Unemployment almost 10% nationally

[I have WHAT in my yard?]

What disturbs me about much of this conversation is how much of what people think is influenced heavily by organizations and media outlets that openly have an avowed agenda that does not include doing what is in the best interest of either America or worse, the middle class.

This morning my dog got attacked on our property by a neighbor's two dogs.

Many here would say the proper response would be to shoot the neighbor's dogs.
Others would say call the police.
Others would say start by talking to the neighbor.

The problem is we all have differing ideas of where our rights and the other guys' rights begin and end.
Since we don't agree inherently, we need a legal framework in which to operate.

Some level of governance is necessary.


History has shown that people are NOT either inherently greedy or inherently lazy. Especially not lazy. It all depends on the culture in which they are raised.
Greedy people are weeded out by being shunned in some cultures. Lazy people are often shunned.
In China, the good of the all is heavily taught. Students clean their own classrooms, students who mark things or litter are heavily shunned by others. As a result the adults become easy to manipulate by those who get government control and who are greedy.
In the US, we foster creativity and innovation and self reliance. As a result those who are actually victimized by those who get power and who are greedy are re-victimized by people who blame them for it.

The solutions are not in Isms or sound bites. They take nuance and understanding and intelligent discussion. We need to retire John Nash and game theory. We need to retire trickle down economics. We need to retire over sized government that does not provide governance. We need to retire thinking that a two party system can keep working indefinitely. I think we are smart enough and capable enough. I just think we need to believe that each other are.

 

[Organics North]

Some days the glass does seem half empty..

I tend to be a "compliant" person, so laws that are poorly written get under my skin.. I also feel something is wrong with our tax system.. You need a boat load of lawyers, and accountants to do your taxes, where one is encouraged to find and use all the loopholes you can.. So the more you have to spend on lawyers and accountants the less you pay in taxes..

Being a rural living person my whole life.. I have a natural distrust for humanity... A homesteaders, a pioneers attitude if you will.. However, even in the days gone by our Government, and the elite who pull their strings and mold the clay of the elected persons minds were busy at work making their filthy money.. The homesteaders and pioneers were simply isolated from the effects... In a way ignorance being bliss...

So another words, I wished it could work..But I am not sure if "leave me alone, and give me my freedom" ever worked, past the first century of our country's history. (My living like the pioneers, independent and self sufficient to a large degree, does not help the situation and one day the powerful "railroad/lumber/cattle baron" will come knocking at my door, with a sheet of paper and be able to take all that is mine.)

Yes I would love to see something other than the current two party system in our Government... I am the first to admit I am a odd puppy, having strong Socialist leanings, with a few drops of Libertarianism in for good measure. It is the Libertarian in me that allowed me to finally see your perspective.. Yes, I could be sold on your Utopia...... However, I do feel it is a distinctly American Utopia, dreaming of century's past..

.... So the realist in me kicks in and thinks a system similar to what is found in every other first world nation would be best for us the people in the United States of America.

(You know what when I write that down it is kind of depressing..

It would be a great utopia to go back to the early 1800's)
*Please note: ON is a nut case that cooks on 100 year old plus cookwear, Builds traditional log and timber frame structures using 100+ year old hand tools, wears wool and silk instead of modern fibers does not wear a watch and uses the sun to tell time... and so forth..

Yes I am a traditionalist and do try and live in the past..

ON

 

[I have WHAT in my yard?]

ON -

I see no contradiction whatsoever in both of our beliefs in freedom AND social responsibility. what the people of the frontier (and the Amish that surround me ) know - and we seem to have forgotten- is that true freedom comes with a strong sense of responsibility for others. The Amish shrug off peer pressure from outsiders. They shrug off the government and its interference, but they take very good care of one another.

Hard work has been punished, by those who have, throughout history. Feudal systems, Lords and slave owners have all worked to repress the rewards of those who worked hard. It is not the government that is punishing the successful. It is the successful who want to keep others from catching up to them that are currently doing it.

Microsoft was once the upstart garage business and then it became a monopoly monster, repressing others' innovations and riving competition out of business with easy efficiency.

Google, Verizon, how many can you name that once they got big used their size to keep others out? Sometimes it is that their ideas ARE better, sometimes it is just that they got there first. Sometimes they caught a break some where. Sometimes they forget that.

 

[newfoundland]

Chicken obsessed is absolutely right. There is no contradiction between freedom and social responsibility. In fact they are complimentary. What sort of freedom is it that only allows the strong and the rich to be free, while the less fortunate are enslaved by their poverty? This must be though freedom under the law. Any society where people live by their own personal laws is doomed to fail. A pioneering spirit is what brought US to where it is today, the early settlers fleeing what they believed was religious and social oppression. I can see why people cling to the old ideas of independence and self reliance, as it has always been a force for good. It does not always sit well with a modern society though. What we need to do in our societies I suppose is to retain what was best of the old and embrace what is good about a much more integrated and interdependent society.

 

[Q9]

I have WHAT in my yard? :

ON -

I see no contradiction whatsoever in both of our beliefs in freedom AND social responsibility. what the people of the frontier (and the Amish that surround me ) know - and we seem to have forgotten- is that true freedom comes with a strong sense of responsibility for others. The Amish shrug off peer pressure from outsiders. They shrug off the government and its interference, but they take very good care of one another.

Hard work has been punished, by those who have, throughout history. Feudal systems, Lords and slave owners have all worked to repress the rewards of those who worked hard. It is not the government that is punishing the successful. It is the successful who want to keep others from catching up to them that are currently doing it.

Microsoft was once the upstart garage business and then it became a monopoly monster, repressing others' innovations and riving competition out of business with easy efficiency.

Google, Verizon, how many can you name that once they got big used their size to keep others out? Sometimes it is that their ideas ARE better, sometimes it is just that they got there first. Sometimes they caught a break some where. Sometimes they forget that.

Lemme get this straight - you're saying that these companies are evil because they're the best? Microsoft doesn't repress innovation, Microsoft itself innovates! Besides, all these things get at the very least decent competition - Google vs Bing, for instance, or Microsoft vs Apple. They aren't monopolies!

I defy you to find me a single actual monopoly in the past two centuries - by monopoly, I mean it cannot have any government support, and it cannot have any competition, and it must raise prices and stifle innovation.​

 

[Q9]

Quote:
Only if they have government support. Otherwise, no chance of that.

 

[Dunkopf]

Good news folks. The Republicans and some of the Conservadems voted against extending unemployment benefits. Now we don't have to worry about those people putting any money in to the economy. They on the other hand don't have to worry about eating or staying out of the snow. Isn't life grand?

 

[knjinnm]

Quote:
And I will bet half+ of the unemployed folks voted republican.
But republicans will flip-flop on this once corporatist remind them that christmas is coming and corporatist need a cash infusion.

Buy only "Made In The USA" this year or don't buy at all.
Republicans are after our social Security to bail out banks, they want to tax your employer provided health benefits as income and they want to eliminate mortgage interest deduction.
Right now the middle class is sitting in the open with a bulls-eye painted around them.
Time to hunker down people.

 

[gamebirdsonly]

Quote:
And I will bet half+ of the unemployed folks voted republican.
But republicans will flip-flop on this once corporatist remind them that christmas is coming and corporatist need a cash infusion.

Buy only "Made In The USA" this year or don't buy at all.
Republicans are after our social Security to bail out banks, they want to tax your employer provided health benefits as income and they want to eliminate mortgage interest deduction.
Right now the middle class is sitting in the open with a bulls-eye painted around them.
Time to hunker down people.

 

[I have WHAT in my yard?]

Sorry, Q9 the Microsoft issue is a no-brainer. How is Microsoft a monopoly? Well, maybe the feds can explain it in their landmark Anti-Trust case against Microsoft. Microsoft lost this case by the way and had several segments broken up and paid hearty fines.

http://www.justice.gov/atr/cases/f3800/msjudgex.htm

Later Microsoft was sued by the BBC for the same thing - different law, same anti-trust intent. Same result, Microsoft lost again. Finding of fact that they had used strong arm tactics such as cornering a market pressuring suppliers and illegally using unfair trade practices to prevent other products that competed with theirs from reaching the market. They also filed massive patent suits against people creating innovation that could threaten them. Most of the suits die when the person who made the innovation does not have endless money or time to duke it out with microsoft.

Does not matter if you respect Microsoft or Bill Gates. Does not matter how much money Bill gives away. What matters is that once he got big enough he used his very size to stifle competition.

Shall we address the ongoing actions against Google for the same things? How about the case moving into the FCC against the Google/Comcast suppression of internet access? That one may not go anywhere as the new congress is not addressing net neutrality at all claiming that the net is not broken and the market can handle it. But, once a site like BYC has to pay hefty fees to have any possibility of turning up in a search the net will become a much more pasteurized place.