Haik, thanks for sharing the story. I love your stories.

JD, I agree that there is a huge difference between the Eastern Bloc and the modern democratic socialist countries. I find it annoying, to say the least, that people on the right fail to make that distinction. It’s a bit alarmist to claim that we are heading toward a Stalinist/Leninist country, not to mention an intellectual cop-out. Unfortunately, we hear that all the time these days. However, there are still problems with a democratic socialist system.

I chipped a piece of the Berlin Wall. It was not big deal since it was 2 years later in 1991. I had to sneak under a fence to get at the part they were trying to save for a museum. My friend and I got stopped by a German cop who thought we were Russian. He spoke to us in Russian with a German accent. I didn’t understand what the hell he was saying. I slipped a small piece in my pocket and made a show of dropping the rest of the rubble I had broken off what was left of the wall. My friend and I just smiled and nodded as the cop spoke on and on in Russian. He let us go.

The part of history that isn’t often told is the involvement of the IMF and other uber free market types in the subsequent policy formation. Solidarity proposed an extremely popular way to depart with the old state run companies. Instead of mass privatization they promised to form worker-owned coops out of the remains of the ashes of soviet style command economy. This is the proposal with which they swept the elections.

Unfortunately the West refused to forgive the debt accumulated by the Communist Party and forced the Solidarity gov’t to repay all of the wasteful spending of their predecessors. This is where the Catch-22 of modern Capitalism takes stage. On cue, the IMF comes in and says we’ll help you with your crippling debt… if you make broad market reforms. I’m sure you can guess that these involved rapid privatization, wage freezes, massive cuts in public expenditure and an overall middle finger to the workers of Poland.

The reason I bring this up is because after these policies took effect, Poland entered a period of extreme economic turmoil and many, many working people took the brunt of the Friedman-esque solution. They eventually became disillusioned with Solidarity and even more confused as to what the hell the West (IMF) was trying to accomplish in their country. I’d like to know your thoughts on this!