Bush, Communism, and the County Dem headquarters

[wolf]

Of course, I can't find the site where I read about this earlier today, but the Sandinistas are making a comeback in Nicaragua.

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by slang

In power?? With a candidate running for the highest elected office in a democratic country?

That is an impressive list but really doesn't relate to the conversation. There are a large number of countries with Communists parties active. Are they in power? Very few. When they take power, then we'll talk about bombing them. We'll have to see what the "list of countries to bomb" looks like at that time.

It is interesting to me how many people here go out of their way to defend or explain Communism. Socialism I could understand but not Communism.

Any way you slice it, Kerry wont be the pres in the next 4 years and there are a boatload of people that are very happy for that.

So.....cry, insult and counter post on......the facts are the facts, Kerry lost and the cellar is short of right thinking people.

As I said, Communists are part of coalition governments in Europe. Socialists are in power in Europe. Let's not forget monarchies, constitutional and otherwise. As for defending Communism, I don't defend it as much as clarify overly simplistic (dumbed down) labels. I personally do not believe that pure Communism is any more viable than pure Capitalism. Both systems require that you let people starve to death if their level of contribution falls below their level of need. This kind of system is not only immoral it is unstable.

I think you are confusing crying or insulting with debating in a calm and rational manner. You will notice that I did not once, ever refer to you as a boneheaded slack-jawed inbred pig-chasing cousin-loving redneck idiot. I would distinctly remember if I had ever sunk to such a low and despicable level.

[Undertoad]

Rich, don't be all backpedaling now. Your original premise was that communism didn't kill 100M people. Now you want to discuss nuances of different kinds of Communism. And put it on some sort of sliding scale with Communism on one end and Capitalism on the other. I find that to be kind of ignorant. What kind of nuanced Communism worked in each of these different approaches to it?



explanation of terms, table

The notion that Capitalism and Communism are in contention for being able to provide for the citizens sorta died in the late 80s/early 90s when we learned that all the worst right-wing rumors about the U.S.S.R. were in fact true. The notion that we kids had when we were in college, that the U.S.S.R. was just a misunderstood grand experiment/hidden utopia? All that shit was wrong. Maybe you haven't been paying attention since college?

The war is over, Capitalism won. In fact the current controversy isn't whether it can provide enough for its people to live on, but whether it actually provides too much and becomes "unsustainable".

[Skunks]

Am I really dumb, or does that chart actually say that a particular .106th of a person was killed by Communism?

I mean, if you want to talk about 'nuanced'...

[Undertoad]

The column header (000) says the column is in thousands, so 0.106 indicates 106 killed.

Meanwhile, I'm still seeking details on the Famine of the Great Depression. For some reason this horrible event was not detailed in our history books.

[slang]

Originally Posted by jinx

Didja manage to get any pool hopping in?

No, no one asked me to pool hop, they asked us to install HUGE Bush signs on their property.

Your version does sound funny, but no, that's not how it worked. This was not a prank for the property owners. It was by request. And the requests were many.

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Rich, don't be all backpedaling now. Your original premise was that communism didn't kill 100M people. Now you want to discuss nuances of different kinds of Communism. And put it on some sort of sliding scale with Communism on one end and Capitalism on the other. I find that to be kind of ignorant. What kind of nuanced Communism worked in each of these different approaches to it?

I didn't say that the total deaths by all Communist governments didn't total up to 100 million, I'm saying that not all Communist governments commit democides and not all democides are committed by Communists. The danger in believing that is that by bad things are always or always done by Communists is that this can cause one to assume that Capitalist societies are immune to abuses, that the freedom to buy a Big Mac means that all other freedoms are guaranteed. This kind of blindness is why Marx thought his revolution would occur in England and Jews assumed the worst persecution they would suffer in the 20th century would be in Russia, Poland and France.




Notice that while most of the table lists Communists dictators, almost half are not Communist. The ones who did not make the list, like Pinochet, are significant not for the number of indivduals murdered, but because of their ties to the US.

President Richard M. Nixon and Henry A. Kissinger, who served as his
national security advisor and Secretary of State, supported a right-wing
coup in Chile in the early 1970s, previously declassified documents show.

But many of the actions of the United States during the 1973 coup, and
much of what American leaders and intelligence services did in liaison with
the Pinochet Government after it seized power, remain under the seal of
national security. The secret files on the Pinochet regime are held by the
C.I.A., the Defense Intelligence Agency, the State Department, the
Pentagon, the National Security Council, the National Archives, the
Presidential libraries of Gerald R. Ford and Jimmy Carter, and other
Government agencies. According to Justice Department records, these files
contain a history of human rights abuses and international terrorism:

* In 1975 State Department diplomats in Chile protested the Pinochet
regime's record of killing and torture, filing dissents to American foreign
policy with their superiors in Washington.

* The C.I.A. has files on assassinations by the regime and the Chilean
secret police. The intelligence agency also has records on Chile's attempts
to establish an international right-wing covert-action squad.

* The Ford Library contains many of Mr. Kissinger's secret files on
Chile, which have never been made public. Through a secretary, Mr.
Kissinger declined a request for an interview today.

[slang]

Originally Posted by richlevy

You will notice that I did not once, ever refer to you as a boneheaded slack-jawed inbred pig-chasing cousin-loving redneck idiot.

Yes Rich, and you have a sense of humor too. Fair enough ( Kerry still lost the election )

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by slang

Yes Rich, and you have a sense of humor too. Fair enough ( Kerry still lost the election )

No hard feelings. I personally get a little tired when a politician declares 'My good friend Senator Whistlewort......' before he pulls out the knives, but I do agree that it's possible to debate without getting really nasty ...unless Radars around.

[Undertoad]

Rich, you're backpedaling in your backpedaling. You called the 100M number an "interesting figure" and then casually failed to find evidence to support it. I produced evidence to support it. I'm not sure why the question doesn't end there, except that now we need to discuss the Famine of the Great Depression.

[Griff]

[troll]So do we total Bushes slaughter(s) under fascist or democratic?[/troll]

[slang]

Hey Griff,

Seriously, do you have any credible stats on these "slaughters"? I keep hearing about them but is there a source?

[elSicomoro]

Well, counting the military folks is easy, but counting the civilians is a bit difficult.

[Griff]

You know we're smart enough not to keep score any more. We learned one thing from Vietnam anyway.Johns Hopkins makes estimates however. Excluding information from Falluja, they estimate that 100,000 more Iraqis died than would have been expected had the invasion not occurred.
I obviously can't vouch for the reliability of their numbers.

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Rich, you're backpedaling in your backpedaling. You called the 100M number an "interesting figure" and then casually failed to find evidence to support it. I produced evidence to support it. I'm not sure why the question doesn't end there, except that now we need to discuss the Famine of the Great Depression.

I couldn't find evidence to support it, you did. According to your chart, about 110 million 'Communist' deaths and 59 million non-Communist. Considering that the two most populated areas of the world were the USSR and China, communist countries, then on a death per 1000 people chart, the non-Communist regimes might match the Communist.

Which brings me back to my point that noone who is shot cares about the politics behind the bullet.