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Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
Worldwide there are tons of regimes that are authoritarian but definitely not communist. Take Saudi Arabia, Iran, Syria, Pakistan, for example.
Worldwide there are tons of regimes that are authoritarian but definitely not communist. Take Saudi Arabia, Iran, Syria, Pakistan, for example.
In this case, Ned is not unreasonable. Though the math is complicated I suppose. On a continent where most countries still have an unreformed Communist Part, and where the reformed ex-communists are often quite influential, and here as recently as 17 years ago the eastern half of the continent was contolled by Communists regimes that varied from authoritarian to totalitarian, it sound rather odd to hear authoritarianism associated only with the far right.
On the other hand far right parties like Le Pen and Vlaams Bok get far more votes than the unreformed Communists. On the other hand, are they more comparable to the unreformed Communists, or to the reformed ex-Communists, as I suspect they (the rightists) would assert? Since neither the far rightists, nor the ex-Communists, have been in power on their own, nor are they likely to be, in the foreseeable future, its really not possible to say, empirically, whether the ex-communists are as close to old Communism, as the far rightists are to fascism. One can only go by claims and rhetoric, and there are major issues of trust in that regard, I suspect.
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