What Does it Cost to Change the World? from WikiLeaks on Vimeo.
What Does it Cost to Change the World? from WikiLeaks on Vimeo.
Via Postal Mail - You can post a donation via good old fashion postal mail to: WikiLeaks (or any suitable name likely to avoid interception in your country), BOX 4080, Australia Post Office - University of Melbourne Branch, Victoria 3052, AustraliaWednesday, October 31, 2012
Freedom of speech VS. Freedom to lie
Some foreign Billionaires now openly try to influence our democracy for their own profit, but at least they are honestly buying up our valuable time and attention. Now we can hold them accountable for the corruption and misinformation they are attempting to spread.
Everyone now knows about the infamous Koch Brothers, Gas Refinery Billionaires who use their wealth to influence the politics of America. And there are Media Moguls like Rupert Murdoch, who simply buy up media channels and spread biased propaganda freely, corrupting both our Democracy and the profession of journalism. This cycle we've learned about gambling tycoon Sheldon Adelsen backing super-PACs for Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney.
Tonight I saw Hungarian-born billionaire Thomas Peterffy started airing his personal pro-Republican ads. Mr. Peterffy, who pioneered electronic trading practices in U.S. markets and now leads discount-brokerage giant Interactive Brokers, one of the firms that most profited from the Wall Street Banking Crisis and the Housing Crisis. Is it no wonder he wants to avoid tax justice and Wall Street reform?
His advertising is so self-serving and disingenuous that it seems like Orwellian double speak. He openly defines Soviet Hungary under Stallin as "Socialism" knowing full well that that totalitarian dictatorship under communist Russia was no more an example of socialism than the Kingdom of Saud is a democratic republic.
I want to debunk three basic premises exposed by his ads.
Everyone now knows about the infamous Koch Brothers, Gas Refinery Billionaires who use their wealth to influence the politics of America. And there are Media Moguls like Rupert Murdoch, who simply buy up media channels and spread biased propaganda freely, corrupting both our Democracy and the profession of journalism. This cycle we've learned about gambling tycoon Sheldon Adelsen backing super-PACs for Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney.
Tonight I saw Hungarian-born billionaire Thomas Peterffy started airing his personal pro-Republican ads. Mr. Peterffy, who pioneered electronic trading practices in U.S. markets and now leads discount-brokerage giant Interactive Brokers, one of the firms that most profited from the Wall Street Banking Crisis and the Housing Crisis. Is it no wonder he wants to avoid tax justice and Wall Street reform?
His advertising is so self-serving and disingenuous that it seems like Orwellian double speak. He openly defines Soviet Hungary under Stallin as "Socialism" knowing full well that that totalitarian dictatorship under communist Russia was no more an example of socialism than the Kingdom of Saud is a democratic republic.
I want to debunk three basic premises exposed by his ads.
- 1) Democrats = Socialism, false. The truth is that both parties have been so heavily infiltrated and influenced by the big money, that neither party is anywhere near a socialist party. Obama is actually a centrist, just to the right of Ronald Reagan in his policies.
- 2) The former U.S.S.R. was Socialist, false. The truth is that the former USSR was a communist dictatorship run by the oligarchy called the 'communist party'. Russia was corrupted, lost track of the purpose of Marxism, and fell into a traditional strong man state, which lead to it's economic collapse, and after the break-up it has evolved into a maffia type system. Hungary was poor because they were repressed by the system, but that system was hardly socialism.
- 3) Socialism is bad, false. Socialism is simply a cooperative economy, where the resources are owned in common by the people, rather than as private property. Thus, our national park system is socialism, our national highway system is socialism, our social security system is socialist, our medicare system is socialist, our public utilities are socialized, our water systems are socialist, NASA, the Military, Public Schools and Universities, yep all socialist, and all other western democracies have adopted more radical socialist systems than the USA. Socialism is good, if you want equality of economic opportunity, a social safety net, or a safe natural environment.
Socialism is success, it takes care of the needy and the strong alike. You can take pride in your work, and strive for excellence under socialist systems, just as you can in a capitalist system. And unlike capitalism, you will be rewarded by your works merit, rather than have the value of your work and inventions co-oped by large corporations which can steal your intellectual property and keep you enslaved to their low wage jobs. People don't get poor under socialism, because there is a floor to poverty. People do not stop working hard under socialism, they simply earn just rewards for their work, instead of being rewarded for harming others or the environment as they are under our current system. There are plenty of jobs under socialism, and everyone can earn a living, no unemployment, because the government can create jobs to upgrade public infrastructure in economic downturns. It seems like Thomas Petterffy didn't learn from our recent past, perhaps he just has too much to lose.
There are lots of good things about capitalism, but unrestrained, capitalism cannibalizes itself. Capitalism needs many reforms and regulations to become a just economic system. The energy and motivation of capitalism is the desire to increase one's freedom, which is fine, as long as your freedoms don't oppress the freedoms of others. These billionaires don't recognize this fact.
It seems kind of unfair that someone who benefited from the Wall Street crisis can use his unearned wealth to influence our public elections using our broadcast air-waves, but I have no problem with people, even rich people, expressing themselves, buying up all the TV air-time just before the election to shout from the mountain top. What I have a problem with is letting their well financed megaphone rewrite history, misinform voters, and confuse the issues. This is my humble attempt to hold Thomas Peterffy accountable for his opinions. Republicans already tried to destroy America once in this century. Don't lett them fool you again.
There are lots of good things about capitalism, but unrestrained, capitalism cannibalizes itself. Capitalism needs many reforms and regulations to become a just economic system. The energy and motivation of capitalism is the desire to increase one's freedom, which is fine, as long as your freedoms don't oppress the freedoms of others. These billionaires don't recognize this fact.
It seems kind of unfair that someone who benefited from the Wall Street crisis can use his unearned wealth to influence our public elections using our broadcast air-waves, but I have no problem with people, even rich people, expressing themselves, buying up all the TV air-time just before the election to shout from the mountain top. What I have a problem with is letting their well financed megaphone rewrite history, misinform voters, and confuse the issues. This is my humble attempt to hold Thomas Peterffy accountable for his opinions. Republicans already tried to destroy America once in this century. Don't lett them fool you again.
