Why is socialism becoming increasingly popular in the United States?

You didn't either.

 

Gallup is one of the few polling services I trust. Thanks for the redirect to post #3. The results of the poll is disturbing.

 

It wasn't long ago that 95% of Republicans said they would vote for an authoritarian fascist. So which is worse?

 

It could be for some people, yet I racked up a considerable amount of debt putting myself through college, as well, and over time I paid off my debt, bought a home, got married, raised a son, all while facing any number of possible calamities, financial and otherwise, as all of us who weren't born with a silver spoon in our mouths do, and I accomplished these miraculous feats that countless other Americans have managed to perform because I didn't sit back and whine about rich, greedy, privileged plutocrats pocketing billions while I looked to my fellow Americans to pay for the the things I wanted instead of earning them myself. You see, one thing I learned while I was poor was that I would remain poor for the rest of my life if I sat around blaming other people for my situation and looking to government (taxpayers) to pull me out of poverty. Furthermore, despite all my hardships and travails, I didn't wind up a socialist - in fact, I wound up pretty much the opposite.

Maybe next time you can offer something that is actually educational.

 

Seems like Democrats already did that when they voted for Stakeholder Fascism Joe.

Hmm, and for some reason I don't hear you complaining about that...

 

I don't complain about that much because Joe isn't a fascist. You and the rest of the far right judge a politician who tries to appease the people while he serves the capitalists as a "fascist" but completely fail to see the real fascist on your side of the partisan line.

Ok. Joe.
Joe is a spineless, appeasing, wimp who is more inclined to apologize for an adversary than to act against one. But he has also accomplished a huge amount of good things, mainly for the rich.

 

If you call what Stalin and Mao did workers "liberation," you are ignorant of history.

 

Please don't raise the level of ignorance around here by calling Old Joe a fascist.

 

Joe is a stakeholder fascist - he's made that clear - but I agree he's done a lot for the rich, most particularly wealthy "progressives".

 

One would be ignorant not to refer to a man who embraces stakeholder fascism as anything other than a fascist, and I haven't even gotten started on the rest of Biden's fascistic unconstitutional antics.

 

People who are aware of the facts and not so full of themselves they can't spare any concern for those less fortunate, you mean?

No, that's just false. Fewer and fewer who were not born with a silver spoon in their mouths are able to do that. Economic mobility has declined dramatically in the USA in the last 50 years, and continues to do so. That is kinda the point.

I have encountered your kind of Trumpian self-absorption often enough to recognize it. Sorry, no; the fact that you and a declining number of others who have succeeded against the odds were strong enough to run the race while carrying the rich, greedy, privileged parasites on your backs does not mean that everyone is that strong. And it certainly does not mean those who are not strong enough are to blame that they are not that strong, nor does it mean they aren't carrying any parasites, or that the parasites you and the others who have succeeded against the odds carried across the finish line got there because they ran the race as fast as you.

And of course, there is another possibility: I don't know anything about your history, but maybe you are one of the parasites, and what you have mainly "succeeded" at is finding a way to leave the honest, productive working class behind and join the privileged parasite class by legally placing your pockets in the path of other people's rightful earnings. Many jobs connected with real estate, banking, and IP monopolies fall into that category, as well as military contractors, marketing types, and many others.

But fewer and fewer manage to perform, remember....

See, that's where you are wrong. Honest, productive working people don't mind paying for things they want with what they earn. What they quite rightly do mind is being legally robbed of their earnings for the unearned profit of rich, greedy, privileged plutocrats. Maybe you don't mind it. Maybe you can afford it. Maybe you don't mind only getting to keep half or less of what you have rightly earned. Maybe you figure you are doing well enough to have earned the right to despise those who haven't done as well, and maybe you feel that's a sufficiently gratifying position to be in.

But some of us who have also succeeded, bought houses, married, and raised and educated our kids are also concerned about the massive, systematic, institutionalized, and wholly gratuitous injustice that stops others who are not so able from doing so.

Ah. There it is: blaming the victims. I knew it could only be a matter of time.

It is precisely government that has pushed people into poverty, by taking the side of the privileged against producers and consumers, and I will thank you to remember it.

Yes, well, I didn't wind up a socialist either -- not that I would expect you to notice such subtleties. In fact, I blame socialists for the problem of privilege and injustice even more than capitalists, because they choose to betray honest, productive working people.

Oh, those three are actually quite educational. You have merely decided not to learn what they could teach you.

 

Academically socialism sounds really enlightened, even if it doesn't work in real world.

 

I didn't say that's what it was. I said if it doesn't liberate the working class and establish the democracy of government of the people, by the people, for the people then IT ISN'T SOCIALISM.

If you call Trump "conservative" then YOU are ignorant of history.

 

Are you hoping to start a revolution? Millions of Americans are falling out of the middle class. We're replacing some of their lost income with government subsidized healthcare, SNAP, rent assistance, etc. Do you figure they intend to starve to protest the "never-ending expansion of the welfare state?"

I wonder if you have any idea what's happened with soaring asset values. Rents and home prices have risen sharply.



And the stock market...



If you didn't have a home or other assets, you're screwed. This is what happened to real wages...

This is nonsense.

More like growing desperation.

True.

 

Has there ever been a socialist state?

I suppose you go with "fascist."

 

I'm sure it would be a treat.

 

There was the beginning of one in the case of Russia but it never got to the consolidation stage. Today, the issue is murky with regard to Cuba given all the interference of the US and other capitalist countries led by the US, making it necessary for Cuba to struggle to adjust for the damage being done, but it looks like they may still be holding tight to a socialist path. Eventually if the US continues to take steps to undermine and damage them, I expect they will fold. But if socialism is so horrible and such a failure and so unable to survive and thrive, wouldn't it be far more of a demonstration of its "weakness" and "flaws" to leave it to its own ends and "watch it crash under its own weight"? If it is so weak, what is the US afraid of? LOL!!!

 

why would anyone want a socialist state in the first place?

 

anything that runs counter to human nature is doomed to fail in the end.

 

Socialism is defined as government ownership of production and distribution, pure and simple. It is not defined as utopia, liberation or non-liberation of anyone, or any one class being over other classes. That is just defining socialism by the outcome the proponents promise, which is the same as defining socialism as anything good.

 

What does any of this have to do with socialism, unless socialism is defined as a pie in the sky thing where everything good happens?

 

By whom? A capitalist publishing company? Do you go to a cop for medical advice? Probably!

I gave you the most authoritative definition. But I can't make you tell the truth.

More bullshit. What is the point of socialism if not to end capitalism and "benefit the down-trodden"? Do you think it is to benefit capitalism????

 

Are you serious? People can see there is a problem specifically with economic injustice, and socialism claims to solve that problem. You might as well ask what working people's frustration at their dismal economic prospects has to do with MLM scams.

 

So, Russia never got there and Cuba is a police state. Oh, well. I suppose you blame the U.S. for repression in Cuba.

The Soviet Union failed on its own. We didn't fall apart under the pressure, they did.

 

You mean faux-humanitarians who aren't concerned with facts?

What I said is what I meant. Your narrative might apply to some people but not to others, and that's the problem with narratives - sometimes they're just bullshit masquerading as facts.

I'll say it again: everyone who isn't born with a spoon in their mouth faces any number of possible calamities, financial and otherwise.

That's a fact. Evidently, you misread what I wrote, and it appears that you based some of your other observations on that mistake.

Yes, I kinda noticed that America's post-WWII Golden Age, when businesses and workers had little competition from the industrialized and developing worlds, ended some time before I was even born - I believe I mentioned that earlier in this thread - but many people in this country, particularly in Washington DC, are laboring under the delusion that it hasn't ended so they don't need to think and act accordingly. Furthermore, I noticed when I got out of college, as younger Americans are finding out today, that Baby Boomers had the good fortune of snapping up most of the plum jobs that became available at that time and the generations following them had fewer opportunities than their predecessors. I'm aware of all that, and my point is despite your narrative, Americans - whether they went to college and racked up debt as I did or not - are still getting ahead in life, getting married, buying homes, raising kids and otherwise living the so-called American Dream. However, if you're just going to sit there and whine about rich, greedy, privileged plutocrats pocketing billions and demand from others what you're unwilling to earn yourself, you're probably not going to achieve any of those things. That's just a cold hard fact - the government can keep you poor and dependent but it can't pull you out of poverty and make you independent. You have to do that for yourself.

I'm not a Trumpeteer, and if your encounter with self-absorption is based on your own failure to comprehend what others write, well, that doesn't say much about your Madd Rekugnishun Skillz, does it?

"Parasites"?

There goes your faux-humanitarian veneer.

While we're in Comic Relief Mode, I'm amused with this imaginary feat of strength you claim I've accomplished - carrying rich, greedy, privileged parasites on my back. Evidently, you mistook me for something out of a Jacobin cartoon that tickled your fancy. I've never carried any of your rich, greedy, privileged bêtes noires on my back, and being rich and privileged and all, they hardly need me to carry them on my back.

As I mentioned earlier, I haven't accomplished anything that millions of other Americans haven't accomplished now and in the past, and many of those people have overcome greater obstacles than I have had to face.

You conveniently neglected to mention another possibility - that you are one amongst the parasitic classes in our society and are projecting your own parasitism onto others.

Since the Golden Age, certainly, but that's no excuse to wallow in a sense of victimhood, whine about "rich, greedy, privileged parasites" and look to others to hand you what you have to earn yourself to get ahead in life.

Of course, there is the alternative, which is something I would never do anyone the disservice of encouraging. There are plenty of other people in this country who are more than happy to do that.

See, that's precisely where I am right. If I had sat back and whined about "rich, greedy, privileged parasites" and blamed them for my poverty and looked to my fellow Americans to pay for the the things I wanted instead of earning them myself I would still be poor.

Funny, I never encountered this "injustice" that failed to keep me poor and prevent me from succeeding, buying a house, getting married, raising and educating my kid. Obviously, your "massive, systematic, institutionalized, and wholly gratuitous injustice" isn't doing a good enough job of keeping us down.

Ah, refusing to be a victim is "blaming the victims". Nice spin, and hardly surprising coming from someone who encourages people to develop a strong sense of victimhood.

Not to mention encouraging people to be weak and dependent victims who blame "rich, greedy, privileged parasites" for their poverty.

Well, unlike yourself, I try not to leap to conclusions about people I don't know.

I'm glad you found them educational, but people were predicting the train wreck that occurred in the late 2000s long before it happened. Welcome to the 1980s.