So, why does the government keep getting bigger and bigger all the time? We see lots of new laws being passed and lots of new government agencies being created, but precious few laws taken off the books and precious few agencies scaled back in size, much less eliminated.
How are Americans “enculturated” to believe that the free market would be superior in providing police protection or defense of the country? Perhaps we are “enculturated” to believe that the free market should only be shut out of the process when there is an obvious reason that letting it participate would cause more harm than good (like the police or the military).
Honestly, I think he was just disparaging Gupta (fairly) and then went for a cheap shot without thinking. I don’t actually think there was any racial hatred there.
Incorrect. My tone was called for when you accused everyone in this thread who disagrees with you of needing intellectual contortions, as if no one could have an honest difference of opinion.
Look, I watched both clips. The point you indicated was included in BrainGlutton’s clip. For that matter, nowhere in yours does Michael Moore even say ‘Sanjay Gupta’ in yours that wasn’t included in BrainGlutton’s. Perhaps if it had once been clipped incorrectly, the webmaster fixed his error.
You’re wrong. The clip in the OP runs just a few seconds shorter and cuts off before the last “Sanjay Gupta” before the broadcast ended. You have to listen to the other clip to the absolute very end-- it’s only a few seconds longer.
What on God’s green earth are you guys going on about? We’re talking about the quote where Michael Moore is saying “People can go to my website and find out the facts about Dr. Sanjay Gupta - they can find out about his facts, right?” - right? He says this at the end of BrainGlutton’s link (right here !), and he says it at the end of initech’s. Both then cut out to Lou Dobbs, though initech’s goes a little further than that, but nothing more by Michael Moore.
I can’t quote an audio clip, so I can’t “prove” it here, but intech’s link has a few more seconds of audio where Moore says SG’s name with what sounds like a mock Indian accent. It’s there as plain as day, and it’s not in the audio clip in the OP. It just isn’t.
I finally figured out what you’re talking about (I think.) BrainGlutton linked to two different clips of Moore. One in the OP on YouTube, which I haven’t watched and don’t intend to, which I can only assume cuts out early. And the one I’ve been referring to all along, here (post #7 for those playing along at home), which doesn’t.
That said, I stand by my original point, which is that Moore is getting a little excited at the end, says Gupta’s name a little louder, faster, and more excitedly, but it seems a stretch to call that mocking. It just doesn’t sound like a faked Indian accent to me, which is what I think the claim is all about. If Moore wasn’t affecting an Indian accent to mock Dr. Gupta, I don’t see how he owes anyone an apology.
I think *you * might be a victim of enculturation.
Socialism is not just “any” State control; it’s State control — and sometimes ownership — of the means of production. In other words, it wants to control the economy. But it has been proved that an economy cannot be centrally controlled, mainly owing to the fact that there is no way to set prices. The complexity of an economy is like the complexity of weather. A free market is always superior to socialism.
If you want to argue that freedom is not always superior to authoritarianism, then that’s a different thing. And in fact, it sounds like that’s the point you’re actually trying to make. And indeed, even I would agree that there are certain things that the State should control. Coercion, for instance. I think that it’s in this area where moral and ethical questions would arise.
It is? Damn, man, why didn’t you tell me ! I’ve wasted years on my political position, when that simple fact alone might have saved me a lot of time! Woe!
And aren’t you a Christian? Jesus advocated Communism 1800 years before Marx. It’s one of the things I like about Jesus and one of the things most Christians studiously try to ignore.
True, to a point. Jesus talked about how people should behave in their private lives. He never said, AFAIK, that we should tax people in order to force them to behave in a certain way. But you’re much more of a Biblical scholar than I am, so maybe you can quote the passage(s) from the Gospel where he advocated that.
I wish this would stop being used as an argument. Michael Moore did this a great deal in Sicko too, and it bothered me every time, where he would emphatically say that France or Canada has an average life expectancy three years or so ahead of the US.
The majority of Europe is far more health conscious than the US. Europeans eat fewer fatty foods, are more aware of their health and have less obesity than US citizens. To say that average life expectancy is a reflection on the efficacy of health care is completely unfounded. Maybe there’s some correlation, but I can’t believe that it would be a 1:1 due to all the other factors involved.
Matthew 22:21 is where Jesus says to pay your taxes (even if you think they’re unjust), but I don’t know what you mean when you refer to people being taxed “in order to force them to behave in a certain way.” Taxing people does not enforce any behavior other than the paying of taxes and has nothing to do with any definition of Communism.
My statements about Jesus being a Communist, (aside from his commands to give everything you own to the poor, his consistent condemnations of the rich, etc. – statements which you would probably try to wave off as advice on “private” behavior) are gounded more in the Acts of the Apostles which says that the first Christian communities (founded by the apostles themselves) lived without private ownership of property and that all money was expected to be handed over to the leaders of the community under penalty of death (see Acts 5).
Apparently CNN taped a “second part” of the interview and broadcast it the next day. I missed it and don’t have a link to the vid, but here’s a scathing response by Frank Dwyer in the Huffington Post.
To run a Gupta story just before an interview was off base. If Wolf had questions he could ask them. Moore could not debate Gupta ,he was not there. The Gupta story actually did not offer a substantive argument. Whether we were one place different in child mortality rates or had to wait a little different amount of time at the doctors is a joke. The point was about our triple cost and 50 million uncovered. That Gupta did not address.
Yes, Jesus says pay your taxes. Paul alsot talks about obeying your rulers. So what? All that means is that Christians should obey secular authorities. It doesn’t mean that Jesus endorsed these secular authorities.
As far as taxes not “enforcing behavior,” apparently you have been studying tax policy as closely as you have been studying health care policy. There are a variety of taxes levied in order to either discourage behavior (so-called “sin taxes”) or encourage behavior (see the plethora of tax credits). Furthermore, the structure of taxes can also encourage or discourage certain behavior. Taxes on capital gains, for instance, reduce the attraction of investing. It’s pretty much a given that taxes affect behavior and are levied, at least in part, to change the way some people do things.
Please find any support in the Bible where Jesus, Paul, et. al., support using the government to force people to do this. Jesus and the early church leaders supported a voluntary form of communism. They did not support overthrowing Rome and establishing socialism. Jesus and Paul were talking about how we should behave as Christians, not how we should behave in the political world. To say that Jesus endorsed socialism as we know it is just plain inaccurate.
