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Johann Hari: The Soft-Voiced Authoritarianism of Fareed Zakaria - The Diigo Meta page

www.huffingtonpost.com/...voiced-authorita_b_152992.html - Cached - Annotated View

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cburell
Cburell bookmarked on 2008-12-24 capitalism history socialism
  • Zakaria's claim that "There Is No Alternative" is demolished by a piece of evidence he himself offers, in a few skimmed sentences he doesn't spot the significance of. He brags that the US has the most competitive economy in the world -- "slipping sometimes in recent years to small northern European countries like Sweden, Denmark and Finland." But -- wait. Is this the Sweden that takes 51 percent of GDP in taxes, and spends it on the most lavish welfare state in the world -- producing the most content population according to international studies? And it's more competitive than America? So it turns out There Is An Alternative course for the post-American world to pursue -- an extraordinarily impressive one -- but Zakaria just doesn't want to acknowledge it, because he would have to rethink some of his dogmas. When a poor country like Hugo Chavez's Venezuela tries to imitate this social democratic vision rather than Zakaria's, he abuses them as "trouble makers" prone to "insane rants."

This link has been bookmarked by 1 people . It was first bookmarked on 24 Dec 2008, by Clay Burell.

  • 24 Dec 08
    cburell
    Clay Burell

    capitalism history socialism

    • Zakaria's claim that "There Is No Alternative" is demolished by a piece of evidence he himself offers, in a few skimmed sentences he doesn't spot the significance of. He brags that the US has the most competitive economy in the world -- "slipping sometimes in recent years to small northern European countries like Sweden, Denmark and Finland." But -- wait. Is this the Sweden that takes 51 percent of GDP in taxes, and spends it on the most lavish welfare state in the world -- producing the most content population according to international studies? And it's more competitive than America? So it turns out There Is An Alternative course for the post-American world to pursue -- an extraordinarily impressive one -- but Zakaria just doesn't want to acknowledge it, because he would have to rethink some of his dogmas. When a poor country like Hugo Chavez's Venezuela tries to imitate this social democratic vision rather than Zakaria's, he abuses them as "trouble makers" prone to "insane rants."