1. The process also happened in Poland. I even have a distant, now deceased relative that made big bucks on landlordism in the 90s. Lots of stuff about old aristocrats coming over and getting "their" land back, the church, etc. Anecdotal evidence and all, but both my parents and grandparents claim that homelessness only started showing up around the time of Balcerowicz's market reforms, roughly at the same time the unemployment offices were created.

2. Public transportation was overcrowded, but it was very well built up even in smaller towns. Besides, the wait for the car is a luxury that imperial citizens of the west take for granted, as well as tropical fruit (a German lib classic). Sure, you had Bananas, and they came from a plantation in Guatemala where pro-American militaries were killing guerrilleros in fights over land in an extremely poor countryside. For the Eastern Bloc, where could they even get those? Cuba and various civil-war ridden republics in Africa. Gee, I wonder why there was so little tropical agrarian produce there - even ignoring the environmental cost.

3. Also the influence of censorship, authoritarianism, etc. is greatly overstated. Yes, the secret police etc. were overzealous (insert Michael Parenti talking about Nicaragua, 1990) but western music was freely available on the radio, contact with the west was allowed - even in stuff like shortwave radio communications etc., western goods were advertised freely (even including a competition to win these computers). Alas, the already wealthier people were dreaming of Paris (also paraphrasing Parenti) - the "we want FREEEEEDOM" was basically a constant in all media of that time (at least in Poland), and it almost always was expressed with "They're telling us what to do, this is 1984", a juvenile yet reactionary and incredibly popular position.

Victor Grossman

I actually saw him IRL once. I didn't talk to him since he was busy talking to someone else and frankly I don't know what about.