Translation:
My personal opinion, for those who are interested, is that these two instances (Hexbear and Lemmygrad) are filled with what we call here nazbols, tankies, or even left-wing fascists.
They are primarily authoritarians who like to call themselves leftist, but use the same tools, have the same political vision, the same organization, and politically and historically tend to ally with “official” fascists as soon as a truly revolutionary leftist movement emerges.
I found it tolerable to “do nothing” as long as they stayed in their corners, but I had somewhat forgotten that an authoritarian remains an authoritarian and that the only place they deserve is down a well, not forgetting to strike the hands that try to escape with a big stick.
Great! Want to stress that I am comfortable with dogging on Kruschev, but haven't yet investigated the books I linked. I have seen them spoken favorably about, but this is the whole "no investigation, no right to speak" bit. I am not endorsing those books here, just saying that they seem to be a good place to start.
Take care!
I can jump in and say the Furr book is good, @BeamBrain@hexbear.net . The critiques I've seen mainly focus on his credentials rather than what he says. Those who do talk about what he says misinterpret the claims and try to brand him as an apologist.
From my recollection, he doesn't really 'praise' Stalin, except where the evidence does that of it's own accord. Instead, he's more discrediting Khrushchev and saying that for most topics, we need to do more research because we basically don't know much at all. In most cases, we now know that the accepted story is wrong.
It's a step to setting the record straight. You'd have thought that historians would love the invitation to re-do a whole field. Unfortunately, you know how it goes—generally they won't touch it because they like the fairy tale version.
The first half of the book is his analysis and interpretation of the speech. The second half is a compilation of the primary sources. If you're pushed for time and want to see some evidence that Khrushchev lied, pick and skim a claim, then flick to the corresponding section at the back to see what actually happened.
Appreciate it!