Someone posted a homemade meme about wealth on a Facebook page I follow. It was taken down after a war of words broke out between its creator and someone who disagreed. Pity.
The meme read – I’m paraphrasing – don’t get upset about extremely wealthy people not giving back to others because money isn’t like a pie. Just because they have more isn’t why other people have less.
The meme-maker got it entirely backward! Money IS a pie and it is finite. And hugely wealthy people hoarding cash DOES mean there’s less for everyone else. The guy defended it to the death; in this case, death was the thread’s removal by the admin. Success isn’t a pie. Popularity isn’t a pie. But money is definitely a pie.
This entire pie-money idea came to the forefront again last week when the Cheeto in Chief of the US went on a racist tirade and then claimed his nation would never become “a socialist country” at the hands of the Democrats. Wrong again.
When you make decisions to bail out major corporations who are losing ground on the open market, you’re a socialist country. As Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders told the Washington Post:
“It’s not just Wall Street that loves socialism — when it works for them. It is the norm across the entire corporate world. The truth is that corporate America receives hundreds of billions of dollars in federal support every single year, while these same people are trying to cut programs that benefit ordinary Americans.”
In other words: socialism for fat-cat corporations: good.
Socialism for ordinary people who are in need: bad.
Donald Trump is a corporate socialist. He’s trying to use misdirection and his trademark bluster to cover up that fact and call socialism bad. I believe most Americans equate socialism with communism, which it is not. But the combed-over Cheeto is doing his best to tie the two together. It’s frightening to think that those who develop their policy opinions based on social media might fall for it.
Well said. The meme is what they want us to believe. The truth is the exact opposite as you point out.