See, if Barack Obama was actually a dictator, the 2010 midterms wouldn't have mattered, because he would've ordered every single Republican congresscritter (and their aides) to be marched onto the White House lawn and executed by firing squad. Because that's what dictators do. A dictator -- or any ruler with absolute power -- does not follow a checks and balances system. A dictator eliminates enemies by whatever means necessary, full stop.
Ah, but the infamous executive orders! He's going over Congress' head, and that somehow makes him a monarch in the eyes of the Koch brothers' personal army. Well see, funny thing about that: Barack Obama has issued fewer executive orders than nearly every other two-term president in the last century.
So if Barack Obama is trying to be a dictator, he's doing a lousy job of it.
But there's still socialism, right? After all, the ACA--
Yeah, stop. Right there. Because if you equate the ACA with socialism, you've just proven you have no idea what either one of them is.
Socialism is not a system of government, for one thing. It's an economic policy wherein the means of production is owned by the people. Or in smaller words that conservatives can digest, socialism is when people work to produce what is needed and make sure that everyone has enough, rather than to make as much money as possible.
The ACA has about as much to do with socialism as Christmas does with Bastille Day. See, the ACA is not socialized medicine. The law doesn't change who the doctors work for. Only how they get paid. That is, the law is making private insurance available to everyone and requiring everyone to have it, in order to make sure that everyone can see a doctor when needed (and that doctor can get paid). The only part that is even vaguely-socialist-if-you-squint is the subsidy program. But the insurance itself is still not provided by the federal government; the federal government is merely footing part of the bill.
Yes, there was a comment from Obama in a speech from 1998 about redistributing the wealth:
"The trick is figuring out how do we structure government systems that pool resources and hence facilitate some [wealth] redistribution -- because I actually believe in redistribution, at least at a certain level to make sure that everybody’s got a shot."Now, if Republican Tea Party Fantasy Island denizens could rip out the Kool-Aid IV for five minutes and read that with a clear head, they'd understand that the federal government is not coming for your paycheck with a fully outfitted M-1 Abrams. In this case, the redistribution of wealth means a better use of the taxes you already pay. Because that's what "government systems that pool resources" are. That's what taxes do. Taxes already redistribute wealth. Obama's idea then was that we should be using that tax system more efficiently and fairly.
See, if Obama was a socialist? He'd be calling for the dissolution of private-owned infrastructure altogether, in favor of resources and utilities being controlled by the state, because that is what socialism is. The public ownership of agriculture, finance (banks and credit), energy (both electric and gas/oil), water management, waste management, healthcare...you get the idea. Or I sure as hell hope so because I'm running out of small words.
Advocating for a tax system that gives people more money to spend buying privatized resources they can't live without is the exact opposite of socialism.
So the next time you see someone complaining about the socialist dictator in the White House, ask them who they're talking about. Because ironically, if there was anyone in the White House who was remotely close to a socialist dictator (and even then, only if you squint) -- someone who imposed wage and price control strangleholds and circumvented checks and balances to grab as much power as he could -- it was Nixon.
You know, a Repu--
...Oh yeah. Nevermind.
No comments:
Post a Comment