Is Mr Obama a Socialist?

[Deliximus]

increase in size of gov't, i have no problem with that since the free market can't take care of itself. Gov't regulation, PLEASE HAVE MORE, deregulation has fucked the world this time big time. Gov't investment in private business, so who else has the money? sounds good.

 

[blackangst1]

Originally posted by: Craig234

Originally posted by: sandorski

Originally posted by: OneOfTheseDays
It's interesting to me to read the topics in P&N these days. So much hatred and anger coming from the right that is largely unwarranted and completely unjustified. It's troubling that there is such an undercurrent of hatred amongst Conservative America, but I'd rather see them vent their frustration on the internet than do something stupid in real life.

Back on topic, I'm not sure many people here really understand what true socialism is. If they did they would never label Obama as a socialist. The election is over, drop the stupid childish rhetoric.

Pure capitalism is definitely no ideal for this nation. We need some level of government oversight. Otherwise you end up with what just happened to our economy, a few wealthy individuals exploit the system for their own gain and everyone else is left SOL.

A lot on the Right are trying to get back for 8 years of Attacks from others. The vast majority of the attempts to do so are total Fail because the assumptions being taken to "prove" their points are entirely incorrect. They rarely post their misgivings or fears, instead they go straight to the assumed outcome and make declarations based upon what has yet to happen....if it ever happens.

That is what they feel the Critics of Bush did for 8 years. Problem is, that's not what the Critics of Bush did for 8 years.

'The right' is basically the bottom half of America, such as the following groups:

- The ignorant
- The exploiters
- Those who lack values
- Those who have no concern about others
- Those who latch on to the right for specific agendas the right panders to (guns, religious right)
- The bigots on non-white race, homosexuality, gender, etc. (not all bigots)
- The lazy who buy into the Republican marketing materials and don't pay attention to how little the marketing agenda is followed
- The lazy who inherit their party from spouse/family/social circle
- The armchair generals/'gimme torture' crowd
- The victims of fear mongering
- The insecure who need an alpha leader to make them feel 'strong'
- Social Darwinists/Milton Friedman followers/Ayn Rand followers
- The semi-informed people who buy into morally and/or practically weak theories (e.g. 'trickle down', or the other right-wing think tank propaganda)

The one less negative class that comes to mind are the people who want the Republican party to be something it's not. People like Kevin Phillips, John Dean, and many others who were Republicans and have left the party, are these types who have a lot of redeeming qualities and no doubt some are still in the party (Lincoln Chafee comes to mind).

But what are we going to get from this crowd in the list above? Not much - of course they're going to grunt 'socialist' at any Democratic leader and so on. They're grunters.

Although youre clearly biased towards the left, even for you, this is trollish. Youre no better than the religious zealots you hate. Just the polar opposite. Come on man.

 

[DealMonkey]

Originally posted by: Sacrilege

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: ScottMac
Yeah, he sure appears to be; and a slimy Chicago-style empty suit piece of crap machine politician to boot.

Name one socialist thing Obama's done.

He gave bailout money to insolvent banks instead of letting them die like a Capitalist would.

So Bush is a socialist too?

 

[DealMonkey]

Originally posted by: BrownTown

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: ScottMac
Yeah, he sure appears to be; and a slimy Chicago-style empty suit piece of crap machine politician to boot.

Name one socialist thing Obama's done.

increase the size of the government, increase governmental regulations, have the government buy stakes private businesses...

So Bush is a socialist too? Where were you guys for the past 8 years?

But really, let me ask - how much bigger has the gov't gotten under Obama in his first 60 days? How many new regulations are there under Obama? Can you even answer those questions?

 

[ProfJohn]

Originally posted by: Craig234

Originally posted by: Jiggz
I don't think he is but he sure is a Narcissist!

Ya, giving up a wealthy career in a big law firm to do community work proves that. If you were just trying to make the people who grunt 'socialist' look better, you might have.

You need to study Obama's career path.

He was a community organizer BEFORE he went to law school. Yes, he did community work as a lawyer, but to say he gave up a big time law firm job to do community work is 100% incorrect.

 

[Craig234]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn

Originally posted by: Craig234

Originally posted by: Jiggz
I don't think he is but he sure is a Narcissist!

Ya, giving up a wealthy career in a big law firm to do community work proves that. If you were just trying to make the people who grunt 'socialist' look better, you might have.

You need to study Obama's career path.

He was a community organizer BEFORE he went to law school. Yes, he did community work as a lawyer, but to say he gave up a big time law firm job to do community work is 100% incorrect.

Fair enough on the detail, but after law school, he did voter registration, then started a civil rights practice, and then ran for office. So my point on his choosing those sort of 'public interest' activities instead of a well-paying corporate law position stands. His pursuit of power was triggered by a fight to get asbestos cleaned up - the confrontation led him to feel he needed to understand more about power to get things done.

 

[retrospooty]

Originally posted by: Craig234

'The right' is basically the bottom half of America, such as the following groups:

- The ignorant
- The exploiters
- Those who lack values
- Those who have no concern about others
- Those who latch on to the right for specific agendas the right panders to (guns, religious right)
- The bigots on non-white race, homosexuality, gender, etc. (not all bigots)
- The lazy who buy into the Republican marketing materials and don't pay attention to how little the marketing agenda is followed
- The lazy who inherit their party from spouse/family/social circle
- The armchair generals/'gimme torture' crowd
- The victims of fear mongering
- The insecure who need an alpha leader to make them feel 'strong'
- Social Darwinists/Milton Friedman followers/Ayn Rand followers
- The semi-informed people who buy into morally and/or practically weak theories (e.g. 'trickle down', or the other right-wing think tank propaganda)

Wow... that was very well said. I would say that describes alot of the right/republican voters. Not 100% of them, but a good 80% match some or all of those categories perfectly.

Not all republicans are everything on that list, but anyone who is anything on that list is definitely a republican =)

 

[heyheybooboo]

Topic: Is Mr Obama a Socialist?

I would say Mr. Obama is President Obama's father.

And LOL at this thread ...

Get back to me when President Obama actually nationalizes something, comrade.

 

[MotF Bane]

Originally posted by: retrospooty

Originally posted by: Craig234

'The right' is basically the bottom half of America, such as the following groups:

- The ignorant
- The exploiters
- Those who lack values
- Those who have no concern about others
- Those who latch on to the right for specific agendas the right panders to (guns, religious right)
- The bigots on non-white race, homosexuality, gender, etc. (not all bigots)
- The lazy who buy into the Republican marketing materials and don't pay attention to how little the marketing agenda is followed
- The lazy who inherit their party from spouse/family/social circle
- The armchair generals/'gimme torture' crowd
- The victims of fear mongering
- The insecure who need an alpha leader to make them feel 'strong'
- Social Darwinists/Milton Friedman followers/Ayn Rand followers
- The semi-informed people who buy into morally and/or practically weak theories (e.g. 'trickle down', or the other right-wing think tank propaganda)

Wow... that was very well said. I would say that describes alot of the right/republican voters. Not 100% of them, but a good 80% match some or all of those categories perfectly.

Not all republicans are everything on that list, but anyone who is anything on that list is definitely a republican =)

Don't bother with the troll.

 

[SickBeast]

Originally posted by: Sacrilege

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: ScottMac
Yeah, he sure appears to be; and a slimy Chicago-style empty suit piece of crap machine politician to boot.

Name one socialist thing Obama's done.

He gave bailout money to insolvent banks instead of letting them die like a Capitalist would.

LOL. Capitalism would not exist without those banks. Read about the Great Depression, then come back. If you really think we should have let the banks fail, please feel free to move to a third-world country.

 

[irishScott]

Originally posted by: retrospooty

Originally posted by: Craig234

'The right' is basically the bottom half of America, such as the following groups:

- The ignorant
- The exploiters
- Those who lack values
- Those who have no concern about others
- Those who latch on to the right for specific agendas the right panders to (guns, religious right)
- The bigots on non-white race, homosexuality, gender, etc. (not all bigots)
- The lazy who buy into the Republican marketing materials and don't pay attention to how little the marketing agenda is followed
- The lazy who inherit their party from spouse/family/social circle
- The armchair generals/'gimme torture' crowd
- The victims of fear mongering
- The insecure who need an alpha leader to make them feel 'strong'
- Social Darwinists/Milton Friedman followers/Ayn Rand followers
- The semi-informed people who buy into morally and/or practically weak theories (e.g. 'trickle down', or the other right-wing think tank propaganda)

Wow... that was very well said. I would say that describes alot of the right/republican voters. Not 100% of them, but a good 80% match some or all of those categories perfectly.

Not all republicans are everything on that list, but anyone who is anything on that list is definitely a republican =)

Lol. With a few differences/reversals in content you could say virtually the same for the "left" as well. Centrist/moderate-progressive is the way to go, and while I don't agree with Obama on a couple of major issues (which I will not mention here to avoid the inevitable spin-off arguments), so far I'm much happier than I was with Bush. If he'd acted the way he's acting now during the election, I would have voted for him.

As for the topic, I believe, like others, that Obama is a left-leaning Centrist. That said, the guy's been in office for less than 2 months. Let's give him some time before slapping on meaningless relative labels. As Craig234 has demonstrated in this thread, one man's socialist is another man's moderate.

 

[Double Trouble]

It depends on your definition of a socialist. If you want to use the technical definition, then no, he's not a socialist. If you take the more common definition of someone who seeks to expand the role of government, increase government spending on welfare and other social programs, someone who seeks to redistribute wealth from certain groups to other groups deemed more worthy, then yes, absolutely he's a socialist.

 

[Vic]

Originally posted by: Double Trouble
It depends on your definition of a socialist. If you want to use the technical definition, then no, he's not a socialist. If you take the more common definition of someone who seeks to expand the role of government, increase government spending on welfare and other social programs, someone who seeks to redistribute wealth from certain groups to other groups deemed more worthy, then yes, absolutely he's a socialist.

Your 'more common' definition would make every President for the last century a socialist, Democrat or Republican.

 

[retrospooty]

Originally posted by: irishScott

Lol. With a few differences/reversals in content you could say virtually the same for the "left" as well. Centrist/moderate-progressive is the way to go, and while I don't agree with Obama on a couple of major issues (which I will not mention here to avoid the inevitable spin-off arguments), so far I'm much happier than I was with Bush. If he'd acted the way he's acting now during the election, I would have voted for him.

As for the topic, I believe, like others, that Obama is a left-leaning Centrist. That said, the guy's been in office for less than 2 months. Let's give him some time before slapping on meaningless relative labels. As Craig234 has demonstrated in this thread, one man's socialist is another man's moderate.

Also very well said =)

 

[cKGunslinger]

Originally posted by: Sacrilege

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: ScottMac
Yeah, he sure appears to be; and a slimy Chicago-style empty suit piece of crap machine politician to boot.

Name one socialist thing Obama's done.

He gave bailout money to insolvent banks instead of letting them die like a Capitalist would.

I bet you voted for a socialist in 2008.

 

[Siddhartha]

Originally posted by: Siddhartha
When the Republicans accused Mr Obama of being a Comminist\Socialist, I thought that they were doing some Red Scare action to crank up the troops.

This is an interesting column by a Socialist on the subject.

What do you think?

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Obama's No Socialist. I Should Know.

By Billy Wharton
Sunday, March 15, 2009; B01



It took a massive global financial crisis, a failed military adventure and a popular repudiation of the Republican Party to make my national television debut possible. After 15 years of socialist political organizing -- everything from licking envelopes and handing out leaflets to the more romantic task of speaking at street demonstrations -- I found myself in the midtown Manhattan studio of the Fox Business Network on a cold February evening. Who ever thought that being the editor of the Socialist magazine, circulation 3,000, would launch me on a cable news career?

The media whirlwind began in October with a call from a New York Times writer. He wanted a tour of the Socialist Party USA's national office. Although he was more interested in how much paper we used in our "socialist cubby hole" than in our politics, our media profile exploded. Next up, a pleasant interview by Swedish National Radio. Then Brian Moore, our 2008 presidential candidate, sparred with Stephen Colbert. Even the Wall Street Journal wanted a socialist to quote after the first bailout bill failed last fall. Traffic to our Web site multiplied, e-mail inquiries increased and meetings with potential recruits to the Socialist Party yielded more new members than ever before. Socialism -- an idea with a long history -- suddenly seemed to have a bright future in 21st-century America.

Whom did we have to thank for this moment in the spotlight? Oddly enough, Republican politicians such as Mike Huckabee and John McCain had become our most effective promoters. During his campaign, the ever-desperate McCain, his hard-charging running mate Sarah Palin and even a plumber named Joe lined up to call Barack Obama a "socialist." Last month, Huckabee even exclaimed that, "The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics may be dead, but the Union of American Socialist Republics is being born."

We appreciated the newfound attention. But we also cringed as the debate took on the hysterical tone of a farcical McCarthyism. The question "Is Obama a socialist?" spread rapidly through a network of rightwing blogs, conservative television outlets and alarmist radio talk shows and quickly moved into the mainstream. "We Are All Socialists Now," declared a Newsweek cover last month. A New York Times reporter recently pinned Obama down with the question, "Are you a socialist, as some people have suggested?" The normally unflappable politician stumbled through a response so unconvincing that it required a follow-up call in which Obama claimed impeccable free market credentials.

All this speculation over whether our current president is a socialist led me into the sea of business suits, BlackBerrys and self-promoters in the studio at Fox Business News. I quickly realized that the antagonistic anchor David Asman had little interest in exploring socialist ideas on bank nationalization. For Asman, nationalization was merely a code word for socialism. Using logic borrowed from the 1964 thriller "The Manchurian Candidate," he portrayed Obama as a secret socialist, so far undercover that not even he understood that his policies were de facto socialist. I was merely a cudgel to be wielded against the president -- a physical embodiment of guilt by association.

The funny thing is, of course, that socialists know that Barack Obama is not one of us. Not only is he not a socialist, he may in fact not even be a liberal. Socialists understand him more as a hedge-fund Democrat -- one of a generation of neoliberal politicians firmly committed to free-market policies.

The first clear indication that Obama is not, in fact, a socialist, is the way his administration is avoiding structural changes to the financial system. Nationalization is simply not in the playbook of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and his team. They favor costly, temporary measures that can easily be dismantled should the economy stabilize. Socialists support nationalization and see it as a means of creating a banking system that acts like a highly regulated public utility. The banks would then cease to be sinkholes for public funds or financial versions of casinos and would become essential to reenergizing productive sectors of the economy.

The same holds true for health care. A national health insurance system as embodied in the single-payer health plan reintroduced in legislation this year by Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), makes perfect sense to us. That bill would provide comprehensive coverage, offer a full range of choice of doctors and services and eliminate the primary cause of personal bankruptcy -- health-care bills. Obama's plan would do the opposite. By mandating that every person be insured, ObamaCare would give private health insurance companies license to systematically underinsure policyholders while cashing in on the moral currency of universal coverage. If Obama is a socialist, then on health care, he's doing a fairly good job of concealing it.

Issues of war and peace further weaken the commander in chief's socialist credentials. Obama announced that all U.S. combat brigades will be removed from Iraq by August 2010, but he still intends to leave as many as 50,000 troops in Iraq and wishes to expand the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan. A socialist foreign policy would call for the immediate removal of all troops. It would seek to follow the proposal made recently by an Afghan parliamentarian, which called for the United States to send 30,000 scholars or engineers instead of more fighting forces.

Yet the president remains "the world's best salesman of socialism," according to Republican Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina. DeMint encouraged supporters "to take to the streets to stop America's slide into socialism." Despite the fact that billions of dollars of public wealth are being transferred to private corporations, Huckabee still felt confident in proposing that "Lenin and Stalin would love" Obama's bank bailout plan.

Huckabee is clearly no socialist scholar, and I doubt that any of Obama's policies will someday appear in the annals of socialist history. The president has, however, been assigned the unenviable task of salvaging a capitalist system intent on devouring itself. The question is whether he can do so without addressing the deep inequalities that have become fundamental features of American society. So, President Obama, what I want to know is this: Can you lend legitimacy to a society in which 5 percent of the population controls 85 percent of the wealth? Can you sell a health-care reform package that will only end up enriching a private health insurance industry? Will you continue to favor military spending over infrastructure development and social services?

My guess is that the president will avoid these questions, further confirming that he is not a socialist except, perhaps, in the imaginations of an odd assortment of conservatives. Yet as the unemployment lines grow longer, the food pantries emptier and health care scarcer, socialism may be poised for a comeback in America. The doors of our "socialist cubby-hole" are open to anyone, including Obama. I encourage him to stop by for one of our monthly membership meetings. Be sure to arrive early to get a seat -- we're more popular than ever lately.

billyspnyc@yahoo.com



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