That's hilarious, as evidently it is you who haven't actually read any of these posts. I haven't claimed you are advocating pure socialism.
The way you respond says differently... "the major flaw of your argument is that you assume that in order for the government to assist people in poverty that they must take over, run, build, regulate, and so forth, entire industries."
This whole argument was started by the claim that socialism created the middle class. A point which you seem to be defending. You don't have to advocate pure socialism to be advocating the socialist practices.
This whole argument was started by the claim that socialism created the middle class. A point which you seem to be defending. You don't have to advocate pure socialism to be advocating the socialist practices.
I advocate social practices because they benefit a lot of people and the middle class would likely not exist in a pure capitalist economy. It is really that simple. While not always perfect these programs are vastly superior to having nothing at all.
I'm not going to repeat all my points. If you weren't willing to read them the first time, it's unlikely to happen the second time. But no, socialist practices do not benefit a lot of people. This is demonstratable by theory and by history. The middle class would exist, and likely would be even wealthier if we did not decide to squander the best part of a 1/5th of our wealth every year.
I'm not going to repeat all my points. If you weren't willing to read them the first time, it's unlikely to happen the second time. But no, socialist practices do not benefit a lot of people. This is demonstratable by theory and by history. The middle class would exist, and likely would be even wealthier if we did not decide to squander the best part of a 1/5th of our wealth every year.
I'm not going to repeat all my points. If you weren't willing to read them the first time, it's unlikely to happen the second time. But no, socialist practices do not benefit a lot of people. This is demonstratable by theory and by history. The middle class would exist, and likely would be even wealthier if we did not decide to squander the best part of a 1/5th of our wealth every year.
The socialist navy benefits nearly everyone by enforcing freedom of movement through international shipping lanes.
The socialist interstate system benefits nearly everyone in America by allowing cheap over-land shipping of perishable goods.
The socialist postal system benefits everyone in a rural area as even FedEx and UPS use it to deliver to them.
The socialist food stamp program benefits 46 million Americans by giving them food.
The socialist NASA benefits everyone with its contributions to science, engineering, and medicine.
The socialist FCC benefits anyone who uses the state controlled air waves to broadcast radio or television.
Government creating demand is actually a great way to provide capital to projects that may be of high benefit to people who are otherwise lacking the capital to do it themselves, and the results are all around you.
I'm not going to repeat all my points. If you weren't willing to read them the first time, it's unlikely to happen the second time. But no, socialist practices do not benefit a lot of people. This is demonstratable by theory and by history. The middle class would exist, and likely would be even wealthier if we did not decide to squander the best part of a 1/5th of our wealth every year.
I'm not going to repeat all my points. If you weren't willing to read them the first time, it's unlikely to happen the second time. But no, socialist practices do not benefit a lot of people. This is demonstratable by theory and by history. The middle class would exist, and likely would be even wealthier if we did not decide to squander the best part of a 1/5th of our wealth every year.
The socialist navy benefits nearly everyone by enforcing freedom of movement through international shipping lanes.
The socialist interstate system benefits nearly everyone in America by allowing cheap over-land shipping of perishable goods.
The socialist postal system benefits everyone in a rural area as even FedEx and UPS use it to deliver to them.
The socialist food stamp program benefits 46 million Americans by giving them food.
The socialist NASA benefits everyone with its contributions to science, engineering, and medicine.
The socialist FCC benefits anyone who uses the state controlled air waves to broadcast radio or television.
Government creating demand is actually a great way to provide capital to projects that may be of high benefit to people who are otherwise lacking the capital to do it themselves, and the results are all around you.
The soup kitchens in Soviet Russia were clearly a benefit to the Russian people.
I'm not going to repeat all my points. If you weren't willing to read them the first time, it's unlikely to happen the second time. But no, socialist practices do not benefit a lot of people. This is demonstratable by theory and by history. The middle class would exist, and likely would be even wealthier if we did not decide to squander the best part of a 1/5th of our wealth every year.
So you are anti-roads and schools then?
No, evidently you are anti-reading though.
You said social programs do not benefit a lot of people. What am I not reading?
I'm not going to repeat all my points. If you weren't willing to read them the first time, it's unlikely to happen the second time. But no, socialist practices do not benefit a lot of people. This is demonstratable by theory and by history. The middle class would exist, and likely would be even wealthier if we did not decide to squander the best part of a 1/5th of our wealth every year.
The socialist navy benefits nearly everyone by enforcing freedom of movement through international shipping lanes.
The socialist interstate system benefits nearly everyone in America by allowing cheap over-land shipping of perishable goods.
The socialist postal system benefits everyone in a rural area as even FedEx and UPS use it to deliver to them.
The socialist food stamp program benefits 46 million Americans by giving them food.
The socialist NASA benefits everyone with its contributions to science, engineering, and medicine.
The socialist FCC benefits anyone who uses the state controlled air waves to broadcast radio or television.
Government creating demand is actually a great way to provide capital to projects that may be of high benefit to people who are otherwise lacking the capital to do it themselves, and the results are all around you.
The soup kitchens in Soviet Russia were clearly a benefit to the Russian people.
They were otherwise starving so yes, what is your point here? American soup lines were a Good Thing too.
The problem is that you are making straw man arguments that I've heard before, which is a little off-putting especially because I might be the one person on here who agrees with you regarding 90% of things.
Uber is a GREAT example of one of the ways in which Capitalism rocks. They found a need. They filled that need. They saved a lot of people a lot of money. It's a great product.
The problem with hardline anarcho-capitalists is that they assume everything can work according to market forces alone when there is no evidence for their view because an anarcho-capitalist society has never existed in the history of the world. Admittedly, we don't have any example of an anarcho-capitalist society existing in the entirety of human history, so we don't KNOW whether it would work or not. The fact that it's never been seriously attempted makes me at least a little skeptical that it's what people want.
However, you ignore all the ways in which capitalism has failed us. You brought up a great example, which is one I wasn't going to bring up. The housing market crash. You pick and chose which elements led to the crash and completely ignored the others. Freddy/Fannie was an example of crony capitalism. Absolutely. However, freddy/fanny didn't cause the crash. The main problem is that big international banks were betting on credit default swaps/ subprime mortgage CDOs. They were making so much money off them that they didn't bother to research them adequately. They thought the market forces that affected one area of the country wouldn't affect another. So huge international banks such as Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers were making huge bets in a market they didn't fully understand and if they did understand they made the bets anyway. They were some combination of greedy/reckless/negligent. When they did crash the government faced two options: 1) Go Herbert Hoover and insist on rugged individualism, the same rugged individualism that contributed to the stock market crash of Black Tuesday October 29, 1929; 2) Intervene and "save" the big international banks, get accused of being a socialist, and allow the big banks to survive. The government intervened because the international banks were too big to fail. Most economists and big players in the financial market, namely Michael Burry and Steve Eisman (people I respect a great deal) argued in essence, "fine if the government is going to save these big businesses to save the economy as we know it then do it but at least punish them so they don't have an incentive to do it again". The government balked at this because the President was afraid of being called a SOCIALIST. The situation we are in now is due to NOT ENOUGH GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION. Most of us have read/seen the Big Short so I won't go into more detail.
Bringing up Russia to prove that Democratic Socialism didn't work is one of the oldest and most false tricks in the book. Everyone knows Soviet Russia wasn't a Socialist Democracy, or even a Marxist society. It was a dictatorship. Lennin took the works of Marx, and perverted them for his own well being. When he died Trotsky argued that they should stick to Marxist ideals while Stalin wanted more power. We've all read Animal Farm and know who Snowball and Napolean represent.
Finally, it's so false and puerile to use Russia as an example because Russia was going to be poor regardless of the economic system and in many ways the Soviet Union made Russia LESS poor.
Marx said in order for Communism to work it has evolve from a failed Capitalist society. A society that is not fully industrialized can never support Communism. He SPECIFICALLY said Communism wouldn't work in Russia in Das Capital. The way unrestrained Capitalism works in theory is that the Capitalist Bourgoise owns the means of production. They are always going to want to increase the value of goods produced while decreasing the value of labor power. Additionally, in a Capitalist economy without restriction there will always be strong business and weak businesses. The strong will devour the weak. When the strong devours the weak, they become stronger, so they can now defeat competing strong businesses. The natural result are Monopolies. As businesses become monopolies, the proletariat labor force loses the power to negotiate meaningfully in the market place. Eventually as the Bourgoise own the means of production there is little the proletariat can do. The Bourgoise rules with absolute fiat. As they continually try to lower the value of labor power while increasing the value of goods produced, eventually the proletariat is working so hard that it is impossible to work any harder and the value of labor power has been reduced to such an extent that they can longer earn a living wage. At this point, the Bourgoise will "out-source" work and search internationally to exploit other labor markets. EVERYTHING MARX SAID HAS COME TRUE. To the extent that it hasn't come true it's for two reasons: 1) The Sherman Anti-Trust Act broke up the monopolies of the 19th century and has prevented monopolies since; 2) Labor laws prevent the proletariat from being completely exploited (arguably). These are all "Socialist" laws. They certainly aren't Capitalist.
The problem with the Soviet Union is they never came from a failed capitalist society and they weren't fully industrialized. Das Capital was NOT proscriptive, it was descriptive. The Communist Manifesto is nothing. It was a stupid pamphlet Marx wrote to convince laymen. His real ideas were in Das Capital.
Now that we are on the topic of the "evil" Soviets, let's go back in history, and get the real history. Life in Russia sucked. They were always the red-headed step child of Western Europe because their country was one third European, one third Asian, and one third frozen hell-hole. Europe was fully industrialized in the early 19th century, America came about 50 years later, but the early 20th century Russia was not fully industrialized. They were still farming with horse and plow and were poor. They lost the Russo-Japanese war of 1904-1905 largely because they weren't fully industrialized and had no way of getting troops to the East and Siberia quickly enough because they didn't have a transcontinental railroad. This was when America and Europe not only had a transcontinental railroad but also cars and just years before the airplane. The Czars had no interest in developing a rail system because it wouldn't be profitable. Then in WW1 it became evident that Russia was over-matched and the Czars were not going to anything about it. So the Russia intelligentsia said look we need to industrialize and these guys aren't going to do anything about it. They revolted.
Fast forward to WWII. People like to cite that Stalin killed more people than Hitler which is absolute complete Cold War era malarkey. More people died in the Soviet Union than in Germany but that's because Hitler's primary genocides occurred in what eventually become Soviet Occupied territory, namely Poland. Additionally, they had an attrition based strategy in order to beat Hitler. They HAD to beat Hitler. Every country in the west was occupied. Hitler turned to the Soviets and if the Soviets lost we would all be speaking German. So Stalin sold his wheat reserves, one of the Soviet's main crops, to churn out all of these T-34 tanks. He established land mines to slow the German advance and when the Germans established landmines Stalin had his infantry climb over the top of them as a way of detonating them because he wanted to preserve his T-34 tanks. Stalin saw men as resources. It was horrible. But it defeated the Nazi's. The battle of Kursk was the biggest tank battle in history, so good thing Stalin preserved his T-34 tanks. Had the Germans won on the Eastern front he would have been able to turn more to the Western Front. Specifically, he would have been able to dedicate more resources to Operation Sea Lion, invaded England. If he did so, DDay would have never occurred.
Personally, I am sick and tired of all this anti-Soviet talk. These are the people who defeated the Nazis. Yeah life in the Soviet Union sucked. Life in Russia sucks too. Life is going to suck in Siberia specifically regardless of what form of government they employ. The majority of Russia is a frozen hell hole with little economic hope. The Balkans have great natural resources but that's a small portion of Russia. If it wasn't for American support of the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan then 9/11 wouldn't have happened. If the Soviet Union still existed there wouldn't be Islamic terrorism in the world today. Islamic terrorism is a direct result of the power vacuum that occurred when the Soviets were forced to abandon their territory in the Balkans and the Middle East. Yes, Stalin was a really bad dude. Is he worse than Isis? Was Gorbachev worse than Osama Bin Laden? At least the Soviets were rational and could be reasoned with.
This is all beside the point. While I sympathize with anarcho-capitalists I think it is a pie in the sky idea much like Marxism. Both are extremes that have never been seriously attempted in the history of the world. Progressives in America have neutered Capitalism and thank goodness they did because without intervention we would have had a financial collapse ten years ago worse than the Great Depression. While I don't agree with Democratic Socialism in its entirety, government intervention has done some pretty good things in America to date.
spending on the VA has gone up because the number of vets has increased but the actual amount per vet has gone down.
The great american middle class was made threw the gi bill after ww2. We never had a wide middle class didnt exist prior to that. You should remember that Ebaneser Scrooge was a representative of what the middle class was before.
Also the book Conservative Mind the single most influential conservative book in America talked about how a broad middle-class was a bad thing and should be diminished.
@Honorbound: The housing market crash is percisely a way that market warping forces of government created false economies and support bad market practices. You seem to forget the pressure that the US government had been putting on the banks since the Carter administration to provide affordable housing, e.g. lend to people who could not actually meet the normal bank base requirements for a loan. Hence the sub-prime market. Hence the derivatives and packaging of bad loans. Add on the further pressure Clinton and Bush put on the markets by driving down interest rates and instituting practices like 0% down which ended up pushing the market into a bubble formation. This is not capitalism. This is crony capitalism. Fanny and Freddie were the major culprit, being responsible for giving out the vast majority of these these bad loans, and yet it is interesting how the "reforms" that they put in with Dodd Frank did nothing to address those sudo government companies, and in fact largely nationalised the housing market.
I'm not sure why you are citing Marx. His economic theories were debunked in the 19th century. Long story short, his assignment of value creation is circular, as he attempts to pin it on labour itself. The reason he is so often cited, is for the same reason that Keynes is cited. Because their theories, while incorrect, have a lot of political appeal to people who want to justify the expansion and power of government. So they serve to cloth the decision making of left wing politicians in a scientific shroud.
Concerning the Soviets, you talk abut me making straw men, but it seems like you've only addressed my argument by making out that I am basing it on them being evil? I did not mention any of those things. You seem to be just coming out with stuff randomly? But I will address some things.
If we want to get to the nub of things, the point about the Soviets is that they were indeed poor to start with and Communism/Socialism did nothing to bring them out of that poverty. Just as with North Korea, it instead merely gave the government ultimate power over the individual and this lead to practices where people continued to live in poverty to the benefit of the political elite. Add on the fact that Stalin instituted policies like Mao did, that killed millions. Stalin's death toll is no myth. This is verified by nearly any historian who who is worth his salt. Unless you want to claim that a person is not killed unless directly ordered to kill. Except, you do apparently leave out the Great Purge, which resulted in about a million people dying, which included his efforts to commite genocide on the Ukrianian people with a forced famine.
There is nothing wrong with the Russian people. There is plenty wrong with the communist Soviet government that they lived under for decades. Sure, Russians assisted in defeating the Nazi's on the Eastern European front. But you seem to leave out the efforts that America contributed in defeating the Japanese in the Pacific and the Nazi's on the Western front. Just because you are sick of hearing anti-Soviet sentiment, doesn't mean we should stop talking about their history. That his a history that should not be forgotten, and should be talked about, because it is one of countless examples in history of what happens when you give a centralised government too much power.
Also, who said anything about Isis, etc? Man, you really are going off the rails with this argument. But it does point out something. If the Soviets regime was evil enough to be worth fighting, then it only solidifies the fact that we should not be half-assing it with what appears objectively to be an even more evil threat in Islamic extremism.
Also, you claim to agree with 90% of what I have said, but honestly, that seems like complete bunk. Who even uses these terms "anarcho-capitalist"? For one, that doesn't apply to me, and it only further demonstrates the complete misunderstanding that most left-wing people have about what capitalism is. Don't patronise me. If you are left-wing, just own it.
spending on the VA has gone up because the number of vets has increased but the actual amount per vet has gone down.
The great american middle class was made threw the gi bill after ww2. We never had a wide middle class didnt exist prior to that. You should remember that Ebaneser Scrooge was a representative of what the middle class was before.
Also the book Conservative Mind the single most influential conservative book in America talked about how a broad middle-class was a bad thing and should be diminished.
The number of Veterans has been trending down for at least the past 40 years (probably longer but I did not go back that far). We used to have almos 30 million in 1980 for example. By 2000, we had only 26.3 million. As of 2011 we only have about 22.6 million, and by 2014 we only had 19.3 million Veterans. Despite the population falling, we've increased our funding to the VA by almost double in the last 10 years alone.
Edit: I believe the number of patients has increased gradually, so perhaps you have a point there. However, the spending has risen in line with that, as I believe healthcare spending in the VA is considered manditory. Interesting analysis.
Once we work past he misunderstanding, I think you are only reinforcing my point that government is incompetitent and cannot even service a small population of people who objectively deserve our greatest respect. It is a travesty what that department has done over the years. My point is to respond to your claim that spending has been cut. It has not. No, rather, to repeat my original point, government care has nothing to do with caring about people. If you just split up an allocated all the money spent on this bureaucracy and just gave it to Veterans, they would receive far better care through the market system.
The GI Bill did not create the middle class. The middle class was already beginning to emerge at the end of the 19th and turn of the 20th century (due to capitalism). For example, the "Roaring 20s" is so called because it was period where Americans were experiencing great prosperity as a result of the growing economy. The whole thing about that period of our history was the inventions that were being taken advantage by average people. Stuff like the electricity and telephone grids were being built at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. The water grids started even earlier than that. Simple stuff like appliances, automobiles, etc, that we all now take for granted were new and exciting innovations during these times, and were well received by people because it made their standard of living better. Going to a fundamental point, government programs do not create wealth.
Lastly, about the Conservative Mind book: for one, there is no single person that can can claim "cannon" for conservative thought. Despite this, I think you have misunderstood Kirk. As one of his central convictions in that book is that we need a middle class.
Also, you claim to agree with 90% of what I have said, but honestly, that seems like complete bunk. Who even uses these terms "anarcho-capitalist"? For one, that doesn't apply to me, and it only further demonstrates the complete misunderstanding that most left-wing people have about what capitalism is. Don't patronise me. If you are left-wing, just own it.
Things don't have to be black and white Nevelo. People can be on the same side of the political spectrum as you and still have differing views. You have said many times you do not think social programs help people implying that you think we shouldn't have them, it is not a stretch to infer that you advocate near pure capitalism from that assertion. would you care to explain what everyone is missing about capitalism since you think we are all leftists for not wanting pure capitalism?
No, I am not leftist. I am a registered Libertarian party member and agree with them on such things as: a limited form of government, abolishment of certain social programs, reduced tax rate or a 10% flat tax rate, the end of humanitarian military intervention overseas, the end of the drug war, etc.
My problem is that you don't seem to understand history, or have an intentionally biased slant toward it. The big banks argued that the Community Reinvestment Act and the Housing and Community Development Act pressured them into making risky subprime loans. Others have attempted to debunk this theory. In any case, that is confusing the issues and didn't lead to the housing crash. The little local banks were the ones making those subprime loans. The big international banks were bundling them into Credit Default Swaps, which they thought could never fail. What lead to the housing crash were not the subprime loans themselves but that the big international banks were overly leveraged in risky Credit Default Swaps. You seem to understand what went on better than most people and the only logical conclusion is that BOTH government policies and the actions of big banks lead to the crash. I am willing to agree on this as compromise but you seem to think it is only government policies. That just doesn't make any sense. The government didn't force the big international banks to become overly leveraged in poor Credit Default Swaps. Additionally, these were INTERNATIONAL banks who were making these credit default swaps, so the impact American policies had on these banks were indirect at best.
Without going into it too much about the Soviets, a government can dangerous to its people, and still benefit the U.S. Few Americans would want that form of government imposed upon them. Yet the industrialization the Soviets went through allowed them to defeat the Nazis. In the Cold War, Soviet expansion into the middle east, Balkans, and Asia suppressed Islamic Terrorism. And we just HAD to fight them at least according to McCarthy era nut jobs. The Cold War bankrupted them, which forced them to abandon their territories. Through the power vacuum arose Islamic extremists/terrorists. There is no doubt if we could do it over again we would have worked with the Soviets, not against them, now knowing what the alternative is. Even now Russia is helping suppress terrorism by providing air support in Syria. Russia has never been and will never be our true enemy. An analogy is they are Gondor, we are Rohan. We spent all of our resources in a futile Cold War which bankrupted Gondor, while ignoring the real enemy Mordor, allowing terrorism to arise.
The reason why I bring it up is because you said something along the lines of "The soup kitchens in the Soviet Union were clearly a benefit to the Russian people,". The problem with arguing with someone like you is that you're viewpoint isn't nuanced at all. I've heard so-called conservatives use the Soviet Union as an example why Socialism is bad. It's a very poor argument. Russia was even more poor prior to the Soviet Union. You act as if Russia was on par with Western Europe and America prior the Communism and Communism is what made them poor. Actually, they were much poorer prior to the revolution, and if anything the revolution is what brought them closer to on par with the Western World. Also, they were spending so much money on the Cold War, which the U.S. is 50% responsible for. Absent the Cold War, had they been able to spend that money on infrastructure, it's possible they would be thriving now. People that support the Cold War are not Libertarian, Capitalist, or anything right wing. True conservatives believe in drawing down the military and reducing foreign military intervention. They would never support the Cold War because they don't believe in foreign intervention. If anything you sound like a die hard Republican, which is very different from a Libertarian or Anarcho-Capitalist. I don't want to put words in your mouth, but you were the one who first brought up the Soviet Union. True Anarcho-Capitalists and also Libertarians view the Cold War as one of the worst failures in modern history.
As far as anarcho-capitalism is concerned, that's the term used in political philosophy circles for the very concepts you're describing. There are many various forms of capitalism and libertarianism, which are two separate things, and sub-philosophies within them. It's helpful to use terms so we know what the other is talking about. This is a commonly used term. Or you could be a Minarchist or a Libertarian. You may be correct in stating these terms don't apply to you. You seem to be a Republican seeing as the views you express are pretty much just an echo of typical Republican sentiments, which may explain why you call me a leftist. Republicans often misconstrue Libertarianisms as leftist. In reality, nothing about the McCarthy era (which you seem to support as you were the one who first brought it up) had anything to do with Capitalism, Libertarianism, or even freedom. War Hawk Fascism maybe.
You have half the picture right concerning the crash. Why do you think they were bundling them? Because they knew a lot of the loans were bad. The point of bundling was to spread the risk accross several loans. But then we get into the problems of ratings companies and so forth. But more so, we had the problem of legislation and pressures changing market dynamics.
The crash itself was due to a large portion of these loans going bad and putting banks that were holding a lot of them in precarious positions because of how leveraged they were. But the culprit here isn't the packaging or the subprime loans, at least intrinsically. It was the fact that the government had setup conditions such that the market was buying into property in a way that was unsustainable. So yes, in some sense the market is at fault, but it's like blaming water for running downhill. It was the warping forces of government intrusion at the heart of it. They created a bubble with a combination of things that were aimed at making housing more affordable. It wasn't just poor people defaulting. It was people who were snapping up lots and lots of properties with the intention of flipping them.
Islamic Terrorism predates the fall of the Soviets. It goes back quite a ways actually, but if we want to talk modern era, it had its roots in the UN creation of Israel and really got a foothold with the coup in Iran during the 70s. Who do you think the Soviets were fighting in Afghanistan? I understand you are trying to make the point that they were not attacking us because the Soviets were keeping them in check, but the terror attacks at the 1972 Olympics and the Iran hostage situation during Carter's administration undermines that. I suppose these things are not obvious, because it appears you did not grow up during this time, especially if you think the Cold War was some sort of good thing (classic left wing belief btw). No, we just had a totalitarian regime with Nukes and a bunch of terrorists to worry about.
Concerning my comment specifically, the claim I responded to was that Socialism is a benefit to people. To cite some superficial examples of things that are helpful misses the point that the system itself puts a hard cap on the progress and potential for prosperity in a society. Wonder of wonders that that Russian people started poor and ended poor under socialism? Surely they were helped far too much? Or perhaps the Koreans had better luck? No? The Chinese then, since they were much more sophisticated and ancient a people? Ahh, so they killed the most of their own people... Never mind then.
I suppose that isn't nuanced enough for you. Very sorry, but that's Socialism/Fascism/Communist in a nut shell. It doesn't create wealth or prosperity. It mostly creates misery and death, tbh. No, but take a country that already has wealth built up (from Capitalism) like in Europe and America, and then put a socialist spin on their government. It looks pretty good? Right? Except good luck holding onto that wealth, as it will be squandered in time and the only people left with it will be those that entrenched themselves in a political elite.
It is not that a particular government is bad. It is that the structure itself cannot lead to prosperity (even with the best and brightest and zero corruption), but worse still has a dispensation to always move towards tyrannical leaders by its nature. Read "Road to Serfdom" for an excellent exposition on this.
Based on the rest of your post, I don't think you understand what Conservatism means. If you are actually Libratarian (somewhat hard to believe given you advocate much to the opposite), I would suggest that you read up on some of this history you supposedly know rather than waste your time telling me I'm stupid.
No one is talking about pure socialism Nevelo, so I don't know why you keep bringing it up. We are talking about hybrid systems like the one the the U.S. employs. They function relatively well and do a lot to fill in the gaps of the market economy. The market economy does not provide everything to everyone, its very simple. In certain areas the Government steps in and helps those left behind by the market with money from taxes. Roads, public utilities, and public education are all perfect examples of things that would not exist in the way we know them today if capitalism reigned supreme. You bring up the most extreme examples to counter these clear successes in our system and it just seems like you are really reaching to find a reason to hate beneficial social programs. You bring up the "road to serfdom" as if unregulated capitalism does not lead to the exact same place.
Also do you think that everyone with a different opinion from you is "left wing"?
I agree with you up to you a point. The international banks were bundling mortgages to mitigate risk. Nothing the government did encouraged them to do so, however. The government didn't force Bear Stearns to become overly leveraged in bad credit default swaps, they didn't even provide any incentives for them to do so. They provided incentives for local banks to provide subprime mortgages and I agree with you that was a mistake. But the credit default swaps and the subprime mortgages themselves are two completely different things. The subprime loans themselves didn't create the crash, the big international banks caused it.
I think you're mistaking my point on the Soviets. I hate Communism. It would be terrible to implement in America. I would never support it in America. What I disagree with is the Cold War. The Cold War, which you seem to support, had nothing to do with Capitalism and everything to do with Imperialism. Fighting a nebulous war with no apparent purpose that cost billions, no trillions, of dollars had no benefit to do with unfettered Capitalism, which you claim to support. The Cold War bankrupted two nations, which is as anti-Capitalist as you can get.
I can hate a governmental system and still not oppose the nation that developed it. The truth of the matter, whether you agree with it or not, is that MODERN Islamic terrorism is a direct result of the fall of the Soviet Union. Terrorism is merely the act of committing violent acts, not to achieve a political objective directly, but to inflict terror into a population to persuade them to capitulate to your desires. So yes, terrorism as a concept has existed for thousands of years. But I think you're being coy, you know what I am referring to when I say terrorism. I am referring specifically to Islamic terrorism that arose in the middle east.
Modern Islamic terrorism arose in nations that were either previously occupied by the Soviet Union or where the Soviet Union would have advanced had we not interfered. Even now, Putin may be reprehensible to some, but for his part he is doing his best to eliminate terrorism. The Soviet Union was ready, willing, and able to end terrorism by spreading into the Middle East, North Africa, and Asia. They were unable to do so because they ran out of money due to the Cold War. We directly opposed them in Vietnam and in Afghanistan. Afghanistan is of particular note because we funded the Mujahadeen in order for them to defeat the Soviets. The Mujahadeen then became the Taliban. I spent two years of my life trying to avoid getting killed by those guys, so I would know. Just outside Kandahar there is a place called "the graveyard", full of old Soviet equipment: abandoned T-34 tanks, artillery, etc. There is a glimmering emerald pool that has become abandoned and filled with moss. A huge bombed out building that once housed their officers. And America is responsible for that. If we would have just let the Soviets invade Afghanistan then there wouldn't have been Osama Bin Laden or 9/11. Just watch/read Charlie Wilson's war. The Soviet Union was on the precipice of eliminating Islamic terrorism, something we have been unwilling to do because of our Rules of Engagement. And WE stopped them. We should have let them do it when they were ready, willing, and able to do it. Now it's too late but the least we can do is support Putin.
Like you I was anti-Soviet until I started to delve deeper into history. No group has been more falsely criticized than they have been. I hate their government, but they could have been useful allies. Unlike you I'm not going to paint a false narrative just to support my beliefs. I can believe their government wouldn't work in the U.S. but still recognize their usefulness as an ally. The Cold War served no economic purpose and in fact ruined the economy of two nations. They just collapsed before we did. Have you ever stopped to think that maybe the economic struggles of the U.S. today were at least in part because we've blown trillions of dollars in the Cold War and other wars that served no economic purpose? Again the fact that you can't accept that makes me think that you're just a Republican shill rather than a true believer in unfettered Capitalism as you claim to be.
You have half the picture right concerning the crash. Why do you think they were bundling them? Because they knew a lot of the loans were bad. The point of bundling was to spread the risk accross several loans. But then we get into the problems of ratings companies and so forth. But more so, we had the problem of legislation and pressures changing market dynamics.
The crash itself was due to a large portion of these loans going bad and putting banks that were holding a lot of them in precarious positions because of how leveraged they were. But the culprit here isn't the packaging or the subprime loans, at least intrinsically. It was the fact that the government had setup conditions such that the market was buying into property in a way that was unsustainable. So yes, in some sense the market is at fault, but it's like blaming water for running downhill. It was the warping forces of government intrusion at the heart of it. They created a bubble with a combination of things that were aimed at making housing more affordable. It wasn't just poor people defaulting. It was people who were snapping up lots and lots of properties with the intention of flipping them.
One thing that you and Honorbound are missing is how important the Federal Reserve was in creating the housing bubble. Risky loans really can't exist unless interest rates are artificially suppressed. It's not a coincidence that the housing bubble took off the moment Alan Greenspan cut interest rates after the dot-com bust in 2001.
You have half the picture right concerning the crash. Why do you think they were bundling them? Because they knew a lot of the loans were bad. The point of bundling was to spread the risk accross several loans. But then we get into the problems of ratings companies and so forth. But more so, we had the problem of legislation and pressures changing market dynamics.
The crash itself was due to a large portion of these loans going bad and putting banks that were holding a lot of them in precarious positions because of how leveraged they were. But the culprit here isn't the packaging or the subprime loans, at least intrinsically. It was the fact that the government had setup conditions such that the market was buying into property in a way that was unsustainable. So yes, in some sense the market is at fault, but it's like blaming water for running downhill. It was the warping forces of government intrusion at the heart of it. They created a bubble with a combination of things that were aimed at making housing more affordable. It wasn't just poor people defaulting. It was people who were snapping up lots and lots of properties with the intention of flipping them.
One thing that you and Honorbound are missing is how important the Federal Reserve was in creating the housing bubble. Risky loans really can't exist unless interest rates are artificially suppressed. It's not a coincidence that the housing bubble took off the moment Alan Greenspan cut interest rates after the dot-com bust in 2001.
That's true and I don't deny it. I also don't deny that supports Nevelo's point about government intervention being bad.
Still, there's no denying the fact that big international banks became so overly leveraged in the credit default swaps of subprime mortgage CDOs on their own volition. Government intervention admittedly played some role in the fiasco. But the big international banks still would have likely made the same wagers. The government policies were not the proximate cause of the disaster. Once it occurred, it could have been a lot worse without government intervention. Not that I agree with the bail out entirely. I feel as the big international banks should have been subjected to more punitive measures.
They took the loans because many of them they had to, e.g. affordable housing pressures. They bundled them to help mitigate the risk they knew they had. I mentioned the interest rates under Bush earlier. This is a significant part of my point. If you setup a market where an unsustainable process is profitable and there is an implied protection built in by the government itself, the market will follow that road like water running down hill. You're placing blame on banks when you should be placing the blame on the government policies that pushed the market into the bubble. More government intrusion is not the solution to government intrusion to this problem as I would think you would understand as a Libertarian. But too late now, we've practically nationalised the property market. Oh and btw, that regulation that they were punished with hasn't done a damn thing to stop the unsustainable practices, so have fun with the next bubble (after we experience the currency one that they are currently building, and will no doubt be blamed again on the banks somehow).
You write about the Cold War as though we were the instigators. We did not build the Berlin Wall and split a city in half and then drop the figurative iron curtain such that there was basically no transit in or out of the USSR. We did not aggressively invade and subsume the eastern bloc countries and push further south into Middle East. We did not threaten to do the same in the rest of Europe, if given the chance. And up until Reagan, the general attitude of politicians was of appeasemeant and yet that did apparently very little mollify the situation. The country was no utopia, given the number of people who fled for political persecution. Instead of watching a comedy drama loosely based on history, have a read of Solzhenitsyn's actual account of his trial and trip to the Gulag. Btw, you do realize that the Cold War started very much prior to Reagan, right? Cuban Missle crisis and other incidents? The Cold War was a result of an aggressive totalitarian regime pushing out its borders in every direction it could.
Lastly, to reiterate Islam Terrorism is not something that was created Cold War nor contained by the Soviets. These are statements you can only makes without any reference to history.
I find it ironic that you claim I have a false narrative, when it is you who seem to have a warped leftwing revisionist view of history (for both the GFC and the Soviets). And if I'm a Republican shill for thinking the Cold War had to be fought rather than surrendered then so be it, just as I think Terrorism must be fought today. That doesn't meant I support Cold Wars or Terrorism, so non sequitur? Anyway, you obviously haven't read enough of these debate forums to know what you are talking about regarding my alignment with Repbulicans. I'd suggest keeping your arguments centered on the facts, otherwise you come off looking like a fool.
I would think you'd know enough about high finance to know the international banks were making billions of dollars so being forced to bet on the credit default swaps of subprime Cdos is really not true. High finance was bathing at money so no that's not something they had to do.
We are the United States. We are NOT the Middle East nor Asia. What the Soviets did there should literally be of no concern to you whatsoever. So yes we were the instigators. The reason why we entered WWII was because we were attacked. The reason why we fought the Soviets in Vietnam or Afghanistan, or rather supported the people who were fighting them was imperialism. There is no other word for it. We felt our empire was threatened. But the actual United States was never attacked nor were our allies. And the Soviets didn't invade Vietnam. A communist government was duly elected and there were people that opposed that and fought the elected Communist government. They petitioned the Soviets for assistance which they provided. In any case this should be of no concern to the United States. Humanitarian military intervention is not a capitalist ideal by any means.
On the one hand you don't blame the big international banks for the financial crisis which I totally understand if you're a pure capitalist.
On the other hand you support a war which was either totally anti-capitalist or else had nothing to do with capitalism. Would a true supporter of free markets endorse invading another country because it wanted to be Communist and asked the Soviets for assistance? That stands against the very principles of free market unless you believe in making other nations be capitalist by force which 1) is imperialism not capitalism; 2) doesn't work-just look at modern day Afghanistan after more than 10 years of American support.
I don't know why you can't understand that I can simultaneously hate communism yet at the same time not feel compelled to burn trillions of dollars to stop it. It's as if you feel intrinsic to the idea of Capitalism is forcing other nations to accept it which again isn't free marke at all.
But we've talked around in circles. I don't mean to be argumentative so I think I've more or less exhausted how much I want to discuss the topic.
They took the loans because many of them they had to, e.g. affordable housing pressures. They bundled them to help mitigate the risk they knew they had. I mentioned the interest rates under Bush earlier. This is a significant part of my point. If you setup a market where an unsustainable process is profitable and there is an implied protection built in by the government itself, the market will follow that road like water running down hill. You're placing blame on banks when you should be placing the blame on the government policies that pushed the market into the bubble. More government intrusion is not the solution to government intrusion to this problem as I would think you would understand as a Libertarian. But too late now, we've practically nationalised the property market. Oh and btw, that regulation that they were punished with hasn't done a damn thing to stop the unsustainable practices, so have fun with the next bubble (after we experience the currency one that they are currently building, and will no doubt be blamed again on the banks somehow).
*Emphasis added*
Pushed? Even before Bush, I'm fairly sure (won't go as far to say certain) that Bill Clinton (even though some of these trends go back further) did not get the idea to push for deregulations on his own. The government got the idea to "push" markets into the bubble from Wall Street and the regulators (Allegedly. Perhaps those lobbying efforts didn't sway impartiality on the government's sovereign choices when they approved the model you describe.) The government is by no means innocent of situation you describe, but to say that there is no influence that could have come from the bankers who have benefited from the disaster comes across to me as... naïve. It'd also go a ways to explain why the model hasn't changed after it failed.
@Honorbound: You really need to brush up on actual history, man. You've evidently been taught a load of garbage concerning the Cold War and these conflicts, as it sounds like the usual leftwing spin which ignores most of the facts. The usual moral equivalencies (or perhaps worse so, as you seem to be lionising the murderous dictators and castigating the people who were defending others freedom). We no more wanted to enter the Cold War than we instigated it.
Communist elections? Come on, man, seriously? As if any of any of those ballots weren't completely rigged if they even made the effort to fake it. Vietnam was taken over by communists by force and with the help of Russia and China long before we officially declared war on the Communist Viet Cong. The actual Vietnamese people were very much against the communists, but just like in pretty much all of these types of regimes, dissenters were imprisoned, tortured, and killed. The South Vietnamese were at one point our ally, and so evidently in your mind abandoning them to a hostile takeover from despots was what we should have done, eh?
No, we are not Russia or Middle East, but that doesn't stop aggressors from threatening us and our way of life. What does us being the Middle East or America have to do with stopping a bunch of insane and evil people from attacking you? Just because you ignore an evil regime does not mean it won't come to your door step and kill you. More recently, average number of people killed world wide each year from Terrorism is about 20,000. In 2014, 33,000 people were killed. Most of these people were innocent civilian bystanders. Some of them were probably like you, and yet they were still killed by Islamic Extremists. This has been going on for 60-70 years.
And much as you seem to be eager to point the blame at America for the aggressions of murderous totalitarian regimes and psychopathic extremists, we are not the people who have been commiting these atrocities decades. And if you think free markets are consistent with the communist regimes of these governments, that we could have somehow "got along with them," that is both ignorant of history and ignorant fundamentally about what a free market even is.
You call yourself libertarian, but it seems to be lip service. However, if you are truely of this mind frame, I dearly hope you actually do a bit of reading as you have evidently been seriously been mislead in your education. As mentioned before, "Road to Serfdom" is a great starting point.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
The socialist navy benefits nearly everyone by enforcing freedom of movement through international shipping lanes.
The socialist interstate system benefits nearly everyone in America by allowing cheap over-land shipping of perishable goods.
The socialist postal system benefits everyone in a rural area as even FedEx and UPS use it to deliver to them.
The socialist food stamp program benefits 46 million Americans by giving them food.
The socialist NASA benefits everyone with its contributions to science, engineering, and medicine.
The socialist FCC benefits anyone who uses the state controlled air waves to broadcast radio or television.
Government creating demand is actually a great way to provide capital to projects that may be of high benefit to people who are otherwise lacking the capital to do it themselves, and the results are all around you.
No, evidently you are anti-reading though.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
The soup kitchens in Soviet Russia were clearly a benefit to the Russian people.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
They were otherwise starving so yes, what is your point here? American soup lines were a Good Thing too.
Uber is a GREAT example of one of the ways in which Capitalism rocks. They found a need. They filled that need. They saved a lot of people a lot of money. It's a great product.
The problem with hardline anarcho-capitalists is that they assume everything can work according to market forces alone when there is no evidence for their view because an anarcho-capitalist society has never existed in the history of the world. Admittedly, we don't have any example of an anarcho-capitalist society existing in the entirety of human history, so we don't KNOW whether it would work or not. The fact that it's never been seriously attempted makes me at least a little skeptical that it's what people want.
However, you ignore all the ways in which capitalism has failed us. You brought up a great example, which is one I wasn't going to bring up. The housing market crash. You pick and chose which elements led to the crash and completely ignored the others. Freddy/Fannie was an example of crony capitalism. Absolutely. However, freddy/fanny didn't cause the crash. The main problem is that big international banks were betting on credit default swaps/ subprime mortgage CDOs. They were making so much money off them that they didn't bother to research them adequately. They thought the market forces that affected one area of the country wouldn't affect another. So huge international banks such as Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers were making huge bets in a market they didn't fully understand and if they did understand they made the bets anyway. They were some combination of greedy/reckless/negligent. When they did crash the government faced two options: 1) Go Herbert Hoover and insist on rugged individualism, the same rugged individualism that contributed to the stock market crash of Black Tuesday October 29, 1929; 2) Intervene and "save" the big international banks, get accused of being a socialist, and allow the big banks to survive. The government intervened because the international banks were too big to fail. Most economists and big players in the financial market, namely Michael Burry and Steve Eisman (people I respect a great deal) argued in essence, "fine if the government is going to save these big businesses to save the economy as we know it then do it but at least punish them so they don't have an incentive to do it again". The government balked at this because the President was afraid of being called a SOCIALIST. The situation we are in now is due to NOT ENOUGH GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION. Most of us have read/seen the Big Short so I won't go into more detail.
Bringing up Russia to prove that Democratic Socialism didn't work is one of the oldest and most false tricks in the book. Everyone knows Soviet Russia wasn't a Socialist Democracy, or even a Marxist society. It was a dictatorship. Lennin took the works of Marx, and perverted them for his own well being. When he died Trotsky argued that they should stick to Marxist ideals while Stalin wanted more power. We've all read Animal Farm and know who Snowball and Napolean represent.
Finally, it's so false and puerile to use Russia as an example because Russia was going to be poor regardless of the economic system and in many ways the Soviet Union made Russia LESS poor.
Marx said in order for Communism to work it has evolve from a failed Capitalist society. A society that is not fully industrialized can never support Communism. He SPECIFICALLY said Communism wouldn't work in Russia in Das Capital. The way unrestrained Capitalism works in theory is that the Capitalist Bourgoise owns the means of production. They are always going to want to increase the value of goods produced while decreasing the value of labor power. Additionally, in a Capitalist economy without restriction there will always be strong business and weak businesses. The strong will devour the weak. When the strong devours the weak, they become stronger, so they can now defeat competing strong businesses. The natural result are Monopolies. As businesses become monopolies, the proletariat labor force loses the power to negotiate meaningfully in the market place. Eventually as the Bourgoise own the means of production there is little the proletariat can do. The Bourgoise rules with absolute fiat. As they continually try to lower the value of labor power while increasing the value of goods produced, eventually the proletariat is working so hard that it is impossible to work any harder and the value of labor power has been reduced to such an extent that they can longer earn a living wage. At this point, the Bourgoise will "out-source" work and search internationally to exploit other labor markets. EVERYTHING MARX SAID HAS COME TRUE. To the extent that it hasn't come true it's for two reasons: 1) The Sherman Anti-Trust Act broke up the monopolies of the 19th century and has prevented monopolies since; 2) Labor laws prevent the proletariat from being completely exploited (arguably). These are all "Socialist" laws. They certainly aren't Capitalist.
The problem with the Soviet Union is they never came from a failed capitalist society and they weren't fully industrialized. Das Capital was NOT proscriptive, it was descriptive. The Communist Manifesto is nothing. It was a stupid pamphlet Marx wrote to convince laymen. His real ideas were in Das Capital.
Now that we are on the topic of the "evil" Soviets, let's go back in history, and get the real history. Life in Russia sucked. They were always the red-headed step child of Western Europe because their country was one third European, one third Asian, and one third frozen hell-hole. Europe was fully industrialized in the early 19th century, America came about 50 years later, but the early 20th century Russia was not fully industrialized. They were still farming with horse and plow and were poor. They lost the Russo-Japanese war of 1904-1905 largely because they weren't fully industrialized and had no way of getting troops to the East and Siberia quickly enough because they didn't have a transcontinental railroad. This was when America and Europe not only had a transcontinental railroad but also cars and just years before the airplane. The Czars had no interest in developing a rail system because it wouldn't be profitable. Then in WW1 it became evident that Russia was over-matched and the Czars were not going to anything about it. So the Russia intelligentsia said look we need to industrialize and these guys aren't going to do anything about it. They revolted.
Fast forward to WWII. People like to cite that Stalin killed more people than Hitler which is absolute complete Cold War era malarkey. More people died in the Soviet Union than in Germany but that's because Hitler's primary genocides occurred in what eventually become Soviet Occupied territory, namely Poland. Additionally, they had an attrition based strategy in order to beat Hitler. They HAD to beat Hitler. Every country in the west was occupied. Hitler turned to the Soviets and if the Soviets lost we would all be speaking German. So Stalin sold his wheat reserves, one of the Soviet's main crops, to churn out all of these T-34 tanks. He established land mines to slow the German advance and when the Germans established landmines Stalin had his infantry climb over the top of them as a way of detonating them because he wanted to preserve his T-34 tanks. Stalin saw men as resources. It was horrible. But it defeated the Nazi's. The battle of Kursk was the biggest tank battle in history, so good thing Stalin preserved his T-34 tanks. Had the Germans won on the Eastern front he would have been able to turn more to the Western Front. Specifically, he would have been able to dedicate more resources to Operation Sea Lion, invaded England. If he did so, DDay would have never occurred.
Personally, I am sick and tired of all this anti-Soviet talk. These are the people who defeated the Nazis. Yeah life in the Soviet Union sucked. Life in Russia sucks too. Life is going to suck in Siberia specifically regardless of what form of government they employ. The majority of Russia is a frozen hell hole with little economic hope. The Balkans have great natural resources but that's a small portion of Russia. If it wasn't for American support of the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan then 9/11 wouldn't have happened. If the Soviet Union still existed there wouldn't be Islamic terrorism in the world today. Islamic terrorism is a direct result of the power vacuum that occurred when the Soviets were forced to abandon their territory in the Balkans and the Middle East. Yes, Stalin was a really bad dude. Is he worse than Isis? Was Gorbachev worse than Osama Bin Laden? At least the Soviets were rational and could be reasoned with.
This is all beside the point. While I sympathize with anarcho-capitalists I think it is a pie in the sky idea much like Marxism. Both are extremes that have never been seriously attempted in the history of the world. Progressives in America have neutered Capitalism and thank goodness they did because without intervention we would have had a financial collapse ten years ago worse than the Great Depression. While I don't agree with Democratic Socialism in its entirety, government intervention has done some pretty good things in America to date.
The great american middle class was made threw the gi bill after ww2. We never had a wide middle class didnt exist prior to that. You should remember that Ebaneser Scrooge was a representative of what the middle class was before.
Also the book Conservative Mind the single most influential conservative book in America talked about how a broad middle-class was a bad thing and should be diminished.
I'm not sure why you are citing Marx. His economic theories were debunked in the 19th century. Long story short, his assignment of value creation is circular, as he attempts to pin it on labour itself. The reason he is so often cited, is for the same reason that Keynes is cited. Because their theories, while incorrect, have a lot of political appeal to people who want to justify the expansion and power of government. So they serve to cloth the decision making of left wing politicians in a scientific shroud.
Concerning the Soviets, you talk abut me making straw men, but it seems like you've only addressed my argument by making out that I am basing it on them being evil? I did not mention any of those things. You seem to be just coming out with stuff randomly? But I will address some things.
If we want to get to the nub of things, the point about the Soviets is that they were indeed poor to start with and Communism/Socialism did nothing to bring them out of that poverty. Just as with North Korea, it instead merely gave the government ultimate power over the individual and this lead to practices where people continued to live in poverty to the benefit of the political elite. Add on the fact that Stalin instituted policies like Mao did, that killed millions. Stalin's death toll is no myth. This is verified by nearly any historian who who is worth his salt. Unless you want to claim that a person is not killed unless directly ordered to kill. Except, you do apparently leave out the Great Purge, which resulted in about a million people dying, which included his efforts to commite genocide on the Ukrianian people with a forced famine.
There is nothing wrong with the Russian people. There is plenty wrong with the communist Soviet government that they lived under for decades. Sure, Russians assisted in defeating the Nazi's on the Eastern European front. But you seem to leave out the efforts that America contributed in defeating the Japanese in the Pacific and the Nazi's on the Western front. Just because you are sick of hearing anti-Soviet sentiment, doesn't mean we should stop talking about their history. That his a history that should not be forgotten, and should be talked about, because it is one of countless examples in history of what happens when you give a centralised government too much power.
Also, who said anything about Isis, etc? Man, you really are going off the rails with this argument. But it does point out something. If the Soviets regime was evil enough to be worth fighting, then it only solidifies the fact that we should not be half-assing it with what appears objectively to be an even more evil threat in Islamic extremism.
Also, you claim to agree with 90% of what I have said, but honestly, that seems like complete bunk. Who even uses these terms "anarcho-capitalist"? For one, that doesn't apply to me, and it only further demonstrates the complete misunderstanding that most left-wing people have about what capitalism is. Don't patronise me. If you are left-wing, just own it.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
The number of Veterans has been trending down for at least the past 40 years (probably longer but I did not go back that far). We used to have almos 30 million in 1980 for example. By 2000, we had only 26.3 million. As of 2011 we only have about 22.6 million, and by 2014 we only had 19.3 million Veterans. Despite the population falling, we've increased our funding to the VA by almost double in the last 10 years alone.
Edit: I believe the number of patients has increased gradually, so perhaps you have a point there. However, the spending has risen in line with that, as I believe healthcare spending in the VA is considered manditory. Interesting analysis.
Once we work past he misunderstanding, I think you are only reinforcing my point that government is incompetitent and cannot even service a small population of people who objectively deserve our greatest respect. It is a travesty what that department has done over the years. My point is to respond to your claim that spending has been cut. It has not. No, rather, to repeat my original point, government care has nothing to do with caring about people. If you just split up an allocated all the money spent on this bureaucracy and just gave it to Veterans, they would receive far better care through the market system.
The GI Bill did not create the middle class. The middle class was already beginning to emerge at the end of the 19th and turn of the 20th century (due to capitalism). For example, the "Roaring 20s" is so called because it was period where Americans were experiencing great prosperity as a result of the growing economy. The whole thing about that period of our history was the inventions that were being taken advantage by average people. Stuff like the electricity and telephone grids were being built at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. The water grids started even earlier than that. Simple stuff like appliances, automobiles, etc, that we all now take for granted were new and exciting innovations during these times, and were well received by people because it made their standard of living better. Going to a fundamental point, government programs do not create wealth.
Lastly, about the Conservative Mind book: for one, there is no single person that can can claim "cannon" for conservative thought. Despite this, I think you have misunderstood Kirk. As one of his central convictions in that book is that we need a middle class.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
My problem is that you don't seem to understand history, or have an intentionally biased slant toward it. The big banks argued that the Community Reinvestment Act and the Housing and Community Development Act pressured them into making risky subprime loans. Others have attempted to debunk this theory. In any case, that is confusing the issues and didn't lead to the housing crash. The little local banks were the ones making those subprime loans. The big international banks were bundling them into Credit Default Swaps, which they thought could never fail. What lead to the housing crash were not the subprime loans themselves but that the big international banks were overly leveraged in risky Credit Default Swaps. You seem to understand what went on better than most people and the only logical conclusion is that BOTH government policies and the actions of big banks lead to the crash. I am willing to agree on this as compromise but you seem to think it is only government policies. That just doesn't make any sense. The government didn't force the big international banks to become overly leveraged in poor Credit Default Swaps. Additionally, these were INTERNATIONAL banks who were making these credit default swaps, so the impact American policies had on these banks were indirect at best.
Without going into it too much about the Soviets, a government can dangerous to its people, and still benefit the U.S. Few Americans would want that form of government imposed upon them. Yet the industrialization the Soviets went through allowed them to defeat the Nazis. In the Cold War, Soviet expansion into the middle east, Balkans, and Asia suppressed Islamic Terrorism. And we just HAD to fight them at least according to McCarthy era nut jobs. The Cold War bankrupted them, which forced them to abandon their territories. Through the power vacuum arose Islamic extremists/terrorists. There is no doubt if we could do it over again we would have worked with the Soviets, not against them, now knowing what the alternative is. Even now Russia is helping suppress terrorism by providing air support in Syria. Russia has never been and will never be our true enemy. An analogy is they are Gondor, we are Rohan. We spent all of our resources in a futile Cold War which bankrupted Gondor, while ignoring the real enemy Mordor, allowing terrorism to arise.
The reason why I bring it up is because you said something along the lines of "The soup kitchens in the Soviet Union were clearly a benefit to the Russian people,". The problem with arguing with someone like you is that you're viewpoint isn't nuanced at all. I've heard so-called conservatives use the Soviet Union as an example why Socialism is bad. It's a very poor argument. Russia was even more poor prior to the Soviet Union. You act as if Russia was on par with Western Europe and America prior the Communism and Communism is what made them poor. Actually, they were much poorer prior to the revolution, and if anything the revolution is what brought them closer to on par with the Western World. Also, they were spending so much money on the Cold War, which the U.S. is 50% responsible for. Absent the Cold War, had they been able to spend that money on infrastructure, it's possible they would be thriving now. People that support the Cold War are not Libertarian, Capitalist, or anything right wing. True conservatives believe in drawing down the military and reducing foreign military intervention. They would never support the Cold War because they don't believe in foreign intervention. If anything you sound like a die hard Republican, which is very different from a Libertarian or Anarcho-Capitalist. I don't want to put words in your mouth, but you were the one who first brought up the Soviet Union. True Anarcho-Capitalists and also Libertarians view the Cold War as one of the worst failures in modern history.
As far as anarcho-capitalism is concerned, that's the term used in political philosophy circles for the very concepts you're describing. There are many various forms of capitalism and libertarianism, which are two separate things, and sub-philosophies within them. It's helpful to use terms so we know what the other is talking about. This is a commonly used term. Or you could be a Minarchist or a Libertarian. You may be correct in stating these terms don't apply to you. You seem to be a Republican seeing as the views you express are pretty much just an echo of typical Republican sentiments, which may explain why you call me a leftist. Republicans often misconstrue Libertarianisms as leftist. In reality, nothing about the McCarthy era (which you seem to support as you were the one who first brought it up) had anything to do with Capitalism, Libertarianism, or even freedom. War Hawk Fascism maybe.
The crash itself was due to a large portion of these loans going bad and putting banks that were holding a lot of them in precarious positions because of how leveraged they were. But the culprit here isn't the packaging or the subprime loans, at least intrinsically. It was the fact that the government had setup conditions such that the market was buying into property in a way that was unsustainable. So yes, in some sense the market is at fault, but it's like blaming water for running downhill. It was the warping forces of government intrusion at the heart of it. They created a bubble with a combination of things that were aimed at making housing more affordable. It wasn't just poor people defaulting. It was people who were snapping up lots and lots of properties with the intention of flipping them.
Islamic Terrorism predates the fall of the Soviets. It goes back quite a ways actually, but if we want to talk modern era, it had its roots in the UN creation of Israel and really got a foothold with the coup in Iran during the 70s. Who do you think the Soviets were fighting in Afghanistan? I understand you are trying to make the point that they were not attacking us because the Soviets were keeping them in check, but the terror attacks at the 1972 Olympics and the Iran hostage situation during Carter's administration undermines that. I suppose these things are not obvious, because it appears you did not grow up during this time, especially if you think the Cold War was some sort of good thing (classic left wing belief btw). No, we just had a totalitarian regime with Nukes and a bunch of terrorists to worry about.
Concerning my comment specifically, the claim I responded to was that Socialism is a benefit to people. To cite some superficial examples of things that are helpful misses the point that the system itself puts a hard cap on the progress and potential for prosperity in a society. Wonder of wonders that that Russian people started poor and ended poor under socialism? Surely they were helped far too much? Or perhaps the Koreans had better luck? No? The Chinese then, since they were much more sophisticated and ancient a people? Ahh, so they killed the most of their own people... Never mind then.
I suppose that isn't nuanced enough for you. Very sorry, but that's Socialism/Fascism/Communist in a nut shell. It doesn't create wealth or prosperity. It mostly creates misery and death, tbh. No, but take a country that already has wealth built up (from Capitalism) like in Europe and America, and then put a socialist spin on their government. It looks pretty good? Right? Except good luck holding onto that wealth, as it will be squandered in time and the only people left with it will be those that entrenched themselves in a political elite.
It is not that a particular government is bad. It is that the structure itself cannot lead to prosperity (even with the best and brightest and zero corruption), but worse still has a dispensation to always move towards tyrannical leaders by its nature. Read "Road to Serfdom" for an excellent exposition on this.
Based on the rest of your post, I don't think you understand what Conservatism means. If you are actually Libratarian (somewhat hard to believe given you advocate much to the opposite), I would suggest that you read up on some of this history you supposedly know rather than waste your time telling me I'm stupid.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
Also do you think that everyone with a different opinion from you is "left wing"?
I think you're mistaking my point on the Soviets. I hate Communism. It would be terrible to implement in America. I would never support it in America. What I disagree with is the Cold War. The Cold War, which you seem to support, had nothing to do with Capitalism and everything to do with Imperialism. Fighting a nebulous war with no apparent purpose that cost billions, no trillions, of dollars had no benefit to do with unfettered Capitalism, which you claim to support. The Cold War bankrupted two nations, which is as anti-Capitalist as you can get.
I can hate a governmental system and still not oppose the nation that developed it. The truth of the matter, whether you agree with it or not, is that MODERN Islamic terrorism is a direct result of the fall of the Soviet Union. Terrorism is merely the act of committing violent acts, not to achieve a political objective directly, but to inflict terror into a population to persuade them to capitulate to your desires. So yes, terrorism as a concept has existed for thousands of years. But I think you're being coy, you know what I am referring to when I say terrorism. I am referring specifically to Islamic terrorism that arose in the middle east.
Modern Islamic terrorism arose in nations that were either previously occupied by the Soviet Union or where the Soviet Union would have advanced had we not interfered. Even now, Putin may be reprehensible to some, but for his part he is doing his best to eliminate terrorism. The Soviet Union was ready, willing, and able to end terrorism by spreading into the Middle East, North Africa, and Asia. They were unable to do so because they ran out of money due to the Cold War. We directly opposed them in Vietnam and in Afghanistan. Afghanistan is of particular note because we funded the Mujahadeen in order for them to defeat the Soviets. The Mujahadeen then became the Taliban. I spent two years of my life trying to avoid getting killed by those guys, so I would know. Just outside Kandahar there is a place called "the graveyard", full of old Soviet equipment: abandoned T-34 tanks, artillery, etc. There is a glimmering emerald pool that has become abandoned and filled with moss. A huge bombed out building that once housed their officers. And America is responsible for that. If we would have just let the Soviets invade Afghanistan then there wouldn't have been Osama Bin Laden or 9/11. Just watch/read Charlie Wilson's war. The Soviet Union was on the precipice of eliminating Islamic terrorism, something we have been unwilling to do because of our Rules of Engagement. And WE stopped them. We should have let them do it when they were ready, willing, and able to do it. Now it's too late but the least we can do is support Putin.
Like you I was anti-Soviet until I started to delve deeper into history. No group has been more falsely criticized than they have been. I hate their government, but they could have been useful allies. Unlike you I'm not going to paint a false narrative just to support my beliefs. I can believe their government wouldn't work in the U.S. but still recognize their usefulness as an ally. The Cold War served no economic purpose and in fact ruined the economy of two nations. They just collapsed before we did. Have you ever stopped to think that maybe the economic struggles of the U.S. today were at least in part because we've blown trillions of dollars in the Cold War and other wars that served no economic purpose? Again the fact that you can't accept that makes me think that you're just a Republican shill rather than a true believer in unfettered Capitalism as you claim to be.
One thing that you and Honorbound are missing is how important the Federal Reserve was in creating the housing bubble. Risky loans really can't exist unless interest rates are artificially suppressed. It's not a coincidence that the housing bubble took off the moment Alan Greenspan cut interest rates after the dot-com bust in 2001.
That's true and I don't deny it. I also don't deny that supports Nevelo's point about government intervention being bad.
Still, there's no denying the fact that big international banks became so overly leveraged in the credit default swaps of subprime mortgage CDOs on their own volition. Government intervention admittedly played some role in the fiasco. But the big international banks still would have likely made the same wagers. The government policies were not the proximate cause of the disaster. Once it occurred, it could have been a lot worse without government intervention. Not that I agree with the bail out entirely. I feel as the big international banks should have been subjected to more punitive measures.
You write about the Cold War as though we were the instigators. We did not build the Berlin Wall and split a city in half and then drop the figurative iron curtain such that there was basically no transit in or out of the USSR. We did not aggressively invade and subsume the eastern bloc countries and push further south into Middle East. We did not threaten to do the same in the rest of Europe, if given the chance. And up until Reagan, the general attitude of politicians was of appeasemeant and yet that did apparently very little mollify the situation. The country was no utopia, given the number of people who fled for political persecution. Instead of watching a comedy drama loosely based on history, have a read of Solzhenitsyn's actual account of his trial and trip to the Gulag. Btw, you do realize that the Cold War started very much prior to Reagan, right? Cuban Missle crisis and other incidents? The Cold War was a result of an aggressive totalitarian regime pushing out its borders in every direction it could.
Lastly, to reiterate Islam Terrorism is not something that was created Cold War nor contained by the Soviets. These are statements you can only makes without any reference to history.
I find it ironic that you claim I have a false narrative, when it is you who seem to have a warped leftwing revisionist view of history (for both the GFC and the Soviets). And if I'm a Republican shill for thinking the Cold War had to be fought rather than surrendered then so be it, just as I think Terrorism must be fought today. That doesn't meant I support Cold Wars or Terrorism, so non sequitur? Anyway, you obviously haven't read enough of these debate forums to know what you are talking about regarding my alignment with Repbulicans. I'd suggest keeping your arguments centered on the facts, otherwise you come off looking like a fool.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
We are the United States. We are NOT the Middle East nor Asia. What the Soviets did there should literally be of no concern to you whatsoever. So yes we were the instigators. The reason why we entered WWII was because we were attacked. The reason why we fought the Soviets in Vietnam or Afghanistan, or rather supported the people who were fighting them was imperialism. There is no other word for it. We felt our empire was threatened. But the actual United States was never attacked nor were our allies. And the Soviets didn't invade Vietnam. A communist government was duly elected and there were people that opposed that and fought the elected Communist government. They petitioned the Soviets for assistance which they provided. In any case this should be of no concern to the United States. Humanitarian military intervention is not a capitalist ideal by any means.
On the one hand you don't blame the big international banks for the financial crisis which I totally understand if you're a pure capitalist.
On the other hand you support a war which was either totally anti-capitalist or else had nothing to do with capitalism. Would a true supporter of free markets endorse invading another country because it wanted to be Communist and asked the Soviets for assistance? That stands against the very principles of free market unless you believe in making other nations be capitalist by force which 1) is imperialism not capitalism; 2) doesn't work-just look at modern day Afghanistan after more than 10 years of American support.
I don't know why you can't understand that I can simultaneously hate communism yet at the same time not feel compelled to burn trillions of dollars to stop it. It's as if you feel intrinsic to the idea of Capitalism is forcing other nations to accept it which again isn't free marke at all.
But we've talked around in circles. I don't mean to be argumentative so I think I've more or less exhausted how much I want to discuss the topic.
Pushed? Even before Bush, I'm fairly sure (won't go as far to say certain) that Bill Clinton (even though some of these trends go back further) did not get the idea to push for deregulations on his own. The government got the idea to "push" markets into the bubble from Wall Street and the regulators (Allegedly. Perhaps those lobbying efforts didn't sway impartiality on the government's sovereign choices when they approved the model you describe.) The government is by no means innocent of situation you describe, but to say that there is no influence that could have come from the bankers who have benefited from the disaster comes across to me as... naïve. It'd also go a ways to explain why the model hasn't changed after it failed.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
Communist elections? Come on, man, seriously? As if any of any of those ballots weren't completely rigged if they even made the effort to fake it. Vietnam was taken over by communists by force and with the help of Russia and China long before we officially declared war on the Communist Viet Cong. The actual Vietnamese people were very much against the communists, but just like in pretty much all of these types of regimes, dissenters were imprisoned, tortured, and killed. The South Vietnamese were at one point our ally, and so evidently in your mind abandoning them to a hostile takeover from despots was what we should have done, eh?
No, we are not Russia or Middle East, but that doesn't stop aggressors from threatening us and our way of life. What does us being the Middle East or America have to do with stopping a bunch of insane and evil people from attacking you? Just because you ignore an evil regime does not mean it won't come to your door step and kill you. More recently, average number of people killed world wide each year from Terrorism is about 20,000. In 2014, 33,000 people were killed. Most of these people were innocent civilian bystanders. Some of them were probably like you, and yet they were still killed by Islamic Extremists. This has been going on for 60-70 years.
And much as you seem to be eager to point the blame at America for the aggressions of murderous totalitarian regimes and psychopathic extremists, we are not the people who have been commiting these atrocities decades. And if you think free markets are consistent with the communist regimes of these governments, that we could have somehow "got along with them," that is both ignorant of history and ignorant fundamentally about what a free market even is.
You call yourself libertarian, but it seems to be lip service. However, if you are truely of this mind frame, I dearly hope you actually do a bit of reading as you have evidently been seriously been mislead in your education. As mentioned before, "Road to Serfdom" is a great starting point.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)