Posts Tagged ‘Socialism’

An editorial cartoon from the Chicago Tribune, 1934.

Planned Economy or Planned Destruction, courtesy of Quipster

The cartoon reads:

Planned Economy or Planned Destruction. Tugwell Head. Power. Whoopee! Ickes. Wallace. Richberg. Young Pinkies from Columbia and Harvard. Depleting the resources of the soundest government in the world. ‘It worked in Russia.’ Plan of action for the U.S. Spend! Spend! Spend under the guise of recovery – bust the government – blame the capitalists for the failure – Junk the constitution and decree a dictatorship. How red the sunrise is getting – Stalin. Copyright by The Chicago Tribune. Orr.

Although this is from 1934, it could readily be applied to stimulus, cap and trade, universal healthcare, and any other ridiculous legislation the hard, far left continues to craft. Seriously, these guys are kind of–no they are–socialists.

Well. Hello again old friend. I see you’ve been very busy lately Sam, you crazy uncle you. My cousins are telling me a lot about what you’ve been up to and let me tell you it sounds pretty wild. The ol’ Uncle Sam residence is really taking a turn for the worse.

I heard you’ve lost a bunch of money on some ponzi investment schemes involving cages for your kid’s pets (I’m still blown away by this one). Turns out those once lucrative domiciles were actually pretty worthless when you found out the pets had no way to pay for them. The whole thing was all twisted up and I’m still having trouble wrapping my mind around the mess that situation created. Really, though, what were you thinking? Pets can’t pay for their residences Sam. At all.

Then, what’s this about spilling money into your kid’s bank accounts (where did that money come from by the way, who exactly is giving you money to lend) to try to prop up those cages? You didn’t learn from your poor decision making the first time around did you? Look, if your kids are ever going to learn anything they need to lose all of their money and start from scratch with a better idea of what to spend their money on. Now you’re just encouraging them to invest poorly.

Also, I heard Grant Michael, little old G.M., makes pinewood derby cars for his buddies in the scouts, but people stopped buying his for some better models made by another kid. That’s too bad, these things happen. No, Sam, don’t go buying up his operation–look he needs to figure out what his buddies want to buy, you can’t just tell him to make something you think is good for your house. It won’t work out well for him or you.

Haven’t you wasted enough money yet? Haven’t you figured out that blowing money is the worst way to get out of money troubles?

Come on Sam, get it together man. You can’t control your house this way. The money’s going to stop coming in when everyone loses their incentive to earn and you keep giving them a bunch of money that you don’t even have yourself.

It’s simple, go back to your first principles, and give your family the space it needs to lead successful lives.

Otherwise, chief, you’re just the dictator of the house.

Here we go folks. It’s time for the great experiment in European style social welfare. The ideals of republicanism are long dead, ignored more and more by the major parties for the past 145 years.

What is republicanism? From wikipedia:

As John Adams put it, “They define a republic to be a government of laws, and not of men.”

As the federal government continues to gather power, it has begun to abuse the rule of law, the constitution, to interpret those laws in a way that justifies the power it has given to itself.

This is not the result of Obama’s election, this is the result of the Civil War and the government that it created. One of centralized power, power not expressly given to it in the constitution.

I will grant that unification of the States and abolition of slavery were important and necessary, but the idea of the sovereignty of the states and their preeminence in all matters of government died in that war simply because the federal government felt it had the authority to usurp power from the states; that is the philosophy that has dominated for the last 145 years and led us to European style social welfare.

Update:12/12/2008 To be honest with you, it looks as if the Obama administration is going to lean to the center for a while, certainly as long as the economy is weak. If he and his team have learned anything from the past, it’s that increasing taxes and spending in an economic downturn, even to create work programs, could inevitably lead to further destabilization and the extension of the problem. At any rate, his first term will be tough, but I’m curious to see how he handles it. Good luck Mr. President, all anybody can hope for is that our government doesn’t try to manage this recessionary period too much.

Update:5/20/2009 Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. This guy is a socialist through and through. He’s sure good at pretending to be a centrist though.

This was not an entirely unexpected result. Mr. Obama was a highly touted media darling of a candidate, and extremely popular with the people—considered the vox populi by many.

I’m not as frightened by his election as some conservatives, and he may well not do any of the things most people fear, but it is what he represents that I find to be so dangerous about him. It is the Marxian principles that he touts so energetically; the socialist tendencies his administration, coupled with Democratic control of both houses of Congress, would bring to the table; and the seemingly willful way in which the media has ignored his associations, misspoken words, policy gaffes, and inexperience in an effort to see that he is elected, that bother me so much.

For me, the American ideal can be summarized as rugged individualism, laissez-faire economics, and little Federal involvement in my life. I believe strongly in paying few taxes to the Federal government, and more locally (i.e. the state or municipality one resides in). What should I pay taxes to the Federal government for? Simply put, defense and operating costs. That’s it.

Obama would raise taxes for the rich; while this might not affect me directly, it does not make this redistribution of wealth right. I’ve read, and I’ve heard, leaving my claims without a source for now, that an increase in taxes will often erode your tax base, leaving you with less money in the coffers than if you had left the rate where it was at. Obama ignores this fact.

Obama would increase the rate at which capital gains are taxed. This leaves less incentive for individuals to invest, and puts our already teetering economy in an even worse position. For the economy to grow, and for individuals to prosper from this growth, we need healthy investment. The economy is built on investment from the top, not the bottom’s spending power.

The Democratic party is entertaining a very nasty idea; some in the party have proposed a removal of tax incentives for 401(k) plans; 401(k) plans are one of the single most important retirement investment tools available to individuals and have been a major investment opportunity for the average person. You remove that and the market will drop to levels not seen in twenty years because of the mass exodus induced by this plan. What will they replace the 401(k) with? Social Security 2: it will be a required deduction of 5% from your check to be deposited into a government retirement account. Your money will be invested in government bonds with a meager return rate of 3%. Oh and they’ll even contribute $600 a year to your account. Plus, and here’s where the mass exodus from the market comes from, any 401(k) rolled into this government investment account will not be taxed.

Additionally, Democrats are itching to reduce that defense budget. By as much as 25%. While we’re still in Iraq and Afghanistan. Dumb move.

Look, Obama won’t be the end of the country, but the damage the Democratic party can do to my future makes me quite nervous. I’m not looking forward to the next two years, but we’ll see what happens.