The Meaning of the Hiss Case

The conspicuous trait uniting Hiss's dogged ex-post-facto bloodhounds with his die-hard defenders is the need to be 100% right in order to vindicate not only their verdict on American history but the governmental policies they espouse today.

The right-wing line goes something like this: liberals were wrong about Stalinism in the thirties; wrong about the influence of domestic communists; wrong about the Vietnam War; and wrong, wrong, wrong about the strength of the Soviet threat. And so it stands to reason that liberals must be wrong today in their opposition to the war in Irak and the erosion of civil liberties associated with the war on terror. Once a naïve liberal, always a naïve liberal.

On the left, the reluctance to let go of the Hiss case also has a pedigree extending from the 1930's: the right was wrong about the threat of Nazism and dismissive of the role played by Soviet Russia in holing off the Germans until America entered the war; wrong about the righteousness of the hunt for domestic Communists in the late forties and fifties; wrong about Vietnam; wrong about Gorbachev's sincere desire for reform; and wrong about the staying power of both communist ideology and the Soviet empire. Finally, of course, liberals believe that the right is wrong about the Irak war and wrong in its willingness to sacrifice some of our own cherished civil liberties in order to fight terrorism.

For both groups, the guilt or innocence of Alger Hiss remains today what it was in the fifties — a symbolic and real indicator of which side you were, and are, on.

— Susan Jacoby
Alger Hiss and the Battle for History

National Communist Party of Sweden

An interesting statement of principles. One sees clearly that while they are loath to give up Marxist-Leninism, they are intuitively reacting against the cultureless secularism and internationalism of Marx. They realize that Liberalism is the enemy, yet they are not prepared to radicalize the conservative elements in society.

England is a Cesspit

Nigerian Nobel laureate, Wole Soyinka, responds to the United States' listing of Nigeria on terrorism list by proposing that the United Kingdom be placed on the list instead:

That was an irrational, knee-jerk reaction by the Americans. The man did not get radicalized in Nigeria. It happened in England, where he went to university.

England is a cesspit. England is the breeding ground of fundamentalist Muslims. Its social logic is to allow all religions to preach openly. But this is illogic, because none of the other religions preach apocalyptic violence. And yet England allows it.

This is part of the character of Great Britain. Colonialism bred an innate arrogance, but when you undertake that sort of imperial adventure, that arrogance gives way to a feeling of accommodativeness. You take pride in your openness.

This demonstrates, I believe, the ontological impossibility of declaring "war" on terrorism.