Obama the soft socialist
Bookworm has a piece at American Thinker in which she makes the point that it might be more instructive to divide ourselves on a continuum of Statists vs. Individualists rather than Liberals vs. Conservatives.
Obama, of course, would be a statist, of the “soft socialism” type. Look to Europe for the template. And look to the British or Canadian health care systems for a preview of just how well it works (hint: anyone with any money goes outside the system for treatment because of the unconscionable waits and the substandard care).
I think it’s even worse than that, however: I’ve noticed Obama showing signs of being at least somewhat simpatico with hard socialism, of the Hugo Chavez type. We don’t know for sure (and I sincerely hope I am incorrect!), because we don’t really know what Obama is made of inside. His record is sparse, but what we see of it is far more to the hard Left than his current rhetoric would indicate. His worrisome propensity for blocking speech that is critical of him is troubling. And of course there are his myriad associations with those whom Steve Diamond has termed the authoritarian Left.
The picture is clouded by the fact that the Right today has become more statist and less libertarian than it used to be. Republican politicians have presided over much of the last decade of growth in government spending, and “small state” conservatives are not at all happy about this development. But it’s a relative thing, and there’s little doubt that Obama would be far more likely than McCain to be in favor of increasing state spending, especially in the general socialist sense of redistribution of income—or what Obama likes to call “fairness.” Equality of outcome rather than equality of opportunity.
The nomenclature may not matter that much, because it’s my guess (and Bookworm’s) that more and more Americans don’t care if the country becomes more socialist, or perhaps might even applaud it. Part of this is the result of decades of education influenced by the likes of William Ayers and company, with the assistance of the likes of Obama.
According to Bookworm, to many Americans today, socialism is:
…just another content-neutral political ideology. In our non-judgmental age, it falls into the same category as Liberal vs. Conservative, or Left vs. Right. To most people, it just means Obama is a more liberal Liberal, or a leftier Lefty, and they already knew that.
Some people think this point of view is possible—and socialism is neutral or even desirable to many Americans—because we’re one of the few Western countries that haven’t had that much of a taste of it. The theory is that if we actually were to experience it we would resoundingly repudiate it.
But this argument fails to take into account the institutionalization of statism. Once the mechanisms are in place—and especially if the party in power has the ability to re-organize districts and voting laws and courts and term limits to favor their own side—it can become more and more difficult to change and revert back even if it’s the will of the people to do so. Just ask the people of Venezuela.
And once a population has become accustomed to being on the dole, it has a seductive attraction and is very difficult to give up. Just ask most of Europe.
Or ask Dostoevsky, author of “The Grand Inquisitor,” an excerpt from his masterwork The Brothers Karamazov. In this passage, the Grand Inquisitor addresses Christ, who in a mythical Second Coming has been imprisoned by the Inquisition:
Dost Thou know that the ages will pass, and humanity will proclaim by the lips of their sages that there is no crime, and therefore no sin; there is only hunger? “Feed men, and then ask of them virtue!” that’s what they’ll write on the banner, which they will raise against Thee, and with which they will destroy Thy temple….They will find us and cry to us, “Feed us, for those who have promised us fire from heaven haven’t given it!” And then we shall finish building their tower, for he finishes the building who feeds them. And we alone shall feed them in Thy name, declaring falsely that it is in Thy name. Oh, never, never can they feed themselves without us! No science will give them bread so long as they remain free. In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet, and say to us, “Make us your slaves, but feed us.”
I don’t think most people realize how much our society benefits from outside-the-box thinking and the ability of our innovators to go from a garage start-up to privately financed small company to world changer. Freedom is generally though of in terms of speech or sex life, but it’s really a mindset that says give it a try. The safer statist countries have a different mindset that tends to stifle if not completely eliminate this spirit.
Even here in Germany, I find Americans ideas supplementing the social net on which they pride themselves. Examples are Meals on Wheels and foodbanks that distribute items that approach the use by date and unsold produce from supermarkets.
With all the current interest in ACORN, I haven’t heard of projects that encourage people to do things for themselves. They seem to be more interested in how to get the state to do things for you. I suspect that in many communities, the gazebo park would have been completed by locals with shovels and some plant donations by local businesses with a few bakesales thrown in to buy a swing set.
The late George F. Kennan preferred the term “state-enforced collectivism,” which I think works very well here. His penultimate book “Around the Cragged Hill” is on my list of books to re-read if Obama pulls this catastrophe off.
The current financial meltdown was caused by leftist efforts at increasing home ownership among the poor. Yet the result has been improved poll numbers for Obama, the politician most likely to push the stupid policies that resulted in the meltdown.
The same is true of medical care, and the HMOs and managed healthcare that was driven by tax policy and medicare.
When cause and effect are spread out over 8 or more years, people don’t get it, they don’t learn the lesson. Often, they learn the opposite of what they should.
It is like those bear traps, where the bear pushes its paw in farther to decrease the pain, instead of pulling out and escaping.
I come to this blog to find comfort. The thinking here tends to be deep and calm; it goes on under the roiled surface of daily events. I come here and leave feeling braced and strengthened. I feel that this is a place where I can regain my moral and intellectual balance.
But what scares me these days is that Neo’s recent posts are having the opposite effect. And they should.
The problem with these towers is that they always collapse. Statism can survive only at expense of those who work, and work creatively – something that slaves never do. And government bureaucracy can not limit its spread, which eventually leads to full paralysis. It can be efficient only in very underdeveloped countries, when the task at hand is mobilization of resources in a handfull of key branches of industry. But in more complex and diversified economies it becames helpless. Symbiosis of statism and capitalism is actually a parasitism of the first on the second, and it is inherently instable. As Europe plunges into stagflation, it became more and more hard to finance all entitlements voted into law in more favorable times. Popular resentment would grow, untill a new conservative revolution became unavoidable.
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Thanks for the thoughtful analysis. I’m also worried that Americans are losing some of their vigilance against hard socialism or even communism. I’m afraid that, as you said, hard socialism will leave an institutional stain that does not come out easily.
Neo, use of the Grand Inquisitor is quite apt. What if his name were…
Saul Alinsky, intellectual mentor to both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
“Make the enemy live up to their (sic) own book of rules,” Alinsky wrote in his 1989 book Rules for Radicals. When pressed to honor every word of every law and statute, every Judeo-Christian moral tenet, and every implicit promise of the liberal social contract, human agencies inevitably fall short. The system’s failure to “live up” to its rule book can then be used to discredit it altogether, and to replace the capitalist “rule book” with a socialist one. (Courtesy Discover the Networks.org)
Old Chinese proverb: May you live in interesting times. Any way of opting out? Besides the obvious!
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Soft socialism? I have to assume that it is as truthful of a term as is ‘compassionate conservative’. There is no such thing, it is merely a play on words to make slavery sound comfortable. Once socialism becomes the governance form, it is hard or soft depending completely on it’s own needs. All for the state, nothing against the state, nothing but the state. As Benino Mussolin might have said. No, no, he actually did say that. So much for the “right” being conservative. Anyway… Don’t believe in fairy tales.
If the bad came to the worst, Second Amendment rights could be evoked to one of their constitutionally prescribed ends: armed rebellion to uproot tyranny. The less bloody option would be coup d’etat or political assassination. Let us hope that these extreme measures can be avoided.
Dostoyevsky is my favorite author and I just got done reading his letters. He was a Slavophile (probably THE Slavophile) and believed that the second coming of Christ would happen when the Slavs brought the rest of the world the Eastern Christ because the West had abandoned Christ due to the Enlightenment (which is essentially correct I believe.) He gave and speech on Pushkin that was wildly recieved and died believing his cause only to have the communists take over less than 30 years later. In spite of this oddity in him I still love the guy for his penetrating psychological insights. And at least he believed in God. Looking at the way things are today you got to believe in something.
I should also add that he was and anti-Semite. But anyone who believes in the special destiny of a particular ethnic group needs a scape goat. I’m not defending him on this.
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Martin Bebow Says:
“I should also add that he was and anti-Semite.”
I don’t believe he was an anti-Semite in the modern sense. It wasn’t ethnic identity but national and Russian Orthodox exceptionalism that had him in its grip. He had no love for other Slavs (the Poles fro example), and detested the Roman Catholic Church.
Even as a Pole and Roman Catholic, I am also an admirer of most his work, my favorite being “Crime and Punishment”.
I am still of the opinion the McCain – Palin ticket will win the day.
My feeling is that Statism has its fingers on our throats already. Too many folks percieve it as a caress, but it will be a very easy matter to turn it into a choke hold.
Emphasizing the first part of my user name, I don’t worry too much about me. What frustrates me so devilishly is that my children do not comprehend. They work hard, pay their debts, live exemplary lives–and accept that the government, and their taxes, should be responsible for all of the less fortunate.
The fundamental difference boils down to the sanctity of citizens property rights. Statists primarily do not value or uphold individual rights in general, and especially the concept of private ownership. Hard won freedoms, as defined by our Bill of Rights, should not be compromised for the will of the majority or any other dictator. Today, “Don’t tread on me” is merely a slogan on license plates for most people.
Worst Case Scenario:
Obama-Biden ticket wins in electoral landslide in November (vote percentage 52-48). Mandate is assumed. Democrats pick up filibuster-proof majority in Senate and extend majority in House due to Republican’s perveived mishandling of economy. New justices are added to Federal District, Appeals and Supreme Courts on the basis of how they “feel” about the fairness of cases before them.
Democrats begin immediate hearings, arrests and convictions on Bush administration “crimes.” Fairness Doctrine is reestablished and talk radio is removed from the air. Patriot Act provisions are used to monitor the web and shut down sites critical of new administration. The Justice Department is used to silence any other critics.
The economy tanking is blamed on fat cats and big business and taxes are raised to cover all of the additional programs the new administration created, including the civilian defense network which has siphoned off funds originally intended for the Department of Defense.
Thirty million undocumented people become citizens and are given the right to bring in all relatives into the country and they are immediately given citizenship as well. Unemployment is rampant so they are given welfare to tide them over.
Mandated “maximum wage” laws are passed on all businesses. Minimum wages are raised to levels called “living wages” that community organizers have studied.
A crisis in the midwest blamed on “right-wing extremists” extend the PA’s reach into the people. Farm failures caused by climate change (earlier frosts and colder winters) require reductions in food and fuel consumption since “green” derived is now mandated. Private transportation is prohibited for most people. Thermostats are required to be governmentally controlled.
People are asked to share their homes with others to save energy and protect the homeless. Rooms are allocated by the number of people in a family. Youth Corps participants are required to discuss their relatives’ views on the new administration to their cadre leaders (community organizers).
Any discussion of this is strictly prohibi…..
Dostoyevky was a typical Russian Orthodox Christian of his time: they tended to hate the Jews. I am currently reading a novel called “Russka” and am about one third of the way into this novel, at the part where some of the history of the Cossacks is interwoven into the fictional characters. The Jews were hated by the Ukrainians and Russians because of how they collaborated with the Catholic Polish landlords in oppressing the peasants of the steppe. The scapegoating of the Jews owes to the role which the Jews were put into by their Catholic overlords. Thus, the Jews were also victims of a nasty sociopolitical and cultural reality, with the Russian peasants on the bottom rung. I’m not excusing anti-Semitism here. Clearly, I am pro-Israel and friendly with Jews. I don’t excuse Dostoyevsky, but I do understand the context for these attitudes.
So, with that out of the way, I just want to say that I have long admired the works of Dostoyevsky. I think he nails the tradition of socialist utopian thought down pat. He is approaching the problem from the Christian tradition, or at least one interpretation of it. He makes a compelling case.
The normalization of socialist thinking in our society now seems to have multiple causes. There most definitely exists the demographic of people who want the redistribution of income because either they benefit from the dole or want to. I call them the rabble. Then, there are the useful idiots who mindlessly imbibe the ideas without ever questioning their provenance. It sounds nice to them. They like them. They were taught that the socialist ideas (but they are not ever called “socialist” but rather are packaged as “progressive” and “liberal”) disseminated in school and university are morally superior and humane. And then there are the intellectuals, which I was in training to become, who know full well where these ideas come from. They are dedicated to studying them at some depth, and then serving as ideological advocates and political influencers. In my case, I was aspiring to take a highly specialized approach and role as an intellectual advocate for socialism. The cutting-edge issue with respect to socialism having any truth claim whatsoever is defined by the critics of socialism: that it is incompatible with human nature. Human beings are selfish and do not naturally fit into the socialist ethos. The telos of socialist thought, whether or not it is explicitly referenced, and whether or not its adherents realize it, is Utopia. The fulfillment of history. Even though scientific socialism has been long discredited, cultural Marxism still has that telos. But every philosophy has to stand the test of scientific scrutiny. The question becomes: “Can human nature be altered or can it be changed so as to be compatible with this Utopia?” This was the question I had in my mind constantly, during my young adulthood as I was making my way through philosophy courses and theology courses. Is there a way around this problem? I tried looking at it from many angles. Towards the end of my intellectual journey into socialism, I digressed into psychology, genetics, and neuroscience in order to look at it from a different angle. I discovered that humanity and even the universe contain flaws right at the design level. We are a mixture of the angelic and the demonic. And so is the cosmos. There are tragic flaws that are not of our making. There are sociopaths who are that way through no fault of bad or violent parenting. Inexplicably, they just ARE. We can never bring heaven to earth. For reasons we can never understand, the Creator has set things up such that we have to labor in this world under suffering and tragedy. Evil and evil people exist, and they always will disrupt communities and families. They are like stones dropped into calm waters that send ripples outward into space and time.
Every experiment in socialism has failed. No exceptions. The trick is to make human selfishness work for the betterment of individuals and communities. Altruism is not a natural trait of the human condition. We have to struggle to tame selfish urges. It has ever been so and ever shall be so.
The vast majority of those “on the Left” of the spectrum do not think about these things. I have not read any article or book extant since leaving the Left in 1987 which definitively deals with the questions I asked myself. I was brought to those questions by the critiques of socialism and Liberation Theology by the lay Catholic theologian and writer Michael Novak. Our condition is marked by original sin and only the grace of God and our struggles to live virtuous lives puts evil in abeyance, but not extinction.
If you don’t understand why “socialism” or whatever it is you on the right don’t like, consider what happens when the manner of government leaves a vacuum for some of the populace.
Something will fill that vacuum. And it will keep filling that vacuum until many of you get off the kick that you don’t have to actually have government that at least makes an attempt to work for everyone.
ACORN is just one example of filling the void, but it’s certainly not the only one.
FredHjr, Dostoyevsky was also a socialist for a few short years.
It explains, to a degree, his great insight on the socialists and their creeds. He was prolific on the subject and socialism finds its way into a good many of his works.
Logern, the vacuum you allude to is more often than not created by the very same government you what…champion?
What void was ACORN filling? What has ACORN done that needed doing? The government’s responsibilities are clearly presented in the Constitution. Much more than those and you accept an incredible risk, to your individuality, freedom, and the very rights enumerated in that Constitution. Good Luck!
I tend to agree with br549. I still believe Obama will lose. Big. Lots of reasons, and race is (ironically) one of them. The media is another. We see them distorting and lying outright about every aspect in this election, yet we’re supposed to believe the poll numbers? We’ll see what happens.
On the topic, this reminded me of something:
In The Aviator there’s a scene where Hughes sits down to dinner with Kate Hepburn’s family and gets a lecture about the moral superiority of socialism, and that they (the Hepburns) don’t care about money. Hughes’ response, IIRC, is that they can all very well afford not to care about it, because they have plenty of it. Telling.
The WSWS’ nasty review of The Aviator seems to have been engendered by that one scene, in fact. The author (Walsh) pursues an irrelevant thesis in an attempt to discredit this notion (which he never actually does) by claiming the script implies that Hughes was NOT born into wealth. The fact – and Scorcese’s point, which Walsh would recognize, were he an actual film critic and not just another socialist mindlessly defending socialism – is that Hughes knew whereof he spoke precisely because he was born into wealth, and because he saw what it took to create that wealth, unlike the Hepburns.
IMHO, this is the biggest factor in favor of those who work so hard to promote socialism by fomenting class warfare with lies like “the disappearing middle class”, “rich get richer”, “tax cuts for the rich”, etc. That is, the average voter has no idea what it takes to become wealthy in a capitalist system. In fact, most would rather not think about it and tend to fall for the pervading implication (spread by the left) that most well-to-do people inherited their wealth. So of course the “logic” that this wealth should be redistributed more “fairly” is an easy sell.
Who else is “for” socialism? College students (and most academic faculty) who’ve never actually held a real job – let alone worked to become wealthy. Elites like those caricatured as the Hepburns, who see socialism as “fashionable” because they’re ignorant of its true nature. Politicians, natch’.
Readers are invited to learn about another American icon who was duped by the false promise of marxist socialism. Shocked the heck outta me.
p.s. Don’t you wish WordPress had a comment Preview widget?
I share Neo’s thoughts, and as to Bookworm’s thesis, have for some months remarked on several blogs, including perhaps this one: Obama=Chavez.
What’s happening will only make interesting history if honest history is in future allowed to be written. To show what’s coming, the historian KC Johnson, whose redoubtable blog Durham-in-wonderland meticulously detailed the Duke lacrosse saga, is, perversely, very pro-Obama. He didn’t allow my Obama=Chavez comment.
This country was not founded, nor does it yet function, on the premise that the function of government is to fill vacums.
If you actually believe that is the role of government, Cuba is probably the closest “Worker’s paradise”. If you want to join the movement at an earlier stage, you could continue further south to Venezeula. If you want a very mature stage, where there are no vacums at all(except empty stomachs), try N. Korea.
However, if you feel a spirtual or religous vacum is the problem you could head for Iran, Saudi Arabia or other “elightened” Theorcracies.
For me. I like the idea that you are free to fill perceived vacums in life as you see fit. It is even better if you are American because not only are you free, you have the opportunity to do so.
One of the claims of Karl Marx was that socialism would produce a new moral man. That’s something that riveted my attention when I first came across it, back in 1979 while reading excerpts of his writings when I was an undergraduate student.
Six years later, just before I reversed course in my thinking, I had already seen the evidence that Marx was wrong about this. If you look at EVERY socialist experiment and every socialist country, the evidence suggests the opposite of that claim: that the spiritual and moral culture declines rather than evolves. From the party apparatchiks on down to the ordinary people, socialism makes people worse, not better.
I am greatly alarmed by the general level of intellectual understanding and discourse over in the socialist sphere in our country. They neither understand what they believe nor do they try to honestly face the kinds of critiques that I subjected myself to. Nor was I alone on that journey. But today it seems that there is no journey for the vast majority of these people who embrace statism/socialism. Moral and intellectual torpor seem to be the norm.
The level of delusion is astounding also. These people ally themselves with 7th century head choppers who worship Satan, thinking that eventually they will win over or defeat Allah’s minions. They are willing to throw us under the bus and they think that the jihadists will willingly go along with this scam.
eeyore,
You paint a disturbing portrait of life in this country that prior generations would find difficult to credit as even possible.
Logern,
It’s true that ‘Nature’ will not ‘tolerate’ a vacuum.
Most on the right understand the allure of socialism quite well. We also understand the consequences of implementing that system of governance. It’s a case of the ‘cure’ being worse than the disease. A case of a severely dehydrated person drinking saltwater to temporarily quench their thirst.
For any society, at base the problem of poverty centers upon the lack of adequate parenting.
Specifically, the insufficient transmission of ‘cultural values’ such as hard work, the ‘golden rule, the desirability of education, personal accountability and responsibility, etc….
There is no societal substitute for these qualities.
I have to accept the present reality that BHO is likely to be elected, and I hold out hope that he will rise to the office and perhaps govern from the center, recognizing that the American people will never, ever accept socialism. Perhaps this is an indirect way of saying that his rational self interest – the desire to be a two term President – will trump that of his socialist left base.
On the other hand, I can also engage in self delusion, as there’s nothing in his background or that of those he surrounds himself with that would suggest that possibility.
As such, it’s my hope that he exhausts what political capital he has quickly, and we’re protected from really, really harmful legislation by Republican Senators schooled in the art of filibuster (assuming there are enough of them), setting the stage for the voters to repudiate him thoroughly in 2010.
To wit, BHO is a lame duck before he serves half of his term.
Now that’s a sunny thought.
I’m linking. The message here has to be spread. In an odd way, like mizpants, it’s comforting to know these things are being seen and understood by so many. I no longer feel so alone, and I am filled with HOPE that McCain will pull it off. By a large margin.
May it be.
A while back, a commentor at newsbusters posted the suggestion that in fact there are four main political forces at work today in the world. A rough rehash from memory of his postulate is this: 1)Global leftists (International Communist, Pro UN, Pro EU, open borders-Pro NAU types 2)Global Right Wingers (Free Trade at all cost, in some cases Pro EU, Pro NAU, pro-open borders) 3) Jihadists: desire World Caliphate 4) Nationalist- believe in individual nations. 1,2, and 3 are in various ways fighting against #4. 1,2,3 may think they will out do the others two in the long run- but for now, in many ways they work together. Hence mass migrations of Muslims into Europe and open borders in North America. Although, some of the Mexicans are in fact category 4 but also advocate open borders for their own nationalist reasons. Obviously, these 4 points are like the corners of a big box. An individual might not fall exactly on one corner, but occupies some place between one or more corners.
There is a further mechanism at work in the addiction to socialism. Socialist economies are not merely static. They are stagnant. Without economic growth, there is growth in poverty, which necessitates more government action to “help the poor.”
Although President Bush has been thoroughly excoriated for his “program cuts,” there have not, in fact been any. His “tax cuts for the wealthy” pushed the tax burden up the economic ladder a bit. Our tax rates are still higher than anywhere else in the industrial world. This is what has driven manufacturing jobs offshore. Our financial markets have prospered, but they have done so without an adequate base in the real productive segments of the economy. Add to that the deliberately bad regulation of mortgage lending, driving the lenders and those who invested in them into bankruptcy, and we do, indeed have, even without Obama, an increased demand for government “help.
I mourn for my lost country.
Neo,
I know you’re going to be interested to investigate the series of YouTube clips I embedded here:
http://mkfreeberg.webloggin.com/individualism-and-collectivism/
And I would specifically refer you to chapter 5, which makes an interesting point: The spectrum of individualism and collectivism is actually wrapped around a cylinder, with the extreme ends meeting in the back of it. That’s because in a completely anarchist society, the strong will muscle around the weak by virtue of superior force, and in so doing establish the underpinnings of a completely totalitarian society.
Michael, the same thing has happened here in CA. Arnold has been screamed at by Unions, newspapers, liberals and academia for making “cuts” each year.
Every year the actual dollars proposed and spent here in CA is more (lots more) and 2 of the last 5 years had more than 10% increases in the budget.
Where I grew up an increase is not a cut.
Journalism seems to be dead.
I even raised this issue at work and nobody believed me so I went to the sco.ca.gov website, pulled the numbers and showed them.
That did nothing to convince the government employees that were so die hard leftist but maybe it put a crack in their thinking for later when I produce other evidence of stuff they have been erroneously spoon fed over the years. Who knows?
Last time I visited the states, I couldn’t believe the private wealth in Ohio alongside the crappy public infrastructure. A little socialism is ok, folks! e.g., paying a bit more in taxes gets you better public transit, which cuts down on pollution. The horror …
From an earlier post something that struck me:
“But in more complex and diversified economies it becames helpless.”
I think this is true in general – the more complex a system the more you try and control it the worse it works.
I’m currently writing software for some high availability and high transaction systems. Basically the systems that things like credit card transaction go through – I’m under a NDA and can’t disclose very much of it, though were I able too even the other people in the field would be highly bored out of their skull let alone anyone else (I was bored out of my skull and I’m getting payed to do it – so this is very much NOT a brag).
The system itself is quite frustrating to work with – it is *really* limited in how it works. I’ve worked in past systems that it reminds me of (say some of the early IBM mainframes) but this is – well – crazy. However they have 99.9995 to 99.9998% uptime (approaching size nines – they have some files that have been open for writing for over *15 years*). Of course, they achieve this level of control by severely limiting what can be done. I’ve found parts of it to be highly interesting (and those parts are not under the NDA, but unless you are in the field then it is, well, back to be boring).
OTOH what I am writing is outside of their system, it is basically a restore of legacy information some sites want. As such I find myself using more current development methodologies. I was having a conversation with one of the people on my team about programming (a college student) and how one can view Object Oriented programing as simply defining the relationships and letting the whole thing just run. He expressed discomfort with the idea, I replied that the systems were getting so complex that no one person (or even development group) could control it so development has been moving towards that for a while.
To some extent this has been seen in Microsoft’s operating systems (which is, by any metric, a VERY complex system). The most buggy parts are the parts they have tried to control with an iron hand. Other systems (say Linux) just define relationships and let the whole thing go. XP was really the first OS (since DOS – which was simple enough that the control worked) they started doing just that and it is really the first I was ever content to use as a development platform.
For software people Bertrand Meyer had the absolute best description of it I have read in “Object Oriented Software Construction” and his language called “Eiffel”. I think someone smarter than me could easily take his ideas and express in them in a general way for things outside of software.
It is interesting that simple systems work best with someone ruling it with an iron hand, complex systems need relationships defined and then let the thing go. It works not only in markets, govts, but also even totally 100% artificial systems such as a programming environment. Politicians do not like little to no control – the very act of choosing to be a legislature (or executor) is choosing to exercise control over the rest of the people. I think we (the US) have had one of the best tries to short circuit that idea, but I do not see anyway to do it for very long.
I liked the site that Morgan K. Freeberg linked for us. If the definitions of the presenter are concise and accurate, and I think they are, then we here in the U.S. and Western Europe are much closer to collectivism and have been so for some time.
I tried to read all the comments before commenting, and the ten or so I did read were those of thoughts that I myself think, and in reading another soul write them, felt. And it got too damn depressing.
I don’t see myself giving in, but I’m not the type to go out in a blaze of glory either. The fact is that all that lives must die. A time for this and a time for that and all that crap. People (high born and placed or low and talking about the water-cooler) don’t even debate anymore. Consensus has become fact, so the bigger group is the “more” correct. Other than never failing, personally, to remain calm and sane and stick to the facts in the face of humans that become howler monkeys and tell me my motives, I cannot think of anything that I can do (or can be done by any) to slow the tide. Even doctors admit that their only ability is to delay death.
I don’t know. It doesn’t seem right to give up, but there is nothing to do that I can see. Not individually, and that is the point. There was a time, in this country, when people were so busy with their individual lives that they didn’t take the time to learn 10% of a national or global issue, then label anyone who disagreed with their position a “war-monger” or “hate-thinker”. There have always been world-class busybodies, but their numbers were few, and the rest of us just wanted room to screw up our lives the way we saw fit. Our own, private, insanity. With a picket fence, because everyone loves a picket fence.
All that lives must die, and America has done better with Her time than any other nation or country or tribe or people that have ever existed in recorded history. But even mighty Caesar must fall. She, too, must pass. And perhaps it is a comfort that each failure of the Test Case of a Free People was, for a time, freer and juster than the last (Greece, Rome, England, USA). Perhaps the USA is just another Good Omen stepping stone in man’s long march from the swamps to the stars. I am just a man, so I can’t know that for sure.
So, I have decided to watch her die with dignity, because as long as I live with dignity, even if America becomes full Che-insane, then at least the America of my childhood is alive in my heart. Man, that sounds mawkish, but there it is. I don’t think I’m lying.
It would be easy to carp and Daily-Kos myself through Obama’s Second Coming, mewling like a child that can’t have his happy meal every single day, but I wont. At least I’ll try not. I shall live my life as best I can, and never deny or waver from what I know in my heart to be true (which, by the way, is the same stuff I can prove with reason in my brain except the existence of dog-heaven); never deviate from the Truth as best as my sense, reason, and wisdom, in unison, can understand. And maybe I’ll watch America die around me. Or, maybe not.
I don’t know why I’m writing this on this blog. I’ve been thinking it for some time, and I read many blogs that I know you read as well. I guess I find you the most level (or at least the most level writer). Not stoic, exactly, but not clownish either. More or less free from excessive defense mechanisms. I imagine you must be a very good shrink. I don’t see one, myself, and I never will no matter how much my family and friends beg. That was a joke, in case the context didn’t shine through.
The bitch of it is, is, that I’m not personally unhappy. Things are more or less ok for me. I have my duties that give me satisfaction, friends, family, hobbies… but, damn it, because I’m fine doesn’t make the fall of the Enlightenment fine with me. It affects me personally, not materially. And it is frustrating-not because I think we’ll lose-but because I don’t know what to do to try to win. It’s like a game that I can’t play a part in, but just watch the ball spin and hope it lands on my number. Dante, at least, knew the path to walk, daunting as it were. But then again, when there is life, there is hope.
Wow… I guess I needed to get that off my chest. I do feel a little better, actually. Weird, the human mind. I don’t pretend to understand it, not even my own, but it is something.
Just to end this far too long comment well, I’ll quote my favorite line from Mr. Reagan (it is rather long for a quote):
“You and I know and do not believe that life is so dear and peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery. If nothing in life is worth dying for, when did this begin — just in the face of this enemy? Or should Moses have told the children of Israel to live in slavery under the pharaohs? Should Christ have refused the cross? Should the patriots at Concord Bridge have thrown down their guns and refused to fire the shot heard ’round the world? The martyrs of history were not fools, and our honored dead who gave their lives to stop the advance of the Nazis didn’t die in vain. Where, then, is the road to peace? Well it’s a simple answer after all.
You and I have the courage to say to our enemies, “There is a price we will not pay.” “There is a point beyond which they must not advance.”
PB
Fascinating post, strcpy. I’m not a programmer, but I think I get it. As an investment professional, I can understand where it can be applied to markets.
“The level of delusion is astounding also. These people ally themselves with 7th century head choppers who worship Satan, thinking that eventually they will win over or defeat Allah’s minions. They are willing to throw us under the bus and they think that the jihadists will willingly go along with this scam.”
This goes right to what I’ve been stunned by: the Left’s indecent haste to jettison ALL their alleged principles — civil rights, women’s rights, freedom of speech, anti-patriarchal systems, gay rights, opposition to genocide, opposition to theocracy — the instant a non-white group attacks America. So, judging by the fruits of this particular tree, their true guiding principles are hatred of whites and hatred of America. Everything else is shoved into the industrial shredder feet-first.
So Saddam Hussein of crimes innumerable, becomes a Victim. Bin Liner, well, he only did to us what we deserved — those three thousand innocent Americans deserved to be burned alive and pulverized. Because they were Americans. Women in the Middle East? as a friend of mine (alleged feminist) said, “Well, maybe they WANT to wear the burka!” Female genital mutilation? hey, it’s a cultural thing. No prob. Executing homosexuals? Aw, come on, you know the Rethuglicans are exaggerating all that because they’re such Racists. Theocracy? hey, it’s a cultural thing! and who are we to pass judgements against people of color and their Rousseuvianly superior native customs? they’re so much more authentic than we are!
The mind boggles. New York has gotten to be like the Twilight Zone: where the useful idiots really do believe that the Girl Scouts(!!) are a fascist, paramilitary organization, Sarah Palin is a Nazi, and that it’s cool to say Wasalamm aleikum before dinner, when these are the bastards who’ve declared their intention of destroying our civilization.
The only thing that comforts me is the somewhat bitter knowledge that humans have fought darkness as bad or worse, many times in our long history on this planet.
We’ve enjoyed a bit of a holiday from history here in America the last thirty years. Time to get back on the ramparts and belt up.
I don’t remember the book, or what it was about. Probably sci-fi – but the thing I remember about it, that has never left me, was a passage about The Government Department of Sabotage,
Because they’d gotten TOO efficient, and found that the system didn’t work well when everything went too smooth, there needed to be anomalies. So people were hired to create problems for people to solve, and things for them to overcome…
It kind of relates to your complex systems need relationships defined and then let the thing go idea.
And Palladbust – I know exactly how you feel – because I’m fine doesn’t make the fall of the Enlightenment fine with me. It affects me personally, not materially. And it is frustrating-not because I think we’ll lose-but because I don’t know what to do to try to win.
The slippery slope; Acorn, election fraud; Illegal aliens, amnesty, politically recruited thru guarantees of social services not available in Mexico; Voter demographics change, eventually securing permanent democratic party control; China and Russia, as well as the jihad culture run unchallenged; The U.N. becomes the center for world government… The entire world morphs into a third world environment, nuclear proliferation amongst small feuding players, ie sunni/shiite, etc. guarantees 9-11’s of nuclear proportions… The europeanization of America, the slippery slope, where the only hope will be preservation of the Republic and the constitution by a dedicated, armed minority and military institutions, similar to the phenomena that has been Turkey… Excellent post Neo.
Incidentally, I may be naive, but today may mark the beginning of the next (international) bull market, with America leading the way. Buy American!
Complexity of interconnected system is measured not by the number of elements, but by the number of connections between them. The last grows as the square of the former. That means that when economy is planned from a single center, the volume of planning growth as a square of the number of enterprises. It is possible to balance a few hundred factories each making only one type of production, but when the number of enterprises amounts to millions, centralised planning became impossible. This doomed the “hard socialism” of the Soviet type.
Soft socialism avoids this trap, but punishing people for success and rewarding them for failure (that what “fairness” or “social justice” actually mean) it undermines working ethics and responsibility. The result is stagnation and moral decadence, falling competitiveness and, eventually, societal collapse.
Hmmmm…. I may be a believer in the four corners theory above. I don’t see all Australians accepting socialism full on. Not all Americans, Canadians, Brits, and a few other countries. Perhaps similar thinkers will indeed migrate to the same areas of the planet and build a country of our own. It would be nice if it were to start where I live now, so I wouldn’t have to move and stuff. You know……
Our country is split, effectively, down the middle. It appears to be firming up as to irresistible vs. immovable. My problem with it is outside influence. If push comes to shove, outside influence will more likely side with the socialist version of our citizenry.
So I am concerned about the second amendment.
Why? Because at this moment, the legal gun owners mainly have rifles, shotguns, and mainly larger bore higher powered pistols. The “other” side at this time has smaller (easier to hide) pistols and Saturday Night Specials. The legal owners can kill at a distance.
As Mickey Mouse is now registered to vote, more ammo is a good idea.
Neo, I’ve had the feeling for some time that we are losing our country to statists and that the coming generations will never know real freedom. Capitalism, which has given the world, in a short period of time, more progress in standards of living and improvement of the conditions of our existence has for some time now been a perjorative. It is being trashed in academe and it’s defenders are nowhere to be found.
Toes commented that collecting taxes to build infrastructure is a good thing and equated that with socialism.
He or she has demonstrated a basic misunderstanding of socialism, and apparently of capitalism also.
It goes without saying that government has certain legitimate functions. Collecting taxes to establish and maintain elements of community infrastructure is legitimate. Even Americans understand that. (Maybe our infrastructure suffers because much of our tax revenue over the past 60 years has been used to protect the freedom of others.)
Collecting taxes to redistribute wealth to other persons in order to level society is certainly questionable. Government control of the means of wealth production is madness.
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This has been a good but very sad set of thoughts. The common thread: We are losing the very good thing (not perfect, mind) that we had. Neo’s Posters are mourning. It should be our task to figure out what happened, to do a post-mortem.
For my part, it seems clear we were too tolerant. Way too tolerant, too accepting of “diversity” in its broad sense. I had some strong self-doubts even as I saw the Gramscian wave wash over the gunwales. May be the Internet came along too late to assist in our finding one another and figuring it out together, as we have now done.
Neo, it has seemed clear to me for quite some time now that acceptance of the multiply-discredited, false promise of socialism requires a particular psycho-emotional makeup.
Elements of this seem to include a failure to progress through some (all) of Erikson’s stages. For instance, the leftist mindset with which we’re familiar could be fairly well stereotyped (caricatured) by the following:
– Not trustful (all government is bad)
– Doubtful or shameful (projected onto authority – both legal and religious)
– Guilt-ridden (“social justice” eases this using OPM)
– Inferior (overcompensated via narcissism)
– Role-confused
– etc.
Are you aware of anyone who’s done any work along these lines? Jonathan Haidt has addressed differences between liberal (actually leftist, but he hasn’t figured this out yet, I think) and conservative mindsets from a different direction, i.e., moral foundations. But those are constructs he’s invented through observation (which doesn’t mean they’re invalid – just maybe untested).
Toes wrote, “Last time I visited the states, I couldn’t believe the private wealth in Ohio alongside the crappy public infrastructure. A little socialism is ok, folks! e.g., paying a bit more in taxes gets you better public transit, which cuts down on pollution. The horror …”
My response is – There is two thing that you are confusing with due respect.
1) Taxes – Which brings in revenue into the government
2) Government spending – which is an outflow from the government.
In this country Toes, the bottom 50% of income earners pay slightly more than 3% of the income taxes. The top 50% of income earners pay the rest – that is nearly 97% of the income taxes.
Those taxpayers would LOVE to have their hard earned money go for things like national security, infrastructure, safety net for the elderly or non-able bodied and veterans, etc.
But what we have here is a situation where EVERY year for the last 60 years there is more money spent than the previous year and Democrats accuse Republicans of cutting which isn’t true. Since 1960 where the Defense budget was 50% of the federal budget expenditures it has gone down steadily to now 19% of the federal government expenditures. What has taken it’s place? The entitlement programs.
As a centrist – I am to the right of both the Democrats and Republicans. Democrats are on record of voting for more spending and more taxes over the last 60 years by more than a factor of 3 than Republicans (I’m being generous – most studies have it more than a factor of 3 but I’m including a 60 year period). However, Republicans have grown spending AS WELL.
As a centrist, I would not cut government as libertarians want to do (to the tune of 80% cut) but I would keep government spending the SAME dollar amount for 8 years while we reprioritize what we spend money on.
Incidentally Toes, government spending on infrastructure has gone up and gone up significantly in the last 13 years (despite Democrats making erroneous cut allegations after the bridge collapse in Minnesota).
It is perfectly legitimate for conservatives to be concerned about the out of control debt/credit/spending problem that California/America/most Western countries are in lately.
People have found that they can vote themselves more goodies (government spending) and not care about the burden they are putting on others in the future.
Non-Western countries will suffer also when Western countries have a depression or recession. It is inevitable that the fight for resources will lead to war. War isn’t good for the infrastructure. 🙂
It is prudent that CA and America choose a better path. It is prudent that voters wise up and vote in people like John McCain, or representatives like Tom Tancredo or other fiscal conservatives who have a voting record that shows many votes towards cutting spending or not increasing it.
Wouldn’t you agree that we could after 60 years of increased spending – freeze spending and re-prioritize a little? Don’t you think that years where there have been double-digit increases in spending has been irresponsible a little?
Baklava, if your reason for voting for McCain is to deny “not so soft socialist” and “soft fascist” Obama the presidency and its powers, fine. If you believe McCain is in any way, shape, or form, a fiscal conservative you are in for one great letdown.
GeoPal, it is nice of you to know my reasons. 🙂
If you see the tone of my post above, you can see that I’m not delusional. I am of no illusion that Republicans are centrist or right of center as a group. There are many individuals who are.
While John McCain has called for a freeze in spending during debate, I am cautiously optimistic that:
a) he can veto everything with an increase in spending that Congress gives him
b) he can propose anything to Congress that has very little increase in spending.
Since you asked (kidding – you didn’t), my reasons for voting for McCain are simple:
1) His understanding of foreign matters and national security are 10 fold over Obama. In fact, Obama’s understanding and naivety are dangerous in my view. National security is very important.
2) John McCain’s economic 101 understanding is positive whereas Obama’s is negative. Obama does not understand economics 101. He thinks “redistribution” or taxing anybody more would create greater prosperity or have a positive effect on the economy. It is a separate issue that he plans to “spend” more and “give” more. Yes – government spending has a positive effect on the economy but is that REALLY what government needs to do in a global credit crunch time?
2 continued) John McCain proposes to reduce capital gains and corporate tax rates. That IS THE REMEDY for the economic hardships this country faces. That is a POSITIVE proposoal and I take him at his word and will type many words fighting to hold him to that proposal.
3) John McCain’s proposal on a host of issues are better ideas that introduce more individual choice and less of a government role. I like those proposals.
I do not believe John with a Democrat Congress can succeed in passing any of his proposals with a Democrat Congress and therefore I will not be “letdown” as you suggest – as I accept the reality of the situation.
The fact that neither Republicans nor Democrats could restrict government spending for decades show that this is a systemic problem, not ideological. Congress holding strings of the purse can not do it because all its members want be re-elected and so they lobby more spending for their constituencies. That is, they have local interest over national interest, and this destructive tendency is not checked and counter-balanced.
It seems strange to me that nobody here mentioned the most important works on the theme of this post, namely The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism. / Vol. 1 of The Collected Works of F. A. Hayek. — London: Routledge, and Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989, and “The Road to Serfdom” of the same author.
The Road to Serfdom was excellent.
I’ll have to check out the Errors of Socialism.
Thanks!
COLLECTIVISM IS THE BORG. FIGHT THE BORG AND STAND FOR LIBERTY AND THE CONSTITUTION!
i cant post again… too much trouble to retype.. its stuff we forgot.. ‘
since i dont want to play games i would say read this document about communist tactics and such and apply it to now…
WHAT WE MUST KNOW ABOUT COMMUNISM
Chapter Eleven – TACTICS AND STRATAGEMS: THE UNITED FRONT
its from 1958… and it sounds like they are talking about alinsky and obama… but thats because they are applying the lessons learned in the 7 eras of the cpusa..
i will jump to the financial part… the post was a good one… but then again, no one like length above sesame street soundbites, and you have to give them commercials
[aside bar: the silient movie greed was 9 hours in its abridged form. wagnerian opera can go 12 hours… today, we cant stay focused long.. which is why we cant invent, design or do much… its a crippling thing]
=======================
the Communists have on their hands the odd double task of seeming to be allied with reformers and yet seeking both to discredit them and to prevent their getting problems well enough solved to lower “class tensions. For this task, the united front affords an ideal maneuvering ground. It makes “legitimate” the presence of Communists at problem points in our society where reformers are at work. Being on hand, they can make the most of every chance to assume “vanguard” role: to grab the spotlight by first inducing strife and then being more “brave” than reformers in fighting the “forces of reaction.” Also, they can do what Marx recommended in his Address to the Communist League: namely, outbid the reformers by being less “timid” and more “generous” in the demands they make in behalf of the needy and discontented.
They enjoy here the same advantage Lenin enjoyed when he set himself to outbid and discredit the provisional government: namely, that of being irresponsible. Reformers, like the provisional government, take a responsible attitude. society, with all its faults. They do so because they regard our society as their own, and want to help make it function -not to prove that it is “bankrupt.” Hence, they feel that they can, in good conscience, recommend only such solutions to problems as seem both workable and fair all across the board. Communists, being ideological expatriates, are not thus constrained. just as they profess a strictly “class” morality, so they propose strictly ‘class” solutions to problems; and they shape their proposals, not in terms of workability, but of wide appeal and of educative” value with respect to the “class” nature of the “bourgeois capitalist State.”
Reformers cannot deal in the Communist type of “immediate demand,” -but they can be doubly discredited by it. By comparison with the more “courageous” and “generous” Communists, they can be discredited in the eyes of those who suffer privation and injustice; and by their united front association with the Communists, they can be discredited in the eyes of the conservative community. Thus, many times, they not only lose good will and practical support for the causes they care about but are themselves diverted from, these causes to problems of self-justification and self-defense.
The CPUSA’s forty-year existence has held six united front periods.
=================
the periods continued after this document which was written in 1958… just before the communist youth revolution…
=================
On a number of counts, this seven-year interval -overspanning the stock-market crash and the worst years of the depression -is one of the most revealing in the history of the CPUSA. For what the Party did at that time tells us much about what we can expect of it if our democratic society is again confronted by a major economic crisis.
The depression was, for all America, an experience so profoundly traumatic that almost any brand of radicalism which was then manifest has passed muster among us as a natural product of despair or of helplessness to relieve despair. Hence, we have tended to overlook certain facts. One of these is the obvious fact that Communism was in no possible sense a product of the depression. Another is that the depression was not, for the Communists, a time eof despair, but of unprecedented optimism. The very type of crisis that Marxism-Leninism had promised them had come to pass. America, at last -with millions unemployed, desperate farmers, bankrupt Ò°etty bourgeoisieÓ -had become a field white unto the harvest. If communist laborers were few in comparison with the total population, they were fired by hope; they had answers to give where no one else had; and they were schooled in politicizing tension and unrest.
Ever since that time, their writings have been tinged with nostalgia for the depression years. Even John Gates, when he was still editor of the Daily Worker, acknowledged the existence of this nostalgia -while doubting its tactical wisdom: “Some comrades say that all we have to do is sit tight until the next depression and the return old days of the thirties. . . . The workers do not consider the days when they starved as the ‘good old days’. (2)
What, then, did the Party do with a depression at its disposal? In 1929 -to quote John Gates again- the basic industrial workers were unorganized, the Negro people lacked organization and leadership,” and the CPUSA “had a virtual monopoly in filling the vacuum.” (3) How did it relate to America’s need? How did it use its opportunity?
As we have already noted, it set itself to discredit the leaders of all non-Communist working groups and to win over their members for its own purposes. While it constantly agitated for reforms that appealed to large “ready-madeÓ groups -and claimed the credit for any that were achieved -it always labeled these as transitional demands”‘ linked them up with propaganda for the abolition of capitalism and “bourgeois democracy.”
To give itself new sources of Party membership and new spheres of influence, it created a host of Ò¦ront” organizations: groups not formally connected with the Part, but dedicated to enacting its program. The leadership in these was securely in Communist hands; but the membership included as many non-Communists as possible. In the language of the Party, such “fronts” were “transmission beltsÓ (using Lenin’s phrase) between the “revolutionary van the “unorganized masses.”
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so this stuff is almost 100 years old now..
the paper is about tactics 30 years old in 1958..
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If the CPUSA was ready for revolution, the American people, as it turned out, were not: not even the unemployed and bankrupt. For a time, in the depths of the depression, the tactic of the “united front from below” netted the Party a host of new members; but, on its own testimony, it lost them as fast as it gained them. Thus, we read in a small pamphlet, issued by the Central Committee of the CPUSA and dated September 1932, a startling admission: “No fewer than 10,000 to 12,000 new members join the Communist Party of America every year, yet the total membership of the Party does not rise above 10,000 to 12,000. This means that every year practically the whole Party membership changes.” (5)
On the basis of this and other evidence, we must conclude that the ‘good old days” of the depression are remembered with nostalgia by veteran members of the CPUSA not because of any marked and durable success in building the Party but because revolutionary aims and allegiances could be openly declared, confidence was at flood tide, and “immediate demands” around which fervent programs of agitation could be developed were unlimited in number. In practical fact, the “united front from below” ended, not as a successful coalition of the party with authentic non-Communist groups, but simply as a drawing together of all the elements already sympathetic to Communism. it became, we might say, a coalition of the Party with its own “front” organizations.
How, then, shall we account for the fact that by 1939 the CPUSA had 59,000 members? The answer lies in the formation of the third united front: ‘the People’s Front Against Fascism.” We can date this from the Seventh Congress of the Comintern, which met in Moscow, in July-August 1935, to deal with the threat to the Soviet Union represented by the Axis powers; and specifically, at that time, by the Berlin-Rome-Tokyo alliance. The key speaker at this Congress was Georgi Dimitrov, General Secretary of the Comintern, and he urged that Communist Parties, particularly in tlie capitalist countries, give up their “left sectarian” tactics and set about creating the broadest possible “front” against fascism. Their aim should be to establish “unity of action of all sections of the working class, irrespective of the party or organization to which they belong.” (6)
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thats all i will post…
there is no such thing as soft socialism…
its only soft when it cant declare itself, and others may kick them out…
but once that cant happen, they come around full flower…
even chavez went to redo the constitution..
how long before obama after election and the false crisis… will change the constitution?
One of these is the obvious fact that Communism was in no possible sense a product of the depression.
by the way, richard (?) Cohen (!) who writes op eds in the daily news (from france), made this assertion a couple of weeks ago…
of course, he is fairly sure that no one has read these things… they havent caugth on that their crap is failing because we have tons of uncensored paper!!!!
so the left is still doing EXACTLY waht it has done for so long… like a mech robo monster, it just keeps slaming its head against the wall till the wall breaks… given that they are trying to control history, and want a failure, they only have to keep trying and trying… for the good guys will not kill the scorpion due to morals…
Toes,
A little socialism is ok, folks! e.g., paying a bit more in taxes gets you better public transit, which cuts down on pollution. The horror …
I think your confused as to what socialism is. the stuff is degraded and not kept because of socialism. (soviet realism was their way of saying, we aint going to spend a penny more than whats is completely pragmatic, regardless of how it makes people feel or how they live as long as they live and work).
if your taking money to do social programs they have to come from somewhere. so in order to aviod raising taxes, they play raise and shift. they raise taxes to help bridges, then they shift that to social programs. the bridges are not maintained, and so they get a crisis, which gets them emergency funding for the bridge.
so by losing they can win, becuase we will not punish the entity in office for screwing things up puerposfully to install socialism.
in any plae where socialism replaces the purpose of the state in a free nation, it first guts infrastructure without the people noticing the jiggering of the budget.
I just read your blog from 10/13/08 [“O” the soft socialist[
The last line”Make us your slaves just feed us”
This got me to thinking about the genetic food seed
manipulation going on presently and how it might
play into the “Long Walk” strategy.
There is no free lunch
WVL
When the public transit workers in Lost Angeles went on strike, it lasted six months. When transit workers went on strike recently in Toronto, it lasted half of a Sunday afternoon. One way to slice that difference is that, in Los Angeles, only powerless people rely on public transit. Is it a cultural thing? I dunno. I’m not nearly knowledgeable enough about government spending in the states to speculate. But what’s striking about the stretch of the USA I saw in 2004 is that you guys have money to spare. I’ve traveled in much less wealthy countries that have really good common space and services.
just wondering why it is socialist for corporations to pay tax, but not people in the middle class
Thank you. best information for me.
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