# "Atlas Panted"



## midcan5

The Tortoise and the Hare.

One day the Hare comes out of his hole all full of bluster singing that he has just finished 'Atlas Shrugged.' I am the master of all I survey. I alone am important. The Tortoise looks at him confused and asks what is it about, and the Hare tells him that his own happiness is the most important value.

The Tortoise puzzled, says but don't we need each other sometimes to mend a dam, or move the earth, and doesn't that make us happy too? Bragging loudly, the Hare says, no Tortoise, I am a free, self sufficient rabbit and you a lowly, slow footed Tortoise.

The Tortoise thinks for a moment and says, if that is true then surely you will be able to beat me in a race. The Hare laughs loudly. Why of course I can beat you any time, name the time and place and I will destroy you. Tomorrow Hare meet me in the field and we shall see who is fastest. The Tortoise hurries home and tell his brother a near look alike his plan. He will stay at one side of the field in a furrow and when the Hare arrives say 'I am here already.'

Next day the two meet and they wager the Hare's new car. The car has made the Hare very happy, but he has no fear of the outcome of the race. So are you ready to lose asks the Tortoise, the Hare laughs loudly and says, I will even give you a head start, go. The Tortoise starts and soon ducks down as the Hare races by. But when he gets to the other side the brother looks up and says, 'I am here already.' The Hare can't believe it, he wants to race back, the Tortoise obliges and soon he is greeted with, 'I am here already.' This can't be, says, the Hare and so he tries again and again and soon exhausted admits defeat. Unhappy he crawls back to his hole.

And the moral of the story:
Sometimes happiness comes in twos and reason can trick us. By the way the Tortoise never took the car as he cheated but he had the last laugh.

with apologies to Grimm

"My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute." Ayn Rand



originally posted as
Libertarianism in a Nutshell IV


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## Threedee

I still think this is retarded. You are making the individualist's point for them by claiming that the collective needs to cheat (or use force/intimidation/etc.) in order to keep up with the individual.

Seeing as how this is the first response, I can only assume that there are not many libertarians on this board like at FP or JPP, or else they have begun to ignore you...


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## Diuretic

What sort of shrug did Atlas give?  Was it the Gallic type?  Was it the "I don't give a shit" type?  Was it the, "search me, I haven't got a clue?" type or was it the sort of shrug you have to give when you receive a wedgie and you don't want to be seen clawing your pants out of your arse?


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## Threedee

It doesn't matter how Atlas did it. The point of invoking Atlas is to use him as a comparison to the characters of the story. He was the guy holding the weight of the world on his sholders. Rand asks, what would have happened if he realized he was the one doing all the work and just shrugged it off?

BTW - I'm assuming your just being sarcastic, but I just recently learned the plot of the story, not having read it myself, because I hear they want to make a movie out of it, possibly starring Angelina Jolie.


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## Diuretic

I rarely use sarcasm and when I do I usually point it out, not because I think anyone is thick but because I like to make sure the reader knows it was intentional.

I use whimsy, scepticism, humour and even (on my best days) some logic, but I do try and eschew sarcasm.

I was, in this instance, combining some whimsy, a little humour and perhaps a dash of my cynicism on the topic of Rand and her "objectivism".

I find "Atlas Shrugged" to be, eventually, rather pointless, empty, unremarkable and a general wank.


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## midcan5

Actually, Three, I watching cspan a few weeks ago and saw a serious discussion of this book. Having once tried to read it I found that absurd so of course I had to re-post one of the old nutshells on libertarian silliness. You take it too serious, like any parable, the purpose points towards the paradoxical nature of living. What I find particularly amusing about libertarians I have meet is they all come from money and then think jeez why are there poor. This one sums it up:

http://www.usmessageboard.com/showthread.php?t=50564


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## Threedee

Well, no, I'm not taking it too seriously, any more than Stringy, ironhead or Warren did. You are simply saying and implying things about libertarianism that are not true.


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## Bern80

Diuretic said:


> What sort of shrug did Atlas give?  Was it the Gallic type?  Was it the "I don't give a shit" type?  Was it the, "search me, I haven't got a clue?" type or was it the sort of shrug you have to give when you receive a wedgie and you don't want to be seen clawing your pants out of your arse?



His post is referring to "Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand.  Probably my favorite book of all time.  The first post is probably meant as some farse as to what the author thinks the book is really about.  

Needless to say the Hare's perspective is not what the book is 'really about'.  Best way to find out is to read it yourself.  But the more accurate perspective of the book is not that people should only strive for their own gains and not help other people, it's that people who are able to help themselves should and not apply false obligations to those that have been successful in doing so.

The "Atlas'" of the book are business leaders that have made themselves successful and as a by product provdied things like quality steel and transportation to many, many people as well as provided many, many jobs.  yet thy're still maligned and are told they must do more for the less fortunate and must handicap themselves in order to allow others to 'farily' compete.  When they get tired of it, they leave society , closeing the doors of their million dollar businesses that provided jobs and products, hence they 'shrugged'.  They form their own society  hidden away from rest of the world where the people understand what the expectations are of each other while the rest of the world is left to struggle on without them.


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## Diuretic

Bern80 said:


> His post is referring to "Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand.  Probably my favorite book of all time.  The first post is probably meant as some farse as to what the author thinks the book is really about.
> 
> Needless to say the Hare's perspective is not what the book is 'really about'.  Best way to find out is to read it yourself.  But the more accurate perspective of the book is not that people should only strive for their own gains and not help other people, it's that people who are able to help themselves should and not apply false obligations to those that have been successful in doing so.
> 
> The "Atlas'" of the book are business leaders that have made themselves successful and as a by product provdied things like quality steel and transportation to many, many people as well as provided many, many jobs.  yet thy're still maligned and are told they must do more for the less fortunate and must handicap themselves in order to allow others to 'farily' compete.  When they get tired of it, they leave society , closeing the doors of their million dollar businesses that provided jobs and products, hence they 'shrugged'.  They form their own society  hidden away from rest of the world where the people understand what the expectations are of each other while the rest of the world is left to struggle on without them.



I appreciate the informative response.

I must say though, that sounds - the idea, not your words - a bit, well, sooky.  Like the business leader is spitting the dummy because he or she is not loved.  Trust me, if I could walk away from a cockup like the CEO of Merrill Lynch with all that money, I wouldn't give a rat's arse what the world thought of me.

Anyway, I've said it before, I can't see much difference between Rand's objectivism and ethical egoism (in it's various flavours).


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## Bern80

Diuretic said:


> I appreciate the informative response.
> 
> I must say though, that sounds - the idea, not your words - a bit, well, sooky.  Like the business leader is spitting the dummy because he or she is not loved.  Trust me, if I could walk away from a cockup like the CEO of Merrill Lynch with all that money, I wouldn't give a rat's arse what the world thought of me.
> 
> Anyway, I've said it before, I can't see much difference between Rand's objectivism and ethical egoism (in it's various flavours).



They don't care whether they're loved or not.  I don't suspect the characters of the book care if people lavish praise or fawn over them for what they have done.  Essentially what they care about is others in society that have the ability to, not holding themselves to the same standards that they hold themselves.  Not only that but essentially being punished for being successful.


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## Diuretic

Bern80 said:


> They don't care whether they're loved or not.  I don't suspect the characters of the book care if people lavish praise or fawn over them for what they have done.  Essentially what they care about is others in society that have the ability to, not holding themselves to the same standards that they hold themselves.  Not only that but essentially being punished for being successful.



I know this is ridiculuous but I'm put in mind of _Walden Two _by B.F. Skinner.


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## Bern80

Diuretic said:


> I know this is ridiculuous but I'm put in mind of _Walden Two _by B.F. Skinner.



Read it. vaguely remember it.  Sort of similar.  Really give it a read.  Warning: its really, really long.  Like 1300 pages or so I think.  While it is social commentary, there is a decent work of pure fiction and story in there to.


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## Diuretic

Bern80 said:


> Read it. vaguely remember it.  Sort of similar.  Really give it a read.  Warning: its really, really long.  Like 1300 pages or so I think.  While it is social commentary, there is a decent work of pure fiction and story in there to.



I haunt second hand bookshops so I'll keep an eye out for it.


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## midcan5

Sorry, but I found it unreadable, also found Skinner's book unreadable, they are both ideology cloaked in so called literature. Read Sinclair or Steinbeck instead. Galbraith's quote pretty much sums it up, "The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness." Anyone who lives and works in corporate business know the premise that they do conscious good work is complete hooey. Think Enron. If you want a real challenging (but easy) read in this area, and it is contemporary, check out Derrick Jensen's, "The Culture of Make Believe." I am just over a hundred pages into it but it questions so much of modern economics BS.


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## Threedee

midcan5 said:


> Sorry, but I found it unreadable, also found Skinner's book unreadable, they are both ideology cloaked in so called literature. Read Sinclair or Steinbeck instead. Galbraith's quote pretty much sums it up, "The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness." Anyone who lives and works in corporate business know the premise that they do conscious good work is complete hooey. Think Enron. If you want a real challenging (but easy) read in this area, and it is contemporary, check out Derrick Jensen's, "The Culture of Make Believe." I am just over a hundred pages into it but it questions so much of modern economics BS.



Well, we're not all entrepreneurs now, are we? That's why I'm not a business or engineering major (I simply cannot do the math). However, anybody can realize the serious benefit that successful businesses give to society - wealth, jobs, products, innovation and even tax revenue. Now, as you may also have been aware, Enron was not successful in the end, which is why a few crooks plotted to cook the books and run off with some cash.


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## midcan5

Threedee said:


> ... Enron was not successful in the end, which is why a few crooks plotted to cook the books and run off with some cash.



Or business people are like all those other folks out there, many are crooks or as John Prine sings:

"Some humans ain't human
Though they walk like we do
They live and they breathe
Just to turn the old screw
They screw you when you're sleeping
They try to screw you blind
Some humans ain't human
Some people ain't kind

You might go to church
And sit down in a pew
Those humans who ain't human
Could be sittin' right next to you
They talk about your family
They talk about your clothes
When they don't know their own ass
From their own elbows"


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## Threedee

Its hard for me to appreciate a piece that repeatedly uses the word "ain't." Its very uncultured.

Now, I find that an anti-business mentality is highly un-American, because we were founded on natural rights philosophy, which declares property sacred. Furthermore, the Revolution broke out in Boston, the city of the merchant class of the period.

Also, recall that it was the free labor/free & competitive marketers of the 1850's that rose up in opposition to the South's despotic single-market system (I say despotic, and note that nowhere on earth today are there single-market systems that have not bred despotism - oil/diamonds/gold/etc.) and to slavery.


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## midcan5

Ain't ain't a word, ain't or ain't it.

I doubt John's song would have much impact in proper English. 

Derrick Jensen puts forth the presumption that all evil is grounded in property.

[ame]http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1931498571/ref=sib_dp_pt/105-5672573-7974020#reader-link[/ame]

"If I were permitted to write all the ballads I need not care who makes the laws of the nation."  Andrew Fletcher


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## jillian

Threedee said:


> Its hard for me to appreciate a piece that repeatedly uses the word "ain't." Its very uncultured.



Kiddo, you're barely drinking age and you're talking about John Prine being "uncultured"? Kind of presumptuous of you, IMO. Guess I'll have to write a letter to Springsteen, and the other songwriters who use the term as a literary device and tell them about how they've gotten it wrong all these years. Perhaps we need to correct the volumes of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, too. 



> Now, I find that an anti-business mentality is highly un-American, because we were founded on natural rights philosophy, which declares property sacred. Furthermore, the Revolution broke out in Boston, the city of the merchant class of the period.



Actually, all property is a creation of law, whether common law or statute. There is nothing "natural" about it. Certain types of property are owned which give rights of succession to the heirs of the owner. Some property rights exist through marriage because the law *says* they exist. Some property rights end with the life of the holder. Intellectual property only exists to the extent that copyright and trademark laws grant those rights. Corporations only exist as entities created artificially based upon statutory code which describes how they are created, who controls them and how they are controlled.



> Also, recall that it was the free labor/free & competitive marketers of the 1850's that rose up in opposition to the South's despotic single-market system (I say despotic, and note that nowhere on earth today are there single-market systems that have not bred despotism - oil/diamonds/gold/etc.) and to slavery.



Is that what you think the civil war was about and what its lessons were?

As for the effects of the "free market" system, that system, when untempered by laws which enforce minimal standards for workers result in Dickensian nightmares. There's a reason that a better way was found. Adam Smith's type of laissez faire capitalism is, ultimately, a failure of humanity when taken to its extreme.


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## Diuretic

Threedee said:


> Its hard for me to appreciate a piece that repeatedly uses the word "ain't." Its very uncultured.
> 
> Now, I find that an anti-business mentality is highly un-American, because we were founded on natural rights philosophy, which declares property sacred. Furthermore, the Revolution broke out in Boston, the city of the merchant class of the period.
> 
> Also, recall that it was the free labor/free & competitive marketers of the 1850's that rose up in opposition to the South's despotic single-market system (I say despotic, and note that nowhere on earth today are there single-market systems that have not bred despotism - oil/diamonds/gold/etc.) and to slavery.



jillian's point is more erudite but there are no "natural" rights, property or other.  Everthing we know about "rights" and "property" is a human invention.


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## Threedee

Hey, natural rights is what we (USA) are founded on, whether you like it or not. They are found notably in the Declaration.

Now, some socialists and communists out there may deplore property (and no, its not simply using buzzwords; this has always been a core belief of far left ideologies), but George Washington and company felt it was a God-given right. Rather than trying to throw out natural rights (in terms of structure, at least, if you don't believe they actually "exist") and attempting to make America a clone of Europe (whom we separated from and swore never to get entangled with - whoops), said socialists and communists can always go back home with their Torryism (that is a buzzword, I suppose).


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## Diuretic

Whlle I am an admirer of your Founding Fathers they weren't bringing up anything new in "natural rights".  But that's okay, they knew what they were and they were determined not to let government unreasonably infringe on them and I reckon that's a damn fine idea.

Socialists and communists aren't opposed to "property". The issue is with the means of production.  

The United States didn't fall out with Europe (remember the French navy?) it fell out with Britain and no wonder.

"Toryism" relates to the values of the political party which existed in Britain about the same time as the Whigs (the current Conservative Party of the UK is labelled "Tory" by its opponents).


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## Threedee

Torryism used to mean being sympathetic to Britain. It was essentially the same thing as being a Loyalist (here in the US).

And my point is that the Founders were affirming and protecting Natural Rights, and that is the basis of this country. Midcan attacked them as unreal and quoted a guy who thinks property (NR #2) is evil.

And communists certainly think property is evil. Marx identified it with the means of production, it the hostility grew from there.


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## Diuretic

Threedee said:


> Torryism used to mean being sympathetic to Britain. It was essentially the same thing as being a Loyalist (here in the US).
> 
> And my point is that the Founders were affirming and protecting Natural Rights, and that is the basis of this country. Midcan attacked them as unreal and quoted a guy who thinks property (NR #2) is evil.
> 
> And communists certainly think property is evil. Marx identified it with the means of production, it the hostility grew from there.



Marx wrote about the ownership of the means of production, he didn't decry property itself.  Communists don't think property is evil, following Marx they believe in the social ownership fo the means of production, not its private ownership.


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## Bern80

midcan5 said:


> Sorry, but I found it unreadable, also found Skinner's book unreadable, they are both ideology cloaked in so called literature.



Ummm, DUH!  They aren't trying to dupe into buying into their ideology via a fictitious story. If you have even a hint of who Ayn Rand is before reading it, you know, whether fictional or not, that what you are about to read will be mostly ideologic commentary.



midcan5 said:


> Read Sinclair or Steinbeck instead. Galbraith's quote pretty much sums it up, "The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness." Anyone who lives and works in corporate business know the premise that they do conscious good work is complete hooey. Think Enron. If you want a real challenging (but easy) read in this area, and it is contemporary, check out Derrick Jensen's, "The Culture of Make Believe." I am just over a hundred pages into it but it questions so much of modern economics BS.



Sorry, Galbraith is simply wrong.  You don't think there is a shred of his own bias in that statement?  The characters aren't trying to justify selfishness. As an Rand said in the book via Hank Rearden, "I do not seek the good of others as a sanction for my right to exist."  That isn't trying to justify anything.  It is simply saying that the fact he is successfull in of itself is not some obligation to be generous.  True it is not the goal of corporate business to do good work.  A corporate businesses job is to make money.  To have anything else as a goal is stupid for a private business.  You can't argue however that good works (jobs, innovation, increased tax revenue, etc.) aren't a bi-product of that pursuit.

And yet still this group of people is constantly pissed on for their perceived greed, instead of being recognized for what they have contributed to society via their pursuit to acheive whatever they hell they want (which is their right in this country).  The problem is the left in this country wants Enron to be synonomous w/ corporate america, when they are the exception instead of the rule.  The best way I can describe is to say that the book is essentially about what happens when the perceived 'greedy', take their ball and go home.


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## Diuretic

All that is true.  The question is, who wants a system where the good is just a by-product of economic activity?  I think one of the reasons that capitalism is coming to the end of its reign is that it is sociopathic in its approach.  That's worked for several hundred years and it's worked well.  This is why the hysterical denialists are jumping up and down when scientists prove the deleterious effects of human-influenced global climate change.  Unfettered capitalism has to be slowed and eventually replaced with an economic system that not only produces good as a direct result of its activity but also has a conscience.

I know, I know, the objections will be myriad, just my thoughts that's all.


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## Bern80

Diuretic said:


> All that is true.  The question is, who wants a system where the good is just a by-product of economic activity?  I think one of the reasons that capitalism is coming to the end of its reign is that it is sociopathic in its approach.  That's worked for several hundred years and it's worked well.  This is why the hysterical denialists are jumping up and down when scientists prove the deleterious effects of human-influenced global climate change.  Unfettered capitalism has to be slowed and eventually replaced with an economic system that not only produces good as a direct result of its activity but also has a conscience.
> 
> I know, I know, the objections will be myriad, just my thoughts that's all.



The answer to the question of your first question is very simple and has historically been shown to be true over and over again.  More good is done as a bi-product of people's pursuit of self improvement (which is all business really is) then by pursuing 'good' as a collective.

Do some reading about William Bradford (he came over with the Mayflower).  It essentially tells the story of how inititally the pilgrims did try to use socialism to sustain themselves.  Each individual was given a plot of land and each member of the community was entitled to an equal share of what was collectively produced.  Bradford saw the problem rather quickly.  The pilgrims landed in the fall, comeing to nothing but a barren wilderness and a harsh winter (half died that winter).  Obviously that situation would require everyone giveing there all.  The problem?  Everyone wasn't giveing their all for the simple reason, why would the most intelligent, ingeneous and bright give any more when their extra work yields nothing?  Why would anyone work hard when they know if that whether they give 100% or 0% everyone is gonna get an equal share.  The person that did nothing is still gonna get as much as the person that does everything. Bradford recongized a basic part of human nature that people work to self-improve.  Bradford was also the governor of the first colony, so he changed the system such that everyone could own their own plot and provide for themselves.  This lead to people producing more than they could use so they set up trading posts to gain better goods.

The point is you and I have seen over and over that collectivism doesn't work.  It leads to mediocrity at best and does not take human nature into account.  You may not look that good is not the ultimate goal of business, but if it were, we would be worse off.


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## Diuretic

I'm not arguing for a simple form of collectivism.  Your examples, which are obviously valid, predate capitalism and industrialism.  You could have quite easily used Soviet collectivism in the 1930s as well, Stalin's destructive agrarian collectivism which caused the huge famine in Ukraine.  And underneath that could be found the quackery of Lysenko and his argument that agriculture could abide by dialectical materialism.  Crackpot thinking but it fitted Stalin's idea of Marxist thought.  It was immensely destructive.

I'm not arguing for utopian socialism.  I'm not arguing for anything specifically (going easy on myself you may think), I'm simply arguing that unrestrained capitalism has now got to the point where it's good is exceeded by the harm it does and a new model has to be invented.


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## Bern80

Diuretic said:


> I'm not arguing for utopian socialism.  I'm not arguing for anything specifically (going easy on myself you may think), I'm simply arguing that unrestrained capitalism has now got to the point where it's good is exceeded by the harm it does and a new model has to be invented.



And what harm do you believe it is causeing?


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## Chips Rafferty

Diuretic said:


> I haunt second hand bookshops so I'll keep an eye out for it.



No wonder you're a filthy atheist and a  ....work ethic denyin' Comm*UNIONIST*!  

You won't find evangelical Christians in _first_ hand, let alone second hand books shops....unless they are looking for free-thinkers books for the fire at tonight's torchlight rally.


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## Chips Rafferty

Threedee said:


> Torryism used to mean being sympathetic to Britain. It was essentially the same thing as being a Loyalist (here in the US).
> 
> And my point is that the Founders were affirming and protecting Natural Rights, and that is the basis of this country. Midcan attacked them as unreal and quoted a guy who thinks property (NR #2) is evil.
> 
> And communists certainly think property is evil. Marx identified it with the means of production, it the hostility grew from there.




You mean proitecting their "Natural Rights" to slave *******?


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## Diuretic

Bern80 said:


> And what harm do you believe it is causeing?



The environment's looking decidedly tatty - that's the big one.


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## Diuretic

Chips Rafferty said:


> No wonder you're a filthy atheist and a  ....work ethic denyin' Comm*UNIONIST*!
> 
> You won't find evangelical Christians in _first_ hand, let alone second hand books shops....unless they are looking for free-thinkers books for the fire at tonight's torchlight rally.



I'm watching the ABC and hoping for a Labor win....I can't begin to think that the bastards will do if they get back in


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## Chips Rafferty

Diuretic said:


> *I'm watching the ABC and hoping for a Labor win*....I can't begin to think that the bastards will do if they get back in



Me Too!


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## Chips Rafferty

Diuretic said:


> I'm watching the ABC and hoping for a Labor win....I can't begin to think that the bastards will do if they get back in




It's starting to look good, Dee. Even Fran Bailey, in my two-bob snob seat of McEwen, is in danger!

*DEATH TO THE IMPERIALIST CAPITALIST MASTERS!!  *


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## Diuretic

Antony Green made his prediction 

I'm still crossing my fingers!

I'm in Makin, it's gone back to Labor and Tony Zappia is in 

Now I think I'll join the Greens, Labor's too conservative for me now


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## Chips Rafferty

Diuretic said:


> Antony Green made his prediction
> 
> I'm still crossing my fingers!
> 
> I'm in Makin, it's gone back to Labor and Tony Zappia is in
> 
> Now I think I'll join the Greens, Labor's too conservative for me now



Yeah, I'm also watching Channel 2. Uncross your fingers Comrade, we have shit in!


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## Diuretic

Chips Rafferty said:


> Yeah, I'm also watching Channel 2. Uncross your fingers Comrade, we have shit in!



I think you're right Chips, I think you're right!  Damn!  Dump these bone dry bastards and get back to our real values


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## Chips Rafferty

Diuretic said:


> I think you're right Chips, I think you're right!  Damn!  Dump these bone dry bastards and get back to our real values



I think the pseudo American "Family First" party vote is up though.


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## Diuretic

Chips Rafferty said:


> I think the pseudo American "Family First" party vote is up though.



I can't understand the FF vote, got me absolutely bamboozled, probably a haven for the ultra-conservatives and the would-be DLP vote.  I think the counter is the Greens, they look like they have won an extra Senate seat which is good news.  

I'm just very glad Labor is going to form government.  I thought I'd be triumphant, strangely I'm not, I'm just relieved.


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## Chips Rafferty

Diuretic said:


> I can't understand the FF vote, got me absolutely bamboozled, probably a haven for the ultra-conservatives and the would-be DLP vote.  I think the counter is the Greens, they look like they have won an extra Senate seat which is good news.
> 
> I'm just very glad Labor is going to form government.  I thought I'd be triumphant, strangely I'm not, I'm just relieved.



Me too. 

All the way through I have had nagging doubts about Rudd. He is not from the same stable of Labor voters that I come from.

Although I think the heavy proportion of unionists in the inner sanctum, that SHOULD get cabinet positions, might just stop him from turning the party into Liberal Light.


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## Diuretic

Chips Rafferty said:


> Me too.
> 
> All the way through I have had nagging doubts about Rudd. He is not from the same stable of Labor voters that I come from.
> 
> Although I think the heavy proportion of unionists in the inner sanctum, that SHOULD get cabinet positions, might just stop him from turning the party into Liberal Light.



If he does go Lib Light the Greens will do him in.  

Howard has conceded.

I just want us to progress.  We need a new paradigm for politics and government.  

I will now move my vote from Labor (it's been there since I first voted) to the Greens.  

I am relieved.  I wish Rudd and Labor well in their first term.  They can save our country.


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## Chips Rafferty

Diuretic said:


> If he does go Lib Light the Greens will do him in.
> 
> Howard has conceded.
> 
> I just want us to progress.  We need a new paradigm for politics and government.
> 
> I will now move my vote from Labor (it's been there since I first voted) to the Greens.
> 
> I am relieved.  I wish Rudd and Labor well in their first term.  They can save our country.





> We need a new paradigm for politics and government.



Too right. A class less one!


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## Diuretic

Me very happy 

Me now Green


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## Bern80

Diuretic said:


> The environment's looking decidedly tatty - that's the big one.



Oh come on Diuretic.  You seemed to be a pretty smart guy.  Pollution is not in of itself a bi-product of capitalism.  It's a bi-product of production.  You think if we were to switch over to socialism there would be no pollution?  Communist Russia was one of the biggest polluters in the world.  Where do you form such opinions?  Does the world look 'decidedly tatty'  outside your window?  You live in Australia for god sake.  How much of your continent has been polluted by human hands and you're arguing that the environment looks 'decidedly tatty'?

Doing away with capitalism in favor of some other economic model isn't going to improve the environment. The U.S. at least is already over the hump as far as teh damage we cause to the environment.  Industry is far better to the environment hear than it was in the past. We have the EPA that monitors and regulates the pollution of our industries.  There is almost no truth behind this notion that rampant capitalsim is causing this dire impact on the environment.  Try again.


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## Chips Rafferty

Diuretic said:


> Me very happy
> 
> Me now Green



Me _still_ Waldorf OR Statler


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## Threedee

Chips Rafferty said:


> You mean proitecting their "Natural Rights" to slave *******?



Angry, are we, that the single biggest political movement against slavery in America was 1850's free market capitalism? And I will reiterate, any American who stands opposed to a nation based upon natural rights and the protection thereof is living in the wrong country.


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## Chips Rafferty

Threedee said:


> Angry, are we, that the single biggest political movement against slavery in America was 1850's free market capitalism? And I will reiterate, any American who stands opposed to a nation based upon natural rights and the protection thereof is living in the wrong country.



Who was talking about about the belatedly democratic, long overdue events that the free world world shamed you into?

Tell me why your "freedom loving" fascist Foundling Fathers didn't free _their _ slaves, TweeDee!

BTW, it was racist 1850's free-market capitalism that sent the "Black Fleet" to Japan to *terrorize* them into the American version "free trade."


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## Threedee

Chips Rafferty said:


> Who was talking about about the belatedly democratic, long overdue events that the free world world shamed you into?
> 
> Tell me why your "freedom loving" fascist Foundling Fathers didn't free _their _ slaves, TweeDee!
> 
> BTW, it was racist 1850's free-market capitalism that sent the "Black Fleet" to Japan to *terrorize* them into the American version "free trade."



All the good one's either didn't own slaves (Adams, Hamilton, even Franklin though I'm not fond of him), or else freed them (Washington). Its just hypocrites and slanderers like Jefferson who owned them all while agitating for freedom. 

You must have confused the US with the other world powers. In the 1850s the US sent Townshend Harris to negotiate with Japan, and in 1858 the Harris Treaty was negotiated wherein Japan opened up Hiroshima and Osaka as ports for foreign trade. A Naval fleet did sail out and anchor off the coast, which led to conflict when one ran aground, and it can said to have been a show of force (there were 8), but no attempt was made beyond that such as the British in China with the Opium and Arrow Wars...


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## Diuretic

I saw the unmarked grounds at Mt Vernon where the slaves are buried.  Washington granted his surviving slaves freedom but only after his death, I believe.


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## Chips Rafferty

Threedee said:


> All the good one's either didn't own slaves (Adams, Hamilton, even Franklin though I'm not fond of him), or else freed them (Washington). Its just hypocrites and slanderers like Jefferson who owned them all while agitating for freedom.
> 
> You must have confused the US with the other world powers. In the 1850s the US sent Townshend Harris to negotiate with Japan, and in 1858 the Harris Treaty was negotiated wherein Japan opened up Hiroshima and Osaka as ports for foreign trade. A Naval fleet did sail out and anchor off the coast, which led to conflict when one ran aground, and it can said to have been a show of force (there were 8), but no attempt was made beyond that such as the British in China with the Opium and Arrow Wars...



So, it was only an evil minority of, presumably, Christ-hatin atheists, was it? 

Well why didnt the moral Christian majority of the first Congress, and of all the congresses up til the 1850s, do something about slavery?

As for Japan, I was talking about Admiral Peary, the man who didnt discover the North Pole, and his fleet of Black Ships,* that was sent in 1853 to bully or bombard the Japanese into opening up their borders to free trade.

Townsends legation was the direct consequence of Pearys intimidation.



> After one unsuccessful and rather cautious attempt at negotiating an opening of Japan, the US government sent a squadron of four warships under Commodore Perry to try again.
> 
> *Perrys instructions permitted him to use force if necessary to gain concessions from the Japanese government*. At about the same time, Tsarist Russia sent a fleet under an admiral, with much the same intentions. The British decided to wait on the results of the American effort.
> 
> In 1853, Perrys black ships arrived. Perry made it clear to the Japanese what he wanted, and that he would not take no for an answer. He announced that he would return the following year, with a bigger fleet, for Japans reply.
> 
> Perrys ultimatum sparked off a major crisis in Japan  a crisis whose outcome was the fall of the Tokugawa shogunate, and an entirely new line of development for Japanese society



go here

*Not to be mistaken for the Imperialist "White Fleet" that your _STILL_ racist goverment sent in 1907 to scare all the heathen savages.


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## Chips Rafferty

Threedee said:


> All the good one's either didn't own slaves (Adams, Hamilton, even Franklin though I'm not fond of him), or else freed them (Washington). Its just hypocrites and slanderers like Jefferson who owned them all while agitating for freedom.
> 
> You must have confused the US with the other world powers. In the 1850s the US sent Townshend Harris to negotiate with Japan, and in 1858 the Harris Treaty was negotiated wherein Japan opened up Hiroshima and Osaka as ports for foreign trade. A Naval fleet did sail out and anchor off the coast, which led to conflict when one ran aground, and it can said to have been a show of force (there were 8), but no attempt was made beyond that such as the British in China with the Opium and Arrow Wars...





> You must have confused the US with the other world powers.



As I've been saying since I got here, the US is no better than the "evil" powers that they are always self-righteously condemning from their self-made perch of moral superiority.

See. The _real_ reasons behind the 12/7/1941 Day of Infamy become obvious when one impartially _reads_ actual history, instead of watching Hollywood's "historical" fantasies, like John Wayne in the The Barbarian and The Geisha, doesnt it?  

Ditto goes for the 9/11 Day of Infamy.

What a calamity it is that most Americans cant/wont read, and thus trust brain-dead drug addicts, with a college degree in My Pet Goat, to interpret world events for them!


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## Threedee

Right, Infamy Day, 1941 was a direct result of the US freezing all Japanese assets in the country. So, what? They were messing around in Manchuria. 

I still don't see why the US is getting all of this credit for imperialism and etc. We have only officially been a world power since 1898. Britain, Netherlands, Spain, Portugal and France were out screwing up the world for quite a long time before that.

The reason why Christianity failed to present as mounting a force against slavery as capitalism did in the 1850's is the same reason why it is unsuccessful today in stopping abortion. In the end its just someone's stupid morality, and there is no cash value in simply doing what is right. Abolitionists were seen as religious fanatics just like they are today. Because it was marginalized politically (and because there were so-called "Christians" on the other side as now), society had to wait for more groups to get on board the wagon.


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## watermark

Threedee said:


> I still think this is retarded. You are making the individualist's point for them by claiming that the collective needs to cheat (or use force/intimidation/etc.) in order to keep up with the individual.
> 
> Seeing as how this is the first response, I can only assume that there are not many libertarians on this board like at FP or JPP, or else they have begun to ignore you...



For once we agree.


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## midcan5

I love when I can go back to an old post and add to it. 

Whittaker Chambers 1957 Review of Ayn Rand

"... Out of a lifetime of reading, I can recall no other book in which a tone of overriding arrogance was so implacably sustained. Its shrillness is without reprieve. Its dogmatism is without appeal. In addition, the mind, which finds this one natural to it, shares other characteristics of its type. 1) It consistently mistakes raw force for strength, and the rawer the force, the more reverent the posture of the mind before it. 2) It supposes itself to be the bringer of a final revelation. Therefore, resistance to the Message cannot be tolerated because disagreement can never be merely honest, prudent or just humanly fallible. Dissent from revelation so final (because, the author would say, so reasonable) can only be willfully wicked. There are ways of dealing with such wickedness, and, in fact, right reason itself enjoins them. From almost any page of Atlas Shrugged, a voice can be heard, from painful necessity, commanding: " To the gas chambers  go!" The same inflexibly self-righteous stance results, too (in the total absence of any saving humor), in odd extravagances of inflection and gesture  that Dollar Sign, for example. At first, we try to tell ourselves that these are just lapses, that this mind has, somehow, mislaid the discriminating knack that most of us pray will warn us in time of the differences between what is effective and firm, and what is wildly grotesque and excessive. Soon we suspect something worse. We suspect that this mind finds, precisely in extravagance, some exalting merit; feels a surging release of power and passion precisely in smashing up the house. A tornado might feel this way, or Carrie Nation.

We struggle to be just. For we cannot help feel at least a sympathetic pain before the sheer labor, discipline and patient craftsmanship that went to making this mountain of words. But the words keep shouting us down. In the end that tone dominates. But it should be its own antidote, warning us that anything it shouts is best taken with the usual reservations with which we might sip a patent medicine. Some may like the flavor. In any case, the brew is probably without lasting ill effects. But it is not a cure for anything. Nor would we, ordinarily, place much confidence in the diagnosis of a doctor who supposes that the Hippocratic Oath is a kind of curse."  Whittaker Chambers 1957 Review of Ayn Rand


[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KmPLkiqnO8]William Buckley on Ayn Rand & Atlas Shrugged - YouTube[/ame]


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