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There is an old saying that tells an eternal truth: History repeats itself and those who dont understand that are doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over.

This piece of wisdom really rings true in our present political arena. Some in the Democratic Party have taken a sharp turn to the left, endorsing their new brand of democratic socialism and railing against the capitalism that has made our country the strongest, most successful nation in the history of the world.

Support for this political doctrine has been especially strong amongst our young people. They seem clearly drawn to the promises of free stuff, and have little or no understanding of the fact that nothing is free; someone must pay for it all. Also, they have lived in a time of relative peace and prosperity. Few have had any firsthand experience with the horrors that socialism/communism have brought to our world.

Are they being taught about these things in school?

Also, contrary to what the news media and some people say, our country, our form of government and capitalism is superior to any other system in the world. Thats why everyone wants to come here. And we are not a bad country. We are a good country, a country that has made mistakes, but we always try to do whats right in the end.

When I was young and searching for my political identity, I studied and compared different forms of government and partisan ideologies. I made a point of reading our Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, our Bill of Rights and the Communist Manifesto. What I learned from them forever shaped my thinking.

The documents read like point and then counterpoint. The Communist Manifesto would decree something. And the Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights would prohibit that same thing.

Our Constitution was written in 1787 and the Communist Manifesto was written in 1848, only about 60 years apart. The same ideas and methods for enslaving people have been around for centuries. Technology changes but government and human nature dont. Our Founding Fathers and their parents and grandparents lived under these forms of oppression. They understood how they worked and what their end results were. So they wrote our founding documents to protect the newly founded republic and their descendants from its tyranny.

Socialism has been around since the beginning of government and has been reinvented an untold number of times, but always with the same results: oppression, misery, death and destruction. Venezuela is the most recent and visible example. It went from the third richest country in the world to an economic and social basket case in 20 years.

In 1921 Adolf Hitler was elected chairman of the National Socialist German Workers Party in Germany. Under his guidance, it eventually morphed into the Nazi Party that started World War II and killed 73 million people.

More than 100 million people have died in the last century in China, the old Soviet Union, Cuba, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos in the name of socialism/communism. And hundreds of millions more people have suffered from starvation and torture. These countries are now considered Communist.

Communism is just a different form of socialism and socialism almost always turns into communism.

Now we are facing another new brand of socialism fueled by the unproven and exaggerated fear of man-caused climate change and environmental disaster. Operating under the United Nations, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change is making rules and laws that affect the whole world. The UNFCCC is made up of almost 200 countries, most of which are dictatorships, communist- and socialist-led countries, and monarchies. Most are labeled as poor developing countries.

The United States and a small number of countries are categorized as developed countries. Under the rules of the organization, developed countries are called upon to provide new and additional financial resources to meet the costs that developing countries incur while trying to meet environmental standards set by the UNFCCC. What a scam. The countries that get the money help determine how much money they get and what they have to do to get it.

Also, its common knowledge that little of the money sent to third world countries ever makes it past the corrupt political leaders. U.S. taxpayers will be financing a huge part of this scheme, but will have very little say over the situation.

Winston Churchill, one of the most admired leaders in the 20th century, once said: Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance and the gospel of envy; its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.

You can put lipstick on a pig, but it is still a pig. We must learn from history and reject any brand of socialism.

Dugger retired as a journeyman carpenter from Clearwater Paper. He lives in Lewiston.

Excerpt from:
History should teach each generation the horrors of socialism - Lewiston Morning Tribune

Those behind the recent coup in the National Clarion Cycling Club (Keir Hardies cycling club jettisons socialism, 14 June) have, like so many others nowadays, misunderstood the concept of inclusion, treating it like a mantra to be trotted out without actually thinking. Inclusion can only be invoked in order to remove irrelevant obstacles to joining an organisation.

For almost all organisations, gender, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation and many other attributes are irrelevant, so they should not be an obstacle. Not so when it comes to political leanings in the context of an overtly political cycling club. One might as well try to persuade the Spurs supporters club to admit a card-carrying Arsenal fan. Those who are so unaware of the current political situation as to think socialism irrelevant should do the decent thing, leave the Clarion and form their own club, to which they would then be free to invite whoever they wish.Jim GrozierBrighton & Hove Clarion Cycling Club

Many years ago, I joined the National Clarion Cycling Club because it was a socialist organisation. I didnt expect to talk about the theories of Marx and Engels while out on club runs, or have lengthy discussions on dialectical materialism at the weekly club night. What I did expect, and I was not disappointed, was a comradeship of cyclists who were interested in their fellow human beings and whose behaviour, based on the principles they held, would provide something far more meaningful than a mere love of cycling.

The Clarion Cycling Club and the wider Clarion movement helped to make history. In the days when the working classes were overworked and underpaid, Clarion men and women were in the forefront of those who expounded the theories for a new way of life and who helped to bring about the material benefits we enjoy today. They dared to dream of a new society, a socialist society.

I was secretary of the National Clarion Cycling Club for three years until 2006, when I helped to set up a new organisation, the National Clarion Cycling Club 1895, to protect the founders commitment to combine the pleasures of cycling with the propaganda of socialism. The Clarion ideal that socialism is the hope of the world has survived for more than 125 years and the link between cycling and socialism will, for some at least, remain unbroken.Charles JepsonSecretary, National Clarion CC 1895

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Clarion call from cyclists to carry on the fight for socialism on two wheels - The Guardian

Cyclings radical traditions are part of Britains social history. Recalling her teenage years in the 1890s, the great suffragette Sylvia Pankhurst wrote beautifully about the band of carefree lefties with whom she rode out of Manchester each weekend. Criss-crossing rural Lancashire and Cheshire, her cycling club was one of many associated with the Clarion, a popular socialist weekly newspaper. The more earnest socialists of the time saw this crowd as ideological dilettantes, too keen on having a good time. And their trips do seem to have been rather fun.

While there was some political evangelism and propagandising, good fellowship was the main object of the exercise: At our journeys end, Pankhurst wrote in a 1931 edition of the Clarion, was always an enormous shilling tea, in which phenomenal quantities of bread and butter and tinned fruit disappeared, then a walk round and frequently afterwards a brief sing-song. A favourite anthem was a marching song written by the utopian socialist Edward Carpenter. England, arise! The long, long night is over resounded outside many rural pubs on Sunday afternoons. How many regulars were converted to the cause is not clear.

Though the Clarion paper has long gone, some of the cycling clubs still thrive. But after 126 years on the road, a dispiriting schism looms. As the Guardian reported this week, the National Clarion Cycling Club AGM has passed a motion to remove a divisive reference in its constitution to socialism. The amended version will instead express a commitment to fairness, equality, inclusion and diversity. The Saddleworth Clarion Club in Greater Manchester has threatened to start a breakaway organisation in protest.

There is, of course, nothing wrong with the new formulation. But it seems sad to lose the literal connection to such a rich past. The Clarion clubs represented a very different, non-doctrinaire and eclectic strand of the early British socialist movement. They were, as the young Pankhurst discovered, a happy haven for the new woman of the Victorian era, who got on her bike seeking greater independence, adventure and fun. They were also a Sunday release for the factory worker, relishing clean air away from the smoke and grime of the mill towns and sprawling cities. For many Clarionettes, socialism was simply another word for idealised fellowship.

The primary function of a constitution is to define the basic principles and laws of an organisation. But in unusual cases such as this, language is also a document of origins; a testimony to the perspectives, associations and hopes of previous generations. The National Clarion Cycling Club has said that local branches are free to write their own constitutions, retaining the reference to socialism. Hopefully some of them will do that, in honour of those cycling choirs that belted out England, arise! with such gusto.

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The Guardian view on socialism and cycling: fellow travellers - The Guardian

THANKFUL FOR CHANGES TO INTERSECTIONThank you, Tyler Morning Telegraph, for your reporting such happy news for this old lady!

Rep. Matt Schaefer doesnt make empty promises, he works for us in this district.

This dangerous (Chapel Hill) intersection will soon become safer for so many. My sister-in-law bought four acres on 64E that extended up Wolfe Lane from a Mrs. Craft. She bought two acres from my sister-in-law and built our home. We saw so many wrecks and also Mrs. Craft was killed at this intersection. I was always afraid school buses making this turn would be hit by an 18-wheeler or tanker.

Thank you, Matt Schaefer for your word and concern.

FUTURE UNDER SB7 ONE WITHOUT DEMOCRACYThe old adage/bumper sticker, If you are not OUTRAGED, you are NOT PAYING ATTENTION is right on target today (Monday).

The Texas Legislature was blocked from passing SB7 on the last day of the legislative session when enough legislators walked out leaving less than the quorum necessary to vote. SB7 is authored by Sen. Bryan Hughes of our East Texas Senate district. Gov. Greg Abbott has vowed to revive SB7 in the special session he will call soon.

The most egregious provision of this bill allows elections to be overturned by state officials when there is just a suggestion of voting fraud. Proof is not necessary. This means election results can be nullified and local election officials no longer have power to certify results if they are challenged. When we, the people, lose this power of the vote, we lose our democracy. There are autocrats and their henchmen ready to step in and take control.

Is this the future you want for yourself and your children? Look to Russia, China, North Korea, Venezuela if you want a glimpse into our potential future.

If this terrifies you, speak out. Contact Gov. Abbott, State Sen. Bryan Hughes, State Representative Max Schaefer to voice your strong opposition to this Bill.

CREEPING SOCIALISM IN U.S.In 2020-21, the forces of socialism have taken over in parts of our country. More so in the Blue States than in the Red States. Texas is somewhat independent of this assent to Marxist ideology, especially among long-term Texans.

We worry a lot about the thousands of emigrants from Blue States will they bring their Blue tax and spend attitudes with them as they settle into our Texas culture? Over time, will they change our state from Red to Purple to Blue? Will they vote for more give-a-way programs for the poor and oppressed? And will they change our state into an immigrant haven, with increased costs for welfare, education and health care?

A positive amongst this gloom is the Hispanic tendency to hold conservative views on most political topics. They tend more often to be pro-life, pro-family, pro-religion and economically conservative. The majority still vote democrat, but that is changing, with the leftward swing of the Democrat Party. In order to keep Texas Red, we must educate our African American and Hispanic neighbors, including Blue State emigrants, on the advantages of acting and voting conservative. This is my call to action.

Texans: Lets choose freedom over socialism!

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Letters to the Editor: Reader write in on intersection, SB7, socialism - Tyler Morning Telegraph

Students on the campus of Columbia University, 2009 (Mike Segar/Reuters)

Statist politicians get a lot of zealous support for their plans for an economic reset from young Americans. Many teachers and professors view themselves as change agents who need to inculcate socialist notions into the minds of their students. Theyve been alarmingly successful.

In todays Martin Center article, Professor Fabio Rojas argues that it is time to start teaching about the dismal record of socialism. Students hear a lot of Marx and his ideas, but very few ever hear any analysis.

Rojas writes, In many courses, you will find Marxist theory as a sort of taken-for-granted way of analyzing the social world. The anthology I use for my own courses, LemertsSocial Theory: Classic and Multicultural Readings, presents about 50 pages of Marxs writings and some from Engels, but not a single selection offering a critical examination of Marxist ideas. At best, Marxs ideas might be critiqued as not going far enough, or for focusing too much on class exploitation and not enough on other forms of repression.

That, Rojas contends, must change. Marxism should be studied, but studied in full not just a rainbows-and-unicorns depiction. A full study would entail an understanding of how socialism ruins spontaneous economic coordination and about the bad results where it has been imposed.

Rojas states, It is important to convey to students that the extreme dangers of socialism are ever-present. There is no better example than Venezuela, the Latin American nation that adopted socialist policies in the 2010s during the presidencies of Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro.

Rojas explains how he teaches his students the warts and all truth about socialism.

I want students to understand social theories, like Marxism, in ways that their proponents would admit is faithful, but, at the same time, not let people off the hook. As with any series of policy proposals, we have to ask hard questions and give serious attention to implementations, whether it be the Leninist Soviet state of the 1920s or the Venezuelan government of the 2020s, he concludes.

Now all we need are faculty who know enough about this subject to teach it properly and for them to be allowed to do so. There arent many of them and the academic world is a minefield for those who dare to speak the truth about leftist ideas.

Read the original here:
Shouldnt Students Understand the Failures of Socialism? - National Review