Text 22348, 75 rader
Skriven 2008-10-21 14:17:10 av Michiel van der Vlist (2:280/5555)
     Kommentar till en text av Robert Bashe (2:2448/44)
Ärende: Preferential treatment
==============================
Hello Bob,

On Tuesday October 21 2008 08:10, you wrote to me:

 MV>> South Africa during the reign of apartheid was not so nice. Not for
 MV>> the non-whites anyway. But is sure was not socialist.

 RB> No, but where is/was there a "nice" socialist country?

Don't put socialism in the same basket as communism. It is not the same.

 RB> The only attempt ever made by was Alexander Dubcek, and he was deposed
 RB> by the forces of his "brother socialists".

I have been there before and after Dubcek was replaced by Husak by the Russian
right of might. Even after the "Prague Spring" was buried, it still was not so
bad there. daily life went on as before....

 RB> And how about the China of today? Better for the masses than even for
 RB> the blacks in RSA back in the "bad old days"?

Definitely better I'd say. China's economy is booming despite the present
financial crisis and everyone in China can benefit from it. Contrary to the
blacks in the South African gettos.

 RB>  And how about the blacks there now?

Better than back then but not by far as good as the white sback then.

 RB> Like democracy, capitalism is a lousy system, but it's the best we've
 RB> got.

I disagree and i would have thought that the present financial crisis would be
a an eye opener for everyone who still believes that a greed driven economy
should be the shining example for everyone. Open your eyes Bob and see where it
gets us if everyone is allowed to gather unlimited wealth at the cost of
others.

No, capitalism certainly is not the best we've got.

 MV>> So you went to the wrong places. I still say that it was not so
 MV>> bad. Generally...

 RB> I went to the places the normal people went, not to those where
 RB> visiting bigwigs were taken or hosted. If you call those the "wrong"
 RB> places, that already says a lot about attitudes.

You judge a whole system by what you saw in *one* country. Rejecting socialism
because of what you saw in the DDR is the same as rejecting its opposite
because of what is happening now in Zimbabwe. Or what happened in Uganda in the
seventees. A ruthless dictator runing the economy by robbing the country of its
resources, all for his own benefit.

I think your error is mixing up socialism - or communism - with dictatorship.
Unfortunately they often go together, but the problems you mention are due to
those countries being dictatorships rather then they being socialist or
communist.

As for a nice socialist country: how about Sweden in the 60ties? Or The
Netherlands under the reign of Den Uyl in the sixties and seventees? That
wasn't so bad either...

 MV>> I think Russia was not so bad either. Our queen's youngest sister
 MV>> went to live in Moscow in the seventees....

 RB> In the Royal Moskva Hotel? In a luxury suite with plenty of servents?
 RB> Damn sure not under the conditions of an average Russian.

My understanding is that she lived in an appartment. Indeed not much different
from countless other people living in Moscow.

Cheers, Michiel

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