Great post, HT. I grew up among Cuban refugees in Miami, Florida. (Venezuelan expat joke about Cubans: 'You know why Cubans like South Florida so much? It's so close to the U.S.')
My explanation for why Communism always immediately leads to the enrichment of the guys in control and the impoverishment of "the proletariat" is kind of backwards. It's based on my belief that capitalism is the only economic system unabashedly based upon self-interest being the sole motivator and determinant of human behavior. (Which simply means I'm a cynic, which is a word that is grossly misunderstood and used as a smear by people who don't know what it means.) To the extent Communism is based on the terribly wrong belief that people will act in the best interests of anyone else or some vaguely defined "community" or proletariat, it is doomed to abject failure. Because, the elect who invariably end up controlling the levers of power are acting in their best interests, and not in those of anyone else. See, eg., Bernie Sanders' wife having a no responsibility but highly compensated job at a college (and running it into the ground) and buying a house on Lake Champlain with somebody's money, maybe her parents' for all I know. But in any event, she purchased the house with ... wait for it ... CAPITAL. The house is not made available to any members of any local workers' committees. It's that simple.
I mean, there was a huge Bernie Sanders tangent on my Twitter interaction. Twitter is always bad at nuance, and I think I failed on that branch... But any reasonable person who knew Bernie Sanders' history, and how his views have changed in lock step with his increase in wealth would have a hard time defending where he is now.
All of which is kind of irrelevant, Sanders is one man. Cullors and Garcia are two women. The fact of the matter is that there is a track record of corruption and the leadership always tend to be just a little more equal than the other animals.
I think, and I'm generalizing here, but I think that "communists" (Or "Marxists" or "socialists"), generally, aren't actually communists (Or). They like the idea of communism because they see it as a path to a better future. And so when they buy in to the band wagon, and they have the opportunity to either choose between self-enrichment or "their principles" (which I'm assuming they don't actually hold), they'll choose self enrichment because that was their goal all along. That's not going to be the story 100% of the time, there are obviously going to be some true believers out there, but I think if you offered basically anyone in the current discourse a million dollars if they never said the word "socialism" again, a majority would take it.
Great post, HT. I grew up among Cuban refugees in Miami, Florida. (Venezuelan expat joke about Cubans: 'You know why Cubans like South Florida so much? It's so close to the U.S.')
My explanation for why Communism always immediately leads to the enrichment of the guys in control and the impoverishment of "the proletariat" is kind of backwards. It's based on my belief that capitalism is the only economic system unabashedly based upon self-interest being the sole motivator and determinant of human behavior. (Which simply means I'm a cynic, which is a word that is grossly misunderstood and used as a smear by people who don't know what it means.) To the extent Communism is based on the terribly wrong belief that people will act in the best interests of anyone else or some vaguely defined "community" or proletariat, it is doomed to abject failure. Because, the elect who invariably end up controlling the levers of power are acting in their best interests, and not in those of anyone else. See, eg., Bernie Sanders' wife having a no responsibility but highly compensated job at a college (and running it into the ground) and buying a house on Lake Champlain with somebody's money, maybe her parents' for all I know. But in any event, she purchased the house with ... wait for it ... CAPITAL. The house is not made available to any members of any local workers' committees. It's that simple.
I mean, there was a huge Bernie Sanders tangent on my Twitter interaction. Twitter is always bad at nuance, and I think I failed on that branch... But any reasonable person who knew Bernie Sanders' history, and how his views have changed in lock step with his increase in wealth would have a hard time defending where he is now.
All of which is kind of irrelevant, Sanders is one man. Cullors and Garcia are two women. The fact of the matter is that there is a track record of corruption and the leadership always tend to be just a little more equal than the other animals.
I think, and I'm generalizing here, but I think that "communists" (Or "Marxists" or "socialists"), generally, aren't actually communists (Or). They like the idea of communism because they see it as a path to a better future. And so when they buy in to the band wagon, and they have the opportunity to either choose between self-enrichment or "their principles" (which I'm assuming they don't actually hold), they'll choose self enrichment because that was their goal all along. That's not going to be the story 100% of the time, there are obviously going to be some true believers out there, but I think if you offered basically anyone in the current discourse a million dollars if they never said the word "socialism" again, a majority would take it.
Communism is simply scam adopted by kleptomaniac sociopaths to gain wealth without having to work very hard. It's a scam of Bernie Madoff proportions.