ALB
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Just noticed that the blurb for the Bernes book says:
“When Marx wrote that the Paris Commune of 1871 showed that the “the working-class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes,” he identified a principle that will remain true as long as capitalism and its class antagonism persists.”
I hope this doesn’t mean that he has read “simply cannot” for “cannot simply” as many anti-parliamentarians have, as that was not what Marx meant. Marx’s point, consistent with what he wrote elsewhere, was that the working class should lay hold of the “ready-made state machinery” but would have to change it (make it more democratic) before “wielding it for its own purposes”.
That Bernes article was heavy going even though he argued that labour time vouchers were useless but harmless. But he didn’t mention the waste of resources that would be involved in the bureaucratic procedures to manage any such system.
We reported that here a week before the Daily Excess!
Labour has paved the way for any rise in ReformUK by beating the patriotic drum and waving the Union Jack to gain votes by showing that they have changed. They wanted to be a “party of government” not a “party of protest”, leaving this spot vacant — which Forage and his mob are having some success in filling. And, as the party in office, they are finding that they can’t control capitalism. They don’t even seem to be competent even by capitalist standards.
They have now publicised their reply (and publicity for our view) on Twitter:
https://x.com/workersliberty/status/1872650056723263548
Not surprising that they have sprung to the defence of their slogan. Search “workers liberty tax the rich” and see what comes up. It seems to be their answer to everything.
That’s a revealing quote from Trotsky and doesn’t conform to what Stalin wrote in 1906. Stalin there envisaged a gradual weakening of the state till it disappeared, not it getting stronger before it finally did. Ironically, Stalin and his supporters later adopted the position Trotsky outlined to justify their own ruthless rule.
I think it is fair to say that Trotsky didn’t really understand what socialism was. In his early writings he identified socialism with nationalisation and he always thought that the state sector in Russia was socialist. His refusal, when deposed and in exile, to describe Russia as state capitalist was based on this belief that the nationalised sector represented a change in property relations and was why he still regarded Russia as a non-capitalist, “workers’ state”, even if a “degenerate” one (due to Stalin rather than him being in charge).
SPEW, which contests elections under the pretentious title of TUSC, the so-called “Trade Union and Socialist Coalition”, has recently registered a new variant of this name that can appear on the ballot paper — Independent Trade Union and Socialist Coalition:
https://search.electoralcommission.org.uk/Registrations/PP804
Presumably they are trying to attract some of those leftists who stood as “Independents” in the general election.
Or maybe to avoid confusion with this group:
Why there are so many civilian casualties in Gaza:
So middle-ranking officers in the Israeli killing machine are authorised to kill up to 20 civilians just to kill one ordinary Hamas fighter, such as the fighters’ family and neighbours. And have been on a mass scale.
No doubt they are authorised to kill 100 or more to try to kill a Hamas commander. And will have done.
By anybody’s standards this is deliberate and planned mass murder .
Who says Zionist Israel can’t be compared with Nazi Germany?
“They grab people and send them to war. It’s slavery,” another migrant said, adding that he does not want to defend a country “in which the government and oligarchs own everything, and the people own nothing.”
This statement from a Ukrainian migrant in Germany is quoted by a Russian state propaganda outlet but they themselves are quoting from a German news channel. So it can be regarded as genuine.
Of course there could well be Russian migrants in Germany who would say the same about Russia.
Headline in today’s Times across two pages: “Economy has ground to a halt since Labour won the election”.
Recorded here not to show how incompetent the Labour government is (the Tory line) but to show that no government can conjure up “growth” at will as the Labour career politicians promised.
Incidentally, the prime minister’s spokesperson is quoted as saying that the Labour is still committed “to getting growth in the economy that delivers for working people that they feel in their pay slips”. Which would seem to be a promise to increase real wages (money wages will go up anyway as the general price level rises though not necessarily by as much).
No, they just want to sell more copies of their rag and the cynical hacks who edit them know that stories told in this sort of way sell. That’s what “sensationalism” means.
The Western media — ie the mainstream media in the USA and those states under its nuclear umbrella — paint Putin as a mad dictator. In actual fact, he has a shrewd understanding of the interest of the Russian capitalist state.
In a recent interview he made it clear that he understands that the rule governing relations between states is “might is right” and that when Russia was weak under his predecessors (presumably a reference to Gorbachev and Yeltsin) the West took advantage of this to fill the vacuum left by the collapse of the USSR.
“Previous generation of politicians ruined Russia as desired by West, says Putin
The previous generation of Russian politicians chose the course towards the country’s destruction for the sake of joining the so-called civilized world but this was what the West wanted, President Vladimir Putin said in an interview with VGTRK journalist Pavel Zarubin on Sunday.
“In the newest history, we have passed the period when our previous generation of politicians, in my view, set course even towards the destruction of their own country in the hope that Russia would become a part of the so-called civilized world. And this was what the civilized world wanted,” the Russian leader said.
As Putin pointed out, “as soon as Russia’s potential dwindled and it became weaker, they [the West] began to ruin it instead of making it an equitable partner and a participant in this civilized world.”
“Unfortunately, this is how the world is arranged, at least today. And if we will build relations with someone, we will build them only on the basis of the interests of the Russian state,” Putin said, speaking about the prospect for Russia to normalize relations with the West.”
https://tass.com/politics/1891555Of course those in charge of the capitalist states of the West know too that “might is right” — ‘how the world is arranged”, as Putin put it — and naturally took advantage of Russia’s weakness after the collapse of the USSR in the early 1990s. Their declared aim in the Ukraine war is to try to further weaken Russia.
The war in Ukraine is a trial of strength between the Western capitalist bloc and the Russia capitalist state. Naturally, socialists don’t take sides in such a war and are wary of the propaganda of the rulers of the state they live under.
He seems to be more an enthusiast for labour-time accounting rather than of labour vouchers as such, since he envisages such accounting continuing even when goods and services are free for people to take according to their needs.
Of course “accounting” in the sense of recording what materials and types of work skills are required and/or have been used to produce will be always be needed.
But this doesn’t have to be “accounting” in terms of “socially average labour time”, if only because this is difficult, not to say impossible, to work out beforehand. There isn’t just the problem of working out this average but also of reducing skilled labour to the simple labour in order to try to calculate this average.
Only the actual labour time of actual types of labour can be measured and would need to be, but this would be no different in principle from measuring the amounts of actual materials and energy needed to produce.
Under capitalism what is “socially average labour time” is measured on and through the market. Under J.B’s scheme a similar mechanism would be required, as he seems to recognise when he writes:
“Goods are “priced” at the socially average labor time it takes to produce them. This latter point is important, because if the goods were priced at the actual concrete time that went into their creation, the more productive individual firms would be the only ones people consumed from, and the critical point that communism raises the productive capacity of all productive nodes would be lost.”
This assumes not only quasi-prices but also a quasi-market and quasi market forces where people “consume from” (“buy”
from) those “firms” (!) whose product is the “cheapest”, so forcing competing “productive nodes” to increase their productivity (reduce their average social labour time cost per unit and so the “price” of what they are “selling”).Doesn’t sound very communistic.
Looks as if his criticism of others for proposing “unscientific utopias” is a case of the pot calling the kettle black.
There was a local council by-election in Dudley in the Midlands last Thursday in a ward previously held by Labour.
Here is the result:
Brockmoor & Pensnett (Dudley) Council By-Election Result:
CON: 35.4% (+7.0)
RFM: 30.1% (New)
LAB: 28.9% (-34.7)
GRN: 3.0% (New)
LDM: 1.5% (-6.5)
IND: 1.0% (New)
Conservative GAIN from LabourAnd here is what one of the sitting Councillors for the Ward put on his Facebook page:
“Councillor Steve Edwards
Yesterday at 08:16 • © Thank you to everyone in Brockmoor and Pennett who held their nose and voted Labour yesterday in the by election. Unfortunately we came 3rd. The over overriding message on the door step was anti Starmer and rightly so. Keir Starmer’s attack on the working class, our children and parents/grandparents is unjustifiable.
He lied to us all to get elected and does not deserve to be the leader of the Labour party. Good honest councillors will lose their seats because of Kier Starmer’s actions and his attack on working class people. I hope that election results like this, Labour Coming 3rd in a seat that only 6 months ago became one of our safest seats, will be the kick up the arse the National Labour Party needs but the truth is I don’t think Starmer gives a damn. I stay in the party hoping he is booted out and a proper working class person, not an establishment stooge gets to lead the party again. Your local councillors will continue to work hard and follow the traditional Labour values in spite of Starmer’s actions & reckless attack on the working class. Well done to Alex who is the new councillor 4 Brockmoor and Pensnett, we had a good chat last night and hopefully he, Karen and I will work together to make Brockma and Pennett a better place.
Keir Starmer is not your friend but we are.
Have a great Christmas folks.”I expect he’ll be expelled soon. Meanwhile ReformUk eats into Labour’s traditional base.
Stand Up to Racism have produced a leaflet for distribution at local by-elections where ReformUK is standing.
The message seems to be “Vote For Anybody but ReformUK”. But, if they want to stop a ReformUK councillor being elected (and they’ve won 7 since the general election) they ought to be saying Vote for the candidate in the best position to beat ReformUK even if it’s Tory.
