Deja Vu

> Actually this sort of thing has happened before, that is a
> socialistic system collapsing without being compared to outside
> capitalistic systems. In 1623, govenor William Bradford wrote
> [snip stuff on Plymouth colony]

Please remember, before the advent of the terrible plagues brought by
the European occupiers, North America had a population of ten to twenty
million Native People's living in essentially a socialist style (land
held in common, often dwellings (like long houses) held in common by
clans, shared results from hunts, etc.). They had been living this way
for many centuries. Their life was not perfect, and included
superstition and violence, but in many ways that life is better than
that lived by many US citizens today in terms of both health and
meaningful experiences.
http://www.nativeamericans.com/
For example, the Natives had no need or use for prisons, schools, or
factories. The Native Peoples maintained the forest trails, farmed
fields, and burned the plains to maintain the Prairie.

The Native People's used the land so productively by the application of
tribal knowledge instead of labor (relative to their populations ) that
they hardly "worked" at all
http://www.deoxy.org/endwork.htm
compared to, say, the backward, ignorant, cultist, Plymouth occupiers
whose writings you cite. Those occupiers only survived at all at first
because they robbed native graves for food and tools and stole native
crops. More importantly, they survived and prospered because they
received free technological assistance from a native (Tisquantum, or
"Squanto") who had been essentially kidnapped and enslaved by other
occupiers and escaped only to return to find his native village
completely decimated by plagues, leaving him the only survivor, upon
which he cooperated with the Plymouth occupiers. (See People's History
of the United States for more details, or _Lies My Teacher Told Me_). Or:
http://www.nativeamericans.com/Squanto.htm
Note that the time you cite (when the Plymouth people were having a
tough time) is a year after their socialist technical advisor (Squanto)
had died of illness, and presumably they were having a tougher time
getting by without him.

The major advantages the European occupiers had were bioterrorism
(killing probably about 90% of the Native population, some
intentionally, most probably inadvertently) and other advanced weapons
incorporated into a hierarchical military structure (which spent
centuries eradicating most of the natives who survived the biological
warfare). This militaristic bureaucracy persists to this day in the US
and is now coming to a head in a global conflict (US and corporate
tentacles vs. essentially the rest of world opinion [the other
superpower]). Most of the US economy in one way or another is oriented
around this militaristic bureaucracy.
http://www.swans.com/library/art9/melman01.html
http://www.aftercapitalism.com/index2.html
Most of the fundamental principles of capitalism as practiced in the US,
from treating corporations as people, to fractional reserve banking,
http://www.xat.org/xat/alternative.html
http://www.profit2u.com/fractional_reserve.htm
http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/frb.html
http://www.prosperityuk.com/prosperity/articles/howbcm.html
to corporate welfare, to lack of payment by companies for external costs
they impose on society, are counterproductive frauds sold to the people
under false pretenses which are violations of the core principles of the
framers of the US Constitution. Even the very notion of a "free market"
is a misnomer and misleading -- since that only nominally refers to the
ability of sellers to set their own price (as opposed to a command
economy) and ignores the issue of producers needing to pay for external
costs through taxes or be regulated to prevent harm to others (which is
also claimed to be harming the free market, but has nothing to do with
fixing prices).

The use of easily identifiable slaves (blacks) who were brutally treated
also contributed to this US capitalist success (slaves == capital in
that model, and the south said they were fighting for human rights, i.e.
the right of a human to hold slaves) based frequently on exploitation of
those who were put in a position of being unable to defend themselves or
ask recompense for their labor or other valuables (including knowledge,
plants, and land) either through military might or by false advertising
["streets paved with gold" attracting immigrants such as those who died
building the railroads]. Unfortunately, like in US pre-Civil War
Southern times where many people, including blacks, aspired to owning
slaves, nowadays people in the US are blinded to the systems problems by
the notion of wanting to become millionaires:
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/millionairewannabes.htm

Despite the above, the US remains a country with people of much hope and
optimism, supporting many good ideals, and capable of much achievement
based on its embracement of cultural diversity in many areas. The people
have a record of successful ongoing struggles against injustice
(slavery, women's rights, civil rights. labor rights, freedom of speech
-- although some of these are faltering at the moment). So, it remains
to be seen where the US will go as it changes over time if it moves into
space or just further diversifies and changes within its borders. For
example, since the birthrate of whites is falling in the US, it is
likely the US may become a Spanish speaking (or Latin dominated) country
in a century or so, perhaps even someday returning land to Mexico which
was gained by a war of conquest -- however, of course, the Vinge
singularity will overtake all these trends in a few decades.
http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~phoenix/vinge/vinge-sing.html

The main problem with occupying Space, as opposed to North America, for
the USA capitalists, coudl instead be seen as that there are no
socialists to steal developed land and supplies and knowledge from. :-)
Once there are (Chinese, Russians, Europeans), one can be sure
militaristic US capitalists will soon follow and try to take it from
them [probably by asserting patent or copyright rights, no doubt, backed
by particle beam and other weapons]. :-)

--Paul Fernhout