> Competition is part of human nature and not strictly a capitalist conceit,
> though capitalism does corrupt the competitive urge.
Bingo. Would that more leftists acknowledged this to be true...
^^^^^^ CB: I'd say a lot of us leftists believe that the big change at the origin of the human species was an explosion of cooperation, the opposite of competition. The distinguishing characteristic of human nature is cooperation, less competition. In other words, our nature is to be more social than other species.
The fall from the Garden of Eden of cooperation occurs with the rise of class exploitative society, capitalism being the latest form of that after slavery, feudalism, whatever.
So , with due respect, it is a first principle for the left that going to communism from capitalism will put us in greater harmony with the human natural tendency to cooperate.