>>...coopted by a right-wing dictator, just as Stalin did

To be fair, that was before Stalin (the bolsheviks, who believed in a ruling elite took it over from the mensheviks who were little-d democrats).

I'd offer a Spain as an example in which the progressives weren't taken over, but the more liberal changes they were making led to the rise of admittedly-fascist Franco and that tragic revolution.

I think there were two keys to our American revolution not being taken over. First, it was a revolution of merchants, and second, George Washington.

Agreed that Orwell said no such thing, not even in his other works. My personal favorite is his "Down and Out" - he certainly had a view of society from the bottom