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Let's call Obamas' bluff.
page: 7share:
I really dont care what you do. Its my oppinion that 100% of everything the Government makes should go to paying off our debt. If that means
everything shuts down then so be it. No welfare or ss? Too bad. Pay it all off and then get the crooks out of the Government.
reply to post by e11888
Easy to hear that you are on the good site of life. Nice mate just # all the older people there actually builded up the # in the first place. Lets just # all the unlucky ending military carieers and now are unable to get jobs.. Lets # them all.
OR maybe not?
Thanks,
Easy to hear that you are on the good site of life. Nice mate just # all the older people there actually builded up the # in the first place. Lets just # all the unlucky ending military carieers and now are unable to get jobs.. Lets # them all.
OR maybe not?
Thanks,
Originally posted by Hilltaker
reply to post by e11888
Easy to hear that you are on the good site of life. Nice mate just # all the older people there actually builded up the # in the first place. Lets just # all the unlucky ending military carieers and now are unable to get jobs.. Lets # them all.
OR maybe not?
Thanks,
So you would rather hold this debt and continue to allow Government and big business to use it as a scare tactic to do whatever they want? Eventually we are going to default. Its inevitable. And when we do not only are we going to lose our status as world reserve currency (which would cause massive inflation and probably kill the US dollar in the process), but we also risk war with our debt holders. This is not about the eldery or returning soldiers. Eventually this is going to affect us all. Now at no time did I say this decision was an easy one but when you step back and look at the problem its the only decision you can make. Continuing to spend more is no way to get out of debt and we need to rip the bandaid off and get the crooks out of Government that put us in this situation.
Of course... we could always bring ALL of our soldiers home. Do you have any idea how spread we really are? We have soldiers stationed in almost every country in the world. End the wars and bring everyone home. That would save a bunch of money wouldnt it? Maybe if our "leaders" werent so bloodthirsty we could pay off our debt without having to shut down services to our people.
edit on 25-7-2011 by e11888 because: (no reason given)
Originally posted by Hawking
Sharing our money with one another??
Sounds like SOCIALISM to me, what are you, some kind of communist?
Because when the idea was to share money to take care of each other's medical problems, that's all anyone was able to shout about
Naw.
It's SOCIALISM when YOU take my money and decide who gets it. It's individualism when I decide who to give it to.
It's not about sharing the money, it's about giving up your right to make your own decisions as to it's use.
The "medical problems" debate is a whole 'nuther issue. My medical problems are nobody else's business, much less their responsibility, and MUCH less the government's. Government ain't got no dog in that fight, and best keep their noses out of it. Social Security and military pensions are a whole different thing. Military pensions are for service rendered, payment, not handouts. Social Security is a return on money paid in for that specific purpose, and is also owed, not a handout.
NO government, anywhere on Earth, OWES me for medical problems. Those are MINE to handle. I don't want their goddamn handouts, and certainly not the strings that come attached to them.
Originally posted by Hilltaker
Hi mates,
I wouldnt mind helping all I could. The thing is my wife is out of job, my brother is out of job so is currently living here with me in my house.
I dont have any money over actually I dont have enough money to get the car taxes paied in time as well as the rent has been going like hell for a surgent period of time.
There isnt any money to help with from my household.
Thanks,
You're already helping. You're taking care of your own, so someone else doesn't have to.
To think otherwise is selling yourself short.
Originally posted by nenothtu
Originally posted by Hawking
Sharing our money with one another??
Sounds like SOCIALISM to me, what are you, some kind of communist?
Because when the idea was to share money to take care of each other's medical problems, that's all anyone was able to shout about
Naw.
It's SOCIALISM when YOU take my money and decide who gets it. It's individualism when I decide who to give it to.
It's not about sharing the money, it's about giving up your right to make your own decisions as to it's use.
The "medical problems" debate is a whole 'nuther issue. My medical problems are nobody else's business, much less their responsibility, and MUCH less the government's. Government ain't got no dog in that fight, and best keep their noses out of it. Social Security and military pensions are a whole different thing. Military pensions are for service rendered, payment, not handouts. Social Security is a return on money paid in for that specific purpose, and is also owed, not a handout.
NO government, anywhere on Earth, OWES me for medical problems. Those are MINE to handle. I don't want their goddamn handouts, and certainly not the strings that come attached to them.
You just don't get it, do you?
If you were poor, without healthcare, working your butt off, and were seriously injured or sick, you'd eat your words like so many shards of glass.
THE SYSTEM, including markets, IS INHERENTLY INSANE. Social safety nets are an artificial but more/less effective way to BALANCE problems of wealth stratification in a society which virtually worships money.
If you want to abolish ALL taxes and government (including our current markets) then fine, I'm with you, ultimately. But if you are in support of taxation... but not in support of using taxes to serve WE THE PEOPLE... then I don't know what the heck you're thinking, it's essentially laissez-faire brainwashing and amounts to poor people fighting for the worst deal for themselves so that things aren't harder on the rich.
reply to post by NoHierarchy
When the brainwashed start accusing critical thinkers of being brainwashed it is worthy of pointing out and sharing the amusement that comes with this.
Your reply was to a member who, for the most part, demonstrates strong critical thinking skills. Your knee jerk reaction to his post was nothing near critical thought.
Let's just first clear up what laissez faire actually means. The word is a French phrase which literally translated means; "Let do". It is a principle of live and let live. If this "brainwashing" is something you are free of, it certainly reveals much about your motives, which most assuredly have nothing at all to do with living and letting others live too. No, you clearly believe that some form of state intervention has to take place to correct the disparity between rich and poor.
"The poor you have with you always..."
Matthew 26:11
I have not quoted this passage from the New Testament to preach biblical scholarship but only to illustrate just how long this disparity between rich and poor has existed. It was an age old phenomenon when Jesus spoke, and more than 2000 years later it remains a phenomenon today.
Envying the rich does nothing at all to "solve" the "problems" of poverty. Under a laisses faire market condition, the poor stand the best chance of rising up out of their economic condition. Under the heavily regulated markets of today, where local, state, and federal government have all conspired to shut out only but the wealthiest from actually competing in the market, what remains is a nation of consumers, which makes us in reality, a nation of poverty.
What you advocate is more of the same, which has steadily made it next to impossible, and certainly improbable for a poor person to start their own business and make a go of it. This is your compassion for the poor, to advocate a closed system that shuts them out of the market place so that there can be an appearance of making things harder on the rich. I suppose you like magic tricks a lot too and every time you witness a magic trick you gasp in amazement and declare; "How did you do that?"
If you want to abolish ALL taxes and government (including our current markets) then fine, I'm with you, ultimately. But if you are in support of taxation... but not in support of using taxes to serve WE THE PEOPLE... then I don't know what the heck you're thinking, it's essentially laissez-faire brainwashing and amounts to poor people fighting for the worst deal for themselves so that things aren't harder on the rich.
When the brainwashed start accusing critical thinkers of being brainwashed it is worthy of pointing out and sharing the amusement that comes with this.
Your reply was to a member who, for the most part, demonstrates strong critical thinking skills. Your knee jerk reaction to his post was nothing near critical thought.
Let's just first clear up what laissez faire actually means. The word is a French phrase which literally translated means; "Let do". It is a principle of live and let live. If this "brainwashing" is something you are free of, it certainly reveals much about your motives, which most assuredly have nothing at all to do with living and letting others live too. No, you clearly believe that some form of state intervention has to take place to correct the disparity between rich and poor.
"The poor you have with you always..."
Matthew 26:11
I have not quoted this passage from the New Testament to preach biblical scholarship but only to illustrate just how long this disparity between rich and poor has existed. It was an age old phenomenon when Jesus spoke, and more than 2000 years later it remains a phenomenon today.
Envying the rich does nothing at all to "solve" the "problems" of poverty. Under a laisses faire market condition, the poor stand the best chance of rising up out of their economic condition. Under the heavily regulated markets of today, where local, state, and federal government have all conspired to shut out only but the wealthiest from actually competing in the market, what remains is a nation of consumers, which makes us in reality, a nation of poverty.
What you advocate is more of the same, which has steadily made it next to impossible, and certainly improbable for a poor person to start their own business and make a go of it. This is your compassion for the poor, to advocate a closed system that shuts them out of the market place so that there can be an appearance of making things harder on the rich. I suppose you like magic tricks a lot too and every time you witness a magic trick you gasp in amazement and declare; "How did you do that?"
Originally posted by Jean Paul Zodeaux
reply to post by NoHierarchy
When the brainwashed start accusing critical thinkers of being brainwashed it is worthy of pointing out and sharing the amusement that comes with this.
Your reply was to a member who, for the most part, demonstrates strong critical thinking skills. Your knee jerk reaction to his post was nothing near critical thought.
Seriously...? Wrong. You're utilizing what's called FLIPPING; where you take an accusation that more accurately fits you (or your ilk) and flip it around on your opposition wrongly. That's what you're doing here. If there is any critical thinking by him... it's quite short-sighted and half-hatched... which ultimately means NON-critical thinking.
Let's just first clear up what laissez faire actually means. The word is a French phrase which literally translated means; "Let do". It is a principle of live and let live. If this "brainwashing" is something you are free of, it certainly reveals much about your motives, which most assuredly have nothing at all to do with living and letting others live too. No, you clearly believe that some form of state intervention has to take place to correct the disparity between rich and poor.
This is an asinine argument and you know it. Laissez-faire does not mean "live and let live"... laissez-faire, in the connotation that I, and most others, use it means a "free market", i.e. a de-regulated market. What I was pointing out is that markets go hand in hand with oppression and the state... you cannot separate them without fundamentally changing markets into something that free-marketers wouldn't even recognize... which is fine by me personally. Second of all... you completely ignored/missed my point when I said that I am all for abolishing government ultimately... you're talking to a real-life ANARCHIST here. But my point was that, so long as the state and markets exist (and oppress us via their own unique ways), our best bet is to utilize what limited power we have to pit governments and markets against each other AND most importantly in favor of the masses. Social safety nets ABSOLUTELY fit the bill of government/markets serving THE PEOPLE rather than the people serving them. You cannot deny this, otherwise it is YOU who is completely brainwashed via roundabout/illogical conspiracy theories rather than looking plainly at in-practice results (and no... North Korea does not count at all).
"The poor you have with you always..."
Matthew 26:11
I have not quoted this passage from the New Testament to preach biblical scholarship but only to illustrate just how long this disparity between rich and poor has existed. It was an age old phenomenon when Jesus spoke, and more than 2000 years later it remains a phenomenon today.
You maintain a tragically brief perception of time and human society. You need to do some homework on human evolution, prehistory, anthropology, the agricultural revolution, tribalism, etc. Preferably prior to 10,000 years ago. The rich/poor gap is actually a VERY RECENT phenomenon born of totalitarian agricultural civilization. For 90% of modern human history, we had no rich/poor gap... today we live out an exponentially exploding monstrosity on many fronts, this includes the worldwide wealth gap.
Envying the rich does nothing at all to "solve" the "problems" of poverty. Under a laisses faire market condition, the poor stand the best chance of rising up out of their economic condition. Under the heavily regulated markets of today, where local, state, and federal government have all conspired to shut out only but the wealthiest from actually competing in the market, what remains is a nation of consumers, which makes us in reality, a nation of poverty.
Envying the rich? Please stop using that sickening phrase. It's not about envy, it's about fairness, it's about some a**hole above the rest of us skating through live via OUR labors while we live in relative squalor. We cannot and MUST NOT simply ignore this. When there is wealth being effectively STOLEN via market games and corporate hierarchies, we must remain vigilant and force a correction. The rich do not automatically deserve their money simply because they worked for it. The system doesn't base rewards on hard work alone or even to a great extent... once again, markets are a centralized, hierarchical, rigged-game as they stand, and de-regulating them will only make things worse unless we dismantle BOTH the reigning governments AND markets (and market entities) without favoritism. Keep in mind, happiness is linked to increased income equality:
www.livescience.com...
Under laissez-faire... well... we've already seen some of the outcomes- sweatshops, child labor, virtually non-existent labor/environmental/health/wage standards, exploitation, insane work-hours, sh*t pay, and bossmen who make far more than their laboring wage-slaves. This isn't some sensationalized story out of a fictional book, this is the VERY REAL history of unfettered markets who are stratified/hierarchical in nature... and who are let free reign upon markets, humans, and the environment all in the name of market fetishism, profit, expansion, and perverted Capitalist ideology. Unlimited growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.
The only reason government has shut out competitors IS BECAUSE the market is unregulated. If we REGULATED the market thoughtfully... we could REGULATE large monopolistic/corporate entities from taking control of our government and using it against everyone/thing else (including small biz/competitors). THAT is the reality we see... the enemy, at least in a market sense, is NOT the government but a lack of regulation on large economic powers which can effectively CONTROL our governments. And if you think these entities would cease coercing people via direct/indirect means if government disappeared... think again. This is why, even if we embrace limited pockets of truly free-markets, we absolutely MUST dismantle all reigning economic entities and start from scratch. Otherwise we're going to be looking at a de-facto private state apparatus which will function FAR MORE TYRANNICALLY than our current government does (think Blackwater/Monsanto)... because we at least have a token chance at democratic/representative government power as the people with the government we're currently under the thumb of. A private de-facto government would be far less Democratic, forgiving, fair, or reformable. Go big or go home.
What you advocate is more of the same, which has steadily made it next to impossible, and certainly improbable for a poor person to start their own business and make a go of it. This is your compassion for the poor, to advocate a closed system that shuts them out of the market place so that there can be an appearance of making things harder on the rich. I suppose you like magic tricks a lot too and every time you witness a magic trick you gasp in amazement and declare; "How did you do that?"
Wrong. What I advocate is more of the DIFFERENT as far as America is concerned. In case you haven't been doing your homework... we're one of the ONLY developed countries without many social amenities which other developed countries have implemented as obvious/no-brainer benefits to the populace, and with great success and almost ZERO inherent tyranny. Look at Canada, France, Germany, Iceland, the Scandinavian countries... they all implement more social programs/assistance than we do in America... YET, they are healthier, smarter, happier, and freer than we are. The myths about eeeeeevil Socialism are just that... myths. Social Democracy is, thus far, the most mature/advanced form of government/economy humans have thus far developed. And even speaking as an Anarchist, I can say that we must AT LEAST adopt these common-sense establishment measures so long as the establishment exists. Once again, go big or go home. De-regulated markets have produced various unacceptable disasters, including our recent economic catastrophe concerning credit-default swaps, toxic assets, and mortgage bundling; it was all a big de-regulated gamble on the part of Wall St. and all the government watchdogs who were trying to warn us were promptly shut up by those who loved free markets so dearly. Even Greenspan himself has admitted that the free market might be a failure... THAT is saying something. Keep in mind... the Federal Reserve is a PRIVATE entity, not actually a federal one.
As for a poor person starting a business... the impediment to that is NOT taxes but literal STARTUP and RISK... sure, some regulations get in the way of this, however, we can refer back to corporate monopolies and their neutralizing of competition for that. Certain social programs help to mitigate risk for entrepreneurs in other countries. And overbearing regulation is NOT THE SAME as providing socialized benefits. In America... chances are you will fail, fail hard, and lack medical/educational/social assistance to provide a safety net for when you fall. Once again, the system is a bullsh** gamble and a rigged game too tied into its own insane system to adequately provide for the common good; it's insane to try to legitimize or worship markets as some noble system. Reality actually shows that in countries with intelligent and greater social safety nets... entrepreneurship is actually far more booming/prevalent than in America. Check out this article explaining this currrrious phenomenon:
www.inc.com...
reply to post by NoHierarchy
Flipping? Ha! Let's look at your asinine argument right here. First of all, laissez faire most assuredly means "let do". Secondly, that is precisely what free markets do, genius, they live and let live. Third, free markets are not "de-regulated markets", free markets are fully free of regulation. Your stupid propaganda only works on the simple minded.
Under a free market system there would be no such thing as a Federal Reserve where a private banking cartel not only prints the currency used in that market but also acts to either suppress or elevate interest rates. Such artificial intrusions has nothing at all to do with a free market.
Getting back to your amusing "flipping" self flattery - when you were a child instead of using the term "flipping" you probably would sing "I'm rubber and you're glue and whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you" - the only "flipping" going on here is by the likes of you. The hopeless attempt to equate "de-regulation" with free markets is undeniably "flipping". This "flipping" is done under the mistaken belief that they can use malfeasance as an excuse to point to all that is wrong with "free markets", and by that people like you, of course, mean "de-regulation".
De-regulation is not un-regulation, non-regulation, or no regulation. De-regulation is merely a relaxing of certain, and almost always very narrow and specific regulatory rules in a particular field of the market. The current economic crisis has nothing at all to do with free market principles and has everything to do with out of control regulatory schemes. All closed systems tend towards entropy, and a regulated market is without a doubt a closed system. A free market is an open system.
Reification does not work for anyone, and it certainly does not work for the ill informed. You cannot separate regulated markets from oppression and the state. That is the reality of the situation. Under the U.S. regulated market, increasingly poor people, as I pointed out, are shut out of the market and expected to accept "their lot" as employees. Under a free market poor people stand a much better shot at making a better life for themselves.
Your biggest mistake is assuming that the "market" is some kind of artificial creation. Market is a term we use to describe the phenomenon of trade. Trade is a natural proclivity of humanity. When humans were nothing more than hunters and gatherers, the moment some hunter traded one of his prey for something else a market existed. It was not that this hunter invented markets, not even likely that anyone in this tribe of people recognized the "market" but the trade that took place resulted in a market.
I am very clearly not talking to a "real-life ANARCHIST", and you contradict yourself all over the place with this last section I've quoted. "Social safety nets" has nothing at all to do with anarchy. The moment you begin implementing "social safety nets" whatever anarchy may have existed is gone, and how naive can you be to actually think that a "social safety net" can actually be implemented without some form of a Leviathan state?
I ignored you pretense of anarchism because it was easy to see the pretense then. Your obsession with controlling markets has nothing at all to do with anarchy. Whatever indoctrination you've bought into, it ain't anarchy. There is a member in this site - mnemeth - who consistently represents anarchy. There is nothing ever contradictory about his views, and time after time this member posts, or creates threads that represent genuine anarchy. While I am not an advocate of anarchy myself, I highly respect this member and strongly suspect he has little respect for your gross misrepresentation of anarchy.
There is just not enough known about civilizations older than 10,0000 years for you to make such an absurd claim. Holding up tribalism as some sort of preferred method of living does nothing at all to bolster your case. Do you honestly believe that under tribalism you would be here today using the internet to make the absurd claims you make?
What the hell do you know about fairness? So far you have disingenuously called yourself a "real-life ANARCHIST", only to turn around and advocate a "social safety net", you've made the absurd claim that civilizations older than 10,0000 years did not have a rich poor gap, but of course, failed to point to any single example of such a thing, all the while reifying with the expectation that your pretentious self righteous indignation is all that is needed to pass for truth. The last thing in this world I would ever do is accept your version of "fair".
Finally you make a statement I can agree with. Tragically, your ill informed strategies on how to "force this correction" only leave us at odds. "Corporate hierarchies" exist by charter. No corporation exists without a grant of charter from some state, somewhere. These corporations are legal fictions and have nothing at all to do with free markets. If there will be any forced correction it will come in the form of We the People demanding a redress of grievance for the malfeasance of corporations, and of course, charters are revokable. This will not happen as long as too many people buy into your nonsensical thoughtlessness, of which far too many do.
Yep. There's your "fairness" for you. Not only do the rich deserve the wealth they created, but the poor deserve what they've created. Any poor person who has managed to create wealth deserves that wealth. Any poor person who has done what you've done and instead just sit around and whine about the rich, deserves the wealth they've created from this pointless form of blame assignment. Blame is irrelevant. If you were genuinely the "real-life" ANARCHIST" you claimed to be, you would be operating outside of regulated markets and using your natural and unalienable right to create as much wealth as you can muster.
See how you've done it? You've gone from attempting to equate free markets with de-regulated markets, and now you drop the pretense of free market equation all together and simply just speak of de-regulation.
Further, your reification that happiness is linked to income equality may be a source of your happiness, although I sincerely doubt it, but it has nothing at all to do with fairness, and it "income equality" most certainly has nothing at all to do with real live anarchy.
Here is a fine example of your indoctrination. You cannot point to a single example of unfettered markets. Just as the communist purist will argue that you cannot point to a single example of genuine communism, (although I would disagree and there are many examples of tribalism that engaged in pure communism), you cannot find any examples of an unfettered market place. Perhaps the closest might be early Islamic commerce before the 11th century when cartelization reared its ugly head. Cartelization, of course, is not a product of free markets, but is instead a form or regulation.
Okay, I am going to end my reply here. This is your indoctrination, sport. The market is not by any stretch of the imagination "unregulated", and this assertion of yours is willful ignorance. It is so ignorant I am going to quote you again:
This is your "wisdom". Let's look at that assertion once more.
If you cannot see the blatant contradiction of this assertion, then there is just no more point in discussing this with you. Government could not possibly shut out competitors in an unregulated market. If you cannot understand this, you are woefully behind the curve.
This is an asinine argument and you know it. Laissez-faire does not mean "live and let live"... laissez-faire, in the connotation that I, and most others, use it means a "free market", i.e. a de-regulated market.
Flipping? Ha! Let's look at your asinine argument right here. First of all, laissez faire most assuredly means "let do". Secondly, that is precisely what free markets do, genius, they live and let live. Third, free markets are not "de-regulated markets", free markets are fully free of regulation. Your stupid propaganda only works on the simple minded.
Under a free market system there would be no such thing as a Federal Reserve where a private banking cartel not only prints the currency used in that market but also acts to either suppress or elevate interest rates. Such artificial intrusions has nothing at all to do with a free market.
Getting back to your amusing "flipping" self flattery - when you were a child instead of using the term "flipping" you probably would sing "I'm rubber and you're glue and whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you" - the only "flipping" going on here is by the likes of you. The hopeless attempt to equate "de-regulation" with free markets is undeniably "flipping". This "flipping" is done under the mistaken belief that they can use malfeasance as an excuse to point to all that is wrong with "free markets", and by that people like you, of course, mean "de-regulation".
De-regulation is not un-regulation, non-regulation, or no regulation. De-regulation is merely a relaxing of certain, and almost always very narrow and specific regulatory rules in a particular field of the market. The current economic crisis has nothing at all to do with free market principles and has everything to do with out of control regulatory schemes. All closed systems tend towards entropy, and a regulated market is without a doubt a closed system. A free market is an open system.
What I was pointing out is that markets go hand in hand with oppression and the state... you cannot separate them without fundamentally changing markets into something that free-marketers wouldn't even recognize... which is fine by me personally.
Reification does not work for anyone, and it certainly does not work for the ill informed. You cannot separate regulated markets from oppression and the state. That is the reality of the situation. Under the U.S. regulated market, increasingly poor people, as I pointed out, are shut out of the market and expected to accept "their lot" as employees. Under a free market poor people stand a much better shot at making a better life for themselves.
Your biggest mistake is assuming that the "market" is some kind of artificial creation. Market is a term we use to describe the phenomenon of trade. Trade is a natural proclivity of humanity. When humans were nothing more than hunters and gatherers, the moment some hunter traded one of his prey for something else a market existed. It was not that this hunter invented markets, not even likely that anyone in this tribe of people recognized the "market" but the trade that took place resulted in a market.
Second of all... you completely ignored/missed my point when I said that I am all for abolishing government ultimately... you're talking to a real-life ANARCHIST here. But my point was that, so long as the state and markets exist (and oppress us via their own unique ways), our best bet is to utilize what limited power we have to pit governments and markets against each other AND most importantly in favor of the masses. Social safety nets ABSOLUTELY fit the bill of government/markets serving THE PEOPLE rather than the people serving them. You cannot deny this, otherwise it is YOU who is completely brainwashed via roundabout/illogical conspiracy theories rather than looking plainly at in-practice results (and no... North Korea does not count at all).
I am very clearly not talking to a "real-life ANARCHIST", and you contradict yourself all over the place with this last section I've quoted. "Social safety nets" has nothing at all to do with anarchy. The moment you begin implementing "social safety nets" whatever anarchy may have existed is gone, and how naive can you be to actually think that a "social safety net" can actually be implemented without some form of a Leviathan state?
I ignored you pretense of anarchism because it was easy to see the pretense then. Your obsession with controlling markets has nothing at all to do with anarchy. Whatever indoctrination you've bought into, it ain't anarchy. There is a member in this site - mnemeth - who consistently represents anarchy. There is nothing ever contradictory about his views, and time after time this member posts, or creates threads that represent genuine anarchy. While I am not an advocate of anarchy myself, I highly respect this member and strongly suspect he has little respect for your gross misrepresentation of anarchy.
You maintain a tragically brief perception of time and human society. You need to do some homework on human evolution, prehistory, anthropology, the agricultural revolution, tribalism, etc. Preferably prior to 10,000 years ago. The rich/poor gap is actually a VERY RECENT phenomenon born of totalitarian agricultural civilization. For 90% of modern human history, we had no rich/poor gap... today we live out an exponentially exploding monstrosity on many fronts, this includes the worldwide wealth gap.
There is just not enough known about civilizations older than 10,0000 years for you to make such an absurd claim. Holding up tribalism as some sort of preferred method of living does nothing at all to bolster your case. Do you honestly believe that under tribalism you would be here today using the internet to make the absurd claims you make?
Envying the rich? Please stop using that sickening phrase. It's not about envy, it's about fairness, it's about some a**hole above the rest of us skating through live via OUR labors while we live in relative squalor.
What the hell do you know about fairness? So far you have disingenuously called yourself a "real-life ANARCHIST", only to turn around and advocate a "social safety net", you've made the absurd claim that civilizations older than 10,0000 years did not have a rich poor gap, but of course, failed to point to any single example of such a thing, all the while reifying with the expectation that your pretentious self righteous indignation is all that is needed to pass for truth. The last thing in this world I would ever do is accept your version of "fair".
When there is wealth being effectively STOLEN via market games and corporate hierarchies, we must remain vigilant and force a correction.
Finally you make a statement I can agree with. Tragically, your ill informed strategies on how to "force this correction" only leave us at odds. "Corporate hierarchies" exist by charter. No corporation exists without a grant of charter from some state, somewhere. These corporations are legal fictions and have nothing at all to do with free markets. If there will be any forced correction it will come in the form of We the People demanding a redress of grievance for the malfeasance of corporations, and of course, charters are revokable. This will not happen as long as too many people buy into your nonsensical thoughtlessness, of which far too many do.
The rich do not automatically deserve their money simply because they worked for it.
Yep. There's your "fairness" for you. Not only do the rich deserve the wealth they created, but the poor deserve what they've created. Any poor person who has managed to create wealth deserves that wealth. Any poor person who has done what you've done and instead just sit around and whine about the rich, deserves the wealth they've created from this pointless form of blame assignment. Blame is irrelevant. If you were genuinely the "real-life" ANARCHIST" you claimed to be, you would be operating outside of regulated markets and using your natural and unalienable right to create as much wealth as you can muster.
The system doesn't base rewards on hard work alone or even to a great extent... once again, markets are a centralized, hierarchical, rigged-game as they stand, and de-regulating them will only make things worse unless we dismantle BOTH the reigning governments AND markets (and market entities) without favoritism. Keep in mind, happiness is linked to increased income equality:
See how you've done it? You've gone from attempting to equate free markets with de-regulated markets, and now you drop the pretense of free market equation all together and simply just speak of de-regulation.
Further, your reification that happiness is linked to income equality may be a source of your happiness, although I sincerely doubt it, but it has nothing at all to do with fairness, and it "income equality" most certainly has nothing at all to do with real live anarchy.
Under laissez-faire... well... we've already seen some of the outcomes- sweatshops, child labor, virtually non-existent labor/environmental/health/wage standards, exploitation, insane work-hours, sh*t pay, and bossmen who make far more than their laboring wage-slaves. This isn't some sensationalized story out of a fictional book, this is the VERY REAL history of unfettered markets who are stratified/hierarchical in nature... and who are let free reign upon markets, humans, and the environment all in the name of market fetishism, profit, expansion, and perverted Capitalist ideology. Unlimited growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.
Here is a fine example of your indoctrination. You cannot point to a single example of unfettered markets. Just as the communist purist will argue that you cannot point to a single example of genuine communism, (although I would disagree and there are many examples of tribalism that engaged in pure communism), you cannot find any examples of an unfettered market place. Perhaps the closest might be early Islamic commerce before the 11th century when cartelization reared its ugly head. Cartelization, of course, is not a product of free markets, but is instead a form or regulation.
The only reason government has shut out competitors IS BECAUSE the market is unregulated.
Okay, I am going to end my reply here. This is your indoctrination, sport. The market is not by any stretch of the imagination "unregulated", and this assertion of yours is willful ignorance. It is so ignorant I am going to quote you again:
The only reason government has shut out competitors IS BECAUSE the market is unregulated.
This is your "wisdom". Let's look at that assertion once more.
The only reason government has shut out competitors IS BECAUSE the market is unregulated.
If you cannot see the blatant contradiction of this assertion, then there is just no more point in discussing this with you. Government could not possibly shut out competitors in an unregulated market. If you cannot understand this, you are woefully behind the curve.
Originally posted by NoHierarchy
You just don't get it, do you?
If you were poor, without healthcare, working your butt off, and were seriously injured or sick, you'd eat your words like so many shards of glass.
You are DEAD wrong about that. I KNOW better, and speak from experience. I AM poor, and without what you refer to as "health care". I work 12 hour shifts to maintain that luxuriant life style. I opted out the the insurance ponzi scheme several years ago when I found out just what it really was, and I'll be double-damned if I'll allow ANYONE, government or otherwise, to force me back in to it.
That just ain't gonna happen.
THE SYSTEM, including markets, IS INHERENTLY INSANE. Social safety nets are an artificial but more/less effective way to BALANCE problems of wealth stratification in a society which virtually worships money.
I give less than 1/2 of a damn about either the "system" or the "markets" or "wealth stratification". They can do as they please, but leave me out of it. we're all good, then.
If you want to abolish ALL taxes and government (including our current markets) then fine, I'm with you, ultimately. But if you are in support of taxation... but not in support of using taxes to serve WE THE PEOPLE... then I don't know what the heck you're thinking, it's essentially laissez-faire brainwashing and amounts to poor people fighting for the worst deal for themselves so that things aren't harder on the rich.
I'm not opposed to abolishing all taxes and government, but we both know that ain't ever gonna happen, and is eminently unworkable given the world population as it is. The next best course of action is to minimize both taxes and government, concurrently and in tandem, as far as possible.
Don't know what I'm thinking? I'm thinking TAXES are for the support of government, NOT the support of people. that's what "jobs" and other related things are for. This is why GOVERNMENTS collect taxes, and you and I don't just go door to door and collect them ourselves.
I also don't care whether things are "hard on the rich" or not. They are not me, and what is theirs is not mine to tinker with. If they get on my nerves too much, I just don't buy their crap and support their opulence. I do, however, firmly believe in equal protection under the law, if we are to have laws at all. I believe it to be unfair to tax ME at 3%, and tax YOU at 70%, and I really don't care what you have in between. That would be, of course, an inequity under the law.
Seems to me there are way too many folks screaming for legal inequity who will scream bloody murder when the inequities go the other way.
Originally posted by Jean Paul Zodeaux
reply to post by NoHierarchy
This is an asinine argument and you know it. Laissez-faire does not mean "live and let live"... laissez-faire, in the connotation that I, and most others, use it means a "free market", i.e. a de-regulated market.
Flipping? Ha! Let's look at your asinine argument right here. First of all, laissez faire most assuredly means "let do". Secondly, that is precisely what free markets do, genius, they live and let live. Third, free markets are not "de-regulated markets", free markets are fully free of regulation. Your stupid propaganda only works on the simple minded.
No... you're taking a literal translation, but a common conversational translation means an unregulated market. Stop playing word games. Free markets are not de-regulated markets? So what fantasy world are you talking about here?? In order to achieve truly free markets, they must be de-regulated... which means to REMOVE regulation. More stupid semantic word games that are unimportant to the main points and whose original use/intent can be easily gleaned via common sense.
Under a free market system there would be no such thing as a Federal Reserve where a private banking cartel not only prints the currency used in that market but also acts to either suppress or elevate interest rates. Such artificial intrusions has nothing at all to do with a free market.
In a world where unregulated markets and governments still exist... PLEASE illustrate to me just exactly HOW something like a Federal Reserve could not exist? You fail to see that a "free" market DOES NOT prevent large economic entities from taking control of government. In fact, a free market would provide economic entities the unfettered FREEDOM to do exactly that. If you're talking about preventing "artificial intrusions" well... it would take REGULATION to prevent these things. A lack of regulation means a lack of control of economic workings and economic entities... which means economic entities can do whatever they like without having to worry about being stopped. Now... if you believe markets should be free then you must also believe that people should be free to... ohhh sayyy... bomb the # out of a private business if it poisoned their drinking supply. In a truly free society, people would be able to do this without worrying about state punishment. Once again- GO BIG OR GO HOME. You cannot have an unregulated market and a regulated populace, that's insane.
Getting back to your amusing "flipping" self flattery - when you were a child instead of using the term "flipping" you probably would sing "I'm rubber and you're glue and whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you" - the only "flipping" going on here is by the likes of you. The hopeless attempt to equate "de-regulation" with free markets is undeniably "flipping". This "flipping" is done under the mistaken belief that they can use malfeasance as an excuse to point to all that is wrong with "free markets", and by that people like you, of course, mean "de-regulation".
Flipping self-flattery? No... I find that many people on the right-wing use the tactic of flipping nauseatingly often and without self-analyzing regard for the truth. What the hell is the REAL WORLD difference between a completely de-regulated market and a free market?? You're playing word games and using sugar-coated euphemisms like the "free" market when what it means is a market completely untouched by a government or law... if you seriously believe that we could remove government regulation (DE-REGULATION... which means there was once regulation, now there's not, it's the only way to do it since we cannot transport ourselves to a fantasy land where regulation never existed) and our current markets would provide all good things for the masses, then you've fallen for a dangerous illusion and have been duped by feel-good Capitalism masqueurading as free society. Ayn Rand was insane and even Hayek himself advocated SOME regulation of markets to prevent monopolies, environmental destruction, exploitation of workers, etc.
De-regulation is not un-regulation, non-regulation, or no regulation. De-regulation is merely a relaxing of certain, and almost always very narrow and specific regulatory rules in a particular field of the market. The current economic crisis has nothing at all to do with free market principles and has everything to do with out of control regulatory schemes. All closed systems tend towards entropy, and a regulated market is without a doubt a closed system. A free market is an open system.
Please point out to me where it says that de-regulation is a "relaxing" of regulatory rules and not a removal, whether in part or whole, of whichever regulations. If you can illustrate that there is a clear definitional difference, then I will stop using the phrase improperly. Either way... conversationally speaking... you know damn well what I refer to when I say de-regulation. Read the context and stop pretending you destroyed my argument by picking semantic nits.
What I was pointing out is that markets go hand in hand with oppression and the state... you cannot separate them without fundamentally changing markets into something that free-marketers wouldn't even recognize... which is fine by me personally.
Reification does not work for anyone, and it certainly does not work for the ill informed. You cannot separate regulated markets from oppression and the state. That is the reality of the situation. Under the U.S. regulated market, increasingly poor people, as I pointed out, are shut out of the market and expected to accept "their lot" as employees. Under a free market poor people stand a much better shot at making a better life for themselves.
What exactly am I reifying and how exactly do you assume it's improperly attributed??
You cannot separate regulated markets from oppression and the state... yeah? So what? You also cannot separate money-driven markets and private property from the state either. Private property, forced contractual obligation, economic hierarchy (both within economic entities and markets/societies in general), the monetary system, banks, etc. etc. BEGAN with the state and have always been tied in with the state and hierarchical civilization in general. Tell me HOW do you enforce private property rights without a state or de-facto state apparatus made to coerce? Keep in mind... most of the societies where "property" was respected naturally, had no actual CONCEPT of private property, and ESPECIALLY not the kind of worship free-marketers espouse. The view that the free market can be the end-all, be-all, foundation of society is an immature, undeveloped, and even dangerous view for ignoring how that plays out. The foundation for society should dictate markets, markets should not BE the foundation.
Now... I agree that under CERTAIN free-market conditions the poor stand a better chance. But you and I seem to be caught on semantics. So let's clear this up... what we're AGAINST is bad regulation and regulation which corruptly favors/funnels the larger economic entities while shutting out and punishing the little guy. Right? Can we also agree that a LACK of regulation in certain areas can be equally as bad as the WRONG regulation? Once again, we can look to somewhere like modern Germany for an example of better regulation (and un/de-regulation) than in America.
Your biggest mistake is assuming that the "market" is some kind of artificial creation. Market is a term we use to describe the phenomenon of trade. Trade is a natural proclivity of humanity. When humans were nothing more than hunters and gatherers, the moment some hunter traded one of his prey for something else a market existed. It was not that this hunter invented markets, not even likely that anyone in this tribe of people recognized the "market" but the trade that took place resulted in a market.
The market is both a natural outflow of our civilization AND an artificial creation; most of all IT IS EXTREMELY COMPLEX... overly complex even. If by markets you simply mean TRADE... then how can you look at modern markets (as compared to the more 'natural'/free trade of hunter-gatherers) and not see INTENSE mutations, artificialities, and tyrannies?? You can analyze markets, you can respect them, you can seek their improvement, but DO NOT blind yourself to the seemingly endless faults of our modern markets. Belief in market utopia is not much different than belief in any other utopia... especially within ideas that rely upon the same root thinking/systems of our civilization which got us into our messes in the first place.
Second of all... you completely ignored/missed my point when I said that I am all for abolishing government ultimately... you're talking to a real-life ANARCHIST here. But my point was that, so long as the state and markets exist (and oppress us via their own unique ways), our best bet is to utilize what limited power we have to pit governments and markets against each other AND most importantly in favor of the masses. Social safety nets ABSOLUTELY fit the bill of government/markets serving THE PEOPLE rather than the people serving them. You cannot deny this, otherwise it is YOU who is completely brainwashed via roundabout/illogical conspiracy theories rather than looking plainly at in-practice results (and no... North Korea does not count at all).
I am very clearly not talking to a "real-life ANARCHIST", and you contradict yourself all over the place with this last section I've quoted. "Social safety nets" has nothing at all to do with anarchy. The moment you begin implementing "social safety nets" whatever anarchy may have existed is gone, and how naive can you be to actually think that a "social safety net" can actually be implemented without some form of a Leviathan state?
WAY TO CHERRY-PICK AND COMPLETELY MISS MY POINTS AGAIN. Yes, you are speaking to an Anarchist... does being an Anarchist automatically require that I advocate OVERNIGHT Anarchy? NO. Does being an Anarchist mean that I cannot therefore hold opinions on how workings WITHIN the system can go? NO. The hypocrisy/logical fallacies reside more in yourself than I. I am realistic... I realize that widespread implementation of peaceful Anarchist society is a long way off... if at all. When I am judging WITHIN the system... I absolutely support social safety nets so long as the establishment chugs along. However, if I put my Anarchist hat on (I can switch hats... and that doesn't automatically mean hypocrisy) I want the entire system (governments, markets, ownership, coercion, hierarchy, etc.) to be DISMANTLED without playing favorites. Social safety nets do not require a "Leviathan" state per se... but they do require a state, I've never disputed that. Seriously... stop playing stupid, as well as playing word games, be more aware of what I'm saying instead of going for an easy, even if false, kill.
I ignored you pretense of anarchism because it was easy to see the pretense then. Your obsession with controlling markets has nothing at all to do with anarchy. Whatever indoctrination you've bought into, it ain't anarchy. There is a member in this site - mnemeth - who consistently represents anarchy. There is nothing ever contradictory about his views, and time after time this member posts, or creates threads that represent genuine anarchy. While I am not an advocate of anarchy myself, I highly respect this member and strongly suspect he has little respect for your gross misrepresentation of anarchy.
My obsession with controlling markets? THE MARKET IS HIERARCHICAL, COERCIVE, AND UNEQUAL. If you knew anything about Anarchism... you'd know that Anarchists are AGAINST hierarchy, coercion, and inequality. And Anarcho-"Capitalism" is a complete oxymoron and is laughed at by Anarchists... despite the naive and recent attempts at forcing it into the acknowledged Anarchist lexicon.
Haha... mnemeth eh? Man... I've handed his ass to him on many occassions, I've also seen others do it quite frequently too. He HARDLY embodies true Anarchist ideas when he promotes Anarcho-"Capitalism". Please DO YOUR HOMEWORK before you talk about something you don't actually know/care about. I don't wholly disagree with him on everything, I'm sure we share many similar values... but I think his ideology, like many other market-worshippers, is not well thought out or developed. I really just don't know why people feel this intense desire/obsession to cling to markets, money, Capitalism, etc... I suppose it's similar to people clinging to anything they identify with, but in a true and sustainable implementation of Anarchist society, it just wouldn't make the cut. Please read:
Is 'anarcho'-capitalism a type of Anarchism?
You maintain a tragically brief perception of time and human society. You need to do some homework on human evolution, prehistory, anthropology, the agricultural revolution, tribalism, etc. Preferably prior to 10,000 years ago. The rich/poor gap is actually a VERY RECENT phenomenon born of totalitarian agricultural civilization. For 90% of modern human history, we had no rich/poor gap... today we live out an exponentially exploding monstrosity on many fronts, this includes the worldwide wealth gap.
There is just not enough known about civilizations older than 10,0000 years for you to make such an absurd claim. Holding up tribalism as some sort of preferred method of living does nothing at all to bolster your case. Do you honestly believe that under tribalism you would be here today using the internet to make the absurd claims you make?
There IS enough known. Once again, do your homework on Anthropology, prehistory, anthropological tribalism, the agricultural revolution, etc.
Tribalism doesn't mean cave-men running around with clubs. Tribes and bands were/are the most pre-eminently human social organizations. They actually worked quite well for humans, the environment, and people enjoyed quite a bit of freedom/leisure, contrary to popular demonization/arrogance regarding tribal life. We can also apply 'tribalism' to things like cooperatives, intentional communities, and all non-hierarchical collectives of people with strong common bonds and/or purpose. And please, for the love of god, don't start ranting against collectivism... humans are very naturally collectivist; and collectivism DOES NOT automatically negate the individual, in fact, many non-hierarchical tribal organizations/societies deeply respect the individuals that make up the whole. The state is a total perversion of collectivism... essentially a coercive hive for humans; it is not our natural inclination to form massive centralized states (or markets for that matter). Also keep in mind- individualism is a strong tenet within Anarchism, as is collectivism; there is no inherent or complete contradiction between them unless you only believe in black and white.
Please read:
www.eco-action.org...
and
www.time.com...
Envying the rich? Please stop using that sickening phrase. It's not about envy, it's about fairness, it's about some a**hole above the rest of us skating through live via OUR labors while we live in relative squalor.
What the hell do you know about fairness? So far you have disingenuously called yourself a "real-life ANARCHIST", only to turn around and advocate a "social safety net", you've made the absurd claim that civilizations older than 10,0000 years did not have a rich poor gap, but of course, failed to point to any single example of such a thing, all the while reifying with the expectation that your pretentious self righteous indignation is all that is needed to pass for truth. The last thing in this world I would ever do is accept your version of "fair".
You're wrong and you're hysterical. Fairness is pretty f***ing easy to imagine when we live in a world which is so terribly unfair/unequal. It exists... and for some reason, people like you have been duped to believe that equality is a bad word. I'm sure pointing at monstrous perversions of Socialism (if it can even be called that) like Soviet Russia for 2-minutes hate against legitimate Socialism helps brainwash those who are already infatuated with Capitalism and/or free markets ideologies.
When there is wealth being effectively STOLEN via market games and corporate hierarchies, we must remain vigilant and force a correction.
Finally you make a statement I can agree with. Tragically, your ill informed strategies on how to "force this correction" only leave us at odds. "Corporate hierarchies" exist by charter. No corporation exists without a grant of charter from some state, somewhere. These corporations are legal fictions and have nothing at all to do with free markets. If there will be any forced correction it will come in the form of We the People demanding a redress of grievance for the malfeasance of corporations, and of course, charters are revokable. This will not happen as long as too many people buy into your nonsensical thoughtlessness, of which far too many do.
I never said that corporate hierarchies DON'T exist by charter. HOWEVER, it is precisely forms of BAD regulation and crucial but MISSING regulation that allow corporations to take control of government to the extent that they encourage immortal corporate charters, de-facto corporate personhood, a relaxing or removal of regulation regarding the environment, human/workers/consumers rights, profiteering, bribery of elected officials, etc. etc. My entire point of view WITHIN THE SYSTEM is that so long as states exist, we MUST prevent economic entities from taking control of them, and this means BOTH regulation that prevents this and DE-regulation of that which promotes it. We must also protect THE REST OF US from more powerful economic entities who may threaten our health, our ecosystems, our lives, our freedoms, our elections, and/or our ability to prosper. We cannot remove government hierarchies and maintain market hierarchies... that would create terrible imbalance and tyranny which would not even PRETEND to be Democratic/Representative of the will of the people.
The rich do not automatically deserve their money simply because they worked for it.
Yep. There's your "fairness" for you. Not only do the rich deserve the wealth they created, but the poor deserve what they've created. Any poor person who has managed to create wealth deserves that wealth. Any poor person who has done what you've done and instead just sit around and whine about the rich, deserves the wealth they've created from this pointless form of blame assignment. Blame is irrelevant. If you were genuinely the "real-life" ANARCHIST" you claimed to be, you would be operating outside of regulated markets and using your natural and unalienable right to create as much wealth as you can muster.
Actually... it's more complex than that, and you seem to have FAR TOO SOFT A SPOT in your heart for the rich and FAR TOO SOFT A SPOT on your brain for the failings of the economic system. Please see my other thread for more detail on this issue:
Do the rich DESERVE their money?
The system doesn't base rewards on hard work alone or even to a great extent... once again, markets are a centralized, hierarchical, rigged-game as they stand, and de-regulating them will only make things worse unless we dismantle BOTH the reigning governments AND markets (and market entities) without favoritism. Keep in mind, happiness is linked to increased income equality:
See how you've done it? You've gone from attempting to equate free markets with de-regulated markets, and now you drop the pretense of free market equation all together and simply just speak of de-regulation.
Further, your reification that happiness is linked to income equality may be a source of your happiness, although I sincerely doubt it, but it has nothing at all to do with fairness, and it "income equality" most certainly has nothing at all to do with real live anarchy.
Once again... you play word games and you hardly make sense. You like to throw around the term "reification" but I'm not reifying happiness as equal to money, I've shown you evidence that income equality actually promotes satisfaction amongst people. Deny the science all you want, but it's there looking you in the eye. Equality in general is one of the absolute cornerstones of Anarchism... I don't know what else to say. What's sick is that those with your worldview think of equality as a bad word... it's troubling how such doublethink propaganda has been so permeated amongst well-meaning minds.
Under laissez-faire... well... we've already seen some of the outcomes- sweatshops, child labor, virtually non-existent labor/environmental/health/wage standards, exploitation, insane work-hours, sh*t pay, and bossmen who make far more than their laboring wage-slaves. This isn't some sensationalized story out of a fictional book, this is the VERY REAL history of unfettered markets who are stratified/hierarchical in nature... and who are let free reign upon markets, humans, and the environment all in the name of market fetishism, profit, expansion, and perverted Capitalist ideology. Unlimited growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.
Here is a fine example of your indoctrination. You cannot point to a single example of unfettered markets. Just as the communist purist will argue that you cannot point to a single example of genuine communism, (although I would disagree and there are many examples of tribalism that engaged in pure communism), you cannot find any examples of an unfettered market place. Perhaps the closest might be early Islamic commerce before the 11th century when cartelization reared its ugly head. Cartelization, of course, is not a product of free markets, but is instead a form or regulation.
I'm talking about PARTIALLY unfettered markets, such as we saw in the 19th and early 20th centuries in America during the industrial revolution. You can look all throughout historical time and/or geographical space to see (partially) un-regulated markets... and in many times/places IT AIN'T PRETTY. Thus my list of examples. Somalia is actually, ironically, an example of free markets with some levels of success. They've provided themselves with an impressive impromtu infrastructure in some ways which rivals neighbors who have centralized governments. Still though... Somalia is hellish and ruled in a partial de-facto style by religious nuts. Their success is also not due to obsession with purist free-markets but to the general success of horizontal, non-hierarchical, voluntary, free societies in general.
The only reason government has shut out competitors IS BECAUSE the market is unregulated.
Okay, I am going to end my reply here. This is your indoctrination, sport. The market is not by any stretch of the imagination "unregulated", and this assertion of yours is willful ignorance. It is so ignorant I am going to quote you again:
The only reason government has shut out competitors IS BECAUSE the market is unregulated.
This is your "wisdom". Let's look at that assertion once more.
The only reason government has shut out competitors IS BECAUSE the market is unregulated.
If you cannot see the blatant contradiction of this assertion, then there is just no more point in discussing this with you. Government could not possibly shut out competitors in an unregulated market. If you cannot understand this, you are woefully behind the curve.
I've already addressed these, but I will once again. The market IS ABSOLUTELY unregulated in certain respects. Is it completely unregulated? NO! Who the heck said that?? Can we attribute some tyrannies/failures to a lack of proper regulation or the presence of toxic legislation? YES. Only a damn fool would deny this.
Once again you ignore context and see fit to cherry pick my statements without listening to my PREVIOUS explanations of them. There is no contradiction in my assertions that an unregulated market could shut out competitors unfairly. Keep in mind I was referring, however, to PARTIAL unregulation... obviously NOT to a completely unregulated market. Once again I will re-iterate... a market which is regulated to benefit the few over the many, and which is UNREGULATED to ALLOW the same is just reality. I'm talking PARTIAL regulation and partial de-regulation in such a combination that it supports tyrannies, corruption, and unfairness. What I'm also saying is that, if GOVERNMENTS STILL EXIST, then even in (ESPECIALLY in) an entirely unregulated market, there is NOTHING substantial preventing an economic entity from taking CONTROL of government and creating beneficial regulations (and thus breaking the market purist golden rule).
At the end of the day... power and wealth corrupt, and allowing hierarchies of EITHER is just inviting the same tyrannies and failures we see in all societies which allow them, no matter their ideological bent. ANARCHISM, eliminates hierarchies of power and wealth, it cuts out the middle-men of property/market/money worship as well as it cuts out the middle-men of any kind of dictatorship of the proletariat (as seen in Communism). It shoots straight for free society without naive notions that a hierarchical market or government will adequately de-fang itself by some form of feel-good magic.
Maybe Ive missed this...but you (the OP) is not getting a monthly check are you? Then, I understand why this is a very misguided and uninformed
thread...otherwise, you'd know the recipients need every penny...and more. And they live on it. ( I however, do not get any assistance or Soc. Sec.
checks as yet...but my parents do.)
Oh...and lets see you buy no groceries, medicine, make your home or car payments for a couple months and get really into farther debt ourselves. Yeah!
That'll show Obama alright.
Lets get hungry, sick-er and into foreclosure. That'll teach him....
Lets get hungry, sick-er and into foreclosure. That'll teach him....
Originally posted by LazloFarnsworth
Oh...and lets see you buy no groceries, medicine, make your home or car payments for a couple months and get really into farther debt ourselves. Yeah! That'll show Obama alright.
Lets get hungry, sick-er and into foreclosure. That'll teach him....
So we can count on you NOT to help people who need help.
Okay.
Relying on the government for ANYTHING is what has gotten our country into this mess to begin with.
Originally posted by beezzer
Originally posted by LazloFarnsworth
Oh...and lets see you buy no groceries, medicine, make your home or car payments for a couple months and get really into farther debt ourselves. Yeah! That'll show Obama alright.
Lets get hungry, sick-er and into foreclosure. That'll teach him....
So we can count on you NOT to help people who need help.
Okay.
Relying on the government for ANYTHING is what has gotten our country into this mess to begin with.
Logical fallacy.
Also, relying on the government for anything has gotten our country into this mess to begin with?? Please attempt to PROVE this so I can have a good laugh...
You pretend as if this country has known something other than a tyrannical government/market... (aside from the indigenous population, which we annihilated).
Reality is, social assistance has helped BOLSTER the middle class in the face of ruthless economic landscapes. That's why people FOUGHT and DIED in the streets for workers rights/benefits, they were fighting the establishment to get their measly cut of the pie...and you wanna TAKE THAT AWAY FROM THEM?? Sickening.
edit on 27-7-2011 by NoHierarchy because: (no reason given)
reply to post by NoHierarchy
Are you out of your mind? A literal translation of a phrase is not - by any stretch of the imagination - "playing word games". Indeed, blurting out remarks such as "common conversational translation" is much closer to playing word games, since common conversation rarely even bothers to translate words.
Look, your willful ignorance is unacceptable. It is you and everyone who points to "de-regulation" as being part and parcel of a free market that are playing games of semantics. It is beyond stupid to suggest that a very clearly regulated market place where licensing schemes are universally imposed, where corporate charters are granted on a daily basis and where multitudes of regulatory government agencies exist, is a "free market". Such an insistence is flat out insane!
The Federal Reserve was created in 1913, genius. Are you under the impression the world was created in 1913?
The blind have no business lecturing the sighted on what they "fail to see". Large economic entities, if they are not government, are corporations, and as I have all ready explained, corporations are charted legal fictions. Their very existence means that by definition a regulated market place exists. Under a free market there is no need to be chartered, no need for permission to exist, and there are no corporations. Your propaganda is of the lamest kind. How anyone with even the slightest of critical thinking skills could ever fall prey to your nonsense is beyond me.
A free market would allow everyone to play, not just licensed entities operating under DBA's - which are legal fictions - but everyone. A free market fosters massive competition, which in itself limits the size of any "economic entity". "Economic entity"? Of course the poster accusing me of playing word games would come up with words like "economic entity", which presumably means business, or company.
Regulation is an artificial intrusion, genius. Governments are artifices, just as are corporations. Under a free market there are only sole proprietorships, or partnerships, but these are not "legal fictions" they are very real people doing business, and unlike governments and corporations, are liable for all of their actions.
Let me school you on how the world actually works. The only reason to stop a business person from doing business is because they are acting criminally. If a business person is acting criminally there are laws in place to deal with that! Regulation is not necessary just an enforcement of the actual laws that exist is all that is necessary. Regulation is nothing more than an excuse for government to aggregate power.
That governments and their insane sycophants keep insisting on going against the natural order of the world is a genuine problem. Fortunately the arguments for a regulated market are always fallacious - how ironic, no? That you who just in a previous post accused another member of logical fallacies basks in these logical fallacies yourself.
I just told you how the natural world works, genius. People do not need to "bomb the # out of private business" because there are acts of legislation in place to deal with the criminality of poisoned drinking supplies. However, in your world, this insane world we all ready live in, corporations such as BP poison oceans with impunity. There's your regulation, sport. You must necessarily be willfully ignorant in order to make the determinations you do. This site is littered with BP threads and their corporate malfeasance, but here you are pretending that it never happened.
More word games from the poster who accused me of playing word games. In a truly free society everyone is profoundly respecting the rights of everyone else and there is no crime! That is what a truly free society is. This is why your "real-life ANARCHY" is just a bunch of nonsense. Clearly, apparently something you and I can agree on, everyone does not profoundly respect the rights of everyone else, so governments must instituted in order to deal with the criminality of abrogation and derogation of rights.
Wait a minute...let me get this straight...is a "real-life ANARCHIST" insisting that people need to be regulated? That's insane!
I keep explaining this to you, but you keep ignoring it, presumably because you are so busy "self-analyzing". In this REAL WORLD, we are bombarded with examples of "de-regulation", i.e. the banking scandal, yet this so called "de-regulation" did not produce a free market at all, and all it produced was an economic crisis.
Sugar coated? Word games? If a market completely untouched by government - law exists with or without government - is not a free market, then what is the word for it, genius?
Let's get something straight about law. Legislation is no more law than the map is the territory, a picture of a pipe is a pipe, or the word the thing defined. Legislation is not law, merely evidence of law. Law is a natural phenomenon. Why I have to explain this to a "real-life ANARCHIST" is absurd, except of course, that you are not at all a "real-life" ANARCHIST, and are just a deceitful propagandist.
Uh-huh. All this rhetoric coming from a "real-life" ANARCHIST.
Your willful stupidity is becoming wearisome. The so called "de-regulation" of the banks did not end licensing schemes, or corporations, or put an end to the FDA, EPA, FAA, USDA, and the multitude of other regulatory agencies that exist. Did you really need that explained to you?
Reification is the act of declaring something to be true expecting all to believe it is true simply because it has been declared to be true. You very clearly do not know a thing about economics, and would never find a single school of economics, let alone a single economist who would support your absurd contentions.
Jesus Christ! This is as far as I am going with this reply because I just have so much patience with stupidity. You have no understanding at all what the law of contracts is and means. There is no such thing as a "forced contractual obligation" under the law of contracts. A forced obligation is not a contract. You need to get a clue and at this point you can post all you want and pretend to be as erudite as you please. I am satisfied the intelligent people reading this thread know precisely how informed you are.
No... you're taking a literal translation, but a common conversational translation means an unregulated market. Stop playing word games.
Are you out of your mind? A literal translation of a phrase is not - by any stretch of the imagination - "playing word games". Indeed, blurting out remarks such as "common conversational translation" is much closer to playing word games, since common conversation rarely even bothers to translate words.
Free markets are not de-regulated markets? So what fantasy world are you talking about here?? In order to achieve truly free markets, they must be de-regulated... which means to REMOVE regulation. More stupid semantic word games that are unimportant to the main points and whose original use/intent can be easily gleaned via common sense.
Look, your willful ignorance is unacceptable. It is you and everyone who points to "de-regulation" as being part and parcel of a free market that are playing games of semantics. It is beyond stupid to suggest that a very clearly regulated market place where licensing schemes are universally imposed, where corporate charters are granted on a daily basis and where multitudes of regulatory government agencies exist, is a "free market". Such an insistence is flat out insane!
In a world where unregulated markets and governments still exist... PLEASE illustrate to me just exactly HOW something like a Federal Reserve could not exist?
The Federal Reserve was created in 1913, genius. Are you under the impression the world was created in 1913?
You fail to see that a "free" market DOES NOT prevent large economic entities from taking control of government.
The blind have no business lecturing the sighted on what they "fail to see". Large economic entities, if they are not government, are corporations, and as I have all ready explained, corporations are charted legal fictions. Their very existence means that by definition a regulated market place exists. Under a free market there is no need to be chartered, no need for permission to exist, and there are no corporations. Your propaganda is of the lamest kind. How anyone with even the slightest of critical thinking skills could ever fall prey to your nonsense is beyond me.
In fact, a free market would provide economic entities the unfettered FREEDOM to do exactly that.
A free market would allow everyone to play, not just licensed entities operating under DBA's - which are legal fictions - but everyone. A free market fosters massive competition, which in itself limits the size of any "economic entity". "Economic entity"? Of course the poster accusing me of playing word games would come up with words like "economic entity", which presumably means business, or company.
In fact, a free market would provide economic entities the unfettered FREEDOM to do exactly that. If you're talking about preventing "artificial intrusions" well... it would take REGULATION to prevent these things.
Regulation is an artificial intrusion, genius. Governments are artifices, just as are corporations. Under a free market there are only sole proprietorships, or partnerships, but these are not "legal fictions" they are very real people doing business, and unlike governments and corporations, are liable for all of their actions.
A lack of regulation means a lack of control of economic workings and economic entities... which means economic entities can do whatever they like without having to worry about being stopped.
Let me school you on how the world actually works. The only reason to stop a business person from doing business is because they are acting criminally. If a business person is acting criminally there are laws in place to deal with that! Regulation is not necessary just an enforcement of the actual laws that exist is all that is necessary. Regulation is nothing more than an excuse for government to aggregate power.
That governments and their insane sycophants keep insisting on going against the natural order of the world is a genuine problem. Fortunately the arguments for a regulated market are always fallacious - how ironic, no? That you who just in a previous post accused another member of logical fallacies basks in these logical fallacies yourself.
Now... if you believe markets should be free then you must also believe that people should be free to... ohhh sayyy... bomb the # out of a private business if it poisoned their drinking supply.
I just told you how the natural world works, genius. People do not need to "bomb the # out of private business" because there are acts of legislation in place to deal with the criminality of poisoned drinking supplies. However, in your world, this insane world we all ready live in, corporations such as BP poison oceans with impunity. There's your regulation, sport. You must necessarily be willfully ignorant in order to make the determinations you do. This site is littered with BP threads and their corporate malfeasance, but here you are pretending that it never happened.
In a truly free society, people would be able to do this without worrying about state punishment.
More word games from the poster who accused me of playing word games. In a truly free society everyone is profoundly respecting the rights of everyone else and there is no crime! That is what a truly free society is. This is why your "real-life ANARCHY" is just a bunch of nonsense. Clearly, apparently something you and I can agree on, everyone does not profoundly respect the rights of everyone else, so governments must instituted in order to deal with the criminality of abrogation and derogation of rights.
Once again- GO BIG OR GO HOME. You cannot have an unregulated market and a regulated populace, that's insane.
Wait a minute...let me get this straight...is a "real-life ANARCHIST" insisting that people need to be regulated? That's insane!
Flipping self-flattery? No... I find that many people on the right-wing use the tactic of flipping nauseatingly often and without self-analyzing regard for the truth. What the hell is the REAL WORLD difference between a completely de-regulated market and a free market??
I keep explaining this to you, but you keep ignoring it, presumably because you are so busy "self-analyzing". In this REAL WORLD, we are bombarded with examples of "de-regulation", i.e. the banking scandal, yet this so called "de-regulation" did not produce a free market at all, and all it produced was an economic crisis.
You're playing word games and using sugar-coated euphemisms like the "free" market when what it means is a market completely untouched by a government or law...
Sugar coated? Word games? If a market completely untouched by government - law exists with or without government - is not a free market, then what is the word for it, genius?
Let's get something straight about law. Legislation is no more law than the map is the territory, a picture of a pipe is a pipe, or the word the thing defined. Legislation is not law, merely evidence of law. Law is a natural phenomenon. Why I have to explain this to a "real-life ANARCHIST" is absurd, except of course, that you are not at all a "real-life" ANARCHIST, and are just a deceitful propagandist.
if you seriously believe that we could remove government regulation (DE-REGULATION... which means there was once regulation, now there's not, it's the only way to do it since we cannot transport ourselves to a fantasy land where regulation never existed) and our current markets would provide all good things for the masses, then you've fallen for a dangerous illusion and have been duped by feel-good Capitalism masqueurading as free society. Ayn Rand was insane and even Hayek himself advocated SOME regulation of markets to prevent monopolies, environmental destruction, exploitation of workers, etc.
Uh-huh. All this rhetoric coming from a "real-life" ANARCHIST.
Please point out to me where it says that de-regulation is a "relaxing" of regulatory rules and not a removal, whether in part or whole, of whichever regulations. If you can illustrate that there is a clear definitional difference, then I will stop using the phrase improperly. Either way... conversationally speaking... you know damn well what I refer to when I say de-regulation. Read the context and stop pretending you destroyed my argument by picking semantic nits.
Your willful stupidity is becoming wearisome. The so called "de-regulation" of the banks did not end licensing schemes, or corporations, or put an end to the FDA, EPA, FAA, USDA, and the multitude of other regulatory agencies that exist. Did you really need that explained to you?
What exactly am I reifying and how exactly do you assume it's improperly attributed??
Reification is the act of declaring something to be true expecting all to believe it is true simply because it has been declared to be true. You very clearly do not know a thing about economics, and would never find a single school of economics, let alone a single economist who would support your absurd contentions.
You also cannot separate money-driven markets and private property from the state either. Private property, forced contractual obligation, economic hierarchy (both within economic entities and markets/societies in general), the monetary system, banks, etc. etc. BEGAN with the state and have always been tied in with the state and hierarchical civilization in general.
Jesus Christ! This is as far as I am going with this reply because I just have so much patience with stupidity. You have no understanding at all what the law of contracts is and means. There is no such thing as a "forced contractual obligation" under the law of contracts. A forced obligation is not a contract. You need to get a clue and at this point you can post all you want and pretend to be as erudite as you please. I am satisfied the intelligent people reading this thread know precisely how informed you are.
reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux
Your response is so disjointed, nonsensical, clueless, and hysterical that I don't really need to respond to it. I've obviously won the debate and you're just kicking and screaming, completely ignoring the points I've already made, completely ignoring the answers to your own questions that lie within the very text of mine you've quoted. ALL OF YOUR POINTS HAVE BEEN ANSWERED AND YOU'VE MISUNDERSTOOD ME AT ALMOST EVERY TURN and then used bunk arguments to prove your own misunderstandings wrong. THIS is why so many debates are pointless, because you either lack the sense to read what I'm actually saying or you are just too lazy to read it carefully and respond carefully as well.
Your response is so disjointed, nonsensical, clueless, and hysterical that I don't really need to respond to it. I've obviously won the debate and you're just kicking and screaming, completely ignoring the points I've already made, completely ignoring the answers to your own questions that lie within the very text of mine you've quoted. ALL OF YOUR POINTS HAVE BEEN ANSWERED AND YOU'VE MISUNDERSTOOD ME AT ALMOST EVERY TURN and then used bunk arguments to prove your own misunderstandings wrong. THIS is why so many debates are pointless, because you either lack the sense to read what I'm actually saying or you are just too lazy to read it carefully and respond carefully as well.
reply to post by NoHierarchy
And yet, you have.
Dream on! You have no idea what you are talking about and obviously live in a different world than the sane do, but go on and keep telling yourself you're a "real-life" ANARCHIST.
Your response is so disjointed, nonsensical, clueless, and hysterical that I don't really need to respond to it.
And yet, you have.
I've obviously won the debate
Dream on! You have no idea what you are talking about and obviously live in a different world than the sane do, but go on and keep telling yourself you're a "real-life" ANARCHIST.
reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux
That all you got, man?
INSANITY is believing that completely unregulating our markets will lead to anything but disaster and economic tyranny.
The SANE can imagine an ideal future (peaceful Anarchism) while being realistic enough to choose the lesser evils within our current system.
That all you got, man?
INSANITY is believing that completely unregulating our markets will lead to anything but disaster and economic tyranny.
The SANE can imagine an ideal future (peaceful Anarchism) while being realistic enough to choose the lesser evils within our current system.
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