The Forgotten Man

[stansd]

“CA Renter, I served with libertarians. I know libertarians. Libertarians are friends of mine, and I am a libertarian. CA Renter, you’re no libertarian.”

A socialist, a capitalist and a communist agreed to meet. The socialist was late. ‘Excuse me for being late, I was standing in a queue for sausages.’

‘And what is a queue?’ the capitalist asked.

‘And what is a sausage?’ the communist asked.

Stan

[stansd]

“CA Renter, I served with libertarians. I know libertarians. Libertarians are friends of mine, and I am a libertarian. CA Renter, you’re no libertarian.”

A socialist, a capitalist and a communist agreed to meet. The socialist was late. ‘Excuse me for being late, I was standing in a queue for sausages.’

‘And what is a queue?’ the capitalist asked.

‘And what is a sausage?’ the communist asked.

Stan

[stansd]

“CA Renter, I served with libertarians. I know libertarians. Libertarians are friends of mine, and I am a libertarian. CA Renter, you’re no libertarian.”

A socialist, a capitalist and a communist agreed to meet. The socialist was late. ‘Excuse me for being late, I was standing in a queue for sausages.’

‘And what is a queue?’ the capitalist asked.

‘And what is a sausage?’ the communist asked.

Stan

[CA renter]

Ack! I had just written a long post with lots of statistics and comments and lost the whole thing while going back and forth between sites.

Anyway, if Darwinian capitalism is so successful, why aren’t all we all capitalists?

Your list above proves exactly my point…basically, all the successful countries are socialist (even if they don’t officially call themselves that, they have socialized medicine, fairly high taxes, public schools, government-controlled infrastructure, and social programs designed to help the poor, etc.).

I still want to see ONE example of a purely capitalist nation (no govt infrastructure, no taxes, no socialized healthcare or social services, etc.) that outperforms the socialist nations. If it is so successful, then it should be relatively easy to find just ONE example…maybe you can find one in Africa, as it would be difficult to collect taxes in many of those countries, and they often have a barter economy…the ULTIMATE capitalists!!!

Here is the U.N. site. Feel free to peruse all indices of well-being, including economic, health care, longevity, literacy, poverty, crime, etc. See if you can detect any patterns…

I’ll start it off with GDP per capita:

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_gdp_percap-economy-gdp-per-capita

[CA renter]

Ack! I had just written a long post with lots of statistics and comments and lost the whole thing while going back and forth between sites.

Anyway, if Darwinian capitalism is so successful, why aren’t all we all capitalists?

Your list above proves exactly my point…basically, all the successful countries are socialist (even if they don’t officially call themselves that, they have socialized medicine, fairly high taxes, public schools, government-controlled infrastructure, and social programs designed to help the poor, etc.).

I still want to see ONE example of a purely capitalist nation (no govt infrastructure, no taxes, no socialized healthcare or social services, etc.) that outperforms the socialist nations. If it is so successful, then it should be relatively easy to find just ONE example…maybe you can find one in Africa, as it would be difficult to collect taxes in many of those countries, and they often have a barter economy…the ULTIMATE capitalists!!!

Here is the U.N. site. Feel free to peruse all indices of well-being, including economic, health care, longevity, literacy, poverty, crime, etc. See if you can detect any patterns…

I’ll start it off with GDP per capita:

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_gdp_percap-economy-gdp-per-capita

[CA renter]

Ack! I had just written a long post with lots of statistics and comments and lost the whole thing while going back and forth between sites.

Anyway, if Darwinian capitalism is so successful, why aren’t all we all capitalists?

Your list above proves exactly my point…basically, all the successful countries are socialist (even if they don’t officially call themselves that, they have socialized medicine, fairly high taxes, public schools, government-controlled infrastructure, and social programs designed to help the poor, etc.).

I still want to see ONE example of a purely capitalist nation (no govt infrastructure, no taxes, no socialized healthcare or social services, etc.) that outperforms the socialist nations. If it is so successful, then it should be relatively easy to find just ONE example…maybe you can find one in Africa, as it would be difficult to collect taxes in many of those countries, and they often have a barter economy…the ULTIMATE capitalists!!!

Here is the U.N. site. Feel free to peruse all indices of well-being, including economic, health care, longevity, literacy, poverty, crime, etc. See if you can detect any patterns…

I’ll start it off with GDP per capita:

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_gdp_percap-economy-gdp-per-capita

[CA renter]

Ack! I had just written a long post with lots of statistics and comments and lost the whole thing while going back and forth between sites.

Anyway, if Darwinian capitalism is so successful, why aren’t all we all capitalists?

Your list above proves exactly my point…basically, all the successful countries are socialist (even if they don’t officially call themselves that, they have socialized medicine, fairly high taxes, public schools, government-controlled infrastructure, and social programs designed to help the poor, etc.).

I still want to see ONE example of a purely capitalist nation (no govt infrastructure, no taxes, no socialized healthcare or social services, etc.) that outperforms the socialist nations. If it is so successful, then it should be relatively easy to find just ONE example…maybe you can find one in Africa, as it would be difficult to collect taxes in many of those countries, and they often have a barter economy…the ULTIMATE capitalists!!!

Here is the U.N. site. Feel free to peruse all indices of well-being, including economic, health care, longevity, literacy, poverty, crime, etc. See if you can detect any patterns…

I’ll start it off with GDP per capita:

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_gdp_percap-economy-gdp-per-capita

[CA renter]

Ack! I had just written a long post with lots of statistics and comments and lost the whole thing while going back and forth between sites.

Anyway, if Darwinian capitalism is so successful, why aren’t all we all capitalists?

Your list above proves exactly my point…basically, all the successful countries are socialist (even if they don’t officially call themselves that, they have socialized medicine, fairly high taxes, public schools, government-controlled infrastructure, and social programs designed to help the poor, etc.).

I still want to see ONE example of a purely capitalist nation (no govt infrastructure, no taxes, no socialized healthcare or social services, etc.) that outperforms the socialist nations. If it is so successful, then it should be relatively easy to find just ONE example…maybe you can find one in Africa, as it would be difficult to collect taxes in many of those countries, and they often have a barter economy…the ULTIMATE capitalists!!!

Here is the U.N. site. Feel free to peruse all indices of well-being, including economic, health care, longevity, literacy, poverty, crime, etc. See if you can detect any patterns…

I’ll start it off with GDP per capita:

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_gdp_percap-economy-gdp-per-capita

[kewp]

I think the reality is that we are being forced to bail out a wide spectrum of greed that began with specuvestors applying for loans that they had little chance ever of paying back.

Whenever there is what I like to call a ‘conflict of competence’ between two parties, I put the lion’s share of the blame on the more experienced of the two.

The onus of responsibility has always been with the bankers. It’s their job to rate the risk of person applying for the loan; not vice-versa.

If the inverse were true, how come we aren’t allowed to choose our own interest rates?

[kewp]

I think the reality is that we are being forced to bail out a wide spectrum of greed that began with specuvestors applying for loans that they had little chance ever of paying back.

Whenever there is what I like to call a ‘conflict of competence’ between two parties, I put the lion’s share of the blame on the more experienced of the two.

The onus of responsibility has always been with the bankers. It’s their job to rate the risk of person applying for the loan; not vice-versa.

If the inverse were true, how come we aren’t allowed to choose our own interest rates?

[kewp]

I think the reality is that we are being forced to bail out a wide spectrum of greed that began with specuvestors applying for loans that they had little chance ever of paying back.

Whenever there is what I like to call a ‘conflict of competence’ between two parties, I put the lion’s share of the blame on the more experienced of the two.

The onus of responsibility has always been with the bankers. It’s their job to rate the risk of person applying for the loan; not vice-versa.

If the inverse were true, how come we aren’t allowed to choose our own interest rates?

[kewp]

I think the reality is that we are being forced to bail out a wide spectrum of greed that began with specuvestors applying for loans that they had little chance ever of paying back.

Whenever there is what I like to call a ‘conflict of competence’ between two parties, I put the lion’s share of the blame on the more experienced of the two.

The onus of responsibility has always been with the bankers. It’s their job to rate the risk of person applying for the loan; not vice-versa.

If the inverse were true, how come we aren’t allowed to choose our own interest rates?

[kewp]

I think the reality is that we are being forced to bail out a wide spectrum of greed that began with specuvestors applying for loans that they had little chance ever of paying back.

Whenever there is what I like to call a ‘conflict of competence’ between two parties, I put the lion’s share of the blame on the more experienced of the two.

The onus of responsibility has always been with the bankers. It’s their job to rate the risk of person applying for the loan; not vice-versa.

If the inverse were true, how come we aren’t allowed to choose our own interest rates?

[kewp]

How about this list? http://www.heritage.org/Index/countries.cfm

Ooh, The Heritage Foundation! No bias there of course…

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Heritage_Foundation

Why don’t we look at something more scientific, like the Human Development Index.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index

Let’s see the top 10 now:

1. Iceland 0.968 (▲ 1)
2. Norway 0.968 (▼ 1)
3. Australia 0.962 (▬)
4. Canada 0.961 (▲ 2)
5. Ireland 0.959 (▼ 1)
6. Sweden 0.956 (▼ 1)
7. Switzerland 0.955 (▲ 2)
8. Japan 0.953 (▼ 1)
9. Netherlands 0.953 (▲ 1)
10. France 0.952 (▲ 6)

The US is 12th United States 0.951 (▼ 4)

All of the top 10 countries are more ‘socialist’ than we are. Four of them even made the Heritage Foundations top ten for economic freedom!

They main difference us and the countries on this top ten list is that our socialism is primarily for the benefit of the wealthiest 5% of the population; whereas their socialism benefits everyone.

Now, assuming you aren’t in that top 5%, where would you want to live?

[kewp]

How about this list? http://www.heritage.org/Index/countries.cfm

Ooh, The Heritage Foundation! No bias there of course…

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Heritage_Foundation

Why don’t we look at something more scientific, like the Human Development Index.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index

Let’s see the top 10 now:

1. Iceland 0.968 (▲ 1)
2. Norway 0.968 (▼ 1)
3. Australia 0.962 (▬)
4. Canada 0.961 (▲ 2)
5. Ireland 0.959 (▼ 1)
6. Sweden 0.956 (▼ 1)
7. Switzerland 0.955 (▲ 2)
8. Japan 0.953 (▼ 1)
9. Netherlands 0.953 (▲ 1)
10. France 0.952 (▲ 6)

The US is 12th United States 0.951 (▼ 4)

All of the top 10 countries are more ‘socialist’ than we are. Four of them even made the Heritage Foundations top ten for economic freedom!

They main difference us and the countries on this top ten list is that our socialism is primarily for the benefit of the wealthiest 5% of the population; whereas their socialism benefits everyone.

Now, assuming you aren’t in that top 5%, where would you want to live?

[Author]

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