Marxism is like herpes. Once a person thinks it’s gone for good, it flares up again. 

Armando Simon | August 15, 2026

I have often stated that Marxism is like herpes.  Once a person thinks it’s gone for good, it flares up again.

Marxism has openly surfaced recently, although I have repeatedly argued it has been present for over a decade under the surface.  The communists now call themselves Democratic Socialists of America, but with the old hammer and sickle being visible.  I strongly suspect that the adherents have not read one word of Marx, Trotsky, or Lenin, they just know that communism is destructive and thus useful in their hatred of their country.

But, let us examine Marxism from a historical perspective.

The core proposition of Marxism is that the imposition of Marxism on society improves the lives of human beings.  Now let us look at the record.

Communist dominion was established in Russia, China, Mongolia, North Korea, Vietnam, Hungary, Laos, Cambodia, Cuba, Estonia, Poland, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Albania, Germany, Lithuania, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Latvia, Armenia, Uzbekistan, Tadzhikistan, Tibet, Kazakhstan, Grenada, Turkmenistan, Ethiopia, and Kyrgyzstan.  That’s twenty-eight countries, twenty-eight case studies, twenty-eight experiments.

Each location had its own customs, history, languages, geography — none of which is supposed to matter, anyway, according to the doctrine.

In all 28 of its manifestations and implementations, the results have been dismal.  For example:

In every single instance, the standard of living — in every level of society — plummeted.  Communism did not improve the lives of the people.

In every single instance, while proclaiming itself to be truly egalitarian, a privileged aristocracy — what in Yugoslavia Djilas called the New Class and in Russia was called the Nomenklatura — came into being, composed entirely of members of the Communist Party.  While many Ukrainians and Chinese and Cambodians and Ethiopians and North Koreans starved to death with their skin barely covering their skeletons, the new class feasted on fish, fruit, meats and all sorts of imported delicacies.  So much for equality.

In every single instance, Marxists wrecked the economy, and the production of consumer goods plummeted in both quantity and quality.  Long lines of people, stretching for several street blocks, waited for their turn to purchase a shirt, or a pair of shoes, or........

© American Thinker