Thread: Direct Democracy. Would you vote for it?

Originally Posted by MK27

I have not said that even once. I was pointing out that all your rhetoric about wanting "less government" is really about wanting a government only for the purpose of assisting property owners to exploit people. I would not call that less government, I would call it a government with a different focus.

Prior to that, you had said and I quote: "..what you are talking about is no government at all." And please do not try to tell me what my rhetoric is "really" about. It is really about protecting the individual rights of people, rights which include the right to own property. If you want to fly off the handle with a bunch of over-dramatized crap about evil property owners and the poor downtrodden exploited "little people" then that's your choice.

Let's make one thing clear: government that is stripped of much of the overreaching powers it has now is most certainly "less government." That's just a fact. And yes, it's a government with a different focus. A focus on protecting rights instead of dictating lives and redistributing wealth at the point of a gun.

Originally Posted by MK27

When I referred to "no government" as an outcome (but not your intention), I meant that a government with such a narrow focus -- that exists only to serve the interests of property (and not people) will in time cease to resemble anything respectable and (in effect) simply serve as a principle uniting a bunch of semi-independent fiefdoms (as has been observed, eg, in parts of Africa and Afghanistan), where a small number of people own everything, and so everyone else is forced to do whatever they ask just in order to have somewhere to live. Very "Noble" minded you are, Sharke.

Once again, either point me to a quote of mine which suggests that what I am proposing is a government which "only serves the interest of property," or stop your repeated lying. Protecting the rights of property is one aspect of a government that I propose, but I have not implied in the slightest that this would be the only function of such a government. No matter how many times you lie about this, it will not become so. Protecting the rights of property is an essential role of government, but it is not the only one. Other rights include the right to walk the streets at night without being threatened by the physical violence of others. Or the right to have a signed contract honored. The whole brunt of your argument seems to be to misrepresent everything I've said, lie outright, and then go off onto some wild non-sequitur about how a government that protects individual rights will eventually turn into some horrific Mad Max world and that I'm an evil person because this is what I really want. I've said it before and I'll say it again...this is like arguing with a 14 year old.

Originally Posted by MK27

If reasoning by your standards is just spouting rhetoric and throwing mud, no, I guess I don't see how anyone is going to do that "objectively".

I'm actually citing reasoned arguments and am prepared to defend them objectively. You're the one who decided to bring mud into this, by calling me mean, a fascist, greedy etc. It is simply not possible to have a debate with a child without them throwing the word "fascist" around like it was confetti at a wedding. You lose claim to any notion of objectivity when you do that.

Originally Posted by MK27

Well, here's an idea for you. If you are all about freedom (which, to me implies choices, and not a lack thereof), I think a sort of "opt-in" system would be in keeping with the idea of "direct democracy" and also a very interesting social experiment. So as a business owner, you could opt in to pay taxes and be responsibly regulated (labour standards, environmental standards, the FDA, etc) or, you could "opt-out", pay no tax and be subject to no regulation. The difference would be that you could then make no claims (other than unverifiable personal ones) about the safety of the workplace and your products. In other words, if you want to pay people $2 hour, dump toxic sludge into the river, and sell food with cholera and lead flakes in it, you can go right ahead.

It could be that everyone would just opt out. However, it could also be that there would be enough people who'd prefer to spend their money in places that are held up to guaranteed, third party standards, and which contribute back to the community in a reasonably objective manner thru taxation, to ensure that such willing partners in society exist. Of course, no one in the opt-in system would have as good a chance to amass as much individual wealth as those who opt-out (in theory, at least), but the opt-in would obviously come with some public perks, such as services like health care, education, et. al. Probably everyone would be happier that way since they would be making a choice, instead of being forced to participate in something they resent.

I'd be very fascinated to see where that would go -- I think it would better reflect the general will of the population from place to place (so some places would end up mostly opt-in, others would end up all opt-out). At that point, you're free to move.

I think you have a very shallow and childish understanding of economics and the free market. In your world, everything is either one extreme or the other because you don't have the intellectual sophistication to discern nuance and the full spectrum of variation. For instance, if someone "opts out" then of course there is no other explanation other than them being evil industrialists who want to pay $2 per hour and dumb unlimited toxic sludge and basically act like the cartoon character that naive young leftists have in their minds when they think of a "capitalist." It doesn't occur to you for one minute that there are very good reasons to believe that the so-called "regulations" and "standards" imposed by government are in many cases meaningless, arbitrary, non-rational and subject to corruption and bribery. Nor does it occur to you that in a free market, a company could choose to "opt out" of your little scheme - along with many other companies in competition - and adhere to standards as measured and certified by a private agency whose standards are not dictated by unelected, faceless government bureaucrats (who more often than not face little consequences for their incompetence, dishonesty and corruption) but are maintained by virtue of the fact that if they do decide to certify a business based on shady backhand deals and bribery, their reputation as a private company is likely to be destroyed and their certification is going to be worthless in the future.

We could even take the private certification agency out of the equation. What would be the financial incentive for a private construction company to build something which falls down? How much business are they likely to get after that? What about a company who works its employees to death? Again, I'm not seeing a financial incentive to having sick employees on the brink of exhaustion or death, or to constantly have to retrain new employees because the old ones died. In your shallow understanding of economics (and consumer psychology) however, the company with no standards is far more likely to "amass wealth," despite the fact that the only way in which they're going to amass wealth is by satisfying consumer demand and despite the fact that consumers, given a choice, will generally choose the superior product and one which doesn't pose a risk to their health or their life. And if they make a bad choice with a product, they're not likely to make that same mistake twice, or recommend that product to their friends.

We don't even have to bring taxes into it. How about this. For every contract entered into between willing partners, those participants have a choice to pay the government a small percentage of the value of that contract. In return, the government will agree to enforce that contract in a criminal justice system should one side decide to refrain from supplying their side of the bargain. A contract could mean anything from a small transaction (for this dollar, you agree to supply this exact product) to a major business contract worth hundreds of millions. You can choose to avoid the fee, but should the other person break the contract you have no legal recourse (unless you're prepared to pay for it yourself of course). Thus, the government's role in this context is to insure contracts. Considering the millions of contracts of various sizes which are made in the US every day, the money raised could certainly support a limited government whose role was restricted to national defense, law enforcement and a court system.

The rest of society is down to the free actions of free individuals, traders in a free market who make their own choices and decide for themselves what's worth their dollars and what's worth their time. That, and only that, can fully represent the "will of the people" in an accurate, granular fashion.

If you're worried about the environment, then be aware that those countries which have made the most progress toward sustainable development have been wealthy countries. When people are forced to choose between food, clothing, shelter or the environment, you can bet your ass that a green environment is going to be viewed as a luxury item. When people are wealthy enough that they don't have to choose between green issues and survival, then effective stewardship of the environment becomes possible. And a desire for greater levels of wealth is naturally connected to the practical benefits of an increasingly efficient means of production and use of resources. Because of the free market, you now have a computer on your desktop that is thousands of times as powerful and efficient as the computers which launched and navigated the first Space Shuttle. Do you really believe that ultimately, there is a financial incentive to become more wasteful and less efficient?

Like it or not, capitalism and the right to private property has done more to improve living conditions for poor people than any other factor in human history. A country's prosperity and general living standards are a direct reflection on the extent to which they enforce property rights. India, for example, has a wealth of infrastructure and a great potential for prosperity. But it was mismanaged by socialist governments for decades and its property laws are vague and ambiguous. The result is that it's extremely difficult to conduct day to day business in India and everything is stifled by layers of bureaucracy, red tape and corruption. If you really care about improving the lives of the world's poor, then take a minute to understand the reasons why capital investment - i.e. wealth creation - is the only way in which their standards of living will improve, and that the business which creates wealth cannot be conducted without property rights and contract enforcement. Whether or not your recognize this fact, which is the empirical truth and not conjecture, is of no consequence to me or anyone else who has ever owned property and run a business. My business is relatively small, but I have provided 12 jobs for people and I am certainly not ashamed of this, nor the level of prosperity I have achieved. Given that you've repeatedly called me a greedy fascist, perhaps you'd like to tell us what you have done for society.

Originally Posted by MK27

I could care less why.

You could care less why what?

Originally Posted by MK27

Maybe you want to set up your own community economic system, dispersing the wealth you have reaped from the world, like Christopher Coke or Robin Hood. Great for you dude, I would totally encourage that and that is why I am suggesting an opt-in/opt-out strategy to government spending.

Why on earth would you think I would want to "disperse wealth"? I grew up in a poor city in the North of England in which a frightening proportion of the population exist on government handouts their entire lives. I know exactly what effect the welfare state has had on the lives and the mentality of those who come to depend on it. Dispersing wealth is a horrible, sick idea, akin to paying the poor to stay poor and miserable. I've since spend a large proportion of my life living in New York City, where I've seen up close what the welfare state and the politics of the socialist left have done to the people of the ghetto, especially to the black population. Your "opt in/opt out" strategy seemed to me to be less a serious idea than a platform on which to showcase your perception of those who do not wish to contribute toward social wealth redistribution as mean, evil brutes who enslave their workers and devote their lives to polluting the environment. How about people simply pay for the government services they use and nothing more?

Originally Posted by MK27

We could make it so the only thing the government guarantees to everyone is the right to own and hold property, which is what you are asking for.

Despite me politely asking you to stop misrepresenting my views with such outright lies, you continue to do it. I guess things are looking pretty desperate for you in this thread so I can't really blame you.

Originally Posted by MK27

That's fine -- but the only way I would go for that is if people retained the option to continue to be part of the existing public social structure. If you do not like it, you do not have to participate, and you do not have to pay taxes or obey the law (eg, with regard to wages, the environment, whatever. Do whatever the hell you want. Impress everyone: You are welcome to ignore or exceed the standards set by the law and still opt-out of taxation! Hooray! You can band together and build schools and hospitals for each in complete independence! Or not! Opt out!* You can racially discriminate on your property to your heart's content! Or you could set an example in openness and love! Be free to choose. But once again, the government will ensure the right to one's personal safety and property. For everyone. There is no opt-out of that, so your stuff will be safe.

How about everyone pay toward the only legitimate function of government, which is to maintain the conditions in which individuals are free to act on the responsibility they have to provide their own livelihoods without the threat of the physical coercion of others. This means a system of national defense to protect from outside invaders, a system of law enforcement to protect the individual from physical violence and from fraud, and a court system in order to hand down the sentences by which violent people are kept out of society and to enforce the contracts and property rights which are essential for a civilized society to function. Nobody is forced at the point of a gun to pay for anyone else's welfare - if an individual decides that his paycheck should support his family and nobody else's then that is his inalienable right to do so. Everybody is free to form whatever voluntary partnerships they so choose, everyone is free to donate as much of their wealth to charity as they like, everyone is free to go ahead and volunteer their time to help out the less fortunate in society. When tax rates are lowered, charitable donations rise in accordance. People are naturally charitable whether they are rich or poor, however it has been shown that those of a leftist persuasion are far less charitable than those of a right wing, conservative or libertarian persuasion. This is likely because leftists would rather pass the buck for the responsibility of the welfare of the less fortunate to the state machine instead of having to get their hands dirty themselves. Some of the biggest philanthropists in America have always been and continue to be rich industrialists. The left's characterization of rich capitalists as evil, greedy and mean is nothing more than an outdated and childish stereotype, a figment of Marxist propaganda. The so called greedy rich, in their quest to become wealthy, have done more to improve the lives of the poor of every single anticapitalist crusader, union leader and bleeding heart liberal combined. Property rights have done more to improve living standards than every single dollar of welfare benefits paid for by the taxpayer. It's time to stop the braying and the sneering and just accept that the things that you denounce as evil have actually done more to help the poor than anything else in history. To be anticapitalist is to be anti-human.

Originally Posted by MK27

I do not think America needs another civil war ) However, people who do want to contribute to society through taxation and enjoy the benefits of such can, if they wish. Otherwise you are just imposing your own kind of restrictions on everybody's freedom, and telling them they have to live according to your philosophy and your laws. That is not freedom.

What I am saying is that in a libertarian society, everybody is free to donate as little or as much of their wealth and their time to society via private charity. There is no need whatsoever to bring government bureaucracy and state corruption into it. There is nothing that I have said or proposed that could possibly be twisted to mean that I think people's freedom should be restricted in the way you say. It's just crazy that you're even attempting to make these arguments.

Originally Posted by MK27

Beyond that, I don't really care to discuss anything with you, unless you find something to say I and everybody else have not heard ten thousand times already. You have not produced one original thought in this entire thread. It's boring. You have nothing interesting to say and there is zero possibility of participating in any kind of dialogue if you are just determined to regurgitate garbage. I don't care. Honestly. Go paste your leaflets somewhere else.

In other words, like a thousand before you, the discussion has proven too much for your intellect and so you're now pretending that it bores you, like some child who's way out of his depth but old enough for the need to save face. I understand. You're also projecting, because it is you, not I, who has composed his posts from a dog eared pamphlet of shopworn slogans. You can either give up now, or keep this thread going and continue to be set straight every time you open your mouth. I think you're right to give up.

Originally Posted by MK27

* I would encourage the Tea Party to pursue this strategy. I think they would have a good chance of people allowing them to do this. Opt out.

I think the message of the Tea Party is fine as it is.