1 Who is it that holds Stalin in "high regard"? Nobody comes to mind and I've met quite a few liberal academics in my day. Some hold Karl Marx in high regard and even some of the ideals of Communism but who is it that approves of Stalinism?

2 The phrase "high regard" may represent overstatement—except, perhaps, as regards one of my ex-boyfriends who is an unrepentant Stalinist—but there certainly is a double standard WRT Stalin vs. Hitler among my lefty friends (many of whom are academicians): for Hitler, it is understood, no apologies can be made. Stalin, on the other hand, meant well, and accomplished so much. He just got carried away. "No one is really evil," one friend earnestly remarks. "How about Hitler and Stalin?" I ask. "Stalin, no. Hitler, yes." And the very fact that the ideals of Marxism are still held up as worthy goals says a lot: do people say similar things about the "good" aspects of National Socia-iism?