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Re: More from the Giancarlo weekend

216.158.7.57

***You should not be surprised at this, given the long-standing alliance between the European artistic community (and, to slightly lesser degree, the US community) and the communist left.

You are right. Actually, I am not surprised as much as I am saddened.

***The Spanish Civil War, in particular, has been romanticized at least since Earnest Hemingway wrote "For Whom the Bell Tolls."

Absolutely true, and the communists made sure that every kid in Russia was familiar with that work.

However, there is an interesting twist. I am reading a serious work by Rudolf Rocker written in 1937, where all those events are covered with what appears to be a very objective eye. There are sections on the communist terror and political assasinations in Spain, on the subversive role the communist party had played, on the role of Stalin and Russia, on the Spanish communist Cheka secret police, on extermination of opposition, and more and more. It is sad that while written at the same time, this work was not given more light, while the "artistic" work was promoted.


***The problem is that facsim lost the contest, and its evils were laid bare long before the same fate befell European/Russian communism and its evils were laid bare.

To large extent the true exposure of the communism did not take place until the late fifties. Anyone familiar with the situation knows that what followed was one massive exodus from the communist parties around the world. The American communist party quickly became a non-entity.

***And, of course, the persistence of belief even in the face of contrary evidence is a well-documented human phenomenon.

Sigh.


***Other "propaganda" films that come to mind:
"z" by Costa-Gavras (1967) very entertaining

I know that one very well. That was before Yves Montand left the party.


***"JFK" by Oliver Stone; laughable to anyone who lived through the period and remembers the events depicted
"The Hurricane" a vicious, dishonest, racially inflammatory polemic that was too much even for Hollywood to swallow; too bad -- a wonderful performance by Denzel Washington wasted

***As for who is worse, Nazis or Communists? One can't make a comparison.

Unlike many of my friends, I do not burden myself much with that question. However, I sometimes use the words "greater evil" for one, perhaps simplistic, reason: in all of human history no other political force was responsible for more deaths. We can perhaps attribute 20 million murders to the Nazi, while by various accounts the communists are directly responsible for extermination of upwards of 150 million people in many countries.

***Unlike the Russian communists, the Nazis didn't have 70 years to play in the sandbox. You must admit that they certainly got off to a *promising* start with the "final solution."

There is no question about it. Unfortunately, while the Soviet Communism had slowed down its murderous pace years ago, its devoted satellites are still there, doing today what they have been doing for many years.

Vietnam, Cuba, China are among these.

But going back to the movie, it is the sad fact that majority of people will not even try to balance that rather artistic viewpoint with facts. Simple food is easier to swallow. So while the right-wing murder squads are rightly painted in their evil color, the communist murderers still escape any light.




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