It’s not a question of whether the Marxist has any good in him. It’s whether he can reasonably be considered a “good person” while actively promoting something as perfectly evil and murderous as Marxism has proven to be.
Take Bergoglio’s comments and replace the word “Marxist” with “Nazi”. Are we having a different conversation? If so, why?
Since I cannot read the Pope’s mind, nor do I personally know the people he considers “good” despite being Marxist, I cannot really discuss this any more with any weight (nor, IMHO, can any one else).
For all we know, the “Marxists” he said were good people, are not hardcore communists but dabblers, coffee table theorists, who the heck knows. I don’t know, you don’t know.
So...
The good man sees the good in all, the bad man sees only the wrong. I think the Pope is a good man and wants to see some good in everyone.
I would like to hear the answer to this question. This could be its own thread.
The statement maybe one of those nervous tics, akin to adding after a critical statement, "Some of my best friends are _____."
Assuming there was more to it than that, though, is he actually talking about those who are "actively promoting" Marxism?
As opposed to MINOs, say? College professors who like a certain vocabulary but aren't about to seize the state. Italians who vote for a post-Communist party because their parents voted for the Communist Party.
Former party members or disillusioned radicals who gave up on Communism or big state solutions but still can't repudiate some sliver of their former beliefs -- if only a name or label. Most of these people aren't in Rush's world or yours or mine, but I'd suppose it would be hard to avoid them in Italy.
Maybe the Mandela commotion provides a context for the discussion. For many people Mandela was still a Marxist to the day he died, but others would say that he wasn't by any means "actively promoting" Marxism in recent years.
Take Bergoglio’s comments and replace the word “Marxist” with “Nazi”. Are we having a different conversation? If so, why?
"Nazi" is more like "Stalinist" or "Leninist" -- too closely tied to actual murderous policies. I'd have a hard time saying that a Leninist or a Stalinist or a Nazi was actually a good person. Personally, I wouldn't say a Marxist was a good person, but the ambiguity is greater there.
I might say that you could find some good in someone who happened to be a Marxist or a fascist, if their Marxism or fascism were theoretical enough and not tied to actual murderous acts. I wouldn't say that someone like that was a "good person," but I don't know if the pope, who isn't the most skilled at media relations, would say that either if he had time to think it out.
This isn't something we come across everyday in the US, but in Italy, quasi-Marxists and quasi-Communists and quasi-fascists abound, and dealing with them might be difficult. Even outside Italy, Europe's Socialist Parties work in a democratic and capitalist framework, but have a lot of trouble figuring out what there relationship to Marx is, and just who Karl Marx really was, what he believed, and what relevance it might have to the present.