Socialism/Communism - why is everyone else always doing it wrong?

Professor Moriarty

realitykeeper wrote: »

I think what pushes people over the edge is when the normal everyday creature comforts they are used to are no longer there. Not being able to buy coffee, cigarettes, heroin (in the case of addicts) or a sliced pan at any price will destabilize society. The next recession will involve trade stopping. Food, fuel and even water will no longer be easy to get.

In 1906, Alfred Henry Lewis stated that:

There are only nine meals between mankind and anarchy.

Still true today.

keane2097

El Tarangu wrote: »

I don't know if you have been to Vietnam lately, but they have begun to embrace the market economy, and things are great. GDP is going up and up - so much so that they are the biggest fans capitalism on the planet.

It's GDP going up and up coincides almost exactly with the removal of US trade embargo tbf.

OMD

BalcombeSt4 wrote: »

Yep, the heroin addicts in O'Connell St. falling asleep in their own vomit seem to be having a brilliant time of it.

Pretty lazy, equating people on the dole with heroin addicts.

.........

realitykeeper wrote: »

The next recession will involve trade stopping

The next recession where ? Ireland ? Or Zimbabwe ? Syria or Tim Buck Tu ?

Surely you mean a war or depression not a recession ?

Even in war trade doesn't stop. Even in the concentration camps trade between people didn't stop.

Depressions, Recessions and Booms are concurrently happening in different parts of the world as we speak depending on what geographic and geopolitical area you are talking about. They always have since time began.

If you're talking about Ireland, What are you basing this fanciful claim on ? Proper evidence please.

1. Where, and when, did it last happen in a recession before ?
2. When did it then in turn, cause what you claim it will and how did it ?
3. Why has it not happened since then ?

BalcombeSt4

OMD wrote: »

Pretty lazy, equating people on the dole with heroin addicts.

So you think the junkies you see around the city begging for money, sleeping on bridges and robbing people have jobs? Yeah okay. :rolleyes:

And obviously not everyone on the dole is addictted to drugs, but most drug addicts are on the dole. The first time I got addictted to any drugs was after I was made redundant & on the dole.

johnnyskeleton

What does what junkies do or do not have to do with socialism?

BalcombeSt4

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

American intervened because of the cold war and fear of a hostile regime close to its borders, not because they disagreed with modest land reforms and female sufferage. The US had no problem with land reforms in Zimbabwae and South Africa because they were not on its doorstep and the cold war was over.

I'm sorry but in what way was Guatemala - a country with a population smaller than Ireland, thats actually nowhere near The US borders, that had a Social Democratic regime which had no links to either China or the Soviet Union a threat? And if they some how were how was supporting a fascist coup & supporting a brutal regime that committed genocide against the native people of the county a good solution? you say they didn't disagree with land reforms or extending the vote but the first acts of the military junta was to over turn the reforms & to ban all political parties.
The reason the USA "intervened" was because the liberal reforms were a threat to the United Fruit Company.

I think Howard Hunt sums it up perfectly. "We wanted to have a terror campaign....like the Germans terrified the populations of Holland, Belgium & Poland"
Or Philip Agee "In the CIA we didn't give a hoot about democracy"
Or Sister Dianna "isn't history taught in the classroom about the role of the US government in human rights violations" Well clearly it does not seem to be, everyobody seems ignorant of it.

Chile is is even further away from the US borders. Venezuala introduced land reforms after the Cold War and the US supported a coup against Chavez.

You can look as close as Greece were popular movements were crushed.

If any other country tried to do what the US has done to dozens of countries without the mighty power of the US they would have been wiped of the map along time ago. Imagine if we tried to invade Britain because we thought Atlee introducing the NHS was too radical or we thought the Wilson regime had some ties to the Soviet Union, we would have righfully gotten a bloody nose for sticking it in were it doesn't belong.

realitykeeper

......... wrote: »

The next recession where ? Ireland ? Or Zimbabwe ? Syria or Tim Buck Tu ?

Surely you mean a war or depression not a recession ?

Even in war trade doesn't stop. Even in the concentration camps trade between people didn't stop.

Depressions, Recessions and Booms are concurrently happening in different parts of the world as we speak depending on what geographic and geopolitical area you are talking about. They always have since time began.

If you're talking about Ireland, What are you basing this fanciful claim on ? Proper evidence please.

1. Where, and when, did it last happen in a recession before ?
2. When did it then in turn, cause what you claim it will and how did it ?
3. Why has it not happened since then ?

A fairly run of the mill stock market crash will trigger something far more serious for obvious reasons. Here are those reasons: In response to a collapsing stock market, central banks will lower interest rates again but since they are already very low, even more QE will be required. Now consider the fact that investors the world over have been investing in the US dollar on the expectation of more interest rate hikes, the lowering of interest rates and new round of QE will result in the dumping of the US dollar. Naturally, if QE/low interest rates failed as a policy in the US, it is logical to assume it will fail elsewhere so the Euro, Sterling and Yen will all collapse and nobody is going to ship goods in return for computer digits in these currencies.

These currencies will collapse in value on the international markets and any new bonds that are issued in these currencies will require ridiculous rates of interest to attract investors. Also, in order to stabilize the currencies, the central banks will increase interest rates a lot.

KyussBeeshop

Sounds like the kind of gold bug "fiat currencies are about to collapse!" scaremongering, that you'd read on Zero Hedge or the like - it's just one step away from proclaiming, that we're about to return to commodity money i.e. the gold standard.

You make a lot of Big Predictions there, with gigantic leaps between one prediction and the next, which don't logically fit together in any way at all - and say it is all 'obvious'.

Wherever you're getting these ideas/predictions from, it's a very poor source of information. Big Predictions like that, require a lot of backing - and you'd have pretty much no backing for those predictions, particularly from looking back for historical examples - should give you an indication, that they're not very credible.

.........

realitykeeper wrote: »

A fairly run of the mill stock market crash will trigger something far more serious for obvious reasons. Here are those reasons: In response to a collapsing stock market, central banks will lower interest rates again but since they are already very low, even more QE will be required. Now consider the fact that investors the world over have been investing in the US dollar on the expectation of more interest rate hikes, the lowering of interest rates and new round of QE will result in the dumping of the US dollar. Naturally, if QE/low interest rates failed as a policy in the US, it is logical to assume it will fail elsewhere so the Euro, Sterling and Yen will all collapse and nobody is going to ship goods in return for computer digits in these currencies.

These currencies will collapse in value on the international markets and any new bonds that are issued in these currencies will require ridiculous rates of interest to attract investors. Also, in order to stabilize the currencies, the central banks will increase interest rates a lot.

Run of the mill stock market crashes happen regularly, most of your paragraph is full of non sequiturs, and you haven't answered the actual questions you were asked.

realitykeeper

......... wrote: »

Run of the mill stock market crashes happen regularly, most of your paragraph is full of non sequiturs, and you haven't answered the actual questions you were asked.

The next stock market crash cannot be contained like previous crashes. I am guessing it will happen around November, that I grant you is a non sequitur. As for the others, you will need to be a bit more specific.

realitykeeper

......... wrote: »

The next recession where ? Ireland ? Or Zimbabwe ? Syria or Tim Buck Tu ?

Surely you mean a war or depression not a recession ?

Even in war trade doesn't stop. Even in the concentration camps trade between people didn't stop.

Depressions, Recessions and Booms are concurrently happening in different parts of the world as we speak depending on what geographic and geopolitical area you are talking about. They always have since time began.

If you're talking about Ireland, What are you basing this fanciful claim on ? Proper evidence please.

1. Where, and when, did it last happen in a recession before ?
2. When did it then in turn, cause what you claim it will and how did it ?
3. Why has it not happened since then ?

As for where: The US, EU, UK and Japan mainly while China will have a less severe/less total recession. I use the word recession instead of depression to avoid being accused of exaggeration. It is true some semblance of trade will always prevail but international shipping will largely stop for the affected economies.

The recession/boom cycle does happen in capitalist economies but it is not associated with communist countries. Should the next recession end capitalism in the US and parts of the EU, those countries will drop out of the world economy and become irrelevant (apart from war/peace matters) to the rest of the world. The likelihood of this happening is far more real than you might imagine.

The answer to 1. above is China in the middle ages, only recently has it rejoined the world as a major trading economy. If a country stops trading and looks inward, it can take hundreds of years to emerge from that.

OMD

BalcombeSt4 wrote: »

So you think the junkies you see around the city begging for money, sleeping on bridges and robbing people have jobs? Yeah okay. :rolleyes:

And obviously not everyone on the dole is addictted to drugs, but most drug addicts are on the dole. The first time I got addictted to any drugs was after I was made redundant & on the dole.

You equated being on the dole to being on drugs. That is ridiculous and a lazy stereotype. Your experience is not everyones. Many drug addicts work. The ones you see on the streets begging are not necessarily your typical addicts but yes most of them are unemployed.
So in summary almost everyone unemployed in Ireland is not an addict.
Many addicts work.

You responded to this

People on the dole in Ireland live a far better life than the average person in any socialist country ever has.

By saying:

Yep, the heroin addicts in O'Connell St. falling asleep in their own vomit seem to be having a brilliant time of it

Which reflects a profound ignorance of addiction, unemployment and social welfare. Saying you were an addict yourself does not mean you should not be criticised for making such ignorant comments.