Carrol, you are at your worst today. Or near it. "Diction" is mot at issue here, since no one says that welfare states oer se are socialist states. Doug and I have challenged critics to explain why socialist states will not be welfare states among other things, but what they get called in political struggle is a different question from the analytical issue where the use of terms can be stipulative. And in the context of the current struggle defense of the CAPITALIST welfare state is top on the order of priority. Whatever we it useful to call what we are defending.
Now, Sarcasm and irony. The Webster II New College Dictionary I have on my office shelf defines "irony" as "use of words to convey the opposite of their intended meaning," which fits exactly what I was doingw hen I said that the US and Sweden were equally capitalist states where workers write under the iron heel. Sarcasm is a mode of irony, "a mocking or contemptuous ironic remark intended to wound another," again according to WIINC. Which pretty much fits Aristophanes and Swift, not that I am as good as they are. But you err where you contarst irony and sarcasm -- at least if you suggest that sarcasm cannot be ironic.
Why are you taking my time with this shit, Carrol? There are issues here:
1) is the welfare state worth defending? 2) is it OK for socialists to talk about defending it when they mean the capitalist welfare state> 3) Or as euphemism for some of socialism 4) Would socialism involve a sort of welfare state?
These are worth discussing. Good teachers don't try to show how much more they knwo than others and habd out gardes and snipe on irrelevancies. Good conversationalists participate in the real discussion. Why don't you? You usually do.
jks
--- Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu> wrote:
> I think this exchange between you and turbulo
> illustrates what I have
> been saying all along -- that trying to use "welfare
> state" to cover
> both socialist and capitalist states expresses no
> particular political
> position AND serves to create confusion in political
> discussion. The
> phrase "welfare state" has been clearer than most
> political slogans for
> at least 50 years. There is an important topic,
> about which sharply
> different viewpoints exist on this list, and which
> _some_ of the posts
> under this subject head ("political cartography")
> took up. And then the
> discussion wandered completely afield because
> someone had a yen to use
> "socialist state" and "welfare state" as having the
> same meaning. Since
> then we've been discussing lexicography rather than
> politics. That's the
> usual result of sloppy diction.
>
> It wasn't pedantry on my part, as the subsequent
> course of the
> discussion proves. And my sarcasm re freshman comp
> was no sillier than
> your sarcasm (not irony) about "capitalists
> dictatorsip." I don't see
> how you can call the one pedantry but associate the
> second with the
> glories of Swift and Aristophanes.
>
> Carrol
>
> andie nachgeborenen wrote:
> >
> > Please don't be irony-deficient.
> >
> > Sweden is indeed a capitalist state where the
> rights
> > of private proverty are upheld -- though to a far
> > lesser degree than in the US , since the existence
> of
> > rights is a matter of degree. It is also a welfare
> > state where the workers have won extraordinarily
> > extensive concessions from capital such that the
> main
> > advantages to them of a shift to socialism,
> understood
> > as full public and democratic control of
> production
> > and investment, would be mainly theoretical.
> >
> > A Swedish Communist once told me that it was as
> hard
> > to be a Communist in his country as in the US, but
> for
> > the rather different reason that it was hard to
> > explain what concrete benefits Communism would
> offer
> > that Swedes do not already have. So, while Sweden
> is
> > capitalist, the workers there do not writhe under
> the
> > iron heel. I should not have to explain this
> obvious
> > stuff in such a pedantuc manner.
> >
> > I will say again that what the Swedes have would
> be
> > worth our fighting for, that if we won it it would
> be
> > a victory past imagining for ordinary and working
> > people (sorry 'bout that ol' time populism -- must
> be
> > a Midwestern disease), and that we are not likely
> to
> > be so lucky in our lifetimes or those of our
> > grandchildren.
> >
> > --- Turbulo at aol.com wrote:
> >
> > > In a message dated 11/21/04 2:04:37 PM Eastern
> > > Standard Time,
> > > lbo-talk-request at lbo-talk.org writes:
> > >
> > > Andie wrote:
> > >
> > > > Both Sweden and the US are capitalist
> > > dictatorships in
> > > > which the workers writhe under the iron heel
> of
> > > > capital. Right?
> > > >
> > > >
> > >
> > > I don't get this at all. Sweden and the US are
> both
> > > capitalist states, which
> > > isn't to say they are identical capitalist
> states.
> > > In the former, the working
> > > class and social provision are much stronger.
> But in
> > > both, the right to
> > > private property in the means of production is
> > > upheld. Is this controversial?
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