Is Obama a Socialist?

say again
WND previously reported on newspaper evidence showing Obama was listed as a member of the New Party in the group’s own literature.
WND also conducted an exclusive with Marxist activist Carl Davidson, a founder of the New Party, who recounted Obama’s participation.
In 2010, John Nichols, Washington correspondent for The Nation magazine, recalled speaking with Obama at New Party events in the 1990s.
Aaron Klein’s “Red Army: The Radical Network That Must Be Defeated to Save America” exposes Obama’s presidential agenda
“When we spoke together at New Party events in those days, he was blunt about his desire to move the Democratic Party off the cautious center where Bill Clinton had wedged it,” wrote Nichols in a January 2009 piece published at Progressive.org.
Now, researcher and author Stanley Kurtz, writing at National Review Online today, reports on documentation from the updated records of Illinois ACORN at the Wisconsin Historical Society that “definitively establishes” that Obama was a member of the New Party.
Kurtz reported Obama also signed a “contract” promising to publicly support and associate himself with the New Party while in office.
In 2008, Obama’s Fight the Smears campaign website quoted Carol Harwell, who managed Obama’s 1996 campaign for the Illinois Senate, as stating: “Barack did not solicit or seek the New Party endorsement for state senator in 1995.”
Fight the Smears conceded the New Party did support Obama in 1996 but denied that Obama had ever joined.
According to documents from the Democratic Socialists of America, the New Party worked with ACORN to promote its candidates. ACORN, convicted in massive, nationwide voter fraud cases, was a point of controversy for Obama during his 2008 campaign for president.
Becoming a New Party member requires some effort on behalf of the politician. Candidates must be approved by the party’s political committee and, once approved, must sign a contract mandating they will have a “visible and active relationship” with the party.
If Obama indeed signed the contract, not only would his campaign be caught in a lie but it could prove highly embarrassing for him at a time when he is fighting claims, including from Mitt Romney’s camp, that his policies are socialist.
Also, Obama’s 2012 campaign slogan of “Forward” has been criticized for its use of a historic socialist slogan.
Socialist goals
The socialist-oriented goals of the New Party were enumerated on its old website.
Among the New Party’s stated objectives were “full employment, a shorter work week and a guaranteed minimum income for all adults; a universal ‘social wage’ to include such basic benefits as health care, child care, vacation time and lifelong access to education and training; a systematic phase-in of comparable worth; and like programs to ensure gender equity.”

say again
WND previously reported on newspaper evidence showing Obama was listed as a member of the New Party in the group’s own literature.
WND also conducted an exclusive with Marxist activist Carl Davidson, a founder of the New Party, who recounted Obama’s participation.
In 2010, John Nichols, Washington correspondent for The Nation magazine, recalled speaking with Obama at New Party events in the 1990s.
Aaron Klein’s “Red Army: The Radical Network That Must Be Defeated to Save America” exposes Obama’s presidential agenda
“When we spoke together at New Party events in those days, he was blunt about his desire to move the Democratic Party off the cautious center where Bill Clinton had wedged it,” wrote Nichols in a January 2009 piece published at Progressive.org.
Now, researcher and author Stanley Kurtz, writing at National Review Online today, reports on documentation from the updated records of Illinois ACORN at the Wisconsin Historical Society that “definitively establishes” that Obama was a member of the New Party.
Kurtz reported Obama also signed a “contract” promising to publicly support and associate himself with the New Party while in office.
In 2008, Obama’s Fight the Smears campaign website quoted Carol Harwell, who managed Obama’s 1996 campaign for the Illinois Senate, as stating: “Barack did not solicit or seek the New Party endorsement for state senator in 1995.”
Fight the Smears conceded the New Party did support Obama in 1996 but denied that Obama had ever joined.
According to documents from the Democratic Socialists of America, the New Party worked with ACORN to promote its candidates. ACORN, convicted in massive, nationwide voter fraud cases, was a point of controversy for Obama during his 2008 campaign for president.
Becoming a New Party member requires some effort on behalf of the politician. Candidates must be approved by the party’s political committee and, once approved, must sign a contract mandating they will have a “visible and active relationship” with the party.
If Obama indeed signed the contract, not only would his campaign be caught in a lie but it could prove highly embarrassing for him at a time when he is fighting claims, including from Mitt Romney’s camp, that his policies are socialist.
Also, Obama’s 2012 campaign slogan of “Forward” has been criticized for its use of a historic socialist slogan.
Socialist goals
The socialist-oriented goals of the New Party were enumerated on its old website.
Among the New Party’s stated objectives were “full employment, a shorter work week and a guaranteed minimum income for all adults; a universal ‘social wage’ to include such basic benefits as health care, child care, vacation time and lifelong access to education and training; a systematic phase-in of comparable worth; and like programs to ensure gender equity.”

say again
WND previously reported on newspaper evidence showing Obama was listed as a member of the New Party in the group’s own literature.
WND also conducted an exclusive with Marxist activist Carl Davidson, a founder of the New Party, who recounted Obama’s participation.
In 2010, John Nichols, Washington correspondent for The Nation magazine, recalled speaking with Obama at New Party events in the 1990s.
Aaron Klein’s “Red Army: The Radical Network That Must Be Defeated to Save America” exposes Obama’s presidential agenda
“When we spoke together at New Party events in those days, he was blunt about his desire to move the Democratic Party off the cautious center where Bill Clinton had wedged it,” wrote Nichols in a January 2009 piece published at Progressive.org.
Now, researcher and author Stanley Kurtz, writing at National Review Online today, reports on documentation from the updated records of Illinois ACORN at the Wisconsin Historical Society that “definitively establishes” that Obama was a member of the New Party.
Kurtz reported Obama also signed a “contract” promising to publicly support and associate himself with the New Party while in office.
In 2008, Obama’s Fight the Smears campaign website quoted Carol Harwell, who managed Obama’s 1996 campaign for the Illinois Senate, as stating: “Barack did not solicit or seek the New Party endorsement for state senator in 1995.”
Fight the Smears conceded the New Party did support Obama in 1996 but denied that Obama had ever joined.
According to documents from the Democratic Socialists of America, the New Party worked with ACORN to promote its candidates. ACORN, convicted in massive, nationwide voter fraud cases, was a point of controversy for Obama during his 2008 campaign for president.
Becoming a New Party member requires some effort on behalf of the politician. Candidates must be approved by the party’s political committee and, once approved, must sign a contract mandating they will have a “visible and active relationship” with the party.
If Obama indeed signed the contract, not only would his campaign be caught in a lie but it could prove highly embarrassing for him at a time when he is fighting claims, including from Mitt Romney’s camp, that his policies are socialist.
Also, Obama’s 2012 campaign slogan of “Forward” has been criticized for its use of a historic socialist slogan.
Socialist goals
The socialist-oriented goals of the New Party were enumerated on its old website.
Among the New Party’s stated objectives were “full employment, a shorter work week and a guaranteed minimum income for all adults; a universal ‘social wage’ to include such basic benefits as health care, child care, vacation time and lifelong access to education and training; a systematic phase-in of comparable worth; and like programs to ensure gender equity.”

My, what an ACTIVE imagination! Just as Chicken Little started a "sky is falling" hysteria based on a falling acorn, so too are various critics pushing a "socialist" or "Marxist" Obama hysteria based on Obama's economic policies. Not only do they conveniently forget that the 2008 bailout was initiated by the Bush administration, but they also seem to have forgotten some basics from Econ 101. They could easily avoid such non sequitur nonsense by following the evidence instead of jumping to conclusions.

According to dictionary.com, socialism is "a theory or system of social organization that advocates the vesting of the ownership and control of the means of production and distribution, of capital, land, etc., in the community as a whole. In Marxist theory, it is the stage following capitalism in the transition of a society to communism, characterized by the imperfect implementation of collectivist principles."

Please note that it is the stage FOLLOWING capitalism. Capitalism has many forms in a mixed economy, with public (collective) ownership of various enterprises based upon economic conditions. Limited public ownership does not comprise Marxist socialism, which requires complete public ownership. When controlled by a police state, however, limited public ownership may become fascism ("national socialism"), Marxist socialism, or even "perfect implementation of collectivist principles." Limited public ownership occurs at virtually every point on the mixed economy spectrum.

Every advocate of greater government economic control might be called a "socialist," but none are true socialists unless they advocate the complete elimination of private enterprise, which requires the complete replacement of capitalism with collectivism. True (laissez-faire) capitalism means zero government control of private enterprise, which is economic anarchy. Neither of these extremes works in the long run. Every successful economy is a mixed economy, existing somewhere on a spectrum between both extremes. Every successful economy is part capitalist and part socialist. They all contain a mix of private and public ownership, and they all have some government control of private enterprise. The only relevant question is "WHERE on this spectrum can we achieve the greatest success?" The rise of Asian economies, with their varying degrees of centralized planning, proves that economic planning helps economic development.

Both laissez faire capitalism and true communism are artificial constructs, as impossible to sustain as cold fusion. Every successful society requires private enterprise regulated by public policy, regardless of Ayn Rand's fantasies. Extremists on either fringe are equally delusional. In some ways regulation is a necessary evil like body fat: too much or too little are both lethal. The normal tendency is to add layers with age. The challenge is to find the level that will produce the optimum outcome, all things considered.

Unless someone advocates the complete replacement of capitalism with collectivism, they do not truly advocate socialism or communism. To accuse them of either, when they have not explicitly advocated as much themselves, suggests either unfamiliarity with mixed economies or intellectual dishonesty. Even George W. Bush and John McCain were accused of advocating socialism based upon their support of 2008 bailout legislation.

The bottom line is simple. If you consider any variation of a mixed economy, including ANY public ownership or regulation of industry to be "socialism," then the United States and ALL other economies are "socialist." The debate is over, because by that definition we have been "socialist" since the 18th century. If you only consider complete collectivism to be "socialism," according to Marxist theory, then no successful economy is actually "socialist." The closest to a Marxist socialist economy is the economic basket case, North Korea. If you consider socialism to occur at some other point on the spectrum between unregulated capitalism and Marxist socialism, then any such point would be arbitrary.

To accuse a mixed economy advocate of being a socialist or communist suggests that you believe that ANY degree of government regulation qualifies as "socialism," or that you believe that any regulation beyond an indefinite "trigger point" qualifies as "socialism,", and that YOU get to set the trigger point. The "trigger point" explanation reminds me of the egocentric explorer who says that anyone who explores farther into dangerous territory is a fool, but anyone who doesn’t explore as far as he does is a coward. His arrogance presumes that his own boundaries are common standards.

Marxist "socialism," in contrast to European "democratic socialism," requires collective ownership of the means of production in lieu of capitalism. That is the death of private enterprise. We may or may not be on a path to collectivism, just as a dating couple may or may not be on a path to pregnancy. Traveling on a path in any direction does not imply any specific goal. For example, traveling on Interstate 10 does not imply that either coast is the goal.

"Direction" is one thing. "Goal" is another. All mixed economies exist at some point in the spectrum between the fatal terminuses of unregulated capitalism and true socialism. In most Marxist states, however, capitalism reappeared as people recognized the lethal consequences of such extremes. Russia, China and other communist nations now recognize the virtue of mixed economies. They learned the hard way.

I await empirical evidence, instead of specious speculation, that Obama wants to eliminate capitalism by moving to that extreme. To say Obama advocates the goal of socialism, based upon his movement on the spectrum instead of being based on his explicit advocacy, is to create a straw man. It is intellectually dishonest and unworthy of serious debate.

say again
WND previously reported on newspaper evidence showing Obama was listed as a member of the New Party in the group’s own literature.
WND also conducted an exclusive with Marxist activist Carl Davidson, a founder of the New Party, who recounted Obama’s participation.
In 2010, John Nichols, Washington correspondent for The Nation magazine, recalled speaking with Obama at New Party events in the 1990s.
Aaron Klein’s “Red Army: The Radical Network That Must Be Defeated to Save America” exposes Obama’s presidential agenda
“When we spoke together at New Party events in those days, he was blunt about his desire to move the Democratic Party off the cautious center where Bill Clinton had wedged it,” wrote Nichols in a January 2009 piece published at Progressive.org.
Now, researcher and author Stanley Kurtz, writing at National Review Online today, reports on documentation from the updated records of Illinois ACORN at the Wisconsin Historical Society that “definitively establishes” that Obama was a member of the New Party.
Kurtz reported Obama also signed a “contract” promising to publicly support and associate himself with the New Party while in office.
In 2008, Obama’s Fight the Smears campaign website quoted Carol Harwell, who managed Obama’s 1996 campaign for the Illinois Senate, as stating: “Barack did not solicit or seek the New Party endorsement for state senator in 1995.”
Fight the Smears conceded the New Party did support Obama in 1996 but denied that Obama had ever joined.
According to documents from the Democratic Socialists of America, the New Party worked with ACORN to promote its candidates. ACORN, convicted in massive, nationwide voter fraud cases, was a point of controversy for Obama during his 2008 campaign for president.
Becoming a New Party member requires some effort on behalf of the politician. Candidates must be approved by the party’s political committee and, once approved, must sign a contract mandating they will have a “visible and active relationship” with the party.
If Obama indeed signed the contract, not only would his campaign be caught in a lie but it could prove highly embarrassing for him at a time when he is fighting claims, including from Mitt Romney’s camp, that his policies are socialist.
Also, Obama’s 2012 campaign slogan of “Forward” has been criticized for its use of a historic socialist slogan.
Socialist goals
The socialist-oriented goals of the New Party were enumerated on its old website.
Among the New Party’s stated objectives were “full employment, a shorter work week and a guaranteed minimum income for all adults; a universal ‘social wage’ to include such basic benefits as health care, child care, vacation time and lifelong access to education and training; a systematic phase-in of comparable worth; and like programs to ensure gender equity.”