Comment Re:The Inevitability of Resource Wars (Score 1) 457
While I don't agree with the corporate welfare and bail-outs, I hardly think that justifies droping all regulation besides the contractual, and allowing business to run its course
You fail to realize the regulations tend to become excessive over time - which gives the same situation as corporate welfare (or industry preference by the government in a more general sense).
You also seem to have a contradictory value system - the reason that strip-mining, sweat shop labor, and toxic waste dumping are occuring is because that is the equivalent of the values of those people and/or lands. I am not making a statement on whether those things are good or bad - they simply are because that is what they are valued as.
For example, the opposite side could just as easily be argued in that the sweat shop labor of children actually increases the wealth of their poverty-stricken families. Those families have increased their purchasing power through that labor.
Nevertheless - setting mandatory wages in itself does not increase the wealth of a person. An across-the-board simply raises prices - leaving those people (within some degree of error of course) just as poor as before.
I mean, what about the F.A.A? I for one feel a little safer flying knowing that not just any hack pilot with a beater plane can start an airline company and kill a few hundred people before "market forces" drive him out of busines.
You say that the FAA keeps you safe from "any hack pilot with a beater plane" that can "kill a few hundred people before 'market forces' drive him out of business". This is not a valid statement because the FAA hasn't done that at all - there are still horrible airline accidents caused by airlines not following safety guidelines put in place through federal legislation. This doesn't even mention that fact that the FAA itself has been in a chronic state of inability to do all facets of its job competently for quite some time now.I don't happen to belive that the ever going hunt to increase wealth is always the best way to solve a given problem. Environmental problems that we have were caused by that quest, one way or another. And I don't think that the same quest is going to turn around and fix them...at least without some nudging.
To say that you "don't happen to believe that the ever going hunt to increase wealth is always the best way to solve a given problem" is to say that would actually advocate a solution that decreases the wealth of people. Not only that - but you would advocate a poorer society on the basis of the argument that "environmental problems that we have were caused by that quest" (i.e. capitalism). The funniest thing about this is that most pollution - namely the strip-mining and toxic waste dumping you mentioned above - takes place on publically-owned government lands. That is the same group you look to in order to solve the problem.
The changeover period to those alternatives is always going to be too expensive, until damn near every last drop of oil is gone, damn near every last tree is cut down (perhaps not in the U.S. in particular, but elsewhere), and the probablems with the environment (which are very very real) are so obvious that it is too late to really do anything to change them besides wait about 300 years or so...maybe longer...
First of all - if the environment changes (believe it or not - it has before), then people will simply have to cope with it.
Secondly, you've blatantly ignored all arguments posted in response to what you've written about oil somehow disappearing someday. (1) Basic economics tells us that if oil becomes scarce in the future, then prices will rise correspondingly and it will become viable to develop alternative energy sources. (2) Someone posted a good reference above somewhere about Cornell geologists finding out that oil sources are actually refilling themselves over time - very possibly at a greater rate than we could remove the oil. It also mentioned the fact that all sources of oil are simply not known to us at this time - meaning that refilling from a now unknown source is most definitely a possibility.
The argument that counters the tree rhetoric is much the same - in that trees will be grown when it becomes economically viable to do so. There's no point in replacing forests at a loss. Of course, you may not understand that since you advocate a contraction in the wealth of a given society.
I just don't have this perfect faith in capitalism. I mean, regulations were put in place for a reason to begin with right?
Faith in something is similar to having faith in God - I may not know why it works, but I'm sure God will take care of it. The obvious question - how can you not have "faith" then in the millions of people who work their own land, fly their own planes, know their personal jobs better than any government planner sitting in an office a thousand miles away - and still manage to have "faith" that an uneducated, unskilled, inconsequential politician has your best interests at heart?
And they have considerably helped the general population.
Prove it - not with emotional nonsense though.
Think about that tomorrow when you have the day off. And think about it every time you get a reasonable pay check for a reasonable amount of work. Unchecked capitalism would probably not let you have tomorrow off, or pay you fairly for your work.
Heh - I'm a student, so I don't get days off.
What is a "reasonable" paycheck anyways? I was always under the impression that "reasonable" pay would compensate me in a fashion that I thought was worth my labor. My labor happens to be valued at about $7.50/hour right now - if I ever become unhappy with that, then I am free to offer my skills to anyone else in the oh so great marketplace of labor at a higher price. However, since I am un-degreed are largely inexperienced employee, I do not think that is a reasonable position.
"Unchecked capitalism" would pay you exactly what you were really worth to the market - if that happened to be $2.00/hour - sorry, that would be your value then. I've always noticed how anti-capitalism arguments tend to degenerate into a tirade against "unfair" labor values. Some people can't stand that their labor can be bought and sold in the market - that they actually may not be as valuable as someone else.
I realized some time ago that asking the government to transfer wealth to me is the equivalent of stealing from another individual with the barrel of a gun pointed at their head. It's not so much the money being taken from me that always bothered me - that money being given to someone whose labor is not worth a minimum wage, given to some moral/political cause that I am not a party to, given to a politician who would spends his time regulating my life, given to the FBI agent who builds a computer system with my wealth that monitors what I say and do over the Internet.
No - what always bothered me the most is that that wealth is my time - time that I will never get back for the remainder of my life. It is time that I could spend with my family, the girl I love, educating myself.
You're going to wake up someday and realize that there is no way that those people can ever guarantee your safety - that they are taking from you solely in the name of power and power alone. They have no desire to help you anymore than in those ways which increase their power.
I realize this and I am a free man because of it. Are you?
