f
Page 2/The Battalion/Tuesday, February 9, 1988
Opinion
Understanding what communism really means
The key chal
lenge facing the
United States to
day is how to re
spond to the So
viet Union under
Mikhail Gorba
chev’s leadership.
This week, MSC
SCONA’s confer
ence “The USSR:
The Kremlin in
Transition” af
fords students the
Brian
Frederick
opportunity to be
come better informed on developments
such as glasnost that could affect our re
lations with the Soviet Union.
Our perception of communism in the
Soviet Union significantly affects our
policy toward it. Seeing the Soviet
Union as the “evil empire” generates
policies very different from those pro
duced by the view that communism is a
benign system, and the Soviets are will
ing to peacefully coexist with us. The
key problem, then, in formulating cor
rect policy is determining communism’s
real nature. That established, we can
evaluate Gorbachev in the proper con
text.
Perhaps the best way of accurately ap
praising that nature is by examining
communism’s history and the writings
of its founders.
Communism in the Soviet Union is
generally built on the works of Marx
and Engels and specifically upon Le
nin’s adaption of their theories to Rus
sian realitity. The writings of these men
and others such as Nikolai Bukharin,
the chief party theorist at the time of the
Revolution, establish the ideological
foundations of the present Soviet State.
According to Marx and Engels, all
history is “the history of class struggle.”
Whether that of serf against lord or of
worker against capitalist, the struggle
between oppressed classes and their op
pressors is history’s unifying theme.
The State “is merely the organized
power of one class for oppressing ano
ther.” Feudal lords used the feudal state
to oppress their serfs, while capitalists
use their liberal bourgeois states to sup
port their exploitation of the workers.
Communism seeks to liberate the
world’s workers from their oppression.
At the heart of this liberation is the abo
lition of private property. “The proleta
rians have nothing to lose but their
chains,” declares the Communist Man
ifesto. “They have a world to win. Wor
kingmen of all countries unite!”
The workers are to be freed by a
world-wide revolutionary movement
that forcibly overthrows the bourgeois
state. According to Engels, “A revolu
tion is an act in which one part of the
population imposes its will upon the
other part by means of rifles, bayonets,
and artillery.” Once the bourgeois state
is overthrown, a “dictatorship of the
proletariat” is established to ruthlessly
suppress all bourgeois remnants in so
ciety. Once all other classes are de
stroyed and a classless society attained,
class conflict ends and the state “withers
Mail Call
An ignorant editorial board
EDITOR:
In reference to The Battalion editorial board’s recent editorial against the
U.S. Surgeon General’s plan to test the students of an American university to
determine the prevalence of AIDS in that population, I must say that I am
disturbed if not surprised by the board’s ignorant stance.
Of course, a group consisting of several undergraduates would know
enough about epidemical surveys to say that another group consisting of
hundreds of physicians, epidemiologists, biostatisticians and public health
professionals does not know what it is doing.
The board’s objections to the use of this survery are based on ingornance,
not on reason. In the first place, the survery is designed to provide informa
tion on the population of American university students by use of anonymous
sampling. Second, the survery is not meant to measure the portion of the
population that “knows or suspects they are infected” (i.e. high risk catego
ries); the survey is meant to sample the general population of the school. It
should be obvious that peolep who “know or suspect they are infected” 1 —
probably been counted in another survey.
has
The board’s final absurdity, asking what useful information could come
from testing one university is the worst of all. Do the board mean in all its wis
dom that it has never heard of standardizing data? Well, standardization is
performed on every piece of epidemiological data that is published. Without
standardization, there is no way you can compare data on two different pop
ulations. With standardization you can compare the prevalence of a disease at
“a Midwestern private college” with the prevalence of the same disease at the
University of California at Los Angeles.
Possibly these reasons are why the U.S. Public Health Service spends their
time listening to epidemiologists instead of ill-informed editorial boards. It
might help students to do the same.
Ray Hatcher ’84
Shocked at culture shock
EDITOR:
Recently, I experiened a shock. I was reading “Poverty: A culture shock”
in you At Ease magazine. The article was about Jill Calarneau’s trip to Har
lingen. She states that she was hurt because never before had she encoun
tered such an example of poverty in its purist form. Granted that the Rio
Grande Valley is generally one the poorest SMSAs, but if she had wanted to
see poverty, she need not have visited the Valley. She could had seen stark
examples at home in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. Also, so as not to give
readers the wrong impression, the Valley is not a giant ghetto; it has pockets
of affluence, as well as a thriving tourist industry.
She continually referred to the inhabitants of the Valley as Mexicans.
They are no more Mexican than I am English. Even worse than this, she em
ployed some terrible stereotypes. “Mexican girls love to have babies — re
gardless of whether they are married or financially able.” I simply could not
believe this gross characterization. Teenage pregnancy is a problem that tran
scends racial barriers. Furthermore, the “unbathed children playing in the
weeds” must have been extremely dirty for you to notice while passing in a
car. Some journalistic license perhaps?
These are but a few of the most absurd statements in her article. Jill, I
suggest you follow your initial reaction and join the Peace Corps. It would be
educational. Perhaps in time, you will not only see, but also understand and
be able to separate myth from reality.
Thomas D. Ovenden
graduate student
Letters to the editor should not exceed 300 words in length. The editorial staff reserves the right to edit letters
for style and length, but will make every effort to maintain the author’s intent. Each letter must be signed and
must include the classification, address and telephone number of the writer.
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The Battalion Editorial Board
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Daniel A. LaBry, Managing Editor
Mark Nair, Opinion Page Editor
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Robbyn L. Lister and
Becky Weisenfels,
News Editors
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Sam B. Myers, Photo Editor
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away.
Lenin, Bukharin and the other Bol
sheviks built the Soviet State on these
basic tenets. Perhaps their biggest chal
lenge was building socialism in back
ward Russia without the spontaneous
world revolution in advanced nations
that Marx had predicted. Since social
ism did not triumph simultaneously in
all countries, there would be a period of
struggle with the remaining capitalist
countries before those nations even
tually succumbed to communism.
This struggle will continue until the
last capitalist nation falls and the world’s
workers are united in a “world-wide so
cialist republic.” Lenin writes, “Only af
ter we overthrow, completely defeat and
expropriate all the bourgeoisie in the
entire world, and not only in one coun
try, will wars become impossible.” Peace
for communists is the ultimate destruc
tion of capitalism, and a state of war
with capitalist nations will exist until the
last one is destroyed.
Lenin and Bukharin point out that
communism’s ultimate ends remain
constant. However, the means em
ployed to attain those ends vary as chan
ging circumstances require, and any
means that attain desired ends are good.
“Whatever helps in the struggle is good,
whatever hinders, is bad,” Bukharin
writes. Even short-term agreements
with capitalist states are permissible if
they advance the long-range goals of
communism.
Terror is one of communism’s nec
essary tools. Lenin declares, “We have
never rejected terror on principle, nor
can we do so.” History shows that Lenin
and his successors employed terror to
good effect and still do.
It is an often-made mistake to blame
communism’s brutality on Stalin alone
who far surpassed Hitler as a killer. In
1918-19 under Lenin’s aegis, the Cheka
(a KGB forerunner) executed a thou
sand persons a month. The system of la
bor camps in which millions suffered
and died was established under Lenin
and did not end with Stalin’s death.
tenvooc
The
According to Russian writer
der Solzhenitsyn, who spent years
viet labor camps, the only differentf|
tween Stalin and later Soviet
that Stalin arrested 100 people k|
the arrest of two persons would
sufficed to frighten the people.Le;
since have returned to the policyolBThe
resting only the two persons nt gents is
to keep the people in fear. Buctio
Today Gorbachev relies upon J cess 1
same basic methods that otherS
leaders have used. Labor camps j ii|Hir|(
prisons are still used to deal with'(■j r p 0rt
mies of the state.” Psychiatric hospi tht fin;
in which people’s brains are destra Bets, M
by drugs may have replaced masssb
ings, but the principle of terror,not
fined, remains the same.
To accurately evaluate Gorl
and his “new” policies, we must cons* “Acti
communism’s history and publ termina
aims, which speak eloquently ofiliBlly t><
ture. If we are to formulateeffttB^’ }
Gen.
cel lor f<:
Jructioi
expansii
lirport
3Wth l
ic surr
Russian major and a columnist{o!%ft, y t i ie
Battalion. Bojects
prove nn
Peel
luded
i/34, v
arth-te
aes, w!
ic non
ron, w
policies towards the Soviet Union I
must address Soviet realities. Toil
or discount these realities fon
reason can only be detrimental toil
nation.
Brian Frederick is a senior histoni
ftHEfolj
op the |
UNlTtt
SPffls ;■
nn
After
lenate p
nat prot
alendar
lays grai
Dr. Pe
lenate’s
pe, said
Florida has something for everyone
ORLANDO,
Fla. — Florida is
one of my favorite
states. It’s gener
ally warm here,
the golf courses
are flat, and I like
suns rising over
oceans. You can
see a lot of that in
Florida.
Florida’s fun.
My family started
Lewis
Grizzard
bringing me here when I was 7. I played
in the sand, rode the waves and ate cot
ton candy.
A young man can fall in love quickly
in Florida. It happened to me on a num
ber of occasions, from the dazzling
white beaches on the Gulf to the packed
streets of Ft. Lauderdale in springtime.
I met Sandra in Panama City. She
would be nearly 40 by now. I met Alli
son and danced with her on the pier in
Daytona when I was 16. She promised
to write me. She never did. Probably lost
my address.
I am forever and ever a Georgian,
amen, but I wish we could be a little
more like Florida at times.
You can get down a bet legally in
Florida. You can go watch the dogs run
or even make a wager in a jai alai fron
ton, whatever that is. But I like the
horses best.
Sometimes, I bet the favorite. Some
times, I bet the long shots. I even bet be
cause I like a horse’s name. I’ll never
forget the time “Harmonella” came in a
winner at 15-1 and I had him across the
board.
We celebrated at Joe’s in Miami. The
stone crab claws were even better than I
had remembered them.
Florida’s got something new going
now — its own lottery. The first day it
opened a couple of weeks ago, Floridi
ans bought $13.5 million worth of tick
ets.
It’s fun. Tickets cost a buck. You buy
them at 7-Eleven stores.
You scratch across the ticket with a
coin revealing a plate of numbers.
Three matches, you’re the winner of ei
ther $2, $5, $50, or up to $5,000.
You can also win free ticket into the
bigger lottery drawing that will pay a
million.
“I think of all the guys we used to put
away for running numbers,” a Flort
attorney was saying. “Now, we j
A friend and I bought 20 tickeisfj
gether.
“We split whatever we get,”hes
“Twenty-five hundred eachisn’tal)
days work,” I said.
We won $6, another ticket and and
try into the big game. That’s betteril
I do in Vegas.
The state of Florida is going top
the money from the lottery towardstj
ucation.
We could have a lot of what
has in Georgia. We have beaches,!^
and you ought to see the wonted
Buckhead.
We also could have dogs and I
running and we could have a stated
tery and we could upgrade our owitf*
ucational system, and I don’t thinkJt*
would be all that upset as long ad
money went to good use.
Of course, none of this will hap/
Florida’s got Mickey Mouse out at®
ney World.
We’ve got him in the governor’^
lice.
Copyright 1987, Cowles Syndicate
□
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BLOOM COUNTY
by Berke Breathe
OVeRHeRE, MISTER
CAUCUS 0056 /
COULP YOU GIVE OUR
CMPtOATC SOME GUlPEUNeS
AS TO WHAT SORT OF
PEHAVtOR IS FOUTICAC
SV/ClPe FOR A PU&UC
F/6(/Re ?
/
APULTFKY... UKF HART'S.
PfAO/ARISM... LIKE BIPEW'S.
RACIAL INSULTS...LIKE
JimY WE GREEK'S.
MIXING IN RELIGION...LIKE
ROBERTSON. CRYING...
LIKE PAT SCHROEPER.
\
HOW 'BOUT CAlLlHb
NEW YORK "HYMItWM‘
ANP COZYtNG UP A
TO LOUIS OH A
FARR A KHAN ?
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