[lbo-talk] BDL on Sweezy

[Michael Dawson]

> Brad DeLong writes at:
> >I would like Paul Sweezy to be remembered for the following passage:
> >
> >"The publication in 1952 of Stalin's Economic Problems of Socialism
> >in the USSR would make possible today a more satisfactory reply.SIn
> >the light of [Stalin's] explanationSI would like to amend the
> >statement which Mr. Kazahaya criticizes.S[The amended statement]
> >conveys my meaning more accurately than the original wording and is,
> >I think entirely in accord with Stalin's view." (Paul Sweezy (1953),
> >The Present as History (New York: Monthly Review Press), p. 352.)
> >
> >Paul Sweezy called himself an intellectual. Paul Sweezy publicly
> >revised his opinion on an analytical issue in order to agree with
> >the position taken by a genocidal tyrant. Fill in the blank: Paul
> >Sweezy was a ________.
>
> Brad, this is a disgrace. What is the point of saying something so
> cruel on the man's death? Is this a ham-handed attempt to police the
> limits of acceptable discourse? It's worthy of Horowitz.
>
> Doug

Disgraceful, indeed, and mega-stupid.  Many thoroughly decent radicals took
until after 1956 to completely jettison Stalin.  Brad De Long will never
produce a work with 1/100th the cutting power of Monopoly Capital, and he's
a boob for drawing this dense conclusion.