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If You Had Actually Grown Up In A Soviet Country, This Is What You Would Have Experienced

10-22-2012 • http://www.businessinsider.com, Rob Wile

"I grew up in a socialist country. And I have seen what that does to people. There is no hope, no freedom. No pride in achievement.

"And that's what I see happening here."

So begins an ad that's been airing in the run-up to November elections, narrated and paid for by Thomas Peterffy, in support of Republican candidates.

Peterrfy, the CEO of Interactive Brokers, came to America in 1965 to escape Communist Hungary.

He fears a world where, if we're not careful, "people will lose interest in really working hard and creating jobs. I think this is a very slippery slope.

"It seems like people don't learn from the past."

Is the U.S. really starting to resemble the country he left?

We turned to "Steeltown, USSR," a book-length work of reportage from current Princeton University History Professor Stephen Kotkin, to see what life under socialism is really like.

2 Comments in Response to If You Had Actually Grown Up In A Soviet Country, This Is What You Would Have Experienced

Comment by GrandPoobah

Entered on: 10/24/2012 7:10:38 PM

Can someone please point out a single difference between the religious conservatives and the nazis other than the religious conservatives would sent both atheists and gays to the camps, while the nazis sent gays and jews to the camps. Both groups want a militeristic ever larger national government controlling almost every part of our lives, and neither had any respect for any point of view other than their own.

Comment by Stupid Amerkin

Entered on: 10/23/2012 2:34:50 PM

Several years ago I met a few young men from the U.S.S.R. that claimed they had more freedom under communist rule in their country then they had here in the good ole U.S.of A and were looking forward to getting back home. This was just seven years ago.

Is there any doubt that Americans don't need to be re-educated on what freedom really is? Is there any doubt that the dumbing down of America has been a total success? Is there any doubt that business won't remain the same until the people wake up and come together collectively to clean house like they did in Iceland?

How much more insanity, greed, lies, and pure evil are the people of the world going to put up with before we wake up?

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