For some time I have been expressing similarities between today's liberal, progressive, socialist or communist movement and the actions taken during the Bolshevik Revolution that launched the USSR at the tail end of World War One.
Many have balked and scoffed at me, thinking only liberalism will bring peace to the world and equal things out. In my reading and comparison of the Bolshevik Revloution, I did not study far enough back, as does columnist Curtis Dahlgren, in an article that up at Alan Keyes website, Renew America.
With keen interest I read the following article, excerpted here,
THOSE “SIXTIES” HIPPIES (in 1860s Russia): An eye-opener for you and me today!
Curtis Dahlgren
June 22, 2007
THEY CALL THEMSELVES "PROGRESSIVES." THEY CALL THEMSELVES SECULAR. They don't like to be called "social liberals" or even "economic Liberals. They don't like it when Bill O'Reilly describes them in their own terms either: "Secular Progressives" (wrong inflection in his voice, I guess, so they want to ban "talk radio").
So let's just call them what they ARE: "over-the-hill-hippies." And Nihilists. Communists.
They talk about "taking back the nation" (so that they can turn it over to "international law"). They talk about shutting down alternative news media (just like Hugo Chavez). They don't really mind having their patriotism questioned either; they're secretly PROUD of their anti-Americanism.
They don't really mind being the "vocal minority" either, because they know that under totalitarianism the minority rules (JUST LIKE THE NIHILISTS DID IN THE GOOD OL' USSR)!
I've alluded to this subject before, but a deeper look into the eyes of these aging hippies — who would have us be "more like Europe" and more like Castro's island-of-misery (and Hugo's coming Gulag on the north shore of the continent to our South) — is long overdue:
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America needs to wake up and see that we conservatives are not the enemie's of America. We desire to see our greatness and freedoms continue. We are ever so gradually losing our liberties under the guise of Socialism which declares their restrictive rules "are only for the good of all."
I applaud Mr. Dahlgren for seeing through the smoke screen of the progressive, liberal, socialist communists now attempting to recreate the failed Soviet Union in America.
Lew
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Lew, it seems to me that there are basically two types here, those that read Das Kapital and the Communist Manifesto and thereby knew the enemy and those that read it and became accolytes.
Of course, the accolytes are incapable of seeing the carnage wrought by the left, but that is another story.
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If the entire country were made up of either the far right or the far left, it would be worse than it is now.
gm,
Is there nothing good in the Communist Manifesto?
I certainly would not claim it to be ALL good, nor was it at all good in its implementation, but are all the ideas bad? Is it completely the "enemy"? Or is it a combination of some good ideas and some bad ideas, all poorly implemented?
Coboble, if you believe there may be something good in the COmmunist Manifesto, please feel free to list it and I'll see if I agree or not. Most likely I won't, but who knows?
True Communism is basically impossible to have, at least in this current world. Some people have drive and ambition and others would rather sit back and have everything done for them and handed to them and of course, there is the middle majority that just works and tries to get ahead a little. In other words, we are all different and have differing goals.
Under true Communism, none would have more than another and everything would supposedly be equal. A garbage collector would have whatever a doctor has. A ditch digger would be equal to an engineer. There would be no incentive for any improvement in one's self.
Under Soviet Communism, it was billed out as that but as we all know, some were elite and others were underlings. The underlings that were ambitious and hard working could no get ahead while underlings that were lazy received whatever the hard workers did. The elite did whatever little thing that made them elite and collected massive rewards for it.
Of course it is more complicated than that, but in a nutshell, that is the way it worked.
As one who flew the borders between East and West Germany and Czechoslovakia, there is something very wrong when a country ecases itself in a high wire fence with finely raked sand and mines, on their side, to keep people in.
Seeing those fences is why I really don't like the idea of a fence along our Southern Border, but don't see another alternative, other than a massive build up of the Border Patrol.
Soviet Communism, the Marxist/Leninist sort that became the Soviet Union may sound good in places, but in reality, it failed the very people it claimed to want to help.
Today, I see many in the Democrat Party and a few in the Republican Party favoring a system much like the Marxism and Leninism that engulfed Russia in darkness and secrecy for so long and really did no good for her people.
"Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children's factory labor in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, etc."
We adopted this in this country.
A lot of the historical stuff it talks about is true. And at the time it was implemented there was a serious problem with exploitation of labor.
It is not so bad any more, and the better solution would be for the consumer to start making purchasing choices based on how labor is treated.
This would pretty much allow market forces to correct that problem.
It is the ownership of (and gaining profit from the ownership of) Land and Natural resources where I tend to most agree with comunist theory.
Do not confuse this with the value added to the land and resources, I believe people have every right to profit from value added activity.
But I don't know how to measure the value added versus the actual resource, nor do I have any sort of plan to fairly transition from one system to the other.
I don't agree with just taking stuff away from people.
While some professions clearly take more work (either in brain effort or physical effort) than others, and should be compensated accordingly; there are cases where the compensation is NOT at all in line with the value added.
Not so much in terms of Doctor versus Bus Driver, but more in terms of Insurance Company Executive verus Doctor.
I think the Doctor adds far more value, but seems to get far less compensation.
Regulations often effect how market forces work, and those with power lobby to insure such regulations work out to their advantage.
The middle class is dwindeling.
The gap between those who do the work, and those who control the companies (not inventing or creating the products) is growing.
But No, I don't think that Communism is the answer. I just wanted to point out that it did have some good in it, and was not all bad.
Coboble, by what you say, some good could even be found in Hitler. He loved animals and was an animal rights activist. It has been said he loved children. He was even one of the earliest anti-smokers and a vegetarian.
None of that 'good' excuses or justifies what he led.
In Communism, even though some words are written that sound really good and equalizes people, the words were often a smokescreen and ended up supressing those it was to supposedly protect.
From the Constitution of the former Soviet Union we read,
Article 34 [Equality]
(1) Citizens of the USSR are equal before the law, without distinction of origin, social or property status, race or nationality, sex, education, language, attitude to religion, type and nature of occupation, domicile, or other status.
(2) The equal rights of citizens of the USSR are guaranteed in all fields of economic, political, social, and cultural life.
Sounds good, but it didn't happen in practice, did it? Religion was pretty much shunned there and any worship was done in private.
Article 52 [Religion]
(1) Citizens of the USSR are guaranteed freedom of conscience, that is, the right to profess or not to profess any religion, and to conduct religious worship or atheistic propaganda. Incitement of hostility or hatred on religious grounds is prohibited.
(2) In the USSR, the church is separated from the state, and the school from the church.
It was none other than Karl Marx, co-author of the Communist Manifesto that said, "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people."
Like wise, a big problem with public education, both here and there is that those in class end up being indoctrinated, not educated. The end result?
U.S. Teens Rank Low in World Tests, High school students dismal in math, science
U.S. falls in education rank compared to other countries
Just because we adopt something that sounds really good, it doesn't always make it good for all.
A thought on this claim of the widening gap between the classes. Does it ever occur to any that it is the middle class and poorer in our society that are becoming more and more dependant on government and doing less for themselves?
I never claimed that the good justified the bad, only that some existed; and you challenged me to present it.
So Hitler was an animal rights activist, I didn't know that.
I think that Marx, based on the time he wrote, really did have some good ideas. But they were all corrupted in practice. I am not even certain that human nature allows them to work in practice.
But the theory is not evil or bad.
Coboble, my comment wasn't intended that you justified or excused, just that in general, if some good is seen in something, the bad too often outweighs that good.
The world and human nature isn't equal or fair. Attempts to make it show end up oppressing people while an elite class enjoys what they condemn. An example would be all the cries of SUVs harming the environment and what have you. Still, many of those complaining have them.
I see idealism driving the left and even in the case of Marx, lofty words and ideas are given but in actual practice, don't work.
I think they don't work because of basic human nature, as different as it is in all of us.
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