BackChannels readers will find the piece in several forms around the web as it has caught the fancy of partisans of various stripe.
It might be fund to annotate each of the 45 remarks (anyone want to write the paycheck?), for each appears to resonate today with two egregious large movements in east-west politics: Putin’s politically absolute position as the leader of a now ulra-nationalist neo-imperial Russian state and, sigh, the American Far Right’s penchant for mirroring Moscow with a correspondingly stiff accusation.
On the reading of Skousen’s book — still in print and ever popular! — BackChannels feels overstocked, underfunded, and out of shelf space.
The bookends of Horseshoe Theory: strident communism and socialism on the Left | rabid libertarian fascism on the Right: may God visit the pox on both their houses.
BackChannels has reset the layout to suit the medium. Forgive any awkward typographica spacing for a while (the editor’s ageing).
Current Communist Goals
EXTENSION OF REMARKS
OF
HON. A. S. HERLONG, JR. OF FLORIDA
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Thursday, January 10, 1963
Mr. HERLONG. Mr. Speaker, Mrs. Patricia Nordman of De Land, Fla., is an ardent and articulate opponent of communism, and until recently published the De Land Courier, which she dedicated to the purpose of alerting the public to the dangers of communism in America. At Mrs. Nordman’s request, I include in the RECORD, under unanimous consent, the following “Current Communist Goals,” which she identifies as an excerpt from “The Naked Communist,” by Cleon Skousen: [From “The Naked Communist,” by Cleon Skousen]
CURRENT COMMUNIST GOALS
- U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.
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U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.
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Develop the illusion that total disarmament by the United States would be a
demonstration of moral strength.
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Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless
of whether or not items could be used for war.
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Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.
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Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.
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Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.
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Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev’s promise
in 1955 to settle the German question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.
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Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the United States has agreed
to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.
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Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.
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Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand
that it be set up ‘as a one-world government with its own Independent armed forces. (Some Communist leaders believe the world can be taken over as easily by the U.N. as by Moscow. Sometimes these two centers compete with each other as they are now doing in the Congo.)
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Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.
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Do away with all loyalty oaths.
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Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.
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Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.
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Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.
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Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current
Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers’ associations. Put the party line in textbooks.
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Gain control of all student newspapers.
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Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.
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Infiltrate the press. Get control of book-review assignments, editorial writing, policy making positions.
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Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and motion pictures.
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Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression.
An American Communist cell was told to “eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms.”
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Control art critics and directors of art museums. “Our plan is to promote ugliness,
repulsive, meaningless art.”
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Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them “censorship” and a violation of free speech and free press.
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Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity
in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio, and TV.
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Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity, as “normal, natural, healthy.”
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Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with “social” religion. Discredit
the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity which does not need a “religious crutch.”
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Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression n the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of “separation of church and state.”
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Discredit the America Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of
step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.
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Discredit the American Founding Fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the “common man.”
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Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American
history on the ground that it was only a minor part of the “big picture.” Give more
emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.
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Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture-education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.
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Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist
apparatus.
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Eliminate the House Committee on UnAmerican Activities.
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Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.
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Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.
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Infiltrate and gain control of big business.
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Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all
behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand or treat.
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Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of
gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.
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Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.
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Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents.
Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence
of parents.
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Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of
the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use united force to solve economic, political or social problems.
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Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self government.
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Internationalize the Panama Canal.
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Repeal the Connally reservation so the United States cannot prevent the World
Court from seizing jurisdiction over nations and Individuals alike.
Source: http://nwlibertyacademy.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/communist_goals.pdf
Related on the Web
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Cleon_Skousen:
After losing his police job, Skousen founded a group called the All-American Society, which Time magazine described in 1961 as an “exemplar of the far-right ultras.”[17] Throughout the 1960s, Skousen was also admired by members and leaders of the John Birch Society, although members of the more mainstream conservative movement and the American Security Council[4] snubbed him out of fear that his controversial views would hurt the credibility of the conservative movement. Skousen used Birch Society magazines as source and reference material,[7] and was pictured on the cover of its magazine, American Interest. Although he was never officially a member of the organization, he was a member of its speakers’ bureau and lectured at John Birch Society events throughout the United States for many years. A 1962 FBI memo described Skousen as affiliating with an “extreme right-wing” group which was promoting “anticommunism for obvious financial purposes”.[4] Skousen authored a pamphlet titled The Communist Attack on the John Birch Society, characterizing criticism of the Society as incipient communism.[12]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Naked_Communist
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1561529/posts (about the same thing as here). 🙂
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