From: utzoo!dciem!mmt
Newsgroups: net.politics
Title: Re: What IS wrong with socialism
Article-I.D.: dciem.189
Posted: Mon Feb 21 21:46:10 1983
Received: Tue Feb 22 08:29:33 1983
References: hou5e.234

Mark (The Capitalist) Terrible's idea about what capitalism should
be (worker-shareholders) is actually what SOCIALIST Sweden does.
(And other West European countries with good economic records and frequent
Socialist Governments).
  Socialism isn't mind control; it isn't Communism; it doesn't prevent
you being an entrepreneur if you want. At least in Canada, the Socialist
party seems to be the one best in tune with both the economic and
the social needs of the country most of the time. The German
Wirtschaftwunder occurred under both Christian Democrat (Right-wing)
and Social Democrat (Left wing) governments, and both of those parties
would be considered radical socialists by many Republicans. People don't
seem repressed in most of Western Europe; some of them are rich,
but few are starving. Lots of them go to the Riviera or Spain for
holidays (try driving in France in August).
   It might be better to look at what Socialism does rather than
flame at theoretical hobgoblins. (I don't think of myself as a Socialist,
because I disagree with lots of what they want, but I don't think
of them as devils either. They are just the best of what we have on
offer. Perhaps I am a Libertarian Socialist at heart.)
		Martin Taylor
P.S. Taxes that are too high on the rich can be devastating, as in Sweden,
but that's not a function of Socialism alone. Incidentally, it is in part
because of attitudes like those of Mark Terrible that Europeans get so
thoroughly browned off with the US from time to time.