I hear it a lot: “Obama is a socialist”. This accusation has been ubiquitous in recent months. From housewives to senators, a fear of socialism seems to be in vogue.
Feverish and fearful conservatives are fighting against universal healthcare tooth and nail; “Health isn’t a right”, they say. Cut welfare, medicare, medicaid, public transit, and public schools. Maybe raze a soup kitchen or two.
This ideology has broad support within the political arena, but outside of politics socialism is making a comeback. From where does this socialist comeback arise? The last place you’d expect: the free market.
Moore’s Law. Get familiar. It’s the reason the price of a new personal computer stays the same even though the processor speed and the capacity of the hard drive double every 18 months (doubt it?). It’s the reason a 5 megapixel digital camera that cost $500 five years ago can be had for $75 today.
Moore’s Law is simple and intuitive: new scientific information/innovation is built upon and sped up by the all of the scientific information/innovation that has preceded it. The result? The rate at which innovation occurs is exponential.
Roughly 5500 years ago humans first developed the written word. In 1439, the printing press was invented. In 1809, the telegraph; 1876, the telephone. In 1890, Herman Hollerith invented the first data recording computer (remember the punch cards?). From here on out, we really see Moore’s Law take effect.
Moore’s Law may be simple, but the implications of the exponential growth of innovation are (frickin‘!!) astounding.
With the advent of the internet, new methods of sharing information are cropping up so rapidly it’s next to impossible to keep track of them all, but here’s a chronological list that indicates the trend: email, chatrooms, instant messaging, Napster, Facebook, Wikipedia, Twitter, and who knows what’s next. Here‘s a great example of the socialization of communication (Most Ironic Thing Ever Award).
What does all this have to do with socialism, you ask? The benefits of upper-class living are increasingly available to the masses (huddled and yearning though they may be). With the click of a mouse, the poorest American in 2009 has access to more knowledge in minutes than the most wealthy American in 1980 could access in months.
And communication ain’t all.
Innovation in energy production is increasing too. Nuclear fission plants are now commonplace, producing energy at vastly greater rates than preceding methods. And nuclear fusion isn’t far off; check it out, the sheer amount of energy produced will render the cost of electricity next to nil. Free electricity for everybody!! Forget gasoline, coal, hydroelectric, etc., that stuff is for suckers; dig a hole 9000′ underground to suck up crude oil.. are you crazy? “In my day we drove uphill both ways, we spent $60 a week on gas and we liked it”. Yeah, grandpa, we know.
Healthcare is another field in which rapidly developing technology will change the face of the institution. I’m hardly a healthcare professional so don’t take my word for it. But she is. And they are.
So while folks are mocking our President, branding him “Nazi” and “socialist”, the capitalism they so feverishly “defend” is quietly undoing itself. It’s working too well, offering too much too cheap. It won’t be long, maybe 30 years, before energy will be free, the entire body of human knowledge will be available for free on the internet, and preventative healthcare will ensure everyone lives happily and healthily beyond the century mark.
Who needs capitalism when life is this good? I think I’ll buy a little piece of lakefront up in the Appalachian mountains and take it easy for a while, say, 80 years or so.
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So–Obama has just taken a leap over that’s gonna occur eventually over a few years?
Interesting.
Righteous article dude! If people just took some time and pulled their head outta their ass they would see socialism already at work.
well, Obama’s policies have nothing to do with socialism at all is part of my point. Those who fear Obama as a socialist are too busy being angry and disrespectful to notice that capitalism’s end result is socialism. We’re fast approaching that nexus point between the two, and, for my part, I think it’s a good thing.
The exponential rate of innovation will soon provide for everyone’s basic needs at very low cost and with great availability.
President Obama’s bailing out of banks (actually, Bush began TARP), auto companies, his efforts to provide universal healthcare… it’s all going to look quaintly capitalistic when we look back 30 years from now and realize he’s desperately trying save capitalism.