Nope, you're right it's not socialist. In some ways it's probably more conservative than my country's conservative party. But when you look at its policies and the changes that have been happening in it over the course of time, it's certainly heading towards socialism. And that is very much a cause for concern (never mind the moral issues).
Just remember the Supreme Court decisions against the Roosevelt administration's New Deal and you can be quite sure, that socialism in its true sense is not constitutional in the US, since even Roosevelt who went much further than today's democrats was not intending to establish socialism.
See, but we both agree that these social barriers are an issue and must be dealt with as they arise. We just see different solutions. I don't believe socialism answers those problems as well as republic/democratic means can. And history supports that.
I think you are right about that, historically all countries who called them socialist or stll call them that way did not do very good on that. The prime reason for that is, that they had an even greater unequality in the distribution of political power due to the abolishment of plural democratic procedures. But of course, general health care in Germany before our reunion wasn't established in the socialist part of the country only but also in the democratic part. Having public healthcare does not lead to the abolishment of democracy and therefore socialist dictatorship, but can also be established by democrativ procedures. And that does not only apply to the case of health care of course.
@Simon Templar
John Locke came to similar ideas but he came at them from a different point of view. The point of this is that in the american ideal freedom is defined by individual rights against government interferance and the ability of the individual to live their life free from interferance.
I actually disagree with the - widely held - idea that American Liberty is basically founded on Lockean, i.e. the British liberal principles. Despite large similarities to Locke's political philosophy in his Second Treatise on Government there is an interesting sentence to be found in your Declaration of Independece which could never have been written by Locke. It says: "But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them [i.e. the governed] under absolute Despotism, it is their Right,
it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security." A duty to revolution against Tyranny is only a meaningful idea, if one has an objective idea of civic virtue, but that is precisely the core of the ancient republicanism. You will nowhere find such a phrase in Locke and with good reason, because Locke is a liberal and not a classical republican. Locke only speaks of the right to resistance as he compares the invasion of Government into private life with that of a robber - and killing the robber in self-defense is justified because he invades the natural right of property. Obviously the founding fathers who addded this little subordinate clause in their text to Locke's ideas were, at least in some points, the opposite of adherents to Lockean principles.
One could even go further. The right's enumerated do not include property. But property plays a very important role in Locke's theory of natural rights. Why is it left out and replaced by the pursuit of happiness? There is another point. According to the the declaration of independence, government shall be founded on such principles as "seem most likely to effect their [i.e. the governed] Savety and Happiness." That again sharply constrasts with Locke, who says in his Second Treatise on Government §124: "the great and chief end [...] of men's uniting into commonwealths [...] is the preservation of their property". That means, in liberal political theory with Locke as its prime representative, happiness is not integral to the principles of government. But it was to the founding fathers of the US. This of course is, because their documents do not really belong to the liberal tradition, but deviate from it in important points.
In the US we were founded upon the principle that the government's only real job is to protect our individual liberties. In europe the government role is much more provider and parent.
Then why does the US constitution speak of the promotion of the general welfare as one of the purposes of the political union? They could have left that out - as it was for example left out in the case of the constituion of the Confederate States of America.
@Jim47
I don't know where you are getting your information, but our democratic party is doing just that, and if Obama gets elected he will cripple our economy with corpoarte taxes.
A tax is not expropriation. So demanding higher corporate taxes may hurt the economy, but it doesnt make anyone a socialist.
We have the best healthcare system in the world. Our only problem is its gotten too expensive because of un-needed government control and regulations, and rediculous law suits
As far as I know, the American private based healthcare is much less efficient than different public healthcare systems, because of the many lawsuits between insurer and the insured. And this is quite logical when one considers the fact that in a privately owned health care system, the insurer has absolutly no interest in ever paying anything to the insured because this is lowering his profits.
If we could make these people work then there would be plenty of chaity for those who really need it, but since government has taken over charity 25% of the country is on charity and the country is going broke trying to support all the free loaders
If I have to trust on the charity of others, what security do I have that they will provide that charity? The problem of charity is the deep dependence of those who receive it - while those who provide charity can take a role of "patrons". It is stange that you, who probably view government provision as patronizing, do instead rely on private charity. What could be even more patronizing than private charity? It even takes away the rule of the law because there is nothing you can appeal to if you are dependent on charity. Charity as a form mercy is a state of absolute dependence while having laws for social security is not.
and now to some of the theological points:
This blatantly contradicts Jesus and Paul on numerous points.
Original sin and total depravity are not merely Augustinian or Reformed Doctrines... they are blatantly Biblical doctrines that you would have if you defined your doctrine with the Bible as the basis and framework rather than some external philosophy.
Well, the interpretation of original sin as cause of human nature's total depravity is not a universal feature of Christianity. It is not accepted by Orthodox christians as far as I know. There simply is no such thing as "doctrine" but in every revealed religion the revelation upon which is based in also subject to change through interpretation, just because its richness is infinite, but our minds are not.
But I would be pleased to discuss this is some more detail. It blatantly contradicts Jesus and Paul on numerous points? If so, which are these points?
I kinda skipped over that stuff since we were talking more about politics. But yes, you are quite right. Early Christianity was not blind to this simple but powerful fact. There were Judaisers who tried to teach otherwise, but that is not part of the Christian faith, and genuine believers understood that, just as we do now.
Politics and theology are interdependent to some degree. Take notions like mercy, sovereignty, justice which all occur in both contexts. Or just take a look into books of classical political philosophy like Hobbes' Leviathan or Locke's First Treatise to find them full with biblical quotations.
I feel for those people as there is no chance for them to get another job in this area for more then a hundred miles.
