So asks Rich Karlgaard at Forbes.com. In part:

The milder forms of it have yielded economic stagnation where and whenever tried: England in the 1970s; France today. The more impatient strains–”socialism in a hurry,” as Lenin reputedly called communism–did nothing but plunder economies and destroy lives. Their fine leaders ordered the deaths of more than 100 million people–Lenin and Stalin (40 million), Mao (60 million) and Pol Pot (2 million), not to mention that syphilitic dictator of the German National Socialist Party, Adolf Hitler (11 million directly, another 35 million through the war he started).

By all rights socialism should be dead, sealed in a steel vault and buried in Hell. Yet the disease lives. You might even say it’s spreading when you look at the ascent of Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, Evo Morales in Bolivia, Ken Livingstone in London and the “progressive” American Net-based left (which says Hillary Rodham Clinton is too far right). What accounts for socialism’s reappearance? To discover the answer, we must ask another question. Why do so many people around the world hate its opposite–free-market capitalism?

Old news, but worth repeating (since the mainstream press is in denial): U.S. GDP growth for the first quarter clocked in at a whopping 4.8%. Remember that this figure is typically revised upward weeks later. Look for a final tally of 5.0+%. Gosh, what else is there to say about the roaring U.S. economy? Oh, yes. Unemployment is safely below 5%, and–wonder of wonders–even the New York Times admits that wages are rising faster than inflation.

I am no longer surprised by my liberal friends who still believe that socialism is a good idea, in spite of its horrific track record. They believe that humans are by their very nature “good” (even those that have read Lord of the Flies) and that socialism has just been poorly implemented to date (blaming hundreds of millions of deaths on the individuals, not the system). They continue to have hope that an ideal society is possible and I applaud that. We should never lose our spark of idealism and hope, else we become cynical and bitter.

But what continually astounds me is their insistence that capitalism is evil, and that encouraging capitalism through tax cuts does more harm than good. They ignore history and don’t won’t recognize current conditions — a booming economy as a result of tax cuts in spite of horrendous drains in the forms of a terrorist attack and a protracted war.

Most astonishing is that they refuse to see that a small business-friendly environment encourages innovation and enables movement between classes. And rather than seeing the great opportunities inherent in the capitalist society they decry the “gap” between rich and poor.

Socialism equals stagnation. That is human nature. I don’t weep about it, I celebrate the possibilities created by exploiting ambition coupled with imagination. It is the magnificence of Man.

[HT to Club for Growth]

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