Wonderful letter to the editor
Our local newspaper -
The Bellingham Herald published a wonderfully succinct letter from a reader in today's edition:
Socialism already has killed about 100 million people
A recent letter writer declares himself a socialist and mischaracterizes capitalism. Allow me to provide an alternate view.
Socialism is based on coercion, force and violence. National socialism (fascism) and communistic socialism have already killed about 100 million people.
Under socialism, people enjoy no rights. Any individual, or minority, may be sacrificed to the "greater good" as determined by the majority or whoever holds power. The form of "cooperation" socialism depends on is involuntary.
True capitalism is based on liberty, reason, free exchange, voluntary cooperation, individual property rights and the rule of law. It helps to create the closest thing to a meritocracy yet discovered by rewarding creativity and productivity. It makes the poor better off.
Capitalistic countries have better records of preserving the environment than more socialistic ones. Compare the natural environment in the United States, Switzerland and Japan to the environmental devastation in China, Russia and Brazil.
I am a member of the Libertarian Party. I joined because I am a socially tolerant advocate of free markets. I believe that you should be able to choose how you live your peaceful life, not some utopian socialist bureaucrat from the left or the right. Socialism requires violence. Liberty yields justice.
Bruce Guthrie
Bellingham
Could not have said it better myself...
Posted by DaveH at December 19, 2004 12:29 PM