From: Miriam English (miriam@werple.net.au)
Date: Wed Jul 18 2001 - 19:47:45 MDT
At 01:37 PM 18/07/2001 -0400, Mike Lorrey wrote:
>Tiberius Gracchus wrote:
> > flawed: with no govt, the rich/ the professional
> > associations/corporations/lobbyists will just buy squads of goons to
> > get their way.
>No, we don't expect a government to enforce law and order. I suggest you
>read David Friedman's "The Machinery of Freedom" first to get a more
>accurate perception of libertarian arguments. Most of what you are
>saying will go away.
[groan... I was going to lessen my involvement in this thread]
I don't expect that anything I say will affect you Mike, but here goes...
I have a friend from the Phillipines. She told me about how things worked
over there. It is slightly less of a problem now, but much of it still stands.
The extremely rich have their own private armies. Most of the poor have
absolutely no chance of getting out of poverty to become more useful
members of society; they are born into slavery and will spend their lives
that way. There were no controls upon the rich and powerful... there still
are few.
Again with the disclaimer: I don't think capitalism is bad. I think
excessive power too often leads to abuse of that power. One natural
outgrowth of capitalism is concentration of power into fewer and fewer
hands... just like most political systems. Use of capitalism as a
substitute religion encourages uncritical acceptance of such a fate.
- Miriam
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Q. What is the similarity between an elephant and a grape?
A. They are both purple... except for the elephant.
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http://werple.net.au/~miriam
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Virtual Reality Association http://www.vr.org.au
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