Trotsky, Part the Third: Permanent Revolution

BlaiseP — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 15:09:35 -0400

[float=right] [img]http://www.kiebalam.com/4forvm/trotsky/niger_man.jpg[/img] [b]* Hausa farmer, Niger Reuters/Finbarr O'Reilly [/b] [/float] Let’s take a step back, put more of the landscape in the frame. At the risk of oversimplifying, I’ll attempt to lay out Trotsky’s point. Nations, then and now exist at various states of development. More precisely, they exist in various states of backwardness and they’re all trying to play catch-up. Backward countries need capital, and they’ll do almost anything to get it. It’s a sad fact of life: backward countries are badly led. A good measure of how badly a country is led is the percentage of subsistence farmers. Workers aren’t a whole lot better off: they leave the farm, only to spend their days doing manual labor in the factory, getting a fraction of the profits, but hey, it is a step up and don’t blame the capitalist, that’s the way these things work. These backward countries can’t wait around for bad leaders to die off and better ones replace them. Countries with fewer farmers have the luxury of plenty of capital. An enterprising worker can run down to the bank with a good idea, get a loan and buy the means of production. Once he’s got a nice little company running, he can expand his business. If it’s a really great idea, a venture capitalist will fund him into the big leagues. The subsistence farmer has no such options.

This McCain Smear

Macallan — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 14:16:06 -0400

The following has cropped up here and elsewhere, and appears to be a whisper smear campaign against McCain; the story goes, 'he's the father of a black child'… no wait! That was the South Carolina whisper smear campaign from 2000. Sorry about that, but they are oddly related, because there seems to be a correlation between the types of people who routinely say, "Bush is despicable, look at what he did to McCain in South Carolina" and those pimping this latest one. Now, before anyone assumes I'm only speaking of the port side, I'm seeing it from people on both the left and the right.

Mid-Olympics Open Thread!

M Scott Eiland — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 04:39:41 -0400

You know you wanna.

Part Two: Everest

M Scott Eiland — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 02:43:27 -0400

Because it is there.--attributed to George Mallory, as his answer to the question: “Why do you want to climb Mount Everest?"

Stay Sassy, Senator McCain - Bonus Stolen Memory Edition!

Harley — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 19:04:18 -0400

So Senator McCain, as part of the now-familiar Pimp My Bio effort, frequently tells the moving story of the cross in the dirt that gave him courage and the will to go on. Funny thing is, this extraordinarily cinematic tale wasn't part of McCain's earliest recounting of his POW experiences. Even funnier? It's very similar to a story told by the greatest man of the previous century, Alexander Solzhenitsen. [quote] Leaving his shovel on the ground, he slowly walked to a crude bench and sat down. He knew that at any moment a guard would order him to stand up, and when he failed to respond, the guard would beat him to death, probably with his own shovel. He had seen it happen to other prisoners. As he waited, head down, he felt a presence. Slowly he looked up and saw a skinny old prisoner squat down beside him. The man said nothing. Instead, he used a stick to trace in the dirt the sign of the Cross. The man then got back up and returned to his work. As Solzhenitsyn stared at the Cross drawn in the dirt his entire perspective changed.[/quote] Hey. Maybe that's not actually funny. Andrew Sullivan noted this first. He's now asking a relevant question. When was the first time McCain told this moving biographical anecdote? Betcha there's some folks digging, and digging hard, right now. And yes, I'm sure it's all true and I'm sure we'll get some kind of confirmation in the next few days because I know Senator McCain would never ever inflate or embellish like that. Any more than he would use his POW experiences as a campaign prop. He's just not that kind of man. Unless he did, of course. And then...? Heh. UPDATE! Speaking of embellishing, hey, if nothing else? It wouldn't be the last time. Here. BONUS UPDATE! At last night's Saddleback Forum, Pastor Rick made it clear that Senator McCain was in a 'cone of silence' so that he would not reap undue advantage, eg know what questions were coming before they were asked. Senator McCain even joked about trying to listen through a wall. Heh. Except it turns out McCain wasn't even in the church during the first half hour of Obama's hour long segment. Gee. That's not quite an embellishment, but. Oh never mind. BONUS BONUS UPDATE! The Story of the Cross begins to spread. Hey, remember Senator Clinton and the tarmac? Heh.

Leon Trotsky: Part the Second, London 1903

BlaiseP — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 17:10:47 -0400

[float=right] [img]http://www.kiebalam.com/4forvm/trotsky/Iskra37a_Clerkenwell_Green.jpg[/img] [b]* Iskra Offices 37a Clerkenwell_Green London[/b] [/float] Trotsky’s escaped from Siberia and fled to London in 1902. Why London? It was a magnet for Russian exiles and other personae-non-grata. Lenin had also escaped to London and was editing Spark magazine, Iskra in Russian. Trotksy began writing for Spark, as were several other raffish ex-prisoners of Tsar Nicholas II, Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russias. All would figure large in the years to follow. This little magazine would be the fulcrum upon which Marxism would teeter and totter. With a smaller circulation than many college newspapers, around 8000, struggle for control of its editorial board would have consequences far beyond anyone’s ability to predict at the time. I give you the cast of characters, for Trotsky cannot be understood without them. Trotsky had married while in prison. He had left his first wife and two daughters behind in Russia of necessity: escaped prisoners don’t usually go back to their families, and his wife understood completely. Trotsky met his second wife in London, took her name and had two more children. The children of Trotsky’s first marriage were raised on their grandfather’s estate. His first wife would later die in the gulag of Kolyma, mining gold in the Arctic. She was last seen in 1938 and has vanished from history. Varlam Shalamov describes the mass graves where she was doubtless buried in his Kolyma Tales, left as an exercise to the reader. Solzhenitsyn said Shalamov, not he, saw the worst of the Stalinist evil. In 1903, Stalin was in Siberia, a young sociopath and thug in training, soon to return to Georgia to a career of robbing banks and extorting money for the Bolsheviks. But this would be far in the future.

Leon Trotsky: Part the First

BlaiseP — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 16:53:23 -0400

[float=right] [img]http://www.kiebalam.com/4forvm/trotsky/Trotsky1897.jpg[/img] [b]* Leon Trotsky, 1897[/b] [/float] In the wake of WW1, and to a limited extent before that war began, the paradox of the Nation State became clear. Kings had been reduced to constitutional monarchs as the Nation States arose in Europe, but the tyrannies remained, with Empires and Nationalists largely in charge of the world. For Liberalism was largely unknown in the world: democracies had not truly reached down to ground level. Here and there, men ruled with the consent of the governed, but universal suffrage and the rights of man remained merely ideals. Into this world steps Leon Trotsky, Russia’s first foreign affairs minister after the Russian Revolution. Lenin may have ruled the Revolution and Stalin would later overthrow it in a sort of Second Revolution, but Leon Trotsky was its brains and heart. Trotsky was essentially a ruthless, decent, intelligent man, the first man with a vision for world democracy, right down to ground level. He is the intellectual forebear of several political movements including Neoconservatives and all the Liberal Hawks, Christopher Hitchens is another of his followers. But everyone who ever believed in Leon Trotsky hated Stalin and all he did. Do not confuse Trotsky with what Communism would become, for Stalin would eventually murder Trotsky for opposing those changes. Every enemy of totalitarian Communism owes a profound debt to Trotsky. Many people espouse his causes, completely unaware of Trotsky’s authorship of those causes. Trotsky is, to my way of thinking, the most misunderstood political theorist.

"The Best Man"

Kierkegaard — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 15:16:15 -0400

Within the next few weeks, the two major political parties of our great nation will be convening to nominate two unelectable candidates. One of whom will become the next president of the United States. Traditionally, I enjoy rewatching the 1964 Henry Fonda film (adapted from his play of the same name by Gore Vidal) 'The Best Man' at this point in the election cycle. But not this year.

What is a neo con?

Macallan — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 12:58:14 -0400

So as not to further derail a separate diary on a different subject, I'll attempt as concise an answer to a very complex question from that diary as I can in the limited amount of time I have. Irving Kristol's pithy definition was, "a liberal who has been mugged by reality." The more precise definition would be -- a leftist who rejects the left, yet seeks a new right. Thus the neo part of neo conservative.

Russia and Georgia: Old Patterns are Seen Anew

BlaiseP — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 18:24:38 -0400

Never on the face of the earth have a more cowardly, racist and self-pitying bunch of bullies and strong-arm robbers been assembled as we now see gathered in the Kremlin. Russia lapses into its natural state, a modus vivendi characterized by insularity and self-aggrandizement. Georgia again plays with fire, nationalist sentiments arise, only to be beaten down, as in centuries past. It has all been seen before

Mid-Week Open Thread

M Scott Eiland — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 22:27:29 -0400

And here we are again.

Part One: The Human Drama

M Scott Eiland — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 05:35:08 -0400

I'm dedicating this series of Olympic diaries to three people: --Jim Murray, who showed me how a professional sports columnist is supposed to do his job with his incomparable column in the LA Times; --Jim McKay, who left us this year after gracing many Olympic Games with his knowledge, professionalism, and love of sports in general;