Bill Brady, Barack Obama's Poker Buddy: 'Socialist With Everyone's Money But [His] Own'

Thanks Dr. Logic. Fanned. Thanks for saying succinctly what I could only do through sarcasm!

... words that could only come from a Republican mouth.

sounds like a joke during a game, probably got a lot of laughs.

why is this a story?

The notion that Obama is in any way a socialist is objectively false.

Return to reason writes:
"If not, are you ok paying for all the Federal benefits and protections for the other half who makes $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 a year???
Yeah I'm okay with that. Most of them work hard and deserve more support. The rich, on the other hand have gone from a 90 percent tax rate in 1960 down to around 35 today. When the tax rate was 90 they paid for it. When it went down to the 30s, the rest of us paid for it increasing revenue shortfalls.

This bagger has a “double digit�? lead over the democratic governor! Do not the voters of Illinois realize you not only elect the person but you’re also electing his party?

The party platforms and positions on issues should be listed right next to the candidate’s name. Forget what candidates "say" while campaigning....the platforms reveal their real allegiance.

That phrase " with everyone else's money but his" applies to the banksters, CEOs, and politicians. So what is his point?

(Part THREE) Regarding the type of "socialism" that is RIGHTLY associated with Europe, Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson (and now Obama), Kolakowski writes: "In the developed industrial countries, all social institutions for the purpose of evening out inequalities and ensuring a minimum of security (progressive taxation, health services, unemployment relief, price controls, etc.) have been created and extended at the price of a vastly expanded state bureaucracy, and no one can suggest how to avoid paying this price" (p.1210). This last he calls "democratic socialism" and defines as very separate from both Marxism and, of course, Communism. This is what Europe has widely accepted and what the Right in America vociferously wants to reject. So yes, Obama, Johnson, Roosevelt, most of Europe ARE part of "democratic socialism" or as it is sometimes called "the Welfare state". But that most certainly does not make them Marxists or Communists. We need to learn the difference, just so our discussions can be a little more insightful and a bit less inflammatory.

(Part TWO) Even if you don't think you have the stamina for 1,300 pages of Kolakowski [ 'all men are NOT created equal!], you might just check out volume I, chapter 10: "Socialist Ideas in the First Half of the Nineteenth Century as Compared with Marxian Socialism". Then, to see where things went totally off the rails check out volume II, chapter 16: "The Rise of Leninism" for the key move of restricting membership in the communist party to a "disciplined elite", which lead to the crushing of all dissent which opened the door for full blown Stalinism (cf. vol. III, chapters 1, 3, and 4)- a house of horrors from which Russia is still trying to recover. Some quotes from the epilogue: "It was Marx who declared that the whole idea of Communism could be summed up in a single formula--the abolition of private property; that the state of the future must take over the centralized management of the means of production, and that the abolition of capital meant the abolition of wage-labor . . . In the event it turned out that, having nationalized the means of production, it was possible to erect on this foundation a monstrous edifice of lies, exploitation, and oppression. This was not itself a consequence of Marxism; rather, Communism was a bastard version of the socialist idea, owing its origin to many historical circumstance and chances, of which Marxist ideology was one." (p. 1209).

Sounds like the POTUS is a pretty shrewd poker player. Not a bad trait to have in a President. Never show your tells. No when to go all in and when to fold.

(Part ONE) Anyone interested in REALLY understanding what "socialism" and "Marxism" and "communism" mean, and what is the difference between them should read Lesek Kolakowski's 'Main Currents of Marxism". It's a 1,300 page journey, but it will make you a much more well informed human being. The first "socialists" were people who did not advocate revolutionary political change but merely wanted governments to take an interest in improving the social conditions of mid-19th century workers who were being BRUTALIZED by inhuman working and living conditions during the early days of the industrial revolution. And actually, the man whose followers invented the term--Robert Owen (1771-1858)--was actually welcomed by and allowed to address both houses of Congress and the then sitting president. (cf. "Pursuing the Millennium", chapter 8 of David Walker Howe's "What God Hath Wrought"--a history of America 1815-1848, Oxford) Owen was quite the celebrity in American political circles until it became known that he did not believe in biblical revelation and was in favor of "free love" (Ouch!)

So I guess the money he donated to charity from his Nobel Peace Prize doesn't count.

Sounds like a sore loser

So Brady was out-classed at the poker table by Mr. Obama.
I think there are quite a few nefarious people feeling the same way right now.
The article should be titled "Sour grapes now becomes a political platform".