{"id":10671,"date":"2011-05-27T11:22:52","date_gmt":"2011-05-27T11:22:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2011\/05\/27\/socialist-shmocialist\/"},"modified":"2011-05-27T11:22:52","modified_gmt":"2011-05-27T11:22:52","slug":"socialist-shmocialist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2011\/05\/27\/socialist-shmocialist\/","title":{"rendered":"Socialist, Shmocialist"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is a tactical mistake for libertarians and conservatives to label Obama a socialist.  For what will happen, has happened: liberals will revert to a strict definition and point out that Obama is not a socialist by this definition.  Robert Heilbroner defines<\/a> socialism in terms of "a centrally planned economy in which the government controls all means of production."  To my knowledge, Obama has never advocated such a thing.  So when the libertarian or conservative accuses Obama of socialism he lets himself in for a fruitless and wholly unnecessary verbal dispute from which he will emerge the loser.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is enough to point out that the policies of Obama and the Democrat Party lead us toward bigger government and away from self-reliance, individual responsibility, and individual liberty.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is even worse to label him a 'communist.'  Every communist is a socialist, but not every socialist is a communist.  If our president is not a socialist, then a fortiori<\/em> he is not a communist.  It is intellectually irresponsible to take a word that has a definite meaning and turn it into a semantic bludgeon.  That's the sort of thing we expect from leftists, as witness their favorite 'F' word, 'fascist,' a word they apply as indiscriminately as 'racist.'  <\/span><\/p>\n

"But haven't you yourself said, more than once, that politics is war conducted by other means?"  Yes, I have said it, and more than once.  In the end that's what politics is.  I call it the Converse Clausewitz Principle.  But we are not quite at the end.  Before we get there we should exhaust the possibilities of civil and reasonable debate.<\/span><\/p>\n

"But what if the tactic of labeling Obama a socialist or even a communist would keep him from a second term.  Wouldn't that inaccurate labeling then be justified?"  That's a very tough question.  An affirmative answer would seem to commit one to the principle that the end justifies the means — in which case we are no better than liberals\/leftists.  On the other hand, how can one play fair with those who will do anything to win?<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is a tactical mistake for libertarians and conservatives to label Obama a socialist.  For what will happen, has happened: liberals will revert to a strict definition and point out that Obama is not a socialist by this definition.  Robert Heilbroner defines socialism in terms of "a centrally planned economy in which the government controls … Continue reading “Socialist, Shmocialist”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-language-matters","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10671"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10671\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}