(05-27-2016, 10:03 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:(05-27-2016, 02:14 AM)Galen Wrote:(05-26-2016, 05:34 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:(05-26-2016, 01:36 AM)Galen Wrote: What you expect doesn't really matter. What does, is that you expect a population of fallible people to produce competent and ethical people to rule us. This is a logical fallacy which is demonstrated by the fact Nixon who contemplated using the IRS for political purposes and later actually did and got away with it. Then there is the Bush and Clinton crime families just in case you needed a few more examples. Then there is Congressman X and his book.
This is the reality that neither you or Eric the Obtuse can accept.
That's why we have laws, police, prosecutors, judges, tax collectors, prisons, and at the extreme hangmen.
I have lived in places where all of the above were corrupt and on the take, possibly not the hangmen. I grew up in a town where the cops were the drug dealers and were all dating the same teenager. People even caught her going down on one of them while he was on duty and that didn't get a response out of the powers that be. Last I heard he retired with a full pension.
You must live a very sheltered life to be this naive.
So we don't need laws, police, prosecutors, judges, tax collectors, and prisons?
Welcome to the jungle! How long would you live? Or would the self-contained plantation, a place in which the owner controls everything be right for you?
[/quote]
You might want to try reading something useful about the Old West. It turns out that it was not nearly as violent or lawless as the Hollywood stereotypes would have you believe. Your assumptions depend on the idea that people in the absence of a ruler will automatically start stealing, killing each other and are completely incapable of resolving disputes without violence. That actual history of the West suggests something different.
(05-27-2016, 10:03 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: A problem with the self-contained plantation -- it can be a veritable paradise for the planter and his family. Everyone else? Nothing but toil, fear, rags, and hunger.
That is a pretty good description of the US at this point. Didn't the bailout of the banks demonstrate that the laws for the little people are different than the politicians and their enforcers that you think that we need. Try not paying taxes and see what happens. Hint: Its no different than what the mafia does.
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. -- H.L. Mencken
If one rejects laissez faire on account of man's fallibility and moral weakness, one must for the same reason also reject every kind of government action. -- Ludwig von Mises
If one rejects laissez faire on account of man's fallibility and moral weakness, one must for the same reason also reject every kind of government action. -- Ludwig von Mises