He has made a clear distinction here which I am glad for: Social Democracy does not fit the paradigm he has laid out. As a result of that admission, I find his thesis more palatable. I'm not so sure that I agree that Social Democracy is not a variant of Socialism, but there is FAR too small a character limit to explain why in a single comment.
Another shocking error he makes is that he draws false parallels between authoritarian Communism (which was/is indisputably totalitarian in nature) and the remaining schools of Socialism, NONE of whom are totalitarian. The current citizens of Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Germany, France, the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, and countless other countries live under a form of Socialism called Social Democracy. Which of these are totalitarian states, I ask you?
@SocialistCatgirl See, this is why you need to watch to the end. He addresses this in the last few minutes of the video. Listening is required before rebuttal.
@SocialistCatgirl It's just a pet peeve of mine when someone makes assumptions and starts responding to something said or written without letting the one speaking/writing finish. It is important to never do this as listening first will make you more informed and make your response more informed. Someone who reads your comment and then watches the video will be inclined to disregard anything more you have to say thinking you weren't paying attention. I'm sure you don't want that.
I suggest that you reexamine Bolshevism and Maoism in contrast to Social Democracy. The differences are quite radical, actually. The absence of a permanent "vanguard" party which decides who may or may not participate in elections (thus truly free elections), the absence of restrictions on free speech, the absence of a secret police and prisons for dissenters, and the canyon between Social Democracy and authoritarian Communism just keeps on growing.
@SocialistCatgirl I acknowledge that their are discernable differences, but from my strict libertarian standpoint, I see them as only valuable if every last person is in full consent of the socialist measures. If one single person does not consent to his property being taken from him, it's fascism. You're arguing price, not principal.
Well, it wouldn't really be fascism if the government was taking initiatives that were not to the entire population's liking. Under such a definition, every government across the globe is Fascist. Fascism is a system where you hold the state as the ultimate ideal and marry industrialism to autocracy. Its heavy emphasis on nationalism tends to lend itself well to totalitarianism.
There are libertarian variants of Socialism you might like. Left Libertarianism is worth a look.
@SocialistCatgirl Thanks, I will. From where I stand now, and from what I know, you can't really have a "left libertarian". A libertarian believes in the first principal of personal liberty, and once you establish that you believe in that, you have in effect subscribed to believe a certain way about individual issues. To be a left libertarian would render your first principal inconsistant and thus your belief a fallacy.
It's a tricky conundrum, because Left Libertarianism emphasizes localized egalitarian efforts, which on the one hand emphasizes the self-ownership of workers but simultaneously weakens the self-ownership of capital holders. A good example of the system in action would be a democratic workplace, such as a co-op. Whether or not protecting one group's self-ownership at the expense of another's self-ownership can be counted as Libertarian is the heat of the conundrum.
I've come as far as I'm going to in this lecture. This man has a lot of substance in his analysis, but his chief flaw is that he is making synonymous "centrally planned economics" and "socialism". Socialism is, simply put, a broad category of political schools which make as their ultimate goal the democratization of the means of production. This CAN take on a form similar to the CCCP's government, but it can also assume (at the federal level) Social Democracy or (locally) unionism.
This guy is an idiot. My family lived in Nazi Germany and there was NOTHING socialist about it. Socialist does NOT = big gov (see left-libertarianism and anarcho-communism); socialist = worker control of production whether through state means or through unions, federations and other free-associations.
@itrainsinoctober True Hitler did have Socialist eliminated however keep in mind what Germany became within weeks is the natural evolution of a socialist government hence the reason why Trotsky was exiled. The totalitarian nature of fascism is the same in what happened in socialism systems. What Trotsky was not was a true study of History no more than Lenin, Ingalls and Marx because their ideological visions of extending power to the mob rule of democracy would inevitably produce a Stalin
@MrReco12 This is untrue, if you are talking about Friedman Chile today is perhaps the wealthiest S. American country DUE to free market capitalism not Corporatism. Co,mparing those in the right who want less regulation and smaller government meddling to a fascist totalitarian regime like Nazism is well to put it bluntly stupid and uneducated. Socialist like your precious left are far more totalitarian in their attitude than the right. I reccomend learning about economics and politics
A fascist sympathizer like Mr Reisman or a capitalist business owner in Nazi Germany Alfried Krupp who said
"The economy needed a steady or growing development. Because of the rivalries between the many political parties in Germany and the general disorder there was no opportunity for prosperity. ... We thought that Hitler would give us such a healthy environment. Indeed he did do that... "
@MrReco12 First off not everyone in Germany was Nazi there is more of a comparison with Obamas belief in eliminating the the constitution and Hitlers party actually suspending their own Constitution. Are you that ignorant of history the Dems were in power after WW2 and guess how many former German scientist we brought into the US afterwards?. How do you think we got their technology in fact how do you war victors get the technology the get after a war ends??
@MrReco12 Oh good god many american companies had done business with Germany and yes the Nazis. And you think that the Left is so innocent, who gives a shit if an ex-nazi voted for any political party it says nothing about the party line LOLOL. I am curious where you got so paranoid of the New World Order, I think you would be suprised how many countries leaders have done secret business with these ex-Nazis.
@MrReco12 I don't think you know what your point is, you make claims that you think will discredit Reisman as if that makes his economic theories any less valid. Explain how you know that Reisman is a member of the Nazi political party and how do you know he supported the genocide. I can't wait to hear your responses.
"Life and liberty are positively helped by the death and disappearance of such mortal enemies."
He supported genocide against the Chilean people for the same reason the conservatives supported Hitler in the enabling act of 1933. To save them from a FAKE communist plot!
What is more damning about Reisman's love of pinochet and his genocidal nazi-like views towards communiuts worse is that we KNOW who the victims of PInochet were:
Here are two sides of the Chileans conflict:
watch?v=r9xOg4JSClY: Riesmans heroes
vs
watch?v=yO3-_ZiYsdw: Evil communists: This video actually shows oppostion and anti government rallies under the "communist dictatorship" of Salvador Allende
@MrReco12 First off Chile was not genocide it was a violent coup where Pinochet eliminated Allende and his communist system and supporters to include Russians. Then Pinochet turned over the economy to the Chicago boys a trained group of economist whom Milton Friedman had trained in free market theories. Through free market capitalism Pinochets power was eliminated he protected the system from malfeasence and communist supporters. It succeeded in establishing freedom and is doing well to this day
Typical response from a closet fascist. Like Hitler, Pinochet privitised large sectors of the economy, created a secret police,first ever in Chilie, murdered communists, trade unionists and supported big business!
"People have an absolute right to rise up and defend their lives, liberty, and property against a Communist takeover. In the process, they cannot be expected to make the distinctions present in a judicial process. They must act quickly and decisively to remove what threatens them."
This is the same logic Hitler used he justified his atrocities.
@MrReco12 Where do I start I do not disagree that from what you have read and know Pinochet was a bad man there were far worse but he was bad, he set a climate that allowed atrocities to happen, I doubt he personally ordered the torture or abuse individual soldiers conducted butthe climate was there. The economist that were trained at the Chicago school of economics convinced Pinochet to release all state controls from the economy. To allow free markets to run unedited.
@MrReco12 Pinochet in his bloody coup could of run a dictatorship with total control but instead was convinced by his Friedman trained Phd economist to allow the free market to run. This choice created through the guile of the economist ended up toppling both communism that preceded Pinochet and Pinochets fascism in a very short time. By the way Pinochet was freely elected after the coup. For the first time the people of Chile could build wealth and a future for their children.
@MrReco12 For the first time the quality of their existence was improved through free market competition where prices are lower and quality is higher. They were no longer wards of the state they were free to choose their existence as they saw fit. They were able to take responsibility for their choices through the freedom of choice offered in free market capitalism. They could freely exercise their god given rights without having rights given to them by the state.
@MrReco12 They were only able to have freedom which eventually toppled Pinochet after he released control of the market without realizing that this freedom of choice would also mean he would have to be freely elected. Once Pinochet was finally gone the economy of Chile is the best in S.America. The elimination of fascism and communism were only possible when the people were free to choose once they got freedom they wanted all of it.
@MrReco12 I think the greatest result is the freedom the people can now express through the markets, the freedom to have initiative pay off for them, this initiative and productivity unleashed in the free market system unleashed a S. American economic powerhouse. Great countries are not built on collective discovery they are built on individual initiative that benefits the collective.
@MrReco12 I think you confuse corporatism with capitalism. Free market economy with no government is controlled by us the consumer and not business it is the expression of our free choice and this is capitalism. Corporatism is something else
Supporting fascism over democracy every time. I repeat: THE RIGHT DISOWN HITLER ONLY BECAUSE HE LOST!
The only freedom conservatives believe in is the freedom for the employer to treat their workers how they like. Hence their support for Hitler and Pinochet etc.
@MrReco12 I support freedom of choice not left or right. I don't want government running my life like the left does. The left would love the government to take over everything in this country to be controlled like a socialist regime without choice. Where do you get the idea that someone who believes in freedom to choose is a fascist. The right and left are both in bed with corporations and the power is with them, the power belongs to the people free market capitalism is the answer we own America
@itrainsinoctober If 51% of the people agreed with totalitarian rule dynamics (suspending the democratic processes) and handed over the authority to a ruler what would the 49% do ? Ideologically speaking Socialism is beautiful in reality it is opportunity for Stalins to seize power and abuse the masses by initiating a state of terror within his secret police state. History has proven that the transition from democracy to totalitarian is a very short time period.
@itrainsinoctober Republics take hundreds of years of reducing its people to a democracy as it has proven through history is the most complex system to deconstruct and provides protections for its citizens throughout the decontruction process until its citizens rights are reduced to but a few choices. Look at the US we have allowed our government education system mislabel our government system a democracy eventually people are going to want it without understanding it
@TheCaptainLulz: Capitalism is a nonsense word that the Communists made up. It thus only "means" the vilitication that the Communist means to convey w/ this epithet. It's the equivolent of "kulak." By "capitalist," you mean anyone who practices his fundamental human right of free enterprise. A logically necessary extension of the right of private property, which is necessary for human dignity.
@VictorLepanto fundamental human right??? ok, never heard that one before. As for the "right" of private proprety, you really think you have that? Ask the japanese ameericans of 1942 about their rights and liberties, they where taken away from them by the state the moment they truly needed them. Communism is worse, theres no "rights" evident in their system at all, and its hellish to be sure.
@TheCaptainLulz: I am talking about fundamental & natural rights. A natural right remains so even if a corrupt state refuses to recognise it. As for FDR's orders to round up Japanese, he was certainly our most socialistic president, until the current nightmare of course.
It does not matter how you define it, socialism simply IS government by what the governing body thinks is "moral" and use of statistics and studies in an attempt to even out what is a perception of "unequality" in society. Socialism also uses force, regulation and limitations to get what they want done. You can define it how you like, socialist scum always try to push the blame on to others. Hitler, Stalin, Mao all socialists but socialists are trying to bush the blame elsewhere.
If you ACTUALLY look up the definition of socialism - the collective (state) exercise of ownership over the means of production - it matches EXACTLY what Reisman is saying. Whether the ownership is exercized directly (a la the Soviets) or de facto (the Nazis) is irrelevant.
You might want to look up the words you are using before complaining that someone else is using them improperly.
The classes and the races, too weak to master the new conditions of life, must give way. But can there be anything more puerile, more short-sighted, than the views of those Economists who believe in all earnest that this woeful transitory state means nothing but adapting society to the acquisitive propensities of capitalists, both landlords and money-lords
Is it because the UK government can't stomach imposing physical state terror on its citizens that they have resorted to surveillance, character assassinations, censorship and emotional blackmail via political correctness etc.?
National Socialism is Socialism in the national interest. On the other hand, International Socialism is Socialism against the national interest,and is in the interests of Jewish Totalitarianism and the International Stock Exchange and corporate colonialism of all nations in the world.
Well your antisemitic views aside, You just said yourself that socialism and national socialism claim to be acting in the interest of their country or even the whole world. So the natural conclusion of such a policy would be that infringements on basic, personal, individual rights are justifiable if they happen in the alleged name of the greater good.
And since Nazis (and even you) seem to have anti-Semitic views infringements on their rights would be claimed to be for the greater good, right?
Wrong, dunderhead. I didn't say say "Socialism"[International Socialism;Communism,etc] acted in the "national interest". I in fact stated the opposite;ie;it is socialism 'against' the national interest. Communism and Internationalism is the work of the Jewish Race. Are you dyslexic, or far from fully literate, or so full of Jewish spoon-fed crap? Either way, I resent political debates with dunderheads like you who mis-quote, mis-interpret,and yet still don't know what they're waffling on about.
@ Richardhedditch261: what you say is very provocative and antisemitic. And see i am not opposed to anyone and a friend of mine got mistreated cause he was right winged and i feel sorry for him. But than again you really shouldn't say the things your saying... it hurts people and just incites hatred and violence - and than you really can't complain if you reap what you sow.
National socialism was an attempt at a regional utopia (germany)
International/global (21st century socialism) is the same NAZI values being pushed on the world to produce a world utopia. If Jews are or are not involved who cares, that is what it is.
"We are socialists, we are enemies of today's capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are all determined to destroy this system under all conditions." --Adolf Hitler
I'm serious, please do away with the idea that Europe is a model for the US. It is not.
Our semi-socialist pseudo-capitalism does not work, nor will it ever do. It doesn't provide us with anything besides high taxes, stagnation of the economy and lack of entrepreneurship.
This comment has received too many negative votesshow
I think mild forms of socialism, like in Europe , is better and more humane than what we have in the USA. Raw capitalism is just as bad as socialism. When you are denied basic things for life, such as healthcare, because you have no money, that's wrong.The best policies are those that give us a broad middle class. Not a small amount of people owning everything .Extreme capitalist societies share that quality with socialistic societies.
Socialism is collective (gov't) ownership of the means of production. Period end of definition. The Nazi's owned production through price and wage controls. These controls were maintained by physical force. (If the companies did not comply, the leaders were punished - put in jail or put to death!)
But Hitler took care of the left, too. In May 1933, he had labor leaders arrested & sent to Dauchau. He then installed the Nazi Labour Front, which was a joke & favored management. ALL SOCIAL CLASSES existed under the Nazis, & the middle & upper middle classes LOVED him, as he allowed private property & killed commies. Wages FELL for average German worker from '32-36. Also, a number of rightwing American businessmen played footsie with the regime, as did the Catholic Church/Lutheran bishops.
Why do you assert that the American business men were "rightwing"? Ford was actually very progressive.
Hitler's assault on labour unions was not ideologically driven, but rather a pragmatic approach to hyperinflation. While wages fell, the absence of hyperinflation improved the standard of living for Germans in general.
Hitler hated Christians, and executed priests and pastors who dared to reisist him.
Hitler's assault on labor unions was VERY ideologically driven...this is explored & written about profusely in Alan Bullock's great work, HITLER: A STUDY IN TYRANNY. Bullock points out how the young Hitler would not even join an artist's union as a young man in Vienna & his hatred of unions and their push for egalitarianism...totally at odds with his ideas of superiority & survival of the fittest.
Oh I bet thats how it works Reinsman, you are pretty comfortable at the top of the capitolist food chain arent you? Youve got your own subtle control and then socialism comes along and threatens to take away the freedom you earned though exploiting others and give it back to the people who you abuse daily and you get pretty frieghtened. For isntance, he says the goverment would own printing facilities! The who idea of socialism is that the people own the goverment, not people like this guy.
Reisman is dealing with the practical implications of socialism as applied in the real world. He isn't wasting any time on theoretical models than have never existed because they are contrary to human nature. he is dealing with the fascist variant of socialism under which collective ownership of the means of production exists while the semblance of private ownership is maintained. But you're right that socialism is about "taking away the freedom" from people based on the LIE of exploitation.
The definition of Socialism is a planned economy. Hitler had a planned economy, case closed.
The reason people think that Nazism wasn't Socialism is because they think of Socialism in an emotional sense, not a real sense, they think Socialism means helping the poor and being nice. In which case Hitler was not a Socialist, but neither was any government in world history.
Wealthy states oftentimes become corporatocracies rather than staying as true democracies. People like Bush give more power and benefits to their wealthy friends on Wall St. while the rest of us suffer or are ignored. Wealthy special interests impede the democratic process and will of the people. Opposition to campaign finance reform only further distorts democracy by letting Big Money control the elections, not the people. Money shouldn't be an issue in an election!
Socialism doesn't HAVE to be anti-freedom. In fact, it promotes freedom and democracy by making workers equal in the company and letting them vote. They don't have that kind of power in a society like America's. They only have limited power as consumers and not much as workers. Execs. can cut pay, lay them off, and cut benefits whenever they want, regardless of what the workers want. Workers are the backbone of a company and deserve fair and equal treatment. Is that fair?
who says capitalism has to be free? during the cold war we put up countless coutnries that were completely capitalist but murdered hundreds of thousands of their own people. freedom is not measured by capitalism. during FDR's stay american companies were puting plans together to do the same thing here. maybe one day they'll get around to it.
Definition of Fascism - that nation which is ruled by corporation and for the benefit of it, through allocation of all wealth and resources for the Corporation. the Corporation is the STATE. Often a single leader with absolute executive powers known as a Dictator is integral but sometimes a governing legislature may exist atleast symbolically even if it has no authority. Absolute Corporate Monopoly (Corporate Communism) --Extreme Capitalism that extinguishes itself by becoming a Monopoly
you confuse Socialism with SOCIAL DARWINISM. Socialism is a measure to prevent Social Darwinism. Social Darwinism leads to the decay and decline inevitable in pure Capitalist society thru greed, poverty, houselessness, unemployment, joblessness, hopelessness, loss of freedom, equality, human and civil rights. Socialism blended with Capitalism revitalized a Capitalist society by repairing social decay, restoring prosperity to Middle Class, eliminating poverty and protecting rich people's wealth
Nazis were NOT Socialists. quite the OPPOSITE! they were FASCISTS. but they were SOCIAL DARWINISTS. ("SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST" or SURVIVAL of the FINANCIALLY Fittest, GENETICALLY FITTEST and HEALTHIEST or RACIALLY PUREST") definition of FASCISM - nation ruled by the CORPORATION and for the benefit of it, through allocation of all wealth and resources for the CORPORATION. the CORPORATION is the STATE. Absolute Corporate Monopoly (Corporate Communism) --Extreme Capitalism that extinguishes itself
Fascism & National Socialism is not the same thing. They were widely different in some areas & very similar in others. But they were /not/ the same ideologies. Hippie.
Fascism is a very wide word. That is like saying there is only one democracy. Nation Socialism was just a name they gave it. Not a form of government.
Hippies & liberals use the term "Fascism" to describe anything not "democratic". But Fascism was & is a specific ideology. Just like National Socialism is a specific ideology. Read up on it you uneducated hippie.
They use it because that is what it is. Dumbass. I know what fascism is and I know what nazism is. They are the same thing. fascism is not a specific ideology. I am not a hippie or a liberal hahaha but nice guess lolol! actually it was a horrible guess lawl ignorant people like you make me laugh.
Read up on Benito Mussolini, the Camicie Nere & Italy between 1922-43 & northern Italy 1943-45. Also, compare German National Socialist economic policy with that of Fascist Italy.
Of course there different. That is like saying any other republic or democracy that is not exactley like the united states is not a republic or democracy. I know what your saying but the actual word is interchangable.
A democracy can be based on Liberalism, Conservatism or Socialism for instance & a dictatorship can be based on Fascism, National Socialism or Communism. The "term" Fascism is used to describe totalitarian regimes because it was stolen from the Italian language & is used by liberals & hippies nowadays. But in its original shape, it is an /ideology/ & still exists as one today. Thus Fascism & National Socialism is not the same thing. Similar in some ways, but two different political ideologies.
So what your trying to tell me is because chocolate was originally a drink, everyone is wrong when they say it is something you eat. So when we say chocolate we are wrong? That is idiotic It was not stolen it was based off of. Fascism can be many things. Your the only hippie.
Individualism leads to someone owning you. The one who lies, the one who has more money, the one who deceives, the one who steals. I very much prefer a nation with strong community ties & a powerful state which holds Nationalism & Militarism as it's highest ideals.
A nationalistic dictatorship is preferable to a decadent democracy with huge class differences, overcrowded prisons, stifling greed/hyper-capitalism, lobby groups owning parliament/congress & declining birthrates. Nationalism, Science & Discipline is a great combo.
About 40,000 traffic deaths happen each year on US public roads, but because it's a government monopoly provided product, it merely gets accepted as the way things have to be & no fuss is made. If private firms provided roads, can you imagine the outcry?
I appreciate you're not a hard line socialist. May I suggest a little reading before making your mind up on the gov't vs. private roads question? Find "Murder on the Roads" by Nathan McKaskle parts 1 & 2 & see if it's not just driver error.
My comment was also addressing the existence of a double standard when it comes to judging govt vs private firm failure. A resigned acceptance & even blaming the victim or at most the hated office holder of the other party is the predominant response to the former, "the govt must step in" the response to the latter. If more good can be expected where people are more demanding, this dbl standard does not argue for govt control.
Fletch is sadly still wearing his social blinkers.Simple question did the eastern bloc abolish the wages system?Did the workers own and control the means of production?
I so enjot the dishonesty of socialists. They even invented postmodernism so that thaey can ignore reality when it is so (obviously) against them. But my favorite is that any (inevitable) failure of socialism must be renamed "state capitalism" (an oxymoron) because the dream cant be allowed to fail. To be fair, it isn't always dishonest; sometimes it's just delusional.
There is no ruling class in a socialist/communist system.How can there be when the means of production are held in common.Wage labour and exploitation are ended.Sadly you are thinking of state capitalism that is nationalisation comrade,bugger all to do with socialism chum.I suggest you study the socialist standard.
right because people like Stalin lived the same way the poor freezing did. Socialism is totalitarian and that is a fact... no free market, free speech, free press. People are not robots. If someone tries harder than another and works up they will be rich or provide a good life for their younger's who may be rich. 100 million have been lost to communism and no more will be. Fuck communism rise to democracy and capitalism
Socialism/communism has not failed its never been tried.When the earths resources and the means of production are held in common it will be a classless stateless moneyless society.
They weren't true socialism, they were state capitalism,as opposed to corporate capitalism - calling themselves 'communism'. True socialism is rule of the people, by the people, for the people - without state coercion.
this old fart talking is merely trying to justify the current rule of the rich, by the rich, for the rich.
You mean true socialism is the rule of the mass, by the mass, for the mass. But in practise it will be: the rule of the leaders, by the mass, for the people.
Because the mass represents only the mass, and not the people. And the mass in incapable of thinking for themselves, so it becomes the rule of the leader.
So don't have a 'mass'. Do away with nations for a start, and have independent collectives instead; there are billions of people and thousands of ways to run things, why choose one for all?
Let people decide for themselves, whether they want ensureance, and don't force anyone to pay for universal healthcare. Don't force people to go to school if they have a diffent belief system. The only thing a state should do is to protect people's freedom, so that they can run their own lives. Government is not here to control us, or to tell us what we should do with our money.
Koreapassie, to protect peoples freedom, you must give them the ability to make choices.
If lots of kids cant go to school because their parrents belive they only shuld be thought in Christianity (or Islam) they won't get to decide for themself in the future, and that's not "taking care of their freedom", thats denieing them their right to invidual freedom.
That's also one of the reasons to why many countries do have a system to take care of the children incase the parrents can't.
What the hell does this guy think he is talking about? people forced to have constant border identity checks and no freedom of the press? what political system is this idiot trying to prove is totalitarian? it's certainly not socialism.
In socialism there is no difference between the "government" and the people. the people are the government!
Socialism is the social ownership of means of production distribution and exchange which should not be twisted into only state ownership has there are a wide variety of social ownership forms - co-ops - community - city - county as well as national ownership
NICKGLAIS: How does a supposed scandanavian know so much about Ron Paul? By the way, I am still waiting for you to acknowledge the 20 million socialist victims of the Soviet Gulag, and the tens of millions of dead peasants resultant Mao's "second five year plan." And why haven't you offered your own definition of Socialism, since you imply that mine and Stalin's ans Mao's are wrong? SPOOK!
Look at Ron Paul he speaks about the Iraq War and the US Empire with its 700 plus bases around the world but by relying on Von Mises economics cannot understand the character of Imperialism - J.A. Hobson at the beginning of the last century let alone Lenin have the analysis to explain the US drive for Empire
Lenin was dead before the USSR ever became the stalinist empire that most people would asscociate it with today. Please remember that Stalinism is NOT socialism and proving that stalinism is totalitarian does not prove that socialism is totalitarian because the two are enormously different.
The brutal regime that collapsed in the old soviet union was a state capitalist dictatorship.The state owned the means of production and the workers still had to sell their labour power to an employer in return for wages.That is capitalism not socialism/communism.
Anarchism was a legitimate part of the socialist movement at the beginning of the 20th century and its anti state philosophy was incorporated into Marxism with Marx seeing the need for a transitional dictatorship of the proletatriat as a result of the experience of the Paris Commune
Peter Kolar you remind me of the blindsighted who only count the military dead in Iraq and not the civilians - you can recite every death under socialism but are incapable of looking at the death toll of capitalism in the 20th century
You are correctly seeing symptoms, but you are misdiagnosing the illness (post hoc, ergo propter hoc). Corrupt Governments controlling armies and controlling people via economic policies and propaganda are responsible for the deaths you blame on "capitalism." The real problem is the existence of this government power which will inevitably be bought by the highest bidder or conquered by the toughest thug. US Constitution = attempt to limit government power.
What kills peoples is the USE OF FORCE UPON OTHERS WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT, like any CHURCH's or STATE's INTERVENTIONS by war, inquisition or collectivism. The problem for nazism, communism and most forms of socialism is that they REQUIRED, by their very nature, the USE OF FORCE UPON OTHERS WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT. And that make most forms of socialism to be deadly. Free-Market, by is very nature, REQUIRED to "NOT USE" FORCE UPON OTHERS WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT.
You said it I did'nt. But your right, Free-Market require anarchy. Free-Market is incompatible with State or any other monopolistic use of force. The use of force is legitimate only to protect people's liberty and property. State is'nt required to do that, free-association can supply protection of people's liberty and property. Thoses free-association can also supply social justice, help the poors, defend workers, protect environnement, supply healt care etc.
well said. But do you mean that all police force ,military, welfare, firefighters and ambulances should be privatised? Call the police and for a small fee we will help you with your burgulars? The downside is that those without money loose all human rights. And all these major associations, will in reality become small gouverments. but its a nice thought.
Most Anarcho-capitalist will say yes, but they admit that they can imposed any specific economic system even capitalist. There can be VOLONTARY-socialist association which could supply protection for anyone regardless to their wealth. If there's peoples to vote for socialist measure in our "modern democraty" there's would be peoples to engage themself in such VOLONTARY-socialist association.
I truly agree, with you. neither socialism capitalism or any other systems should be imposed on people, not even Democracy. If its right or not, is only up to the people to decide. And you got propaganda from all sides that influence the opinion. this video is an example.
Perfect summary of what I lived under.
oneyaker 19 hours ago
Hitler destroyed the worker unions so could not be socialist, he also barred universal health care to non aryan.
In conclusion he has his facts wrong
greg91ification 1 month ago
He has made a clear distinction here which I am glad for: Social Democracy does not fit the paradigm he has laid out. As a result of that admission, I find his thesis more palatable. I'm not so sure that I agree that Social Democracy is not a variant of Socialism, but there is FAR too small a character limit to explain why in a single comment.
SocialistCatgirl 6 months ago
socialists says:
Nazi Germany was not REAL socialist
Soviet Union was not REAL socialist
As the nazi says "repeat a lie 1000 times, and it will be a truth"
trifulquita15 6 months ago
@trifulquita15
Soviet Union was socialist whilst Nazi Germany wasn't!
Your an idiot!
MrReco12 6 months ago
@MrReco12 But they were both collectivist, right?
aseredy 2 months ago
Another shocking error he makes is that he draws false parallels between authoritarian Communism (which was/is indisputably totalitarian in nature) and the remaining schools of Socialism, NONE of whom are totalitarian. The current citizens of Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Germany, France, the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, and countless other countries live under a form of Socialism called Social Democracy. Which of these are totalitarian states, I ask you?
SocialistCatgirl 6 months ago
@SocialistCatgirl See, this is why you need to watch to the end. He addresses this in the last few minutes of the video. Listening is required before rebuttal.
angpetru 6 months ago
@angpetru
Touche. And so I shall.
SocialistCatgirl 6 months ago
@SocialistCatgirl It's just a pet peeve of mine when someone makes assumptions and starts responding to something said or written without letting the one speaking/writing finish. It is important to never do this as listening first will make you more informed and make your response more informed. Someone who reads your comment and then watches the video will be inclined to disregard anything more you have to say thinking you weren't paying attention. I'm sure you don't want that.
angpetru 6 months ago
@SocialistCatgirl The only discernable difference is widespread consent.
HammerOvThor 6 months ago
@HammerOvThor
I suggest that you reexamine Bolshevism and Maoism in contrast to Social Democracy. The differences are quite radical, actually. The absence of a permanent "vanguard" party which decides who may or may not participate in elections (thus truly free elections), the absence of restrictions on free speech, the absence of a secret police and prisons for dissenters, and the canyon between Social Democracy and authoritarian Communism just keeps on growing.
SocialistCatgirl 6 months ago
@SocialistCatgirl I acknowledge that their are discernable differences, but from my strict libertarian standpoint, I see them as only valuable if every last person is in full consent of the socialist measures. If one single person does not consent to his property being taken from him, it's fascism. You're arguing price, not principal.
HammerOvThor 6 months ago
@HammerOvThor
Well, it wouldn't really be fascism if the government was taking initiatives that were not to the entire population's liking. Under such a definition, every government across the globe is Fascist. Fascism is a system where you hold the state as the ultimate ideal and marry industrialism to autocracy. Its heavy emphasis on nationalism tends to lend itself well to totalitarianism.
There are libertarian variants of Socialism you might like. Left Libertarianism is worth a look.
SocialistCatgirl 6 months ago
@SocialistCatgirl Thanks, I will. From where I stand now, and from what I know, you can't really have a "left libertarian". A libertarian believes in the first principal of personal liberty, and once you establish that you believe in that, you have in effect subscribed to believe a certain way about individual issues. To be a left libertarian would render your first principal inconsistant and thus your belief a fallacy.
HammerOvThor 6 months ago
@HammerOvThor
It's a tricky conundrum, because Left Libertarianism emphasizes localized egalitarian efforts, which on the one hand emphasizes the self-ownership of workers but simultaneously weakens the self-ownership of capital holders. A good example of the system in action would be a democratic workplace, such as a co-op. Whether or not protecting one group's self-ownership at the expense of another's self-ownership can be counted as Libertarian is the heat of the conundrum.
SocialistCatgirl 6 months ago
I've come as far as I'm going to in this lecture. This man has a lot of substance in his analysis, but his chief flaw is that he is making synonymous "centrally planned economics" and "socialism". Socialism is, simply put, a broad category of political schools which make as their ultimate goal the democratization of the means of production. This CAN take on a form similar to the CCCP's government, but it can also assume (at the federal level) Social Democracy or (locally) unionism.
SocialistCatgirl 6 months ago
This guy is an idiot. My family lived in Nazi Germany and there was NOTHING socialist about it. Socialist does NOT = big gov (see left-libertarianism and anarcho-communism); socialist = worker control of production whether through state means or through unions, federations and other free-associations.
tstruss912 1 year ago
And the REAL Socialists in Germany were some of the first people Hitler had murdered.
"Socialism needs democracy (this is a quote by Trotsky) like the human body needs oxygen."
...
...and don't be fooled by the Nazi name.
itrainsinoctober 2 years ago
@itrainsinoctober True Hitler did have Socialist eliminated however keep in mind what Germany became within weeks is the natural evolution of a socialist government hence the reason why Trotsky was exiled. The totalitarian nature of fascism is the same in what happened in socialism systems. What Trotsky was not was a true study of History no more than Lenin, Ingalls and Marx because their ideological visions of extending power to the mob rule of democracy would inevitably produce a Stalin
Richdanahuff 10 months ago
@Richdanahuff
Rubbish!
This man is a vile hypocrite and a fascist himself: Look at his favorite Latin American regime: watch?v=HzvpxrbWpVM
The Right disown HItler because he was defeated. It is as simple as that!
MrReco12 9 months ago
@MrReco12 This is untrue, if you are talking about Friedman Chile today is perhaps the wealthiest S. American country DUE to free market capitalism not Corporatism. Co,mparing those in the right who want less regulation and smaller government meddling to a fascist totalitarian regime like Nazism is well to put it bluntly stupid and uneducated. Socialist like your precious left are far more totalitarian in their attitude than the right. I reccomend learning about economics and politics
Richdanahuff 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
Who should i believe?
A fascist sympathizer like Mr Reisman or a capitalist business owner in Nazi Germany Alfried Krupp who said
"The economy needed a steady or growing development. Because of the rivalries between the many political parties in Germany and the general disorder there was no opportunity for prosperity. ... We thought that Hitler would give us such a healthy environment. Indeed he did do that... "
MrReco12 9 months ago
@MrReco12 First off not everyone in Germany was Nazi there is more of a comparison with Obamas belief in eliminating the the constitution and Hitlers party actually suspending their own Constitution. Are you that ignorant of history the Dems were in power after WW2 and guess how many former German scientist we brought into the US afterwards?. How do you think we got their technology in fact how do you war victors get the technology the get after a war ends??
Richdanahuff 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
What rubbish.
ex Nazis who were respolble for massacring Jews joined the republican party and campaigned for Bush in 1988.
(3) Nicholas Nazarenko, leader of a Cossack GOP ethnic unit. Nazarenko was an ex-Waffen SS officer.
(4) Method Balco, GOP activist. Balco organized yearly memorials for a Nazi puppet regime.
(5) Walter Melianovich, head of the GOP's Byelorussian unit. Melianovich worked closely with many Nazi groups.
etc.
MrReco12 9 months ago
@MrReco12 Oh good god many american companies had done business with Germany and yes the Nazis. And you think that the Left is so innocent, who gives a shit if an ex-nazi voted for any political party it says nothing about the party line LOLOL. I am curious where you got so paranoid of the New World Order, I think you would be suprised how many countries leaders have done secret business with these ex-Nazis.
Richdanahuff 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
Back to the original point: Reisman is a fascist pig and a Nazi himself!
A nutcase who supported in genocide in Chilie!
MrReco12 9 months ago
@MrReco12 I don't think you know what your point is, you make claims that you think will discredit Reisman as if that makes his economic theories any less valid. Explain how you know that Reisman is a member of the Nazi political party and how do you know he supported the genocide. I can't wait to hear your responses.
Richdanahuff 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
here is a quote: "Pinochet is dead"-
"Life and liberty are positively helped by the death and disappearance of such mortal enemies."
He supported genocide against the Chilean people for the same reason the conservatives supported Hitler in the enabling act of 1933. To save them from a FAKE communist plot!
cont.
MrReco12 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
What is more damning about Reisman's love of pinochet and his genocidal nazi-like views towards communiuts worse is that we KNOW who the victims of PInochet were:
Here are two sides of the Chileans conflict:
watch?v=r9xOg4JSClY: Riesmans heroes
vs
watch?v=yO3-_ZiYsdw: Evil communists: This video actually shows oppostion and anti government rallies under the "communist dictatorship" of Salvador Allende
MrReco12 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
Victor Jara: A man who was tortured to death by PInochets millitary. : watch?v=d66yZ9x3gHw
Manchuca,film made by a Chilean who experienced pinochets bloody massacres of the poor: watch?v=bPDEGUuhXGU&
Reismans other heroes: watch?v=ojwx3BoDbTM
Again, as i have stated many times before the only reason Reisman the Nazi diwons Hitler is because of this: watch?v=QV_T8QXMH2Y
MrReco12 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
What do you think of Reisman now?
MrReco12 9 months ago in playlist Austrian Economics
@MrReco12 First off Chile was not genocide it was a violent coup where Pinochet eliminated Allende and his communist system and supporters to include Russians. Then Pinochet turned over the economy to the Chicago boys a trained group of economist whom Milton Friedman had trained in free market theories. Through free market capitalism Pinochets power was eliminated he protected the system from malfeasence and communist supporters. It succeeded in establishing freedom and is doing well to this day
Richdanahuff 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
Typical response from a closet fascist. Like Hitler, Pinochet privitised large sectors of the economy, created a secret police,first ever in Chilie, murdered communists, trade unionists and supported big business!
MrReco12 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
"People have an absolute right to rise up and defend their lives, liberty, and property against a Communist takeover. In the process, they cannot be expected to make the distinctions present in a judicial process. They must act quickly and decisively to remove what threatens them."
This is the same logic Hitler used he justified his atrocities.
MrReco12 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
One of the reasons why genocide supporting fascists like Riesman support PInochet is that brings back his Third Reich nostalgia:
watch?v=EhIczbT5XYU
Reminds him of the good old days: watch?v=vMyiqjMhVzw
Gray clad,human rights abusing goose steeping soldiers always manages to excite Mr Reisman
A true sicko!
MrReco12 9 months ago
@MrReco12 Where do I start I do not disagree that from what you have read and know Pinochet was a bad man there were far worse but he was bad, he set a climate that allowed atrocities to happen, I doubt he personally ordered the torture or abuse individual soldiers conducted butthe climate was there. The economist that were trained at the Chicago school of economics convinced Pinochet to release all state controls from the economy. To allow free markets to run unedited.
Richdanahuff 8 months ago
@MrReco12 Pinochet in his bloody coup could of run a dictatorship with total control but instead was convinced by his Friedman trained Phd economist to allow the free market to run. This choice created through the guile of the economist ended up toppling both communism that preceded Pinochet and Pinochets fascism in a very short time. By the way Pinochet was freely elected after the coup. For the first time the people of Chile could build wealth and a future for their children.
Richdanahuff 8 months ago
@Richdanahuff
PInochet was never freely elected, Reisman supports genocide but disowns the Nazis for one reason: Because they were defeated by the Soviet Union.
MrReco12 8 months ago
@MrReco12 For the first time the quality of their existence was improved through free market competition where prices are lower and quality is higher. They were no longer wards of the state they were free to choose their existence as they saw fit. They were able to take responsibility for their choices through the freedom of choice offered in free market capitalism. They could freely exercise their god given rights without having rights given to them by the state.
Richdanahuff 8 months ago
@MrReco12 They were only able to have freedom which eventually toppled Pinochet after he released control of the market without realizing that this freedom of choice would also mean he would have to be freely elected. Once Pinochet was finally gone the economy of Chile is the best in S.America. The elimination of fascism and communism were only possible when the people were free to choose once they got freedom they wanted all of it.
Richdanahuff 8 months ago
@MrReco12 I think the greatest result is the freedom the people can now express through the markets, the freedom to have initiative pay off for them, this initiative and productivity unleashed in the free market system unleashed a S. American economic powerhouse. Great countries are not built on collective discovery they are built on individual initiative that benefits the collective.
Richdanahuff 8 months ago
@MrReco12 I think you confuse corporatism with capitalism. Free market economy with no government is controlled by us the consumer and not business it is the expression of our free choice and this is capitalism. Corporatism is something else
Richdanahuff 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
You are a joke and fascist!
Supporting fascism over democracy every time. I repeat: THE RIGHT DISOWN HITLER ONLY BECAUSE HE LOST!
The only freedom conservatives believe in is the freedom for the employer to treat their workers how they like. Hence their support for Hitler and Pinochet etc.
MrReco12 9 months ago
@MrReco12 I support freedom of choice not left or right. I don't want government running my life like the left does. The left would love the government to take over everything in this country to be controlled like a socialist regime without choice. Where do you get the idea that someone who believes in freedom to choose is a fascist. The right and left are both in bed with corporations and the power is with them, the power belongs to the people free market capitalism is the answer we own America
Richdanahuff 9 months ago
@Richdanahuff
Reisman beleives that a government has a right to kidnap and torture opponents. Hence his support for this disgusting regime:
watch?v=EeUF_H8RBCQ
He would have been an SS officer he had lived in Nazi Germany!
MrReco12 9 months ago
@itrainsinoctober If 51% of the people agreed with totalitarian rule dynamics (suspending the democratic processes) and handed over the authority to a ruler what would the 49% do ? Ideologically speaking Socialism is beautiful in reality it is opportunity for Stalins to seize power and abuse the masses by initiating a state of terror within his secret police state. History has proven that the transition from democracy to totalitarian is a very short time period.
Richdanahuff 10 months ago
@itrainsinoctober Republics take hundreds of years of reducing its people to a democracy as it has proven through history is the most complex system to deconstruct and provides protections for its citizens throughout the decontruction process until its citizens rights are reduced to but a few choices. Look at the US we have allowed our government education system mislabel our government system a democracy eventually people are going to want it without understanding it
Richdanahuff 10 months ago
socialism is tyrany of the state, capitalism is tyrany of the rich. both of them are antithetical to true freedom.
TheCaptainLulz 2 years ago
@TheCaptainLulz: Capitalism is a nonsense word that the Communists made up. It thus only "means" the vilitication that the Communist means to convey w/ this epithet. It's the equivolent of "kulak." By "capitalist," you mean anyone who practices his fundamental human right of free enterprise. A logically necessary extension of the right of private property, which is necessary for human dignity.
VictorLepanto 1 year ago
@VictorLepanto fundamental human right??? ok, never heard that one before. As for the "right" of private proprety, you really think you have that? Ask the japanese ameericans of 1942 about their rights and liberties, they where taken away from them by the state the moment they truly needed them. Communism is worse, theres no "rights" evident in their system at all, and its hellish to be sure.
TheCaptainLulz 1 year ago
@TheCaptainLulz: I am talking about fundamental & natural rights. A natural right remains so even if a corrupt state refuses to recognise it. As for FDR's orders to round up Japanese, he was certainly our most socialistic president, until the current nightmare of course.
VictorLepanto 1 year ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
Look up the definition of SOCIALISM. It doesn't say anything about what rubbish he's saying.
MLadyAzzera 2 years ago
It does not matter how you define it, socialism simply IS government by what the governing body thinks is "moral" and use of statistics and studies in an attempt to even out what is a perception of "unequality" in society. Socialism also uses force, regulation and limitations to get what they want done. You can define it how you like, socialist scum always try to push the blame on to others. Hitler, Stalin, Mao all socialists but socialists are trying to bush the blame elsewhere.
kronosgyros 2 years ago
If you ACTUALLY look up the definition of socialism - the collective (state) exercise of ownership over the means of production - it matches EXACTLY what Reisman is saying. Whether the ownership is exercized directly (a la the Soviets) or de facto (the Nazis) is irrelevant.
You might want to look up the words you are using before complaining that someone else is using them improperly.
FletchforFreedom 2 years ago
"The classes and the races too weak to master the new conditions of life must give way They must perish in the revolutionary holocaust" karal marx.
jowns0 2 years ago
@jowns0
That is a misquote from the soviet story.
Real quote reads:
The classes and the races, too weak to master the new conditions of life, must give way. But can there be anything more puerile, more short-sighted, than the views of those Economists who believe in all earnest that this woeful transitory state means nothing but adapting society to the acquisitive propensities of capitalists, both landlords and money-lords
MrReco12 1 year ago
Is it because the UK government can't stomach imposing physical state terror on its citizens that they have resorted to surveillance, character assassinations, censorship and emotional blackmail via political correctness etc.?
NickDiPerna 2 years ago
This socialism sounds just like the UK where I live!
NickDiPerna 2 years ago
National Socialism is Socialism in the national interest. On the other hand, International Socialism is Socialism against the national interest,and is in the interests of Jewish Totalitarianism and the International Stock Exchange and corporate colonialism of all nations in the world.
Richardhedditch261 2 years ago
Well your antisemitic views aside, You just said yourself that socialism and national socialism claim to be acting in the interest of their country or even the whole world. So the natural conclusion of such a policy would be that infringements on basic, personal, individual rights are justifiable if they happen in the alleged name of the greater good.
And since Nazis (and even you) seem to have anti-Semitic views infringements on their rights would be claimed to be for the greater good, right?
Supenmanu 2 years ago
Wrong, dunderhead. I didn't say say "Socialism"[International Socialism;Communism,etc] acted in the "national interest". I in fact stated the opposite;ie;it is socialism 'against' the national interest. Communism and Internationalism is the work of the Jewish Race. Are you dyslexic, or far from fully literate, or so full of Jewish spoon-fed crap? Either way, I resent political debates with dunderheads like you who mis-quote, mis-interpret,and yet still don't know what they're waffling on about.
Richardhedditch261 2 years ago
@ Richardhedditch261: what you say is very provocative and antisemitic. And see i am not opposed to anyone and a friend of mine got mistreated cause he was right winged and i feel sorry for him. But than again you really shouldn't say the things your saying... it hurts people and just incites hatred and violence - and than you really can't complain if you reap what you sow.
Supenmanu 2 years ago
National socialism doesnt claim to act for the good of the "world". They act for their nation-they say.
shurednichso 2 years ago
Got conspiracy?
National socialism was an attempt at a regional utopia (germany)
International/global (21st century socialism) is the same NAZI values being pushed on the world to produce a world utopia. If Jews are or are not involved who cares, that is what it is.
kronosgyros 2 years ago
George Reisman is a totalitarian butthole.
treid100182 2 years ago
@treid100182 He doesn't know what he's talking about.
DaHonestAbe 1 year ago
@treid100182
Indeed, he admires mass murdered and facist General Augusto pinochet.
MrReco12 1 year ago
there is a proven better economic system.
The american system economics.
please read and watch the works of
lyndon larouche. He in on youtube!.
be inquizitive and at least think about
his ideas...thanks
777bal 2 years ago
freemarkets and monertism are this
mans goal please think . read lyndon
larouche's The christian Economy.
Ask yourself the question? I am under
the law of wealth and financiers,who
have no ability to regulate themselves!.
most contries are mixed economies.
777bal 2 years ago
NObama!
savida34e 2 years ago
This has been flagged as spam show
"We are socialists, we are enemies of today's capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are all determined to destroy this system under all conditions." --Adolf Hitler
Grebryspell 3 years ago
I'm serious, please do away with the idea that Europe is a model for the US. It is not.
Our semi-socialist pseudo-capitalism does not work, nor will it ever do. It doesn't provide us with anything besides high taxes, stagnation of the economy and lack of entrepreneurship.
PirroV90 3 years ago
I wish you knew just how lucky you are not to live here sccoast. : /
PirroV90 3 years ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
I think mild forms of socialism, like in Europe , is better and more humane than what we have in the USA. Raw capitalism is just as bad as socialism. When you are denied basic things for life, such as healthcare, because you have no money, that's wrong.The best policies are those that give us a broad middle class. Not a small amount of people owning everything .Extreme capitalist societies share that quality with socialistic societies.
sccoast1700 3 years ago
Has this guy heard of Godwin's Law or the association fallacy?
plasticbarf 3 years ago
well the key principal behind socialism is universal equality.
so any idiot can look at the comparison between nazism and socialism and throw that propagandic idea out the window.
somethingtrulyclever 3 years ago
Not very clever!
Socialism is collective (gov't) ownership of the means of production. Period end of definition. The Nazi's owned production through price and wage controls. These controls were maintained by physical force. (If the companies did not comply, the leaders were punished - put in jail or put to death!)
Mbowster 3 years ago
But Hitler took care of the left, too. In May 1933, he had labor leaders arrested & sent to Dauchau. He then installed the Nazi Labour Front, which was a joke & favored management. ALL SOCIAL CLASSES existed under the Nazis, & the middle & upper middle classes LOVED him, as he allowed private property & killed commies. Wages FELL for average German worker from '32-36. Also, a number of rightwing American businessmen played footsie with the regime, as did the Catholic Church/Lutheran bishops.
ciraldofan 3 years ago
Why do you assert that the American business men were "rightwing"? Ford was actually very progressive.
Hitler's assault on labour unions was not ideologically driven, but rather a pragmatic approach to hyperinflation. While wages fell, the absence of hyperinflation improved the standard of living for Germans in general.
Hitler hated Christians, and executed priests and pastors who dared to reisist him.
dragknuckle 2 years ago
Hitler's assault on labor unions was VERY ideologically driven...this is explored & written about profusely in Alan Bullock's great work, HITLER: A STUDY IN TYRANNY. Bullock points out how the young Hitler would not even join an artist's union as a young man in Vienna & his hatred of unions and their push for egalitarianism...totally at odds with his ideas of superiority & survival of the fittest.
ciraldofan 2 years ago
Interesting, and makes total sense. I stand corrected.
dragknuckle 2 years ago
Oh I bet thats how it works Reinsman, you are pretty comfortable at the top of the capitolist food chain arent you? Youve got your own subtle control and then socialism comes along and threatens to take away the freedom you earned though exploiting others and give it back to the people who you abuse daily and you get pretty frieghtened. For isntance, he says the goverment would own printing facilities! The who idea of socialism is that the people own the goverment, not people like this guy.
LordKingMan 3 years ago
Reisman is dealing with the practical implications of socialism as applied in the real world. He isn't wasting any time on theoretical models than have never existed because they are contrary to human nature. he is dealing with the fascist variant of socialism under which collective ownership of the means of production exists while the semblance of private ownership is maintained. But you're right that socialism is about "taking away the freedom" from people based on the LIE of exploitation.
FletchforFreedom 3 years ago
The definition of Socialism is a planned economy. Hitler had a planned economy, case closed.
The reason people think that Nazism wasn't Socialism is because they think of Socialism in an emotional sense, not a real sense, they think Socialism means helping the poor and being nice. In which case Hitler was not a Socialist, but neither was any government in world history.
MainSourceNo1 4 years ago
Your definition is wrong. Socialism is not planned and not authoritarian. Communism is... That's a huge difference ;) Believe it or not, it's true.
pippino1111 3 years ago
Wealthy states oftentimes become corporatocracies rather than staying as true democracies. People like Bush give more power and benefits to their wealthy friends on Wall St. while the rest of us suffer or are ignored. Wealthy special interests impede the democratic process and will of the people. Opposition to campaign finance reform only further distorts democracy by letting Big Money control the elections, not the people. Money shouldn't be an issue in an election!
Whoo69 4 years ago
Socialism doesn't HAVE to be anti-freedom. In fact, it promotes freedom and democracy by making workers equal in the company and letting them vote. They don't have that kind of power in a society like America's. They only have limited power as consumers and not much as workers. Execs. can cut pay, lay them off, and cut benefits whenever they want, regardless of what the workers want. Workers are the backbone of a company and deserve fair and equal treatment. Is that fair?
Whoo69 4 years ago
who says capitalism has to be free? during the cold war we put up countless coutnries that were completely capitalist but murdered hundreds of thousands of their own people. freedom is not measured by capitalism. during FDR's stay american companies were puting plans together to do the same thing here. maybe one day they'll get around to it.
Jovian84 4 years ago
Definition of Fascism - that nation which is ruled by corporation and for the benefit of it, through allocation of all wealth and resources for the Corporation. the Corporation is the STATE. Often a single leader with absolute executive powers known as a Dictator is integral but sometimes a governing legislature may exist atleast symbolically even if it has no authority. Absolute Corporate Monopoly (Corporate Communism) --Extreme Capitalism that extinguishes itself by becoming a Monopoly
VampiressOnDaProwl 4 years ago
you confuse Socialism with SOCIAL DARWINISM. Socialism is a measure to prevent Social Darwinism. Social Darwinism leads to the decay and decline inevitable in pure Capitalist society thru greed, poverty, houselessness, unemployment, joblessness, hopelessness, loss of freedom, equality, human and civil rights. Socialism blended with Capitalism revitalized a Capitalist society by repairing social decay, restoring prosperity to Middle Class, eliminating poverty and protecting rich people's wealth
VampiressOnDaProwl 4 years ago
Nazis were NOT Socialists. quite the OPPOSITE! they were FASCISTS. but they were SOCIAL DARWINISTS. ("SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST" or SURVIVAL of the FINANCIALLY Fittest, GENETICALLY FITTEST and HEALTHIEST or RACIALLY PUREST") definition of FASCISM - nation ruled by the CORPORATION and for the benefit of it, through allocation of all wealth and resources for the CORPORATION. the CORPORATION is the STATE. Absolute Corporate Monopoly (Corporate Communism) --Extreme Capitalism that extinguishes itself
VampiressOnDaProwl 4 years ago
Fascism & National Socialism is not the same thing. They were widely different in some areas & very similar in others. But they were /not/ the same ideologies. Hippie.
CSV1 3 years ago
Fascism is a very wide word. That is like saying there is only one democracy. Nation Socialism was just a name they gave it. Not a form of government.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
Hippies & liberals use the term "Fascism" to describe anything not "democratic". But Fascism was & is a specific ideology. Just like National Socialism is a specific ideology. Read up on it you uneducated hippie.
CSV1 3 years ago
They use it because that is what it is. Dumbass. I know what fascism is and I know what nazism is. They are the same thing. fascism is not a specific ideology. I am not a hippie or a liberal hahaha but nice guess lolol! actually it was a horrible guess lawl ignorant people like you make me laugh.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
Read up on Benito Mussolini, the Camicie Nere & Italy between 1922-43 & northern Italy 1943-45. Also, compare German National Socialist economic policy with that of Fascist Italy.
CSV1 3 years ago
Of course there different. That is like saying any other republic or democracy that is not exactley like the united states is not a republic or democracy. I know what your saying but the actual word is interchangable.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
A democracy can be based on Liberalism, Conservatism or Socialism for instance & a dictatorship can be based on Fascism, National Socialism or Communism. The "term" Fascism is used to describe totalitarian regimes because it was stolen from the Italian language & is used by liberals & hippies nowadays. But in its original shape, it is an /ideology/ & still exists as one today. Thus Fascism & National Socialism is not the same thing. Similar in some ways, but two different political ideologies.
CSV1 3 years ago
So what your trying to tell me is because chocolate was originally a drink, everyone is wrong when they say it is something you eat. So when we say chocolate we are wrong? That is idiotic It was not stolen it was based off of. Fascism can be many things. Your the only hippie.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
Read the original post I replied to, hippie.
CSV1 3 years ago
I read everyone your an idiot. How am I a hippie?
bob1qaz 3 years ago
You smoke weed & listen to decadent music.
CSV1 3 years ago
Incorrect sir but nice try :)
bob1qaz 3 years ago
But if thinking war is a bad idea and only an absolute last means in a defensive action is good then I guess I am a hippie.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
War is great, it thins the herd from faggots.
CSV1 3 years ago
You are a moron. War is just the destruction of human labor and life nothing more. You fucking neo-con bastard go to hell.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
I'm not a Neo-Con, because they suck Jewish cock. I believe in the holy trinity of Ultra-Nationalism, Militarism & Alcohol.
CSV1 3 years ago
Your an idiot. Killing young people for a social cohesion of allusion is no ultra-nationalism that is a disgrace military offense is useless.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
Don't be such a "new age we are the world faggot".
CSV1 3 years ago
Your the only faggot. You do not know shit. You actually think your know what facism is when you don't. You are a brainwashed biggot.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
It's spelled *Fascism & yes, I am a *bigot by today's faggy standards. But that does not mean we cannot be friends? How about a New Age hug?
CSV1 3 years ago
How about an old age sock to the face?
bob1qaz 3 years ago
We must invade Poland & secure Warzaw. Don't you support Ultra-Nationalism & black boots marching across the globe?
CSV1 3 years ago
Nop. I support individualism and technology.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
Individualism leads to someone owning you. The one who lies, the one who has more money, the one who deceives, the one who steals. I very much prefer a nation with strong community ties & a powerful state which holds Nationalism & Militarism as it's highest ideals.
CSV1 3 years ago
Wrong that just leads to dictatorship. Individual liberties is the #1 social cohesion.
bob1qaz 3 years ago
A nationalistic dictatorship is preferable to a decadent democracy with huge class differences, overcrowded prisons, stifling greed/hyper-capitalism, lobby groups owning parliament/congress & declining birthrates. Nationalism, Science & Discipline is a great combo.
CSV1 3 years ago
If freedom is worthless then I agree. But I go with the motto give me liberty or give me death.
bob1qaz 3 years ago 7
Yes, true democracy, otherwise I'll go with strength & unity instead.
CSV1 3 years ago
The main point with socialism is that everybody shuld have equal rights, not that everybody shuld be and look equal.
what can be wrong about that?
Nabo00o 4 years ago
no innovation/motivation for success
14534 4 years ago
finally some sense in the pit of socialism that is youtube!
llapole 4 years ago
or more nonsense in the capitalist-fascist scumhole of the media.
anarcrustie 4 years ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
socialism isn't completly bad. The whole world uses socialism. Health services, police, firefighters, post offices etc.
Absolute capitalism is just as bad as absolute socialism.
doford 4 years ago
About 40,000 traffic deaths happen each year on US public roads, but because it's a government monopoly provided product, it merely gets accepted as the way things have to be & no fuss is made. If private firms provided roads, can you imagine the outcry?
bobtassoni 4 years ago
Private roads wouldn't change a thing. Driving is a individual responsability. The vaste majority of car crashes are driver error.
I'm not a hard line socialist, i believe that socialism has gone to far in europe and america when it comes to your own responsibility.
A national health service makes sense. If your neightbour is sick it can move to you so it should be a social responibility.
doford 4 years ago
I appreciate you're not a hard line socialist. May I suggest a little reading before making your mind up on the gov't vs. private roads question? Find "Murder on the Roads" by Nathan McKaskle parts 1 & 2 & see if it's not just driver error.
bobtassoni 4 years ago 4
My comment was also addressing the existence of a double standard when it comes to judging govt vs private firm failure. A resigned acceptance & even blaming the victim or at most the hated office holder of the other party is the predominant response to the former, "the govt must step in" the response to the latter. If more good can be expected where people are more demanding, this dbl standard does not argue for govt control.
bobtassoni 4 years ago
Fletch is sadly still wearing his social blinkers.Simple question did the eastern bloc abolish the wages system?Did the workers own and control the means of production?
worldoffreeaccess 4 years ago
Tubub what a brainwashed sycophantic minion.
majorMcpharter 4 years ago
The soviet union was a state capitalist dictatorship.
majorMcpharter 4 years ago
I so enjot the dishonesty of socialists. They even invented postmodernism so that thaey can ignore reality when it is so (obviously) against them. But my favorite is that any (inevitable) failure of socialism must be renamed "state capitalism" (an oxymoron) because the dream cant be allowed to fail. To be fair, it isn't always dishonest; sometimes it's just delusional.
FletchforFreedom 4 years ago 9
There is no ruling class in a socialist/communist system.How can there be when the means of production are held in common.Wage labour and exploitation are ended.Sadly you are thinking of state capitalism that is nationalisation comrade,bugger all to do with socialism chum.I suggest you study the socialist standard.
majorMcpharter 4 years ago
right because people like Stalin lived the same way the poor freezing did. Socialism is totalitarian and that is a fact... no free market, free speech, free press. People are not robots. If someone tries harder than another and works up they will be rich or provide a good life for their younger's who may be rich. 100 million have been lost to communism and no more will be. Fuck communism rise to democracy and capitalism
tubub 4 years ago
Socialism/communism has not failed its never been tried.When the earths resources and the means of production are held in common it will be a classless stateless moneyless society.
majorMcpharter 4 years ago
Socialism/communism is a class system. The ruling class and the people who don't rule.
georgio316 4 years ago
U.S.S.R, China, Vietnam, Korea, Cuba, Costa Rica.... right, it's never been tried
tubub 4 years ago 2
They weren't true socialism, they were state capitalism,as opposed to corporate capitalism - calling themselves 'communism'. True socialism is rule of the people, by the people, for the people - without state coercion.
this old fart talking is merely trying to justify the current rule of the rich, by the rich, for the rich.
juliangibson 4 years ago
You mean true socialism is the rule of the mass, by the mass, for the mass. But in practise it will be: the rule of the leaders, by the mass, for the people.
Because the mass represents only the mass, and not the people. And the mass in incapable of thinking for themselves, so it becomes the rule of the leader.
koreapassie 4 years ago
So don't have a 'mass'. Do away with nations for a start, and have independent collectives instead; there are billions of people and thousands of ways to run things, why choose one for all?
juliangibson 4 years ago
You can't just get rid of a mass... Or how do you plan to do so?
And nations are indeed stupid but probably neccicary. It is not realistic to want to get rid of borders.
"..,why choose one for all?" Exacty!
Freedom means letting people run there own lives and letting people decide for themselves. (continue to next message)
koreapassie 4 years ago
Let people decide for themselves, whether they want ensureance, and don't force anyone to pay for universal healthcare. Don't force people to go to school if they have a diffent belief system. The only thing a state should do is to protect people's freedom, so that they can run their own lives. Government is not here to control us, or to tell us what we should do with our money.
koreapassie 4 years ago 2
Basically, I think we agree. The only problem is people aren't perfect and we always seem to screw things up somehow.
juliangibson 4 years ago
Yes indeed Julian, Socialism has not failed its never been tried.The brutal regime in the old eastern bloc was State Run Capitalism.
majorMcpharter 4 years ago
I see that you use the term "State Run Capitalism" in many of your posts.
Don't you know that the term "State Run Capitalism" is the same as Socialism?
It is not a form of capitalism it is the opposite of capitalism.
Antigreenie 4 years ago
Koreapassie, to protect peoples freedom, you must give them the ability to make choices.
If lots of kids cant go to school because their parrents belive they only shuld be thought in Christianity (or Islam) they won't get to decide for themself in the future, and that's not "taking care of their freedom", thats denieing them their right to invidual freedom.
That's also one of the reasons to why many countries do have a system to take care of the children incase the parrents can't.
Nabo00o 4 years ago
What the hell does this guy think he is talking about? people forced to have constant border identity checks and no freedom of the press? what political system is this idiot trying to prove is totalitarian? it's certainly not socialism.
In socialism there is no difference between the "government" and the people. the people are the government!
j0ofez2 4 years ago
Socialism is the social ownership of means of production distribution and exchange which should not be twisted into only state ownership has there are a wide variety of social ownership forms - co-ops - community - city - county as well as national ownership
nickglais 4 years ago
NICKGLAIS: How does a supposed scandanavian know so much about Ron Paul? By the way, I am still waiting for you to acknowledge the 20 million socialist victims of the Soviet Gulag, and the tens of millions of dead peasants resultant Mao's "second five year plan." And why haven't you offered your own definition of Socialism, since you imply that mine and Stalin's ans Mao's are wrong? SPOOK!
peterkolar 4 years ago
Look at Ron Paul he speaks about the Iraq War and the US Empire with its 700 plus bases around the world but by relying on Von Mises economics cannot understand the character of Imperialism - J.A. Hobson at the beginning of the last century let alone Lenin have the analysis to explain the US drive for Empire
nickglais 4 years ago
Ron Paul acknowledges and opposes the US empire. He wants to dismantle it. Did Lenin oppose or offer any explanations for the Soviet empire?
peterkolar 4 years ago
Lenin was dead before the USSR ever became the stalinist empire that most people would asscociate it with today. Please remember that Stalinism is NOT socialism and proving that stalinism is totalitarian does not prove that socialism is totalitarian because the two are enormously different.
j0ofez2 4 years ago
The brutal regime that collapsed in the old soviet union was a state capitalist dictatorship.The state owned the means of production and the workers still had to sell their labour power to an employer in return for wages.That is capitalism not socialism/communism.
majorMcpharter 4 years ago
Anarchism was a legitimate part of the socialist movement at the beginning of the 20th century and its anti state philosophy was incorporated into Marxism with Marx seeing the need for a transitional dictatorship of the proletatriat as a result of the experience of the Paris Commune
nickglais 4 years ago
Peter Kolar you remind me of the blindsighted who only count the military dead in Iraq and not the civilians - you can recite every death under socialism but are incapable of looking at the death toll of capitalism in the 20th century
nickglais 4 years ago
You are correctly seeing symptoms, but you are misdiagnosing the illness (post hoc, ergo propter hoc). Corrupt Governments controlling armies and controlling people via economic policies and propaganda are responsible for the deaths you blame on "capitalism." The real problem is the existence of this government power which will inevitably be bought by the highest bidder or conquered by the toughest thug. US Constitution = attempt to limit government power.
peterkolar 4 years ago
What kills peoples is the USE OF FORCE UPON OTHERS WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT, like any CHURCH's or STATE's INTERVENTIONS by war, inquisition or collectivism. The problem for nazism, communism and most forms of socialism is that they REQUIRED, by their very nature, the USE OF FORCE UPON OTHERS WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT. And that make most forms of socialism to be deadly. Free-Market, by is very nature, REQUIRED to "NOT USE" FORCE UPON OTHERS WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT.
anarkoFred 4 years ago
Thats anarchy..
plainlake 4 years ago
You said it I did'nt. But your right, Free-Market require anarchy. Free-Market is incompatible with State or any other monopolistic use of force. The use of force is legitimate only to protect people's liberty and property. State is'nt required to do that, free-association can supply protection of people's liberty and property. Thoses free-association can also supply social justice, help the poors, defend workers, protect environnement, supply healt care etc.
anarkoFred 4 years ago
well said. But do you mean that all police force ,military, welfare, firefighters and ambulances should be privatised? Call the police and for a small fee we will help you with your burgulars? The downside is that those without money loose all human rights. And all these major associations, will in reality become small gouverments. but its a nice thought.
plainlake 4 years ago
Most Anarcho-capitalist will say yes, but they admit that they can imposed any specific economic system even capitalist. There can be VOLONTARY-socialist association which could supply protection for anyone regardless to their wealth. If there's peoples to vote for socialist measure in our "modern democraty" there's would be peoples to engage themself in such VOLONTARY-socialist association.
anarkoFred 4 years ago
but they admit that they CAN'T imposed any specific economic system even capitalist. Sorry
anarkoFred 4 years ago
I truly agree, with you. neither socialism capitalism or any other systems should be imposed on people, not even Democracy. If its right or not, is only up to the people to decide. And you got propaganda from all sides that influence the opinion. this video is an example.
plainlake 4 years ago
Anarkofred: EXCELLENT! Well said.
peterkolar 4 years ago