Oh damn, and here I was going to sing his praise.

Give me a break, the guy had a catchy looking face on a T shirt, and all sorts of people wanted to cop the "rebel w/o a clue" mantle by wearing it. Poor fool was hung out to dry by his buddy Fidel, he thought he could just show up in Bolivia and lead the masses to a better life.

This guy actually worries anyone? I'm more worried about the enormous funds that have been (it ain't over) wasted in our various campaigns to stamp out this evil doctrine, this foul infection that once it takes root, renders it's victims little better than the living dead, zombies who wish only to infect others with their poison.

Good lord, watching some of the grave faced dudes of the 40s and 50s carry on about Godless, evil socialism is jaw dropping stuff. And these cats actually believed it.

What is it in so many humans, that drives them to identify the chief evil in the world as being that crowd over there? 'All of us-uns are God's chosen and we will cleanse the world of this vermin!'

(Please note, this is not an actual quote -- merely a light speculaion on the inner workings of various fanatical minds)

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Te futueo et caballum tuum

1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

I don't know. Sometimes I get all stony faced and all when I read about the fun loving stuff that Maoists, Communists and their ilk (refined isn't it) get up to. During the 40s, 50s, 60s and 70s (80s and 90s too) they sure did kill a lot of people. Orders of magnitude (in the language of mathematics that means multiply by 10 or 100 or 1000 or other multiple of ten) greater than any aberrant US soldier or failed policy . I guess those grave faced dudes in the 50s actually believed that communists worldwide were killing folks right and left - most likely because they were doing exactly that. I mean really, you want the true ethos of the fabricated phrase "we had to destroy the village in order to save it" look no further than Mao or Stalin or Ortega or Castro or Guaverra or Pot. They actually did destroy numerous villages and killed millions in doing so; all so they could bring a better life to their homelands (or someone else's). Fitting that the quote was fabricated by a really progressive dude.

Looking back on things though it seems that the folks living in the communist countries are most responsible for ridding themselves of "the vermin" as you put it. I'm sure we helped along the way but there's nothing we could do that people who actually lived under communism couldn't do better.

What has developed into one of the most bizarre of ironic truisms is the fad in this country and Europe of rich privileged morons who feel such great love for this communist system of government. No matter how many times it's failed worldwide and taken millions to their deaths with it there's no shortage of people here who will defend it at all costs. Many who are just purely ignorant of what they are advertising. Case in point; (pretty package, not a lot going on upstairs)

That's not nearly as depressing as the people who defend it or make light of it and know full well what it's done.

But hey, no big deal, right?

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-livin' in the terminally flippant zone

I have an idea that major upheaval would have occurred in those countries w/o communism. The czars and the Swedes shed copious amounts of blood in various struggles for territory, power, etc., long before Marx took his first typing class.

And I'm just sure Cameron Diaz can read Chinese. Many people have gotten tatoos with Chinese characters that said something other than what they thought it did.

Capitalism in this country has been far more equitable and fair than in other countries -- some places that went commie were dealing with the type of feudal lords our founders fled from and then threw off.

Uno mass, the GI bill is/was a socialist program. Ditto for the educational system that did a great deal to make this country a powerhouse.

__________________
Te futueo et caballum tuum

1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K