Communism, what it is and what it isn't (off topic)
 

No nation has ever been communist, though several have tried. No nation
ever will become communist, most likely. However, any nation that did could
be a far greater superpower than the world has ever seen, because communism
is (in actual practice) much more efficient than the alternatives. But it
won't happen.

Communism only works in very small groups of up to 100 or so people, though
the number can vary. There are certain reasons for that which I won't get
into now.

The unfortunate fact is that competition stimulates and communism sedates
99%+ of the population. If you can get more gold by working harder or
improving a product or process or whatever, you're going to be really
motivated to do it! If your only hope of reward is improving the system,
working for the greater good, then why should you bother? Why work (or why
work hard or well) if you're going to get the same amount of cash in your
pocket regardless? That's how most people feel. That's how I feel.

Communism works like an ant colony or beehive. Each individual contributes
to a common goal. In unity their is strength and incredible efficiency. If
an entire nation of people were all single-minded in their desire to put
forth their best effort to advance the greater good, such a nation, even
with a population of only a few million, would be able to accomplish more
than the rest of the world put together. But people aren't ants or bees.
We live communally in a sense, socially, but we're stimulated by personal
gain, by avarice, by having a flashier car than the neighbors, a bigger
house, better property, etc. When those motivations are taken away, most
people lose their motivation to work. If they are forced to work anyway,
they'll do as half-assed a job as they can get away with.

There are a few very small communities scattered around the world which live
like the idea of communism is supposed to work, and for them it works very
well--much more efficiently than capitalism can, when you consider resource
capabilities per person, or efficiency of production vs. consumption.
However, the person who can give up personal material gain and work for the
sake of the community is exceedingly rare. That's why communism fails
miserably when attempted on a large scale--because it has to be forced on
people who don't want it. And that's why no nation has ever been
communist--because communism isn't about dictatorship, totalitarianism,
restricted freedom and that stuff--all that is only needed because the
people don't want communism so you have to have an authoritarian government
in order to force people into compliance.

Stupid. It's stupid to even try. You can't make people want to live a
certain way by forcing them to live that way. It's a catch-22. Communism
won't work unless it's completely voluntary, and no more than one person in
a hundred thousand (and probably far fewer than that) is going to volunteer
to give up personal gain and work for the common good. It's too bad, but
that's how it is.

To summarize, communism in actual practice is much more efficient than other
systems, but it can only be put into practice if all the participants are
willing or better yet enthusiastic about giving up personal material gain
and instead, work for the common good--which excludes 99.9999% of the
population. Therefore, communism works in small, voluntary groups but is
impossible to work for any larger number of people.

--
Most of the great evil done in the world is done in the name of fighting
evil.