harry truman on "socialism"

i hear so much about "socialism" on this board, a little reminder of the right's misuse of the word as a "boogie man" may be in order.

In President Harry's Truman's remarks in Syracuse, New York on October 10, 1952, he said this:
Socialism is a scare word they have hurled at every advance the people have made in the last 20 years.

Socialism is what they called public power. Socialism is what they called social security.

Socialism is what they called farm price supports.

Socialism is what they called bank deposit insurance.

Socialism is what they called the growth of free and independent labor organizations.

Socialism is their name for almost anything that helps all the people.

When the Republican candidate inscribes the slogan "Down With Socialism" on the banner of his "great crusade," that is really not what he means at all.

What he really means is "Down with Progress--down with Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal," and "down with Harry Truman's fair Deal." That's all he means.

 

Harry Truman dropped atomic weapons on innocent civilians.. Talk about socialism...

 

lololololololol and if i don't defend that i'm some kind of unamerican hater of democracy?

truman was in the middle of a deadly world war. i don't want to monday morning quarterback whatever it took to end the carnage.

 

Hardly. Truman couldn't have cared less about the people in Hiroshima or Nagasaki. He "socialized" the pain, typical of democrats. Innocent people had to die so he could win. Most folks would think absent knowing he was a US president that he was a monster. You'd defend the use of atomic weapons and the massive carnage of that to then suggest it "ended the carnage"... Laughable.

You want to use this guy as a thought leader? Really? He was a monster.

 

It's called war.

 

Say the dog whistle 'socialist' and the R base get inverted instantly .

 

Hmm.. There was a war. I don't recall anyone else vaporizing the citizens of others. Does it bother you that Truman targeted civilians? Isn't that a war crime?

 

Socialism and the labor unions can be a good thing for many people as well as society in general. The problem is when both are carried too far plus the greedy people who are the leaders. We are now in the problem stages.

 

20,000 americans lost their lives taking okinawa. care to guess how many would die in a similar operation on kyushu? on honshu?

at any rate, this discussion (and i might advocate a blockade of the main islands rather than invasion, but stalin (an honest to god socialist who certainly did not care how many russians or ukrainians died taking hokido) was entering the war and truman was interested in keeping the iron curtain off the islands) is irrelevant to the red scare wolf cries of "socialism"

 

ir seems to me that we are in the problem stage of deregulated capitalism, and that a little more anti trust and labor organization might be good for society in general. .

 

Hah! So now you define socialism as "dropping atomic bombs"?

Couldn't ask for a better example of binary thinking!

 

Margaret Thatcher described socialism best when she said, "Socialism works great until you run out of other people's money."

All systems are designed by the few for their own enrichment. This includes all "isms" past, present, and future. And although capitalism is by far the best system of economics man has been able to fashion [compared to slavery and feudalism], it has its issues, as well.

The bottom-line is that it is human corruption that takes whatever system is in place and renders it f-u-b-a-r. Although representative democracy [with functional 'checks and balances' in place] is the best you can hope for [politically], when corruption reaches critical mass, the people who are demonic in their very nature will destroy everything in sight. You are once again watching this play out as we speak.

Socialism is putting the bar really low so the elite can have their way with a population completely dependent, folks with no self-respect, no ability for critical thought, and most importantly, beings with no hope. It is breaking the spirit of man...telling him there is no reason [ever] to grow-up. You will remain a child forever.

 

Sounds an awful lot like a justification, not a denial of the war crime he committed. The horror of war is just that. it should keep leaders in check before they commit to that course. Millions of folks died because the ideology of socialism required it of them. And worse, it was capped by one of the worst purposeful attacks of civilians in history.

 

I would have thought Acknowledged would have been the key word and reaction..

 

Or a decided inability on your part to consume the provided information. Typical. Did you support a president attacking civilians?

 

Ahhhh, but the DNC/U.S. has found a better system, money printing and economic suicide! The latter will be very painful for some

 

It's not a problem until the sleepers awake and see the oncoming car in their LANE!

 

Industrial wars included civilians or did you not see that?

 

IMHO

Hiroshima was justified
Nagasaki was not

 

Yeah, it's just the DNC doing it. Lol

 

What nation is or was socialist?

 

Depends on the goal.

 

Monday morning quarterbacks abound. After the dust settles it's easy to be the expert because your opinions are never tested.

 

Technically speaking, a nation is socialist, by definition.

 

And a Republican president would not have done it under the same circumstances!

Yeah Right!

Some criticisms make the person doing the criticising look stupid.