Rand Paul and Farmers Might Think the U.S. is a Capitalist Country, But Socialism Abounds

Making the rounds of Facebook lately is the following quote attributed to Rand Paul, Republican senator from Kentucky. Paul is a libertarian conservative. Here’s the quote: “Our Founders never intended for Americans to trust their government. Our entire Constitution was predicated on the notion that government was a necessary evil to be restrained and minimized as much as possible.”

Interesting. On the other hand, do you think the Founders considered a future with automatic rifles and machine guns? Or a future with medications that could prevent the dissemination of life-threatening contagious diseases? Or the instant communication of radio, television, cable and the Internet with their potential to undermine freedom? Or the ability to mass produce food and the need to safeguard its production and consumption? Or trains, planes and automobiles and the necessity to regulate their use? Or the depletion and pollution of clean water and air? 

Perhaps the Founders didn’t always get things right. They did, after all, sanction slavery. Rand Paul and his originalist brethren need to realize the Constitution and its amendments are templates for a governing philosophy that requires modifications based on the evolution of mankind’s technical and scientific abilities to do good and evil. 

The Constitution and amendments need to be interpreted in light of changes in reality. As the Bible is. Western society has gone beyond the literal “eye for an eye” doctrine of penalties for actions intended or not. 

So, too, must our unassailable reliance on a late 18th century document. 

A recent New Yorker article on Wisconsin farmers and their loyalty to Donald Trump contained the following from a dairy farmer: “I’m not in favor of any kind of socialism,” he said. “We’re a capitalist farm.”

As much as that farmer professed a disdain for socialism I wonder if he realizes just how much “socialism” he and his fellow sodbusters receive. Based on U.S. Dept. of Agriculture data, the Environmental Working Group computes that from 1995 through April 2019, farmers received $390.9 billion of federal subsidies. Wisconsin farmers pocketed $9.113 billion, ranking the state 16th among those accepting federal support. 

As a nation we don’t have a problem with creeping socialism in this country. Rather, we have a problem with people failing to understand how socialism—how the “means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole”—is embedded in our everyday lives. 

Social Security. Medicare. Medicaid. Food stamps. Public schools. Free and subsidized school food programs. Energy subsidies. Subsidies that pay farmers to limit what crops to plant and how much their acreage should yield. Yada, yada, yada.

We are awash in government giveaways. Some may quibble about individual handout programs. Overall, we are better for them. 

Rand Paul might think government is “a necessary evil,” but he would be wrong. His state of Kentucky, according to WalletHub, is the third most dependent on money from Washington (https://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-least-dependent-on-the-federal-government/2700/). A year ago, WalletHub estimated that for every dollar Kentucky sends to Washington, it receives $2.61. Just imagine how poorly Kentucky would fare if it didn’t receive its share of our “socialist” government.

Does Trump Fit The Profile of a Fascist?

Like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart’s 1964 amorphous description of obscenity (“I know it when I see it”), fascism is a concept much bandied about lately but little understood. It is often invoked to disparage political extremes on the right or left, leaving its true meaning murky. Most people associate fascism with Hitler and Mussolini and they want nothing to do with it. 

Of course, the reality is more imprecise in our application of the epithet “fascist.” Is Donald Trump a fascist or just an ill-spoken nationalist? 

Here, thanks to an article in Haaretz, a liberal Israeli news organization, by Dan Tamir, author of “Hebrew Fascism in Palestine, 1922-1942,” is a critical analysis of the features of fascism (https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-when-jews-praised-mussolini-and-supported-nazis-meet-israel-s-first-fascists-1.7538589). You can decide if some or all strains of the fascist model have invaded our government: 

“... what is fascism? What sets it apart from other right-wing political streams? In 2004, Robert Paxton, in his book “The Anatomy of Fascism” (disclosure: this writer [Tamir] translated that book into Hebrew), listed seven features that collectively might delineate the nature of fascism as an ideology and as a political practice. They are: 

“certainty in the supremacy of the group—national, ethnic—over every right of the individual, and the individual’s subordination to the group; 

“belief that the group in question is a victim of other groups, as a consequence of which there is justification for every action taken against its enemies (domestic or external, real or imagined); 

“fear of harm befalling the group from liberal tendencies or ‘foreign’ influences from outside; 

“the need for closer integration of a ‘purer’ national community, whether by agreement or through violence;

“insistence on the group’s right to rule others without any limitations—a right accruing to the group by dint of its singularity or skills; 

“a sense of the existence of a severe crisis, not amenable to any traditional solution; 

“belief in the need for the authority of a lone and solitary leader, and obedience to that leader based on the conviction that he possesses supernatural insights or capabilities.”

Tamir added an eighth characteristic: “Another trait that some would add is fierce opposition to socialism in all its forms—a characteristic that was especially apparent in the practice of fascist movements active in the second half of the 20th century, even if not in their declared ideology.”

I’m not quite ready to declare Trump a fascist but it is troubling to see features of fascism that may be checked off when reviewing his actions. How many would you check off?

Reflections on the News About Dogs, Tigers, Blackface, Socialism, Messy Desks, the Autobahn

Oh so much news to digest. Racism in Virginia. Anti-semitism from a Democrat from Minnesota. Wall financing or not. Government shutdown or not. Venezuela. North Korea. Iran. Isis. China. 

Where to begin? How about a few of the stories that touched my life. 

A Dog’s Life: One of my regrets in life is never having a pet dog during my adulthood. Gilda and I had three cats at one time, but as anyone who is a dog lover will tell you, a cat is no substitute for a dog. 

Not just any dog. For me a dog cannot be small enough to pick up with one hand. It cannot have a pug snout. It cannot have a yappy bark. 

So why didn’t we have a dog? I could say it was because Gilda didn’t want one, or that Dan’s asthma would not tolerate a dog. Truth is, I’m picky and lazy. Which translates into, I don’t mind walking a dog (when it isn’t too early or too late and definitely when it is not raining, snowing or brrrrr-cold outside). And, most tellingly, I am not the type of dog lover who is OK cleaning up after them. 

That said, the day after the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show picked a wire fox terrier as its Best in Show, here are vintage photos of dogs in New York accompanied by a roundtable discussion of why we obsess about dogs in general, followed by an adorable video of golden retrievers making themselves indispensable to human pleasure:

https://nyti.ms/2E1Pxj2

https://www.facebook.com/788348771557632/posts/809584992767343?sfns=mo

From my own dog experience, here’s a link to a post from eight years ago: https://nosocksneededanymore.blogspot.com/2011/01/snow-dog-memories.html

Sticking with an animal theme, were you aware of a Hangover-like incident in Houston involving a tiger? https://www.click2houston.com/news/tiger-found-at-se-houston-home-hpd-says

Clairvoyant: In the wake of the Virginia blackface scandal swirling around the governor and state attorney general, three days ago in my last block I suggested yearbooks would be a new source of background checks of prospective hires. Well, it didn’t take long for yearbook checking to hit the mainstream news media. 

Consider this report from Wednesday’s CBS News (caution: some of the images are disturbing): https://www.cbsnews.com/news/colleges-launch-yearbook-audits-amid-virginia-governor-ralph-northam-blackface-scandal/ 

Socialism Bad, Right? Not necessarily. At least that’s one of the takeaways from Donald Trump’s support of Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Gerardo Guaidó Márquez. Guaidó is seeking to displace Nicolas Maduro as the country’s president. 

Maduro has a well-deserved reputation as a socialist dictator who currently is denying humanitarian aid to his countrymen because it is from the United States. But as Ozy points out, the contest between Guaidó and Maduro is not capitalism vs. socialism. Read on: https://www.ozy.com/opinion/venezuelas-standoff-is-socialist-vs-socialist/92589

For another viewpoint on the duplicity in Trump’s antipathy toward socialism, consider former Labor Secretary Robert Reich’s analysis: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/11/trump-offers-socialism-for-the-rich-capitalism-for-everyone-else?CMP=share_btn_link

Don’t Mess With Me: Enter Gilda’s and my shared home office and you would immediately be able to identify which is her desk and which is mine. My desk is so cluttered that I do not compose these blogs there—too messy. 

During my decades as an editor and publisher my desk was, shall we say, a repository of facts and figures, large and small. To anyone who would ask I would aver that I knew exactly where any specific paper could be found. 

The company president was not convinced. During one of my business trips he ordered one of our assistants to clean my desk. Naturally, when I returned to the office I was aghast. Livid. I threatened to fire the assistant if she ever touched my desk again. A toothless threat—I promoted her to copy editor shortly thereafter. 

I don’t have that option with Gilda so every so often, when the papers start slipping off my desk onto the floor I clean up, mostly by stacking them neatly but sometimes throwing some out. But I am comforted by a recent article in Ozy supporting the argument that a messy desk if a sign of a creative mind: https://www.ozy.com/immodest-proposal/slobs-rejoice-why-you-shouldnt-clean-your-messy-desk/92331

Speeding Along: Last week The New York Times reported  Germans were incensed that some politicians were advocating a speed limit on their cherished autobahn (https://nyti.ms/2DR79Os). 

If you’ve never driven on the autobahn let me assure you it is a thrill-a-second. Here’s how I described my one and only time as a frightened passenger: 

“During my first trip to Germany, in 1996, to attend the EuroShop conference in Dusseldorf, I was invited by the team from Boston Retail to tour some stores. They had rented a car, a large Mercedes sedan, with a driver. I sat in the middle of the rear seat with an unobstructed view of the speedometer. German cars measure speed in kilometers per hour. It’s a simple computation to convert the number into miles per hour. Simply multiply it by 60%. 

“When the speedometer needled its way toward 160, I could barely contain my anxiety as I also had an unobstructed view of the traffic in front of us, which at that moment was no more than two car lengths ahead. It wasn’t that our driver was a tailgating daredevil. Every driver on the autobahn was spaced the same one to two car lengths behind the car he was trailing. To travel less than 96 miles per hour would endanger all. 

“Of course, that means when a car slows down, because of snow, fog or some other reason, there is a chain reaction should any one vehicle not brake to the precise slower speed. Large pile-ups are common in Germany.”

Much to my relief we did not encounter any trouble. But I do not look forward to my next trip on the autobahn.

To the Barricades: Socialist Dems Under Attack

To much applause from his party apparatchiks during the State of the Union speech Tuesday night Donald Trump voiced the oft-repeated trope America will never become a socialist country. 

“We are alarmed by the new calls to adopt socialism in our country. America was founded on liberty and independence and not government coercion, domination and control. We renew our resolve that America will  never be a socialist country,” said the demagogue-in-chief.

To which I would respond, go back to school, Donald. What about Social Security? Unemployment insurance? Disability insurance? Medicare? Medicaid? Farm subsidies, energy subsidies, food stamps? National parks? Public transportation systems? The Tennessee Valley Authority? The list could go on and on. 

We live in a republic imbued with democratic and socialist policies and programs. Yes, the country may have been founded on the pursuit of liberty (for all but the enslaved) and independence (except for slaves), but it was not done without coercion (think slavery), domination (government sanctioned slavery) and control (slavery once more). What’s more, today’s Republicans want to remove liberty and independence from women’s reproductive options through coercion, domination and control. 

Casting Democrats as socialists may be the newest fear bogeyman by a bully who has already labeled Hispanic and Muslim immigrants the source of most evil in our country (https://nyti.ms/2DWLuEp). He could succeed in his dark portrayal if Democrats do not fight back immediately and vigorously.

With rare exception senior Americans have come to rely on their Social Security checks arriving each month. Some even rely on the U.S. Postal Service to deliver them. Democrats need to educate the electorate that Democrats initiated Social Security and that Republicans have for years tried to dismantle it.

Democrats need to begin an ongoing advertising campaign pointing out all the support programs they started amid the Republican record of dissent and budgetary cutbacks.

Turn the discussion away from socialism to social welfare and healthcare programs.

Pose: Were you struck as I was by the posture Trump took during his speech? (Take a look at the picture accompanying this article: https://nyti.ms/2DYYREg). Often pursing his lips, Trump thrust his chin up and out, like…like Il Duce, Benito Mussolini. All that was missing was an upward thrust of his right arm at the beginning. (Look for yourself at video from a 1934 speech at Taranto, Italy: https://youtu.be/OOv-Ncs7vQk)

And, as long as I’m comparing Trump to an Italian dictator, does anyone else conjure up images of a Mafia don when they see Trump walking around in an open overcoat (no doubt cashmere) while his capos are comfortable in just suit jackets? 

Chutzpah à la Trump: The definition of chutzpah used to be when a man accused of killing his mother and father seeks mercy from the court because he is an orphan. That explanation, advanced by Leo Rosten in his book “The Joy of Yiddish,” can be supplanted by the racist-and misogynist-in-chief calling out Virginia Democrats for their acts of racism and alleged sexual assault. 

No doubt the image of Democrats in Virginia has been tarnished. To call out their faults, however, Republicans would have to explain how they overlook Trump’s repeated falls from grace.