Balkinization: George Bush and the revival of Marxism 101

Comments:

Professor Levinson: do I hear a revival of Marxism in the wings?

God, I hope not. It's not like Marx has a corner on the analysis of economic choke points or systems theory. But he and his do seem to have a corner on nonsensical forumlae in which captial always shows a profit on labor's exploitation; basically Marx was the kind of guy who would divide by zero. If all we have to oppose the rapacious evil of PNAC is Marxism then I am left with no hope at all.

What Marx on the one side, and Posner, Coase and the rest of the Chicago school on the other side, all fail to treat is non-economic value; value-as-a-verb. There's a lot more to life than accumulating money or goods or power; wealth is not measured in such things. Similarly, you can never enslave a free man, you can only kill him. Granting ascendancy to accumulation of money, goods, and power fits the "might makes right" value system of the Social Darwinists, and it seems Marxist thought as well. Thankfully Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness are not tied to such material trivialities; thankfully those are the values and criteria we are supposed to be pursuing.

# posted by

Robert Link : 2:46 PM

The analogy between Iranian (et al) oil and Chinese Treasury holdings is flawed.

The oil example is akin to a large real estate owner debating whether to sell his home today or tomorrow in order to maximize his profit and/or market power.

The China example is akin to that same real estate owner buying real estate for $100 million and then selling it for $50 million to "collapse" the real estate market.

If the Chinese sell their holdings -- at a huge loss -- then who do you think the buyers will be? For the most part, it will be us.

If the Chinese want to be idiot investors -- first by loaning us money at ridiculously low interest rates and then by selling the debt back to us at a huge loss -- then I say let them.

# posted by

KipEsquire : 4:00 PM

I certainly hear a revival of puerile economic analysis from law professors who don't know what they're talking about. Why don't you take a deep breath, sit down, and ask yourself: "Why did the U.S. economy so dramatically outperform the Soviet economy during the 80s that the latter collapsed? Why didn't any of the people I hang out with see anything of the sort coming? How can we have such high LSAT scores and be so ignorant?" When you have the answers to those questions ready, you can post again on economic topics.

# posted by

sean : 8:39 PM

Yeah, the Chinese aren't going to sell back America at 50 cents on the dollar. 50 Cents on the Euro, that's a different question....

What would a cogent economic policy look like in the age of globalization? I take it that visions of autonomy--whether sketched by Pat Buchanan or Ralph Nader--are increasingly untenable.

It can't be assumed that globalization as we know it now will survive peak oil and natural resource depletion. That's going to pit corporation against citizen and some of us against the other 6 billion. We're going to want local and community control over resources. That could be feudalism or democracy, I guess.

One of the reasons, BTW, we "outperformed" the Soviet Union in 80s was our use of the oil weapon. Destroyed is more the word comes to mind.

# posted by

dryki : 9:37 PM

I believe it wa Greg Mankiw that refuted that argument (but, I could be wrong). The point was though that China cannot wreck our economy without destroying its own.

Its a simple as this, China only survives as it does because of its exports. The US is its largest market. A buyer the size of the US is not fungible. There simply is no one who could pick up the slack from the US. China has no interest in seeing our economy fail. Best case for China is economic MAD.

Many others argue persuasively that China is actually much more vulnerable than we are in such a situation. Basically, any damage to our economy and currency by China causes much more damage to their own economy. This is due to two factors: the requirement for exports and the smaller size of their economy. So, it is very likely that even if they tried, it would destroy their economy, while we had a recession or the like.

So, sorry, but you have nothing to fear.

# posted by

humblelawstudent : 10:40 PM

This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

# posted by

humblelawstudent : 10:58 PM

Robert,

I would still love to hear an explanation about what is "evil" in PNAC's statement of principles that you linked to a few posts back.

We all know that the Jew Neocons all control PNAC which is only a front for their attempt at world domination, but I'm just curious how it shows up in their "statement of principles." Please enlighten me.

# posted by

humblelawstudent : 11:02 PM

But Bush's admission that the US is in fact vulnerable to those who control the means of production and/or the finance capital necessary to maintain a capitalist system (do I hear a revival of Marxism in the wings?)

Actually, U.S. opposition to Hugo Chavez and Iran has been on this basis for some time. It will be a part of the 2008 campaign.

# posted by

Mortimer Brezny : 6:38 AM

This thread has a Looking Glass quality to it. The "criticisms" of Prof. Levinson by Sean and HLS don't actually criticise anything Prof. Levinson said. Instead, they criticise the implicit position of Bush which Prof. Levinson is himself questioning.

Take, for instance, this "criticism" by HLS:

"Basically, any damage to our economy and currency by China causes much more damage to their own economy. This is due to two factors: the requirement for exports and the smaller size of their economy. So, it is very likely that even if they tried, it would destroy their economy, while we had a recession or the like.

So, sorry, but you have nothing to fear."

But Prof. Levinson already made the exact same point:

"Presumably they [China] don't do that in part because it would harm their own economy (and, of course, they are hindered by being such a strong holder of dollars that could not, in fact, be sold overnight)."

The point being made in the original post is that Bush himself is the one acting as if these implausible economic events were likely. It's Bush himself who said, "And then you can imagine them [Iranians] saying, 'We're going to pull a bunch of oil off the market to run your price of oil up unless you do the following. And the following would be along the lines of, well, 'Retreat and let us continue to expand our dark vision.'"

It was Bush himself whose comment implicitly asserts "that the US is in fact vulnerable to those who control the means of production and/or the finance capital necessary to maintain a capitalist system".

The whole point of the post was to criticise this silly statement by Bush. And the conclusion asks for a serious discussion of the economic issue precisely because we can't take Bush as having a serious position on it (as demonstrated by his idiotic comment quoted above).

# posted by

Mark Field : 11:26 AM

Mark,

You're wrong (or partially so) and here is why.

I took Sandy's point, but I think he is wrong. Iran has already threatened to use oil as a weapon. China, to my knowledge, has not made any threats of large scale economic warfare.

From what we know of China, they are hardly ideological anymore (compared to 30-40 years ago) Their biggest ideology is maintaining the power of the Communist party - themselves. We assume, reasonably, that they will act rationally to further that goal. Destroying America's economy only hurts the one thing that keeps them in power - their ability to continue economic growth.

Iran's leadership has shown to be able to maintain power regardless of the economic situation. Plus, they seem more likely to inflict economic damage even at their own expense - this isn't the same with China.

Sandy was trying to say Bush that is (or should be) worrying about China, if Iran is a threat (despite, the little sentence he puts in about the difficulty China would have in hurting us). But, his comparison is flawed, because China is faced with an entirely different set of incentives and has largely different goals than Iran, so his comparison doesn't say much.

Bush's quote, as follows, makes perfect sense in the context I outlined "You can imagine a world in which these extremists and radicals got control of energy resources," he said at a rally here Saturday for Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-Colo.). "And then you can imagine them saying, 'We're going to pull a bunch of oil off the market to run your price of oil up unless you do the following. And the following would be along the lines of, well, 'Retreat and let us continue to expand our dark vision.' "

# posted by

humblelawstudent : 11:55 AM

HLS, I don't read it that way. The way I read it, Prof. Levinson says (1) Bush made a silly statement, and (2) here are some other consequences of that statement if it were true; since those consequences don't follow, that re-emphasizes the silliness of the original statement.

In this reading, the reference to China is not a prediction or a caution, it is simply taking Bush's statement regarding Iran and applying its consequences (in relevant form) to another country.

Personally, I'm not very worried that either Iran or China will behave in the feared way. I also think, though, that it makes sense to hedge against either/both scenarios.

# posted by

Mark Field : 1:27 PM

Mark,

Okay, fair enough. It was how I took Sandy, but your reading makes sense. Even assuming what you say is true, I still have a quibble. The entire Bush quote eliminates China - the attributes he mentions don't really apply as well to China as to Iran. And it is hard to extend his quote by analogy to the economic terror China could bring. I think you have to generalize Bush's quote far too much to make it work for China - which hardly makes it fair then to criticize Bush for being stupid, IMO.

# posted by

humblelawstudent : 7:07 PM

I would worry a great deal more about radicals and extremists getting ahold of energy resources, selling them for whatever the market will bear, and using the profits to buy arms.

# posted by

Essayist-Laywer : 7:58 PM

Professor Levinson: I assure you I mean this as a genuine question. Are we likely to hear a serious discussion of this in the runup to 2008 from any mainstream Republicans or Democrats?

Not a chance; neither can afford the risk of losing votes to such hi-falutin' nonsense. But maybe we can get some such here? The question, in case folks missed it, was: What would a cogent economic policy look like in the age of globalization?

Part of the answer depends on just what is meant by "globalization." Seems the GOP tends to view it as a gloss for the privilege of dumping goods that can't be sold domestically, and likewise getting labor for rates that can't be had domestically. Others of a more liberal bent tend to view it as a gloss for recognition that pissing downstream from my camp is still upstream from my neighbor's. So we find ourselves again on the horns of a semantic dilemma; the first battle of *this* war will be to determine for which "globalization" we fight.

# posted by

Robert Link : 9:21 PM

psittakos: December crude is about $59, which really is not terribly expensive. If you're worried about global warming, it's too cheap.

Excellent point; applies equally to matters of finite resource allocation...

# posted by

Robert Link : 9:27 PM

@Robert: isn't it a much prettier world without Bart? Everyone can dissapear him.

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