Disqus - Latest Comments for anselmcantaur

Re: 10 Things a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Should Do

anselmcantaur — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 06:08:38 -0000

"4 of the Things a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate has already done"

I agree with all of Joel's 10 initiatives for fundamental change. These aspirations for the future of the Obama presidency are very progressive. But given that the best predictor of a politician's future actions is best gauged by a politician's past actions, what would cause a rational global citizen to expect this conversion to a progressive agenda of this scope ?

Looking at Obama's actions (not aspirations) since November 08, he has done many political actions which give us some actual information. (1) He continued the catastrophic indefinite Iraq occupation, (2) he coerced the Iraqi govt. not to allow the popular referendum required by the Status of Forces Agreement, (3) he ordered Pakistan to begin a full scale war in the NW part of that nation - which has put 2 million people on the run or in refugee camps, and (4) he escalated the war in Afghanistan (to this date) by 20,000 more US Troops.

Re: A Question?

anselmcantaur — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 05:35:20 -0000

Thomas,
William Greider is national affairs correspondent for The Nation. Check out his fact based outline of Obama's Rubinomics
political and economic strategy with the GM restructuring plan (quoted in my post ) What do you think of Greider's view?

Re: Labor Day, Obama, and the Battle for Democracy

anselmcantaur — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 16:24:19 -0000

<<obama's speaks="" to="" the="" country's="" schoolchildren="" today.="" he="" will="" urge="" them="" to="" stay="" in="" school="" and="" get="" a="" good="" education.="" socialist="" propaganda?="" or="" a="" way="" of="" ensuring="" that="" our="" citizenry="" has="" the="" tools="" to="" participate="" in="" the="" expansion="" and="" preservation="" of="" democracy?="">>
Noooo, not socialist propaganda. Building up America so it can remain the No 1 power dominating the wretched of the earth. That is the unchanged message and subtext of all American presidents, Obama egregious among them. Feh

Re: Re: Brad DeLong critique of Marx

anselmcantaur — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 16:50:15 -0000

I appreciate Norman Markowitz's comments and his general tone of cooperative encouragement and respect for others.

Was the USSR Collectivization struggle - initiated from the center and implemented by the "25,000ers" working-class - necessary to achieve the eventual defeat of fascism in WWII? This question alone is the subject of many books and elicits different and complex answers. But what we do know is that this was the historical path actually taken and the Red Army did break the back of Fascism. And we know that in the post WW2 era because of the role of The Resistance and the USSR, the CPs in Europe (Italy, France, Czechoslovakia etc) made tremendous gains in membership, prestige, and electoral results.

I am sympathetic with all who wish we did not have an authoritarian party political culture due to the top-down interpretation of Lenin's democratic centralism. I also wish
it rained beer -- but it doesn't!

At some point I question all the second-guessing of the
mess that is human History. And I can't help but wonder what the reason is for asking all such questions? Particularly since one would have to learn Russian and devote one's life to the Soviet Archives to reach an informed status as an expert qualified to give expert analysis? Is there a political Agenda at work that has not yet been stated? I gather that party intellectuals want to move away from the form and substance of
20th century CP style socialism. Where are the discontents taking the movement?

Re: Re: Brad DeLong critique of Marx

anselmcantaur — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 13:32:07 -0000

I should have wrapped up by saying that despite the fact that I do not have all the answers on how to extricate the CP from the shadows in its past, I have concluded in this period of deep economic crisis and rising fightback in the movements that the global Communist parties still possess a leading role because of the power of Marx-Lenin thought to interpret the crisis and serve as an guide to action.

Re: http://paeditorsblog.blogspot.com/2009/04/video-recount-in-moldova-confirms.html

anselmcantaur — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 22:29:36 -0000

I agree that socialist movements follow evolutionary paths depending on historical circumstances. But the specific content of the Socialism of Marx and Lenin and Communists is the taking of state power by the working-class through socialist revolution (peaceful transitions where allowed by ruling class).

Without this specific content one may be hip to the "New Times" or
the latest Social Democratic book - but one is not a Communist.

Re: Question: What Can We Do to Expose and Punish Cold War and Imperialist War Criminals by Norman Markowitz

anselmcantaur — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 13:35:55 -0000

Norman Markowitz asked "How can we best challenge this decision and work to educate working people to oppose it (part one)?" I think our past campaigns about political crimes should be taken up again. These include Open Meetings on the Crimes involved, protests and international petitions and etc These methods are well known on the Left and in global movements, and should be taken up again.

I will now like to outline another action of the new Administration that should be protested by the Left /progressive/ Human Rights movements: last Feb. the Obama administration filed a brief in federal court.

In two sentences, this brief declared that the Obama Department of Justice basically embraced the Bush administration's totalitarian position on (against) habeas
corpus.

After the Supreme Court ruled last June that Guantanamo detainees possess the right to a hearing to contest the charges against them, the Bush administration simply started sending so-called enemy combatants from around the world to the American prison camp in Bagram Air Force base in occupied Afghanistan. Since Afghanistan is a "war zone," the Bush White House argued, prisoners there have no constitutional rights. Never mind that these were not prisoners captured on a battlefield in Afghanistan but were people abducted from their homes and workplaces in other countries and flown in secret U.S. jets to Bagram.

In its February '09 brief, the Obama justice department defended this fascistic illegal policy, arguing that such prisoners can be locked up without any constitutional rights for an indefinite period of time just as long as they are incarcerated in Bagram instead of Guantanamo.

I hope others on the Left realize that in another political time and place we are also potential victims of such tactics just by
virtue of socialist affiliation to a party.

Re: Today's Question: What Can We do about the looming Afghan Trap by Norman Markowitz

anselmcantaur — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 22:27:28 -0000

Correction:
The 2nd from last para. should read:
"From a Communist perspective our Parties SHOULD participate in and by guided by the perspectives of the global Communist and Workers parties particularly those close to the nations of Pakistan and Afghanistan."

Re: Today's Question: What Can We do about the looming Afghan Trap by Norman Markowitz

anselmcantaur — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 22:23:33 -0000

I would first like to quote the imperialist dissenters within their Camp. Expert statements on the military situation in Afghanistan of US/NATO occupation forces were provided a few months ago by Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, the former (?) UK ambassador to that nation (publ. in Le Canard Enchainé). Cowper-Coles said "American strategy is destined to fail" in Afghanistan. "The current situation is bad. The security situation is getting worse. So is corruption and the Government has lost all trust. Our public statements should not delude us over the fact that the insurrection, while incapable of winning a military victory, nevertheless has the capacity to make life increasingly difficult, including in the capital. The presence - especially the military presence - of the coalition is part of the problem, not the solution. The foreign forces are ensuring the survival of a regime which would collapse without them. In doing so, they are slowing down and complicating an eventual exit from the crisis (which, moreover, will probably be dramatic)." He said any policy of strengthening US/NATO troop numbers"would identify us even more clearly as an occupying force and it would multiply the number of targets (for the insurgents)."

From a humanitarian viewpoint, the very idea of the US as the "development and peace" provider is absurd. The US ties all recipients of its aid to itself for reasons of state interest. Full stop. The new Holbrooke plan for "AF/PAK" represents a grandiose new "outreach" by Imperialism to bring Pakistan into more abject servitude to American reasons of state.

From a Communist perspective our Parties shouldn't participate in and by guided by the perspectives of the global Communist and Workers parties particularly those close to the nations of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Does the CPUSA even attend meetings or sign these Statements anymore? See Solidnet (http://solidnet.org/) for the list of member party signatories to crucial Resolutions on these wars! World Communists are urged by the member party signatories to struggle against NATO and its new expansion, against the US anti-missile shield, NATO bases and expansion of US/NATO wars, and against the participation of our nations in NATO.

It seems national communist parties have sometimes become so assimilated/ acculturated into their national political cultures that they lose sight of their specifically Marxist worldview. This is as dangerous a path as ultra-leftism. Principled communist protests that conflict with the centrist voices of the particular nation cause cadre who should know better to "clam up" about international wrongs for short term "don't rock the boat" interests.

Re: Today's Question: What Can We do about the looming Afghan Trap by Norman Markowitz

anselmcantaur — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 14:22:34 -0000

being deemed "extreme" is a heavy indictment in today's centrist political climate in the USA. Hoser says the starting point is "working on convincing the public and political leaders that Afghanistan's situation is not OUR problem". By your use of "our" I gather you are representing yourself as one more member of the imperialist bloc who is in pragmatically convinced of the utilitarian uselessness of invading Afghanistan? Are you suggesting Communists forget concepts like imperialism and working-class internationalism and simply concentrate on thinking up pragmatic tactics for the Obama administration. A trifle Machiavellian or simply a utilitarian mindset?

Re: Political Affairs Magazine - The Problem of Transition: Development, Socialism and Lenin's NEP

anselmcantaur — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 02:17:12 -0000

I would be interested in understanding Atkins' analysis of precisely why Stalin reversed his 1920's line of building up the productive forces under the NEP to the Collectivization line? CJ Atkins all but explicitly says that Stalin's back and forth on the plausibility of the NEP was crass opportunism. I quote: "Within a matter of a few short years, Stalin was able to successfully move from one policy position to another in accordance with the needs of the moment while simultaneously eliminating (first politically and later physically) all other party leaders from any positions of authority. " What were the material conditions, the grain procurement crises and shortages under the NEP in 1927-1928? Did these crises hitting the swelling ranks of the urban industrial working class not pose an obvious material and political demand on Stalin's very leadership of the Party-- to say nothing of the need to industrialize or perish? Finally, would the Revolution have survived without the militant morale of the industrial proletariat who were not only the backbone of the Party - but the activists who most fervently believed in the Party Line on Collectivization as it turned left from 1927 ?

Of course no political leader or aspirant to leadership is completely free of changing party lines because of the complex
dimensions of current politics: this was true of the charismatic Bukharin and dilettante Trotsky as well. But I think the description of the turns in the Stalin line on collectivization presented in the Atkins article was perhaps somewhat less than painstakingly careful and fair in its treatment of the multi-sided realities that produced Soviet collectivization of agriculture.

Re: Today's Question: What Can We do about the looming Afghan Trap by Norman Markowitz

anselmcantaur — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 22:56:58 -0000

Why are communists being asked to think up face-saving exit strategies for an Imperialist war? Wouldn't a total withdrawal of US forces and defeat of the US puppet government be a setback for US imperialism? Are we thinking as communist internationalists these days or as a Democratic Party advisory group?

Re: Political Affairs Magazine - Socialism has failed. Now capitalism is bankrupt. So what comes next?

anselmcantaur — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 21:29:19 -0000

It takes some doing to achieve Hobsbawm's level of world-weary, sophisticated defeatism...
But then again since 1983 he supported Neil Kinnock's transformation of the British Labour
Party into the vessel that endorsed Tony Blair's "New Labour".

Re: Political Affairs Magazine - Socialism has failed. Now capitalism is bankrupt. So what comes next?

anselmcantaur — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 21:19:33 -0000

Having followed Hobsbawm through his post-Communist dotage I presume the answer to "Socialism has failed. Now capitalism is bankrupt. So what comes next?' is: a revised new-times version of Social Democracy?

Re: Multiple Choice Questions for New Times by Norman Markowitz

anselmcantaur — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 16:18:41 -0000

I appreciate your reply. It could just be misinterpreted.

Re: Multiple Choice Questions for New Times by Norman Markowitz

anselmcantaur — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 03:41:50 -0000

I think on reflection I should add I am perhaps overly anxious about
"New Times" because of the Canadian experience around 1990-1 ff to liquidate the cpc in favour of varied social democratic foundations, associations (so many schemes, re-namings, new Lines). And it happened in a different but familiar trajectory in Britain. I do not wish to accuse, hector or anything deleterious to the communist movement.
Perhaps those comrades outside the US have the wrong approach and misunderstand. It is not my place to interfere, but on the other hand, may I as an international and internationalist comrade who worked a decade in America respectfully request
fraternal dialogue.

Re: Multiple Choice Questions for New Times by Norman Markowitz

anselmcantaur — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 00:07:35 -0000

These are good questions but I wonder what you are up to in using the loaded phrase "New Times" in a CPUSA forum. The party-group who contributed to the British Communist Party journal Marxism Today in the 1980's concluded we were living in ‘New Times’, which required a total rethinking of left politics and a scrapping Marxism-Leninism. Have you decided or has the communist party decided that we are living in "New Times" that require a new kind of socialism sans a communist vanguard party leading a working-class to socialist revolution??

I would not ordinarily startle at a perhaps coincidental use of a mere phrase were the phrase not notorious in the global Communist Parties. But because communist intellectuals know what "New Times" came to mean in the former CPGB -- liquidationism of the party -- can I surmise its use was accidental in an American moment when many necks have been twisted round 180 degrees by "old times" Social-Democracy?

Re: Debate over 1930s famine in Ukraine continues

anselmcantaur — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 23:47:45 -0000

There was certainly an unhealthy deference to and veneration of The USSR and Stalin in former years.
But there has also been a carte blanche demonization
of the USSR and CPSU in Stalin's years. I have never
considered myself or called myself a a Stalinist. And I am not an anti-Stalinist. But as a communist who is a student of cultures and ideologies I do not apologize for seeking the truth about the campaigns or actions of global CPs. In the process of party-building and creating accurate educationals and marxist schools we need access to a balanced picture of what the Communist movement has been - and hopes to become. That and only that is my agenda. Stalin and the CPSU's successes and Stalin and the CPSU's crimes belong on the same page. We can't cloak our past while we are Communist parties. For better and for worse we have formidable ancestors!

Re: Debate over 1930s famine in Ukraine continues

anselmcantaur — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 13:01:27 -0000

I add the following advertisement of a very fine book for the interest of those interested in reading further about Soviet Collectivization:

_ The Best Sons of the Fatherland: Workers in the Vanguard of Soviet Collectivization _
by Lynne Viola, (University of Toronto professor)
ISBN13: 9780195042627ISBN10: 019504262X paper, 302 pages
Mar 1989

Description
In this ground-breaking study Lynne Viola--the first Western scholar to gain access to the Soviet state archives on collectivization--brilliantly examines a lost chapter in the history of the Stalin revolution. Looking in detail at the backgrounds, motivations, and mentalities of the 25,000ers, Viola embarks on the first Western investigation of the everyday activities of Stalin's rank-and-file shock troops, the "leading cadres" of socialist construction. In the process, Viola sheds new light on how the state mobilized working-class support for collectivization and reveals that, contrary to popular belief, the 25,000ers went into the countryside as willing recruits. This unique social history uses an "on the scene" line of vision to offer a new understanding of the workings, times, and cadres of Stalin's revolution.

Re: Had enough yet?

anselmcantaur — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 10:39:12 -0000

This video as well as the new administration and congress are doing a Show Trial of individual greedy capitalists as the true culprit of the economic crisis. Marxists ought to reject this and do serious education about the the system that encourages greed: capitalism.

Re: Debate over 1930s famine in Ukraine continues

anselmcantaur — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 10:32:51 -0000

Ben has asked the basic historical questions which are still actively debated by historians of Soviet history and Soviet agricultural policies of the collectivization process. Barbara correctly asks what the Soviet authorities did wrong, "otherwise what is the point of the (NYT) article?" I am not an expert but have read some of the scholarly materials and I think the NYT piece was useless.

The fact is in the academic world the jury is still out on the reasons for the Ukrainian famine. Some historian-agronomists do not concur in the claim made by Ukrainian nationalists that the famine was an "act of genocide" and question the whole thesis of a persecution of the Ukrainian nation . Professor of History at the University of West Virginia , Mike Tauger and Professor of History at the University of Melbourne, Steven Wheatcroft, argue that the famine was not a result of a deliberate policy against the Ukrainians, they bring out agricultural and political documentation to illustrate their contention that the widespread 1932 starvation in Ukraine and western Russian areas was due to misguided or misapplied economic policies during collectivization, to severe drought conditions, and to a harvest that turned out to be much smaller than originally anticipated.

This is an academic debate. But it is at the same time a partisan ideological struggle by Ukrainian nationalists, anti-communists, and the government of Ukraine. I hope the Left does not simply capitulate to the most insidious demonizing portrayals of its past as it retools for the 21st century!

-anselmcantaur

Re: Debate over 1930s famine in Ukraine continues

anselmcantaur — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 01:50:00 -0000

what exactly is "this issue" that is irrevocably nailed down in history? I always try to clarify the issue. Perhaps that is my deviation. The Times piece was rather vague. Is your position that the Famine (and there was a famine) was purposefully plotted by the Soviet government? Or is your position that the USSR govt was selling the grain to the West and was coldly unconcerned that people were starving as a consequence? Did Stalin want to destroy Ukrainian nationalism by an artificial famine? Or was it a combination of factors - agricultural and political and economic that led to the deaths? My concern as a student of history is to actually discuss the issuers and see which option is correct. But if one is simply starting with the premise that Stalin was a Monster, and therefore thinking is unnecessary, I think we are doing history a disservice.
There are many analogous questions about the exact nature of British policy in the Irish famine (not a perfect comparison I admit) but it would seem rather loony to a priori make an a priori statement that the British government was simply being a fiendish Monster? And it is rather primitive Marxism to boot?

Re: Debate over 1930s famine in Ukraine continues

anselmcantaur — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 15:20:13 -0000

I was somewhat surprised to see an anti-soviet piece from the NYT on PA Editors Blog. I read the entire piece. I wanted to say 2 things one personal and one a suggestion of academic sources on the Ukrainian-W Russian Famine. First, on a personal note my mother in law was a child of 10 living on her parents farm on the outskirts of Ternopil, Ukraine in 1932 and has no memory of famine in her area. So we need to be careful about which regions were most impacted by famine.
Second, I suggest to academic readers that they read RW Davies & SG Wheatcroft's book The Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931-33 (NY: Macmillan, 2004)esp p 214; Also see Mark B Tauger's article: "The 1932 Harvest and the Famine of 1933", Slavic Review, 50:1 (1991) esp p 89; and see Terry Martin's The Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union 1923-1939 (Cornell U Press: 2001) esp 273-308
None of these scholars are Stalinists. They are social scientists and historians of Soviet agriculture who do not however support the notion of a conscious conspiracy by Stalin and the CPSU to create a "Ukrainian Holocaust". There are intermediaste positions!

Re: Sam Webb easily handles Glenn Beck's 9-year old mind

anselmcantaur — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 20:31:44 -0000

I wish our international family of related cp's had their own channel:
but that takes a mass movement and money. But we could do so much
more educational work on politics, culture, history if we had a voice of
our own in TV media. I'm not sure if it does us much good in terms of
exposure to have our leaders on these chatter shows hosted by Ids.
I thought Sam was excellent - but Beck tried to use him and abuse him.
Any Left-wing millionaires out there who want to fund a TV political analysis
show? We could call it something catchy like "Political Affairs" or "The Peoples Voice" or "Morning Star"???....

Re: Nationalization, Socialism, and the U.S. Banks

anselmcantaur — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 01:48:25 -0000

I think you've got it right. All the present state measures to stimulate high finance, to salvage jobs and (some) jeopardized homes and to restore credit availability are positions we must advance as Marxist-Leninists.
But it is not to be confused with socialism.