h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

"Marxist-Leninist Communist it is rule by a small group of people who come out of nowhere and decide that they know best."

Not strictly true, Cat. That is the misguided and misplaced way that Marxist communism has been practiced. But it's not what was intended.

Thats why I stated Marxist-Leninist. Most Communist and Trotskyite parties still accept the idea of the vanguard party.

Believe me folks communism does not work.
I'm a social democrat.
For communism read corruption.
Blair has just about got it right in the UK.

But communism Math...forget it...your lookink at an elitism enforced by thugs. Yes I know...but the old communist system was seriously flawed.

A few known examples: THE KURSK disaster
THE CHERNOBYL disaster

Bhopal

Exxon Valdize

Challenger

Concorde

Just a few capitalist disasters in the interests of balance, OO.

Can you get rid of Tony B Liar? It seems to me he should be deeply unpopular by now.
Have you seen 'Believe Nothing' with Rik Mayall? The episode we saw on Sunday had a brilliant portrayal of Blair, as a wannabe rock star going on 'Celebrity Stars in Their Eyes.'

Della, I find it incredible that Tony blair hangs on to power. He used to have a good thing going for himself. But now he's thrown away all the credibility and goodwill he once had. He only keeps his job because the conservatives are in disarray and Britain has no effective opposition. The latest in their succession of leaders has the same surname as the Australian primeminister, surely political suicide.

"Just a few capitalist disasters in the interests of balance"

The list is a lot longer than that:

Enron

Worldcom

Xerox

The Ford Pinto

Etc

Etc

Etc

And on it goes...

ZZZZZZZZ bookmark

Those you have mentioned emptyhead were financial disasters.

Oh dear I should have remembered you were on this thread empty and made it more clear for you that OO and I were talking about real disasters.

Oh sorry does disaster mean something else in NZ So many words seem to.

Comparing Xerox to Chernobyl. How many died or were poisoned during the "Xerox catastrophe"?

In some ways Enron could be an example of the resilience of capitalism. If we're going to compare it to Chernobyl, let's look at the big picture. Enron, a major energy trader collapsed. At the end of the day though, no one lost heat, electricity or running water at their houses. So compared to Chernobyl, I think Enron is an excellent example of how capitalism works.

dave

How is Chernobyl an example of how communism *doesnt* work?

(without reading much of the backlog)
I'd like to make a small point here about the Bhopal tragedy. That was NOT an industrial accident, it was sabotage. A disgruntled, recently fired employee snuck into the plant. He bypassed several safety devices and plugged a water hose into the the vessel containing a chemical that reacts VERY badly to water. The employee only thought he would be costing the company some money in ruined product. The managers and technicians did what they could to avert it, but not knowing that a waterhose was attached to one of the tanks they transferred the chemical to another tank. This unfortunately exacerbated the problem causing the explosion and the gas cloud.
Ok... that said.. carry on.

I did not know that I was merely stating it as an example of a disaster that took place in a free trade, privately owned factory.

I'm not actually saying it shouldn't be in your list... I just feel it's sad that hardly anyone knows that it was a case of sabotage... a disgruntled worker. If I remember the report I read on it he lost his job because a failed personal relationship was affecting his work... He lost his girl, he lost his job... someone had to pay and the girl had left town... Thousands die. Horrible story. But it's all been left to what the EARLY press declared as an accident due to lax safety measures... The early press had no idea what they were talking about, but the early stories were never retracted.. the press moved on. The Indian government kept liked the 'accident' story and used it as their basis for lawsuits. It wasn't until years later that the true story came out (due to an independent study done by a group from Britian). The story was 'covered up' from the ground up! It started with those workers on site who 'covered up' for their coworkers because they didn't want their friends to get in trouble... even though the did NOTHING wrong... from there the managers 'covered up' all the way up to the national government. All because some por schlub lost his girlfriend.

Remember FIVE MILE ISLAND

Please be aware that deep in the former USSR and China the incidences of catastrophes remain speculative. Reuters and the gang can't be everywhere all the time. Contrary to popular belief not every hectare of the plabet is surveyed by satellite.

Capitalism is a better system if you have a vigorous free press. And that of course is the big problem for Italy with Burlesconi as political premiere and media mogul.

It's also a problem for the US, b/c of our fascist govts control over our media.

Hey empty, you never answered my question about why your website on the iraq bodycount uses so many US media sources?

dave

Dave ES works for Homeland Security...still not integrated

"Capitalism is a better system if you have a vigorous free press"

Is that why the UK Gov took 21 years to admit there were nuclear weapons aboard HMS Sheffield when it was sunk during the Falklands war

Good Point

The defence of the nation and its allies..NATO..overides an editor's autonomy. There are two statutary tools to enforce
Official Secrets Act
Schedule D Order

In any one day I would guess an editor would reject at least three reports because of the above.

I would be very surprised if it was that often...

and as for HMS Sheffield, Greenpeace were reporting it from day 1 and in 1991 a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency stated that there were nuclear weapons aboard the Sheffield when she went down yet it took until December 5th last year for the UK Gov to confirm these reports. Hardly free & open government is it?