Matt Brundage

What really gets my blood boiling these days is the “Communist chic”, especially on clothing and apparel. Why has the wearing of the Soviet hammer and sickle, the red star (of both the USSR and China), or images of Che Guevara, Marx, or Mao become stylish?

First, let’s analyze communism on an absolute basis: 100,000,000 lives lost to democide. Communism, wherever it’s tried, leaves a trail of death.

And what of living conditions of the survivors?

The irony of this is that communism in practice, even after decades of total control, did not improve the lot of the average person, but usually made their living conditions worse than before the revolution. It is not by chance that the greatest famines have occurred within the Soviet Union (about 5,000,000 dead during 1921-23 and 7,000,000 from 1932-3) and communist China (about 27,000,000 dead from 1959-61). In total almost 55,000,000 people died in various communist famines and associated diseases, a little over 10,000,000 of them from democidal famine.^[1]

Throw in chronic political oppression, slave labor, and a basic lack of human rights (including fundamental property rights) and suddenly celebrities, actors, musicians, and Middle America are clamoring to be seen in Communist-themed apparel. Am I missing something here?

I’ve seen images of popular musicians and even television personalities wearing Communist-flavored shirts and hats; for the most part, there is no outrage! These people are subsequently lauded and with no mention of their disgusting logos.

Imagine, for a moment, if a celebrity were to wear, say, a Nazi or Hitler-themed shirt or logo. Remember that Nazi Germany was responsible for the deaths of close to 20,000,000 people — a number that almost pales in comparison with Communism. This Nazi-logo sporting celebrity would be instantly vilified and his career would be essentially over. Well-meaning people would discuss his sanity (a-la Charles Manson). Yet if that same person were to wear a hammer and sickle shirt, replete with red star and perhaps a Fidel Castro-style hat, he would be seen as yet another rational, sensitive, well-meaning liberal. Unbelievable.

In late May I was given the opportunity to join the web management team at the FAA. I enthusiastically accepted a position and started earlier this month.

FAA happens to be right next door to my previous location at the Department of Energy, but while my commute has barely changed, my job description has been given a huge shot in the arm, so to speak. However, I must point to serendipity rather than pure ambition as the reason for the “career” change — all the pieces came together at exactly the right moment. If you were to ask me what my ideal job would be, my answer wouldn’t differ much from what I’m doing now at the FAA: web management for the FAA’s various websites, coding, design, upkeep, testing, etc.

This is quite possibly my first truly fulfilling position.

• Sleeping in until 10:45am
• Light reading at home
• Getting the kitchen completely clean
• Working out at the Gwendolyn Coffield Center
• Shopping at Montgomery Mall: getting things for “free” with gift cards and having way too much caffeine
• Browsing the stacks at Davis Community Library
• Celebrating mass at the century-old St. John’s historic church
• Watching a baseball game in wide screen HDTV on Fox
• Finishing my laundry
• Listening to classic country music on KEXP
• Web developing into the night