Zonorhc

Um, okay. So, tell me... Do you actually have any justifiable and, moreover, logical opinions or are you just going to spout the same rhetoric and drivel in an attempt to stand out from the crowd and show off how oh so tough you are by making vague statements about the survival of the fittest in some pathetic rendition of the Nuremberg Rallies, with a good bit of maladjusted nihilism on the side?

Wow, a holy man who isn't a right prig. Ah, you Brits... If you can't win the cricket, at least you can come up with good things like that.

The failure of communism as a system of government and economic management comes from a number of factors. Firstly, the ideal communist state will have at some point in the past already industralised under a capitalist system. Given this, most states will in fact be unable to make the transition as the power base of the capitalists will be too strong to overthrow. The Russian revolution was a success because of the incompetence of the current ruling class, the superior organisation of the new ruling elite, and that it ignored the fact that Russia had not fully industralised by 1917. If it had, however, there would simply have been no way for communist ideas to take hold, since only the powerless in a capitalist system would actually support it. However, given that, at the time of the 1917 revolution, the power of the Tsarist state over the people rested almost entirely within the military - which, as it was composed largely of the peasantry following conscription to sustain the Eastern Front, was easily subverted by Lenin's "Peace, bread and land" motto. This is the reason why the Bolsheviks managed to seize control. The crucial thing to realise is that there is simply no way for a revolution to take hold where the only support is the powerless masses. A strong ruling elite is needed, as in Russia's case, and backed by a powerful entity such as the military. A revolution on ideological grounds alone is doomed to failure, especially on as large a scale as Russia. The second assumption of communism is that, by the time of its implementation, all society in the world would be psychologically prepared to accept it and use it as a system of government and economic management. There is the key assumption - everyone working for everyone else. This has never actually happened before. At the time of the Russian revolution, Lenin conceded that in order for the transition to a communist state to actually happen, there would have to be, for a time, a strong ruling elite to govern the state, protect it from outside threats, and manage its resources. By its nature, a dictatorship is the most efficient form of government. However, as demonstrated by the events surrounding the treaty of Brest-Litovsk, it was clear that there would be no revolutions spawning from the Russian into the rest of Europe, as Lenin and Trotsky hoped when they tried to delay negotiations with Germany. After Brest-Litovsk, Trotsky put forward the idea of socialism in one country - that is, giving up the notion of a world revolution taking hold so soon after the Russian. The simple fact of the matter was that no other states in Europe were unstable enough to actually allow a communist revolution to take hold. There is the problem - communism is, ideally, a system which encompasses the whole world. Limiting it to only one state is not conducive to its spread, at least in a centrally controllable manner. Take the case of China, Cuba, Vietnam and North Korea, for example. They do not emulate the system which was used by the Bolsheviks, which is contrary to the aims of world revolution. This is why communism fails. There can be no transition from a capitalist state to a communist simply because there is an insufficient power base to support a communist movement within a capitalist society. Furthermore, the socialist revolution relies on a mindset which is, at this point in time, virtually unachievable by the world as a whole.

Okay, so you seem to have completely ignored my argument. Is that because I was glaringly correct?

The fundamental flaw in your reasoning is the assumption that an individual will, in their lifetime, be completely unable to find at least one thing that they enjoy and are passionate about.

Hey, don't worry, they ain't getting any smaller. =P

Oh god, now they've done it. They've played the video game card again.

Things get done eventually anyway, and there's a shift in which countries get how much blame. *Shrug* And Krum, would it kill you to just stick an EU flag in your signature instead of wandering around Europe like a schizophrenic migratory bird with ADD and an inferior sense of cardinal direction?

I should print out a copy of this article and use it to help convince girls to sleep with me on the off-chance that the world will end. Can't say that the girlfriend would be too happy with that, though...

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.c ... d=10400645 Discuss. Note, of course, the reassuring line I bolded above. Yes, I know the article is from last September.

Just Photoshop.

I demand your gene-seed!

Original size So, yes... Trying this thing again... It's a Greycoat. They're the secret police in the largest city of my D&D campaign setting. Comments and constructive criticism, please? Hit the link if you need to see a larger version.

I read a lot about different types of rocks on the internet last week. Does that make me a qualified geologist?

Okay, I think you're stuck in one of those common misconceptions about investments... Here's the deal: An investment does not always guarantee a return. If it does, you won't get it anytime soon.

Of course I don't get what you're saying. It doesn't make sense. You want to earn lots of money so that you don't have to work for as long. A higher paying job would allow you to earn that money and leave the workforce faster. You don't want to further your education to improve your chances of getting a higher paying job. Do you see where this is going?

It's hard not to judge when it's so blindingly obvious that you don't actually have an argument against using that money to further your education.

... What? You fail at argument. You do realise, of course, that a higher paying job means you can actually leave the workforce at an earlier date? Arguing against getting one is contradictory to your reason for having a job.

Wait for a couple of hours, and if that doesn't fix it, ice up the other side of your face to even it out.

So I'm not already at rock bottom? :shock: You may commence digging.

Mate, pay tuition fees for high school or uni or whatever you have in your whackjob American system.

Prepare yourself for an influx of hormones, convoluted relationships and trashy music.

God have mercy on your nation when they introduce you to intelligent foreigners as one of America's best and brightest.

That's... the point of getting a higher paying job. To get out of working faster than the schmuck who doesn't. Education is an investment to get said higher paying job, and thus get out of working faster. You might want to dwell on that.

Someone with an above average mental capacity and drive to succeed academically? You know, the people that jocks make fun of because they won't be flipping burgers for the next decade or so.