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WarMageI am pro-democracy but I have been becoming anti-capitalistic more and more recently.
All depends on which type of "democracy" you support first off. If you are going by the 1913 definition:
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Government by popular representation; a form of government in which the supreme power is retained by the people, but is indirectly exercised through a system of representation and delegated authority periodically renewed; a constitutional representative government; a republic.
[1913 Webster]
I am with you all the way. Modern "Democracy" on the other hand, as we allegedly have in the US is a very distorted and corrupt version of this form of government, where money rules, circumvents, manipulates and creates law, and corporatist tyranny is not too far away.
As far as the anti-capitalism, in its current form, I have to disagree. I think the main important thing to realize, and as has been mentioned above, is that the current system we have is not free market capitalism, but a largely distorted version thereof. When your government is bought and paid for by the corporations, both "democracy" and capitalism, along with the personal freedoms guaranteed us, cease to exist IMO.
I personally believe free-market capitalism, theorietically, is the best way to guarantee the common people freedom. What went wrong, and seemingly is repreated all throughout history, is that the people became content, fat, and stupid and let the unscrupulous bastards of the world take over.
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WarMage: I believe that me and all those around me will be further subjugated by those with the wealth.
I agree, but I would add it is not so much as those with the wealth, but those with wealth who use that wealth to manipulate the system. An increasingly common practce for sure. Wealth in itself is not a crime, it is how you use the wealth.
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WarMage: Will capitalism ever help us to realize a utopia
Only if we can eradicate greed and corruption from the human makeup...good luck there. 
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Ehtheist: BTW, the big companies against which your rail are made up of investors-large and small.
Do some research into the percentage of the stock market which is owned by the stock market. These big, multi-national companies and the elites who rule them are becoming as powerful as small nations, and that is a very dangerous prospect. They are selling out us serfs for profit and the bottom line.
I fully agree that Socialism is not right. When you get right down to it, it's theft. It doesn't matter that the government plays the middle man and does the stealing for you, it is still theft. We are guaranteed to be secure in our property by Constitutional law, and to deprive the citizens of their property is unconstitutional and leads to slavery.
So where do we go? What next? Well first, I think we need to abolish the federal reserve, go back to a gold standard upon which are money is backed by worth, put a damper on the banks, deflate the dollar, pay off the debt, and then repeal the 16th Amdendment and parts of the 14th, in that order. Then we need take back our media from corporate interests so the people get the truth, limit the reach of presidential Executive Orders, change our foreign policy, dismantle the military-industrial complex, write a constitutional amendment considting of about 50 sentences, each starting with the words "government shall never", stop "privatization" schemes, etc etc etc etc. That is a rough outline, undoing the legislation which has haunted us for nearly a century. Lot of work to be done. 
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Jestah: A $150,000 a year job is well within the reach of anyone and all that's required is a little motivation.
Certainly, to an extent I agree, although those opportunities are disappearing quite fast. We are exporting our jobs on a large scale and future prospects look grim. For instance, China and India are negotiating at this very moment in a sort of partnership where China would handle IT hardware and India would do software. Goodbye to all the well-paying American IT jobs. As DL said, we created the problem ourselves, but we can also uncreate it.
GM, our largest automobile manufacturer just posted huge losses, and reports a few week ago had some analysts calling their bonds junk. We are to have Chinese cars on our roads in the not so distant future, sure to be cheaper without all the regulation and unionized workforces.
The dollar continues it decline in value, many countries which bought the dollar are now switching, fully or partially, to the gold backed Euro.
All goes hand in hand though. Our money is currently primarily backed by the blood & sweat of hard working Americans, remove the oppotunity to bleed and sweat and that money becomes worthless.
What happens when a country, over an extended period of time through the overuse of credit, consumes more than it produces? Eventually you will have a crash, as many economistas and market analysts are now predicting. The middle-class disappears, and all you have is rich and poor, the rulers and the slaves.
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Jestah: Influence by the powerful is just the way things work.
Does not mean we give up, almost sounds like you are conceding defeat.
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NoJive: I have a huge problem with the whole walmart business model.
You and me both. On the Walton family, five of them fall into the 15 richest people in the world (#10-#14) with approximately $20 billion each.
In the end, we the people are at fault the most. The people can still take it all back, preferebly the same way it was taken from us, with little bloodshed, but first they need to be awoken from their slumber.
Edit, excellent post Dan.
Ramasax
(Edited by Ramasax on 04-21-2005 01:06)
posted 04-20-2005 16:46
