You mention many social topics, but as I said, I really don't care about social topics. I think a good economy is the most important thing. Not that congressional rules and evolution aren't important, but I think the single most important thing is giving people an opportunity to have wealth.
I have been disappointed by Bush's big government approach to so many things. Steel tariffs, farm subsidies, and increasingly socialized medicine continue to be a big disappointment. But clearly liberals are even more invasive and fascist than Bush when it comes to economics. Kerry wanted to raise taxes. Thats Democrats telling the individual how their money should be spent. Not a very libertarian ideal. Between the FDA and medicare our health system is more than 50% nationalized and for that reason, the health care costs have sky rocketed. Just look at the cost of lazer eye surgery. Its plummeted and is a largely unregulated procedure. Compare that to prescription drugs which is an enormous beaurocratic nightmare where prices are continously going up.
And by the way anyone who thinks that all Republicans are fundamentalist christians is about as dumb and out of touch as anyone who thinks that all Democrats are communists.
i don't think thats accurate. i'd say liberals are generally socially libertarian while conservatives are generally economically libertarian. liberals want to see big government in the economy and conservatives want to see big government enforce social stuff.
i'm libertarian so i'm a bit torn, but i think the economy is more important than social stuff so i tend to go conservative.
hey i totally agree. high school text books are especially bad (and boring because of it) because they always avoid controversy. just give me the information. i'll sort through and choose what i like.
thank goodness! someone else out there thinks timezones are dumb. everytime i suggest getting rid of timezones to people they look at me funny and i can never change their mind.
if thats true then why not just randomly insert lots of bugs into our code. the whole country will become enormously wealthy. in fact everyone should add defects to their products so we can all make money fixing the defects.
i don't think making bad products is a strategy that will create wealth.
you don't create wealth by changing the date. if that were true, then we could just randomly add bugs to code, and we'd all get rich fixing them.
people said the same thing about the tsunami. they said the economy would grow because of all the great new construction projects. if thats true then why don't we have the government just bulldoze new york city every 10 years? that ought to generate heaps of wealth.
I would point out that you haven't said anything that tried to dispute my argument that the free market is more free than a democracy. You have instead tried to convince me that a free market is just as bad as a democracy.
But there are major differences: shareholders are able to move their money into different companies. This is much different from voters in a government democracy who will find it very difficult to change countries.
And I still think you are overestimating the roll of voting in the market place. The only shareholders who bother to vote are large institutional investors. Most people don't vote at stock holder meetings. If they don't like how their money is being used, they take it out and put it some where else. As I already said above, this is not an easy option in a government democracy. And anyway how many of the market decisions that an individual makes every day involve the kind of voting you are talking about? Virtually none: buying groceries, individuals buying a home, how much to spend on what kind of healthcare, what color car to buy, which job you are going to take, buying and selling stock, etc. In the market, people just make a decision and do it.
A monopoly is not an example of a free market. Its market that has been distorted and competitors are no longer free to compete because of actions taken by the monopolist. I think you are talking about market anarchy where criminals can impose their will on others. When people say "free market", they mean free in the same way the founding fathers meant it: you are free to do what you want as long as you don't infringe on the freedoms of others. This requires a strong and fair justice system which means a strong federal government.
I support having a federal government to keep markets free. And as much as i dislike democracy, I can't think of a better way to run a government. However, democracy always oppresses the minority view and so we should avoid it as much as possible. Sometimes thats not possible. But lets stick to the free market as much as we can.
Do consumers in the market have the freedom to choose? To a limited extent, yes..and that limitation is IMPOSED by the controlling interest in the marketplace..because as we all know, business isn't interested in fairness or charity.
I'm unconvinced. Its true that consumers can't necessarily buy purple pickled peanuts at stores with red doors because the "controlling interest in the marketplace" doesn't care what color the store doors are and they don't like pickled peanuts or purple food. But in a marketplace people are free to choose from among the options that are out there and there are quite a lot of choices to be made as far as how you want to spend your money. Contrast that with an elected Congress who gets to decide what to do with 40% of your income. Or worse, contrast that with voting for president where you get 2 choices and 51% of the voters get to impose their choice on the other 49%.
Not that I have a better idea for how to choose a president. But again, democracy always oppresses the minority view and so we should avoid it as much as possible. Free markets give individuals freedom. Democracy is the group oppressing the individual.
maybe you are trying to say that the stock market is really just a democracy and so therefore the free market is a democracy. but i think you are very mistaken if you think most of the market transactions that take place in the world involve the stock market. the stock market is just a small part of the commerce that happens around the world. alos, shareholders are able to move their money into different companies. this is much different from voters in a government democracy who will find it very difficult to change countries.
I think you are talking about market anarchy where criminals can impose their will on others. When people say "free" market, they mean free in the same way the founding fathers meant it: you are free to do what you want as long as you don't infringe on the freedoms of others. This requires a strong and fair justice system which means a strong federal government.
I support having a federal government to keep markets free. And as much as i dislike democracy, I can't think of a better way to run a government. However, democracy always oppresses the minority view and so we should avoid it as much as possible. Sometimes thats not possible. But lets stick to the free market as much as we can.
People always try to justify big government by saying thats it democracy and the people voted for it.
The fact is, democracy sucks. The difference between the marketplace and a democracy is, in a marketplace everyone gets to make their own personal decision about what they want while in a democracy the majority impose their will on the minority. For example. Say a group of 10 people are going to vote on an issue. 6 people vote for it and 4 against. This means 6 people get to tell the other 4 what to do. In a marketplace, all 10 people decide what they want. Which one is more free?
Democracy is not as great as advertised. Real freedom is found at the individual level in the marketplace.
Oh, you can't do this because it's interfering with somebody's idea of the functioning of the marketplace...a municipality is a democratically run institution. They can make their own decisions.
I hear this all the time from big government fans and communists. The fact is, democracy sucks. The difference between the marketplace and a democracy is, in a marketplace everyone gets to make their own personal decision about what they want while in a democracy the majority impose their will on the minority. For example. Say a group of 10 people are going to vote on an issue. 6 people vote for it and 4 against. This means 6 people get to tell the other 4 what to do. In a marketplace, all 10 people decide what they want. Which one is more free?
Democracy is not as great as advertised. Real freedom is found at the individual level in the marketplace.
actually germany has more public debt (64.2% of GDP in 2003) than the states.
things just aren't growing over there recently and i don't think 2004 was much better for germany than 2003. i hope old europe loosens the grip of the labor unions and gets back to a good growing economy though, because its dragging the rest of us down.
Germany: GDP - real growth rate: -0.1% (2003) GDP - per capita: $27,600 (2003)
United States: GDP - real growth rate: 3.1% (2003) GDP - per capita: $37,800 (2003)
And I think its clear (100% risk) that the consequences of following the IPCC's recommendations of decreasing green house gas production by 70% to 1900's levels of production is pretty much the end of the world. Energy usage is clearly tied to wealth and standard of living. The average person in America in 1900 made a salary of about $2500 in 1998 dollars. People were really poor. We would probably be able to do a little better than that with our efficiency increases. But its not like we can just stop buying SUVs and turn off the lights when leaving the room and everything will be all better. If the IPCC is correct, we are talking no cars and no refrigerators. Society will have to take a major step backwards
Maybe we will have to do take these drastic measures to avoid the consequences of global warming. But I think we should look at our options very very carefully and be very very certain it will actually solve the problem, before embarking on such a policy.
I think environmentalists ignore these consequences.
I think the grand parent's description is more accurate than yours. The real difference it seems to me, is:
With weather, we have a computer model tracking actual real physical chunks of air around the earth. With climate, we are just looking at what happened in the past and extrapolating data into the future. ie making a guess. Its the difference between tracking an asteroid and knowing it will hit earth, and calculating the probability of some random asteroid hitting earth in the next fifty years.
The problem with this is that scientists a. don't know for sure what weather is going to be happening in fifty years -- its just a guess based on the past -- and b. they don't know what is causing the trend and therefore how to prevent it. before we freak out and destroy the world economy, lets make sure of these two things.
The headline on this article is bizarre to me. They haven't proven that global warming is man made. They have a model that uses past data to guess at future data. This may be helpful and useful and points a person in a certain direction, but its hardly proof of what the weather will be in 50 years or that man is changing global weather. Honestly I don't even see it proving that global warming is occuring. The only thing it proves is that the temperature over the last 40 years has gone up.5 degrees. Their models may strongly suggest that the cause is greenhouse gases, but its not proof.
check the numbers, copernicus. if global warming is really as big a problem as the UN says, we have to go back to 1940's level of pollution. it'll take more than a little home conservation to accomplish that.
Slashdot Mirror
You mention many social topics, but as I said, I really don't care about social topics. I think a good economy is the most important thing. Not that congressional rules and evolution aren't important, but I think the single most important thing is giving people an opportunity to have wealth.
I have been disappointed by Bush's big government approach to so many things. Steel tariffs, farm subsidies, and increasingly socialized medicine continue to be a big disappointment. But clearly liberals are even more invasive and fascist than Bush when it comes to economics. Kerry wanted to raise taxes. Thats Democrats telling the individual how their money should be spent. Not a very libertarian ideal. Between the FDA and medicare our health system is more than 50% nationalized and for that reason, the health care costs have sky rocketed. Just look at the cost of lazer eye surgery. Its plummeted and is a largely unregulated procedure. Compare that to prescription drugs which is an enormous beaurocratic nightmare where prices are continously going up.
And by the way anyone who thinks that all Republicans are fundamentalist christians is about as dumb and out of touch as anyone who thinks that all Democrats are communists.
i don't think thats accurate. i'd say liberals are generally socially libertarian while conservatives are generally economically libertarian. liberals want to see big government in the economy and conservatives want to see big government enforce social stuff.
i'm libertarian so i'm a bit torn, but i think the economy is more important than social stuff so i tend to go conservative.
hey i totally agree. high school text books are especially bad (and boring because of it) because they always avoid controversy. just give me the information. i'll sort through and choose what i like.
why couldn't things evolve without death?
it wouldn't work through our normal dna rna stuff we have now, but why couldn't you could come up with a system where you mutate in place?
or grow a new improved body and copy over your brain.
i see no reason that immortality and evolution would be incompatible.
thank goodness! someone else out there thinks timezones are dumb. everytime i suggest getting rid of timezones to people they look at me funny and i can never change their mind.
if thats true then why not just randomly insert lots of bugs into our code. the whole country will become enormously wealthy. in fact everyone should add defects to their products so we can all make money fixing the defects.
i don't think making bad products is a strategy that will create wealth.
you don't create wealth by changing the date. if that were true, then we could just randomly add bugs to code, and we'd all get rich fixing them.
people said the same thing about the tsunami. they said the economy would grow because of all the great new construction projects. if thats true then why don't we have the government just bulldoze new york city every 10 years? that ought to generate heaps of wealth.
asdf
I would point out that you haven't said anything that tried to dispute my argument that the free market is more free than a democracy. You have instead tried to convince me that a free market is just as bad as a democracy.
But there are major differences: shareholders are able to move their money into different companies. This is much different from voters in a government democracy who will find it very difficult to change countries.
And I still think you are overestimating the roll of voting in the market place. The only shareholders who bother to vote are large institutional investors. Most people don't vote at stock holder meetings. If they don't like how their money is being used, they take it out and put it some where else. As I already said above, this is not an easy option in a government democracy. And anyway how many of the market decisions that an individual makes every day involve the kind of voting you are talking about? Virtually none: buying groceries, individuals buying a home, how much to spend on what kind of healthcare, what color car to buy, which job you are going to take, buying and selling stock, etc.
In the market, people just make a decision and do it.
You're not taking monopolies into account.
A monopoly is not an example of a free market. Its market that has been distorted and competitors are no longer free to compete because of actions taken by the monopolist. I think you are talking about market anarchy where criminals can impose their will on others. When people say "free market", they mean free in the same way the founding fathers meant it: you are free to do what you want as long as you don't infringe on the freedoms of others. This requires a strong and fair justice system which means a strong federal government.
I support having a federal government to keep markets free. And as much as i dislike democracy, I can't think of a better way to run a government. However, democracy always oppresses the minority view and so we should avoid it as much as possible. Sometimes thats not possible. But lets stick to the free market as much as we can.
Do consumers in the market have the freedom to choose? To a limited extent, yes..and that limitation is IMPOSED by the controlling interest in the marketplace..because as we all know, business isn't interested in fairness or charity.
I'm unconvinced. Its true that consumers can't necessarily buy purple pickled peanuts at stores with red doors because the "controlling interest in the marketplace" doesn't care what color the store doors are and they don't like pickled peanuts or purple food. But in a marketplace people are free to choose from among the options that are out there and there are quite a lot of choices to be made as far as how you want to spend your money. Contrast that with an elected Congress who gets to decide what to do with 40% of your income. Or worse, contrast that with voting for president where you get 2 choices and 51% of the voters get to impose their choice on the other 49%.
Not that I have a better idea for how to choose a president. But again, democracy always oppresses the minority view and so we should avoid it as much as possible. Free markets give individuals freedom. Democracy is the group oppressing the individual.
maybe you are trying to say that the stock market is really just a democracy and so therefore the free market is a democracy. but i think you are very mistaken if you think most of the market transactions that take place in the world involve the stock market. the stock market is just a small part of the commerce that happens around the world. alos, shareholders are able to move their money into different companies. this is much different from voters in a government democracy who will find it very difficult to change countries.
so.... whats your point?
I think you are talking about market anarchy where criminals can impose their will on others. When people say "free" market, they mean free in the same way the founding fathers meant it: you are free to do what you want as long as you don't infringe on the freedoms of others. This requires a strong and fair justice system which means a strong federal government.
I support having a federal government to keep markets free. And as much as i dislike democracy, I can't think of a better way to run a government. However, democracy always oppresses the minority view and so we should avoid it as much as possible. Sometimes thats not possible. But lets stick to the free market as much as we can.
People always try to justify big government by saying thats it democracy and the people voted for it.
The fact is, democracy sucks. The difference between the marketplace and a democracy is, in a marketplace everyone gets to make their own personal decision about what they want while in a democracy the majority impose their will on the minority. For example. Say a group of 10 people are going to vote on an issue. 6 people vote for it and 4 against. This means 6 people get to tell the other 4 what to do. In a marketplace, all 10 people decide what they want. Which one is more free?
Democracy is not as great as advertised. Real freedom is found at the individual level in the marketplace.
Oh, you can't do this because it's interfering with somebody's idea of the functioning of the marketplace...a municipality is a democratically run institution. They can make their own decisions.
I hear this all the time from big government fans and communists. The fact is, democracy sucks. The difference between the marketplace and a democracy is, in a marketplace everyone gets to make their own personal decision about what they want while in a democracy the majority impose their will on the minority. For example. Say a group of 10 people are going to vote on an issue. 6 people vote for it and 4 against. This means 6 people get to tell the other 4 what to do. In a marketplace, all 10 people decide what they want. Which one is more free?
Democracy is not as great as advertised. Real freedom is found at the individual level in the marketplace.
look up your own dumb facts then. or better yet just keep on trusting your intuition. who really needs facts anyway.
actually germany has more public debt (64.2% of GDP in 2003) than the states.
o s/ gm.htmlb ook/geos/ us.html
things just aren't growing over there recently and i don't think 2004 was much better for germany than 2003. i hope old europe loosens the grip of the labor unions and gets back to a good growing economy though, because its dragging the rest of us down.
Germany:
GDP - real growth rate: -0.1% (2003)
GDP - per capita: $27,600 (2003)
United States:
GDP - real growth rate: 3.1% (2003)
GDP - per capita: $37,800 (2003)
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/ge
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/fact
this has got to be the worst advice ever. doesn't germany have like 14% unemployment or something horrible? the US only has 5% unemployment.
i laughed anyway.
radio waves are pollution? give me a break. black holes generate radio waves. lets pass a law against black holes.
google rocks. everything they do is sweet and beautiful. i love google. *hug*
Yes, you are wrong. Weather models attempt to simulate physical chunks of air. Climate models also attempt to simulate physical chunks of air.
...uh maybe i'll read it ..later.
huh. well in that case, how do they expect to predict the weather in 50 years when they can't predict it 3 weeks from now?
i suppose your link tells me about it.
I agree.
And I think its clear (100% risk) that the consequences of following the IPCC's recommendations of decreasing green house gas production by 70% to 1900's levels of production is pretty much the end of the world. Energy usage is clearly tied to wealth and standard of living. The average person in America in 1900 made a salary of about $2500 in 1998 dollars. People were really poor. We would probably be able to do a little better than that with our efficiency increases. But its not like we can just stop buying SUVs and turn off the lights when leaving the room and everything will be all better. If the IPCC is correct, we are talking no cars and no refrigerators. Society will have to take a major step backwards
Maybe we will have to do take these drastic measures to avoid the consequences of global warming. But I think we should look at our options very very carefully and be very very certain it will actually solve the problem, before embarking on such a policy.
I think environmentalists ignore these consequences.
I think the grand parent's description is more accurate than yours. The real difference it seems to me, is:
.5 degrees. Their models may strongly suggest that the cause is greenhouse gases, but its not proof.
With weather, we have a computer model tracking actual real physical chunks of air around the earth. With climate, we are just looking at what happened in the past and extrapolating data into the future. ie making a guess. Its the difference between tracking an asteroid and knowing it will hit earth, and calculating the probability of some random asteroid hitting earth in the next fifty years.
The problem with this is that scientists a. don't know for sure what weather is going to be happening in fifty years -- its just a guess based on the past -- and b. they don't know what is causing the trend and therefore how to prevent it. before we freak out and destroy the world economy, lets make sure of these two things.
The headline on this article is bizarre to me. They haven't proven that global warming is man made. They have a model that uses past data to guess at future data. This may be helpful and useful and points a person in a certain direction, but its hardly proof of what the weather will be in 50 years or that man is changing global weather. Honestly I don't even see it proving that global warming is occuring. The only thing it proves is that the temperature over the last 40 years has gone up
Am I wrong?
check the numbers, copernicus. if global warming is really as big a problem as the UN says, we have to go back to 1940's level of pollution. it'll take more than a little home conservation to accomplish that.