Posts by mistycrane3

northernheron8 said:These divisions between blue-collar workers and everyone else are just nonsense. Everyone is doing something, but whether that work actually matters is a different conversation entirely. I don't see how people working in heavy industry are inherently more important than anyone else.

It isn't just about factory workers—it’s about the working class. But then again, not everyone who holds a job qualifies as part of the working class.

Detektor said:Communism is all about expropriation and the redistribution of wealth.
Christianity, on the other hand, suggests it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven; even in the Acts of the Apostles, we see how someone who refused to redistribute their wealth was struck down by a "higher power."
Freemasonry—which essentially mirrors modern liberalism—has its roots in the Knights Templar and certain forms of Kabbalism.

Churchill was actually aligned with this third group. It brings to mind those instances of Christian antisemitism where people attack Judaism, yet it's the underlying Jewish thought processes that authored these very ideas to serve their own interests. I find myself wondering where the Sanhedrin gets the notion that men like Trump or Putin could somehow facilitate the building of a Third Temple.

I honestly can't make heads or tails of what you're trying to convey here. I have no idea how any of this connects to the rest of this thread, nor do I understand what that last bit is supposed to imply.

Go get some sleep; it’s late, and things usually look a little clearer in the morning.🙂

The Catholic Church maintains that their Messiah will actually be ours—that both Jews and Christians are ultimately waiting for the same figure. All roads lead to Jerusalem.

NB—you clearly don't grasp the theology involved.

Steven Murphy2 said:You seem to be one of those people who needs everything drawn out for them in crayon. I have already explained what Marxism means for the American worker, and I am not repeating myself.

You claimed that Marx was calling for the expropriation of European workers. It is hardly my concern if you choose to lie.

Communism without a classless society

That is not what I said.

So what is National Bolshevism?

It is a very murky Russian nationalist ideology that blends Stalinism with Russian imperialism. Leftist? Perhaps to a certain extent. Social ownership of the economy? Definitely not.

If capitalists were the majority, how did the crisis occur?

I never said the capitalists were the majority; learn how to read. And while you are at it, learn how to provide actual sources for your claims.

Communism didn't exist in the USSR

Of course it didn't, nor did anyone in the USSR claim it did.

Mainly, I am glad you indirectly admit that Communists aren't any threat to the system—they couldn't even be when the system itself brought them into Russia.

No. I stated that the USSR during World War II represented a smaller threat to Western capitalists than Nazi Germany. A similar dynamic played out during World War I, where the German bourgeoisie posed a massive threat to British and French interests, and lo and behold—it was the capitalist system on both sides. You see, Germany in WW2 was a direct threat to American, British, and French interests; the USSR was merely a distant problem that became more pressing later on (though it had been relevant even before WW2). Communism has always been an issue for the West.

Winston Churchill on communism in Russia, therefore Hitler's opponent and a high-ranking Freemason:

http://library.flawlesslogic.com/ish.htm

Was Churchill a Francophile? Sure. Given that the great hope of the Right, Donald Trump, has nothing but praise for Israel, we certainly have a wonderful future ahead of us.

So, apparently this incredibly powerful, wealthy British imperial politician is out here attacking Communists by leaning into these old antisemitic conspiracy theories! Well, you’ve certainly sold me on that logic. There is absolutely no way someone holding a position of that much influence would ever resort to spreading such blatant falsehoods, right? Not a chance.

🤣

Steven Murphy2 said:Maybe you should look into who actually banned child labor in the mines, or who pioneered the progressive legislation that paved the way for health insurance, workers' compensation, and old-age pensions?

So, some kind of socialist, then?

In a sense, yes, mostly. It was usually social democrats of various stripes, particularly in the era following WW2. Occasionally, however, conservative or right-wing administrations were the ones to push these through—not out of sudden altruism, but for the exact same reason the left did: the sheer pressure from the working class and the very real fear of a looming revolution.

I seem to recall reading a quote from a certain British conservative politician addressing his own party colleagues, essentially warning them that they had to implement progressive social reforms after the war, otherwise, they ought to brace themselves for an uprising. I’ll try to track down the specific passage.

Alright, let's pick up the pace:

Steven Murphy2 As stated by Steven Murphy2:
He isn't suggesting a global seizure of workers' assets; rather, he’s specifically targeting the workforce across Europe.

Not unless you can provide me with an exact quote; if you can, then I’ll gladly eat my words.

If you find yourself sitting comfortably in the upper echelon of global wealth while the rest of the workforce struggles in the lower tiers, then the concept of a dictatorship of the proletariat isn't just an academic theory—it’s a direct threat to everything you've built, isn't it?

No. Communism isn't some grand equalizer. It isn’t about some "more equitable distribution of wealth" or any other similar fantasy peddled by people who clearly haven't the slightest clue what they're talking about.

National Bolshevism essentially functions as a system where the means of production remain predominantly under social control.

No. Honestly, I haven't the slightest clue where you even found the inspiration for such an idea.

And that did them absolutely zero good, honestly. Besides, the left doesn't exactly hold the reins over there in Iraq anyway.

I provided an example, and honestly, what failed there is an entirely different issue altogether. Besides, what on earth does the government in Iraq have to do with any of this?

Where exactly did this claim come from—that the workers actually made up the majority? It seems like a bit of a reach to me. After all, isn't the very foundation of a democracy built upon the principle of the majority vote?

Yes, the source clearly stated that the workers made up the majority. Just because a democracy operates on a "majority rule" basis doesn't mean the working class actually held the numerical advantage in this instance. Honestly, is this really the level we’ve sunk to in our discussions?

If I may take a moment to poke a little fun at your rhetoric: why on earth did the right-wing factions of the USSR and the right-wing West find themselves fighting against the left-wing elements of Central Europe? It is common knowledge that the anti-communist West didn't exactly rush to form a coalition with Hitler.

The economy of the USSR was traditionally quite left-leaning, so I’m having a hard time grasping your exact point here. Why did the West and the USSR join forces against Nazi Germany? It was simply a matter of self-interest. At that particular moment in history, the Soviet Union posed a much smaller threat to Western capitalists than Hitler's Germany did. That fact actually says more about the supposed communism held by those foreign leaders than it does about the Nazis themselves, though I suspect you aren't going to see it that way. 🙂

By the way, Marxism was pretty much a mandatory subject back when you were sitting through those public school classes in the States.

Are we being serious here? Marxism isn't some monolithic, unified dogma, if that’s what you were implying. What was taught back in those old state-run schools was merely one specific interpretation—one that conveniently served the interests of the ruling party bureaucracy.

Frankly, the fact that you identify as a Marxist tells me everything I need to know. Marxism is nothing more than a weapon wielded by the capitalist elite of one nation against the civilization of all others. It mobilizes the workers of underdeveloped nations to dismantle civilized ones, and what is the result? A paradise on earth? I believe we've seen how that plays out in practice. Even Churchill addressed this in an article regarding who was actually pulling the strings behind Marxism in Russia. It's the same crowd that mobilized people from the catacombs in Rome to plunge us into the Dark Ages. Vatican City openly sides with the impoverished, the modern-day inhabitants of the Third World's catacombs. This would happen regardless of their influence, which is why selective population policies are necessary—policies that democracy and liberalism either refuse to acknowledge or simply don't understand—leaving civilization once again vulnerable to incursions from the East.

Oh, right, now I remember—you're that wild conspiracy theorist obsessed with fascism. Sure, sweetheart, you're absolutely right; it's all controlled by Jewish people, and the world is just a simple, easy-to-explain concept if you just use a few paragraphs from an internet forum.🙂

I have no interest in engaging in an irrational debate about the Democratic Party shifting to the right, especially when radical right-wingers spend all their time arguing that the Republican Party is moving left.

I suppose it isn't "rational" then, because I pointed out three or four very clear instances of the Democratic Party making decidedly right-wing political decisions?

Steven Murphy2 As stated by:
So, they’re actually suggesting Marx to you? I've already laid out the mathematical reality of the situation once, and frankly, I have very little desire to go through the motions again by explaining exactly what communism would do to the American workforce on the global stage.

Where exactly does Marx suggest the expropriation of workers? I'd love to see a quote.

It seems we’re circling the same drain here. From what I can gather, the left essentially falls into those classic categories you're always tearing into—whether it's outright communism or that whole national-bolshevik strain where the means of production are handed over to the workers regardless of race, gender, or creed. You seem to categorize all of that under the umbrella of capitalism, which is an interesting choice of words. Based on your logic, since you’ve already taken aim at worker-managed factories as being non-capitalist, it feels like you've backed yourself into a corner. If communism isn't capitalist by your definition, and even decentralized worker control is off the table, I find myself wondering: what exactly is left on the menu?

I find myself constantly revisiting my critiques of that old American "self-management" myth. Let’s be honest: communism, at its core, is about social control over the means of production; it isn't some whimsical collection of autonomous cooperatives—not that those actually existed under the old regime anyway, as "self-management" was little more than a hollow rhetorical flourish used to mask state dominance. Furthermore, I suspect you haven't quite grasped the actual tenets of national Bolshevism; I imagine you simply find the term aesthetically pleasing, which is a rather superficial way to approach such heavy political theory.

While some worker halfway across the globe is out there striking and making noise, the guy here in America just keeps showing up to work.

It really shouldn't be this difficult to grasp, but an American worker would find much more leverage in fighting for their rights if they weren't standing alone—if they were striking in lockstep with workers across the rest of the country. It’s basic math, isn't it? Why on earth is that concept so hard for people to wrap their heads around?

"Quote:"

Again? When was that ever even a reality? I honestly can't recall a single instance of genuine, global worker solidarity that actually held water.

Here’s a more recent one for you, looking back at that time when those rail workers in Scotland refused to transport the weaponry used during the 2003 invasion of Iraq— The Forgotten Story of How American train drivers tried to derail the Iraq WarThey couldn't have possibly expected anything in return, yet there it was—pure, unadulterated solidarity.

Taxing coffee is one thing, but slapping an extra sales tax on a daily ritual feels fundamentally different from the massive budget cuts we're seeing in healthcare, education, and social services. It’s a matter of principle, really. I’ve always felt that if the government is going to take our money, they should be focusing on the essentials. Personally, I’m a firm believer in selective state subsidies—using those funds to bolster things that actually serve the common good rather than just draining the pockets of everyday people for marginal gains.

Tax cuts lead to shrinking government revenue, which inevitably necessitates spending cuts—and I think we all know exactly where those blades will fall first.

You don't need to be certain about anything; the facts are staring us right in the face.

What’s your source for that? Honestly, I don't even have the energy to go back and forth with you about Hitler; you seem far too enamored with him for my liking. If everything I just laid out regarding the Nazi Party's political playbook—the criminalization of strikes, the systematic dismantling of independent unions and labor organizations, the total militarization of the workforce, and so on—isn't enough to make you realize how this all works, then we're clearly past the point of productive conversation. wasn't actually a workers' party, and honestly, I don't have the energy to litigate that point any further.

Self-management and a market economy (though I suspect you're thinking of a completely free market, if we're being honest)...

It strikes me that you’re criticizing just for the sake of being critical; frankly, it feels like you lack even a basic grasp of the left's own tenets. I would sincerely suggest you pick up a book or at least watch some lectures from the very ideologies you claim to champion—or oppose—just so you actually understand the ground you're standing on.

The truth is, I know this subject quite intimately because I consider myself a Marxist; I’ve spent my time with Marx, rather than relying on secondhand hearsay or, heaven forbid, Kardelj's writings. It is an objective fact that the American economy operated on market principles, and I truly don't see how anyone could dispute that. It wasn't laissez-faire capitalism—far from it—but it was capitalism nonetheless. If those American firms were competing for market share, and Western corporations were investing in them and exporting their goods abroad...

By the way, I find it quite amusing how you glossed over all those right-wing policies favored by the Democratic Party😍

Steven Murphy2 said:Based on market value, if an American worker sits in the upper half of the total global population, then a "dictatorship of the proletariat" occurring somewhere else—say, at the expense of Western workers three-quarters of the way down the line—effectively means the expropriation of Western workers. You simply cannot turn mathematics into philosophy.

What kind of expropriation of workers are we talking about? No one has ever actually proposed that. Besides, I wasn't even specifically referring to the dictatorship of the proletariat; I was speaking about the left in general terms.

An American worker isn't going to feel the ripple effects of a strike in Gabon. Global labor solidarity doesn't exist, and multiculturalism is headed for a collapse because we aren't all the same.

The corporation will certainly feel the impact of a strike in Gabon, and they'll feel the impact of a strike in America too. Two strikes carry more weight than one; if workers in both Gabon and America fight together, they have a much better shot at securing their rights than if they remain at odds. That is the essence of internationalism as the left—or at least the socialists—understands it. I have no idea how you managed to spin that into a commentary on multiculturalism, but fine. What part of this is unclear?

And you're not wrong about one thing: global labor solidarity doesn't exist. It needs to be rebuilt from the ground up.

It matters because this isn't a classless society.

???

A worker in Gabon wants a raise of maybe 50 dollars. An American worker wants a raise of several hundred or even thousands. I'm using the most basic example possible. If they fight together against the management of their firm, they stand a much higher chance of success. Again, what is so difficult to grasp here?

Removing bureaucratic hurdles means allowing people to build on their own land without paying taxes, drinking beer without excise taxes, and eliminating the parasites who produce nothing—in other words, getting rid of unproductive professions.

Ah, so that translates to cutting funding for healthcare, education, social services, and so on. I see. Naturally, the right can't advocate for workers' interests; if they did, they’d just be the left.

And what was Hitler, if not a worker?

Are you seriously asking me that? A failed artist, an adventurer, essentially a drifter for most of his life, coming from a family of state bureaucrats... yeah, he was the product of an impoverished, angry middle class; somewhat lumpenproletariat.

What does an impoverished middle class represent if not workers?

It was a bit of everything, really. Small business owners, local tradespeople, a significant portion of the German peasantry, intellectuals, government bureaucrats, merchants, and so on. Yes, even a segment of what one might economically classify as the "working class," alongside various management teams and such. But you make a fair point; I suppose I should provide some context. The proportion of the middle class that supported the Nazi Party within the total middle class was actually larger than the share of workers who supported them within the overall German working class. And you’re right to suggest that a subset of those "proletarianized" small-scale bourgeois—those whose livelihoods were so thoroughly gutted by the crisis that they essentially slid into the working class—saw their salvation in the Nazi Party. That doesn't change the fundamental reality, however, that the actual laborers were a constant source of friction and trouble for the Nazi regime.

Then tell me why. If workers make up the majority and capitalists are just a minority, how is it that the Nazis didn't have a solid base among the working class?

I’m not entirely convinced that workers constituted a majority, and they certainly weren't a dominant one. Society isn't strictly bifurcated into brawny factory hands on one side and top-hatted capitalists puffing on thick cigars on the other.

So America was capitalist; I wonder what the forum communists have to say about that? I heard it was "real socialist" (whatever that's supposed to mean).

Exactly. Self-management essentially meant introducing market economy principles on a much larger scale than anything seen in the Eastern Bloc. It was, in many ways, an incredibly intense version of social democracy. To be clear, I am not suggesting that the systems in the Soviet bloc were any better; far from it.

"Quote:"

Steven Murphy2 As if I haven't heard this all before. If you want to understand where you truly stand in this messy world, you need to look at things through a more realistic lens. There simply is no such thing as a unified global working class with shared goals. The interests of a laborer here in the States are fundamentally different from those of a worker halfway across the world in Africa.

It’s honestly a bit foolish. We are living in an era defined by global capital, where multinational corporations are just part of the daily landscape. I fail to see how the interests of an American worker at a major firm differ fundamentally from those of a worker at a branch office in Gabon. How can anyone argue that an American employee wouldn't have more leverage to demand a raise if their counterparts in Gabon were striking simultaneously? At the end of the day, it doesn't really matter if the American worker is pulling in eighty thousand dollars while the person in Gabon is scraping by on five hundred; the structural pressure on the corporation remains the same.

"Quote:"

If you look at the math, it’s pretty sobering. If a worker over in Germany is pulling in a minimum wage of around $1,100, while an American worker is scraping by on roughly $350, you start to see where the logic shifts. It makes sense that the cost of hiring someone locally would settle around $700—essentially matching that higher baseline. It's a cynical way to view labor, I know, but when you run the numbers, the disparity becomes impossible to ignore. $1567If we strip away the bureaucratic red tape and start rolling out the red carpet for foreign capital, people will inevitably ask what’s in it for the American worker. It’s a fair question, really. I remember sitting in a diner back in Ohio, listening to guys talk about how every time a massive multinational corporation moves in, they promise the moon, only to leave the local workforce high and dry once the tax breaks expire. There's a certain cynicism that comes with watching the gears of industry turn; you have to wonder if cutting those regulatory hurdles actually builds something lasting for the person on the factory floor, or if it just clears a path for big money to sweep in, take what they need, and move on to the next frontier.

When politicians start throwing around phrases like "cutting through bureaucratic red tape," I can't help but feel a certain sense of dread. In most cases, it’s really just a polite little euphemism for stripping away workers' rights. I remember sitting in a small diner back in Ohio, listening to a group of factory guys talk about how much they feared the latest round of "deregulation" coming out of D.C., and it struck me then that the language used by those in power is rarely as innocent as it sounds. It’s a calculated way to frame the erosion of protections as some sort of victory for efficiency, when in reality, it's usually just a way to leave the American worker more vulnerable than they were before.

A left-wing decision from Biden's administration? Give me a break. That's just absurd. The Democratic Party is firmly on the right; there is simply no way you can try to spin it that way.

It seems like the Democratic Party has decided to hike up the premiums for supplemental health insurance again. It’s becoming quite difficult to ignore how these incremental shifts in policy always seem to land squarely on the shoulders of the average person just trying to keep their family covered. I remember back when I was working that desk job in Chicago, dealing with my own benefits package, and even then, the feeling of watching those monthly deductions creep upward while the actual service remained stagnant felt incredibly draining. It’s a wearying cycle we find ourselves in.I can't see any link here. If you have something you want me to look at, go ahead and drop it in.We should probably take a moment to look back at that attempt to outsource public sector roles—an initiative that only stalled because the unions finally decided to get aggressive. It felt remarkably similar to the push for privatizing the interstate highway system. Then came those labor law amendments, which were essentially just Clinton picking up where Reagan left off with his anti-labor agenda. link With all their endless talk about introducing atypical work arrangements, this supposed "flexibility" that serves no one but the bosses, and making it easier to gut collective bargaining agreements, they've shown their true colors. On the global stage, the Democratic Party is fully behind the imperialistic policies of the USA, and under Biden's administration, we've seen them actively arming Islamists in Syria. It’s the same old story of institutional betrayal, just wrapped in different packaging.

A Swiss person doesn't even come close to comparing to this mess.

The Nazi Party actually rose to power through democratic channels, which stands in stark contrast to other movements we've seen; since the working class makes up the vast majority of the electorate, they naturally voted in their own self-interest, effectively making the choice a binary struggle between communism and Nazism. If communist ideology had truly taken hold among the German workforce, one has to wonder why it wasn't the outcome that prevailed. After all, even Hitler was one of them.

The Nazi Party never actually held much sway among the working class; their true foundation was always, and will forever remain, that shrinking middle class, bolstered by massive financial injections from powerful industrial titans. Back in 1932, their quasi-union Nazi organization—the NSBO—managed to scrape together about 300,000 members, which pales in comparison to the social democratic unions of the era, which boasted memberships numbering in the millions.

Why wasn't communism chosen? Unfortunately, you can't simply vote for communism in an election. Why didn't the Communist Party ever take power? Because by the 1930s, it had devolved into a Stalinist sect with a shrinking base among the working class. And frankly, there's a good reason for that.

It’s fascinating to look at national-Bolshevik China or North Korea and then compare them to the national-Bolshevik America, which eventually fell apart because it lacked the ethnic homogeneity found in those two.

Every single one of those countries is purely capitalist, and America was no different during its existence.

As far as I know regarding those countries, they don't want to take anyone in; it was something about why they wouldn't just move to the wealthy Arab nations.

In Saudi Arabia alone, there are at least 500,000 refugees from Syria (link). Not to mention the sheer number currently in Jordan.

I'm just popping back in here before I get into my actual response—it looks like my previous post might have vanished into thin air. If I somehow managed to delete it myself, believe me, it was a complete accident.

Sure, a right-wing party might toss the word "worker" into its branding to sound more populist, but let’s be honest: a party running on a right-wing platform is, by its very definition, incapable of actually representing the interests of the working class.

The fact that the Democratic Party and several others are essentially just rebranded versions of the liberal right is a completely separate issue altogether.