Asymmetrical Information

Well I'll be damned. That's exactly what it says right here in the dictionary:

The belief that a society or system should be run by an elite.

I used to hate Home Depot until I actually started a major project, and I realized just how much cheaper it was than my local hardware store. Home Depot crawls with people running around, buying stuff cheaply and creating value with it. Go Home Depot and chaotic commerce.

But you have your work cut out for you if you're going to claim this word back; try this little google search and you'll see what I mean.

I have a different obsession; I love infrastructure. I love post offices and libraries in small towns. I love channel markers and lighthouses and rest stops, all these little things that we've agreed are necessary to keep things moving, that we're willing to pay for collectively and that then anyone can use however he wants. It's not the same as imposing order; it's about putting the avenues and conventions in place that allow us to figure out our own little inventive ways of making money and living a life.

So I see what you're saying, but I still don't agree that it's elitist, even by your definition, to be discouraged by the sight of a truck driving on a sidewalk. I'll be happy when there are lots of trucks, lots of stoplights and lots of undisturbed pedestrians in Iraq. Commerce needs both volume and order - there are even stacks of the same-sized wood in my Home Depot, and customers wait patiently in line.

Actually, it'll be enough just to have Iraqis stop killing us and each other. But you know what I mean.

I tend to look at infrastructure and consider whether it is truly a Public Good. See Steve (and here, since Steve goes through it rather quickly) for definitions and discussion.

I don't object to libraries and channel markers, but many infrastructure projects may 'crowd out' private efforts or spontaneous order, which can be cheaper to society and preferable from an individual liberty point of view.

Statistics on foreign aid are instructive in that regard - Bigger governments seem to have little or no private aid.

The evidence linked in Drezner's post above, by the way, strongly supports an early blog assertion of mine.

Mindles, if you take a moral and aesthetic pleasure in the spontaneous exercise of freedom, does that mean that you'd be a supporter of fairly widespread and significant redistribution of wealth in order to massively increase the number of people who could have a go at this aesthetically pleasing activity? That's why I'm a man of the left (broadly defined); I have never been able to get over the fact that the private property system, while obviously a freer way of organising the world than what you define as "statism", still has obvious and obviously soluble flaws which could be substantially mitigated by sharing the goodies out a bit. The failure of the political right (and all but a damn few libertarians) to engage with this genuine problem in good faith is, IMO, the original sin of classical liberalism.

dsquared:
"redistribution of wealth " by whom ?
Redistribution can't happen by itself, of rather it happens all the time, in the free market with people buying, selling, giving, earning, bequeathing, etc.

What you mean is to add to this some FORCED redistribution. Forced by whom ? By the Elites ?
Here you have another definition of Elites: elites are those who impose and manage a system of forced redistribution of wealth.

dsquared, I think you underestimate, in the current state of U.S. society, the degree to which essentially property-less people have the ability to engage in this activity, if they understand what is possible. On a semi-regular basis, I work with people who have arrived in this country with literally only the clothes they are wearing, and perhaps a small bag of possessions. They own real estate now, cars newer than mine, have a network of customers to serve, employees to manage, and this all happened without initial skills in English.

This happened because they weren't stymied, delayed, and obstructed at every turn by an overweening bureaucracy which was attempting to direct human behavior, ostensibly for the "common good". Does protecting private property have flaws? Undoubtedly, since everything has flaws. However, what you term as "obvious" solutions will also have flaws, and they will be the flaws that tend to carry a high price,in that those who seek bureaucratic power over the lives of others (and no, I'm not saying that this includes you, or even the vast majority of those on the "left", whatever that term means) never call a halt to "progress", and given their preference, will destroy what makes a society dynamic.

Can there be areas of accomodation between your view of the world and mine? I think so. I think there are far too few people who understand how to take advantage of what is available, often due to lack of education,or an education system which has failed to teach ways of thinking and skills which help maximize human potential. Solving this problem is neither obvious or easy, though, and it would be helpful if people of differing views of the world could engage with each other in good faith, and work together where it is possible. Oh, to dream.

Mindles has a point. The term "elitist" is politically neutral.

The Athenian and Roman Republics were elitist societies (only citizens could vote - and that was a small fraction of their society). Feudal societies in he Middle Ages were elitist societies (the nobility ran things). Nearly every monarchy of the Reformation was elitist (royalty was elite). Ditto Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and the Soviet Union (the party in power ran things, was a small portion of the portion of the population, and brooked no opposition).

All of these societies were run by a small, powerful minority. All believed that this small minority should continue to run things. All were therefore elitist by definition.

The common thread is not left/right. The common thread - if there is one - is the belief that it was right for a small minority to run things as it sees fit. This belief seems to span the political spectrum.

If one believes the term "elitist" to be politically biased, perhaps one should re-examine the facts. It's possible that the belief is wrong.

Sure, Hondo, but by that logic I could call you a fascist and then protest "But I was just calling you a torch-bearer in Italian," strictly speaking, I'll bet you've held a torch before, haven't you?"

Language changes, it gets appropriated and passed around, and it's pretty well documented that the Right has appropriated "elite" for its own uses. This just happened to appear today; I didn't even have to look that hard to find it.

This is a serious question and I'm not trying to change the subject of the thread.

Is it politically incorrect for me to call certain blood relatives of mine and others like them who 1. refuse to become educated and 2. find gainful work "rednecks"? If I remember correctly, that didn't come up during my diversity training.

Although my political views would be considered centrist, I find myself waiting patiently for them to discover the obvious route to success - public education and personal initiative. For the record, I am a legacy of the same modest Midwestern folk as they.

Listen, you want to call your cousins rednecks, go ahead; there are rednecks and elitists in America, a lot of both. I'm not banning either word, I'm just pointing out the way they've been slyly appropriated.

I mean, everyone has redneck cousins.

I'll have a go at your question, dsquared, when I have some time. I have read a book recently that addresses your question -

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0312210833/002-6080066-2540861?v=glance

One thing that comes to mind is the failure of property reform efforts around the world, except possibly in Japan. I've also heard you decry means testing, and a massive wealth redistribution effort resembles means-testing to me.

The benefits of property don't seem to accompany insecurity about your property rights. Kind of like the permanent income hypothesis (I know, you probably aren't a fan of that..)

Gary - Yes, I would think it would be wrong to call the people you describe "rednecks". A redneck, if I understand the history of the term, is someone, like a farmer, who spends a lot of time working outside -- thus his neck is burned red by the sun. So, it's similar to the terms "white collar" and "blue collar" in that it referred (at least originally) to the type of work an individual performed. (What's up with this focus on necks in classifying jobs?) The term became pejorative because many city folk assumed that those working outside must be doing so because they are uneducated and unfit for other work. Being uneducated, it was also obvious that such people could not have the qualities that only come with education -- like the ability to treat others fairly, care about the common good, etc.

The proper term to use for those you describe is "lazy".

dsquared:

As a "man of the left" I want you to immediately
share ALL YOUR WEALTH with those less well off
than yourself.

If you do not IMMEDIATELY do so you are shown
to be what most of the left is - HYPOCRITICAL
to the extreme.

What you meant to write was that you don't mind
sharing OTHER PEOPLES WEALTH; not your own.

If you personally haven't chosen to live in
extremely reduced circumstance you are only
advocating the organized seizure of someone
elses property.

I'm sure that makes you feel inordinately smug
however.

Contributor B:

I frankly expected better from you.

Yes, language changes. That's not what is happening here. In this context, language is being deliberately abused.

You reference what I assume is a NYT editorial decrying the political right's use of the term elitist. (I don't know, because the NYT requires registration to view that article - and I don't generally read websites requiring registration due to privacy grounds.)

So what?

You seem to be implying that the "sins" of the right excuse similar "sins" on the left. Two wrongs make a right? Is that really the position you want to advocate? Because that is the position you seem to be defending, consciously or not.

My point is that the term "elitist" is currently being misused - likely with malice - by the left and the right alike. The term itself is neutral. The fact that both ends of the political spectrum are doing so does not change that fact. It also does not absolve either side from blame.

By the way: I cannot ever recall carrying a torch in my life - unless, of course you're using British slang for a flashlight.

Hondo, I'm confused. Where have I excused the sins of the left? My point was strictly about the word "elitist." I'm not advocating the use of the words "fascist" or "redneck," only pointing out that they're just as wrong.

And it is true that the right abuses the word "elitist" more than the left does. That doesn't mean that the Left doesn't do bad things, it just happens to not be one of the bad things the left is doing right now. Again, type "liberal" and "elitist" into google and see what you get.

"Elitist" implies too much education, it implies snobbery and disdain, and these are lables that the right very much wants to pin on the left right now. The left, when it wants to decry the rich, uses different terms: "fat cats" or "CEOs" or "The Man."

This whole problem can't be solved by saying "The right sins, the left sins, let's call the whole thing off." We have to be able to take issue with a specific problem without having to belabor the very real fact that everyone does things wrong.

But I'm flattered, at least, that you expected more. I'll try not to disappoint you in the future.

Is it politically incorrect for me to call certain blood relatives of mine and others like them who 1. refuse to become educated and 2. find gainful work "rednecks"? If I remember correctly, that didn't come up during my diversity training.

;)

i'd just like to say that i thought this post was both interesting and insightful and that i might just go read virginia's book.

also, i sympathize with mindles in his big government, pro kerry saturated environment that he mentions in both this post and his ASS-U-ME post. i live in minneapolis and thats what my life is like too.

Contributor B:

Forgiving the "sins" of the left was the implication I drew from a previous post - perhaps incorrectly. Perhaps "ignoring" would have been a better choice of words.

However, your last post clearly shows you recognize that both extremes distort. Criticism withdrawn.

Having said that, I think we are not all that far off here. We seem to be discussing opposite sides of the same coin.

You argue what is unfortunately pretty much fact: a number of standard english terms have been hijacked by those with political agendas, by the ignorant - or by both - and used to change the terms of argument to their advantage. I point out the fact of this hijacking, and call it what it is: abuse of the language. I suspect we both agree that it shouldn't have happened. You seem to accept it; I seek to change it.

I usually disagree with at least part of what you post (I'm much more conservative, I think, than you are). However, you seem openminded, intelligent, and logical; your posts add to the quality of discourse. Please keep at it.

The redefining of political extremes to a dynamist/statist approach is interesting, but incomplete (and perhaps not new -- what underlying principles of fascism differ markedly from communism, even if the means are somewhat different?). Two people like e.g. Nader and Buchanan may become bedfellows in their desire for a statist-like solution to problems, but it's still a strange union because their motivations to those means are obviously different.

So perhaps what we really need is an xy scatter plot in which left/right appears on the x-axis and statist/dynamist appears on the y-axis.

anaony-mouse - I suggest a 3D graph, with
X = stasists/dynamacist
Y = economic liberal/conservative
Z = social liberal/conservative

anony-mouse:

As I recall my history, there was precious little real difference between the Nazi and Soviet Stalinist regimes. Both were police states run by a small number of folks rabidly following the political ideology of their party.

Both murdered millions for political reasons.

IMO, you are correct. The essential political distinction isn't left/right - it's group/individual.

I've long held that there is little real difference between the extreme left and extreme right. Both seem to want to establish a dictatorship where they are in absolute control - then eliminate those who don't agree with them. The actual political philosophy each espouses is, IMO, a cover. What they really want is control.

I am conservative. However, I distrust the radical right just as much as I distrust the radical left. I have no desire to live in a police state run by either.

Doh! How did I get pulled into this? B, you move to Boston and I can't keep you out of comments sections anymore.

Two observations: the phrase "liberal elite" (use quotation marks if you'd like to replicate) appears five times more than "conservative elite" on Google. I do agree with B that conservatives have tried to appropriate the word to apply it sneeringly to over-educated people who haven't cleared enough brush.

Hondo, big disagreement on no difference between Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany. I'm with anony-mouse. Yes, both were police states, but the motivations and roots matter. One was the enlightenment gone badly wrong: communism was a supposedly scientific theory based on some not-always-completely-insane economic and historical observations. Nazism was enlightenment's opposite, romanticism, gone badly wrong: the same current that gave you Wordsworth getting back to nature also gave you "volkisch" theorists who believed in some kind of organic national-racial collective soul to be exalted above all things, including reason and the universal brotherhood-of-man type stuff.

In this vein, the thing that Mindles is worried about is clearly communism: people thinking they are so scientific and know so much better than you do that you'd really better shut up and do what they say. The idea of Nazism, that you'd really better shut up and do what they say because they are the natural leaders of the organic Volk, is not really a vibrant stream of thinking any more. Thank Jeebus.

Contributor A - If it were possible to read the hearts and minds of Stalin and Hitler, we might find that one had good intentions while the other did not. But since we cannot read what was in their souls (at least I cannot), I think it is unprofitable to look too closely at their claimed motivations. Both Stalin and Hitler may have been spouting their theories more as a way to gain and maintain their power than from any real belief in what they said.

Giving credit for good intentions makes it too easy for us to acquiesce to policies that destroy individual liberty. That's where the focus ought to be -- before we advocate a policy that limits freedom, it should be PROVEN the idea will work. Giving up freedom for some hoped for ill-defined benefit is seldom a good bargain.

Contributor A:

If you agree with anony-mouse, they you also agree with me. I suggest you re-read his last post. There, anony-mouse asks "what underlying principles of fascism differ markedly from communism, even if the means are somewhat different?" Seems to me that he finds little significant difference between the two.

"Motivation matters." Oh really. Tell that to the nearly 21 million murdered under Hitler, and the nearly 50 million murdered in cold blood under Stalin. Better yet, tell it to their surviving kin. Good intent does not come anywhere close to justifying the cold-blooded murder by the million, nor does bad intent make it any worse. Murdering literally millions in cold blood is an abomination, regardless of motivation.

No, the above numbers DO NOT include war dead from World War II; they refer only to those murdered by the Nazis and Soviets over and above war dead. And yes, I can provide references for the above numbers - from an authorative source - if you like.

In my opinion, Hitler and Stalin were both incredibly evil men. IMO, neither of them was anything but a power hungry megalomaniac willing to kill anyone who got in their way or whom they perceived as a threat. Regrettably, both managed to rise to a position that allowed them to murder literally millions.

Yikes, Hondo. I don't know what in my post made it seem as if I were defending either Hitler or Stalin. I was just musing from a historical point of view that the two murderous -isms at issue were very different, one ostensibly hyperrational, the other based on a hyperemotional-irrational appeal to nation/race. Yes, they were both deadly, but so is cancer - that doesn't mean "cancer is fundamentally no different from Nazism - both have resulted in millions of dead people." And I was further musing that one (nationalism) is dead or at least dying, the other (socialism) is very much alive and well.

For the historically impaired here: Stalin = communist = international socialist; Hitler = Nazi = German national socialist; Mussolini = fascist = Italian Marxist and socialist. There is a common theme here if you look closely. You decide if they are from the left or the right or there is any significant difference. As Hondo stated "The essential political distinction isn't left/right - it's group/individual." Or as Hillary said recently " We're going to have to take it away from you for the common good."

TFAIE was enlightening for me as well. The Nader/Buchanan axis struck again recently when Buchanan interviewed Nader for his magazine.

Contributor A:

Might want to re-read your post. It seems to me that you speak in nearly reverential tone about the Soviet Union, ascribing to it "good intentions" and stating that communism is "scientific" and was "enlightenment". I find it hard to accept that a philosophy which produces a regime that systematically murders an average of nearly 1,600,000 persons a year over period of 31 years (between 1923 and 1954) can be anything remotely approaching "enlightenment".

Soviet communism also had strong racist components. Anti-semitism was strong in the Soviet Union. Ask the Crimean Tatars - if you can find any surviving Tatars, that is - about how the Soviets treated some of their racial/ethnic minorities.

Moreover, IMO intent is absolutely irrelevant in justifying atrocity. The intent of medieval Islam's policy of forcible conversion in conquered territories was noble (to the conquerors); so was the intent of the Inquisition (to the Church). Both sought to save the souls of those so treated, and to prevent others from being "led astray." That does not alter the fact that both were morally reprehensible.

Paul is also correct. Both communism and Nazism are variants of socialism (as was Italian fascism); both have socialist economic priciples at their core. Indeed, "Nazism" is the shortened form of the German "Nationalsozialismus", or "national socialism". The economic philosophy of the Nazis - e.g., central planning and control, massive public sector - seems to me pretty damn similar to that of the Soviets. The intent of both was to use the states economic resources for state - as opposed to individual - progress.

In short - other than the fact that they were implacable enemies - I don't find two cents worth of difference between Nazism and Soviet communism. Both were murderous, repressive police states. I simply don't see how one is in any way preferable to the other.

Oh come on. It's a little boring, this desperate attempt to see who hates communists and Nazis more. And Hondo, I cannot begin to tell you how in over your head you are when you lay down, for Contributor A, the derivation of the word "Nazi." If you really want to cross swords here, the Nazis appended "National" to the front of "Socialismus" as a way to distinguish themselves from the scrum of socialisms kicking around Germany in the twenties; ask a German -- even a modern, enlightened one -- to pronounce it and you'll marvel at how much harder he stresses the "National" than the "sozialismus."

Yes, duh, Hitler and Stalin both killed millions and millions of people. Why is it that you're so desperate to see an apologist for communism where there is none? Nobody said it was ok for Stalin to kill all those people, but it is still true that one of the many differences between Soviet communism and Hitler's Germany in the 30's was that, yes, Nazis borrowed heavily from romantic nationalism and the Soviet communists professed a kind of rational materialism. Was it right or even rational? No, and again, duh, but it's still true that two movements started in fundamentally different places and arrived at killing millions of people.

Why can't you just let that stand as a point? Why do you have to get so bent out of shape reminding us how wrong it is to kill? Thank you, got it. Killing=bad.

And Contributor A is also completely right about the remnants of socialism; we've completely discredited Volkish nationalism, but a lot of what started as socialism is still with us. Or do you still work a seven-day week? You should check with your union about that.

Paul, by the way, that was gorgeous, how you got from Hitler to Hillary in a single paragraph. Sweet. Nice job.

Seems to me some critical things they had in common was state control of industry and an elite(!) bureaucracy controlling society and industry. This results in little to no regard for individual freedom because otherwise the bureucracy cannot achieve control.

Hayek was so completely right. I don't care how Germans prounounce it - socialism leads to fascism regardless of intent.

I have stumbled in here as a result of a link from Instapundit. I hope you don't mind my throwing in.

This thread is timely for me. I have within the last year read both Virginia's book and The Road to Serfdom.

I will need to reread them both at some point, but some things began to gel for me almost immediately.

On the subject of the word elitist: I believe that the negative use of this word derives from an implied isolation from the larger entity, or the average. In this sense, we can have an intellectual elite and at the same time an economic elite. I think that some kind of set model would work for me, and an individual could be a member of many different elites, not all of them with negative implications. An elite athlete for example.

This whole left/right, liberal/conservative construct is dysfuntional in my opinion.

Virginia Postrel's stasist/dynamist idea is helpful, but not complete.

I have to go with Hayek in that I now see only Liberty and various levels of it's diminishment. The Nazis and Stalinists are equivalent in that they both diminish Liberty arbitrarily and in the extreme.

For me, enlightened self interest with a strong focus on individual Liberty fits the bill. We can decide to willingly give up Liberties in certain areas because it will be in the best interest of the group as a whole, and presumably ourselves as individuals within that group. We all choose to drive on the right side of the road for example. This would be a good idea even if it were not enforced by the civil government, in the sense that a protocol is required for driving if we are to live long enough to enjoy our Liberty.

I am disapointed with the actual Libertarian Party thus far because they apparantly have not yet realized that Liberty cannot mean "anything goes".

I honestly believe that in order to expand Liberty, we must also willingly choose to act within some kind of generally agreed upon moral construct.

I now view those on the so called "left" and "right" who believe in using the power of government to enforce their own restrictions on others as kin to one another in their opposition to Liberty.

John,

If you want liberty you must either have a limited social order (agreed on morals) or a lot of tolerance.

Since I can't say how you'd get the former in America I'd say the effort must go into the latter. Even if it seems libertine.

There is always some reason why liberty is not good for the other guy.

As to why G. Bush seems to have gone left and Clinton went right. Simple really if you understand why Pepsi tastes a lot like Coke.

Let me just blurt it out: IN A REAL DEMOCRACY THE GOVERNMENT REPRESENTS THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE.

I don't know why this is so hard to figure out. Now maybe the people want some things that are not good for them. This is quite possible. It still does not change the fact that the government of America is representative of the people.

M.Simon

I'm not sure what you are saying.

To clarify, and I knew I would run into trouble by using the word moral, what I meant was: In order to have successful limited government, we need a general agreement on a broadly acceptable construct as well as a lot of tolerance.

In areas such as literature and music, when I am looking for direction I prefer to go "back to the roots", I believe our Democracy should be renewed occasionally by our doing the same.

Clearly, due to the time period in which our founders lived, the Liberties they sought to guarantee were limited to white, male, property owners. The remedy for this is simply to bring all people under that original umbrella.

Those who peddle government action as the answer to all problems without acknowledging Democracy's need for responsible action by the individual many times create more problems and diminish Liberty.

I agree that Democracy should represent THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE, but not always THE WHIMS OF THE PEOPLE.

In order to provide the greatest opportunity to the greatest number, Democracy requires an informed and active electorate. Looking at voting statistics and groupthink in the popular media, I believe that we have room for improvement.

Question:

Have any of you read any of the later Ken Wilber? Particularly, A Theory of Everything ? I have found his use of Don Beck's Spiral Dynamic model to be particularly useful and I think that it explains much of what goes on here in the comments. Elsewhere in other comments sections, too, for that matter.

I'm interested in some opinions from those of you who are familiar with this work.

I think to some extent that we need to distinguish the ideology of fascism and socialism from the practice. I think it's theoretically possible, in some imaginary universe, that you could have both fascist and socialist states that weren't murderous and oppressive; it's just that in the real world, with real human beings, putting either ideology into practice requires unimaginable brutality. (Fascism didn't have to include genocide; it just did, under the Germans. Similarly, communism didn't have to include murdering millions who weren't sufficiently enthusiastic about the programme; it just did, under the Russians, Cambodians, Chinese, and so forth.) So while Contributors A&B are talking about the ideology, and are correct that they are very different, the rest of the commentators are talking about the practice, and are also correct that it is surprisingly similar. I don't think that you can let the communists off the hook because they're idealists; the people of Germany were just as idealistic as the people of Russia, and both were willing to kill millions of people to put their ideals into practice. Both ideologies conveyed the right upon the state to kill those people in the name of the greater community, which is why libertarians tend to see them as essentially similar, rather than essentially different. This is especially true of Soviet and Chinese communism, which combined nationalism with socialism in such a way as to make them arguably different in degree, rather than kind, from the Nazis.

(That said, I think Hitler's germany was worse than Soviet Russia. But I find it hard to muster a strong logical argument for this belief, which leaves open the possibility that my horror is only a generally acceptable version of "the shudder test" proposed by Leon Kass against stem cell research.)

Jane,

Forgive me if I am not entirely accurate on this, because it has been several months, but my reading of Hayek left me with the impression that the main flaw in socialist thought lies not in the outcomes we have seen, but in it's diminishment of Liberty itself. That is: Even a theoretically benevolent socialist construct is flawed because it by it's own nature must to some extent favor winners over losers and in so doing limit personal Liberty.

I am not a devotee of Hayek as such, but something struck a chord with me.

John, if I have time, I'll answer that one later. For now, I also wanted to point out that the difference between elitism and fascism, as words, is that when people employ the word fascist, there is generally a different word that would be more descriptive. In this case, dearest Mindles wanted to use the word "elite", not liberal. There isn't another good word I can think of that's adequately substitutable. And I actually think it is a good point; there are a large number of people in nice houses in old suburbs or cities who really hate the way the lovely countryside is being despoiled by nasty housing developments, and deeply resent all those evil "sprawlers" crowding up the highway on their Wal-Mart runs as the more sophisticated types motor up to New Paltz for a hike. They push for laws in accordance with these values, schmooshing moral, aesthetic and economic values into one cause. Hence, Brooklyn remains low-rise close to Manhattan, protecting the lovely brownstone lined streets of current residents at the expense of potential residents and renters, who are forced farther and farther from work in search of housing -- this is why the city's legal secretaries and dental hygeinists live an hour or more away from their jobs.

These elites don't even have to be rich; just powerful. Hence a coalition of community groups and politicians like Charlie Rangel have fought development of Harlem and other poor neighborhoods, because if the average income goes up, they'll lose power.

Contributors A, B:

No, actually I’ll thank the federal government for the fact that I don't routinely work a seven-day week. I can be required to work that of schedule by my employer, however, if appropriately compensated per federal law. The reason businesses and other organizations don't routinely do this is that it's economically better for them to hire additional staff vice pay the overtime and chase off trained employees through overwork.

A fair number of small business owners routinely work 7-day weeks. A fair number of other folks do as well, at least from time. Just ask anyone you might know that's ever been in the uniformed military.

Regarding Nazism and communism: one of these perverse philosophies hails from the left, one from the right. Both are based on socialist principles. No substantial difference in practice. I see and admit that - hell, it's obvious. What bothers me is that neither of you seem willing to admit that BOTH have the same fundamental problems. You denigrate the one generally held to be far right, but won't admit that the one generally accepted to be based on leftist principles has the same inherent flaws.

IMO, as philosophies both Nazism and communism - and, in general, socialism - suffer from the same fundamental flaw: they ignore human nature. By and large, mankind is composed of a bunch of crafty but greedy and selfish individuals (I'd say 95+%) who are primarily concerned with bettering themselves and their family; maybe 5% of mankind is primarily altruistic and therefore committed to bettering the common good at their own expense. A political philosophy that fails to recognize this fact - and which depends on the majority of people acting altruistically for the common good ("from each according to his ability, to each according to his need") - has a REAL problem. It will fail, or it will be forced to result to repressive means to force compliance. The vast majority of people just are not going to act that way naturally.

Socialism CAN work in those situations where everyone IS altruistic and committed to working towards the common good. Monasteries, cloisters, and isolated religious communes are examples. However, I don't know of many other human endeavors that meet these criteria. Hell, sometimes even isolated religious communes go bad - remember Jonestown?

IMO, John and Mindles have things pretty much correct. There simply is not any essential difference between Nazism and Soviet-style (or, IMO, any other style) communism. Both are based on the principle that the state is supreme and that the individual's needs are irrelevant - or, restated, that the "common good" takes absolute precedence over individual needs and desires.

The key distinction isn't between left and right. The key distinction is whether a system places the individual's or the state's needs first.

Contributor B:

My providing the definition of the word "Nazism" was intended merely as a reminder that the Nazi party was in fact a socialist party, and identified itself as such. Nothing more, nothing less.

On the other hand, your gratuitous insult regarding same really wasn’t necessary. Seemed a bit arrogant and elitist, actually.

I’ve always found that cavalierly telling people about whom I know next to nothing that they are "in over their head" on a given issue to be very risky. Unless you know the individual and their background in great detail, it’s always possible that they are MORE qualified to speak on a given issue than you are.

All I know about you is what I have read here in these fora. Unless you’re a good – and damned quick – investigator, that’s all you know about me as well.

For all you know at this point, I may have a doctorate in history, teach it at the university level - and have written my dissertation on German history of the interwar period.

In fact, that isn’t the case - but until I told you this, you didn't KNOW one way or another. You assumed.

Judge my words if you like; that’s fair game. It's dangerous to judge my intent or background when you know neither; you could be badly wrong.

About the Commie/Nazi similarities...

Recently a DVD was released. On it was a propaganda film put out by one of these regimes.

It's a film about the Titanic.

In this version, the greedy capitalist owner of the Titanic, Ismay, recklessly hastens the voyage in order to get his stock price up. He needs to get the stock price up because a greedy capitalist passenger, Astor, is trying to drive the stock price down. These greedy capitalist machinations are responsible for the disaster.

At the end of the film, a title card appears which reads: "The deaths of 1,500 people remain unatoned for, an eternal condemnation on the English quest for profit."

Left-wing, or right-wing? Click here to find out.

(Interesting that the director hanged himself in his cell. I guess filmmaking can be a depressing business.)

Forgive me if I am not entirely accurate on this, because it has been several months, but my reading of Hayek left me with the impression that the main flaw in socialist thought lies not in the outcomes we have seen, but in it's diminishment of Liberty itself. That is: Even a theoretically benevolent socialist construct is flawed because it by it's own nature must to some extent favor winners over losers and in so doing limit personal Liberty.

英国留学 women garments 出国留学 porcelain insulator 出国留学咨询 耳机 surfing scooter pocket bike mini chopper gas scooter foot scooter electric motorcycle mini e-bike electric-bike mini e-scooter electric-scooter gas scooter surfing scooter gas scooter 耳机 tomato paste green raisin
electric scooters pocket bike mini chopper skate board q scooter

Comments are Closed.