Are you planning to vote in the 2012 election

[Guest]

Clarification of my above post:

I said (italics added):

"Note: If you don't actually state your positions (first on reality and then on the existence of states) and try actually arguing for them in your next post then there's a good chance I won't seriously reply. I've endured enough of such nonsense from quag for one summer."

If it was not evident from the rest of my post, "on reality" refers to the first part of my post in which I quoted myself from earlier on my description/explanation of how the concept of ownership works in reality. Do you agree or disagree with my description?

And "on the existence of states" refers to the later part of my post in which I explained why the existence of states hurts a fairer practice of the concept of ownership from being realized. Presuming you disagree, could you try actually defending your position that the state makes for a fairer practice of ownership in a society, rather than just make up non-issues of conflict-of-interests and DRO funding in the free market as if they were serious objections to my position that the state does not make for a fairer practice of ownership in a society, or as if they somehow justified states' tyrannical, violently-enforced "dispute resolution" services.

[Guest]

Dawh, not to rush you in your reply or seem impatient, but I just want to make sure that this isn't an issue:

I believe I have explained ownership without social contracts. If you don't think I have I'd appreciate you saying so rather than just not responding to me. Although again, if you just haven't gotten around to reading my long posts don't misinterpret this post as me being impatient or trying to rush you. I just want to make sure that you understand that I think I have fulfilled your request.

Also on a related note, I still don't see why you think the concept of social contracts adds to the "explanation" of ownership. Specifically, it seems to me that you think these social contracts somehow add to the government's subjective opinion on who owns what to make it more legitimate, or better, or more "correct" in some way somehow. I don't believe that this is true, so could you clarify if you think it is true or not to clarify what you think the relationship between these social contracts and the role of the government with regard to property ownership is.

Also, despite the fact that this is the post you (dawh) literally clicked reply to, you didn't reply to these points in your post.

I said, "I believe I have explained ownership without social contracts," and yet you neither said that you agreed that I did or disagreed that I did.

I said, "I still don't see why you think the concept of social contracts adds to the "explanation" of ownership. Specifically, it seems to me that you think these social contracts somehow add to the government's subjective opinion on who owns what to make it more legitimate, or better, or more "correct" in some way somehow. I don't believe that this is true, so could you clarify if you think it is true or not to clarify what you think the relationship between these social contracts and the role of the government with regard to property ownership is." And yet you didn't offer any explanation of how your concept of social contract adds to the "explanation" of ownership. And also despite literally clicking reply to this post, you still didn't explain your presumed view that these social contracts somehow make the government's subjective opinion on who owns what more legitimate, but instead left me in the dark with regard to your position on this subject just as you did with your previous post.

Edited July 26, 2011 by Use the Force

[Guest]

I replied to that post because I was rejecting your statement that you had adequately explained ownership sans "Social Contracts." Whether we agree regarding who owns what is immaterial to the Social Contract that is the basis of our ownership society. Nomadic tribesmen don't have the concept of ownership. The tribe "owns" everything. There are no things which any one person "owns" in such instances. So if you took such a tribesman and Donald Trump and put them in a room to make a property deal, they couldn't work together because they don't have that implicit Social Contract that agrees on the nature of ownership. You and I at least come from the same starting place regard what it means to own something, therefore we could make a deal (theoretically), unlike the tribesman and The Donald.

So even though you don't call it a Social Contract, our implicit agreement on what constitutes property seems like a Social Contract to me. That's what I was rejecting, not your definitions of ownership. I was just being a bit petulant as I am growing tired of this thread constantly running round in circles. I've told myself a couple of times to call it quits on this discussion because we do seem to have basic axiomatic differences, but like quag, I tend to act like this.

You keep saying, "But the State does X (which dawh abhors when companies do it)! The State does Y (which dawh hates when corporations do it)!" The difference between the State doing it and a private corporation doing it is that with modern democracies, the State is supposed to be answerable to its citizens. If the State oversteps its authority, the people have the power to step in and stop it. In my view, that's not possible with a private corporation.

Yes, a corporation has to answer to its shareholders and its consumers, but if I am neither, then I can have no direct say on what the corporation does. If Woolworth's doesn't want to serve black customers, I can choose to boycott it and I can choose not to patronize it, but I can't force it to serve all people equally. If the State does the same, as a citizen and user of the State's resources, I do have a say regarding its actions and I can demand that the State change as a right granted to me by the State. That's the Social Contract that we made when we founded the State. If we don't agree with what the State is doing, we have the right to change it. Government "of the People, by the People, for the People."

That's the distinction that I draw between modern governments and corporations and if you don't accept that distinction then I agree that we can't take this discussion any further.

...

Just quickly:

UtF: "The two parties could just agree to not pay the DRO more than half the cost of the dispute resolution service each if they were each worried about each other trying to bribe the DRO to bias their resolution."

If I'm supporting a family while making $50,000 a year, engaged in a dispute with someone making $200,000 a year, I probably can't just pony up half of the cost of the dispute if it's expensive enough to warrant outside investigation. In instances where one of the claimants can't afford to pay for the investigation, either all the costs are going to fall to one party (where there's a strong risk of bias being introduced), or the DRO is going to have to do it pro bono (which a lot of private companies would be loath to do since that cuts into profits). So it seems to me that without laws to protect all people, justice will be decided more based on who can fork out more cash. If the DRO sides with me in the dispute, I can give it my congratulations and pay it a pittance of the cost of the investigation, while if it sides with the rich man, he can probably promise it more lucrative business in the future.

Hence the reason I would vastly prefer an impartial entity to resolve a dispute that is not directly financially dependent on any of the claimants in order to resolve it. But that's just me...and 300 million or so other people in this country.

[Guest]

I replied to that post because I was rejecting your statement that you had adequately explained ownership sans "Social Contracts." Whether we agree regarding who owns what is immaterial to the Social Contract that is the basis of our ownership society. Nomadic tribesmen don't have the concept of ownership. The tribe "owns" everything. There are no things which any one person "owns" in such instances. So if you took such a tribesman and Donald Trump and put them in a room to make a property deal, they couldn't work together because they don't have that implicit Social Contract that agrees on the nature of ownership. You and I at least come from the same starting place regard what it means to own something, therefore we could make a deal (theoretically), unlike the tribesman and The Donald.

So even though you don't call it a Social Contract, our implicit agreement on what constitutes property seems like a Social Contract to me. That's what I was rejecting, not your definitions of ownership.

So if two people agree on something without explicitly stating that they agree on the something, it's now a "social contract"? Okay, you can call such agreements social contracts if you wish. I still don't see how that's helpful in any way though.

As for your assertion that some tribe person and Donald Trump couldn't resolve a property dispute because of the absence of a social contract, I completely disagree. What makes you think that they couldn't agree on whose stuff is whose without resorting to violence?

I was just being a bit petulant as I am growing tired of this thread constantly running round in circles. I've told myself a couple of times to call it quits on this discussion because we do seem to have basic axiomatic differences, but like quag, I tend to act like this.

What a coincidence, this is the same reason why I've been continuing this discussion. I even told you all that I was going to call it quits on the discussion in the hope that you all would help me quit it somehow. Maybe this means we should put come up with an end date in which we'll both just stop posting?

You keep saying, "But the State does X (which dawh abhors when companies do it)! The State does Y (which dawh hates when corporations do it)!" The difference between the State doing it and a private corporation doing it is that with modern democracies, the State is supposed to be answerable to its citizens. If the State oversteps its authority, the people have the power to step in and stop it. In my view, that's not possible with a private corporation.

Okay, but as you know I strongly disagree with this view. How could you possibly think that "the people" have the power to step in and stop it if its been going on continuously for hundreds of years with no end? One "X" example I gave: The state has merged "dispute resolution" services and physical power together such that it has been using its monopoly of physical power to violently enforce its conception of a "resolution" to any and all disputes that it has with people in a society. It has been doing this for hundreds of years continuously. How can you then claim that "the people" have the power to step in and stop this tyranny when they haven't for many generations.

If Woolworth's doesn't want to serve black customers, I can choose to boycott it and I can choose not to patronize it, but I can't force it to serve all people equally. If the State does the same, as a citizen and user of the State's resources, I do have a say regarding its actions and I can demand that the State change as a right granted to me by the State. That's the Social Contract that we made when we founded the State. If we don't agree with what the State is doing, we have the right to change it. Government "of the People, by the People, for the People."

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! Do you hear what you're saying? You're saying that you want to initiate violence against people who don't want to sell things to certain people (e.g. black people). Are you kidding? This is the most explicitly absurd thing you have said in a while.

"That's the Social Contract" that we made when we founded the State." ??? Again, what social contract? By your definition of social contracts as agreements between people that are not explicitly stated I don't see what "that" "Social Contract" that you're talking about is at all.

"If we don't agree with what the State is doing, we have the right to change it." Again, who is "we"? I don't agree with the state's uses of violence against people and yet I am unable to change it. So what do you mean "we have the right to change it"?

"Government 'of the People, by the People, for the People.'" More like Government "by some people, for some people, against other people." Again with your mention of this "Social Contract" in your previous sentence and then this phrase in this sentence, it sounds to me like you're trying to pretend that the state is founded on consent. This is not true. You do not have "the consent of the people" because there is no "the people." There are simply individuals who do not consent to be treated as a single group entity and thus when you try to pretend that you have the consent of "the people" you're brainwashing yourself into thinking that it's okay for you to support the state using violence against individual people.

That's the distinction that I draw between modern governments and corporations and if you don't accept that distinction then I agree that we can't take this discussion any further.

Oh good, no I don't agree. Well I agree with the part you said about the state, unlike private businesses, initiating violence against people (to force people to serve black people), but I strongly disagree that that makes the state better. With regard to that specific example though, do you truly want to initiate violence against people to force them to serve black people or violently punish them if they don't? Seriously, even ignoring the immorality of such violence, wouldn't you still not want to use such violence against them due to the fact that you want to know who the racists are in your society so that you can avoid interacting with them (buying their products/services, selling to them, etc)? For example, if a restaurant owner doesn't want to sell to blacks, do you really want to have a law saying that you'll use violence against anyone who refuses to sell to blacks? If you do, you won't know that you're eating at a racist restaurant owner's restaurant because he'll be serving blacks also despite not wanting to. So personally despite the NAP violation I still wouldn't want to have such a law because I would want to know who was racist, etc, so I could avoid them.

Just quickly:

UtF: "The two parties could just agree to not pay the DRO more than half the cost of the dispute resolution service each if they were each worried about each other trying to bribe the DRO to bias their resolution."

If I'm supporting a family while making $50,000 a year, engaged in a dispute with someone making $200,000 a year, I probably can't just pony up half of the cost of the dispute if it's expensive enough to warrant outside investigation. In instances where one of the claimants can't afford to pay for the investigation, either all the costs are going to fall to one party (where there's a strong risk of bias being introduced), or the DRO is going to have to do it pro bono (which a lot of private companies would be loath to do since that cuts into profits). So it seems to me that without laws to protect [sic] all people, justice will be decided more based on who can fork out more cash. If the DRO sides with me in the dispute, I can give it my congratulations and pay it a pittance of the cost of the investigation, while if it sides with the rich man, he can probably promise it more lucrative business in the future.

Hence the reason I would vastly prefer an impartial entity to resolve a dispute that is not directly financially dependent on any of the claimants in order to resolve it. But that's just me...and 300 million or so other people in this country.

The "sic" I added above was because you said "protect all people" rather than "violently force some people to pay other people (i.e. steal)".

Again, the conflict of interest you described above does not exist in the version of DROs that I have described (or at the very least it can be avoided). Also, if some rich man were to bribe a DRO to bias their ruling, you have to realize that the DRO doesn't violently enforce its rulings like the state does. This means that even if the DRO makes an unfair ruling due to a bribe then there isn't really a problem because people choose whether or not they wish to follow various DROs rulings. So chances are when people see that a DRO has made some blatantly unfair rulings, they will choose to not listen (i.e. ostracize accorind to) to that DRO's rulings even if they don't have any evidence that a bribe was the reason for the unfair ruling. So there really is no conflict of interest because the DROs are successful not by making biased rulings to rich people to get the rich peoples' money, but instead by making "fair" rulings in the eyes of as many people as possible to make sure that they continue getting those peoples' business. And if to this you say you disagree again for the reason that "as many people as possible" don't have a bunch of money to give to DROs, but rather, "a few rich people" have the spare money to give to DROs, then realize that the DRO is only successful so long as people follow its rulings. And people follow its rulings more the more deterants there are to not follow the rulings and the more people (consumers) that there are in a society who view the DRO's rulings as fair, the more likely they are to ostracize people who don't follow the DRO's rulings, thus making the DRO more prominent and successful. And thus, the most successful DROs in the long run (the ones who grow the biggest and make the most money) are not the ones who accept bribes from the rich to bias their rulings, but rather the ones who make the most fair rulings in the eyes of as many people as possible. While a DRO could accept a bribe, that would only be a short term benefit and they would surely be doomed to fail as a business in the future as people would look at their biased rulings and choose to stop obeying any of that DRO's rulings.

On the other hand, why didn't you reply to the conflicts of interests that are present in the state that I mentioned in my post to you? Surely the few examples I mentioned are undeniably very serious conflict of interests? Did you ignore them because you think that the people working for the state are mainly altruistic rather than selfish, or something? Certainly this isn't the case and thus the conflict of interests that I mentioned earlier are very serious problems that you should be trying to answer before continuing to call the state an "impartial entity" and before cotninuing to believe that the state provides better "dispute resolution" services are better than the free market.

And on the note of "dispute resolution" services in quotes, you said: "Hence the reason I would vastly prefer an impartial entity to resolve a dispute that is not directly financially dependent on any of the claimants in order to resolve it."

Realize that the state is not an impartial entity and that it does not "resolve" disputes, but rather violently puts an end to them in a physical sense using its monopoly of physical power.

Also, with regard to your quote: "But that's just me...and 300 million or so other people in this country." Realize that if it weren't for the state's monopoly on physical power in the US, then the state would be visibly waging war against many millions of people (easily a majority of people in the US (not the small portion of people that you alluded to when you said that 300 million people represent the other portion)) in order to try ending peoples' disputes in the forceful way that it usually does. For example, with regard to the dispute regarding who owns peoples' money, without the state's monopoly on physical power it would become extremely evident that millions of people have this dispute with the state on whether the state has the right to take (steal) their money or not. It would become extremely evident because many millions of people who ordinarily pay taxes because they fear the wrath of the state's monopoly on physical force would stop paying their taxes. And while this was happening illustrating to you that the government indeed steals from millions of people ("steal" in the subjective opinion of many millions of people), people would still be paying each other for goods and services in the free market. Why? Because transactions in the free market are voluntary (i.e. free from physical coercion) and are thus legitimate, unlike the coercive, NAP-violating, tax transactions between people like me (or my statist neighbors) and the government.

[Guest]

It'd be nice if you could respond to what I actually wrote, not what you wanted me to have written...

So if two people agree on something without explicitly stating that they agree on the something, it's now a "social contract"? Okay, you can call such agreements social contracts if you wish. I still don't see how that's helpful in any way though.

This may not have been entirely clear, but I thought it would be straightforward enough. I wasn't trying to imply that every implicit agreement is a "Social Contract" as that would be nonsensical. Though we've never signed a contract to that effect, I assume that we both agree that the the sky is blue. That's a fact and we don't need a contract, social or otherwise, to agree on that fact.

But when we're dealing with purely human constructs with no natural bases, we need some basic understanding to exist between us in order to reach an agreement. Something like property ownership fits the bill. (I do admit that I'm probably using the term Social Contract more loosely than most people would use it, but it's mainly to try to explain it since you still don't seem to understand the concept at all.)

As for your assertion that some tribe person and Donald Trump couldn't resolve a property dispute because of the absence of a social contract, I completely disagree. What makes you think that they couldn't agree on whose stuff is whose without resorting to violence?

This is just sloppy. I never said anything about violence. The whole point of the story about the tribesman and Trump trying to work out a land deal was to show that because they don't have a fundamental agreement on the definition of ownership, they can't resolve their dispute in the same way we could. They would first have to make each other understand the ownership of the other side and come to an arrangement. We can skip that part because we already have that understanding (what I'm referring to as a Social Contract). That was the point. I don't care if the tribesman and Trump come to blows over the deal or not. It's completely incidental to the point I was trying to make.

Okay, but as you know I strongly disagree with this view. How could you possibly think that "the people" have the power to step in and stop it if its been going on continuously for hundreds of years with no end? One "X" example I gave: The state has merged "dispute resolution" services and physical power together such that it has been using its monopoly of physical power to violently enforce its conception of a "resolution" to any and all disputes that it has with people in a society. It has been doing this for hundreds of years continuously. How can you then claim that "the people" have the power to step in and stop this tyranny when they haven't for many generations.

Well, the people only have to step in and change this if they view it as wrong. As I don't think that the merging of the groups is inherently wrong with the proper checks and balances, I don't see that it needs to be changed. That's the beauty of our system. It's designed to prevent even corrupt people from taking extreme advantage of it (it's hard to prevent all corruption of the system, but we do the best we can). Corrupt police officers can be arrested and prosecuted (see Kerik, Bernard). Corrupt judges can also be arrested and prosecuted (see County, Luzerne). No one is above the law, so there's the potential for everyone to be prosecuted. Does it work perfectly? No, but it's the most just system we've managed to develop.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! Do you hear what you're saying? You're saying that you want to initiate violence against people who don't want to sell things to certain people (e.g. black people). Are you kidding? This is the most explicitly absurd thing you have said in a while.

Oh good, no I don't agree. Well I agree with the part you said about the state, unlike private businesses, initiating violence against people (to force people to serve black people), but I strongly disagree that that makes the state better. With regard to that specific example though, do you truly want to initiate violence against people to force them to serve black people or violently punish them if they don't? Seriously, even ignoring the immorality of such violence, wouldn't you still not want to use such violence against them due to the fact that you want to know who the racists are in your society so that you can avoid interacting with them (buying their products/services, selling to them, etc)? For example, if a restaurant owner doesn't want to sell to blacks, do you really want to have a law saying that you'll use violence against anyone who refuses to sell to blacks? If you do, you won't know that you're eating at a racist restaurant owner's restaurant because he'll be serving blacks also despite not wanting to. So personally despite the NAP violation I still wouldn't want to have such a law because I would want to know who was racist, etc, so I could avoid them.

Racism doesn't go away just because you boycott it. Lynchings were common and accepted in the South until the Federal government stepped in and said "You can't infringe on the rights of black Americans." I'm sure that you never would have gone to a lynching, but just because UtF disapproves of lynchings doesn't mean that they'll go away. Racism was an institutionalized part of the South until the Federal government stepped in. It wasn't going to go away on its own for several more decades (I'm not sure that it would be gone even now if the government had not acted). Yes, there are still racists, but they've been forced underground and lynchings are no longer accepted practices across most of the country. There are a lot of people that are safer today than they would have been living in the same circumstances 50 years ago. That's an improvement in my book.

The racists in the South had enough presence and power to maintain their way of life even if they were economically ostracized by the rest of the country. Sure, you and I and Rand Paul would never have gone to a racist Woolworth's, but you and Paul would want to have allowed the company to continue segregating their customers. And since segregation was such a big part of the Southern culture, it wasn't going to go away, just because you and I refused to patronize them. There were enough people who agreed with the policy that they would have continued to segregate, probably through to present day.

I realize that I'm conjecturing, but because the Federal government stepped in and forced desegregation in all our institutions, public and private, it delegitimized segregation and racism as acceptable behavior in American culture. Without the government acting, I think that it's likely that a large segment of the South would still be segregated and I sincerely doubt that Barack Obama would have been able to be elected President of the United States since there would still be a large contingent of the population in the South with a backwards view on race. Thanks to the intervention, while there are still racists who may still own lunch counters, they can't legally act on their abhorrent beliefs and they are slowly dying out of the culture (still too slowly, but it seems that they are shrinking).

Again, the conflict of interest you described above does not exist in the version of DROs that I have described (or at the very least it can be avoided). Also, if some rich man were to bribe a DRO to bias their ruling, you have to realize that the DRO doesn't violently enforce its rulings like the state does. This means that even if the DRO makes an unfair ruling due to a bribe then there isn't really a problem because people choose whether or not they wish to follow various DROs rulings. So chances are when people see that a DRO has made some blatantly unfair rulings, they will choose to not listen (i.e. ostracize accorind to) to that DRO's rulings even if they don't have any evidence that a bribe was the reason for the unfair ruling. So there really is no conflict of interest because the DROs are successful not by making biased rulings to rich people to get the rich peoples' money, but instead by making "fair" rulings in the eyes of as many people as possible to make sure that they continue getting those peoples' business. And if to this you say you disagree again for the reason that "as many people as possible" don't have a bunch of money to give to DROs, but rather, "a few rich people" have the spare money to give to DROs, then realize that the DRO is only successful so long as people follow its rulings. And people follow its rulings more the more deterants there are to not follow the rulings and the more people (consumers) that there are in a society who view the DRO's rulings as fair, the more likely they are to ostracize people who don't follow the DRO's rulings, thus making the DRO more prominent and successful. And thus, the most successful DROs in the long run (the ones who grow the biggest and make the most money) are not the ones who accept bribes from the rich to bias their rulings, but rather the ones who make the most fair rulings in the eyes of as many people as possible. While a DRO could accept a bribe, that would only be a short term benefit and they would surely be doomed to fail as a business in the future as people would look at their biased rulings and choose to stop obeying any of that DRO's rulings.

Again, where did I use the word 'blatant'? I never said the bias would necessarily be blatant. If there's a legitimate dispute where either side could potentially win the case, the rich man could pay a little extra just to entice the DRO to side in his favor most of the time. And since these would be private companies, auditing of their financing would be dependent on the DROs voluntarily offering the books to auditors, since they wouldn't have the authority to do it if people simply suspected the DRO of corruption, but lacked a contractual obligation to investigate it.

You're advocating for a society with no checks or balances. I disagree with your views on morality. But just because quag, gvg and I disagree with your definition of morality doesn't mean that our arguments are "nonsensical." Morality is not an absolutely defined thing (as much as we might like it to be). People can have opposing views on morality without one side clearly being better than the other. So it would be nice if you didn't call our arguments "nonsensical." I have always understood your arguments, but I have simply disagreed with them. You do not have a monopoly on the definition of morality and we have the right to define our own definitions. As it so happens, your views on morality happen to be an aberration compared to the views of the dominant culture. So you can sit there and pontificate your views all you want, but you can't expect us to accept your definitions just because you want us to. We can't expect you to change your views either, but we've been trying to show why you think that your views will make things worse and you always ignore us and return to what you were saying before we interrupted.

This is a contentious issue with no easy answers. This has been debated by people for centuries, which is why I keep bringing the ideas of political philosophers into the discussion. They've already written reams of documents on some of the very issues we've been discussing and I think that it's foolish to ignore centuries of wisdom on the subject just because you think your idea is best.

[Guest]

It'd be nice if you could respond to what I actually wrote, not what you wanted me to have written...

Wow, unbelievable. I did respond to what you wrote. I'm not going to bother reading the rest of your post; our discussion is not worth continuing.

[Guest]

Wow, unbelievable. I did respond to what you wrote. I'm not going to bother reading the rest of your post; our discussion is not worth continuing.

Well, I can't help it if you attributed at least two words or ideas to what I wrote that clearly isn't in the original text.

You said that I said a property arrangement between a primitive tribesman and Donald Trump would necessarily end in violence. I never said anything about violence in that part of the post at all. In fact, I never even discussed how a deal between Trump and the tribesman would resolve because it didn't matter to the point I was trying to make. This was one of those instances where you make hay out of something I said while completely missing the salient point I was trying to make on the subject. How Trump eventually resolved the deal (if he even did), was never important to me.

And in terms of DRO bias, you claimed that I had indicated such bias would be "blatant" and therefore the public wouldn't stand for it, but I never implied how obvious the bias would be, blatant or subtle. A savvy rich person would work to ensure that any bias in his favor was subtle unless he felt he had so much wealth and influence that he could flaunt it, but, regardless, I never said it was blatant or subtle or anything in between.

So what can I do other than point out that you attributed to me ideas that I never professed.

But I've given my closing remarks and I agree that this discussion has reached the end of its useful commentary period. So you can leave it there, if that's the way you want it. I probably won't be coming back here, except to correct the record when my words get misrepresented.

My final thought (perhaps) on the subject of the OP: I plan to vote for Obama in the 2012 election because the Republican candidate (whoever it ends up being), is going to be joined at the hip to the Tea Party and as this debt ceiling fight has shown, the Tea Party is wildly out of touch with reality. They have no concept of economics or science and if we are forced to adopt their policy prerogatives, we're going to be in a lot of pain as a country and I frankly don't know if we'll survive it. Obama hasn't been perfect, but he's been more than willing to compromise on most everything, while the Tea Party has repeatedly taken their ball and gone home every time because they seem to believe themselves to be entitled to be in charge (despite being a minority of the majority party in the House). Whatever you might believe about Obama or our governing system in general, I don't see how any sane person can believe that the Tea Party platform is going to result in anything other than chaos.

[Guest]

Interestingly, I just ran across this article in the "New Republic" by a libertarian lamenting Ron Paul's particular brand of libertarianism.

His arguments refuting Paul's statements are rather similar to some of the arguments made by people on this thread.

Just FYI.

[gvg]

Ron Paul gives libertarians a bad name, honestly, and plus, i'm not entirely sure that he's a true blue libertarian.

[Guest]

Hi all,

I am not back for another discussion, but instead just wanted to mention something that just made me think of BrainDen.

I just watched this YouTube video of a random guy stating his political views that also fully describes my political views:

The video made me think of BrainDen when the person in it mentioned that JRR Tolkien was an anarchist. I looked it up to see if it was true and in fact it is. Here is some more information on the subject that I just looked at if anyone is curious:

http://mises.org/daily/899

http://libertarianchristians.com/2009/01/26/tolkien-libertarian/

http://mises.org/media/4557/JRR-Tolkien-as-Libertarian/8

So it turns out that JRR Tolkien was an anarchist and the Lord of the Rings is a story about abolishing state power. The ring represents state power. Throughout the story we see people try to use the power of the ring for the good and fail. We see them try to use the power of the ring to eliminate it and fail. The power corrupts so that even those who try to use it with good intentions inevitably end up using it for evil. I had never really thought of any symbolic meaning to Lord of the Rings, but thinking of it now, things like the fact that Gandalf refused to touch the ring when Frodo first tried to hand it to him really make sense in light of this symbolic meaning.

So anyways, this mention of JRR Tolkien as an anarchist made me immediately recall a quote that Dawh posted to me in one of the discussions we had either in this thread or in the other long thread. When I tried looking up the quote on this forum I found that Gvg had put the quote in his profile:

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs." -John Rogers

I am sure you too can appreciate how funny this is in light of the fact that JRR Tolkien was an anarchist and that the Lord of the Rings is a story about abolishing state power. The irony of this quote is the funniest I have ever encountered.

[Guest]

Because I clicked on the link to the article about Ron Paul, I suppose I'll say something about it.

The article brings up Paul's position on illegal immigration saying that it contradicts his libertarian principles. In fact, I agree, as is evident by a conversation I had on YouTube last week with the uploader of this video:

Read the uploader comments of this video if you wish (plus a little bit more at the front of the regular comment section to get the whole discussion). I am WelcometotheUnknown.

So some voluntarists make an argument for some sort of "closed border" in our current society with a state. My position is completely open borders, but apparently the issue may not be as clear as it seems at first glance. If my position is right and thus Paul's position contradicts libertarian (and voluntarism) principles though then all that means is that Paul failed to follow the logic through from the principle to his position of illegal immigration in a society with a state.

Anyways, Paul is a libertarian even if we could possibly find some flaws in his positions that are inconsistent with the principles. The point is that he aims to be consistent with libertarian principles. If he messes up the logic on a point or two then that is an issue, but it's not an issue that prevents him from being a libertarian.

Gvg said that Paul gives libertarians a bad name. I don't know what to make of this except that you might just be ignorant. Paul is certainly the most descent politician by far that I have heard of. In the above video he says something that makes it sound like he is an anarchist at heart, but just thinks that we need to reduce the state slowly on our way to that eventual goal. I would thus say that he is a minarchist in his actions, but would probably support going all the way to anarchism if only we didn't have such a large state.

On this note, I happen to come back to the initial topic of the thread. I am not going to vote, even for Ron Paul. This discussion helped me make up my mind:

http://www.tomwoods.com/blog/why-even-an-anarchist-should-vote-for-ron-paul/

When this thread started I was inclined to believe that by voting I would be consenting to the system in some sense and thus some actions of the government against me would be justified that would not have been justified had I not voted. I now reject this argument for at least two reasons, one of which you can find in the comment section at the above link and the other of which you will find by defining the requirements for a contractual agreement to be legitimate.

"Many Americans won’t consider even listening to a point of view that barely registers on the political radar screen. Whether out of intellectual laziness, cowardice, whatever, they just won’t. So it hurts us if Ron Paul gets 1% of the vote. But if he gets solid double digits, those people who might be faint of heart might realize they aren’t totally alone in supporting him, and will be more willing to do so. Yes, this is ridiculous and unjust, but that’s how it is. That’s why I think it hurts the cause of the free society not to vote for Ron Paul."

In response to this argument, I considered the time that it would take me to vote and the effect that that vote would have on the percentage of votes that Ron Paul gets and the effect that the size of that percentage would have on getting people interested in learning about the things that Ron Paul advocates (e.g. liberty and Austrian economics). I decided that a more efficient and effect use of my time in advancing these goals would be to spend the time discussing these subjects with people to get them interested and curious to learn about libertarianism and voluntarism and anarchism.

Thus, I'm choosing not to vote for pragmatic reasons--it's not a good use of time. Also, note that I am not interested in getting Ron Paul elected. The only good thing about him winning the 2012 election would be that a lot of people would have voted for him and thus would have believed in what he stands for and thus more people would be educated that social problems can be solved in voluntary ways, rather than using the state's coercive power. Putting this notion aside, I don't think it would be good if Paul was magically elected simply because of the great difficulties in trying to reduce state power using state power. So many people are dependent on the state that even if Paul became President and managed to persuade Congress to do everything he wanted, it wouldn't be a good thing to immediately cut a bunch of programs, simply because so many people have grown dependent on them. So many people are dependent on the government that if Paul did everything he says he wants to do, then there would be riots everywhere due to the large number of people who would have lost their dependence on the streets. I believe that the chances are the long term effects of this disaster would be against the goal of the free society simply because the masses wouldn't be educated enough about why there were problems going on and thus would just blame the disasters on Ron Paul and thus on libertarianism. And it would thus take several generations more before liberty would stand a chance. Thus, I really think the best was to promote non-aggression and voluntary interactions between people is not from the top down, but from the bottom up. When enough minds are changed the whole system will change. Putting someone like Ron Paul in the government and abolishing a significant portion of the state would almost definitely be a disaster.

So, thus, the only reason to vote for Paul, or anyone else, in my mind, would thus be to get their ideas recognized with a wider audience when the public sees that he received a significant number of votes. However, due to the practical reason that a more efficient use of my time in advancing this goal of education would be discussing voluntarism with people myself rather than going to vote, I have decided not to vote.

[Guest]

So it turns out that JRR Tolkien was an anarchist and the Lord of the Rings is a story about abolishing state power. The ring represents state power. Throughout the story we see people try to use the power of the ring for the good and fail. We see them try to use the power of the ring to eliminate it and fail. The power corrupts so that even those who try to use it with good intentions inevitably end up using it for evil. I had never really thought of any symbolic meaning to Lord of the Rings, but thinking of it now, things like the fact that Gandalf refused to touch the ring when Frodo first tried to hand it to him really make sense in light of this symbolic meaning.

So anyways, this mention of JRR Tolkien as an anarchist made me immediately recall a quote that Dawh posted to me in one of the discussions we had either in this thread or in the other long thread. When I tried looking up the quote on this forum I found that Gvg had put the quote in his profile:

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs." -John Rogers

I am sure you too can appreciate how funny this is in light of the fact that JRR Tolkien was an anarchist and that the Lord of the Rings is a story about abolishing state power. The irony of this quote is the funniest I have ever encountered.

I've never looked up Tolkien's political philosophy, so I've never looked at Lord of the Rings in that way. Of course, people can impose their own views on a metaphorical story easily enough, no matter what the original author's intent was. If he really wrote the story with the expectation that people would view the Ring as State power, it's interesting that so many of the protagonists are Kings and leaders of kingdoms. Rohan, Gondor, Numenor are all kingdoms and I can't really think of anything more Stateful than a kingdom. So I certainly was fooled if his goal was to advocate against State power.

The Lord of the Rings is a story about good versus evil, which is part of an age-old human tradition, and it's not hard to impose your own views on such a familiar allegorical story. Some people say that Tolkien was racist because the orcs and goblins are representing black men. Again, I've never seen evidence of anything like that and I never made that association when I read the books. But people are good at seeing what they want to see, regardless of what is really there or what was intended to be there.

If Tolkien was an anarchist, then yes, using that Ayn Rand quote is a little ironic. But considering that that allegory is in no way obvious (so far as I can see), I don't see it as being all that significant. The quote is still valid, IMO, because his story is fantasy, so it's hard to draw direct comparisons between it and the real world, while Rand's work is "realistic" fiction, so it's easier to see the parallels between the events in her books and reality. Hence the reason that someone can become "emotionally stunted, [and] socially crippled" by reading her works. It's far easier to map her world onto reality than it is to map Tolkien's.

On the subject of Ayn Rand, I just read an article posted on Talking Points Memo about a Tea Partier who wants small businesses to sign a pledge to stop hiring workers until Obama leaves office. She really seems to think that "going Galt" would be a good idea. I thought it was particularly stupid since the President won't have to leave office for at least another year at a minimum. He could resign, but I don't see him doing that, and there's no way that Congress could remove him from office. I don't think that the House could find the grounds to impeach him, and even if they did, the Senate would never kick him out of office. So any "small business" signing the pledge would be pledging a hiring freeze for over a year's time. That's a very long time and a lot can happen to put you out of business in that time if you don't have the workforce to do the job. Plus, if he does get reelected, you got another four years to hold the fort with no new workers. I don't see any of the signers having successful businesses if they follow through with the threat.

Plus, small businesses don't really hire that large a percentage of the populace anyway (no matter what the Republicans like to claim). From NPR:

BLOCK: We hear a lot about small businesses being the engine of job growth in that - country. How true is that?

WOLFERS: Categorically false.

BLOCK: Really?

WOLFERS: Yeah. In the United States right now, the latest numbers suggest there are about 6 million firms with paid employment. Ninety percent of those are small businesses, which means they have, you know, 20 or fewer employees. Those 90 percent of all firms only make up 20 percent of all jobs. So while there's lot of businesses, there's not a lot of jobs in small business.

So even if she does manage to get a bunch of businesses to follow suit, she seems doomed to be capped at 20% of employment at a maximum. Since she'll never get full compliance from all of the small businesses, it would likely backfire and just give her competitors a leg up on her.

[Guest]

Scratch the last thing I wrote. While I agree with the pragmatic reason that I shouldn't vote because there are better uses of my time, I want to add that even if I could just vote with the snap of my fingers in an instant completely effortlessly, I actually still wouldn't vote.

[Guest]

I've never looked up Tolkien's political philosophy, so I've never looked at Lord of the Rings in that way. Of course, people can impose their own views on a metaphorical story easily enough, no matter what the original author's intent was. If he really wrote the story with the expectation that people would view the Ring as State power, it's interesting that so many of the protagonists are Kings and leaders of kingdoms. Rohan, Gondor, Numenor are all kingdoms and I can't really think of anything more Stateful than a kingdom. So I certainly was fooled if his goal was to advocate against State power.

The Lord of the Rings is a story about good versus evil, which is part of an age-old human tradition, and it's not hard to impose your own views on such a familiar allegorical story. Some people say that Tolkien was racist because the orcs and goblins are representing black men. Again, I've never seen evidence of anything like that and I never made that association when I read the books. But people are good at seeing what they want to see, regardless of what is really there or what was intended to be there.

If Tolkien was an anarchist, then yes, using that Ayn Rand quote is a little ironic. But considering that that allegory is in no way obvious (so far as I can see), I don't see it as being all that significant. The quote is still valid, IMO, because his story is fantasy, so it's hard to draw direct comparisons between it and the real world, while Rand's work is "realistic" fiction, so it's easier to see the parallels between the events in her books and reality. Hence the reason that someone can become "emotionally stunted, [and] socially crippled" by reading her works. It's far easier to map her world onto reality than it is to map Tolkien's.

On the subject of Ayn Rand, I just read an article posted on Talking Points Memo about a Tea Partier who wants small businesses to sign a pledge to stop hiring workers until Obama leaves office. She really seems to think that "going Galt" would be a good idea. I thought it was particularly stupid since the President won't have to leave office for at least another year at a minimum. He could resign, but I don't see him doing that, and there's no way that Congress could remove him from office. I don't think that the House could find the grounds to impeach him, and even if they did, the Senate would never kick him out of office. So any "small business" signing the pledge would be pledging a hiring freeze for over a year's time. That's a very long time and a lot can happen to put you out of business in that time if you don't have the workforce to do the job. Plus, if he does get reelected, you got another four years to hold the fort with no new workers. I don't see any of the signers having successful businesses if they follow through with the threat.

Plus, small businesses don't really hire that large a percentage of the populace anyway (no matter what the Republicans like to claim). From NPR:

So even if she does manage to get a bunch of businesses to follow suit, she seems doomed to be capped at 20% of employment at a maximum. Since she'll never get full compliance from all of the small businesses, it would likely backfire and just give her competitors a leg up on her.

It's more than just being about destroying state power. It's about attempts to destroy that power with other power. Notice that not of these kings can destroy the ring. If they try they fail. The power corrupts them. The person to destroy the ring is the powerless Frodo from the anarchist Shire. He's not a king. He doesn't represent any government power. He represents the bottom up approach of abolishing the state. Recall when Faramir wanted to take the ring from Frodo? He was a good man, but the power of the ring would have corrupted him and he would not have destoryed it. Anyways, you can look into it more if you want to. It seems by your statement that "people are good at seeing what they want to see" that you want to deny the symbolism that JRR Tolkien put into the book.

"And here we have the correct understanding of the theme of the novel: it is about the evils of power. More precisely, the book aligns itself against power--not "economic power" or "social power", but specifically political power. This is also the central theme of the classical liberal political tradition.

This has been explained in various occasions by Tolkien himself:

"You can make the Ring into an allegory of our own time, if you like: and allegory of the inevitable fate that waits for all attempts to defeat evil power by power" (The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, 1995, p. 121.)"

"I am not a `democrat' only because `humility' and equality are spiritual principles corrupted by the attempt to mechanize and formalize them, with the result that we get not universal smallness and humility, but universal greatness and pride, till some Orc gets hold of a ring of power--and then we get and are getting slavery" (The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, 1995, p. 246)

These quotes seem to show that JRR Tolkien indeed intended for this symbolism. It's thus not just "people are good at seeing what they want to see" as you said, but rather the author explicitly saying that this symbolism was intentional.

Also:

"My political opinions lean more and more to Anarchy (philosophically understood, meaning abolition of control not whiskered men with bombs) - or to `unconstitutional' Monarchy. I would arrest anybody who uses the word state (in any sense other than the inanimate realm of England and its inhabitants, a thing that has neither power, rights nor mind); and after a chance of recantation, execute them if they remained obstinate!" (The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, 1995, p. 63.; See NYT Review.)"

So there's really no denying that he was an anarchist or a libertarian approaching complete anarchism. Anyways, you can think what you like of course. I just thought you might appreciate the irony of the quote.

"Hence the reason that someone can become "emotionally stunted, [and] socially crippled" by reading her works." Well this part of the quote was nonsense. Many of the voluntarists I know are the most moral and socially pleasing people I know. The "emotionally stunted" and other rhetoric just sounds like a lame ad hominen attack to make some people who for some odd reason dislike voluntarists (people who believe that interactions between people should be voluntary) feel better or something. So what the quote is saying is nonsense; it's the irony of the fact that both stories are written by libertarians or near-anarchists about trying to abolish much if not all of government power that I found funny and wanted to share. Anyways....

I agree that that teapartier's idea is very dumb. Note that I don't care for the tea party at all if you somehow didn't already know that.

[Guest]

My point was that in the numerous times I've read "The Lord of the Rings," I've never seen an anarchist message in the books. If he wrote them to be symbolic of anarchy winning out over statism, that's fine by me, but they don't necessarily have to be interpreted that way. But show me the man who's turned to anarchy because he read "Lord of the Rings" and then I'll agree with you that it's ironic.

And if you really wanted to get into it, while the Shire is clearly the ideal world, the Utopia, it is simplistic and backwards and he acknowledges that it is going away. "The Age of Man is rising," and all that. The Shire is an ideal that doesn't exist and can never exist in reality. That's why it has hobbits living in it rather than humans. Humans aren't able to live in a society with that sort of social structure. Should we aspire to live in such a commune? Maybe, but the fact is, right now we can't. So we need to focus on what's achievable and realistic, instead of wishing human nature were something other than what it is. I'll read and enjoy Tolkien's books for their prose and the fantasy, but I would never read them to develop a coherent political philosophy. Plus, having gone back and read them again, I like the movies better.

Perhaps John Rodger's quote is a bit of an ad hominem attack, but it's supposed to be ridiculous. That's the point. It's humor. It presents you with the opposite of what you expect. As that most prolific of authors, Anonymous, said, "A little nonsense now and then, is relished by the wisest men." Most jokes are poking fun at someone or something.

And I only mentioned the tea party article because it relates to Ayn Rand's book "Atlas Shrugged." John Galt advocates for the "job creators" to go on strike against the lazy and dependent workers to show them what pulling themselves up by their own bootstraps is really like. That the Tea Party woman would seriously urge people to sign a pledge to do the same indicates to me that she is "an emotionally stunted, socially crippled [adult], unable to deal with the real world." It's not a realistic world-view to expect that that could possibly work the way she intends.

[gvg]

Gvg said that Paul gives libertarians a bad name. I don't know what to make of this except that you might just be ignorant.

First off, i didn't mean bad name as in he's a bad guy, i meant he isn't as libertarian as, say, you. I may very well be ignorant though, i just can't see a guy who wants closed borders & is anti-abortion can be 'true-blue libertarian' as I said. but believe me, I like him; he's definitely a decent guy, and not as 'politiciany'. i just don't think he has a chance in hell of winning, which you recognize. (Just to throw it in there, i personally like Huntsman, but that's just me).

As for the lord of the rings thing, that is a reasonable way of looking at it, though i've only seen the movies so i can't say much =)

But either way, don't they crown Aragorn as king or whatever?

And to add another book, i just finished reading Anthem by Ayn Rand in English class. I acutally liked it, and i liked some of the ideas (reflecting on our discussion has in fact sent me moveing right on the economic scale (not much, but noticeable) and even more libertarian on the social scale than i already was, UtF. Just to let you know =)). Although liberty seems awfully submissive; is there any particular reason she put the major woman character in the book in such a stereotypical way? i mean, i know it was the way of the time, but I would think Rand would want more woman's right and what not. Just wondering if any of you can explain that to me.

[gvg]

& is anti-abortion

i just realized what i said. i meant anti-choice, not anti-abortion.

[Guest]

First off, i didn't mean bad name as in he's a bad guy, i meant he isn't as libertarian as, say, you. I may very well be ignorant though, i just can't see a guy who wants closed borders & is anti-abortion can be 'true-blue libertarian' as I said. but believe me, I like him; he's definitely a decent guy, and not as 'politiciany'. i just don't think he has a chance in hell of winning, which you recognize. (Just to throw it in there, i personally like Huntsman, but that's just me).

As for the lord of the rings thing, that is a reasonable way of looking at it, though i've only seen the movies so i can't say much =)

But either way, don't they crown Aragorn as king or whatever?

And to add another book, i just finished reading Anthem by Ayn Rand in English class. I acutally liked it, and i liked some of the ideas (reflecting on our discussion has in fact sent me moveing right on the economic scale (not much, but noticeable) and even more libertarian on the social scale than i already was, UtF. Just to let you know =)). Although liberty seems awfully submissive; is there any particular reason she put the major woman character in the book in such a stereotypical way? i mean, i know it was the way of the time, but I would think Rand would want more woman's right and what not. Just wondering if any of you can explain that to me.

I actually haven't read any of Ayn Rand's work with the exception of the "money speech" in Atlas Shrugged, which is only half a dozen pages or so I believe, so unfortunately I can't help explain anything to you about the book, sorry.

[Guest]

I just wanted to post this video of Elizabeth Warren, presumptive Democratic Senate candidate of Massachusetts, making the case for liberal values:

She's always been a simple, no-nonsense sort of person, so I think she would be a great Senator (though considering the state of the Senate, I'm not sure how much she can help ). In particular, I like the second half of the clip, where she's talking about a theoretical factory owner. If you live in a society and you use the resources of that society to enrich yourself, then you owe it to the next generation to pay it forward. Give back some of what you earned to support the next you. It's not complicated; it's fair.

[gvg]

Dawh: Loved the clip. Sorry to have never heard of her before. Why can't people just SAY THAT and not go into a bunch of political mumbo jumbo?

Sigh.

Anywho, any bets on the success of the debt committee? I can't see it working despite that automatic cuts that come with them failing.

Also, what do you guys think of the US stopping its contributions to UNESCO or whatever it was because they recognized Palestine? I think it's a little ridiculous.

[Quag]

I gotta disagree with video to simplistic and ignoring half the story

She is implying the factory owner isnt paying any taxes. Well he is and a lot more than any other individual. Also the money his factory generates pays workers who also pay taxes. Without that revenue no more new roads would be built or those existing could not be maintained.

In fact the govt can only spend so much $$$ because this fictional factory owner started his factory creating empolyment etc. The schools would have no money to teach students who could then work in factory if the factory, through business taxes, the owner through income taxes and the workers through income taxes didnt provide the govt with $$$. And lets be honest, for most factory work very little education is required, perhaps she should have said schools to teach engineers to design stuff for the facotry to build.

The person who is doing nothing productive for society is the !/$%&/ politician (any stripe they are all leaches, yes im cynical and bitter)

So factory couldnt exist without roads, roads cant exist without govt, govt cannot exist wthout $$, which is generated by the factory. You pick chicken or egg what came first?

[Guest]

I gotta disagree with video to simplistic and ignoring half the story

She is implying the factory owner isnt paying any taxes. Well he is and a lot more than any other individual.

I don't think she's trying to imply that he doesn't pay taxes already. She's arguing against the notion that "job creators" (Republicans current favorite meaningless buzzword) create their own wealth entirely by their own effort. She's saying this is a group effort and because they are benefiting from society, they owe society to pay some back.

Also the money his factory generates pays workers who also pay taxes. Without that revenue no more new roads would be built or those existing could not be maintained. In fact the govt can only spend so much $$$ because this fictional factory owner started his factory creating empolyment etc. The schools would have no money to teach students who could then work in factory if the factory, through business taxes, the owner through income taxes and the workers through income taxes didnt provide the govt with $$$. And lets be honest, for most factory work very little education is required, perhaps she should have said schools to teach engineers to design stuff for the facotry to build.

So factory couldnt exist without roads, roads cant exist without govt, govt cannot exist wthout $$, which is generated by the factory. You pick chicken or egg what came first?

Small quibble, the factory doesn't produce money. It's going to produce a product which people are going to buy for money. The money is already in circulation. I'm not really sure why the chicken and egg thing matters. We have the society that we have. We need to deal with it as it is now, not the way it was or how it will be in the future. And the place it started shouldn't affect the current situation.

The workers and roads the owner uses were subsidized by the government (you still need some sort of education to operate in society and it really doesn't matter how much education would be required to work at her fictional factory...it's fictional. If the workers were designing a cold fusion reactor, the argument would still be the same). The factory owner is using resources from our society in order to enrich himself. Because he used some public resources to get the job done, he should pay for that. That's all she's saying. I'm not sure what you're objecting to.

The person who is doing nothing productive for society is the !/$%&/ politician (any stripe they are all leaches, yes im cynical and bitter)

Well, I think that it's possible to have effective politicians, but the current crop (especially on the Republican side here in the US) are dead set on being as useless/harmful as you feel they are. You can't build an effective interstate highway system without government. You can't build massive public works like the Hoover dam without government.* You can't build a rocket ship to go to the moon without government.*

And politicians are required to run government. I do think that It would be better if politicians had roots in other jobs, rather than being "career politicians" like so many are. I think that a Congress full of Rush Holts could be effective. He's a rocket scientist and he's serving as a representative for New Jersey. They ought to be there because they want to serve society, not to make a lucrative paycheck with many benefits. (Not that that means that I support Perry's suggested reforms for Congress; they would be almost universally awful. )

*Theoretically you could do these, but no private entity would be willing to back them considering the prohibitively high investments required with possibly no material benefit to show for it for generations.

[Quag]

I don't think she's trying to imply that he doesn't pay taxes already. She's arguing against the notion that "job creators" (Republicans current favorite meaningless buzzword) create their own wealth entirely by their own effort. She's saying this is a group effort and because they are benefiting from society, they owe society to pay some back.

but he does pay back, he pays more in straight terms and in % terms of his income in taxes so what is her point then??? She is implying the guy paying 35% tax should be baying what 70%,90%?

Small quibble, the factory doesn't produce money. It's going to produce a product which people are going to buy for money. The money is already in circulation. I'm not really sure why the chicken and egg thing matters. We have the society that we have. We need to deal with it as it is now, not the way it was or how it will be in the future. And the place it started shouldn't affect the current situation.

chicken and egg thing was where did the govt get the $$ to pay for the roads? from taxes that could only be collected if there is a functioning economy, which requires her fictional factory to exist. In actual fact historically speaking the factories built their own transportation systems to get their products out there. Highways are a recent invention. My point was that you can build all the roads you want if there is no one creating reasons to use them you are wasting your money just as much as you are wasting your time building a factory in the middle of nowhere with no way of getting the products out there (though again hsitorically speaking factories were built where the resources where and they built their own system to move their product.)

The workers and roads the owner uses were subsidized by the government (you still need some sort of education to operate in society and it really doesn't matter how much education would be required to work at her fictional factory...it's fictional. If the workers were designing a cold fusion reactor, the argument would still be the same). The factory owner is using resources from our society in order to enrich himself. Because he used some public resources to get the job done, he should pay for that. That's all she's saying. I'm not sure what you're objecting to.

I am objecting to a politician saying its not about class warfare then using class warfare language to attack the "RICH", Orwell called this doublespeak.

Yes we all use resources provided by the whole but again her diatribe suggest the rich arent paying and they should. The fact is they are paying and in a larger percentage those who earn less. This makes everything she says nothing more than demagogery for political gain. She is the worst kind of politician in my mind. She is either ignorant (a distinct possibility) or purposly creating anger in one group of society against another for her own political gain (the more likely scenario)

No point in copy/pasting about the politicains. I agree they are a necessary evil and non career pooliticains would be better though i do not think the Dems are any better than the Republicans. Look at Pelosi, Frank, Dodd etc they are all worse than useless.

[gvg]

Quag, i think what she is trying to making a counterargument to the republican 'If taxes, cut it to 0' thing. I didn't think she was implying to make super-massive-unnecessary tax hikes. She was making i counter argument. The same argument, if i recall correctly, you made to UtF about something with roads. But that's irrelevant.

And don't assume she only meant the rich. My dad owns a business; were middle class. I'm assuming she would have made the same argument.

And yes, class warfare is ridiculous. That's what i hate about watching anything political just to get news, it eventually turns into a clusterf*** about either the poor being lazy or the rich being evil/corrupt/power-hungry/etc. (fox news and msnbc respectively).

Edited November 18, 2011 by gvg

[Quag]

Quag, i think what she is trying to making a counterargument to the republican 'If taxes, cut it to 0' thing. I didn't think she was implying to make super-massive-unnecessary tax hikes. She was making i counter argument. The same argument, if i recall correctly, you made to UtF about something with roads. But that's irrelevant.

UTF was saying there shoudl be 0 nada no taxes she is implying the rich already dotn pay IE shes promoting class warfare!! big difference! she is the opposite of UTF im in the middle of the two. Though I believe UTF was talking from conviction and she was talking only as a means to drum up support for her own political gain. More respect to UTF here !

If that is the point she was trying to make she is a terrible politician because everyone i showed that message to got the same anti rich tax em to death message as i did. however if this was her convoluted point ok then. Though I hear a lot more Dems saying tax the rich than Reps saying cut the taxes on the rich, it is usually leave em alone or cut for everyone and no one says down to 0%

20% flat tax or option for current system (perry and silly)

9 9 9 a major redo of tax system but i admit i havent researched it enough really understand it so i have no opinion on it yet.

etc.

agreed too much blaming the other guy goes on still rewatch her and ya gotta really try to see hwo she isnt attackign the rich. RIGHT after saying shes against class warfare!!!!

*()&&*&*? politicians!!!