An Open Letter from mainly Leftist) Intellectuals on US/Russian Relations

I've not read Christopher Andrews' books, which I think is what you're referring to. (The original archives are still classified, but you can access an edited version at Cambridge University -- if you can read Russian. I assume you're not referring to them.) I had a look at the Wiki article on the Mitrokhin archives, and there doesn't seem to be anything about the Socialist Party or the Green Party being orchestrated by the Soviets. If you've got some specific evidence of this I'd like to see it.

You're probably not a Leftist, or actually familiar with the Left. I was a Leftist for twenty-five years, deeply involved in radical activities in the South [real subversive stuff like registering Blacks to vote] and New York state and California, and I can tell you, the CPUSA, during the Vietnam anti-war movement period, was scorned by almost all the young people on the Left. The CP were seen as old fuddy-duddies, timid, conservative ... they advocated 'Negotiations Now' whereas all the young leftists were for immediate withdrawal at a minimum, and 'Victory to the NLF' at the maximum. And then came the Prague Spring in 1968, supported by almost the entire non-CP Left.

In Latin America, young revolutionaries scorned the CP, because the CP didn't want to pick up the gun and open a guerilla foco. People who think the Left was some united conspiracy co ordinated by the Russians simply know nothing about the reality. (Anyone interested in the reality could do worse than start by studying Chile, where the Soviets and their local party, the CP, were the most conservative force within the Left. A good summary is here.)

 

Thomas Frank may be an intellectual but he’s also a lonely voice in the wilderness of leftyism

 

The intellectuals come down from their ivory towers are models of insanity

Too bad for America tha5 our best and brightest have descended to them

 

actually that is only true of the hate filled pseudo intellectual far right

 

No

I was correct the first time

 

as always, the far right on this forum is always far WRONG

 

I don't automatically equate "patriotism", or even "American patriotism" with Good. Too often it's used as a way to stop thought.
But anyone who thinks the American leftist intelligentsia is 'patriotic' is being disingenuous, or showing their total ignorance.

Here's Nation magazine editor Katha Pollitt's column in that journal a week after 9/11, entitled Put Out No Flags.

Here's a snippet, but you should read the whole article:

"My daughter, who goes to Stuyvesant High School only blocks from the World Trade Center, thinks we should fly an American flag out our window. Definitely not, I say: The flag stands for jingoism and vengeance and war. "

 

I'm sure that the daughter, her mom, or anyone else who reads the Nation had any role in exploding the Murrah building or in hiding Eric Rudolph from the Federal authorities like the unpatriotic right wingers did.

 

Definitely not. The Weathermen, maybe.

 

not likely as the Weathermen were dissolved way back in 1977

 

Huh? Is that the best imagery you can come up? Muddled, imprecise, and cheap, without a shred of wit.

INtellectuals are necessary to society, but they sure as hell ain't the only ones who make contributions to society. Its just that they have what you will never have and it sounds like you are rather envious.

 

The lefty intellectuals of today are all of those expletives and more

 

please buy a dictionary. none of them are expletives, they are adjectives that in my opinion perfectly characterize the subject of my sentence.

I object to unsubstantiated bullshit bumpersticker mischaracterizations to excoriate whatever "other" that the purveyor doesn't identify with. I also understand that many cannot see the difference between a precise substantiated perspective and the use of a bumpersticker. they only see equivalency because they don't know what they don't know and aren't in the least bit interested in finding out.

 

I consider them expletives

The intellectual class in America today are not fit to shine the shoes of the Founding Fathers

They are mostly clowns

 

Open Letter from Leftist ^

 

Yeah I know what you mean, all those wall street bankers and brokers your dear leader just gave a cool trillion to, are fit enough for to take your money, but not fit to shine shoes?

I would agree that all those war planners, and weapon designers and diplomats, and professors,and inventors, and researchers and business leaders probably might be a tad overqualified to shine shoes.

I doubt you have any such problem.

 

The reality is that the Soviets - not the Russians - influenced the "left" in the USA and Europe. The Soviets did not have to literally take over and run the green party, or USA communist party, or the Democrat party, or the anti-nuclear groups. Those groups agenda aligned with the Soviet agenda, the Soviets only had to enable and influence those groups through indirect financing, moles, backroom politics, and open political statements which align with the groups activities.

And the Soviets had to do was provide some help to allow the "left" to be active. Plus a nudge or two when it was needed.

No Soviet called you all into a room and gave you orders, that would be stupid and it was totally unnecessary. You did what the Soviets wanted because you were misguided and misinformed partly by your own fault and partly through Soviet activity.

 

All your specific examples of 'help' are necessarily vague. A 'nudge'? 'Indirect' financing? 'Moles'? 'Backroom politics'? Sorry, you'd have to give some concrete examples. If the Soviets had never existed, all the things you probably object to -- organizing labor unions, opposing US invasions of other countries, fighting for Black and women's rights ... all of them would have occured, and did occur years before the 1917 Revoluiton.

I think your argument is something like this: if two groups of people claim to be fighting for the same goal, then one of them is being manipulated by the other.

For example, throughout the 1950s and 60s, the Soviets made a big deal about the lack of voting rights for Blacks in the South of the US. (In fact, the CPUSA had always made a big deal about this.) They could deflect criticisms of their one-party state with its fake elections by bringing up conditions for Blacks in the South -- something that made a special impression on the emerging Third World intelligentsia and government leaders. (Of course it was hypocritical on their part.)

So, the Soviets raised a big stink about voting rights for Blacks in the South. And various (mainly leftist) groups also made a big deal about voting rights for Blacks in the South.

The same argument went for school integration: how often did I hear, from John Birchers, that school integration was a Communist plot. And, yes, the Communists agitated for it. And various liberal and leftist groups agitated for it. And quite a few Republicans supported it too.. [And the lunatic Birch society believed that Eisenhower was a secret member of the Communist Party ... integrating schools and all.]

Therefore ... by your logic ....these groups were dupes of the Reds.

I don't really know how to explain this basic logical fallacy better than just laying it out ... if you don't see the screaming fallacy, I probably can't help.

I

 

“Writer, Poet, and activist” - AKA: Worthless.

 

Wrong. Poor examples, and largely irrelevant ones, the Soviets didn't give a damn about voting rights in the USA. A better one is the Soviets did not want tactical nukes in Europe, weapons such as the "neutron bomb", so they encouraged protests by the green parties and environmentalists in the US and Europe, as well as hyping the inhumanity of the neutron bomb and the fears of Europeans (mainly Germans) that the US would be prone to using the weapons since people and animals would die but the land and material would remain largely intact and usable. The Soviet goal of removing a potent weapon against a Soviet attack aligned with the naïve outlook of various political and activist groups on the "left", the Soviets stoked the flames with misinformation and support.

 

Of course they didn't care about voting rights in the USA, except insofar as this issue was a useful stick to beat the US with, especially in the Third World.

As for the issue of Cruise MIssiles and the Neutron Bomb: I'm sure they did everything they could to encourage the European protests against them, just like the FSB (or some Russian agency) probably tried to arrange a violent confrontation between pro- and anti-Islam people in Austin Texas. They had active campaigns of disinformation, tried to cultivate journalists who were on the Left, etc.

But this doesn't mean that the people opposing Islamism in the US, or Cruise Missiles in Europe, are agents of the Russians, and that their issues can be discredited by saying "Look, the Soviets/Russians are behind it!" They are right, or wrong, independently of whether their actions get the approval of someone else.

Here's what is really bad about that method of reasoning: it is EXACTLY the same method used by tyrants in Iran, Syria, China, Cuba and elsewhere to discredit pro-democracy activists. "You're just agents of the Americans! You're being funded by CIA money!" In fact, we've seen this very argument used on the forum by apologists for Assad.

Of course, although it's a bad argument, it's also a very powerful one. Because of course the US is favorable towards pro-democracy activists in these places, and the CIA or similar bodies, official and quasi-official, no doubt do what they can to encourage them. But since in places like Iran and Cuba the US, given its history, is not seen by everyone as a benign force, it's a powerful weapon to use in support of the regimes.

I support an online pro-democracy Cuban newspaper, which is at this moment trying to raise money to pay its bills. They won't take money from the US government, or quasi-governmental sources. A few days ago they published an appeal for support, and, in the comments section, almost immediately appeared a sarcastic post: "Why don't you ask the NED?" [National Endowment for Democracy, an institution funded by the US government], It's the first response of people who want to avoid a political argument.

 

Hats off to Trump the "meeting man". Likes meetings. Isnt afraid of them and moves forward on issues. Some poster above listed the reasons he doesn't like Trump (and fair enough) but these meetings and his business experience ...isn't this why he was elected?

You can be a lot of things but if you want a squeeky clean presidential candidate and he/she gets in office, you just might get a dud of a president.

 

The problem is, no one, including his supporters, and maybe including himself, knows what he wants out of these meetings.

 

You consider wall street bankers to be part of the intellectual class?

I dont

They are educated but spend their time applying their education to business and making money

True intellectuals have no real purpose in life except to aquire knowledge and are usually found in colleges or think tanks

And the ones we have today are practically useless

 

The Russians -- in the 19th Century -- made a useful distinction between the 'educated class' -- lawyers, teachers, doctors, engineers -- and true intellectuals. They called the former 'the intelligentsia'.

IIt used to be the case that most college professors could be called 'intellectuals', or near-intellectuals. But the great expansion of higher education in the US, and its capture by the Left, has meant that there are tens of thousands of Politically Correct second-rate minds spouting nonsense while holding a PhD and indoctrinating students. There are many genuine intellectuals on the Left, (and also on the Right), but on American campuses nowadays you're more likely to encounter a Thoughtpoliceman.