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RufusW
Joined: 14 Jun 2008
Location: Busan
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 Posted: Fri Oct 02, 2009 8:29 am Post subject: |
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| ontheway wrote: |
| This is what the Fascist-Socialist Democrat... |
Do you understand the fact Socialist is on the other end of the political spectrum as Fascist and Democrat is between the two? Pick one at least. Unless you're supposing the Democrats in America are fascist... in which case you're lost already.. |
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Nowhere Man
Joined: 08 Feb 2004
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| Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 5:41 am Post subject: ... |
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| You have no idea what free market means. A free market economy is a system where there are zero government controls. The opposite of that is a command or planned economy where the government makes rules about what can be made, etc. |
No, it's not the opposite because corporatism, by definition, is tripartite and you, calling people out for lack of knowledge, are ignoring unions as the third element. This pure, laissez faire, free market has never existed in the modern era.
| Quote: |
| It has nothing to do about free competition. |
In such a scenario, collusion is fair game and the FCC intervention here is an attempt to stop private entities impinging upon internet service. The creators of the internet didn't profit from its creation, and this is an example of business using infrastructure to its own ends. One could, of course, argue that any private entity can come along and lay its own fiber-optic lines, but that's wasteful and pointless.
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| You're suggesting that you don't like the free markets, and that we should adopt some sort of socialist position where the government steps in and tells companies what to do. |
No, you should put away the socialist business. What's being supported here is the corporatist position that government, labor, and the private sector work this out.
This is a capitalist position, just not laissez faire.
So, to recap this properly, we have a very common situation. Private entities abuse their power. The government steps in to respond. The paid-off government steps in to oppose.
That, like it or not, has been SOP for a good 100 years or so.
The market was freer before that. That's when Teddy Roosevelt, and I dare you to call him a socialist, set about trust-busting.
To get back to this specific topic, what we have is business abusing power. The (what I'll call) Ron Paul Libertarian solution is to just let this happen in hopes that some other private business will take an interest in providing a better service. That is the solution. What that essentially implies is that business becomes government, minus the checks and balances. That is not a solution at all.
Let's take it one further step: there is a great abundance of finger-wagging at the banking sector. The banking sector, aside from the Fed aspect, IS IN the private sector. Look at those banks getting trillions of dollars. Per some of you, we don't need welfare because these nice capitalist/corporatist entities are going to provide for the poor.
What's that you say? No, they aren't?
Well then, why, in your unfettered laissez faire business concept should we believe that a mythical free market is going to provide for the poor? It's not. A very convenient notion of the mythical free market economy is that charity will suffice. It won't.
It's at this point we get down to brass tacks, and this is my take on it:
1) We're in a very serious financial debacle.
2) Ability to predict the crisis (see Austrian School) doesn't necessarily equate with how to solve it
3) Capitalism and corporatism all fall under one umbrella. Corporations (in particular the massive, international conglomerates) exist under both. People implying they're anti-corporation because they don't support "corporatism" are either misled, misinformed, or lying. The idea that corporations won't be neck-deep in government if they're not regulated is dangerously naive. Unions have been a very important check on capitalism, and individuals, aware or unaware, are also proposing rendering them impotent when they talk about free markets.
4) This conflation of ideas is critical to consider. No matter what the crisis is, condemning bankers to instead give free run to big business is not a solution at all. |
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ontheway
Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Location: Somewhere under the rainbow...
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| Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 9:13 am Post subject: |
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| RufusW wrote: |
| ontheway wrote: |
| This is what the Fascist-Socialist Democrat... |
Do you understand the fact Socialist is on the other end of the political spectrum as Fascist and Democrat is between the two? Pick one at least. Unless you're supposing the Democrats in America are fascist... in which case you're lost already.. |
Most Democrat Party office holders are fascist-socialists.
Do you understand that the left-right line that you think is a political spectrum is just a line? Would you use a line to try to draw a map of the world? Label every city, province, nation, mountain, river, lake, ocean and sea on a single straight line? Genius. That's what you're doing with your left-right line. One dimension reveals very little.
The left-right line was abandoned by real political scienists about four decades ago. The left-right line is nonsense.
Just like you need at least a two dimensional map for geography, you need two dimensions for politics.
(Actually, I prefer 3 dimensions or even nth dimensional space, but few people can comprehend anything beyond two dimensions.)
Socialists don't like the two dimensional map. It shows them in their true colors. It reveals that fascists and communists are in the same corner and are both subsets of socialism. It reveals where they intersect with all totalitarians, in the corner of government control and evil.
The socialists originally identified the Nazis and the other fascists as left wing. Then, when they became enemies, they decided they were right wing. The socialists have pulled the wool over your eyes.
Wake up.
Study the real poltical map.
You can try this simple quiz. It seems oversimplified, but it has been confirmed to be valid.
http://www.theadvocates.org/quizp/quiz.php |
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ontheway
Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Location: Somewhere under the rainbow...
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| Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 9:17 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| A free market economy is a system where there are zero government controls. The opposite of that is a command or planned economy where the government makes rules about what can be made, etc. |
This is correct. |
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Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
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| Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 3:22 pm Post subject: |
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| ontheway wrote: |
| fascists and communists are in the same corner and are both subsets of socialism. |
From the political program of the Nazi Party, adopted in Munich, February 24, 1920.....
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We ask that the government undertake the obligation above all of providing citizens with adequate opportunity for employment and earning a living. The activities of the individual must not be allowed to clash with the interests of the community, but must take place within its confines and be for the good of all. Therefore, we demand: � an end to the power of the financial interests. We demand profit sharing in big business. We demand a broad extension of care for the aged. We demand � the greatest possible consideration of small business in the purchases of national, state, and municipal governments. In order to make possible to every capable and industrious [citizen] the attainment of higher education and thus the achievement of a post of leadership, the government must provide an all-around enlargement of our entire system of public education � We demand the education at government expense of gifted children of poor parents � The government must undertake the improvement of public health � by protecting mother and child, by prohibiting child labor � by the greatest possible support for all clubs concerned with the physical education of youth. We combat the � materialistic spirit within and without us, and are convinced that a permanent recovery of our people can only proceed from within on the foundation of the common good before the individual good.
http://www.adamsmith.org/blog/misc/fascism-is-communism-200910044220/
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(A funny trick is to give the above passage to a leftist, without saying who it is, and ask what they think.  ) |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 3:26 pm Post subject: |
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| ontheway wrote: |
| Socialists don't like the two dimensional map. It shows them in their true colors. It reveals that fascists and communists are in the same corner and are both subsets of socialism. |
Yeah, but according to you every human society in history has been sitting up in that little corner of your proposed 2 dimensional map as an evil Socialist regime. That's why most people aren't interested in your broader multi-dimensional political spectrum: there's nothing in the vast majority of your map according to you.
Nice map. I especially like the section on the bottom being prejoratively labelled "big government." I wonder if that reflects the biases of the people involved at all? |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 3:31 pm Post subject: |
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| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| ontheway wrote: |
| fascists and communists are in the same corner and are both subsets of socialism. |
From the political program of the Nazi Party, adopted in Munich, February 24, 1920.....
| Quote: |
We ask that the government undertake the obligation above all of providing citizens with adequate opportunity for employment and earning a living. The activities of the individual must not be allowed to clash with the interests of the community, but must take place within its confines and be for the good of all. Therefore, we demand: � an end to the power of the financial interests. We demand profit sharing in big business. We demand a broad extension of care for the aged. We demand � the greatest possible consideration of small business in the purchases of national, state, and municipal governments. In order to make possible to every capable and industrious [citizen] the attainment of higher education and thus the achievement of a post of leadership, the government must provide an all-around enlargement of our entire system of public education � We demand the education at government expense of gifted children of poor parents � The government must undertake the improvement of public health � by protecting mother and child, by prohibiting child labor � by the greatest possible support for all clubs concerned with the physical education of youth. We combat the � materialistic spirit within and without us, and are convinced that a permanent recovery of our people can only proceed from within on the foundation of the common good before the individual good.
http://www.adamsmith.org/blog/misc/fascism-is-communism-200910044220/
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(A funny trick is to give the above passage to a leftist, without saying who it is, and ask what they think. ) |
I know the Nazis are reviled as evil, but the fact that they did horrible things doesn't mean everything they ever said and did was horrible. If you found a quote of Hitler saying, "I love babies," I don't think it would be reasonable to start attacking other people who love babies for being of the same mind as Hitler, for instance.
The Nazis are reviled because they launched a massive war against the rest of the world in combination with a massive slaughter of their own people, not because of quotes like the above. The two don't need to go hand in hand, and historically, they have not. It's not like Socialist Europe is launching a lot of unprovoked wars and engaging in genocide right now, despite the fact that many European politicians would no doubt agree with what was expressed in the above quote. |
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Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
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| Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 4:00 pm Post subject: |
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Well, Nazi Germany is just yet another shameful chapter in the narrative of socialism and its humans-to-ashes conveyor belt.
Taunting leftists with Hitler is very similar to taunting Christians with Hitler. The myths that the Nazis admired atheism and/or capitalism have had free reign to infect young minds for over 60 years. The game's up.
The game's up for theism and socialism |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 9:43 pm Post subject: |
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| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Well, Nazi Germany is just yet another shameful chapter in the narrative of socialism and its humans-to-ashes conveyor belt. |
No, it's a shameful narrative of launching unprovoked wars and mass murdering people. There are plenty of examples of privately owned businesses doing absolutely attrocious things as well, but you don't seem eager to scream about the attrocities of Capitalism. It's equally ridiculous to blame Socialism for things like unprovoked wars and mass murdering when it's clear nothing about Socialism requires such things (as is evinced by the lack of unprovoked wars and mass murders in many Socialist European countries).
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Taunting leftists with Hitler is very similar to taunting Christians with Hitler. |
In that it's just done out of pure spite and doesn't actually prove anything or mean anything? If what you're trying to say is that some people who are proponents of Socialism also happen to be evil, I agree. If you're trying to say Socialism somehow inevitably leads to mass murders and unprovoked wars, well... there are far too many counter-examples for a remotely intelligent person to possibly make that claim. |
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shifter2009
Joined: 03 Sep 2006
Location: wisconsin
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| Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 10:59 pm Post subject: |
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| How did my post my post about Net Neutrality turn into a argument about whose a nazi in less then two pages? Jesus, no wonder no one reads the current affairs forum |
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Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
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| Posted: Wed Oct 07, 2009 1:56 am Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| as is evinced by the lack of unprovoked wars and mass murders in many Socialist European countries). |
Socialist European countries such as whom? I didn't realize there were any. I'm pretty sure who you have in mind, though.
Before you answer, consider: "Their [Scandinavian countries'] characteristic driving force of production and economic activity is the initiative of private owners motivated by the prospect of private profit"
http://mises.org/story/1937
And consider also: "Denmark has greater business freedom, monetary freedom, investment freedom, financial freedom, and labor freedom while having comparable property rights and trade freedom scores to the U.S. Sweden has greater business freedom while having comparable trade freedom, monetary freedom, property rights enforcement, investment freedom, and financial freedom to the United States. Norway, the least successful Scandinavian nation, has comparable business freedom, trade freedom, and property right enforcement with the US In many ways, Scandinavian countries are more "laissez faire" than the United States"
http://mises.org/Community/forums/t/5616.aspx
I strongly suspect you subscribe to a decidedly, shall we say, American notion of 'socialism' - ie. public healthcare, high taxes and big welfare. To the rest of the world, that makes it a mixed economy, not socialist.
| Fox wrote: |
| you don't seem eager to scream about the attrocities of Capitalism |
Give an example. If it's bad, I'll scream, I promise.
By any chance, are you thinking of slavery? Despite the fact that slavery existed for infinity prior to capitalism, yet abolitionism occurred at the height of the Industrial Revolution?
Sure. Pure spite - why not? The achievements of socialism - that is to say, public ownership of the means of production - range from merely lengthening the queues for vegetables, for clothes and for bread, for absolutely everything, to starvation in labor camps. I'm tired of people still clinging to juvenile dogma as though it is still the ultimate, lofty, distant, inevitable goal of all man's works without a record of monstrous indecency.
When a theist says to me that Hitler was an atheist and that theism is ethically superior to atheism, I remind them that Hitler was a theist and that more people have been killed because of God than any other reason. Likewise, when a socialist says to me that Nazi Germany was capitalist, and socialism is ethically superior to capitalism, I remind them that Nazi economics was de facto socialist and that more people have been killed because of socialism than for any other reason (second only to God). |
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Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
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| Posted: Wed Oct 07, 2009 1:57 am Post subject: |
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| shifter2009 wrote: |
| How did my post my post about Net Neutrality turn into a argument about whose a nazi in less then two pages? Jesus, no wonder no one reads the current affairs forum |
Your thread title sucked |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Wed Oct 07, 2009 2:09 am Post subject: |
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| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Fox wrote: |
| as is evinced by the lack of unprovoked wars and mass murders in many Socialist European countries). |
Socialist European countries such as whom? I didn't realize there were any. I'm pretty sure who you have in mind, though. |
I'm just going to go ahead and ask. Does anyone else there are no Socialist nations in Europe?
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| I strongly suspect you subscribe to a decidedly, shall we say, American notion of 'socialism' - ie. public healthcare, high taxes and big welfare. To the rest of the world, that makes it a mixed economy, not socialist. |
I'm also going to go ahead and ask. Does anyone else think that public health care is not Socialist?
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Fox wrote: |
| you don't seem eager to scream about the attrocities of Capitalism |
Give an example. If it's bad, I'll scream, I promise. |
[url=http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/5/3/724370/-How-Freedom-Was-Lost]Here's a start
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| to"] By any chance, are you thinking of slavery? |
No. I don't need to go there.
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Sure. Pure spite - why not? |
Glad we agree. Being spiteful is your perrogative. |
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Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
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| Posted: Wed Oct 07, 2009 2:28 am Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
I'm just going to go ahead and ask. Does anyone else there are no Socialist nations in Europe?
I'm also going to go ahead and ask. Does anyone else think that public health care is not Socialist? |
You cited "the lack of unprovoked wars and mass murders in many Socialist European countries"
Public healthcare is not a socialist country. It's a policy of a mixed economy. Socialists - just like theists - constantly change their definition of socialism.
Socialism these days is Norway! (with a freer economy than the US!)
| Fox wrote: |
| http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/5/3/724370/-How-Freedom-Was-Lost |
Pollution is the price of progress. Sure, if we'd never burned any coal, we'd have no pollution. We'd also probably never have been born (the Industrial Revolution increased the world population by 700%). We'd also probably bake our bread and make our own clothes.
100 million unarmed civilians being mowed down by machine gun fire by their own governments is the price of socialism.
Just so we're clear on our definitions: socialism = public ownership of the means of production (with other private ownership permitted). Communism = no private ownership at all. Mixed economy = Scandinavia. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Wed Oct 07, 2009 2:40 am Post subject: |
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| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Fox wrote: |
I'm just going to go ahead and ask. Does anyone else there are no Socialist nations in Europe?
I'm also going to go ahead and ask. Does anyone else think that public health care is not Socialist? |
You cited "the lack of unprovoked wars and mass murders in many Socialist European countries"
Public healthcare is not a socialist country. It's a policy of a mixed economy. Socialists - just like theists - constantly change their definition of socialism.
Socialism these days is Norway! (with a freer economy than the US!) |
Thank you for reaffirming -- again -- that you don't feel any nation in Europe (including Norway) is Socialist. If a few other people speak up and agree with you, perhaps this might need to be talked about. If not, I'm not going to waste my time refuting something I think which is so patently obvious in its falseness.
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Fox wrote: |
| http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/5/3/724370/-How-Freedom-Was-Lost |
Pollution is the price of progress. |
So when a government happens hurts people, it's an attrocity and you scream about it. When people die due to a company being massively negligent and killing people with pollution, you say it's just the price of progress.
As expected.
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| 100 million unarmed civilians being mowed down by machine gun fire by their own governments is the price of socialism. |
Most countries who engage in Socialist practices have done no such thing.
| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| Just so we're clear on our definitions: socialism = public ownership of the means of production (with other private ownership permitted). Communism = no private ownership at all. Mixed economy = Scandinavia. |
You're intentionally trying to define those terms to avoid having to admit that certain incredibly successful Scandanavian countries are Socialist. Given your hatred of Socialism, I can understand why you'd want to do that, but it doesn't make it correct.
Last edited by Fox on Wed Oct 07, 2009 2:47 am; edited 1 time in total |
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