That is the mark of a "production professor". They go to school, more school, write a paper, then more school, then teach. If they do not have an eidetic memory, you may as well talk to the dude begging on the street corner, he may have more sense and facts, as well as ideas.

....because when it does, we'll enslave "them" and force them to produce.

I think that Heinlein simply enjoyed being a gadfly. He'd push buttons and then sit back and see what he had wrought.

The article below seems to describe some interesting things he did. Like giving a presentation and making the attendees donate blood and provide him the reciepts at the door! Kinda like a HillaryBeast event only her donations are checks, made out to her...

"They never wonder what will happen when it all runs out ........."
In the 1980's I asked a college professor acquaintance "What will you do when.......?"
Reply: "Oh, that will never happen."

Yes. He was one of those people you'd like to have as a personal friend. You could well imagine having some great conversations over drinks.

I have not found the web page that had an Editorial about him from the 60's questioning his anti communist credentials, but here is a really good web page in which he is discussed vs Libertarianism/Objectivists and some of his issues with being labeled a fascist, or endorsing fascism (as in Starship Troopers):

http://www.friesian.com/heinlein.htm

Oh, I know he was not a commie, but he did have issues with publishers and press. I loved the guy and have all his books, hard copy and audio. I know he was not a commie, he was one of the few sane people there were.

I am not going to argue those points, because they do fit into the issue, but it is not a simple as just releasing people. Draconian could be as much as a max 30 days between death sentence and execution. Add in DNA records for evidence, make prosecutors have to produce clear and convincing proof. The system is so gamed and manipulated at all levels that there is nor real common system of "justice" anymore. We have so damn many laws and 99% never get enforced. Perjury is so little prosecuted people do it with impunity and the law says it is too little to prosecute, so everyone lies now. So what happens to truth? No truth, no justice. If you cannot apply your laws evenly, then scrap the whole mess and lets go to personal enforcement. HillaryBeast and the Obamanation are the result of a lot of our "laws" today. They have used them to manipulate and confuse the sheeple to the point they will vote for anything, like a personality cult. Anyone one who can vote for Hillarybeast with all the evidence that is there right now, is part of the problem, they are actively approving of a Felon, no prosecution, "off you just hate her" Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" crap out. Yet they do it by the millions, and the Dumbocrap party and Debbie "I will manipulate the rules for myself" Wasserbum are all about lies, cheating and stealing. In such an environment, you can give up on justice, honesty and reasonable enforcement. We need to clean up this cess pool we call a society, and start over. More Draconian?, Yep, I can go more Draconian, but politicians need to be at the top of the list to be vetted.

Even more interesting, check out the commentary about the song at Wikipedia. It's like they are discussing, in minute detail, the creation of some religious artifact. Also:

Lennon and Ono co-produced the song and album with Phil Spector, who commented on the track: "We knew what we were going to do ... It was going to be John making a political statement, but a very commercial one as well ... I always thought that 'Imagine' was like the national anthem."

Copied from: Imagine (John Lennon song) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imagine...

Listen to the lyrics.

And the shoe pounding. Wherever he is, he's laughing.

"A world where all are equal, no one has any more of anything than anyone one else has, no desires, no difficulties, no challenges, no one excels in anything"
Is any of that actually in the song?

When asked by reporters how the Democratic Party is any different than socialism, Party Spokeswoman Debbie Wasserman-Shultz couldn't name one way. Hillary Clinton was asked the same question and again couldn't come up with an answer.

Look at what Democrats are pushing for:
- socialized healthcare
- taxpayer education funding for higher education
- taxpayer-funded retirement programs
- socialized education
- replacement of parental rights with community rights
- the replacement of a middle class with a worker class where you get told how much you will make (minimum wage) and how much you will spend (zero interest rates certainly don't encourage saving).

I look at the list and compare the differences and they are miniscule or areas of degree only. It started under Bill Clinton and has been drifting left ever since. Under Obama, they are indistinguishable. The Democratic Party is not what it was under JFK. It's not even what it was under Reagan. It's shifted completely leftist.

I'll leave the other items alone, but "Imagine" - just can't leave this one alone. Have you actually listened to the lyrics and thought about the meaning? A world where all are equal, no one has any more of anything than anyone one else has, no desires, no difficulties, no challenges, no one excels in anything.... If I was ever condemned to a world like that, I would have a desire for two things only - a rope and a bar of soap...

If you want a more draconian criminal justice system, we're near a fundamental disagreement. I think having a) so many things being illegal, b) long prison sentences, c) no rehabilitation for those who will be released at a young enough age to offend again, d) ineffective enforcement of the law and e) militaristic policing, are literally destroying the US. That sounds like hyperbole, but I mean it literally.

"To like communism, no thinking is necessary at all."
In some cases maybe it's non-thinking and in others Ellsworth Toohey thinking.

"John Lennon's "Imagine" was liked by a lot of totally unthinking people."
I'm generally thinking, and I like it.

"Now, I am not calling the majority of the human race "stupid""
This reminds me of Allen Greenspan talking about this in Age of Turbulence. He talks about how open on the surface sound contrary to values that most major religions and cultures from pre-industrial times taught, leading good people to support bad policies. He also mentions talking to Ayn Rand about these issues.

Heinlein was far from being a commie.
I'm not sure what he was, but he was a heluva good writer. Rarely has one been able to read books that were so much fun.
I suppose I should say I "grok" him just to show that I'm with him, but I won't.

So what's shocking about that? Hasn't it been
obvious for years? It was easy enough for me to
see resemblances between the Democratic Party
and the Communist one decades ago. The only
shocking part to me is the part about JFK's be-
ing relatively pro-free-enterprise.

You may be giving undue credit to some people. To like communism, no thinking is necessary at all. John Lennon's "Imagine" was liked by a lot of totally unthinking people. Now, I am not calling the majority of the human race "stupid"; what I'm saying is that most people are intelligent and knowledgeable in some areas of specialization, while quite incompetent in other areas. Thus, it would not be desirable for a congress of plumbers voting on how to do brain surgery, just like it would be equally undesirable for a congress of brain surgeons voting on how to do plumbing. Most people, in America today, have very little knowledge of history or economics and have very poor skills in logic - perhaps they should not be allowed to vote in the first place. Perhaps a test of some sort of competence is overdue. Of course, the original setup allowed votes only to people that either had a profession or in some way proved their positive participation in the society.

Starship Trooper was not available in several places, because of it's glorification of violence. Several of his short stories collections were likewise banned because in some of them he characterized government as an overburdensome failure, resulting in nuclear war, as well as oppressive religious empire. Revolt in the 21st century was one of the one religious groups took great offense too. In Grumbles from the Grave he discussed his admiration of some aspects of Communism, and also his dislike of many of it's faults. He also went to Moscow in the 60's or 70's and wrote of that, which was rather funny, as he described the whole waiting in line thing to a T.

There is a series a Sheriff in the Midwest got funding for, where they had 10 or so volunteers who went in for 60 days totally unknown to anyone. They discovered there was a large number of people who went in just because they could get drugs easier and cheaper than out, and that a significant group of deputies were abusive morons. He fired the deputies and made it much harder to get stuff into the jail. That is one problem with the system, can a government who can screw up simple things ever get prisons right? No. That does not mean we do not need them, what value is having a set of laws that cannot be enforced because of no punishement? I had an idiot next door who committed so much perjury on his bankruptcy it wasn't funny, and the federal attorney said it was just "small perjury". When I asked him what big perjury was, he hung up. The system is so irretrievably screwed we are now talking about carrying guns to protect ourselves. I will guarantee that someone who commits a crime, will do so again. The only thing that will correct that is a total and complete overhaul of our legal system and a more draconian punishment system.

My wife and I were talking about that last night, we are waiting for some Dumbocrap idiot to shot him, and claim he was defending America, get found insane, and then released in a year. Trump is a huge target for them, because he is a super threat to their freeloading system. I hope he has really good security for him and his family, he really needs it, especially now.

I believe that the term is "enlightened self interest". While objectivism has a component of that, it does not require you to get your goodies from the government, but from your own effort. That is the key concept that people have lost, you earn your own reward, not ask for it from the Obamanation or HillaryBeast. But, it is so much easier to just vote for money, even if it comes from someone else. Heinlein pounded on that concept many times.That was one reason people called him a commie lover, yet I saw just the opposite.