Capitalism in crisis

[Psy]

It seem capitalism is in its worse crisis yet, the large amount of imaginary capital created by the finical capitalists has evaporated into thin air, commodity prices are destabilizing with some commodities losing (market) value while others increase in (market) value.

The biggest problem is the crises continues to get worse.

[F9]

Capitalism will get the worst crisis when diesel wont be available to fulfill the demands,i dont know how far away we are from the dissapearing of diesel but i think its not very far away.

And in those crisis the workers are those who going to pay the price for the rich guys.In one hand we want the capitalism have it crisis so it is weaker but on the other hand such crisis make worker class pain a lot!

Fuserg9:star:

[trivas7]

Capitalism will get the worst crisis when diesel wont be available to fulfill the demands,i dont know how far away we are from the dissapearing of diesel but i think its not very far away.

I disagree, there is plenty of oil in the ground for at least the next twenty years. I am old enough to remember the gas lines of the '70s. That was tough.

[F9]

I disagree, there is plenty of oil in the ground for at least the next twenty years. I am old enough to remember the gas lines of the '70s. That was tough.

men i don't know how much oil left,i suppose it wont be far from what i hear and i see the prices going wild on the oil.;)

Fuserg9:star:

[Dr. Rosenpenis]

It the world is out of petroleum in 20 years, I think we'll be fucked.

[DancingLarry]

There is indeed oil in the ground for 20-30 or more years, but each new drop is going to cost more and more to extract. Marginal cost drives market cost.

However, the larger question is this: is this a crisis for capitalism, or just for those of us living under capitalism? I would argue that unless and until there is an active and vital alternative to capitalism with a broad and deep base of social acceptance, then there is no crisis of capitalism, at least in the first world where capitalist hegemony is perhaps the most solid and unchallenged as it has ever been in the history of the system. Perhaps the biggest reason that this is so is that we on the left, the only ones who could feasibly offer such an alternative, continue to be locked into the conceptual structures of the late 19th century and debate the practices and particulars of the early 20th century, or of the mid 20th century at best. Our entire understanding of such a fundamental concept as what the "working class" is remains defined by the late 19th/early 20th century industrial proletariat, which continues to wither away by all measures: as a proportion of the population, as a factor of production, and as a historically rising and thus progressive force. In all these ways the classic industrial proletariat, the centerpiece of the main social leftist currents of both red and black variants, at least in the west is in inevitable and historically accelerating long-term decline. We on the left have absolutely failed to come to grips ideologically and philosophically with that reality, rendering ourselves superfluous with our superannuated ideological categories and analytical precepts. As riddled with errors as their analyses may be, give credit to people like Foti (http://www.lipmagazine.org/ccarlsson/archives/2006/06/alex_foti_inter.html) and the Negri (http://www.makeworlds.org/node/49) who are at least trying to come to grips with that reality, which can be said for few other leftist currents. There is indeed a crisis for all working people living under capitalism, but only by accepting and applying ourselves (the left) collectively to the task of formulating a class-based and materialist social and economic analysis as accurate for the 21st century as Marx's was for the 19th, can that crisis be transformed as an active principle into a crisis of capitalism, a crisis for the capitalists. Otherwise it's just another bump in the highway of hegemony, which the capitalists will resolve by plowing under some greater portion of the subordinate classes.

[OI OI OI]

It seem capitalism is in its worse crisis yet I disagree. The biggest crisis was during the Great Depression. But I think we are heading to get on that level soon. Of course a crisis of capitalism is not enough . There should be a capable proletariat leadership that would act as a vanguard. This kind of leadership does not exist in may places. So I hope that the big crisis of capitalism does not hit very soon, in order for us to have the time to build that leadership! As about the oil prices, they play as much as a role as the ficticious capital for this crisis. Bourgeois economists said that oil prices will not go under 120$ a barrel for the next 6 years! Considering that their prediction is by nature conservative due to their role , I would accept it but for sure 6 years is the absolute minimum and probably not the case. The rising prices have an effect that we can observe even now with the rise of food prices and the social explosions that this resulted in. So compared with the evident collapse that we will see in the stock market very soon due to all this "imaginery" capital this will create a social "atomic bomb" that can destroy capitalism once and for all. But without the correct leadership the proletariat will be headless. It will be a massacre. So we have to create that leadership soon( especialy in countries like the USA, Canada, Australia etc ) in order to avoid a massacre and a reign of the reactionaries. If the world is out of petroleum in 20 years Dr.Rosenpenis we won't be "fucked". Even under capitalism revolutionary ways to produce energy are available for usage, but the monopolies of oil do not allow that. See use of Hydrogen etc .

[GPDP]

Sorry, but hydrogen is a joke. It is a net energy loser, and will not power any economy anytime soon. Same goes for ethanol and a few other "alternatives".

I think we on the left are severely underestimating the potential from catastrophe that could come about from the decline of petroleum. I've even seen some very well-respected posters here, such as RS2K, just about deny that there is a problem. It's not about oil monopolies, or even about oil running out. We're just nearing the point where oil production will peak worldwide due to the nature of oil fields themselves, after which oil will become prohibitively expensive to extract. We might have even passed it already; it's hard to say. In light of this, I'd say 20 years is the most optimist estimate we can possibly come up with.

I'm not a doom-and-gloomer per se, though. I only ask that we take this a bit more seriously, and look at the objective conditions of the energy situation in the world today, rather than writing it all off as just another plot for Big Oil to profit from (though I don't deny that they won't before the shit hits the fan). This could mean the difference between a more humane alternative for civilization in the near future, or a complete collapse towards fascism or barbarism (so-called "anarchy", in the chaotic sense of the word).

[Psy]

There is indeed oil in the ground for 20-30 or more years, but each new drop is going to cost more and more to extract. Marginal cost drives market cost.

However, the larger question is this: is this a crisis for capitalism, or just for those of us living under capitalism? I would argue that unless and until there is an active and vital alternative to capitalism with a broad and deep base of social acceptance, then there is no crisis of capitalism, at least in the first world where capitalist hegemony is perhaps the most solid and unchallenged as it has ever been in the history of the system.

It is a crisis of capitalism as the capitalists class is becaming disillusioned with capitalism and the M-C-^M cycle is under threat not currently from the proletariat but from the threat of the capitalists class taking the tactic of defending their capital they have by hording it (taking capital out of circulation) that causes even real capital to evaporate into thin air. Also if the capitalist class becomes disillusioned enough they might overthrow capitalism for a system they find defends their position better like a kinda of neo-feudalism and simply demanding tribute from the proletariat and abandon capital accumulation.

[VukBZ2005]

It is a crisis of capitalism as the capitalists class is becaming disillusioned with capitalism and the M-C-^M cycle is under threat not currently from the proletariat but from the threat of the capitalists class taking the tactic of defending their capital they have by hording it (taking capital out of circulation) that causes even real capital to evaporate into thin air.

Psy, the Capitalist classes of the de-industrialized regions of the world are not becoming disillusioned with the Capitalist system, and, the reason why I state this is because it is simply not in their interests to become such, for that would essentially be an act of social, cultural, economical and political suicide. It is my opinion, however, that the Capitalist classes of the de-industrialized regions of the world are, instead, becoming irrational, that is, irrational in their attempts to fully escape the threat of Working Class Revolution, which, in turn, have collectively driven them to destroy the industrial manufacturing bases from which they obtained Capital that was both real, and, that had not been recycled from earlier periods of Capital accumulation. But, from what we have seen, these attempts to escape from this threat, this...most dangerous threat of Working Class Revolution, have all failed in their objectives, and, are now on the verge of creating a extremely deadly situation in which the human inhabitants of the de-industrialized regions of the world will be forced to chose one of these two options: Genuine Communism or death.

Also, Psy, the reason why I mentioned specifically the Capitalist classes of the de-industrialized regions of the world has to do with the fact that the current economic crisis is being generated from these regions, and not from the regions that are not industrialized/industrializing, nor from the regions that are industrialized/industiralizing. Thus, any type of economic collapse that may come from this will effect the de-industrialized regions of the world the most, which will prepare the grounds for the development of a new phase of Capital accumulation in which a certain industrializing region will, for all intents and purposes, will take the place of the United States of America, that is, if this development is not stoped by successful working class revolutions which have to occur in the de-industiralized regions of the world, as well as the non-industrialized and industrialized/industrializing regions of the world.

[Psy]

Capitalists are becoming disillusioned as the two subclasses of the capitalists (finance capitalists and productive capitalists) are currently struggling against each. Also, the capitalists class eventually will abandon capitalism once they feel collectively their privileged position is threatened by capitalism, meaning once the rate of profit gets low enough capitalists would revolt against capitalism in favor for a system that better serves their interests (odds are a new form of feudalism).

Capitalists are not capitalists because they believe in it but because it is currently to their advantage to be capitalists, once that advantage disappears capitalists will look for other ways to maintain their position in society.

[VukBZ2005]

Capitalists are becoming disillusioned as the two subclasses of the capitalists (finance capitalists and productive capitalists) are currently struggling against each. Also, the capitalists class eventually will abandon capitalism once they feel collectively their privileged position is threatened by capitalism, meaning once the rate of profit gets low enough capitalists would revolt against capitalism in favor for a system that better serves their interests (odds are a new form of feudalism).

Firstly, it has to be repeated that disillusionment is not what is occurring here; it is simply the inability of the Capitalist classes of the de-industrialized regions of the world, especially that of the United States of America, to fully and effectively eliminate working class revolutionary class struggle, an inability which is making their responses to the subsequent material economic environment more and more irrational. If disillusionment was occurring, it would be because the entirety of the material basis for the Capitalist classes of the de-industrialized regions of the world was on the verge of being completely annihilated by the intensification of the current economic crisis into a full-scale financial systemic collapse. And even at that, the aforementioned Capitalists will not turn against their own mode of production and transform it into something else, despite their disillusionment, for the material context in which they developed in inhibits such action. Rather, the working classes of the de-industrialized regions of the world would have to be pushed into the type of situation I described in my last post, because there would be no other way to escape the inherent....chaos that a financial systemic collapse of the de-industrialized regions of the world would bring about.

Also, even though the entire world would be affected by something of that nature, the industrialized/industrializing regions of the world will eventually get out of it and, as I said before, if it is not prevented, the economic revitalization of these regions will commence a process in which, eventually-speaking, one of these industrialized/industrializing regions takes the place of the United States of America and becomes the new world Capitalist hegemon, thus, creating a new period of Capital accumulation.


Capitalists are not capitalists because they believe in it but because it is currently to their advantage to be capitalists, once that advantage disappears capitalists will look for other ways to maintain their position in society.You are absolutely wrong on this; Capitalists are Capitalists specifically because they have total control over both property, and, the means of production that happen to exist on that property. And it is because of this total control that they are able to perpetuate their existence through the constant extraction of labor-power from the propertyless Working class. Once both of these items of contention fall out of their control, the Capitalist class, and Capital accumulation, as anyone would know it, would completely cease to exist, even though there would be people that would be left that were, collectively, once a part of this class. Whatever inherent advantage that they get out of this is only inherent to their control over the means of production and property, in its commodified and private form.

Also, I have say, your assertions are giving me the impression that you are either unable to understand, or, most likely, are negating, the concept of Historical Materialism, which asserts that, basically, different modes of production come into existence once there is a material basis for it, and once there is a class that is both based on that material basis, and, consciously aim to establish a different mode of production based on the material basis that they orginate from. As Karl Marx once said, "It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being that determines their consciousness", and for you to negate this, that is, if you are negating it, is to essentially negate Historical Materialism, not to mention, negating the entire rationale for both Working Class Revolution and Communism.

[Psy]

The current crisis is much deeper then class struggle against the proletriat, even if the proletariat totally surrendered to the capitalists the current crisis wouldn't be solved as the finance capitalists and productive capitalists would still be at each others throats.

Also you misinterpreted Marx, Capitalism in the long run will eventually strip the capitalists from their privileged position even if the workers totally submitted, meaning eventually capitalism will not even be in the interests of capitalists. Now you either assume capitalists will go against their collective class interest and just allow their empires to go under because profits are impossible or there will be a point where the capitalists owners of the means of production will resort to violence to defend their empire. We just have to look at organize crime (that have the same mindset as capitalists) to see the new mode production that awaits us if the capitalism is overthrown by capitalists.

[ckaihatsu]

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKN2634924420080630

Mortgage ruling could shock U.S. banking industry

Mon Jun 30, 2008 8:14pm BST

By Gina Keating - Analysis

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A lawsuit filed by a Wisconsin couple against their mortgage lender could have major implications for banks should a U.S. appeals court agree that borrowers can cancel their loans en masse when their lenders violate a federal lending disclosure law.

The case began like hundreds of others filed since the U.S. housing boom spawned a rise in sales of adjustable rate loans. Susan and Bryan Andrews of Cedarburg, Wisconsin, claimed that lender Chevy Chase Bank FSB (CCX_pc.N: Quote, Profile, Research) had hidden the true terms of what they believed was a good deal on a low-interest loan.

In their 2005 lawsuit, the couple said the loan's interest rate had more than doubled by their second monthly payment from the 1.95 percent rate they thought was locked in for five years. The interest rate rose well above the 5.75 percent fixed-rate loan they had refinanced to pay their children's college tuition.

The Andrews filed the case seeking class action status; and in early 2007, U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman ruled that the bank had violated the Truth in Lending Act, or TILA, and that thousands of other Chevy Chase borrowers could join them as plaintiffs.

The judge transformed the case from a run-of-the-mill class action to a potential nightmare for the U.S. banking industry by also finding that the borrowers could force the bank to cancel, or rescind, their loans. That decision was stayed pending an appeal to the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which is expected to rule any day.

[...]

[progressive_lefty]

It comes to no surprise that Capitalism may be coming to a close, with consumerism taking a plunge. I don't think the masses know what the price of capitalism is, poverty for two-thirds of the world's population. We can't kid ourselves.

[ckaihatsu]

Note how the establishment is going through an intense political implosion over the issue of national boundaries, and of national jurisdiction (FISA).

This, at the same time that the financial realm not only has no avenues for growth, but almost none left for pure speculation, either.

The first article (excerpt) below is about how Obama and Congress are backing Bush's stance on FISA, while the second article is about a federal judge who has indicted Bush for that very stance. That's the hallmark of a constitutional crisis.


Chris



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http://wsws.org/articles/2008/jul2008/fisa-j10.shtml

Obama joins Senate vote to legitimize Bush’s domestic spying operation

By Bill Van Auken
10 July 2008

The Democratic Party’s presumptive presidential nominee voted Wednesday afternoon with a majority of the US Senate to pass legislation vastly expanding the government’s power to carry out warrantless wiretapping and electronic surveillance, while handing blanket retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies that facilitated the illegal domestic spying operation in the US in the six years following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

The Senate passed the legislation by a vote of 69 to 28 after voting down three amendments aimed at eliminating or limiting the provision that shields the telecoms by overturning some 40 civil lawsuits challenging their actions.

The House approved the legislation last month by a vote of 293 to 129.

[...]



http://newyork.craigslist.org/mnh/pol/751379595.html
http://whatreallyhappened.com


Federal Judge- George W. Bush is a felon


george bush: felon (impeach)
Reply to: see below
Date: 2008-07-11, 6:27PM EDT


Chief Judge Vaughn Walker of the US District Court in California has
ruled that President George W. Bush is a felon. The ruling stems from
the case of Al-Harmain Islamic Foundation Inc. v Bush, a case which
will now be remembered as making it official that Bush's program of
'warrantless spying' is illegal.

Judge Walker held that the president lacks the authority to disregard
the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA — which means
Bush's warrantless electronic surveillance program was illegal.
Whether Bush will ultimately be held accountable for violating federal
law with the program remains unclear. Bush administration lawyers have
fought vigorously — at times using brazen, logic-defying tactics — to
prevent that from happening. The court battle will continue to play
out as Congress continues to battle over recasting FISA and possibly
granting immunity to telecom companies involved in the illegal
surveillance.–Suing George W. Bush: A bizarre and troubling tale

The complete story at Sott.net outlines the sorry history of how the
Bush administration has defined the law of this nation as well as the
laws of common sense and decency to carry out a program that would
have made even Richard Nixon or J. Edgar Hoover blush. It would seem
to me that it's now well established that Bush is indictable in a
Federal Court. It is also my understanding that any sitting federal
judge can now –upon his/her own motion –convene a federal grand jury
to investigate Bush's many violations of federal law, not the least of
which are US Codes, Title 18, Section 2441, which make Bush subject to
the penalty of death for each death of his war of aggression in Iraq.

(a) Offense.— Whoever, whether inside or outside the United States,
commits a war crime, in any of the circumstances described in
subsection (b), shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for life
or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim,
shall also be subject to the penalty of death. –TITLE 18 > PART I >
CHAPTER 118 > § 2441 § 2441. War crimes

It's easy to find evidences of Bush's tyranny. Here's a headline
linked from the article cited above.

Editor's note: This article is part of a Salon investigative series on
spying inside the United States by the Bush administration. Research
support for the article was provided by the Nation Institute
Investigative Fund.

Spying on Americans without warrants, charges based on secret
evidence, a small town divided by fear. Welcome to the world of Bush's
"specially designated global terrorists."May 19, 2008 | RIYADH, Saudi
Arabia, and ASHLAND, Ore. One day in March 2004, Soliman Hamd
Al-Buthe, a former member of Saudi Arabia's national basketball team
and a government official in the city of Riyadh, picked up his phone
for an urgent call with two American lawyers in Washington, DC Most of
the call concerned a growing confrontation between the US government
and the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation in Ashland, Ore., the US branch
of a global Saudi Arabian charity organization under investigation for
possible links to terrorism. Al-Buthe had been an advisor to
Al-Haramain from 1995 to 2002 and was a member of the Oregon
foundation's board of directors. Just weeks prior to the call, the
foundation — a respected fixture in the Ashland community run for
years by an Iranian-American Muslim named Pete Seda — had been raided
by US law enforcement agents.–Blacklisted by the Bush government, Tim
Shorrock, Salon

It is the Bush administration which has pressed this issue, an issue
that has come up, until Bush, just four times in 23 years. But since
911 and the Bush wars for which it is fraudulently cited in
justification, Bush has seized upon a Supreme Court ruling of 1953 to
justify sweeping authority far beyond anything that could have been
envisioned by the courts. Mere mention of two words –'state secrets'
–was always enough to get a wink and nod from a federal judge. Things
have changted. There is the possibility that George W. Bush is under
investigation by a Federal Grand Jury as we write this.

Federal grand juries do two things: They investigate to determine if
federal crimes have been committed; and they indict, or bring criminal
charges against, those whom the grand jury believes committed federal
crimes. To indict, the grand jurors must have probable cause to
believe the persons indicted did violate federal criminal law. Grand
juries offer prosecutors several advantages in conducting a criminal
investigation, especially a high-profile, factually complicated
investigation. For one thing, grand juries operate in secret; this not
only gives prosecutors the ability to shield the evidence they are
gathering from disclosure to the press and others, it can also
encourage people to cooperate with a grand jury. Unless a witness
reveals that he or she testified before a federal grand jury, no one
ever needs to know that occurred, and since the transcripts of grand
jury testimony are secret, no one will know what the witness said.
This can be an advantage in an investigation, such as an investigation
into terrorism, where witnesses may be afraid of retaliation if they
cooperate with investigators.Grand juries also give prosecutors the
power to subpoena witnesses and evidence from around the country and,
in some circumstances, from other countries, as well. (Getting
evidence from abroad is discussed below.) If federal agents want to
interview someone, the person can refuse to speak to them; this is
true even if the person is arrested as a material witness, because
persons who are arrested can invoke the Miranda rights to silence and
to an attorney. The U.S. Supreme Court has held, however, that the
Miranda rights are not available to witnesses subpoenaed to testify
before a grand jury. Unlike someone being interrogated by federal
agents, a grand jury witness not only has not right to silence or
counsel, he or she is required to answer questions posed by the
prosecutor working with the grand jury and by the grand jurors. A
grand jury witness can refuse to answer if he or she can invoke the
Fifth Amendment as to a question, but the privilege must be claimed as
to each question and the prosecutor can challenge a witness' ability
to invoke the privilege.–Using a Grand Jury to Investigate the
September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks, Susan Brenner & Lori Shaw

It is against both the letter of the law, logic, and common sense to
allow Bush carte blanche to dismiss out-of-hand legal challenges to
his various assumptions of dictatorial powers. This is crucial! Bush
wars on Iraq, Afghanistan and 'terror' can be shown to be criminal and
fraudulent. No other criminal defendant could simply invoke 'executive
privilege' in order to have the smoking gun evidence against him
thrown out of court. And Bush must no be allowed to do so either!

In this case, the evidence that must be allowed, the evidence that
must be weighed by a federal grand jury will prove beyond any shadow
of doubt that the panoply of frauds and lies Bush perpetrated upon the
sovereign people of the US amount to high treason, mass murder, and
war crimes for which US Codes themselves demand the death penalty.








* Location: impeach

[Sam_b]

The current recession certainly isn't the worst that has occurred. The crises of the early 1970s for example, and even to maybe a lesser extent in 2001, have all been heralded as the same 'sign of capitalism being in decline'. After WW2 and up until the late 1960s, certain areas of the world were bing run like an arms economy in order to keep up production rates and the like (a good introduction to this is in Jonothan Neale's 2004 book "Whats wrong with America?"; a more in-depth discussion is the writings of Harman on the Permanent Arms Economy), while others, like Germany and Japan who were barred from building up militaries focused a lot of their spending around manufacture - and thus yielded huge profits, to the extent that they were accumulating about 25c extra profit in every dollar they invested. Since then, these 'blips' in the economic system have been much more noticeable as profts have been in decline since then in relation to investment costs (of course 'blips' happened before this but they were not nearly as bad).

The capitalist system of production is an uneven and illogical one, and thats why these ups-and-downs happen: for every few years of huge growths, there will be a couple of minor crashes and loss in profit. Thats just how capitalism works. We can make the arguments all we like, however; but capitalism will not be in crisis until their is a force in place to overthrow and better it. This is why we need to keep building in our places of employment, unions and communities: so we have a unified and politicised working class capable of building an alternative economic and social system.

[BIG BROTHER]

I agree with Sam, if during the 1930's which was an actual depression capitalism didn't "fall". There fore instead of having apocalyptic dreams of capitalism going into total chaos our obligation is to work with the masses in order to overthrow it, whether its in crisis or not.

[ckaihatsu]

I have to insist that the Great Depression *was* a failure of capitalism -- we're seeing the exact same symptoms todaay -- oversupply, lack of growth, frenzied speculation, a credit crunch, and a stock market crash.

Yes, the only thing keeping the U.S. economy going since the '70s has been a permanent wartime (arms) economy, with massive government spending (Keynesianism). As a result the U.S. has the biggest stick, economics be damned, but even that mode of influence has reached its limits. World opinion is more and more constraining, and we've seen the U.S.'s coalition partners slip away as its wars on Afghanistan and Iraq have quickly turned into quagmires.

Now the international proletariat is larger than ever and it is now equipped with informational communism (the Internet is communism for your brain).

What's going on right now is not a "minor crash" -- last time around, in 2000-2001, only the scare tactic / inside job of 9/11 rescued U.S. capitalism from a sharp downward slide, by bolstering the "national security" economy, essentially more militaristic spending. The stock market has barely raised its head since then, and now it's sliding right back down.

I'd like to remind everyone that the latest bubbles we've seen are the result of *very* desperate moves by capital -- in lieu of finding avenues of true growth in the U.S. economy we've seen speculative pools of capital well up in sectors that are known to have *no growth*, particularly housing and commodities.

The rest of this thread of discussion has dealt with what kind of power situation would result after capitalism has imploded, *without* a large-enough revolutionary force to take the helm. Of course the point of activity is to build class consciousness so that there *is* a vanguard that can step to the fore -- and RevLeft is an instrumental vehicle for this -- but part of that leadership should include an ability to explain the current situation of capitalism to people, in the most accurate terms.

[BobKKKindle$]

I agree with Sam, if during the 1930's which was an actual depression capitalism didn't "fall".

Capitalism was not overthrown by the proletariat due to the absence of an effective proletarian vanguard, as identified by Trotsky in The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/tp/index.htm) otherwise known as the Transitional Program:


The world political situation as a whole is chiefly characterized by a historical crisis of the leadership of the proletariat.

[...]

The economy, the state, the politics of the bourgeoisie and its international relations are completely blighted by a social crisis, characteristic of a prerevolutionary state of society. The chief obstacle in the path of transforming the prerevolutionary into a revolutionary state is the opportunist character of proletarian leadership: its petty bourgeois cowardice before the big bourgeoisie and its perfidious connection with it even in its death agony.

The same lesson is also important for the current international situation. When faced with attacks on living standards (due to a high level of unemployment, increased prices of basic goods, reduced state expenditure on the provision of services, etc) they may become politically apathetic, or may turn to fascist organizations which create divisions within the working class by identifying immigrants as the cause of material deprivation, thereby obscuring the role of the capitalist system. A vanguard party is necessary to develop the level of class consciousness (and so prevent the spread of reactionary ideas such as racism, and combat these ideas where they already exist) through a process of agitation and intervention in workers struggles.

[A New Era]

It comes to no surprise that Capitalism may be coming to a close

What? These things happen from time to time, and this is part of capitalism. We've seen many crisis like these, and many have been worse.

[Psy]

What? These things happen from time to time, and this is part of capitalism. We've seen many crisis like these, and many have been worse.
No capitalism has not seen a crisis this bad before. Financial capital doesn't care about the crisis, they are betting the crisis will get worse and the bourgeois states are refusing to defend productive capitalists from financial capitalists and instead the bourgeois states print more money to throw at financial capitalists.

[ckaihatsu]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Village


Wikipedia doesn't have an entry for this, but I'd like to put forward a meaning for 'Global Village (political)', which would be:

"Welcome to neo-feudalism, the colonization of the entire globe. You're fucked into substandard employment and insufficient income no matter where you live. You will be stuck in the same location, from cradle to grave, almost as much as the serfs of feudalism were, despite all the awesome transportation lying around, now well out of *your* reach, plebe.

Of course you're being watched and dominated over, but, instead of it being from a singular local asshole from the nobility it now could be anyone from a shifting tableau of globally networked assholes on different work shifts.

A large portion of your crops-- I mean wages, must be forked over through taxes to pay for the simple upkeep of a state of society that hasn't changed in generations. Enjoy the technically-upgraded-but-same-ol'-same-ol' bread-and-circuses -- it's good enough for the likes of you and your kind, prole.

Don't even bother to bother the upper crust with your imagined woes -- the rich and famous are enjoying lifestyles that even Robin Leach will never be privy to, so don't even * think * about disturbing them -- that's an offense that's punishable with jail time.

Remember, it takes a village to raise a child, so you'd better get on that right away!"