39 Comments

1. Bunker:

Our job, as much as possible, is to make sure this is done fairly.

Socialistically?

Apr 5, 2005 - 10:44 am 2. Roger:

Of course. What other way?

Apr 5, 2005 - 10:47 am 3. neo-neocon:

I think socialism is still in there somewhere, although it’ a vestigial organ, shriveled and almost forgotten.

They are capitalists now because it serves them, but I don’t think they believe in capitalism in general. They use capitalism as a tool–in Soros’s case, to toy with the currency of various nations and to wield political power.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:06 am 4. Robert Crawford:

Soros may have made money off of capitalism, but that does not make him a capitalist in the ideological sense. He seems quite attracted to collectivism and command economies, at least in the causes he funds.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:13 am 5. ambisinistral:

The old Marxist theories have been transported from individuals to nations, or even more appropriately cultural fragments.

Marx posited a finite amount of wealth. When all the wealth was in circulation, then the capitalists — greedy bastards that they are — would start to accumulate more of it. This would of necessity involve taking wealth from the workers. Eventually their impoverishment would trigger the revolt of the proletariate.

With the collapse of Marxism his notions morphed. The far left, as their obsession with resource depletion attests to, still believe that wealth is a finite substance. Instead of bosses stealing from the peons, the model now has rich nations getting affluent at the expense of the Third World. In the Finite Wealth model it is impossible for both industrialized and developing nations to continue to accumulate wealth. The only equitable model is for the wealthier nations to transfer wealth to the third world they exploited.

In fact, I think many Leftists consider our modern oil-fueled prosperoty tp be an abheration. When the well goes dry we’ll collapse in on ourselves, and the world’s economy will transform to a small scale and locally oriented utopia of small farmers and businesses engaged in sustainable green technologies.

Don’t yell at me folks, I don’t believe the above theory, but I do believe it is approximately what modern Leftists think. That’s the underlying theory that needs to be attacked and discredited IMHO, the rest is just two sides talking past each other.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:15 am 6. Rick Ballard:

Fedora for the public and Mao cap at home, huh?

There is a difference between speculation and investment. Soros has never, to my knowledge, controlled means of production. Calling him a capitalist may be true in the sense that calling a buzzard a carnivore is true but capitalist is associated with production as carnivore is with hunter.

Soros appears to be an oligarch wannabe which makes his association with and use of the remnants of the left even more entertaining. May they enjoy a long association with evergrowing public awareness as to the means they intend to use to achieve the ends that they so clumsily attempt to hide. I bought the book and added this one for fun. I find York’s NRO articles enjouable and look forward to his analysis.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:16 am 7. Rick Ballard:

Dmaned Preeviw stripped my “this one” link and then misspelled enjoyable.

He’s close, Katherine – we may have a chance tonight.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:22 am 8. Roberts:

Roger, I don’t think “know-nothing pacifism” is correct. I don’t think the marxism is completely abandoned. The left is now dominated by a bizarre admixture of marxist derived rhetoric that is now based on more of a rootless know-nothing nihilism. Frankly, I think it always was and that the marxism was a whitewash atop the nihilism. Just the whitewash is gone.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:25 am 9. UML Guy:

Roger,

Respectfully, I see it slightly differently.

Every socialist movement has had cadres of people who believe that, “Yes, we’re all equalt; but somebody has to be in charge, so that things are distributed equitably. And those should be the elite who can see the big picture better than the peons — oops, I mean ‘people’ — can. And of course, WE are that elite.”

And then, when the socialists gain power, there’s a falling out, as different elite cadres vie to determine who will be THE elite cadre.

And once the true elite are selected, the first thing they do is start accruing power. Equality is for the people, not for the elite. They deserve special privileges and special powers as keys to doing their important work of keeping everyone equal. Meanwhile, less privileged people learn to kiss up to the elite as a way to get what they want.

So all that I see different here is that the elite are building off a base of capital. Is there any doubt that Mr. Soros sees himself as a leader of the utopia he hopes to create?

Oh, one more difference: the elite don’t seem to think they have to pretend to be part of the people. And sadly, they seem to be right: when a George Soros or a Michael Moore’s hypocrisy are pointed out, their fellow travelers are quick to excuse or explain away their failings as being good for the cause, on balance.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:38 am 10. Paul:

Ambisinistral is on the money. I believe it’s called the global immiseration theory.

The postmodern left is at war with Western civilization, white males, science, reason, objective truth, individual liberty, ownership of private property, and the general idea of capitalist democracy.

If this sounds like an extreme statement I would strongly suggest reading “Explaining Postmoderism: Skepticism and Socialism from Rousseau to Foucault”, by Stephen R. C. Hicks.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1592476422/qid=1112726035/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/103-0166792-5135001?v=glance&s=books

The actions and attitudes of the left that we, including those of us who may at one time had leftists sympathies, find so baffling and infuriating become understandable, if not acceptable, once the pedigree of their philosophical tradition is revealed. I don’t believe even a small fraction of the modern left is aware of basic premises underlying their beliefs, let alone what the actual results of the implementation of their policies would be for mankind.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:56 am 11. Perry Branson:

I would add to the mix that (some of) the Soros’s of the world truly believe everyone should be equal (which is why the left is always pushing for equality of outcomes) and for their success in our system they suffer terrible (though mostly disavowed) guilt. The upshot is that they work actively to interfere with our ability to defend our culture and society from our enemies (all in the name of “human rights”) out of disgust with a system that has allowed them to be so successful.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:56 am 12. Roger:

What an interesting discussion!

To some extent, UML, much as I agree with you, this is a chicken-and-the-egg argument. Is Soros a mega-capitalist using his wealth to bring on socialism? I doubt it. Not that long ago, he was instrumental in bringing down socialism in Eastern Europe. I think this is more about ego than it is about ideology. For a man like Soros, it’s about him, not about which side you’re on. In other words, the world is good if Soros makes it so. If good things happen without Soros, they are not good. Narcissism pure and simple.

Apr 5, 2005 - 11:56 am 13. Kyda Sylvester:

Perhaps the left has recognized (finally) that any economic system in which government owns and/or controls the production and distribution of goods/services is destined to fail and therefore can not achieve its goals. It does not like capitalism and wants to control it to the extent possible but will allow it to function in the service of those goals.

What the left wants now is a highly centralized government imposing excessive rates of taxation for the purpose of redistributing wealth. The left still wants to get to the same place. It adjusts its dogma because, contrary to what some may believe, it has learned a little something through the years about human nature. Not enough, however, to recognize that, although the system it now champions may function over the short term, it can not sustain itself in the long term.

I would say that most Democrats are married to the idea that the proper function of government is to redistribute the nation’s wealth in the form of government programs. They feel it is proper for the government to provide universal health care and health care insurance, childcare and education at all ages and levels and full retirement benefits. Further, they feel it is the duty of government to fill any crack through which an individual might conceivably fall.

Our job, as much as possible, is to fight this mindset tooth and nail.

Apr 5, 2005 - 12:03 pm 14. ambisinistral:

Soros is his own creature. A sort of living breathing Scrooge McDuck caricature. He just wants to be the ultimate mover and shaker.

Apr 5, 2005 - 12:03 pm 15. chuck:

I think another invariant of the left is unhappiness and a sense of not belonging to the everyday world: anomie forever. Whether or not this is learned or is a natural outcome of modern society is an open question, I myself tend towards the learned explanation. This unhappiness finds its expression opposing many things, but I don’t think the common thread is pacifism or equality or whatever, I think the common thread is opposing what is.

Apr 5, 2005 - 12:06 pm 16. Charlie (Colorado):

It may be cynical of me, but I can’t help but think the real distinctions is between people who want to run things and are comfortable with using coercion to make things run the way they want, and people who are happy to let other people make their own choices as long as they share that freedom. Soros appears to be mostly interested in seeing to it that his side has the power of coercion — not in freeing people.

Sadly, there seem to be plenty of people on the “coercion” side in both political parties.

Apr 5, 2005 - 12:08 pm 17. WichitaBoy:

Soros might be after ego, a sense of meaning thorugh do-gooding, or power, as has been suggested, but are you sure he’s not simply after money? After all, with a President in his pocket he could run all sorts of profitable scams, secure in the knowledge that he could be pardoned from any possible illegalities. Hey, it’s been done before.

Apr 5, 2005 - 12:18 pm 18. Katherine:

Socialism, as practiced as opposed to the preached version, is all about building a society in which a class of aristocrats (sometimes going by the name of Politburo) rules the masses. How else ordinary people (also referred to as proles, morons, or cattle by their betters) would know how to live and what is good for them?

To the aristocrats privileges are owned and tribute is paid; also, they make all the laws and occasionally dispense privileges on the faithful servants. In that sense, socialism only differs in a form (and number of corpses left behind) from any other social system in which a ruling class holds unchecked power. Having power like that is like being a god.

There is no contradiction between taking advantage of a system that allows you to enrich yourself and then turning around and trying to impose another which will make sure that any potential competitor to your status stays down and presents no threat. All you have to do is to ensure that you will be a member of the new ruling elite and your money will stay with you, so one would have to push assets offshore before starting the revolution or the currency manipulation, if the choice is to merely bring the economy down.

Most people who have as much money as Soros convince themselves that they are qualitatively better human beings than the rest of humanity. Soros and his billionaire buddies all feel that they belong to the class of exalted beings and it is damn annoying that things like Constitution and our still relatively free-market system does not grant them the power that they simply deserve.

Apr 5, 2005 - 12:48 pm 19. Katherine:

Rick,

Just let me know where and when and I will be there: gun, knifes, rope and all.

Apr 5, 2005 - 12:51 pm 20. Rick Ballard:

“Sadly, there seem to be plenty of people on the “coercion” side in both political parties.”

Why sadly, Charlie? When has a thinking man’s lot been other than rowing hard between Scylla and Charybdis before quenching his thirst in the Lethe? We may imagine that a life without tension would be the sweetest of fruits but I believe that we would reach for Lethe’s cup all the quicker were we forced to endure it.

Apr 5, 2005 - 12:59 pm 21. Patrick Tyson:

That’s part of your problem: you haven’t seen enough movies. All of life’s riddles are answered in the movies.

—Lawrence Kasdan, Grand Canyon 1991

You are an old man who thinks in terms of nations and peoples. There are no nations! There are no peoples! There are no Russians! There are no Arabs! There are no third worlds! There is no West! There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and immane, interwoven, interacting, multi-variate, multi-national dominion of dollars, petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars, reichmarks, rubles, rin, pounds and shekels.

It is the international system of currency that determines the totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things today.

That is the atomic, subatomic and galactic structure of things today. And you have meddled with the primal forces of nature, and you will atone.

Am I getting through to you, Mr. Beale?

—Paddy Chayefsky, Network 1976

Apr 5, 2005 - 1:02 pm 22. Terrye:

Sometimes I think it is guilt.

When I see multi millionaire Hollywood artists make cooing noises about Che Guevara, when I hear a Democratic Senator in a $200 tie talk about Bush and his rich friends on Wall Street I think to myself…Do these people think I am stupid?

They want to be the masses, really they do..but it is just so damn depressing in the trenches and so they will make all the correct power to the people noises and act as if private accounts in Social Security is the end of the program all the while they are to all intents and purposes that which they profess to despise: wealthy, privileged people.

And next to guilt there is calculated propaganda. There is the idea that most people are stupid and or ignorant and easily manipulated and a little class warfare can get you a long way in politcs.

Just look at Hugo Chavez. The price of oil goes up and up and the poor people of Venezuala get poorer and poorer..and whose fault is that?

Why the rich of course.

So today we see antiglobalization riots from middle class kids that count on their parents to get a second mortgage to send them to college where they can learn to hate the folks paying the bills.

I think Soros is about power.

Apr 5, 2005 - 2:01 pm 23. Sandy P:

SOS – Monarchy/aristocracy.

Bastiat? was right, they have their wealth and they spend it making sure you don’t get yours.

—-

Terrye’s right, too.

What I don’t understand is why they just don’t give a lot of it away, they won’t feel guilty.

Apr 5, 2005 - 2:09 pm 24. Sandy P:

–What the left wants now is a highly centralized government imposing excessive rates of taxation for the purpose of redistributing wealth. –

How come it’s always my wealth and not theirs?

Apr 5, 2005 - 2:10 pm 25. Sandy P:

It all comes down to the beginning, who is the King? They feel they are entitled to be King, what are their crimes?

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people….

Apr 5, 2005 - 2:17 pm 26. Sandy P:

Kinda OT via Dailypundit:

Meet The New Bear – Same As The Old Bear

CBS News | Official Warns Russia May Collapse | April 5, 2005 01:13:07

(AP) Infighting among top Russian political leaders, rattled by popular uprisings in three ex-Soviet republics, may cause a rift that puts Russia at risk of breaking up, President Vladimir Putin’s chief of staff warned in an interview published Monday.

Analysts said the rare public comments by Dmitry Medvedev, a powerful member of Putin’s inner circle, appeared to be an attempt to bolster the authority of Putin’s administration.

In the interview published in the magazine Expert, Medvedev said infighting among politicians may cause Russia to collapse, leading to “horrible consequences” and making the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union seem like a “kindergarten party.”

“If we do not manage to consolidate elites, Russia may disappear as a unified state,” Medvedev was quoted as saying. “And then everybody will be in trouble, including our immediate and distant neighbors.”

Apr 5, 2005 - 2:23 pm 27. Stephen:

Roger,

I don’t think that Socialists have disappeared so much as that one of the offshoots of Socialism,Fascism,has absorbed them. The differ between the two was that true Socialists wanted abolition of Capitalism,private property,etc. in order to have a better world,while true Fascists believed that the abolition of Capitalism wasn’t realistic,but that it should be controlled by the State in ordet to get a better world. In short,the Socialists were/are dreamers,while the Fascists were/are realists,but both have same goal of a better world-as defined by them.

We tend to equate Fascism w/the Nazis,but Italy was the first Fascist State. Fascism came to be considered Right,not Left,because Fascists believed in using the State to advance their goals,whereas the Communists believed that the State should disappear and anyone who believed in the State was on the Right.

Fascism has become the “Third Way” between Capitalism,w/its every man for himself,and Communism,w/its reality of Government control of everything.

Fascism has absorbed the socialists(altho they’d be shocked to be described as fascists)because it accepts the dream of a better world-non-sexist,all Green,decent wages for all,whatever-yet provides a realistic means of attaining that dream;by accepting the world w/all its flaws,it can be made better w/the proper State guidance.(Note that the State can be an individual country,the EU or for the esp. ambitious,the UN.) Thus,the reluctant acceptance of Capitalism as a means of raising the funds to do good. On the individual level,”I’m not getting rich because I love money,I do so to help make a better world.” On a governing level,wary acceptance of Big Business-and small business too-but w/no understanding of how business makes wealth,and the need to regulate every aspect of life,in order to get that ideal world.

Apr 5, 2005 - 2:25 pm 28. Steven Mitchell:

“The left is now dominated by a bizarre admixture of marxist derived rhetoric that is now based on more of a rootless know-nothing nihilism.”

I think Roberts is correct. Or at least most of the leftists I have met are well described by that sentence. Perhaps the leftist leaders are different. Anyway, challenge any leftist I’ve ever met, and he’ll argue without blushing that:

1. There are no roots.

2. The West is to blame because of root causes.

Perhaps nihilism is the refuge of the useful idiot?

Apr 5, 2005 - 3:13 pm 29. Carol_Herman:

It’s such a marriage. Between Canada and France. And, we almost all got stuck with it. “Nuanced, Kerry,” indeed.

Roger, I just wish you’ve read Ann Coulter’s book TREASON. Wallace, the veep of FDR, before Truman, was a paid Soviet agent. There were lots of them!

And, it makes me sick at heart that FDR called Stalin “uncle joe.”

Sure. Something got sold in America, as we went lax. And, hated the wars in Korea and Vietnam. (Mistakes, enough, to send our generals into new directions. And, Israel certainly did put out some ideas about fighting that weren’t seen in Europe. Even including WW2. A much more measured response.)

Today, I’m much more suspicious of our MSM. Walter Chronkite misused the trust placed in him. Woodward and Bernstein a team? Why? Only Woodward had the Naval Intelligence clearance.

Oy.

We got sold a bill of goods.

Today, in retrofit mode, the democrats are re-labeling themselves pro-Gressives. You’re buying this PR scheme?

Isn’t it wonderful how the world is waking up to real democracy? Heck, even in Canada, just like in France, the curtain’s being pulled back on the unbelievable money raised by graft. You know, if the Mafia only knew! They wouldn’t need extortion and prostitution. Nor, any of their other stuff.

What a graduation! And, they just kept getting away with it. More and better haircuts. Even a slob like clinton started to dress in better suits.

And, I don’t think we’re home free, yet.

The old socialists? My dad was born in 1898. Came to America, alone, at age 15. (1913). His parents were fearful of his wellbeing in Krakow. And none of his family made it out of the Holocaust.

It’s easy to forget, today, what America was like when labor had no safety net at all.

When the 1929 Crash came; and Churchill. Who was here in America at the time said: You can’t stop the behaviors of greed. But America was a great country because it knew how to clean up the messes. And, what a mess it was!

Today’s left loony screaming idiots are a mere shadow of what was once an ideal. (Even Reagan didn’t leave the democratic party; until LBJ. Reagan saw the qualities in Goldwater. Most of us just got scared.)

Not easy to be a politican. But between Reagan, and the guy in office now, there is real hope.

While the democrats fade, regressive.

Apr 5, 2005 - 3:51 pm 30. Bostonian:

On an earlier thread, one of the regular commentors of this blog said something like this:

“Is there anything that the Left does not perceive as a zero-sum game?”

I think that about sums it up. The corollary to the zero-sum game idea is that the government should divide the spoils fairly until the citizens become enlightened enough to do it fairly themselves.

I don’t think socialism has gone too far away at all.

Besides, there’s nothing new at all about the support of wealthy people for socialism. Many of socialism’s early fans & defenders were rich, far above middle class.

Apr 5, 2005 - 4:07 pm 31. TedN:

Probably too late to comment on this thread, but the innumeracy of redistributionists always amuses me.

I don’t know the exact figure, though this URL http://tinyurl.com/5bcmw

suggests $5500, but the average world per-capita income is a rather small number.

Some people don’t seem to know what “average” means, and what distributing “everything” equally would mean.

We’ve got to grow the pie, not slice it with a micrometer.

Apr 5, 2005 - 4:54 pm 32. chuck:

Bostonian:

Many of socialism’s early fans & defenders were rich, far above middle class.

When I feel sarcastic, I maintain that socialism is just another way for the idle rich to hang onto power in the face of meritocracy.

Apr 5, 2005 - 4:55 pm 33. idi_amin:

speaking of Byron, there is breaking news that Byron Allen of the widely syndicated entertainment program “Kickin’ It With Byron Allen” has offered $2.2 billion in cash for PAX-TV, home of “Doc”, starring Billy Ray Cyrus, and “Sue Thomas F.B.Eye”.

“Kickin’ It With Byron Allen” can be found playing at 330am or 4am in all major media markets. Synergy is achieved in conjunction with this program and “EntertainmentStudios.com” featuring Byron Allen.

In all honesty, relative to the news coverage, this news has affected me more than the death of the Pope.

Apr 5, 2005 - 5:04 pm 34. ahem:

Here, Roger, I’ll share this with you: A liberal is a capitalist who believes he’s a socialist. A progressive is a capitalist who really believes he’s a socialist.

Apr 5, 2005 - 5:13 pm 35. richard mcenroe:

Plutocrats/wannabe aristocrats like George Soros like Socialism and Marxism because it’s much easier when you can get the peasant scum to oppress themselves for you…

Ever see a socialist bureaucrat at the UN or EU working for the minimum wage?

Apr 5, 2005 - 6:09 pm 36. TmjUtah:

Roger-

“Our job, as much as possible, is to make sure this is done fairly.”

Change that last to “justly” and I’m on board.

Oh, and I didn’t see anyone touch on the pragmatic aspects of the competing ideology argument.

We have socialists, capitalists, nihilists, anarchists, marxists, hippies, yippies, blue collar, white collar, suburbanites, urbans, rurals, immigrants, expats, and illegals living here and just trying to get to tomorrow.

Politicians want offices. Some want the offices enough to use any tool today that will mean fifty- one percent in November. I believe that the majority of the “left” crowd in the contemporary political arena are about as ideologically driven as is my kid’s wind-up toys, meaning that they choose “left” because it really lends itself to emotional manipulation and advertising. If everyone is a victim it works pretty well. At least it did for most of the second half of the last century.

Doesn’t work nearly so well in a marketplace full of sovereign citizens.

I cannot listen to Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, or any A list national Dem speak without getting flashes of “pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!”. They aren’t a party. They are a con gone bad.

Apr 5, 2005 - 10:46 pm 37. HA:

Roger,

You are WAY off the mark here. Socialism is alive and well. The Democratic party is organized around the principles of Gramscian Marxism:

http://www.policyreview.org/dec00/Fonte.html

http://www.futurodecuba.org/Gramsci%20And%20The%20U.S.%20Body%20Politic.htm

Everybody thinks that Marxism died with the Soviet Union. Nothing could be further from the truth. The unambiguous evil of the Soviets was the greatest barrier to Western Marxists. With its collapse, they no longer had to apologize for the Soviets to advance their agenda. The iron fist of the USSR has been replaced by the “soft power” of the EUSSR.

The Marxist agenda completely aligns with the Democratic agenda. Elite rule, government redistribution, subordination of individual rights to group rights, supression of religion – which in the West is primarily supression of Chistianity – and subordination of national sovereignty. And they are successfuly using Gramscian tactics to achieve their agenda through unelected and unaccountable judges like Ruth Bader Ginsburg:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/02/politics/02ginsburg.html?

Obviously, there is no greater threat to liberty than nuclear armageddon. Absent that, Western liberty today faces greater peril from the Marxist Axis of the EUSSR, Canada and the Democrats than at any time in history. We would be wise to heed the words of Wendell Phillips:

Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty?power is ever stealing from the many to the few?. The hand entrusted with power becomes ? the necessary enemy of the people. Only by continual oversight can the democrat in office be prevented from hardening into a despot: only by unintermitted Agitation can a people be kept sufficiently awake to principle not to let liberty be smothered in material prosperity.

http://www.bartleby.com/73/1073.html

Apr 6, 2005 - 3:24 am 38. Jack:

I disagree that we are living in a capitalist country. Look around, Roger, and you will see the dead hand of government in everything we do. That’s socialism.

Apr 6, 2005 - 6:41 am 39. thibaud:

Rick Ballard,

Soros has never, to my knowledge, controlled means of production. Calling him a capitalist may be true in the sense that calling a buzzard a carnivore is true but capitalist is associated with production as carnivore is with hunter.

Not so. His funds’ investments include early-stage venture capital and later-stage private equity investments, which are about as pure a form of capitalism as you’ll find.

Soros appears to be an oligarch wannabe which makes his association with and use of the remnants of the left even more entertaining

This I agree with. Soros himself– as opposed to his various fund managers– is essentially an arbitrageur, someone who seeks to exploit pricing discrepancies between various markets or informational asymmetries within one market. In other words, what under communist law was known as the grave crime of “speculation.” Soros’s first millions were made by exploiting loopholes in US taxation of profits on foreign securities; his biggest windfall came from exploiting currency spreads.

So the notion of Soros as the latest champion of “multilateralism” must appear an especially bitter joke for any Briton or for that matter any treasury official around the world. This was the man who unilaterally– indeed, singlehandedly– trashed national currencies and lined his pockets with over a billion dollars worth of public funds. His credibility on anything related to redistribution of wealth or public services is nil.

OTOH Soros did indeed perform a noble service in his charitable career, the one that, prior to Bush’s accession to the White House, was devoted primarily to supporting democratic movements and associations in eastern Europe, where Soros is originally from. His intentions are solid, although the results are mixed: he had some impact in Hungary, less in Czech, and absolutely none in Russia. In fact he conceded as much, shutting down his operations in Russia a couple of years ago and taking a lower profile everywhere else. In this sphere his influence is a bit like Bono’s on African poverty: more for PR and devoting media attention to problems than for actually having any impact on the situation.

Then there is the other grab bag of his more recent charitable causes, the ones which bind him to the Bush-hating left. Medical marijuana. Campaign finance reform (!). Opposing US “unilateralism.” Supporting Moveon.org and vowing in 2004 — never mind his support for campaign finance reform– to “spend as many millions” of his fortune as needed to get the electoral outcome he seeks.

Soros, in sum, as a perfect example of the complete incoherence, diffusion, even silliness of the post-marxist left: a vague and contradictory motley procession of odd cultural obsessions and fierce personal animosity, and lacking any vision of society or generosity of spirit. A hollow shell, as Wretchard writes, into which all manner of intense faiths– radical environmentalism, islamism, queer theory, what-have-you — can find a home.

Apr 6, 2005 - 10:01 am

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