I'm sorry, but where on this planet are the rabid conservatives getting their information from? Observe:
I want to start by saying that I'll regard "capitalist USA" as the U.S. pre-Obama and Republican-only because I think that's what this picture is trying to get across since they use a picture of Obama and "Democrat" in the last column as a point of reference opposite "capitalist USA." I'm not even going to take on the misrepresentation of America under Obama and other Democrats compared to communist, socialist and fascist governments in other countries because that would be a whole other rant. I am however going to reserve the right to use history to disprove this chart since historical governments are used within the chart.
So, with out further ado, let's go down the list, shall we..
1. Takeover of private companies, over the objection of shareholders:
Actually, the some of the biggest trust-busters were republicans like William McKinley and Howard Taft and private companies were not too happy with their policies.
2. Rounding up detractors (critics) and putting them in concentration camps
While we may not have called them concentration camps, plenty of dissenters were rounded up by our government with both democrat and republican leaders in office and put in deplorable conditions.
3. Allow people to succeed on their own merits:
Okay, cool, but what happens when people's merits aren't in coming into the picture because institutionalized racism, sexism and classism keeps their merits from ever being put on the table? I'm all about people succeeding on their own merit and the best people for the job being selected, but what happens when the best people don't even get an interview because their names are associated with a certain race that the interviewer is biased against? What then? Allowing people to succeed on their own merit necessitated anti-discrimination laws, but I don't think that's what the green check-mark under Republican Capitalism means to the maker of the chart.
4. Party members given special privileges:
Again, total disregard for US history. All presidents gave positions and privileges to party members (AKA the Spoils System) prior to reforms passed after President James Garfield was assassinated for trying to clean up widespread government corruption.
5.Treat all people as equals:
Well women, looks like we missed the memo. We're still only getting $.77 to every $1.00 a man makes in the same position. Is that equal?
6. Dividing people by race, using stereotypes and identity politics...
I could probably find 20 conservative-oriented pictures in two minutes that use racial stereotypes to try to toward portraying Obama. The U.S. has a long history of amplifying racial stereotypes in order to keep different groups of people from defining the enemy as the same person. Indentured servitude was ended in part to elevate the status of poor whites over blacks because slaves and indentured servants were getting too friendly and started to work together and realized that they were both being treated unfairly by the same people at the top.
7. Requires state control over the media in order to stay in power:
Actually, SOPA was introduced by a republican in Texas. If Obama censored the media, Fox news would be off the air by now and Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh would be in jail. The media isn't being censored by the government, it's being censored by the corporations that control it and, with only a few exceptions, they mandate that mass media tell the audience whatever they think is going to raise the ratings and have a bigger pay-off that week. Good try though.
8. Controls the educational system to indoctrinate youth before they are capable of critically thinking:
Wow, you just defined organized religion. Wait sorry, that was a little mean. But the largely republican Texas Board of Education tends to make textbook decisions that influence textbook choices for the whole country. It's impossible not to "indoctrinate youth before they are capable of critically thinking." Children learn from their surroundings long before they actually recognize what they are learning, whatever those surroundings may be.
9.Can be sustained without bankrupting the country with debt:
Hmm...Great Depression anyone? It was in large part due to unchecked and unbalanced capitalism. Need a more recent example? Ronald Regan, Republican hero extraordinaire, increased the country's debt three-fold during his presidency while trying out Reaganomics.
10. Extols freedom and the private ownership of property:
Capitalism, when unchecked, extols freedom only for the very rich at the expense of all others, which isn't freedom at all. In fact, total freedom is the definition of anarchy. As for the second part of that, I tend to regard my own body as my own, not anyone else's property. If you're a woman, conservative republicans are at odds with this idea, saying that we don't have the right to determine what's best for our bodies if we ever become pregnant.
11. People are rewarded for how hard they work, rather than what some arbitrary central committee decides:
I might be wrong, but being a single parent with three minimum-wage jobs seems like pretty hard work to me for there to be no "reward" of an affordable health care system. In this country, many people are rewarded for how hard they work others rather than how hard they themselves work. If this statement about hard work correlating with reward were the case in actual terms, people would receive much closer to the full value of their labor. I agree with hard work as a good general philosophy, but it falls short when you try to relate it to larger society and the reality of the economic status of workers.
Note: I'm not here to say Democrats and liberals are the saviors of the U.S. I think that mostly everybody sucks. The people I agree with aren't doing enough and the people I don't agree with are doing too much. I want the record to state that, even though I've never voted for a Republican, I'm registered as independent.
I want to start by saying that I'll regard "capitalist USA" as the U.S. pre-Obama and Republican-only because I think that's what this picture is trying to get across since they use a picture of Obama and "Democrat" in the last column as a point of reference opposite "capitalist USA." I'm not even going to take on the misrepresentation of America under Obama and other Democrats compared to communist, socialist and fascist governments in other countries because that would be a whole other rant. I am however going to reserve the right to use history to disprove this chart since historical governments are used within the chart.
So, with out further ado, let's go down the list, shall we..
1. Takeover of private companies, over the objection of shareholders:
Actually, the some of the biggest trust-busters were republicans like William McKinley and Howard Taft and private companies were not too happy with their policies.
2. Rounding up detractors (critics) and putting them in concentration camps
While we may not have called them concentration camps, plenty of dissenters were rounded up by our government with both democrat and republican leaders in office and put in deplorable conditions.
3. Allow people to succeed on their own merits:
Okay, cool, but what happens when people's merits aren't in coming into the picture because institutionalized racism, sexism and classism keeps their merits from ever being put on the table? I'm all about people succeeding on their own merit and the best people for the job being selected, but what happens when the best people don't even get an interview because their names are associated with a certain race that the interviewer is biased against? What then? Allowing people to succeed on their own merit necessitated anti-discrimination laws, but I don't think that's what the green check-mark under Republican Capitalism means to the maker of the chart.
4. Party members given special privileges:
Again, total disregard for US history. All presidents gave positions and privileges to party members (AKA the Spoils System) prior to reforms passed after President James Garfield was assassinated for trying to clean up widespread government corruption.
5.Treat all people as equals:
Well women, looks like we missed the memo. We're still only getting $.77 to every $1.00 a man makes in the same position. Is that equal?
6. Dividing people by race, using stereotypes and identity politics...
I could probably find 20 conservative-oriented pictures in two minutes that use racial stereotypes to try to toward portraying Obama. The U.S. has a long history of amplifying racial stereotypes in order to keep different groups of people from defining the enemy as the same person. Indentured servitude was ended in part to elevate the status of poor whites over blacks because slaves and indentured servants were getting too friendly and started to work together and realized that they were both being treated unfairly by the same people at the top.
7. Requires state control over the media in order to stay in power:
Actually, SOPA was introduced by a republican in Texas. If Obama censored the media, Fox news would be off the air by now and Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh would be in jail. The media isn't being censored by the government, it's being censored by the corporations that control it and, with only a few exceptions, they mandate that mass media tell the audience whatever they think is going to raise the ratings and have a bigger pay-off that week. Good try though.
8. Controls the educational system to indoctrinate youth before they are capable of critically thinking:
Wow, you just defined organized religion. Wait sorry, that was a little mean. But the largely republican Texas Board of Education tends to make textbook decisions that influence textbook choices for the whole country. It's impossible not to "indoctrinate youth before they are capable of critically thinking." Children learn from their surroundings long before they actually recognize what they are learning, whatever those surroundings may be.
9.Can be sustained without bankrupting the country with debt:
Hmm...Great Depression anyone? It was in large part due to unchecked and unbalanced capitalism. Need a more recent example? Ronald Regan, Republican hero extraordinaire, increased the country's debt three-fold during his presidency while trying out Reaganomics.
10. Extols freedom and the private ownership of property:
Capitalism, when unchecked, extols freedom only for the very rich at the expense of all others, which isn't freedom at all. In fact, total freedom is the definition of anarchy. As for the second part of that, I tend to regard my own body as my own, not anyone else's property. If you're a woman, conservative republicans are at odds with this idea, saying that we don't have the right to determine what's best for our bodies if we ever become pregnant.
11. People are rewarded for how hard they work, rather than what some arbitrary central committee decides:
I might be wrong, but being a single parent with three minimum-wage jobs seems like pretty hard work to me for there to be no "reward" of an affordable health care system. In this country, many people are rewarded for how hard they work others rather than how hard they themselves work. If this statement about hard work correlating with reward were the case in actual terms, people would receive much closer to the full value of their labor. I agree with hard work as a good general philosophy, but it falls short when you try to relate it to larger society and the reality of the economic status of workers.
Note: I'm not here to say Democrats and liberals are the saviors of the U.S. I think that mostly everybody sucks. The people I agree with aren't doing enough and the people I don't agree with are doing too much. I want the record to state that, even though I've never voted for a Republican, I'm registered as independent.
