Fernando Cassia wrote:
>
>
> Get rich quick schemes?. While you guys fantasize whch reaching
> "critical mass" and bring the revolution (in what? 200, 300 years?),
> some countries are attempting 21st century socialism, ie, Venezuela,
> Ecuador, Bolivia...
They are struggling to _partially_ detach themselves from the "Empire of Capital" as Wood calls it. There is nothing wrong with them calling it socialism; that's as good a declaration of independence as any and better than most. All power to them. And if they can hold on, one can't say that they won't, under different conditions, actually advance to socialism. But they won't be able to make that move until there are revolutions in some of the 'core' capitalist states. Your flippancy, like Bhaskar Sunkara's flippancy, does exhibit a lack of understanding of capitalism, and if you took Chavez more seriously, you might learn that he does not think his socialism is a general theory applicable to all nations. Fetishiziing Chavez is as bad as the stupid criticisms of those who think they have the _only_ one true key to revolution.
We may get barbarism instead. No direction is built into history.
Carrol