Twitter
StumbleUpon
Facebook
Delicious
Digg
Newsvine
Google
Yahoo
TechnoratiSocialism Without a Soul
Newt Gingrich is right: "It is European socialism transplanted to Washington." How else to describe an economy in which the government controls the entire financial center and is now supplying life support for the auto industry? That's on top of the existing socialist economy run by the military-industrial complex, which, thanks to George W. Bush, now absorbs upward of 60 percent of the non-entitlement federal budget.
Although we still have a way to go to catch up with the good parts of the European system, including universal health care, high-quality public education and decent working conditions, we do have a system that is now as socialist in budget size as Europe's. That part I get when I listen to the right-wingers on Fox News bemoaning the reversal of the Reagan Revolution. But what I don't understand is how in the world they can blame this startling turn of events on Barack Obama.
The vast majority of money allocated so far on President Obama's watch is an extension of Bush's banking bailout, which has committed trillions to failed Wall Street conglomerates. I certainly don't want to defend the bailout and personally think the banks and stockbrokers deserve to go belly up, but what does that mess have to do with Obama, who was in college when the Reagan Revolution launched the deregulation that allowed Wall Street to run wild?
Didn't Obama inherit the current financial meltdown less than two months ago from the Republicans, who for eight years under Bush assured us that the markets were not in any need of tighter regulation? Wasn't it GOP congressional members led by folks like Gingrich who pushed though the deregulation legislation that enabled the growth of "too big to fail" financial institutions that now have to be saved by the taxpayers?
Nor has Obama demanded anything more in the way of accountability from those Wall Street swindlers than had the Bush administration. Under both presidents a total of $170 billion was given to insurance giant AIG, and, as The Wall Street Journal reported, at least $50 billion of that money was passed on to top foreign and domestic banks without any public accounting. Indeed, the second in command at the Fed told a Senate committee last week that he wouldn't reveal the names of the banks that grabbed our money.
Nor has there been any serious demand put on the banks to use the hundreds of billions in federal funds they received to increase liquidity. Indeed, the banks are raising interest rates and cutting limits on credit cards at a time when the government is hoping consumers will use those cards to pump some life into the retail market. As bank industry analyst Meredith Whitney wrote in a Wall Street Journal Op-Ed article, consumer credit card lines "were reduced by nearly $500 billion in the fourth quarter of 2008 alone." She estimates that credit card limits for consumers will be halved over the next year, mostly on consumers who have not done anything wrong. This will take "credit away from people who have the ability to pay their bills," she notes.
So what we have here is socialism without even the pretense of a soul. Certainly that has been the case with the abject refusal of the banks that received government bailouts to be more aggressive in preventing home foreclosures. And the Obama administration has made it clear that it has no intention of taking over the operation of any of the mega-companies that are in trouble, even when, as in the case of AIG, the government already owns 80 percent of the shares. The reason? Because that would be viewed as nationalization.
So what exactly would Obama's critics do differently? Nothing on the bailout side. Instead, they have settled for carping criticism of the stimulus package, playing games by nitpicking lesser-cost programs while ignoring the big items that most governors, be they Republican or Democrat, eagerly want. The great fear of the GOP seems to be that some of the stimulus program might actually prove helpful to struggling Americans, but the Republicans can't just come out of the closet and say so.
What they have picked up on instead is that Obama's tax cuts provide some redistribution of income to favor the rapidly disappearing middle class at the expense of the super-wealthy, who have profited wildly from Bush tax cuts. Which brings us back to Gingrich's complaint that Obama is importing European socialism. If that means a system of governance in which a robust middle class is rewarded for work with a strong social safety net supported by higher taxes on the most affluent, well, let's get it on.
36 Comments so far
Show All"And the sad thing -- Americans don't even believe they deserve better."
The polls show otherwise.
I lived in the USA until about age 35.
Now I live and work in Britain.
Britain has the worst health care system in the European Union.
I've had to use it on 4 or 5 different occasions.
But guess what, this "worst" system gave me the care I needed, including a week in the hospital once, for 7% out of my paycheck. Actually that covers the state pension too (social security).
No bills, no forms, and I could choose a local doctor as my primary care physician. No arguments, no lawyers, no court cases or arbitration. No bankruptcy.
Only one job.
Get well.
So far I can see that the worst Europe has to offer is already much better than even those with in insurance in the USA get.
What's interesting - and dishonest - about those who oppose universal care is that they always point out the faults in other country's systems.
Well, aren't we, the US, supposed to be the "best" and the "greatest?" Can't we avoid the mistakes and shortcomings other systems have made?
And would the Canadians, or the Europeans, or the Japanese or Taiwanese ever trade their universal systems, faults and all, for ours?
Never!
Of course, many of us here in the US entertain the idea that whatever "big government" does is bad. And with presidents like George Bush putting their incompetent cronies in charge of things they have a point: sort of. Because to make government work competent serious people who actually believe in healthcare, protecting the environment, public education, etc., have to be put in charge.
Will the private sector offer universal health care? Let's assume they would. Fine. Then let them do it. But we know they never will. So who does that leave to provide this vital basic human need? That's right, the Fed.
We don't like Social Security or Medicare, some anti big government purists may ask? Oh yeah? Look at the polls.
What is the big deal about SOCIALIST programs?
Doesn't anybody know that our national debt is owned by CHINA?
That we are literally the financial posession of a COMMUNIST world power?
Does anybody out there recognise the irony of this?
Hello?.... am I alone?
Good point. Just tonight, my republican father was talking to me about how he was so worried he might lose his job and how there was no way he would be able to get healthcare because of pre-existing conditions. I told him that even the early proponents of free market capitalism (Adam Smith) recognized that it is a system that concentrates wealth into the hands of the few, and that an important role for government would be to redistribute some of the wealth in order to maintain a society that one would actually want to live in. He said, "yeah, but at least we aren't socialist." I nearly lost it.
Ouch! I sympathize with you there. The issue is not whether are not we are socialists. Every civilization to date has had some form of socialism. The issue is more about figuring out the rights, privileges, and responsibilities of the individual to the collective and vice versa.
This shows just how effective the brain-washing is.
Here is this man, worried about his job, and then his health care...and yet despite the absolutely deadly nature of these fears (I'm being literal here, no health care is certainly deadly)....he STILL says "at least we aren't socialists"....
I would have lost it too.
This is beyond stupid.
It's not even wrong.
You are mostly preaching to the choir here if you discount the few libertarians who *might* disagree.
I'm an Obama critic. One thing I'd do differently is simply cancel all the f'ng debt already! For everyone. Throw the bills in the fire. Most people will never ever pay it all off no matter how hard they work, all while they are told by those in higher income brackets who got their cushy jobs because they knew the right people that they just need to "set goals" or that they are untalented and lazy.
Create a living salary. $22 an hour. I say salary because if we make having a job a right, it will cause an influx of new workers and thusly, possibly allow for a reduction in hours but it will still be equal to getting paid for 40 hours. When people make more money, they tend to not get stuck financially as much.
Universal single-payer healthcare AND education. You'll have a healthier pool of workers and that pool of workers will be able to get educated and trained in whatever field they want, for free.
That's just the beginning.
Why you God damned socialist! How dare you attack everything American. Next it will be God, Mom, and apple pie.
To follow up on madlib (1:34pm)"The right know perfectly well Obama had nothing to do with this". Well, of course. But they have had a plan for the last year to be content with a loss in 2008 becasue the economy was going to fall apart in 2009 or 2010, the Dems wouldn't know what to do and would make a mess, and by 2012 they'd have their permanent majority. Things fell apart a little sooner than expected, but they're clearly sticking to the plan. Rush is NOT the leader of the Party. He is the mouthpiece.
The sad part is, this is a crisis of debt, not liquidity as our esteemed Secretary of the Treasury would have us believe, and like it or not, you cannot borrow and spend your way out of debt. So, the R's may have a winning ticket.
PS. Note that they knew trouble was coming and I bet the Dems did too. (Or they are truly stupid)
Obama's economic stimulus'a continuation of the Bush administration policies to favor the super wealthy, with minor cosmetic tax retouches that won't fix the damage caused by Bush, not by a long stretch.
These retouches are designed to deceive the "audacity of hope" fools, and it's working so far, this article is proof.
Most Republicans don't even know what Socialism is.
They even equate progressive taxation with Socialism. And regarding such subtleties as left wing Socialism and right wing Socialism and democratic Socialism and Stalinism and Trotskyism and all the other varieties, homegrown, foreign, historic or contemporary, they really could care less.
But the term "socialism" is a most convenient pejorative, bringing up all the old associations with Stalin and Mao and all the rest of the worst. They won't even consider that Eugene Debs was beloved even by stalwart Republicans in his time, and that for the most part, like Norman Thomas, he was highly respected.
All they want to do is protect their own perks, wealth, power, and class interests. So taxing the rich becomes "envy" and "class warfare." And regulation is linked to Stalin's show trials.
Class warfare indeed! Are we, for the sake of a myth, the myths Reagan et al gave us, willing to surrender once again?
Let's take a look at the bush legacy in photos:
http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0%2C29307%2C1882089%2C00.html
Lets be clear here, when Obama signed the second bail out bill, opposed by most of the country and most economists it turns out.....when he signs the Omnibus bill that he said he wouldn't, both bills absolutely stuffed with pork and as it turns out with no urgency to get either done quickly....he owns it.
No more I "inherited it".........this is Obama's to fix or fold at this point.
And socialism, smocializm......thats right wing talk radio stuff....he is simply trying to push thru his social agenda while he thinks he has the opportunity. Unfortunately I believe he is getting very, very bad advice.
What was being described, mainly by the right, as pork in the first bill didn't sound particularly porkish.
It isn't socialism yet. It's still "anti-socialist Social Democracy"; the demos is already demanding more of its own wealth.
History makes so much more sense to me now, since I've been able to watch, in real-time, the unravelling of a seemingly all-powerful ideological regime, that of neo-liberalism proclaimed at the end of the USSR & centered in the US, and the first auguries of a real, not imagined, revolution in progress.
Don't stand in the doorway don't block up the hall,
For he who gets hurt will be who has stalled --
There's a battle outside & it's ragin',
It'll soon shake your windows & rattle your walls . . .
But much more than the mere change in social mores which was coming at that time . . .
Saint-Just March
"What was being described, mainly by the right, as pork in the first bill didn't sound particularly porkish"
The first bill was Bush's and that one had plenty of pork in it, but not nearly as much as the second one (which I assume you are designating #1)most of that was pork, things that did not have anything to do with creating jobs or helping the financial sector.
LEFT or RIGHT, pork is pork and anyone knows if something is pork or not.
As to an unraveling.....lets wait a bit and see. Perdictions of a funeral may be premature.
A good day to you.
What was being described, mainly by the right, as pork in the first bill didn't sound particularly porkish
At least among the examples used by the MSM as pork, I found quite a few good projects that I'd support. For instance, I do not consider funding a library "pork." A big mag-lev rail-line is only pork if there is no innovation being tested.
I guess I have a very different view of pork.
Right -- pork to me is something that is a clear give away without any real benefit to the greater society. One example in my state (maybe not pork, but how people in power use it to their own advantage) is that there is a specific tax loophole for depreciation of daycare centers - because one of our legisltators owns a bunch of daycare centers. But he won't vote for benefits for kids and families who need daycare. When I do Taxcut online for my state, it asks me if I have a daycare center that I can deduct the depreciation on. It is unbelievable.
Pork is a word that is thrown around. Your illustration is a very good example of how to differentiate. And even though it seems like a good cause (daycare), it is most likely a misapplication of funds.
Joe
Thanks for the daycare example - I had no idea. I'm going file this away to use as ammunition :-).
As pointed out earlier, we've got socialized police, socialized fire departments, socialized public education, socialized water and sewer systems, socialized roads, socialized military industrial complex, socialized terrorism, socialized violence, and socialized poverty. Them rightwing assholes must be confronted. Don't give up the fight !
Hmmm, what we are doing is not socialism at all.
Where is the control of production? We through the govenrment own large stakes in big companies but the control still rests in private hands (ref. Citigroup making a profit after we bailed them out - see frank1959's comments on this thread).
There is no pretense of egalitarian distribution either, and as raydelcamino points out this is pure corporate control of the government - Fascism at its best. We are still privatizing profits and socializing debt.
not only that but the stock market loved it, frank...
and madlib...sounds to me like you are asking if truth will win out in the end?..
and if you are, i think that it will, but only eventually, it takes awhile till people are willing to hear it.. not to mention that the truth tends to meander
Nov. 2008: "Citigroup was nationalized Sunday night with the government (meaning We The Taxpayers courtesy of President George W. F@#king Bush) deciding to back $306 billion of the bank's loans while pumping at least $25 billion into the ailing company..."
March 9, 2009: "Citi Chief Executive Vikram Pandit said the bank was profitable in the first two months of this year."
Now that's my kind of 'socialism' - We The Taxpayers eat $306 billion of Citi debt and also give em another $25 billion in spending cash, and they - not us, they - "earn" $8 billion IN PROFIT in just over 2 months.
If "the government" ate my bad debt and handed me a few billion in petty cash, I guarantee I could earn a f@#king profit, too...
I am halfway surprised that Bush and Obama have not bailed out Bernie Madoff. He could have turned a profit too this year if he had such generous help. Or I guess some Wall Street crook had to pick the short straw and be thrown under the bus to "prove" to all the suckers that there is "justice" in the US of A.
Take it easy frank, just the annual property tax bill on any one of the many mansions each of those financial industry executives owns runs into the six figures.
Add the insurance, upkeep, etc. and you are looking at real money. The fleets of yachts and aircraft they own are even more expensive. Expecting these people to live on less than an 8 figure income is cruel and unusual punishment.
Besides, we will all be enriched by their trickle-down. Just be sure to wipe off the trickle down before it dries or you will smell like piss.
The right know perfectly well that Obama has nothing to do with this. They are not stupid. They know he has been in power for less than two months and has not passed that much legislation.
The political right wing in the United States owes its entire success over the past 30 years to control over the mass media and skilled use of distortion and outright lying to create false beliefs necessary to passing laws that don't benefit people. Hear that Newt? Are you listening? You know that your friends on the political right use lies don't you? I hope that bothers you.
O.K. It's obvious that the Republican playbook for 2010 and 2012 is to portray Obama as the demonic guy (not openly using race) who introduced socialism into American. The intelligent response to this, and I hope everyone is listening to my idea, would be to point out what they are doing and how they are trying to blame THEIR policies on Obama.
It's no exaggeration to compare their handwringing about socialism to the famous "Big Lie". The Big Lie was the hitlerian technique of constantly repeating a falsehood until it is believed as if it were true. The logical antidote is to endlessly point out how Republicans broke the bank with irresponsible spending and are now trying to pass the buck.
Am I wrong about this? Are we just using their frame and helping them? Clearly we cannot ignore this. Please respond.
Stop making excuses for Obama, he voted for Bush's bailout, he voted to fund Bush's wars and he's continuing his policies. He's even kept his Secretary of Defense.
Obama's the black version of George W. Bush, no amount of apologies and excuses will change that.
Lies don't bother Newt.
Newt knows that lies equal big campaign contributions, a simple economic model that even a moron can understand.
I'm searching in vain for evidence of "socialism" in either the military budget or the bank bailouts. Socialism, defined as broadly as I can get it, is state control of production, and egalitarian distribution. What you have with the bank bailouts isn't state control, just state handouts; and the distribution is anything but egalitarian.
It would seem to me that this is the opposite of socialism.
Exactly. It is not just about state involvement --it is about the state representing the greater good. We are so far from that. And the sad thing -- Americans don't even believe they deserve better.
It's socialism for the rich, and the rich only, at the expense of everyone else.
Or in your terms: the rich control the state, the rich control production thus state control of production. Profits are privatized, costs and debts are borne by the population thus distribution of income to the oligarchy.
The US corporate welfare we have witnessed on a grand scale for the past quarter century and are now witnessing on an ever grander scale is pure FASCISM, not socialism.
Unfortunately the fascists control the agenda in DC and thay can label anything anyway they want to and lie about anything and get away with it.
Obama does not challenge the fascist lies and we have all learned from the Republican noise machine during the past quarter century that a lie repeated three times and left unchallenged becomes a fact.
So what exactly would Obama's critics do differently?
Finish looting the nation, literally stealing every penny they can, then move on, like a plague of locusts, to gut the next bunch of suckers somewhere else in the world. This is solely what Reaganism/Bushism was always about.
That's about it. The first mistake one can make is to assume that "Obama's critics" on the right or virtually anyone in the Republican Party has any intention to deliver honest criticism or has any sense of decency or shame. They have a job to do and it has nothing to do with the common good or with good governance.