Socialism = Penury, Says New York Times

Last week the New York Times ran a series on the current near famine in southern Africa. The following line appeared in passing in the story:

War wrecked Mozambique's economy; socialism and plunging copper prices reduced Zambia to penury; Zimbabwe's economy collapsed after the government seized its richest farms, which were owned by whites.

Perhaps some small amount of progress is being made when it is the unremarkable conventional wisdom in the New York Times that "socialism" reduces countries to penury.

Comments

[Jennifer]

I keep hearing about plunging copper prices, but copper cookware gets more and more expensive.

[TallDave]

Unbelievable. Walter Duranty is rolling over in his grave.

[Phil]

That's because, what with your pollution and your global warming, the air that takes up the empty space in and around the cooking surface of the pots and pans is getting more expensive.

[D.A. Ridgely]

Sure, now that the international cartels and robber barons ruined another people's paradise. ;->

[Jennifer]

Well, Phil, if I'm going to live in a trashed environment anyway then I'd at least like to get a nice, affordable set of copper cookware out of it. And a copper rack for hanging/displaying them. That's all I'm saying.

[Jennifer]

Copper rack for hanging/displaying it.

There goes my credibility.

[Frank Anderson]

joe,

Beat me to the punch, I was about to say that for most liberals and progressives that there is a world of difference of what Zimbawe does (forcefully destroy people's property and use terror to enforce the economic/political regime) and current-day liberalism.

Of course, most commentors here would say that what the current-day liberalism is just a less opressive form of what Mugabe does, but I don't think most people would see the expropriation of people's property, with compensation, for say public domain via an elected government as necessarily tyrannical.

[JMoore]

Nothing to this, really. For once, NYT's sloppiness results in their stating something the opposite of their core beliefs. Funny, but hardly an indication that the Grey Lady is anything other than a Red Whore at heart.

[JMoore]

My last comment sounds a bit trollish on a second reading. My apologies.

Anyway, my point is that we need not read anything into this. It's probably just an oversight.

[fyodor]

Interesting that Frank Anderson's use of the term "progressive" seems to back up what joshua corning said in the previous post, made at almost the exact same time, obviously before Frank Anderson could read it.

[Hakluyt]

Stretch,

All you need do is watch a documentary like The Corporation to see how anti-capitalist liberalism is.

[Jennifer]

You know, you can take one or two steps leftward on the political spectrum without going all the way to the extreme.

[JMoore]

joe

I don't "just know" the NYT doesn't mean it. But, weighing their track record of left-wing advocacy against this one tiny statement makes me suspect they don't.

And, liberals are fundamentally capitalist? Really? So-called classical liberals, perhaps.

[Yoda]

You know, you can take one or two steps leftward on the political spectrum without going all the way to the extreme.

Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny. Consume you, it will.

[Sandy]

That's great. Now can someone convince the Republicans of the same thing?

[joe]

Stretch,

I actually see Republicans compare abortion to murder all the time. Mainstream Republicans, a majority of them.

Democratic Congressmen salutin Che? Not so much, really.

JMoore, "their track record of left-wing advocacy" Like I said, workers comp, collectivization of farms...damn lefties.

[joe]

I like the reasoning here, though - everything but pure laissez faire is merely a variant of Marx.

The one drop rule - not just for Jim Crow anymore!

[Scott]

The one drop rule - not just for Jim Crow anymore!

We have far more than "one drop" of govt regulation.

"One drop" was a rationalization for oppressing individual human beings. As govts are creations of human beings and merely a means to an end, you cannot 'oppress' a govt by restricting it like you can a human being. Governments have no rights, people do.

[Ruthless]

joe,
Penetration, no matter how slight, and we will no longer be the Vestal Virgins here.

We are the keepers of the flame.

[Hakluyt]

Ruthless,

So, do we get to treat you like Postuma if it happens? 🙂

[Ruthless]

Hakluyt,
Without looking it up, did Postuma die with a smile on her face or some such?

Or am I thinking of just a big pimple that got popped?

[Shem]

Copper rack for hanging/displaying it.

Actually, an adjustable copper pot could make someone a very wealthy person. Somebody get Ron Popeil in here.

[Hakluyt]

Ruthless,

After that comment I thought to myself that I might be getting her confused with a Vestal Virgin was actually executed. Postumia was tried but not convicted. Anyway, the general punishment (I can't say how often this was adhered to) was to bury them in a large enough space and leave them some food and water. Obviously such an experience, well, sucks.

[Hakluyt]

Stretch,

No wyou are creating a strawman. Capitalism and minarchism are prefectly amenable to one another. A mixed economy is something entirely different and certainly isn't capitalistic. The French term dirigisme might apply as well to what liberals want - that is a an economy with very strong state intervention into almost all aspects of economic life while at least some of the economic life remains in the hands of individuals. That isn't capitalism. It may not be as bad as Castro's Cuba (a place that liberals generally love and defend with their last breath), but it isn't capitalism either.

[Ruthless]

"POSTUMIA. 1. A Vestal virgin, accused of incest in b.c. 419, in consequence of the elegance of her dress and the freedom of her remarks, but acquitted, with an admonition to be more careful in her conduct for the future. (Liv. iv. 44.)"

Hakluyt,
I had to look it up myself to get it right.
You are so right. Postumia is the typical Reasonoid posting here for sure.

[Hakluyt]

A capitalist system with a welfare and a regulatory state isn't capitalism. Capitalism requires that all (or at the very least nearly all - as in 99%) of the means of production are owned by private entities and the production, prices, etc. of goods and serves are determined wholly or almost wholly (again, 99%) by the market. A mixed-economy liberal state isn't anything like this. Indeed, compare such to the amount of the means of production are owned by governments in the U.S., or how much the government interferes with production, prices, etc. Anyone who considers a mixed economy liberal to be a capitalist is clearly wrong.

[Hakluyt]

Ruthless,

Many years ago I read a book on Roman religion that had a chapter on the Vestals. They were largely forgotten until the 18th century when their temple was unearthed. Following that romanticists went nuts over them.

[Hakluyt]

Someone needs to learn what solipsism means. Because quite clearly that someone doesn't know what it means. 🙂

That someone probably means arrogance or some like term.

[joshua corning]

"Penetration, no matter how slight, and we will no longer be the Vestal Virgins here."

but everytime i get fucked by the government it feels like the very first time.

[Isaac Bartram]

but everytime i get fucked by the government it feels like the very first time.

Funniest comment on H&R today, and you've had competition.

LMFAO

[Hakluyt]

joshua corning,

Oh no, don't let this start a Resevoir Dogs quote marathon. 🙂

Ruthless,

As a means to show people how much they have in common with libertarianism. 🙂

[Hakluyt]

nmg,

Yes, you are absolutely right, and that's why liberals (and conservatives) aren't capitalists.

[joe]

Begin rant

Another pet peeve of mine in the linguistic gymnastics that defines "capitalist" as "government not taking sides."

There are four types of inputs into economic activity: capital, labor, resources, and technology.

If I started talking about "laborism," you would immediately assume that I was talking about political philosophy dedicated to protecting labor, or those who supply labor. Ditto "resource-ism" or "technolog-ism."

However, we read "capitalism," and oh no, you're not supposed to understand it as a political philosophy dedicated to protecting capital, and those who supply capital. No, we're defining that as a politics that doesn't protect anybody.

And, in true Wharf-Sapir fashion, those supporting politics dedicated to protecting rich people, their money, and their power run around spouting off about how they're just letting nature take it's course, by being hands off, and don't want the government to favor anyone. And they get away with it because, surprise surprise, the people with the money have enough cultural power to pull something like that off.

End rant.

[jf]

cap-i-tal-ism: An economic system in which the means of production and distribution are privately or corporately owned and development is proportionate to the accumulation and reinvestment of profits gained in a free market.

Where is the word "government" in the definition? For that matter, the word "protection"?

[Hakluyt]

No, we're defining that as a politics that doesn't protect anybody.

Quite clearly it protects lots of people, be they folks screwed over on contracts, those defrauded, etc.

[Phil]

jf, the words "privately or corporately owned" sort of imply some sort of government context, no? If only to recognize ownership and protects the rights of owners?

[joe]

jf,

Quoting the dictionary definition is not a refutation of an argument that there is a problem with the dictionary definition.

Do you think the fact that Bush, and pretty much every other Republican politician in the country, gets away with talking about minimal government while shoveling graft to his cronies is a coincidence?

[Sam McManus]

What else would a "free market" be, though?

[Hakluyt]

nmg,

So, we've gone from a claim that liberals are capitalists (which joe now finds himself unable to defend) to a claim that a lot of folks who claim to be capitalists are in fact hypocrites.

What I'm saying is, the glorfication of capital and capitalists in the ideology of capitalism encourages the conflation of free market capitalism with crony capitalism.

Which is why libertarians also favor a minarchist government. Duh!