Can we Create an America that can Lead the World

[Willem]

Originally posted by Azazel
How about having 3 companies, all of them govt. controlled?

Why bother when there's so many private companies set up to handle the distribution? The only goal was to ensure that Canada had a presence in the market, since at the time all the gas companies were foreign multinationals. Now we're on an even playing field with companies like Shell, or Exxon etc., at least within our own country.

[Az]

yes, but this way, you don't have billionaires as a must, "to incourage innovation, and creativity"

[DuncanK]

Originally posted by Arrian
Duncan,

I shouldn't be King because I can make fish hooks. But I should receive some benifit for being so useful to society (no fishhooks, not many fish... maybe starvation). Otherwise, the next time I come up with a bright idea, I'm not gonna tell you about it!

-Arrian

And why should you be special for making fish hooks? Why is that more neccessary than fishing? Why should you be able to make the fish hooks while we fish?

Of course you would tell us about a good idea, because it would benefit you. Even better than that, it would benefit all of us.

Why do you guys make such ridiculous assumptions? Come on now. Do you think you're fooling us?

[DuncanK]

Originally posted by Willem


The point is Duncan that, just like you, the founders of the Soviet Union started out with good intentions. And look where it ended up. And frankly, you haven't really said anything new, you've just borrowed most of the same ideas that they had. It didn't work for them, why do you think it will work any better if we implement your ideas? You've offered no new slant on the subject at all, you've just been reiterating all the same old propoganda. How are your ideas fundamentally different from those of Lenin and Trotsky, and all the others that ushered in the "great socialist enterprise" back then?

Lenin was not a Marxist. He came up with his own theories to justify his actions. Marx never predicted that an underdeveloped country would have a socialist revolution. Marx never justified a police state.

[Az]

I am personally not a marxist.

Gee, how pleasant it is to see all those questions pass by.

[DuncanK]

Originally posted by Willem


You're talking about yet another utopia that may never take place, and probably won't. Now there's nothing wrong that, it's good to have some ideals to strive for. But you also need to temper your ideals with a good dose of reality once in awhile. At least if you expect anyone to take you seriously.

I do talk about the present situation in real terms whenever its seems appropriate. Look at the title of the thread. I'm trying to show why the US can not lead the world. And that is because it is not morally fit to do so. And I'm explaining why.

[DuncanK]

Originally posted by Willem


No, they have the choice to set up their own business and work for themselves.

Ridiculous. I have no capital. I can't get a loan from the bank. I have no skills. What business can I start? Mowing lawns? Sure Willem. Got anymore propaganda you want to lay on us?

[Ned]

Originally posted by Azazel

1) Freedom is as vague a concept as they get.
2) What generally drives people: Freedom or Happiness?

You've been reading too much Aldus Huxley.

[Az]

You didn't answer the question.

[Velociryx]

Going to give it another whirl....not that I expect to change any minds, but what the heck....I'm groggy from Nyquil, and this is actually kinna fun.

Having clawed my way up from the bottom of the capitalistic food chain to somewhere in the middle, I am speaking from personal, first-hand experience when I tell you that capitalism offers a high degree of social mobility. I know it does, not from theorizing, not from guessing, but because I am a living example of that very thing.

I began with nothing but debt and a crappy car, and am to the point where I have almost no debt, a good car, and am saving toward a house.

That didn't happen because I lied, cheated, and stole my way up from the bottom. It didn't happen because some fat-cat at the PolitBoro handed me anything, it happened because I busted my a$$ and made it happen.

It happened because I took the initiative to bring about the result that I desired for myself. No one set my goals for me, no one held a gun to my head and MADE me go to work at any particular place (and sometimes, several places). I chose to do it, and I accepted the responsibility that came along with that.

Are some people born with better opportunities? They certainly are, and that statement holds true whether you are in a capitalist or a communist society (do you really believe that, during the height of the Soviet Union, the children of the party leaders were not even *slightly* better off than the poorest of the poor? Do you belive that even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary?).

The thing is, however, economics is not a zero sum game. It is NOT the case that if I have more, it means that you have less. That is simply not the way it works. IF that was the way it works, then there would never be any way for total productivity, or global GDP to increase. It would be, in a word, impossible for that to occur.

But it has.

Which means that even IF some people are born with more and better opportunities, everybody HAS opportunities.

You seem exceedingly hung up on worrying about what other people are doing, rather than focusing on what YOU are doing (example: Regarding Arrian and the fish hooks - you asked what Arrian was going to be doing while we were out fishing. - Why ask that? Why worry about what Arrian is doing with his time? It is, after all HIS time, not yours), and this seems to be a key difference.

In every communist experiment that has ever existed, the equality you are striving to achieve has not existed. The disparities between the richest and poorest may not have been as wide, but they have always been there. There is no indication that trying it "your way" would work out any differently, but there is a body of historical evidence that sugessts otherwise.

If you truly feel that the act of going to work equates to your being oppressed, then why don't you take out a loan and start up your own business? Would that not solve the "I'm being oppressed!" problem?

If you currently own a house, why not give it to the less fortunate around you? Surely they are no less deserving of a house?

I don't knock anybody for their beliefs, but the communist ideal is just that...an ideal. It is a system that promises something it cannot deliver.

Capitalism makes no promises, but this. Hard work and innovation are rewarded.

Are other things rewarded as well? Things like lying, cheating, and stealing? Yep....in the short run, they can be rewarded under a capitalist system. But in the end, the liars, cheats, and swindlers get caught, and jailed, and their work gets undone.

When you look at people who are examples of, as you say "the oppression of capitalism" and you point to those as being a point in your favor, I would ask you to dig slightly deeper than the surface. I have, because I used to do that for a living....helping people get from hand-to-mouth to something more. Something better.

Do you know what I found?

In almost every case, there was a direct cause of their current situation, and it was not "capitalsim." It was usually one or more of the following: Lack of understanding of the economy, lack of understanding of money, lack of understanding of budgeting, living beyond their means, addiction of one form or another (the lotto, smoking, alcahol, drugs, other), or simple laziness.

None of these reasons has anything to do with the "inherent evilness of capitalism." All of them are behavioral or education problems, and these are easily solvable problems indeed.

Your argument against capitalism has not shown me the first solid example of "the evils of capitalism" at work.

Where are they?

-=Vel=-

[Velociryx]

As to the fish hook question - That's an easy one. Without fish hooks, you catch maybe three fish a day. With them, you see your catch triple.

Would you not say that is a tangible, *valuable* benefit?

And should not Arrian's, clearly valuable contribution be rewarded? What's wrong with that? He TRIPLED your catch! If that is exploitative, then I'm all for being exploited!

-=Vel=-

[Ned]

Originally posted by Azazel

There are different ways of organizing accountabilty in socialism as well.

in a more decentralized scenario, one company would sue the other. The management would be chosen by the workers, for example.
It could complain to oversight, that would change the management.
there are different ways to tackle such a problem.


Well, if they're doing well, why do we need private ownership of industry as a pre-requisite of good management, and effectivness?

I'm sorry Azazel, I thought you were too intelligent to believe in this nonsense.

State businesses are by definition monopolies. One cannot have two businesses competing with each other, can we? That would be "unfair."

The problem with monopolies are notorious. They are inefficient and tend to bad products at high costs.

An entire system based on such muddled thinking cannot produce anything but poverty. A country that bases its economy on such systems will soon be bypassed by countries that are based on free enterprise. Workers will then want to flee the communist paradise. They are kept in by barbed wire, mine fields, dogs and trigger-happy border guards that aim for the back.

Come on, think!

[Az]

State businesses are by definition monopolies. One cannot have two businesses competing with each other, can we? That would be "unfair."

You took this from you ass, pardon my french.

Why not have to bussinesses, self-run, and economically independent, that would belong to the government/their respective workers?

[Ned]

Originally posted by DuncanK
Ned,

Freedom to me is freedom from restraint. By that definition people are not free in America. They have no other choice but to reliquish part of their wage to someone who maybe entirely undeserving of it.

The only thing certain in life is death and taxes.

However, I'll be damned if someone has the right to tell me that I cannot work for whom I want, marry whom I want, or own my own home, business or make investments in other's businesses.

In the name of liberty you provide slavery.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Azazel
You didn't answer the question.

What drives people? Freedom or Happiness?

Sex, drugs and rock and roll - why of course. But to get these things, one must be successful.

Genghis Khan was apparently driven by sex. He conquered far and wide to consume large numbers of women. Such is happiness.

I wonder how much sex, drugs and rock and roll exists in North Korea?