"They called themselves Communists." The former East Germany called themselves the German Democratic Republic. What's in a name?
"Lenin was the orthodox Marxist." At the risk of oversimplification, Lenin was about the Party, and centralizing power. I suspect he may have considered that a necessary interim measure but he did that. There's a reason they called it "Marxist-Leninist"; he changed marxism . "Mao was an orthodox Marxist." He was just an evil totalitarian dictator. He used Marxist-Leninist jargon and catch words but he was basically a Stalinist. "Stalin maintained Lenin's system." See Mao. I mean, he basically wrested power from Lenin (Trotsky was the heir apparent) and turned the USSR into a full-on State-Capitalist economy. He was an evil dictator. He was all about power. He turned himself into a god, a cult leader to be worshipped and adored. There was nothing of a communist about him. Look, I said earlier that there's never been a communist state. And I don't think there ever will be one. I think that one of the downfalls (perhaps the biggest one) of communism is that it almost necessarily devolves into a dictatorship, with a single-party, totalitarian government led by a megalomaniac who tries to turn himself into a god. It's happened enough times, hasn't it? I'm a lefty but I'm no commie. Nice concept, nice theory but it'll never fly. The vacuum left during or after the revolution will always leave the opening for the above to occur. Always. But whatever criticisms you have of the evil regimes you mention, they're evil for reasons other than their putative communism. Cheers, frank On November 17, 2015 2:50:01 PM EST, Collin B <[email protected]> wrote: >>There has never been a communist state. After the Revolution the USSR >may >have been moving that way but never got there. However close they may >(or >may not have) come, >>they were completely derailed by Stalin. >> >>The USSR and every other so-called communist state were actually >State-Capitalists. That is they were in fact capitalist however the >means of >production were owned by >>the state rather than individuals or corporations (who are, as we all >know, >legal persons). >> >>So whatever happened to the USSR and the Warsaw Pact states, it wasn't >happening to commies. >> >>Cheers, >> >>frank > >In the West we like to over-simplify or idealize communism as some sort >of >communalism. >Nothing could be further from the truth, John Lennon not being excused >for >his "imagination." > >They called themselves Communists. Lenin was the orthodox Marxist. >Mao was an orthodox Marxist. Stalin maintained Lenin's system. >Stalin killed 60M. Mao, at least 30M. Hitler, 10M+ >Those three killed about 1/20 of the world population of the mid 20th >c. >Communism is about power. It was never about a touchy-feely community. > >Reading Marx' "Capital" he did not entirely oppose the existence of >capital >but the system under which it was managed. > > >We just don't learn from history. Malthus was foundational to Marx. >Though his predictions have failed on numerous occasions they are still >being proposed as workable (eg, Sanger & the modern green movement). >Lenin just couldn't make things work. (To his credit, though, he did >clamp >down on organized crime.) >Look at PROC & Cuba? They survive because the feed off capitalism, just >as >do other forms of socialism. >N. Korea, on the other hand, presents the world something much closer >to >Stalin's USSR. -- "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept." -- Henri Cartier-Bresson Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
