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American leftists were Pol Pot's cheerleaders
Boston Globe ^ | April 30, 1998 | Jeff Jacoby

Posted on 04/10/2008 8:01:03 AM PDT by Interesting Times

The death of Pol Pot, 23 years to the day after he and the Khmer Rouge seized control of Cambodia, occasioned long backward glances at one of the 20th century's most horrific genocides. It was noted everywhere that the communist reign of terror in Cambodia lasted nearly four years and that at least 1 million human beings -- by some estimates as many as 2 1/2 million -- were murdered in an orgy of executions, torture, and starvation.

"In the name of a radical utopia," The New York Times recalled in its long obituary, "the Khmer Rouge regime had turned most of the people into slaves.... Dictatorial village leaders and soldiers told the people whom to marry and how to live, and those who disobeyed were killed. [Those] who did not bend to the political mania were buried alive, or tossed into the air and speared on bayonets. Some were fed to crocodiles." Nearby was a photograph of human skulls -- emblem of the dreadful "killing fields" in which the communists butchered a quarter of Cambodia's people.

But nowhere in the Times story was there a reminder that the Khmer Rouge was able to seize power only after the US Congress in 1975 cut off all aid to the embattled pro-American government of Lon Nol -- and that it did so despite frantic warnings of the bloodbath that would ensue. President Ford warned of "horror and tragedy" if Cambodia was abandoned to the Khmer Rouge and pleaded with Congress to supply Lon Nol's army with the tools it needed to defend itself.

To no avail. US troops had come home two years earlier, but American antiwar activists were still intent on effecting the "liberation" of Southeast Asia. Radicals like Jane Fonda, David Dellinger, and Tom Hayden stormed the country...

(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Government
KEYWORDS: 1975; cambodia; cambodiangenocide; communism; congress; daviddellinger; deathmarch; dellinger; democrats; fonda; ford; geraldford; hayden; janefonda; journalists; khmerrouge; leftistenablers; leftists; lewis; lonnol; media; peaceniks; phnompenh; polpot; southeastasia; tomhayden
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To: RoadKingSE

(Guevara}
Thanks. I was way off. But the facts are still there - liberals are crazy!


41 posted on 04/10/2008 9:13:29 AM PDT by Bitsy
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To: AdmSmith; Berosus; Convert from ECUSA; dervish; Ernest_at_the_Beach; Fred Nerks; george76; ...

Elsewhere in the news, Mugabe has declared the election results a state secret; Obama’s cousin is engaged in an effort to overthrow the gov’t of Obama’s real native land...


42 posted on 04/10/2008 9:18:47 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/_____________________Profile updated Saturday, March 29, 2008)
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To: Interesting Times
Twenty-three years ago, American leftists cheered, justified, and denied as the communists plunged Cambodia into a nightmare of atrocity. In the end, they failed to whitewash Pol Pot's record. They will not succeed in whitewashing their own.

I have to disagree.

It would appear to me that the vast majority of americans have no idea of the leftist culpability for yet another 20th century communist genocide they cheered on. 

43 posted on 04/10/2008 9:40:51 AM PDT by zeugma (FedGov has no intention of actually doing anything to secure this nation. It's all a power grab.)
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To: Interesting Times
Pol Pot was a monster, but he didn't kill two million people with his own hands. You have to have a cadre of fanatics eager to slaughter for the cause to accomplish that...

Nope. You just need your average person for it. Look around you. More than half the people you meet on any given day would willingly participate. 

44 posted on 04/10/2008 9:50:15 AM PDT by zeugma (FedGov has no intention of actually doing anything to secure this nation. It's all a power grab.)
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To: VeniVidiVici
Americans who objected were guilty of ``cultural arrogance, an imperial assumption, that . . . our way of life'' would be better.

The truth is that it was the KR who imposed an alien way of life on the Cambodians -- one learned on the left bank in Paris by Pol Pot. In the process of imposing a Marxist "utopia" on the Cambodians, the Khmer Civilization was largely destroyed and the damage lingers today.

45 posted on 04/10/2008 9:51:45 AM PDT by JimSEA
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To: zeugma
Nope. You just need your average person for it. Look around you. More than half the people you meet on any given day would willingly participate.

I think you're off by a couple of decimal places.

46 posted on 04/10/2008 9:55:08 AM PDT by Interesting Times (Swiftboating, you say? Check out ToSetTheRecordStraight.com)
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To: Eurale
Liberals don’t need to be reminded of their past mistakes because they’re perfectly willing to do the same thing again... and again... and again. After all, they know what’s best for all of us - and the world.

The way my one (and only) conservative college professor described the typical liberal was "Okay, so my first twenty-six ideas didn't work. But you really owe it to yourself to listen to number twenty-seven..."

47 posted on 04/10/2008 10:01:07 AM PDT by A_perfect_lady
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To: Interesting Times
I think you're off by a couple of decimal places.

No sir. You are. Studies have been done on this, though not nearly enough due to the importance of the subject matter. Someone had to man the ovens, or work the killing fields, or kill millions in 'cultural revolutions'.

48 posted on 04/10/2008 10:02:13 AM PDT by zeugma (FedGov has no intention of actually doing anything to secure this nation. It's all a power grab.)
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To: Interesting Times

The mistake most leftists make is in believing that they have good intentions, and that therefore they’re going to get their rationally-willed social changes right, sooner or later, unlike stuck-in-the-mud conservatives, who clearly happily settle for yesterday’s mistaken ideas.

Why does the left believe this?

The main purpose of government-controlled public schools is to train and condition children to believe , no matter how unpleasant reality seems to be, that the authorities know best and it’s really all for your own good. Essentially, they’ve been successful.

After 12 years under government supervision, most of the youngsters believe this party line, not just the ‘left’. Why wouldn’t they? Only a relative handful of freaks, dissidents and disruptive elements act out against the system. That’s just the sad truth.

Frankly, the visible signs of teenage rebellion are useful to the system, as limited tolerance of properly-chanelled grievances can be useful to the basic party program of social “improvement”.

Get ready to be improved, or liquidated, one way or another. That’s the socialist program - finally, it’s all about who gets to kill.


49 posted on 04/10/2008 11:02:41 AM PDT by headsonpikes (Genocide is the highest sacrament of socialism.)
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To: Interesting Times
Thanks for the ping. My article "Goodfellow's Bedfellows" has some relevant info in the bibliography on the Indochina Resource Center, which played a major role in influencing media coverage of events in Cambodia. I'd particularly recommend this item for well-documented criticism of media coverage of the subject:

Ear, Sophal. "The Khmer Rouge Canon 1975-1979: The Standard Total Academic View on Cambodia". Berkeley: University of California, Berkeley, May 1995.

50 posted on 04/10/2008 11:13:08 AM PDT by Fedora
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To: Interesting Times; devolve; ntnychik; PhilDragoo; MeekOneGOP; dixiechick2000; All
The Bridge to Nowhere

Liberals will keep repeating the same mistakes over and over.


51 posted on 04/10/2008 11:20:57 AM PDT by potlatch
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To: Interesting Times
A useful companion article from the other end of the political spectrum, relating it all to Iraq in a good way, can be found here.
52 posted on 04/10/2008 12:03:05 PM PDT by Question_Assumptions
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To: Interesting Times
It is “SEARED” into my memory.... As one of the first airplanes into Cambodia after Lon Nol came into power I came to know the Cambodian people as wonderful folks. To this day I am ashamed of what my government did to aid and abet the misery and genocide that was to follow... It gives me great pleasure however to give Jane Fonda a bath at my local American Legion post after a few beers!
53 posted on 04/10/2008 12:08:18 PM PDT by RVN Airplane Driver ("To be born into freedom is an accident; to die in freedom is an obligation..)
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To: zeugma
No sir. You are. Studies have been done on this, though not nearly enough due to the importance of the subject matter. Someone had to man the ovens, or work the killing fields, or kill millions in 'cultural revolutions'.

Your statement was that more than 50% of the U.S. population is willing to commit political murders, which is a great exaggeration. Even in Nazi Germany, how many German citizens actually murdered civilians? No more than a fraction of a percent.

Unfortunately, that's all it takes.

54 posted on 04/10/2008 12:39:12 PM PDT by Interesting Times (Swiftboating, you say? Check out ToSetTheRecordStraight.com)
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To: Interesting Times

A good one. We all know it, but 90% of the US has no idea thanks to the MSM, hollywood and academia.

The three pillars of socialism and ideological fascism.


55 posted on 04/10/2008 1:29:29 PM PDT by Bob J ("For every 1000 hacking at the branches of evil, one is striking at it's root.")
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To: Interesting Times
...the Khmer Rouge was able to seize power only after the US Congress in 1975 cut off all aid to the embattled pro-American government of Lon Nol -- and that it did so despite frantic warnings of the bloodbath that would ensue. President Ford warned of "horror and tragedy" if Cambodia was abandoned to the Khmer Rouge and pleaded with Congress to supply Lon Nol's army with the tools it needed to defend itself.

Our leftists didn't care when it happened in Cambodia, didn't care when it happened in Viet Nam, and don't care that it will happen in Iraq.
Why? Could it be racial prejudice as well as hatred of the USA?

56 posted on 04/10/2008 2:02:23 PM PDT by R. Scott (Humanity i love you because when you're hard up you pawn your Intelligence to buy a drink)
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To: RoadKingSE; SunkenCiv

What I find amusing is that the less someone knows about Che Guevarra (namely that he was one of the 20th century’s biggest losers), the more likely he/she is to sport his picture.


57 posted on 04/10/2008 2:19:38 PM PDT by Berosus (Support our troops, bring them home -- from the Balkans.)
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To: R. Scott
“Our leftists didn't care when it happened in Cambodia, didn't care when it happened in Viet Nam, and don't care that it will happen in Iraq.
Why? Could it be racial prejudice as well as hatred of the USA?”

When arguing with people that think we should pull out of Iraq, I usually ask them if they would be OK with another genocide similar to the one in Southeast Asia, caused by our governments abandonment of our allies in the region. They usually have no answer other than to bash the president and rant about how we are perceived by the rest of the world.

58 posted on 04/10/2008 2:30:02 PM PDT by mickey finn
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To: Interesting Times

Yes, this is worth a bookmark. Thanks for posting it.

The Communists called “leftists” or “liberals” are not ashamed of their support for any Communist genocide, because they believe all means including genocide are justified by the great and glorious goal of Communist utopia. As you said, nothing will convince them otherwise, but remembering and publishing the truth about Communist atrocities may influence rational people from whom that truth has been hidden.


59 posted on 04/10/2008 2:46:50 PM PDT by zot
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To: Fedora
Thanks for the ping. My article "Goodfellow's Bedfellows" has some relevant info in the bibliography on the Indochina Resource Center, which played a major role in influencing media coverage of events in Cambodia.

I remember that one. Thanks for linking it.

60 posted on 04/10/2008 2:49:43 PM PDT by Interesting Times (Swiftboating, you say? Check out ToSetTheRecordStraight.com)
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