Capitalism versus Socialism

[Empowered One 41]

My general idea about that is that people have to start taking more control over their lives in terms of making constructive decisions what they do with the resources they have. I can't put it exactly to words yet so I can't explain it or even try because it has to do with a ton of things that make my brain explode trying to put it down... But it generally involves that Patrick Dennis quote of yours, A Nonny Moose. People just seem to have the tendency to make bad decisions because they aren't taught to oversee the ripples they create.

I believe greed is a cultural aspect rather then something we are born with. The only reason people think it's like that is because the commercial industry targets children at a sickening low age, making them think they want something more then they need and therefor forming the basis of greed.

I alos think that there is no way without violence to get out of this mess. The double dip has already occured not to long ago and still the general public in Holland is told that we are doing just fine, despite a billion Euro loss of 1 bank controlled by the state which means a 60,- loss for every Dutch citizen.

[eskimoquinn 1]

No one has replied yet? Well then, I'll be the first. I absolutely agree with you on socialism, I don't think capitalism has any power left in it to be a progressive force in society, the unstoppable drive towards greed inevitably drives society towards political confrontation, huge economic divides, and social degradation.

Obviously this is a sensitive topic for some people, but if we disagree I'm sure we can do so civilly.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Fascinating, and entirely true.  The machine is broken because it is in a positive feedback loop that no one has control over.  It will eventually shake itself to pieces, and the question remains: "Will there be anyone to pick up the pieces, and who will want to?"

The advertising industry, besides having the Congress of the United States in its back pocket, has the bit in its teeth.  There seems to be no area into which these people will not go.  Their ethics are the ethics of King Midas.

This is one of the breakdowns of the capitalistic system we are all enjoying.  Most adults are not taken in by the constant barrage of garbage from Mad Av, but kids are not so strong.  Kids are, as the clip says, information sponges, and they have very few, if any, discriminators as to whether the noise should be ignored or taken in as valid information.

We are unable to stop or regulate this, because the government prevents people like the FTC from doing so.  I am in accord with the idea that we may have to resort to violence.  But keep in mind that violence is the last resort of incompetence.  We must find a non-violent way to  fix this problem because it is growing, and it is unacceptable that our children should be exposed to this drek.

With kids on the Internet, how many parents actually activate the parental controls in the browsers?  I would be willing to guess less than 1% because: (a) they don't understand them; (b) they are unaware of them; © they just don't care; (d) their kids know more about the Internet browsers than they do.

So this is another case of Peter's Pretty Pass.  Unfortunately, we can't take the solution offered by Dr. Peter,  which is quit and get another job.  I am sure that there were people in the Roman empire that foresaw the coming fall and had the temerity to say so.  One emperor (Nero) simply had them made into sarmentii and semaxii and used them to light his garden parties.  One way or another it is (social) death to be a nay-sayer in a society that is, essentially, out of control.

The soviets also got rid of objectors.  Stalin had them disappeared.  Others just sent them off to the gulag.  Hitler got rid of dissenters in his way too.  We are probably too "civilized" these days to take such actions, but we do make troublemakers into non-persons.  You can't do much squeaking when you can't even find a wheel to live in.

When I started working, corporations were rather avuncular with respect to its employees.  Their attitude was that they had a lot invested in these people, and they needed to be looked after because we want to keep them.  Somewhere in there, this changed.  Perhaps it was the MBA attitude that the bottom line is the only thing that matters.  Now, employers have become callous as regards the people working for them.  They discontinue whole divisions and chuck the people out the door.  They make lip-service gestures like giving them some time with a "restructuring agency" or the like. 

{rant}

From personal experience, I can tell you that these outfits have experience with placing secretaries and clerks, but can't handle high-level people of any stripe.  I have never been so disconcerted with an outfit in all my life.  They thought that maybe I could learn something about computers and get some low-level job.  They hadn't even read my last job description, or they would have known that I had thirty years of computer experience at the time I was let go.  Why would I need computer skills?  What a bunch of dolts.

(/rant}

So, what do we do?  Can we afford to wait and see when the crash will naturally come?  Can we band together and make something happen?  If you try to put something together these days, you will have the anti-terrorism crowd down on you unless you are very, very careful.  Any anti-whatever activity could be construed as terrorism.  What an easy out for the powers that be.  Maybe it is too late to do anything, and we just have to let the whole system smash itself to flinders and hope we can pick up the pieces, assembling them into a better world.

Edit: eskimoquinn, you got in while I was editing the above screed.  You'll see that I agree with you, in a lot more words.

[Empowered One 41]

I strongly hope that there can be something done, as long as there still is 'time', to keep things together while things fall apart. Solitude is definitely not the way to go, but finding people who agree with you and want to work together to a common goal as big as this, is rather hard. The guy from the vid that I posted a few pages back has something like that going on (Venus Project/Zeitgeist Movement) yet it seems rather disorganized in the way that a handful of people all over the world want to do stuff globally. That's just insane and impossible. Now if you would get something like that done locally... you should be able to ripple the constructiveness through to those that are ready to embrace that way of thinking/living.

I've got a headache so I hope I'm making sense.

Edit for the vids I was refering to.

[bremner19 1]

socialism all the way

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Originally posted by: bremner19

socialism all the wayquote>

You really want to be careful with that.  What is your definition of socialism?  A classless society with no owners is communism, so you can't mean that, besides it only works in monasteries and convents.

What kind of a hierarcy do you see in your socialist state?  What kind of tax structure?  I can see the income tax form now:

• What did you make?
• Double it, and send it in.

Here in Canada, socialized medicine alone is close to breaking the national bank.  To fix it, we are going to have to jump on the drug companies and get rid of the doctors' fee for service system.  This will cause most doctors to head for the border, so we would have to restrain them somehow.  How do you make a doctor be one, if he doesn't want to?  I know of at least one young doctor who plans to retire at age 50, when he figures he will be independently wealthy.  Somehow, I don't think having a medical degree should be a license to print money.

[Empowered One 41]

[eskimoquinn 1]

Some very interesting ideas brought up here. For one thing is the idea of organization, violence, terrorism, that Nonny Moose brought up and how to proceed if we agree that capitalism is holding society down.

I think, since I'm a socialist, that what Nonny Moose mentioned about Stalin is important because far too many people are manipulated into thinking that the soviet union, red china, cuba and all the rest were legitimately socialist or communist. The USSR was perverted very quickly after its revolution, its poverty and total devastation from the war allowed the Stalin clique to gain control of the bureaucracy and re-introduce social inequality, this time based on the government's control of resource allocation. In Cuba and China, militant leaders like Mao or Castro used the banner of communism, which had earned a great legitimacy and popularity among many oppressed people, as a cover to attract people to their cause. But both leaders, and man other "communists" were fundamentally opposed to democracy, the working class, internationalism, and such values which real communists had based themselves on before the betrayal of their leadership. Instead, they used military power to establish themselves as the new overlords. A discussion of socialism gains nothing by drawing conclusions from their reactionary agenda.

Above in my first post I mentioned economic, social, and political collapse, but another factor which we face very urgently in the 21st century is the environmental crisis. The BP spill, Katrina, the failed copenhagen conference, accelerated destruction of natural resources and many other examples demonstrate the total incapacity of capitalists, or capitalist states, to rationally deal with the monstrous situation they've created. And as much as the media has told us that the oil is "all gone" from the BP spill, that is in no way the case (http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/aug2010/scie-a18.shtml)

In my views I am a marxist completely, I feel that the political systems and parties of every country offer no way to move beyond the existing social order and institutions. The working class, the most numerous class by far and the people who actually make everything run, need to create their own organizations of political and economic power. To marxists, though we acknowledge that we should be prepared for violence, the socialist revolution is about building the consciousness, strength, solidarity, and will of the working class. That site I linked to above is, I feel, the leader of that endeavor.

And yes, of course people who talk like this are called terrorists and, depending on where you are, usually silenced in some form or another. But people are pretty intelligent, and they can sense when something is being hidden. Many people are becoming disaffected with capitalism these days and are looking for alternatives, this is very heartening for me.

[Detective Stan 0]

Well, capitalism allows every man to make his fortune himself and that's a good thing, but I think that the socialist way brings equality. But I also think that the welfare of some semi-socialist States like Italy, where I live, has made the people to believe that they can live off the State thanks to the benefits that the "socialism-lifestyle" brings.

I also agree with eskimoquinn: the real idea of the communism is never been carried out; North Korea and Cuba are less or more only dictatorships, China has a capitalism system and the URSS has failed. So I don't think that communism can be a real system, but, unfortunately, only an idea.

By the way, I apologize for my bad English.

[Empowered One 41]

I personally feel that Marxism is outdated, or more specific, too late to be brought into effect for obvious reasons. Besides, Marx had, from what I gather, more in his head that he was allowed to let out (for reasons stated by anonnymoose), which lead to a distortion of his true ideas.

I don't know how to categorize myself as I have very strongly ideas present in my head on how things should be/could be/ought to be.

I don't think 'money', which is basicly just a sophisticated form of trade, should exist in the way it does now. I think something else should come, something along the lines of a reward system of some kind that provides something extra for doing something constructive for the community/society. This while everyone has the same 'luxuries' so that competitiveness isn't an issue. Must be the reason why I like the vid I posted in my previous post.

@Detective Stan: Define fortune. Making a fortune for yourself can hold numerous things, most of which I'm willing to bed have very little to do with gathering luxuries like more expensive tv's. <--minor example but I hope I get my point across.

There is also the problem that, if you have a job you really like, it might not make 'enough' money to actually have a 'fortune' in terms of money, where you still have to scrape the bottom of the barrel to keep your comfy home. There are in my point of view, severial psychological and social problems attached to such a concept.

[Detective Stan 0]

Don't worry, I understood your example. When I say "fortune", I mean the ability of everyone to reach his aims. Theorically, the capitalism enables everyone, even the poors, to have an acceptable lifestyle, on condition that they work hard to earn it.

Anyway I agree with you for what concerns the last of your points: I know a lot of people who don't like their jobs, but they keep it because they earn enough "to keep their comfy homes".

[Jayster 7]

Last night I watched Capitalism: A Love Story.

After watching this, I was just so shocked and disappointed in the way America has become. For only being 16, it was a major eye-opener. I didn't understand all of it but what I did understand came as a shock.

Right now, I'd say my mom is on the low end of the Middle wealth Working class. I live with her so this is the life style I'm used to. Living paycheck to paycheck, eating out is a rarity, not having the nicest stuff. My dad on the other hand is on the low end of the High wealth class. He is making a 6 figure job and is well secured in his job position. Whenever I go and visit him, it is always very nice because we don't really have to worry about money.

My mom would always tell me about her life growing up, her dad had a job and her parents bought their house and had it paid off within a few years. Her mom didn't work, they lived great.

I think that if they changed certain aspects of Capitalism, then it would begin to work better for the country. If  we were to suddenly drop back into the 60's and 70's and stay there, I think society would function much better than now.

One day at school  my friends and I were discussing a sort of "New Communism" for the world. You basically have all the freedom you want but you are guaranteed a job, healthcare, and education. There would not be wealth classes because everyone, no matter what they do, would make the exact same amount of money. This idea would work perfectly if we could remove the idea of being "rich" from people's minds.

Overall, if we still lived in the 60's, I would support Capitalism but right now and the way everything is, I think Socialism is the way to go.  

 

[Empowered One 41]

Michel Moore isn't my cup of tea. Something about that guy rubs me in the wrong way in the way that it seems rather comercial. Speaking of shock docs,has anyone seen the shocking documentary 'Money as Debt'? Now that IS a sickening piece of film, showing how banks make money out of thin air and how the current loan system came to be.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

I think we are slowly coming around to the conclusion that the present system is irredeemably broken.  It just hasn't completely stopped working yet.  The idea of money is exactly that.  It is a fiction that has become a marketable commodity.  All the money markets are trading in thin air.  They are dealing only with the symbol of wealth, and not true wealth.

What is wealth?  Let's start with the meaning of wealthy.  A person who is wealthy is able to get whatever he wants whenever he wants it.  This does not mean rich in money.  It means having the ability to obtain things by trade, barter or purchase to satisfy any want.  Maybe what we need is to do away with the idea of physical currency, or money, replacing it with something else.

The purpose of money is to represent labor.  Money is what you get when you trade your labor for a reward.  But what if what you got wasn't money?  What if you  got some groceries?  How about a chicken and some beans?  Or maybe a blanket?

What if we could scrap the presently failing positive feedback system that requires continuous growth (impossible), and replace it with something else of value.  How do you measure the value of a person's labor?  In our present system, some people's labor is rewarded with obscene amounts of money, giving them impossible purchasing power.  Why should these persons receive this kind of compensation?  What  good is it to them?  It is probably responsible, in many cases, for their poor health from worrying about what to do with it, or from excesses which they could not achieve were their compensation more realistic.  Maybe a compensation of over, say, $100,000 per annum is unhealthy.  In fact, it probably is, in many cases.

Under our present system, we could tax the excess away, so that no one achieved over $100,000 net per annum.  The tax form would be simple:

If you made less than or exactly $100,000 after expenses this year, keep it.

If you made more than $100,000 after expenses, keep $100,000 and send in the rest.

No exceptions, no deductions, no allowances, no loopholes of any kind.  Expenses are limited to those needed to make the money.  Spending on property does not count as an expense.  If you are property poor, you had better sell something because your taxes are due, and if you don't pay, we will sell you up.

This may sound like a 'tax the rich' scheme, but these days, a working family needs about that amount to stay afloat.  Fifty or sixty years ago, you could do it on about $30,000 but with inflation, things are a little higher now.

Well, how do you buy something that costs more than $100,000?  Save out of the grocery money, old boy.  That's what we had to do in the past.  Mortgages on real property are not available, and loans have to be repaid within one tax year.  At the end of the year, all debts must be at zero.  (Now, you see, I just outlawed borrowing on long terms.  End of credit bubble.)

I guess we can call this Moosenomics.

Its silly, but it is no different than trying to apply Marxism today.

[Empowered One 41]

I think it's like you already said: The current currency is beyond help. Not a single good idea can change that. We can only adjust ourself and hope to try to create a society capable of sustaining itself without money as we know it today.

[Barbarossa 51]

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[Barbarossa 51]

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[Detective Stan 0]

Originally posted by: Barbarossa

The problem with capitalism is that it is driven by money.  More to the point, it is driven by greed.  Even ancient nomads (and Pink Floyd) recogized this.

Barbarossa

quote>

After this sentence, this topic can be closed. Barbarossa is right: the only problem of the capitalism is that is driven by greed. I guess that it's a mankind problem, that's why I like socialism but I know that it doesn't work.

[Detective Stan 0]

Originally posted by: Barbarossa

The problem with capitalism is that it is driven by money.  More to the point, it is driven by greed.  Even ancient nomads (and Pink Floyd) recogized this.

Barbarossa

quote>

After this sentence, this topic can be closed. Barbarossa is right: the only problem of the capitalism is that is driven by greed. I guess that it's a mankind problem, that's why I like socialism but I know that it doesn't work.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Maybe we should move this to the Off Topic area and add the discussion to the House of Worship.  We can discuss bowing down to Mammon over there in a more philosophical context.

I agree, capitalism has failed, socialism doesn't work because it requires absolutely honest people of whom not enough exist.  So this leaves us with what?  What kind of acceptable theorem can drive the world economy?  I am not willing to give up, but I am losing hope.  Maybe we have already passed the gate that says "Abandon hope all ye who enter."

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Maybe we should move this to the Off Topic area and add the discussion to the House of Worship.  We can discuss bowing down to Mammon over there in a more philosophical context.

I agree, capitalism has failed, socialism doesn't work because it requires absolutely honest people of whom not enough exist.  So this leaves us with what?  What kind of acceptable theorem can drive the world economy?  I am not willing to give up, but I am losing hope.  Maybe we have already passed the gate that says "Abandon hope all ye who enter."

[Barbarossa 51]

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[Barbarossa 51]

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[Empowered One 41]

We should not trust on a handful of people to make the decisions for you. That's what I believe is the fatal flaw in current society and cultural way of thinking. Everyone is trying to avoid their own responsibilities and just keep making bad choices and since kids pick up on this, it continues without breaking the circle.

Honest people are out there, they are just hard to find in the 99% of other kinds of people. They are the legal aliens. XD

[Empowered One 41]

We should not trust on a handful of people to make the decisions for you. That's what I believe is the fatal flaw in current society and cultural way of thinking. Everyone is trying to avoid their own responsibilities and just keep making bad choices and since kids pick up on this, it continues without breaking the circle.

Honest people are out there, they are just hard to find in the 99% of other kinds of people. They are the legal aliens. XD

[Barbarossa 51]

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[Barbarossa 51]

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[Empowered One 41]

The language barrier has played a role again I'm afraid. I'm having trouble to put my mind to words, especially in English. Not only that, but things are 99% always twisted when translated in the sense that the interpretation can vary alot.

What I meant with that is that people have the tendency to think that they don't have to do anything but vote for the side or party they think that represents them most. Yet a person can do much more then just vote. I don't mean volunteer but more along the lines of making decisions that ripple constructively. An example to explain that would be lets say, you are a parent and you want your kids to grow up in a better environment then you. This can only be done by making good decisions and being a good role model. I hope you can understand now where I'm going with this.

About the legal aliens thing, that joke sounded better in my head....

[Empowered One 41]

The language barrier has played a role again I'm afraid. I'm having trouble to put my mind to words, especially in English. Not only that, but things are 99% always twisted when translated in the sense that the interpretation can vary alot.

What I meant with that is that people have the tendency to think that they don't have to do anything but vote for the side or party they think that represents them most. Yet a person can do much more then just vote. I don't mean volunteer but more along the lines of making decisions that ripple constructively. An example to explain that would be lets say, you are a parent and you want your kids to grow up in a better environment then you. This can only be done by making good decisions and being a good role model. I hope you can understand now where I'm going with this.

About the legal aliens thing, that joke sounded better in my head....

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Originally posted by: afstandopleren

The language barrier has played a role again I'm afraid. I'm having trouble to put my mind to words, especially in English. Not only that, but things are 99% always twisted when translated in the sense that the interpretation can vary a lot.

What I meant with that is that people have the tendency to think that they don't have to do anything but vote for the side or party they think that represents them most. Yet a person can do much more then just vote. I don't mean volunteer but more along the lines of making decisions that ripple constructively. An example to explain that would be lets say, you are a parent and you don't want your kids to grow up in a better environment then you. This can only be done by making good decisions and being a good role model. I hope you can understand now where I'm going with this.

About the legal aliens thing, that joke sounded better in my head....quote>

My text emphasis.  You clearly didn't mean to say that.  If the word don't was removed, I think we get the sense you intended.  I get the impression that your language group uses a lot of double negatives for emphasis.  Could that group be Germanic?

---

Anyway, getting on with what to do.  If we had a very small country, we could adopt the Swiss system where everyone votes on major issues, but I am not sure they do that there any more.  However, maybe the bi-cameral representative system which most of us have now needs to be overhauled.  Certainly in Canada, the country is too big for Parliament in Ottawa to properly address the needs of peoples across the country.  We have such a diverse culture and the geography is so great that it becomes impossible.  Even the provinces are too big.

We need a central government to represent us internationally, but do we need them having departments that could better be handled locally?  There is a lot of duplication between the federal government and the provinces, and often they don't communicate with each other for various reasons including jealousy and party interference. 

Maybe we need to insert a third tier, which is already there, but doesn't do much.  Namely, the county governments.  Each province is divided into counties or cantons for civil law purposes and some levels of policing.  What if we had a county legislature with elected representatives that, essentially, replaced the provincial legislature, and this could put representatives, number to be determined, into the provincial legislature changing that to an appointive body appointed by selection by the county legislatures. 

Now, we replace the Senate of Canada, which is appointed at the pleasure of the Prime Minister, to be appointed by election by the county representatives, and subject to election on a periodic basis. 

Next we overhaul the federal set up to remove any part of it that is actually local concern.  Ministries that were eliminated would have to face the reality of "find a job" in the market, which would be proper sauce for the gander, frankly.  Employment protection for government employees ends here.  CUPE and other pulblic employee unions get their charters revoked.

The House of Commons from which the Prime Minister and other Ministers of the Crown are generally selected would be elected by the counties in their legislative session.  The only public vote would be for your county representative.  The rest is just window dressing today, and we don't need it.

If this became reality, and we got a Parliamentary Hierarchical Constitutional Monarchy (PHCM), I think everyone would be happier.  County elections need not be simultaneous.  Each province could vote on a staggered system, so that there would be fresh faces and opinions in government on a regular basis.  Since there are 12 provinces and territories, the cycle could be either six or twelve years.

Of course there is a massive amount of detail to be handled here, but that is for the gofer ground to solve.

Of course, a massive constitutional amendment would be needed for this which has to be approved by a two-thirds majority of the provinces or by a revolution, whichever comes first.