Takedown: Khrushchev warned us!

I love it when everything comes together in one ridiculous crapdate. This week, we celebrated (well, some of us celebrated) the fact that the Supreme Court upheld the Affordable Health Care Act, and some of those who didn’t celebrate it were quick to bemoan the end of America as we know it, socialism at its WORST which leads to communism at its WORST which leads to THE WORST THAT COULD EVER BE EVER I AM MOVING TO CANADA.

And here I am, writing this Takedown from a village in the south of Ukraine, which is THE BREADBASKET OF COMMUNISM THE WORST.

So, here we go:

I followed my instincts and went to Google to find a citation. I found this article, written in 1962; even then, just three years after it supposedly happened, it was un-track-down-able. The Library of Congress said, ““We have searched the Legislative Reference Service files, checked all the standard reference works on quotations by Khrushchev, and consulted with the Slavic division of the Library of Congress, the Department of State, and the US Information Agency, in an attempt to determine the authenticity of this quotation. From none of these sources were we able to produce evidence that Khrushchev actually made such a statement.””

I mean, this was a world leader who was being watched carefully, and the Library of Congress has no record of it. I looked for any Russian citations, to see what I could find, and there is a similar version floating around:

“Ð’Ñ‹ не принимаете коммунизм сразу, Ð° мы будем кормить вас маленькими дозами социализма, Ð¿Ð¾ÐºÐ° Ð² Ð¾Ð´Ð¸Ð½ прекрасный день вы не проснётесь Ð¸ Ð½Ðµ поймёте, что у Ð²Ð°Ñ уже коммунизм.”

“You won’t accept communism all at once, but we will feed you small doses of socialism, until one beautiful day you will wake up and not even understand, that you have communism already.”

This is only slightly different, but importantly so: there is none of this crap about “helping elected leaders” ““ so it can’t be aimed at, say, the president, with a cry of “HE TOLD YOU SO!”

I was digging into this, looking at arguments for “he said it!” and “no he didn’t!” when I realized that it doesn’t matter. He was a leader of the Soviet Union, at a time when the biggest enemy was the United States, and the most obvious difference between the countries was the type of government. He had to be macho, and he had to show that his way was the best. Even if he said it, who cares? He was not a psychic, and he was not a prophet. And, actually, his entire country fell to its knees a few decades later. The bits of wisdom that were floating around about communism have since been rendered ineffective based on the fact that those who were seen as wise were absolutely, 100% wrong. It would be like quoting Caesar saying that he would trick his enemies into trusting their friends bit by bit until they were surrounded by their completely trustworthy friends at all times.

What the crapdate is trying to say is that 1) Obama is a socialist, as is evidenced by his grim determination to force access to health care upon everybody, even the poor and the sick; 2) Socialism is basically the same as communsim; 3) Even the communists say so; and so Conclusion) Obama is turning America into the Soviet Union.

But Obama isn’t a socialist. Imma go ahead and quote myself from an earlier article, because damn, I’m good.

“Socialism is characterized by state ownership of assets and a planned economy. But Obama wants to have universal health coverage! THAT MEANS HE IS A SOCIALIST! No, it doesn’t. It means that he wants to have every person in America covered by insurance. Which, by the way, was an idea originally put out there by conservatives. But out of the mouth of Obama, it means socialism. Right? No. Wrong.

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You would think, wouldn’t you, that socialists would loooove Obama and all of his socialistic socialized socialism. But they don’t. He didn’t nationalize the banks when he had a chance. His health care bill was a compromise and left out the government option. He continues to not run a country with state ownership of assets and a planned economy.

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Says Billy Wharton, co-chair of the Socialist Party USA: “It makes no rational sense. It clearly means that people don’t understand what socialism is.”

But but but! But the Affordable Health Care Act is socializing health care! IT IS EXACTLY AS PROPHET NIKITA PROMISED! Small doses! Let’s pretend that this is socialism, and that Khrushchev was indeed a prophet, and that socialism is basically the same as communism. Sorry to have to break this to you, but in that case, this is just a drop in the bucket. We’ve been taking in doses of communism for years, even before the Soviet Union existed – see: public education, the United States Postal Service, the U.S. Military. In other words, if we’re doomed, it’s not because of this health care act.

I can understand why people panic at the thought of centralized anything. I really can. But I also know that the way things have been is absolutely unacceptable. When I was pregnant, I switched health insurers – and had to fight to get coverage because my pregnancy was considered a pre-existing condition. My brother was treated for colon cancer at the age of 31, and because colon cancer is so treatable if found early, and because it is so genetic, all of his immediate family were instructed to get colonoscopies (thanks, Rob), which I could never get because, duh, screenings aren’t covered. I tremble at the thought of reaching my lifetime limit and then just…having to go without.

The fact that people say with a straight face that “health care is a privilege not a right” is so disgusting to me that I can’t even respond. Having the ability to go to a doctor when you are sick is not the Evil Empire reincarnated. If everything is a privilege, even down to the basic ability to keep ourselves alive, what we’re talking about is not capitalism but anarchy, and thanks, but no thanks.