Don't vote for Ron Paul

You seem to be accepting this. Instead, you should be asking how we change that.

That's not the free market itself caring about anyone. That's individuals caring. Big difference.

 

The only way to change it is to advocate for liberty and support politicians who advocate for liberty, and that's what I do. I'm merely stating that despite my efforts and the efforts of others, we will likely never achieve the kind of ideal we espouse because mobs are irrational and easily manipulated and the powers that be are dead-set against it.

Free markets ARE individuals. The "free market" is just another way of saying "the aggregation of mutually consenting INDIVIDUALS transacting free of coercion and the threat of violence". The "market" and the "individual" are one in the same, inextricable. You cannot disentangle them. And that was never the point. It's obvious that poor people WILL be taken care of under a free market system. No one will be starving on the streets unless they choose to starve.

 

I have been involved with many individuals at school, work and home, and I can say without a doubt that the main reason, in this particular time, for people not critically thinking about politics etc. is this:

They. Don't. Care.

About anything other than their immediate personal lives, as well as entertainment and pop culture.

To sum it up, they're intellectually lazy. They don't expend any more effort into critically thinking about what indirectly effects their lives because they are well, intellectually lazy!

That's why.

Well, let's not get confused about what I'm saying. When I say "the common man > the Big Man", I don't mean "even if the common man is utterly lazy and incompetent and incapable of being and unwilling to be productive, they deserve to be taken care of". We have to get rid of that assumption that right wingers tend to make, before it even starts.

 

And this why we are very unlikely to achieve the kind of ideal that most libertarians and even geoists espouse.

What does that have to do with anything? I never accused you of that. I was merely responding to your assumption that "millions" would starve to death under a free market system. That is obviously not true. The "free market" has proven it is more than willing to care for those in need. Indeed, if so much money wasn't being confiscated by governments, the private charities would probably be in a better position to help people because they would have access to inordinately more capital and resources.

 

Not necessarily. But this leads to a very profound point IMHO. You have to accept one (and only one) of the following:

1. People have the ability (intellectual and otherwise) to escape intellectual laziness and critically think about these issues and understand that libertarianism is the "best" system, or

2. People do not have that ability.

Let's say that 1. is true. In that case, what you've been saying (which is that libertarianism has barely any hope?) is wrong, because it's a matter of somehow getting people to not be so intellectually lazy.

Let's say that 2. is true. In that case, WHY do they even DESERVE liberty in the first place? Isn't the entire reason why libertarians don't see anything wrong with slaughtering animals for human food consumption because of the fact that said animals don't have the ability to appreciate and respect liberty, therefore they don't deserve it?

If 2. is true, that means that (most) people..don't have the ability to appreciate and respect liberty, therefore they don't deserve it. Which would mean that they have no more rights than a slaughtered pig!!

So, which is it? And which (IMHO) profound implication, therefore, is realized?

Let's iron out the above first

 

They have that ability. They are just too brainwashed or self-interested to change.

The points are not related. Your contention about mass starvation in a libertarian society has no basis in fact. Being mistaken on an internet forum isn't the end of the world, friend. You can just concede the point. I promise I won't brag.

 

Then they don't have the ability. Not due to an intellectual lack of capacity, but a lack of other capacities.

The entire argument for being allowed to slaughter and imprison non-human animals is that they can't really appreciate and/or understand liberty. If that's the case, why not slaughter and imprison people who cannot appreciate and/or understand liberty?

In fact this is somewhat of a tangent but, what about severely mentally handicapped people? Can they really understand and appreciate "liberty"?

Well if the Robber Baron lifestyle got big enough, yes it definitely could happen. If.

In some ways, what I'm advocating is a system where voluntaryism (I prefer that term to "libertarianism") occurs, except when tumors among society get too big. Then as a last resort, they're regulated.

To quote a capitalist from another forum:

"Greed is good. Unregulated greed is bad."

 

Unregulated in the sense of Committing Crimes of breaking the three... Life, Liberty and Property. No one is asking for everyone to have the Authority to kill someone and get away with it at all.

 

Well, I interpret "unregulated" in the sense of what Henry George said:

"What has destroyed every previous civilization has been the tendency to the unequal distribution of wealth and power."

Having too large of a government would be tyrannical.

 

One of the major reasons a divergence of wealth occurrs in the first place is due to a large Centralized Government. Your ideals would only work in a transition period which is Free Market Capitalism due in large part of Technological Advances being more rapid to produce a World that doesn't truly require ownership and/or a workforce. Let the transition happen! ;P

 

I agree.

Perhaps.

 

If Gingrich led the life he preached to others, then there would be nothing for the mainstream media to paint about him, but Mr. Family Values spoke out of both sides of his mouth and was recognized as the true hypocrite he really is. Easing him out of of contention by the republican party will eliminate one embarrassment they don't need.

 

Yet funny I don't see the same energy coming from the media that so demonize him with one anal exam after another as they are doing to Palin do the same for people with D in front of their names? Now if there are pictures and online chatter that is something that is just too much fun for them to resist on either side but......

You remember that elderly floida couple that had a device that would intercept other people cell phone conversations and they tape Newt's discussion with one of his colleagues from the house, I think the house whip? The media got so upset about that, like Newt is talking to the House Whip, well you know he is the Speaker of the House? I think they got upset, "they are doing business on their time!" (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*) we just can not have that! Yet the couple that is bugging people's telephones, taping them and then posting them and sending the tapes to the DNC, well they are just concern grandparents that just so happen have this technology with them as they are driving down the highway (minding their own business) in the same direction as Newt! I think one of them said, "You know that was just the craziest thing how that day's drive turned out".

 

I say let's give Sarah Palin's hot piece of MILF meat a chance. she's eye candy at least.

 

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAgrDvgc5UY"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAgrDvgc5UY[/ame]

 

What about Obama? Nobody is more hypocritical in the way they live vs the way they want others to live than him and his wife.

 

First of all, the ending the wars will not destroy anything...IF you are claiming that being at war protects us from terrorist attacks than I have news for you.....
May 19th, 2002: Luke Helder injures 6 by placing pipebombs in mailboxes in the Midwest. Motivation to protest government control over daily lives and the illegality of marijuana and promotion of astral projection

July 4, 2002: An Egyptian gunman opens fire at an El Al ticket counter in Los Angeles International Airport, killing two Israelis before being killed himself.

October 2002: John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo conduct the Beltway Sniper Attacks, killing ten people in various locations throughout the Baltimore-Washington Metropolitan Area from October 2 until they are arrested on October 24.

October 1st, 2005: Joel Henry Hinrichs III detonated a bomb near the packed football stadium at the University of Oklahoma in Norman, Oklahoma killing himself in the process.

March 3, 2006: Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar, an Iranian-born graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, drives an SUV onto a crowded part of campus, injuring nine.

August 30th, 2006: An Afghani Muslim hit 19 pedestrians, killing one, with his SUV in the San Francisco Bay area.

December 22. 2006: Federal Agents disrupt Derrick Shareef’s attack on an Illinois shopping mall planned for December 22. His intent was to commit “violent jihad” just before Christmas.

December 12th, 2008: Woodburn police Capt. Tom Tennant, and Oregon State Police bomb technician Bill Hakim were killed, and Woodburn Police Chief Scott Russell was critically injured after a bomb exploded at the West Coast branch of Wells Fargo in Woodburn. Customer Service Manager Laurie Ann Perkett was taken, and later released from the hospital after being hit by shrapnel. The explosion happened just before 5:30 p.m. while Hakim and Tennant were trying to open the bomb, which Hakim felt confident was not a bomb. Officers were on the scene investigating a bomb threat called in to the bank at 10:19 a.m., when the explosion occurred. Joshua Turnidge and his father, Bruce Turnidge, were charged for the crime, and in December 2010, were found guilty of all charges, including aggravated murder.

June 1, 2009: Little Rock, Arkansas; Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, an American Muslim opened fire on a U.S. military recruiting office. Private William Long was killed and Private Quinton Ezeagwula was wounded.

November 5th, 2009: Killeen, Texas; Nidal Malik Hasan, while serving as a Major in the United States Army, opened fire killing 13 and wounding 30 at Fort Hood.

December 25, 2009: Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab attempts to detonate an explosive on an aircraft enroute from Amsterdam to Detroit. During the incident, the suspect ignites himself on fire until he is extinguished and overpowered by two passengers. The aircraft lands safely in Detroit with the only injuries reported to be the suspect himself and two others.

May 1st, 2010: New York City, New York, United States New York's Times Square was evacuated after the discovery of a car bomb.[46] US government believes radical Islamists in the Pakistani Taliban directed the plot, and may have financed it.

May, 10, 2010: Jacksonville, Florida, United States A man used a pipe bomb to attack a mosque. The bomb exploded while about 60 Muslims were praying in the mosque. The attack caused no injuries.

All of those attacks happened during the wars....So being at wars protects nothing.



Secondly, we already spend way too much on the military....and very little of it goes to things that actually matter, such as better pay for soldiers and better equiptment. Most of the money is used to line the pockets of the Higher ups in the military.

Third, Ron Paul has never advocated drug use. He advocates the right to choose whether you want to do drugs or not. Something I am 100% for. He also advocates even harsher punishments for people who break the law while on drugs, (Such as driving under the influence).

As for his supporting gay marriage, he understands that the government should have no say in whether two consentinga adults are allowed to marry or not. If you have a problem with gays, then that is your problem, you dont have the right to decide whether they are allowed to get married or not.

He's the only true libertarian left in the Republican party.

 

How about you stop calling yourself a conservative, because you really aren't one. You seem like the run of the mill war mongering statist neocon, that has highjacked the GOP, and turned into the farce it is today.

 

funny how the neocons and the progressives can be similar, yet insist that they are polar opposites.

 

This is not a nation founded under God. I hope you remember this when you vote. Fat chance though.

 

Yep, they're two peas in a pod, and not smart enough to figure that fact out.

 

both are just big government statists.
They each fool a different half of the population. Together we are nearly all fooled.

They've done a great job.
Just look at 99% of the posts on PF. "The GOP did this", .....or "The liberals did that". Each side's supporters believe we are just one good piece of legislation away from living the dream.

 

Good grief.. I would NEVER vote for Ron Paul but after your rant I would NEVER vote Republican again... and I was a Republican for 35 years.

Do YOU represent what has happened to the party?

 

lol dont you guys realize this thread is a joke?

 

You're a joke >_> Don't call the "Don't Vote for Ron Paul" thread a joke.