ALB
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Yes, Ashley Montagu is good;
“the SPGB’s ‘materialism’ (which they share with Lenin)”
Just in case, Thomas, you get the wrong impression:
http://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2019/03/lenin-reviewed-1976.html?m=1
That’s not the view of the SPGB but of some weirdo who frequents this forum. It’s open to anyone including weirdos.
I don’t want to be (too) pedantic but it’s been known for ages that inheritance is through genes not the blood as was thought for a long time. So should we really be encouraging this mistaken belief by using its terminology? It’s a valid point of course that national characteristics are cultural rather than biological and are transmitted through learning not through genes.
Of course you are qualified to comment Alan! So-called “Modern Monetary Theory” is basically the view that the government can and should print as much money as it needs to finance its activities without needing to worry about any adverse consequences such as roaring inflation. This is why it’s been said that what MMT stands for is Magic Money Tree. Anybody can refute that. The article you refer to also criticises it after summarising its claims.
I think we’ve had a thread on them before but here’s a more theoretical refutation of the theory.
This, from a more conventional reformist standpoint than the MMTers’, isn’t too bad.
Yes , it’s because dentists (and doctors not directly employed by the NHS such as consultants and GPS) are “independent contractors”, ie profit-seeking businesses, and that’s what profit-seeking business do in any way they can. It’s called “private enterprise” and is a basic form of the capitalist system. And like all businesses one of the risks they take is being found out if they break the law or bend the rules as many do from time to time;
I got confused between SOEs and SBCs. But it didn’t seem to be saying anything particularly new. The fact that the old USSR was ahead for a while in the space race shows that the state can develop one sector of the economy if it throws enough resources at it but this will be at the expense of other sections. I think this is what the present UK government wants to do with hi-tech industries but the EU regards such “state aid” as unfair competition.
What are we to make of this?
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.com/news/amp/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-54138247
Hume was in effect an agnostic and a sceptic who is still studied by all students of philosophy in Britain. He did support slavery and needn’t have done as others at the time didn’t.
That other philosopher taught in all British and American universities, John Locke, drew up a constitution for Carolina which provided for chattel slavery.
Another one, Thomas Jefferson, fathered children with one of his slaves. Rabbie Burns was going to take up a job as a slave overseer in the West Indies.
All this needs to be pointed out of course, drawing attention to the feet of clay of the great philosophers of the rising bourgeoisie. But I would have they that it’s much more important to refute their ideas than pulling down their statues or renaming buildings (as a prelude to banning their books?).
One philosopher who might escape this is Plato since he was at one point bought and sold as a slave himself. Not that it prevented him proposing a caste system as the ideal way to organise society.
If there was that degree of socialist consciousness amongst the general population wouldn’t it also manifest itself politically by sending to parliament mandated socialist delegates not pro-capitalist politicians? That way the change to socialism could be properly co-ordinated and the socialist majority have the power and legitimacy to deal with any possible attempt by any minority to try to hold up the establishment of socialism.
Having said that, I think you could be right that something like what you say could be expected to happen in the last days of capitalism. More likely than the alternative of people rushing to spend all their money before socialism was established.
More from Varouflakis. Now he wants an independent Scottish poond:
History does indeed seem to be moving backwards. Or at least some people want it to.
Yes, elections in the US are a farce from the point of view of formal democracy as those with money like capitalists and capitalist corporations can effectively spend as much as they like to support candidates of their choice. Previous attempts to limit this have been over-ruled by the Supreme Court. This from Wikipedia:
”On February 19, 2013, the Supreme Court announced it would hear McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, a case challenging the limit on how much individuals can donate directly to political parties and federal candidates. On April 2, 2014, the Court announced its opinion and maintained aggregate limits on campaign contributions were unconstitutional under the First Amendment”.
Marx once referred to Belgium in his day as a capitalists’ paradise. This title has long since passed to the US.
We’ve got one too of course:
It is not clear what the government is up to with its Bill to deliberately break an international treaty signed only last year. I know we have always said that treaties are just pieces of paper that a state can find a pretext to tear up if the interests of its capitalist class require this. It has happened many times.
In this case, however, it is difficult to see what is the capitalist interest, even that of the minority section which was anti-EU and pro-US instead. Northern Ireland is of no consequence to the UK capitalist class; in fact it’s a drain on their resources. So that can’t be the reason.
The only rational explanation would seem to be that it’s a negotiating ploy to get the EU to agree to a better trade deal from the UK point of view. We will see.
This article brings out rather well the diplomatic and electoral duplicity involved, but then we already knew that politicians tell lies to win elections though Johnson is clearly more brazen about this than most others.
The accompanying video is good too on the implications for the Irish capitalist economy.
