nationalize the oil industry!?

[Realizalize]

oilonize the nation

[abrown051980]

You are 100% correct! The profit made from nationalizing oil will go back in our pockets! Thank you for speaking the truth!!

[nuclearnight]

thanks.

[IWW610]

We have a long way to go to get our shit together. I hope that the American empire collapses slowly enouf for that to happen. I am in favor of strong, democtatic union control of the oil industry with a far sited intrest in the consequinces of their work. I think such an arangement would be far more beneficial (to all life on the planet) than a system based on the greed of a few or a barely accountable state. I agree that we need to find better ways to do what oil does for us. -Kind Regards.

[nuclearnight]

thanks.

[TheEditorialist]

If you're going to nationalize the energy industry, you may as well nationalize the others.

Take the pharmaceutical industry for example. Their profit margins are much higher than the oil industry's, but people don't really notice because they're not forced to fill up on Tylenol every week.

And what about the credit companies and banks? Sure, they're losing money now, but not before making a killing off of the backs of middle and working class persons for years with usurious interest and fees.

[nuclearnight]

I agree with you, I think all industry should be nationalized.

[TheEditorialist]

One of people's chief complaints with communism has always been that creativity and dynamism would be lost without the profit motive.

To which any student of history can reply, "Could Czar Nicholas' Russia have beaten Hitler?"

The honest answer is, "Not in a million years."

In 1957, China was communist, India was capitalist. Compare the strengths of these two countries after 50 years. China is a hands down success, a global powerhouse.

While India eats dirt by comparison.

Just my observations

[BlackProteus]

Yeah, people say that communism can't be innovative, but then they forget that communists invented the first ever artificial satellite, put the first living being in space, the first human in space, etc. -- all on a budget that was 10% of the US space program.

[BlackProteus]

I'm pro nationalization of the commanding heights of industry. But light industry should be under direct worker ownership or profit-sharing (co-ops).

Oil is dangerous, so should be phased out. Hydrogen or solar might be the ways to go. Interesting new ideas are afoot at MIT: watch?v=N3HwJ6shrOg

But modern ecological problems are a reason why we need to fundamentally re-think Marx, who counted nature as an "externality."

I'm no Zerzanist. Industrialism, like rock 'n' roll, is here to stay.

[nuclearnight]

I think in Marx's time nature was an externality, it's life wasn't at the mercy of humanity, regardless i don't think we need to rethink marx because that dynamic has changed, more and more people are splitting up into the bourgeoisie and the proletariet and marxism, as a living science is capable of adapting to new situations and problems as i see it, most marxists i know care a lot about the environment.

[BlackProteus]

I think the left hangs on too tightly to a 150 year old theorist. No other real science does that; they adapt and move on. It is my suspicion that this is because Marxism is treated as a pseudo-religion. Not really Marx's fault -- or perhaps it is for his overblown claim that his ideas were a "science"? If we treated Marx as real scientists do, we'd realize that much of it has simply been falsified, and we'd move on to a new theory, using some of the old, but much that is new.

[nuclearnight]

I think most of the left hangs onto no theories at all, just things that sound good. What has been falsified about Marxism? or Dialectical Materialism? I understand that not all theories appeal to all people, we're all different and get our heads hooked on different philosophies, but I know that the state of the left, especially in the United States is holding up capitalism rather than challenging it with strong ideas that make sense for working people.

[BlackProteus]

Marx's prediction that the gap between the rich and poor would widen was wrong, at least in his articulation; his idea that monopoly was inevitable was wrong; his idea that communism is inevitable is, I guess, not falsifiable, but it seems pretty obviously wrong: capitalism can go on bailing itself out over and over again if people let it. Perhaps you can tell me this, as I'm not sure: did Marx advocate central planning? If so, I'd say that's a method that seems proven not to work.

[nuclearnight]

The gap between the rich and poor is widening, I don't know how that's been disproven. Monopolies do exist. but apart from that, the only reason those things aren't as drastic in the U.S. or other western countries is because of the struggle of the working class to claim their own piece of the pie, and the regulation of the government on the market. When the market was completely unregulated, that's what happened. I'm not sure what you mean exactly by capitalism bailing itself out...

[BlackProteus]

The gap between the rich and poor is something the left has said is "widening" since the 1850s. But think about it: it can't have been true for that long, else the gulf would be so wide now, you'd have nothing but millionaires on one pole and serfs on the other. The fact is, in the west at least, the poor live better now than the poor of the 19th century. I am anti-capitalism, but I believe it's important to be objectively factual about these things.

[nuclearnight]

It has no other option, but I don't think capitalism naturally can continue to bail itself out, the dynamic of the system is anarchic and it's contradictions make it incredibly unstable, that's what i got out of reading reform or revolution, that the supposed bail-outs of capitalism are in fact, not bail outs but things that make the system even weaker and more chaotic.

Marx advocated nationalization of industry, I believe in central planning, certainly.

[BlackProteus]

By "bailing itself out," I mean capitalism reforms and re-sets itself whenever crisis occurs -- with socialist ideas, to be sure. For example, capitalism essentially did collapse in the 1930s. But it bailed itself out (in my terms) with reforms. Marx had no inkling that this was possible, that it could go through cycles like this and even make them seem natural. I agree that it has contradictions, but to suggest it's heading towards some inevitable collapse seems religious, not realistic.

[nuclearnight]

I think decentralized action and "doing your own thing" is a real problem in the left, i do think we need massive centralized action, against the war, to protect reproductive rights, to protect already already nationalized industries from being privatized, us doing our own thing doesn't seem to smash the system.

[BlackProteus]

What do you mean by "doing your own thing"? We need new theory rather than analysis built on conditions a century and a half ago. We also need to learn from the Soviet project, some of which succeeded and some of which failed. Central planning seems clearly to have failed for delivering consumer goods. So I think a cooperative system should be used with a market to deliver those things. The commanding heights, however, should be nationalized. David Schweickart's New Communism seems right to me.