Reddit-ass geopolitical experts.

The reason Marxist nations have struggled is due to elite corruption, not the ideology itself.

The primary reason, by a long shot, is that the imperialist states never stop trying to destroy socialist states, or really any state that stands between them and their plundering.

• Understanding Siege Socialism w/ Gabriel Rockhill
• Michael Parenti, Blackshirts and Reds, Pure Socialism vs. Siege Socialism

They’re not wrong about democratic backsliding in this case, but I generally ignore this index, which The Economist Group^[1] publishes for the purposes of imperial core propaganda against states that it wants to regime change.

I actually fully believe in a genuine democratic capitalist government

This is impossible to achieve, because whenever “democracy” becomes too “genuine” for their tastes, the bourgeoisie will unleash fascism.

• Fascism Is Possible Not in Spite of Liberal Capitalism, but Because of It
• Michael Parenti:
  • Fascism: The False Revolution
  • Rational Fascism
• Gabriel Rockhill:
  • Fascism: Now You See It, Now You Don’t!
  • Liberalism and Fascism: Partners in Crime
  • The U.S. Did Not Defeat Fascism in WWII, It Discreetly Internationalized It
• Domenico Losurdo: Liberalism: A Counter-History

A good dictatorship, one that truly serves the people and removes the influence of the elite, could be the only way to actually return power to the masses.

A “good dictatorship” in the Dark Enlightenment sense of the people skulking around the White House right now, or a “good dictatorship” in the Marxist sense?

why would funding campaigns matter if the vote wasn’t real?

In capitalist states, campaign finance is one of the reasons why voting isn’t, in practical terms, real.

You really need to specify what state you’re talking about and when. If you’re talking about a capitalist state, then the answer is the capitalist class runs it. If you’re talking about the US specifically, then I’ll recycle my previous answer:

It’s not wrong to say regulatory capture is a problem, it just doesn’t go far enough. The US government was never not captured by the bourgeoisie, because the US was born of a bourgeois revolution[1]. The wealthy, white, male, land-owning, largely slave-owning Founding Fathers constructed a bourgeois state with “checks and balances” against the “tyranny of the majority”. It was never meant to represent the majority—the working class—and it never has, despite eventually allowing women and non-whites (at least those not disenfranchised by the carceral system) to vote. BBC: [Princeton & Northwestern] Study: US is an oligarchy, not a democracy

“Actually, I live in my own basement, dumbass!”

Right, so days & nights trolling then. Got it 👍

Everyone—including yourself—knows that no one can possibly know whether he will win, so why say it? Do you have a time machine, or do you just spend your days & nights trolling on Lemmy?

Look upon his Works, ye Mighty, and despair!

Mormon Satanist. Transracial Socialist Workers Party Kopimist Monk. Debt-free. Alcohol-free. Drug-free. Caffeine-free. “Over 45,000 downvotes, mocked, stalked, parodied, and called a troll—all because I dare stand against the Duopoly. Yet here I am, unbeaten. Breaking the chains of oppression!”

Just the straight-edge virtue signaling alone is 😬 And “debt-free”? That’s mostly dumb luck, and not at all moral virtue.

Edit to add: I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone as ratioed. No one on Lemmy is buying what he’s selling, but I guess that just proves how right he is.