Re: Rage against spammers and telemarketers

["Tomas L. Byrnes" <tomb () byrneit net>]

So much to reply to....

> -----Original Message-----
> From: funsec-bounces () linuxbox org [mailto:funsec-bounces () linuxbox org]
> On Behalf Of der Mouse
> Sent: Wednesday, July 22, 2009 6:06 PM
> To: funsec () linuxbox org
> Subject: Re: [funsec] Rage against spammers and telemarketers
>
> > This post and your one regarding DDT have shown you for what you are:
> > a misanthropic elitist who is trying to have his religion (Gaianism)
> > established by law.
>
> Hmm.  Thank you for stating it so clearly.
>
> Can you explain exactly what you mean by Gaianism?  I'm not entirely
> clear within myself on my religion, and you appear to be able to see
> into me more clearly than I can.
[TLB:] Earth-worship. A belief in the earth as an organism, and valuing
it above any particular organism or group of organisms on it.

> I'm also wondering how I'm trying to get any of this into law.  
[TLB:] Banning DDT, Endangered Species Act, closing large areas of coast
and parkland to human access, population control, etc. etc. Perhaps you
aren't personally involved, but the politicians who espouse the
positions you support have and are implementing policies that place
animals above people.
I
> wasn't aware I was trying to have any law changed (well, not in any way
> that's relevant to this; I _am_ aware of working for anti-spam
> legislation in some minor ways).  Could you explain that?  I'm
> wondering if I've been lobbying in my sleep or something.
>
> > It's OK that you don't believe in a Democratic Republic,
>
> Aside from the contradictions in the term, I believe in what I think
> you mean by it; I've _seen_ some.  (Note that this doesn't mean I like
> them; also doesn't mean I don't.)[TLB:] 
[TLB:] 
[TLB:] A Democratic Republic is a limited representative government with
democratically elected representatives. There is no contradiction. It's
a hybrid. Pure Democracy rapidly becomes mob rule followed by a
dictatorship, and a pure republic degenerates into an autocratic
oligarchy, based on historical experience.
> > human rights trumping those of animals, or free markets, and at least
> > you are honest about it.
>
> You appear to be using "believe in" to mean something more like
> "support" or "consider good" than the usual sense of the term (which is
> more like "be convinced of the existence of"). 
[TLB:] 
 
[TLB:] Correct.

With that rereading: I
> believe that a republic is one of the half-dozen or so forms of
> government that's reasonably workable at modern population densities.
[TLB:] 
[TLB:] Define workable? And for whom does it work? I guess it depends on
your goal. Political stability is not a goal in and of itself, IMO, if
the requirement is effective enslavement of the populace. I believe that
peace is a product of tyranny, and not a goal. The world needs conflict,
because change and adaptation creates conflict. The trick is keeping
that conflict manageable.

> I believe that human rights trump animal rights in many cases, but I
> also believe that many so-called "rights" are nothing of the sort, and
> some that are shouldn't be.  (Some businesses, for example, appear to
> think they have some kind of right to make a profit with their current
> business plan, even after the world has changed enough to render that
> plan unworkable.) 
[TLB:] 
[TLB:] That's clearly not a right. You have the right to pursue
happiness, not a guarantee of finding it, no matter what the
Socialist/Populist/Affirmative action crowd peddle, or well connected
businesspeople. Seeing Hillary Rosen on CNN as a political commentator
makes me want to kill my TV, as they never point out her real
background. Clearly payoff for the good job she did for Warner Bros.

 I also believe many of the cases said to be human
> rights trumping animal rights are actually human convenience and greed
> stomping on animal rights (to the extent nonhuman animals _have_
> rights; most "rights" are human inventions).
[TLB:] 
[TLB:] Agreed, I would define a right as those things you have that
require the actions of others to be taken from you, as opposed to things
that require the actions of others for you to have. Thus, you have a
right to life, but not to food or health care. Those latter may be part
of a social contract, but they are not innate human rights.
> Free markets - I'm not sure I believe in them.  I don't think I've ever
> seen an example of one, and with good reason; I suspect such a thing,
> unless it formed only a small part of a society, would turn into a
> particularly nasty form of plutocracy, bordering on kleptocracy.
[TLB:] 
  
[TLB:] That's not a free market. Regulation is required to keep a market
free. Anti-trust monopoly and cartel busting is as important as
enforcing contracts in keeping markets free and functioning. Our recent
troubles have been the result of forced lending (the community
reinvestment act) and cornering of the market for credit by a very small
number of closely related superbanks, who share BODs and shareholders,
many of whom are politically connected (and now in government), not a
free market. That the markets weren't free was the result of regulation,
not the failure of it (except the lack of enforcement of anti-trust. If
a business is too big to fail, then it's too big, period.)

(The
> scientist in me wants to perform the experiment.  The humanist shudders
> at the risk of making life nasty, brutish, and probably short for an
> entire population.)  Even the freeest markets I've seen have had
> regulations of various sorts imposed.
>
> > This was the reason Madison insisted on the second amendment.  Lest
> > the government be perverted by an unaccountable elite.
>
> Hasn't worked very well, has it?
[TLB:] 
[TLB:] It's worked better than anything that has been tried everywhere
else. 


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