|
On July 28 2011 10:35 TheFrankOne wrote:Show nested quote +On July 28 2011 10:32 chickenhawk wrote:Is that what you would do to my country? No Canada is just fine.. but USA did bomb with 2 nuclear weapons for there freedom, they never killed anyone. HEY! We committed GENOCIDE of Native Americans for our freedoms, how dare you ignore the efforts of thousands of American colonists, forcing marches, killing women and children, and shoving the indigenous peoples into smaller and smaller parts of the country. I swear you people need to give us Americans credit for the full breadth of atrocities we have committed.
EH, most of the genocide was via plagues that Americans couldn't have really controlled anyways. Forced marches were actually a tiny percentage of populations, as evil as that sounds, and at least a third of our government was always against such injustices... We just had fucking TERRIBLE Presidents...
Bombing Nagasaki and Hiroshima and killing around 250,000 people sounds horrible... and was horrible... but imagine if we had made that major offensive towards Kyushu? How many MILLIONS of Japanese would have died for the exact same result... not to mention the many thousands of Americans who also would have died... What rational President could NOT utilize the best means of cauterizing the wound that was the Pacific during WWII...
|
On July 28 2011 10:38 Josealtron wrote:Show nested quote +On July 28 2011 10:34 chickenhawk wrote:That's fine but I don't live in some shitty third world country. The mechanisms are a little more complicated when you actually have to heal people Argentina live expectency is around 76, not for from the 78 of US and 81 from Canada.. Don't listen to him, he's been posting nothing but stupid shit and has no decent knowledge of history. People need to stop responding to his posts-he's clearly trolling(or one of the most ignorant people I've ever seen on this website) and it's derailing this thread from the topic at hand (the US Debt) so can the debate over the US debt please continue? thanks. This isn't a "debate libertarian ideas thread", this is a discussion about the US Debt.
On the US debt thing. You can also choose not to pay  . A lot of countries have defaulted sovereign debt and they still exist and are in good shape.
|
Which is why I can never be a pure capitalist, it's too impersonal and "efficient" in it's neglect of those who are at the bottom of the food chain.
Actually, the only economic system that has EVER raised standards of living, not just for the elite, but for the average joe, the poor, has been unregulated laissez-faire capitalism. For example Hong Kong. Wage rates in hong kong are 4x those of mainland china. Why? Under british rule, unrestricted free trade. Or America during the 18th and 19th century. Standards of living for the poor increased faster than at any other time period.
Statists claim to be compassionate, but there is no compassion in the use of coercion.
|
On July 28 2011 10:42 ShatterZer0 wrote:Show nested quote +On July 28 2011 10:35 TheFrankOne wrote:On July 28 2011 10:32 chickenhawk wrote:Is that what you would do to my country? No Canada is just fine.. but USA did bomb with 2 nuclear weapons for there freedom, they never killed anyone. HEY! We committed GENOCIDE of Native Americans for our freedoms, how dare you ignore the efforts of thousands of American colonists, forcing marches, killing women and children, and shoving the indigenous peoples into smaller and smaller parts of the country. I swear you people need to give us Americans credit for the full breadth of atrocities we have committed. EH, most of the genocide was via plagues that Americans couldn't have really controlled anyways. Forced marches were actually a tiny percentage of populations, as evil as that sounds, and at least a third of our government was always against such injustices... We just had fucking TERRIBLE Presidents... Bombing Nagasaki and Hiroshima and killing around 250,000 people sounds horrible... and was horrible... but imagine if we had made that major offensive towards Kyushu? How many MILLIONS of Japanese would have died for the exact same result... not to mention the many thousands of Americans who also would have died... What rational President could NOT utilize the best means of cauterizing the wound that was the Pacific during WWII...
I believe that they nuked the japs to give the world a message : Don't fuck with us or we will nuke u.
|
On the US debt thing. You can also choose not to pay . A lot of countries have defaulted sovereign debt and they still exist and are in good shape.
This is actually the only moral position, and Ron Paul is arguing right now for a default. Politicians and bureaucrats racked up this debt, they should be responsible for paying it back, not the innocent taxpayers who have been getting bilked this whole time. Repudiation is the only sensible way of dealing with government debt. Personal debt is different though, if you default there you are stealing from the people you borrowed from.
|
Which would never escalate into private armies ethnically cleansing our racial dissidents and morally inclined neighbors... How in the HELL could private police forces help ANYTHING? If you think gang war is terrible imagine trained police officers and swat teams slaughtering each other... or even just trying to one up one another.
Or you could regulate the private police... with a Police force over the Police... which would be worse than the police we already have. Accept some rational evil for some irrational freedom.
|
United States5162 Posts
On July 28 2011 10:42 BestZergOnEast wrote:Show nested quote +
I find it ironic you bring up the morality angle when unregulated capitalism has issues with it as well.
Perhaps you could show an example of unregulated capitalism slaughtering tens of millions of innocent people.
No, but I can show you examples of horrible working conditions, child labor, unsanitary and overpacked slums, environmental destruction, and a general lack of value in life of any kind. I'd also argue that any authoritative regime is capable of horrible atrocities and that the mentioned mass slaughter is no more related to socialism then the above mentioned problems are associated with democracy.
|
Bombing Nagasaki and Hiroshima and killing around 250,000 people sounds horrible... and was horrible... but imagine if we had made that major offensive towards Kyushu? How many MILLIONS of Japanese would have died for the exact same result... not to mention the many thousands of Americans who also would have died... What rational President could NOT utilize the best means of cauterizing the wound that was the Pacific during WWII...
So why nuke a city? Full of citizens? Why nuke 2 cities? Why not a island with at least low population? And then say 'See there? We have thousands more?' Besides this is far from the objective of the thread.
|
As far as ethnic cleansing and genocide is concerned, considering EVERY EXAMPLE OF THIS HAS BEEN A GOVERNMENT AT WORK, I find it pretty hilarious that you claim the market will do this. Of course various competeting defence agencies would have incentives to work together, not to go to war with each other. The only organization that can go to war is government... war is far too costly fo little to no gain for any market actors to do it. It requires coercive taxation + the ability to debase the currency supply.
|
On July 28 2011 10:42 ShatterZer0 wrote:Show nested quote +On July 28 2011 10:35 TheFrankOne wrote:On July 28 2011 10:32 chickenhawk wrote:Is that what you would do to my country? No Canada is just fine.. but USA did bomb with 2 nuclear weapons for there freedom, they never killed anyone. HEY! We committed GENOCIDE of Native Americans for our freedoms, how dare you ignore the efforts of thousands of American colonists, forcing marches, killing women and children, and shoving the indigenous peoples into smaller and smaller parts of the country. I swear you people need to give us Americans credit for the full breadth of atrocities we have committed. EH, most of the genocide was via plagues that Americans couldn't have really controlled anyways. Forced marches were actually a tiny percentage of populations, as evil as that sounds, and at least a third of our government was always against such injustices... We just had fucking TERRIBLE Presidents... Bombing Nagasaki and Hiroshima and killing around 250,000 people sounds horrible... and was horrible... but imagine if we had made that major offensive towards Kyushu? How many MILLIONS of Japanese would have died for the exact same result... not to mention the many thousands of Americans who also would have died... What rational President could NOT utilize the best means of cauterizing the wound that was the Pacific during WWII...
Regarding the atomic bombing of Japan: there is significant historical evidence that Japan had been trying to surrender secretly for some months prior to the use of atomic weapons. The catch was that the Japanese demanded legal protections for the emperor, which the US would not guarantee, and that Truman and the military were in agreement that the use of the atomic bomb would dissuade Stalinist Russia from pursuing its own nuclear weapons program.
In other words, we could have averted both an invasion and the use of nuclear force against civilians, if deterring the USSR had not been such a massive geopolitical consideration.
|
No, but I can show you examples of horrible working conditions, child labor, unsanitary and overpacked slums, environmental destruction, and a general lack of value in life of any kind. I'd also argue that any authoritative regime is capable of horrible atrocities and that the mentioned mass slaughter is no more related to socialism then the above mentioned problems are associated with democracy.
He must never have studied the industrial revolution, or he just thinks that it was that great thing back then that gave everyone a beautiful live.
|
No, but I can show you examples of horrible working conditions, child labor, unsanitary and overpacked slums, environmental destruction, and a general lack of value in life of any kind. I'd also argue that any authoritative regime is capable of horrible atrocities and that the mentioned mass slaughter is no more related to socialism then the above mentioned problems are associated with democracy.
If you look at modern conditions, and compare them to 200 years ago, well yes, things were worse 200 years ago. DUH! But if you look at conditions 250 years ago, and then 200 years ago, you see things are rapidly improving. So it does no good to say "capitalism 200 years ago had poor working conditions" you should look at how condtions for workers changed. The reason why there was child labour was because parents weren't rich enough to not put their child to work. Capitalism ALLOWED for child labour to end by making the parents more productive. It wasn't government that ameliorated conditons for the working class, it was capitalism, capital accumulation, the development of industry.
|
On July 28 2011 10:43 BestZergOnEast wrote:Show nested quote +Which is why I can never be a pure capitalist, it's too impersonal and "efficient" in it's neglect of those who are at the bottom of the food chain. Actually, the only economic system that has EVER raised standards of living, not just for the elite, but for the average joe, the poor, has been unregulated laissez-faire capitalism. For example Hong Kong. Wage rates in hong kong are 4x those of mainland china. Why? Under british rule, unrestricted free trade. Or America during the 18th and 19th century. Standards of living for the poor increased faster than at any other time period. Statists claim to be compassionate, but there is no compassion in the use of coercion.
Are you serious?
Say that when you're the man from Argentina whose grandmother dies of a cold because he can't get fever medication because of an "efficient" government. We won't fix overpopulation through happily utilizing euthanasia on millions because in the long term it will save more lives... I know I sound like an idiot idealist but it's not WWII any more, I believe we can be better and stronger than cutting off our limbs to save our bodies... Or sacrificing the souls of our children to save the lofty "many's" children...
Will we really be dragged around by realpolitik and short shortsightedness to our repetitive demise?
|
On July 28 2011 10:47 Expurgate wrote:Show nested quote +On July 28 2011 10:42 ShatterZer0 wrote:On July 28 2011 10:35 TheFrankOne wrote:On July 28 2011 10:32 chickenhawk wrote:Is that what you would do to my country? No Canada is just fine.. but USA did bomb with 2 nuclear weapons for there freedom, they never killed anyone. HEY! We committed GENOCIDE of Native Americans for our freedoms, how dare you ignore the efforts of thousands of American colonists, forcing marches, killing women and children, and shoving the indigenous peoples into smaller and smaller parts of the country. I swear you people need to give us Americans credit for the full breadth of atrocities we have committed. EH, most of the genocide was via plagues that Americans couldn't have really controlled anyways. Forced marches were actually a tiny percentage of populations, as evil as that sounds, and at least a third of our government was always against such injustices... We just had fucking TERRIBLE Presidents... Bombing Nagasaki and Hiroshima and killing around 250,000 people sounds horrible... and was horrible... but imagine if we had made that major offensive towards Kyushu? How many MILLIONS of Japanese would have died for the exact same result... not to mention the many thousands of Americans who also would have died... What rational President could NOT utilize the best means of cauterizing the wound that was the Pacific during WWII... Regarding the atomic bombing of Japan: there is significant historical evidence that Japan had been trying to surrender secretly for some months prior to the use of atomic weapons. The catch was that the Japanese demanded legal protections for the emperor, which the US would not guarantee, and that Truman and the military were in agreement that the use of the atomic bomb would dissuade Stalinist Russia from pursuing its own nuclear weapons program. In other words, we could have averted both an invasion and the use of nuclear force against civilians, if deterring the USSR had not been such a massive geopolitical consideration.
I don't think that nuking japan was a good deterrent for Stalin. You just showed a madman a thing that goes big BOOM. That will inevitably result in him trying to get his own thing that goes boom. It was a message to the entire world about who was the new "world boss".
|
On July 28 2011 10:47 BestZergOnEast wrote:
As far as ethnic cleansing and genocide is concerned, considering EVERY EXAMPLE OF THIS HAS BEEN A GOVERNMENT AT WORK, I find it pretty hilarious that you claim the market will do this. Of course various competeting defence agencies would have incentives to work together, not to go to war with each other. The only organization that can go to war is government... war is far too costly fo little to no gain for any market actors to do it. It requires coercive taxation + the ability to debase the currency supply.
Markets are not capable of genocide, they lack things like armies and territory, I don't even understand what you are trying to say. Markets are not a replacement for government.
|
On July 28 2011 10:19 BestZergOnEast wrote:Well here in a first world nation people routinely wait 3+ months to see specialists. You guys probably just don't even have those specialists, or equipment. If you think Argentina has a better health care system than America, I want what you are smoking. Since the days of Aristotle, men have noticed that private property is superior to communally owned property. My evidence is the economic history of the world. Every socialist nation has failed - usually with brutal slave labour camps and autocratic tyrants. Every time laissez-faire capitalism has been attempted there has been prosperity and wealth created.
You either count Sweden and Denmark as "socialist" countries, in which case socialism can work fine, or you don't, which would mean that social security and socialized health care aren't socialism.
|
Personally though, I think it's fine for a child to have a job. Many do (delivering nwspapers, for example). Somehow people get the idea that having a job is exploitative or demeaning and we need to protect our youth from this onerous burden. Not at all. A job is an opportunity, a way to devlop your skills and earn independence.
|
As far as ethnic cleansing and genocide is concerned, considering EVERY EXAMPLE OF THIS HAS BEEN A GOVERNMENT AT WORK, I find it pretty hilarious that you claim the market will do this. Of course various competeting defence agencies would have incentives to work together, not to go to war with each other. The only organization that can go to war is government... war is far too costly fo little to no gain for any market actors to do it. It requires coercive taxation + the ability to debase the currency supply.
Yup cartels never shoot them up, also wait and see.. when global companies have enough money to have a small army.
|
On July 28 2011 10:51 BestZergOnEast wrote:
Personally though, I think it's fine for a child to have a job. Many do (delivering nwspapers, for example). Somehow people get the idea that having a job is exploitative or demeaning and we need to protect our youth from this onerous burden. Not at all. A job is an opportunity, a way to devlop your skills and earn independence.
I agree. I had my first job at nine years old in a sheet metal factory; two weeks later, I was running the floor. Child labor laws are ruining this country
|
You either count Sweden and Denmark as "socialist" countries, in which case socialism can work fine, or you don't, which would mean that social security and socialized health care aren't socialism.
Or, I could count them as "mixed market economies", that in the case of Sweden, was once free market, and since developing this welfare state they have not been doing as well.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
