Frank De Varona Quotes

Mandela was the head of the African National Congress a revolutionary party fighting against the then dictatorial apartheid government. As the head of the ANC armed wing, after years of peaceful protests and suffering literal massacres of people for nothing other than protesting, Mandela embarked upon a program of sabotage of military and government facilities reserving guerrilla warfare if that failed. Mandela was arrested for the sabotage and served 27 years in jail. While Mandela was incarcerated, the government resorted to death squads and massacres and the ANC retaliated with counter terrorism—but Mandela was not a part of it. There were a number of communists in the ANC movement, but when Mandela, released from jail, became the President of the integrated country, he maintained supported a capitalistic system which it has been ever since. However his refusal to purge the ANC of communists when he needed all the help he could get, has been held against him by some arch conservatives. To many of them, a communist is a communist, a friend of a communist is a communist, a person who knowingly works with or associates with communists is a communist, a revolutionary is a communist, a person who advocates whatever communists advocate is a communist, a person who opposes the investigation of communists in any field of endeavor is a communist. Mandella opposed racial discrimination and the Communist party also did to embarrass the US and other capitalistic countries which then had legal discrimination. Therefore, Mandella was accused of being a communist early in his career. The same thing happened in the United States where anyone who advocated Civil Rights and racial equality was a communist because he/she was echoing the communist line.

McCarthy accused thousands of people of being communists and disloyal. He claimed to have lists of communists in universities, the Army and other agencies of government, but never produced such lists. In addition to being a overbearing demagogue, he suffered (and died from) from a serious case of alcoholism. McCarthy’s false and irresponsible attacks eventually caused the Senate to censure him. That and his drinking destroyed his career. Not a single person “exposed” by McCarthy was ever convicted of anything. Many had their careers destroyed however. A number of universities fired Professors because at an earlier phase of their careers, they had been a member of an organization that was communist or affiliated with communists, and then left. These firings led to intensive efforts to strengthen the rules of tenure and academic freedom so that the McCarthy abuses could never be repeated. McCarthy could not be sued for his defamatory lies as he always made his accusations from the floor of the Senate where there is absolute protection even for malicious and irresponsible statements.

This is a classic example of one of the many politicians of the 20th and 21st century who would call anyone a communist who opposed anything that he regarded as American. In actuality, there were some very conservative economists and shareholders who did not think that the funding of celebrations had little or no value for shareholders. Many on the left were concerned that the celebration was in great part paid for by all Americans because of the tax deduction that was allowed. However none were communists.

First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt had more influence and visibility than any other first lady, before or since. She was First Lady for 3+ terms—longer than any other, and in addition to her official duties, she wrote a very popular daily newspaper column. As FDR was handicapped and could not travel much, she traveled all over the nation and the world. She was also very outspoken and no one ever knew whether or not she was speaking with the President’s concurrence or was on her own. She tended to be very liberal—especially in terms of the evils of racial segregation—then legal, and the problems of workers. Her broad influence was very damaging to Southern Segregationist groups and arch Conservative economic groups, who realized that her influence in the change of public opinion was much more effective at changing America than were the socialists and communists who were calling for revolution and were so unappealing that they could easily be attacked. Mrs. Roosevelt was for them more dangerous than Communism.

Even the President was not spared during the McCarthy era. The red scare was so pervasive, that a lunatic fringe ultra right wing organization could call the President a “communist dupe” and be taken seriously be much of the media who were themselves intimidated and might be accused of being communists at any moment. It was a very low point in America’s history.

Ever since the end of WWII, many Republicans have called their Democratic Opponents Marxists and Communists even for a conservative Democrat like Kennedy. Even Ronald Reagan stooped to this tactic before he ran for the Presidency.

Throughout the history of American Slavery, the Southern apologists for slavery have accused abolitionists and anyone opposed to slavery of being Communists, Atheists, or any other group that was generally unpopular in the day. This is one of the early instances where that heinous practice was started. However it continued and became especially virulent, in the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s where anyone who opposed segregation was accused by Southern Segregationists of being Communists and Atheists as well as other unpleasant epithets. Most religious Americans opposed slavery in the 1850s but there are some in the South, like this Preacher, who seemed totally ignorant of the strong pro abolitionist views of the many religious leader abolitionists in the North and a few in the South.

This quotation illustrates the extreme paranoia and irrationality of many of the ultra-conservative, right wing extremists of the day. It also has three of the classic ultra right wing conspiracy scenarios that are still claimed by the most extreme rightists: American leaders are giving U. S. Sovereignty to the United Nations; Many American leaders are anti-Christian and appoint more; civil rights is a communist idea and civil right demonstrations (riots) are inspired and/or controlled by communists.

For years the Nationalist Military under Chiang Kai-shek and other Generals like Ma Hongkui had murdered suspected communist politicians, and in the Civil War with the communists rarely took any prisoners. The Communists in turn, “tried” and executed landlords and other major capitalists who had previously in their view treated the peasants badly and were responsible for much starvation. Neither side had any scruples about ignoring human rights and committing war crimes.

He had asked a family friend not to bring books by Hemmingway into his home. The friend asked why and received this answer. Koch and his brother were the largest political contributors in the United States, so they had enormous influence on Republicans (they only made political contributions to conservative organizations).

The text was actually written by John Kenneth Galbraith who was writing speeches for Stevenson.