Venezuela and Socialism

[Warren Dew]

(05-26-2016, 12:54 AM)Galen Wrote:

(05-25-2016, 08:26 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

Quote:The only action that is possible is for large number of people to simply stop obeying.  Until the US has its Soviet Union moment, for pretty much the same reasons, this will not happen and the status quo will be maintained.  It looks like at the very least Trump has made a deal with Sheldon Adelson which suggests to me that Trump will turn out to be a disappointment to his followers for much the same reason Reagan and Obozo were to theirs. 

We are far away from the scenario of the Soviet Union in 1990. It's when the police terror weakened and the Soviet Union started to take on democratic characteristics (free and competitive elections and multiple political parties) that the system began to break down.

Given the amount federal debt and unfunded liabilities we are not that far from such a moment.  At the time it looked like the Soviet Union was going to be with us and then suddenly it wasn't.  I think one of the reasons the Fed is holding interest rates at zero is because of what would happen to the federal deficit.  In order for the status quo to continue people must believe and when they stop it changes or disappears.

Another thing that happened in the Soviet Union was that people started using the bureaucracy against itself.  Combined with the fact that most did not do more than the minimum which helped sink the system.  Gorbachev tried to save the Soviet System incrementally but it was too far gone.

Economically we are close.  Politically we are not.

Gorbachev was Adaptive; Adaptives are naturallly tolerant and Adaptive leaders try to do their best by their people.  In Gorbachev's case, that meant allowing his government to dissolve.

Idealists would never do that.  Can you imagine Lenin dissolving the Soviet state?  The Soviet Union was on the verge of economic collapse for most of a generational cycle, with purges of tens of millions to keep the people in line in the face of mass starvation.  If things continue as they are, the best we can hope for is a bloody coup, or more likely revolution, against an oppressive socialist or fascist government.  More likely, progressive Idealists, Adaptives, and Civics maintain Soviet style oppression until we're rescued by Quiets well into the second half of the century.

That's why it's so important to install or convert leadership which will voluntarily start reversing the centralization of power that has been happening.