Posted on 04/27/2010 8:45:46 AM PDT by Comrade Brother Abu Bubba
Lately many have characterized this administration as socialist, or having strong socialist leanings. I differ with this characterization. This is not to say Mr. Obama believes in free-markets by any means. On the contrary, he has done and said much that demonstrates his fundamental misunderstanding and hostility towards the truly free market. But a closer, honest examination of his policies and actions in office reveals that, much like the previous administration, he is very much a corporatist. This in many ways can be more insidious and worse than being an outright socialist.
Socialism is a system where the government directly owns and manages businesses. Corporatism is a system where businesses are nominally in private hands, but are in fact controlled by the government. In a corporatist state, government officials often act in collusion with their favored business interests to design polices that give those interests a monopoly position, to the detriment of both competitors and consumers.
A careful examination of the policies pursued by the Obama administration and his allies in Congress shows that their agenda is corporatist.
Obama's cap-and-trade legislation provides subsidies and specials privileges to large businesses that engage in carbon trading. This is why large corporations, such as General Electric support cap-and-trade.
Using precise terms can prevent future statists from successfully blaming the inevitable failure of their programs on the remnants of the free market that are still allowed to exist. We must not allow the disastrous results of corporatism to be ascribed incorrectly to free market capitalism or used as a justification for more government expansion. Most importantly, we must learn what freedom really is and educate others on how infringements on our economic liberties caused our economic woes in the first place. Government is the problem; it cannot be the solution.
(Excerpt) Read more at thedailycrux.com ...
Whatever the HELL he is...he needs to be stopped!!!!!
And so does EVERY corrupt politician in government!!!!
We need to Take America Back!!
I’m not sure if the term carpet bagging was referring to the candidate Bush was trying to get to run against Ron Paul or if you were referring to Ron Paul. But I just wanted to clarify something for you. Ron Paul was born and raised in Green Tree Pennsylvania. So you could say that in Texas, he’s a carpet bagger...
Has he told Timmy to sell off the GM stock? No?
He’s a socialist.
There’s not too much difference between fascism, socialism, communism, marxism, - they’re all related. All about centralized control of things by the government. Some give the appearance of private property more than others, but fascists will have government take over certain businesses and industries if they deem it ‘necessary’, when the typical fascist mountains of government regulations just aren’t enough to control a private business.
and PS you’ll never see real ‘communism’. That’s the end goal of socialism. And no offense, you never get there because it’s an idealization, it is not the goal of those in power in a socialist society. They say it is but the real goal is being in the elite group where you get to live like a rich capitalist, and the 95% of the rest (proletariat) live in crap conditions and can’t overthrow you.
I can't believe that Ron Paul actually got that wrong. Socialism is NOT "a system where the government directly owns and manages businesses." That's Communism.
Socialism might be called "Communism-Light" because the state takes so much of the incomes of individuals and businesses, but in a purely Socialist system, there is still private property ownership. It's just not worth a damn, because you have a hard time profiting from it, due to taxes.
I think there is a common misconception that Fascism and Communism are different systems. Fascism and Communism are virtually the same thing. Both give absolute control to the government to control means of production (though fascism allows private ownership in name only.) The only real difference is their claimed intentions. Fascism is a corporate elite trying to kill capitalism to enhance their power while saying its in the national interest, while communism is the party elite, controlling all of the companies in the name of making everyone equal. Both ways you end up with a small group of people controlling all of the companies, killing free enterprise, and taking all of your freedoms away.
They are the same system with different stated intents (but with the same ultimate results), and they are both tyranny. So I think you are right when you say that you see fascism and socialism in Obama. You see it because fascism and communism are effectively the same thing.
Ron Paul:
“When he is a called a socialist, the President and his defenders can easily deflect that charge by pointing out that the historical meaning of socialism is government ownership of industry; under the Presidents policies, industry remains in nominally private hands. Using the more accurate term corporatism forces the President to defend his policies that increase government control of private industries and expand de facto subsidies to big businesses. This also promotes the understanding that though the current system may not be pure socialism, neither is it free-market since government controls the private sector through taxes, regulations, and subsidies, and has done so for decades.
Using precise terms can prevent future statists from successfully blaming the inevitable failure of their programs on the remnants of the free market that are still allowed to exist.”
VERY well said. You nailed it.
Ok, he’s a national socialist democrat; Nazi.
The main difference is that Mussolini also wanted to restore the glories of his country, not like our clown.
Splitting hairs. Call it what the people understand. Trying to educate them on different words will lose the issue through noise.
P.S. Obama does not believe in private ownership of corporation. He believes the government should own them, therefore, “corporatists” is not the proper term for Obama. Communist or Marxist is the correct term.
Fascist is the correct term. He gives private business the pretense of private ownership, yet he controls the factors of production. Instead of more SUVs, GM will build electric cars at wages determied by the Obama government. Likewise, instead of building trolley cars, Henschel will build Panzer IVs at wages determined by the Reich.
Oops, Panzer IV should read Panzer VI (i.e. King Tiger)
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