Trump Jr. to young conservatives: Don't get indoctrinated by these loser teachers pushing socialism

No, we don't know that it can be done, and you and everyone else needs to be honest about this. You're hoping and assuming it can be done here because it was done elsewhere. The United States is not other countries. What works in a small European nation isn't necessarily going to work here.

Imagine that on a grander scale. It's the system itself that has failed, and it failed people in our country under our government. Furthermore, to compensate for the failure of the public system we finally allowed people to acquire care in the private system. Where are people going to go when UHC fails us - overseas? Behind closed doors, paying cash out-of-pocket because there isn't a private HI system?

No thanks.

Now, we're parting ways even further. I think America is the greatest nation on earth, and we don't need to be forced to make choices that we don't need to make now.

Watch costs explode and the quality of care diminish. As P.J. O'Rourke quipped, if you think healthcare is expensive now, wait till it's "free".

It astonishes me how people think that adding a massive and incompetent layer of federal and state government bureaucracy on top of an entire segment of our economy (or anything else, for that matter) is going to improve quality and reduce overall costs.

How are insurance companies going to "adapt just fine" when Kamala Harris & Co. eliminate them entirely? They can't because they won't be around to adapt.

Expanding Medicaid is one thing, but extending it to everyone - aka "single payer" - is quite another.

 

I’m sure trump who is well educated was speaking from experience

No doubt he has had to relearn much of what he was mistaught by the lib teachers

 

Scandinavian countries.

 

I can't quote any socialist, Marxist, or other proponent because they can't or won't admit that blind and unchecked "altruism" is one of the inherent problems with socialism.

We've already been over this, Kode. Perhaps the most glaring internal flaw within socialism is that the theoretical ideal cannot be implemented here in the real world where people actually live. We don't live in a theoretical world inhabited by theoretical people. It's been said that socialists are trying to create an impossible world for an impossible humanity, and I think that observation is accurate.

The pure theoretical libertarian ideal is a utopian construct, just as the pure theoretical socialist ideal is a utopian construct. Neither one can be successfully implemented because, once again, we're talking about creating an impossible world for an impossible humanity. In both cases, people just aren't up to the different challenges that both of those utopian constructs demand.

There's a theme that runs through the novels and short stories of Nobel laureate William Faulkner, and it is this: Man cannot defy Nature with impunity. That includes Man's own nature. In many of his works, that observation applied specifically to slavery in the Antebellum South and its malformed progeny, Jim Crow, but it also applies to just about everything, including socialism. To some extent, that observation applies to socialism's individualist antipodes, because Man is a social creature. A system that is inconsistent with human nature is doomed to failure.

That's an interesting observation because the late Jean François-Revel devoted an entire book, Last Exit to Utopia, to the subject of the survival of socialism in the post-Soviet world. Furthermore, I was a somewhat of a "progressive" myself until the crumbling edifice of socialism in the Communist Bloc forced me to examine not only what happened there but my own personal views. By the time the USSR fell in 1991 I had already reached my own conclusions and gone my separate way but you're telling me that the world movement still hadn't finished summing up past experience by the end of the decade.

How is that?

Revel's argument, and I'm inclined to agree with it, is that the world socialist movement didn't want to face past experience, so it chose to retreat into the "impregnable fortress of the utopian ideal". I can see this in your own posts, as well, but the Left's furious reaction to the publication of Le Livre noir du communisme: Crimes, terreur, répression in France in 1997 is probably the most notable example of that unwillingness to face past experience, and I think that is what we saw and are seeing in Venezuela. Past experience was there to learn from, but they ignored it. How that relates to the world socialist movement, I don't know. Given that the movement has to be heterogenous I can't define what it is and what it stands for beyond the broad socialist umbrella. However, I'm incredulous that the movement was incapable of summing up past experience by the late 1990s when myself and many others were able to do so. Something else is obviously at work there.

Furthermore, one need look no further than Clement Attlee's democratic socialist government in post-WWII Britain and his nationalization programs to see the alternative socialist strategies that were available to the world socialist movement and the socialists in Venezuela by the late 1990s, so there's something else to that country's decent into the same horrible economic, political and human rights conditions that existed throughout the Communist Bloc.

What, if anything, am I missing here?

Puhleeze. Chavez, Maduro and the rest of the socialists in Venezuela are responsible for their own misguided economic ideas/policies, authoritarian impulses and violent streak. The people aren't dumpster-diving for food and protesting in the streets on account of "U.S. intervention and interference" - they're doing it because Chavez, Maduro & Co. destroyed their economy and democracy. I'm not seeing all this "good" you say they brought the country. In fact, I see quite the opposite - they've brought destitution and dictatorship to Venezuela.

 

If you want to bring up Israel to support your argument you should provide data on the cost of their universal health care viz a viz the amount of US monetary assistance they receive.

 

So true, and it was music to my ears to hear Trump say that in his SOTU address.

 

Says the recipient of a silver spoon in his mouth at birth, who has never had to work an honest day in his life.

 

What's an opinion that I can't prove - the fact that the people who want government-run HC in this country want government-run HC in this country or the fact that the VA's performance has been poor?

Of course, the people who want government-run HC in this country don't mention the VA's poor performance. Why would they?

The question in my mind is how many of the proponents of government-run HC have actually thought about the existence and performance of the government-run HC we already have in this country? I have to believe a lot of them haven't and the rest of them just ignore it.

 

LOL!!!!! So they operate secretly with secret agenda and goals that they never mention but you know about it all somehow! LOL!!!! And you don't think you just threw away the last remnants of your credibility? LOL!!!

[/QUOTE] We've already been over this, Kode. [/QUOTE]
Yes and you don't learn and won't look into it to find out. So you keep posting BS like this.

Oh, well in that case please tell me who identified the theoretical basis for you which is to be implemented.

[/QUOTE] We don't live in a theoretical world inhabited by theoretical people. It's been said that socialists are trying to create an impossible world for an impossible humanity, and I think that observation is accurate. [/QUOTE]
LOL!!!! "It's been said".

So you say no basically socialist system was ever utilized by ancient tribal people? And again, please quote some world famous socialist who described this "pure theoretical socialist ideal".

Yes. And man has always formed societies because of his nature and his wish to benefit from mutual contributions and cooperation. -socialism's basic characteristic.

[/QUOTE] ... I was a somewhat of a "progressive" myself until the crumbling edifice of socialism in the Communist Bloc forced me to examine not only what happened there but my own personal views. By the time the USSR fell in 1991 I had already reached my own conclusions and gone my separate way [/QUOTE]
So did I. I saw man's nature to be one of striving to be "better", and that translating into "better than my neighbor" and therefore a belief in deserving a greater benefit. So I turned to other things for a few years. Then I found a new, emerging analysis of the Soviet and Chinese experiences and new strategies that solve these problems

I'm telling you that the new strategies also took time to "make the rounds", be accepted, and hen spread.

I don't think so.

Yeah but you and I were both wrong in our analysis and summations.

That's the whole point of propaganda, isn't it. . . . make the people believe what you want them to believe. And it certainly isn't and wasn't in the interest of capitalist media to do otherwise. If you study honestly into the matter, you will find what I found, but I already know your political bias would most likely prevent it.

• Unemployment dropped from 14.5% of the total labour force in 1999 to 7.6% in 2009

• Population has increased from 23,867,000 in 1999 to 29,278,000 in 2011. The annual population growth was 1.5% in 2011 compared with 1.9% in 1999

• GDP per capita has risen from $4,105 to $10,801 in 2011

• Venezuela has a complicated history concerning currency exchange rates. Compared with 1999 when the exchange rate was under one bolivar to the US dollar, the latest figures from Reuters place it at 4.3 Bolivars to one dollar

• Poverty has decreased - in 1999, 23.4% of the population were recorded as being in extreme poverty, this fell to 8.5% in 2011 according to official government figures

• Infant mortality is now lower than in 1999 - from a rate of 20 per 1,000 live births then to a rate of 13 per 1,000 live births in 2011

• Violence has been a key concern in Venezuela for some time - figures from the UNODC state that the murder rate has risen since 1999. In 2011 the intentional homicide rate per 100,000 population was 45.1 compared with 25.0 just twelve years earlier

• Oil exports have boomed - Venezuela has one of the top proven oil reserves in the world and in 2011 Opec put the country's net oil export revenues at $60bn. In 1999 it stood at $14.4bn

https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2012/oct/04/venezuela-hugo-chavez-election-data

 

What you can't prove is "that's ultimately what the proponents of socialized HC want - an incompetent and over-expensive government-run HC system".

Why should they when doing so would confuse the issue. There is no law that says UHC must be run like the VA and own and operate the medical centers, hire doctors, pay them a salary, subject itself to partisan bickering without the oversight of the public and Congress worrying about the public's views, etc.

LOL!! Well, according to your last question here and my response to it, apparently YOU haven't actually thought about it or you wouldn't have tried to bring up the VA as an example of "how bad it's going to be".

 

IOW, it has nothing to do with Socialism. It's high grade capitalism, which is so lucrative that it allows the funding of 'social' programs.

 

Especially for those like Dirty Donald Jr. who have never had to do an honest days work in their life!!!

 

Ahhh nope, they are not socialist and even Sweden is a capitalist economy. Finland just tried their little socialist free income experiment and it failed.

How about Venezuela? Cuba? The Soviet Union? China? North Korea?

 

As Venezuela Collapses, Children Are Dying of Hunger.

Shockingly, the word “socialist” actually appears in the story:

 

Socialism isn’t destroying Venzuela....people who lead that system corrupted it for their own benefit

Communism didn’t destroy Russia....people who lead the system corrupted it for their own benefit.

Capitalism didn’t destroy america...people who lead.......

You understand

 

You view America as "destroyed" and in class with Venezuela and Russia?

 

Thanks for confirming that the violent left wants bring nazism back to the world

 

The law that would do that hasn't been written yet. That's why we dont have govt healthcare yet.

 

"loser teachers that are trying to sell you on socialism from birth."
Not "teachers".
But you knew that.
Your slight of hand was lame.
Have a nice day.

 

So you can't or won't admit that blind and unchecked "altruism" is one of the inherent problems with socialism, either. Never mind that blind and unchecked "altruism" is what produced the catastrophes behind the Iron and Bamboo curtains. Never mind that blind and unchecked "altruism" is what drove Venezuela into the ground.

I learned and looked and found out along time ago. Why didn't you?

How far back do you want to go? Whose identification of this theoretical basis do you want? Plato? Babeuf? Marx?

It's a fact that we are not theoretical people who are living in a theoretical world.

As for the "It's been said" part, it's not their utopian fantasy - it's yours.

Ancient tribal people?

Where did I say anything about ancient tribal people? Nice red herring...

Fair enough. I'll give you one:

"Nature has given to every man the right to the enjoyment of an equal share in all property"
-- François-Noël Babeuf

Your "basic characteristic" doesn't take into account things like voluntary association, private ownership and free enterprise.

I'm not clear on what you're saying here. Please clarify.

If you don't mind me asking what did you turn to?

I'm also curious what these "emerging" analyses and "new" strategies were/are and where they came from.

I know all about the new strategies, but taking a different approach to pushing the same old ideas and programs and repeating past mistakes doesn't indicate that the world socialist movement learned anything from its failures and excesses, does it?

Fair enough. Refute my assertion, if you can.

How so?

As far as I'm concerned this argument ended thirty years ago when the Berlin Wall fell.

I have studied honestly into this matter and I see the same disastrous policies and outcomes we saw in the USSR and Red China. You act like we haven't seen this all before - the shortage of basic necessities, the rationing and long lines to obtain them (if possible), worse yet, the usurpation of an entire people's right to self-determination, the jailing of dissidents, etc.. On the flip side, we saw the Solidarity protests in Poland, the East Germans beating on the Berlin Wall with sledgehammers and now the demonstrations in VZ.

That's all going down the Memory Hole along with everything else, isn't it?

Amnesia is the post-Soviet Left's best friend.

All your data ends in 2011. Thank you for taking the time to post this but current data is what we have to look at.

 

I fear something was lost in your reading of my post. I said, more than once, that government SHOULD NOT RUN HEALTHCARE. On that, we agree completely.

And I'm not overly concerned about Harris' plans to eliminate insurance companies. They are as American as apple pie, and they aren't going anywhere. People still need insurance - and they will get it. They just won't need ridiculously high medical premiums.

As for America being the greatest nation on earth, we can agree to disagree. It isn't the worst thing in the world - not to be #1 or the greatest or the best. In fact, I think it would be so much better for the country if people didn't go around claiming the title...maybe it would allow for a little humility - and in that humility, we could learn how to be better. When any organization sees something being done better than they do, they step up their game and either try to emulate or better how the other organization does it. But when someone thinks they are the 'best' or the 'greatest', they stop seeing that others might just be doing something better. In fact, they refuse to see it. And in doing so, they are no longer the 'best' or the 'greatest'.

I agree with you - America isn't other countries. But we could be, if only we wanted to be better.

 

Yes. Do you honestly think we have a “free” market ?

 

Perhaps, I did lose something, but what exactly do you mean when you say that the government should not run health care? Does "run" mean deliver?

The fact is, when the government controls the purse strings it controls delivery.

I don't share your cavalier attitude towards eliminating private HC insurance companies.

Yes, we can agree to disagree and perhaps you should move to one of those greater nations on earth since you would be more happy and/or satisfied there. America isn't for everyone.

Oh dear, If only we wanted to be more socialist...

 

In the past you have said Social Security is "socialism". And you asked me "where has it partially been tried and succeeded?"

I told you. Those UHC and retirement security programs in Scandinavian countries were started by socialists in government. They were a partial step. And besides Scandinavian countries, socialism has worked in the US in the form of S.S., Medicare, the USPS, SNAP, and many other programs . . . . . --since you find S.S. to be "socialism".

 

And there is NO PLAN to make UHC operate like the VA.