On Jun 17, 2009, at 8:27 AM, Chris Doss wrote:
>
> True and not true -- well it may be completely true in Iran, but not
> so in the EE countries. Bureaucrats actually did not live all that
> well (unless we are talking about the upper echelons). The ire of
> the Soviet middle class (a term that actually refers to the
> intelligentsia and educated professionals) was more directed at the
> system that 1) kept them at a fixed salary ceiling and 2) paid them
> less than miners and factory workers.
"upper echelons"=nomenklatura=the "post"-Stalinist ruling class "the intelligentsia and educated professionals"=the most super- exploited group of workers (paid the least proportion of their product) under Stalinism. Their "ire" was "more directed at the system" that denied them the most elementary personal and political freedoms. And constantly insulted their intelligence.
Shane Mage
> This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it
> always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire,
> kindling in measures and going out in measures."
>
> Herakleitos of Ephesos