In the smug afterglow of victory, our friends on the left seem to have developed a huge blind spot.
preg_replace('/<\/?p( [^>]*)?>[ ]*/', ' ', preg_replace('/I find it puzzling that I consistently see the same wrongheaded argument being presented to me by my Democrat friends in their desperate efforts to excuse the excesses of the Obama administration. I'll bring up something like massive troop deployments in Afghanistan and Pakistan or unprecedented deficit spending and corporate bailouts, and their rote reply seems to be that I can't criticize Obama because of all the terrible things that Bush did. Further, because I'm a Republican I must be complicit in whatever crimes Bush committed and therefore am disqualified from questioning or criticizing Obama.…
[ ]*/', ' ', ''))
Article comments
26 - Baronius
Roger - You have complained in the past about people addressing a third party rather than stand up to the person they're arguing with. Please do me the courtesy.
You don't seem to understand about my position. I believe that it is our duty to help the poor. I don't believe that government is the best means to help the poor.
And I don't think that health care is antithetical to free speech (which is to say, I'm not completely insane). The point of the distinction I was making is that, when most people claim the higher ground on human rights, they're either talking about the First & Second Freedom, or the Third, and not considering the other side.
27 - Irene Wagner
1-20-13
The Mayans thought we'd have all had enough of it by then, too.
28 - roger nowosielski
Baronius,
All sides and points of view should be considered, Baronius. I'm well aware of that. And I'm also aware that some of the rights of the privileged might have to get abridged (somewhat) to afford the rights of the many. The term for this is distributive justice - and the best example is of offering equal protection under the law, even to those who can least afford it. So yes, there is some balancing act involved (because we can't depend solely on charity and the goodness of the human heart). You and I apparently differ on this; you think it will do the job; I disagree.
Further, as I indicated in an earlier comment addressed to Dave, I don't regard the Constitution as either final or definitive document - a good start, perhaps, but not the epitome of justice.
So here's another point of difference. I don't regards the American society or the American experience as representing the culmination of what's possible. We can do better.
Roger
29 - Cindy
Oh Dave, I wish I had time to sling some mud back at you. But I am off to Cooper Union Square to plot with other people who believe "...that people should have the right to benefit from the fruits of their labor."
(okay here's mud in your eye Dave, just a tad--irresistible)
I suppose you prefer that people should work hard and have all of their production seized by the state for forced redistribution?
Yeah, right Dave...that's what I prefer!?! I think the state has seized your mind. You're babbling.
Does the earth look blue from your planet Dave?
30 - Cindy
Oh, I should have put the event. Never know what kind of people might be reading. They could be foolish, like me.
Haymarket Books presents FIRE THE BOSS: The Worker Control Solution from Buenos Aires to Chicago
With the authors and editors of Sin Patrón: Stories from Argentina´s Worker-Run Factories: lavaca collective, foreword by Naomi Klein and Avi Lewis
7 pm tonight in NYC for anyone who is around. I'll save you a seat.
(p.s. Mark, I'm going to try to make a video.)
31 - Baronius
Roger, this is why we need to be careful when we talk about rights. The traditional 1st/2nd-Freedom-type rights aren't distributive. The 3rd-Freedom-type rights are. That's part of the reason I don't believe that health care, for example, can be called a human right. A human right is something that doesn't cost anything. My right to religion doesn't infringe on your right to religion. If I had a human right to health care, it would be my right to your property. Even recognizing our responsibility to our fellow man, I can't make that jump.
You have a right to your goods. We have a right to your goods. I don't see that I have a right to your goods.
32 - Dave Nalle
Cindy, reflecting back to your earlier comments about "greed" I think I've come to the conclusion that you're a communist and not an actual anarchist. You seem to subscribe to the maxim "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need."
Dave
33 - roger nowosielski
I said, Baronius, it is a balancing act. There's got to be some give and take. Even rights to property I don't regard as absolute and inviolable. That's what distributive justice is about. Taxation is already a form of distributive justice at work, to greater or lesser extent.
Consequently, it's my position that some rights, especially since they're not absolute, may have to be abridged for in order to make room for other rights.
It's just a matter of degree, because the practice has long ago been established (as each of us, you, I and everybody else, are willing or unwilling members of a civil society.
34 - Dave Nalle
The problem, Roger, is that too many of the things you're calling rights are actually services, and there's no requirement that those services have to be provided and paid for with the money of other citizens taken from them by force.
Dave
35 - Christopher Rose
Cindy, you seem to have forgotten your coding; back to html school with you!
36 - roger nowosielski
I think, Dave, it's a matter of time and of getting used to.
"Right to education," "health care"?
I'm certain that "civil rights," once upon a time, sounded odd to the ear. No longer.
You do have a general kind of point, however. And we should tread carefully here lest the concept becomes diluted.
37 - Dave Nalle
Roger, education and healthcare aren't rights. They are services which we as a society have chosen to authorize our government to provide (well, we have with one and we probably will with the other). We made a decision that society would be better off with an educated population. They have hence become accepted entitlements, but that does NOT make them the same as rights. Rights are inherent and unalienable. Entitlements exist at the whim of the government and the people.
Dave
38 - Dr Dreadful
And who decides what actually is 'inherent and unalienable', Dave?
39 - STM
Baron: "A human right is something that doesn't cost anything".
With respect, bollocks, Baron old boy ... it costs a shit-load to buy a gun, or guns, and all that bloody ammo.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on that one.
I see health-care as a basic right and part of the citizen/government contract in return for all the taxes I pay. I'd rather my government spent on that than upping its military expenditure (which is considerable here for a small country since we are still the Deputy Sherriff acting for the US in the south pacific and indian ocean regions).
I also see education as part of that contract between government and people ... and as a basic human right.
If I want to pay over the odds for a private education for my kids (and I did, but only once they were ready for high school), that's a different thing.
But I like the idea that everyone at either a state or private school here is studying the same curriculum and has the same opportunity (in reality in this country, that's part fallacy as we all know the kids in the well-off neighbourhoods do better than those in the lower socio-economic strata) - but at least what's on offer is the same chance if you can grasp it.
And it's provided free, by the state.
And it's a right, not a service.
I couldn't live in a country where a decent education wasn't considered a right. I bet most of you feel the same on the other side of the big, blue pond.
So how does that thinking jell with the notion that these things are services, not rights?
It doesn't, does it?
Remember, too, the Constitution isn't some kind of holy grail. It was written 200 years ago by men, for man, with admonitions from some of the founding fathers that Americans should absolutely change it (for the better, one would suspect) as they saw fit as their new society evolved.
40 - roger nowosielski
STM/Dreadful:
It is somewhat of a slippery slope, this "rights" business. It might help to identify perhaps some basic - "inalienable" rights and derivative ones.
One could look, of course, at the business of education, not just as a government service but as obligation; to call it a right makes that obligation more compelling.
It's complicated further by the fact that at least primary-level education is compulsory: the parents are required to put their kids through public school in lie of other other arrangements (private schools or home-education).
Some rights are recent - the right to privacy, for example, because privacy wasn't of such a value in the past as it is today.
Some states are "right to work" states - another interesting concept.
So it'd seem that Baronius's identification of rights as "something you don't have to pay for" is too simplistic. The right to (adequate) self-defense doesn't come free of charge, and not everyone can avail themselves of this right; public education is taxed; so are your water services (though air and water are supposed to be free). Even "equal protection under the law" is taxed directly or indirectly - as part of the obligation the state has to all its citizens (but in this case, regardless of one's ability to pay).
Anyway, I just threw some complications.
41 - Jordan Richardson
Ha, didn't see this until now.
Dave,
but we agree on the fact that life is more than being fed and housed and not being killed
Life is what you make it, sir. I would agree with you, too, that by the standards of our most fortunate existence we are indeed granted lives that are more than "not being killed" and so forth. Of course, this shows our perspective, doesn't it? And that perspective (or lack of it) was the basic architecture of my point. Before we can strive for more out of life, we must have the very basics.
Now that's a helluva tangent from the point I was making in addressing Archie so vigorously, but I suppose it can't be helped.
you are a sad and pathetic drone who deserves the world which Obama wants to create for you.
Interesting comment here. First of all, it relies on the relatively absurd notion that Obama wants to create a "world" of some design, as though his presidency is going to upset or utterly change the apple cart of corruption, greed, slavery, and warfare that you Yanks have got rolling along pretty swiftly down there. Let's face facts, dude: he's not going to change anything about the structure of human life on this earth. At all. You will still be able to earn money, you will not be a socialist, corruption will still be the rule of law in Congress, and so forth. No worries, Dave. It'll be business as usual and he'll keep the seat warm for the next right winger to take office, brag about shrinking the size of governments while growing the coffers of corporations, and keep the downward spiral going until even Canada hates your ass.
I'd like to know what the "better, more important things to be angry about" if liberty and individual rights are of no interest to you.
Poverty, war, the environment, racism, etc. You're working with a political mythos, Dave, admit it. You have yet to define anything CLEAR about where this anger is directed and it's all small potatoes by the standards of the majority of the world. I know, I know...you don't care about the majority of the world. You only care that your "right" to own a second home and have a hot pool boy is maintained. Honestly, Dave, and I mean this sincerely: fuck that.
Life is more. You're damn right.
Jordan are happy to accept that if their bellies are full and they get 350 channels of cable.
Let me know when I should start worrying about YOUR rights being taken away, Dave. Seriously. Present something tangible, something that matters in the grand scheme of things, and I'll discuss it with you. No hyperbolic statements, no stretched facts, nothing like that. Just good, honest discussion without political paint all over it.
42 - Dave Nalle
I see health-care as a basic right and part of the citizen/government contract in return for all the taxes I pay.
Stan, it's either a basic right or it's part of the social contract. It can't be both. The social contract picks up where fundamental rights leave off, and is flexible and negotiated between the people and their government. Rights are inflexible and non-negotiable and exist outside of and above the social contract.
I also see education as part of that contract between government and people ... and as a basic human right.
Again, a contradiction. As a society you decided to provide education because it was better for the society that you do so. That means that education came after the more basic rights which government is supposed to recognize and protect.
Either that or you believe that ALL rights are consensus rights, and that means that you accept the idea that government can take your life, your liberty and your property at the whim of the majority, which means you accept and delegate the possibility of tyranny to your government. I don't.
And it's provided free, by the state.
It's free? None of your tax money goes to education? Wow. How did they manage that?
The truth is that you pay for it with your taxes and that makes it a service, not a right. The right you have is to delegate the provision of that service to the government. The service itself is not a right.
I couldn't live in a country where a decent education wasn't considered a right. I bet most of you feel the same on the other side of the big, blue pond.
Not exactly the same. I certainly wouldn't want to live in a country where I didn't have the option of paying through taxes or direct payment to the school to educate my kids, but I accept the fact that it's a service which I pay for rather than engaging in some fantasy that it's free and a right.
So how does that thinking jell with the notion that these things are services, not rights?
It doesn't, does it?
No, it doesn't. Because you are living under the illusion that your income belongs to the government and your salary is just a gift from the state.
Remember, too, the Constitution isn't some kind of holy grail. It was written 200 years ago by men, for man, with admonitions from some of the founding fathers that Americans should absolutely change it (for the better, one would suspect) as they saw fit as their new society evolved.
The Constitution, like any set of laws, recognizes and protects rights, but does not grant them. Rights are superior to and exist independent of any human law. They are natural to the human condition.
Dave
43 - STM
Arch: "Do you consider it a right that someone from the government should wipe your ass?"
No, Arch, you rude American b.st.rd, I don't. We don't have donkeys here anyhow.
On topic, I have top cover private health-insurance too. But because I don't live in America (thank christ, if some of the comments on here are any example), the thought process in regards to this might be somewhat different.
Even though I pay my own way, like all Australians, I still pay tax to fund the universal health care program in this country - which entitles me to use whatever bits of it I need to and whenever I need to.
It's not free, though. There's no such thing as a free lunch. It's just a whole lot easier easier and waaaaay fairer. And everyone gets the right to decent treatment, not just those like me who can pay above the odds.
America is the only place in the civilised world where a large proportion of people find the idea of UHC unpalatable, and an improper use of taxes.
I don't suppose it would ever occur to you that you're wrong and the rest of us are right?
It's a bit like the bloke locked up in the asylum who thinks everyone but him is mad.
44 - Dave Nalle
Interesting comment here. First of all, it relies on the relatively absurd notion that Obama wants to create a "world" of some design, as though his presidency is going to upset or utterly change the apple cart of corruption, greed, slavery, and warfare that you Yanks have got rolling along pretty swiftly down there. Let's face facts, dude: he's not going to change anything about the structure of human life on this earth. At all. You will still be able to earn money, you will not be a socialist, corruption will still be the rule of law in Congress, and so forth. No worries, Dave. It'll be business as usual and he'll keep the seat warm for the next right winger to take office, brag about shrinking the size of governments while growing the coffers of corporations, and keep the downward spiral going until even Canada hates your ass.
Well, if we can get Canada to hate us then we really will have succeeded. But the truth is that Obama does want to change the basic structure of how many things are done here in the US. He wants to massively increase the power of the state to interfere in almost every aspect of our lives, increase the role played by central government planning, and reduce our liberties substantially. All of that while still preserving the corruption you mention and probably expanding on it.
And you're wrong about the next right-winger to sit in the White House. There's a pretty good chance that if we do manage to get Obama out we'll put in a much more radical and reform-oriented Republican administration which will actually change how things are done. If we're ever allowed a shot at it, anyway.
Poverty, war, the environment, racism, etc. You're working with a political mythos, Dave, admit it. You have yet to define anything CLEAR about where this anger is directed and it's all small potatoes by the standards of the majority of the world.
Your poverty, war and racism all stem from the denial of basic rights by government. Fix that and you fix the symptoms you mention.
I know, I know...you don't care about the majority of the world. You only care that your "right" to own a second home and have a hot pool boy is maintained. Honestly, Dave, and I mean this sincerely: fuck that.
Again, you focus on irrelevancies becasue you can't face the reality of how much you have already given up, and you seem to gloat over the fact that Americans are apparently trying to catch up in the race to give up liberties.
Let me know when I should start worrying about YOUR rights being taken away, Dave. Seriously. Present something tangible, something that matters in the grand scheme of things, and I'll discuss it with you. No hyperbolic statements, no stretched facts, nothing like that. Just good, honest discussion without political paint all over it.
Read my articles, Jordan. That's what they're all about.
Dave
45 - Dave Nalle
America is the only place in the civilised world where a large proportion of people find the idea of UHC unpalatable, and an improper use of taxes.
I don't suppose it would ever occur to you that you're wrong and the rest of us are right?
Stan, in actuality neither approach to health care is wrong or right. They are both valid choices. Some nations have opted for universal healthcare, some like Australia have a hybrid system. Even the US provides a universal healthcare safety-net. We have just chosen not to go as far as most other nations, leaving more choice up to the individual. That doesn't mean that we reject other ways of resolving our healthcare needs in concept, we've just chosen a different route.
Dave
46 - STM
Dave: "Stan, it's either a basic right or it's part of the social contract. It can't be both ... rights are natural to the human condition."
Who says, Dave?? You??
Now let's see ... who made up those rules?
First, it's 2009, not 1688 or 1776, so whoever decided that the rights you talk about were the ONLY basic and intrinsic human rights rights probably doesn't have a snowflake's chance in hell of convincing anyone in the civilised world that those are the only things natural to the human condition in the 21st century.
We live in a different world.
In 1066, no one would have thought that the notion of free speech (against the government, or the monarch) was a basic human right. It actually wasn't considered so. We know it is, but it wasn't then and you would have had a harde job of convincing a lot of people that it was their right.
If Americans think the right to bear arms is a basic right, Australians believe the right to carry their Medicare cards is a basic right. Seriously, what's the difference? Both offer protections to the wellbeing of the person, both have been paid for by the individual (one way or another) and are potential lifesavers.
I consider education and health care to be my rights, even if you don't ... and I don't live over there so I'm not constrained by this bollocks.
In fact these things ARE regarded by the government here as basic rights, along with those you consider natural to the human condition. We are the government - our representatives working on our behalf and with our mandate.
I understand and appreciate the ideological wellspring of your thought, which is why I think you're making sh.t up as you go along, again, Dave, tossing everything in that libertarian marinade before it goes on the grill.
At best, it's hair-splitting and semantics. Just because it doesn't fit the libertarian notion of what consitutes a right natural to the human condition as defined by the founding fathers, the Saxons, the Bible, judeo-christian religious tradition, English law, Thomas Jefferson and John Locke, doesn't mean it isn't a right.
Plenty of people with equally valid notions of what constitutes a right natural to the human condition have appeared in the years between.
And on my salary. Why would you think I'd even consider it a f.cking gift to the state. I willingly give them a portion of it so they can do the things I elected them to do.
There's a fair difference there.
No taxation = no government = anarchy.
47 - Dave Nalle
Dave: "Stan, it's either a basic right or it's part of the social contract. It can't be both ... rights are natural to the human condition."
Who says, Dave?? You??
Well, I certainly agree. But the reason we say this is that for centuries man has made a study of man and again and again those who have engaged in that study have come to the conclusion that certain rights are natural to human existence.
First, it's 2009, not 1688 or 1776, so whoever decided that the rights you talk about were the ONLY basic and intrinsic human rights rights probably doesn't have a snowflake's chance in hell of convincing anyone in the civilised world that those are the only things natural to the human condition in the 21st century.
The date doesn't have anything to do with whether rights are valid or exist or not. The basic natural rights underly all the other "rights" you talk about which derive from them. You can rename things and argue about the date, but that doesn't change the reality of it.
We live in a different world.
I don't.
In 1066, no one would have thought that the notion of free speech (against the government, or the monarch) was a basic human right. It actually wasn't considered so. We know it is, but it wasn't then and you would have had a harde job of convincing a lot of people that it was their right.
Not knowing that you have a right does not mean that the right does not exist.
If Americans think the right to bear arms is a basic right, Australians believe the right to carry their Medicare cards is a basic right. Seriously, what's the difference? Both offer protections to the wellbeing of the person, both have been paid for by the individual (one way or another) and are potential lifesavers.
The right to bear arms derives directly from the basic right to life and to protect that life from external threats. Your healthcare card derives from society's interpretation of the right to life by a more indirect method. It's still a valid entitlement because your society agreed on it, but it's not as close to the root as the right to self defense.
I consider education and health care to be my rights, even if you don't ... and I don't live over there so I'm not constrained by this bollocks.
You can call them rights if you want, but they're still services you contract with government to provide for you because you believe that they are good for society.
In fact these things ARE regarded by the government here as basic rights, along with those you consider natural to the human condition. We are the government - our representatives working on our behalf and with our mandate.
If they were basic rights then you would be entitled to them WITHOUT paying taxes. If you chose not to pay taxes would the government give you free education and healthcare?
Compare that to free speech or freedom of religion. Do you pay taxes to have free speech? Do you expect government to subsidize your church with tax dollars?
I understand and appreciate the ideological wellspring of your thought, which is why I think you're making sh.t up as you go along, again, Dave, tossing everything in that libertarian marinade before it goes on the grill.
Not really, Stan. I'm just looking at these things rationally. There really is a functional difference between services the government provides to which you are entitled as a citizen and rights which do not derive from the government or the social contract.
At best, it's hair-splitting and semantics. Just because it doesn't fit the libertarian notion of what consitutes a right natural to the human condition as defined by the founding fathers, the Saxons, the Bible, judeo-christian religious tradition, English law, Thomas Jefferson and John Locke, doesn't mean it isn't a right.
Like I said, you can choose to call it a right, but there are clear functional differences between the "rights" granted by government and rights which exist whether government is involved or not.
And on my salary. Why would you think I'd even consider it a f.cking gift to the state. I willingly give them a portion of it so they can do the things I elected them to do.
So again, you admit that you are paying for services with your taxes.
Dave
48 - Cindy
#33
Dave,
That's true. I love that idea 'from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.' Sounds a bit like how a family works doesn't it? Perfect. I'm open to other things too. But really I think that idea is pretty darn good.
It's the stuff in the middle that I don't like about what Communists believe: the socialist state, supposedly needed to enforce the interests of the proletariat, the withering away of that state. Communists don't really think about authority enough in my opinion.
Funny though, in the Paris Commune, for all the different politics, people cooperated to quickly implemented a lot of sane ideas. I think anarchists, Communists, socialists, are three different visions of the same drive toward human sanity. I don't see it as any surprise that they could learn from each other and cooperate. I am interested in working with these other people, and their visions, as allies. This is how I think the world will change--recognizing the similarities in the main and working through the differences--not by staunch rejection based on ideology.
Anyway, the world that Anarchists and Communists desire to create looks very much like the same thing to me. But Communists seem focused on Marx's 'formula' for how to get there. I don't think that is a good thing. Anarchists are trying to realize that world directly--without an intervening authoritarian state.
I'm pretty easy-going Dave. I'm likely to go along with whatever kind of Anarchist ideas work at the time when we see what is needed. I like the Anarchists without adjectives sort of thinking. Unless the adjectives relate to private property (anarcho-capitalism, agorism, individualism, etc.) Private property is unacceptable in a free society. No way around it; it could never be justified.
Feel free to call me a Communist though. I mean you call Obama a Communist, don't you? You have a pretty open definition going on there. But recognize that I do have problems with some of the ideas. Still, I do like Communists an awful lot-- the ones I've met or chatted with, so far.
49 - Dave Nalle
That's true. I love that idea 'from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.' Sounds a bit like how a family works doesn't it? Perfect. I'm open to other things too. But really I think that idea is pretty darn good.
It's not how my family works. I teach my kids responsibility and self reliance and that seems to work quite well.
But clearly, you're a communist, so you can stop pretending to be an anarchist.
It's the stuff in the middle that I don't like about what Communists believe: the socialist state, supposedly needed to enforce the interests of the proletariat, the withering away of that state.
You don't like the withering of the state? So you're an authoritarian too? The hypothetical withering of the state -- which never really happens -- is one of the few positive ideas in communism.
Communists don't really think about authority enough in my opinion.
Odd, in my experience they're all about authority.
Funny though, in the Paris Commune, for all the different politics, people cooperated to quickly implemented a lot of sane ideas.
Like executing thousands of innocents solely because they were wealthy and productive. I think we see where you are coming from.
I think anarchists, Communists, socialists, are three different visions of the same drive toward human sanity.
And yet all three inevitably end in tyranny. I think it's the tyranny you really like.
I don't see it as any surprise that they could learn from each other and cooperate. I am interested in working with these other people, and their visions, as allies. This is how I think the world will change--recognizing the similarities in the main and working through the differences--not by staunch rejection based on ideology.
Why should we NOT reject ideologies which are proven failures?
Anyway, the world that Anarchists and Communists desire to create looks very much like the same thing to me. But Communists seem focused on Marx's 'formula' for how to get there. I don't think that is a good thing. Anarchists are trying to realize that world directly--without an intervening authoritarian state.
And yet, what they get is that authoritarian state anyway.
I'm pretty easy-going Dave. I'm likely to go along with whatever kind of Anarchist ideas work at the time when we see what is needed. I like the Anarchists without adjectives sort of thinking. Unless the adjectives relate to private property (anarcho-capitalism, agorism, individualism, etc.) Private property is unacceptable in a free society. No way around it; it could never be justified.
And yet it is the primary and fundamental basis for a free society. So you're fine with any society so long as it is not free.
Feel free to call me a Communist though.
Already did.
I mean you call Obama a Communist, don't you?
Actually not yet. I think he's a state-corporatist, which is quite different but maybe just as bad.
You have a pretty open definition going on there. But recognize that I do have problems with some of the ideas. Still, I do like Communists an awful lot-- the ones I've met or chatted with, so far.
You should meet and chat with some of the ones I've met and chatted with. The ones that sent people I knew to the gulags and mental institutions.
Dave
50 - Cindy
Dave,
It's not how my family works. I teach my kids responsibility and self reliance and that seems to work quite well.
'From each according to his ability to each according to his need.'
What does that statement mean to you Dave? This is very interesting. It's like we have two completely different pictures in mind while imagining that idea.
I guide children toward responsibility and self-reliance as well. So, why do you think we still have such a different idea of what that would look like?.
It's as if you can only see through a Capitalist's eyes. You can't seem to imagine beyond that. I'd guess you think that the statement means something like a few hard-workers should support a lot of lazy people.
It's sort of this cutout that you apply to the world and that's the only way it makes sense to you. As if everything would stay the same and only the economics would change.
Here is how it works in a family Dave. The children aren't fending for themselves, nor are the aged or the infirm. When your wife is ill and in bed you don't tell her 'too bad...take care of yourself'. You feed your children...they probably partake in the work around the home (even if it's some authoritarian arrangement--like ordering them to--rather than a natural growth of responsibility as a normal event that all people do). If your parent were ill you would support her/him. Older children would babysit younger ones.
That's not how your family works Dave?
51 - roger nowosielski
"In 1066, no one would have thought that the notion of free speech (against the government, or the monarch) was a basic human right. It actually wasn't considered so. We know it is, but it wasn't then and you would have had a harde job of convincing a lot of people that it was their right."
I like your point, STM. Just goes to show how perceptions change over time.
Same with the right to privacy I alluded to earlier. It wasn't considered important in times past. But today, it is a right.
52 - roger nowosielski
By the same token, certain "rights" considered sacrosanct by some - because so posited by the founders - may comes to be abridged or regarded as less than absolute, such as the right to property, for instance. They're already abridged and subject to eminent domain, e.g.; and land ownership is not absolute either but held as a fief - can't think of the proper legal term. And one would certainly be hard put to argue it's an unalienable right, when it's more a reflection of existing or dominant social arrangements and often resulting from fortuitous circumstances - such as who was the first to stake the land, or who was more powerful to take possession of it and dispossess the previous occupant.
53 - Cindy
I'll read the rest of your post later, Dave. I started, but it seems very hostile. I realize that I brought it on myself for being snarky in my earlier comments. But, still I was being critical in a friendly sort of way (or I thought so). You are just intentionally distorting and being plain mean.
You're like a crazed McCarthyite.
(I don't think Les Slater would want to throw anyone into a gulag. I like him and every other Communist I've talked to since.)
54 - roger nowosielski
"Not knowing that you have a right does not mean that the right does not exist."
Correct, but that's no argument as to what some may consider as "rights" you disagree. Your disagreement, in short, may just be a reflection and a function of your inability to see far enough.
55 - roger nowosielski
"There really is a functional difference between services the government provides to which you are entitled as a citizen and rights which do not derive from the government or the social contract."
I would tend to agree, Dave, and add "fundamental difference." What's considered "natural rights" give rise to a social contract and installing the apparatus of the State; and if the state fails in this respect, it's reason enough to abolish the state. So the idea of "social contract" has mostly to do with the state undertaking the protection of "natural rights" for all against any and all encroachment, including by the state itself. The derivative rights are those which follow, by extension, from "natural rights."
There is somewhat of a confusion, then, when you do speak of "the social contract" apart from this meaning - to refer to other "government services," as you have put it.
56 - STM
Lol. Dave, you've hilariously gone back to madly dissecting posts and commenting on each bit.
None of which make any more sense than any of your other answers.
You've might have the hide of an elephant, but your answers look robotic to me.
A liber-bot.
Same sh.t, different day :)
Bit quiet up there in Austin today mate?
57 - STM
Dave: "Not knowing that you have a right does not mean that the right does not exist."
True. Most Americans don't realise they have the right to free healthcare, although more and more of them are startying to realise that the right not to have lunatics take potshots at you is another of those fundamental, inalienable human rights.
One that can only be achieved by canning the absurd 2nd amemdment.
58 - roger nowosielski
That could well be a good argument, STM, against firearms. Since they're so costly and obviously not affordable be every Tom, Dick and Harry, the right to self-defense is not equally distributed throughout the society: only the well-to-do can afford adequate protection.
So either abolish firearms or arm everyone to the teeth at government's expense.
I wonder now how this proposition would sit with the NRA crew which, if I'm not mistaken, tends to regard itself as a kind of private, social club.
59 - Jordan Richardson
Dave, our disagreement essentially stems from our basic fundamental differences in the types of liberty we desire.
You appear to desire liberty from certain things, like government, so that you can conduct business as usual, earn a decent wage, and take care of your family. I, on the other hand, desire positive liberty.
Your philosophy stems on the notion of freedom from being prevented to accomplish your goals. A good example of this would be in the corporate world, where a corporation would utilize the principles of liberty to ensure that they have no interference from government or outside forces to maximize profit.
I, on the other hand, would prefer a society in which we all have the freedom to earn what we work for, and so forth. The individual must have the right to fully develop themselves and exercise their freedom. Workers should own and control the means of production and all that Red stuff, I guess.
I would add, however, that any such liberty passed down to the masses by the government would be more akin to a loan of freedom because the power ultimately rests with the politicians in such a case. So while you would like a government, albeit it small one, to provide protection from things that would inhibit your ability to earn, live freely, and earn some more, I would prefer a lack of government entirely.
Now, that's a dream, but what the hell? I've been called worse.
60 - Cindy
Sorry Big C,
I didn't forget my html. I just got flustered. It registered for a moment how many Daves there are in the world and I went berserk.
Nice site btw for info on CSS.
61 - Cindy
Jordan, have you ever seen The Corporation? It might interest you.
THE FILM, IN 23 CHAPTERS, ON YOUTUBE
62 - Jordan Richardson
Own it. Great documentary, it should be required viewing in schools.
63 - Cindy
Jordan, A teacher is doing that in Essex, Ontario - The Corporation in the 8th grade classroom.