Dark Prince: Why should the means of producing and distributing goods be owned collectively or by a centralized government? If you don't need a middle man telling you what to do and how to do it, because you are already doing it, then why give a third party a piece of your action? Protection money? To avoid future shakedowns? Do you like the idea of a nanny state controling every aspect of your life? I suppose it's okay for the "nannys"... not so good for everyone else. I could understand the appeal of socialism if I had an aversion to making decisions regarding business and personal matters.

My point about Castro was, I thought, self evident. If I was him I would make sure I had the best medical care possible, but apparently the finest Universities and Colleges in Cuba couldn't produce a doctor good enough to do the job.

Capitalism doesn't need to be socially engineered. It has always been the natural way of doing things. People began specializing in one particular area and then trading with people who specialized in other areas. Bartering was replaced with coin and paper transfers that made the system move more efficiently, and the rest is history. All socialism does is to fix what isn't broken and cause the development of better technology to come to a grinding halt. As bad as things are right now I'm still better off as a proor man in the U.S. than a king was in his cold dank castle a thousand years ago.