While socialism is more commonly understood to mean the direct ownership of property and production by individuals, that concept has never worked and, in fact, cannot work as a national plan. Everyone continues to bang at Obama as a Socialist, but neither he nor anyone else has ever been able to hold up an example of a successful socialist society on anything greater than a tribal scale. Beyond that it immediately becomes totalitarian. Even assuming that he was schooled as a Muslim in a Socialist environment, as a well-to-do American, neither he nor anyone else who has reached a privileged place in this society could possibly be willing to trade that for a society in which his position would not exist. Apart from the word 'socialism' no one seems to be able to articulate a path the President might take which does not give the individual MORE choices than we have today.
Both the Merriam Webster and the American Heritage Dictionaries have been banned in various schools. The Merriam Webster was banned in a California elementary school in January 2010 for its definition of oral sex. "It's just not age appropriate," a district representative said. The grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck. An immediate and huge bestseller, the classic depicting poverty and the struggles of migrant workers was and often still is banned for obscenity and for the negative light in which the country was painted. "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, what do you see" This beloved children's book was banned in January 2010 by the Texas Board of Education because the author has the same name as an obscure Marxist theorist, and no one bothered to check if they were actually the same person. Anne Frank's diary has been banned on multiple occasions. The most recent was in January 2010 when the book was pulled from a Virginia school for "sexually explicit" and "homosexual" themes. Little Women, Louisa May Alcot: Not easy to figure out why this one was banned, but it may have been that the strongest woman character marries a boring and much older man--counter to feminism.A farewell to arms, For whom the bell tolls - Ernest Hemingway. How times have changed. "A Farewell to Arms" was banned for sexual content and "For Whom the Bell Tolls" because it was seen as pro-communist.
Walter was explaining to me over dinner last night that Europe is more enlightened than the US. Prostitution and drugs are legal, there is an effective national health care system which covers everyone and we are seen as substantively backward regarding the care of our own citizenry and our continuing, failed, wars against women's rights, sexual freedom, drugs, education, continuing attempts at colonialism and greed to the exclusion of ethics. Then he said that moving America in that direction constituted a Liberal Socialist agenda. So I don't know whether we are a backward country trying to catch up or that all the things Europeans deride us for means they are all too liberal and educated to understand what is important. Except for societies in which one person or a small cabal manages to snatch enough power that they can make unlimited war against any country they choose (Hitler, Stalin, George Bush), Walter did not quite convince me of the reason all those personal liberties exist almost everywhere except here or why we should not seek them. Direct rule by the governed is a prime directive of Socialism, although central planning and several other dysfunctional....and dystopian..plans have been tried and been found wanting. A good example of direct socialism would be a requirement that every decision regarding individual rights and liberties be made by the citizenry directly. Unfortunately, that is impractical to the point of impossibility. Let me give a few examples of conservatives at work:
In point of fact, single payer health care was a REPUBLICAN IDEA. Almost exactly the same one the Republicans suggested in 1991 as an alternative to the Clinton health reform. The Republicans proposed it again to Dubya's cabinet in 2001 and it was very well received; but 9/11 made everyone forget it. But before that it was bandied by Nixon and GHW Bush. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/29/individual-mandate-now-vi_n_517097.html When they tried it, it was a step forward. When the Demoncrats use the same wording, it is socialism.
I don't particularly like it at all; it has never been fair. But you cannot have it both ways. It's not good or bad depending upon who proposes it. It has to be good or bad by it's elements.
Book banning:
Both the Merriam Webster and the American Heritage Dictionaries have been banned in various schools. The Merriam Webster was banned in a California elementary school in January 2010 for its definition of oral sex. "It's just not age appropriate," a district representative said. The grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck. An immediate and huge bestseller, the classic depicting poverty and the struggles of migrant workers was and often still is banned for obscenity and for the negative light in which the country was painted. "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, what do you see" This beloved children's book was banned in January 2010 by the Texas Board of Education because the author has the same name as an obscure Marxist theorist, and no one bothered to check if they were actually the same person. Anne Frank's diary has been banned on multiple occasions. The most recent was in January 2010 when the book was pulled from a Virginia school for "sexually explicit" and "homosexual" themes. Little Women, Louisa May Alcot: Not easy to figure out why this one was banned, but it may have been that the strongest woman character marries a boring and much older man--counter to feminism.A farewell to arms, For whom the bell tolls - Ernest Hemingway. How times have changed. "A Farewell to Arms" was banned for sexual content and "For Whom the Bell Tolls" because it was seen as pro-communist.
But no one ever banned Mein Kampf, The Communist Manifesto, any of Karl Marx' works, The ~30,000 verses of the Bible ( I include the Apocrypha) which either deal with violence or sex...a pretty good percentage since the Bible runs to only 31,101 verses).
'Liberal' and 'Conservative' are words which must be taken in context of time and place. People who self-identify as one or the other at location 'X' might well be at the different end of the political spectrum at location 'Y' or a few years of time either way. I dislike labels and titles and unchallenged authority. I do not like people who have strong opinions without having strong knowledge upon which to base them. But.....Americans are losing their rights to assemble peacefully. Not because of Obama....because of Bush and the Patriot Act and the idea of training TSA agents and police officers that citizens do not have the same rights as they used to and are all to be considered potential terrorists.
That that happened at all appalls me. And because it is STILL happening, and old ladies and students are being TASERed by the thousands, civil disobedience is stepping up to the next level. But we are getting very near a place we do not want to be. People simply cannot be impassioned and logical at the same time. Once the violence starts, sides will be in flux continually, theough whim, caprice, greed, a sudden desire for power, revenge, hunger, bloodlust... no one will know from hour to hour who they can trust; so they will gravitate to the most powerful person in their tribe and kill him (or her) for being unable to predict the future and making mistakes.
"Governmental encouragement does not order men to believe that the false is true, it merely makes them indifferent to the issue of truth or falsehood."-Ayn Rand.
"If everyone bandies words as brickbats...and none of it is true...they have destroyed their credibility in an effort to make a point which cannot be made. At that point then, when words have failed and violence becomes the norm again...as it always has throughout history...where shall they turn for the truth?"
-Burnett
a hui hou
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