Maybe America will be the last country that has to prove that Socio-Communism doesn't work.
Posted on 11/18/2008 5:05:49 PM PST by SeekAndFind
If you wanted to turn the United States of America into a socialist country, what strategy would you adopt? Joseph Stalin, the world’s top communist from 1924 to 1953, is reputed to have advocated the following strategy to William Z. Foster, leader of the Communist Party U.S.A.: “Work for more government intervention and control of the business activities of the people. In this way the American people will accept Communism without knowing it.”
Stalin would be pleased with the trend in America since he dispensed that advice. He would be positively delighted with the recent partial nationalizations of the housing, mortgage, financial, and insurance industries during the Crash of 2008. He would be even more thrilled by the future prospects for socialism in America.
The Democrats seem to have found the perfect strategy to replace free markets with government control. Their game plan is now clear: to move incrementally but inexorably from capitalism (free markets) to socialism (government control of economic activity).
The first stage in that transition, the proverbial nose of the camel under the tent, was accomplished by earlier generations of politicians, primarily Democratic. It was to condition Americans to view government as a player, rather than a referee, in all sorts of previously private markets. That is, sell the voters on a government program for some worthy cause—nothing as radical as total government control, but simply as a supplementary aid in some important area of life, such as retirement, health care, housing, energy. Thus, Social Security was created to put a modest floor under Americans’ retirement income; Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to help poorer Americans afford homes; Medicare and Medicaid to help seniors and the poor afford medical care; the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. to insure bank deposits; the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corp. to insure pensions, etc., etc., etc.
The second stage in creeping socialism is to keep expanding government programs. This is easy in a democracy. Understanding the political dynamic so pithily summarized by the great playwright (and socialist) George Bernard Shaw—“The government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always count on the support of Paul”—the politicians who want greater government control carry the day. The party of Bigger Government—the Democrats—has skillfully employed demagoguery against all who dare question the wisdom or long-term financial viability of such programs, shamelessly and unfairly denouncing them as heartless and uncaring. This Democratic and democratic pressure intimidates some Republicans to become “pragmatists” who acquiesce in fiscally unsustainable policies. The result has been that Congress has repeatedly increased the vote-buying benefits, while avoiding the prudent, but politically unpopular, steps of maintaining programs on a solid financial footing.
That brings us to the present. Today’s Democrats—some crypto-socialists, others not bashful about showing their socialist stripes—actually desire the fiscal mismanagement that bankrupts federal programs, because it precipitates stage three of their strategy: the crisis stage. During a crisis, the choice becomes whether to shut down the insolvent program, or to rescue the program since so many Americans have become dependent upon it. Few Republicans are willing to tell scared Americans that government can’t help them during an emergency (e.g., President Bush during the current crisis), and that gives rise to stage four.
The fourth stage of socialism on the installment plan has dawned in 2008. It is rescuing programs in the crisis stage by nationalizing them. You can choose to believe that Congress was taken by surprise by the looming bankruptcy of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but it wasn’t. I wouldn’t be surprised if Barney Frank and other leading Democrats, who successfully blocked earlier Republican attempts to reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, uncorked champagne bottles when Uncle Sam became the largest mortgage holder and de facto landlord in the country by nationalizing the bankrupt mortgage giants. They will celebrate again when the federal Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation goes broke and Uncle Sam nationalizes private pensions. Ditto for when the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation some day runs out of funds and banks have to be nationalized.
Still looming in the future are the Big Three of precariously under-funded future liabilities: Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. The Democrats are playing a giant game of chicken as these three programs march inexorably toward insolvency—Medicare alone being under-funded by $36 trillion for the next 65 years. Democrats reject all attempts to reform these programs and put them on a sounder financial footing. When George Bush suggested private accounts as part of a possible reform, the Democrats went berserk. Being socialistic, they are as terrified of private property as Dracula is of a cross. We were given a peek of the future of Social Security in October when Congressman George Miller (D-CA) held hearings that included discussion of nationalizing Americans’ IRAs.
Like the frog who doesn’t realize it is being boiled until it is too late to jump out of the pot, at some point during the ongoing government takeover of Americans’ businesses and wealth, we could wake up in a new country. The U.S.A. could morph into the D.S.S.A., the Democratic Socialist States of America, with the Democrats entrenched in power, overseeing it all. That is their end game.
Will the Democratic strategy succeed? Having just been swept into power on a wave of expectations epitomized by the Sarasota woman who exulted, “I won’t have to worry about putting gas in my car. I won’t have to worry about paying my mortgage. If I help (Obama), he’s gonna help me.”—the Democrats are in the driver’s seat. We who believe in free markets have our work cut out for us.
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Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson is a faculty member, economist, and contributing scholar with the Center for Vision & Values at Grove City College.
Around seventy years too late with this article.
I would say there is an argument to be made that we are already there.
JoMa
slowly moving towards socialism??? Somebody isn’t paying attention...
It already has.
With the Commie ‘RATS getting ready to confiscate our retirement accounts, I’d say we jumped over socialism and went straight into fascism.
Slowly, huh?
Demo-Commies are to be hated. Period. All of us who worked hard to get ahead have been screwed by the 52% of the idiots out there.
Slow, Like the speed of light!
I’m pretty sure he said it was the end game...the slow cooker is about to beep.
At least that utter Dope BOR is covering Soros in one Minnesota Race.
The Sheeple never fail to disappoint.
Stupidity is bred in the Public School System, that’s wher “They” started. 1970 Earth Day.
Yes.
2) Is it reversible ?
No.
I hate to repeat myself, but maybe it’s time to let the idiots starve. All liberty loving, free market peoples may have to peacefully seperate from the idiots. Move to a few of the ‘freer’ states. Reestablish Constitutional and free market principals in those states (succession, maybe). Yea, I been told many times it’s been ‘tried’ before. But we’re not defending something immoral, we’re defending liberty. We are going to have to leave our comfort zones one way or another. So , we either accept what’s coming and wait for our ‘free stuff’ or fight it. I’m just suggesting one way to fight. Get busy livin’ or get busy dyin’. I’m not ready to die yet.
It all comes down to this: if we conservatives have been right all these years about how to organize a free republican government and a free economy, we win. If the Commies and Social-Fascists have been right all these years in supposing that people will willingly trade a little (or a lot) of freedom in exchange for the illusion of “fairness” and the “security” that comes from knowing that however bad off I may be, my neighbor is no better off than I (except, of course, for the “artists” and the “intelligentsia”, who are somewhat more equal than the rest of us), then all of us lose. I believe that history’s on our side, but history never unfolds quite as fast as we might desire. Nevertheless, there’s a vestigial spirit of rebellion and freedom that will guarantee that the American people will never be good subjects for an experiment in totalitarian utopianism.
My God, he’s got everything exact.
So now... what will be our end game?
Maybe America will be the last country that has to prove that Socio-Communism doesn't work.
Did you just say it’s not reversible?
Have a gander at the Gadsden Flag for an hour. Then look at your family. Then you come back and say it’s not reversible.
There will be no civil war.
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