Posted on 03/06/2008 8:00:03 PM PST by ScratInTheHat
There is, in a competitive society, nobody who can exercise even a fraction of the power which a socialist planning board would posses...Who can seriously doubt that the power which a millionaire, who may be my employer, has over me is very much less than that which the smallest bureaucrat possesses who wields the coercive power of the state and on whose discretion it depends how I am allowed to live and work? ... Our generation has forgotten that the system of private property is the most important guarantee of freedom. It is only because the control of the means of production is divided among many people acting independently that we as individuals can decide what to do with ourselves. When all the means of production are vested in a single hand, whether it be nominally that of 'society' as a whole or that of a dictator, whoever exercises this control has complete power over us.
To many who have watched the transition from socialism to fascism at close quarters the connection between the two systems has become increasingly obvious, but in the democracies the majority of people still believe that socialism and freedom can be combined. They do not realize that democratic socialism, the great utopia of the last few generations, is not only unachievable, but that to strive for it produces something utterly different - the very destruction of freedom itself. As has been aptly said: 'What has always made the state a hell on earth has been precisely that man has tried to make it his heaven. ... 'Conservative socialism' (todays liberal) was the slogan under which a large number of writers prepared the atmosphere in which National Socialism succeeded.
(Excerpt) Read more at btinternet.com ...
Sending out a call to all Democrats to READ THIS PIECE!
Can dems read? ;)
Second best political economy book in history, right behind “Free To Choose.”
BTTT
They read. They just use it as instructions on how to create a serfdom.
I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means.I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. In my youth I travelled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer. There is no country in the world [but England] where so many provisions are established for them; so many hospitals to receive them when they are sick or lame, founded and maintained by voluntary charities; so many alms-houses for the aged of both sexes, together with a solemn general law made by the rich to subject their estates to a heavy tax for the support of the poor. Under all these obligations, are our poor modest, humble, and thankful; and do they use their best endeavours to maintain themselves, and lighten our shoulders of this burthen?On the contrary, I affirm that there is no country in the world in which the poor are more idle, dissolute, drunken, and insolent. The day you passed that act, you took away from before their eyes the greatest of all inducements to industry, frugality, and sobriety, by giving them a dependence on somewhat else than a careful accumulation during youth and health, for support in age or sickness. In short, you offered a premium for the encouragement of idleness, and you should not now wonder that it has had its effect in the increase of poverty. Repeal that law, and you will soon see a change in their manners. St. Monday, and St. Tuesday, will cease to be holidays. SIX days shalt thou labour, though one of the old commandments long treated as out of date, will again be looked upon as a respectable precept; industry will increase, and with it plenty among the lower people; their circumstances will mend, and more will be done for their happiness by inuring them to provide for themselves, than could be done by dividing all your estates among them.
—Benjamin Franklin
Glenn Beck talked about this and some Lib called him a lair.
He said show me the quote from Franklin! LOL
OK, you got me :) I heard it on Beck today too, so I looked it up. But I thought it was apropos.
ping
I doubt it'd make any difference. Democrats lack the insight to see themselves in anything that damns their neo-socialist tyranny.
That's cold-blooded.
“Road to Serfdom,” required reading.
Also; Socialism capitalized.. or the Capitalization of socialism..
You know, like in China, and Russia.. and Europe, and England, and Canada...
AND soon to be in the United States..
Thanks very much for posting. Belated WELCOME ABOARD!
Bump for morning read with a good cup of coffee.
bookmark
Business councils have been around for a very long time, as have unions and the like.
Should be posted on the wall of every schoolroom in the U.S. No, the world. Will it? LOLOLOL.
Probably has something to do with buying votes. Even the Republicans are doing it.
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