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466 [lbo-talk] Pedantry -- rank: 1000

Sean writes: 'There is a fine line between pedagogy and pedantism.' ... I think you mean _pedantry_ ...

Document Size:	4502
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat Apr 10 12:38:31 PDT 2010

467 [lbo-talk] History, necessity and the New Zealand Wars -- rank: 1000

In Scott Hamilton's article, recommended by Mike Beggs, I read: 'Marxist sociologist Dave Bedggood has used the term 'Polynesian mode of production' to describe the hybrid economic system that flourished in the Waikato Kingdom in the 1850s and early 1860s, and which later thrived in the famous mini-state of Parihaka. The inhabitants of the Waikato Kingdom and of Parihaka held and worked their land in common, but exported their products to Pakeha capitalist enclaves like Auckland. They thus parti ...

Document Size:	6583
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat Apr 10 08:29:31 PDT 2010

468 [lbo-talk] History, necessity and the New Zealand Wars -- rank: 1000

As I read it, the Governor Grey flip-flopped between supporting Maori land-rights as a limit on settler expansion at first, then shifting ground to attack the Maori the next. The British position was for many years very ambiguous, and the British army reluctant to back the settlers' campaign against the Maori. One of Grey's campaigns was to prevent Maori from selling land to settlers, which they were often keen to do, only later to make the greatest purchases as Governor. I agree that Trotter's ...

Document Size:	6071
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat Apr 10 04:01:48 PDT 2010

469 [lbo-talk] Capybara: Behold! The New New Left Shall Rise From The Ashes of The Old New! -- rank: 1000

that was inspired, Dwayne

Document Size:	4887
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat Apr 10 03:48:57 PDT 2010

470 [lbo-talk] Platypus: what we are, what we do, and why -- rank: 1000

I tend to agree that Tariq Ali is a good man and oughtn't be traduced. But Chris Cutrone is teaching us an important lesson that ought to be heard. The decisive factor - and I mean the decisive factor - in contemporary political life is indeed the defeat of the left. Left wing politics (no doubt flawed in many ways) was none the less a real factor determining the balance of social forces in the twentieth century. Maybe that is not immediately apparent in the US, but in the world, the division be ...

Document Size:	6564
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Apr 9 16:58:09 PDT 2010

471 [lbo-talk] balance of payments -- rank: 1000

Doug: 'Here's a map making my case'. In your dreams.

Document Size:	4497
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Apr 9 16:29:37 PDT 2010

472 [lbo-talk] Happy Birthday Baudelaire -- rank: 1000

*Exterior objects slowly, successively take on strange appearances sounds clothe themselves in colours, colours acquire musical notes colours take on unaccustomed energy and enter the brain with a victorious intensity young girls with sparkling flesh look at you with eyes that are deeper and more limpid than the sky and the water receding waters, playful fountains, harmonious cascades, the blue immensity of the sea, all flow, sing and sleep with an inexpressible charm. * ** *Those beings ...

Document Size:	5447
Author:	JAMES Heartfield
Date:	Fri Apr 9 08:03:19 PDT 2010

473 [lbo-talk] Platypus: what we are, what we do, and why -- rank: 1000

Chris C.: "More than 50 years of "Third World" so-called "revolutionary" movements have failed to produce any emancipatory results whatsoever" Is that something of an overstatement? Having visited both the South Africa and the West Bank and Gaza, I was very impressed with what people had done there in straitened circumstances. I hear that Vietnam is quite impressive, too.

Document Size:	5186
Author:	JAMES Heartfield
Date:	Fri Apr 9 07:01:18 PDT 2010

474 [lbo-talk] The Hidden History of the Guardian Newspaper... in its own words -- rank: 1000

The Hidden History of the Guardian newspaper, in its own words: "The simple cause, at the end, is just. An evil regime in Iraq instituted an evil and brutal invasion. Our soldiers and airmen are there to set that evil right. " "We need an open-ended occupation, a benign colonial regime." "The government has lied and I am glad" "What s so terrible about the nanny state, anyway?" "We think Tony Blair should be elected as Labour s new leader" " ...

Document Size:	6095
Author:	JAMES Heartfield
Date:	Fri Apr 9 03:32:23 PDT 2010

475 [lbo-talk] U.S. civil war -- rank: 1000

I wouldn't want to make too much of it, but Honest Abe did say this when he was running for Congress back in 1846: "In all ages of the world, that some have laboured, and others have, without labour, enjoyed a large proportion of the fruits. This is wrong, and should not continue. To secure to each labourer the product of his labour, or as nearly as possible, is a most worthy object of any good government."

Document Size:	5016
Author:	JAMES Heartfield
Date:	Fri Apr 9 01:46:11 PDT 2010

476 [lbo-talk] Platypus: what we are, what we do, and why -- rank: 1000

Chris C. writes: 'James Heartfield wrote about the problem of the "mirror image" of anti-imperialism being the anti-Islam sentiments one finds in fears of Islamist terrorism. While the threat can and is exaggerated, it does exist... Does this mean that the U.S. invasion and occupation of Afghanistan was justifiable as "self-defense?" In certain terms, yes...' But once you buy into the exaggerated and absurd fears of the worldwide terrorist conspiracy it gets very hard to abst ...

Document Size:	6143
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Apr 8 16:37:03 PDT 2010

477 [lbo-talk] US Civil War (was Platypus etc) -- rank: 1000

Joseph writes: 'If we choose "reaction" vs. "progress" as our litmus test, we will find ourselves on the side of empire in Afghanistan and any number of other conflicts.' Really? I think you have more faith in the US army's ability to improve people's lives than I have. and further: "How long do you imagine it might have lasted without military conflict? Economic forces sufficed to destroy it in most of the hemisphere pretty much simultaneously" But that is a false ...

Document Size:	6400
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Apr 8 15:28:56 PDT 2010

478 [lbo-talk] Platypus: what we are, what we do, and why -- rank: 1000

Joseph writes: 'I'm hard-pressed to believe it [abolition] was much more than that [propaganda].' But slavery was abolished. So it wasn't just propaganda. Is slavery such an incidental to you that you don't mind if it is or is not abolished? Joseph asks: 'Do you think that abolitionism was any kind of a major factor in the Union's decision to go to war? Why?' That would surely be the obvious conclusion. If you are appealing to some kind of common sense or viewpoint you should spell it out, becau ...

Document Size:	5655
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Apr 8 09:49:02 PDT 2010

479 [lbo-talk] P.S. On Marx on the American Civil War: -- rank: 1000

Chris C. writes: 'history shows that crushing slavery in the American South, the degree to which it did not lead simply to the strengthening of the American workers' movement and overcoming capitalism in the U.S., was a highly ambivalent phenomenon. In many ways Jim Crow racism combined with intensive capitalization in the South was indeed "worse than slavery" ' I wonder if you aren't rather telescoping the historical events here. Jim Crow was not the immediate consequence of the Union ...

Document Size:	6713
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Apr 8 09:35:41 PDT 2010

480 [lbo-talk] Platypus: what we are, what we do, and why -- rank: 1000

Chris C. writes: " his (their) judgments were about not about phenomena in and of themselves, but rather what potentially advanced or blocked the changes he (they) wanted to politically pursue" I wonder if this way of putting it introduces too great a distinction between objective circumstance and subjective goal. If the phenomena in their own right (let's say the Union cause, for example) were not worthy, it would be eccentric to rally the support for it. Marx is not a pragmatist. Chr ...

Document Size:	6994
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Apr 8 08:51:45 PDT 2010