“What if you don’t have tea?”
then they steal your crumpets
I am actually scared of that happening. It’s the one reason I would consider hoping he doesn’t become president. I don’t mean to go off-topic, but do you think the JFK assassination had anything to do with central bankers and Executive Order 11110?
It certainly had to do with the central bankers but I doubt it had to do with that EO. The best research so far (The Unspeakable) points the finger towards the CIA with some involvement from the Mafia due to the underworld connections of CIA, but I still feel that no one has applied a thorough-going “power-elite” analysis to the problem. The hard part with any conspiracy analysis is that we are talking about a real crime so you can’t just “follow the evidence” because the perps have concealed the evidence. It is necessary to speculate and use interpolation, just as police investigating a crime would do.
What I would like to see is an analysis of the wider conflicts between the Kennedys and other power interests within the Anglo-American complex. Who backed Kennedy (what families, what corporate interests, what foreign powers)? Who opposed him? Who had the Kennedys pissed off in the past? Who did JFK piss off during his Presidency? It is impossible to look at the assassinations of JFK, RFK and JFK Jr. and the political neutering of Ted without seeing a systematic pattern of destruction of the Kennedy family. To whom were the Kennedys a threat and why?
Clayton -
I agree with the fact that Ron Paul has absolutely zero chances of “winning” (which I take is “becoming president of the US”). But that is not his goal. He knows he stands absolutely zero chances of gaining even a nomination because he’s not promising free gifts to anyone: he built his carrer on that and he isn’t surely going to change now. But think how many people hear this “crackpot” on TV or read about him on the Internet and say “wait a minute… this chap may not be so crazy after all”. The big problem is how these people, ranging from hard core anarchists to Jeffersonians, can organize “resistance” but that’s another matter.
On the issue of the State starting to fall apart it depends on what you mean. If you mean a quick collapse followed by looting, vanadalism etc I agree with you, totally: it’s not going to happen anytime soon. But a slow, steady and irreversible slide into oblivion has already started. And while many persons will blame faceless bureaucrats and politicians hungry for votes I put the blame squarely on people. All of my life I have lived in an “entitlement” society. People firmly believed they are “owed” pretty much anything and the two former categories are only too happy to oblige. People don’t stop for a second to think about the consequences of their continous clamoring for “more”. They don’t think “can we really afford this?” or “how are we going to pay for that?”. They don’t know (or willingly ignore) that resources are finite and if you use them to, say, provide amusements free of charge to the masses, they won’t be available to, say, purchase capital goods. We have already reached the point where artificially low interest rates on fiat money are becoming a substitute for true capital, which is increasingly confiscated and destroyed to keep the masses into their drunken stupor. That is living on borrowed time, quite litteraly, and mimics very closely what happened to the Roman Empire. Again, the Roman Empire didn’t disintegrate overnight but slowly wasted away over the course of two centuries. And it took Europe many centuries to recover.
Capitalism isn’t a god and neither is socialism. It’s just an economic system built around the accumulation and use of capital in atruly free market. Differently from socialism (or fascism, or communism) it doesn’t involve the threat of violence and the confiscation of assets. That’s pretty much it.
“Differently from socialism (or fascism, or communism) it doesn’t involve the threat of violence and the confiscation of assets. That’s pretty much it.”
There’s also the minor point that it provides for tremendous abundance, as opposed to misery and starvation.
You got a point. They should really use something like vbulliten if it is practical. The quote button does not work on Opera and Chrome. On Opera, I can’t even post.
I have a question for you, You are required to pay taxes, if you don’t, property is seized or you are jailed until you pay. In order to pay for taxes you have to work. For example, there is a $10 tax, and you make $10 net an hour. Therefore, I am “FORCED” for an hour, to work to pay for the $10 tax. Sounds like slavery?
Of course not, because slavery shall be narrowly defined as forcing black people to work by the lash on plantations in the pre-Civil War Southern United States. If the state forces you to work for them for a percentage of your time, that’s not slavery because you tacitly agree to it by living here. Or something like that. Oh, also some cliche about being disrespectful to actual slaves by comparing your current situation to them, you ungrateful heathen scum, etc.
Or racist. In order to leave here, I need a passport. Which is a tax in itself. And pretty much no matter where else one lives, taxes will follow.
Tax=slavery is all the justification I need. People could argue about other topics. But the root is slavery.
“But capitalism is really two big ideas: 1) self-ownership (and, by extension, property rights) 2) voluntary exchange. Please tell me how self-ownership and voluntary exchange harm people. Please explain how these ideas make the rich richer and the poor poorer. I would love to hear your explanation.”
Allow me to play devil’s advocate for a second…
-
Inheritance
-
Cult of Personality, hegemony, marketing
Things are not so simple as A + B = C in human action friend. I thought that was the first Misesian lesson one was to learn…
That’s zero sum. It’s just a title transfer. That doesn’t make the rich richer, nor the poor, poorer. It’s also voluntary.
What’s to prevent a cult of personality in any system?
Hegemony of what? How?
Marketing? So what? Don’t listen to it. Fraud is illegal, and people will do what they think is best for them anyways. I don’t see how marketing hurts, or makes the poor, poorer. It might actually make them better off by helping them find better deals for things they want or need.
I just don’t see a better alternative.
Of course the socialists believe that there is a limited amount of wealth, and so any rich person is by default depriving someone else of wealth.
Considering that RP was polling in the low to mid single digits nationally in '08, I think breaking the 10% barrier would be a realistic and achievable goal. I think he’ll do better in an 2012 run than the '08 run, but still no where near winning the primary. Romney, Palin and possibly Geengrich will rule the roost… too bad so many Tea Partiers are all talk and no substance and think Palin is the torch bearer for liberty.