by

Michael Parenti: Capitalism and Empire

with Michael Parenti
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
Michael Parenti Blog
www.michaelparenti.org
May 4, 2012

Anti-cuts March

Image by quisnovus via Flickr

by Diane G
Wild Wild Left Radio
www.blogtalkradio.com
May 4, 2012

Tonight I have the honor of speaking to another of our generations brightest and best, the genius of Michael Parenti.

A true visionary, Parenti has been working tirelessly for decades to break the paradigm of political orthodoxy and bring us to a clearer vision of the realities we face under Capitalism and Empire.

[…]

via Wild Wild Left Radio 151 Michael Parenti Interview 05/04 by Diane G | Blog Talk Radio
(Note: starts at 26-28 minutes in.)

Michael Parenti’s most recent books are The Culture Struggle (2006), Contrary Notions: The Michael Parenti Reader (2007), God and His Demons (2010), Democracy for the Few (9th ed. 2011), and The Face of Imperialism (2011). For further information about his work, visit his website: www.michaelparenti.org.

see

Chris Hedges’ talk May Day at OWS: Overthrow the Corporate State!

May Day Protests Around the World + Thousands join May Day march for workers rights in New York

from the archives:

Stalin, The Poet and Life’s Choices by Gaither Stewart

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10 thoughts on “Michael Parenti: Capitalism and Empire”

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  5. Writers have written for decades even centuries on political corruption.
    The courage and artistic ability of crusading authors is admirable.
    The achievements of such writings might be reviewed. How many wars were prevented how much abuse of power was curtailed by endless streams of eloquent critique?
    There may be a chasm between intellectual community of authors sending messages to the converted (within a small grouping of like minded writers) and the broad democratic process.
    Where is the connect with the decision makers?
    Of interest would be how many authors such as wrote on Dandelion Salad are to be discovered on the Oxbridge Library shelves or on any syllabus in Ivey league halls.
    There may be a cult of the righteous so introverted that the discussion circles only their own camp fires.
    Theirs is an isolation of self adulation and opportunity for influence and change is and has been lost.
    There are democratic practices of influencing decision making other than individual writings.

  6. I don’t understand how he can defend Stalin. Unless everything I understand about the Gulag system is wrong.

    • I think he is saying that Stalin, while not “good” isn’t “bad” like Hitler. “Good” and “bad” being not the best words to use, but for lack of other words explains it briefly.

      Here’s an older piece by one of my other writers:

      […] Most certainly Stalin, whose positive accomplishments survive, should not be classed with Hitler, whose counter-revolution destroyed his own nation in a delirium of madness and whose social agenda, from the start, was reactionary, racist and ignoble. Though Stalin like Hitler was ruthless in eliminating opposition and built a totalitarian state, he succeeded in creating a new social order and, at an enormous price, made a modern nation of what had been labeled a country of savages. Moreover, while Hitler was engaged in all his Aryan gibberish, Stalin’s goal, however distorted by Stalin the dictator, was and remained the birth of a new society based on equality. Social justice. Surely even in capitalistic and indoctrinated America we remember what this is about. […]

      https://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2008/08/21/stalin-the-poet-and-life%E2%80%99s-choices/

      • What a waste of time and intellect …that humans should degrade any debate on comparisons between Stalin and Hitler.
        Degrees of barbarity and inhumanity might be compared but only by numerical computations.

      • Sounds to me like Parenti is making an ends justifies the means argument. Commit massive atrocities in the name of eliminating barbarism? That just doesn’t cut it for me.

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