Yeah, it was certainly concerned with preventing tyranny, and that's the side of the Constitution that we all learn about in High School, and why so many people think this is a democracy or that democracy is an ideal. But one of the primary ways you product a society from a tyranny is to [i]prevent a democracy from voting one into power[/i], which they will assuredly do, every time. A couple examples of anti-democratic measures in the Consitution are the Supreme Court, the bicameral legislature, the Constitutional amendment process, and of course the Electoral College.
Doubel-edged sword.
Do I have that correct?
That kinda puts a crimp in the purpose of this thread, don’t it?
Well, usually when people talk about “law enforcement” they’re talking about police force and the judicial system… which very much is coercion.
Ah, so it’s already decided… but that does mean that coercion may be invoked… it’s just that both parties agreed to it in the first place.
Well, so far your vision sounds very much in line with most conservatives’ views… rolling back government to a very limited role, one of arbitration.
That’s the reason why the elected federal Government is called the Administration, and why the guy in charge is called The President, is because arbitration is the intended function, yes.
I will read the Constitution one of these days. 
Not entirely. When a vote passes in the “wrong” direction, adjustments are made to the populous and the vote is taken again until the vote is “properly” made. Alternatively other laws are passed, often on the sly, such as to remove any affect of the offending vote, “Okay, let them have that one because we can just do this instead”. Or in extreme cases, the law is simply slyly ignored. Most often laws are merely applied at the convenience of the rulers such as to act as a plausible deniability and a show of acting in accord with compliance and “justice”.
Ask the wrong question by asking it out of order, and what can you expect?
That is merely YOUR mentality and why You shouldn’t be allowed to vote on matters involving others.
True arbitration IS a very limited role. Dictatorship requires a huge government because the people are not making their own decisions, the government is and that requires a huge government and far, far more constraints on freedom, else the decisions simply can’t get made; “If we can’t keep track of it, we can’t allow it”, “First disallow everything and then permit only what we can determine to be of favor”.
By “adjustment”, you mean manipulation?
I opened this thread with the question “What can we do about the problem of political corruption?”
You’re saying we ought to ask “What law would I make for myself regardless of my situation?”
Are you saying that if I asked myself the latter question first, I would never have asked the former? Or perhaps that by asking them in that order, the former question would have been the “right” question?
You said earlier that “the mentality remains ‘What am I supposed to do’, that of a child, rather than ‘what needs doing’, that of a mature adult.”
The question “What needs doing?” may not be exactly the same as “what law would I make for myself…?” but the irony, if you’re implying I’ve never asked this of myself, is that “what needs doing?” is the motto I’ve lived by for the past several years, and in fact, has lead me to begin this thread… which in turn lead to you proposing the “what law would I make for myself…?” question.
Keep in mind, James, that this is still a philosophy forum, not a political activist task force. Despite that Laughing Man is all too painfully correct that this thread has produced nothing new under the Sun (not that there was any great hope of that from the beginning), it has done extraordinarily well, for my own tastes, as far as sparking a philosophical discussion is concerned. And there’s no requirements on “pondering life’s deeper question” or on “asking what needs doing” or on “what the best law for my life would be” for one to post a topic for philosophical discussion. Indeed, such questions are typically only raised after one digs his/her heals into philosophical discussions.
And all the while–while we’re basking in our armchairs shooting the philosophical breeze–each of us may be pondering the questions you prescribe, and in fact doing things in the world to ameliorate it or to serve as an example to others–the two activities are not mutually exclusive.
And I certainly hope you don’t think that by asking the question “how can we solve the problem of political corruption?” one is implying the imposition of federal laws restricting what the political process, or simple citizens, can and cannot do. Not only is there no connection between this question and that implicit solution, but that being the standard default solution that most people fall back on for any political problem should signal to you that I want something more.
I’m inspired by history, James. A mere five months have passed since the beginning of this thread. The age of history is eons. I think this is where LM is short-sighted. He wants all the solutions to the world’s political problems in a matter of a few months–with the brain power of only a few intellectuals. When I look at history, I see what all of humanity can accomplish given several millennia and it is brilliant. The great solutions are far and few between–the application of logic to philosophy, the scientific method, the modern republican system of government–but when they arise, they really are great. This gives me hope. It tells me that though the prospects of finding a solution seem bleak, things can arise that we never would have dreamt. It’s not algorithmic. Laying down laws are algorithmic (which is why so many are tempted to take that route). But the only route to finding powerful and lasting solutions is to keep putting our heads together until something arises. This requires unprecedented patients, for history is a long haul. But as long as one understand it, one will always find the inspiration keep strive in hopes that something will be accomplished.
No, actually, it’s a fact. The first paragraph in the wikipedia article on law enforcement says:
The problem with you, James, is that if I were to say “There are places in the world in which the government brutally oppresses its people and violates their basic rights,” you’d tell me “that’s a bad attitude,” or “that just reflects the way you would do things.”
I mean use any trick in the book to alter the next vote; show more news that implies the proper direction, create terrorist attacks, silence influential dissenters,… Then take the vote again. If that wasn’t good enough, do it more and more and more until they get what THEY coerce onto YOU, the masses.
Yes.
And more significantly, that you have far too much to learn about what is actually going on concerning your world and thus it is best for You to just bail out and start over with yourself as the first example. You have the mentality that has been programmed into the population so as to create a larger socialistic totalitarian government, largely inspired by the phrase, “There should be a law!”. Do you remember when that phrase was being said so often? Many steps have been taken to get the population to think in terms of "the government should force ‘those other people’ to behave" - government dependency, higher taxes, and more authority to the point that now, you actually have no freedoms at all - the very intent. And now that is what you think the government is for.
Currently there is no democracy in America, so you have to create it. The USA isn’t even a republic any more. Currently the USA is a huge prison with prison guards, called “ATF”, at every air terminal, train station, border crossing, bus terminals, and highway checkpoints checking for the warden’s permit to travel (“Prison Planet”). The USA is a police state with high surveillance everywhere, including in your homes. And all run by coercion, obfuscation, and extortion … because “that’s what laws are for”.
And THAT is the blatant naivety and immaturity that has gotten programmed into You and most of the population; "don’t think about what you are doing, just do something now - Let your passions rule your mind and the world". That is what creates a Nazi like government (exactly what has been formed).
And in case you didn’t notice, they are always resisted as being impossible, impractical, “insane”, “crackpot”,… ideas that would never work. Much like you are proclaiming about what I am telling you.
I didn’t say that you were alone with that mentality. Who do you think writes those Wiki articles? The very same population that has been under “algorithmic” programming for the past 3 generations. But of course, you have no knowledge of any of that. YOU see only the surface.
And the problem with You, Gib, is that you default to “argumentum absurdum” rather than that mature thing that we discussed. Consider that you made that your motto because you were not very good at it … and how to get good at it is the question you should be asking = “your need”.
The purpose of laws is to serve the needs of the individuals. Until you know exactly what those needs truly are, you cannot choose what laws to make. You have to stop thinking like a socialist, a communist, or an uncapped capitalist. Learn of your true needs and you will already know what laws to make and begin thinking more like a Jesus, “resolve your differences without pleading to coercive laws”.
You are living in a world of Nietzschean God-wannabes trying to extend their authority to God status, the “Ubermensche”; “omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient”. And they don’t really care about that “omnibenevolence”.
James, what do all the following quotes have in common:
They are all strawmen! Gargantuan, hideous, monolithic strawmen.
You know what I think–I think you’re still bitter at this:
…but these last few exchanges with you have done nothing but reinforce this sentiment. My only fault is that I’m asking questions because I don’t understand your view well enough, and yet you treat it as intolerable bigotry.
I always say that the most damaging idea is that questions shouldn’t be asked, especially when it’s used to suppress the questioning of authority. You, like certain others in this thread, seem to react to questions whose intent is to scope out a proposed idea for any merit or potential, with defensiveness and hostility. It is met with derisive attacks–ad homs, strawmen, and mud slinging–which is why I think you would make the worst tyrant in the history of tyrants if you were to ever gain power. Any questioning of your “deep thoughts” would be punished harshly, which is another way of saying it’s all about ego and personal glory for you. Anyone who truly sees the cause of fighting corruption and despair in society as a worthwhile one would put that cause above him/herself, and therefore would be completely open to questioning and the entertainment of other people’s views–even if they don’t immediately concur with their own. But you seem to think the universe revolve around you–like everyone, from birth, knows that you’re right–like the human genome consists of the you-know-James-is-right gene–and any skepticism over this is a sign of socialist evil needing to be stamped out or brainwashing needed to be derided and shamed. That’s called scare tactics–the conditioning against questioning and outspoken skepticism by way of humiliation and guilt, only terrorists using the more sinister devices of torture or death. This can only be justified upon an egomaniacal self-righteous mentality of moral superiority according to which you have every right to shit on anyone who disagrees with your view… and you want us to follow your example.
For this reason, I see no point in continuing our exchange. It’s too bad. I didn’t actually think you’re views were without their merits. I would have liked to pursue exploring them further, the fruitfulness of which I have demonstrated with Ucci and Eric (yes, even Eric), thereby applying the very principle of leading by example which you espouse, but that requires asking questions–and yes, sometimes in response to apparent inconsistencies I detect, but that is not an attack. Since this seems only to illicit derogatory and defensive reactions from you (indicating major insecurities on your part), and makes my work all the more frustrating, I’m going to spare myself the pain.
[size=50]But I never hold grudges, so if you ever want to engage me again, feel free to adjust your attitude and try again.[/size]
When the blind pride of the naive blocks the vision of the eyes, nothing is seen but what is desired to be seen.
Yes, I think that you are blinded by your own arrogance, belief in the significance of your knowledge and wisdom. And of course, blinded men see no light even when asking and looking for it. They just blunder onward, free to lie and create strawmen of unsupportable accusations of strawmen.
I have NEVER asked for faith in my word from anyone. You are a liar, just like those who make laws to control/coerce you.
You are living in a child’s dream world.
Now you have two options;
1) Ask me why I believe that,
2) Declare that I demand faith in my word concerning it.
Of course, so as to protect your dream world, YOU choose (2) … on a philosophy sight of all places.
And then just out and out lie by proclaiming that I am the one who demanded it.
Ucci is more popular than somebody? Hooray!
Of course, Ucci, I hold you in high esteem.
I’ve been trying to sort out my thoughts lately on the merits of the conservative view point.
I’ve been watching Milton Friedman videos lately (what a guy, even more interesting to listen to than Sowell), and there’s one video in which Friedman explains the evils of socialism as follows: in order to do good, to bring wealth to the poor or aid to the needy, the socialist would have government tax the rich and give to the poor, but that is nothing more than theft–you must take money from others by coercion, in other words, and that implies a willingness to engage in immoral acts from the outset. So already, just to have socialism, one must be willing to commit, or at least allow, immoral acts, and it begins a slippery slope from which there is no turning back.
Friedman’s point made perfect sense, which is why I struggled a bit with my own morality when trying to square it with this question: what is the greater evil: to take one’s money against one’s will, or to leave someone else out in the cold? This question stood out in my mind much like the trolley problem: if 5 people are strapped to a track with a train barreling down it, but there’s a switch that you can pull which would cause the train to veer down a different rack with only one person strapped to it, what should you do? In sheer utilitarian terms, the answer seems obvious: kill the one person in order to save the 5. The one death is an undesirable loss, and if you could save all 6 people, of course you would, but the scenario is not setup that way–given the parameters of the scenario, your only choices are: let the 5 die or kill the 1. Isn’t stealing from the rich to give to the poor the same kind of moral dilemma? You don’t want to steal from anyone, of course, but if your only options are to let 5 poor people starve to death or to take a chunk of a rich man’s money in order to feed the 5 (and the rich man will survive), what should you do?
But then I’m reminded of the philanthropy that Eric and Ucci assure me exists in society, and that there are studies to prove it. If this is true, it’s not a question of whether we should steal from the rich or let the poor starve, but of how we should feed the poor: by force or by voluntary humanitarianism? Should a government hand reach into the pockets of the rich in order to take money to feed the poor, or should we allow people to choose to spend their money on feeding the poor (and directly!).
But then again, I start thinking about the fundamental principles of economics. My economics 101 professor in university put them thus: 1) people are rational, 2) people will act to maximize their own self-interest. Defenders of conservatism from an economics perspective–like Eric, like Friedman, like Sowell–would be shining examples of free market economists if their ever were such people–but wouldn’t that mean that they believe, in accordance with 2), that people, at bottom, are fundamentally selfish? Indeed, it is a basic principle of economics, if I’m not mistaken, that the whole thrust of the economy depends on people wanting to amass wealth for themselves, and that means people will only work if paid, and that the quality of their work only goes up if they understand the positive correlation between work quality and rate of income. But then what does this say about the volunteers who sacrifice their own time and effort–the doctors, the fire fighters, the suppliers of aid–to help the poor and needy without any pay? Does it not say that the quality of their work will be at an all time low?
Well, this is silly. It couldn’t say this, for if it did, how could one explain the initiative to do it at all? Yet, this was another puzzle in my mind that I had to sort out. It still seemed at odds with basic economic principles. If I were to think outside the economic box, I’d guess that it says that people can be driven to work by a whole number of motives–money need not be the only one. Principle 2) above only states that people will act to maximize their own interest–it doesn’t say that amassing wealth is the only way to do that. Could a doctor volunteer his time helping the sick in order to secure a good reputation for himself, to be sure he will not leave this world without having done some good (and therefore be worthy of Heaven), to offer society an alternative to government dependency? Well, sure! These aren’t material gains, but so what? People can be motivated by, and self-interested in, a whole number of immaterial motives that serve their self interest. But is it really moral to do things if it’s really for self-interest? I think this is the wrong question to ask. So what if it is, so what if it isn’t–people are being helped… and voluntarily no less.
But one final time, my thoughts fall back onto socialism: if one of the problems of socialism is that it gives social loafers an opportunity for a free ride, or that it drains people of the motivation to do hard work or to contribute something of quality to society, then wouldn’t the same dangers exist regardless of whether the wealth and aid that the poor receive were forced from the rich by a government hand or voluntarily given by well-meaning members of the community? Well, again, I’d have to say no–not if I understand the conservative philosophy correctly, for it hinges squarely on allowing people to make free choices: if certain volunteers notice that this or that member of the poor are really not that hard done by, and that they seem to be milking charitable aid for all its worth, or if these free handouts are having more of an adverse affect on the community (i.e. making them lazy), then they can choose, with a well informed head, to withdraw the help. You can’t choose to withdraw tax dollars from the national treasury.
So getting back to my original dilemma–the trolley problem in the form of welfare–I don’t think it’s necessarily immoral to steal from the rich to give to the poor any more than it’s immoral to choose to kill the one person strapped to the tracks in order to save the five–not in principle anyway–but the key insight missing in this scenario that conservatism provides is that there is a better moral alternative: allow people to get richer in a free market environment such that voluntarily giving to the poor directly becomes more affordable and effective. So when juxtaposed against this alternative, and assuming one is aware of this alternative, the morality of taxation in the name of socialist aid comes into question in the vein of Friedman’s argument.
Now, I know these are trivially shallow thoughts–not deep ones like James’s–and obviously the whole of it reveals just how brainwashed I am by the socialist thought engineers who want me to think exactly how I just did, but I want to at least make it clear that this is an example of my thought processes and how I came to the conclusions I did, not a defense of socialism! My thoughts go to one side and think of the defenses in support of a free market and a limited government and then swing towards defenses in support of a socialized market and an empowered government, and they go back and forth like this–these are the pros and cons, none of which on their own representing my official stance–only the net balance that emerges after the pros and cons cancel out can be said to be my official stance, and wouldn’t you know it, it turns out in favor of the conservative side.
Capitalism is not a natural system; it is by nature not ‘fair’, and legitimises a type of theft whereby the rich can exploit the poor.
The invention of money has enabled the concentration of wealth into an abstract form to facilitate this sort of exploitation.
It is the state the prints the money, and thus we are always in a state where we may be called upon to render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s. In the UK, the notes have a picture of the Queen, and if her government want to rake back some of that money to redress the balance between rich and poor, then she has than right.
The simple fact is that were Friedman and his cronies to have their own way the eventual outcome of Capitalism would be a state of maximal polarisation of wealth, with one man owning everything and everyone else hoping from crumbs off his plate.
There is a continual refreshing of the labour force and a continual downwards pressure on wages from the owners and producers. Coupled with that - the urge to maximise profits combines to a self destructive tendancy.
Let’s imagine a world without taxation. Who would educate the poor, police, build roads, pay for defense; in short provide the infrastructure? The fact is the the rich factory and land owners benefit the most from the infrastructure and the provision of a healthy and well educated populace; it is a complete no-brainer that the Rich need to shoulder that burden. And if the people are allowed to starve on low wages and turn to crime, they would be justified in taking what they need from a society which is not working for them.
As it is corporate tax is at a modern low, and the most of the tax burden is on the people.
There reaches a point where wages are so low, and unemployment is so high that there is no one to buy the products that the country produces; the result is a downwards spiral.
It is the duty of government to protect the nations industries against foreign competition, and to provide a re-balancing of economic forces to keep the wheels of supply and demand turning.
Milton Friedman and his cronies would say it was unfair - boohoo. It’s a bit like a guy with a shotgun in a duck shoot saying that it is unfair if the ducks keep on moving!
He has everything and he wants more; more of your wealth.
Of course you could follow Friedman, we already tried that. When everything was privatised, the Roman legions stalked the earth, and the rich had the burden of slavery. All wealth was polarised in a tiny minority and free trade was at a minimum. But “socialist” remedies still had to be found; bread and circuses to keep the populace from rebelling, and a good war to give men an opportunity, and to cull the potential threat to domestic peace. Crime was the norm as there was little incentive for the rich to protect the poor, as they had their own protection; and the same goes for education. progress in science and social aspiration remained unchanged for hundreds of years, until its eventual collapse under weight of Christianity.
Capitalism is nature itself, the lowest level of society - free competition.
Try to learn and see the difference between unrestrained capitalism (monopolies and such), unconstitutional in the USA yet supported, and merely low level free trade and gain, “Capped Capitalism”, that which the US Constitution actually supported.
Uncapped Capitalism is merely Socialism in disguise so as to try to get around Constitutions that prohibit it.
I was just having a Zoidberg moment, don’t mind me. WIll respond to your monster post about conservatism soon.
Ah, finally, we’ve got a liberal here to defend and explain his side of the story.
Now, Lev, I’m going to say to you what I’ve been saying to everyone in this thread. I don’t mind conspiracy theories and I think you’d have to be an idiot to think conspiracies don’t go on, but I’m always going to demand proof before buying into one or another customized conspiracy theory.
I guess it might be important to also note that I’m leaning to the right at this point in the discussion, although I’ve kind of wavered back and forth throughout (trying to avoid the extremes) and trying to remain neutral as much as possible, by which I mean trying to base my position on facts as much as possible.
That being said, let’s see what you have to say:
Some would say that capitalism is what you get when you leave the market to its natural processes.
To call this theft is quite the claim, for it implies that the capitalist has broken the law. Calling it exploitation is also quite the claim. You’re gonna have to back this up a little more. For starters, what constitutes “exploitation”?
This is where it starts to sound like a conspiracy theory–the language you use suggests that someone invented money deliberately for the sole purpose of exploiting the have-nots, and the abstraction of money was also deliberate as a means of facilitating this purpose. Please explain what you mean by this.
That’s just false as far as I know. If a person earns money by work or the exchange of a good or service, that money is legally and rightfully his.
Are you British? If so, we may have to digress a bit. I’m Canadian and most people here are American (we’ve got one German who calls himself Arminius–he pops in from time to time). We’re going to have to understand the British system and how it works before getting too far along.
You’re talking about monopoly. This is one of those topics I was hoping to squeeze into this discussion somewhere. Might as well be here. I don’t know enough about Friedman’s policies, nor what the American Constitution, have to say about the prospect of monopolies in a free economy. To prevent them seems like a regulation being imposed into the market, but it would be good to hear what Eric or Ucci, or any other conservative, would have to say on the matter.
Again, gonna need proof. For my own part, I would think the rate of change for wages depends on market forces–if the position or the quality of work is in high demand, wages will go up, and if not, they go down.
I don’t know if that’s what the right have in mind. Maybe libertarians (I don’t know), but my discussions with Ucci and Eric suggest that maybe taxes might be OK if they go towards what the American Constitution stipulates that government needs. Even government as arbitrator needs something to live on, but then again, maybe the conservative view is that the people should offer whatever money they can out of their own free choice (kind of like how Wikipedia’s sustained). As for education, police, roads, Eric and I had a good discussion earlier about how those could very well come out of natural market forces.
Diplomacy and civil discussion first, but other than that I agree. However, that they are allowed to starve and made to turn to crime is what’s in question. The very post you quoted (mine) makes mention of the charitable organizations whose purpose it is to alleviate hunger and the need for crime, and Eric and Ucci (my conservative informants 
) reassure me that the studies have been done to show that this is an option for the poor and needy to fall back on.
Besides that, there is the point that in a competitive market, there are several other options that one can turn to before facing starvation or a life of crime–other employers who, as a means of remaining competitive, will offer higher wages. What would a liberal like you say about that?
Proof please.
Are you sure this is not because of the rise of socialism as opposed to a lack thereof?
Is it? In a republic, the government belongs to the people. It’s up to the people to decide what its duty is.
This is where I’m more sympathetic to the liberal view point, as my trolley metaphor emphasizes–I don’t feel particularly sorry for a billionaire who has to part with a few hundred thousand dollars if it goes to helping the poor and needy. Losing a small percentage of a huge fortune is hardly on par with facing starvation or homelessness or sickness, etc… But fairness is not my top concern–the consequences for society is. We must ask what the long term consequences are of a socialized system. Do they turn out as expected, or do they backfire in catastrophic ways? My discussions with Ucci and Eric over the past several pages suggest the latter.
This sounds like a mix of fact and speculation. I don’t know if a comparison between the Roman empire and what the right want for the American system is fair. They seem to share the aspect of a free market (but I’d have to look into this as I’m not a historian of antiquity), but there are numerous other aspects that they do not share in common (one example that comes to mind is that Rome was a dictatorship at the height of its empire).
Still, for all its faults, the Roman empire was the best the world had to offer at the time–many yearned to live under its rule. That the poor rebelled and needed distractions is nothing new–it’s even happening now, here, and it will happen anywhere where there is a disparity between the rich and the poor. The point is, according to what I’ve been gathering from our conservative friends, more socialism doesn’t solve this problem, it worsens it.
=====================
You may have noticed, Lev, that I’ve been falling back on Eric and Ucci to assert my position. There’s a reason for this. As I said above, I’ve wavered back and forth between the right and the left a bit throughout this thread. I started out completely neutral as I was more or less oblivious about what the debate between the right and then left was all about. Then when Eric and Ucci made it clear to me what these two wings stood for, I realized I was on the whole left leaning… but then they persuaded me. I went through a lengthy debate with Eric about the pros and cons of socialism and those of capitalism (or liberalism and conservatism respectively), and Ucci helped me out in understanding what the ideologies, and the histories thereof, were all about. In the end I was won over. But I still consider myself a moderate, and I still consider myself neutral in that I’m trying to be persuaded by facts–not rhetoric, not emotion, not intellectual bullying–and also in that I’m trying to be flexible, never clinging too tenaciously to whatever stance I so happen to take at the time.
My response and questions to you above are meant to show you where I’m at in my thinking. Do not take them as attacks. I’m revealing to you the challenges you will have to overcome if you’re serious about convincing me that liberalism is really the right ideology and that conservatism has it all wrong. I really meant it when I said that I’m glad a liberal finally showed up to defend and explain his side of the story (actually, that’s not fair to Liz and UPG–UPG has poked his head in hear from time to time voicing his liberal sentiments, and Liz, although she hasn’t outspokenly declared herself to be liberal, seems to promote liberal ideals more than conservative ones–but these two haven’t really been making extended efforts to convince me that liberalism is correct or explain to me what liberalism is all about). My current right leaning stance is, as I said, foremost a result of Eric’s and Ucci’s persuading me. It hasn’t been balanced though, so I’m hoping you can serve as a counter balance to them. I’m open minded and flexible chiefly because I know I’m so new to these ideas, and don’t know enough to take a firm stance one way or the other, but I should warn you that I’m not easy either, and if you really do want to convince me, you might have to be a bit thick skinned–I will challenge you and point out what I detect are your inconsistencies and errors, but only to let you know where you’re failing to win me over.
Oh, and hostility and rudeness don’t help.
I’m not even hinting at a conspiracy theory. My POV comes from a life long interest in anthropology. The reason capitalism is not natural is that it employs conceptual value. Money is an invention, that enabled the long terms storage of wealth and value.
Before money, and in societies that never had it, social relations were very different indeed, and we are talking about 99% of human history here.
The relationships of production were very different, and the primary producers were more valued for their work, when money enabled to introduction of hierarchical power structures, people become alienated from their labour. Whereas before wealth was shared out through necessity, such as before the food went bad! Money enabled goods to be sold and the wealth stored for longer periods.
In the earluy times; grain that could be stored was the first way that powerful interests were able to control the flow of wealth, to the top, and literally store the grain, to be dolled out for extra effort.
In ancient Babylon the leadership got control of the land through force, and rented it out to the peasantry from whom they took their grain, and demanded building work in payment for when the peasants food ran out - THAT is food the peasants already made!
Today we have an extension of the same system; a small minority controlling the movement of money - even inventing new imaginary products, mortgages, derivative, “futures markets”, to enable a system which keeps millions struggling - struggling so the rich don’t have to.
There are many tropes used by the rich to justify their control. And none of them require a conspiracy theory in any sense. Most of the rich believe it: Fairness. Oh please! There is no doubt that the rich conspire, it’s easy when it is so lucrative. When you are making money the consequences of that activity to others does not seem to get much attention.
You want proof that corporate tax is low and that the greatest burden is on the populace? It’s no wonder you are undecided.
Corporate subsidies run into billions. When you work you pay tax, and when you spend you pay tax all over again on the same money; you are taxed for your car, your house; to the feds and the state.
What percentage will you have paid after sales tax?
…the average corporate tax rate in 2011 dipped to 12.1%, its lowest level since before World War I, largely due to the great recession and a bonus depreciation tax break.[2] Wiki.
Asa share of GDP
Guess where the burden is going?
Now ask yourself if you think you work is overvalued by virtue of your wages?
Ask yourself if you tax burden is fair, when the corporations making all the money and paying you the minimum possible are shouldering less of the tax burden then they have this century.
One thing you’ll notice about the falling corporate income effective tax charts is that is bares almost zero correlation to the stance of administrations in office and what they believed ought to be done with regards to corporate taxes: you’ll see it drop under Carter, you’ll see it drop under Reagan. Why? Well, when a politician raises taxes, they make sure their are tons of loopholes for their favorite industries/states/persons and the State doesn’t actually take in any revenue- all that ends up happening is the tax burden is progressively shifted by the left to punish people who don’t have the means/lack of integrity to manipulate the State to their advantage.
On the question of Capitalism being a natural state of what people do with their money when left alone- it's almost true. You need contract enforcement to have capitalism; if you invest 10k in my business on the understanding that I will pay you 12k in a year, you need a State (or a really really powerful civil society) to keep me from just running with the money. There have been states in the past that considered charging interest immoral, and refused to consider any contract that involved such to be null and void.
So it's not completely natural- you need an acceptance of interest charging (usury) and some neutral arbitration of contract enforcement for capitalism to take off. I'll leave it to you to decide how natural "It is fair and reasonable to loan somebody something now in exchange for more in return later" is, and how natural "If a person promises something they ought to be compelled to keep that promise" is.
Anyway, Gib. I like your comparison of taxation to the ‘tied to the rails’ ethical thought experiments. There’s a few elements that are worth thinking about though that I didn’t see in your break down.
1.) Are the victims actually[i] tied[/i] to the rails? Sure, if the choice is to divert the train over a smaller group of people to spare a larger group, that's one thing. But what if the larger group (or the vast majority of them) could simply stand up and walk off the rails with a bit of effort? Keep in mind, when you are thinking about poverty in the U.S., that just over half of the people below the poverty line won't be there anymore in 10 years: and the same is true of those in the top 1%. There is a lot of economic mobility in the U.S., we're not talking about the responsibility of the blue bloods to the surf caste, here.
2.) Keep in mind diminishing marginal utility. If you take a million dollars away from a billionaire, he barely feels it. If you divide that same million dollars up among 10 people who have nothing, they feel it a great deal. So you can hurt one person a little to help another a lot, because the same real value means more to those that have nothing.
3.) Another thing to think about is that it’s key to conservatism that you can’t think of these things as ideals, because when it comes to human institutions, there simply aren’t any. In other words, if you do the moral math and declare “Yes, it is in fact the morally just thing to take X amount from the rich to provide to the poor in Y circumstance”, you can’t thereby justify any particular instance of such necessarily. It’s a liberal error to argue from the ideal to the real. In reality, the mechanism of getting that wealth from the rich to the poor involves
a.) A bureaucracy that may be corrupt,
b.) Punishment/incentives/whatever to goad the compliance of the rich, which raises ethical concerns.
c.) Countermeasures against whatever the rich might do in response (move their wealth offshore, stop doing business with the U.S.) which may raise ethical questions.
d.) A social and psychological effect on the poor who are receiving wealth without work.
e.) A social and political effect on the poor who owe deep gratitude and dependence on the State instead of their neighbor.
It's these considerations in my experience that frame a conservatives resistance to the welfare state. I generally only see strict libertarians make the 'taxation is theft' argument; I certainly don't think that it is, at least not necessarily.
ON MONOPOLIES: Anti-trust laws that protect the economy from monopolies are certainly a regulation on the free market, and one I support. It’s also worth pointing out that anti-trust laws are an accomplishment of conservative distributivism not liberal socialism. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributism
Capitalism was doing fine before usury was injected into it. Usury is a default monopoly and not simply charging of interest. Usury is renting money that one doesn’t have, “imaginary money”. By controlling the only source of printed money (promissory notes), you control the nation - through monopoly. J.P. Morgan and his Judeo-Nazi buddies knew that and stated it openly before they created the FED.
Usury is Uncapped Capitalism utilized by totalitarian Socialists to enslave nations through extortion and a lust for power (and known about for thousands of years which is why the RCC said to not do it and the Jews will not do it among themselves). And that is why the Constitution declared that ALL money was to be either silver or gold. All of the problems in the USA today can be directly related to usury (monopolies = Socialism), not merely Capitalism itself.
To compensate for usury, a nation has to form anti-usury, rent debt that it doesn’t have, more commonly known as artificial terrorism, consumption, and false-flags. The entire nation gets caught between imaginary hopes and imaginary threats that often become real because of the belief in them. The power that is gained by usury for the individual is taken away by artificial terrorism. And all the while the renters/brokers of these imaginary hopes and threats gain real power that they hope to be an eternal source because it yields the power to create more imaginary hopes and threats (all conscious entities are guided by the perception of hopes and threats).