Marx Exhumed, Capitalism Buried

by John Huxley - October 23rd, 2008 - Sydney Morning Herald

Maybe, as the international financier George Soros wrote, "The main enemy of the open society, I believe, is no longer the communist but the capitalist threat." But if Marx is truly a man of our times, our straitened times, it owes as much to his account of capital-city poverty than his analysis of capitalist economy.

Here, for example, Marx writes from the cramped, upstairs rooms of the hovel in Dean Street, Soho, London, which he and his family occupied in the early 1850s. Harassed by debt collectors, plagued by carbuncles, pursued by secret police, he pens a begging letter to Friedrich Engels, a lifelong friend, financial supporter and cotton-industry capitalist. "I am unable to go out for want of the coats I have in pawn, and can no longer eat meat for want of credit," he complains. "My wife is ill. Little Jenny is ill. Lenchen has some sort of nervous fever. I could not and cannot call the doctor because I have no money to buy medicine. For the past eight to 10 days I have been feeding the family solely on bread and potatoes."

For much more about a towering man whose writing was, not surprisingly over several decades, contradictory, incomprehensible, virtually unreadable and even simply wrong, try Francis Wheen's excellent biography, Karl Marx.

It is hard to forget the simpistic appeal of Karl Marx, considering the intellectual pretensions his advocates employ. What you find is that few people who create value in the world are Marx fans. Most are like George Soros, people who are not capitalists at all. Capitalism is ultimately about creating wealth. Soros made his money manipulating markets, not creating wealth. To listen to him about capitalism is like listening to a salesman talk about cars. He may know some things about cars, but he could never build one.

That is the fear I have of Barack Obama as President of America. Putting him in charge is a frightening prospect for the next generation because someone is going to have to create the products that drive our ecomony. Our nation is built on creators and doers, not talkers. Yet all that Obama can do is talk. He is a car salesman peddling an image of a vehicle that he really has little idea how to actually create.