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Four fears for authoritarians

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Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#111

Post by squozzer »

presidentender wrote: post #83
jstalin wrote: post #75

I'm reminded of a George Washington quote: "Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." In other words, government is, at its bare naked minimum, the monopoly of force. It must be contained, mistrusted, and treated as a necessary evil. Despite the USA being screwed up in so many ways, I still thank my lucky stars for the anti-federalists, who…

Hamilton argued that the very existence of the bill of rights invited the expansion of government into all those areas not expressly forbidden therein, but one might question Hamilton's motivations. That Washington 'quote' cannot be found before 1902. I agree with the sentiment, but false attribution does nothing to help our credibility.

And Hamilton's argument was (partially) countered by the 10th Amendment. "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#112

Post by unethical_ban »

dclowd9901 wrote: post #93
jstalin wrote: post #75

I'm reminded of a George Washington quote: "Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." In other words, government is, at its bare naked minimum, the monopoly of force. It must be contained, mistrusted, and treated as a necessary evil. Despite the USA being screwed up in so many ways, I still thank my lucky stars for the anti-federalists, who…

This philosophy is precisely why I was so dumbfounded to hear a congressman talk on the topic of the Patriot act on NPR. He recently flip-flopped from having been instrumental in writing it to being categorically for reform of it. What blew me away was that he genuinely did not think that the NSA would interpret the term "relevant" as broadly as humanly possible. Anyone who's taken 10 minutes of a law class knows tha…

F. James Sensenbrenner - http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=2139021...

I heard the same thing. His position is that there is a common sense definition of "relevant" that they did not define in the law, and that the NSA would be cool and only look at what they needed.

EDIT: A quote.

>What Congress intended and what I intended is that the target had to be a foreign national and not a U.S. person. He would be targeted, and then they would find out who that person was calling, both in the United States and elsewhere, rather than grabbing all of the phone information and working backwards to the target. The relevant standard was intended to limit what NSA could do. They took the position that it expanded it. And that tips the commonsense definition of relevance on its head.

Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#113

Post by hyperventilator »

hahainternet wrote: post #101
hyperventilator wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose you can defend giving someone jailtime for hurt feelings, but it sounds pretty stupid to me.

Well I'll just go let all those victims of harassment know that it doesn't matter how they feel, hyperventilator has overridden them.

Yay, nanny state!

Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#114

Post by hcarvalhoalves »

mr_luc wrote: post #107
hcarvalhoalves wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yep, see what happened in the Arabic countries (and some other countries outside of the Islam-sphere). I think we need to make a distinction here. See Egypt, for example. A secular military government was in power for decades long (with support from the west). Their "Internet generation" got together and managed to overthrow Mubarak, and call for elections. They had elections, and the most organized party (Islamic)…

Apart from democracy, ie systems that let majorities of individuals pick either the laws directly, or the leaders, what system would be the 'ultimate solution' for any country? I agree that just because you get to democracy doesn't mean everything becomes peachy. But what other systems are better 'ultimate solutions' for given countries? Ie, maybe there's a country for which right now the most practical government is…

The biggest problem with political systems is that countries don't exist in a vacuum.

For instance, it might be possible that Egypt successfully adopted democracy, even when a leader supported only by a sector of the society got elected. The very nature of democracy is forcing you to deal with different viewpoints on the political arena.

But since that goes against the west agenda and the US finances their military, you end up with a dysfunctional democracy, and suddenly it's acceptable to overthrow a democratically elected leader.

Today's world is interconnected so much that the very notion of sovereign countries is arguable.

Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#115

Post by yuvadam »

TimSAstro wrote: post #72
yuvadam wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Act by raising your awareness. Act by not standing silent. Act by being the change you want to see. There is nothing else but this.

I'm sorry to be snarky, but this gives me absolutely no concrete guidance on things I can do. It's a platitude.

Well, that is because there's no guaranteed success in any course of action, save for becoming change, and believing that that action alone is a small, but important, part in the network effect.

I understand HN isn't exactly the usual activist crowd, but it should be pretty easy to understand that activism is about acting against forces much larger, stronger, and better funded than you are.

Actions that bring change will be one-in-a-million, and they will always be the fruit of an individual (or a collective) that are persistent in their goals, and pursue them regardless of others joining them or not.

Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#116

Post by Zigurd »

saraid216 wrote: post #96
presidentender wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hamilton argued that the very existence of the bill of rights invited the expansion of government into all those areas not expressly forbidden therein, but one might question Hamilton's motivations. That Washington 'quote' cannot be found before 1902. I agree with the sentiment, but false attribution does nothing to help our credibility.

> That Washington 'quote' cannot be found before 1902. I agree with the sentiment, but false attribution does nothing to help our credibility. Amusingly, in checking this out myself, I found this: "If they have real grievances redress them, if possible; or acknowledge the justice of them, and your inability to do it at the moment. If they have not, employ the force of government against them at once."

I kind of doubted that the guy who sicced the army on the Whiskey Rebellion would find the government dangerous and fearful.

Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#117

Post by snitko »

swombat wrote: post #79
snitko wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the tax has already been paid Not so. Inflation is yet another tax you'll be paying if you keep your money in a bank. Inflation is a huge thing for governments. Without inflation, they'd be out of so many opportunities to finance various things and the fraudulent financial system governments run would be instantly exposed. Then you would also have to remember that if you keep your savings in Bitcoin, you can pay fo…

Bitcoin has a lot of volatility. I'd rather take a steady 2-4% cut every year than an unpredictable swing that could take out 95% of my savings overnight.

Ok, but the question was how to change things, not how to minimize risk.

Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#118

Post by snitko »

tomp wrote: post #80
snitko wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kinda simple. We finance this bullshit by paying taxes. Why do we pay them? Because they force us to and convince us it's a good idea. What do we do about it? Use any form of money that is problematic to track and tax: cash, gold, Bitcoin. Pretty sure it's possible to live just on that - would be a little uncomfortable, but certainly less so than some violent action. And it would be a major blow to the government if…

I disagree. Taxes are good (I'm from Europe), and most of our governments are good as well; they give us security (police), fire safety, health insurance (emergency services and hospitals), education (most of it is public in Europe), infrastructure (roads, ...), regulation (of the food we eat, ...). Most of it is good, and I used it, and I want to use it in the future. The bad part of the government is very small (bu…

Note how you say "they give us". It's not true. They don't give you anything. They take money from you in the form of taxes (and, mind you, take them with the threat of force towards those who, for example, dislike the services and do not wish to pay) and then pay other people to provide you with products and services. So government is a middleman, but a special kind of: it decides what you want. If you don't like something a government does, you still have to pay.

Stop and ask yourself. If government is effectively gone tomorrow, would the demand for protection, fire safety, health insurance, education, infrastructure and safety net for the poor be gone too? Of course not! And if the demand is not gone, then wouldn't you simply have those things offered on the market?

Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#119

Post by lloyddobbler »

hahainternet wrote: post #102
jstalin wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry if it's an apocryphal quote. I see what's happening in the UK, where people are prosecuted for speech and there is no limit to parliament's power (other than watered-down EU treaties and such) and I'm glad we have the first amendment, which prevents prior restraints and criminalizing unpopular speech.

> I'm glad we have the first amendment, which prevents prior restraints and criminalizing unpopular speech Then why is it that the US ranks lower than the UK on the Press Freedom Index? How exactly has allowing the most vile and offensive hate speech protected you or improved your nation?

Because back in the 1960's, someone speaking out about giving black people equal rights could have been called "vile" and "offensive." That which the majority considers "hate speech" one day might be considered good the next.

Long story short: if you stifle the speech of anyone - say, if they're objecting to an overzealous monarch who demands taxation without representation, OR objecting to puritanical standards that don't allow for interracial marriage - progress will not happen.

Re: Four fears for authoritarians

#120

Post by lloyddobbler »

squozzer wrote: post #111
presidentender wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hamilton argued that the very existence of the bill of rights invited the expansion of government into all those areas not expressly forbidden therein, but one might question Hamilton's motivations. That Washington 'quote' cannot be found before 1902. I agree with the sentiment, but false attribution does nothing to help our credibility.

And Hamilton's argument was (partially) countered by the 10th Amendment. "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

Unfortunately, that hasn't worked out so well, has it?
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