Russians Consider Burying Lenin

NewsMax ^ | 4/7/06 | AP

[wagglebee]

A Russian history institute and its parent organization have apparently split over whether Vladimir Lenin's corpse should remain on display in Red Square - a dispute that reflects nationwide ambivalence over the Soviet founder's historic role.

Lenin's body has been on display in the mausoleum just outside the Kremlin since 1924. President Vladimir Putin said in 2001 he opposed the removal of Lenin's body because it might disturb civil peace.

Recently, high-ranking allies of Putin have floated the idea of burying Lenin, and the president said in an interview earlier this year he would support a solution that would lead to the "reconciliation and unity of the nation," not a schism.

Vladimir Lavrov, the deputy director of the Institute of Russian History, wrote in a letter to a memorial fund for victims of communist-era repression that the bodies of Lenin, dictator Josef Stalin and other Communist luminaries should be removed from Red Square, the Kommersant and Vedomosti newspapers reported Friday. In the letter, he reportedly said the bodies should be given either to their families or to the Communist Party.

Stalin and the other dignitaries are buried behind the mausoleum.

"The activity of Lenin and Stalin sent the country into a social-political and spiritual dead-end, slowed its development and isolated it from civilized humanity," Lavrov wrote, according to Vedomosti. "The government should not spend taxpayers' money on the maintenance, exhibition and restoration of the body of the leader of the Communist Party."

But Yuri Osipov, the head of the institute's parent organization, the Russian Academy of Sciences, opposed removing the corpse, saying it was unacceptable to "burn out" history, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported.

"If every generation is to settle accounts with the previous one, nothing good will come of it," Osipov was quoted as saying.

Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov called the proposal to remove the mausoleum as a "provocation against our Soviet history," the Interfax news agency reported.

Putin's predecessor, Boris Yeltsin strongly pushed for removing Lenin's body, but was stopped by vigorous opposition from the Communist Party and others.

[wagglebee]

I think they should take his body on a freak show tour, kind of like a bad King Tut exhibition.

[BenLurkin]

It would draw throngs in San Francisco.

[wagglebee]

I think it would make a great coffee table!

[TexanToTheCore]

Put wheels on him and drive him in the Soapbox Derby.

[1rudeboy]

The Dems could make him the head of the DNC.

[tet68]

It would draw throngs THONGS in San Francisco.

[LibKill]

It should be incinerated like any other trash.

Stalin's body too.

[WestVirginiaRebel]

Make him the dean of a major American university.

[Interesting Times]

Slice him, dice him, plasticize him...

[quark]

Too late. President Reagan, Lady Thatcher, and Pope John Paul The Great already took care of it.

[weegee]

Auction the exhibit on ebay.

[Zack Nguyen]

LOL. A "freak show tour." I think they should "consider" burning him at high noon, and dance around the flames like wild Indians. It would be a fitting final chapter for Soviet Communism.

[GarySpFc]

It would draw throngs in San Francisco.

It's just a matter of time until Lenin is buried. I know Putin has been wanting to do that for some time, but he also wants to keep the country unified. He keeps floating the idea, and when the opposition seems light it will happen very suddenly one night. I suspect Seattle will want to see the mausoleum and body transported and rebuilt to their city.

[brazzaville]

Good evening.
"Make him the dean of a major American university."

With tenure?

Michael Frazier

[lndrvr1972]

Don't worry the Big One in the near future will take care of SF.

[Ladysmith]

[operation clinton cleanup]

They could always give him a dignified space burial...

VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. - A clutch of tiny capsules was launched into orbit early Tuesday EST aboard a Taurus rocket, ferrying into space portions of the Earthly remains of 36 people for a flight that could span all of the next millennium.

The launch aboard the Orbital Sciences Corp. rocket is the third and largest for Houston-based Celestis Inc., which gained renown in 1997 for sending aloft part of the cremated remains of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry and counterculture legend Timothy Leary.

Tuesdays launch, piggybacked with a primary payload consisting of satellites built by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute and NASA, will jettison the 2-pound (1.2-kilogram) canister containing the capsules into low-Earth orbit.

Christopher Pancheri, a Celestis spokesman, said the canister could remain in orbit for anywhere from 100 to 1,000 years before re-entering and burning up in the atmosphere.

Each capsule contains just 0.245 ounces (7 grams) of cremated remains and bears a personalized message.

[chickenlips]

He would look great hanging over a fireplace...especially in the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library!

[DesScorp]

"In the letter, he reportedly said the bodies should be given either to their families or to the Communist Party."

They should dig all of them up, find a prison graveyard, and bury them among the worst of the murderers, which is what they are anyway.