[brien]

Quote by: SlantedFacts [CENTER] [/CENTER] I gotta answer this! YOU ASKED! YES!! They have failed BIG TIME! Let me present this analogical scenario - A person goes to work - the employer expects 10 things to be accomplished every day. Another employer in the same field of experience expects an employee to do (more or less) just 6 things. Basic human nature would dictate that more people would try to get a job with the second company than with the one with higher expectations COMMON SENSE would make a person wonder which one was more successful. Politics is like those employer's - the lower standards attract more employee's with lower goals and objectives. As I see it - Socialism is like the second company. Look at what has happened in this country already. People do not want to be responsible for their sexual outcome So there is a push for ABORTION and AIDS research and assistance on the taxes People do not want to be schooled So they expect the schooled to subsidize their poverty through taxes Homeless do not want to work So they expect handouts funded through taxes and donations People want FREE medical They wait for months to get special medical services paid from taxes. Socialism is a let down for producers - those who are willing to work for higher goals and standards. DON'T GET ME WRONG - I am all for helping the poor (the poor that are willing to help themselves). A big part of why the poverty level is as it is in the USA is due to the feverish need to play political Robin Hood. There is a reasonable solution to this . . . but it needs to go into a NEW THREAD! :)

First, I think you need to define Socialism so we all understand what it is we are exactly addressing. You have provided examples of actions that may well result in the state being responsible for the outcomes of those actions, but this in and of itself, may not be Socialism. Since most abortion is privately funded, I do not agree that abortion is particularly a property of Socialism. AIDS, how does Socialism cause AIDS? And the AIDS research is no less important by any responsible society that is Cancer research. Would you deny AIDS therapy to an innocent child born of an infected mother? And since AIDS is contracted in the US mostly by using dirty needles, would not the legalization of illegal drugs significantly reduce the incidence of AIDS thereby reducing the caseload?

People don't want to be schooled because the government schools have failed them. The Welfare system has been responsible for the break up of the family. It encourages women to not have marriage partners and lose their entitlements In this respect, if this is what you call Socialism, I would agree. But I don't think Socialism means that everyone sits back and collect entitlements from the state. I think you need to be more specific here.

I don't think that the average person on welfare wants to be there. Oh, we all hear about the welfare queens with six kids by six different men, but this is probably the exception rather than the rule. If I remember my statistics on this , there are more white people on welfare than African Americans. I disagree that people want to be on welfare. There just isn't enough money doled out to make it a comfortable lifestyle for the avearge welfare recipient.

I think your employer scenario is way too simplistic. Perhaps a worker would go to the employer who expects 10 things to be done on a daily basis because : they enjoy that work, they are good at that work, it comes easy to them, etc, etc. I think you paint the average citizen with too broad of the "lazy" brush. It seems you have little faith in the American worker.

I think what is happening in America today may be a "back door" approach to Socialism by de facto. There are numerous examples of this.

AMTRAK, Corporate subsidies, Farm subsidies, cetatin entitlement under Social Security, etc. America's compass may be pointing towards Socialist answers to society's problems like health care, but it is only because we have a Congress full of spineless dunces. The Democrat and Republican Parties both have factions that are firmly entrenched in ideology that is influenced by Socialism, but there is no real Socialist Party that has any meaningful power in the Government. This is why I term it "back door" Socialism by de facto, because the Congress tackles its problems in a reactionary way. Rather than design programs around answers rooted in Capitalism and Private Industry, they take the spinelss way out of these problems and design their solutions around government programs that are funded by shoveling the fiscal burden upon the taxpayer who has no control over their spending.

America requires radical reform that should begin by first retracting its military from around the world. Close every military base on foreign soil. America is not the worlds's great protector. Stop the deluge of money being handed to foreign nations on a yearly basis until the US can get its own social problems solved first. The US should resign from the UN and offer to help relocate it to Geneva Switzerland. The US should resign from NATO. Those nations do not require the US to protect them, nor should the US protect them, and the US certainly doesn't need them to protect us.

Our budget deficit is over 300 BILLION for this year. This kind of money is going to bankrupt this nation unless we stop this drunken spending spree. The sooner we stop the hemmorage of money related to foreign military entanglements and occupations, foreign drain pipes to countries whose leaders steal the money earmarked for their indigent, and money wasted here at home, the better postion the US will be in to solve its own domestic problems before it seeks to tramp around the globe selling something we can't even deliver.