LPSG - View Single Post - Will Barack Obama win the 2012 US Election?

ECUBiBoy · 11-11-2010

Quote:

Originally Posted by VinylBoy

I didn't say it was Un-American to criticize people. But to label them things that you know will spark fear into people is dishonest and bigoted is ignorant. You don't have to label something in order to critique it. You just choose to do so, which is your right. But to the rest of us it seems desperate and insincere.

Blasting ideologies for the sole purpose of doing so without any facts or specifics to make things better is nothing but hot air. I get sick of people who think everything is a bad idea but have no well thought out alternative. So you think programs that only benefit women, or "Feminism" as you so place it, are wrong. Fine. What would you do instead to ensure that these people don't lose any of the rights granted to them by the law? Don't just tell me that everything would be better if we got rid of it, like we're supposed to just trust what you say.

Seriously, do you know how to debate?

In this country it has everything to do with it. Deliberate or not, you have an ideal of how this country should run and your rhetoric speaks to the soul of it. If you didn't care, then you wouldn't be here now arguing with me (or anyone else) about it. The problem is, some people's views on our nation have little to no regard to anyone else besides people who look or think like themselves.

Seriously, stop guessing. The answer is pretty easy, but you'll never get it if your thoughts are too partisan.

You specifically said you wanted to be ruled by NOBODY. Those were your exact words.

So who enforces them? You think citizens with no established roles have the ability to govern themselves? You so trustworthy of your fellow man that you'd think everyone would have everyone else's best interest in mind? Hell, that doesn't even happen now in our current society. Don't kid yourself.

Don't kill, don't steal, don't lie. Sounds like "religion" to me. Sorry, Theocracy is for the dogs. You do realize most of the wars in this world are fueled because of people's overly zealous religious & moral beliefs? What makes a Christian's morals any better than a Buddhist's? And again, who enforces these rules if someone breaks them? In your Utopian world, if someone killed, stole or lied, what would be their just punishment and how would it be determined? Since you think a vote by majority is wrong, it doesn't leave many options left now does it?

This is what's so inherently dishonest with your ideologies. Even though our nation is run by a Democracy, not ever decision made follows that precise script. Certain things are decided upon and signed into law even without majority rule. Hell, our President can veto anything he deems inappropriate as legislation regardless if everyone in the House & Senate agreed.

Yeah, that's smart. Like that's actually going to do anything.
You can't convince an entire nation of people to not go to the polls on Election Day. On top of this, what makes you think our government wouldn't be able to function or provide a process to elect officials if by the one out of a quadrillionth chance a complete nationwide revolt on Election Day happen and nobody voted?

Dream on, dreamer...

So again, if it's so evil then what is your alternative? We obviously know a lawless society where everyone is supposed to behave accordingly with some mysterious set of morals that everyone magically adheres to will never work.

ABSOLUTE bullshit.
You have to assume that your own arguments have no fault or room for question. And clearly, your ideologies are not so set in stone that they cannot be taken apart and exposed for the farces that they are. Just how arrogant are you to think you are exonerated from providing statistics to back up your claims, dude? That shit doesn't work here, especially if you want anyone to take you seriously.

You're such a lightweight. Overly generalized topics with no substance.
Yes there were bailouts, much to the chagrin of many people here (including myself). But did all of these things only benefit the rich and have absolutely no effect for citizens in our country? You act as if the corporations can fail freely with no consequences. But what about the number of jobs that are cut when big corporations fall? How do these newly unemployed people go about getting another job, especially the workers who have only been trained to do one task and have been doing so for several years? Keep in mind, you hate all entitlement programs so I'm sure Welfare, Unemployment, Food Stamps and all those other "evil programs" so I'm sure these millions of now unemployed people wouldn't be able to rely on them while they tried to regroup. Eventually they run out of money. They can't even take care of their basic necessities such as food and shelter. What do these people do now? Got an answer for this? Seriously, you talk about the bailouts. Did you REALLY pay attention to everything that was going on, or are you just spouting out more narrow minded ideological nonsense because you think it's "hard logic"?

Plenty of signs show that our economy is actually starting to heal a little bit after our government issued out these financial bailouts. We still have a long way to go, but without government intervention on certain levels we would be worse off than ever.

Apparently you have no idea how Social Security works. Either that, or you never had a job. The elderly consists of people who at one time were employed and worked everyday just like you and I. I'm not sure if you noticed this, but every time you receive a paycheck money is automatically deducted by the government for this program and many others. THIS is not voluntary... unless you want to get paid under the table, EVERYONE is required to do this. Based on what they pay into the system (as well as any other money they contribute towards it), they are ENTITLED to a certain amount of money a month after they retire until their benefits run out. Don't give me this ideological bullshit, son. Unless you want to do the stupid thing and insist that we do away with Social Security (which would be political suicide), don't even go here.

You see it as extortion. I see it as necessary. Because despite your "kum-by-ya" style rhetoric where everyone lives under the same rules of morality and are trustworthy enough to do what's right without any regulation, anyone with a brain knows this will NEVER happen. Greed is as real as the air we breathe. While some people would join hands with you, there will always be people who will try and bend the system and not contribute their full share. It happens now within every political, social and financial system in existence. What makes you think yours will be different?

Well, truth be told the mass majority of your posts are a waste of space. But for some reason I still deem it necessary to respond. I mean, you did try to "piss me off" when you mentioned that the AIDS crisis was a hoax. And if you're just trying to get under people's skin, I can be just as coy about it.

And sadly, none of your ideas would solve ANY problems. Too bad you don't see it.

Why did you ask me what I would do for people who would "lose any of the rights granted to them by the law?" There are no such things as rights granted by the law. Rights come from our own human nature. They're grounded in what we own, chief among them is one's life itself. You don't get rights because people gather together and decide on them.

If my rhetoric speaks to how I think America should work, then what does that have to do with being Un-American? If I were Un-American, wouldn't I be spending time trying to find ways to make it not work? My views are not biased toward any group over another. I advocate a propertarian approach to society, which only works through voluntarism and cooperation. Private property levels the playing field, whereas public property distorts society by causing "tragedies of the commons." Public property is also only achievable through aggressive force, which is morally wrong (just like aggressive murder or thievery committed by private individuals is wrong).

Yes, I want to be ruled by NOBODY. You can have laws in a ruler-less (anarchist) society. It just means the laws are enforced through social cooperation and private justice.

First of all, people do not need governments in order to have "established roles," AKA division of labor. A shoemaker is still a shoemaker regardless of the political system. Secondly, laws (natural laws) do not have to be enforced by a governing body in order to be effective. Is it the government that makes people behave morally? No, it's societal expectations that keep people in line. If you act wicked, you will be outcast or rebuked one way or another. Also, you may have noticed that the government's punishments for criminals do not exactly deter them from committing them, sometimes repeatedly. A free soceity couldn't do much worse than our current system as it pertains to criminal detterance. No matter what, there's always going to be a small percentage of sociopaths who refuse to get the message (prisons do very little to stop them). I'd be happy to go into more detail about this, but I'll await your response.

Why are religious ideals bad anyway? It doesn't have to be a theocracy either. If you take a close look at the most popular religions in the world, you'll notice their moral messages are quite similar once you get beyond the ontological, spiritual, and stylistic differences. Virtually all of them speak of treating others well, not stealing, not loan-sharking, not killing unless in defense, not raping, respecting the property of others, and so forth. It's a shame people fight wars over this. The only just punishment is proportional revenge by the hand of the victim. The state never achieves this since it is never the victim.

Yes, not every decision is subject to direct democracy. Is this a good thing? We leave personal decisions related to wealth, our safety, our health, our children, and so much else up to a paternalistic board of lunatics and attention seekers. The state is horrible no matter which form it takes. Democracy and oligarchy happen to be the worst forms.

Avoiding the polls would be a good idea. Either the tyrants in charge will get the message or the social fabric will disintegrate further. Every political revolution that's occured has been a result of civil disobedience in one form or another. I see no reason why ignoring the civic duty of voting would not be a form of civil disobedience.

I do not assume my arguments cover everything. I just know that certain things are knowable through a priori, deductive reasoning (logic) and statistics is not required. It's like knowing that an equilateral triangle has three interior angles that all equal 60. You don't need statistics or any kind of measurement to determine that if you encounter a triangle with equal-length sides. If you have a problem with what I say, then it's your job to critique the premises of my argument or to question how they led me to my conclusion. Empiricism has many limitations and cannot solve every problem. Focus on the fundamentals of the problems we are discussing.

Bailing out companies does not have a positive effect on the poor. Using tax money (stolen wealth) to give to the rich does not help poor people. Where do you think the rich get their bailouts? Where else COULD they have gotten it? There money comes from devaluing the currency or raising taxes. Ruining the currency hurts those who have the least money the most (money, like any good, is subject to marginal utility). The rich, as you may have noticed, never raise taxes on themselves. If they did that, they would be in even greater need of a bailout since their funds would be depleted further. Therefore, in order for them to gain from the bailouts, they must steal from someone else. Since those bailed out already own the overwhelming majority of the wealth, they could have only gotten it from those less wealthy.

Letting the companies fail would be very difficult for a little while. This might mean a year of very painful economic conditions. However, once the market is allowed to reallocate the mis-allocations of the financial bubbles, things will turn around and people will find employment in newer, up-to-date venues. When an economy experiences a boom created by government-driven market distortions, it must experience a recession. The recession is a correction of the distortion. It's not fun, but it's the only way to avoid the several years of economic depression that come from governments trying to prop up the decadent system that boomed too much in the first place. The Great Depression was an example of not allowing the market to correct itself. Hoover and FDR forced the depression to continue by injecting stimulus into the economy and trying to save large, politcally-connected industries.

The economy is not improving for very many unless you consider the growth in millioniares amongst the bailed-out Wall Street elite. The gap between rich and poor that the socialists frequently discuss is created from their very own only policy prescriptions. The free market could hardly do worse than this in terms of inequality.

I know exactly how Social Secuirty works (and it doesn't work). You may not know but it was actually intended to be a temporary program. Also, the first social security system was invented by Otto von Bismarck as an attempt to bribe people into not emmigrating to Prussia. I'm not sure why you would think an anarchist such as myself would be concerned about "political suicide." I think the only way to save our society from a chaotic super-depression is for everyone to pull the plug on Washington entirely. If by some bizarre chance the polticians committ suicide on their own volitions, then I welcome that miracle.

How can Social Security be necessary if we survived as a country so long before it existed? Your lungs are necessary. Social Security is not. I told you it's a personal savings perversion created by monsters like FDR and von Bismarck.