Actually, what this country cannot afford is to spend nearly as much on the military as the rest of the world combined, while taxing the rich less than they are taxed in any other first world country.

 

I know for a fact that not everyone who works at Microsoft is a genius. Not even most--but they do tend to have higher IQs.

I also know people with IQ who work at Walmart...

 

Has socialism really failed everywhere?

Those who maintain, "Socialism has failed in every country where it has been tried," usually present the Soviet Union and Cuba as illustrations of what they claim to be true.

The Soviet economy enabled Russia to recover from two German invasions and a civil war. It also carried Russia from semi feudalism to the space age. The standard of living in Cuba compares well with that of the rest of Latin America.

Of the fifteen countries that retain AAA ratings from both Standard & Poor's and Moody's, most have recognizably Social Democratic economies.
http://www.huliq.com/3257/us-leaves-whos-left-among-countries-both-moodys-s-p-aaa-ratings

Of those countries with Social Democratic economies, the four with the most fully developed Social Democratic economies are Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland. According to the CIA Worldfactbook, these have less public debt as a percentage of gross domestic product than the United States.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publica...ates&countryCode=us&regionCode=noa&rank=38#us

Democratic socialism does not exist anywhere, but Social Democracy is its closest approximation.

 

In this economy there are any number of people who used to be managers and professionals who are desperate for any job they can get.

 

Tell me something I don't know...

 

You got that right. Thanks Bush and thanks Obama.

 

This is a very misleading statement. The US leads the world in military spending, BUT it also arms the free world with the bulk of their high tech weaponry, for which the development is funded by the defense budget.

The tax rate on corporations is higher than almost every other country, the personal income tax is also higher than many other developed nation, considering the actual revenues paid by the high income earners.

 

Many corporations use ample loop holes in order to pay much less than corporate tax rates. The only first world country that pays even marginally lower taxes than the United States is Japan.
http://www.forbes.com/2009/04/09/tea-party-taxes-opinions-columnists-bartlett.html

Japan is not burdened by our bloated military budget.

Europe neither needs nor wants our protection. The way for the United States to avoid war is not by being so strong that no country will dare attack us. It is by being so weak that American presidents will not be tempted to start unnecessary and sometimes immoral wars.

If the United States had been weaker in 1965 Lyndon Johnson would not have sent ground troops to South Vietnam. If Bill Clinton had done what he should have, and cut the defense budget to the bone, George W. Bush would have avoided the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.