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[R. Steve Walz]

Mark Fergerson wrote:

R. Steve Walz wrote:

Everything is founded on lies, some better than others, that's all.

Ergo you admit your idealized Socialism is founded on lies.
-----------------------------------

That's not what I said, you shit-fucking liar.

I said that everything ANYBODY says is one kind of a lie or
distortion or another. That's because truth and lies are not
actual opposites. They are actually orthogonal, the truth can
also be lies and lies can also be the truth. You can lie in
support of the truth.

And many lies are the Truth as well.

Which is classic doublespeak.
-----------------------------

Nope, just more expansive than your simplistic grasp of Boolean.

Pretending Rather is not credible because of a misstep he admitted
is disingenuous.

No, stating that he's not credible because he presented
faked documents he _wanted_ to believe to be true, and
wanted to convince his audience were true _in the face of
counterevidence he suppressed_, is reasonable.

He told the Truth, he just didn't have proof of it. It's forgivable.

Sigh. He knowingly lied about the validity of the documents.
----------------------------------

No, he didn't even know that at the time.

The only relevant "proof" was that demonstrating that the
events described in the documents did not occur as claimed.
He had that proof in hand and suppressed it. This is not
truth of any kind, capitalized or otherwise.
------------------------------------

He knew the truth, and suppressed evil that contradicted it.

But you're so blinded by your addiction to doublespeak,
you appear to be claiming he was "serving a higher truth" or
some such.
--------------------------------------

He was serving the only Truth, you just don't LIKE that because
you happen to prefer your Anti-truth.

He selectively presented information that supported his
beliefs, and did not present information that contradicted
them, and in fact said that any such information was "not
credible" without stating his criteria for credibility. He
also went out of his way to suppress information on the
source of the faked documents.

Nonsense, he was misled to believe the Truth. It was still True.

Even granting that he did not originally know that the
documents and their contents were fabrications, he still
ought to have reported on their diminished credibility _the
instant_ he suspected it.

He did not do that, which is lying by omission.
-----------------------------

He has no obligation to give your Anti-truth ANY credence.

After he was exposed he claimed to have "misstepped", yet
did not remedy his failure to report the contradictory
information, nor did he make any effort to report on the
motives of the source of the faked documents. He lied to his
audience and justified it by lying to himself.

He isn't obligated to tell your falsehoods for you just because
he couldn't prove the Truth.

He isn't obligated to tell _any_ lies. He _is_ obligated
to tell as much truth as he knows, which he didn't.
---------------------------------

Yes, actually he did, you just didn't happen to LIKE that Truth!

Any credibility I *DO* have is based on *WHAT* I say,

But if you're lying...

You missed the point. Content determines credibility, not source.

There's the rub. Much of what you claim cannot be
second-sourced.

Nothing I say needs any proof at all, it's all structural argument
that is based only on the common human experience.

Yet another unsubstantiable claim.
----------------------------------

It needs no "substantiation", it is simply what I said I always
intend to do. It is statement of my own principles.

Your experience is not
mine, and vice versa. Be extremely careful trying to refute
that statement; you'll be reduced to using "spurious factoids".
---------------------------------------

I need no such thing.

In fact I personally refuse to believe or even hold anything to be
important that cannot be argued solely from structure without any
assertion of spurious factoids.

That's nice. That kind of "reasoning" must rest on
untestable assumptions. That kind of structuredstructure an
"opinion".
----------------------------------------

At some point all rests on assumptions. I consider mine as necessary
and part of the fabric of existence. You have been warped by your
upbringing so as to deny them.

Anything that is merely evidenciary can always be disingenuously
contradicted by anyone Evil enough to wish to do so, and any kind
of evidence can be undermined by enough repetitious deceit unless
offered in a majority-respected peer-reviewed setting where Evil
is simply denied a voice.

Since you accept no evidence at all contradictory to your
position, I must assume that since there is also none valid
to support your position, that it is exactly equal to any
other such position; namely, it's an "opinion".
----------------------------------------

Opinion is what you have. Certainty is what I have.

It's like knowing how to count and do the arithmetic.
You won't learn, and so you speak in inequalities
and haven't the vaguest idea why those are unacceptable.

The only cure for Evil is to stifle or kill it.

Yep, since you can't out-argue anyone, stifle or kill them.
-------------------

I simply say that it is futile to argue with an oppressor,
since he isn't really listening.

Say, I was wrong; you're not a fan of Lenin at all.
Actually, you're a fan of Stalin.
----------------------------

Nonsense. He has nothing in common with me except a means that you
wouldn't want me to use, but which all humans finally have to.

Examine what is said and why, not who says what.

Great. Provide cites to support your opinions in future.

Disingenous. As I have said, that is disreputable and invalid.

Then your opinion has exactly no greater weight than
anyone else's, by your own criteria.
----------------------------------

By my criteria, mine does.

Nobody believes anyone else unless they agree with them.

Only if they can't distinguish between "truth" and "fact".

No, what I said applies to everyone. People agree NOT based on
whether something is true, but whether they share the same belief.

This contradicts what you said above. Agreement about
"truths" is based on a common belief system which does not
take note of, or deliberately rejects, objectively
verifiable evidence.

There is no such thing outside a Majority-Respected Peer-Reviewed
milieu, because all falsehood can be misportrayed and all Truth
can be mischaracterized by you who seek to do Evil.

Sure, once you define a "majority" of "peers" as those
that believe the same bullshit doublespeak you do.
-------------------------------

You misdefine "doublespeak" to suit your ends. Nothing I say is
confusing or confounding to anyone. YOU simply don't LIKE it, and
are LYING because you don't like me besting you so easily with my
words!!

Of course, for this to work, you must continue to
characterize anyone who disagrees with you as "evil". You
sound more and more like a preacher.
----------------------------------

If preachers speak against obvious evil, sure, you'd probably think
that. Your chosen sin is inequality and oppression of others, you
really know you are supporting Evil, and you even know WHY it's
Evil, you just wish to continue to DO it ANYWAY! If you dislike
people pointing up your crimes, you sure won't like me!

Our True statements are always dishonestly characterized by you
Evil-doers as being mutually contradictory using deceit.

Oh, I get it; "logic"="deceit".
---------------------------------------

Nope, your twisting things out of perspective to be deceitful only
masquerades as "logic".

The only cure for this is to torture or kill your kind.

Same old same old.
---------------------------------------

Your disinfo is the same old same old that all slave masters
have ever used.

This is the difference between religion and science. In
the latter, agreement comes from the presentation and
examination of _all_ evidence for a given POV, both
supportive and contradictory.

Any Peer-Review forum that permits your intentionally creative
mischaracterizations violates all principles of Science and Truth.

Yet your preferred "intentionally creative
mischaracterizations" such as Rather's,
---------------------------

He didn't use any such thing. Liar.

and your insistence
that anyone not agreeing with you is evil, are OK. Right. So
much for Science and Truth under your watch.
-----------------------------------------

You who wish to twist perspective and deceive will receive the Truth,
and you will NOT like it!

Any such forum that permits the dogshit you pretend is a POV is
doomed. At some point it must be admitted that no codification
can ever prevent the infinitely creative nature of Evil, and that
such Evil must simply be strangled to death by the Majority Will.

That's right; even the most rabid European Leninists
reject doublespeak these days. When will you catch up?
--------------------------------------------

There aren't any such thing. More of your deceit.

At some point your deceit, lies, and cheekiness should simply be
frightened back into hiding like a child who is intentionally
disruptive and should not be coddled under pretense of reasoning
with your sort.

Waah.
---------------------

Whiner.

Rather is comparable to a Baptist tent preacher pounding
his Bible on a lectern, ignoring or shouting down doubters,
then turning his flock against them with pitchforks and
torches lest his lies be exposed.

Rather told the Truth. He simply didn't yet have the evidence.

He lied. There is ample evidence of it, and exactly none
to support the contents of the faked documents he presented.
--------------------------------

What he said was True, he simply didn't have evidence of it yet.
He didn't know that at the time.

You are one of his faithful because you believe his lies,
and accept his excuses for lying.

I don't like him or the media at ALL, *I* think they're WAY TOO
RIGHTIST!!!

Don't try to change the subject; we're talking about
Rather's lies.
-----------------------------------

He never lied. That you say he did is YOUR lie.

The way we are changed from external influences is from within,

You used to say that we cannot change our minds from
within at all. Lying again, or changed your mind?

We cannot, through ANY act of supposed "will", change what we
believe, not even the smallest thing. But other things from within
and from without will change us, even if against our "will".

This is either your opinion or a lie.

You do not specify the enumeration of our choices in that regard.

You already did.
-------------------------------------

You don't GET to.

Please present
objectively verifiable evidence so I may discern which.

You are not capable of such discernment, so it isn't appropriate.

Oh, right; I'm too stupid. That's a popular fallback in
formal debating; oh, wait, no it isn't.
----------------------------------------

This isn't a debate. That you're too stupid is merely True.

below awareness, beyond our control.

True for those that will not even attempt to understand
how their minds work.

Nonsense. You cannot lift yourself into the air, and you cannot
encompasse your own nature with your awareness. Any believed
control is easily proved to be illusory.

Then kindly present a brief, concise proof.

Goedel's Theorem, look it up.

I am aware of Godel's Incompleteness Theorem, and it
simply does not apply to the real world as universally as
you'd like it to.
-------------------------------------

Nope, wrong.
Take us through it, why don't you, and I'll point out how!!

Betcha won't, or that you'll try to gloss over it disingenuously!

Hold on, I did read it. It comprised four of the five
points on the Bush site.

Yeah, except in the opposite direction.

Uh, no. Same identical points.

So you'd like to pretend that there was no reason to see these men
as adversaries? You're an idiot!

Of course there's no reason for them to be adversaries;
they're from the same socioeconomic stratum, members of the
same "secret society", and have much the same ends in mind.
Their political platforms were conveniences of the moment
and will have as much effect on their subsequent policies as
past examples, which is to say none.
---------------------------------------
Up to a point you're correct, but then you neglect their differences.

There are no significant differences between _them_. The
only significant differences in their political lives is the
agendas of their handlers.
--------------------------------------------

Insipid nonsense.
I wish Kerry HAD handlers, he needed some.

And where the hell do _you_ get off whining about
toss-off slurs, you Evil, posturing, deceitful,
disingenuous, lying, dogshitting, incapable of discernment,
nonsense-prating idiot?
------------------------------

I use them against Evil, you against Good and Truth.
That's the ultimate difference!

As for the name-calling, Steve, do you really take the
American political dog-and-pony shows seriously?

I have one well beyond it that I do, of which the American version
is but a sick weak semblance. But the two sides are NOT the same,
one is quite a bit better (less Evil) than the other!

Sigh. Care to be a little less vague?
------------------------------

Your perception is vague, I was clear.

Tax the rich back to the level of the rest of us.
Require any business to pay each person working the SAME per hour.

Dammit Steve, do you have to keep repeating the same old
zero-sum bullshit?

Ain't bullshit. At any moment the economy is finite,

There's your problem, trying to apply calculus to
economics.

Actually econonists have been doing that since shortly after Leibniz
and Newton.

Yup. And they're all wrong.
-------------------------

Rightists are.

You make the same mistake every economist from
Adam Smith onward makes; you willfully ignore the fact that
value and cost are in constant flux WRT each other.

Labor is the only cost, value is that labor. Any other assertion
is merely connivance to steal.

In your fantasy world only.
----------------------------------

In the real world that will destroy yours.

FTM, in your stated ideal economy, a made object's value
must decline over time.

Nope.

You said exactly that. Want me to Google it up?
----------------------

Whatever *I* said, YOU misinterpreted it.
Typical.

Even though pragmatically most items decay/depreciate.

A house built last week would have
less value than one built today, even if they're otherwise
indistinguishable.

Ever hear of dry rot? But nevermind, you're prating nonsense.

Don't be disingenuous. I said _indistinguishable_. Dry
rot does not occur in a week.
-----------------------------------

Drive it off the lor, and...

Still, irrelevant.

This makes no sense at all. If you wish
your system to be accepted, you'll have to resolve this kind
of inconsistency.

Nothing you maintain here is remotely my position.

Want me to Google it up?
--------------------------

Misinterpret to your heart's content, you will anyway.

Or find better ways to make things that don't involve
more hand labor.

Absolutely. Don't tell me that you have some delusion that I want
everyone to "plant a garden" or "make things by hand"!!?? By labor
I mean the maintenance and use of state of the art manufacturing by
manufacturing technician workers.

Yeah, I got that. But that means that an hour's labor one
day (before an innovation is installed) will produce less
than an hour's labor the next day after upgrading. Also, an
hour's labor in one factory will produce less than a factory
elsewhere with more efficient technology.

It does in fact cost more labor to do whatever without any certain
technological amplification. If we did it yesterday without the
tools it took more manpower, and that cannot be denied, and those
workers must be paid. That is ALREADY true in ALL systems.

OTOH are you suggesting that every workplace everywhere
be upgraded simultaneously? Sure, that'll work.

No, just that that's irrelevant.

No, it measn that workers in plants at diferent upgrade
levels will be producing different amounts per worker-hour.
Unfair! Torture to death the bastard that thought this up!
---------------------------------------

Labor is equal, no matter the tools, and it must be paid equally
per hour. THAT is the moral right! WHAT and HOW MUCH they produce
is irrelevant, they worked the same hours!

How about making us ALL the current equivalent of filthy rich?
You know damn well we're capable of it right now.

You know no such thing, we don't have self-replicating industrial
robots yet. This means we are limited in what we can have and
maintain by how much we can work and to what degree our industrial
base amplifies our production.

So? That doesn't mean that a more efficient distribution
of the output of the present means of production cannot make
everyone the equivalent of filthy rich in terms of not going
without neccesities or even luxuries (depending who's
defining "luxury"). What's stopping it from happening is the
popular addiction to bookkeeping in the form of
artificially-defined credit.

irrelevant repetitious screed snipped

"Production amplification" is exactly the reason your
"work to live" scheme is pointless. People used to have to
work dawn to dusk just to eat. That's no longer the case.
It's down to, what, four hours a day (excluding "tax hours")?

We need to share the profit of production entirely equally, and
then we'll see the average buying power triple, when we prevent
the rich from stealing it all.

Exactly; there won't _be_ any "rich" by the old
definitions of accumulated wealth and buying power.

Yup, the formerly rich will be required to produce consumer items
using factory equipment. They will receive the same wage per hour
as everyone else. Their accumulated wealth on paper will cease to
exist when the banks are destroyed, and they will forfeit any more
than an average fair-sized residence to the rest of us.

No, the entire concept of wages will be irrelevant.
------------------------------

Wage *IS* labor-hours. That's NOT irrelevant.

But as I've tried to explain to you many times, those you
despise as "wealthy crooks" don't count their wealth as
accumulated buying power, but as accumulated ability to
influence and control the lives of those they perceive as
lesser beings. You propose to cure this misperception
through slow death by torture, which completely misses the
point.

I think employing those of the formerly rich who accept employment,
and having them work for a living, after they relinquish their
wealth, is sufficient. The rest we can shoot.

Kill, kill, kill. Same old same old.
---------------------------------

The only thing many of you shit understand.

So, why do Dems lie?

They don't, except obviously where appropriate and moral to do so.

Interesting; you forgive doublespeak when your side does
it. I don't forgive it at all.

Republican lying to steal versus Democratic lying to steal back,
of course!! Stealing is not forgivable, stealing back for the
victim is a virtue!

Bullshit. Exposing lies does not require lying. Getting
in the habit of lying _for any excuse_ merely makes further
lying easier. This is the doublespeak trap that forced what
_might_ have been Lenin's Socialism in the USSR to become
Stalin's Oligarchy. The leaders first lied to themselves,
then each other (with a wink here and there), then everyone,
because they'd gotten in the habit of not telling harsh truths.

Lies and Truth are NOT opposites. Most so-called opposites are NOT,
upon closer examination. When lies are told to oppose the Truth,
that is the only time they're Evil.

Doublespeak bullshit.
----------------------------

Nope, advancee Boolean algebra.

You propose the same old thing; set up your Ideal
Socialism on lies, and it will go the same way.

No, that's merely you posturing disingenuously.

Now you're merely parroting Kerry's wife.

Irrelevant, she didn't run, and is mildly insane.

She claimed that anyone who disagreed with her husband
was stupid, and you're doing the same for yourself. Simple
elitism.

She happened to be right.

The worst thing about your arrogance is that you can't
even see it.
---------------------------

Equality cannot BE arrogance. When we are all equal we can discuss
your fantasy of our "arrogance" in wanting what is OURS!

What will you do when
your local Committee decides you're best suited to carrying
nightsoil?

Doesn't happen, ain't no "committee", just Majority Democracy, and
everyone gets the same work and the same chances.

What, you've revised your precious People's Committees
out of existence? How will your State know what the People
need to do?

By Democratic vote, of course, the sub-committees are merely advisory
executive/research organs.

Ah, the "local committes" now pop back into existence,
under a new name.
--------------------------------
Gee, now you're pretending that you're rewriting the future with
your deceit. First you lie about what I said, then accuse me of
changing my mind when I have to correct you.

No, I didn't. You claimed that your precious committees
will make all decisions "according to democratic vote",
includoing who does what for how long. I simply got the name
wrong. Don't be disingenuous.
-----------------------------------------

The Majority Democracy decides, the committees work FOR them
and do their bidding!

And if their research indicates there are too many people
doing your preferred job, and not enough nightsoil carriers?
What will you do, move away? You never did answer me when I
asked you about that the first time. Suppose the committee
decides you're too valuable to allow to move away?
--------------------------------------
Everyone gets to do SOME of their preferred job if qualified.
They must also do SOME of the other things that need doing.

And who decides how much "some" is? Not the individual
involved; sounds like slavery to the committee-of-the-moment.
----------------------------------

Everyone gets their share, they sign up, it is divided equally.
No committee is required, it is a principle.

If you are specifically skilled you will be required to train
your replacement. Your education is a contract to use it for
the society. Just like astudent loan.

Ah, right. Nobody will be permitted to get an education
on their own hook obviously, else they can't be enslaved to
your system.
----------------------------------

You can go to the library if you please, but you will be paid only
if you take the tests, and then you are subject to the will of the
society that tests and certifies you if your skills are critically
needed. Even this society has laws that say that if you have been
notified that you'rea criticalworker, that you can be forced to
report to work in all emergencies. Back when I was an EMT I was so
notified.

How can any State function if everyone does all the same
jobs? Shit's gonna pile up real quick.

You're becoming confused.
The jobs are all different, but they just PAY the same.

Well, now that the "sub-committees" are back in
existence, no problem.

All you're doing now is attempting to confuse issues.

The "committees" are unrelated to the topic here, but since you had
nothing else you simply decided to be deceptive.

You might simply have corrected my misnaming of your
precious committees. But no, you have to feel superior.
------------------------------------

They are not "precious",
and you misnamed them intentionally to be an ass.

Yeah, right. Which coast do you "live" on?

The Left Coast

Why am I not surprised?

Why do you posture irrelevantly?

Not irrelevant posturing. Please secede ASAP. Then try
living on the resources within your borders.
---------------------------------
One: You haven't the vaguest idea who I am or what I do.

I don't give a flying fuck.
------------------------------------

Preety well sums you up.

-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rstevew@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public

 

[Mark Fergerson]

R. Steve Walz wrote:

Rich The Philosophizer wrote:

On Sun, 14 Nov 2004 07:23:27 -0700, Mark Fergerson wrote:

R. Steve Walz wrote:

meaning the People can run them
just as well as ignorant rich bastards by taking over and controlling
the corportation by Majority Democracy.

Yet those "ignorant bastards" are the ones that set up
those extremely productive farms, not a bunch of long-haired
Co-op ex-hippies.

Often successful production is started by family workers and people
who profited little from it out of conscience, and then it was
absconded with at their death by the unscupulous rich! Few family
farms became corporate ag combines with their original ownerships.

Do you have a little shrine containing a bust of Lenin in
your house?

I just love it when you use words like "often" without
supporting statistics. Yes, I've done my own research, and
the numbers don't bear your claims out.

Small family-owned farms are one of the original "small
business" enterprises that used to be the real economic
backbone of this country, not the profligate "robber-barons"
you vent so much of your spleen on. The latter speculated on
the output of the former, without whom they'd have had to go
into coal, lumber, or other speculation.

As the output of the farms became larger than local
markets could handle, the "robber barons" got rich by
finding larger markets. Without that effort, the small
farmers couldn't have passed on their farms to latter
generations because prices would have kept dropping. That's
also how America got into the subtly destructive habit of
feeding the world rather than teaching it how to feed
itself. If that had happened (exporting knowledge instead of
its fruits), we wouldn't see the wage and other general
economic disparties between America and the rest of the
world. There wouldn't be slave-wage sweatshops anywhere
because the populations would be used to eating better and
living better than they have for nearly three hundred years.

And farm ownership clearly passed into conglomeration
because of the short-term economic thinking we go into below.

Most major coporate farmers in California's central valley are
merely rich land speculators who bought them under-rated from
downtrodden areas and failed rural savings and loans in bad years.

Yup, because shipping food "long distances" (say, across
county lines) worked better, according to short-term
economic thinking, than carrying farmers' loans during those
bad years. That's how family farms got swept into
agribusinesses.

Where are the extremely productive
communes, Steve? There aren't any.

"Communes" weren't FOR that, numb-nuts.

Well then, what _were_ they for? Why couldn't they even
feed themselves? Because they refused to recognize the
_real_ economic climate they existed within, that's why. If
they had, they'd have out-competed the "big boys" to scale
by meeting the specialized market demands the big boys can't.

Today you'd be buying "organic" vegetables etc at
competitive prices from large communes instead of from
"boutique" producers at ridiculously inflated prices.

And NONSENSE, many agencies and most public utilities are publically
owned and NON-PROFIT!!!

Solely because they are legislatively required to be
non-profit. They also cannot run at breakeven.

But the financial profitability of communes, public
utilities, or any other group enterprise isn't really the
issue here; self-sustainability is, and that requires a
slightly greater output than input to make up for entropy.
But you don't get that without motivation, and threatening
the workers with death by torture for not meeting quotas
won't make it happen.

The proper application of the principle of "production
amplification" will, and does. The _improper_ application of
that principle is what dehumanizes these enterprises, and
puts ex-farmers into poorhouses.

Mark L. Fergerson

 

[Tom Seim]

"R. Steve Walz" <rstevew@armory.com> wrote in message news:<41A04596.7677@armory.com>...

Tom Seim wrote:

Rich The Philosophizer <null@example.net> wrote in message news:<pan.2004.11.20.02.01.44.925063@neodruid.org>...
On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 14:08:20 -0800, John Larkin wrote:

On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 21:15:24 GMT, Rich The Philosophizer
[rich vs. poor stuff]

But spending isn't primarily what rich people do. Poor people think
about all the things they would buy if they were rich. But the essence
of being rich is *not* spending. A billionaire may have three houses
and ten cars, but not 3000 houses and 10,000 cars.

Well, yeah, but here's the thing. To the guy who has no hope of
ever having even one house that he can ever call his own, that
second or third house that the billionaire just conjures up
with a flip of his wrist really, really rankles.

Would they also be pissed off at a millionaire that owns only one
(really nice) house?
----------------
You mean like with ten thousand rooms? If they don't have any and he
made them build it and then made them live there and pay rent?
Betcher fuckin' ass!

-Steve

Ten thousand rooms? Have you ever seen such a house? If such a thing,
were it to exist, would be out of the price range of a millionaire. I
was thinking about a $0.5M house.

Let's say they would be pissed off about that, too. Would they be
pissed off at a starter house, say $125K (at least that would be a
starter in my area)?

 

[R. Steve Walz]

Mark Fergerson wrote:

R. Steve Walz wrote:
Rich The Philosophizer wrote:

On Sun, 14 Nov 2004 07:23:27 -0700, Mark Fergerson wrote:

R. Steve Walz wrote:

meaning the People can run them
just as well as ignorant rich bastards by taking over and controlling
the corportation by Majority Democracy.

Yet those "ignorant bastards" are the ones that set up
those extremely productive farms, not a bunch of long-haired
Co-op ex-hippies.

Often successful production is started by family workers and people
who profited little from it out of conscience, and then it was
absconded with at their death by the unscupulous rich! Few family
farms became corporate ag combines with their original ownerships.

Do you have a little shrine containing a bust of Lenin in
your house?
---------------------

More of your irrelevant posturing crap.
I don't have a thing by him or of him.
I don't worship heroes of any kind.

I just love it when you use words like "often" without
supporting statistics. Yes, I've done my own research, and
the numbers don't bear your claims out.
----------------------------

You did doodley.

Small family-owned farms are one of the original "small
business" enterprises that used to be the real economic
backbone of this country, not the profligate "robber-barons"
you vent so much of your spleen on. The latter speculated on
the output of the former, without whom they'd have had to go
into coal, lumber, or other speculation.
----------------------------------------

The teensy farm was a trap for rubes, stuck there with people you
didn't choose and wanting to leave if you had a brain. In Europe
it was family-as-dynasty, and you had to give away your
birth-rightful inheritance of the earth to escape family-farm
slavery. In the USA you sold your parents farm, put them in
a home, and moved to the suburbs, and STILL lost your rightful
place to land-speculators who gave you doodley and cranked up
the urban housing prices artificially to reap windfall, leaving
you a renting/mortgaged serfs paying monthly tribute for what
was rightfully yours AT BIRTH.

As the output of the farms became larger than local
markets could handle, the "robber barons" got rich by
finding larger markets. Without that effort, the small
farmers couldn't have passed on their farms to latter
generations because prices would have kept dropping. That's
also how America got into the subtly destructive habit of
feeding the world rather than teaching it how to feed
itself. If that had happened (exporting knowledge instead of
its fruits), we wouldn't see the wage and other general
economic disparties between America and the rest of the
world.
------------------

So you entirely neglect the simple fact of agriculture that
3 FEET of topsoil from Vermont to the Mississipi and farther,
compared to the 2 INCHES Europe had left or the 1/2 INCH that
the middle east has on its prime farmland would not out-produce
the rest of the world easily, no matter HOW stupid and inefficient
the system running it?? How about the MILLIONS of square miles of
forest when England has left scarely a tree?? Moron, the continent
was the engine, there was no "knowledge", American farmers have
even forgotten how to rotate crops since petroleu-driven fertilizer
production!

There wouldn't be slave-wage sweatshops anywhere
because the populations would be used to eating better and
living better than they have for nearly three hundred years.
--------------------------------

They would need people who actually KNEW how to do that to help
them, not stupid fucking Americans! They would need physicists and
agronomists who knew the proper uses of sheet plastic and aluminum
foil and glue and recycling of materials, and they would need a
free hand politically in those countries, because they were driven
to ruin BY THEIR RICH CLASS WHO WANTED INSTANT PROFIT AND FIGURED
ON JUST MOVING ELSEWHERE WHEN THEY WERE RICH ENOUGH, LIKE TO THE USA!

And farm ownership clearly passed into conglomeration
because of the short-term economic thinking we go into below.
---------------------

Above.

Most major coporate farmers in California's central valley are
merely rich land speculators who bought them under-rated from
downtrodden areas and failed rural savings and loans in bad years.

Yup, because shipping food "long distances" (say, across
county lines) worked better, according to short-term
economic thinking, than carrying farmers' loans during those
bad years. That's how family farms got swept into
agribusinesses.
------------------

The small farmers often had gone to ruin because they had degraded
their soil and couldn't profit anymore, family farmers are usually
MORE stupid than even agribusiness, which has to answer to share-
holders, but a Communist govt running it has to answer to WAY MORE
PEOPLE!!

Where are the extremely productive
communes, Steve? There aren't any.

"Communes" weren't FOR that, numb-nuts.

Well then, what _were_ they for?
---------------

Which kind?
In the Sixties in the USA, they were for SEX!

In Russia, they were someplace to isolate workers and then have
the Army come in and remove the contents of their store-houses
year after year and bring them back NOTHING. This makes the
workers lean on their shovels so the army will go elsewhere.
The Politburo sold all that product abroad and socked the money
into offshore accounts, and their man Putin runs the Russian Mafia
which *IS* the govt, the re-transormation of Russia back to nearly
Tsarist times.

Why couldn't they even
feed themselves? Because they refused to recognize the
_real_ economic climate they existed within, that's why. If
they had, they'd have out-competed the "big boys" to scale
by meeting the specialized market demands the big boys can't.
----------------------------------

Nonsense, niche markets are artificial and trendy. They are
like casino gambling with your retirement.

Today you'd be buying "organic" vegetables etc at
competitive prices from large communes instead of from
"boutique" producers at ridiculously inflated prices.
------------------------------------

They are converging lately, because agribusiness has FINALLY
picked it up. But also, the State has made inroads, forcing
them to reveal their soil amendments to the consumer.

And NONSENSE, many agencies and most public utilities are publically
owned and NON-PROFIT!!!

Solely because they are legislatively required to be
non-profit. They also cannot run at breakeven.
----------------------------------

They don't require subsidy, so they COULD INDEED be profit, but instead
offer MUCH LOWER rates for water and power to locals than commercial
profit utilities!!

But the financial profitability of communes, public
utilities, or any other group enterprise isn't really the
issue here; self-sustainability is, and that requires a
slightly greater output than input to make up for entropy.
But you don't get that without motivation, and threatening
the workers with death by torture for not meeting quotas
won't make it happen.
-----------------------------------

Irrelevant. No such is needed.
Pay workers fairly and equally, and if they must work to eat,
they will work fairly. If not they will be fired till they
starve or change their attitudes. What happens now on the
streets of America if someone won't work? They starve or they
beg. In my society begging is a crime of harrassment and
criminal parasitism! You don't HAVE to work, as long as you
are willing to go without food. Sign up for the next available
job you're qualified for, or training to a job, and you eat
that day. Simple. THAT'S motivation! If they do their work
they can have anything anyone else has, because pay is the SAME!!
If they wantamore interesting job, sign up to be educated, and
while you're trained THAT will be your job, as long as you DO
it and achieve competence.

The proper application of the principle of "production
amplification" will, and does. The _improper_ application of
that principle is what dehumanizes these enterprises, and
puts ex-farmers into poorhouses.

Mark L. Fergerson
-----------------------------

Everyone has the right to a home, free and clear, because all of
all our ancestors built everything we see. We fairly inherit our
share of the earth and man's products from them, as our birthright!

But we do NOT have the right to live off others, and so we must
work for the collective, at work it votes that it needs done. Or
else we can live in that house and eat bugs till we die and they
hose us out! The primary motivation to work is hunger, once hunger
is sated, other interests pertain and further motivate. And so on
up the heirarchy of human needs to human wants.

-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rstevew@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public

 

[Tom Seim]

"R. Steve Walz" <rstevew@armory.com> wrote in message news:<41A059D8.582@armory.com>...

Tom Seim wrote:

"R. Steve Walz" <rstevew@armory.com> wrote in message news:<419EC733.56E7@armory.com>...
Mark Fergerson wrote:

R. Steve Walz wrote:

That's what I was trying to tell RSW. It's approaching
the situation with royalty in the U.K. and other countries
that maintain them for show.

I can see a day when those genetically predisposed to
excessive wealth acquisition are kept in elaborately gilded
cages, smirkingly waited upon hand and foot and bowed and
scraped to, just to keep them out of everyone else's way.
Come to think of it, it's already happening...
--------------------------------
All it takes is to make theft of all types illegal and unfair wealth
acquisition simply won't be allowed. If these idiots want to work
every hour of every day so that they have no time to enjoy what they
earn, and they can buy unperishable wealth items of value that they
have no time to enjoy, they should probably be made to see a pshrink.

Ok, what's the maximum wealth that you would permit?
---------------
No owning land, democratic control

Is your government elected or appointed?

of all land except residential.

Everyone is entitled to own their home and compound. No sale of
homes, only trade straight across through the aegis of the State
if one desires to relocate.

No owning corporate factories or any industrial equipment except
what you can pursue on your residential compound. No owning stocks
or bonds, no savable money, all exchange is in terms of labor hours

So you are going to dismantle the monetary system.

rendered to the State for basic commodities and consumer items.
All grown and made products are rendered to the State for their
agreed labor hours credit amortized over the whole of each product.

If it takes a total of 300 labor hours to make 3000 widgets from
materials mined or harvested to parts composing it, to the final
assemblage, then each costs a tenth of an hour. Unless crippled,
veryone is required to work the democratically agreed minimum hours
to meet basic needs or else they don't eat and it is illegal to even
feed them.

From each according to their abilities, to each according to their
needs.

If they want more they sign up for more labor hours over their
minimum, with which to buy consumer items. The only wealth that
would even be possible is in personal property. Used items can be
freely traded at weekly local flea markets.

The State mandates that repair parts be available indefinitely for
anything at cost.

How are you going to set costs without a monetary system? Who pays to
maintain an inventory of spare? How do you account for the inevitable
loses incurred on providing spares "at cost"?

If you can make something the rest of us want on

your compound then you can petition to work at home, and be paid for
supplies and tools as well, but otherewise you work at a publically
owned factory or farm.

If you want something and can find enough other people who do you
can get the State to assign labor credit to anyone who wants to make
that item at an agreed exchange rate based on how long other skilled
workers in similar fields agree it would cost in hours of labor.

So the State decides what will be produced.

Everything of this sort is decided locally at the Society meeting
twice a week by whomever shows up to do it. People are lenient
with each other because they want support for their own desires
as well.

You order things before they are produced, and they aren't produced
for your order unless you order them.

So mass production is gone. And, along with it, low-priced goods.
Products will be hand made at very high cost. Take you average car.
How can you organize a supply chain when your "vendors" have no idea
what quantities you will be ordering? And when you do order, the
vendors will have to supply the parts at cost.

If we all decide we have enough
stuff for a month or two, we go home and pursue our hobbies after our
minimum hour jobs until enough people want new things. They literally
arrange with others who ALSO want more "stuff" to make it for one
another, via the computerized ordering system

Forget about computers - this is an extremely heavily capitalized
industry that will be vaporized by your system.

between factories that
records all orders for manufacture and all labor hour credit. High
ticket items can be partly paid in advance by labor and partly by
promised future labor, time payment out of your wage to save storage
costs. If you don't work the hours, you forfeit the item till you
do.

All this can be done quite locally in terms of a govt of perhaps
only 5000 people

What size population are you talking about? It takes 5000 people just
to issue Social Security checks when all steps in the process are
considered.

either at public meetings or over the Net. Larger

governance are done via the Net or by study committees that report
back to everyone for grassroots approval.

-Steve

 

[Mark Fergerson]

Pig Bladder wrote:

On Thu, 18 Nov 2004 09:47:48 -0700, Mark Fergerson wrote:

R. Steve Walz wrote:

Mark Fergerson wrote:

R. Steve Walz wrote:

The Left Coast

Why am I not surprised?

Why do you posture irrelevantly?

Not irrelevant posturing. Please secede ASAP. Then try
living on the resources within your borders.

Be careful what you ask for - the last I heard, California got back about
60% of what it paid in federal taxes. I don't think it'd be California
that'd suffer if they withheld their federal extortion payments.

Sigh. Read what I wrote. Then think about "subsidization".

Mark L. Fergerson

 

[Mark Fergerson]

John Larkin wrote:

On Thu, 18 Nov 2004 09:47:48 -0700, Mark Fergerson <nunya@biz.ness
wrote:



We need to share the profit of production entirely equally, and
then we'll see the average buying power triple, when we prevent
the rich from stealing it all.

No, we'd see zero investment, gross scarcities, and a tripling of
prices through inflation. And that the short-term; it would be worse
longterm.

Which appears to be exactly what RSW wants.

Exactly; there won't _be_ any "rich" by the old
definitions of accumulated wealth and buying power.

But as I've tried to explain to you many times, those you
despise as "wealthy crooks" don't count their wealth as
accumulated buying power, but as accumulated ability to
influence and control the lives of those they perceive as
lesser beings. You propose to cure this misperception
through slow death by torture, which completely misses the
point.

In the tradeoff between instant consumption and deferred investment,
it is the rich who invest. Working-class people and government are
generally *negative* investors. Rich people who aren't good longterm
investors lose their wealth to people who are better at it.

Yup. And when smart investors do their stuff, _everybody_
benefits.

But we live in a society of excess already, so most of the arguments
about class and wealth are moot.

That's what I was trying to tell RSW. It's approaching
the situation with royalty in the U.K. and other countries
that maintain them for show.

Mark L. Fergerson

 

[Mark Fergerson]

R. Steve Walz wrote:

John Larkin wrote:

On Thu, 18 Nov 2004 15:16:25 -0700, Mark Fergerson
nunya@biz.ness
wrote:

But we live in a society of excess already, so most of
the arguments
about class and wealth are moot.

That's what I was trying to tell RSW. It's approaching
the situation with royalty in the U.K. and other countries
that maintain them for show.

I can see a day when those genetically predisposed to
excessive wealth acquisition are kept in elaborately gilded
cages, smirkingly waited upon hand and foot and bowed and
scraped to, just to keep them out of everyone else's way.
Come to think of it, it's already happening...

Someone recently noted that anybody can go to a nearby
gas station
mini-mart and, for $6 or so, buy a better bottle of wine
than any
French king ever tasted.

Totally unimportant to the issue.
If the peon had to work only an hour a day, and the rich
not at all,
I'd still be saying "KILL THE RICH!!"

You just don't get it. The wealthy have always worked
_all day long_ at being wealthy, no matter how many hours
the "peons" they thought they were "managing" worked per day
(and they're "managing" themselves out of existence faster
than any State could wither itself away).

They are absolute slaves to their "wealth acquisition"
behaviors, with no time at all to spare for "nonproductive"
pursuits. Have you never noticed what abysmal morons rich
people tend to be on any subject other than acquiring money?

Have you never noticed that once a wealthy person
acquires interests other than acquiring wealth, the first
thing they do is start giving away as much of it as possible
so they aren't enslaved by it any more?

Get a grip Steve, and yank your political thinking out of
the 19th century. The rest of the world is passing you by.

Mark L. Fergerson

 

[R. Steve Walz]

Pig Bladder wrote:

On Sun, 21 Nov 2004 07:29:50 +0000, R. Steve Walz wrote:

Well, yeah, but here's the thing. To the guy who has no hope of
ever having even one house that he can ever call his own, that
second or third house that the billionaire just conjures up
with a flip of his wrist really, really rankles.

Would they also be pissed off at a millionaire that owns only one
(really nice) house?
----------------
You mean like with ten thousand rooms?

I guess that would depend on to what extremes you
[]
The Pig Bladder
--------------------------------

"You mean like with ten thousand rooms? If they don't have any and he
made them build it and then made them live there and pay rent?
Betcher fuckin' ass!"

You deleted my comment and didn't address the topic, you shithead.

-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rstevew@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public

 

[R. Steve Walz]

Rich The Philosophizer wrote:

On Sun, 21 Nov 2004 07:29:50 +0000, R. Steve Walz wrote:

Tom Seim wrote:

Rich The Philosophizer <null@example.net> wrote in message news:<pan.2004.11.20.02.01.44.925063@neodruid.org>...
On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 14:08:20 -0800, John Larkin wrote:

On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 21:15:24 GMT, Rich The Philosophizer
[rich vs. poor stuff]

But spending isn't primarily what rich people do. Poor people think
about all the things they would buy if they were rich. But the essence
of being rich is *not* spending. A billionaire may have three houses
and ten cars, but not 3000 houses and 10,000 cars.

Well, yeah, but here's the thing. To the guy who has no hope of
ever having even one house that he can ever call his own, that
second or third house that the billionaire just conjures up
with a flip of his wrist really, really rankles.

Would they also be pissed off at a millionaire that owns only one
(really nice) house?
----------------
You mean like with ten thousand rooms? If they don't have any and he
made them build it and then made them live there and pay rent?
Betcher fuckin' ass!

R. Steve Walz, I'm ashamed of you.

This degree of unsolicited extrapolation does not speak well of your
objectivity in this issue.

Ah, I give up. It's your choice if you want to go through life as an
all-or-nothing thinker, or as a real person.

;^j
Rich
-----------------------

Grow up. It's an exact analogy. You just didn't like that I used it.

-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rstevew@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public

 

[R. Steve Walz]

Mark Fergerson wrote:

R. Steve Walz wrote:

That's what I was trying to tell RSW. It's approaching
the situation with royalty in the U.K. and other countries
that maintain them for show.

I can see a day when those genetically predisposed to
excessive wealth acquisition are kept in elaborately gilded
cages, smirkingly waited upon hand and foot and bowed and
scraped to, just to keep them out of everyone else's way.
Come to think of it, it's already happening...
--------------------------------

All it takes is to make theft of all types illegal and unfair wealth
acquisition simply won't be allowed. If these idiots want to work
every hour of every day so that they have no time to enjoy what they
earn, and they can buy unperishable wealth items of value that they
have no time to enjoy, they should probably be made to see a pshrink.

Someone recently noted that anybody can go to a nearby
gas station
mini-mart and, for $6 or so, buy a better bottle of wine
than any
French king ever tasted.

Totally unimportant to the issue.
If the peon had to work only an hour a day, and the rich
not at all,
I'd still be saying "KILL THE RICH!!"

You just don't get it. The wealthy have always worked
_all day long_ at being wealthy, no matter how many hours
the "peons" they thought they were "managing" worked per day
(and they're "managing" themselves out of existence faster
than any State could wither itself away).
---------------------------

Wealthy people call "work" shopping or getting a latte'.
Wealthy people call talking on the phone about new ways
to steal from the poor "work".

By work *I* ONLY mean producing items or commodities that
others need by the actual labor required to grow, collect,
or construct them.

They are absolute slaves to their "wealth acquisition"
behaviors, with no time at all to spare for "nonproductive"
pursuits. Have you never noticed what abysmal morons rich
people tend to be on any subject other than acquiring money?
--------------------------------

Theft and crime is a specialty that consumes all one's time.
But it does not make it excusable.

Have you never noticed that once a wealthy person
acquires interests other than acquiring wealth, the first
thing they do is start giving away as much of it as possible
so they aren't enslaved by it any more?
--------------------------------

No one else notices this, you're merely confabulating what you
prefer to believe.

Get a grip Steve, and yank your political thinking out of
the 19th century. The rest of the world is passing you by.

Mark L. Fergerson
------------------------------

Now all you're doing is lying.

-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rstevew@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public

 

[R. Steve Walz]

Pig Bladder wrote:

On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 09:15:53 +0000, R. Steve Walz wrote:

John Larkin wrote:

On Thu, 18 Nov 2004 09:47:48 -0700, Mark Fergerson <nunya@biz.ness
wrote:

We need to share the profit of production entirely equally, and
then we'll see the average buying power triple, when we prevent
the rich from stealing it all.

No, we'd see zero investment,
------------------
Investment isn't necessary.

Of course not. In SteveTopia, factories grow up from the ground.
The Pig Bladder From Uranus
----------------------------

Nope, they are already in existence, and we already own them if
we simply say so.

-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rstevew@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public

 

[John Larkin]

On Sat, 20 Nov 2004 02:51:57 GMT, Rich The Philosophizer
<null@example.net> wrote:

I wonder how many homeless people you could feed and school
and house for the price of a spare house and its upkeep?

Or the price of an SUV, or a Disneyland vacation, or a granite
kitchen, or Cable TV?

John

 

[Tom Seim]

Rich The Philosophizer <null@example.net> wrote in message news:<pan.2004.11.20.02.01.44.925063@neodruid.org>...

On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 14:08:20 -0800, John Larkin wrote:

On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 21:15:24 GMT, Rich The Philosophizer
[rich vs. poor stuff]

But spending isn't primarily what rich people do. Poor people think
about all the things they would buy if they were rich. But the essence
of being rich is *not* spending. A billionaire may have three houses
and ten cars, but not 3000 houses and 10,000 cars.

Well, yeah, but here's the thing. To the guy who has no hope of
ever having even one house that he can ever call his own, that
second or third house that the billionaire just conjures up
with a flip of his wrist really, really rankles.

Would they also be pissed off at a millionaire that owns only one
(really nice) house?

 

[R. Steve Walz]

Rich The Philosophizer wrote:

On Sat, 20 Nov 2004 04:10:30 +0000, R. Steve Walz wrote:

John Larkin wrote:

On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 09:26:55 GMT, "R. Steve Walz" <rstevew@armory.com
wrote:

Someone recently noted that anybody can go to a nearby gas station
mini-mart and, for $6 or so, buy a better bottle of wine than any
French king ever tasted.
John
---------------
Totally unimportant to the issue.
If the peon had to work only an hour a day, and the rich not at all,
I'd still be saying "KILL THE RICH!!"

Of course. What's really important is the killing, isn't it?

John
-------------
No. What is REALLY important is the FAIRNESS!

What is important is The EQUALITY, and the FREEDOM for REAL PEOPLE'S
LIVES that GENUINE ECONOMIC EQUALITY GUARANTEES!! Money *IS* FREEDOM!
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
You poor, unfortunate, deluded fool.
---------------------

You present no content.

IT IS YOUR *LIFE* AND THE LIVING OF IT!

Purest Absolute Bullshit.
---------------------

Lame and without content.

IT IS HOURS OUT OF YOUR ONLY
LIFE!!

If you are this addicted to money, then I am very sad for you.
-------------

It's not money, it's time and life!

If you are NOT paid equally and are NOT given your fair share of the
world, then TO THAT DEGREE AND AMOUNT you are UNFREE, TO THAT DEGREE
YOU ARE ENSLAVED!! You should KILL anyone who does that to you!!!

You _can_ still get medical attention for this disorder.

Good Luck!
Rich
--------------------

You're meaningless.

-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rstevew@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public

 

[R. Steve Walz]

Tom Seim wrote:

Rich The Philosophizer <null@example.net> wrote in message news:<pan.2004.11.20.02.01.44.925063@neodruid.org>...
On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 14:08:20 -0800, John Larkin wrote:

On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 21:15:24 GMT, Rich The Philosophizer
[rich vs. poor stuff]

But spending isn't primarily what rich people do. Poor people think
about all the things they would buy if they were rich. But the essence
of being rich is *not* spending. A billionaire may have three houses
and ten cars, but not 3000 houses and 10,000 cars.

Well, yeah, but here's the thing. To the guy who has no hope of
ever having even one house that he can ever call his own, that
second or third house that the billionaire just conjures up
with a flip of his wrist really, really rankles.

Would they also be pissed off at a millionaire that owns only one
(really nice) house?
----------------

You mean like with ten thousand rooms? If they don't have any and he
made them build it and then made them live there and pay rent?
Betcher fuckin' ass!

-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rstevew@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public

 

[Pig Bladder]

On Sat, 20 Nov 2004 23:00:45 -0800, Tom Seim wrote:

Rich The Philosophizer <null@example.net> wrote in message news:<pan.2004.11.20.02.01.44.925063@neodruid.org>...
On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 14:08:20 -0800, John Larkin wrote:

On Fri, 19 Nov 2004 21:15:24 GMT, Rich The Philosophizer
[rich vs. poor stuff]

But spending isn't primarily what rich people do. Poor people think
about all the things they would buy if they were rich. But the essence
of being rich is *not* spending. A billionaire may have three houses
and ten cars, but not 3000 houses and 10,000 cars.

Well, yeah, but here's the thing. To the guy who has no hope of
ever having even one house that he can ever call his own, that
second or third house that the billionaire just conjures up
with a flip of his wrist really, really rankles.

Would they also be pissed off at a millionaire that owns only one
(really nice) house?

It's not a de facto sort of thing. It doesn't go by rules and numbers.

The question is, how do you _feel_ about the guy having a house?
--
The Pig Bladder From Uranus, still waiting for
some hot babe to ask what my favorite planet is.

 

[Pig Bladder]

On Tue, 23 Nov 2004 09:43:48 -0800, John Larkin wrote:

On Sat, 20 Nov 2004 02:51:57 GMT, Rich The Philosophizer
I wonder how many homeless people you could feed and school
and house for the price of a spare house and its upkeep?

Or the price of an SUV,
44.

or a Disneyland vacation,
9.

or a granite

kitchen,
23.

or Cable TV?
Only 4-5, but for a very long time.

John

--
The Pig Bladder From Uranus, still waiting for
some hot babe to ask what my favorite planet is.

 

[Tom Seim]

Is your government elected or appointed?
--------------------
Let's pretend you have a mind.

Testy, are we?

What does Democratic Majority mean everywhere in my writings?

I have NO IDEA!

of all land except residential.
Everyone is entitled to own their home and compound. No sale of
homes, only trade straight across through the aegis of the State
if one desires to relocate.

No owning corporate factories or any industrial equipment except
what you can pursue on your residential compound. No owning stocks
or bonds, no savable money, all exchange is in terms of labor hours

So you are going to dismantle the monetary system.
---------------------------
Hmmmm, you're certainly dense, aren't you?

The sign of a shallow mind: no response, then call me a name.

rendered to the State for basic commodities and consumer items.
All grown and made products are rendered to the State for their
agreed labor hours credit amortized over the whole of each product.

If it takes a total of 300 labor hours to make 3000 widgets from
materials mined or harvested to parts composing it, to the final
assemblage, then each costs a tenth of an hour. Unless crippled,
veryone is required to work the democratically agreed minimum hours
to meet basic needs or else they don't eat and it is illegal to even
feed them.

From each according to their abilities, to each according to their
needs.
------------------------------
Nope. Read it again.
You're regugitating your brainwashing from high school.

Better do a spell check.

If they want more they sign up for more labor hours over their
minimum, with which to buy consumer items. The only wealth that
would even be possible is in personal property. Used items can be
freely traded at weekly local flea markets.

The State mandates that repair parts be available indefinitely for
anything at cost.

How are you going to set costs without a monetary system?
----------------------------
Every product has a costs assessment in labor hours following it,
from wells, mines and farms to factories right up to delivery as
a product, and from that the price of each item in labor hours
is amortized.

Like I said, you've eliminated the monetary system.

Who pays to maintain an inventory of spare?
------------------------------
Who does now? We do. Now figure out how that can be done my way.
How stupid are you? Orders for spares stock are pre-ordered for
products by the repair facilities as their normal stock of supplies,
just as any factory does.

Shame, shame. More name calling- typical of dogmatics. Without an
economic incentive, nobody is going to maintain ANY kind of an
inventory.

How do you account for the inevitable
loses incurred on providing spares "at cost"?
------------------------------------
Simple, you study that phenomenon and justify a slightly higher price
in labor hours of those goods because of it, represented by each
product item's price by division of its costs for the whole lot.

The State gains its costs for medical and care of the infirm in a
similar way, by costing each person an equal minimum labor hour
quota they must work to receive food, power, telecom, gas, recycle,
and water. This "tax" on things is price-inherent, not seen explicitly
for any one item.

This is your "new" monetary system - trading of labor hours. People
will have a disincentive to pursue higher education because their
labor is valued equally to unskilled labor.

If you can make something the rest of us want on
your compound then you can petition to work at home, and be paid for
supplies and tools as well, but otherewise you work at a publically
owned factory or farm.

If you want something and can find enough other people who do you
can get the State to assign labor credit to anyone who wants to make
that item at an agreed exchange rate based on how long other skilled
workers in similar fields agree it would cost in hours of labor.

So the State decides what will be produced.
--------------------------------
No, each person both orders things from the Catalog, and adds items

Catalog, with a capital "C". Sounds like something passed down from
the "State".

to it by submitting requests online in a kind of eco-political eBay
for people to organize who want some new kind of product, they present
it to everyone, and they ask that orders for such a product by collected
and that these orders become standing work-orders for that
product to be produced, then people who want more work can offer to
manufacture it at any factory with suitable space and tools, or they
can ask that a new factory be built for it and submit evidence that
it would be well-used. If a hobby group wants certain specialty items
produced, it simply submits its orders to the local Committee of the
People that meets several times a week. If approved, they compete for

Who "approves" what?

any remaining materials and factory space, or they are requested to
pursue its manufacture as a hobby or avocation in their home compounds
for a bit longer till there is more demand. If they can show demand
and ability and get labor hour quotes approved those who manufacture
them, even on a small scale, can be paid labor hours to do so. If
they can simply show orders and provide an acceptable quote for labor
then they can be paid labor hours and they sell the product to the
State Catalog for sale.


Everything of this sort is decided locally at the Society meeting
twice a week by whomever shows up to do it. People are lenient
with each other because they want support for their own desires
as well.

You order things before they are produced, and they aren't produced
for your order unless you order them.

So mass production is gone. And, along with it, low-priced goods.
-------------
Not at all, we simply make things in huge lots when an order for that
many accumulates, unless the People vote it a critical commodity.


Products will be hand made at very high cost. Take you average car.
How can you organize a supply chain when your "vendors" have no idea
what quantities you will be ordering? And when you do order, the
vendors will have to supply the parts at cost.
------------------------------------------
In reality everything is done "at cost", profit is merely the rich
stealing a portion of the wage of the laborers and then partially
inflating the exchange medium without fully correcting for that.
Now that there are no rich to do so, cost is all that anything
requires. Investment is only done by the People as the State.

Profit is the reward for taking a risk, such as making a product that
nobody wants. Take away the reward, profit, and nobody will take the
risk, i.e. no products. And you don't have to be "rich" to do this -
small businesspeople do it every day.

If we all decide we have enough
stuff for a month or two, we go home and pursue our hobbies after our
minimum hour jobs until enough people want new things. They literally
arrange with others who ALSO want more "stuff" to make it for one
another, via the computerized ordering system

Forget about computers - this is an extremely heavily capitalized
industry that will be vaporized by your system.
----------------------------------------
Nonsense. No "capital" from "rich" is required. The People's State
alots extra labor to begin new endeavors or tool-up for a new run.
This is done in factories all the time.

That is actually what is happening anyway, it is simply disguised
as the "rich" funding new endeavors by their stolen wealth and by
their greed dictating what the society will next produce.

Consumers dictate what will be produced - except in your personal
hell.

between factories that
records all orders for manufacture and all labor hour credit. High
ticket items can be partly paid in advance by labor and partly by
promised future labor, time payment out of your wage to save storage
costs. If you don't work the hours, you forfeit the item till you
do.

All this can be done quite locally in terms of a govt of perhaps
only 5000 people either at public meetings or over the Net. Larger
governance are done via the Net or by study committees that report
back to everyone for grassroots approval.

-Steve

What size population are you talking about? It takes 5000 people just
to issue Social Security checks when all steps in the process are
considered.
--------------------------------------------
But not in one town or city. Nor do we need any such without "money".
It is totally scalable.

-Steve

GOOD LUCK! You will be asking everybody with savings to give those
savings up, hardly a winning strategy. But, then again, you don't
REALLY have any expectations of winning.

 

[John Larkin]

On Wed, 24 Nov 2004 17:22:58 GMT, Pig Bladder
<pig_bladder@anyspammer.org> wrote:

I bet you and Pig Bladder could have a long discussion on that
subject.

Depends on if we trip over our groupies, admirers, and hero-worshipers.

Not to mention all those hot babes that groove on your pickup line.

John