Digital strip search

The average person doesn't know what true communism is. They know communism as the communist dictators like Castro or Chavez . Communism is basically another term for Statism (wiki below) nowadays since we have all but lost the original definition.


By saying he's turning America communist they are talking about the state taking control of major industries. Currently, the banking industry is being forced to take money with huge strings attached to the point that banks are refusing the money because the strings are just ridiculous. Last year during the "fuel crisis" when gas was about $4/gal there was talk about the government taking over the oil industry to stop the "gouging" that politicians claimed was happening which for anybody who stopped to look at the numbers would realize the profit margins of $0.3/gal aren't "gouging" but, the sentiment was gaining popularity.



Yep, my hatred for Obama is quite legendary. I think I was the first person on Fakku to be avidly against him. Though, I'm not exactly fond of Bush either due to his expansion of domestic spying then Obama building on that. The rumors of Obama trying to protect the domestic spying program from lawsuits the would block the program based on constitutional grounds should cause some concern even amongst the most die hard Obama supporters.

This is just a theory but, I think the reason why the internet turned against Obama is because he didn't keep him promises. He claimed he'd make government more transparent, more accountable,etc. Yet, with his stimulus bill he passed even the people voting on it only had a single night to read like 500 pages. Then we have the breaking up of the "ole boys club" when all he did was hire ex Clinton advisers. I could go on but, I believe I've made my point. He is already breaking promises he made during his campaign.

Broken Promises

Obameter

Your example is a bit misleading I think. Certain crimes, like rape and child molesting, due tend to see people assumed guilty in the court of public opinion if there is even enough evidence to arrest them, but in a court of law, the burden of proof is still on the accuser. I tend to think that someone being accused of possession "shared" files would actually be a sympathetic figure to the public, as we saw back in the days of the insane RIA lawsuits.

To clarify another point, the TSA isn't going to be going through peoples' laptops looking explicitly for pirated files. This proposed plan would just allow them to confiscate such files and prosecute people if they found them incidentally.



And they are free to refuse the money. In fact, libertarians tend to think that we shouldn't even have offered them any money anyways. If this were a statist nation, the government would just come and take control of all the banks. Even with the bailout money, the government isn't interested in directly running these institutions, the sentiment is more that these institutions screwed up and they need to prove that they are going to move in a significantly different direction if they want to be bailed out at taxpayer expense. The whole firing of Big 3 CEOs was a bit silly and more for show than anything, but the government isn't forcibly taking over companies. Even the whole gas gouging thing was mainly espoused by a small number of politicians trying to drum up populist support.



I'm not sure to what extent the internets have turned against Obama, but I think the reason for the hostility we see is more along the following lines: a combination of overload of information, sensationalist new, and people latching onto such stories without bothering to consider how reliably/reasonable they or their sources are. The news story that this topic was originally about is a great example. It's based on shoddy and misleading news reports from the Czech Republic and Russia, but someone put it on Digg, and lots of people read it and assumed that it was true and quality reporting.

Honestly, the internets would have turned against anyone in some sense. It's a fundamental truth of politics today that it's easy to spread negative information and smear because it can be done in a few sentences, while most people lack the determination to sort through the more nuanced and complete views of what's going on.

Ironically enough, the Obameter actually makes it seem like Obama is doing pretty well so far. Keeping 23 promises, including some very major ones, and breaking 5 is a pretty good percentage so far. No. 240 being broken is disappointing, and I agree that some of his appointments have been not to my liking, but he has been changing some major aspects of policy.

it wasn't just a small number of politicians. It was a majority of the democratic party. Namely Reid, Pelosi,etc. You may see it as drumming up populist support and I see it as the old "eat the rich" strategy that is becoming more and more popular with every passing day. A recent poll on CNN said that 53% of Americans think Capitalism is the better system while 20% said socialism is. Yes, I realize that is only 73% but, the remaining voted "not sure". It's an undeniable fact that the democratic party wish to remodel America after the European socialist system. These sorts of changes can't be abrupt as Americans would riot in protest. A good politician would make changes slowly and secretly.

I would like to clarify that I'm not screaming "the end is nigh" for America but, I'm seeing the warning signs that the shift is starting to happen and I'm calling them out before it happens since I'm against socialism which is another argument for another time.

the government, by bailing out big companies, makes the companies owe them in the future. they're not just doing it for that (they say AIG and GM are essential to society. i only thing GM going under would be absolutely horrible.) but that is one reason. they bailed out around 100 banks in the US. now when the banks have the money again, the government isn't allowing them to pay them back. they aren't accepting the money. that just gives the government strings attached to the banks so they can pull them when ever they want.