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Read the rules in the OP before posting, please.In order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a re-read to refresh your memory! The vast majority of you are contributing in a healthy way, keep it up! NOTE: When providing a source, explain why you feel it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion if it's not obvious. Also take note that unsubstantiated tweets/posts meant only to rekindle old arguments can result in a mod action. |
On April 23 2015 12:54 Millitron wrote:Show nested quote +On April 23 2015 12:39 rararock wrote:On April 23 2015 10:56 Millitron wrote:On April 23 2015 10:23 WolfintheSheep wrote:On April 23 2015 09:53 Millitron wrote:On April 23 2015 09:49 Gorsameth wrote:On April 23 2015 09:43 Yoav wrote:On April 23 2015 04:39 cLutZ wrote:
The problem for the Democrats/Republicans on trade deals is they have to explain their contradictory viewpoints vis-a-vis immigration:
Republicans: Pro Foreign Goods, Anti Foreign People
Democrats: Anti Foreign Goods, Pro Foreign People
Both have similar effects of suppressing wages of Americans, while lowering prices for consumers.
When you break it down like that, you see that the immigration debate is really only about the party's perception of who they expect immigrants to vote for. It's a lot more than this. Republicans (of the neocon stripe) are pro-foreigner in the sense that they think Arabs/Islam capable of democracy, where far-left democrats think the opposite. That said, they're also less likely to bomb the "bad" foreigners. And even the immigration thing is complicated. There's a lot of Democratic pressure to keep out high-skilled people from India and the like. Everyone is capable of Democracy. The problem is trying to implement it in a tiny time frame. You cant just have people hold an election and declare them a working Democracy. The culture, the checks and balances all require time and effort and the west in general is not willing to commit to that so instead we leave behind broken countries that descend into anarchy. I'm not so sure everyone is capable of democracy. Democracy is only possible in a culture that highly values the individual. Which seems rather ignorant of other cultures, like Asian ones that value duty to family, duty to society, and avoidance of public shame before individual rights and freedoms. I would say that democracy is largely an extension of individuals having the means and desire to gain more rights. I mean, what's the point in having an uprising to overthrow a government if you'll remain just as poor and destitute before and after? Or, who cares about democracy while the dictator is actually doing an acceptable job? Aside from valuing individuals, the culture also has to value rule of law. Without rule of law, any democracy that gets started will just be done away with by the first guy to be elected. The people have to not put up with that kind of shit if democracy is to survive in a nation. That's why it's failed so often in the Middle East and Africa. The people are simply indifferent to the brutal cult of personality politics that go on. They're used to politicians bullying and murdering their way to the top. And even when a dictator does finally piss off too many people and gets overthrown, he's often just replaced with a different dictator. On April 23 2015 10:38 cLutZ wrote:
Democracy is fairly easy to establish. A democracy that is not just as tyrannical as your average dictator is. Not all dictators are bad guys, and not all democracies are good. Oliver Cromwell was pretty good to his people. One advantage a dictatorial society has, as far as the people are concerned, is that if things do get too bad, you know who to go after. If a democracy was tyrannical, it's not very clear what you can do. Consider the French Revolution. They knew exactly who to guillotine; the king and his ministers. Now imagine if they were a democracy instead and had a huge supporting bureaucracy. It wouldn't be so obvious who is causing the problems. Lol at using the French Revolution as an example of targeted killing. Robespierre and his goons didn't just execute the king and his ministers, they were executing everyone. The majority of those killed were peasants. I didn't say the revolutionaries would always be calm and careful not to kill innocents. Just that at least some of the people killed would be the ones at fault for whatever problems incited the revolution, i.e. the dictator. A corrupt democracy has no obvious target, so things just continue to get worse and worse. There's no way out, because there's no obvious problem to fix. It's the whole system. And in a democracy, that means the people are part of the problem too. Everyone is the problem, there's no deranged or evil king to overthrow.
Eh, you could consider Morsi's democracy in Egypt a corrupt democracy (for the half a year that it lasted). Seems like al-Sisi and his goons knew EXACTLY whom to go after.
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On April 23 2015 21:47 kornetka wrote:Show nested quote +On April 23 2015 21:11 Paljas wrote:On April 23 2015 09:43 Yoav wrote:On April 23 2015 04:39 cLutZ wrote:
The problem for the Democrats/Republicans on trade deals is they have to explain their contradictory viewpoints vis-a-vis immigration:
Republicans: Pro Foreign Goods, Anti Foreign People
Democrats: Anti Foreign Goods, Pro Foreign People
Both have similar effects of suppressing wages of Americans, while lowering prices for consumers.
When you break it down like that, you see that the immigration debate is really only about the party's perception of who they expect immigrants to vote for. Republicans (of the neocon stripe) are pro-foreigner in the sense that they think Arabs/Islam capable of democracy, where far-left democrats think the opposite. lmao how do you even make up this stuff I guess what he means is that the Republicans started war in Iraq and tried to make it democratic, while the Democrats were against it. The logical conclusion of this is what he wrote.
There is so much wrong with this line of thinking that I don't even know where to begin.
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On April 23 2015 23:13 oneofthem wrote:
well of course, instead of accepting totalitarianism in the name of liberty these situations cannot exist because tautology.
Not all dictatorships are totalitarian.
Imagine this for a second. You have a country with a monarchy. And the king is a great guy who respects his people and treats them well. Gives them lots of rights, lets them run their own lives mostly. That's a dictatorship and yet it still embodies many of the ideals of Libertarianism.
A libertarian society is one that leaves its members alone as much as possible. It is just as easy for a monarch to leave his people alone as it is for a democracy.
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Privately run Medicare plans, fresh off a lobbying victory that reversed proposed budget cuts, face new scrutiny from government investigators and whistleblowers who allege that plans have overcharged the government for years.
Federal court records show at least a half dozen whistleblower lawsuits alleging billing abuses in these Medicare Advantage plans have been filed under the False Claims Act since 2010, including two that just recently surfaced. The suits have named insurers from Columbia, S.C., to Salt Lake City to Seattle, and plans that have together enrolled millions of seniors. Lawyers predict more whistleblower cases will surface. The Justice Department also is investigating Medicare risk scores.
Though specific allegations vary, the whistleblower suits all take aim at these risk scores. Medicare uses the scores to pay higher rates for sicker patients and less for people in good health. But officials were warned as early as 2009 that some plans claim patients are sicker than they actually are to boost their payments.
Privately run Medicare Advantage plans have signed up more than 17 million members, about a third of the people eligible for Medicare, and are poised to get bigger. Earlier this month, the industry overturned proposed cuts sought by the Obama administration for a third straight year, instead winning a modest raise in payment rates for the programs.
Medicare Advantage resonates with many seniors for its low out-of-pocket costs. It's also winning favor with some health policy experts who argue these managed care plans can offer higher quality care than standard Medicare, which pays doctors and hospitals on a fee-for-service basis.
Karen Ignagni, the chief executive officer of America's Health Insurance Plans, the industry's trade group, called the government's change of heart "a notable step to provide stable funding."
But the whistleblower suits argue that it's too easy for health plans to gouge the government.
Source
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On April 23 2015 22:51 Yoav wrote:Show nested quote +On April 23 2015 21:11 Paljas wrote:On April 23 2015 09:43 Yoav wrote:On April 23 2015 04:39 cLutZ wrote:
The problem for the Democrats/Republicans on trade deals is they have to explain their contradictory viewpoints vis-a-vis immigration:
Republicans: Pro Foreign Goods, Anti Foreign People
Democrats: Anti Foreign Goods, Pro Foreign People
Both have similar effects of suppressing wages of Americans, while lowering prices for consumers.
When you break it down like that, you see that the immigration debate is really only about the party's perception of who they expect immigrants to vote for. Republicans (of the neocon stripe) are pro-foreigner in the sense that they think Arabs/Islam capable of democracy, where far-left democrats think the opposite. lmao how do you even make up this stuff Hanging out with far-left democrats, mostly. Not all are like this, of course. But the Bill Maher contingent does exist.
"far left" -> Bill Maher
never change america, never change
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
On April 24 2015 02:40 Millitron wrote:Show nested quote +On April 23 2015 23:13 oneofthem wrote:
well of course, instead of accepting totalitarianism in the name of liberty these situations cannot exist because tautology. Not all dictatorships are totalitarian. Imagine this for a second. You have a country with a monarchy. And the king is a great guy who respects his people and treats them well. Gives them lots of rights, lets them run their own lives mostly. That's a dictatorship and yet it still embodies many of the ideals of Libertarianism. A libertarian society is one that leaves its members alone as much as possible. It is just as easy for a monarch to leave his people alone as it is for a democracy.
what happens when a guy doesn't want the king to do a particular move/pay tax to fund the king/deny his authority in whatever form etc.
but yea i am not expecting any substantial answers given that libertarianism has been used to defend a very wide range of decidedly anti-liberty situations.
anyway this discussion actually reminded me of the existence of monarchist libertarians. while i have sympathy for the libertarian concern for individual liberty and autonomy, its historical and cultural adherents really do not do the movement any favors whatsoever.
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On April 24 2015 03:32 Paljas wrote:Show nested quote +On April 23 2015 22:51 Yoav wrote:On April 23 2015 21:11 Paljas wrote:On April 23 2015 09:43 Yoav wrote:On April 23 2015 04:39 cLutZ wrote:
The problem for the Democrats/Republicans on trade deals is they have to explain their contradictory viewpoints vis-a-vis immigration:
Republicans: Pro Foreign Goods, Anti Foreign People
Democrats: Anti Foreign Goods, Pro Foreign People
Both have similar effects of suppressing wages of Americans, while lowering prices for consumers.
When you break it down like that, you see that the immigration debate is really only about the party's perception of who they expect immigrants to vote for. Republicans (of the neocon stripe) are pro-foreigner in the sense that they think Arabs/Islam capable of democracy, where far-left democrats think the opposite. lmao how do you even make up this stuff Hanging out with far-left democrats, mostly. Not all are like this, of course. But the Bill Maher contingent does exist. "far left" -> Bill Maher never change america, never change
yes, didn't you know that the left right spectrum is a spectrum of decency and intelligence, where far left just means idiotic indecent public annoyance.
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On April 24 2015 03:37 oneofthem wrote:Show nested quote +On April 24 2015 02:40 Millitron wrote:On April 23 2015 23:13 oneofthem wrote:
well of course, instead of accepting totalitarianism in the name of liberty these situations cannot exist because tautology. Not all dictatorships are totalitarian. Imagine this for a second. You have a country with a monarchy. And the king is a great guy who respects his people and treats them well. Gives them lots of rights, lets them run their own lives mostly. That's a dictatorship and yet it still embodies many of the ideals of Libertarianism. A libertarian society is one that leaves its members alone as much as possible. It is just as easy for a monarch to leave his people alone as it is for a democracy. what happens when a guy doesn't want the king to do a particular move/pay tax to fund the king/deny his authority in whatever form etc. but yea i am not expecting any substantial answers given that libertarianism has been used to defend a very wide range of decidedly anti-liberty situations.
Well, what do you do when you don't like a particular move your current government makes? How much freedom do you have to make changes?
Democracy really gives you no less individual power than a benevolent dictatorship or monarchy does - which is to say, you have very little at all. It's all about the power of the collective masses, which you are a very tiny drop in.
I mean, if we're talking about most other democratic nations that aren't the United States, a leading party can be in power for a very long time, with almost unhindered power to make whatever decisions they want, so long as the population likes having them in power. Doesn't sound so different than a dictator that a nation wants on the throne, does it?
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
the example of one guy is not supposed to be asking for that one guy to have all the powers. in a democracy the one guy has participatory power, in a monarchy there will be a point at which resistance is met by force. and democracy is not relativism of values, it is actually a set of substantive commitments to stuff like individual political and social power.
the appeal of having a monarchy for some of these libertarians is basically to defend strong set of natural rights, existing mechanisms having been found unsatisfactory only a mythical device would do.
so really the libertarian argument against the 'ineffectiveness' of democracy is very dishonest. it's actually a fear of the effectiveness of democracy that motivates this appeal for idealized monarchy. except the monarchy also embodies a set of ideal social states in which the worthy people are protected, and whatever dissent is simply illegal/immoral attempt to overcome the correct rights arrangements.
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On April 24 2015 04:11 oneofthem wrote:
so really the libertarian argument against the 'ineffectiveness' of democracy is very dishonest. it's actually a fear of the effectiveness of democracy that motivates this appeal for idealized monarchy. except the monarchy also embodies a set of ideal social states in which the worthy people are protected, and whatever dissent is simply illegal/immoral attempt to overcome the correct rights arrangements.
For as meandering as oneofthem can be at times, this is on point as fuck.
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Yes, the "effective democracy" which perfectly reflects the will of 50%+1 on the populace is very scary to libertarians. Honestly, it should be scary to everyone.
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This is some bullshit.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — A federal judge on Thursday sentenced David H. Petraeus, the highest-profile general from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, to probation for disclosing classified information. He was also fined $100,000, which was $60,000 more than the government had recommended.
The sentencing was the end of a leak investigation that embarrassed Mr. Petraeus and created bitter disputes inside the Justice Department about whether he was receiving too much leniency from Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.
F.B.I. officials and some prosecutors had contended that Mr. Petraeus should receive prison time for providing highly classified journals to a woman with whom he had an affair and who wrote his biography when he was the director of the C.I.A.
But Mr. Holder sided with Mr. Petraeus, ultimately deciding to agree to recommend that he be spared prison time. That decision angered the F.B.I. officials and prosecutors who said the attorney general was giving Mr. Petraeus preferential treatment, according to several law enforcement officials.
Not only had the head of the C.I.A. potentially jeopardized national security, but he had lied about it to F.B.I. agents in an interview, the officials said. Lying to federal agents is a felony that carries a sentence of up to five years in prison. The Justice Department has used that charge against terrorists, corrupt politicians and low-level drug dealers.
David Petraeus Is Sentenced to Probation in Leak Investigation
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On April 24 2015 04:11 oneofthem wrote:
the example of one guy is not supposed to be asking for that one guy to have all the powers. in a democracy the one guy has participatory power, in a monarchy there will be a point at which resistance is met by force. and democracy is not relativism of values, it is actually a set of substantive commitments to stuff like individual political and social power.
the appeal of having a monarchy for some of these libertarians is basically to defend strong set of natural rights, existing mechanisms having been found unsatisfactory only a mythical device would do.
so really the libertarian argument against the 'ineffectiveness' of democracy is very dishonest. it's actually a fear of the effectiveness of democracy that motivates this appeal for idealized monarchy. except the monarchy also embodies a set of ideal social states in which the worthy people are protected, and whatever dissent is simply illegal/immoral attempt to overcome the correct rights arrangements.
Point is that you as an individual in a democracy have almost zero power to influence individual government decisions. What you do have, collectively, is a much lower threshold to throw out the leading powers...which isn't a small thing, but is very much on the macro scale opposed to the micro.
I don't think anyone honestly advocates instating a dictator with the ideal that it's a perfectly functional system. The idea, though, is that a dictator that no one wants to oust (with emphasis on desire, and not means) will not feel much different than a government that gets elected every single time. The problem that everyone understands is that getting a dictator that people like having around is worse than a crapshoot.
Hence the Churchill quote "...it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."
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On April 24 2015 04:11 oneofthem wrote:
the example of one guy is not supposed to be asking for that one guy to have all the powers. in a democracy the one guy has participatory power, in a monarchy there will be a point at which resistance is met by force. and democracy is not relativism of values, it is actually a set of substantive commitments to stuff like individual political and social power.
the appeal of having a monarchy for some of these libertarians is basically to defend strong set of natural rights, existing mechanisms having been found unsatisfactory only a mythical device would do.
so really the libertarian argument against the 'ineffectiveness' of democracy is very dishonest. it's actually a fear of the effectiveness of democracy that motivates this appeal for idealized monarchy. except the monarchy also embodies a set of ideal social states in which the worthy people are protected, and whatever dissent is simply illegal/immoral attempt to overcome the correct rights arrangements.
Democracy is very effective. It achieves its goals very well. The problem is that its goals are often against personal liberty, and the oppressed have little or no recourse. The south during the Jim Crowe era was a democracy. China is a democracy.
With a dictatorship, there is one person the people can hold accountable. How could the English have gotten the Magna Carta if King John wasn't there to be forced to sign it? How could you hold a bureaucracy at gun-point and force them to sign the Magna Carta?
A bad monarch is much easier to replace than a bad democracy.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
as i've said already, was only using the 'one guy' as a rhetorical device. not going to read the rest
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On April 24 2015 04:31 oneofthem wrote:
as i've said already, was only using the 'one guy' as a rhetorical device. not going to read the rest
Funny, I didn't mention your first paragraph at all.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
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On April 24 2015 04:24 farvacola wrote:This is some bullshit. Show nested quote +CHARLOTTE, N.C. — A federal judge on Thursday sentenced David H. Petraeus, the highest-profile general from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, to probation for disclosing classified information. He was also fined $100,000, which was $60,000 more than the government had recommended.
The sentencing was the end of a leak investigation that embarrassed Mr. Petraeus and created bitter disputes inside the Justice Department about whether he was receiving too much leniency from Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.
F.B.I. officials and some prosecutors had contended that Mr. Petraeus should receive prison time for providing highly classified journals to a woman with whom he had an affair and who wrote his biography when he was the director of the C.I.A.
But Mr. Holder sided with Mr. Petraeus, ultimately deciding to agree to recommend that he be spared prison time. That decision angered the F.B.I. officials and prosecutors who said the attorney general was giving Mr. Petraeus preferential treatment, according to several law enforcement officials.
Not only had the head of the C.I.A. potentially jeopardized national security, but he had lied about it to F.B.I. agents in an interview, the officials said. Lying to federal agents is a felony that carries a sentence of up to five years in prison. The Justice Department has used that charge against terrorists, corrupt politicians and low-level drug dealers. David Petraeus Is Sentenced to Probation in Leak Investigation
Typical Holder right? Maybe that's why republicans fought to keep Holder as the AG for so much longer than Obama wanted?
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China is a democracy? Lol. No. China is an oligarchy.
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The south during the Jim Crowe era was a democracy.
no
as i said, I'd volunteer to be a monarch for you guys.
i'd be really easy to replace, big promise
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EPT
