Acton Institute Powerblog Archives

Post Tagged 'communism'

November 21, 2024

A Gentleman in Moscow Is More than Mere Entertainment

When Vladimir Lenin seized control of Russia in 1917, his Bolshevik government ended centuries of autocratic rule, replacing it with an all-consuming tyranny of its own. Within half a century, over 18 million Russians would pass through forced-labor camps and more than 25 million would be dead. Continue Reading...
August 15, 2024

No, Socialism Is Not Neighborliness

Незнакомые смотрят волками, И один из них, может быть, я. —Борис Гребенщиков Strangers glare like wolves, And I might be one of them. —Boris Grebenshikov The Democrat vice presidential nominee Tim Walz entered the national scene with a passive-aggressive endorsement of government-run economic activity. Continue Reading...
January 19, 2024

Vladimir Lenin: Bloodthirsty Superstar

Whenever I read a story involving one of the profusion of holy relics preserved and exhibited over the centuries, whether it be the Shroud of Turin or the finger bone of the fifth-century patroness Saint Genevieve, to this day displayed in a small glass cylinder in the Chapel of St. Continue Reading...
October 17, 2023

How Did George Orwell Know?

The collocation in the title captures the thoroughgoing exploration of the topic in a phrase: George Orwell and Russia. Masha Karp is not the first to ponder George Orwell’s relationship to Stalinist Russia—and the relationship of both Stalinist and post-communist Russia to Orwell—but she is the first to frame a comprehensive, well-researched study around them. Continue Reading...
August 23, 2023

The Firemen’s Ball: When Comedy Made Ideology Cringe

Miloš Forman was an incredibly famous director in the 1980s, when his Amadeus (1984) won eight Oscars out of 11 nominations, and Ragtime (1981) also received eight nominations, period pieces about music’s potential for social transformation, overcoming prejudices or conventions, and making a new world. Continue Reading...
May 17, 2023

Tetris and the Birth of an Obsession

It may be hard to picture now, when American children spend seemingly every waking hour absorbed in Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube, but once upon a time the country’s youth contented themselves with activities that did not involve gazing into tiny screens—you know, riding bikes, throwing around a football, jumping rope. Continue Reading...
January 18, 2023

Fidel Castro’s Failed Paradise

Six decades after its celebrated communist revolution, Cuba remains a totem for America’s left. Yet the country is imploding into irrelevance. Fidel Castro is dead and Raul Castro is retired, but their successors rule as if 1989 had never occurred. Continue Reading...
September 15, 2022

The Manchurian Candidate Is a Neglected Masterpiece

In 1959, when Richard Condon published his political thriller The Manchurian Candidate, he took a topical idea and ran amok with it. The idea was that during the Korean War a platoon of GIs had been captured by the Chinese, brainwashed (“not just washed, but dry-cleaned”), and released back home to do the enemy’s bidding. Continue Reading...
September 08, 2022

Remember the Cold War’s Witness

It was 70 years ago, 1952, that Whittaker Chambers published his memoir, Witness. It was a bestseller with a major impact, including on a future president who, more than any other figure, defeated the country that Chambers once served, winning the Cold War. Continue Reading...