Russia’s Communists Flirt with Faith.

Religion is a sort of spiritual booze, in which the slaves of capital drown their human image.

This was said by Russia’s first communist Vladimir Lenin.

Over a century later Russia’s Communist party is flirting with the Christian faith in the run up to this month’s elections on the 19th; while hoping for a miracle.

A far cry from the days when they declared war on religious beliefs razed Churches to the ground and murdered priests by the thousands.

So it’s surprising to hear the leader of the country’s modern-day Communist Party Gennady Zyuganov, put a religious spin on things.

Jesus was the first communist; he told the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda on Thursday.

We need to study the Bible.

Make no mistake the Russian communist party of today is a different animal than the one of yesterday; it combines elements of communism, nationalism and pre-revolution Russian values.

Its ideology has been called left of conservative, but what’s remarkable is how the Communist’s party’s ideals are the basis for all the country’s political parties; and the norm in Russia today.

And the present day leader of the communist party had a big hand in this state of affairs.

In fact all parties in with a chance in the upcoming elections fit comfortably in this left of conservative paradigm.

This might come as a surprise but the pro-Putin United Russia party is the moderate one of the bunch, with the communists more hardline; they think Putin’s not as anti-liberal and anti-Western as he should be.

They also reject what they call the “comprador capitalist” system created in the 1990s, which Putin has been content to leave largely intact.

While the Communist Party is polling well above its total in the last elections five years ago, it’s unlikely, that it’ll see any major miracles at the ballot box; in the view of analysts at least.

In a way Zyuganov has already won, his ideas for revitalizing the Communist party, once considered fringe, have been accepted in the main stream.

And just how many can make that claim to fame?