In Wealthy City, a Marxist Mayor Wins Over Voters

THE NEW YORK TIMES: Yes, this Communist politician in Graz, Austria, wants to redistribute wealth, but a focus on housing, her own modest lifestyle and a hard childhood have helped her popularity.

The iconic bell tower in the wealthy city of Graz, Austria, which is led by a Communist mayor, Elke Kahr. | Marylise Vigneau for The New York Times
THE SATURDAY PROFILE
GRAZ, Austria — That the conservative mayor would win yet again, and serve a fifth term, had been treated as a foregone conclusion in Graz, Austria’s second-largest city, a place where it’s not uncommon to encounter local residents proudly dressed in traditional lederhosen and dirndls.

Elke Kahr, the leader of the city’s Communist Party, was equally convinced she would lose again to the slick heir to a trading dynasty who had led the city for 18 years.

So she was as surprised as the journalist who told her the election news last September: The Communists had emerged victorious, and she would be the next mayor.

“He was completely bewildered — and I thought it was a joke,” Ms. Kahr recalled of her election night conversation with the reporter at City Hall.

Newspapers across Europe started calling the city “Leningraz,” a moniker the new mayor smiles about.

“Yes, 100 percent, I’m a convinced Marxist,” Ms. Kahr said in her mayoral office, flanked by the used Ikea shelves with which she displaced the stately furniture of her predecessor, Siegfried Nagl, of the Austrian People’s Party, or Ö.V.P.

Ms. Kahr, 60, is now trying to “redistribute wealth” as much as her role allows her to, she said.

But that doesn’t mean that her Communist Party of Austria, or K.P.Ö., plans to dispossess the bourgeoisie or abolish the free market. Ms. Kahr said her goal was “to alleviate the problems of the people in our city as much as possible.” » | Denise Hruby | Friday, August 12, 2022

David Horowitz on Communism, Marxism, and the Black Panther Party; Why I Am No Longer a Leftist; On Abortion, Islam, and Donald Trump (Parts 1, 2 & 3)

David Horowitz (author) joins Dave Rubin to discuss the Communist Party, Black Panthers, similarities with the hate for Reagan and the hate for Trump and more.

Vietnam Offers Free Courses in Marxism and Ho Chi Minh Studies

BBC: Vietnam is to waive university fees for philosophy students who agree to take courses in Marxism-Leninism and Ho Chi Minh ideology, in a bid to boost the uptake of unpopular courses.

PM Nguyen Tan Dung has signed a decree stipulating the fee exemption.

It will also apply to medical students who want to focus on TB, leprosy, mental illnesses and surgical sciences.

In addition traditional Vietnamese drama and opera students will get a reduction in their fees.

In recent years, the number of students who want to study "communist sciences" has dwindled sharply even though Vietnam takes pride in its Marxist heritage.

Pham Tan Ha, head of admission and training at the Social and Human Sciences University in Ho Chi Minh City, told local media that his university had been struggling to attract new students to study philosophy, including Marxism-Leninism and Ho Chi Minh ideology. » | Nga Pham, BBC News, Bangkok | Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Pope Benedict XVI: Marxist Ideology No Longer Corresponds to Reality
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: The Pope has warned that communism no longer works in Cuba and said the Church stands ready to aid a peaceful transition without "trauma".


Speaking days before the first papal visit to the Caribbean dictatorship of Cuba in 14 years, Pope Benedict XVI said: "Today it is evident that Marxist ideology in the way it was conceived no longer corresponds to reality."

On the plane taking him from Rome for a five-day trip to Mexico and Cuba, he said that the 53-year-old communist system in Havana "can no longer respond and build a society", and called for "new models" to replace it.

Pope Benedict offered the help of the Church in achieving a peaceful transition on the island, saying the process required patience but also "much decisiveness."

"We want to help in a spirit of dialogue to avoid traumas and to help move forward a society which is fraternal and just, which is what we desire for the whole world," he added. » | Saturday, March 24, 2012

Related »

Deutschland: Extremismus – Hassmusik zum Einstieg
ZEIT ONLINE: Der Verfassungsschutz beobachtet ein Erstarken der Linksextremen. Auch in dieser Szene gibt es jetzt Bands, die mit Musik zur Gewalt aufrufen.

Die linksextreme Szene in Deutschland wird stärker. Das Potenzial sei im vergangenen Jahr, nach Abzug von Mehrfachmitgliedschaften, um 600 Personen auf 32.200 gewachsen, sagten Verfassungsschützer dem Tagesspiegel. Den deutlichsten Anstieg, um 500 Personen auf jetzt 25 800, verzeichnete das Spektrum der "Marxisten-Leninisten und anderen revolutionären Marxisten", wie der Nachrichtendienst die in der Regel nicht zu Gewalt neigenden Organisationen nennt.

Auffallend ist vor allem die weitere Zunahme beim Verein Rote Hilfe, der Linke unterstützt, die mit dem Gesetz in Konflikt geraten sind. Im Jahr 2010 sei die Zahl der Mitglieder auf 5500 gestiegen (2009: 5300, 2008: 5000). Die Rote Hilfe sei "strömungsübergreifend" für Linksextremisten attraktiv, hieß es. >>> Von Frank Jansen | Freitag, 07. Januar 2011

Verbunden >>>

Barack Obama Compared to Hitler and Lenin in Tea Party Billboard
THE TELEGRAPH: A roadside billboard created by a branch of the Tea Party in Iowa comparing President Barack Obama to Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin has been condemned by other groups in the movement.

North Iowa Tea Party co-founder Bob Johnson said the sign highlighted what the group argues is Mr Obama's support for socialism. Photograph: The Telegraph
The North Iowa Tea Party began displaying the sign in Mason City last week. It shows photographs of Mr Obama, the German Nazi leader and Russian communist with the statement: "Radical leaders prey on the fearful & naive."

The words "Democratic Socialism" are featured over Mr Obama's picture, over Hitler's photo is "National Socialism" and over Lenin's head is "Marxist Socialism." The word "Change" – Mr Obama's campaign slogan – is included on each photo.

North Iowa Tea Party co-founder Bob Johnson said the sign highlighted what the group argues is Mr Obama's support for socialism. >>> Alex Spillius in Washington | Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Andy Williams Accuses Barack Obama of Following Marxist Theory
THE TELEGRAPH: Andy Williams, the veteran pop singer, has accused Barack Obama of "following Marxist theory" and "wanting the country to fail".

Williams, a lifelong Republican whose hits include Moon River and Music To Watch Girls By, told the Radio Times he thought Mr Obama wanted to turn the US into a "socialist country".

The 81-year-old was a friend of the Kennedy family during the 1960s and was present at the Los Angeles rally where Robert F Kennedy was assassinated in 1968.

"I was very close to Bobby and he asked me to be a delegate for him when he ran for president," he said.

"He knew about me being a Republican, but just laughed and said, 'Sign yourself in as a Democrat and then change back afterwards'. Sadly, I never got to do that.

"I was very close to Teddy Kennedy, too, and his death recently brought it all back. What a tragedy. Had he lived, I think Bobby would have been a great president."

But Williams had a less favourable opinion of the current president.

"Don't like him at all," he said, "I think he wants to create a socialist country. The people he associates with are very Left-wing. One is registered as a Communist. >>> | Monday. September 28, 2009

Blunt Warning about Greens Under the Bed
TIMES ONLINE: Once the lure of communism seduced the idealistic. Today’s environmental ideologues risk becoming just as dangerous

Britain is, thankfully, an ideologically barren land. The split between Right and Left is no longer ideological, but tribal. Are you a nice social liberal who believes in markets, or a nasty social liberal who believes in markets? Anthony Blunt’s memoirs, published this week, reveal a different age, one in which fascism and communism were locked in a seemingly definitive battle for souls.

Blunt talks of “the religious quality” of the enthusiasm for the Left among the students of Cambridge. There is only one ideology in today’s developed world that exercises a similar grip. If Blunt were young today, he would not be red; he would be green.

His band of angry young men would find Gore where once they found Marx. Blunt evokes a febrile atmosphere in which each student felt his own decision had the power to shape the future. Where once they raged about the fleecing of the proletariat and quaked at the march of fascism, Blunt and his circle, transposed to today’s college bar, would rage about the fleecing of the planet and quake at its imminent destruction. If you squint, red and green look disarmingly similar.

Both identify an end utopia that is difficult to dispute. The diktat “from each according to his ability, to each according to his means” sounds lovely on paper. Greens promise a world in which we actually survive a coming ecological apocalypse. A desirable outcome, undoubtedly.

But the means to these ends seem similarly insurmountable. Both routes demand an immediate suspension of human nature.
Ideologies often credit man with either more nobility or more venality than he deserves. In reality he is a mundane creature. He wants a home for himself and those he loves, stocked with food. And he wants to have the right to control his own destiny, own his own stuff, and to acquire more if he can without interference or fear of imminent death. Such low-level acquisitive desires support high concepts: property rights and the rule of law, without which there would be no foundation for democracy. >>> Antonia Senior | Friday, July 24, 2009

American Capitalism Gone with a Whimper
Image: Google Images
PRAVDA: It must be said, that like the breaking of a great dam, the American decent into Marxism is happening with breath taking speed, against the back drop of a passive, hapless sheeple, excuse me dear reader, I meant people.

True, the situation has been well prepared on and off for the past century, especially the past twenty years. The initial testing grounds was conducted upon our Holy Russia and a bloody test it was. But we Russians would not just roll over and give up our freedoms and our souls, no matter how much money Wall Street poured into the fists of the Marxists.

Those lessons were taken and used to properly prepare the American populace for the surrender of their freedoms and souls, to the whims of their elites and betters.

First, the population was dumbed down through a politicized and substandard education system based on pop culture, rather then [sic] the classics. Americans know more about their favorite TV dramas then the drama in DC that directly affects their lives. They care more for their "right" to choke down a McDonalds burger or a BurgerKing burger than [sic] for their constitutional rights. Then they turn around and lecture us about our rights and about our "democracy". Pride blind the foolish.

Then their faith in God was destroyed, until their churches, all tens of thousands of different "branches and denominations" were for the most part little more then Sunday circuses and their televangelists and top protestant mega preachers were more then happy to sell out their souls and flocks to be on the "winning" side of one pseudo Marxist politician or another. Their flocks may complain, but when explained that they would be on the "winning" side, their flocks were ever so quick to reject Christ in hopes for earthly power. Even our Holy Orthodox churches are scandalously liberalized in America.

The final collapse has come with the election of Barack Obama. His speed in the past three months has been truly impressive. His spending and money printing has been a record setting, not just in America's short history but in the world. If this keeps up for more then another year, and there is no sign that it will not, America at best will resemble the Wiemar Republic and at worst Zimbabwe.

These past two weeks have been the most breath taking of all. First came the announcement of a planned redesign of the American Byzantine tax system, by the very thieves who used it to bankroll their thefts, loses and swindles of hundreds of billions of dollars. These make our Russian oligarchs look little more then ordinary street thugs, in comparison. Yes, the Americans have beat our own thieves in the shear volumes. Should we congratulate them? >>> Stanislav Mishin | Monday, April 27, 2009

Hat tip: Always On Watch >>>

How the Left Turned to the Right
TIMES ONLINE: Liberal over-sensitivity to the beliefs of others is undermining freedom of speech, so giving reactionaries an easy ride

I attended an academic conference in late 1989 on the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe. Martin Jacques, editor of the now-defunct journal Marxism Today, put a brave face on the rejection of the ideals he espoused. He argued that these revolutions would expand the variety of left-wing views in Western Europe.

I recall arguing with him from the floor that the opposite was true. Of the two principal left-wing traditions in Europe, insurrectionary socialism and pro-Western social democracy, only the second retained credibility.

It is obvious now that we were both wrong. The revolutionary Left has made fitfully fruitful tactical alliances, such as the bleakly comic amalgam of Leninists and Islamists who formed and then rent apart George Galloway’s Respect party. But in its own name it remains a minuscule if variegated sect.

What has happened to the other wing of nominally progressive politics is more surprising. Liberalism, in its broadest sense, has become suspicious of its own ideals.

Notions once considered reactionary, even extreme, have insinuated themselves into the mainstream of right-thinking (that is, left-thinking) social idealism.

When you encountered someone of professed left-of-centre opinions, you used to be able to draw broad but important, and generally reliable, inferences about what these entailed.

They included, at a minimum, commitments to secularism, freedom of expression, individual liberty against collective authority, women’s rights, homosexual equality and the combating of xenophobia. Times have changed. Now these stances are unusual, even heterodox.

The degeneration of progressive idealism has many roots. But among the most important is the instinct that the ideas of Western liberty are specific to time and place — that they are Eurocentric. Almost coincident with the revolutions of 1989, which testified to the power of the human instinct for liberty, was a far more atavistic political movement.

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Supreme Leader of Iran, issued in February 1989 his fatwa calling for the murder of Salman Rushdie, a British citizen, for writing a novel that satirised Islam.

Western governments, religious leaders and political figures were more embarrassed than appalled. In effect, they acknowledged the offence and took issue only with the sentence. The chief rabbi in Great Britain, Dr Immanuel Jakobovits, remarked: “Both Mr Rushdie and the Ayatollah have abused freedom of speech.” >>> Oliver Kamm | Saturday, May 23, 2009

Marxist Muricio Funes Is New President of El Salvador
Mauricio Funes and wife Vanda Pignato as he declares victory. Photo courtesy of TimesOnline
TIMESONLINE: A party of former Marxist guerillas has gained power in El Salvador, bringing an end to 20 years of conservative rule.

Mauricio Funes, leader of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN), declared himself President late on Sunday night as early counting gave him 51.2 per cent of the vote with more than 90 percent of ballots counted. Shortly afterwards his rival, the right-wing candidate Rodrigo Avila, conceded defeat

"I'm the president-elect of the Salvadorans," Mr Funes told a news conference as jubilant supporters, dressed in red, poured on to the streets of San Salvador cheering and waving FMLN flags. "This is the happiest night of my life, and I want it to be the night of El Salvador's greatest hope."

The FMLN and the military government fought a bloody 12-year civil war between 1980 and 1992 in which 75,000 people died. The FMLN's victory will place El Salvador firmly on the Latin American left-of-centre axis led by President Chávez of Venezuela.

Although Mr Funes, 49, has promised unity, the rise to power of the FMLN will be watched closely by Washington, already unnerved by the "pink tide" sweeping Central America. >>> Anne Barrowclough | Monday, March 16, 2009

WELT ONLINE: Linkskandidat wird neuer Präsident in El Salvador

Mauricio Funes hat die Präsidentenwahl in El Salvador aller Voraussicht nach gewonnen. Der Kandidat der linken Befreiungsfront FMLN erklärte sich zum Sieger der als historisch bezeichneten Wahl. Funes versprach Frieden für das Land, andere warnen vor Kommunismus und dem Einfluss Kubas.

Der Kandidat der linken Befreiungsfront FMLN, Mauricio Funes hat nach Auszählung von mehr als 90 Prozent der Stimmen die Präsidentenwahl in El Salvador gewonnen. Der 49-Jährige erreichte bei der als historisch bezeichneten Wahl 51 Prozent der Stimmen. Sein Gegner von der Regierungspartei Arena, Rodrigo Ávila (44) brachte es auf 48 Prozent.

Damit muss die rechte Arena-Partei zum ersten Mal seit rund 20 Jahren in die Opposition. Mehr als 4000 nationale und internationale Beobachter waren im Einsatz, darunter mehrere Dutzend aus Europa. Schwerwiegende Zwischenfälle wurden nicht gemeldet.

Funes erklärte sich am Abend zum Wahlsieger, noch ehe die Oberste Wahlbehörde das offizielle Ergebnis mitgeteilte hatte. Er wandte sich an die Nation und versprach, er wolle dem von Bürgerkrieg und sozialen Gegensätzen gespaltenen Land endlich den Frieden bringen. „Ich möchte zum Präsidenten des Friedens und des Wiederaufbaus werden“, rief er den jubelnden Anhängern zu. „El Salvador gehört uns allen.“ >>> dpa/lk | Montag, 16. März 2009

The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Paperback – USA) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Hardcover – USA) >>>

Former Radical Extremist: Radical Islam Similar to Marxism, Soviet Union
TOWNHALL.COM: A former leader of a radical Islamic organization told Congress extreme Muslims are motivated by an ideology similar to Marxism and that Islamism has much in common with the former Soviet Union.

Maajid Nawaz, a native of England and once prominent figure in the London-based extremist group Hizb ut-Tharir, testified before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that the root cause of Islamic terrorism was its fanatical ideology, not poverty or discrimination.

“There is a common misconception on the left in the UK that only grievances can lead to Islamism,” he said.

Nawaz drew parallels between socialist Marxism and Islamism, contending that both movements see everything as a global ideological power struggle. He said Islamists wished for the world to be ruled under a single caliphate state, “like the Soviet bloc.”

“There will always be a conflict between Islamism and capitalism, just as there was once conflict between communism and capitalism,” he said. Former Radical Extremist: Radical Islam Similar to Marxism, Soviet Union >>> By Matt Purple | July 11, 2008

The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Dust Jacket Hardcover, direct from the publishers (US) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Paperback, direct from the publishers (US) >>>

Interview with Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Kyrill
Photo of Metropolitan Kyrill, possible successor of Patriarch Alexy II, courtesy of SpiegelOnline International
SPIEGELONLINE INTERNATIONAL: Metropolitan Kyrill, foreign minister of the Russian Orthodox Church, discusses Christian values in the post-communist era, his relationship with the pope in Rome, Vladimir Putin the churchgoer -- and wrangles with SPIEGEL about homosexuality.

SPIEGEL: Your Eminence, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russian Orthodox Church seemed to have prevailed over the godless communists. But has it been able to fill the spiritual vacuum that followed?

Kyrill: I wouldn't call it a vacuum. In communism, the church had no direct way of influencing society, but it did influence Russian culture and people's awareness. I remember a tour guide in a monastery in Vologda in the early 1970s. She talked about architecture and painting as if she were giving a sermon. There was no talk of Christianity, but her speech depended on a Christian system of values. This woman was not alone. Writers and artists spoke the same way. Or, someone would see a destroyed church and discover another world beyond the gloomy prefabricated high-rises where people lived. Christian values were always kept alive among the people. They ultimately brought about the fall of communism.

SPIEGEL: Crime and corruption were rampant after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Murder, robbery and fraud became mass phenomena. Wasn't this a defeat for the church?

Kyrill: Reviving morality is a long process. We also see high crime rates in other countries. Besides, Russia faced massive social changes. Our economy was in ruins, foreign influence was growing and so was the consumption mentality, the focus on performance, all of these postmodern ideas which treat everything as relative and no longer require us to distinguish between truth and lies.

SPIEGEL: It sounds as if the present is no better than the past, in your opinion.

Kyrill: The church should have taken time to regenerate. We were weakened by atheism, and then we were faced with a double burden. We were like a boxer who walks around for months with his arm in a cast and is then abruptly shoved into the ring, accompanied by shouts of encouragement. But there we encountered a well-trained opponent, in the form of a wide variety of missionaries from America and South Korea who tried to convert the Russian people to other faiths. Religion was also marginalized by a secular way of thinking.

SPIEGEL: Is capitalism ultimately worse than communism?

Kyrill: The free market economy has certainly proved to be more effective than the planned economy. Unlike corporate executives, however, the church also believes in justice. As far as that's concerned, we have no fewer problems today, perhaps even more, than in the Soviet era. The gap between rich and poor in Russia is scandalous. That's an issue we are addressing.

SPIEGEL: You must find it obscene, the way the Russian oligarchs, with their palaces and yachts, show off their wealth.

Kyrill: It isn't the church's place to point to someone and say: He owns yachts and airplanes, so let's take away his riches and redistribute them. That happened in the 1917 revolution. At the time, they were saying that paradise was the next step after expropriation. But what we got instead was hell. May God protect Russia from repeating the same mistake. However, the government must ensure that the gap doesn't become too wide. Russia's future depends on it. ’The Bible Calls it a Sin’ >>>

Part 2:
’Men Can Control Their Drives’

This superb interview will be cross-posted at The Shrewd Economist because of several references to economic affairs in post-communist Russia.

Mark Alexander (Paperback)
Mark Alexander (Hardback)