On Tuesday, August 13, 2002, at 04:49 PM, Gordon Fitch wrote:
> Dddddd0814 at aol.com:
>> Tahir, this is a good point. The point is that, given the global
>> dominance of
>> the capitalist economic system, there is no "third way" out of all of
>> this.
>> We can either be with the capitalists or against them. Any "third
>> way"-- from
>> fascism on one extreme, all the way to individualist anarchism on the
>> other--
>> will simply lead back to support of the class in power. This has been
>> bourne
>> out time and time again throughout history.
>
> It seems to me that what history bears out is that most of
> the parties who defined themselves very specifically against
> capitalism, the Communist Parties of the Soviet Union and
> China (among others), _became_ capitalists, precisely through
> support of the class in power -- the supposed revolutionaries,
> who, having State power and thus a class position to defend
> and maintain, found they had a lot in common with their
> supposed capitalist opponents.
i'm reminded of a recent addition to the growing body of nixon tapes, minutes, and transcripts.
/---/ Nixon and Kissinger relish their meetings with the Chinese as philosophical summits, and when Zhou recites a poem praising men who climb "perilous peaks," Nixon exclaims, "That's beautiful!"
A year later, Kissinger seems wounded when Mao mocks their differences as so much show business.
"You say, away with you Communists; we say, away with you imperialists," Mao says, laughing.
"I think both of us must be true to our principles," is Kissinger's sour reply. /---/
http://www.taiwansecurity.org/AP/2002/AP-050702.htm
j