Yes, I'm passionate for liberty.  That's why I'm a Capitalist.  Ayn Rand wrote
in her essay, Capitalism:  The Unknown Ideal, "Capitalism is a social sys-
tem based on the recognition of individual rights, including property
rights, in which all are privately owned."   She goes on say that the most
fundamental property right is to own yourself.  There can be no freedom in
any legal or political sense unless you own yourself.  Any system which per-
mits others, be they individuals, institutions, or society as a whole, to have
any claim on you is one which practices slavery.

Economic freedom is essential to any political freedom.  The two go hand in
hand.  Economics being the most fundamental human interaction aside from
sexual intercourse and parenting, is another concept identified by Rand.  She
has got it right, in my opinion.  You cannot be free if a government coerces
you in your business, any less than if it attempts to regulate your bedroom.

We've seen the results of when government tries this.  Nazi Germany, the
Soviet Union, Communist China, Cambodia, etc.  Oppression, murder, and
slavery.  There have been countless smaller, yet no less bloody.  Rwanda,
Serbia, Sudan, and Somalia have been recent transgressors.  We've even
seen the wreckage caused when democracies flirt with attempts to control
our lives.  In the 1930s through '70s, England and America practiced their
restrictions and regulations of free markets.  In each case, the effort wound
up causing more problems.  Despite the best intentions, to help people, when
government takes action, it makes matters worse.

WHAT?!, you exclaim!  Am I comparing The New Deal and the Great Society
to Nazis and Stalinism?!  You bet I am!  Look at the damage those policies
created.  Social Security was a pyramid scheme from Day One, and the end
result is a looming disaster on the horizon.  There just simply won't be enough
workers employed to sustain those receiving benefits in the next decade or
so.  Not without oppressive tax rates, that is.  The fabric of the family itself
has been shattered by welfare, giving rise to whole generations of people
that have no motivation to succeed in our economy.  These 'solutions' were
only compounded with the ultimate, Socialist solution to economic ills, wage
and price controls.  When Nixon did this in the early '70s, it helped plunge us
into real despair, with shortages, rising unemployment, and inflation.

But there is hope.  As we saw in the 1970s and '80s, a few leaders stood to
challenge the trend of centralized authority.  Thatcher and Reagan took an
ax to slashing regulations that strangled free trade and incentive.  In one
crucial instance, Chile, a dictatorship turned towards free markets, only to
succeed in getting itself ousted from power as it's people became unchained
from accepting government control over their lives.  Bolivia's embracement of
Capitalism stabilized the most unstable government, with coups almost every
month.  It also closed the door on the second worst case of hyper-inflation in
human history.  By the 1990s, Capitalism was roaring strong across the en-
tire globe. 

This is not to say the transformation has been painless.  Indeed, millions in
the developed world, and billions in the developing world, have paid a dear
price.  Workers displaced as old industries modernize or are replaced.  Life's
savings and investments wiped out during shifts in market forces.  In much
of the world, the price was paid in blood and suffering.  We do not have to
search long or hard to find tragedy and misery.

In the developing world, including the formal Socialist states of Eastern Eu-
rope, the big problems are corruption within the government and it's bureau-
cratic institutions, and the lack of the necessary institutions to support the
infrastructure of Capitalism.  The two most basic of these, as pointed out by
Hernando DeSoto in his The Mystery of Capitalism, are property laws and
identity systems.

Under Communism, all property is owned by the State.  Even your life.  The
individual has no claim to anything.  Once the Communist governments be-
gan to collapse, there was no system of laws or even guidelines to give the
property to anyone.  Under even the best of circumstances, the best that
could be implemented was a form of the de-nationalization practiced by the
Thatcher administration in England during the late '70s through mid '80s. 
Everything, from personal dwellings to giant industries, had to be privatized. 
In much of the developing world, the practice was 'squatters rights'.  Being
there, whether you had any claim to it at all or not, was the only rule.  As
they say, possession is nine-tenths of the law.

Likewise, being able to prove who you are and what you're worth was very
difficult.  Despite the bureaucracy of many heavy-handed governments, few,
if anyone, has proper proof of their identity.  Certainly not enough to obtain
a credit card.  And that is important.  Ask any business person.  A line of
credit is essential to doing any business.  Combining this with the property
issues, and you have a situation where the ability to obtain credit, loans, or
investment, is nearly impossible.

Acquiring these (loans, credit, investment) then pave the way for entrepre-
neurism.  At this stage, the individual now takes the next step in personal
freedom, control over your own destiny.  The real test in achieving progress.
Owning not only yourself, but the creation of your own mind and sweat.  As
another time-tested cliché goes, you'll never get rich working for somebody
else.  It is not selfish to aspire to this.  On the contrary, it encourages and
assists others.  Creation of new enterprises leads to increasing employment,
trade, and puts more cash (and wealth) into circulation. 

This is one of the fundamental economic problems with Socialism.  There is
little incentive, aside from the threat of violence, to encourage people to
seek improvement.  To go beyond the possible.  Taking risks is always ne-
cessary if one wants to better themselves.  We find this is always the case in
our romantic lives.  So to is it in our economy.  The rewards are just as great,
self-satisfaction, self-worth, and self-respect.  This is why economic freedom
and politic liberty are so closely tied to each other.  It all leads to self-aware-
ness and self-government.  Self-ishness is not evil.  It is a positive, highly
motivating force.  It is also an honest one, not dependent on propaganda or
the threat of violence.  Self-determination demands self-appraisal.  You must
always consider where you are in regards to where you want to be.  Who you
are and whom you want to be.

This is the essence of Capitalism which attracts my-self.  When we speak in
terms of individual freedom, we can only do so in the context of Capitalism,
for no other system permits it.  In ALL other cases, the individual is squashed
and made subordinate to some higher authority, be it a king, a dictator, or
even the masses as a whole.  Only in Capitalism can an individual own him
or herself.  Own other tangible assets like land, a business, or, my favorite,
gold!  Only in Capitalism can one own intangible assets, the two most im-
portant being ideas, the products of an individual's mind, and choice, the
product of an individual's dreams and persuasions.

It absolutely astounds me at times how so many people who claim to be
artists, who's very lives are driven by the desire to be creative, will immedi-
ately dismiss any notion that Capitalism is a good thing.  Despite the fact that
they benefit most of all from the by-products of Capitalism, namely, self-ex-
pression.  No other system would permit it to function with any substantial
degree of freedom from censorship.  Free markets require a free exchange
of ideas, even ludicrous ones.

So this is why I love and believe in Capitalism.  Is it perfect?  Not yet. There's
still more work that needs to be done.  What needs reforming, and how to go
about it, will be the subject of future chapters.  As will be what we can expect
from the current problems we face now, and those to come.