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TRUMP LIES ABOUT EVERYTHING!
Refute the Republican Rhetoric
By Bill Peifer
On Saturday afternoon, Trump posted on his Untruth Social account:
I would often say in Speeches, and otherwise, America will never be a Socialist Country, and I was 100% correct, the Dumocrats skipped Socialism, and went all the way down to Communism. AMERICA WILL NEVER BE A COMMUNIST COUNTRY! President DONALD J. TRUMP
Ignoring the intentional misspelling of “Democrats”, Trump’s lie here is that Democrats are advocating a change of our economic system to communism. I don’t know if Trump understands the meanings of capitalism, socialism and communism himself, but he’s obviously playing to his audience of cult members who, based on what they can be seen posting on social media, do not. So, here’s a brief summary of what each of those systems, in their purest form, looks like.
Under capitalism, in its purest form, the wealthy own everything. A classic example of almost pure capitalism can be seen in our own country in the late 1800s when a small number of industrialists and financiers owned a relatively small number of companies that owned a huge percentage of our country’s production, and our workers usually didn’t even own their own homes. Take the mines, for instance. The mine owners lived in fancy houses and never even dirtied their hands in the mines that they owned. The workers lived in squalor in shacks that they rented from the company and had no choice except to buy their food and other necessities, at exorbitant prices, from a “company store”, which would extend them credit, but their entire paychecks went back to the company for their rent and their bill at the company store. There was never any hope of improving their lives, or their children’s.
Under communism, the government owns everything. There is no such thing as personal property. Once again, workers don’t own their own homes. The government owns it all and doles it out “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need." So, basically, it’s like capitalism but with the government taking the place of the ultra-wealthy who own everything. Under socialism, private ownership of personal property, real estate and even small businesses are allowed, but just about anything major is owned by the government.
Our current economic system is sort of a hybrid system with both facets of capitalism and socialism coming into play. Our roads are socialistic, as are police and fire departments and some of our public utilities. Our public schools, libraries and parks are all owned by the government, with everyone benefiting from them. And our military, as well, is an example of socialism. Yet, the vast majority of our economy is driven by capitalism, both small businesses and large ones being owned by individuals or corporations. It’s a system that works.
So, what is this Democratic Socialism that’s employed by much of Europe? It’s supported by Bernie Sanders, AOC, Zohran Mamdani and an increasingly large number of Democrats but hated so vehemently by Trump! It’s basically a desire to move a little bit more of our economy to the socialistic side. For instance, socializing the entire healthcare industry with not just “single payer”, but moving to “single provider”, with the government being the provider. Maybe also more public utilities owned by the government instead of simply regulating them.
Yes, Trump lies. Nobody of note in the Democratic Party is advocating a switch to communism or even full-blown socialism. They’re just hoping to get a little bit more of the greed out of our current system while replacing it with a better deal for the vast majority of Americans.
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