OMG! Ron Paul wants to bring back feudalism!!!

[Timshel]

Of course you can do all of that. It might even work . . . for a day or two. At most.

Look, the single most fundamental and unchanging facet of human interaction is that we bug the shit out of each other. We are incredibly diverse, far more so than any other species of ape. And this is a good thing, too: it's a survival trait. Behavioral diversity is like genetic diversity, only better. It's better because social evolution works much faster than biological evolution does. The price of this adaptation, however, is that we never, ever agree entirely on anything.

Human beings living in social groups experience friction and the larger the group, the greater the friction. This is absolute and you will never change it. Any attempt to ignore it is doomed to utter failure: witness strict Marxist Socialism, for example.

There will always be dissenters. Always. And gods bless 'em, too. There will also always be criminals and "socially unacceptable deviants" of various kinds.

You will never get any sizable group of humans to "voluntarily" abide strictly by any code of behavior. Any social system predicated on purely voluntary compliance is futile and a complete waste of time.

I have no clue how you can state so many things correctly and then come to the conclusion that me must have a highly centralized monopoly power to force everyone into one set mold and punish dissenters.

Statists are not much different than advocates of ID. To IDers complex life cannot come about without a designer. To statists a civil society can not come about without a designer. Statists merely replace God with the state.

There are obvious differences. Statist will argue that in democracies laws develop from society debating issues and voting on these matters. They are not delivered top down onto the people. This is often true. Any state that attempts the reverse is usually confronted with total failure. But this is not a very good argument for the state and since complete democracies (i.e., all vote on the laws) are unfeasible we attempt create "representative" democracies. Once the central state grows to Godly proportions taking over control of more and more decisions the representative democracy starts to become unfeasible and we turn to bureaucracy, which is not very representative at all.

The fact, is that most of the "social structures" embedded in the state's laws developed spontaneously. The state merely monopolized enforcement and became determined to aggressivley punish dissenters, lest there monopoly be endangered.

But dissenters often bring about necessary and healthy change.

If the best laws come from a bottom up approach why do we need a monopoly state at all? Intellignet design is not only not necessary, it simply will not work as it is not adaptable. Spontaneous order is much more efficient.

 

[FUCK THE POLICE]

Classical liberalism claimed to oppose mercantilism. A shuffling of the deck chairs only, however, from a functional perspective.

How can you even compare the two?

Their function was limited (mainly concerning global trade) but they disagreed on every issue there.

 

[FUCK THE POLICE]

Yeah, and Senator DiFi strongly and aggressively opposes "earmarks" too. She doesn't do anything about them -- other than use them as well as any other Senator -- but she strongly and aggressively opposes them.

Classical liberalism does not address the fundamental problems with mercantilist economic systems. Instead, it just shuffles more deck chairs.

Pretty much all analogy's are non-sequitor by definition, Ornot.

 

[FUCK THE POLICE]

Stringy, didn't RJS tell you last week to shut up your mouth about this Ron Paul obsession you have been bitten with? You and your fellow Paul proselytes are making the whole Republican party look like crazies, it is not appreciated? I watched him on the debate this week and I could not believe my eyes, if his eyes pop out of his head anymore, Britt Hume will have to pick them up from the stage? He is unhinged, unzipped, a wacky whacko, and the less said about him being a Republican the better, personally I tell people he is a Demorat?

You shouldn't make yourself so obvious.

If you hate RS's argument, as a troll, it is your duty to AGREE with him.

 

[FUCK THE POLICE]

Of course you can do all of that. It might even work . . . for a day or two. At most.

Look, the single most fundamental and unchanging facet of human interaction is that we bug the shit out of each other. We are incredibly diverse, far more so than any other species of ape. And this is a good thing, too: it's a survival trait. Behavioral diversity is like genetic diversity, only better. It's better because social evolution works much faster than biological evolution does. The price of this adaptation, however, is that we never, ever agree entirely on anything.

Human beings living in social groups experience friction and the larger the group, the greater the friction. This is absolute and you will never change it. Any attempt to ignore it is doomed to utter failure: witness strict Marxist Socialism, for example.

There will always be dissenters. Always. And gods bless 'em, too. There will also always be criminals and "socially unacceptable deviants" of various kinds.

You will never get any sizable group of humans to "voluntarily" abide strictly by any code of behavior. Any social system predicated on purely voluntary compliance is futile and a complete waste of time.

I hate whenever people say that human beings "aren't evolving" anymore, and how terrible a thing this is for our genes.

We don't NEED to evolve through reproduction anymore. We've found a much better way to go about things - our minds. And this is the sole reason we've triumphed over the other animals, because of that quick adaptation, rather than painfully slow adaptation through mere breeding.

I also never really understand social darwinists. Sure, evolution works on a basic level. But evolution is really stupid. It takes it a trillion years to do anything meaningful, and after that you still have an appendix. Not something I'd base a philosophy off of.

 

[Epicurus]

Classical liberalism claimed to oppose mercantilism. A shuffling of the deck chairs only, however, from a functional perspective.

I've always suspected that's what you thought, coy bastard.

 

[OrnotBitwise]

Pretty much all analogy's are non-sequitor by definition, Ornot.

Sure, but it can illustrate effectively. Nice strong pen hand.

My point is, simply, that while the architects of classical liberalism protested mightily against the evils of mercantilism, their prescribed remedies were little better than snake oil. They perceived the problems of mercantilism but incorrectly attributed them to protectionist tendencies and the like. Certainly the entanglement of noble/governmental interests with commercial ones was a problem but the answer -- to the extent that there is one -- does not lie with casting government, or the ruling class, as an external, coercive force.

In a sense, they made the same error that Marx did. They cast the politically powerful as "evil" and then tried to cast spells against the demonic influence, as it were. They compounded the error in their forays into economic theory.

Freeing the market, while it does have advantages in a frontier society, certainly, ultimately only serves to concentrate power even more strongly in the hands of a few.

 

[OrnotBitwise]

I've always suspected that's what you thought, coy bastard.

Classical liberalism was, I think, a necessary stage of evolution. It wasn't evil, nor was it worse than what came before. Like anything human, however, it wasn't perfect and we, right now, are getting smacked in the face by its shortcomings. Just an accident of history, but here we are.

 

[OrnotBitwise]

How can you even compare the two?

Their function was limited (mainly concerning global trade) but they disagreed on every issue there.

How? By blithely ignoring the distinctions between economic, philosophical and social theory, of course.

As far as I'm concerned, the only real problem the classical liberals had was in their economics.

 

[OrnotBitwise]

I have no clue how you can state so many things correctly and then come to the conclusion that me must have a highly centralized monopoly power to force everyone into one set mold and punish dissenters.

Statists are not much different than advocates of ID. To IDers complex life cannot come about without a designer. To statists a civil society can not come about without a designer. Statists merely replace God with the state.

There are obvious differences. Statist will argue that in democracies laws develop from society debating issues and voting on these matters. They are not delivered top down onto the people. This is often true. Any state that attempts the reverse is usually confronted with total failure. But this is not a very good argument for the state and since complete democracies (i.e., all vote on the laws) are unfeasible we attempt create "representative" democracies. Once the central state grows to Godly proportions taking over control of more and more decisions the representative democracy starts to become unfeasible and we turn to bureaucracy, which is not very representative at all.

The fact, is that most of the "social structures" embedded in the state's laws developed spontaneously. The state merely monopolized enforcement and became determined to aggressivley punish dissenters, lest there monopoly be endangered.

But dissenters often bring about necessary and healthy change.

If the best laws come from a bottom up approach why do we need a monopoly state at all? Intellignet design is not only not necessary, it simply will not work as it is not adaptable. Spontaneous order is much more efficient.

What comes after the nation-state? I don't know but I have absolute confidence that it will NOT be some idyllic, gosh-aren't-we-all-so-very-evolved anarchistic utopia. Throughout human history, the trend in government has always been toward more centralized, formal structures rather than the other direction. There can be, have been and, I certainly hope, always will be counter currents but the mainstream has steadily flowed downhill, always toward centralization of authority.

We call the exceptional periods "revolutions" generally speaking. That's when we don't call them "catastrophic collapse" or "the end of the world as we know it."

Why do you insist on such absolute terms? I never said that power must be monopolized, nor have I suggested that the "new world order" -- to borrow ButtHead's obsession -- must be monolithic and totalitarian. In fact, I believe in decentralizing power and authority wherever possible. What I don't believe in is nationalism: I don't believe that effective decentralization can be achieved by strengthening geographically defined political boundaries.

The day of nations is slowly drawing to a close. It's time to take a good hard look at what may come after as we can, with some luck, influence whatever that might be. I'd prefer, however, that we don't even try to make it fit some antique dreamworld conception of how people really ought to behave if only they were all rational.

People aren't rational, at least not most of the time. Sad, perhaps, but true.

 

[Cancel5]

What comes after the nation-state? I don't know but I have absolute confidence that it will NOT be some idyllic, gosh-aren't-we-all-so-very-evolved anarchistic utopia. Throughout human history, the trend in government has always been toward more centralized, formal structures rather than the other direction. There can be, have been and, I certainly hope, always will be counter currents but the mainstream has steadily flowed downhill, always toward centralization of authority.

We call the exceptional periods "revolutions" generally speaking. That's when we don't call them "catastrophic collapse" or "the end of the world as we know it."

Why do you insist on such absolute terms? I never said that power must be monopolized, nor have I suggested that the "new world order" -- to borrow ButtHead's obsession -- must be monolithic and totalitarian. In fact, I believe in decentralizing power and authority wherever possible. What I don't believe in is nationalism: I don't believe that effective decentralization can be achieved by strengthening geographically defined political boundaries.

The day of nations is slowly drawing to a close. It's time to take a good hard look at what may come after as we can, with some luck, influence whatever that might be. I'd prefer, however, that we don't even try to make it fit some antique dreamworld conception of how people really ought to behave if only they were all rational.

People aren't rational, at least not most of the time. Sad, perhaps, but true.

Wow, another very nicely stated post.

Nationalism is what makes people crazy! I have seen it happen on a small scale in the psychology exercises that they so loved to do in the 70's. It was amazing to watch people turn on each other in a very short period of time.

 

[Timshel]

What comes after the nation-state? I don't know but I have absolute confidence that it will NOT be some idyllic, gosh-aren't-we-all-so-very-evolved anarchistic utopia. Throughout human history, the trend in government has always been toward more centralized, formal structures rather than the other direction. There can be, have been and, I certainly hope, always will be counter currents but the mainstream has steadily flowed downhill, always toward centralization of authority.

Uhh, that is not true. Classical liberalism fought against and overthrew the notions of a central power in the monarchs. Europe is now seeing the folly of central power and attempting to move away from it. Same in China.

We call the exceptional periods "revolutions" generally speaking. That's when we don't call them "catastrophic collapse" or "the end of the world as we know it."

Why do you insist on such absolute terms? I never said that power must be monopolized, nor have I suggested that the "new world order" -- to borrow ButtHead's obsession -- must be monolithic and totalitarian.

States monopolize power. All states, even the relatively good ones.

It becomes totalitarian for the reasons I outlined. A pure democracy is unworkable even for a government strictly limited to a few matters. Representative democracies become unmanageable when you heap enormous powers on them to direct trade and other matters. So we then turn to bureaucracies, which are undemocratic and dictatorial.

In fact, I believe in decentralizing power and authority wherever possible.

When?

What I don't believe in is nationalism: I don't believe that effective decentralization can be achieved by strengthening geographically defined political boundaries.

Nobody is arguing for that. Federalism is effective in keeping government power decentralized. From there reforms are needed to check the state and regional governments with greater protection of individual rights.

The day of nations is slowly drawing to a close. It's time to take a good hard look at what may come after as we can, with some luck, influence whatever that might be. I'd prefer, however, that we don't even try to make it fit some antique dreamworld conception of how people really ought to behave if only they were all rational.

People aren't rational, at least not most of the time. Sad, perhaps, but true.

People are raional most of the time. However, that it is not at all necessary under a free society that they be so all the time. Libertarianism is not dependent on the libertarian man. That comes from your statist hogwash.

 

[Litmus]

What comes after the nation-state? I don't know but I have absolute confidence that it will NOT be some idyllic, gosh-aren't-we-all-so-very-evolved anarchistic utopia. Throughout human history, the trend in government has always been toward more centralized, formal structures rather than the other direction.

Bullshit, empires form and crumble, and nations evolve again from the ashes. And that's as it should be. There are reasons for it.

But of course, as your quote in my signature indicates, the internationalist fascists are trying to create a permanent global empire which has little to do with individualism or freedom. They will fail.

There can be, have been and, I certainly hope, always will be counter currents but the mainstream has steadily flowed downhill, always toward centralization of authority.

We call the exceptional periods "revolutions" generally speaking. That's when we don't call them "catastrophic collapse" or "the end of the world as we know it."

Why do you insist on such absolute terms? I never said that power must be monopolized, nor have I suggested that the "new world order" -- to borrow ButtHead's obsession -- must be monolithic and totalitarian. In fact, I believe in decentralizing power and authority wherever possible. What I don't believe in is nationalism: I don't believe that effective decentralization can be achieved by strengthening geographically defined political boundaries.

The day of nations is slowly drawing to a close. It's time to take a good hard look at what may come after as we can, with some luck, influence whatever that might be. I'd prefer, however, that we don't even try to make it fit some antique dreamworld conception of how people really ought to behave if only they were all rational.

People aren't rational, at least not most of the time. Sad, perhaps, but true.

There's nothing necessarily wrong with nationalism, this is a lie perpetuated by globalists who seek to erode that alliance, and force all individuals into a coercive and parasitic alliance with the international fascist machine only. They seek to erode all alliances which do not benefit them. this is the purpose of political correctness, to fan racial hostilities, to turn men against women, rich against poor, to manipulate the identities of the elites of society, to distort their teachings and create an ethos of shame and self hatred.



You see the worst in others, to justify the worst in yourself.

 

[Timshel]

There is nothing right about nationalism, either. I hope the day of nations are drawing to a close. But not if they ar to be replaced them with one central government.

 

[Litmus]

There is nothing right about nationalism, either. I hope the day of nations are drawing to a close. But not if they ar to be replaced them with one central government.

They are to be replaced with one central government,according to all forces demonizing nationalism. There's nothing wrong with an allegiance to those colocated. A global identity will be fine, when people get there. As it is now, they're trying to force it and play eugenics while at it, strengthening islamic tribalism, radicalism and violence, weakening western culture, and then injecting the totalitarian islamists into the already weakened western world, to islamicize the globe.

And they're relegitimizing slave labor in the modern area, and using it to make all other people dependant, or slaves themselves trying to compete.

Let's not hasten an "out of the frying pan into the fire" scenario.

 

[uscitizen]

Hunam beings will always have governments. At least for the forseeable future. It is the way of most of us.
There are many reasons, greed, fear, religion, etc....

 

[Timshel]

There are many reasons, greed, fear, religion, etc....

Yes, those certainly seem to often be the goals for those behind government.

 

[FUCK THE POLICE]

Watching government commercials, has anyone ever noticed that the government is the only organization that feels it necessary to threaten you even in its promotional material?

 

[uscitizen]

I dunno about organization, but billions are made off of the fear industries each year.
The NRA, "they are going to take your guns away"
Religion exists mainly on fear.

 

[Damocles]

Watching government commercials, has anyone ever noticed that the government is the only organization that feels it necessary to threaten you even in its promotional material?

Well, if you don't act one way, it seems there is a group that will tell you that you will go to hell for eternity. That the 'light-bringer' will be there to greet you....