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Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

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Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby KaiserJeep » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 03:50:15

Sorry If You're Offended, but Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution
Socialism is the leading man-made cause of death and misery in human existence.
David Harsanyi | July 27, 2018
On the same day that Venezuela's "democratically" elected socialist president, Nicolas Maduro, whose once-wealthy nation now has citizens foraging for food, announced he was lopping five zeros off the country's currency to create a "stable financial and monetary system," Meghan McCain of The View was the target of internet-wide condemnation for having stated some obvious truths about collectivism.

During the same week we learned that the democratic socialist president of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega, is accused of massacring hundreds of protesters whose economic futures have been decimated by his economic policies, Soledad O'Brien and writers at outlets ranging from GQ, to BuzzFeed, to the Daily Beast were telling McCain to cool her jets.

In truth, McCain was being far too calm. After all, socialism is the leading man-made cause of death and misery in human existence. Whether implemented by a mob or a single strongman, collectivism is a poverty generator, an attack on human dignity and a destroyer of individual rights.

It's true that not all socialism ends in the tyranny of Leninism or Stalinism or Maoism or Castroism or Ba'athism or Chavezism or the Khmer Rouge—only most of it does. And no, New York primary winner Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez doesn't intend to set up gulags in Alaska. Most so-called democratic socialists—the qualifier affixed to denote that they live in a democratic system and have no choice but to ask for votes—aren't consciously or explicitly endorsing violence or tyranny. But when they adopt the term "socialism" and the ideas associated with it, they deserve to be treated with the kind of contempt and derision that all those adopting authoritarian philosophies deserve.

But look: Norway!

Socialism is perhaps the only ideology that Americans are asked to judge solely based on its piddling "successes." Don't you dare mention Albania or Algeria or Angola or Burma or Congo or Cuba or Ethiopia or Laos or Somalia or Vietnam or Yemen or, well, any other of the dozens of other inconvenient places socialism has been tried. Not when there are a handful of Scandinavian countries operating generous welfare-state programs propped up by underlying vibrant capitalism and natural resources.

Of course, socialism exists on a spectrum, and even if we accept that the Nordic social-program experiments are the most benign iteration of collectivism, they are certainly not the only version. Pretending otherwise would be like saying, "The police state of Singapore is more successful than Denmark. Let's give it a spin."

It turns out, though, that the "Denmark is awesome!" talking point is only the second most preposterous one used by socialists. It goes something like this: If you're a fan of "roads, schools, libraries and such," although you may not even be aware of it, you are also a supporter of socialism.

This might come as a surprise to some, but every penny of the $21,206 spent in Ocasio-Cortez's district each year on each student, rich or poor, is provided with the profits derived from capitalism. There is no welfare system, no library that subsists on your good intentions. Having the state take over the entire health care system could rightly be called a socialistic endeavor, but pooling local tax dollars to put books in a building is called local government.

It should also be noted that today's socialists get their yucks by pretending collectivist policies only lead to innocuous outcomes like local libraries. But for many years they were also praising the dictators of Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. Sen. Bernie Sanders, the nation's most successful socialist, isn't merely impressed with the goings-on in Denmark. Not very long ago, he lauded Hugo Chavez's Venezuela as an embodiment of the "American dream," even more so than the United States.

Socialists like to blame every inequity, the actions of every greedy criminal, every downturn and every social ill on the injustice of capitalism. But none of them admit that capitalism has been the most effective way to eliminate poverty in history. Today, in former socialist states like India, there have been big reductions in poverty thanks to increased capitalism. In China, where communism sadly still deprives more than a billion people of their basic rights, hundreds of millions benefit from a system that is slowly shedding socialism. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, the extreme poverty rate in the world has been cut in half. And it didn't happen because Southeast Asians were raising the minimum wage.

In the United States, only 5 percent of people are even aware that poverty has fallen in the world, according to the Gapminder Foundation, which is almost certainly in part due to the left's obsession with "inequality" and normalization of "socialism." Nearly half of American millennials would rather live in a socialist society than in a capitalist one, according to a YouGov poll. That said, only 71 percent of those asked were able to properly identify either. We can now see the manifestation of this ignorance in our elections and The View co-host Joy Behar.

But if all you really champion are some higher taxes and more generous social welfare, stop associating yourself with a philosophy that usually brings destitution and death. Call it something else. If not, McCain has every right to associate you with the ideology you embrace.


Original is at: https://reason.com/archives/2018/07/27/sorry-if-youre-offended-but-socialism-le
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby yellowcanoe » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 07:55:29

Denmark, which certainly qualifies as a Socialist country, is in fact the third easiest country in the world in which to start a business. https://investindk.com/en/insights/worl ... in-denmark

Successful socialist countries recognize that having a strong private sector is essential to generate the tax revenue required to support social programs. Capitalism and Socialism go hand in hand!
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Ibon » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 07:59:38

Who was president before Ortega in Nicaragua? Anastasio "Tachito" Somoza
Who was president before Fidel Castro? Fulgencio Batista y Zaldívar
How severe was the disparity of wealth in Venezuela before Chavez? 2nd only to Brazil.

What's my point? Well, if you want to avoid the population becoming enamored to socialism you better make sure that you are not planting the seeds today.

Let's pull up the graph Pops presented on another thread.


Image[/quote]

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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby dissident » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 08:59:11

Venezuela is an example of the failure of state run economics and not socialism per se. As pointed out, Denmark is rather functional with its socialism. The difference is that it does not have a de facto idiot central planner who runs the economy into the ground. Chavez was able to manage Venezuela's "socialism" much better than the moron hack Maduro. Instead of stopping policies that are utterly failing, Maduro just keeps digging the hole deeper.

The moral of the story is that central planning is a terminal disease for the economy. Socialism does not require central planning. In fact, it leverages the private sector engaged in market economics to offer more welfare and benefits (e.g. free health care and education) via taxation. In the US, large corporations stash their earnings in offshore havens and hide from tax man like in any banana republic.
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Ibon » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 09:13:07

dissident wrote:

The moral of the story is that central planning is a terminal disease for the economy.


Explain China please.

Note: I reread your above post Dissident. I think you did explain this. in your last paragraph. Noted.
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby dissident » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 10:05:53

Ibon wrote:
dissident wrote:

The moral of the story is that central planning is a terminal disease for the economy.


Explain China please.

Note: I reread your above post Dissident. I think you did explain this. in your last paragraph. Noted.


China is in no way a communist economy. It is a nepotistic, government-attached capitalist economy (e.g. PLA generals own large companies). If it has a Central Planning Department, then it literally serves no purpose and has zero impact. Even with all the corruption (a loaded, abused term) there is a middle class growing in China. And contrary to the myth that China is an export economy, its GDP growth is mostly driven by domestic demand.

There is lots of corruption in the developed capitalist economies. One would have to be profoundly ignorant not to see it. The optics are managed much better, but it is there.
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Pops » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 11:23:58

Having the state take over the entire health care system could rightly be called a socialistic endeavor, but pooling local tax dollars to put books in a building is called local government.


So government book=good, gov medicine=bad?
I guess because there is no profit in lending books... maybe at interest? Then you could privatize all the libraries. Woot!

Political screeds like the article really add nothing. Pretty sure for every evil pointed out you could replace "socialism" with "authoritarianism." Don't want to go there though because the right likes it's strongmen- "don't be gentle putting them in that cop car..."

Capitalism is great at distribution with a government to balance the power money affords. Currently in the US, not only is inequality returning in force, even our socialist policies favor the top.

Specifically, the 40% of American adults with incomes just below the top 10% received more in safety net government transfers (Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps/SNAP, Veterans’ benefits, etc., but excluding Social Security) than the bottom 50% of Americans (Figure 11).

"Wealthy Americans complain about 'entitlements' for the poor, but they keep collecting their own entitlements, to a degree that average Americans can only dream about." Even MORE STUNNINGLY, according to the same authors, when Medicare and Social Security are both included the richest 10% on average received approximately as much in government transfers as the poorest 50%

http://cdn.equitablegrowth.org/wp-conte ... counts.pdf
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2017 ... ich-people
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Pops » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 13:11:09

Socialism is perhaps the only ideology that Americans are asked to judge solely based on its piddling "successes."


Social Security, mandated & operated by the gov reduced old age poverty, not piddling

Image

Before Medicare only about half of oldsters had any health insurance, now about 2%

Before Medicare, Medicaid, ACA 25% of the entire population had no insurance

Image

--
As mentioned before, all the socialist beneficiaries aren't poors.

3rd in gov spending after so sec & medicare is the exemption for employer provided health insurance, about $250 billion annually. Yeah that is socialist spending.

How about some other socialist programs like subsidized housing for the rich? Something like $70 Billion per year.

Image

Image


There are other upside down socialist programs for the rich, like the $100 billion tax subsidy on retirement savings of which 70% goes to the top 20%
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Plantagenet » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 13:14:26

Pops wrote: ...the right likes it's strongmen-


Hi Pops. Welcome back. I hope you don't mind if I join in this discussion.

OK--Lets start by being intellectually honest here....the left has had its share of strongmen as well. Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Kim, etc. quickly come to mind. In fact, even Hitler and Mussolini were arguably on the left---Look at Mussolini...he was a leader in the socialist movement of Italy before it split into International Socialists and National Socialists in WWI, and Musslini ---like many Italian socialists----went with the National Socialist authoritarian wing of socialism.

Pops wrote: Pretty sure for every evil pointed out you could replace "socialism" with "authoritarianism."


Thats exactly right.

A related question is whether socialism produce tendencies in a society that lead to authoritarianism. Obviously, communism is an overtly and intentionally authoritarian form of socialism, so the questions is quite fair. Some socialists want authoritarian government.....the history of the 20th century is clear on that.

IMHO, Democratic socialism like that practiced in western Europe does not lead to authoritarianism---but it doesn't lead to socialism either. When you compare the US economy, for instance, to Scandinavian socialism, the state sector in the US is similar in size and actually bigger then the state sector in some scandinavian countries. European democratic socialism is really a movement for better social welfare policies. For the most part it isn't about the government taking over the private sector or being authoritarian.

But in some cases democratic socialism does lead directly to authoritarianism. The example of Venezuela shows this clearly. When you concentrate more and more economic and social and political power in the state, it inevitably crowds out independent voices. Today in Venezuela there is mass famine and poverty in the name of socialism, and there are also no more independent newspapers or tv or media. They've all either gone bankrupt or been "socialized." Venezuela is a socialist nightmare.

And we see the same thing happening right now in socialist Nicaragua. The country is descending into chaos just as has already happened in Venezuela.

Socialists have only one solution for every problem----let the government take it over----and when that doesn't work they have only one response----let the government take over something else....and so on.

Image
Socialism has brought famine to Venezuela, an oil rich country. The streets are filled with people searching for food in socialist Venezuela
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Plantagenet » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 13:32:28

Pops wrote:
Social Security, mandated & operated by the gov reduced old age poverty

Image


Yes it did. Hoo-RAY for social security..... but social security isn't an example of socialism. Its an example of social welfare program. Social welfare programs were invented by Bismark in capitalist Germany.

IN a social welfare program the government taxes one group of people and it uses those taxes to pay benefits to another group of people. Food stamps, social security, etc. are examples of such social welfare programs.

Social welfare programs aren't socialism. The concept and the means to create such program are a product of capitalism, and only wealthy capitalist countries like the USA and the those in the EU have enough money to pay generous social security benefits.

The socialist solution would be for the government to take over the private sector financial markets, but we still have a thriving private sector, and many people invest in private annuities or in stocks or in CDs or real estate to supplement their meagre social security checks.

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PS: would you be kind enough to update us on what you doing these days? Back in the day I always thought your tag-line "living on my grandkid's farm" was one of the cleverest things on the internet, and I was very surprised when you sold out and moved back to California. Whats up with you these days? I'm still up here in Alaska, still chopping wood all summer to help heat the cabin all winter, and still saving pennies to travel the world in the winter and see what I can see before global climate change and sea level rise and heat waves and fires change and destroy everything. My next outing is my annual trip down to the Shakespeare Festival in Ashland Oregon---just a bit north of the fires now destroying large hunks of California. How about you---what are you up to these days?

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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Pops » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 13:50:05

Plantagenet wrote:When you concentrate more and more economic and social and political power in the state, it inevitably crowds out independent voices.


Hi Plant,
Again, you are confusing authoritarianism with socialism or what they are calling Democratic Socialism nowadays, high-tax socialism. Pretty sure there is no one looking to give trump total power.

Arguing that "socialism" is a growing threat to the US because it leads to authoritarianism is exactly the same as arguing sharia law is about to be imposed, it ain't gonna happen but it keeps the proles occupied.

On the old political compass I rate more anti-authoritarian than I do left wing, I'm not agitating for confiscation of production, never have, my hobbyhorse is basically the anti-democratic nature of outsize wealth. Some people are good at making money, good for them. But I'm no more looking for them to set the political stage than some tin-pot dictator.
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Ibon » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 13:56:22

dissident wrote: If it has a Central Planning Department, then it literally serves no purpose and has zero impact.


I might be wrong but I understood the following examples as being strong organizational roles that the central government still exercises.

1) It is the central government that grants its citizens residency rights to live in specific urban areas. A software engineer from one city cannot freely move to another urban area with this permit.

2) A mass transit train right of way or a high rise high density zoning is done by the central government and if you are living in these areas you are forced to move.

3) The entire urban migration of 400 million chinese during the past 30 years along with the construction of the urban areas where they moved was planned by the central government. As you say contracts where given to generals as a form of nepotism but the central government was instrumental in the planning.

If these examples are representative I do not think you can discount the critical role the central government sill plays in the planning and design and implementation of some of the key macro infrastructure projects along with deciding where its citizens can reside.
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby dissident » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 16:57:24

Ibon wrote:
dissident wrote: If it has a Central Planning Department, then it literally serves no purpose and has zero impact.


I might be wrong but I understood the following examples as being strong organizational roles that the central government still exercises.

1) It is the central government that grants its citizens residency rights to live in specific urban areas. A software engineer from one city cannot freely move to another urban area with this permit.

2) A mass transit train right of way or a high rise high density zoning is done by the central government and if you are living in these areas you are forced to move.

3) The entire urban migration of 400 million chinese during the past 30 years along with the construction of the urban areas where they moved was planned by the central government. As you say contracts where given to generals as a form of nepotism but the central government was instrumental in the planning.

If these examples are representative I do not think you can discount the critical role the central government sill plays in the planning and design and implementation of some of the key macro infrastructure projects along with deciding where its citizens can reside.


China does have rather harsh population migration controls as you have listed. I suppose it is not all about capitalism vs. communism in this case, but just necessitated by a massive population. It would be a nightmare if tens of millions of people rapidly migrated from one part of the country to another. No infrastructure could accommodate such a burden. I doubt private ownership would remove these negative aspects of a large population.

But in terms of command economics, the Soviet GosPlan and its Chinese analogue no longer exist. The initial measures of Chavez in Venezuela at redistributing the wealth were not too excessive. It was rather European in character. But towards the end of his leadership, the nationalization became excessive and this continued under Maduro. This created a central planning mode and the current train wreak we are seeing.
After all the failures of the 1900s, this dead end development model should have not been followed regardless of any considerations about poverty and workers' rights.
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Socialism: The Slouching Beast on Our Campuses

Unread postby KaiserJeep » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 17:29:26

Socialism: The Slouching Beast on Our Campuses
CHRISTINE TALENT | July 25, 2018, 12:05 am
A combination of ignorance and dissatisfaction with their economic prospects has led many college students to embrace socialism.

Socialism has come a long way since 1917. Socialist regimes ruled half the world — at a terrible cost — during the Cold War. Then, with the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s, socialism fell like a rocket crashing back to earth. Yes, China, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuela, and other countries were still ruled by socialists, but, in general, socialism appeared to be a dying ideology.

To be sure, there were different degrees of socialism. The totalitarian socialism of Mao and the Soviet Union killed people, ruined economies, and snuffed out freedoms critical to both political and personal life. The democratic socialism common in the West, softer and therefore less destructive, merely specialized in overregulating the private economy and extreme redistribution of wealth.

But even in the West, socialism manifestly failed. The democratic socialism of Great Britain reduced that country from a leading economic power to the “sick man of Europe,”and was firmly rejected by British voters during the Thatcher years.

Unfortunately, socialism has come slouching back onto our college campuses, settling itself comfortably among the students. A 2015 Reason-Rupe poll showed that 58 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds viewed socialism favorably. By contrast, only 28 percent of seniors ages 65 and above were favorable toward socialism.Several other polls say the same thing: A majority of young adults support socialism, and in fact prefer it to capitalism.

To older adults, this fact probably seems disturbing and inexplicable. How could anyone support a philosophy that has spawned evils ranging from economic stagnation to mass killing? Speaking as a 21-year-old college student, I believe that the explanation boils down to two things — discontent and ignorance. Most of today’s college students grew up during the Great Recession. They are graduating with large debts and, for many, bleak prospects for employment. They feel cheated, and believe that something is deeply wrong with our current system. Since that system is capitalist, they see socialism as an alternative.

At the same time, however, most young adults misunderstand socialism. In one study only 16 percent of millennials could define socialism as a government-managed economy. And who can blame them for their ignorance, considering what they’ve learned — or haven’t learned — in the classroom? In my experience, professors may not espouse socialism, but they seldom challenge its tenets. Most of my history classes in college have focused on the many ways America has victimized the poor and downtrodden. Professors equated capitalism with imperialism while failing to even mention the evils committed by totalitarian socialist countries or the economic destructiveness of democratic socialism. One of my professors dismissed the atrocities committed under Mao Zedong’s regime by saying, “While there were certainly many failures with Mao’s reign, during his rule China’s literacy rate went up, as did migration to cities.”

“Failures” — that is how my professor referred to the 45 million who starved to death under Mao.

I believe this same indifference to truth is what turned so many college students into enthusiastic supporters of Bernie Sanders during the last presidential campaign, giving him more youth votes in the primary than Clinton and Trump combined.While Sanders is no totalitarian, he certainly supports the same democratic socialism that emaciated Britain in the postwar years. Students loved the promises he made (free college, free healthcare, and forgiveness of debt) and were perfectly willing to believe that big and benevolent government could make almost anything “free” simply by raising taxes on the very rich.

It should be said that this support for socialism isn’t necessarily permanent. Studies find that support for socialism drops after college and goes down as people earn higher salaries.Young people aren’t stupid; they are just young, and some economic truths cannot be truly appreciated until experienced.

Of course, some college students don’t make it easier for themselves. Many refuse to listen to conservative voices and cannot stand correction — or argument. Nothing strengthens a lie quite like an echo chamber, so the lie of socialism has grown into a powerful force on campus that threatens competing (and worthier) ideas. Yes, most students are just young and will outgrow their revolutionary fervor. But right now, students are being cheated out of the best opportunity most will ever have to test competing political and economic ideas against one another.And until our colleges have the courage to break through the echo chamber, students will get — at best — only half the education they’re paying for.


Original is at: https://spectator.org/socialism-the-slouching-beast-on-our-campuses/
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby onlooker » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 18:31:36

Capitalism has done such an excellent job of destroying any country with dreams of equality under a socialist or communist banner, that not one country, not even the U.S.S.R. has ever existed that was actually truly communist. If any country threatens to bring equal rights to its citizens, its smashed by the U.S. which also has done an excellent job of brainwashing its workers into actually believing that being wage slaves to psychopaths is the only way to go. We eschew equality, we eschew decent health care based on healing rather than on profiteering, we eschew a decent and free educational system which is extant in every industrialized nation on the planet with the exception of the U.S. - which, to be fair, is no longer an industrialized nation, but a banana republic. But the serfs will defend their thieving, exploitative masters no matter how bad things get, no matter how bad and expensive and unavailable housing gets so the Jared Kushner's of the world can continue to leech off the work of others through privatized property, no matter how bad the educational or job opportunities. Amerikan workers will continue like zombies sleepwalking through life, accepting their masters' version of reality instead of the hell we're forced to live so the insanely bloated rich and powerful can become even more insane, more bloated, more powerful and even richer. One of these days, they'll cut down the last tree, murder the last animal for sport, destroy the last "enemy". Then we'll be the only enemy left for them to kill and I already know, as they do, that as many stupid and vicious people exist, they can always find enough hired hitmen among the working class to kill the other half. Then their collaborators will be the last to go and we'll have made of earth a Psychopath's Paradise and change the name of Earth to Earth, Inc.
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Plantagenet » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 18:39:59

Pops wrote:
Hi Plant...you are confusing authoritarianism with socialism or what they are calling Democratic Socialism nowadays, high-tax socialism.


Not really-- I discussed Democratic Socialism in my post and why it is completely different from authoritarianism.

Pops wrote:
On the old political compass I rate more anti-authoritarian than I do left wing, I'm not agitating for confiscation of production, never have, my hobbyhorse is basically the anti-democratic nature of outsize wealth. Some people are good at making money, good for them. But I'm no more looking for them to set the political stage than some tin-pot dictator.


Me too. I bet most people are mostly anti-authoritarian except for the communists, fascists, technocrats, oligarchists, elitists, and monarchists and such folks.

-------------------------------

I confess I roll my eyes when socialists say they aren't for the state taking over private businesses and private property and "the means of production" and such, since thats what socialism calls for and thats what it is based on.

When it comes to social welfare benefits, like libraries and social security and government subsidized healthcare, these have nothing to do with socialism, and they tend to be better in wealthy capitalist countries like the US and those in the EU then in socialist countries. IF we want higher social security or cheaper medical care, a good place to start is making our society as rich as possible.

AND when it comes to the "anti-democratic nature" of outsize wealth, the solution is pretty simple---increase taxation on the very wealthy. However this is proving very hard to do. For instance, when the Rs increased taxes on very wealthy people in their new tax bill by capping the size of the real estate interest deduction, the Ds squealed and went to court to block the taxes increases on wealthy people. And of course, when its the Ds turn to increase taxes on the wealthy, its the Rs who squeal.

Cheers!

PS: I understand you might not want share any personal information at this time. However, if you have some stories to tell, please go ahead and tell them. Your stories were always very interesting.
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby Plantagenet » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 18:44:28

onlooker wrote:Capitalism has done such an excellent job of destroying any country with dreams of equality under a socialist or communist banner, that not one country, not even the U.S.S.R. has ever existed that was actually truly communist.


Well, then we'll just have to judge communism on the failures of all the actual communist states that the communists themselves created during the 20th century.

And the judgement of history is that the socialist economies and communist governments of eastern Europe and Asia were failures. Some were a bit better then others, but overall they were failures. Many of the people who lived in those countries fled communism, and those who remained and who were best positioned to judge their own countries, were ecstatic when they were able to overthrow the communist regimes themselves.

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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby onlooker » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 19:01:28

Well, I think I should remind any reading this, that it is via Capitalism and its main tenents that we are arriving at this most intractable overshoot situation of our species on this Earth. It is precisely, the "success" of Capitalism as practiced in the last few centures that has created the furor of consumerism, the need and desire to expand its purview to all corners of the Earth and its allure that entices people to seek fulfillment via materialism and pleasures. Yes, this over materialistic and technological world has been a boom to this transitory phase of humanity but it is wholly unsustainable. Its nature is to seek to grow. So it is reaching limits to growth and in the process wrecking the habitability of our planet for much of life. Thus its success is ironically its curse. We have made everything in this world a commodity to be bought and sold. And this juggernaught of commerce is now threatening most of life on this planet with true devastation of a kind rarely seen on this planet. So congratulations, Capitalism by converting so many to your ideology you have paved the way for the demise of Civilization and humanity.
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby KaiserJeep » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 19:28:18

onlooker wrote:Capitalism has done such an excellent job of destroying any country with dreams of equality under a socialist or communist banner, that not one country, not even the U.S.S.R. has ever existed that was actually truly communist. If any country threatens to bring equal rights to its citizens, its smashed by the U.S. which also has done an excellent job of brainwashing its workers into actually believing that being wage slaves to psychopaths is the only way to go. We eschew equality, we eschew decent health care based on healing rather than on profiteering, we eschew a decent and free educational system which is extant in every industrialized nation on the planet with the exception of the U.S. - which, to be fair, is no longer an industrialized nation, but a banana republic. But the serfs will defend their thieving, exploitative masters no matter how bad things get, no matter how bad and expensive and unavailable housing gets so the Jared Kushner's of the world can continue to leech off the work of others through privatized property, no matter how bad the educational or job opportunities. Amerikan workers will continue like zombies sleepwalking through life, accepting their masters' version of reality instead of the hell we're forced to live so the insanely bloated rich and powerful can become even more insane, more bloated, more powerful and even richer. One of these days, they'll cut down the last tree, murder the last animal for sport, destroy the last "enemy". Then we'll be the only enemy left for them to kill and I already know, as they do, that as many stupid and vicious people exist, they can always find enough hired hitmen among the working class to kill the other half. Then their collaborators will be the last to go and we'll have made of earth a Psychopath's Paradise and change the name of Earth to Earth, Inc.


Has it ever occurred to you that - by your own words - the fact that no "truly" Socialist/Communist/ Collectivist country or government or economy has ever existed - has a very simple explanation?

That would be that Marx and Engels were fools that did not understand the true nature of mankind the great ape. These insights were not understood by anyone until the second half of the 20th Century, and all earlier writings that do not acknowledge and incorporate the primate nature of man are fatally flawed.

That thing that you call Capitalism does not truly exist either. That term is a convenient label for a collection of primate behaviors, and the reason that "Capitalism" spontaneously arises every time yet another variation of Marxism fails miserably, in the process slaughtering the hapless and helpless citizens in large numbers.

Wise up. That thing called Capitalism is the only viable economy around. The human overshoot arises from other ape instincts, and has nothing to do with the economy, the overshoot is greatest in environments where humans face difficulty in securing the necessities, and their instincts react by having them breed like rabbits.
Last edited by KaiserJeep on Sat 28 Jul 2018, 19:33:12, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Socialism Leads to Misery and Destitution

Unread postby onlooker » Sat 28 Jul 2018, 19:29:43

And Kaiser, I know what you will say that Overpopulation is the main culprit of our overshoot situation and continuing damage to Ecosystems of Earth. To which, I reply what allowed us to produce so much food, to concoct medicines to cure people, to construct showers and sinks for cleaniliness. All this made possible by Industrial Civilization. Ah but you say NO, by FF. Well, if it weren't for the technology and drive made possible by Capitalism we would not have sought to or been able to exploit these rich energy sources. It is the impetus of Capitalism which has driven it call. And yes at its root is the traits of greed, aggression, power attainment/competition etc But all these traits are then neatly woven into the Economic system as embodied by Capitalism
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