From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Tue Jul 30 2002 - 18:35:11 MDT
Randall writes
> > I say that their reason and experience should cause them to
> > conclude that they should obey even the laws they disagree
> > with, (fanciful exceptions aside,
>
> With the number of deaths attributed to government in the 20th
> century alone standing at well over 100 million people, I hardly
> think you can call exceptions 'fanciful'. The word seems to
> imply that you believe that people just make up these things,
> or that such things can't happen where you live, so aren't
> worth worrying about.
>
> > and it being understood
> > that one lives in a fundamentally democratic society).
What, did you start replying even before you got to the end
of the sentence? :-) It's clear I meant democratic
societies, and that totally and specifically excludes
the 20th century holocausts.
> It seems to me that the only bearing brought by living in a
> "fundamentally democratic society" is the assumption that laws
> in such a society will be more likely to be good laws. If
> that is the case, why not cut to the chase and advocate good
> laws?
Yes, laws made by democratic societies are mostly better, but
you sound as though that's the only reason to support democracy.
> If that isn't why you support "fundamentally democratic" societies,
> why do you?
Yes, we should always "cut to the chase" and advocate the
enactment of good laws. Of course. But democracy (or
republicanism) also causes power and influence to be spread
more evenly, encourages openness, and teaches cooperation.
(Think of kids holding elections in schools.) A benign
dictatorship somehow guaranteed to produce only laws that
were just would still be a worse place.
> > Democracy is the least worst
> > of governments because of that feedback from the voters.
>
> Democracy may be better than other forms of government.
> However, even democracy gave us WWII and the slaughter
> of the Native Americans.
Sorry, but that's utter nonsense. World War II was brought
about by the imperialistic ambitions of Germany and Japan.
Had they been democratic, it wouldn't have happened.
What befell the Native Americans would have been
vastly worse had the U.S. not been a democracy, with
Indian advocates occasionally carrying the day. Look
at how imperial Spain dealt with the natives if you
want a good comparison. Next, imagine if Andrew Jackson
really had been as big a dictator as his detractors said:
what happened to the Cherokees at his hands would have
been nothing compared to what would then have happened
elsewhere in the U.S. No, in every case, whether its
Britain's management of its African and Indian colonies,
or Frances, life for the natives would have been infinitely
worse under Mussolini, Tojo, or the Germans.
> There has never been a nation ruled by laws. Such a thing
> sounds nice, but those who enforce the laws still must
> choose to do so. President Jefferson of the US acknowledged
> that he was violating the Constitution himself during his
> term in the early 1800s.
Again, you pick one exception by one American president to
conclude that "there never has been a nation ruled by law".
Since ancient times, many societies have indeed been held
in check by the laws, and innumerable times otherwise
nearly omnipotent dictators had to bow before it. In
most major countries in the world today, those in power
have utterly no choice but to obey the law. Why didn't
Nixon just order the arrest of all those pesky scoundrels
in Congress the way that Indira Ghandi did? Simple: India
had not yet evolved to the point that it's at today.
> I would be much happier with a government which was actually
> limited to the Constitution of the US than I am with what we
> have now. :)
Yes, that would be nice. But it would first need to be
established that the constitution meant what a typical
educated man in the street who could read English would
think it meant. "Says here the right to bear arms shall
not be infringed, see? So where can I order an a-bomb?"
It would take us several generations and a lot of
amendments to even get close.
> > Or, since it is impossible to avoid math errors, why should
> > one even try? Or since it is impossible to be objective, why
> > should anyone try? I'm really surprised that the quest for
> > certainty has popped up here. You can't be serious.
>
> But it *is* possible to avoid math errors. :) The point I'm
> trying to make is that since most people are already lawbreakers,
> striving not to break the law in order not to be a lawbreaker
> is quixotic.
I think that you knew what I meant: one never frees himself
or herself from occasional math errors, nor, because of the
huge number of laws, entirely free oneself from breaking
them. The way that we mostly use the term, a "lawbreaker"
is someone who routinely breaks serious laws at a much higher
frequency than the rest of us. Pedantic efforts to obscure
that fact doesn't change it. I'd bet anything that you
really knew what was attempting to be communicated.
> At the same time, it is also true that the majority of actual
> prison inmates are people who are just like the average person
> on the street, except that he or she was in the wrong place at
> the wrong time, or angered the wrong person.
Still seems incorrect to me every time I read that and similar
statements. Presumably you're talking about drug offenses.
So am I to infer that you think that the majority of people
take drugs but don't get caught? Do you have an even more
amazing claim that a very large fraction of people in jail
merely made a cop angry, or pissed off a judge, or fell
a foul of some important person's personal displeasure?
I don't understand.
Lee
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