Why I am not Voting Obama

I believe you may be arguing the point on a too abstract plane. One principle of our legal system is that the only actions that can be prohibited by government are those that are specifically named in advance under democratically established laws, and then only in areas specified in the eneumerated powers of the Federal government. We have gone a long way past that…

… and nowhere in our constitution is government given the power to ensure that all actions by its citizens are subject to anything so broad as the fairness doctrine you suggest. Indeed such a doctrine arguably opens the door to almost any action on the part of government, much as Lenin rationalized the "elimination of the irreconcilables" in his pursuit of a socialist paradise which he imagined would benefit everyone. Sadly, after the slaughter of tens of millions only poverty and tyranny resulted. I believe a central lesson of human history is that such discretion on the part of any ruling power almost always results in death and tyranny. The outcome may have an element of fairness, in that nearly everyone suffers equally, but I doubt that you would find it attractive.

"Fairness" is a vague and easily distorted concept, and ensuring such fairness for such a heterogenious species as human beings requires god like powers of which human society is incapable.

Moreover experience teaches us that even the attempt to achieve equal outcomes for people corrupts the group, lowers production and impoverishes everyone. Such doctrines appear to be incompatible with human nature as it really is.

that experience to date consistently revealed that without him the supply of them would be very quickly reduced for all.

I am looking for a better world…a fairer world. Not sure how to get there, but I suspect that in a society as complex as ours, the need for regulation (the need of individuals to give up individual freedoms for the greater good) is very important…and will become more and more important as time goes by. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one.

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that experience to date consistently revealed that without him the supply of them would be very quickly reduced for all.

Sure, because capitalism doesn't work at all. No one would step in and take their place because capitalism is a dead end.



C'mon george, you can do better than that.

There's a lot of real evidence out there affirming the notion that freedom and its side effects work far better both for individuals and the organized mass of humanity than the attempts at organized perfection by authoritarian reformers of any stripe - however well intended they imagine themselves to be at the start. In this area we may have a very fundamental disagreement.

I don’t think we are better off now than we were back in the 50’s when the politics and mentality was much, much more liberal than now.............
..........
In view of that highly relevant and recent history, it seems to me that you have a very substantial burden of proof in advancing this remarkable idea, one that you haven't yet begun to meet.

You know the author!

....Default would also be a good thing, he argues since government would be forced to renege on its social security and Medicare promises.

The best way to alleviate future suffering is to repeatedly and emphatically warn the American people that these programs will go under...

It seems to me, however, that for the last forty plus years, conservatives and conservative doctrine has pretty much had its way in America. Conservatives brag about being conservatives…conservative politicians proclaim their conservatism—while liberals damn nears apologize for being liberals and liberal politicians shun the word “liberal” as if it were the plague. Conservatives and conservative thinking have driven the American vehicle for over forty years.

I don’t think we are better off now than we were back in the 50’s when the politics and mentality was much, much more liberal than now. I think you are over estimating the positive influences of conservative thinking and under estimating the positive influences of progressive (!) thinking.

In light of all that, allow me to qu0te the words of a very wise man, whose thoughts you might want to consider:

In view of that highly relevant and recent history, it seems to me that you have a very substantial burden of proof in advancing this remarkable idea, one that you haven't yet begun to meet.

You know the author!

If, for example, you were arguing that for 40 or so years we have foolishly obsessed on controlling the affairs of other nations and peoples in a distorted view of "national security, and have wasted great resources in the process, and that too was an element of the "conservatism" you were addressing , I would willingly agree. I would also point out that various of these foolish actions enjoyed substantial political support from many who label themselves as "liberal" as well.

You have not proved that the recession we just experienced (or the many others that preceeded it) were predictable at all - even despite the obvious historical fact that they were NOT convincingly predicted by anyone at the time.

I don't know the author and I don't care about literature; I do know the numbers and they are scary. The '50s btw were not more liberal than now, they were far, far, more fiscally conservative - to see this, think that they were the last decade to show a federal budget surplus.

Anyone who knows the numbers also knows we're not far from a Greek-style default.

The author was George himself!

The problem here is that the labels "conservative" and "liberal" both represent very poorly specified contending positions and proposals over a very broad array of specific issues. If, for example, you were arguing that for 40 or so years we have foolishly obsessed on controlling the affairs of other nations and peoples in a distorted view of "national security, and have wasted great resources in the process, and that too was an element of the "conservatism" you were addressing , I would willingly agree. I would also point out that various of these foolish actions enjoyed substantial political support from many who label themselves as "liberal" as well.

I note and appreciate your turning of my words to your service in this matter, but believe that on the narrow matter of individual freedom and organized attempts to organize the perfection of human society , we have a fundamental disagreement.

... but I think we are headed into the toilet.

Hasn't that been the way of history, Frank, for all those nations filled with hubris, the ones that have plundered and murdered their way to wealth and success?

Isn't the toilet really too good an end for such a country?

I think if the experiment that is America succeeds...I suspect the entire world will be beneficiary, because true success is exportable.

What America is trying to export right now...is bullshit...and we are trying to cram it down everyone's throats--which is never a good idea.

I am not rooting for America to go into the toilet...I want it very much to succeed.

It's a pretty specious argument to keep up this long standing charade, Frank. America has never exported anything but death and destruction. Its sole purpose for existing is to shift wealth and power into the hands of a tiny, select group of Americans.

This is the very charade I mentioned. What the US is doing now, I suspect you mean Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran, is no different than what America has been doing forever.

I too want it to succeed, but I want it to do so in the same manner that, say, a Sweden or a Denmark, [and other countries] do, by not relying on plundering the wealth of the world's poor.

Not only do those countries not plunder others wealth, they spend considerable sums of their own money helping the world's poor - you know real foreign aid instead of another plan to advance their own business interests.

Beware of a phrase like “Its SOLE purpose for existing…” because you not only invite a charge of hyperbole…you actually concede the argument by doing so.

jtt:
This is the very charade I mentioned. What the US is doing now, I suspect you mean Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran, is no different than what America has been doing forever.

Frank A: Same comment re: hyperbole.

We have lots of problems and even more faults, JTT. Identifying them is the easy part. Coming up with workable solutions for those problems and faults that have some chance of being instituted is another thing altogether.

One would think the obvious thing for you to do, Frank, is to illustrate that the phrase in question is not true. Instead you go to this old trick. What's next, the troll routine, maybe Beth's favorite - "you're off topic"?

It's a pretty specious argument to keep up this long standing charade, Frank. America has never exported anything but death and destruction. Its sole purpose for existing is to shift wealth and power into the hands of a tiny, select group of Americans.