From Conservapedia

Communism is a left-wing anti-democratic and violent ideology dedicated to supposedly overthrow Capitalism, replacing it with a unelected "dictatorship of the proletariat" by technocrats and an atheist elite. Under Communism, the political system replaces private ownership of the means of production with a supposed "collective ownership" of the economy, but really maintained for the benefit and profit of a corrupt elite. Capitalism is impossible to overthrow because any business, or "means of production," that costs more to operate than the income it produces, i.e. does not turn a profit, will ultimately fail.

These elites empower criminal gangsters and hoodlums to keep opposition in check. Because private ownership is illegal in favor of a collective, prisons are emptied of anyone convicted of a property crime. This criminal element is the base of the communists' political power to destroy democracy. Political opposition is outlawed. Having rejected the culture and habits of the old regime as unjust, many of the worst violent offenders are released from prison to become enforcers for the corrupt ruling elite.[1]

In Karl Marx's theory, Communism is the final phase of societal evolution that begins with Socialism. Marxist theory alleges that feudalism evolved into capitalism, and capitalism evolves into socialism, and eventually the highest order of societal evolution is achieved when socialism evolves into communism. Marx's Communist Manifesto proposes the establishment of a "classless society" when human society reaches this ultimate perfection, minus any resistors or counterrevolutionaries. Communist societies however do maintain a class structure with the corrupt elite on top, scientists, technicians, and skilled workers recruited from schools who are afforded special privileges, thugs and mobsters who now become the enforcers and police, and everyone else with no political rights.

Communists distinctly despise anyone who holds a moral code that worships or teaches loyalty to anything other than the state and government. Religious believers particularly are singled out for persecution and "re-education."

Communist societies which have survived into the 21st century, China, Cuba, and North Korea, in fact have reverted back to a feudal order of inherited privilege run by the descendants of the original revolutionaries who murdered all opposition and stole the wealth of the rich and powerful of their day. To manage government and society, the party trains and recruits "experts" from government schools who are promised party membership which brings special privileges not afforded to the proletariat. Students who do not go along with the party agenda are doomed to a life of limited career opportunities, limited career advancement, or poverty. All live in terror, both party members and non-party members, of running afoul of the party's secret police which enforces the party's ever changing, contradictory dictums and agenda. Communist party's are essentially criminal organizations built on murder and theft, and maintain their power by murder and theft.

Communism supposedly is "democratic";[2] however a "democratic" election in a communist system has candidates from only one party, nominated by higher-ups in the organization. A communist system is intolerant of opposing views and outlaws political opposition. The lack of a political opposition leads to a lack of accountability.

Governments under the banner of Communism have caused the death of somewhere between 40 million to 260 million human lives.[3] Dr. R. J. Rummel, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Hawaii, is the scholar who first coined the term democide (death by government). Dr. R. J. Rummel's mid estimate regarding the loss of life due to Communism is that it caused the death of approximately 148,286,000 people between 1917 and 1987.[4]

President Ronald Reagan in an address before the British House of Commons said,

“ What I am describing now is a plan and hope for the long term — the march of freedom and democracy which will leave Marxism-Leninism on the ash heap of history as it has left other tyrannies which stifle the freedom and muzzle the self-expression of the people.[5] ”

Today, Communism continues to rule over at least one-fifth of the world's people,[6] and has infiltrated the Democrat Party of the United States since at least the WWII era, more so since the 1960s, and is now fully out of the closet in the 2020s.

Modern communism

The first false dichotomy of communism is the notion that capitalism and communism are competing ideologies. They are not. While communism is built on an ideology that justifies murder and theft, capitalism is built upon the natural law that you cannot consume that which has not been not been first produced.

Maoism

See also: Maoism and Rectification

In China, the Chinese Communist Party retains an autocratic regime controlled by the party, which allows no democracy or dissent. However it does allow capitalism, and has experienced a very rapid growth of the private sector and the middle class. Observers expect that the regime's efforts to control public opinion and forestall the will of the people will be more and more difficult.

The Maoist strategy for world revolution is based on the global version of the strategy employed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) which led to Mao's victory in 1949. The analogy went like this: through "peoples war" the CCP forces who controlled the countryside of China encircled the cities of China, isolated the foe, and destroyed it piecemeal. The logic followed that the countryside of the world as a reaction to the super-exploitation suffered at the hands of the city of the world would become united and defeat the latter, and in the process establish a world socialist order. This grand design would come about not through the struggles of working classes in revolutionary fervor inside the advanced capitalist countries as prescribed by Marx, but through the vehicle of national liberation struggles of the colonial and former colonial peoples of the Third World.

Maoism inspired students and other young people who looked to the Chinese Red Guards as a model of activism.[8] While some of these young activists were drawn to the Progressive Labor Party (PLP), the full flowering of American Maoism would not come until the proliferation of new groups such as the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), Weather Underground (WUO), Black Panthers (BPP) and the Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist) (CP-ML) after 1969.

North Korea remains a brutal dictatorship controlled by the same family. Laos, and Vietnam are also run by the old Communist cliques.

Communism in the United States

Author Linda Goudsmit described American communism at America's self0inflicted moment of crisis in 2020:

Democratic Socialism: 1992 - present

See also: Committees of Correspondence of Democratic Socialism

With the collapse of Soviet Communism and the conversion of Chinese Communism to "state run capitalism," the spiritual and ideological center of world of Communism and the Marxist-Leninist tradition shifted to the United States. Several prominent American Communists, rudderless without Moscow direction, formed a new organization in 1992 called the Committees of Correspondence for Democratic Socialism.

The initial organizational conference was held in Berkeley, California, July 17–19, 1992. Charlene Mitchell, a former leader of the California Communist Party, speaking at the conference said, "the collapse of socialism in Central Europe and the Soviet Union left the United States in a near unchallenged position of world leadership." Mitchell continued,

“ What began as a moment to take stock and ponder where to go from there has now become a very different entity. People from the Communist Party, from CrossRoads, from the Democratic Socialists of America, from NCIPA [National Committee for Independent Political Action], from Solidarity, from the Socialist Organizing Network and many others, including independent leftists and independent socialists, have come together here in Berkeley. ”

Criticizing U.S. actions in the First Gulf War, Mitchell stated,

“ progressive forces were nearly powerless in the face of an onslaught of demagogic, patriotic jingoism and yellow ribbons. This war, fought for no legitimate reason, was the crowning height of President [George H.W.] Bush's New World Order. Previously, the Soviet Union helped to provide a certain balance to rein in the crazies in this country. Now, that balance is no longer there. It is now up to us, the American people, to rein in our own crazies. The left must take a major responsibility in organizing this task. ”

Obamunism

Former NSC staffer Michael Doran described what is at stake as "a core principle of our democracy: that elected representatives control the government, and not vice versa." National security expert Chris Farrell characterized the Obamagate scandal as "a titanic struggle for America's future," and warned that if "Communications Intelligence is used as a partisan political weapon without people going to jail, we will have crossed the point of no return for institutional corruption in our government, our intelligence services and law enforcement. This is illegal domestic political espionage on a scale never before imagined. It is, however, totally consistent with the Obama Administration’s weaponizing of the IRS, as well as other unlawful manipulations of government programs to fund the operations of political allies and non-governmental organizations."[11]

Press censorship and control

On September 21, 2010 an internal email entitled “Obama Leak Investigations” at the “global intelligence” company Stratfor claimed Obama's White House adviser John Brennan was targeting journalists.

"Brennan is behind the witch hunts of investigative journalists learning information from inside the beltway sources,” writes one Stratfor official to another. The email continues: “Note —There is specific tasker from the [White House] to go after anyone printing materials negative to the Obama agenda (oh my.) Even the FBI is shocked. The Wonder Boys must be in meltdown mode…”

“The Wonder Boys” reportedly refers to the National Security Agency (NSA).[12]

Repressive measures against a CBS News anchor

On October 31, 2014, CBS News anchor Sharyl Attkisson revealed to the world videographic evidence[13] that some person or persons unknown installed keylogging and remote-access software and used it to interfere with her work and compromise several sensitive personal passwords. Worse yet, someone tampered with the router that provides her with high-speed Internet service.[14][15]

Sharyl Attkisson reporting from a combat mission over Kosovo

In her Best Seller, Stonewalled: One Reporter's Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama's Washington,[16] Attkisson tells how her work and personal computers had been hacked for more than two years after she began filing stories about the Benghazi massacre.[17] CBS News investigated and found evidence of multiple unauthorized accesses by a third party in late 2012.[18] The hackers were identified by experts as a US Government intelligence agency.[19] In March 2015, Attkisson and her family initiated suit against Eric Holder, Patrick R. Donahoe and unnamed agents of the US Department of Justice, the US Postal Service and the United States claiming to have been subjected to illegal surveillance activities.[20][21]

On March 19, 2017, a federal judge denies motion to dismiss case brought by former CBS anchor Sharyl Attkisson against Eric Holder and other Obamagate conspirators. Attkisson reported on Operation Fast and Furious, the Benghazi massacre coverup, and exposed the hoax reporting of Hillary Clinton landing under sniper fire. For this she was wiretaped and resigned from CBS. In her Best Seller, Stonewalled: One Reporter's Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama's Washington,[16] Attkisson details her story. The judge transferred the case allowing it to go forward.[22]

Repressive measures against Associated Press reporters

In May 2013 the Associated Press announced telephone records for 20 of their reporters had been subpoenaed by the Justice Department. News sources reported the US Attorney's office for the District of Columbia was conducting a criminal investigation into publication of a foiled May 2012 terrorist plot. While journalists are protected, leakers in the government are subject to prosecution. The Justice Dept. subpoenaed the phone records of AP from Verizon and other service providers.[24] The AP claimed these acts were a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into news-gathering.[25][26] The "intrusion" is the frightening off of government sources, the bread and butter of the Washington news gathering industry. CEO Gary Pruitt of AP stated: "These records potentially reveal communications with confidential sources across all of the newsgathering activities undertaken by the AP during a two-month period, provide a road map to AP's newsgathering operations and disclose information about AP's activities and operations that the government has no conceivable right to know;"[27][28] a "conceivable right to know" would be a hunt for leakers of FISA information within the administration.

Repressive measures against the American people

In 2013 the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court secretly approved an FBI request to continue obtaining daily telephone records of millions of Verizon customers.[29] The judge ordered Verizon to turn over the information to the National Security Agency (NSA). This directly contradicted Obama DNI James Clapper’s Congressional testimony.[30]

Data collection and privacy rights

In August 2009 it was reported the White House was soliciting bids to outsource a technology vendor to conduct a massive, secret effort to harvest personal information on millions of Americans from social networking websites of Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube, Flickr and others – any space where the White House “maintains a presence.” The information to be captured includes comments, tag lines, emails, audio, and video.

Critics have charged the emerging pattern of information management and control as "yet another sign that this Administration is at best indifferent to privacy rights and at worst prepared to violate civil liberties for political purposes."[31]

4th Amendment abuses

The FISA court ruled the Obama administration 's improper access of FISA data granted to contractors "seems to have been the result of deliberate decision making."

The Obama Justice Department has been accused of being "secretive, tyrannical, and oppressive" and compared with President George W. Bush, "even worse."[32] As a candidate, Senator Obama lamented that the Bush Administration "invoked a legal tool known as the 'state secrets' privilege more than any other previous administration to get cases thrown out of civil court," however in a motion to dismiss Jewel v. NSA, the Electronic Frontier Foundation litigation against the National Security Agency for the warrantless wiretapping, the Obama Administration argued that the state secrets privilege requires the court to dismiss the issue out of hand. The Obama administration argued that simply allowing the case to continue "would cause exceptionally grave harm to national security." As in the past, this is a blatant ploy to dismiss the litigation without allowing the courts to consider the evidence.

The Obama Justice Department then argued that the U.S. Government is completely immune from litigation for illegal spying — that the Government can never be sued for surveillance that violates federal privacy statutes. Birch Bricker writing in the Auburn Journal then points out, "This is a radical assertion that is utterly unprecedented. No one — not the White House, not the Justice Department, not any member of Congress, and not the Bush Administration — has ever interpreted the law this way....The Obama Administration goes two steps further than Bush did, and claims that the US PATRIOT Act also renders the U.S. immune from suit under the two remaining key federal surveillance laws: the Wiretap Act and the Stored Communications Act. Essentially, the Obama Administration has claimed that the government cannot be held accountable for illegal surveillance under any federal statutes." [33]

Libya was an ally of the US against the jihadis until Obama armed the jihadis to overthrew the government. One of their first acts was the mass beheading of Christians

Discrimination against dissident groups

Main article: IRS scandal

During the Obama Administration, the Internal Revenue Service discriminated against conservative organizations by making them wait for years just to gain tax-exempt status. At the same time, other groups received the same status in a very short period of time, such as a satanic group which received nonprofit status in only ten days.[34][35] In 2017, the Trump Administration ended the scandal by settling with the affected organizations and apologizing,[36] but it still declined to prosecute IRS official Lois Lerner for her major role in the scandal.[37]

Warrantless wiretapps

The Cybersecurity Act of 2009 would give the administration authority to conduct warrant-less spying and dictatorial power over Internet.[38]

Section 215 -- drastically broadens the kinds of information the government can demand under Foreign Intelligence Security Act to "any tangible thing" while lowering the burden of proof to obtain such an order. According to the Washington Post this measure "allows investigators probing terrorism to seek a suspect's records from third parties such as financial services and travel and telephone companies without notifying the suspect. The American Civil Liberties Union has criticized the provision, saying it violates the First Amendment rights of U.S. citizens."

Section 206—grants the authority to use secret "roving wiretaps." "In the past, authorities had to seek court approval for each electronic device carried by a suspect, from a cellphone and a BlackBerry to a home computer," writes the Post, "But under the provision, one warrant can cover all of those machines." "Unlike roving wiretaps authorized for criminal investigations," the ACLU explains, "section 206 does not require the order to identify either the communications device to be tapped nor the individual against whom the surveillance is directed, which is what gives section 206 the Kafkaesque moniker, the "John Doe roving wiretap provision."

Section 6001—or the "lone wolf" provision, which allows for secret FISA surveillance orders against people who have no connections to a terror group or foreign nation. "The government justified this provision by imagining a hypothetical "lone wolf," an international terrorist operating independently of any terrorist organization," explains the ACLU, "but there is little evidence to suggest this imaginary construct had any basis in reality."

Rod Beckstrom, formerly in charge of coordinating the US government's cyber-security operations, in a resignation letter to Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano,[39] cited the expanded control over the nation's computer security efforts poses “threats to our democratic processes.” [40]

Persecution of dissidents

In September 2014 Dinesh D'Souza was arrested and sentenced to 5 years probation.[3]

Andrew McCarthy noted this about D'Souza's indictment:

"Yet there were patent mitigating circumstances, starting with the fact that few people actually get prosecuted at all for this offense. Even in the case of gargantuan violations, such as the Obama 2008 campaign’s own millions of dollars in illicit contributions, the Justice Department allows cases to be settled with an administrative fine. Furthermore, in the few cases that are pursued criminally, there is unvaryingly a corruption angle — the donor is dodging the limits in the expectation of a quid pro quo.

"In D’Souza’s case, there was nothing of the kind: He was trying to be supportive of a friend who had no chance to win."[41]

President Trump gave D'Souza a full pardon on May 31, 2018, citing D'Souza's mistreatment by the Obama Justice Department.[42]

Misuse of intelligence agencies

Prime movers in the Deep State coup against American democracy: Comey (first left) a man with a warped and perverted sense of justice and the role of law enforcement in a free society; Brennan (second left) an admitted Communist and mastermind of the coup against American democracy; and Clapper (third from left) who lied under oath to Congress about spying on the American people.

President Obama's agreement to approve the illegal actions taken against Donald Trump and the Trump campaign were primarily motivated by a wish to destroy his candidacy and, after Trump's election, delegitimize the Trump presidency in much the same way Obama felt Trump delegitimized Ohama's presidency with Trump's involvement with the Birther movement.

The FISA Act was passed in 1978 on recommendation of the Church Committee specifically to protect the civil rights of people such as Obama's mentor Frank Marshall Davis and Obama's neighbors who got Obama started in politics, Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn. Both regaled Obama with tales of FBI surveillance and harassment in the pre-FISA age, which had thwarted the communist revolution in America. On becoming President, Obama was determined to seize control of the institutions and apparatus that had frustrated generations of communist revolutionaries and turn them against Obama's imaginary enemies.

Not since the election of Abraham Lincoln, has an outgoing administration sought to undermine and sabotage an incoming president.

Justice Department corruption

Throughout its entirety, the Obama administration attempted to criminalize political opposition,[43][44] first by an illegal misuse of the IRS targeting conservative groups, and when they were caught began misusing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act database in 2012 to spy on American citizens.[45][46][47]

By 2015 and 2016, the Obama administration interfered in American elections. It scuttled the investigation into Hillary Clinton's felonious violations of the National Records Act and Espionage Act,[48] paving the way for her nomination as the Democratic party presidential candidate, while conducting illegal spying on Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump,[49][50] falsely accusing him of colluding with Russia.[51] In doing so, the Obama administration colluded with foreign actors in an effort to subvert American democracy.[52][53]

Amendments to the Patriot Act in 2008 loosened regulations governing domestic spying;[54] Obama took rules intended for targeting al Qaeda to protect national security and applied them against political opponents and administration critics.[55] Under Barack Obama's leadership, an Inspector General appointed by Obama discovered, for the first time in history, that the top two personnel appointed by Obama to head the FBI had both violated the law.[56]

Forced abortion

In March 2009 the Obama administration announced it would send $50 million to the United Nations Population Fund, or UNFPA. UNPFA actively promotes abortion and is working closely with Chinese population control officials to implement China's forced abortion policy. The CCP's coercive one-child rule has resulted in forced abortions, involuntary sterilizations and other human rights abuses.[57]

UNFPA officials work side-by-side their Chinese colleagues and even share the same offices.[58]

2020 Leftwing riots

[59] Bernell Tremmell was murdered by Marxists in Milwaukee in July 2020 for his outspoken beliefs in freedom, justice, and racial equality.

2020 Leftwing riots were an effort by the DNC and mainstream media to spark a race war in the United States in advance of the 2020 presidential election.[60] On the BLM homepage, which features a “Defund The Police” petition front and center, if a user chooses to donate, they’re rerouted to a site hosted by ActBlue, the DNC's official payment portal.[61] ActBlue claims to be tax exempt organization and all donations to it are tax-deductable. The terms and conditions also link to ActBlue and mention "Campaign Finance Laws".[62] Joe Biden is a top beneficiary of the ActBlue’s fundraising efforts.[63]

Antifa No go zones

See also: Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone

Secular Leftism in the 21st century

See also: Decline of the secular left

Historically, the largest advances of the secular left has been through utilizing the power of the state (see: State atheism and Atheism and communism). For example, secular leftists use the power of the state to promote evolutionary ideology and to censor creationist/intelligent design models of origins (See: Suppression of alternatives to evolution and Atheist indoctrination).

The historian Martin Van Crevel points out that sovereign states are losing power/influence due to technology democratizing access to information, welfare states increasingly failing, fourth-generation warfare being waged against countries and sovereign states increasingly losing their ability to maintain internal order.[64][65] See also: Decline of the secular left

CCP global pandemic

Main article: CCP global pandemic

The CCP malevolently allowed the Chinese plague to spread as a result of human-to-human transmission beginning in Wuhan, China. As it metastasized, the World Health Organization (WHO) parroted the Chinese Communist Party line that the Wuhan virus could not be passed from one human to another, and that it was “racist” to refer to the virus by its place of origin.[66]

Cuban Communism

Cuba remains a Communist state controlled by the Castro brothers since 1960 and under U.S economic sanctions.

Communism in the Cold War era

Communist goals of 1963

1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.

2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.

3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament of the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength.

4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.

5. Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.

6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.

7. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.

8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the German question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.

9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the United States has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.

10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.

11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces. (Some Communist leaders believe the world can be taken over as easily by the U.N. as by Moscow. Sometimes these two centers compete with each other as they are now doing in the Congo.)

12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.

13. Do away with all loyalty oaths.

14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.

15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.

16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.

17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers' associations. Put the party line in textbooks.

18. Gain control of all student newspapers.

19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.

20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book-review assignments, editorial writing, policy-making positions.

21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and motion pictures.

22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms."

23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. "Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art."

24. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.

25. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio, and TV.

26. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as "normal, natural, healthy."

27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity which does not need a "religious crutch."

28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state."

29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.

30. Discredit the American Founding Fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man."

31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of the "big picture." Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.

32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture—education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.

33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.

34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.

35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.

36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.

37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.

38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand or treat.

39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.

40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.

41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.

42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use united force to solve economic, political or social problems.

43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.

44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.

45. Repeal the Connally reservation so the United States cannot prevent the World Court from seizing jurisdiction over nations and individuals alike.[67]

Collapse of Soviet communism

The shooting down by the Soviets on September 1, 1983 of Korean Airlines Flight 007 may have been a contributing factor for the downfall of the Soviet Union as well as for the whole Soviet block. It being a catalyst for the collapse of the Soviet Union may be inferred from the fact that NATO had decided, under the impetus of the U.S. administration, to deploy Pershing II and cruise missiles in Europe, primarily West Germany. This deployment would have placed missiles just 6–10 minutes striking distance from Moscow. But support for the deployment was wavering and many doubted that the missile deployment would find enough support to effect it. When the Soviet Union shot down Flight 007 with 269 people aboard, including conservative Democratic Congressman Larry McDonald —an act which U.S. President Ronald Reagan characterized as a "massacre"—enough support was galvanized for the deployment. The deployment caused great resources of the Soviet Union to be diverted from inner economic use to military expenditures to counter the U.S. and NATO missile deployment.

Between 1989 and 1991, many Communist governments fell. The Berlin Wall in Germany, which had become a symbol for the division between the Communist states and the rest of Europe, was torn down largely in response to Ronald Reagan in 1989, and there was also a large revolution against Romanian dictator Nicolaie Ceausescu which led to Ceausescu's arrest on December 22 that year and his subsequent execution on December 25 following a quick trial. In 1991, the USSR broke up into several countries - each of which reformed to capitalism. Some of these remained under autocratic governments, but some have embraced democracy. With the collapse the remnants of Communist parties have dropped their old names and ideologies, but still operate on the left of the political spectrum.

In 1992 President Boris Yeltsin announced that the Russian people had been liberated and that Communism in the former Soviet Union was dead. [4] Pres. George H. W. Bush imagined the global threat had passed by telling Congress, "Communism died this year."[68] Liberal historians called the death of the Soviet Union, "the end of history," when in fact the Communist disease only went into remission. The seat of the global Marxist revolution relocated from Moscow to Berkeley, California, under the vanguard party name, Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism.

In contrast to Yeltsins statement his successor Russian president Vladimir Putin declared that "[he] liked Communist and socialist ideas very much and [he] like[s] them still." and compared the Soviet code of conduct to the Bible.[69] Putin also has compared communism with Christianity.[70]

Communism has remained in the world despite the fall of the Soviet bloc in the late 1980s.[71]

Historical Communism: Theory and Practice

Communism is based upon Marxism, a philosophy which uses materialism to explain all physical and social phenomena. The theory of evolution influenced the thinking of the Communists, including Marx, Engels, Vladimir Lenin, and Joseph Stalin.[72] Marx wrote, "Darwin's book is very important and serves me as a basis in natural science for the class struggle in history." Marx offered to dedicate the second German edition of his polemic Das Kapital to Charles Darwin, but Darwin declined the "honour." [73][74]

Economically, Communism advocates a socialist economy in which the government owns the means of production. In countries where Communism has been imposed, the government has taken ownership of farms, factories, stores and so on in the name of the people; see "dictatorship of the proletariat". This drives all market-based economic activity underground and leads to inefficiencies and shortages. In both the Soviet Union and Red China, the number of people who starved to death when the government confiscated their farm products (animals and grain) is estimated in the tens of millions.

Even more important, one party controls every organization from the local labor union to the army to the national government. The party is not elected. Its top officials (the "Politburo") select replacements when there is a vacancy. Usually a dictator (like Stalin, Mao or Castro) controls the Politburo, but sometimes power is shared among five or six people. No dissent is allowed—all news media are controlled, and the Internet is heavily censored.

Elites do not disappear. Members of the ruling party (see Nomenklatura) have special stores in which ordinary people are barred, stores which are immune to the shortages which the lower class must endure.

Various Communist doctrines have evolved or been adapted to the time and place they have been implemented. Marxism, developed by Karl Marx, and its modifications under Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, and Mao Zedong, advocates the overthrow of the existing order by a revolution of the proletariat, the social group which does not control the means of production. The goal of Marxism is supposedly to create a classless society which would result in no longer the need for any government (Communism).

The most famous government to label itself "Communist" is the former USSR or the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics; the Communist Party controlled its government from 1918 to 1991. This government was officially atheist and attempted to suppress all religion until World War II, when it discovered religion was needed to rally the people against the Nazi invaders. Like all authoritarian regimes, it tried to cultivate reverence for the state as a psychological substitute for religion.

Marxist theory is intended to appeal to its adherents with the phrase, "from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs", which essentially states point blank a worker does not get paid according to his abilities, and there is no incentive within the economic theory. Another quote by Marx was, "The theory of the Communism may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property," or as some have phrased it, legalized theft.

Lying, deceit and hypocrisy play major roles in Communism and advancing its goals.[75] According to then-Federal Bureau of Investigation director J. Edgar Hoover:

“ The basic premise of Communism is deceit and hypocrisy. The Communist philosophy teaches that every available means must be utilized to achieve the final end—world revolution. For this reason the Communist will lie, cheat and resort to any tactics which will gain his end. He will advocate today exactly what he denounced yesterday. And with a straight face! Has he lied? No, he will say, he's only carrying out party policy. The concept of morality and fair play, as practiced in our democracy, is alien and repugnant to him. Moreover, the Communists employ a purposive double-talk, roundabout style, known as "Aesopian language," in their literature and speeches, designed to deceive and evade to clothe their true thoughts. This technique, utilized by Lenin, is the very epitome of deceit.[76] ”

Pope Pius IX spoke of how Communism operates, including its use of lies and deceit and its attacks on religion, in his condemnation of the ideology in his 1846 encyclical Qui Pluribus:

“ A very bitter and fearsome war against the whole Catholic commonwealth (is) being stirred up by men bound together in a lawless alliance. … They are experienced and skillful in deceit, which they use to set in motion their plans to quench peoples’ zeal for piety, justice and virtue, to corrupt morals, to cast all divine and human laws into confusion, and to weaken and even possibly overthrow the Catholic religion and civil society. They teach that the most holy mysteries of our religion are fictions of human invention, and that the teaching of the Catholic Church is opposed to the good and the prerogatives of human society. They are not even afraid to deny Christ Himself and God.[77] ”

Apologists claim Communism is a system created by people with good intentions who failed to recognize that their idealistic system was inconsistent with human nature. As a result, they caused more harm than good.[78] In reality, successful communist revolutionaries and leaders have historically been common criminals and murderers.

Communism and militant atheism

See also: Atheism and communism According to the University of Cambridge, historically, the "most notable spread of atheism was achieved through the success of the 1917 Russian Revolution, which brought the Marxist-Leninists to power."[79]

Karl Marx believed atheism to be a key part of Communism. He is often very famously quoted as saying, "Religion ... is the opium of the masses."[80] His full quote was: "Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people."[81] He believed it was part of the "superstructure," a false culture built to maintain the status quo. Thus he denigrated Christianity as a "fictional" religion. Instead, Marx was an avowed atheist, as he wrote, "Communism begins from the outset with atheism; but atheism is at first far from being communism; indeed, that atheism is still mostly an abstraction."[82]

Vladimir Lenin similarly wrote: "A Marxist must be a materialist, i. e., an enemy of religion, but a dialectical materialist, i. e., one who treats the struggle against religion not in an abstract way, not on the basis of remote, purely theoretical, never varying preaching, but in a concrete way, on the basis of the class struggle which is going on in practice and is educating the masses more and better than anything else could."[83]

In 1955, Chinese communist leader Chou En-lai declared, "We Communists are atheists".[84] In 2015, the Communist Party of China reaffirmed that members of their party must be atheists.[85]

The atheism in Communist regimes has been and continues to be militant atheism and various acts of repression including the razing of thousands of religious buildings and the killing, imprisoning, and oppression of religious leaders and believers.[86][87][88][89][90][91][92]

Marxists justification for its persecution of the Russian Orthodox Church was based upon the claim that the Church was a "willing tool of Tsarism."[93]

The clergy openly stated its support for the counter-revolution (White Revolution). Lenin proclaimed that a Communist regime must show itself to be merciless toward the question of religion. There was no place for the church in Lenin's regime. This led to anti-religious decrees and propaganda. All church property was expropriated by the new Soviet government.[94]

During the late 1930s and later 1940s the restrictions on church activity were loosened as Stalin needed all the support he could get for the war. This doctrine of co-operation between the church and state continued throughout the existence of the Soviet republics and the other Warszawa pact nations. Though never going as far as a leader of the Soviet Union asking god to bless the country the clause in the Soviet Unions constitution addressing the separation of church and state was rendered useless.

Dr. Martin Luther King said, "for the Communist there is no divine government, no absolute moral order, there are no fixed, immutable principles; consequently almost anything - force, violence, murder, lying - is a justifiable means." [95]

Atheistic Communism and torture of the religious

See also: Atheistic communism and torture The website Victimsofcommunism.org declares concerning atheistic Communism and the use of torture:

“ Significantly, communists did not merely try to block or halt religious faith but to reverse it. This was particularly true for Romania, even before the Nicolai Ceausescu era. This meant not just forbidding religious practice and jailing ministers and believers but employing torture to force them to renounce their faith. It was not enough to contain, silence, even punish believers in prison; it was decided they must be tortured in truly unimaginably degrading ways to attempt to undo religious faith.[96] ”

For additional information please see: Atheistic communism and torture

Social gospel

Some Communist ideology has made its way into the Church as a Social Gospel, interpreting the Gospel as less redemptive of sin and more of a public works campaign and activism. They often cite Jesus feeding the masses and warnings to the wealthy who believed self-seeking is all this world has to offer. Communists often cite the Acts of the Apostles, as early Christians practicing some form of sharing for the common good:

“ And all that believed were together, and had all things common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need. (Acts 2:44-45, KJV) Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, And laid them down at the apostles' feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need. And Joses, who by the apostles was surnamed Barnabas, (which is, being interpreted, The son of consolation,) a Levite, and of the country of Cyprus, Having land, sold it, and brought the money, and laid it at the apostles' feet.(Acts 4:34-7, KJV) ”

But as Arnold Toynbee has pointed out, this Marxist view denies the most crucial points,

“ The passage in the Acts represents the philanthropy of the primitive Christian Society as flowing from a God-given grace which was the fruit of a belief in the divinity of Jesus. In other words, the charity which is here depicted as moving the primitive Christians to go—in their mutual concern for one another's welfare—to the extreme length of sharing all their worldly goods is not a mere love of Man for Man (which is the limited literal meaning of the word ‘philanthropy’), but is a spiritual relation to which God is a party as well as His human creatures. In fact, this Christian Socialism is a practical application, on the economic surface of life, of the fundamental religious truth that the brotherhood of man is a consequence of the fatherhood of God - a truth which is driven home with special force by a religion which teaches that God is not only the Father and Creator of man, but also his Savior, Who has been incarnate in human shape and has suffered, and triumphed over, death.[97] ”

Sloth in atheistic Communist countries vs. Protestant work ethic

[98] In China , the growth in religion has accompanied China's fast economic growth over the last twenty years.

See also: Atheism and sloth and Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism Atheism is a part of Marxist-Leninist and Maoist/Chinese Communist ideology (See: Atheism and communism).

Widespread sloth in the former Soviet Union helped cause much poverty.[99][100] A study performed in the former Soviet Union found that over 50% of the work force admitted to drinking alcohol while on the job (See also: Atheism and alcoholism).[101] In the former Soviet Union, a popular joke was that the workers pretended to work and the Soviet Union pretended to pay them.[102]

On the other hand, Harvard University historian Niall Ferguson declared: "Through a mixture of hard work and thrift the Protestant societies of the North and West Atlantic achieved the most rapid economic growth in history."[103]

In China, the growth in religion has accompanied China's fast economic growth over the last twenty years.[104] Christianity is seeing rapid growth in China and the historian Niall Ferguson attributes this recent economic growth to the Protestant work ethic being more incorporated into Chinese society.[105] See also: Protestant work ethic and Growth of Christianity in China

Similarities between Communism, Nazism and liberalism

See also: Similarities between Communism, Nazism and liberalism Adolf Hitler noted that Communists made excellent converts to National Socialism (a.k.a. Nazism), because the same personality type was attracted to both. "[T]here is more that binds us to Bolshevism than separates us from it. There is, above all, genuine, revolutionary feeling, which is alive everywhere in Russia except where there are Jewish Marxists. I have always made allowance for this circumstance, and given orders that former Communists are to be admitted to the party at once. The petit bourgeois Social-Democrat and the trade-union boss will never make a National Socialist, but the Communists always will."[106] Josef Stalin also recognized that ex-Nazis and ex-fascists were natural recruits for post-war Communist regimes. As Stanley Payne notes in his A History of Fascism: 1914-1945, "All over Soviet-occupied eastern Europe (should be: Central and Eastern Europe), most rank-and-file former fascist party members, together with many lower-level leaders, were welcomed to fill the ranks of the initially exiguous local Communist parties. The psychological transition seems to have been an easy one, for obvious reasons."[107]

Communist Manifesto Nazi Party Platform Analysis 1 "Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes." "We demand an agrarian reform in accordance with our national requirements, and the enactment of a law to expropriate the owners without compensation of any land needed for the common purpose. The abolition of ground rents, and the prohibition of all speculation in land." The stripping away of land from private owners. Liberalism today demands "eminent domain" on property. 2 "A heavy progressive or graduated income tax." "We demand the nationalization of all trusts...profit-sharing in large industries...a generous increase in old-age pensions...by providing maternity welfare centers, by prohibiting juvenile labor...and the creation of a national (folk) army." The points raised in the Nazi platform demand an increase in taxes to support them. Liberalism today demands heavy progressive and graduated income taxes. 3 "Abolition of all rights of inheritance." "That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished." Liberalism today demands a "death tax" on anyone inheriting an estate. 4 "Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels." "We demand that all non-Germans who have entered Germany since August 2, 1914, shall be compelled to leave the Reich immediately." The Nuremberg Laws of 1934 allowed Germany to take Jewish property. 5 "Centralisation of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly." "We demand the nationalization of all trusts." Central control of the financial system. 6 "Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State." "We demand that there be a legal campaign against those who propagate deliberate political lies and disseminate them through the press...editors and their assistants on newspapers published in the German language shall be German citizens...Non-German newspapers shall only be published with the express permission of the State...the punishment for transgressing this law be the immediate suppression of the newspaper..." Central control of the press. Liberals today demand control or suppression of talk radio and Fox News. 7 "Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, &c, &c." "In order to make it possible for every capable and industrious German to obtain higher education, and thus the opportunity to reach into positions of leadership, the State must assume the responsibility of organizing thoroughly the entire cultural system of the people. The curricula of all educational establishments shall be adapted to practical life. The conception of the State Idea (science of citizenship) must be taught in the schools from the very beginning. We demand that specially talented children of poor parents, whatever their station or occupation, be educated at the expense of the State. " Central control of education, with an emphasis on doing things their way. Liberals today are doing things their way in our schools.

Atrocities and Repression

[108] Apologists frequently claim Communism has "never really been tried". Exhumed skeletons of class war victims murdered by Communists.Apologists frequently claim Communism has "never really been tried".

Communist regimes have engaged in mass killings on a scale of millions of individuals.[109] A work entitled The Black Book of Communism published by the Harvard Press focuses on the crimes, terror, and repression of modern Communist regimes over a 70-year period.[110] This book is fairly controversial partly due to the various estimates regarding the millions of people who died under communist regimes.[111]

Similarly, an influential book which concerns itself with Russian Communist torture, repression and atrocities is Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago which won Solzhenitsyn a Nobel Prize.[112] In 1983, Alexander Solzhenitsyn in which he gave his explanation of the cause of why millions of people died under Russian Communism:

“ Over a half century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of old people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: "Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened. Since then I have spent well-nigh 50 years working on the history of our revolution; in the process I have read hundreds of books, collected hundreds of personal testimonies, and have already contributed eight volumes of my own toward the effort of clearing away the rubble left by that upheaval. But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some 60 million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: "Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened. ”

In Communist North Korea, abuse and killing in prison camps is occurring today.[113][114] In addition, the North Korean government practices brutal repression and atrocities against North Korean Christians.[115][116]

In 1999, the publication Christian Century reported that "China has persecuted religious believers by means of "harassment, prolonged detention, and incarceration in prison or `reform-through-labor' camps and police closure of places of worship."[117] In 2003, owners of Bibles in China were sent to prison camps and 125 Chinese churches were forced to close.[118] China continues to practice religious oppression today.[119]

Notorious Communists

Well known Communists include:

Further reading

Pipes, Richard. Communism: A History (2003), by a leading conservative historian Pipes, Richard. History of Communism: A Brief History (2002)

(2003), by a leading conservative historian Priestland, David. The Red Flag: A History of Communism (2009)

(2009) 100 Things You Should Know About Communism

See also