Afternoon, freedom fighters

This week we discuss Session 2 of Prof Wolff’s online course Marxian Class Analysis Theory and Practice.

There’s a lot of substance here, providing a new perspective to the economic crisis we are currently drowning in. It’s certainly more realistic that what we hear from politicians, pundits and run-of-the-mill economists, Krugman included. I can’t resist saying that TheBenBernanke is no more knowledgeable or honest than Allen Greenspan, super cheerleader of Randian economics.

Did this session open any eyes or answer any questions you may have had?

I also recommend watching Prof Wolff’s talk at City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco in early September. (1 hr, 40 min)

Have at it.

Session 3 next week.

Welcome to the discussion group on Marx’s theories on class analysis. In his usual way Prof Wolff lays out the foundation and history of class analysis in his first class. We all know the broad terms rich, poor, powerful, powerless. Wolff shows us how Marx looked at class from a different perspective. All of the sessions of this course are on one web page:

Marxian Class Analysis Theory and Practice

In all of his courses Prof Wolff talks about other works of Marx that are connected to his opus, Capital. I thought a short review of these published works might be in order. In addition to Capital and essays and articles published in various journals in the 1850s-80s, Marx wrote 3 major works in his lifetime. These books cover one or more topics in more depth than is covered in Capital.

Grundrisse, written in 1857 and was not intended to be published and indeed wasn’t until 1939. It is a collection of notebooks of Marx in his research on capitalism. It contains more in depth material on some of the topics covered in Capital. David Harvey’s course Reading Vols 2 and 3 of Capital refers to text in it. It is available through Penguin Classics.

A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy. Written in 1859 it was intended to be the first installment of a much larger work on capitalism. It was overtaken by Capital. Its sections on the history of money and theories of surplus value add depth to those topics as covered by Capital. It’s now available from Forgotten Books, either as a free ebook download or hardcopy through Amazon. Both are facsimile copies of the 1904 International Library Publishing Company edition.

Theories of Surplus Value. Written in 1861 this 3-volume work, almost as big as Capital, is Marx’s notes on portions of the theories of classical economists Adam Smith, David Ricardo and others. Good luck finding complete sets of this work. Separate volumes are out there, various editions published by Progress Publishers, Moscow in the 1960a and 70s, about $20 a copy. There’s nothing wrong with having different editions, the translations are the same. There are no paperback editions unless you go to International Publishers, where it’s spread out over 3 volumes in the Complete Works of Marx and Engels, something close to 40 volumes. There are other writings in the 1st and 3rd volumes so you’ll have more than just Theories. $24.95 a copy.

For those who don’t have a problem reading really long texts online all of Marx’s and Engels’ works are on the Marxist archive website:

Marx Engels Archive

This is one section of the much larger Marxists Internet Archive. All you fans of Emma Goldman and Rosa Luxemburg will have a ball here.

Marxist Internet Archive

So, what did you think of the first session?

Class 2 next week.

Saving one animal will not not change the world but it will change the world for that animal.

Namaste

A quiet week at Chez Tigre. I got Toes’ ashes back Tuesday. Pet Memorial does a bang up job. Nice wooden urn, looks like cherry wood, a paw print in some kind of material and ashes in a velveteen bag. They did the same with Kismet but Toes’ urn is a little smaller and nicer.

I’m very disappointed with ICanHazCheeseburger. They’ve been rearranging the site for the last few weeks and in an hour’s time I found one image that did not have a caption, some of which are really stooopid. So. I’ll be recycling images I’ve used before.

Here’s the only image I found without a caption today.

This the image of the ferals I posted last week. See the grey kitteh just to the left of the little orange guy? She’s the friendliest little thing. She wants lots of attention and every time I walk out of the porch she comes running, looking for scritches.
Read the rest of this entry →

Saving one animal will not change the world but it will change the world for that animal.

Namaste

For those who missed my diary on losing Toes Monday it’s here.

I had 3 kittehs I fed in the bedroom because they get canned food and have to be isolated so they can eat in peace. While I was monitoring Toes’ eating I noticed that both Ptah and Tama were leaving a lot of food in their bowls. They were getting a can of either Fancy Feast grilled chicken or beef and a third of a can of either beef or chicken classic (pate) mixed in. I long ago saw that Toes wouldn’t eat the grilled so he’d been getting pate all along. They were leaving a lot of the grilled pieces and eating all of the pate. Towards the end of the week I changed them to 1 can of chicken or beef pate, eliminating the grilled altogether. I was going through 70 cans of Fancy Feast a week, that’s including the 14 cans a week for Maste. This way I’m down to 42 but I’d have been happier at 56. Twenty-eight cans at $0.60 a copy is a pretty good chunk o’ change every week.

Ahhhh, a paper bag.

Read the rest of this entry →

Saving one animal won’t change the world but it will change the world for that animal.

Namaste

Not a good week at Chez Tigre.

In early August 2009 I took in a little female tortie and a male gray kitteh with white toes. Kismet was 17 and Toes was 12. Their original names were Maude and Brutus. I couldn’t stand the names. Kismet was easy. Toes on the other hand didn’t come as easily. Kismet never responded to Maude and Toes never responded to Brutus. Kismet was affectionate and thrived on affection. Toes was reclusive, spending most of his time in some out ot the way place where the others wouldn’t bother him. I kept trying to come up with a name for him but wasn’t getting anywhere. One night, sitting on the edge of the bed I was looking at him and said to him , “Well, until I can come up with a better name I’m just gonna call you Toes cuz of your cute little white toe tips.” He immediately responded to the name so it stuck. Kismet schmoozed with all the other cats and loved other two-leggeds. Toes remained reclusive. After he’d been here a little over a year Toes started to come out of his shell. Not a lot but anything was better than nothing. He started hanging out in the kitchen when I was getting ready to feed them all. He loved to talk, a little one syllable meow that I could easily imitate. He didn’t like being held and definitely wasn’t a lap kitteh. He did like me to sit on the floor so he could do that cat thing and walk around me, rubbing up against me and we chatted back and forth. A few months ago he started a habit of greeting me every morning when I swung my legs over the side of the bed. He’d head butt my legs, rub up against them while I scritched his ears and we talked. He repeated the process at night. I was seeing him begin to really socialize and wondered what I’d see after another year or so.

I noticed last week that Toes wasn’t eating well and was losing a lot of weight. Monday I took him in, thinking we were dealing with some age related thing and I would once again be on the pills forever routine. No big deal. Dr examined him for a while and listened to his chest for a long time. Examined more of him and went back and listened to his chest for another extended period and said he wanted to do some xrays. He came back in with a number of films and put one up on the viewer, a full body (neck to tail base) top view, saying, “These are the lungs of a healthy cat.” I knew we were in trouble. Right and left side views of the healthy cat. He then put up the full body top view for Toes. Both lungs covered with tumors. In the left side view his heart was barely visible through the tumors. I’m now numb and in a tailspin. The cancer hadn’t started to spread out from the lungs yet but that was right around the corner. The wasting process, eg, rapid weight loss, had already begun. We were out of options. I had to let him go.

Rest In Peace, Toes.

I’ll see ya at the Bridge. You were special and I really love ya.

Toes (1997 – 23 Jul 2012)

Larger image

Saving one animal will not change the world but it will change the world for that animal.

Namaste

A quiet week at Chez Tigre with the exception of either Nagi or Sita tearing the screen out of the kitchen window. I can’t seem to catch either one in the act but find one of them sitting on the sill with all the stuff that lives on the sill in the sink. Devils.

A little ingenuity at home can go a long way.

Nonquixote’s Mcat. With a ShopVac, no less.

Snow leopard

Read the rest of this entry →

Saving one animal will not change the world but it will change the world for that animal.

Namaste

Another quiet week at Chez Tigre. Well, almost.

So it’s Monday evening, time to put the trash (mostly used litter) out next to the alley. I finish that task and come back in to do the boxes and feed the crew. For some reason while I’m in the computer room scooping out the boxes I go back into the kitchen and, uh oh, the kitchen door’s ajar. Aw, shit, how many have I got out on the screened porch? I step out onto the porch, look around and there’s only one, sitting on the ledge looking out the screen. Yep, yellowsnapdragon’s buddy, Nagi. I say, “Nagi, what are you doin’ out here?” He looks at me and starts to work his way over and around all the stuff that’s piled up along the edges of the porch. It’s wood to about waist high with an 8″ ledge where the screening actually starts. He walks over to the kitchen door and when I open it he walks right back in. No muss, no fuss.

This is my first experience with a purebred Manx and it’s quite the experience. There isn’t any place this little guy can’t get into or onto. The framework that contains the glass shower doors is about 1 1/2″ at the top. I can tell when he jumps up there by the sound the toilet tank lid makes cuz it’s not a perfect fit on the tank. It’s not far, maybe 3-4 feet, but he’s so good he never fails to make it up there without incident. Same thing with the kitchen cabinets. It’s nothing to walk into the kitchen and see Nagi looking down at me. Little guy’s just an absolute joy to be around.

Nagi and his bff and partner in crime, Feurae.

Henri has an admirer.

Read the rest of this entry →

Saving one animal will not change the world but it will change the world for that animal.

Namaste

A quiet week at Chez Tigre if ya ignore hairball hell.

Tiger Lily and Peter Pan

Oh, hai

Read the rest of this entry →

Saving one animal won’t change the world but it will change the world for that animal.

Namaste

A quiet week at Chez Tigre. A little scare with Toes not eating but it turned out he was just frightened from having Ptah go after him at dinner time Friday night. Poor little guy is afraid of his own shadow.

Walking with lions

Fishing cat kitten at Smithsonian National Zoo

Little sisters are such a pain.

Partners in crime

This is just cute.

Simon’s Cat. Oh, lordy, how did evil Disney get involved with Simon?

Share you tiger stories with us.

Saving one animal will not change the world but it will change the world for that animal.

Namaste

A quiet, uneventful week at Chez Tigre. Nice.

Tropical storm in the Gulf so I’m just hangin’ out at home. Was going to PetSmart but think I’ll hold off until tomorrow.

They’d better find a better place for da bunny when this cub gets older.

The dog did it.

Is Flavio the world’s oldest tiger?

Hmmmm

Henri

Basket full o’ tiger cubs

Share your tiger stories with us.