I'm not sure that I agree with your view of the socialist countries. We seem to be at different degrees of the same point.
One additional trait that I'm seeing in socialist countries is the lack of 'extremism' and more trust in the government (thinking of Denmark, Norway, etc).
It goes back to my freedom to kill yourself with food example. Bloomburg wants to bad the large soda and people are fighting him for it. I wouldn't expect to see that type of resistance in socialist type countries.
In the end, it doesn't really matter. You or I are not able to change the current overall conditions and these thread reduce our chances for QT to post up boob pics.