Iraq Situation is Bullshit by Succatash

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

I wish I had the benefit of your first-hand experience. (Notice I didn't want the experience itself, just the benefit!

) I'm sure there's a lot going on that we never get to hear. Was it Bismarck who said that those who like sausage and laws should never see how they're made?

You're correct that discussion will never change how we mere mortals are treated. But in order to be free, we must first free our minds.

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Tuesday, September 16, 2003 9:12 PM

I think that 9-11 has shown that the middle east has already blown up in our face.

Things have changed in the intervening years since Desert Storm, we now have more news outlets, blogs, more analysis and more brains on the job, arguing both sides of the various questions.

The self serving factors don't bother me as much as some, as I have a long time ago figured out that altruism is a con game. The question is whether the consequences are benefitical, or not.

But I don't share the hopelessness you display. The government may be self servicing, but so are the voters that government has to appeal to in order to stay in power. People talking here and there might change enough minds. Even if two opponents in a debate can't convince each other, there is still the audience to those debates that may be swayed one way or the other.

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Wednesday, September 17, 2003 9:53 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

In three sections
1) the Patriot Act
2) Iraq (again!!!!)
3) economics

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PATRIOT ACT

At what point would you say the government has gone too far?

When it starts secretly roundng up citizens and holding them indefinitely, without charges?

When it starts tracking people through their entire personal lives (medical records, loans, phone calls, emails) without a warrant?

When it creates a financial and legal blacklist that you don't know you're on?

At what point would you say that civil liberties take precedence? Or WOULD you ever get to that point? Does the danger of terrorism justify any and every intrusion?
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IRAQ

Basically what you're saying is that even if we invaded Iraq because of manufactured reasons, we did a good thing, and that to argue gainst the invasion is the same as supporting Saddam.

First of all, I don't like be lied to by the President, Vice-President, National Security Advisor, Secretary of Defense, and the Secretary of State. Most of what they told us or implied is demonstrably false, they KNEW it was false, and they broadcast it to create a sense of urgency that didn't exist. WE rushed in on a minimal budget with no international support (in fact we had to detour our troops and materiel around Turkey) because....??? Why??? What was so terribly urgent that we went in half-*ssed and couldn't wait another year until spring rolled around again and conditions would once again be more suitable for invasion? There was something weird about this artifical urgency which had nothing to do with WMD.

Just because I didn't support the invasion doesn't mean that I support Saddam. We've deposed enough governments to have a vast repertoire of actions: subversion, aiding military takeovers, assasination, trade and aid embargoes, assisting neighboring countries, trade agreements ("engagement"), etc. Why does it have to be
"invasion or nothing"? The only answer that I can come up with has to do with that big puddle of oil that Saddam was sitting on.
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ECONOMIC

What ARE you going on about????

You're talking about the "labor theory of value" and I'm talking about the circulation of capital.

The point I was trying to make is that in order to realize a profit, the manufacturer must sell a product. If money inevitably trickles towards the owner, and Joe and Jane Worker can't buy their entire output, who is the manufacturer going to sell to? (We'll have to discuss further what the owner does with the money and why it doesn't create a demand.)

Keynes solved this problem simply by inserting money into economy at the bottom level, where it would create a demand, and accepting a certain amount of inflation as the price to pay for not crashing the economy. The Fed does the whole money-supply dance following this principal.

"As to the Depression, it appears that Roosevelt's policies did not cure the depression, rather deepened it and made it worse." Which policies were those? The "pump priming" that they attempted? How would that make things worse?

AND FINALLY

"And in all this you miss a very important point. The owner is not some absentee landlord."

Yeah. Tell that to Fastow, Lay, and the other corporate crooks who worked so hard cooking the books and risking other people's money!

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Wednesday, September 17, 2003 9:54 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

double post! oops!

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Wednesday, September 17, 2003 6:55 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

dang it! happened again!

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Wednesday, September 17, 2003 11:11 PM

Essay questions.

PATRIOT ACT:
You want simple answers to complex questions. There is a common saying here that it is better for 10 guilty men to go free than 1 innocent man get punished. The problem is if even one of those free guilty men kill a 1,000 people, its still a net loss.

This gets into legal theories which I could bore you plenty with, but a key point to bring out is the law is not a goal unto itself, it is a means to an end. Since 9-11, prosecution after the fact was recognized as being insufficient for protecting and defending the lives of the people, and the move has been made toward preventing further terrorist attacks. The shear numbers of deaths that a terrorist cell can create changes the risk/reward equation. And either the legal and political systems adapts to that change, or a lot more people get killed.

Getting information on a possible threat, I don't see a problem with. But then maybe that is because I don't have anything to hide from the government. Taking action against a possible threat, is where it gets dicey, and where we are both concerned. Simple solutions, like Manzinar, are not effective at the goal, but then I don't see any political will in that direction anyway. The reaction in this country toward Muslims after 9-11 was nothing like the reaction toward Japanese Americans after Pearl Harbor, and I see that as a good thing, an improvement.

You run into a problem when you start placing artifical limitation on the right to self defense, and especially if you announce those limits. You give those who want to kill you an advantage. Not a good idea.

As in all of life, you do the best you can, based on the information you have on hand. You are not God, nor ever going to be. You will make mistakes, the trick is to minimize them, to come up with proceedures that reduce the impact of those mistakes. Like I have said before, I don't think we are anywhere near there yet, but I really don't want to defend it too much, because railing against any potential excesses now may prevent them in the future.
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That is not what I am saying. I am saying that you are wrong. Demostrably wrong in fact. I am also pointing out that even if you are right, you are still wrong.

I don't like getting lied to either, and I don't think we were. But I do understand that when you tell the American people, you tell the world and that includes the bad guys. Saddam gets CNN. It is impossible to keep a secret amongst 280 million folks without it leaking out to the rest of the world. Besides which a lot of the stuff I have said was all available before the war.

I do understand that intel is not perfect. Again, we are not Gods, not even if you work for the CIA. If Saddam had fooled the CIA, he also fooled the FSB, MI-6, French and Chinese intel services, et. al. That is why 1441 passed unanamously.

"Just because I didn't support the invasion doesn't mean that I support Saddam." It may not have been your intent, but that is the consequences of any kind of "do nothing" proposition. YOu may have a kind heart, and really care about the Iraqi civilians, more than me perhaps. But teh fact remains that your proposed course of action left him in power longer. The particulars of Saddam's regime left little option other than the military one. It should have been done a lot sooner.

As to the oil factor, you need to talk to TotalFinaELF and LukOil about their opposition to the invasion. The problem with Iraq was as long as Saddam had that oil, economic sanctions were not going to work. He was going to stay in power until he died, and turned it over to his sons. And build his weapons programs and palaces. To the point where he had a sufficient deterence force to prevent just such a military invasion, and possibly do a bit of invading himself.

I find it a bit ironic that you would call for 'deposing' Saddam through other means. As it is folks from your side of the aisle that have constantly complained whenever we've done that in the past, who constantly pull out the ghost of Mussadegh, as an example of what not to do. All the other options have failed, including sanctions.

You keep saying "Show me the weapons" and I admit I have no idea where they are. But you need to show me that he got rid of them, and that is something you can't do either. That is why we are stuck in this debate.
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Grin. What is the owner, chopped liver? He gets the profits from the business, and that is what you seem to be missing. The owner is not some diety who needs nothing, he has to eat and buy things too. By cutting out his economic activities, you end up with the very problem you cite.

It is your refusal to take in consideration the economic activities of the business owner that gives you problems. Once you recognize their contributions, problem solved.

Not long ago, Congress put a special luxury tax on yachts. Rich folks, because of the increase in costs of American yachts, decided to either stop buying them, or buy them overseas. A lot of small yacht making companies in New England ended up getting squeezed and petetioned Congress to repeal this particular tax, successfully, in order to save their business. Even though the average yacht builder could not buy one of his own products, someone else could, and that is really all that matters.

Joe and Jane worker may not be able to buy the factory they work at. Even combined, the factory may be worth more than their salaries. But they still benefit from it being there, from somebody having the resources and wealth to put it up and willing to assume the risk until it became productive.

As to Keynes I will qoute Friedman: "You know, it's a mystery as to why people think Roosevelt's policies pulled us out of the Depression. The problem was that you had unemployed machines and unemployed people. How do you get them together by forming industrial cartels and keeping prices and wages up? That's what Roosevelt's policies in the New Deal amounted to. Essentially, increasing the role of government, enhancing the monopolistic position of labor, and creating as I said before the equivalent of price fixing cartels made things worse. So most of his policies were counterproductive."

Fixing prices, or establishing monopolies does not work. Supply and demand is like gravity, its not something you can legsilate away. If you fix prices too low, it is no longer profitable to produce those goods, and you end up with shortages. You fix prices, or wages too high, folks can't afford the goods, and employers cannot afford to hire people.

As for Lay et.al. hard at work cooking the books. The point still remains that they were doing work. Illegal and immoral work, and the market has already taken their dishonesty into account, by dropping the price of their stocks, showing that their work is not valued (or rather, valued negatively).

You don't like fraud, neither do I. No one does, and that is why Lay and the rest are facing jail, bankrupcy and worse. Even if the law had not stepped in, their names are mud in the market.

Now, I would like to hear what you would propose to do about this problem you see? More equitable pay for the workers? Who decides? Take all the profits and distribute them equally? How do you get the capital consentrations needed to make large purchases such as factories?

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Thursday, September 18, 2003 3:41 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

At no point is there any sort of oversight or mandated judicial review in the Patriot Act, so malicious or overzealous detention is a real possibility. Given what Bush and Aschcroft have done so far, I don't trust them to use the Patriot Act just for anti-terrorism. It's entirely possible that an activist could be identified as an enemy combatant and hustled off to a secret military trial, or more likely as a key witness and detained indefinitely. Somewhere along the line another branch of government needs to be inserted into the process to make sure that people aren't getting railroaded.

THe scary thing is that Ashcroft had written most of the provisions of the Patriot Act BEFORE Sept 11, and immediately afterward passage the Justice Department was giving classes on how the Patriot Act could be stretched to cover other activities. Now Bush and Ashcroft want to extend the act even further. That's putting a great deal of trust in people who so far have been untrustworthy.

Okay, gotta go and wake up the family.

TTUL

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Thursday, September 18, 2003 4:39 AM

SUCCATASH

Here's a good article:

Mayors Call for Better Security Funding
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&ncid=519&e=10&u=/a
p/20030918/ap_on_re_us/mayors_homeland_security_2

"We're sending $87 billion to Iraq for reconstruction, but we can't even get $4 billion spent in direct funding to our first responders to protect Americans," said Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley.

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Thursday, September 18, 2003 10:07 PM

This is false. As I understand it, you still need a warrant, from a judge to do any kind of search. You have to show probable cause to that judge. I understand that for certain searches, Ashcroft has been seeking special subpeona powers, but has had little luck getting them.

Almost all, if not all, of the provision of the PATRIOT Act were provisions are powers the government has had for some time in dealing with the Mafia, and other crimes. Roving wiretaps, investigating library records, etc. The only new stuff that is here is the application of these tools for terrorism.

Besides which, what you are saying is directly contradicted by the US Constitution. Amendment 4 in particular. If you have a case, you need to make it to the courts, instead of to me.

But you do touch on something I see quite often here. The key issue is you do not trust Bush and Ashcroft. There is this hatred for the present administration that I honestly don't understand, it goes well beyond normal political competition. You appear to fear that because you are in the political opposition (rather competition, as both your side and Bush's are competiting for the same electorate's "hearts and minds") that you will be disappeared. I don't see that happening. You and the rest of your side are still at it.

This is a case of the very act of making the charge disproves it. I would think that if the administration wanted to silence you, they would have long before now, and you would be able to say the very things you are saying. So your hatred appears misplaced.

[Perhaps this is a case of projection. Is this what we are to expect when your side comes to power? You think that the administration will do the things you would?]

You also have to remember that we are at war. I know that this is something that some folks will disagree with, but I see no other way to describe it. There are folks who want to kill you, just for being you. Folks who cannot be deterred or dissuaded. How do you deter a suicide bomber, someone who already has accepted his own death and destruction as part of the operation?

We are not talking about petty theft, or smuggling bobble headed gesha dolls. We are talking about folks who want to kill and destroy, who see democracy and freedom as a clear and present danger to their entire way of life, and opposed by God's will. (Funny that they keep losing, but then we are not dealing with rational actors here). You think Firefly would have even been aired under their version of Sharia? Guess again.

And if the older legal processes became a hindrance to fighting that war, they no longer served their function and had to be changed. You are still free to rant and rave and charge and file suit, so in that respect nothing has changed. The things that have changed are needed to prevent another 9-11. To prevent another act of death and destruction like that on that day.

Guilt or innocence of a crime has nothing to do with how trials or searches are conducted. It has to do with whether the person did the crime. Trials function as an epistimal process to determine whether the accused is guilty or innocent. We do the best we can, but when the procedures can actually hinder the goal that the process is designed for, they have to be changed.

You don't trust Bush and Ashcroft, fine. I really don't care about your personal feelings one way or the other. But if you want to return to the way things were prior to 9-11, you ain't gonna get there.

For more information see: http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA_PATRIOT_Act

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Thursday, September 25, 2003 9:50 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Sorry for the late reply. Life is very complicated and busy right now!

I've re-read a number of your posts, not to argue but to understand. Frankly, I still don't understand, but I'm trying!

I think it all boils down to your identity- who you think you are. You continually draw boundaries. I'm on "their" side. Bush, the military, the wealthy, are on "your" side.

And of course, "you" represent freedom and democracy (and BTW capitalism). And since you are working towards a better world, your cause is just, and your methods are justified. Because of course it's all for the cause of "freedom" and "democracy".

You said that I "hate" Bush. I don't hate Bush- my level of emotion doesn't rise that high- but I don't make the mistake in thinking that his administraion and I share the same motives. There is too much evidence- which I have been pointing out to my colleagues and Senaors since before we invaded Afghanistan- that the Bush administration has been playing the American public. Bush may be too slow to be duplicitous, but Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, Wolfowitz, Perle, Abrams et al will certainly be there to tell him what to think, how to feel, and how to convince the public to go along.

You and I have the same goals, believe it or not. I want to see democracy and prosperity around the world. We may argue about the hows and whens but we are aiming in the same direction.

But you have faith. For some reason you really really believe that these guys have America's best interests at heart. This is where you and I disagree. Since faith is unarguable, how do we get there from here?

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Friday, September 26, 2003 3:17 AM

Hey, real life has a nasty habit of interfering with the truly important things in life

Identity is not quite right. I am me. I exist, and I have certain characteristics, both physical and mental that others have, and others do not. As close as that gets to being grouped into any organization, or several, it gets a bit dicey. Its never a complete or perfect match.

"You and I have the same goals, believe it or not. I want to see democracy and prosperity around the world. We may argue about the hows and whens but we are aiming in the same direction."

This was well said. We do have the same goals, and it does boil down to a question of means.

"But you have faith. For some reason you really really believe that these guys have America's best interests at heart. This is where you and I disagree. Since faith is unarguable, how do we get there from here?"

But I don't have faith. I have a different perspective than you do, a different "model of the universe" inside my head than you. I can claim that my views and reasons are just as founded on logic and observation as you can about yours. The real question is which view is correct.

Which is better, altruistic intentions or altruistic consequences? I ask this because this is why I see as default, that freedom is better than slavery, democracy is better than totalitarianism, and capitalism better than any form of centralized control of the economy. Each of the former members of these pairs are essentially selfish choices. My freedom, my vote, my ownership of my stuff, and my life. They may not be ideal, but they are better than anything else tried and that is enough.

I am a selfish bastard. I freely admit it. I am more concern with me and mine than I am with you and yours. But this is not some kind of Nietzchean Ubermench mentality. Your a person, with more or less the same hopes dreams and desires as the other 6 billion souls on this planet. You can be benefitical to my goals and wants, making things I desire, or even helping me verbalize a lot of the semi-coherent thoughts running through my skull. But in order to achieve that benefit, some tactics work, and some do not.

Its not that I don't care about you, as much as I don't even know you. I don't know what will make you happy, or what your dreams are. Unless you are able to articulate it, I can never know what goes on in that skull. The situation is symmetrical however. Multiply that by 6 billion folks, and you see the problem inherent in any kind of altruism based system.

If I become a real threat to your life, or your stuff, or your freedom, you are going to defend yourself. We might even agree that you have a right to do so. And that defense can prove very detrimental to me and mine. So to avoid all that, I am left with treating you as I want to be treated. And demand that you do the same in return.

By both of us acting like people and treating the other like people, we can both benefit from interacting.

There are those out there who think differently, believe, and have faith in their beliefs that is radically different from mine. That some are put on this planet to rule others, make decrees, and the rest are simply cannon fodder or toys for the elite to play with. Some see democracy as a clear and present danger to their very ideals, attitudes, and identities as the elite, or God's chosen few. And are willing to kill, rape, steal, do whatever it takes (or rather send others to do whatever it takes) regardless.

In one sense they are right. Without meaning to, they see this country is a threat to their way of life. We never got a class system running over here, and so a lot of our products, (both physical and cultural) are directed toward the lower class. There are more of them, and as our ancestors got kicked out of every decent country in Europe (or the world) we are more in tune with the lower classes than with the aristocracy (mullahcracies, or whatever the elite want to call themselves) Since we were founded on the concepts of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and have shown how unnessicary the various kings and potentates are, our culture and ideas are very attractive to their people.

To put it another way, the American experiment has shown that the lower class does not need the upper class. But the upper class, the various aristocracies, etc. need their lower classes. Its tough to be emperor if nobody calls you that, or does your bidding. What does it matter if you claim a hotline to God if no one will do your bidding?

Technically, politically, militarily, economically, and culturally, right now we are the last remaining superpower, whether we like it or not. We did it without obeying any mullah, without listening to any king or commisar, without any group of wiser gentlemen to direct us. That is a blasphemy in the eyes of some. A direct affront to their ideas of God. And so they are willing to toss aside their God's teachings in order to fight that blasphemy.

And since fighting the blaphemy, jihad, is God's commands, they will sleep well at night, knowing they are right with that God. We ain't got a spaceship, so gathering up all our pieces of precious and running is out. Besides there are some stupid reasons for staying and fighting for what is our, what we created, anyway.

Since they made the choice that one of us has to die, I choose them. As long as Bush and the rest protect and defend us, well, that is the job they got elected for.

I know Wolfowitz is a Jew, but so what. Ending terrorism may be benefitical to Israel, but it will also be benefitical to the US as well as the rest of the world. Cheney may have ties to Halliburton, and Halliburton may want that oil. But if in the process they get rid of a dictator, free the Iraqi people, put an end to terrorism, (and still have to pay a market price for that oil to the Iraqi people) does it really matter? Besides which, what other companies out there can do the job they are doing in Iraq now? Unfortunately, there isn't any available, there are only three companies that could even approach the problem as effectively as Halliburton could, one French, and the other unavailable.

As for Bush being stupid, I don't get that and never did. You will have to explain how a guy who got Cs in Harvard's MBA program is dumber than a guy who flunked out of Villanova Divinity school. Having looked into both economics and theology, I can say that economics is the tougher subject, as it has to work in the real world.

He talks like a rube, and sometimes flubs his lines, but that is a rather superficial indication of intelligence. Besides ain't part of intelligence recognizing talent, and hiring the right people for the job?

So, even if their intentions are pretty selfish, I don't have a problem with that. Because their goals coincide with my own selfish intentions, which is to not get blowed up. I see a great deal of altruistic effects from their selfish goals and means of pursuing those goals. I see a free Iraq emerging after 30 years of Saddam, and an Afghanistan where the burka is a choice, not a command.

"my kind of stupid"

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Friday, September 26, 2003 9:55 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Well Drakon, I'm glad to see that you haven't gotten bored of this discussion yet.

It's so seldom that I get an in-depth (if off-topic!) conversation that doesn't degenerate into huffy name-calling. It's entirely to your credit. And your response is chock-full of such lovely ideas, so you have already made me happy.

(I wish there was an icon for someone gleefully rubbing their hands.)

I think I understand where you are coming from. I think you would say that it is individuals acting in their own best interest that drive society forward. That those who desire wealth or power have beneficial (if unintended) effects: they put together the money, effort, etc to create the factories, maintain internal order and defend us from harm. That there are others who live by an entirely different paradigm, and that the two paradigms are mutually exclusive, they are an immediate and irreconcilable threat to each other.

OK, now here's the really weird part- I agree with 99% of what you're saying. I'm ALSO a selfish bastard. I freely admit to it, and I think everyone else should be a selfish bastard too. I hope not to see TOO many cases of people acting out of altruism.

BUT.... there are some (many) instances where we can get farther collectively/ socially than individually. The economy is not a group of individuals acting individually, it's a system that is capable of more than the sum of individual capabilities.

"Wealth of Nations" did a fine job talking about competition, but it left out the real driving force of human advancement which is cooperation- the division of labor, the ability to interact socially (humans are a social species not a solitary one), the ability to share ideas and create new ones- these are what lift us out of the individual grubbing for food in the forest. So while I DON'T believe in altruism, I DO believe in rationale cooperation.

If we were to study society, economy, language and technology as a system, then we might see something more interesting that the Darwinian viewpoint presents. For example, the nature of organizational power in human society- what are the feedbacks (if any) that keep an organization from becoming top-heavy, rigid, or ineffective?

As far as your view of radical Islamists- I agree with you that they are operating on an entirely different paradigm, and that our paradigm (which is an essentially materialistic one) represents a threat. Eventually, the system that offers a reasonable living and a predictable future for the most people will prevail.

But my lunch half-hour is up, and I have to finish this later!

TTUL

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Friday, September 26, 2003 5:52 PM

Drakon:

I really hate to barge into a private conversation but the irony is sOOO delicious.

We are not talking about a meritocracy here, where everyone plays by one set of rules. We are talking about a supreame court that has equated money with free speech, and one where the wife of one justice and the son of another worked for the Bush campaign. We are not really talking about Republicans in the John McKain or even the Richard Nixon sense (quirks and 5 Oclock shadow aside, Nixon was a brillent, decent, individual). We are talking about a government of kleptrocacy and cronyism.

You write
"There are those out there who think differently, believe, and have faith in their beliefs that is radically different from mine. That some are put on this planet to rule others, make decrees, and the rest are simply cannon fodder or toys for the elite to play with. Some see democracy as a clear and present danger to their very ideals, attitudes, and identities as the elite, or God's chosen few. And are willing to kill, rape, steal, do whatever it takes (or rather send others to do whatever it takes) regardless."

There is a class, who has just this attitude and whenever they are in power they change the rules to fleece the rubes. They call themselves Republican but Teddy Roosevelt and would shoot them and Abe Lincoln would prosecute. Their religion is greed. Remember the "Savings and Loan" mess during the Regean administration?
The Savings and Loans were undercapitalized?
They had changed Savings and Loan capitalization ratio requirement and with the stroke of a pen the S&Ls were undercapitalized.
(The capitalization ratio is the ratio of the value of the stock to the loans outstanding) They gave the S&Ls 6 months to raise more capitol, when it takes a year to do an S1 filing to sell stock, so the only way that S&Ls could balance the books was to sell junk bonds or call in loans. The result was that a lot of people lost all their equity, S&Ls were put under, assets were sold at 10 cents on the dollar, David Stockman (Regean's budget director) became a billionaire buying up the assets of the newly bankrupt, and you and I paid for a bailout.

And then there is the hostile takeover, leveraged buyout thing. Before Regean it was illegal to borrow money against the value of a company to buy the stock. We are the only country that allows that.
I worked for a company that was one member of five companies that was owned by a parent company.
We had no debt, 2300 employees, a R&D fund of 50 million, a fully funded retirement plan, a square mile of land near John Wayne Airport in Orange County and a stock price of $30 a share and a shop floor rate of $50 an hour.
That was before the buyout.
The stock price went up North of $100 pre share. The buyer used our R&D fund to pay the interest payment on the money borrowed from Coalberg Kravis, Roberts to make the tender offer. Our shop floor rate went to $300.00 an hour; we lost most of our contracts, everyone buy 70 employees were laid off. They bought the umbrella company for 260 million, sold off our property, took the R&D fund, took a tax write-off for depreciation against us of something like 100 million and then sold our single company for 260 million, and destroyed 2230 jobs in the process.

There are some people for whome 100 million dollars is not enough for them not to begruge milk money for children.

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Friday, September 26, 2003 10:52 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
I think I understand where you are coming from. I think you would say that it is individuals acting in their own best interest that drive society forward. That those who desire wealth or power have beneficial (if unintended) effects: they put together the money, effort, etc to create the factories, maintain internal order and defend us from harm. That there are others who live by an entirely different paradigm, and that the two paradigms are mutually exclusive, they are an immediate and irreconcilable threat to each other.

Bingo. There is no middle ground between life and death, between existence and non-existence. We want to live, to exist. They want us dead.

And yes, the rich have their function. That is the cool thing about capitalism, and what demostrates the potential of humanity. Everyone acting in their own selfish interests ends up having a net benefitical effect for everyone, whether it is intended or not is beside the point.

Some political theories have postulated that if only mankind was different, more altruistic, things would be better. But capitalism makes use of mankind as he is, uses that "evil selfishness" in a way that ends up benefitical to more folks than altruism ever could.

Quote:
BUT.... there are some (many) instances where we can get farther collectively/ socially than individually. The economy is not a group of individuals acting individually, it's a system that is capable of more than the sum of individual capabilities.

This is only sort of true. And this gets kind of deep philosophical territory here. You see, a society is, well, a figment of the imagination.

The best analogy I can think of has to do with evolution. We talk about "species evolving". But that brief phrase is a shorthand for the complex and myriad interactions of individual members of the species, that result in their individual success or failure, their survival to reproduce, or their early deaths.

When a population of individuals with one set of characteristics competes against another population with slightly different characteristics, generally speaking, the more apt survive, multiply and reproduce. The less able do not reproduce as much, and so you get a population shift. Before their were a large number with one set of characteristics. Later, the majority population has a different set.

That is the long hand meaning of the phrase, "species evolve".

The same is true with economic systems. The system is nothing more than a mental construct, with no reality apart from the real individuals who make up the system. Remove the system, the individual will still remain and find other ways of operating. But remove the individual, the system dissapears along with them.

Quote:
"Wealth of Nations" did a fine job talking about competition, but it left out the real driving force of human advancement which is cooperation- the division of labor, the ability to interact socially (humans are a social species not a solitary one), the ability to share ideas and create new ones- these are what lift us out of the individual grubbing for food in the forest. So while I DON'T believe in altruism, I DO believe in rationale cooperation.

Okay, now how do you achieve this cooperation? Do you coerce others to cooperate, regardless of cost to them? Or do you make it worth their while and let them decide for themselves whether to join or not. And live with their decision regardless?

Quote:
If we were to study society, economy, language and technology as a system, then we might see something more interesting that the Darwinian viewpoint presents. For example, the nature of organizational power in human society- what are the feedbacks (if any) that keep an organization from becoming top-heavy, rigid, or ineffective?

Grin, exactly. What is a feedback loop exactly? Its an information loop, information is transferred from one point on the individual's decision loop to another. We see reality, compare our sensory input to what we desire it to be, take action (in accordance with our mental model that hopefully predicts how our action will alter that external reality) and observe the consequences. And the cycle keeps going and going.

In free market economics, money serves as that information loop, that feedback path. My profits tells me what you want, (and don't want) and how effective I am at turning low value commodities into high value products. If the products are not valued, for whatever reason (including the public simply thinking I am ugly) then the products don't sell, they are not valued.

Quote:
As far as your view of radical Islamists- I agree with you that they are operating on an entirely different paradigm, and that our paradigm (which is an essentially materialistic one) represents a threat. Eventually, the system that offers a reasonable living and a predictable future for the most people will prevail.

Actually the system or paradigm which offers the most life and happiness will prevail. When another better one comes along, it will be tried and succeed. Evolution works on ideas and paradigms as well as biological individuals

The material versus spiritual thing kind of bothers me though. It appears closely related to the whole realism versus idealism debate that has raged in philosophy since the days of Plato and Aristotle. The fact remains that we are physical beings who live in the physical world.

We may believe the bowling ball in our hand is only illusion, only maya as the Hindu would say, but if you drop it on your foot, you are still going to feel pain. So whether it is or is not an illusion, unless we want to break our toes, we still have to treat it as a real bowling ball.

And there are troubles with dealing with, or explaining the spiritual realm anyway, as experiences there can differ far more radically than they do in this common physical reality that we live in. And since your visits and mine may never see the same thing, it makes it impossible to tell who is correct. There is no commonality of sensation present to render a judgement.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Friday, September 26, 2003 11:25 PM

As this is a public forum, barge right in.

I don't want to get into the 2000 election too much. I find it strange that two different groups can live through the exact same historical incident, and come away with two completely different (and mutually exclusive) views of the same thing. Besides its ancient history, and we have to deal with reality as it is today.

I disagree very strongly with your views that we are living under a kleptocracy. Other than the appointment of friends whom the President trusts, I don't see where you get the cryonism either. Would you prefer that only those who despised and hated the President and his policies be appointed?

The Savings and Loan problems was more bi-partisan than you seem to allow. Both sides of the aisle thought that those changes would work. They didn't, which is obvious. And not knowing anything about your particular situation, it makes it difficult for me to briefly comment on it. Heck its tough enough for me to be brief.

But you do have what appears to be an inaccurate model of both Republicans and greed in general. Look, greed is an evolutionary benefitical trait in humans. While it can lead to detrimental excesses, try imagining a world where no one was trying to get ahead, get more, make a profit. Things would end up in a static situation, technical advancement would grind to a standstill. Heck if things were only good enough, why bother working harder for more?

And again it comes to coerced altruism or allowing people to use their naturally and evolutionarily derived selfish impulses for the betterment of all. The closing of the business may have been tramatic, but you survived. You are working elsewhere, still providing something of value to your employer, your customer. And I would guess so did all your co-workers. Things change, and one either adapts to those changes or ceases to exist.

What you are essentially arguing for is statis. In the real world statis does not exist. Especially in anything that comes in contact with any biological entity, including people. The very definition, the essense of life is change. Statis is essentially equvalent to death. Businesses, like people, and other organic things, are born, live and sometimes die out.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Friday, September 26, 2003 11:34 PM

SUCCATASH

I've heard that Bush prays in bed, is that true?

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Saturday, September 27, 2003 12:05 AM

BRTICK

Quote:
Originally posted by Succatash:
I've heard that Bush prays in bed, is that true?

so would I, if I was him.

Keep Flying!

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Saturday, September 27, 2003 3:37 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

"Some political theories have postulated that if only mankind was different, more altruistic, things would be better. But capitalism makes use of mankind as he is, uses that "evil selfishness" in a way that ends up benefitical to more folks than altruism ever could."

However, one other feature that consistently comes up in human behavior is cooperation, in one form or another. For example, while most people look at war as form human aggression, it is mostly a form of human cooperation- how else do you get people to give up their lives en masse? If humans didn't have the capacity to cooperate, our children would never have survived their extraordinarily long dependent state. (dependent= to hang from. Children must be carried through their first year of life.) In fact, it's that cooperation that prevents the total individualism and rationality required by capitalist theory.

"This is only sort of true. And this gets kind of deep philosophical territory here. You see, a society is, well, a figment of the imagination.

The best analogy I can think of has to do with evolution. We talk about "species evolving". ...The less able do not reproduce as much, and so you get a population shift.... That is the long hand meaning of the phrase, "species evolve"."

Yes and but...

Society is partly our ideas about how things should work, and partly our technological and language inheritance. Societies evolve, but not just by the survival of their individual members. The religion that discovered conversion did a lot better than the religion that was based on inheritance.

"The same is true with economic systems. The system is nothing more than a mental construct, with no reality apart from the real individuals who make up the system. Remove the system, the individual will still remain and find other ways of operating. But remove the individual, the system dissapears along with them."

The system has it's own life, otherwise we wouldn't be talking about it's survival. The closest analogy I can think of is the body. While it's true that the body would disappear if the cells disappeared, no one would argue that the body is a figment of the imagination, or that one arrangement of cells (the hydra) is equivalent to another arrangement of cells (the human). To get really rarified about the whole concept, you can even postulate a whole ecosystem of systems. In that case, by analogy the survivability of a diverse ecosystem of systems is pitted against the efficiency of a monoculture. But I digress.

"Okay, now how do you achieve this cooperation? Do you coerce others to cooperate, regardless of cost to them? Or do you make it worth their while and let them decide for themselves whether to join or not. And live with their decision regardless?"

As I said before, you don't have to coerce people to cooperate, it's in our nature, just like competition. The only question is the rules of cooperation, which are socially defined.

"Grin, exactly. What is a feedback loop exactly? Its an information loop, information is transferred from one point on the individual's decision loop to another. We see reality, compare our sensory input to what we desire it to be, take action (in accordance with our mental model that hopefully predicts how our action will alter that external reality) and observe the consequences. And the cycle keeps going and going.

In free market economics, money serves as that information loop, that feedback path."

Again yes, yes, and but...

First a minor quibble- I'm not sure we see reality. We see part of reality, but there are large parts of reality that we filter out or are incapable of perceiving. So what we "see" is already highly mediated by our ideas and capabilites. But I know what you mean, so moving on...

I'm going to have to get real ethereal here, because I haven't fully thought out these ideas...

The history of successful systems (those that manage to overtake other systems on contact) seems to be that they reach a pinnacle of heirarchy and fall apart. I'm trying to understand this through several analogies, none of which are completely useful for explaining the phenomenon.

The first analogy is computerised "artifical life" in which bits of code are placed on competitive environment. Once "producers" are in place, parasites and predators arrive soon afterwards, but symbiots eventually evolve and become successful. The second analogy is species reproductive strategy. Some are "harem" species, others rear their young cooperatively, still others are seasonally monogamous etc. One common feature is that if males are not providing a net benefit to the young, they are driven out through intense intraspecies male competition. The main point seems to be that the various breeding strategies have mechanisms to pass on greater amounts of resources to the young. The third analogy is the body, in which cells are required to stop growing and "keep their place" otherwise they become cancerous and eventually kill the host. All of these involve the use of resources by non-cooperative members.

It seems to me that something similar happens to economic/ social systems. Those who command greater resources may initially provide a benefit to those that command fewer resources: they provide internal stability by enforcing a set of laws, or provide protection from external threat, enhance trade by building roads, stimulate technological advance by disseminating ideas, etc. But at SOME point, unless there is a negative feedback loop built into the system, they either outlive their utility or wind up diverting an inuspportable amount of resources for their maintenance through sheer power. (As far as I can tell, power is a positive feedback system- those in power gain more power.)

The question is whether capitalism provides an effective negative feedback system, and I think the answer is "no". Money rules everything- our politics, our media, our schools, our values, our military adventures. The moneyed sit like leeches at the jugular veins of our economy, and there is no way to joggle them loose when they become counterproductive, as I believe they have.

"The material versus spiritual thing kind of bothers me though. It appears closely related to the whole realism versus idealism debate that has raged in philosophy since the days of Plato and Aristotle. The fact remains that we are physical beings who live in the physical world.

And there are troubles with dealing with, or explaining the spiritual realm anyway, as experiences there can differ far more radically than they do in this common physical reality that we live in. And since your visits and mine may never see the same thing, it makes it impossible to tell who is correct. There is no commonality of sensation present to render a judgement."

Dare I say "AMEN"???

Sorry, couldn't resist! My colleagues and I have had interesting lunchtime discussions about this (philosophy on fast-forward!) and that is the one thing we agreed on. We can talk ethics and morals, goals and means, but once a deity comes into the conversation then rationale discussion must cease. I just tell them that I believe in a six-foot white rabbit, and that my belief is equal to theirs since no one can prove me wrong. Pisses some of 'em off, but makes a point.

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Saturday, September 27, 2003 4:32 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
"Some political theories have postulated that if only mankind was different, more altruistic, things would be better. But capitalism makes use of mankind as he is, uses that "evil selfishness" in a way that ends up benefitical to more folks than altruism ever could."

However, one other feature that consistently comes up in human behavior is cooperation, in one form or another. For example, while most people look at war as form human aggression, it is mostly a form of human cooperation- how else do you get people to give up their lives en masse? If humans didn't have the capacity to cooperate, our children would never have survived their extraordinarily long dependent state. (dependent= to hang from. Children must be carried through their first year of life.) In fact, it's that cooperation that prevents the total individualism and rationality required by capitalist theory.

Umm... I think we are talking past each other here. Individualism, or selfishness does not preclude cooperation. It precludes cooperation by force, (or fraud) or in cases when it is not benefitical to all parties involved. That is the key there.

Again one can either persuade others to join in with you, for a common goal. Or you can put the knife to their throat and force them (or alternately you can lie to them.)

Persuasion will fail, usually unless there is a benefit to be had by those other folks. And the backlash from fraud can be detrimental to you, and your future attempts at persuasion. Force is generally a bad idea, unless the issue is a matter of life or death and the other side cannot be talked out of them killing you.

Quote:
Yes, and but...

Society is partly our ideas about how things should work, and the partly our technological and language inheritance.

Societies evolve, but not just by the survival of their individual members. The religion that discovered conversion did a lot better than the religion that was based on inheritance.

Are you familiar with memetic evolution, the theory of how ideas evolve in a society? Genetic evolution follows Darwinian lines, yet memetic evolution follows LeMarkian lines. The essential difference is whether the idea can be re-written on the fly and the new change transmuted through the culture. While mice who have their tails cut off will still breed tailed mice, an idea can be changed and permeate a culture far faster.

And yes, societies do evolve based on the lives and happiness of their individual members. This is the whole reason for forming the groupings to begin with, is for the improvement of the lives and happiness of the individual members. There is no group, except as an idea. The individual members cannot, nor should not be forgotten.

But you do have a good point here about evangelical religions having a natural advantage over inherited or blood related ones. But its not always an either/or situation. We can really get boring on the subject of Dispora and how that been successful and has actually been benefitical to both Christians and Jews alike. (Or Malay and Chinese too, as similar situation exists in the Far East)

Quote:
The system has it's own life, otherwise we wouldn't be talking about it's survival. The closest analogy I can think of is the body. While it's true that the body would disappear if the cells disappeared, no one would argue that the body is a figment of the imagination, or that one arrangement of cells (the hydra) is equivalent to another arrangement of cells (the human). To get really rarified about the whole concept, you can even postulate a whole ecosystem of systems. In that case, by analogy a diverse ecosystem of systems is pitted against the efficiency of a monoculture. But I digress.

But an economic system is not a physical thing. Free market economics do not have a brain, nor are free to choose the way a human is. It makes use of the decision making capabilities and freedom of thought to make those decisions of its individual members.

It does create an ecosystem of sorts, (or at least a setup analogous to an ecosystem) with different companies competing in an open market. And it requires the various companies to increase their efficiencies, or else die out.

Quote:
As I said before, you don't have to coerce people to cooperate, it's in our nature, just like competition. The only question is the rules of cooperation, which are socially defined.

Why is it in our nature? How does society establish its rules, and why those rules versus some other?

Again, yes, yes, and but...

Quote:
First a minor quibble- I'm not sure we see reality. We see part of reality, but there are large parts of reality that we filter out or are incapable of perceiving. So what we "see" is already highly mediated by our ideas and capabilites. But I know what you mean, so moving on...

I understand the question and doubt. What I was trying to point out was two essential things here.
1) In order to know reality, the real reality, we some sensory information about it. At present, there is only the five known physical senses that we have. Deteriming what is true or real is essentially a comparison, between data and a statement. Without the data the comparison is impossible

2) It doesn't matter anyway. We still get hurt if we drop that ball on our foot. Our actions in the physical impact our senses. Some sensation are desirable and some are not. So whether the physical is real or not, we still have to act 'as if" it is real to avoid pain and achieve pleasure.

Quote:
I'm going to have to get real ethereal here, because I haven't fully thought out these ideas...
.......
It seems to me that something similar happens to economic/ social systems. Those who command greater resources may initially provide a benefit to those that command fewer resources: they provide internal stability by enforcing a set of laws, or provide protection from external threat, enhance trade by building roads, stimulate technological advance by disseminating ideas, etc. But at SOME point, unless there is a negative feedback loop built into the system, they either outlive their utility or wind up diverting an inuspportable amount of resources for their maintenance through sheer power. (As far as I can tell, power is a positive feedback system- those in power gain more power.)

The question is whether capitalism provides an effective negative feedback system, and I think the answer is "no". Money rules everything- our politics, our media, our schools, our values, our military adventures. The moneyed sit like leeches at the jugular veins of our economy, and there is no way to joggle them loose when they become counterproductive, as I believe they have.

This is damn good. I am sorry to cut your examples, but I really am trying to be brief. These were good analogies usable in the explaination.

The bug? You didn't follow them out far enough. What happens when a predator eats all the food in a given area, and cannot leave? What happens when the cancer cell takes over? The body dies, and the parasite, the cancer cell or preditor, dies out as well. If it cannot jump to a new host, then it goes the way of the dinosaur.

It and its host then become food, (resources) for other organisms.

If the son of a rich man inherits his wealth, what does he do? He has the same choice as everyone else, produce or die. He can spend into his inheritence, but once its spent, its gone. Unless he is creating wealth, value, he will not get anything back and his wealth will wither until it is all gone. He cannot use force or fraud to get more, he can't steal, (in free markets) so eventually he dies out.

In the meantime, all his wealth that he has squandered has gone to other folks, the guy selling him beer, or bobble headed gesha dolls, or whoever he bought from.

It is the absence of coercion that makes it possible to dislodge would be parasites, and convinces them to either produce, or see their fortunes waste away.

As to the money in politics issue, I think this gets overstated. Voters are not that stupid and all the flashy advertisements in the world are not going to turn a pig's ear into a silk purse. (Where does that expression come from?) We've seen too many well funded stupid propositions defeated here in California alone, and underfunded but good ideas succeed at the ballot box.

Quote:
We've had some intersting lunchtime discussions about this (philosophy on fast-forward!) and that is the one thing we agreed on. We can talk ethics and morals, goals and means, but once a deity comes into the conversation then rationale discussion must cease. I just tell them that I believ in a six-foot white rabbit, and that my belief is equal to theirs since no one can prove me wrong. Pisses some of 'em off, but makes a point.

That is why I like to stick to the material side of things. Like I said earlier, to determine whether a statement is true, one needs to compare that statement with the reality being expressed. In order for more than one person to agree on the truth, to determine it themselves, that reality has to have a commonality amongst all potential observers. The physical side is objective, in that it independent of any particular observer (or actor). The mental, or spiritual is subjective. It depends on a particular observer. And as such you can't get agreement.

Heck sometimes its hard enough getting agreement about objective reality.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Saturday, September 27, 2003 7:18 PM

D

In both the case of the S&Ls and the changes in the legality of Leverage Buyouts, there was no bi-partisan change in legislation.
Changes in the banking legislation did occur some years later, but they had nothing to do with the S&L mess.

Rather there was a change in the interpretation of the law and thus agency regulations. The Republican administrations made a different interpretation of the existing law, and changed the rules.
When you elect a President, you actually elect his 7000 political appointees who head the rule making bodies. Congress makes laws and the Agencies carry out the rules. The laws did not change the rules changed.

Your postulate:

If the son of a rich man inherits his wealth, what does he do? He has the same choice as everyone else, produce or die. He can spend into his inheritance, but once its spent, its gone. Unless he is creating wealth, value, he will not get anything back and his wealth will wither until it is all gone. He cannot use force or fraud to get more; he can't steal, (in free markets) so eventually he dies out.

You speak in broad generalities while avoiding specific examples or substance.
But these are sustentative issues. Paradigms lead to beliefs which dictate where the money goes and who produces what, which in turn dictates to who will have a job and, do well, who will have a job and go to bed hungry, and who sleeps on silk sheets.

"He cannot use force, fraud and can not steal."

You are extremely intelligent so you know that there are manipulations which amount to the same thing but are much more subtle than that.

How about an interest free loan, which is then forgiven?

I did not know that these things (interest free loans that are then forgiven) existed until I was looking into the finances of a Republican congressional candidate in California.
The man had started a bank with his brothers. Then had each put up 20,000.00 and then had sold 10 million of stock in the bank. So essentially they paid for the business plan, filing and listing fees, and created a business that had not existed before. The bank had 50 million dollars in deposits and 250,000,000 in loans outstanding.
He became a director of the bank and received a salary of 300,000,000 a year.
Among the loans made by the bank (and this is when the commercial interest rate was north of 12%), were several loans large loans made to his businesses at 3%, and 16 months before he ran successfully for congress, the bank made him a loan of over a million (don't remember if it was 1,or 2 now, been a while) which was forgiven a little over a year before he decided to run for congress.

When I asked the Banking Commission about the legality of this, they told me that it was not unusual. So basically he took a couple of million from his bank to run for congress before the campaign reporting horizon, and under the rules of the Banking Commission
Rules this was judged to be legal. Weather this is considered legal or not depends on the administration in power. Another person with different politics might try it and get an entirely different ruling, and that bothers me a lot.

You apparently simplify this to a contest between the haves and the have-nots. Between Republicans and Democrats.

It is not a Democrat vs. Republican thing.

It is a Kelptocracy vs. all of us thing.

You constantly divide things into two groups, so try this.
Fair consistent rules for everyone, value and jobs created Vs kelptocracic manipulation of rules to allow cronies to get rich while businesses are ruined.

My grandpa always said that you have to take care of your people and you livestock.
The new kleptocrats have no idea of the concept.

The Puritans arrived and then there went the neighborhood.

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Sunday, September 28, 2003 6:32 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Any comments?

U.S. Uses Terror Law to Pursue Crimes From Drugs to Swindling
By ERIC LICHTBLAU

Published: September 28, 2003

WASHINGTON, Sept. 27 — The Bush administration, which calls the USA Patriot Act perhaps its most essential tool in fighting terrorists, has begun using the law with increasing frequency in many criminal investigations that have little or no connection to terrorism.

The government is using its expanded authority under the far-reaching law to investigate suspected drug traffickers, white-collar criminals, blackmailers, child pornographers, money launderers, spies and even corrupt foreign leaders, federal officials said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/28/politics/28LEGA.html?hp

Of course, they will not openly admit that they're using the Patriot Act to investigate activtists and political opponents.

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Sunday, September 28, 2003 7:57 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Drakon, we've have a wonderful discussion but it has not reached any conclusions. I'd like to try and bring this to some sort of closure. I think I know what you believe in, but I want to make sure that we're both clear, so I'm going to ask you a bunch of questions. However, after my post, should we start up a new thread? Just a thought.

Ground rules- First of all, let's not get into the discussion whether capitalism exists or not. If you decide that it's a figment of imagination, there's nothing to discuss, is there? Let's hypothesize that capitalism exists and can be inferred from sensory data (like electrons).

Second, since we are testing a hypothesis that we agree should be rooted in the physcial world we should be able to refer to, explain and predict events. Since we can't test our hypotheses in the laboratory, then it must have superior explanatory and/ or predictive power in real life.

Third, we must adequately define or paramterize what we're testing, so starting with the usual questions-

When did capitalism start? Ballpark answer only.

Where does capitalism exist today?

What is capitalism, as distinguished from other systems?

How is it maintained?

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Monday, September 29, 2003 1:32 AM

Your first question shows something that is probably the most confusing thing about one of the cnetral issues of philosophy. Which is the real world, the world outside, or inside one's skull?

Things are real if and only if they can affect objects in their environment. By that test, both physical objects, and ideas are real,a s both can affect changes in other objects in their environment.

The difference between a rock and our ideas of a rock, are that while real physical rocks can afect and be affected by other forces and actions, ideas require a mind in order to exert or generate any changes. The idea has to affect behavior of the individual holding it.

To put another way, while a rock may be, and for all appearances is, independent of a mind in order to influence other physical objects, ideas are dependent on a mind in order to exert any influence. Remove the mind, and the idea affects nothing.

So while capitalism, or any economic system, like religions and governments and rights and such, are merely ideas, they do have a reality, they have effects. Granted its only possible as long as folks believe and act as if they are real, but it does have affects and in this sense, are real.

Just because something is imaginary, does not mean it has no reality, that it has no effect on other objects. It has a very different reality from a rock, and it is dependent on a mind, but it still causes effects.

Take a look at Serenity. It does not exist in reality, yet here we are, spending all our time discussing, when we could be doing other things. Fighting for its return to the airwaves, even though it is a figment of the imagination.

Okay on to your questions.
When did it start? Unknown. Its birth is shrouded in pre-history, and goes back to the first person to declare that some object was "his", the first time someone declared personal ownership.

The concept of ownership means that in regards to a particular object (or concept) you get to decide what is done with it. Your money, your land, your car, your computer, in all cases you get to decide what is done with that object. And more importantly, no one can simply assume ownership or control without persuading you to relinquish that control.

[This can get fuzzy as we often will talk about "my God" or "my group". And anyone who thinks that they can control "my wife" probably don't have one.

]

Capitalism exists throughout the US, a lot of Europe, Hong Kong probably had the pureset form of capitalism before Chinese takeover. In most places there is this bastardized hybred capitalism/socialism system in place.

The distinguishing characteristic, and difference between capitalism and its competing system, (regardless of what it is called, communism, socialism, etc.) is who really owns their stuff. Do you own you, and what you produce, or does someone else. Do you make the decisions, or does someone else.

Nazism maintained the name of ownership, but regulated private industries to such a degree that ownership was essentially just a fiction. And in a lot of Europe today, employers cannot freely choose how to run their businesses, which is causing problems. Because businesses are not free to fire people when things get bad, they are far more reluctant to hire people in good times. Which slows the growth rate and play havoc with their unemployment rates.

How capitalism is maintained is an interesting question. As long as one is free to dispose of his own property as that person sees fit, and the less he has to ask the permission of others, capitalism is maintained. As long as folks have this idea in their mind that they own themselves, they own what they create, and are able to act on that idea, you have capitalism.

Fundamental to the idea of capitalism, the root of it, is the concept of freedom. Freedom to think and act as one sees fit, rather than allowing some outside actor veto. You want to start a business, hire folks to make a product, its your money, and your decision. I can't stop you unless I can prove your actions are a clear danger to myself and others, to my life, and my property. No force, no fraud.

So in order to get rid of it, you have to get rid of the underlying concepts. That means getting rid of the ownership, and the idea of freedom. Which is why economics is important. Once you give control of an economic system to any one person or small group, you control everything in that population.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Monday, September 29, 2003 1:45 AM

Quote:
We need to get the hell out of Iraq and bring our soldiers home. I have many friends without Dad's and little babies being born without parents and this is bullshit, no one is protecting me from Freedom, this is just meddling bullshit in other countries and inspiring more terrorism and world wide hatred against the United States FOR NO GOD DAMN GOOD REASON.

Pulling out now would abandon the Iraqi people to the Saddamites and terrorists while they are too weak to defend themselves. And it is easy to see the outcome of doing what you want, Saddam shooting his way back to power, and a return of his defiance of the UN.

It would weaken the efforts of pro-democracy dissidents in Iran and Syria, and pro-western sympathizers in Saudia Arabia, as well as the rest of the world. We would prove Usama right that were were a paper tiger, and instead of reducing terrorism, your proposal would simply increase the likelyhood of terrorist attacks.

The reason why Usama attacked us was because he thought he could and our reaction would be at worst, few cruise missiles into empty tents. Such ineffective actions just emboldens those who want to kill you. A withdrawal now would have the same effect, would be considered a win by the bad guys.

War sucks, but if you think that sucks, think through the consequences of your actions.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Monday, September 29, 2003 2:16 AM

Grannysteel
I really do try to keep these posts short. Which is why I try to stay with the arguments and the abstract for the most part.

I disagree strongly with your perception of the S&L mess. It was changes in regulations, brought about by the fact that S&L were supposed to deal almost exclusively in home loans and personal property development. This put them at a competitive disadvantage with respect to banks and other finacial institutions. S&Ls were not supposed to take the kinds of risks that banks do, and because of that, they could not make the profits that banks did.

Which is why Charles Keating lobbied to change the rules, and got several Senators and congressmen, including as one example, John Glenn, Democrat senator of Ohio, to help them out.

You said that it is not a "It is not a Democrat vs. Republican thing." then complain about Republicans, and Puritans. Sorry, I see you trying to make this more a "pox on both their houses" kind of deal, but then your prejudices betray themselves.

Not being familiar with the particular congressman, or case, it is impossible to comment intelligbly except in general. A loan which is forgiven, is a loss to the business. And investors don't like losses, and start pulling their money out, selling their shares to others. In short, this is a great way to lose the business if this is what you are trying to do.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Monday, September 29, 2003 2:28 AM

I've gotten a couple of e-mails on this thread, and other stuff I have written, via the Fireflynet. Unfortunately, the reply bounces back to this net, instead of their e-mail account. Which makes replying offline difficult.

So, if you want to write to me, please put your e-mail address in the message. Hate mail, no matter how well deserved, is not welcome

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Monday, September 29, 2003 7:58 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

HOO BOY!

I can see why we've been going round and round! As far as you're concerned, capitalism = personal ownership, innovation, freedom, democracy, and everything good.

OK, can you try and refine that idea a bit by perhaps chiseling out what capitalism is NOT? Looking more specifically at capitalism's connection to democracy and personal freedom:

Although you claim that capitalism had its roots in prehistory, when do you suppose democracy came into being? IF Greeks and Romans had a form of democracy but also had slaves, were they capitalist?

As far as decision-making is concerned, you claim that under capitalism one gets to make decisions. What kinds of decision-making are prohibited under socialism?

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Monday, September 29, 2003 6:33 PM

First let me say that I have an error in my last e-mail.. The honorable congressman was making 300,000 a year as chairman of the board of his bank. not 300,000,000. Typo.

Drakon:
Obviously even a bright guy like you does not know what a capitolization ratio is. Look it up in the banking regs. It takes more than 5 seconds to explain so crooks get away scot free.

This country was founded on a reverence for hard work. There has to be a balance between the value placed on work and the value placed on capitol.
When work becomes over valued you get stagnation. When capitol becomes overvalued you get feudalism.

But here is another question.
What happens to this country and the world when the only jobs we don't outsource to another country are policeman, docters, lawyers, and the military?

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Tuesday, September 30, 2003 2:27 AM

Grin,

There are two ways of doing things. Either you make your own decisions, or you don't. If you do not, that means some outside agency makes them for you, such as a central planning committee, a single "Great Leader" etc.

Capitalism is not the same thing as democracy, however, as democracy is a political system, whereas capitalism is an economic system.

There is a relationship however between the two, since everything boils down to economics, the creation, distribution and consumption of limited resources to meet unlimited wants or demands. What you do and how you act, depends if you can afford it in terms of time, effort, or resources, even if its going to church, or staying home to watch the game.

One can have a socialistic economic system where the planning committee is elected by the population. You can also have a benign dictator who enforces the rules, especially property rights, but leaves the population free to interact on their own as they see fit. An executive to produce honest cops and honest judges, but leaves everything else alone.

My understanding of history is that while democractic Athens was pretty capitalistic, despite the slave owning (which has its own problems with regards to a free capitalist society, we can get into later) while Sparta was more what we would term fascist (in the original meaning, i.e. very nationistic, or tribal, and military) and communal. However the basis of the hoplite armies was the fact they were free landholders.

The issues of slavery, and the role of women is secondary, but somewhat important for determining whether an economic system is capitalistic or socialistic. It depends on how much control the state, or any other, has on your decision process. While slaves are not allowed to vote or determine for themselves, that would render their relationship a rather "socialistic-eques" with respect to their masters. But if the slave owners were free to treat their property, including slaves, as the owner desired, that would render it a capitalist system.

Slave societies are a bastardized half breed between the two. And ultimately, if the slave society is to be upheld, it has to be upheld by force, with more and more restrictions placed on the owner as to how to treat their slaves, and what to do with them. Even things like teaching a slave to read can be outlawed. What you see is that these "half breeds" don't work, and the system eventually evolve in one direction or the other.

The basis of capitalism is personal ownership. Which means that one is personally free to dispose of one's own property. Free to choose to produce, sell or buy, or whatever. Free market societies have shown to be more innovative than socialistic, or slave societies, and can produce more. (One of the biggest reasons the south lost the war of Northern Agression)

With personal economic freedom, comes a desire for more political freedom, more access and control of government. Which ends up meaning democracy, which as Churchill called it, "the worst form of government ever invented, except for all the others." Limited government is required for a capitalistic system to function. Once you get outsiders interfering, an "inalienable" set of minority rights have to be observed. Or else democracy becomes mob rule, and the majority can simply vote to pack a minority off to concentration camps.

I have used the term "liberal democracy" to describe what I am talking about. Without respect for minority rights, or limitations on government authority, things can quickly devolve back into a dictatorship. But too little government, too little protections of rights, or enforcement of laws ends up doing the same thing, as the guy with the biggest guns, and the will to use them, ends up coercing others into acceptance of his "Great Leadership".

Not necessarily "everything good" but at best "least bad" The trouble with the Other making your economic decisions is that he don't and can't know you, your wants, needs and abilities as well as you can and do. There is a big information problem involved, as attempting to control all the economic decisions of any large population quickly becomes a nightmare. How is a central authority supposed to know what kind of underwear is produced, unless it polls the population to determine what underwear they want, like, or need?

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Tuesday, September 30, 2003 2:44 AM

I understand about capitalization ratios and all that, I was pointing out that a bank is a business, and it has to be responsive to its investors, its customers and its workers. IF either of these groups are unhappy, they go somewhere else and take their toys (money, work, experience, whatever) with them.

Banks have to fogive bad loans from time to time. But if they are fogiving too many for too much, the bank goes under, they lose customers and investors, if not workers as well.

What is missing is the relationship between work and capital. It takes work to create something of value, whether it is a product or a factory to make a product. It takes work to accumilate capital, as people don't spend money on things of no value, willingly.

What you appear to be worried about is essentially other people's values, how they value one over the other, or to the exclusiong of the other. Some people are going to have values you disagree with, economic values being only a small part of the entire value structure that each individual has. Now, where you go with that disagreement, that is another question altogether.

Or, how to get people to agree with your value structure?

As for outsourcing, its a false delimma. Take a look at Say's Law, and remember that labor is a comodity like anything else. If you have a bunch of out of work folks, there is a labor supply there, and demand will follow that supply. Supplies, intentionally or not, tend to create demands.

And again, I keep seeing indications of the old class warfare at work in your posts. The rich are not the enemy, nor parasites of the poor, nor are they a different class. Anyone with a good idea, and hard work can become one of those rich folks. And quite a few have. At least in this country.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Tuesday, September 30, 2003 9:37 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

WHOA THERE!

I'm trying to narrow down your rather broad-brush explanations into something a bit more testable.

In essence, what you are saying is that capitalism is defined by it's PROPERTY relations. So, have we decided that social mobility and democracy are not required for capitalism to exist? Seems like it to me.

Excluding those issues and focusing on property relations, I have a couple more questions regarding economic decision-making abilities under various economic structures:

Humans also act as consumers. Are consumption decisions (what to buy, where to live etc) inhibited BY LAW OR FORCE under socialism?

Humans also act as investors. Are investment decisions inhibited BY LAW OR FORCE under socialsim?

Humans also act a "laborers". Are employment decisions unhibited BY LAW OR FORCE under socialism?

The reason why I specify "by law or force" is because I KNOW you will say that unless the owner is allowed to do as he wants, consumers, investors, and laborers will face a narrowed range of choices. I don't want to get into that end of the discussion, I'm just trying to get a complete theoretical parsing of what capitalism is or isn't.

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Tuesday, September 30, 2003 7:19 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Drakon:
I understand about capitalization ratios and all that,

Okay, you understand, and it’s hunky dory with you that the rules were manipulated to put as many S&Ls as possible out of business and engineer a contraction of the money supply.
Hard on a lot of home building and related businesses.
And “cartels” arouse your scorn, however what do you call a conglomerate created by leveraged buyouts?
And if you think buyouts increase efficiency look at the glass industry. Higher prices now because there is no competition.

Kleptocratic administrations calling themselves Republican changed the rules in a ways that made it easier for the Masters of the Universe to get richer but harder for the small and medium size business to get loans (in the Old George’s Admin) and risky to go to the capitol markets and that this was bad for most businesses.

It was not until the 3rd year of the Clinton Administration that loans were reasonably available to business again.

In ignorance I will say that I do not know of anything that the present Bush administration has done to exacerbate the situation, however. The previous changes and Greenspan raising interest rates for the 2000 election, which lead the present recession has lead to a hemorrhage of jobs which would be the main topic of national discourse were it not for the distraction of the “War” in Iraq. 3000 odd people were killed in the world trade center. So we went where the terrorists trained and reigned and we cleaned house. But we half-assed it, and now with Iraq on out plate Afganistan is sliding back
into chaos.

However think abut it. When the best job an average American can find is in the military and we are sent off to war as a diversion from the economic mess at home, we have some work to do here.

No! Don't interfere, the Captain wants to handle this himself.

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Tuesday, September 30, 2003 10:30 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
WHOA THERE!

I'm trying to narrow down your rather broad-brush explanations into something a bit more testable.

In essence, what you are saying is that capitalism is defined by it's PROPERTY relations. So, have we decided that social mobility and democracy are not required for capitalism to exist? Seems like it to me.

Social mobility is a product of a capitalistic system. It is not a pre-condition, but a natural effect resulting from free markets. Some folks will work hard and get rich, some won't.

You also have to understand that class distinction are less important if they exist at all, under capitalism. Can you do the job? Well whether you can or cannot is irrelavant to whether you are a king or a commoner.

Democracy, again is a political system and while somewhat related is not necessary for capitalism. Just as democracy, or authoritarianism is not necessary for socialism either. However, what one sees is that capitalistic societies tend toward democracies, as greater economic wealth gives rise to the desire for more political freedom and control. Whereas socialism tends toward authoritarianism because of the information problem inherent in socialist systems, as noted by Hayek.

Or to put it another way, the manner in which laws are enacted is less important than what those laws are. Social mobility and democracy are nor necessary precursors to capitalism. But are natural if unintended effects of that system. The essential ingredient in a capitalistic system is respect for the individual's right to his own property.

Quote:
Humans also act as consumers. Are consumption decisions (what to buy, where to live etc) inhibited BY LAW OR FORCE under socialism?

Humans also act as investors. Are investment decisions inhibited BY LAW OR FORCE under socialsim?

Humans also act a "laborers". Are employment decisions inhibited BY LAW OR FORCE under socialism?

The reason why I specify "by law or force" is because I KNOW you will say that unless the owner is allowed to do as he wants, consumers, investors, and laborers will face a narrowed range of choices. I don't want to get into that end of the discussion, I'm just trying to get a complete theoretical parsing of what capitalism is or isn't.

Again, the difference is whether you make your own choices, as to where to invest, work, make or buy. Or whether someone else does. If you make your own decisions, then you have capitalism. If it is someone else, then we are talking about socialism (or communism or whatever one wants to call it.)

Laws are always enforced by force, coercion. Don't speed or you will be arrested, and your freedoms will be restricted further. Don't kill, don't steal, etc. (again, how those laws are enacted, or decided, is of less relavance than what those particular laws are.)

Heck, I can't get away from the concept of negative and positive rights. Because it is relavant here. Althought this is on the political side of things, it is related to the economic.

You have the right free speech. In practical terms what that means is that I am required to NOT force you to shut up. It puts a negative obligation on me, as it rules out a particular activity on my part. I can do all sorts of things, such as ignore you, argue with you, call you silly names, make faces, anything EXCEPT force you to shut up.

Because it excludes one set of actions from the whole range, we call this a "negative right" By looking at the obligation it places on others, and in particular, that such an obligation is a negative, (not do something, but leave the rest of potential actions alone) it is a negative right.

A 'right to housing' is a positive right. Because you are not requiring a negative action, but a positive one. You are requiring others to build you a house, regardless of what they want to do with those same resources, time etc. Instead of removing one action from the list, you are requiring a specific action and throwing away the list.

The cool thing about negative rights is reciprocity. I won't try to shut you up, and in exchange, you refrain from doing the same. We can work out a social contract, whereby we both benefit, for not doing the exact same things. I won't kill you, as long as you don't kill me. I won't steal from you, and you won't steal from me.

Positive rights cannot construct an equitable or reciprical arraingment. If you can build your own house, you don't need me to do it for you. And if you cannot, you cannot reciprocate, and I don't need you to anyway. If I can build my own house, why do I need a "right to housing' that you provide?

Laws are needed for societies to function and for the members to benefit. Some free actions have to be excluded, or else the society fails to provide the purpose for which it was created in the first place. Which is the life and happiness of its members. Now, how you do that, what rules that society picks and chooses, (freely) determines how well it function.

Negative rights, up to a point, work well, and aid in the establishing of a social contract between free people who are politically equal. Positive rights, like the right to housing, health care, or the right to someone else's product or property, don't work. It continues a "bi-polar" political structure in which some "are more equal than others". It has a lot of practical problems, such as freeloading, and the information problem we've talked about earlier.

Positive rights don't work. If you have a right to another man's product, pretty soon, he stops producing. He has no incentive, because there is really nothing in it for him, it is risky, and costly to produce, and the benefit does not make the effort worth it. Besides, does he not have the same right to other's products as you?

So the short answer to all your questions is yes. Under socialism, regardless of whether it is democratically elected wise men, or a single leader that shot his way to power, one either works where one is told, invests in what one is told to invest in, and makes and buys what one is told to buy, or else. The full force of the law comes down on the individual, and whether that individual agrees or disagrees with the choice made, is irrelavant. Property rights cease to exist as anyone, or the "State" has the right to dictate the disposition of "your" property. And if they can do that, then in what meaningful sense is it yours?

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Tuesday, September 30, 2003 11:01 PM

Quote:

Okay, you understand, and it’s hunky dory with you that the rules were manipulated to put as many S&Ls as possible out of business and engineer a contraction of the money supply.

Sigh, that is not what I said, nor meant. The purpose of the new looser regulations at the time was to make S&Ls more competitive with regards to banks and other financial institutions.

Because of those regulations, S&Ls took more risk, and sometimes foolishly. That some of those risks did not pay out, well, that is what happened. If foresight were as good as hindsight, then there would be no risk taking in the first place.

Quote:
In ignorance I will say that I do not know of anything that the present Bush administration has done to exacerbate the situation, however. The previous changes and Greenspan raising interest rates for the 2000 election, which lead the present recession has lead to a hemorrhage of jobs which would be the main topic of national discourse were it not for the distraction of the “War” in Iraq. 3000 odd people were killed in the world trade center. So we went where the terrorists trained and reigned and we cleaned house. But we half-assed it, and now with Iraq on out plate Afganistan is sliding back
into chaos.

Funny. IMF is reporting a 38 percent increase in the Afghani GDP, and they have just annouced a new constitution. Also, since the overthrow of the Taliban, they have a had a refugee exodus back TO Afghanistan, from all over the world. Most, if not all, of the people who fled the Taliban have returned home. To a place that is "sliding back into chaos?" That does not make sense.

One of two possible things is going on here. Either your information and perception is in error, or the vast majority of Afghanis is in error. I am going to bet on the Afghanis being right on this one.

Quote:
However think abut it. When the best job an average American can find is in the military and we are sent off to war as a diversion from the economic mess at home, we have some work to do here.

This is something I have difficulty understanding, although I see it frequently. What you are saying is that this war is somehow "unreal" or done just as a distraction. That it is fake. Yet you note that there were 3,000 people killed on 9-11.

I don't know how to deal with this kind of perspective, because it is so at odds with my own. We are dealing with a radically, and mutually exclusive perception of the common universe we live in.

What I see is there are people out there that want to kill us, and feel it is their God given duty to do so, even if they die in the process. Not for anything you or I might have done, but for the simple reason that we exist as we are.

Now, if you want to die, please, don't let me stop you. Just don't take me with you. Some of us are going to fight, in order to live. You may claim it is a distraction, and you can see all sorts of sinister conspiracies behind it, but sometimes reality is just what it appears to be. Fanatics want to kill us, and will use any means they can get their hands on to do so. We either stop them, or die at their hands.

Yes, national security is an issue, and has displaced the economy as the number one thing on people's minds and probably the key point on which the elections will be won or lost. Because if you are dead, the economy really doesn't matter, as there ain't one.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Wednesday, October 1, 2003 9:17 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Slow down Drakon! I'm not talking about negative or positive rights or freedom of speech. I just want "yes" or "no" answers if possible, unless of course you suffer from hypergraphia!

So, without including extraneous factors, and restricting yourself to yes/ no so we can reach some common ground without having to go over everything AGAIN, would it be fair to say that capitalism is defined by property laws which

1) recognize and protect property rights
2) allow people in their economic spheres- as consumers, workers, investors, and employers- free economic decisions within a free market
3) do not have one-to-one relationships with co-existing political or social insitutions?

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Thursday, October 2, 2003 12:16 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Slow down Drakon! I'm not talking about negative or positive rights or freedom of speech. I just want "yes" or "no" answers if possible, unless of course you suffer from hypergraphia!

So, without including extraneous factors, and restricting yourself to yes/ no so we can reach some common ground without having to go over everything AGAIN, would it be fair to say that capitalism is defined by property laws which

1) recognize and protect property rights
2) allow people in their economic spheres- as consumers, workers, investors, and employers- free economic decisions within a free market
3) do not have one-to-one relationships with co-existing political or social insitutions?

Sigh, what can I say. I don't suffer from hypergraphia, I enjoy it

I am trying to be complete, and that does come out as wordy. I will try to be brief.

Your answers:
1) Yes. This is essential. I want to note that property rights is a negative right, as your property right puts an obligation on me to not interfere with your decision. (With the obvious caveats about your decision not to get me killed)

2) Yes. It is essentially the freedom from force or fraud. And again with the obvious caveat.

3) Yes. BUT! there is a causative mechanism at work here.

If men were angels then there would be no need for governments. There would be no need for cops, or prisons, or laws. But men ain't. Sometimes they are stupid, ill-informed. Sometimes they are selfish in the self destructive Nietzchean sense, and some folks are just evil sadistic bastards who like hurting folks.

If everybody played by the rules, then there would be no need for enforcement of those rules. Or working out disputes as to what those rules are, or should be. But different folks will have different information, and different ideas as to how to best do things.

Because of these disagreements, some method of arbitration has to be worked out. And force has to be used to compel the "wrong side" to comply.

Now a centralized ecomony already has a decision making body, and because it controls the economy, and the economy has such an influence over the rest of human experience, such a body already has the capability to force compliance of those who disagree with it.

And because of the information and freeloader problems mentioned earlier, the central authority has to use force to correct for the inherent flaws in that economic system, in order to attempt to keep it running, and keep the central committee in power.

Whereas under capitalism, the government is limited to preserving the (negative) rights of the people, and is limited in its ability to interfere, unless there is a real danger to members of its population. And as the economy grows more and more, people start thinking they are smart enough to do the same job as any other law maker, or executive. And start lobbying for their own place at the political table.

So, what we see is that socialist economies trend toward authoritarian dictatorships. While capitalist economies trend toward democracies. While the particular governmental structure is secondary, we do see a causitive relationship between democracies and capitalism, as well as dictatorships and centralized economic authority.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Thursday, October 2, 2003 9:43 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

I should have written-

1) Recognize and protect INDIVIDUAL property rights.

A society that recognizes and protects communal property rights is obviously not capitalist!

OK, in the interest of refining these definitions, I'm going to go exploring around the edges a little bit to see where these ideas break down. Care to join me?

Does (1) mean that capitalism is "just" a group of laws or a natural and inevitable result of human economic endeavor?

(1) Are there, or should there be, any limits on the use that an individual can make of "their" property? For example, I used my meat smoker and your house gets fumigated.

If people should be allowed to make free choices in a free market (2) does this mean that you favor legalizing street drugs, prostitution, and/ or slavery? Obviously there is supply and demand for all of the above!

If I'm a landowner in the 7th century with free choice in my economic spheres (2) i.e- control over my products, home, and acquisitions- but there are no roads, no currency, and no markets, is this capitalism?

One of the requirements of capitalism seems to be the establishment of a "free market". But what does it take to establish a "free market"- or in fact ANY sort of market- anyway? (2)

(3) If capitalism promotes democracy while socialism promotes dictatorships/ police states, and capitalism should work without force or fraud, then would you expect to see the most capitalist countries with the fewest police? Or, given that ALL societies need some law enforcement, at what level of enforcement (police per capita, percent population in prison) would you consider a society to be a "polic state"?

(3) Indeed, if capitalism is such a boon to the world, then shouldn't the largest capitalist nation have the smallest military and lowest number of military interventions?

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Thursday, October 2, 2003 11:37 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
I should have written-

1) Recognize and protect INDIVIDUAL property rights. A society that recognizes and protects communal property rights is obviously not capitalist!

First off, I understood your original question in the former sense, rather than the latter. In other words I thought you were talking individual property right anyway.

Second, you need to define what you mean by "communal property rights" Are we talking about property owned in common amongst a group of individuals, or are we talking about "the Tradegy of the Commons?" kind of thing?

Quote:
OK, in the interest of refining these definitions, I'm going to go exploring around the edges a little bit to see where these ideas break down. Care to join me?

I am still here ain't I?

Quote:
Does (1) mean that capitalism is "just" a group of laws or a natural and inevitable result of human economic endeavor?

Yes.

But seriously folks, it is both. Rights are really nothing more than ideas, concepts we create and use. But they are ideas that control or our modify behavior. If I believe in the "right to life" I ain't going on a 3 state killing spree no matter how tempting it may be.

Behavior affects the environment we live, and has consequences. We turn on the switch, because we want the lights on, not to flush the toilet. We all want to live and be happy, so we direct our actions toward those goals. Our behavior is a means toward the goal of maintaining our lives and increasing our happiness.

We engage in a broad class of economic activities for that very reason. To eat, to have a place to sleep, to attract girls, or purchase things that we think will make us happy. Some actions will achieve that goal, and some actions, like turning an electrical switch to flush the toilet, will fail.

And if the action fails, the idea behind the action gets modified. If the concept of "divine rights of kings" does not work, or even no longer works, then we try a different set of concepts. And keep trying till we find the best system to keep us alive and improve our own happiness.

Quote:
(1) Are there, or should there be, any limits on the use that an individual can make of "their" property? For example, I used my meat smoker and your house gets fumigated.

Then you are infringing on my ability to make myself happy, and violating my rights to my property. Also, as you do not want me to do the same to you, it would not be a good idea for you to start such an activity.

Some natural limitations on an individual's freedom become necessary when that individual is put with others. Again, look over what I was saying about negative rights earlier. And social contracts in that same post.

Quote:
If people should be allowed to make free choices in a free market (2) does this mean that you favor legalizing street drugs, prostitution, and/ or slavery? Obviously there is supply and demand for all of the above!

Grin,

As to slavery, I am not in favor of it. You own you. I cannot own you, even if you offer to sell yourself. My mind control chips are all at the shop right now, so I have no way of controlling you to begin with, without your permission.

As for drugs and prostitution, I don't think the government is right in stopping it, unless it becomes a health hazard to others. If you are taking drugs and driving, or otherwise putting others at risk, we got a problem. But its your body, and you want to ruin it, or screw yourself up, that is your business. I may advise you that such are bad ideas, and you really don't want to go there. But I would not use force to prevent you.

But that is me. There are those who see drug use as a hazard to others, not without reason. And some who see prostitution as very little different from slavery, as well as a health hazard, and destructive to the family unit. But these are really side issues when it comes to capitalism.

Quote:
If I'm a landowner in the 7th century with free choice in my economic spheres (2) i.e- control over my products, home, and acquisitions- but there are no roads, no currency, and no markets, is this capitalism?

One of the requirements of capitalism seems to be the establishment of a "free market". But what does it take to establish a "free market"- or in fact ANY sort of market- anyway? (2)

What are free markets free from? Force and fraud. If you don't want to buy or sell, I won't stop you. All you need for a market of any kind is a bunch of people with goods to trade. Those goods can be anything, from shiny metal disks to bobble headed gesha dolls, it don't matter.

What makes it a free market, is the absence of folks telling you "trade or else I will kill (jail, fine, imprison, give you a noogie) you."

Now currency is not an issue. But the lack of roads and markets renders the question moot. If you are not interacting with other people, it really does not matter what you call your economic activity. If no one is forcing you, (but you), you can call it capitalism if you like. But who are you going to tell?

Quote:
(3) If capitalism promotes democracy while socialism promotes dictatorships/ police states, and capitalism should work without force or fraud, then would you expect to see the most capitalist countries with the fewest police? Or, given that ALL societies need some law enforcement, at what level of enforcement (police per capita, percent population in prison) would you consider a society to be a "polic state"?

(3) Indeed, if capitalism is such a boon to the world, then shouldn't the largest capitalist nation have the smallest military and lowest number of military interventions?

This is probably the best question yet.

IF you had a society in which everyone played by the rules, REGARDLESS of what those rules are, you would need no police at all. If you lived on a planet in which EVERYONE was a capitalist, or heck maybe even a socialist, there would be no need for militaries.

But we do not live in such a nation, nor on such a planet. And due to the sometimes idiotic nature of humans, jealousies and all that, let alone different ideologies, conflicts naturally ensue. Some folks don't know how to take no for an answer, nor want to. Some folks are willing to lie, cheat, steal, even kill for the property of others.

Because you have criminals, folks who just don't care about the rights of others, you need police. Because you have nations that want to kill you, you either establish militaries to defend yourself, or else you die out.

But there is some side effects for all this, talked about by Victor Davis Hanson in his book "Carnage and Culture: Landmark Battles in the Rise of Western Power" Democracies and capitalists are able to build more effective armies than dictatorships and socialists. This is proven in battle, time and time again. Free people can be better at discipline (I found this a counter-intuitive finding!) than any army composed of, well, slaves to the king or state.

The reason being is that for the slave-soldier to achieve higher status, he has to disquinish himself in battle personally. Means exposing himself and his troops to more risks. Teh greater the odds, the greater the "glory", and more likely he will be noticed and rewarded by the king. Sooner or later, the guy does something stupid, getting killed. Dead soldiers are not useful to your cause, unless they are the other guy's.

But the volunteer citizen or free soldier, he is there to defend his home, and he wants to go back there. He don't want to die, but he does not want to lose his freedom either. Which ends up meaning he understands the benefits of group tactics, and is less likely to charge the enemy single handed. The difference in tactics alone usually means the difference between being dead and going home after it all over.

Another aspect is the citizen soldier is defending his family, his property, his rights. He has a personal stake in it. The slave warrior is fighting for some other guys stuff, their rights, etc. He has less of a personal stake in the outcome, and he may see death as a way to escape his Master. If life sucks and you are stuck in it, dying seems like an good option at times.

Third, capitalism tends to build on free thinking. Some nut comes up with an idea for a product, puts it out, and makes a million dollars, seemingly overnight. We learn to tolerate the slightly weird, because every once in a while, he is useful, not only to himself, but to the rest of society as well.

That translates somewhat over to military actions. Hanson as a story about one of the code breakers before the Battle of Midway, used to show up at work in a bath robe and slippers. Despite being active duty navy, his dress was tolerated because he was doing vital work against the Japanese Navy.

And he did, he was able to warn of the impending attack on Midway, and we were able to stop the Japanese then and there. His presense, despite his talents, would have not been tolerated by the Japanese, as he was too "out there".

To sum up, democratic capitalist nations, because of their ideas are able to field soldiers that are more disciplined, more flexible, and more talented, who have a personal stake in the outcome, than those of socialist or slave societies. This combined makes them more lethal. The proof is on the battle field.

Now, as to your police state question, I am not at all sure the raw number of police is relavant. It depends on what crimes the state has created for them to enforce. Is thinking a crime? Is simply opposition or complaining a crime? Or do you have to go around and actually break things and kill people to get arrested? (Or rather, threaten to do so, or create situations where you harm others.)

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Friday, October 3, 2003 12:06 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
I should have written-

1) Recognize and protect INDIVIDUAL property rights. A society that recognizes and protects communal property rights is obviously not capitalist!

Quote:
OK, in the interest of refining these definitions, I'm going to go exploring around the edges a little bit to see where these ideas break down. Care to join me?

I am still here ain't I?

Quote:
Does (1) mean that capitalism is "just" a group of laws or a natural and inevitable result of human economic endeavor?

Yes.

Quote:
(1) Are there, or should there be, any limits on the use that an individual can make of "their" property? For example, I used my meat smoker and your house gets fumigated.

Quote:
If people should be allowed to make free choices in a free market (2) does this mean that you favor legalizing street drugs, prostitution, and/ or slavery? Obviously there is supply and demand for all of the above!

Quote:
If I'm a landowner in the 7th century with free choice in my economic spheres (2) i.e- control over my products, home, and acquisitions- but there are no roads, no currency, and no markets, is this capitalism?

One of the requirements of capitalism seems to be the establishment of a "free market". But what does it take to establish a "free market"- or in fact ANY sort of market- anyway? (2)

Quote:
(3) If capitalism promotes democracy while socialism promotes dictatorships/ police states, and capitalism should work without force or fraud, then would you expect to see the most capitalist countries with the fewest police? Or, given that ALL societies need some law enforcement, at what level of enforcement (police per capita, percent population in prison) would you consider a society to be a "polic state"?

(3) Indeed, if capitalism is such a boon to the world, then shouldn't the largest capitalist nation have the smallest military and lowest number of military interventions?

This is probably the best question yet.

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Friday, October 3, 2003 3:23 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Second, you need to define what you mean by "communal property rights" Are we talking about property owned in common amongst a group of individuals, or are we talking about "the Tradegy of the Commons?" kind of thing?

I meant- a society that only recognizes common ownership and views individual ownership as illegal.

I am still here ain't I?

Thank goodness!

Quote:
Does (1) mean that capitalism is "just" a group of laws or a natural and inevitable result of human economic endeavor?

Yes.

But seriously folks, it is both.

We engage in a broad class of economic activities ...some actions, like turning an electrical switch to flush the toilet, will fail.

And if the action fails, the idea behind the action gets modified. If the concept of "divine rights of kings" does not work, or even no longer works, then we try a different set of concepts. And keep trying till we find the best system to keep us alive and improve our own happiness.

You seem to view the range of possible actions as static, in other words, capitalism was always there but society needed to stumble around for a bit before revising it's ideas to match the activity, whereas I take a different tack. See further.

Quote:
(1) Are there, or should there be, any limits on the use that an individual can make of "their" property? For example, I used my meat smoker and your house gets fumigated.

Quote:
If people should be allowed to make free choices in a free market (2) does this mean that you favor legalizing street drugs, prostitution, and/ or slavery? Obviously there is supply and demand for all of the above!

Grin,

As to slavery, I am not in favor of it....
As for drugs and prostitution, I don't think the government is right in stopping it, unless it becomes a health hazard to others. If you are taking drugs and driving, or otherwise putting others at risk, we got a problem. But its your body, and you want to ruin it, or screw yourself up, that is your business. I may advise you that such are bad ideas, and you really don't want to go there. But I would not use force to prevent you.

What about in the case where drugs cause addiction even with first-time use? Who picks up the bill for an addict's medical treatment or- presuming they have violated OTHER laws in chasing their habit- incarceration?

Quote:
If I'm a landowner in the 7th century with free choice in my economic spheres (2) i.e- control over my products, home, and acquisitions- but there are no roads, no currency, and no markets, is this capitalism?

One of the requirements of capitalism seems to be the establishment of a "free market". But what does it take to establish a "free market"- or in fact ANY sort of market- anyway? (2)

What are free markets free from? Force and fraud.

Who do you appeal to if force or fraud is comitted?

Now currency is not an issue. But the lack of roads and markets renders the question moot. If you are not interacting with other people, it really does not matter what you call your economic activity. If no one is forcing you, (but you), you can call it capitalism if you like. But who are you going to tell?

This is where we disagree. The "law of supply and demand" and the force of competition only work (according to theory) in a free market, which pre-supposes that you have a market to begin with. The indigenous tribe member has a lot of free choices- where to build the hut, how to shape the spear, when to go hunting- but you wouldn't call it capitalism by any stretch of imagination.

Not only that, but the establishment of a common currency is a requirement for capitalism. How do you pay your workers? In bowling balls? What are they supposed to do- lug those balls to the market and trade with whoever wants bowling balls that day? Even if you had FedEx and Ebay, how do you save for the future? How do you invest?

For practical purposes, capitalism requires roads and currency.

Quote:
(3) If capitalism promotes democracy while socialism promotes dictatorships/ police states, and capitalism should work without force or fraud, then would you expect to see the most capitalist countries with the fewest police? Or, given that ALL societies need some law enforcement, at what level of enforcement (police per capita, percent population in prison) would you consider a society to be a "polic state"?

(3) Indeed, if capitalism is such a boon to the world, then shouldn't the largest capitalist nation have the smallest military and lowest number of military interventions?

This is probably the best question yet.

I'll have to finish this later!

------------------------------------

IF you had a society in which everyone played by the rules, REGARDLESS of what those rules are, you would need no police at all. If you lived on a planet in which EVERYONE was a capitalist, or heck maybe even a socialist, there would be no need for militaries.

But we do not live in such a nation, nor on such a planet. And due to the sometimes idiotic nature of humans, jealousies and all that, let alone different ideologies, conflicts naturally ensue. Some folks don't know how to take no for an answer, nor want to. Some folks are willing to lie, cheat, steal, even kill for the property of others.

Because you have criminals, folks who just don't care about the rights of others, you need police. Because you have nations that want to kill you, you either establish militaries to defend yourself, or else you die out.

But there is some side effects for all this, talked about by Victor Davis Hanson in his book "Carnage and Culture: Landmark Battles in the Rise of Western Power" Democracies and capitalists are able to build more effective armies than dictatorships and socialists. This is proven in battle, time and time again. Free people can be better at discipline (I found this a counter-intuitive finding!) than any army composed of, well, slaves to the king or state.

The reason being is that for the slave-soldier to achieve higher status, he has to disquinish himself in battle personally. Means exposing himself and his troops to more risks. Teh greater the odds, the greater the "glory", and more likely he will be noticed and rewarded by the king. Sooner or later, the guy does something stupid, getting killed. Dead soldiers are not useful to your cause, unless they are the other guy's.

But the volunteer citizen or free soldier, he is there to defend his home, and he wants to go back there. He don't want to die, but he does not want to lose his freedom either. Which ends up meaning he understands the benefits of group tactics, and is less likely to charge the enemy single handed. The difference in tactics alone usually means the difference between being dead and going home after it all over.

Another aspect is the citizen soldier is defending his family, his property, his rights. He has a personal stake in it. The slave warrior is fighting for some other guys stuff, their rights, etc. He has less of a personal stake in the outcome, and he may see death as a way to escape his Master. If life sucks and you are stuck in it, dying seems like an good option at times.

Third, capitalism tends to build on free thinking. Some nut comes up with an idea for a product, puts it out, and makes a million dollars, seemingly overnight. We learn to tolerate the slightly weird, because every once in a while, he is useful, not only to himself, but to the rest of society as well.

That translates somewhat over to military actions. Hanson as a story about one of the code breakers before the Battle of Midway, used to show up at work in a bath robe and slippers. Despite being active duty navy, his dress was tolerated because he was doing vital work against the Japanese Navy.

And he did, he was able to warn of the impending attack on Midway, and we were able to stop the Japanese then and there. His presense, despite his talents, would have not been tolerated by the Japanese, as he was too "out there".

To sum up, democratic capitalist nations, because of their ideas are able to field soldiers that are more disciplined, more flexible, and more talented, who have a personal stake in the outcome, than those of socialist or slave societies. This combined makes them more lethal. The proof is on the battle field.

Now, as to your police state question, I am not at all sure the raw number of police is relavant. It depends on what crimes the state has created for them to enforce. Is thinking a crime? Is simply opposition or complaining a crime? Or do you have to go around and actually break things and kill people to get arrested? (Or rather, threaten to do so, or create situations where you harm others.)

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Saturday, October 4, 2003 12:02 AM

Quote:
You seem to view the range of possible actions as static, in other words, capitalism was always there but society needed to stumble around for a bit before revising it's ideas to match the activity, whereas I take a different tack. See further.

Okay, I don't think this quite reflects my view. But lets keep looking here to see where the bugs are.

Quote:
Then you are infringing on my ability to make myself happy, and violating my rights to my property. Also, as you do not want me to do the same to you, it would not be a good idea for you to start such an activity.

Does this mean then that regulations controlling pollution are a good thing?

So? At the risk of sounding like a first grader, you started it. You need to explain why it would be okay for you to violate my property rights, but not okay for me to violate yours.

Remember, those rights are essentially negative rights, and as such allow the construction of mutually beneficial reciprocal arraingments. I only respect your rights because that benefits me. I don't care about you in particular, being the selfish bastard I am. If that observation does not have a benefitical effect, then why do it?

To put it another way, if you don't I won't. You don't respect my rights, I won't respect yours. It would actually be detrimental for me to let you use my "kind heartedness" against me.

Quote:
What about in the case where drugs cause addiction even with first-time use? Who picks up the bill for an addict's medical treatment or- presuming they have violated OTHER laws in chasing their habit- incarceration?

What about it? As long as you don't make it my business, by creating a danger to me and mine, it ain't my business. Once you make it my business, then you put me in a bad situation, and might not like my solution.

Simply don't ask me to pick up the tab for your treatment. Because as it is my money, I will "treat" you in a way that I see fit. And if you become a criminal, a threat to me and mine, again, I will defend myself. As to whether that is to your detriment or not, well, that is your problem, not mine. I will remove the threat.

Quote:
This is where we disagree. The "law of supply and demand" and the force of competition only work (according to theory) in a free market, which pre-supposes that you have a market to begin with. The indigenous tribe member has a lot of free choices- where to build the hut, how to shape the spear, when to go hunting- but you wouldn't call it capitalism by any stretch of imagination.

And economics only makes sense when you are talking about groups of individuals rather than an isolated person. If everyone is utilizing the resources as they see fit, and not interacting, then it makes little sense to discuss how they are interacting.

Quote:
Not only that, but the establishment of a common currency is a requirement for capitalism. How do you pay your workers? In bowling balls? What are they supposed to do- lug those balls to the market and trade with whoever wants bowling balls that day? Even if you had FedEx and Ebay, how do you save for the future? How do you invest?

For practical purposes, capitalism requires roads and currency.

Why not use bowling balls? You point out the disadvantage of bowling balls, but this is really secondary to the issue. We could be talking about cows, in fact cows have been used as currency before.

What is currency? It is simply a medium of exchange, that is all. It is a reference. Instead of trying to figure out the price of cows in terms of chickens or shoes or bobble headed gesha dolls, we price everything in terms of a single comomidty, namely dollars. That way, complicated conversions become a lot easier.

Bowling balls as you note, are too bulky to make a convenient currency. Instead, we could use slips of paper, treebakr, or shiny metal disks. Which have the advantage of being less bulky and that is all.

As for roads, like currency, you are looking at the superficial aspects, and assuming they are fundamental. What you need are markets for anything approaching an economy, in any meaningful sense. How that market is controlled and what those controls are based on, that determines which economic system you are talking about.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Saturday, October 4, 2003 12:17 AM

I missed one of your questions

Quote:
Who do you appeal to if force or fraud is comitted?

Now this gets into politics and shows the relationships or interconnection of politics with economics.

There are several ways you can handle this, some are effective, and some are not.

You can take matters into your own hands, and in fact this does happen a lot more than is realized. You can simply not deal with the person, not buy or sell to him (boycott) or even go so far as slap him around a bit and punish him to make him stop doing it. In the extreme, you can even hang him.

But there is a problem with going too far, the first of which is epistemal. Are you sure the guy is a crook, or could you be wrong?

Another way is the establishment of an agency to determine the case, whether the guy is a crook or not, and met out punishment.

How much power is granted to this agency over the actions of the individual members and how that agency is designed, functions and persons selected for the job, gets into the definition of different political systems.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Saturday, October 4, 2003 6:09 AM

-=ZERO=-

sad.

----------------------------------------------
-=ZERO=-

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Saturday, October 4, 2003 11:57 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Yes, I know!

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Saturday, October 4, 2003 9:59 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

You know Drakon, for someone who likes to base his arguments in the material world, you have a habit of ignoring all the "mess" that comes with it:

the necessity of safe roads for markets

the need for currency

the conflict between my property rights and your
right to breathe

the framework of property laws underpinning the system

Rather than being a system that resulted from the development of surplus and trade around which laws were constructed, to you capitalism is pure individual ownership, free of economic, technological, and social development. In fact, you sound like a dyed-in-the-wool idealist when it comes to capitalism- if only we could ignore all those DETAILS that detract from it's pure essence.

But, after that proking thought, I need to toddle off to bed. I'll have to continue this later!

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Saturday, October 4, 2003 10:54 PM

SUCCATASH

So, we all agree, right? Bush sucks?

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Sunday, October 5, 2003 1:57 AM

RAZZA

Quote:
Originally posted by Succatash:

So, we all agree, right? Bush sucks?

No actually we don't, but I suspect you don't really care what others think anyway, so why ask?

"Keep Flying!"

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Sunday, October 5, 2003 2:29 AM

RAZZA

First, I want to say that I've enjoyed the discussions between you two for some time now. It's rare, unfortunately, to see two such intelligent folks who disagree so strongly share their beliefs so civilly. Thank you both for keeping it so civil!

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
You know Drakon, for someone who likes to base his arguments in the material world, you have a habit of ignoring all the "mess" that comes with it:

the necessity of safe roads for markets
Quote:

I'm not sure I agree that safe roads are necessary for markets. I lived in the third world for a couple of years and there were some pretty unsafe roads where I was living, especially during the rainy season. It didn't seem to put a stop the weekly market day, however. Roads plagued with bandits would certainly open a booming business for potential caravan guards and might promote capitalism is this security sector of the economy. I will grant that unsafe roads are undesirable for market expansion and growth, but not are not necessarily essential.

Quote:
the need for currency
Quote:

I think this depends greatly on your definition of currency. If you mean the use of a standard medium, sanctioned by some governing body, then I think you overvalue the concept of currency. Capitalism does not require such a rigid form of exchange. Barter was around millenia before hard currency and I suspect it will be around in some form or another for a long time.

Quote:
the conflict between my property rights and your right to breathe
Quote:

Not sure what you are getting at here. Drakon was promoting the "Golden Rule" of property rights. If you would claim ownership of the air I breathe, you would have to back that up with some kind of force, and in return be prepared to meet any force I would place in opposition to your claim. In short if you don't want me claiming your air, don't try to claim mine. Are you trying to make that point that air is "communal property"? I think that bares some more discussion certainly and is a good question!

Hope you two don't mind me entering the discussion, its been fun just watching from the sidelines, thougt it would be more fun to enter the fray.

"Keep Flying!"

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Sunday, October 5, 2003 5:48 AM

Grin.

I don't ignore the "mess", but I do see it as less "messy" than any other system available or thought of. Again, it boils down, to either you make your choices as to how to dispose of your property, or someone else does.

Besides which, what the heck have I been saying? I have not ignored any mess, but have addressed and faced each and every question, or potential "mess" you have brought up.

You don't know me, and for the most part, my existence does not affect you in any material way. Now because of that, you are incapable of making my economic decisions for me. You are not me and it is my life that is at stake, not yours.

If you screw up, I recieve the direct effect. Maybe you are affected later on down the road, indirectly, but that does me little good. You don't know me, nor can you know me. And that alone renders you incompetent at making my decision, deciding what I do with my property.

Roads: What about a world in which there is no solid ground for roads. It is not the road that are necessary, it is a means of travel. This can be accomplished by boats, airplanes, submarines, starships, etc. Again it is markets, not the superficial things that facilitate those markets.

And really when you get down to it, all a market is, is a bunch of folk who gather together to trade goods. It does not matter what those goods are, (in the absrtact), what marks it as a capitalistic system is whether some agency coerces the traders, or not.

Currency: You seem to be under the false assumption that currency is somehow a "real thing" instead of simply an idea. Remove the goods and services you can exchange for currency (help me, I am channeling Anya), currency is worthless. Currency makes things easier, and different things have been used as a common medium of exchange, like cows, or sea shells, or giant stone wheels, or shiny metal disks that other than the fact that it is pretty, has no other pratical use.

The only reason why a piece of colored paper has value, and the only reason why folks are willing to give up their own property for those is because they and many other act "as if" it is valuable. Because folks act in such a manner, it does have value, namely the value of goods and services that can be exchanged.

How many chickens = a cow? Or how many goats, shoes, baskets, etc. = 1 cow? Its kind of a hard question to figure out. But if you convert all these various items into dollars, use the price in currency, then the problem becomes a lot easier.

Conflict of property rights: Again, you need to go back and look at what I wrote about negative and positive rights. I have already explained that property rights are negative rights. That they impart an obligation or responsiblity on the other. You right to ownership, means I am not allowed to interfere.

My right to ownership means you are not allowed to interfere with my decision as to how to utilize or dispose of my property. In other words, take the above statement and swap the "me" and "My" and "you" or "yours", swap the players around and you end up with two symmetrical statements.

Because of the symmetrical nature of the statements, reciprical agreements can be arraigned, and both parties benefit by observing those limitiations on our own actions. It is that exact benefit that is the whole purpose of arraigning the limitations in the first place.

If you want the concept of property rights respected in your case, you are left with observing them in others. You can ignore those rights of others, but that has quite different consequences than respecting them.

And it appears this is exactly what you are arguing for, the freedom from consequences or responsibility for your own actions. This makes little sense, as the whole purpose of taking an action (or inaction) is because one wants to bring those consequences about. What is the point of observing rights if it gains no benefit for the observer?

Just so you can live like a king while the rest of us suffer? How does that benefit me?

In short, again, rather than ignoring details, I have been outlining (as breifly as one can in a forum like this) exactly how and why and to what purpose these rights and, from those rights, laws come about.

I see how socialism and other forms of centralized control of the economy has led to not a more equitable distribution of wealth, but nothing more than a more equitable distribution of misery. Hayek has done a better job than I can in describing the inherent structural problems in any kind of centralized economy.

I see exactly how socialist systems end up giving unlimited political control to that central economic planning agency. How it ends up a police state, that simply cannot provide for the lives and happiness of the population. And how that police state, rather than making the general population happier, ends up in being a threat to the very happiness of its citizens.

I see not only that capitalist economies out compete against socialist ones, but how and why. How letting folks purue their own happiness, we all benefit. And I have tried to explain it. I have not been ignoring any of the "mess".

You may be smarter than anyone else on the planet, but you've only got one life, and one perspective. You can't get into anyone else's mind, and therefore don't know just what will make them happy at each and every moment of their lives. Heck, we may not know ourselves ahead of time, but the point remains that you cannot know.

And if you cannot know, then how can you decide correctly? You may be smarter than anyone else, but you cannot be smarter than everyone else.

"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"

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Sunday, October 5, 2003 5:56 AM