330 replies to this topic

[rwac]

o What major provisions in the Bill are socialistic?
o What is your definition of socialism

http://www.healthreform.gov/reports/keyprovisions.html

Thing is, the major socialist provision of the bill only goes into effect in 2014.
It's the one where insurers are prohibited from denying coverage based on pre-existing
conditions.

This will lead to insurance prices going sky high, insurers going out of business, and the government will be forced to step in.

[bobdrake12]

Thing is, the major socialist provision of the bill only goes into effect in 2014.
It's the one where insurers are prohibited from denying coverage based on <em>pre</em>-<em>existing</em>
conditions.

This will lead to insurance prices going sky high, insurers going out of business, and the government will be forced to step in.

Thanks, rwac!

I presume you mean this one:

Insurers cannot impose any coverage restrictions on pre‐existing conditions (guaranteed issue/renewability)

I understand the the insurance companies found a loophole in the law. The renewability will stand but the guaranteed issue is where the loophole supposedly is.

How about this proivision?:

Requires plans to cover, at no charge, most preventive care (plan years beginning 9/23/10)

The reason why I want insurance is to cover catostrophic conditions. For example, my auto insurance does not cover my gas and oil costs nor would I want it to.

I prefer option of having a policy that requires me to pay out of pocket for normal maintenance care.

This provision is likely to result in higher premiums because of the cost all the paperwork involved in processing these small claims and the opportunity for some to abuse the system because it's "free".

In any event, if someone wants a policy with free health maintenance care, that is fine with me. My issue is that I am being forced into a policy that doesn't suit my needs.

Edited by bobdrake12, 10 April 2010 - 02:57 PM.

[Alex Libman]

Can you provide just one example of a specific provision in the current legislation that "involve(s) the government doing anything except gradually fragmenting and privatizing itself out of existence."

Every sentence of it:

http://www.gpo.gov/f...111hr3590PP.htm

[RighteousReason]

Thing is, the major socialist provision of the bill only goes into effect in 2014.
It's the one where insurers are prohibited from denying coverage based on <em>pre</em>-<em>existing</em>
conditions.

This will lead to insurance prices going sky high, insurers going out of business, and the government will be forced to step in.

Thanks, rwac!

I presume you mean this one:

Insurers cannot impose any coverage restrictions on pre‐existing conditions (guaranteed issue/renewability)

I understand the the insurance companies found a loophole in the law. The renewability will stand but the guaranteed issue is where the loophole supposedly is.

How about this proivision?:

Requires plans to cover, at no charge, most preventive care (plan years beginning 9/23/10)

The reason why I want insurance is to cover catostrophic conditions. For example, my auto insurance does not cover my gas and oil costs nor would I want it to.

I prefer option of having a policy that requires me to pay out of pocket for normal maintenance care.

This provision is likely to result in higher premiums because of the cost all the paperwork involved in processing these small claims and the opportunity for some to abuse the system because it's "free".

In any event, if someone wants a policy with free health maintenance care, that is fine with me. My issue is that I am being forced into a policy that doesn't suit my needs.

Forcing health insurers to cover pre-existing conditions is like signing up for car insurance after you wreck your car and then forcing the car insurance to pay for it.

Insurance is betting against unexpected, catastrophic expenses. A payment plan is nothing like insurance. And what they are forcefully creating isn't even sustainable as a legitimate payment plan.

This bill is a major step (following many smaller ones before it) to destroying the entire free market health industry on a national scale, in order to eventually achieve their publicly stated goal of creating a tyrannical single payer (government) health system-

OBAMA: I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program.

-where the government panels and committees and bureaucrats will dictate who is allowed to get what, by whatever rules they make up (remember there are no rules ... we make them up as we go along ), and how the seized resources that are in limited supply will be rationed among the ruled peoples who have an unlimited need.

or as Jefferson would say:

when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism

or as Alexander Tyler would say:

A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.

or as Cloward and Piven would say:

the "Cloward-Piven Strategy" seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse.

http://www.discovert....asp?grpid=6967

Edited by RighteousReason, 10 April 2010 - 05:05 PM.

[rwac]

I prefer option of having a policy that requires me to pay out of pocket for normal maintenance care.

This provision is likely to result in higher premiums because of the cost all the paperwork involved in processing these small claims and the opportunity for some to abuse the system because it's "free".

In any event, if someone wants a policy with free health maintenance care, that is fine with me. My issue is that I am being forced into a policy that doesn't suit my needs.

You will not get this option. You will be forced to buy a policy, and it will cover everything that the government requires it to, and it will be expensive.

Anyway, I doubt it will be a problem for very long. Obamacare is designed to fail, leading to a government takeover of healthcare.

You have to look at the big picture.

[bobdrake12]

.

This bill is a major step (following many smaller ones before it) to destroying the entire free market health industry on a national scale, in order to eventually achieve their publicly stated goal of creating a tyrannical single payer (government) health system-

OBAMA: I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program.

-where the government panels and committees and bureaucrats will dictate who is allowed to get what, by whatever rules they make up (remember there are no rules ... we make them up as we go along ), and how the seized resources that are in limited supply will be rationed among the ruled peoples who have an unlimited need.

A good part of the Bill was written by the insurance industry.

Driving premiums up = more sales and profits for the insurance industry.

The Bill has done exactly what the insurance industry wanted by not increasing competition.

http://www.americant...ng_heart_l.html

Problem: There are not enough insurance companies to make for true competition.

Solutions: At the federal level, eliminate the antitrust exemptions granted to health insurance companies which apply to nearly all other industries so that price-fixing and other collusion between insurance companies is eliminated. Further, eliminate the commerce exclusion which prevents insurance companies from selling their products across state lines. This would allow all citizens of all states access to all insurance plans available anywhere in America.

This Bill does not include the public option.




And while certain politicians have demonized the insurance industry promising to do away with it, this Bill has done exactly what the insurance industry wanted making them even more powerful. Hopefully, you have read my post on Rules for Radicals on the previous page. It is important to understand how the students of Saul Alinsky operate. The bottom line is not to fall for their tactics of what they say but rather pay close attention to what they do.

Thus, major health insurance companies stocks are up about 30% because of this Bill.

This Bill is consistant with the "too big to fail bailout" agenda. It further organizes our nation on corporatist perspectives; values; and systems such as the political system and the economy. There is a specific definition for this agenda and a consequence where it leads.

An example of how this "too big to fail bailout" agend further organizes our nation on corporatist perspectives; values; and systems such as the political system and the economy at the detriment of the best intrest of our country is shown below:

http://www.businessp...goes-to-brazil/

GM Layoffs: 10,000 Dismissed; Bailout Money Goes to Brazil

General Motors latest round of layoffs will target 10,000 salaried workers. The New York Times reports:

General Motors, which must submit a satisfactory restructuring plan to the government next week to keep billions of dollars in loans, said Tuesday that it would lay off 10,000 salaried workers worldwide this year and reduce pay for those who remain by as much as 10 percent.

The announcement comes a week after G.M. extended more buyout and early retirement offers to its hourly work force and three months after it shed 5,100 salaried jobs, also through buyouts.

This time, however, the cuts are being made through layoffs rather than voluntary programs because the government loan terms prevent G.M. from using money from its overfunded pension fund to pay for buyout packages, as it has previously.

Because G.M. is using taxpayer money to avoid having to file for bankruptcy protection, it must bring payments to departing workers more in line with what is typical of companies in other industries. As part of its restructuring, G.M. has said it needs to eliminate about 31,500 hourly and salaried employees.

So much for bailing out a company to save American jobs. MarketWatch commenter Gars250 pointed out this Latin American Herald Tribune article, that says GM will be using $1 billion (where’d that come from?) to “avoid the kinds of problems (GM is facing) in its home market”:

According to the president of GM Brazil-Mercosur, Jaime Ardila, the funding will come from the package of financial aid that the manufacturer will receive from the U.S. government and will be used to “complete the renovation of the line of products up to 2012.”

“It wouldn’t be logical to withdraw the investment from where we’re growing, and our goal is to protect investments in emerging markets,” he said in a statement published by the business daily Gazeta Mercantil.

There’s no pointing in bailing out GM if the money is going into the Brazilian economy. Let them file Chapter 11 and restructure without sending remittances to their subsidiaries abroad.

Edited by bobdrake12, 10 April 2010 - 07:45 PM.

[bobdrake12]

You will not get this option. You will be forced to buy a policy, and it will cover everything that the government requires it to, and it will be expensive.

Anyway, I doubt it will be a problem for very long. Obamacare is designed to fail, leading to a government takeover of healthcare.

You have to look at the big picture.

It is a fact that we are being forced into government approved insurance with a vast amount of red tape.

This results in a "too big to fail bailout" agenda. It further organizes our nation on corporatist perspectives; values; and systems such as the political system and the economy. There is a specific definition for this agenda and a consequence where it leads. The insurance industry will only get more powerful with their partnership with the government. That is why their stock is up 30%.

One other aspect of this Bill is that it cuts the funding of Medicare by 1/3 ($500 billion over 10 years).

http://voices.washin...p_medicare.html

The Senate voted Thursday to keep nearly $500 billion in Medicare cuts in its overhaul of the health care system, protecting the bill's major source of financing against a Republican attack.

The medicare cuts prove Jefferson's wisdom:



What needs to be considered is whether the Bill's change is actually better than the status quo.

Somewhere in this Dialectic Process "winning" can become the sole focus. And the actual "win" can eventually result in a negative outcome for some of those who were strongly behind the movement. An example of this self-defeating behavior can be displayed in the video shown below, Triumph des Willens (Full movie - English: subbed):



There is change:




And there is change:



Change by itself is neither good or bad. But can we foresee its consequences? Do the medicare cuts combined with increased medicare taxes forecast where future provisions for this Bill will lead?

Edited by bobdrake12, 10 April 2010 - 08:05 PM.

[Rational Madman]

Although many of the provisions are objectionable, it would be quite a stretch to argue that the law in question will have a profound effect on personal freedom. As part of the social contract, and based on the constitutional powers that we have vested in the government, the sovereign are empowered to make choices for the collective good. In the absence of the Commerce clause, and other precedents, you might have a point. But, because of this clause and clearly established precedents, it does not deviate far from other laws designed for the collective good. And, because of its clear accordance with established law and precedent, it would be fanciful to think that that the Supreme Court would ever dare challenge the constitutionality of any of the provisions of this law. For the Supreme Court to render such a decision, the plaintiffs would have to demonstrate irreparable harm to individual rights, and any constitutional scholar will tell you that's a significant threshold to pass.

Edited by Rol82, 12 April 2010 - 01:05 AM.

[bobdrake12]

Judge Napolitano: Obamacare State Lawsuits will Fail (video)
http://nationalexpos.../News/2367.html

[bobdrake12]

States launch lawsuits against healthcare plan (excerpt)

http://news.yahoo.co...althcare_states

Virginia Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli, who plans to file a lawsuit in federal court in Richmond, Virginia, said Congress lacks authority under its constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce to force people to buy insurance. The bill also conflicts with a state law that says Virginians cannot be required to buy insurance, he added.

Edited by bobdrake12, 12 April 2010 - 03:25 AM.

[valkyrie_ice]

The problem, RR, is that not everyone feels anything unjust has occurred under Obama, other than the fact that needed acts were hindered by those who's sole reason to oppose was the desire to put themselves back in power following a legal election against them.

'valkyrie_ice',

Could you help me to understand?

Can you please give me some examples of:

...needed acts were hindered by those who's sole reason to oppose was the desire to put themselves back in power following a legal election against them.

Alright, since you asked politely, but this will likely be my last post in this thread. Since RR has started quoting conspiracy theories, I've concluded this thread has ceased to have any association with reality and is thus a complete waste of time.

For the last 30 years, the Republican strategy of trickle down, deregulate, and favor the wealthy has resulted in one thing. The destruction of the economy. Ayn Rand's "free market" has been tried, with the result I expected, a group of parasites quickly moved to eliminate competition, tilt the playing field in their favor, and feather their own personal nests at the expense of everyone and everything around them.

This is inevitable. Examine the Black Market for what will always happen in a completely unregulated free market. Regulation exists for a single purpose, to minimize parasitic behavior. Only in a regulated market in which parasitic behavior has been minimized is it possible for a true "free market" to exist. Failure to understand this is where the overwhelming majority of Rand followers leave reality behind. Unchecked, parasitic behavior will always and inevitably crash the system. Supply and demand become disconnected due to the influence of parasites who will minimize supplies to maximize demand, and thus maximize profit for minimal expense. This creates a spiraling effect that eventually spirals out of the control of even the parasites, and results in a crash. The less regulation the market has to prevent this, the faster it happens.

For the free market to work, symbiosis is needed. Regulation to minimize parasites, prevent tilting of the playing field and insure that everyone in the market is acting in the collective good. You can't play football without rules, why does anyone think you can run the market without them?

To correct the parasitism that has lead to the present situation, Regulation must be put into place to prevent a reoccurence, and those who are directly responsible for the crisis, the parasites themselves, need to be removed from the system in a manner which discourages future parasites.

This applies not only to Wall Street, Health Reform, and "Too Big to Fail" companies, but to the entire system of lobbyists, congress and military who have contributed to the crisis.

And it is exactly these needed steps which must be taken to eliminate the parasites and restore a healthy economy which has been violently opposed by the both the conservative party which created the debacle, and those who support fantasies of a parasite free, unregulated market. Despite the obvious failure of their policies, the conservatives have fought tooth and claw against the changes needed to restore a healthy and growing economy in their efforts to return to power as they have been for over thirty years.

[RighteousReason]

Since RR has started quoting conspiracy theories

I'm not quoting conspiracy theories... I'm just observing the facts and their logical conclusions.

Forcing health insurers to cover pre-existing conditions is like signing up for car insurance after you wreck your car and then forcing the car insurance to pay for it.

Insurance is betting against unexpected, catastrophic expenses. A payment plan is nothing like insurance. And what they are forcefully creating isn't even sustainable as a legitimate payment plan.

This bill is a major step (following many smaller ones before it) to destroying the entire free market health industry on a national scale, in order to eventually achieve their publicly stated goal of creating a tyrannical single payer (government) health system-

OBAMA: I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program.

-where the government panels and committees and bureaucrats will dictate who is allowed to get what, by whatever rules they make up (remember there are no rules ... we make them up as we go along ), and how the seized resources that are in limited supply will be rationed among the ruled peoples who have an unlimited need.

or as Jefferson would say:

when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism

or as Alexander Tyler would say:

A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.

or as Cloward and Piven would say:

the "Cloward-Piven Strategy" seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse.

http://www.discovert....asp?grpid=6967

Edited by RighteousReason, 12 April 2010 - 11:11 PM.

[RighteousReason]

The problem, RR, is that not everyone feels anything unjust has occurred under Obama, other than the fact that needed acts were hindered by those who's sole reason to oppose was the desire to put themselves back in power following a legal election against them.

'valkyrie_ice',

Could you help me to understand?

Can you please give me some examples of:

...needed acts were hindered by those who's sole reason to oppose was the desire to put themselves back in power following a legal election against them.

Alright, since you asked politely, but this will likely be my last post in this thread. Since RR has started quoting conspiracy theories, I've concluded this thread has ceased to have any association with reality and is thus a complete waste of time.

For the last 30 years, the Republican strategy of trickle down, deregulate, and favor the wealthy has resulted in one thing. The destruction of the economy. Ayn Rand's "free market" has been tried, with the result I expected, a group of parasites quickly moved to eliminate competition, tilt the playing field in their favor, and feather their own personal nests at the expense of everyone and everything around them.

This is inevitable. Examine the Black Market for what will always happen in a completely unregulated free market. Regulation exists for a single purpose, to minimize parasitic behavior. Only in a regulated market in which parasitic behavior has been minimized is it possible for a true "free market" to exist. Failure to understand this is where the overwhelming majority of Rand followers leave reality behind. Unchecked, parasitic behavior will always and inevitably crash the system. Supply and demand become disconnected due to the influence of parasites who will minimize supplies to maximize demand, and thus maximize profit for minimal expense. This creates a spiraling effect that eventually spirals out of the control of even the parasites, and results in a crash. The less regulation the market has to prevent this, the faster it happens.

For the free market to work, symbiosis is needed. Regulation to minimize parasites, prevent tilting of the playing field and insure that everyone in the market is acting in the collective good. You can't play football without rules, why does anyone think you can run the market without them?

To correct the parasitism that has lead to the present situation, Regulation must be put into place to prevent a reoccurence, and those who are directly responsible for the crisis, the parasites themselves, need to be removed from the system in a manner which discourages future parasites.

This applies not only to Wall Street, Health Reform, and "Too Big to Fail" companies, but to the entire system of lobbyists, congress and military who have contributed to the crisis.

And it is exactly these needed steps which must be taken to eliminate the parasites and restore a healthy economy which has been violently opposed by the both the conservative party which created the debacle, and those who support fantasies of a parasite free, unregulated market. Despite the obvious failure of their policies, the conservatives have fought tooth and claw against the changes needed to restore a healthy and growing economy in their efforts to return to power as they have been for over thirty years.

"One of the worst fallacies in the field of economics - propagated by Karl Marx and accepted by almost everyone today, including many businessmen - is the notion that the development of monopolies in an inescapable and intrinsic result of the operation of a free, unregulated economy. In fact, the exact opposite is true. It is a free market that makes monopolies impossible." - Nathanial Branden

"The ideal political-economic system is laissez-faire capitalism. It is a system where men deal with one another, not as victims and executioners, nor as masters and slaves, but as traders, by free, voluntary exchange to mutual benefit. It is a system where no man may obtain any values from others by resorting to physical force, and no man may initiate the use of physical force against others. The government acts only as a policeman that protects man’s rights; it uses physical force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use, such as criminals or foreign invaders. In a system of full capitalism, there should be (but, historically, has not yet been) a complete separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church." - Ayn Rand

America has never had a truly free market. It is always government interference, often under the guise of regulation or "increasing competition", that has enabled the abuse you are so ignorantly and wrongfully blaming on capitalism.

The sanctity of voluntary contract - upheld by an objective system of law and courts, and enforced by the full power of police and military forces - this is the only effective form of regulation, and indeed, the only moral form of regulation.

This is the only government enforced rule necessary, and it is the only just, moral, ethical, or practical, rule of the football game or chess game of the marketplace.

· Would you be able to play if, at a crucial moment – when, after hours of brain-wrenching effort, you had succeeded in cornering your opponent – an unknown, arbitrary power suddenly changed the rules of the game in his favor, allowing, say, his bishops to move like queens? You would not be able to continue? Yet out in the living world, this is the law of your country – and this is the condition in which your countrymen are expected, not to play, but to live.

· Would you be able to play if the rules of chess were updated to conform to a dialectic reality, in which opposites merge - so that, at a crucial moment, your queen turns suddenly from White to Black, becoming the queen of your opponent, and then turned Gray, belonging to both of you? You would not be able to continue? Yet in the living world, this is the view of reality your countrymen are taught to accept, to absorb, and to live by.

· Would you be able to play if you had to play by teamwork – i.e., if you were forbidden to think or act alone and had to play not with a group of advisers, but with a team that determined your every move by vote? Since, as champion, you would be the best mind among them, how much time and effort would you have to spend persuading the team that your strategy is the best? Would you be likely to succeed? And what would you do if some pragmatist, range-of-the-moment mentalities voted to grab an opponent’s knight at the price of a checkmate to you three moves later? You would not be able to continue? Yet in the living world, this is the theoretical idea of your country, and this is the method by which it proposes to deal (someday) with scientific research, industrial production, and every other kind of activity required for man’s survival.

· Would you be able to play if the cumbersome mechanism of teamwork were streamlined, and your moves were dictated simply by a man standing behind you, with a gun pressed to your back – a man who would not explain or argue, his gun being his only argument and sole qualification? You would not be able to start, let alone continue, playing? Yet in the living world, this is the practical policy under which men live - and die - in your country.

· Would you be able to play – or to enjoy the professional understanding, interest and acclaim of an international chess federation – if the rules of the game were splintered, and you played by “proletarian” rules while your opponent played by “bourgeois” rules? Would you say that such “polyrulism” is more preposterous than polylogism? Yet in the living world, your country professes to seek global harmony and understanding, while proclaiming that she follows “proletarian” logic and that others follow “bourgeois” logic or “Aryan” logic, or “third-world” logic, etc.

· Would you be able to play if the rules of the game remained as they are at present, with one exception: that the pawns were declared to be the most valuable and nonexpendable pieces (since they may symbolize the masses) which had to be protected at the price of sacrificing the more efficacious pieces (the individuals)? You might claim a draw on the answer to the this one – since it is not only your country, but the whole living world that accepts this sort of rule in morality.

· Would you care to play, if the rules of the game remained unchanged, but the distribution of rewards were altered in accordance with egalitarian principles: if the prizes, the honors, the fame were given not to the winner, but to the loser – if winning were regarded as a symptom of selfishness, and the winner were penalized for the crime of possessing a superior intelligence, the penalty consisting in suspension for a year, in order to give others a chance? And would you and your opponent try playing not to win, but to lose? What would this do to your mind?

You do not have to answer me, Comrade. You are not free to speak or even to think of such questions – and I know the answers. No, you would not be able to play under any of the conditions listed above. It is to escape this category of phenomena that you fled into the world of chess.

-"An Open Letter to Boris Spassky" from "Philosophy: Who Needs It" by Ayn Rand

"The only proper purpose of a government is to protect man's rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence. A proper government is only a policeman, acting as an agent of man's self-defense, and, as such, may resort to force only against those who start the use of force. The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law." - Ayn Rand

Edited by RighteousReason, 12 April 2010 - 11:37 PM.

[RighteousReason]

Democratic Congressman in moments of honesty...

There are no rules, we make them up as we go along

I don't care about the Constitution

Edited by RighteousReason, 12 April 2010 - 11:26 PM.

[bobdrake12]

Since RR has started quoting conspiracy theories

I'm not quoting conspiracy theories... I'm just observing the facts and their logical conclusions.

Forcing health insurers to cover pre-existing conditions is like signing up for car insurance after you wreck your car and then forcing the car insurance to pay for it.

Insurance is betting against unexpected, catastrophic expenses. A payment plan is nothing like insurance. And what they are forcefully creating isn't even sustainable as a legitimate payment plan.

This bill is a major step (following many smaller ones before it) to destroying the entire free market health industry on a national scale, in order to eventually achieve their publicly stated goal of creating a tyrannical single payer (government) health system-

OBAMA: I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program.

-where the government panels and committees and bureaucrats will dictate who is allowed to get what, by whatever rules they make up (remember there are no rules ... we make them up as we go along ), and how the seized resources that are in limited supply will be rationed among the ruled peoples who have an unlimited need.

or as Jefferson would say:

when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism

or as Alexander Tyler would say:

A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.

or as Cloward and Piven would say:

the "Cloward-Piven Strategy" seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse.

http://www.discovert....asp?grpid=6967

RighteousReason,

All valid points and I fell for the ploy regarding the video where President Obama stated, "I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program."

But the fact is there is *no* Public Option (Single Payer Option) in the Health Care Bill. In addition, the current Health Care Bill isn't even a universal heath care program.

We also need to recognize that President Obama is an adroit student of Saul Alinsky. Hopefully, this quote from Rules for Radicals helps:

"The means-and-ends moralists, constantly obsessed with the ethics of the means used by the Have-Nots against the Haves, should search themselves as to their real political position. In fact, they are passive — but real — allies of the Haves…. The most unethical of all means is the non-use of any means... The standards of judgment must be rooted in the whys and wherefores of life as it is lived, the world as it is, not our wished-for fantasy of the world as it should be...." pp.25-26

The bottom line is not to fall for thei tactics of what the adroit students of Alinsky say but rather pay close attention to what they do.

Edited by bobdrake12, 13 April 2010 - 12:41 AM.

[bobdrake12]

The problem, RR, is that not everyone feels anything unjust has occurred under Obama, other than the fact that needed acts were hindered by those who's sole reason to oppose was the desire to put themselves back in power following a legal election against them.

'valkyrie_ice',

Could you help me to understand?

Can you please give me some examples of:

...needed acts were hindered by those who's sole reason to oppose was the desire to put themselves back in power following a legal election against them.

Regulation exists for a single purpose, to minimize parasitic behavior. Only in a regulated market in which parasitic behavior has been minimized is it possible for a true "free market" to exist. Failure to understand this is where the overwhelming majority of Rand followers leave reality behind. Unchecked, parasitic behavior will always and inevitably crash the system. Supply and demand become disconnected due to the influence of parasites who will minimize supplies to maximize demand, and thus maximize profit for minimal expense. This creates a spiraling effect that eventually spirals out of the control of even the parasites, and results in a crash. The less regulation the market has to prevent this, the faster it happens.

For the free market to work, symbiosis is needed. Regulation to minimize parasites, prevent tilting of the playing field and insure that everyone in the market is acting in the collective good. You can't play football without rules, why does anyone think you can run the market without them?

To correct the parasitism that has lead to the present situation, Regulation must be put into place to prevent a reoccurence, and those who are directly responsible for the crisis, the parasites themselves, need to be removed from the system in a manner which discourages future parasites.

This applies not only to Wall Street, Health Reform, and "Too Big to Fail" companies, but to the entire system of lobbyists, congress and military who have contributed to the crisis.

valkyrie,

Thank you so much for your response and I agree with the above.

One example regarding these necessary regulations is the Glass–Steagall Act. Unfortunately, the Provisions that prohibit a bank holding company from owning other financial companies were repealed on November 12, 1999, by the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act. That action had dire consequences.

I feel you provide a valid contribution to this discussion and hopefully you will continue. In any event, I do not plan to continue discussing your point on necessary regulations without your participation.

[valkyrie_ice]

The problem, RR, is that not everyone feels anything unjust has occurred under Obama, other than the fact that needed acts were hindered by those who's sole reason to oppose was the desire to put themselves back in power following a legal election against them.

'valkyrie_ice',

Could you help me to understand?

Can you please give me some examples of:

...needed acts were hindered by those who's sole reason to oppose was the desire to put themselves back in power following a legal election against them.

Regulation exists for a single purpose, to minimize parasitic behavior. Only in a regulated market in which parasitic behavior has been minimized is it possible for a true "free market" to exist. Failure to understand this is where the overwhelming majority of Rand followers leave reality behind. Unchecked, parasitic behavior will always and inevitably crash the system. Supply and demand become disconnected due to the influence of parasites who will minimize supplies to maximize demand, and thus maximize profit for minimal expense. This creates a spiraling effect that eventually spirals out of the control of even the parasites, and results in a crash. The less regulation the market has to prevent this, the faster it happens.

For the free market to work, symbiosis is needed. Regulation to minimize parasites, prevent tilting of the playing field and insure that everyone in the market is acting in the collective good. You can't play football without rules, why does anyone think you can run the market without them?

To correct the parasitism that has lead to the present situation, Regulation must be put into place to prevent a reoccurence, and those who are directly responsible for the crisis, the parasites themselves, need to be removed from the system in a manner which discourages future parasites.

This applies not only to Wall Street, Health Reform, and "Too Big to Fail" companies, but to the entire system of lobbyists, congress and military who have contributed to the crisis.

valkyrie,

Thank you so much for your response and I agree with the above.

One example regarding these necessary regulations is the Glass–Steagall Act. Unfortunately, the Provisions that prohibit a bank holding company from owning other financial companies were repealed on November 12, 1999, by the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act. That action had dire consequences.

I feel you provide a valid contribution to this discussion and hopefully you will continue. In any event, I do not plan to continue discussing your point on necessary regulations without your participation.

To be blunt, I still think that it's rather pointless but I will respond when I feel it might actually be listened to.





To address RR, the error you seem to make is to assume I am speaking of monopolies. Monopolies are not the problem. They are a SYMPTOM of the problem.

To clarify, in a true free market, one is which no parasites exist, and one in which all players begin on a level playing field, regulation is indeed unnecessary. Where you lose sight of reality is to ignore the human factor. In any market in which humans are a part, the genetically driven instinct to maximize personal gain to enhance one's mating status and improve one's chances of genetic reproduction will inevitably cause a small percentage of the species to engage in extremes. These extremes tend to engage in behavior which is highly detrimental to the collective body of humanity, but which is extremely beneficial to the individual engaging in this behavior. Left unchecked, these extremes continue to engage in the behavior that benefits them, regardless of the harm they may cause to the collective.

The situation we have at present is one in which the parasites have been left uncontrolled so long that their aberrant behavior has become considered not only acceptable, but even glorified by a percentage of the collective. Capitalism, communism, socialism are meaningless in this context. This situation has occurred repeatedly throughout history regardless of political or economical system. It is genetically driven alpha pack behavior that has been taken to extremes. In nature, alphas assume some responsibility for the well being of their pack, whereas what we have happening here is alphas refusing to accept any pack responsibilities while demanding excessive benefits.

Can you truly say a CEO who bankrupts his company, receives a billion dollar severance package, and then avoids all responsibility for his mismanagement and begins the process all over again as the head of a new company actually is a desirable leader? Or is he a parasite, feeding off the health and work of others, "killing" their hosts and moving on? Is the company the villain if it enacts his policies, or is it the person who issues those orders?

It is this parasitic behavior which lies behind the inevitable tendency of large companies to attempt to construct monopolies, control political structures to their favor, and create networks of lesser parasites all eager to help in exchange for a share of the benefits.

This is genetically programmed behavior. It cannot be eliminated without reprogramming the human genome. You can argue the power of the free market to self regulate all you wish, but so long as you ignore the biological facts of human behavior, you are dealing in myths and fantasies.

Regulation is needed not to "control the market". It is essential to control the HUMANS PARTICIPATING IN THE MARKET.

All your quotes and quips do nothing to change the underlying reality of human genetics, or the true nature of government.

[bobdrake12]

Can you truly say a CEO who bankrupts his company, receives a billion dollar severance package, and then avoids all responsibility for his mismanagement and begins the process all over again as the head of a new company actually is a desirable leader? Or is he a parasite, feeding off the health and work of others, "killing" their hosts and moving on? Is the company the villain if it enacts his policies, or is it the person who issues those orders?

valkyrie_ice,

Thank you for your response.

Unfortunately, what you wrote above is a fact.

http://jimmysmithblo...orporatism.html

Corporatism on the Rise

With the bailouts of financial giants (like Citi Bank), insurance companies (like AIG), automakers, and home mortgage companies (Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac), it is becoming increasingly more difficult to tell where the private sector ends and government begins. Many companies that were once proudly free-market can suddenly find themselves making arguments in favor of protectionism and corporatism.

Some companies have fought the onslaught of government but it seems to be a losing battle. Take the example of Wal-Mart and Microsoft, again quoting from Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism. "For years both Wal-Mart and Microsoft boasted that they had no interest in Washington. Microsoft's chief, Bill Gates...had one lonely lobbyist hanging around the nation's capital. Gates changed his mind when the government nearly destroyed his company. The Senate Judiciary Committee invited him to Washington, D.C., to atone for his success, and the senators, in the words of the New York Times, 'took a kind of giddy delight in making the wealthiest man in America squirm in his seat.' In response, Gates hired an army of consultants, lobbyists, and lawyers to fight off the government. In the 2000 presidential election, Wal-Mart ranked 771st in direct contributions to federal politicians. In the intervening years, unions and regulators began to drool over the enormous target the mega-retailer had become. In 2004 Wal-Mart ranked as the single largest corporate politcal action committee." (p. 303-304)

http://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/

Revolving Door

Although the influence powerhouses that line Washington's K Street are just a few miles from the U.S. Capitol building, the most direct path between the two doesn't necessarily involve public transportation. Instead, it's through a door—a revolving door that shuffles former federal employees into jobs as lobbyists, consultants and strategists just as the door pulls former hired guns into government careers. While officials in the executive branch, Congress and senior congressional staffers spin in and out of the private and public sectors, so too does privilege, power, access and, of course, money.

Edited by bobdrake12, 13 April 2010 - 03:57 AM.

[valkyrie_ice]

Pretty much what we have here is a situation where the parasites have infested both the upper corporate management, the regulatory agencies, the lobbyists, and congress to the point that they've created a system where only the parasites thrive.

The main point to notice about this is not that corporations are making the governments pay "corporate welfare". It's that THEY NEED THAT WELFARE TO SURVIVE. These companies have been being told for decades that they had to change their business models, learn how to change and adapt quickly to accelerating technological change, or die. And rather than listen, they sought to maintain the status quo, tried to influence the government to pass laws designed to prevent change, and now that their strategies have failed they are clinging to the lifeline of government bailouts, and trying to pretend everything is business as usual.

However, this is going to inevitably change over the course of the next several years. This mess is only possible in conditions of concealment. In the past, that concealment has always been possible, due to the difficulty of transferring information, the ease of concealment, and the lack of public scrutiny. That is no longer possible. Even if the FCC fails to enact net neutrality, conditions are such that attempts by the service providers to control content will fail. It may not happen in a year or even two, but with wireless becoming more and more common, it's pretty certain that the hard lines are going to become less and less important. What this means is that information has passed from anyone's control. When it comes to secrecy and concealment, the internet is poison. As the internet is now in the process of integrating cellphones, cameras, and many other common devices, and evolving towards VR, it's creating a true panopticon, an All Seeing Eye, if you will, one which is universally accessible, to both the public and the government, to the buyers and the sellers. We are willingly giving up our privacy for visibility and connectivity, for the ability to see as much about our governing structures as they can see about us.

This mess will not survive the decade. It's the last desperate gasps of dying parasites. Their successes merely hasten their demise and make them ever more dependent on a public that despises them, and makes them that much easier to purge. I hope that purge will be a peaceful one, but that is uncertain. With the huge number of people who are unwilling to look outside of their ideologically defined worldviews and see reality, we have a lot of misdirected anger at the systems, rather than at the people misusing those systems for their parasitic benefit. That's like blaming a tree infested with wood mites for the wood mites damage. The system is fine. The parasites simply need to be removed from it.

[RighteousReason]

This bill is a major step ... in order to eventually achieve

But the fact is there is *no* Public Option (Single Payer Option) in the Health Care Bill. In addition, the current Health Care Bill isn't even a universal heath care program.

The hell? Did you read anything I wrote?

And a public option is a completely different concept than single payer. Single payer is not an option. It's a SINGLE payer. That leaves no other option.

nevermind... don't know why I'm dealing with you people...

Edited by RighteousReason, 13 April 2010 - 06:16 PM.

[RighteousReason]

To address RR, the error you seem to make is to assume I am speaking of monopolies. Monopolies are not the problem. They are a SYMPTOM of the problem.
...
It is essential to control the HUMANS PARTICIPATING IN THE MARKET.

Yeah you should definitely read past the first line of my response. I was addressing your entire point including the understanding that monopolies are symptom and not the essential. I also explained how the government should control humans participating in the market.

"One of the worst fallacies in the field of economics - propagated by Karl Marx and accepted by almost everyone today, including many businessmen - is the notion that the development of monopolies in an inescapable and intrinsic result of the operation of a free, unregulated economy. In fact, the exact opposite is true. It is a free market that makes monopolies impossible." - Nathanial Branden

"The ideal political-economic system is laissez-faire capitalism. It is a system where men deal with one another, not as victims and executioners, nor as masters and slaves, but as traders, by free, voluntary exchange to mutual benefit. It is a system where no man may obtain any values from others by resorting to physical force, and no man may initiate the use of physical force against others. The government acts only as a policeman that protects man’s rights; it uses physical force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use, such as criminals or foreign invaders. In a system of full capitalism, there should be (but, historically, has not yet been) a complete separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church." - Ayn Rand

America has never had a truly free market. It is always government interference, often under the guise of regulation or "increasing competition", that has enabled the abuse you are so ignorantly and wrongfully blaming on capitalism.

The sanctity of voluntary contract - upheld by an objective system of law and courts, and enforced by the full power of police and military forces - this is the only effective form of regulation, and indeed, the only moral form of regulation.

This is the only government enforced rule necessary, and it is the only just, moral, ethical, or practical, rule of the football game or chess game of the marketplace.

· Would you be able to play if, at a crucial moment – when, after hours of brain-wrenching effort, you had succeeded in cornering your opponent – an unknown, arbitrary power suddenly changed the rules of the game in his favor, allowing, say, his bishops to move like queens? You would not be able to continue? Yet out in the living world, this is the law of your country – and this is the condition in which your countrymen are expected, not to play, but to live.

· Would you be able to play if the rules of chess were updated to conform to a dialectic reality, in which opposites merge - so that, at a crucial moment, your queen turns suddenly from White to Black, becoming the queen of your opponent, and then turned Gray, belonging to both of you? You would not be able to continue? Yet in the living world, this is the view of reality your countrymen are taught to accept, to absorb, and to live by.

· Would you be able to play if you had to play by teamwork – i.e., if you were forbidden to think or act alone and had to play not with a group of advisers, but with a team that determined your every move by vote? Since, as champion, you would be the best mind among them, how much time and effort would you have to spend persuading the team that your strategy is the best? Would you be likely to succeed? And what would you do if some pragmatist, range-of-the-moment mentalities voted to grab an opponent’s knight at the price of a checkmate to you three moves later? You would not be able to continue? Yet in the living world, this is the theoretical idea of your country, and this is the method by which it proposes to deal (someday) with scientific research, industrial production, and every other kind of activity required for man’s survival.

· Would you be able to play if the cumbersome mechanism of teamwork were streamlined, and your moves were dictated simply by a man standing behind you, with a gun pressed to your back – a man who would not explain or argue, his gun being his only argument and sole qualification? You would not be able to start, let alone continue, playing? Yet in the living world, this is the practical policy under which men live - and die - in your country.

· Would you be able to play – or to enjoy the professional understanding, interest and acclaim of an international chess federation – if the rules of the game were splintered, and you played by “proletarian” rules while your opponent played by “bourgeois” rules? Would you say that such “polyrulism” is more preposterous than polylogism? Yet in the living world, your country professes to seek global harmony and understanding, while proclaiming that she follows “proletarian” logic and that others follow “bourgeois” logic or “Aryan” logic, or “third-world” logic, etc.

· Would you be able to play if the rules of the game remained as they are at present, with one exception: that the pawns were declared to be the most valuable and nonexpendable pieces (since they may symbolize the masses) which had to be protected at the price of sacrificing the more efficacious pieces (the individuals)? You might claim a draw on the answer to the this one – since it is not only your country, but the whole living world that accepts this sort of rule in morality.

· Would you care to play, if the rules of the game remained unchanged, but the distribution of rewards were altered in accordance with egalitarian principles: if the prizes, the honors, the fame were given not to the winner, but to the loser – if winning were regarded as a symptom of selfishness, and the winner were penalized for the crime of possessing a superior intelligence, the penalty consisting in suspension for a year, in order to give others a chance? And would you and your opponent try playing not to win, but to lose? What would this do to your mind?

You do not have to answer me, Comrade. You are not free to speak or even to think of such questions – and I know the answers. No, you would not be able to play under any of the conditions listed above. It is to escape this category of phenomena that you fled into the world of chess.

-"An Open Letter to Boris Spassky" from "Philosophy: Who Needs It" by Ayn Rand

"The only proper purpose of a government is to protect man's rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence. A proper government is only a policeman, acting as an agent of man's self-defense, and, as such, may resort to force only against those who start the use of force. The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law." - Ayn Rand

Edited by RighteousReason, 13 April 2010 - 07:11 PM.

[Alex Libman]

Off-topic interjection: When I see quotations of Ayn Rand, a terrifying thought occurs to me... it seems that I have almost all of her non-fiction works, and the important parts of her fiction, memorized word-for-word! How scary is that?!

And I have awful memory - I forgot every Spanish / Mandarin / Japanese / Korean word I ever learned, and my native Russian has been on decline as well. The same applies to the programming genres I haven't touched in a long time, family members, etc. And it's not just because audio information absorbs better, especially when listened to while hiking outdoors - there are podcasts / radio shows to which I've listened dozens of hours a week for years, and I hardly remember the most frequent callers...

Edited by Alex Libman, 13 April 2010 - 09:31 PM.

[RighteousReason]

Off-topic interjection: When I see quotations of Ayn Rand, a terrifying thought occurs to me... it seems that I have almost all of her non-fiction works, and the important parts of her fiction, memorized word-for-word! How scary is that?!

And I have awful memory - I forgot every Spanish / Mandarin / Japanese / Korean word I ever learned, and my native Russian has been on decline as well. The same applies to the programming genres I haven't touched in a long time, family members, etc. And it's not just because audio information absorbs better, especially when listened to while hiking outdoors - there are podcasts / radio shows to which I've listened dozens of hours a week for years, and I hardly remember the most frequent callers...

great idea... listening to Ayn Rand on audio while hiking

[valkyrie_ice]

To address RR, the error you seem to make is to assume I am speaking of monopolies. Monopolies are not the problem. They are a SYMPTOM of the problem.
...
It is essential to control the HUMANS PARTICIPATING IN THE MARKET.

Yeah you should definitely read past the first line of my response. I was addressing your entire point including the understanding that monopolies are symptom and not the essential. I also explained how the government should control humans participating in the market.

I did read it RR. and I will yet again point out that your quotes refer to the symptoms and fail states.

Your quotes blame government "interference." What they fail to address is that interference is supposed to occur only during failure states. These failure states only arise when parasitic behavior begins disrupting the market.

However, what has occurred is that the parasites have invaded the entire system, so that the regulation which is supposed to remove parasitic infestation is instead being used by the parasites to promote it.

Your assumption is that the parasites are endemic to the system, i.e. that the SYSTEM is at fault. This is not the case. The system is fine, and when it is not suffering from widespread parasitism, it works for the greatest common good for the greatest number of people.

IN other words GOVERNMENT IS NOT THE PROBLEM. MISUSE of Government by parasitical humans is. The solution to this is not to abolish government, nor is it to promote unrealistic ideological scenarios. In order to solve the problem, the root cause must be addressed. Parasitical behavior must be prevented, and the conditions which lead to parasitical behavior must be eliminated.

To be quite honest, Ayn Rand's main failure is to not recognize that the human element is the problem, and to instead blame the government for falling prey to human beings. It's not "THE GOVERNMENT" that would hold a pistol to your head, it's someone USING THE GOVERNMENT to promote their own will. THE GOVERNMENT is neutral. It exists solely as a tool of the collective. It is when that tool is misused by smaller interests against the good of the collective that it causes great harm, but that is not the fault of the government, it is the fault of those misusing the system.

The missing element to making government work precisely as Ayn Rand says it should is accountability. And that is accountability on ALL SIDES, not simply the collective being accountable to the individual, but the individual being accountable to the collective as well. That is were Rand went wrong, by assuming that ONLY the collective must be accountable and that the individual should not be accountable back. That lack of reciprocal accountability is precisely what creates parasites to begin with.

[RighteousReason]

Your quotes blame government "interference." What they fail to address is that interference is supposed to occur only during failure states. These failure states only arise when parasitic behavior begins disrupting the market.

What are failure states? Violations of individual rights. What is the proper "interference" in case of failure? Justice.

You argue that

regulation which is supposed to remove parasitic infestation is instead being used by the parasites to promote it.

Social security, medicare, housing loans, education... the entire regulatory-welfare monster of government that falls outside of it's proper role of protecting individual rights -- has nothing to do with removing parasitic infestation. It's exactly the opposite. It breeds it and protects it. Intentionally. It's the only thing in the world even capable of parasitism, because it's the only thing in the world that can take money from people by force for sustenance without otherwise being subject to justice by means of the government's proper function. Everything else is otherwise subject to voluntary contract. Everything else is otherwise symbiotic.

Your assumption is that the parasites are endemic to the system, i.e. that the SYSTEM is at fault. This is not the case. The system is fine, and when it is not suffering from widespread parasitism, it works for the greatest common good for the greatest number of people.

IN other words GOVERNMENT IS NOT THE PROBLEM. MISUSE of Government by parasitical humans is. The solution to this is not to abolish government, nor is it to promote unrealistic ideological scenarios. In order to solve the problem, the root cause must be addressed. Parasitical behavior must be prevented, and the conditions which lead to parasitical behavior must be eliminated.

I completely agree. The government should be limited to the protection of individual rights. Legalizing the power of force outside of these limitations is exactly the condition which leads to parasitic behavior and must be eliminated.

To be quite honest, Ayn Rand's main failure is to not recognize that the human element is the problem, and to instead blame the government for falling prey to human beings. It's not "THE GOVERNMENT" that would hold a pistol to your head, it's someone USING THE GOVERNMENT to promote their own will. THE GOVERNMENT is neutral. It exists solely as a tool of the collective. It is when that tool is misused by smaller interests against the good of the collective that it causes great harm, but that is not the fault of the government, it is the fault of those misusing the system.

That is were Rand went wrong, by assuming that ONLY the collective must be accountable and that the individual should not be accountable back.

Of course we understand that it is the ruling class of the government holding the gun, that the government is neutral, that it is not the government holding a gun to someone's head, it is individuals -- do you realize that? That there is no collective? That there is no collective hand holding the gun, only individual hands, and there is no collective brain to decide to point the gun, there are only individual brains, there are no collective thoughts -- there is no collective consciousness -- there are no collective rights -- there is no collective responsibility. Only individuals have hands, brains, minds, rights, responsibility.

And yet you relentlessly advocate giving them more power at the expense of the individual?

Edited by RighteousReason, 13 April 2010 - 11:56 PM.

[valkyrie_ice]

Your quotes blame government "interference." What they fail to address is that interference is supposed to occur only during failure states. These failure states only arise when parasitic behavior begins disrupting the market.

What is interference? What are failure states? What is parasitic behavior? These are rhetorical questions-- you are speaking in a vague, non-technical manner. Consequently, you make no sense. What are failure states? Violations of individual rights. What is the proper "interference" in case of failure? Justice.

You argue that

regulation which is supposed to remove parasitic infestation is instead being used by the parasites to promote it.

Social security, medicare, housing loans, education... the entire regulatory-welfare monster of government that falls outside of it's proper role of protecting individual rights has nothing to do with removing parasitic infestation. It's exactly the opposite. It breeds it. It's the only thing in the world capable of sustaining parasites, because it's the only thing in the world that can take money from people by force for sustenance. Everything else is subject to voluntary contract.

Your assumption is that the parasites are endemic to the system, i.e. that the SYSTEM is at fault. This is not the case. The system is fine, and when it is not suffering from widespread parasitism, it works for the greatest common good for the greatest number of people.

IN other words GOVERNMENT IS NOT THE PROBLEM. MISUSE of Government by parasitical humans is. The solution to this is not to abolish government, nor is it to promote unrealistic ideological scenarios. In order to solve the problem, the root cause must be addressed. Parasitical behavior must be prevented, and the conditions which lead to parasitical behavior must be eliminated.

Yes of course... the government should be limited to the protection of individual rights. Legalizing the power of force outside of these limitations is exactly the condition which leads to parasitic behavior.

To be quite honest, Ayn Rand's main failure is to not recognize that the human element is the problem, and to instead blame the government for falling prey to human beings. It's not "THE GOVERNMENT" that would hold a pistol to your head, it's someone USING THE GOVERNMENT to promote their own will. THE GOVERNMENT is neutral. It exists solely as a tool of the collective. It is when that tool is misused by smaller interests against the good of the collective that it causes great harm, but that is not the fault of the government, it is the fault of those misusing the system.

That is were Rand went wrong, by assuming that ONLY the collective must be accountable and that the individual should not be accountable back.

This is more nonsense and vagueness. Of course we understand that it is the ruling class of the government holding the gun, do you realize that? When you constantly advocate giving them more power at the expense of the individual in the most extreme agenda possible? Do you have any idea what it means to misuse a gun? To use force against others in ANY way other than in self-defense is to misuse force. *You* certainly take some blame for that misuse, in advocating that misuse, and by means of your vote for Obama and others.

And this is precisely why I say communication is impossible, because you live in a psuedo-reality of ideological thought, rather than in actual reality.

There is a collective. There always has been and always will be in any group of humans larger than one. Humans are pack animals. That is a genetic fact. Pack mentality is what creates the collective. Individual behavior that harms the pack is parasitic. Individuals must be responsible to the pack, just as the pack must be responsible to the individual. Your disconnect with reality is to mistake the pecking order of the pack for the pack itself. You also confuse the packs ability to divide resources for the good of the entire pack with the parasitical behavior of exploiting the pack for personal benefit. You blame the pack for the actions of the pecking order, and blame those most in need of assistance for requiring the packs resources.

What happens to a football team when every player decides they are just going to run wherever? What happens when one side plays by the rules and the other doesn't? How well would the "star player" do if he was the sole person on the field?

Using the collective's resources to provide for the common good of all the members of the collective is the entire reason for the collective in the first place. It is the evolutionary strategy used by humanity to lift itself out of the dust and reach for the stars. It is inbred into every single member of the human race to be part of the pack. Deny that if you will, but reality will not change.

[RighteousReason]

you responded before I finished my editing...!

my edit time also ran out. doh

Here is my finished post:

Your quotes blame government "interference." What they fail to address is that interference is supposed to occur only during failure states. These failure states only arise when parasitic behavior begins disrupting the market.

What are failure states? Violations of individual rights. What is the proper "interference" in case of failure? Justice.

You argue that

regulation which is supposed to remove parasitic infestation is instead being used by the parasites to promote it.

Social security, medicare, housing loans, education... the entire regulatory-welfare monster of government that falls outside of it's proper role of protecting individual rights -- has nothing to do with removing parasitic infestation. It's exactly the opposite. It breeds it and protects it. Intentionally. It's the only thing in the world even capable of parasitism, because it's the only thing in the world that can take money from people by force for sustenance without otherwise being subject to justice by means of the government's proper function. Everything else is otherwise subject to voluntary contract. Everything else is otherwise symbiotic.

Your assumption is that the parasites are endemic to the system, i.e. that the SYSTEM is at fault. This is not the case. The system is fine, and when it is not suffering from widespread parasitism, it works for the greatest common good for the greatest number of people.

IN other words GOVERNMENT IS NOT THE PROBLEM. MISUSE of Government by parasitical humans is. The solution to this is not to abolish government, nor is it to promote unrealistic ideological scenarios. In order to solve the problem, the root cause must be addressed. Parasitical behavior must be prevented, and the conditions which lead to parasitical behavior must be eliminated.

I completely agree. The government should be limited to the protection of individual rights. Legalizing the power of force outside of these limitations is exactly the condition which leads to parasitic behavior and must be eliminated.

To be quite honest, Ayn Rand's main failure is to not recognize that the human element is the problem, and to instead blame the government for falling prey to human beings. It's not "THE GOVERNMENT" that would hold a pistol to your head, it's someone USING THE GOVERNMENT to promote their own will. THE GOVERNMENT is neutral. It exists solely as a tool of the collective. It is when that tool is misused by smaller interests against the good of the collective that it causes great harm, but that is not the fault of the government, it is the fault of those misusing the system.

That is were Rand went wrong, by assuming that ONLY the collective must be accountable and that the individual should not be accountable back.

Of course we understand that it is the ruling class of the government holding the gun, that the government is neutral, that it is not the government holding a gun to someone's head, it is individuals -- do you realize that? And yet you relentlessly advocate giving them more power at the expense of the individual?

Don't you realize by your own admission that there is no collective? That there is no collective hand holding the gun, only individual hands, and there is no collective brain to decide to point the gun, there are only individual brains, there are no collective thoughts -- there is no collective will -- there is no collective consciousness -- there are no collective rights -- there is no collective responsibility. Only individuals have hands, brains, minds, rights, responsibility.

The "collective" is neutral -- it is solely a descriptive tool for what is happening out there among individuals, in the same sense that "evolution" is neutral and only a description of what is happening among species -- evolution does not literally have a will to change one thing or another. To believe otherwise is to suffer from Anthropomorphism ... read how Yudkowsky (a collectivist leaning person himself... I would think) talks about anthropomorphism in AI and evolution and compare it to our conversation about collectivism.

Creating Friendly AI http://www.singinst....FAI/anthro.html
Chapter 2: Beyond anthropomorphism

Artificial Intelligence as a Positive and Negative Factor in Global Risk http://www.singinst....igence-risk.pdf
Chapter 1: Anthropomorphic bias

-- This has far too much relevant, extremely high-quality content to quote here, this is merely the conclusion of that particular chapter:

Anyone seeking to reduce anthropomorphic bias in themselves would be well-advised to study evolutionary biology for practice, preferably evolutionary biology with math. Early biologists often anthropomorphized natural selection - they believed that evolution would do the same thing they would do; they tried to predict the effects of evolution by putting themselves "in evolution's shoes". The result was a great deal of nonsense, which first began to be systematically exterminated from biology in the late 1960s, e.g. by Williams (1966). Evolutionary biology offers both mathematics and case studies to help hammer out anthropomorphic bias.

I have to thank you for this conversation after all, as this has led me further into the new territory of understanding how Objectivism and Friendly AI are so closely tied.

Edited by RighteousReason, 14 April 2010 - 12:56 AM.

[Alex Libman]

And this is precisely why I say communication is impossible, because you live in a psuedo-reality of ideological thought, rather than in actual reality.

Um, wow... You really will parrot any insult that was rightfully directed at you onto others, without even the slightest inkling of a thought about how its substance fully describes you while being the complete opposite of what my Objectivist pal here represents...

There is a collective.

That's like saying "there is a sum" or "there is an average" - those concepts do not themselves exist, they are generalizations about other proper nouns that do. There are individual human beings that are capable of individual thought, and sometimes they explicitly cooperate amongst themselves for mutual benefit (i.e. capitalism). There is no such thing as collective thought, collective will, or collective conscience - all of those are religious concepts that you are trying to brainwash others into for your own benefit.

There always has been and always will be in any group of humans larger than one.

The quantity of human beings in existence is irrelevant. Your collectivist claims are based on a notion that all human beings constitute a single sentient organism that owns itself collectively and has "collective rights" that supersede Individual Rights, which is total nonsense. "I think therefore I am" is a phenomenon that occurs in an individual human mind, not 0.1 minds or 10 minds but one integral sentient self-owning entity! Each individual human being is autonomous in mind and body and capable of interacting with others on a voluntary basis. No human being has the natural capacity to feel another's pain as the subject himself feels it, read the subject's mind, control the subject's body as one controls one's own, etc. I cannot crawl inside your head and understand something for you (otherwise we wouldn't be having this discussion). I cannot cease reaping the consequences of being Alex Libman and become somebody else instead. Etc. Abstractions don't exist - individuals do.

Humans are pack animals. That is a genetic fact.

Humans are ~7 billion individuals who compete and cooperate on the basis of individual self-interest. Whenever economic opportunity allows it they tend to choose their surroundings and companions based on individual preference, often preferring to live in individual rooms instead of a large random pact, for example. Most people read a book they want to read individually instead of going to a pack hall where thousands of people read the same words at the same time. Etc. As civilization progresses, so does our capacity for individual freedom, which creates a positive feedback cycle of economic growth because original thought is what has by far the greatest value in the modern idea-oriented economy, not mindless obedience to the pact.


(I feel like I'm arguing with Hitler here... I need to take a break before I put my fist through the screen...)

[bobdrake12]

This bill is a major step ... in order to eventually achieve

But the fact is there is *no* Public Option (Single Payer Option) in the Health Care Bill. In addition, the current Health Care Bill isn't even a universal heath care program.

The hell? Did you read anything I wrote?

And a public option is a completely different concept than single payer. Single payer is not an option. It's a SINGLE payer. That leaves no other option.

nevermind... don't know why I'm dealing with you people...

RighteousReason,

Allow me to suggest that you click on the URL below from the Health, Employment, Labor, and Pensions Subcommittee Hearing titled, "Examining the Single Payer Health Care Option":
http://edlabor.house...payer-hea.shtml

With that said, I agree that there is a difference between the two. As defined below:

http://blogs.findlaw...ealth-care.html

Public option is proposed healthcare reform that would give individuals and employers a choice between government-provided healthcare--in a system run similarly to Medicare--or private healthcare. It is a kind of hybrid system between single-payer, or universal, healthcare and the current system serviced primarily by private insurance companies.

Restating my post to get to the core issue I was making:

The fact is there is that the Health Care Bill does not include either the Public Option or Single-Payer.

QUOTE (RighteousReason @ Apr 10 2010, 04:37 PM)
Forcing health insurers to cover pre-existing conditions is like signing up for car insurance after you wreck your car and then forcing the car insurance to pay for it.

Insurance is betting against unexpected, catastrophic expenses. A payment plan is nothing like insurance. And what they are forcefully creating isn't even sustainable as a legitimate payment plan.

This bill is a major step (following many smaller ones before it) to destroying the entire free market health industry on a national scale, in order to eventually achieve their publicly stated goal of creating a tyrannical single payer (government) health system-

On the contrary, all the insurance company needs to do is raise its rates as displayed in the article, "Healthcare overhaul won't stop premium increase":

http://www.latimes.c...0,6096091.story

Public outrage over double-digit rate hikes for health insurance may have helped push President Obama's healthcare overhaul across the finish line, but the new law does not give regulators the power to block similar increases in the future.

And now, with some major companies already moving to boost premiums and others poised to follow suit, millions of Americans may feel an unexpected jolt in the pocketbook.

Although Democrats promised greater consumer protection, the overhaul does not give the federal government broad regulatory power to prevent increases.

This is not surpising since "the original Senate Finance Committee bill was authored by a former Wellpoint VP."

http://fdlaction.fir...alth-care-bill/

This bill is almost identical to the plan written by AHIP, the insurance company trade association, in 2009.

The original Senate Finance Committee bill was authored by a former Wellpoint VP. Since Congress released the first of its health care bills on October 30, 2009, health care stocks have risen 28.35%.

Edited by bobdrake12, 14 April 2010 - 02:03 AM.

[bobdrake12]

Social security, medicare, housing loans, education... the entire regulatory-welfare monster of government that falls outside of it's proper role of protecting individual rights -- has nothing to do with removing parasitic infestation. It's exactly the opposite. It breeds it and protects it. Intentionally. It's the only thing in the world even capable of parasitism, because it's the only thing in the world that can take money from people by force for sustenance without otherwise being subject to justice by means of the government's proper function. Everything else is otherwise subject to voluntary contract. Everything else is otherwise symbiotic.

RighteousReason, there are a number of people who believe in the The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations in 1948 which states, “everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of oneself and one’s family, including food, clothing, housing, and medical care." And they vote in this country.

http://www.nhchc.org/humanright.html

Human Rights, Homelessness and Health Care

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations in 1948, proclaimed that “everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of oneself and one’s family, including food, clothing, housing, and medical care.”

Although this statement of high principle was adopted at the urging of the United States, and although it reflects the truths of our nation’s founding documents, our government has achieved neither formal recognition nor practical realization of these rights. Mass homelessness and the escalating health care crisis in the US are compelling evidence of our disregard for human rights. Sadly, our country is but one of many nations where grave offenses against the dignity of human beings are commonplace, and global enforcement of human rights remains a distant goal. In the US, however, the twin advantages of democratic institutions and great wealth provide the opportunity for our nation to implement the principles human rights. Implementation of human rights principles will lead inexorably to the elimination of mass homelessness.

A useful summary of the international agreements that establish and codify the human right to health care, entitled “The Right to Health Care in the United States: What Does it Mean?” has been published by the Center on Social and Economic Rights, and is available by clicking here or at CESR’s website.

Since 1991, the National Health Care for the Homeless Council has recognized that “every person has the right to adequate food, housing, clothing and health care” and has incorporated a human rights perspective into our work to assure health care for everyone and to ends homelessness. Policy changes that will advance implementation of the right to health care, along with other human rights such as housing, are described in the annual Policy Statements of the National Health Care for the Homeless Council.

A number of important organizations advocate for a rights-based approach to social justice organizing. We call to your attention:

US HUMAN RIGHTS NETWORK
659 Auburn Ave NE,
Unit 205
Atlanta, GA 30312
404/588-9761
www.ushrnetwork.org

Edited by bobdrake12, 14 April 2010 - 02:42 AM.