The Old Left, socialism and its deranged derivative communism, is dead, each idea discredited and neither having a major adherent. The key notions of the Old Left were the promises of social and economic equality, i.e., few if any rich and no poor. This nirvana was to be achieved by centralizing governmental power; economic planning and the means of production, e.g., the government would literally own every business.

That ideology was adopted by a host of academics as it appealed to their self-proclaimed social justice theories and, of course, as the intellectual elite, they instantly perceived for themselves a central role in the government. Who better to plan the world than its most intelligent citizens? Moreover, they would never be required to stoop to earn a living. Power (and privilege) would simply accrue to them based on their indispensable intellectual labors. Hence the abundance of academic consultants employed by America's liberal politicos. There are some Americans who yet promote the Old Left theory but none has any following of note. No American politician now runs for office on any of the Old Left ideas.

As in America, so in the world. China's allegedly communist gov-ernment, for example, practices the oppression of Stalin and his KGB thugs yet is seeking to modernize its economy, even allowing some modicum of capitalism as its leadership knows the economic ways of the left fail utterly. How to achieve that balance with-out losing Beijing's totalitarian control over its citizens is a task no government has been able to strike. Once the capitalis-tic genie is out of the bottle, not much can force its beneficiaries to return to the old ways.

Cuba, on the other hand, is still stuck in its Marxist ideological past. It is a perfect example of why the Old Left is dead. The country is a shambles. Its economy, no longer subsidized by former fellow-traveler Russia, is in tatters. Its people defect whenever possible. Political opposition is not permitted and dissidents are jailed, tortured and killed. Nevertheless, Cuba is frequently extolled by the Euro-trash Left, a handful of American academics and the sinister fossils at the New York Times. This is precisely the same crowd which, in larger number and in former days, were the true believers in Messrs. Marx, Lenin and Stalin.

Thus, the modern world is capitalistic, i.e., Americanized. Call it capitalistic imperialism, cultural imperialism or what you will. It is one of the principal reasons for the anti-Americanism in Europe and other places in the West where you would not expect it. Those anti-Americans are the residual members of an extinct specie and they know it; hence their whining.

There is one world group which is reminiscent of the Old Left: despots of all stripes. By definition, a despot or dictatorship centralizes power in one place, often in one person (Cuba and Castro) or narrow class of persons (Saudi Arabia and the Royal(?) Family; Iran and the clerics). Thus, despite the rhetoric of the American liberal media, dictatorships are left-oriented, not right-oriented. As a rule, they are small countries; China being the present exception as was Russia before its conversion.

Today, we, the United States, are in an almost Messianic world struggle with the remaining dictatorships as in the recent past, we clashed with the Old Left Soviets. We are going to take down the Iraqis which will prompt the fall of Iran's mullahs which will accelerate the fall the Saudi ruling class. All are soon to be in history's dustbin, none too soon for those who suffer under their oppression of basic human rights through uncontrolled power. After them, only Africa will be left to modernize, by eliminating tribalism, introducing liberty and bringing it into concert with the Western world. China will evolve slowly, ever so slowly, and move in our direction. There is no turning back. What, after all, is there to return to? The Old Left is dead.