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Date: Tue, 11 Sep 2007 01:11:51 -0400 (EDT)
To: improvetheworld &AElig umich.edu
From: Andrew Reeves <andrew.reeves &AElig wayne.edu>
Subject: Re: mind the gap

    Danny, and everybody else in this dinosaurian debate
(please forward as appropriate, as I am not sure how to do that):

    You are goading me to enter the fray, but I am still resisting. One of
the great luxuries I am enjoying as an American is that I do not HAVE to get
involved in debates of this sort, in glaring contrast to early-Communist
Hungary in the late 1940's when "Dialectic Materialism: the Overthrow of
Exploitation in a New and Just Society" became a required subject in the
CHEMISTRY (as well as any other) curriculum at the University while the
classes on "Resonance Theory of Chemical Bonding", along with all biology
classes based on the gene theory of heredity, were dropped. This was by no
means an isolated phenomenon: ideologic purity was valued higher than
technical expertise in all Communist societies whose first priority was,
naturally, self-preservation. It was this mentality, eventually overriding
all other considerations, that was the decisive kick in my ass to assume all
the dangers and difficulties of escape and starting a new life from scratch
in the West.

    You guys seem to have been asleep (or perhaps not born yet) during most
of the twentieth century. As far as I am concerned, the mention of dinosaurs
in the salutation was not only a reference to their size, but also to their
obsoleteness. Today, after the conclusion of this most turbulent century in
human history, it is no longer necessary to compare societal systems on
their  THEORETICAL beauties.  We now have historic experience. The "Daddy"
model, the "Coconut" model, and all others, including the "value surplus"
model of Marx, are of course ludicrous oversimplifications.You can debate
those models until you are blue in the face. Why not just look at the
HISTORIC RECORD, and realize that Socialism, for all its good intentions,
DOES NOT WORK and must be eventually propped up by police support that in
the Stalinist/Maoist extreme became a veritable nightmare. Capitalism, for
all its basic selfishness, WORKS and does not need internal reinforcement.
That does not mean that it is perfect, and the Capitalist system is indeed
constantly subject to vigorous debate and changes here-and-there. Try to
just suggest this in a Socialist/ Communist society and you know where you
will end up. And if you say it is unfair to compare the American model to
say Russia which was subject to absolutism even under the Czars, I have the
perfect controlled experiment for you: Just compare East and West Germany
1949-1989. One people, one tradition, comparable industrial/agricultural
base; only the occupying power and the governments they imposed  was
different. Then compare their standard of living, personal freedoms, even
the bare looks of towns and villages. QED, and you guys can go on beating
your dead horse.

--Danny's Grandpa (now also Great-Grandpa) Andrew.