Subscribe to Common Dreams News Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
Oh, What a Lovely Class War!
So what are conservatives, Wall Street and financial television commentators shouting? Socialists! That's right. Spread the word: Socialists are swarming over our nation's Capitol and making off with the means of production, otherwise known as campaign contributions and the federal budget. You got trouble, my friends.
The hysteria started during the campaign, retreated a bit but was back full throttle by the day after the inauguration. President Obama's left hand was barely off Abraham Lincoln's Bible when South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint told the January 21 edition of The Wall Street Journal, "What I'm looking to do as a conservative leader in the Senate is to identify those Republicans, and even some Democrats, and put together a consensus of people who can help stop this slide toward socialism."
Newt Gingrich, resurrected yet again, proclaims his Contract on America has been canceled and replaced by Barack Obama's "European socialism." Josh Bolin, founder of the conservative web site Reagan.org is quoted in The New York Times saying, "Socialism is something new for us to hit Obama over the head with," and a panel at the recent Conservative Political Action Conference was titled, "Bailing Out Big Business: Are We All Socialists Now?"
And what do all these pesky socialists coming out from the woodwork want? Why, class war, of course. Arise, ye workers from your slumbers, at least in time to watch early morning TV. On the "Today" show last week, CNBC's Jim Cramer alleged that President Obama was perpetrating 'an agenda in this country now that I would regard as being a radical agenda," adding, "This is the most, greatest wealth destruction I've seen by a president."
Joan Walsh of Salon.com noted several hundred references to Obama and "class warfare" when she searched the words on Google News at the beginning of March and wondered "why are mainstream reporters pushing this storyline?"
The truth is, there's nothing new about any of this. A famous New Deal-era cartoon in The New Yorker shows Manhattan swells in black tie urging neighbors to "Come along. We're going to the Trans-Lux to hiss Roosevelt." And as financial historian Charles Geisst told the Times, "To hear [FDR] referred to as Comrade Roosevelt during that period was not unusual."
But although Obama embraces FDR analogies, in some respects he's a piker by comparison. The Columbia Journalism Review linked to a chart from the National Taxpayers Union and noted, "The top marginal rate of 39.6 percent that Obama is proposing is actually low by historical standards - he may be adopting FDR-style rhetoric, but his tax plan isn't in the same ballpark. And it wasn't only Roosevelt. Throughout the Eisenhower administration, top tax rates exceeded 90 percent. Under Nixon, they never dropped below 70 percent. Even for most of Ronald Reagan's term, they were at 50 percent. Those presidents aren't often thought of as 'class warriors.'"
Nor did Democrats or progressives fire the first shots in any so-called class war. As the recently poorer multibillionaire Warren Buffet said a couple of years ago, "There's class warfare, all right, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war, and we're winning."
America wasn't founded as a nation where winner takes all, but over the last couple of decades that's the way it has turned out. The central vision of "We, the people" has been distorted and manipulated by the powerful and privileged doing their damnedest as they wage class war to sustain their way of life at the expense of everybody else, even in this current crisis.
"Sold Out: How Wall Street and Washington Betrayed America," a report released last week by the nonprofit citizen's group Essential Information and the Consumer Education Foundation finds that "from 1998-2008, Wall Street investment firms, commercial banks, hedge funds, real estate companies and insurance conglomerates made $1.7 billion in political contributions and spent another $3.4 billion on lobbyists, a financial juggernaut aimed at undercutting federal regulation."
According to Harvey Rosenfield, president of the Consumer Education Foundation, "Depression-era programs that would have prevented the financial meltdown that began last year were dismantled, and the warnings of those who foresaw disaster were drowned in an ocean of political money. Americans were betrayed, and we are paying a high price - trillions of dollars - for that betrayal."
The truth of the matter may be that, as Nate Silver wrote at FiveThirtyEight.com, "The stock market is engaged in something of a pity party - the prevailing emotions being fear and loathing. It is concerned about policies which might be burdensome to equity holders in large corporations while perhaps nevertheless being boons to economic recovery."
Add to that a heavy dose of petulance, arrogance and malice stirred further by any attempt at curtailing their rice pudding days. While the dives in the stock markets are real enough, the screams and rending of bespoke garments carry more than the hint of self-inflicted wounds, in the manner of spoiled kids saying, "I meant to do that," when they break a toy, even though this administration is seeking solutions by joining hands with the very financial institutions that got us into the jam in the first place - including private equity firms and hedge funds.
Cries of Socialism! - with their insinuations of sedition and Bolsheviks under the bedstead - ring hollow, especially with the threat of global Communism 20 years past and many in the financial world opting for expediency over ideology. The basic truth is that there are no easy answers, no quick fixes, no kiss to the body politic that will make it all better.
Nonetheless, they lash out, flailing madly, saddling up straw horses and conjuring memories of McCarthy-like witch hunts, desperate to point the finger at anyone but themselves.
- Posted in
48 Comments so far
Show AllIt's interesting how banks and companies whine about strings attached to financial aid, but boy, when the aid goes to individuals and families in need, boy do the radical right-wing pundits and leftover Republican Members of Congress REALLY whine!!
I WAS RIGHT!!! Some the TARP money has disappeared because we are paying off foreign institutions (or their governments behind the scenes).
I am watching David Shuster's 1600 program on MSNBC, and just found out some of the TARP money to Citibank was "invested" in a Dubai company and in a Chinese company!
The toxic non-innovative financial products (garbage) of the Greenspan-BushCo economy have come home to roost.
Mon Mar 26, 2007
"NEW YORK (Reuters) - Citigroup Inc. (NYSE:C - news) said on Monday it will announce results of its cost review by mid-April, amid reports it may cut 15,000 jobs AS SHAREHOLDERS DEMAND BETTER PERFORMANCE AND HIGHER STOCK PRICES.
Mr.Prince (CEO) will have to cut deeply enough to satisfy shareholders like Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, who last July told Reuters that “draconian” reductions were needed."
Would you call this class warfare?
"America wasn't founded as a nation where winner takes all, but over the last couple of decades that's the way it has turned out."
I was raised to believe that WWII was a fight against Facism, and we are still in that fight- we destroyed the German Machine, partly with/by creating our own, and the IMF/WB among others. Again, depends on what the definition of We is.
As to the cry of Socialism.... it's not as dirty of a word anymore (though still dirty). More people are starting to say "Hell, I get to own something and not "those bastards"- that might be a good idea!"
The Single-Payer Insurance proponets have helped greatly just by saying "Hey, you know your insurance sucks, just take a look at Europe- you don't have to do it like them, but you do have to realize that other ways work."
I wouldn't say Socialism is re-emerging, but more people are willing to say that (Class Warfare) it is less red vs. blue "us and them", but creditors and debtors "us and them".
I think (the people on CD) can connect with (people who probably would never now go to CD) by affirming their intellect and opinion (yes "they" have them) by reminding them that We have more in common then not- especially from the prospective of "creditors vs. debtors".
And, IMO, Obama's doing OK... it's just that he's doing a campaign and I want a Revolution. Eat the Rich.
My dad joined the army and fought against fascism in World War II and would feel like a sucker for doing so if he were still alive.
The US voters embraced the fascist policies of Ronald Reagan and his successors, thereby allowing fascism to grip the US.
Few US voters today are able or willing to recognize fascism even as it stares them in the face. Although Obama's policies are more fascist than socialist, 98% of the US population would do as well or better under socialism, compared to fascism.
smipypr
No strings for the uber-robber barons, but when the unionized auto industry needs some help, the strings are braided into a noose.
I note that while we have respectable news commentators and congressmen talking about our “slide toward socialism,” there were none who noted our “slide toward fascism” beginning after 1980, indeed polite liberals regarded comparisons to fascism as being out of bounds. This seems to indicate that only conservatives are considered competent to name political positions, regardless of the content and precedent of thos positions.
Let's see: we've got socialized police, socialized fire departments, socialized public education, socialized water and sewer systems, socialized roads...
It seems that most of those crying havoc about socialism couldn't describe it if you gave them the Cliff's Notes for the entire collected works of Marx, Engels and Trotsky.
ClassAct writes "This seems to indicate that only conservatives are considered competent to name political positions, regardless of the content and precedent of those positions."
...and they'll tell you they're the only victims of class warfare, too.
Not to mention the entirely socialized military-industrial-complex.
Whether anyone wants to admit it or not, obviously not, we are a species of socialism. Not even the darkest deepest loners of society are able to avoid being a part of society and socialism. Unless they're so wealthy as to escape to a wilderness and avoid man kind almost completely. Even still they'd have to donate to society at certain points during life. The problem with socialism is who is benefitting from it at the time. And right now in the U.S. the wealthy are in fear of loosing their battle of controlling society and being at the top of our/THEIR secretive socialism. Pretty much everything we do is in fact a means of sustaining socialism. And the only person I see who comes close to understanding that is a leader in Venezuela.
The sad thing is, only a few of those on your list would be a GOOD example of our current "socialism".
Public schools? A mess.
Police? Corrupt, racist and a license to kill.
Fire Dept? Yay!! Seems they do a good job (from what I can tell, anyway)
Water & Sewer? At least there's clean water when I turn on the tap and the toilts in my house flush. Cost? Not sure about that one.
Roads? Another mess. Potholes galore, clogged with traffic & bridges falling down.
I dunno. Socialism isn't getting such a good name if you look at these programs.
I do get your point, though.
"The sad thing is, only a few of those on your list would be a GOOD example of our current "socialism".
Public schools? A mess.
Police? Corrupt, racist and a license to kill.
Fire Dept? Yay!! Seems they do a good job (from what I can tell, anyway)
Water & Sewer? At least there's clean water when I turn on the tap and the toilts in my house flush. Cost? Not sure about that one.
Roads? Another mess. Potholes galore, clogged with traffic & bridges falling down.
I dunno. Socialism isn't getting such a good name if you look at these programs. "
But if you look at how those things worked before 28 years of republcian (and to be fair, some democratic) ignoring of basic maintenance, those things worked pretty well.
It took Reagan turning the educational system upside down and bad mouth teachers to start ruining schools. We were at the top of the list of test scores, we had higher levels of education and sent more kids to college than any other country in the world. Starting in about 1981, that all started to turn around, satarting with the elimination of music and art studies from schools, to the point where now, we are around 27th in the world in education.
Police? Well, I can't argue with you there. It's taken 28 years of passing laws that make us all guilty before we are proven innocent to relaly make that change, though. Look at the incarceration levels before and after Reagan took office. Once they privatized the "justice" system, levels shot through the roof to where we are now, #1 in prison and probation population in the world. And Clinton putting 100,000 more police on the streets added to that. Justice for money is no justice at all.
Fire depts? No real knowledge of this, but I suspect that they haven't been privatized enough to hurt us yet. If the righties had their choice, it would be totally privatized. I guess they don't see where to make enough money on it to make it worth stealing.
Water and Sewer? Here in the west (I live in Colorado), we are in a constant state of near water war. It's only through knowledge of what water really means out here that it's not privately owned at this point. We have a saying here, "he who controls the water controls the west". And those in the west are pretty indpenedent, sometimes to our detriment.
Roads? Another case, along with bridges, public buildings, hospitals (that aren't owned by private entities), and libraries that have been ignored for the last quarter century. Basic upkeep is not done, and repairs are made in the cheapest way possible. That is why they have gone straight to hell. And also why it's gong to cost ten times the basic repair costs to fix them. It's like our health care system, when people don't have care, they don't go to get preventive care, they wait until it's emergency room time. And then it costs ten times more to do what would have been far cheaper to fix in the earlier state.
Socialism works pretty well when it's not allowed to get lazy for the sake of profit and ignore taking care of what it's built. What you are seeing is the result of privatization, where everything is up for grabs by the highest bidder to profit on. At that point, it's not "cost effective" to take care of things, just to let them go for the sake of making money. It's the profitization of everything that you are seeing, not the "socialism" of them. In spite of what they say, profit doesn't make people more responsible towards things, it just makes them greedy as hell.
LeeAnnG
Great points.
As far as education is concerned, some experimentation has been done with private schools, and as it turns out, they don't do any better than the public schools. No matter how it's done, educating all the different economic and advantage levels in a country as huge as the USA is very difficult. The damage done by defunding during the Reagan administration as well as the NCLB program is hard to exaggerate.
It's been said before, but it bears repeating that when people who hate government are put in charge of the government, the government will not do a good job. Bobby Jindel tried to promote the idea (during his comments about the President's speech to congress) that Hurricane Katrina was proof that the government is terrible during disasters. But FEMA had done a great turnaround during the Clinton years - I just read a very good account of all of that yesterday - and responded to many disasters with expediency and professionalism. When FEMA was gutted and put in the hands of political appointees during the Bush years, it deteriorated rapidly.
When the military privatized its services to companies like Haliburton, the military was charged for food our troops did not receive, and the food the troops did get was often horrid. Mercenaries received salaries disproportionate to what was paid to our service men and women. Huge amounts of money were "lost" and these funds have never been accounted for. Atrocities committed by mercenaries were outside any law, one result of which was to further alienate many Iraqis against the US.
The privatization of our prisons has resulted in an incredible rise in incarceration rates, and conditions are certainly far from humane in many places.
Imagine if Social Security truly had been privatized. I work for a school system, and my retirement is through the state. Not long after I began working, the retiriement system was changed and partially privatized with investments and tax shelters. Mine is secure, and I can purchase medical insurance after I retire with my saved personal and vacation days. Those who are on the new system can only do so for a small portion of their insurance. Everyone who has the new retirement hates it.
"Socialist" or government run programs will never work if the people in charge don't believe in them. They will be underfunded, poorly supervised, allowed to deterioriate, and unresponsive to the needs of the people. Government programs that are run by enthusiastic, well-educated and trained personnel are quite often successful and less expensive to constituents than their private counterparts. But they don't create profits for the ruling class, so they are denigrated by corporate media and the talking heads who fear that they will lose.
Our infrastructure has been sorely neglected for many years. It's not that the government can't do a good job; it's that the Republican government has purposely defunded the government agencies that oversee and maintain our roads, electric grids, and other important needs.
The recent government policies since Reagan have been geared toward making the already fabulously wealthy obscenely wealthy. It's disgusting that the rich and powerful are doing their best to prevent the rest of us from getting the health care, education, and other services that should be a right and not a priviledge - as they are in virtually every other industrialized country in the world.
Sioux Rose
LEE ANN: Good post.
We've had a class war going for over 30 years, now. Reagan fired the first open shot with his "go for it, America" statement, which was a go ahead to all those who were waiting for the call to screw the country over. And they ran with it. The lawyers bought up everything and started suing each other to see who would end up on top. The rest of us have seen our wages drop or stagnate, our benefits disappear, and finally, after W was appointed by a batch of judges, our jobs run off to India and China, who now owns us and our federal debt of $10 TRILLION.
We weren't allowed to talk about it, we just had to buck it up and take the lies about how business needed to be more profitable, like that meant anything to US. How would business being more profitable at our expnse help US? Truth is that it was never supposed to. They have been after us and our lives for decades, it's just lwately with the collapse of everything that people have finally started to wake up and realize they have been duped. Funny how they still worship Reagan, the man who fired the first shot into their soon to be dying carcass.
At least people don't look at me like I have three heads when I mention it now, unlike the names I was called back then for pointing it out. They just didn't want to believe it, but now, they can't help it. Took them long enough to catch up, and I'm no economist, but I knew that if you took the money away from those who needed it and spent it and gave it to those who already had far more than they would ever need or be able to spend, you were going to suffer. now if we can only get the idiot politicians to understand that, and put us back on a sane, workable and sustainable course, we might stand a chance. But it's gong to take alot of shouting down, because money does indeed speak louder than words (ANOTHER mistake the SCOTUS made whe it equated moeny with speech).
Reagan was a genius. He made the American people bend down and have there hands tied around their ankles while they cheered him on ! As you mentioned, they are still cheering for him even after being screwed for a quarter century.
You won't get the idiot politicians to change. They are owned by the people that now have all of the money that was once in the US treasury and most of the money that the US Government continues to borrow on your behalf, your children's behalf, grandchildren's behalf...
Can you say "third world nation" ?
It is another Corporate Media myth that Reagan was or is incredibly popular.
In fact his approval ratings when he left office were worse than Clinton and many other Presidents. One of the major reasons why Republicans kept getting elected after Reagan despite their lack of popularity was a major falloff in voter participation rates not any actual increase in popularity. Rove understood that perfectly well which is why Bush-Rove pushed voter suppression efforts to new extremes. If Republicans could discourage working class, poor and middle class voters then the affluent benefitting from their class warfare were certain to vote in disproportionate numbers.
Maybe it is about time to stop this "Socialism and Liberals" are bad, while "Capitalism and Conservatives" are always to be desired. There will never be an end to some kind of class war, as the wealthy never seem to get enough (example- executives), and the poor and middle class just have to keep fighting to survive. The problem with people is that whichever group gets their way, they will push too far, as labor may have done previously, and capitalists have certainly done recently.
One thing the conservatives have managed to do is grab the issues that work well in elections--morality, gun ownership, nationalism, abortion, freedom, etc. That leaves the progressives social programs, gay rights, gun control, environmental controls, unions, that are easy marks for criticsm. However, when our nation is about wrecked, the Great Obstruction Party has more trouble with their own class war. They will do anything to maintain their power and wealth.
Nonetheless, they lash out, flailing madly, saddling up straw horses and conjuring memories of McCarthy-like witch hunts, desperate to point the finger at anyone but themselves.
The fact that this fanciful swill is all over the MSM is no surprise at all. The fact that anyone with a handful of brains believes it is an indicator of how uninformed and even downright dumb so many in this country are.
Obama needs in his next address to America to say, "The people who brought you the foreclosures,the banks, big money....they oppose my attempts to help the middle class, the working poor. And they do it by saying I propose socialism! This because I want fair tax rates. For the rich included. And they don't want that and try to scare you with the word socialism. Well lay that smear to rest. I demand a fair tax rate for all. What they are fighting against is fairness."
Joe.
It's absurd to call Obama socialist. He's fighting class war alright, on the side of the rich. It's also absurd that being "a socialist" has become an epithet equivalent to being called "a terrorist." What is so wrong with the workers owning the means of production? "Class warfare" is somewhat meaningless, if there is a capitalist class, then it will always fight "class warfare" against the working class. It's time to fight back!
We can't afford the rich.
Nor can we afford those who posture as rich while they're sucking off the government at the same time that they revile socialism.
Take a look at most of those that made a fortune from the Invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.....Their fortunes came from the U.S. Government and many are ex -government: employees, military, and politicians........
Now, look at a list of the Members of The Council on Foreign Relations. It is extensive, but it shows you who are some of the "Power Elite" and the blend of Democrats and Republicans. Now, look at how many of President Obama's Department heads are members of the same group.
Yes, they take care of their own and they make the decisions.
It is called Socialism when it is aimed at the middle and low income populace. It is called government contracts and financial necessity when it goes to the wealthy.
Let's be patriots and help our country rebuild and bring the soldiers home....Unfortunately,Conservative America has decided to help Obama fail and take their money to "Off Shore Accounts" and shut down their factories and businesses......
Those who seem to commplain the loudest about Obama being a socialist seem to be the largest recipients of those socialist redistribution of wealth policies deemed as necessary for the continuance of our economy by the biggest socialist of all times...Bu$h.
It seems the type of socialism that is unacceptable is that which helps the lower and middle classes, who I guess according to the elite are unnecessary for the survival of our economy. Of course when it helps the rich, it's called capitalism. Hummm.
The problems started with Milton Friedman and the Chicago School of Economics, which popularized free markets, dismantling of social programs and government regulations, and privatization of government institutions.
In the 1970s he Chicago School through the CIA helped overthrow the democratically elected leftists Allende government in Chile and replaced it with a military dictatorship. The new right-wing government eliminated government regulations, instituted free market policies, privatized institutions and eliminated social programs. The results were disastrous: social malaise and hyperinflation plagued the populace.
In the 1980s Reagan helped to popularize the free market policies in the United States. He convinced those who most needed it that government was their enemny and not to be trusted. He helped dismantle Keynesian policies instituted during the New Deal. Sadly, people who drove jalopies and barely survived on minimum wage jobs began voting Republican even though that party began the massive redistribution of the nation's wealth that has resulted in the most serious economic problems since the Great Depression. Many lower class and middle class Americans still do not realize that they were duped while those who raped them loll in mansions they have built in Caribbean hideways.
It's time to reclaim the words liberalism and socialism. The Reich Wingers will gladly define them for us if we do not.
We have one socialist in the Senate now. It's a start.
When the choices are clearly between Republican Party rule by Fascism and Democratic Party rule by corporatism, the time is here for the people to proudly raise the flag of socialism.
Wave it wide and high.
Time to reclaim the word "conservative" as well.
It once referred to an ideology that was frugal with the taxpayer's money, not an ideology that drained the US Treasury into the hands of 1% of the US population and proceeded to borrow unlimited amounts of money with no plan for repaying the debt.
Being frugal with taxpayer's money is the element conservatives claimed to stand for but the hidden element was conservatives' support of the elite's plot to enslave the people. It's frightening how "conservative leaders" managed to suppress this element from the minds of their followers. Same with "liberal leaders" and THEIR followers.
Seems there is an "apolitical" solution: Reign in power abuse wherever it manifests, whether public or private institutions. All the people must do their part, of course, by enlightening themselves and shifting their exchange/association away from all power centers and toward their local communities.
People want to see some accountability. How does Madoff get out on Bail, (With stolen money) Was the judge paid off?
Without Accountability - The Poor get Eaten and the Elite ( Bank exec.Cheney, Bushes, ect)
continue to bask in the sunshine of there private beach where they don't have to even see you . Not that they want to
"They have been after us and our lives for decades, it's just lately with the collapse of everything that people have finally started to wake up and realize they have been duped. Funny how they still worship Reagan, the man who fired the first shot into their soon to be dying carcass."
Yes, such as his "trickle down economics." Finally realized the real meaning of that which is basically an insurance policy for rich people to ensure that they stay rich and the rest of us -- well -- look around at reality today!!
People need to realize that the rich could give a s____ about regular people. They are ALREADY rich and are quite willing to rip off regular people to get richer!
There needs to be and I think will be a revolution in this country.
We appear to have a consensus here.
Republicans are Fascists.
Democrats are Corporatists.
U.S.A. =USUAL SOCIAL APATHY
http://www.theocracywatch.org/
The socialists outnumber the capitalists. They'd better be worried because in this economy, the commies'll only grow in number. And I'll call every single one of 'em brother and sister.
So if Obama is Lenin, does that make Larry Summers and Tim Geithner Trotsky and Stalin? Sure, I suppose that were I to promote a Bolshie revolt, I'd put the former head of the NY Fed and a member of the Group of Thirty at the helm. Real radicals, his advisory team. Sheesh.
If there are any two people more vested in the status quo than Summers and Geithner, I'd love to know who they are.
The fools on the right should count their blessings. If the same &^%* keeps hitting the dying fan, "class war" is gonna look less like deals made in nice restuarants between Geithner and AIG deputies and a lot more like more Madame Defarge knitting in the bloody streets of Paris. In other words, it's going to look like class war WITHOUT the quotation marks.
Now I must off to sharpen my pitchfork and light my torch. Aux les barricades!
m horan
http://www.nosuppertonight.com
The United States, historically, has been gripped in a class war since its inception. The wealthy class never has and never will adopt a philosophym of "I am thy brother's keeper". Its "every man for himself" ideology has run straight and true for 200 hundred years.
The poorer class doesn't get it and never has. Tey keep buying into the American Dream and think that all they have to do is follow inthe footsteps of Horatio Alger and, once there, they too can look down on those they left behind.
The wealthy class doesn't give a hoot if the poor class all go bankrupt, lose their jobs, their homes. All they want to do is sabotage the Democrats in power nolw and put all the blame on them for the coming new Great Depression.
In the end, this can only lead to another Civil War, which is why the wealthy class has been inexorably readying the police and military forces to handle large uprisings. We are moving slowly, inexorably towards this horrific period in American history. But the wealthy class again doesn't give a hoot because they know they have the power to handle it. They think! It's going to gegt ugly boys and girls.
The poorer class doesn't get it and never has. Tey [sic] keep buying into the American Dream and think that all they have to do is follow inthe footsteps of Horatio Alger and, once there, they too can look down on those they left behind.
Sadly, from my informal empirical tests, conservatives believe this all too much. Reminds me of Joe the Plumber (JTP).
Sioux Rose
JEROME: There is a lot of evidence to support your contention which I find myself musing about, too. I also think the pattern is gaining tread on a worldwide basis.
Winship is correct. The shoe is on the other foot for the first time in many years and the Republicans haven't a clue what to do other than make noise. And that's all it is - noise. Most of those yelling "Socialist!" don't even know the meaning of the word. These are the people who listen to Rush every day.
I hear some fascists talking about leaving the country because they can't stand it anymore. As if that's any kind of shocking new idea. Hell, I was ready to do so several times during the reign of the King Bush. Now I feel the country has a chance of being restored to what it once was and should be. We have a President who works for more than the wealthiest 3% of us, and he delivers on his campaign promises.
socializm by definition relates to investment in public sector - which in real life is made to serve the private one, so they must be refering to 'socialist shortcut'
edweg
The war has been successful, the wealthy have won. Both income and wealth inequality have moved closer to the late 1920's situation. What is shocking is tracking income inequality through the decades since the '20's, pretty gruesome stuff. With respect to financials 10% of all households own 85% of stocks, bonds etc. These 10% also own 90% of all business equity.
It is no wonder the Forbes article came out revealing the sad plight of the billionaires' losses world wide, it is our duty and responsibility to commiserate with these folks and share in their pain :).
I have always been suspect of the wealthy in America. It seems to me that they don't want a little more or even a lot more. They don't even want way more than a fair share. They want it ALL without leaving any for the rest of us. Greed will be the downfall of the U.S. May God bless us all and I don't just mean Americans.
The Republican hypocrisy is getting sickening. So its not socialism when we bail out billionaire corporations. Its not redistribution of wealth when we are taking taxpayer money and financing a bunch of sociopathic executive weasels who live in mansions and are cheuffered around in stretch limos.
The harsh reality they would see if they uncorked their heads out of their butts would be they have created a system of government assisted privatized profits for near monopoly corporations while socializing the losses. That is neither free market capitalism nor is it true socialism. It is called Republicans prostituting the federal government out to billionaires for the last 8 years.
Hey Mr. Michael Liberal Guy Winship,
Class war is ever-present in a capitalist society. Sometimes hidden, sometimes subtly manifested, sometimes open and roiling. Liberals like yourself, help perpetuate class inequality and class war by refusing to see any reality to the Left of the Democrats or Liberalism. But while the liberals celebrate their latest messiah, be it Clinton or Obama, rest assured, Rome burns.
Within the conflagration, there are real, live, revolutionary socialists, organizing on a local and global scale, who intend to win the real class war, the one that's about us workers taking the means of production from the capitalists and building a democratic socialist society.
Boo!
And I guess we'll have to wait awhile before we can report on our progress on Bill Moyers Journal... .
-- Leon
Leon.
Hi. You say folks organizing are gonna win the class war, folks working within that conflagration, Rome burning while fools fiddle.
Help me with one little thing I am confused easy. Did Mr. Marx say that rich folks would steal more and more wealth while the population grew causing most all regular folks to see their standard of living shrink like money in the stock market or home values?
That only then would they riot and storm the gates and take back a stolen nation's wealth.
Did he say that folks would invert wealth, take it back via violence only, bloody revolution only, but NEVER via organizing while Rome burned?
Only seeing their lives lost would provoke the rage, the action.
Did I learn that down in Hatville as a young 'un in civics? Cause they taught us commies sucked and I got confused.
Thank You, Joe.
busterkikki
As a non-titled student of Socialism in the United States, I would recommend that all Americans read the following: If these books don't grab your attention and reveal the sicknesses of the powerful when unleashed, I will be absolutely amazed at your lack of understanding. These books were written entirely by American authors, many of whom you can recognize, and I highlight those that are best and will make your blood boil the quickest.
Clarence Darrow for the Defense (an Irving Stone Masterpiece)
Eagle Forgotten, John Peter Altgeld, Gov. of Illinois at the time of the "The Haymarket Massacre"
The Jungle By Upton Sinclair
The Iron Heel By Jack London
And dozens of others like these, all of which show the destruction of the laboring class when the Armours, Pullmans, and their ilk bled our country dry.
These are not Lenins or Trotskies, but Americans who only wanted a chance to work and make a living, but often couldn't.
Some of you may see the American problem in a different light and see Socialism as an entirely separate entity than Bolshevism, which was hated by American Socialists. Go on. Do yourself a favor.
socialist thinking takes a mixture of certain perspective on society and conscious humanism / most people have adoptive attitudes so they stick to the non-controversial mode, where lotto and casino mentality is the simple way out (laughable, and yet they have the potential...
/ edweg
The "threat" of global Communism will never be gone while there are still people like me who think that people like Warren Buffet - as well as the politicians who facilitate their depredations - are scum whose greatest service to the human race would be to blow their own brains out before a Workers' Tribunal hangs them from lamp posts!