There's a line of reasoning circulating among conservatives used to discredit political progressives, social justice Christians, Occupy Wall Streeters, and their so called "socialist" agenda that is almost satanic in nature."You don't see babies with distended bellies in America so quit your whining!" they say. As if being poor, unemployed, homeless, and hungry in America is one of the benefits of American Exceptionalism.
Let's begin with conceding the point so that we can move on to the satanic nature of the argument. Yes, you're better off being poor in America than being poor in Afghanistan or Somalia. Using that line of reasoning to do nothing however, is pure evil. And that is what the neo and theocons would have us do. If anything, doing nothing in a country like ours when we have the ability to change our situation is at least as reprehensible as those that do nothing in countries without our resources.
And do not forget, the same people making this argument are the ones in full-throated roar to wage war on those countries. It's as if bombing them into regime change is their way of helping those babies with distended bellies. The same people arguing that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme gleefully spend trillions on bombs and war machines, all the while demanding that food aid to the Third World is out of control and must be cut or stopped.
So yes, I'm grateful to live in America and not Bangladesh, but is it socialism to say we can do better?
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