Comments on Krugman, the ass line and mortgage crisis

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

Recently, Paul Krugmen, a contributor to the New York Times stated on the Leher News Hour: 

“…the engine is mostly fine, but there’s one part that’s malfunctioning. And that’s what’s happening now. It’s not that capitalism is dead. It’s not that the whole American system is dead, but this financial thing that we’ve created, with these institutions and derivatives that we don’t understand, needs to be fixed. And that’s — you know, it’s not that we have to tear everything up. And we don’t have to become Maoists. We just have to fix this part, but we’d better do it soon.” (1) 

Krugman half jests “we don’t have to become Maoists.” In other words, the economic crisis   does not need to be answered by a radical reorganization of society. Instead, the crisis can be solved within the framework of capitalism. Many within the White so-called “left” have been caught up in the rhetoric of the day that claims that capitalism is headed for total collapse. According to many in the White so-called “left,” the White “working class”  is on the verge  of rising up in response to this collapse. Contrary to such doomsday hype, the real vehicle for the discontent among Amerikans has become the Democratic Party. It is no accident that the Obama campaign has seen its fortunes improve substantially as the crisis has widened. Conversely, the McCain campaign has suffered setbacks. With the current crisis as it is, it is almost certain that Obama will be swept to victory in November. 

Fake Maoism and the ass line

There are dozens of groups and organizations in the First World that articulate essentially the same sort of world view: Trotskyists, crypto-Trotskyists, social democrats, post-Maoists, etc. Among these groups, some of them have latched onto Mao’s supposed conception of the “mass line.” These forces believe that upholding the “mass line” is critical to a revolutionary party. So much is this the case that some of these forces have elevated their version of the “mass line,” the ass line, into their points of unity, a cardinal point, for their organizations. 

These forces have embraced a particular historical narrative of the “new communist movement” that evolved from the 1960s. Their narrative assigns the failure of their movements to a lack of the ass line.  In their Goldilocks view of history, the great failure of the new “communist” movements were being either too cold or too hot in relation to the ass line. In their dreamworld, revolutionaries merely need to find the “just rrrright” combination of tactics, then the gates of revolutionary heaven will open to them.

How lucky for them that that the mortgage crisis has given them the perfect opportunity to practice their ass line. Here is an opportunity for them to show how powerful the ass line is under crisis conditions in the U$. A perfect opportunity has been served up to show just how revolutionary Amerikans can be with the right ass line leadership. 

Now we will get to see whether all the talk about the ass line is anything other than hot air. Or, is ass line rhetoric just a way that various sects can continue to justify their existence vis a vis other sectarian sects. Will these dopey ass line posers actually begin to organize homeowners groups around mortgage issues? Will they go door to door? Will they protest banks? Or, will they continue to blather about “mass line” among First Worlders while ignoring the single best opportunity (within their twisted paradigm) to actually implement the ass line? This author predicts that the ass line posers won’t even try. This is because, operationally, these ass line posers recognize, even if it is in an unconscious way, that the First World is thoroughly bought-off. Instead of actually trying to implement the ass line in the First World, they will stick to sexier issues like the twists and turns in Nepal. 

Maoism-Third Worldism

Contrary to the the fakes, Maoism-Third Worldism recognizes that the reason that there has been nothing even close to proletarian revolution in the First World is because the First World is bought-off; there is no First-World proletariat. The posers split hairs over tactics while Maoists-Third Worldists actually provide material analysis. The posers start with the idealist, utopian assumption that revolution led by an Amerikan proletariat must be possible. Yet since the posers can’t fit the square peg through the round hole of reality, they endlessly debate each other over whether they are pushing the peg too hard or too soft. 

Krugman, in his comment, recognizes that Maoism, not revisionism or anarchism, for example, has been the real oppositional alternative to capitalist imperialism. The reason that Krugman mentions Maoism as opposed to “socialism” or “anarchism” is because it was Maoism specifically that was able to project itself globally as a real way to radically reorganize  existing social orders. Maoism was the science that emerged out of the last great wave of social revolutions. Maoism was to the last great wave of revolutions what Soviet communism was to those in the 1930s. Today, the “Maoist” movement is infiltrated by First Worldism, White chauvinism, revisionism, eclectics, reformism, Trotskyism, etc. Unless revolutionary science can advance to Maoism-Third Worldism, the lessons of the revolutionary experience of the last hundred years will be lost. If Maoism-Third Worldism is not taken up by people’s movements globally, it will be a huge setback. And, with the looming ecological crisis, not taking up Maoism-Third Worldism by people’s movements could lead to the end of humanity itself.  This makes the dissemination of Maoism-Third Worldism one of the most important revolutionary tasks. Our fellow travelers should do as much as they can to help us increase web traffic to Maoist-Third Worldist blogs.  

Notes.

1. Leher News Hour quoted by Kasama Project. Many of KP’s participants split from Bob Avakian’s cult/pyramid scheme known as “RCP USA" to form a First-Worldist, social-democratic blog that mostly recycles liberal news articles. So far, they are an online only group. We don't know which way they are evolving yet, maybe toward another cult/pyramid scheme given the niche their leaders came out of. We'll see. They are a good source of information on "RCP USA."   Check it out. http://mikeely.wordpress.com/2008/10/11/ny-times-krugman-capitalisms-fine-no-need-to-become-maoists/

Also see: KKKolumbus Day is a celebration of genocide

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

Dear Maoist-Third Worldist,

First world workers are parasites for Third World peoples? So much for class analysis and international solidarity on your part.

Workers in the “First World” in a globalized world also suffer from oppression and exploitation, immigrant workers suffer more so. You seem to be content being high priests of the Maoist movement, you don’t see the confusion in your isolated rantings.

You have the same arguments as ‘terrorists’ who blame everyone in the US, including its underpaid workers and single mothers, for all that’s wrong with US policy.

With all the disunity in the left camp, it seems there’s no need for the “First World” governments to be concerned, even with all the crises happening. Get your act together!

Combol

October 10th, 2008

Dear Combol,

Like most of the First-World so-called “left,” there is not a single bit of analysis in your bald assertions. You merely assert that workers in the First World are exploited, underpaid and oppressed. This only goes to show, once again, that First Worldists have no substantial arguments against the global class analysis of real Marxism, which is known as Maoism-Third Worldism. 

Those living below the so-called “poverty line” in the U$ represent a small percentage of the U$ population. Yet someone at the so-called “poverty line” in the U$ falls within, roughly, the wealthiest 10%-15% globally. According to First Worldists, internationalism means standing up for the richest people in the world. This is why there is really not that much difference between the First-World so-called “left” and the fascist movement. Both the First-World so-called “left” and the fascists advocate for a more even distribution of the imperialist plunder among themselves, the richest in the world. The fascists and social-fascists ("socialist in word, fascist in deed") cannot conceive of an internationalism that is not First Worldist and White.  

It is it ironic that you imply that our analysis lacks international solidarity when it is our analysis that represents the interests of the vast majority of humanity living on under 3$ a day in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Amerikans live lives of luxury while the majority of humanity is living at subsistence and sub-subsistence. A truly just distribution of wealth globally would entail much lower incomes for peoples in the First World. You want to make First Worlders richer at the expense of the vast majority of humanity. We want to make First Worlders poorer in order to even out wealth. It is our analysis that stands with the global poor against the global rich.

Like most poser “Marxists,” you don’t demonstrate a scientific understanding of exploitation. Instead, you are content with the religious view that all workers are exploited because they are workers. Yours is a view that Marx mocked as a blockhead theory. Do you have a method to calculate the global value of labor? Do you have a way to demonstrate that supposed exploitation of workers in the First World isn’t offset by unequal exchange or value flows to the First World? Have you put forward a scientific distribution principle? No, of course you have not. Instead, you rely on dogma and typical dipshitism as your comment about “single mothers” clearly shows -- you running for office or something? 

Maoism-Third Worldism, on the other hand, has established several methods to calculate the level of parasitism of the First World. Maoist-Third Worldists and similar forces are the only ones who have advanced Marxist theory to reflect  actual global class dynamics. First Worldists keep trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Again and again, First-Worldist predictions about First-World revolution fall flat. This is because, at bottom, the view of First Worldists is not one that starts from reality. Instead, the view of the pseudo-Marxist posits a description of the world that is idealist. Rather than working from data to a theory, the First Worldist begins with a religious view and forces it onto the world. First Worldism, in this sense, is no different than Christianity. 

Those “terrorists” that you mention who blame everyone in the U$ have a better class orientation than the psuedo-Marxists who see the majority in the U$ as blameless. Amerikans should be blamed for carrying out the greatest genocide in history against the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. They should be blamed for engaging in the greatest land grab in history. They should be blamed for benefiting from the poverty inflicted on the Third World by imperialism. The lifestyles of Amerikans are so disgustingly decadent that the very future of the planet is at stake.  The "terrorists" you mention are better allies of the global proletariat than the First-Worlist pseudo-Marxists. 

Since there is no First-World proletariat, the only revolution that the First-World so-called “left” could possibly pull off would be a fascist revolution. The First-World so-called “left” is “socialist in word, fascist in deed.” It is good that the First-World so-called “left” is not unified. It is good that there is no a a powerful bottom-up fascist movement. The reason that there is no powerful bottom-up movement in the U$ is because those at the bottom recognize that the mainstream bourgeois parties, the Democrats and Republicans are, at present, better advocates for their class interests than the fascists and social-fascists are. Of course, the First-World so-called “left,” as deluded as it is, fails to see this: the “workers” that they claim to represent care not the slightest about their efforts. This is why, operationally, the First World so-called “left” relies on students and intellectuals. In order to survive, they stay far away from the factories and close to the campuses. 

Even without understanding revolutionary science, you should still be able to see the obvious fact right under your nose: There is no First-World revolution. Instead of looking for the answer in the vulgar dogma of the so-called “left,” you should begin with the facts about global class. Mao’s first question of revolution is who are our enemies and who are our friends? Instead of trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, why don’t you look at the actual dynamics of the world. 

*

Also see: Amerikkkans rich, Indians poor, so-called “ICM” deaf and dumb,Are First Worlders more productive?, Review: Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, A Maoist-Third Worldist Position on Unequal Exchange, Notes on Exploitation, Distribution, and Method, Dear Maoist Third Worldist…reproletarization, A rough estimate of the value of labor by Serve the People of IRTR, How will socialism come to North America, The form of the Dictatorship of Proletariat, Medical breakthrough cures one of the biggest problems facing the planet: Amerikan pet obesity, Simple questions by the numbers.. the majority in the United Snakes: revolutionary or not?, IRTR repost on capitalism and socialism, another reason to hate amerikkka, The High cost of living in the Third World

Their hypothesis, our hypothesis.. quick comments on "M"IM and gender

by Prairie Fire

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

In a recent article “M”IM states the following:

“MIM has argued before that the decline in Japanese marriage in particular is proof that "all sex is rape" historically. For example, Japanese females now take advantage of staying with rich parents to avoid marriage. In the 30-34 age group 5% were never married and living with parents in 1975 versus 19% in 2000.(53) Without MIM's orientation toward the underlying coercion in gender relations, there is no way to explain why marriage and birth rates decline when females obtain the choice of supporting themselves economically as they do today in the rich countries.” (1) 

According to “M”IM, as females gain economic independence, as they do in the First World due to super-profits, they have a greater ability to avoid sex, which “M”IM equates with rape. Hence, in those countries where super-profits have provided more independence for females, there should be less sex, less “rape,” going on. What should develop is a culture of asexuality among females in those societies. Thus, a kind of female separatism should prevail among First World females. In order to back up their theory, “M”IM states an incredibly weak argument that declining marriage rates and birth rates are "proof" of their underlying theory that all sex is rape. 

A big hole in “M”IM’s theory is that declines in marriage rates and birth rates are not the same as declines in sex rates. In fact, according to one source, the U$, land of super-profits, has the highest sex rate in the world. If this source from 2000 is correct, then, the U$ is a case where a high level of economic independence for females accompanies a high sex rate. The sex rate in the U$ is 132 times a year; the world average is 96. The same source places young Japanese near the bottom of the list, having sex 37 times a year. (2) Since the U$ and Japan are both swimming in super-profits, both allow for a high degree of economic independence for females, the explanation for the difference in sex rates is almost certainly cultural. 

"M"IM's speculation implies that the U$ should be tailing Japan as far as sex rates are concerned. Contrary to this, our view is that Japan is tailing the U$. Eventually, Japan's sex rate should approach that of similar First World countries. Our view is that as females gain independence due to their share in super-profits, they become like their male counterparts. In other words, they will adopt male sexual psychology and culture. The rise of free love in the 1960s and ho culture of recent years rather than asexuality reflect the real post-World War 2 trend. (3)

Females will not use their autonomy to withdraw from male society, they will use their autonomy to increase their position within male society. What develops is a kind of hedonistic culture, not a female ascetic culture. Marriage and birth rates will decline, not because females are having less sex, but because females are adopting the male attitude toward sex. Females, like males, will have more sex without the traditional obligations that go along with sex. In other words, they will have more sex with “no strings attached.” More sex, not less will be the norm.

In addition, there are other factors behind lower marriage and birth rates. The birth-control pill was a huge factor behind the rise of "free love" in the 1960s: people could have sex without fear of pregnancy. Abortion is also much easier to obtain in the United $nakes nowadays; it was illegal a generation ago. Other technological aids within easy--sometimes free--reach of the Amerikan public help to reduce the birth rate even if sex is on the rise. Homosexuals and others are becoming more open about their sexual practices, too.

The recent decline in marriage may have more to do with culture than with economics. The decline in marriage until the 1970s or so probably had more to do with economics, as females increasingly took on jobs instead of being housewives dependent on their husbands. Amerikans are singularly unsuccessful at marriage, getting divorced after just a few years. The cost and inconvenience of divorce have discouraged marriage. 

No matter how refined a theory is, if it doesn’t correctly explain and predict, then it isn’t any good. “M”IM cuts the toes to fit the shoes when it comes to gender. The reason for this is a lingering gender Trotskyism hidden in the “M”IM line; this line wants to recognize First World females as allies. Contrary to “M”IM’s implicit view, in the U$, females, like males, benefit from partaking in the sexual culture. It is by partaking in this culture, not by withdrawing from it, that individuals tend to advance their social status. Female separatism is not the future in the First World, greater integration into male culture is. Partaking in the mainstream sexual culture is one way that individuals increase their access to life opportunities and super-profits. 

Notes. 

1. http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/countr....ites100808.html

2. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/976831.stm 

3. http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com....aunch- culture/

*

Also see: MSH Gender Line, Female Chauvinist Pigs reviewed

KKKolumbus Day is a celebration of genocide

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

All people of good conscience oppose the celebration of KKKolumbus Day (October 13th, 2008). KKKolumbus Day is a celebration of the greatest genocide and land theft in history. A continent of peoples were annihilated by the Euro-invasion of the Americas. Monkey Smashes Heaven supports the efforts of the American Indian Movement (AIM) and the Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist Movement (RAIM-Denver) to oppose KKKolumbus Day. Red salute!  

From Shubel Morgan:

MSH issues the Anti-Kolumbus Program for the Destruction of the White Nation. 

1. The White Nation (Amerika and Klanada) will be removed from all lands it occupies and abolished forever. The Dictatorship of the Proletariat of Exploited Nations will oversee the long term management of the imperialist nation populations.

2. Occupied land will be returned to the Mexican people. We support the national liberation, self-determination and socialist reunification for the Mexican people.

3. First Nations will have much of their historic land returned to them. We support their national liberation and self-determination.

4. Land will be given to the Black Nation, possibly in the Black Belt Lands as identified by the Comintern. We support national liberation and self-determination for the Black Nation.

5. National liberation and self-determination for all U$ colonies and neo-colonies.

6. Massive reparations from the imperialist nations to all peoples that they have exploited or oppressed.

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

Recently, the Peru People’s Movement (MPP), claiming to represent the Communist Party of Peru, also known as “Shining Path” in the bourgeois media, has been polemicizing against Afakean’s RCP(USA) and Prachanda’s Path. The MPP states that they want to “drive forward the two-line struggle in the heart of the RIM.” (1) As part of this, the MPP seem to be organizing their own international conference opposed, on one level, to Afakean and Prachanda. Yet, on another level, the MPP has not advanced to a unity based on revolutionary science, based on the fourth stage of Marxism: Maoism-Third Worldism. Advancing science is key, not building another opportunist RIM-type unity. The RIM is dead, let it stay that way. The MPP states:

“The comrades of the CoRIM and of the RCP avoid debate with the PCP because they do not want to assume their responsibility in the frontal struggle against the reactionary hoax of "peace accord" of the CIA-ROL in Peru. Just as they remain quiet and promote, today as well, in the case of the ‘peace accord’ in Nepal. There, just like in the case of the ROL in Peru, imperialism, reaction and revisionism collude in seeking to present a so-called tamed ‘Maoism’-a ‘Maoism’ without people's war, without new power, without the dictatorship of the proletariat.” (2)

Similar points are made in our own statements on the topic of the RIM. (3) The RIM was a vehicle to destroy Maoism, not advance it. From its outset, RIM was a revisionist organization. The Communist Party of Peru claimed it was the “red fraction” within the RIM. However, why would a “red fraction” choose to associate itself with an organization like the RCP (USA)? In the early 1980s, RCP(USA) had openly attacked the strategy of launching simultaneous people’s wars against U$ imperialism as “Lin Biaoism.” (4) In the early 1980s, they rejected Lin Biao’s strategy of global people’s war for the Trotskyist strategy of permanent revolution, as articulated in Afakean’s Conquer the World article. The RIM itself, as a CIA tool, sabotaged people’s wars worldwide. Why would any real Maoist party unite with a party that openly opposed global people’s war and embraced Trotskyism in all but name? The unity of the RIM was an opportunist unity of the CIA and those who had a fan club approach to Mao. They were not united around the revolutionary science, they  united around the image of Mao. The RIM’s view of Maoism lacked all substance. The RIM’s theory might as well have been that a Mao cap makes a Maoist. That the MPP can still refer to Afakean and the Prachanda clique as “comrades” even though they have abandoned the core practices of Maoism is revealing. Why would any serious revolutionary group be “comrades” with those who seek to destroy the revolutionary movement? The MPP doesn’t even know where the bourgeoisie is. The RIM itself was the bourgeoisie.

What the MPP says about the peace process in Nepal is, in the main, correct. It echoes what the IRTR, MSH and SM cells (5) have said. The MPP states:

“Together with its wars of aggression, imperialism, colluded with revisionism, especially with the new revisionism, wherever there is revolution, wherever there is people's war, where there are armed struggles, etc., impels its plan of ‘peace accords’, like in Peru with the rats of the revisionist and capitulationist ROL, like in Nepal, Palestine, Colombia, Iraq, etc. They do this to impose the ‘peace of the cemetery’, to unleash greater genocides, to try to drown the revolution, the combat and resistance of the peoples, in blood. We reject and condemn this sinister plan underway of imperialism, principally Yankee, to sow capitulation in the whole world in its desperate and impossible attempt to annihilate the world revolution...” (6)

The debate over whether people’s war, dual power, new democracy, cultural revolution, etc., are correct is a debate outside of the Maoist camp. To be a Maoist is to uphold these practices. There is no two-line struggle over these issues within the Maoist camp. The MPP embraces the RIM's interpretation of two-line struggle that all struggles are two-line struggles. Maoism-Third Worldism rejects this view. Maoism-Third Worldism does not have two-line struggles with the CIA and Trotskyists. One does not have a two-line struggle with Maoists over these core aspects of revolutionary science. 

The MPP raises the slogan, “May Maoism assume the command of the new great wave of the world revolution!” (7) Yet one wonders what they mean by “Maoism,” since they still allow CIA, revisionists, and Trotskyists into the fold. The way forward is not a new or revised RIM, which seems to be the direction the MPP is headed with their international conference in October. If the science isn’t there, then the RIM is what inevitably what results. The way forward is the deepening of Maoist science, brining it to a higher level. Hopefully, the MPP will come to realize this. This is what the Maoist-Third Worldist movement is doing. Maoism-Third Worldism places global people’s war at the heart of revolutionary science. Maoism-Third Worldism calls on the popular classes of the global countryside to rise up and crush the parasite classes of the global cities, these parasite classes include the Western so-called “working class.” There is no international communist movement without Maoism-Third Worldism.

Notes.

1.Peru People’s Movement. Let Us Drive Forward the Two-Line Struggle in the Heart of the RIM. September 2008http://www.redsun.org/mpp_doc/driveforward_200809_en.htm
2. Peru People’s Movement. Let Us Drive Forward the Two-Line Struggle in the Heart of the RIM. September 2008http://www.redsun.org/mpp_doc/driveforward_200809_en.htm
3. On Nepal (New) http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/on-nepal-recent-analysis/ and On Nepal (Old)http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/on-the-situation-in-nepal/
4.Avakian, Bob. For a Harvest of Dragons. RCP Publications. USA:1983. p 150-151. “ ….to cling to at least aspects of Lin Biao-ism. Lin Biao was a top leader of the communist Party of China in the 1960s and he is associated with the line of singling out U.S. imperialism for a common onslaught from the “third world,” with simultaneous national liberation wars defeating U.S. imperialism throughout the “third world,” and even possibly destroying it altogether. His line (as expressed in a 1965 pamphlet [written by Lin Biao], Long Live The Victory of People’s War) represented the absolutizing of what was then the principal contradiction in the world (between oppressed nations and imperialism) — raising it out of context of world relations and contradictions in which it actually exists and treating it as a thing unto itself and virtually the only significant contradiction in the world. While recognizing the existence of revolutionary situations and favorable revolutionary prospects in many countries in the “third world” it exaggerated this into a tendency to treat the “third world” as an undifferentiated whole, ripe everywhere for revolution. Related to this, in upholding the importance of armed struggle as a necessary means for replacing the old order with the new and insisting on the fact that in many places in the “third world” it was possible and necessary to make armed struggle the main and immediate form of struggle — in opposition to the Soviet revisionist line that attempted to make economic development the main task in the “third world” neo-colonies — Lin Biao’s line exaggerated this to a point of virtually insisting that everywhere in the “third world” revolutionary warfare could and must be launched right away (in Long Live the victory, whether one dares to wage a people’s war is made the touchstone of distinguishing Marxism-Leninism from revisionism). As part of this whole line, the objective fact that the proletarian revolution had been delayed in the imperialist countries and that there was as yet no proletarian revolutionary movement there was absolutized, so that the prospect of such revolution in the imperialist countries was all but dismissed…
…But to attempt to cling to Lin Biaoism in the world situation of today, with all its profound changes since the 1960s, including the principal contradiction, can only have very serious and disastrous consequences…”
5. On Nepal (New) http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/on-nepal-recent-analysis/ and On Nepal (Old)http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/on-the-situation-in-nepal/
6. Peru People’s Movement. Let Us Drive Forward the Two-Line Struggle in the Heart of the RIM. September 2008http://www.redsun.org/mpp_doc/driveforward_200809_en.htm

7. Peru People’s Movement. Let Us Drive Forward the Two-Line Struggle in the Heart of the RIM. September 2008http://www.redsun.org/mpp_doc/driveforward_200809_en.htm

*

Also see: Prachanda wins. Marxism-Leninism-Maoism is dead, Maoism-Third Worldism lives, Again on the “RIM” Renegades in Nepal, The sun rises in the East and sets in the West: On Maoism-Third Worldism, Get off the fence! Disband the RIM and smash revisionism! Put Maoism in command!, Interview with Ganapathy, General Secretary, CPI(Maoist); comments on the Islamic upsurge, David Horowitz, Bob Avakian wrangle over copyright?, On Bob Avakian’s New Synthesis, Our differences with Jose Maria Sison, Is people’s war universal?, How will socialism come to North America?, Shubel Morgan movie on Lin Biao’s theory of People’s War!, Fraternal Organization criteria, Indian movements won’t connect the dots…yet, A Maoist-Third Worldist Position on Unequal Exchange, Notes on Exploitation, Distribution, and Method, Dear Maoist Third Worldist…reproletarization, A rough estimate of the value of labor by Serve the People of IRTR, How will socialism come to North America, The form of the Dictatorship of Proletariat, Medical breakthrough cures one of the biggest problems facing the planet: Amerikan pet obesity, Simple questions by the numbers.. the majority in the United Snakes: revolutionary or not?, IRTR repost on capitalism and socialism, another reason to hate amerikkka, The High cost of living in the Third World

POLICY ON UNITS OF MEASUREMENT

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

In accordance with Maoism-Third Worldism, we shall henceforth use only metric units, which are almost universal in the Third World. Imperial units convey an Anglo-Yankkkee perspective and are inconvenient for comrades in the Third World (and even in most of the First World). No longer shall we put Amerikkkan readers first by using their bizarre and unscientific mishmash of units left over from pre-feudal times.

When quoting sources that use non-metric units, we may retain those units if we supply a conversion (to the appropriate number of significant digits) for the convenience of our readers. But we will not convert anything to Imperial units. Anglo readers who don't like that should get off their lazy asses and learn the metric system. Our work serves the Third World, not a bunch of backward Anglo labor aristocrats.

All men must die, but death can vary in its significance. The ancient Chinese writer Szuma Chien said, "Though death befalls all men alike, it may be weightier than Mount Tai or lighter than a feather." To die for the people is weightier than Mount Tai, but to work for the fascists and die for the exploiters and oppressors is lighter than a feather.  -Mao Zedong

Six Points on Third World Unity: Smaller Nations within Multi-National Formations

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

1. Ultimately, Maoism-Third Worldism promotes global unity of all nations as a step toward achieving communism. Communism is defined as the elimination of all oppression of groups over other groups. This is the only way to true world peace. 

2. Maoism-Third Worldism promotes Third World unity. In order to challenge and defeat the First World, it is desirable to have Third World multi-national formations that are as large as possible. These formations have historically taken the form of multi-national states.

3. Within the context of Third World multi-national formations, provision should be made so that smaller nations are protected from physical and cultural annihilation. This means providing full protection of smaller nations: preserving their rights, arming the population, etc. Regarding culture, this means that, unless utterly reactionary, cultural traditions of the small nations should be protected and preserved within the larger formations. This means that local languages should be used for official purposes. Legal protections should be in place to preserve and encourage the flourishing of local culture. The administration of the smaller nations should be left to members of the smaller nations within multi-national formations. If land and reparations are owed to smaller nations, then land should be returned and reparations paid by the larger Third World formations. 

4. Maoism-Third Worldism pushes for maximal self-determination for all exploited nations. Self-determination, including the right of secession, is upheld except in cases where secession has a direct adverse effect on the self-determination of other exploited nations. Another way of stating this is that Maoism-Third Worldism pushes for the right of maximal self-determination, including the right to secession, for nations except when the self-determination of a particular nation works against advancing the principal contradiction between exploited nations and imperialism. A single exploited nation should not advance its self-determination at the expense of other exploited nations. 

For example, Maoism-Third Worldism does not support phony “national liberation” or secessionist movements that are backed by U$ imperialism. In cases where secession directly, significantly and demonstrably increases the hegemony of imperialism or curtails the self-determination of other nations, Maoism-Third Worldism rejects the right of secession in such instances. For example, the Tibetan “freedom” movement that aims to secede from China is one that is tied to U$ imperialism. The Tibetan movement has historic ties to the CIA. The succession of Tibet, at present, curtails the right of self-determination of other exploited nations by increasing U$ imperial hegemony in the region. This is also the case in the Sudan, which U$ imperialism seeks to control under the pretext of intervening on behalf of one party in a national conflict. In other words, when a “national liberation” movement or successionist movement aids imperialism, Maoism-Third Worldism rejects them as illegitimate. Imperialism is a bigger enemy than instances of national chauvinism. Making a deal with the imperialist devil is not a road to true liberation and self-determination. 

5. Maoism-Third Worldism, while promoting Third World unity, aims to break up First World unity in order to destroy the First World entirely. Those who seek to break up Third World multi-national formations as a matter of principle can end up aiding imperialism, especially U$ imperialism. 

6. Maoism-Third Worldism supports the self-determination of oppressed nations (that may not necessarily be exploited) under First World occupation. In particular, it supports the self-determination of the First Nations occupied by the U$ and Kanada, the Aboriginal nations under White occupation in Australia, the Maori nation of occupied Aotearoa, the Black nation under U$ occupation, Palestine, occupied northern Mexico, Boricua, and Hawai'i, among others.

Suitable for framing:
http://www.uploading.com/files/F6OGZ1IX/mtwme.png.html

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

The Denver police brag about beating up protesters at the Democratic National Convention. According to the media, the police have been selling t-shirts with an anti-R68 logo on the front. R68 was the coalition that organized the DNC protests that RAIM took part in. Accompanied by a graphic of pigs in riot gear, wielding batons,  “We get up early to BEAT the crowds” is emblazoned on the back of the shirt.

Some in the White left will claim that this is proof that the police state acts with impunity in its oppression of the Amerikan people. However, truth be told, most Amerikans are right there cheering the police as they beat down the protesters, most of whom are no more radical than Dennis Kucinich. According to local TV News, the police have been selling the shirts to raise funds.  The shirts are selling like wild. According to the Rocky Mountain News:

"The Denver police detective who produced the shirts, Nick Rogers, says he has received no complaints until now. He said the shirts are being sold for $10 each at the Police Protective Association offices.

He said every Denver police officer was given one." (1)

Amerikans support the pigs because the pigs are part of the imperialist system, a system that makes even the poorest in Amerika the wealthiest in the world.  Pigs will be pigs. 

Notes.

1. http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/sep/25/cops-we-beat-crowds-dnc-protest-t-shirt-creates-st/

Our differences with Jose Maria Sison

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

1. Who are our enemies? Who are our friends? This is a question of the first importance. Jose Maria Sison has consistently answered this question incorrectly. Sison does not understand the basic contours of the global class structure. The First World super-exploits the Third World to such a degree that there is no significant First World proletariat. The First World “working class” should be regarded as bourgeois. The median income for an Amerikan household member is $26,036 (USD), 1,054,000 Philippine pesos (PHP). A Filipino that makes 1,054,000 Philippine pesos (PHP) per year is not part of the global proletariat in any meaningful sense. A person in the United States that has access to 1,054,000 Philippine pesos (PHP) in income a year is also not part the global proletariat. (1) A minimum wage worker in the U$ is in the richest 15% in terms of global distribution of wealth. (2) Many of the poorest of Amerikans have more income and access to capital than the Filipino bourgeoisie. These Amerikans are less inclined to stand against imperialism than many compradors in the Third World. The lack of a First World proletariat is also confirmed by the complete lack of First World socialist revolutions. The only First World revolution was imposed on what would become the German Democratic Republic by the Soviet Union. 

Failing to understand the degree of First World parasitism has proven itself a catastrophic error to people’s movements in the Third World. This error, on the part of Mao Zedong, contributed to the restoration of capitalism in the People’s Republic of China. This error, on the part of Mao-influenced leaders the Third World, has lead to the destruction of their movements by First Worldists and police agencies. To claim that the U$ and other First World countries have a significant revolutionary class is total nonsense. To tell the Filipino people otherwise is to serve them up to the imperialists. It is a betrayal of the global proletariat.

2. By omission, Jose Maria Sison’s uninformed analysis negates the national question for oppressed nations within the borders of the U$. Sison discusses the situation of the U$ “worker,” yet he omits any discussion of national liberation within the U$. This negation of the national question via omission is de facto White chauvinist.

3. Sison has lent his de facto support to the Prachanda clique. The Prachanda clique in Nepal has abandoned almost every core aspect of Maoism in favor of eclecticism and reformism. They have abandoned people’s war in favor of electoral reformism. Lenin denounced Kautsky for such a line. The Ninth Congress Report of the Chinese Communist Party denounced Liu Shaoqi similarly in April of 1969. The Prachanda clique has abandoned dual power in favor of bourgeois reformism. They have abandoned New Democracy in favor of bourgeois reformism. Prachanda has abandoned the Cultural Revolution in any meaningful sense. Either Maoism stands for something universal or it does not. For Sison and Prachanda, Maoism has ceased to stand for anything universal. Both Sison and Prachanda should stop calling themselves Maoists. They should instead call themselves “fans of Mao.” (6) (7)

4. Sison did not object to the moribund RIM’s alliance with U$ imperialism against the resistance in Afghanistan. Also, Sison did not object to the RIM’s alliance with the U$ imperialists against the Islamic Republic of Iran. (8) In these cases, Sison revealed that he favors an alliance with the First Worldist parties of the RIM and ICMLPO over Islamic resistance to imperialism in the Third World. Sison’s practice indicates that he believes that the parasitic populations of the First World are better allies than Islamic forces in the Third World. Sison has rejected the Maoist practice of the United Front. 

5. Sison has not voiced any criticism of the recent statement by the National Democratic Front, signed by the Communist Party of the Philippines, that promulgates the ridiculous personality cult of the northern Korea revisionists. This statement, while not literally calling the Korean monarchy “socialist,” certainly gives the impression that it is something to be upheld or followed. The revisionists in northern Korea are not upheld as a model by Maoists.  (9)

We call on all scientific revolutionaries to join us in raising the red flag against revisionism. Jose Maria Sison should correct his ways. Maoism-Third Worldism is the way forward in the Philippines and everywhere else. Let's make the 21st century a century of people's wars to wipe imperialism off the face of the Earth once and for all!

Notes. 

1. Simple Questions by the Numbers. http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com....tionary-or-not/

2. globalrichlist.com

3. Sison, Jose Maria. Global Trends, Challenges and Opportunities After 911. September 22, 2006. In this document, Sison discusses everything under the sun, but omits the national liberation struggles in North America in order to not offend White chauvinist organizations that he is allied with. 

4. Sison, Jose Maria. ILPS Extends Its Solidarity with the People of the U.S. Against the Criminalization of Immigrants and Intensification of the U.S. War of Terror. Reproduced with commentary here: http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/countries/aztlan/chicano092506.html Note that Sison omits any discussion of the liberation of Occupied Mexico and instead adopts the White populist and integrationist framework of White chauvinist groups like WWP, RCP, and so on. 

5. Also see: http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/countries/phil/migrants091306.html 

6. On the “RIM” renegades in Nepal. http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/on-the-situation-in-nepal/

7. Marxism-Leninism-Maoism is dead. Long Live Maoism-Third Worldism.http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/on-nepal-recent-analysis/

8. Disband the RIM. http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/2006/10/16/disband-the-rim/ 

9. New Democratic Front. 60th founding anniversary of the Democratic People's Republic of Koreahttp://neworleans.indymedia.org/news/2008/09/13053.php

**

Translation via Amihan Malaya:

Ang mga pagkakaiba namin kay Jose Maria Sison

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

1. Sino ang ating mga kaaway? Sino ang ating mga kaibigan? Ito’y isang katanungan ng pangunahing importansya. Palagiang sinagot ni Jose Maria Sison ang mga katanungang ito ng mali. Hindi naiintindihan ni Sison ang simpleng hulma ng pandaigdigang istraktura ng uri. Ang Unang Daigdig ay labis-labis na nagsasamantala sa Ikatlong Daigdig hanggang sa umabot ang puntong wala nang makabuluhang proletaryong Unang Daigdig. Ang “uring manggagawa” ng Unang Daigdig ay dapat nang ituring na burges. Ang median na kita para sa isang Amerikanong miyembro ng pamilya ay $26,036 (USD), 1,054,000 Philippine Pesos (PHP). Ang isang Pilipino na taunang kumikita ng 1,054,000 Philippine pesos (PHP) ay hindi kabilang sa pandaigdigang proletaryo sa anumang makabuluhang kahulugan. Ang isang tao sa Estados Unidos na may access sa 1,054,000 Philippine pesos (PHP) sa taunang kita ay hindi rin kabilang sa pandaigdigang proletaryo. (1) Ang isang minimum wage na manggagawa sa U$ ay nasa pinakamayamang 15% sa termino ng pandaigdigang distribusyon ng kayamanan. (2) Karamihan sa mga pinakamahihirap na Amerikano ay masmarami pang kita at access sa kapital kaysa sa Burgesyang Pilipino. Ang mga Amerikanong ito ay hindi gaanong inclined para tumindig laban sa imperyalismo kaysa sa karamihan ng mga komprador sa Ikatlong Daigdig. Ang kakulangan ng proletaryong Unang Daigdig ay pinatotohanan na rin ng kakulangan ng sosyalistang rebolusyon sa Unang Daigdig. Ang natatanging rebolusyon sa Unang Daigdig ay ipinataw sa kung ano ang naging Demokratikong Republika ng Alemanya gawa ng Unyong Sobyet.

Ang kabiguang maunawaan ang grado ng parasitismo ng Unang Daigdig ay napatunayan sa sarili nito bilang isang napakalaking pagkakamali ng mga kilusang bayan sa Ikatlong Daigdig. Ang kamaliang ito, sa papel ni Mao Zedong, ay naging ambag sa pagbabalik ng kapitalismo sa Republikang Bayan ng Tsina. Ang kamaliang ito, sa papel ng mga lider ng Ikatlong Daigdig na naimpluwensyahan ni Mao, ay nagdulot sa pagkawasak ng kanilang mga kilusan, gawa ng mga maka-Unang Daigdig at ng mga ahensya ng pulisya. Para sabihin na mayroong makabuluhang rebolusyonaryong uri sa U$ at sa iba pang bansa sa Unang Daigdig ay isang malaking kabalastugan. Para sabihin sa masang Pilipino sa ibang paraan ay para ihain sila sa mga imperyalista. Ito ay pagtataksil sa pandaigdigang proletaryo.

2. Sa paraan ng paglaktaw, ang walang kamalayang pagsusuri ni Jose Maria Sison ay ikinakaila ang pambansang katanungan para sa mga bayang api sa loob ng mga hangganan ng U$. Tinatalakay ni Sison ang sitwasyon ng “manggagawang” U$, subalit kinakaligtaan niya ang anumang pagtalakay ng pambansang pagpapalaya sa loob ng U$. Ang pagkakailang ito sa pambansang katanungan sa paraan ng paglaktaw ay de-facto na sobinismong Puti.

3. Si Jose Maria Sison ay nag-alay ng kanyang de-facto na suporta sa grupo ni Prachanda. Ang grupo ni Prachanda sa Nepal ay tinalikuran na ang halos lahat ng tamang aspeto ng Maoismo sa pagpabor ng eklektisismo at repormismo. Tinalikuran na nila ang digmaang bayan sa pagpabor ng repormismong elektoral. Kinondena ni Lenin si Kautsky sa gayong linya. Ang Ninth Congress Report ng Partido Komunista ng Tsina ay halintulad na kinondena si Liu Shaoqi nuong Abril ng 1969. Ang grupo ni Prachanda ay tinalikuran na ang dalawahang kapangyarihan sa pagpabor ng repormismong burges. Tinalikuran na nila ang Bagong Demokrasya sa pagpabor ng repormismong burges. Si Prachanda ay tinalikuran na ang Rebolusyong Pangkultura sa anumang makabuluhang kahulugan. Maski ang Maoismo ay kumakatawan sa anumang bagay na unibersal o hindi man. Para kina Sison at Prachanda, ang Maoismo ay huminto nang kumatawan sa anumang unibersal. Kapwa sina Sison at Prachanda ay dapat nang tumigil na tawagin ang kanilang sarili bilang mga Maoista. Bagkus dapat nilang tawagin ang kanilang sarili bilang mga “tagahanga ni Mao”. (6) (7)

4. Si Sison ay hindi tumutol sa pakikipagalyansa ng naghihingalong RIM sa imperyalismong U$ laban sa pag-aalsa sa Apganistan. Si Sison ay hindi rin tumutol sa pakikipagalyansa ng naghihingalong RIM sa imperyalismong U$ laban sa Republikang Islamiko ng Iran. (8) Sa ganitong kalagayan, ibinunyag ni Sison na mas pabor siya sa isang alyansa ng naghihingalong RIM at ICMLPO kaysa sa pag-aalsang Islamiko kontra imperyalismo sa Ikatlong Daigdig. Ipinapahiwatig ng mga gawain ni Sison na naniniwala siyang mas masmabuting kaalyado ang mga populasyong parasitiko ng Unang Daigdig kaysa sa mga puwersang Islamiko sa Ikatlong Daigdig. Tinalikuran na ni Sison ang Maoistang gawain ng Nagkakaisang Prente.

5. Si Sison ay hindi nagpahayag ng kahit anong kritisismo sa kamakailang ulat ng Pambansa-Demokratikong Prente ng Pilipinas, pirmado ng Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas, na naghahayag sa katawa-tawang kulto ng personalidad ng mga rebisyunistang taga-hilagang Korea. Sa ulat na ito, bagama’t hindi tuwirang tinawag na “sosyalista” ang Koreanong monarkiya, sigurado namang binibigyan ng impresyon na ito ay isang sosyalistang modelo para sa Ikatlong Daigdig. Ang mga rebisyunista sa hilagang Korea ay hindi itinaguyod bilang isang modelo ng mga Maoista (9)

Inaanyayahan namin ang lahat ng siyantipikong rebolusyonaryo na umanib sa amin upang itaas ang bandilang pula laban sa rebisyunismo. Dapat nang ituwid ni Jose Maria Sison ang kanyang nakagawian. Ang Maoismo-Third Worldismo ang landas pasulong para sa Pilipinas at sa kung saanman. Ang Ika-21 Siglo ay ating gawing dantaon ng digmaang bayan upang mabura na nang tuluyan ang imperyalismo sa balat ng lupa.

Mga tala:

1. Simple Questions by the Numbers. http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com….tionary-or-not/

2. globalrichlist.com

3. Sison, Jose Maria. Global Trends, Challenges and Opportunities After 911. September 22, 2006. Sa dokumentong ito, tinatalakay ni Sison ang lahat-lahat sa ilalim ng araw, pero kinakaligtaan niya ang mga pakikibaka para sa pambansang pagpapalaya sa Hilagang Amerika upang hindi niya masaktan ang mga organisasyong sobinistang Puti na kanyang kaalyado.

4. Sison, Jose Maria. ILPS Extends Its Solidarity with the People of the U.S. Against the Criminalization of Immigrants and Intensification of the U.S. War of Terror. Reproduced with commentary here: http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/countries/aztlan/chicano092506.html Pansin na nilalaktawan ni Sison ang anumang pagtalakay ng pagpapalaya sa okupadong Mehiko at sa halip nanindigan siya sa populistang Puti at integrasyunistang balangkas ng mga grupong sobinistang Puti tulad ng WWP, RCP, at iba pa.

5. Also see: http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/countries/phil/migrants091306.html

6. On the “RIM” renegades in Nepal. http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/on-the-situation-in-nepal/

7. Marxism-Leninism-Maoism is dead. Long Live Maoism-Third Worldism. http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/on-nepal-recent-analysis/

8. Disband the RIM. http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/2006/10/16/disband-the-rim/

9. National Democratic Front. 60th founding anniversary of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea http://neworleans.indymedia.org/news/2008/09/13053.php

Maoism- Third Worldism salutes the Iraqi Resistance.

DVD - search mininova for the title: SupportOurTroops

Dear Maoist-Third Worldist.. are First World "workers" more productive?

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

Recently, a comment was left regarding Comrade Serve The People’s rough estimate for the value of labor. Read the original comment here. 

Matthijs Krul asks Maoists-Third Worldists:

“I find this calculation very interesting, thanks. However, it seems to me the question of differing productivity is too easily dismissed. Indeed we can all reject the bourgeois economic idea that people actually get wages proportional to their productivity, but nonetheless it seems to me quite possible that the productivity of First World workers is significantly higher than Third World ones. Not because they work harder (as said, the labor intensity is vastly higher in the Third World), but because of technology. Isn’t it possible that skilled labor on high tech machinery is significantly more productive than Third World unskilled labor in handicraft or simple manufacture? That would lessen (though probably not eliminate) the difference in the wage/value ratio. Apologies if I am making a reasoning error, I’d just like this clarified.”

This question is answered by two MSH comrades. Serve The People responds for MSH:

"For years we have been waiting for someone to prove to us that First World 'workers' are more productive than Third World workers, and that this alleged difference in productivity is great enough to account for the vast discrepancy in wages between the Third World and the First World. No one yet has come forward with a scrap of evidence in support of this claim.

Elsewhere we have proven, using data from the u$ government itself, that not even 20% of Amerikkkan 'workers' are in, or even close to, the productive sector. Most Amerikkkan 'workers' deliver services of various kinds: sales, marketing, clerical work, education, health care, law, accounting, finance, repairs, maintenance, cleaning, food preparation, transportation, security, management, media, engineering, government, consulting, art, recreation, advertising, personal services, child care, research, etc.–not to mention the state’s big oppreSSion industry, which includes the police, the military, and the pri$ons. None of that is in the productive sector; it produces no value. Some of it helps to *realize* value, but none of it *produces* any.

Things are different in the Third World. In India, for example, more than 80% of workers are in manufacturing, agriculture, fishing, or mining. Those are productive-sector occupations.

Since the unproductive sector produces no value but does consume value, it is somewhat parasitic: the unproductive sector lives at the expense of the productive sector. In the united $nakes, if (let’s be generous) 20% of the 'working' population is productive, then one productive worker has to produce enough for himself and four unproductive-sector workers. In India, if 80% (an underestimate) is productive, then each productive worker has to produce enough for herself and 1/4 of an unproductive-sector worker. Quite a difference! (And we haven’t yet considered the very different standards of living of India and the united $nakes.)

If technology were sufficiently advanced, perhaps one worker could produce enough value to support five workers and their dependents. Currently this is not possible. The size of the u$ unproductive sector by itself supports a good argument that the u$ is parasitic: that value cannot all be produced by the small productive sector, so much of it is coming from somewhere else–namely, the Third World. A comparison of Third World and First World standards of living only strengthens this argument.

But let us return to the question of technology. Amerikkkan productive-sector workers may push buttons in an automated factory while Indian workers toil away with more primitive tools. Does the higher output per worker of the automated factory imply that Amerikkkan workers are more 'productive' than Indian workers?

The first thing to notice is that this situation rarely exists. Production tends to be specialized: the united $nakes produces cars while India produces garments. Naturally, the labor-intensive work (such as sewing) gets sent to India, where labor is cheap (thanks to imperialist superexploitation). Also, India does have technology. The assumption that India has no modern technology is simply a manifestation of ignorance coupled with First World chauvinism.

One big area in which this is not true is agriculture. Amerikkkan farms are highly mechanized and employ many inputs (mainly petrochemicals), while much Indian agriculture uses primitive tools and few inputs. So the question above might be rephrased in terms of agriculture. If a corporate farm in the united $nakes yields far more per worker than a village in semi-feudal India, does that mean that Amerikkkan farm workers are more “productive” than Indian peasants?

No, because the comparison is unreasonable. It is tantamount to a race in which the Indian contestant is hobbled while the Amerikkkan contestant gets to use a car. Of course a worker can get more done with a tractor than with a hoe. That’s no credit to the worker.

The labor theory of value states that the value of a commodity is the amount of average socially necessary labor that went into its production. It is not socially necessary for Indians to use hoes when tractors are available. If Indians have only hoes to use, it is because of national oppression, not social necessity. Capitalism and semi-feudalism squander Indian labor-power by depriving Indian peasants of agricultural technology.

In addition, the labor that goes into a commodity includes not just living labor but also dead labor–the labor embodied in the equipment and inputs employed in production. Grain produced in India may contain very little dead labor, but grain produced in the united $nakes contains a lot: oil, fertilizers, pesticides, a share of expensive equipment. That dead labor represents a large amount of the value of Amerikkkan agricultural products; consequently, the living labor of the Amerikkkan worker represents only a small amount.

If we assume that the Amerikkkan worker is of average productivity for a tractor-driver and that the Indian worker is of average productivity for a peasant under conditions of semi-feudalism, then their labor is of equal value, hour for hour.

In this writer’s experience, the intensity of labor in the united $nakes and other First World countries is decidedly lower than than of the Third World. For this reason, it is likely that typical First World labor is worth less per hour than typical Third World labor.

One other comment. As technology improves, production becomes more efficient. That means that less labor is needed to produce a commodity, and therefore the value of labor-power DECLINES as technology improves."

MSHC1 responds for MSH:

"The First World worker using a great deal of technology to perform productive labor is only as productive as that technology allows him to be, neither more nor less. That is to say, the average 'productivity' (defined as volume of output) of a First World productive worker is determined largely by the technology he is using, not by the labor he is performing. If a machine plus one worker can churn out a million widgets per hour, but a human alone can only make ten, does that mean that the former worker is far more productive than the latter? No. In fact it means that much more capital must be laid out in the production process, and hence less value can accrue to the product of such.

It is vital to stress that labor is the only value creating substance in the world: technology is only as 'productive' as it is designed to be. The Third World worker’s productivity is, unfortunately, because of imperialist capitalism, largely produced by the intensity of her labour.

There is also, of course, the question of closed borders: if Third World workers, willing to work for a much lower wage than lazy First World workers, were allowed to work and travel freely, then Third World workers in the First World would be a great deal more productive than First World workers in the First World! In fact, this is precisely the reason that imperialists want Third World laborers working for them in their home country. The main reasons for the inflated wage packets of First World workers are closed borders, militarily repressive working conditions in the Third World, and the politico-economic functionality of a mAss First World parasitic bourgeois 'working class'."

Matthijs Krul responds on September 19,2008:

"Thank you for the expansive answer. I now understand better what you mean. I did of course not mean to imply India has 'no technology', just that the labor intensive industry tends to be concentrated there and the capital-intensive (and thereby more of the high tech) industry in the First World.

The only part I do not understand is this part of ‘Serve the People’’s answer: 'If we assume that the Amerikkkan worker is of average productivity for a tractor-driver and that the Indian worker is of average productivity for a peasant under conditions of semi-feudalism, then their labor is of equal value, hour for hour.'

As ‘Serve the People’ says, the conditions of semi-feudalism themselves imply that 'it is not socially necessary for Indians to use hoes when tractors are available'. Wouldn’t one therefore say that the peasant working under conditions of semi-feudalism works such that the labor time expended is _more_ than socially necessary? In which case the Labor Theory of Value would state that the difference between the socially necessary time and the ‘excess’ time is not value-producing? Then hour for hour, the value produced by the American tractor driver and the Indian peasant are not equal. I suppose this depends though on whether 'socially necessary' applies globally or per society.

After all, Marx himself wrote in 'Value, Price and Profit', Chapter VI:
'When, in England, the power-loom came to compete with the hand-loom, only half the former time of labour was wanted to convert a given amount of yarn into a yard of cotton or cloth. The poor hand-loom weaver now worked seventeen or eighteen hours daily, instead of the nine or the hours he had worked before. Still the product of twenty hours of his labour represented now only ten social hours of labour, or ten hours of labour socially necessary for the conversion of a certain amount of yarn into textile stuffs. His product of twenty hours had, therefore, no more value than his former product of ten hours.'

Not, of course, that this would invalidate the other points, but I am unsure about this specific part.'

MSHC1 responds for MSH on September 19, 2008:

Thank you for your very incisive questions, Matthijs. 

Your quote from Marx is correct. However, Marx was writing in a competitive age, when capital which was invested in a less profitable industry would be withdrawn and reinvested in a more profitable one. Nowadays, in the age of global-imperialist monopoly capitalism, capital is overwhelmingly concentrated in the banks, corporations and governments of europe, north amerika and japan, with which it is impossible for Third World capitalists to compete. 

The imperialists monopolize the means of high technological production and ensure that Third World producers must engage in low-wage labor-intensive industry, whether as a link in the Multinational Corporation's commodity production chain or as "independent" producers. As a consequence of this archaic mode of production imposed on the Third World by the First World, it is only necessary for monopoly capital to make a small investment in order to obtain a massive return or, indeed, to sit back and reap the superprofits from unequal exchange.

Where technology is fully utilized in the Third World production process (which it often is, as Serve the People points out), the low wages of the Third World industrial worker compensate for any comparative shortfall between First World and Third World average socially necessary labor time. This website, for instance, claims that labor productivity in Mexican export industries is 80-100% of u$ levels while wages are 10-15% of u$ levels. (1) 

Nowadays, Third World industry is largely controlled by Multinational Corporations which offload their outmoded technology for inflated prices on to the Third World and guarantee that all of the value-creating production is concentrated there. Meanwhile, in the First World the accumulated dead labor of exploited Third World workers (workers paid less than the value of labor) is converted into advanced technology, mostly implemented in production of decadent luxury junk for the bourgeois First World 'working class' and/or weapons of mass destruction. 

Through mechanisms of superprofit allocation (e.g. trade and minimum wage laws, job market protectionism, commercial retail accessibility, etc.) First World workers can purchase the necessities of life at bargain basement prices and, lo and behold, they are left with a fat chunk of surplus from their wages. The First World 'productive' workers then happily ignore the source of all of the profits that go into their high-tech employment, and imagine that their superwages result from their productivity. 'Forget class struggle, forget the need to strike for higher wages, those nice capitalists pay us high wages because, fortuitously, we happen to use a lot more technology in our production than those primitive Third World workers.'

In sum, the labor time of, for example, the Indian agricultural worker precisely is average socially necessary labor under conditions of imperialist oppression of nations and capitalist monopoly. This situation is one which we communists seek to overturn, because we know that is it an unnecessary and (outside the First World and the guarded living spaces of the comprador bourgeoisie) unwanted social arrangement responsible for murder, starvation, disease and death on a historically unprecedented scale.

Notes

1. 

http://home.alltel.net/bsundquist1/gcib.html"

Joseph Ball on September 21, 2008 wrote:

"The exploitation of Third World labour takes forms other than the ‘classic’ form of a First World worker in a capital intensive industry exploiting products with a Third World worker in a labour intensive industry-which is what is being discussed here.

However, it’s important to stress that this ‘classic’ form is exploitation not simple exchange.

The fact is that when products with a high ratio of constant capital (c) to variable capital (v)
are exchanged with products with a high proportion of (v) compared to (c) then there is a transfer of surplus value from the second producer to the first (c stands for the raw materials, machinery, premises and so on needed for production, v is the outlay on labour). This is because labour is the source of surplus-value, therefore the second type of producer tends to produce more surplus-value (s) with their outlay than the first. However, the forces of the market lead to a single rate of profit between low and high surplus value producer.

How is the exchange between products of low and high ratios of c to v exploitation of one worker by the workers of another country, one may ask. Well, if you have a single, open labour market it isn’t as in this case labour is only paid its rate of reproduction so no worker can be said to be benefiting from the exploitation of another.

When you have exchange of these products between two different countries with high levels of wage inequality between them it’s a different matter.

Basically what happens is that the workers producing the product with a high proportion of c compared to v in the imperialist country are paid above the level of reproduction of labour because restrictions in supply of labour (due to immigration controls mainly but also trade union action and some other factors) force the price of labour up. These higher wages are paid for out of the additional s that is extracted from the lower paid workers in the oppressed country producing the product with the higher v in relation to c.

In practical terms, lets say the UK exports high-tech, specialist medical equipment to the Chinese and they export Barbie dolls in return. Specialist medical equipment and the other types of products we might sell to the Chinese would tend to contain only a fairly small amount of living labour v and a large amount of c. But by exporting such products we can import the products of tens or hundreds of millions of Chinese and other Third World workers working in labour intensive industries. Therefore our huge advantage in the amount of capital our products embody means we can set to work tens or hundreds of millions of wretchedly paid, exploited workers.

How do First World workers benefit?(As opposed to the capitalists who benefit directly from the trade.)

By two ways. Firstly lower wages in the countries we import from makes their goods relatively cheaper. This means that the wage paid to the First World worker can buy more-the amount of wage necessary to reproduce the First World workers existence is reduced and therefore the amount of the wage the worker can spend on luxuries increases. Secondly, the s produced by the Barbie doll producer can finance the higher wages of the First World worker fairly directly. Marketing and retail are fairly large employment sectors in the UK. None of them involve productive labour-they don’t involve a change of state of the commodity just its circulation. The wages of those in the retail and marketing sectors are paid out of the surplus value produced by manufacturing workers whose product those in these sectors are retailing or marketing. If the retailers and marketers were based in China, arguably, this wouln’t involve exploitation. But when, e.g. the UK retail worker earns seven times the wage of the Chinese industrial worker (I’m not exaggerating) due to the far more favourable labour market conditions, then the huge transfer of surplus value from the Chinese worker to the wage of the UK worker can only be exploitation. (The same principle applies to many others in the First World such as those who design or transport the goods produced in the Third World. These are actually productive workers but their wages are still boosted by labour market conditions in the First World, therefore their wages involve transfer of s from the manufacturing worker in the Third World.)

The fact is that all the additional capital that exists in the UK and other imperialist countries, compared to the poor countries is what can effectively set all this labour to work in the Third World. The UK accumulated all this capital by forcibly suppressing the development of Third World countries, a process that continues to this day through IMF and WTO conditionality, for example (and outright blockade and military attack when that fails).

Therefore the exploitation of Third World labour by First World labour is the result of unequal endowments of capital. The solution to the problem is the ’socialisation’ of the capital that has accumulated in the First World, mainly by the Third World masses."

EndofAmerikkka wrote on September 23, 2008:

Having access to technology does not justify one’s consumption of a greater percentage of the global social product. Just because a person is located in a region that has technology does not mean that person is entitled to more of the global social product. Under a rational economic order, someone should not be penalized within the global economy for not having been born in the First World. To argue, as First Worldists do, that Third World workers should starve and First World workers should live the Western lifestyle because the former do not have access to technology and the latter do have access goes against the spirit of communism.

It makes even less sense today, in this increasingly globalized economy, to ague that Amerikans should make bloated wages. It boils down to arguing for a distribution principle that states Amerikans have a right to consume more of the global social product simply because they are Amerikans.

Socialism is supposed to be a more rationally ordered economy. Under a socialist system, Amerikan workers would make substantially less than they do now. To argue otherwise is straight up chauvinism, even if it is disguised under Marxist rhetoric. The distribution principles that follow from First Worldist theories serve as reductios to their whole approach — at least from the stand point of the world’s vast majority.

Serve the People of MSH wrote on September 24, 2008:

It seems to me that Matthijs Krul is trying to liken Third World proletarians to the Luddites of England, who wanted to go on working with their manual looms after the power loom had taken over. Weavers with their own equipment made good money until the power loom came along; then their capital (looms, shuttles, etc.) became almost worthless, and they were completely unable to compete with mechanized textile mills (except perhaps in a tiny niche market). They were thrown out of work. Many petty-bourgeois weavers ended up being proletarianized when they took jobs as operators of the new power looms in big industrial factories.

The reactionary Luddite movement sought to restore the weavers’ petty-bourgeois privilege by destroying machinery and otherwise preventing industrialization. It didn’t work. People who tried to go on making a living with their manual looms quickly found out that their project wasn’t viable. Why? Because the amount of average socially necessary labor required to produce cloth had fallen dramatically as a result of industrialization. Just as an example, if a new process can produce cloth in 1 labor-hour that took 5 labor-hours in the past, then workers who go on using the old technology produce only 1/5 the value, hour per hour, that workers using the new technology produce. This is an illustration of what Matthijs Krul was talking about.

Are Indian peasants comparable to the Luddites of yesteryear because they use hoes rather than tractors? The answer is NO, because they do not CHOOSE to work with outmoded technology; they are DEPRIVED of superior technology by imperialism and semi-feudalism. The Luddites had lost a favorable situation and wanted to turn back the wheel of progress rather than finding a place in the world as it was; the peasants in India would go with better technology if they could, but they are kept down. It was NOT socially necessary for the Luddites to go on working with their manual looms; it IS socially necessary–thanks to national oppression–for the Indian peasants to work with obsolete technology. Indians don’t get the option to use tractors, nor yet to take $7/hour unproductive-sector jobs at a doughnut shop in the united $nakes.

So we do NOT say that the Indian peasants produce less value than First World tractor drivers. Most Indians living on a few hundred dollars a year would leap at the chance to get paid $7/hour or much more, as is usual in the united $nakes (where the minimum wage is $6.55/hour and is going to go up to $7.25/hour in less than a year). But those jobs are not open to them: they are offered only in imperialist countries, which effectively close their borders to the Third World proletariat. If you removed the oppressive conditions that limit the Indians’ options, you’d see that they could easily compete with their First World counterparts.

If a fucked-up imperialist-dominated society forces some workers to slave away in conditions of superexploitation for the benefit of other populations, the oppressed workers cannot be charged with producing little value; the blame for their plight belongs on the system that oppresses them. Hour for hour, they produce the same value as average workers in the imperialist countries, if not more."

Joseph Ball wrote on September 24, 2008:

"I think there’s a confusion here between the semi-feudal sectors of the Third World economy and the globalised capitalist sectors. Many farmers across the Third World live on a semi-subsistence basis, despite the growth in urbanisation and manufacturing. (I met some semi-subsistence farmers in China who led wretched lives although the government had kindly supplied them all with electricity and a TV so they would get their daily dose of state propaganda-a real example of unbalanced development.) For such semi-subsistence farmers, the fact that western farmers are more productive is not relevant. Their ability to grow their own food is almost a kind of minimum income guarantee as well as social security for when they cannot sell cash crops, get taxed ruinously by oppressive local officials, relatives in the city lose their jobs and stop sending money back etc.

I don’t have much first hand experience of India but I suspect it’s much the same there.

Outside this sector which is partially autonomous from the globalised sector, Third World farmers and industrial workers must compete with First World workers in their ability to make profits for capitalists, if they want employment. As I said in my last post, ‘classically’ the Third World worker produces a product that is competitive due to low labour costs, the First World producer competes on the basis of high productivity due to a high-tech, more capital intensive mode of production. This is the process I described in my last post, in reply to Matthias. In this, globalised sector of the economy, both the labour-intensive product of the Third World worker and the capital intensive product of the First World worker are produced under the market discipline of global capitalism, in the context of a great deal of labour immobility and grossly unequal wages as a result of this immobility (NOT primarily as a result of differences in skill and education levels, although these are a fairly important factor).

Therefore, as the other people who posted suggested, the Third world worker producing in a labour-intensive context produces their product, on average, in the socially necessary labour time, when seen on a global scale. This is because ’society’ or the global labour market dictates that it is ’socially necessary’ (i.e. most profitable) for them to produce in a more labour-intensive way, as their labour is so cheap. On the other hand it is ’socially necessary’ for the more expensive First World labour to work in capital intensive production processes as it is worth the capitalist paying out the money to buy the labour-saving machinery in order to reduce the wage bill.

Anyway, that’s how it was in the 1970s and 1980s. Now, I suspect finance capital is getting so dominant in the West (except in Germany where manufacturing is still relatively strong) that it rather covers up the role of ‘unequal exchange’ in the super-exploitation of the Third World masses. However, I would suggest unequal exchange is still the material basis of the wealth of the First World as opposed to pure exploitation by finance capital, but this needs to be investigated further."

Matthijs Krul wrote on September 26, 2008:

"Thank you for the answers.

If I understand it correctly then from these responses, the issue is that “socially necessary” is here to be read as following from the _specifics_ of the current world system, so to speak, rather than in the more abstract sense of capital’s “ideal” movement as described by Marx in the essay I quoted? Because I could definitely agree with that. Joseph Ball’s answer seems to imply it is to be understood at global level, with “socially necessary” as it would be understood within one society (which Marx was talking about) being modified globally by factors such as the immobility of labor, and Serve the People’s observations about forced use of less than optimal technology. I certainly would not pretend to know the correct theoretical formula for all this, but I definitely think it would help Third-Worldism, and science in general, if a clear theoretical formulation of labor theory as it applies worldwide could be undertaken in light of these issues we have discussed, in particular the question of the meaning of technology and productivity differences on value production.

In any case I would want to emphasize to ‘Serve the People’ that statements on the production of value are not meant normatively, and that nobody is accusing Indian workers of being stupid or lazy or somesuch! Similarly, I agree with ‘EndofAmerikkka’ that any normative conclusions based on analyzing these differences in technology definitely point in favor of Third World workers. After all, the entire point of Marxism was, among other things, the use of technology in favor of man’s full development, rather than against him."

Serve The People of MSH wrote on September 27, 2008:

"Matthijs Krul may not have meant to imply that Third World workers are stupid, lazy, or otherwise inferior to First World workers. But that is exactly what many 'Marxist' parties in the First World have been saying for years. A major precept of Trotskyism is the idea that the West is more “advanced” than the rest of the world and that therefore it is Western 'workers' that will lead the movement for socialism. We say just the opposite: Western 'workers' benefit materially from imperialism and have every short-term reason to support imperialism. The international proletariat has no use for Trotskyism (as is demonstrated by the complete absence of Trotskyist revolutions in world history), yet numerous 'communist' leaders uphold the lie of the 'proletarian' nature of the First World 'working' class.

Capital’s 'ideal' movement doesn’t happen anymore (if it ever did). 'Free trade' is a lie. Capitalist society today falls short of the capitalist ideal in that competition is not free. True capitalists would favor eliminating the borders, as indeed a few libertarians claim to do.

We are improving our theoretical formulation of Maoism-Third Worldism. On the particular question of the effects of differences in technology and throughput, we follow in Comrade Marx’s footsteps. Answering that question is just a matter of applying the labor theory of value."

Joseph Ball wrote on October 1, 2008:

"As Marx says, productivity gains allow for a smaller amount of v to work up the same amount of c to produce the same mass of product. This means that in a production process as a whole you can increase the amount invested in c, while reducing the amount invested in v (or keeping it the same or expanding it less quickly than c) in order to produce a proportionally greater mass of product than the investment has cost in value terms. Thus automation in a factory may half the number of workers necessary (reduce v by half) while doubling the cost of c. Let’s imagine c and v were equal before (a bit unrealistic admittedly). It might seem like the company concerned is only producing the same value as before. Yes, but the effect of the automation may be to double the mass of production in physical terms (while reducing the value of each product produced by half). As long as the market price of the product remains the same, the innovating capitalist is coining it in, though as other capitalists follow suit, this advantage is competed away.

The point that Matthijs seems to be making is that the First World capitalist tends to have an automated production process and thus higher productivity than the Third World capitalists with their labour-intensive production processes.

If this meant that the Third World manufacturer was expending more than the socially necessary labour time on production, then this would lead to the Third World manufacturer going bust due to competition from automated First World producers.

Actually, the opposite is what tends to happen as manufacturing relocates from First World to Third. This is because production is now global. Given the cheapness of labour in the Third World, it may not be socially necessary on a global scale for the Third World producer of, say Barbie dolls, to automate. Given the expense of the equipment that might be involved and the relative cheapness of paying a Chinese worker to do the work the machine would be doing, it is more profitable in the global system to produce the Barbie doll by labour intensive methods. Therefore the value of the Barbie doll is determined by an hour of socially necessary labour using the labour-intensive method in the Third World. The First World worker could maybe produce more Barbie dolls in an hour using more advanced machinery but this would probably cost more, due to their higher labour costs and the cost of the machine. This extra cost dictates that the socially necessary labour time is determined by the work-time of the Third World worker.

To get slightly off Matthijs’s immediate question, the fact that the First World worker exchanges a product that embodies far more c per hour of their labour than the product of the Third World worker is the secret of the First World worker’s wage advantage. It means that a small amount of First World labour (in terms of labour hours) can appropriate the product of the labour of a much larger amount of Third World labour in terms of labour hours. Ironically, for Marxists, the First World worker’s advantage in this regard is due to the unequal endowment of capital owned by the First World worker’s capitalist. Thus capitalism tends to work in the First World worker’s favour.

So to recap, the higher c embodied in an hour of First World worker’s labour means that the product of the much smaller amount of labour time expended in the First World can exchange for a vast mass of Third World labour hours. The First World worker gains advantage from this, as much as the First World capitalist, because labour market conditions in the First World allow their wages to go much above the level of the reproduction of labour. This is due mainly to immigration controls in the First World but also trade union action and other factors such as the existence of minimum wage legislation."

***

More to come? As we get responses, we will move them into the main body of the article.

Also see: A Maoist-Third Worldist Position on Unequal Exchange, Notes on Exploitation, Distribution, and Method, Dear Maoist Third Worldist…reproletarization, A rough estimate of the value of labor by Serve the People of IRTR, How will socialism come to North America, The form of the Dictatorship of Proletariat, Medical breakthrough cures one of the biggest problems facing the planet: Amerikan pet obesity, Simple questions by the numbers.. the majority in the United Snakes: revolutionary or not?, IRTR repost on capitalism and socialism, another reason to hate amerikkka, The High cost of living in the Third World

[This is a three part series on the Cultural Revolution. Maoist-Third Worldists claim that the Cultural Revolution was the farthest advance toward communism in history. Because this is the case, serious revolutionary scientists should be asking themselves why the Cultural Revolution, ultimately, failed to prevent the restoration of capitalism. Most self-identified Maoists know next to nothing about the Cultural Revolution except a few out of context slogans and hype -- such metaphysics should not be allowed to pass for science. In this article Prairie Fire begins exploring these topics by looking at two roads that the Cultural Revolution could have moved forward along, but did not. The first part covers the First Road of the "ultra-left" mass movements. This part will cover the Lin Biao road. This is part two of our three part series that re-thinks the Cultural Revolution. Part three will outline the new paradigm in understanding the Cultural Revolution and reject the various police narratives and falsifications that have informed so much of the traditional "Maoist" historical narrative.]

Two Roads Defeated in the Cultural Revolution Part 2: the Lin Biao Road 

by Prairie Fire

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

It is popular, even among those sympathetic to the Chinese Revolution, to see the Cultural Revolution as only chaos, as destruction with no construction. They hold that this led to the demise of socialism in the People’s Republic. With no competing social reorganization to fill the void after the chaos of the early years, the door was left open to capitalism. Such is the view of Slavoj Žižek and others. Such a simplistic narrative is flawed. Instead, there were two identifiable leftist roads, two trends, during the Cultural Revolution that represented realistic, defined ways forward. The First Road was the road of the spontaneous mass movements whose power climaxed in 1967. The Second Road was the road of the leftwing PLA, Lin Biao’s road. This road climaxed from 1968 to 1971. Though in the early years of the Cultural Revolution, Lin Biao, as the spokesperson for the movement as a whole, echoed the First Road, later his group had their own particular vision. (1) The interests of both groups intersected and, often, these two trends shared similar ideals. Sometimes they were at odds. Both roads sought an extension and radicalization of the Cultural Revolution at key junctures. These trends sought to exert themselves where they could. The rise of capitalism was not a passive process. Rather, it was the active result of the political defeat of these early breakthroughs during the first half of the Cultural Revolution decade.  

International Outlook: Global People’s War

The Second Road’s global strategic outlook and global class orientation is articulated in Lin Biao’s key 1965 article Long Live the Victory of People’s War! Lin Biao’s article extended the metaphor of the people’s war such that the main dynamic shaping the world is the global countryside pitted against the global city. Such is the principal contradiction. The Third World is pitted against the First World:

“Taking the entire globe, if North America and Western Europe can be called 'the cities of the world', then Asia, Africa and Latin America constitute 'the rural areas of the world'. Since World War II, the proletarian revolutionary movement has for various reasons been temporarily held back in the North American and West European capitalist countries, while the people’s revolutionary movement in Asia, Africa and Latin America has been growing vigorously. In a sense, the contemporary world revolution also presents a picture of the encirclement of cities by the rural areas. In the final analysis, the whole cause of world revolution hinges on the revolutionary struggles of the Asian, African and Latin American peoples who make up the overwhelming majority of the world’s population.” (2) 

The implications of Lin Biao’s article for global class, though not completely articulated, were understood. Lin Biao’s view struck fear into the Amerikan imperialists of a Third World invasion. (3) (4) Lin Biao’s article was not the only one that hinted in this direction. Qi Benyu’s Patriotism or National Betrayal? comes close to explicitly writing off the West as whole in its condemnation of “Western civilization,” (5) “civilized Europeans,” (6) and embrace of Boxer slogans such as “kill the foreign devils.” (7) These outlooks have their precursors in Chen Boda’s systemization of Maoism as the revolutionary path for the colonial and semi-colonial worlds. (8) (9) Whereas, Lin Biao’s outlook tended to write-off the First World, Mao saw the First Worlders, and the White “working class,” as allies. In fact, some Maoists in Shanghai saw the claim that Amerikan “workers” were no longer exploited as tantamount to capitulation. (9) Outside of China, the implications of Lin Biao's line, in terms of First World "workers," was understood. (10) In August, 1966, the Chinese media featured Black liberation fighter Robert F. Williams articulating a line that ran contrary to Mao, even as he praised Mao:

“The United States today is a fascist society more brutal than any the world has ever known. It has all but exterminated a whole people. It has robbed and raped an entire continent with impunity. It has divided the peoples of the world into national factions and set them against themselves and their brothers. With no more authority than the wave of its bloody imperialist hand it has abrogated the right of self-determination of small nations. It has appointed and crowned itself both king and armoured knight of the whole universe. It threatens the globe with annihilation. It is a super colonial power that is colonializing the colonials. 

The world famed and brilliant philosopher, Lord Bertrand Russell has justifiably stated that racist America has exterminated more black people than Hitler exterminated Jews in Nazi Germany. Lord Russell and many other fair-minded humanists throughout the world have justifiably stated that the U.S. military aggression in Vietnam is executed in a more cruel and barbarous manner than even the horrible campaigns of aggression, genocide, and conquest carried out by Hitler's fascist Germany.

Yet, there is a mighty tendency, promoted by the sinister American devil himself, to engender more sympathy and fraternalism for the so-called ‘good reasonable Americans’ than for the wretched victims of vicious and brutal U.S. imperialism. The U.S. constitutes one of the greatest fascist threats ever to cast its ugly shadow across the face of the earth. When the butchers of Nazi Germany were on the plunder, the world cry was ‘Crush Nazism!’ ‘Crush the Fascist Power Structure!’ ‘Crush Germany!’ Total war was unleashed without deference to any who may been considered ‘good Germans’ inside Nazi Germany. No sane person opposed to fascism pleaded for a soft policy toward Nazi Germany or pleaded for victims to wait for deliverance through the benevolence of ‘good German workers and liberals.’ Racist America didn't give a damn about sparing the good Japanese people when they dropped their horrible and devastating atom bombs.” (11)

A year later, the Chinese media again featured Robert F. Williams paraphrasing Long Live the Victory of People’s War! In the paraphrase, Robert F. Williams refers to whole First World countries as exploiters. Since this speech was made within China, and published within China, it is likely that Robert F. Williams was expressing not only his own view, but also a non-official, minority line within the Chinese Communist Party. It is very likely that there were, at a minimum, different pulls within the Chinese Communist Party. And, some of those foreshadow Maoism-Third Worldism. It would not be surprising if Robert F. Williams’ views on White Amerika expressed the losing side of a two-line struggle within the Chinese Communist Party: 

“This is the era of Mao [Zedong], the era of world revolution, and the Afro-Americans’ struggle for liberation is a part of an invincible worldwide movement . . . . In keeping with the principles of people’s war, wherein the great masses of exploited peoples of the world represent the rural masses surrounding the cities (the exploiting industrial countries), the Afro-American revolutionaries represent a mighty urban underground within the city. Our people will further develop and master people’s warfare. Every battle will be a glorious monument to Chairman Mao’s August 8, 1963 statement and we shall become even more fierce in resisting the tyranny of racist U.S. imperialism.“ (11)

In August of 1967, Lin Biao’s work was raised against the revisionist Adverse Current, Zhou Enlai and Marshal Chen Yi in the Foreign Ministry, by the mass movements and the left CCRSG. The Adverse Current made the claim that the mass movements of the First Road were hurting China’s ability to fight imperialism. They insisted the PLA must maintain order. (13) Qi Benyu, by making the connection that the new bourgeoisie were comprador, implied that the mass movements were not hurting the struggle against imperialism, but were part of it. The First Road’s street movement, which he likened to the Boxers, were part of Lin Biao’s global people’s war. The First Road was advancing the principal contradiction against imperialism. (14) On August 7, Wang Li claimed that the Foreign Ministry of Zhou Enlai and Marshal Chen Yi had done nothing to put Lin Biao’s global people’s war line into practice. The media echoed the importance of the people’s war line. (15) (16) This led to the brief ascension of the red diplomat Yao Dengshan, who echoed Qi Benyu’s threats against Britain in Hong Kong from the Foreign Ministry. (17) (18) There was an intersection between the Lin Biao Road and the First Road in the struggles during the hot summer of 1967.

A part of Lin Biao’s view was that Western imperialism, led by the United States, and Soviet social-imperialism worked jointly to oppress the Third World. Despite accusations after Lin Biao’s death, there is little evidence that he sought an alliance with the Soviets against the United States. Certainly Mao was closer to the United States than Lin Biao was to the Soviets. In fact, Lin Biao’s Long Live the Victory of People’s War! had been, in part, a polemic against such a position articulated by then Chief of Staff Lou Ruiqing in 1965. (19) Lin Biao’s outlook, since it seeks its principal allies amongst the forces of people’s wars, leaves little maneuvering room for foreign policy. After all, these people’s war forces seek to overthrow the very states that foreign policy aims to do business with. Intra-imperialist rivalry was not acute such that one imperialist bloc could be played off another. Rather Lin Biao’s view was to support the broad united front of national liberation and socialist forces against imperialism. Rather than playing the imperialists against each other, Lin Biao’s outlook sought to prioritize establishing a global ideological, but not organizational, independent, proletarian pole. As part of this, the work of Chinese missions abroad emphasized the dissemination of Maoism. And, ambassadors returned to China to participate in the Cultural Revolution. (20) 

Lin Biao’s road elevated the significance of Maoism in the International Communist Movement. Following Chen Boda’s earlier elevation of Maoism as the path for the colonial and semi-colonial world, Lin Biao’s Second Road recognized that Mao had “creatively and comprehensively and has brought it [Marxism-Leninism] to a higher and completely new stage. Mao [Zedong]'s Thought is Marxism-Leninism of the era in which imperialism is heading for total collapse and socialism is advancing to world-wide victory.” (21) The elevation of Maoism is militantly internationalist. This line was also associated with elevating people’s war generally. So much so, that whether one dared to wage people’s war was a mark of whether one was a true communist or revisionist. (22) (23) This was not the ordinary politics of shortsightedness and compromise. This was a farsighted strategy that departed from the politics of the ordinary in its efforts to remake the world. Recently, some revisionists have accused other revisionists as “Lin Biaoist” for their efforts to establish a Fourth International of Mao-influence parties. (24) (25) However, there is no evidence that Lin Biao’s road sought to establish a new Comintern to micro-manage a global people’s war. At one point, Indian Maoists influenced by Lin Biao sought to appoint Mao as the chairman of their party. The Chinese rejected this move; they rejected the patriarchal party model of the Soviet revisionists. (26) There is no evidence that Lin Biao sought to revive such a model, nonetheless, the First Road and Lin Biao’s Second Road were later criticized for self-glorification and Trotskyism by Zhou Enlai. (27) Echoing the post-Lin Biao consensus, Samir Amin recently called the Second Road’s global people’s war model as “too extreme to be useful.” (28) Contrary to this consensus, Maoism-Third Worldism has revived the global people’s war model. Today, global people’s war is at the heart of the rebirth of the International Communist Movement. (29)

The changing winds could be seen at the Twelfth Plenum of the Eighth Congress in the fall of 1968. This meeting was to prepare for the Ninth Congress in April of 1969. At this meeting, both Lin Biao’s and Jiang Qing’s groups agreed that the main issue was the Adverse Current and the attempt to reverse the verdict on deposed cadres. The aim of both radical groups was to remove as many conservatives before the Ninth Congress. 

“One after another, they denounced a number of veteran cadres. Kang Sheng condemned the Feburary Adverse Current as ‘an opposition to Chairman Mao, a negation of the Yanan rectification campaign, an an attempt to reverse the verdict on the Wang Ming line’. Jiang Qing declared that Chen Yi, Ye Jianying and Xu Xiangqian had created disturbances in the army. Yao Wenyuan expressed the view hat the Feburary Adverse Current demonstrated an effort to reverse the verdict on Liu Shaoqi, Deng Xiaoping and Tao Zhu. Xie Fuzhi held that Chen Yun had opposed Mao, the Great Leap Forward