GAHH!! The evil and utter abhorrence that is Socialism!

[peaceloverugby]

Now, I'm certainly not a political science major, but a little piece of me dies every fucking time a "Tea Party" person or some other conservative pops a vein about socialism. Now, for those of you who don't live in America, or Americans who live under a rock, President Obama has been accused by some (read: Glenn Beck and his Kool-Aid drinking lot) of being a socialist and/or Marxist (among other things, including a dirty foreigner and a fascist). ANYWAYS, back on track. This is not in the least bit true. If Obama is a socialist and/or Marxist, he's a very bad one. Where is the land redistribution? The leadership of the proletariat? The destruction of the bourgeoisie? (Tangent: if anyone worked to destroy the bourgeoisie, it was Bush with his tax cuts for the rich.) When people attack Obama with these names, they do not know, or brazenly ignore, the denotation behind them. They care only about the connotations of totalitarianism, parades through Red Square, Lenin and Mao, et cetera. They are just buzzwords spouted by demagogues and picked up by their followers, meant to raise Cold War, McCarthy-istic fears that people have yet to overcome.

Why is socialism so bad, you might ask? Because it would bring an end to capitalism. And why is capitalism so good? Because the people in power, who decide what is good and what is bad, make a hell of a lot more money under capitalism. Obama is no socialist. As my social justice teacher would say, Obama is America's first half-black president, and its 44th upper class president. He wouldn't be where he is today without capitalism, just look at all the campaign contributions he received from corporations. In fact, compared to other world leaders who actually are somewhat socialist, Obama looks utterly moderate, at best; perhaps even center-right.

My closing request to all those who claim Obama is a socialist/Marxist/Maoist/fascist/foreign/Anti-Christ/pinko commie: Please look up words you don't know, especially before you start using them. And don't watch so much Glenn Beck. You know he's Mormon, right?

[Sage]

It's a cultural thing. I blame McCarthy and the "Red Scare"- The people from that generation have yet to die out along with their ideas, especially given that communism isn't a major threat to the world anymore. The USSR has collapsed, Russia and China are slowly becoming more capitalistic, and the last bastions of real communism, like in North Korea, are widely regarded as ridiculous and dismissed by most people as silly, stupid ideals. While fascism in the world died with a bang, communism is dying with a whimper. A really long, drawn out whimper.

I can't blame them, either- The years after World War 2, the whole Cold War era, were scary times. Communism was a total polar opposite to capitalism. Two polar opposites were both superpowers, and both had enough firepower to destroy the entire world. Though they never fought directly, both of them financed smaller conflicts among their allies like the Korean War and the Suez Crisis. These days, however, there's more or less a single superpower- the United States. China is improving, but again, they're no longer total communists and we can actually work with them on a great number of things. Today, we don't have to live in fear of an entire nation setting foot on our land and gunning down everything that movies or bombing out streets to rubble. All we have now are terrorists. Petty, idealistic and often primitive human scumbags with rocket launchers and towels wrapped around various parts of their bodies. Whooptie-fucking-doo. I guess we can count on the media to blow things out of proportion and get people worried over things that aren't even a threat to us in any sense. Osama bin Laden isn't even in the same league as Hitler and Stalin.

I myself am not a communist. I don't like a number of aspects about capitalism, but feel it more or less works. Socialism, in my view, is giving the state more power to keep powerful corporations in check- because with no one to be accountable to, these corporations will abuse their power.

But, anywho- I'm not too bothered. The tea party crowd is mostly an older generation that grew up in a different world and failed to realize the Cold War ended a number of years ago. Protest and announce your craaaazy ideas like corporate regulation and universal healthcare loud enough and some of them may just have a stroke.

[Perseus]

Haha, Glenn Beck also calls him a Progressive. :P Obama isn't a socialist, but people think he is just because of universal healthcare. I personally believe you shouldn't have to pay for healthcare, y'know, does that make me a socialist? I think it's dumb that the ambulance ride is like a thousand dollars.

[peaceloverugby]

Yeah, I didn't mention progressive because I think Obama was certainly a progressive, and has become more moderate, for whatever reason. They do call him names because of the healthcare reform, which was anything but socialist. If they had passed a good, single-payer plan for everyone, THAT would've been socialist (oops, I guess you all know what my political feelings are now :P). But what he's done is just made it more available, which is a step in the right direction.

[Sage]

I think Obama was certainly a progressive, and has become more moderate, for whatever reason.

It's a whole "bipartisan" thing. The republicans will demand a compromise be made on any new bills and then they'll vote against the bill anyway, leaving a watered down piece of rubbish that no one wants.

[peaceloverugby]

It's a whole "bipartisan" thing. The republicans will demand a compromise be made on any new bills and then they'll vote against the bill anyway, leaving a watered down piece of rubbish that no one wants.

QFT. Could not have said it any better myself.

[Sage]

The problem in US politics is that Republicans have no brains and Democrats have no balls. You can choose between bad ideas or good ideas that won't see the light of day. If a republican had as great a majority in government as Obama did, I guarantee you they would pass every fucking bill they want and be more or less bulletproof. Obama seriously needs to stop taking shit from people who never have and never will support him and pass some goddamned good bills.

[peaceloverugby]

Exactly. When Bush was in office and the Republicans had a majority, they passed everything. Remember when there was talk of using the "nuclear option" to pass healthcare? Republicans used it multiple times under Bush. Remember the hub-bub they raised when Obama appointed people while Congress was in recess? Bush did it on several occasions. It's just this stupid back and forth pointing of fingers. It doesn't make much sense to have a minimum age for politicians when they all act like they're four.

[quartermaster]

Now, I'm certainly not a political science major, but a little piece of me dies every fucking time a "Tea Party" person or some other conservative pops a vein about socialism. Now, for those of you who don't live in America, or Americans who live under a rock, President Obama has been accused by some (read: Glenn Beck and his Kool-Aid drinking lot) of being a socialist and/or Marxist (among other things, including a dirty foreigner and a fascist). ANYWAYS, back on track. This is not in the least bit true. If Obama is a socialist and/or Marxist, he's a very bad one. Where is the land redistribution? The leadership of the proletariat? The destruction of the bourgeoisie? (Tangent: if anyone worked to destroy the bourgeoisie, it was Bush with his tax cuts for the rich.) When people attack Obama with these names, they do not know, or brazenly ignore, the denotation behind them. They care only about the connotations of totalitarianism, parades through Red Square, Lenin and Mao, et cetera. They are just buzzwords spouted by demagogues and picked up by their followers, meant to raise Cold War, McCarthy-istic fears that people have yet to overcome.

Why is socialism so bad, you might ask? Because it would bring an end to capitalism. And why is capitalism so good? Because the people in power, who decide what is good and what is bad, make a hell of a lot more money under capitalism. Obama is no socialist. As my social justice teacher would say, Obama is America's first half-black president, and its 44th upper class president. He wouldn't be where he is today without capitalism, just look at all the campaign contributions he received from corporations. In fact, compared to other world leaders who actually are somewhat socialist, Obama looks utterly moderate, at best; perhaps even center-right.


You are completely correct in that Obama is not a socialist, well at least, his policies are not socialist in character. Socialism, in the truest form, is when a government has complete control over the means of production. This is, of course, not what Obama is advocating; the proper term to describe both Obama and Bush would be corporatist. Socialist and especially Marxist (as you aptly stated), are misnomers, as they do not describe the Obama administration; in the truest sense, there is only one country that is arguable truly socialist today, and that is North Korea—and even that is in dispute.


Why is socialism so bad, you might ask? Because it would bring an end to capitalism. And why is capitalism so good? Because the people in power, who decide what is good and what is bad, make a hell of a lot more money under capitalism.

This is where we part ways, as under a true capitalist system, this would not be true, as government would have no influence in the economy. Of course, in a corporatist system, the corporations and government work in a form of collusion to meet business ends. In a sense, corporatism belies the mercantilist and imperialist predispositions of the United States government. Despite the beautiful capitalist rhetoric of Reagan, or even Thatcher in the UK, privatizing or deregulating a few industries does not denote capitalism; they were not promoters of capitalism, they too, were promoters of corporatism.


My closing request to all those who claim Obama is a socialist/Marxist/Maoist/fascist/foreign/Anti-Christ/pinko commie: Please look up words you don't know, especially before you start using them.

Interestingly enough, fascist is not too far off from corporatist, in many ways, corporatism is a mild application of the fascist economics, as it promotes a business model that is defined by the collusion of government and big business/corporations. Eliminating the stigma of the word fascism and taking it in its purest economic sense—that is to say, solely its academic application— the United States is actually quite close to that system. That is not to say that the means of production are necessarily only controlled by a few corporations with direct government oversight (though that is not too far from the truth in some industries), but that is to say that we have a system (which far predates the presidencies of Bush and Obama) that combines government and corporate power in many industries (which is economically fascist in nature).

“Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power”

-Benito Mussolini

Historically, the American fascination with fascist economic theory goes back, naturally, to the 1920s before fascism had its stigma. An interesting point is that many US lawmakers, prominent citizens and economists alike marveled and applauded Mussolini's economic model. Many advocated for such measures to be taken here within the United States. When fascism became associated with dictatorship, usurpation and nazism, it lost its appeal as a unified scheme, however, many remnants of the fascist obsession remained ingrained in the American mosaic of government interventionism.


The problem in US politics is that Republicans have no brains and Democrats have no balls.

I'd disagree, neither have brains.