Once again I’m focusing on words and meanings, and how they distort rational discourse.Socialism is a word misused , intentionally or otherwise , by both the Left and the Right.Let’s start with the dictionary definition :“Any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods.”Is that what the Progressives really want in our country?Is that what the Right really think Obama, Clinton and other Democrats espouse?More confusion arises from both sides referring to Scandinavian and other European countries as Socialist economies.They are all Capitalist economies with strong social welfare programs. Very different.In fact it is their Capitalist economies that generate sufficient wealth to pay for those social welfare programs.Just to put a point on it, I can’t think of any real Socialists countries past or present that don’t have single party authoritarian political rule. None are democracies.So let’s just drop the term Socialism and get on with a rational discussion of what needs to be done to improve our country for the betterment of all of our citizens.
Thursday, February 21, 2019
Words and Meanings - Socialism
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Unless someone smarter or more erudite than myself or Eric defines socialism differently, then it's the concept of "making our country thrive by doing what we can to make lives better by advocating help for those less fortunate than the upper echelons of our economy". I think it's true that a country's ability to take care of the weakest members of their population defines their level of commitment which goes toward deciding where they stand on the list of greatest countries. How are we doing on that?
ReplyDeleteGeorges Clemenceau presumably said anyone at age 21 who is not a Socialist has no heart and by age 30 a Capitalist has no head. Very simply it is understandable at a certain age to be concerned with distribution (wealth, income, etc.) from those who have to those who need. But...and this is the crux of the matter...get over it!
ReplyDeleteCharming young people are concerned and should be concerned with the inequities of life. An old person like Bernie Sanders is grotesque because he cannot get over it.
The reason that socialism does not work is because it is administered by government fiat. Anytime government interferes with the natural course of events, it distorts reality as much as it helps achieve the intent. Government administrators empowered to do anything become obnoxiously driven to bureaucratic excess. People who enjoy being part of governmental authorities are rule-driven by nature and over time become intolerable as in "power corrupts, and absolute power absolutely corrupts."
So we do need simple safety nets in modern society, but more important we can not make people equal, we cannot solve social inequities, and sense and humility by mature people should lead them to agree that every law and every administrative rule is by nature a corruption of freedom.
Cheers to all the privileged well-to-do otherwise mature liberals in our community who live isolated away from witnessing the "rule of laws" by government administrators ALL promoted at least 2 steps beyond their level of competence.
My advice is that all the Senior Class Presidents running for Presidential nomination under identity political formats, promoting all kinds of pie-in-sky policies (no student loans, free college, medicare for all, reparations, and the like) are incapable of being the Leader of the Free World. Hard to believe but the Democratic candidates are as bad as the clowns who ran for the Republican nomination last time.