Tag Archives: Communism

04/21/17

“Queer Communism” Finds its Voice

By: Cliff Kincaid | Accuracy in Media

Since MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow is still preoccupied with the supposed influence of Russia on President Donald Trump and the American political process, we suggest that the publication of a new book called Communism for Kids by MIT Press is worthy of her attention. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the 1917 Russian revolution, this book offers a glimpse into an uprising that was global in scope and which has not only destroyed the moral fiber of Russia, but has also done enormous damage to America.

The author of Communism for Kids, Bini Adamczak, writes that “the Russian revolution instilled new hope, particularly in women and people who did not identify themselves within the hetero-normative paradigm.” The “destruction of the family,” she writes, was the goal. “With the revolution, the right to legal abortion, both sexes’ right to divorce, the decriminalization of adultery, and the annulment of the sodomy law (which had previously prohibited homosexuality) were implemented and enforced,” she explains.

“In Moscow, one could find international communes led by gay communists,” she says. “Drag kings could become legitimate members of the Red Army. Participants of the revolutionary debates decided upon the destruction of the family, demanded the legalization of incest, and advertised the practice [of] polygamy.”

“Queer communism” is the battle cry of these modern Marxists, who label themselves “Queer communists” and identify with the origins of the Russian revolution.

It’s doubtful that Maddow, despite her “obsession” with Russia, will turn to this fascinating topic, since she is one of the liberal media’s open advocates of the homosexual lifestyle. She is a favorite of the National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association (NLGJA), which now calls itself the Association of LGBTQ Journalists.

On Thursday, in New York City, CNN’s Don Lemon will host a “star-studded event” for the NLGJA designed to raise tens of thousands of dollars for the organization’s programs. “More than 350 journalists, news executives, dignitaries and allies attend this event each year in what has become one of New York City’s must-attend media events,” the advertisement for NLGJA says.

The corporate media sponsors include Comcast/NBC Universal, Fox News, ABC News, CNN, CBS News and the New York Post.

Despite the virtual integration of the corporate media and the gay rights movement here in the U.S., Communism for Kids author Bini Adamczak writes that more advances have to be made in the field of “queer politics,” using the strategies of Marxist revolution. Eventually, she says, “modern reproduction technologies” could be used to “completely abolish the sexes.”

Transgender liberation is the next major frontier. She notes that “In her autobiographically inspired novel Stone Butch Blues, Leslie Feinberg grants readers a powerful insight into the connectedness of queer politics.” Feinberg, a Marxist member of the Workers World Party, was identified as “an anti-racist white, working-class, secular Jewish, transgender, lesbian, female, revolutionary communist.” Her last words before she died were, “Remember me as a revolutionary communist. Hasten the revolution!”

Another prominent advocate of “transgender liberation” is Bradley/Chelsea Manning, the former U.S. Army analyst sentenced to prison for espionage for his/her collaboration in the release by WikiLeaks of thousands of top secret intelligence reports. Former President Obama commuted Manning’s sentence, which was originally 35 years in prison for espionage, and he/she will now be released on May 17, after only seven years in prison. Manning was an open homosexual in the Army before deciding to become a woman.

“WikiLeaks walks like a hostile intelligence service and talks like a hostile intelligence service,” declared President Trump’s new CIA director, Mike Pompeo. “It has encouraged its followers to find jobs at CIA in order to obtain intelligence. It directed Chelsea Manning in her theft of specific secret information. And it overwhelmingly focuses on the United States, while seeking support from anti-democratic countries and organizations.”

Yet Pompeo has not indicated whether the lax rules that are in place at the CIA and other intelligence agencies, permitting mentally disordered and confused transgender individuals to gain employment and get top secret security clearances, will be changed.

“It is time to call out WikiLeaks for what it really is—a non-state hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors like Russia,” Pompeo said. “In January of this year, our Intelligence Community determined that Russian military intelligence—the GRU—had used WikiLeaks to release data of U.S. victims that the GRU had obtained through cyber operations against the Democratic National Committee. And the report also found that Russia’s primary propaganda outlet, RT, has actively collaborated with WikiLeaks.”

In his article for AIM, “CIA Funding and Recruiting LGBT,” Alex Nitzberg wrote about how the CIA maintains its own employee organization called “ANGLE,” which stands for the “Agency Network for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Officers and Allies.” Last December 16, the CIA itself announced that ANGLE had received an award for “promoting LGBT issues.”

Obama’s CIA Director John O. Brennan was quoted as saying, “It is difficult to overstate how heartening this progress has been to me. Indeed, one of the highlights of my tenure has been seeing the LGBT community blossom under the leadership of ANGLE and its cadre of devoted allies—a group to which I proudly belong.”

Brennan was also an ally of Muslim and pro-communist CIA employees. He personally voted communist before joining the agency in 1980.

The CIA has released a documentary “ANGLE of Ascent,” highlighting “the key role CIA leaders have played in building inclusive environments” and focusing on “the cultural shift that occurred within the Agency since the signing of Executive Order 12968, which gave LGBT officers the right to obtain a security clearance and serve openly in the Federal Government.”

“The CIA exists to gather and assess intelligence in order to protect America’s national security,” wrote Nitzberg. “Americans must decide whether they believe the CIA’s involvement in recruiting from and funding LGBT events serves to advance those objectives.”

But Americans are not given the opportunity to pass judgement because they are kept in the dark by elements of the news media in bed with the homosexual and transgender movements. As part of this collusion, Pompeo will be encouraged to continue Brennan’s pro-LGBT policies at the CIA. He will be threatened with the charge of “homophobia” if he decides to return the CIA to its mission of protecting America’s secrets.

  • The growing list of special guests at Thursday’s NLGJA event includes:

Dari Alexander, WNYW; Jason Bellini, The Wall Street Journal; Gio Benitez, ABC News; Dan Bowens, WNYW; Frank Bruni, The New York Times; Kenneth Craig, CBS News; John Bannon Dias, News 12; Willie Geist, MSNBC; Kendis Gibson, ABC News; Sunny Hostin, The View; Preston Konrad, celebrity stylist; Steve Lacy, WNYW; Brett Larson, FOX News Headlines 24/7; Kyle Marimon, Fresco News; Jared Max, FOX News Headlines 24/7; John Meyer, Fresco News; Michael Musto, OUT.com; Court Passant, CBS Corporation; Lydia Polgreen, The Huffington Post; Caroline Que, The New York Times; Gus Rosendale, WNBC; Carolyn Ryan, The New York Times; Michelangelo Signorile, SiriusXM; Baruch Shemtov, WNYW; Lauren Simonetti, FOX Business Network; Steve Sosna, NBC4; Joanna Stern, The Wall Street Journal; Joe Toohey, WNYW; Kris Van Cleave, CBS News; and Jana Winter, investigative reporter.

Cliff Kincaid

Cliff Kincaid is the Director of the AIM Center for Investigative Journalism and can be contacted at [email protected] View the complete archives from Cliff Kincaid.

04/14/17

Fox Commentator in Bed with Kim Jong-un

By: Cliff Kincaid | Accuracy in Media

The Epoch Times newspaper is currently running an editorial series called “The Dead End of Communism” that includes a detailed discussion of the diabolical, even Satanic, roots of Karl Marx, the father of communism. Looking at his writings in detail, the authors document how his goal was “to enact a sort of vengeance against heaven.” Contrary to his “progressive” profile, Marx hated humanity and life on earth. His appeal was that he promised a heaven on earth. But it turned out to be hell for those living under it.

Communism has killed more than 100 million people, and millions more are at risk of death. The people of South Korea and other countries are currently in the crosshairs of Communist North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. The communist ruler, Kim Jong-un, has even threatened America with a nuclear attack.

The North Korean nuclear weapons program was assisted by President Bill Clinton’s administration, in the name of stopping it, and the Obama administration did little to contain it. It’s likely that former President Barack Obama informed President Donald Trump about this growing problem, and that this helps explain why Trump has been so concerned, even preoccupied, with the North Korean nuclear threat since he took office.

Of course, the North Korean regime could not survive without the assistance of its communist neighbor, China. So communism is not itself dead. It is very much alive and a real threat. Trump understands this, but continues to be assaulted by the media and their Democratic Party allies about his so-called Russian connection, for which there is no evidence.

A serious examination of the real Russia problem can be found in The Epoch Times series marking the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution. President Trump recognized that Russia has not changed significantly from the old Soviet days when he authorized a U.S. military strike on Russian client state Syria in response to its alleged chemical weapons attack on innocent civilians.  Russia’s relationship with Syria and Iran represents the “Red Jihad” that has existed since the days of Lenin, when the founder of the Soviet state urged the “oppressed” Muslims to join in a global campaign against the West.

Meanwhile, communism is very much alive and doing well in Latin America. The communist rulers of Venezuela are in the news for totally mismanaging their once-healthy economy and persecuting their own citizens. And Washington Times investigative journalist Martin Arostegui writes about how Colombia’s FARC communist guerrillas are still in the business of dealing drugs and spreading terrorism.

It was supposed to be a “peace process,” but the serious flaws in the agreement made between the terrorists and the government will have to be fixed if Colombia is going to survive as a free and independent country. “Three months into the agreement’s implementation, the guerrillas have surrendered what critics say is a token number of weapons while the production of coca has skyrocketed from 63,000 hectares in 2013 to 188,000 last year,” writes Arostegui. “Analysts attribute the rise to concessions that the FARC has obtained through the peace process.”

Like the mess in Syria, Obama’s fingerprints are all over this. As the author notes, “President Obama backed the peace process by trying to delist the FARC as a terrorist group to facilitate an agreement. He earmarked $450 million for fiscal 2017 to underwrite the deal, and his secretary of state, John F. Kerry, publicly met with FARC leaders.”

It looks like “peace” in Colombia is similar to the “100 percent” elimination of chemical weapons in Syria.

As President Trump attempts to rally the nation in the face of the North Korean threat, we can see how communism is also very much alive on the streets of America. Communist groups have organized a tour covering nine U.S. cities, from April 4 through the 16th, to mobilize against the deployment of the U.S. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile system in South Korea. THAAD is designed to deter a North Korean nuclear attack. It’s the one thing Obama set in motion to help defend South Korea.

The main sponsor of the anti-THAAD tour is the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), a self-described “revolutionary Marxist party in the United States,” and its front, Act Now to Stop War & End Racism (ANSWER).

Individual endorsers of this campaign include Marxist academic Noam Chomsky and former Democratic Congressman Dennis Kucinich, who is now a Fox News contributor.

Remember Kucinich? His Fox News bio notes that he “conducted an exclusive interview with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to discuss the allegations of the use of chemical weapons alongside FNC’s Senior Foreign Affairs Correspondent Greg Palkot.” That was aired on Special Report with Bret Baier back in 2013. After the recent allegations of a chemical attack, Kucinich was back on Fox News saying he didn’t think Assad was behind it.

It’s fascinating that Kucinich is now a leader of the campaign against defending South Korea from a communist attack.

His “message of solidarity to the Korean people in the struggle to oppose the THAAD missile ‘defense’ system” reads like something written by a North Korean propagandist. “THAAD is not a technology for peace,” Kucinich says. “It is for war.”

Kucinich says, “It could be argued that the installation of such a system, whether it works or not, is a provocation (‘first the shield, then the sword’). Added to the joint U.S./South Korean military exercises, it places an additional burden of tension to already strained relations with the North. I would instead urge greater reliance upon the wonderful capacity of the Korean people to engage in diplomacy with the brothers and sisters in the North, to avert conflict.”

It is signed by Kucinich with the biographical information, “Member of the United States Congress, 1997-2013. Democratic Candidate for President 2004 and 2008.”

It certainly looks like a major figure in the Democratic Party is acting like a foreign agent for the North Korean regime. There seems to be more evidence of his work on behalf of Kim Jung-un than there is for Trump being a Russian agent.

Is there any likelihood that his fellow Democrats will raise any alarm by this kind of behavior? Will they call for hearings and investigations?

Perhaps his employer Fox News should look into it.

Cliff Kincaid

Cliff Kincaid is the Director of the AIM Center for Investigative Journalism and can be contacted at [email protected] View the complete archives from Cliff Kincaid.

04/5/17

What Will Trump Do About Red China?

By: Cliff Kincaid | America’s Survival

Joshua Philipp, an Award-winning National Security reporter for Epoch Times, discusses the threat posed by Communist China and the paper’s series, “The Dead End of Communism.” He talks about what President Trump will likely discuss with Chinese dictator Xi Jinping at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida during the April 6-7 summit. What will Trump say to the Chinese dictator about the North Korean nuclear weapons program?

03/24/17

Author, filmmaker warns of biggest US threat is those who threaten the Constitution

By: Bryant Maddrick | Fox 28

The terror attack in London has some American cities on alert, watching activity on major bridges.

Author and filmmaker Trevor Loudon says the biggest threat here is not ISIS or Al Qaida. It’s what happening right here on American soil

“You cannot rely on the government in its present state to effectively guard your internal security to keep you safe,” says Loudon.

That’s the message the author and filmmaker is making in his book and documentary, both titled “The Enemies Within.”

“What we’re talking about are the internal enemies of the Constitution. We contend these are actually more dangerous.”

Loudon argues groups like the Muslim Brotherhood have influenced members of Congress. The New Zealand native has been traveling the country talking to people about what he sees as a problem and the solution to it.

“Have the Muslim brotherhood designated officially by the state department as a terrorist organization. Just as Hamas is, just as Al Qaida is.”

Loudon makes his point on the same day as a deadly terror attack in London that left four dead.

“There are Islamic cells all over Europe, all over the Middle East, and obviously here in America who can strike at a moment’s notice.”

The New Zealand native says it’s another reminder of the world we live in.

“If we don’t do something about it, it’s just going to be a continual pattern of American and Europeans being slaughtered in their own homes, in their own cities.”

Loudon explains his message is not to appeal to partisan politics. Instead, it’s to appeal to American’s love for the constitution.

“They do want their American identity. They know the country’s based on the Constitution. They know it’s based on a free enterprise system and strong national defense. They know America has been a world leader and most Americans will buy into that.”

Loudon will take his message to the Cincinnati area before going to Canada.

03/22/17

Can Trump Save His Presidency and the Nation?

By: Cliff Kincaid | America’s Survival

Geopolitical expert Jeff Nyquist talks with Cliff Kincaid about whether Trump can “drain the swamp” before the swamp swallows and takes him down. Nyqust analyses how the communists in the Democratic Party and Russia are working together, not in opposition. Will FBI Director James Comey charge Trump or his associates with being Russian agents? Why is Trump pouring more U.S. troops into Syria and Afghanistan? Can Europe survive with a Russian agent (Angela Merkel) running Germany?

12/27/16

The HUMILIATING Truth About Obama’s Presidency Revealed Just Weeks Before He Leaves Office

By: Terresa Monroe-Hamilton | Right Wing News

Barack Obama will leave office with a 58% approval rating. I don’t know about you, but I find that impossible to believe. He has all but destroyed this country over the past eight years. The list of damages is too long to really go through. Among his greatest crimes are Obamacare, which destroyed the greatest health system in the world. He gutted our military and destroyed the morale of our troops, basically leaving us severely exposed to our enemies. The Iran deal nuclearized the greatest terrorist threat on the planet, all funded by the United States. He opened our borders wide to an invasion and is still bringing in thousands of Muslim refugees that aren’t vetted. And let’s not forget that he brought the Muslim Brotherhood into the White House and got four men killed in Benghazi. His last and possibly most transparent crime was against Israel at the UN, where Obama joined with the jackals and stabbed Israel in the back.

Only one in seven Republicans approve of his job performance and I think that number is way too generous. According to Pew Research, 88% of Democrats approve of Obama, while on 15% of Republicans approve. Again… not buying those numbers. Almost a third of this country has been out of work for years… regardless of the unemployment numbers they parade around, which is a massive manipulated lie. Businesses have fled this country at an astounding rate to escape taxes and regulations… all thanks to Obama’s Marxism.

From the Daily Mail:

President Obama’s job approval rating is a healthy 58 per cent as he begins his glide path out of office, but that number hides a partisan split among Americans that’s wider than any outgoing president has seen since at least the 1960s.

During a November 17 press conference in Germany, Obama claimed that ‘based on current surveys of public opinion in the United States, it turns out that the majority of Americans think I’ve done a pretty good job.’

But that assessment hides a deep divide: While 88 per cent of Democrats told Pew Research Center pollsters that they have a favorable view of Obama’s work in the Oval Office, just 15 per cent of Republicans agree.

That gap – 73 per cent – is far larger than what Gallup polls recorded at the end of the Reagan and Clinton administrations, and as both George Bushes prepared to leave the White House.

Obama’s average approval rating across all eight years of his presidency also shows the largest partisan breach measured since opinion surveys began separating data by political party affiliation during the Eisenhower administration.

The 73-point party gap is the largest ever measured since pollsters started recording approval ratings during the Eisenhower years. There is such a huge gap between the left and the right now, it is staggering and frankly, frightening. When you see such a disparity between political entities within a country, it usually means you are on the cusp of a civil revolt of some sort. I’m hoping and praying that President-elect Donald Trump can fix enough of the damage to stop that from happening here. The communists have been successful in tearing us apart and causing upheaval and chaos. Thank God Hillary Clinton did not get elected… she would have finished us off, I have no doubt of that.

Obama claimed last month that ‘the majority of Americans think I’ve done a pretty good job’. No, they don’t. Only the uninformed or the ones that are communists or Islamists do. That’s the brutal truth. Obama also claimed that if he ran against Donald Trump, he would have beat him. Again, no… he wouldn’t have. Americans are sick of the corruption, Marxism and lies brought on by Barack Obama. That is what he will truly be remembered for. He took Saul Alinsky to heart and really should be included with the other rebel that Alinsky honored… Lucifer: “Lest we forget at least an over the shoulder acknowledgment to the very first radical: from all our legends, mythology and history (and who is to know where mythology leaves off and history begins – or which is which), the very first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom – Lucifer.” ― Saul D. Alinsky, Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals. That’s one hell of a legacy. Just sayin’.

President Barack Obama has a 58 percent approval rating as he leaves office, but that number hides a massive 73-point gap between Democrats and Republicans.

Pew’s numbers show 88 percent of Democrats and just 15 percent of Republicans currently approve of Obama’s job performance.

Averaged over Obama’s eight years in office, approval of the outgoing president’s Oval Office work drew a 67-point partisan gap – the largest measured in more than 60 years.

12/17/16

Weekly Featured Profile – Bahman Azad

KeyWiki.org

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Bahman Azad

Bahman Azad is an Iranian-American peace and justice activist living in the United States. He has a Master’s Degree in Economics and a Ph.D. in Sociology from American universities. He served in the Iranian Air Force as a 2nd Lieutenant between 1971 and 1973.

He is a former acting director of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Rutgers University. He is currently a Professor of Economics and Sociology at Berkeley College in New Jersey.

Azad has been active in radical politics since his arrival in the United States in 1973, first as a student activist against the previous regime in Iran and then as a member of the National Board of the Communist Party USA front U.S. Peace Council. He joined communist dominated Veterans for Peace in the early 1990s at the invitation of his close friend and then VFP President, long time Maoist David Cline. He is currently serving as the Chair of VFP’s Iran Working Group, Organizational Secretary of the U.S. Peace Council, Co-Chair of the Iran Pledge of Resistance and an NGO representative of the formerly Soviet controlled World Peace Council at the United Nations.

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In 2004 Roger Keeran, and Thomas Kenny published “Socialism Betrayed: Behind the Collapse of the Soviet Union”

Special thanks went to Bahman Azad, Norman Markowitz, Michael Parenti, Anthony Coughlan and Betty Smith for reading the entire manuscript and suggesting editorial and substantive changes.

In December 2010, Alfred L. Marder, Catherine Goodman and Bahman Azad were listed as the originators of a U.S. Peace Council “Petition to President Barack Obama and Congress to end the Korean War and Normalize Relations,” a long time goal of communist North Korea.

We call on U.S. government to stop its repeated “war games” threatening North Korea, to stop demonizing but rather recognize North Korea as a sovereign nation, to engage the North Korean government in meaningful direct talks to end the Korean War, to sign a peace treaty, to remove all U.S. military bases and troops from South Korea, to negotiate with North Korea to dismantle its nuclear weapons as part of global nuclear abolition, and to normalize diplomatic and trade relations between the two nations.

Earlier this year Bahman Azad joined the Coordinating Committee of Hands Off Syria Coalition, a front group supporting the pro-Moscow regime in Syria.

(Bahman Azad|more…)

12/7/16

Castro, The New York Times, and Fake News

By: Cliff Kincaid | Accuracy in Media

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The New York Times is claiming the ability to expose “fake news.” It should know something about the topic. So-called “fake news” from The New York Times helped bring Fidel Castro to power. Castro had urged the Soviet Union to launch the nuclear missiles it had installed in Cuba on the United States, with the potential to obliterate tens of millions of Americans.

In its obituary, “Fidel Castro, Cuban Revolutionary Who Defied U.S., Dies at 90,” the Times mentions that Castro had pushed the world “to the brink of nuclear war,” through the Cuban missile crisis, but did not highlight the fact that he had advocated a Soviet nuclear strike on the U.S.

Here’s a reference to this from The New York Times in 1990: “Fidel Castro urged the Soviet Union to attack the United States in 1962 because he feared an American invasion of Cuba during the Cuban missile crisis, Nikita S. Khrushchev said in portions of his memoirs published today.”

The memoirs of Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev quoted the Cuban leader as saying in 1962 that the Kremlin “should launch a pre-emptive strike against the U.S.” to prevent destruction of the Soviet missiles in Cuba.

The Times obituary about Castro also neglected to mention that Castro sponsored terrorism in America through such groups as the Weather Underground and FALN. The paper did, however, find time to note that Castro put scarce resources into an effort to develop a Cuban supercow.

The Times referred to “suspicions that Mr. Castro and the Cubans were somehow involved” in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Perhaps the “somehow” had something to do with the fact that the assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, was a Marxist member of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee who had defected to the Soviet Union.

Oswald’s communist connection was more obvious than the Islamic motivation of the Somali Muslim at Ohio State University who was inspired by ISIS to drive a car into a group of students and take out a knife to injure them.

In the obituary, the Times did note the pro-Castro coverage by its correspondent in Cuba at the time of Castro’s seizure of power, saying that Herbert Matthews had “presented a Castro that Americans could root for,” and “repeated Mr. Castro’s assertions that Cuba’s future was anything but a Communist state.”

“He has strong ideas of liberty, democracy, social justice, the need to restore the Constitution, to hold elections,” Matthews wrote. When asked about the United States, Castro replied, “You can be sure we have no animosity toward the United States and the American people.”

A review of Matthews’ work by Ron Radosh ran under the title, “A Dictator’s Scribe,” while Cuban-American Humberto Fontova authored a piece about Castro, Matthews and the role of the Times as the “Unrepentant Communist Enabler.”

Professor Paul Kengor notes that “conservatives would later joke, quite uneasily, that Castro had gotten his job through the New York Times.”

“Unfortunately,” he goes on to say, “this kind of service by the New York Times has not ended. A new generation of Times reporters is picking up the torch, educated at universities that teach that the only bad thing about communism was Joe McCarthy.”

In this context, one key fact about Castro, relevant to today’s problems in the U.S. news media and academia, is that he studied to become a communist in college. The late leftist filmmaker, Saul Landau, a member of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee, confirmed that Castro told him that he had become a Marxist from the time that he read the Communist Manifesto in his student days.

Castro was also quoted as saying, in a book published in 2006, “In the university, where I arrived simply with a rebel spirit and elementary ideas of justice, I became a Marxist-Leninist and acquired the sentiments that over the years I have had the privilege never to have felt the slightest temptation to abandon.”

Yet, Herbert Matthews called Castro an anti-communist.

It would be nice if The New York Times would simply apologize for using fake news to help bring Castro to power.

Cliff Kincaid

Cliff Kincaid is the Director of the AIM Center for Investigative Journalism and can be contacted at [email protected] View the complete archives from Cliff Kincaid.

11/20/16

Pope Francis: “…it is the communists who think like Christians”

By: Renee Nal | New Zeal

Pope Francis climbs the steps to the altar upon arriving to give the first mass of his visit to Cuba in Havana's Revolution Square, Sept. 20.

Pope Francis climbs the steps to the altar upon arriving to give the first mass of his visit to Cuba in Havana’s Revolution Square, Sept. 20.

Last week, Pope Francis told Italian journalist and co-founder of the newspaper La Repubblica Eugenio Scalfari that “…it is the communists who think like Christians.”

Here is the exchange:

Q: You told me some time ago that the precept, “Love your neighbour as thyself” had to change, given the dark times that we are going through, and become “more than thyself.” So you yearn for a society where equality dominates. This, as you know, is the programme of Marxist socialism and then of communism. Are you therefore thinking of a Marxist type of society?

A: “It it has been said many times and my response has always been that, if anything, it is the communists who think like Christians. Christ spoke of a society where the poor, the weak and the marginalized have the right to decide. Not demagogues, not Barabbas, but the people, the poor, whether they have faith in a transcendent God or not. It is they who must help to achieve equality and freedom”.

Pope Francis also used a familiar progressive expression surrounding immigrants. He said in part, “…we need to break down walls and build bridges…” The pontiff said in part:

We must break down the walls that divide us: we must try to increase well-being and make it more widespread, but to achieve this we need to break down walls and build bridges that allow us to reduce inequality and increase freedom and rights. More rights and greater freedom.”

Wall at Vatican City

Wall at Vatican City

As an aside, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerburg was quoted in April as saying, “Instead of building walls we can help build bridges.” Just one month later, Zuckerburg reportedly “…started buying parcels around his Palo Alto home to protect his privacy.”