He chose a white guy

[GernBlansten]

Police, fire protection, military and transportation infrastructure all are socialized. Are they bad? Would it be better if they were privatized?

[TheScout]

Those are all traditional government functions. The whole purpose of government is to protect order and property to allow people the greatest liberty. I would consider them probably the clearest of the natural monopolies.

[OldGreyEagle]

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

 

Establishing justice, sounds like grounds for a police dept along with the court system; Insure domestic tranquility, sounds like the fire dept fits in there; provide for the common defense, thats the military; promote the general welfare, that would be the infrastructure of transportation.

 

Now, securing the blessings of liberty to ourselves and posterity is really open to interpreation, aint it?

[TheScout]

The Preamble does not in itself grant any powers to the federal government. It is a mere introduction. However some believe that it can help to define the scope of other powers listed.

[NJCubScouter]

Look, its all a matter of perspective. I have known Libertarians (capital L) who think that the Democrats and Republicans (who they call the Republicrats and other cute names) are really just two wings of one big Socialist party. I am sure there are Socialists (self-proclaimed, I mean) who think (although I have never heard one say this, since I haven't known too many) that both major parties are really just two wings of one big Capitalist (a bad word, to them) party. I do know some Green Party members who, while not quite so far on the extreme, see no real difference between the parties and regard both Democrats and Republicans as war-mongering, environment-destroying, poor-neglecting... ok, I got to the end of my adjectives and don't have a noun. But you know what I mean. (The Greens actually are divided between Green-Democrats who spend half their time trying to pull the Democratic Party to the left, and other Greens who have rejected the Democratic Party and really think they accomplished something by voting for Nader and throwing the 2000 election to President Bush... that is, if he won... but anyway...

 

The point is that when you are an extremist, almost everybody else looks like an extremist as well. The one thing that the Libertarians, Socialists, Greens and other far-right and far-left parties have in common is that when the ballots are counted, between all of them they generally get less than 2 percent of the presidential vote (except when a "name" like Nader is running on the force of his own reputation and basically taking a minor party along with him, no seats in Congress, and virtually no offices at the state level either. I think the last few elections have shown that many people in this country want things pretty much in the middle and are not swayed by ideological labels and name-calling -- at least, not for more than two elections in a row, in the same direction.

[TheScout]

I don't think you could say Liberatarians are extremists. Look at their platform. Their lack of electoral success is better described by the attributes of our system of governement which favors the formation of two broad parties.

[packsaddle]

"I think the last few elections have shown that many people in this country want things pretty much in the middle and are not swayed by ideological labels and name-calling -- at least, not for more than two elections in a row, in the same direction."

 

Now THAT's the sense of humor that I've missed for sooo long. NJ, you are so funny sometimes, I can hardly stand it.

 

Edited part: The Scout, technically NJ 'could' say pretty much anything he wanted, short of violating some free speech restriction while the administration was monitoring his private conversations.

But if he 'could' say certain things, that just wouldn't necessarily make him correct about it. Perhaps that was your point?

But the card-carrying, avowed Libertarians I know pretty much conform to his description. They shrug their shoulders and then charge straight into the turning blades of the windmill. The rest of us watch in horrified fascination...sometimes pulling for the windmill.(This message has been edited by packsaddle)

[GernBlansten]

So some socialism is better than other socialism, as long as you don't call it socialism but a traditional government function or service.

I get it.

[TheScout]

Ever hear of the term "natural monopoly"?

 

So was a hard core right wing regime - name any - Nazi Germany, Pinochet's Chile, Franco's Spain. Were they socialists since they had a military and police?

[GernBlansten]

The Nazi Party, officially: National Socialist German Workers' Party

 

But what's in a name?

[TheScout]

Even in the pre-Hitler days the Nazis, (originally the German Workers Party) were totally opposed to the Communists and Social Democrats of Germany. Hitler later purged his leftist opponents, the Communists in particular.

[GernBlansten]

So a natural monopoly like health care or education is bad because why?

[packsaddle]

Gern, You probably already understand this but I'll give it a try. When we oppose universal health care, the subliminal message is, 'if you can't afford private health care, die'. Or for social security, 'if you can't afford retirement, work until you die.' As a society, we merely are too timid, for some reason, to state these things in these terms, honestly. I've never understood why not.

I've only heard it stated clearly by one talk-show guy who often refers to mothers on welfare as "brood-mares" and advocates their own "ovaries fed to them stir-fried as their last government-subsidized meal." At least he's honest.

[GernBlansten]

Yes Pack,

I fail to understand why it is fine to socialize the loses of corporations (bailouts), yet when it comes to providing for the general welfare (health care) of the citizens, its fine to privatize the loses.

I also fail to understand why the finest socialized organization in the US, our military is great, yet the term socialism is a derogatory term when describing a political ideology.

[packsaddle]

Gern, that I can answer with a word: Profit.