From: John K Clark (johnkc@well.com)
Date: Mon May 05 1997 - 21:38:30 MDT
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On Tue, 06 May 1997 Erik Moeller <flagg@oberberg-online.de> Wrote:
>Education _is_ a real problem. Not only education of the poor, but
>also education of those who are able to buy whole universities.
This is unclear. Are you saying that even the rich will be uneducated and
will just buy a diploma? Or are you saying that if we can't give the poor a
good education we should give everyone a bad education? Or are you just
talking in riddles?
>Money means power
Yes.
>and in a world where some people are much richer than others,
>you will always have explicit power structures.
Unless every human on Earth dies or goes into a comma, power will exist.
Power that is chaotic destroys everything around it, so power that lasts any
length of time is always organized. So when something is organized it has a
structure, so we will always have explicit power structures, so what is your
point?
>Decisions of today are made by this power elite.
Not everyone makes important decisions, so those that do are an elite,
so decisions of today are made by a power elite, so what is your point?
>it's those economic rulers, investment banks [...] They WANT
>government. Government is an easy way to get money (taxes) and to
>invest it the way they want.
True. As I've said before whenever there is a proposal to deregulate an
industry the strongest opposition always come from the industry itself.
>Government therefore doesn't only (or does hardly) do "clever"
>investments. Pushing weapons industry, for example, always helps big
>companies to grow bigger and to crush smaller companies, for it
>doesn't raise the life standard.
True again, and be advocating even more government you'd be playing right
into their hands.
>Remove government and you get a dictatorship of banks / monopolies.
Huh? That is the exact opposite of what you said just one sentence before.
>Freedom? You'll be so free, you'll want to buy a whole load of guns
>in order to defend yourself from street thugs.
Naturally, nothing is free. There will always be street thugs and I will
always want to be protected from them. Today the government says they and
only they may offer this protection, they tell me how much protection I will
get and how many of their guns I must pay for. It makes no difference if I
think others could protect me better, I must give my business to the
government or I go to jail, or worse. I'd like to go to a competitor but
government makes me an offer I can't refuse.
>any communist movement is crushed in its roots, whether by media
>propaganda
It is well known that the only fault of communism was that it allowed total
freedom of the press and they were far too tolerant of those who disagreed
with them. Stalin only killed 20 million of his own people, if he'd shoved 40
or 50 million into ovens everything would have been perfect. Next time,
no more Mr. Nice Guy.
>no free markets and no dictatorships (whereas these two are actually
>the same).
You have something to sell at a price I'm willing to pay and no third party
is forcing us to do anything. Appalling! Totalitarian! Pure dictatorship!
>I advocate efforts to help the poor.
A noble aim, but if most people agree with you then why do we need government?
If most people don't agree with you then how will government help?
>I'm working hard to prove it. Maybe in about 3 or 4 months, maybe in
>a year, I can give you a fully documented analysis of the effects of
>economic liberation (and economy & freedom in general).
Erik, that doesn't sound very scientific. You've already reached your
conclusion, now you just need the evidence. If you're bound and determined to
obtain evidence to support you viewpoint I can guarantee you that is exactly
what you will find, and it doesn't matter in the slightest what that
viewpoint is.
>I find it amusing that certain beliefs must not be questioned on the
>Extropian mailing list.
It's just that most think the Extropian mailing list is no place for
Extropy 101, an idea I disagree with by the way.
John K Clark johnkc@well.com
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