Gingrich 'Knows': Paul 'bad choice for America'

Just curious: exactly how many operations has the US launches from its "tactical and strategic" base in Israel?

 

Are you saying that economic growth does not tend to accelerate? I mean, what you saying? Do you reject logic? Show me evidence that economic growth does not tend to accelerate then. Show me a situation where economic growth decelerated over the long term. Do you even know what economic growth is? Do you even care?

No, my position is that economic growth tends to happen so long as people have the freedom to work, produce, and build of a store of capital. The more freedom people have to do these things the greater the growth will be and the more prosperity the people will acquire, all else being equal.

Your argument is that the increasing standard of living over the 20th century disproves free market economics. This is fallacious because we did have some economic freedom during the 20th century. Therefore, we had more growth in prosperity thanks to that. But not thanks to government interferences, which just represented a drag on the growth that was otherwise occurring due to private market actors working and producing.

The reason is because mere "spending" alone does not equate to prosperity. Government tends to spend its resources not on goods and services consumers want but on goods and services government wants. Resources that otherwise would have been invested in things consumers want are instead invested in, for example, bombs and prisons and surveillance cameras.

The government is the competitor of the consumer, as resources as subsumed in satisfying government demands rather than consumer demands. Therefore, consumer demands are less satiated than they would be otherwise were the government not hogging those resources on things the government wanted.

Your argument is that free market economics is disproven by the increasing prosperity in the postwar period. I'm explaining that that is not the case because the increasing prosperity in the postwar period was due to private production and exchange of the kind free market economists advocate.

The measurement in the growth in standard of living over time But growth is improved given an atmosphere of economic liberty. It's not magic; it's production of more goods and services over time. Your characterization of increasing prosperity through production as "magic" if just more proof of your woeful economic ignorance. Why do you pretend you trust science so much, if you don't see why science improves over time?

They created government because they wanted power, of course. Why did people create the Mafia?

Oh no, not Hume or Plato, those Neanderthals.


"Have you ever heard of Plato? Aristotle? Socrates? Morons!"

What is your beef with philosophy? You sound almost resentful of the idea that people consider philosophy a sensible means of seeking truth. As I said before, the scientific method is rooted in the logical deduction of good philosophy. If you reject philosophical logic, you are left with no basis for trusting the scientific method and therefore empirical data, other than "Durp, science good. Men in white lab coats smart."

 

You are throwing a lot of questions out there that are assuming a lot of stuff. I'm saying that economic growth isn't guaranteed. There is no inherent ability for one to continue growth with out suffering setbacks. Economics evolved because of the barriers people faced in improving economic conditions. Whether it be wars, famines, plagues, bank runs, crime, govt, etc.

Your implication is that with out Govt the economic growth would continue... but what economic growth are you talking about? Are you talking about America's economic growth? Or are you talking about the Chinese economic growth after they turn us all in to their slaves since we don't have a military and we still trade gold bars?

Your theory is simply "it would work out", even though it doesn't always work out.

You are making stuff up again. How do you know more "freedom" the greater the growth will be. That is a bold statement that is backed by zero evidence whatsoever.

No, my argument is simply that we have had more growth in the 20th century under a centrally planned sophisticated economy than we did in the 19th century. That's all I'm saying. The burden of proof is on you to explain why our standard of living would be higher right now with your laissez-faire approach to economics. And I'll let you know in advance, you aren't going to be able to actually do it.

Do people not have to build bombs, not have to build prisons, not have to build surveillance cameras? You are not making any sense... productivity is about building things and offering services. If the Govt spends money and people provide goods/services what is the difference between you spending money for goods and services? The people who produce goods in this country do not care who is giving them the money.

Oh my gosh, you have zero clue about economics. The Govt isn't a person, it doesn't purchase food for itself, or purchase weapons for itself. It pays real human beings who purchase real goods and services from other real human beings.

You make so many assumptions that it is ridiculous. I call it "magic" because all you are saying is that things will improve with or with out the Govt. Oh yea, what are you going to do when Japan or Germany want to take your resources? What are you going to do when we run in to a plutocracy? You have no solutions, your only theory is that things will work out. Such an intelligent theory, lol.

This is another thing you are making up. Not all Govts are created by thugs who want power.

I don't have any problems with philosophy. I have a problem with people passing off philosophy as economics.

 

Show me that standard of living was higher in 1750, before the Industrial Revolution, than it was in 1900, after it.

Your argument appears to be (a) the 19th century economy was primarily one of statism rather than liberty (b) and therefore standard of living declined. I don't think that's true historically, but if it is--if I gave you the historical interpretation on both those points--it would only prove my point that free markets lead to prosperity while statism leads to impoverishment. Your historical claims, if they are true, only back up my point.

Increased standard of living data is the most relevant, I agree. But once again, increased standard of living, for rich, poor, and middle, is best brought about by economic liberty.

Again, very true (though I disagree that majority consensus does not mean it was imposed by force on the majority). I was addressing why, despite all this, standard of living nonetheless rose during the period. The reason was the limited economic freedom remaining in the system, hindered and truncated though it was.

Economic growth is not inevitable, but it is generally the case because, generally speaking, people are allowed to work and produce and improve things to some extent. Thus, even during periods on rather massive statism, there is some growth, albeit far more limited than would have been the case otherwise. There are cases when that the state has been so incredibly massive that the economy actually shrunk under them, but it's rare. I'm not convinced that it even happened in the "Dark Ages." 90% of the population on those times were peasants, and I've seen no evidence that their standard of living declined at that time. If so, it would have been because the Roman state had destroyed the economy to an unusually severe extent.

Unfortunately, there seems to be little attempt to control for confounding variables and more greater attempt to use questionable statistics as an ideological battering ram, as with the GDP issue. GDP is a spurious statistic, yet it is continually used and, worse, painted as "scientific." Observational studies can be useful, but they should not be given the same weight as repeated, controlled experiments.

Furthermore, there are times when logical deduction, i.e. "theory" or "philosophy" is required. Take the question question of whether the Great Depression was exacerbated by Roosevelt's economic policies or not. Since we can't see what would have happened had he done something else, we can't know and, therefore, need to apply rationalistic deduction to see what is the must logical answer.

Saying that economies tend to grow is not saying that they always grow at every moment. I fully admit there are cases where they shrink, as under extreme statism, war, or perhaps some devastating natural disaster. I don't know that that's the case with "dark ages," which are only called dark because we don't know much about them and that may be because the aristocratic minority was poorer and therefore not writing as much.

I also don't know what you mean by "destructive economic activity." Do you mean acquiring resources by conquest? That is destructive, though I wouldn't define it as economic activity.

No, it is not, assuming the property was acquired through just means. I reject the "democratic" argument that left-wingers use to justify fearing corporations more than governments with million-man armies. Your "voice" in government is so minuscule it is totally irrelevant; you have more chance of dying on your way to the voting booth than swinging a major election. And you do have a voice in business decisions by voting with your dollars, which is the basis of all decisions made by merchants in the marketplace. More importantly, you are not forced to do business with merchants in a free market, whereas the state--democratic or not--imposed itself on you through violent conquest.

 

Neither of these two buttholes have a chance of two :fart in a hurricane.

 

There is no end to idiots ......F-ing (F for Fig) amazing.

 

Nope.

Only idiots will vote for the Political Idiot Ron Paul.

 

Which is nothing more than typical right-libertarian cowardice, hiding behind the government they claim to hate. As always, their plan for liberation involves being ruled by a government, they just prefer to call their government the court system.

And frankly, if you weaken the government so far there's nothing but law enforcement, the corporations will just steamroll the sheriff and do what they want anyway. It's laughable to think that law enforcement in a minarchist state would be sufficiently powerful to counter a multinational corporation, many of which wield power greater than a fair number of industrialized governments today. You think the local sheriff is going to put up that much of a fight? Yeah, you'll find out what forcible taxation feels like, when the manager of the local Wal-Mart decides to become the feudal lord of your town.

Yeah, they can't legally, so long as the government is strong enough to actually enforce its laws. If you starve the government to the point that it can't put up a fight against corporations, what on earth do you think will protect you? The force of righteousness and justice? Any government strong enough to take on these corporations is strong enough to seize your crap, and will require you to pay taxes to support it.

Breaking the government before you break corporations is a dumb, dumb idea.

 

I have to agree with Gingrich, but for different reasons. Ron Paul is too close-minded and intransigent to be President. I know for forum members this is hard to comprehend, but the majority of Americans are moderates. We want compromise. We want bipartisanship. Ron Paul would provide niether of these qualities.

 

And where do you stand exactly?

 

First, The Political idiot Ron Paul doesn't even have a dog's in hell of getting the nomination.......EVERYONE with a nanogram of a brain KNOWS that.

Second: WHY are ALL the certified Islamist Swine posting in a desperate, almost hysterical manner, their support for the Political Idiot Ron Paul ?????

Third, there are approx 1,400,000+ Military on active duty (2010). Confirm by Googling.

Stats: The contributions received by the Political Idiot Ron Paul (using stats provided by your link) was:

US Army $24,503
US Air Force $23,335
US Navy $17,432

That's $65,270.

One way of looking at it: $65,270/ 1,400,000 = .05 !

That's to say, each one of the military contributed a nickel to The Political Idiot Ron Paul's coffers.

Another way of looking at it: $65,270/1400 = 0.47 !

ONE outa 1400 of the military contributed less tha 1/2 a buck to the Political Idiot Ron Paul ......hardly something to rhapsodize about and conclude that the Political Idiot Ron Paul has "overwhelming military support".

And, that's understandable. Naturally, every category of voters have their weirdos & kooks. However, the OVERWHELMING NUMBER of the Military wouldn't support the Political Idiot Ron Paul who has a predilection of kissing the butts of our ENEMY: The Islamist Swine that killed 4500+, and wounded 33,000 of our Finest in Iraq.

Oh.....it's true that the OwebamaCRAPSTER gets less support from the Military. But, then why would anyone in their right mind contribute to the Monumental Mendacious Fraud, Commie/Socialist, Racist Charlatan Obozo.

Normally, I don't waste too much of my time on Islamist Swine, and/or their supporters the Liberal Idiots ........however, the above information is not for them.....there isn't ANYTHING.....even IRREFUTABLE FACTS that would convince this human garbage of the REALITY.

This info is for the rational posters.

 

I think you're misunderstanding me here. I'm not saying economic growth is guaranteed. I'm saying it a tendency in human society. Yes, it can be hindered or even reserved due to wars or plagues. But in any society that is orderly enough for people to continue to produce and store new goods, that economy will grow as they do so. Therefore, it is a non sequitur to say 20th century economic growth disproves the free market. It would be a highly unusual circumstance if the 20th century economy did not grow, requiring wars or tyrannies far more oppressive than even the ones the 20th century saw.

Why is it that, after thousands of years of low economic growth, the laissez-faire 19th century suddenly saw economic growth magnitudes higher that at any time previously? Thousands and thousands of years of slow growth under empire, under feudalism, under mercantilism and absolute monarchy. Then we get a relatively laissez-faire free market in the late 18th century and, all of sudden, we boom up to a whole new level of civilization, unseen since the agricultural revolution ten thousand years ago.

I consider that pretty strong evidence, on top of the fact that it is simply logical that people will become most prosperous when you give them the freedom to produce, trade, and consume as they please and don't meddle in peaceful economic decisions.

First of all, the American economic is not nearly as "centrally planned" as it might be. It's a "mixed economy." Secondly, again, this economy is built upon the Industrial Revolution of the 19th century. You couldn't have 20th century standard of living without 19th century economic production upon which to build it. That's the foundation. In fact, the 1880s was possibly the decade of the greatest acceleration of economic growth in American history.

But what if those people are producing useless goods and services? You could hire everyone to dig ditches and fill them back up, give them all fat paychecks, and call it prosperity. But they'd all actually grow poorer and poorer because there would be nothing useful on the shelves for the money to buy. Prosperity is not based on "having jobs" or "making money" and it's certainly not based on spending. It's based on producing goods and services people actually need and want. Everyone could have a job and make money and be starving if there's no food to buy because people aren't growing it because they're too busy digging ditches.

Germany or Japan ? Now you are just being silly. We are not even talking about national defense (against external governments); we're talking about economic policy. I don't think you need a monopolistic state to protect you against aggressors, but even if I give you that, that doesn't justify abandoning free market economics for top-down regimentation and central planning. And what do you mean by "plutocracy"? Rich people running around isn't plutocracy. If it means something involving force or fraud, well, that's prohibited in a free market too.

Oh, of course they are. But that's another story.

And I have a problem with people passing off economics as a natural science. Economics is a study of human action and for that you need to a analyze human nature, which you can't do through statistics alone.

 

For who? There's not one standard of living, there's many standards of living, for people at various social levels and in different countries. The plight of workers in Russia was very different than, say, the plight of workers in France, or the United States. I'm not denying that the elites, the owners of capital and the controllers of states definitely saw an improvement in their quality of life. I'll give you some debate about the poor, who didn't materially gain much from the industrial revolution, and saw a sharp reduction in their standard of living in many countries. Are we talking about a poor Frenchman, or a wealthy American, or who?

I also object to your extension of the discussion to a 150 year period. By 1900, labor organizations had already secured many victories to establish better futures for themselves. After that, things got a lot better for the lower classes. There wasn't a whole lot of difference between being a peasant in 1793 and being a peasant in 1843, but there was a massive difference between 1843 and 1903--and almost all of that had to do with unionization finally forcing the owners of capital to distribute some of those material benefits to their workers. Let's pick a more reasonable time frame. Pick a 50 year period that you feel adequately represents the industrial revolution in the country you'd like to discuss.

My argument is that the standard of living for wealthy people went up, the standard of living for the middle class fell, and the standard of living for the unskilled poor was about the same. My argument is further that this condition changed once labor organization forced concessions and better working conditions out of the owners of capital. This transition happened in the last quarter of the 19th century, though early efforts started in the 1830s and 1840, depending on the country.

Not even remotely. The American and English capitalists in the 1840s felt that the "free market" was best expressed by private ownership of the means of production, which in turn led to private ownership of the instruments of the state, which was used to enact social codes to suppress the workers. It wasn't until the 1880s or so that the modern idea of laissez faire economics--the free market that is presently discussed--came about... primarily because labor organizations had built up political power and were using it to force companies to pay their workers better.

Point in fact, it was that very political change that led to the increased standard of living for the lower and middle classes in the US and Britain in the last quarter of the 19th century and first quarter of the 20th. What differed here was not some transformation in the degree of state control... what changed was the nature of the state and how it interfered in the economy. In the beginning of the industrial revolution, the state was a tool of the wealthy people to maintain their dominance. At the traditionally defined end of the industrial revolution in the US and Britain, the state had become an instrument of social reform to advance the status and material circumstances of the lower and middle classes.

You're trying to make an argument that somehow the state became more and less intrusive, when really all that happened was that it intruded for different reasons and by different means according to the changing political fortunes of the poor. And their circumstances were improved not by mechanized industry, nor even by urbanization--their circumstances changed because, in their common misery, they saw the necessity of standing together and developing political power. It wasn't the output of the factories that bettered their condition--what bettered their condition was the improvement in their political and social power that came from union organization.

It's brought about by social power, nothing more and nothing less. Economic equality is one path to social power, but it is not the only path, as demonstrated by the labor movement. One tends to follow the other, however.

I guess it depends on how you measure standard of living. I would say to you that per capita GDP is a pathetic measure of the standard of living because that does not show the inequalities in the distribution of that product. If all of the GDP growth goes to the 5% of people on the top, that doesn't better the lives of the people on the bottom at all. A big part of the problem of analyzing this issue is that no one kept very good demographic records during the 19th century. They were lucky to even get a head count correct, and offer little or nothing about income data, social mobility measurements, literacy rates, etc.

A lot of people just kind of assume that things must have been better for them because goods became cheaper and there was a fair amount of economic growth, but we don't really have much good data about changes in income by social class. The first hand records of the people who lived over that period paint a pretty dim picture of how the industrial revolution impacted the poor, and quite a few of them noted (especially people in the textile industry) that they were worse off for the development of mechanized industry. The case of the textile workers is particularly interesting because it was really the first industry that got extensively and quickly mechanized, so the impact was a bit more pronounced, dramatic, and recorded. Later tragedies were scarcely noted except to point out that some industries were failing and that people had to move. It's hard to really come up with a "modern" example because the modern examples have usually been unskilled industries yielding to more advanced unskilled industries, or unskilled labor giving way to skilled labor and greater mechanization. We haven't had something equivalent to a textile manufacturer's guild in at least a century, so it's not really within our context. Those were middle class people in the 18th century, and they were basically wiped out by 1840. Sure, yes, mechanization did yield a lot more productive output, and certainly the price of cloth fell... but it did have a human cost in the form of the formerly well-off people forced to give their jobs up to any unskilled bum off the street.

If the industrial revolution had been accompanied by meaningful socialist reforms, then we could have had the growth and the human benefits both. Or, at least, with fewer people left behind.

The real story of the industrial revolution and its impact on the standard of living is much more complicated than some story of heroic factory owners valiantly developing an economy and making lots of money, or some simplistic tale of how freedom was converted to statism, or the reverse. There a lot of very personal stories about it, if you look past the works published by the wealthy at the time. Was it worth it? Yeah. Could it have been done with a lot less human suffering? No doubt. What was responsible for most of the suffering? Capitalism.

That, I think, is the fundamental problem with capitalism. People are 'allowed' to work, rather than entitled to do so. People must pay for the privilege of being allowed to work... for someone else. That's the nature of profit, and the tragedy of capital.

That's arguing from mouth and ass at the same time. Earlier you acknowledged that early 19th century Britain was very "statist" (because you wanted to make some dig about how you thought I was making your point), but here you're arguing that it wasn't. Because surely you would not disagree that the first half of the 19th century was a time of tremendous, bountiful growth for Britain? I would say to you that levels of statism are irrelevant. Because I think you will have trouble finding any period of the Industrial Revolution where there was not what you would term excessive degrees of statism. In fact, I challenge you to find any period of US or British history post 1800 where there was a period of tremendous economic growth combined with a low level of "statism".

Statism turns out to be the fastest way to grow, but it has tremendous social costs. In contrast, the socialist model is less socially destructive, but yields somewhat slower growth. That, I would suggest, is a better path in the long run. What's the point in economic growth if you never get to enjoy it?

<continued>

 

Yeah, that was a period where the states were in decline. Europe only started to come out of the dark ages once some kingdoms consolidated enough power to establish internal security and productive regimes under feudalism. There are really two options for long-term workable economic systems--statism (as feudalism, capitalism, state capitalism, totalitarianism, etc), or socialism (anarcho-syndicalism, libertarian federalism, etc). Take your pick. You either remove concentrations of power in society (socialism), or you embrace them (because they'll embrace you if you don't). There can be no middle ground here, because if power becomes concentrated, it will only consolidate, in one form or another.

The pitiful view that conflates growth of authority with the decline of economic performance is wholly, utterly inadequate to explain so many episodes of history. It cannot explain why, in the absence of authority, Europe did not flourish during the dark ages, nor can it explain why, despite historically unprecedented authority, the United States experienced historically unprecedented growth in the postwar period.

You "saw no evidence"? I guess you just didn't bother to study it? You don't consider marauding bands of murderers swarming through the countryside to be evidence of a decline of the standard of living? Perpetual famine and disease? Rotating leadership sometimes from year to year? Peasants in the Europe during the dark ages had a standard of living well below slaves in the Roman Empire hundreds of years before. They might as well have been on a different planet if you compare their circumstances to their fellows in the Byzantine Empire, their fellows in the Arabic world, etc. They suffered as much because of the social and political collapse of the Roman Empire as they did from the economic decline. Their causes may have been linked, but that does not change the fact that regular hordes of soldiers burning your town to the ground is profoundly worse than a debased currency.

GDP is a useful measurement... just not useful for the purposes most people tend to use it for. It's not a measurement of national prosperity, just a measure of economic activity.

Yeah, totally useless. An Austrian will come to a totally different "logical" conclusion than a Keynesian, who will also have a logical conclusion. Using logic and philosophy to understand economics is pretty much an example of an intellectual circle-jerk, because you'll only confirm your own preconceptions, and you'll use like-minded fellows to reinforce that view. Logic is all about the assumptions, and if the assumptions have no relationship with reality (like the idea that state intervention inherently damages an economy), your nice logical argument will not explain reality.

All human beings have silver skin
Joe is a human being
Therefore, Joe has silver skin.

That's a fine logical statement from a formal logic standpoint. Does it have any bearing on reality? No. Because the initial assumption about human skin composition was wrong. In the same way, your faulty economic assumptions might yield some formally correct logical arguments... that also have nothing to do with reality. Observations of similar events and situations can yield useful insight to allow us to formulate more accurate assumptions... but you'll find few examples of that in economic studies.

If you acknowledge that uncer certain conditions, economies can shrink, you cannot establish a tendency to grow. At best you can say that "compared to the past, the present economy is larger;" or, perhaps "historically speaking, human societies have tended to make the correct economic decisions." Saying flat out that economics means growth is silly and unjustified.

Paying people to go around breaking windows, paying people to go make weapons you never use, arranging for people to destroy arable farmland, that sort of thing. And sure, conquest is definitely an economic activity. Soldiers get paid, after all, and conquest is usually done in order to secure resources for further economic exploitation. Pretty much anything involving an exchange of resources is an economic activity.

Yet it is still more say than I have in a private corporation's decisions. And, if I convince enough of my fellows that my way is best, we can collectively have enough of a voice to make a change. No matter how many of complain, the corporation will do what it wants, because even collectively we have no power over it.

You can have any master you want, so long as you have a master. Yes, I've pointed that out several times. "Voting with your dollars" is no power at all. Your threat not to shop at wal-mart has no impact whatsoever on wal-mart corporate decisionmaking. Less than a vote at the booth, in fact. Literally no impact, because they will not even bother to read it. At least they count the votes at the polls before they add what they need to win.

I'm forced to do business with someone, even if I can choose who I would prefer to have screw me. I don't see this as a meaningful choice, when all of them will still screw the customer in the end. All of them are trying to steal from the customer, all of them are trying to exploit their workers. That's the nature of profit.

 

If it makes you feel any better, as a market anarchist, I oppose statist law enforcement too. I think your fear of "corporations" is silly. What's a corporation anyway? Does a corporation have a million man army? Does it have a thousand nukes? Most importantly at all, has the vast majority of the populace wrongly bought into the idea that a corporation has the rightful authority to initiate violence against others. Because that is the only way any institution can achieve true tyranny: if the vast bulk of the people go along with it, if only passively.

Right now, the above is true of no corporations, only states. You could speculate that, in the absence of states filling the power vacuum, some firm might acquire armies and nukes and the passive acceptance of its dominance of the people. But then the firm would simply be a new state under a different title. Which means we'd just be back to where we are now: a world dominated by states. The most that might show is that a stateless society is unsustainable or at least difficult to sustain. But it wouldn't make things worse.

Of course, you'll say, "Well, but the states created by the firms wouldn't be democratic." That may or may not be true, but it really doesn't matter to me, since I give virtually no credence to democracy. Mostly, I consider it a pernicious people-management scheme invented by the ruling class to dupe us into thinking we are free, once they realized we no longer bought the "divine right of kings" line.

In fact, it can easily be argued that democracy further entrenches the slave system by deceiving most of the slaves. Just look at you, for example. Your trust the "democracy" given to you by your masters has disarmed you from putting up any kind of substantive resistance to them. Instead, you'll be satisfied to vote for Slavemaster A over Slavemaster B once every few years and reserve your resentment for Wal-Mart's low, low prices. No one makes a better slave than the slave who thinks he's free.

 

They could, easily, if they were allowed to raise armies.

Everyone one of them in the US was produced by a corporation working on contract.

No it's not. Tyranny happens on a much smaller scale when one rich bastard hires a hundred people at above average wages to go make the other thousand people do what he demands. When you break people apart into individual or family units, they're easy to overwhelm. Power is only countered in groups, not by the individual. Even small institutions can take down the individual.

It doesn't take a million man army to be tyrannical, and one nuke is sufficient to hold an entire city hostage to your whim.

Yes, so why let them survive? It will just be the seeds of more authority. There's no point in allowing it. Abolish property, solve the problem.

Oh, yes it would, because our current state was established after centuries of struggle to find a balance between authority and trivial liberty. Do you think our country left no bodies on the road to that balance? Maybe it would lead to the same situation again... which means we get to undergo all of that pain again. What's the point? Abolish property, remove the threat.

We do not, and have never had, a democracy. So complaining about the current fascist system is not meaningful in relation to democracy. Democracy can only happen in a socialist society. Democracy does not involve votes for representatives.

 

If you want a narrower span of time, the time of great economic growth for the US was between about 1800-1900. The so-called "labor movement" wouldn't even have been possible without the Industrial Revolution in the first place. Nor would any of the subsequent produce have been possible without the innovation and increased store of capital caused by the Industrial Revolution. Without it, we'd still be subsistence peasants. I don't know if you're really asserting that Industrial Revolution was needless in terms of creating more prosperity, but if so you are living in Cloud Cuckooland. I guess all those new factories were producing worthless junk no one wanted.

The state has never intervened to improve the lot of the poor. It's never been controlled by the poor. It can never be controlled by the poor, because whichever poor controlled it would become rich and no longer be the poor; they'd then turn around and make everyone else poor. Sometimes the state throws the poor a little bread and circuses to keep them from revolting, which it did before the Industrial Revolution as well.

In America, the federal government's economic power did expand to some degree starting around the Civil War, when it started subsidizing the railroads and created a quasi central banking system. It created the ICC to "regulate" the railroads. In the early 20th century it created the FDA, the income tax, and the Federal Reserve. All of these did, of course, benefit special interests.

Where did all the goods the factories produced go, down a tunnel?

What is social power? Why do you socialists love these vague, fuzzy, undefined terms? I'm sure tribal chief in the Paleolithic had lots of social power, but I'd still rather be a slum-dweller in 2011 than a tribal chief in 40,000 BC. Why? Economic development.

You say cloth prices fell because of mechanization, which undoubtedly benefited everyone. But, you say, it was offset because the privileged guild member had to give up his job to a bum. Well, that may have been unfortunate for the guild member, but it was beneficial for the bum, who was apparently more competitive. I'm supposed to weep because the Industrial Revolution destroyed guild cartels that used violence to shut out competition and artificially inflate the earnings of their inefficient members, in favor of rewarding more competitive laborers? I consider that a blessing.

To say someone is entitled to work is to say that someone else should be forced to provide him with a job. Sorry, no one should be forced to provide anyone with a job. The only thing you're entitled to is your own person and labor.

You said it was very statist and that that hindered the standard of living, and I saw no reason to argue, when you were giving me the key point: that statism hinders standard of living. Personally, I think the 19th century was very statist. Every period has been far too statist for me. However, relatively speaking it was significantly less statist than what came before or after. There was at least some attempt to allow economic competition, by killing the guilds, establishing some degree of international free trade. It was very far from perfect, but that is all relative.

First you say that the problem is "concentrations of power" and then you say that the problem is not "growth of authority." I don't see the difference between one and the other. As for the "Dark Ages," they were the direct cause of the Roman Empire, which was a huge authority/concentration-of-power and which destroyed its own economy. As for postwar growth, again, postwar America still had a relatively free economy and it was building on previous production due to past generations of a relatively free economy.

This sounds like a way for you to avoid addressing logical arguments you can't refute. Such as the logical argument that an enforced guild or union--i.e. a labor cartel--will (a) restrict jobs to members, benefiting them while harming all other laborers and (b) raise the price of labor, thereby hurting consumers. Therefore, such cartels benefit their own members even as they harm everyone else. This is a logical argument that requires no data. Can you refute it logically? If so, do so. If your only response, is to say "data needed," I find that every unconvincing since I already find the logical argument convincing enough on its own.

That is just totally wrong. Businesses change their policies all the time in response to consumer demand, boycotts, etc. Why do you think McDonald's got rid of Styrofoam containers and beef tallow fries? Of course, I wish they'd go back. In fact, every decision by a business is made in response to what they think consumers want will give them more money for.

As for the state, the state can use force to get what it wants. All states are oligarchies and largely unaccountable to anyone, and even if such a thing as democracy could exist, it would just be tyranny of the majority and equally as horrible as oligarchy. Because the horror of the state isn't who controls it or how many control it or whether it works for poor people or rich people. The horror of the state is that it uses violence to achieve its ends.

You don't have to trade with anyone; you can be a hermit if you really believe everyone you might trade with is trying to "screw you." I don't see acts of trade that way. Unless fraud is involved, each party tries to obtain the best deal on an equal footing. Profit is another socialist "boo!" word; it's just the return to the owner of the capital goods after expenses.

Of course, I know you don't believe in property in the first place. Property is legitimate as long as it is acquired through one's labor. Being the great supporter of labor that I am I believe that everyone has a right to own the produce of that labor and that I term property.

 

There is a very important difference between socially acceptable violence and violence that the individuals of the society, in general, condemn. Although both are evil, the former is far more dangerous. The former is where you get human sacrifice, serfdom, slavery, and states, all of which were/are normalized in certain societies. If they weren't, they would not have entrenched themselves to the degree they did.

Property is the fruit of one's labor. Why are you anti-labor, sir?

What does it involve? If it involves a majority group imposing it's will violently on a minority group, I want no part of it.

 

We fear corporations because are totalitarian. Corporations are not democratic. Are greedy. A corporation are small dictatorships or not so small. There are corporations with more money than the PIB of many countries.

Corporations are dangerous because there is no control of them. People would be slaved to them. In definitive, if we finally live in an anarchocapitalist, that is not anarchism, is pure brutal "liberalism", we would have a total slave society. With no freedom, only corporations would be free. And probably that would be a chaos, because corporations would fight for power, and people would be under the umbrella of a corporation or other. Instead of dictatorships of governments, we would have the dictatorship of the corporations and they would rule.

Sorry, but anarchocapitalism is impossible, and only leads to a chaotic world where the corporations rule.

 

Well, there you go again, with the same old boilerplate about "corporations" and "democracy" and "greedy." Why not through "profit" and "exploitation" in there too complete the barrage of empty buzzwords. It's really very simple. It's all a question of justice. Property is justly acquired as the fruit of one's labor. Once one has the property, one justly has absolute dominion over that piece of property to use it, trade it, invest it, rent it, form contractual groups with others using it, whatever. That is just, and anything else is unjust. End of story.

P.S. Outcomes are irrelevant in matters of deontology.

 

No. First property is not adquired by labour. That would be true in the anarchocommunism, not in the anarchocapitalism.

If I have money I can buy whatever I want. Even if I've not done anything, inherited.

And in anarchocapitalism justice doesn't exist. If I have power, I can do everything, and power is money in anarchocapitalism. If I don't have money I am a pariah without anyting.

And that system is not just. I don't have any right on land. Because the land is not mine. Property like said Proudhon is theft.

And, is not just a system where I can have slaves, you said that. People working for me. That brings to many injustices, inferior levels. And that creates a dictatorship where the owner is the dictator, and the rest must believe me. If they don't believe me, they won't eat, they won't have my protection... We go back to the Feudalism. That is neofeudalism.

 

Yeah, and left to their own devices, the owners of property will always build up ideas of "socially acceptable violence", and those ideas will be strangely self-serving.

No, it's not. Property is a claim of ownership over what rightly belongs to the community--it is a claim over someone else's labor. How can you 'own' something, except by denying it to others? Proper, just ownership extends no further than what you yourself can protect, which absent concentrations of power pretty much ends up being yourself and the things you carry with you.

Property has no purpose other than restricting the ability for others to engage in labor. "I own this iron ore, so pay me usury or you can't make steel with it." "I own this bolt of cloth, so pay me usury or you can't make clothes with it." "I own this land, so you can't stand there and work unless you pay me usury." The essence of property is the control it grants over the actions of others; namely your ability to restrict their labor.

Democracy is self-management; it is "government" (and I use the term loosely, because there is no better word) by true consensus where no one has the power to make another person act, or deny them the right to act.

 

See, you obviously don't understand the difference between right wing libertarian and left wing anarchy. Libertarians in America don't hate the government, we hate the size of government. The size of government that has gone WAY past the constitution. The government that has become so lazy they don't declare war, they just send troops to attack 3rd world countries, then feel so bad that we attacked that they stay there for 8 more years throwing money into a burn pit.

There is no cowardice by having the cops or the law that the LOCAL (not federal) government to stop the criminals from trying to force someone off their land. Only the left wing anarchist would hate the law, and all forms of government. The Libertarian knows there needs to be some form of government, and law, and respects those institutions as long as they stay within the bounds of the constitution of the state, or ferderal government.

If you think that, what do you think keeps corporations inline right now? Law enforcement isn't just for the people, it stops corporations and companies from forcing you off your land. Do you really thinks all corporations act like the Sapranos? Talk about a tin foil hat.

And what does Obamacare, welfare, social security, medicaide, medicare funding have to do with the strength of the government? Again, you fail to realize that libertarians aren't for haveing a one cop towns, we are for liberty. If a corporation is forcing people off their land, that is not liberty and there would be a police force or some form of law that kept them from taking liberty from the people. Government is there to ensure liberty, not dictate which liberties you will have as it does right now.

Getting rid of the department of education at the federal level will hinder the governments power to keeping corporations from taking citizens liberties away? Your tin foil that makes you think corporations are some big network of mutlinational mafia that says "pay us or we break your legs" might just be made with lead.

 

Most Americans cant understand that compromising and taking 50% of failing policies is STILL FAILING. Ron can do a lot on his own, once the American people see the progress he would make, they would be hounding the congress people to side with Ron.

 

Ron Paul is the only candidate with strong Independent and disaffected Democrat support. That's a pretty good start towards bi-partisanship. If he were to be elected, it could be seen as a true People's mandate rather than just a partisan victory.

As for being intransigent, ALL our national politicians should be working within the framework of their oaths of office, which is to preserve the Constitution. If that parameter was respected, we wouldn't be in such the mess we're in now in the first place.

Here's a good illustration of the bi-partisanship that could be achieved with a Ron Paul presidency.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dE7MHgZ7kPo"]Freedom Watch: Judge Napolitano Interviews Ron Paul &amp; Ralph Nader Together - YouTube[/ame]