Political Meme Thread 21.9.5 Endwalker

"Real socialism has never been tried" -- Real socialism, in terms of a command economy and public ownership of all resources, has been tried and has failed. So you're right on that one.

"That's a capitalistic society with a large welfare state" -- the reason you "hear that all of the time" in reference to countries like Denmark, Germany, Sweden, etc., is that they are, in fact, capitalistic societies with large welfare states.

Is this sentence even English?

Look, we can declare that a command economy and public ownership of all resources is called "Bob" and the economic system that exists in most of western Europe is called "Steve" if it'll stop you from getting hung up on the nomenclature. "Bob" has been tried and failed. "Steve" is operating successfully in many, many countries and has been for years.

And it works. When you don't redistribute wealth, you end up living in a Dickensian shithole. When you do, you can actually end up with a functioning society.

Now how many of them depend heavily on favorable trade terms and strategic defense agreements with evil capitalist nations to sustain it? What happens to them if everyone ceases to be evil and capitalist?

They don't need the defense agreements anymore?

In all likelihood they’d need them even more.

Dollar amount is a cake.

you make $1
your neighbor makes $100

You pay $4 in taxes
Your neighbor pays $10.

Is that equitable?

No.

https://itep.org/who-pays-taxes-in-... year, the share of,this group (20.9 percent).

Why would non-evil countries attack them? Are they really that annoying? Maybe, instead of defense agreements, they should learn to just not play party music at 120,000 dB every Thursday at midnight.

Non-capitalist generally means some variant of Marxism. Not known for being good neighbors.

How many times did we invade Mexico, again? And were we a Marxist country when we did it?

Again with the shifting definitions.

Are Sweden or Denmark bad neighbors?

Nor is the US, if you have oil or some neo-con fuckwit thinks you are a better target in the War on Terror.

Or if you're a civilian in a 'Stan the US propped up the brutal dictator of because it needed his airfields to bomb other 'Stans.

Or a Kurd.

And yet, strangely, which way are the immigrants moving?

Europe, if they get the chance.

Hmmm, yeah, about that . . .

Your entire fucking nation are immigrants.

I also note that even with only 5 of the 27 EU nations (I'll include the UK because of geography) on your graphic, we're within 10 million of the US total.

And I further note that, as a percentage, Canada has you biting the curb with the foot descending. Y'know, Canada, with the socialist medicine?

I accept your surrender. You may have an

You could offer me an orange slice, if you're willing to accept you rely on immigrant labor to harvest it.

Hmmm . . . I just ate a tangelo, as a matter of fact, and I've no idea where it came from or who harvested it. I'm assuming Florida and some flavor of hispanic, but for all I know it came from India and was harvested by a Philippino.

Not to worry! They will keep at it until it works if it kills every last one of us in the process. No sacrifice is too great!

What are their immigration policies? Finds like a perfect fit for you, unless you already live in such a paradise.

so you'd have millions of people doing "fun" stuff and nobody doing the not-so-fun but very necessary stuff - what could go wrong? On the bright side those willing to do the very necessary stuff should be able to negotiate a huge income.

So, you don't think that people would be doctors and nurses if they didn't get paid for it? You don't think that people would grow food just because they liked doing it? You don't think that someone would be a garbage man just for shits and giggles? Because there's a whole lot of things that I'd do for fun that it wouldn't matter to me if I got paid for them or not, provided my basic needs were covered. And some of them are actually necessary things for society. My present job, for example, is one such a thing that I'd do for fun, even if I didn't get paid, simply because I've learned so much from it. It's also somewhat necessary, as well.

Oh, so we're back to "if you think your country could be better, you should leave it." Thanks, Spiro.

The immigrants that the political right wants to push away? Those immigrants?

In the case of this particular immigrant, however, I came to Europe...

Interesting what you can do with statistics.

Of all the countries in the world, the US has the third largest population (far behing India and China, sure, but way ahead of everyone else). Your chart uses brute numbers of immigrants to try to make it look like the US is the country most favoured by immigrants. But if you put it in terms of per capita percentages (those little numbers at the side, grayed out so they don't show up much...) the results are vastly different. And it doesn't even include a country like Switzerland, widely reputed to be anti-immigration but with 27% of the population who are foreign-born!

So your argument is that even though many millions more people come to the US than anywhere else, because the US already has a large population that immigration flow doesn’t count?

If you're throwing a party with 200 guests, an extra one or two won't make much of an impact. If you're sitting down to dinner with one other person, an unexpected stranger at the table might be more difficult to either ignore or serve part of the meal.

However, if you're a super friendly person with lots of money or food to throw around, maybe that extra stranger isn't a bother at all.

If it's my party, I will decide who the fuck may show up.