"Stuart & Kathryn Fields" wrote in message
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"Ed Huntress" wrote in message
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snip

What morass? Are you starving? Are you threatened by some other
country? Did you have to sell your children into slavery? What in the
hell are you talking about, "morass"?

I'm talking about the Morass of restrictive laws and rules such as the
FEMA telling me that I might have to raise my entire 40X72 steel
building because of some bureacratic derived flood plain that there
exists no evidence, historically or otherwise to support.

That sounds like your primary gripe.

Ed: For a person of obvious articulatory skills you seem to have a
problem identifying examples and choose to ignore the ramifications of a
government agency enforcing entirely stupid rules. The FEMA thing is
just a single concrete example of which I have written proof. I've already
successfully ignored them. Their rules still exist and have no blockage
for getting worse. I'm sure that if you were the victim of similar kinds
of BS, your skills with the written word would come forth. However, you
seem to be comfortable with the ramification of the examples that I have
put forth that have come from my personal experience and I guess you seem
to think that these examples are to be expected in the current
non-libertarian government that we have.

There always are some infuriating examples of bureaucracy, and nobody likes
them. I don't think you'll ever eliminate them as long as you have
government. I've had outrageous examples in dealing with police. Do you want
to get rid of them, too?

But thinking that libertarian policies will eliminate them, without
simultaneously turning the dogs loose in finance and opening the door to
collusion and monopoly in business is pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking, Stu.
We already know what happens when those excesses are unregulated.

And even more comfortable forecasting what ifs that aren't based on actual
fact but on your opinions and personal biases.

No. Based on the only evidence that's available, and thousands of years of
history. Libertarians see a panacea in just doing away with things, as if
that alone will create a new kind of man. What lunacy! If it was 180 years
ago, you guys would be the ones starting utopian communes in the wilderness.
That's the same mentality -- and the same denial of human nature. It's
something you share with communists, socialists, religious utopians and
other philosophy-based movements. You seem to think that people will play
nicer if you just change the rules.

You're the one who has no supporting history or facts, Stu. You're off in
cloud-cuckooland.

Labels like Edwardian, Conservatives, Libertarian, Centrist etc. etc. I
guess serve some purpose. However when the tire is flat, you can call it
a chicken fart if you want to but the tire remains flat. We have a bunch
of flat tires right now and our old ways of dealing with them by saying
let the Federal Government solve them hasn't worked. Most of the flat
tires have been caused by government getting involved, making thoughtless
decisions that have created long lived agencies that are expensive and
don't really provide much bang for the buck.

Nonsense. That's your conclusion. And your solution is just to do away with
them. Some solution! The problems are still there. Under your program, the
difference is that they won't be dealt with at all.


I'm talking about the 3 star general in charge of the Strategic Defense
Command responsible for the Star Wars stuff getting his hand caught in
the cooky jar setting himself up with BDC for a post retirement job.

How would libertarianism fix that, or any of the other things you've
listed?

To start with the laws and rules that already exist would be enforced. I
was restricted to a certain time (IFIRC 2 years) from entering into
employment with any contractor with whom I had business during my career.
Those are being enforced at the lower levels but certainly not at the
higher.

Wait a minute. I thought that libertarians wanted to *reduce* the laws and
rules. Now you're talking about stricter enforcement. Is this just a call
for stricter authoritarianism, after all? It sounds like it.

It all looks like some kind of blind faith. What kind, I have no idea.


What are you, a radical who has a program for overturning tradition?

Of course not tradition should be worshiped and never examined for
applicability. "Thats the way we've always done it" is just an outstanding
justification for doing things. The traditional stuff I was told when I
went to work for the Government turned out to be mainly eyewash. The real
rules and values were involved in how to get your ass up the ladder and
make as much as you could. Another personal example: High ranking DoD
official told me that he needed a $450M project started next year. I
asked him for some details, sinch as an engineer I might be able to help.
His response was: "I don't know what it will be but that is the funding
level of a project that I need under my control to get the Senior
Executive Service position". This guy certainly did think his process
thru. From my point of view looking into a non-libertarian run
government, this kind of thing needs to be changed. Our current
government service of just laying on another "watch dog" agency. Won't
work. Hell here is another: GAO audited my group at the Kwajalein
Missile Range. We were audited to determine whether we were providing a
useful function. Sounds good doesn't it. They also audited another group
where my wife worked. AAH!! The government is really accountable and
taking care of business. There auditing technique for my branch consisted
almost entirely of MEASURING THE VOLUME OF OUR FILE CABINETS. They could
have been empty file cabinets. What we did and how many people were
required to do it never entered into the questions. I even suggested that
they ask us what our plans for the year were and what we expected to
produce. I was ignored.

Let me ask again: What is there about the libertarian program that would fix
this problem? It sounds like you want better government. Libertarians want
as little government as possible. Those aren't the same thing. In fact,
they're close to being opposites.


Yes Ed the libertarians don't think their process thru like the current
thoughtful government. These aren't opinions of what would happen if.
They are factual experiences that I've had with the current operation of
the Government. If changing to Libertarian would help correct some of
these I'm all for it.

I would be, too. But there is nothing in the party platform, and nothing
I've seen in the writings of Ron Paul and the other nutballs, that would do
one damned thing to correct it.

I have absolutely no faith that either Obama or McCain are going to
change any of the above. At least Ron Paul talked about reigning in the
Feds and stopping the deficit spending. Ron Paul wanted to debate the
foreign policy and the negative effects it was creating. Whether you
agreed with his opinions or not it would have certainly put our policies
out for a badly needed review.

His idea of "review" is to promote his wacky ideas. He wants to de-regulate
pharmaceuticals. He wants to do away with the FDA. Does the man have no
knowledge of history whatsoever? Doesn't he know what happened when drugs
were unregulated? Have you ever seen the early trial results on new drugs,
where they kill rats and dogs, and often a few humans, trying to figure out
what is safe?

He's a nut, Stu. And so is the whole libertatian program -- a nutty solution
to complicated problems. It pretends that you can just make a problem go
away by ignoring it. Nutty ideas for nutty people, like Ron Paul.

--
Ed Huntress