How Socialism Ruined My Country

[deanrd]

The GOP elite has convinced their sordid base that "every man for himself" is the way to live. Only the GOP elite don't live that way. For them, it's "white and rich, but white first" against everyone else.

 

[BluesLegend]

Which makes the assumption that a good socialist leader would have led them down the exact path they are on now. I don't agree with that. I think their main problems are because of their leadership being awful. Maduro is not Chavez.

But had the price of oil not dropped, then Maduro probably wouldn't be having so many problems either. When you have an economy which has, quite frankly, been fucked over by the US for so long, then the economy might have been better, and might have been able to cope without relying heavily on oil. But it did, and Chavez got elected because he promised hope of getting out of the US's shadow.

It's a complex situation, and one where you can't just blame it on Socialism. And I think Socialism is mostly unworkable. However I also support things like socialized healthcare, police, armed forces etc.

This is on Chavez. Maduro merely inherited the problem.

Chavez was grossly incompetent. He ramped up spending when oil was at all time highs, ran deficits even then, and eviscerated PdVSa causing production to fall. When inflation started to soar, he implemented capital controls, pegged the bolivar, and fixed prices on many goods. Unsurprisingly to anyone who isn't an economic idiot, shortages occurred because businesses wouldn't operate at a loss. Chavez then started seizing businesses, blaming them for the shortages, curtailing investment even further.

After Chavez died, oil collapsed. But the economy was heading south beforehand.

This has happened many times before. As Marx said, history repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce.

Socialism doesn't work for anything larger than a tiny village.

And you can prove that, right?

What does "work" mean in this context?

Venezuela, Greece, and so on. The USSR and China had to murder 10's of millions. None of that equates to success.

COMMUNISM is totalitarian where the state owns everything. Socialism is democratic, well regulated fair capitalism with a good safety net. Try getting that thru your thick brainwashed head.

LOL your socialism is working brilliantly lib /sarcasm

 

[LeftofLeft]

Capitalism in the US just recently created The Bush Great Recessoin, and 20 trillion dollars of debt. The US has a president that hands out government jobs to his friends and family like candy on Halloween. He colluded with a foreign adversary to fix the US election. And he and his allies in Congress are working on a tax cut that will cut taxes on the poor by $40 but cut taxes on wealthy people by $1,000,000.

Yeah that shit is working like a well oiled machine in America.

All successful governments are a mix of Capitalism and Socialism. There aren't any Americans volunteering to pay for and pave their own roads, they expect the Society collectively to pay for that. One example out of thousands. People don't equate roads with 'socialism' because they've always been there. Someone has to pay for them, and 95% of the population could not afford to pay for even a 1/4 mile of a paved road.

Everyone that believes they are pure capitalists you need to pry your lips off the socialist teet first. The video in the OP is simple minded and directed at simple minded people. Corruption leads to debt and disaster? Yeah no shit, just check with Wallstreet in September 2008.

If you pay more in taxes, you get a greater tax cut in raw dollars. Define "poor". Most poor and even lower middle class pay no taxes. If they got a tax cut it means they were paid even though they did not pay taxes. I have no problem with that just like I have no problem with the high income earners netting more dollars in a tax cut vs. what get because they are already paying more dollars than I do in taxes. My problem is the Left simply uses this as a vehicle to stir up class warfare to make US more like the failed socialist economies around the world. We have limited socialism. Let's keep it that way.

 

[BluesLegend]

The GOP elite has convinced their sordid base that "every man for himself" is the way to live. Only the GOP elite don't live that way. For them, it's "white and rich, but white first" against everyone else.

It is, we'll inherit the earth. You libs will die out and be forgotten.

 

[francoHFW]

This is on Chavez. Maduro merely inherited the problem.

Chavez was grossly incompetent. He ramped up spending when oil was at all time highs, ran deficits even then, and eviscerated PdVSa causing production to fall. When inflation started to soar, he implemented capital controls, pegged the bolivar, and fixed prices on many goods. Unsurprisingly to anyone who isn't an economic idiot, shortages occurred because businesses wouldn't operate at a loss. Chavez then started seizing businesses, blaming them for the shortages, curtailing investment even further.

After Chavez died, oil collapsed. But the economy was heading south beforehand.

This has happened many times before. As Marx said, history repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce.

Socialism doesn't work for anything larger than a tiny village.

And you can prove that, right?

What does "work" mean in this context?

Venezuela, Greece, and so on. The USSR and China had to murder 10's of millions. None of that equates to success.

COMMUNISM is totalitarian where the state owns everything. Socialism is democratic, well regulated fair capitalism with a good safety net. Try getting that thru your thick brainwashed head.

LOL your socialism is working brilliantly lib /sarcasm

Yes it does. See EU, Canada, Oz, NZ, Japan and the USA with ACA- tho USA is a pander to the rich GOP mess.

 

[francoHFW]

The GOP elite has convinced their sordid base that "every man for himself" is the way to live. Only the GOP elite don't live that way. For them, it's "white and rich, but white first" against everyone else.

It is, we'll inherit the earth. You libs will die out and be forgotten.

Libs always win. It's called progress.

 

[12icer]

Capitalism in the US just recently created The Bush Great Recessoin, and 20 trillion dollars of debt. The US has a president that hands out government jobs to his friends and family like candy on Halloween. He colluded with a foreign adversary to fix the US election. And he and his allies in Congress are working on a tax cut that will cut taxes on the poor by $40 but cut taxes on wealthy people by $1,000,000.

Yeah that shit is working like a well oiled machine in America.

All successful governments are a mix of Capitalism and Socialism. There aren't any Americans volunteering to pay for and pave their own roads, they expect the Society collectively to pay for that. One example out of thousands. People don't equate roads with 'socialism' because they've always been there. Someone has to pay for them, and 95% of the population could not afford to pay for even a 1/4 mile of a paved road.

Everyone that believes they are pure capitalists you need to pry your lips off the socialist teet first. The video in the OP is simple minded and directed at simple minded people. Corruption leads to debt and disaster? Yeah no shit, just check with Wallstreet in September 2008.

Another ignore it post by the great mind of the preschool.

 

[12icer]

The GOP elite has convinced their sordid base that "every man for himself" is the way to live. Only the GOP elite don't live that way. For them, it's "white and rich, but white first" against everyone else.

It is, we'll inherit the earth. You libs will die out and be forgotten.

Libs always win. It's called progress.

No it is REGRESSION to MONARCHY, the basis of all socialist states.

 

[francoHFW]

Capitalism in the US just recently created The Bush Great Recessoin, and 20 trillion dollars of debt. The US has a president that hands out government jobs to his friends and family like candy on Halloween. He colluded with a foreign adversary to fix the US election. And he and his allies in Congress are working on a tax cut that will cut taxes on the poor by $40 but cut taxes on wealthy people by $1,000,000.

Yeah that shit is working like a well oiled machine in America.

All successful governments are a mix of Capitalism and Socialism. There aren't any Americans volunteering to pay for and pave their own roads, they expect the Society collectively to pay for that. One example out of thousands. People don't equate roads with 'socialism' because they've always been there. Someone has to pay for them, and 95% of the population could not afford to pay for even a 1/4 mile of a paved road.

Everyone that believes they are pure capitalists you need to pry your lips off the socialist teet first. The video in the OP is simple minded and directed at simple minded people. Corruption leads to debt and disaster? Yeah no shit, just check with Wallstreet in September 2008.

If you pay more in taxes, you get a greater tax cut in raw dollars. Define "poor". Most poor and even lower middle class pay no taxes. If they got a tax cut it means they were paid even though they did not pay taxes. I have no problem with that just like I have no problem with the high income earners netting more dollars in a tax cut vs. what get because they are already paying more dollars than I do in taxes. My problem is the Left simply uses this as a vehicle to stir up class warfare to make US more like the failed socialist economies around the world. We have limited socialism. Let's keep it that way.

Only if you only count fed income tax, dupe.

Wonkblog
The one tax graph you really need to know




By Ezra Klein September 19, 2012

At the heart of the debate over "the 47 percent" is an awful abuse of tax data.

This entire conversation is the result of a (largely successful) effort to redefine the debate over taxes from "how much in taxes do you pay" to "how much in federal income taxes do you pay?" This is good framing if you want to cut taxes on the rich. It's bad framing if you want to have even a basic understanding of who pays how much in taxes.

There's a reason some would prefer that more limited conversation. For most Americans, payroll and state and local taxes make up the majority of their tax bill. The federal income tax, by contrast, is our most progressive tax -- it's the tax we've designed to place the heaviest burden on the rich while bypassing the poor. And we've done that, again, because the working class is already paying a fairly high tax bill through payroll and state and local taxes.

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But most people don't know very much about the tax code. And the federal income tax is still our most famous tax. So when they hear that half of Americans aren't paying federal income taxes, they're outraged -- even if they're among the folks who have a net negative tax burden! After all, they know they're paying taxes, and there's no reason for normal human beings to assume that the taxes getting taken out of their paycheck every week and some of the taxes they pay at the end of the year aren't classified as "federal income taxes."

Confining the discussion to the federal income tax plays another role, too: It makes the tax code look much more progressive than it actually is.

Take someone who makes $4 million dollars a year and someone who makes $40,000 a year. The person making $4 million dollars, assuming he's not doing some Romney-esque planning, is paying a 35 percent tax on most of that money. The person making $40,000 is probably paying no income tax at all. So that makes the system look really unfair to the rich guy.

That's the basic analysis of the 47 percent line. And it's a basic analysis that serves a purpose: It makes further tax cuts for the rich sound more reasonable.

But what if we did the same thing for the payroll tax? Remember, the payroll tax only applies to first $110,100 or so, our rich friends is only paying payroll taxes on 2.7 percent of his income. The guy making $40,000? He's paying payroll taxes on every dollar of his income. Now who's not getting a fair shake?

Which is why, if you want to understand who's paying what in taxes, you don't want to just look at federal income taxes, or federal payroll taxes, or state sales taxes -- you want to look at total taxes. And, luckily, the tax analysis group Citizens for Tax Justice keeps those numbers. So here is total taxes -- which includes corporate taxes, income taxes, payroll taxes, state sales taxes, and more -- paid by different income groups and broken into federal and state and local burdens:

That's really what the American tax system looks like: Not 47 percent paying nothing, but everybody paying something, and most Americans paying between 25 percent and 30 percent of their income -- which is, by the way, a lot more the 13.9 percent Mitt Romney paid in 2011*
The one tax graph you really need to know

 

[frigidweirdo]

Which makes the assumption that a good socialist leader would have led them down the exact path they are on now. I don't agree with that. I think their main problems are because of their leadership being awful. Maduro is not Chavez.

But had the price of oil not dropped, then Maduro probably wouldn't be having so many problems either. When you have an economy which has, quite frankly, been fucked over by the US for so long, then the economy might have been better, and might have been able to cope without relying heavily on oil. But it did, and Chavez got elected because he promised hope of getting out of the US's shadow.

It's a complex situation, and one where you can't just blame it on Socialism. And I think Socialism is mostly unworkable. However I also support things like socialized healthcare, police, armed forces etc.

This is on Chavez. Maduro merely inherited the problem.

Chavez was grossly incompetent. He ramped up spending when oil was at all time highs, ran deficits even then, and eviscerated PdVSa causing production to fall. When inflation started to soar, he implemented capital controls, pegged the bolivar, and fixed prices on many goods. Unsurprisingly to anyone who isn't an economic idiot, shortages occurred because businesses wouldn't operate at a loss. Chavez then started seizing businesses, blaming them for the shortages, curtailing investment even further.

After Chavez died, oil collapsed. But the economy was heading south beforehand.

This has happened many times before. As Marx said, history repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce.

Socialism doesn't work for anything larger than a tiny village.

And you can prove that, right?

What does "work" mean in this context?

Venezuela, Greece, and so on. The USSR and China had to murder 10's of millions. None of that equates to success.

COMMUNISM is totalitarian where the state owns everything. Socialism is democratic, well regulated fair capitalism with a good safety net. Try getting that thru your thick brainwashed head.

No, that's not Communism at all. That's what the USSR was, it wasn't Communist at all, nor is China or any of the other countries that claim communism.

Communism is when the people control the country without hierarchy.

 

[jon_berzerk]

Shall we list the countries destroyed by capitalism?

Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Vietnam etc etc?

--LOL

how stupid can one get

 

[bitter clinging swiftie]

Shall we list the countries destroyed by capitalism?

Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Vietnam etc etc?

Afhghanistan was occupied and waged war upon by communists for years
Vietnam suffered untold misery at the hands of the communist party, and most of the gains in life expectancy, individual income, etc have been made because the ruling party has allowed some concessions to the free market

 

[frigidweirdo]

Shall we list the countries destroyed by capitalism?

Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Vietnam etc etc?

Afhghanistan was occupied and waged war upon by communists for years
Vietnam suffered untold misery at the hands of the communist party, and most of the gains in life expectancy, individual income, etc have been made because the ruling party has allowed some concessions to the free market

Well, Afghanistan suffer MORE under the US and Britain than the USSR, and Vietnam suffered MORE under the US than supposed Communism, and suffered MORE under the French too. Don't let facts get in the way of a bad argument though.

 

[bitter clinging swiftie]

Shall we list the countries destroyed by capitalism?

Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Vietnam etc etc?

Afhghanistan was occupied and waged war upon by communists for years
Vietnam suffered untold misery at the hands of the communist party, and most of the gains in life expectancy, individual income, etc have been made because the ruling party has allowed some concessions to the free market

Well, Afghanistan suffer MORE under the US and Britain than the USSR, and Vietnam suffered MORE under the US than supposed Communism, and suffered MORE under the French too. Don't let facts get in the way of a bad argument though.

by what metric do you make that claim?

 

[IsaacNewton]

Capitalism in the US just recently created The Bush Great Recessoin, and 20 trillion dollars of debt. The US has a president that hands out government jobs to his friends and family like candy on Halloween. He colluded with a foreign adversary to fix the US election. And he and his allies in Congress are working on a tax cut that will cut taxes on the poor by $40 but cut taxes on wealthy people by $1,000,000.

Yeah that shit is working like a well oiled machine in America.

All successful governments are a mix of Capitalism and Socialism. There aren't any Americans volunteering to pay for and pave their own roads, they expect the Society collectively to pay for that. One example out of thousands. People don't equate roads with 'socialism' because they've always been there. Someone has to pay for them, and 95% of the population could not afford to pay for even a 1/4 mile of a paved road.

Everyone that believes they are pure capitalists you need to pry your lips off the socialist teet first. The video in the OP is simple minded and directed at simple minded people. Corruption leads to debt and disaster? Yeah no shit, just check with Wallstreet in September 2008.

If you pay more in taxes, you get a greater tax cut in raw dollars. Define "poor". Most poor and even lower middle class pay no taxes. If they got a tax cut it means they were paid even though they did not pay taxes. I have no problem with that just like I have no problem with the high income earners netting more dollars in a tax cut vs. what get because they are already paying more dollars than I do in taxes. My problem is the Left simply uses this as a vehicle to stir up class warfare to make US more like the failed socialist economies around the world. We have limited socialism. Let's keep it that way.

I agree on the limited socialism. Nobody in politics is even promoting 'socialism'. Bernie Sanders calls himself a socialist but he isn't. He's not advocating for the government to control all the means of production. He's talking about social justice and equality in specific areas like healthcare and I agree that it is a right for humans to have access to adequate healthcare. The newer generations believe this as well. I'm not for the nationalization of industry or business. Certainly they need to be regulated because all human systems move towards concentrating the wealth in the hands of a few at the expense of the many. Just as with a nuclear reactor you need control rods or the reaction burns itself up. This is true for all human systems through all of history. Left unchecked they give us The Bush Great Recession of 2008. Greedy people do not police themselves. They in fact look for never ending ways to cheat and manipulate the system in their favor.

 

[francoHFW]

This is on Chavez. Maduro merely inherited the problem.

Chavez was grossly incompetent. He ramped up spending when oil was at all time highs, ran deficits even then, and eviscerated PdVSa causing production to fall. When inflation started to soar, he implemented capital controls, pegged the bolivar, and fixed prices on many goods. Unsurprisingly to anyone who isn't an economic idiot, shortages occurred because businesses wouldn't operate at a loss. Chavez then started seizing businesses, blaming them for the shortages, curtailing investment even further.

After Chavez died, oil collapsed. But the economy was heading south beforehand.

This has happened many times before. As Marx said, history repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce.

Socialism doesn't work for anything larger than a tiny village.

And you can prove that, right?

What does "work" mean in this context?

Venezuela, Greece, and so on. The USSR and China had to murder 10's of millions. None of that equates to success.

COMMUNISM is totalitarian where the state owns everything. Socialism is democratic, well regulated fair capitalism with a good safety net. Try getting that thru your thick brainwashed head.

No, that's not Communism at all. That's what the USSR was, it wasn't Communist at all, nor is China or any of the other countries that claim communism.

Communism is when the people control the country without hierarchy.

That's Marx's theoretical utopia. Never happened. I'm talking about any intelligent conversation outside the US lol. There, Communism is the USSR, NK- and socialism is what we call social democracy- because RWers in the US can't separate the two.

 

[IsaacNewton]

Capitalism in the US just recently created The Bush Great Recessoin, and 20 trillion dollars of debt. The US has a president that hands out government jobs to his friends and family like candy on Halloween. He colluded with a foreign adversary to fix the US election. And he and his allies in Congress are working on a tax cut that will cut taxes on the poor by $40 but cut taxes on wealthy people by $1,000,000.

Yeah that shit is working like a well oiled machine in America.

All successful governments are a mix of Capitalism and Socialism. There aren't any Americans volunteering to pay for and pave their own roads, they expect the Society collectively to pay for that. One example out of thousands. People don't equate roads with 'socialism' because they've always been there. Someone has to pay for them, and 95% of the population could not afford to pay for even a 1/4 mile of a paved road.

Everyone that believes they are pure capitalists you need to pry your lips off the socialist teet first. The video in the OP is simple minded and directed at simple minded people. Corruption leads to debt and disaster? Yeah no shit, just check with Wallstreet in September 2008.

Another ignore it post by the great mind of the preschool.

Don't just ignore the post, put me on permanent ignore. That is my favorite spot on this site. You have no return argument so in your mind the messenger must be demonized.

Welcome to Fox News.

 

[Rustic]

Capitalism in the US just recently created The Bush Great Recessoin, and 20 trillion dollars of debt. The US has a president that hands out government jobs to his friends and family like candy on Halloween. He colluded with a foreign adversary to fix the US election. And he and his allies in Congress are working on a tax cut that will cut taxes on the poor by $40 but cut taxes on wealthy people by $1,000,000.

Yeah that shit is working like a well oiled machine in America.

All successful governments are a mix of Capitalism and Socialism. There aren't any Americans volunteering to pay for and pave their own roads, they expect the Society collectively to pay for that. One example out of thousands. People don't equate roads with 'socialism' because they've always been there. Someone has to pay for them, and 95% of the population could not afford to pay for even a 1/4 mile of a paved road.

Everyone that believes they are pure capitalists you need to pry your lips off the socialist teet first. The video in the OP is simple minded and directed at simple minded people. Corruption leads to debt and disaster? Yeah no shit, just check with Wallstreet in September 2008.

Socialism is a cancer, once spineless fuck ups are addicted to it - it cannot be cured…

 

[frigidweirdo]

Shall we list the countries destroyed by capitalism?

Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Vietnam etc etc?

Afhghanistan was occupied and waged war upon by communists for years
Vietnam suffered untold misery at the hands of the communist party, and most of the gains in life expectancy, individual income, etc have been made because the ruling party has allowed some concessions to the free market

Well, Afghanistan suffer MORE under the US and Britain than the USSR, and Vietnam suffered MORE under the US than supposed Communism, and suffered MORE under the French too. Don't let facts get in the way of a bad argument though.

by what metric do you make that claim?

By the one of facts.

 

[francoHFW]

Capitalism in the US just recently created The Bush Great Recessoin, and 20 trillion dollars of debt. The US has a president that hands out government jobs to his friends and family like candy on Halloween. He colluded with a foreign adversary to fix the US election. And he and his allies in Congress are working on a tax cut that will cut taxes on the poor by $40 but cut taxes on wealthy people by $1,000,000.

Yeah that shit is working like a well oiled machine in America.

All successful governments are a mix of Capitalism and Socialism. There aren't any Americans volunteering to pay for and pave their own roads, they expect the Society collectively to pay for that. One example out of thousands. People don't equate roads with 'socialism' because they've always been there. Someone has to pay for them, and 95% of the population could not afford to pay for even a 1/4 mile of a paved road.

Everyone that believes they are pure capitalists you need to pry your lips off the socialist teet first. The video in the OP is simple minded and directed at simple minded people. Corruption leads to debt and disaster? Yeah no shit, just check with Wallstreet in September 2008.

If you pay more in taxes, you get a greater tax cut in raw dollars. Define "poor". Most poor and even lower middle class pay no taxes. If they got a tax cut it means they were paid even though they did not pay taxes. I have no problem with that just like I have no problem with the high income earners netting more dollars in a tax cut vs. what get because they are already paying more dollars than I do in taxes. My problem is the Left simply uses this as a vehicle to stir up class warfare to make US more like the failed socialist economies around the world. We have limited socialism. Let's keep it that way.

I agree on the limited socialism. Nobody in politics is even promoting 'socialism'. Bernie Sanders calls himself a socialist but he isn't. He's not advocating for the government to control all the means of production. He's talking about social justice and equality in specific areas like healthcare and I agree that it is a right for humans to have access to adequate healthcare. The newer generations believe this as well. I'm not for the nationalization of industry or business. Certainly they need to be regulated because all human systems move towards concentrating the wealth in the hands of a few at the expense of the many. Just as with a nuclear reactor you need control rods or the reaction burns itself up. This is true for all human systems through all of history. Left unchecked they give us The Bush Great Recession of 2008. Greedy people do not police themselves. They in fact look for never ending ways to cheat and manipulate the system in their favor.

GD it LOL, socialism definition- the basic one- says owns or REGULATES means of production. Pure socialism, COMMUNISM, owns them, socialism- now defined as democratic, REGULATES.

This is the most misunderstood word in America...