The Third World War

JAMES BURNHAM The Not So Glorious Fiftieth

Taking it all in all, the celebration of the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Bolshevik insurrection was rather a flop. Tf it had not been for the bally- hoo provided by the mass media of the bourgeois nations, the Kremlin would have had to write it down as a net loss on bal- ance. To begin with, nobody had much fun, and anniver- saries without fun are pretty dreary affairs. Commu- nists just don’t seem able to throw a fun party. Pre- 1917 Russians, we all know from the novels and mem- oirs, were the world’s best party- givers, but Russian Communists are as hopeless as all other Communists, and maybe worse. The most you can hope for is caviar, smoked sturgeon and enough vodka to get plastered on, but gaiety, glamor, manners and plain un-angled enjoyment went out with the Czar. Polish and Hungarian Communists do maybe a mite better than the Russians, but all Communists Burnham from pole to pole are on the grim side.

JB

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James Burnham

JAMES BURNHAM The Not So Glorious Fiftieth

Taking it all in all, the celebration of the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Bolshevik insurrection was rather a flop. Tf it had not been for the bally- hoo provided by the mass media of the bourgeois nations, the Kremlin would have had to write it down as a net loss on bal- ance. To begin with, nobody had much fun, and anniver- saries without fun are pretty dreary affairs. Commu- nists just don’t seem able to throw a fun party. Pre- 1917 Russians, we all know from the novels and mem- oirs, were the world’s best party- givers, but Russian Communists are as hopeless as all other Communists, and maybe worse. The most you can hope for is caviar, smoked sturgeon and enough vodka to get plastered on, but gaiety, glamor, manners and plain un-angled enjoyment went out with the Czar. Polish and Hungarian Communists do maybe a mite better than the Russians, but all Communists Burnham from pole to pole are on the grim side.