This year marks the 80th anniversary of the execution of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti. Convicted of a double murder after a notoriously corrupt trial, the anarchists went to their deaths maintaining their innocence. Director Peter Miller’s new documentary Sacco and Vanzetti follows the men’s lives from their arrival in America to their infamous journey through the U.S. justice system… return to article
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Reader Comments (19)Page 1 of 1 pages“They reasoned that state violence—the enslavement of the working class in a cycle of poverty—was far worse than their simple mail bombings.”
Or to put it more simply, they were violently deluded. I bet they would be fond of Crazy Ted if they lived later!
“Most historians agree that Sacco and Vanzetti’s arrest, trial and conviction was a miscarriage of justice”
Sort of like the Rosenthal’s? Only now, it is beyond debate that they were in fact guilty. (But i wonder, does anyone here still believe in *their* innocence, despite the now known facts?)
These guys were clearly violent. They were also able to “justify” their violent behaviour by crazy rationalizations. While i do not know for a fact that they were guilty, it sure seems that they had the right mindset to kill for money.
“And yet they realized, in Vanzetti’s words, that “in no other country on earth does a man tremble before his fellow man like here.””
Yet they still could not resist being here. Too stupid to appreciate living in a great nation, they preferred destroying to creating. How stupid and sad. . .
Posted by wolf on Mar 27, 2007 at 8:24 AM Speaking of “stupid and sad” I believe wolf was referring to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. No surprise that s/he did not bother to look it up in 5.7 google seconds. Research and understanding require work and commitment, something which free thinking individuals like Sacco and Vanzetti, and plenty of thinkers all over the political spectrum, pursue every single day in the attempt to understand and improve their world.
Citizens of a perfect nation state would not have to worry about criticizing recent history (which this case is) nor seeking out alternative or oppositional viewpoints and evaluating how they might help improve the nation. As perfection does not exist on earth, every situation can benefit from contrasting what exists with what might. Any country, even a “great nation” like our own needs the type of self-evaluation its own critics can provide. In a democracy, the ultimate responsibility lies with the people, who have granted themselves those rights practiced by Sacco and Vanzetti at the cost of their lives. Buried with them are the democratic ideas of anarchy which have become, to the popular American mind, unthinkable.
Posted by TsarBomba on Mar 27, 2007 at 3:35 PM Speaking of “stupid and sad” I believe wolf was referring to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. “
Thanks for catching my typo. I am glad you agree that they were stupid, sad and quite guilty, despite the shrill protests of the left for decades. Perhaps one can learn from such foolish mistakes?
It seems odd to me that you would think that violent letter bombers are best referred to as “free thinking individuals”. Are you a fan of crazy Ted? Perhaps he too, as a “free thinking individual” has been railroaded? Take heart, he is alive and thus a “free Crazy Ted” movement might be led by those who are willing to put in the “work and commitment”. . .:)
Even better, there are apparently many Iraqis willing to “improve their world” by blowing up innocent people. And they don’t wimp out and post their bombs - they deliver them themselves and die in the process. Talk about commitment (and insanity!)! Surely a model for social change.
Me, i prefer the horrors of peaceful democracy. Along with the benefits of freely speaking ones mind with little fear of reprisal. Just typical life in the US.
Posted by wolf on Mar 28, 2007 at 8:23 AM We are not and never have been a democracy, LoneWolf, read The Federalist Papers, IF you can read. I love your flatulent complacency
but then that’s what those psychotic drugs do, right ? But when you breath starts to smell like your behind it might be time to cut back.....
Posted by blondemike on Mar 28, 2007 at 11:48 AM “I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night,
Alive like you or me.
‘But Joe’, I said, ‘you’re ten years dead’.
‘I never died’, said he.
‘I never died’, said he.”
Posted by luminous beauty on Mar 31, 2007 at 8:53 AM The Rosenbergs were railroaded. The entire trail was filled with due process violations and should have been declared a mistrial. They were prosecuted under the wrong law to begin with. They should have been tried under the 1946 Atomic Energy Act and not the 1917 Espionage Act. Under the 1946 Act the defendant, if convicted, could only be sentenced to death with jury recommendation and only if the dissemination of information resulted in direct harm to the US the burden of proof of which was on the state. The US was a wartime ally of the USSR at the time of the alleged espionage so any help to the Russians was also a help to the US. The 1917 Espionage Act allowed for the conviction and execution of the defendant without jury recommendation requiring the state to prove only that classified information was passed to a foreign power in time of war. Further, no jury recommendation was required to invoke the death penalty. Justice Hugo Black’s legal observation that the Rosenberg’s were tried under the wrong law was based on these distinctions.
It is doubtful that the Rosenbergs advanced the timeline of Soviet production of a nuclear bomb. This is the opinion of many competent scientists. The couple did have contact with the KGB but it is doubtful that any real valuable classified information was passed along to them. Prejudice and cold war hysteria carried the day in influencing their conviction and execution.
Posted by cabdriverinchicago on Apr 1, 2007 at 11:34 AM The Kremlin opened its archives and the doubt is gone now as to the Rosenberg’s.
Providing nuclear technology to the Soviets back then is about as bad as it gets. It would be almost as bad as doing the same for Iran now (which some here think would be ok, as far as i can tell).
Posted by wolf on Apr 2, 2007 at 11:41 AM The Rosenbergs were guilty as charged and even the former leftist Ron Radosh brought that out in 1983. The Venona Files opened by the Soviet government conclusively prove the guilt of the Rosenbergs. For a while Radosh and some others tried to claim that Julius was guilty but Ethel was held hostage but that was exploded when she turned out to be evn more militant a Stalinist than he was. Roy Cohn’s great book McCarthy, nails these traitors as does America’s Most Hated Senator by Arthur Herman which largely vindcates McCarthy. Chicago is recycling the old discredited Stalinist shit here. Black was wrong on the law and the only question is HOW far up the treason went, I suspect it went as high as Oppenheimer or Einstein, both fanatical Reds.
Posted by blondemike on Apr 2, 2007 at 12:44 PM Their political orientation doesn’t make them guilty of the charges. This is fascist reasoning. Providing the Russians with nuclear related technology or classified information was done when they were allies. Thus they were not guilty of a crime according to the terms and specifications of the 1946 Act. The exact nature of the classified information was never discussed. The issue of whether or not it actually sped up the capabilities of the USSR in splitting an atom or making a deliverable nuclear weapon is in doubt. You don’t address this issue and engage in your usual racist ad hominem attacks on all Jews whom you doubtless resent for having greater cognitive ability, BM.
Posted by cabdriverinchicago on Apr 3, 2007 at 11:06 AM Cabbie,
If Mikey has resentment for those with greater cognitive ability he must resent rocks as well as Jews.
Posted by luminous beauty on Apr 3, 2007 at 11:46 AM They weren’t tried for their politics, they were tried for their spying and yes, a Communist symapathizer like Oppenheimer or Einstein is a very likely suspect because they could give even much more than a lower level spy like both Rosenbergs. Anyone who advocates imprisoning people for their ideas, as you do, cabbie, is the last one to call anyone “fascist.” There was never any doubt about the Rosenbergs guilt or that they made a substantial contribution to the Soviets acquiring nukes, the prosecutor and the trial Judge were also Jewish so your usual ploy of “anti-semitism” won’t work here, it never does anyplace else either. There are a great many books I can reference but I listed two above so as to not to overload your tiny mind. By the way, they are still guilty of treason, it was not part of our temp alliance to provide the Soviets with top secret atomic info AND they continued to provide it after WW2 as well. Like the Pollards they are traitors. Sentence five of yours above, Chicago, is a total lie as you well know. And what they provided was revealed. The words “in doubt” at the end of your sixth sentence are a total weasel copout. You are trying to rationalize Soviet spies solely because they are Jewish. Again see Ronald Radosh’s 1983 book on the Rosenbergs that he co-authored with Joyce Milton. That’s the THIRD ref I’ve given you here and then there’s the Venona Papers that Wolf referred to. The fourth reference. Chicago, you are a tribal liar caught with your pants down again. Loony Boony, am I to understand that you do it with rocks too ? Not my style.
Posted by blondemike on Apr 3, 2007 at 6:23 PM You have no proof. Much of what was admitted into evidence in the trial was hearsay which can’t legally be admitted as evidence. A lot depended on the hearsay testimony of a fellow engineer named David Greenglass who was strongarmed and threatened into providing false testimony about providing classified information to KGB agents. This is inadmissable. There were many violations of due process of this nature. See. Committee for the Reopening of the Rosenbergs Case.
Posted by cabdriverinchicago on Apr 5, 2007 at 12:25 AM I gave the sources which give the proof, imbecile. The Rosenbergs’ cause has been totally discredited, not only the sources I gave but several others, just have to look up the titles and the opening of the Soviet Venona files has finalized their guilt as well as that of Hiss. Don’t bother referring me to old Commie front organizations as authorities here. David Greenglass provided the daming evidence and he wasn’t strongarmed. The Judge Irving Kauffman was known as a great Judge and he doesn’t need to be second guessed by some half-assed cabbie. Some types of hearsay evidence ARE admisable under certain circumstances. Nice try, little Commie, but no cigar.
Posted by blondemike on Apr 5, 2007 at 11:07 AM The Government based its case entirely on the Greenglass testimony that the Rosenbergs facilitated a meeting between Greenglass who provided vital sketches of the bombs being developed at the Los Alamos laboratories at the time to KGB agents. Greenglass had been in contact with the Russians via a convicted British spy Klaus Fuchs as a go between. He seemingly turned states evidence by framing the Rosenbergs in order to get out from under espionage charges himself. The Greenglass hearsay testimony was used by the government to convict the Rosenbergs along with cold war hysteria about their being members of the CPUSA at the time. Their taking the fifth on the question ot CP membership convinced the jury they were guilty of espionage. All this is evidence of a frameup. BTW, the Venona Files were US government frauds. Nowhere in the forty nine Venona Documents are Julius and Ethel Rosenberg mentioned in connection with alledged Soviet espionage and the CIA and NSA kept the documents secret for about 20 years in order to give the false impression that there was secret proof of their guilt. In addition, the sketches sent by Greenglass were useless as he himself had no real knowledge of the workings of the atomic bomb as alledged. The KGB agent, Alexander Feksilov, recanted in 1997 what he told the the US government in his official testimony for substantial reward money. He said the Rosenbergs provided useless information compared to what Klaus Fuchs, who never had any contact with the Rosenbergs, provided. Fuchs, one of many German scientists picked up after the War, was not executed despite the far more valuable information he provided the Russians and only received a 14 year sentence for his role in the nuclear espionage ring.
Posted by cabdriverinchicago on Apr 7, 2007 at 8:29 AM The Rosenbergs were guilty as charged and Greenglass as Ethel’s brother well knew their spy activities for Stalin’s Russia. See the 1983 book by Ronald Radosh and Joyce Milton which proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Rosenbergs knowingly transmitted whatever nuclear secrets they could to the Soviets. They were traitors and spies and richly deserved their execution. Also Roy Cohn’s McCarthy for further details as Cohn prosecuted the case for Truman’s Justice Department. Cohn was Jewish as was the Judge Irving Kaufmann and even the ADL & Commentary disavowed the “auntey-seamite” line used by Communist liars like yourself. There was also a critical book on Ethel in the late 80s by a DSA woman and ITT contributor and she took sharp issue with the Radosh-Milton thesis that Julius was guilty but Ethel was not. As Hoover noted Ethel was the stronger and more militant Communist & Sovietophile of the two. Her brother’s testimony was accurate and decisive. Nowhere does Venona exonerate her. That “recantation” is meaningless in the face of overwhelming evidence of their guilt. If I have to go Amazon to recall other books on the infamous Rosenberg traitors I will do so. As Judge Kaufmann noted the crime of the Rosenbergs was unforgivable and a mere death sentence could hardly atone for the magnitude of their enormous crime against western civilization. Like with Hiss the argument is over and they justly convicted and justly sentenced. The Constitution specifcally provides for the death penalty for treason and they were gulity of espionage and treason as you know. If they had been German you never would be making these absurd arguments. You are a stinky little asswipe Jewish racist. And that’s all you are, a stinking liar who will tell any lie and commit any crime for his peepul. As Weinberger correctly noted, the Pollards should have been executed too. They gave stolen information to East Germany as well as Israel and the information they gave to the Soviets allowed them to kill every CIA agent in eastern Europe in exchange for one million Russian Jews immigrating to Occupied Palestine/Israel. Seymour Hersch, whom I met years ago, documented this. Bottom line is that the Rosenbergs provided what they were able to, that a more highly traitor like Oppenheimer provided much more I wouldn’t doubt for a split-second and he’s a Kraut either. All you have read is the same discredited William Reuben crap and associated liars including their two lying sons.
Every time you try to spread this Commie crap I’ll be here rebutting your sorry little tush.
Posted by blondemike on Apr 9, 2007 at 12:19 PM A few book recommendations, by the way, Chicago lied about Feklisov, who was the Rosenbergs handler and he lied about Venona not exposing the Rosenbergs.
The Secret World Of Communism by Harvey Klehr, CPUSA members like the Rosenbergs were very much invloved in spying and espoinage for the Soviets.
The Man Behind The Rosenbergs-Alexander Feklisov, their NKVD handler.
The Haunted Wood: Soviet Espoinage in America by Allen Weinstein,
the historian who nailed Hiss, he does the same for the Rosenbergs here.The Venona Secrets, Exposing Soviet Espoinage and America’s Traitors
by Herbert Romerstein.There are others but these will as well as the Radosh-Milton book(s).
The Red Queen on Elizabeth Bentley finds her more right than wrong as does Arthur Herman’s The Most Hated Senator on Joseph McCarthy.
He finds McCarthy more right than wrong.Red Star Over Hollywood by Ronald Radosh also goes into this and other areas of Soviet subversion.
Bombshell: The Secret Story of America’s Unkonown Atomic Spy Conspiracy by Joseph Albright.
Remember, last week when Chicago claimed that Butz had been fired from Northwestern U ? A total lie and he climbed right back into his rathole when I confronted him on this.
Chicago, six TRILLION of crap like you down the shitter would be no loss to the rest of humanity.
Posted by blondemike on Apr 9, 2007 at 4:43 PM One more reading recommendation here:
The Greatest Plot In History by Ralph de Toledano, the Sephardic Jewish libertarian conservative, who recently died. Establishes the guilt of the Rosenbergs and others beyond any doubt. Published by Duell, Sloan and Pearce in 1964.
Posted by blondemike on Apr 10, 2007 at 9:19 AM Toledano didn’t have all the facts. And he doesn’t have a thorough knowledge of the US legal system.
Posted by cabdriverinchicago on Apr 14, 2007 at 11:23 AM Wrong on both counts, he covered the trial for Newsweek. He was born and raised here of Moroccan Jewish descent.
Posted by blondemike on Apr 15, 2007 at 4:31 PM Page 1 of 1 pages -
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