United Socialist States of America - USSA

[Archaeopteryx]

This isn't humor. This is for real, in response to a growing number in this subforum who advocate various degrees of socialism. I'm merely taking this to the ultimate conclusion to ask the fundamental question, is this where Ameicans want this country to go?

Not everyone one step to the left of you is a Socialist.

 

[Illuminaughty]

Democratic Socialism:

Democratic socialism is a political philosophy and social movement that rejects centralized, elitist or authoritarian means of transitioning from capitalism to socialism. Democratic socialism advocates for the immediate creation of decentralised economic democracy from the grassroots level, undertaken by and for the working class itself.

Democratic socialism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Schroeder]

Democratic Socialism:

Democratic socialism is a political philosophy and social movement that rejects centralized, elitist or authoritarian means of transitioning from capitalism to socialism. Democratic socialism advocates for the immediate creation of decentralised economic democracy from the grassroots level, undertaken by and for the working class itself.

Democratic socialism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

so its just a different "means" to the same dern thing. got it.

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

Democratic Socialism:

Democratic socialism is a political philosophy and social movement that rejects centralized, elitist or authoritarian means of transitioning from capitalism to socialism. Democratic socialism advocates for the immediate creation of decentralised economic democracy from the grassroots level, undertaken by and for the working class itself.

Democratic socialism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

So we take over the government to replace a republic with a democracy?

 

[1234321]

.

 

[Schroeder]

How is it a step towards socialised medicine?

because obama said so.He said he is for socialized medicine BUT it would be through many small steps to get to it. I do believe he is honest about some things, just that the media failed to show those truths.

 

[SonOfTheWest]

My advice for the OP. Make an account at rpg.net so you can view the Tangency section. Go to that section and read the thread "No, Obama is NOT Socialist." Don't be fooled by the thread title as it sidetracks into other territory almost immediately. In particular people from various areas like my own UK, Germany,etc touch on socialism and the realities in Europe,etc.

Frankly, this sort of casual American news influenced ideas of what socialism is and does is purely American in origin. This is not to say I would note that there are not clashing ideologies between various forms of socialism and other ideologies in Europe. You'd have to be remarkably ignorant of history to think so. But it does highlight how so much of U.S. perception(some mind you) is almost hilariously influenced by their colouring of history, particularly WW2 and beyond by the U.S.

 

[Redac]

So we take over the government to replace a republic with a democracy?

The way I've always understood it, it's a reformist ideology. You don't take over or overthrow anything, necessarily; you use the already-existing state apparatus in order to gradually bring about a socialist state that would probably look somewhat different than the sort you get from a Marxist-Leninist revolution.

Edit to add: Also note that there's a significant degree of bottom-up activism and involvement from the proletariat as a whole; it's not some sort of dictatorship of the party bureaucracy.

 

[Rusticus]

Let's consider a move to socialism in the USA. We'll call this thought experiment the USSA - the United Socialist States of America.

We'll need to make a few changes, however.

1. All income will be taxed at 95%. You won't need much, because government will be providing all your basic needs.

2. You relinquish all deeds and ownership of property and housing. You will receive your government provided allocation.

3. You will relinquish all ownership of automobiles, boats, and forms of personal transportation. The government will provide for your transportation to and from work, and from federal social gatherings and government owned entertainment facilities.

4. All corporations will cease to exist. The government now owns all forms of production, including manufacturing, services, banking, transportation, etc.

5. Wages are frozen effective immediately. Your salary will be determined by your fit to the needs of government and government's review of your contribution to society. Military personnel will be selected and controlled by the government, based on government needs.

6. All health care will be federally provided. When you require health care, you be given a national phone number to call to locate the nearest government health provider, and you will be given a date of your appointment based on resource availability.

7. All television programming will be provided by the federal government. You need not worry about having too many channels any more. All channels will carry the same programming.

8. All passports, VISAs, birth certificates, and forms of citizenship will be acquired and controlled by the federal government. You need not worry about whether someone is a citizen. Government will decide.

9. Your food will be provided weekly to your home. No need for wasting time shopping anymore. You will receive 5 pounds of food equivalent per week.

10. Religion will be suspended and evaluated by government. You will be allowed to worship in government facilities in the future, should government decide this is needed.

11. Finally, there are no more political parties nor elections. Government will decide future political leaders as selected by government authorities.

This ends your public broadcast message. Good night, Americans. Tommorow is another bright, red day.

Now, is this the future Americans want?

The above list has nothing to do with socialism. If you are interested in the subject, maybe find out what socialism is.

(BTW, when you say in your signature that socialism worked wonders for the USSR you seem to be mixed up a bit, because the USSR was communist.)

 

[ThatRobGuy]

It's not the future this American wants, because if it happens I'll either be living in a cave with twenty other guys and re-loading ammunition by hand to use against the socialists, or else I'll be departing by whatever means necessary for someplace like Tierra del Fuego.

Save a spot for me in the cave, I'll bring plenty of ammo to share

 

[ThatRobGuy]

Can anyone please name one single thing Obama has socialized? Just one!

Socialism

/ˈsoʊʃəlɪzəm/ is an economic system characterised by social ownership of the means of production and co-operative management of the economy,[1] and a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to cooperative enterprises, common ownership, direct public ownership or autonomous state enterprises.

You just want one example? GM

That was too easy...

What do I win?

 

[mpok1519]

Obamacare is one step towards socialized health care. Many on here say we should go further to one national health care plan.

You're forgetting Medicare, which is one national health plan.

 

[David Brider]

Let's consider a move to socialism in the USA. We'll call this thought experiment the USSA - the United Socialist States of America.

We'll need to make a few changes, however.

1. All income will be taxed at 95%. You won't need much, because government will be providing all your basic needs.

2. You relinquish all deeds and ownership of property and housing. You will receive your government provided allocation.

3. You will relinquish all ownership of automobiles, boats, and forms of personal transportation. The government will provide for your transportation to and from work, and from federal social gatherings and government owned entertainment facilities.

4. All corporations will cease to exist. The government now owns all forms of production, including manufacturing, services, banking, transportation, etc.

5. Wages are frozen effective immediately. Your salary will be determined by your fit to the needs of government and government's review of your contribution to society. Military personnel will be selected and controlled by the government, based on government needs.

6. All health care will be federally provided. When you require health care, you be given a national phone number to call to locate the nearest government health provider, and you will be given a date of your appointment based on resource availability.

7. All television programming will be provided by the federal government. You need not worry about having too many channels any more. All channels will carry the same programming.

8. All passports, VISAs, birth certificates, and forms of citizenship will be acquired and controlled by the federal government. You need not worry about whether someone is a citizen. Government will decide.

9. Your food will be provided weekly to your home. No need for wasting time shopping anymore. You will receive 5 pounds of food equivalent per week.

10. Religion will be suspended and evaluated by government. You will be allowed to worship in government facilities in the future, should government decide this is needed.

11. Finally, there are no more political parties nor elections. Government will decide future political leaders as selected by government authorities.

This ends your public broadcast message. Good night, Americans. Tommorow is another bright, red day.

Now, is this the future Americans want?

So, yeah...basically, hardly any of that could be described as "socialism".

Your point was..?

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

So, yeah...basically, hardly any of that could be described as "socialism".

Your point was..?

Read the thread.

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

No, to make people think.

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

To generate discussion about a future dystopian socialist America... except you used a creative narrative that didn't have anything to do with socialism as we all pointed out, so now we are confused and still don't think this is likely to happen.

Obamanism -> Socialism -> Communism

 

[TeddyReceptus]

Oh Goody! A thought experiment!

Let's consider a move to socialism in the USA. We'll call this thought experiment the USSA - the United Socialist States of America.

We'll need to make a few changes, however.

So far I'm following along!

1. All income will be taxed at 95%. You won't need much, because government will be providing all your basic needs.

Hmmm, well this is a pretty big jump. You are now saying all income is taxed at 95%? Is there any precedent in any social democracies that this is the case? (I mean there's no reason to jump completely over the nearly infinite gradations between our current tax system and this ridiculous extreme)

2. You relinquish all deeds and ownership of property and housing. You will receive your government provided allocation.

Well, again, you seem to have no concept that social democracies exist (like, oh, let's say NEARLY THE ENTIRETY OF WESTERN EUROPE and people can still own property there...)

4. All corporations will cease to exist. The government now owns all forms of production, including manufacturing, services, banking, transportation, etc.

Don't mean to derail your fun-train here, but looks to me like you just jumped clean on up to full on COMMUNISM.

I understand the world is largely black and white to you (despite your use of red font) so it may surprise you that there are many, many shades of grey in between.

5. Wages are frozen effective immediately.

Do you mind if I ask you what you do for a living? Because I'm a PhD researcher working for one of the large corporations (in fact I bet one of our products is in your home right this minute) and I got about 2% worth of raise between 2006 and 2010 and one year when everyone had to take a 5% pay cut. So if you get all these raises you are extremely lucky. Congrats.

Your salary will be determined by your fit to the needs of government and government's review of your contribution to society.

Well when you work for industry that is usually the case only instead of "government" you have "corporation" in that sentence up there and even then you don't have a guarantee of raises. (That's kind of why the middle class median income has stagnated over the last 30 years.

But do carry on...

Military personnel will be selected and controlled by the government, based on government needs.

So are you saying the government doesn't currently select and control the military????

(What country are you currently living in? Because so far you don't seem to be operating from the same base as the rest of us in the U.S. Just sayin'...)

6. All health care will be federally provided. When you require health care, you be given a national phone number to call to locate the nearest government health provider, and you will be given a date of your appointment based on resource availability.

I am going to go out on a limb here and suggest you don't have health insurance, because that is pretty much how health insurance plans work. Only instead of calling the government to locate the nearest provider, you have to call the insurance company to find the nearest doctor on your plan.

So far we know a couple things about you:

1. You don't seem to have a job in the modern US private sector (industry)
2. You don't seem to know American government works in re the military
3. You don't seem to know how health insurance works

OK, do go on!

7. All television programming will be provided by the federal government. You need not worry about having too many channels any more. All channels will carry the same programming.

Interesting. Perhaps you are extremely young. I'm not that old and I remember when there were only 3+PBS. But I will grant that none of them were run by the government.

8. All passports, VISAs, birth certificates, and forms of citizenship will be acquired and controlled by the federal government.

Honestly do you think most Americans will miss "passports"? Only about 30% of Americans currently have passports. I'd recommend people like you get one! Try visiting other countries. Maybe Europeans can explain how the American governmental system works to you!

You need not worry about whether someone is a citizen. Government will decide.

They kinda already do. It's in the Constitution.

11. Finally, there are no more political parties nor elections. Government will decide future political leaders as selected by government authorities.

Well, again, remember there are many shades between the current USA and this Communist dicatorship you have hypothesized. I'd recommend travelling a bit, maybe seeing other parts of the world. You might be surprised. But from the many people I've met in Europe and on my travels around I'm guessing they wouldn't be surprised by you!

This ends your public broadcast message. Good night, Americans. Tommorow is another bright, red day.

Now, is this the future Americans want?

No, no it's not. But then if you had even a nodding acquaintance with the rest of the world you might realize virtually no one outside of GOP Nightmare peddlers thinks this is a reality.

 

[David Brider]

No, to make people think.

Well, so far you've made me think that you don't know what socialism is.

 

[Trogool]

Well, so far you've made me think that you don't know what socialism is.

^^this.

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

Well, so far you've made me think that you don't know what socialism is.

Truthfully, you aren't my target audience, but you are welcome to participate.