Examined... All three protect the individual from the government's abuse. None guarantee the individual any handout...
Who pays for legal representation ? Who pays for the infrastructure necessary to hold a trial ? Who reimburses the jurors for their time ? Who pays for the dispute to be investigated ?
I can remember a Byte article back in the day talking about Windows NT 4.0 having 32 and 64 bit versions.
There was no publicly available, 64-bit version of Windows NT 4.0. Internally within Microsoft is another matter - it maybe have existed in some form, like the ports to SPARC and PA-RISC, but I doubt it was ever fully functional, especially since the first published 64-bit version of Windows NT wasn't released until 2001, 5 years after NT 4.0 (ie: there would have been no cost/benefit justification for developing 64-bit NT 4.0).
According to Wikipedia, Windows NT 4.0 did indeed have a 64 bit version:
That article is about Windows 2000. The 64-bit Alpha port of Windows 2000 made it into the RC phase, but was canned before release. The first commercially available 64-bit version of Windows 2000 was the Itanium port, that came out in 2001.
For a/. geek, what does Windows 7 have that's *really* useful/desired/cool vs. Windows XP? Not trolling, just haven't had the time to install it/play with it yet.
* Makes running as a non-admin substantially easier.
* Search.
* You can install the OS into a VHD disk image and boot from it, making all those reinstalls Slashdotters seem to love less disruptive.
* No need for crappy third-party Wifi management utilities.
* You may like the new Taskbar. Personally I think it's copied the OS X Dock, and therefore taking a huge step backwards in terms of usability (with the exception of being able to drag/drop and rearrange the buttons).
You will NOT get Windows 7 professional for $70.00 It's a $299.00 option. you can have the useless Home extreme/deluxe black edition for the free price but that is 100% useless in a business environment when you have to join the domain.
$299 is
Vista Business adds $99 to a Dell PC. As, if I recall correctly, did Windows XP Pro.
Can you offer any rationale why Windows 7 Business would be priced any differently ?
America's Founding Fathers only saw necessary to enumerate the protective rights -- they listed the things, the Government is not allowed to do to people. All of them believing in personal responsibility for the famous Pursuit of Happiness, they did not put anything remotely like Right to Shelter [nytimes.com] -- a Government obligation to give citizens something other than freedom to mind their own business -- into the Document they crafted.
I suggest you re-examine the 5th, 6th and 7th amendments to the Bill of Rights.
But until the libertarian dream is realized (at least as much wishful thinking as marxist socialism) I'll take public welfare over corporate welfare any day:)
The Libertarian dream *is* realised. Take a look at pretty much any dysfunctional African state like Somalia.
First and foremost, we've learned that you are an ass who uses emotive rhetoric to promote his agenda.
Secondly, we've learned that (at least) the 5th, 6th and 7th Amendments to the USA's Bill of Rights are "Positive Rights" and, therefore, all citizens of the USA are "second class citizens, slaves".
Finally, we've learned that all "rights" are, in fact, completely dependent on an individuals ability to enforce them and therefore not "natural", "god-given", or in any other way inherent.
Unusual for a nanny stater to be so blunt about their true belief. You aren't interested in a government based on a logical philosophy but on forcing your preferred solution on everyone.
Errr, no. Quite the opposite, in fact. (That would have to be the biggest non-sequitur you've pulled out so far.)
Of what value is it to debate with you when if I accept your view it would be a more profitable use of my time to obtain a big stick.
Ignoring for a second that's not what I said at all, of what value is it to debate with you when you don't even believe the police are anything more than a convenience ? Your position is so detached from reality it's laughable.
I thought I might have been talking to someone interested in reason, my mistake, I won't bother you further.
Well, when you're prepared to "reason" with the criticisms I've already made, I'll still be here.
So long as you produce it yourself or obtain it by voluntary exchange it is.
So, basically, if you're poor you have no rights other than the charity of others ?
It just isn't a right that justifies the use of force against others in order to pay for it. You haven't justified your position that your "right to good health" trumps my right to the product of my labour. If you wish to take my money, surely the onus is on you to provide justification. Oh, that's right, the big stick is the only justification you acknowledge.
The justification is you getting to live in a safe, healthy, educated, wealthy, civilised society.
Tell it to this woman:
Your propaganda video is irrelevant. It neither supports any of your arguments, nor refutes any of mine.
Not everyone accepts the role of helpless victim in need of protection.
When that woman's gun protects her from identify theft, fraud, wrongful dismissal, vandalism, defamation, or any of the other 99% of situations the police and justice system are there for, let me know.
You seem to think that being pathetic gives your arguments moral force.
Not in the slightest. It's my arguments having some connection to how the real world operates that gives them moral force. You seem to think that so long as everyone gets a gun and pays no taxes, everything will be hunky-dory.
No, I mean it's a convenience to have them do it rather than do it ourselves.
But individuals can't do what the police do "themselves", outside of a few situations. It's not a "convenience", it's a necessity for society.
Not everybody, myself included, wants to live in a fortress. The point came up in regard to whether you have a basic right to the services of others. It is more convenient for us to operate together and pay for a specialist police force than to arrange that ourselves. Self-defence is a basic right, ie: you could never be rationally understood to have given up the right to it, no matter the system of government in place. The justice system functions of the police are more appropriately considered social contract rights, not basic rights, ie: we give up our right to personal revenge in return for a police and court system. Medical services can only be considered as a contractual right, either by private contract between you and the provider or as part of the social contract. You tend towards wanting it as part of the social contract, I by private contract, a worthy subject of debate. Trying to claim it as a basic right is an attempt to shut down the debate. It also has the effect of claiming the effort of someone else as your natural right. I personally believe that only the results of your own effort are your natural right. Everything else is a form of contract or an acquisition by force.
You have not justified why the services provided by the police (let alone other obvious things like the fire department) are different from the services provided by healthcare. Trying to hand-wave with "self-defence is a basic right" doesn't cut it - firstly because the level of "self-defence" you can have without the police is minimal, and secondly because you haven't demonstrated why "good health" is any less of a right that "self defence".
Further, trying to make a distinction between "basic rights" and "social rights" is disingenuous. All "rights" are - ultimately and practically - determined by the society you live in. No amount of heart-stirring speeches can change the fact that if you're not on the side with the biggest sticks, you either do what they say, or leave.
Using slightly irregular definitions of "reasonable".
You refer to them as a "convenience", thus indicating they are not an essential service. Is the provision of non-essential services not an indication of the "nanny state", in your opinion ?
I don't excuse the behaviour of banks. I would agree that they are fraudulent. However that is (so far) government sanctioned fraud that is specifically enabled by banking regulations. Banks tell all depositors their money is available, yet in reality they do not have everyone's deposit available for withdrawal, they depend on most people not withdrawing their money. This has long been banking practice and would be illegal in any other industry. It is a practice that bears some similarity to bait and switch advertising, for example, because they are claiming availability of something when they have no intention of honouring that claim. Pretty much every aspect of our banking system is fraudulent and legally sanctioned, something the increased regulation proposed will do nothing at all to resolve. Forcing the banks to play by the rules of real free market enterprises would require repealing legislation, not increased regulation to try to prop up their dishonest business practices and make them stable.
Ah, let me guess. You're a get-back-to-the-gold-standard person as well ?
Tell me then, what would have to be implemented for you to agree it's a nanny state? You don't have a point. Your position is that you want a nanny state, but you can't bring yourself to admit it. So you pretend we don't have one.
Now *that's* a straw man.
Firstly, the term "nanny-state" is a worthless soundbite. It's a phrase so inexact and subjective, that even attempting to use it in any sort of meaningful way is laughable.
Secondly, the reasonable inference from your comments thus far is that you consider even the police to be an indication of a "nanny state", so it's a reasonable conclusion from that you consider pretty much the mere existence of any state to be "nannying".
Thirdly, my position is that government-funded health care is no more evidence of a "nanny state" than state-funded police, firemen or other services essential to a lawful, civilised, safe and productive society. Your counter-argument to this has been that since the police wouldn't even be necessary, if only we had more guns, then health care is no more an essential service than they are (ie: it isn't). Thus leading again to the logical inference that you consider essentially any state, to be a "nanny state".
Even Kevin Rudd has as good as admitted the government caused the economic collapse. To claim a stimulus plan of giving us back our tax money solves the problem is a tacit acknowledgement that excessive taxation was a significant contributor to the problem.
But of course. In your world, all problems are caused by excessive taxation. Irresponsible - if not outright fraudulent - behaviour by banks and other financial institutions was a relatively minor factor, and only happened at all because of Government meddling.
That taxation is necessary for your beloved nanny state though. Unless we acknowledge it for what it is and start to dismantle it things will only get worse.
Like I said, if you want to see what happens when the "nanny state" is dismantled, cast your eyes towards Africa.
I didn't object to all forms of taxation, I objected to income tax. You are not even making a minimal attempt to understand what I'm saying, you seem to prefer to answer with straw man arguments.
That's because any distinction you make will be specious. Your argument is against the government taking your money, not the semantics of how they do it.
Another straw man. I didn't say most people live on farms.
You are trying to extrapolate your ability to "defend yourself" to everyone else and use that to support your argument of why the police are a "convenience". Ergo, the fact that you were on a farm but 99% of the population is not, is relevant.
That depends if any are willing to be the first to die.
Probability would be low. Even most gun nutters don't sleep with a loaded pistol underneath their pillow, the ability to think and act coherently after waking up is greatly diminished, and that's assuming she'd even have the conviction to pull the trigger. Add in some intoxication on behalf of the perpetrators, some "go on mate", and there you go.
Fruther, that's the likely chain of events in the relatively uncommon situation where a gun might actually have a chance at being useful. A more stealthy attack, or one like the gang rapes in Sydney a few years back, and the gun would be less than useless.
Since that's unlikely, very useful. I doubt there are many people willing to sacrifice their lives so their friends can rape someone. It's another dishonest argument anyway, since you know full well that the police will not defend her in that circumstance anyway, unless you plan to station them in people's homes.
Indeed, they would not. They would, however, be able to bring the weight of the police department to bear on locating the perpetrators and locking them up so they didn't attack anyone else. That - apart from dramatically increasing the probability of success - adds a far, far greater level of deterrence.
You obviously have no intention of having an honest discussion about this.
Heh. Says the bloke ignoring pretty much all of my points.
Yes, because it would be impossible to have a state without income tax. Good one, Sherlock. Your assertion that my argument is intellectually dishonest rests solely on that falsehood. However I'm prepared to accept the possibility that you're ignorant rather than dishonest.
If you can think of a way for a government to reliably and consistently provide services without some form of taxation, feel free.
However, that is but one of the reasons I think you reject the idea of the state entirely. Calling the police a "convenience" is another dead giveaway of your type.
Not a historical reality. Having grown up on a farm I assure you we provided our own self-defence.
Something you might not be aware of: most people don't live isolated from each other on farms. They live cheek to cheek in large cities.
How useful do you think your "self defence" would have been if the owners of the four farms around yours decided they wanted it ? How useful do you think a gun is going to be to some 20-year old woman living alone when a dozen guys kick down her door at 2am looking for a good time ?
Police would never have got to us in time. I would suggest that if you are incapable of self-defence it is because you are not armed.
Whether or not I'm armed is basically irrelevant. Being armed will, as I already said, help protect from a minority of threats, but it certainly won't protect from all of them, nor help with any events before and after a particular type of physical attack.
If you believe you are inherently incapable, then what do you think is the difference between the police and you that makes them capable?
*Vastly* more resources, experience and time.
It isn't a genetic dysfunction in you, it's the gun. That being so, it is government that has made you dependent on government.
A gun won't magically make you self sufficient. It *might* help you "defend yourself" from a small number of attackers. It certainly won't protect you from a large number of them, or dissuade them from attacking in the first place. It won't give you the ability to pursue your attacker after he has bonked you on the head, raped your wife and stolen everything in your house. It won't help protect other people from that same person by catching him. It won't protect you from non-physical threats, like slander, libel and other false accusations. It won't protect you from sexual harassment at work, wrongful dismissal or being hurt due to your employer's negligence.
You might long for the glory days of the Wild West. I have good news for you - you can go and relive them in Somalia, or any of several other African countries with little to no government (and the predictable results thereof). Personally, I like the safety and convenience of modern, civilised society and I'm fairly confident most people agree with me.
My primary and lasting complaint vs Vista was the decision (which admittedly was foreshadowed in XP) to create multiple versions of the OS, where the only difference for the price was what features were enabled in the kernel.
You mean the same pricing model that's existing in one form or another since Windows NT 3.1, in 1993 ?
To the extent that's true, they agree with me and reject the nanny state. What's your argument again?
No, your position is to pretty much reject the state entirely.
My argument is that government funded healthcare is no more a "nanny state" issue than government-funded policemen, firemen, the army, public transport, or most any of the other things already mentioned.
You say that but you offer no argument to refute it. The product of someone else's labour can never be a basic right to others without implementing in some degree a slave state.
Which makes, by definition, every state (or at least every functioning state) a "slave state". Ergo, the intellectual dishonesty of the argument.
If your "basic right" obliges me to work without reward in order to pay for your right (income tax), in what significant way does that differ from me being enslaved by you?
Firstly, you do get a "reward". It's living in a civilised society and not some third-world hellhole.
Secondly, and most importantly, it differs from you being "enslaved" because you can leave, or act to try and change the situation.
Police aren't free but they are a convenience. In the absence of police you are responsible for your own self defence. In the absence of a hospital can you perform your own heart surgery?
No. Nor, unlike you, do I hold any illusions about being about to provide my own self defence - outside of mostly trivial physical threats - or pursue criminals after the fact.
Don't you think you're saying something about our education system here?
Not really, no. Their parents, corporate advertising and banks, on the other hand...
A house, the one major expense for most people, used to cost about 2.5 years of an average wages in my area, now it's about 7.
And will probably drop further. The bubble's not finished deflating yet.
That's in the space of 10 years. Families used to be able to get by on one wage, now most people can't.
I'm sure most of them could get by on one wage if they shopped at K-Mart and Target, had a single 5-10 year old car and made their own coffee and dinner - like their parents and grandparents used to.
There is a significant cultural fixation on home ownership in Australia (and similarly in the USA and UK), but it is ultimately a relatively small aspect of qualify of life. Actually shelter at all, being able to eat, work, clothe yourself and have leisure time are all vastly more significant.
Irresponsibly cheap credit made possible by our GOVERNMENT OWNED reserve bank, and no deposit loans made possible by the first home owners grant.
Rubbish. All the first homeowners grant did was push up house prices by $7-14k. No-deposit loans were already possible (or near as damnit to it if the $7k swung the balance), and *no-one* except the privately owned banks is responsible for their lending standards.
Let's also not forget all those banks convincing people that interest rates would stay low forever, or that they could afford a loan even when they couldn't, or handing out credit cards like candy. Certainly, the problem was nowhere near as bad in Australia as it was in the US or the UK, but that doesn't mean the blame lies anywhere else except the banks themselves.
Think, dammit! If people begin to realise the culpability our governments have had in this they wouldn't fall for the "it was caused by a lack of regulation" propaganda.
Yet the evidence shows that countries higher levels of regulation have fared better.
How different do you think the situation would have been if a 20% cash deposit and 12 months of steady income at least 5x higher than the minimum repayment was legally required before a mortgage could be issued ? How about if you couldn't get a credit card with a limit greater than a month's salary without a 3-year history of reliable payment with the lender issuing it ?
Which is an even sillier way to put it. The Government isn't in your house cooking you dinner and turning down your sheets.
Australian are amongst the longest-working and most productive individuals on the planet. Australian ex-pats tend to be very highly thought of in foreign countries because of their work ethic. In what way are they "not able" ?
Australians don't have to save money because if you lose your job we'll give you the dole indefinitely, your retirement plan will be worked out between the government and your boss, your health insurance by the government, your education by the government.
I guess that explains why every Australia doesn't work, retires at exactly 65 and lives in the lap of luxury, never uses private healthcare and spends most of their life at school or in Univerisity.
Oh, wait, none of those things are even remotely true.
As I have mentioned in my previous posts, the government will even make sure you get your vitamins. I'm not talking about the lowest wage earners only it's the majority who simply do not develop the habits and mentality of self-reliance necessary to a free people. You think the government and the company are really going to look after you? I'm ok with having that as a backup plan but to make it the mainstay of our daily habits is insane.
You will need to work long and hard to convince me that's how the "majority" of people think. Indeed, from the travelling I've done, Australians are only second (behind the Americans) for being skeptical of the Government's ability to provide anything. Indeed, about the only major difference between Australian and American attitudes towards Government is that Australians expect the Government to screw up out of incompetence, whereas Americans expect them to simply be flat-out corrupt.
It's very admirable to want to make sure people aren't left to fend for themselves in the face of disaster but in the process we've created a culture of dependency that is very dangerous. We don't just look after people in times of disaster, we have the government meddling in our every day lives and that meddling is constantly advancing.
There's certain more meddling than there should be. However, I strongly disagree that there's any "culture of dependency".
I doubt our trade agreements go close to paying for our military shortfall. In any case, I'd prefer not to have the agreements and look after ourselves, for the US military to stay in the US and for ours to not follow them into their various wars.
It's not like Australia is surrounded by an enclave of aggressive countries.
Except for that bit about being dependent on them. I wouldn't be boasting about economics though. In real terms we've had a massive reduction in living standards over my lifetime.
Funny. My parents and pretty much everyone else older than me says the opposite. Heck, they were over here visiting us only a few months ago, and my father made the point that their flights to Europe cost the same in unadjusted dollars as they did twenty years earlier. The difference is that today (well, five years ago - he's retired now) he had to work about a quarter as much to earn that amount.
Which "living standards", exactly, have been "massively reduced" and how are you measuring it ?
All you have to do is include housing in your inflation figures. Don't be fooled by the relatively mild effects we've had from the financial collapse. Young people starting out now have incredible financial obstacles to overcome compared to 10 years ago. The financial collapse wasn't the disaster, the housing boom was. The fact that not many people seem to understand that doesn't speak much for the education system either. How can young people afford to pay for others healthcare, education, baby payments, social security, etc, etc, when they can barely afford a place to live?
When it collapses we will have a population that is totally unprepared to look after themselves.
Oh, bullshit. There is a vast gulf of difference between sleeping easier at night because you know a personal disaster won't have you out in the streets begging for scraps, and being "unprepared to look after yourself".
Further, you make the erroneous assumption that the only people who would otherwise suffer are those who aren't prepared to look after themselves. All the preparation in the world won't help you when you're on a low wage and your child gets diagnosed with some illness that requires more money to treat than you'll make in twenty years.
"When it collapses" we won't be screwed because we have people who are unprepared to look after themselves, we'll be screwed because we won't be *able* to look after anyone.
In any case, how different do you think Australian health care (or any other socialist health care) would look without the drugs and equipment developed by that evil American system?
Not very. The vast, vast bulk of health care is mundane, and the biggest benefit from a universal system comes from preventative care and early diagnosis, not the "treatment" of erectile dysfunction and prolonging the life of 95 year old terminal patients for another 6 months.
Or if our defence spending had to be adequate to actually defend our country because we didn't have US military bases here?
But we don't, because we buy in their protection with favourable trade arrangements.
Note that most of the US's "defence spending" today is not spent on "defence". Of them, us, or anyone else.
Australian socialism as it exists is absolutely dependent on our relationship with the US, it is foolishness to hold us up as an example of doing it better.
But we are, in pretty much every metric you care to measure. Education, health, economics, etc.
Done voluntarily, that's called insurance and I agree. What is the preoccupation with the use of government force?
Same "preoccupation" that exists with all things society has decided are basic rights - protection from others, workplace safety, non-discrimination, etc. The reason you can't opt out of health care is the same reason you can't sell yourself into slavery.
If it was really about "a whole bunch of people who have decided" as you claim, it wouldn't need to be compulsory.
Of course it would, because there's always some small group of selfish pricks who want all the rights and none of the responsibility, or the much larger group who think it will never happen to them, or the folks who just don't give a shit.
As a society, Australia has decided certain things will be law. If you don't like them, you have two choices - convince enough people you're right so you can change the law, or go somewhere else. I wish you luck convincing lots of Australians that being some combination of poor, unlucky and sick should ruin a person's life, and the lives of anyone who depends on them. You'll need it.
If the boss asks any questions, it's just a little something that you've got there, to pull out of your hat if the main system goes to hell, and you need to get back on your feet in a hurry.
If "Plan B" is an untested, undocumented system that only one person knows anything about or is capable of executing, then there are far, far larger problems to be worrying about than whether or not Open Source is involved.
If your insurance company sucks, the solution isn't a government takeover - it's making a smart decision about where you get your insurance.
For most people, that's typically something they don't find out until it's too late. Which in the case of a car accident, might "only" leave you with financial problems. However, in the case of health care, it might leave you bankrupt. Or dead.
Slashdot Mirror
Examined... All three protect the individual from the government's abuse. None guarantee the individual any handout...
Who pays for legal representation ? Who pays for the infrastructure necessary to hold a trial ? Who reimburses the jurors for their time ? Who pays for the dispute to be investigated ?
I can remember a Byte article back in the day talking about Windows NT 4.0 having 32 and 64 bit versions.
There was no publicly available, 64-bit version of Windows NT 4.0. Internally within Microsoft is another matter - it maybe have existed in some form, like the ports to SPARC and PA-RISC, but I doubt it was ever fully functional, especially since the first published 64-bit version of Windows NT wasn't released until 2001, 5 years after NT 4.0 (ie: there would have been no cost/benefit justification for developing 64-bit NT 4.0).
According to Wikipedia, Windows NT 4.0 did indeed have a 64 bit version:
That article is about Windows 2000. The 64-bit Alpha port of Windows 2000 made it into the RC phase, but was canned before release. The first commercially available 64-bit version of Windows 2000 was the Itanium port, that came out in 2001.
I walk to the cinema as well, but I don't bring my laptop. Do you find yourself bringing your laptop to the cinema often?
Yes. Pretty much whenever I go to the movies after work, I'll have my laptop. That would probably be, oh, about 9 out of every 10 times.
P.S. Fun Fact: Windows NT 4.0 had an Alpha version.
Indeed. But it wasn't 64-bit.
For a /. geek, what does Windows 7 have that's *really* useful/desired/cool vs. Windows XP? Not trolling, just haven't had the time to install it/play with it yet.
* Makes running as a non-admin substantially easier.
* Search.
* You can install the OS into a VHD disk image and boot from it, making all those reinstalls Slashdotters seem to love less disruptive.
* No need for crappy third-party Wifi management utilities.
* You may like the new Taskbar. Personally I think it's copied the OS X Dock, and therefore taking a huge step backwards in terms of usability (with the exception of being able to drag/drop and rearrange the buttons).
You will NOT get Windows 7 professional for $70.00 It's a $299.00 option. you can have the useless Home extreme/deluxe black edition for the free price but that is 100% useless in a business environment when you have to join the domain.
$299 is
Vista Business adds $99 to a Dell PC. As, if I recall correctly, did Windows XP Pro.
Can you offer any rationale why Windows 7 Business would be priced any differently ?
America's Founding Fathers only saw necessary to enumerate the protective rights -- they listed the things, the Government is not allowed to do to people. All of them believing in personal responsibility for the famous Pursuit of Happiness, they did not put anything remotely like Right to Shelter [nytimes.com] -- a Government obligation to give citizens something other than freedom to mind their own business -- into the Document they crafted.
I suggest you re-examine the 5th, 6th and 7th amendments to the Bill of Rights.
But until the libertarian dream is realized (at least as much wishful thinking as marxist socialism) I'll take public welfare over corporate welfare any day :)
The Libertarian dream *is* realised. Take a look at pretty much any dysfunctional African state like Somalia.
Let's analyze this based on what we've learned.
First and foremost, we've learned that you are an ass who uses emotive rhetoric to promote his agenda.
Secondly, we've learned that (at least) the 5th, 6th and 7th Amendments to the USA's Bill of Rights are "Positive Rights" and, therefore, all citizens of the USA are "second class citizens, slaves".
Finally, we've learned that all "rights" are, in fact, completely dependent on an individuals ability to enforce them and therefore not "natural", "god-given", or in any other way inherent.
Unusual for a nanny stater to be so blunt about their true belief. You aren't interested in a government based on a logical philosophy but on forcing your preferred solution on everyone.
Errr, no. Quite the opposite, in fact. (That would have to be the biggest non-sequitur you've pulled out so far.)
Of what value is it to debate with you when if I accept your view it would be a more profitable use of my time to obtain a big stick.
Ignoring for a second that's not what I said at all, of what value is it to debate with you when you don't even believe the police are anything more than a convenience ? Your position is so detached from reality it's laughable.
I thought I might have been talking to someone interested in reason, my mistake, I won't bother you further.
Well, when you're prepared to "reason" with the criticisms I've already made, I'll still be here.
So long as you produce it yourself or obtain it by voluntary exchange it is.
So, basically, if you're poor you have no rights other than the charity of others ?
It just isn't a right that justifies the use of force against others in order to pay for it. You haven't justified your position that your "right to good health" trumps my right to the product of my labour. If you wish to take my money, surely the onus is on you to provide justification. Oh, that's right, the big stick is the only justification you acknowledge.
The justification is you getting to live in a safe, healthy, educated, wealthy, civilised society.
Tell it to this woman:
Your propaganda video is irrelevant. It neither supports any of your arguments, nor refutes any of mine.
Not everyone accepts the role of helpless victim in need of protection.
When that woman's gun protects her from identify theft, fraud, wrongful dismissal, vandalism, defamation, or any of the other 99% of situations the police and justice system are there for, let me know.
You seem to think that being pathetic gives your arguments moral force.
Not in the slightest. It's my arguments having some connection to how the real world operates that gives them moral force. You seem to think that so long as everyone gets a gun and pays no taxes, everything will be hunky-dory.
No, I mean it's a convenience to have them do it rather than do it ourselves.
But individuals can't do what the police do "themselves", outside of a few situations. It's not a "convenience", it's a necessity for society.
Not everybody, myself included, wants to live in a fortress. The point came up in regard to whether you have a basic right to the services of others. It is more convenient for us to operate together and pay for a specialist police force than to arrange that ourselves. Self-defence is a basic right, ie: you could never be rationally understood to have given up the right to it, no matter the system of government in place. The justice system functions of the police are more appropriately considered social contract rights, not basic rights, ie: we give up our right to personal revenge in return for a police and court system. Medical services can only be considered as a contractual right, either by private contract between you and the provider or as part of the social contract. You tend towards wanting it as part of the social contract, I by private contract, a worthy subject of debate. Trying to claim it as a basic right is an attempt to shut down the debate. It also has the effect of claiming the effort of someone else as your natural right. I personally believe that only the results of your own effort are your natural right. Everything else is a form of contract or an acquisition by force.
You have not justified why the services provided by the police (let alone other obvious things like the fire department) are different from the services provided by healthcare. Trying to hand-wave with "self-defence is a basic right" doesn't cut it - firstly because the level of "self-defence" you can have without the police is minimal, and secondly because you haven't demonstrated why "good health" is any less of a right that "self defence".
Further, trying to make a distinction between "basic rights" and "social rights" is disingenuous. All "rights" are - ultimately and practically - determined by the society you live in. No amount of heart-stirring speeches can change the fact that if you're not on the side with the biggest sticks, you either do what they say, or leave.
Using slightly irregular definitions of "reasonable".
You refer to them as a "convenience", thus indicating they are not an essential service. Is the provision of non-essential services not an indication of the "nanny state", in your opinion ?
I don't excuse the behaviour of banks. I would agree that they are fraudulent. However that is (so far) government sanctioned fraud that is specifically enabled by banking regulations. Banks tell all depositors their money is available, yet in reality they do not have everyone's deposit available for withdrawal, they depend on most people not withdrawing their money. This has long been banking practice and would be illegal in any other industry. It is a practice that bears some similarity to bait and switch advertising, for example, because they are claiming availability of something when they have no intention of honouring that claim. Pretty much every aspect of our banking system is fraudulent and legally sanctioned, something the increased regulation proposed will do nothing at all to resolve. Forcing the banks to play by the rules of real free market enterprises would require repealing legislation, not increased regulation to try to prop up their dishonest business practices and make them stable.
Ah, let me guess. You're a get-back-to-the-gold-standard person as well ?
Tell me then, what would have to be implemented for you to agree it's a nanny state? You don't have a point. Your position is that you want a nanny state, but you can't bring yourself to admit it. So you pretend we don't have one.
Now *that's* a straw man.
Firstly, the term "nanny-state" is a worthless soundbite. It's a phrase so inexact and subjective, that even attempting to use it in any sort of meaningful way is laughable.
Secondly, the reasonable inference from your comments thus far is that you consider even the police to be an indication of a "nanny state", so it's a reasonable conclusion from that you consider pretty much the mere existence of any state to be "nannying".
Thirdly, my position is that government-funded health care is no more evidence of a "nanny state" than state-funded police, firemen or other services essential to a lawful, civilised, safe and productive society. Your counter-argument to this has been that since the police wouldn't even be necessary, if only we had more guns, then health care is no more an essential service than they are (ie: it isn't). Thus leading again to the logical inference that you consider essentially any state, to be a "nanny state".
Even Kevin Rudd has as good as admitted the government caused the economic collapse. To claim a stimulus plan of giving us back our tax money solves the problem is a tacit acknowledgement that excessive taxation was a significant contributor to the problem.
But of course. In your world, all problems are caused by excessive taxation. Irresponsible - if not outright fraudulent - behaviour by banks and other financial institutions was a relatively minor factor, and only happened at all because of Government meddling.
That taxation is necessary for your beloved nanny state though. Unless we acknowledge it for what it is and start to dismantle it things will only get worse.
Like I said, if you want to see what happens when the "nanny state" is dismantled, cast your eyes towards Africa.
I didn't object to all forms of taxation, I objected to income tax. You are not even making a minimal attempt to understand what I'm saying, you seem to prefer to answer with straw man arguments.
That's because any distinction you make will be specious. Your argument is against the government taking your money, not the semantics of how they do it.
Another straw man. I didn't say most people live on farms.
You are trying to extrapolate your ability to "defend yourself" to everyone else and use that to support your argument of why the police are a "convenience". Ergo, the fact that you were on a farm but 99% of the population is not, is relevant.
That depends if any are willing to be the first to die.
Probability would be low. Even most gun nutters don't sleep with a loaded pistol underneath their pillow, the ability to think and act coherently after waking up is greatly diminished, and that's assuming she'd even have the conviction to pull the trigger. Add in some intoxication on behalf of the perpetrators, some "go on mate", and there you go.
Fruther, that's the likely chain of events in the relatively uncommon situation where a gun might actually have a chance at being useful. A more stealthy attack, or one like the gang rapes in Sydney a few years back, and the gun would be less than useless.
Since that's unlikely, very useful. I doubt there are many people willing to sacrifice their lives so their friends can rape someone. It's another dishonest argument anyway, since you know full well that the police will not defend her in that circumstance anyway, unless you plan to station them in people's homes.
Indeed, they would not. They would, however, be able to bring the weight of the police department to bear on locating the perpetrators and locking them up so they didn't attack anyone else. That - apart from dramatically increasing the probability of success - adds a far, far greater level of deterrence.
You obviously have no intention of having an honest discussion about this.
Heh. Says the bloke ignoring pretty much all of my points.
At least when the Comcast monopoly or other corporations come-round demanding money, I can tell them to "Fuck off; I don't want your service."
What do you do when all the companies providing the service you want behave in the same way ?
Why MSFT always seems to be piss poor on basic tools I have no idea [...]
Because when they're not, crowds gather outside chanting "Anti-trust".
Really, I don't even understand how two women can make love, unless they kind of scissor or something.
Exactly. There's other options too.
Yes, because it would be impossible to have a state without income tax. Good one, Sherlock. Your assertion that my argument is intellectually dishonest rests solely on that falsehood. However I'm prepared to accept the possibility that you're ignorant rather than dishonest.
If you can think of a way for a government to reliably and consistently provide services without some form of taxation, feel free.
However, that is but one of the reasons I think you reject the idea of the state entirely. Calling the police a "convenience" is another dead giveaway of your type.
Not a historical reality. Having grown up on a farm I assure you we provided our own self-defence.
Something you might not be aware of: most people don't live isolated from each other on farms. They live cheek to cheek in large cities.
How useful do you think your "self defence" would have been if the owners of the four farms around yours decided they wanted it ? How useful do you think a gun is going to be to some 20-year old woman living alone when a dozen guys kick down her door at 2am looking for a good time ?
Police would never have got to us in time. I would suggest that if you are incapable of self-defence it is because you are not armed.
Whether or not I'm armed is basically irrelevant. Being armed will, as I already said, help protect from a minority of threats, but it certainly won't protect from all of them, nor help with any events before and after a particular type of physical attack.
If you believe you are inherently incapable, then what do you think is the difference between the police and you that makes them capable?
*Vastly* more resources, experience and time.
It isn't a genetic dysfunction in you, it's the gun. That being so, it is government that has made you dependent on government.
A gun won't magically make you self sufficient. It *might* help you "defend yourself" from a small number of attackers. It certainly won't protect you from a large number of them, or dissuade them from attacking in the first place. It won't give you the ability to pursue your attacker after he has bonked you on the head, raped your wife and stolen everything in your house. It won't help protect other people from that same person by catching him. It won't protect you from non-physical threats, like slander, libel and other false accusations. It won't protect you from sexual harassment at work, wrongful dismissal or being hurt due to your employer's negligence.
You might long for the glory days of the Wild West. I have good news for you - you can go and relive them in Somalia, or any of several other African countries with little to no government (and the predictable results thereof). Personally, I like the safety and convenience of modern, civilised society and I'm fairly confident most people agree with me.
My primary and lasting complaint vs Vista was the decision (which admittedly was foreshadowed in XP) to create multiple versions of the OS, where the only difference for the price was what features were enabled in the kernel.
You mean the same pricing model that's existing in one form or another since Windows NT 3.1, in 1993 ?
Just compare it to OSX [...]
Except OS X is *at least* as sluggish as Vista, if not more so.
To the extent that's true, they agree with me and reject the nanny state. What's your argument again?
No, your position is to pretty much reject the state entirely.
My argument is that government funded healthcare is no more a "nanny state" issue than government-funded policemen, firemen, the army, public transport, or most any of the other things already mentioned.
You say that but you offer no argument to refute it. The product of someone else's labour can never be a basic right to others without implementing in some degree a slave state.
Which makes, by definition, every state (or at least every functioning state) a "slave state". Ergo, the intellectual dishonesty of the argument.
If your "basic right" obliges me to work without reward in order to pay for your right (income tax), in what significant way does that differ from me being enslaved by you?
Firstly, you do get a "reward". It's living in a civilised society and not some third-world hellhole.
Secondly, and most importantly, it differs from you being "enslaved" because you can leave, or act to try and change the situation.
Police aren't free but they are a convenience. In the absence of police you are responsible for your own self defence. In the absence of a hospital can you perform your own heart surgery?
No. Nor, unlike you, do I hold any illusions about being about to provide my own self defence - outside of mostly trivial physical threats - or pursue criminals after the fact.
Don't you think you're saying something about our education system here?
Not really, no. Their parents, corporate advertising and banks, on the other hand...
A house, the one major expense for most people, used to cost about 2.5 years of an average wages in my area, now it's about 7.
And will probably drop further. The bubble's not finished deflating yet.
That's in the space of 10 years. Families used to be able to get by on one wage, now most people can't.
I'm sure most of them could get by on one wage if they shopped at K-Mart and Target, had a single 5-10 year old car and made their own coffee and dinner - like their parents and grandparents used to.
There is a significant cultural fixation on home ownership in Australia (and similarly in the USA and UK), but it is ultimately a relatively small aspect of qualify of life. Actually shelter at all, being able to eat, work, clothe yourself and have leisure time are all vastly more significant.
Irresponsibly cheap credit made possible by our GOVERNMENT OWNED reserve bank, and no deposit loans made possible by the first home owners grant.
Rubbish. All the first homeowners grant did was push up house prices by $7-14k. No-deposit loans were already possible (or near as damnit to it if the $7k swung the balance), and *no-one* except the privately owned banks is responsible for their lending standards.
Let's also not forget all those banks convincing people that interest rates would stay low forever, or that they could afford a loan even when they couldn't, or handing out credit cards like candy. Certainly, the problem was nowhere near as bad in Australia as it was in the US or the UK, but that doesn't mean the blame lies anywhere else except the banks themselves.
Think, dammit! If people begin to realise the culpability our governments have had in this they wouldn't fall for the "it was caused by a lack of regulation" propaganda.
Yet the evidence shows that countries higher levels of regulation have fared better.
How different do you think the situation would have been if a 20% cash deposit and 12 months of steady income at least 5x higher than the minimum repayment was legally required before a mortgage could be issued ? How about if you couldn't get a credit card with a limit greater than a month's salary without a 3-year history of reliable payment with the lender issuing it ?
How much is your b
By unprepared I mean "not able", not unwilling.
Which is an even sillier way to put it. The Government isn't in your house cooking you dinner and turning down your sheets.
Australian are amongst the longest-working and most productive individuals on the planet. Australian ex-pats tend to be very highly thought of in foreign countries because of their work ethic. In what way are they "not able" ?
Australians don't have to save money because if you lose your job we'll give you the dole indefinitely, your retirement plan will be worked out between the government and your boss, your health insurance by the government, your education by the government.
I guess that explains why every Australia doesn't work, retires at exactly 65 and lives in the lap of luxury, never uses private healthcare and spends most of their life at school or in Univerisity.
Oh, wait, none of those things are even remotely true.
As I have mentioned in my previous posts, the government will even make sure you get your vitamins. I'm not talking about the lowest wage earners only it's the majority who simply do not develop the habits and mentality of self-reliance necessary to a free people. You think the government and the company are really going to look after you? I'm ok with having that as a backup plan but to make it the mainstay of our daily habits is insane.
You will need to work long and hard to convince me that's how the "majority" of people think. Indeed, from the travelling I've done, Australians are only second (behind the Americans) for being skeptical of the Government's ability to provide anything. Indeed, about the only major difference between Australian and American attitudes towards Government is that Australians expect the Government to screw up out of incompetence, whereas Americans expect them to simply be flat-out corrupt.
It's very admirable to want to make sure people aren't left to fend for themselves in the face of disaster but in the process we've created a culture of dependency that is very dangerous. We don't just look after people in times of disaster, we have the government meddling in our every day lives and that meddling is constantly advancing.
There's certain more meddling than there should be. However, I strongly disagree that there's any "culture of dependency".
I doubt our trade agreements go close to paying for our military shortfall. In any case, I'd prefer not to have the agreements and look after ourselves, for the US military to stay in the US and for ours to not follow them into their various wars.
It's not like Australia is surrounded by an enclave of aggressive countries.
Except for that bit about being dependent on them. I wouldn't be boasting about economics though. In real terms we've had a massive reduction in living standards over my lifetime.
Funny. My parents and pretty much everyone else older than me says the opposite. Heck, they were over here visiting us only a few months ago, and my father made the point that their flights to Europe cost the same in unadjusted dollars as they did twenty years earlier. The difference is that today (well, five years ago - he's retired now) he had to work about a quarter as much to earn that amount.
Which "living standards", exactly, have been "massively reduced" and how are you measuring it ?
All you have to do is include housing in your inflation figures. Don't be fooled by the relatively mild effects we've had from the financial collapse. Young people starting out now have incredible financial obstacles to overcome compared to 10 years ago. The financial collapse wasn't the disaster, the housing boom was. The fact that not many people seem to understand that doesn't speak much for the education system either. How can young people afford to pay for others healthcare, education, baby payments, social security, etc, etc, when they can barely afford a place to live?
The problem is there is mo
When it collapses we will have a population that is totally unprepared to look after themselves.
Oh, bullshit. There is a vast gulf of difference between sleeping easier at night because you know a personal disaster won't have you out in the streets begging for scraps, and being "unprepared to look after yourself".
Further, you make the erroneous assumption that the only people who would otherwise suffer are those who aren't prepared to look after themselves. All the preparation in the world won't help you when you're on a low wage and your child gets diagnosed with some illness that requires more money to treat than you'll make in twenty years.
"When it collapses" we won't be screwed because we have people who are unprepared to look after themselves, we'll be screwed because we won't be *able* to look after anyone.
In any case, how different do you think Australian health care (or any other socialist health care) would look without the drugs and equipment developed by that evil American system?
Not very. The vast, vast bulk of health care is mundane, and the biggest benefit from a universal system comes from preventative care and early diagnosis, not the "treatment" of erectile dysfunction and prolonging the life of 95 year old terminal patients for another 6 months.
Or if our defence spending had to be adequate to actually defend our country because we didn't have US military bases here?
But we don't, because we buy in their protection with favourable trade arrangements.
Note that most of the US's "defence spending" today is not spent on "defence". Of them, us, or anyone else.
Australian socialism as it exists is absolutely dependent on our relationship with the US, it is foolishness to hold us up as an example of doing it better.
But we are, in pretty much every metric you care to measure. Education, health, economics, etc.
Done voluntarily, that's called insurance and I agree. What is the preoccupation with the use of government force?
Same "preoccupation" that exists with all things society has decided are basic rights - protection from others, workplace safety, non-discrimination, etc. The reason you can't opt out of health care is the same reason you can't sell yourself into slavery.
If it was really about "a whole bunch of people who have decided" as you claim, it wouldn't need to be compulsory.
Of course it would, because there's always some small group of selfish pricks who want all the rights and none of the responsibility, or the much larger group who think it will never happen to them, or the folks who just don't give a shit.
As a society, Australia has decided certain things will be law. If you don't like them, you have two choices - convince enough people you're right so you can change the law, or go somewhere else. I wish you luck convincing lots of Australians that being some combination of poor, unlucky and sick should ruin a person's life, and the lives of anyone who depends on them. You'll need it.
If the boss asks any questions, it's just a little something that you've got there, to pull out of your hat if the main system goes to hell, and you need to get back on your feet in a hurry.
If "Plan B" is an untested, undocumented system that only one person knows anything about or is capable of executing, then there are far, far larger problems to be worrying about than whether or not Open Source is involved.
If your insurance company sucks, the solution isn't a government takeover - it's making a smart decision about where you get your insurance.
For most people, that's typically something they don't find out until it's too late. Which in the case of a car accident, might "only" leave you with financial problems. However, in the case of health care, it might leave you bankrupt. Or dead.