Re: [A-List] Academic life of Mises

[Waistline2@xxxxxxx]

In a message dated 12/19/02 1:13:10 AM Pacific Standard Time, hliu@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:

> A Socialist organizer was sent to a small farming village to raise the revolutionary consciousness of the masses.  He began his speech before a gathering of villagers by saying that if a person owns two farms and he can only farm one, he should give one to another who has none.  There was wild applause of approval from the audience.  Encouraged, the organizer went on to say that if a person has two houses and he can only live in one, he should give one house to another who has none.  Against wild applause.  If a person has two cars and he can only drive one, he should give one to another who has none.  Again wild applause.  If a person has two chickens and he only needs one, he should give one to another who has none.  Dead silence.  Confused, the organizer turned to his local cadre and asked what happened.  "They all have two chickens," was the reply. Henry C.K. Liu 




The law of value has to be understood not simply in its theoretical loftiness - which is important, but also as it is understood in the minds of men. If another man or rather "that man" as opposed to "this man" has to carry the burden, then we can all go home. Every man is "that man" to the other man. 

Henry,

I followed the entirety of the discussion on Marxline in which Mark J. article was the focal point and your reply's also.  Mark J.'s presentation contains an "element" of "less" while arguing against "less" in favor of that, which is called more rational. 

On the other hand I tend to agree with your assessment of what was once called Soviet Revisionism and crystallized in documents like "On Khrushchevâs Phony Communism and It's Lessons For the World." This is of course a historic document, which means it cannot be applied to today. 

In other words if China today does not embark - as it has been doing for 20 years, on a crash program to modernize its economy, the social process will be set back another century. Modernization for a previously colonial country is not possible without foreign capital and technological transfer. Americans "forget" that is manufacturing processes came from - oftern stolen, from England. 

Then again, I have had an opportunity to be elected a leader and measure my particular theoretical projection against the mass conception of value. One must deliver the goods or good home. Relations between states are - as you state, more practical. 

My argument is simple: the injection into the production process of advanced robotics, computerization and digitalized processes places the value form under attack in a fundamental way. I do not know how the outcome will look.

In terms of your farmers and those two chicken. What happens and happened when the collective farmers refuses to alienate their 300 chickens on anyone except on the basis of exchange?  There is no escape from the law of value, except at a certain stage in the development of the material power of production. We are only at the beginning of the beginning of this process. 

Peace,


Melvin P.