Ah…next time put in a tag like ‘for the humor impaired, this was a joke’ and I’ll be able to follow along. 
-XT
Since I’d already directed everyone to drop this and specifically told you not to make those comments, I’m giving you a warning for ignoring moderator instructions.
But wait! Where will corporate America find low page workers to exploit?!
Actually, no-I haven’t. I Googled that phrase, and apparently it has only been said twice.
By you, in two different SDMB threads.
It wasn’t my expression, just something I heard somewhere. Is it true? You tell me. I’m sure that there have been examples of capitalism and socialism in history - weren’t the Pilgrims originally socialists, until that failed miserably, and they turned to capitalism which saved the day? Or is that an old wives tail?
The British and French empires started off ruling the world - then they get all socialist-y and now look at them.
As for Cuba, seems like people are combining the economic and political systems. They’re probably an example of communism plus socialism (failure). I’d guess China is an example of communism plus capitalism (blooming).
Trust me, I didn’t make it up.
Not an old wive’s tale-more than likely just another original idea of yours that you are trying to pass off as common knowledge.
Like the poor matter.
-Joe
:dubious: Is there an appeal procedure for this? I don’t think it counts as “flaming” to direct insults, however meaty, to swathes of the general population, however wide, so long as one does not directly flame another Doper.
Mr Smashy, it sounds like you don’t know what socialist means. You should probably look that up. Maybe the Pilgrims had some elements in their society that could be described as socialistic (although I’ve never ever heard anybody say that was the case), but the principles of socialism come from Karl Marx, and he was writing 200 years after the Pilgrims. China has an authoritarian government and parts of a free market economy, but “communism plus capitalism” does not make sense. What they are doing is sometimes described as state capitalism, but I don’t think that has to go hand in hand with an authoritarian government.
Let’s take this to private messages or ATMB, please.
Whoops, good catch on tale…
Sorry that you are impervious to reason wrt to the origin. I’m not nearly smart enough to come up with that stuff. Not like everyone else on this board, anyway :rolleyes:
Are you suggesting that socialism, as a concept but perhaps not labeled as such (which is certainly rigorous enough for the discussion we’re having), didn’t exist until Karl allegedly wrote about it?
In your defense, neither the phrase nor the idea you posted afterward seem at all “smart”, so I’m am sure you are capable of thinking up either/both.
Marx produced what he considered the principles of ‘scientific socialism’ in direct challenge to what he deemed ‘utopian socialism.’
I don’t know if you were joking about exploiting them or not (I assume so) since grassroots labor/environmental movements seem to be a natural progression when economic growth occurs. But I have heard no nation offers all the benefits of China.
A surplus of educated, healthy, young, low paid, obedient workers
Few labor and environmental protections
A stable, business friendly government
Good infrastructure
No other nation offers all those things at once. So hopefully that’ll give more leverage to labor against capital once China prices itself out of the market.
I’ve heard companies are moving to Bangladesh, Vietnam, India, etc. now that China’s standards are going up. But those nations all have problems China didn’t (too few people, illiteracy, health problems among workers, crappy infrastructure, etc).
I think applying Marx’s term to societies that existed long before Marx is always going to be a stretch and a matter of ideological interpretation.
That might be an interesting point even though that’s also his term. I don’t want to start a hijack about Puritan society. I was saying I don’t know where Mr Smashy gets his analysis from. I’m even more dubious of the idea that the British and French empires declined because of socialism. Certainly Britain was ruthlessly capitalist for a very long time (debtors’ prisons, colonialism) and that was independent from the reasons the empire declined (difficulty of governing such a geographically disparate empire, World War II).
Never heard it in my life. Then again, I don’t hang out with crazy whack job the market can solve all ills people. I am sure one of them said it. So just because you didn’t make it up, I would advise you against assuming the people you hang out with are a normal cross section of society.
I think Robert Owen, for example, would disagree with you. Except that he’s dead.
I don’t know either anymore.