Yeah, sock it to 'em, Nation!
Good old fashioned populism at work. If the common working stiff realizes just how much he’s been screwed over by our capitalist overlords, and realizes the value of voting for policies that benefit oneself, rich folk like Rand will be fucked. Go ahead Rand, go John Galt on us and withdraw your talents. I’m sure you’ll stop the machinery of society. Or not.
When we do get real healthcare reform, it’s going to stay that way forever. No politician would dare think to abolish it once it’s been established and people have realized that the scare mongering was false.
Please, in the future, avoid giving the impression that we Dopers on the verge of maturity suffer senile derangement, or are otherwise less than in full possession of our where’s my cookie? I had a cookie right here. Fear! Did you steal my cookie…?
It’s nice when you guys drop all pretense and show the nastiness in your core. This is what I was talking about upthread–people like you call people like me greedy, but I’m the one providing stuff to other people that they find valuable, you just take and take from people like me.
Also, don’t count your chickens yet, bub. Your dumbass “healthcare” proposal hasn’t passed yet, your stupidass cap and trade bullshit hasn’t passed yet, and Obama’s approval ratings are in the dumpster. Also, any of that stuff that does pass can be reversed later, so don’t kid yourself about that.
Delusion is a horrible thing. Obama’s approval ratings are still in the mid-60s. The Previous Occupant was in the low 20s by the time he was evicted. And his fellow Republican vice-president was in the teens.
Rand Rover -
I know it’s been a few pages, but since you didn’t reply the first time, could you possibly explain how your assertion that “those who make more provide more value, which is shown simply by the fact that they make more” is not mere tautology?
**Nation **and Rand Rover: now THERE’S a match made in hell. I don’t know which one should be more ashamed of the other.
And don’t you forget it. That tired, “exploit the liberal’s guilt” shtick used by conservatives and libertarians isn’t going to work any more. The one thing I have learned from conservatives over the last eight long years was that political power is pointless if you don’t use it to crush your adversaries.
You are right about one thing, though; we won’t have it forever, so we intend to make the most of it in the short run. Hopefully, we can make changes that can no more be undone than Social Security or the Civil Rights Act.
You might as well get used to having my patchouli-scented Birkenstock on your neck for a while.
It is tautological. Adam Smith first posed the value paradox, which our friend Rand Rover blithely ignores.
Thank you. I know you’re not RR, but I’m glad someone else noticed this.
I don’t hate the guy or feel the need to lob insults at him (unlike that smarmy self-satisfied shithead, curlcoat), as I think that the SDMB needs lots of different POVs to remain interesting, but this particular argument is some pretty weak sauce.
Bad form, RR.
Thank you again. After he called me a “stupid fucking bitch” when I pointed this out, and is now taking a crap on my in the Pit thread in my honor because he’s so butthurt at being proven wrong… I wonder if Adam Smith is a stupid fucking bitch too. I guess, unless we make more money than he is, we all are.
Guess you haven’t paid attention to the news in the past week.
I know, right? Birkenstocks are totally out this year. Crocs are the new “in” shoe. Totally embarassed to be in the same thread as you. Gawd.
Do I look worried? 
You just keep on with that fantasy. Maybe if you hold your mouth just right, the mean old liberals will be gone when you open your eyes, and you can get back to the good old days of raping the powerless without consequences.
You let us know how that works out for you.
I think Rand might have known something once upon a time about economics but has either ignored it or forgotten it. The fact that he may command a premium in the marketplace is due to the fact that he does a job that few others are willing to do and that at the same time, has high barriers to entry. Price is driven by the production of the good, not by its value to the consumer.
This misunderstanding is evidently the source of a great deal of unjustified smugness.
The reason you are a stupid fucking bitch is that you kept insisting that I meant my “value to society,” which is not what I said at all.
Also, Fuji, I pretty much lost interest in that discussion when Rubystreak did what lots of dumbasses do around here constantly, which is simply mischaracterize my argument instead of actually arguing against it.
I’m not sure what you mean by describing my statement that “I make more, therefore I provide more value” as tautological. It’s not something that is true because it’s true. I think it’s rather a simple application of the principle that something is worth what people will pay for it.
I do thnk there are some interesting things to explore in that statement. Like the doctor example–a doctor may provide a lot of value when they save someone’s life, but it’s not like a doctor just sits around waiting to save the life of someone who would definitely die without that particular doctor’s services. Rather, the value of saving someone’s life gets averaged over all doctors and all services performed by a particular doctor.
In any event, I shouldn’t have even gotten into that whole discussion. All I meant to do was point out the fallacy in the statement that people like me are bad because we only look after ourselves. That’s wrong becaue the things I do to make money provide value to others, so it’s not like I’m just taking when I get rich, I’m providing value in exchange for everything I get. The liberal douches don’t understand this and think money just grows on trees, so if they take it from the rich then the rich will just make more so they can take it again.
Uh, what? This is just as wrong as it can be, and is coverd in any Econ 101 class.
You would think so, having only actually taken Econ 101. The reality is more inconvenient than your quaint heuristics would suggest.
You just keep taking from the rich and see how that works out for you. Watch NYC and CA in the coming years–the brain drain there is already occurring. The term “fly-over country” will come to refer to both coasts–the areas that people in the middle fly over when they go to Hawaii or Europe.