Tag: socialism

Failure and the Five-Day Weekend

Post author By CS Admin
Post date May 6, 2016
3 Comments on Failure and the Five-Day Weekend

Venezuela, socialism, failure, work day, illustration

Socialists often brag how their activism — through unions — gave the modern world its five-day workweek. One could spend a book picking at this boast, but no need: it’s overshadowed by the latest.

A socialist country has just reduced the workweek to two days! Hooray for socialism!

Or, no cheers at all. For this epochal move occurred in Venezuela, the “world’s worst performing economy,” with an inflation rate soaring to 720 percent and an absence of food, toilet paper, and … electricity: “President Nicolás Maduro will furlough the country’s public employees,” Nick Miroff writes in the Washington Post, “who account for a third of the labor force — for the bulk of the week, so they can sit through rolling blackouts at home rather than in the office.”

It’s only government employees who get the five-day weekend. And this is not a sign of socialist efficiency (heh heh), ushering in a Marxist utopia.

Another nation ruined by socialism and technocracy!

But not just any nation. Venezuela can boast one of the largest oil reserves in the world. If Norway and Alaska and desert sheiks can milk their underground deposits and distribute goodies to their people, why cannot Venezuelans manage it?

Because they extended socialist planning beyond a kleptocratic sharing scheme. Experts had advised them decades ago to build the world’s largest hydroelectric dam, live off low- or no-priced electricity as well as oil sales. Today, oil goes cheap … and there’s a drought, too little water behind the dam.

Now Venezuelans are trying to burn oil to generate electricity — mostly without success. Socialism has it all — rampant corruption and catastrophic inefficiency.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags government failure, socialism, unions, Venezuela, Venezuelans

general freedom ideological culture meme moral hazard nannyism too much government U.S. Constitution

Dear Bernie: Here’s How Rights Work…

Post author By CS Admin
Post date March 30, 2016
1 Comment on Dear Bernie: Here’s How Rights Work…

Dear Bernie, rights, violation, violates, how rights work, meme, Common Sense

A new “right” that violates other fundamental rights, can’t be a right.

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Tags Bernie Sanders, health care, human rights, Individual rights, medical socialism, rights, socialism

folly general freedom ideological culture meme national politics & policies too much government

One-Party Socialism?

Bernie Sanders, Democratic Socialism, Che, democracy, meme, illustration, Common Sense

As the President of the United States noodles around Cuba, opening up relations and trade for the first time in half a century, one obvious obstacle to progress sticks out: Fidel Castro is still alive, and his brother, Raoul, still runs a one-party state.

It is worth reminding Americans how desperately socialism in Cuba requires repressive one-party rule. Sometimes folks forget. As Bernie Sanders pushes a “democratic socialism,” we should wonder where he and his Sandernistas stand on Cuba’s brand of socialism, i.e. without the democratic part.

Months ago, an old 1985 video surfaced of Bernie Sanders, then mayor of Burlington, Vermont, back from trips to Nicaragua and Cuba. Frankly, I agreed with his opposition to U.S. intervention in Central America. But Bernie also praised the Cuban government, asserting that Cubans were not “against Fidel Castro” because “he educated their kids, gave their kids health care, totally transformed society.”

He did not mention what Fidel didn’t give, indeed, would not allow: opportunity, progress, autonomy, freedom, democracy … the list is long.

Cubans who speak out are arrested, imprisoned.

Bernie did add: “Not to say Fidel Castro and Cuba are perfect.” But failed to make any mention of the total political repression of democratic activity.

The necessity of violence to establish socialism should be obvious. Even Bernie’s so-called “non-violent” supporters engage in raucous, invasive protests against Trump, and litter Twitter with indecent talk of assassinating the Republican front-runner.

What would they do with official power?

Are they committed to democracy as a process, really? Or to their programs alone?

Programs that rely upon mass expropriation and strong-arming governance. No matter what Sanders says about “love.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags Bernie Sanders, Cuba, Democratic Socialism, socialism

free trade & free markets general freedom ideological culture moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies too much government

Socialist Stasis, Disturbed

Post author By CS Admin
Post date March 21, 2016
3 Comments on Socialist Stasis, Disturbed

Cuba, stasis, Obama, visit, illustration

As the President of the United States treads ground previously trod by such a personage nearly ninety years ago — Calvin Coolidge was the last U. S. Commander in Chief to make the trip to Cuba — we are understandably inundated with coverage.

Obama’s Cuba trip is Big News.

We see that Cuba is backwards — it is socialist, after all, so no surprise there — but slowly opening up to American travel and trade. The nation’s voluntary sector squirms under the omnipresent, oppressive feet of its regulators.

What we see now is the result of socialist repression. Cuba shows, perhaps, socialism’s best-case-scenario result, stasis. The island dystopia is in many ways a time capsule. Some of its current charm is that stuck-in-timed-ness.

But there is also endemic hopelessness in the country. The people are held back. Infantilized. Ruled.

And there is no disputing the fact that this is all the result of an excess of socialism. As I have argued before, the old standby, the Blame the US Embargo ploy, is one that socialists wield with devastating results — to their own ideology. Socialism is the suppression of free trade; pure socialism abolishes all trade, along with all private property. Blaming an embargo shows how important private property and capitalism itself are to socialism’s few successes.

Barack Obama is, right now, demonstrating the best case against socialists in his own party, by opening up Cuba to the wonderfully corrosive processes of the market.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags Cuba, freedom, Havana, Obama, socialism

Accountability general freedom ideological culture moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies responsibility

Impatience as a Political Impulse

Post author By CS Admin
Post date March 8, 2016
2 Comments on Impatience as a Political Impulse

impatience, frustration, politics, radicals, balance, caution

It is not demonization to recognize a besetting sin.

Yesterday, I warned against demonization, though admittedly, I have “picked on” both Trump and Bernie here at Common Sense and in this site’s new Steal This Meme section. In my defense, to refrain from seeing only the worst in one side or the other (or both) is not to resist telling the truth about the characteristic worst aspects, right or left.

Neither the Donald nor the Bern are good party men. Trump has never been close to the GOP; Sanders has registered “independent” throughout his Senatorial career.

But Sanders is a self-proclaimed socialist, and his support is “from the left”; Trump is vague ideologically, but his characteristic blunt pronouncements seem “right-wingish” even if not obviously conservative.

Maybe this is all about frustration and impatience.

Socialism has long been associated with impatience at the “slow pace” of progress, as economist Yves Guyot made clear in The Tyranny of Socialism over a hundred years ago. The fact that, even in our bumbling age, all segments of society have gotten richer is not enough. More must be extracted from a few and given to the many. That is the Bern of it.

Trump’s supporters are obviously impatient with things “not getting done” in Washington, and upset that “we don’t win anymore.” But one reason things are hard to do, politically, is that limited government, a rule of law, and separation of powers makes it difficult. Cutting through the b.s. sometimes means destroying the bedrock of a free society.

That sort of “winning” would be a Pyrrhic victory.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags 2016 Presidential race, Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump, Presidential campaign 2016, separation of powers, socialism

folly general freedom ideological culture meme moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies Popular

Bernie’s Slippery Definition of Democratic Socialism

Post author By CS Admin
Post date February 23, 2016
No Comments on Bernie’s Slippery Definition of Democratic Socialism

Bernie Sanders has always given a comically slippery definition of democratic socialism. For years he simply called himself a socialist, but given the dismal and bloody history of that word, he’s modified his label (and has repeatedly modified its definition).

Bernie:

Socialism has failed in the past because it’s been hijacked by ruthless dictators… but the socialism I want is “democratic,” so the people would be in control and not a dictator!

Skeptic:

But Bernie… every socialist regime has defined itself as a “people’s movement.” Even today, socialist dictators come to power through democratic means… Venezuela is a modern example.

Bernie:

But I mean countries like Denmark and Sweden! They’ve figured out how to make it work! That’s the kind of socialism I want!

Skeptic:

But Bernie… After several decades of economic decline, the Scandinavian countries have found it necessary to liberalize their economies… not make them more socialistic. Even the Prime Minister of Denmark says that his country is not socialist. He insists that Denmark is a market economy.

Bernie:

Well I don’t really mean Scandinavia. I mean something like FDR’s New Deal. Don’t you like Social Security and Medicare? Don’t you like government service?

Skeptic:

But Bernie, Social Security and Medicare are insolvent and teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. Every government service I can think of is plagued with inefficiency and corruption. Our welfare system has a decades long history of trapping people in poverty. Why would you want more of that?

Bernie:

Well, What I really mean is Scandinavian democratic socialism! They’ve figured out how to make it all work!

Skeptic:

But Bernie…
and round and round and round…

Of course, his core socialist beliefs have remained pretty consistent: capitalism must be opposed, wealth must be redistributed and the state must have more power to enforce these goals.

But he can’t simply say that out loud… because genuine socialism has some very serious problems…

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