Scott, I get paid every other week. My first allocation of money from my earnings goes to Ron Paul. I’ve been doing this since he got into the campaign. As of this date, I’ve given him over $600. I hope more people are doing this, if they can afford it.

Scott - since you ask, I send him 100$ a couple of weeks ago. not much, but that all I can spare, really. also, he is the only politician that I ever gave money to in my entire life. I just saw that as a way of helping the country I am living in nowadays. frankly, I don’t agree with his internal politics, but civil rights and liberties on one hand, and external peace on the other is what I really care about.

Great Society and New Deal so loved by America’s Left and moderates
But that is the point: having a society which collectively looks after its weak, poor or sick people is something of the “left” only the the USA. In the rest of the world this is called “civilized” (along with not torturing, not executing, not giving life sentences over 30 years, having a real labor code, decent and rape-free jails, paid holidays, unions, war only in self-defense, respect of international law, etc. etc. etc.)
You guys have had the bad luck of living under the single most useless and evil government out there and FOR THE USA having no government at all would, alas, be a real improvement over the current situation. But rejecting all government on principle while hoping for a perfect society which will never happen (and which, of course, had never happened in the past) is not something which only the “Left” would reject.

Here is how I see this, for whatever this is worth coming from a “legal alien” who lived for a total of about 12 years in the USA:
The French have a very good expression: “les acquis sociaux” which can be loosely translated as “social achievements” or, better, “societal accomplishments”. It basically refers to something which, once it is achieved by a culture cannot be reversed. When French President Mitterrand abolished the death penalty in France in 1981 it was against the majority of the popular opinion. Still, when the conservatives came back to power they simply could not reverse this societal accomplishment. In the USA this simply did not work.
As Clemenceau famously said America is the only nation in history which miraculously has gone directly from barbarism to degeneration without the usual interval of civilization. Maybe the fact that it was born from a poly-genocide (all the Native American ethnicities) and slavery had something to do with this. Or maybe it was being cut-off from the rest of the civilized world. I don’t know.
I am NOT saying that the USA was not filled with highly educated and very civilized people - it was. But AS A SOCIETY basic civilizational progress taking place elsewhere simply did not take hold here. Technology did. Development did. Even education did (to some degree). But in a society of lynching, racism, constant violence and war there were very few “acquis sociaux” and, since Ronald Reagan, things in fact got WORSE: a societal REGRESSION occurred.
In fact, the glaring ABSENCE of “acquis sociaux” was then explained away by a ideology of individualism. For example, my mother in law sincerely thinks that having people without basic health care is an expression of “the pioneer spirit”. That kind of nonsense might feel good, but it only is effective as a psychotherapy, not as a basis for progress.
The Founding Fathers did, of course, very much value freedom and individualism (not to mention self-reliance). But they still aimed at having a STATE defined by a CONSTITUTION as the highest expression and guarantor of the will of the people. After all, no opponent of the state would write a constitution.
Hardline libertarians, I believe, do not share the core values of the Founding Fathers. They reject the state, any state on principle, whether in North Korea or Switzerland. That is, I believe, an abandonment of the core value of the Founding Fathers.
It is also a reaction against the useless, obnoxious, over-taxing, aggressive and outright evil state which the Neocons have gradually managed to create over the past years.
In a way, the US Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights are the most remarkable contribution to the world civilization made by the USA. These documents *almost* embody, I think, a type of purely American “acquis sociaux” and are immensely admired world wide. Still, even this is now being deconstructed by the Neocons. But since the US society as a whole does not oppose this deconstruction with demonstrations, riots, mass protests and acts of civil disobedience even these priceless documents cannot be considered as real “acquis sociaux”.
All the things which I enumerated in my previous post (taking care of the poor, weak, unemployed or sick, not torturing, not executing, not giving life sentences over 30 years, having a real labor code, decent and rape-free jails, paid holidays, unions, war only in self-defense, respect of international law, etc. etc. etc) are all “acquis sociaux” in the rest of the developed world. They are part of not only the societal, but also of the cultural fabric of society. They are not really questioned anymore.
In the US all these values are something alien, something seen as “communist” (not surprising in a society which believes that social=socialist), something for the “liberal Euro-trash”, for hippies or for weaklings which cannot take care of themselves.
In that sense, as in many others, living in the USA is like living on a different planet.
I am a guest here, and it is not my role to try to change this. I sent money to Ron Paul only because I believe that a US Republic based on the Constitution is better than a Fascist Empire based on the Neocon hate-filled ideology. I wish the USA well, but I would never want the US model imposed on any other country in the world (well, maybe besides North Korea).
My 2cts.

Oscar, please do not take expression of commiseration towards the American people as a “wisp of condescension”. My quarrel is not with the people of the USA, but with a society and culture which first and foremost deprives Americans from what are considered basic human rights on other developed countries. Now, if we are talking about the social system then I am in no way expression a “wisp of condescension” either. I am expressing an outright revulsion, a deep seated loathing of a society which suffers from an acute “compassion deficit disorder” towards its OWN people (nevermind the Iraqis or others oppressed abroad by this society).
Posters here are, I presume, mostly individualists and they should not, I presume, mistake a harsh criticism of a society as condescension towards them. In fact, I would presume that any libertarian would not care about any criticism of any government or society simply because he/she would not feel that it is directed at him/her. Right?
Is the USA a cartoonish nightmare? No, nothing cartoonish here, but it is definitely a nightmare. A nightmare for the poor, the sick, the unemployed, for those who love freedom, for those who care about justice, for those who care about education. etc. Look at all the wars of aggression this country has fought. Look at the insane drug laws, at the prison industrial complex, at the all powerful police forces, the 16 intelligence agencies, at the pollution levels, at illiteracy, at the corporate media, at the morons running for office, at the working poor, at the executions, etc. The USA is like the Borg in Star Trek: is cruises around the world and repeats “resistance is futile - you will all be incorporated”.
The USA has not always been like that, but ever since the Reagan years and then the official takeover by the Neocons the USA is not a nightmare, it is THE nightmare for the entire planet (including the American people).
Yes, people are people. But societies and culture at times seem to be taken over by a collective folly of evil, an orgy of iniquity. Russian did this, Germany did this, England, Spain and Portugal did this, as did China and many others. People are people even in Bosnia and Rwanda. But societies and cultures are different and the one being built today by the Neocon is amazingly evil. That is why I sent money to Ron Paul. Because he is, I am afraid, one of the last people (with Kucinich, Gravel and Nader probably) to stand up to the Neocons (and he is the most effective and capable of the lot for sure). But I really, really fear what will happen when the two factions of the business party (as Chomsky calls them) appoint Giuliani and Hillary as a “choice” for America. Then the nightmare will become far worse I am afraid.

…VS: I think it was former Chief Justice Oliver Wendall Holmes who once remarked that “…taxes are the price you pay for Civilization.” If so, we in the United States are surely being short changed.

…Yeah, you may as well. All I can say for myself is that after 56 years I have at best been in the periphery, and at worst, on the edge of existence for 35 of them now…The irony here is that, if anything, Msr. VS, you impress me as a Civilized, Progressive, if not erudite European Gentleman…Me, The Michigan Muddshark and a few others are amongst the true Calibans of this the Stress blog

V/S I’m sorry if I read that from you. Was feeling a little prickly, no offense intended to you either. Keep speaking free as you want, don’t let me throw any wet blankets on you. gotta run, thx.

Amen VS!

There’s no crowd I’d rather be locked up in a gulag with more than…you guys. Hell, the way things are going, maybe that’s what will happen…

There’s no crowd I’d rather be locked up in a gulag with more than…you guys. be careful what you wish for - you might get it one day…

I think those on the left make a big mistake when they believe that those of us who would prefer no government or as little government as possible think this would result in a perfect society. In fact, it would seem that those who advocate for a government solution for every societal ill are pushing the utopian fantasy.

The perfect society will arise only when all of mankind reaches perfection - and I’m not holding my breath on this happening - ever. The sad fact is that governments throughout history have served the elite and continue to do so - in America and Europe. The primary goal has always been to redistribute wealth upwards while throwing down just enough crumbs to prevent rioting in the streets.

Negative rights such as the “right” to health care exist only at the expense of the rights of others. As a self-employed working person of modest means, I am forced to pay for the health extravagance of the wealthy, the health insurance of the corporate and government worker, and the health care of the poor - all while being unable to afford health insurance for myself.

I would gladly accept the imperfection of no government over the murderous thievery and oppression of “liberal” government. And remember, there is no such thing as a free lunch. America and Europe are already facing financial insolvency. Future generations of Americans face about $65 Trillion in debt and unfunded liabilities. That’s a hell of a lot of “civilization” to impose on out grandchildren.

Yeah Tom, Let’s get rid of all government:You know, like they did in lovely
downtown Fallujah or Baghdad! You’d love it there.

vineyard;

“Civilized” healthcare, huh?

If deciding not to turn over my health care to an institution - the government - which has shown itself incompetent in handling just about everything it does is uncivilized, then I’ll stay uncivilized.

If deciding not to hand over yet another power with which the government could coerce me (Gosh, what do you think the government could do with the power to decide wether my loved ones get their medicine or not?) is uncivilized, then I’ll stay uncivilized.

If remembering that US government charity programs spend about 80% of the money they take in on overhead (i.e. sustaining and growing their bureaucracy) and finding that inefficient and stupid is uncivilized, then I’ll stay uncivilized.

If being uncomfortable enough with the idea of taking something from one American who earned it, by force of arms, and giving it to someone else to whom it does not belong, by government fiat, that I approach any proposal to do just that with extreme caution is uncivilized, then I’ll stay uncivilized.

If looking at the federal budget and how deep this government is in hock and figuring out that we can’t afford to keep giving away all the “free” shit we do now, much less giving away even more, is uncivilized, then I’ll stay uncivilized.

If being cautious in the extreme about the government finding yet another way to make itself “indespensible” to the masses is uncivilized, then I’ll stay uncivilized.

If a sneaking suspicion that socialized medicine is really another form of corporate welfare (After all, most Americans now get their health insurance from their job - if government pays for everybody’s health care instead, then the corporations don’t have to pick up that bill anymore, do they?) is uncivilized, then I’ll stay uncivilized.

If asking where in the Constitution of the United States a right to free doctor visits might be is uncivilized, then I’ll stay uncivilized.

but then…..wouldn’t man then be in a state of nature….and his life poor, basty, brutush, and short…..I think I got that quote right.

If you can tell me who I’m quoting (assuming I didn’t F it up) give yourself a gold star.

Vineyardsaker and Anthony Gregory are exempt.

Yeah Scott, that’s the problem in Iraq:Too much government!
Wonder why Gareth Porter never mentions that?

If deciding not to turn over my health care to an institution - the government
Your arguments runs into two problems:
1) nobody is suggesting that anyone should turn his health to the government - all agree that MD should handle that. The point is how to best FINANCE the costs of healthcare, not to somehow have the government take care of your health. (BTW - In all of Western Europe and Canada you can choose your doctor)
2) there is no need to guess anything here. There are basically three models from which to choose from
a) the US model. Totally dysfunctional, extremely expensive.
b) the rest of the developed world model. mostly functional. mostly affordable
c) some never yet seen utopian paradise model. Perfect in all respects except one: has only been seen in the dreams of utopians.
I pick option b. So does the rest of the civilized world.

The Marxists promised the perfect society under Communism. Hitler offered a 1000 years Reich. The capitalists have declared, via Francis Fukuyama, the “End of History”. The last, the VERY LAST THING the world needs is yet utopian delusion.
How about starting to things things that suck today, One step at a time. Rationally. NO?

If being uncomfortable enough with the idea of taking something from one American who earned it, by force of arms, and giving it to someone else to whom it does not belong,. That principle is called *social solidarity*. that there is a bond of mutual assistance between the folks in a village, a city, a region and a country. What the “me-myself-and-I” model expresses is, I believe, a very sad “compassion deficit disorder”. Oh. I know about all the good deeds of so many volunteers, donors, patrons, etc. And that is great. But being to be on the receiving end of such aid is always humiliating. Once you make that a social and human RIGHT there is no shame, not stigma in getting the help, not any more than getting insurance money after an accident. Unemployment or disability are paid for by society simply because each member of this society knows that my insuring others, if you will, he is also insuring himself. Lastly, no employer in Europe can ever threaten his employee with a “pink slip” which could cost him his health. The USA is the ONLY country in the world where slaves, instead of getting whipped, get their health insurance removed when they loose a job, and thus, like the slave, end up suffering in their flesh. How paradoxical that is for the “land of the free”. And slaves here are even conned into believing that their sad condition is an expression of some individualist “pioneer spirit”. Truly something immensely tragic and sad.
How can ANYONE be free when his health depends on the whims of his slavemaster?

>How can ANYONE be free when his health depends on the whims of his slavemaster?

And what is there about the government that precludes it from being a “slavemaster”?

Is it really a heartwarming example of “social solidarity” when it has to be enforced by guys with guns who will haul you off to jail if you don’t go along with it?

Also, I am not a slave. I have an agreement with my employer, voluntarily entered into on both our parts, and freely terminatable on either of our parts. What in any of that constitutes “slavery”?

Ask any real slave in, say, 1850 Alabama, wether he’d prefer a situation in which either party - himself or his “employer” - could voluntarily terminate their arrangement and walk away.

>Oh. I know about all the good deeds of so many volunteers, donors, patrons, etc. And that is great. But being to be on the receiving end of such aid is always humiliating. Once you make that a social and human RIGHT there is no shame, not stigma in getting the help, not any more than getting insurance money after an accident.

So, wait a second. You’re saying there is shame and humiliation in accepting the help of people who willingly and voluntarily offer aid of their own free will because of the compassion they feel for their fellow man, but there’s no shame or humiliation to be had in sending the government to shake people down and take their money by force so that it can be spent on you?

So it’s really the inclusion of government goons in this whole process that gives it its moral validity? Hmm.

I am of the Milton Friedman camp in that I do not believe that just because something needs to get done in life, that that means that government is the right choice as to who should be doing it. Government screws things up, does things horrendously expensively, and has no incentive to improve. And, of course, it gives government ever-more power. It’s like “my roof, my rules” when you’re a teenager - if the government is the one spending the money, it’s the one calling the shots.

The US model is not extremely dysfunctional. It has its problems, but so does every system. People die on waiting lists for treatment in Britain, Canadians cross the border to get care in the US, and roaches crawl on hospital walls in Cuba.

Oh, and as for “the rest of the developed world is doing it” - if the rest of the developed world jumped off a bridge, I wouldn’t. Peer pressure is a lousy reason to set national policy.

Scott;

I hope you don’t mean that you think Somalia was “doing fine” in the 1990s with the warlords. That would be a stretch. But if you mean that it was doing relatively well under the Islamic Courts Union, there I’ll agree with you. The ICU had legitimacy because it ruled under widely-accepted religious law, was more or less unbiased and non-corrupt, and brought order, which people desperately needed. But alas, it had “Islamic” in its name, which meant that under the Grand Neocon Crusade Against Islam, it had to go.

So we dumped a country full of people back into chaos and war. But of course, that’s if you see them as people at all - remember that they have the double-whammy against them of being both Muslims and “darkies”…

@SteveC: I think there is a distinction being lost here between HEALTH and HEALTHCARE COVERAGE Yes, absolutely. This is why having universal healthcare does not mean “handing over your health to the government”. However, ONCE THE HEALTHCARE COVERAGE IS GONE SO IS YOUR HEALTH as the removal of the former also results in a deterioration of the latter (unless you are a millionaire, of course, in which case you really do not need healthcare coverage at all).
@Slim:And what is there about the government that precludes it from being a “slavemaster”?
Stuff like laws, a constitution, international treaties and, above all, the capability of its people to impose its will upon their government. There are people out there who fear their government, there are also governments who fear their people. The latter is what we should strive for.
Is it really a heartwarming example of “social solidarity” when it has to be enforced by guys with guns who will haul you off to jail if you don’t go along with it?.
No, not at all. But that is not ALWAYS how government operates. Waco-like events are something are something for the Third World countries. Not only that it happened in the first place, but that the government got away with it. There are no Dutch, French or Swiss Wacos, and if there were, the governments would fall in the wake of the scandal and outrage.
Also, I am not a slave. I have an agreement with my employer, voluntarily entered into on both our parts, and freely terminatable on either of our parts. What in any of that constitutes “slavery”
It is slavery in the sense that when you go into your bosse’s office and have to talk to him you know that if you piss him off he can fire you and you, dude, will loose your health insurance as a result. Now, if you are young and health that’s cool. Or if you are a professional in high demand. But if you are a 45 year old secretary with diabetes or if you have a son with Asperger syndrome you are so totally fucked! Consider that in the latter case your slavemaster takes you son as a hostage and threatens to hurt him.
None of that is something a European ever risks. Ever. And any government which would try to make such as setup legal would be literally overthrown by strikes, demonstrations, an outraged media, etc. Face it pal: you are a slave.
You’re saying there is shame and humiliation in accepting the help of people who willingly and voluntarily offer aid of their own free will because of the compassion they feel for their fellow man, but there’s no shame or humiliation to be had in sending the government to shake people down and take their money by force so that it can be spent on you?
If the “shakedown” is the result of a democratic process and expresses the consensus of society than no. And if you believe that there ever was, or ever will, be a society without laws (and hence, mechanisms to enforce laws), you are more naive than my 6 year old.
The US model is not extremely dysfunctional.
Ok. you are not naive. You are both ignorant and delusional (no offense intended. that is just a fact). Go see “Sicko” for starters.
@Scott: A lesson here for the rest of you. Don’t bother arguing with a leftist
I am not sure whom you mean here, but if you see me as a Leftist because I support universal healthcare than be aware that what you are saying is “Don’t bother arguing with the rest of the developed world’. That is fine, and that is definitely your right. Just be aware that the chasm between the USA and the rest of the world is getting deeper and deeper.

vineyard;

>Go see “Sicko” for starters.

Sicko? You’ve gotta be kidding me. Michael Moore is full of shit. All of his documentaries are examples of manipulations and one-sidedness. And you can do that without actually lying, per se. What Sicko did was show all the best-case scanarios of one way of doing things, and all the worst-case scanarios of all the other ways of doing things. If I made a documentary in which I showed vignettes of the five richest people in Haiti and the five poorest people in Singapore, I could, without ever actually lying, create a picture that would convince someone who didn’t know any better that Haiti was a way better country in which to live than Singapore.

>Stuff like laws, a constitution, international treaties and, above all, the capability of its people to impose its will upon their government.

All of which has done just a dandy job up to now in preventing the US government from running roughshod over anybody it likes. If none of that stuff stopped Bush/Clinton/Bush, what makes you think it’ll stop the next Clinton, or anybody else?

>There are people out there who fear their government, there are also governments who fear their people. The latter is what we should strive for.

Right. And letting the government decide who does and does not get their medicine leaves…. who in charge?

>No, not at all. But that is not ALWAYS how government operates. Waco-like events are something are something for the Third World countries. Not only that it happened in the first place, but that the government got away with it. There are no Dutch, French or Swiss Wacos, and if there were, the governments would fall in the wake of the scandal and outrage.

No, in Europe it’s just suffocating socialist soft-fascism. For example, the Catholic Bishop who was just told that he cannot sack a renegade priest who taught things the Church does not believe because it would violate Swiss labor laws. Or the family in Germany who had their six children taken away because they wanted to homeschool instead of sending their kids to the government propaganda schools. But no, no Wacos.

>It is slavery in the sense that when you go into your bosse’s office and have to talk to him you know that if you piss him off he can fire you and you, dude, will loose your health insurance as a result.

Yes. Then I’ll get another job. Which in a free market is not that hard.

>Face it pal: you are a slave.

If you really think that, then you have no concept of what slavery is. In 1850 in Alabama, the average black dude picking cotton under the threat of a whipping would love to be able to do what I have the unquestioned and absolute right to do: Walk in and tell the boss that I quit.

That, not an unlimited claim on the money of people I’ve never met, is freedom.

>None of that is something a European ever risks. Ever. And any government which would try to make such as setup legal would be literally overthrown by strikes, demonstrations, an outraged media, etc.

Right. Because in Europe no one ever questions their inalienable moral right to other people’s money.

>If the “shakedown” is the result of a democratic process and expresses the consensus of society than no.

It was the result of a democratic process and expressed the consensus of society in 1800 that we should rip off the labor of black folks without remuneration and turn it into GDP via agricultural business. It was the result of a democratic process and expressed the consensus of society in 1870 that we should rip off the American Indians’ land and take it for more productive white folks. It was the redult of a democratic process and expressed the consensus of society that we invaded Iraq twice - both in 1991 and in 2003 - in an attempt to rip off their oil.

If any old ripoff is okay because 51% support it, there will be no end to the ripoffs practiced. As Catherine Austin Fitts noted, what most people in the great mass want from government is not freedom or democracy or any of that stuff - what most people want is their government check or freebie. People have zero knowledge of economics, and think that the government can create money out of thin air to give them their freebies (and all too often lately, they’re right). They don’t know, want to know, or care where the money comes from - all they know is that the politician who promises them the most government cheese must care about them more than the mean, stingy old Scrooge who tells them that we don’t have the money, that they have no moral claim on other people’s money, and that it’s their responsibility to take care of their own damn selves.

And that’s why the US is, if you really look at it, dead broke - because no one can or will stand up to the people and tell them that no, they can’t have that. Plato told us 2500 years ago that democracies inevitably collapse because people vote themselves so much of other people’s money that eventually the economy can’t function and you end up with a dictator. Man hasn’t been wrong yet.

in Europe it’s just suffocating socialist soft-fascism. ok. against this even the Gods stuggle in vain. I give up.

…Yeah, VS…Use your diplomatic skills. Curt’s right, they get crazy now and again. I knew a Libertarian welder who, when drunk, wanted to take his cutting torch to all the traffic signals in this part of Vegas. Yet when the Libertarian’s and their ideas are correct, they’re incontrovertible. If I’m of the Realist, Mearsheimer-Walt School of Foreign Policy? No matter… The Libertarians remain the, 3rd largest Political Party in The US and as such only viable alternative to the one party facade that is The American Political Calculus. Their pathological mistrust and hatred of the State is not entirely without justification. Probably their worst liability is that they seem willing to worry about tomorrow another time. There’s was an interesting, if ironic adage in Japan during their Militarist days that seems lacking in their persuasion. “After victory, one must fight even harder.”

test test

Cash, Grass, or Ass - No One Gets Healthcare For Free

Ideally, the organic order springing from a truly free market would be the best supplier of human needs for all.

However, currently, in the USA, people lose fingers and toes because their diabetes isn’t cared for properly.

Of course, this is partly because the agricultural surplus given to America’s poor is almost perfectly designed to make one as obese as possible in the shortest amount of time. The surplus is a giant subsidy to companies like ADM and Monsanto.

Wonder what would happen, if, first, giant farm subsidies are removed.

Still, being poor really sucks. You really are treated like shit when you’re poor, and after awhile you feel that way too.

It would be nice if the insurance cartel weren’t so heavily over-regulated such that choices for those wanting an affordable individual policy can’t really get one easily.

I don’t think that socialized medicine is the best solution. But, considering that America neither understands nor desires anything resembling a free market, it might be the most realistic one to supply people with what I consider to be a basic human need. It jus tmight be better than medical fascism, the current reality.

So replace it with medical totalitarianism? I don’t know. It seems like a great way to further erode basic individual rights when doctors are given larget amounts of political enforcement power.

Still, the poor and cast-aside people would get cared for. We’d pay for it, but the poor would live.

Bob, with all due respect, I’ve seen plenty of poor people rotting in the streets. They push around shopping carts, they piss and defecate outsde or in public transportation stations. They sleep in blankets. They talk to themselves.

Of course, such people also inhabit the enlightened and noble city of Paris, with its gleaming spires of social medicine….yeah true enough.

“Bob, with all due respect, I’ve seen plenty of poor people rotting in the streets. They push around shopping carts, they piss and defecate outsde or in public transportation stations. They sleep in blankets. ”

Go into the ghettoes Bob. The rotting poor are real.Most americans are simply ignorant and oblivious about them and that’s no accident.Also, there is far less rotting poor in Paris proportionately than in New York or L.A.

“…when a once independent and republican form of government is degenerating”

It’s never been as ideal as you make it out to be. Ask Jefferson’s slaves.

Hamilton said the purpose of government is to protect the opulent few from the majority.

>Go into the ghettoes Bob. The rotting poor are real.

Paul, yes there are poor people in the US but are you telling me that if they go to a hospital ER they don’t get medical care?

Vineyardsaker made the least sensible comments here, so the following is for him:

The slavery analogy was perversely stupid. Slaves got ‘free’ health care, lodging, food, clothes, et cetera. They just didn’t get paid and weren’t allowed to quit and leave these blessings behind. The modern worker may get some of these things for ‘free’ (in lieu of a portion of their paycheck of course) and is able to leave and look for a better deal. There’s no way to sanely insist the latter is slavery.

I liked the bit about “laws, a constitution, international treaties” being able to keep gangsters from committing crimes. Making crime illegal has never eliminated crime. This applies to the massive, perpetual crimes committed by the State too. Maybe you could explain to me exactly how the existence of habeas corpus and the Geneva Conventions prevented the American crime syndicate from violating habeas corpus and the Geneva Conventions?

And finally, the query about whether markets have ever worked anywhere: markets are just supply and demand. Bread gets baked, beer gets brewed, and opiates get produced because there are a sufficient number of people willing to spend money for those things. They will be done whether or not the local crime syndicate approves of it. So the answer is yes, markets have been tried and work everywhere and mobsters aren’t necessary for it to continue working.

cous cous,

from Slim,”The thing is, wether or not complete statelessness would be a good idea, it’s an impossibility. Sooner or later something would creep into that power vacuum and become a de facto state. It always has. Even in Somalia, where the official state collapsed, local gangs and warlords sprang up and became mini-states in the neighborhoods they ruled - collecting taxes, enforcing laws, establishing an army/police force, and making war. That’s the way it is and always will be. Nowhere ever has had complete statelessness, nor will it.

Beyond that, yes, having a state presents a lot of problems. But statelessness would present problems too. Private armies, police forces, and courts inevitably owe their primary loyalty to whoever’s paying them, and very little loyalty to whoever isn’t paying them. So whoever can hire the biggest and baddest police force gets the most justice. And why should I recognize the legitimacy of your private court over me?

Something has to be done about rapists and car thieves, who will always exist. If your answer is “Everybody carry a gun”, then what happens when the bad guys form gangs - ten guys with guns who want your wallet, your car, or your daughter versus little old you? Do the victims and the criminals have an arms race to see who can form the biggest, baddest gangs?

Paul - you are wasting your efforts here: neither facts nor logic will ever impact these guys. As with any person in deep denial only lots of pain will wake them up and, courtesy of the combination of the US health care system (or rather, the lack thereof) and the “pioneer spirit” ideology, there is plenty of pain heading their way. As they say in AA: let go and let God

Okay VS, I’m done!

Yeah VS, there’s much about AmeriKa and ‘merkans (as Bushie says) that is barbaric. And the biggest, baddest barbarian on the block is our government. Just ask all the people it kills and tortures. More government control of healthcare in this country will not result in better healthcare because our government is rotten to the core. My guess is that if the Dems win in 08 we will see some variation of Hillary Care implemented. Regardless of who wins we will see more government control of healthcare in this country, and I can guarantee you healthcare will not get better for the poor or even the middle class.

…SteveC, wasn’t James Ellroy’s mother the victim of a grisly sex murder in Los Angeles? Back in the mid 50’s?

Paul;

Funny, it looks to me like India is doing very well at getting its shit together and pulling itself up by its bootstraps. India and China seem to be the rising stars of the 21st century. And both (but especially China) seem to have started on that path by deciding to get government the hell out of the way and let business do its thing.

Every attempt to make a country prosperous by government fiat has been an unmitigated disaster - thus the failure of communism. It is only by “getting its shit together and pulling itself up by its bootstraps” that any individual, any community, any group, or any nation ever went from poverty to prosperity. Sorry, that may be cruel, but sometimes they call them the “cold, hard” facts for a reason.

Cous Cous;

Laws do prevent crime. They just don’t prevent all crime. There will always, for example, be a certain number of rapes committed in the world, no matter what anti-rape laws are around. But having no consequences for rape whatsoever will of course result in more rapes. Consequence-free environments inevitably end up breeding more of whatever behavior there is no consequence for. That is precisely the reason why lifetime unlimited welfare is a bad idea - it creates a consequence-free environment for the shiftless, for the loafer, for the cadger.

Not every “criminal” in this country is some poor schmoe who’s in jail for smoking a joint in his dorm room. There are people in this world who are predators. Real bad, violent, sadistic, twisted people who assume a right to victimize anybody they like. Not that many, by percentage, but it’s naive in the extreme to pretend that they don’t exist. Are we to live in a world where there are no consequences to the predatory actions of such people? As the old saying goes, “Mercy to the wolf is cruelty to the sheep”. Again, those are the cold, hard facts.

On the other hand, Paul and vineyard:

If more big government, more welfare, and more regulations make a country more “civilized”, why is it that in the 19th and early 20th century, when America had far smaller government, almost no welfare, and few government regulations, violent crime was a fraction of what it is now? In the early 1950s, before the Great Society, Medicare, Medicaid, WIC, Affirmative Action, Brown vs. Board of Education, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and innumerable gun control laws, Los Angeles averaged about 70 murders a year. Now it averages more than 90 murders a month.

I don’t have compassion deficit disorder. I just - and please, again, try to follow this - don’t think that just because something needs to get done in the world, that government is the best choice as to who should do it. Though I don’t have a lot of (or even a little) extra money to spare, there’s a little girl in the Philippines who lives in a tarpaper shack to whom I send money through a charity, who gets to go to school and see a doctor because I do that. I didn’t need any government compulsion to do it. I did it because I thought that Jesus Christ would want me to. If you feel like people in this country don’t have enough medical care, then get off your ass and organize a charity to get them some, or go work for one that already exists - I’m sure your church probably has something along those lines. Do that instead of pointing an accusing finger at me and telling me what a barbarian I am because I’m suspicious of giving more money and power to a government that has proven time and time again that it can’t be trusted with the money and power it already has, let alone huge additional amounts of it.

Laws and punishments don’t prevent crime. The overwhelming majority of people don’t commit violent crime and the ones who do obviously aren’t deterred by laws prohibiting crime, or draconian punishments for said crimes.

A law isn’t necessary to defend yourself from a private criminal; nor is a law necessary to hire someone to provide additional security for you. Ironically, it is illegal to defend yourself against crime committed by the State, which is the one entity guaranteed to aggress against you.

…East St.Louis!?!—Jesus Christ Slim! Man, that’s worse than Watts-South Central LA!—and it’s a fuckin’ War Zone!

Cous Cous;

The thing is, sometimes people don’t act in their own self-interest. Some people smoke crack, even though it ends up with them living in the gutter. Some people gamble their life savings away. Some people join gangs, which ends up in unhappy lives full of jail time and violence.

What precisely was self-interested or logical about what Jeff Dahmer or BTK did?

There’s a definition of “utopian” which I like which is: “Any scheme which requires a basic and universal change in human nature in order to work right”. Communism required exactly that, which is why it failed. Communism required a “New Man”, who would work as hard for the interests of others as he would for his own interests - something which will never happen. Anarchism, too, requires a “New Man”. It requires everybody in the world to be logical, which will never happen, to not be petty or greedy, which will never happen, to not be self-destructive, which will never happen, and to respect everybody else’s property as much as they respect their own, which will never happen.

As for how much better things will be once we have private security agencies and courts: So let me get this straight - you think it’ll be paradisical once we get rid of the police and replace them with armed versions of mall security guards? You can’t wait for the freedom of having your city patrolled by Blackwater USA?

And here’s the thing: With competing laws, law enforcement, and courts, who gets to say who should be arrested and tried for what? What if my courts hold that it’s okay for a white man to kill a black man because whites are the master race, or that it’s okay for a black man to rape a white woman as compensation for 400 years of oppression? Then if a white man kills a black man, to whom do the black man’s family turn? To their cops and their courts? Then surely the white man will turn to his cops and courts for protection. And what will we have then? A gang war between your cops and my cops?

If I’m a petty thief in Baltimore and I lift a Muslim’s wallet, what inducement is there for me to appear before his courts to get my hand chopped off for stealing? In my tradition of law, petty theft is punishable by a short stretch in a local jail and a fine, and his punishment is unbelievably draconian. Whose tradition of just punishment should hold?

What if my neighbor, with whom I’ve had longstanding trouble, decides to accuse me of stealing from his property? What if the “cops” he sends are his no-goodnik bruiser cousins? What if the judge is himself? What if he decides that in his court, I’m guilty until proven innocent? What if he decides that the punishment is confiscation of my house and my bank account, and the right to deflower my 16-year-old daughter? What then? Again, a gang war between my “cops” and his? What if he’s rich, and can afford a big gang, and I’m not, and can’t? “Sorry, honey, just lay back and enjoy it”?

Justice only works where there is a universal law that applies equally to all, is recognized by all, is universally respected, is administered by impartial courts, and where there’s a standard of punishment that’s universally recognized. But the idea that that can or will exist in a voluntary system arrived at by individual personal opinion is nonsense. And it simply won’t and can’t exist when everybody has their own private cops, courts, and laws.

Sorry, but utopian fantasies just don’t work.