socialism

I note you take a while to respond. Is it because you're thinking hard, or because you're stumped? We did not invade Vietnam because we were trying to stop the Soviet Union. Vietnam was not part of the Soviet Union. It was an independent country, and the people within the northern part decided to turn communist. They posed no danger to us. We were simply paranoid and wanted to kill the spread of communism as quick as possible. They had the right to turn communist, and they did; The Vietnam War was the only war we lost, because we were foolish and didn't think about the repercussions of declaring war without reason. I am not a fan of dictators. I am a fan of justice and sanity, and if communism is a better system than communism, then I support it wholeheartedly, and blame the people who incorrectly implemented communism, not the concept of communism itself. There is nothing wrong with communism if it is used in a fair and just manner, with a democratic form of leadership and the abolition of currency. We did not wish to avoid a World War when we invaded Vietnam. If we had wished to avoid a World War, we would not have attacked the communists and sent troops. That will make your enemy pretty angry and it will start a fight. To avoid a World War, we should have simply negotiated peace and accepted communism as another way of handling economics, and we could have told the Russians to accept our capitalist ways. That might have resolved the fight. We didn't want to stop the fight when we sent troops into Vietnam. We were asking them to shoot us in the face. Might I add, though, that it was a COLD war, where neither party really wanted to fire because both sides were equipped with weapons of mass destruction. Sending troops to Vietnam was such a stupid decision that we should have been awarded a prize in stupidity. Might I also add that Vietnam did NOT instigate the conflict, the gulf of Tonkin incident was exaggerated and oversimplified in order to instill fear within the American public. Vietnam was NOT trying to team up with the Soviet Union, they just wanted to be communist, and they should have had that right. They're still communist today. The war did nothing to stop Vietnam from turning communist. We lost, and we lost our dignity and credibility in the process. Seriously, you should read up on the Vietnam War. It was the war which made the American people begin to question their government and question the sensibility of fighting. Americans received just as much propaganda and conformism as the other side, and they were just as gullible. https://www.usni.org... https://www.cia.gov... https://www.history.com... https://www.britannica.com... You think that only communists use their people as tools of the state? What do you think a DRAFT is? https://en.wikipedia.org... Now you're seeming to admit some things. You admit that Joe McCarthy was an insane raving lunatic. But doesn't he represent the viewpoint of America during the Cold war? He pointed fingers at people who were completely innocent. He was the living embodiment of paranoia. During the Cold War, I really wouldn't prefer either side. Both sides were filled with lies and hatred, and they were both futilely trying to win over the other. They were two kids fighting in a sandbox. That's how I see it. You call out the Great Purge for picking out political dissidents. Didn't McCarthy pick out political dissidents and throw them in prison for having unique outlooks on life? Isn't that the same? Is anybody truly better than anyone else? Can all wars be classified as black and white? Now you admit that Jim Crow was atrocious, that internment camps were just as bad as concentration camps. But you persist in saying that the dropping of the Atomic Bomb was necessary to save lives. It didn't save lives. It took lives. It's a death machine and you know it. It did not save any lives. By the time the bomb was dropped, Japan had been weakened. We could have just burst into Hirohito's palace and got him. But we didn't. We bombed two cities, two CIVILIAN cities, I might add, not just military bases. And all the people in those cities yelled as the fire tore them limb from limb. And then cancer was passed from generation to generation for decades. So yeah, I'd say the bomb took more lives than it saved. I never said capitalism is a new idea. I know that it has been going on for hundreds of years. That does not mean it is better than Communism. Observe the conditions of factory workers during the Industrial revolution. That was all in the name of capitalism. Communism is a new idea, and has many advantages over the idea of communism. For instance, in a pure communist country, the government has little control, there's no class structure, and no money. An ideal communist country is paradise compared to a capitalist state. We just haven't seen an ideal capitalist country yet. https://firstindustrialrevolution.weebly.com... Only the rich support capitalism. Like capitalism or hate it, you can't deny the fact that rich people love capitalism and poor people hate it. I live in Colorado, which is a pretty liberal, democratic state. I do know that on election night, we were blue, so the majority of us voted for Hillary, not Trump. I don't know about other states, but I don't know any rich people who would vote for the Democrats or any poor person who would vote for the Republicans. That's not the way it works. Only idiots would vote for the party that doesn't represent them. Rich people want to keep their money, so they vote for rich people like Trump who will give them more tax cuts and less affordable healthcare to the peasants. Poor people want more money, so they vote for democrats like Bernie who'll give the rich people more taxes and make healthcare more affordable. That's how the two parties work. To say they don't work like that is to say that you don't know beans about American politics. https://www.diffen.com... Communism has only been tested in 27 countries, and a few other countries once had somewhat socialist references in their constitutions. But there are over 100 countries in the whole world. I claim that 27 countries is not a fair testing number. In addition, many European Communist countries did not willingly become Communist, but were forced to become communist by the Soviet Union. These countries made up what is known as the Eastern bloc. If a country is forced to partake in a certain political structure, then the citizens of that country will be angered. Also, every Communist country that existed had a bad government and poor living conditions. Also, they had to deal with hatred from the capitalists. How could a country be good under conditions like that? Here's my proposition: We take a few acres of land, select a nice guy to be a leader- not a jerk like Stalin or Lenin- have the citizens plant some crops, build some houses, and see how things turn out. Really, it's as simple as that. https://en.wikipedia.org... https://www.worldatlas.com... We cannot conclude that communism always fails just because it hasn't succeeded yet. We can't conclude that a pie can't be made if we burn it in the oven every time. We need to try again, because communism sounds a lot better than capitalism. I have read many history books. Did you know that one requirement of a good history book is to be unbiased? It's true. A good history book will point the finger at Joe McCarthy and Stalin equally. What we read in history books isn't always true, you know. Historians can give negative or positive connotations to something, bend the truth, influence our minds- and evidently you're a victim of that. There has been an economic upturn for most communist states. But that doesn't mean every future communist country will have an upturn. We should not blame communism, we should blame the people who use communism incorrectly. The great Depression and the 2008 recession were also economic disasters, you know, and they happened because of capitalism. People can be communist and still reap what they've sown. They'll just reap PRODUCTS instead of CURRENCY. That's what I think you're missing about communism here. The only difference between communism and capitalism is that in capitalism, a person gets money for working, while in communism, a person gets food and furniture for working. That's it. It takes out the money, is all. If a country has enough food and furniture, then they'll be fine running the whole place communist. The Soviet Union had a supply shortage, so things were bad. That doesn't mean every country will have a supply shortage. I claim that capitalism is a system of greed. They might have tried to rebuild Europe, but they only did that so the people in the neutral countries would stay capitalist and prefer America better. There's usually a motive behind altruism. Here's a fun poster, made by those good old capitalists: https://upload.wikimedia.org... Here's an article about something which is about equal to the atrocities of Tiananmen square: https://www.npr.org... Communism does not have to have classes unless it chooses to, at which point it isn't real capitalism. You say I'm historically ignorant. I'm not. Ignorance is different than stupidity. Stupidity is the lack of knowledge about the world in general. Ignorance is the lack of knowledge about a certain topic. By declaring capitalism as good and communism as evil, and not understanding that the world is complex, you, sir, are being historically ignorant.