Retired Air Force guy buries MAGAt in facts and it's a lovely thing to see.

[CousinIT]

From:

Link to tweet

[peggysue2]

1. This is something we can all do

Rebutting the lies in our local/regional papers. We read something we know to be false? Write a letter to the editor. Write often enough (as many cranks do) and they'll end up publishing your effort. Make it factual, pointed and succinct and subscribers will read it, too.

This is a way we push back. Expose the lies for what they are--distortions of reality. Provide the truth, the historical record.

We have a voice. Let's use it.

[housecat]

22. over and over and over again

[Just A Box Of Rain]

2. The VA is NOT an example of "socialism," and feeding the right-wing trope is stupid.

Same with libraries, police & fire, roads, schools....

[Justice matters.]

19. Well, without "socialist" taxes, there wouldn't even be an Air Force.

Nor any military.

Same with libraries, police & fire, roads, bridges, schools, or they would all be for-profit corporations, the Federal Reserve included. Once the stock market goes down for good (with no "socialist" program to bail the gullibles out and save the economy), well, good luck with that, tough luck.

[Just A Box Of Rain]

20. "Taxes" are not an example of socialism either.

It is unwise to feed into right-wing false narratives.

[Justice matters.]

21. Agreed, but they associate them with the Boston Tea Party

revolution for NO-TAXES (at all).

[Just A Box Of Rain]

23. Another good reason not to allow "them" to paint false narratives.

If we do that, we lose.

[pnwmom]

26. Sure it is. And so are public libraries, police, fire departments, roads, and public schools.

The libertarian right would like to replace all that with private-pay entities.

We'd rather manage these for the collective good.

[Just A Box Of Rain]

27. No. That's dead wrong.

Why pick up false right-wing tropes???

[pnwmom]

29. A short primer on socialism, from the Brookings Institution.

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2019/05/13/socialism-a-short-primer/

[Just A Box Of Rain]

32. Articles that claim that socialism "is now seen in light of the achievements

of social democratic governments in Scandinavia and elsewhere in Europe" are pure gaslighting, given all these social democracies have advanced capitalist economies and not a single one is a socialist state.

Perhaps you could use better and more honest sources that can straighten out such mencacities?

The accomplishments of liberal societies are accomplishments of liberal societies, no matter what some people attempt to claim.

[EarnestPutz]

30. One of the original definitions of socialism is when "Society as a whole undertakes the....

......responsibility to meet a recognized societal need". This could be providing fire protection, public education, water, sewers, air traffic controls, interstate highways, a military defense, weather forecasting and many other things, including when society as a whole takes on the responsibility of providing continuing care for our veterans. Right-wingers want everyone to hear "socialism" and think "communism", despite a whole world full of examples why it isn't.

[Just A Box Of Rain]

31. No, it is not.

Or every organized society in the history of the world would be called "socialist" and language would be without meaning.

This is a false narrative that helps the right-wing wing false paint liberals as "socialists."

[EarnestPutz]

33. Yes, it is, "one of the original definitions of socialism" like I said. Right-wingers want people to

....equate socialism and communism and that is the false narrative. This is made very plain in Bernie Sander's position papers for example.

[Just A Box Of Rain]

34. I'm not buying what you seem to be selling.

[EarnestPutz]

35. Thank you for being civil as we disagree. Disagreement are inevitable when one debates....

....basic definitions before value judgements.

[Just A Box Of Rain]

36. When accepted definitions for political terms which describe political ideologies are replaced with

terminology that is so vague that it would apply to every organizing form of government in the history of mankind, then there are no grounds for honest discussion, as words (and terms) are rendered meaningless.

[EarnestPutz]

38. Those position papers that I mentioned do provide definitions that differentiate between.....

.....communism and socialism, but I'd like to know how you might do so.

[HuskyOffset]

49. It's difficult to have a serious discussion

When you haven't given your definition of socialism.

Edited to add: Nevermind, I see way down the thread in post #28 you've defined it. Thank you.

[Just A Box Of Rain]

50. The same way political scientists have defined socialism for generations.

Not "my" definition, but the accepted understanding.

[malaise]

3. Most exxcellent!

Rec

[KS Toronado]

4. About 30/40 years back

republicans turned the word "Socialism" into something evil, wish we could reverse that.

[peppertree]

8. As long as Big Business controls most of Big Media, that would be quite an uphill climb

To say nothing of Hate Radio.

All controlled by people who a) don't feel they should be taxed; and b) feel they should be above regulations - even the law.

Taxes - and the law - are, after all, "for the little people" (including all the rubes who choke on fries while tuned in to Farce News and Hate Radio).

[KS Toronado]

9. I agree 100%

All we can do against their "noise" machines is control all 3 Houses and let our actions speak louder than
words, unfortunately we have a 2 year wait for that. Truly believe we'll see a Big Blue Wave in 2024.

[peppertree]

10. Thanks. It is what it is.

If those feral pigs push us into a debt ceiling crisis - with the obvious intent of provoking a severe recession just in time for the campaign season - I can only hope and trust our fellow voters will see that for what it is.

[KS Toronado]

11. My gut feeling on the debt ceiling is that

behind closed doors the few sane republicOns are telling the MAGAt ones not to go down that road.
But they'll allow the freedumb caucus to rant and rave until the last minute.

[peppertree]

12. I hope you're right

Last time, in 2011, they at least had Boehner - who was, at least, capable of some dialogue, and of restraining the worst of the worst.

But of course, we don't now - and what's more, there are big-money Repug interests who are hoping to make a killing on this crisis.

You might recall that in 2011, Eric Cantor was revealed to be in secret talks with Paul Singer - whose bread and butter is, precisely, buying up defaulted bonds in the black market, and then suing governments for 10+ times what he paid for them.

And Singer now has the Argentina precedent - handed to him (possibly for a bribe) by a Nixon-appointed Wall Street Judge, the late Tom Greasa.

You know he's looking at this crisis very closely.

[KS Toronado]

13. You might be on to something there

this might be just a manufactured crisis for insiders like congress critters to make $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Maybe our elected Democrats should be throwing this out there.

[peppertree]

18. From your keyboards to God's ear.

Repugs have zero compunctions against throwing the wildest brain farts out there, and getting their mouth-breathers to believe it's the Gospel truth.

We should be bolder about alleging what, frankly, is most likely true anyway.

[progressoid]

16. They've been doing it for a lot longer than that.

[KS Toronado]

17. WOW, thanks for the education, getting forgetful in my old age

So republicans started doing this "Socialism is evil" crap to combat FDR's New Deal I take it. And the R's
poster attacking Socialism resemble Hitler with a lying nose.

[Just A Box Of Rain]

24. It was an idiotic lie then, and it is an idiotic lie now. And Truman called it out.

"All of you, I am sure, have heard many cries about Government interference with business and about "creeping socialism." I should like to remind the gentlemen who make these complaints that if events had been allowed to continue as they were going prior to March 4, 1933, most of them would have no businesses left for the Government or for anyone else to interfere with - and almost surely we would have socialism in this country, real socialism."

Harry S Truman

Truman knew that the New Deal helped save this country from a very bad fate.

[JHB]

48. See #46 below. They've been doing it since the word "socialism" was coined

And its not as if the Bolsheviks winning the Russian revolution didn't help those negative associations along.

Truman's point was not that those things are socialism, but that conservatives always call them that. To them, anything that helps the general public falls under that word. They'll call something socialist if they think it's ugly and its mother dresses it funny.

[Just A Box Of Rain]

37. Some people seem to be missing the fact that Truman was skewing the mendacity of

right-wingers as he defended the accomplishments of the liberal New Deal from false claims.

Don't advance right-wing narratives.

[Septua]

40. Truman said that in 1952, so it's been...

..the conservative's 'impending doom' harangue since the 1930s, probably 1935 right after FDR signed the Social Security Act.

[progressoid]

41. Yep. And it's even worse now.

Especially on social media.

[Traildogbob]

42. What do they call

The bank bailouts?

[JHB]

47. "Payday"

[JHB]

46. The thing that changed back then was the collapse of the obvious counterexample

Conservatives have demonized the word for over a hundred years, and they got a lot of help with that by the authoritarian nature of other countries that loudly advertised themselves as "socialist."

Conservatives have always, among themselves, called government programs that benefit the general public "socialist," but as long as the Soviets were around, in front of the general public they had to couch it in more tentative terms, like "creeping socialism." Otherwise they were up against a wall of perception: "You're being waaaay over the top. That's not like how things are in the USSR, so no, it's not socialism."

But when the Soviet Union dissolved the counterexample went away, and conservatives had forged an entire, separate media ecosphere that nowhere had "moderation" in its business model, so they broadcast their version from the housetops... and cable tv stations, and 50,000 Watt radio stations all over the country, with no pushback.

And thus what had once been a definition that marked the user as a ranting crank became normalized.

[KS Toronado]

51. Thanks for the education

That was very enlightening,

[republianmushroom]

5. like it

[Joinfortmill]

6. This guy rocks it!

[LakeArenal]

7. Most MAGATS can't read past the first sentence.

Just sayin’.

[Cha]

14. TY & Ret Col John Allen!

[AllaN01Bear]

15. very good . i n my playbook ," inflation " is another codeword for greed.

[The Wizard]

25. The government is the nation's

largest employer. By nature, government jobs are the core of socialism. We as a society have decided to spend tax dollars on goods and services that benefit all Americans. I like my socialized medicine from the VA. I like police and fire protection. I like garbage collection. I like well maintained roads.
I don't like unchecked pollution that benefits the wealthy elites at the expense of my health.
Repubics have been beating that same drum since Roosevelt's New Deal saved capitalism.

[Just A Box Of Rain]

28. Socialism isn't "government jobs,"

rather socialism is state ownership of the means of production and distribution and the elimination of private enterprise.

You are right that Roosevelt's New Deal saved capitalism. That was the intention.

The New Deal saved liberal democracy from the twin evils of totalitarianism that threatened the world in the 1930s (and beyond).

[Septua]

39. I'm pretty sure the current state of inflation was the result of the...

..pandemic and the supply/demand principle. The world ran out of product and demand exceeded supply. Then add to that the greed factor within some companies who simply raised prices because they could blame it on inflation.

If inflation was specific to the US, it could be blamed on Biden or the democrats or government spending or socialistic agenda or whatever but it's not specific to the US. And some significant segment US population refuses to Google the topic or accept the facts or listen to anyone other than right wing media.

So, what else is new?

[calimary]

43. The moral of the story, as always, is "be careful what cuts you ask for...

...they might target the help YOU need most."

[mahina]

44. I hope Moe Davis steps up to run again. He is a good man. Could not believe that the people of

This state voted for Madison Cawthorn instead of this accomplished, thoughtful, competent individual. I hope they learned their lesson.

[czarjak]

45. Facts will not deter them. Ask my neighbor..