The US seems to be following Lenin's plan to a T

[liberlict]

Unveiled! Lenin's Brilliant Plot to Destroy Capitalism (http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/09/unveiled-lenins-brilliant-plot-to-destroy-capitalism/280006/)


Hundreds of thousands of ruble notes are being issued daily by our treasury. This is done, not in order to fill the coffers of the State with practically worthless paper, but with the deliberate intention of destroying the value of money as a means of payment. There is no justification for the existence of money in the Bolshevik state, where the necessities of life shall be paid for by work alone.

Experience has taught us it is impossible to root out the evils of capitalism merely by confiscation and expropriation, for however ruthlessly such measures may be applied, astute speculators and obstinate survivors of the capitalist classes will always manage to evade them and continue to corrupt the life of the community. The simplest way to exterminate the very spirit of capitalism is therefore to flood the country with notes of a high face-value without financial guarantees of any sort.

Already even a hundred-ruble note is almost valueless in Russia. Soon even the simplest peasant will realize that it is only a scrap of paper, not worth more than the rags from which it is manufactured. Men will cease to covet and hoard it so soon as they discover it will not buy anything, and the great illusion of the value and power of money, on which the capitalist state is based will have been definitely destroyed.

This is the real reason why our presses are printing ruble bills day and night, without rest.

[Lowtech]

what is your concern with value while the rich produce none?

[Skyhilist]

So basically you're saying that a guy who wrote this at the beginning of the 20th century is wrong when it comes to society an entire century labor? I'm no Lenin supporter, but is that really surprising? I mean you've gotta place these things into historical context. It might've been true when he said it that such things would cause people to become class conscious, even though it obviously isn't true (in America) now given our current state of affairs unfortunately.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

The article in the Journal of Economic Perspectives claims:

"A report of an interview with Lenin was published on April 23, 1919, by the Daily Chronicle in London and the New York Times Dated April 22 and cabled from Geneva, the article claimed to be based on “authentic notes of an interview with Vladimir Ulianoff Lenin, the high priest of Bolshevism, which were communicated to me by a recent visitor to Moscow.” Attributed to the Chronicle’s unnamed “Special Correspondent,” the visitor was also unidentified."

In other words, the quote is based on "authentic notes" from an unnamed special correspondent, or to be brief - it's most likely spurious. The Bolshevik government did issue a lot of banknotes in the period, but that had something to do with the civil war that was going on.

[liberlict]

The article in the Journal of Economic Perspectives claims:

"A report of an interview with Lenin was published on April 23, 1919, by the Daily Chronicle in London and the New York Times Dated April 22 and cabled from Geneva, the article claimed to be based on “authentic notes of an interview with Vladimir Ulianoff Lenin, the high priest of Bolshevism, which were communicated to me by a recent visitor to Moscow.” Attributed to the Chronicle’s unnamed “Special Correspondent,” the visitor was also unidentified."

In other words, the quote is based on "authentic notes" from an unnamed special correspondent, or to be brief - it's most likely spurious. The Bolshevik government did issue a lot of banknotes in the period, but that had something to do with the civil war that was going on.

The Bolsheviks were trying to abolish all capitalist forces during the Civil War, that is true. Not for idealogical reasons, mind you, but because they actually believed state planning would achieve a better economic outcome to aid their war efforts (maybe it's just me that finds that amusing ).

Here's a Trotsky quote describing the plan:

"The Soviet government hoped and strove to develop these methods of
regimentation directly into; system of planned economy in distribution
as well as production. In other words. from "war communism" it hoped
gradually,- but without destroying the system, to arrive at a genuine
communism.. ..Reality however came into increasing conflict with the
program of war communism"

"In one fell swoop the market was declared illegal. Private trade, the
hiring of labor, leasing of land, and all private enterprise and ownership
were abolished, at least in theory, and subject to punishment by the state.
Property was confiscated from the upper classes. Businesses and factories
were nationalized. Surplus crops produced by the peasants were taken by
the government to support the Bolshevik civil-war forces and workers in the
towns. Labor was conscripted and organized militarily. Consumer goods
were rationed at artificially low prices and later at no price at all.
Unsurprisingly, special treatment was accorded those with power and
influence."

War Communism to NEP:
The Road from Serfdom (http://mises.org/journals/jls/5_1/5_1_5.pdf)

So I don't know if the quote is authentic at all, but it would be in line with Lenin's thinking at the time, anyway.

[liberlict]

So basically you're saying that a guy who wrote this at the beginning of the 20th century is wrong when it comes to society an entire century labor? I'm no Lenin supporter, but is that really surprising? I mean you've gotta place these things into historical context. It might've been true when he said it that such things would cause people to become class conscious, even though it obviously isn't true (in America) now given our current state of affairs unfortunately.

No I'm saying that if printing bank-notes is Lenin's plan to abolish capitalism, maybe Bush and Obama are secret Leninits (not to mention Mugabe lofl).

[ВАЛТЕР]

Are you fucking high? :laugh:

[liberlict]

Yes but what's that got to do with anything? :unsure:

[Lowtech]

misguided means of destabilizing society has nothing to do with the debate between capitalism and socialism. you seem to be hinting that capitalism is some how the reverse of what is described above?

capitalism isn't stable at all, but as long as the rich are insulated from the brunt of capitalism's inadequacies, leaving the poor and wage slaves to experience the reality of artificial scarcity, it is assumed to "work". yet working for only 20% of the population is no measure of success. i'm sure you assume yourself educated, yet how do you placate yourself into believing that people are poor or wage slaves of their own fault and only coincidental that things are sold above production cost and workers are paid less than the value of their labor?

[Paul Pott]

America's Perestroika.

dun dunn dunnnnnnna

[Geiseric]

the idea of printing more money is to give it to capitalists in the U.S. in the form of bailouts, which devalues the pay we get due to inflation. That was not how the USSR's economy worked.

[Skyhilist]

No I'm saying that if printing bank-notes is Lenin's plan to abolish capitalism, maybe Bush and Obama are secret Leninits (not to mention Mugabe lofl).

Yeah so in other words he was wrong because Obama and Bush have done this and capitalism is no weaker than before in the U.S.

But yeah again, historical context is everything.

[argeiphontes]

Destroying the currency wouldn't bring about the end of capitalism, just a currency crisis. It can just be devalued and reissued. Check out the new peso or the Polish new zloty. I remember 1,000,000 and 1,000,000,000 banknotes issued by the Polish National Bank. 10s and 20s would just be thrown in the trash. Yet capitalism flourished.

[Red_Banner]

Yes, take Lenin and history out of context.

[liberlict]

the idea of printing more money is to give it to capitalists in the U.S. in the form of bailouts, which devalues the pay we get due to inflation. That was not how the USSR's economy worked.

The USSR's economy worked differently at different times. This just addresses the 'war-communism' period.

[liberlict]

Destroying the currency wouldn't bring about the end of capitalism, just a currency crisis. It can just be devalued and reissued. Check out the new peso or the Polish new zloty. I remember 1,000,000 and 1,000,000,000 banknotes issued by the Polish National Bank. 10s and 20s would just be thrown in the trash. Yet capitalism flourished.

A currency crisis is just what was hoped for though, wasn't it, (according to this article)? If money means nothing then Russians would start relying on state distribution. Currency crises are what is hoped for, because once people have no confidence in money they will start to see food/clothes/whatever in use values.

Zimbabwe is a very contemporary analogue of what was going on in 1920 Russia. It was a complete nationalization of all productive assets, called "indigenisation"-- just kicking all the colonialists out and taking over the technology. Money became useless as in the USSR. The problem with countries like that (and Russia 20th Century) are not economic systems but all the civil wars between primitive tribes that are still raging into the modern era.

http://www.theafricareport.com/Southern-Africa/zimbabwes-indigenisation-law-gets-review-as-investments-fall.html

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zNVvQczHtHQ/ThCwi6-eGQI/AAAAAAAAA5A/PKnaVi1ZsBw/s1600/zimbabwe-cash-inflation.jpg

[argeiphontes]

The US isn't in any danger of any currency or inflation crisis. Bourgeois economists like Krugman are always complaining about there not being enough of an inflationary policy.

This is either trying to scare up support for austerity or some intra-capitalist conflict with the state as its venue that I'm not really fathoming right now. Though it's part of the Grover Norquist's "starve the beast" strategy.

Austerity is, of course, a redistribution scam where money is borrowed from capitalists to bail out other capitalists, but then instead of raising taxes (on the rich), budgets are cut and the bailouts are paid for by the people that the tax burden has already been shifted to, i.e. the middle classes. There would be no need to borrow if taxes could be raised, but even Democrats have to shut up about raising taxes because of propaganda about incentives. Yet, during the years after WWII the marginal tax rate was as high as 95% and returns on assets were highest then, it was the big postwar boom.

Bailing out banks didn't solve the crisis, just displaced it or deferred it. There's a "capital strike" going on where banks aren't lending as much as they used to. Yeah, it's probably because there are no profitable investments yet, since asset prices were propped up by the bailout to begin with. Remember the risky investments they were willing to make in bad mortgages? That was a last grab for decent profits, I would think. Those investments shouldn't have been bought by the government, but not because of growing inflation, but because that capital needed to evaporate into thin air.

Besides, from a bourgeois economics point of view, wouldn't inflation have been worse when the economy was still humming? Now that it's crashed there are deflationary pressures like lack of consumer demand. Government debts aren't enough to cause any inflation. (Any "printing of money" is actually a loan from the federal reserve and debt-to-GDP ratios are low.)

I think...

[argeiphontes]

So, thanks for playing but there's no Leninist policy going on :laugh:

[Flying Purple People Eater]

This guy isn't seriously trying to back up his statement with an American newspaper article from the 1910s about the October Revolution?

You do know that those articles were claiming that people like Lenin and Trotsky had died, was mutinied upon, came down with disease and/or capitulated to Britain every single week, with the added bonus of rabidly starting neighbourhood witch-hunts for 'red sympathisers' on the scale of similar magazines targeting homosexuals in Uganda (i.e. THIS MAN IS A COMMIE! HERE'S HIS NUMBER, NAME AND ADDRESS, NOW GO GRAB THOSE PITCHFORKS AND TORCHES). The news at that point in time was completely and utterly bogus, and was used by the American right as a political battering ram against any and all forms of leftist groups. You cannot come to any other conclusion after reading the fucked up blood-haze crap of the Daily Mail and NY Times (even the NY Times!) during that time. It makes McCarthyism look like a playground bully in comparison.

There's one particularly hilarious and ridiculous article that user Ismail found during that era, where a reporter claimed that the Bolsheviks were now 'nationalising women' to become communist sex-slaves, and that every girl at a certain age was taken to this big 'nationalisation' office in Moscow to be registered as 'sexual public property'.

These people where either under a state of heavy psychosis or were pushing an utterly dishonest and coercive right-wing agenda of fear and repression (but most likely both).