RE: why are many american obsessed over maintainign the illusion of choice in healthcare?
October 1, 2019 at 4:13 pm
(This post was last modified: October 1, 2019 at 5:04 pm by Anomalocaris.)
(October 1, 2019 at 2:02 pm)LOBrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote:(October 1, 2019 at 1:27 pm)Anomalocaris Wrote: I don’t think it is a cold war holdover. Rather, it is reversion to a more nature state that would have existed without cold war.
Communism from even before WWII was born out of and focused a light on the consequences of the excesses of capitalism. It's presence in Soviet Russia made revolutionary changes elsewhere seem both a plausible and potentially desirable alternative to the excess of capitalism. The fear of such an outcome made American political and establishment more accepting of such public and social programs as would take some wind out of the sails of communist Propaganda.
The weakness of Soviet Union in the late 1980s and the fall of communism in the Soviet Block at the end of the decade gave American capitalism renewed confidence and reduced ots willingness to compromise in order to keep abreast and ahead of the appeal of communism. What you are seeing is a process of reversion of American capitalism to what it would have evolve towards when unconstrainted by the need to use both carrot as well as stick to tamp down the social appeals of socialism or communism.
social programs =/= socialism =/= communism =/= totalitarianism were the view capitalist elite were willing to accommodate in order to stave off the credible threat of radical left wing revolution.
social programs = socialism = communism = totalitarianism is the view natural to capitalist elite who fear no existential danger from credible threat of radical left revolution.
(October 1, 2019 at 2:02 pm)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote: Then why is the constant hue and cry against UHC almost always framed in terms of 'This is socialism'?
Boru
Because the word “socialism” is a emotive dog whistle curse term convenient for inciting disapproval, like “mother fucker”. In this useable it doesn’t convey any precise meaning susceptible to evaluation. So just as with the word “mother fucker”, When the word socialism is invoked to incite disapproval is far more informative then the literal meaning of the word.
So did Cold War contribute to socialism become such a curse word? Maybe. Did Cold War cause the resistance to UHC? No. The resistance to UHC is natural development of laissez faire capitalism.