Socialism is wrong, wrong, wrong.
Anyone who disagrees is not only wrong, but is pure evil.
From libertarian Michael A. LaFerrara:
The Atlas Society ran this video of Milton Friedman explaining why capitalism is Superior to Socialism. With respect to Friedman, I think he epitomizes why Socialism keeps winning.
Friedman defines Socialism as a system of social organization in which the government owns and runs the means of production. So he’s talking about what I describe as Criminal Socialism. Good start.
But he then grants proponents of socialism the benefit of the doubt — good intentions. I don’t believe good intentions to be fundamental to the Socialist mind. Given the well-known history of Criminal, or state-imposed, Socialism in practice, any good intentions are just a reflection of ignorance.
But I don’t see ignorance as the prime attraction for Socialists. The attractions are much lower.
Not only does Mr. I-Form-a-Conclusion-and-Then-Work-Backwards-From-There-to-Justify-It seem to have a complete misunderstanding of what Socialism is in relation to what policy suggestions in America are, but judging from his ‘Criminal Socialism’ treatise, he seems to also lack a fundamental understanding of what constitutes crime or what a crime is.
Crime is not just something you’ve decided that you don’t like. Otherwise, to my kid, I’m committing a crime every time I try to feed them broccoli.
As an aside:
“So socialism has appeal to the phony. Greed, powerlust, envy, hatred, and phoniness, or some combination thereof, are what draws people to socialism.”
You think this guy would get tired of knocking over all of those straw people. Like… he’s totally describing Gordon Gecko here… not the hippy-dippy, power to the people pinko-commie-socialist we’re used to hearing about.
Why do so many of these *vs* posts devolve quickly into over-simplification/hyperbole? “blood-sucking vampire”? ” Socialism doesn’t work (to put it mildly) because it is bad in theory. Capitalism works because it is.” (bad in theory?)
Unless societies can control the bad human traits that turn capitalism into an oligarchical orgy of blood-sucking autocratic vampires (my attempt at over-simplification/hyperbole), there will always be a pendulum swing between the isms. Both isms can result in the same harms to the common good due to bad implementation.
We need to back away from the notion that this is a binary decision, and roll our own theory and implementation. UBI and govt-sponsored healthcare/housing/education/jobs (for those who choose it) would be good places to start.
Why?
Over simplification makes everything easier.
Build a house with the bare minimum of supports, and its easier to tear down.
Score a line in a board, and its easier to break it half
So, set yourself up against a wet noodle of an argument, of course you crush it.
Charlie Kirk, Ben Shapiro, Hannity, Limbaugh.. they’ve built “careers” out of “debating” like this.