Given the nodal points of discussion that develop rapidly and spread with a joyous promiscuity - as sunflowers take over a field - around the questions of who Stalin was, what he did, and what motivated him it appears that he’s a seriously strange attractor for many LBO’ers.
Anyone care to offer a theory on why this so?
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Socialism and the critique of political-economy is the basic 'limit set' of LOBsters.
Stalin defined socialism U.S.S.R. style.
Many 'trajectories', both positive and negative flowed from this reality. For example, there are/were some (even some who call themselves socialist, like LBOsters generally do) who proclaimed, "To be anti-Soviet or even critical of the Stalin's definition/reality of socialism is to become counter-revolutionary." On the other hand, there were/are those (including many socialists--I include anarchists here--and some LBOsters) who say that nothing positive came out of the M-L experience and the sooner we admit this fundamental truth, the sooner we can get on with realistically reforming and/or revolutionizing social relations.
Mike B)
===== ***************************************************************** "The sheep feels best, safest, and happiest in the flock, where it has nothing else to do but graze, grow wool, and give birth to lambs. Once the new office workers had reached that stage, when their intellectual capacity and their ambition had become like those of sheep in a flock, that was when they had begun to be useful and reliable pillars of the Company they worked for and which paid them their salary."
from B. Traven's TROZAS
http://profiles.yahoo.com/swillsqueal
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