Dems make no sense in moaning a wailing over this one event when it is just a blip on the radar of what Antifa/BLM have done.

First, it is because the Left is in control of 97% of the political loyalty of the mainstream media outlets and therefore what matters is ONLY what the MSM and the Dem Party's politicians SAY is important.

Thus who paid ANTIFA's and BLM's radicals living wage plus free room and board for a year to methodically riot, loot, burn, mug, and murder WHILE leftist politicians looked the other way and blocked republicans from taking any action is never going to be investigated, period.

I thought it would die down after the first few weeks. The left just won't drop this. Those riots are nothing compared to England destroying the Capitol Bldg or the Marxist Weather The Weather Underground set off a bomb in the Capitol Bldg. It was not insurrection nor was it a war. It was not planned, organized or even spurred on by President Trump.

Some of the people arrested were Antifa members.

If this was organized and planned it was planned by the Democrats with the intention of trying to pin this all on Trump so that he could never be eligible to run for any political office ever again.

It was not even close to the worst insurrection in this country. That was the Civil War. After that it is the spread of Marxism in this country. Marx hated America and his followers today all hate America and everything it was founded on. Their ideology is both foreign to this nation and unwanted. It is slavery. There is no getting Marxism right this time because it is the foundation of socialism that it is built on that concentrates far too much power into the hand of the oligarchy by stealing that power from the individual. Both Antifa and BLM (the organization) are heavily Marxist. They are not fighting for the benefit of America, they are fighting for it's destruction.

Because, you see, the people in Congress matter. The peons who were murdered or saw their livelihoods destroyed don’t.

Unfortunately that is true. If us peons mattered then the government would have shut down Antifa/BLM the same day they started.

It is probably exaggerated to be the worst, but its the first time in recent history that a group has tried to change an election by force. There is also the gallows humor of a group that has mocked the left for having protests turn into riots having the same thing happen.

Some of the people arrested were Antifa members. - source? Because I don't think so.

Democrats tricked them into doing it. - Personal responsibility for the win.

You can hate Socialism and Communism, but you really should join us in the real world and realize that what Marx wrote about was the working-class rising up against the aristocrats to form a classless society. You can call it naïve, you can call it wrong, but to make it sound like he is an evil mastermind is just laughable. The guy was a philosopher who paid his bills by writing books and political commentary.

Marx - writing about the Civil War
"The workingmen of Europe feel sure that, as the American War of Independence initiated a new era of ascendancy for the middle class, so the American anti-slavery war will do for the working classes. They consider it an earnest of the epoch to come that it fell to the lot of Abraham Lincoln, the single-minded son of the working class, to lead the country through the matchless struggle for the rescue of an enchained race and the reconstruction of a social world."

And speaking specifically of Lincoln "The new world has never achieved a greater triumph than by this demonstration that, given its political and social organization, ordinary people of good will can accomplish feats which only heroes could accomplish in the old world!" << Just dripping with hate.../s

Here is one. He is BLM not Antifa but then really aren't they the same thing?
https://nypost.com/2021/01/15/who-is-john-sullivan-accused-provocateur-charged-in-capitol-riot/

I wonder if that quote has been sanitized so that modern cultural Marxists don't "cancel" Marx. Marx thought Africans had an inferior intellect.

Show me one Communist nation that has ever achieved the dream you seek. Just one.

It doesn't happen because it robs political power from the individual and concentrates it in the hands of the central planners (aka the oligarchs). It does not matter how wonderful what Marx may have said and what his dreams were the fact is that as long as toxic narcissists exist they will always be drawn to power. This is why in the history of the world there has only been about 5% of the people who have ever known any type of freedom.

The labor theory of value, which Marx incorporated into his own economic philosophy, was already proved wrong before he took it. It is the idea that labor sets the value of goods and services. Why this does not work is because it means that even if you produce a product that no one wants you should be paid the same as someone who produces a product that people want because you worked just as hard.

Unless the government is involved with controlling the means of production the business that produces the product no one wants will collapse. That is important that bad businesses are allowed to collapse because it makes room for better businesses who offer better products to succeed.

When the government controls the means of production - you can say it is the collective who controls the means of production but the collective does not have a voice, it is the central planners who are the voice of the collective and that is the government - then bad businesses are propped up. We found out how wrong that was with Bush's "too big to fail" nonsense.

Also when all workers are paid the same then the exceptional workers stop being exceptional. This causes a rippling effect to where the only solution is to enforce quotas. Because eugenics has always been a part of all socialist movements and Marxism is just another variation of socialism, then not only quotas are enforced but if a person cannot meet that quota the value of their life is considered lower. They are exterminated so that they do not take the resources of those who the central planners deem as more valuable.

This is the problem that Marxism has always caused.

I'm not a Marxist, no matter how much you claim it. All the 'isms' are flawed. How about you point me to a capitalist country that achieved your dream? Bearing in mind that in pure capitalism there can be no regulation. You let the market correct itself and rely on the 'invisible hand'. You can't because there aren't any. In pure capitalism you would let medicines be sold without going through the FDA. If they kill their customers, that's just the market correcting itself. If a skyscraper collapses, the builder goes out of business.

In all modern functional countries there are a mix. Our modern arguments are how to adjust the mix. Except for the people who still think its either or, which is not really paying attention.

Capitalism - anywhere we do want profit to be the motive and we are willing for their to be variance in quality. So most things. Capitalism is best for innovation.

Communism - Public and national parks, public lands, as well as roads are communal. Nobody owns them - we all do.

Socialism - Fire Departments, Police, the armed forces, etc. - (not the traditional socialist definition, but not privatized) - Highly regulated and we don't want profit to motivate them. We don't want fire departments competing (that actually used to happen and it was bad, remember "gangs of new york"?), we don't want cops to be paid on number of arrests or people shot. We don't want them to have to write enough tickets to cover their salary.

"Capitalism - anywhere we do want profit to be the motive and we are willing for their to be variance in quality. So most things. Capitalism is best for innovation."

You say you're not a Marxist but you talk just like one. If you really understood capitalism you would realize that it is the consumer who is benefited. You are also looking at the profit motive as a bad thing. When a business earns a profit they can afford to pay their employees, they can afford to pay the business that supplies the materials that go in to the production of their products. If a business earns enough profits they can expand and when they do that they create more jobs.

So when all of the employees earn their wages they buy food, clothing etc and that causes other businesses to be able to afford to pay their employees.

None of this cannot happen unless people are free.

Nothing else gives this kind of freedom to the individual. Nothing.

When you realize this then the money that the business owners earn is irrelevant to you. If you work for his/her business you need to worry if they are going to make a profit or else you will need to look for another job.

When you realize that wealth is generated for both the buyer and the seller then it makes no difference how much money someone else has because wealth is not finite. It is only limited by the absence of freedom. The less free the individual is then less wealth is created.

No other form of political or economic system can even come close to that. It doesn't matter about public and national parks, it doesn't matter about public lands, or roads. That can all be produced by private individuals. You don't need the government for any of that.

The government taking care of that for you is counter productive and does not produce wealth. It destroy it because if you create a national park is Maine and I never go to Maine, let alone a national park in Maine, then you have taken money from me that I will never recoup. I get no return on my forced investment. Fortunately I have been to Maine and it is a very beautiful state.

That mix that you and others talk about will never give us the prosperity that would have and could have. It does nothing but make us less and less free.

The reason this talk gets zero traction with progressives anymore is you ignore Canada and European countries who have implemented stronger social safety nets and still have comparable GDP and quality of living. You want to call everything socialism that isn't pure libertarian capitalism? Fine. Don't complain that we don't think its a bad word.

I'm in pretty high tax bracket, and if I benefit with things how they are. But I also see that things could be better for a whole lot of people. Also, things like free college...I really feel like other countries are going to eat our lunch. In a global marketplace, a lot of tech work can be done anywhere. If college prices keep going up, we will have fewer people go to college. Its penny wise, pound foolish.

Libertarians accuse everyone else of ignoring human nature... You ignore the fact that without regulation monopolies squash competition. A big company will lower its prices and operate at a loss until their competition goes under. They buy up the smaller companies. And you think companies and individuals would build roads and everything would be hunky dory? You should look at the state of broadband and the things they do to prevent competition. Companies would build roads, charge the max they could get away with. Unless resources are expended to build multiple interstates, there isn't really competition.

Currently we have generic medicines that aren't being made because the pharmaceutical companies have arrangements to not make them. Look up 'pay to delay'. This is what happens in regulated capitalism - companies find loopholes in the regulations. And you want the regulations to go away?

Your claims that I am ignoring Europe or that I ignore that "monopolies squash competition" are bogus.

What you are missing is that you have never lived any different than how we live now. Neither have I. We have been living in The Matrix so to speak and think this is normal or that this is what America is all about. Then you go back and read what the founding fathers tried and succeeded in giving us is nothing at all like what we have right now. How much freer or better our lives were.

Yes I am well aware that technology has advanced and people live longer and easier lives but that would have never happened as fast as it did if it where not for the freedoms that we once had.

Consumer demand prohibits monopolies. People do not like monopolies and they stop buying products from them. The only way a monopoly can exist outside of the free market is when the government prop them up.

In fact the federal government IS a monopoly. It wasn't always a monopoly. The 10th amendment put the state's rights above that of the federal government. If a person didn't like how their state was run they voted with their feet and moved to another state. Now the federal government is more powerful than the states and no one seems to care. They don't even realize that the fed IS a monopoly.

In a free market businesses rise and fall with much greater frequency. There is just no way for them to form a monopoly without government assistance. And that is just what the government does. Large corporations pay billions of dollars to send lobbyists to congress to try to gain a competitive edge. That is exactly the wrong place for them to go but far too often if they don't sent lobbyists then their competition will have the government regulate them out of business.

And that is what you and so many misinformed Americans think that free market economics is all about. In order for a market to be completely free it require anarchy (i.e. no government at all). I do not support anarchy because I think a small limited government has its purpose. None of its purposes include regulating businesses to death. We think stealing money from the productive to create social safety nets is better than private charities, or families. We just can't be bothered with taking care of grandma so we stick her in a nursing home. We have intellectualized God out of existence and stopped learning how to be moral at our churches.

How much freer and better our lives were - I won't even go the route of 'unless you were a woman or black or...' because I assume you would have those rules applied evenly to all races, but you just want to keep the base freedoms. I still disagree though, but I'm not going into the nitty gritty of history and the reasons laws were passed and freedoms have evolved the way they have. But that's the tact I would take - tell me the specific law or reg you take issue with and look up why it was passed.

Consumer demand prohibits monopolies - in Adam Smith's fantasies. The whole point of a monopoly is you deny people choice. In the good old days where a monopoly would be limited to a city or town, that would have been possibly true (I doubt it, but I won't argue). But on todays scales? Amazon has setup algorithms that monitor price changes on their competitors sites and lower their price in relation to drive the competitors out of business. Businesses make deals to support each other. I'm sorry but the market always self correcting is naïve.

The federal government is a monopoly - that's a stretch. But whatever. Move to a different country the same as you would have moved states.

There would be no way to form monopolies...how do you figure? One business buys another, deals are made.

Without federal government to lobby, local officials would be lobbied, and it there was nobody making rules, business interests would look to other ways to press their advantage. Look at what businesses do to force individuals to sell their property. Its all just good business.

But we have historical examples of before there were safety nets. Again, every regulation you have issue with, go back and look at why it was passed. Why did we pass child labor laws? Why do we have laws about dumping waste? Because businesses did it and would continue to do it if they could.

Free market is anarchy - yes. but like most anarchists, you fail to acknowledge that people form structure in a vacuum, and it generally sucks. The Mafia formed in part because police wouldn't take complaints from Italians seriously. Union busting is just good business. Moving production to China to save a nickel. Lying to people about the fact that things would be so much better without regulation.

"How much freer and better our lives were - I won't even go the route of 'unless you were a woman or black or...' because I assume you would have those rules applied evenly to all races, but you just want to keep the base freedoms."

Yes and thank you. I fully mean that all liberties and rights apply equally to all races. I have no intention, desire or want to bring back slavery. That is repulsive to me. How could be so adamantly against socialism, communism, Nazism and fascism because of the loss of private property rights and then turn right around and say except blacks, it is okay for them to lose their property rights. That is not who I am. If one isn't free than none of are free.

"Consumer demand prohibits monopolies - in Adam Smith's fantasies."

Who is going to protect that monopoly when their consumer base refuses to do business with them? Bad business models, including monopolies, can never last if they cannot sell a product or hire descent employees. It is up to the consumer. And if the consumer is happy only having one choice then that is the decision that they free to make.

In a free market monopolies cannot run to the government for protection. If a new business starts up and competes with them then, yes, they can try to buy them out. And yes, they can try to go to their suppliers and stop them supplying products to the new business but they cannot make any of them do anything. They cannot make the new startup sell and they cannot make the new startup's suppliers not sell of them.

In a free market no one business has power over another.

Plus you are assuming that ALL businesses want to operate as a monopoly.

I would say more but I have to leave now. Maybe I'll address this later.

If I haven’t made it clear, let me try this - communism, socialism, capitalism. They all look great on paper. They all have the same flaw - people. People looking to twist things to their benefit. If 9 out of 10 businesses won’t cross a line, number 10 will.

I think you might underestimate the pressures at the low income levels. In high school and college I got paid shit. And even though where I worked was being hurt by wal mart, the fact is that’s where I could afford to shop. People but from Amazon even though they shouldn’t - not morally, but just from a pure economics position. Sometimes you have to pay predatory interest because that’s all that’s offered.

I am fully willing to trade some profit and volatility for stability. I think most people are.

What I saw when I skimmed through was basically contortions of what these things are to the point of looking like satire.

And to add - Monopoly, Oligarchy, and Crony Capitalism is NOT a part of Capitalism.

They are THE fruitiion of Capitalism, the normal course Capitalism heads in when unfettered by regulation.

Exactly. I don't use the phrase "crony capitalism" because it has nothing to do with capitalism. Instead I call it corporatism. Our founding fathers called it mercantilism.

A newer designation has shown up with the big tech giants. It's called corporate socialism.

"I don't use the phrase "crony capitalism" because it has nothing to do with capitalism. Instead I call it corporatism. "

"crony capitalism" has nothing to do with "capitalism"?
k

“Some of the people arrested were Antifa members. - source?”

You’re welcome.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/02/update-blm-antifa-organizer-john-sullivan-arrested-storming-us-capitol-bashing-windows-writing-book-paid-video-trump-supporters-rot-jail/

John Earle Sullivan is a "crowdfunded video journalist" and founder of http://www.insurgenceusa.com/
"Insurgence USA's mission is to provide you the truth. We are on the frontlines, giving you unedited raw footage, photos, and news of the insurrection here in America.

Revealing the truth about Antifa and BLM's communist plans to overthrow democracy.

Exposing the sinister motives of Proud Boys and Right-Wing militias as they plot to topple the government.

Welcome to the revolution."

Got anyone else?

Gateway Pundit is a laughable source. Try again.

Unlike the New York Times, the Gateway Pundit has never helped cover up a genocide. Screw your “reliable sources”.

Oldest trick in the book - ask for a link, citation, or source and then when you don't like the message criticize the messenger.

“The guy was a philosopher who paid his bills by writing books and political commentary.”

The guy was a useless, exploitative, abusive sack of shit who sponged off of a rich friend.

That may be true, but he also supported Unions and was a big part of the labor movement that worked to prevent the British from recognizing the Confederacy and lending them aid.

He definitely got most of his money through his friend with the equivalent of a trust fund.

I'm not saying anyone has to like him. But really, the guy is more L. Ron Hubbard than he is Mussolini.

Seriously???? Mussolini was a Marxist. He studied Marx. Marx also hated Jews and wanted them all exterminated. L. Ron Hubbard was just crazy dude with some bizarre religious ideas. As far as I know Hubbard never wanted anyone to be exterminated.

I think who Marx was directly related to his philosophy. He was a misanthropic narcissist who had no clue about human behavior. He thought that we would all be better off living as ants in some collectivist ant colony.

He supported unions because they are the last vestige of the labor theory of value.

Marx believed that a person's value was determined by the labor he/she performed. Today far too many people cannot separate a person's value as a human being from the value of his/her labor. They are not that same thing and never ever should they be confused. The value of an individual is infinite. The value of their labor can change and improve with experience and then start to devalue with age. If you look at people the way Marx did then you only assess them by their labor.

Despite what I'm writing below, I'm not defending Marxism. He was a professor writing about working people...he thought he knew things that were just theories. He wasn't evil though.

That's my point. Marx created communism/Socialism in the same way Hubbard created scientology. I think Marx believed what he wrote and some good (and some very bad) ideas were developed from his writing.

per the Holocaust Encyclopedia,
"Although Karl Marx's own attitude toward Judaism has been characterized as ambivalent at best and hostile at worst, his books were burned in 1933 because of both his Jewish heritage and his socialist ideology. Marx was already named an ideological enemy in Hitler's early writings."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_antisemitism_in_the_United_States
In a 1938 poll, approximately 60 percent of the respondents held a low opinion of Jews, labeling them "greedy," "dishonest," and "pushy."[29] 41 percent of respondents agreed that Jews had "too much power in the United States," and this figure rose to 58 percent by 1945.[30] Several surveys taken from 1940 to 1946 found that Jews were seen as a greater threat to the welfare of the United States than any other national, religious, or racial group.

So, while yes, some of his writings seem to reflect anti-Semitism, that's like pointing out someone in the 1700's owned a slave, or in the early 20th century believed in Eugenics. Its unfortunate, but expected.

Mussolini - He was Marxist when he thought it would get him power.

Mussolini's writings eventually indicated that he had abandoned Marxism and egalitarianism in favor of Nietzsche's übermensch concept and anti-egalitarianism... After being ousted by the Italian Socialist Party for his support of Italian intervention, Mussolini made a radical transformation, ending his support for class conflict and joining in support of revolutionary nationalism transcending class lines.

Well, he also founded the ideology that killed about 100 million people in the 20th century & oppressed 100s of millions more. So he’s got that going for him.

Would you consider slaves in America and elsewhere to be killed or oppressed by capitalism? The people killed in the civil war? Native Americans and the trail of tears?

I wouldn't, but then I think such blame games are generally politically motivated.

People often act in their own self interest and use religion or politics to justify it. Whichever one the people are most likely to accept at the time.

A lot of authoritarians threw the communist or socialist stamp on their shit. A better question would be whether there are any genuine communist revolutions that have occurred. I don't think so, since they were supposed to arise from the working class, and that isn't what happened in most cases.

Wow! “Real communism has never been tried.” So original! So brilliant! Any other stunning words of wisdom you’d like to contribute?

You didn't answer my questions.

To my knowledge there has been no revolution like Marx pictured. The workers rising up hasn't happened - its always been someone else. I'm not saying it to defend Marx - if anything he was clearly wrong in his predictions.

Instead you usually have a coup or a more traditional revolution backed by a different faction.
if a General says "hey we are having a Communist revolution", that is by its very nature, not a communist revolution as Marx envisioned it.

If you want to blame some of the expanded writings that built on Marx - maybe. I'm not all that familiar with them. But unless the source philosophy actually says to do the things you say are because of Marxism, then its no more fair to blame Marxism than to blame capitalism for things that happened under it.

Now, if I'm wrong, and there is an updated version of Communist doctrine that says to do all the evil, then I would agree that that version can be blamed if anyone followed it.

Yes I can. Because. Any questions?