Posted on 08/22/2013 7:12:46 PM PDT by Enza Ferreri
The fact that communism, or even socialism, cannot be implemented in reality, is by now widely accepted; even Leftists and liberals, if unhappily and grudgingly, had to surrender to the overwhelming historical evidence which has accumulated especially in the last 2 or 3 decades, showing that a socialist economy is almost a contradiction in terms, and a society based on those principles is barely feasible, and certainly not a happy one.
But hardly anyone seems to question the ethical validity of socialist ideas. In the mind of most people, they still inhabit the moral high ground.
In fact, I believe that socialism not only starts from premises which are wrong factually, but it is also wrong ethically.
First of all, let's start from explaining what wealth is. There is a common misconception that wealth is a theft of sort, that people become rich by taking from others.
I don't think that this idea began with socialism. The French libertarian socialist, or anarchist, Proudhon, famously said: "Property is theft", but I don't think that he was original in that.
No, it seems to me that, when you lack something, to blame someone else for your want is one of the simplest, most instinctive of all human impulses: envy.
The thought behind this seems to be that there's only a given, limited amount of goods, and if somebody has more, then it follows that somebody else must necessarily have less.
There's a long history of that idea, perhaps beginning with humanity itself, through Robin Hood to modern-day socialists.
It is a misconception, due to a failure to understand the nature of wealth. Wealth is essentially created, not given.
If anybody is in any doubt about it, they just have to think of these two countries: Iran and Switzerland.
Nature has given an enormous wealth to the former, in the form of oil (although the reason why oil is "black gold" has to do with the huge economic and historical development of the West, and the need of Western societies for it) and natural gas. Iran has the world's largest proved natural gas reserves, and the world's fifth largest proved crude oil reserves. And yet, it is the 75th country in the world for Gross Domestic Product based on Purchasing-Power-Parity (PPP) per capita.
The Swiss live in an extremely hard habitat, a region of high mountains very unsuitable, on the face of it, to human settlement and economic prosperity. Still, the Swiss have the 9th highest Gross Domestic Product based on Purchasing-Power-Parity (PPP) per capita in the world.
It is obviously the use that both these populations have made of their natural resources that has made them rich or poor, not those resources in themselves. And that use stems from a conscious choice of those people, which in turn comes from their mindset, their way of thinking.
And here we arrive at one of the many hypotheses and fundamental parts of his theory that Karl Marx got wrong: the idea that human beings are dominated by the ineluctable laws of economics, which in turn are governed by the dialectic of history and eventually of nature.
For both Marx and Sigmund Freud humans are not free agents, but subject to deterministic principles. They go against the Christian concept of free will, which is not only closer to the truth, but also positively guides human behaviour, so it is pragmatically useful.
Instead, psychoanalysis and Marxism, two theories of huge influence, one in the personal the other in the public sphere but both profoundly affecting the cultural and political life of our time, have done a lot of damage through the creation of a highly destructive way of thinking that denies free will.
It's true that most individual human beings only use a little part of their potential. That doesn't imply the flattering idea, which has sometimes been expressed, that everybody is potentially an Einstein or a hidden genius.
It just means that most human beings don't fully realize how much control they can have on their lives, how much difference a choice rather than another can make on one's destiny.
We hold the moral high ground but we’re always on the defensive.
It’s also anti-Biblical. The Bible is big on people having to face the consequences of their actions, but socialism tries to protect people against the consequences of their choices in life.
/johnny
But what if it takes money away from my higher paid boss and gives it to me?
If you met my boss you would understand LOL
He really is a ....
Switzerland is in fact a modern welfare state. In Milton Friedman’s favorite Hong Kong over 75% (?) of housing is public.
While writing “Das Kapital” Karl Marx spent a lot of time in London libraries reading Adam Smith, not to learn from Smith but to pervert him.
yes it is
well, Hong Kong is part of China
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alqUqdbfxhk
Calculation and Socialism
This was the lecture that convinced me without a doubt that socialism could never work.
Here is an old Soviet anecdote:
One day Karl Marx visited his mother and told her that he wrote a book called “Capital”. His mother looked and told him “you are a moron” Marx was in shock and asked “why ?”.She responded that instead of wasting his time to write “ Capital” he should make capital.
A true story, Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata had Socialism explained to him as everybody doing what they could in working the fields and then all the crops being divided up equally. His response was if anyone was going to take away the crops he grew himself for someone who did not work as hard, he would shoot him nine times in the chest.
Source, Frank McGlynn’s “Villa and Zapata”
Only market capitalism is a moral economic system.
You mean one where a person who has something to sell and a person to looking to buy come to a mutually beneficial transaction?
...
Well, that’s racist
///sarcasm
Obama and Holder are publicly producing weekly plans that are just more smokescreen distractions to divert attention away from the incompetent manner Obama has handled his day job.
The best indicator of a PHONY ADMINISTRATION is the number of its REAL SCANDALS.
Commie Tyrant Obama’s current talking points are thus smokescreen distractions for the products of Obama’s first 4 years in office:
* Refusal to close US Southern Border to Mexican illegal alien invaders
* No known un-forged records of Place of Birth
* No known un-forged records of University grades
* Benghazi Massacre
* Dereliction of Duty as CIC during Benghazi Massacre
* Cover up of Benghazi Massacre
* Destruction of Seal Team Six
* Cover up of Fast and Furious murder of US Border Agent by Exec. Order
* IRS-Obama’care” Commune Death Grip on Wealth and Health
* NSA-Gestapo Death Grip on all citizen’s communications
* Use of Courts against News Media
* Use of Supreme Court to install Un-Constitutional Obama’care’ Tax
* Destruction of the US Coal Industry
* Refusal to permit XL Pipeline construction
* Trillion Dollar a year Federal Overspending
* Monthly violations of the US Constitution by Obama
* Use of Exec. Orders to bypass Congress.
REPLACE sniveling coward Speaker Boehner with a FIGHTER!
It is time to IMPEACH Tyrant B. Hussein Obama, aka Barry Soetoro.
_______________________
Tyrant B. Hussein Obama, (aka Barry Soetoro), continues his unopposed efforts to expand Totalitarian Obamanation in Liberty-based America.
Where are the Republican opponents of Tyrant Obama?
Why have the Articles of Impeachment for Tyrant Obama not been issued by US House Speaker Boehner, or Pro-Welfare Republicans Cantor or Ryan?
Have House and Senate Pro-Welfare Republicans formed a cave-in pact with Pro-Welfare Democrats to protect Tyrant Obama?
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