As far as I can tell, the traditional American litanies about capitalism and communism pretty much require accepting that every bad thing that happens under soc

As far as I can tell, the traditional American litanies about capitalism and communism pretty much require accepting that every bad thing that happens under socialism and communism is because of lack of capitalism, while every bad thing that happens under capitalism is in spite of capitalism. In other words, it's the classic "X can't fail, it can only be failed" pattern of thought. I think that's a hard sell if you didn't grow up with a lot of propaganda about how being American means being capitalist and being socialist or communist means being anti-American. It's an even a harder sell looking at post-Soviet Russia and seeing political repression and corruption that appears to be no better at a fundamental level, rather than being less severe due to being less systematic. So it falls to more general arguments evaluated in light of our current context, which is inherently messy because we don't have the answer sheet yet.