What is the Difference Between Socialism and Communism?

The young socialists of today call themselves Democratic Socialists. They are "green" on the outside and "red" on the inside. They truly believe that they can do socialism in America much better than it was done in the twentieth century in the Soviet satellite countries which called themselves democratic socialist republics.

These countries were not democratic; they were tyrannies controlled by the Communist Party. The Communist Party represented about ten percent of the population while the other ninety percent were subjugated by the total control of the top Communist Party executive leaders.

The Communist Party leaders had a huge standing army, a huge street police apparatus, and a large security police controlled by the Dear Leader. The ultimate power resided with the tyrant and his wife.

What is Socialism?

Socialism is a societal form where the central government [the Communist Party] controls all the means of production, the centrally planned economy, government banking, all press, education, travel, health care, all churches, arts, publishing, and all media.

When asked what socialism is, people on the street answered this way:

-           Socialism is a political party that takes care of people; you Americans are not taking care of your people

-           Socialism is being friendly and sociable with others

-           Socialism is compassion, fairness, and equality  

-           Socialism is the other word for communism, and it was horrible, it killed a lot of people

-           I don’t know and I don’t care

-           Socialism is like a worm which destroys its host nation

-           Free stuff like the Nordic people get

Twenty-first century American socialists or Democratic Socialists as they call themselves believe that they can dispense with the political tyranny of socialism and keep the economic programs and thus do socialism the right way, never explaining what the right way is.

The elephant in the room is that under socialism, economic programs did not exist, you had to work hard for a meager salary. There was no incentive to work harder since everybody was paid about the same. This gave rise to the performance motto: “We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us.”

Under socialism, land and farms were confiscated, private real estate like nicer homes and hotels were confiscated. Any criticism of the government’s decisions landed one in prison for years and worse.

Shouldn’t rational human beings be able to learn from the experience of millions of people who suffered and died under socialism in the twentieth century, without having to live it personally in the twenty-first century?

The most obvious case against socialism is that it creates abject poverty, loss of all freedoms, and no prosperity because no human is so altruistic that would be willing to share all personal wealth and hard work with the lazy.

Socialism is propaganda, deceit, lies, and false promises. The Government uses force to control and change society. It is a tyrannical society of thieves. The main goal of socialism is communism. Vladimir Lenin wrote, “what is usually called socialism was termed by Marx the ‘first,’ or lower, phase of communist society.”

According to Paul B. Skousen, socialism has seven pillars. (Paul B. Skousen, The Naked Socialist, Ensign Publishing Co., 2014)

1.      All powerful RULERS

2.      Society divided into CASTES (see India) and CLASSES

3.     All things in COMMON

4.     All things REGULATED

5.      Compliance is FORCED

6.      Control of INFORMATION

7.      No UNALIENABLE RIGHTS

Skousen also wrote that there are 46 goals of modern socialists:

1.      Promote Socialism

2.      Demean capitalism

3.      No national boundaries

4.      Install Environmental Rulers (green energy)

5.      One-world currency

6.      Control the Internet

7.      Establish economic rulers

8.      Economic equality

9.      Ruler’s Law (bypass national law)

10.                             Render Congress irrelevant

11.                             Subordinate local government

12.                             Destroy representation (no free elections)

13.                             Deflate constitutional convention

14.                             Uphold 17^th Amendment

15.                             Regulate all transportation

16.                             Regulate all energy

17.                             Eliminate private property

18.                             Destroy family culture

19.                             Redefine normal and healthy

20.                             Destroy the sacrament of marriage

21.                             Discredit the traditional family

22.                             Destroy gender distinctions

23.                             Universal access to abortion

24.                             Limit family size

25.                             Replace God-centered religion with Humanist religion

26.                             Destroy church economies (tax exempt status)

27.                             Eliminate cash in the marketplace

28.                             Nationalize health care

29.                             Supreme World Court

30.                             One-World Super-Legislature

31.                             Environmental rights supersede Human rights

32.                             Nationalize all natural resources

33.                             Destroy nuclear weapons unilaterally

34.                             Neutralize Israel

35.                             Nationalize all industry

36.                             Synch animal rights with Human rights

37.                             Infiltrate and regulate all education

38.                             Control all information

39.                             Infiltrate and regulate labor

40.                             Uphold all labor as Optional

41.                             Discredit the U.S. Constitution

42.                             Discredit all Freedom Heroes and Founding Fathers,

43.                             Rewrite history to discredit American culture.

(The Naked Socialist, Paul B. Skousen, 2014, pp. 493-500)

What is communism?

Communism is a classless, stateless society. Communism promises that a communist society, even in the absence of work incentives, will produce greater quantities of goods than any other economic and political system in existence and each person will be provided according to his/her needs.

In the Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels wrote that property is to be eliminated and used for public purposes, income tax must be progressive or graduated, property of all emigrants and rebels should be confiscated, credit, transportation, and communication should be centralized in the hands of the state, a common plan for all production and agriculture must exist, all must labor in industrial armies, town and country must be abolished, agriculture and manufacture must be combined,  and education must be free.

“Communist production will produce a state of absolute saturation where all human needs will be satisfied. Supplies are to be stockpiled and distributed according to the needs of every person. Services are also to be made available at central depots and are to be available in such quantity that all elements of competition among consumers will be eliminated.” (W. Cleon Skousen, 2014, The Naked Communist, p. 87)

So, greed, selfishness, jealousy, coveting, markets, money, and prices will disappear? And who decides the needs of each person and by what metrics? You will own nothing and be happy about it? Who will measure your happiness quotient? Who will suppress dissention and dissatisfaction? How would selfishness be eliminated, which, according to communists, leads to class struggle?

 

Socialism for the Gullible

Socialism is the ideology of thieves and tyrants. – Dinesh D’Souza

 'Ship of Fools' (woodcut)

It does not matter how many people speak up against socialism, the steppingstone towards communism, and describe the miserable lives they lived under such system before they were able to escape to capitalism and its various opportunities, the useful idiots who vote time and time again for socialists and the fake Democrat Socialists, have no idea that they are voting themselves into poverty and misery.

The young advocates of socialism live well and safe under the umbrella of capitalism but have been brainwashed that it is so bad that they must change it to socialism immediately and at all costs.

Do they know what socialism really is? No, because schools spent no time teaching them in world history what it is and what it did in all countries in which it has been tried in the twentieth century.

Even socialist countries in Latin America and in Europe keep voting in more socialists expecting a different result. Many give up, sneak across the U.S. border and live illegally off the fruits of capitalism without paying any income taxes. Their children take advantage of the free education and health care system and all the welfare provided if their parents vote illegally for the Democrat Party in elections. They send remittances back to the countries they fled from, supporting dozens of other foreign nationals with welfare tax dollars from the U.S.

If various generations of Americans had studied in schools the world’s history of socialism, they would have learned that the socialist government controls all the means of production, education, land, property, industry, entertainment, travel, vacation, health care, banking, and centrally plans the entire economy. Nobody can own anything and citizens are not happy about it.

In the world of socialism, the steppingstone to communism, “war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength.” Among the young American socialists, men can menstruate and have babies.

Orwell wrote in his 1984 novel that Winston’s world was governed by the Ministry of Truth (arts, entertainment, education, and news), Ministry of Peace (war), Ministry of Love (law, order), and Ministry of Plenty (economic affairs). Newspeak, the official language of Oceania, referred to these ministries as Minitrue, Minipax, Miniluv, and Miniplenty. The Ministry of Love was the most frightening to the main character, Winston, as it was an impenetrable rectangle without windows. “To prevent any penetration other than official business, the building was surrounded by “a maze of barbed-wire entanglements, steel doors, and machine-gun nests.” Gorilla-faced guards in uniforms secured the streets.

Leaving Orwell’s euphemisms aside, the socialist governments everyone experienced in the former Soviet Socialist Republics around the globe were not farfetched from Winston’s imaginary world. (Orwell, 1984, pp. 4-5)

Socialism’s Thought Police was aptly described by Orwell. In real life socialist republics, people had no freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and freedom of thought. Americans like the libs of TikTok who constantly complain about the capitalist system as being fascist, would have been carted off to prison in a socialist country and remained there a long time for insulting the party, the Democrat Party that is.

The mainstream media has become the Democrat Party’s constant advocacy group. They repeat the same language of scripted narratives, not unlike Orwell’s Newspeak, the official language of Oceania.

Newspeak of Orwell’s 1984 had three components: the A vocabulary, the B vocabulary, and the C vocabulary.

The A vocabulary was small and only used for everyday life. Such words were not allowed to be used for political, philosophical, or literary purposes.

The B vocabulary was only allowed for use in political purposes. They were “intended to impose a desirable mental attitude upon the person using them.”

The C vocabulary was composed of scientific and technical terms. The words were stripped of any “undesirable meanings.”

The Newspeak reflected the 1984’s societal reality of the people of Oceania who had become soulless automatons by having lost their human qualities, the ability to express themselves clearly and meaningfully, and worst of all, did not even realize the loss.

Young American socialists truly believe that they can do socialism in America much better than it was done in the twentieth century in all the Soviet satellite countries which have failed their populations miserably and destroyed their lives.

Twenty-first century socialists think that they can dispense with the political tyranny and keep the economic programs. They think that this way, they can do socialism the right way. The problem with this thinking is that the economies of every socialist state failed because the Communist Party controlled the economy through disastrous central planning, confiscation of private property, land, and total control of the means of production. Any criticism ended citizens in prison and worse.

Shouldn’t rational human beings be able to learn from the experience of millions of people who suffered and died under socialism in the twentieth century without having to live it personally in the twenty-first century?

The most obvious case against socialism is that it creates abject poverty, loss of all freedoms, and not prosperity. No human is so altruistic that would be willing to share all personal wealth and hard work with the lazy.

Does Bernie's Democratic Socialism Exist and What Is It?

Democrats love to invent euphemisms that do not accurately describe the terms and the agenda behind the words. Such a term is Democratic Socialism. Bernie Sanders and all his followers promote very loudly Democratic Socialism. Do they know what it is?

All countries that were ruled by the Communist Party were Socialist Democrat Republics but, there was nothing Democratic about them, they were socialist countries where the authoritarian government owned the means of production by force and controlled everything else.

Such governments proclaimed the existence of a scientific socialism, but the country was run poorly by a handful of top Communist Party apparatchiks with their paid henchmen. People did not elect them; they were forced to accept their existence and tyranny at the end of a barrel of a gun or by voting fraud.

Bernie Sanders advocated the “kinder, gentler socialism like Denmark and Sweden” and millions of young Americans believed him, voted for him, and supported his “Democratic Socialism” platform.  

Denmark’s prime minister was unhappy because, although Denmark is a welfare state, they are not socialists. This welfare state is paid for by the entire population in the form of 25 percent sales taxes and income taxes of 60 percent starting at an income of $60,000 per year. The rich people in Scandinavia pay way less taxes than the rich in America. Bernie’s mantra that the rich must pay more to pay for his socialist paradise is ridiculous.

Sen. Rand Paul said that Scandinavian corporations have been paying on average 15 percent less in taxes than the corporations in America in the last twenty years. Just recently U.S. corporate taxes have been lowered to the level of Scandinavian countries.

The Prime Minister said, “Denmark is far from a socialist planned economy.” Scandinavian countries have private property, stock exchanges, and free markets. Calling Scandinavian countries socialist is bad for their business. Their economic freedom indexes are great, i.e., Denmark (10), Iceland (11), Netherlands (16), and Finland (17). I do not recall the former Soviet satellite countries run by dictators having any freedoms at all and the workers did not own any means of production or private property.

Does Democratic Socialism exist? Dinesh D’Souza wrote about Indian socialism which adopted Fabian socialism from England when India became independent in 1947. He wrote, “I grew up under Indian socialism – which I remind you was democratic socialism – and experienced its signature institutions.” D’Souza enumerated such signature institutions: everyday corruption (paying petty bureaucrats a bribe under the table), the ration card (how much sugar and cooking oil a family was allowed to purchase each month), and the seven-year waiting period to get a phone. (Dinesh D’Souza, United States of Socialism, 2020, p. 5)

D’Souza argues correctly that socialism fell because of its economic failures. He cites as examples North Korea vs. South Korea and East Germany vs. West Germany. When East Germany (socialist republic) reunited with West Germany (capitalist federal republic), East Germany had one third of West Germany’s GDP (gross domestic product). South Korea is 20 times richer than North Korea. (United States of Socialism, pp. 4-5)

Mao’s socialism was implemented through fear, deprivation, starvation, and tyranny and Soviet satellite states followed the same playbook to implement their socialism. His Communist Red Guard purged all dissidents. The dissidents were those who spoke loudly against the forced socialism. Vaclav Havel wrote a collective book on dissent, The Power of the Powerless, to point out the marginalized citizens called dissidents.

If so many millions of marginalized citizens, some famous, have escaped socialism and established in capitalism, why are Americans clamoring for socialism, for misery, deprivation, tears, and fear? They do not understand what socialism is. Schools spend little time studying socialism and communism.

Following the example of Mao and other socialist dictators, socialist governments nationalized all factories and confiscated private lands. The bourgeoisie (tradesmen, businessmen) were targeted and their properties were seized.

Mao wrote that he wanted to “destroy the property-owning class by killing at least one landlord in every village via public execution.” A cousin in our family was sent to prison for seven years for owning a nice home. A friend spent seventeen years in a lead mine because he owned a hotel in a mountain resort. Both lived to tell their prison-time stories. One eventually escaped to freedom in the U.S. The other died under socialist oppression.

Socialism is the steppingstone to communism when you won’t own anything, but you will be happy about it and your needs will be met by a benevolent government each day if you obey and behave appropriately. “From each according to his ability; to each according to his needs” is the guiding principle of a communist, classless society.

In The Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx and Friederich Engels wrote, “There are, besides, eternal truths such as Freedom, Justice, etc., that are common to all states of society. But communism abolishes eternal truths, it abolishes all religion, and all morality, instead of constituting them on a new basis; it therefore acts in contradiction to all past historical experience. (Simon & Schuster, Inc.,1964, p. 92)  

Marx and Engels’ fundamental changes proposed in the Communist Manifesto were adopted in every socialist republic that were Soviet satellites in the 20^th century:

1.      Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.  

2.      A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.

3.      Abolition of all rights of inheritance.

4.      Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.

5.      Centralization of credit in the hands of the state by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.

6.      Centralization of the means of communications and transport in the hands of the state.

7.      Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state.

8.      Equal liability of all to labor. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.

9.      Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of the distinction between town and country, by a more equable distribution of the population over the country.

Free education for all children in public schools.

(quotes from Simon & Schuster, Communist Manifesto, 1964, p. 94)

To all Americans who clamor for socialism, remember that your current capitalist way of life will become a distant memory once you adopt socialism. Diana Gabaldon wrote a non-political but fitting metaphor on cherished memories and possessions. “Things you cherish and hold dear are like pearls on a string – cut the knot, they scatter across the floor, rolling into dark corners, never to be found again. So, you move on and eventually forget what the pearls even looked like.”

Once you adopt socialism, you are forced to forget your former life and to accept the new reality of socialism, forgetting what capitalist freedoms looked like.

 

                             

  

Birth Rates in Western Civilization

It seems that Western civilization is breeding itself out of existence by not having enough babies to replace the people who are dying of old age or disease. Birth rates have plummeted across the globe, in many countries across Europe and in the U.S.

Niger has the highest birth rate in the world with 44.5 babies born per 1,000 people per year. United Nations and the World Bank rank countries in a different order. Central Africa appears to be the fastest-growing population region globally. Birth Rate by Country 2026

Vatican City has 4.63 births per 1,000 people per year. The next lowest are Hong Kong (5.43 births), South Korea (5.62), Ukraine (5.75), San Marino (5.92), and Japan (6.65).

There are many reasons why women choose not to have children: a slow economy, dearth of jobs, the costs of raising a child, people choosing to further their careers over a family, older average ages for first-time moms, and the desire to travel and sow one’s wild oats while they are still young.

Governments have given incentives to couples to marry in many forms, i.e. down payment on homes, free childcare, starting motherhood financial packages, baby bonds, free maternity care, free hospital care, and tax deductions per child.

Other countries face overpopulation with problems such as overcrowding, poverty, and overwhelmed health care, low life expectancy, and low education levels.  In such cases the government may pass laws to forbid having more than one child or give incentives to couples to have less children.

Because we have free or inexpensive contraception in western societies and “planned parenthood” which engages in abortions, the replacement population rate is quite low.

The population replacement level is 2.1 children per family. U.S., U.K., and France have a replacement level of 1.5-1.6 babies per family, below replacement value. Perhaps with all the illegals who come here for birth tourism, the birth rate may be slightly higher than the 1.5-1.6 replacement value. Chad and Somalia have the highest replacement value of 5.9 children per family. Which countries have fertility rates above or below the “replacement level”? | Our World in Data

People have more babies in countries where the mortality rate is high, or agriculture is a principal industry. Planning a family there rarely involves any contraception and religious beliefs play an important role as well.

The earliest known document on contraception was found on an Egyptian papyrus from 1850 B.C. which described a concoction made of crocodile dung inserted into the vagina. Strangely, sometimes it worked. The function of the sperm was not discovered until 17th century A.D. Other birth control methods included sticky suppositories made of various strange substances, elephant dung, Egyptian recommendations on a papyrus to drink potions, irrigation with drugs, douching with wine and garlic, and even instructions how to bring about abortions.

Besides the added cost of feeding another mouth when resources were scarce, a papyrus revealed that Egyptian women were worried about the physical results of having multiple pregnancies. The Greeks even used olive oil as a form of contraception by reducing motility of the sperm. The Ebers papyrus from the 16^th century B.C. advised women to use acacia extract and honey as contraception. Interestingly, the mixture contains lactic acid which is considered today a conception-inhibitor.

The Greeks and the Classical Age were in favor of population control via various methods.

Plato and Aristotle “advocated limiting the size of families by contraception, abortion, and unwanted infants’ exposure.” 

Hippocrates, the 5^th century B.C. father of Greek medicine, invented an intra-uterine device composed of a lead tube filled with mutton fat, partially introduced via the cervix into the uterus. The foreign body, IUD, prevented pregnancies.

In antiquity both Greeks and Romans desired to control the size of their families. In the 2^nd century A.D., Actios, a gynecologist of Amida (now modern Turkey) proposed the use of washing the male’s member with brine or vinegar, both highly spermicidal.

Believers of the Old and New Testament, ancient Hebrews and early Christians, believed that it was their religious duty to propagate the human species and intercourse was reserved for such duty.

It was not until 1843 that the cellular union of egg and sperm was understood. Surprisingly the ancient, without the benefit of a microscope used methods and “devices” to control the size of their families.

There are many fascinating theories of the ancients and tribal peoples as to how humans are formed. The Hindus blamed the ibis; the Japanese the butterfly and the crane; American Indians the red spoonbill; ancient Teutonic tribes blamed the stork, hence the fairy tale that the stork delivers the babies; Trobriand Islanders believed that children came from the spirit world; Papua and New Guinea believed the eels impregnated women. To avoid pregnancy women had to stay away from such creatures. Some women even wore charms to protect them from unwanted pregnancies and problems in childbirth.

We must remember that civilization is made strong by its people. With a dwindling population, countries become weak and open targets to invasions by others. Rome was sacked by the Visigoths in 410 A.D. because the Visigoths wanted what the Romans had, they did not want to become Romans at all. King Alaric captured and plundered the city. The world was in shock. Rome never recovered; the western empire fell in 476 A.D.