Lately, many have accused the President Obama of embracing Socialism . As someone who was once a member of the Communist Party, I have researched Socialism/Communism for years. I think this quote best sums up my feelings about it now:
"How do you tell a Communist? It's someone who reads Marx and Lenin. How do you tell an anti-Communist? It's someone who UNDERSTANDS Marx and Lenin." -Ronald Reagan.
Having said that, after I did my research, I understood how unfair, and how damaging the idea of Socialism/Communism is. I now consider myself a proud Libertarian, and am a huge opponent of gigantic government.
My question is: if Obama is 'the farthest thing from a Socialist' as some of his supporters claim, how do you explain this?
http://www.cpusa.org/article/articleview/1054/1/157/
As a former member of this party, I can attest that most of it's members were ECSTATIC when Obama won the Presidency, and some called him "The best chance our party has".
If Obama does not hold Socialist ideals, why did he say this?
"One of the, I think, the tragedies of the civil rights movement, was because the civil rights movement became so court focused, I think that there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributive change, and in some ways we still suffer from that." -Barack Obama
Basically what I'm asking is, to those of you on the left: do you really think that Socialist ideals are a good thing for America?
As opposed to authoritarian and overtly religious corporatist ideals?
Hell yes.. I prefer socialism over that any day.
Could you please explain yourself a little better and maybe provide a source?
The fact that the other alternative, the Republicans, are religious corporatist moral authoritarians is common knowledge. One does not need a citation for common knowledge.
I was merely stating my OPINION, which also does not need a citation, that I prefer socialism to the aforementioned ideology.
The whole premise of your argument is the assumption that it is common knowledge that socialism is automatically bad in all circumstances no matter what.
Believe it or not, that's not the case, and even if it was, you've cited or sourced nothing to prove it other than a weak attempt at quoting a clearly biased author.
This is not 1950s Wisconsin... McCarthy is long dead. No, I don't want the USA to become the Soviet Union. I believe in a democratically elected pragmatic government that ensures some of the most basic needs of the people while also fostering innovation, creativity, and a spirit of entrepreneurship.
If that is "socialist" to you.. fine. I don't care. But I'm not going to parse with you over semantics about the common perceptions and definition of the word "socialism".
