White privilege certainly exists, and I have shown two statistics to point this out already. Not that that proves in and of itself that systemic, institutionalized racism exists, but at least I'm actually posting verifiable data instead of bullshit conjecture and anecdotes. Like the saying goes, the plural of anecdote is not data.

That being said, the fact that poor white people exist in America does not disprove white privilege. It merely underscores that in capitalist society oppression occurs mainly on a socioeconomic plain as opposed to a racial one.

Boner:

Late getting into this thread (first, I had to figure out who Veta was).

Is perennialness of Mediterranean countries a function of their sea power? Sea power, trade, and markets all support each other, and the United States will retain prominence if it continues to support all three.

skrum: read Guns, Germs, and Steel.

We had to read a few excerpts of it in my intro to anthro class as well as watch the documentary which was modernized. pretty good stuff if you've ever wondered why white people [europeans] have had so much influence on the world in the last 500 years

"Let me ask you, what is the measure of a government of a society? If you answered the general prosperity of the individuals of the nation on a whole you would be correct. This is not the most universal or articulate means to measure ruling institutions but it is definitely self evident. Let me explain, the more people in a given nation become prosperous, the better job the government is doing."

Can any Nation beat China here on that one right now? I guess not. Despite all this human rights talk, China is getting its population and not only a few of them, richer by every day passing by. Thats a fact.

Adding some points to the talks about countries to live in. Since Germany has been named here, i have to say that there is not much difference here. You have the wealthy middleclass that has put a monopol on good education for their loved ones while all the others including foreigners and lower class germans lack the chances to profit from the system. Its not like there isnt the chance to make something out of ur life. More theoretical than pratical though... Of course here in Germany minorties "mourn" too much and dont just "take their chances". So same bullshit over here too...

Arguably china is the most successful government by that measure currently but I'd argue that neglecting to take into consideration their censorship and chokehold on ideas is a big draw back to life there. Despite all the corruption and nonsense here in the west the truth usually comes out. Not everyone will believe it and nobody usually acts on it but eventually we find out things like how bush made shit up and ignored the international community to invade Iraq for oil.


I'm not being very articulate but I hope you get my point, I think things like socialism should come about naturally as marx suggested and not forced through revolution. Ultimately socialism grows out of capitalism not the other way around as it has in china. For that reason I feel china will face some major challenges in the future. Lastly I'd like to point out while china is actively pursuing policies to improve the stations of it's people they are still miles behind places like Lichtenstein (and so is much of the world) in standard of living.

Keep in mind people per capita wealth isn't a good measure of individual prosperity so I strictly neglected mentioning it.

Conservatives want to let nature take its course, hence their hands-off approach. Meanwhile, Liberals are trying to force socialism upon society (see Obama, Barack)

if you look past the pretty-picture chinese megacities, a large portion of the country is really dirty industry (which is why a lot of our jobs go there). two major concerns of mine about china is this massive population of migrant workers that work for minimum minimum wage, and have no homes, and whenever the global economy goes down a little, they have no means to live. also, there is something like 100 MILLION extra guys than girls because of the rampant abortion of females due to the one-child policy (which is slowly being eased up on in some ways, thankfully).

from my conversations with chinese immigrants, ones that hung out in tiananmen square for a few days before shit got serious, they said that the (corrupt) leadership couldnt control the younger generations natural progression towards capitalism. basically the country while technically "communist" is driven by capitalism now, and the momentum is too much to slow down now.

also, these chinese immigrants laughed at me when i asked if they wanted to take the skillsets that they learned in the west, and take them back to china. they couldnt understand why anyone would want to leave the us.

we were just saying that as far as what a good government should do for the livelihood of its people china is the only one working on it.

obviously they're still way behind the west in standard living and per capita income

Harry, hands off of what? If the Republicans were completely hands off I'd be fine with that. If they literally wanted to change nothing it'd be a lot harder to criticize them. But thats not how they operate at all.

Read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nolan_Chart
"Conservatives and those on the right tend to favor more freedom in economic areas (example: a free market), but more government intervention in social areas (example: abortion)."

Basically conservatives want to take away your social freedoms like, fireworks, drinking on sundays, abortion, etc. That's pretty unamerican if you ask me. The only thing that conservatives are "hands off" about is the economy and we know how well that's been working. The hands off approach to the economy was trounced in the 1930s when the whole world went into a recession, it took john keynes's revolutionary economics to fix our poor understanding of capitalism. Now that we've again rejected those notions we're in a stagnant economy that isn't improving... go figure. The government should have a hand in the economic well being of its citizens and it shouldn't have a hand in what the fuck I put in my body or if I want to shoot fireworks in my backyard. That's my opinion anyway. The federal government is concerned with commerce as it should be. Whether I can buy beer or not on a weekend should not be an issue at any level of government, such policies are tantamount to ruling by sharia law. The same goes for bullshit like giving out no bid contracts. That shouldn't happen at the federal level, but guess what it always happened when a business man gets into office (cough cheney cough).

So anyway greek, if you came out as supportive of libertarianism i'd have a lot more respect for you. But I can't stand conservatives, because their ideology is by definition against freedom. Conservative comes from the same root for constrain just like how liberalism and libertarianism come from the same root for liberty. These latter ideologies are rooted in freedom, the former is rooted in control. Not regulating the economy is tantamount to allowing the rich and wealthy to regulate the economy. I'd rather the government which is legally bound to protect our rights run the economy than let greedy old men run it.