Mao is Dead -- Be Like Him!

[Justin Schwartz]

> > Your analogy is defective: the CCP (and the
> > Chinese people) pulled together a totally undeveloped nation that had 
>been
> > devastated by period famine for centuries, that had no functioning
> > governing, that had been not mere occupied but torn into balkanized
>factions
> > by predatory factions and greedy warlords. The Party's policies largely
> > wiped out famine.
>
>I conceded this, and perhaps this was the only way China could advance.
>Brutal but perhaps necessary, though I don't think all that cult worship of
>Mao was needed,

Absolutely, it was dispicable.

esp since he and his cronies lived better than the people
>they claimed to represent.

Though the run of the mill Party members under Maoism lived humble and 
austere lives with lots os responsibilities, and there were lots more of 
them. Btw, no one ever accused Chou En-lai of sybaritic excess, and lots of 
Long Marchers were fairly ascetiv characters.

Greed and predatory factions didn't leave China
>once Mao took over; they just took different shapes, used different
>reasoning.

No comparison with the warlordlism and civil war of 1920-37 and 1945-49. You 
really had a Hobbesean situation there.

jks

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