Hi ya all, This is a great discussion. Only one question to spice this up or give an alternative preception maybe with the hope to contribute. Everyone is argumenting on if Socialism is a religion. Maybe we should turn this arround and see if religions are social systems of organisation and social codes/structures and behaviours instead? Please note (and simplify instead of just arguing in word labyrinths) that neither National "Socialism" of Hitler, nor Communist "socialism" are in reality applied socialism. Socialism as a notion is based on the root of SOCIAL. That being said, I am no pro neither against it, just trying to make the point that "socialism" nowadays may be perceived by different people in different ways and as mentioned above, going to the principles and not its historical abuses, might lead us to understand better its vision. Socialsm is to many equal to comunism which is not true at all. That said, also capitalism contradicts Cristian (and to that effect almost every religion out there) in terms of sharing with the peron next to you...when was the last time a banker gave any of you 5000000USD_??? what I am trying to say I guess is, that controversies exist all over, through christian-republican, or cristian-democrat, or Russian Communist or whatever... so are you willing to talk about the up to now application of what where philosophical models of social organisation or to their evolvement in various application models with their differentiation? Is not money in itself power and religion today? does that make capitalism bad? Not necessarely in my perception but the same applies for all political ideological frameworks (I exclude radicals of any kind as personal choice of not accepting extremist ideologies from this conversation, as I do from my life). Thakn you and I hope my comment to be constructive. my best of regards to all, George.