Communism

[Michael Archer]

It is the right of the inventor to sell his products to whomever he wants under what conditions he wants.

 

Yes. Provided he is operating in a free market environment. However, colluding with others or using his monopoly market power to block competition should NOT be his right.

 

I'm confused. It seems to me like you're saying two conflicting things. Isn't the keyword in "free market" free? As in, free to trade with who you want under what conditions you want?

 

This is at once terribly idealistic, naive and opportunistic statement.

 

Firstly, by intervening in other people's affairs the interloper, like the US, acts a dictator - dictating its will to others.

 

I don't see how. The United States is a semi-free country that more or less upholds the individual rights of its citizens. If it invades a dictatorship in the middle-east; if one were to say that the dictatorship has the moral high ground, that implies that the dictatorship has a right to exist which would be a contradiction in terms i.e. they would be saying that there's such thing as the right to initiate force.

 

The issue of governance is a complex one and can only be dealt with by people who are directly affected. If you intervene from outside in 99% of the cases your timing will be wrong and the result will be worse than it would otherwise have been.

 

This is true. That's why even though the United States would be morally justified in invading an African dictatorship, it shouldn't. It has no self-interest in going to Africa.

 

Case in point Iraq - the iraqi people should have been left alone to deal with their internal affairs. If not for the sanctions Saddam would not probably have lasted as long as he did anyway. Yet, now all you have done is handed the country to Iran on a plate and at a cost of hundreds of thousands of people. This is not easily forgotten - you will not be welcome there for generations.

 

Except, you forgot that America DOES have a self-interest in the middle-east: oil. While I don't support the Iraq war, America DOES have an interest in Iraq.

 

Secondly, if one is against dictatorship on principle - he must act consistently, against any dictatorships that are out there. I don't see that happening. So it looks as if the US is not against dictatorial powers as such but is simply using it as an excuse to further its own geopolitical interests. This is not a surprise and pretty much everyone in the world now sees it for what it is (largely because of the Iraq war debacle with Gitmo and all other things).

 

Remember: a government's job is to protect the rights of its citizens. It would be immoral to send our boys to die in a country that we have no interest in liberating.

 

I have nothing but respect for Jewish people by I often say to my Jewish friends - when a Jew steps on the Israeli soil he leaves his brain at the immigration desk and puts his balls where the brain used to be.

 

I cannot see Israel as a success at all for the time being. For decades they cannot establish relationship with neighbours - this is not statesmanship. Freedom? Very questionable in a country which is officially based on religious and racial discrimination. What is happening with the Palestinians bears very troubling resemblance to the Final Solution in the Nazy-occupied Europe (with some sensitivities taken into account - so no gas chambers or extermination camps - but with ghettos and a similar ultimate goal).

 

Is the US support good or bad thing? Clearly, without it Israel in its present form would not be here today. It would have had to adapt and make peace with those around it or disappear. Also, reliance on the US support is a dangerous game. One day that support will vanish in thin air and Israel will have to face all its enemies on its own, all of a sudden. A country so reliant on a Big Daddy's helping hand will be very, very vulnerable when that happens.

 

I don't excuse Israel's fault e.g. their failure to completely separate synagogue and state, the fact that they're a mixed-economy. However, Israel is the only hint of freedom and progress in the middle-east. They are a peaceful people surrounded by savages that want nothing more than to kill them. When civilized men fight barbarians, you side with the civilized men. Remember how I said that America should only get involved militarily if it's in their own self-interest to do so? If America helps Israel, it's not out of altruism or "helping the Israeli people", but it's because that Israel is America's front line for the war on terror.

 

Israelis enjoy relative freedom while being surrounded by savages. The United States would be justified in invading Egypt and and Jordan, but it has no self-interest in doing so.

"surrounded by savages". That's a very dissapointing opinion Michael.

 

What word would you use to call people who run dictatorships and attacks a peaceful country upon its creation with the sole intent of wiping them off the face of the planet.

 

I am not judging your country for trying to get as much of what it thinks it needs by force

He's Canadian, as am I.

 

I'm born and raised in the United States, and I was a dual-citizen from birth. I live in Canada right now.

[Vapymid]

I'm confused. It seems to me like you're saying two conflicting things. Isn't the keyword in "free market" free? As in, free to trade with who you want under what conditions you want?

 

That makes two of us Price fixing and free market are mutually exclusive. If you have one you cannot have the other. If price fixing is allowed the market is no longer free. Can you please clarify what do you mean by "price fixing"?

 

if one were to say that the dictatorship has the moral high ground, that implies that the dictatorship has a right to exist which would be a contradiction in terms

 

I don't see any contradiction in terms. Dictatorship or any other method of governance does not automatically invalidate the state's right to existence. There is a whole body of international law which governs relationships between states. If a dictatorship is within these laws and someone will attack it in breach of these laws the dictatorial state will have the high moral ground.

 

Except, you forgot that America DOES have a self-interest in the middle-east: oil. While I don't support the Iraq war, America DOES have an interest in Iraq.

 

OK, so it may have an interest in the region, but that in itself cannot justify it invading another country.

 

Remember: a government's job is to protect the rights of its citizens. It would be immoral to send our boys to die in a country that we have no interest in liberating.

 

In this we appear to be in agreement. Except that I would also add "It would be immoral to send our boys to die in a country that we have no legal or moral rights to invade".

 

When civilized men fight barbarians, you side with the civilized men.

 

Civilisation does not equal morality. Just because a society thinks of itself as civilised does not a) automatically mean it is and b) prevent it from acting as a savage itself.

 

America's front line for the war on terror

 

There is no such war. There is a blitz of paranoia known under that name, which has been politically exploited for many years to push through otherwise politically difficult legislation and to justify more pork barrels for the defence industry. But the actual war there isn't. Few half-hearted neo-colonial expeditions to countries with very hot climate and full of angry people hardly qualify as a "war" especially as "war on terror" (which is technically impossible anyway).

 

What word would you use to call people who run dictatorships and attacks a peaceful country upon its creation with the sole intent of wiping them off the face of the planet.

 

What would your reaction be if you would be told that from today a bunch of "Occupy here or there" protesters will take over a few rooms in your house and live in it as lawful tenants and, no, you have no say on the matter?

 

The whole Israel debacle is a case how not to build new states. It's a political failure of the "civilised" Western world (to which I would also add Russia/USSR) of massive proportions. To blame it solely on some "uncivilised barbarians" will be to deceive ourselves...

 

Regards

[Doom Shepherd]

There is no such war. There is a blitz of paranoia known under that name, which has been politically exploited for many years to push through otherwise politically difficult legislation and to justify more pork barrels for the defence industry.

 

Talk about a blitz of paranoia, I hardly see the above statement NOT qualifying.

 

What would your reaction be if you would be told that from today a bunch of "Occupy here or there" protesters will take over a few rooms in your house and live in it as lawful tenants and, no, you have no say on the matter?

 

People who accept this analogy as valid are about two mental steps away from exploding in a restaurant.

 

The whole Israel debacle is a case how not to build new states.

Nah, that would be the REST of the Middle East.

[Vapymid]

Yes, the rest of the Middle East too, of course. With the amount of meddling by the Europeans (Britain, France, Russia), by Turkey, by the US, that whole area is a mess and all of these countries bear at least some responsibility for that. But the past is past and it can't be changed whereas the future can, if people will try to think by their heads instead of by their asses. Oh, and stop believing everything they hear on TV...

 

People who accept this analogy as valid are about two mental steps away from exploding in a restaurant.

 

I don't know. You should not ever take these analogies literally but I think this particular one is quite apposite. What about the restaurant, anyway? Portions here in Europe are not like in the US - there is no danger of exploding, no matter what you order (you can burst into flames if you order certain type of curry, though).

 

Also, I see you disagree with my suggestion that "There is no such war [on terror]. There is a blitz of paranoia known under that name, which has been politically exploited for many years to push through otherwise politically difficult legislation and to justify more pork barrels for the defence industry."

 

Do you have evidence to the contrary?

 

Regards