No company should be prevented from selling their products directly to the public. Land of the free indeed.

You're correct, but the problem you mention is nothing to do with capitalism. If you're suugesting that socialism is a solution to that then you're advocating that the state actively harms people to help those in need.

The only ethical way to help people in need is via compassion and charity. Since government enforced wealth redistribution is compulsoy, it cannot be compassionate not charitable. Those traits are voluntary. It's not the political system via the government that should address the issue of people in need, it's the social system via communities and *voluntary* action that should.

On that we disagree. People should be protected from the initiation of force. The state shouldn't be in the business of actively harming people.

Ethically capitalism is way ahead. Nobody should be in enforced slavery. The state shouldn't actively harm us, they should be procting us from people who want to harm us. Socialism (of the kind in the US, Europe and almost everywhere else) sees the state actively harming people under the guise of "helping" them. That's ethically and morally wrong.

There is no slavery in a proper capitalist system (that is, a system where people are free) - at least not slavery of the kind we're talking about. People will always be slaves to nature and the needs of their bodies - no system can change that.

It's the goal of socialism. When you work for money and the state then confiscates a portion of that money for their own uses,that's effective slavery. You are working for them without choice. Socialism makes EVERYONE who works a slave to the state.

Capitalism is about freedom of choice and freedom of trade. If anything, people are slaves to nature - we must feed and clothe ourselves. That's nothing to do with capitalism though.

And many atheists do not.

The term "atheism" means "without theism". I.e. without a belief in a god. It's about a lack of belief, not a belief of lack.

Destroyed? Hardly.

The entire government is running a money extortion program, in particular the IRS. Taxation is extortion (forcibly confiscating someone's private property using a threat of force if they don't comply). The sooner the scam is stopped and liberty restored the better.

It doesn't to me. If I sell a book to someone and a part of that sale is a contract that explicitely prohibits digitisation, then they should not be able to digitise. The law should not be able to trump private contracts.

They're not specifically doing anything to attract either gender to contribute. Everything they do is gender neutral. This is a non issue.

For us it's phones and iPods, laptops and an old P4 2.4GHz in the garage which drives the CNC machine (wifi is the easist way to get gcode files from the main PC to the garage PC).

Nullum est periculum mercedem non.

What's sad about people making a lot of money? Just because one person makes lots of money doesn't mean anyone else should be sad as a result. Envious maybe. Perhaps even jealous. Unequality is not a bad thing - it's natural.

I can put anything on a CD I like. I can go into the bush and record 2 hours of bird noises. Nobody can tell me I am not allowed to make as many copies of such a CD as I like.

The AARC is making the assumption that the only CDs that can be put into the car's stereo system are CDs with content they own the copyright of. That's patently not true. People can put in CDs that have their own music (that is, music they themselves have created). Because of this I don't think the AARC have a leg to stand on. CM and Ford wouldn't be infringing copyright laws - end users would be.