Mamdani's housing plan rests on the oldest Soviet question, says a physicist the KGB expelled: who decides who gets what. Dr. Yuri Yarim-Agaev modeled the Soviet economy from inside and found a hidden tax above 90 percent, the rest handed back by party loyalty. Zohran Mamdani's plan for New York, he says, works the same way: take as much as possible and redistribute it by their rules, decided not democratically, not by merit, and not by means, but by a small clique. The middle class, the nucleus of any city, is pushed out first. In the second half of a two-part conversation in the Surviving Communism series, he tells Jenny Beth Martin what it was like to be in the room when Ronald Reagan asked whether the Soviet Union was a sick bear or a wounded bear, why Reagan was the only president who understood that ideology is the heart of a totalitarian system, what finishing the job in Iran means, why Vladimir Putin's conservatism is Stalin's and not Reagan's, and why the danger from the left is always greater than the danger from the right. Guest: Dr. Yuri Yarim-Agaev, physicist, Soviet dissident and member of the Moscow Helsinki Group, expelled from the Soviet Union in 1980, founder of the Center for Democracy in the USSR, who briefed President Ronald Reagan before Reykjavik and before his trip to Moscow and worked as a scientist at MIT and Stanford. Learn more at teapartypatriots.org and jennybethshow.com.
Guest:
Dr. Yuri Yarim-Agaev is a physicist and Soviet dissident who joined the Moscow Helsinki Group, the main human rights organization inside the Soviet Union, and expected arrest every day. After Natan Sharansky and Yuri Orlov were arrested and Andrei Sakharov was exiled, American and Western European scientists organized a boycott of scientific cooperation, and the Soviets, far behind in computers and electronics, chose to force him out in 1980 rather than send him to a labor camp. In America he worked as a scientist at MIT and then Stanford, founded the Center for Democracy in the USSR to support dissidents still inside, testified before Congress, briefed President Ronald Reagan one day before Reykjavik and one day before Reagan's trip to Moscow, and was one of three men who briefed him on the weakness of the Soviet economy. He never worked in government. He describes himself as two things for life: a scientist and a human rights defender.
Key topics:
• Mamdani's housing plan: the Soviet question is who decides who gets what, and it is never decided democratically, by merit, or by means
• The Soviet economy in one number: a hidden tax above 90 percent, with the rest handed back by loyalty to the party
• The middle class is the nucleus of the city, and it is the first to be pushed out
• COVID and rule by expertise: one truth, one set of experts, the dissenting scientists silenced; Gavin Newsom's restaurant party
• Political opponent versus national enemy: do not call the whole Democratic Party communist; communists are enemies of the country
• Scoop Jackson, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and the AFL-CIO: when Democrats were the anticommunists
• Schumer and Jeffries are not communists, both agree; they are afraid
• Exiled by the KGB in 1980 after Western scientists boycotted Soviet science
• Meeting Reagan: sick bear or wounded bear? The answer was sick
• The only president who understood ideology; regime change as a deliberate strategy
• Iran: stop in the middle and you do not win, you lose; the regime has consolidated
• One bloc: Russia, China, and Iran; the weakest link is Russia and the road to Tehran runs through Kyiv
• Russia today: the same KGB, still sponsoring terrorism, still working to discredit American elections
• Putin's conservatism is Stalin's and Brezhnev's, not Reagan's and Truman's; family values do not separate free countries from totalitarian ones
• The danger from the left is always greater than the danger from the right, and liberals who will not fight the radical left summon the authoritarian right
• Human rights: the best thing humankind invented, 250 years after the Declaration and 50 years after the Moscow Helsinki Group
Timestamps:
00:00 — Cold open: the physicist who put the real Soviet tax rate above 90 percent
00:43 — Part two of two: expelled in 1980, briefed Reagan before Reykjavik and Moscow
01:25 — Mamdani's housing: an affordability crisis, or a seizure of private property?
02:44 — The key question in his whole program: who will control it
03:24 — The Soviet economy in one number: more than 90 percent hidden taxation
04:03 — Mamdani's plan: take as much as possible, redistribute by their rules; the middle class is out
05:41 — Jenny Beth Martin: young people understood government control during COVID; Gavin Newsom's restaurant
07:25 — Rule by expertise: one truth, one theory, one party
08:28 — The pandemic experts, and the specialists who were silenced
10:29 — Why pointing at Mao does not impress young Americans: get to the appeal
11:41 — An internal ideological war that needs resources, not a shoestring
11:52 — Political opponent versus national enemy: do not equate the Democratic Party with communism
13:10 — Scoop Jackson, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and the AFL-CIO: when Democrats were the anticommunists
14:42 — Jenny Beth Martin: Fetterman and Carville have said no; Schumer and Jeffries are afraid
15:49 — A gesture by Republicans: unite on this one issue
16:49 — How he left: the Reagan briefings, George Shultz, and the young men of Reagan's Soviet policy
18:23 — Exiled by the KGB: Sharansky, Orlov, Sakharov, and the scientists' boycott
19:59 — Forced out instead of imprisoned; MIT, then Stanford
20:51 — What was it like meeting Reagan? He listened and asked very good questions
21:21 — His model of the Soviet economy: the Soviets could not afford another arms race
22:20 — Sick bear or wounded bear?
22:54 — The only president who understood the importance of ideology
23:46 — Regime change was Reagan's deliberate strategy: evil empire, ash heap of history
25:07 — Jenny Beth Martin: we have to finish the job we started in Iran
25:47 — What finishing means: the Marshall-MacArthur model of Germany and Japan
26:10 — Stop in the middle and you do not win, you lose
26:27 — The regime and the country: the Soviet Union in 1945
27:24 — Iran today: the country damaged, the regime consolidated
28:53 — Jenny Beth Martin: Americans do not want war, and do not remember the hostages
30:18 — One united bloc: Russia, China, and Iran
31:47 — The weakest link is Russia: the road to victory in Iran goes through Kyiv
33:20 — Why Russia is still a problem: an attack on the democratic world
35:21 — The same KGB: terrorism, election interference, agents of influence
38:04 — Jenny Beth Martin: September 11, the war on terror, and President Trump responding in Iran
39:00 — What Putin does inside Russia; the unwritten rule he broke
41:09 — Jenny Beth Martin: Americans are being fed Russian propaganda on social media
41:37 — Conservatism is relative: Reagan and Truman, Stalin and Brezhnev
43:02 — Family values do not distinguish free countries from totalitarian ones
43:56 — What Americans should be on guard about: totalitarianism outside and inside
44:38 — The danger from the left is always greater than the danger from the right
46:40 — The authoritarian right is called to arms by the authoritarian left
48:32 — The last question: the biggest lesson of a life spent fighting for human rights
48:54 — Human rights: the best thing humankind invented
49:41 — Two anniversaries: 250 years of the Declaration, 50 years of the Moscow Helsinki Group
51:58 — Thank you for not walking away
52:32 — The close: the panel episode, 92 percent against 13; vote for liberty; share the series
53:53 — Outro
Links mentioned:
jennybethshow.com
teapartypatriots.org