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Milton Friedman on government and private enterprise

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  1. #376
    JKDS's Avatar
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    Also, I would totally use a gun to stop someone from poisoning people. It doesnt really matter to me whether it is intentional, malicious, or accidental poisoning.

    There isnt an immediate need for a gun though. Your first action should be a dialogue. But should a dialogue fail, I would easily use a gun.

    ----

    On a different note; I'm pro-government, and pro-small government. I dont say that enough, because it tends to not be relevant to the conversation. Half the reason I argue with wuf is because government needs funding, so I'm pro-taxes. (Though they are way too freakin high).
  2. #377
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    Quote Originally Posted by JKDS View Post
    A robbery is inherently violent. It's defined as theft + force or threat of force.

    Gimme your wallet = theft
    Gimme your wallet or I'll beat the shit out of you = robbery
    OK.

    Then I misspoke about the thing I said about not inherently violent. I wonder if Penn was using a legal definition, there, but it's not really relevant aside from wuf and I arguing about what he meant, which I'm not into.

    ***
    I think the point about the cyanide is that if you tell them, "Hey, cyanide is a poison." and they're all, "OMG! We didn't know!" then they proceed to pay the medical expenses of anyone poisoned by them and paid any other legally appropriate damages, then also stop using cyanide in all of their food products, then no gun is necessary.

    Otherwise, the gun is necessary. And by "gun" I mean gov't regulation w/ legal consequences.
  3. #378
    CoccoBill's Avatar
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    ^I would think Penn meant whether using violence is on the table, not that it'd be the first option.

    I figured Penn to mean that he'd accept the use of force to stop someone from harming others, but he wouldn't accept it to make someone do something against his will. Putting cyanide in the food you sell, whether knowingly or unknowingly, would IMO fall under harming others. Of course, we'd have to ask him. Either way, there's a lot of grey in that area and I'm not entirely sure where to draw the line.
    Last edited by CoccoBill; 08-20-2016 at 03:05 AM.
    Our brains have just one scale, and we resize our experiences to fit.

  4. #379
    JKDS mentioned he thinks taxes are too high. I'm curious as to how taxes should be lower. What I'm getting at is the question: what are the sustainable ideals behind having a society with lower taxes?

    Let's take welfare for example. Could I design a welfare program that benefits people greatly and is much cheaper? Yes, absolutely. For the curious, I'd do something like this link. The short is that only those being productive would get help. Those who are able-bodied yet refuse to be productive would receive no help. The method would be one that incentivizes self-sufficiency and helps people get off dependency. Anyways, I mention this because, well, do I think this is a sustainable political ideal? Um, not really. As long as legislators and executives have power over a field and collect taxes and are managed at the ultimate level only by votes from citizens, I think that the political reality will be one of rent seeking and other factors that turn the welfare state into a mess that benefits only a myriad of special interests at the expense of the whole.

    In part, this appears to me to be why I'm so anti-government. I would love for government to be better, to be scientific and reasoned. But tbh I don't think it can except in how it is forbidden to intervene. For the interested, there is an irony in my lefty pro-government education. I took a class on American government, and it didn't push anything anti-government whatsoever and was mostly pro-government. But the thing that stuck with me the most was the lesson of the US Constitution. The Bill of Rights doesn't give people freedoms because it designates them; it gives people freedoms by forbidding the government itself to intrude in the arena. The law doesn't grant us free speech; it forbids the lawmakers to prohibit our free speech. It is from this I think I ultimately derive my anti-government beliefs.
    Last edited by wufwugy; 08-20-2016 at 07:16 PM.
  5. #380
    MadMojoMonkey's Avatar
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    Only federal law-makers, though.
  6. #381
    It appears that by structure the feds supersede. For example, if a state government said "yo sucka no free speech" the supreme court would still rule based on federal law. At least I think that's correct.
  7. #382
    MadMojoMonkey's Avatar
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    That's the way it works, now, due to SCOTUS ruling so.

    The original interpretation did not work out like that. It's not the structure of the constitution or the bill of rights, but the structure of current implementation.
  8. #383
    I mean, I'm fine with that interpretation as to the mechanism for how the rights are handed down. As far as I can tell, judicial review became a thing by somewhat unintended consequence of the Constitution.

    However, I'll appeal to the wording of the 1st Amendment:

    Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
    This is prohibiting the lawmaking by government with regard to abridging these particular elements.
  9. #384
    I'll add that I think without these prohibitions of government intervention, westerners would be far less free, about as less as we were back when absolute monarchies reigned. I believe that even Europe, without these constitutional prohibitions of government, still mostly practices them because America sets the cultural and political standard.
  10. #385
    MadMojoMonkey's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    This is prohibiting the lawmaking by government with regard to abridging these particular elements.
    "The lawmaking" by "government"?

    That covers non-American laws and governments. I'm sure you can choose a more precise way to tell me your interpretation of the bill of rights, but that wont change the fact that the wording very plainly does not include states' legislatures.

    It says, "Congress shall not..." It doesn't say, "No congress shall..." It doesn't say, "No law shall..."
    In no place in the US Constitution does it say anything about any state having a congress. It references state legislatures, but no state congress. It says, "No state shall, without the consent of Congress..." a lot in Article I, Section 10.

    It's interesting, at least, that the first amendment starts with "Congress..." and not, "The Congress..." as is the usage in the Constitution (at least most of the time... I scanned it quickly looking for the word congress and noted that it was always "the Congress" with the definite article and capital C.)

    At any rate, I don't read the amendment as talking about any Congress but the Congress laid out in the document, i.e. the US Congress.
  11. #386
    Quote Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey View Post
    "The lawmaking" by "government"?

    That covers non-American laws and governments. I'm sure you can choose a more precise way to tell me your interpretation of the bill of rights, but that wont change the fact that the wording very plainly does not include states' legislatures.

    It says, "Congress shall not..." It doesn't say, "No congress shall..." It doesn't say, "No law shall..."
    In no place in the US Constitution does it say anything about any state having a congress. It references state legislatures, but no state congress. It says, "No state shall, without the consent of Congress..." a lot in Article I, Section 10.

    It's interesting, at least, that the first amendment starts with "Congress..." and not, "The Congress..." as is the usage in the Constitution (at least most of the time... I scanned it quickly looking for the word congress and noted that it was always "the Congress" with the definite article and capital C.)

    At any rate, I don't read the amendment as talking about any Congress but the Congress laid out in the document, i.e. the US Congress.
    The Constitution supersedes. That is elsewhere in the Constitution. This is why you hear about SCOTUS striking down or upholding state laws from time to time. It does so based on constitutional principles (or at least their interpretation of them, some of which SCOTUS has egregiously bastardized, like Dred Scott and Wickard v. Filburn).
  12. #387
    FWIW, my point here doesn't necessitate an abolition of government. It simply suggests the role of government is to rigorously prohibit the prohibition of "natural" rights.
  13. #388
    MadMojoMonkey's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    The Constitution supersedes. That is elsewhere in the Constitution.
    Show me.

    I gave you a link to the document in the post you quoted.
  14. #389
    JKDS's Avatar
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    Google "incorporation bill of rights".

    Tldr, most of the bill of rights now applies to the states because of the 14th amendment.

    While most states had similar/identical rights in their state constitutions, the incorporation of the bill of rights meant you citizens now have a minimum set of rights. The state could give you more rights, but at minimum you have these ones.

    The biggest impact of incorporation, imo, is on the 4th amendment and the restrictions on searches and seizures. Example, Miranda v Arizona

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