The fact that Haz confronts facts with determination to not acknowledge them reaffirms our conclusion that he is indeed a populist and not a Marxist. No other would equate discourse with a competition of ‘last man standing’ or raw competition than a vapid populist of pette bourgeois origins.

“The pure contingency of a real world-historical event unfolding before our eyes - that has not yet been consolidated by a discourse, ideology, or narrative” It most certainly does pertain to the discourse and ideology of Marxism.

Apparently he does not believe in “the ‘universality of class struggle”, so he admits to selectively apply Marx as it’s convenient to him?

I will admit that is a poor take from Hakim as he misses the material reality that if a capable force does not oppose imperialism then imperialism goes unchecked. Yes we prols pay the cost in blood, and the bourgeoisie direct us, but this is the scheme a capitalist society operates under. How would one expect a pette bourgeois country to oppose the imperial order? Establish a DotP first? This is ahistorical. Hakim is very based though, I have no quarries with him.

“That is not to imply Russia is socialist in the sense strictly relevant to a proletarian dictatorship. But simply ‘capitalism’ is not a useful description. ‘Capitalist markets’ in the strict sense are mostly obsolete in the 21st century. This analysis does not betray any understanding of how Russia’s economy works, in what way it is caught in the web of definite global financial institutions, and all geopolitical, et. al implications. Traditional spontaneous, wild and chaotic capitalist production does not prevail in any part of the world.”

^ This simply bypasses ultra left and enters ultra right, diluting the definition of capitalism until it means nothing and so nothing is capitalist. Hazah! Who knew our job was already done for us?! But no, there are specific criteria for what capitalism is, it isn’t some immaterial concept one can just bullshit their way through. A capitalist system has been firmly defined by both Marx and Lenin, again unless this clown believes he knows better than the father of socialism or the greatest revolutionary of all time. The market is anarchistic by it’s very nature: competition and the profit motive. It doesn’t matter how many state assets are involved in this market, some stability to the market (social democracy) is still a wild sea with a few dams keeping some form of definition.

“Capital is an epicycle of geopolitical metaphysics.”

^ A poor man’s attempt to negate an absolute truth by turning a force of nature against itself. The objective truth of Marx’s teachings remain, clown.

“Capitalism, or ‘capital,’ in the strictly modern sense of being used as a pathological description of the ‘true essence behind things’ is basically made-up hippie bullshit. ‘Why is all this bad shit happening? It’s capitalism, man, capitalism!’” And this is some low-grade propaganda, man! Who is he relating to? A 50 year old uncle? 😂

“Capital itself is not the essence, the ritual is.”

^ His best attempt at describing debt velocity under neoliberalism? Debt is the shadow of capital, without capital it cannot exist, and so debt could not be leveraged as an IOU. An IOU for what if capital does not exist?

"He is alluding to the notion that this is, in fact, an inter-imperialist war, and that the ‘duty of the working class of both countries’ is to oppose 'their respective governments. And only with a little bit of pressure, the ‘Leninist’ part of ‘Marxist-Leninism’ undergoes total surgical mutilation, with flawless operational success. That ultra-left stupidity which neglects the national question, and neglects the significance of anti-imperialism disappears, and we arrive at the view that class struggle has no form, that there is no dialectic of forms, that the form and content of class struggle are one and the same. "

^ This is a based take imo.

“His position is a slap in the face of Russian Communists, whose position is not only decidedly behind the Russian government - it is the position of the Russian government, which the Communists already play an extremely significant role in!”

^ Not exactly. The Russian communist party allowed to exist is as communist as the democrats are leftist. He mistakes the happenstance position of the Russian state with that of the international tendency we Marxists hold. This is not the case. Russia is pette bourgeois, and in so fighting for it’s own interests, it must oppose the imperial bourgeoisie who at this time have become decrepit leeches hellbent on devouring all value it can, including cannibalizing it’s own class, to fulfill the necessity of it’s rate of profitability and hegemony on which it stands which is currently on it’s highly advanced deathbed.

Russia. Is. No. Longer. The. USSR.

“Who is the working class? What is this working class? What form does it take, what is its actual, substantive reality? Alas, it has none. It is a purely ideological subject - it refers to a social formation defined entirely by its commitment to affirming certain ideological precepts. They aren’t talking about any actual, material class of people within Russia or Ukraine. They are talking about ‘all those who decide to define themselves by my Utopic caricature of humanity, rather than the real thing.’ The real problem with Putin is that he doesn’t agree with my ideology.”

^ Here he equates “the working class” when said by liberals to be the same as “nazis” by liberals. Personally I haven’t seen it come to this but it’s a predictable advancement of the current path. I don’t believe Hakim is as malicious as he perceives him to be, at least from the takes he is commenting on. I haven’t checked in on Hakim recently but from my experience with his content he is incredibly based, and as such deserve more credit than someone affiliated with such a clown as Dugin, and he himself qualifies as a clown by his own content. Another populist opportunist in ML’s clothing from that same corner of the ideological world.

“Through decades of experience, it has been proven that the proletariat is an essence of the people as a whole; and that Communists are an orientation within a broader popular front, over which they seek to gain hegemony” See Khrushchev opportunism (“we are a country for all peoples! Not just the working class but the bourgeoisie as well! Shit did I say that aloud?”) He is a populist parading around as a Marxist.

“And further, the proletarian subject is not neatly defined within the ranks of the people (defined against establishments, monopoly capital, imperialism, etc.), - it is rather an aspect, an essence of the people given intelligibility by Communists.”

^ He seems to be mechanically analyzing the social function of a subject of propaganda without studying the subject of that propaganda in good faith. This is what he did with the concept of capitalism a few paragraphs up I commented on. This too has a clearly defined characteristic. Class is a physical division in society, it is not just a meaningless function of propaganda we communists give meaning to like debt solely functioning off of it’s quantity and use rather than it’s innate value and unique characteristics. But again, this is an argument a populist would use as this is how he sees Marxism - as a tool to get what he wants. He understands the power of democracy, strength in numbers, but he has a completely cynical viewpoint of Marxism. He just sees it as the best populist scheme, completely casting aside the guts and wearing it’s skin like a barbarian.

" existed strictly as a tendency within the peasant mass"

^ This doesn’t even make any sense. If you view the peasants as a distinct class, and you view the proletariat as a subject within that class, you literally recognize the material existence of the proletarian class…you just have it reversed. He contradicts himself within this statement.

“There is no real ‘system’ represented by the popular front of Russian sovereignty. The nationalization of Russia’s gas industry has already provided the foundation for an alternative path of economic development”

^ This is doublespeak or just plain ignorance. A path also known as a SYSTEM of economic development.

" From liberals to Communists to technologists"

^ Technologist is a profession not an ideology.

"The Communists remain the most powerful counter-hegemonic and anti-imperialist movement within Russia, and they have benefited from every blow to American imperialism, and every blow to Russia’s reliance on the US-led global financial system. "

^ They don’t though. This again demonstrates he knows nothing of what a communist even is. He views the Russian intelligentsia and academia as communists, but this is not the case. A communist isn’t simply someone educated in Marxism, but practices it. Our ‘power’ he references doesn’t come from defeating national enemies, it grows with the working class as together we unite to liberate each other and ourselves as well as raise the human species to the highest stage of development, casting aside all reactionary formats in time to become true masters of our skills and proper administrators of this world. (Juche) We do not “raise our power level, bro 🤜 💥 🤛” by assisting a pette bourgeois nation in overtaking an imperial one (and thus replacing them as Russia has no DotP).

“Putin’s recent speech, criticizing the policy of Bolsheviks and Soviet Communists, was made in the context of a very fast growing domestic Communist party (which has made great gains among the youth especially, setting to rest the long-held view that it was a party of nostalgic boomers). This has probably intimidated the Russian status quo as a whole.”

^ Again he contradicts himself. Are they a large portion of the Russian status quo or are they alien to it? To this he has claimed both.

“But Putin himself represents no particular interest. He represents no intelligible class, or even state of affairs per se. He is a Russian centrist, who represents the bare minimum of Russian sovereignty under the conditions notwithstanding.”

^ Demonstrates he does not have a proper understanding of politics nor of Russian internal politics. Putin is a representative of the Russian bourgeoisie. Centrist merely recognizes the strength of the Russian proletariat, but the bourgeoisie control the economy never the less, and so he is their puppet, not a representative of ours. To believe in a true centrism under capitalism or socialism for that matter is idealist or in the latter case revisionist opportunism (again going back to Khrushchev’s “people’s republic”)

“Russian Communists, thus, are critical of Putin because they perceive him as not being anti-Western enough, and as too conciliatory to the globalist elite. In their view he should have done what he is now doing in Ukraine much sooner, actually…But there is no indigenous Russian capitalist system - the extent to which Russia is tied to capitalism, is the extent to which it is tied to globalist monopoly capital and more specifically global financial institutions.”

^ Describing nationalism as communism. Clearly the two are interchangeable to him. The Russian Marcyist trend being evident. He understands buzzwords but not Marxist theory, otherwise he would not view capitalism as an ideology but as a necessary stage of economic development all countries go through in 1 form or another.

The remainder is just him talking shit about Hakim and western Marxist-Leninists. Of this, an aspect of competition in his mind, he, much like Maupin, is a true contender. THIS he has studied. If only he applied this effort into reading Capital or Imperialism, The Highest Stage. 🤦