[phaemon]

> This however, didn't stop party officials...[gaining massive wealth]...

Well, exactly. And you don't think they earned that wealth, I presume? You think they took it from the ordinary working person. So why are you arguing that this exact same behaviour is acceptable under a Capitalist system?

Your other points are worth addressing and you argue well, but there are too many for one post. I don't like the funneling of wealth that happens with Copyright either, so I'd like to see it abolished, if that answers some of your later stuff.

[c22]

Do you think Carmack could have made 60 million under a communist system? I don't know if he really "earned" it (this seems extremely subjective), but wealth accruing to the people who make cool video games seems better than wealth only accruing to the people who make the rules.

Sure, there's a fair amount of wealth accrual to the people who make the rules in capitalist systems as well--that effect is perhaps orthogonal to the economic system in play, but the fact that capitalism provides opportunities for people to accrue wealth also by their own initiative is what makes it so attractive.

It's definitely not perfect, but what is?