By Dr. Ileana Johnson Paugh ——Bio and Archives--March 10, 2023
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Few Americans have heard of William Z. Foster and Gus Hall, former leaders of the Communist Party U.S.A. William Z. Foster had died in Moscow on September 1, 1961, having devoted most of his adult life to the communist Russians. Foster had gone to the Soviet Union in 1961 to seek medical care because, he said, he could not afford it in the U.S. When he died, the Soviets gave him a huge memorial service in the Red Square and offered to bury him in Kremlin’s walls. Instead, his ashes were brought to a cemetery outside Chicago.
Gus Hall, dedicated his entire life to the communist movement as well, and, having participated in riots all over the country. As a young man, he testified his willingness to take up arms against constitutional authorities.
The two Americans were classical examples of useful idiots, utilized by Soviets to further their communist agenda. Their devotion to the cause of communism exemplifies that fact that communists, since they took power in 1917, have built a veritable “empire” around the world based on intense propaganda. By 1961 there were 40 million members in 87 communist parties spread around the globe.
To people like me, who have escaped the clutches of the Communist Party and its dictatorship, it is shocking that American citizens would want to join a movement that promises to destroy their way of life permanently. Voters can choose communism at the ballot box, but they must fight their way out of it if they want to escape its tyrannical boots.
For naïve and ignorant “woke” Americans, it seems that the promise of free “stuff” is enough for them to repudiate capitalism and to embrace the illusory promise of a cure for their financial problems and other problems of the world. What are the attractions of communism that convince these Americans to demand the replacing of capitalism with socialism/communism?
People who are desperate economically, i.e., have lost jobs, savings, are in severe debt, lost their homes, are hungry because food is so expensive, will accept desperate measures to resolve their problems. They truly believe that socialism/communism will solve all their problems and they would be able to start a new life, a much happier and healthier one, with a clean slate.
What they do not realize is that, even under communism, there are haves and have nots, there is no equality, nor “equity.” If you don’t work, you don’t eat, and you have to work where you are told. You will get a miserly and spartan apartment with no furnishings. Food will be basic and hard to find. Savings and loans will not exist, healthcare will be sparse and inadequate, basic necessities missing in the stores. Electricity, heat, and water will be rationed along with food. A centralized and controlled economy under communism will not yield any prosperity for the masses, only for the people at the top who control it all.
Americans who have experienced various forms of social injustice or prejudice are strong candidates for communism. Some Americans are frustrated with existing conditions which they find unfair and want to eliminate all injustices. Frustrated with the democratic process, these adherents to communism believe that only communism can fix all injustices.
The communist propaganda portrays communism as “the champion of social protest, the only force striving to improve the conditions of the oppressed.” This is a total lie. There is no place to redress injustice under communism because the entire system is rigged by and sustained for the success of the elites at the top of the Communist Party.
Communist propaganda promises the simplicity of one party that runs everything and delivers paradise. The propaganda highlights the success of the former Soviet Union, economically, industrially, scientifically, educationally, and technologically, but hide the huge human cost to achieve this communist political order – all the human suffering, gulags, and deaths at the hands of the Communist Party, the only political entity allowed to exist.
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Highly insecure and inadequate Americans in their personal lives are attracted to communism because they don’t have to be burdened by any responsibility for their bad decisions and terrible actions. They are happy to let communist party leaders make decisions for all individuals. Some even give up their prior religious beliefs and take up atheism as a poor replacement.
The party offers endless activities of propaganda, pulling them more and more into the communist movement and forcing them to abandon any outside interests. The party becomes their whole lives. Educating and guiding the masses into submission becomes an all-consuming activity for “selfless dedication and self-sacrifice.”
Soviets were exceptionally good at drawing in the under-developed world because lives were governed by ignorance and poverty. The communist social activists helped locals improve their diets, prevent disease through simple hygienic measures, their living conditions, helped them build roads, railroads, and provided them with education and technical training. Many less developed countries became communist easily and permanently even though their citizen’s lives are rotten and desperate to this day. The communist propaganda is so strong that citizens continue to vote their way into communist-delivered poverty, crime, and misery.
Communist activists cleverly exploited nationalism to their advantage in less developed nations. They disguised themselves as the supporters of the “right of all nations to their complete independence.”
The Soviets and the Chinese offered them trade agreements, technical aid, economic aid, military aid, and university scholarships at the most prestigious universities. The communists worked very hard to undermine non-communist governments in these developing countries and held back the modernization process.
The ”woke” Americans in this country are the dedicated fools who believe that socialism and communism are the ways to secure their futures. They may understand that socialism is communism light, or may not understand at all what they are asking for.
The “woke” want to live like the “socialist” Nordic countries that seem to be paradise transported on bicycles. What they don’t understand is that those Nordic countries are not socialist, they are capitalist nations with free enterprise, and a government that strongly favors national welfare for its citizens and taxes them to death to pay for these welfare programs.
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Dr. Ileana Johnson Paugh, Ileana Writes is a freelance writer, author, radio commentator, and speaker. Her books, “Echoes of Communism”, “Liberty on Life Support” and “U.N. Agenda 21: Environmental Piracy,” “Communism 2.0: 25 Years Later” are available at Amazon in paperback and Kindle.