(Speaking of communism...)

From: https://shorturl.at/jU59l (nypost.com)

===
  After a 40-year hiatus, the Communist Party USA is back on the ballot - and
                       already has three people in office

   By Chadwick Moore
   Published Nov. 25, 2025, 3:37 p.m. ET

   It's the red dawn of a new day.

   After a four-decade-long break, the Communist Party USA has picked up the
   hammer and sickle to resume the glorious struggle of electoral politics -
   and they're already seeing success.

   Three candidates the CPUSA ran in the Nov. 4 elections this year won; in
   Maine, Massachusetts, and Upstate New York. That doubles the number of
   open Communist Party members ever elected to US public office in the
   Party's 106-year history.

   And, yes, these are your grandfather's commies.

   According to one former CPUSA candidate who spoke to The Post, the Party -
   founded in 1919 after the Russian Revolution, which brought the first
   communists to power - is an actual Soviet-sympathizing, China-loving
   political party which believes a Marxist-Leninist one-party political
   structure needs to be implemented to achieve the "workers' paradise."

   "The Communist Party believes that capitalism needs to be replaced
   fundamentally," CPUSA co-chair Joe Sims said in an October interview with
   left wing program "The Daily Show," calling the economic system which
   built the modern world and lifted billions from poverty "distasteful."

   He appeared on the show to draw a distinction between his party and now
   mayor-elect of New York City Zohran Mamdani's Democratic Socialists of
   America - letting everyone know who really wears the proletariat pants.

   "Socialists believe they can function within the framework of the
   Democratic Party," Sims - whose resume includes attending "democratic
   youth festivals" in 1980s Berlin, Moscow, and Pyongyang - said, referring
   to Mamdani's ilk as "reformers" not revolutionaries.

   "We don't believe the Democratic Party can be reformed."

   On Nov. 4 in Bangor, ME CPUSA member Daniel Carson won one of three city
   council seats up for grabs, while down the coast, Cambridge, Mass. elected
   Brazilian immigrant Luisa de Paula Santos - identified in Communist Party
   USA literature as a member - to the school board.

   "I think he really flew under the radar," Maine-based Chuck Ellis, who
   hosts a podcast about the state's news and politics, told The Post of
   Bangor's new city councilman Carson. "The mainstream media is pointing you
   to what's happening in Washington rather than what's happening in your
   backyard. These super local races, most people have absolutely no idea
   about any of the candidates."

   Ellis is not surprised such radical candidates are winning. "In the past,
   Mainers wanted more independent-minded people," he said. "To use a
   biblical passage, there's this idea of, if you're lukewarm, God will spit
   you out of his mouth. And I think that a lot of voters are feeling the
   same way."

   In Ithaca, New York, Hannah Shvets, 20, was elected to the city's Common
   Council. A member of the CPUSA, Shvets campaigned on building "denser"
   housing, reparations for black people, maintaining a sanctuary city status
   in Ithaca for illegal immigrants and easing sobriety requirements at
   homeless shelters.

   Ithaca and Cambridge are both college towns. There has been a national
   resurgence in socialism fueled by young people drawn to aspirational goals
   like equality or ending oppression, although they don't fully understand
   what they're voting for, according to Benjamin Powell, an economics
   professor at Texas Tech University.

   "Socialism means something to Karl Marx and to economists who have studied
   [his work]. It means government owning the major factors of production or
   abolishing private property. But most young people don't think about
   socialism like that," Powell told The Post.

   Comrade Estrada has since left the CPUSA, citing political 
   differences-naming the party's friendliness with Democrats.

   "It's not accidental that they're running and winning in local elections
   because usually you work your way up the chain in politics and they're
   breaking in at the lowest level," said Powell, who wrote the book
   "Socialism Sucks: Two Economists Drink Their Way Through the Unfree
   World."

   "It's also the case that the socialists and the communists are probably
   less scary at the local level than at the national level," he said, adding
   that about ten percent of the people at socialist conventions he visits
   are true lovers of despots like Chairman Mao and Josef Stalin.

   But even November's red resurrection has been a sneaky operation by
   design. In April 2021 the CPUSA announced it would restart candidate
   fielding operations with a strategy to target non-partisan local elections
   - those where candidates are listed on the ballot without party labels.

   This was the case in Maine, Upstate New York, and Massachusetts, so voters
   potentially don't realize they're supporting a member of the Communist
   Party.

   "We really can't be a political party if we don't run candidates," Party
   co-chair Joe Sims said at the time.

   That year, 29-year-old US Army vet Steven Estrada became the first
   candidate since 1984 to run openly as a CPUSA member when he vied for a
   seat on Long Beach, CA city council. He wasn't elected and came in third
   place.

   Previously CPUSA members tended to run as Democrats or Independents.

   "I support China," Estrada told The Post. "I think in the general sense,
   they are a progressive force in the world."

   By contrast, Mamdani's DSA, Estrada says, is a "big tent organization"
   where "hardcore Marxist-Leninists," "anarchists" and other far-lefties can
   hob knob and plot how to inject radical hoopla into the existing political
   structure - and not a political party in its own right.

   The DSA is more "general ideas and principles," said Estrada.

   "The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was this grand experiment
   applying the general ideological principles of Marxism in its first
   political project. And I think it did a lot of good things," Estrada
   added,saying he feels China is the "next step in the evolution" of Marxism
   and Leninism following the "dark times" after the collapse of the Soviet
   Union between 1989 and 1991.

   "The official line on China is that [the CPUSA] is friendly towards China
   and the Chinese Communist Party," he continued, noting it's a sticky
   position as the Party attempts to recruit members and most Americans look
   at China with suspicion.

   One thing the recent Bolshevik bidders all share is the slick look of
   their campaign materials - with this year's crop of commies taking a cue
   from Mamdani and DSA-backed New York Rep. Alexandra Ocasio Cortez by
   featuring bold, high-contrast colors; bold fonts and upward tilts in their
   branding.

   The CPUSA leadership structure modernized in 2000 and today it has a
   co-chair leadership structure, shared by Sims and Rossana Cambron.

   Neither Sims nor Cambron responded to multiple requests for interviews
   from The Post. Shvets, Santos, and Carson also did not respond to repeated
   requests for interviews.

   Estrada, who still identifies as a Marxist-Leninist communist, said he
   recently left the CPUSA precisely because they were too friendly to
   Democrats.

   Surprisingly, Estrada also said he was fed up with all the anti-Trump
   venom coming from the party, telling The Post that he believes the Make
   America Great Again political movement is the workers' will and ought to
   be respected.

   "I think MAGA is one of the sole populist and authentic political
   movements here in the country," Estrada said, adding he now aligns with
   another communist offshoot that believes "MAGA represents the true
   underlying political will of the working class."

   He also thinks communists should learn from Trump, instead of swiping at
   him.

   "The forces that really propelled MAGA are fueled fundamentally by regular
   working class people who want to see their interests in Washington, DC,"
   he said.
===

-- Sean

... "A good scare is worth more to a man than good advice." - E.E. Howe
--- MultiMail/Win
 * Origin: Outpost BBS * Johnson City, TN (618:618/1)