Why aren't the left doing better?

[brasicritique]

Right, so you've got nothing to back up your repeated claims, then, or you wouldn't be going all-out with the bullshit.
As I suspected.
.

your a hypocrit and you know it you always go all out with bullshit and have nothing to argue against my claim i have made formed from my personal experiece and those of other people i know which i am not allowed to have owing to you and your fuckwitted friends highly intelleigent objective judgment criteria when you can come back on how this should be done without breaking any of the faq or naming names time dates places and people disregarding there right to privacy in an on line forum for all the world to see just to keep you and that other dweep happy then come back fatty however you are so arrogrant its obvious that in real life you have nothing to be arrogant about and as with dot com are deeply insecure person still i forgive and hope you win that uniform on ebay

Then why make an issue of it, unless you're an idiot who's got nothing better to do or say?.

that is my question to you seing as how you only posted o topic after another failed attempt at flaiming you femi dom and looking at the high number of posts you have your the idiot with nothing to do or say still as the advert says why dont you get out more

Yeah, whatever, brasic, you working class hero, you!
.

yeah whatevee lard arse as i am always claiming to be just that and never using a marxsist perspective of class unless i have become one of your inane insecure posse of pussys

So you say, but then you would, wouldn't you?.

yes and you would say what you do so your so fucking clever

I'd reply to that sentence if it made any sense, but it's even more fucked up than the usual crap you puke up.

get out your family album for the sympathy vote i am sure the serial arse liker dotcom will play the violin

 

[DotCommunist]

wow I am part of the monothought clique now.

Do I get a badge?

 

[brasicritique]

Did I call you a "nazi"?
Nope, I made a joke about your having written "stoped".
If you're enough of a fool to take my saying that I reckon you might want nino to become a eugenicist as me calling you a nazi, you've got to be even dumber than I thought.

Oh, and nice to see you're so articulate and able to argue that you have to resort to name-calling and acting the internet hardman. Well done, tough-guy. You'd be amusing if you weren't quite such a sad case.

whatever your trying to worm out of the fact you have tried to smear me by linking me to eugenists and genetisists so i have no sympathy for the fact you are back tracking

no you are the one who thinks theyre an internet hard man your acting hard i wonder why well you do collect all those uniforms actaully thats that prick longdog who pm'd me calling me cunt then posted a thread moaning about being intimidated on a train full of drunken football fans now that is a real bully and coward

 

[brasicritique]

wow I am part of the monothought clique now.

Do I get a badge?

no your an hypocritical arse licker who cannnot even defend themselves and needs the help of others to do so still are you happy that i have given you atention your two atention pleading post sbegged for

 

[phildwyer]

In terms of other countries, one thing that I find myself wondering is whether there's a way to work the linkage between primitive accumulation elsewhere and the various kinds of accumulation by dispossession we're being exposed to here, privatisation, financialisation, the debt trap that's being sprung etc. I mean, I know there's stuff like the World Social Forum, and there was pre-911 quite a bit of interesting stuff happening on the streets in places like Seattle, although obviously the forces of repression have figured out how to suppress the populist side of that since the 'war on terr' got started.

I don't think the dispossessed peasants of India and China are going to care much about Mr. Smith of Tunbridge Wells having his house repossessed. Nor do I think electoral politics, or any kind of politics as traditionally conceived, has the remotest chance of holding back the tide of global capitalism. The governing Communist Parties of China and Bengal are among the most enthusiastic capitalists in the world. So if even a Communist Revolution can't stop capital, what can? Surely nothing material. Surely something spiritual.

 

[phildwyer]

Oh, and nice to see you're so articulate and able to argue that you have to resort to name-calling and acting the internet hardman. Well done, tough-guy. You'd be amusing if you weren't quite such a sad case.

I wonder if you wouldn't mind shutting the fuck up, please? There are some here who are trying to have a serious discussion.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

I don't think the dispossessed peasants of India and China are going to care much about Mr. Smith of Tunbridge Wells having his house repossessed. Nor do I think electoral politics, or any kind of politics as traditionally conceived, has the remotest chance of holding back the tide of global capitalism. The governing Communist Parties of China and Bengal are among the most enthusiastic capitalists in the world. So if even a Communist Revolution can't stop capital, what can? Surely nothing material. Surely something spiritual.

No, I'm sure they won't. On the other hand, both they and Mr. Smith are going to be struggling against things that have a lot of similarities, and hence the techniques developed by one may translate or provide insights to the other.

One of the virtues of a world with global communications is that they may well get to hear about what works and what doesn't on a global level, which means a greater population within which evolutionary improvements in tactics may occur and be transmitted.

 

[DotCommunist]

no your an hypocritical arse licker who cannnot even defend themselves and needs the help of others to do so still are you happy that i have given you atention your two atention pleading post sbegged for

can you fit that on a badge?

p.s get it spellchecked first yeah?

 

[brasicritique]

can you fit that on a badge?

p.s get it spellchecked first yeah?

i still see that your an unoriginal writer

 

[phildwyer]

No, I'm sure they won't. On the other hand, both they and Mr. Smith are going to be struggling against things that have a lot of similarities, and hence the techniques developed by one may translate or provide insights to the other.

One of the virtues of a world with global communications is that they may well get to hear about what works and what doesn't on a global level, which means a greater population within which evolutionary improvements in tactics may occur and be transmitted.

I agree. The potential offered by globalization is that by removing the petty ideological distraction of competition between nations, it lays bare the true nature of capital. Once Mr. Smith and Mr. Singh understand that they are fighting the same enemy, and (for me this is the vital point) once they understand that this enemy only exists in their minds, then perhaps they may yet vanquish it. I wouldn't bet on it though.

 

[DotCommunist]

i still see that your an unoriginal writer

i tsill see that u can't fukkin mashul ur wits enuff to speel wright haha the daily male

 

[Bernie Gunther]

I agree. The potential offered by globalization is that by removing the petty ideological distraction of competition between nations, it lays bare the true nature of capital. Once Mr. Smith and Mr. Singh understand that they are fighting the same enemy, and (for me this is the vital point) once they understand that this enemy only exists in their minds, then perhaps they may yet vanquish it. I wouldn't bet on it though.

Well, if it's hurting them enough, they may have to at least try to vanquish it.

 

[ViolentPanda]

I wonder if you wouldn't mind shutting the fuck up, please? There are some here who are trying to have a serious discussion.

At the risk of repeating what's become a sadly-regular refrain:
Fuck off, dwyer.

 

[phildwyer]

Well, if it's hurting them enough, they may have to at least try to vanquish it.

They'd have to be literally starving in order to be galvanized into the kind of effort that would be necessary to overthrow capital by force. And capital won't agree to its own abolition by democratic means, not any more. Why should it? No, the only answer is to change the way people *think* about capital, which basically means getting them to understand what it is.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

They'd have to be literally starving in order to be galvanized into the kind of effort that would be necessary to overthrow capital by force. And capital won't agree to its own abolition by democratic means, not any more. Why should it? No, the only answer is to change the way people *think* about capital, which basically means getting them to understand what it is.

There's a bit of either/or there that I want to dig into. I think that by causing hardship, capital does two things that are really important potentially.

Firstly, it creates the possibility of people questioning the 'common sense' neo-liberal ideology that they've been indoctrinated with over the last few decades and secondly it creates the possibility of people organising stuff to mitigate some of that hardship. Those two things provide a potential base to build on. Not to 'smash capitalism' next week, but to build effective resistance.

 

[Dissident Junk]

It's a blind.

The 'cultural left' have basically remade most of the understandings and rules of engagement within British society in the last fifteen years, and we are living in that situation now, complete with double think slogans, fears and mechanisms of self-policing and political policing over speech and action.

Now when you talk about capitalism, and 'the right' and the banking system, just take a step back and look at what we have at the moment.

These bank bailouts.

These bank bailouts mean that the State now owns large segments of the banking system. It now owns thousands of peoples' homes through its financial agents. The State is almost functioning as a holding company that owns vast parts of the banking system.

Now see this for what it is. Sounds a bit like state capitalism to me.

If you default on your NR mortgage, and you get repo'ed, the entity who owns your debt is the State. You have essentially been thrown out of your home by the State's agent, NR, to protect the financial investments of the State, which, incidentally, is your own f*kin money anyway.

We are in a predicament where the State's ownership and control over property, financial vehicles, savings, debts of its citizens etc. is heading towards a level of involvement that makes me damn nervous.

So, when speaking about the 'economic left', well, they are doing it, aren't they? Under our noses. They are expanding state involvement over large parts of the economy. They have chosen to go this way, Gordon Brown has chosen to go this way, so he can control.

For some unlucky sods in this country, the State owns the vehicle that knows how much they earn, what their health is like in terms of financial risk, it owns their house, their debts, it has them paying inflated costs for that housing, it knows how much they save -- and the State itself has them over a barrel in terms of tax credits and service provision from the Welfare state, and it wants them to carry a bloody biometric ID card as well.

You may think: "Oh, but it is not like that really, DJ. It's not how you've made it sound at all."

But think it through. PFI deals, for example. The line has always been that it costs the State and thus the taxpayer more money. Fair enough.

But it also means that private contractors now have 'investments' that rely solely on State-paid income streams. Instead of seeing it as a privatisation of national property etc, it can also be seen another way: as an increase of State control over private enterprises. If the state defaults on those payments, it aint the state going down, it's the private contractor. And, politically, it is nigh on impossible for a private contractor to shut down a hospital because government has stopped paying the lease.

Who wins? Gordon Brown.

The Left ain't dead. It's just YOUR 'people's Left' that's dead. The patrician power-hungry authoritarian Left are doing just fine, which is why Gordon seems to be smiling so much these days.

The Old left, the people's left, needs to get up to speed on what this all means for them, their liberty, their representation and the food on their table because we are sleep-walking into a dire scenerio where our power over our lives and circumstances is dissolving.

And when the State is controlled by people like Brown, you should feel very uneasy -- the smoke and mirrors, the blatant lies, the refusal to accept facts, the constant power grasping. He's the wizard of Oz in the flesh.

I have never understood this State vs. capitalism argument. It's always a patrician class that controls: be it a patrician political class or a patrician business class, often interchangeable. The point of the old left, and of Old Labour, was to stop these patrician classes from constant rule.

But that has never quite happened, has it?

And you just wait and see what happens when the patricians get really nervous as they will do in the next few years. Oh boy, are we in for some fun then.

 

[nino_savatte]

it mens your a ninny

Pity it's only you who thinks that this sort of puerile crap passes for wit - eh?

 

[nino_savatte]

i still see that your an unoriginal writer

I tihnk yore a kok

 

[brasicritique]

i tsill see that u can't fukkin mashul ur wits enuff to speel wright haha the daily male

as i said your unoriginal and yet again reveal your snobish attitude which reveals that you are a snob and only have middleclass friends as i said its people like you who turn people away from the left

 

[brasicritique]

I tihnk yore a kok

i think you cannot think end of

 

[nino_savatte]

i think you cannot think end of

Predictable shite from your enfeebled mind.

 

[Streathamite]

it mens your a ninny

ohh the irony....
(hint; try playing the ball not the man. I have no idea of how you are in real life - how could I - but here, you come across, to the impartial observer, as a tad, well, lacking in reasoned argument.

As to the main thrust of the thread: I'm convinced that one reason why, in the UK, we seem doomed to permanent marginalised importance, is that we are really, REALLY bad in communicating what to me is a strong case (the economic one, based on class conflict) to the people who we most need to convince; ordinary working people who we see as being shafted 24/7. And there's two especial reasons why this is so; left activists are, by and large, awful at LISTENING to those people, and at talking to them in everyman's language. The SWP are especially guilty in this regard, but most left groups echo that.

Dissident Junk - excellent post. <applauds>

 

[brasicritique]

ohh the irony....
(hint; try playing the ball not the man. I have no idea of how you are in real life - how could I - but here, you come across, to the impartial observer, as a tad, well, lacking in reasoned argument.
:

yes as your first post where you attempted to flame me out of the blue was really impartial wasnt it yet again we see another middleclass hypocrit i dont know about Streathamite your more like a streatham shite

As to the main thrust of the thread: I'm convinced that one reason why, in the UK, we seem doomed to permanent marginalised importance, is that we are really, REALLY bad in communicating what to me is a strong case (the economic one, based on class conflict) to the people who we most need to convince; ordinary working people who we see as being shafted 24/7. And there's two especial reasons why this is so; left activists are, by and large, awful at LISTENING to those people, and at talking to them in everyman's language. The SWP are especially guilty in this regard, but most left groups echo that.


Dissident Junk - excellent post. <applauds>

yes Dissidents post was excellent its a shame that you did not read it or if you did appear to not understand the point DJ was making imo about so called left wingers like you

 

[brasicritique]

Predictable shite from your enfeebled mind.

well you are the expert on being feeble fullstop

 

[Streathamite]

yes as your first post where you attempted to flame me out of the blue was really impartial wasnt it yet again we see another middleclass hypocrit i dont know about Streathamite your more like a streatham shite



yes Dissidents post was excellent its a shame that you did not read it or if you did appear to not understand the point DJ was making imo about so called left wingers like you

As EVERYONE else could see, I was actually being mild, civil and reasonable - that was no flame, there was even well-meant advice there, which you are too ignorant, illiterate and cosmically thick to see. Do come back if you are ever remotely capable of reasoned, informed debate, or even proper usage of English.
At long last.....a suitable replacement for pbman!
<on ignore>

 

[Bernie Gunther]

<snip>

The Left ain't dead. It's just YOUR 'people's Left' that's dead. The patrician power-hungry authoritarian Left are doing just fine, which is why Gordon seems to be smiling so much these days.

The Old left, the people's left, needs to get up to speed on what this all means for them, their liberty, their representation and the food on their table because we are sleep-walking into a dire scenerio where our power over our lives and circumstances is dissolving.

And when the State is controlled by people like Brown, you should feel very uneasy -- the smoke and mirrors, the blatant lies, the refusal to accept facts, the constant power grasping. He's the wizard of Oz in the flesh.

I have never understood this State vs. capitalism argument. It's always a patrician class that controls: be it a patrician political class or a patrician business class, often interchangeable. The point of the old left, and of Old Labour, was to stop these patrician classes from constant rule.

But that has never quite happened, has it?

And you just wait and see what happens when the patricians get really nervous as they will do in the next few years. Oh boy, are we in for some fun then.

That's a really good post, and reinforces for me the case for emphasising democracy as something we've lost (if we ever really had it) and need to start forcefully trying to attain.

 

[brasicritique]

As EVERYONE else could see, I was actually being mild, civil and reasonable - that was no flame, there was even well-meant advice there, which you are too ignorant, illiterate and cosmically thick to see. Do come back if you are ever remotely capable of reasoned, informed debate, or even proper usage of English.
At long last.....a suitable replacement for pbman!
<on ignore>

oh look its another one of those 'ive put you on ignore after i have flamed you 'what a sad bastard

 

[nino_savatte]

well you are the expert on being feeble fullstop

How unoriginal. What you don't realise is that by posting these feeble replies you are offering us an insight into your shitty thought processes and your inability to offer anything of substance.

One more of these and I will report you.

 

[treelover]

'The left must wake up
After being asleep on the economy for two decades, it's time to ensure the system messed up by the right has fairness at its heart


'The knock-on effect of the demise of communism has led to human rights becoming the cause celebre of the left. A well-known human rights activist recently said: "I was a socialist in the 1980s until I saw the size of the gulag … then I became a human rights person.'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jan/28/recession-politics'



It seems like others have been asking these questions

 

[Dissident Junk]

Hehehe ..... the left isn't doing better because people like Rosa Freedman and Luke McDonagh get articles like that one published on CIF, and just regurgitate a load of unthinking rubbish about the last ten years of economic phenomenon.

Jeez, sometimes I really despair.

The problem is that 'the left' -- and here I mean the vocal, involved metropolitan 'left', the ones with influence -- basically abandoned domestic policy when New Labour came into power (aside from Toynbee's obsession with Sure Start). They didn't talk about it, write about it, publish anything on it; they swapped their gaze wholesale onto international issues -- Israel/Gaza, America etc -- and 'human rights' and the environment. This was muddied by Blair's wars, I must admit.

However, the massive international focus left a hole in political debate. Hardly anyone from the metro-left was watching the domestic sphere -- particularly the economy, largely because until about three months ago, they had a weird relationship with New Labour (NL were "their people", but did things they didn't like but also did like, so it ended up being like arguing with a sibling) and they didn't know much about finance and economics anyway, because a lot of them don't know much about the way the world actually works.

And a lot of them are fairly wealthy. You don't start to question certain economic developments if you have no exposure to them.

Now the metro-left has finally noticed we are going to hell in a handbasket, and what does it do? Publishes ill-thought out tripe, because it still will not admit that a hellova lot of the problem here in the UK has been wildly exacerbated by Gordon Brown's 'wonderful' policies -- policies they thought were marvellous at the time.

Even though they have people like Larry Elliot on staff, who actually knows what he is talking about.

I dunno. I think the main problem is that "the modern left" just don't do economics or finance. Part of me wonders if it is because they are too lazy to actually trawl through figures and learn about the subject: they are too 'instinctive', too emotional, too outwardly desparate to show they 'care', that they are 'good people'.

But sometimes, to truly give a shit about people, you have to be a hard organised bastard. You have to dump the hugs and get mean about the figures and facts.

This, the metro-left seems totally unable to do. The result is we now have a crippled economy, a crippled education system (where 'hugs' ran riot over guidelines), a crippled society, and a crippled set of government books.