Yesterday I was skimming a book by Maurice Meisner on the Chinese Revolution. (Oh, oh Proyect likes the same book. Oh well.) the chapters on the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward are excellent and Meisner as befits his beginnings in the New Left (was one of the founders of the Bulletin of Concerned Asia Scholars) and knowledge of marxism (see also his essay collection, "Marxism,maoism and Utopianism.") expresses considerable sympathy w/ the stated goals of the GPCR. (there was as heh, Shactmanite/Djilas/Bakunanist Mao recognized the crystallizationj od New Exploiting Bureaucratic Bourgeoisie in the highest ranks of the CCP) Meisner relates many examples of the violent repression of cadre in the Party, not for any material privileges they held post '49, but , 'cuz their parenst or Grandparents were middle or upper class. Thomas Seay's Chinese wife can relate many tales as well of the arbitrary repression of loyal cadre during the GPCR.
One of my mentors, rad left Jesuit, Blase Bonpane when I said back in '79 that Daniel Ortega was from a bourgeois background he said what Joanna said.
And to curmudgeon frank scott, from a former aide to Ron Dellums who i canvassed precincts w/ in '88 vfor jesse jackson, Ying-Lee kelly, who had been in Line of march,. I heard of Sandero Luminoso killing lesbians, trade unionists and what was called there the, "legal left."
From a chapter on the Shining Path in, "Freedom or Security, " a collection on the Patriot Act, just published, pg. 150, "Sandero killed fifty union leaders and over 40 leaders of community orgs." Sandero killed over 30,000 and the costs of the war exceede 30 billion $.
Except for Eurocommunists (and libertarian communists), Leninists abjure any strong self-criticism for the murderous repression they have exacted on their own comrades and leftists outside their ranks. One again though, y'all can read, 'the Stalinist legacy, "edited by Tariq Ali, if you want to see good examples of Trotskyist and New Left and libertarian communist crits of Bolshevism in practice, not the whitewash preferred by some comrades.
Michael Pugliese