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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Truth Is We Need To Be A Democratic Socialist State Like Sweden, Norway, et al.
Our nation will not survive as decent place to live unless we become more like Sweden, Norway, et al. Democratic socialism is a much fairer system than what we have now. Taxes may be higher but most citizens have their basic needs met. And workers are more protected from the abuses of run away capitalism like we have in the US and many parts of the world now.
The trouble is that our ignoramuses in the US think that socialism is Marxism which it is not. And they would rather vote against themselves than risk someone undeserving, black, hispanic et al getting tax money. Too many voters would rather die without health care than have someone they look down on getting the same benefit. The GOP has been playing the "race" & "taker' card forever. Sadly it keeps working.
In reality if the GOP got its way on the domestic agenda the disabled, the elderly, the sick, minorities and other "unacceptable" would be out on the street, starving or dead. And the "elite" would have their protected environments like a country club. That is the GOP's ideal world where "their kind" get to make all the decisions on others fate.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)"Greece for the world" is the corporatist plan. World conquest without firing a shot, and it leaves the real estate undamaged and a nice big pool of soon-to-be slave laborers to be exploited to death. Milton Friedman and Ayn Rand's fantasies come to brutal, vicious life.
Gregorian
(23,867 posts)Marx has been demonized in this country. The whole point of the McCarthy era was to ensure that this arrangement did not take place. It was the rich's way of staying in control, and increasing their power and wealth.
We already have this system in the US in the form of profit sharing. It's not like some evil Red monster. What IS a monster is what we have, which has disabled the working class, and enabled the owners to say in control.
Communities of workers who make decisions and control their own employment. It's a community. It's commun-ism, and as long as the boss has been eliminated, it works.
If you've ever seen a company that uses profit sharing (like Hypertherm, who make plasma cutters) you will notice a distinctly different attitude among the people who work there. They aren't slaving away to make some guy rich. They are participating in the process, and benefiting from it.
Lower taxes, higher pay, in control. No wonder McCarthy got away with it.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)There is a very left-wing economist, Wolff, IIRC, who has been thumping this tub for years. Seems like it would be a great issue for Bernie to push as well.
My mom works for just such a company. Everyone buys shares, gets dividends, gets profit sharing etc. There are still issues with the board but for the most part, it's a very fair company and the employees work their butts off and make a shit ton of money. My mom doesn't have anything but a high school education and is nearing retirement (5 years early) with more than enough money to retire comfortably, even though she's only been lucky enough to be with this company for 12 years or so. All of her retirement savings comes from the last 12 years. My brother also works there (but he does have a degree) and will be able to retire comfortably in 10 years if he wants. Other great benefits with this company are ample vacation (3 weeks to start, plus 12 'flex' days, 1 friday off a month guaranteed), great healthcare, 'allowances' for fitness, art, computers, flexible hours, work-at-home options, etc.
Yes I've been trying to get in as well, or look for a similar company. Sounds like a bit of heaven to me. My company does nothing more than the bare minimum needed by law. And it shows in the employees. Many stay because they love the work, but are overworked, stressed and underpaid...and many leave at the first chance they get. And, IMO, it costs the company more than they save on their low wages. But, shareholders are king and profits this quarter are important and the shareholders are not the employees.
notadmblnd
(23,720 posts)I find this common amongst both Democrats and Republicans.
TeddyR
(2,493 posts)I'm perfectly ok with capitalism, despite its drawbacks.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)laundry_queen
(8,646 posts)unregulated capitalism? Or highly regulated capitalism?
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)I doubt that the socialist will win but it's a step.
Arugula Latte
(50,566 posts)If I could wave a magic wand and make it so, I would.
former9thward
(32,121 posts)They operate with market based capitalism. The government does not tell companies what or how much to produce as they do in socialist countries. They have a bigger and deeper social safety net than we do. That is the main difference. Norway in particular does very well due to the hated oil. They would not appreciate socialism in their country.
Could we have a bigger and deeper social safety net? Yes, but it would mean drastically cutting our military (since we provide the military safety net for Norway, etc and have since WW II). I wonder what Norway, etc. would think about that?
jwirr
(39,215 posts)They do not want us to have anything to say about what they do.
Hated oil? What are you talking about?
cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)jwirr
(39,215 posts)former9thward
(32,121 posts)Oil is attacked on this board in many threads everyday and you know it. But play your games. Our industries are heavily regulated. There are thousands of pages of regulations which affect any industry. Ask people in Norway if they are socialists. They would laugh at you.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)hunter
(38,340 posts).... rah, rah, protectors of the free world!
Not.
The U.S.A. experience of World War II was unique in history.
Our Industrial and Agricultural "heartlands" were beyond the reach of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. Their airplanes couldn't go that far, and their navies couldn't get close except for a few hit-and-run sorts of adventures; from the Japanese a few firebomb balloons, and incidents like the glorious attack of Elwood, California.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardment_of_Ellwood
As the world became a smaller place post WWII and atomic weapons and missiles were perfected, then the game world domination by military might became as simple as Tic-Tac-Toe, stalemate after stalemate after stalemate between players who were not entirely insane.
Cold War.
And smaller "wars" became very very messy.
Korea, Vietnam, hell, Grenada or Nicaragua, how'd those work out for us?
The modern international economy is too fragile for the kind of "protection" our Military-Industrial-Complex pretends to provide. It's a house of cards. The greatest threat to the system today a financial meltdown, a loss of religious faith in the "hard" currencies" and their bankers, or else the sandal wearing queer pacifist like Jesus Christ or Mahatma Gandhi.
That's why all the world's authoritarians build huge machines to monitor all communications. They are not afraid of one another, they are not afraid of stomping about in Iraq or Ukraine, but they are terrified of the wild cards, good or evil, peaceful or violent, who would disrupt the existing "order."
Even should they succeed for now, Mother Nature will kick them to the curb. They will be gone, but many humans living in poverty will survive for no other reason than that there are so many of them.
former9thward
(32,121 posts)Not endorsing it, Many of your points are valid. But whenever the economic consequences of a military reduction are written about posters say "No, don't lay off the government workers". But that is exactly what would happen by the hundreds of thousands if not millions.
hunter
(38,340 posts)One of my grandfathers was an Army Air Force officer in World War II. He was obsessive about aircraft and could do the math, occasionally doing dirty deeds as the handsome officer with a big black car and his enlisted driver carrying a get out of jail free card for lunatics and misfits deemed essential to the war effort.
He was an autistic spectrum lunatic himself, but could pass ordinary inspection. A bit of an actor.
I can be him. Yep, okay, this is how a "normal" person would react.
But I've grown tired, and a complete fuck-up who's normal state is some kind of homelessness.
The Army Air Force kept my grandfather on the ground, mostly here in the U.S.A., doing business he never spoke of.
I've met many WWII veterans like that. Stony silence. Their secret horrors buried with them. The Great Generation.
My grandfather later worked as an engineer on the Apollo Project. Some of the metal he designed and touched took mankind to the moon and back. Bits of metal he touched are in the Smithsonian and on the moon.
This was my grandfather's fierce pride and he was always happy to talk about it.
Twice in my younger post-graduate university life I was offered good jobs in the dark place. I slept, and then refused them.
When I was a naive young man my boss/girlfriend/partner-in-crime sold some of my work to the Military Industrial Complex, but that's not why we broke up. It's a really, really, bad sordid story that doesn't make me look honorable in any way.
Life is sometimes like that.
former9thward
(32,121 posts)But is any candidate will to reduce our military pretense? I have heard than from no one, including Sanders.
stone space
(6,498 posts)former9thward
(32,121 posts)Not even Sanders has mentioned it.
stone space
(6,498 posts)(Isaiah 2:4)
former9thward
(32,121 posts)Or anything else.
stone space
(6,498 posts)Neither am I.
(Two of them are no longer with us, unfortunately.)
Fr. Philip Berrigan (October 5, 1923 December 6, 2002)
Elmer Maas (??? - May 8, 2009)
Charlie King
My name is Daniel Berrigan, chaplan at a hospice for the dying.
I have seen the face of death. It is for life, I bring this hammer down.
My name is Molly Rush. I have six children, they deserve a future.
I strike this blow today for the children all the world around.
I hear the prophets' cry of hope ring through the prison wall.
We've waited thirty centuries to see that hammer fall.
If we think we've got thirty more, we cannot see at all.
For swords into plowshares, the hammer has to fall.
My name is Elmer Maas. Were this a peaceful world, I'd sit and play piano.
But lacking Nero's concience, I could not watch that fire devour the land.
My name is John Schuchardt. I am no stranger to the prison that awaits us.
But where genocide is legal, I stand an outlaw with a hammer in my hand.
I hear the prophets' cry of hope ring through the prison wall.
We've waited thirty centuries to see that hammer fall.
If we think we've got thirty more, we cannot see at all.
For swords into plowshares, the hammer has to fall.
Dean Hammer is my name. Mica and Isahia my tradition.
Oh, I tried to be their scholar, but could not escape their logic in the end.
My name is Philip Berrigan. In world war II I flew the bombing missions.
Now with every blow I strike today, I say the bombs will never fall again.
I hear the prophets' cry of hope ring through the prison wall.
We've waited thirty centuries to see that hammer fall.
If we think we've got thirty more, we cannot see at all.
For swords into plowshares, the hammer has to fall.
Carl Cabott is my name. I have lived and worked amoung the thirld world peoples.
I've seen corporations flourish, while the poor were left to fight for every breath.
My name is Anne Montgomery. My life spent in community with women.
I bring their healing power to this factory of of carnage and of death.
I hear the prophets' cry of hope ring through the prison wall.
We've waited thirty centuries to see that hammer fall.
If we think we've got thirty more, we cannot see at all.
For swords into plowshares, the hammer has to fall.
The hammer has to fall...
former9thward
(32,121 posts)It takes someone running --- and winning -- who wants to change our budget priorities. Otherwise it will never happen.
stone space
(6,498 posts)Plowshares Movement History
Published on Aug 1, 2012
A history of the Plowshares movement from 1980 to 2009, compiled from the records of many friends by Ardeth Platte OP and Susan Crane.
former9thward
(32,121 posts)stone space
(6,498 posts)Oh, well.
olddots
(10,237 posts)that they say they don't like the weather in Sweden and Norway so why should we live like them .
jwirr
(39,215 posts)programs that serve the basic needs of the people are not profit making organizations. They are like our fire departments - paid for by taxes to serve all. They are not means tested because testing to see what your income is costs money. A lot less money than just including everyone. That is why the administration of Social Security is cheaper than food stamps - because we spend a lot on workers to approve the applications for the last. It also takes a lot of money for the doctor/hospital to file all the different insurance papers to charge for what they do. Consolidating programs to eliminate more than one administration would also make it cheaper. And finally we use a three tier system (local, state and federal) to run most of our programs - I suspect that does not happen in other countries.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)at least profits to corporations. Decent food, housing, and medical care, to start with, should be available to all as the rights of citizens. Putting profit-making middlemen in any supply chain increases expense, siphons huge amounts of money to people and entities that add nothing, but only act as parasites.
I have no problem with for-profit options being available for people who want to pay a pretty penny for more than the basics, but it is intolerable, inhumane and immoral for so many to have so little in the richest society the world has ever known.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)Which offers a better experience for customers?
hunter
(38,340 posts)There's no way in hell I'd ever visit an Apple Store.
At the DMV there are all sorts of interesting people to watch and many stories to listen too as I wait my turn.
An Apple store is full of expensive toys and people with too much money.
I'm posting this from an old Pentium III laptop running Linux. I've spent maybe $25 putting it all together, and in much less time than it would take me to drive to the nearest Apple store.
My most expensive computer, which I consider an expensive personal indulgence, is a $35 Raspberry Pi.
https://www.raspberrypi.org/
former9thward
(32,121 posts)colsohlibgal
(5,275 posts)We need to skew hard that way from where we are now, which is capitalism gone wild, resulting in horrible income inequality.
We need to reinstate the principles of the New Deal, the deal we started dismantling in 1981.
People need work, our infrastructure is crumbling, it's a match, lots of ways to pay for it if we start taxing rich people and wealthy corporations a fair amount - and slash the Hell out of our insane defense budget.
GeorgeGist
(25,326 posts)to vote socialist. Right here on DU.
AngryAmish
(25,704 posts)We only have resources. White folks (roundheads, cavaliers, scotch-irish, ethnic proles like me) all hate each other. Then look at african and mesoamericans.
Country splits up in 50 years, let alone go socialistic.
pampango
(24,692 posts)Sweden and Norway have immigrant populations that are more then the US (Sweden) or almost the same percentage (Norway and the Netherlands).
https://data.oecd.org/migration/foreign-born-population.htm
AngryAmish
(25,704 posts)As to my pessimism, the nondiverse folks will be deported.
pampango
(24,692 posts)you are right.
cantbeserious
(13,039 posts)eom
Drunken Irishman
(34,857 posts)Sweden has a population of 9.3 million people - or a population that's smaller than Los Angeles County.
The comparison of the U.S. to these smaller, homogeneous nations is just as disingenuous as the comparison the right likes to make between rural America and inner-city America. They're totally different experiences with different cultures and problems.
The U.S. could certainly be more like, say, Canada, and can definitely liberalize its laws but poverty in a massive country like America is going to be dramatically different than poverty in Sweden. Likewise, poverty in Chicago is going to be different than poverty in Mayberry.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)They have stockmarkets, profit-making corporations, and are very big on free trade. A few acts of Congress could raise US taxes to pay for a similar kind of social safety-net that those countries have, with no overthrowing of capitalism needed.
pampango
(24,692 posts)strong regulations, an effective safety net, strong unions, etc. It is amazing how the "FDR/Scandinavian" model actually works then and now, in large and small countries. It is small wonder that Bernie asks why we can't be more like Scandinavia.
KingCharlemagne
(7,908 posts)socialist' states (as least as the latter phrase has been used historically). There is no public ownership of the means of production in the Scandinavian countries you name, nor is there in Denmark or Finland.
That said, the citizens of all 4 of those countries seems to enjoy much higher standards of living and far less social dysfunction than America does.