It seems to me that the real villain in our culture is GREED, along with his running mate, CORRUPTION. Those two killed the mess that was masquerading as Communism in Eastern Europe and the USSR. It very nearly killed our system back in the days leading up to the Great Depression (the best argument against unbridled Capitalism that anyone could offer). It has undermined all attempts to create more equitable solutions here in America now, and has since the Roosevelt days.

My only question to those who advocate "free market Capitalism", which has been a phantasm in America (except for the underground economy), is simply "How can a system that rewards greed (the accumulation of capital is clearly an advantage) be expected to correct the problems caused by greed?

you have to keep in mind something that was raised earlier in the political threads - big government in the US came about to offset the excesses of big business, i.e., the free market capitalists. If you don't accept this, get a hold of the PBS series on the Rockefellers; it's probably at your local library.

One last point to stir things up before I get to work. Marx was trying to describe what he saw as a natural economic progression; he didn't posit Communism as an alternative to Capitalism as much as a possible result of Capitalism. What Lenin imposed on Russia and Eastern Europe was not what Marx suggested would happen. Communism would grow in industrialized nations, not the agrarian backwaters like Russia or China. The fall of the Soviet Union was not the failure of Marx's predictions; as far as I know the only real attempt to thwart what Marx saw as inevitable is the socialism practiced in the US and England. A socialism that the Republican administrations have been furiously trying to dismantle, a piece at a time.

I am not an expert on Marx. Nor am I a communist. I think it's impractical in a country this size. I believe there is an accountability problem that comes into place as people who are used to sneaking by (endemic in our society) are suddenly released from the coercive elements of capitalism. I am a republican socialist, in that I put more trust in the republic than in the states, the market or rule by the masses. Democracy in an indifferent and often ignorant society is meaningless.

Jump right in. Enjoy your day. I'll check in later.

Bart