John, with all due respect, I think you’re being a little too hard on the new guy. I mean, I’m sure you’ve heard of accepting a proposition arguendo, right?
shagdrum, can you please respond directly to those three points?
Or was this latest post supposed to be a “no, I cannot”?
I already have in my previous two posts.
Let me spell it out…
- Please tell me what is “moral” about pointing out the implied assumption in the “pay for tax cut” position that the current level of not only government spending, but also of government spending growth is a complete necessity, and cannot possibly be reduced or even slowed, lest the world economy would collapse.
Here is what I said:
“I am simply looking to avoid a moral argument for the moment (which the property rights angle would turn the debate into).”
Also…
“Questions of political values are moral question. Private property is a political value.”
Your question misses what I was refering to as a “moral question” (private property, which is what all those other issues derive from).
- You see nothing dishonest about pretending you believe something is valid and worthy of debate on its technical details, when in actuality it is a debate you don’t even think is relevant or necessary…just for the purpose of tricking someone into listening to you?
This is a bit of a loaded question which I responded to with the following…
“I am not pretending to do anything. Again, you keep making that false assumption and act shocked when I point out that you are missing what I am saying.”
- Please tell me what it is you’ve said that I haven’t heard (or even directly responded to, for that matter).
See my response to the previous question as well as this…
“You seem to assume that because I don’t blow the argument up into a moral issue, I am agreeing with increasing revenue (this is where you seem to be refusing to hear what I am saying). Not contesting the notion for the moment if far different then agreeing with it.”
in reference to #1
What does private property have to do with what I said there?
in reference to #2
How is that an answer to the question? Do you see anything dishonest about what is described there or not? And are you implying that you are not doing what is described there?
in reference to #3
Even if you consider private property a “moral issue”, I haven’t mentioned anything about a moral issue since the very first response in this thread. For the third time: after you dismissed the response I gave you in that very first post, I brought up another issue. Initially it seemed as though you got it. But ever since then you have completely ignored virtually everything I’ve said, and pretended as though I’ve been arguing something I haven’t. You refuse to address the point about the level of government spending being assumed a given, and instead keep on attacking the property rights issue…something I have not brought up since the very first response in this thread.
This is why I said it is as though you haven’t read any of the posts since then. You keep bringing up the exact same thing again and again “I don’t want to make this a moral argument about property rights…then the person won’t listen to me.” I heard that the first time you said it. That’s why I brought up another issue. Yet here we are, on the second page of this thread and you are still going on and on about “moral issues, leftists won’t listen to me if I go that far, blah blah blah.”
This is why I said it is as if you seem to be so focused on your own idea that you’re refusing to hear what I’m saying…because you refuse to even acknowledge the point I raised about assumptions of government spending levels and keep harping on “I don’t want to talk about moral issues”.
This is why I asked you what does assumptions about government spending levels have to do with a moral argument about property rights. But you have yet to answer that question. You just simply restated the same thing: “I am simply looking to avoid a moral argument for the moment (which the property rights angle would turn the debate into).”
This is why I’m asking you now, what assumptions of government spending levels have to do with property rights. And I’m only wondering how you’re going to manage to say the exact same thing again, even after all this.
John James, Its not property right when its not property in the first place, by the very rules of the NAP. Because the implicit agreement of being on the territory of a nation is the rule of the government, government is free to allocate its resources as it sees fit. The same principle as in Murphy’s “Chaos Theory”. As such, it is not theft/robbery when the government taxes and executes policy, it is merely the government exercising its own property rights.
First, can you explain how this “implicit agreement” works?
Second, can you explain how the government came to own everything in the first place?
The point of conceding something for the sake of argument is merely to save time. Such as on TV, etc. I agree with John that it is not a good approach for the long term, but there is a place for sound-bite level argument (just ask Peter Schiff).
I don’t really have a problem with a statement that begins with “Even if that were true…” or “Let’s suppose for a second I agree with that…” The problem is that is not what the OP is doing. For one thing, he has not made it clear he does not necessarily agree with the premise. You may think this is an insignificant detail, but it is not. Second, a large part of my point was that such a presupposition is completely unnecessary in this case and does nothing to further the cause or reach any sort of goal of persuading the person that less government is better.
Again, all it does is allow the statist to make the argument be about a technicality of a premise that he already agrees with, instead of forcing him to debate the real issue, and consider another point of view. Much like arguing with John McCain about needing to be in Iraq for 100 years by saying “that’s just an unfounded embellishment…there’s no way you could know that far ahead…we might need to be there for another 20 or 30 years, but throwing out a full century is just a baseless assumption.” And then you go back and forth on exactly how many decades the U.S. needs to be sending young kids to die and kill in the Middle East.
(As I said, this was illustrated extremely well in the Ron Paul debate clip I linked). Again, what the OP describes is literally allowing oneself to be drawn into a debate about the most efficient way for the state to expropriate funds. This has to be one of the most unproductive, malinvested uses of a libertarian’s time. It will do nothing to persuade the person one is debating with, and certainly nothing to further the cause of liberty. The only thing it might do is offer support of the statist’s original premise…as you are admittedly agreeing with it, and simply arguing the technicality. So he may very well be further convinced of his fundamental position, and simply question his method of achieving his statist goal.
If your aim is to get someone to consider new ideas, look at something in a different way, and ultimately come to a libertarian persuasion, starting an argument with them by saying “that’s not the best way for the state to confiscate financing!” is not going to get you there.
If that’s what the OP is intending to do, I completely agree. We don’t have the luxury of starting on their home turf, within their preconceived paradigm.
Implicit agreement is being on the territory of the government. Same as any implicity agreement of use of property. IE if you are at your buddy’s place you act by his rules. Government being the owner of the entire nation has this implicit right at the largest scale. Because of that, it is quite reasonable for the government to ponder as to how to maximise its income, and compatible with libertarian beliefs to exercise its right to do so.
How Government came to own its territory is hard determine or re-evaluate based on even the strictest Rothbardian premises, so it doesnt relate to the debate anyway.
The difference is, if I don’t follow the rules at my buddy’s place, I’d say he’s within his rights to ask me to leave, or even to force me off his property; but I wouldn’t say he’s within his rights to then imprison me on his property or worse. In other words, being on his property doesn’t mean I’m now owned in any way by him.
However, I can’t help but notice that you use an analogy which contradicts your point - if the government owns everything, then my buddy doesn’t actually own “his place”, now does he?
I completely disagree. I’d say it’s essential to the points you brought up. So no, I refuse to ignore history and focus only on the here-and-now.