List All Redeeming Values - If any A QUEST

Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 11 years ago to Politics
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In the discussion my use of 'best of'' socialism as cultural system and capitalism as a financial system caused some questions. Capitalism was much easier. If it's so bad why do socialists rely on it? Why has everything bad done by capitalists been condoned, demanded, and made legal by socialists. So the idea there is easy. Unfettered but controlled against the always present criminal class serves for a short explanation.

Then I turned to socialism....

QUESTION

List any and all redeeming values of Socialism including intended but not carried out changes affecting the nation - in any nation.

If not state, if you have some, ideas and perhaps a useful name for any and all of the needs that society should have and those which require some government.

I made it broad as possible as in casting a net rather than spearing a grouper.


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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    No. All of you made it for me. I wanted to do a fact check just in case. With greatful thanks to all who helped out.
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  • Posted by $ puzzlelady 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    Great metaphors all, blackswan. Their envy justifies government-enforced robbery by seeking to impose guilt on the more productive to make them easier to rob..
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  • Posted by johnpe1 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    I wish that article did this -- to prevent involuntary
    action requirements like the EPA and the IRS saddle
    us with -- yet the way it's going these days, we need
    a stronger, more explicit constitution. . imho. -- j
    .
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    Been a while since I read Von Mises. I'm currently going through Bateson's Mind and Nature and finished The Great Adventure by Cruise about the NWMP mounties of Canada. It contains a rather detailed and graphic description of the 1800's and the settlement of the Canadian west.both the natives and the Europeans. Taken from actual diaries of the first mounties and others. It conforms in many ways the stories of my grandfather who moved from Minnesota to Idaho in the late 1800's. Particularly pay attention to the meaning of pacify for a perhaps more accurate assessment of human nature.
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago
    Might be a good time to end the socialism quest with a garlic smeared stake and go one with the other.

    The only redeeming quality Socialism had or has is found in it's failure to produce anything much less fulfill all it's promises.

    The promised goals however often do have value so which falls right into the lap of the representative Democracy AKA Republic as the tool we do have or any other form of society and it's government as a free gift and one that is not insurmountable as it would be to a socialist but surmountable (both good words).

    One reason I don't support either of the two socialist parties in power.

    However I'll leave this segment with the twin phrases of 'motor of the world' and 'means of production.'' Useful tools meaning much the same thing as this phrase. If they pretend to pay we'll pretend to work. Being ''men of the mind'' our pretense will be more productive as whatever is available will be ours. The means of production refers to the simple conclusion that everyone employed in any endeavor top to bottom must contribute for the endeavor to succeed. A combination of mind and muscle and that was depicted by John Galt as a track laborer.

    .
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  • Posted by Bobhummel 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    Socialists are prepared to solve all the inequity in the world - with Other People's Money, with other peoples abilities and with other peoples lives. Just as long as they get to choose who gets what tiny bit is left over after they take all that they "need" for being our dear leaders.
    I can't think of a single aspect of socialism that does not want to destroy personal freedom. It is a toxic as " a little poison " in you solar powered drinking water.
    Cheers
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  • Posted by $ jlc 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    Humans are much better in cause-and-effect if the correlation is sooner rather than later. If you take an affluent country of hard working people with a good infrastructure, it will take a long time to drain the reserves and get to the 'will no longer work' point.

    This is what is happening in California. We have a great economy here (if it were left alone) and thus we can support a large number of parasites without the 'pinch' being too tight.

    Jan
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  • Posted by $ jlc 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    We can also 'clean up' after socialism, which is what we are doing now.

    Jan
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  • Posted by philosophercat 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    Read Von Mises "Human Action" and "Socialism" . Humans to survive must trade. Capitalism is the system of free trade among individuals. Socialism is trade coercively regulated by third parties for their benefit not the producers. Locke is excellent on the moral basis of work as giving the producer the right to his labor. Ask what is the moral basis of taking the product of that labor and you will see socialisms foundation.
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    At this point before the wifi fails again thanks to all who participated and TIA for those who will. johnpe brings us to that conclusion as does part of the constitution. for the moment I will stick with small d democratically selected large R republic form of representative government - as a start point ...
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    Agreed the government employee must be accountable and that includes universal recall. Why wait six years or even two?
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    I love pacifists. They do what their told to do when they are told to it. Even the Quakers served in the military as medics. Joan Baez did the same thing. however when the anti-war movement quit just prior to getting the draft banned she was suddenly left all alone. Women's movement did the same thing in the 1990s turning their backs on their sisters in favor of the nations Womanizer-In-Chief. The answer to that is equality in everything including responsibilities of citizenship. and yes Virginia There is a draft waiting in the wings. The other way is expand to areas other than military for people wishing to serve. I can't think of anything more scary than walking into an inner city high school classroom without body armor and a loaded weapon - and a pre-signed pardon. just to draw a picture of other opportunities.
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    Agreed but then socialism is not an economic system where as capitalism is all about financial matters. Mussolini before the split from Socialism to Naitonal Fascism asked Lenin to explain Marxist Economics so he could explain it. Lenin answered you can't teach it you can only preach it.Make sure you hold out some hope for understanding to your followers and let them know the party has people that understands and make it work. And that's what they have done ever since.
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    Great job but now add in Sweden, New Zealand to name the two leading socialist countries. One can hardly call them totalitarian and I see little evidence of fascism (do anything to control the citizens).

    Anyone up on those two countries and why they work or don't work? I can't say high taxes because when you add it all up ours are probably higher with all the embedded stuff. England on the other hand did not make it work.l
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    It was now called grading on a curve. Now they give Honor Roll status to near half the student body so they won't feel bad and stunt their growth. The next invention was the 5.0 student who gets extra credit for doing anything beyond regular class assignments. Kinda like the former Governor of California before Arnold. He had a Bronze Star. Everyone got a Bronze Star for going through one year without a court martial or a non-judicial punishment Article 15. To be a 5.0 student you had to get a Bronze Start with V for valor device or something higher. Even that wall was breeched by the touch feelies.
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    I'll second that or may be first it. I've been contending all along in my posts that people who support evil lesser or greater are nothing more nor less than supporters of evil. Nixon and LBJ got beat out by Obeyme for that title but I would bet there all pikers compared to the next one.
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  • Posted by $ 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    I just received a copy of 3 Days To Kill. There is a a sequence in their between Kevin Costner and the daughters boyfriend when they first meet that perfectly illustrates well worth watching and a great comedy.
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  • Posted by Mamaemma 11 years ago in reply to this comment.
    You had to think hard to come up with that, Jan, and you are right. The value of Objectivism is that it paints a bright enough picture to induce people to destroy a totalitarian regime. And then that bright picture would actually come true, unlike socialism, which is actually totalitarianism.
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  • Posted by Zenphamy 11 years ago
    By asking the question, you infer that you think there might be some redeeming quality. And by asking for something to replace socialism, you're playing the sophist.

    Socialism can only be rightly defined as pure evil. And it's founding thoughts and the men that espoused them were also pure evil with evil intent.
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