Book Review: Takedown: From Communists to Progressives...

Takedown: From Communists to Progressives, How the Left Has Sabotaged Family and Marriage. By Paul Kengor, Ph.D.

I understand how radical feminists plan to control the culture, how liberal feminists plan to control politics and legislation, and how socialist feminists plan to control the government and economy. And, I already know feminism is saturated with references to its patriarch Karl Marx, Marxism, and, of course, socialism. In my opinion, nothing sold socialism to the unsuspecting masses in America more than feminism. Therefore, I completely understand how we got to this point from the 1960s. The 1960s is the decade that gave birth to the second wave of feminism.

However, I had no solid answers to fill the gap between the ideas and life of Karl Marx (1818-1883) and the rise of 1960s feminism. How, when, and where, exactly, did Marxists break into our universities? How did Marxists gain political influence that goes all the way to the top? How did Marxists plan to control the culture?

Dr. Paul Kengor's book Takedown far exceeded my high expectations. The primary focus of Takedown is the Left's sabotage of family and marriage, but it could just as well be used as a guide for studying how Marxists sabotaged all of America's institutions. Thanks to Dr. Kengor, Takedown makes it easy to connect the names, places, and dates.

For example, Jewish Marxists escaped National Socialism in 1930s Germany for the U.S. They were hired as professors at prestigious Ivy League Columbia University in New York City where they began plotting international communism. How did they get hired? It's connections and who you know. They had help from American comrades already on the inside such as John Dewey. Dr. Kengor provides plenty of evidence that “founding father of American public education” Dewey was communist except for being a “formal Party member”. Columbia “housed the nation's top teachers' college”. The Marxist professors taught future teachers and professors and they fanned out from there.

Takedown includes a chapter about a Marxist named Wilhelm Reich. The English title of one of his books is The Sexual Revolution. The German title is Die Sexualitat im Kulturkampf, which translated means, “sexuality in the culture war,” and it's subtitle is, “for the socialist restructuring of humans.” That was back in 1936! It's ironic because Reich also had to escape from Germany's National Socialism but he was every bit as much a socialist, Marxist, and Communist Party member. Reich hated marriage, family, and parental authority.

Dr. Kengor quotes from Marxist Herbert Marcuse who urged, “intolerance against movements from the Right, and toleration of movements from the Left.” So now you know of at least one name behind the concept of selective toleration.

Takedown is a “who's who” of Marxist progenitors of every type, from Marx, to communist feminists Clara Zetkin and Aleksandra Kollontai, to Marcuse, to today's feminists. It's all there in Takedown.