Wonkette
Huzzah, Wonktards! We have won over some significant percentage of our fellow citizens to the side of the hedonist left, where stoners get paid welfare checks to wank it over Thomas Pynchon books all day. A new Rassmussen survey shows that a mere 53 percent of Americans believe capitalism is better than socialism.
Twenty percent think socialism is better, while 27 percent are “not sure,” because on the one hand — bigger paychecks for some; on the other hand, free money for everyone.
It’s cute that anybody even thought to ask this question, of course, since it’s not like we can do anything about it. President Obama has already instituted a Muslim socialist dictatorship. OR WERE YOU TOO HIGH TO NOTICE?
Just 53% Say Capitalism Better Than Socialism [Rasmussen Reports]
Well it’s a good thing we have a serious, thoughtful opposition at least. Also.
Tuesday: Homo Queens for Vermont. Today: Hobo Beans for All!
What happens to the numbers when you include anarchy as an option?
It’s the end of DEMOCRACY!!!!!11!!
tragically, only 7% of respondents knew what socialism or capitalism were, and a mere 2.4% could reasonably describe both economic systems.
George W. Bush, the man who destroyed capitalism.
You couldn’t pay me enough to read another Thomas Pynchon book. Well, maybe if you paid me a lot. I struggled through Gravity’s Rainbow and thought there were some interesting bits, but then I read Mason and Dixon.
Really, if you’re thinking about it, don’t.
Isn’t sobriety a requirement of any Muslim socialist dictatorship? ‘Cause that’s not change I can believe in.
Where’s facism?
gurukalehuru: I drew the line at Mason and Dixon.
Well said, Comrade Smith.
Oh sure, but now we are Communists not Socialists smartypants.You should have a look at Rush Limbaugh’s dacha.
Unfortunately most Americans think socialism has something to do with worshipping Facebook. If it can’t be explained to us in a picture more complicated than, say, a puppy with a rawhide bone in its mouth, you can pretty much guarantee that the answers have nothing to do with reality.
Judas Peckerwood: Ha!
Why would Rasmussen even do a poll like this? What? A bunch of right wing hacks you say?
TEABAGGING!!11
Hmm, that 53 percent better pack their bags for reeducation camp.
SayItWithWookies: …socialism has something to do with worshipping Facebook.
Instead of socialism do you, perhaps, mean nihilism? ‘Cause my FaceBook posts are all about me, me, me.
…i can haz socialist abortion?
Canmon (the Inadequate): Wow. A real possibility for how W is historically remembered. Snark and truth. Snruth. Two great tastes together.
Like I told the Rasmussen dude, “Just put me down for whichever one results in me getting more BJ’s and beer.”
Meh. Those same 53% think Jesus rode a dinosaur.
102415: Shhhhhh….I’m watching a teabag rantfest.
Why does Barry’s fro-pick look like a hammer and a sickle?
A fairly incomplete poll. It should have been, like, which would you prefer:
A) Capitalism
B) Socialism
C) Communism
D) Feudalism
E) Anarchy
F) Monarchy
G) Meritocracy
H) Warring Gangs
I) Winner Take All
J) High Tech Neo Hunter Gatherer Tribalism
K) Other (please explain)
Lazy Media: No, it means Zombie Joseph McCarthy, and his High Imperial Priestess Magister, Michelle Bachman, will have to start up the fucking Inquisition.
There is no need to Pynchon if you use Kleenex.
Rasmussen: always fair and balanced.
It’s a biased survey. Clicking on the “see questions” brings up this:
1* Which is a better system - capitalism or socialism?
53% Capitalism
20% Capitalism
27% Not sure
Gopherit: They only think it’s ‘probable.’ They freely admit there’s no way to know that.
I need to meet the stoner who can comprehend a Thomas Pynchon novel.
Because that odyssey is a novel in itself.
Now we must all strive Together for glorious Unity, comrades. It is a glorious new Soviet Collective, brothers and sisters!
gurukalehuru: you forgot feminism, vegetarianism, and caturdayism
Kleptocracy.
gurukalehuru: theocracy, oligarchy, tyranny and, my personal favorite, bacchanalia.
Time to resurrect zombie Lenin!
“Must… crush… capitalism”
gurukalehuru: K) buttsecks.
Can i have the meritocracy monarchy combo plz
gurukalehuru: loved GR, also V, less so Vineland and way less so Mason & Dixon. But I never had arugula. Also.
Real Americans would prefer an Imperial Theocracy.
magic titty: Those of us who can show our Pynchon mastery will form the core of the Amerikan Politburo.
Technocratic anti-utopia FTW.
Well, the whole democracy thing was pretty fake to begin with.
“It’s cute that anybody even thought to ask this question, of course, since it’s not like we can do anything about it.”
It’s also cute the way we’re supposed to pretend that the typical American could explain and comprehend any “ism”, economic or otherwise, to save their life.
Paterlanger: Then count in Dorothy Gambrell…
http://www.verysmallarray.com/index.php?s=pynchon
BklynIlluminati: Would you like to Jumbo size your order of Freedom Fries with that?
I was at the Reagan library just yesterday and yenno what, I don’t think the Gipper would be too pleased by this.
WAKE UP SHEEPLE!!1!one!
tunamelt: How can you call a pile of Mad Magazines and Archie Comix a library?
i can haz nindustrial rev’lution?
The Helvetica Scenario: “Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it’s just the opposite.” ~ Albert Camus
Gopherit: There is a PLANE! ZE PLANE! ZE PLANE!
fuck Pynchon. Pabst Blue Ribbon!
Tommy Says Soooo, Jugdish!: Pynchon is what southern capitalists do after a trip to Old Country Buffet.
Capitol Hillbilly: Where’s my dream?
gurukalehuru: Philistine! Mason & Dixon was awesome. I’ve read it three times. And Gravity’s Rainbow was a cupcake compared to Proust or Joyce.
Now, Against the Day, that’s another story. I keep going back to bang my head against that one; haven’t made it past the first hundred pages. I blame the short-attention-span-inducing influence of teh internets.
smartypants: OMG, I forgot there is a real Smarty Pants. Please forgive me comrade.
Paterlanger: “Those of us who can show our Pynchon mastery will form the core of the Amerikan Politburo.”
Heh heh, I guess I’m in, then. I’m looking forward to hiring hobo princess Wanda Tinasky as my secretary.
socialism, fuck yeah!
Oh hell, 80% of Americans couldn’t name one core principle of capitalism or socialism.
“It is my intention to point out that the success of the sexual revolution is inversely proportional to the decline in morality…”
What does that even mean?
success(sexual revolution) = k / decline(morality)
success(…) = 1/decline(…)
success(sexual revolution) = k * success(morality)
But of course, sexuality is contained in morality so the equation is nonlinear.
haha. Wrong thread! I lose!
Capitol Hillbilly: PBR - it’s union made.
Don’t make me go Tristero.
they both suck. anarcky ftw.
gurukalehuru: Kakistocracy
Anonymous Office Zombie: It’s also cute the way we’re supposed to pretend that the typical American could explain and comprehend any “ism”, economic or otherwise, to save their life.
Including, presumably, prism and…you know, the “j” one.
Giant Robot:
Can I use a lifeline?
102415: I’ll leave that to his gynecologist.
gurukalehuru: I would have included Rosicrucianism as well. I don’t know why, it just sounds like something that is about to catch on.
Giant Robot:
Capitalism: We feed the rich.
Socialism: The other one.
masterdebater: Here-here. If the wingnut fundamentalists and the pouty, angry atheists could both be linked together in stupidity it would be through a lack of understanding about this kind of underpinning to all things U.S.
Pynchon? Please. Real hooked-on-welfare stoners only wank to David Foster Wallace.
Falangism always gets left out.
Does that mean we’re Swedan or Canada?
Did I ever try to alter your system of government?
You never did.
The Kenosha Kid
I added Gravity’s Rainbow to my to-read list after this post. Do you think I’m pregnant now?
Tommmcatt: That would be the worship of Lola Falana?
Judas Peckerwood: I draw the line at Manson & Nixon…
tunamelt: Have you gotten the library’s smell of ben-gay, just-for-men and bullshit out of your clothes yet?
arclight: Just start working out well in advance, so you can lift it. I hear it even makes the Kindle gain a pound.
gurukalehuru: (K) Queerocracy!
american mutt: What kind of “economic system” is anarchy? Answer: it isn’t. You can have anarcho-capitalism or anarcho-socialism. Choose, but choose wisely.
gurukalehuru: This is still America. My money is on military junta.
From each according to their abilities; to each according to their needs.
Trucknutz for all!
Can we be Luxembourg instead of Sweden? Or France? I’m not so into the government mandated fermented fish dinners… the furniture is so hard to put together too… not Sweden, please.
SomeNYGuy:
Hardly. It is a government BASED on the worship of Lola Falana, so there.
BillyClubb: That’s not nihilism. Nihilism is a belief that everything is senseless and useless, and that there are no moral truths. “Nihil” = “nothing”. Same root as “nil”.
“Me, me, me” is either solipsism, or that Ayn Rand shit … ;->
SayItWithWookies: It’s true. I’m nearly 60; one of my dear friends is nearly 40; she works with folks who are 20-28, and most of them don’t even know they’re supposed to be *scared* of Socialism. The word only gives them warm fuzzies; they connect it with being social, or belonging to social networks.
As for “Communism”, they find the term absolutely quaint, something out of ancient history books, like being a Whig or a WWII Resistance Fighter.
But most of ‘em know what Fascism means. And they’d prefer not to experience it.
And although they really don’t call it anything, most of them are aware that their *parents* didn’t have to live six or eight to a crappy apartment, each paying somewhere between $500 and $1000 per month, when *they* were first starting out. They’re also aware that their parents had better employer-paid healthcare than they will ever see.
And they’re not the least bit happy about it. *THEY* are not cheering those “hard workers” on Wall Street who make 300 or 500 times what most of them make in a year.
BTW, ever stopped to consider: Although it’s mitigated by their extreme social conservatism, Mormons are the closest thing we have to Socialists in this country today.
DoctorCulturae: I am an unrepentant word-weenie, I confess.
You can’t be *that* cultured if you think the expression is “Here, here.” Doesn’t it bother you that this makes no sense?
It’s “Hear, hear!”
Of course.
The Cold Sea: I’ve been calling the Republicans “the party that destroyed capitalism” for awhile now.
Even when the markets were humming, a few years back, and the Rethugs I knew online were using this as proof positive that, despite two bullshit wars, warrantless spying on citizens, Guantanamo, and Abu Ghraib, that the Bush/Cheney Presidency was an Excellent Thing, I suggested to them that the great market numbers were just a metric for the flow rate out of the pockets of the middle class into the pockets of the Criminal Masters of the Universe.
I’m so goddamned prescient.
Humble, too.
(Pauses for applause … not a sausage …)
gurukalehuru: I’ll take “J”, please! Especially if we can have big dance parties out in the middle of the desert.
Giant Robot: Well … um … one of ‘em’s good. That’s the one *we* are. And the other one’s bad. That’s the one our *enemies* are!
Good enough?