tv Cross Talk RT August 13, 2021 12:30am-1:01am EDT
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as contributing each in their own way, but we also know that this crisis will not go on forever. the challenge is paid for the response has been massive. so me, good people are helping us. it makes us feel very proud that we are together in the and unexpected upside of the pandemic kenya's experiencing. and elephant baby boom. 200. why does kenya have so many allison carves and how has the panoramic impacted people's lives? there's a wall, it's fairly big along in any fact he end up killing himself. i don't live on a lease and then you go and buy a car. well, and i will make the was,
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i didn't mean that did you get i can let me in to because neither of the one, anybody who did the they didn't even notice whether the calls you go, there's no local but i know the company just wasn't go or whatever it is, me the ah ah hello and welcome to cross talk. we're all things considered. i'm peter lavelle.
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americans had a long and contentious history with the word socialism for conservative. most often it is a dirty word, even unpatriotic. for many liberals, it's about social justice in compassion. however, for better or worse that remains red line within the electorate. ah, ah. the cross talking socialism, i'm joined by my guess kayla mauppin in new york. he is a journalist and political analysts and r t in miami. we have sariah foss, she is a former us presidential candidate, and in atlanta, we have the don jones, she's an attorney and a former state director for bernie sanders in 2016 or in cross cross and effect. that means you can jump in anytime you want, and i always appreciate it, caleb being, let me go to you 1st because we've kind of bumped heads in the past about this issue here. what, what does socialism mean to you? and, and i really want to make it very clear here. i don't really want to go into the
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pros and cons of it. i want to talk about the meaning of it in, in the context of american politics because everyone knows i'm a conservative, but i have to show my cards a little bit here. i'm really tired of conservatives throwing that word out. is it, is it really means much any more go ahead. gala in new york. will the essence of socialism in the sense that karl marx and vladimir line and others wrote about the essence of it is growth and progress. the idea is the means of production. the banks, factories, major industries should be organized to serve public good and liberated from the anarchy of production and the chaos of the market. and if we can get beyond profits in command, human growth and creativity can be unlimited and you know, wealth can expand for all is deciding, you know, in a rational society and a socialist society. self driving cars would be a great thing because then there would be less work for everybody. but under capitalism, technological progress leads to poverty and instability. the more efficient it
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becomes to produce things, the fewer people you have to hire less people are getting paid in wages and we lead to the disaster we're seeing in the west right now, which is a high tech low wage economy where working people who can only only work so long as their work and riches a boss, they are, they are left outcast and starving as the means of production get more and more efficient. and socialism is about overcoming the irrationality of profits in command having a centrally planned economy. so that grows can be unlimited. ok, so how does the, how do you define it? because what, what we just heard from kayla beer is that everything is centralized, essentially by the state. okay. and historically, in the 20th century, we've seen that is problematic at the very least. but i think that caleb, i gave him credit. that is basically the, the, the, the bones and flesh. but the idea is all about go ahead in miami, your thoughts? i think more than anything, the fear that everybody has that socialism at the end will lead to communism will
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lead to a craft with 8 less than an end to capitalism, you know, within society. and that's the theory that everybody has when they hear the work. socialism, kale, more or less, you know, something as to what the, you know, what the original definition of what should me. okay. well, it was good with down here because now we're kind of kind of circle the wagons around really what's going on here because it's, you know, progress on one side. clearly the, the theory of it here. but the practice is about who has the power and i think that that's, that's really the debate here. yeah, i mean, is it is a good day give the state all power or give it to oligarchy. i mean, if you're home on the lower ring of this high, he doesn't really make any difference. go ahead and atlanta. so one very important component that was left out is that it is not socialism. if it is not connected, it's not democratic, right? and so it's not just a government making decision, it is people who are left by the individual who will be running the system that
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makes it socialism, right? it's about a means of production. so the people who will be educated in the system elect, the officials who decide how the system works and then we can all equally use the system. so that's a very important component of socialism. as it is today is involved is a component of democracy. and so there are not oligarchy who can come in and make decisions unchecked. they have to be elected and appointed by the people, just like they can be removed by the people. if they don't ensure that everyone has a bite at the apple for those important things like energy, transportation, health care, education, housing, all of those things that we all need right here all the time throughout the entire world. okay. okay, well i mean if it's that idea like, and i and i actually hear an echo of bernie sanders there and, and i have to admit ladon, it's turning into ancient history. but i've said repeatedly on this program and 2016,
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there were only 2 candidates that i follow that was donald trump and bernie sanders . ok. so because his message does resonate, resonate with people and with a lot of conservatives, believe it or not. ok, caleb, so i mean in the american context, because, i mean, i believed around the world. i've lived most of my entire life, not my adult life, my entire life in different countries in the world and all of them have had health care, all of them. okay. some of them better than others here. so why is it that america can take best practices? because that's the question i ask myself all of the time. go ahead, caleb. well, part of the rise of neo liberal economics, milton friedman and iran, and alan greenspan was pushing this notion that any involved by the government in the economy is by definition, socialism and leading to communism. and a lot of americans believe that if they pay taxes, that that is socialism. a lot of americans believe that the post office is socialism. but all capitalist economies have state actors and state governments
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spending to some degree or other. i mean, you have to have a road, you know, to facilitate people going and shopping and capital is stores. and the notion that any state sector is somehow somehow communism and we should get beyond it. that was introduced in the united states during the 1900 seventy's. really we saw the rise of this kind of economic thinking and it has led to big economic problems. look at the united states crumbling infrastructure. i mean, the rust belt economic, u. k. you know, we've got a system of prisons for profit military contractors. i mean we're seeing, we're seeing neo liberal 3 market extremism brought to its logical conclusion in the united states. and i think that i think that it's those ideas that say that any involvement by the government, any social welfare state is, you know, you should immediately think of joseph stalin, that kind of thinking has led to big problems in the states. but that's why the term is now being used so loosely is that, you know, we've been program through the cold war to just, you know,
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had this got hostile reaction to anything associated with communism. so now it's useful, you know, as replacing an economic problem to point at those who would want to resolve it or implement measures that are designed to address it and say, hi, you're a communist. it's no, it's okay with the absolute right. i mean, conservatives and progressives, you know, there's a lot to discuss among ourselves a lot and a lot of progress can be made. but then we have the, the neal liberals, we have the, the establishment here, they throw in the hangar again. it's called socialism and then they make everyone argue about it. ok, that's think and tired of that because the conservatives and progresses have a lot in common. if we give each other a chance instead of letting me neil liberals mediate the conversation with them. so i was saying that really in miami, one of the things really bothers me about the socialism to be there's plenty of socialism in the american economy. and that's the coddling of big business by the government. you know, when there's a crisis who gets bailed out, 1st big, big, big companies. ok. i really resent that. i resent that
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a lot. ok. and we saw that in 2008. and then we thought last year and through this year with the pandemic. ok if you're rich and powerful, you're going to get computer service. that's socialism in my mind. and i don't like that kind of socialism. go ahead in miami. i think that's one of the big issues that we're having in there we're seeing today is that these bigger corporations are the ones that are getting the bail out. and the people who really need it, the middle class and the lower cost, you know, they're the ones that are having a more difficult time because we don't see it even when it comes to the stimulus. you know, all these billions of dollars are going to help all the corporations and it's not really coming to the people. if we were to really divided the, well, you know what it is they want to help the economy. they would go directly to the people from the start, what, you know, but yeah, yeah, but i mean, got a good, let's go back to la dom, because about what about the democratic process here? it seems to me, you know, when you, when i look at polling, i looked at a lot of galler pulling right before the presidential election is that there is
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a huge myth out there. a lot of people want assistance. they want to have some kind of like pre k paid for. i'm for it. ok. community college free. i'm for it. okay, absolutely. for it. okay. you have to give people a stake in society, but then, you know, then it's, you know, a bill is past and it's all the old out to these. this is education, industrial complex, and then they suck up all the money and they get teach their kids trash. that's my opinion. go ahead when you hit the nail on the head. so here's the key component to make socialism work is not just about filling out money. from the government to people who need it, wherever you fall on the spectrum is awful about the people doing the work. when we have infrastructure projects in the united states, a lot of times those are shop produce, right? so you have elected officials who are taking some the money to invest in a role that we all use, but then they also are investing in the employment of people who then get to receive those funds on the backend. because we know labor tends to be one of the
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highest cost of any project that you have. and so when you have something like the stimulus, right, where the corporations got millions of dollars, we have no control, no already, no input or have those millions and billions use right. and the people who run the corporations get to decide how that money is sold out. there's no guarantee that it's going to trickle down to the people who are actually working right. there's no benefit to the overall united states economy. there's no benefit to the fact that, you know, this restaurant isn't feeding people who need to eat seating people who are willing to pay the money to eat right back while into capitalism. so very important component of socialism that people forget, it's not just free education. it's also the employment of teachers and pre k teacher and all the people who feed into our system from bus driver to the cafeteria workers, the same thing with any other level of socialism. and so when folks think of that antiquated term, when they're thinking about what happened during the cold war,
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we have to remember, particularly in american politics. republicans once dixie cracked, right. they were democrats at one time and we did a switch where there is another switch that took place right with socialism, particularly democratic socialism as bernie sanders and others in the speak of it. and we have to look at in that format, if we're still trying to use the terminology from 1800 and early 1900, we're going to miss the point and the benefit of what socialism really well i, you know, you're, i hope we can all agree all 4 of us can agree that trickle down economics, you know, we need to retire the term and the, the, and the be the actions. ok. because it certainly has not worked and, and we can, that's a topic of a totally different program here. i will jump in here, we're going to go to a short break, and after that short break, we'll continue our discussion on socialism. stay with the
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the join me every thursday on the alex simon show. when i was speaking to guess in the world, the politic sport business. i'm show business. i'll see you then in oh, yeah, you could, i don't know when you go to deal with a sick day marathon of creativity, a multi cultural festival. and the biggest variety is the competition for a few days, became a russian cultural capital, $28.00 categories. ahh, from violin and piano, to the parenting and data protection night years just throwing up over water.
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sure. you know, if you could get some kind of a 3 or for them to be here, they 1st had to when reading the content the delta games only take the very best of the best buy ah ah, welcome back to cross type were all things are considered i'm peter lavelle to remind you we're discussing socialism. ah okay, go back to kay, limon in new york and you know, this whole discussion about the infrastructure build at the administration is proposing and trying to get republican support here. again,
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i think that the term socialism warps everything. i think the neo liberal media warps everything because they're looking to score points. again has nothing to do with people is asked to do with their shareholders and their political affiliations and allegiance is here. i mean, if you look at this infrastructure bill, i don't have a problem with the price tag, it's over 10 years. my goodness, you know, they'll never touch this defense spending. will they? but you know, this infrastructure thing and if it's done right, it creates jobs. and it pays for itself eventually if it's done right, there's one thing i don't, i really worry about caleb and, and maybe i'll kick up a little bit of dust on the program with this one. i don't like the strings attached. you know, you have to have critical race theory. you have to have these woken st elements, you know, to be able to get the money. you know, there's a lot of people that are very uneasy about that and it feels very totalitarian. and particularly if it is a demand and not a negotiation, an explanation here. how do you, how would you, you know,
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alleviate worries of half the country when it comes to that issue? go ahead. caleb. i share a lot of your concerns. peter. look, i started out by saying the essence of socialism is growth, but if you listen to a lot of the rhetoric coming out in the white house right now, i seems like sleepy joe doesn't believe in grow. he thinks growth is that smaller is better build a bigger empire. i mean, this is rockefeller malthusian id. this is, this is very dangerous and all throughout the united states. we have seen the rise of pessimism and a lot of ways. you know, joe biden seems like jimmy carter to point out pushing this notion that we need to reduce consumption. you know, while republicans are pushing for full deregulation. libertarian free market policy seems like a lot of what the democrats want is not growth in rational planning of the economy . but rather what they want is simply a state managed austerity, you know, gradually, gradually roll back the living standards oversee
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a continuing process where the next generation has a much lower standard of living than their parents ever had. you know, try to control them, whether it's with, you know, manage social media or whether it's, it's with drugs that they haven't already gotten on. ritalin when their kids, you know, give them marijuana and give them hallucinogens as adults. and, and, you know, there is a very dangerous kind of managerial, social, social engineering aspects to what the liberals are doing right now. and small businesses seem to be the most, you know, targeted by it. they seem very, very, you know, upset and you know, they may be wiped out. it may be the big capital is like amazon and walmart who really benefit from, from what they're proposing. but it's interesting because if you look around the world, the strength of socialism in the 21st century, whether you go to vietnam or nicaragua, or china as been, you know, while you have a state central plan, empowering small businesses, micro entrepreneur, you know, you know, socialism with chinese characteristics is all about having a market sector in order to combine the strengths of capitalism with the overall
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vision of socialism and planet. caleb, you know, you know what you're talking about, you know, lowered expectations and downsizing. no one in you know what one sector is really exploding. so per yachts. that's exploding right now. they're building the biggest yards of all time. okay. they're not downsizing it. so i have that. you know, caleb brings up such an excellent point and i'd like to say again, conservatives and progressives can have a lot in common. a lot of what caleb said, i absolutely agree with here. that what about entrepreneurs? i mean, it's one of the things we're going through the locked downs and the reaction to the pandemic. there seems to be no interest in helping middle size small businesses. i mean, absolutely not. i mean, heretic stories of, for no reason of all people that have shut down and then their competitors that are, you know, these big box companies. you know, you can go shopping there, but you can't go to a mom and pop pharmacy. i mean, where is that in the, in the economy moving forward here because i would have thought that that would be
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pro people very, you know, a part of the socialist dream, but it's not there. it's almost completely void. go ahead in miami, one of the very dangerous we've had at least i could be here locally. a lot of businesses were closed because of that they didn't really have so much to support as much as i would say. it came in later on in the game, right. then they couldn't maintain your businesses just to touch on a little bit of okay, that was the thing regarding the infrastructure. a lot of the issues that we're having, i mean, it's great and it's very ideal. but you're going to see that those companies that are going to get the contract not going to be the people that are working. it's always somebody to know somebody that knows somebody who is a 3rd cousin or sign law or whatever that ends up with these types of contract. and the money just stays in the same circle. and that's what we're seeing, that there's a huge problem. i mean, whether it's a local or national, it's always they always seem to have a ways to still keep the profit out of it. it's never really about the people and
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that's where my concern is really. right. yeah, well you know, we meet there, there is, it's called influence. peddling and pay to play and there is plenty of it to go around. we don't need to go down that rabbit hole right now, but i think everybody knows that i'm talking about go back to atlanta here. you know, one of the things, a lot of the figures that you'll see in the bottom of the screen when you watch this here, is from a gallop poll before the election. and i was really kind of struck how many young people are attracted to the idea of socialism and reading the fine print with don when i found really interesting is that it may not be particularly an attraction to a certain idea of socialism. but a rejection of neo liberalism because you know what? it's not working for them. ok, any unit you don't have to explain it. be radically in their living. it ok, go ahead. so your other get hit the nail on the head, right? so the reason why government involvement is a crucial component of socialism is to make sure that your cousin doesn't get the
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big contract behind doors, right? that's where the government control and regulations come in. on the other end of this free market that the conservatives like to push forward so that you know re capitalism and re gross see the differences. it was a time that republicans were conservative as it was bending right. we have to protect our financial future or future generation. now this generation, which was the future generation that they were speaking of, if they were good with the money we are concerned about is the air we're concerned about being able to breed. we're concerned about pin demick, right, and these things that spread across the globe and we have a responsibility to ensure that for the future. and we are willing to give us some of our freedom why we're willing for these really rich folks who are building need to have to build more efficient yacht that are better for our earth and for the
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atmosphere in order to preserve the future long term. because you are right, they are not the beneficiaries of all of this high in capitalism and better access to capital that that capital is push forward. and so what is important with socialism is one making sure that there are limit on people who are able to get out . been an outing. i am a both a loser and a what has gone on since the past due on one business that close in the beginning of the pandemic because we were very relying on people coming in and if they couldn't come in, we couldn't proceed. but then my other businesses have, have benefited through the payroll and p, p, p. and other things that have come in that have allow me to grow and hire more people. so there is a benefit and a burden that has come in that all high in with socialism in the underlying goal is that particularly in america, we are far too rich
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a big country to have as many homeless to have as many unemployed to have as many people who are struggling out there that if we just took a little bit of time and the organization of the government to ensure that everyone has a fair shot at being able to have health care, we will all be better off. yeah. okay, let me know if that's one of the, you know, with my conservative friends, really get upset with me when i talk about health care. because i've seen a good part of the world and it's not a debate in both the world it's, it's pretty obvious what's right. ok, and what works here. okay? and, you know, and it's something that, you know, maybe i can tell our viewers here, you know, you know, being an american being brought up in america, be anxiety of not having health care. really. it is an amazing, amazing negative effect on you. you're afraid of getting sick. ok, i'm out and most of the world at least to develop world there. nobody's afraid of getting sick. i mean, it happens unfortunately, and there is assistance there because you pay your taxes here. but the impact that
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has on americans is a truly extraordinary. and this pandemic tells us everything that's wrong with the, with the pharmaceutical industry. it's really the heights of him, a morality of what we're seeing with these vaccines and ip and all about when the, you know, they're protecting their, their patton's note, the american people paid for those patterns. they paid for the research they paid for all of the research. they've been doing it for one patent after another for well over a decade. and you have the mainstream media parenting, you know, we know if you know, somebody might be able to use the formulas and cure cancer. god forbid something like that. and i mean, do they, did they have any understanding of what they're saying? because it really shows the lack of any kind of a moral compass of what the average condition of the average american is and what the world is experiencing because of this pandemic go ahead. caleb, well, you know, it's interesting because, you know,
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this notion that conservatism and capitalism walk hand in hand. they doubt the american and it's pretty, pretty western. and you know, if you look at it, you know, conservative anti capitalism predates marxism by hundreds of years. you know, the catholic church was looking during the rise of capitalism and saying this is a system where money is being put over religious principles. and it's encouraging, you know, breaking a part of the bond that holds society together. and there is a strong conservative critique of capitalism in united states. we seem to have lost that notion. yeah, we market, you must be on the left and i don't think that's true. internationally speaking, i'm, if you look at the political spectrum, right wing, anti capitalism has been around for a long time. but i think that the essence of the problem we have in the united states is look, if the pie is only so big. the only way your slice can get bigger is by cutting into somebody else's and nobody ever thinks that their slice of the pie is too big . in fact, they want their slice of the pie to get bigger. and so when you,
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when you say that there is a limit to growth, when you declare that growth is bad, you're setting up worse, huge divisions and society. you're setting up for all kinds of problems. but if we can get back to the notion that growth is unlimited and that if we can get beyond the irrationality of greed and profits running our economy and we can mobilize to build like roosevelt did during the great depression. you know, with the, the works progress administration, you know, appealing to, you know, people's desire to go out and build a better world. friendship with countries around the world that are, that are trying to do the same thing and lift themselves up out of poverty. you know, we could, we could get beyond, you know, the divisions that are inherent in the notion that the pie is only so big. and, and i think that, that is the biggest impediment we have here in the united. well, you know, caleb, i think it's neal liberalism just determines the size of the cake and they're the ones that decide who cuts it. and that's the problem here as all the time we have. i want to thank my guests in new york, miami, and in atlanta. and i want to thank our viewers for watching us here are see you next time. remember, cross cultural the
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ah, ah, one of the worst ever mass shootings in america was in las vegas in 2017, a tragedy a close, a little live in real vegas. where many se elected officials are controlled by casino loaners. the dank is shooting, revealed what the l v m p d really is. and now it's part of the stem machine. to the american public barely remembers that it happens. that just shows you the power of money and las vegas. the powerful showed that true colors when the pandemic had the most contagious contagion that we've seen in decades. and then you have a mayor who doesn't care to. here's caroline goodman, offering the lives of the vegas residence, to be the control group, to the shiny facade, conceal of deep indifference to the people vice gonna say that they would take an
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action. absolutely keep the registering and keep the slot machines doing. this is a money machine is a huge cash register that is ran by people who don't care about people's lives. being lost i think is part of mental health revolution. we increasingly freeze political claims. the language of mental health became more common. so if you disagree with something i said on this program, you know, just say i just agree with you. i think you're wrong because of the following problems in your adventure logic. you see your micro grass mate, you say you triggered me. you said you hard me again, some psychological way because those are psychological terms. and i guess an enormous problem for politics because it's almost impossible to have
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a discourse on that terrain. the the 21 moment said and 17 others arrange it for a powerful bluff test for a bus in the town of roneesh in western russia. officials a yet to identify what happened know what the cause was and i witness says explosion hit the vehicle. extremely hard, the explosion was very loud, so loud i was deaf and for some time. and the plus pressure was so high that my car was almost pushed to the other side of the road and elsewhere us soldiers back. and i've got to stop this time to get the diplomat. so who's the taliban? say they've seen the country 2nd and 3rd largest cities. now the state department claims. it's not a hasty evacuation low, just to save drop down. they say of embassy staff. meantime, use open door policy,
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