There's also a hoard of gold in Fort Knox...but I find it interesting that you quote stability and history of honoring debt obligations- when for the past 40 years or so we've been particularily unstable and incredibly bad at honoring our debt obligations.
Yes, and there is furniture in the White House that might fetch some money...a complete accounting of government assets does not change the math nor the fact that the government's chief asset is its long-term stability and history of having never defaulted on a monetary debt.
Incredibly bad at honoring our debt obligations? Particularly unstable? Can you provide evidence or example? Has the instability been more or less disruptive to the foundations of government than that associated with the depression, abolition, women's suffrage, or the civil war?
You're the one who tried to compare the government to individuals there.
Yes, but you're the one who said we should "hide the body" and "charge up" their credit cards. If I were to extend the metaphore, your plan is like leading a mob of stockholders that shoot Martha Stewart in a crowded public square because you don't think she's gonna honor her stock.
Some of you may be able to get what she's got on her, but before you can charge anything on her cards her accounts would be frozen and your stock in her company would become truly worth less since it's main asset is Martha Stewart. While you may earn some money back from selling her clothes (and taking her cash and pawning her watch and...yes you could list more shit), that would represent a small fraction of the debt owed and simultaneously destroy a great majority of the wealth that would have otherwise been available to repay the debt.
Thus, your method of seeking repayment would produce very limited results for a very few.
There's more than just the property of the government at stake- there's also the property of the shadow government, the corporations, which when police protection disapears will also be up for grabs.
Yes, good thinking. You can cleanly pick off the large corporations. No small businesses provide any services to large corporations, and large corporations don't contribute to the economy. There will still be plenty of demand left in the economy when people once employed by the corporations and small businesses are out of work. I suppose that once the corporations are gone, the people will be happier without their televisions, sodas, cars, gas, computers, and other products produced by large corporations. After all, they will have the company's office furniture and the cash from the register at the local Texaco under the mattress.
Of course that cash gets its value because it is backed by the full faith and credit of the United States government, an institution destroyed under your plan. Dramatic inflation would be almost inevitable as the dollars value would plummet without the government there to give it value.
Consequently, the cash too loses much of its value.
The property of the rich will also be available for tribute and dispersal to the less fortuneate.[sic]
Oh, right, your Marxist benevloence would shine through after killing and seizing the assets of everyone perceived to hold power under the current system.
Only when viewed through the eye of somebody who still thinks democracy has any meaning at all in the United States, or that a government that has been running deficits for a good hundred years now is a good credit risk.
Guilty as charged. I believe that the free market is still better than what humans can accomplish via managed economies. I believe that the federal representative republic in which we live gives citizens a voice without yielding to mob rule. I believe that limited debt is an efficient way to take risk in order to produce growth, and that the presence of a federal deficit for over 100 years actually argues strongly that the government takes its debt obligati
By killing the people who are keeping you from collecting on the loan, you can take their property in lieu of payment.
Aye, there's the rub in your "obvious" solution for collecting on government debt. While government owned assets like used fighter jets and ships and government buildings may have some meager value, the most valuable asset of the U.S. government is its stability and its history of honoring its debt obligations. Violent revolution necessarily destroys the government's most valuable asset.
Thus taking their wallet....hide the body so nobody knows that they are dead and charge up the ammount of the loan on their credit cards.
First of all, how do you propose to "hide the body" when you're talking about "massive violent revolution" in the United States? Word is gonna get out.
Second, plundering the property of the government would only partially repay those controlling marketable government assets after the revolution. The government would still totally default on credit held by those not so "fortunate." Thus, violent revolution does not prevent default; it makes default inevitable.
Third, the government has no "credit cards" to "charge up." The government sells securities, and no one's going to buy them after the violent revolution renders previously issued securities worthless.
Your "obvious" solution is nonsense.
With the individual you can say, break a leg or two and give them another week to pay up before you shoot them.
You're now officially on the list of "people from whom I will not borrow money" along with the mob, my friends, and my family.
The obvious way is massive, violent revolution...failing that, you don't.
How exactly does a _violent_ revolution collect on the loan? That's like saying that the "obvious" way to collect on a debt is to shoot the person owing you money.
I see an analogy between this and the TSA takeover of airport security after 9/11.
When the TSA took over airport security, competition in that area wilted and we will be paying the costs for generations. Wouldn't a better option have been to increase standards, keep security firms private, and allow the market to address the need through competition?
Couldn't NASA set standards for safety and make participants comply just in order to COMPETE for the prize? Wouldn't that accomplish the best of both worlds: safer, cheaper, more dramatic, innovation?
Interesting comment. Let's explore some more...assuming the continued existence of Microsoft.
What if, hypotheticially, someone used a ptrace root-shell exploit in linux to compromise my mission critical servers causing unknown amounts of damage to my company's data without detection for as long as three months...hypothetically.
Who do I sue? (Ask the FSF?)
Also, should my friend's new company deploy Microsoft, now legally liable for the stability and security of their product, or open-source software from a company selling their support but, presumably, not legally liable for the quality of the software?
Wasn't the internet itself a military project?
Besides, where do you draw the line. The military is HUGE. If I use your code to run my business that makes MREs (Meal Ready to Eat) which I sell to campers and relief agencies, am I violating the terms of your license if I sell them to the Military too?
"I was thinking of the immortal words of Socrates who said...'I drank what?'"
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, and there is furniture in the White House that might fetch some money...a complete accounting of government assets does not change the math nor the fact that the government's chief asset is its long-term stability and history of having never defaulted on a monetary debt.
Incredibly bad at honoring our debt obligations? Particularly unstable? Can you provide evidence or example? Has the instability been more or less disruptive to the foundations of government than that associated with the depression, abolition, women's suffrage, or the civil war?
You're the one who tried to compare the government to individuals there.
Yes, but you're the one who said we should "hide the body" and "charge up" their credit cards. If I were to extend the metaphore, your plan is like leading a mob of stockholders that shoot Martha Stewart in a crowded public square because you don't think she's gonna honor her stock.
Some of you may be able to get what she's got on her, but before you can charge anything on her cards her accounts would be frozen and your stock in her company would become truly worth less since it's main asset is Martha Stewart. While you may earn some money back from selling her clothes (and taking her cash and pawning her watch and...yes you could list more shit), that would represent a small fraction of the debt owed and simultaneously destroy a great majority of the wealth that would have otherwise been available to repay the debt.
Thus, your method of seeking repayment would produce very limited results for a very few.
There's more than just the property of the government at stake- there's also the property of the shadow government, the corporations, which when police protection disapears will also be up for grabs.
Yes, good thinking. You can cleanly pick off the large corporations. No small businesses provide any services to large corporations, and large corporations don't contribute to the economy. There will still be plenty of demand left in the economy when people once employed by the corporations and small businesses are out of work. I suppose that once the corporations are gone, the people will be happier without their televisions, sodas, cars, gas, computers, and other products produced by large corporations. After all, they will have the company's office furniture and the cash from the register at the local Texaco under the mattress.
Of course that cash gets its value because it is backed by the full faith and credit of the United States government, an institution destroyed under your plan. Dramatic inflation would be almost inevitable as the dollars value would plummet without the government there to give it value.
Consequently, the cash too loses much of its value.
The property of the rich will also be available for tribute and dispersal to the less fortuneate.[sic]
Oh, right, your Marxist benevloence would shine through after killing and seizing the assets of everyone perceived to hold power under the current system.
Only when viewed through the eye of somebody who still thinks democracy has any meaning at all in the United States, or that a government that has been running deficits for a good hundred years now is a good credit risk.
Guilty as charged. I believe that the free market is still better than what humans can accomplish via managed economies. I believe that the federal representative republic in which we live gives citizens a voice without yielding to mob rule. I believe that limited debt is an efficient way to take risk in order to produce growth, and that the presence of a federal deficit for over 100 years actually argues strongly that the government takes its debt obligati
Aye, there's the rub in your "obvious" solution for collecting on government debt. While government owned assets like used fighter jets and ships and government buildings may have some meager value, the most valuable asset of the U.S. government is its stability and its history of honoring its debt obligations. Violent revolution necessarily destroys the government's most valuable asset.
Thus taking their wallet....hide the body so nobody knows that they are dead and charge up the ammount of the loan on their credit cards.
First of all, how do you propose to "hide the body" when you're talking about "massive violent revolution" in the United States? Word is gonna get out.
Second, plundering the property of the government would only partially repay those controlling marketable government assets after the revolution. The government would still totally default on credit held by those not so "fortunate." Thus, violent revolution does not prevent default; it makes default inevitable.
Third, the government has no "credit cards" to "charge up." The government sells securities, and no one's going to buy them after the violent revolution renders previously issued securities worthless.
Your "obvious" solution is nonsense.
With the individual you can say, break a leg or two and give them another week to pay up before you shoot them.
You're now officially on the list of "people from whom I will not borrow money" along with the mob, my friends, and my family.
How exactly does a _violent_ revolution collect on the loan? That's like saying that the "obvious" way to collect on a debt is to shoot the person owing you money.
I see an analogy between this and the TSA takeover of airport security after 9/11. When the TSA took over airport security, competition in that area wilted and we will be paying the costs for generations. Wouldn't a better option have been to increase standards, keep security firms private, and allow the market to address the need through competition? Couldn't NASA set standards for safety and make participants comply just in order to COMPETE for the prize? Wouldn't that accomplish the best of both worlds: safer, cheaper, more dramatic, innovation?
Interesting comment. Let's explore some more...assuming the continued existence of Microsoft.
What if, hypotheticially, someone used a ptrace root-shell exploit in linux to compromise my mission critical servers causing unknown amounts of damage to my company's data without detection for as long as three months...hypothetically.
Who do I sue? (Ask the FSF?)
Also, should my friend's new company deploy Microsoft, now legally liable for the stability and security of their product, or open-source software from a company selling their support but, presumably, not legally liable for the quality of the software?
Wasn't the internet itself a military project? Besides, where do you draw the line. The military is HUGE. If I use your code to run my business that makes MREs (Meal Ready to Eat) which I sell to campers and relief agencies, am I violating the terms of your license if I sell them to the Military too? "I was thinking of the immortal words of Socrates who said...'I drank what?'"
No offense, but that is the stupidest thing I've ever read.