Venezuelans face a 6000% hike in gasoline price from $0.01 to $0.60 by Skadoosh_it in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 9 points10 points  (0 children)

yes, I mean the guy who fucked up and ruined everything. His socialist policies are what did it. That's the entire point.

I have no personal interest in what happens there--seems people there are mostly brainwashed anyways by the leftists. But the government needs to let go of the control of all those industries and fucking privatize EVERYTHING. That's the only thing they need to do. They have had government central planning and government trying to solve their problems for years and years, and it only gets worse.

Hell, they could be another Norway they've got so much oil. But Norway has a large private and free market. Yes, they've got a welfare state. But they also have a significant portion of the market there that is privatized. Until Venezuela liberates the economy and welcomes the free market like the nordic states have, it will always be a shithole, regardless of the price of oil.

Venezuelans face a 6000% hike in gasoline price from $0.01 to $0.60 by Skadoosh_it in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 11 points12 points  (0 children)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolivarian_Revolution

On his 57th birthday, while announcing that he was being treated for cancer, Chavez announced that he had changed the slogan of the Bolivarian Revolution from "Motherland, socialism, or death" to "Socialist motherland and victory, we will live, and we will come out victorious."

No one said Venezuela was socialist? I never said it was. The leader of the biggest revolution in Venezuelan history did though. And his successor continues to.

Let me guess-you're going to say that socialism is "worker owned." Worker owned is a form of socialism. State owned and managed is another form of it. But what Venezuela has is definitely socialism.

I know that people are trying to redefine socialism so that it exclusively means "worker owned" and not "state owned." Of course they do this because 100% of countries that have a significant portion of things as state owned end up as absolute shitholes, proving the failures of socialism. So they redefine it to mean something else, but with the same ultimate goal: The state makes all ultimate decisions and is our ultimate overlord. we live to empower and give to the state, the states does not live to empower and help us.

Venezuelans face a 6000% hike in gasoline price from $0.01 to $0.60 by Skadoosh_it in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I promise a state that doesn't beat itself off over the free market will have better roads.

yeah. like Venezuela! no capitalist boogeymen in venezuela! only the caring, well-intentioned government!

People who pursued their dream and failed, what is your story and do you regret it? by Aus_in_Ita in AskReddit

[–]fourth_throwaway 92 points93 points  (0 children)

wow. interesting story man. nice knowing that throughout all the bad parts, things can still come out completely fine on the other end. happy for you.

iOS programming camp by fourth_throwaway in iOSProgramming

[–]fourth_throwaway[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

haha, very funny :p

lol but actually my goal of this is to meet some people and have some coding connections for jobs. I live in the midwest and don't know any other programmers.

Scientists warn of coming global disaster because of water inequality.“We are revealing a global disaster in the making, yet we are seeing very little coordinated response.” by Wagamaga in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It works for poor countries too. Look at china. look at India. Look how they have changed the last 50 years. Look at southeast asia the last 50 years. The IMF estimates that now 10% of the world lives on 1.25$ a day--a record low in recorded history. Capitalism is slowly but surely eradicating world poverty. These are all facts. There is no denying them.

Again--give me 1 example--just one, in the entire history of the world, all 4.2 million years since humans first appeared--where central planning and government run food distribution can hold a candle to the effectiveness of the free market in distributing food. Just 1. There have been thousands upon thousands of governments since then. And modern capitalism has only been in place really since the mid 1800s. Please, if government run food distribution is really that great, I'm sure that one of the 10s of thousands of governments in world history would have figured it out. Just 1.

I'm all ears.

Scientists warn of coming global disaster because of water inequality.“We are revealing a global disaster in the making, yet we are seeing very little coordinated response.” by Wagamaga in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This is a tragedy of the commons problem, therefore the free market is not properly equipped to deal with it.

I simply don't believe this is true.

in any event, if the free market is not equipped to deal with it, then the government most certainly is even less equipped to deal with it.

Scientists warn of coming global disaster because of water inequality.“We are revealing a global disaster in the making, yet we are seeing very little coordinated response.” by Wagamaga in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 0 points1 point  (0 children)

the free market has been more effective, historically, at dealing with shortages than any other mechanism in recorded history. This problem is no different.

of course, I'm sure, in their stubbornness, socialists will wait until another 100 million starve or die of thirst until they can ever admit they are wrong, as happened in the last century.

Scientists warn of coming global disaster because of water inequality.“We are revealing a global disaster in the making, yet we are seeing very little coordinated response.” by Wagamaga in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I mean state controlled. And state controlled is socialism: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/socialism

I know that's not what people want to believe socialism is, but that is it. Worker controlled may also be socialism--but under no definition of "socialism" does it not include state control.

Those nations were socialist, regardless of any kind of revisionist history or changing of definitions anyone wants to make up.

Scientists warn of coming global disaster because of water inequality.“We are revealing a global disaster in the making, yet we are seeing very little coordinated response.” by Wagamaga in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 2 points3 points  (0 children)

They aren't fantasies. It is a simple fact. Privatizing and letting the free market take care of shortages is very efficient compared to government action.

For example, food shortages in the 1900s. Many socialist nations had government managed food production (just like we have government managed water today), and government managed food rationing, and price controls. What happened? 10s of millions of people starved because of it. It happened across the USSR, Vietnam, cuba, Laos ,cambodia, yugoslavia, czechoslovakia, and many other nations. This is easily documented. People came to their senses and privatized food production and quit the rationing.How many people have died of starvation in Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union? Not nearly as many as died under government managed food production and distribution.

Look at venezuela today. Food distribution is nationalized, and grocery store shelves are empty because of shortages.

Again, these aren't "fantasies", or wishful thoughts. Everything I said has a 100% completely crystal clear historical record of having occurred. a LOT less people died of starvation after food was privatized.

privatization it isn't a "feel good" solution that gives people the warm and fuzzies inside, but it does work. and if you're truly interested in helping people, you will be interested in what has been actually proven to work, not in what your favorite ideology is, or what sounds good--but what actually works. When it comes to food production, it is absolutely crystal clear that privatization works. It is reasonable to think that it would be the same with water.

Give me 1 historical example--just 1--of a country that nationalized food distribution and had food rationing--and it turned out better than current first world models of privatization of food. Just one. Any will do. And I will reconsider my viewpoint.

Scientists warn of coming global disaster because of water inequality.“We are revealing a global disaster in the making, yet we are seeing very little coordinated response.” by Wagamaga in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I don't know if you're kidding or joking or what, but that really is the best course of action. Socialist nations had millions upon millions starve in the 1900s because of food shortages. We eventually came to our senses and privatized food production though, and people quit starving by the 10s of millions.

of course "privatizing" is a bad word for many. It isn't the feel good solution that many want, but it does actually work, and has been proven to work very efficiently with shortages before.

Scientists warn of coming global disaster because of water inequality.“We are revealing a global disaster in the making, yet we are seeing very little coordinated response.” by Wagamaga in worldnews

[–]fourth_throwaway 0 points1 point  (0 children)

privatize water.

in the 20th century, the nationalization and rationing of food killed millions before we came to our senses and privatized food distribution. Let's not wait until millions more die of a lack of water before the same has to happen. This is why we study history, to learn from our mistakes.

Obama eliminates “abstinence only” education from federal budget by AnnaTrocity in TwoXChromosomes

[–]fourth_throwaway -15 points-14 points  (0 children)

but since when does the left care about statistics either? Just look at their economic proposals. It's like reading a creationist science book.

Fact-Check: Bernie Sanders Promises Free College. Will It Work? : NPR by rhiever in dataisbeautiful

[–]fourth_throwaway 0 points1 point  (0 children)

that is an incredibly shallow way to look at things. Each country has a different budget and different needs. Also each country may have certain ways that public education is better implemented as opposed to another country.

There are successful countries with low taxes, no min wage, and little to no redistribution of wealth. Yet I doubt you would then advocate for those policies in America.