Re: Censorial leftists (Was: Interesting article)

[frissell@panix.com]

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At 03:02 PM 12/4/97 -0500, J. Lasser wrote:

>And Singapore survives quite well being a totalitarian capitalist
>society. Sure, you can pick nits and claim that Singapore's not entirely
>capitalist, but it's more capitalist than this country and certainly
>less free, too.
>
>The fact of the matter seems to me to be that most people are perfectly
>satisfied to be passive consumers. While they like to be free, that
>means free to make purchasing decisions. They also like to be safe, and
>if they have to lose civil liberties to be safe, then they're all for
>it. Just so long as they can buy what they want. That seems to me to
>describe the essence of the Singapore problem, and I'd bet it holds true
>for the U.S. (and many other places) as well.

Forty years ago Singapore was poor and at risk of being wiped out by Malays 
or Commies or both.  (Maylays killed 1 Meg of their own Chinese in the '60s.) 
 I'm sure that a few decades of being rich and safe will engender in that 
population a liking for social freedom.  They are currently more economically 
free than we are.  We rate 5th and they are 2nd or 3rd on the two indices of 
economic freedom.  They have many personal freedoms as well.  They have 
speech restrictions but are quite outspoken in any case.  The gum and 
spitting and smoking restrictions are no different than the smoking bans and 
such we are coming to live under.  We have one-party rule too.

DCF  
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