Another Stupid "What if..." question

[Oversoul]

Wow, that is some "liberal" definitions of distribution/redistribution.....

Howso?

Let me see if I get this right:
If I buy a meal at a restaurant I am redistributing my wealth?
What if I buy for those at my table..."Hey, it's my treat"?

Yes.

Socialism is the TOTAL redistribution of resources..... ugh......

Well, if that's right, the assertion (I'd think you've heard it as it was quite popular) was that Obama was a socialist or very much like a socialist all because he would "redistribute the wealth." His policies would not be a "total" redistribution of resources.

But I'm not familiar with any socialist regimes that actually did a total redistribution of resources upon getting into power. It's not the plan of any socialist political party that I'm aware of (it's certainly not what the Socialist Party in the U.S. proposes). So I don't think your definition is right.

Mmm, technically, I should say that some of the old Utopian socialists might have endorsed total redistribution. But they'd fallen by the wayside in favor of Marxists by the time any socialist regimes were actually able to rise to power. And while some socialist leaders might have taken the extreme position of "the state owns everything" and that would have been, in theory, total redistribution, I don't think any of them, in practice, actually followed through on that and my suspicion is that it was a ploy anyway. In any case, the majority of socialists have neither advocated nor implemented total redistribution of resources.

 

[EricBess]

But we're not really talking about a socialist regime here, just socialistic principles. In general, we're talking about a philosophy that there should be no rich and no poor and that government is responsible to make sure that happens.

In practice, however, this cannot work unless there is also no selfishness and no greed. Last I checked, the US didn't fall into that camp. Oh...and no laziness.

It's a great ideal, but it doesn't work. Capitalism, on the other hand, is based on the theory that everyone is self-interested. It breaks down when someone (or some corporation) becomes so rich that they don't have to play by the rules, sure, but in theory, government is there to protect against that. Unfortunately, our political system is built around special interests, so that occassionally breaks down as well...

In practice, every society has different aspects of different things. The US is a "democratic republic", for example because our system of elections is a combination of principles of democracies (one person, one vote) and of republics (one state, one vote).

In my opinion, however, the closer we come to a socialist government, the further we move from being strong as a country.

 

[Oversoul]

But we're not really talking about a socialist regime here, just socialistic principles. In general, we're talking about a philosophy that there should be no rich and no poor and that government is responsible to make sure that happens.

Yeah, it's kind of a murky topic. Socialist philosophy is complicated enough that it probably can't be summarized well in one sentence. A prevalent school of socialist thought today seems to be the "democratic socialists" who definitely don't believe that there shouldn't be any rich people, although they do think that the rich should be taxed a lot.

They probably do think that there should be no poor, but I agree with them about that, or I think I do. I've heard some really damning arguments against poverty and it seems to be a pretty bad thing. I'm unfamiliar, though, with any solution that's both plausibly effective and acceptable. But I digress.

In practice, however, this cannot work unless there is also no selfishness and no greed. Last I checked, the US didn't fall into that camp. Oh...and no laziness.

Yeah, that's a common criticism of socialism. I happen to agree with it, but it is a more complicated situation than, "What about greed? Ha. Checkmate, socialists. You forgot to consider greed." As a side note, I think that most of the attempted socialist regimes in history failed for reasons other than greed.

It's a great ideal, but it doesn't work. Capitalism, on the other hand, is based on the theory that everyone is self-interested. It breaks down when someone (or some corporation) becomes so rich that they don't have to play by the rules, sure, but in theory, government is there to protect against that. Unfortunately, our political system is built around special interests, so that occassionally breaks down as well...

Yeah, that's fair. Things get murky here too though. Especially in the details of what exactly the governments role should be and what it's doing wrong now. So many different arguments there.

In my opinion, however, the closer we come to a socialist government, the further we move from being strong as a country.

This seems overly simplistic. Any given action could be interpreted as either a move toward socialism or not depending on the individual's perspective. Most socialist plans involve a lot of taxation. So some might argue that any new tax or tax increase is a step, however small, toward socialism. I find that to be highly specious.

I'm not a socialist and I don't want our country to be a socialist one. But if someone is against a particular change, I'd rather that person provide an actual argument against it, not just dismiss it as a step toward socialism.

 

[Ransac]

This is a pretty worthless conversation, as we all know that I should've won the election.... stupid EricBess....


Ransac, cpa trash man

 

[BigBlue]

I like KFC. (Isn't there a flag w/ the Colonel's likeness?)

Rascist comments of any sort in a school should not be tolerated.

Going back to the original Thread's intent. I don't think we'll look drastically different 3 years from now.

We may be finally done with the military operations in Iraq, and will likely still be involved in military operations in Afghanistan.

I'm not 100% gloomy about the economic outlook... this is going to be rough times. Energy costs are dropping. But, our lack of manufacturing is going to continue to cause problems. We cannot continue to be a Consumer Driven Service Economy forever. I think Peter Schiff is extreme in his appraisal of the future, but he is correct in that we aren't coming out of this dive right away. The gov't should be wary of handing out money in bailouts for anyone. Obama will be walking a tightrope. He needs to quickly downplay enthusiasm about some magic wand which will fix the economy. It took decades to get us here, and it could take a decade or more of rebuilding to pull us out. GWB's spending and driving the country further in debt is very problematic.

As long as we start doing things right, even if it doesn't show instant success... we can expect that continuation of staying a proper course will eventually lead us out of this economic debacle.

I heard already that of the money spent so far in the bailout, it cannot be completely accounted for. I'm not suggesting it was "stolen", but rather that it was wasted. It's like a money pit, you can either continue to throw money into bad strategies and keep them afloat... or you can allow them to fail, and then help them rebuild in a better structure suited to todays economy. I vote for the latter (speaking of the Big 3 wanting 25 Billion).

 

[Mooseman]

We cannot continue to be a Consumer Driven Service Economy forever.

Amen, Brother...... Maybe the pres-elect can start to rebuild the infrastructure and create jobs that way....... 350 bil would build plenty of roads, bridges, mass transit systems, improved energy grids, etc....