The babyjesuschristsuperstar on Board: filling the moral void of Clinton’s legacy

[Spanky]

Originally posted by baltassoc
This would not be a dictatorship of the proletariate under Marxism. Perhaps under Leninism.

I think you are wrong here. Not sure but pretty sure. In Das Kapital I think Marx pointed out that an intellectual elite would have to represent the workers interest. How else woud a dictatorship of the proletariate work?

Originally posted by baltassoc
I don't think we really disagree here, in the sense that you recognize that no country ever came close to the Marxist ideal of communism, which means that, given the expected timelines set out by Marx, 20-30 years out people could still be idealistic.

Yes true communism was never achived, because true communism mean not government. But where I think we might disagree is I am pretty sure every communist believed that you need to move through a dicatorship of the proletariate (and had to discard liberal democracy) to get there.

Originally posted by baltassoc Why not? My point was just that the prior government wasn't really better for the common man. Not saying it was worse.

I had heard the corruption refrain about other precommunist government but never Karensky's government. The only thing Lenin improved was he got out of the war (of course giving up the entire Ukraine to do it) but besides that everything got worse for the Russians after the Bolshevik takeover. Massive famines, outbreak of disease, massive executions, labour camps etc.

Originally posted by baltassoc
Exactly. It is temporal chauvanism of the worst sort, however, to judge based on our current conceptions of proper political structures. In the first 40 years of the 20th century, whether a dictatorship was better than a democracy for representing the people was still a matter of open debate amoung intellectuals. I have a hard time understanding it, but both communism and facism (not necessarily with the racist overtones) were popular topics of debate at the time.

I like that: Temporal Chavinism. But these people were promoting the idea of ending democracy. Throwing away the Bill of Rights. Destroying the American system of government. I don't care when it occurred, it was wrong and dangerous. I don't give Washington and Jefferson a walk on Slavery and I don't give these people a walk because there were plenty of people who did not fall for this B.S. If you flirt with throwing away the US constitution and ending civil liberties, don't expect society to welcom you with open arms.