Social Libertarianism

Socialism equals economic equality (downward redistribution of wealth from the upperclass to the working and middle classes), capitalism equals economic freedom and corporatism equals economic inequality (upward redistribution of wealth from the working and middle classes to the upper class).
You can have a little economic equality and/or economic freedom or a lot, it’s a spectrum.
There’s different ways to downwardly redistribute wealth, from market socialism, social anarchism to democratic socialism, and different subsets within each of them.
I’m for more economic equality and economic freedom for the lower classes and less economic freedom for the upper class.
Taking money from someone or group and giving it to a profession isn’t socialism, if it isn’t a downward redistribution of wealth from the upperclass to the working and middle.
State intervention in the economy isn’t necessarily socialism, could be corporatism, meritocracy, nationalism, environmentalism or meddling, could be lots of things.

One man one vote is a form of political equality.
That being said, it does leave much to be desired.
Democracy would be more equal if it was more direct.

1stly, there’s different forms of socialism: market socialism, social anarchism, democratic socialism, the state isn’t necessary.
2ndly, state socialism isn’t, just the state controlling the money, the state controlling the money could be socialism or corporatism, meritocracy, nationalism, environmentalism, could be lots of things.
3rdly, insofar as the state is representing the people, it’ll do right by them, whether the people want socialism or capitalism, a professed socialist isn’t more likely to be corrupt than a professed capitalist.
Lastly, socialism isn’t about deciding who gets to be rich, unless deciding who gets to be rich helps lift the poor out of poverty.

Taking money from the likes of Donald Trump and Jeff Bezos (who don’t pay their taxes and hire illegals while we pay ours mind you) and giving it to the poor has everything to do with equality, letting them keep it is inequality.
Taking money from wall street (who got bailed out with trillions of our tax dollars) has everything to do with equality.
It’s a rigged system, the billionaires are above the law, the working and middle classes standard of living has been declining for decades while the rich get richer.
The economy and efficiency grow, but we got nothing to show for it except some smart phones and tablets, meanwhile food and housing is costlier than ever in living memory.

You’re conflating socialism with plutocracy.

You could say that about professed capitalists, what they often wind up doing is cutting taxes more for the rich than the poor, even tho the rich usually find ways around and can afford to pay them a hell of a lot more than we can anyway, we’re just scraping by.
They make it easier for the rich to circumvent taxes and hire illegals, bail out big business, overregulate and tax small businesses, expand government bureaucracy, NASA, the phoney wars on drugs and terror while claiming to have no money for social services.

The trouble with your thinking is when professed socialists are corrupt, you take that as evidence socialism is inherently corrupt, but when professed capitalists are corrupt, you say that isn’t capitalism, that’s socialism masquerading as capitalism.
I don’t think like that, that every time a professed capitalist does something contrary to his supposed principles, is proof capitalism is bad, that’s what polarized people do, I take it as proof that individual is bad.

Capitalism has pros and cons and so does socialism, I can listen to capitalists all day long and agree with a lot of what they have to say, same with socialists.
The problem isn’t ideology so much as the parties (and the men and women they comprise) we vote for are bought and paid for by the deep state.

Practically everything they do runs counter to their professed ideology.
They want to keep things on the ideological level, so we don’t notice they’re really just sociopaths who don’t give two shits about the unwashed masses.
And of course there’s only 2 ideologies, not 3, 4 or 4 hundred, and of course the two party dictatorship claims monopoly on them.
No they’re just social constructs, we make them up, which’s not to say the practical ones won’t have some basis in human nature and nature, but still.

These people have bad intentions, they’re liars and thieves, by and large it’s not bad luck or a consequence of their ideology, it’s by design.

Classical liberal is libertarian, but I’m also changing the definition a bit.
I’m making liberalism/libertarianism more about the social sphere and less about the economic, so it can be conceptually and linguistically combined with socialism.

The federal government is far removed from me, my family and community, I’ll give you that.
But local governments aren’t as far removed and I’m in favor of giving local governments more power.
However when it comes to multinational corporations, the federal government is necessary.
Multinationals are also far removed from me and mine, ran by a bunch of billionaires and operating offshore, corrupting governments, engaging in all sorts of sordid practices.
Buying out small businesses so they don’t have to compete with them, putting regulations in place small businesses can’t possibly afford to adhere to, blackmail, bribery, employing mafia and on and on it goes.
I want to get government out of our private lives as much as anyone, but at the same time, I have no trouble with local governments and the fed going after multinationals if it demonstrably benefits us, just as I have no trouble with market socialism, collective bargaining, cooperatives, unions and so forth.

For me, it’s very basic, and I know people don’t like to hear this:

The will of the people is being suppressed by the elites.

The republic is a failed experiment.

I’ll make my presidential campaign speech very simple:

I want to be the last president and turn this over to direct democracy.

It’s better to go out the most beautiful flower the world has ever seen, and make all of our conquerors envy us for all time, than to be a putrid bloom… and who knows, we may actually make it!!

It seems that you are saying that everyone should vote for socialism because they promised a lot of free stuff. And after they take the money from the rich, line their pockets, devastate the economy, and move into their distant palaces, we can all proudly proclaim that they were not “real socialists”.

Of course by that time, they won’t care. The economy will be destroyed, there will be no means to rebel, and voting will be Soviet style. Realize that along with economic control comes media control (if those weren’t already the same people). And with media control, all electable candidates and voting shall be as prescribed or not at all. Actual democracy doesn’t exist in socialist countries.

The US DNC is already a socialist party and already doing all of those very things. So try not to think about it too hard. Of course you are still free to say that they aren’t the right kind of socialists. They won’t mind, as long as you gain them votes.

Socialism is a cult methodology, forbidding truth to be known. They demand that everyone only speak State approved thoughts and recoil violently against any signs of divergence. Socialism seeks to protect itself above all else and thus freely seeks to program people into obedience, same as with Communism (displayed by China).

As I originally said, you are obviously very lost in the murky deep waters within your propaganda bubble of belief. If you were to actually use dictionaries and encyclopedias to discover the real meanings of things, I fear that the bright sun of reality would cause within you horrific insecurity, anxiety, fear, anger, hostility, and possibly extreme violence, as your bubble burst. It is a common occurrence these days.

I realize that you believe that socialists are all good Samaritans and exceedingly humane, but what happens if one of those deplorable bad people accidentally sneak into power? Think about how you would get any of your rights back once you fall under socialist control?

The Right believes that the Left has bad ideas.
The Left believes that the Right are bad people, so their ideas are not to be heard.

Look to Los Angeles, New York City, Venezuela. You can see what your socialist promotion brings. And they viciously seek to control the entire world the same way - extreme poverty for the unworthy, extreme wealth for the elite.

I know that you can’t accept any of that even if your mind would let you see it so I’m not going to pressure you as so many others would.

Sounds more like the synopsis of a dystopian horror movie than a good critique of socialism.

I think it’s time for you to ask a Rosa, 524.

This guy didn’t listen to a word I said, he’s talking to a stereotype, not to me.

His thinking is too binary to have a conversation with.

Not very, observant.

I’m not even a socialist, in some ways I prefer the US economy and society, in some ways I prefer the Scandinavian economy and society (which’s still predominantly capitalist), and in others I prefer the Visegrad Group (which’s again still predominantly capitalist), I have tried to synthesize them in my thinking.

That really sux man, should be free.

Would I be correct in thinking that everyone so far is not in favour of Progressivism?

Would then the primary point of dispute be over whether Social Reform is part of Socialism? The OP clearly states they do not think this is the case.

The other half of the OP is in favour of economic reform as distinct from social reform.

Assuming I am correct in thinking that nobody is in favour of social reform, there seems little point in arguing over it. Instead, what do you guys think about economic reform? Is it needed? If it is, when what kind?

That being said, I don’t support this Rosa Lichtenstein, this has nothing to do with me.

She’s anti-free speech and a thug.

I’d like to see a synthesis of rep and direct internet democracy, where the legislative, judicial and executive branches still existed and could propose bills, but they’d still have to pass through all three branches of government and could be vetoed by the people, likewise the people could propose bills with sufficient backing by the people (like say 10000 supporters), but they’d have to pass through all three branches of government and could be vetoed by the people.
Of course internet democracy is dangerous because there’s no paper trail.
I think we should still elect representatives, including those who administer the internet democracy by paper, while voting for bills online.

well i don’t know about that, but she is straight thuggin’.

if you ever change your mind, marx, rosa and i will be right here waiting for you…

Actually, internet democracy is pretty solid. You just have to make the source code public domain so people can see if it’s been altered. When a person shows their physical registration at a voting center, they walk in and receive a random serial number for that vote, which they can always check.

The problem of anonymous and transparent
voting through internet has been solved

We have the tools to do this

In socialism, there is no democracy.

Last I checked, they had democracy in Fennoscandia, which’s again not to say I like everything about it.
I think about society, government and economics 3 dimensionally.
I’m a nationalist, anti-immigration and a libertarian on social issues.
These positions also factor into who and what I’ll support.

Furthermore, the Nordic model is too corporatist for my liking.
From my understanding, it’s difficult to move up or down the economic ladder in Fennoscandia.
I want to make it easier for the poorest 99% to climb the ladder and the richest 0.1% to fall by eliminating taxes on the 99% and small businesses while increasing taxes on the 0.1% and big business (but of course not beyond what would render them unprofitable) while redistributing the wealth in the form of universal supplementary income (everyone with a legitimate source of income (an aboveboard job or income assistance) will be given an additional 10 grand by government or whatever we can afford).
Minimally regulate small businesses while maximally regulating big.
Increase corporate welfare for small businesses while eliminating it for big.

What I’m proposing is, as far as I know, historically unprecedented.
It would mean a gradual transfer of ownership and management of the economy from the top 0.1% to the bottom 99%.
Of course an overnight transfer would result in economic ruin.

either all that or partly nationalize and unionize or cooperativize all megacorps and run them in the interests of workers and consumers.
I say partly, because of course government and unions or workers won’t be able to run them by themselves, at least not initially.

Really?
I’ll have to look into that.

I’d want a mix of direct and indirect democracy, at least for a while, until the people became more educated about governance.

essentially the Fennoscandinavian model is democratic social corporatism, whereas mine is either proper social democracy or democratic socialism.

From my experience, most people here are lukewarm about or opposed to progressivism.
However, they’re split down the middle about socialism.

In general I think social democrats and democratic socialists could broaden their appeal if they ditched progressivism.
Most white and even some black and brown people don’t like hearing about how whites are bad, we’re not and we don’t owe anyone anything, and we still make up the majority of the Anglosphere, including the majority of voters.
Whatever success the left has had in recent years, it’s been in spite of progressivism, not because of it.

I think it’s by design, the deep state keeps the races, religions and sexes squabbling over scraps to distract us from itself.
They keep the working and middle classes fighting over taxes and wages.
They don’t want us to know it’s possible for government to help both classes simultaneously by going directly after the elite full tilt.

Here’s something like what I think should be done to help the economy:

eliminate immigration, so the working class doesn’t have to compete with immigrants for housing, jobs and social services.
In the 21st century, we no longer need economic or population growth, we need economic justice and sustainability.
While the offspring of skilled immigrants might, immigrants themselves don’t create housing, jobs and social services, they just compete for them.

eliminate offshoring.

Nationalize the central banks.

eliminate corporate welfare.

eliminate the war on drugs, the war on terror and bring all our troops home.

eliminate foreign aid.

Maximally deregulate small businesses while maximally regulating big business.

eliminate the carbon, sales and all taxes except the income tax and the unnecessary bureaucracy that goes along with them, eliminate the income tax on the poorest 99% and maximally increase the income tax on the richest 0.1%.

Nationalize postsecondary education and improve healthcare and public transportation.

Implement what I call universal supplementary income (USI, similar to but not the same as UBI): government gives at least 10 grand annually (or whatever we can afford) to everyone with a legitimate source of income (everyone with an aboveboard job or on income assistance).

so far the plans look good, but when you get into office be prepared to be heckled by economists who are going to worry you to death with their spreadsheets and market predictions and budget analyses and all that shit. that’s the real bitch about governance; a plan looks good… but how well can it predict what will happen when policy x, y, and z are affected.

‘The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.’ - hayek

I’m a big picture guy, I’ll leave the detail and grunt work to my underlings.
But if I like start getting the feeling they’re just trying to protect the elite’s interests, I’ll take a little more than they say I can take and see what happens.
If it works out, I’ll replace them with new underlings, but if it doesn’t, I’ll pull back a bit, and think of other ways to redistribute more.