perfidy

Mike, I am puzzled. You keep talking about the pure, received faith in Marx as prophesied by his disciple Engels (and very interesting that you should use such religious imagery, btw.) and how basically almost no one over the last hundred plus years has ever gotten it right. Now, I am more than willing to believe that you are correct and every leftist/Marxist over the last century was completely wrong. Most people are idiots. However, your description seems completely different from the way almost every leftist/Marxist/environmentalist/Commie in the world thinks of themselves.

I worked with hardcore environmentalists for years, and I can assure you that they all believed in Marx. They had copies of the Communist manifesto. They spouted communist doctrine, hated capitalism, the works. They laughed at the watermelon joke (green on the outside, red on the inside.) Marx' picture was on walls throughout those murderous states that were founded by faux communists. But it is curious that as soon as someone gets power and begins murdering people, oh wait, he's not a communist. Can we ever know what a communist government is like? We know what democratic, monarchical, republican, totalitarian and oligarchical governments are like, because we have seen them. It seems that your communist prophecy is completely unverifiable, in that it ceases to be communist as soon as it gains power.

Given the statements in the last paragraph of "Speaking of phony leftism," do you believe that it ever will be verified, that an actual communist government will ever exist - by your definition of communism? If not, why does anyone bother being communist, when the only result is either a) frustrated fringe dwelling in affluent societies or b) rampant murder, terror, and poverty if a communist ever gains power anywhere else? Looking at the wreckage of states whose leadership fervently believed (despite disagreeing with you) that they were communists, and were the followers of Marx, and looking at the stagnant economies in nations that have adopted large scale socialist programs (Sweden, France, Germany) where before there was rising prosperity, I have a hard time swallowing the whole left/Marxist/socialist package on a pragmatic basis. Of course, my classical liberal ideals give me other reasons not to like it. But is there anywhere in the world where this has worked? Not that I've ever heard of.