Let's face it, the old Soviet Union was no more Communist than we are a Representative Democracy. Those sociological labels were/are just starting points for governmental ideologies that morphed over time to become the hulking beasts that, in the former case, imploded, or in the latter case has ground to a near standstill. The Conservatives of this country scream like a cartoon wife who has just seen a mouse whenever the word 'socialism' rears it's head, but don't seem to mind government intervention when they're about to go bankrupt...or they just met their son's boyfriend. There was a lot of rhetoric from the Right that Obama's tax plans are designed to 'redistribute wealth' as if The Communist Manifesto is what he reads to his children at night. I have attempted to decipher Obama's tax plans, and they don't seem to be all that different from what we already have, except that instead of giving the tax breaks to the big corporations in the hope that they'll trickle the joyous bounty down to us little folks(how's that been working for you all so far?), the tax breaks will now go to those of us at the lower end of the ladder. We've endured eight years of being trickled on. Eight years of watching CEOs make obscene salaries while the workers of this country barely scrape by. We've seen jobs shipped overseas where labor regulations are non-existant, and the minimum wage is pennies. The rich have gotten richer, some of whom I will grant you worked their asses off for it and have every right to want to keep it, but the poor are getting poorer. And many of the poor are working every bit as hard as the rich, but without the tax balloons and stock options and other fiscal safety nets available to those at the top. I don't advocate rewarding welfare scam artists, or people who won't work, but I see nothing Communist with shifting the focus from those who don't really need any sort of help, especially since we have seen in graphic detail just how much some of the richest bastards couldn't care less about anything but the bottom line, to those who just can't get a toehold on the American Dream. Obama is not going to put on a green jerkin and start raiding corporate bank accounts and then dump the cash from a helicopter over 'the hood'. Hopefully what he'll do is make it possible for lower income families to finally make some progress toward not just getting by, but maybe even getting a little bit ahead. I don't think that makes him the new Lenin.
7 comments:
My feelings exactly. I think it started 28 years ago with Reagonomics. In Europe Thatcher did much to same. Overall the UK seemed to do better expect there was more poverty and unemployment than when she started. Nice to see your country doing better, less fun to you find out you paid the price.
Funny. Pretty much the sort of thoughts I've had lately.
I've been reading the blogs of some acquaintances, and have been rather taken aback by vehemence.
Some claim that he only got votes because of the color of his skin. I am sure this is true, to some extent, but the I'm just as sure that the opposite is true. I have no doubt that many did not vote for him simply because he is black.
Then there are the rants of how he is going to turn the country into a socialist state... Sigh. Good luck with your plans to move to Scotland - don't bother to write.
The Republican Fear Machine is chugging along at full force, and has lost no steam as yet. I can't wait until it is broken down on the side of the road, a monument to ignorance.
Give it time. This campaign had moved to warp 11 and realism was thrown by the wayside. Especially the McCain campaign kept upping the ante of fear and the Obama said responded with ever higher towers of hope. The high mark was election day and now it's all over.
You can just turn it off like a powerswitch. It will take some more time and frustrating it may seem at face value, the time between election and inauguration is a good thing.
The socialism part amuses me to no end. These people have no idea what socialism is (ironically enough, the former USSR c.s. didn't know or care either - it was a thin guise for a one party dictatorship). If Obama does what he says he'll do (or will be able to, given the empty wallet and I.O.U. he has to work with - let's not forget the previous administration robbed the state coffers blind) we are looking at a friendlier capitalism, that acknowledges that you need to a stable society at all levels as opposed to one the hits the roof and then crashed into the ground ad nauseam with all the people falling victim to it. There is nothing wrong with becoming rich, even filthy rich, yet if you destablize society by making it possible to break Joe Average, your heaps of money will eventually buy you nothing. If Reagan, Bush and Bush followed that path, the USA would have been a wealthier, more advanced society. We would be planning the launch date of the Mars mission instead of wondering what to do to prevent a system meltdown.
There are two ways to rob people of hope and thus to will to go forward: regulating everything to the detail or leaving the system to deregulated energy and make it possible that a few rob a lot of people of the means to do anything but survive from day-to-day.
Capitalism does work, financial anarchy does not.
Can someone call the firebrigade, my horse has grown so high I'm can't get off of it :D
On a lighter note, this quote from BBC's Friday Night Comedy:
'No one dared to believe Americans would put aside their prejudices and elect a president with a brain'.
I share your thoughts too. . . I have hopes for this presidency that are reminiscent of the Kennedy administration. For the first time in a VERY long time, I have hope for this country, and I think that's a good thing. I don't think Obama can work miracles, but I do like that he said a) it will be a long road back (smacks of honesty to me) and b) it's up to ALL of us to pitch in and help ~ he can't do it by himself. Having a mostly Democratic congress should help though!
Damn! I was hoping this article was going to cover the veiled threats the Russian "President" has already made to Obama.
I just read an article on what the Russians are doing, and it sounds to me like the standard saber rattling that has been going on in Europe since the end of WWII. Plus all the crap Medvedev is whining about is Bush's stuff. It sounds like he wants to work with Obama.
“Russia is convinced of the need for the gradual development of cooperation between our countries,” the telegram said, according to a Kremlin transcript.
“I count on constructive dialogue with you on the basis of trust and taking into account each other’s interests.”
Despite Putin's agressive stance(I hold no illusions that Medvedev is anything but Putin's puppet) I don't think Russia is in a position to start anything big. Their military is antiquated and underfunded, and the last thing they can afford is a real conflict.
Or so it seems to me. :-)
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