BCITORGB wrote:
Tnt says:
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Totalitarian Capitalist ?????????
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Nazi Germany springs to mind. Chile in a previous iteration.

Although, given the nature of this thread, I'm going to quibble with
you a bit. I'll contend that so long as nations confer welfare (both
individual and corporate), there exist absolutely NO capitalist
economies.

Like communism, capitalism is an interesting academic concept. I'm
reminded of my college physics texts which prefaced questions with
"assuming no friction" in order to make the theoretical concepts
easier
to comprehend. In the case of both communism and capitalism, if you
could preface your explanations with "assuming no human avarice, ....
oh hell, let's keep it simple: assumimg no common human traits".

I find it interesting that you should label Canada as DS, and the USA
as DC. What lead you to that conclusion? In your mind, how is the USA
more capitalist than Germany?

Cheers,
frtzw906
++++++++++=

Oh yeah, I forgot about the NAZI, that means National Capitalistic
party! No wait, I am wrong, that was National Socialist Party. Sorry
they don't fill the bill.

Regarding Chile, I spent way to much time in Mexico, a Latin American
country, to believe you would put Chile forward as a defining example
of a Totalitarian Capitalistic country. Granted the beggar selling
pencils on the street could be considered a free Enterprise
entrepreneur, but hardly a capitalist. Judging from that, even N.Korea
could be a capitalistic country. Sorry again, you've got to do better
that that.

Regarding Canada as Ds, Us as DC, and Germany as DS. Maybe we get to
the heart of the difference of definitions. The D part has to how we
select or arrive at our leaders, and we seem to be in agreement here
that Democracy and elections are the preferable process. When we look
at the S or C distinction, is where we differ. I see it as more than
the production of profit aspect, but also the distribution of profit as
well. In a C environment the individual produces and determines the
distribution of the proceeds of the production. In a S environment, the
individual produces, and the government determines the distribution.
Now there are degrees of involvement of the individual and the
government in both production and distribution. Countries with more
involvement are defined as Socialistic, and countries with less, as
Capitalistic.

In the US we started out as the great experiment in capitalism, after a
shaky start at communism in some of the early colonies. Did not take
them long to figure out that would not work, so they issued everyone a
plot of land where they could raise their own produce, and sale any
excess for a profit. The Jamestown colony started prospering after
that. Not all the colonies were set up the same. However after the War
of Independence, and other struggles, they established the idea of
capitalism as being central in our country.

Then as a new country, they found they needed to raise taxes to support
a Dept of Defense, and then other necessary Depts. Finding out how
easy it is to raise taxes, and spend the money for our good, various
poiticians got the idea this was a good thing. Which brings us up to
today. There are some that want more federal involvement, hence more
taxes, and there are some who want less. Less fed, and less taxes. The
first are social liberals, and the second is capitalist conservatives.

There is no pure capitalism economy, and you are correct in asserting
this. But there are those of us who would like to keep it as
capitalistic as we can. All politicians love to collect money to spend
on their pet projects, and some are quite expensive. We can only hope
they are necessary, and that our politician is watching out for our
best interest.

I could consider myself more of a libertarian, though that doesn't hold
much clout in any government by definition. So you compromise. TnT