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Tom & Rabbit: At the risk of sounding snarky, I'm fairly confident I could have predicted your answers here. This really isn't meant as a slight, just an observation. To be honest, I'm not terribly interested in turning this into a debate on fundamental principles.
I am, however, curious where Rakeesh falls on these questions, because I genuinely don't feel that I can reliably guess his answer.
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I suppose that it could also depend on what one means by "the deck is stacked." Do you simply mean that rich people have significant advantages that poorer people lack? I'll certainly agree to that.
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Not just advantages, they've always had advantages, but advantages that extend to a degree that is far beyond what has traditionally been the case.
There's nothing within the normal spectrum of events that leads me to believe this trend of the rich getting richer, and everybody else going nowhere while expenses continue to rise will stop. If that is the case, what outcome is left to us? The awful prospect of social upheaval, administered with all the delicate care of an elephant having a seizure in a china shop.
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Right. Orincoro, don't you usually object when people put words in your mouth? Couldn't you do me the basic courtesy of not inflicting on me what you would hate to be inflicted on you? I know I'm an evil conservative/libertarian but I'm trying pretty hard to discuss in good faith here and not just snipe.
I was specifically asking Rakeesh to clarify something because I honestly don't understand what his opinion of it is, and I know he tends to be a bit more of a moderate/centrist so I was genuinely curious.
Tom's not a moderate. I don't think he'll be insulted by my asserting that... at least I hope not, since I don't find it insulting myself. I'm not a moderate. But as I said, I wasn't really interested in having the debate that will inevitably occur if Tom and I discuss that. I don't think it would be very productive and I just don't have the energy right now. I was just curious what exactly Rakeesh meant, and where he falls on this issue.
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No, I typically object when people misread me to the point of not demonstrating even a superficial understanding of what I am saying. I put words in people's mouths all the time- people often complain about it. Perhaps that's what you're thinking of.
quote: I know I'm an evil conservative/libertarian but I'm trying pretty hard to discuss in good faith here and not just snipe.
Oh, I see. You're a victim. So, you lost already. Now we should take pity on you. Your ideas and your advocacy for those ideas are not strong enough- *cannot* be strong enough to justify you even sharing them. How can we have a good faith conversation if this passive aggression is your actual starting point? "A jeez, these guys are mean and they'll never believe I'm being honest and not just a hack conservative know-nothing..." This conversation is bound to turn out well.
And you wonder why you don't get taken seriously- maybe you shouldn't spend so much of your time worrying about how you are perceived.
I don't find conservatives to be evil. I find the conservative movement to be, primarily, stupid. I am very consistent on that point. Stupidity is the prime mover in my conception of conservatives.
quote: Tom's not a moderate.
Well, you have never had a serious conversation with an extreme liberal, if that's what you think. Of course, Tom is pretty typical for an American liberal... which is to say "moderate."
There are one or two "extreme" liberals on this board. You notice they get the piss taken as much or often more than you do.
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I wasn't asking for pity, man. I was just asking for you to not be such a jerk. My mistake.
It's amazing to me that you view a desire to keep the conversation civil as some sort of weakness or passive aggression.
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D_F, No, I view *your mode of expressing that desire,* and not the desire itself, per se, as a sign of weakness and passive aggression. Your approach indicates to me that you don't want civility as much as you want to be treated nicely, and so will pretend to treat others nicely with false self-deprecation, "I don't mean to sound snarky, but here's a little snark I want to display..."
quote: I was just asking for you to not be such a jerk. My mistake.
Your mistake indeed. Since you didn't ask that- you merely made the implication... passive aggressively .
But I digest. Yes, I think it's lame to shut people down with some remark about how predictable they are, couched in a semi-respectful backhanded "just saying," line.
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quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: D_F, No, I view *your mode of expressing that desire,* and not the desire itself, per se, as a sign of weakness and passive aggression. Your approach indicates to me that you don't want civility as much as you want to be treated nicely, and so will pretend to treat others nicely with false self-deprecation, "I don't mean to sound snarky, but here's a little snark I want to display..."
I'm perfectly happy not being civil, actually. When the context calls for it. But my impression of Hatrack as a community is that civility and niceness is valued fairly highly. Just trying to play ball. You got me, though. Despite my efforts, I certainly was a bit snarky.
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro:
quote: I was just asking for you to not be such a jerk. My mistake.
Your mistake indeed. Since you didn't ask that- you merely made the implication... passive aggressively
Did I now? Too difficult to scroll up a few inches, or what? I asked you to do me "basic courtesy," that seems pretty explicit. My error wasn't in being passive aggressive, it was in mistakenly thinking you were the one who dislikes it when people misrepresent him.
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: But I digest. Yes, I think it's lame to shut people down with some remark about how predictable they are, couched in a semi-respectful backhanded "just saying," line.
That's actually fair. It was lame. I still think I had legitimate reasons, but you're right, what I said was very "Just saying!" Why couldn't you have just said this to begin with, instead of being such a prick? Anyway, sorry Tom, Rabbit.
PS: I hope your digesting goes well. I would recommend help but most of the results look sort of woo-woo "alternative"-y, so... good luck.
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I am a "firm" believer in dried psillium seed husks. Pass on the word- and we can really get this party... moving.
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FoolishTook, others have addressed this, but your memories notwithstanding, Republicans are *dramatically* more obstructionist now than Democrats have ever been in the past.
----
Geraine, you shifted the discussion. The *reauthorization* of the PA was a very different animal than the initial PA. Even the rejection of Democratic 'obstructionism' is worded strangely. Fundamental (valid, in retrospect) concerns about civil liberties are 'inexcusable'. Today, Republican leaders have admitted to obstructing anything the Democrats would like to achieve as much as they can, strictly to weaken them in the next election. That's a *very* different thing than a party having fundamental concerns about the rights of American citizens (and, further evidence of the glaring contradiction in the GOP) the *power of government*. That is supposed to be what *Republicans* are concerned about, while Democrats want to expand the government at the expense of the people to protect them.
As for your vote, I was never in doubt that you'd vote for who you felt would do the best job. I was pretty sure but not certain that list would include some of the names you mentioned as off. But, and this isn't a zinger just an observation, I am *also* not surprised to learn that you don't really feel Republicans are behaving in an unusually bad way. I'm not surprised because it explains your unconcern with rewarding Congressional Republicans-why shouldn't they be rewarded? When it comes to bad stuff, they're the same.
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Dan, I feel that when the rich in a population continue to get *proportionally* richer, and the rest either stagnate or get poorer (and really, it's 'get poorer', the supply being limited and the subject relative), then yes, it's a bad thing. To an extent it's unavoidable. Wealth confers advantages. Wealth *at birth* confers *enormous* advantages, as striking as does poverty. Those advantages will, naturally, seek to perpetuate themselves. That's why harmful monopolies form if we just leave the system alone. That's why aristocracies are bound to exist, under whatever name, if permitted to grow unrestricted.
The deck cannot be stacked fairly *at all*. It's a contradiction in terms. But I'll tell you what's real unfair stacking: being born in a high crime neighborhood with failure factory schools where drug dealers work corners and jobs with healthcare are few and far between, because employers keep workers right below full time. That kid, if he wants to be President, or a CEO, he's gotta be a goddamned hero of effort. The kid born with wealth, healthcare, connections, guaranteed education, freedom from the fear of crime, how hard does *he* have to work to achieve the same result?
In America, an individual can be what he wants to be. Depending on the circumstances of his birth, though, he has to want it some, a bit, or want it like a forest fire. That's the kind of thing I mean by unfair stacking. 'Land of opportunity' is a *goal*, not an entire reality.
As for how I mean that beyond 'the rich have advantages the poor don't, here's a simple example: the rich get vastly more benefit from the social structure overall than the poor. If your kids live in an affluent neighborhood, the cops will be working, effectively in many cases, to ensure they never even *see* a violent teenager in their school. If they live in a poor neighborhood that's home to a government run failure factory school, the cops may be so overworked they must settle for being satisfied the violent teenagers haven't shot anyone that month. Or week.
I suspect I'm actually much closer, politically, to 'extreme liberal' than you think, Dan. I don't tend to read nearly as much malice or stupidity into conservatives as, say, Orincoro or Tom do, though. But I don't consider myself a moderate.
(And, sheesh Orincoro, must you be so consistently hostile? I get just as frustrated as you do by the type of behavior you're describing, but you seem to trigger and see that behavior *much* sooner than I do. I think it's nonsense, a cynical political ploy, these notions that there's equivalence in bad behavior between the parties, as well as the insistence that because an individual *can* achieve whatever he likes, theoretically, the job is done. But I don't see how you mean to even discuss the topic, much less change someone's mind or learn what they think, if you arrive on the scene already knowing what they think.)
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: I suspect I'm actually much closer, politically, to 'extreme liberal' than you think, Dan. I don't tend to read nearly as much malice or stupidity into conservatives as, say, Orincoro or Tom do, though. But I don't consider myself a moderate.
That's fair, my assumptions must have been off-base. And I really appreciate your answers to my questions. That's exactly what I was looking for.
... I feel like it's worth mentioning, that I never called anyone "extreme." I've seen too many people in real life that put you or Lyrhawn or Orincoro or Samp or Tom to utter shame on the extremity meter. All I said was that I doubt Tom would identify himself as a centrist/moderate any more than I would (or, apparently, any more than you would!) And as I said before, I don't think that's a bad thing.
Frankly, it annoys the hell out of me when someone who is obviously a staunch liberal/conservative tries to self-identify as a moderate. I think it's an unsubtle attempt to radicalize anyone on the other side of the field from them.
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quote:There are one or two "extreme" liberals on this board.
Oh oh! Am I one?
I wouldn't say so... would you?
I think when you balance my political beliefs, I tend to come out fairly moderate. But I think a lot of my liberal views are very liberal...they're just moderated by a few conservative views I hold that attenuate my liberal tendencies.
It's a tricky, if somewhat useless distinction I suppose.
Edit to add: After reading Dan's post on self-identified moderates, I think you have to ask how people who don't fall 100% of the time on one side can label themselves. I'm a social liberal on 99% of the issues, except for abortion, which I have a somewhat complicated view on. And I'm both liberal and conservative on a few other issues as well.
On the whole, I lean way to the left. But do I call myself a liberal just like that, when I believe a few things that would probably get me kicked out of most diehard liberal coffee klatsches? Or do I average them all together and call myself a sort of left leaning moderate? This is why I hate labeling really, because simplicity suggests one answer, but the assumptions that come with it demand a more nuanced approach.
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quote:There are one or two "extreme" liberals on this board.
Oh oh! Am I one?
I wouldn't say so... would you?
I think when you balance my political beliefs, I tend to come out fairly moderate. But I think a lot of my liberal views are very liberal...they're just moderated by a few conservative views I hold that attenuate my liberal tendencies.
It's a tricky, if somewhat useless distinction I suppose.
Heh, if I'm understanding you right, by that criteria I'm totally moderate. Of course, so is every libertarian. And, honestly, if there's one party I don't think should ever get to call themselves "moderate," its the libertarians.
Edit after Lyrhawn's Edit: Good point. Even calling myself a libertarian is really misleading, as I diverge on some significant areas.
Labels are sticky, and I mean that in multiple ways.
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Obviously, I'm deluded. *Sigh*
I suppose that it could also depend on what one means by "the deck is stacked." Do you simply mean that rich people have significant advantages that poorer people lack? I'll certainly agree to that.
What I mean by the deck being stack is that there is a positive feed back loop. If you are poor, you can only make money by working. If you are rich, you can also make money by investing that money, and not just in the stock market. You can invest that money to get a prestigious education. You can invest that money to buy tools and equipment you can use to make more money. You can spend that money at clubs and other places that buy you friends in influencial places. You can invest that money by campaigning for policies that will benefit you. You can invest that money paying people to do mundane life chores so you have more time for pursuits with a bigger pay back. If you have excess, you can make high risk investments with the potential for a big pay out without fearing that you'll be homeless and destitute if you loose. I can't imagine you disagree with any of those things. They aren't controversial.
But what that all boils down to is that the more money you have, the easier it becomes to make more money and gain more power and influence. Its an exponential process that is fundamentally unstable. Once you understand the math, the idea that the free market could produce a stable self regulating system is flat out ridiculous. Markets are fundamentally unstable without external regulation.
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quote:I suppose that it could also depend on what one means by "the deck is stacked." Do you simply mean that rich people have significant advantages that poorer people lack? I'll certainly agree to that.
I mean that criminal law is written to favor the rich and ignore the crimes the rich most often commit, the tax code is written to favor the mechanisms by which the rich expand their wealth, our culture forgives behavior in the rich which it will not tolerate from anyone else, and our society is one in which almost all figures of influence are either rich themselves or forced to grovel to the rich for their approval and funding.
quote:Tom's not a moderate. I don't think he'll be insulted by my asserting that...
I am very much a moderate, actually. I am, however, anti-authoritarian, which makes me appear to strongly oppose both the corporate wing of the Republican Party and, well, the rest of the Republican Party. But being opposed to pretty much every part of the Republican Party doesn't necessarily make me a liberal. Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Frankly, it annoys the hell out of me when someone who is obviously a staunch liberal/conservative tries to self-identify as a moderate. I think it's an unsubtle attempt to radicalize anyone on the other side of the field from them.
Well, in Canada the Liberal party *is* either centre right or centre left depending on leader. There are two parties on the left with parliamentary seats, Green and NDP, the latter of which is the current opposition and one party on the right, the governing Conservatives.
So, it's all a matter of perspective. (If you toss in Chinese political beliefs, it gets even weirder)
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I am to the left of most of the folks here and, compared to most of the developed world, I am not very far left at all.
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Compared to the rest of the developed world, I'm probably dead in the middle, possibly even right. Most left-wingers in america are first uncomfortable with the idea ('me? right wing? but?') but then you just have to point out what that means in terms of how comparatively out there the American right-wing is, and how artificial our political debates seem to the rest of the modern world.
Most people who live out of the U.S. in developed nations tend to see it this way: our left wing is comparable to their right wing (liberals), our right wing is ... well, when they put it frankly, most just say that they're glad it's not something analogous to any party in their nation outside of the absolute fringe.
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quote:You got me, though. Despite my efforts, I certainly was a bit snarky.
Depending on who you're talking to, I've come to sense you can't really help yourself!
Hello pot, my name is kettle! (I am secretly suspicious, since it seems so very strange that *you* would criticize someone for being constantly snarky, that you were joking.)
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: I mean that criminal law is written to favor the rich and ignore the crimes the rich most often commit, the tax code is written to favor the mechanisms by which the rich expand their wealth, our culture forgives behavior in the rich which it will not tolerate from anyone else, and our society is one in which almost all figures of influence are either rich themselves or forced to grovel to the rich for their approval and funding.
Which reminds me of this highly appropriate Calypso. . In case you can't catch the lyrics, you can read them here.Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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For another example as to the deck stacking question, Dan: if you're an accessory to a bank robbery gone bad which ends in a murder, you're looking at decades in jail or perhaps sometimes even the death penalty.
If you ruin the finances of tens of thousands of lives, you're likely looking at less prison time in a less awful prison, always assuming you're caught in the first place. Stealing: it's better to do it when you're rich. Not just because you'll have (much) better legal representation, but because the penalties will be less.
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Blayne Bradley
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quote: Frankly, it annoys the hell out of me when someone who is obviously a staunch liberal/conservative tries to self-identify as a moderate. I think it's an unsubtle attempt to radicalize anyone on the other side of the field from them.
If its any consolation I self identify as Far Left.
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I self identify as "slightly to the left of Karl Marx" so its kind of shocking to me when I'm in Europe and I find myself aligned with moderates.
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: For another example as to the deck stacking question, Dan: if you're an accessory to a bank robbery gone bad which ends in a murder, you're looking at decades in jail or perhaps sometimes even the death penalty.
If you ruin the finances of tens of thousands of lives, you're likely looking at less prison time in a less awful prison, always assuming you're caught in the first place. Stealing: it's better to do it when you're rich. Not just because you'll have (much) better legal representation, but because the penalties will be less.
Not to mention better lawyers and the ability to make bail. The wealthy have more access to justice. Or the clout to avoid it. (Rod Blagojevich is still not in jail.)
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Sure. Some of that is simply unavoidable, though: the wealthy will have more access to services and privileges than people who aren't wealthy. That's simply a given, and it always will be probably forever, unless there's some fundamental change-so deep it's not really imaginable-in humanity.
But my point was that, aside from better legal counsel, bail, etc., that even if the book were thrown at someone and it hit `em, if you're rich and steal millions from thousands, you're likely to face an equal or lesser penalty-and I mean this in the sense of actual laws in place, not just lawyer's tricks-than if you're poor and steal thousands from a couple.
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Rakeesh, that's a great example of a way that the deck is legitimately stacked in favor of rich people, and I agree that it shouldn't be that way. Realistically, wealthy people have access to more resources, so they have an advantage there and I'm not willing to say I think simply having better resources is an injustice we need to correct. Resources come in many shapes and sizes beyond just wealth.
But you're absolutely right that the penalties for crimes are all over the map, and skewed against crimes more likely to be committed by the poor. (As an aside, I think people are assuming I don't think the deck is stacked against poor people, and I'm not really saying that. I actually really liked what you said about a person's background vs. how much they have to want to achieve something. I think that was very well put)
Tom: How do you reconcile being anti-authoritarian with the authoritarian nature of government? Unless I'm once again making assumptions... For the purposes of the above question I am assuming that you support government force to reign in the wealthy and help the poor. If I'm off base, let me know.
Also, re: political labels, Samp I think saying that "I'm a moderate in Europe therefore I'm a moderate" is sort of disingenuous. I mean, I'm a classical liberal in the tradition of Mises and Popper. Yet in today's climate, where I live, I'm undeniably a "conservative." I think the primary function of these labels is as shorthand for the people around us, so as long as you're communicating with mostly Americans, seems like it makes sense to use the labels as they are commonly understood in America. No?
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quote:Also, re: political labels, Samp I think saying that "I'm a moderate in Europe therefore I'm a moderate" is sort of disingenuous.
I said that compared to the rest of the developed world I am dead in the middle. This is an expressly international observation independent of why I would consider myself a moderate in american politics specifically, and not an argument that 'therefore I'm a moderate.'
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Dan, No. I think that Americans in general need to be reminded of the context in which they are considered liberal or conservative. We live in a fairly conservative bubble and it behooves us to be aware of that.
quote:How do you reconcile being anti-authoritarian with the authoritarian nature of government?
As long as the little people are empowered through participatory democracy, I don't think this is as much of a problem. That's why it's so important to make sure that we aren't just propping up oligarchs. Right now, someone can trade money for influence, and we haven't as a society come up with good ways to prevent this that don't infringe on their freedom to spend their money they way they want, or to engage in speech they consider important. We've drawn some arbitrary lines in the past -- "you can pay THIS much money to engage in this specific sort of speech, but no more" -- but I don't think anyone would argue that these lines made much sense or resolved the problem; the Supreme Court, noting the logical inconsistency, removed the lines a little while ago, and we're discovering that, yes, they were preventing some problems. So I think we need, as a society, to figure out which freedoms we're willing to impinge upon -- and whose -- in order to maximize the total liberty of our community. It's all well and good to stand on principle, but we'd all still think badly of a pacifist who merely watched while someone strangled a child an arm's length away.
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: ... as long as you're communicating with mostly Americans, seems like it makes sense to use the labels as they are commonly understood in America. No?
Not necessarily. For example, one doesn't necessarily switch to imperial units from metric units when talking to Americans for example.
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quote:Rakeesh, that's a great example of a way that the deck is legitimately stacked in favor of rich people, and I agree that it shouldn't be that way. Realistically, wealthy people have access to more resources, so they have an advantage there and I'm not willing to say I think simply having better resources is an injustice we need to correct. Resources come in many shapes and sizes beyond just wealth.
Nor am I. But, for example, equal amounts of money being stolen and then being punished differently? That's an injustice. Then comes the question of how just is the justice system if the poor are disadvantaged from the get-go? (This is a given, in fact-the poor are disadvantaged from the get-go. The question is what to do about it.)
quote:But you're absolutely right that the penalties for crimes are all over the map, and skewed against crimes more likely to be committed by the poor. (As an aside, I think people are assuming I don't think the deck is stacked against poor people, and I'm not really saying that. I actually really liked what you said about a person's background vs. how much they have to want to achieve something. I think that was very well put)
Thank you. I didn't think you were saying the deck wasn't stacked, but I wasn't sure. As for penalties, it's not really that they're all over the map. It's that there's multiple maps covering the same (supposedly) landscape. It's like a contour map or something. And again, that's just for crime-doesn't even touch on other things.
quote:Tom: How do you reconcile being anti-authoritarian with the authoritarian nature of government? Unless I'm once again making assumptions... For the purposes of the above question I am assuming that you support government force to reign in the wealthy and help the poor. If I'm off base, let me know.
Well, so do you-support government force to reign in the wealthy and help the poor (be less poor in the long-run). Everyone supports that, even the most reactionary of Tea Partiers. To an extent. These notions that're often heard of, that conservatives are 'against big government' or 'don't like to use government authority as force', etc., are simply bull@#it. I don't say it's intentional BS, but the fact remains that everyone supports using the government as a forceful tool and that use is only outrageous when the force is applied in opposing directions. Another of those little contradictions I was talking about among conservatives.
Basically, unless the wealthy are 'reigned in', they will over time inevitably get even more wealthy and in a society of limited resources that means that other people will get poorer-a lot of people. I don't think anyone can really argue that's incorrect-something must be done. The question is what, of course.
And as for the notion of 'reigning in' the wealthy...wealth is never, ever entirely self-generated in a human society. Hell, you can't be wealthy as an individual-you're only wealthy as a member of a civilization. Hermits aren't wealthy-they might have their necessities fully and tastily covered, but that's not the same thing. As a society, we give and protect the opportunity for people to make it big. Really big. They didn't do it on their own, and I don't think their obligation ends when they pay the minimum possible to maintain the infrastructure. Everybody else who doesn't make it big also pays to maintain the infrastructure, which has whether through circumstances of birth, personal success, or both aided the one who made it big more than everyone else. From these people, more is required because more has been gained.
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Blayne Bradley
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When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist.
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quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist.
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