Victor Davis Hanson posted an article at The Daily Signal yesterday titled, “Are Americans Becoming Sovietized?” In the article, he lists ten traits of the Soviet Union that seem to have found their way into America. Please follow the link above to read the entire article, I am only going to list the ten things. The article contains the details of each.

These are the ten symptoms of Sovietism:

1. There was no escape from ideological indoctrination—anywhere.

2. The Soviets fused their press with the government. 

3. The Soviet surveillance state enlisted apparatchiks and lackeys to ferret out ideological dissidents.

4. The Soviet educational system sought not to enlighten but to indoctrinate young minds in proper government-approved thought.

5. The Soviet Union was run by a pampered elite, exempt from the ramifications of their own radical ideologies.

6. The Soviets mastered Trotskyization, or the rewriting and airbrushing away of history to fabricate present reality.

7. The Soviets created a climate of fear and rewarded stool pigeons for rooting out all potential enemies of the people.

8. Soviet prosecutors and courts were weaponized according to ideology.

9. The Soviets doled out prizes on the basis of correct Soviet thought.

10. The Soviets offered no apologies for extinguishing freedom.

The parallels are frightening.