Is social policy in socialism just a substitute for economic policy?
Socialism was primarily, of course, a system of economics. Marx and other Marxists wanted first and foremost to eliminate the capitalists, the exploitation of labor, and the property rights of the capitalist system. In the desire to eliminate all the old, reactionary institutions of society, different sorts of attacks were made on marriage, education, youth programs, and other traditions. It was therefore quite natural that when the economic program failed to prove effective, agreeable, or even viable, socialists would turn to other political pursuits.
What role did religion play in President Obama’s politics? What religion?
In the case of the Obama administration, it was not immediately apparent that it would be so. The Obamas adopted Christianity, although the president’s heart was quite apparently captivated by Islam. Of course, his father’s dreams were Muslim and according to Muslim doctrine, everyone is born Muslim and remains so until they join some infidel religious institution. The President doubtless identifies with the faith of his father; he clearly had no grasp of Christian doctrines in spite of his joining Reverend Wright’s congregation. Reverend Wright tipped his hand in the first Obama campaign for the presidency when he publicly spoke for “black liberation theology,” which is an offshoot of Latin American “liberation theology,” a doctrine of Marxist “Christians” that appears to have had some influence on Pope Francis. President Obama has spoken openly and ardently of Muslim culture; there were few signs of religious devotion in his emotional attachment to Islam.
President Obama’s legacy is that he installed socialism into the democrat party. He was very popular, so traditional democrats stood by quietly as he opened the way for a takeover of the party by radicals.
President Obama and environmental policy
His greatest convictions seemed to lie in the realm of environmental policy. He was perfectly willing to watch the spread of unemployment that accompanied his anti-employment environmental efforts. On the other hand, I personally believe his efforts to persuade China and India that they should make contributions toward any worldwide effort to stem global warming was on the right track. If they do not make efforts to curb the growth of carbon, anything the U.S. does will be far too little. The reasonable approach, however, to whatever man-made global warming there may be is simply to accommodate to its consequences as well as possible. To let hundreds of thousands, or even millions of workers subsist in unemployment in order not to reduce global warming by half a degree Fahrenheit seems far from prudent policy.
Did Obama wish to generalize human rights? For the LGBT community, yes indeed.
President Obama’s greatest social policy concern seems to have been in securing civil rights for the LGBT community. It is amazing to me that the LGBT community has gained formal and legal recognition so quickly in the United States. Sodomy laws were perfectly acceptable to our society from the founding of the colonies until the Supreme Court ruled in Lawrence v. Texas in 2003 that it is unconstitutional to bar consensual sex between adults, calling it a violation of the 14th Amendment. Social sentiment against homosexuality had existed as an integral part of the Judeo-Christian tradition for well over two millennia. One would think it might take more than a decade or two to convince Christians who always read that homosexuality is unacceptable to the God of the Bible.
It does seem refreshing to consider that that issue is between God and the homosexuals. God has commanded people to love one another and to leave the issue of theological judgment to Him. He has not required of Christians to embrace what has always been thought of among them as sin, but they are required to embrace those subject to it. My personal belief is that the LGBT community should also recognize the rights of Christians to practice their religion freely as mandated by the U.S. constitution. Please be aware, my friend, that I respect your right to believe what you do, so long as it does no damage to others.
The purpose of this blog is merely to acknowledge that human rights are a highly important issue to socialists or progressives. I speculate that it currently plays a role larger than it otherwise might if socialists had more to say about economic policy. The long book I wrote on socialism is really focused on economics and does not address either the issues of Islam or of social policy, although I am greatly interested in the interplay between socialism and freedom. Nor do I find the issue of human rights for the unborn without interest.
The final BHO contribution to American politics remained unknown for several years after he ended his term as president. It was that he weaponized the Justice Department and the FBI to serve as the secret police for the democrat party. Under Obama the FBI developed the Russia Russia Russia Conspiracy Theory that President Trump was an agent of Russia. The FBI spied on President Trump and his campaign, then subsequently on the presidency, striving diligently to feed the public all the lies that were the preoccupation of the democrats and the captive media for those years. Those lies were ultimately debunked, but those who derive their “knowledge” of public events from the propaganda arm of the party would never hear the truth from the “media.”
