Intellectuals vs. activism / labor theory of value

[Wojtek Sokolowski]

At 08:43 PM 8/6/2002 -0400, Gordon wrote:
>I was recently involved in a discussion of the labor theory
>of value in which one of my interlocutors asserted that it
>was used in a purely normative manner, i.e. as above, the
>wokers _ought_ to _own_ the means of production because it
>is created by their labor.  This seems like a very Lockean
>argument to me, what with the oughtings and the ownings,
>and I'm surprised to see it in the work of the father of
>Communism, even with a big C.  What does a Communist care
>about such bourgeois values and relations?  I had had the idea
>that the exploitation of labor's power to create value led
>(theoretically) to the crisis of overproduction.  But I'm no
>scholar of Marx, and I would mildly appreciate the efforts
>of anyone who wanted to go to the trouble to set me straight
>on this matter.

This arguments offers a powerful, logically coherent argument for wealth 
redistribution that stands on a principle rather than appeals to  pity, 
charity, altruism, etc.  The issues of intellectual property rights to it 
are, at best, of tertiary importance.

Wojtek