From the Easy Chair

Discussion of Recent Trip to Romania

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Conversations, Panels and Sermons

Lesson: 59-214

Genre: Speech

Track:

Dictation Name: RR161BD103

Year: 1980s and 1990s

Dr. R. J. Rushdoony, RR161BD103, Discussion of Recent Trip to Romania from the Easy Chair, excellent colloquies on various subjects.

[Rushdoony] This is R. J. Rushdoony, Easy Chair number 213, March the sixth, 1990.

This evening Otto Scott and I are going to talk with our Chalcedon Report editor Gary Mose. Gary returned last night from a trip which took him to Nicaragua and to Hungary, I believe, and Romania. He was accompanied by another of our Chalcedon staff members, Joseph McAuliffe, as well as Douglas Alexander and a friend from Sweden. The purpose of the trip was relief mission with some funds that he carried from Chalcedon. And we are going to discuss tonight his trip in particular Romania, which is very, very much in the news where a very fine reformed group has been making a major stand, in fact, helped precipitate the revolution and now must fight to continue it.

Gary, do you want to tell us in general about your trip and then we can ask specific questions?

[Mose] Yes, the ... as you said the trip began in Nicaragua. I went there for a couple of reasons. The one was to observe the work of the Caribbean Christian ministries program and, secondly, to cover some pre election stories for a Dutch news agency with whom I am affiliated.

I must say that the ... the people in that Caribbean Christian ministries has in place in Nicaragua are a very high group of people doing an excellent work, pastor Ryan Savory, in particular, who is head of the ministry there in Managua is a very well educated, a very intelligent man and very dedicated to the Lord and his work. I was privileged to sit in on a seminar he gave to a group of evangelical pastors on the subject of liberation theology and I was very impressed with his command of the subject and the way in which he responded to liberation theology with a Christian Reconstruction message. It is an excellent work.

Pastor Savory is from the Atlantic coast region, the east coast of Nicaragua which is heavily Christianized section of Nicaragua where the ethnic minorities, the Mosquito Indians, the Creoles and other people of Africa decent are re located. They were Christianized more than a century ago by the Moravian missionaries and they still to this day have resisted Communism and ... which the Sandinistas brought into the country and, because of that, have... have been at... at odds throughout the 10 years with the regime.

I had an opportunity to observe the... observe the... the election campaign in progress there, although I had to leave before the election. I was quite impressed with the vigor of the campaign. People were... ordinary citizens were very much involved in the campaign process, riding though the streets in cars, wearing t-shirts and banners and it was really quite a very vigorous public participation in the campaign. I was also impressed, I guess, negatively, by the hundreds perhaps even thousands of international election observers who were there, almost all of whom were the... the ones that I met, anyway, were extremely oriented towards the left. And the night before I left I attended a briefly by a press officer for a group called the Witness for Peace. And I was rather amused at the confidence with which he displayed toward a Sandinista victory in the election which he just almost totally dismissed any possibility that the Uno coalition could possibly win the election and accused the Uno group and, according to her the Contras who... who supported Uno which I don't think was exactly accurate of committing all sorts of irregularities in the campaign. And my investigation was that it was just the opposite. I was unable to... I was able to uncover quite a number of complaints and examples of campaign fraud by the Sandinista side.

For example, evangelical Christians in one of the large cities where we visited told me that they probably would not vote in the election out of fear because the secret agents of the government had personally visited their homes threatening them with beatings or harm to their families or various other threats if they supported the opposition. And also if ...

[Scott] Where did these other observers come from? We knew that American observers went down there, but where did the others come from?

[Mose] Well, they were from just about all over the world, quite a number from western Europe. I met some from Holland, some from Sweden and I don’t recall the exact homes of all these people, but my impress was they were from homes all over the world, Canada, western Europe and the United States, of course.

[Rushdoony] Uno must have won by considerable margin for them to admit defeat.

[Mose] Yeah, it is... I think the report I saw it was like a 14 percent victory margin for Uno, which, considering the climate of the campaign, I think, was an overwhelming victory.

[Scott] There is now a determined press effort to talk it away.

[Mose] Yeah.

[Scott] And to say that even ... Uno is a combination of parties which will break apart and they have also pointed out that that representation in the parliament, Congress, I think they call it, is four votes short of what is necessary to change the constitution.

[Mose] Yes. I believe that is correct. Uno, of course, was a coalition of 14 parties which ranged everywhere from extreme right wing groups to a couple of the Communist parties were even involved in that. Apparently the thrust of it was a common enemy. Even though they... many of the parties themselves disagreed vigorously with each other. So I think there is a good chance that as a party or as a coalition ... well, you could hardly call Uno a party, because it represented such a broad spectrum of ideas and ideologies, but it did prove to be an effective coalition in terms of winning an election.

Mrs. Chamorro is, I think, admittedly, a figurehead. Even her closest supporters characterized her as a rather weak in her actual abilities to govern the country, but she is surrounded by some very capable people and some people that I found to be extremely impressive. One in particular was Gilberto Quandro who is the president of the superior counsel on private enterprises, the main business group in Nicaragua. He is a very impressive man, a very devout Christian who reads his Bible at the beginning of his work day every day, has two or three Bibles in his office and uses them. I was very impressed with his understanding of the economic situation, his very realistic look at Nicaragua’s place in geo politics and in the economics of the western hemisphere. People like him gave me great hope that Nicaragua may, indeed, have quite a bright future under Mrs. Chamorro.

[Scott] Do you think these observers all went home after the election? Do you think any of them will remain? You don’t know, because you ...

[Mose] Yeah, I really don't know...

[multiple voices]

[Mose] ...I left before the election. Many of the ... the people who were serving as observers has been there for quite some time. In fact, they were jokingly referred to as a {?}.

[Scott] Yeah.

[Mose] ... the kind of hippie types that have been there for some time trying their level best to shore up the faltering Sandinista regime.

[Scott] Well, we have been... they have pretty well clouded reportage from Nicaragua up until this point. And I ... I am afraid that we have a press curtain regarding the new regime, too.

[Mose] Yeah. It could be this... this press officer that I mentioned from Witness for Peace. If she... if she is characteristic of... of the people who I... and I think she is, of the people ... the people who were briefing the international press there, then the press was not getting accurate information. But I listened to her for five minutes and I just totally dismissed her as a reliable source of information, although the observers who were listening to her and were soaking up her every word.

[Scott] They took it as what they wanted to hear.

[Mose] Right. So, you know, when someone like, even like Jimmy Carter says it was the most fair election he had ever observed, he was just completely naïve and...

[Scott] Well, I guess...

[Mose] In addition to the threats...

[Scott] We could estimate Carter’s behavior down there by the amount of praise he has received from our press. I have reached the point where anyone that our press likes I am immediately suspicious of.

[Mose] Yeah. In addition to the threats of violence against the voters in the opposition they also learned of examples of the Sandinistas buying up voter cards, offering very tempting sums in exchange for voter registration cards. This was done particularly in the ... the Christian section of the country over on the Atlantic coast. They were also, in effect, bribing people to vote or not to vote giving children hundreds and hundreds of very nice bicycles I saw them driving around in the streets offering things like home appliances to people. Other very nice rewards to, say, to attend a rally or something. And I also heard that when people did not show up they went and took back the... the gifts.

[Scott] Now not a word of that, so far as I know, has appeared in the press up here. And yet it was visible.

[Mose] Yeah. It was very visible. The Sandinistas were very active in the neighborhoods in Managua where I observed and perhaps in other cities as well, holding block parties for children with games and races and piñatas and things like that, all night dances for the young people and stuff. They really went all out. So with that kind of effort and the... and the vastly superior financing they had, well, it makes the victory for Uno even more stunning.

[Scott] People took a big risk in voting against them.

[Mose] Yeah, although Uno made a big point of the fact that the balloting was secret. I saw one large banner hanging over a street that was addressed particularly to military and teachers reminding them... reminding them that the balloting was secret. And I think that that did play a large role, the balloting. In fact, it was secret. But there were these threats and other irregularities which made it an unfair election and yet they lost. The bad guys lost even though they were cheating.

The ... the ministry there that I observed, as I said, was very impressive. They really are going out into the villages with the fine educational programs, seminars, also with meeting the material needs of the poor people in Nicaragua and it is an extremely poor country. We have heard this, of course, but I was just astonished at how poor it really was.

[Scott] It used to be the most prosperous country in Central America.

[Mose] Yeah, well...

[Scott] When I was down there just in Somosa’s last year and wrote about its economy, it had more land available... the land was available, for instance, for homesteading. You could get a loan from the government and instruction from the government and all the tools you needed to farm. It ... it exported food.

[Mose] Yes.

[Scott] ...to all parts of the world.

[Mose] It is just incredible how in 10 years the Sandinistas could have so thoroughly destroyed that country, just abject poverty, no tools available. Consumer goods are almost non existent. {?}

[Scott] They used to have Mercedes automobiles all over the coast.

[Mose] Yeah, now the only ones you see are the Russian Latas and a number of other rather funny eastern European cars, one little East German two cycle engine which I have seen in eastern Europe with a very funny little car. That is about all that is there. And they are all foreign cars.

[Scott] I guess our Congress would like to see us improve the same way.

[Mose] Yeah, I guess. The statistics which Mr. Quadro gave me were just appalling how in the 10 years things could deteriorate so badly. Maybe I could just cite a few of them. According to this figures the national per capital income was 900 dollars per year in 1978-79 and that has dropped now from 900 to 300. That is just in 10 years.

[Scott] That is two thirds.

[Mose] Yeah. The lowest average wage, the wage for the lowest level of worker, an unskilled, entry level worker was about three dollars per day in 1978-79 and now even highly regarded professionals such as teachers are earning only about 15 dollars a month so that...

[Scott] What about the...’

[Mose] {?} went from 90 dollars a month now dropped to 50... 15 dollars a month.

[Scott] What about inflation?

[Mose] Oh, that...

[Scott] Don’t they have a horrendous inflation underway?

[Mose] Just... just incredible. When you enter the country you are required to exchange 60 dollars cash for cordobas and that is 60 dollars that I traded in made me a millionaire. It was over three million... three... I mean 3.6 million cordobas.

[Scott] Did you take a taxi by any chance or were you picked up or what?

[Mose] And I did not have occasion to ride a taxi, but I did buy a few meals there and ...’

[Scott] How much did they cost?

[Mose] Well, there were three of us that had one... oh very fine, very tasty dinner, steak dinner. And the three of us together cost, I think, over 800,000 cordobas.

[Scott] That would be about 40 dollars or so?

[Mose] Well, after all, that was for three of us. I think that is about 10 or 12 dollars.

[Scott] Ten to 12.

[Mose] The price very low, but the... the...

[Scott] But in cordobas 800,000.

[Mose] Yeah. I brought the ... kind of hard on an audio tape to describe {?} but I brought an example of their money. This... this bill that I have in my hand was printed originally to be a 100 cordoba bill and because the value changes so rapidly they haven’t bothered... bothered to print new money. They just crudely print it right over the old bill and this 100 cordoba bill now says 100,000 cordobas.

[Scott] 100,000.

[Mose] 100,000, yeah.

[Scott] So that is... that is in 10,000 percent inflation.

[Mose] Yes. It is just ... just astonishing.

[Scott] 10,000 percent.

[Mose] Cordoba is now trading on the black market now at about 72,000 per dollar.

[Scott] 72,000 per dollar.

[Mose] I understand that Mrs. Chamorro’s ...

[Scott] No wonder they wrote that dear commandant letter. I mean what is money mean to a democratic congressman?

[Mose] Yeah. Inflation is just astonishing. We were told not too exchange too much when we came in to... because even if you stayed like three days....

[Scott] You would lose.

[Mose] You would lose a substantial amount of money, you know. It changes almost hourly.

[Scott] I wonder how anybody lives under that circumstance. How does a poor person live?

[Mose] Well, they don’t. As a matter of fact I was told that most families ate one meal a day. They just do not have enough even to buy food for a single day. They way most families are surviving is by sending some members of their family outside the country to earn money and send it back in. That country is taking in about 80 million dollars a year from...

[Scott] From relatives.

[Mose] ...relatives living elsewhere.

[Scott] That is they have been reduced to beggars.

[Mose] Yes.

[Scott] ...beggars.

[Mose] They really have, they really have. The only store I saw that was well equipped was one called the Diplo which is the diplomatic store. And even though officially there is an embargo of American goods, that store was loaded with... it was a very bright, modern store. In fact, in several sections of stores are loaded with American goods, strictly American goods.

[Scott] How do you suppose, Gary, these left Sandinistas could reconcile what they were looking at with their beliefs?

[Mose] I just can’t understand it. They had to be just totally ... totally blind. I this got to be spiritual blindness. That is the only way you can describe it.

[Scott] It has to be physical blindness, too.

[Mose] Well, maybe.

[Rushdoony] Will Shiparovich said that Socialism has a will to death, to destroy everything including life.

[Mose] Well, of course, these are the people who want to snuggle up to the people in power. And apparently the infatuation with power of... I have run into people through years who make a practice of traveling to the most begotten parts of the world, the poorest parts of the world, because it makes them feel rich.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Scott] Do you think there is anything like that involved?

[Mose] Oh, I am sure there is. Yeah, particularly the ... the observers that I saw come down would probably fall in that category. They were generally wealthy people.

[Scott] Wealthy people.

[Mose] Wealthy people. They were intellectuals, university professors and so on, probably financed their own way down and...

They, you know, they ... they firmly believe the... the ideology which the Sandinistas represent and so they were just blind to the... the effects that that ideology causes.

[Rushdoony] Was the Russian presence minimized at this time because of the election?

[Mose] Yeah. I was told that that was definitely the case. I happened to notice... it was pointed out to us, a Russian compound, very... living in high style and very fine villas, which belong to previous land owners and }

[Scott] That were all compensated. Yes.

[Mose] Yeah, right. They are living very well. And I was told also that a number of Russians and Czechoslovakians and, I believe, Bulgarians were mentioned. Several eastern... people from several eastern European countries were invited in, in fact, were hastily given citizenship papers so that they could vote in the election.

[Scott] Well, their... their governments haven't recalled those types yet.

[Mose] Nope. Still there.

[Scott] So we have this anomaly.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Scott] The up... the infrastructure in eastern Europe still seems to be in place.

[Mose] Yeah.

[Rushdoony] Nothing has been done, of course, to separate the Sandinistas from the army, nor the secret police.

[Mose] Yes. As I understand they ... they still do control the... the military department and the department of the interior which runs the secret police operation.

[Scott] Well, I think the official handover is supposed to be in April.

[Mose] Yeah, there is... there is a very

[Scott] ... that is the moment of truth.

[Mose] Right. There is a very concerted effort, demand from the le... the victors that the Sandinistas completely turn over the government.

[Rushdoony] The ... the sad fact is they are caught... they have called for the disarmament of the Contras...

[Scott] First.

[Rushdoony] ....but not the Sandinistas yet.

[Mose] That is right.

[Scott] They want...

[Rushdoony] No mention of that.

[Scott] They want them to disarm and go back. In fact, former President Carter said that the Contras are the only block to complete happiness down there.

[Mose] The... the Sandinistas may have made a fatal mistake by inviting the Contras to participate in the election process. What they had done, many of them have moved back into the cities, particularly in Managua and are resettled in the... the neighborhoods.

Managua is kind of a ... of an unusual city. It doesn’t seem to have a center.

[Scott] Well, it was not operated...

[Mose] It was all destroyed by the earthquakes and never been rebuilt. So you have a decentralized city and so what ... what is happening in Managua is happening in the individual neighborhoods. So the Contras have returned to the neighborhoods and have... I guess you might say reinfiltrated the neighborhoods, which was the tactic that the Sandinistas used in their original takeover was to infiltrate key neighborhoods, seize control of those and then move on to the ... the next neighborhood and they gradually that way took over Managua. And now the Contras are in the... the same position.

[Scott] That is great.

[Mose] They are not laying down their arms. There are also people in the neighborhoods who ... who have access to weapons who are actually part of the government. Right next door to the headquarters for Caribbean Christian Ministries a man living next door was someone who, I believe, was an... an educator of some kind who regularly goes out into the countryside on various projects for the government and whenever people like this go out they are given weapons, supposedly to defend themselves against the Contras. But this man definitely is not sympathetic to the government even though he has job for the government. So as people like him who are in neighborhoods and who do have access to weapons who...

[Scott] What about the neighborhood committees, the neighborhood watch?

[Mose] I... I just don’t know anything about hat, so I don’t... I can’t answer that question.

[Scott] Well, it is too bad you had to leave the day before the election. You must have done a lot of thinking on the flight to Europe as to what... what the outcome would be.

[Mose] Yeah.

[Scott] Did you really think when you saw it all that the Chamorro would win?

[Mose] Yes, I did.

[Scott] Oh, you did.

[Mose] I really did. I was there on the Sunday before the election and the campaign was to ride... actually officially wind up on the following Wednesday, but on that Sunday before the election was the ... the last big campaign effort and the crowd that turned out in Managua for the Uno group was overwhelming. It as an astonishing crowd of ... oh, it was estimated everywhere from 40,000 to 400,000 and I would guess it was on the... the upper side of that. It was a sea of people, by far the largest outpouring of opposition sentiment that has ever been seen in the ... in the 10 years that the Sandinistas have been in power.

And the people that I talked to and the reliable sources of information were just completely convinced that there would be an Uno victory. So I left there expecting that that would be the case. And it turned out to be so.

[Rushdoony] You were there alone on that leg of the journey or what is...

[Mose] Yes.

[Rushdoony] ...one of the... any of the men with you?

[Mose] No.

[Rushdoony] They joined you...

[Mose] Right.

[Rushdoony] Subsequently.

[Mose] Right.

[Scott] In Amsterdam?

[Mose] Yes, we all ... the... the four of us who were on the team to eastern Europe met each other in Amsterdam, met first of all with a group which I met... I think I have mentioned before, the Christian Foundation of Aid to Conscience Convicts which is located in a small town called Andike. We received a briefing there on the ... on their... their work and the latest efforts to provide relief to eastern Europe, particularly to Romania.

[Scott] So what does that mean, prisoners of conscience?

[Mose] Yeah. That is the name of the organization.

[Scott] And...

[Mose] Christian Foundation...

[Scott] Could they go to prisons or...

[Mose] Well, the... the organization began in... about 10 years ago. In fact, they are just celebrating their 10th anniversary this year. They began with a campaign to write to prisoners post cards and letters from Christians in the West to prisoners in the Soviet Union and other eastern countries. Their basis for their whole ministry is in Matthew 25 where Jesus talks about the ... at the final judgment of a... I was in prison and you visited me and that whole passage, so that they have a number of legs to their ministry. The effort to be of encouragement to prisoners was in response to what Christ said about visiting prisoners and what Christ said about feeding the hungry and giving drink to the thirsty as part of their ... their food supply effort.

[Rushdoony] This group ministering to prisoners, of course, has been asking people also to write to heads of state, the Soviet premier, whatever the country is so that they know there are people, Christians, who are concerned about the Christians in prison.

[Mose] That has been very effective. The people who have been persecuted in these countries have been the unknown people for the most part, those that have become well known or at least identified generally are better off when the leaders in those counties have known that the West knows. It has been ... gone much better for them. So this has been a very important ministry to... not only to encourage those who have been in prison, but to, as you say, let the authorities know that we know what they have been doing.

[Scott] Has there been any change in the condition of the prisoners in Romania?

[Mose] Yes. They are... there... there definitely is change in Romania. No doubt about it. Where there is not change, I think, would be in the economic area. It has been just a very short time since the revolution and there is virtually no government now in Romania. Those who are in government positions from my observation are doing nothing more than crisis management. People are beating the doorstep down with needs, with demands that people are coming in asking for housing. In the city of Irad, for example, where we spend most of our time they have a 10,000 requests for housing and only 100 dwellings available.

[Scott] Well, where are they living?

[Mose] They are living with relatives or sometimes in the streets or in the countryside.

[Scott] In the streets.

[Mose] Yeah.

[Scott] Well, it s pretty cold. It is still winter, isn’t it?

[Mose] Yes, it is. Although it has been unseasonably warm, though. Just as we left a storm moved across Europe and it got quite cold again, but it definitely is not a pleasant place to be.

[Scott] What are they using for money?

[Mose] They... they still use the leu, the...’

[Scott] Is anything working? Are the factories working?

[Mose] Yes.

[Scott] Are the trains running?

[Mose] The trains... well, they never ... they haven't been working for 40 years now and...

[Scott] They have no trains.

[Mose] They have trains, but they are very old, very rickety, often do not have any glass in the windows.

[Scott] What about...?

[Mose] From... from appearances, economically I would say there is... there is no difference. I was told that... that, you know, some of the necessities of life that ... the staple foods, for example, oil and butter and flour are now available in the store whereas they were not before. So some of the very basic necessities. There is...

[Scott] You traveled by car, didn’t you?

[Mose] Yes.

[Scott] Where did you get your gasoline? They have stations?

[Mose] Well, you... you just go... you make sure you don’t run out. You don't go deep enough into the country to... to run out of gas.

[Scott] Well, they do have places to refill.

[Mose] They do have stations. There are gas stations, but just as before the... the lines are miles long. Every gas station... I would say at least two miles of... of cars lined up.

[Scott] Is there a limit to how many gallons you could get?

[Mose] ... two and three...

[Scott] ...or liters?

[Mose] Yeah, well, yeah, for the ordinary people, I mean, the residents of Romania that is the case. Western visitors can buy coupons at the border and in the special dollars shops they call them.

[Scott] And you can fill up.

[Mose] You can... you can buy a coupon. Yeah, you know, if it is available. And price is extremely high.

[Scott] How much?

[Mose] Oh, 13, 15 dollars a gallon.

[Scott] Fifteen dollars a gallon. Oh, you ought to tell Ralph Nader. Tell Ralph Nader about this. I mean, we have got some... we have got some environmentalists here who would like to hear this. That is what...

[Rushdoony] They might favor it, yes.

[Scott] That is what I am saying. They would like it.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Scott] So everybody can walk.

[Mose] I was told more gasoline was available, but from the lines I saw, I had a hard time believing it. Sometimes...

[Scott] Fifteen dollars a gallon.

[Mose] Yeah. Sometimes three and four abreast for a mile or two cars would be lined up. That is the same way it was five years ago when I made my first trip there. So, like I say, economically there has been almost no improvement. Where there has been improvement is in the area of the fear.

[Scott] There is less fear.

[Mose] Less fear. No fear at all, I would say.

[Scott] No fear at all.

[Mose] ... as the... whereas before people lived in... in constant fear and ... and terrible despair over the outrageous oppression which I previously described and which now is quite well known in the world.

[Scott] Now...

[Mose] Now the people feel very free.

[Rushdoony] The reports that have been coming to me have been that there is a radical moral collapse. It was probably there before and is more evident now. And apart from the Christian community, things look rather bleak. How is the Christian community meeting this situation?

[Mose] Well, you are probably right. The Christian community has been the stabilizing factor even during the years of Ceausescu. People recognize that and... and people who were not Christians would often adhere to the Christian community just because they were that stabilizing factor. They were really in a very real sense were the salt of Romanian society. Christians now have become very active, I am pleased to say, not only in evangelism which they can now do openly and in preaching the gospel in their churches, but are also very active in attempting to reconstruct their society. And the city of Irad was... was... I was just astonished at what had happened there. that city and it is also the same name. Irad is a district or you might ... comparable to our state here in the United States. The government of that province is completely Christian from the president of the province...

[Scott] How did that happen under the Communists?

[Mose] Well, when the revolution broke out in Timişoara, one man, one Christian man, a father who is an actor, actually, father of, I think he said five children, became very concerned when he heard that the army at that point and the secret police were killing people right and left including children. And he vowed that if that moved over into his city, Irad, that he would want to be in the forefront of resisting that effort. And when {?} did come to Irad he did step forward and led the population of Irad in resisting the security forces. And because he just stepped forward in front of the crowd, the crowd said, “Ok, you are the leader.”

[Scott] So this is the new governor.

[Mose] This is the new government, yeah.

[Scott] The new administration.

[Mose] The new administration, yeah. All the old guys are out. And we have a completely new administration there now and it is thoroughly Christian from the president who I just described and all of his advisors and all of the key leaders in the city are Christians.

[Scott] Well, could you tell me something? Did you see any stores?

[Mose] Stores, yeah.

[Scott] Hotels?

[Mose] Yeah, believe me. I stayed in a hotel and that is where I was robbed.

[Scott] Oh.

[Mose] Right in my hotel room. The hotel we stayed in was ... as all hotels are, they are very pathetic. The windows were full of... of bullet holes. In fact the... the room of the door we stayed in had a bullet hole through it from... on the wall on the inside the bullet was lodged in the wall yet. So there was very... very heavy fighting.

[Scott] Well, who owns the... who owned the hotel? Who owns these stores? I understood that...

[Mose] The state owns them.

[Scott] ...the state owned everything.

[Mose] Yeah.

[Scott] The state still owns everything.

[Mose] It is... yes. There are now private taxis. That is the first ...

[Scott] Private taxis. That is the first {?}

[Mose] ...private enterprises.

[Scott] Somebody with a car has decided to operate as a taxi.

[Mose] Yes. And they are ... and they are authorized now.

[Scott] Oh, they are authorized. So they even have a license even now.

[Mose] Right. And there has been in the countryside some land has been given to the peasants so there is some privately owned land now. And there is an effort to return some of the government land to people so there is hope for a private...

[Scott] To persons from whom it was confiscated or from... some... some body else who was lucky enough to get there first in line?

[Mose] I don’t know if anybody has figured that out yet, but I suppose...

[multiple voices]

[Scott] ...knowing somebody who maybe could turn it over?

[Mose] I think in the case of the peasants that I was told about it is people who were working that particular land for...

[Scott] Who were working it anyway.

[Mose] Yeah.

[Scott] For the state.

[Mose] I think now... now.... now own it.

[Scott] Now own it.

[Rushdoony] The reformed church there, of course, was the source of the revolutionary impetus.

[Mose] Right. That is an interesting thing. The is very definitely an ethnic problem in Romania as there seems to be throughout the eastern Europe and the reformed church is... is a Hungarian church. And the Romanian people were very impressed by the fact that it was the Hungarians who many of them who do not like were the ones who led their country to freedom. And ... and they recognized, of course, that it was not only Hungarians, but it was Hungarian Christians. So there is a tremendous new respect among the Hungarian... the Romanian population for the Hungarian Christians. Pastor László Tőkés who was the Hungarian pastor in Timişoara who... who led the revolution...

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Mose] Is now just a giant of a character in... in Romania and he is a... a hero of heroes. Painted on the wall outside of his church office is a sign that says, “Long live László Tőkés.”

[Scott] Did you see him by any chance?

[Mose] Yes. So he did... we were able to meet with him very briefly. He is an extremely busy man and has a ... a tremendous appointment schedule. And there were reporters from all over the world trying to get interviews with him. We managed to get one for about five minutes which I have on video tape. He is an impressive character and a very soft spoken, self effacing, calls himself a complete newcomer to politics and... and doesn’t even really want to be in politics, although he did admit he was considering whether he would run for a national office and will make a decision on that soon.

I ... I received various reports about him and about the faction in the reformed church that he represents. When I was in Hungary we met with the leader of a reformed college in a city called Debrisen, an old college that date backs... dates back to the Reformation. It has been in existence since that time. The group that is affiliated with this college characterizes itself as the evangelical element within the Hungarian reformed church, although Doug Alexander, who was with me, thought he detected some Barthian philosophy in this group.

The man I talked to from that group described László Tőkés and other elements in the Hungarian reformed church as traditionalists and cultural Christians. And I... I... I would have to say in the brief interview I had with him that there may be some substance to that, although he was described as being completely a non spiritual man. I don’t think that is the case. It appeared that his interest was perhaps as much cultural as it was religious.

When we asked him, you know, how his faith influenced his ... his work in society, his... his political standing right now, he said, well, of course, as a pastor and as a Christian the Word of God informs him, but he did not believe it was possible or necessarily even right to try to directly implement biblical teachings in ... in politics and in government.

So when... as I say... it was a very short interview and perhaps inconclusive in determining what his actual beliefs are with regard to what we would call Christian Reconstruction.

But he is... he is clearly a Christian. In fact, I was told that on one of his recent trips to Hungary for a speaking engagement, his body guard, who is a soldier in the Romanian army went with him and he led that soldier to Christ. The soldier himself testified to that fact. So I believe he definitely is a Christian. As to the depths of his ... his faith, I just can’t say.

[Scott] Or how the faith interworks with the social...

[Mose] Right, right.

[Scott] It sounds from your description pretty much like the upset landscape that I recall at the close of World War II in which everything was more or less up for grabs.

[Mose] Yes.

[Scott] Nobody knew anything and people were bartering all over the place, making deals for food and this and that and so forth.

[Mose] That is exactly... You have described Romania today just very perfectly. As I said before there is... there is...

[Scott] {?} after the war.

[Mose] ... Ceausescu when... when he died or when he was killed left a complete vacuum in every way, socially, politically, economically and since he personally controlled everything in that country in a very literal sense, there is just no one there who is equipped to deal with anything, so there is no government. There is no social structure. The is no infrastructure. It is all completely deteriorated. It is a country that is in complete chaos. And anyone who steps forward with half a brain or an idea...

[Scott] Or money.

[Mose] Or money... very few have that... is, by default, a leader.

[Scott] Are there... were there many foreigners? Did you see other Americans by any chance?

[Mose] No, the only... well, there are quite a few foreigners in the country now, but that is because of the massive relief effort.

[Scott] Yes.

[Mose] As we traveled across Europe we... I think we ... we didn’t make a specific count, but I dare say we saw two to three, maybe 500 trucks with red cross signs on them from the European community, from the Red Cross, the Hungarian Red Cross and any number of private relief agencies.

[Scott] From the West to the East.

[Mose] Yes. Convoys of trucks, long convoys, sometimes 20, 25 trucks in a convoy. And you could see them all over the place in Romania. So there has been a massive effort. The organization that we went with alone has sent 80 trucks of relief goods since Christmas.

[Scott] From Amsterdam?

[Mose] From Amsterdam. Yeah.

[Scott] It is interesting, because, you know, Paul... I listened to Paul Warig a few weeks ago who has led a team over to those countries and he is giving them seminars on how to conduct elections and how to campaign. And he said in his talk that they needed instruction on how to democratize. And since you ... when you stop to think about this, the staggering effrontery of that because most of those countries had parliaments and democratic institutions a thousand years ago.

[Mose] Most of them did, but Romania is the exception there.

[Scott] Romania is... is the exception.

[Mose] They do not have a democratic tradition there and they are the first to admit it. This young Christian president of Irad County told me that, in fact, he... he begged. He said, “We need help. We do not know what democracy means. We do not know anything...”

[Scott] I am not sure we know what it means here.

[Mose] That may be the case, but he begged. And he was very specific in saying what I need is ... is persons. He ... he told me he would not listen to anyone who was not a Christian. He just could not trust anyone from the West who is not a Christian and he insists that any advice he gets is going to have to come from Christians.

[Rushdoony] Recently I was looking through a bound volume of a news periodical from the 20s and it was ironic, because the was Romania, King Carol....

[Scott] Oh, yes. And...

[Rushdoony] And Lupescu his mistress.

[Scott] Yes.

[Rushdoony] And all the talk which made Romania a playboy’s paradise.

[Scott] Oh, yes, yes.

[Rushdoony] In those days.

[Scott] Yeah, he called his... his yachts...

[Rushdoony] His money...

[Scott] Lucifer.

[multiple voices]

[Scott] ...had lots of oil.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[multiple voices]

[Rushdoony] Very wealthy...

[Scott] Romania oil fields are really the biggest elephant tits in ... in Europe.

[Mose] Yes, that is tremendous oil reserves, all kinds of minerals, gold and silver in the Carpathian mountains...

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Mose] And... and agriculturally it is a ... it could be a very rich country. The management of agriculture by... under the Communists is a disaster, of course, but at one time, I believe, where Romania was very much a breadbasket for...

[multiple voices]

[Rushdoony] The Communists took one of the wealthiest centers of Europe and turned it into a horror with their policies.

[Scott] Well, of course, they still have.... Russia still has, the Soviet Union still has these countries tied up on paper for their commodities. And some of those counties are now talking about trading with the West. But they are still under contract to the Kremlin.

[Mose] Yeah.

[Rushdoony] How about Hungary?

[Mose] We... I have been going there off and on for five years now and in each of my trips I notice a remarkable, noticeable improvement in the economic situation. They have been toying with capitalism now for, oh, almost 10 years and the contrast between Romania and Hungary is just astonishing. From a material stand point, Hungary is pretty much now another ... just another European country, not anywhere near, say, West Germany or anything like that. But there are .... the shops are... and the ... and even the large stores are ... are full of goods. Western interests are in there. The large hotels... Hilton hotels and so on. So it is ... Budapest is just another European capital. People are well dressed.

[Scott] There must be a {?} race underway...

[Mose] ...fashionably rich.

[Scott] ...on corporate levels.

[multiple voices]

[Mose] Oh, yes, I think so. There is just vast opportunities there. Prices are very low in Hungary. So it is... it is a good place to even to vacation at this point. We stayed in a very, very nice hotel in Budapest for only 18 dollars a night.

On the other hand the... the downside of it is the... the Hungarians have used their newfound freedom in kind of a libertine way that... that adopting all of the... the worst aspects of western culture. Pornography is just absolutely rampant. Everywhere you turn, everywhere you look you see examples of it. The occult is very strong. It is a... it is a country that has been totally secularized and it is an Atheistic country in... in every way. And so there is ... it is not a pretty sight morally. But economically they are progressing.

[Rushdoony] Budapest is now exercising quite an appeal to the jet set as a place to go for fun and games.

[Mose] Yes.

[Rushdoony] For anything goes.

[Mose] {?} Hotel, for example, has just opened a new casino there so you have casino gambling in Budapest. So I can see that that ...

[Scott] Oh, it is a post war... it is a post war element, really.

[Mose] Yeah. I hadn't thought of that way, but that... that is a good way of describing.

Because, you know, this is what attends the end of the great war.

[Mose] Yeah.

[Scott] ... is total abandon.

[Mose] Yeah.

[Scott] We are alive. Let’s celebrate and so forth.

[Mose] It was a...

[multiple voices]

[Scott] There is a lot of cynicism that emerges.

[Mose] Yeah. That is true. And ... and a despair that comes with that, too. Hungary has one of the highest suicide rates in the world.

[Rushdoony] Oh.

[Mose] If not the highest.

[Rushdoony] More than Sweden.

[Scott] Not the highest.

[Mose] Higher than Sweden even.

[Scott] Oh, my. Higher than Sweden.

There is something in the... in ... in the little items appearing in the press to the effect that the eastern Europeans are... intellectuals are going to Sweden and Scandia generally because they can’t quite make the transition into Capitalism as though it exists. I mean, let’s be fair. There is no Capitalism anywhere. We have a mixed economy here, very similar to... not to the extent of Sweden, but not too far from it. So there... these eastern Europeans intellectuals, according to the press, are looking at Scandia as a pattern.

[Mose] Yeah, that... you hear that very often there. The Swedish model is being put forward as the model for eastern Europe and ...and this is a disaster. The Swedish model

just in the past month has badly deteriorated. The Swedish economy is in very sad shape right now and the last Easy Chair that I visited with you, I think I mentioned signs of ... of cracking in the Swedish economy. And since we had that discussion there has been quite a bit of press in Europe about that fact.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Mose] In fact the... the British Economist magazine this week has a special, about a 20 page special section on the crash of the Swedish model.

[Rushdoony] Well, Sweden has had a favored position among nations because it has not had a war since the Napoleonic era and has had to spend very little money on defense. And in every war it has sold heavily to both sides. So it has been highly prospered by wars. But it has burned up all of that now and it is...

[Mose] Yes, it has used up all of its capital along that line and all of its moral capital and what little religious capital it had left which... which was the foundation, of course, for the very bright economy that Sweden once had.

[Scott] Well, it is interesting. I saw a comment. I think it is in this commentary to the effect that the 18th century ended in 1789 with the French Revolution. The 19th century ended effectively in 1914.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Scott] And it could very well be that the 20th century has ended with the collapse of the Socialist regimes in eastern Europe. And it has take people quite a little while to adjust to this sudden reversal.

[Mose] The sad thing is, though, when you... when you... when you see a country that had the base that Sweden has... had, it is... its own model now collapsing. Its economy is in very bad shape, but it... that now being used as the model for these ...

[Scott] Well, that is...

[Mose] ...terrible countries in eastern Europe. I mean...

[Scott] ... they don’t want it. The intellectuals there don’t want to turn around and say we have been totally wrong.

[Mose] Right.

[multiple voices]

[Scott] ...halfway wrong.

[Mose] It is never going to work in these countries and that is the sad part.

[Rushdoony] Our time is almost up. Gary, do you want to make a summary statement about the trip?

[Mose] Well, maybe I will just avoid summary and I will just want to tell you one other thing about Romania that just really touched me while I was there. That is the spirit of forgiveness that I saw among Christians. A young pastor that I have written about and talked about Dora Popa who for years was persecuted even up until just a... the time of the revolution was arrested and in prison. What... I went with him to the police station. He helped me out with my theft in the hotel room there and after we left the police station he was talking to a police man in a very friendly way and after we left he turned to me and said that that man had been the chief of police up until the revolution and was, in fact, the man who had arrested him and had accused him of being a parasite and harassed him and caused all kids of problems for him. And now after the revolution this... this young pastor is now the chairman of the human rights council in Irad and has a very high government position and he went back to this former police chief and asked him, “Now do you think I am a parasite?”

And the man said, “No, I never thought you were. It was the Communist party officials that made me do what I did to you.”

But the attitude that this young pastor had to the man who had been his enemy had done him great harm, was just the most beautiful example of forgiveness that I had ever seen and another very astonishing example was a church in the city of Medius had received a food shipment from group in Holland and when they got their food allotment from them, their pastor told them to go into their streets of their neighborhood and share the food with the people who had spied on them before. And they did and the neighbors broke down in tears and were on their knees in the streets in front of these Christians who shared their substance with those who had been their enemies.

[Rushdoony] Well, thank you, Gary and thank you all for listening.

[Voice] Authorized by the Chalcedon Foundation. Archived by the Mount Olive Tape Library. Digitized by ChristRules.com.