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Thread: Cultural Marxism (Political Correctness) ft. Ron Paul, G Edward Griffin, Pat Buchanan

  1. #121
    Quote Originally Posted by ChaosControl View Post
    For example, most on here reject communism. I reject it currently as well. But how many of us are willing to entertain the idea of changing their view on it, as in would they be willing to listen to arguments in favor of it and consider these arguments instead of rejecting the arguments from the beginning merely because they are pro-communist arguments?
    The only reason anyone would be open to arguments in favor of communism is if they don't have a clear understanding of what it is and the damage it has done. Communism always evolves into dictatorships and establishes fear in its people.
    China, Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, and North Korea all come to mind.
    Diversity finds unity in the message of freedom.

    Dilige et quod vis fac. ~ Saint Augustine

    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    Above all I think everyone needs to understand that neither the Bundys nor Finicum were militia or had prior military training. They were, first and foremost, Ranchers who had about all the shit they could take.
    Quote Originally Posted by HOLLYWOOD View Post
    If anything, this situation has proved the government is nothing but a dictatorship backed by deadly force... no different than the dictatorships in the banana republics, just more polished and cleverly propagandized.
    "I'll believe in good cops when they start turning bad cops in."

    Quote Originally Posted by tod evans View Post
    In a free society there will be bigotry, and racism, and sexism and religious disputes and, and, and.......
    I don't want to live in a cookie cutter, federally mandated society.
    Give me messy freedom every time!



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  3. #122
    Quote Originally Posted by Deborah K View Post
    The only reason anyone would be open to arguments in favor of communism is if they don't have a clear understanding of what it is and the damage it has done. Communism always evolves into dictatorships and establishes fear in its people.
    China, Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, and North Korea all come to mind.
    Ditto Kiddo

  4. #123
    Quote Originally Posted by Deborah K View Post
    The only reason anyone would be open to arguments in favor of communism is if they don't have a clear understanding of what it is and the damage it has done. Communism always evolves into dictatorships and establishes fear in its people.
    China, Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, and North Korea all come to mind.
    What about socialism in Sweden, Denmark and Norway. What do you attribute to their success? The people in Denmark are the happiest people in the world.
    "..and on Earth anguish of nations, not knowing the way out...while men become faint out of fear and expectation of the things coming upon the inhabited Earth." -- Jesus of Nazareth

  5. #124
    Quote Originally Posted by YumYum View Post
    What about socialism in Sweden, Denmark and Norway. What do you attribute to their success? The people in Denmark are the happiest people in the world.
    Socialism is not communism. Communism and Socialism are for reform through government regulation, as well as government expansion and control over production, but there are some specific differences. Communist governments want control of all means of production, and all resources. Socialist governments leave some control in the private sector but they have control over redistribution of wealth.
    Diversity finds unity in the message of freedom.

    Dilige et quod vis fac. ~ Saint Augustine

    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    Above all I think everyone needs to understand that neither the Bundys nor Finicum were militia or had prior military training. They were, first and foremost, Ranchers who had about all the shit they could take.
    Quote Originally Posted by HOLLYWOOD View Post
    If anything, this situation has proved the government is nothing but a dictatorship backed by deadly force... no different than the dictatorships in the banana republics, just more polished and cleverly propagandized.
    "I'll believe in good cops when they start turning bad cops in."

    Quote Originally Posted by tod evans View Post
    In a free society there will be bigotry, and racism, and sexism and religious disputes and, and, and.......
    I don't want to live in a cookie cutter, federally mandated society.
    Give me messy freedom every time!

  6. #125
    In either case you are dealing with collectivism in favor of individualism.
    Diversity finds unity in the message of freedom.

    Dilige et quod vis fac. ~ Saint Augustine

    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    Above all I think everyone needs to understand that neither the Bundys nor Finicum were militia or had prior military training. They were, first and foremost, Ranchers who had about all the shit they could take.
    Quote Originally Posted by HOLLYWOOD View Post
    If anything, this situation has proved the government is nothing but a dictatorship backed by deadly force... no different than the dictatorships in the banana republics, just more polished and cleverly propagandized.
    "I'll believe in good cops when they start turning bad cops in."

    Quote Originally Posted by tod evans View Post
    In a free society there will be bigotry, and racism, and sexism and religious disputes and, and, and.......
    I don't want to live in a cookie cutter, federally mandated society.
    Give me messy freedom every time!

  7. #126
    Quote Originally Posted by YumYum View Post
    What about socialism in Sweden, Denmark and Norway. What do you attribute to their success? The people in Denmark are the happiest people in the world.
    Ha ha better check what Norwegians say about their health care. "Make your will be fore you enter the hospital."
    As for taxes in those countries all I can say is wow. You can have socialism.

  8. #127
    Quote Originally Posted by YumYum View Post
    What about socialism in Sweden, Denmark and Norway. What do you attribute to their success? The people in Denmark are the happiest people in the world.
    Checkout the Mises.org forums for Denmark. Here's one thread about Scandinavian countries in general:
    http://mises.org/Community/forums/t/5616.aspx

    I know there is a huge thread about Sweden, but I can't seem to find it.

  9. #128
    Quote Originally Posted by LibertyEagle View Post
    It is a representation of the fruit of one's labor.



    That, and the 2nd Amendment.



    You must be kidding. I don't understand how you could be a member here so long and not understand how important private property is to individual liberty.

    If you don't hold certain principles dear and understand from whence they came, you are open to be led by the nose almost anywhere.
    I understand private property and its importance and I support private property. In practice I agree with probably 95% of Ron Paul's positions if not 99%. I'm just open to different possibilities is all.



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  11. #129
    Quote Originally Posted by ChaosControl View Post
    I understand private property and its importance and I support private property. In practice I agree with probably 95% of Ron Paul's positions if not 99%. I'm just open to different possibilities is all.
    Ok. I guess I don't understand is all. If you understand the basis and history of the principles behind private property, free enterprise, etc., I don't see how you could be thinking what you are about Communism.

  12. #130
    Quote Originally Posted by ChaosControl View Post
    For example, most on here reject communism. I reject it currently as well. But how many of us are willing to entertain the idea of changing their view on it, as in would they be willing to listen to arguments in favor of it and consider these arguments instead of rejecting the arguments from the beginning merely because they are pro-communist arguments?
    I try to go into things with an open mind, but there comes a point on some subjects where the evidence is so overwhelming and the implications are so grave that revisiting them is out of the question. Why? An open mind is a double-edged sword. It is inherently more capable than a closed mind of gradual or radical inspiration, progress, and improvement, but it is also inherently more vulnerable to tragically wrong and radically dangerous ideas as well.

    Traditionally, the average American believes that the ideas of communism and socialism are so insane and "un-American" on their face that "common sense" automatically eliminates them from consideration. Relying on conventional wisdom is pretty much the opposite thought pattern from critical thinking, which is why excessive deference to tradition is anti-intellectual at its core. "Common sense" and conventional wisdom can lead to intellectual and cultural stagnation, because they are such conservative forces that preserve tradition and the status quo at the expense of rapid progress and improvement.

    Despite its suffocating conservatism, conventional wisdom is a heuristic that has served humanity well in making reasonable decisions without requiring full-blown analysis. In contrast, critical thinking can lead to new, better, and improved conclusions...but it can also lead to horribly, horribly wrong conclusions. When it comes to complex subjects, not everyone is equally capable of rigorously analyzing an idea and its implications carefully and thoroughly enough to come to the right conclusion. Some people are fantastic critical thinkers, and other people only think they are. Others are better at recognizing their limitations than the latter group and simply stick with what they know.

    Getting to the point here, the important thing to remember is that socialists and communists are not complete idiots. The ideas were discovered and fleshed out by extremely brilliant people, and they came up with deep intellectual arguments in support of them. Ordinary Americans generally believe that communism is a horrible idea, and they can cite some pretty solid reasons why, but most would be completely obliterated in a debate with any of those much smarter thinkers. In the end, their sophisticated arguments swayed a lot of very smart people, people smarter than you or me or the vast majority of people...and then these very intelligent people led over a hundred million other people to their dooms.

    Ordinary Americans may have good reasons for opposing communism and thinking it's a stupid idea, but it took Ludwig von Mises, a total genius, to rigorously analyze it and prove its inevitable failure through economics. He tore communism's intellectual foundation to shreds and refuted it once and for all, even though many do not realize this or are too arrogant to accept it.

    Now, think about this: Communism is perhaps the worst idea ever imagined by anyone in all of human history, but it took Mises, a total genius, to come along and thoroughly refute it. You most likely could not have done that, and I most likely could not have done that. The lesson here is that critical thinking and open-mindedness are important and wonderful things, but they can also be very dangerous and terrible things. Smarter people than you and I have been led to horribly wrong, horribly dangerous conclusions, to the peril of all. Every single one of us needs to be cautious of this, especially when our critical thinking leads us to radically different ideas than what conventional wisdom would suggest. Especially in those cases, we need to carefully think out all the implications of our positions, the structure of the institutions they support, their corner cases, and the interactions of those institutions with the good and bad sides of human nature. We need to take our ideas to their logical conclusions.

    Personally, I've determined never, ever to revisit communism, any form of totalitarianism, or Marxism in general with an "open mind." It's simply too dangerous. [This will never happen anyway for reasons of principle though: I believe utilitarianism is self-defeating in practice and leads to intractable levels of conflict, and my largely deontological moral principles impede the kind of control-freak arrogance that enables communist thought...but the moral aspect is beside the point.] I'll analyze those ideas and form logical arguments against them to the best of my capabilities, sure. However, if my thought process ever somehow takes me to the point where I'd change my mind and consider supporting them, I will conclude that I must have made a mistake in my logic and defer to Mises and others on the matter. In this particular case, the souls of over a hundred million dead people remind me that keeping an open mind is not always worth the risk.
    Last edited by Mini-Me; 08-20-2010 at 08:47 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by President John F. Kennedy
    And we must face the fact that the United States is neither omnipotent nor omniscient. That we are only 6% of the world's population, and that we cannot impose our will upon the other 94% of mankind. That we cannot right every wrong or reverse each adversity, and that therefore there cannot be an American solution to every world problem.
    I need an education in US history, from the ground up. Can you help point me to a comprehensive, unbiased, scholarly resource?

  13. #131
    Quote Originally Posted by YumYum View Post
    What about socialism in Sweden, Denmark and Norway. What do you attribute to their success? The people in Denmark are the happiest people in the world.
    Norway is the Saudi Arabia of Scandinavia, so while they have money, socialism is a great thing. I'm sure there were many happy slaves who did what they were told and accepted their position in life.
    --------------------------------------------
    First step to ending the income tax: end payroll tax withholding.
    Require each American to write a check to their state and federal governments every month.

  14. #132
    Quote Originally Posted by YumYum View Post
    What about socialism in Sweden

    Swedish Welfare


    Nima Sanandaji | The New American
    02 September 2008


    Sweden’s strong cultural values have temporarily propped up its celebrated welfare state, but this support is growing steadily weaker due to the nation’s socialist policies.

    Sweden is a prime example demonstrating that tax-and-spend welfare policies can work, correct? One hears enough about Sweden's near-miraculous feat of succeeding despite its high taxes and generous welfare benefits that one seldom questions whether Sweden's experiment in socialism has actually succeeded, but wonders instead how it has done so. The answer is that it has not succeeded - in the long term. Nor was it even possible to do so, since economic principles are inviolate.

    Sweden is now having to face coming to grips with "the long term." The reason that the welfare state could work marginally well in the short term but not the long term is manifold, but one important reason is the long-term effect economic policies have on people's values. Norms associated with work and responsibility may support welfare states for a time, but those norms are eventually eroded by the welfare states they prop up, leading to the states' downfall. Sweden, often viewed as a role model for welfare societies, offers a good example of this phenomenon.

    Swedish Economic History

    Foreign intellectuals often view Sweden as a nation where high taxes and generous government handouts have been successfully instituted and maintained in a growing economy. This is, however, built upon a biased view of Swedish economic history. During the end of the 19th century, the Swedish economy was transformed through a series of free-market reforms that enabled the nation to experience rapid growth. The once-impoverished country had become one of the most affluent in the world by the middle of the 20th century.

    Although the Social Democratic (socialist) Party had gained influence in Sweden, for a long time policymakers relied on growth- and work-friendly policies. In the '50s, for example, Sweden still had lower taxes than the United States. It was not until the '60s that the Social Democrats radicalized and attempted to shift the Swedish economy toward socialism. Then, as could be expected, government interference in the economy, high taxes, and generous handouts slowly, but surely, reduced the competitiveness of the nation's economy. Sweden would go from being one of the richest nations in the world to a mediocre industrialized country in terms of wealth. The country became poorer as a result of the tax-and-spend policies, but it did not face immediate catastrophe. The competitiveness and relative wealth of the country remained fairly strong until a welfare mentality had time to take hold of the Swedes.

    How did the change to socialism also change the Swedish people and their value systems? At the end of the 19th century, Sweden was a nation dominated by small farmers who, contrary to many other countries at the time, often owned their own property. Swedes were quite poor, yet had very strong, justice-centered principles and work-related norms reflecting hard work as a value. Society was dominated by a strong Protestant work ethic.

    This ethic, linked to their deeply held religious beliefs, motivated generations of Swedes to work hard to support themselves and their families and those truly in need. The work ethic was ingrained in the culture, and Swedes willingly accepted hard work as one's role in society.

    When the Swedish welfare state slowly started to rise in the first half of the 20th century and then grow rapidly during the second half, socialism did not compromise the fabric of society as much as in other countries (though compromise it did) - and Sweden became famous as a system where socialism and capitalism worked together fairly well. Sweden benefited from the fact that it had a tradition of effective public service (less bureaucracy than other nations) and, most significantly, had citizens who were imprinted with strong norms not to cheat the system.

    As Professor Assar Lindbeck, perhaps the most important Swedish economist, has written, traditional Swedish welfare could rely on a society where individuals shared strong values relating to not overusing the generous welfare system. Welfare programs, however, created a situation much different from what had existed in previous generations. Suddenly, it became quite possible to live a comfortable life relying on government handouts, or even surpass one's living standard by supplementing employment with the combination of handouts and black-market work. And so slowly, over the coming generations, Swedes have adopted their norms to the circumstances.

    Societal Norms

    The researcher Friedrich Heinemann has recently shown that throughout the world people's norms - their acceptance of personal responsibility, their work ethic, and their honesty - have deteriorated as a consequence of welfare policies. He examined global surveys of values, where people around the world were asked if it can ever be right to use welfare services that one is not entitled to (amongst other questions). The number of respondents who believe that it might be right to abuse welfare systems has increased in many nations during the past decades, particularly in societies with excessive welfare policies.

    In the case of Sweden, Heinemann's research shows that the population still had strong norms during the '80s. In a survey conducted between 1981-84, 82 percent of Swedes polled responded that it could never be right to take advantage of public services one is not legally entitled to. However, when the survey was repeated in 1999-2004, only 55 percent of those polled held the same view. According to this measuring stick (not abusing public systems), Sweden had gone from possessing one of the strongest societal norms to possessing the one of the weakest.

    There are, of course, many other signs of the deteriorating norms in the Swedish system. In the '70s, some 10 percent of the adult population was not working for one reason or the other, relying instead on taxpayers for their living. Today, this figure has doubled. Many Swedes are being supported by social security, sick leave, etc. An astonishing number of Swedes are on sick leave, given that we are talking of one of the healthiest people on the planet. This increase in out-of-work people is readily explained by the new norms that arose hand in hand with the welfare state. A survey in 2002 showed that 62 percent of Swedes believe that it might be acceptable to report to sick leave even though one is not too sick to work. This attitude is in particular shared with the young, whilst older Swedes to a larger degree are clinging to the strong norms of the past.

    In Sweden today, socialism remains strong, and even after some very-much-needed tax cuts were implemented both by center-left and center-right governments, average Swedes pay close to three-fifths of their incomes in taxes. Why are such high taxes accepted? One answer is that the taxes and the benefits are much more evenly distributed in Sweden compared to the United States. In Sweden, one pays high taxes even if one's income is low, and one receives quite a lot of handouts even if one's income is relatively high. Some of the money you earn goes to government bureaucracy and redistribution, but some is transferred back to you. The situation is clearly different from the United States where many low-income Americans do not pay any significant amounts in taxes whilst more successful individuals are taxed heavily.

    But clearly the social democratic system doesn't really work well nowadays. People are increasingly going around the system, for example paying for private healthcare in foreign countries since the accessibility to Swedish public healthcare is low (although the quality is good). Sweden is a complex country. Many free-market reforms have taken place during the past few decades to salvage the social democratic system, including school vouchers and partially privatized social security. Taxes have been cut, but remain high as it proves much more difficult reducing than expanding government once people have become dependent on public spending.

    In the years to come, Sweden - and the rest of the European welfare systems - must face the challenge of dealing with people's adaptation to welfare systems. For the lesson from history is that government-provided welfare can only function when supported by very strong norms relating to work and responsibility - and even then only until the system subverts the norms supporting it. Over time, more and more people will choose government assistance as an alternative to work, hide their income from the state, and overuse generous public systems. When the cultural norms are strong and are firmly rooted in religious principles, it takes time, generations in fact, until people change their values to adjust to new economic circumstances. But when it happens, it is difficult to go back and reverse the norms.

    Heinemann's research is worthwhile reading not only for policymakers in European welfare nations, but also in the United States, where work is still highly valued, but where political elites are constantly calling for national healthcare and (in general) expansion of the welfare state.


    Nima Sanandaji is the president of the Swedish free-market think-tank Captus.


    SOURCE:
    http://www.thenewamerican.com/index....wedish-welfare
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    Inspired by US Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, this site is dedicated to facilitating grassroots initiatives that aim to restore a sovereign limited constitutional Republic based on the rule of law, states' rights and individual rights. We seek to enshrine the original intent of our Founders to foster respect for private property, seek justice, provide opportunity, and to secure individual liberty for ourselves and our posterity.

  15. #133
    Socialism can last longer in homogeneous populations, but soon destroys itself because with the socialism always comes the destruction of the people and culture. It's like a wound that will bleed and start festering until the host dies.

  16. #134
    Quote Originally Posted by clarity View Post
    Socialism can last longer in homogeneous populations, but soon destroys itself because with the socialism always comes the destruction of the people and culture. It's like a wound that will bleed and start festering until the host dies.
    Interesting analogy. When you think the "host" will die in the case of American socialism?
    Quote Originally Posted by Torchbearer
    what works can never be discussed online. there is only one language the government understands, and until the people start speaking it by the magazine full... things will remain the same.
    Hear/buy my music here "government is the enemy of liberty"-RP Support me on Patreon here Ephesians 6:12

  17. #135
    More pieces to the puzzle:

    Obama Admin Uses Socialist to Promote Illegals Pay Program

    Girl Scouts exposed: Lessons in lesbianism
    Communists, radical feminists cited as role models for troops

    http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=259208
    ----

    Ron Paul Forum's Mission Statement:

    Inspired by US Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, this site is dedicated to facilitating grassroots initiatives that aim to restore a sovereign limited constitutional Republic based on the rule of law, states' rights and individual rights. We seek to enshrine the original intent of our Founders to foster respect for private property, seek justice, provide opportunity, and to secure individual liberty for ourselves and our posterity.

  18. #136



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