Russia wasn't socialist.  They were communist.  Not to mention Russia was incredibly unstable.  Do I have to remind you that its entire government collapsed two decades ago?  Not to mention it had massive social uprisings that completely redistributed the balance of power a few decades prior.  I don't think Russia was ever the model of stability.

Anyways, the U.S., the Western European nations, and some Asian nations like Japan are really in the post-industrial phases of their economies more so than the industrial phases.  So I should have said post-industrial rather than industrial.  That was my mistake.  Post-industrial nations are developed countries that are dominated by the tertiary and quaternary sectors of their economies rather than the primary and secondary sectors of their economy.

Russia was Communist when Putin hand picked his own successor and is taking control?  Say again?

Russia's per capita GDP is about a fourth of the United States, Australia, France, Germany, the UK, Canada, and Japan.  How can you really even compare the stability of their governments with such a broad discrepancy?

And this is a very accurate indicator of economic prosperity and stability for a country as populated as Russia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita

So Mexico and Turkey aren't stable?  That's a weird definition of stability you've got there.

If you think the healthcare market is an example of free market practice and non-government interference then we've been living in different realities. Otherwise the healthcare situation is an example of how badly we need a freer market applied there (granted there is no simple uniformity and some areas need to be less controlled while others could use more oversight - but the point is intended on the whole).

The government provides police proctection and national defense because those are explicit powers granted by the constitution.  Healthcare is not.  Whether or not they can or should require a drivers license is not something I've talked about so the point is moot - but comparing the aquisition of a license to exhibit ones proficiency with a vehicle to the instantiation of government run healthcare, or even government involvement in it, is patently absurd.

Yes there are people who believe and advocate healthcare as a right, many of the men and women in congress for example - thus it is very relevant to the discussion and an aspect worth discussing.

The auto-bailout has to do with the free market...as I explicitly stated (ie "This is why...") in the post after you brought up the market and efficiency. .

The rest of your post is sleight of hand, intentional or not.  On the one hand you try to push me into the Laissez-faire corner hoping to get pushback on it so you can use it to come back at me on the "gee whiz why can't government get involved in healthcare" point you've made right after.  The whole point - the fundamental point that I've been making to begin with - is that I'm vehemently opposed to government CONTROLLED healthcare.  At no point have I ever said I was against the government touching it at all.  In fact in my reply to you I made clear my biggest concern on this issue is that of a government run system which IS being pushed by many liberals.  Once the concept of nationalized healthcare is dead and buried by all parties the topic of the bredth and depth of government involvement in various sectors is the next debate, and a vast topic in its own right that I've yet to even address thus far.

Just to clarify:

• Do you think healthcare is a right?
• Do you believe a public option would lead to single payer?

I know you want to push into that aspect of the debate but I'm not heading there until the nationalized option is off the table completely.

Just as a side track on healthcare ...

If (for a moment) we ignore the implications of the government taking control of a market which they don't really have the right to, and just question whether they could make positive impacts on the cost and quality of healthcare in the United States, there are still massive problems with what is currently happening in the United States. The US government has no demonstrated ability to be able to manage a healthcare system of any size efficiently with high quality results, and there is almost no chance they will be able to do it with the worlds largest healthcare system without causing more problems than they resolve.

As much as I disagree with the government taking over the healthcare system, it would make far more sense for the federal government to work with state governments to experiment on a small scale with a variety of ways to deliver low cost high quality healthcare. By doing this you would get a good idea of what works, and more importantly what doesn't work, and the end result would be information for both the public and private sector to use to keep their costs reasonable.

Before America considers having a national healthcare system (which I'm pro, but it should also maintain its private system at the same time, to give its citizens choice), I think the government really needs to focus on getting its finances in order. The ridiculous debt really needs to be tackled and spending and the overall size of government needs to be reduced.

For example the American empire with its 600 to 800 overseas bases could be dismantled.

Airplane - Any of various winged vehicles capable of flight, generally heavier than air and driven by jet engines or propellers.

Does this definition apply any differently today than it did in 1950?

You guys are claiming the definitions are fluid and have changed over the years yet you're also treating the title I gave him as though it were still the decades old idealogies.  So which is it?  Is a mild Facsist Social Interventionist of modern times a bad thing or good thing?   Which era of ideaology do you wish to apply?  Pick one and stop trying to alter to to fit your arguments.

Fannie and Freddie were too big to fail. There is such a thing.

If those things had failed they would have taken down pretty much the entire US financial system with them, they just had too many ties to the market to be able to go bankrupt.

Um, bankruptcy court exists for a reason. Their valuable assets would have been sold to banks that could take on the debt while the illiquid assets would have been charged off instead of being bought by the Fed on our dime.