I'm a day or two late but 17 July was the centenary of the murder of the Romanov family by Bolshevik soldiers under the orders of Lenin.

Unlike other Europe monarchs who we executed after a revolution, the Romanovs weren't given a trial and the entire family was destroyed. Clearly a haemophiliac 14 yr old boy and his sisters were a great danger to the worker's paradise. OTOH it wasn't quite a paradise for those workers who attended the Romanovs out of loyalty. They were also executed.

The executions were particularly brutal with the entourage being shot, clubbed and bayoneted to death. The bodies were stripped and buried in secret.

The murder of the Romanovs was done in secret, as with most of the Soviet murders such as those on the Siberian tundra or the Katyn forests.

Centenaries like this would normally be noted and various documentaries made, but anything that puts the Bolsheviks and/or Lenin in a bad light, is generally sent down the memory hole.

MHaze,

I wonder if Trump brought this up in his in-depth discussion with Putin, on the anniversary itself ? Perhaps it slipped his mind, he had so many in-depth issues to discuss. Not to mention double netagives to work on.

Joe

A minute-by-minute breakdown of how the doomed Russian Tsar and his family were executed, as his daughters had their agony prolonged when bullets failed to kill them due to diamonds sewn into their tops

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5960717/A-minute-minute-breakdown-doomed-Russian-Tsar-family-executed.html

I have not read it yet just saw it Tuesday, seemed appropriate to post link.

mhaze,

Thank You for bringing this to our attention.

I have a family connection to Russia. My grandmother,
was from Russia. She met grandad (a Lithuanian) who
was in the Tsar's army. They married in St. Petersburg.
And moved to Lithuania. Eventually migrating as
Displace Persons after World War II - with my
parents to Australia. They fled from the Soviet Regime.
Dad's brother was brutally tortured and killed by the retreating
Red Army in the infamous massacre in the forest of
Rainiai in Lithuania. Today, there's a famous monument that
has been built in Lithuania for those massacred in Rainiai.
You can Google this information.

Anyway, it's not surprising that there's no mention of the
Romanov murder today. The West maintained a shroud of silence
for so many years concerning the occupation of the Baltic
States. Even today Putin is still looking hungrily at the
States. Trump did not raise any issues with Putin in Helsinki.
Nothing - concerning the Ukraine, Crimea, or the future
of the Baltic States. Russia has never owned up to any
acts of any atrocities it has committed. It is especially sad
that a US President is currently being manipulated by an
adversary that he should not and cannot trust. It begs the
question - what does Putin have on the US President?
And is it grounds for impeachment?

Here's one they prepared earlier:

http://www.netflix.com/au/title/80145290

I haven't watched it yet. I may never get around to it, as I advise potential viewers that this documentary is rated LW for Lucy Worsley, which means you'll have to put up with her annoying diction all throughout. It beggars belief that anybody ever thought she'd make a good narrator for anything. It's a shame, because the BBC does decent history documentaries.

yes read just about everything I can find on this a common thing I noted was poorly educated idiots who both ordered and did the killing in the end became greedy users of the very people they told us they served in the end their country became the criminal cartel it is today

I think the full time score was Peasants 6 Romanovs 60 million, a big "win" to the Romanovs. The match report said the Romanovs were rather thick throughout the contest, and the Peasants had been on a Spartan diet for 300 years to work em' up to match fitness. That dem de breaks fellas!

The Romanovs probably wouldn't have been overthrown and executed if the Bolsheviks had no popular and widespread support.

The reason they had that support is, like all political revolutions, because of the severe oppression and hopelessness of the population and rampant government corruption.
It's happened in many countries and for almost the same reason every time.

This was the result of the second Bolshevik revolution - the first failed but the second was assisted by Wall Street financiers.

That's a couple of other things conveniently "sent down the memory hole".

Wrong is wrong. Regardless of what was done under the Romanov government the murder of the Romanovs was a crime. Presumably, the murder of their servants were to eliminate witnesses to the crime. How come we know about it? Some of the criminals must have told of the crime. Perhaps they were revolted by what they had done.

The myth has been created by supporters of Lenin and Trotsky that Lenin was a good person, and Stalin betrayed the revolution. This is nonsense. Lenin ordered the crime. The censorship and gulags started with Lenin, and Stalin ws his follower.

I had a faint hope that this topic might turn into a discussion of the brutality of the Soviet system and authoritarian systems in general.

In these days when an apparently large number of younger folk are warming to these socialist ideals while remaining utterly ignorant of what actual happens after the revolution, it is important that the dark history of the 20th century communist/fascist regimes not be lost.

But alas, these days it seems that the mere mention of Russia is enough to cause those who suffer Trump Derangement Syndrome to descend into outraged ranting.

Foxy thinks Trump is being "manipulated" by Putin through blackmail. That there's no evidence of it and that Trump's presidency has been much tougher on Putin than any since Reagan, seems to not matter. "is it grounds for impeachment?" NO.

"I wonder if Trump brought this up in his in-depth discussion with Putin". I'd doubt it since its utterly irrelevant to the current relations between the two countries. I wonder if Trump mentioned the betrayal of Varus when he met Merkel?

"This was the result of the second Bolshevik revolution - the first failed but the second was assisted by Wall Street financiers."

The second? When was the first? Perhaps assisted by one or two wealthy Americans. But those who like to fall for the usual conspiracy theories will fall for the usual conspiracy theories.

"the infamous massacre in the forest of Rainiai in Lithuania."

Yes there were many such massacres, the biggest being that of 10-15000 Poles in the Katyn forest by the Soviets. In the main the people so massacred were the leaders of the occupied nations, the aim being to make the rest of the population compliant.

The Soviets treated these subject and subjugated nations so badly that, when the Nazis first arrived, they were welcomed and treated as liberators. That changed under the equally brutal rule of the Gestapo.

Over the past half-century there's been quite a lot of work done trying to understand how these totalitarian regimes were able to recruit so many people to do their evil work. The guards in the gulags who participated in the slow deaths of the inmates, the young revolutionaries who forcibly stole food from already starving 'kulaks', NKVD officials who raped kids to force false confessions. I think of a scene cover by Shirer of a German soldier shooting naked Jewish children row after row. Where do these people come from?

In the Banality of Evil' we see people who are able to do the most vile of things during the day and then go home to the wife and kids in the evening, or write the most loving letters home.

In the end it requires that these people be indoctrinated into no longer seeing the victims as human or as being so evil that they have to be eradicated. The Nazis did it by race. The Jew was no longer human.

Lenin did it by class. All classes other than the workers were so evil that all members had to be destroyed. A baby born into the aristocracy was just as evil as the father. The kulaks were demonised so that they could be destroyed.

Which brings us to the charming Paul1405 who thinks the murder of the Romanov kids was just to be expected because of the actions of their ancestors.

Its from the Pauls of this world that these murderous regimes draw their foot-soldiers. There's nothing particularly evil about the Russians or Germans. We saw it in China and Kampuchea and Vietnam and Korea and almost everywhere authoritarianism laid its hands. It was said of the Australian communists in the late 1940's that if they gained power (and they thought they would) that they'd have been signing death warrants with both hands.

The flippant dismisal of the 'other' as less than deserving of compassion is at the root of these evil regimes. Western liberal democracy has suppressed these urges but they remain under the surface among too many.

rache,
It goes deeper than that. The reason for the severe oppression was the reformist Tsar Alexander the Second had been assassinated. His successors concluded that entrenching their own power was a safer course of action.

At Parliament House in Canberra on 25th June 2018,
Liberal Senator Eric Abetz launched an English
language translation by Regina Share of the book
written by Stasys Jameikis entitled, "Only Eleven
Came Back." A Lithuanian survivor's account of
transportation and life in one of the Soviet Union's
"re-education" camps.

The account follows one group of 1,505 people who were
sent to the Archangelsk region in the Russian Archtic
as forced labour in June 1941.

After thirteen years, only eleven of those people survived,
hence the title of the book, "Only Eleven Came Back."
Fellow Lithuanian and Tasmanian, Dr Al Taskunas, who
started the Lithuanian Studies Society at the University of
Tasmania, and whose father was in the same group of prisoners
recently published an English translation of the book.

Prior to Senator Abetz officially launching the book, Dr Al
Taskunas spoke to an audience comprising members of the
local Lithuanian, Latvian, and Estonian Communities, interstate
visitors, diplomats, and a large group of Government Senators,
and told them of his personal story and its connection with
what was revealed in the book.

In his presentation Dr Al Taskunas emphasised the message that
we, the Baltic communities, did not simply escape the
deportations and occupation of our countries to seek a better
life in Australia.

We came to seek freedom.

In his summary, Senator Abetz encouraged all his fellow Senators
to purchase the book, not only for themselves, but to circulate
it as gifts to others so that the important message in Stasys
Jameikis' testimony, and Dr Al Taskunas' observation on the
fight for freedom is not only spread to a wider audience, but
preserved into the future.

Dear Foxy,

I wish there was a 'like' button on OLO :)

Love,

Joe

mhaze, the Romanovs and their ancestors simply sowed the seeds of their own demise. Revolution is the child of discontent, and discontent on a massive scale was evident in Russia long before Lenin came to power. Although the conditions in Russia were right for violent revolution the Russian proletariat was totally powerless, it lacked the necessary educated leadership and organization to insight revolution until the Bolsheviks provided that, and made a successful bid for power in 1917. The ruling class, a very small minority represented by the Czar, had maintained authority, and absolute power through the oppressive brutality of the state.
In such a society there is no place for moderates, only the radical prevail. What do the violent radicals like the Bolsheviks do? They murder and imprison people on a grand scale, that is an inescapable fact.

"Which brings us to the charming Paul1405 who thinks the murder of the Romanov kids was just to be expected because of the actions of their ancestors."
The short answer mhaze is yes. I am surprised it took the violent Bolsheviks as long as it did to murder the Czar and his family. Do you believe they were not going to do that, eventually?

"Its from the Pauls of this world that these murderous regimes draw their foot-soldiers" mhaze, wrong, you would be at the head of the queue given the right conditions, because you appear to be a person who lacks the necessary understanding and moderacy, and is easily lead.

Dear Joe (Loudmouth),

I really needed that. (smile).

Big hug.

Dear Paul1405,

There were two revolutions in Russia in 1917. The first was in February and deposed the Romanovs. The October Revolution by the Bolsheviks was not against the Romanovs. They had already been deposed. After the February Revolution there was an attempt to set up a democratic state with the elimination of censorship and political prisoners as there was under the czars. The slogan of the Czarist government was orthodoxy, autocracy and nationality. The Bolshevik Revolution was not against the Romanovs. It was against democracy. Marxism replaced orthodoxy, and autocracy was restored as were censorship and political prisoners. In a real sense Bolshevism was a restoration of czarist tyranny with a new ideology and a new management.

My father's brother was a Bolshevik. He was arrested by the czarist police. My father was already in the USA, and he brought the rest of the family out in 1921. His brother was quite happy to get out being cured of Leninism by four years of it.

Paul,

I "would be at the head of the queue" because I'm "easily lead."
Oh dear! Logic not a strong suit I see.

Paul, nowhere do I argue that the revolution wouldn't have taken place given the hardships suffered by the Russian people as a result of the shellacing the Germans were giving them on top of the deprivations they suffered as a result of the inefficiency of the Tsarist state. But the revolution which overthrew the Tsar occurred in February 1917 and was followed by an attempt to institute a democracy.

Lenin and his cohorts were terrified of this prospect since they stood no chance of attaining any sort of power under fair elections. So they sought to undermine the Kerensky government which was struggling to survive in the midst of the chaos of a revolution and a losing war.

That the Tsar would be ultimately executed was a fair bet. I've not disputed that. But there was no likelihood that his family would be killed as well. Remember that when other European monarchs feel (Charles in England, Louis in France) their children were left unharmed.

But as explained above, Lenin had different motivations and intended to usher in a merciless regime that brooked no opposition and treated all those in the wrong class as enemies to be destroyed irrespective of sex or age.

The executions of the Romanovs was really just the first example of the brutality that Lenin was to usher in. Russia suffered through that brutality for 70 years of Soviet rule and really hasn't recovered to this day. They and the world would have been a vastly better place had the Bolshevik revolution not taken place or failed.

but those who simply shrug at the deaths of the innocent children (and remember the girls only avoided being raped before being executed because of traditional communist inefficiency in organising the executions) as they try to excuse anything the communists did, demonstrate where their humanity really stands.

"Here's some advice, boy. Don't put your trust in revolutions. They always come around again. That's why they're called revolutions."
- Sir Terry Pratchett, 'Night Watch''

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ly8TD0fKcvs

Could someone please explain to me how and why a US President
could take the word of a former KGB officer, now a Russian
dictator, over his own Secret Service appointees and bend
over backwards, with a wink and a nudge in humouring the
man? Does the US President not realise who he's dealing with?

The American Revolution was fought to establish a man's right to
liberty, and to restrain the power of his rulers. The American
Revolution thus created a concept of law which was, and is,
foreign to the system resulting from the Bolshevik Revolution
in communist controlled lands. The distinction is one between
freedom, liberty, and the right to the pursuit of happiness as
opposed to the interest, control, and domination of the state
over the individual. Lenin's perception of law is so
repulsive to the legal traditions of Western democracies, that
they have long been complacent in the belief that the specter
of Lenin's concept of law was confined to the sphere of
communist influence and control.

The conceptual differences between democratic legal traditions
and totalitarian communist systems which use law as a political
weapon are so great, that it is inconceivable that the two
systems would work for their mutual benefit in any matter
involving international political issues and human rights.

Yet, the US President has acquiesced to accept the words of
the Russian leader over his own Secret Service Agencies.

We need to ask - Why?

Dear Foxy,

Putin is trained as a KGB. Trump is not a cagy anything. He is a vulgar orange oaf and not a vulgar boatman. He has his own unintelligent agency.

Dear mhaze,

The Romanovs were of a ruling class which butchered their way through any Russians who got in their way. British Labour Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald calling the Tsar a "blood-stained creature and a common murderer".

The pogroms against the Jews as well as a brutal suppression of the 1905 revolution are a couple of standouts in a pretty obnoxious period.

He can be likened to Gaddafi in a number of ways. Gaddafi's family were bombed resulting in the deaths of family members including a 2 year old daughter. When he was captured Gaddafi was sodomised with a bayonet before being shot and left to die over several hours. A horrific end to a regime.

In neither instance is the brutality displayed justifiable. It lessens us all.

That the Bolsheviks and their adoption of a warped form of communism were determined to match the French revolutionaries in their brutality can not be excused but it shouldn't taint what the gift socialism has bestowed on our modern nations.

Your link is tenuous at best.

Foxy,
Remember Trump's a compulsive liar, so we can't be sure he really did take Putin's word for it.

But if he did, it may be because the US secret service does have a track record of unreliability (remember the Iraq WMDs?) and Pissgate demonstrated incontrovertibly to him that so called intelligence can be nothing of the kind.

//In these days when an apparently large number of younger folk are warming to these socialist ideals while remaining utterly ignorant of what actual happens after the revolution//

So... like the Socialist ideals that people warmed to after the 2nd World War in Britain, resulting in the creation of NHS?

Socialism doesn't always have to involve revolutions. Sounds like you've been listening to the wrong people. Here's a clue on how to spot the wrong people: they'll be the ones wearing Che Guevara T-shirts. Those guys are twats, don't listen to them.

But don't write off Socialism either. It works quite well, and I wouldn't trade Medicare (our poor man's version of the NHS) for all the tea in China.

Dear David F.,

I enjoyed your - "not cagy anything, vulgar orange oaf,
not a vulgar boatman, and his own unintelligent agency."

I think that we could add "The Indecider" and
"der Trumpenfuhrer" to the list.

And Putin is certainly "The Puppet Master!"

SteeleRedux,

Yes, I get that you want to excuse the Bolsheviks for their brutality. But nowhere was I saying that they execution of the Tsar was unexpected, a-historic or particularly brutal. What I was saying was that the execution of the kids and the family's employees was brutal and indicative of the disasters Lenin was about to unless on the Russian peoples. I've now explained that several times but I guess the nuance goes over your head.

"Your link is tenuous at best."

I didn't post a link. I noted in a previous thread that your comprehension skills are suspect. Unfortunately they'd need to improve by orders of magnitude to be considered tenuous.

Toni,

Yes the term 'socialist' is a little ambiguous these days. At the time, Lenin would and did describe himself as socialist. What does the second 'S'in 'USSR' stand for? Equally Hitler and Mussolini called themselves socialist. I was using the term in its traditional sense.

The term has been watered down these days to mean something it didn't mean back in the day. Given the disasters that socialist Russia became, western welfare states couldn't share the word with it, so Russia became communist and the welfare states appropriated a watered down version of the term 'socialist'.

" resulting in the creation of NHS"

Well we could probably have a whole new 100 page thread on how the NHS is a perfect example of why socialism doesn't and cannot work. It would definitely attract all the I-wish-the-government-would-make-more-decisions-for-me posters.

mhaze, your claim that socialism doesn't work, is only partly true. Western democracies operate a mix of socialism and capitalism. A totally capitalistic society with its excesses would disadvantage far too many to be sustainable in the long term. Whilst pure socialism in the form of communism is unworkable in a complex modern society. What is workable despite numerous problems is our liberal democratic system, which provides a degree of freedom for all, and at the same time protecting the vulnerable from exploitation, and supporting the socially disadvantaged.
The above is what I support, what about you?

My understanding is that the best countries to live in are the Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands. They have a high degree of political freedom and economic security. They have a low degree of corruption and religious belief. They do not have a big gap between rich and poor. They have combined the caring nature of socialism without the compulsion which is often associated with socialism. When I was working in the Netherlands I got sick, and the manager of the hotel I was staying at called a doctor. He treated me, and I recovered. We talked, and he told me he had an American girlfriend who wanted him to come to the USA where a doctor could make much more money than he was making. He told me he felt good about Dutch society and his role in it. I hope his girlfriend joined him.

//Equally Hitler and Mussolini called themselves socialist.//

Umm, no, Mussolini called himself a Fascist.

Hitler called himself a National Socialist, but then devoted a great deal of effort to rounding up Socialists and sending them to concentration camps. A friend of Socialism in name only.

//Well we could probably have a whole new 100 page thread on how the NHS is a perfect example of why socialism doesn't and cannot work.//

Yes, what a terrible system. Socialised healthcare flies in the face of social darwinism by artificially prolonging the life of poor people who wouldn't otherwise be able to afford healthcare. What an awful, wicked thing to do.

You're a bit of prick, aren't you mhaze?

//I-wish-the-government-would-make-more-decisions-for-me//

Yes, what it a terrible thing it is for the government to take important decisions like 'Will I go to see the doctor about this lump on my neck, or will I eat this week? Well, the lump on my neck could be benign and I do like food, I think I'll eat.' Shame if the lump is malignant...

You know what? I'm OK with governments taking decisions like that out of people's hands. And it's not like anybody has to use socialised medicine if they don't want to. Patients being able to make their own decisions about their treatment is still a cornerstone of our medical system, hence all the consent forms that have to be signed before any treatment can be given. You're still allowed to seek second opinions, refuse treatment, solicit the services of quacks, go private, whatever. Nobody is stopping you. It would be a breach of medical ethics, and possibly illegal.

Toni,

"Umm, no, Mussolini called himself a Fascist."

Mussolini was a high ranking member of the Italian Socialist Party but broke away from them and formed the fascist party during WW1 because he felt they were insufficiently nationalist. Fascists were nationalists AND socialist.

Yes, Hitler rounded up other socialists, again those that were insufficiently nationalist.

Lenin rounded up socialists and other non-Bolshevik communists. Does that mean he wasn't a communist?

"You're a bit of prick, aren't you mhaze?"

Oh dear. Someone who gets a little deranged when their shibboleths are attacked.
I appreciate that for many the notion that the government can solve all problems is a comfort. But I'm with Reagan who said "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help."

The notion that the options are either an NHS or medical poverty is just so much propaganda. Exhibit A - Australia.

Just a few examples to go on with...

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/may/04/poor-nhs-care-contributed-deaths-13-learning-disabilities

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/jun/22/nhs-investigative-body-to-examine-suspicious-deaths

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/nhs-cuts-excess-deaths-30000-study-research-royal-society-medicine-london-school-hygiene-martin-a7585001.html

The problem with an NHS-type system is that it inevitably ends up becoming concerned about things other than the welfare of the patient.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/02/pope-shows-solidarity-with-charlie-gards-parents

Charlie Gard is an example of what happens. In the end the NHS and the government determined that they and they alone had the right to determine how he was to die. His life was their's to decide. His parents had no rights. The individual became the property of the state.

Paul1405,

"The above is what I support, what about you?"

I support a system which is as 'laissez faire' capitalist as possible but which, recognising that some will not fare well in that system, offers welfare to them. I oppose all forms of government invention in the market-place, and especially all forms of subsidy except where it might be necessary to offset other governmental failures.

I favour welfare based on true need but only to the point where it doesn't create incentives to take the welfare as a replacement for productive involvement in the economy.

That is what I currently think is the best system to achieve economic success for both the nation and the vast majority of citizens. But we should be cognisant that the changes coming down the road due to automation and the like, may create a vast unemployable class which will require a very different capitalist and redistribution system

A bit of the good old high school classroom stuff! 'Laissez faire' economics, as championed by the French theoretical economists around the middle of the eighteenth century, and later becoming the doctrine of the devotees of the classical Scottish economic and political philosopher Adam Smith, as published in his book of doctrine 'The Wealth of Nations', seems such people are still around. The belief that the free market would be self regulating to the point where all would somehow benefit through unencumbered interaction between labour and capital. The Industrial Revolution proved that in a complex free market, capital will prevail over labour, and capital will always assume a position of economic and political dominance.

1. "I (mhaze) support a system which is as 'laissez faire' capitalist as possible but which, recognising that some will not fare well in that system, offers welfare to them."

2. "I (mhaze) oppose all forms of government invention in the market-place"

I can only assume by "welfare" in one, you mean privately funded charity. As government welfare relies on taxation, a major component of government interference in the economy, that is incongruous with your second statement. Unless you plan to only tax the already miserably poor labour component of the economy. Which will be self defeating as it will help to make them even poorer. Since capital will be the dominant political power in society they will be unwilling to be taxed to provide benefit to the mass of the miserable unemployed non productive labour. Since labour is politically powerless they will have no means to instigate their desire for government funded (taxation) welfare.
Sounds like the good old days of nineteenth century industrial Britain.

//"You're a bit of prick, aren't you mhaze?"

Oh dear. Someone who gets a little deranged//

Seriously? You think calling somebody a prick is indicative of derangement?

You've never actually met anybody suffering psychosis, have you?

Me calling you a prick is healthy disagreement; me standing on street corners shouting at pricks is derangement.

//But I'm with Reagan//

Yeah, why am I not surprised by that?

//I support a system which is as 'laissez faire' capitalist as possible//

laissez-faire: Every man for himself, and devil take the hindmost.

Which works out well for some chaps, I'm sure, but for most leads to a life that is nasty, brutish and short.

And I've always been a fan of utilitarianism because, well, Jeremy Bentham (Oh, Jeremy Bentham!). Greatest good for the greatest number of people and all that. And not so much of the keeping the fatcats fat by feeding them the children of the poor.

Thanks Toni.

There's hope for this forum yet.

Dear Toni,

Utilitarianism can justify oppression. The greatest good for the greatest number can justify keeping some people in slavery if most people benefit by the few in slavery. When the old Soviet Union was not allowing Jews to emigrate I heard a man defending the action of the USSR. He said that he believed in the greatest good for the greatest number, and the Jews continued presence in the Soviet was necessary for the greatest good of the Soviet people. If we want a world with a minimum standard of well-being for everyone that vision is not compatible with utilitarianism.

Toni,

I said a LITTLE deranged. Selective quoting is a LITTLE dishonest.

Then as to emphasis your penchant for selective quoting you take the first part of my sentence on 'laissez faire' capitalism and tell me how bad it can be for some people, WHILE completely ignoring the second part of my sentence which pointed out that those who suffer should be looked after.

No longer a little dishonest...now just plain dishonest.

" Greatest good for the greatest number of people ". Oh so you do support capitalism. :)

Hi Foxy, I'm up in the deep north at the moment (Brisbane), could be living up here soon. Given the failures of the Czarists and their absolute monarch Nicholas II, and the general conditions that existed in Europe at that time, it was only to be expected that an equally abhorrent regime, i.e. the Bolsheviks under Lenin, would come to power. In times of extremism one should expect violent action to be the normal behavior of the state. Like Stalin, Hitler and Mussolini coming to power was no accident, they were violent individuals supported by like minded equally violent fanatics.

It is only through vigilance and the safeguarding of the principles enshrined in our liberal democratic form of government, that we can remain free of the tyranny of the despots, and the murderous behavior of the tyrants. Yet on this thread some advocate the replacement of our healthy democratic liberalism as it now exists, with something that unfortunately would be the ideal environment for the extremest to take power.

// The greatest good for the greatest number can justify keeping some people in slavery if most people benefit by the few in slavery.//

Well...

Fair point and well made, david f.

I'm going to have to spend some serious time inside my mind re-examining my assumptions.

//I said a LITTLE deranged. Selective quoting is a LITTLE dishonest.//

Right... seems to me that's like being a LITTLE pregnant.

Not everything is on a spectrum. Some things are quantised.

Derangment is on a spectrum, but if calling people names puts you on that spectrum then we're all fruitcakes together. Lying is quantised; a person is either lying or not lying, although until the truth is ascertained and the wavefunction collapsed, one must assume a superposition of states, as it were.

//WHILE completely ignoring the second part of my sentence which pointed out that those who suffer should be looked after.//

Um, yeah, I guess I did.... it's just that you seem to be deadset against anything which might actually help the poor. I mean it's all very well to light up the Virtue Signal, but unlike the Bat Signal there is no Virtueman coming to save us. Offering up motherhood statements is about as useful as tits on a bull without the policy to back them up.

//Oh so you do support capitalism. :)//

Well, yeah... sorry, were you under the impression that I didn't? Just because I'm in favour of universal healthcare? Wow...

Politics really is getting weird these days.

I've never really studied economics properly. I tried it for a little while, decided I wasn't a fan, and never really bothered with it again. I dunno why I didn't take to it, but I do know it annoys me when people refer to it as one of the sciences. Doesn't seem very scientific to me, although maybe I have a narrow view of what constitutes science.

But I do like philosophy, and as it turns out economics and philosophy do brush up against each other. Smith and Marx were apparently both philosophers, although I've not read either beyond the odd quote.

But I know which philosophers I like, and from my readings I've ascertained that the liberal philosophers I admire like Locke, Mill and Bentham (Oh, Jeremy Bentham!) belonged to much the same school of thought as Smith.

All that being said, I think that there are better and worse ways to do capitalism. And this where it comes back to policy rather than philosophy. I see fundamental flaws in the philosophical underpinnings of Marxism, (to that extent I understand it without actually having read Marx, but having read 'Animal Farm' at least half a dozen times) that I don't see in capitalism. But I am still a science nerd at heart, and I cannot help but observe empirical evidence of capitalism being done well, and not so well.

And it seems to better with a bit of socialism in the mix... just my observation, and hey, I'm as biased as the next observer.

Dear Paul1405,

We've had many discussions on this forum on the
unresolved problems that face us in this country. Problems
that we must deal with to move forward as a free, fair
and vibrant society.

You and I have no doubt we can find the solutions that suit
us. provided we don't succumb to the siren calls of demagogues,
charlatans, and ideologues.

The achievements of the past decades have laid extraordinary
foundations. Properly preserved and built on, we now have
opportunities we never had before in Australia's history.
The best years for our country are still in front of us.
The measure of our society over history is our fidelity
to our principles. We must remind our government and our
people to remain faithful to those principles or otherwise
our society, like so many in the past, will be swept on the
ash heap of history.

Paul1405,

Seriously Paul, which part of "recognising that some will not fare well in that system, offers welfare to them" was too hard for you to understand?

So I'm not advocated open slather 'laissez faire' but a system tempered by the need to look after those who falter by not being able to partake in the economy.

I even describe the type of welfare I'dsupport, which somehow both you and Toni managed to (conveniently?) miss.

"taxation, a major component of government interference in the economy"
That's rubbish. Taxation isn't interference in the market (note I said market, not economy) except to the extent that it discriminates between businesses eg by having different rates for different sizes of business or different types of business. There's nothing, absolutely nothing I've said in this or any other
thread which would even hint that I'm opposed to company tax per se. Given that you have to go through this convoluted thinking to try to discredit my post, I'm taking that as an indication that the post was on the money.

More on the horrors unleashed on the Russian people by Lenin and co of which the death of the Romanovs was but an early example....

http://spinstrangenesscharm.wordpress.com/2018/07/22/the-kazakh-famine-of-the-1930s-another-harvest-of-sorrow/

The Kazakh Famine of the 1930s.

Interestingly the article mentions the fate of one of the Romanov assassins....also executed. Revolutions often eat their own.

//Interestingly the article mentions the fate of one of the Romanov assassins....also executed. Revolutions often eat their own.//

Did you end up watching Land of the Blind? I really like that film.

//The Kazakh Famine of the 1930s.//

Appalling.

Now, please to standings up for national anthem of Kazakhstan:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIV-QdPEx-Q

much better version here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePQ9_re7f1A

Take the story of the diamonds and stopping bullets with a grain of salt, diamonds may deflect bullets, but they don't stop them.

If anyone is interested in the dark side of history,
I suggest a read of Robert Conquest's books - "The
Great Terror," and "A Harvest of Sorrow."

They are those definitive works which crystallize
pieces of history forever. As the blurb tells us in
"The Harvest of Sorrow," -

"Between 1929 and 1932 the Soviet Communist Party struck
a double blow at the peasantry of the USSR: dekulakization,
the dispossession and deportation of millions of peasant
families, and colectivization, the effective abolition of
private property in land and the concentration of the
remaining peasantry in "collective" farms under Party control.

This followed a "terror-famine", inflicted by the State on
the collectivised peasants of the Ukraine and certain other
regions by setting impossibly high grain quotas, removing
every other source of food, and preventing help from outside -
even from other areas of the USSR - from reaching the starving
millions. "

"The Harvest of Sorrow," is an ambitious yet always accessible
attempt to record for the general reader the full history of
possibly the worst human disaster in living memory.
It is a harrowing read - and makes one seriously question the
fact that while criminals like the Nazis have been pursued
all over the world for their crimes, the communist criminals
were allowed to go free.

They were, in effect, given tacit permission to continue the
operation of their concentration camps, to expand their
draconian systems to include psychiatric wards, thereby raising
torture, suppression, and murder to a science. The fact that
the process persisted was vividly disclosed to the free world
by Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn in his book, "The Gulag Archipelago."

I wonder if Trump's ever read any of these books?

Thanks, Foxy.

Dear Joe (Loudmouth),

We hear about the cruelties of the Nazis but hardly
ever about the Communists. Whereas both the Nazis and the
Communists had committed unheard of cruelties. Concentration
camps - on both sides - operated at a high pitch prior to
and during the war years. While the USSR policy of mass
murder preceded that of Nazi Germany, most notably with the
artificial Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33, the wholesale
destruction of the Russian peasantry, and later of the
peasantry and intelligentsia in the occupied territories as
well, the Nazis soon matched Soviet terror with their
wholesale slaughter of Jews, Gypsies, and others, in equal
numbers, if not proportions of their populations. As
stated in - "The New KGB":

"There is no dispute about the enormity of HItler's holocaust.
But it is equally important to be as aware of the accomplishments
of the Soviet Secret Police, which brought death to at least
four times as many Russians, Poles, Jews, Latvians, Lithuanians,
Estonians, Japanese, Koreans, Chinese, Gypsies, and Romanians,
as Hitler did in his eleven years as a leader of the '1,000-year
Reich."

Foxy,

I've read both books and indeed all of Conquest's output. While these two are astonishing works, my favourite Conquest book is "Reflection on a Ravaged Century".

If it wasn't for the fact that he was a conservative writer (although he started off as a communist) he would easily be considered the greatest historian on the 20th century.

The history of these and his other books on the USSR is almost as interesting as the books themselves. Initially most of his information came from interviewing Russians and others who were witness to the atrocities since, obviously, the Russian government suppressed all documentary evidence. As such apologists for the USSR and leftists in general derided the books as lacking evidence and treated them as right wing propaganda.

It was only after the fall of the Sovit Union, when actual documentary evidence was available, that it became clear that Conquest was mostly right and understood the truth more than any of his critics.

"Mulling a new title for “The Great Terror”, his pal Kingsley Amis suggested “I told you so, you f$$king fools”.

Amis is also worth a read.

"I wonder if Trump's ever read any of these books?"

Unknown but I do recall Hillary refering to them at some point. Still she and Obama obviously didn't take much notice given how easily Putin bent them to his will - Georgia, Crimea, Donbas, Syria,Uranium One, EU defence systems. Its interesting how people cheered while Obama bent over backwards for Putin for 8 years , and now cry foul when Trump doesn't fix the problems Obama caused in one.

mhaze,

You do surprise me at times.

Hi Foxy,

I believe politics is all cause and effect, given certain conditions the outcome will be as it is. There is at this time, no danger to Australia from political extremism, the conditions simply are not there for extremism to proliferate.

Dear Paul 1405,

I'm also optimistic about our country's future.
With a few reservations.

I shall repeat what I've stated previously - "At all
times, vigilance is the price of liberty. We
must remain vigilant. We must not heed the siren
calls of demagogues, charlatans, and ideologies.
The measure of our society is our fidelity to our
principles. We must remind our government and our
people to remain faithful to those principles or
otherwise our society, like so many in the past
will be swept on the ash heap of history."

Paul,
"...There is at this time, no danger to Australia from political extremism, the conditions simply are not there for extremism to proliferate."

That's because not enough are stupid enough to vote Green!