Libtards Declare: “OBAMA IS NOT A SOCIALIST!!!” (Thou Doth Protest Too Much) (by ContraSuggest)

Don’t Say the ‘S’ Word!

When critics of President Obama’s economic policies employ the use of the word socialism, they are immediately demonized by the administration’s lap dogs as ignoramuses resorting to hyperbole.  I want to be reasonable and fair here.  So in order to see if this holds water, let’s agree on a good working definition of socialism and then see if Obama’s policies rise to the level of that definition.  But first let’s remember that Barack Obama has, over the years forged alliances with several leading socialists.  As president he has allowed the appointment of renowned socialists to influential positions in his administration: Carol M. Browner, the administration’s global warming czar, was listed as one of 14 leaders of the organization Socialists International’s Commission for a Sustainable World Society, which calls for “global governance” and states that rich countries must shrink their economies to address climate change.  Former White House Communications Director, Anita Dunn, publicly praised the mass-murdering former dictator of China, Mao Zedong, as one of her “favorite philosophers.”  Obama’s former Green Jobs Czar, Van Jones, an admitted communist, was forced to resign after it came to light that in 2004 he signed a 911 Truthers petition, calling for an investigation into so-called unanswered questions on the subject of the Bush Administration being complicit in the 9/11 attacks.  The president has never been held accountable, and has never so much as offered an apology, to the American people for hiring self-admitted socialists and communists to fill influential administration positions.   

Now let’s get down to a good working definition of socialism: Socialism is an economic system in which the production and distribution of goods and services are controlled substantially by the government rather than by private enterprise, and in which cooperation rather than competition guides economic activity.  There are many varieties of socialism.  Some socialists tolerate capitalism to varying degrees, as long as the government maintains the dominant influence over the economy; others insist on an abolition of private enterprise.  So, according to our definition, are Obama’s policies dragging our economy more or less toward socialism? 

Let’s outline a few of the president’s main domestic policies, one by one, and hold them up to our definition. 

• A trillion dollar plus “stimulus” package that allowed the federal government to hand over massive amounts of cash to, and buy up shares in, ailing public and private sector financial institutions.  There were at least three more rounds of stimuli (that didn’t stimulate anything except the federal government’s debt), and allowed the feds to pick winners and losers rather than the market  
• An auto bailout package that allowed the federal government to own a controlling share in one of America’s largest companies, General Motors.  GM shareholders were screwed-over while the bloated UAW received a huge windfall (workers of the world unite!)
• A “Cap and Trade” bill that would allow the federal government to penalize private businesses for doing business, by auctioning permits to companies that emit greenhouse gasses, which will impose massive costs on the use of fossil fuels
• A Health Care law that will bring the entire healthcare industry under the jurisdiction of the federal government; including provisions that will force everyone to purchase insurance (whether they chose to or not) and the forcing of private insurers to cover everyone despite health status.  Punitive fines will be imposed to any private citizen or business that doesn’t comply        

Long-term government ownership of both private mortgage securities and formerly private corporations (and don’t forget President Obama actually firing GM’s CEO!); and forcing citizens to purchase health care; are clearly taking us in the direction of the actual definition of socialism: “…the production and distribution of goods and services are controlled substantially by the government rather than by private enterprise.”  In a country where the government does not own private banks and automobile manufacturers, then passes legislation that allows it to own or exercise greater control over those entities, we’ve moved closer to socialism, as accurately defined.  When the federal government moves to expand a hopelessly broken Medicaid program to the currently uninsured; the art of cost-shifting and implementing artificial price-controls on medicines and procedures, will inevitably lead to pricing employer-provided and private coverage out of the market.  After that, the only choice left would be the public option.  So, under the Obama healthcare plan, to a greater degree, “…the production and distribution of goods and services would be controlled substantially by the government rather than by private enterprise;” again, specifically meeting the definition of socialism. 

 

 The Obama administration has continuously stated a need to make our economic system and government policies “fairer;” this notion has been the impetus for a crusade to redistribute wealth from the people who earn money to people who earn little or none.  Raising taxes on the so-called wealthy, and redistributing it to lower income earners in the form of “targeted” tax cuts and new or expanded government benefits, is attempting to further change our free market system from one that relies on profit motive and risk, to one that uses the euphemisms of “fairness” and “government guarantees.”  This clearly rises to the level of the second part of our definition of socialism: “(an economic system)…in which cooperation rather than competition guides economic activity.”   So those who deride Obama’s critics for claiming that his policies are socialistic, either don’t know what socialism is, or know precisely what it is and are just playing dumb.  Either way they’re the ones using hyperbole, and are the true ignoramuses.

The government public sector has never been a sustainable source of economic prosperity; only the engine of the free market, driven by elements of profit motive and risk, can create the type of robust activity necessary to drive the country’s economy.  Although the U.S. private sector has never been completely private, it has continued to perform badly as more and more government controls have been placed upon it.  It’s true that government creates millions of government jobs; but those jobs are not created by entrepreneurs figuring employee expenses into a business model designed to bring about profit.  Each government job’s salary, health and retirement benefits package is paid for by money that is taxed away from citizens, hindering essential economic activity and job creation in the private sector.  The notion that the government can create anything other than the illusion of temporary prosperity, through the hiring of lots of government workers and wealth redistribution, is simply false.  The great economic strides America has made throughout the last century and a half (thriving industry, high standards of living, technological innovations, etc.) were not brought about by government programs, but by the economic growth from a booming free market.  When agents of the federal government (Czars and the like) can tell us how much energy we can consume, what medical procedures we can and can’t get, what kinds of light bulbs we can screw into our living room lamps, when we can afford to buy a car, how much toilet water we may defecate into, and whether or not my elderly grandfather is eligible for a heart valve procedure, our freedoms have eroded to an unacceptable degree.  So welcome to Barry O’s socialist America, aka “New Havana.”