Yes, China still has problems but in comparison to how it was under communism, the people are overwhelmingly better off. Certainly China has more to go with regard to opening up markets – but the trend is obvious, the more markets are opened, the greater the standard of living is. This trend is not unique to China, it is a worldwide trend. The more you follow Adam Smith, the better the standard of living, the more you follow Karl Marx, the worse.

In short, if you want radical change, if you want significant improvements in standard of living, the solution has always been to reduce government.

And did you just mention Hong Kong, China! even if we agree that the economy has benefited from free trade (but tell that to all the Wal-Mart workers who work in terrible conditions with very little pay), look at how in the interest of protecting big business, the Chinese government brutally represses its population.

Look at India and China today, I’d like to see community organization approach even 1% of that change – millions, and I do mean millions, being lifted out of poverty every year, all because of the private sector and capitalism.

Before that we can look at Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea and many more examples to see the overwhelmingly radical social change the free market have caused.

But you don’t have to argue against me tin, read the Obama article I linked to above – its a long list of failed community organizations. Just the point I was trying to make above – only Obama’s experience said it better.

well, where to begin, for one thing we need to define community organizing. the christian right, conservative, etc, they all in a way are engaged in community organizing to further their own interests (like electing McCain to government). so community organizers is not a homogenous group of people. i think we are talking about grassroots organizing who focus on civil rights (is the ACLU a community organization?), fulfilling community needs (like community centers that run cultural, legal, education, and health services), etc.

but really, how can we argue against a free market fundamentalist. at the very least, we would both have to know the same history about capitalism and about social movements (I recommend reading Naomi Kleins shock doctrine), but I don’t think that conservatives even know it. we also don’t agree on the terminology, and even when we use the same words, we mean very different things.

for me, Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, MLK, Malcolm X, and pretty much all the revolutionaries of the world (Gandhi, Mandela, Zapata, etc), including Europeans, were organizers. to create a social revolution, such as the US Revolution, the French Revolution, the Mexican one, etc. you need to organize, and it has never ever been the private sector who creates positive radical social change. negative change, like the Chilean Pinochet dictatorship on the other hand, well, that’s always been a partnership between the military and big business, kind of like in the US, except that here you also have to add the Christian fundamentalist (like Palin) and free market ones (like HP).

but really, how can you argue against a fundamentalist. no se puede.

Momo,
How is it a waste to be involved in a democratic process?

El Chavo,
Maybe it’s just somewhat positively squishy?

Matias,
Good point. I know a lot of people who get involved in improving their community directly through their church. It’s sad the GOP and people like HP find it a waste of time.

“He told Kellman that he feared community organizing would never allow him “to make major changes in poverty or discrimination.” To do that, he said, “you either had to be an elected official or be influential with elected officials.” In other words, Obama believed that his chosen profession was getting him nowhere, or at least not far enough. Personally, he might end up like his father; politically, he would fail to improve the lot of those he was trying to help.

And so, Obama told Kellman, he had decided to leave community organizing and go to law school. Kellman, who was already thinking of leaving organizing himself, found no reason to argue with him. “Organizing,” Kellman tells me, as we sit in a Chicago restaurant down the street from the Catholic church where he now works as a lay minister, “is always a lost cause.” Obama, circa late 1987, might or might not have put it quite that strongly. But he had clearly developed serious doubts about the career he was pursuing.”

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

http://act.credoaction.com/campaign/defend_community_organizers/?r_by=-1782890-ij38W4x&rc=paste

Sign it, HP!

And, if we bring up the fact that the community organization Barack worked for was, in fact, a faith-based organization, does that make your comment tragically misinformed, unconventionally childish, or simply stupid? I can’t decide. Choose one and we’ll use the other two for Palin’s speech.