Re: Hitler a yellow socialist?

by **Celtiberian** Mon Aug 01, 2011 1:16 pm

rockstar1488 wrote:This is a common misconception among many, they think an autocratic government means that there cannot be any democracy, this is not true. autocracy and democracy are not mutually exclusive. there was democracy under the reich, i dont know if youve heard of the 1936 elections. it took place after the first 4 year plan as Hitler promised. (and ofcourse the overwhelming majority re-elected him) now thats more than any capitalist or communist leader ever dids for their people.

The "election" of 1936 was no more legitimate than were the elections carried out in the former Soviet Union. Of course the Reich officials wanted to gauge the public's opinions regarding the policies the state was enacting every so often, because even despotic regimes worry about public opinion turning against them—which could easily end up becoming a hindrance to having their policies enforced. The results of the '36 referendum alone prove that it was a disingenuous act, meant to gather information while deceiving the public into thinking they were participating in an actual election: There was a voter turnout rate of 99%, with 98.8% of the German people allegedly approving of a single party Reichstag. Bear in mind, in the election of 1933, the NSDAP received only 43.9% of the vote, thereby leaving us to presume that somehow (within the span of three years) the NSDAP managed to win over a further 54.9% of the German electorate—which included millions of communists and Social Democrats, no less. Maybe you can find such a remarkable change of heart among such a large segment of the population believable, but I most certainly cannot.

Regardless, to argue the Third Reich was a "democracy" is beyond absurd. Hitler possessed nothing but disdain for the very notion of democracy:

"The young movement is in its nature and inner organization anti-parliamentarian; that is, it rejects, in general and in its own inner structure, a principle of majority rule in which the leader is degraded to the level of a mere executant of other people's will and opinion.

. . . The NSDAP should not become a constable of public opinion, but must dominate it. It must not become a servant of the masses, but their master!

. . . By rejecting the authority of the individual and replacing it by the numbers of some momentary mob, the parliamentary principle of majority rule sins against the basic aristocratic principle of Nature.

. . . There must be no majority decisions, but only responsible persons, and the word 'council' must be restored to its original meaning. Surely every man will have advisers by his side, but the decision will be made by one man."
Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf, pp. 344, 465, 81, 449

Hitler even said: "I am not a dictator, democracy will be rigorously enforced by national socialism". its even in the 25 points of national socialism: "The right to vote shall be enjoyed by all citizens".

Hitler said a lot of things throughout his political career, many of them incoherent and even contradictory. What he said is of less interest than what he actually did upon becoming chancellor. The 25 Point Programme never being fulfilled is a good example highlighting the stark difference between Hitler's rhetoric and his action.

National socialist germany was a republic. in his table talks Hitler even says: "a republic is better than a monarchy".

By no means was the Third Reich a "republic." Hitler did indeed come to despise monarchism, but his notion of a republic was based almost entirely on the thoroughly undemocratic nature of the Catholic Church hierarchy:

"The election of the Chief must not take place in public, but in camera. On the occasion of the election of a pope, the people does not know what is happening behind the scenes. A case is reported in which the cardinals exchanged blows. Since then, the cardinals have been deprived of all contact with the outside world, for the duration of the conclave! This is a principle that is also to be observed for the election of the Fuehrer: all conversation with the electors will be forbidden throughout operations."
Hitler, Adolf. Hitler's Table Talk, p. 388

interesting, so then you say that marxists also think of the economy as a means to an end? okay then, lets say hypothetically, the only way to achieve bread and living space for everyone woud be through a free market system, would they adopt it? So far every marxist ive talked to doesnt even want to hear about doing it any other way than is perscribed in the communist manifesto, but if im wrong please explain how.

If it could be conclusively proven that Margaret Thatcher was correct, and there's truly "no alternative" to capitalism, then any rational communist would have no choice but to abandon the entire socialist project. However, no such lesson can be drawn from history. As a matter of fact, socialism (i.e., workers' control of the means of production) has already been empirically proven to work in practice, and work well. Even Soviet style central planning wasn't a complete failure, so there's absolutely no reason to believe a population would be in the position to need to adopt the capitalist mode of production in order to survive.

and heres another thing i wanted to address, (this is in reference to part of your respone from the "information is not property" thread) you say that merely employing someone is exploitation, well thats absurd in my opinion. if a small bussiness pays a guy 10$ an hour to sit in front of a cash register and press buttons, thats completely fair in my opinion. exploitation is what wal-mart does to its employees, when the company makes 17 billion dollars annually while their workers are paid minimum wage with no benefits, THATS exploitation. and its insulting to those people when a well paid well compensated small bussiness employee claims "exploitation" just because he has a boss.

You're obviously unfamiliar with the socialist definition of exploitation—which, incidentally, precedes Karl Marx's adoption of it. To quote from my article, "The Petite Bourgeoisie":

"The crux of the issue is whether or not petit-bourgeois enterprises withstand the socialist critique of capital, and the answer is unequivocally no, they do not. So the logical question which follows is: What precisely is the socialist objection to capitalism? There are primarily two objections, one based upon the capitalist theft of surplus-value, and the other based on the juridical principle of imputation. I will explain each of these in turn.

Charlotte Wilson accurately explained surplus-value as being the 'difference between the value produced by the workers and the wages they receive.' In other words, workers are paid a wage to manufacture commodities that usually have an exchange value greater than the wage they receive from their capitalist employer. The capitalist appropriation of the surplus-value labor produces is what socialists refer to as 'exploitation.' Capitalist ownership of the means of production is what enables this exploitation to occur, because labor has no alternative to working for a capitalist, or as Marx put it, 'Capital obtains this surplus labor without an equivalent, and in essence it always remains forced labor no matter how much it may seem to result from free contractual agreement.'

The term 'wage slavery' was coined at the height of the Industrial Revolution in the United States, by the so-called 'factory girls' who labored in the cotton mills of Lowell, Massachusetts. 'Wage slavery' is used to denote the similarities between wage labor and chattel slavery—i.e., the surplus-value both the wage laborer and chattel slave produces is appropriated by property owners, as opposed to the individuals who actually produce said surplus. However, we can even find sentiments against capitalist social relations as early as 1767, when Simon-Nicholas Henri Linguet quite eloquently explained the unjust nature of wage labor:

'It is the impossibility of living by any other means that compels our farm laborers to till the soil whose fruits they will not eat, and our masons to construct buildings in which they will not live. It is want that drags them to those markets where they await masters who will do them the kindness of buying them. It is want that compels them to go down on their knees to the rich man in order to get from him permission to enrich him. . . . What effective gain has the suppression of slavery brought him? . . . He is free you say. Ah! That is his misfortune. The slave was precious to his master because of the money he had cost him. But the handicraftsman costs nothing to the rich voluptuary who employs him. . . . These men, it is said, have no master they have one, and the most terrible, the most imperious of masters, that is need. It is this that reduces them to the most cruel dependence.'

The juridical principle of imputation is also a strong indictment against the capitalist wage-for-labor-time contract. In legal theory, imputation implies that 'people should always be held legally responsible for the positive and negative results of their de facto responsible actions.' So in criminal law, for example, if a gang conspires to rob a bank and one remains outside in the car to ensure a quick escape, while the others kill a guard inside the bank, the driver is jointly liable for the homicide. In other words, whenever two or more people embark on a joint exercise, they are equally liable for everything that happens during the execution of that plan. If we apply imputation into the realm of economics, and we assume that people have the inalienable right to the product of their labor and their labor time (as socialists do), then the capitalist wage-for-labor-time contract is in direct violation of the juridical principle of imputation since it permits capitalists to have the legal responsibility for the firm's entire output and the liability for the labor time of his/her employees. Workers not being held legally responsible for the results of their labor is to reduce workers to the status of things and, consequently, to have them lose their dignity as human beings.

Capitalist apologists utilize a litany of theories to justify bourgeois social relations, from 'time preference' theory to 'risk.' For the sake of brevity (and because of the obvious absurdity of defenses based upon time preference and risk), I shall focus on the most commonly invoked defense of capitalism: entrepreneurial discovery. The Austrian school economists, Joseph Schumpeter and Israel Kirzner, are the most famous advocates of this theory (sometimes referred to as the 'finders-keepers' ethic). According to this theory, capitalist profit is justifiable because entrepreneurs use their knowledge to identify gaps in the market, new products or services or new means of producing existing goods. There are, of course, numerous problems with this theory. Aside from the fact that it doesn't logically follow that mere discovery is deserving of non-labor income, a requisite condition to generating a profit from discovery within capitalism is to attain the means by which to bring said discovery to the market (i.e., having or being lent funds to invest in machinery, office space, etc.). Without the exploitation of labor, however, no profit could possibly be made by the entrepreneur. Moreover, as Peter Kropotkin rightly noted, 'every invention is a synthesis, the resultant of innumerable inventions which have preceded it.' There is also the problem of credit rationing under capitalism. The finders-keepers ethic posits that everyone has the equal opportunity to be a 'finder' (and therefore, profit from entrepreneurial activity), but within the capitalist mode of production, financial institutions systematically discriminate against the asset-poor in society (otherwise known as the 'working-class'). As a result of this discrimination, no matter how much interest a person might be willing to pay to subsidize their business idea, if they don't have adequate collateral to satisfy lenders, they'll be denied a loan—hence the expression: 'it takes money to make money.'

Capitalist social relations might be justifiable if it could be argued every institutional alternative to capitalism is unworkable, but we know this to be false. One of the socialist solutions to the capitalist exploitation of labor is to replace capitalist enterprises with syndicalist firms (also known as 'worker cooperatives,' 'collectives,' 'labor-managed firms,' etc.). In syndicalist firms, labor would be held responsible for appropriating the surplus their firm generates, thereby eliminating exploitation. As Christopher Eaton Gunn explains:

'The economic category of profit does not exist in the labour-managed firm, as it does in the capitalist firm where wages are a cost to be subtracted from gross income before a residual profit is determined . . . Income shared among all producers is net income generated by the firm: the total of value added by human labour applied to the means of production, less payment of all costs of production and any reserves for depreciation of plant and equipment.'

Millions of laborers throughout the world work within such syndicalist firms today, and the success of the cooperative organizational model has been empirically verified. The task of a future Socialist-Nationalist commonwealth, dedicated to ending the exploitation of labor, is to foster cooperative production via the implementation of syndicalist firms and the abolition of the wage-for-labor-time contract. The economist, Jaroslav Vanek, proposed the following law to be written within a socialist constitution:

'Whenever people work together in a common enterprise (whatever their number), it is they and they only who appropriate the results of their labors, whether positive (products) or negative (costs or liabilities), and who control and manage democratically on the basis of equality of vote or weight the activities of their enterprise. These workers may or may not be owners of the capital assets with which they work, but in any event such ownership does not impart any rights of control over the firm. Only possessions of and income from such assets can be assigned to the owners, to be regulated by a free contract between the working community (i.e., the enterprise) and the owners.'"
A., Michael. "The Petite Bourgeoisie."

the national socialist concept of bussiness was still vastly different than that of capitalist countries. the nazis sought to combine the concepts leadership and entrpenuership. so the plant leader still had to place the common good of the corporation above his profit.

The Hitlerian conception of business still involved private ownership of the means of production and wage labor, ergo, it was a form of capitalism. No one has argued that National Socialist Germany practiced a form of laissez-faire capitalism, I've been perfectly willing to concede that the Third Reich's economy can be characterized as having been a form of dirigisme featuring several provisions for the social welfare. However, it would be a mistake to refer to such an economy as typifying revolutionary socialism—which, again, is what we advocate on this forum.

this is what i think marxists need to understand, the problem is not that the capitalists are making money, the problem is that they dont SHARE it. Hitler saw this perfectly.

Profit-sharing capitalism, as promoted by the likes of Martin L. Weitzman, does nothing to redress the central injustice of capitalism: exploitation. Nor does it bring us closer toward an economy free of the anarchy of the market—a worthy goal in the minds of many of us. Income unearned by work would persist, as would alienated labor. Need I go on?

well, did they succeed in assassinating Hitler?

Obviously not, but that's not to say they wouldn't have eventually succeeded.

that wouldnt be a problem, as sooner or later the people would come together as a folk and classes would cease. the aim of national socialism is to achieve a classless society through class cooperation. as the Fürher put it "in the future there must be no ranks or classes and you must not let them grow within you"

The idea that individuals with interests completely opposed to one another will ever unite for the "greater good" of society is idealistic claptrap. It's never happened in the past and we have no reason to expect it to occur in the future. Wishing away class differences, while enabling the very material factors which give rise to those class antagonisms to persist, is completely absurd (to put it mildly).

yes, i dont deny that its a difficult process, but do you really think a nation of the proletariat is anymore realistic?

Yes, I do. Steps could be taken immediately which would move us beyond capitalism and toward a socialist mode of production governed by a democratic workers' state.

exactly how did that work out in the USSR or Maoist China? Sure the USSR was better than Czarist Russia, but it was still far from adequate.

No one is denying this, least of all most contemporary Marxists.

marxism (and capitalism) ignores human nature, that is why communism will just turn into a dictatrorship.

Again, you're making unfounded generalizations. Have some Marxists in the past failed to acknowledge important aspects of human nature? Certainly, but plenty have made no such mistake. If anything, I believe it is the Hitlerites who fail to appreciate the implications an acknowledgment of human nature has for their theories.

i beg to differ there, yellow socialism only has a capitalist shell, but its substance is something much more different.

Yellow socialism is a form of capitalism, there's simply no getting around it. No matter how far it may diverge from laissez-faire, it still retains the features of capitalism revolutionary socialists (myself included) find most objectionable.

that is the folly of marxism, materialism.

Rev Scare already sufficiently addressed this remark, so there's no need for I to elaborate any further.

one of its other main focuses is eugenics, which marxism dpes not include.

I'm sorry, but you're mistaken again. The founder of eugenics, Francis Galton, had a young protégé named Karl Pearson, who happened to be both a eugenicist and a Marxist—and he wasn't the only Marxist eugenicist; to quote from another one of my essays:

"Hermann Joseph Muller was an American geneticist (and Nobel laureate), who in 1935 wrote a book entitled 'Out of the Night: A Biologist's View of the Future.' Like the work Pearson and Woltmann which preceded it, 'Out of the Night' sought to reconcile Marxism and eugenics. The Soviet Union under Lenin had actually founded a Eugenics Society, headed by the Russian biologist, Nikolai Konstantinovich Kol'tsov. The initial Soviet support for eugenics was based on the view that the philosophy of eugenics 'undermined Christianity and shared the Marxist, materialist belief that human beings have the power to shape the future and improve the human condition.' Indeed, an entire movement arose in the Anglo-American world known as 'Bolshevik Eugenics,' which held that the Soviet Union was the only nation capable of enacting an unbiased eugenics program, since 'only a scientific society could treat issues like breeding objectively, and only an egalitarian society could allow innate abilities to express themselves undistorted by social class.' However, the Eugenics Society was disbanded by Joseph Stalin, due to Stalin's disbelief in the scientific value of eugenics, and because Russia had suffered massive losses of life during the Civil War and therefore couldn't afford to be sterilizing its citizens. Muller, who had been living in the USSR as a Senior Geneticist at the Institute of Genetics of the Academy of Sciences, sent a copy of 'Out of the Night' to Joseph Stalin, attached with a letter urging Stalin to restart a program of eugenics in Russia. Muller's arguments basically echoed the warnings of Eden Paul (leading member of the Communist Party of Great Britain), who believed that 'unless the socialist is a eugenicist as well, the socialist state will speedily perish from racial degradation.' Muller's warnings were not heeded by the regime, and he quickly fell into disfavor with Stalin. Shortly thereafter, Muller left the Soviet Union, but remained a dedicated communist for the duration of his life.

Muller and Paul's insistence on the necessity of eugenics represented the views of a major segment within the socialist and communist movements of the early twentieth century. Socialist intellectuals such as Margaret Sanger, Sidney and Beatrice Webb, Havelock Ellis, George Bernard Shaw, H. G. Wells, Joseph Needham, and so forth, all supported eugenic policies to be implemented in conjunction with socialism. When writing for the Daily Worker in November 1949, the renowned evolutionary biologist and British communist, J. B. S. Haldane—who was also a signer of the 'Eugenics Manifesto' of 1939, along with fellow communists, H. J. Muller and Joseph Needham—rebuked the claim that communism upheld an egalitarian conception of human nature, by stating 'The dogma of human equality is no part of Communism . . . the formula of Communism: 'from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs' would be nonsense, if abilities were equal.'
A., Michael. "Socialism, Race, and Equality."

the only reason they kept the system of free market was only because it was more efficient than a state-run one. that is why the nazis actually tried to privatize as much industry as possible.

They had no basis whatsoever for thinking capitalism was "more efficient" than state socialism, let alone syndicalism. As Albert Speer explained:

"Actually, a kind of state socialism seemed to be gaining more and more ground, furthered by many of the party functionaries. They had already managed to have all plants owned by the state distributed among the various party districts and subordinated to their own district enterprises. In particular the numerous underground plants, which had been equipped and financed by the state, but whose directors, skilled workers, and machinery had been provided by private industry, seemed destined to fall under state control after the war. Our very system of industrial direction in the interests of war production could easily become the framework for a state-socialist economic order. The result was that our organization, the more efficient it became, was itself providing the party leaders with the instruments for the doom of private enterprise."
Speer, Albert. Inside the Third Reich, p. 359

The actual reason the NSDAP sold off so many state assets upon coming to power was so the government could afford the massive Keynesian stimulus program they implemented without having to tax the bourgeoisie or deficit spend in order to do so.

yes, in a way. because if you take the term socialism, youll see that its quite a broad term.

We all know this.

national socialism seeked to transcend classes, it's vision was far more idealistic than that marxist socialism.

Marxists differ as to the institutional framework they favor for ushering in a socialist mode of production, which is why there has always been so much sectarianism within the far left.

you see, i share Hitler's view of socialism, one time he said " if people have something to eat and their pleasure, then they have their socialism."

That quote from Hitler, of which I'm very familiar, is incredibly condescending. Socialism is about far more than having food in your stomach and leisure time, it's about achieving genuine social justice.

when I joined i was under the impression that ALL socialists and leftist nationalists are welcome. although now I clearly see that is not the case.

Then you obviously didn't read the forum's FAQ section.

judging from other posts in this forum, i have concluded that you guys are not even nationalists! youre just marxist internationalists as ive even seen many of your members espouse politically correct anti-racist rhetoric.

Every member of this forum is a left-wing nationalist. If you're unable to distinguish left-wing nationalism from the reactionary nationalism espoused by the likes of Adolf Hitler, I suggest you take the time to read more while posting less. As for the accusation we're "politically correct anti-racists," I find such a notion laughable. You're correct in saying we're not racists (i.e., individuals who support racial supremacism and oppression), but we do advocate on behalf of national self-determination for all peoples—a politically incorrect position, if ever there was one.

i knew when i joined that there were going to be predominatly marxist socialists, but i thought i was going to be viewed as an equal. but no, this forum is just full of people who think socialism is exclusively marxian.

I've spent a considerable amount of time civilly debating with you, so I fail to see why you feel as though you haven't been treated with respect here. And no, we do not accept individuals who promote capitalism (whatever its form may be) as "equals," but that should have been apparent to you upon registering.

you marxists have hijacked the term socialism. and to tell you the truth, you are all hypocrites if you dont accept national socialists and fascists as your comrades, because then you cant follow the teachings of marx, and be nationalists at the same time!

Since when have National Socialists or fascists ever sought to accept Marxists as their "comrades"? And for your information, it really isn't difficult to reconcile the work of Marx and Engels with nationalism if you have a firm understanding of both Marxian and nationalist theory.

national socialism and fascism are LEFT WING, regardless of what a few confused people say.

They were as left-wing as the 'New Deal Democrats' were, or perhaps 'Old Labour' in Britain.

I mean really, you have no problem glorifying mass murderers like stalion or mao, yet you are against giving due credit to a man who saved his country from financial ruin.

I haven't seen anyone "glorifying" the murders Stalin and Mao were responsible for, though I haven't exactly seen you denouncing the countless deaths Hitler and Mussolini were responsible for either. You basically treat Adolf Hitler as a demigod, religiously clinging to every word the man ever uttered, completely disregarding his innumerable shortcomings as a leader and theorist.

by Pantheon Rising Mon Aug 01, 2011 5:50 pm

Coach wrote:And I'll add that he might be way too comfortable with the current status quo, with the current efforts and the current prevailng ideas being advanced in the name of our people (yet obviously not getting our people even a step closer in the real-world to a fundamental resolution of the critical questions/problems of our time).

Most people see Nazi stuff and imagine these guys are really radical. I see a bunch of people hiding behind swastikas and Hitler talk and crude racially antagonistic slogans/jokes to escape responsibility to provide any relevant serious effective mass struggle and revolutionary leadership to our working people. They know our people would see and hear that Nazi white supremacist stuff and instantly respond "get the fuck outta here", so they have the perfect "dog ate my homework" excuse to hide on the sidelines and the fringes, to spew their hateful and elitist bullshit like nobody will care (because they fucking don't, until you try to actually act on it...then they'll just want to off you, and these nazi guys know that, so in the shadows and online they will overwhelmingly remain).

Hey Nazis: Stop being satisfied with the status quo and the system that causes it. Then we'll have something to talk about.

I think the attitude towards National Socialists here is absolutely absurd. No one here goes around waving swastikas. I am frankly sick of the equating of proud National Socialists with such bullshit like white supremecists, eliitist, hateful, and that we are somehow okay with the status quo. Ive stated many times that I am none of that. But yet NS get accused of this all the time. Besides a couple posters I think most here have an SF view to those with views different than them.

by Pantheon Rising Mon Aug 01, 2011 6:18 pm

I honestly do support the ideas behind this site, I just wish it could be without shoving the words NAZIS and RACISTS down our throats. It makes it seem more like RevLeft than a serious Socialist Nationalist movement.

by **Rev Scare** Tue Aug 02, 2011 2:52 am

SSocialistStateSS wrote:I think the attitude towards National Socialists here is absolutely absurd. No one here goes around waving swastikas. I am frankly sick of the equating of proud National Socialists with such bullshit like white supremecists, eliitist, hateful, and that we are somehow okay with the status quo. Ive stated many times that I am none of that. But yet NS get accused of this all the time. Besides a couple posters I think most here have an SF view to those with views different than them.

We have striven in earnest to distance this forum's guiding ideologies (left-wing nationalism and revolutionary socialism) from those deemed incompatible therewith. The arguments in defense of national socialism presented here in Opposing Views have only vindicated our disinclination toward such a, if I may evoke some subtle irony, Weltanschauung. National socialism stands functionally at odds with both revolutionary socialism and left-wing nationalism. Neither you nor rockstar1488 have managed to convince me otherwise but have only affirmed my original assertions regarding your purported tendency. The very term "national socialism" is one that is, in my view, irreparably marred in the public mind, which was a prominent factor in our decision to cast away the term in favor of "socialist nationalism."

In addition, there is no sense in accepting all manner of sociopolitical tendencies so long as they loosely correspond with "nationalism" and "socialism." We are here to advance a defined set of socialist and nationalist principles. Your comparison of the bulk of our forum to Stormfront is unfounded, as we have clearly delineated our positions, whereas SF seeks to remain an amalgam of incoherent "white nationalist" strains with a latent paleoconservative dogma which cannot be transgressed. The SF administration are hypocrites in that they do not admit their intolerance to all forms of progressive social movements; we readily admit our aversion to national socialism and fascism.

by Pantheon Rising Tue Aug 02, 2011 9:46 pm

Rev Scare wrote:We have striven in earnest to distance this forum's guiding ideologies (left-wing nationalism and revolutionary socialism) from those deemed incompatible therewith. The arguments in defense of national socialism presented here in Opposing Views have only vindicated our disinclination toward such a, if I may evoke some subtle irony, Weltanschauung. National socialism stands functionally at odds with both revolutionary socialism and left-wing nationalism. Neither you nor rockstar1488 have managed to convince me otherwise but have only affirmed my original assertions regarding your purported tendency. The very term "national socialism" is one that is, in my view, irreparably marred in the public mind, which was a prominent factor in our decision to cast away the term in favor of "socialist nationalism."

In addition, there is no sense in accepting all manner of sociopolitical tendencies so long as they loosely correspond with "nationalism" and "socialism." We are here to advance a defined set of socialist and nationalist principles. Your comparison of the bulk of our forum to Stormfront is unfounded, as we have clearly delineated our positions, whereas SF seeks to remain an amalgam of incoherent "white nationalist" strains with a latent paleoconservative dogma which cannot be transgressed. The SF administration are hypocrites in that they do not admit their intolerance to all forms of progressive social movements; we readily admit our aversion to national socialism and fascism.

Alright, I understand. I apologize for your comparison to stormfront. I can see that I do not fit in EXACTLY with the "weltanschauung" expressed here, though I do support MANY of the ideas. I do see your reasoning behind adopting the term. I just don't like to hear my views cast off as reactionary and I don't expect to be called a racist.

by rockstar1488 Wed Aug 03, 2011 10:22 am

Celtiberian wrote:The "election" of 1936 was no more legitimate than were the elections carried out in the former Soviet Union. Of course the Reich officials wanted to gauge the public's opinions regarding the policies the state was enacting every so often, because even despotic regimes worry about public opinion turning against them—which could easily end up becoming a hindrance to having their policies enforced. The results of the '36 referendum alone prove that it was a disingenuous act, meant to gather information while deceiving the public into thinking they were participating in an actual election: There was a voter turnout rate of 99%, with 98.8% of the German people allegedly approving of a single party Reichstag. Bear in mind, in the election of 1933, the NSDAP received only 43.9% of the vote, thereby leaving us to presume that somehow (within the span of three years) the NSDAP managed to win over a further 54.9% of the German electorate—which included millions of communists and Social Democrats, no less. Maybe you can find such a remarkable change of heart among such a large segment of the population believable, but I most certainly cannot.

Regardless, to argue the Third Reich was a "democracy" is beyond absurd. Hitler possessed nothing but disdain for the very notion of democracy:

"The young movement is in its nature and inner organization anti-parliamentarian; that is, it rejects, in general and in its own inner structure, a principle of majority rule in which the leader is degraded to the level of a mere executant of other people's will and opinion.

. . . The NSDAP should not become a constable of public opinion, but must dominate it. It must not become a servant of the masses, but their master!

. . . By rejecting the authority of the individual and replacing it by the numbers of some momentary mob, the parliamentary principle of majority rule sins against the basic aristocratic principle of Nature.

. . . There must be no majority decisions, but only responsible persons, and the word 'council' must be restored to its original meaning. Surely every man will have advisers by his side, but the decision will be made by one man."
Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf, pp. 344, 465, 81, 449

Well, its believable if you take into account that in only 1 year the NSDAP managed to reduce the unemployment rate by half, and get Germany on its feet again. Many communists and social democrats dfected to the NSDAP, thats a fact. but regardless, ill give you that one too, as i cant say for sure that it wasnt rigged. but theres still the fact that anyone who didnt like the reich and its government could just leave, yet barely anyone did. so that itself indicates that the people were overall satisfied with the NSDAP. and Hitler mainly just came out against PARLAIMENTARIAN democracy. the Reiuch was a republic, except it was also a meritocracy. so ofcourse not just anyone had the right to vote on legislation, there is actually an excellent article on the national socialist government by an american journalist who travelled to nazi germany and interviewed some of the nazi officials. the way he described it was that the party was in charge, and people gained entry into the party based on merit. and it was the party that formulated new laws, ideas, etc., that the state was to carry out.

Hitler said a lot of things throughout his political career, many of them incoherent and even contradictory. What he said is of less interest than what he actually did upon becoming chancellor. The 25 Point Programme never being fulfilled is a good example highlighting the stark difference between Hitler's rhetoric and his action.

okay yes, its true that Hitler does contradict himself, but keep in mind that Hitler was contantly evolving throughout his life. thats why he even stated to albert speer once that mein kampf is "outdated". on eexample is Hitler's ambiguity towards race. in his earl;y life he was quite rtacist, but towards the end of his career, he came to reject racism, in his famous plattenhorf speech, he said "race and folk are not the same". not to mention, nazi germany wasnt anymore racist than america at the time. in fact, blacks were not even segragted like in america.

If it could be conclusively proven that Margaret Thatcher was correct, and there's truly "no alternative" to capitalism, then any rational communist would have no choice but to abandon the entire socialist project. However, no such lesson can be drawn from history. As a matter of fact, socialism (i.e., workers' control of the means of production) has already been empirically proven to work in practice, and work well. Even Soviet style central planning wasn't a complete failure, so there's absolutely no reason to believe a population would be in the position to need to adopt the capitalist mode of production in order to survive.

whao whao, dont twist my words, i never said capitalism, i said "free market", and thats not how meant it, it was just a hypothetical question, i never implied that only a free market can work, as i know for a fact that it does not. and i never said the soviet economy was a "failure", heck i even said it made "great strides". but compared to the nazi economic system, it was bad. however i do admit that it was better than the USA at the time, i acknowledge that russia was living in the feudal era before the soviets took power, and that it was thanks to the soviets that many people gained access to healthcare and basic education. but compared to it's potential, when you take into account its abundance in natural resources, it made far less progress than it should have made. although this was not jsut because of the system, it was chiefly due to bad leadership, because the USSR wasted a lot of money on the arms race, not mention it was run by zionist bucthers who didnt have the interests of teh Russian people at the forefront of their agenda.

You're obviously unfamiliar with the socialist definition of exploitation—which, incidentally, precedes Karl Marx's adoption of it. To quote from my article, "The Petite Bourgeoisie":

"The crux of the issue is whether or not petit-bourgeois enterprises withstand the socialist critique of capital, and the answer is unequivocally no, they do not. So the logical question which follows is: What precisely is the socialist objection to capitalism? There are primarily two objections, one based upon the capitalist theft of surplus-value, and the other based on the juridical principle of imputation. I will explain each of these in turn.

Charlotte Wilson accurately explained surplus-value as being the 'difference between the value produced by the workers and the wages they receive.' In other words, workers are paid a wage to manufacture commodities that usually have an exchange value greater than the wage they receive from their capitalist employer. The capitalist appropriation of the surplus-value labor produces is what socialists refer to as 'exploitation.' Capitalist ownership of the means of production is what enables this exploitation to occur, because labor has no alternative to working for a capitalist, or as Marx put it, 'Capital obtains this surplus labor without an equivalent, and in essence it always remains forced labor no matter how much it may seem to result from free contractual agreement.'

The term 'wage slavery' was coined at the height of the Industrial Revolution in the United States, by the so-called 'factory girls' who labored in the cotton mills of Lowell, Massachusetts. 'Wage slavery' is used to denote the similarities between wage labor and chattel slavery—i.e., the surplus-value both the wage laborer and chattel slave produces is appropriated by property owners, as opposed to the individuals who actually produce said surplus. However, we can even find sentiments against capitalist social relations as early as 1767, when Simon-Nicholas Henri Linguet quite eloquently explained the unjust nature of wage labor:

'It is the impossibility of living by any other means that compels our farm laborers to till the soil whose fruits they will not eat, and our masons to construct buildings in which they will not live. It is want that drags them to those markets where they await masters who will do them the kindness of buying them. It is want that compels them to go down on their knees to the rich man in order to get from him permission to enrich him. . . . What effective gain has the suppression of slavery brought him? . . . He is free you say. Ah! That is his misfortune. The slave was precious to his master because of the money he had cost him. But the handicraftsman costs nothing to the rich voluptuary who employs him. . . . These men, it is said, have no master they have one, and the most terrible, the most imperious of masters, that is need. It is this that reduces them to the most cruel dependence.'

The juridical principle of imputation is also a strong indictment against the capitalist wage-for-labor-time contract. In legal theory, imputation implies that 'people should always be held legally responsible for the positive and negative results of their de facto responsible actions.' So in criminal law, for example, if a gang conspires to rob a bank and one remains outside in the car to ensure a quick escape, while the others kill a guard inside the bank, the driver is jointly liable for the homicide. In other words, whenever two or more people embark on a joint exercise, they are equally liable for everything that happens during the execution of that plan. If we apply imputation into the realm of economics, and we assume that people have the inalienable right to the product of their labor and their labor time (as socialists do), then the capitalist wage-for-labor-time contract is in direct violation of the juridical principle of imputation since it permits capitalists to have the legal responsibility for the firm's entire output and the liability for the labor time of his/her employees. Workers not being held legally responsible for the results of their labor is to reduce workers to the status of things and, consequently, to have them lose their dignity as human beings.

Capitalist apologists utilize a litany of theories to justify bourgeois social relations, from 'time preference' theory to 'risk.' For the sake of brevity (and because of the obvious absurdity of defenses based upon time preference and risk), I shall focus on the most commonly invoked defense of capitalism: entrepreneurial discovery. The Austrian school economists, Joseph Schumpeter and Israel Kirzner, are the most famous advocates of this theory (sometimes referred to as the 'finders-keepers' ethic). According to this theory, capitalist profit is justifiable because entrepreneurs use their knowledge to identify gaps in the market, new products or services or new means of producing existing goods. There are, of course, numerous problems with this theory. Aside from the fact that it doesn't logically follow that mere discovery is deserving of non-labor income, a requisite condition to generating a profit from discovery within capitalism is to attain the means by which to bring said discovery to the market (i.e., having or being lent funds to invest in machinery, office space, etc.). Without the exploitation of labor, however, no profit could possibly be made by the entrepreneur. Moreover, as Peter Kropotkin rightly noted, 'every invention is a synthesis, the resultant of innumerable inventions which have preceded it.' There is also the problem of credit rationing under capitalism. The finders-keepers ethic posits that everyone has the equal opportunity to be a 'finder' (and therefore, profit from entrepreneurial activity), but within the capitalist mode of production, financial institutions systematically discriminate against the asset-poor in society (otherwise known as the 'working-class'). As a result of this discrimination, no matter how much interest a person might be willing to pay to subsidize their business idea, if they don't have adequate collateral to satisfy lenders, they'll be denied a loan—hence the expression: 'it takes money to make money.'

Capitalist social relations might be justifiable if it could be argued every institutional alternative to capitalism is unworkable, but we know this to be false. One of the socialist solutions to the capitalist exploitation of labor is to replace capitalist enterprises with syndicalist firms (also known as 'worker cooperatives,' 'collectives,' 'labor-managed firms,' etc.). In syndicalist firms, labor would be held responsible for appropriating the surplus their firm generates, thereby eliminating exploitation. As Christopher Eaton Gunn explains:

'The economic category of profit does not exist in the labour-managed firm, as it does in the capitalist firm where wages are a cost to be subtracted from gross income before a residual profit is determined . . . Income shared among all producers is net income generated by the firm: the total of value added by human labour applied to the means of production, less payment of all costs of production and any reserves for depreciation of plant and equipment.'

Millions of laborers throughout the world work within such syndicalist firms today, and the success of the cooperative organizational model has been empirically verified. The task of a future Socialist-Nationalist commonwealth, dedicated to ending the exploitation of labor, is to foster cooperative production via the implementation of syndicalist firms and the abolition of the wage-for-labor-time contract. The economist, Jaroslav Vanek, proposed the following law to be written within a socialist constitution:

'Whenever people work together in a common enterprise (whatever their number), it is they and they only who appropriate the results of their labors, whether positive (products) or negative (costs or liabilities), and who control and manage democratically on the basis of equality of vote or weight the activities of their enterprise. These workers may or may not be owners of the capital assets with which they work, but in any event such ownership does not impart any rights of control over the firm. Only possessions of and income from such assets can be assigned to the owners, to be regulated by a free contract between the working community (i.e., the enterprise) and the owners.'"
A., Michael. "The Petite Bourgeoisie."

I am quite familliar with the socialist defiition of exploitation! Thats what I was talking about in that entire paragraph! the marxian definition of exploitation, is when a worker is only given a fraction of the fruits of his labour, meaning that simply because he works for a wage, he is exploited. but this assertion is just silly in my opinion. he is only being exploited if the company he works for makes billions and he is still only paid minimum wage (like walmart for example). but if he is adequately compensated for his labour, he cannot claim exploitation. marxists are correct that the worker has a right to partake in the fruits of his labour, this is what we (yellow socialists at least) call profit sharing. but the worker cannot demand this of a small bussiness owner. not only because of certain moral principles, but because it would be bad for the economy. as far as worker ownership of the means of production goes, it is a wonderful fantasy, and it really does seem like it will work, however upon closer inspection, you would see why it fails.
think about it this way, a well functioning economy needs bilionares. because those billionares buy goods and services from companies that cater to billionares because the products and services are so expensive that only billionares can afford them. now keep i mind that these companies also have employees, these employees have work because the company they work at has customers. a good example is the ferrari company. rich people buy ferarris therefore the ferarri company can pay it's employees. and those employees in turn by goods and services from other companies thus continuing the cycle. now imgaine if the workers would take control over all the means of production, they would have to divide up the surplusses amongst all the workers, sure at first theyd all get a lot of money, but no one would be rich enough to buy ferarris, so guess what, the ferarri company would soon go out of bussiness, so those workers who worked at/owned the ferarri company would be out of work, and they couldnt buy goods and services from other companies, so pretty soon those companies would have lower and lower revenues, thus the surplusses to divide up amongst the workers would be less and less, so they wouldnt be able to buy goods and services from other companies either, pretty soon the entire economy would collpase. thats why i dont think worler ownership of the means of production will ever work.
capitalism is failing right nwo for the same reason, people need to keep in mind that its consumer spending that drives the economy, and since all the wealth is pooling in the hands of these greedy CEOS no one can buy their goods and services, because they dont pay their workers enough. so in essence they are the cause of their own downfall. marxism would have this same problem in my opinion. the free market is a necessary evil, but the workers must be paid well inorder to keep the free market alive. so thats why the best solution is profit sharing, because it guaruntees a high pay for the worker, yet at the same time allows the existence of billionares so that a high standard of living is still attainable.

by **Leon Mcnichol** Wed Aug 03, 2011 11:50 am

I am quite familliar with the socialist defiition of exploitation! Thats what I was talking about in that entire paragraph! the marxian definition of exploitation, is when a worker is only given a fraction of the fruits of his labour, meaning that simply because he works for a wage, he is exploited. but this assertion is just silly in my opinion. he is only being exploited if the company he works for makes billions and he is still only paid minimum wage (like walmart for example). but if he is adequately compensated for his labour, he cannot claim exploitation.

So if a slave happens to get a part of what they are producing for their "owner" while this owner stands around doing nothing, thats not exploitation?...

marxists are correct that the worker has a right to partake in the fruits of his labour, this is what we (yellow socialists at least) call profit sharing. but the worker cannot demand this of a small bussiness owner. not only because of certain moral principles, but because it would be bad for the economy. as far as worker ownership of the means of production goes, it is a wonderful fantasy, and it really does seem like it will work, however upon closer inspection, you would see why it fails.

What "moral principles"? And can you prove it would fail? Because there is proof that it would succeed just the same, in fact, history is full of examples of that.

think about it this way, a well functioning economy needs bilionares. because those billionares buy goods and services from companies that cater to billionares because the products and services are so expensive that only billionares can afford them. now keep i mind that these companies also have employees, these employees have work because the company they work at has customers. a good example is the ferrari company. rich people buy ferarris therefore the ferarri company can pay it's employees. and those employees in turn by goods and services from other companies thus continuing the cycle. now imgaine if the workers would take control over all the means of production, they would have to divide up the surplusses amongst all the workers, sure at first theyd all get a lot of money, but no one would be rich enough to buy ferarris, so guess what, the ferarri company would soon go out of bussiness, so those workers who worked at/owned the ferarri company would be out of work, and they couldnt buy goods and services from other companies, so pretty soon those companies would have lower and lower revenues, thus the surplusses to divide up amongst the workers would be less and less, so they wouldnt be able to buy goods and services from other companies either, pretty soon the entire economy would collpase.

Ah yes, one of the reactionaries most silly arguments. Billionaries are necessary you say? You do realize that those comodities made specially for them are inflated in price, and sometimes rather useless from a society point of view right? Besides, what would happen would be that Ferrari would just adjust to the market. A ferrari didnt cost 1 million dollars back in the 70s, because very few people could afford it back then. If the rich people would become "less rich" they would just adjust their products to the market, as they always did. Besides, plenty of car companies went bust in the last few decades because of capitalism, and because of globalization, and not necessarily because they made bad products, so that is non argument.

thats why i dont think worler ownership of the means of production will ever work.
capitalism is failing right nwo for the same reason, people need to keep in mind that its consumer spending that drives the economy, and since all the wealth is pooling in the hands of these greedy CEOS no one can buy their goods and services, because they dont pay their workers enough. so in essence they are the cause of their own downfall. marxism would have this same problem in my opinion. the free market is a necessary evil, but the workers must be paid well inorder to keep the free market alive. so thats why the best solution is profit sharing, because it guaruntees a high pay for the worker, yet at the same time allows the existence of billionares so that a high standard of living is still attainable..

You clearly don't quite grasp what you are talking about. The "living standard" is defined by what comodities are produced, and who can afford it. If the difference between rich and poor changes, the living standard doesn't necessarily change. Sure a few people stop being able to buy islands in specially build places, but if that's the "price" to pay for millions to be able to afford house, food, and education, i am happily going to dispense of them. Billionaries do nothing but to use the money they exploited from workers to cater for an artificial "upper" market that is only created based on how much money these billionaries have. People would still be able to drive Ferraris, or go to Bora-Bora, but the cost of those things, numerically would be lower, it's as simple as that.

by **Celtiberian** Wed Aug 03, 2011 4:10 pm

rockstar1488 wrote:Well, its believable if you take into account that in only 1 year the NSDAP managed to reduce the unemployment rate by half, and get Germany on its feet again. Many communists and social democrats dfected to the NSDAP, thats a fact.

His defiance of the Versailles Treaty, as well as the Keynesian recovery of the German economy he presided over, made Adolf Hitler a very popular chancellor—much as Franklin D. Roosevelt was popular in the United States for his 'New Deal' programs. And you're correct in claiming many communists and Social Democrats eventually joined the NSDAP, but one would have to be quite credulous to think the NSDAP managed to sway 54.9% of the German population into voting for a single party Reichstag in 1936.

but theres still the fact that anyone who didnt like the reich and its government could just leave, yet barely anyone did. so that itself indicates that the people were overall satisfied with the NSDAP.

Nonsense.

"The Reich flight tax (Reichsfluchtsteuer), a stringent property tax on emigres, threatened to impoverish prospective emigrants. First passed by the Brüning government in 1931 to prevent capital flight, the Nazis raised it to punitive heights for emigrating Jews. The Reich flight tax provided the German government 1 million Reichsmarks in 1932-33 and with 342 millions Reichsmarks in 1938-39. In all, the German treasury may have gained as much as 900 million Reichsmarks from it alone. Many people had to sell all of their belongings simply to meet this particular tax requirement."
Gellately & Stoltzfus. Social Outsiders in Nazi Germany, p. 82

As you might expect, it was much easier for wealthy German citizens to pay the tax and flee the country than it was for proletarians dissatisfied with the regime to do so. Even ignoring the tax, the bourgeoisie can always move around the world with relative ease due to the fact there is no shortage of foreign nations eager to court their potential investments, whereas strict immigration laws typically serve as challenging barriers for proletarians wishing to emigrate.

and Hitler mainly just came out against PARLAIMENTARIAN democracy. the Reiuch was a republic, except it was also a meritocracy. so ofcourse not just anyone had the right to vote on legislation, there is actually an excellent article on the national socialist government by an american journalist who travelled to nazi germany and interviewed some of the nazi officials. the way he described it was that the party was in charge, and people gained entry into the party based on merit. and it was the party that formulated new laws, ideas, etc., that the state was to carry out.

I oppose this exclusionary, "meritocratic," form of republicanism for the same reasons I oppose any form of dictatorship, chief among them being: it denies people the right to participate in decisions in proportion to the degree they're affected by those decisions. Even if you disagree with the principle of self-management, think of it from a purely economic standpoint: the government functions off of tax revenue collected from the entire nation—therefore, it logically follows that state officials should be held accountable by the individuals who pay their salaries.

With that said, I've already discussed this issue at length in the 'Democratic Façade' thread and have no interest in rehashing that discussion here.

okay yes, its true that Hitler does contradict himself, but keep in mind that Hitler was contantly evolving throughout his life. thats why he even stated to albert speer once that mein kampf is "outdated". on eexample is Hitler's ambiguity towards race. in his earl;y life he was quite rtacist, but towards the end of his career, he came to reject racism, in his famous plattenhorf speech, he said "race and folk are not the same". not to mention, nazi germany wasnt anymore racist than america at the time. in fact, blacks were not even segragted like in america.

I realize that the Third Reich wasn't anymore racist than the United States was (provided we ignore the mistreatment German-Jews received throughout the duration of the National Socialist regime), and if it's true towards the end of his life Adolf Hitler came to abandon the ridiculous Nordicist theories he initially espoused, that's admirable. However, he was still a German chauvinist and his imperialist lebensraum policy was responsible for the deaths of countless Eastern European people—it would be preposterous to ignore that fact.

whao whao, dont twist my words, i never said capitalism, i said "free market", and thats not how meant it, it was just a hypothetical question, i never implied that only a free market can work, as i know for a fact that it does not.

You're right to make a distinction between the market and capitalism, as the former is a mode of distribution, while the latter is a mode of production—but it's implicit in your advocacy of yellow socialism that you support both the market method of allocation and the capitalist mode of production. As I've said throughout my discussion with you, however far it diverges from laissez-faire is irrelevant; if private ownership of productive assets and wage labor are maintained, yellow socialism remains a form of capitalism in all but name.

And if you acknowledge that the "free market" doesn't even work, what was the point of your thought experiment?

and i never said the soviet economy was a "failure", heck i even said it made "great strides". but compared to the nazi economic system, it was bad. however i do admit that it was better than the USA at the time, i acknowledge that russia was living in the feudal era before the soviets took power, and that it was thanks to the soviets that many people gained access to healthcare and basic education. but compared to it's potential, when you take into account its abundance in natural resources, it made far less progress than it should have made. although this was not jsut because of the system, it was chiefly due to bad leadership, because the USSR wasted a lot of money on the arms race, not mention it was run by zionist bucthers who didnt have the interests of teh Russian people at the forefront of their agenda.

At no point was the Soviet Union "run by Zionists" (if you're interested in some statistics, see this post). But setting that aside for the moment, it's improper to compare the Soviet economy with the Third Reich's economy for a variety of reasons. First of all, as you pointed out, the Soviets inherited an undeveloped, backward, agrarian empire from the Tsarist era; while the National Socialists came to power in one of the most industrialized nations on earth. Secondly, the Third Reich only lasted 12 years, which isn't long enough to conclusively determine whether their particular form of dirigisme would have continued to outperform the Soviet economy. Third, as you also mentioned, the Soviet Union was forced into an arms race with the West, wasting valuable resources on what would have resulted in the "mutual assured destruction" of both the United States and the USSR. Finally, I'm perfectly willing to admit that centralized economic planning was incapable of adequately meeting consumer demands—but if you take even a cursory glance at the opinion polls conducted over a decade after the downfall of the Eastern bloc, you'll see that enormous segments of the Eastern European populace still feel the Soviet system served their needs better than does capitalism.

I am quite familliar with the socialist defiition of exploitation! Thats what I was talking about in that entire paragraph!

Apparently you aren't, because the socialist definition of exploitation is identical to the Marxian definition (hence why I wrote that Karl Marx adopted it from earlier socialists). The definition of exploitation you're employing, on the other hand, is synonymous with the typical liberal/progressive definition—which basically asserts that any wage beneath their arbitrarily determined "living wage" is exploitative (it possesses absolutely no regard for unjust social relations whatsoever).

the marxian definition of exploitation, is when a worker is only given a fraction of the fruits of his labour, meaning that simply because he works for a wage, he is exploited. but this assertion is just silly in my opinion.

How is the bourgeoisie's systematic theft of the surplus value the proletariat produces "silly"? Precisely what do you disagree with regarding the juridical principle of imputation? I'm genuinely curious.

but if he is adequately compensated for his labour, he cannot claim exploitation.

Who is to determine what "adequate compensation" is, and by what method are they to come to this conclusion?

as far as worker ownership of the means of production goes, it is a wonderful fantasy, and it really does seem like it will work, however upon closer inspection, you would see why it fails.

Not only does it "seem like it will work," it's already working throughout the world today. To call an economy consisting of labor-managed firms (aka socialism) a "fantasy" is to disregard the considerable amount of empirical data collected on the issue of worker control of the means of production—virtually all of which, incidentally, confirms that worker control of the means of production enhances productivity and overall job satisfaction. The operational viability of labor-managed firms has already been answered innumerable times: they work.

think about it this way, a well functioning economy needs bilionares. because those billionares buy goods and services from companies that cater to billionares because the products and services are so expensive that only billionares can afford them. now keep i mind that these companies also have employees, these employees have work because the company they work at has customers. a good example is the ferrari company. rich people buy ferarris therefore the ferarri company can pay it's employees. and those employees in turn by goods and services from other companies thus continuing the cycle. now imgaine if the workers would take control over all the means of production, they would have to divide up the surplusses amongst all the workers, sure at first theyd all get a lot of money, but no one would be rich enough to buy ferarris, so guess what, the ferarri company would soon go out of bussiness, so those workers who worked at/owned the ferarri company would be out of work, and they couldnt buy goods and services from other companies, so pretty soon those companies would have lower and lower revenues, thus the surplusses to divide up amongst the workers would be less and less, so they wouldnt be able to buy goods and services from other companies either, pretty soon the entire economy would collpase. thats why i dont think worler ownership of the means of production will ever work.

capitalism is failing right nwo for the same reason, people need to keep in mind that its consumer spending that drives the economy, and since all the wealth is pooling in the hands of these greedy CEOS no one can buy their goods and services, because they dont pay their workers enough. so in essence they are the cause of their own downfall.

As Leon Mcnichol said, your grasp of economics is highly confused (to put it mildly). Your bizarre invocation of both supply-side and Keynesian arguments betrays a fundamental lack of understanding.

If economic reforms were enacted rendering billionaires a thing of the past, you're entirely correct in thinking a lot of the companies which currently cater to the desires of the super rich would go out of business. What would happen to the workers involved in those specific industries? The same thing that happens to workers whenever any company goes out of business: They would find work in different industries involved in the production of different goods and services—though, under a socialist mode of production, they would also play an active role in the allocation of the surplus their firm generates, as well as in shaping shopfloor policy; and the government would serve as employer of last resort if they were unable to find work in the cooperative sector for a period of time. Simply put, the production of luxury commodities is not necessary for an economy to function.

The real reason the rich are necessary under capitalism is because economic growth is dependent on a relatively high rate of private savings—and since the wealthy consume only a fraction of their disposable income, while the working-class consumes the majority of theirs merely on subsistence, the maintenance of a decadently wealthy class is indispensable for economic investment. In essence, the wealthy hold the nation hostage by threatening not to save or invest if the "business climate" is not to their liking (choosing instead to go on a capital strike and/or exercising their liquidity preference). Socialism solves this issue by socializing finance. One specific model is to levy a flat capital assets tax on each labor-managed firm in the economy (which would serve as a leasing fee workers would pay for access to society's means of production), and channeling the revenue collected therefrom to regional public banks—which would then allocate part of it to public services and the remainder to financing new firms and/or reinvesting in profitable existing firms.

the free market is a necessary evil

I thought you claimed to disagree with Mrs. Thatcher's TINA ("there is no alternative") argument, but now you're claiming the "free market" is a "necessary evil"?

by **Admin** Thu Aug 04, 2011 12:44 am

rockstar1488 wrote:think about it this way, a well functioning economy needs bilionares. because those billionares buy goods and services from companies that cater to billionares because the products and services are so expensive that only billionares can afford them. now keep i mind that these companies also have employees, these employees have work because the company they work at has customers. a good example is the ferrari company. rich people buy ferarris therefore the ferarri company can pay it's employees. and those employees in turn by goods and services from other companies thus continuing the cycle. now imgaine if the workers would take control over all the means of production, they would have to divide up the surplusses amongst all the workers, sure at first theyd all get a lot of money, but no one would be rich enough to buy ferarris, so guess what, the ferarri company would soon go out of bussiness, so those workers who worked at/owned the ferarri company would be out of work, and they couldnt buy goods and services from other companies, so pretty soon those companies would have lower and lower revenues, thus the surplusses to divide up amongst the workers would be less and less, so they wouldnt be able to buy goods and services from other companies either, pretty soon the entire economy would collpase. thats why i dont think worler ownership of the means of production will ever work.

We've heard these sorts bourgeois arguments before.

(I suppose Rand Paul and the Tea Party Caucasus are National Socialists/yellow socialists as well.)

In any case, your entire statement is nothing more than a strawman argument. The abolition of the bourgeois class will indeed eliminate the market for many luxury products directed towards that affluent demographic. However, the elimination of those businesses will not lead to any sort of economic calamity. Such markets are relatively small and the state would obviously provide all workers affected by economic reforms with the sort of assistance needed to transition into other fields or provide them with employment opportunities in state enterprises.

by **Rev Scare** Thu Aug 04, 2011 3:30 am

rockstar1488 wrote:think about it this way, a well functioning economy needs bilionares. because those billionares buy goods and services from companies that cater to billionares because the products and services are so expensive that only billionares can afford them. now keep i mind that these companies also have employees, these employees have work because the company they work at has customers. a good example is the ferrari company. rich people buy ferarris therefore the ferarri company can pay it's employees. and those employees in turn by goods and services from other companies thus continuing the cycle. now imgaine if the workers would take control over all the means of production, they would have to divide up the surplusses amongst all the workers, sure at first theyd all get a lot of money, but no one would be rich enough to buy ferarris, so guess what, the ferarri company would soon go out of bussiness, so those workers who worked at/owned the ferarri company would be out of work, and they couldnt buy goods and services from other companies, so pretty soon those companies would have lower and lower revenues, thus the surplusses to divide up amongst the workers would be less and less, so they wouldnt be able to buy goods and services from other companies either, pretty soon the entire economy would collpase. thats why i dont think worler ownership of the means of production will ever work.

My comrades have already sufficiently addressed your inarticulate post, but I will provide some additional commentary on this particular argument, as it is one of the most pertinent claims that you have thus far made.

To begin with, your propositions are entrenched within the capitalist mode of production and market distribution. To assert that billionaires are somehow socially "necessary" because they are capable of affording luxury goods and services is analogous to stating that feudal lords were necessary because they could afford to live in castles and manors and drink from silver chalices, and then proceeding to justify their immoderate existence on the basis that the peasants who toiled for those lords would have found themselves without work if such a class had been expunged! This is absurd. It begs the question: why are such pompous creatures, who lead such an inordinate social existence, even necessary to begin with? What justifies their highly disproportionate access to the social product, especially with regard to the crème de la crème? The purpose of genuine (revolutionary) socialism is to redefine how our societies operate.

Furthermore, why is it, in your mind, somehow acceptable to perpetuate a society in which some people have exorbitant wealth and others have nothing? Where a fractional minority owns more of what is worth owning than the overwhelming majority combined? If luxury items fade into obscurity because honest, working people are no longer exploited and are allowed to democratically allocate the social product, then your insistence upon the "importance" of the superfluously wealthy becomes wholly arbitrary. Under capitalism (and other exploitative systems), it is perfectly acceptable to squander social resources and deplete the global environment so long as the bourgeoisie can indulge in conspicuous consumption; under socialism, society would be compelled to restrain and rationalize its interactions with both nature and individual citizens so that we could ensure a sustainable and more just social existence for all of us and posterity.

If Ferrari was absolutely constrained to the production of automobiles (which are, in my opinion, themselves an undesirable mode of transportation) that could not be afforded by citizens, then Ferrari would fall into oblivion—I most certainly would not lose sleep over it.

by Isakenaz Thu Aug 04, 2011 9:47 am

rockstar1488 wrote:
think about it this way, a well functioning economy needs bilionares. because those billionares buy goods and services from companies that cater to billionares because the products and services are so expensive that only billionares can afford them. now keep i mind that these companies also have employees, these employees have work because the company they work at has customers. a good example is the ferrari company. rich people buy ferarris therefore the ferarri company can pay it's employees. and those employees in turn by goods and services from other companies thus continuing the cycle. now imgaine if the workers would take control over all the means of production, they would have to divide up the surplusses amongst all the workers, sure at first theyd all get a lot of money, but no one would be rich enough to buy ferarris, so guess what, the ferarri company would soon go out of bussiness, so those workers who worked at/owned the ferarri company would be out of work, and they couldnt buy goods and services from other companies, so pretty soon those companies would have lower and lower revenues, thus the surplusses to divide up amongst the workers would be less and less, so they wouldnt be able to buy goods and services from other companies either, pretty soon the entire economy would collpase. thats why i dont think worler ownership of the means of production will ever work.

Fleas exist, they only take a little blood and their are industries dedicated to producing creams and ointments to alleviate their bites, but the doesn't mean we have to accept them, indeed it is considered beneficial to society to eradicate these parasites. Is there a difference between the need for capitalists and fleas?

by rockstar1488 Sun Aug 21, 2011 10:03 pm

Celtiberian wrote:His defiance of the Versailles Treaty, as well as the Keynesian recovery of the German economy he presided over, made Adolf Hitler a very popular chancellor—much as Franklin D. Roosevelt was popular in the United States for his 'New Deal' programs. And you're correct in claiming many communists and Social Democrats eventually joined the NSDAP, but one would have to be quite credulous to think the NSDAP managed to sway 54.9% of the German population into voting for a single party Reichstag in 1936.

LOL, this is the biggest misconception about the third reich. the third reich was NOT keynesian. keynesian economics is DEBT FINANCING, but the third reich never embarked upon such harmful economic practices. the new currency (reichmark) was LABOUR BACKED. it was a debt-free currency. Hitler abolished fractional reserve banking and interest on loans. The source from where Hitler got the money to pay for the public works programs was from setting up dummy companies (mefo bonds) and then cashing them in. so in reality, the third reich's economics had nothing to do with the capitalist keynesian methods used by FDR.

I oppose this exclusionary, "meritocratic," form of republicanism for the same reasons I oppose any form dictatorship, chief among them being: it denies people the right to participate in decisions in proportion to the degree they're affected by those decisions. Even if you disagree with the principle of self-management, think of it from a purely economic standpoint: the government functions off of tax revenue collected from the entire nation—therefore, it logically follows that state officials should be held accountable by the individuals who pay their salaries.

but why do you oppose it? are seriously trying to say that you think anyone should have the right to decide the matters of state just because he turns 18. i dont know where you live, but i grew up in the inner city, and the kinds of people i come into contact with everyday probably cant even tell me when the american revolutionary war started if i would ask them, let alone decide what to do about the deficit, the stock market, etc. so, i would much rather have only those people decide the matters of the state who actually have a highschool diploma (at least). and in fact the philosophy of nazi government was that every leader shall be held 100% accountable for his actions. so i dont know where you got the idea that they wouldnt be.

I realize that the Third Reich wasn't anymore racist than the United States was (provided we ignore the mistreatment German-Jews received throughout the duration of the National Socialist regime), and if it's true towards the end of his life Adolf Hitler came to abandon the ridiculous Nordicist theories he initially espoused, that's admirable. However, he was still a German chauvinist and his imperialist lebensraum policy was responsible for the deaths of countless Eastern European people—it would be preposterous to ignore that fact.

come on, dont tell me you actually believe in the holocoust. i believe national socialism gets an unfair rep when it comes to race. yes, it started out as a racialist movement. but in reality, if one further examines the doctrine, theyll find that its a folkish movement not so much a racial one. bear in mind that there were many types of national socialism which emerged throughout the world at the time. (my favorite being Hungarism, not just because im hungarian, but because i believe szálasi's idea of con-nationalism was genius) authentic german national socialism was something that came as a reaction to the current time, the current situation. therefore some of its policies such as lebensraum were influenced by the current politics, people, and general zetgeist. i would even dare say that national socialism is not racist. i personally view race as a spiritual concept. i simply believe in a good meritocracy where people would recieve based on merit. and there are many national socialists today who would agree.

You're right to make a distinction between the market and capitalism, as the former is a mode of distribution, while the latter is a mode of production—but it's implicit in your advocacy of yellow socialism that you support both the market method of allocation and the capitalist mode of production. As I've said throughout my discussion with you, however far it diverges from laissez-faire is irrelevant; if private ownership of productive assets and wage labor are maintained, yellow socialism remains a form of capitalism in all but name.

but its not irrelevant. there is a point in which you cant call the system just capitalism anymore. you shouldnt look at wether the means of production are in private hands or not, you should look at the goal. you should look at what the system aims to achieve. if the aims of the system are the common good, and if this is a basic principle of the entire system, then you can no longer call it capitalism. under yellow socialism private property is simply a means of the ends of the folk. because of this it crosses the threshold into socialism.

At no point was the Soviet Union "run by Zionists" (if you're interested in some statistics, see this post). But setting that aside for the moment, it's improper to compare the Soviet economy with the Third Reich's economy for a variety of reasons. First of all, as you pointed out, the Soviets inherited an undeveloped, backward, agrarian empire from the Tsarist era; while the National Socialists came to power in one of the most industrialized nations on earth. Secondly, the Third Reich only lasted 12 years, which isn't long enough to conclusively determine whether their particular form of dirigisme would have continued to outperform the Soviet economy. Third, as you also mentioned, the Soviet Union was forced into an arms race with the West, wasting valuable resources on what would have resulted in the "mutual assured destruction" of both the United States and the USSR. Finally, I'm perfectly willing to admit that centralized economic planning was incapable of adequately meeting consumer demands—but if you take even a cursory glance at the opinion polls conducted over a decade after the downfall of the Eastern bloc, you'll see that enormous segments of the Eastern European populace still feel the Soviet system served their needs better than does capitalism.

well, the USSR was indeed run by zionists. stalin tried to turn against them, thats why he was poisoned. since stalin, no soviet leader has ever dared stand up to the zionists who were runing things behind the scenes.

Apparently you aren't, because the socialist definition of exploitation is identical to the Marxian definition (hence why I wrote that Karl Marx adopted it from earlier socialists). The definition of exploitation you're employing, on the other hand, is synonymous with the typical liberal/progressive definition—which basically asserts that any wage beneath their arbitrarily determined "living wage" is exploitative (it possesses absolutely no regard for unjust social relations whatsoever).

i see the difficulty on agreeing on a "living wage" as it can be subjective. but its important not to fall over the side of horse. the marxist definition can be equally as absurd. because a marxist would claim exploitation even if i were to profit 1$ from the labour of another person.

How is the bourgeoisie's systematic theft of the surplus value the proletariat produces "silly"? Precisely what do you disagree with regarding the juridical principle of imputation? I'm genuinely curious.

youre thinking about the current status quo. youre thinking about the theft that is occuring under our current judeo-capitalistic system. ofcourse i am against that, and ofcourse i condemn it as theft. but its because the worker is not given as much as he ought to recieve. i believe that the bussiness owner indeed has a right to profit. because afer all it is his property and without it, the worker would not have a job. HOWEVER i fully 100% believe that the worker must share in the surpluss of his labour. we have this in yellow socialism, its called PROFIT SHARING. where the workers share in company profits. this is an ideal solution to the problem because, the CEO gets his rightful profit, while at the same time the worker gets to share in the fruits of his labour. this is also good because it incentivises the bussiness owner to make more money, therefore the worker will automatically benefit because he too in turn will make more money.

Who is to determine what "adequate compensation" is, and by what method are they to come to this conclusion?

the workers and the bussiness owners would decide internally. yellow socialism entails the forming of commitees and councils in each corporation where the workers and the managers would reach decisions together about such matters. which is actually very similar to syndicalism.

As Leon Mcnichol said, your grasp of economics is highly confused (to put it mildly). Your bizarre invocation of both supply-side and Keynesian arguments betrays a fundamental lack of understanding.

If economic reforms were enacted rendering billionaires a thing of the past, you're entirely correct in thinking a lot of the companies which currently cater to the desires of the super rich would go out of business. What would happen to the workers involved in those specific industries? The same thing that happens to workers whenever any company goes out of business: They would find work in different industries involved in the production of different goods and services—though, under a socialist mode of production, they would also play an active role in the allocation of the surplus their firm generates, as well as in shaping shopfloor policy; and the government would serve as employer of last resort if they were unable to find work in the cooperative sector for a period of time. Simply put, the production of luxury commodities is not necessary for an economy to function.

but those industries who would have to welcome the many new workers would have to further divide their revenue to pay the new workers. so wouldnt the workers evetually make less after a while?

The real reason the rich are necessary under capitalism is because economic growth is dependent on a relatively high rate of private savings—and since the wealthy consume only a fraction of their disposable income, while the working-class consumes the majority of theirs merely on subsistence, the maintenance of a decadently wealthy class is indispensable for economic investment. In essence, the wealthy hold the nation hostage by threatening not to save or invest if the "business climate" is not to their liking (choosing instead to go on a capital strike and/or exercising their liquidity preference). Socialism solves this issue by socializing finance. One specific model is to levy a flat capital assets tax on each labor-managed firm in the economy (which would serve as a leasing fee workers would pay for access to society's means of production), and channeling the revenue collected therefrom to regional public banks—which would then allocate part of it to public services and the remainder to financing new firms and/or reinvesting in profitable existing firms.

thats why under national socialism the state would play a primary role in the direction of investments. you seem to be forgetting this. you seem to think im taking a libertarian standpoint, but in reality im doing no such thing. in national socialist system the state, the workers, and the capitalists would all collaborate with eachother, each one keeping the other in check, and each one working not for their own interests, but the interests of the folk as a whole. this is what yellow socialism is. at least, what i understand it to be.

by Egalitarian Mon Aug 22, 2011 7:43 pm

Rockstar, Hitler was the most reactionary, fascist, Right-winger ever to be.

I don't how you can defend him. He doesn't serve our cause.

by Isakenaz Tue Aug 23, 2011 3:21 pm

Racial Communist wrote:Rockstar, Hitler was the most reactionary, fascist, Right-winger ever to be.

I don't how you can defend him. He doesn't serve our cause.

That is why Rockstars posts are here in the reactionary section. Hopefully one day he'll grow out of it.

by **Celtiberian** Wed Aug 24, 2011 3:03 am

rockstar1488 wrote:LOL, this is the biggest misconception about the third reich. the third reich was NOT keynesian. keynesian economics is DEBT FINANCING, but the third reich never embarked upon such harmful economic practices. the new currency (reichmark) was LABOUR BACKED. it was a debt-free currency.

During periods of economic depression, Keynesian economists prescribe demand-side policies, such as deficit spending and the construction of public works projects, to help stimulate aggregate demand and, thus, aid in recovery—this, of course, being in stark contrast to the laissez-faire "solution" to economic downturns, which mainly consists of policies promoting austerity and allowing the market to "correct itself." Though John Maynard Keynes's seminal work, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, wasn't published until 1936, Hjalmar Schacht was already instituting Keynesian-like programs in the Third Reich as early as 1934 (i.e., the Reichsarbeitsdienst).

Hitler abolished fractional reserve banking and interest on loans. The source from where Hitler got the money to pay for the public works programs was from setting up dummy companies (mefo bonds) and then cashing them in. so in reality, the third reich's economics had nothing to do with the capitalist keynesian methods used by FDR.

Metallurgische Forschungsgesellschaft was a fictitious corporation initially established to assist the NSDAP in their re-armament efforts (which obviously violated the Treaty of Versailles). The "mefo bill" system also enabled the regime to run a greater budget deficit than it otherwise would have been able to.

As for fractional reserve banking and interest, I've not read anything which would support the notion that interest or fractional reserve banking practices were abolished in the Third Reich. Hitler did take the Reichsmark off of the gold standard, thereby turning it into a fiat currency more easily controllable by the bureaucracy—he had a lot of faith in the idea that wage and price controls could help mitigate financial crises—but that's about the extent of the monetary reforms I'm aware of occuring in the Third Reich.

but why do you oppose it?

In short, because I believe that any system which fails to incorporate the principle of self-management—which posits that people have a fundamental right to participate in decisions in proportion to the degree they're affected by those decisions—into its governing structure is essentially slavery.

are seriously trying to say that you think anyone should have the right to decide the matters of state just because he turns 18.

If you're old enough to work and serve in the military at 18, you're certainly old enough to participate in the decisions that affect your life.

i dont know where you live, but i grew up in the inner city, and the kinds of people i come into contact with everyday probably cant even tell me when the american revolutionary war started if i would ask them, let alone decide what to do about the deficit, the stock market, etc.

That's an indictment against the deplorable state of our educational system, not of democracy.

so, i would much rather have only those people decide the matters of the state who actually have a highschool diploma (at least).

If you're going to set such arbitrary restrictions, why not also add the reactionary caveat that only property owners should have the right to vote? Or only individuals with an IQ over 130?

and in fact the philosophy of nazi government was that every leader shall be held 100% accountable for his actions. so i dont know where you got the idea that they wouldnt be.

Accountable to whom, exactly? Other unaccountable party bureaucrats? I'm sorry, but every form of dictatorship hitherto practiced has been a recipe for disaster—to say nothing of the transparently unethical nature of the very notion of dictatorship itself.

come on, dont tell me you actually believe in the holocoust.

I'm in no mood to engage in a discussion related to the Holocaust. With that said, even notable Holocaust deniers, like David Irving, are at least intellectually honest enough to admit that Jewish people were severely mistreated under the Third Reich.

but its not irrelevant. there is a point in which you cant call the system just capitalism anymore.

Indeed, and that point is reached when the wage-for-labor-time contract is abolished and productive assets either fall under social or worker ownership.

you shouldnt look at wether the means of production are in private hands or not, you should look at the goal. you should look at what the system aims to achieve. if the aims of the system are the common good, and if this is a basic principle of the entire system, then you can no longer call it capitalism.

On the contrary, apologists for capitalism frequently justify the system by explicitly stating that it serves the interests of the "common good" better than any alternative. As the revered bourgeois economist, Adam Smith, wrote in 1786:

"By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was no part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it."
Smith, Adam. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Book IV), p. 184

Populist rhetoric doesn't change the fact that private ownership of the means of production and wage labor are the defining features of the capitalist mode of production.

under yellow socialism private property is simply a means of the ends of the folk. because of this it crosses the threshold into socialism.

"Socialism" as you and other Third Positionists define it.

well, the USSR was indeed run by zionists. stalin tried to turn against them, thats why he was poisoned. since stalin, no soviet leader has ever dared stand up to the zionists who were runing things behind the scenes.

By definition, a Zionist is someone who supports the establishment of a Jewish nation-state. While the Soviet Union did form the Jewish Autonomous Oblast for Jews who wished to live within their own ethnocultural community, very few Soviet Jews ever emigrated there (most likely due to the harsh climate in the area it was located). Moreover, the establishment of the Jewish Autonomous Oblast isn't evidence of Jewish control over the Soviet state apparatus—it was formed because such communities conformed with Joseph Stalin's work on the National Question. Most high ranking Jewish officials in the regime didn't concern themselves with matters of Zionism, however, and were mostly secular and in favor of assimilation.

There is a considerable amount of literature devoted to the subject of Soviet Jewry; suffice it to say, any claims that suggest Jewish Supremacists were "secretly running" the USSR are baseless. I really recommend you read more about the topic before you continue to entertain such conspiratorial rubbish.

i see the difficulty on agreeing on a "living wage" as it can be subjective. but its important not to fall over the side of horse. the marxist definition can be equally as absurd. because a marxist would claim exploitation even if i were to profit 1$ from the labour of another person.

There's absolutely nothing "absurd" about the Marxian definition of exploitation. Profit derived from the mere ownership of capital is the most exploitative feature of capitalism.

i believe that the bussiness owner indeed has a right to profit. because afer all it is his property and without it, the worker would not have a job.

Sheer nonsense. The wage-for-labor-time contract is only necessary for the employment of workers within the context of the capitalist mode of production. The entire point of socialism is to provide workers with an alternative (and superior) method of producing and distributing the means of life.

the CEO gets his rightful profit

Socialists contend that CEOs, capitalists, and private shareholders are not entitled to any "rightful" share in the surplus-value the proletariat creates. By suggesting any of the aforementioned parasites are actually entitled to a share in that surplus, you're implicitly defending capitalism (which is not surprising, since that's precisely what you've been doing throughout this thread).

the workers and the bussiness owners would decide internally. yellow socialism entails the forming of commitees and councils in each corporation where the workers and the managers would reach decisions together about such matters. which is actually very similar to syndicalism.

What if the workers simply decided they didn't want to share their surplus with their firm's capitalist(s)? Such a scenario arising is entirely reasonable, considering the fact capitalists aren't necessary for the production of goods and services to transpire.

And don't insult the name of syndicalism by suggesting it has any association with the corporativist system you've outlined. I'm aware that a few eccentric Italian syndicalists in the past supported similar corporativist policies at times, but it was always under the strict condition that those policies represented only a brief transitional phase between capitalism and syndicalism.

but those industries who would have to welcome the many new workers would have to further divide their revenue to pay the new workers. so wouldnt the workers evetually make less after a while?

No. The very abolition of the bourgeoisie, coupled with the disincentive for individuals to save their money (which socialized finance would foster), would spread wealth out more equitably amongst the population and also encourage further consumption of goods and services. In other words, the market for more modest goods and services would expand, thereby allowing new firms to take advantage of this increased demand without necessarily infringing upon the market share existing firms in those industries previously had. Also, bear in mind that the actual number of workers currently involved in the production of luxury commodities consumed exclusively by the super rich is quite small.

thats why under national socialism the state would play a primary role in the direction of investments. you seem to be forgetting this. you seem to think im taking a libertarian standpoint, but in reality im doing no such thing.

Socialized finance is but one element of a genuinely socialist mode of production. I appreciate that you understand the benefits such a method of finance would bring, but I remain utterly baffled as to why you favor preserving the bourgeoisie.

by **Admin** Wed Aug 24, 2011 8:53 am

rockstar1488 wrote:
Celtiberian wrote:His defiance of the Versailles Treaty, as well as the Keynesian recovery of the German economy he presided over, made Adolf Hitler a very popular chancellor—much as Franklin D. Roosevelt was popular in the United States for his 'New Deal' programs. And you're correct in claiming many communists and Social Democrats eventually joined the NSDAP, but one would have to be quite credulous to think the NSDAP managed to sway 54.9% of the German population into voting for a single party Reichstag in 1936.

LOL, this is the biggest misconception about the third reich. the third reich was NOT keynesian. keynesian economics is DEBT FINANCING, but the third reich never embarked upon such harmful economic practices. the new currency (reichmark) was LABOUR BACKED. it was a debt-free currency. Hitler abolished fractional reserve banking and interest on loans. The source from where Hitler got the money to pay for the public works programs was from setting up dummy companies (mefo bonds) and then cashing them in. so in reality, the third reich's economics had nothing to do with the capitalist keynesian methods used by FDR.

I oppose this exclusionary, "meritocratic," form of republicanism for the same reasons I oppose any form dictatorship, chief among them being: it denies people the right to participate in decisions in proportion to the degree they're affected by those decisions. Even if you disagree with the principle of self-management, think of it from a purely economic standpoint: the government functions off of tax revenue collected from the entire nation—therefore, it logically follows that state officials should be held accountable by the individuals who pay their salaries.

but why do you oppose it? are seriously trying to say that you think anyone should have the right to decide the matters of state just because he turns 18. i dont know where you live, but i grew up in the inner city, and the kinds of people i come into contact with everyday probably cant even tell me when the american revolutionary war started if i would ask them, let alone decide what to do about the deficit, the stock market, etc. so, i would much rather have only those people decide the matters of the state who actually have a highschool diploma (at least). and in fact the philosophy of nazi government was that every leader shall be held 100% accountable for his actions. so i dont know where you got the idea that they wouldnt be.

I realize that the Third Reich wasn't anymore racist than the United States was (provided we ignore the mistreatment German-Jews received throughout the duration of the National Socialist regime), and if it's true towards the end of his life Adolf Hitler came to abandon the ridiculous Nordicist theories he initially espoused, that's admirable. However, he was still a German chauvinist and his imperialist lebensraum policy was responsible for the deaths of countless Eastern European people—it would be preposterous to ignore that fact.

come on, dont tell me you actually believe in the holocoust. i believe national socialism gets an unfair rep when it comes to race. yes, it started out as a racialist movement. but in reality, if one further examines the doctrine, theyll find that its a folkish movement not so much a racial one. bear in mind that there were many types of national socialism which emerged throughout the world at the time. (my favorite being Hungarism, not just because im hungarian, but because i believe szálasi's idea of con-nationalism was genius) authentic german national socialism was something that came as a reaction to the current time, the current situation. therefore some of its policies such as lebensraum were influenced by the current politics, people, and general zetgeist. i would even dare say that national socialism is not racist. i personally view race as a spiritual concept. i simply believe in a good meritocracy where people would recieve based on merit. and there are many national socialists today who would agree.

You're right to make a distinction between the market and capitalism, as the former is a mode of distribution, while the latter is a mode of production—but it's implicit in your advocacy of yellow socialism that you support both the market method of allocation and the capitalist mode of production. As I've said throughout my discussion with you, however far it diverges from laissez-faire is irrelevant; if private ownership of productive assets and wage labor are maintained, yellow socialism remains a form of capitalism in all but name.

but its not irrelevant. there is a point in which you cant call the system just capitalism anymore. you shouldnt look at wether the means of production are in private hands or not, you should look at the goal. you should look at what the system aims to achieve. if the aims of the system are the common good, and if this is a basic principle of the entire system, then you can no longer call it capitalism. under yellow socialism private property is simply a means of the ends of the folk. because of this it crosses the threshold into socialism.

At no point was the Soviet Union "run by Zionists" (if you're interested in some statistics, see this post). But setting that aside for the moment, it's improper to compare the Soviet economy with the Third Reich's economy for a variety of reasons. First of all, as you pointed out, the Soviets inherited an undeveloped, backward, agrarian empire from the Tsarist era; while the National Socialists came to power in one of the most industrialized nations on earth. Secondly, the Third Reich only lasted 12 years, which isn't long enough to conclusively determine whether their particular form of dirigisme would have continued to outperform the Soviet economy. Third, as you also mentioned, the Soviet Union was forced into an arms race with the West, wasting valuable resources on what would have resulted in the "mutual assured destruction" of both the United States and the USSR. Finally, I'm perfectly willing to admit that centralized economic planning was incapable of adequately meeting consumer demands—but if you take even a cursory glance at the opinion polls conducted over a decade after the downfall of the Eastern bloc, you'll see that enormous segments of the Eastern European populace still feel the Soviet system served their needs better than does capitalism.

well, the USSR was indeed run by zionists. stalin tried to turn against them, thats why he was poisoned. since stalin, no soviet leader has ever dared stand up to the zionists who were runing things behind the scenes.

Apparently you aren't, because the socialist definition of exploitation is identical to the Marxian definition (hence why I wrote that Karl Marx adopted it from earlier socialists). The definition of exploitation you're employing, on the other hand, is synonymous with the typical liberal/progressive definition—which basically asserts that any wage beneath their arbitrarily determined "living wage" is exploitative (it possesses absolutely no regard for unjust social relations whatsoever).

i see the difficulty on agreeing on a "living wage" as it can be subjective. but its important not to fall over the side of horse. the marxist definition can be equally as absurd. because a marxist would claim exploitation even if i were to profit 1$ from the labour of another person.

How is the bourgeoisie's systematic theft of the surplus value the proletariat produces "silly"? Precisely what do you disagree with regarding the juridical principle of imputation? I'm genuinely curious.

youre thinking about the current status quo. youre thinking about the theft that is occuring under our current judeo-capitalistic system. ofcourse i am against that, and ofcourse i condemn it as theft. but its because the worker is not given as much as he ought to recieve. i believe that the bussiness owner indeed has a right to profit. because afer all it is his property and without it, the worker would not have a job. HOWEVER i fully 100% believe that the worker must share in the surpluss of his labour. we have this in yellow socialism, its called PROFIT SHARING. where the workers share in company profits. this is an ideal solution to the problem because, the CEO gets his rightful profit, while at the same time the worker gets to share in the fruits of his labour. this is also good because it incentivises the bussiness owner to make more money, therefore the worker will automatically benefit because he too in turn will make more money.

Who is to determine what "adequate compensation" is, and by what method are they to come to this conclusion?

the workers and the bussiness owners would decide internally. yellow socialism entails the forming of commitees and councils in each corporation where the workers and the managers would reach decisions together about such matters. which is actually very similar to syndicalism.

As Leon Mcnichol said, your grasp of economics is highly confused (to put it mildly). Your bizarre invocation of both supply-side and Keynesian arguments betrays a fundamental lack of understanding.

If economic reforms were enacted rendering billionaires a thing of the past, you're entirely correct in thinking a lot of the companies which currently cater to the desires of the super rich would go out of business. What would happen to the workers involved in those specific industries? The same thing that happens to workers whenever any company goes out of business: They would find work in different industries involved in the production of different goods and services—though, under a socialist mode of production, they would also play an active role in the allocation of the surplus their firm generates, as well as in shaping shopfloor policy; and the government would serve as employer of last resort if they were unable to find work in the cooperative sector for a period of time. Simply put, the production of luxury commodities is not necessary for an economy to function.

but those industries who would have to welcome the many new workers would have to further divide their revenue to pay the new workers. so wouldnt the workers evetually make less after a while?

The real reason the rich are necessary under capitalism is because economic growth is dependent on a relatively high rate of private savings—and since the wealthy consume only a fraction of their disposable income, while the working-class consumes the majority of theirs merely on subsistence, the maintenance of a decadently wealthy class is indispensable for economic investment. In essence, the wealthy hold the nation hostage by threatening not to save or invest if the "business climate" is not to their liking (choosing instead to go on a capital strike and/or exercising their liquidity preference). Socialism solves this issue by socializing finance. One specific model is to levy a flat capital assets tax on each labor-managed firm in the economy (which would serve as a leasing fee workers would pay for access to society's means of production), and channeling the revenue collected therefrom to regional public banks—which would then allocate part of it to public services and the remainder to financing new firms and/or reinvesting in profitable existing firms.

thats why under national socialism the state would play a primary role in the direction of investments. you seem to be forgetting this. you seem to think im taking a libertarian standpoint, but in reality im doing no such thing. in national socialist system the state, the workers, and the capitalists would all collaborate with eachother, each one keeping the other in check, and each one working not for their own interests, but the interests of the folk as a whole. this is what yellow socialism is. at least, what i understand it to be.

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