odds and ends by 1kiki

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Quote:
Force. It ain't rocket science, Siggy. Lemme repeat in small words so you can understand.
1. If you are not using force, no force will be used on you.
2. If you are using force, force will be used on you.
I added to the scenario. I posed a question which you have not answered.

I answered the question. (See underlined above.) The answer, again, is FORCE.

Kidnappers are using force, so... Force. Is. Used. On. Them. See?

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Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 4:20 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
I answered the question. (See underlined above.) The answer, again, is FORCE.
Kidnappers are using force, so... Force. Is. Used. On. Them. See?

And then I said... so, your proposal would be to have individuals willy-nilly kill slave-owners? But the slave owners, they're not following YOUR rules. They have used their monopoly on tantalum to gain greater weapons. They have organized. And knowing that the best defense is a good offense, they invade.

Then what?

Can I give you a hint, DT? The Founding Fathers, they went through this already. They had to create an army, which... at the very beginning... was only supported by 30% of the population. And then, because an army is a non-producing segment of the population, they had to impose taxes in order to fund it which BTW were also opposed by a significant portion of the population AND the states. And then, they had to create a common currency which would be accepted in all states. Scrip, as I recall.

Now, they COULD just as easily... in fact. MORE easily... sat back on their haunches and accepted British rule.

You. Have. Not. Thought. This. Through.

Hey, I gotta get to work. Later.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 5:07 AM

This cycle of hierarchy is a very European view of history. I'm not sure I agree it is a global truth about humanity. There are many national groups that also subsisted in a tribal or even nomadic state for thousands of years. With no outside influence from Europeans (which I don't particularly believe to be a very positive lifestyle model), they would likely have remained in such a state.

However...

Quote:
Pushing the "reset" button for the thousandth time isn't going to help.

I agree. You can't get something new by repeating history. Instead, you have to work to create something new, possibly by a new or at least unexpected process. Parts of TPTB only seem to understand military force and conquerors as the way to establish their worldview, others are more tricky, but I think you could still surprise the heck out of both of them.

Also, I do think education has quite a bit more of a freeing effect on slavery than it's being credited for. I'm reminded of slavery in America, when it was considered dangerous to teach a black man to read. Why? Well, because not only could he run away, then he could also provide a living for himself, or he might be able to go track down family members he was separated from, and restore that core support unit that gives people the strength to resist and endure.

It might not stop someone with a gun, unless you know how to speak the gunner's language (metaphorically and literally).

Certainly women becoming educated was a large part in their liberation from being considered second class citizens.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 7:17 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
so, your proposal would be to have individuals willy-nilly kill slave-owners?

I really don't know what you mean by willy-nilly.

Quote:
They have used their monopoly on tantalum to gain greater weapons. They have organized. And knowing that the best defense is a good offense, they invade.

Then what?

The answer is still the same. FORCE.

They use force. We use force.

You're not changing the scenario. You are saying they use force to kidnap people. Then they use more force to keep them kidnapped.

So we use force to free the kidnapped people. If they escalate the force, we match. The scenario remains the same: Force vs. Force.

If it becomes a war, so be it.

If we fight intelligently, we win. If we fight stupidly, we lose. But they will find out the kidnapping people by force will cost them lives. They don't get that for free.

By and large, I believe kidnappers and other violent criminals are predators. They are not ideologues willing to die for their beliefs. They prey on the weak and those who don't fight back. They engage in predatory behavior with the fewest consequences. If they have to die for it, they are likely to be dissuaded.

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Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 12:13 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Magon,

In what strange world is a predatory financial system part of a free market? If the people are under these taxes, mortgages, etc., they're being forced into a social labor system by that society's designers.

You're kidding me, right?

Quote:

This is closer to the heart of the problem. This sounds to me like a stock analysis of civilization that you might get from some professor and then accept as part of your reality when it should be recognized as pure supposition which is easily disproven by studying primitive societies where there is plenty of division of labor, or looking at the actual cost of food.

What it doesn't sound like to me is a Magon's eye view of the world. There's no point in telling us what someone might have fed you at some earlier point, analyze the situation for yourself, I think you'll come to a different conclusion. That doesn't mean you'll come to my conclusion, but you'll come up with something better than this.

If you have an argument to make against what I have said, argue it. Don't patronise me.

Quote:

I see no reason why it should.

Nothing more to discuss, I see.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 12:42 PM

Well said Signy on all your points.

DT and CTS want their utopias to exist, clearly structured with their own rules, but believe that it will all come about like magic, with no intervention, no organisation, no governance, no laws. Reminds me of reading the Watchtower, seeing all those freaky Americans wandering around God's paradise with big grins on their faces.

CTS like rules, only she doesn't want them implemented. Last time I checked, the thing about rules were that they were, well rules, everyone gets to follow them, there are consequences if you don't. If you believe that rules are great but shouldn't be enforced, then I guess they aren't rules, they're ideals.

The most frustrating part of these arguments is the lack of self reflection. You both are dogmatic about what you want, what you are certain is the best way to live. Do you think that everyone shares your views? What if what others want is some form of governance, laws and regulations, a police force to enact them, an army to protect them? What do you do if the majority of people want what you do not? How in your world will it work if people don't want it to work the way you do?

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 1:34 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
no intervention, no organisation, no governance, no laws....CTS like rules, only she doesn't want them implemented.

You got 1 out of 5. I support intervention, organization, governance, AND implementation. No laws.

Here is the root of the persistent mischaracterization of my position. Government provides intervention, organization, governance, implementation, and laws. If I don't want government, then I must not want all 5 things. The fallacious assumption is those 5 things can ONLY come from government, which simply is not true.

Lemons provide vitamin C. If I don't like lemons, I must not want vitamin C. Fallacious assumption: vitamin C can only come from lemons.

Quote:
If you believe that rules are great but shouldn't be enforced, then I guess they aren't rules, they're ideals.

Here are my rules:

Rule #1: If you use force on someone, force may or will be used on you.
Rule #2: If you don't use force on someone, force will not be used on you.

Obviously, there is enforcement of Rule#1. Obviously, there is no need for enforcement of Rule#2.

Quote:
Do you think that everyone shares your views? What if what others want is some form of governance, laws and regulations, a police force to enact them, an army to protect them? What do you do if the majority of people want what you do not?

Sigh. Do I not say over and over again that everyone is entitled to EXACTLY the form of government they want? If you want laws, regulations, police, army, whatever, THAT is exactly what you should get.

If *I* don't want those things, that is exactly what *I* should get.

You and I just can't live close to each other.

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Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 1:57 PM

Ah, well now I see how you can have such a flawed world view. Rule Number 2 is the key. So force has never been used on someone who does not use force? No one has robbed from someone unarmed? No one has beaten up a passive victim? No country has ever invaded a weaker, undefended country?

Again, I agree with sig that you don't know history. Looks like you have a blind spot regarding humanity as well.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 2:26 PM

Quote:
Ah, well now I see how you can have such a flawed world view. Rule Number 2 is the key. So force has never been used on someone who does not use force? No one has robbed from someone unarmed? No one has beaten up a passive victim? No country has ever invaded a weaker, undefended country?

I think the point CTS was making, is that in her imagined world, the people using the force would be slated for having force used against them. Not perhaps by the initial victim, but at a later time, or as a retaliation by other people who have the ability to use force against them.

To me, the problem I see with this isn't that you'll have rabid bandits preying on the unarmed (really you'll have that in any system), but rather this is a way to start a nasty feud of escalating violence as more people get pulled into it.

Because, I mean, the people acting on behalf of the wronged person in their minds are only dishing out justice, but what about the friends of the person they just used force against? They wouldn't see it as justice, and they'd then go after those attackers.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 2:46 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
So force has never been used on someone who does not use force?

When did I say that MY rules have been followed throughout history? Are you THAT bent on twisting everything I say?

My Rules #1 and 2 are what SHOULD happen. In my ideal world. Not what has happened or has never happened throughout history. Sheesh.

In my ideal world, if someone with guns forces a woman--who has not used force--to sit at the back of the bus for no reason except that she is a woman, then said woman or her relatives get to use guns on this someone.

If someone with guns forces this woman--who has not used force--to pay 10% of her income for "protection" of her house, then said woman or her relatives get to use guns on this someone.

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Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 2:51 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
Because, I mean, the people acting on behalf of the wronged person in their minds are only dishing out justice, but what about the friends of the person they just used force against? They wouldn't see it as justice, and they'd then go after those attackers.

That's exactly right. That is a very real danger.

Either everyone would die very quickly (the whole world would be blind and toothless as the saying goes), or people would learn quickly to use force as a last resort.

It behooves all parties involved to mediate and agree on restorative justice rather than punitive and violent justice.

-----
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 3:05 PM

Quote:
"If government exists, someone will buy it."

Nietzsche was right when he predicted it as well.

Byte,

I don't think slavery ended, I think it evolved.

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Nothing more to discuss, I see.

Magon,

Then lets save ourselves some time. No hard feelings, I'm actually interested in your ideas. I get the feeling you haven't really analyzed them thoroughly, but I think you should.

To Socialists in general,

The problem with all this theory is that these ideas have all been well tested in reality. We have numerous east germany-west germany examples like north-south korea; zimbabwe-botswana; etc.

It doesn't make us right, but it makes us unwilling to return to centrally planned economic models.

I know this isn't the only bone of contention, but I don't feel up to the others right now.

I don't think free market fundamentalism is narrow minded by itself, or if it is, then narrow means "within these parameters of freedom" we will explore many new ideas.

ETA:

When the Way is lost, there remains harmony;
When harmony is lost, there remains love;
When love is lost, there remains justice;
But when justice is lost, there remains ritual.

I need to redo these in falling green characters. I'm surprised no one's done it yet.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 3:19 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
But the simple answer is: direct democracy, because then you'd have to buy off the majority of the population.

1) You don't think corporations will have the money to buy off the majority of the population?

2) What is keeping the majority of the population from voting out current bought politicians? You don't think the majority of the population is already bought?

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Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 3:46 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by canttakesky:
Quote:
Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
So force has never been used on someone who does not use force?
When did I say that MY rules have been followed throughout history? Are you THAT bent on twisting everything I say?

My Rules #1 and 2 are what SHOULD happen. In my ideal world. Not what has happened or has never happened throughout history. Sheesh.

In my ideal world, if someone with guns forces a woman--who has not used force--to sit at the back of the bus for no reason except that she is a woman, then said woman or her relatives get to use guns on this someone.

If someone with guns forces this woman--who has not used force--to pay 10% of her income for "protection" of her house, then said woman or her relatives get to use guns on this someone.

In my ideal world, we'd all have wings and fly around.

Shall we keep the conversation to what is possible?

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 3:48 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by canttakesky:
Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
Because, I mean, the people acting on behalf of the wronged person in their minds are only dishing out justice, but what about the friends of the person they just used force against? They wouldn't see it as justice, and they'd then go after those attackers.
That's exactly right. That is a very real danger.

Either everyone would die very quickly (the whole world would be blind and toothless as the saying goes), or people would learn quickly to use force as a last resort.

It behooves all parties involved to mediate and agree on restorative justice rather than punitive and violent justice.

Doesn't seem to be working in the Sudan.

The cycle of revenge can and does get played out over generations. Look to the Balkans for an example. It's what causes the cycle of revenge and its a pretty shitty way to live.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 3:59 PM

DT, your ideas are not based in any reality that I know of. You constantly refer to corrupt totalitarian regimes as socialist and point to them as examples of why socialism can never work.

And for the record, I don't support fully centrally planned economies. I think mixed economies are viable and effective alternative to either fully centralised planning and fully free markets. I think there should be a mix of private business and government run services. I believe in some regulation. I believe in tax breaks to encourage small business growth. I believe that there should be laws to protect citizens and that those laws should be enforced and not voluntary, but that citizens should have say over these laws. I believe there should be mechanisms in place to prevent power from being concentrated in the hands of individuals, governments and businesses.

And you know what, there are plenty of places where this works okay, not perfectly, but okay.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 4:08 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
Shall we keep the conversation to what is possible?

So do you like things exactly the way they are?

Do you not dream of change?

And when you do, and when someone simply dismisses your ideas patronizingly as "Shall we keep the conversation to what is possible?", do you find that a valid critique of your ideas?

Or does it sound like someone is simply being a tosser?

I am willing to entertain legitimate critiques, like those Byte has raised. My ideas have very real flaws like any other.

But what I get is obtuse misinterpretation or deliberate strawmanning. And the forum equivalent of "You're such a poopoo head that you suck donkey doo doo." This is not debate.

-----
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 4:54 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
By and large, I believe ...

By and large, I believe that you believe a lot of things.

I will repeat my point about slavery one more time. If at that point, you don't understand what I'm saying, then further discussion is pointless.

In order to WAGE WAR you must COLLECT TAXES. There was a conundrum proposed regarding WWII: If you as a group of like-minded people confront a mortal enemy of equal or superior strength, iron discipline, and ruthless violence, must your group become like the other in order to survive? How many characteristics of the enemy must your group take on?

Quote:
Shall we keep the conversation to what is possible?=-Magon

So do you like things exactly the way they are? Do you not dream of change? - CTS

Way to go, strawman!

OF COURSE I want of change. But I don't propose dreams or fantasies. There is that belief system again. It's impossible to discuss beliefs. You believe; and that's all there's to it. No amount of facts or discussion will cause you to change your beliefs. You have an entire list of "shoulds" and "shouldn'ts" in your head, but the world is not going to abide by your list of the way things "should" be, and you will come no closer to achieving your goals if you do not pay attention to reality.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 5:04 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
1) You don't think corporations will have the money to buy off the majority of the population?

2) What is keeping the majority of the population from voting out current bought politicians? You don't think the majority of the population is already bought?

Oh, one more thing... if you believe this is really the case, then it should be clear to you that the majority has ALREADY decided in favor of convenience over your version of freedom.

So, what then?

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 5:11 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

BYTE- I liked your comment about Eurocentric thinking. It got ME to thinking. But I think the answer to that is that hierarchies are not always natively grown, they are often imposed from the outside by imperial forces. It's kind of like the model of capitalism... compete, or prepare to be absorbed. Either way, the hierarchy wins. The only three things that I see which bring hierarchies down are revolution, a change in the economic basis, or environmental catastrophe.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 5:17 PM

RIONAEIRE

Beir bua agus beannacht

I agree with Magon's, in my world everyone could fly if they wanted,, they could also teleport, have super powers, travel to different realms and there would be lots of lakes and streams everywhere to swim in.

The problem with CTS's world is that it looks, as Byte said, a lot like the Balkans and Sudan, blood feuds, constant conflict etc. I wouldn't want to live in that world and because all that stuff was going on the people who did want peace and rules wouldn't be able to have them because the warring would wreck it up all the time, so everyone wouldn't be able to have exactly what they want. So everyone wouldn't really be deciding for themselves, those who were running around killing and warring would decide for everyone because they'd be the ones making waves that rickochet off everything and everyone else. CTS's idea wouldn't work in reality unless we all lived completely seperately and didn't depend on each other in any fashion, which is nye on impossible because humans are interconnected with each other.

"A completely coherant River means writers don't deliver" KatTaya

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 5:51 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by canttakesky:
Quote:
Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
Shall we keep the conversation to what is possible?
So do you like things exactly the way they are?

Do you not dream of change?

And when you do, and when someone simply dismisses your ideas patronizingly as "Shall we keep the conversation to what is possible?", do you find that a valid critique of your ideas?

Or does it sound like someone is simply being a tosser?

I am willing to entertain legitimate critiques, like those Byte has raised. My ideas have very real flaws like any other.

But what I get is obtuse misinterpretation or deliberate strawmanning. And the forum equivalent of "You're such a poopoo head that you suck donkey doo doo." This is not debate.

I find it hard to argue with someone who denies the reality of human existence. Yes, I'd like to live in a world where violence was never, ever used and no-one ever had to suffer. But that is not the human condition, or it denies the human condition in all its complexity. I'd prefer to accept that people will not always behave well, that some people use violence and coercian to get what they want, some people will only think of themselves and will not give a stuff about the impact of their actions upon others. What my ideal would look like would be a world where that behaviour wasn't rewarded, where people were not able to get away with such things.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 6:29 PM

Magon,

1) Socialist is a most excellent word to describe what you would otherwise have to term "One of Stalin, Mao or the Nazis, or any regime which has copied them" and it just so happens that all of those regimes and their copiers have called themselves and their governments "socialist."

2) It just also happens to be a terrible system whose design flaws become apparent when you study them.

3) Personally, when someone does something like puts "socialist and proud of it" as their tag line, I feel it's the moral equivalient of a swastika avatar, and I cringe every time I see it. An actual swastika avatar, which I have seen online, is usually less offensive, as it generally means the user is a hindu jain, unless you're on stormfront.org.

Do I call anyone socialist who doesn't call themselves socialist? No. I don't.
After 250 million dead and over a billion more if you count eugenics, then why should we *ever* try it again?
So, do I want to entertain this idea? No. I don't.

Now that said, yes, the problems that are socialism-created are created by socialism. I'm not making it up. But not all problems are socialism-created.

In the two examples you just mentioned, no, I don't see either of these as endless cycles of retribution. What you have instead is govt. out of control.

In the Sudan you have a right wing religious extremist govt. which is trying to hang on to colonial territorial claims because that land has resources, even though much of it is not inhabited by Sudanese. Darfur is just such an example. They have oil, no money, and they're not sudanese. The govt. had been trying to institute sharia law, and the Darfuri, like the Luo and the Beja, decided to secede. Chad, with asst. from the US, sent in some militias that in a non-US supported operation we might have defined as "Al Qaeda" at any rate a islamic terrorist mujahideen with direct ties to Osama bin Laden, with aid from the US, stepped in to help the Darfuri. The govt. responded by trying to wipe them out.

In Yugoslavia what happened was the fall of the berlin wall coincided with the death of marshal tito, creating a power vacuum in the nonsensical versailles creation. Up stepped yugoslav socialist leader slobodan milosevic who created a new socialist republic, keeping much of the old communist system. Everyone responded by announcing their secession from serbia, where milosevic had his govt. There wasn't really a lot of dissent there, though there was some opportunistic ethnic cleansing in croatia. Still, you had four countries breaking off, and then bosnia. The real disaster in bosnia was that 1/2 the population was ethnic serb, and milosevic decided to support some radical serb militias in hopes of making bosnia into a serb state so if he lost the other four, he would still have a coast. This awakened the mujahideen in albania and kosovo, which flooded in to help the muslims in bosnia with help from us, again. The mujahideen ultimately captured the whole country and tried to conquer up the coast but were defeated at dubrovnik, like many armies before them.

What we have here in both cases is not an endless cycle of retribution but the madness of runaway central planning. One socialist, the other theocratic. In both cases the majority ethnic control the govt. and the minority ethnics, geographically distinct, are under its thumb, and try to break away and form separate states. Right now the Luo state of South Sudan has US recognition which is in no small part because the president of the United States is a Luo. It would be nice if he could recognize Darfur and the Beja as well. Oh, and we recognize Kosovo which was originally part of Serbia of course.

Anyway, back to your point of a compromise solution, I am willing to compromise with something, but not with central planning and state control. In the ultimate, it's an unmitigated disaster, and as you said "some places have a compromise and do okay" which I agree is true, but is "okay" what we're aiming for here? I think that I would like to do a lot better, and maybe compromising with an unmitigated disaster is part of the reason that they're not doing better.

I agree that things could be better done, and I think the US is headed for a disaster. Our main problem though is probably not economic, but the encroaching police state.

Here's a Fraser institute list of free market countries (used by the world bank and with competitiveness index)

1 Hong Kong 9.01
2 Singapore 8.68
3 New Zealand 8.20
4 Switzerland 8.03
5 Australia 7.98
6 Canada 7.81
7 Chile 7.77
8 United Kingdom 7.71
9 Mauritius 7.67
10 United States 7.60
11 Bahrain 7.59
11 Finland 7.59
13 Slovakia 7.56
14 United Arab Emirates 7.54
15 Denmark 7.52
15 Estonia 7.52
15 Hungary 7.52
18 Cyprus 7.51
19 Austria 7.50
20 Luxembourg 7.49
21 Germany 7.45
22 Japan 7.44
23 Panama 7.41
24 Lithuania 7.40
25 Ireland 7.38
26 Taiwan 7.37
27 Georgia 7.36
28 Bulgaria 7.34
28 Oman 7.34
30 Albania 7.32
30 Netherlands 7.32
30 South Korea 7.32

Riona,

The fear of chaos is what the state uses to get you to surrender your freedom to them.

I would also point out that CTS lives in a country structured in a very libertarian free for all way, that being Peru, and it doesn't seem to be all blood feuds and death. Meanwhile, up here, I can't help but see the police state creeping in on us.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 6:34 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Quote:
I answered the question. (See underlined above.) The answer, again, is FORCE.
Kidnappers are using force, so... Force. Is. Used. On. Them. See?
And then I said... so, your proposal would be to have individuals willy-nilly kill slave-owners? But the slave owners, they're not following YOUR rules. They have used their monopoly on tantalum to gain greater weapons. They have organized. And knowing that the best defense is a good offense, they invade.

Then what?

Can I give you a hint, DT? The Founding Fathers, they went through this already. They had to create an army, which... at the very beginning... was only supported by 30% of the population. And then, because an army is a non-producing segment of the population, they had to impose taxes in order to fund it which BTW were also opposed by a significant portion of the population AND the states. And then, they had to create a common currency which would be accepted in all states. Scrip, as I recall.

Now, they COULD just as easily... in fact. MORE easily... sat back on their haunches and accepted British rule.

Abe Lincoln was not a founding father.

And trust me, I've thought it through.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 7:06 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
Abe Lincoln was not a founding father.

Apparently you don't understand hypothetical examples. There is no point in talking about this further with you, because you're too busy building "your" world, "your" free-market, "your" rules, in your head.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 7:12 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
Depends on the economy. Some economic systems self-select against larger businesses.

Really? Which ones?

Quote:
With enough technology, any manufactured product could become easily produced locally.

Really? I've heard of 3D laser-printing plastic parts, but you can't make an engine out of that, or a computer. It would be nice if all technologies could be reproduced at the local level, but we're not there yet.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 7:24 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
In order to WAGE WAR you must COLLECT TAXES.

You need money. You do not need taxes.

-----
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 8:09 PM

Quote:

Depends on the economy. Some economic systems self-select against larger businesses.

Well there's some that don't actually have any kind of business at all, such as in a communal sharing scenario, which do this by default.

But some economies are limited by what they have access to, such as if their means of transportation is lacking. But then, you don't have to have transportation if you can make everything locally. You might not even really have a large labor force, depending on the level of technology you're talking about. And if you don't have a large labor force, and your consumers are pretty much also the local level, you tend to stay a small business by default. This is the kind if thing we might see in an artisan driven economy.

There's also potentially ways to organize cooperatives and corporations so they aren't soul sucking monstrosities - in that case a corporation might employ every single person in a town, but since choices in the company are democratic, it does not tend to behave like big business as we know it or would define it. And certainly it's still a smaller business than a global corporation, and it's still technically local.

Quote:
Really? I've heard of 3D laser-printing plastic parts, but you can't make an engine out of that, or a computer. It would be nice if all technologies could be reproduced at the local level, but we're not there yet.

Sure. But imagine if we head that direction, or even completely redesign our machines and electronic circuitry to not rely on mineral or petroleum resources. I've suggested it before, and I know everyone's thought it sounded far fetched, but I would love to see completely organic plant computers that could be grown in a pot in your house.

The best system I can imagine is always small, always community based, economic and social system can vary, but there's no need to travel very far due to technology. and then we have these grown computers, so we still have an internet, you can communicate long distance to collaborate on large scale projects that way.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 8:27 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Quote:
Abe Lincoln was not a founding father.
Apparently you don't understand hypothetical examples. There is no point in talking about this further with you, because you're too busy building "your" world, "your" free-market, "your" rules, in your head.

Good.

But you did say "the founding fathers did this.... and then they raised taxes and a large standing army and then issued a new currency." That's not a problem in sentence structure, it's a problem in argument. All three of those are things Lincoln did. The founding fathers didn't issue a new currency, they minted bullion coins exchangeable for any other bullion coins on the world market. Not making an argument in favor or against, just stating that the printing of a new currency was lincoln's, as were the others. The point of saying this is that Lincoln's america and that of the founding fathers were not remotely the same vision. Abe, as I'm sure you've heard here, gets a lot of criticism for being somewhat of a totalitarian, otoh, he also didn't have slavery, those were two ways in which he was different from them, things unrelated from each other. It's just not a logical continuity to say you had to have lincoln as a natural outgrowth of the founding fathers, and it's blatantly inaccurate to say that the founding fathers did these things he did.

It's a logical fallacy, I was point it out.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 8:32 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:

I've heard of 3D laser-printing plastic parts, but you can't make an engine out of that, or a computer. It would be nice if all technologies could be reproduced at the local level, but we're not there yet.

Actually we are. You can build just about anything with CAD/CAM these days. I was just reading about the curious case of Samsung and outsourcing. What was most interesting was that Samsung only outsources when they are at capacity, and there is still demand, even though they are paying their domestic works a far higher wage. When they exceed capacity, they make up the slack by hiring a foreign firm to assemble products by sending them the specification files. You can make microchips, automobiles, virtually anything.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012 10:27 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:

1) Socialist is a most excellent word to describe what you would otherwise have to term "One of Stalin, Mao or the Nazis, or any regime which has copied them" and it just so happens that all of those regimes and their copiers have called themselves and their governments "socialist."

2) It just also happens to be a terrible system whose design flaws become apparent when you study them.

3) Personally, when someone does something like puts "socialist and proud of it" as their tag line, I feel it's the moral equivalient of a swastika avatar, and I cringe every time I see it. An actual swastika avatar, which I have seen online, is usually less offensive, as it generally means the user is a hindu jain, unless you're on stormfront.org.

Do I call anyone socialist who doesn't call themselves socialist? No. I don't.
After 250 million dead and over a billion more if you count eugenics, then why should we *ever* try it again?
So, do I want to entertain this idea? No. I don't.

Now that said, yes, the problems that are socialism-created are created by socialism. I'm not making it up. But not all problems are socialism-created.

You've got a bit of blind spot regarding socialism, sport. You cannot compare totalitarian regimes of the USSR and Korea with governments that fund services such as those in Europe, Canada and Australia. The word socialist gets kicked around all over the place, a bit like Nazi, and I've noticed that Americans in particular drag it out when they want to criticise anything that involves government funding of anything, including healthcare and education.

In USSR, what they had essentially was the same autocratic government that they always had. The Tsar had absolute rule, life and death, over his subjects. So did Stalin. Too often the way of violent revolution where one set of tyranny is replaced with another. It wasn't even close to what Marx envisaged as a perfect society, which was no rulers, no one placed above the other. Poor Marx, he didn't have a handle on human nature either.

Tyranny is tyranny. It is neither unique to left or right winged ideologies.`

Quote:

In the Sudan you have a right wing religious extremist govt. which is trying to hang on to colonial territorial claims because that land has resources, even though much of it is not inhabited by Sudanese. Darfur is just such an example. They have oil, no money, and they're not sudanese. The govt. had been trying to institute sharia law, and the Darfuri, like the Luo and the Beja, decided to secede. Chad, with asst. from the US, sent in some militias that in a non-US supported operation we might have defined as "Al Qaeda" at any rate a islamic terrorist mujahideen with direct ties to Osama bin Laden, with aid from the US, stepped in to help the Darfuri. The govt. responded by trying to wipe them out.

Sudan has basically been at war with itself for 20 years, not helped by it being a proxy for international conflicts as well as a hot bed of religious and tribal conflict. Kind of a morality tale about what happens when you have a lot of well armed people who hate each other living together.

I brought up Sudan as an example where people don't do as cts alleges 'Either everyone would die very quickly (the whole world would be blind and toothless as the saying goes), or people would learn quickly to use force as a last resort. ' because that often doesn't happen.

Quote:
In Yugoslavia what happened was the fall of the berlin wall coincided with the death of marshal tito, creating a power vacuum in the nonsensical versailles creation.

You think that conflict in the Balkans started then????????? These people have been battling out their ethnic differences since the start of the 20th century, and before. Some of the most bloody and awful fighting in WW2 took place in the Balkans.

Quote:

I agree that things could be better done, and I think the US is headed for a disaster. Our main problem though is probably not economic, but the encroaching police state.

Yeah, everything I've read about the US says something similiar. One in 100 of your citizens in jail, long prison sentences for crimes of even a non violent nature and aggressive and armed police.

Quote:
Here's a Fraser institute list of free market countries (used by the world bank and with competitiveness index)

1 Hong Kong 9.01
2 Singapore 8.68
3 New Zealand 8.20
4 Switzerland 8.03
5 Australia 7.98
6 Canada 7.81
7 Chile 7.77
8 United Kingdom 7.71
9 Mauritius 7.67
10 United States 7.60
11 Bahrain 7.59
11 Finland 7.59
13 Slovakia 7.56
14 United Arab Emirates 7.54
15 Denmark 7.52
15 Estonia 7.52
15 Hungary 7.52
18 Cyprus 7.51
19 Austria 7.50
20 Luxembourg 7.49
21 Germany 7.45
22 Japan 7.44
23 Panama 7.41
24 Lithuania 7.40
25 Ireland 7.38
26 Taiwan 7.37
27 Georgia 7.36
28 Bulgaria 7.34
28 Oman 7.34
30 Albania 7.32
30 Netherlands 7.32
30 South Korea 7.32

Most of those would be mixed economies, with both a central government providing regulation and services. Singapore is virturally a centrally planned economy, with the government responsible for about 60% of the GDP. I don't think your list is proving very much, unless you want to argue against yourself that countries with strong central planning can't be competetive.

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 3:51 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Hoo boy, lotta action in this thread, imma take it from my last post...

Magons

Quote:
Or it may happen from wild-eyed idiots mowing down a whole lot of innocents.

Plenty of places in the world where the rule of law is enacted by criminals, gangs and rogue armies and the government is impotent. Not particularly pleasant places to live.

Me, I'd prefer a police force to be less aggressive, minimally armed - specialist weapons units only and limits and checks on their power as well. But like all these issues you don't do it via hope alone, but structures to limit powers, dare I say - laws.

Well, me, I don't see a lot of difference between criminals, gangs, rogue armies and other forms of government cause in practice the only real difference a lot of the time is perceived legitimacy.

So far as structures to limit power, two problems with that, firstly when those who make the rules also make themselves exempt from them, and second when those who enforce them are not properly accountable, at which point they SHOULD lose their legitimacy, which is what I feel the case is here.
Believe me, if american police were held to the same exacting standards regarding weapon possession and use that citizens are, one way or the other it'd solve a whole HOST of problems, and likewise if members of government were not exempt from the laws they create, it would put a serious check against abusive and exploitive regulation right up front.

Way I see it, a right or a law is UNIVERSAL - it either applies to EVERYONE, or it applies to NO ONE.
Anything less is tyranny, pure and simple.

Siggy

Quote:
But systems are NOT people, and they don't behave like people. Whether you want to believe it or not, large groups of human beings will form systems, just as groups of animals and plants form ecosystems and computers are more than collections of metal and plastic.

Human behavior is not just the average of its parts. The moment people start gathering in more than a monkey-sphere, non-monkey-sphere processes start. Groups stay in one place, tools aggregate, property rights become important, labor is divided, stability becomes paramount, cooperation necessary, rules are created, memes persist, power concentrates... all sorts of things happen which will not ever happen in small groups.

Frem, have you ever designed or built a circuit? Do you understand the concepts of amplification, and positive and negative feedback, underdamped systems and so forth? Human systems can be described using those terms. No matter how much you try to reduce these complex interactions to "people"... to the individual components on the board... groups of people will persist in behaving in complex ways. The American Medical Association does not act like your average doctor and corporations live, eat, grow, adapt, evolve, and die on a non-human scale over non-human lifetimes.

Well, for one, I do believe we're on the verge of an evolutionary jump in just how large a monkeysphere can be, that RSA vid I am fond of explains that sufficiently enough I don't need to detail here, I think.

And yes, I know social dynamics on a larger scale, heaven knows I manipulate it enough myself, not to mention having extreme awareness of other players on the field, but a large part of that is our unwillingness to question what IS, and WHY it is - questions I think NEED to be asked.

You do have a tendancy to strawman your arguments, but in this case CTS was originally kinda dancing around the necessity of use of force as a check against bad actors - something which is always gonna be necessary, but again I posit to you that one good look at american history shows that if government had not intervened EVERY SINGLE TIME on the side of corporations, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

Imagine if the military had not intervened at Blair Mountain ?
And it's never necessarily how much force, explicitly - a buncha goat herders out in the rocky desert are kickin our ass pretty good right now, yes ?

That all said, you too have a problem looking beyond a certain cycle, that hidebound thinking that cause it always was, thus it will always be, and I don't hold with that, firstly cause I happen to believe in humanity as a seperate thing than a mere component to some system whatever that be...
And secondly - cause I am Crazy Eddie.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mote_in_God%27s_Eye#Meet_Crazy_Eddie

Select to view spoiler:

And don't ya know - Crazy Eddie WINS!

We can do better, and I believe we will - all just a matter of time.

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 5:23 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
that RSA vid I am fond

Which??

Quote:
We can do better, and I believe we will - all just a matter of time.

There's "belief" again. But the question remains.... HOW??? That is a discussion that nobody, not even you, seems prepared to have, and that's the ONE question I have been asking over and over. What I was looking for is not to set off a firestorm of emotion but someone who could help answer the question....

What are the fewest rules or procedures necessary to set up a durable, dynamic, self-regulating, society which is prosperous and which guarantees the maximum amount of freedom?

I thought that, perhaps, among all of the bright, forward-looking, politically diverse people here, there would be someone who would be able to think through to an answer, or at least an idea. But all I've been getting back is belief and hope.... CTS's "free market" magic wand, same with DT, or the "all we need is a new set of beliefs among the many" and the accusation that "I don't want to change" or that I'm somehow for THIS government and THIS paradigm.

As far as how I feel about the topic... well, I "hope" too. And I would like to believe that we will do better, but I think with climate shift and our vast population, we are rapidly running out of time.

And BTW... if our new society is going to depend on rapid universal communication, then (1) better make sure that no one can control the communication and (2) better make sure the communication can withstand solar storms, earthquakes etc. Depending on a single complex technology just creates a singular point of weakness. Kinda like the Jesus nut on a helicopter.

Oh, and...

Quote:
but again I posit to you that one good look at american history shows that if government had not intervened EVERY SINGLE TIME on the side of corporations, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

I suspect that the corporations would simply have used their vast resources to buy up the requisite number of goons. It was just cheaper for them to call on the government, but not necessary. Now, if you had said that our army (and by logic, our government) was necessary to impose capitalism abroad I would more likely agree.

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 6:56 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Oh, and the reason WHY I keep asking that question is because every single effort to prevent concentration of power has been rolled over. Past revolutions for "Liberty, Equality and Fraternity"? Concentrated power. Freedom from the bourgeois/ capitalist class? Concentration of power. Democracy? Concentration of power. Heck, at one time "we" weren't even supposed to have a permanent standing army, and where are we now??? Imperialist-class forces, most powerful in the world, with a budget more than all other armies combined.

So, maybe the rule is.... no governments representing more than ten million people. You get more than ten million? You have to hive off.

Or maybe the rule is no banks.

Or maybe the rule is no police and no armies.

Or maybe the rule is women in charge.

I think about Mohenjo-Daro. It is a mystery... a thriving trade city in the Indus Valley with

no ramparts
no temples
no armories
no palaces
no slums
no jails
no money
sophisticated sewage system everywhere
massive granaries

There is also no art

The city's long history reveals no charring (as in warfare), no mass graves of people killed by trauma. When the city failed, it was because the river shifted.

The city was regularly flooded by the Indus, and painstakingly rebuilt street by street, house by house, in exactly the same locations as before after each flood. But was there growth?

Each house has a well and a drain for a shower. There is a massive pitch-sealed shallow bowl in the city which looks like nothing so much as a public swimming pool. Maybe transgressions were healed by yearly public baptisms (washing away sins). Maybe unforgivable transgressions were dealt with by banishment.

However they dealt with their society, it didn't have the same markers of oppression and warfare and belief structures that ours do. So, yes, I think we can do better. But HOW???

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 7:13 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
You can build just about anything with CAD/CAM these days.

Not seeing it, DT. The chips and so forth are manufactured in chip fabs. You need sophisticated vacuum and crystal growth technology, toxic gases, sub-micron optical capability, clean rooms of unbelievable purity.

That technology cannot be reproduced easily, anywhere... in your garage or basement, for example. The investment cost is still HUGE. The barrier to competition is still the investment cost.

Quote:
The founding fathers didn't issue a new currency, they minted bullion coins exchangeable for any other bullion coins on the world market.

Also, AFA the currency during and just after the American Revolutionary War

Quote:
Early American currency went through several stages of development in the colonial and post-Revolutionary history of the United States. Because few coins were minted in the thirteen colonies that became the United States in 1776, foreign coins like the Spanish dollar were widely circulated. Colonial governments sometimes issued paper money to facilitate economic activity. The British Parliament passed Currency Acts in 1751, 1764, and 1773 that regulated colonial paper money.

During the American Revolution, the colonies became independent states; freed from British monetary regulations, they issued paper money to pay for military expenses. The Continental Congress also issued paper money during the Revolution, known as Continental currency, to fund the war effort. Both state and Continental currency depreciated rapidly, becoming practically worthless by the end of the war.

To address these and other problems, the United States Constitution, ratified in 1788, denied individual states the right to coin and print money. The First Bank of the United States, chartered in 1791, and the Coinage Act of 1792, began the era of a national American currency.

So, yeah, they DID create "scrip"

And AFA levying taxes:

Quote:
The national government had few responsibilities and no nationwide tax system, relying on donations from the States for its revenue. Under the Articles, each State was a sovereign entity and could levy tax as it pleased. When the Constitution was adopted in 1789, the Founding Fathers recognized that no government could function if it relied entirely on other governments for its resources, thus the Federal Government was granted the authority to raise taxes. The Constitution endowed the Congress with the power to "…lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States." Ever on guard against the power of the central government to eclipse that of the states, the collection of the taxes was left as the responsibility of the State governments.

To pay the debts of the Revolutionary War, Congress levied excise taxes on distilled spirits, tobacco and snuff, refined sugar, carriages, property sold at auctions, and various legal documents.

So, yep... they levied taxes too.

www.policyalmanac.org/economic/archive/tax_history.shtml

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 8:20 AM

Quote:
So, maybe the rule is.... no governments representing more than ten million people. You get more than ten million? You have to hive off.

Or maybe the rule is no banks.

Or maybe the rule is no police and no armies.

The first two are right on. I have to think about the third one. I'm not prepared to say there should be no such thing as self-defense, although if you have an army, you have to figure out a way to restrict it ONLY to self-defense.

I'm sure women would make just as much a mess of things as men do, so I doubt that's it.

Quote:
There is also no art

Uh oh.

You really got me interested in that city, then you said that. That suggests to me something might actually have been REALLY wrong.

Looking into it, are you sure? I just read something about a famous dancer girl figurine, that's technically art.

But I'm also hearing that there was an upper city and a lower city, so far they've only uncovered the upper quarters which was very rich. I have my own suspicions what they'll find in the lower quarters.

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 5:43 PM

FREMDFIRMA

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
There's "belief" again. But the question remains.... HOW??? That is a discussion that nobody, not even you, seems prepared to have, and that's the ONE question I have been asking over and over. What I was looking for is not to set off a firestorm of emotion but someone who could help answer the question....

And I have answered it, time and time again, only to have that answer ignored cause folks cannot seem to fit it into the way they look at things and it falls right through their massive psychological blind spot - or they don't like that answer and so pretend it wasn't never given.

Once again, I will post the RSA vid, in hopes you at least partially understand what I am getting at.

Introduce SANITY and EMPATHY, and you NEED NOTHING ELSE, comprende ?
As for the specific mechanics of doin that, why the hell you think I do what I do ?

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 6:02 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Frem, you have as much said that people are by an large cooperative and decent. We don't need to "introduce" sanity and empathy to the population, they already have it. Nonetheless, we have a crazy system that drives the good OUT of people.

Why???

It's because a mere 0.0001% are in control.

As a thought-experiment, let's assume that everyone (except the 0.0001%) "gets it"... they realize they're OK but they're being totally screwed by the system. Let's even assume that all regulations and all governments are gone... POOF!

THEN WHAT?

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 7:15 PM

Magon

Sorry, these are out of order

Quote:

In USSR, what they had essentially was the same autocratic government that they always had. The Tsar had absolute rule, life and death, over his subjects. So did Stalin.

You're quite right about Stalin, but Stalin went out of his way to essentially reinvent the concept of tsar. I'm not sure this applies to the USSR as a whole, and systematically, a lot of the mechanisms which caused disaster were pure socialist constructs. I'm not sure that the soviet union gains by comparison to tasrist russia, which had near slavery and was almost always at war.

Quote:
It wasn't even close to what Marx envisaged as a perfect society

But then again, what is? I mean, the US is a terrible democracy, and most democracies are worse. We also have a terrible capitalism. Adam Smith would be appalled. We're even a terrible America, the founding fathers would be appalled.

You have to plan for disaster, and I think you're right about marx's weakpoint, or one of them, he didn't plan that his system would be enacted by humans. Also, though, I think there's an inherent flaw in large centrally planned structures, because the more you engineer, the less thinking ironically that's involved in the result, because only those who set it up will be doing the planning, not the millions who will be in it later on.

Quote:
Magon:
You think that conflict in the Balkans started then?????????

I was actually nominally in that conflict, though I didn't see it first hand, I knew a lot of people who did, two who lost thousands, one who have to dig the mass grave himself. I'm familiar with it.

Don't confuse the actions of the Nazis in WWII with the actions of the socialist regime in the 1990s. That would be giving credence to Milosevic's claim that his actions were retribution for the collaboration of Crotia in the second world war. To put that claim in context, he also said that his actions in bosnia were retaliation for the sacking of Constantinople in 1453; and more to the point that he claimed to be the reincarnation of Lazar Hrebeljanovic, a serb prince who died in 1389.

In short, he was a fucking lunatic.

I don't blame socialism for Milosevic being a fucking lunatic, but I do blame it for allowing lunatics to do so much damage because of the centralization of the power structure innate to its centrally planned economic and political system. When you have a lunatic in power in a right wing country, as with Pinochet, it's a disaster, but it's nothing on the scale of the cambodia, russia, china or germany, or for that matter, yugoslavia.

Re: Sudan, I disagree. Sudan has been a disaster for 20 years, yes, but that's because Bashir declared himself eternal dictator 22 years ago, and has been trying to crush every ethnic minority ever since.

Also, not my list, I got it from wikipedia. That's a list of who the world bank or its advisors think is a free market country. I don't care for the WB, but i'm not about to argue with them on this. (i thought some of their criteria were not ones that I would use, but unless i'm prepared to do my own research and classification which i'm not, then i'll settle for it)

On Singapore, I see where you went wrong on this, the statement in wikipedia is misleading:

Quote:
the state owns stakes in firms that comprise perhaps 60% of the GDP

It owns stakes, it does not own. The singapore state spending is less than 15% of GDP. Singapore is a highly corporatist state, it's been criticized in the other direction for being essentially "run by a corporation" and in the australian press a couple years back for being "run by a drug ring." I figure all of these accusations are probably not entirely unfounded, I get the feeling it's like the US style capitalism on steroids, and everything i hear seems to the support the idea that it's somewhat of a police state. I see that it has that reputation online as well, and there's much arguing about it, but statistically it is maybe only as bad as the US?

At any rate, it's not a model society. OTOH, neither is Dubai.

Seeing as they ranked your home 5th, I wouldn't complain.

Oh, and just because I have nothing else to do and am waiting to nod off:

Quote:

You've got a bit of blind spot regarding socialism, sport. You cannot compare totalitarian regimes of the USSR and Korea with governments that fund services such as those in Europe, Canada and Australia.

There are socialist countries in Europe? Well, I suppose there's Belarus.

Also, I thought we just concluded that Australia was the 5th omst free market nation on earth and now you dub it socialist? I think it has a reputation as pretty right wing. Also, Canada, socialist? Not sure what you're smoking. Yes, they have a national health plan, but so do many countries and have for a while. The public health is like public education, it's not generally part of a centrally planned economy because it's not strictly speaking part of the free market economy, (though us radicals think it could be, it usually hasn't been) but I have a lot of gripes with the govt. of canada, none of them are for being too socialist, more for being too corporate capitalist. It's more capitalist than the US. (again, statistically, check out corporate involvement in canada.)

Quote:
The word socialist gets kicked around all over the place, a bit like Nazi,

Yes, they're almost synonyms, except that socialism is a more encompassing term as it includes soviets and maoists. Nazi+Soviets+Maoists together represent the founding ideology of basically almost all socialists states of the 20th c. There's a list of close to a hundred regimes there, and you can find a number of websites devoted to it. just over half IIRC were unmitigated disasters on an apocalyptic scale, the others were just unproductive govts. with a serious human rights problem.

Now why are poeople defending it again?

Quote:

and I've noticed that Americans in particular drag it out when they want to criticise anything that involves government funding of anything, including healthcare and education.

I grant that this is a problem. It's sort of like godwin when americans use the term socialist to apply to things which aren't strictly speaking socialist. It's a GOP talking point, and it's also something i've been accused of here a few times, but you make a good point. "National healthcare is socialism!" is at least an overstatement, especially when your national healthcare plan is just a law requiring everyone to buy corporate health insurance.

Quote:

Yeah, everything I've read about the US says something similiar. One in 100 of your citizens in jail, long prison sentences for crimes of even a non violent nature and aggressive and armed police.

It's a rather worrisome problem, and it just got worse. The new NDAA gives the govt. carte blanche to imprison any american, and the internal police and paramilitary forces now also equal 1% of the population which make now officially more of a police state than nazi germany. (or so i read)

Obama put out a signing statement saying he would not use the NDAA to detain US citizens indefinitely without trial, but there are three problems with that

1) he does not ban his successor from doing so, in fact, he just permitted a successor to do so in a way that wouldn't have been possible before

2) He didn't say he wouldn't use the NDAA for its permitted 3 year trial-less hearing-less detention

3) The NDAA contains a sticky provision that any point in those three years, or even prior to the arrest, (which is for suspicion, not a warrant or charge) that the govt. can revoke the suspect's citizenship without process.

This means that yes, he can detain US citizens indefinitely without trial by revoking their citizenship upon arrest. This allows him to sound like the good guy while actually taking the action of the bad guy, a technique he's gotten very good at.

Oh, BTW, I don't think Obama is a socialist. Not even remotely. And I really dislike the Obama admin. I think Auraptor is too pro-Obama ;)

(I'm serious of course.)

All that said, no, not a blind spot. I think that would be what the self styled socialists have. They're not seeing the poverty slavery and genocide that it has wrought, or for that matter, the environmental destruction which it is still doing.

Socialism, though it was cooked up in the 18th c. as an idea, really became the grand experiment of the 20th century. It was a worse disaster than I think any of its creators could have imagined. Humanity

Sig,

your first three rules sound good:

Quote:
So, maybe the rule is.... no governments representing more than ten million people. You get more than ten million? You have to hive off.

Or maybe the rule is no banks.

Or maybe the rule is no police and no armies.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 8:41 PM

whoops

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Thursday, January 5, 2012 8:41 PM

DT, I note that you like to weigh on with a debate on history, giving a whole load of information, sometimes a little ill informed simply for the sake of it. Reading your post, I'm kind of getting the 'so what' sensation that comes over me when I sometimes read your very long replies. It's really just a whole load more words about one of your et gripes, socialism, and I'm not interested in debating the intricacies of history, when really my single point was that revenge cycles get played out in countries all over the world and that it is difficult to diffuse conflict by more conflict. Nothing in your history diatribes really demonstrated that this doesn't happen.

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Originally posted by dreamtrove:

But then again, what is? I mean, the US is a terrible democracy, and most democracies are worse. We also have a terrible capitalism. Adam Smith would be appalled. We're even a terrible America, the founding fathers would be appalled.

the difference is that it bore almost resemblance to communism as Marx envisaged it, whereas the basic democratic processes are still in place in the US - just that democracy didn't really consider the role of huge corporations and the sheer size that the US would grow to.

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You have to plan for disaster,

Kind of what I have been saying all along. If not disaster, you plan for the worst in human nature.

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Also, though, I think there's an inherent flaw in large centrally planned structures, because the more you engineer, the less thinking ironically that's involved in the result, because only those who set it up will be doing the planning, not the millions who will be in it later on.

I don't understand what you mean. I think you have this fixed idea about the kind of central planning that takes place in totalitarian regimes, where the citizens have no say in how things are done. You can have central planning in a participatory democracy. Nevertheless, tired as I am in pointing this out, I don't support fully centrally planned societies. I just think government can have a role in infrastructure and regulation.

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Don't confuse the actions of the Nazis in WWII with the actions of the socialist regime in the 1990s.......

see above.

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On Singapore, I see where you went wrong on this, the statement in wikipedia is misleading:

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the state owns stakes in firms that comprise perhaps 60% of the GDP

It owns stakes, it does not own. The singapore state spending is less than 15% of GDP. Singapore is a highly corporatist state, it's been criticized in the other direction for being essentially "run by a corporation" and in the australian press a couple years back for being "run by a drug ring." I figure all of these accusations are probably not entirely unfounded, I get the feeling it's like the US style capitalism on steroids, and everything i hear seems to the support the idea that it's somewhat of a police state. I see that it has that reputation online as well, and there's much arguing about it, but statistically it is maybe only as bad as the US?

Singapore government is one of the most centrally planned democracies around. The government owns shares in or outright owns much of the industry and is responsible for the bulk of the infrastructure. Your list in no way demonstrated free markets of the kind that you have been advocating for, and Singapore would the antithesis of your optimimum as would Australia, NZ, Canada, Britain etc. All of these are mixed economies, the kind that I am advocating for (with some changes) and the kind you are advocating against.

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There are socialist countries in Europe? Well, I suppose there's Belarus.

Also, I thought we just concluded that Australia was the 5th omst free market nation on earth and now you dub it socialist? I think it has a reputation as pretty right wing. Also, Canada, socialist? Not sure what you're smoking.

It's getting to be like we are married, DT. We seem to be having the same conversation over and over again.

I don't call any of those countries socialist, but by definition of many in the US, they would be. All these countries have a high level of government funding of services, such as health care and welfare benefits. The governments play an active role in many aspects of society, including infrastucture, regulation of financial sector, and society shaping through tax incentives and breaks or actually monetary outlay. The tax system is progressive and can rise as high as 45%.

Australia's most right winged politicans would be where Obama would be, maybe just a little to the right. Probably Clinton. We've had this conversation before, and you have assured me that you know more than I do on this matter, as in so many matters regarding my country where you have informed me you know more than I do and frankly having these kind of discussions with you really pisses me off.

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Yes, they're almost synonyms, except that socialism is a more encompassing term as it includes soviets and maoists. Nazi+Soviets+Maoists together represent the founding ideology of basically almost all socialists states of the 20th c. There's a list of close to a hundred regimes there, and you can find a number of websites devoted to it. just over half IIRC were unmitigated disasters on an apocalyptic scale, the others were just unproductive govts. with a serious human rights problem.

Yep, had this conversation before and don't much want to revisit it.

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Friday, January 6, 2012 6:55 AM

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when really my single point was that revenge cycles get played out in countries all over the world and that it is difficult to diffuse conflict by more conflict. Nothing in your history diatribes really demonstrated that this doesn't happen.

I don't think DT disagrees with this. It's part of the Tao.

I think the socialism thing is hanging people up in the conversation. I figure it's none of my business if someone's socialist so long as they don't try to make me be socialist or make me part of the system they're building.

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Friday, January 6, 2012 7:41 AM

Magon,

It's like selling television to people who already have internet. Once you've experienced a taste of user-generated society there's no interest anymore in the broadcast central planning. I'm not interested in the hybrid for the same reason I'm not interested in a hybrid of television and internet. If we let that concept in, the central planners are going to use their influence to build up their control network again, and in the end, the result of that compromise will be that we will all be screwed.

I will concede that yes, corporations can become monopolistic and get involved in their own central planning, like the way Apple is run, but I think as long as the people mentally are keeping their eye on, and selecting for, a free society, they will not allow the powers that be to have enough control to get a permanent grip on power, even a little bit.

Still, I think you're pretty open minded about it, and I'll grant I'm not the best salesman of free society, and it took me some years here to get to the position I have now, where I'm willing to completely let go of govt.

As to Australia, I have some relatives down under and I've known a lot of australians, but I'm not familiar with it, no. I'm just telling you the outside impression, which is that australia is kind of a conservative place. Your international image is Mick Dundee and Steve Irwin. I've known some australians who buck that, and one who was even an avid socialist, but I've also known a lot of australians who reinforce that outback stereotype.

Sometimes I fear what the international image of the US is becoming, and worry that I might have to become from somewhere else.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Friday, January 6, 2012 7:52 AM

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Originally posted by Bytemite:
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when really my single point was that revenge cycles get played out in countries all over the world and that it is difficult to diffuse conflict by more conflict. Nothing in your history diatribes really demonstrated that this doesn't happen.

I don't think DT disagrees with this. It's part of the Tao.

I think the socialism thing is hanging people up in the conversation. I figure it's none of my business if someone's socialist so long as they don't try to make me be socialist or make me part of theyf the system they're building.

Byte,

Thanks, yes of course.

As to socialists, individually, I agree. I only fear what happens when they get into power, or support someone into power. Which is why I try to shake them when they start off that way and say "hey, okay, you might have a point about the problems you point out, but watch where that road leads before you take us down it"
If they can be shaken, I feel it's worth doing. If they've already drunken the koolaid, it's probably best to just move on.

It's a real wake up call when you start reading about these societies like cambodia, where they'd do things like exterminate a public school, and think to myself "how can a society even get away with that?" And then you have to start thinking about power mechanisms and control, and how you have to build your culture around not accepting that level of central control where it's even possible for someone to do that. I'm afraid at this point, in the US, it's almost possible. It's probably possible, but not politically survivable, but the media sure is getting people to that with their attacks on illegals, jihardist, the FLDS, etc. I actually knew people who blamed the branch davidians for Waco.

BTW, this is the problem with armed rebellion. We wouldn't be in the mess we are in today if there had been a revolution after Waco like their should have been, but the problem was that when people did revolt, it was easy to discredit the armed rebellion. You need something more subtle and calculated.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Friday, January 6, 2012 10:09 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Sanity and Empathy is relative, Siggy - that 0.0001% can't control *anything* without people willing to obey their orders, and those as a general rule are the ones mentally and emotionally warped into doing so by a system apparently designed to do exactly that, which is why I strike at the root of it, something which although I never thought to see a positive effect from even in my lifetime, is bearing fruit already, although not much of it, sure.

Also, infrastructure isn't an on-off switch, by reframing the debate into an all-or-nothing thing, you lose any chance of real discussion - time and time again I've pointed out there's structures and systems even a generally Anarchist society *would* keep, but by throwing the argument to extremes and then piling emotional investment in on top of it these discussions always go to hell, especially when people make assumptions that wouldn't even be possible regarding the society in question.

That'd be as if I started a discussion in current american society with "So there you are, walking your slave coffle..." - it STARTS with an assumption *NOT POSSIBLE* within the society and thus poisons the well from the very start, you understand ?

People, neighborhoods, communities, simply do not change that radically, that quickly - while various forms of entertainment may play with (and tremendously exaggerate) the notion of peoples response to a lack of rules, or being given power - power only changes people according to their nature.

On that note, I'd recommend you watch the series "Jericho", it's pretty well done overall, but I think you might find interesting just how little most of the people involved are affected, most of it being a change in perspective, and over time they *do* run into a lot of the problems we've discussed, and handle some of it as badly as humans do.

I think, where this goes south is that you keep envisioning a radical, overnight change thrust upon people wholly unprepared for it - and I would really rather it NOT come to that, but as a gradual evolution of sorts, humanity finally growing up socially, mentally, emotionally, beyond the level of angry apes via removing suppression of primary drives.
And yes, that sets me against many other Anarchists, since I think forcibly taking away structures people actually WANT, even if those structures are maybe somewhat harmful to them, is every bit as wicked as forcing them on others, unwanted.

You don't need to change the system, you just need to change the people, and you start by not screwing them up to the point where they feed it and make it a self-perpetuating evil.

And yes, addressing some elements of that 0.0001% and their hangers-on who play along because they WANT to, handling structures completely brazen, even glorifying, in their inhumanity may require some unpleasant means - but I do not, will not, can not, subscribe to that justifying any endpoint at all.
If there is a "sin" there, in a moral or ethical sense, it is *MY* "sin" and I will answer for it only to whatever power I believe I should, not to other humans for it...
But that delves into religion with me, and so I will stop there.

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Friday, January 6, 2012 11:45 AM

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Originally posted by dreamtrove:

As to Australia, I have some relatives down under and I've known a lot of australians, but I'm not familiar with it, no. I'm just telling you the outside impression, which is that australia is kind of a conservative place. Your international image is Mick Dundee and Steve Irwin. I've known some australians who buck that, and one who was even an avid socialist, but I've also known a lot of australians who reinforce that outback stereotype.

Yeah, and I think everyone looks like Tom Cruise in America. Perhaps you could actually extend yourself to hearing about a place from someone who lives there, rather than believing a media distorted image as a reality.

And more of your 'I read it/heard it/saw it somewhere so it must be true' in offering to any debate.

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Friday, January 6, 2012 11:54 AM

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Originally posted by Fremdfirma:

Sanity and Empathy is relative, Siggy - that 0.0001% can't control *anything* without people willing to obey their orders, and those as a general rule are the ones mentally and emotionally warped into doing so by a system apparently designed to do exactly that, which is why I strike at the root of it, something which although I never thought to see a positive effect from even in my lifetime, is bearing fruit already, although not much of it, sure.

So how do you suggest that we change the people or the system so that there we have a more empathic society?

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Also, infrastructure isn't an on-off switch, by reframing the debate into an all-or-nothing thing, you lose any chance of real discussion - time and time again I've pointed out there's structures and systems even a generally Anarchist society *would* keep, but by throwing the argument to extremes and then piling emotional investment in on top of it these discussions always go to hell, especially when people make assumptions that wouldn't even be possible regarding the society in question.

Pot meet the kettle. Please dont make criticisms about piling emotional investent into debates when that is basically what you bring to any discussion.

I don't believe that I have been arguing for an all or nothing system, and in fact have been arguing against such a thing. However, CTS and DT pretty much have been doing that. Particularly CTS - well possibly just because I actually get what she is proposing, DT's ideas are shambolic as far as I can tell.

So if you want to talk about what bits you would keep and what you would throw out, bring it on. I'm interested.

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People, neighborhoods, communities, simply do not change that radically, that quickly - while various forms of entertainment may play with (and tremendously exaggerate) the notion of peoples response to a lack of rules, or being given power - power only changes people according to their nature.

Sure, and I've never suggested that all people would respond badly to lack of rules, but I think that there will be those, maybe a minority, who will stuff it all up if left to their own devices. That is why you need to plan for that contingency.

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On that note, I'd recommend you watch the series "Jericho", it's pretty well done overall, but I think you might find interesting just how little most of the people involved are affected, most of it being a change in perspective, and over time they *do* run into a lot of the problems we've discussed, and handle some of it as badly as humans do.

I really enjoyed Jericho, wished they had continued it. Haven't got any more time now, but would be interested in discussing the apocalyptic wish that is often played out in many american films.

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Friday, January 6, 2012 1:01 PM

Magon,

Don't have no media here, and I still have family in Australia. Besides, aren't you really a brit?

You really are digging for dischord within agreement here. Ah well, this thread is too long, let's put it to bed.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Friday, January 6, 2012 6:20 PM