The ideas of Karl Marx still thrive

Nando Times ^ | 4/25/02 | DEROY MURDOCK

[45Auto]

Marx wanted one more thing: a completely disarmed peasentry to work as slaves for his "greater good." The old bastard should be dug up, drawn and quartered, and hung.

[bassmaner]

bump

[45Auto]

Marx may have been the greatest mass-murderer ever born. His philosophy and those miserable, gullible idiots who favored it have led to the deaths of tens of millions of people in the 20th century. I guess the 21st century will be no different. The entire African Continent and most of Europe (if not the world) is sliding into this Marxian Madness.

[Digger]

...and where does the collectivist ideology get impregnated into the sheeple--THRU THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. Who gave it a $8 BILLION boost above & beyond the incredulous amount it already receives? Why Mr conservative - GW Bush.

[Billthedrill]

The ideas of Marx will continue to thrive in the face of contrary evidence because their appeal is to those who are in need of simple concepts to explain complex phenomena, and convenient enemies to blame for outcomes contrary to theory. These are the hallmarks of intellectual adolescence; it is simply a pity that some intellectuals and would-be intellectuals never grow up.

[Aurelius]

Anyone who doesn't believe that "the ideas of Karl Marx still thrive" should check out this review from last Sunday's NYT Book Review: The Myth of Ownership: Challenging the Rhetoric of Tax Cutting

[chilepepper]

IMHO, the monumental mistake Marx made which overwhelms everthing else he is credited with was to ignore the VALUE OF INFORMATION. This of course underlies every economic transaction, and is the base ground of all enterprises and labor.

He didn't even mention anything resembling INFORMATION or more mundanely, the ENGINEERING, ENTREPRENEURSHIP, or even the MARKET RESEARCH which makes a concern successful. Now in his day, some of this information was folded in with the idea of the skilled laborer, or artisan.

But Marx blew it when he tried to equate a common laborer with someone who designs a factory or a process, or even more abstractly the person who risks his capital to try making something which hasn't existed before.

It may be that human beings are obligated by good morals and values to make sure people don't starve, but they sure as hell are not obligated to pay subservience to the state...

[Dan Day]

One thing I noticed a long time ago was that higher taxation equals a slide towards communism.

Think about it: Capitalism is when you get to keep the fruits of your labors and get to choose how/where to spend it yourself.

Communism is when the government takes the fruits of your labors, and then *it* decides how/where to spend it (and how much you may or may not ever get back).

That's communism, but it's also exactly the situation you'd have in a "capitalistic" system if tax rates reached 100%. 100% taxation = something indistinguishable from communism.

So what is it when the government confiscates, say, 50% of the fruits of your labor (income) via taxes (directly and/or indirectly)?

It's not capitalism, and it's not communism -- it's a mix of half of each. And as the tax rates rise, the mix becomes more and more communism and less and less capitalism.

[f.Christian]

In theorhetical physics, cause and effect is interchangeable-reversible...

what changes is observation and communism--evolution is running backwards...

the effect interpreting the causes...

falsely---manmade 'science'---Quackery.

[moderation_is_not_a_bad_thing]

It's not capitalism, and it's not communism -- it's a mix of half of each. And as the tax rates rise, the mix becomes more and more communism and less and less capitalism.

You're right about that, but I'm not sure a mixture of the two is a bad thing. While we know that pure socialism is not workable, I'd say that pure capitalism is just as flawed. Marx wasn't totally wrong when he predicted massive uprisings against the capitalist robber barons that existed in his time. We almost saw a socialist revolution in this country in the early part of the last century. It was only because the gov't stepped in on the side of labor by legitimizing unions and setting up anti-trust legislation that we didn't end up with a revolution here. Now we're mostly capitalist with some concessions to social activism and gov't oversight of business. Since our economy is doing so well, I'd say we have a decent balance although continued tweaking is always a good thing.

[Calvin Locke]

I saw pictures of his grave (in London, IIRC. At least the UK).

Quite extravagant for someone who's ideas caused so much death and destruction.

Probably not on the order of Lenin, or Mao, though.

[Tailgunner Joe]

bttt

[stimulate]

You're joking about the dsarmamanent part,right? If you are,I apologize for not picking up.because Marx advocated violent,bloody overthrow of the State by the worker.

[45Auto]

Well, here's a little something I found from the essay of an idiot from Loyola Univeristy:

Marx and the Psychological Control of Firearms

"Karl Marx said, in his essay, "Estranged Labor," that if man spends enough time working with machines on a production line, he too would become a machine on a production line. This idea, one that is truthful in some respects, can be interpreted to have an effect on the firearm technology. If you give a man a gun, which is a killing machine, then will that man also become a killing machine? To a person with a gun, the world is an existence not of things, but if targets. So, perhaps firearms have some kind of hypnotic effect on those who use them."

So I figure that pure Marxists all would want to disarm the very people who helped to overthrow an established Republic, for example. In practise, that's how every Marxist-inspired tyranny has reacted.

[45Auto]

If you give a man a gun, which is a killing machine, then will that man also become a killing machine? To a person with a gun, the world is an existence not of things, but if targets. So, perhaps firearms have some kind of hypnotic effect on those who use them."

This is the essence of the leftist's view of firearms and explains their insane, never-ending quest to remove arms from everyone's (except govenrment's) hands. They really, really DO believe that the mere ownership of a gun will drive the owner to murder and mayhem. Now do you see what patriots are up against? Now do you see that any compromise with these devils is a step to the total confiscation of arms, which is the GOAL?