http://www.socialismconference.org/

Such talk is dangerous to any new people interested in socialism. I've encountered this vile site being advertised several times in the past few days.

This even is being sponsored by the International Socialist Organization, the ISO.They claim to be Trotskyist which is an utter lie. They hold the view that the Soviet Union and all the other "socialist" countries were "state capitalist" which is in direct opposition to the Trotskyist theory of "degenerated workers states".

I could go on as to why state capitalist is incorrect regarding the Soviet Union, but that's something minor compared to the other drivel they have.

They have more in common with the Democratic Party than any orthodox Marxist organization.

"The world economic crisis has shattered the free-market consensus that has dominated politics for the last generation. Meanwhile, the end of the conservative era and the election of the first African American president have raised expectations among working people that long overdue change is at hand. With capitalism in crisis, even some in the mainstream media are admitting that Karl Marx was right."

Conservative era is over just because the new President has a different skin color? Obama was the preferred candidate of Wall Street and his staff is made up of criminals from the former Bush and Clinton administrations. There is no long overdue change at hand and there never will be. As for the mainstream media admitting "Karl Marx was right". That is drivel and nonsense. Only few European outlets have voiced such an opinion.

Already on main page, in one paragraph they have lied to you.

"That’s the purpose that Socialism 2009—expanded to two sites this year—has set for itself. Gather with activists from around the world to take part in dozens of discussions about changing the world: How can we end racism? What kind of organization do we need? What would a future socialist society look like?"

All of these questions have been answered over 100 years ago by men and women 100 times more dedicated and more intelligent than these buffoons.

Let's look at some of their speakers.

"Laura Flanders on prospects for progressives in the Obama era

Laura is the host of GRITtv the new, daily, news-discussion and take action program seen on Free Speech TV (Dish Network ch. 9415) and online at the popular blog site Firedoglake.com as well as at GRITtv.org. She also serves as the host of RadioNation, the nationally-syndicated weekly radio program of the Nation Magazine.

Laura is also the author of Blue Grit: True Democrats Take Back Politics from the Politicians."

Summary of said book:
"Blue Grit is a clarion call to progressive voters looking for a new direction. While many pundits continue to argue that the Democratic Party must race to the center in a desperate attempt to win back the White House, Flanders offers a compelling analysis of the strength of the modern progressive movement in America, showing us that the Democratic Party must not abandon its core progressive values and ideals, but capitalize on them to win."

Is this meeting a discussion on socialism or how to get inside the Democratic Party and try to lead it to a "progressive path"?

"Christian Parenti on Afghanistan

Christian is a correspondent for the Nation and is author of The Freedom: Shadows and Hallucinations in Occupied Iraq."

"Dave Zirin on sports and resistance.

Dave Zirin, Press Action's 2005 and 2006 Sportswriter of the Year, has been called by Robert Lipsyte "the best sportswriter in the United States." He writes about sports for the Nation Magazine, their first sports writer in 150 years of existence."

Interesting. Cluless idiots from The Nation. What is The Nation? A progressive liberal newspaper. Complete and utter drivel. The kind of simple-minded reformist nonsense that one would encounter on similar sites like Democracy Now and Common Dreams.

Another absolute vile and disgusting political perversion. For the ISO and this conference, socialism is synonymous with progressive bourgeois liberalism. How interesting.

The sad part is that there are always new people being introduced and becoming interested in socialism. And unfortunately they get their entire education from pathetic, pitiful, liars such as these.

Marx and Engels, the founders of scientific socialism, have stated that socialism will never occur from parliamentary bourgeois politics. Promoting, campaigning, voting, etc. All of that is nonsense. You must use what limited freedoms you have in a bourgeois democratic society. You can and should promote your party and it's principles. But you do not waste your foolish time on running for office because every bourgeois democratic state is structured in such a way that makes it impossible for change to ever occur using the powerless ballot.

For Chavez, he's been in power for what? 10 years now?

And he keeps abolishing term limits, swinging/rigging elections, among other things. He's another Lukashenko except nicer. He's a populist power-hungry reformer and the only thing that makes his power semi-legitimate are his reforms. Some people actually do like him and respect him which only make the rigging of elections not-so-obvious.

Don't get me wrong, there have been gains in his 10 years of rule but none of them were big. Bolshevik Russia achieved more gains in 4 years during civil war, an international blockade which prevented food and medicine from coming in, 14 imperialist armies invading them, bankruptcy, huge loss of territory, huge loss of lives, and huge destruction of everything.

In 10 years of Chavez rule all during peacetime, what has been accomplished? Him making a complete ass out of himself on an international scale by making silly speeches, supporting Saddam Hussein and Robert Mugabe, supporting Iran's nuclear power program, and comparing George Bush to the devil in front of the United Nations.

What kind of a socialist believes in god?

In Trotsky's memoirs of Lenin, he recalled that in their exile in London they attended a British socialist meeting that was held in a church. In between fiery revolutionary speeches they sang hymns of God and said other.... questionable things. Lenin turned to Trotsky and told him that these people will never be able to make a revolution. Socialism infused with religion, racism, and/or sexism will never succeed.

I'm not an expert of Latin American politics, and to be honest I don't spend my time reading up on the things Chavez and Morales are doing because I don't care. They're not socialists. It's simple as that. Chavez is as much of a socialist as is Fidel Castro, the man he looks up to. Castro is as much of a socialist as Stalin. He is, in fact, the Cuban version of Stalin.

The biggest problem with Morales and Chavez is the form of government. It is the same as in any other bourgeois democratic republic. Venezuela is split into 3 branches just like here in America.

This is a huge problem.

Socialism is not supposed, and it cannot, function under a bourgeois democratic form of government. Bourgeois democracy is no longer progressive. It simply cannot offer anything better. It just can't. Bourgeois democracy and capitalism have been incredibly progressive and were a necessary stage of society to overthrow the backward medievalist feudal society. Rights, liberties, society, industrialization, technology, everything has progressed massively once bourgeois democracy and capitalism has been put to place. But it just cannot offer anything more. It can only raise the minimum wage to a certain amount. It can only offer so many limited services. It may or may not provide free health care. Why? What is the incentive for it? The bourgeois prospers through goods and services through corporations, not goods and services of the state.

Morales and Chavez got lucky that they were democratically elected.

But they will never be able to offer socialism unless they are willing to do away with power and with Chavez constantly doing away with term limits, it doesn't look like it.

Marx and Engels wrote that the proletariat is supposed to smash not seize bourgeois state power. Afterwards the proletariat creates a temporary state, the period of transition known as socialism, which as Engels wrote many times is no longer a state in the modern sense of the word. The word state has so many different meanings and interpretations to it. Most agree that state refers to bourgeois republics and everything prior to them, including kingdoms and principalities, aren't considered to be states.

Socialism means the democratic control of society by the working class. The working class is not in control in Bolivia or Venezuela. They are duped. They elect petty-bourgeois officials and legislatures. Capitalist Ministers. Trade union bureaucrats.

The type of government that is supposed to function under socialism according to Marx and Engels was the Paris Commune type. The only "socialist" republic to ever mimic the true socialist form of government was Bolshevik Russia under the guidance of Lenin.

Marx said "The commune was to be a working, not a parliamentary, body, executive, and legislative at the same time."  You do not have several branches of government. You do not have separation of powers. There is no need for it and it cannot allow it. It is the dictatorship of the proletariat. Bourgeois democracy allows opponents. It allows opposition. I guarantee that within 10-15 years Morales or Chavez so called tamed socialism will be done away with or overthrown. All you have to do is get a charismatic guy and finance his campaign. I'm sure America is thinking of it as we speak.

Under the dictatorship of the proletariat, the state merely becomes "an administration of things" as Engels has said. Everyone is elected from the bottom up. Elected officials can be recalled at any time and only receive the wages of an average workman. The workers are in complete control of the government. This is the key difference between  the types of governments Morales and Chavez have and an even bigger different than the deformed workers states of Cuba, China, North Korea, Vietnam, Laos, and post-Lenin Soviet Union.

There is no longer a police or a standing army. Instead the entire state is a group of armed workers ready to crush the counter-revolution that the bourgeoisie and their lackeys are plotting.

Modern democracy is the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.

Proletarian democracy is the dictatorship of the proletariat.

"This means replacing what in fact is the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie (a dictatorship hypocritically cloaked in the forms of the democratic bourgeois republic) by the dictatorship of the proletariat. This means replacing democracy for the rich by democracy for the poor. This means replacing freedom of assembly and the press for the minority, for the exploiters, by freedom of assembly and the press for the  majority  of the population, for the working people. This means a gigantic, world historic  extension  of democracy, its transformation from falsehood into truth, the liberation of humanity from the shackles of capital, which  distorts  and truncates any, even the most "democratic" and republican,  bourgeois  democracy. This means replacing the bourgeois state with the  proletarian  state, a replacement that is the sole way the state can eventually wither away altogether. "
- Vladimir Lenin, "Democracy" and Dictatorship

While eBay has almost all the used games that I'm interested in, they do not have the literature.

I just ordered the Collected Works of Vladimir Lenin Volume 14 for $15 along with The Collected Works of Marx and Engels Volume 5 also for $15.

Frankly, I've been running out of reading material. I bought 4 volumes of Mao Zedong along with a volume of Ho Chi Minh last year when I was going through my short pseudo-Maoist phase. After reading some of his works, I realized that Mao's ideas were completely different than those of Lenin's or Marx's. Completely. In every shape and form.

I also purchased the 3 volume set of Lenin's Selected Works. I've read the most important works in those 3 books. My volume 1 of Trotsky's History of the Russian Revolution is an ancient copy that I received as a gift from a professor and it's in poor condition so I can't carry that with me to college and read in my free time because it's falling apart. I also have Victor Serge's Year One of the Russian Revolution but I've read most of Trotsky's volume 1 of the Russian Revolution and I'd prefer to enhance my understanding of Marxism in all it's complex concepts and scientific facts.

I could continue and finish reading the other material in those 3 volumes of Lenin's Selected Works but they're not that major and I'd prefer to continue reading major significant works.

So I ordered Volume 14 of the Collected Works. It is one work really. Lenin's Materialism and Empirio-Criticism: Critical Comments on a Reactionary Philosophy. It is probably Lenin's most important philosophical work and should keep me occupied for a while.

I have one final thing to say. Whenever somebody asks me for a recommendation on a Marxist work, I always direct them to Marxists.org

I strongly, strongly, strongly urge them to not go out and buy a book with a compilation of works.

For several reasons. Here they are:
1. Left-wing literature is profitable. Believe it or not, it's very profitable. It's not hard for a publishing company to slap on 3-4 works of Lenin with nothing new added in and sell it for $30. And people will unfortunately buy it. Either they don't know about Marxists.org or maybe they're new to Marxism. Whatever reason it may be. The Socialist Workers Party USA actually owns a publishing company. They charge a lot of money for works of Marx, Lenin, and Trotsky. A lot of money. Especially for Trotsky. For a 200 page book, they'll charge you $25 + shipping. They even went as far as suing Marxists.org for publishing Trotsky's writings for free. It's true. The party is a revisionist party that has abandoned socialism and embraced Fidel Castro 30 years ago. The party leaders are a couple who own the publishing house. Last year they sold their condo in Manhattan for $2 million dollars. Their publishing company is Pathfinder Press. Stay away from it.

2. a. Editors. You cannot trust the editors. Firstly, there is a parasite that has been going around ever since Engels died. This parasite is known as Social Democracy aka democratic socialism. Over time, social democrats have taken Marx out of Marxism. It is no longer Marxism and this is why I call democratic socialism bourgeois socialism. That is fact. Social democrats decided to ignore and forget about 3/4ths of Marx's literature and focus on a few of his early philosophical works. They believe in reforming capitalism through peaceful "democratic" means. They may be socialists in words, but in deeds they are simply capitalist ministers. This is why the Russian Social Democratic Party of Labour split in 1903 into the Bolshevik and Menshevik camps. Mensheviks believed in parliamentarism, an open party that anybody can join, and later defending their country in WW1. They ignored what Marx wrote about how socialist society is meant to function in his works concerning The Paris Commune. Lenin did not. Socialist Party USA is one of these social democratic organizations.

b. Liberal editors. Liberals could publish some stuff, take it out of context, and give their own incorrect biased interpretation of it. I read one compilation that compared Marxism to religion throughout.

c. Stalinists. Stalinism and Maoism are still very popular in left-wing politics. Anybody supportive of Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, North Korea, China, etc are all Stalinists. They prefer to call themselves Marxist-Leninists. If you ever see this term, steer clear of it. If these editors publish works of Marx and Lenin, they will purposely take things out of context to somehow justify or give a positive image of Stalin, Mao, and Castro. Yes, Engel's wrote a short article called On Authority. If you take a few sentences out of the last paragraph out of context, anybody could justify mass murder.

That is why I recommend Marxists.org whenever somebody asks me. I learned the hard way.

But I can't always sit in front of a computer and read. It's uncomfortable and you could easily lose your place. I commute a lot and therefore do not feel like printing out dozens and dozens of pages This is why for a while now I've only been purchasing the official works.

Firstly, these books have been out of print for a long period of time. The only people who sell them are people cleaning out their house or a small bookstore. I'm not talking about a massive corporation like Barnes & Noble. I'm talking about a small business, and there is nothing wrong with a small business. Secondly, because it's used it's cheap. You get more for your money by purchasing an edition that is part of the Collected or Selected Works. A $15 collected work will feature more information than a $30 liberal bastardization ever will. Thirdly, you yourself can interpret the text only if you are smart and ignore the Stalinist editors. Most of these were published by the Soviet Union's international publishing organization known as Progress Publishers. The text is unchanged. The editions are practically all the same with the only difference being anti-something propaganda because this person or thing was at-the-time the "enemy" of the Soviet state. Ignore the preface, ignore the footnotes that weren't written by the original author, and ignore the minor biographical sketches in the back and you're good to go. These are the same versions that Marxists.org put up on their site.

These are the best translations and the best versions you will ever find. And because you are ignoring the Stalinist drivel included as propaganda, you are then left to your own interpretation. You don't have a filthy social democrat telling you Marx believed in evolution not revolution. You don't have a "Marxist-Leninist" justifying Stalin's mass murder. And you don't have a liberal taking things out of context trying to incorrectly prove that communism is a silly utopia.

From Leon Trotsky's Letter to the Bureau of Party History:
http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1937/ssf/sf06.htm

In all those very few – questions upon which Stalin has attempted to occupy an independent position, or has merely given, without the immediate direction of Lenin, his own answer upon major issues, he has always and invariably, and so to speak, organically, occupied an opportunist position.

The struggle of Lenin against Menshevism, against Vperyodism [31] and Conciliationism, Stalin denounced from exile as an émigré "tempest in a teapot" (cf., Zarya Vostoka, Dec. 23, 1925).

No other political documents as to the form of Stalin's thoughts up to 1917 exist, as far as I know, except for a number of more or less correct but schoolboy articles on the national question.

The independent position of Stalin (prior to the arrival of Lenin) at the beginning of the February revolution was opportunist through and through.

The independent position of Stalin in relation to the German revolution of 1923 was wholly saturated with tail-endism and conciliationism.

The independent position of Stalin on the problems of the Chinese revolution is nothing but a cheap edition of Martinov's Menshevism of 1903 to 1905.

The independent position of Stalin on the problems of the British labor movement is a Centrist capitulation to Menshevism. [32]

You can juggle quotations, hide the stenographic reports of your own speeches, forbid the circulation of Lenin's letters and articles, fabricate yards of dishonestly selected quotations. You can suppress, conceal and burn up historic documents. You can extend your censorship even to photographic and moving-picture records of revolutionary events. All these things Stalin is doing. But the results do not and will not justify his expectations. Only a limited mind like Stalin's could imagine that these pitiful machinations will make men forget the gigantic events of modern history.

In the year 1918, Stalin, at the very outset of his campaign against me, found it necessary, as we have already learned, to write the following words:

"All the work of practical organization of the insurrection was carried out under the direct leadership of the Chairman of the Petrograd Soviet, comrade Trotsky. We can say with certainty that the swift passing of the garrison to the side of the Soviet and the bold execution of the work of the Military Revolutionary Committee the party owes principally and above all to comrade Trotsky." (Stalin, Pravda, Nov. 6, 1918)

With full responsibility for my words, I am now compelled to say that the cruel massacre of the Chinese proletariat and the Chinese Revolution at its three most important turning points, the strengthening of the position of the trade union agents of British imperialism after the General Strike of 1926, and, finally, the general weakening of the position of the Communist International and the Soviet Union, the party owes principally and above all to Stalin.

Take your son, your only son – yes, Isaac, whom you love so much – and go to the land of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I will point out to you. (Genesis 22:1-18)

Suppose you hear in one of the towns the LORD your God is giving you that some worthless rabble among you have led their fellow citizens astray by encouraging them to worship foreign gods. In such cases, you must examine the facts carefully. If you find it is true and can prove that such a detestable act has occurred among you, you must attack that town and completely destroy all its inhabitants, as well as all the livestock. Then you must pile all the plunder in the middle of the street and burn it. Put the entire town to the torch as a burnt offering to the LORD your God. That town must remain a ruin forever; it may never be rebuilt. Keep none of the plunder that has been set apart for destruction. Then the LORD will turn from his fierce anger and be merciful to you. He will have compassion on you and make you a great nation, just as he solemnly promised your ancestors. "The LORD your God will be merciful only if you obey him and keep all the commands I am giving you today, doing what is pleasing to him." (Deuteronomy 13:13-19 NLT)

Consecrate to me every first-born that opens the womb among Israelites, both man and beast, for it belongs to me. (Exodus 13:2)

As you approach a town to attack it, first offer its people terms for peace. If they accept your terms and open the gates to you, then all the people inside will serve you in forced labor. But if they refuse to make peace and prepare to fight, you must attack the town. When the LORD your God hands it over to you, kill every man in the town. But you may keep for yourselves all the women, children, livestock, and other plunder. You may enjoy the spoils of your enemies that the LORD your God has given you. (Deuteronomy 20:10-14)

If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father. Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her. (Deuteronomy 22:28-29 NLT)

Thus says the Lord: 'I will bring evil upon you out of your own house. I will take your wives [plural] while you live to see it, and will give them to your neighbor. He shall lie with your wives in broad daylight. You have done this deed in secret, but I will bring it about in the presence of all Israel, and with the sun looking down.'

Then David said to Nathan, "I have sinned against the Lord." Nathan answered David: "The Lord on his part has forgiven your sin: you shall not die. But since you have utterly spurned the Lord by this deed, the child born to you must surely die." (2 Samuel 12:11-14 NAB)

"When you go out to war against your enemies and the LORD, your God, delivers them into your hand, so that you take captives, if you see a comely woman among the captives and become so enamored of her that you wish to have her as wife, you may take her home to your house. But before she may live there, she must shave her head and pare her nails and lay aside her captive's garb. After she has mourned her father and mother for a full month, you may have relations with her, and you shall be her husband and she shall be your wife. However, if later on you lose your liking for her, you shall give her her freedom, if she wishes it; but you shall not sell her or enslave her, since she was married to you under compulsion." (Deuteronomy 21:10-14 NAB)

Whoever strikes his father or mother shall be put to death. (Exodus 21:15 NAB)

If one curses his father or mother, his lamp will go out at the coming of darkness. (Proverbs 20:20 NAB)

All who curse their father or mother must be put to death. They are guilty of a capital offense. (Leviticus 20:9 NLT)

"If a man lies with a male as with a women, both of them shall be put to death for their abominable deed; they have forfeited their lives." (Leviticus 20:13 NAB)

They entered into a covenant to seek the Lord, the God of their fathers, with all their heart and soul; and everyone who would not seek the Lord, the God of Israel, was to be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman. (2 Chronicles 15:12-13 NAB)

Suppose you hear in one of the towns the LORD your God is giving you that some worthless rabble among you have led their fellow citizens astray by encouraging them to worship foreign gods. In such cases, you must examine the facts carefully. If you find it is true and can prove that such a detestable act has occurred among you, you must attack that town and completely destroy all its inhabitants, as well as all the livestock. Then you must pile all the plunder in the middle of the street and burn it. Put the entire town to the torch as a burnt offering to the LORD your God. That town must remain a ruin forever; it may never be rebuilt. Keep none of the plunder that has been set apart for destruction. Then the LORD will turn from his fierce anger and be merciful to you. He will have compassion on you and make you a great nation, just as he solemnly promised your ancestors. "The LORD your God will be merciful only if you obey him and keep all the commands I am giving you today, doing what is pleasing to him." (Deuteronomy 13:13-19 NLT)

But if this charge is true (that she wasn't a virgin on her wedding night), and evidence of the girls virginity is not found, they shall bring the girl to the entrance of her fathers house and there her townsman shall stone her to death, because she committed a crime against Israel by her unchasteness in her father's house. Thus shall you purge the evil from your midst. (Deuteronomy 22:20-21 NAB)

If your own full brother, or your son or daughter, or your beloved wife, or you intimate friend, entices you secretly to serve other gods, whom you and your fathers have not known, gods of any other nations, near at hand or far away, from one end of the earth to the other: do not yield to him or listen to him, nor look with pity upon him, to spare or shield him, but kill him. Your hand shall be the first raised to slay him; the rest of the people shall join in with you. You shall stone him to death, because he sought to lead you astray from the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery. And all Israel, hearing of this, shall fear and never do such evil as this in your midst. (Deuteronomy 13:7-12 NAB)

One day a man who had an Israelite mother and an Egyptian father got into a fight with one of the Israelite men. During the fight, this son of an Israelite woman blasphemed the LORD's name. So the man was brought to Moses for judgment. His mother's name was Shelomith. She was the daughter of Dibri of the tribe of Dan. They put the man in custody until the LORD's will in the matter should become clear. Then the LORD said to Moses, "Take the blasphemer outside the camp, and tell all those who heard him to lay their hands on his head. Then let the entire community stone him to death. Say to the people of Israel: Those who blaspheme God will suffer the consequences of their guilt and be punished. Anyone who blasphemes the LORD's name must be stoned to death by the whole community of Israel. Any Israelite or foreigner among you who blasphemes the LORD's name will surely die. (Leviticus 24:10-16 NLT)

WHO'S YOUR GOD NOW?