Socialism - American Style

Not sure what you mean when I spoke of those who are fined for making comments in some European governments when being Critical of Immigration or other anti-government propaganda. Are you trying to change the subject? And, within Socialism, no worker has ownership or any control of the means of production? At least in a capitalist society, more people are able to own and build companies on their own or as partners.

 

That is exactly what socialism would be. And your comments were about "Socialist liberals" (you conflated socialists and liberals) and didn't mention immigration issues. And you said they "can be fined or imprisoned" if anyone disagrees with them ("Socialist liberals") in some Europeans countries.

So it looks like rather than me trying to change the subject, YOU are trying to dodge and deny what you said.

 

So, there are different levels of Socialism? I didn't know that. Is this where Liberals try to make Socialism more palatable to those who are not progressive? Regardless, Socialism as a whole where the government has complete control over certain aspects of our lives or livelihood is what we do not need to let happen. If people think the Rich/Poor divide is bad now, just let Socialism take hold and see that taken to an entire new level of just Rich and the rest.

 

Ok so you can't back up your claim of European "socialist" countries (of which there are none) imprisoning people and fining people for disagreeing with the "socialists". I knew that.

But if you want to know something about socialism, feel free to ask. I may have an answer since I've favored socialism for half a century. No, there aren't "different levels". Socialism would have less control over our lives than capitalism does. But understanding this requires understanding the depth and intensity of the brainwashing propaganda we've been subjected to for over 50 years regarding socialism and communism. Propaganda has little or no effect when the target audience knows they're being handed propaganda, and so a great many Americans would completely reject they've been subjected to propaganda. But this is a subject that needs to be clarified and laid bare.

 

Yes, it is a very bad situation in Venezuela. But our sense of the cause is skewed to the extreme by our US propaganda.

In reality, Venezuelans saw their living conditions vastly improved by socialism for a while. Their current economic problems are not due to some inherent fault in socialism, but to artificially low oil prices and sabotage by forces hostile to socialism.

What were free market policies prior to Chavez doing to Venezuela? Chavez was elected president of Venezuela in 1999. His election was viewed as a referendum on the extreme free market policies enacted in Venezuela during the 1990s. It is a known history in Venezuela how the privatizations mandated by the International Monetary Fund made life in Venezuela almost unlivable during the 1990s. Garbage wasn’t being collected. Electricity would go off for weeks. Haido Ortega, a member of a local governing body in Venezuela, said: “Under previous governments we had to burn tires and go on strike just to get electricity, have the streets fixed, or get any investment.”

The argument that socialism has bred corruption also ignores facts revealed by several empirical studies of Venezuela's 2012 currency-corruption scandal. According to those probes, traditional economic groups, multinational corporations and emerging businesspeople were all guilty parties in the $20 billion dollar rip off.

But one of the studies, by political analyst and activist Luis Enrique Gavazut, concluded that “the lion's share of the fraud in 2012 was perpetrated by large multinational corporations that have subsidiaries in the nation”. Gavazut said that some of the illicit activity (involving dollars) could not have been carried out had US authorities monitored shady operations in Florida and other states where the dollars were eventually deposited or invested.

So, far from Venezuela’s slide into difficulties being the result of socialism, it turns out that it is the forces of entrenched international opposition with international banks, foreign oil, and U.S. corporations playing major roles that are the real cause of Venezuela’s troubles.

Look into Mark Weisbrot of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, and American lawyer, Eva Golinger who spent 3 years studying our role in the development of the Venezuelan crisis.

Weisbrot said the U.S. has been working to topple the Venezuelan government for many years and as an example in March of 2016 Obama announced sanctions againt Venezuela, saying that they presented “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security of the U.S.” The corporate U.S. media didn’t bother to ask how that could be so Obama never had to explain that bit of contrived thinking. But it succeeded in persuading banks to refuse to extend further loans to Venezuela.


Weisbrot cites increased Trump sanctions that threaten to destroy Venezuela’s oil industry and the economy with it. Even the Venezuelan opposition is against the sanctions. So the threat to their economy is coming from the U.S., not Venezuela or “socialism”.


Eva Golinger, who I previously mentioned, spent 3 years studying our role in the development of the Venezuelan crisis. She used the FOIA to access government data. The documents she obtained showed that the U.S. government knew all about the 2002 coup that was to occur against Chavez two days before it happened. The documents showed that the CIA identified Chavez and 10 others to be arrested. A document said “to provoke military action, the plotters may try to exploit unrest stemming from opposition demonstrations slated for later this month”.

Two hours before protesters were shot by rooftop snipers, an army officer representing military forces that overthrew Chavez recorded a statement for release in which he said that Chavez had snipers kill 6 people. Chavez was captured and a corporate giant, Pedro Carmona was installed as President. Dispite knowing what would happen beforehand and even making recommendations on whom to arrest including Chavez, Ari Fleischer said in a quick press conference “we know that the action encouraged by the Chavez government provoked this crisis. The results of these events are now that President Chavez has resigned the presidency.” The public announcement of this false information was part of the U.S. government’s role in the coup. Tens of thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets to demand Chavez’s safe return and soldiers still loyal to Chavez retook the palace and the coup crumbled within 48 hours.

Eva’s investigation uncovered a money trail from Washington to key organizations and individuals involved in the coup. She found that in the months before the coup, Washington had given millions of dollars to Chavezes opponents.

The U.S. claims they want “democracy” in Venezuela, but while Chavez was in jail, Carmona was busy dissolving the parliament and the courts leaving him free to rule by decree. Just 5 months before, Carmona had visited Washington as a guest of the State Department. A cable from the U.S. Embassy in Caracas referred to Carmona and his collegues as “influential business leaders who have consistently played a critical role in advancing U.S. commercial interests in Venezuela.” Another one said Carmona was “the right man at the right time” for Venezuela.

After Chavez was returned to power, the State Department sent instructions to the U.S. Embassy in Venezuela, saying “if asked ‘was the United States involved in the attempt to remove Chavez from power?” the answer was to be “absolutely not”.

Golinger’s research also uncovered documentation showing that Washington also backed disgruntled elements within the Venezuelan Armed Forces.

This 6-minute video might interest you too:

 

So, we can depend on your moving to Venezuela ASAP to show them that this is just a temporary crisis caused by a mean US President of two, and if we hadn't interfered, things would be ducky...

Good luck with that. Write when you find work.

I was working there 30 years ago. Have some first hand information on the "good years". That was hogwash too- the people then were already conditioned to curfews and dictator-presidents. Their economy was running on a rob-peter-to- pay-paul scheme AKA, socialism) - and when oil crashed they just borrowed from world bank and others to try and keep it afloat until they used up all their credit. The banks told them then that if they wanted any more credit, they would have to move to shut down their fake economy and move to a free-market economic system. While I was there.... attempts to do that led to riots; over 500 killed in Caracas the first day. I worked under a 6-6 curfew and martial law- now, it's 50 times worse. They need you, please go soon.

 

That's what happens when you blow all of your wealth and income on short term projects.

When you blow all of your savings and have nothing for a particularly rainy day, is it not the fault of your economic policies? Chavez could have kept the sovereign wealth fund and built it up as originally intended by putting all oil sales in excess of X$/bbl in that fund. Instead, he eviscerated it. Socialism sees saving and investment as hoarding, which is an inherent fault in socialism.

Socialism doens't breed corruption. It requires strong, centralized government, and that breeds corruption. Another inherent flaw in socialism.

Why would a socialist nation want to trade with a capitalist one, anyway? If it's immoral to exploit workers in your own nation, then it's immoral to utilize the fruits of exploited workers in other nations.
Socialists nations should be stronger for sanctions, not weakened by them.

The US government is largely corrupt, no doubt. That doesn't mean socialism would work without the US corruption. It ought to work in spite of it.

 

Yes, that would be the fault of economic policies. But it's not the fault of socialism. Would you say that the 2008 crash was the fault of capitalism? Or would you say it was the economic policies?

 

Not sure since you didn't ask a question regarding what you want. If you want actual data, there is news posted over in Europe just about every day where some old lady is fined for questioning immigration or someone is imprisoned for criticizing immigration while immigrant rapists walk free. Unless of course, you only get your news from leftist propaganda sites like CNN or MSNBC.

 

I would say that it's the fault of central planning, a hallmark of socialism, of the monetary system.

 

Was "central planning" responsible for our housing crash and stock market crash in 2009?

Your answer makes zero sense.

 

"Government equals socialism and government is bad". Wrong thread? That's fitting for Anti-Socialism: American style

 

@Kode I wanted to highlight this piece you wrote, as it is what has happened in much of South America. The CIA and American corporations have gutted South America with corruption so they could mine their resources and cut down their rain forests... then turned around and blamed Socialism...

 

You can't just blame the North Americans. The Washington Consensus originates from South America after all....

 

I'm blaming North America because they are to blame... not just for the sake of blaming. It has been documented for over a decade, since 2005 I believe

https://www.google.com/search?q=joh.....69i57j0l5.5951j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

 

They didn't invent the Washington Consensus. They stole it from the South Americans. You're playing boogieman economics, rather than looking at the complexity of the economic history.

 

Quite the contrary, the New Deal progressivism did all that and more.

 

An economist history piece versus a party political hack? Hmmm, difficult one for me!

 

oh please I've read through you posts in this thread, you're basically a deflector, you try to derail this thread with garbage. Both Kobe and Earthsky have vast knowledge on this topic, yet you continue to throw you bullshit at them... I'm far more likely to put you on ignore

 

the personification of true PATRIOTISM

 

No, they have opinion that agrees with you. That is living in a bubble; creating a false certainty that is easily destroyed by objective analysis (and therefore empowering the right wing). Can you prove that the Washington Consensus wasn't invented by South Americans? (Hint: you're going to be disappointed).

 

deluded right wingers cry "socialism" when it comes to certain reforms such as the following which were invented by our Founding Fathers:


social security: Thomas Paine

free public education: Jefferson

public libraries & postal system: Ben Franklin

infrastructural building: Hamilton & Washington




Socialist Marx was born a full generation after these guys left the scene.

 

I haven't read this one, but I'll give it a go when I have the time (as it also describes how conservatism has infected subsequent Democrats: "Democratic fiscal conservatives from presidents Truman to Carter have continued to believe that they could realistically champion fiscal responsibility and accept the modern state. Even their Keynesian advisers would turn to automatic stabilizers and stimulative tax cuts, rather than public spending, to stimulate the economy while continuing to endorse balanced budgets under strong economic conditions"):

Zelizer (2000) The Forgotten Legacy of the New Deal: Fiscal Conservatism and the Roosevelt Administration, 1933-1938, Presidential Studies Quarterly
This article examines the role of fiscal conservatives in Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal administration. Unlike most existing scholarship on the New Deal, which downplays the importance and complexity of fiscal conservatism in Roosevelt's administration, this article argues that the tradition was crucial to the development of the New Deal state. Through the New Deal, it demonstrates how the histories of liberalism and fiscal conservatism are intimately related. The article focuses on two key advisers—Lewis Douglas, Director of Budget from 1933 to 1934, and Henry Morgenthau Jr., Secretary of Treasury from 1934 to 1945—who were instrumental in making fiscal conservatism a part of President Roosevelt's agenda. While Douglas's rigid orthodox approach eventually isolated him from policy making, Morgenthau's entrepreneurship produced a new vision of moderate fiscal conservatism that could coexist with the New Deal.

Amazing how folk even have the inclination to call it socialism...

 

FDR's New Deal did nothing to help the economy. Nothing improved until WW II.

Many experts say the New Deal actually slowed economic recovery, like Obama's policies that resulted in a very, very slow recovery.

 

You would think an incentive for the rich to plow their profits back into their businesses would be excellent for the economy.