In a message dated 4/2/2002 6:20:49 AM Eastern Standard Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:


> > No, sir, the brutal repression
> >is not relegated to the 15th century or "backward societies" but is, as
> >Malcolm X said, "as American as apple pie."
>
> The point I'm trying to make David is that what is happening in the middle
> east is nothing whatsoever to do with the class war. It is not a clash
> between the working class and the employing class.

"What is happening in the middle east is nothing whatsoever to do with the
class war." Well, by your yardstick, NOTHING ANYWHERE has to do with class
war. No, no, no, my friend, there is no such thing as "The Class War" as am
absolute. But we do see global capitalism manifested in different ways for
different reasons, including in Israel. Why is Israel always the exception to
the rule?


>
> > > And they can't aspire to citizenships rights, simply because they are
> not
> > > Jewish.
> >
> >Neither can most Mexicans who enter the United States.... what's your
> point?
>
> My impression is that many of them do aspire to US citizenship. When you
> say "most" cannot, what are you implying? Does the US have a policy of
> discriminating against applicants for citizenship on the basis of religion,
> race or ethnic
background?


Yes, they do! Check out the wall along the Mexican border, my friend. Check
out the militarization of the border with Mexico, compared to that with
Canada, even post September 11. Mexicans cannot aspire to citizenship rights
in the United States because they are poor and have brown skin, just like the
Palestinians.


>
> Australia used to have such a policy, the White Australia Policy, but this
> eventually became politically untenable and was quite irrelevant to the
> issue of class. In fact the ruling capitalist class are strenuously opposed
> to the suggestion of any return to similar public policy. Bad for profits
> you see.

Now you want to draw a direct, point-to-point comparison between Australia
and the Palestine Occupied territories. The reasons for oppression are
different, but the results are often the same. Ever hear of some people
referred to as the Aborigines? Is it so awful for the capitalists in
Australia to have so many Aborigines on the bottom rung of society,
railroaded into alcohol addiction?

 The point is that Israel appears to still maintain such discrimination, in
the form of a
> Jewish Israel policy. I assume it isn't because they are a capitalist
> society that they favour discrimination. But if you are suggesting
> otherwise, then please explain your reasoning, don't merely make vague
> assertions.
>

Apparently my assertions haven't been "vague" enough for you to understand,
Bill. Israel is an imperialist (read: capitalist) state funded by the U.S.,
the heart of capitalist enterprise. The jackboot is not put to the neck
because of religion or because of "ideology" abstract from anything else. It
is put there for material reasons. And when you feel a jackboot on your neck,
I'm sorry, but it is not a "vague" sensation. Please go back and read what I
have posted in the last 4 or 5 messages.

> >No oppression or brutality that takes place in the 21st
> >century, in the context of the nation-state (which is what Israel IS, not
> a
> >fiefdom), is absent of a class character. All oppression has a class
> purpose.
>
> This is somewhat sweeping. And of course I didn't say Israel was a feifdom,
> it is obviously a capitalist economy. But some of its social policy seems
> to be informed by backward ideas. Reactionary ideas.
>

But you didn't answer the challenge in my last mail: Name a capitalist
country that does not have reactionary policies. Name one. Uno. Echad.

>
>
> > The condition of
> >Palestinians is identical to that of working class Blacks and Latinos in
> the
> >U.S., period.
>
> Don't be ridiculous.
>

No, I'm being quite serious. It is you who are being "ridiculous" because all
you can do is make a terse, ad hominem attack regarding the nature of my
statement, with no critique or analysis at all. That is the definition of
"ridiculous"-- responding to things without any clear intent other than to
make an utterance.


> >"Primarily by economic coercion" indeed! Please describe a capitalist
> society
> >you are aware of that does not discriminate on any other basis--
> domestically
> >or internationally-- besides an economic one. By your definition, then,
> there
> >is no such thing as capitalism! I guess we are all living in feudalism.
> The
> >point is that capitalism uses ANY means necessary, be they political,
> >military, physical, economic, or otherwise, in order to increase the
> profit
> >margin.
>
> Since all profit is derived from the surplus value of workers, there is
> only one way to increase the profit margin - pay a smaller percentage of
> the value created by workers back to them as wages. A capitalist economy is
> one where economic coercion is the virtually universal method by which the
> working class are coerced to labour for the ruling class. Rather than at
> the point of a gun, or a whip.
>

Again with the strict, essentialist interpretation of "a capitalist economy."
An interpretation so strict it allows for not a single instance of reality to
creep in: Are you familiar with the history of the major capitalist economic
powers, i.e., the U.S., France, Germany, England, South Africa? These are
among the most objectively brutal nations ever to exist in the history of the
Earth!!!!!

> > This is about the ends, not the means: read Macchiavelli.
>
> What does that mean?
>

Capitalism is about the ends (i.e., profit) not the means.

> > And now you
> >wish to single out military oppression as separate from economic?
>
> Yes. Its a different thing entirely. It the difference between being told
> "work for me or I'll shoot you," and "work for me or you won't be able to
> pay the rent." Most people acknowledge there's a difference and that the
> gun at one's head is the greater evil. And the ends are clearly quite
> different, else why do people prefer to live in a society where economic
> coercion is used and flee those societies where more brutal forms of
> coercion are used?
>

No physical coercion is ever used in Australia, is it, Bill?

>
>
> >And must we continually parrot Dan Rather and CNN in framing the entire
> >matter as a "religious conflict?"
>
> I can assure You I was doing no such thing. I've heard of them of course,
> but I don't think your Dan rather gets aired here. So I've never seen his
> show and wouldn't know him from a bar of soap. Not having ever heard him
> speak, I can't parrot him, now can I?
>

Unless the propaganda system that Chomsky describes in "Manufacturing
Consent" and "Necessary Illusions" works as well as he theorizes!

> > Is this the Spanish Inquisition? Does the
> >United States have a geopolitical hold on Israel because of its interest
> in
> >Jews and Judaism? Or is it money?
>
> The US has a hold on Israel because of its huge industrial and military
> capacity and the fact that it props up Israel economically and military
> with a small part of its huge surplus value. If the US says "jump", Israel
> has no option but to ask "How high?"
>

Oh, now the state functions of Israel "ARE" economic!!!!! How did that
happen?

> But that isn't the issue,

"But that isn't the issue." How can it be the EXPLANATION but not the ISSUE?
How is it that the abstract, idealist notions about the way things are or
ought to be are more important than an ACTUAL analysis of what's ACTUALLY
going on to ACTUAL people????????


>
> >You probably also maintain that the United States got involved in WWII
> >because it was morally opposed to racial and religious bigotry against
> Jews,
> >no? How morally upright it was of the U.S. to liberate the concentration
> >camps (forget the fact that the Soviets did most of the dirtywork), and
> then,
> >in order to take their just compensation, create a satellite settler
> colony
> >in the Middle East to lock itself in as world superpower, provide a
> >counterweight against Stalin, and have a stake in the control of oil
> >resources to boot!
>
> You'll have to wait and see. I tire of your ridiculous assertions.
>

Oh, fuck you.

-- David