Posted on 02/28/2014 12:46:37 PM PST by servo1969
RUSH: Salon.com. This is a huge piece here. This prints out to six pages. "Why You're Wrong About Communism: 7 Huge Misconceptions About It (and Capitalism) -- Most of what Americans think they know about capitalism and communism is total nonsense," and as I read through this...
I'm not gonna read the whole thing to you, but we will link to it at RushLimbaugh.com. As you read through this, if you take the time to do it, this could very easily be the kind of gobbledygook that's being taught in college. "As the commentary around the recent deaths of Nelson Mandela, Amiri Baraka and Pete Seeger made abundantly clear, most of what Americans think they know about capitalism and communism is arrant nonsense.
"This is not surprising, given our country's history of Red Scares designed to impress that anti-capitalism is tantamount to treason. In 2014, though, we are too far removed from the Cold War -- era threat of thermonuclear annihilation to continue without taking stock of the hype we've been made, despite Harry Allen's famous injunction, to believe. So, here are seven bogus claims people make about communism and capitalism."
Would you like to hear these bogus claims? Okay, here you go. I'm just gonna give you the seven claims and get into some of them, maybe. "1. Only communist economies rely on state violence." That's just absolute BS! Capitalist economies require state violence, too, not just the commies. "2. Capitalist economies are based on free exchange." That's bogus. There's no free markets in capitalism!
That's the biggest lie that's ever been taught. It's the biggest myth that there is. There's no freedom in free markets. There are no free markets in capitalism. "3. Communism killed 110 million people for resisting dispossession." This attacks the notion that, those people in the Soviet Union didn't die 'cause they wanted to get out of the country. They didn't die because of a totalitarian the government that murdered 'em!
These 110 million, 75 million, they didn't get killed! Communism doesn't kill. That's another myth. Another myth: "4. Capitalist governments don’t commit human rights atrocities." I don't know who says that, but you see where this is headed. "4. Capitalist governments don’t commit human rights atrocities." That's a myth! Capitalist governments violate human rights all the time, is the point here.
Why, this country's been capitalist and look at all the racism and look at all the sexism and look at all the homophobia and look at all the bigotry! See? Communism is being advocated here. The point is, this is an advocacy piece. It's a slam on capitalism. "5. 21st Century American communism would resemble 20th century Soviet and Chinese horrors." They say that's a myth.
If America became communist this century, it wouldn't look like Soviet Union! It wouldn't look anything like the ChiComs killing people left and right. It wouldn't look like that. There wouldn't be mass poverty. The grocery stores wouldn't be empty. If America went communist, it wouldn't look anything like any other communist nation ever! Right, because the right people would be in charge!
For the first time ever, the right people would finally be in charge, and we'd have all the money we want. I mean, Stalin and these guys, they were okay, but they just weren't the right people. Mao? He was ahead of his time. Fidel? If it hadn't been for the blockade, who knows what kind of paradise Cuba could have become. I mean, they got the best health care system in the world, but imagine what else if we hadn't embargoed 'em!
So twenty-first century American communism? Why, we're the ones that could finally make it work! "6. Communism fosters uniformity." That's a myth. That's not true. Communism doesn't make everybody the same. Communism doesn't demand everybody be the same! Communism doesn't demand everybody think alike. That's a... (interruption) No. They didn't watch the opening ceremonies.
Well, if you watched the opening ceremony of the Chinese Olympics, that was scary. The opening... We even commented on it. The opening ceremony the Chinese Olympics was scary. Other people thought it was really beautiful: Synchronization, conformity, and choreography. I thought it was scary, but that's not the point. He's saying here that communism doesn't make everybody behave and think and act the same.
That's another myth that these right-wingers have put out there. "7. Capitalism fosters individuality." That's a bogus myth! That's not true! Capitalism doesn't do that. Capitalism doesn't make people entrepreneurs or independent or individual or whatever. Capitalism isn't what allows us to be different from each other. It's in Salon. It's by a guy named Jesse Myerson.
I don't know what else he does. I don't have any information about where he teaches or if he's just a journalist or whatever. But the point is, this didn't just happen. This piece is the result, no doubt, of a lot of thinking over time. Look, it's just probably what suffices for education today in college. I think that's probably the case. That's why I say, you know, when you look at the national malaise and what people's attitudes are, you gotta look at how young kids have been taught what they've been taught.
Again, folks, that's why I'm doing my children's books. It's to counter this crap. It's to try to do what little we can in that venue to try to counter some of this stuff that is being, quote/unquote "taught" or propagandized. I can just tell you, when I was going to school -- and probably you, too -- there was no way this was taught.
There were people who had high hopes for Soviet communism, but in school it was never advocated. We were never taught of the wonders and the potential and the beauty and the greatness that we could all achieve if we were communists. That just didn't happen. Nobody ever went there -- and they even tackle that. That's said to be a problem, 'cause that led to all of these misconceptions about capitalism.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Okay. If I'd have known this I might not have spent as much time on this column as I did. Jesse Myerson, the author of this piece on why you're wrong about communism, is "media coordinator" for Occupy Wall Street. Had I known that, I probably would have had more fun laughing at this than I did. It's an absolute nutcase. Occupy Wall Street is a total Obama Regime concoction.
There's no doubt the kid believes it, and I still believe the stuff's being taught. I still believe that. Where did this kid get the idea of all this stuff? This stuff all has to be taught. He recently had a piece in Rolling Stone that urged Millennials "to demand communism in America by eliminating private property, 'guaranteeing' everyone a job and turning banks into state property." That's who the guy is.
Private property. I guess he's never read the Gulag Archipelago or any of that. Anyway, I think it was worth the time because you need to know that if you have a young person, children, child, son, kid, whatever, this is the kind of stuff they're up against. This is what they're being told. This is how they're being influenced, shaped, flaked and folded.
Mantra of typical liberals - Communism has not worked in the past because we were not in charge of it...
Everyone knows that once you give the people on the top of the power structure a communist country they rule it like saints and not tyrants......
(cricketnoise)
He looks pretty gay to me. And, as we all know, they do SOOO well during Communist regimes.
Saw the piece on FR a few days ago. The author apparently feels that setting up ridiculous straw men and then knocking them down constitutes some sort of political discourse. It really isn’t worth much more time than it takes just to note that.
Okay. I admit I was wrong. It’s way worse than we ever thought and the “lyin’ king” is bringing us along nicely.
He is free to export himself to cuba any time he wishes...
We are not going to detain him like the soviets detained people trying to flee that socialist state in the 20th century....
Jesse Myserson is an imbecile that makes other imbeciles look highly intelligent
The idiots who love Communism, I give them this challenge..go live in Venezuela or North Korea for a month, heck, I’ll do better than that, live in any of those two countries for a WEEK, and I bet you 100 bucks they will be begging, pleading to come back to the US and kiss the ground
[ He looks pretty gay to me. And, as we all know, they do SOOO well during Communist regimes. ]
The only thing that gives me some solace if we fail to save this country is the fact that his kind, and I mean the wackjob libs will be the first against the wall AFTER any Communist revolution is successful.
I may die, but it will be 3rd or 4th wave....
All kidding aside... yes, they do believe that.
Liberals’ belief system centers around the assumption that people are basically good and respond to their environment with corresponding choices and behaviors. In other words, bad choices and evil behaviors are only a result of a bad environment, and if that environment were good, they’d act good. Of course, that good environment would have to be created, and of course, only those with this belief system would want to created such an environment. Those people would have to be given the power to do so.
The reason they are baffled, or in denial, when it is shown that this fails every time, is that it would require they give up on their assumption of human nature. And they don’t want to do that because that would logically and inevitably lead to “Mere Christianity” as the only solution to the human condition.
[ Saw the piece on FR a few days ago. The author apparently feels that setting up ridiculous straw men and then knocking them down constitutes some sort of political discourse. It really isn’t worth much more time than it takes just to note that. ]
He reminds me of the Anarchist Communists that are so in love with Communism they failt o realize that Communism requires absolute government which is the diametric opposite of Anarchy.
Which means these screwballs are dangerous because they have SEVERE BI-Polar disorder.
These nut bars are usually the type that have been involed in MOST of the political asassinations of the 20th century...
This is a Scary Evil Disturbed man...
I have critized the “Noble Savage Myth” many times here, glad to see you know if it’s evil as well.
The institutions of capitalism are:
1) free market price system
2) financial self interest and the profit motive
3) freedom of economic competition
4) freedom of economic inequality
5) saving and capital accumulation
6) money and exchange.
These institutions are necessary for a modern division of labor society, which is necessary for increasing total productive ability and rising productivity of labor. Both of these are necessary for rising real wage rates and rising standard of living for the average worker.
Capital accumulation is necessary for economic progress which is necessary for increasing prosperity. Communism destroys these institutions which makes rising standard of living and increased prosperity impossible, no matter who does it or which country does it.
Well, traitors are always the first to go, aren’t they? If they could turn against their own country surely they could turn against the new socialist order! Socialism always breeds paranoia among those who assume power.
That sideways glare & bow tie scream “I’m a rebel against the conventional!!!”
Anyway..... all together now, children, one, two, three:
“TRUE COMMUNISM HASN’T BEEN TRIED YET!!!!!”
He writes like a 7th grader but gets published in Rolling Stone. He’s the very definition of a “young skull full of mush.”
I grew up reading David Horowitz and Ron Radosh - great writers and historians of Communism. I can’t deal with stupid kiddie essays that appear to be written in crayon.
Have you read Sowell’s “Conflict of Visions”?
Brilliant work.
And what’s funny was, I read it once pre-”new creation” and got it, but it made a LOT more sense reading it post-”new creation”.
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