In Reply to: Anyone's who's seen a history book wiil pick capitalism posted by Andrew on June 27, 1996 at 12:39:38:
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> Let me restate my point a little more clearly so the intellectually challenged will be able to understand. Certainly free-market democratic capitalism is not perfect, but throughout history, all the alternatives have proven to be unspeakably violent and inevitably unstainable. And in deferance to your massacre analogy - atrocities occur in all countries - the scale of which is undeniably lower (by several orders of magnitude) in free market democracies than in communist or socialist systems. No-one with a pulse can deny that. You want to compare poverty levels? I'll put Harlem up against Calcutta any time.
> So to summarize: There is no perfect political or economic system (a reflection more of the imperfection of Human Beings than a lack of effort) Given the choices, however, anyone who has ever so much as seen a history book will pick free market democratic captialism without so much as a second thought. And, I can't believe I just wasted more valuable on-line time.That is simply not true. Actually if you pick up a history book, you will see that a democratic
socialist system is actaully the most successfull.
It is a system that does not allow the disgusting
polarisation of wealth that occres in North
America (no Bill Gates!), but at the same time encourages
dynamic people, and provides incentive to work,
and allows a consumer culture.North Americans have a lot to learn from the Asutralian system,
not that is socialist in any way anymore, but it
has managed to smooth over some of the
disgusting social ills that North Americans
have to put up with. One of the greatest fears
of the Australian community has always been
turning into a U.S.A!!!I'd debate a North American over their system any day!