Karl Marx believed that “Democracy is the road to socialism.” Socialists seem to have found a generation of dupes to buy their ahistorical, fanciful pitch. A new poll shows 43% now have a positive view of socialism. An astonishing 65% of Democrats have a positive view. Socialism is now the rage on the left.
Like clothing styles, if you wait long enough, socialism tends to come back into style with generations with no memory of past failures. However, it is an astonishing trend in one of the most prosperous nations on Earth that outlasted a history cluttered with the broken failures of socialist and communist systems.
A new slick packaging of socialism has emerged with leaders such as Zohran Mamdani offering to teach people of the “warmth of collectivism.” The Democratic Socialists of America are enticing voters with narratives like “Imagine the end of capitalism.” Those words promise voters that there is a brave new world without landlords, debt, mandatory work hours, and “food, education, energy, medicine, and transportation… are common goods and utilities.”
What is incredible is that many are buying this pitch.
It is also ironic that this is happening not just on the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence but also on the 250th anniversary of the publication of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations.
As I write in Rage and the Republic:
“While he never visited the United States, his theories seemed quintessentially American to many of his generation. For a revolution that was triggered by tariffs and fueled by events like the Boston Tea Party, Smith’s general principles read like an economic version of Common Sense. It was a type of declaration of independence not just from the British policy of mercantilism (emphasizing British exports over imports) but from economic controls over individual productivity and self-determination….
In summary, Smith was first and foremost viewed as a political theorist, and his economic theories were closely tied to his views on the natural liberties of humanity. He saw capitalism as a liberating system for individuals to allow them the wealth and resources to pursue their own chosen paths. Conversely, he saw government controls and subsidies as forms of control and potentially forms of suppression of the human will. If people are to be truly free, they must have the resources to pursue that freedom. The government dole can become a type of servitude or at least a subterfuge for citizens. If they are dependent on the government, they are never truly free.”
The book compares many of these proposals to identical policies of the Jacobin movement in the French Revolution. Both the American and French revolutions arose during the same period, but one became the world’s oldest democracy while the other became the blood-soaked “The Reign of Terror.”
Notably, the Jacobins pushed for the same unicameral system that the socialists are now advocating as well as attacks on the wealthy.
The DSA is the direct descendant of the Jacobins in seeking to tear down moderating institutions and replace the president and justices with democratically elected figures by a Congress composed only of the House of Representatives.
As with the original Jacobins, those demanding these changes are not the working class but professors, pundits and young college-educated voters.
Pushing this analogy to a more menacing level, another poll shows that roughly 60 percent of Democrats now would support a military coup to remove President Donald Trump.
The return of socialism is like the reappearance of low-rise jeans. You are left mystified by anyone who believes that this is a worthy theory to emulate after consistent and catastrophic failures. Long forgotten is the disaster of the socialist government of François Mitterrand in France.
Most recently, Prime Minister Andy Burnham condemned the privatization policies of Margaret Thatcher: “The country surrendered control of the essentials — housing, water, energy, transport — and left people exposed to higher costs.” What he does not mention is that she followed the collapse of socialist policies under Labour Prime Minister James Callaghan in 1977–78 during the so-called “winter of discontent,” which I also discuss in the book.
Perhaps Marx was right after all: “History repeats itself, first as a tragedy, second as a farce.”
Jonathan Turley is the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
Let’s look at the reality. Letting politicians make the decisions that decide the goods and services produced by a populace means that your lives will be controlled by the likes of: Joe Biden; Kamala Harris; Hunter Biden; Hillary Clinton; Barack Obama; and all the other Democratic Presidents and their highly-placed leaders. When have we ever had a President that truly understood economics? As Mitt Romney said to Barack Obama: ” You don’t pick winners and losers. You just pick losers.”
I suspect the percentage of Americans who have positive views of Socialism is close to 100% when you consider those who appreciate Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. We have public libraries, fire departments, and public schools. Socialism can be more narrowly defined but depending on who’s asking the question and what they include. Everybody loves socialism except the ultra-rich.
enigmainblackcom,
Agree mostly, especially with your implied premise that most people don’t realize that the programs your cite (and many many others you don’t) are all forms of social welfare; some frankly Marxist in their origin. Where we might differ is that I think the ultra-rich love the socialist nature of our current governmental policies. Why? Because they have figured out how to privatize their profits but socialize their losses. As long as they can continue to send the bill for their losses to the taxpayers they are good with that form of socialism.
-g
If they’re so good, why are both SS and Medicare teetering on insolvency? They are both a Democrat multi generational Tar Baby Ponzi scheme.
Schools, fire stations, utilities and roads are primarily paid for in part or whole by Developers. The government side comes after people buy the homes, that’s in the form of property tax or CDD fund they pay in perpetuity.
Socialism and Communism, you will own nothing, you will have nothing and you will like it…or else.
It’s like hand me downs. Share your shoes with your brothers. One brother walks in the mud. Share your bodies where not even murder has a meaning.
Total degradation
They aren’t insolvent. They had tremendous funds, but the Republicans have replaced them either IOUs to balance the Federal budget from which the Republicans have famously removed revenue by cutting taxes on big corporations and very wealthy people. When they say “insolvent” they mean the Republicans wish to renege on the IOUs.
That was Bill Clinton.
I can remember a USA Today, editorial cartoon where Bill has his head in a hole labeled Social Security and he exclaims, “Hey! I found a bunch of money to balance the budget!”
And, of course, there is no constitutional basis for Social Security or Medicare.
Try reading Article I, Section 8.
The Constitution severely limits and restricts the powers of the federal government, while leaving the people with the maximum possible sphere of individual freedom.
People are free to purchase retirement plans and health care in the private market. Indeed, most Americans obtain both through employment, where employers and employees voluntarily participate in private retirement and health-care arrangements.
A common trait of the programs you mention are that they are designed to assure that people who are unable to fully care for themselves due to age and/or infirmity —- or that they are services for which it is unfeasible to perform individually — fire dept etc. What I find deplorable about socialist pipe dreams like “Medicare for all” or state owned grocery stores is that it takes from the able bodied the rights to make their own decisions.
Medicare for All takes from the able bodied the ability to pay 100%-500% higher insurance costs than for a Medicare insurance program. It also takes from the pharmaceutical companies the ability to maximize profits by floating the prices to the maximum free cash patients are expected to have access to, unless they are wealthy enough to simply import them on their oversees trips.
The communist loser simply wants “free stuff” and “free status,” like all covetous parasites who are afraid of freedom and self-reliance.
Affirmative Action—Don’t leave home wiffout it!
Enigma, I need your definition of socialism since likely you are adhering to a different definition than the classical one. Socialism: No private property.
The programs you mention are social welfare. Alone, they cannot exist and rely on capitalism to provide the funds. The problem is that the more money taken from capitalist enterprises, the less money is available for everything else, including welfare.
What you do not realize is that most classical liberals and libertarians, for the most part, have no problems with charity and even some government funding for the very needy; Friedrich Hayek, a Nobel Prize winner, includes a comment about most needy in his famous book the Road to Serfdom. He is what you might call a classical liberal or conservative.
“Everybody loves socialism except the ultra-rich.”
Close.
Everybody loves socialism except the ultra-rich and poor racists.
The poor racists love socialism but won’t realize it until it’s gone. How many fools helped get rid of their own health care?
The Israelite slaves were out of Egypt before the ink was dry on their release papers, but then they had the capability and acumen sufficient for the task.
WordPress Censorship Here
The Israelite slaves were out of Egypt before the ink was dry on their release papers, but then they had the capability and acumen sufficient for the task.
The communist loser simply wants “free stuff” and “free status,” like all covetous parasites who are afraid of freedom and self-reliance.
Affirmative Action—Don’t leave home wiffout it!
WordPress Censorship Here
The Israelite slaves were out of Egypt before the ink was dry on their release papers, but then they had the capability and acumen sufficient for the task.
You could not be more wrong.
If I took all my earnings that were taxed for SS, starting back when I was a teenager, and could of put those into market index funds, I could retire by now.
I would much rather have a tax deductible, Health Savings Account then Medicare or Medicaid. Be even better if I could take those savings invest them, let them grow and be able to withdraw without penalty when use for a legit health reason.
Your regular reminder that Trump has the strongest communist tendencies of anyone in American Politics. Don’t believe me? He tried to kick the press out of the White House so that he could air everything via Trump TV instead – that’s state controlled television. He does most of his communication through state controlled messenging – Truth Social. Hegseth kicked reporters out of the Pentagon that wouldn’t write what HE dictated to be facts. The U.S. government holds direct equity stakes and shares in roughly 30 to 39 private companies under the Trump administration. And Trump has amassed an inner circle of oligarchs that have taken over media and entertainment companies and purged them of dissenting voices. Let’s not forget the Russian oligarch who bankrolled Don Jr’s wedding. And the GOP has stood by and applauded him. Trump is a commie.
Wait, I thought you said Trump was Hitler?!
Before that an insurrectionist
Before that a Capitalist Pig
Before that a felon
Before that a pedophile
Before that a rapist…
Trump has his faults as every single person does, but he is none of those things. Two more years so you best get ready for what is coming, accountability through the courts.
Trump has never been Hitler. Hitler had organizational skills and didn’t put ketchup on overcooked steak.
Although these American proponents of evolutionary socialism believe that socialism can be achieved by democratic means and that cooperation, rather than competition, between people is the natural course of evolution, in reality socialism turns out to be a mechanism by which an elite few protect themselves and their interests from competition by the masses thereby increasing the likelihood that the elite survive to pass on their genes. Rather than compete for survival, the socialist elite improve their chances by reducing and limiting their competitor’s ability to out-compete with the elite. If one does not believe this possibility, just look at the results of socialism in the former Soviet Union politburo, the Castros in Cuba, the CCP in communist China, and Chavez and Maduro in Venezuela, among many others. What is amazing is how these socialist “leaders” engage a cadre of useful idiots to support their own personal demise.
Surely Professor Turley is smart enough to know that socialism isn’t the same as communism. That there are successful socialist countries, like Israel. That there is a continuum, where many countries in the EU have socialist aspects.
Why do smart educated people start to support socialism? Perhaps because classical liberalism in the United States has been replaced by crony capitalism, that wealth here has very little to do with productivity but more with capture of the US government and forcing the American taxpayer to go into collective debt to enrich the wealthy. That democracy has been distorted by allowing the rich to dominate political speech and campaign financing with their money.
I think that the Professor thinks his readers are fools because he is smart enough not to believe most of what he publishes here.
Unfortunately, based on many of these posts, it seems he is correct to think his readers are fools.
Just look at Turley’s post earlier this year, where he acknowledges that countries, which are often called socialist like the Scandinavian countries, actually are market-driven economies with socialist welfare policies.
https://jonathanturley.org/2026/07/19/the-dsa-and-the-myth-of-scandinavian-socialism/
From Rage and the Republic: “Countries like Denmark and Sweden are strong adherents to capitalist principles and are listed among the most capitalist nations on Earth. Indeed, leaders often express surprise by American references to their socialist principles. In 2015, the Danish Prime Minister Lars Rasmussen observed, “I know that some people in the U.S. associate the Nordic model with some sort of socialism. Therefore, I would like to make one thing clear. Denmark is far from a socialist planned economy. Denmark is a market economy.”
How many in the poll believed that “socialism” meant the Nordic model? This poll is utterly useless.
(As an aside: One should take issue with Turley’s seemingly binary concept of denoting an economy either capitalist or socialist. Calling an economy entirely not socialist when it has a income tax rate of >78% is a bit silly.)
“. . . there is a continuum . . .”
True.
There’s also a continuum of diseases. For a person who likes health, the goal is to eradicate the lesser disease *before* it kills you.
Who here actually read the poll?!
Can you give me its definition of “socialism”?
oh wait… it didn’t define the term…
There is that which is Karl Marx and the “warmth of collectivism”. There is that which drew another German to our shores. And the socialists have no explanation why. That German brought the special and general theories of relativity. And this idea: we cannot solve our problems by using the same thinking we used when we created them. We know him as Albert Einstein, also a Jew escaping Nazi Germany. His choice of country speaks to Benjamin Franklin. “Yes. Keep it”.
An Inconvenient Truth:
A handful of native born Americans have no constitutional rights and the U.S. Supreme Court has known this for over 25 years.
Several here blame the teachers. Better history teaching would help. It still wouldn’t be enough.
Formation is happening all the time, deliberate or not. It is like the air around us. Calm or hurricane force. Clean or polluted. We can read about all of those things and understand what the words mean, but it isn’t until we experience them that we actually know what they feel like.
History works much the same way. Knowledge tells us what happened. Experience lets us feel what it meant. Formation occurs when what we know encounters what we experience, until that understanding becomes part of how we see, judge, and act. A generation can read about tyranny, socialism, communism, dependency and the loss of liberty, but reading about them is not the same as living through them.
Meanwhile, that generation is being formed every day by the world it actually does experience. We keep thinking that teaching history is enough. It isn’t. Somehow, we have to figure out how to let each generation feel the lessons of history without requiring them to live through the catastrophe that taught those lessons in the first place.
Professor Turley writes, “What he [Burnham] does not mention is that she [Thatcher] followed the collapse of socialist policies under Labour Prime Minister James Callaghan in 1977–78 during the so-called ‘winter of discontent…'”
And she served eleven years as Prime Minister and was followed by another Tory, John Major, who served until 1997–eighteen years of solid Tory rule. Labor under Tony Blair succeeded them, bringing the bungled Iraq invasion and uncontrolled immigration.
College professors are lying to students about this period. They’re telling students that conservative governments economically underperformed socialism. These scumbag PhDs lie with statistics, but there’s an overwhelming fact that proves them flat wrong: conservative governments were extremely popular during this period.
Another example was Ronald Reagan, who served two terms and was succeeded by another Republican, George Bush–twelve straight years of GOP leadership. Reagan was in fact reelected by 49 out of 50 states, winning the most electoral votes ever. Even Massachusetts voted for him. You read that right: Massachusetts. Mondale barely won his home state of… wait for it… Minnesota.
Even Bill Clinton eventually had to admit “the era of big government is over.” After that, Clinton’s popularity soared, and he was reelected.
There wasn’t just a “winter of discontent” in Britain. Remember the “misery index?” It was a measure of Democrat economic failure that got Reagan elected. Leftwing professors can’t lie to me. I was there. It was “my lived experience.”
How does any of that square with conservatives underperforming? It does not! Most college faculty are lying liars. At least Professor Turley tells the truth.
Diogenes,
It’s cute that you rely on your ‘lived experience’ as a substitute for actual economic data, because your memory seems to have conveniently blanked out why those conservative governments actually lost power.
You praise the 18 years of Tory rule under Thatcher and Major. If their economic policies were such a stunning success, why did John Major suffer the most humiliating landslide defeat in modern British history in 1997? The British public didn’t pivot to Tony Blair because they were bored; they did it because years of Tory privatization left public infrastructure crumbling and triggered deep economic recessions.
You brag about Ronald Reagan’s 49-state landslide in 1984. But if electoral margins prove policy success, then by your exact logic, Richard Nixon’s 49-state landslide in 1972 proves Watergate was a great idea. Furthermore, you completely skip over George H.W. Bush—the heir to the Reagan economy—getting booted out of office after a single term because a massive recession hit the country and forced him to break his ‘read my lips, no new taxes’ pledge.
Economic performance is judged by long-term metrics like wage growth, wealth inequality, infrastructure stability, and deficit spending—not short-term voter sentiment. Left-wing professors aren’t lying to students with statistics; they are just teaching them how to read a full graph instead of stopping at the parts that make them feel good.
X, Nixon used price controls and said, “we’re all Keynesians now.” He was less conservative on economic matters, and that exacerbated inflation. Bush raised taxes during a recession and lengthened and deepened the 1990’s recession. That’s hardly a conservative approach. Both paid the price. I had anticipated your arguments.
As for Blair, he couldn’t get elected dogcatcher today.
The real problem these days, X, isn’t capitalism. It’s globalism. Globalism was a product of pro-capitalist policies, but it was oversold. We don’t want to ship our key industries to countries that are hostile. We had hoped capitalism would convert those countries. Instead, it gave them economic leverage to subvert us.
Replacing capitalism with socialism is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Capitalism guarantees economic efficiency–and you need that and lots of it–but it doesn’t guarantee political stability. Government does play a role by limiting immigration and trade to protect political stability and national security.
I would add that the socialists are actually politically aligned with the globalists. That’s an alliance born in hell, but that alliance is doomed to breakdown due to the internal contradictions over governance. It’s already collapsing here and in China.
China is in a much better position than we are. We have virtually depleted our SPR. China still has a year’s worth of reserves. China can keep oil prices stable because of that. WE are at their mercy.
The idea is NOT about replacing capitalism with socialism. It’s about combining the two. Why? Because it’s a successful model and the Nordic countries who have adopted them have shown that they really do work.
“China is in a much better position than we are.” No. I’m not even going to argue with that.
Norway is very dependent on North Sea oil and international capitalist investment, so it’s an exception. Finland is struggling because their key industries have been hurt by competition like the iPhone, so you can’t cite them as an example. Sweden and Germany both went through capitalist reforms in the 1990s that proved highly successful, but they kept high taxes to support universal healthcare, etc., but in many ways, Sweden is more capitalist than the U.S., so that’s a complicated question at best. The jury is still out on universal healthcare. It keeps needing “capitalist reforms.” I’d still rather be ruled by Sweden than the idiot savants in academia or the Democrat Party. At least the Swedes recognize failure when they see it.
Combining the two systems is known in economic theory as “convergence.” A lot depends on how far left that convergence happens. If Social Security and Medicare are going bankrupt and public education is becoming a farce, it’s hard to argue that we need more socialism. The Swedes have a defined contribution program for their social security. We have a defined benefit program, so even on the social safety net, they are often more capitalist than we are.
Finally, Democrats aren’t talking about convergence. They’re talking about socialism, X. Don’t tell me they’re nuanced on this issue. They’re not.
Diogenes,
Dismissing the entire Nordic model as an “exception” or “struggling” ignores their actual economic reality. Every economy has unique challenges—the U.S. has massive debt, while Finland has tech transitions. Yet, Finland, Sweden, and Norway consistently rank at the top of the global Heritage Foundation Index of Economic Freedom and lead the world in innovation and quality of life. They prove that a society can maintain a powerful capitalist engine while investing heavily in its human capital through a strong social safety net. It’s not an exception; it’s a proven, repeatable blueprint.
The “jury is not out” on universal healthcare; it saves money and creates a more flexible labor market. You claim universal healthcare keeps needing capitalist reforms, but reform is a sign of a functioning system, not failure. The U.S. healthcare system spends nearly double per capita what Sweden or Germany spend, yet the U.S. lags behind them in life expectancy and infant mortality. Furthermore, universal healthcare is highly pro-capitalist: it frees entrepreneurs to start businesses without the fear of losing their family’s health insurance.
Adapting social safety nets isn’t “more socialism”—it’s smart fiscal governance. You accurately point out that Sweden updated its social security to a defined contribution model. But this isn’t a victory for raw capitalism; it is the definition of successful convergence. Sweden used smart, market-based mechanisms to make their social safety net sustainable for the long haul. The U.S. system isn’t failing because it has safety nets; it is struggling because political gridlock prevents the U.S. from enacting the exact type of modern, flexible reforms the Nordics use.
Mislabeling mainstream Democratic policy as “pure socialism” is a strawman argument. The vast majority of mainstream Democrats are not calling for the state to nationalize factories or eliminate the free market. They are advocating for policy adjustments that match what every other major developed G7 nation already has: affordable higher education, regulated corporate monopolies, and universal healthcare. That isn’t a rejection of capitalism; it is an effort to rebalance it so it works for the middle class, not just the top percentage.
“They are advocating for policy adjustments that match what every other major developed G7 nation already has: affordable higher education, regulated corporate monopolies, and universal healthcare.”
I strongly disagree. Democrats prefer socialism, not some vague Nordic convergence. I strongly doubt the majority of Democrats even know what economic convergence means. Your economically literate Democrat is the strawman.
Now to healthcare. The problem with healthcare isn’t too much capitalism. It’s demographics. Drug gangs murdering each other in our streets contributes too much to our poor life expectancy. The Nordics don’t have that problem on our scale, but they’re definitely getting there in Malmo, and the welfare magnets of those societies aren’t helping. A better comparison is the life expectancy of a privately insured individual versus a universal care individual of similar lifestyles. Americans fare very well in that comparison.
And yes, the jury is out on universal healthcare. You guys had the same arguments 30 years ago about Canadian universal care, and enough time has passed that nobody makes those arguments anymore. I would expect that Sweden will have to “reform” it’s healthcare system, especially with all the rocket scientists from North Africa that are going there to sponge off the system.
Finally, socialized medicine kills innovation. The real innovation is coming out of America because Americans are willing to pay for medical research. Europeans, not so much. And the G7 is not a model of economic progress. Europe is falling way behind the USA in median personal income. This was happening even before the Ukraine War.
Diogenes, nope.
Dismissing mainstream policy as “secret socialism” ignores actual legislative reality. You claim Democrats want pure socialism, but legislatively, the focus remains on working within a capitalist framework. Policies like the Inflation Reduction Act used market incentives—specifically tax credits for private companies—to drive manufacturing and green energy. True socialism involves state ownership of the means of production, which is not what mainstream policy dictates, regardless of what rhetorical labels the farthest-left fringes use.
Blaming U.S. life expectancy drops entirely on crime is mathematically incorrect. While violent crime is a serious issue, actuarial and public health data show that America’s lagging life expectancy is primarily driven by systemic issues like metabolic disease, opioid overdoses, and unequal access to preventative care. Relying solely on the metric of “privately insured individuals” ignores the macroeconomic drag of a system where millions are underinsured, pushing emergency room costs onto taxpayers and businesses.
The “jury is not out” on universal healthcare systems, which structurally adapt rather than fail. Yoi point to Canada’s current struggles, but ignore that mixed universal models—like Germany’s statutory health insurance or France’s multi-payer system—consistently achieve better health outcomes than the U.S. at a fraction of the cost per capita. Passing reforms to address demographic aging or fiscal sustainability is a feature of responsive governance, not proof that universal coverage is a failed concept.
The claim that Europe lags in medical innovation ignores the globalized nature of pharma. While the U.S. market spends heavily on healthcare, a massive portion of that spending goes toward administrative overhead, marketing, and corporate profits rather than raw R&D. Furthermore, breakthrough medical innovations are deeply globalized. Some of the most critical recent medical advancements—including the mRNA technology behind modern vaccines—were pioneered by European companies and scientists, heavily supported by European public and private research.
Higher raw median income in the U.S. hides structural economic vulnerabilities. While U.S. median personal income is higher than in Europe, that raw dollar figure does not account for the immediate out-of-pocket costs Americans pay for basic necessities like childcare, higher education, and medical deductibles. When a single medical emergency can wipe out a middle-class American family’s savings, a higher raw income does not automatically translate to superior economic security or a higher overall quality of life.
what a clown.
X, medical innovation IS NOT globalized pharma.
OMG
you are too funny
How would you know? You don’t have an argument. Care to try again?
X,
“The US is recognized as the global leader in medical innovation, significantly contributing to health sciences research, producing four times more publications than most countries.”
https://schmidscience.com/which-nation-has-made-the-most-medical.html
“We’ll get right to the point. The answer to the question, “what country leads the world in medical innovation?” is the United States. Medical industry professionals all over the world would have to agree that the top medical technology currently being used around the world has ties to the U.S.”
https://vantagemedtech.com/what-country-leads-the-world-in-medical-innovation/
You are obviously confusing medical innovation with the lower ranking in Fiscal Sustainability.
Too many wannabes and losers like you like to feed off of the govt.
his mommy forgot to tell him not to use big words he lifted off the AI that he doesn;t understand.
Still….nope.
Quoting industry trade blogs does not disprove the heavily globalized reality of medical research. While the U.S. is a major powerhouse in medical technology commercialization, treating it as an isolated silo ignores how the industry actually operates. Major breakthroughs are deeply decentralized. For instance, the mRNA technology that formed the backbone of modern global vaccines was pioneered by European scientists and companies, and the first approved artificial heart was developed by a French medical firm. The U.S. excel at buying, scaling, and marketing innovation, but it does not possess a monopoly on raw scientific discovery.
If you read past the first paragraph of the very article you linked, the authors explicitly state that the U.S. may not lead indefinitely as global competitors enter the fold. It highlights Canada’s state-backed JLABS ecosystem and highly regulated European medical robotics companies as direct threats to U.S. dominance. The source itself refutes the idea that heavily subsidized or regulated foreign healthcare models are inherently incapable of leading-edge innovation.
The U.S. leads in medical spending and patent volume because it operates a high-margin, venture-backed healthcare system. However, that massive spending does not translate to basic system efficiency. Pointing out that the U.S. lags behind almost every other G7 nation in life expectancy, infant mortality, and healthcare affordability isn’t “feeding off the government”—it’s a mathematically verifiable critique of a system that prioritizes corporate profitability over foundational population health.
Medical research isn’t the same as medical care.
Lord, what an epistle. My responses, as succinct as I can:
“You claim Democrats want pure socialism, but legislatively, the focus remains on working within a capitalist framework.”
If one believes socializing the entire medical system will get better results at a lower price, one can socialize everything and get utopia. Medicine is not unique among industries. That’s the great internal contradiction of your argument. Democrats do always wind up wanting more socialism.
“Blaming U.S. life expectancy drops entirely on crime is mathematically incorrect.”
It’s not mathematically complete, but it’s a major factor. You cite addiction, but that’s mostly a crime issue, too. As for the uninsured, I could accept a defined-contribution program that takes the burden off of businesses, but Democrats will never accept any limits. Hence, taxes, deficits, and Canadian-style failure.
“Germany’s statutory health insurance or France’s multi-payer system—consistently achieve better health outcomes than the U.S. at a fraction of the cost per capita.”
Socialized medicine will always fail, German or not. Germany greatly suppresses doctor’s pay for instance; that will lead to shortages, and European systems don’t get better results compared to privately insured Americans who obey the law. Nobody can fix Democrats acting badly.
“The claim that Europe lags in medical innovation ignores the globalized nature of pharma.”
Read Anonymous below at 6:40 PM.
“Higher raw median income in the U.S. hides structural economic vulnerabilities.”
Globalist-leftists created the bulk of those vulnerabilities by flooding the country with immigrants and shipping jobs to China. That’s a problem with globalist-leftism, and not all capitalism is globalism.
“While U.S. median personal income is higher than in Europe, that raw dollar figure does not account for the immediate out-of-pocket costs Americans pay for basic necessities like childcare, higher education, and medical deductibles.”
Actually, it does. Even accounting for those additional expenses, Americans have more disposable median income. Europeans give it all back and more in taxes and regulations–and socialist services are almost always less efficient.
X, you said Germany’s costs were a fraction of America’s. That needs a little clarification. Last I heard, and I’m speaking from memory, Germany has a two-tier system. People could pay more if they wanted private care, but most of the system was typical universal care that uses price controls on doctor’s pay, etc. Even so, the German system’s per capita cost is second only to the U.S. Germans on average pay, ballpark, about 60% of what Americans pay; that is technically a fraction, but it’s not a small fraction.
Even so, the German price controls and regulation will inevitably lead either to deficits or shortages or both, my opinion. Things like that can take up to 20 years before they start to bite because at first the costs are hidden, but they are inevitable.
you see how X tries to play this game and loses?
After he shoots himself in the foothat the U.S. may not lead indefinitely by saying that U.S. doesn’t lead, he NOW tries to change his argument (above) to : “If you read past the first paragraph of the very article you linked, the authors explicitly state that the U.S. may not lead indefinitely”
NO ONE, not me or Diogenes or anyone, said that the U.S. would lead indefinitely.
I’m hoping that more people wise up to littel boy X, who is trying so so hard.
“he U.S. healthcare system spends nearly double per capita what Sweden or Germany spend, yet the U.S. lags behind them in life expectancy and infant mortality.”
GSX: Is it the healthcare system or social causes? This bumkin doesn’t go any further than skin deep. Take infant mortality, where America is considered far down the list of success.
Infant mortality is most closely related to weight. If one separates the weights into five categories, with the lowest weight on the bottom and the normal weight on top, one finds the US at the top of the list for success. How can the US be so good at treating low birth weight infants and, on the other hand, be told it “lags”
The answer is simple. The healthcare system provides the highest level of care, and the problem rests with social problems like drugs, alcohol, and teen pregnancy, all of which contribute to low-birth-weight infants and an increase in infant mortality.
I don’t think this explanation, based on logic, will be understood by GSX. Perhaps someone else can help.
Diogenes, 100%! You rock!
🙂
Polls like this only measure the brand sentiment of “socialism.” They tell you next to nothing about policy preferences.
Socialism is not defined, so respondents have to project their own meaning onto it. Most may not know, for example, that our welfare state is neither purely capitalist nor socialism; rather, it incorporates elements of both.
#. The world, the US has reached complete degradation, even the spirit is degraded.
So it is…
What Turley and those crazies on the right don’t realize is it’s Trump’s fault for creating this new sentiment. It’s his failures. The irony is breathtaking.
Those who are promoting ‘socialist’ ideas and policies are succeeding because they are doing EXACTLY what Trump did in the run up to his first term. He listened to the people most were not listening to. They are also doing things that people notice…delivering on their promises.
Turley criticize Mayor Mamdani for the things he’s said. But he leaves out the painful fact that the Mayor Mamdani is actually doing what he’s promising. He’s running the city more efficiently, is more responsive to the city’s residents requests and needs like filling pot holes, fixing broken infrastructure, cleaning up parks and reopening them. At record speed. And best of all he’s literally engaged in their concerns. Things that have made him not only more popular than Trump, but more visible on the things he’s promised to do.
Republicans can’t touch that nor can Turley except whine about things he’s said that have been twisted to spook the ignorants and gullible MAGAs who don’t live in the city.
The panic is absolutely hilarious. What has happened is Republicans have run out of culture war BS to peddle. Nobody cares about the culture war issues when gas, groceries, and utility bills are rising faster than their pay every day.
One look at how Mayor Mamdani has successfully implemented his ideas and addressed New Yorkers concerns with the kind of attention that is unheard IS what is making people give Democratic socialist ideas a second look. Because the do indeed work and the mayor is delivering on his promises. He’s making New Yorkers lives a little easier and it shows by the fact that every where he goes he’s greeted with enthusiasm. Trump can’t do that outside a constantly shrinking MAGA crowd.
The Iran war is Trump’s and the Republicans worst problem and they can’t get out of it because Iran is in control, not Trump. He can’t help the Saudis because it risks using up precious valuable ammunition. He doesn’t have regional bases to rely on anymore because the Iranians destroyed them. Israel can’t bomb Iran anymore because they need whatever missiles they have left to protect themselves from what is clearly a well stocked Iranian missile arsenal.
Now Trump has the Houthis to deal with and he has no extra military power to deal with it because it’s costing him more and more money WE don’t have. But I digress.
Bottom line is more Democrats see the Mamdani-style ‘socialism’ more attractive because he’s literally delivering on his promises and showing results. And he’s showing he’s actively engaged in his city resident’s concerns every day.
A far reach to try and hang that on Trump. I would put it more on the cumulative effect from Johnson, Clinton, Obama, Bush and Biden. Unfunded wars, failure to take out Bin Laden, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Clinton’s repeal of Glass-Stegall. Obama’s printing of money, quantitative easing and COVID handouts, USAID frauds, all delivering us to a $40 Trillion dollar debt. The reckoning will come, just when?!
Wars aside, the Democrats ARE Socialists, this has always been their plan, Cloward-Piven, they just haven’t figured out that as parasites they have killed the host, when the host dies it’s Communism.
It is fascinating how you list almost every single modern president to blame them for the national debt, yet completely airbrush Donald Trump out of the equation. Talk about a ‘far reach.’
Donald Trump added a staggering $7.8 trillion to the national debt in just a single four-year term. A massive chunk of that came from the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which non-partisan budget analysts proved blew a permanent hole in the deficit during a booming economy, long before COVID-19 even existed.
You blame Obama for ‘COVID handouts,’ which makes zero sense considering Barack Obama left office in January 2017. It was Donald Trump who signed the $2.2 trillion CARES Act in 2020, putting his literal name on the stimulus checks.
Invoking the Cloward-Piven strategy—a fringe 1960s political theory about intentionally overloading the welfare state—is just standard internet paranoia. Mainstream Democrats aren’t trying to ‘kill the host’ to bring about Communism. They are running establishment capitalistic platforms focused on corporate regulation, infrastructure investment, and standard safety nets identical to every other developed Western country.
Trump is spinning the plates that were handed off to him by the incompetent boobs before him.
I didn’t blame Obama for COVID. I blamed him and Summers for printing money for 8yrs as QE into the market after Clinton’s repeal of GS allowed mortgages to be traded on the market unchecked crashing the economy. This was a result after federal mandates to force banks to make loans available to borrowers that could never qualify, how did that end?
Cloward-Piven was and remains the playbook, they haven’t changed.
Yeah right on the rest of your baloney, Mamdani has exposed exactly what they’re trying to do. Establishment Capitalistic platforms you say? That’s a good one, you’re right, they don’t want to kill the host. They want to absorb the host over time so their disciples will be placated until other peoples money runs out. By then the hook is set and it’s too late at that juncture.
Spinning the plates? What a laugh. Trump declared HIS economy would be the best. Trump can’t blame Biden or Obama for his failures anymore he definitely tries but that just makes him look dumber every time he does.
Mamdani showed he delivers on his promises. On things people actually care about. If his policies are showing actual results people see every day. They won’t care about the “concerns” Turley brings up. What they care about is that things are being done. Turley can’t argue against that nor can Republicans. Because THEY haven’t done anything that shows they are listening to constitutients.
Dems have manipulated the high food prices to 86 Republicans. It’s finished except for packing your suitcase and catching a jet. The US was the only refuge so fly, fly…
BIDEN ADDED 8.4 TRILLION to the National Debt!! Which is HIGHER X?? 7.8 or 8.4?? TOUGH ONE FOR YOU???
BTW OBAMA ADDED 9.1 TRILLION. Between OBAMA AND BIDEN 17.5 TRILLION 2 DEMS!!! HUGE chunk of the 40 Trillion(over 40%)
Let’s see how Mamdani does when the wealthy in NYC exit for more tax-friendly states, taking many of their employees, and their tax dollars and discretionary spending, with them. He doesn’t seem to have realized that the tax savings from such a move would more than cover his proposed tax on second homes in NYC. But then again, progressives have never been known for their mathematical prowess.
The wealthy won’t leave New York City. That’s where they make their money and have their most important business connections.
Some of those ‘wealthy citizens’ moved to Florida to establish it as their primary home. But….that makes whatever they have in NYC as their second home therefore imposing the tax they wanted to avoid in the first place. It exposed the. Tax dodge most wealthy NYC residents were using to game the system. The can afford to pay the tax. They will alway come back or choose to stay.
The math doesn’t work in their favor.
“The wealthy won’t leave New York City.”
GSX: I left NYC along with a bunch of my well-heeled friends and homesteaded in Florida. One of them sold his apartment for somewhere between $ 20 and $35 million dollars. When having dinner with him in NYC, he used to fly out of the restaurant so he could pass the toll counter and exit NYC to Connecticut before the day was out. You are making things up.
Many will not stay to pay the tax. Like me, they may have apartments in NYC, but the cost of property tax isn’t that much.
S. Meyer, you’re so bad at this.
Your friend “racing the clock” to beat a toll does not escape New York City income tax. Under New York’s strict statutory residency test, if you own an apartment in NYC and spend more than 183 days a year in the state, you are taxed as a full-time resident on all global income—regardless of whether you sprint across the state line to Connecticut before midnight. Driving out of the city for dinner does not change where your primary economic life is anchored, making that specific example completely implausible as a legal tax avoidance strategy.
Despite warnings that a progressive agenda or new local surcharges would cause a mass exodus to Florida, the data shows the opposite. Comprehensive state and IRS data released in September 2026 proves that New York’s millionaire population actually grew by roughly 3% (gaining nearly 2,000 millionaire filers). Meanwhile, the number of millionaires nationwide fell over that same period, proving that New York is consolidating its share of private wealth, not losing it.
If multi-millionaires were abandoning their apartments to evade the local tax base, luxury home prices would collapse under a wave of panic-selling. Instead, market reports from major brokerages show that signed contracts on luxury Manhattan properties costing $4 million or more surged by 25% following the implementation of new fiscal platforms. The super-elite are actively buying into the market, not liquidating assets to flee.
Your “ friend” sold his apartment for $20 or $30 million means another millionaire moved in.
You’re being a little loose with the facts.
easy to clock X’s responses by how long it takes for him to look at a comment, consult AI, then spin a reply.
Usually runs a minimum of 30 minutes.
It means I do research and actually make an argument based on substance.
You don’t do anything besides whine.
No, it means that you personally have no knowledge of anything, hurriedly consult AI, then turn around and try to discredit (emphasis on try) as holding the superior view==without even understanding that AI algorithms ONLY summarize the information they extract (almost always because ONE SIDE pollutes the Internet in order to control that or those views) AND YOU HAVE NO INTRINSIC OR EXTRINSIC knowledge or intelligence or COMPREHENSION to understand the difference. keep trying, .
GSX, I tried to be nice and helpful to you recently, but that is not what you want.
” if you own an apartment in NYC and spend more than 183 days a year in the state, you are taxed as a full-time resident on all global income—regardless of whether you sprint across the state line to Connecticut before midnight. “
You don’t know the law and how it works, though over half the days in NYC are correct. I have an expensive apartment in Manhattan, so I am well aware of the potential problems I face. I have even had a potentially costly fight with NYC over tax issues that many face, and I won.
How does one prove they aren’t a resident is not easy, since NYC requests proof, or there is a protracted legal fight that costs a fortune and even more when one decides to settle. One way is this: Go by toll roads, proving with a receipt that one is out of NYC before midnight. Remember, he only has to prove he is not in the city for about one-half of the year.
“proves that New York’s millionaire population actually grew by roughly 3% “
You never learned how to deal with statistics and comparisons. Assuming your % is correct, though from experience it likely is not, the number of millionaires increased all over the country. So you need to provide like comparisons and then deal with total wealth.
“If multi-millionaires were abandoning their apartments to evade the local tax base, luxury home prices would collapse under a wave of panic-selling. Instead, market reports from major brokerages show that signed contracts on luxury Manhattan properties costing $4 million or more surged by 25% following the implementation of new fiscal platforms.”
Another statement demonstrating ignorance. If a home was purchased 30 years ago and went from $500,000 to ten million dollars, it might have gone for $20 million but on paper it looks good when it is really a loss.
“Your “ friend” sold his apartment for $20 or $30 million means another millionaire moved in.”
That is pushing my point further. He got a lot less than he thought the house was worth and finally lowered the price substantially below what it was worth earlier. The new owner may have gotten a deal or not. Who knows.
Face it, GSX, you are completely ignorant of NYC and probably all of the world. You don’t think, and probably don’t have that important ability..
Most of the people who are in favor of socialism (communism) are naive enough to believe life will be easy and free. But the price they’ll pay will be far greater than the price of gas they complain about today, freedom!
How so? Remember, Republicans control Congress, the White House, and conservatives dominate the Supreme Court.
Who has caused this economic mess? High gas prices? Growing inflation?
The economy is not doing what Trump promised. Everything is costing more and he’s pocketing more money thru corrupt deals and ventures that have absolutely nothing to do with how YOU can afford to live or improve your living standard.
He’s not proving to be the ‘savior’ from Biden’s economy he claims to be. He’s doing the opposite. Making things worse.
Except most of what you wrote is not true.
Prove it. Make an argument. Offer a counter-argument.
The latest U.S. unemployment rate is 4.1% for August 2026
The latest annual U.S. inflation rate is 3.4% for the 12-month period ending in August 2026
U.S. real gross domestic product (GDP) increased at an annual rate of 1.5% in the second quarter of 2026
Dow up almost 6K for the year.
U.S. average wage growth has largely rebounded to USAFacts outpace inflation after brief squeezes earlier in the year.
U.S. retail sales are growing at an estimated annual rate of 4.4% in 2026, reaching $5.6 trillion according to projections by the National Retail Federation.
What is the labor participation rate?
What is the wage growth by $20k increments to $200k?
Dow is up from inflated prices as a result of shifts of income to corporations and the wealthy, not from real gains in industrial capacity.
Retail sales are up because prices are up. What does consumer debt look like?
Hey X, gas is currently high due to a war to stop a theocratic, violent, destructive terrorist state from having nukes and other weapons while gas was even higher under Biden and the Dems due to intentionally destroying our energy sector to give their grifting allies billions of dollars.
PS. Inflation was higher under the Dems, the border was open under the Dems, crime was higher under the Dems, DEI and the trans insanity was out of control under the Dems.
PSS. Mamdani is a Jew hating terrorist supporting radical and he is attempting to steal landlords property and give it to the sate. He is NOt being succesful as you allege, he just hasn’t crashed and burned…yet.
Hullbobby, you’re hilarious. Iran didn’t attack us. WE did. At the behest of Israel. The strait of Hormuz as wide open before Trump decided to attack Iran out of the blue. He thought this would be over in a few weeks. Obviously he was dead wrong. Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon. That was always Israels claim. They want Iran out of the picture so THEY can expand.
Trump was not prepared for a long drawn out war with Iran which they have successfully managed to hurt us economically and lay blame on us for the world’s energy crisis. Saudi Arabia has nuclear power. Did you know that? How come Israel is not accusing them of seeking out a nuclear weapon? Do they trust the Saudis? Please. Iran has openly allowed IAEA inspectors to ensure they nuclear material they have does not rise to the level of needed for a nuclear weapon. Have the Saudis allowed the same, how about the Israelis?
The narrative that the previous administration ‘destroyed our energy sector’ completely ignores reality. Under Biden, the U.S. became the largest oil producer in global history, averaging over 13 million barrels a day. The current fuel crisis—regular at $4.48 and diesel at $6.51 a gallon—is a direct result of the ongoing Strait of Hormuz standoff, which military experts warn is stretching our Navy to unsustainable deployment models. Trump has nearly depleted the SPR and that is why he can’t use it any more to keep gas prices artificially low. Especially diesel.
You claim Mayor Zohran Mamdani is failing and ‘stealing property’. The reality is he just delivered a historic policy win by getting the Rent Guidelines Board to pass a 0% rent freeze on 1 million rent-stabilized apartments. Landlords are suing over it, which is standard municipal friction, but it’s hard to call a massive, fulfilled campaign promise ‘crashing and burning.
More importantly, Donald Trump completely disagrees with your assessment of him. Trump just spent the afternoon with Mamdani at Gracie Mansion, praised his leadership, and publicly stated he hopes Mamdani is a ‘great mayor.’ If the leader of the MAGA movement can treat a democratic socialist mayor with respect and work with him on Sunnyside Yard federal housing funding, maybe you should stop letting online rage-bait dictate how you see the world.
X states that his buddy Iran didn’t attack us forgetting that the held our embassy staff hostage, killed Americans in Lebanon, killed Americans in Iraq, tried to kill American leaders, killed westerners in the ME, had their proxies kill Americans and westerners all over the world, took over Lebanon, took over Gaza, took over Yemen, hadtheir allies close the Red Sea and killed many of their own citizens. But according to X and his lefty friends Iran never bothered us. It is laughable.
X, who “isn’t a communist” says it is a win when Mamdani’s hand picked rent board mandated a ZERO PERCENT raise in rents i.e. making people that OWN property take a loss when prices rise, repairs are needed and tenants to damage.
Yup, to this “non-communist” the mayor has the right and the power to tell someone who owns a piece of property what he or she can charge to let some other person use it. Screw the 5th Amendment, we’re taking this property because we think the layabout loser who hasn’t paid rent in two years deserves a break. Even some of Mamdani’s own staff are these deadbeats that “avoid paying rent”.
As far as the Strait is concerned, yes, it was open before the war, but I am curious if this is your barometer of when a military action should be taken. I guess we should say that the Pacific was open to trade before that meanie FDR decided to fight back against the Japanese. I guess it was better after Obama killed Ghaddafi in Libya which is now a failed state. I guess he thinks “hey, at least we had trade and cotton before stupid Abe went after the South”. “I wish Washington didn’t open this can of worms because now we have no tea and we did have tea before”.
This nitwit is bragging about Biden’s oil production and yet he oddly skips over the fact that his gas prices were higher than Trump’s…and for longer.
Also, note that X didn’t deem to debate the border????
Hullbobby, obviously you’re not a student of history.
No one is arguing that Iran has a clean track record, but the debate is about avoiding another catastrophic, trillion-dollar war. Listing Iran’s hostile history and proxy actions doesn’t mean the only answer is an open-ended military conflict that would destabilize the entire global economy. Pointing out that direct war with Iran would be a strategic disaster isn’t “defending” them; it’s practicing a realistic foreign policy that avoids repeating the exact same multi-decade mistakes made in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The NYC rent freeze isn’t “communism”; it’s a necessary emergency measure to halt a mass homelessness crisis. The Rent Guidelines Board’s landmark 7-1 vote to freeze rents on one- and two-year leases is a response to an unprecedented housing affordability crunch. It does not violate the 5th Amendment, nor does it strip landlords of property ownership. Rent stabilization laws have been repeatedly upheld by courts for decades. Furthermore, property owners still possess legal mechanisms to increase rents to recoup costs for major capital improvements and building-wide infrastructure repairs.
If you want to talk about the border, don’t ignore who actually killed the solution. The left didn’t avoid the border debate; the reality is that the most comprehensive, restrictive, and well-funded bipartisan border security bill in decades was ready to pass Congress. It was explicitly tanked by the right because they preferred to keep the border open as a campaign issue rather than actually vote to pass the funding, personnel, and policy changes needed to fix it.
Diesel is price gouging by dems. Djt refilled the US oil reserve.
You keep repeating this nonesense put out by the media without proof. They want to lure idiots into believing things that make a political point.
GSX: ” Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon.”
Iran admitted to having enough enriched uranium for 11 nuclear weapons.
IAEA breakout threshold time: under a week to 2 weeks
E3 Group: 3 weeks.
What credible scientific group provided the information you quoted above?
S. Meyer, you are really, really gullible.
The claim that “Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon” is not media nonsense—it is the consensus of the United States Intelligence Community. The specific information originates from the U.S. Annual Threat Assessment (ATA) compiled by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). For years, the ODNI, the CIA, and the Defense Intelligence Agency have consistently stated in their unclassified reports that “Iran is not currently undertaking the key nuclear weapons-development activities necessary to produce a testable nuclear device.” Intelligence agencies differentiate between building up a latent capability (enriching uranium) and making the political decision to weaponize it, which U.S. intelligence assesses Iran’s leadership has historically held off on doing.
Iran has never “admitted” to wanting or accumulating material for 11 nuclear weapons. The assertion that Iran openly declared this is false. Iranian leadership, including newly elected President Masoud Pezeshkian at the UN General Assembly, has consistently and publicly insisted that its nuclear program is strictly for peaceful, civilian energy and medical purposes. While Western nations strongly dispute this claim due to Iran’s high level of enrichment, the regime has never publicly broken its official stance to declare a nuclear weapons breakout or admit to building a bomb.
The “breakout time” counts fissile material, not deliverable bombs. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the E3 (France, Germany, and the UK) monitor Iran’s stockpile of 60% enriched uranium. While it is technically true that Iran possesses enough highly enriched uranium that if further purified to 90% weapons-grade could supply multiple devices, the “one to two week” breakout time only measures how long it would take to make the raw fissile material.
Now, S. Meyer, show me how any of this is wrong or incorrect. If you can prove this is incorrect show proof. I provided mine.
Meyer, as usual, X is like a little howdy doody doll that moves its mouth and spits out what the AI hand inside its head dictates. He has no COMPREHENSIVE UNDERSTANDING OF WHAT HE IS SAYING.
too bad his mommy didn’t warn him not to use big words unless he could understand them. ROLF! CUTE! HILarious! those are the only words he truly knows.
THis is the best, frank discussion of the issue that I have seen, published by
someone who knows a little bit more about it than X>
https://www.inss.org.il/publication/iran-nuclear-policy/
LOL!! You have no idea what you’re trying to argue. I completely understand what I research and read. You don’t bother to read at all.
Your attempt to weaponize the INSS report is completely undermined by the fact that you clearly didn’t read it. The analysis published by the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) on August 13, 2026, explicitly refutes the idea that Iran has a unified or successful nuclear strategy. The core thesis of the report is that Iran’s long-standing nuclear threshold doctrine has fundamentally collapsed following recent devastating military campaigns. Far from describing a stable or functional policy, the author describes a panicked, fractured internal debate in Tehran over whether their nuclear program has transformed from an asset into a massive liability.
According to the very paper you linked, senior figures within Tehran increasingly believe their primary strategic card is actually their geographic control over the Strait of Hormuz to shock global energy markets, rather than a military nuclear breakout. The experts you are relying on argue that a small, un-tested nuclear stash would be operationally useless without a second-strike capability and precision delivery systems that Iran simply does not possess. They didn’t need a nuclear weapon. They had something far better. Control of the strait of Hormuz. It’s exactly what they are doing now. Trump or Hegseth had absolutely no clue. They keep thinking “nuclear weapons” when they should have been thinking “secure the strait first”.
That’s why Trump can’t win. He doesn’t have the resources to sustain a military mission into Iran without compromising any more vital defensive missiles like the patriots and THAADS. Trump miscalculated disastrously. And you’re paying or it with increased costs for everything.
See, this is the stupid game X tries to pull on people, and I hope no one is dumb enough to believe his twist.
X clearly states, above, that “Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon.”
That is so facetiously stupid that it borders on psychotic denial.
When X is called out, he changes the argument and premise, instead NOW pretending that his argument was,
“The…International National Security Studies (INSS) on August 13, 2026, explicitly refutes the idea that Iran has a unified or successful nuclear strategy.”
NO ONE, not even Meyer or I, EVER IMPLIED OR SAID that “Iran has a unified or successful nuclear strategy.”
See how georgie works. He thinks that we are dumb enough to not see him pinned to the wall like the donkey in “Pin the Tail on the Donkey” game.
Now he’s our Donkey clown.
GSX: Your reply to me conflicts with the reply to Anonymous. You are all over the map and don’t know where you are coming from or going to. That happens with those addicted to copy-paste and who don’t learn the subject matter.
A. “Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon.”
Vs
B. Iran has “historically held off” on deciding to weaponize
Which is it?
We don’t need to know much more to figure out that GSX doesn’t know what he is talking about. He doesn’t know how to read or learn.
One explanation of the garbage GSX produces is enough. He is a giant waste of time, even when someone is trying to help him.
” They had something far better. Control of the strait of Hormuz.”
That statement by GSX about Hormuz was way overblown and demonstrates that he doesn’t know how to read an article.
And here is another time GSX posted twice where his conclusions didn’t agree.
“The claim that “Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon” is not media nonsense—it is the consensus of the United States Intelligence Community.
GSX: That is not true. You have taken liberties in your attempt to say what the IC said, in an anti-Trump manner, concluding all sorts of negatives presently being shown as lies.
“Iran is not currently building a nuclear weapon” was turned into “Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon.”, The latter is dumb rhetoric meant for the dumbest of the dumb. Iran’s earlier stated positions were that they intended to build a nuclear weapon, but that is talk and not data, just like all of your postings and the rest of your response. It is correct that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon; instead, they are enriching uranium so that when one can say they are building a weapon, it will already be after the fact.
But let us better complete the statement: “Iran is not currently building a nuclear weapon.” BUT IT IS IN A “BETTER POSITION TO PRODUCE ONE, IF IT SO CHOOSES,” Once everything is gathered in one place, the bomb can be built in days.
lets deal with data.
U.S. Intelligence Community’s 2024 assessment:
• Iran had continued increasing its stockpiles of 20% and 60% enriched uranium.
• It was manufacturing and operating increasing numbers of advanced centrifuges.
• Its 20% and 60% stockpiles were “far greater than needed” for its stated purposes.
• Iran had the infrastructure and experience to quickly produce weapons-grade uranium at multiple underground facilities.
• The IC assessed that Iran’s total stockpile, if further enriched, could produce more than a dozen nuclear weapons.
The IAEA adds:
• Iran had accumulated uranium enriched to 60%, something the IAEA calls a serious proliferation concern.
• Iran was the only non-nuclear-weapon state in the world producing and accumulating uranium at 60%.
• The IAEA concluded that Iran had conducted an undeclared structured nuclear program until the early 2000s.
• Iran had repeatedly failed to provide technically credible answers about unresolved safeguards issues.
GSX, let’s stop with your foolish interpretation of “Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon” and draw conclusions based on data. Iran “IS IN A “BETTER POSITION TO PRODUCE ONE, IF IT SO CHOOSES,”
Meyer, agree.
I think X’s real problem is that he is just trying to discredit Turley and those who follow this blog.
He’s got some kind of personal problem.
I already responded with facts instead of words that evolve and say what you want them to say. You can reply to that response since this is more of the same. But in the meantime, “Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon” was never said and evolved from wording that can mean a lot of different things, but the rest of that idea was that Iran “IS IN A BETTER POSITION TO PRODUCE ONE, IF IT SO CHOOSES.” Presently, it is building components for a nuclear weapon, not a nuclear weapon. When all the components are in one spot, it could complete building a nuclear weapon in a matter of days.
If socialism can stop landlords and business owners and managers from being cruel and unfair, then how is this a failure?
If I am dissatisfied with my landlord I can move. If I am unhappy with a business I can go somewhere else. If I don’t like my manager I can look for a new job. How do I avoid a government that I want to stop meddling in my private affairs and decisions?
Currentsitguy, sure of you can afford it. But most can’t. So dealing with bad landlords and property not up to code and bad businesses improves the ability of those who can’t afford to do the thing you facially can it keeps those who help keep the city viable happy and more productive.
Crappy landlords are crappy for a reason. When the city from which they benefit also requires them to be fair and keep their properties which they CHOSE to buy and maintain up to code are also accountable to the city. Not just the tenants. They made that choice. If they can’t handle the requirements let a better landlord take over.
You always have a choice. Life entails risk and sometimes hardship. Sometimes bad things happen to good people who played by the rules and did everything right. No one needs an intercessor they did not want and did not ask for. The most important thing you can have is your freedom and autonomy. If you are not living your life on your own terms you are nothing more than a slave to interests that are not yours and are not to your benefit. NEVER give up control of your life to someone else, particularly someone (namely government) who has the literal power of life and death over you. Starvation and abject poverty are preferable.
Currentsitguy,
You are correct.
I have faced hardship on more than a few occasions. But I still had choices. More than a few were not easy but I took the hard path and came out of my previous position for the better.
“sure of you?”
Aren’t you the same dude that made fun of someone’s typo “are”
maybe you’re just a poor little ole tenant who is against the world. Sure sounds like it everyday, always picking on what others say
Some of the most rapacious capitalist institutions on the planet – universities – turn out 10’s of thousands of little commies every year who are resentful of the debt these institutions impose on them. But they somehow are taught to blame everyone BUT the people who put them in debt. Good trick.
ROFL! Professor Turley sure loves a good spin—especially when his target audience is the most easily triggered, emotionally fragile crowd on the internet. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out why this poll shows a growing acceptance of ‘socialism.’ To be more accurate, voters are looking at Democratic Socialism—the kind practiced in the Nordic countries—as a viable escape hatch from this mess.
Honestly, more than half of the commenters in this thread have absolutely no clue what socialism actually means. To them, it’s just a scary buzzword interchangeable with Communism, Marxism, Fascism, or whatever other ‘ism’ keeps them up at night. It’s hilarious to watch.
Turley is literally running a masterclass in rage-baiting, tuning the right into a frothing, crazy-eyed rant-fest just to sell his books.
The reason the ‘good kind’ of socialism is looking so attractive right now is simple: Trump and his Republicans have utterly failed to deliver on their promises, and things are getting exponentially worse. Gas and diesel prices have spiked so high under this administration that people are actively looking for new jobs just to avoid driving. Inflation is still climbing, making everyday life unaffordable. And let’s not forget the data centers. Trump and the GOP hyped them up like the second coming, but their completely unregulated construction has caused massive water shortages, skyrocketing utility bills, and rampant noise pollution. Now, hilariously late to the party, those same Republicans are pulling wild 180s—suddenly denouncing the very data centers they greenlit because they desperately need something to campaign on.
It’s pretty pathetic. Congress just went into recess extra early because the Speaker was terrified of an impeachment vote on Pete Hegseth. So, how exactly are they planning to pass legislation to help their constituents deal with these rising prices? You know, the literal exact thing they ran on?
What we are witnessing isn’t a ‘socialist takeover’—it’s the systemic failure of Trump’s policies, with the rest of the GOP following him over the cliff like a bunch of clueless, loyal little lemmings.
Another entirely predictable comment from Mr. Lax.
YAWN!
Bingo Mr. X. Keep preaching! We are reading!!!!!
And laughing our azzes off at your crap!
Eating tasty zoo animals. Brought to you by socialism.
Three decades of teacher unions indoctrination and lies pays off..
Read Howard Zinn while chomping on zebra leg.
I thought you would be enjoying the imported beef rejects from Brazil Trump brought for YOUR consumption. They are cheap for a reason. Not even the Chinese would take that.
Another inconvenient truth that Turley faithful don’t want to know about….
Zoo food
I think one of the problems is that now more half of those alive are too young to remember the world and the absolute misery of the Communist World before the fall of the Iron Curtain. I’ve actually read people now trying to say the East Germans had it made before the fall of the Berlin Wall. They have no knowledge of the murder of those trying to leave, or of the vast networks of secret police who could get you pulled in for questioning, or far, far worse, merely for a frustrated complaint or off color joke. They have no memory of the practice in the Soviet Union for forcibly confining outspoken critics to mental hospitals because “only the crazy could not realize they were living in the Worker’s Paradise”. They downplay or outright dismiss the Gulags and political prisons unless your name is Hasan Piker who seems to think these things are a feature, not a bug in the world he wants to bring about.
The problem is it’s not communism. The sort of ‘socialism’ that is looking more attractive is the same kind of ‘socialism’ being practiced in Nordic countries. Democratic socialism.
Our poorly educated Republican voters can’t tell the difference between the different kinds of socialism, Marxism, communism and fascism. So they bunch them all together and view them as one and the same. That’s what one would call pure ignorance and poor education. Steve Witherspoon is a great example of a poorly educated and emotionally unstable individual who cannot grasp reality for fear of realizing things are not as bad as his reality makes it out to be.
Why is the leader of the free world such a fanboy of the leader of the Chinese Communist Party?