Except that

1) The government controls the media, so it is really hard for an honest reformer to get his message across to the public.

2) If a reform politician starts to really get somewhere, the government throws him in jail or has a bullet put through his head.

If case you don't know communist countries held elections too except in practice you could vote a single party.

communism [kom-yuh-niz-uh m] noun

1. a theory or system of social organization based on the holding of all property in common, actual ownership being ascribed to the community as a whole or to the state.

2. (often initial capital letter) a system of social organization in which all economic and social activity is controlled by a totalitarian state dominated by a single and self-perpetuating political party.

In what ways is current Russia different than the second case? From what I understand Putin's party fits much of this description. I'm not being argumentative, I appreciate your insight.

Communism is better described by the line of thought started by: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-m...

I generally feel that taking a definition from a dictionary dominated with post war US propaganda terminology, might not be the best way to hold a constructive conversation regarding communism.

Taking a definition from literal communist propaganda website (marxists.org, really?) isn't much good either. I'm sure national-socialists describe themselves in nicest terms too.

I am taking one of the foundational documents of the marxist movement as a basis... I feel it might be somewhat more authoritative to start a discussion on the ideas espoused by them. However at this point I give up, it feels relatively pointless to try and discuss Marxism in this thread, especially when to do it properly you need to get into the details of the economic theory versus it's implementations on particular pre-existing socio economics systems.

Just because I can't resist if you are curious, try to read about how Marxists proposed to implement communism, and what sort of pre-requisites they envisioned in order for a transition to be successful, versus how it was implemented in existing societies.

It's more like a creed: "here's what you're supposed to believe in if you want to call yourself a communists". We generally accept that religious movements' definitions of such creeds; why not political movements?

National-socialists had one, too. I'd say it's pretty upfront about what they really were about: http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/riseofhitler/25points....

I don't know where you got this definition but it's so broad that it would easily encompass Nazi Germany, which was certainly not communist, or Napoleon III's France.

Any modern form of Communism must have some link to the theories of Marx and Engels. Putin's Russia has no such thing, it's a simple oligarchy led by a semi-formalized dictator for life. See also: Gaddafi, Pinochet, Batista, Mugabe etc etc etc.