Text 22379, 109 rader
Skriven 2008-10-22 10:22:22 av Robert Bashe (2:2448/44)
  Kommentar till text 22348 av Michiel van der Vlist (2:280/5555)
Ärende: Preferential treatment
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Michiel van der Vlist wrote to Robert Bashe on Tuesday October 21 2008 at
14:17:

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

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

You're trying to use book definitions to change the realities.

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

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

How yould you know? Were you visiting a private person and living in a private
house?

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"?

MV> Definitely better I'd say. China's economy is booming despite the
MV> present financial crisis and everyone in China can benefit from it.

Oh, that's the reason there are protests by peasants whose land has been
appropriated without or with inadequate payment, and why two old ladies who
took the claims of "freedom of demonstration" during the Olympics in a Peking
park seriously were sent to a "re-education" camp for two years.

I wrote "better for the masses", not "better for the lucky few".

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

MV> I disagree and i would have thought that the present financial crisis
MV> would be a an eye opener for everyone who still believes that a greed
MV> driven economy should be the shining example for everyone.

Since when was that ever true? But since when was it ever true that human
beings are altruistic, selfless and uninterested in personal gain? If that were
true, true communism would be the main government form on this planet.

MV> Open your eyes Bob and see where it gets us if everyone is allowed to
MV> gather unlimited wealth at the cost of others.

You talk like the people who rail at the bankers for their "greed",
conveniently forgetting that the "poor, helpless depositors" were equally
looking for the highest return on their money, and that a high return
automatically means a higher risk. So who was "greedy"? Try "everybody".
Looking for scapegoats at this stage is not only futile, but downright
hypocritical.

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

MV> You judge a whole system by what you saw in *one* country.

I was in the DDR, Czechoslovakia, Roumania, Hungary and several times in
Yugoslavia, although the last was of course not comparable. All of that in the
late 60s and mid 70s. So don't get up on your high horse and tell me I don't
know what I'm talking about.

MV> I think your error is mixing up socialism - or communism - with
MV> dictatorship.

And yours in assuming a top-down, government-run society can have any modicum
of freedom. Of course it's easier to put everyone in jail and dictate what they
can and can't do, but I personally don't want to live in such a society.

MV> As for a nice socialist country: how about Sweden in the 60ties?

Where the taxes were so high that many of the most productive people - I
remember Ingmar Bergman - left the country. The situation got so bad that even
the socialists later realized what they had done and reduced the tax levels to
a halfway acceptable level. That even so is one of the highest in Europe?

MV> Or The Netherlands under the reign of Den Uyl in the sixties and
MV> seventees? That wasn't so bad either...

Presumably you're talking about something like the so-called "social market
economy" we theoretically have in Germany. The problem is the balance. Get too
social and the system goes bankrupt. Put the tax rates too high and the best
people move out. At the moment, we have both of these disadvantages, and nobody
seems to know how to change the situation. Naturally, any solid financing is
categorically refused and only taxes on labor bear the burden.

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.

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

Other oligarchs, you mean. No way she lived in a 15 square-meter apartment on
the third floor of an apartment building with no elevator and inadequate
heating, like so many Russians.

Cheers, Bob

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