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16 [lbo-talk] Stalinism (was Eric Hobsbawm) -- rank: 1000

Michael, questioning my cliam that Socialism in One Country was not possible without access to western technology 'I don't know. Others are more up on the subject than I am, but my sources indicate that the Soviets's weapons were superior to the Nazis.' Yes, you could consult this 'Unpatriotic History of the Second World War', http://www.amazon.com/Unpatriotic-History-Second-World-War/dp/1780993781 Access to Western technology was a central preoccupation of the USSR that drove its opportunistic ...

Document Size:	7819
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Oct 9 01:11:53 PDT 2012

17 [lbo-talk] Stalinism (was Eric Hobsbawm) -- rank: 1000

'What is Stalinism' asks Charles, and 'what is the difference between Leninism and Stalinism'? I think there is a clearly stated break, which is this: in the new period the old formula becomes incorrect and must inevitably be replaced by another formula, one that affirms the possibility of the victory of socialism in one country. 'The Social-Democratic Deviation in our party', Report delivered at the Fifteenth all-union conference of the CPSU(B), Nov 1, 1926 in Stalin On the Opposition (Fo ...

Document Size:	6211
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Oct 8 14:53:02 PDT 2012

18 [lbo-talk] Singapore -- rank: 1000

1955 strike in Singapore http://sphotos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/274_25863468153_5913_n.jpg

Document Size:	4710
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Oct 7 07:37:16 PDT 2012

19 [lbo-talk] Singapore -- rank: 1000

Singapore is a very interesting place. My father-in-law was sent there in the 1950s to put down the Communists. They gave him a picture of Chin Peng and another of Lee Kuan Yew with orders to shoot on sight. There are some good books that tell the story of how the Communist movement among the Chinese (the Island is split between Chinese and Malays) turned into a kind of nationalist, and eventually capitalistic movement when Lee Kuan Yew betrayed his allies on the Island, and clashed with those i ...

Document Size:	5551
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Oct 3 12:28:25 PDT 2012

20 [lbo-talk] Hobsbawm -- rank: 1000

Carrol asks of me 'What, in this context, does "Stalinism" mean?' I explained in the article, in the 8th, 9th and 10th paragraphs, the section that begins 'Communism as a movement grew alongside and out of the class struggle... and end '...the most forward-looking and militant people in the 1930s and 1940s were left championing the cause of the most reactionary and destructive regime.' Stalinism means pretty much what it always meant to those that coined the term. Stalinism was a world ...

Document Size:	6417
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Oct 2 14:34:14 PDT 2012

21 [lbo-talk] Eric Hobsbawm -- rank: 1000

Eric Hobsbawm and the tragedy of the left Where Hobsbawm s histories of the 19th century were enlivened by his Marxism, his histories of the 20th century were corrupted by his Stalinism, according to me, anyway. Here's the rest: http://www.spiked-online.com/site/article/12936/

Document Size:	4796
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Oct 2 05:30:22 PDT 2012

22 [lbo-talk] Greece: Ready for business -- rank: 1000

Greece: ready for Business, according to this Observer insert from 2006 'Greece has changed and now offers many opprtunities for foreign investors' http://a8.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc7/163335_10151146231668154_756513153_13236056_822974643_n.jpg

Document Size:	5022
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed May 30 13:35:45 PDT 2012

23 [lbo-talk] cars -- rank: 1000

I cycle all over London, which does have quite a few cycle lanes and bus/cycle lanes. They don t really confer any advantage on us cyclists, but they are a big nuisance to car drivers (because our roads are narrower, taking a lane out of commission seriously impedes traffic). Cyclists for the most part ignore the dedicated cycle lanes, and weave in and out of traffic, which irritates drivers but seems fair enough to me the risk is ours to take. We manoeuvre ahead of drivers at traffic lights s ...

Document Size:	5722
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu May 10 13:56:32 PDT 2012

24 [lbo-talk] London vote -- rank: 1000

The UK punished the governing Conservative/Liberal Alliance in yesterday s elections. The exception was London, where the Tory Boris Johnson narrowly beat Labour s Ken Livingstone. Livingstone s supporters complain that the wealthier outer suburbs outvoted the more impoverished inner London. (The doughnut strategy) But it is no longer true that inner London is impoverished and outer London wealthy. Tim Butler, Chris Hamnett and Mark Ramsden s analysis of London s employment in the 2001 census ...

Document Size:	5647
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat May 5 00:03:09 PDT 2012

25 [lbo-talk] advertising and marxism -- rank: 1000

... mind you Lenin s answer to Charles problem wage laborers are only paid so much, and it is always less than enough to buy all the consumer commodities which they produce was that workers are not the only consumers. Capitalists consume, both privately consuming luxuries, and as corporations, consuming those intermediate goods and machines that go to make up consumer goods. The total demand, therefore is greater than the demand of the working class. Lenin explains in Capitalism in Russia, wh ...

Document Size:	5052
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Mar 26 11:20:55 PDT 2012

26 [lbo-talk] advertising and marxism -- rank: 1000

Wojtek writes: Did not they try to "get around" this by expanding credit availability to the mass of wage laborers and, one may add, homeowners? And it worked for a while with fabulous results- capitalists made like bandits. Of course, there is the question of how long it will work, but as Keynes commented, in the long run we are all dead. Nothing stops the future generations from playing this musical chair game again. But credit is only money, if the distribution of money has no corr ...

Document Size:	5601
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Mar 26 10:23:14 PDT 2012

27 [lbo-talk] advertising and marxism -- rank: 1000

I wrote this for Critique a while ago trying to integrate Marxism and brand theory This article looks at the contemporary vogue for branding in business theory as symptomatic, less of success than of failure, of the attempts by businesses to avoid market failure. It sees the quest for brand added-value as an attempt to avoid diminishing returns, and looks at the ways in which branding raises the threshold to market entry at the cost of rivals. It also investigates the connection between re-brand ...

Document Size:	5399
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Mar 26 09:58:30 PDT 2012

28 [lbo-talk] America IS the 1%? -- rank: 1000

I don t really agree with this, but it is interesting, all the same. America IS the 1%: You need just $34,000 annual income to be in the global elite... and HALF the world's richest people live in the U.S. Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2082385/We-1--You-need-34k-income-global-elite--half-worlds-richest-live-U-S.html#ixzz1qETt2dPI

Document Size:	4970
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Mar 26 07:19:26 PDT 2012

29 [lbo-talk] Park Slope Food Coop and Israel boycott -- rank: 1000

More on the Park Slope intifada. And already predominantly white, it is getting whiter by the decade http://www.fuckedinparkslope.com/home/census-2010-the-unbearable-whiteness-of-park-slope.html http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/census/census2010/m_pl_p6_ct.pdf One of the more gentrified parts of one of the wealthiest cities in the world. http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2008/12/parts_of_brooklyn_that_feel_ri.html Property prices are forcing poor people out http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/31/49/3 ...

Document Size:	5533
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Mar 21 00:28:21 PDT 2012

30 [lbo-talk] Park Slope Food Coop and Israel boycott -- rank: 1000

A favoured race indeed, Joe. Park Slope median income: $96,532 in 2000, says wikipedia

Document Size:	4719
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Mar 20 14:59:46 PDT 2012