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Orlanth wrote:What matters is that it works

*looks at China*

They've had to move away from communism to make it work, so what does that say about communism?

Melissia wrote:

Orlanth wrote:What matters is that it works

*looks at China*

They've had to move away from communism to make it work, so what does that say about communism?

Have they moved away from communism though? I think they have redefined it instead. North Korea it is not.

Orlanth wrote:

Melissia wrote:

Orlanth wrote:What matters is that it works

*looks at China*

They've had to move away from communism to make it work, so what does that say about communism?

Have they moved away from communism though? I think they have redefined it instead. North Korea it is not.

If your not going to use the traditional definitions for things then how can you even have a conversation? It's like redefining the word is every time you talk.

China more of a Capitalist dictatorship now which is SO not the same thing as Communism.

Orlanth wrote:Have they moved away from communism though?

Princeton wrote:(n) communism (a political theory favoring collectivism in a classless society)

Yes. By definition, a society with widening differences between poor and rich is moving away from communism.

Our governments change. The next one up apparently for governments to go into is Communism believe it or not but Communism is considered to be the perfect government. As everyone is equal. And USSR was Totalitarian society not a true communistic government.
Democracy is great but it still has its flaws. Communism however does as well, human error.

Yes, communism, a perfect government for a perfect people.

Communism and beneveloent dictatorship are those government types that seem great on paper, but just don't work in practice simply due to the fact that humans are flawed creatures.

To an ideologue any form of government they choose is going to be seen as perfect whether it be an anarcho-primativist, a free-market capitalist, or a radical communist.

Asherian Command wrote:Communism is considered to be the perfect government. As everyone is equal. And USSR was Totalitarian society not a true communistic government.

Who says that everyone should be equal? Or even that we want everyone to be equal? Not everyone is equally talented. Not everyone works equally as hard. The communist/socialist obsession with equality of results is baffling to me.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

Asherian Command wrote:Communism is considered to be the perfect government. As everyone is equal. And USSR was Totalitarian society not a true communistic government.

Who says that everyone should be equal? Or even that we want everyone to be equal? Not everyone is equally talented. Not everyone works equally as hard. The communist/socialist obsession with equality of results is baffling to me.

Humanity goes through government systems. And People SHOULD BE EQUAL.
it even says in our US Constitution, All men are created equal.

Orlanth wrote:
Have they moved away from communism though? I think they have redefined it instead. North Korea it is not.

I don't see much of anything in China that I would consider to be communist, outside of political rhetoric. I've heard it described in a number of different ways, but the most popular seems to some variation on "authoritarian state capitalism". Hell, even on a rhetorical level the Chinese are well beyond claiming to be moving towards a workers paradise, most often they talk about generic development.


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Asherian Command wrote:
Humanity goes through government systems. And People SHOULD BE EQUAL.
it even says in our US Constitution, All men are created equal.

I think the questions of whether or not people are equal, or can be equal, are more important than the question of whether or not they should be.

sebster wrote:

sillyboy wrote:Hope this made sense. First time explaining a philosopher in English.

It not only made sense, it was very good. Thanks for posting that.

And reading through this thread, i'm still convinced she was right.

Asherian Command wrote:

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

Asherian Command wrote:Communism is considered to be the perfect government. As everyone is equal. And USSR was Totalitarian society not a true communistic government.

Who says that everyone should be equal? Or even that we want everyone to be equal? Not everyone is equally talented. Not everyone works equally as hard. The communist/socialist obsession with equality of results is baffling to me.

Humanity goes through government systems. And People SHOULD BE EQUAL.
it even says in our US Constitution, All men are created equal.

Equality before the law is not the same as equality of economic result. We are all equal in our right to a speedy trial, our right not to self incriminate, our right the speak, etc. We are not all equal in our right to own a home. Some of us work to pay for our homes, some of us sacrificed greatly to save up for our homes, some us still sacrifice so that we can stay in our homes. Some of us don’t do those things. To try and create economic equality is to violate the real freedoms and rights of the hardworking and successful citizens to benefit those who for whatever reason (often self created reasons) were not able to achieve. It backwards and creates less freedom and equality, not more.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

Asherian Command wrote:Communism is considered to be the perfect government. As everyone is equal. And USSR was Totalitarian society not a true communistic government.

Who says that everyone should be equal? Or even that we want everyone to be equal? Not everyone is equally talented. Not everyone works equally as hard. The communist/socialist obsession with equality of results is baffling to me.

I don't think equality of outcomes is ever going to be possible. No theatrical producer would allow me to become a chorus line dancer even if I wanted to.

That doesn't mean that inequality of opportunity and massive inequality of outcomes is automatically tolerable.

biccat wrote:
Personally, I would favor a corporate governance, where the 'product' sold by the corporation is strictly limited to votes. Every election you can 'buy' as many votes as you want. That money goes into the treasury and has to be spent for the public welfare (no 'rolling over' funds).

Add in a Supreme Court that is appointed at creation, with each Justice selecting his or her replacement (to be approved by the remaining justices), and you've got a pretty decent system, IMO.

Yes, I understand this means that this will result in the "golden rule" - whoever has the gold makes the rules - but I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing.

I don't see how that's especially different from a nominal democracy. A few exceptions aside, the guy who spends more money is going to get more votes. Hell, that's how you get single party democracies like Mexico up until 15-20 years ago. And what almost always follows from a single party democracy is industrial clientelism where overall economic performance is less important than ensuring your pet industries remain the dominant sources of wealth, and therefore votes.

Asherian Command wrote:Humanity goes through government systems. And People SHOULD BE EQUAL.
it even says in our US Constitution, All men are created equal.

The key word there is created.

Let's say that there are two men who start out with an equal amount of money. One invests it in an emerging technology, one invests it in a failing technology. The same facts are available to both.

One fails, one prospers.

Why should the return on investment be divided in half and shared between them?

dogma wrote:I don't see how that's especially different from a nominal democracy. A few exceptions aside, the guy who spends more money is going to get more votes. Hell, that's how you get single party democracies like Mexico up until 15-20 years ago. And what almost always follows from a single party democracy is industrial clientelism where overall economic performance is less important than ensuring your pet industries remain the dominant sources of wealth, and therefore votes.

Well, it's more honest than a nominal democracy. It also has the added advantage of limiting how much government can spend.

"Congrats, no one cares about politics this year, you win the presidency for $10! Bad news: you have a $10 budget."

The problem of specific grants of government money to individuals or companies is solved by a truly independent judiciary. No more court stacking plans, no filibusters of judicial nominees, an independent judiciary that (nominally) answers to the founding documents, not the will of the people.

Personally, I would favor a corporate governance, where the 'product' sold by the corporation is strictly limited to votes. Every election you can 'buy' as many votes as you want. That money goes into the treasury and has to be spent for the public welfare (no 'rolling over' funds).

Asherian Command wrote:
Humanity goes through government systems. And People SHOULD BE EQUAL.
it even says in our US Constitution, All men are created equal.

Emphasis on the word 'created'. You have the same chance to succeed or fail as anyone else. You and everyone else start off from the same point, and work your way forward from there. If one person works harder, and pulls ahead of someone who doesn't work as hard, should we reign in his success so he's in line with the lowest common denominator?

I believe in equality of opportunity. I do not believe that everyone should be equal. Some people are better at certain things than others, and we have to recognize that.

Benevolent Dictator is the best.

Amaya wrote:Benevolent Dictator is the best.

Because....

Kilkrazy wrote:

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

Asherian Command wrote:Communism is considered to be the perfect government. As everyone is equal. And USSR was Totalitarian society not a true communistic government.

Who says that everyone should be equal? Or even that we want everyone to be equal? Not everyone is equally talented. Not everyone works equally as hard. The communist/socialist obsession with equality of results is baffling to me.

I don't think equality of outcomes is ever going to be possible. No theatrical producer would allow me to become a chorus line dancer even if I wanted to.

That doesn't mean that inequality of opportunity and massive inequality of outcomes is automatically tolerable.

That comment is based on a couple of assumptions I do not agree with.

1. The US has serious inequality of opportunity. This could not be further from the truth. There are so many programs, and so many ways for disadvantaged minorities to get a heads up I almost think it is beginning to turn the other direction where people who don’t have access to those programs are being put at a disadvantage. The US has by leaps and bounds the most class mobility and equality of opportunity in the world.
2. Massive inequality of results is always illegitimate. There or plenty of fair and right reasons one person is massively successful and the next person is desperately poor. The massively successful person may have had a billion dollar idea and executed it. They may have worked hard and sacrificed family, friends, and health to achieve their goals. The poor person may have made a series of easy or poor decisions. They may be addicted to drugs. They may just be lazy. I think the vast majority of the inequality in our nation is morally correct. The hard working are prospering, the non hard working aren’t. To try and fix the rest, like I said, only creates equal or more inequality in different forms, discourages success, and generally decreases the wealth and opportunity of the society. The US isn’t perfect, but we have it figured out better than virtually any other place on earth. Give credit where credit is due.

Ahtman wrote:

Amaya wrote:Benevolent Dictator is the best.

Because....

I think he left off '...dictator.'

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:2. Massive inequality of results is always illegitimate. There or plenty of fair and right reasons one person is massively successful and the next person is desperately poor. The massively successful person may have had a billion dollar idea and executed it. They may have worked hard and sacrificed family, friends, and health to achieve their goals.

Or they inherited it.

In fact, this is far more likely. The majority of the rich people in the world inherited their way there. Either directly or indirectly, through having family connections with which to find investors and such.

WARBOSS TZOO wrote:

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:2. Massive inequality of results is always illegitimate. There or plenty of fair and right reasons one person is massively successful and the next person is desperately poor. The massively successful person may have had a billion dollar idea and executed it. They may have worked hard and sacrificed family, friends, and health to achieve their goals.

Or they inherited it.

In fact, this is far more likely. The majority of the rich people in the world inherited their way there. Either directly or indirectly, through having family connections with which to find investors and such.

In the world maybe, in the US absolutely not. I just heard it a couple months ago, give me some time to find it but something like 70% of the millionares in the US are 1st generation millionares. I think I have the book with me... I'll brb.


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Ah! I don't have it with me. But the book is called The Millionare Next Door, very enlightening.


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And I also disagree with the assumption that inheriting wealth is automatically bad. I’m not going to inherit any, but maybe someday I would like to pass some on to my kids. If that is what gets me up every day keeps me working hard and creating economic activity and jobs for other people then I say live and let live. That’s the kind of behavior we should be encouraging.

Democracy sucks, but its the only way that works. Its the best way.

I mean, I would place it third after Monarch and benevolent dictator in this fictional way because then I get to say a good monarch, and a good dictator. The issue with those two is that your totally screwed when you get a bad one.

So yeah, in the real world, our system is the only way to go. But in an ideal world, seriously.. the BD is the way forward. "Freedom" is just a ridiculous notion because non of us are actually "free" theres a gak load of rules to worry about, and we get forced into all sorts of stuff we arent keen on! An awesome dictator would be cool because people couldnt play the system anymore, like he would go "ok freedom of speech, but I dont like you dirty beardy terrorist types burning those poppies because thats taking the piss so im going to hang you"

And all politicians seem to be unversally slime. So, If the current charming lovely queen could abolish parliament and just start making all the rules I would be more than happy with it over our current system. Maybe not so much when she shuffles off the mortal coil though...

biccat wrote:
Well, it's more honest than a nominal democracy. It also has the added advantage of limiting how much government can spend.

"Congrats, no one cares about politics this year, you win the presidency for $10! Bad news: you have a $10 budget."

Honesty isn't always a good thing. Even being forced to maintain the pretense of equality serves to expand the number of constituents that have to be cared for, and therefore forces their issues into the spotlight.

I'm also not convinced that limiting the state's ability to spend is a good thing; especially when it isn't permitted to maintain any sort of cash reserve, a fact that basically just encourages corruption.

"Its not my fault that my primary contributors got back 75% of what they spent on the election, I'm required to spend all of the government's money before my term is up, and was left with no clearly superior alternative."

biccat wrote:
The problem of specific grants of government money to individuals or companies is solved by a truly independent judiciary. No more court stacking plans, no filibusters of judicial nominees, an independent judiciary that (nominally) answers to the founding documents, not the will of the people.

Unless the government in question is going to maintain a fixed body of public servants in order to attend to its functional needs, which seems unlikely given a large potential degree of budgetary fluctuation, there will be no choice but to allow state grants to individuals or companies. Just off the top of my head, you're left with the need to outsource defense, diplomacy, and state administration, all of which will have to be accounted for by spending directed to the private sector. Of course, you could account for this with some sort of low-level taxation that establishes a basic level of funding for these services, but I'm guessing that's what you're trying to avoid.

There's also a lot of scholarship that seems to indicate that the confluence of economic and political power tends to produce negative outcomes for the state in question, except where the economic interests within the state are relatively narrow.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

WARBOSS TZOO wrote:

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:2. Massive inequality of results is always illegitimate. There or plenty of fair and right reasons one person is massively successful and the next person is desperately poor. The massively successful person may have had a billion dollar idea and executed it. They may have worked hard and sacrificed family, friends, and health to achieve their goals.

Or they inherited it.

In fact, this is far more likely. The majority of the rich people in the world inherited their way there. Either directly or indirectly, through having family connections with which to find investors and such.

In the world maybe, in the US absolutely not. I just heard it a couple months ago, give me some time to find it but something like 70% of the millionares in the US are 1st generation millionares. I think I have the book with me... I'll brb.


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Ah! I don't have it with me. But the book is called The Millionare Next Door, very enlightening.

Millionaires. Pfah, that's chump change. Look at the billionaires and up.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:Automatically Appended Next Post:
And I also disagree with the assumption that inheriting wealth is automatically bad. I’m not going to inherit any, but maybe someday I would like to pass some on to my kids. If that is what gets me up every day keeps me working hard and creating economic activity and jobs for other people then I say live and let live. That’s the kind of behavior we should be encouraging.

There's nothing inherently wrong with inheritance, just with the way it works in practice. Let's say that you become a trillionaire somehow. Your kids will never have to work, through no effort of their own. Is that equality in action?

dogma wrote:

biccat wrote:
Well, it's more honest than a nominal democracy. It also has the added advantage of limiting how much government can spend.

"Congrats, no one cares about politics this year, you win the presidency for $10! Bad news: you have a $10 budget."

Honesty isn't always a good thing. Even being forced to maintain the pretense of equality serves to expand the number of constituents that have to be cared for, and therefore forces their issues into the spotlight.

Well then the question is, what makes a government 'good'?

You can have a 'happy' society by selective oppression. You can have a 'productive' society by enslaving people. You can make a 'free' society by abolishing government completely. And you can have a 'compliant' society by heavy-handed oppression.

I think honesty is a good because it allows people to know how the game is played, and therefore allows for social mobility by 'playing the game.' Modern politics isn't about success, it's about knowing the right people. A capitalistcracy would overcome that problem, at least in some fashion.

dogma wrote:I'm also not convinced that limiting the state's ability to spend is a good thing; especially when it isn't permitted to maintain any sort of cash reserve, a fact that basically just encourages corruption.

"Its not my fault that my primary contributors got back 75% of what they spent on the election, I'm required to spend all of the government's money before my term is up, and was left with no clearly superior alternative."

Maybe, maybe not. The US doesn't have the ability to carry over cash from one fiscal year to another and doesn't have a huge corruption problem.

dogma wrote:

biccat wrote:The problem of specific grants of government money to individuals or companies is solved by a truly independent judiciary. No more court stacking plans, no filibusters of judicial nominees, an independent judiciary that (nominally) answers to the founding documents, not the will of the people.

Unless the government in question is going to maintain a fixed body of public servants in order to attend to its functional needs, which seems unlikely given a large potential degree of budgetary fluctuation, there will be no choice but to allow state grants to individuals or companies. Just off the top of my head, you're left with the need to outsource defense, diplomacy, and state administration, all of which will have to be accounted for by spending directed to the private sector. Of course, you could account for this with some sort of low-level taxation that establishes a basic level of funding for these services, but I'm guessing that's what you're trying to avoid.

If people think defense, diplomacy, and state administration are a good thing, then they can pay for it buy buying votes and donating them to candidate X.

If not, then it's not something the people want, and they shouldn't be forced to pay for it.

WARBOSS TZOO wrote:
Millionaires. Pfah, that's chump change. Look at the billionaires and up...

There's nothing inherently wrong with inheritance, just with the way it works in practice. Let's say that you become a trillionaire somehow. Your kids will never have to work, through no effort of their own. Is that equality in action?

I can only think of five American Billionares, Bill Gates, Oprah, Mark Zuckerberg, Warren Buffet, and Donald Trump. I'm sure there are more but those are some of the richest people in the country. Trump and Buffet are the only two with notable backgrounds and their backgrounds aren't even that notable. There just isn't a lot of old money in our country, it's too easy to lose and relatively easy to gain.

And yes I do think leaving trillions to a child is equality, because all of us right now have the same opportunity to go out and find a way to collect those trillions for our children. As I said, if that is what keeps you working (and millions, much less billionares, work A LOT) and producing and making jobs and opportunities for other people, more power to you.