Can we Create an America that can Lead the World

[Velociryx]

Capitalism also has a much higher success rate. One need only witness the parade of imploded communist countries to get the sense that there must be something flawed with the model.

Where are the thriving Communist nations today, and how do they rate, in terms of affluence and strength of their economies to the capitalistic nations? Is there even a comparison?

Nope.

And yet, the communists would have us believe that if we "try just one more time" we'll get it right.

Don't hold your breath.



-=Vel=-

[DuncanK]

Well we keep trying with capitalism here in the US and our economy keeps crashing. But we still try it over and over again.

[Velociryx]

It's true that the US economy has gone through a lot of ups and down, but rather than crashing, it keeps growing! It's bigger than it's ever been.

The stock market crashed (once), but since then, we've kept right on trucking.

-=Vel=-

[DuncanK]

Originally posted by Velociryx
It's true that the US economy has gone through a lot of ups and down, but rather than crashing, it keeps growing! It's bigger than it's ever been.

The stock market crashed (once), but since then, we've kept right on trucking.

-=Vel=-

The economy has crashed several times. The last big crash was in 1929. About that time the USSR was lookin' pretty good . You are just taking a point in time and judging by that. Look at history. It matters what point in time you are at.

[Velociryx]

How do you define "crash" - yes, there is very definitely a boom-bust, expand-contract cycle in the economy, but even when the stock market crashed in '29, the economy didn't stop (though that is the closest we have come to seizing up).

Look at the countries that are florishing today....they are florishing because they've adopted an economic model that works.

Had communism worked better, they'd have won the cold war, and, no doubt, more countries would now be adopting their proven stronger economic system.

But that's not what happened.

-=Vel=-

[DuncanK]

Vel,

No economy ever completely stops, but it was very bad in the Great Depression. It was disasterous. I will not give the details. You can do an internet search if you have forgoten how bad it was.

Marx predicted that nations would accumulate captital at an amazing rate while they were in the capitalist stages. There is no argument there. You can't really compare capitalism to communism. Marx predicted that capitalism would be better for the world at one part of history and communism would be better for the world at another part. That's because capitalism has so many problems with it. In particular, the crashing part and the exploitive nature of it. No industrialized nation has ever had a communist revolution. As soon as one does I'm possitive that it will do very well.

As far as the Cold War goes, the US beat the **** out of Russia. Duh' like that wasn't going to happen. It doesn't prove that capitalism is better than communism. It just proves that the Russians didn't do to good in that one.

[Velociryx]

Thing is, Duncan, you'd think that if communism was superior, there'd be at least ONE modern day example of a thriving, exceling communist nation.

There's not.

I contend that there's a reason for that, and the reason is....it doesn't work.

It looks GREAT on paper. Absolutly fantastic, but power abhors a vacuum, and into any centrally planned, highly centralized system, that vacuum WILL be filled, generally with ambitious, power hungry men (a la Stalin).

The human race is not advanced enough for any sort of utopia, and that is what communism promises. Because of that, it is doomed to fail.

-=Vel=-

[DuncanK]

Originally posted by Velociryx
Thing is, Duncan, you'd think that if communism was superior, there'd be at least ONE modern day example of a thriving, exceling communist nation.

There's not.

I contend that there's a reason for that, and the reason is....it doesn't work.

It looks GREAT on paper. Absolutly fantastic, but power abhors a vacuum, and into any centrally planned, highly centralized system, that vacuum WILL be filled, generally with ambitious, power hungry men (a la Stalin).

The human race is not advanced enough for any sort of utopia, and that is what communism promises. Because of that, it is doomed to fail.

-=Vel=-

Sadly, its our fault that Stalin took power. We were hostile to the USSR from its very birth. They needed a dictator. When you are at a state of war you have to centalize power. The US does it too when they have to.

Every communist nation has faced the US as its enemy. No doubt the US is strong, and thats hard for a third world nation to deal with. You just have to admit the communist nations have done suprisingly well even if they have had to give great powers to men like Stalin. Damn, look at Cuba. How the hell could that little nation do so well while the US has been on its back the whole way trying its damndest to keep it down.

[Willem]

Originally posted by DuncanK
Well we keep trying with capitalism here in the US and our economy keeps crashing. But we still try it over and over again.

Crashing is just part of the process. When times are good, people spend their money and buy all sorts of new things; new cars, new furntiure, new appliances. But after awhile, a lot of people have everything they want, they don't need to spend any more. So things so down, the economy suffers.

Then a few years later, when things starts breaking down, or the latest model makes your old stuff look grossly obsolete, people go out and start buying again. It's a cycle, just like the waves or the seasons. You can't expect to have prosperity all the time.

[DuncanK]

Originally posted by Willem


Crashing is just part of the process. When times are good, people spend their money and buy all sorts of new things; new cars, new furntiure, new appliances. But after awhile, a lot of people have everything they want, they don't need to spend any more. So things so down, the economy suffers.

Then a few years later, when things starts breaking down, or the latest model makes your old stuff look grossly obsolete, people go out and start buying again. It's a cycle, just like the waves or the seasons. You can't expect to have prosperity all the time.

Actually communism is very stable. Sure you have shortages sometimes, but you don't have long periods where many people are unemployed and struggling to survive.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Velociryx
Che....that's splitting hairs. IF what you are saying were true, IF the only interests to be served were among the groups you named off, then there would not have been....I repeat *would not have been* any increase in the franchise at all. None whatsoever.

There are two factors which you ignore. One, power concedes nothing without a fight. So, you are looking in the right direction when you say that the franchise would not have been extended, except, there were fights. At a certain point, denying the franchise to unpropertied white males became more destabilizing than allowing them to vote. Ever here of the Dorr County War in Rhode Island. Disnefranchised white men lead a virtual rebellion against the state government, complete with guns and cannon. Although it was put down, they got the vote. Women got the vote following a period of intense agitation, after WWI, after the Russian Revolution (which granted women the vote before the US). Black people got the right to vote in a period of global colonial revolution, when the left was growing in the United States and Black nationalism was on the rise. The cost of continuing to prevent these groups from voting would have eventually resulted in political upheaval. Better to give them the right to vote.

At the same time, when the vote was used to unseat entrenched elites in the South during Reconstruction and the Progressive Era, Southern elites unleashed a wave of terror that broke those government and stripped Black men of their right to vote. During the 1920s and 1930s, as Socialists and Communists and the like grew in popularity, laws were changed to make it almost impossible for anyone but the two entrenched parties to get on the ballot. In North Carolina, for example, a Democratic or Republican candidate might have needed only 5,000 signatures to get on the ballot (IIRC it was less) while independents needed 30,000 signatures. This pattern was repeated across the United States. In the South, the polical system was completely locked up by the Democratic Party and all decisions were made away from the public. In the North, powerful machines like Taminy Hall in NYC completely controlled all the big cities, and by extention the states.

Today, though we have primaries instead of caucases (except in Iowa), and it's becoming easier for independents to get on the ballot, it now requires huge sums of money to be seen in the race. If you can't get on television, you aren't running, and the big money goes to those who approach capital on bended knee. Labor doesn't even donate a tenth of the money corporations and the wealthy donate.

At the same time, the Republican Party has a policy of discouraging Black voters. They challenge Black's right to vote (and those who don't know better will leave), they post police to intimidate and harass Black voters, in Florida the illegally stripped 91,000 people of the right to vote on the basis that they might be convicted felons (some of whom were convicted for crimes in the future ), etc. Nor is the Democratic Party overly concerned about this, despite Black people being part of their base. After all, they wouldn't want Black people to have too much influence on the Party's handouts to the wealthy. Voting machines in Black districts are often much older than those in white districts, tending to break down more often so that votes can't be cast.

Yet, the franchise is still a potent weapon. After all, despite the machinations of the Republican Party here in Florida, we were still able to force class size amendments and education reform on a state government that refused to give the people what they wanted (although they've managed to cut the heart out of an amendment that would have restored the old state system of universities, i.e., one state system instead of multiple universities with overlapping programs). If the franchise weren't important, the Republicans wouldn't have gone to so much trouble trying to keep so many legal voters off the rolls. Would have meant a different President, and maybe a different governor here in Florida.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by DuncanK
Actually communism is very stable. Sure you have shortages sometimes, but you don't have long periods where many people are unemployed and struggling to survive.

Yes, it is very stable. Every thing is **** all the time every time.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Velociryx
Capitalism also has a much higher success rate.

Only because capitalism cooks the books, so to speak. When one side is constantly invaded and subjected to terrorism and the other side isn't, it skews the numbers. One one side starts out with the industrialized world and the other with dirt farmers, it skews the numbers. And of course, the capitalists only count the successful capitalist countries, and ignore all the unsuccessful ones when making their comparisons.

So while the Communist governed countries may have a success rate of 0%, the capitalists only have a success rate of 10%, when the rest of the world is included. And for a time, the Communist states were doing better than the Third World. Up until the 1970s, for example, North Koreans had a higher standard of living than South Korea. Cuba's standard of living exceeded that of many Latin American nations (including Puerto Rico, a part of the United States). East Germany had a higher standard of living than Spain or Italy.

[Willem]

Originally posted by DuncanK


Actually communism is very stable. Sure you have shortages sometimes, but you don't have long periods where many people are unemployed and struggling to survive.

If communism is such a superior system, why then does one regime after another either collapse or switch to some form of capitalism?

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Willem
If communism is such a superior system, why then does one regime after another either collapse or switch to some form of capitalism?

Because Communist led states get attacked and messed with while the leading capitalist states don't. Of course, as usually, you ignore the 150 failing capitalist states.