We Are All Socialists Now

shocking is right

I do not like the sounds of this

We have been somewhat socialist for some time now. Bush just pushed it out of control.

JMO but I think Bush was so far left that even the most Radical Democrat could not see him with a telescope. Every program he pushed after 9/11 was government control.

The truth is, we turned this corner decades ago, and have been a socialistic system trying to coexist with capitalism for years. As the world gets more complex, and it does, unbridled capitalism has the power to work against the citizens of the state. I think we have just had a crash course, in that regard. Greed is a never ending motivator for man, but it seems that in the past couple decades, American capitalism has been more about figuring the angles and exploiting the easy profit, and damn the consequences, than it's classic role of catalyst for innovation, and excellence. Socialism works better than predation, in any social system, sorry.

"Every program he pushed after 9/11 was government control."

You have your loyalties ,in regard to Bush confused, Colonel. He was right, in fact he was so right, it smacked of Fascism, not left wing. Fascism, according to the guy that basically invented it's tenets out of loose confederation of rabble rousers, Mussolini, is the blending of the power of the corporate and the government power. If that doesn't describe Bush, right up till the end, with his giveaway of billions to corporate cronies, I don't know what does. You bend the very definitions of right, and left, when you ascribe him as being of left stripe.

The prescription drug program was not meant to enhance Medicare, either, it was meant to kill it. This follows "starve the beast" theory to a T. The provisions prohibiting government from using the vast consumer base at their disposal, and actually paying Pharm firms to "encourage them not to raise prices", were aimed at the distruction of Medicare, in the long run, though people hailed it as a boon in the short term. It is so expensive that the Bush administration told a government employee they would fire him if he leaked the actual cost of the program to congress before it was passed. Remember that?

Ron-You are absolutely right, Bush was a Fascist. He wanted government to control everything and everyone, for his and his cronies to have power.

Poeple need to start understanding that Socialism is NOT Communism and it's NOT a "dirty" word. People need to understand that we already have a lot of "socialized" programs, schools, police, fire depts are all socialized programs.
Capitalism works in theory, but people are greedy and will do what is best for them and thier "friends". If it will line their pockets who gives a rats behind if the least of us get screwed. The idea that the wealthy will provide jobs, etc was fine until they learned to "play the angles" and that they could just put their money in different places and let it grow. That doesn't provide jobs for anyone, it just makes them richer.

Left or right Ron, It makes little difference you still could not find him with search dogs.

Ron the Medicare program did not help or hinder the Drug Lords. They still get their asking price. That is why we hit the donut hole every year. Medicare happenss to have over 3 Trillion Dollars in its trust fund. I doubt it is going broke soon.

It helps them Col. Medicaid negotiates lower prices for prescriptions. The Medicare program just hands it over to the corporation.

Hmmm. France or Nazi Germany? I'm going where the crepes are dude.

That is, of course, right, Sharon, and, as I noted above, pays yearly mega bucks to the Pharm companies for essentially nothing, just to "encourage them" not to raise prices. Colonel, there is a story stemming from that period, although unprovable, at this point, that says that the Republican that originally sponsored this bill for the BA, admitted to a fellow Congressman, that he didn't even have the time to read it before it was submitted. He, and his Senate counterpart, took delivery of it directly from the Pharm lobby, as instructed.

Are we going to finally start recognizing that those "glorious" Reagan years were crap? Maybe you don't understand what I'm talking about if you didn't eat government cheese or had a job during that era. Most of the people I knew then were laborers and we were all on unemployment, welfare, food stamps, or a combination of them all. The only business that flourished in the lower income areas was the drug trade.

The French make sure everyone in France has access to health care. You don't make a choice there between going to a doctor and paying the heating bills.

This is terrible next thing you know MY tax dollars are going to go for things like libraries so people other than ME can read books. They need to just buy them.

And to pave roads that OTHER people drive on. If you own a car pave your own road.

And some bad kid is going to get abused and expect to call the police on MY DOLLAR.

And when my kids are out of school I dont want to pay for ANYONE elses.

And some loser is going to expect the fire department to put out their fire again with MY MONEY.

And some loser senior is going to expect ME to support them when they decide to be lazy and not want to work anymore.

And some Vet is going to expect MY TAX dollars to support his problems. Hey is he or she went to war thats NOT MY problem. Why should I support them I didnt ask them to fight for me. I could have done it for half the price and not expect welfare when I get out. They just need to cowboy up.

And Colonel, I wonder sometimes, where you get your information:

A SUMMARY OF THE 2008 ANNUAL REPORTS
Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees
A MESSAGE TO THE PUBLIC:

Each year the Trustees of the Social Security and Medicare trust funds report on the current and projected financial status of the two programs. This message summarizes our 2008 Annual Reports.

The financial condition of the Social Security and Medicare programs remains problematic. Projected long run program costs are not sustainable under current financing arrangements. Social Security's current annual surpluses of tax income over expenditures will begin to decline in 2011 and then turn into rapidly growing deficits as the baby boom generation retires. Medicare's financial status is even worse. This year Medicare's Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund is expected to pay out more in hospital benefits and other expenditures than it receives in taxes and other dedicated revenues. The difference will be made up from general revenues which pay for interest credits to the Trust Fund. Growing annual deficits are projected to exhaust HI reserves in 2019 and Social Security reserves in 2041. In addition, the Medicare Supplementary Medical Insurance (SMI) Trust Fund that pays for physician services and the prescription drug benefit will continue to require general revenue financing and charges on beneficiaries that grow substantially faster than the economy and beneficiary incomes over time.

The drawdown of Social Security and HI Trust Fund reserves and the general revenue transfers into SMI will result in mounting pressure on the Federal budget. In fact, pressure is already evident. For the second consecutive year, a "Medicare funding warning" is being triggered, signaling that non-dedicated sources of revenues—primarily general revenues—will soon account for more than 45 percent of Medicare's outlays. The President recently proposed remedial action pursuant to the warning in last year's report and, in accordance with Medicare statute, a Presidential proposal will be needed in response to the latest warning.

We are increasingly concerned about inaction on the financial challenges facing the Social Security and Medicare programs. The longer action is delayed, the greater will be the required adjustments, the larger the burden on future generations, and the more severe the detrimental economic impact on our nation.

Medicare

As we reported last year, Medicare's financial difficulties come sooner—and are much more severe—than those confronting Social Security. While both programs face demographic challenges, rapidly growing health care costs also affect Medicare. Underlying health care costs per enrollee are projected to rise faster than the wages per worker on which payroll taxes and Social Security benefits are based. As a result, while Medicare's annual costs were 3.2 percent of GDP in 2007, or nearly three quarters of Social Security's, they are projected to surpass Social Security expenditures in 2028 and reach 10.8 percent of GDP in 2082.

Moreover, this is the second consecutive year that the Medicare Report triggers a Medicare funding warning. Under the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003 the Medicare Report must include a determination of whether the difference between total Medicare outlays and dedicated financing (such as premiums and payroll taxes) exceeds 45 percent of total outlays within the first 7 years of the projection period (2008-2014 for the 2008 Report). The Act provides that an affirmative determination in two consecutive reports be treated as a "funding warning" for Medicare that would, in turn, prompt a Presidential proposal to respond to the warning and expedited Congressional consideration of such proposal. The 2008 Report projects that the difference will surpass 45 percent in 2014 and therefore again makes a determination of excess general revenue funding (as prior Reports did in 2006 and 2007). This determination triggers the second consecutive Medicare funding warning. Under the provisions of the 2003 Act, this calls for a Presidential proposal to respond to the warning within 15 days of the submission of the Fiscal Year 2010 budget and for Congress to consider the proposal on an expedited basis. This provision is expected to bring additional attention to Medicare's impact on the Federal budget.

The projected 75-year actuarial deficit in the Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund is now 3.54 percent of taxable payroll, down slightly from 3.55 percent projected in last year's report. Were it not for new methods for projecting immigration that were implemented this year, the HI actuarial deficit would have increased rather than decreased. Despite the slight improvement, the fund again fails our test of short-range financial adequacy, as projected annual assets drop below projected annual expenditures within 10 years—by 2013. The fund also continues to fail our long-range test of close actuarial balance by a wide margin. The projected date of HI Trust Fund exhaustion is 2019, the same as in last year's report, when dedicated revenues would be sufficient to pay only 78 percent of HI costs. Projected HI dedicated revenues fall short of outlays in this and all future years. The Medicare Report shows that the program could be brought into actuarial balance over the next 75 years by an immediate 122 percent increase in the payroll tax (from 2.9 percent to 6.44 percent), or an immediate 51 percent reduction in program outlays or some combination of the two. As with Social Security, adjustments of greater magnitude would be necessary if changes are delayed or phased in gradually. Larger changes would also be required to make the program solvent on a sustainable basis beyond the 75-year horizon.

Part B of the Supplementary Medical Insurance (SMI) Trust Fund, which pays doctors' bills and other outpatient expenses, and Part D, which pays for access to prescription drug coverage, are both projected to remain adequately financed into the indefinite future because current law automatically provides financing each year to meet next year's expected costs. However, expected steep cost increases will result in rapidly growing general revenue financing needs—projected to rise from 1.3 percent of GDP in 2007 to 4.1 percent in 2082—as well as substantial increases over time in beneficiary premium charges.

I think some people should go to the library and look up the word socialism before they freely toss it about. However, it would seem that the free market has let us down rather significantly so government has to step in. Would you rather everyone be ruined to serve some ideological principle?

Ron I dont even bother to go to the hyper links anymore I just take for granted they will go to some intellectually challenged blogger. Who wouldnt know the truth if it came up and bit him on the arse.

What's it like to live in perpetual fear?

What's it like to live in perpetual fear?

Perpetual fear of sharing and caring. That's some irrational fear.

I found an article on Gather that tries to make sense of all of this socialism talk. Perhaps someone here can help to clear things up.

http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.jsp?memberId=36130&articleId=281474977492089&nav=MyGather

Ah, but Sandy... they're the compassionate conservatives, dontcha know?

I loved your article, Joseph! Hilarious and entertaining. Thanks.

Lori, all of that has been going on for the last 60 years that I know of and probably long before that. It will not change anytime soon.

Thanks for the article.

It's all those grisly globalists at it again. It's like the saying goes, they want to socialize risk while privatizing gain. So let's not let them get away with it! Socialism, as Ludwig von Mises observed, is not really an economic system at all -- and only serves to maximize human misery. Liberty is the answer, so let's keep advancing it as long as we've still got a breath of life to spare!

Col.-

There have been some small strides to bigger government over the last 60 years, but look out for this clown. They hid crap in the stimulus to lay the groundwork for the government take over of health care. Now, the "one" will propose raising taxes on businesses and a lot of other people in his address to congress. This guy just does not get it. 2012 can not come quick enough. Maybe America will wake up by then.

EM JAY ???? W.-

Move to France if you think that is so glorious. The fact is they cannot sustain the system. They are like California they either have to go bankrupt or seriously cut back on services.

We have been going here for a long time. In fact ever time we get a Socialist President, more doors are opened, and everyone else keeps going through.
The problem here and now, is the new Liberal, as they do not want any regulation on any thing. Socialism, without regulation, just like capitalism without it, leads to Anarchy. Yes bush helped it along, but Obama is going to push it a lot futher towards Anarchy.

Modern, I am afraid you are right. "We the People" who voted for this one should have insisted on knowing exactly what "Change" he planned. Castro won on a promise of "change" and the people of Cuba learned very quickly what he meant by it.

Col. so many of us tried to get people to look, and they refused, and just looked at what the media said, or their political Leaders. There was so much to look at, and why I opposed both Republican and Democrat a like.
Now the extreme left stil refuses to face reality, and we are heading into a system that will make things far worse, combined with the fact like most of what the Democrats do is unregulated, will only amplify the problems. This Government is going to be dangerous for this country, by far worse than Bush ever is. Economists are already figuring Obama will double Bush's spenditure by double at the end of his first term...

We are in great danger of a very deep depression Dan, Too bad no one would listen when they had the chance.

This is very true. Many of us had the right idea, that Obama and McCain were wrong for what is needed, but we lost to a fantasy that may now finish destroying the fabric of this nation.

My first thought when I heard Obama sepak after winning Iowa was that he was nothing more than a Confidence May, A Con Artist. So far he has not proven me wrong. I wish he would.

We have lived in troubled times for many years.

Not me. I'm an Italian American grandmother Christian, right wing nut job, but never a socialist.

it's funny how we love the pledge of allegiance, but hate socialists. we seem so patriotic and ready to defend a history we don't even know.

What is the socialist Church? is Jesus a capitalist?

The Pledge of Allegiance was written in 1892 by Francis Bellamy (1855-1931), a Baptist minister, a Christian socialist, and the cousin of socialist utopian novelist Edward Bellamy (1850-1898). Bellamy's original "Pledge of Allegiance" was published in the September 8th issue of the popular children's magazine The Youth's Companion as part of the National Public-School Celebration of Columbus Day, a celebration of the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's discovery by the natives of America, conceived by James B. Upham.

Darren,

Interesting information, thank you. Your point? Because a Socialist penned the words to the pledge does not take away from its meaning and importance.

there is nothing wrong with socialism. we are not pretending to fight the wizard of Oz (USSR) certain forms of communism are obviously are dangerous, but so is lasa fair capitalism.

socialism got its dirty name from the cold war. but when the iron curtain fell there was no monster. a big part of the cold war was fought here at home, with propaganda.

without the wizard we would not have gone to the moon. so the real story here is not let or right , but rather how. how to we motivate the people to invest in large scale projects that cost B$. without resorting to propaganda?

Col. George W.
i am glad you posted the news link. this is an important subject, but not for lamenting. its an opportunity to create a national dialog.

what is it?

Although Adam Smith is often described as the "father of capitalist thinking," he never used the term "capitalism". He described his own preferred economic system as "the system of natural liberty." However, Smith defined "capital" as stock, and "profit" as the just expectation to keep the revenue from improvements to that stock. Smith also made capital improvement the central goal of the economic and political system.[44]



Dialectical materialism is the philosophy of Karl Marx, which he formulated by taking the dialectic of Hegel and joining it to the Materialism of Feuerbach. According to many followers of Karl Marx's thinking, it is the philosophical basis of Marxism.

What is Property? Or, an Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government (French Qu'est-ce que la propriété ? ou Recherche sur le principe du Droit et du Gouvernment) is an influential work of nonfiction on the concept of property and its relation to anarchist philosophy by the French anarchist and mutualist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, first published in 1840.

My point Col. respectfully Col Sir.
is we have intellectual and practical examples of various forms of civil governance. we should be able to extrapolate resound instruction from the world we live in.

"how to we motivate the people to invest in large scale projects that cost B$. " Darren why not let them see that they can make a profit from the venture.

There is nothing wrong with Socialism? When the governmet controls there is no incentive to work or start a business. Socialism levels people and robbs them of incentive.

sorry I took so long Col Sir.

venter capital wont send us back to the moon just like it didn't build the highway system. that kind of spending takes government. The country needs to grow up, that means going beyond isms. Our people are way behind and corporate greed is partly to blame, but also the gullibility of generations.

my generation was marketed for disaster, I know because I bought into it. Sex, drugs and rock and roll.

"Because a Socialist penned the words to the pledge does not take away from its meaning and importance."

I started here with the Flag because its something we both hold in high esteem. and that which we hold dear we conceived in an idealism that we have been toled is anti- American.
that is confusing to say the least.

in a capitalistic society the man on the bottom has to trust the man at top, because when you work 16 hours a day you don't have the luxury of a fully informed mind set.

Thats how we ended up with the worlds largest prison population. prohibition has served the interests of venture capitalists quite well, but it has undermined the cowmen welfare of the country.

my grand father had 8 kids in the great depression, he got one of those fake government jobs were he learned about steam engines. later that skill went to work in the war effort. when steam fell out of favor, he managed to work on the old dyeing steamers for many more years to come.

this is an example of a successful government spending program.

somewhere between 1933 and 1979 when he passes on, government spending on its own people got a dirty name. But the evidence against spending at home is hard to come by. this was a way forward in hard times that lead to a life time of employment and opportunity far him and his family.

You bring up some very good points Darren.

However, we sent men to space and we built a highway system as well as a lot of other things without being a Socialist nation. Only a Semi Socialist Republic. We grew up in a Republic that had a few Socialist like programs and I see no reason to change it as Obama wants. Government controling the banks and industry? I think that is going a bit too far into radical Socialism.

Government controling the banks and industry?

thats not socialism its fascism. But what would you have him (Obama) do? people your age and older would be the one to suffer the worst. without the economy there will be not social safety net for the old and the feeble.

Do you really think that free markets would favor you best interest?

Do you keep your money in the islands so you wont have to pay your taxes?

Do you swindle your neighbor, blow all the ill gotten gain then ask for a lone so you can give yourself a bonus?

The change Obama is bringing is the change we voted for. I did not vote for Mr Bush, but I still got the change he brought.

I do think a one party system is a very bad thing for the country, but the Right needs a platform of ideals that brings us to the center.

Now is not the time to lament that which is lost. now is the time to Work for what might be saved.
Sir.

Darren,

Your stattement "Now is not the time to lament that which is lost. now is the time to Work for what might be saved." is the reason for the Campaign for Liberty and a few other movements to restore this Republic and the Constitution.

I am a little to the left on social issues and I don't like the bigoted nature of some of the reform movement.


you have been around, you know how it is. you were a leader of men and maybe women. Did you ever expect one of your people under your command. to go to prison for following your orders?
I don't know you, but I'm looking at your face and I don't see that in you.

look were we are, what are we to do? the President of the United States of America... may have committed treason. we put our own children in prison to support local revenues. we would rather pay dictators then spend at home.

i am trying to reach out to your generation and not just blame, but i feel like there has to be responsibility on all sides.

sorry if I rambled a little there Sir. I guess I'm a little disturbed about law and order. when bad things happen the bad guys on top resin. the little guy goes to jail....

Nixon did us more harm by trumping the law than he did by braking it. Now we stand on the crossroads again.

Darren,

a. When I was in the service a commander was responsable even to the acts of his men.

b. You need to be in the Campaign for Liberty to some degree.

c. There is still a hope that Bush Cheney & Co. will be prosecuted. I hope they then turn them all over to the internaional court to show the rest of the world that there is no favortism in America, Everyone must live under the law, even our leaders.

Thank you Sir.

i will read up on this Campaign for Liberty group. i think this conversation is a good one. we are all Americans and we need to find our common voice.

Dr. Pule.. thank you Sir.. I see now were your heart is. I will keep up with this and with you.