Via Instapundit comes this surprising op-ed from the New York Times that admits that the People’s Republic of China’s ‘Great Leap Forward’ caused truly frightening numbers of deaths: looking at the actual source material, its author is now estimating a death toll of 45 million (50% more than previous estimates). That works out to about 6.5% of its population, based on the 1960 census: to put that in perspective, the equivalent for 2010-era USA would be 20.15 million, or just over the entire population of New York State.
Now, this op-ed is not surprising because said famine (which was largely deliberate) is unique in the annals of world Communism: it’s not. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics had deliberate famines in the Ukraine in the 1930s and a general one just after World War II. The Khmer Rouge of Democratic Kampuchea likewise had a general one in the 1970s, as did the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea in the 1990s. Half the famines in Africa over the last fifty years involved either civil wars started by Marxists, or started against them. In short, it’s long been known that the only thing that Communism is good at is in turning large numbers of live peasants into large numbers of dead ones. That’s because – as I have noted before – Marxism is intellectualism for stupid people; it tends to attract the sort who can’t understand that an economic system that cannot feed its own population reliably has failed at the game of Life. Literally.
No, this article is surprising because it got published in The New York Times. Do you know that they still list Walter Duranty’s Pulitzer on their awards page? Apparently, they think that it’s enough to declare that the deliberate framing and hiding of widespread deliberate famines was a ‘failure’ on Duranty’s part. Personally, if I was running the NYT I’d be demanding that the Pulitzer people revoke that prize as a blot on my paper’s good name, but I suppose that the current owners have different priorities…
Moe Lane (crosspost)
PS: Ah, Glenn got a irate email from somebody throwing out the ‘But their motivations are noble!’ apology. Yes, of course: when I get a bullet in the back of the head from somebody for the ‘crime’ of believing in property rights I so totally will feel better about it because the shooter and I ‘merely’ disagree on the best route to Utopia.
Moe Lane
PG DeFreese
Victoria Coates
Daniel Horowitz
Dan Spencer
I'm Reminded Sadly of a Great Philosophical Saying From China
Repair_Man_Jack (Diary) Thursday, December 16th at 12:41PM EST (link)“Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”
Of course you have to let that guy keep his fish or trade them for some other dude’s beans and rice, which does not usually happen under intellectualism for stupid people…
Mr. Obama is pretending that an economic “recovery” is underway when he knows damn well that the banking system is just blowing smoke up the shredded *** of what’s left of that economy – James Howard Kunstler
I love that line: Marxism is intellectualism for stupid people.
d_lamar Thursday, December 16th at 12:57PM EST (link)It concisely summarizes why our culture is going the direction that it is. The best example may be the radio interview in Detroit of the couple of women overjoyed about getting some kind of payment from the government, Obama stash.
Me, too.
Bill S (Diary) Thursday, December 16th at 1:21PM EST (link)In fact, I think I’m going to change my sig line to that.
Thanks, Moe…
“It’s such a fine line between stupid, and clever.” – David St. Hubbins
Why nobody mentions
voicefromthevoid Thursday, December 16th at 1:00PM EST (link)that marxism is scientifically de-facto incorrect and that consequently, any system based on marxism simply cannot work no matter what?
Marxists Actually Explain That Well
Repair_Man_Jack (Diary) Thursday, December 16th at 1:18PM EST (link)The guy I studied Marxism under in college refered to this as “people refusing to spit out an idea that tastes good.” Not only was it a pretty good turn of phrase, it totally explained what Marcuse meant by False Consciousness. Marxists like how their ideas taste. it bolsters their self-regard. Screw reality. They want to be plugged back into the Matrix.
Mr. Obama is pretending that an economic “recovery” is underway when he knows damn well that the banking system is just blowing smoke up the shredded *** of what’s left of that economy – James Howard Kunstler
5555! A lot of people think Hitler was the biggest mass murderer of all time
JSobieski (Diary) Thursday, December 16th at 1:04PM EST (link)When in actuality, he was merely #3 behind Mao (#1) and Stalin (#2).
The moderates oujt there need to think about the people in the current administration who have said glowing things about Mao. Those same mushy moderates should educate themselves about how the New Duranty Times er New York Times wrote such glowing things about Stalin as he was purposely starving millions of people to death–people who lived in the bread basket of Europe. Duranty was sent specifically to investigate this genocide, and covered it up in the most shameless act of useful idiot propaganda in the history of western journalism.
Marxism is intellectualism for really dumb people. Unfortunately there are two many Americans who sincerely do love this country, but don’t seem to give enough weight to the Duranty behavior of people in the media and in politics.
If I had the money to do so, I would create a “Duranty Award” and give it out each year. I don’t think it would shame the recipients, but it might educate those moderate independents out there who love the country but can seem to identify the Durantys in their midst.
My rules of the road for primary season.
Rule #1: Vote for YOUR first choice in the primaries
Rule #2: Vote for the R in the general.
Rule #3: Don’t let anyone convince you to violate Rule #1 or Rule #2
Rule #4: When in a center-right argument, reaffirm Rules #1-#3–it will help us all to get along better.
Rule #5: If you are using the language of the left, you probably aren’t furthering conservativism
Rule #6: The priority is issues first, candidates second, and supporters third. Nobody is bigger than the issues. Conversely, if you spend your time focusing on supporters, you are wasting everyone’s time.
STOP THE MADNESS!
A reduction in the rate of spending increases is NOT a cut!
In-state tuition for illegals is NOT amnesty!
Requiring someone to pay their medical bills is NOT an individual mandate!
Reducing tax rates is NOT a tax increase!
The "noble intentions" defense...
Alyssa Kaeding (Diary) Thursday, December 16th at 1:11PM EST (link)Yes, I know that defense well. I hear it all the time from my liberal friends. I always think back though to what Milton Friedman said: “One of the great mistakes is to judge policies and programs by their intentions rather than their results. Almost all government programs are started with good intentions, but when you look at what they actually achieve, there is a general rule. Almost every such program has results that are the opposite of the intentions of the well-meaning people who originally backed it.”
As I've said for years
gwalt Thursday, December 16th at 5:01PM EST (link)If Marxists are so smart, why aren’t people drowning to get into Cuba?
If Marxists are so smart, why did the Soviet Union fall?
Answer: they’re not that smart. They just think they can do the Karl shuffle better than the previous dude.
“A lot of briefing for a 2 hr. special with Dan Rather. Saw the show & wonder why we bothered”. –Ronald Reagan, The Reagan Diaries (January 27, 1982)