You are absolutely certain about an awful lot of things that you can't describe in any detail....Farm Price Supports have been around a L-O-N-G time. So has protectionism in all it's forms. Are you sure you don't want to reconsider that statement of yours about 'new Americans'?
Nope. The doctrine that one can get a little something for nothing has been around a very long time. In times past American society realized its foolishness because many members at one point literally died of it. That is why Smith at Jamestown said, 'if one does not work, one does not eat.' And it is why St. Paul had earlier said the same thing. Today, remarkably fewer Americans believe this because it is quite accepted that if some do not work, society has an obligation to feed them. This principle is the driving force behind much of our society and it is absolutely false.
>>> Gee, I wonder if this means you are opposed to inherited wealth (didn't 'work' for it, ya know). Wonder 'what JC would say' about tossing the infirm and the ill over-board?
Yeah, well... I'd start with the commodity crop subsidies, and the sugar price supports and Mohair subsidy, and Helium reserve... and other such market-distorting pork... You can start with the tremendous amounts of taxpayer money being wasted on Christ images in urine if you'd like....
Fine. I'll start with the desecration and you start with crops and together we'll destroy it all. Nevertheless, subsidizing a farmer is altogether different than subsidizing an artist. You can at least eat what the farmer produces and he desecrates nothing.
>>> Sorry guy, I'm NOT with you on that one. Say, $10 Billion vs., what?, $100 Grand? My guess is your little 100 K of subsidized 'art' causes NOTHING of the magnitude of the harm done by misallocating $10 Billion of the citizens money into activities that are not economic... without the artificial stimulus of taxpayer money. Yeah, no contest, not even close.
You can't. It's a fantasy.
It is no fantasy. You merely need do work that I will not do for you.
>>> Yeah, right... whatever you say. When I learn to read your mind I'll get back to you.
There are various forms of 'power'.
Irrelevant here. The sort of power at the crux of this conversation has to do with that which is consolidated in the hands of 1% of the population. It is that power which leftists eagerly attempt to steal and give to those who have not earned it.
>>> Plenty of 'rich people' try to steal that 'power' called money too... (and more than a few of 'em got rich by being so successful at that stealing. LOL!!!!!!!) My point is that, left or right, you've got plenty of people sitting there ready to steal. Get used to it.
I simply pointed out that they suffer no apparent economic disadvantage --- which was ALL I tried to do.
And I pointed out that this is unimpressive since they all do this in the face of extraordinary human oppression.
>>> You contradict yourself here. How can it be 'unimpressive' if the society (and individuals within it) are achieving their relative success 'in the face of extraordinary human oppression.'!!!!!!!!!!!!
Whereas, you, have failed utterly to produce either logic or examples of societies that 'can exist where all the wealth is in 1% of the hands'. You argument must fail for lack of support.
False, because that never was my argument. My argument was this: even were it the case that 100% of the wealth legitimately existed in the hands of only 1% of the population, there would be absolutely nothing wrong about it.http://www.siliconinvestor.com/readmsg.aspx?msgid=19468650 . You've simply forgotten the argument because you have gotten carried away with numbskullian irrelevancies - a typical thing with leftists.
>>> OK, now we're getting somewhere. Now here is my argument: such a society (with all wealth in 1% of the hands) would FAIL (witness your inability to come up with any examples of such a society: it must have many internal contradictions and inherent weaknesses to have never even developed even ONCE in all of history). And it would most likely FAIL VIOLENTLY... either from external conquest, or internal revolution.
>>> If failure and disaster is an inherent feature of such an economic model and distribution of wealth... than I would argue that that particular model represented an 'immoral choice' for human societies --- as revealed by Nature... because the natural world does not allow such a society to esist for long before it declines, collapses, or is otherwise destroyed.
>>> By the way --- on most every objective test of political philosophy I've taken... I test out at smack dead center (or only ever-so-slightly a smidge left of absolute dead center, or smidge to the right) on the typical economic left/right axis... while I also register STRONGLY to the Libertarian side of the Libertarian/Authoritarian axis which measures one's attitudes towards power in human institutions. Obviously you don't care, but I reject your 'leftist' characterization as demonstrably false and illinformed.
No. It is EXCEEDINGLY IMPORTANT to anyone who must live in that society. Total societal failure and collapse is not a fun thing to endure.
And neither is it fun to be murdered in bits. Ultimately, your point dies because it is most irrelevant to my argument.
>>> Like Hell it does. You can't 'wish away' an argument you merely don't want to address.
Small note: you are making an argument about ethics and morality. And, NOWHERE did I EVER say ANYTHING like 'the natural rights of one group must be denied to provide stability to other groups.' You are forming your own debating society of one here....
You initially responded to my argument sir, whether it is moral or otherwise. I am now defending my argument and winning handily because you are lost in your own irrelevant foolishness.
>>> You are still arguing with yourself here... not with anything I ever said. Hope you enjoy arguing with yourself (which one of you should I root for? <G>)
Gee, guy... most people think that when someone DROPS an entire line of argument, because they provide no evidence to support it, nor attempts at logic, that they must be conceding that argument. (Maybe you just forgot it though....)
Nope. It is not I who has forgotten a single sentence. I am still on argument, as I have been from the very beginning. It is you who has forgotten and who has become consistently frozen in stupidity.
>>> Absolutely... and if Wishes were Horses, your Beggars would Ride. LOL!
Yeah, I can't read minds... nor see through mud. My applogies.
No need to read anyone's mind, nor look through any mud. One merely needs average intelligence to address an opponent's position.
>>> <G> If he actually states it , that is....
No... just the plain truth. ALL TAXES are discriminatory... and frequently redistributive in effect.
Discrimination is irrelevant here. It is not the same thing as infringment upon natural rights. I may possess a certain set of rights, but willingly give a portion of them to the state so that with the state I might build a society. That is legitimate and no infringement takes place. It is not legitimate for anyone simply to take rights from others with their consent. That is infringement. Discriminatory taxation is irrelevant.
>>> If you want to come up with a program where YOU can personally choose to affiate yourself with a State and it's regulations, or to not affiliate yourself, and go into exile... well, then, I'm ALL FOR IT. It sounds like a great plan. Tell me when and if you decide that the USA is the country you wish to legally enroll in... or if you have your eyes cast to some other spot on the Globe. (PS - let me know what AGE you'd suggest at which childred or young adults, or whatever, may make their 'affiliation choices' as well... Sounds interesting!)
Maybe... but now you are talking about ALL Democries, and ALL other forms of government as well. What's going to be left to rebuild from if you destroy them all?
Completely irrelevant. The issue of relevance here concerns the persistent theft of human life without consent. In modern life, that theft occurs both directly, in the form of the literal murder of millions upon millions of children, and it occurs indirectly in the form of immoral wealth distribution.
>>> Sorry, the existence (the continued existence ) of human society is not 'irrelevant' to me. Peddle that stuff somewhere else.
Good. Nice answer. Since 'math is the music of the spheres', and the natural language of nature: the next time you profess to "know" what 'natural law' is (presumably because 'Nature' spoke it to you) I would like you to express your arguments in their appropriate and proper language --- so that we may determine their correctness, or their falseness. Speak in Mathematics.
Inappropriate for a variety of reasons.
>>> In other words: you CAN'T... you are BEFUDDLED. (You sing hossanas to this 'music of the spheres', this 'language of nature'... but you are illiterate in it). <G>
>>> It's OK, nothing to be ashamed of... but you will now forgive me if I don't believe you have any direct pipeline into the thinking of Nature and 'Natural Law', and consequently, your 'observations' on the teachings of the Universe may safely be disregarded.
Firstly, the math required to describe all of existence is certainly present as even you by implication have here admitted. But no one yet knows it in its completion.
>>> I didn't ask for all of it... just the least little part!
Secondly, since we use words to convey ideas here, we must employ the sister of mathematics, LOGIC, to get near the symmetry in nature betrayed by both disciplines. That tool, albeit a very rudimentary form of it, I have used here - and rather consistently.
>>> Logic, too, can be expressed formally. Have at it, I'm listening.
Fourthly, even were anyone capable of such a mathematical feat, it would be inapproopriate to perform it here, shutting out so many people, when simple words will do just fine - as I have demonstrated.
>>> R-I-G-H-T.... you don't want to scare off the poor, ill-educated natives here with your fountains of wisdom. I get it.....
No, I certainly don't [believe in murdering kids] nor have I ever said any such thing.
Well. Redefining humanity as you do is a lie that I suspect even you do not yet fully accept. For your own sake, pray you never do.
>>> ?????????? How have I 'redefined humanity'??????????
...Well, duh! Surely you can do much more than say 'we exist'.
I already have. Based upon what we know of ourselves, we know when the complete human organism comes into being as an entity. That is ultimately a mathematical quantity...
>>> See the 'well, duh.. we exist statement above.
and it is highly significant in a moral system with human existence as its basis.
>>> So, your personal morality is relativistic... based upon human forms and norms? ... Not derived from anything greater than our pitiful little species of hairless ape?
And hopefully you see the problem with any morality that does not have existence as its basis (grin).
>>> Yeah, yeah... tree in the forest and all that.
I don't care WHAT base system you employ... all mathematical expressions are testable & verifiable.
Indeed. The expression for all existence is very large and wondrously complex. But we can begin with certain relatively small portions of it and test those. One of these concerns the point at which the human organism comes into space-time as an entity. Even this quantity is far too complex to describe here, but we certainly know it exists and can now point to it. The name for it is - conception.
>>> Sorry, I tend to take what I believe is a longer view... and look to things like speciation events.....
So, if you truly have these grand answers: bring them forth to be tested.
I already have. Many times. The truth is right in front of you - even in your own flesh. This 64.106.143.169 has a definite point of existance in space and time - with us. From the point of its first existence, all else is arbitrary until the process that begins here ceases.
Go ahead and test it if it pleases you (grin).
>>> I looked. Nothing I wasn't already in the know about. As I said: I prefer to look at larger complications, beyond any narrow species-centric focus or mythology.
>>> You are welcome though. |
