1 00:00:02,520 --> 00:00:05,280 Speaker 1: Welcome to I Could Happened Here, a podcast about a 2 00:00:05,320 --> 00:00:09,440 Speaker 1: world sliding ever further into the abyss. I'm your host, 3 00:00:09,600 --> 00:00:14,520 Speaker 1: Mia Wong. As the wave of atrocities committed by Israel 4 00:00:14,560 --> 00:00:17,120 Speaker 1: and the Gaza strip rate is on and the moral 5 00:00:17,160 --> 00:00:20,520 Speaker 1: authority of Biden and his liberal cohort crumbles day by day, 6 00:00:21,320 --> 00:00:24,280 Speaker 1: a new generation of right wing media grifters have seized 7 00:00:24,320 --> 00:00:27,160 Speaker 1: on Palestine as a way to boost their own reactionary brand. 8 00:00:28,240 --> 00:00:30,800 Speaker 1: But these are not the standard kind of right wing 9 00:00:30,840 --> 00:00:33,919 Speaker 1: grifter that we've become accustomed to on this show. They 10 00:00:33,920 --> 00:00:38,080 Speaker 1: aren't Chris Ruffo, they aren't libbit of TikTok, and although 11 00:00:38,120 --> 00:00:41,360 Speaker 1: they will eventually appear on Tucker Carlson, they aren't cut 12 00:00:41,520 --> 00:00:48,000 Speaker 1: from that pre existing template. These are our monsters. These 13 00:00:48,000 --> 00:00:50,640 Speaker 1: are monsters birth by the left I grew up in, 14 00:00:51,040 --> 00:00:54,360 Speaker 1: by the generation of new socialist radicalized by Bernie Sanders, 15 00:00:54,400 --> 00:00:57,480 Speaker 1: the serience of a war, and the election of Donald Trump. 16 00:00:58,920 --> 00:01:01,960 Speaker 1: This is largely to be a set up episode to 17 00:01:02,080 --> 00:01:04,720 Speaker 1: understand the background of the kinds of people who are 18 00:01:04,720 --> 00:01:08,399 Speaker 1: going to come later, But I wanted to start the 19 00:01:08,520 --> 00:01:10,880 Speaker 1: story with a taste of where it's going to end. 20 00:01:11,840 --> 00:01:14,320 Speaker 1: Max Blumenthal is a left wing journalist with the outlet 21 00:01:14,440 --> 00:01:18,160 Speaker 1: Gray Zone. He was for a very long time well 22 00:01:18,200 --> 00:01:21,760 Speaker 1: regarded in anti imperialist circles. In many ways, he is 23 00:01:21,800 --> 00:01:25,039 Speaker 1: the ideological predecessor to enormous portions of the modern left. 24 00:01:26,040 --> 00:01:29,480 Speaker 1: In twenty twenty one, Anthony Fauci, the former head of 25 00:01:29,480 --> 00:01:32,880 Speaker 1: the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and Biden's 26 00:01:33,240 --> 00:01:36,240 Speaker 1: chief health official, went on Face the Nation to face 27 00:01:36,280 --> 00:01:39,840 Speaker 1: allegations and calls by Senator Ran Paul and Ted Cruz 28 00:01:39,920 --> 00:01:43,760 Speaker 1: for him to step down and quote be prosecuted over 29 00:01:43,800 --> 00:01:46,840 Speaker 1: the course of COVID nineteen. Yeah, after the Saint if 30 00:01:46,840 --> 00:01:48,920 Speaker 1: you happen to Face the Nation, release a tweet about it. 31 00:01:49,400 --> 00:01:52,840 Speaker 1: Bluementhal responded with an incredibly disturbing video. I'm going to 32 00:01:52,880 --> 00:01:54,520 Speaker 1: read the tweet. I'm not going to play the video 33 00:01:54,600 --> 00:01:58,880 Speaker 1: because this guy listening to him is a painful experience. 34 00:02:00,040 --> 00:02:04,919 Speaker 1: Bluementhal responded, quote Nobel winning inventor of the PCR test, 35 00:02:05,280 --> 00:02:09,080 Speaker 1: Carrie Molus on Anthony, quote I am the science Fauci quote, 36 00:02:09,120 --> 00:02:12,280 Speaker 1: and this is from Mollas. Tony Fauci does not mind 37 00:02:12,320 --> 00:02:14,519 Speaker 1: going on camera in front of the people who pay 38 00:02:14,520 --> 00:02:17,679 Speaker 1: his salary and lie directly into the camera. By the way, 39 00:02:18,000 --> 00:02:20,679 Speaker 1: the part where he says lie instead of lying, there 40 00:02:20,760 --> 00:02:24,040 Speaker 1: is a direct quote that is him, not me. So 41 00:02:24,120 --> 00:02:28,280 Speaker 1: to understand how absolutely it absolutely absurd this is we 42 00:02:28,320 --> 00:02:34,120 Speaker 1: need to talk about who Carrie Burris actually is. So 43 00:02:34,480 --> 00:02:39,359 Speaker 1: Max Bluemoenthal is correct that Carrie Mollis won the nineteen 44 00:02:39,440 --> 00:02:42,280 Speaker 1: ninety three Nobel Prize for the invention of the PCR test, 45 00:02:42,360 --> 00:02:44,840 Speaker 1: which is now one of the basic building blocks of biology. 46 00:02:44,880 --> 00:02:48,000 Speaker 1: Like they let undergrads and college do this stuff, but 47 00:02:48,080 --> 00:02:52,600 Speaker 1: he is also an enormous crank. Berkeley's alumni magazine wrote 48 00:02:52,639 --> 00:02:54,680 Speaker 1: a profile of him when he died in twenty nineteen. 49 00:02:54,840 --> 00:02:59,440 Speaker 1: They described him like this quote. He'd become a vociferous 50 00:02:59,440 --> 00:03:03,440 Speaker 1: critic of widely accepted scientific theories, ridiculing the notion that 51 00:03:03,560 --> 00:03:08,239 Speaker 1: CFCs caused the ozone hole, that humans caused climate change, 52 00:03:08,480 --> 00:03:13,920 Speaker 1: and that HIV caused aids now Okay, climate change denihilism, 53 00:03:13,919 --> 00:03:17,440 Speaker 1: I think is something we all understand. The ozone layer 54 00:03:17,520 --> 00:03:19,880 Speaker 1: stuff is extremely funny. This interviews from the nineties. So 55 00:03:19,880 --> 00:03:21,840 Speaker 1: in the nineties we were using these things called CFC's, 56 00:03:21,880 --> 00:03:24,000 Speaker 1: which is a class of chemical that we used in 57 00:03:24,080 --> 00:03:28,880 Speaker 1: like hairspray and refrigerators and using them tore a hole 58 00:03:28,960 --> 00:03:32,040 Speaker 1: in the ozone layer. So the world, for maybe the 59 00:03:32,120 --> 00:03:35,960 Speaker 1: last time, actually performed a collective action, stopped using them, 60 00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:40,920 Speaker 1: and the hole fixed itself. So okay, obviously, carry mollis 61 00:03:41,120 --> 00:03:45,480 Speaker 1: unbelievably and very quickly proven unbelievably wrong. But the last part, 62 00:03:45,600 --> 00:03:49,320 Speaker 1: the part where carry Mullus claims that HIV does not 63 00:03:49,480 --> 00:03:52,360 Speaker 1: cause AIDS, we need to talk about a bit more 64 00:03:52,640 --> 00:03:56,480 Speaker 1: because it is absolutely monstrous and it is going to 65 00:03:56,520 --> 00:03:59,040 Speaker 1: give mollos a body cout. Even Kissinger would not in 66 00:03:59,080 --> 00:04:02,320 Speaker 1: respect to. So okay, we need to talk about what 67 00:04:02,600 --> 00:04:06,480 Speaker 1: HIV AIDS actually is. So I'm just gonna go to 68 00:04:06,480 --> 00:04:10,640 Speaker 1: the CDC for this one. HIV human and aminio deficiency 69 00:04:10,720 --> 00:04:13,320 Speaker 1: virus is a virus that attacks the body's immune system. 70 00:04:13,760 --> 00:04:16,200 Speaker 1: If HIV is not treated, it can lead to AIDS 71 00:04:16,279 --> 00:04:21,000 Speaker 1: acquired amino deficiency syndrome. There is no effective cure. Once 72 00:04:21,040 --> 00:04:24,080 Speaker 1: people get HIV, they have it for life, but with 73 00:04:24,160 --> 00:04:28,200 Speaker 1: proper medical care, HIV can be controlled. People with HIV 74 00:04:28,320 --> 00:04:31,599 Speaker 1: who get effective HIV treatment can live long, healthy lives 75 00:04:31,640 --> 00:04:35,800 Speaker 1: and protective partners. And this is something that queer people 76 00:04:35,880 --> 00:04:39,600 Speaker 1: fought and died for. If you have HIV. There are 77 00:04:39,640 --> 00:04:41,560 Speaker 1: simple and easy tests for it. Now you can get 78 00:04:41,600 --> 00:04:44,800 Speaker 1: treatment and you can live a normal life. On the 79 00:04:44,800 --> 00:04:48,479 Speaker 1: other hand, if HIV isn't treated, you can get acquired 80 00:04:48,520 --> 00:04:52,359 Speaker 1: ammino deficiency syndrome AIDS, and that can and will kill you. 81 00:04:53,200 --> 00:04:57,520 Speaker 1: It is what killed so so many, almost an entire 82 00:04:57,640 --> 00:05:01,520 Speaker 1: generation of queer people killed the for decades and decades 83 00:05:01,560 --> 00:05:05,320 Speaker 1: and decades, and it's still killing them now. Carrie Mullis, 84 00:05:05,440 --> 00:05:07,719 Speaker 1: the guy who Max bluemitthal is tweeting a video of 85 00:05:07,800 --> 00:05:11,679 Speaker 1: to go after Anthony Fauci doesn't think that HIV causes AIDS. 86 00:05:12,000 --> 00:05:14,839 Speaker 1: He thinks that AIDS is caused by malnutrition in poverty, 87 00:05:15,279 --> 00:05:17,280 Speaker 1: and he is going to spend the rest of his 88 00:05:17,360 --> 00:05:21,400 Speaker 1: life telling anyone in everyone he can, getting mainstream press coverage, 89 00:05:21,640 --> 00:05:25,160 Speaker 1: telling people that HIV doesn't cause AIDS. He is the 90 00:05:25,200 --> 00:05:29,040 Speaker 1: Andrew Wakefield of HIV AIDS denihilism. Lots of people believe him, 91 00:05:29,080 --> 00:05:32,560 Speaker 1: including for example, the Foo fighters Dave Gruel. They believe 92 00:05:32,600 --> 00:05:35,120 Speaker 1: him because he is apparently a reputable source. The man 93 00:05:35,240 --> 00:05:39,000 Speaker 1: has a Nobel prize. But unfortunately, as we've already seen 94 00:05:39,000 --> 00:05:42,279 Speaker 1: from his climate denial and his CFC denial, he is 95 00:05:42,279 --> 00:05:47,000 Speaker 1: spreading unbelievably dangerous lies, and this specific lie that HIV 96 00:05:47,120 --> 00:05:51,000 Speaker 1: doesn't cause AIDS fucking kills people. Here's from that Berkeley 97 00:05:51,080 --> 00:05:53,600 Speaker 1: article again. I don't like the way they're phrasing it. 98 00:05:53,600 --> 00:05:57,480 Speaker 1: It's the you know, it's Berkeley, right like, so some 99 00:05:57,480 --> 00:06:01,719 Speaker 1: stuff going to some stuff's going to be racists. His 100 00:06:01,880 --> 00:06:04,840 Speaker 1: views on AIDS don't just look bad, they may have 101 00:06:04,839 --> 00:06:08,240 Speaker 1: had deadly consequences. By the late nineteen nineties, South Africa 102 00:06:08,360 --> 00:06:12,359 Speaker 1: was in the midst of a catastrophic AIDS epidemic. President 103 00:06:12,360 --> 00:06:16,280 Speaker 1: Thumbo mcbecky, under the spell of AIDS de nihilist including Mullis, 104 00:06:16,400 --> 00:06:19,840 Speaker 1: declared that AIDS was caused by poverty, not HIV. Many 105 00:06:19,880 --> 00:06:23,159 Speaker 1: South Africans were denied access to treatment. A two thousand 106 00:06:23,160 --> 00:06:25,599 Speaker 1: and eight study published in the Journal of Acquired Immuno 107 00:06:25,640 --> 00:06:30,000 Speaker 1: Deficiency Syndromes estimated that as a result, thirty five thousand 108 00:06:30,000 --> 00:06:33,120 Speaker 1: babies were born with HIV and three hundred and thirty 109 00:06:33,240 --> 00:06:39,159 Speaker 1: thousand South Africans died of AIDS unnecessarily. This is monstrous. 110 00:06:40,160 --> 00:06:43,920 Speaker 1: And here is Max Blumenthal, who was up until very 111 00:06:43,920 --> 00:06:47,880 Speaker 1: recently at the very least nominally a left wing journalist, 112 00:06:48,480 --> 00:06:51,640 Speaker 1: tweeting a video of this fucking guy to attack Anthony 113 00:06:51,640 --> 00:06:53,839 Speaker 1: Fauci on behalf of a bunch of right wing anti 114 00:06:53,880 --> 00:06:58,080 Speaker 1: lockdown rules. Now, I especially want to do this because 115 00:06:58,120 --> 00:07:01,800 Speaker 1: if you want to attack Anthony Fauci, it is very 116 00:07:01,920 --> 00:07:03,920 Speaker 1: very easy to do from the left. You can attack 117 00:07:04,000 --> 00:07:08,200 Speaker 1: him for his response to the original HIV AIDS pandemic, 118 00:07:08,640 --> 00:07:11,880 Speaker 1: and you know, lots of queer people have done this. Instead, 119 00:07:12,000 --> 00:07:15,240 Speaker 1: Max Bluemandal is tweeting a guy is tweeting a video 120 00:07:15,480 --> 00:07:20,320 Speaker 1: from an unbelievable right wing crank who were responsible for 121 00:07:20,360 --> 00:07:23,720 Speaker 1: the death of three hundred and thirty thousand people. So 122 00:07:23,760 --> 00:07:25,560 Speaker 1: the question we're going to be answering for the next 123 00:07:25,560 --> 00:07:29,960 Speaker 1: three episodes is how did we get here and what 124 00:07:30,080 --> 00:07:34,400 Speaker 1: is happening now? And to do this, we need to 125 00:07:34,440 --> 00:07:38,000 Speaker 1: talk about the rise of American Marxist Leninism. I'm going 126 00:07:38,040 --> 00:07:40,800 Speaker 1: to try to present the ideology as sympathetically as possible, 127 00:07:40,840 --> 00:07:43,920 Speaker 1: because it's important to understand how people came to believe 128 00:07:43,920 --> 00:07:48,560 Speaker 1: in these things, because part of the horror and tragedy 129 00:07:48,600 --> 00:07:51,000 Speaker 1: here is that not all of these people are the 130 00:07:51,040 --> 00:07:54,080 Speaker 1: grifters and shills and right wing fanatics that the ideology 131 00:07:54,160 --> 00:07:56,960 Speaker 1: spawned and who were now having to deal with people 132 00:07:56,960 --> 00:08:01,000 Speaker 1: who are on info Wars agreeing with Alex Jones. Most 133 00:08:01,040 --> 00:08:03,360 Speaker 1: of them were people like us, people who saw the 134 00:08:03,400 --> 00:08:05,520 Speaker 1: horrors of this world and wanted to make it better. 135 00:08:07,680 --> 00:08:11,360 Speaker 1: A lot of the writing about this is clinical and antiseptic, 136 00:08:12,160 --> 00:08:16,120 Speaker 1: largely coming from either academic journals or very very angry liberals. 137 00:08:16,640 --> 00:08:21,440 Speaker 1: And I can't be clinical about this. I can't cover 138 00:08:21,520 --> 00:08:24,400 Speaker 1: this neutraally. And I can't do that because some of 139 00:08:24,400 --> 00:08:26,920 Speaker 1: these people were my friends. There were people I loved 140 00:08:26,960 --> 00:08:29,120 Speaker 1: and respected and cared about, and they're people who have 141 00:08:29,200 --> 00:08:31,840 Speaker 1: now lost, and so I owe it to them to 142 00:08:31,880 --> 00:08:47,480 Speaker 1: be fair about this. So what is the modern generation 143 00:08:47,600 --> 00:08:50,599 Speaker 1: of Marxist Leninism. You could start with the history of 144 00:08:50,640 --> 00:08:54,360 Speaker 1: the Bolsheviks and Stalin's consolidation of power and the development 145 00:08:54,400 --> 00:08:56,800 Speaker 1: of Marxist Leninism as an ideology, and you could trace 146 00:08:56,800 --> 00:08:59,440 Speaker 1: it through the twentieth century, and you could trace, you know, 147 00:08:59,480 --> 00:09:02,120 Speaker 1: the ways which it is and isn't the ideology that 148 00:09:02,240 --> 00:09:06,400 Speaker 1: Lenin had originally been developing. But that really is the 149 00:09:06,400 --> 00:09:09,360 Speaker 1: wrong place to start here if you want to understand 150 00:09:09,440 --> 00:09:12,120 Speaker 1: how this ideology came to be and why so many 151 00:09:12,160 --> 00:09:15,000 Speaker 1: people came to follow it. The right place to start 152 00:09:15,559 --> 00:09:18,920 Speaker 1: is America. It's with a generation of young people who 153 00:09:18,960 --> 00:09:20,480 Speaker 1: grew up in the wake of the two thousand and 154 00:09:20,480 --> 00:09:23,280 Speaker 1: eight financial collapse and the ruthless suppression of occupy by 155 00:09:23,280 --> 00:09:26,840 Speaker 1: the Obama administration. It's a generation of people who grew 156 00:09:26,880 --> 00:09:29,440 Speaker 1: up on the Internet who began to learn about the 157 00:09:29,480 --> 00:09:32,080 Speaker 1: lies we've been fed our entire lives about the world 158 00:09:32,160 --> 00:09:35,800 Speaker 1: and America's role in it. They learned the lies we'd 159 00:09:35,840 --> 00:09:39,600 Speaker 1: been told about the war in Iraq, about Afghanistan, about Vietnam, 160 00:09:39,679 --> 00:09:43,880 Speaker 1: about Allende and Pinochet, about Cuba, about the Sandinistas, about 161 00:09:43,880 --> 00:09:47,600 Speaker 1: American imperialism in Lebanon and Haiti and Guatemala and Honduras 162 00:09:47,640 --> 00:09:51,359 Speaker 1: and Iran, about Patrice Lamumba and the DRC, About Sukarno 163 00:09:51,480 --> 00:09:55,720 Speaker 1: and Suharto in the Killing Fields, about Thomas Sankara, about Saikuavara, 164 00:09:55,800 --> 00:09:58,319 Speaker 1: about the Black Panthers, about a thousand wars and a 165 00:09:58,400 --> 00:10:01,559 Speaker 1: thousand crimes of the American m Empire crime as we 166 00:10:01,600 --> 00:10:06,000 Speaker 1: could spend an entire episode just listing by name. They 167 00:10:06,080 --> 00:10:09,040 Speaker 1: learned in a tremendously short amount of time that the 168 00:10:09,080 --> 00:10:12,679 Speaker 1: American Empire was born of genocide, It was built by slavery, 169 00:10:12,840 --> 00:10:15,600 Speaker 1: and he is sustained by replicating those genocides across the 170 00:10:15,640 --> 00:10:18,760 Speaker 1: world and at home. That the governments they were taught 171 00:10:18,760 --> 00:10:21,520 Speaker 1: from birth to love and respect, slaughtered children in the 172 00:10:21,559 --> 00:10:24,280 Speaker 1: streets with health fire and missiles, and then had the 173 00:10:24,360 --> 00:10:27,400 Speaker 1: unmitigated gall to turn around and proclaim itself the leaders 174 00:10:27,440 --> 00:10:29,760 Speaker 1: of the free world and the upholder of the rules 175 00:10:29,760 --> 00:10:34,880 Speaker 1: based international order. And so they started learning about how 176 00:10:34,880 --> 00:10:38,880 Speaker 1: our capitalist economy really functions. They started reading Marx and 177 00:10:38,880 --> 00:10:41,360 Speaker 1: then they started reading Angles, and it led to other 178 00:10:41,440 --> 00:10:44,880 Speaker 1: Marxists into the great international enemies of American imperialism from 179 00:10:44,880 --> 00:10:49,320 Speaker 1: the last century ho Chi Minh Castro to Lenin, to 180 00:10:49,400 --> 00:10:52,880 Speaker 1: struggles against colonialism in Algeria, and to intellectuals like Phenonen 181 00:10:53,000 --> 00:10:56,720 Speaker 1: and militants like Asada Shakur. It led them to believe, 182 00:10:56,920 --> 00:11:01,080 Speaker 1: to really believe in the struggle against capital and racism 183 00:11:01,120 --> 00:11:05,559 Speaker 1: and imperialism, and that led them to Stalin and Mao, 184 00:11:05,960 --> 00:11:08,959 Speaker 1: and eventually it would lead them down a darker path, 185 00:11:09,760 --> 00:11:14,000 Speaker 1: a path where anything and everything could be justified if 186 00:11:14,040 --> 00:11:17,800 Speaker 1: it meant defeating the American Empire, a path that told 187 00:11:17,840 --> 00:11:19,760 Speaker 1: them it was their duty to back every state in 188 00:11:19,800 --> 00:11:22,240 Speaker 1: the world who could even conceivably check the advance of 189 00:11:22,280 --> 00:11:27,920 Speaker 1: American power. It led them to modern geopolitics, to the 190 00:11:27,920 --> 00:11:31,120 Speaker 1: belief that modern China and Vietnam or socialist states still 191 00:11:31,200 --> 00:11:35,520 Speaker 1: resisting American imperialism. It would lead them eventually to backing 192 00:11:35,559 --> 00:11:38,800 Speaker 1: the very Russian oligarchs that had destroyed their beloved USSR. 193 00:11:39,559 --> 00:11:41,160 Speaker 1: And it would lead some of them into the very 194 00:11:41,160 --> 00:11:44,280 Speaker 1: heart of darkness itself, to an alliance with anyone and 195 00:11:44,320 --> 00:11:47,839 Speaker 1: everyone who opposed liberal interventionism. It would lead in the 196 00:11:47,880 --> 00:11:51,120 Speaker 1: seeking alliance with the arch right wing anti communist Donald Trump. 197 00:11:51,840 --> 00:11:54,920 Speaker 1: But it didn't start that way. The co option of 198 00:11:54,960 --> 00:11:57,600 Speaker 1: the ideology is a process that took almost a decade 199 00:11:58,080 --> 00:12:00,760 Speaker 1: and comprised a series of debates in side the left 200 00:12:00,800 --> 00:12:05,040 Speaker 1: about what capitalism, socialism, and imperialism really are and how 201 00:12:05,080 --> 00:12:08,440 Speaker 1: the left should relate to nationalism in the state. We'll 202 00:12:08,440 --> 00:12:10,559 Speaker 1: talk more about how these debates led to a right 203 00:12:10,559 --> 00:12:15,160 Speaker 1: wing turn at episode three. But the core beliefs anti imperialism, 204 00:12:15,440 --> 00:12:19,320 Speaker 1: objection to capitalism, a rejection of liberal interventionism, and some 205 00:12:19,360 --> 00:12:22,520 Speaker 1: of the darker and more conspiratorial tendencies, like accusing any 206 00:12:22,559 --> 00:12:26,080 Speaker 1: protest movement against the government they supported of being CIA assets, 207 00:12:26,679 --> 00:12:30,960 Speaker 1: spread like wildfire. There were contradictions from the beginning, of course, 208 00:12:31,840 --> 00:12:34,200 Speaker 1: how do you square your opposition to capitalism with your 209 00:12:34,240 --> 00:12:37,520 Speaker 1: support for China, a country with almost one thousand billionaires. 210 00:12:38,360 --> 00:12:43,080 Speaker 1: The solution was to lie. Lies about China, in particular 211 00:12:43,160 --> 00:12:46,600 Speaker 1: abound it. Many Marxist Leninists believe, for reasons that are 212 00:12:46,600 --> 00:12:49,880 Speaker 1: deeply unclear to me, that China has public housing that 213 00:12:50,040 --> 00:12:53,280 Speaker 1: automatically guarantees every citizen a home. This is not true. 214 00:12:53,480 --> 00:12:56,880 Speaker 1: This unclear to me if it's ever been true, even 215 00:12:56,920 --> 00:12:58,920 Speaker 1: through this so I mean, I guess you could argue 216 00:12:59,240 --> 00:13:01,080 Speaker 1: it was sort of true during the socialist period. It 217 00:13:01,080 --> 00:13:03,360 Speaker 1: has not been true for a very very long time. 218 00:13:03,920 --> 00:13:06,800 Speaker 1: China has a lot of homeless people. But you know, 219 00:13:06,960 --> 00:13:09,280 Speaker 1: these sort of lies persist because they are what you 220 00:13:09,480 --> 00:13:13,600 Speaker 1: need to believe in order to believe that China is 221 00:13:13,640 --> 00:13:16,960 Speaker 1: a socialist state and not a capitalist one. Another common 222 00:13:17,000 --> 00:13:20,040 Speaker 1: line is that China has a fully socialized healthcare system. 223 00:13:20,720 --> 00:13:25,480 Speaker 1: This is unbelievably not true. China, in fact, used to 224 00:13:25,520 --> 00:13:28,679 Speaker 1: have something like a universal medical system that they operated 225 00:13:28,840 --> 00:13:32,600 Speaker 1: in extreme difficulty with groups of people called the barefoot 226 00:13:32,640 --> 00:13:34,920 Speaker 1: doctors who would go to rural villages that had never 227 00:13:34,960 --> 00:13:37,800 Speaker 1: really received proper medical care before and attempt to treat them. 228 00:13:38,679 --> 00:13:40,800 Speaker 1: This was the thing that China used to have, and 229 00:13:40,880 --> 00:13:43,480 Speaker 1: then they tore it up and privatized it, and now 230 00:13:43,679 --> 00:13:47,920 Speaker 1: Chinese private healthcare is absolute disaster. Calculations by the Chinese 231 00:13:48,000 --> 00:13:52,280 Speaker 1: Journal Twang estimate that almost the entire Chinese economy is 232 00:13:52,320 --> 00:13:56,880 Speaker 1: based on corporations not paying their required contributions to healthcare plans, 233 00:13:56,880 --> 00:14:00,080 Speaker 1: and that if corporations actually paid into the healthcare plans 234 00:14:00,080 --> 00:14:03,640 Speaker 1: of migro workers, the entire economies of entire provinces would 235 00:14:03,640 --> 00:14:07,200 Speaker 1: immediately go under as an enormous majority of their corporations 236 00:14:07,240 --> 00:14:11,360 Speaker 1: immediately went underwater. And so what we're getting a sort 237 00:14:11,400 --> 00:14:17,400 Speaker 1: of picture of is people begin to believe things that 238 00:14:17,760 --> 00:14:20,000 Speaker 1: need to be true in order for their ant to 239 00:14:20,320 --> 00:14:23,600 Speaker 1: square their anti imperialism or their version of anti imperialism, 240 00:14:23,600 --> 00:14:27,360 Speaker 1: which is opposing at all costs the United States with 241 00:14:27,440 --> 00:14:31,600 Speaker 1: their anti capitalism when the two began to conflict in 242 00:14:31,680 --> 00:14:34,760 Speaker 1: terms of, you know, attempting to support a very obviously 243 00:14:34,800 --> 00:14:40,320 Speaker 1: capitalist economy, and this leads to some very very bizarre 244 00:14:40,400 --> 00:14:44,600 Speaker 1: twists in turns. One very common thing is for socialists 245 00:14:44,600 --> 00:14:47,280 Speaker 1: and socialist organizations in the US, or at least I 246 00:14:47,280 --> 00:14:50,480 Speaker 1: say socialists, I made Marxist Leninists organizations to advocate for 247 00:14:50,520 --> 00:14:53,040 Speaker 1: a fifteen or twenty dollars midiroom wage in China, while 248 00:14:53,080 --> 00:14:56,640 Speaker 1: simultaneously celebrating three two cents an hour as the end 249 00:14:56,680 --> 00:15:00,320 Speaker 1: of poverty in China. This has never actually peneted raided 250 00:15:00,320 --> 00:15:03,040 Speaker 1: the minds of the new Marxist Leninists with their endless 251 00:15:03,080 --> 00:15:06,040 Speaker 1: parades of flags and new countries added every day, from 252 00:15:06,040 --> 00:15:10,240 Speaker 1: the genocidal austerity bongers in Ethiopia to the hardline, murderous 253 00:15:10,240 --> 00:15:13,880 Speaker 1: anti communists to rule Meenmore by baton and bullet, new 254 00:15:13,920 --> 00:15:18,280 Speaker 1: Marxist Leninists were able to effectively insulate themselves from reality. 255 00:15:18,440 --> 00:15:21,040 Speaker 1: This left them as prey for a new generation of 256 00:15:21,120 --> 00:15:24,360 Speaker 1: right wing grifters would cynically exploit them for wealth and status. 257 00:15:24,960 --> 00:15:28,120 Speaker 1: They also garnered the hatred of the more internationalist factions 258 00:15:28,120 --> 00:15:31,400 Speaker 1: of the left, and then, as their numbers expanded, the 259 00:15:31,480 --> 00:15:35,320 Speaker 1: increasing ire of liberals, who, stealing a term from anarchists, 260 00:15:35,360 --> 00:15:39,000 Speaker 1: began to call the Marxist Leninist tankies. This, I suspect, 261 00:15:39,120 --> 00:15:42,000 Speaker 1: if you have heard of these people, is probably the 262 00:15:42,080 --> 00:15:45,720 Speaker 1: word you've heard used to describe them. So we should 263 00:15:45,760 --> 00:15:51,680 Speaker 1: talk about what this word actually means. But first, unfortunately some. 264 00:15:51,760 --> 00:16:05,080 Speaker 2: Ads, and we're back. 265 00:16:05,440 --> 00:16:08,440 Speaker 1: To explain what a tanky is, we have to go 266 00:16:08,560 --> 00:16:14,680 Speaker 1: back to, bizarrely, the nineteen fifty six Hungarian Revolution. So 267 00:16:15,800 --> 00:16:18,960 Speaker 1: all right, in nineteen fifty six there was a massive 268 00:16:19,080 --> 00:16:23,920 Speaker 1: uprising in Hungary. The Hungarians effectively forced their government to 269 00:16:23,920 --> 00:16:26,720 Speaker 1: break with the Soviets. The Soviets respond to this by 270 00:16:27,440 --> 00:16:30,040 Speaker 1: rolling a bunch of tanks across the border, claiming everyone 271 00:16:30,080 --> 00:16:32,960 Speaker 1: in the revolution is the fascism, killing them all, and 272 00:16:33,160 --> 00:16:36,520 Speaker 1: they were fairly successfully able to convince a large number 273 00:16:36,520 --> 00:16:40,880 Speaker 1: of Communists that the Hungarian revolutions really were fascists. They 274 00:16:40,920 --> 00:16:43,320 Speaker 1: were aided in this by the fact that the liberals 275 00:16:43,360 --> 00:16:46,360 Speaker 1: also lied about what the Hungarian Revolution really was, and 276 00:16:46,400 --> 00:16:48,120 Speaker 1: this is a lie that they continue to spread to 277 00:16:48,280 --> 00:16:51,920 Speaker 1: this day. The liberal version of the revolution is that 278 00:16:51,920 --> 00:16:54,640 Speaker 1: it was, you know, it was a liberal revolution by 279 00:16:54,640 --> 00:16:58,720 Speaker 1: people who wanted liberal democracy against the Soviets, hotel Terrrianism, etc. 280 00:16:58,920 --> 00:16:59,440 Speaker 3: Etc. Etc. 281 00:17:00,640 --> 00:17:04,280 Speaker 1: And that's also not true. The reality of that uprising 282 00:17:04,359 --> 00:17:07,480 Speaker 1: and what most of it was was a rebellion by 283 00:17:07,560 --> 00:17:12,119 Speaker 1: the Hungarian workers' councils. So workers across their factories seized 284 00:17:12,119 --> 00:17:15,640 Speaker 1: control of their factories, threw their bosses out and began 285 00:17:15,720 --> 00:17:19,439 Speaker 1: to manage and democratically the different workers' councils like foreign 286 00:17:19,440 --> 00:17:24,560 Speaker 1: regional federations. It is very stunningly, very very similar to 287 00:17:24,640 --> 00:17:27,400 Speaker 1: the original Soviets of the nineteen seventeen Russian Revolution, which 288 00:17:27,520 --> 00:17:31,600 Speaker 1: in theory the USSR is supposed to be named after. 289 00:17:32,280 --> 00:17:36,679 Speaker 1: But when they reappeared again, the Soviets just absolutely smashed 290 00:17:36,720 --> 00:17:40,280 Speaker 1: them because they weren't advocating for a Soviet aligned one 291 00:17:40,320 --> 00:17:45,280 Speaker 1: party state. And what this actually meant was tanks rolling 292 00:17:45,359 --> 00:17:48,160 Speaker 1: up to the gates of factories blasting apart the very workers' 293 00:17:48,160 --> 00:17:51,080 Speaker 1: councils who are supposed to be the basis of communism. 294 00:17:51,760 --> 00:17:54,639 Speaker 1: This was an attempt, in some sense, yes, to implement democracy, 295 00:17:54,680 --> 00:17:57,040 Speaker 1: but it was an attempt to implement democracy in the factory, 296 00:17:57,280 --> 00:17:59,600 Speaker 1: and it was attempted by the working class to seize 297 00:17:59,600 --> 00:18:03,520 Speaker 1: control the means of production and manage them themselves. Now, 298 00:18:03,640 --> 00:18:06,600 Speaker 1: the smashing of the Hungarian Revolution led to a split 299 00:18:06,680 --> 00:18:09,320 Speaker 1: in enormous numbers of communist parties all across the world. 300 00:18:09,720 --> 00:18:13,840 Speaker 1: The people leave communist parties and droves. This is a 301 00:18:13,840 --> 00:18:17,120 Speaker 1: big enough deal that it spawns effectively like a crisis 302 00:18:17,119 --> 00:18:19,840 Speaker 1: in China, where there is a series of bast strikes 303 00:18:19,840 --> 00:18:23,720 Speaker 1: and people chanting like here another Hungary, and in particular, 304 00:18:23,760 --> 00:18:26,760 Speaker 1: the British Communist Party had a guy on the ground 305 00:18:26,840 --> 00:18:30,160 Speaker 1: in Hungary reporting of what was happening, and his reports 306 00:18:30,200 --> 00:18:33,240 Speaker 1: split the party between the people who supported the Hungarians 307 00:18:33,280 --> 00:18:36,480 Speaker 1: and the people who supported the Soviets. The latter faction became 308 00:18:36,520 --> 00:18:39,080 Speaker 1: known as tankies for their support of rolling tanks across 309 00:18:39,119 --> 00:18:42,920 Speaker 1: the border and slaughtering in the working class. The term 310 00:18:43,000 --> 00:18:45,399 Speaker 1: was revived in the twenty tens to describe the return 311 00:18:45,440 --> 00:18:47,840 Speaker 1: of Marcist Leninists, so though much of its usage was 312 00:18:47,880 --> 00:18:52,000 Speaker 1: about Russia and Syria rather than the original Hungarian uprising. 313 00:18:52,240 --> 00:18:55,480 Speaker 1: Now it is true that all of these people do 314 00:18:55,720 --> 00:18:59,280 Speaker 1: actually support or they do actually believe that the Soviets 315 00:18:59,280 --> 00:19:04,159 Speaker 1: were crushing like the return of fascism, but that that 316 00:19:04,280 --> 00:19:07,840 Speaker 1: actual belief, like the belief in you know, that the 317 00:19:07,880 --> 00:19:11,760 Speaker 1: Soviets were right to crush the Hungarian Revolution, is effectively 318 00:19:11,800 --> 00:19:14,400 Speaker 1: irrelevant now except as a sort of marker of loyalty, 319 00:19:14,560 --> 00:19:18,360 Speaker 1: because you know, the USSR is gone and the Hungarian 320 00:19:18,400 --> 00:19:22,679 Speaker 1: Revolution is gone too, and so what's left is a 321 00:19:23,359 --> 00:19:28,520 Speaker 1: term that on the one hand does correctly, you know, 322 00:19:28,880 --> 00:19:32,120 Speaker 1: it does correctly describe a part of their political tradition, 323 00:19:33,560 --> 00:19:36,840 Speaker 1: but it has it has a tendency to sort of 324 00:19:37,160 --> 00:19:40,080 Speaker 1: anchor these arguments in the past instead of the presence 325 00:19:40,119 --> 00:19:45,359 Speaker 1: with the substance of disagreements with the Marxist Leninists actually 326 00:19:45,400 --> 00:19:48,360 Speaker 1: are now marxistlenin Iss. They're also just yeah, they're called 327 00:19:48,480 --> 00:19:52,960 Speaker 1: mls to Marxist Leninists absolutely hate being called tankies except 328 00:19:53,040 --> 00:19:57,040 Speaker 1: under you know, the circumstances where they adopted ironically, and 329 00:19:57,200 --> 00:19:59,640 Speaker 1: I'm of two minds. I have called these people's tankies 330 00:19:59,680 --> 00:20:02,840 Speaker 1: a lot. But the biggest problem with calling these people 331 00:20:02,880 --> 00:20:06,120 Speaker 1: tankies is that the original tankies, the people who supported 332 00:20:06,160 --> 00:20:10,000 Speaker 1: the Soviets butchering the Hungarian working class, were actually communists. 333 00:20:10,520 --> 00:20:13,479 Speaker 1: They were Marxistlninists who supported the USSR and believed that 334 00:20:13,520 --> 00:20:16,000 Speaker 1: state ownership of the means of production was the socialist 335 00:20:16,040 --> 00:20:20,320 Speaker 1: transition to communism. These modern quote unquote Marxist Leninists don't 336 00:20:20,320 --> 00:20:23,760 Speaker 1: even believe that both Stalin and kruis Chef, for all 337 00:20:23,800 --> 00:20:26,480 Speaker 1: the differences, would have had these people shop for supporting 338 00:20:26,480 --> 00:20:29,480 Speaker 1: capitalists in their imperialist market economies. If you tried to 339 00:20:29,560 --> 00:20:32,680 Speaker 1: explain to Mao that Deng Jao Ping, with his people's 340 00:20:32,680 --> 00:20:35,760 Speaker 1: billionaires and a trillion dollars of American treasury bond singing 341 00:20:35,800 --> 00:20:39,000 Speaker 1: it sitting in his coffers, was doing communism, he would 342 00:20:39,000 --> 00:20:40,879 Speaker 1: have branded you a capitalist, wrote and sent you to 343 00:20:40,960 --> 00:20:43,399 Speaker 1: your re education camp at the end of the day. 344 00:20:43,720 --> 00:20:48,040 Speaker 1: Whatever else. The original tankies, the British supporters of the USSR, 345 00:20:48,440 --> 00:20:52,320 Speaker 1: were communists. Their modern day equivalents don't even have that 346 00:20:52,400 --> 00:20:55,600 Speaker 1: to height behind. They have been reduced to capitalists with 347 00:20:55,600 --> 00:20:59,200 Speaker 1: a hammer and sickle fetish. So who are these people really? 348 00:21:00,040 --> 00:21:04,120 Speaker 1: What they've become is suicide net socialists because the suicide 349 00:21:04,160 --> 00:21:07,520 Speaker 1: nets are the actual content of their politics. This is 350 00:21:07,560 --> 00:21:10,560 Speaker 1: the actual content of backing states like the People's Republic 351 00:21:10,600 --> 00:21:13,480 Speaker 1: of China. It is full throated support for the suicide 352 00:21:13,560 --> 00:21:15,880 Speaker 1: nets to fly under the roofs of the Fox confactories 353 00:21:15,880 --> 00:21:19,600 Speaker 1: at Shenzhen. The reality of their suicide net socialism is 354 00:21:19,600 --> 00:21:21,879 Speaker 1: that the Chinese working class would rather kill themselves than 355 00:21:21,920 --> 00:21:25,760 Speaker 1: live under it. And it was these suicide net socialists 356 00:21:25,760 --> 00:21:30,400 Speaker 1: who sins spawned their bastard children, patriotic socialism and eventually 357 00:21:30,600 --> 00:21:36,640 Speaker 1: Maga communism. So how do we understand what these people are? 358 00:21:37,760 --> 00:21:41,359 Speaker 1: I am going to give the final word to Karl Marx, 359 00:21:41,440 --> 00:21:46,440 Speaker 1: the man whose ideology in theory spawned theirs. I'm going 360 00:21:46,480 --> 00:21:49,280 Speaker 1: to read from one of Marx's most famous works, the 361 00:21:49,320 --> 00:21:51,240 Speaker 1: eighteenth through Mayor. I'm pretty sure I've quoted it on 362 00:21:51,280 --> 00:21:55,680 Speaker 1: the show before. The tradition of all dead generations weighs 363 00:21:55,720 --> 00:21:58,520 Speaker 1: like a nightmare on the minds of the living, And 364 00:21:58,720 --> 00:22:01,919 Speaker 1: just as they seem to be occupy with revolutionizing themselves 365 00:22:01,920 --> 00:22:05,840 Speaker 1: and things, creating something that did not exist before, precisely 366 00:22:05,840 --> 00:22:09,800 Speaker 1: in such epochs of revolutionary crisis, they anxiously conjure up 367 00:22:09,840 --> 00:22:13,000 Speaker 1: the spirits of the past to their service, borrowing from 368 00:22:13,080 --> 00:22:16,800 Speaker 1: them names, battle slogans, and costumes in order to present 369 00:22:16,920 --> 00:22:20,000 Speaker 1: this new scene in world history and time honored disguise 370 00:22:20,080 --> 00:22:25,439 Speaker 1: and borrowed language. Thus Luther Martin Luther put on the 371 00:22:25,440 --> 00:22:28,960 Speaker 1: mask of the Apostle Paul. The French Revolution of seventeen 372 00:22:29,000 --> 00:22:32,320 Speaker 1: eighty nine to nineteen fourteen draped itself alternatingly in the 373 00:22:32,359 --> 00:22:35,080 Speaker 1: guise of the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire, and 374 00:22:35,119 --> 00:22:37,840 Speaker 1: the Revolution of nineteen forty eight knew nothing better to 375 00:22:37,920 --> 00:22:41,600 Speaker 1: do than to parody. Now seventeen eighty nine, Now the 376 00:22:41,640 --> 00:22:46,920 Speaker 1: revolutionary tradition of seventeen ninety three seventeen ninety five. This 377 00:22:47,240 --> 00:22:49,840 Speaker 1: is precisely the trap that Marxist Leninis have walked into. 378 00:22:50,760 --> 00:22:54,040 Speaker 1: Faced with mass social upheaval. They knew nothing better than 379 00:22:54,080 --> 00:22:57,280 Speaker 1: the down the mask of Stalin and Mao, and it 380 00:22:57,359 --> 00:23:02,159 Speaker 1: was a terrible mistake. Here is mark again. The social 381 00:23:02,200 --> 00:23:05,200 Speaker 1: revolution of the nineteenth century cannot take us poetry from 382 00:23:05,240 --> 00:23:08,560 Speaker 1: the past, but only from the future. It cannot begin 383 00:23:08,640 --> 00:23:11,680 Speaker 1: with itself before it has stripped away all superstition about 384 00:23:11,720 --> 00:23:16,119 Speaker 1: the past. The former revolutionaries required recollections of past world 385 00:23:16,160 --> 00:23:19,680 Speaker 1: history in order to smother their own content. The revolution 386 00:23:19,800 --> 00:23:22,600 Speaker 1: of the nineteenth century must let the dead bury their 387 00:23:22,640 --> 00:23:26,320 Speaker 1: dead in order to arrive at its own content. There 388 00:23:26,800 --> 00:23:30,120 Speaker 1: the phrase went beyond the content. Here the content goes 389 00:23:30,160 --> 00:23:35,840 Speaker 1: beyond the phrase. But we never buried our dead. The 390 00:23:35,880 --> 00:23:39,159 Speaker 1: memories of dead generations still weigh like a nightmare in 391 00:23:39,200 --> 00:23:42,720 Speaker 1: the minds of the living. And in the next episode 392 00:23:42,800 --> 00:23:46,640 Speaker 1: we will walk face first into that nightmare and behold 393 00:23:46,640 --> 00:23:47,440 Speaker 1: the abyss within. 394 00:23:52,400 --> 00:23:54,880 Speaker 3: It could happen here as a production of cool Zone Media. 395 00:23:54,960 --> 00:23:57,640 Speaker 3: For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website 396 00:23:57,680 --> 00:24:00,800 Speaker 3: coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio, app, 397 00:24:00,840 --> 00:24:04,159 Speaker 3: Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts, you can 398 00:24:04,200 --> 00:24:06,920 Speaker 3: find sources for It could happen here, Updated monthly at 399 00:24:06,920 --> 00:24:10,119 Speaker 3: coolzonemedia dot com, slash sources. Thanks for listening.