WHEN you think about it, Joe Biden is the Yuri Andropov of American politics and Donald Trump the Yeltsin-cum-Gorbachev delineating the end of the old regime. More generally, one cannot but notice the resemblance between the May Day Parade balcony snaps of the 1970s and the dramatis personae officiating over the decline of the United States from their ideological Zimmer frames. A synchronicity more telling than a gloomy comparison, however, has arisen in response to the death of the aforementioned Mikhail Sergeyevich, 91, this week. For the occasion, obituarists have dusted off a hallowed cliche of progressive journalism: the canonisation of a safely grey man from the past to vilify still more an all-too-reigning villain. As regards the US Presidency, this is a feature of all pop-historiography, post-Nixon. The Republican leader before the incumbent is always honourable and a “real conservative.” In the age of Trump, Bush is beloved; in the age of Bush, Reagan was the one; in the age of Reagan, Ford. The top perk for an outgoing GOP President or front-runner, in fact, is to no longer be Hitler. Something like this exaltation by deprecation is in play – right and left – apropos of Mikhail Gorbachev versus Vladimir Putin.
The problem is the Soviet Union’s last leader doesn’t deserve it. That the USSR didn’t come to a bloodier and, for the wider world, more dangerous conclusion was down to the courage and convictions of Pope John Paul II, Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher (in that order). Moreover, nobody twisted Gorbachev’s arm to become a dedicated communist in the 1950s and he was never exiled on a matter of principle during his long career as an apparatchik throughout the 1960s and 70s. That era was coterminous with persecution and murder on a less-than-Stalinist but terrifying scale. Rarely, if ever, in modern history has a man displayed more intelligence, noble bearing or savoir-faire while negotiating a time-out on behalf of an exhausted empire. For that, Gorbachev deserves his place in the chronicles. But he was no Gandhi, Mandela or Solzhenitsyn. He was the Robert E. Lee of Cold War I.
Western leftists only embraced Gorbachev in the 1980s because he gave them a way out of having to defend the indefensible. They could pretend instead that the summits in Geneva and Reykjavik proved the USA and the USSR were equally culpable and jointly needful of redemption. Sting even wrote an anthem for that muddleheaded worldview. Those on friendly terms with communists – like, for example, a certain young member of the so-called ‘Bolsheviks’ faction of the NSW Labor Party – were never going to give credit to a pontiff, a Republican and a Tory for walking into a bar and saving the world. Anthony Albanese’s letter paying tribute to Gorbachev yesterday only names Reagan (after drive-by references to glasnost and perestroika). Many conservative commentators have been no less historically deluded. Contra the great Nigel Farage, Gorbachev had no coherent “vision” for the Russian Federation. Inconveniently for purveyors of unflattering comparisons, he also had the same view of NATO-creep as Putin, took a nationalist line on the Russo-Georgian War and backed the annexation of Crimea. For that, he was banned from entering Ukraine. Gorbachev was as admirable as a communist could be but he is nobody’s hero.
Australians had a similar approach in understating the importance of Gorbachov.
He came on a speaking tour of Oz sometime in the mid-1990’s and at one conference attendees flocked to hear Rene Rivkin but deserted the hall for an early lunch when Gorby was scheduled to speak.
Those praising Gorbachov’s achievements have forgotten he was pushed into action.
“Mr. Gorbachov, tear down this wall!”
Thank you CL.
Love your work.
Well said CL.
OSC. (7.20am) was in Berlin (west) on that day. Old mate was at the Canadian military mission, which did all immediate stuff for Australians who needed stuff done, since Bonn was far far away. Example; medical examinations for Aussie Immigration etc…. Verification of documents and so on.
This role had passed to them when the Australian Military Mission to Berlin was closed….
“Australian Military Mission, Berlin, to Department of External Affairs
Cablegram AMM633, BERLIN, 18 June 1948
MOST IMMEDIATE MOST SECRET
The Soviet Commander in Chief informed today that currency reform will be introduced in Western Zones (in western Germany) on Sunday June 20th. Will not apply to Western sector Berlin. Sixty old Mark may be exchanged at parity, remainder blocked and to be released at one for ten later on. I anticipate distinct hardening of Soviet attitude”
Mr. Steel[1] informed me this afternoon that he considers
(a) Control Council meeting likely.
(b) French anxious for one.
[1] Christopher Steel, Head, Political Division, Allied Control Commission for Germany.”
Anyhow….my mate now lives in Toronto. A very big day back then which will alway stay with me. The left hated Reagan. The Tages Zeitung (Taz: the West Berlin leftist rag) reckoned that speech was the surest way to start WWIII!
BTW: That cable was sent 18th June. The blockade began June 24th. Some hardening, eh what!
When fighting Tories isn’t particularly expedient, ignoring them seems the best option. I can just imagine that stupid tool choking on his weetbix when he realised he was going to need to provide a eulogy to the guy who sealed the fate of his beloved soviet regime.
Fascinating stuff, Mantaray.
Gorby visited Eureka, Illinois, in 2009 – home of Reagan’s old High School and site of a little memorial park dedicated to that speech in Berlin.
Asked about what impact Reagan’s words had on him and the USSR’s top men, he laughed it off …
From about 1:25:
CL obviously never lived in Gorby’s time as he has as usual written guff and lies.
It was Gorby that led to the end of the cold war. He saw spending on guns and not butter unsustainable. That was what perestroika was all about. It didn’t matter how much Reagan was able to spend through large deficits until gorby came along the soviets did not budge. It only budged because of gorby
Gorbymaina incidentally was a bi-partisan policy. The GOP lapped him up as much perhaps more than the Democrats.
His greatest misconception was he could reform the soviet state. He could not. his failure led to the Oligarchs appropriating russian wealth and to Putin.
Thus russia has the leadership of china without any benefits of rising living standards.
A very poor combination.
Ever wonder why the soviets capitulated to russian mothers and got out of Afghanistan whilst Putin stays in Ukraine while the casualties are far worse?
Never mind that the Russian Afghan war went for 10 years before the Russians got out, or that they weren’t fighting for anything of value. Apparently, 190 days in we can say with absolute certainty that the Russian people will be more supportive of the Ukraine conflict and the leadership that foisted it upon them.
Apples, oranges anyone?
Non Mentis
Still sticking with the lefty “narrative”. LOL.
Paul Dibb forecast the economic collapse of the Soviet Union when Brezhnev was still in power. Gorby was the one stuck with the mess.
Hahahahahahahahaha.
NT. Chicken vs Egg discussions are always fraught.
And Gorby “came along” because why? Why was Gorby chosen as the new leader?Something to do with the impossibility of the USSR competing with Reagan’s military spending (RR had been prez for 4 years when G became General Secretary), maybe? something to do with G making it clear to the senior CPSU membership that an accommodation was better than endless animosity?
No cigar, and not even a good try NT.
Nope.
He was just the poor bastard commissioned to buy time.
Reagan and Wojtyla brought down the house of straw.
Incidentally, Homer – if you disagree with my opinions (as you are free to do) by calling me a liar again, you will be permanently banned.
This is why the focus on Putin is misleading. He reflects the overwhelming geopolitical position of the political elite; there is nothing exceptional in his position at all. Removing him would simply replace him with somebody that shares the same geopolitical position, possibly even more maximalist, and very likely, without the realist sense of what is and isn’t achievable.
They d i not. I have showed it was gorby. Incidentally there was also Dengmania around the same time.
given that some ruskies were going to the russian othodox church how a hapless Pope given to Mary idolatry caused the end of the soviet union is in your fevered trump dreams.
gorby did not submit his reformation of communion to the General committee. They selected him presumably because of his intellect, energy and he would die within a year.
As I said previously It was gorby and gorby only that he wanted less guns and more butter. There was an attempted coup because of this.
Margaret Thatcher famously shook Gorby’s hand when she met him, saying at the same time “I hate Communism”.
She could have also added (and she may have): “If I were one of your subjects, with my views, I would be in one of your gulags or psychiatric hospitals. Do you think I would deserve to belong there? You know, you could abolish them with the stroke of a pen.”
I hate communism. I hate socialism and fascism and Nazism. Hence, I also hate the b.s. about global warming and the mania about the farcical covid “vaccines”.
No-one’s perfect, of course. Maggie closed the coal mines and poured cement down them. She should have just let the market decide what to do, just as it does the price of jelly beans. The U.K. is being punished for her mistake.
So, you also hate science.
In other words, the antithesis of pretty much everything you stand for Prepo.
‘So, you also hate science.™’
As the antithesis of the Scientific Method, ‘the science™’ is most hateworthy, as are its loathsome proponents.
Non Mentis
They d i not. I have showed it was gorby. Incidentally there was also Dengmania around the same time.
No you did not, you asserted that it was Gorby, different thing.
given that some ruskies were going to the russian othodox church how a hapless Pope given to Mary idolatry caused the end of the soviet union is in your fevered trump dreams.
The end of communism in the Eastern bloc was clear from the time that Polish Secret Police were put on trial for the torture and murder of Fr. Popieluszko. Once the Secret Police of a communist country could no longer get away with murder, the writing was on the wall. That was before Gorby became General Secretary.
gorby did not submit his reformation of communion (sic) to the General committee.
Not sure that Gorby ever had the power to reform communion.
As I said previously It was gorby and gorby only that he wanted less guns and more butter.
You can assert it as often as you like, that does not make it true.
Perverse Preposterous
I hate communism. I hate socialism and fascism and Nazism. Hence, I also hate the b.s. about global warming and the mania about the farcical covid “vaccines”.
So, you also hate science.
No, he also hates faux klimate “science”, an entirely different thing, but you are too stupid to understand that subtlety.
PS, have you worked out a definition of fascism yet, or is that too complex for you?
Gorby believed in climate change, it seems, writing in 2009:
But then, all Popes have believed in it too. Still not enough to convince the Catholics who hang out here.
Perverse Preposterous
But then, all Popes have believed in it too.
Perhaps you could provide some actual evidence to support this assertion? No? Thought not.
PS, Whatever else hew was, Gorby remained a communist. Using “environmentalism” to destroy western industrial society is just the latest communist tactic.
Did gorby say to the General committee I have a dream to reform communism. Of course not.
He got to the leadership and then attempted to reform communism. That is not debatable. That is what occurred.
Actually you can read more butter and less guns on any book on gorby. sorry you can’t read.
CL a person who asserts Biden had an incestual relationship with his daughter or who thinks the the 2020 election was a result of voter fraud is mentally unbalanced.
A few sandwiches short of a picnic. you can point out to these people how wrong they are and it is very easy but they still continue to pour out these poisonous untruths.
Truer words were never spoken or written, C.L.
But then “progressives” and many commentators can barely bring themselves to splutter these conservatives names.
Non Mentis
Did gorby say to the General committee I have a dream to reform communism. Of course not.
You were present? How fascinating. After Andropov and Chernenko, the Central Committee would have accepted anyone promising to live longer than a couple of months.
Actually you can read more butter and less guns on any book on gorby. sorry you can’t read.
The idea that Reagan’s defense spending surge convinced Gorby that the Soviet Union could not compete and that the restive populations of the Eastern Bloc had to be given more butter is too complex for your tiny mind? Not surprising, really.
but they still continue to pour out these poisonous untruths.
“untruths” sounds like a euphemism for “lies”. See CL’s note at 0921.
John, in one sense it would be disappointing to see NT banned here.
His comments are a great source of unintended humour, if not hilarity.
Lee
Agree, but does he offer anything of substance, or just the usual leftist talking points?
Thanks, Prospero. I didn’t think Gorby was such a looney. But then he was repeating lines, like Greta.
We Have a Real Emergency, on climate change and the need for global action:
B.S. 1.5 degrees C warming since about 1850, and we’re supposed to head for the hills? Have you headed for the hills, Prospero? In what way?
The global environmental crisis is at the heart of practically all the problems now confronting us, including the need to create a global economic model grounded in the public good.
What??? As opposed to socialism and communism? Are you kidding? And who would trust a Commie who put people in psychiatric hospitals because they ideologically disagreed with him, and never apologised, to know what the “public good” is all about?
It is directly linked to security issues and to increasingly dangerous ethnic and international conflicts; to mass migrations and displacements of people, which are already destabilizing politics and economics; to growing poverty and social inequality; to the water crisis and energy and food shortages.
Gorby, my friend, (R.I.P.) the number one threat to security issues, and international conflicts, and displacements, etc, is COMMUNISM and SOCIALISM. No-one was fleeing to North Korea or Communist China, or Russia, you idiot! They were fleeing to the West” you know, the home of capitalism, of the free market. And you’re pointing to a 1.5 degree C since 1850 as the source of all the world’s ills? Was this a joke … were you an earlier incarnation of Greta?
Excuses and pretexts for not taking action on the environment, and assertions that there are more important problems, are simply no longer credible. If we fail on this problem, we’ll fail on all the others.
Actually, in capitalist countries, the environment is fine. Right whales have returned to the Hudson. Otters happily mix with joggers on the footpaths of downtown river banks in Canadian cities. The Great Barrier Reef is flourishing. It’s only when the idiotic state (with no accountability) steps in that problems tend to occur. (Like and bat-killing wind turbines) As in communist countries such as China, and the Soviet Union, systemically. Have you not seen the destruction of Lake Baikal, and the Aral Sea. Or the air in Chinese Communist industrial cities? And you are daring to preach to the world about global warming? P.S. Gorby, what should the average temperature of the world be? Remember that we’re emerging from a life-destroying Ice Age, and that below about 180 ppm, all plant life and hence animal life dies out. We’ve recovered to 400 ppm, thank God. The world has been used to much higher levels, and flourished.
Hugh
Ask Perverse Preposterous if he has installed a battery (in a suitable fireproof enclosure) at his house, and sold his fossil fuelled car for an EV. You know, lived by the principles he espouses for others.
Primary school drop outs simply have problems with comprehension.
The General committee did not want to change the system. Why would they. Their standard of living was fine.
It was gorby that saw favouring guns over butter was not helping anyone. Perstroika was built on the myth the Russian production possibilities curve would increase. It could not.
It couldn’t well before Reagan.
Communism and Eastern Europe only changed because of gorby.
In the end we can say it would have been better to have a Deng plan to start with and end with a gorby plan.
We still have not been gifted with the explanation of John Paul’s role in this. This is to be expected
Several days ago Governor Newsom was boasting to the NYT about his plans to ban all petrol and diesel powered vehicles from California’s roads by 2035.
A day or two later, owing to California’s energy crisis he asked Californians to “avoid using large appliances and charging electric vehicles, and turn off unnecessary lights.”
Irony alert!
Plan, plan, plan.
As Edward Banfield famously recounts in The Unheavenly City, Soviet town planners were taken on a tour of U.S. cities during a break in the Cold War. After reviewing all the places they visited, they chose Houston, Texas as their favourite plan.
Problem was: Houston was the only city they visited that was totally unzoned!!
It was Deng’s visit to capitalist Singapore (ironically run by Lee Kwan Yew, head of the Socialist Party of Singapore!) which turned his mind around. He was staggered.
I agree that JP2’s role is to be debated (I’m a traditional Catholic). But I know he detested killing or incarcerating people because they merely disagreed with you about some point of politics or economics. That, in tandem with Reagan and Thatcher contributed to the zeitgeist.
So, NT, why couldn’t Gorby, safe and well after he was out of power (say 2009), have included in a footnote to his Greta-style address, “Oh, and by the way, Communism is a load of sh*t”?
Non Mentis
Pre-school failures can’t understand the progression of dates. Communism was on the decline before Gorby came to power. After the stasis of the Brezhnev years, the Central Committee tried to stick with the old ways under first Andropov, then when he dropped ov (deliberate spelling) the perch, Chernenko.
Meantime, the authority of communist leaders was challenged in Poland by Solidarity and the trial of secret police for murdering a dissident. These non-economic issues added to the clear failure of communist economics, as already foreseen by Paul Dibb. Gorby was a last desperate throw of the dice.
JP’s role linked in with his support of Solidarity and Walensa, support which gradually underlined the “inevitability” of communism. Anyone with a successful pre-school education could see that.
Hugh says:
2 September, 2022 at 1:09 pm
So, NT, why couldn’t Gorby, safe and well after he was out of power (say 2009), have included in a footnote to his Greta-style address, “Oh, and by the way, Communism is a load of sh*t”?
Because Gorby remained an unrepentant communist to the end, and much of the environmental movement was supported by Soviet communism before the fall of the Berlin Wall, and since by the heirs to Soviet communism.
But for Non Mentis to admit this would be a rejection of his entire political philosophy.
Socialists and communists always think that it doesn’t matter what they say, as long as they say it enough times, it will become true.
It’s the reason certain logic and fact challenged individuals resort to accusations of lies and abuse when their cognitive dissonance becomes hard to deny.
Ironically, butter was a luxury item in England during ww2.
BJ and Buc, I’m inclined to agree!
I don’t think you would get any significant amount of argument from Western climate change advocates that capitalism has a much better record in environmental care than the large communist regimes, and that capitalist innovation is the way to address climate change.
But capitalism’s response needs regulatory and other guidance (in terms of tax incentives, etc). This is where the government minimalists (the libertarians, the “never touch the free market” types) go wrong and become the enemy of environmental protection. Obviously, left to its own devises, a capitalist system can be too slow to respond, and take the easy path of maximising profit until things get so bad, even the customers/shareholders revolt.
But when governments decide that things just have to be done a different way, such as with the replacement of refrigerants due to the Ozone hole, you get the self interested whines of “but this will make everything so much more expensive!”; and then, lo and behold, capitalism finds the replacements that aren’t so expensive, and it’s not an economic or lifestyle disaster at all.
You just have to push through the self interested resistance to change, and let capitalism do its thing, using an appropriate set of regulation and incentives to get to the result you need.
Perverse Preposterous
But capitalism’s response needs regulatory and other guidance (in terms of tax incentives, etc).
Oh, yes. Guidance by the “great and the good”, most of whom turn out to be rabid left wingers.
Obviously, left to its own devises, a capitalist system can be too slow to respond, and take the easy path of maximising profit until things get so bad, even the customers/shareholders revolt.
But enough about the harvesters of ruinable subsidies, they give capitalism a bad name, but are supported by those “great and good”, strangely.
But when governments decide that things just have to be done a different way, such as with the replacement of refrigerants due to the Ozone hole,
ROFLMAO, someone still believes that the Ozone hole was something other than an act of economic sabotage.
You just have to push through the self interested resistance to change, and let capitalism do its thing, using an appropriate set of regulation and incentives to get to the result you need.
Meaningless word salad.
PS, still no definition of “fascism”?
Incidentally, clearly, the re-tooling of energy production (and other activities) to low or zero carbon production is an enormously larger task than replacing CFCs was. And it wouldn’t be surprising if there are hiccups on the way (such as power reductions when a fossil fuel replacement plant can’t work – such as we see now with hydro in China.)
But the reality of enormity of the changes to the planet if average temperatures keep climbing far, far outweigh the problems that may occur on the way, which the self interested (and simply stupid) are inclined to exaggerate anyway.
Perverse Preposterous
But the reality of enormity of the changes to the planet if average temperatures keep climbing far, far outweigh the problems that may occur on the way, which the self interested (and simply stupid) are inclined to exaggerate anyway.
That is a big “if”. Apart from dodgy computer models drawn up with self-interested assumptions, what measurable evidence do you have that the minor level of human induced temperature change so far (which is not the same as total temperature change) will actually be “catastrophic”?
Hugh mentioned Singapore, the technocratic capitalist government of which is 100% into trying to address climate change, even though their tiny land footprint makes it enormously difficult.
I think it’s better to be mentally unbalanced than to be a liar. If you are a liar they put you in the gulag, if you are mentally unbalanced they put you in a psychiatric ward. The injections are horrible but it’s better than freezing to death.
deary me,
A decision to change direction from guns to butter means if matters not how much Reagan was splashing on nuclear weapons. Gorby thought it wasteful and not helping anyone. you are changing the direction of the economy.
gorvy never thought communion was shite. That was what perestroika was all about. Economic reform.
wow Poland led the way eh except it didn’t. find out why the wall fell!
Shall we wait until every last square metre of Pakistani cities and towns is underwater each monsoon season? Until current 1 in a 100 year floods in most places become 1 in a decade floods (actually, seems we may not have to wait long for that).
You goose – people are rightly drawing the conclusion from what they can see already on their TV that events that climate change makes worse are getting worse – flash floods (and droughts when they happen), as well as worse bushfires, etc. 40 degree days in England – you probably would have poo-pooed that as a thing only a few years ago.
It is no doubt a large part of why the Teals were successful – because voters can see the predictions are coming true and having dire consequences already.
But hey, let’s burn the coal and crank up the temperature (and atmospheric water content) by another couple of degrees and then we’ll decide how bad it is.
No, we’re not going to pander to the old pig-headed people who don’t admit that they backed the wrong horse.
It’s pretty rich to come here and lecture folks about the folly of minimalist government on a thread about the fall of communism. Even more so after admitting that total state control has historically led to worse outcomes.
This blog is not the Cat, and although some commenters have come across and do believe in limited government as overwhelmingly the most proven way to prosperity, the opinions about the degrees to which regulatory intervention should be implemented varied quite substantially on the Cat and I suspect here too.
The folly of both Communist Russia and Communist China show overwhelmingly, that the suppression of dissent lead to regulatory outcomes that bear no reflection of actual evidence. This is overwhelmingly a far greater risk for any society than unfettered companies unhindered by wider community concerns. (for consumers don’t just buy products based on the function and form of the product but for other esoteric reasons including the reputation of the company that supplies them)
Perpo, it would do you well to acknowledge that given the excess of over regulation is so obvious from these examples, that government that restricts itself to creating and enforcing rules for the people and by the people is far superior to one that tries to control all aspects of production.
In plainer language, a government whose role is to create and maintain a level playing field rather than delivering services, products and outcomes (or picking winners)
Gorbachev in his 2009 climate musings was merely attempting to get off one bandwagon by jumping onto another passing by.
Non Mentis
A decision to change direction from guns to butter means if matters not how much Reagan was splashing on nuclear weapons. Gorby thought it wasteful and not helping anyone. you are changing the direction of the economy.
You are projecting your personal preferences on to people of a different era. Your understanding of the ambitions of the Soviet communists might best be described as perfunctory.
wow Poland led the way eh except it didn’t. find out why the wall fell!
I suppose that it is inevitable that a pre-school failure would have only a limited understanding of the causes of change in different countries. Communism relied on the raw power of the state to survive. Once that raw power was challenged successfully, as it was in Poland, the facade collapsed. Then the purveyors of different “narratives” got into the act, to defend their preferences.