Why Obama is wrong when he says business needs the government

[BlindBoo]

First, the bonds were backed by a private bank, not the government.

It is interesting that Southern Pacific had government enforced monopoly on ferries, but I don't see how that actually proves me wrong.

I am not making anyone out to be a hero, I am pointing out that Obama is wrong.

On November 4, 1930, voters within the Golden Gate Bridge and Highway District’s six member counties (San Francisco, Marin, Sonoma, Del Norte, and portions of Napa and Mendocino) went to the polls on the question of whether to put up their homes, their farms and their business properties as collateral for a $35 million bond issue to finance the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge (Bridge).

Bank of America purchased the first block of bonds - $3 million of the District bonds at 96.23 cents and an additional $3 million on Marh 1, 1933.

*

Bank of America purchased the remaining 29 million in April 1933.

Yes, a single individual threw all the assets of his business, which happened to be a bank, behind the project.

and made 39 million to boot.

Chief Engineer Joseph Strauss along with a strong committee of Board members and officials, presented the District problem to Amadeo P. Gianni, chairman of the Board of Bank of America. A.P. Gianni pledged his bank’s support, and through the work of Will Moorish, the Bank President at that time, and local bond houses, a new bond syndicate headed by Bank of America was formed.

The Golden Gate Bridge and Highway Act (1928) provided that funds to build the Golden Gate Bridge may be raised in the preliminary stages by taxation. Accordingly, a tax rate of 3 cents per $100 was levied on all taxable property within the Golden Gate Bridge and Highway District (District) on July 24, 1929 for preliminary expenses, and an additional 2 cents was levied in July 1930, making a total of 5 cents, yielding about $465,000. The assessed value of all District property for taxation purposes was a little under one billion dollars.

 

 

[PratchettFan]

Do you think the public sector is more knowledgeable than the private sector, yes or no? If yes I will jump in and debate you all day long. If no, and all you want to do is argue about the tole of government in delivering those things, I suggest you read more of the Discworld books. He is pretty good at showing how absurd government bureaucracies are.

Your point is irrelevant. I am only concerned with whether or not the job gets done and it doesn't get done without the government. I love Terry Pratchett's work, but I do understand the difference between reality and fiction. Do you?

If that was your concern you shouldn't have jumped in and tried to argue that the public sector is more knowledgeable than the private sector.

I didn't. "Knowledgeable" is a meaningless term in this context. People are knowledgable, not business or government. Knowledgable people can be in either, and are.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Tell the defense industry they don't need the government. Let Lockheed-Martin build fighter jets and sell them to private individuals as recreational vehicles, and see how long they stay in business.

 

[OODA_Loop]

Tell the defense industry they don't need the government. Let Lockheed-Martin build fighter jets and sell them to private individuals as recreational vehicles, and see how long they stay in business.

Provide for the common defense sure has a Constitutional ring to it.

 

[regent]

There are many historians that would support the thesis that the Constitution was written to help America's business. Sure a lot of evidence.

You could argue that, though I doubt with any real success. Even so, so what?

Charles Beard, a famous historian, wrote a book about it, Economic Interpretation of the Constitution.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Your point is irrelevant. I am only concerned with whether or not the job gets done and it doesn't get done without the government. I love Terry Pratchett's work, but I do understand the difference between reality and fiction. Do you?

If that was your concern you shouldn't have jumped in and tried to argue that the public sector is more knowledgeable than the private sector.

I didn't. "Knowledgeable" is a meaningless term in this context. People are knowledgable, not business or government. Knowledgable people can be in either, and are.

You didn't make this post?

Nonsense.

America is made great by the blending of private and public sectors, each addressing issues both know best and which are appropriate for either to indeed address. In a modern industrialized society there is no hard, bold border between public and private.

What issues does the public sector know best?

Other than making life hard for the private sector.

Well, off the top of my head, water and sewer services, roads, fire, police, courts, defense, international relations, border control, health inspections, quality control for food, inspections of commericial vehicles and operators, air traffic control, inspections of commericial airplanes. Would you like more?

Want to just admit you stuck your nose into the wrong conversation? It even includes the part where I specifically asked the idiot what does the public sector know best, and you tried to assert all sorts of things that you now admit are wrong.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Tell the defense industry they don't need the government. Let Lockheed-Martin build fighter jets and sell them to private individuals as recreational vehicles, and see how long they stay in business.

I can name a lot of business that rely in the government, that does not change the fact that most do not. Nor dies it change the fact that none should.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Government built Las Vegas.

It took this place, out in the middle of the desert where no one wanted to go and decided to build a city there. So it put in roads, sewers, added police and fire departments. Is that how it happened?

Nope, but Hoover Dam made it possible.

Hoover Dam made it easier, not possible.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Business -- more accurately, commerce - pre-exists government, and some commerce exists in opposition to it.

Thus, it is impossible to argue that commerce -requires- government.

No. Government pre-existed commerce.

Nope. Not even close. There was commerce before there was the -idea- of government.

 

[M14 Shooter]

The government is the reason Las Vegas started to gain attention. So what is your point, actually?

1: Business arrived
2: Government followed
Says all that needs to be said.

Business did arrive in Las Vegas before the government did, then government did arrive, and bigger business and more people arrived. Your point?

That government is not -necessary- for commerce.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Really? They don't use money?

They don't -have- to.

I am agog. How do they that?

Rather limited understanding of the history of commerce, yours.
What did people 'pay' with before governments created money?
If I have guns to sell, you have food you;re willing to trade for those guns, we reach an agreement as to the numbers of each, and complete the transaction, we've engaged in commerce, all w/o th euse of government-created currency.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Why do right wingers like to ignore certain events like the Lewis and Clark Expedition etc?

Why do you refuse to understand that government is in no way -necessary- for people to engage in commerce?

 

[M14 Shooter]

If there were no rules regulating society, business could not exist.

False. Your local drug dealer and gun runner - all of whom conduct their business in direct oppoition to the rules regulating society - disprove your notion.

Do the gun runners and drug dealers have rules and regulations regarding their transactions? Usually if a business is illegal and wants to last it will eventually make rules and regulations sort of creating their own governments. The ultimate of that kind of business is probably found in our own prohibition era, Capone and the South side was one such government and the Bugs on the North side. Each had a government with rules and regulations--and stiff penaltys.

Nothing yuo posted here in any way negates what I said.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Of course commerce will still happen in the absence of government.

Thank you for agreeing that my premise is sound. Have a wonderful day.

Nothing like context to make a point! Sound bites and bumper stickers are merely the skeleton of an effective argument.

Changes not the fact that I made a sound argument and you agreed to it.

 

[saveliberty]

Tell the defense industry they don't need the government. Let Lockheed-Martin build fighter jets and sell them to private individuals as recreational vehicles, and see how long they stay in business.

Provide for the common defense sure has a Constitutional ring to it.

Yet they regulate and restrict the sale of guns to citizens...

 

[francoHFW]

Business needs infrastructure and a trained work force, and customers with money. That's what voodoo has been busy destroying for 30 years-myopic greedy Pubs...

 

[8537]

. The reason utilities are monopolies is that government declared it, not because there is no way to actually compete.

Utilities are monopolies because society wants the services they provide but the service would not be provided without a monopoly.

 

[saveliberty]

. The reason utilities are monopolies is that government declared it, not because there is no way to actually compete.

Utilities are monopolies because society wants the services they provide but the service would not be provided without a monopoly.

Tell that to AT&T. Also government passed legislation allowing one utility to provide power to a customer on another company's transmission lines. Your point is incorrect.

 

[8537]

. The reason utilities are monopolies is that government declared it, not because there is no way to actually compete.

Utilities are monopolies because society wants the services they provide but the service would not be provided without a monopoly.

Tell that to AT&T.

Eh, yes - Tell that to AT&T. For the first fifty years or so of their existence they were guaranteed a monopoly in order to take advantage of the economies of scale involved in brining phone service to rural areas.

Also government passed legislation allowing one utility to provide power to a customer on another company's transmission lines. Your point is incorrect.

Eh, yes - Government intervened in a market in order to force one company to carry another company's power on its lines. Let me check: Do you find that to be proof that markets will naturally break up a monopoly?

 

[saveliberty]

Utilities are monopolies because society wants the services they provide but the service would not be provided without a monopoly.

Tell that to AT&T.

Eh, yes - Tell that to AT&T. For the first fifty years or so of their existence they were guaranteed a monopoly in order to take advantage of the economies of scale involved in brining phone service to rural areas.

Also government passed legislation allowing one utility to provide power to a customer on another company's transmission lines. Your point is incorrect.

Eh, yes - Government intervened in a market in order to force one company to carry another company's power on its lines. Let me check: Do you find that to be proof that markets will naturally break up a monopoly?

You retracting that the only way these services can be provided is by monopoly then? That is what you said.