"Communism remained a politically effective force as long as these three pillars worked to support each other. While the command economy was notoriously bad at delivering consumer goods and the one-party state offered little room for civil rights or liberties, they did deliver improved healthcare and education and widespread social mobility, along with rapid industrial progress."

More communist apologia. True, communist nations made certain advances but much less so than if they'd embarked on a free capitalist system. From 1945 to 1980, East Germany made some social and economic progress, but much less than West Germany. When a man who could have made $30,000 under capitalism makes only $5,000 under communism, it makes more sense to focus on the $25,000 he didn't make than the $5,000 he made. As for industrial progress, at what cost? 15 million dead in USSR. Nothing to celebrate. As for China, little industrial progress even after 50 million killed by Mao.

"In some quarters, President Obama is denounced as a Leninist for suggesting tepid social-democratic reforms to the healthcare system (which come nowhere near the government-administered programs of Canada or Western Europe). "

No, it's because he's known many radical ties all his life. Marshall, Ivy League radicals, Wright, Ayers, Alinsky group, Acorn, etc. If a Republican president had been friendly with the likes of Tom Metzger, we would never hear the end of it.

"'The Rise and Fall of Communism' is a work of considerable delicacy and nuance."

Typical of a liberal to enjoy a book on the history of a movement that killed tens of millions of innocents for its delicacy and nuance'. Now, why doesn't someone write a book on Nazism with 'delicay and nuance'? So much better than the 'hysterically obsessive' morally judgmental stuff.

For thousands and thousands of years there have always existed rich and poor--and as such inequality; and with inequality a lack of liberty. The difference between two hundred years ago and now is that resources now exist to end poverty, yet poverty still exists and is in fact growing. The rich on the other hand still get rich, despite the collapse of the finance system and a recession. The reason being that capitalism is a system designed to shield the rich and help them accumulate wealth. The rich get rich because they control the goods and services produced by those who do the work (something which they themselves don't do).

This small class of rulers as such get rich at the expense of everyone else.

Hunger itself exists because those who control food production have an interest in making a profit, which they do by keeping prices up--thereby making food unaffordable for the poor due to the fact that they lack the money to buy it. Millions around the planet aren't starving because there's not enough food; they're starving because they are too poor to afford it. And that's because capitalism isn't organized to produce what's needed for everyone in society, but exists so that a tiny class of wealthy elites can make money (and to hell with everyone else). For just as its highly profitable to pollute and release carbon emissions into the atmosphere, so it's more profitable to produce coke than feed the poor. That's because the rich people of the world have economic control.

Socialism then--which some people here are confusing with social democracy--is based on the notion that the resources of society should meet people's needs. Unlike capitalism, where all individuals must enter into market relations in order to gain access to the means of life, or have to work for a boss to survive, under socialism people do not serve the economy, the economy serves the people (hence freeing people from material and economic restraints).

The name Communism on the other hand usually refers to the final stage in Marx's theory of the overthrow of capitalism: according to Marx, society moves from capitalism to socialism (the dictatorship of the proletariat; really when the masses seize power and rule) to communism (the classless society). At other times Marx spoke of "scientific socialism" (if he never used the term 'socialism' it was because it was already being used: socialism precedes Karl Marx) which he distinguished from 'utopian socialism'.

Evidently, he was a socialist. He believed the people should control the resources of society democratically; should be able to shape their own destiny and define the values of their culture; & that society should be run in the interest of all citizens and not for the purpose of amassing wealth for the rich and powerful. He only differed in what methods were to be employed to bring this state about. The Soviet Union was as far from his vision as right wing Christians today are to Christ. I think most people who aren't right-wing nuts know that the former Soviet Union was no more 'socialist' than Maoist China was a people's democracy; it was a dictatorship and its economy was a form of state capitalism. The fact that they called themselves 'socialist' hardly means they were. They weren't a worker's paradise; wage labour can hardly be said to have been eliminated; people did not have control over their lives; they were not egalitarian or democratic--all of which are essential for socialism and constitute its core.

Obviously wealthy elites benefit from falsely identifying socialism with the Soviet union as this allows them to discredit socialism. This boogyman is convenient as it enables them to amass great wealth without having to work by the sweat of their brow. They can parasitically live off the proceeds of the work the rest of us do by brandishing it.

They hate socialism because under it resources are used to benefit all citizens and not so as to increase the riches of a few parasites. Under such a system, labour ceases to be the measure of value--as it is under capitalism because it is the source of wealth for the rich--and instead will be just one aspect of being human. One won't labour hard to make somebody else rich; one will be doing meaningful work that serves human need. What I mean is that under socialism people come before profit, and because they do what counts first and foremost is the human being. The goal of socialism is to help every person realize their potential--it's organized around allocating goods and resources to that purpose and not organized around making a profit, as the free market is. The free market produces more misery than any system on earth, as policies of deregulation, privatization, and free trade cause destitution, all so those at the top of the economic tree increase their wealth. That this means small children are breaking stones in India so affluent people pave their houses, means aggressive wars are being waged to loot countries, and means services to the poor are being cut so the rich prosper is never acknowledged.

What 19th century Capitalism did is radically transform social relations--in that the market came to be regarded as an adjunct of society. With industrialization, it came to play a principal role in society whereas before it played only a secondary role. So dislocating was market society to social relations and to the human psyche, because of the awful effect it had on people's lives, that it had to be regulated to protect people from its ravages. Hence calls for its abolition; the rise of socialism and trade unions. As long as the haves continue to exploit the have-nots, people will yearn for a better world--one in which work is not the means by which some are subjected to others but is a means for achieving the common good.