Books of the Times | 'Mao: The Unknown Story' China's Monster, Second to None

NY Times ^ | October 21, 2005 | MICHIKO KAKUTANI

[Pharmboy]

Not only does their book demolish many of the myths Mao perpetrated about himself - myths that were believed by a host of Westerners, ranging from Simone de Beauvoir to Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon - but it also serves up a far more scathing portrait of the Chinese leader than those laid out by recent biographers like Philip Short and Jonathan Spence.

Yep...it was only those dumb Republicans that Mao fooled.

[Pharmboy]

Ping.

Blam, I included you since this is almost anthropology.

Has the NY Times always called Mao a monster?

[Killing Time]

I've read it. Some of the tales are barely believable. Those from the "red-zones" plumb the deepest depths of human depravity.

[mgist]

Truth is stranger and fiction.

[ncountylee]

Mao was also a big time pedophile.

[gridlock]

Mao's monstrous nature was unknown only to the worthies at the New York Times. But, then again, they made apologies for Stalin and Hitler as well, so I guess they were working according to form.

[Pharmboy]

Wow...who thought it could get worse? Did the Monster Mao go after little boys or little girls?

[JohnLongIsland]

You have to read the 11/3 issue of The New York Review Of Books (not posted on the net yet) where Jonathan Spence reviews this book. He still tries to justify his position.
I love reading these elitist dopes, because each one tries to out liberal the other one. An added bonus in the same issue is a review of a biography of Willie Munzenberg, the so called red millionaire. The conclusion that all these hot shot libs arrive at is that their beloved communist revolution failed because in the most part the main players had major character flaws; they don't make them like the beloved Vladimir Ilyich Lenin anymore.

[ncountylee]

Did the Monster Mao go after little boys or little girls?

Girls.

[Pharmboy]

Boy...to read the NYROB you must have to hold your nose for a loooooong time.

So I guess now commie-ism failed because of the leaders' character flaws, whereas before it failed because they just hadn't gotten it right.

[elfman2]

"...he envisioned a brain-dead, "completely arid society, devoid of civilization, deprived of representation of human feelings, inhabited by a herd with no sensibility, which would automatically obey his orders."

[JohnLongIsland]

"...he envisioned a brain-dead, "completely arid society, devoid of civilization, deprived of representation of human feelings, inhabited by a herd with no sensibility, which would automatically obey his orders."

...this is exactly the way hillary feels...
remember mao was her biggest influence in her college years.
i wonder though if hillary likes little boys or little girls?

[wildcatf4f3]

after bill, i'd say girls

[n230099]

"Has the NY Times always called Mao a monster?"

Good question. One still wonders about their complicity with their bootlicking Walter Duranty. Had "Stalin's Apologist" brought out what was really happening there how might things have been different. It does seem a shift that they would even review something that "smeared" their heros.

[robowombat]

Not all that unusual in China. Without lapsing into the near pornographic suffice to say there is a well established, if not well publicized, tradition of 'older gentlemen' umm, receiving favors from very young girls. This was supposed to be one of the supreme erotic pleasures , right up there with the bound foot. Go figure,. Every society produces its own curious sociopathic activities.

[Kurt_Hectic]

I don't need that book to tell me that Mao was one of the worst. If you count it by the lives that were lost, he was worse than Hitler and Stalin. But the same thing can be argued about the Khmer Rouge, who at least comes in at a fourth place on the shortlist. But that is history, we have to remember that we have a "Mao" still breathing in North Korea: Kim Jong Il. How many deaths he and his father Kim Il Sung is responsible for is unknown, but I'm shure it's over a million (kz-camps, starvation...). And that is happening today...

[jocon307]

"I've read it. Some of the tales are barely believable."

Wow, I'm impressed you've read this book already. Whatever its failings it's getting some amazing coverage in the MSM. I actually heard the authors interviewed on NPR the other day. Based on that I can easily believe the book is tendentious, the woman is very much that way. But it is easy to get tendentious when you go against the ignorant and entrenched liberal mindset that grants respect to slime such as Mao and Castro.

[carumba]

And then Jummah Cahtah helped them secure nukes. And to top it all off he got the Nobel (if memory serves) for his efforts. The old argument that it would be insane to start a nuclear war because of the destruction that would follow does not apply to crazy despots who want to eliminate 90% of their own countries population anyway. By their math having their own die leaves more for the survivors.

[Eagles6]

save

[kipita]

I think Mao's early success was largely due to Chiang Kai-Shek's failure, in that he didn't respond strongly to Japan's "acts" against the Chinese. From that point forward it was socialism and failure. Just compare Taiwan to China.