How can Obama disguise his far left policies by advocating them using soothing, non-threatening rhetoric?
Socialists mainly share the belief that capitalism unfairly concentrates power and wealth into a small section of society who control capital, and creates an unequal society. All socialists advocate the creation of an egalitarian society, in which wealth and power are distributed more evenly, although there is considerable disagreement among socialists over how, and to what extent this could be achieved.
Socialism is not a discrete philosophy of fixed doctrine and program; its branches advocate a degree of social interventionism and economic rationalization, sometimes opposing each other. Another dividing feature of the socialist movement is the split on how a socialist economy should be established between the reformists and the revolutionaries. Some socialists advocate complete nationalization of the means of production, distribution, and exchange; while others advocate state control of capital within the framework of a market economy. Social democrats propose selective nationalization of key national industries in mixed economies combined with tax-funded welfare programs; Libertarian socialism (which includes Socialist Anarchism and Libertarian Marxism) rejects state control and ownership of the economy altogether and advocates direct collective ownership of the means of production via co-operative workers’ councils and workplace democracy.
Socialism is the transitional stage between capitalism and communism.
It was federal government policies and programs that caused most of the problems of the inner city today. The fact that Obama wants to try more of the same only shows that absolute dearth of ideas emanating from the left regarding urban policy.
The definition of Socialism is from Wikipedia.
Also, Karl Marx posited that socialism would be achieved via class struggle and a proletarian revolution, it being the transitional stage between capitalism and communism.
Charles
August 1st, 2008 at 9:07 pm
God, he’s not socialist! Bush is trying to make this country socialist with banking and McCain wanted to make SS socialst too! Oh, but it’s all Obama’s fault huh? Whatever.
August 4th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Reagan greatly expanded Social Security and placed it on sound financial footing for decades to come, and thanks to Reagan’s efforts, millions of those boomers who voted for Reagan aren’t faced with poverty as a result of the meltdown in stocks and bonds and their real estate which would deplete their retirement savings.
Hoover and Nixon proposed universal healthcare.
Lincoln, Hoover, Eisenhower, Nixon, and Bush to list a few Republicans, proposed massive government investments in infrastructure, in part to provide jobs, but primarily to move the nation into a new era of economic growth.
I don’t see how Obama is any more socialist than your typical Republican president.
August 5th, 2008 at 7:29 pm
its not too late vote for him love he better than the other
August 8th, 2008 at 9:52 pm
Obama is a Democrat not a Socialist. The term rhetoric is one that would describe your entire rant
August 10th, 2008 at 10:24 pm
Appearances are decieving, and liberals are the most easily decieved because they’re overly idealistic.
August 12th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
It’s the Jedi mind trick he learned in his youth.
August 15th, 2008 at 10:58 am
#1 Socialism IS NOT the transitional state between capitalism and communism. That is a misconception from people who have no real knowledge of politics. Dictatorship of the proletariat is what some people think is socialism, but that is highly inaccurate.
The goal of socialism has never been and never will be to create a classless stateless society.
#2 Far left policies are any policies that do not agree with the policies of the extreme right.
August 17th, 2008 at 8:14 pm
Democratic President Franklin Roosevelt calmed the nerves of investors during the Great Depression. He created many programs that brought the US back to the greatness that it was in the past. I say past, because Clinton left a surplus, Bush has created the greatest deficit in American history.
So, if Obama can do what Roosevelt did, how can it be a bad thing?
August 19th, 2008 at 8:47 pm
I’m sorry Ms. Michala …you have written a very interesting essay on socialism, but you have failed to connect it to your thesis statement that Barrack Obama is a far-left politician or in any way supports socialism.
Therefore I am forced to give you a failing grade on the assignment.
August 22nd, 2008 at 3:59 am
Thanks for your inaccurate description of Socialism. If I were to grade your thesis I would give you an “F”.
August 22nd, 2008 at 3:09 pm
We all knew that Barak Obama was liberal.
There has been much more discussion of Obama’s “themes” of empowerment and unity than there has been of specific policy proposals.
His “solutions” will sound familiar to those who listened to Lyndon Johnson’s poverty gurus and their fellow travelers under Jimmy Carter’s presidency. Promising massive government assistance with the help of private businesses (help that never seems to be asked for when the programs hit the streets), Obama goes Johnson one better by promising to empower unions to organize (read “intimidate”) just about everyone.
If Obama and his socialist friends were to focus on what “actually works,” they would make school choice the law of the land, ***** down on drugs and gangs, lower taxes in urban areas to encourage the growth of the private sector, and a host of other free market solutions that have been advocated for decades. Instead, we get the same old tired bromides about government intervention.
What the inner city needs, Obama and his socialist theories of government activism cannot provide. And that is the simple human dignity that goes with being self sufficient and supporting your loved ones. Getting those jobs to where they can do the most good will require rethinking urban policy so that lower taxes as well as tax incentives will begin the process of wealth creation that Americans are so good at. But asking these big city Democratic mayors to lower taxes and seek more free market solutions to their problems flies in the face of their own interests in feeding the numerous interest groups, special pleaders, and cronies who have gotten used to the contracts, the handouts, and the barely disguised bribes that pass for local government action these days.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:32 pm
Obama has his own controversial socialist connections. He is, in fact, an associate of a Chicago-based Marxist group with access to millions of labor union dollars and connections to expert political consultants, including a convicted swindler.
Obama’s socialist backing goes back at least to 1996, when he received the endorsement of the Chicago branch of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) for an Illinois state senate seat. Later, the Chicago DSA newsletter reported that Obama, as a state senator, showed up to eulogize Saul Mendelson, one of the “champions” of “Chicago’s democratic left” and a long-time socialist activist. Obama’s stint as a “community organizer” in Chicago has gotten some attention, but his relationship with the DSA socialists, who groomed and backed him, has been generally ignored.
DSA describes itself as the largest socialist organization in the United States and the principal U.S. affiliate of the Socialist International. The Socialist International (SI) has what is called “consultative status” with the United Nations. In other words, it works hand-in-glove with the world body.
The international connection is important and significant because an Obama bill, “The Global Poverty Act,” has just been rushed through the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, with the assistance of Democratic Senator Joe Biden . Conservative members of the committee were largely caught off-guard by the move to pass the Obama bill but are putting a “hold” on it, in order to try to prevent the legislation, which also quickly passed the House, from being quickly brought up for a full Senate vote. But observers think that Senate Democrats may try to pass it quickly anyway, in order to give Obama a precious legislative “victory” that he could run on.
The socialist connections of Obama and the Democratic Party have certainly not been featured in the Washington Post columns of Harold Meyerson, who happens not only to be a member but a vice-chair of the DSA. Meyerson, the subject of our 2005 column, “A Socialist at the Washington Post,” has praised convicted inside-trader George Soros for manipulating campaign finance laws to benefit the far-left elements of the Democratic Party. Obama’s success in the Democratic presidential primaries and caucuses is further evidence of Soros’s success. Indeed, Soros has financially contributed to the Obama campaign.
It is not surprising that the Chicago Democrat, Rep. Jan Schakowsky, has endorsed Obama. Schakowsky, who endorsed Howard Dean for president in 2004, was honored in 2000 at a dinner sponsored by the Chicago chapter of the DSA. Her husband, Robert Creamer, emerged from federal prison in November 2006 after serving five months for financial crimes. He pleaded guilty to ripping off financial institutions while running a non-profit group. Before he was convicted but under indictment, Creamer was hired by the Soros-funded Open Society Policy Center to sabotage John Bolton’s nomination as Ambassador to the U.N.
After his release from prison, Creamer released a book, Listen to Your Mother: Stand up Straight: How Progressives Can Win, described by one blogger as the book that was “penned in the pen.” A blurb for the book declares, “Some people think that in order to win, Democrats need to move to the political center by adopting conservative values and splitting the difference between progressive and conservative positions. History shows they are wrong. To win the next election and to win in the long term, we need to redefine the political center.”
In addition to writing the book, Creamer is back in business, running his firm, Strategic Consulting Group, and advertising himself as “a consultant to the campaigns to end the war in Iraq, pass universal health care, change America’s budget priorities and enact comprehensive immigration reform.” His clients have included the AFL-CIO and MoveOn.org. In fact, his client list is a virtual who’s who of the Democratic Party, organized labor, and Democratic Party constituency groups.
Creamer’s list of testimonials comes from such figures as Democratic Senators **** Durbin (Ill.) and Sherrod Brown (Ohio), Harold Meyerson, MoveOn.org founder Wes Boyd, and David Axelrod, a “Democratic political consultant.”
Axelrod, of course, is much more than just a “Democratic political consultant.” He helped State Senator Barack Obama win his U.S. Senate seat in 2004 and currently serves as strategist and media advisor to Obama’s presidential campaign.
August 26th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
Obama has been successfully hiding the fact that he is far to the left by rhetoric for quite awhile now. The important thing in any election is to look at what someone has done and how they have voted. Truth goes out the window the minute the campaign begins. so, anyone making their decison based ont he campaign gets what they desevre. In the US we have had a long tradition of this sort of thing, and my decsions are made long before the campaign starts; that way I can sit back and watch the threate of american political campaigns.
Your definition of socialism is incorrect, and I do not see that Obaam is a socialist. socialism means govenrment ownership of the means of production so that what gives a product it’s value “labor” is duly compensated. The problem is that socialism doesnt work very well,– profit motive seems to be necessary in some industries. Government does things without profit motive and rightly so, some things need to be done that way.
the united states has had a long tradition of regulated capitaism — we rellay don’t want people driving cars and eating food and taking mediciens that would harm them so government regualtion of industry is a necessary part of catpitism and it staved off a movement torward comunism.
Communism and socialism are to separte soci-eceonomic systems — socisim is not a precusror to communism and never has been. for all though cummunims is socialist b y nature, sociaism is not communist.
The only person in recent times who has moved toward socialism is Georoge W. Bush. when we see the govenrment takin stakes or owning banks that is socialism.
In today’s eceoniimc climate is it necessary temporailiy?
August 27th, 2008 at 3:10 am
Youth today has no idea what Socialism is or can do to our country.
I am a stanch Democrat…voting McCain. Obama talks pretty, but the Truth is….Your correct.
Added emphases on the Pro-Life issue and Obama’s shady friends sway me to the McCain camp.
Good Question.
August 30th, 2008 at 7:14 am
Unfortunately Obama has the ability to spin, a lot like Bill Clinton did… he’s a good “inspirational” speaker and knows what words will get people’s attention and admiration. His words hint at or outright promise that everything will be so wonderful once he’s president because he’ll be able to fix it all. He’s a lot lighter on “how” he’s going to make things better, but he does run on socialist premises. It’s his “Robin Hood” message that is putting him ahead in the polls… He’ll take from the rich and give to the poor, and Evil Prince Johnbush and his crony the dastardly Sheriff McNottingcain have run the country into this grave state of economic distress (never mind the majority of democrats in the congress and senate during Bush’s presidency, or that Obama himself has been part of the “problem”.) Just support Obama Hood and he’ll right all the wrongs and bring back prosperity.
That’s how he’s getting away with it; he just obfuscates and spins rhetoric when asked to explain HOW he’s going to fix it all. (His track record certainly doesn’t show him “making things better.”) Then, he keeps reminding everyone over and over again that he’s our Robin Hood. Just don’t anyone forget that Robin Hood actually “ran” with real thieves and brigands and did rob from those who didn’t necessarily always deserve it as well as those who did. He got to decide who had too much and forced them to cough it up. “Oh, is that a treasured family heirloom? Too bad, so sad.” But hey, if you’re okay with treating the rich like crud because they’re rich and you’re not, I sure can’t stop you or change your mind.
By the way, I’m soooooo NOT rich. We are a one income lower middle class homeschoooling family, with that one income about to disappear (my husband’s being laid off.) We own modest teenaged vehicles, a modest home in a run down area of town and have no real assets other than two small retirement funds and a bit of equity in our home. And we still wouldn’t want to “rob” the rich to improve our circumstances; we’d rather earn it.