Commentary: On December 2, 2011 I was excoriated by a young "conservative" named Mike, who wanted to give me a hiding for my communist views on "unregulated" capitalism. He called me or more precisely my views "ridiculous" I'll let you decide who is ridiculous. His tirade was quite lengthy so I am publishing my response in 9 parts as "A series of letters from Left to Right: Dear Mike Since his attack was full of vitriol I have taken off the gloves as I see no point of entertaining his bombastic rhetoric. Parts 5-9 are in-response to the object of his real distain—my post called "Adam Smith Re-examined."
I have color coded my blog post that he critiqued in red—his critique in blue—and my response to his critique in black.
This is Part
6 "A Series of Letters from the Left to the Right: Dear MikeOn the Causes and Nature of Rebellion
The current plutocratic class are waging a dangerous war that they cannot win by economic subjugation—sheer numerical superiority will win out as it has countless times before in human history—the French Revolution and our own revolution were violent reactions to the masses being repressed by the ruling class.
The French Revolution was a bunch of anarchists and wanna-be tyrants seizing an opportunity to commit mass murder and subjugate a people. Fortunately, the movement collapsed when people got sick of the bloodshed, but their revolution was nothing like our own.
Let them eat cake ! Off with their heads!
Yea there was no thought given to the grinding poverty and oppression by those wanna be tyrants. Nothing ever came out of French Enlightenment and French Revolution—that was worth a shit like say: François-Marie Arouet — 21 November 1694 – 30 May 1778), better known by the his nome de plume Voltaire, a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state. Voltaire was a prolific writer, producing works in almost every literary form, including plays, poetry, novels, essays, and historical and scientific works. He wrote more than 20,000 letters and more than 2,000 books and pamphlets. He was an outspoken supporter of social reform, despite strict censorship laws with harsh penalties for those who broke them. Source: Wikipedia
Voltaire was one of several Enlightenment figures (along with Montesquieu, John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Émilie du Châtelet) whose works and ideas influenced important thinkers of both the American and French Revolutions. Voltaire Famously wrote, "I may disagree with your views, but, I will defend with my life, your right to express them." a line that was quoted so frequently by Americans of the day that many American's think that an American wrote it. Source: Wikipedia
Or, Jean-Jacques Rousseau's who's social contract theory states that governments draw their power from the governed, its 'sovereign' people (usually a certain ethnic group, and the state's limits are legitimated theoretically as that people's lands, although that is often not, rarely exactly, the case), that no person should have absolute power, and that a legitimate state is one which meets the needs and wishes of its citizens. These include security, peace, economic development and the resolution of conflict. Also, the social contract requires that an individual gives up some of his natural rights in order to maintain social order via the rule of law. Eventually, the divine right of kings fell out of favor and this idea ascended; it formed the basis for modern democracy, (including our Declaration of Independence) Source: Wikipedia
Which were (also) the foundation for French the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen which was adopted 26 August 1789[1], by the National Constituent Assembly (Assemblée nationale constituante), during the period of the French Revolution, as the first step toward writing a constitution for France. It was prepared and proposed by the Marquis de Lafayette.[2] A second and lengthier declaration, known as the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen of 1793 was later adopted. Source: Wikipedia
The concepts in the Declaration of the Rights of Man—come from the philosophical and political principles of the Age of Enlightenment, such as individualism, the social contract as theorized by the French philosopher Rousseau, and the separation of powers espoused by the Baron de Montesquieu. As can be seen in the texts, the French declaration is heavily influenced by the political philosophy of the Enlightenment, and by Enlightenment principles of human rights, some of which it shares with the U.S. Declaration of Independence which preceded it (4 July 1776). Thomas Jefferson, primary author of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, was at the time in France as a U.S. diplomat,[3] and was in correspondence with members of the French National Constituent Assembly. James Madison's proposal for a U.S. Bill of Rights was adopted by the U.S. House of Representatives on 21 August 1789.[4][5] Source: Wikipedia
I am a bit fuzzy on American history but, didn't they send some dude named Lafayette**—who went to war for us—help blockade Cornwallis at Yorktown—which was the final nail in decisive battle of the Revolutionary War.
Yea—other than that man, those French—what a bunch of losers. Yea I am totally with you there Mike. Frickn' French anarchist!
**In the American Revolution, Lafayette served as a major-general in the Continental Army under George Washington. Wounded during the Battle of Brandywine, he still managed to organize a successful retreat. He served with distinction in the Battle of Rhode Island. In the middle of the war he returned to France to negotiate an increase in French support. On his return, he blocked troops led by Cornwallis at Yorktown while the armies of Washington and those sent by King Louis XVI under the command of General de Rochambeau, Admiral de Grasse, and Admiral de Latouche Tréville prepared for battle against the British. Source: Wikipedia
But like you said: but their revolution was nothing like our own.
Ya we all all sang Yankee Doodle and got along just fine.
Nobody got hurt during "our Revolution". People weren't hunted down tarred feather and burned alive, hung, without trial and left to rot as a warning, shot, hacked to death or murdered—out of shear hatred. Loyalist American's didn't butcher Patriot Americans or vise versa. There was no blood feuds between the two. There was no blood lust at all—which is why it has been described by historians as America's first Civil War! Not to mention the real Civil War over the question of slavery that erupted into a bloody rebellion—killing 620,000 or 2% of the population at the time [Today that would be the equivalent of 6.25 million people]—over the issue of subjugation of a whole class of humans*.How many people got killed during the Reign of Terror again—40,000 maybe 50,000? Ya what a blood thirsty bunch of wanna be anarchists.
To quote you: "Fortunately, the movement collapsed when people got sick of the bloodshed."
*I am sorry they were only three quarters human.
And like you say—our Revolution has evolved way better than theirs. We were way more "enlightened" and evolved—ya, we mass murdered 2-3 million American Indians to steal their land and exploit its natural resources. And—now we get to elect our wanna be dictators and tyrants—a "small" government controlled by a few rich capitalists who buy every pre-selected congressman they can. Throw in some well paid jack booted storm troopers to keep those Occupy leeches in line, kind of like Syria or Libya—you can barely tell the difference when you watch on TV. Ya then we undermined the fourth amendment with illegal eavesdropping to cast a wide net—called it "the war on terrorism" to scare the shit out of the easily duped** to toe the party line—we called torture "enhanced interrogation", held people indefinitely without trials—screw habeas corpus—whatever that means. Now we just gotta start getting rid of people who aren't like us, we'll have marginalize them—call them names like: socialist, communists, liberals, the leeches, the mentally retarded, queers, fags, anyone with weird religious beliefs—you know all those evil inferior mud people... Ya we are way, way, way better!
On the other hand having lived a long as I have it sounds a lot like the makings of fascism to me. Or as Mussolini called it Corporatism.
But then we tried that already—it didn't work out very well for 26 million people.
To quote someone who understood the vagaries of human nature: **"Why of course the people don't want war ... But after all it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship ... Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country." - Hermann Goering, Nazi leader.
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