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Conclusion: 91% of ConservativeHQ Readers are Idiots.

Jill

Richard Viguerie is the supposed “founding father” of conservative strategy in the United States and the chairman of the website ConservativeHQ. He also runs an annoying email list to which I have somehow become subscribed. I usually delete his emails without opening them, but today, the headline caught my eye:

91% of Conservatives Believe Obama is a Socialist, Marxist, Communist or Fascist.

Apparently, 91% of conservatives don’t understand that words mean things. And they wonder why they’re increasingly irrelevant.

19 thoughts on Conclusion: 91% of ConservativeHQ Readers are Idiots.

  1. Wow. They forgot Maoist and Stalinist, not to mention Trotskyite, Bolshevik, and Menshevik. How could they? I should call this ConservativeHQ place up and ask them if they really want me believe that Obama is not, in fact, a Stalinist. I mean really. I think they must be in league with him. Everyone knows he’s a Stalinist. Look at how much like Hitler he is!

    /snark

  3. They also left out Jacobin, Chartist, Fourierist, and Fabienist. Personally, I think it’s blindingly obvious that Obama is a Jacobin….that’s what they’re really trying to cover up.

    Just you wait…any day now we’

  4. They also left out Jacobin, Chartist, Fourierist, and Fabienist. Personally, I think it’s blindingly obvious that Obama is a Jacobin….that’s what they’re really trying to cover up. I mean, anyone who likes Dijon mustard must also support the metric system, which is a dead giveaway.

    Just you wait…any day now we’ll be adopting a new calendar and worshipping at the alter of Reason.

  6. Shrug. He is a socialist, isn’t he? Just like almost all of our legislature, no?

  8. I can’t speak to Marxism or Communism, and Fascism has become such a meaningless and loaded term in modern politics that it can’t really be discussed (although partial government ownership and “partnership” with banks and industry is a hallmark of Fascist economic policy). But is calling Obama a socialist really that controversial?

    This is not meant to be inflammatory. If someone believes that primary functions of government are to ensure a “fair” distribution of wealth, to ensure that government provides all the basic necessities of life (i.e. education, healthcare, employment), to provide an extensive social safety net, and to intervene to suborn the interests of business to the interests of the collective community, that person can be reasonably labeled a socialist. If someone believes that the U.S. system should more closely resemble the systems of Europe and Canada (both of which have many parties that openly self-identify as socialist), that person can be reasonably labeled a socialist. It seems clear that President Obama believes all of these things.

    The fact that conservatives use the term as a pejorative doesn’t make the term inaccurate. I can be accurately labeled a libertarian, a term I’m well aware is used negatively by folks on the left. I don’t deny the obvious truth about my beliefs when challenged. If these are the things you believe, why quibble over the label? Why engage in the misdirection? Why not just own it honestly?

  10. “is calling Obama a socialist really that controversial?”

    Well, I’d say that socialism means wanting to do away with capitalism (even at some indefinite oft-delayed point in the future) and replace it with a society collectively run by workers. But then I would say that.

    It’s a fair point that the term ‘socialist’ has been cheapened to mean about the same as social-democrat or (in US-talk) ‘liberal’, by both self-described such ‘socialists’ and frothing right-wing anti-socialists. But while that usage may be common, I think it can be called ‘mistaken’ in some sense simply because it drains away so much meaning from so many words.

    If we’re to have, as the post says, ‘words meaning things’ then ‘socialism’ should be a system contrastable with ‘capitalism’, and ‘socialists’ should be people wanting to do away with classes, the market, and private ownership of capital.

  11. If someone believes that primary functions of government are to ensure a “fair” distribution of wealth, to ensure that government provides all the basic necessities of life (i.e. education, healthcare, employment), to provide an extensive social safety net, and to intervene to suborn the interests of business to the interests of the collective community, that person can be reasonably labeled a socialist.

    Actually, it was just such language that was final proof for the socialists in Britain that our Labour Party had finally abandoned socialism for good.

    The language that was replaced was the famous “Clause IV” which promised to “secure for the workers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry and the most equitable distribution thereof that may be possible upon the basis of the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange” – common ownership meaning in this context either nationalisation, workers’ collectives or possibly ownership by local authorities.

  12. Yeah, I’m with #9 and 10 that socialism is a lot more than just being a progressive. I think what you described as socialism was just leftist. My understanding is that socialism still pretty much means a centrally planned economy. This is different from Marxism and the like because it might be less intimately connected to the proletarian revolution.

    In the face of economic disaster, Obama has definitely increased central planning of the economy, but we’d gone so many miles into neoliberal capitalism and privatization of everything that we’re still leagues away from socialism.

  13. Obama does not believe in the “fair” distribution of wealth. He is just for reversing the unfair redistribution of wealth that has occurred during the last eight years. Tax cuts for the rich, loopholes to get out of the other taxes, offshore accounts (Halliburton is an offshore company? Really?), no bid contracts, etc. etc. Tax cuts for the middle class and a safety net for the severely impoverished is not the same thing as wealth redistribution. It is a social contract.

    Besides, fair distribution (redistribution?) of wealth is not the definition of socialism, even if that is what he was supporting. Socialism is collective ownership of means of production. Why is Chavez a socialist? They took over the oil companies and own them in Venezuela! The next time Obama or any Democrats suggest collective ownership, let me know, but until then, they are not Socialists.

  14. The Marxist tab is sort of meaningless, as it really depends on which Marx is being referenced. I have no facts to support whether Obama believes (or doesn’t believe) in the Labor Theory of Value or any of Marx’s economic positions (surplus value and the illusory nature of prices being examples). I also don’t know how much he agrees with Marx’s theory of history and political theory. Does anybody believe in dialectical materialism or the labor theory of value anymore? I’m not sure.

    As for Socialism:

    I would define Socialism as the economic theory advocating collective ownership and collective or central administration of the means of production and distribution of goods and services.

    I think it is helpful to break it down into both “production” and “distribution.” I think it is fair to say that Obama advocates for collective and central administration of the distribution of goods and services. In particular, this would apply to any form of universal health insurance.

    As to “production”, the case is not as clear cut; however, as in the case of GM, Chrysler and the financial industry, a case can be made as to production of goods and services as well.

    If Obama is a socialist, so was Bush. In fact, Bush was pretty far to the Left on economic issues. (TARP, expansion of government spending, steel tariffs, expansion of the federal role for traditional local functions etc.) I would say similar to Nixon in that regard. A real disappointment for those that believe in the free market.

  15. I like this bit:
    “Ninety-one percent of self-identified conservatives said Obama was either a “socialist,” “Marxist,” “communist,” or “fascist,” proving Obama is no garden variety liberal.”
    I always knew Republicans didn’t differentiate between “proof” and “conservative opinion”, but I never thought they were this open about it.

  16. I would argue that there is no difference in practice between government ownership of the means of production and government power to direct the ends of those means. Calling one socialist and the other not is a quibble (like I said earlier, technically the latter could be described as fascist, but that term has become meaningless because it implies so many other things that have nothing to do with economic policy).

    Fiscal conservatives believe that it’s all just semantics anyway, because in the end leftism, Socialism, Marxism and Fascism necessarily result in authoritarianism. It’s not much wonder then that they don’t bother discriminating between the terms.

  17. You are probably right Henry regarding the distinction. I know Mises in his work on socialism really took apart “distribution” separately to demonstrate that directing the ends of production will still resort in disruption of the pricing mechanism and information conveyed by such pricing. I can’t recall where, but I think Hayek made the same point.

  18. The idiocy is not limited to ConservativeHQ. The Augusta Chronicle are full of these idiots. I had to break out the dictionary and give the wingnuts the definition of fascist. Wingnuts obviously know nothing about the words they use.

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