted right-to-work laws. Union officials funnel a huge portion of the compulsory dues and fees they collect into efforts to influence the outcomes of elections. In return, elected officials are afraid to anger them even in the face of financial crisis. This explains why states with the heaviest tax burdens and the greatest long-term fiscal imbalances (in many cases due to bloated public employee pension funds) are those with the most unionized government workforces. California, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Ohio and Wisconsin represent the worst default risks among the 50 states. In 2010, an average of 59.2 percent of the public employees in these nine worst default-risk states were unionized, 19.2 percentage points higher than the national average of 40 percent. All of these states except Nevada authorize compulsory union dues and fees in the public sector.

 “Reprinted by permission from Imprimis, a publication of Hillsdale College.”
 SUBSCRIPTION FREE UPON REQUEST.

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Commentary on the Macon County Comprehensive Plan

Maconians packed the Commissioners Board Room to listen to the Macon County Commissioners discuss the Macon county Comprehensive Plan.

Commentary

I attended a meeting of the Macon County Commissioners last night where we were told (once again) that nothing in the Macon County Comprehensive Plan was binding, that it was just a list of recommendations for the future development of Macon County. 

The Commissioners spent over three hours going over the recommendations that the Macon County Planning Board had spent two years working on...line by line I might add...and removed entire sections, added new paragraphs emphasizing that the recommendations were only recommendations, even at one point, a preamble to an Introduction. 

I am told a local paper (The Franklin Press) even published an editorial urging the passage of the Comprehensive Plan for the good of the citizens of Macon County.

The Commissioners Board Room was nearly full for a good bit of the meeting. As someone who has attended all but three meetings of that body in the past two years, I can tell you that it is rare that more than three citizens attend, let alone a room full. 

Commissioners mocked some things that were in the plan (like the idea of a Convention Center) and fought cinematic Last Stands to keep some things in it. 

It sure is a funny way for people to be acting over a document that is non-binding, 'just a road map', and a toolbox of options for the future, isn't it? 

I am very tempted to give every member of the Macon County Planning Board a copy of Friedrich von Hayek's "Road to Serfdom" to show them just where all this planning will take us.

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Mike Bayer – Communist Agent in the Bernie Sanders Camp?

As a student in Chicago, Sanders was active in the Young Peoples Socialist League and has a decades old relationship with America’s largest marxist organization, Democratic Socialists of America.


It was in conjunction with D.S.A. that Sanders formed, in 1991, the Congressional Progressive Caucus, now a more than eighty strong alliance of far left Senators and Congressmen.


Mike Bayer’s closeness to Senator Sanders, however I takes things to a new level. While Bayer is no longer the open communist he once was, there is evidence that he is acting as a spy on Sanders’ Party and may be be some kind of liaison man or agent-of-influence for the Communist Party.


Bayer has lived in Vermont since 1996, working as Chief Financial Officer of Vermont Legal Aid. He has been a leader in the leftist Vermont Progressive Party, since its earliest days.


Currently Bayer is running for the position of State Auditor of Accounts for Vermont, on the Progressive Party ticket. The position is currently held by Republican, Thomas M. Salmon.


Before moving to Vermont, Bayer was for many years, Indiana District organizer of the Communist Party USA and a regular contributor to the Party paper Peoples Daily World/ Peoples Weekly World.

Source: Key Wiki Blog (be sure to read the rest there and add that blog to your daily reading list or RSS Reader)




Commentary


The communists and socialists have never really gone away. They just changed their name to progressives. Their goal remains the same...total government control over every aspect of your life.

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Kay Hagan Nailed by Furious Voter Over Health Care

US Senator Kay Hagan gets an earful from an angry constituent regarding health care while visiting a hospital in Kernersville, N.C.


Notice the difference between the above video that was released on the Internet and the one that aired on television. 




I am hoping that people are still this angry and this motivated in November.

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Buncombe Commissioners Refuse to Bailout URTV

The URTV Saga continues. Here is an excerpt from The Wild West blog of the John Locke Foundation regarding last night's refusal of the Buncombe County Commissioners to bailout URTV...

I felt like a sucker at the meeting of the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners tonight. Questioning why I had never felt so before, I realized this was the first time I was hearing fiscal conservatism from the dais. Though swarmed by petitioners for money to bailout URTV, Commissioner Holly Jones said those who wanted URTV to survive would have to pool their mental resources and come up with a plan. Chair David Gantt echoed. He did not think it appropriate for government to be holding the purse strings of Public Access TV. Prior to public comment, consultant John Howell kept pointing his finger at the state for screwing the county out of revenues it could be channeling to URTV. When Howell said the commissioners had the option of giving URTV a special award, Commissioner Bill Stanley, replied thrice, “That’s not an option,” then added, “We can’t raise taxes.”

Source: Running Out of Dreams by Leslee Kulba (emphasis added by me)


I've not really blogged about the thing here because I've thought the whole thing an exercise in silly people pursuing silly power plays in an endless parade of silly Drama Queens. 


PEG, short for Public, Educational, Government access television got its start in the late sixties and early seventies via the FCC (Federal Communications Commission). These channels are typically only available to cable television subscribers, although many now stream their content on the Internet. It is my belief that the Internet has essentially rendered public access obsolete. Many more people can watch via the Internet rather than the small cable TV audiences. Here is a portion of what I have posted recently on the Mountain Xpress website regarding my thought on the matter:






PEG Channels have been rendered obsolete by technical means. Anyone with a camera and access to a fast Internet connection can make videos and upload them for the world to see…not just the few local cable TV subscribers in their town.


Cameras are cheap. You can get an HD camera for less than $200. Video Editing Software is cheap. Windows Movie Maker and iMove are free and there are many open source options available as well http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_free_and_open_source_software_packages#Video_editing, and good editors can be had for under $100.


Training is cheap or even free if one can use a search engine and is willing to read and then conduct their own experiments to see if they’ve understood what they’ve read about the theory and application of filming techniques and various articles regarding technical aspects of building or operating a studio.


About your citation of the 1984 Cable Franchise Policy and Communications Act, the full text is available at http://www.publicaccess.org/cableact.html
You didn’t pay attention to the wording of the Barry Goldwater’s bill. It states “may require not shall require. May require means that it is an option, not a requirement. The local government has the option of keeping the money. Most local governments around the country keep that money.


PEG advocates may have intended the 1984 bill to save PEG Channels from the Supreme Court ruling against the FCC in FCC vs. Midwest Video Corp. http://supreme.justia.com/us/440/689/ , but it had the opposite effect due to the poor wording of the bill as sponsored by Barry Goldwater.


Public Access was created to provide a free-speech forum, open to all on a first-come, first-served basis without discrimination or favoritism based on content. I argue that the Internet, along with cheap cameras, free or cheap software and free or cheap training renders PEG Channels obsolete, if not already parochial.


And, as a bonus, you don’t have to deal with the ever-present internecine bureaucratic struggles for power and control of local PEG programming, facilities, equipment and funds.


...


One other thing I forgot to mention that makes Public Access totally irrelevant is 24/7 FREE WEBCASTING available via Ustream, Livestream (formerly Mogulus) and Justin TV. There are others that also offer this service.


You can do live shows, or upload pre-recorded content without having to worry about putting your hands in other people’s pockets for money to bankroll your operation or having to worry about open meeting laws or power-hungry people hiring a private investigator to dig up dirt on you or the person running the operation. You don’t have to worry about childish office politics as people jockey to get a better time slot or use a piece of equipment that Other People’s Money bought for you.




[Be sure to click over and read the lengthy discussion over there on the matter. (also check out this new discussion thread) It floors me that some people who consider themselves to be fiscally conservative would support bailouts on the local level...since they oppose them on the federal level. I consider that a hypocritical attitude.]


I think that the primary reason that the Buncombe County Commissioners are staying out of the URTV Saga is the violently vociferous actions of a few people who have been, in my opinion, seeking personal and political power via the URTV platform. In their mad pursuits, they have killed (or very badly wounded) the very thing they claim to support. 

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The Socialist Holocaust

• Marx and totalitarianism
  
  Lenin's commitment to totalitarianism, in both theory and practice, is essentially beyond dispute. The view of his precursor Karl Marx is more ambiguous, both because Marx wrote less clearly than Lenin, and because Marx never held power. In spite of this, the totalitarian strain in Marx is pronounced. He directs much of his critique against the classical liberal concern for personal freedom and private property - the Rights of Man, or what Marx called "bourgeois freedom." The doctrine of the rights of man was faulty, according to Marx, because:
• 
  
  
  
  
  

  None of the supposed rights of man, therefore, go beyond the egoistic man, man as he is, as a member of civil society; that is, an individual separated from the community, withdrawn into himself, wholly preoccupied with his private interest and acting in accordance with his private caprice... Thus man was not liberated from religion; he received religious liberty. He was not liberated from property; he received the liberty to own property. He was not liberated from the egoism of business; he received the liberty to engage in business.
  On the Jewish Question

  For Marx, freedom of religion or the freedom to own property are hollow freedoms, or at least grossly inadequate stepping stones to something better: "political emancipation itself is not humanemancipation." "[B]ourgeois 'freedom of conscience' is nothing but the toleration of all possible kinds of religious freedom of conscience, and that for its part [socialism] endeavors rather to liberate the conscience from the witchery of religion." (Critique of the Gotha Program). Rather than advocating freedom for all people, liberals really value only the freedom of the ruling class of capitalist society, viz., the bourgeoisie.
  Marx accuses the liberal tradition of slighting the social nature of man. "Liberty is, therefore, the right to do everything which does not harm others... It is a question of the liberty of man regarded as an isolated monad, withdrawn into himself." Marx elaborates: "The right of property, is, therefore, the right to enjoy one's fortunes and dispose of it as he will; without regard for other men and independently of society... It leads every man to see in other men, not the realization, but rather the limitation of his own liberty." (On the Jewish Question)
  Marx's solution, the route to human emancipation, was Communism, which would give people the freedom that bourgeois society denies them. Communism is, he explains, "the positive transcendence ofprivate property, or human self-estrangement, and therefore the real appropriation of the human essence by and for man... the complete return of man to himself as a social being..." (Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844)
  Innumerable social thinkers disagree with much of Marx's thought, but praise his reflections upon human freedom, the depth of his insight in contrast to the shallowness of laissez-faire liberalism. Yet it is difficult to understand how Marx's concept of freedom is anything more than a defense of tyranny and oppression. No dissident or non-conformist can see society as the "realization of his own liberty." And what can the attack on "the right to do everything which does not harm others" amount to in practice, except a justification for coercing people who are not harming others? The problem with "broad" notions of freedom is that they necessarily wind up condoning the violation of "narrow" notions of freedom. Under "bourgeois" notions of religious liberty, people may practice any religion they wish ("a private whim or caprice" as Marx calls it); how could this liberty be broadened, without sanctioning the persecution of some religious views?
  While Marx occasionally says something in favor of democracy, Lenin did not originate the doctrine of the dictatorship of the proletariat. That was Marx's creation. In his Critique of the Gotha Program, Marx explains, "Between capitalist and communist society lies the period of the revolutionary transformation of the one into the other. There corresponds to this also a political transition period in which the state can be nothing but the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat." It is not clear how long Marx thought this transitional dictatorship would last. As democratic socialist historian Carl Landauer notes:
  
  
  
  
  

  Gradually, it became evident that the transition from capitalism to socialism would take not merely months or years but decades, and therefore the extreme left wing of the social revolutionists was compelled to take one further step. If it was permissible and even necessary to throw one's country for so long a period into the horrors of civil war and dictatorship, was it then not illogical to balk at the use of deceit, torture, provocation - in fact of any means that would speed up the revolution? Was it not clear that the actions of revolutionaries in the transition period should be governed only by the law of expediency, and that sincerity, mercy, justice toward the individual had as little place in the struggle of classes as in the jungle? (European Socialism: A History of Ideas and Movements)

  Marx's thought did not provide the blueprint for Communist totalitarianism, but it did provide a rough outline for more practical men like Lenin to elaborate upon.
• Socialism and totalitarianismMarx was a leading figure in a broad socialist tradition. Much of this tradition shared his critique of "bourgeois freedom" and longed for a world in which the government eliminated both the economic and personal freedom of capitalist civilization. Such ideas may be found in the works of Rousseau, Saint-Simon, Auguste Comte, Ferdinand Lassalle, and many other prominent thinkers. Even socialists critical of authoritarianism such as Bernstein mainly tried to convince their fellow socialists of the value of democracy, showing little appreciation of the danger that universal state ownership as such could pose to human freedom, or the conflict between freedom and enforced equality.
  Communists often deviated from Marxism on small points, but almost invariably remained true to the broader authoritarian socialist tradition if they could get away with it. Thus, the Khmer Rouge reversed Marx's emphasis on the urban industrial proletariat, idealizing peasant life so strongly that they forcibly deported Cambodia's city dwellers into the country. Their inspiration came from other authoritarian socialists, such as Rousseau. What varies is what the Communist state forces its subjects to do; what is constant is that the Communist state recognizes no constraints upon its rule. The variable portion of the program usually but not always comes from Marx. The constant comes from the critique of "bourgeois freedom" found in the broader socialist tradition.
  Placing Nazism, Italian Fascism, and related movements in proper historical perspective sheds further light on the socialist-totalitarian connection. Nazism's connection with Communism is somewhat complex, and is discussed in the next section. The connection with Italian Fascism, however, is quite direct: until 1914, Benito Mussolini was the leader of the Socialist Party of Italy. He was a staunch proponent of revolutionary rather than reformist socialism, and actually received Lenin's endorsement and support for expelling reformists from the Socialist Party. Mussolini split with the Socialist Party over participation in World War I, not over abstract theory, or economic doctrine. As A. James Gregor explains Mussolini's fall from leadership of the Socialist Party: "On the day after Mussolini's call for a change in Party policy [on the war], the directive committee of the Party called a meeting to discuss the issues involved. The meeting was a heated exchange between Mussolini and the orthodox majority, almost all of whom favored adherence to the traditional commitment to absolute neutrality. In the face of almost unanimous opposition, Mussolini submitted his resignation as editor of Avanti!" (Young Mussolini and the Intellectual Origins of Fascism) During World War I, Mussolini publicized his new synthesis of nationalism and socialism, contrasting his view with orthodox Marxist internationalism. As violent verbal and physical clashes between Mussolini's followers and the Socialist Party escalated, Mussolini finally opted to cast aside the "socialist" label. But he freely admitted that his position was a hybrid of nationalism and socialism:
  
  
  
  
  

  Although Mussolini finally decided that the term "socialist" had become so debased and devoid of specific meaning that he recommended its abandonment, he was quick to remind his readers that he was prepared to assimilate everything that remained vital in the tradition. He argued that his objections to socialism were addressed to the form of socialism that had rigidified into dogma and was no longer capable of confronting concrete reality with any intellectual independence... Those socialists who chose to abandon the nation in pursuit of socialist interests not only failed in their obligations to the many who had died in a revolutionary and progressive war, but also violated the letter and the spirit of the best traditions of socialism. (A. James Gregor, Young Mussolini and the Intellectual Origins of Fascism)

  At the root of Mussolini's heresy was the realization that a socialism based on concrete tribal affections would appeal far more to the "man in the street" than a socialism based on the abstract solidarity of the international proletariat. Eliminating domestic class conflict would allow Italy to industrialize and become a great power. The galvanizing Enemy naturally became the foreigner rather than the capitalist. Again quoting Gregor, "Mussolini insisted that the only socialism that would be viable in the twentieth century would be a socialism committed to national development, both economic and political. The commitment to national tasks involved fundamental common interests uniting all the special economic and parochial interests of the population."
  Mussolini's heresy thrived not because he repudiated socialism, but rather because he and threw out Marxism's internationalist bathwater but kept the socialist baby. He was therefore able to appeal to socialist sentiment and Italian jingoism at the same time. "To insist, as did the orthodox socialists and communists, that so many Italians had died in the benighted service of capitalism left many Italian families, bereft of their sons and fathers, without dignity or consolation." (A. James Gregor, Young Mussolini and the Intellectual Origins of Fascism) Instead Mussolini reached out to veterans and their families as well as other segments of Italian society sympathetic to his message. One of these segments, unsurprisingly, were other disaffected socialists; quoting Gregor, "the rank and file membership of the socialist organizations began to defect in large numbers, and soon over half a million workers were organized in Fascist syndicates. Socialism gave every evidence of disintegration." Or rather, orthodox socialism gave every evidence of disintegration. In would not be long before the former leader of the Socialist Party was the dictator of Italy, Italy's official ideology was his heretical socialist doctrine.
  Stalinist invective against Trotsky, proclaiming him an arch-enemy of socialism, has long met with historians' ridicule. The official Comintern line on fascism, however, met with far less skepticism then and since, but it is hard to see why. Mussolini's struggle with the Italian socialists was, like the conflict between Stalinists and Trotskyists, an intra-socialist struggle. Both were a mixture of personality clashes and relatively minor ideological differences within the totalitarian camp.

Source: Museum of Communism
Related: Hitler was a Socialist.
Related: Libertarian Socialism
Related: The Mind of The Left (the continued appeal of socialism and totalitarianism to the young)




Food for thought while I am away this weekend.

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Elena Kagan's Undergraduate Thesis Shows Her Support for Socialism

"The story is a sad but after also a chastening one for those who, more than half a century socialism's decline, still wish to change America." ~Elena Kagan






For those that still doubt that President barack Obama is an avowed socialist, and seeks to promote others who also avowed socialists, take a gander at Elena Kagan's thesis from Princeton. It is a fascinating read. The quote I used at the top of this article comes from her thesis as she bemoans the failure of socialism and the success of capitalism in America. Remember that this was written during the Cold War with the champion of socialism...the Soviet Union.




Read on...



Elana Kagan's undergraduate thesis

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Earth Day and Lenin's Birthday are today Coincidence? I think not

Earth Day and Lenin's Birthday are today. Coincidence? I think not. Read more.

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Asheville Citizen-Times Reporter Leslie Boyd Charged by Bloggers with Web of Ethics Violations

Screenshot taken of AC-T Website

Asheville bloggers have taken on the lefty bias of local media outlets, including the Asheville Citizen-Times and WLOS-TV in Asheville. I was alerted to this story via Twitter by @LiberT who also has a blog called Fr33 Asheville.

Previously, Freedom Works held a Health Care protest in front of Blue Dog Democrat Congress Heath Shuler's office in Asheville, and the Asheville Citizen-Times did not send a reporter to cover the event (despite giving copious amounts of coverage to lefty rallies & protests), and the WLOS story focused more attention to the opposing side, and most of the coverage they gave the protest was focused on advocating FOR Government-run health care. Witness the video below:

A new Asheville blogger [since October 2008], Jane Q Republican, has noted the activism of one of the Asheville Citizen-Times reporters, Leslie Boyd. Here is an excerpt:

For evidence of whether Ms. Boyd’s involvement has influenced the news, I refer you to last week’s rally in opposition to Nationalized Healthcare. On Friday, July 17, over 250 area citizens gathered at the Asheville office of Heath Shuler (D-NC11) in opposition to the proposed government takeover of healthcare. The Asheville Citizen-Times did not send a single reporter or photographer. To date, not a single word in Asheville’s only daily newspaper has been devoted to this event.

When Ms. Boyd became a journalist, she made the choice to be an impartial observer and reporter of the news. She promised to uphold a code of ethics which prohibits her from entering into public politics and activism. This was a career choice that she made and, judging by the name she has made for herself at the Asheville Citizen-Times, it was a good one. If she has now changed her mind and wishes to enter the political activism arena, that is indeed her prerogative. What she may not do, however, is straddle the fence between the two occupations. She may not make the news and report it too.

At least, not if she is held to the standards of her employment contract . That remains to be seen.

Source: Jane Q Republican (read the whole article, which includes email exchanges between the blogger and the newspaper)

Another blogger covering this is Tim Peck. This is a portion of what he has to contribute:

Asheville Citizen-Times reporter Leslie Boyd has violated the code of journalistic ethics by participating in partisan political events as an advocate while also covering the story for her employer. Boyd is pictured on the WNC for Change website as the keynote speaker at the recent Healthcare Reform Rally held at Pritchard Park in Asheville on June 20, 2009.

Source: Tim Peck (he goes on to provide links and photos of the Moveon Rally...which Boyd was unable to attend at the last moment).

I'll add my two cents worth to the kitty by noting what Leslie Boyd has posted herself online regarding how she sees her job and her advocacy for the nationalization of healthcare.

From her Ning Network blog (created by the Asheville Citizen-Times):

Things here have been pretty bleak. We had layoffs yesterday. Rob and I escaped, but we had friends who worked here a long time who got cut. I feel like I'm watching the demise of an entire industry.
But it's more than just an industry, and being a reporter is more than just a job. We felt like we had a higher calling: to be watchdogs of government and big business, to dig out the truth and to inform the public. We have been the children of the First Amendment.
Now most papers have too few people in the newsroom to do any investigative reporting. We can report on government meetings, but we can't dig any deeper. We can write about the new office building being put up, but not on the dealings that helped it get permits in spite of height restrictions or zoning laws.

In the end, government and big business will be able to do what they want, unfettered by the press looking over them. Actually, they pretty much do already.

Source: WNC Mom I lifted the whole post in case it gets tossed down the memory hole.

And another, on her advocacy:

WNC for Change had a health care rally in Asheville this morning and 300 people came out. That's almost twice as many as came out last fall. People are getting worried that this won't get fixed after all, and they want to tell Congress that's not acceptable.
I was the keynote speaker, telling Mike's story and noting that he was one of about 30,000 who died last year.
Rep. Heath Shuler met with about 50 of us this afternoon and assured us he wants to fix it too, but the law says it has to be defecit neutral. I can think of a few ways to raise the money, but none of them will happen because corporations are more important than people in America.
I'm not sure how we'll take it back, but I'm working on it.
If you want to see photos of the rally and of Heath Shuler, visit here: [AC-T]

Source: WNC Mom Again, I lifted the entire post for the same reason as the last.

As Jane Q Republican and Tim Peck have pointed out, she covered the rallies for the Asheville Citizen-Times events at which she herself was a speaker and organizer.

A lefty blog had this to say about Leslie Boyd's keynote address at the rally, which the War Resister's League billed as "Asheville Calls for Health Care Revolution":

By far the most powerful speaker was local reporter and health care advocate Leslie Boyd who spoke with “righteous indignation” about her son’s death due to denial of critical health care. She founded the group Life o’ Mike to commemorate her son and to advocate for health care for all.

Source: War Resisters League

I have, so far, been unable to locate online video of Boyd speaking at any of these events. If you know of an example, please let me know in the comments, and if you are in possession of such video, let me know in the comments, and I will help you get it posted online.

It is time we held "journalists" accountable. And they wonder why they are held in in low regard by their fellow Americans. I would tell them that their lefty bias has turned a significant portion of their audience off. I quit buying papers from the AC-T over two years ago because I couldn't just take it anymore. Due to the recent cutbacks at the paper, as reported by AshVegas, I have not been the only one.

It would be more acceptable to me if they would come right out and admit that they are lefties instead of pretending they are unbiased.

Let this incident serve notice to the various news media outlets of western North Carolina that they can no longer serve as Gate Keepers of the news, nor can they set the agenda as they have in the past. They should come clean about their biases, as most bloggers do.

When bloggers report on events or news stories, they usually aren't afraid to come right out and tell you what side they are on, and then they proceed to tell you why they believe as they do.

**Note...I have preserved the original spellings in the posts I excerpted for use here.

**9.03am**

As an example of a lefty paper, I give you the Mountain Xpress. Everyone knows they are lefties, and they don't hide it. And the thing is, they often provide better coverage of Asheville in a weekly free paper than the Citizen-Times does with a daily paper.

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