berman@ihlpg.UUCP (Andy Berman) (10/12/85)
In the midst of Martillo's obsession with the clitoral health
of our Arabic sisters, Black's racist Jew-baiting, and the fantasies
of laissez-faire libertarians, it's a chore to keep up with
this newsgroup. But here's a little piece from the New York Times
(Oct 8, 1985) that may calm things down a bit:
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"WHERE RONALD REAGAN READ OF THE PLOT TO CONQUER AMERICA
(NY Times, Karl E. Meyer)
"President Reagan was asked the other day if he still
thought the Soviet Union was an evil empire. Yes, he told
Ted Koppel of ABC...moreover he said, Soviet leaders have repeatedly
proclaimed their global ambition which is why 'I have often
quoted Lenin's statement that:'
"'We will take Eastern Europe. We will organize the
hordes of Asia. And then we will move into Latin America and we
won't have to take the United States. It will fall into our outstreched
hands like overripe fruit.'
"When did Lenin day that? The quote fell like an overripe
fruit into a televised discussion that followed Mr. Reagan's
appearance. A Soviet official, Georgi Arbatov, denounced it as a Nazi
invention once exposed by commentator Alistair Cooke. Mr. Cooke, sitting
at hand, seemed to smile in assent.
"When later asked for details, Mr. Cooke...had his own theory:
the line might have come to Mr. Reagan from an old movie script.
"At the Library of Congress, researchers found an old folder
showing that they had been asked several times to check the
citation. It failed to turn up as promised in the Collected Works
of Lenin, Volume X, page 172---or in any Russian or English edition.
"Our colleague Joseph Lelyveld wrote that he heard the same
language attributed to Lenin quoted by right-wing generals in
Pretoria, South Africa.
"Prompted, I finally found what seems to have been President
Reagan's source: 'THE BLUE BOOK OF THE JOHN BIRCH SOCIETY' compiled
in 1958 by Robert Welch. On page 10, his book says:
"'Lenin died in 1924. But before his death he had laid down
for his followers the stategy for this conquest. It was, we should readily
admit, brilliant farseeing, realistic and majestically simple. It has
been paraphrased and summarized as follows: First we will take Eastern
Europe. Next the masses of Asia. then we shall encircle the last bastion
of capitalism, the United States of America. We shall not have to attack:
it will like overripe fruit into our hands.'
"So there it is: an undocumented Birchite 'paraphrase'
offered 'often' as a live quotation by a President of the United
States."
--New York Times, October 8, 1985
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Now who on this net dared say that President Reagan doesn't read books!
-Andy Berman ...ihnp4!ihlpg!berman