A good part of our problem is Americans, beginning in the 1950's "learned" about political "philosophies" from TV ads and promos. Since too many Americans read very little except picture books and 'fan magazines', unlike you Susanna, they haven't a clue about 'communism' or socialism.
I keep repeating there is not now and never has been a…
A good part of our problem is Americans, beginning in the 1950's "learned" about political "philosophies" from TV ads and promos. Since too many Americans read very little except picture books and 'fan magazines', unlike you Susanna, they haven't a clue about 'communism' or socialism.
I keep repeating there is not now and never has been a communist government on Earth, regardless of what they call themselves. Every nation, including, China, Cuba, North Korea, Russian are, or were, authoritarian dictatorships. They are not and never were classless societies. The "revered" workers are and were little above serfs. The oligarchs rule instead of the aristocracy but that too, is merely a change in name.
Socialism in some degree exists in most citizen centered 'democracies' today. But the closest thing to pure socialism we have are the 'Nordic' Countries, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden.
In the USA, today, those who receive the largest amounts of 'welfare' meaning unearned taxpayer dollars are not the poor and neediest - they are the wealthiest among us. The oil depletion allowances, the bonuses paid to industrial agriculture (NOT the family owned farms) for not growing certain crops like wheat, corn, etc - which they never intended to grow anyway. The huge tax giveaways starting in the 1980's which actually redistributed the wealth from what used to be the middle class to the top 10% of the population, who were already swimming in money.
"Socialism for the rich, the 'free' market for everyone else" (along with variations thereof) has been a slogan since I was a young person. ;-) As I understand it, "classless society" was always an endgame. Has any country ever claimed to have achieved it? I don't think so, but I'm not sure. What's obvious to me is that any "revolution" has to build on what was already there, even though revolutionaries (overwhelmingly male) invariably claim that they're starting anew. The Russian, Chinese, and Cuban revolutions all arose from extremely hierarchical societies, and -- surprise, surprise -- what resulted was also extremely hierarchical. (I know very little about Korea/North Korea, but I suspect similar conditions prevailed there too.)
As to what we USians have learned -- my take is that since the mid/late 19th century press and politicians have been vilifying anything that threatens capitalist hegemony. Look at how any attempts of workers to organize were met with brute force, by the Pinkertons etc. That was long before the 1950s. Also look at how, once FDR and the New Deal had somewhat rescued the economy, the capitalist class started to attack it in earnest in the late '30s.
Yes Susanna, actually the oligarchs attacks began in 1933 as soon as FDR was inaugurated. They attacked him as being a "traitor to his class". Which he was.
With wealth seems to come insatiable greed. And FDR, like the Kennedy's came from wealthy families. And like Franklin Roosevelt, Jack and Bobby Kennedy came from wealth and yet all three could see that the nation did well when the majority of people Working, Middle, and Wealthy all did well, That doesn't imply there was no distribution of wealth, there was. It just wasn't obscene. Working, middle and wealthy all had decent housing, sufficient food and clothing and good health care for the time.
Things started to dismantle with Reagan - although the plans for the redistribution of wealth to the top echelon started i the early70's.
Fay, they began long before that. Take a look at the so-called "robber barons" of the late 19th century, and even the industrialists who seem to have developed a conscience *after* they made their millions, like Andrew Carnegie. Check out the violent, ongoing efforts to suppress working people's attempts to organize. This is what the anti-trusters and Progressives of the early 20th century were reacting to -- and where the Sherman Anti-Trust Act (1890) and the Clayton Anti-Trust Act (1914) came from. Go back further than that: on one level, the Civil War pitted an oligarchy -- rich Southern whites -- against the more democratic North.
You're right, Susanna. We could go as far back as the early written human history. We have always had, mostly men, who forced others into abject slavery, I was thinking of 'modern' America in the previous reply
A good part of our problem is Americans, beginning in the 1950's "learned" about political "philosophies" from TV ads and promos. Since too many Americans read very little except picture books and 'fan magazines', unlike you Susanna, they haven't a clue about 'communism' or socialism.
I keep repeating there is not now and never has been a communist government on Earth, regardless of what they call themselves. Every nation, including, China, Cuba, North Korea, Russian are, or were, authoritarian dictatorships. They are not and never were classless societies. The "revered" workers are and were little above serfs. The oligarchs rule instead of the aristocracy but that too, is merely a change in name.
Socialism in some degree exists in most citizen centered 'democracies' today. But the closest thing to pure socialism we have are the 'Nordic' Countries, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden.
In the USA, today, those who receive the largest amounts of 'welfare' meaning unearned taxpayer dollars are not the poor and neediest - they are the wealthiest among us. The oil depletion allowances, the bonuses paid to industrial agriculture (NOT the family owned farms) for not growing certain crops like wheat, corn, etc - which they never intended to grow anyway. The huge tax giveaways starting in the 1980's which actually redistributed the wealth from what used to be the middle class to the top 10% of the population, who were already swimming in money.
"Socialism for the rich, the 'free' market for everyone else" (along with variations thereof) has been a slogan since I was a young person. ;-) As I understand it, "classless society" was always an endgame. Has any country ever claimed to have achieved it? I don't think so, but I'm not sure. What's obvious to me is that any "revolution" has to build on what was already there, even though revolutionaries (overwhelmingly male) invariably claim that they're starting anew. The Russian, Chinese, and Cuban revolutions all arose from extremely hierarchical societies, and -- surprise, surprise -- what resulted was also extremely hierarchical. (I know very little about Korea/North Korea, but I suspect similar conditions prevailed there too.)
As to what we USians have learned -- my take is that since the mid/late 19th century press and politicians have been vilifying anything that threatens capitalist hegemony. Look at how any attempts of workers to organize were met with brute force, by the Pinkertons etc. That was long before the 1950s. Also look at how, once FDR and the New Deal had somewhat rescued the economy, the capitalist class started to attack it in earnest in the late '30s.
Yes Susanna, actually the oligarchs attacks began in 1933 as soon as FDR was inaugurated. They attacked him as being a "traitor to his class". Which he was.
With wealth seems to come insatiable greed. And FDR, like the Kennedy's came from wealthy families. And like Franklin Roosevelt, Jack and Bobby Kennedy came from wealth and yet all three could see that the nation did well when the majority of people Working, Middle, and Wealthy all did well, That doesn't imply there was no distribution of wealth, there was. It just wasn't obscene. Working, middle and wealthy all had decent housing, sufficient food and clothing and good health care for the time.
Things started to dismantle with Reagan - although the plans for the redistribution of wealth to the top echelon started i the early70's.
Fay, they began long before that. Take a look at the so-called "robber barons" of the late 19th century, and even the industrialists who seem to have developed a conscience *after* they made their millions, like Andrew Carnegie. Check out the violent, ongoing efforts to suppress working people's attempts to organize. This is what the anti-trusters and Progressives of the early 20th century were reacting to -- and where the Sherman Anti-Trust Act (1890) and the Clayton Anti-Trust Act (1914) came from. Go back further than that: on one level, the Civil War pitted an oligarchy -- rich Southern whites -- against the more democratic North.
You're right, Susanna. We could go as far back as the early written human history. We have always had, mostly men, who forced others into abject slavery, I was thinking of 'modern' America in the previous reply