The Right Wing’s New Election Boogeyman

Yeah. And in the second round your first round vote gets cancelled and you get to vote again. In your case, for the same candidate.
Stop pretending that this gives anyone two or more votes. It doesn’t. It gives every person a single vote in each round of voting. The allocation of each person’s vote to a specific candidate will be determined in each round. It might change or it might not, but it’s one vote per person in each round.

 

I'm prepared to bet that a politician who served in the US Senate from 1973 to 2009 and served as the Vice President of the United States from 2009 through 2017, involved in the highest affairs of state, not to forget the fortitude of surviving all the tragedies his family went through, is likely to be WAAAAAAAAAY more intelligent and more accomplished both personally and professionally, than those who call him an idiot.

 

There's nothing inefficient about it. A large number of well-established democracies proceed this way, with two rounds, first all candidates, then 2 to 4 weeks later, the top two face off.

 

It is true that some other countries do that - but that does not make it efficient. It is, in fact, quite inefficient.

I really don't see what is so complicated or objectionable about ranking your choices. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 etc.
One possibility is what you say - top two face off against each other. So drop all of the votes for 3, 4, 5 etc and re allocate them to whoever they have ranked higher amongst 1 and 2.
Alternatively, drop the lowest candidate in each round and re-allocate. Then drop the lowest again and re-allocate. That is super easy and efficient with ranked voting.

I am not saying that any one method is better or more legitimate than any other method. They all have pros and cons. I object to people who say that one system or another is "unfair". They aren't. They are just different.

 

It's the flying that will catch up with them. DHS can track their movements through the plane passanger manifests.

 

Agreed. But I don't find the two-round system inefficient. It all depends on infrastructure. See Brazil, for example. Despite being a third world country (well, sort of; they've been reclassified as developing nation with emerging economy) they have one of the best electronic voting systems in the world. They have literally millions of those cute voting machines that have microprocessors derived from early PC technology with limited processing and memory. but merely to record who the voter is voting for you don't need a lot of computing power and the old technology is more hacker proof because it is incompatible with most modern things. So those machines of theirs are shielded in 16 different levels from hacking. They report directly to a central computer. So once the polling precincts close at 8 PM literally in minutes the whole country's votes are tabulated and they know the winners down to a very precise count without any mess with mail in ballots (they don't allow those; they have to show up in person to vote - with an official ID, but there aren't really lines due to the efficiency and speed of these voting machines) or any doubts about incorrected filled ballots, no lawyers for parties filing lawsuits and challenging the count, etc.

So, minutes after 8 PM they know who the two top candidates are, and so they campaign again with debates and all, trying to earn the hearts and minds of the people who did not vote for them in the first place and trying to contrast more their different proposals for the country, then 4 weeks later people go back to the machines, and boom, a little after 8 PM they have an elected president.

Sure, they have to do it twice, but the system is so efficient that it isn't really a burden... And they ensure that the candidate that ultimately wins is supported by more than 50% of the voting population, which is good for governability. This also allows them to have a full multi-party system without the risk of someone being elected with 25% of support.

Sure, I have nothing fundamentally against the method of ranking choices, but I like the idea that in Brazil and other countries (like France) the top two candidates are allowed to go back to the votes and plead their cases again, specifically saying what they'd do better than the opponent, instead of, in the first round, having a more diffuse opposition to a high number of varied platforms.

So, the top two candidates will tell the people "I think I'm better qualified than my opponent because on healthcare he proposes this plan X and I have this better plan Y, on the economy I want to do A which is better than the B that he proposes for these specific reasons [listed here]... " etc., in much more detail than what they were able to convey when they were facing 12 or 15 candidates. It's equivalent to our primary debates here being much less specific than our one on one presidential debates. There are no primaries in Brazil, by the way. Each party presents one candidate for each single office, period (president, governor, mayor, senators for each state, etc; of course they present multiple candidates for the House and other non-single offices).

So the two-round system has advantages too.

In America where we have the most incredible number of different voting machines, old and new, paper ballots, mail in ballots, etc., we get into a mess so having two rounds would double the mess...

But if you have an efficient system then two rounds are not inefficient.

By the way, the American Congress once sent a delegation to Brazil to learn from their unique electronic system... but nothing got changed here, which is a pity. I guess for certain interests, having the mess that we have is interesting, in terms of attempts to disenfranchise specific segments of the population (for example it was said in Bush v. Gore that the Florida Republican officials who were in control of the Board of Elections allocated old, slow, and faulty machines to precincts that traditionally voted more for Democrats, and new, fast, and highly performing machines to precincts that traditionally voted Republican so that lines were short in the latter and long and discouraging in the former.

The Brazilian voting machine:

 

Correct. Individuals always have the capacity to behave badly. A constitution establishing Rule of Law is required to deal with that reality.

I am claiming the BLM protests are an indication of institutional dysfunction that results in generational unemployment, poverty and incarceration among disadvantaged groups. In modern highly productive economies, there is simply no need for ANY involuntary unemployment at all; we have a systems problem.

OK. But will we then have a 'united' states of America?

Note the underlined: a result of the perceived threat of any central authority eg the British king, or an American president, to freedom of the individual.

Note the underlined: which is an expression of personal sovereignty above the general welfare.
Individuals, as well as being self interested (both consciously and instinctively), have widely different capacities and abilities, meaning that some will not prosper in an economy in which individuals compete with one another for material success, in free markets without government intervention.

Marx recognised this when he wrote "from each according to his ability...."; ie, while we all have the capacity to contribute, we can not all necessarily successfully compete in a free market economy.

[Marx's error is in the next bit of the sentence, namely: "to each according to his need", which fails to acknowledge the need for the incentive of reward for individual effort and creativity.]

Addressed above; government that enables all to contribute, according to ability, is NOT the same as "entrenching disadvantage for some".

Individual sovereignty over and above rule of law instituted by a central authority (government) is the the R-W world view. Everything you state above is a promotion of (instinctively self-interested) individual freedom, above community order and well-being for all (which is not the same as demanding equality of outcome).

See....you equate government intervention - to enable universal above-poverty participation (perfectly achievable in modern highly productive economies) - with "totalitarianism ".

[According to a Harvard study, the "totalitarian " Chinese government has greater than 90% support on the mainland, because it subsidises the living expenses of all citizens. Governments in neoliberal democracies can only ever muster around 50% support of the population...]

Focused on the individual? In what way, and why?

Certainly, rule of law is required to adjudicate and promote well-ordered relations between self-interested individuals.

The avoidance of anarchy via rule of law obviously benefits individuals, and hence the community composed of individuals.

But unless the right to above poverty participation and employment is also enshrined in the Constitution, we end up with generational disadvantage. Look around you.

 

Your glowing characterization of a group whose objective is to destroy things and kill police is impressive although devoid of reality.

[QUOTE}OK. But will we then have a 'united' states of America?[/QUOTE]The United States of America is a republic that unifies states under some specific and limited precepts that were viewed as only accomplishable by central national control. All other functions were left with the states -- the definition of a republic.

It is the strong central authority (government) that is the road to national tyranny and viewed by the founders and framers as an anathema to a republic that fundamentally makes personal liberty paramount and individuals in charge. In this context the president was much less of a concern to the framers than was the congress. Per the constitution it is only the congress that can legislate, albeit with some checks and balances. (However this often gets attacked by a president (Obama being the quintessential example), and the courts (which unfortunately has no checks and balance).)

Nowhere is it said that personal sovereignty is put above the general welfare. Simply, personal sovereignty must be instituted. General welfare will follow on its own so long as there is a system of equal justice under the law.

Well, DUH! If there are different skills and capabilities among free individuals there is no possible system that can equalize outcomes. The correct phrase is "prosper as much." The poor in America are magnitudes better off than the poor is countries that do not allow much individual liberty.

Utter nonsense. Nobody has ever said that individual liberty means that individuals are above the law.

Incorrect. Totalitarianism is an all powerful central government that dictates everyone's actions and living. It usually includes ballyhooing about how they are helping the poor by redistributing the wealth, but that is just a small part and always unsuccessful.

To adjudicate, absolutely. To promote, maybe a little. If relations between self-interested individuals are adjudicated with justice, well-ordered societies will be promoted naturally

 

Before I reply to your post, I will bring to your attention a difficulty we face in this debate, which is shown in two contrasting quotes from Thomas Paine, who is considered to be one of the founding fathers of the US Constitution:

1. "The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.”

2. "The World is my country, all mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion".

Note: from wikipedia":
Common Sense is a pamphlet written by Thomas Paine in 1775–1776 advocating independence from Great Britain to people in the Thirteen Colonies. Writing in clear and persuasive prose, Paine marshaled moral and political arguments to encourage common people in the Colonies to fight for egalitarian government.
His argument begins with more general, theoretical reflections about government and religion, then progresses onto the specifics of the colonial situation. Paine begins by distinguishing between government and society.]

Paine was obviously a radical thinker and very much a man of the then developing 18th century 'enlightenment', with its ideas of religious freedom (and freedom from religious authority), scientific discovery, and freedom from royal despots (such as the British king).

My observation: the second of those Paine quotes could have been penned by Karl Marx...... and is in the finest tradition of the UN Charter. (Beethoven also used Schiller's words "All mankind are brothers" in his Ode to Joy, composed only 5 decades after Paine's pamphlet.

So....we can see a basis for the disagreement - going all the way back to Paine - over the role of government from the perspective of the Left (ie government intervention on behalf of "the common welfare") and the Right (individual freedom unfettered by government regulation).

OK. (But it won't surprise you to know my preference is for the efficiencies achievable when a central government has the chief role in a federation, given my enthusiasm for Paine's 2nd quote, above.
And in Australia, with only 25 million people, there is a view the states should be abolished altogether, in favour of regional councils who would only be concerned with LOCAL, not national issues like health, and education, and national infrastructure) , as argued by Left-Wing Prime Minister Whitlam back in the 70's. Conservative parties don't like the idea....).

So I have already addressed much of this above. Your assertion that strong central government leads to tyranny fails to take account of the division of powers that can be achieved in a federation. (I note your statement that the power of the Supreme Court has no checks and balances; fact is rule of law in a federation ultimately requires adjudication by a majority vote in a national Supreme Court.

An observation: a totalitarian state with agreed basic principles doesn't have this problem...and there is a Harvard study showing that mainland Chinese view their government more favourably (c 92% support) than in any 'liberal' democratic system with an adversarial two party system...see below).

Can you please give an example of where Obama attacked the constitution".

Maybe, but that's MY description of the reality; self-interested individuals, by definition, are not concerned by the general welfare....as can be seen by looking around you. Entrenched poverty is tolerated by the majority because the majority think is is the natural order of things, or more specifically because they think government cannot guarantee above poverty employment because it's (a) economically impossible, or (b) not possible without infringing on the freedom of others.

Both considerations are erroneous (see MMT; Modern Monetary Theory).

In the sense that rule of law must be instituted, inter alia, to avoid anarchy in the commerce between self-interested individuals.

Note: in line with Paine's noble assertion that "all mankind are my brethren", only government can achieve the conditions in which we can achieve well-ordered "brotherly" communities and nations, in practice.

There is another thread debating whether systemic racism exists in the US (the "white supremacy" thread). I argue the problem in the US is not systemic racism (because as you say equal justice under the law has largely been achieved).

The problem is very much that the basic right* to above poverty participation in the nation's economy is NOT assured in a neoliberal economy based on classical liberal economic theory, with its later development of the erroneous NAIRU concept.

*article 23 of the UNUDHR states:

"Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment. 2. Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work".

Thoroughly addressed and rejected above. "There is no possible system..." is merely a reflection of your indoctrination/acceptance of neoliberal/neo-Keynsian economics

Wrong. In fact China - with a fifth of US per capita GDP - subsidises education, health and housing for its poor.

https://ellenbrown.com/2019/06/14/the-american-dream-is-alive-and-well-in-china/

Further, the extremes in wealth distribution in the US - a powerful cause of demoralisation amongst the unemployed in the US - are a factor in the social unrest manifesting as the BLM in the US (supported by many whites around the world, as seen in the recent global protests) , as well the debt burdens carried by many Americans owing to health and education expenses.

Maybe, but that is the effect since not everyone can succeed in a liberal free market competition which determines monetary reward for individuals, as already addressed above.

..with >90% support in mainland China as noted above.

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/st...rvey-reveals-chinese-government-satisfaction/

"The survey team found that compared to public opinion patterns in the U.S., in China there was very high satisfaction with the central government. In 2016, the last year the survey was conducted, 95.5 percent of respondents were either “relatively satisfied” or “highly satisfied” with Beijing. In contrast to these findings, Gallup reported in January of this year that their latest polling on U.S. citizen satisfaction with the American federal government revealed only 38 percent of respondents were satisfied with the federal government".

Addressed above.

Unlike in the US where inflation adjusted wage rates for the bottom 50% of workers have stagnated over the last 4 decades* (since the imposition of Milton Friedman's flawed supply side neoliberal economics in the 80's), in the same period China has raised 300 million people into the middle class, and lifted another I billion out of absolute poverty (and raised per capita GDP from $2k to $10k

*https://www.epi.org/publication/swa-wages-2019/

State of Working America Wages 2019
A story of slow, uneven, and unequal wage growth over the last 40 years
Report • By Elise Gould • February 20, 2020

So...what is the cause of the problem in the US, with its descent into political hyper-partisanship and civil unrest?

 

Have only read the first page. This system is what we have down here. Called 'preferential voting.' Reckon it is fair. If the Number One in the popular vote does not get an absolute majority of the popular vote (i.e. plus 50%) then it goes to distribution of preferences.

 

A decent review of Paine, but you misunderstand part of his meanings. His "all mankind are my brethren" does not mean the same as Marx. Paine meant that he has deep respect for all mankind, feels empathy for them, and wants them all to have liberty. Marx wanted to "help" all mankind by controlling them, telling them how to live right, and taking away their liberty. Paine categorically did not want government intervention in the lives of the people.

Pains absolutely did not like a chief role of the government in the lives of the people. However, he and the founders and framers recognized that the federal government must have a chief role but in highly selective and limited areas. National defense, a common system of justice, removing barriers to trade between the colonies, setting standards for measurements and money, to name a few. There were some other activities where the federal government could readily do a better job, and those were enumerated in the Constitution. The federal government can do no more, at least per the Constitution. The framers knew full well that efficiency was not only not the objective but that it tended to evil. You show me a country that absolutely keeps individuals in strict order for the common good and I'll show you a totalitarian police state.

If the division of powers lies only within the central government then that always leads to tyranny. It just takes a little longer the single branches of government. It also is not a true federation by definition unless the power is divided among the states with the states getting all except the enumerated powers. The reason for all of this is the practical and factual understanding that people can more easily control their local governments, but cannot control with any effectiveness a powerful distant remote government

True. But a branch of government without any checks and balances will always end up despotic and tyrannical. This is the one area IMO where the framers goofed..... because they did not imagine anything other than a weak Supreme Court -- in fact they worried about that.

I am not swayed by that at all. Sadam always got 95% of the vote. Putin routinely gets 85%. If you dislike a despotic government you're likely to end up in some re-education camp or dead, so of course they all like their government.

He attacked it regularly when he taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago. However, my claim was that Obama didn't follow the constitution by legislating from the white house. He did that numerous times as he changed his Obamacare law as easily as getting up in the morning. He sell-admitted doing that with DACA.

Not true and not a historical fact. Local communities, especially churches and local governments have aided the poor and the infirm ever since our founding. And they do a much better job than the federal government. It is impossible for the federal government to wipe out poverty, to wit the many trillions it has spent ever since LBJ started the War on Poverty, and to what result. The federal government can make everybody (other than government leaders) equal, but they will all be poor to lower middle class.

a perfect example how the government cannot distribute wealth and well being equitably, and it usually backfires

We do not have the BLM and antifa because they are poor or they despise the rich (after all it's some rich that are paying for their airline tickets). We have them in erupting in spades because the marxists anarchists and left wing radicals have discovered what they want to do they can do without encumbrance, and, for now, are taking full advantage.

If you are talking inalienable rights like life, liberty, free press and assembly, arms, etc, then there is no such right to work like there is no such right to health. An individual can have no such rights unless there is enslavement of employers, taxpayers, and healthcare providers. Given an open market there is cause to assure free choice, favorable work conditions, and reasonable equivalence of pay for equal work (though not protection from unemployment), though these are not "rights" and are better handled on a local or state level

 

Let's just say you have much higher opinion of US Senators than I, the only place Biden served was at the public trough.

 

Thanks

OK, I won't disagree with that (*but see my comment re 'empathy' later in this post)

This formulation (by you) both illustrates (as I suggested in my previous post) and underpins the division between Left and Right.

You said Paine "wants them all to have liberty". The question is how to achieve it. Meanwhile you say of Marx : "he wanted to control them....by taking away their liberty".

Here you are confusing goals with methods as I will now explain; both philosophers were seeking to improve the lot of mankind, but the circumstances faced by each were different.

As was noted "Paine marshaled moral and political arguments to encourage common people in the Colonies to fight for egalitarian government" ie against arbitrary, despotic rule by a 'foreign' king. (Needless to say, not everyone among the "common people" wanted to secede from the Motherland...).

The scenario being a vast new frontier land based on an agricultural economy with access to virtually free land (but actually stolen from native tribes).

On the other hand, 3/4 of a century after Paine, Marx was writing when the industrial revolution was in full swing in Europe, ie, in nation-states with age-old social class structures and rigidities; at a time when children by accident of their class were forced to forgo education and work underground in coal mines to enable survival of their families.

Hence Marx correctly observed that economic servitude and poverty related to class are incompatible with individual liberty, and given that the French revolution with its proclamation and promotion of governance that enabled institution of 'Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality" had already happened (5 decades earlier), Marx naturally directed his attention to economic theory rather than the constitutional matters that exercised Paine seven decades earlier in the New World.

Hence the import I place on a nation's economic arrangements.

So in light of the above, I will by-pass some of your post re constitutional matters(though a consideration of the Supreme Court in a federation IS very topical at present!....I will examine that issue later) and resume the debate at:

"Entrenched poverty".

Well, I won't disagree with your formulation of what has happened in the past. But it's not surprising you (and the Right) appeal to charity, as a legitimate part of good governance. It is not. It is demoralising for the people dependent on it.

Again true, in the sense that this is what has been past experience....BECAUSE of the neoliberal economic orthodoxy followed in the US.

Yes the Left, bless their souls, tried to eliminate poverty via welfare payments - which were fought by the Right all the way (naturally, because redistributive welfare is not in the Right's DNA); but 'the Great Society' had to learn that welfare is as destructive of individual morale as charity.

No; ... and I can see from now on your argument will be based on neoliberal macroeconomic orthodoxy for which I will not condemn you, because even Jerome Powell believes in the same obsolete nonsense.

And in your above formulation, we now see the yawning chasm between Left and Right....

Working backwards: what exactly is it that 'marxist anarchists - a contradiction in terms by your own definition equating Marxism with totalitarian government, or government in a police state, which is the opposite of 'anarchy' - and left wing radicals' have discovered?

That they can cause rioting and social unrest "without encumbrance"?

And why do they want to do that?

Please elaborate.

Even though MACRO-economic circumstances in 'liberal' democracies are demonstrably beyond the control of individuals in those 'free market' economies subject to periodic economic crises, not to mention the permanent effect of the hideous NAIRU formulation itself.

Besides, now you are forgetting Paine altogether: " The World is my country, all mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion" , as well as UNUDHR article 23; Right to above poverty employment.

See how your "empathy"* for your fellow man - a la Paine's "brethren of mankind" - is fast disappearing? (After all, charity can deal with the problem...).

[*Note re empathy: the ape brain is NOT all roses; instinct can turn us all into devils. Just to remind how complicated this debate is).

A statement of RW orthodoxy.

In short: the higher taxes required to decently fund desirable policies like higher education, promote health, and infrastructure are an "enslavement", in the eyes of the Right.

That's one of the reasons why I consider Jerome Powell to be public enemy No.1, because he is part of the orthodoxy that is determined to hide the simple reality:

A sovereign currency-issuing government like the US doesn't need to tax or borrow from the private sector - see MMT.

 

I'm "very concerned" about Collins losing

Really I am

 

No my vote stands and those who lost get a second vote for someone else.

Again just have a campaign for a runoff and let the voters make a better decision.

Instant runoff

Used in national elections in Australia, this system is said to simulate a series of runoff elections. If no candidate is the first choice of more than half of the voters, then all votes cast for the candidate with the lowest number of first choices are redistributed to the remaining candidates based on who is ranked next on each ballot. If this does not result in any candidate receiving a majority, further rounds of redistribution occur.[10][11]

Those who voted for the lowest get a second vote.

 

Paine wanted to improve the lot of mankind by giving them liberty. Marx wanted to improve the lot of mankind by taking away their liberty, controlling them, telling them what they have to do for a better life, and dictating their economics. From the tenets of Marx

1) Abolition of Private Property.
2) A high and progressively graded income-tax.
3) Abolition of Rights of Inheritance.
4) Confiscation of Property Rights, including property of rebels and emigrants
7) Government Ownership of Factories and Agriculture.
Government Control of Labor
10) Government Control of Education
And Lenin added to Marx's dislike of religion by banning religion in revolutionary Russia.
Doesn't include much individual liberty or reason to expect much individual economic prosperity.

Different economic circumstances do not affect the efficacy of either. Compare the overall status of the average American with the average Chinese or Russian to see who, Paine and our founders or Marx, Lenin, and Mao were correct in their thinking.

BTW, it's not a complaint, but citing the French Revolution as a show of good things is a little shaky. Besides you should identify which French Revolution.

Why is getting charity from the government not demoralizing? And what is the real problem if someone is demoralized? Is that really a pressing problem for me or the government.? Are we to find a system of governance and economics where nobody ever feels bad?

I said, "It is impossible for the federal government to wipe out poverty" not because of our so-called neoliberal economic orthodoxy, but because it is impossible for the federal government to wipe out poverty, period.

the unworkability of redistribution of wealth is not in the Right's DNA. It comes from a rationale understanding of how the world works. Again, individual morale is not the primary objective. Liberty and the greatest economic prosperity -- which is known to be a super morale booster -- possible is.

Marxist anarchist are simply following the 1st Phase of Marxism: Phase 1: A revolution must take place in order to overthrow the existing government. Marx emphasized the need for total destruction of the existing system in order to move on to Phase 2. That is why they do the rioting, arson, and killing people, especially police. Don't ignore BLM's basic mantra: What do we want? Dead cops. When do we want it? Now. The leftist leaders in the cities and states abet by withholding law enforcement, painting supporting signs and banners, reducing police presence and force, and providing bail money for the unlucky anarchists who did get arrested (including by the likes of the Democrat's illustrious VP candidate.)

Paine in his deepest downed moment would have never agreed with HNHDHR-23. He probably would have said, "That's what I'm talking about that we need to get rid of."

I never said the federal government should not promote good health. I said if it legislates the right of every citizen to get whatever medical care (not the same as health BTW) they wanted, it could not be done without the enslavement of medical providers and the confiscation of all medical facilities. Infrastructure is not a right and not applicable here. Education is not enslavement because schooling, while declared as highly desirable, is not bestowed as an inalienable right. There are laws that force children to go to school, but that is all local prerogative, and it is the local citizenry that decide they like it and are willing to pay the going rate for teachers, administrators, and buildings.

They can sing, dance, and pour seltzer down their pants 'till the cows come home but printing money to pay for everything will end up in a non-functioning hyperinflated economy. I think that would demoralize people (not just the few but everybody) something fierce Speaking of MMT, why would anybody with a rational mind listen to AOC about economic policy?

 

There is no difference between instant runoff and delayed runoff. Everyone gets their vote counted once in the first round and once in the second.

What exactly is your objection to instant as opposed to delayed runoff? What practical difference is there?

 

He just feels he has to argue the point because the GOP is against this because they will get HAMMERED if this was in more states...

 

You already previously asserted that, and I note you have simply ignored my examination of that assertion, repeated here:

" The scenario (in which Paine developed his ideas in the 1770's) was a vast new frontier land based on an agricultural economy with access to virtually free land (but actually stolen from native tribes).

On the other hand, 3/4 of a century after Paine, Marx was writing when the industrial revolution was in full swing in Europe, ie, in nation-states with age-old social class structures and rigidities; at a time when children by accident of their class were forced to forgo education and work underground in coal mines to enable survival of their families.

Hence Marx correctly observed that economic servitude and poverty related to class are incompatible with individual liberty, and given that the French revolution with its proclamation and promotion of governance that enabled institution of 'Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality" had already happened (5 decades earlier), Marx naturally directed his attention to economic theory rather than the constitutional matters that exercised Paine seven decades earlier in the New World."

So obviously your assertion that Marx wanted to "take away their liberty" has no basis in fact. Marx was very much exercised by the denial of liberty resulting from the conditions of economic servitude under which the working class lived at that time.

Marx developed a theory of economic management which he hoped would overcome the economic servitude of the working class. eg unions can seek to improve workers' bargaining powers in negotiations with the owners of capital.

In fact, Marx taught how, in his estimation, workers can take control of their own working lives, rather than being subject to the economic servitude forced on them by (naturally) self-interested capitalists.

In your above list, the right to be free FROM poverty and economic servitude, which was Marx's chief concern, is construed by you to be in conflict with the right to freedom of individuals to pursue their own economic interests, without state intervention. Obviously a balance needs to be instituted, under a system of rule of law.

[Speaking of religion: we can all be confident that ANY extant scripture is NOT the actual Word of God, but rather the word of men in search of God. An important distinction, because Judge Barrett, being a Conservative Catholic, reads the letter rather than the spirit of the law...and in scriptural matters this means the Church Militant with its doctrine of continual warfare on earth, until the final battle of Armageddon (as per Revelations).

Thereby completely divorced from Christ's actual message to the whole (Roman) world (including gentiles): "Love God and love one-another".

A message also completely at odds with the bronze-age OT god who authorised genocide by his "chosen people", against tribes who already occupied the "promised land" (in Canaan). However I digress...]

It's not a matter of expectations, it's a matter of fulfillment.

Like I said, Paine was concerned with establishing independent governance in the New World, with its unlimited access to (supposedly unoccupied) agricultural land, while Marx, Lenin and Mao faced totally different circumstances in the Old World.

I cited the French Revolution of 1789-92 to point out that Marx, writing a half century after it, did not need to consider issues of constitutional governance dealt with in that revolution; in contrast to Paine for which the issue of constitutional governance for the colonies was uppermost in his concerns face to face with Britain in the 1770's.

It IS demoralising; that's why I raised the failure of the Great Society to eliminate poverty. (Though it is possible to imagine a highly productive economy with robots doing most of the work, with an above poverty UBI, thereby freeing everyone to follow their own creative interests).

But the level of welfare expenditure of the Great Society was never large enough to raise schools, education, housing, and infrastructure in depressed ghettos to an acceptable condition.

It's a disaster for the individual concerned. Well-known effects include drug-taking, loss of community spirit, and inhibition of positive (creative) engagement with the community.

Not if demoralisation only affects isolated individuals; government can organise access to psychologists for such individuals.

But if the demoralisation is widespread as for example in ghettos, then it IS a problem for you and the government.

Unfortunately Trump's only ideas for dealing with this much larger problem are to bring in the national guard....despite the fact he appeared to recognise the problem in 2016: "You are living in poverty, your neighborhoods are like war zones, your schools and hospitals are broken, your young men are in prison..."

No...but as stated above, the SYSTEMIC demoralisation evidenced in ghettos of the type recognised by Trump (above) does require governance capable of eliminating such conditions.

You will see that only governance which includes a Job Guarantee can achieve that outcome.

Yes.....and I explained that it is possible to eradicate poverty in any wealthy country, but that to do requires the treasury and reserve bank to abandon obsolete monetarist dogma (as described in neoliberal/neoKeynsian orthodoxy).

Got it. But recall my comments on (false) religious dogma: unfortunately the "Right's DNA" is is based on preserving the status quo for those who are already comfortable, by appealing to a constitution written in the 17700's. Whereas liberty and freedom from economic want are no longer incompatible, in modern AI and IT enhanced highly productive economies, in which oversupply is just as likely to be a problem. (See how nations hustle for access to oversees markets because they can't find enough local demand).

OK thanks for your explanation.

But the fact remains: BLM attracted enormous global support.

I have now described how - by change of government macroeconomic policy, including money creation in the US treasury consistent with available resources and vast productive capacity of the modern US economy, to enable eradication of the ghettos, and institute basic economic freedom for all, and ensuring real full employment. Note: there is an infinite amount of useful work to be done in any community, beyond the concerns of the private sector).

Needless to say, you've lost me there..something wrong with a right to work?....when in fact most people of working age need to work to survive. You're putting words into Paine's mouth....

"Civilisation is a race between education and catastrophe". HG Wells.

1. "Inalienable" right or not, universal education might be a good thing....including knowledge that scripture is not the perfect Word of God, and eg, enabling examination and understanding the role of religious dogma in the catastrophe of 9/11, and its causes. Note: Bin Laden told of his anger re the modern creation of Israel, as one reason for the attack).

2. A nation requires public infrastructure to advance its economy, obviously.

3. Primary health is promoted by education, eg, to help people resist the fatty, sugary junk that the profit-seeking private sector inflicts on an unwary public via flash, mind-numbing advertising.

4. Re funding costs, which are always the chief concern of the Right re provision of public services (ie "How are we going to pay for it"), I have described an alternative fit for our present economies.

Think about it for a moment. With all the resources and productive capacity of the US economy, you still think the US can't have national high speed rail, AND bull-doze all it's ghettos, AND institute a job guarantee.

Look at China (with only 2/3 US GDP): in 10 years they have built enough brand new fully functioning cities to house the entire population of the US, and built the world's most extensive high speed rail network, AND raised 300 miillion people into the middle class AND raised another 800 million out of absolute poverty.

Now ask yourself: where did China get all the renminbi from, to fund that massive amount of construction? Without any inflation in sight!

Yes hyperinflation is always super demoralising...and China knows how to avoid it.

haha, good one....nice to end with a chuckle; and AOC doesn't need my defense...
eg, let's see how the pandemic progresses in the US. Economic conditions for many people may yet deteriorate badly enough to require even more "money printing" to rescue the economy...at which point you will be begging AOC to explain how this can be done without causing inflation, and without increasing public debt to even higher levels than present..

Thanks for the debate.

 

The ideas you present sound very well and desirable. The practical problem is: Marxism never ever reaches it stated goals, partly because it is impossible and partly because it real goals, maybe subliminal at first, totalitarian control are not its stated goals. A job can never ever be a sustainable right of every individual assured and insured by government. (A right to find a job is required and that is called liberty.) Beyond the early enthusiasm Communism will never ever be supported by a majority, although millions will blindly support their government no matter what. This is because they will never see the promised economic benefits and mostly because they have lost their liberty. You threw under the rug the listed 7 of Marx's 10 tenants that are a direct and straight forward glomming of liberty. Liberty has beaten the pants off of Marxism ever since Marx presented it, and not because we had unlimited land. Our tremendous wealth for everyone exploded in the late 19th and early to mid 20th centuries.

The best way to get an individual out of poverty is to give him the liberty to pursue his ambition. Subsidizing can only work for a minority and then always proves to be a dead end because additional help is always required.

$22 trillion over 50 years was not enough??? Are you saying that because it did not make a dent?

There is no way you can know or verify those figures. Investment in infrastructure and plants and office buildings have been tremendous mostly because China opened up itself to private investment.

A highly very unlikely scenario.[/QUOTE]

 

I suppose this debate will at least highlight the impact of ideology....

"Never ever" is a very long time., and past performance is no guarantee of future results (to borrow the line of investment managers) .

Impossible? Only for those indoctrinated by certain tenets of classical economics, such as 'allocation of scarcity in the face of unlimited wants'.

Modern AI and IT enabled economies have undermined the basis of that classical economics dogma.

Real goals?

Simple: above poverty participation by all. There is no scarcity preventing this.

"Totalitarian"? Enabling citizens to choose allocation of the fruits of the nation's productive capacity is not "totalitarian'.

That's just your ideological misrepresentation, following on the errors I have discussed above.

The present system maintaining the ghettos can just as easily be described as "totalitarian".

Trump (in 2016): "You are living in poverty, your neighborhoods are like war zones, your schools and hospitals are broken, your young men are in prison...".
but like you - being indoctrinated in classical economics - he thinks it's impossible to bull-doze the ghettos, and institute universal participation in the new economy. Pathetic.

Disputed above. Liberty requires freedom from economic want; classical economics merely distributes scarcity, thereby guaranteeing enslavement by material need, among those 'allocated' the scarcity (by 'free' markets).

"Tremendous wealth"...exactly, so why Trumps' ghettos? Answer: classical economics with its obsolete "scarcity" dogma.

In contrast, China has poured as much concrete in two decades as the US poured in a century.

People don't need to be "given the liberty to pursue their ambitions"; they need an environment in which they CAN pursue their ambitions.

Subsidization of living costs by the central government, exceptionally successful in lifting 800 million people out of absolute poverty in China, and 300 million reaching middle class status, most definitely assisted the majority; noted in the Ellen Brown link, while increasing GDP five-fold from 1980 to the present.

I'm saying poverty level 'sit down' money (aka 'welfare') is always destructive of an individual's morale. China certainly did not go down that path to achieve its fabulous economic growth.

The facts speak for themselves; you forgot residential investment in the form of multiple entire new cities...

"Private" investment?

Very much within the environment of the famous so-called "capitalism with Chinese characteristics".

Yes...unlikely, because Covid-19 is not deadly enough to instill the fear of death into the entire population....(some people even think it's a hoax....).

But if it was both contagious and deadly enough to force everyone (except workers in food and essential utilities) to stay home, for a year or more .........

 

Never ever is the reality. However, marxists, leftists, and socialists never stop promising that nirvana is just around the corner and will happen for certain next time, if only the people would just do what they are told to do.

None of Marx's ten tenants has a single word about allocating the fruits of the nation's productive capacity, though one indirectly hints at it. Six to seven are a direct call for totalitarianism, although of course they don't use that word.

To the contrary, liberty does not require freedom from economic want. Freedom from economic want, with just a few exceptions, comes from allowing an individual the liberty to do and earn what he can. Liberty comes only from a government that allows and protects it. There is nothing in our "classic" economic system that prevents an individual from pursuing his own economic interests, and possibly rising from the poor to the rich, as has happened numerous times. Economic mobility is extensive. About 50% change income quintile brackets over 10 or so years with more moving up than moving down. For the record the top 0.01% had a 75% turnover over 25 years. A system that predetermines income and economic distribution by definition will not allow for such mobility, and reduce effective individual liberty, not expand liberty.

Trump's ghettos??? You lost a few points with that comment. We have had ghettos long before Trump arrived. The War on Poverty spent trillions replacing ghettos with projects to better allocate economic opportunity and, in accordance with your theory, liberty. It accomplished close to zilch.

I don't buy those statistics for a nanosecond

 

Ten tenants? (..10 tenets) I did a quick google search and learnt about the "League of the Just" in this article from 'conservativeusa.net'

http://www.conservativeusa.net/10planksofcommunism.htm#:~:text=Karl Marx's "10 Planks" to seize power an

Another search reveals

"The League of the Just was founded by German émigrés in Paris in 1836. This was initially a utopian socialist and Christian communist group devoted to the ideas of Gracchus Babeuf rather than the teachings of Christ. It became an international organization."

So far so good.....

Back to 'conservativeusa.net'

Karl Marx was paid by the "League of the Just" (later named the "Communist League") in 1847 to write the Communist Manifesto, and paid again to rewrite it in 1848. The Manifesto was intended to incite violent revolution, was a recipe for tyranny itself, and was later used as propaganda (a 'glorious goal' to believe in) to blind followers to the realities of the brutal dictatorships that oppressed all workers and slaughtered millions under Communist rule. Hitler's "Mein Kampf" and Mao's "Little Red Book" served similar evil and deadly purposes. Many dictators throughout history and today attempt to disguise their tyranny with fancy labels and phony philosophies to make slavery seem somehow just and essential--another example was the earlier doctrine of "divine rule of kings." These 10 steps are just a part of the Manifesto, the full text of which can be found on the web."


There are a number of problems with that passage.

1. Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto, not to "incite violent revolution".

Rather, "the Industrial Age was the very reason for Karl Marx to write the Communist Manifesto. He saw how the working people (Proletariat) was treated and exploited by the wealthy people that owned the means of production. To understand his intention behind writing that book, you need to know the circumstances in that time".

You keep ignoring this fact, as I have already pointed out.

2. "was a recipe for tyranny itself" etc.

No, it was a recipe for freedom from the economic servitude experienced by workers in factories and mines at that time.

Now, whether that was at all achievable at the time without a revolution is another matter..

3. Marx intended his 'revolution' to take place in industrial Europe, not in the subsistence agricultural economies of Russia and China. (Hitler's Mein Kampf has nothing to do with Marx).

As has been correctly observed, blaming Marx for Stalin's USSR is like blaming Christ for the Spanish Inquisition.

The utopian socialists and christian communists of Marx's time of course rejected and refute your assertion...and they are correct. Economic servitude and want are incompatible with personal liberty. You can't accept this simple common sense proposition because your "freedom" narrative is destroyed by it.

Exceptions?

Apparently I have to say it again: individuals want liberty whether they are allowed to have it or not. In fact government is required to institute a balance of freedoms among self-seeking individuals, a difficult mission as evidenced by the history of governance thoughout history.

Yes there is: it's called NAIRU, the dogma ordained by classical/neoliberal economists to control inflation in free markets.

Hence you are committing the well-known 'fallacy of composition"; namely, because one or a number individuals can escape economic servitude or disadvantage, you wrongly assume all can do it when NAIRU plainly states a certain number MUST be unemployed for the 'good' of the economy.

Mobility exists whether entrenched economic disadvantage (in the ghettos) exists or not. My goal is to eliminate the disadvantage, not the mobility.

You misunderstood my meaning. I used the term "Trump's ghettos" simply as a reference to my quote of Trump's own words on the inner city ghettos. I already agreed with you re the failure of the "War on Poverty", with it's misplaced emphasis on poverty level welfare rather than above poverty employment.

Compare the economic development of India and China over the last 30 years. ......to see whether a free market adversarial two- party democracy is as capable of raising living standards among comparable populations, as a state-managed one party (which we call "authoritarian") meritocracy.

 

Marx's 10 planks of Communism (copied from the conservativeusa.net link

http://www.conservativeusa.net/10planksofcommunism.htm#:~:text=Karl Marx's "10 Planks" to seize power an

Karl Marx's "10 Planks" to seize power and destroy freedom:

(note my underlined......those words are an obvious misrepresentation of Marx's project, by 'conservativeusa')

Interspersed with some of my comments:

1. Abolition of Property in Land and Application of all Rents of Land to Public Purpose.

Many 'free' people don't own a house, and must rent...though no doubt would rather own....

2. A Heavy Progressive or Graduated Income Tax.

As existed in most western economies post WW2 until the 70's

3. Abolition of All Rights of Inheritance.

To avoid institution of privilege.

4. Confiscation of the Property of All Emigrants and Rebels.

To preserve national wealth and unity.

5. Centralization of Credit in the Hands of the State, by Means of a National Bank with State Capital and an Exclusive Monopoly.

See Ellen Brown, promoter of public banking: "the american dream is alive and well in china".

6. Centralization of the Means of Communication and Transport in the Hands of the State.

We have private vehicles these days; but public transport remains highly desirable for efficiency and environmental reasons.

7. Extension of Factories and Instruments of Production Owned by the State, the Bringing Into Cultivation of Waste Lands, and the Improvement of the Soil Generally in Accordance with a Common Plan.

The latter two points are incontrovertibly good; and we now know private ownership of factories is not a prerequisite if we have effective public sector oversight (see MMT).

8. Equal Liability of All to Labor. Establishment of Industrial Armies, Especially for Agriculture.

Thought by Marx to be necessary in his time.

9. Combination of Agriculture with Manufacturing Industries; Gradual Abolition of the Distinction Between Town and Country by a More Equable Distribution of the Population over the Country.

A farsighted decentralization policy perhaps...

10. Free Education for All Children in Public Schools. Abolition of Children's Factory Labor in it's Present Form. Combination of Education with Industrial Production.

Another incontrovertible good; and note my underlined, to remind us of the environment in which Marx worked.

The conservativeusa article concludes with this garbage:

Of important mention here is Saul Alinsky's "Rules for Radicals;" much has been written about President Obama's (and Hillary Clinton's) study and use of Alinsky's strategies for seizing power without concern for ethics or the harm caused. Read the book (try Amazon or eBay)--study it and you will better understand Obama's governing strategy and anticipate his actions. Marx and Alinsky both shared a similar desire to seize power at any cost, hence the listing on this page. It should be of little surprise that Alinsky dedicated "Rules for Radicals" to the devil.

It seems ANY government intervention - to improve minimum standards - and termed "gradualism" by these Conservative goons, is "the work of the devil".

God help us......

[Reminds me of Loyd Blankfein's infamous remark "Goldman Sachs does God's work". In fact Obama should have stripped him of his bonuses in the decade leading up to the crisis and jailed a dozen other banksters responsible for the catastrophe of the GFC.

Then Obama should have nationalized the banks and ordered the US treasury and reserve, via the US currency-issuing capacity, to pay all housing mortgages until the economy was back on its feet.

Meanwhile these Conservative goons claim Obama was a freedom-destroying "socialist". In fact he was paralyzed - like a rabbit in headlights - in the face of the unfolding GFC].