The commies are coming! The commies are coming!

(or, Making McCarthy Proud)

You know, I'm almost 33, so maybe I'm too young for this, but do commies really scare anyone anymore? Really? I vaguely remember thinking, upon hearing of the Berlin Wall falling, "what, that thing was still up?" Communism is just such a theoretical fear to me that I can't feel anything about it. Apparently, that isn't true of others.

(Just for the record, I mostly vote Democratic, and I've been registered as Republican, Democratic, Libertarian and Independant. While I feel strongly about the rights of women and children, I don't want to "spread freedom" via guns and bombs. I'd rather spread medical supplies and food and books via tiny parachutes. I like tiny parachutes.)

JERUSALEM – The enactment of a "single payer" socialist health care system; passing laws to make joining a labor union easier; raising the minimum wage and increasing labor union support – all these are just some of the policies the Community Party USA has mapped out as crucial for Obama to push through during his term of office.

Why is the place listed as "Jerusalem"? I'm pretty sure Obama is President-Elect of the US. Is this supposed to be symbolic? For all those aspiring writers out there, don't use symbols that are meaningless to anyone else but you. I could say that this article is very COG-like. It would mean something to me, it wouldn't mean anything to you.

For what is unlikely to be the last time: Obama's health care plans are neither "single payer" nor socialistic. Once more with feeling: If you have insurance you like, you can keep it. If you don't have insurance, or you don't like your insurance, you can buy into (at a fantastically low rate) the same insurance politicians get. That's it. Very soon, the only people without insurance will be people who don't want it. Why is this wrong? People without insurance are 50% more likely to die of traumatic injuries and cancer. That's a good thing?

Oh, god, raising the minimum wage! It's evil! EVIL! The minimum wage currently is $6.55. It will rise to $7.25 in July of 2009. (All figures: US Department of Labor) For anyone not living in reality, yes, there are adults raising children while simultaneously trying to eat and stay warm who have to get by on $6.55 an hour. You try it. And don't get me started on WIC and Food Stamps and Section 8. WIC stops when the child turns 6 (because 6 year olds don't eat), Food Stamps provide for $3 a day per person (the dollar menu at McDonalds is good for you, right?) and Section 8 will make you pay up to 30% of your income for rent. This might only equal $300 a month, but if all you had was 1000 to begin with, that's a lot of money.

Apparently, hating poor people is an American/Christian value. That's something to be proud of.

Oh, and I'm pretty sure that Obama is a member of the Democratic Party. There actually is a Communist Party in the US. It's tiny and powerless, and would be horribly offended to be mistaken for the Democratic Party.

"For the people who elected Obama and the increased Democratic majority," Norman Markowitz writes, "'change we can believe in' isn't about bailouts for corporations and banks. It isn't about wearing American flag pins on your lapel. ...
"It is about ending the post-World War II policies that led to the long-term stagnation and decline of the labor movement," Markowitz writes. "It is about creating a national public health care program more than 50 years after it was established in other major industrial nations, and handling a national debt which has increased 10 times since Ronald Reagan became president in 1981."

Apparently, I'm insane, because I can't see what is wrong about these things. No, wait, I've got it. Norman Markowitz is an admitted Marxist. A pinko commie! This is a logical flaw called "the attack ad hominem." Essentially, an ad hominum attack is an attack on the speaker rather than the idea. For instance, if I tell you that smoking cigarettes is bad for your health while smoking a cigarette, your immediate reaction would be "look who's talking", but, the fact that I smoke doesn't change the fact that cigarettes are bad for you. My point? Markowitz being an admitted Marxist doesn't affect the validity of his ideas.

Also, right wingers get all bent out of shape about the liberal media and freedom of speech, and then want to slap some duck tape over the mouth of anyone who disagrees with them. Apparently, freedom of speech only applies to people who agree with them.

Markowitz urges Obama to implement a "single payer" national health system, or socialized universal medicine.

Interesting. The first paragraph of this article implies that Obama is a communist and wants socialized medicine. Here, however, we have Markowitz "urging" Obama towards socialized medicine. You don't urge someone to do something they're already going to do. Hmmm . . .

The New Zeal Blog, which researched connections between Obama and the Communist Party USA, commented: "The best way to determine the Obama administration's likely agenda is to read the communist press. Very few US voters would have any inkling that the approximately 3,000 members of the Communist Party USA have a huge influence on the policy and direction of the Democratic Party ."

When did quoting random blogs become research? You're welcome to quote me all you want, but don't use me as source material in your doctoral thesis. I'm not an expert in anything. Neither is the New Zeal blogger. (He's also from New Zealand. I have friends from New Zealand and they have really peculiar ideas about the US.)

Very few US votes would have any inkling that the Communist Party has huge influence in the Democratic Party because they don't. That's just silly fear-mongering, conspiracy nut pandering. SHOW YOUR WORK, new zeal! (That's right, I'm calling you out!)