OK... fine. If you want to argue about the 19th century I will. I do not hold it as a standard for how I want this country to be run. You have racism, child labor, and the 19th century ended with the rise of the trusts. The anti-trust regulation that was passed at the beginning of the 20th century is a result of your example of how capitalism should be. It was not the wars which led to the government taking a more active role in restraining business. It was the fact that businesses were given the opportunities that you now want to give them again, and were shown to abuse that power. A free market was not shown to end up in more competition. It was shown to give one company the ability to dominate a sector of the economy and then abuse the position of power that it has gained by taking advantage of the common man. I will not use it as an example of why your system will not work because it was, as far as technological progress is concerned, a long time ago. Systems that would not work a long time ago could possibly work now because of the revolution we have had recently in communication (the internet). But your example does not help your case in any way whatsoever.
You are going to use a system that disappeared over 100 years ago as an example? Go back 500 years and a dictatorship (or monarchy) was the most effective form of government. Should I argue that democracy in modern times is the wrong system to use? Technology and society have changed in the meantime. There are 195 countries in the world. If your system is so effective, why have none of them utilized it fully?
AIG is part of the banking sector. It is not covered under FDIC (so not a traditional bank), which is why the government had to bail it out. Enron was corrupt, AIG was gambling and then had the american taxpayers take up its debts when the gambling failed. It is different kinds of corruption (AIG's wasn't illegal) but in both instances more regulation and oversight is needed.
The stockholders who owned stock when it crashed got screwed. Anyone who sold before that point made money that they should not have.
and no taxpayer funds were used to pay for anything.
Are you sure. At the very least they picked up the cost of the criminal proceedings. Regardless, someone had to pick up the cost of all the corporate shuffling that had to occur once Enron collapsed. And it is either the taxpayers or consumers who end up footing the bill.
Since banking is already highly regulated, are you sure you picked the right side of this argument?
The biggest bailout, and the one that has not been paid off yet went to AIG, who was not regulated since they specialized in creating derivatives and insurance options. The housing crash was bad enough, but it is the unregulated derivatives that is and continues to be a problem.
You totally missed my point. Just because another company does not enter the market does not mean that the market is not "free". Even if the consumer is being totally screwed. For example, how many competing electricity companies would you allow in your neighborhood? How many parallel sets of power poles and power lines should they be allowed to put across the front of your yard? 2? 3? 5? 10? Keep in mind that each pole will probably take up at least 2 feet of space into your yard? So if you allow 10 then you could have a power pole and power line right next to your house! (Assuming that your yard is 20 feet from the street)
Because government regulation kept corporations in check so that they competed in ways to give better service to customers instead of competing on ways to screw over their customers.
But their stockholders got rich in the meantime and their customers had rolling blackouts. So, it would be like the banking industry. We would always have terrible electricity service, but every 10 years or so the provider would "crash and burn" and the taxpayers would pick up the bill.
A single provider is bad because they can take advantage of their position to stifle competition and screw the consumer. Every market has barriers to entry. There are always startup costs. For something like electricity the startup costs are enormous (would you even allow 5 different companies to run 5 different power lines all on different poles to every house in your neighborhood?). It would cost thousands of dollars to run a power line from the nearest power plant to your house. So, if I were the "single provider" I would charge you just enough so that it is not worthwhile for another company to put in that (tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars) investment in you. Or, once they run the line, change my pricing to you to one that they can't match. You would end up paying hundreds of dollars every month. My stockholders would be happy.
How much do you think it would cost to build a "competing grid"? It is called a high barrier to entry. It does not mean it is not a free market. It does greatly reduce (or eliminate) competition in your "free market".
You free market nuts are just like the communists. You claim that your system is the best but there are tons of examples where it has failed but none of where it has succeeded. I would ask you why you expect that it would work differently this time, but I know what your answer would be. You would point out in all the failures how it didn't follow your "perfect" free market system. Communists do the same thing (Russia did not follow the ideal communist model). The fact is that if your system does not correct itself, then it is a bad system.
Here is a metaphor for you... You can balance a ball on top of an upside down bowl, but if you push it just a little bit off of its "perfect" position then it will tumble off of the bowl. While the ball can stay balance at the top of the bowl forever, it will only stay balanced if it is in its "perfect" position. On the other hand, if you turn the bowl the other way around and put the ball exactly in the center of the bowl, it will stay there. But, if you give it a small shove, it will move back towards the center of the bowl. If your system cannot deal with imperfections in implementation, then it is useless. It has to be able to deal with corrupt politicians/businessmen, crashes in the stock market, and just people being stupid. Show me where your system has succeeded and I might give your argument some credence. But the only argument that you have is to have "faith" in your ideology. I prefer science.
How many Federal Governments do you have to select amongst? How many local ISP's do you have to select amongst?
I have two. At&t or Comcast. Just like I have two parties to choose from, Democrat or Republican. So I actually have no choice for either.
How many Federal Governments have force to apply against you should you not comply with their rules? How many local ISP's have force to apply against you should you not comply with their rules?
Ever heard of the DMCA? The ISPs will use the government's force. Again, no difference.
You do know that the FCC is a US regulating agency, right? The UK Government has no jurisdiction over them. I have not heard the FCC propose to block all porn. Citation would be nice. Also, as far as the fairness doctrine is concerned, the purpose of that was to make sure people were supplied with a diversity of viewpoints. I seem to recall that the limited number of channels people had access to was an important consideration. If you have neutral access to the internet, I don't see how it could be argued that it would be needed. I do believe that there was talk about re-implementing it on TV (which is off-topic for this discussion). Again, citation would be helpful.
How are corporate monopolies any better than government (monopolies)? At least with government the electorate has some influence. With corporate monopolies, the only influence the common man has is through government.
Maybe the fact that we had government enforced net neutrality before and no one was complaining about government control. People claim that government regulation makes everything worse, but we have the glaring example of the government regulations helping the initial growth of the internet with net neutrality (the net was neutral in the 1990s).
Who knows what sort of exonerating evidence he chose not to release that is still classified (meaning they can't defend themselves.)
Obviously you do since it would be very underhanded to attack his character like this without any evidence whatsoever of wrongdoing on his part.
Or, are you assuming that he did this? If so, it is very convenient for you because it is impossible to prove otherwise. Which is why I assume that he is releasing leaks in an unbiased manner. Because that would be very easy to disproved if it weren't the case. (Wouldn't be the first time politicians leaked classified materials)
But I have another reason for believing that wikileaks is not withholding information. Because it would be stupid. If wikileaks (a site dedicated to fighting corruption by posting leaked documents in the public domain) were shown to be corrupt it would destroy their credibility. And they know that the irony of the situation would be way too much for about half of the nerds out there not to leak on wikileaks.
A country can take no actions, as it has no concrete existence independent of its constituent individuals. Every individual is responsible for his own actions.
So, by your logic, it should not be illegal for me to give money to terrorist organizations. I am just giving them the means/power they need to go out and kill innocent people. Each terrorist is responsible for his own actions. I bear no responsibility for those actions just because I enable them.
Correct?
I can choose whether or not I wish to lease a car. One does not get a choice as to whether or not one wishes to be a subject of a government or retain his natural sovereignty.
Bullshit. You can move to whatever country suits your ideals. No one is forcing you to stay here. I am sure there are plenty of people willing to take your place.
If I have a weapon, I can kill the motherfucker and claim self-defense if made to stand trial. I might even convince the jury to let me off.
True, but you have no way of preventing him from trying to take your money in the first place. With a government you do, and can thereby prevent the violent outcome and risk to your life.
OK... I will take your bait. So who is liable for the actions of a country? You say that politicians are not our agents. They are elected based upon promises they make and ideology they espouse during the election. They are in their position of power because the people that elected them decided to put them there. If they are elected to office, are these politicians not ethically bound to follow the ideologies that they espouse and follow up on the promises that they made? (whether or not they actually do is another question) If so, it would seem that they are ethically the agents of the people who elected them. Since they got elected based upon actions that they are expected to perform.
Also, "confiscated under threat of violence by the state"? How do you figure they are "confiscated"? If you lease a car, and then refuse to make payments, would you consider the court requiring that you pay them "confiscation" or just you being forced to make payments? The state is providing services; why should you not pay for them? Also, you don't elect a "highwayman". You have no effect on his ability to take your money. You do have an ability to affect whether a state can take your money. It is an invalid metaphor.
I will give you that Michael Moore is a propagandist. How is Assange one? The only way I have seen him manipulate information is to protect himself against the smear campaign being mounted against him.
Yes, in war civilians get killed. That does not make it OK to lie about how those people died. If it is only a few then the public will probably accept it as acceptable collateral damage. If not, then the public can put pressure on politicians to change how things are progressing. It is a check upon the workings of the government. But, if the government lies about it, then that check is circumvented. If you don't know the truth about what is going on, then how do you judge whether your government is acting in your best interests (as opposed to the best interests of the rich and powerful)?
How are they not public domain? Are these cables copyrighted? patented? trademarked? Do I have to pay the US government if I want to use this material?
Name one person who has died due to Wikileaks releasing information. The US tried that argument before and it turned out to be wrong. Yet everyone still talks about the poor informants who will be killed. It shows who the Pentagon astroturfers are.
You are just advocating keeping the public ignorant.
Slashdot Mirror
From TFA, "credible" single tips. A tip from a parent, giving details that can be somewhat checked, is more credible than some stranger on Slashdot.
What about a pissed off ex-girlfriend or ex-wife? Are they credible? Would they vindictively try to screw up your life?
OK... fine. If you want to argue about the 19th century I will. I do not hold it as a standard for how I want this country to be run. You have racism, child labor, and the 19th century ended with the rise of the trusts. The anti-trust regulation that was passed at the beginning of the 20th century is a result of your example of how capitalism should be. It was not the wars which led to the government taking a more active role in restraining business. It was the fact that businesses were given the opportunities that you now want to give them again, and were shown to abuse that power. A free market was not shown to end up in more competition. It was shown to give one company the ability to dominate a sector of the economy and then abuse the position of power that it has gained by taking advantage of the common man. I will not use it as an example of why your system will not work because it was, as far as technological progress is concerned, a long time ago. Systems that would not work a long time ago could possibly work now because of the revolution we have had recently in communication (the internet). But your example does not help your case in any way whatsoever.
You are going to use a system that disappeared over 100 years ago as an example? Go back 500 years and a dictatorship (or monarchy) was the most effective form of government. Should I argue that democracy in modern times is the wrong system to use? Technology and society have changed in the meantime. There are 195 countries in the world. If your system is so effective, why have none of them utilized it fully?
AIG is part of the banking sector. It is not covered under FDIC (so not a traditional bank), which is why the government had to bail it out. Enron was corrupt, AIG was gambling and then had the american taxpayers take up its debts when the gambling failed. It is different kinds of corruption (AIG's wasn't illegal) but in both instances more regulation and oversight is needed.
Their stockholders got shafted
The stockholders who owned stock when it crashed got screwed. Anyone who sold before that point made money that they should not have.
and no taxpayer funds were used to pay for anything.
Are you sure. At the very least they picked up the cost of the criminal proceedings. Regardless, someone had to pick up the cost of all the corporate shuffling that had to occur once Enron collapsed. And it is either the taxpayers or consumers who end up footing the bill.
Since banking is already highly regulated, are you sure you picked the right side of this argument?
The biggest bailout, and the one that has not been paid off yet went to AIG, who was not regulated since they specialized in creating derivatives and insurance options. The housing crash was bad enough, but it is the unregulated derivatives that is and continues to be a problem.
You totally missed my point. Just because another company does not enter the market does not mean that the market is not "free". Even if the consumer is being totally screwed. For example, how many competing electricity companies would you allow in your neighborhood? How many parallel sets of power poles and power lines should they be allowed to put across the front of your yard? 2? 3? 5? 10? Keep in mind that each pole will probably take up at least 2 feet of space into your yard? So if you allow 10 then you could have a power pole and power line right next to your house! (Assuming that your yard is 20 feet from the street)
Because government regulation kept corporations in check so that they competed in ways to give better service to customers instead of competing on ways to screw over their customers.
But their stockholders got rich in the meantime and their customers had rolling blackouts. So, it would be like the banking industry. We would always have terrible electricity service, but every 10 years or so the provider would "crash and burn" and the taxpayers would pick up the bill.
A single provider is bad because they can take advantage of their position to stifle competition and screw the consumer. Every market has barriers to entry. There are always startup costs. For something like electricity the startup costs are enormous (would you even allow 5 different companies to run 5 different power lines all on different poles to every house in your neighborhood?). It would cost thousands of dollars to run a power line from the nearest power plant to your house. So, if I were the "single provider" I would charge you just enough so that it is not worthwhile for another company to put in that (tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars) investment in you. Or, once they run the line, change my pricing to you to one that they can't match. You would end up paying hundreds of dollars every month. My stockholders would be happy.
How much do you think it would cost to build a "competing grid"? It is called a high barrier to entry. It does not mean it is not a free market. It does greatly reduce (or eliminate) competition in your "free market".
You free market nuts are just like the communists. You claim that your system is the best but there are tons of examples where it has failed but none of where it has succeeded. I would ask you why you expect that it would work differently this time, but I know what your answer would be. You would point out in all the failures how it didn't follow your "perfect" free market system. Communists do the same thing (Russia did not follow the ideal communist model). The fact is that if your system does not correct itself, then it is a bad system.
Here is a metaphor for you... You can balance a ball on top of an upside down bowl, but if you push it just a little bit off of its "perfect" position then it will tumble off of the bowl. While the ball can stay balance at the top of the bowl forever, it will only stay balanced if it is in its "perfect" position. On the other hand, if you turn the bowl the other way around and put the ball exactly in the center of the bowl, it will stay there. But, if you give it a small shove, it will move back towards the center of the bowl. If your system cannot deal with imperfections in implementation, then it is useless. It has to be able to deal with corrupt politicians/businessmen, crashes in the stock market, and just people being stupid. Show me where your system has succeeded and I might give your argument some credence. But the only argument that you have is to have "faith" in your ideology. I prefer science.
The SRB makes the hydrochloric acid. The main tank does not.
How many Federal Governments do you have to select amongst? How many local ISP's do you have to select amongst?
I have two. At&t or Comcast. Just like I have two parties to choose from, Democrat or Republican. So I actually have no choice for either.
How many Federal Governments have force to apply against you should you not comply with their rules? How many local ISP's have force to apply against you should you not comply with their rules?
Ever heard of the DMCA? The ISPs will use the government's force. Again, no difference.
You do know that the FCC is a US regulating agency, right? The UK Government has no jurisdiction over them. I have not heard the FCC propose to block all porn. Citation would be nice. Also, as far as the fairness doctrine is concerned, the purpose of that was to make sure people were supplied with a diversity of viewpoints. I seem to recall that the limited number of channels people had access to was an important consideration. If you have neutral access to the internet, I don't see how it could be argued that it would be needed. I do believe that there was talk about re-implementing it on TV (which is off-topic for this discussion). Again, citation would be helpful.
How are corporate monopolies any better than government (monopolies)? At least with government the electorate has some influence. With corporate monopolies, the only influence the common man has is through government.
Maybe the fact that we had government enforced net neutrality before and no one was complaining about government control. People claim that government regulation makes everything worse, but we have the glaring example of the government regulations helping the initial growth of the internet with net neutrality (the net was neutral in the 1990s).
We had government enforced net neutrality before, what has changed to make it no longer work?
Who knows what sort of exonerating evidence he chose not to release that is still classified (meaning they can't defend themselves.)
Obviously you do since it would be very underhanded to attack his character like this without any evidence whatsoever of wrongdoing on his part.
Or, are you assuming that he did this? If so, it is very convenient for you because it is impossible to prove otherwise. Which is why I assume that he is releasing leaks in an unbiased manner. Because that would be very easy to disproved if it weren't the case. (Wouldn't be the first time politicians leaked classified materials)
But I have another reason for believing that wikileaks is not withholding information. Because it would be stupid. If wikileaks (a site dedicated to fighting corruption by posting leaked documents in the public domain) were shown to be corrupt it would destroy their credibility. And they know that the irony of the situation would be way too much for about half of the nerds out there not to leak on wikileaks.
A country can take no actions, as it has no concrete existence independent of its constituent individuals. Every individual is responsible for his own actions.
So, by your logic, it should not be illegal for me to give money to terrorist organizations. I am just giving them the means/power they need to go out and kill innocent people. Each terrorist is responsible for his own actions. I bear no responsibility for those actions just because I enable them.
Correct?
I can choose whether or not I wish to lease a car. One does not get a choice as to whether or not one wishes to be a subject of a government or retain his natural sovereignty.
Bullshit. You can move to whatever country suits your ideals. No one is forcing you to stay here. I am sure there are plenty of people willing to take your place.
If I have a weapon, I can kill the motherfucker and claim self-defense if made to stand trial. I might even convince the jury to let me off.
True, but you have no way of preventing him from trying to take your money in the first place. With a government you do, and can thereby prevent the violent outcome and risk to your life.
So, Michael Moore is like Fox News. He IS a real journalist. Right? It is Assange who is a fake journalist.
OK... I will take your bait. So who is liable for the actions of a country? You say that politicians are not our agents. They are elected based upon promises they make and ideology they espouse during the election. They are in their position of power because the people that elected them decided to put them there. If they are elected to office, are these politicians not ethically bound to follow the ideologies that they espouse and follow up on the promises that they made? (whether or not they actually do is another question) If so, it would seem that they are ethically the agents of the people who elected them. Since they got elected based upon actions that they are expected to perform.
Also, "confiscated under threat of violence by the state"? How do you figure they are "confiscated"? If you lease a car, and then refuse to make payments, would you consider the court requiring that you pay them "confiscation" or just you being forced to make payments? The state is providing services; why should you not pay for them? Also, you don't elect a "highwayman". You have no effect on his ability to take your money. You do have an ability to affect whether a state can take your money. It is an invalid metaphor.
I will give you that Michael Moore is a propagandist. How is Assange one? The only way I have seen him manipulate information is to protect himself against the smear campaign being mounted against him.
Yes, in war civilians get killed. That does not make it OK to lie about how those people died. If it is only a few then the public will probably accept it as acceptable collateral damage. If not, then the public can put pressure on politicians to change how things are progressing. It is a check upon the workings of the government. But, if the government lies about it, then that check is circumvented. If you don't know the truth about what is going on, then how do you judge whether your government is acting in your best interests (as opposed to the best interests of the rich and powerful)?
Or zero resistance, like a superconducting cable would have (read TFS).
How are they not public domain? Are these cables copyrighted? patented? trademarked? Do I have to pay the US government if I want to use this material?
Name one person who has died due to Wikileaks releasing information. The US tried that argument before and it turned out to be wrong. Yet everyone still talks about the poor informants who will be killed. It shows who the Pentagon astroturfers are.
You are just advocating keeping the public ignorant.