"Lumpen" was probably the worst verbal error in the collected works of Marx (and of his successors). It's a fucking stupid word that confuses every discussion into which I rears is thick head.
Carrol
-----Original Message----- From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org] On Behalf Of Marv Gandall Sent: Saturday, April 23, 2016 1:05 PM To: LBO Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Uptown Trump
> On Apr 23, 2016, at 10:29 AM, Shane Mage <shmage at pipeline.com> wrote:
>
>
> On Apr 23, 2016, at 1:04 PM, Marv Gandall wrote:
>
>> In the media and political establishment's effort to discredit Trump,
he's been identified as the candidate of the lumpenproletariat - the most
poorly educated, low-income, and racist segment of the working class...
>
> This is to distort, grossly, the meaning of "lumpenproletariat"--that word
means the ordinary CRIMINAL element, a class that scarcely exists in
American society (as distinct from the lumpencapitalists, the social base of
the Clintons and their Demoncrudic apparatchiks). NAFTA with all its
acronymized successors is a perfectly valid working-class issue that
accounts for the Trumpe-l'oeil's success so far and would (combined with the
overflowing bin of "Opposition Research" on the Clinton) easily produce a
Demoncrudic disaster in November should the Repugnicon apparatchiks somehow
fail to destroy their own campaign at their convention and their
counterparts somehow escape their suicidal propensities and manage to dump
the Clinton as the loser she most certainly is.
The term has much broader application than to just the criminal element, Shane, otherwise the fascists would never have come to power. Trotsky described the lumpenproletariat as "all the countless human beings whom finance capital itself has brought to desperation and frenzy". Marx saw it composed of that sector of the working class "whose conditions of life prepare it far more for the part of a bribed tool of reactionary intrigue", who are "prepared to sell themselves to anyone who will make extravagant promises".
More here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumpenproletariat#cite_note-1 ___________________________________ http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk