>>As I said, there are few apologetics for power that are more extreme
>>than this.
>>
>>
>
>So, you're saying that if Chris doesn't think someone is insane, he must
>therefore be defending them. I don't see where this is implied. He's arguing
>that 'insanity' is not a helpful analysis, if an analysis at all.
>
Actually, he's saying that we cannot apply the terms "insane" or
"lunatic" to Joseph Stalin. And in this context, and accompanied by
Chris's insistence that Stalin's actions were perfectly "rational,"
there's little else it can be but a defense of Stalin.
Chris expends his energies niggling over whether the terms "insane" and "lunatic" should be applied to Stalin, merely because he's not foaming at the mouth, or confined to a padded room, or unable to put on his own clothes. Such concerns would make sense only if we had Stalin here, right now, and we were debating whether we should put him under psychiatric restraint. But that's not the case. We're evaluating his actions in an historical context, and we are evaluating his actions by our moral standards. Yet Chris insists on imposing the limited, clinical standard on Stalin (and, as I've pointed out, Stalin alone).
In that context, using terms like "lunatic" and "insane" and even "evil" are perfectly acceptable. After all, most human beings don't act upon the impulse to murder a single human being, let alone millions. We usually regard such callousness to human suffering as a sign of severe pathology. And don't we regard our fellow Americans' disregard of global suffering as a symptom of our cultural isolation, or the damage done to our country by propaganda? Yet, Chris argues that, because Stalin could function well enough to rise to his rank in society, he therefore cannot be called "insane" or "lunatic."
By the same logic, Jeffrey Dahmer could not be called "insane" because he managed to murder several people before being caught, or that Charles Manson isn't a "lunatic' because he was able to attract followers and exert control over their lives for a period of time.
Given Chris's objection to the use of the term "evil," I'd like to state that he could not exert _any_ moral judgement over the acts of others. If someone could provide a simple, utilitarian rationale for some heinous act-- say, gassing the Kurds because they threatened one's regime, or throwing ethnic groups into mass graves because they were just too prominent in society, or destroying villages in order to save them from Communist influence, or whatever-- Chris must defend these acts against the charge of "evil" solely because they could be recast as "rational" actions.
These are elements of an elementary moral compass. One has to be able to call an evil act "evil," or to call a policy or leader "insane" or "lunatic." Otherwise, one enters into a kind of deranged pedantry, where the worst acts and greatest sufferings must meet exacting standards of definition before one can even think of condemning them. I think it's ridiculous to comment even further.