Friday, November 21, 2008
Lenin vs Obama
Lenin and Obama have many of the same ideas in regards to creating equality and the oppression of workers which is demonstrated through Lenin's the Dictatorship of the Proletariat. However, Lenin's goal to abolish the state completely directly conflicts with Obama's role as president. Even though their views are very similar, their ultimate goals do not coincide.
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In regards to Obama’s victory, Lenin would agree with many suggestions and promises Obama makes. Lenin, a bit more extreme than Obama, strongly believes in equality and enforcing communistic ideals such as realizing the need for change due to class antagonisms. Lenin would approve of Obama’s promise for larger tax cuts on middle class and oppressing class struggle through universal health care and other workers’ benefits. Lenin’s similar views are demonstrated through the Dictatorship of the Proletariat.
In the Dictatorship of the Proletariat, Lenin designs to eliminate capitalist exploitation and has every person receiving a workman’s wage. Obama’s similar idea is cutting taxes for the middle and lower class but increase taxes for the very wealthy. With the excess money from the upper class, Obama plans to distribute it among the middle and lower class creating more “equality.” Obama’s method is a bit more unfair than Lenin’s because of his modern day Robin Hood technique instead of creating a universal wage. However, Lenin is also unfair through his allowance of the bourgeois right. In the Dictatorship of the Proletariat, Lenin plans to distribute wealth according to the amount of work completed creating a bourgeois right whereas Obama just takes people’s money and gives it to people who do not make as much (377).
Even though Obama and Lenin have similar views, Lenin would say that because of this capitalistic society, Obama only deceives the people into believing that they have power through their ability to elect him (342). This power of the people mystifies the thousand threads that connect the state to the bourgeoisie. These threads also protect capitalist democracy by providing freedom and space to organize class struggle. Lenin expects these threads to be indestructible through non violent force and therefore must be abolished which would be highly unlikely under the rule of Obama considering he is a part of the state. This one factor alone will cause Lenin to ultimately disprove Obama’s overall authoritarian position. Conflict of interest would arise due to Lenin’s essential goal to completely abolish the state. Abolishment of the state would mean ridding of Obama due to his capitalist ties and his participation in the thousand threads.
Lenin’s views are very extreme. For one, he believes that in the Dictatorship of the Proletariat workers need to be armed and the military needs to be abolished (382). Obama would not agree with this statement due to his intentions of continuing the war in Iraq. However, Lenin and Obama alike want to enforce a society where all officials are elected but subject to recall.
I think Lenin tries to take excessive measures that are unrealistic by aiming to completely abolish the state. It seems to be such a far reaching goal that no one is capable of accomplishing. Destroying the thousand threads seems nearly impossible. I think Obama’s ideas are a much better way to start than through Lenin’s idea being a revolution.
I really enjoyed reading your paper Morgan. I agree that Lenin is too extreme. His ideal of dissolving the thousand threads that unite the state and the capitalist class does seem "nearly impossible."
Furthermore, I think that the dictatorship of the proletariat is not the answer to capitalism as it will lead to more violence and you're right no one is capable of accomplishing it unless it be a brute dictator who crushes everyone in their path. Which we have seen and truthfully this does not seem like the answer to our problems.
Great paper. :-D
I like how you actually critique Lenin's overall theory as being "too extreme." However, something of Lenin's that I would use to question your argument would be the amount of change he could make under a capitalistic parliamentary-democracy system that put him into power.
Lenin says that this system acts as a shell for the capitalists because it gives people the illusion that they have power, when in reality, they don't do anything. Even more so, what really only happens is a "talking shop" where a lot is said, but nothing really happens to the system in general.
So would these promises of equality, lowering taxes, etc truly be for the working man and an attempt to push that class up? Or is it simply a way to appease the masses without really doing anything, which would exemplify "mystifying" those thousand threads?
If you take a look at Obama himself, he really does not come from the typical working class - has an ivy league education, and has done many things and has attained positions of power that may question what class he really belongs to and what class he is working for.
Just food for thought. Again, I do really like how you question Lenin's theory overall, if its valid (or invalid).
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