Republicans accuse Obama of socialism

By Tom Raum

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Brunobear at 10:47 AM JST - 28th June

The reason why Americans fear Socialism is because from the very start they developed a severe cultural distaste for paying taxes. That is why they went to war against Britain. It was over a tiny little tax to assist mother Britain fund a war against hostile France at the time. Their was nothing heroic in the Boston Tea Party or the War of Independence in 1776. Australia started off as a British colony in 1778 and like the early US was heavily subsidized by the British. Every request Australia made to Britain for self government was always promptly approved. A decade ago we voted overwhelmingly to reject a Rupublic and remain a Constitutional Mornarchy with the "Queen" as out head. A wonderful system that has made us the wealthiest and freest people on earth.

We started the eight hour day and numerous social reforms as far back as the nineteenth century. 96% of Australians have voted at every Federal election since 1926 because it is compulsory. That means all Australians take a real interest in public policy. We don't have self serving lobbyists distorting our development as the US does.

We have had a fabulous publicly funded health system since 1975. No one in Australia fears losing their savings or their home if the get sick. There are very few law suits against the medical profession. Melbourne has the best hospitals, medical research and doctors in the world and you get treated free! The most serious always go straight to the head of the line. People bitch because they have to wait 12 weeks for a free hip operation. We attract the best medical brains in the world here!

We took the future of our medical system out of the hands of the doctors in the 1970's and put it into the hands of health professionals and the Parliament. Our health drug system ensures people get access to the best drugs at a very competitive price and effectively free for the less wealthy.

Australians if given a choice between a tax cut or better public services, will take the latter every time. They go for practicable things and are not trembling in false fear of silly labels like "socialism". It is just a word, and a word that hardly gets mentioned here. FEAR is an acronym for "false evidence appearing real".

America is almost broke now it is drowning in $13 trillion of the giantist "ponzie" scheme of all time. Federal "Public Debt" is so big in the US it cannot even service the interest on it for goodness sake. Australia on the other hand is just going into a "minute" amount of public debt to assist its people from suffering from the world financial crisis started in the US. Our economy is actually now out of the financial crisis and doing very well.

Like most "Aussies", I really love America and Americans. They are on the whole great people and the greatest force for good of all time in the world. We are forever grateful for what our big US brother has done for us . But guys you Americans have an elite that only looks after the elite and that is bad for your Society. Our elite and Parliament put the interest of the whole society first. We have never had a national leader sacked for improprietry or accused of not putting the whole nations interests first. We would demand sacking of a PM if he was late returning a library book!

We have learned a lot from the US, but now the US population might have a look across the Pacific and see what why its little brother down under is doing so well and abandon those stupid self destructive labels.

Obama is a great force for good in the World. Wed could show him how to solve America's financial, health and democracy problems in a few days.
teleprompter at 11:31 AM JST - 28th June

Not one of Obama's would-be defenders here seems to understand that socialism in America will not and cannot be like socialism elsewhere.

The posts above are replete with historical blindness, Euro-centrism, jingoism and naivete, not to mention ignorance of even the most basic terms being thrown around.

And that is why so many here insist socialism isn't coming to America or is a figment of paranoid conservative imagination.
buddha4brains at 12:09 PM JST - 28th June

socialism in America will not and cannot be like socialism elsewhere.

Then maybe it isn't socialism then. As far as I can tell, all it is is the-GOP-talking-points-for votes-country-be-damnedism. Obama sneezes and the GOP will try to find a political angle on it.

Yeah, I know America is special but you can't hide behind empty ideas by trying to redefine the argument everytime someone challenges you. You rightists criticize at every turn and reject every overture - may as well move to Iran. America is just an excuse to play politics (the same goes for the left-wing nuts).
zurcronium at 12:13 PM JST - 28th June

The fact is the free market myth that conservatives have pretended to believe in for decades is dead now. It died again with the bush economic melt down and the boy blunderers $900 billion bailout of the finance industry in the US.

Obama is no more a socialist than Reagan was one, who raised taxes several times in his political career. The difference is that republicans want to give tax breaks only to the rich and do not mind running up trillions in debt. It always takes a democrat to bail out the country from the massive failures of the republican mistakes.
Sarge at 12:23 PM JST - 28th June

"Obama's handling of the economy isn't his strongest card"

Really?
teleprompter at 12:38 PM JST - 28th June

Even the left wing Spiegel mag is dissin' zurcronium's World Prez Obama.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,632494,00.html
Brunobear at 12:55 PM JST - 28th June

Zurcronium: It seems you are confusing socially beneficial activities with the brutal Jewish 1917 "Bolshevik" Soviet communism that dominated Russia and its neigbors until 1988 and the genesis of the far more genteel kibbutz in Israel. They were misplaced experiments of an earlier age. They failed because they involved the destruction of private and individual property rights. Something that is not envisaged by anything President Obama promotes. President Theodore Roosevelt as long ago as the 1890's, a enlightened man of enormous inherited wealth, saw the benefit of public infrastructure, services and utilities and introduced them in NY State. 100 years later New Yorkers were selling to the world the benefits of privatising public infrastructure and services for personal gain. Obama had little choice with his big spending as the US is publicly bankrupt from borrowing for stimulus packages to benefit private entreprise and tax cutting at the same time. The alternative is a financial collapse for say a decade or more and widespread and absolute misery in the US. Guys you have to start doing it better!
goodDonkey at 01:29 PM JST - 28th June

teleprompter said:

Not one of Obama's would-be defenders here seems to understand that socialism in America will not and cannot be like socialism elsewhere.

/

The posts above are replete with historical blindness, Euro-centrism, jingoism and naivete, not to mention ignorance of even the most basic terms being thrown around.

/

And that is why so many here insist socialism isn't coming to America or is a figment of paranoid conservative imagination.

You tell 'em teleprompter. Socialism in America is different. It includes mostly free markets. It includes 99 point many decimals (99.8888888.....%) public ownership of corporations, businesses, sole proprietorships, partnerships, LLC's, LLP's, S corps, C corps, Non-Profits, 501(c)4's, 501(c)3's not to mention a very health underground market. We don't need to pick jobs for people to be socialists. We don't need government officials in any corporations, etc. (refer to above). Private ownership, tell 'em teleprompter, we can still have socialism with private ownership. Don't let the stock markets, bond markets, Boards of Trades, commodity markets, futures markets and all the other trading facilities fool you either we will still be socialist. Just because people are still free to start up a local bank out of their own volition does not mean we can't be socialist. Just because farmers are free to sell their products to anyone they choose doesn't mean we are not headed for socialism. We don't have to be egalitarian to be socialists. It is not the Egalitarians anyway it is the Democrats. We can keep all of our various wealthy economic stratifications and still be socialists. We don't need central planning. We don't even need to nationalize 1% of our nations commerce producing facilities and we can still be socialistic.

teleprompter wants socialism and we're going to get socialism damn it. He hates socialism and it is Obama's fault that we have it. All we need is Social Security (see it has the word Social in it). And we are going to have Medical Security. And they teach Social Studies to kids in school

You can put lipstick on a pig but it is still a pig!

"Not one of Obama's would-be defenders here seems to understand that socialism in America will not and cannot be like socialism elsewhere." - telepromter

.
teleprompter at 03:00 PM JST - 28th June

I'm pretty sure goodDonkey has something to say, I just can't work out what it is.
Sarge at 10:05 PM JST - 28th June

goodD: "teleprompter wants socialism... He hates socialism"

You feelin' OK, goodD?
zurcronium at 08:08 AM JST - 29th June

brutal Jewish 1917 "Bolshevik" Soviet communism . . .

Racism always helps to bolster any argument. I think that is in the republican how to win elections manual, chapter four.

You pretty much lost me after that. My advice to you is to not try so hard.
goodDonkey at 03:25 PM JST - 29th June

sarge said:

goodD: "teleprompter wants socialism... He hates socialism"

/

You feelin' OK, goodD?

Amazing what you can get away with by using ellipses inside quotes isn't it? You must have a ball putting WAV's together to say funny things or joining MPEG's.
Brunobear at 05:02 PM JST - 29th June

Zurcronium: I probably lost you with facts mates. The 1917 revolution was the Bolshevik Revolution. The proponents and almost all operatives Jewish, many Russianised their names. It is not a racist comment, it is what happened. Their communist theory was to dispossess people of their land and assets and introduce collectivised state farms and factories. Tens of millions were stripped of their wealth and millions finished up starving. The system was a failure of gigantic proportions. Eventually the whole system collapsed in 1988. Our Western system was introduced in Britain in 1691 and protects private ownership of land and assets with courts and laws to back it up. It has made Britain and the countries that flowed from it the freest and wealthiest on earth. Our economies are mixed economies with some planning, some public ownership and a lot of private ownership and a free market. The mistake the Americans make is to associate "Socialism" with the former, not the latter as it is practised around most of the advanced western world.
Brunobear at 05:02 PM JST - 29th June

Zurcronium: I probably lost you with facts mates. The 1917 revolution was the Bolshevik Revolution. The proponents and almost all operatives Jewish, many Russianised their names. It is not a racist comment, it is what happened. Their communist theory was to dispossess people of their land and assets and introduce collectivised state farms and factories. Tens of millions were stripped of their wealth and millions finished up starving. The system was a failure of gigantic proportions. Eventually the whole system collapsed in 1988. Our Western system was introduced in Britain in 1691 and protects private ownership of land and assets with courts and laws to back it up. It has made Britain and the countries that flowed from it the freest and wealthiest on earth. Our economies are mixed economies with some planning, some public ownership and a lot of private ownership and a free market. The mistake the Americans make is to associate "Socialism" with the former, not the latter as it is practised around most of the advanced western world.
jhk at 08:56 AM JST - 2nd July

Sorry, how many states in the US are on the verge of bankruptcy? How many promises has Obama held since coming to office? Sorry, what are you talking about with this western system? Is this the same western system you are talking about? Lets talk about how it is doing today, pick a country if there are any left. You must be old, because what you talk of is old news. As zurcronium says, don't try so hard, and posting your garbage twice doesn't help either.