and thus i guess capitolism sucks and is the root cause of all of our suffereing
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hmm, wow, where do i begin?
"Capitolism" is a word to describe partisan grid-lock, and the fact that market forces are subsumed to the will of politicians in Wash, D.C.
"Capitalism" is an economic system whereby private individuals are allowed to own the means of production in order to extract profits at the expense of workers. Each worker is individually exploited as he is never paid the full value of his labor, with the difference being siphoned off as "profits" by the owners of the firm.
First: Your block quote is ridiculously inaccurate and racist. Please don't cite phony "articles" containing fictitious figures, it undermines your argument. And it makes you look like a fool for believing it to be true.
Second: The argument contained within the phony article is fallacious. More specifically it employs the "throw the baby out with the bathwater" fallacy. Originally the name of this fallacy came from German:
das Kind mit dem Bade ausschütten. Also known as the False Dilemma Fallacy. This fallacy represents the argument that if something is imperfect, then there is no way to improve it, and the whole thing must be scrapped. Which is of course, not true. Fallacious reasoning will earn you an F in your debate class. Please do not try it.
Third: Adam Smith, the intellectual and spiritual father of American free market capitalism in his seminal work, his
magnus opus,
The Wealth of Nations, warned us all that while free market capitalism is the most efficient means of organizing capital and labor, it must nevertheless be rigorously and vigilantly regulated either by a very strong government or by a very active tort bar, or both. Smith cautioned that free market capitalism will be forever in jeopardy of being ruined by the stupidity and greed of the capitalists themselves. Smith warned that the goal of every businessman was to control the market and fix prices, through monopoly, oligopoly, collusion and criminal enterprise. Smith further warned that a business-dominated political system would allow a conspiracy of businesses and the government against consumers, with the former scheming to influence the politics and legislation of the latter. Which is exactly what is happening right now.
Fourth: Plato the Greek philosopher, foretold in his book
The Republic, written in 380 B.C., that democracy, as a form of government, is vulnerable to being superseded. The enemy of democracy is not fascism (as most conservatives try to tell you), instead the enemy of democracy is plutocracy: rule by a class of elites. Plato warned that the natural trend in every democracy is for wealth to be concentrated in the hands of a few, which leads to an entrenched class of rich people, who then take control of the government, and who will eventually eliminate democratic rule, since they fear that the will of the people is contrary to their sustained wealth and power. Again, this is happening right now.
