Thomas Sowell: Useful Idiots

Jewish World Review ^ | May 20, 2003 | Thomas Sowell

[SJackson]

The term "useful idiots" has been attributed to Lenin, as a description of those mindless people in the Western democracies who would always find ways to excuse whatever the Soviet Union did. Columnist Mona Charen's new book "Useful Idiots," shows that such people are still with us.

Long after the Soviet Union's horrors had become too widely known around the world for their sympathizers in the West to be able to get away with whitewashing the USSR, new Communist dictatorships arose to become the new objects of the affections of the Western intelligentsia and of like-minded people in the media and in politics.

As Mona Charen's book makes painfully clear, this usually happened in a pattern that was repeated again and again, with the same useful idiots saying the same kinds of things again and again. She spells this out and names names, quoting Peter Jennings, Jesse Jackson, Anthony Lewis, Ted Kennedy, Ted Turner and a long list of others.

The founding of the Castro dictatorship in Cuba set the pattern that was followed later in Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Grenada. By initially concealing the fact that he was a Communist, and having some non-Communists around him as window dressing, Fidel Castro was able to play the role of a popular liberator, out to end oppression, hold free elections, and do all sorts of good things for "the people."

Purchasing this book -- linked in 1st paragraph -- helps fund JWR

The useful idiots in the United States and other Western democracies ate it up. Many still do, to this very moment.

Once in power, Castro tolerated no opposition, held no free elections, and established a police state that made the previous dictators look like amateurs. Those who spoke out against what was happening were jailed or executed. So were those who tried to flee the country.

Now that the mask of liberator was no longer necessary, Castro revealed that he was -- and always had been -- a Communist, despite useful idiots who claimed that it was American hostility which drove him into the arms of the Soviet Union.

Not only was Castro part of the Soviet bloc from day one, he made Cuba the first Soviet military base in the Western Hemisphere and supplied Cuban troops to go help other Communists to gain and hold power in Africa.

How did the useful idiots see all this? In addition to saying that it was all the fault of the United States, because of American hostility to Castro, they said that the Cuban people had a right to live under whatever form of government they wanted, whether or not Americans liked or disliked that kind of government. Eleanor Clift of Newsweek even said that she was not going to criticize the Cubans' "lifestyle."

It never seemed to occur to these apologists that the Cuban people were not allowed to choose anything. They did what they were told, if they wanted to live. The fact that tens of thousands of them tried to flee the island at the risk of their lives, whether from drowning at sea or being shot by the Castro regime, never made a dent in the rosy vision of the Cuban dictatorship held by many in the media, in politics and among the intelligentsia.

With minor variations, this same pattern reappeared with the later emergence of other Castro-like movements and regimes in Nicaragua, El Salvador and Grenada. Mona Charen's book spells it all out with quotes from the useful idiots themselves.

Some of their gushing praises of brutal dictators simply have to be seen to be believed. Nor was this infatuation with Stalinist oppression limited to the Western Hemisphere. Some gushed over the mass murdering Mao regime in China and even the consummate bizarre evil in North Korea.

Continued......

[SJackson]

Continued.......

The collapse of the Soviet bloc has now made it clear that these useful idiots were not pro-Communist. They were and still are anti-American. They have contempt for the values of the American people and the principles on which this country was founded and built.

They are ready to give a sympathetic hearing to our enemies around the world, whether those enemies are Communists or Islamic fundamentalists or whatever. Mona Charen's "Useful Idiots" spells it all out, citing chapter and verse.

[Fudd]

Not only do we have useful idiots running around, we have useful infidels, too.

[x1stcav]

I still remember the white wash job in 1958 in the major media that these were 'agrarian reformers'. It is to me, today, unbelievable that the majority of Americans bought this line. There were a few voices (the Birchers?) trying to get the real message out, but they were drowned out and ridiculed into irrelevance by the Com-symps in the Guvmint and the press.

[liberallarry]

The collapse of the Soviet bloc has now made it clear that these useful idiots were not pro-Communist. They were and still are anti-American

For me, this is the most important paragraph in the article. It best accords with my personal experience.

"Useful idiots" see only the flaws in American society and will uncritically rush to the side of anyone claiming to do better. Not too different from those who buy "miracle cures" from telemarketing hucksters.

[hnorris]

Charen's book is awesome. While she stops with the war in Afghanistan, by that time the clear linkage of the anti-American left to America's latest enemy is clearly established, along with the complicity and duplicity of politicians and media players.

She also exposes the strategies and tactical patterns the anti-American left uses, to the point where it became very obvious while watching the debate and start of the War in Iraq.

This book should be required reading. A truly groundbreaking work.

[Free the USA]

http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/bump-list

[LiteKeeper]

read later

[sine_nomine]

Years ago I read the book by the Cuban poet or writer who endured horrible treatment in Castro's prison system. Here is a link:
http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=625

I am sure that some of the useful idiots are just that, but I also think that some of them are paid foreign agents or perhaps just volunteer foreign agents.

[hnorris]

It is interesting that you bring up Cuba -

As I went to lunch today with my wife, NPR played some babbling fool talking about President Kennedy and the distrust he had of the military because they failed so badly at the Bay of Pigs.

I don't know how I kept from throwing up.

[Tailgunner Joe]

bttt

[sine_nomine]

And why are you listening to National Putrid Radio? It is an efficacious emetic but I see no other reason for tuning in.

I imagine JFK chickened out on Cuba because the Russians laid out how much information they had on him, from sleeping with Hitler's spygirl to his real healthy situation to his boffing young Catholic girls in the White House. The nude group swims at Camp David and other news would have doomed him for re-election.

[onyx]

Worth repeating, so here-tis...

The collapse of the Soviet bloc has now made it clear that these useful idiots were not pro-Communist. They were and still are anti-American.

[Only1choice____Freedom]

I hope there is another follow-up book for the time peroid after the beginning of the Afghan war. There has been enough material in the last year and a half for two books!

[hnorris]

I was listening to NPR because it was my wife's car we took to lunch. :-(

Sooner or later, you have to listen to their choice of radio station.

[sine_nomine]

A mixed marriage: NPR and Freeper.

[firebrand]

One point Charen makes in her Cambodia chapter is that although we bolstered a corrupt regime there, it was nothing compared to the horrors of the Khmer Rouge. Unfortunately, she does not go on to make a general point out of this.

The Hate-America crowd then, and the Hate-America crowd now, LOVE to point out that we supported unworthy regimes, even governments that we were later forced to overthrow (as when we supported Iraq because at that time Iran was worse). Then the one-thought idiots pick up the refrain---"We supported bin Laden," "We supported Saddam"---as if national priorities and alliances never change. To the ignorant followers of the useful idiots, this one sound bite justifies their hatred for anything America does.

Parents have to be real careful how they raise their children, especially the second child, who tends to be rebellious if not given sufficient favor.