The Worlds Smallest Political Quiz

[xBaron Dants]

Dear Mr Anonymouse,

I must first of all applaud you for the tremendous display of vocabulary. I also thank you for your kind words.

Now, I will take your advice and judge based on history.

Historically, or even based on what we see in the world today, we can conclude that, in the vast majority of cases, a country with democracy has ended up being a lot better than a country without it. Countries with a State have also been better off than countries without one. A great example would be Sierra Leone. The State had no authority and a lot of natural ressources. This resulted in the ugly side of capitalism taking over. Companies such as De Beers hiring guerillas to terrorize the country, as they silently robbed the country of their riches. Had laws been put in place and enforced, it would have been much more difficult. The fact remains that to fulfill the needs of individuality, one is usually tempted to xxxxxle on the rights of others. While I have been called an idealist, I am not naive enough to believe that the rich corporates of the world will not do everything in their power to abuse the poor in order to get richer.

I know that there is a huge irony in all of this. In the United States, the rich have gotten richer BECAUSE of the government, and their tax cuts and so on. This is not something I support. This is a case where the rich corporates basically screw the population, and the government does nothing as high placed individuals gain from it too. This is the type of government that is to be avoided.

However, a sort of State is needed to stop such corporates of ruining the lives of so many people. If you want, you don't even need to call it a State, call it "Verifications Board" or "Justice Committee" or whatever you please.

Keep in mind that economic laissez-faire was used almost to the key during the industrial revolution. The result was the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer and sicker, and the kids working at ridiculously low ages, for ridiculously low wages. The State then interfered, putting an age limit, putting a minimum wage, etc. Had it not done so, I do not see why any of the corporations would care about the working class.

You make a very strong point when you say:

The market is based on individual choice ( capitalism ), whereas politics is based on collective decision.

However, it is the collectivity that lives the consequences of the individual choices made in capitalism, which causes the State to ultimately have a role to play. The extent to which it should participate is very debatable, and I myself have not arrived to a conclusion (because as I said, I have not read enough about economics), but it has been historically proven that if there is no one to control the oligarchs that have NO sympathy whatsoever for the working class, the society, on a whole, will fail.

Sincerely,
Your antithesis

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by Baron Dants Dear Mr Anonymouse,

I must first of all applaud you for the tremendous display of vocabulary. I also thank you for your kind words.

Now, I will take your advice and judge based on history.

Historically, or even based on what we see in the world today, we can conclude that, in the vast majority of cases, a country with democracy has ended up being a lot better than a country without it. Countries with a State have also been better off than countries without one. A great example would be Sierra Leone. The State had no authority and a lot of natural ressources. This resulted in the ugly side of capitalism taking over. Companies such as De Beers hiring guerillas to terrorize the country, as they silently robbed the country of their riches. Had laws been put in place and enforced, it would have been much more difficult. The fact remains that to fulfill the needs of individuality, one is usually tempted to xxxxxle on the rights of others. While I have been called an idealist, I am not naive enough to believe that the rich corporates of the world will not do everything in their power to abuse the poor in order to get richer.

I know that there is a huge irony in all of this. In the United States, the rich have gotten richer BECAUSE of the government, and their tax cuts and so on. This is not something I support. This is a case where the rich corporates basically screw the population, and the government does nothing as high placed individuals gain from it too. This is the type of government that is to be avoided.

However, a sort of State is needed to stop such corporates of ruining the lives of so many people. If you want, you don't even need to call it a State, call it "Verifications Board" or "Justice Committee" or whatever you please.

Keep in mind that economic laissez-faire was used almost to the key during the industrial revolution. The result was the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer and sicker, and the kids working at ridiculously low ages, for ridiculously low wages. The State then interfered, putting an age limit, putting a minimum wage, etc. Had it not done so, I do not see why any of the corporations would care about the working class.

You make a very strong point when you say:



However, it is the collectivity that lives the consequences of the individual choices made in capitalism, which causes the State to ultimately have a role to play. The extent to which it should participate is very debatable, and I myself have not arrived to a conclusion (because as I said, I have not read enough about economics), but it has been historically proven that if there is no one to control the oligarchs that have NO sympathy whatsoever for the working class, the society, on a whole, will fail.

Sincerely,
Your antithesis

Dear Mr. Dants,

I understand what you are saying and indeed agree with you that of course if left to themselves these corporates would do harm, as they are doing. I never denied this infact, but I am glad we touched on to this. Most of what we know as conglomerates or corporations have come into existence because of government, these are for the most part government created monopolies, whether it was Standard Oil, or Microsoft, or the Federal Reserve. Big Government and Big Business are mutually inclusive in that one cannot exist without the other.

Capitalism as I have come to understand it, from both Adam Smith, Ludwig Von Mises, Murray Rothbard, and Rand, is consonant with individual. It was Emil Durkhaim in his marvelous work "The Division of Labor in Society", in which he stated that capitalism and the free market itself was no threat to humanity and only with the rise of the State will become exploitative and destructive. Indeed, on the market, all is harmony, because all transactions are voluntary.

The kids that did work did so voluntarily, no one forced them to work there. They worked voluntarily and were given a wage for their labor. These 14 and 15 yr old kids hold part time jobs because they need the money, but it's illegal for them to work more than a set number of hours a day, or more than 18 hours a week. Thus if a teenage busboy works three and a half hours, he's guilty, and his boss can be fined $100,000 and sentenced to six months in prison. What's wrong with hard work? And why should the federal government, not exactly an expert in hard work, stick its nose in? The Constitution doesn't appoint government as the big brother, yet somehow its role is morphed into that. Can a youngster work too many hours? Sure, just as he can play too many hours. But in a free and decent society, decisions about these matters are for parents, not bureaucrats or politicians.The government only violates the free market, and usurps the authority of fathers and mothers.

This is made easier by what Ludwig von Mises identified as the "anti-capitalistic mentality" of politicians and intellectuals, and the long history of socialist propaganda on this subject. We're told that capitalism put young people to work in the English factories of the 1700s and 1800s that were little better than concentration camps. As usual, the socialists habe got it exactly backwards. Before the Industrial Revolution John Locke urged families to put their children to work at age three. By 1830 the life expectancy of children had vastly increased, thanks to the most explosive growth in living standards in history thanks to the industrial revolution ushered in by capitalism. Before capitalism, as Mises explains, that these children were destituteand their only refuge was the factory which saved them from death by starvation.

Child labor was not abolished by government stepping in any more than it could be legislatively eliminated today in Bangladesh or Ghana. Only when the income of parents became sufficient to support them did it cease. The emancipators and benefactors for these children were "manufacturers and financiers, not politicians.

The State doesn't play a role, it forces itself to be the sole authority in matters of economics and centrally planning economics. Everytime the State interferes in the free market, there are problems, and depressions, such as the Great Depression, and unemployment right now. The Soviet Union collapsed because of this, as this was one of the many reasons why a centrally planned State cannot succeeded, since all systems move towards disorder. The more you try to have order, the more it moves towards disorder, per the study of chaos theory, in accordance with the second law of thermodynamics and entropy. This is why all economic schools of thought, such as the Keynesians, the Classicals, the post-Classicals, the Malthusians, etc., all involve their theories based on groups and the collective unit, whereas the Austrian school of economics is the only one which addresses economics from an individual point of view.

So going back to politics being about collectivism, and how free market economics is based on individual choice, the two cannot coexist. Either politics is contradicts the principles of economics, or the principles of economics are all wrong.

Sincerely,
Your anti-thesis.

[xBaron Dants]

Dear Mr. Anonymouse,

I believe we will pretty soon enter the cycle of endless repetitions, but nevertheless, I offer my rebuttal.

I will first of all disagree about how "voluntary" the work of the kids was back during the time of the industrial revolution. The life they were leading were not normal. They had to work (starting earlier than age 14) because even if the parents worked 16 hour shifts every day, they still didn't have enough to feed them. Working would of course prevent them to have an education, which would mean that they would keep the same job until they died themselves, without being able to pay for the education of their own children. How is this a sign of things going well?

As for the rules in the USA about "child labour", I believe they do not apply here as I work over 20 hours a week quite often, and have been doing so since I was 15. But then again, you seem to confuse the State with the US government, which is flawed in so many ways that only Surfer would have the guts to defend it.

As for the governments of Ghana and Bangladesh, their lack of commitment in ameliorating the lives of their citizens is what allows the exploitation to take place. I believe that Castro, for example, had something good going on, and Cuba only "failed" because America wanted it to.

I am not the greatest fan of government as it is presently, but I do believe that such a power, elected by the people (and with the opposition also playing an active role in the process) needs to exist.

And while it shouldn't play as big a role as it is doing in the USA presently, its guidance and contributions are needed to help the small farms and businesses of Armenia.

Sincerely yet again,
your anti thesis (HOW do you spell that word?)

[jahannam]

Libertarians are self-governors in both personal and economic matters. They believe government's only purpose is to protect people from coercion and violence. They value individual responsibility, and tolerate economic and social diversity.

yup.. that'd be ME!!

[xBaron Dants]

Originally posted by jahannam Libertarians are self-governors in both personal and economic matters. They believe government's only purpose is to protect people from coercion and violence. They value individual responsibility, and tolerate economic and social diversity.

yup.. that'd be ME!!

That would be me once I have ensured that all Armenians will get enough food on their table, and that the Turks are no longer a threat.

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by Baron Dants Dear Mr. Anonymouse,

I believe we will pretty soon enter the cycle of endless repetitions, but nevertheless, I offer my rebuttal.

I will first of all disagree about how "voluntary" the work of the kids was back during the time of the industrial revolution. The life they were leading were not normal. They had to work (starting earlier than age 14) because even if the parents worked 16 hour shifts every day, they still didn't have enough to feed them. Working would of course prevent them to have an education, which would mean that they would keep the same job until they died themselves, without being able to pay for the education of their own children. How is this a sign of things going well?

As for the rules in the USA about "child labour", I believe they do not apply here as I work over 20 hours a week quite often, and have been doing so since I was 15. But then again, you seem to confuse the State with the US government, which is flawed in so many ways that only Surfer would have the guts to defend it.

As for the governments of Ghana and Bangladesh, their lack of commitment in ameliorating the lives of their citizens is what allows the exploitation to take place. I believe that Castro, for example, had something good going on, and Cuba only "failed" because America wanted it to.

I am not the greatest fan of government as it is presently, but I do believe that such a power, elected by the people (and with the opposition also playing an active role in the process) needs to exist.

And while it shouldn't play as big a role as it is doing in the USA presently, its guidance and contributions are needed to help the small farms and businesses of Armenia.

Sincerely yet again,
your anti thesis (HOW do you spell that word?)

Dear Mr. Dants,

While we might indeed get entangled in repetitions, we also entangle ourselves in new territories. I strongly disagree with the assertion that government regulation of labor, be it with wages or child labor, is anything good. Anytime you have government regulation and interference in the free-market, you have trouble.

Most of us never dare to question the belief that government protects childrens rights, or indeed, anyone elses rights. Your own response highlights to me how you imagine child labor in 19th century Britain, the root of modern child labor laws. You see Britain had two forms of child labor, free and parish, a few historians which I won't name unless you want me to whos work on the Industrial Revolution and child labor are considered definitive, recognized the distinction between the two.

The free labor children lived with their parents and worked during the day, voluntarily, for agreeable wages. Often times their parents refused to send them to dangerous working environments if need be. Private factory owners could not forcibly subjugate the free children nor make them work in conditions their parents deemed unacceptable.

Parish children on the other hand were under direct government authority and parish work houses had existed for hundreds of years. But then again we are now given images of these parish children, a five year old in a coal mine, or kids at textile mills and we are meant to sympathize with them against those greedy businessmen. But it was precisely because of government taxes that the attitude toward the poor moved from compassion to condemnation. It was precisely because of government created regulations in the first place that you had these parish children in parish work houses.


Respectfully,
Your very own anti-thesis ( I think this is how you spell it ).

[xBaron Dants]

Dear Mr Anonymouse,

I am personally happy that we DO have government regulations. I like knowing that if ever my dad loses his job, he is not left out in the street with nowhere to go, and no idemnisation. I also like to know that a single mother with 3 children can get some help in putting her kids to school. I can't see anyone else enforcing that.

I would only like you to tell me what you think would happen if, as you suggest, we get rid of government today. What would be the outcome?

Sicnerely,
your anti-thesis (I'll trust you)

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by Baron Dants Dear Mr Anonymouse,

I am personally happy that we DO have government regulations. I like knowing that if ever my dad loses his job, he is not left out in the street with nowhere to go, and no idemnisation. I also like to know that a single mother with 3 children can get some help in putting her kids to school. I can't see anyone else enforcing that.

I would only like you to tell me what you think would happen if, as you suggest, we get rid of government today. What would be the outcome?

Sicnerely,
your anti-thesis (I'll trust you)

Dear Mr. Dants,

The dissolution of government, would mean for me, a privatizing everything. Private business can do all things that government does, perhaps even better.

The outcome perhaps would be no more total wars, since governments ( the State, Nation-State, Nations ), rely on collectivity and mass mindedness. Society in general has become more collectivized and more centralized has history has progressed, and with that it has become more destructive, more violent, and caused more suffering, so if we measure 'democracy' by that wavelength, it is a horrible failure, for like I have said, in the 20th century alone, 200 million deaths were caused because our need to reinforce this idea of "democracy".

We have grown so collectivized and our thoughts are steeped in collective thinking. We are taught that group action and group thinking is superior to individual action and thinking. We have gone so far in the anus of collectivism that we stand on the brink of destruction, of destroying our very damn earth, which all our supposed "isms" seek to make better.

Thus, the guiding maxim is that if a state and politics cannot be avoided, to make the domain of politics as small as possible, and also examine alternatives of self enforcing voluntary social orders. The "State" has not always existed and in fact, people at one point were very self sufficient and dependent on themselves, not the State, for everything.

Sincerely,
Ankark mook.

[xBaron Dants]

Dear ankark mook,

May I first of all vent my frustration, as I had almost completed my reply before my browser decided to shut down.

Now, I am not convinced about this whole dissolution of the state, because logically, I believe the private companies that will take over will be the multinational, multibillion dollar corporations that have effectively screwed the population so far. I can only picture them being greedier and more insensitive as they get more responsibility, more sources of revenue.....and fewer regulations.

In the United States, for example, you would be correct in saying that the government has played a role in creating the problem, but that is only because it EXEMPTED companies from the regulations that are already in place (giving them tax cuts, and so on...). What needs to be done in the USA, in my humble opinion, is the creation of a strong and viable third option after the Republicans and Democrats (or a real SECOND option, if you will). One that will not allow major corporations to lay off workers so easily, that will make them pay their taxes, that will not facilitate or even encourage their move to Mexico, etc.

As for Armenia which, if you may recall, shaped my almost socialistic way of thinking, I am convinced that if you leave the rich oligarchs handle everything, the disparity between the rich and the poor will be even greater. Kocharian's campaign was pretty much based on an economic platform, and the man, hate him or not, has succeeded in bringing economic growth, has limited inflation, and I had the pleasure to witness an ever-growing middle class in Yerevan. In cases like these, a non-participation of the State in the economy would lead to chaos.

Once we have assured that the peach farmer in the Ararat Valley is making enough profit to be able to compete on the market without assistance, the State can slowly move away from the market, while always keeping an eye on the situation.

Srdakin Harkankov,
Shadakhos Dants

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by Baron Dants Dear ankark mook,

May I first of all vent my frustration, as I had almost completed my reply before my browser decided to shut down.

Now, I am not convinced about this whole dissolution of the state, because logically, I believe the private companies that will take over will be the multinational, multibillion dollar corporations that have effectively screwed the population so far. I can only picture them being greedier and more insensitive as they get more responsibility, more sources of revenue.....and fewer regulations.

In the United States, for example, you would be correct in saying that the government has played a role in creating the problem, but that is only because it EXEMPTED companies from the regulations that are already in place (giving them tax cuts, and so on...). What needs to be done in the USA, in my humble opinion, is the creation of a strong and viable third option after the Republicans and Democrats (or a real SECOND option, if you will). One that will not allow major corporations to lay off workers so easily, that will make them pay their taxes, that will not facilitate or even encourage their move to Mexico, etc.

As for Armenia which, if you may recall, shaped my almost socialistic way of thinking, I am convinced that if you leave the rich oligarchs handle everything, the disparity between the rich and the poor will be even greater. Kocharian's campaign was pretty much based on an economic platform, and the man, hate him or not, has succeeded in bringing economic growth, has limited inflation, and I had the pleasure to witness an ever-growing middle class in Yerevan. In cases like these, a non-participation of the State in the economy would lead to chaos.

Once we have assured that the peach farmer in the Ararat Valley is making enough profit to be able to compete on the market without assistance, the State can slowly move away from the market, while always keeping an eye on the situation.

Srdakin Harkankov,
Shadakhos Dants

Dear Mr. Dants,

I have to disagree with the analysis for it is because of the State interfering in the market, that it creates problems for later.

For example, it is because of government interferences, fixing wages, prices, that people have unemployment. Not even Lord Keynes questioned it. It is a simple fact that with rising wages, unemployment increases, as well as taxes. That is why many of the businesses go to China, or Mexico, etc.

The assumption that through government we can save the private sector is flawed since that is socialistic, it hampers on the free market and competition, thereby reducing quality and growth, making people dependent on government, one of the reasons why Socialism failed. To try to use government to help farmers, only help them, then abolish it makes no sense, for you make them dependent on government. Private enterprise can do exactly what the government does, even better, for the private world is moved by competition therefore better quality in what they do. Government is a monopoly, and it is guaranteed income through taxation no matter what, which this then hampers on progress and quality, in other words even if the government doesn't work to its maximum potential, it is still guaranteed a wage, thereby reducing quality and competitiveness, what socialism is about.

People have to start realizing that it is not the corporations that are evil per se, yes they are evil, but they have only come into existence via Government, whether its the IMF, or World Bank, or Halliburton, or Enron, these are all government created superstructures. The free market itself wouldn't allow the creation of such monopolies because of the inherent competition, by governemnt subsidizing and favoriing one over another it creates the climate for these monopolies to grow out of control, and work in tandem with government legislation to maximize their profits.

My aunt who is now visiting from Armenia tells me otherwise about the situation over there. Armenians flee their own country daily, or look for a means to.

And while we are on the discussion of the State in relation to the market, it is precisely BECAUSE OF THE STATE, because of too much government and too much regulation and price fixing that socialism that, that we have the situation that we have now.

Regards,
The mouse with missing chromosomes.