Text 22417, 159 rader
Skriven 2008-10-23 10:44:03 av Michiel van der Vlist (2:280/5555)
     Kommentar till en text av Robert Bashe (2:2448/44)
Ärende: Preferential treatment
==============================
Hello Bob,

On Wednesday October 22 2008 10:22, you wrote to me:

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

 RB> How yould you know?

I told you: I was there. Before and after.

 RB>  Were you visiting a private person and living in a private house?

Yes and yes.

 RB> Oh, that's the reason there are protests by peasants whose land has
 RB> been appropriated without or with inadequate payment,

You can not makle an omelet without breaking eggs. Whenever the need of the one
must make way for the need of the many, one will have conflicts like this. The
Chinese want to move on. Compare that to tsituation here where one pig headed
farmer or any small group of dissidents can block a project for over a decade.

 RB> and why two old ladies who took the claims of "freedom of
 RB> demonstration" during the Olympics in a Peking park seriously were
 RB> sent to a "re-education" camp for two years.

When people break the law, they are sent to jail. China does not change its
laws just because you think hey are unjust. What did you say about the Blom
case again?

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

Two old ladies and a handfull of disgruntled farmer's do not the masses make. I
say again: it is better in China now than it was for the blacks in RSA during
apartheid.

 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.

 RB> Since when was that ever true?

Since about half a century when we have been flooded with the US economic model
that was presented as the best there is?

 RB> But since when was it ever true that human beings are altruistic,
 RB> selfless and uninterested in personal gain? If that were true,

Exactly, And that is why society needs rules to prevent people from letting
their self interest hurt others.

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

 RB> You talk like the people who rail at the bankers for their "greed",

YES! I am pointing fingers at the greedy bankers who took irresponsible risks
with ther peoples money and then walk away with millions in bonusses if it goes
wrong.

 RB> conveniently forgetting that the "poor, helpless depositors" were
 RB> equally looking for the highest return on their money, and that a high
 RB> return automatically means a higher risk.

That may go for some, but it certainly does not go for Joe the Plummer who put
his money in a savings account. In a bank that the "experts" assured him was
solid. A+ rating and al...

 RB>  So who was "greedy"? Try "everybody".

Maybe, but the bankers arte ths so called experts. They are the ones who should
have known better.

 RB> Looking for scapegoats at this stage is not only futile, but downright
 RB> hypocritical.

I disagree. Looking for scapegoats is not only just, but will help to prevent
that it ever happens again.

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

 RB> And yours in assuming a top-down, government-run society can have any
 RB> modicum of freedom.

Socialism is not the same as top down government...

 RB> Of course it's easier to put everyone in jail and dictate what they
 RB> can and can't do,

You can not run a scociety when evryone is in jail.

 RB>  but I personally don't want to live in such a society.

Neither do I, but that was not what we were discussing.

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

 RB> Where the taxes were so high that many of the most productive people -
 RB> I remember Ingmar Bergman - left the country.

Ah, here we go again. Taxes. One movie maker leaving for the greener pasture of
the neighbours does not make a country go bankrupt. And i would say that movie
makers from small countries that move to hollyowod are much more driven by the
urge to seek a wider  audiance than by the urge to flee taxes. Abba - or what
is left of it - is still living in Sweden.

 RB> The situation got so bad that even the socialists later realized what
 RB> they had done and reduced the tax levels to a halfway acceptable
 RB> level. That even so is one of the highest in Europe?

Yes, US American influence seeping in....

Anyway, if you think high taxes are a curse, China must be heaven for you.
Almost no taxes on fuel....

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

 RB> Presumably you're talking about something like the so-called "social
 RB> market economy" we theoretically have in Germany. The problem is the
 RB> balance. Get too social and the system goes bankrupt. Put the tax
 RB> rates too high and the best people move out.

So let them go. People who leave because of high taxes are never worth their
salaries anyway. They are the greedy moneygrabbing basterds who got us in this
financial mess in the frist place. Society does not need people who are only in
it for the money. What we need are engineers and craftsman that take pride in
their job. Scientists who are driven by the urge to understand how the universe
ticks. Teachers who can pass on the knowledge to the next generation. Artist
who are driven by the urge to make beautiful things. Society does not need
greedy moneygrabbbers who only think about themselves. Let them go.

 RB> At the moment, we have both of these disadvantages, and nobody seems
 RB> to know how to change the situation. Naturally, any solid financing is
 RB> categorically refused and only taxes on labor bear the burden.

Frankly, I do not understand why you stay there if you believe it is so bad...

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

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

You seem to be determined not to accept that someone can live a normal happy
life in Russia among perfectly normal people.

We will have to leave it at that I suppose.


Cheers, Michiel

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