ALB
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Musk’s view of who’s in charge in the USA. Good point but who does control the teleprompter?
Spot the difference.
Kherson(under Russian control)
“The Russians were interested in who organised the [pro-Ukrainian] rallies in Kherson’ (…) They are still hunting the organisers. ‘The Russians went from house to house, asking them who lived where in the building.(…) Later they came to specific addresses, kidnapping people and taking them away.’” (Times, 16 May)
Odessa (under Ukrainian control)
“Ukraine’s southern port city of Odesa has strong historical links to Russia. And many people there still identify as Russian.
Ukrainian officials say some local collaborators are helping the Kremlin’s war effort by supplying sensitive information.
Now, a hunt for alleged collaborators is under way in Odesa. Technology is playing a key role in this hunt as citizens use several apps and chatrooms to send information about suspicious people to the cybersecurity investigator. Once verified, they pass on the information to the SWAT police team deployed to find suspected collaborators and prosecute them for treason.“ (Al Jazeera video, 17 May https://massive.news/2022/05/17/ukraine-war-swat-police-hunt-for-russian-collaborators-in-odes/)Putin has confirmed that he doesn’t see Finland and Sweden joining NATO as such as a threat but only if NATO moved its troops or weapons there. A bit if shadow boxing going on here, then?
https://www.politico.eu/article/putin-russia-no-problem-finland-sweden-join-nato/amp/
I can understand the Finnish state wanting to join. It has a history of conflict and wars with the Russian state.
But the Swedish state. I can’t understand why. They don’t share a border with Russia and would be treated as just another US client state. No UN more peacekeeping roles, no more giving refuge to political opponents of other NATO states or of states NATO has attacked. In fact, the main victims of Sweden joining would seem to be Kurdish nationalists and other opponents of the Turkish state. Some are likely to have to be handed over to the Turkish state for imprisonment and torture before it lifts its veto on Sweden joining.
I am bit surprised that there isn’t quite a bit of opposition in Sweden to joining. Maybe there is and that’s why the government daren’t hold a referendum on the issue. Anybody know?
RT reports that Ukraine too is thinking of more nationalisations. So, not only is political superstructure of Ukraine and Russia converging but so are their economies:
https://www.rt.com/business/555551-ukraine-economy-russia-conflict/
I think YMS is right that what is relevant is the fact that in joint stock limited liability companies profit need only be enough to pay interest on the bonds issued to raise its capital, not the fact that they have “a high ratio of constant capital to the variable” (even if they do and why they take this legal form).
Marx is not saying that the return to capital in capitalist enterprises with a high c/v does not enter into the equalisation of the rate of the general rate of profit.
He is saying that the return to capital in capitalist enterprises with a high c/v and which take the form of a joint stock companies with limited liability does not have to enter into this equalisation.
On the other hand, the return in capitalist enterprises with a high c/v ratio but which didn’t have the legal form of a limited liability joint stock company would.
Marx was writing at a time — the 1860s — when joint stock companies with limited liability were only beginning to be adopted as the legal form of a capitalist enterprise; which had only been made legally possible in the previous decade. When Marx mentions this phenomenon earlier in volume 3 he gives railway companies and their bonds as the typical example. In fact Engels, editing Marx’s manuscripts nearly 30 years later, had to insert a note about developments since the 1860s.
Today of course nearly all capitalist enterprises are joint stock limited liability companies and it would be a badly performing or unambitious such company which only made or aimed to make enough profit to pay interest on its bonds (and so none to reinvest in expanding the business).
The other question is: what will you do if it doesn’t happen? Say like the Jehovah witnesses that you got the date wrong?
Meanwhile Ukraine is continuing to pass repressive laws to make the regime there the mirror image of the one in Russia. St. Zelensky has just signed a law making it easier to ban political parties without appeal. We would be banned under it if we didn’t follow the government line that the war doesn’t have the civil war aspect that it obviously does have. Saying that it does will get you into trouble just as in Russia saying that it is a war and not a special military operation will.
You can follow the story here:
https://www.rferl.org/amp/ukraine-law-bans-pro-russia-parties-zelenskiy-signs/31849737.html
I doubt it. But,if happens, the British capitalist state will have to prepare to send the expeditionary force to go to northern Russia again that it has committed itself to.
But, to be serious for a moment, Finland is already trying to appease Russia by saying that nuclear weapons won’t be installed there.
I didn’t know the NUS was funded by the government. Won’t be a problem if it collapses as being president of the NUS is one traditional pathway to becoming a Labour MP.
Lambeth Council have now published the turnout figures for all the wards. This allows us to compare how the 5 TUSC (SPEW front) candidates did. Here’s what this shows.
Stockwell West & Lakhall: 87 out of 3173 ballor papers returned = 2.7%
Clapham East: 38/1743 = 2.2%
Brixton Acre Lane: 78/3772 = 2.1%
Streatham Wells: 45/2587 = 1.7%
Herne Hill & Loughborough Junction: 71/4795 = 1.5%Our candidate in Clspham East was 31/1743 = 1.8%.
Incidentally, Clapham East had the lowest turn-out at 23.32% — less than a quarter of the electorate — in the whole borough of Lambeth.
Clearly, they are in the same league as us. They did no better with a full-blown reform programme than we did on a straight socialism and nothing else ticket.
People here have quesioned the wisdom of us contesting in view of the small number of votes. But what must SPEW think as they are doing it to get elected and get reforms?
Interview here by an Israeli journalist with one of the leaders of the Azov battalion holed up
In that steelworks in which the journalist asks this relevant question:“In Zaporizhzhia, I met refugees from Mariupol and I spoke with people who were evacuated to Rostov in Russia. They all repeated the same claim that they were shot at from all directions while they were in the basements. They stressed that it wasn’t just the Russians who were shooting, but the Ukrainian soldiers as well – indiscriminately, at houses. I understand that when there are street battles, there isn’t really an alternative. The question is different: Was this worth it? Kherson, for example, surrendered without a battle, and it is occupied, but there weren’t victims there on a scale like this. Has the fierce defense of Mariupol been worth it?“
To which of course there is only one answer.
I doubt it. I think they are more likely to in Britain’s own breakaway statelet across the Irish Sea.
Three members and sympathisers did cover this and gave away leaflets and copies of the Socialism or Your Money Back book and sold a few Socialist Standards. We were also interviewed by some mickey-taking anti-woke YouTube channel. For the record here it is:
Somebody springs to our defence in the Comments.
As that link mentioned, there were presidential elections there on 8 May which were won by an opposition party candidate. I don’t know whether or not this means that the place could be described as some sort of limited political democracy or what divides political opinion there. The size of the electorate suggests that the election was more like one for one small parliamentary constituency in Britain. According to Wikipedia the opposition candidate was less keen on joining Russia so the result of the referendum might not be a foregone conclusion.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_South_Ossetian_presidential_election
