 ColoradoRight says: And the twits at Davos and elsewhere still don't understand it. With all due respect, bull s**t. Nice fact filled retort. Capitalism is, as rightly pointed out, not a system but a description of how human beings go about their lives. Politics is about how best to modulate this behaviour so that the best values of humanity have a chance to inform our lives. I'm sorry, n2sooners, if you found my retort to be too terse. I simply meant that every word I read was wrong, and "bs" seemed a fitting review. I could pull out an economics, or history, or political science textbook, but I'll settle for Wikipedia: "Capitalism generally refers to an economic and social SYSTEM in which the means of production are predominantly privately[1][2] owned and operated, and in which investments, distribution, income, production and pricing of goods and services are determined through the operation of a market economy. It is usually considered to involve the right of individuals and groups of individuals acting as "legal persons" or corporations to trade capital... Capitalism has nothing to do with an exchange of ideas or knowledge.? How quickly we white folksCapitalism did not allow slavery. People allowed slavery and they did so because of MATERIALIST underpinnings. The same MATERIALIST underpinnings that allowed Stalin and Hiter to murder millions. The same MATERIALIST underpinnings that say we should not secure our borders when millions of illegal immigrants are sneaking into the country and working for sub-par wages in sub-par conditions. Capitalism is not to blame. People... Capitalism has nothing to do with slavery, except that they were concurrent in history. Slavery existed under the pharaohs. It existed under various monarchies. You overlook the fact that, although our country was formed at a time when slavery existed, it was also that system of personal freedom (a capitalist republic) that overthrew slavery. Slavery _still_ exists in parts of the world, but not here. Why is that? On a related note: what exactly do you think communism is? Under that system _everyone_ is a slave of the state. Look at Venezuela today -- if a farmer wants to sell his crops to another country where he'll get a higher price, Hugo says he's a "traitor" and will seize the farm. There's your "freedom" under socialism. Capitalism allowed slavery just as the pharoahs did and just as others do today. Venezuela is neither a communist nor a socialist country. It is a parliamentary democracy with a mixed economy (mixing elements of capitalism - a market economy- and socialism- a planned economy.) Hugo Chavez is not a dictator and the Venezuelan people are not ''slaves". Whew. Do you hear that clock? From the Chronicle of Higher Education: --------------------------------------------- Hugo Chávez, Venezuela’s president, has threatened to nationalize any educational institution that does not adopt his socialist government’s new curriculum. “All of the schools in the nation must apply this curriculum,” Mr. Chávez said this week during his regular call-in show, Hello, President. “Any school which does not comply — to be nationalized! Any university which does not comply — to be nationalized!” Mr. Chávez also said that if the director of any “educational... Read a different take on the same story: http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6928633,00.html "President Hugo Chavez threatened on Monday to close or take over any private school that refuses to submit to the oversight of his socialist government as it develops a new curriculum and textbooks." "All schools, public and private, must admit state inspectors and submit to the government's new educational system, or be closed and nationalized, with the state taking responsibility for the education of their children, Chavez said." "The president's opponents accuse him of aiming to indoctrinate young Venezuelans with socialist ideology. But the education minister said the aim... So he can just announce the schools that don't do what he wants will be closed or nationalized, but he's not a dictator? And this is just one action. He's pretty much nationalized all oil production (or forced the oil companies to pretty much produce the oil at cost), he's involved in subverting the elections of Argentina and Bolivia, and on and on. Just from memory Stalin was elected, Hitler was elected, even Enver Hoxha was elected in Albania. And Mr.Brimstone might have been "elected", but if you go back to the history and look at the restrictions place on his opponents, the constitutional "changes", the nice little people's communes where the votes were taken - he's about as constit... Mayor Daley has taken over the public schools in Chicago. The federal government has mandated that schools that don't meet NCLB standards be closed. The only difference here is that the closed schools are privatized. A sure capitalist enterprise! So here we are, back to capitalism, via Chavez. I don't see how this discussion was twisted. We just went off an a tangent. And by the way, I'll give you Hitler and Chavez (freely elected), but not Stalin and Hoxha. Surely you don't argue that elections in the USSR or Albania were free? I meant "I'll give you Hitler, but not Stalin and Hoxha." I don't know if Chavez just personally deciding that all schools will follow his mandate is the same as the elected legislature passing laws with time lines and mandates for action. It would seem to be more like a contrast between dictatorship and representative government. Stalin and Hoxha certainly announced that they had free elections. Stalin had nominal opponents (I have no idea about Hoxha on that score). And the United Nations and most of the world played along with that fiction. I do agree it was fiction. |
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