Communism

Commies hate property owners, especially ones who happen to be landlords. In New York, the next step on the path to communism has been taken. Mamdani just signed a law that any apartment building sold must first be offered to approved “non-profits” who will have an exclusive 145-day window to buy the property. If the sale doesn’t go through, but the property is sold within 12 months of the end of that window, the organizations will have the right of first refusal, allowing them to match the competing offer.

The law covers buildings with four or more units that are in significant disrepair, as well as properties with existing affordability restrictions. Note that the term ” disrepair ” doesn’t seem to be defined anywhere.

The city government will maintain a list of qualified entities, including nonprofit housing organizations, tenant groups, community land trusts, and other organizations that won’t be corrupt or funnel any money to government officials.

This is going to destroy the New York real estate market.

Socialism and communism are two flavors of the same ice cream. In fact, if government and economic systems could be ice cream, those collective philosophies would be strawberries and salmon flavored. It’s just that socialism would have sprinkles and communism would be in a waffle cone. Oh- and someone else would pay for it on your behalf.

Liberal city residents, when questioned on this, make it obvious that socialists are just people who want free stuff so they can go ahead and spend their money on baubles. They think socialism means- in his words- “taking care of the needs of people, things like national health care, like that.”

Then he is asked, “What about the government taking property, businesses, things like that?” He mentions not really thinking about socialism like that.

This socialist supporter then says, “I don’t like the idea of government taking things away from you.”

Then they switch to a guy who, let’s put it gently, doesn’t look very masculine and is wearing a Cuban flag medallion on a chain around his neck. His opinion is that there is too much wealth inequality in this country, and that could be solved with higher taxes on the rich.

The next woman comes on and is at least honest- her belief of what socialism is, is the elimination of private businesses. She says it’s too difficult to run small business, and corporations have too much power, so the way to solve this is to make all businesses owned by the government. She is at least the first person they interviewed who knew the answer and was not shy about honesty.

That’s the problem with socialists- they have a desire for free necessities, but don’t give a single thought into how it will be paid for, or the ones who DO think about that, assume it will be taken from those evil “rich people.”

These two theories of government are, simply stated, government ownership. Socialists will be quick to argue the two are different because in socialism, you still get to own your property. Do you really? No, you don’t. Socialism is an idea about organizing the economy so that businesses and resources are owned or controlled socially, in other words, by the government. The stated reason is to reduce inequality and serve public needs. In other words, seizing the means of the production of goods and services.

What collectivism is not is a synonym for “everything the government does.” There are legitimate reasons why we form governments, and why we grant that government with certain powers. That is, we give up a little autonomy in order to gain things we could not get on our own.

In socialism, all businesses are now the property of the government, who decides what and how much everyone will receive. Imagine an economy with the efficiency of the post office and the compassion of the DMV. Of course, no one will be corrupt, and not a single government official will give money and extra power to their relatives.

It’s great when everyone contributes to a society. The flaw in collectivism is simple: some people will take advantage of the collective contributions of others to reap benefits without themselves having to do a thing to create those benefits. If you’ve ever been involved with a group project in school or at work, you know what I mean.

The difference between a legitimate function of cooperation for mutual benefit and the loss of autonomy found in collective governments is not a bright, hard line. It’s more a shifting from day to night, and somewhere in the middle you realize things have gotten so dark you can no longer see.

That’s how collectivism works- the government has ultimate control over everything from your labor to the factory, farm, or business you perform that labor in. That’s an important difference from a Republic or a free market.

To me, the difference is clear: is the benefit being paid for with tax dollars available to everyone, or just to some? Is the cost borne by everyone, or just a few? Some things to consider:

• A military. Collectivism, or free market? The answer is it can be both. A free market military is either volunteer, or everyone has to serve. If people with power and wealth aren’t forced to participate in the draft, then it’s collectivism. See the Vietnam draft versus the WW2 draft.
• What about fire departments? Again, they can be both. If the fire department is better equipped in a rich neighborhood than a poor one, but everyone pays the same tax to support it, or the opposite: everyone pays different amounts but receives the same service, it’s not free market.
• What about police and the courts? Again, everyone should get the same level of service for the same legal rights, which doesn’t mean they are collectivist.
• Schools. Government run schools are a collectivist policy. Forcing people without kids, or whose kids don’t attend schools to pay for a school system from which they derive no benefit is definitely not free market.
• Social Security and Medicare are not free market and are definitely collectivist. They weren’t intended to be, but there you are. The problem is Social Security was intended to be self supporting, with contributions in your working years being intended to fund the money you received in your retirement. We all know what happened there.
• Medicaid. Collectivist, and has NEVER been free market. Everyone pays, but you have to qualify in order to get it.
• Public Beaches, Parks, and Libraries. Not collectivist. Everyone pays, but its free for everyone. It’s a public service, which is quite different from means tested collectivist perks.
• Roads. Not collectivist. They are funded through tolls and fuel taxes. The people who use them are the ones paying for them.

Now it’s plain to me this government we live in has never been a complete free market. There have been differing levels of service and taxes since forever, and to be quite frank, I am not sure a completely free market can actually exist and still support a cohesive society. Likewise for communism. There is no way that any society made of humans can be completely communist. Some will have more abilities, a stronger work ethic, while others will be more likely to sponge off the system.

What communism attempts to sell is complete equality, but it falls far short- as it must.

What socialism sells is taking from those who produce and giving to those who consume- favoring the sick, lame, stupid, and lazy.

The free market allows some to fail. If an individual can’t or won’t work in a pursuit that ensures they can provide for themselves, they must rely on the charity and good graces of others, and some people just can’t handle that while blaming society and those who produce, rather than the person whose fault it actually is.

I have spoken of vzyali quite a few times on this blog. I learned the term from my Scoutmaster when I was a boy scout as a teenager. Greg (I used his first name for security reasons) had escaped from the Soviet Union in the 1950’s as a teenager when his parents managed to smuggle him across the border in the trunk of a car. He never saw his parents again, they were vzyali.

He used to tell me stories of what it was like to live in the Soviet Union. How they used to spy on and watch everyone, to the point where you were required to bring your unsealed envelopes for mailing to their post office. The officials would read your mail to ensure it contained nothing disloyal before sealing and passing the envelope on.

Vzyali is one of the most chilling linguistic phenomena of the Soviet era, particularly during Stalin’s Great Terror in the 1930s. In that context, “Vzyali” translates more accurately to “They took [him/her/them]” or “They’ve taken.” It was used as an absolute, terrifying euphemism.

• The Unspeakable “They”: Everyone knew exactly who “they” were—the NKVD (the Soviet secret police, later the KGB)—but naming them aloud was incredibly dangerous. By omitting the pronoun or noun, citizens avoided speaking the name of the state security apparatus, which could invite suspicion upon themselves.
• Avoiding Legal Terms: People rarely said “arrestovani” (arrested) because “arrest” implied a legitimate legal process, a charge, and a system of justice. “Vzyali” stripped away any illusion of legality; it meant a person was simply plucked from their life, usually in the dead of night, never to be seen again.
• The Atmosphere of Fear: The word captured the arbitrary, predator-like nature of the regime. To say someone was “taken” meant they had vanished into the Gulag system or been executed, and their family was left to live in terror of being “taken” next.

This linguistic coping mechanism is famously documented in Soviet dissident literature, including Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago and Anna Akhmatova’s poem Requiem, reflecting how totalitarianism alters language itself to express trauma.

Our scoutmaster was a good man, but he passed away a few months ago. He and his wife became good friends with my own parents. They lived a few miles from us, and I remember they used to visit often. Pat’s specialty was mango pies, Greg’s specialty was teaching me skills like living in the woods, washing dishes without water, and other useful skills. His wife Pat died a few years ago.

No one hated communists more than Greg, and he would let you know why. All you had to do was get to know him. He loved the US with everything he had, and did more to serve this country than most who were born here. He left a lasting impression upon me, and is a huge reason why I am as opposed to the communist movement that the left has become.

I want to illustrate some communist stupidity. These Marxist idiots have a kindergarten level of understanding when it comes to economics.

A circuit breaker for the front of the house kept tripping. I kept losing power to two bedrooms and a bathroom. 6 receptacles, plus the lights for the three rooms. I spent a good part of the day trying to chase down the cause. It took about 3 hours to discover one of the stretches of Romex running between two receptacles on two different walls had a short between the ground and the neutral wires. They measured less than an ohm between them. I was forced to cut the ends of the wire off in both boxes. Now the breaker stays on. I’m glad the wire in question only powers the one plug.

So tomorrow, I will run to Lowes and get a twenty foot piece of 12 gauge Romex and some nail plates. Then I will have to pull the baseboard between that plug and one that is on the same wall, pull the wire behind the drywall, use a hammer drill and masonry bit to drill into the block, pull the wire up in to the boxes through the hole I just drilled, wire it all up, and then repair the wall and replace the baseboards. Call it another 4 or 5 hours of my day MINIMUM. Even doing the work myself is going to take about 20 hours of work and cost about $60 in parts. If I had paid an electrician, probably $1,000 worth of service call. All because of a tripping breaker.

How is this related to communists? Because, according to Communists, owning and maintaining property isn’t work, and landlords shouldn’t be allowed to charge people money for that.

The replies to this are really funny. No owning property shouldn’t be your job. Property shouldn’t be treated as a commodity. It isn’t “work” to own property and extort from someone

— Gene Parmesan (@Antiphrasing) October 15, 2026

I’m pro capitalism but charging for air is the biggest scam in the world. pic.twitter.com/2dyy9BHZkp

— Investing Addict (@InvestingAddict) September 30, 2026

So the owner of the business has to provide the compressor, the electricity, the maintenance, insurance, and other necessary items at his own expense?

Pass a law against charging for air, and they will just remove the air station, ensuring that no one will have air available at all.

Oh, and saying “I’m pro-capitalism, but” right before making a statement like this is like saying “I’m a gun owner, but”

Background: Some moron came to social media to simp for passing a law reducing the work week to 32 hours. Some people complained that they wouldn’t be able to pay bills with a 20% reduction in income. The response from the advocates of this claimed the law would require an hourly raise so the fewer hours would not affect the employees’ take home pay. That’s the background.

I objected, asking how businesses would pay for this. The response was “studies have shown that this schedule increases employee productivity so that this plan has no net impact on business operations.” I called bullshit- if this were the case, businesses would already be doing this.

In response, they attached a “study” done by the government of San Juan county, Washington. Since 2023, the county has only required employees work 32 hours per week. They have made it permanent by claiming an increase of over 200% in job applicants and an increase in employee productivity.

The catch is in how the government defines productivity. I will quote it here:

Maintaining Productivity: Employee timesheet data shows an average of 18% less sick time used after adopting the 32HWW, and 21% less sick time used during flu season. 

That isn’t productivity. That’s presence. Just because an employee doesn’t call in sick as often doesn’t mean he is doing anything while he is there. This is the kind of bullshit that people pass off as “scientific studies” today.

So I asked, if employee productivity goes up, why wouldn’t all businesses do it? His answer? Business owners are greedy. If by greedy, you mean “all business owners want to earn the largest profit they can,” Then I guess they are. However, if they are greedy and want to maximize profit, you do that by increasing productivity.

There are two types of costs that a business incurs:

• Variable costs. These are costs that vary with the amount of product you produce. Things like labor, raw materials, etc.
• Fixed costs: insurance, cost of the factory, administrative overhead like HR and accounting departments, things like that.

If a business is creating 3200 widgets and has 400 labor hours each week, there are 8 products being made per labor hour. That’s a measure of variable labor costs. If I could reduce that to 320 labor hours, but still manufacture 3200 widgets, I just cut my labor costs by producing 10 widgets per labor hour.

But there’s more. At the same time, the fixed costs stay the same, only now there is time in a week to work another 3/4ths of a shift in the three days remaining. If I hire a second shift to work an average of 240 hours per week and they can maintain the 10 widgets per labor hour, I am now producing 5600 widgets per week without increasing my fixed costs.

I just increased my profit margins. Why wouldn’t I??

The reason I wouldn’t? Because productivity doesn’t increase when you cut working hours. If a person can assemble ten widgets an hour, he won’t magically assemble 12 of them because you give him more time off.

So what happened? How did San Juan county’s government departments all meet their targets, even though they were working 20% fewer hours? Two ways: They made salaried employees work more hours, and they had an outsourcing contract that brought in outside contractors to complete the backlogged work.

That’s how leftists and governments define success. It’s all smoke and mirrors.