Liberal Forum

Sumela » 08 Jan 2024, 11:02 pm » wrote: ↑

08 Jan 2024, 11:02 pm

LOL....Stretchy
 

*** stretch your asshole.

Sumela » 08 Jan 2024, 11:02 pm » wrote: ↑

08 Jan 2024, 11:02 pm

LOL....Stretchy
 

YOur mother sucks cocks in hell for free.

Sumela » 08 Jan 2024, 10:39 pm » wrote: ↑

08 Jan 2024, 10:39 pm

Yes _____ chose the CHURCH...the NEW ISRAEL.

Catch up old man

Hey, that's Mr old man to you....  

Harvey Mushman » 06 Jan 2024, 11:05 am » wrote: ↑

06 Jan 2024, 11:05 am

Unfortunately, given the uninformative nature of the corporate media, most people do not understand the reality that, although Venezuela's revolution contains some aspects of Marxism, it is a Bolivarian revolution rather than a socialist revolution. Nonetheless, like Cuba's socialist revolution, Venezuela's revolution is one under siege by internal and external capitalist forces that, by design, have significantly hampered the Venezuelan revolution. U.S. and EU sanctions and domestic economic sabotage have devastated Venezuela's economy. So, of course, Venezuela's Bolivarian Revolution isn't fairing well because that's what embargos, sanctions, and domestic economic sabotage are intended to do. They are war by other means. To understand that, one need only recall the order given to then-CIA Director Richard Helms by Richard Nixon to "Make the [Chilean] economy scream" following the election of Chile's Marxist President Salvador Allende. 

Per Cuba's socialist revolution, it has been disaffected by the U.S.'s sixty-two-year-old trade embargo, the Helms-Burton Act, and various EU sanctions, all designed to make the Cuban economy scream. And scream it has. 
Throughout it all, though, the Cuban Revolution has taken the Cuban people from the second lowest standard of living in the Western hemisphere in 1959 to one of Latin America's highest living standards. Indeed, Cuba has lower rates of infant mortality, neonatal death, illiteracy, unemployment, and homelessness than the U.S. When compared head-to-head with Detroit, Michigan, Dayton, Ohio, Newark, New Jersey, and many other American cities, Cuba's standard of living is tremendously higher. 

If Cuba had not been subjected to the devastating effects of economic warfare throughout the past sixty-two years, it would likely have one of the world's highest standards of living. And that is precisely why capitalist juggernauts such as the United States have waged war on Cuba since 1962: because the Cuban Revolution stands as a threat of a good example. Despite its economic warfare-induced limitations and hardships, Cuba has served and continues to serve as an inspiration to billions of people worldwide. 

Where is your disinformation any better than corporate media's?

You don't expose what isn't possible anymore than any reality has in the history of people saving intellectual humanities making every generation gap believe genetics cannot limit life to genetics eternally separating the ancestors adapting as displaced forward here now.

Zeets2 » 07 Jan 2024, 1:09 pm » wrote: ↑

07 Jan 2024, 1:09 pm

Well, Harvey, I think it's time you took off those rose-colored glasses with which you envision Castro's revolution, where you apparently see non-existent "enormous social gains" that you think were a "good example" that the US should follow.  And you seem to believe that the US did not have just cause to cease diplomatic relations with Cuba, regardless of their kidnapping of Americans, their confiscation of foreign assets, his refusal to allow Cuba to hold new elections as he promised, and despite his torture and executions of 600 people from the Batista regime.  Yet you still think the US wasn't justified by our response despite our being one of the first to publicly recognize the Castro government as legitimate, which gave them every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism, and you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with him.

Funniest of all, you see no comparison whatsoever to the devastating condition of cities like San Francisco, Chicago, LA, Philly, Newark, Detroit, and Baltimore, all who have held a stranglehold on state and local governments that continually promote every radical socialist policy that comes down the pike. 

You may not support the DNC, but you can't deny that their policies are far more socialistic than any the GOP ever supports, AND that they've failed miserably in every one of those cities.  One day I may provide you with the socialist reasons that they became deindustrialized, and it was NOT due to their following of capitalism, and were NOT incapable of counteracting those socialist pathologies.

And a good day to you too, sir.

(PART I of III)

Zeets2: "Well, Harvey, I think it's time you took off those rose-colored glasses with which you envision Castro's revolution, where you apparently see non-existent 'enormous social gains' that you think were 'good examples" that the US should follow.'"

The Cuban Revolution is not "Castro's revolution" any more than the American Revolution was "Washington's revolution." No nation can be revolutionized behind its back. Revolutions require the support and active participation of a substantial percentage of the society's population being revolutionized. In colonial America, one-third of the population supported the counter-revolution of 1775, while 94% of Cubans supported the Cuban Revolution, which began in 1953. Today, virtually all Cubans still support their revolution - the Cuban Revolution. 

Zeet2's virtually solo denial of Cuba's highly well-documented social gains is not something I have control over. They are achievements verified and reported by several mainstream sources, including the CIA via its CIA World Factbook. 

Zeets2: "And you seem to believe that the US did not have just cause to cease diplomatic relations with Cuba, regardless of their kidnapping of Americans, their confiscation of foreign assets, his refusal to allow Cuba to hold new elections as he promised, and despite his torture and executions of 600 people from the Batista regime. 

I've not stated nor suggested that the U.S. did not have, from its perspective, just cause to sever diplomatic relations with Cuba following the ouster of the Batista regime. The Eisenhower administration would have been remiss had it not done so, for, like all presidential administrations, its primary function was to protect the capitalist class's interests and uphold and perpetuate the capitalist system. The U.S. government was no less aware than I am now that the Cuban Revolution constituted the threat of a good example and was, therefore, duty-bound to do all it could to crush the revolution. And, as the U.S. government's deposing of Mosaddegh, Goulart, Arbenz, Allende, Bishop, Lumumba, Allende, Salazar, and many others demonstrates, the U.S. capitalist state has no regard for peaceful revolutions, either. 

(END OF PART I)

Zeets2 » 07 Jan 2024, 1:09 pm » wrote: ↑

07 Jan 2024, 1:09 pm

Well, Harvey, I think it's time you took off those rose-colored glasses with which you envision Castro's revolution, where you apparently see non-existent "enormous social gains" that you think were a "good example" that the US should follow.  And you seem to believe that the US did not have just cause to cease diplomatic relations with Cuba, regardless of their kidnapping of Americans, their confiscation of foreign assets, his refusal to allow Cuba to hold new elections as he promised, and despite his torture and executions of 600 people from the Batista regime.  Yet you still think the US wasn't justified by our response despite our being one of the first to publicly recognize the Castro government as legitimate, which gave them every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism, and you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with him.

Funniest of all, you see no comparison whatsoever to the devastating condition of cities like San Francisco, Chicago, LA, Philly, Newark, Detroit, and Baltimore, all who have held a stranglehold on state and local governments that continually promote every radical socialist policy that comes down the pike. 

You may not support the DNC, but you can't deny that their policies are far more socialistic than any the GOP ever supports, AND that they've failed miserably in every one of those cities.  One day I may provide you with the socialist reasons that they became deindustrialized, and it was NOT due to their following of capitalism, and were NOT incapable of counteracting those socialist pathologies.

And a good day to you too, sir.

(PART II OF III)

Concerning the kidnapping of Americans and the confiscation of foreign assets, such tactics are hardly unique to the Cuban Revolution. George Washington referred to the kidnapping of Brits as an "honorable" practice, and his forces routinely seized the assets of British loyalists. Moreover, the confiscated foreign assets were produced by Cubans under near-chattel slavery conditions. So please excuse me for not shedding tears for multinational sugar and tobacco interests. 

Oh, and about the "torture and executions of 600 people from the Batista regime." Didn't all of that unfold in a place called Abu Ghraib? 

Zeets2: "Yet you still think the US wasn't justified by our response despite our being one of the first to publicly recognize the Castro government as legitimate, which gave them every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism, and you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with him."

Again, I haven't asserted that the U.S. government, from its viewpoint, wasn't justified in its reaction to the Cuban Revolution's success in seizing power; it was. The U.S. political state only moved to recognize Fidel as Cuba's head of state, not for his legitimacy. And, with all due respect for Zeets2 as a human being, the statement that the U.S. government "gave [Cuba] every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism" is quintessential American arrogance. It is akin to King George III uttering, "I've given the colonists every opportunity to kiss my ring." 

Furthermore, like all revolutions, the Cuban revolution intended to break free from the economic relationships that held the Cuban people in bondage and, accordingly, subjected them to the then-second-lowest living standards in the Western hemisphere. But even if Cubans had decided to "follow the path of the free market and capitalism," they (still) would not have been allowed to do so. They would have continued to be subjected to the same imperialist conditions that spurred their revolution because, like in all such situations, the last thing the U.S. capitalist state wanted to allow for was indigenous capitalist development. 

(END OF PART II)
 

Zeets2 » 07 Jan 2024, 1:09 pm » wrote: ↑

07 Jan 2024, 1:09 pm

Well, Harvey, I think it's time you took off those rose-colored glasses with which you envision Castro's revolution, where you apparently see non-existent "enormous social gains" that you think were a "good example" that the US should follow.  And you seem to believe that the US did not have just cause to cease diplomatic relations with Cuba, regardless of their kidnapping of Americans, their confiscation of foreign assets, his refusal to allow Cuba to hold new elections as he promised, and despite his torture and executions of 600 people from the Batista regime.  Yet you still think the US wasn't justified by our response despite our being one of the first to publicly recognize the Castro government as legitimate, which gave them every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism, and you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with him.

Funniest of all, you see no comparison whatsoever to the devastating condition of cities like San Francisco, Chicago, LA, Philly, Newark, Detroit, and Baltimore, all who have held a stranglehold on state and local governments that continually promote every radical socialist policy that comes down the pike. 

You may not support the DNC, but you can't deny that their policies are far more socialistic than any the GOP ever supports, AND that they've failed miserably in every one of those cities.  One day I may provide you with the socialist reasons that they became deindustrialized, and it was NOT due to their following of capitalism, and were NOT incapable of counteracting those socialist pathologies.

And a good day to you too, sir.

(PART III OF III) 

Zeets2: "[A]nd you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with [Castro]."

To reiterate, never have I harbored such a lack of understanding.

Zeets2: "Funniest of all, you see no comparison whatsoever to the devastating condition of cities like San Francisco, Chicago, LA, Philly, Newark, Detroit, and Baltimore, all of which have held a stranglehold on state and local governments that continually promote every radical socialist policy that comes down the pike. 

"You may not support the DNC, but you can't deny that their policies are far more socialistic than any the GOP ever supports AND that they've failed miserably in every one of those cities. One day, I may provide you with the socialist reasons that they became deindustrialized, and it was NOT due to their following of capitalism. They were NOT incapable of counteracting those socialist pathologies."

If any American politician were socialists, I would support them rhetorically and economically. But no American politician, including the social democrats Bernard Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, are socialists. The nature of the policies and practices carried out by Democratic mayors that reactionaries oppose is not socialist. Socialism suggests a complete change in socioeconomic relations, not piecemeal legislation borne of bourgeois governments consisting of pro-capitalist Republican politicians and pro-capitalist Democratic politicians. 

(END OF PART III)

Zeets2 » 07 Jan 2024, 1:09 pm » wrote: ↑

07 Jan 2024, 1:09 pm

Well, Harvey, I think it's time you took off those rose-colored glasses with which you envision Castro's revolution, where you apparently see non-existent "enormous social gains" that you think were a "good example" that the US should follow.  And you seem to believe that the US did not have just cause to cease diplomatic relations with Cuba, regardless of their kidnapping of Americans, their confiscation of foreign assets, his refusal to allow Cuba to hold new elections as he promised, and despite his torture and executions of 600 people from the Batista regime.  Yet you still think the US wasn't justified by our response despite our being one of the first to publicly recognize the Castro government as legitimate, which gave them every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism, and you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with him.

Funniest of all, you see no comparison whatsoever to the devastating condition of cities like San Francisco, Chicago, LA, Philly, Newark, Detroit, and Baltimore, all who have held a stranglehold on state and local governments that continually promote every radical socialist policy that comes down the pike. 

You may not support the DNC, but you can't deny that their policies are far more socialistic than any the GOP ever supports, AND that they've failed miserably in every one of those cities.  One day I may provide you with the socialist reasons that they became deindustrialized, and it was NOT due to their following of capitalism, and were NOT incapable of counteracting those socialist pathologies.

And a good day to you too, sir.

(ADDENDUM)

In this thread's parent post, I wrote, "The progressive achievements won by Soviet workers pressured the U.S. capitalist state to concede reforms for American workers. Reforms including homeownership, desegregation, investments in education, public healthcare, etc." It may be accurately stated that reforms implemented by capitalist governments are like the defensive fortifications erected by armies in battle, but they are not manifestations of socialism. While wishing to - indeed needing to thwart any widespread demand for the establishment of a socialist society, bourgeois governments have enacted nominal reforms as, again, defensive fortifications. But, as also mentioned in this thread's parent post, with the dissolution of the U.S.S.R. and, therefore, the elimination of a countervailing system, the U.S. capitalist state began to claw back New Deal programs and other social reforms. Capitalism is, again, free to be as mean as it needs to be.
And it must be pointed out that few pieces of reform legislation have been passed into law without the support of both Democratic and Republican legislators. Ergo, if Democratic politicians who introduce and vote for reform legislation are socialists, then so, too, are their Republican "counterparts" who also tend to support such laws. 

Zeets2: " One day, I may provide you with the socialist reasons that they became deindustrialized, and it was NOT due to their following of capitalism."

I look forward to it. 

Be well.
Good day.
"Harvey Mushman"

HarveyMushman » 09 Jan 2024, 9:19 am » wrote: ↑

09 Jan 2024, 9:19 am

In this thread's parent post, I wrote, "The progressive achievements won by Soviet workers pressured the U.S. capitalist state to concede reforms for American workers. Reforms including homeownership, desegregation, investments in education, public healthcare, etc." It may be accurately stated that reforms implemented by capitalist governments are like the defensive fortifications erected by armies in battle, but they are not manifestations of socialism. While wishing to - indeed needing to thwart any widespread demand for the establishment of a socialist society, bourgeois governments have enacted nominal reforms as, again, defensive fortifications. But, as also mentioned in this thread's parent post, with the dissolution of the U.S.S.R. and, therefore, the elimination of a countervailing system, the U.S. capitalist state began to claw back New Deal programs and other social reforms. Capitalism is, again, free to be as mean as it needs to be.

Good day.
"Harvey Mushman"

I reject your basic premise, because you equate the changes and improvements WILLINGLY PROVIDED BY PRIVATE EMPLOYERS with the way your socialistic ideals empower their government to MANDATE such reforms, much as Obama attempted to do with his idiotic plan and multiple lies about his universal healthcare plan, later named Obamacare.  It was a complete fraud, and ONLY survived the backlash from the country because of the lies, which I'm sure you remember, starting with, "if you like your healthcare plan you can keep it", a lie because any plan that an employer provided that his workers were happy with (as mine were) were rejected as inadequate because mine didn't include abortion coverage, something an employer with only men and older women who could not possibly need an abortion.  The next lie was, "if you like your doctor, you can keep him", and that was quickly proven false as many doctors that people had for years were not available to them on Obamacare.  And finally, the biggest lie of them all, "you'll save an average of $2500 per family under my healthcare plan", a blatant lie that was quickly exposed as premiums rose dramatically for most people, and yearly increases in Obamacare premiums have continued every year at roughly the same rate as private insurances had increased in prior years.

The free market works, and that's the reality you socialist can never accept.

Need an example?
When business owners found a dearth of employees willing to take a job at the prevailing minimum wage over the past few years, THEY AND THEY ALONE decided to offer higher wages than the minimum wage state and federal laws mandated.  And capitalists like myself have no problem with that because it's foolproof evidence that the free market works!  See the proof in the photos below.

So any "achievements" won by the USSR workers had NOTHING TO DO with the concession of business owners to offer greater benefits to workers.  That choice was made freely, and was under NO pressure from government to do so.



 
 

HarveyMushman » 09 Jan 2024, 9:18 am » wrote: ↑

09 Jan 2024, 9:18 am

(PART III OF III) 

Zeets2: "[A]nd you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with [Castro]."

To reiterate, never have I harbored such a lack of understanding.

Zeets2: "Funniest of all, you see no comparison whatsoever to the devastating condition of cities like San Francisco, Chicago, LA, Philly, Newark, Detroit, and Baltimore, all of which have held a stranglehold on state and local governments that continually promote every radical socialist policy that comes down the pike. 

"You may not support the DNC, but you can't deny that their policies are far more socialistic than any the GOP ever supports AND that they've failed miserably in every one of those cities. One day, I may provide you with the socialist reasons that they became deindustrialized, and it was NOT due to their following of capitalism. They were NOT incapable of counteracting those socialist pathologies."

If any American politician were socialists, I would support them rhetorically and economically. But no American politician, including the social democrats Bernard Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, are socialists. The nature of the policies and practices carried out by Democratic mayors that reactionaries oppose is not socialist. Socialism suggests a complete change in socioeconomic relations, not piecemeal legislation borne of bourgeois governments consisting of pro-capitalist Republican politicians and pro-capitalist Democratic politicians. 

(END OF PART III)

Sorry, but you don't get to pick and choose which policies are and are not socialist in nature.  The fact remains that radical left-wing politicians like AOC and Bernie Sanders continually promote huge socialistic reforms, including his $2.5 TRILLION plan for "Housing for All", a new $3 TRILLION dollar tax on oil companies, and a $16.3 TRILLION proposal for the hoax of a "green New Deal".  Other socialist demands included higher taxes for everyone, free college tuition for all, a commission to study black reparations, doubling the federal minimum wage, all while supporting the dictatorships of human rights abusers like the Sandinista and Castro tyrants.  You simply cannot deny that those POLICIES which are ALWAYS present in a socialist's campaign are deeply rooted in their true socialist makeup. What you see as them being fraudulent socialists is nothing more than true socialists simply taking small bites of the socialism apple at a time in order to implement the full agenda of governmental economic control they desire in their aim to gradually bring full socialism to the country.
 

Cannonpointer » 08 Jan 2024, 6:37 pm » wrote: ↑

08 Jan 2024, 6:37 pm

The fact that you even have to ask him that rather exposes your reading skills. 

Every wall street banker, every deep stater, and every newspaper publisher is guilty of treason. Every university president, almost every Christian church leader, and every senator and congressman is guilty of reason. Anyone who works for Ikea can be considered part of the problem, as well.

Why not then make the claim that EVERY business owner, every employee, every clergyman, every teacher, and every politician is equally guilty of treason along with every newspaper publisher according to your warped perspective?  Apparently, your absurd definition purposely flies smack in the face of the 1st Amendment, GUARANTEEING a free press. There is not basis in fact for such mindless sputtering. 

The entirety of your idiotic diatribe is pathetically laughable and easily ignored.
 

HarveyMushman » 09 Jan 2024, 9:14 am » wrote: ↑

09 Jan 2024, 9:14 am

(PART II OF III)

Concerning the kidnapping of Americans and the confiscation of foreign assets, such tactics are hardly unique to the Cuban Revolution. George Washington referred to the kidnapping of Brits as an "honorable" practice, and his forces routinely seized the assets of British loyalists. Moreover, the confiscated foreign assets were produced by Cubans under near-chattel slavery conditions. So please excuse me for not shedding tears for multinational sugar and tobacco interests. 

Oh, and about the "torture and executions of 600 people from the Batista regime." Didn't all of that unfold in a place called Abu Ghraib? 

Zeets2: "Yet you still think the US wasn't justified by our response despite our being one of the first to publicly recognize the Castro government as legitimate, which gave them every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism, and you can't understand why we broke diplomatic ties with him."

Again, I haven't asserted that the U.S. government, from its viewpoint, wasn't justified in its reaction to the Cuban Revolution's success in seizing power; it was. The U.S. political state only moved to recognize Fidel as Cuba's head of state, not for his legitimacy. And, with all due respect for Zeets2 as a human being, the statement that the U.S. government "gave [Cuba] every opportunity to follow the path of the free market and capitalism" is quintessential American arrogance. It is akin to King George III uttering, "I've given the colonists every opportunity to kiss my ring." 

Furthermore, like all revolutions, the Cuban revolution intended to break free from the economic relationships that held the Cuban people in bondage and, accordingly, subjected them to the then-second-lowest living standards in the Western hemisphere. But even if Cubans had decided to "follow the path of the free market and capitalism," they (still) would not have been allowed to do so. They would have continued to be subjected to the same imperialist conditions that spurred their revolution because, like in all such situations, the last thing the U.S. capitalist state wanted to allow for was indigenous capitalist development. 

(END OF PART II)

Yes, abuse and torture certainly was used on prisoner terrorists at Abu Ghraib.  The big difference is that once those allegations were proven in the court-martial of no less than 15 soldiers who committed those crimes were tried and convicted.  Some of the soldiers were acquitted; others received reprimands and rank reductions. Two of the troops were sentenced to prison terms of two and five months.

Which of your fabled socialist/communist governments EVER handed down equally severe penalties adjudicated in a fair trial by those governments you honor?

Furthermore, you cannot simply accept as fact the unprovable your claim that Cuba "following the path of the US" STILL "would not have been allowed to do so".
The fact is that the US would have LOVED to continue working and trading with Cuba economically as it had in years past, and it was only the anti-American propaganda of the US as nothing more than "capital imperialists" that forced us to break those ties, with businesses losing millions of their investments as Castro nationalized every means of production, much to the detriment of the Cuban people.  According to you, such theft was justifiable and should have been ignored, and it should have been America "kissing the ring" of Castro, and that was not about to happen. 
 

Zeets2 » 09 Jan 2024, 10:41 am » wrote: ↑

09 Jan 2024, 10:41 am

Why not then make the claim that EVERY business owner, every employee, every clergyman, every teacher, and every politician is equally guilty of treason along with every newspaper publisher according to your warped perspective? 

If you insist.

Zeets2 » 09 Jan 2024, 10:41 am » wrote: ↑

09 Jan 2024, 10:41 am

Apparently, your absurd definition purposely flies smack in the face of the 1st Amendment, GUARANTEEING a free press. There is not basis in fact for such mindless sputtering. 

I was unaware the homosexual cohort believed the press was "free." I was under the impression even gays understood the press is a creature of the state, for multiple reasons - among them, that it is publicly traded on a government created, government regulated, government funded trading board. Thanks for that information, Petunia.

Zeets2 » 09 Jan 2024, 10:41 am » wrote: ↑

09 Jan 2024, 10:41 am

The entirety of your idiotic diatribe is pathetically laughable and easily ignored.

Yet you responded to it.

Are you a woman? Or "identify" as such?

Sumela » 08 Jan 2024, 10:43 pm » wrote: ↑

08 Jan 2024, 10:43 pm

You worship Satan?  Makes sense.
 

Siphilis infected ***.

 

LowIQTrash: "...if you asked me to choose between capitalism and socialism, I'd choose the latter (but not Marxism-Leninism; I have a different idea in mind)." 

What do you have in mind? 

LowIQTrash: "What I question is: 1) Whether the achievements you ascribe to socialism are due to socialist policies (as opposed to something else, like, say, modernization and industrialization). 2) Whether those countries practiced socialism. The Soviet Union and similar countries seemed to more or less represent an anti-bourgeois state capitalist system. Anti-bourgeois because they despised small business / small shops / small-scale landowners, and as some of your left-communist "colleagues" (thorns on your side) might note, there was never any serious attempt to do away with commodity exchange. Private wage labor was abolished, only to be replaced with a wage "offered" to (foisted upon) the glorious worker by the state." 

Yes, of course, industrialization was crucial for achieving desired socioeconomic goals. It served as the material basis for those improvements, without which socialist policies wouldn't have been worth the paper they were written on. Under capitalism, the lion's share of the wealth derived from industrialization accrues to the capitalist class, while under socialism, worker-produced wealth realized through industrialization is used to improve society as a whole rather than the sliver of society known as the capitalist class. That material basis provided by industrialization explains the success of the Soviet Union's socialist policies.  

Concerning whether those countries practiced socialism, it must be understood that socialism is a historical process, not a list of things one checks off (i.e., improved socioeconomic conditions) to say, "Now we have socialism." Capitalism and socialism are historically embedded processes unfolding dialectically and not as a static state of affairs. Therefore, socialist experiments stand distinct from one another for material reasons. As such, socialist societies will appear different based on those material conditions. The only constant is that capitalism and its social relations were eliminated within those experiments. In brief, Marxism or scientific socialism is an action guide, not a dogma. So, yes, those countries did practice socialism.  

And yes, all socialist societies are anti-bourgeois, but not only because they reject small businesses/petty-bourgeois businesses. They are merely anti-capitalists, which encompasses capitalism (and) petty capitalism. And yes, indeed, it was the case that "there was never any serious attempt to do away with commodity exchange," which is a topic that takes us back to the material conditions therein, which hampered the ability to eliminate commodity exchange. After all, just as the improvement of social conditions depends upon underlying material realities rather than the soundness of government policies, socialist or otherwise, the ability to eschew commodity production is also so dependent. In short, having been established within the context of a backward, mostly uneducated semi-agrarian society, the Soviet Union lacked many of the prerequisites for the total implementation of socialism and, later, communism. But as the world's first socialist experiment, it was very successful.  

LowIQTrash: "Capitalism is not a "non-violent" system - contrary to the propaganda from libertarians, neoliberals, and conservatives." 

Yes, not only is the capitalist system extremely violent, but it is so in a variety of ways that most people don't understand. From socioeconomic-induced street crime to domestic violence and the loneliness of atomized capitalist society, "capitalism is horror without end." --Lenin.  

To be continued...
 

 

LowIQWTrash: "However, I'd say the record for MLM states isn't 'anything to brag about' [vis-a-vis violence] given that a large # of deaths did occur under Stalin, Mao, etc." 

Yes, many atrocities have been committed in socialist societies. But, unlike the various settler colonial projects carried out to pave the way for capitalist development, they were barbarities not brought about to further the cause of socialism. Apart from the ongoing genocide of the US's indigenous peoples, for example, they weren't intended to eliminate entire groups of people, i.e., people of color such as Palestinians. They were, at times, particularly concerning Stalin, implemented to settle political and personal scores. 
It's also the case that, given the Soviet Union's and China's vast landmasses and then-slow and cumbersome communication systems, many local party officials could execute people for various petty reasons that Stalin and Mao had nothing to do with. In their totality, these killings and persecutions by other means augmented Mao's and Stalin's misdeeds, which served to exaggerate the number of deaths attributed to them today. 
But so, too, were justified killings, imprisonments, and exilings of civilians instituted. Many Kulaks, for example, maliciously set out to sabotage the Russian Revolution by destroying crops and livestock and carrying out other antisocial acts. 

Per the violence associated with foreign wars, although the USSR did fight them, they didn't do so to exploit other peoples' resources and labor power. Unlike the US and other imperialist powers, the Soviet Union fought against imperialism and, accordingly, in solidarity with oppressed peoples, such as Angolans. Never did it invent wholly bogus reasons to invade oil-rich nations, slaughter hundreds of thousands of their people in the process, and then continue to occupy those countries while brutalizing their people for years afterward. 
And yes, a bit of an aside, the then-Afghani government asked the Soviets for their military assistance in its fight against Mujahideen and other factions. 

LowIQTrash: "...the economic policies carried out by National Socialist Germany, which ended the Great Depression caused by 'a certain group' of the usual suspects and reversed almost 20 years of economic damage in maybe 3-4 years. There's no precedent or peer in modern times."

Would that "certain group" be Jewish people? 

LowIQTrash: "I understand you (and MLMs in general) have been told that 'Nazi Germany [wasn't] socialist and fascism is capitalism in decay.' Still, the definition of socialism I use is different from yours. National socialism is an offshoot of 'right-wing' socialism in contrast to the internationalist agenda of Marxism."

With all due respect for LowIQTrash, it isn't a matter of my being "told that Nazi Germany [wasn't] socialist and fascism is capitalism in decay." It is my 40-year study of Marxian social science that informs me accordingly. By definition, I know that socialist societies are devoid of privately owned means of economic production. German society's means of production in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s was entirely privately owned. Indeed, it was not only German capitalists who financed the Nazis' rise to power but also American capitalists. Only the thoroughly ill-informed are foolish enough to believe that the said capitalists would have provided such backing had the Nazis been socialists. 

Moreover, following WWII, Ford, GM, Crysler, and other corporations shamelessly requested and received "reparations" from the US government for damages "inflicted" upon their manufacturing facilities in Germany by Allied bombing raids. Had Nazi Germany been a socialist society, (no) capitalist-owned businesses would have operated in it. 
(Ford, GM, and Crysler made trucks, tanks, and other implements of war for the Nazis.) 

 

Zeets2: "Yes, abuse and torture certainly were used on prisoner terrorists at Abu Ghraib. The big difference is that once those allegations were proven in the court-martial, 15 soldiers who committed those crimes were tried and convicted." 

The reality that there hadn't been a single suicide bombing in Iraq until 2004, roughly ten months after the US's illegal and cowardly invasion, is enough to know who the terrorists were. To be sure, the terrorism that unfolded in Iraq in 2004 was a direct result of the US invasion and brutal occupation of Iraq. 

Zeets2: "Which of your fabled socialist/communist governments EVER handed down equally severe penalties adjudicated in a fair trial by those governments you honor?" 

Soviet military personnel, for example, were prosecuted and punished in the 1940s by the Soviet command and military tribunals. In the first months of 1945, over four thousand Soviet officers were convicted for crimes against the local population in Germany. And those were just the officers, for several thousand rank-and-file soldiers were also convicted. Many were executed in front of their units.  Zeets2: "Furthermore, you cannot accept as fact the unprovable claim that Cuba 'following the path of the US' STILL 'wouldn't have been allowed to do so.'  During Batista's rule, the economic relationship between the US and Cuba wasn't a mutually beneficial trading relationship between two capitalist states like the financial relationship between the US and Germany. It was a typical imperialist relationship between the world's most powerful capitalist nation and a tiny Third World country. Ergo, and like all imperialist relationships, recourses, in this case mainly sugar, tobacco, and nickel, were mostly taken out of Cuba in their raw form. That means Cuba, by design, had few domestic industries that could have processed those resources, added value, employed Cubans rather than enslaved them, and built a meaningful tax base. In other words, Cuba was denied the ability to develop a domestic capitalist economy, for it was there to be milked by the US and other capitalist powers. Batista's role was mainly to protect the interests of US and European capitalists against the aspirations of his "fellow" Cubans.  So, it wasn't a matter of the US and Cuba continuing a normal trading relationship because such a thing never existed in the first place. But Zeets2 is correct in as much as "the US would have LOVED to continue" that relationship because it was a one-sided arrangement in the US's favor. And it was not unique to Cuba, not then and not now.  

Zeets2: "It was only the anti-American propaganda of the US as nothing more than 'imperialists' that forced us to break those ties, with businesses losing millions in investments as Castro nationalized every means of production, much to the detriment of the Cuban people. According to you, such theft was justifiable and should have been ignored, and it should have been America "kissing the ring" of Castro, and that was not about to happen." 

Yes, such "theft" was justified, just as American colonists' "theft" of British assets was warranted. Do you, Zeets2, agree that the colonists' theft of British assets was justified? Is it only dark-skinned revolutionaries that haven't the right to thwart their oppressors?"  Finally, it's not easy to imagine how the Cuban government's nationalization of foreign-owned assets was "much to the detriment of the Cuban people." After all, before their revolution, the Cuban people suffered the second lowest overall living standards in the Western hemisphere, next to then-equally exploited Haiti. But by the 1970s, well after the said nationalizations, Cubans enjoyed Latin America's highest overall living standards. Indeed, the Cuban Revolution has been enormously beneficial for Cubans. 
 
 

 

 Zeets2: "Sorry, but you don't get to pick and choose which policies are and aren't socialist. [R]adical left-wing politicians like AOC and Bernie Sanders continually promote huge socialistic reforms, including his $2.5 TRILLION plan for 'Housing for All,' a new $3 TRILLION tax on oil companies, and a $16.3 TRILLION proposal for the hoax of a 'Green New Deal.' Other socialist demands include higher taxes for everyone, free college tuition for all, a commission to study black reparations, doubling the federal minimum wage, all while supporting the dictatorships of human rights abusers like the Sandinistas and Castro tyrants. You cannot deny that those POLICIES that are ALWAYS present in a socialist's campaign are deeply rooted in their true socialist makeup. What you see as them being fraudulent socialists is nothing more than true socialists simply taking small bites of the socialist apple at a time to implement the full agenda of governmental economic control they desire in their aim to bring full socialism to the country gradually."  

Although a reading of the Communist Manifesto will show that revolutionary socialists support reform legislation designed to ease the burdens created by capitalism, we do so with the understanding that, as alluded to in this thread's parent post, capitalist states tend to claw back those reforms eventually. (I wrote: But with the dissolution of the U.S.S.R. and, therefore, the elimination of a countervailing system, the U.S. capitalist state began to claw back New Deal programs and other social reforms. Capitalism is, again, free to be as mean as it needs to be.)Nonetheless, to assert that specific laws and policies created by the capitalist state are socialist is to admit ignorance as to the meaning of socialism. Socialism has one intent: eliminating the capitalist system, not its "reform."  Yes, liberal politicians like Bernard Sanders and AOC introduce legislation meant to lessen the devastating social effects of capitalism's massive transfer of wealth from the producing working class to the parasitic capitalist class. Capitalism creates a lack of affordable housing and homelessness via speculation and other factors, and Sanders, AOC, and other typically worthless politicians introduce $2.5 trillion "housing for all" plans in a futile effort to end homelessness. And they propose $2.5 trillion tax plans and $16.3 trillion proposals to alleviate capitalism's disastrous environmental consequences. But those things aren't ever going to happen. To understand that, one only has to consider that then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi called the Green New Deal “the Green Dream or whatever.” She also literally eulogized Pete Peterson on the House floor. Pete Peterson’s life’s ambition was to destroy the Social Security and Medicare programs. To be sure, to confuse reformist legislation with socialism is to confess that one doesn't understand socialist thought.  

Zeets2: "You cannot deny that those POLICIES that are ALWAYS present in a socialist's campaign are deeply rooted in their true socialist makeup." 

But I and millions of other revolutionary socialists (do) deny that. If that weren't the case, virtually all other revolutionaries and I would support those politicians rhetorically and monetarily. But we don't because they're not socialists.  

Zeets2: "Other socialist demands include higher taxes for everyone, free college tuition for all, a commission to study black reparations, doubling the federal minimum wage..." Again, those things will fail to come to fruition because capitalism is free to be as mean as it needs to be.  Finally, what books penned by Marx, Engels, Lenin, Mao, Trotsky, etc., have been read by Zeets2? 
 

 

Zeets2: "I reject your basic premise because you equate the changes and improvements WILLINGLY PROVIDED BY PRIVATE EMPLOYERS with how your socialistic ideals empower their government to MANDATE such reforms ... So any 'achievements' won by the USSR workers had NOTHING TO DO with the concession of business owners to offer greater benefits to workers. That choice was made freely and under no government pressure to do so."

Very well.  But how do you, Zeets2, account for New York financier and banker Simon Straus' comment that "Widespread and successful homeowning activities in the US would do more to alleviate social unrest and build a bulwark against the encroachments of Bolshevism than any other development"? --excerpted from a 1917 Washington Post op-ed. 

Too, and again, the Labor Department then initiated its "Own Your Own Home" program, later led by Herbert Hoover, which provided liquidity for banks toward the expansion of home loans. In 1933, the New Deal's "Home Owners' Loan Corporation was launched, which granted home loans to workers, making homeownership far more accessible.

Yes, the US government and banking capitalists initiated that program and many others voluntarily. However, as evidenced by Simon Straus's statement, they were motivated by the success of the Bolshevik Revolution. 

Zeets2: "["Obamacare"] was a complete fraud and ONLY survived the backlash from the country because of the lies ... starting with, "If you like your healthcare plan, you can keep it..."

I couldn't agree anymore, Zeets2. But if the Affordable Care Act were a manifestation of socialism, those "covered" by it wouldn't be paying premiums to insurance companies because, under socialism, insurance companies wouldn't exist. And you know that medical insurance companies had a hand in writing the ACA, right, Zeets2? 

Zeets2: "The free market works and that's the reality you socialists can never accept. Need an example?] When business owners found a dearth of employees willing to take a job at the prevailing minimum wage over the past few years, THEY AND THEY ALONE offered higher wages than the minimum wage state and federal laws mandated. Capitalists like me have no problem with that..."

As evidenced by the fact that various state legislatures have relaxed laws relative to child labor over the past two years, which has enabled many capitalists to hire children at lower wages, capitalists do have a problem with paying higher wages. As we can also see by the closing of several recently organized Starbucks stores, capitalists will go to great lengths to resist paying higher wages. And why wouldn't they? After all, the unpaid portion of the economic wealth produced by workers' labor power is the source of capitalist profits. 

Zeets2: "Capitalists like me..." 

I take it that you are a business owner and or a significant stockholder. Is that correct, Zeets2? 
 
 

 

Kobia2: "Not surprising the short life expectancy of Russians in 1917, considering the millions of Military & Civilian deaths from WW1 and the additional death toll of the Russian Revolution, which also began in 1917... Just as I'm sure, the average lifespan of a Russian from the years 1941 to 1945 was significantly lower due to around 22 Million of them being killed during WW2... So, it's not a great revelation that Russians began living longer in the 30-year absence of major war." 

The absence of war also increased the Soviet Union's average life expectancy. That is true. But average life expectancy was much lower in Russia before the revolution, and it would have continued as such had there not been a revolution. Czarist Russia would have carried on with the same atrocities that were responsible for its low average life expectancy, which spurred the Bolshevik Revolution in the first place. Since the Soviet Union was primarily devoid of war between 1945 and 1975, the Bolshevik's socioeconomic practices dramatically increased the USSR's average life expectancy by 1975.  

The Bolsheviks opened pregnancy consultation centers, maternity hospitals, and "milk kitchens" across the country where none existed before. That alone quickly and significantly reduced rates of neonatal death and infant mortality. By 1928, there were six gynecological hospitals, twenty-one maternity hospitals, and thirty "Point(s) of Medical Consultation" centers in Moscow alone.  By 1931, there were thirty maternity hospitals, ten gynecological hospitals, and thirty-five pregnancy consultation facilities, and their numbers were doubled before the then-current five-year plan ended in 1935.

As a result of the excellent work of these various institutions, 90% of the children born in Moscow were alive at the end of their first year, compared to 66.3% who survived their first year in 1920. By 1940, in Moscow, each clinic was equipped to care for six to ten thousand pregnant women a year, covering the corresponding number of births. That is why I wrote in this thread's parent post, "Poverty, unemployment, illiteracy, homelessness, and other social ills were virtually and easily eliminated in socialist societies. I say 'easily' because those pathologies are all but effortlessly eliminated when doing so becomes a governmental priority, unlike in the U.S."  Be well.Good day."Harvey Mushman"