I should add, BTW, that that should not be taken as a condemnation of you or your family, jsgoddess. I have plenty of relatives who are the same way.
I wonder where he gets the cash for the roads he drives on, or the military that protects him. Or what happens if he has to call the police, or the fire department.
Pay for them with what? Currency? Oh, maybe you mean that he barters with things he’s grown or furniture he’s built.
But you can’t barter if there’s nobody else to barter with. Also, there won’t be an electric company if there isn’t a customer base bigger than just you because as much as you may be the center of the world, it won’t be efficient to generate just your electricity each day.
You kind of have to hope that there are enough healthy, educated, nourished people out there with transportation and some means of protecting and educating their own families to create your power or provide you with police and fire services and so forth, while also seving as a customer base themselves to make it efficient for someone else to build your computer.
Or could you just pay for all of that on your own?
It’s society in the form of the public utility commission that regulates your electric company, ensuring that your rates are based on the fair cost to serve you rather than whatever the company can get away with; that the outside plant (poles, wires, underground conduits, transformers, substations, etc.) are maintained in safe and reliable condition; that if you want to dispute your bill you have a knowledgeable but neutral forum in which to bring your case. Many states impose winter moratoriums on both gas and electric company shutoffs for nonpayment, so that customers with an infant or an illness won’t lose their service during heating season.
“But if we took the bones out it wouldn’t be crunchy!”
At least he made his name fighting the mob. Too much of the current GOP seem like they’d rather hang out with the wiseguys.
Yeah, how is the asshole-fucking coming along these days?
It’s pretty shitty.
I don’t think it’s exactly hypocrisy, at least the things I’m mostly talking about. It’s over-reliance on categorization and an inability to make the categories flexible enough to contain what they need to contain.
The pizza delivery guy should also not expect any sympathy if he goes into debt to pay for his ever-skyrocketing tuition and then has trouble paying off his loans.
I understand this viewpoint, but it’s still wrong. Unless you’re producing every good or service you ever consume, or you’re independantly wealthy, on some level you’re relying on other members of society. Assuming you’re not independantly wealthy and simply earn a generous wage, how are you earning that wage? Are you providing value for others? Do you depend on demand from others to have a reason to work? Is there an infrastructure or framework in place that facilitates you trading your work for value? Did you construct this framework?
Imagine the most rugged individualist you can think of, and imagine he has to work to eat (his specific output isn’t important). Who is consuming his work? Assume it’s people in his local community. How can they afford to pay him? Are they simply bartering their goods and services amongst themselves, or do they have customers outside the community? If they sell to outsiders, how are they selling to them? Did they create and maintain the infrastructure that facilitates their outside dealings? What if their customers live in a dense urban area? Would the urban area be possible without some kind of legal or social framework to hold it all together? Your reliance on society may be very subtle, but it certainly exists.
Do you really believe this? An angry mob? Please, let me ask this as politely as possible: Where did you hear this? Seriously, if there’s any evidence of this I totally missed it. I’ve been to two Tea Party protests and they were pretty tame compared to the anti-war marches of my youth. In fact if you do hear about any likely angry conservative mobs let me know. I’d love to go just for the educational/entertainment value.
I think what happens is that MSM has this weird view of what a conservative is and then pushes it on people. And a lot of people accept it uncritically. That’s sad.
I think the main difference is that you guys think that central planning is more efficient and we think that free markets are more efficient.
Oh yeah, and we don’t go around calling you guys dicks based on what some guy on TV told us.
I think Teabaggers engage in recreational protesting without really knowing what the hell they’re actually bitching about or whether their presumed grievances have any sort of coherence or relevance.
Give me some links and I’ll check them out. How often do you think “responsible conservatives” refer to money compared to other things? What are the “other things”?
There’s something really wrong with your ability to assess conservatives if you are using Rudy Giuliani as your counterpoint.
I’ve got two words for you:
Bernard Kerik.
I agree, you’re relying on society. But you’re not relying on society in some intangible, unquantifiable way: you pay taxes for the roads and schools, you buy your food and electricity. And other people buy your goods and services.
This is a much better argument. I’m not sure I would describe it as owing anybody anything, but it’s a benefit from society that an individual can’t achieve on his own.
I’ll put it like this, if I had to vote in an election where it was George W. Bush vs Rudy Giuliani I’d vote for W hands down.
Correct, I was referring to Republicans I personally know and have known.
I’m pretty much middle of the road but leaning left (although not leaning as much left as I used to be.) I have friends on both ends of the political spectrum. Being middle of the road, I often seem very liberal to my Republican friends and very conservative to my liberal friends. My right-wing friends will kid me jokingly about being such a “leftie,” while my left-wing friends can make some pretty nasty comments. For me, the question would be why are liberals such dicks, and intolerant ones to boot.
I would move to Canada, or take up a heroin habit. Whichever seems more sensible in a world gone mad.
Have you heard about this story? The article is biased, but the event is true.
Do you deny that there are a lot of conservatives just looking for something to protest about? First they were out maliciously compaigning against Obama (remember the horrible “Get a job!” people? Remember the Obama monkey t-shirts? Remember the rumor that he was a Muslim? Good times, good times…). Then it was the April 15th Douche–I mean–Teabag Parties. Yeah, let’s get fired up about having to pay more in taxes, except that we’re not! Two weeks ago it was the Birther thing (it’s actually still going on, but let’s pretend it’s blown over), and now it’s time to beat down the townhall walls like the zombies in Thriller, because OMG!! SOCIALIST OBAMA IS KILLING BABIES!!
At least when the left-wingers were protesting Bush, we stayed pretty much on the “no war for oil” message. And we waited for the war to actually happen before we started protesting (maybe we shouldn’t have). Furthermore, we didn’t need a talk show host to tell us what we were so angry about. Take away Beck, Hannity, and Limbaugh and the conservative base wouldn’t know WHAT to think.