"So, government regulation then?"

Yes. Because brainbomb's view about how the libertarian hive mind works is wrong.

"How large of a monopoly is too large?"

That depends on the industry and behavior of the company.

@SamWest

"You keep coming back to the fact that the Founding Fathers/the Constitution don't like/support democracy, and of course, everyone smart here knows that's true. We "silly liberals" don't agree with the Founders. When people criticize the electoral college for being undemocratic, we aren't misunderstanding it. We are disagreeing with it. Everyone here took ninth grade civics, man. We know America is a Republic, we wish it weren't. We are arguing about what we want to the world to be, not what it is already."

5 states population:
A. 1
B. 10
C. 100
D. 1000
E. 10000
total: 11111 population

Red: (60%B)+(60%C)+(40%D)+(40%E)+(100%A)
Blue: (40%B)+(40%C)+(60%D)+(60%E)

electoral: 3:2 Red Wins

1+6+60+400+4000=4467
4+40+600+6000=6644

popular: 40.2% / 59.8% Blue wins

imagine this is all about air conditioning. people who vote Red want a nice warm 80 degrees, while people who vote Blue want a chill cool 60 degrees.

If you want the federal government to control the temperature and make it the same for ALL states, then a popular vote would get the best temperature for the most people, 6644

but, if you want each state to control its own temperature, then 6667 people get what they want, a better overall tally

now i’ve use EXTREME number ratios, but the principle is pretty much the same.

However, we live in a federal system, so we do in fact want the federal government to control stuff, namely, interactions between the states. if this were a pure democracy, the people wanting 80 degrees in their states couldn’t have it if the other states started stealing their magical runestones of Iracachio, so to to prevent such mob rule, the federal government must maintain balance.

the metaphor has officially gotten away from me, but we shouldn’t let less widely accepted views of the world be destroyed by more widely accepted ones, if both systems work, and don’t infringe upon the basic tenants of life liberty and property. This is why we add both house reps AND senators into the equation for the # of electors. We want to hear the people, yes, but we also want to hear the states.

thus we get a balance of both, their is a disproportionate population:elector ratio for just this reason.

furthermore, i do personally support states splitting electoral votes: if they so choose to do so.

sorry for a bit of a repost, but mathematics shows my system to be more representative than yours.


"You keep talking about individual rights, which of course are important. But who decides what rights have value? Again, I think it should be the people."

i disagree. i don't want 51% of the population at any given moment in time deciding what is and what is not a right. if 51% of the population wants to take away my right to free speech, they can go fuck themselves. a little crude on my part, sure, but this is the fundamental problem with pure democracies. sorry for having principles.


"There is no group who can better represent the people than the people themselves. I think most of the time people are smart enough to make decisions in their own self-interest, and once again, you haven't really given me any compelling historical examples of times when unfettered democracy has hurt people that I can't refute."

my god... you just espoused nearly word for word a libertarian ideal. people DONT need governing bodies to rule their everyday life. people DONT need others interfering with their business constantly. but your solution is a democracy? democracy is mob rule, the masses saying what's good for you. your reason is good, your solution is bad.

here's an example of an unfettered democracy: socrates' death for "corrupting the youth." the first democracy ever, and it killed possibly the greatest philosopher ever for speech they did not find acceptable.

i'll be waiting in your next post for a response to this, and will not post anything else if you do not address it, but simply continue to press you on this one point. do not sidestep this



"Governments throughout history have obviously done awful and corrupt things, but so has private business, as I mentioned before. To me right now I think big business is more dangerous because it is also influences government policy, and, as I said before, at least the government is accountable to me."

that's just the thing, libertarians (i'm realizing how ironic it is that i'm defending libertarians, as i'm not one of them...) HATE corrupt businesses that use government power. their SOLUTION is that we should construct a government so that it is responsible to the people, and limited so that corporations can't lobby it for any real power.


"I would consider myself partial to the libertarian/anarchist currents in the socialist tradition, like Bakunin, Proudhon, Kropotkin and Chomsky, as I mentioned before. So I'm obviously not going to defend soviet/maoist systems that were undemocratic and had nothing to do with socialism."

the core problem i have with socialism, is the forced redistribution. Marx and Adam Smith disagreed on less than you think, they both wanted to destroy corporate interests in an authoritarian government class. the difference between the two were as such: Marx believed things should only be valued by intrinsic worth, whereas Adam Smith said value was derived from the overall demand for an item. they were both right to varying degrees.

the problem i have nowadays when someone says "i'm a socialist" is that most often they still support a government entity to redistribute the wealth. if you WANT a commune, then in 1800s America you could have created one. there were MANY "utopia" experiments back then, it's a simple matter of get some land, and everyone support one another. but in modern America, there is a natural impersonalization, so even on a state level a socialist state would demand that people vote to take things away from people that they worked hard to produce.

the wealthy in this country fall into one of three categories:

1. luck and inheritance, whether it's the lottery or rich family members, these people did not earn their wealth.
2. hard work. leftists hate to admit it but these people exist, and they're not a tiny fraction
3. government interference supported. nobody likes these guys, except politicians

your idea that people should vote on who gets what, entirely ignores the second group, and i still haven't heard an entirely convincing economic or moral argument for destroying inheritance.

people who work hard deserve to have the fruits of their labor, and if you want to steal from them, that means you're a bad person. stealing people's labor, is one step off from slavery.


"Answer me this: who decides what individual values we as a society hold dear? I'm honestly curious what you think."

individual values are always in flux in a society... nobody DECIDES them, because they're not consistent across society. do you mean who decides what rights we get? because Rousseau's social contract model is entirely idiotic and was dismantled by David Hume and his utility argument.


"I'm always going to lean toward what is good for the most is better."

ahhhhhhhh. the utilitarian appears. talk to a socialist long enough and this comes out. funnily enough, socialized medicine is only good for the most in the short term. sorry to burs your bubble, but Europe is SOOO bad at creating new drugs, here in the USA we create 95% of all new drugs

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paulroderickgregory/2012/07/01/obama-care-will-end-drug-advances-and-europes-free-ride-unless-china-steps-in/#33a8ce521c05

and it costs 2.6 billion dollars to get a new drug onto a market: in a VERY high risks game.

http://csdd.tufts.edu/news/complete_story/tufts_csdd_rd_cost_study_now_published

you see, medical advancements occur NOT because of socialized healthcare: but because of market forces and private business. it's a good sentiment on the left to help the poor, but the NHS has had solvency problems for years now, and healthcare costs aren't JUST rising in the USA, but europe is also facing a health crisis. if the USA socializes and we drop in new drug production, our health level is going to drop worldwide. europe is able to stay afloat because they don't subscribe to US patent laws, and can use generic brands of our drugs freely.

read that Forbes article, it may put some things into perspective. socialized medicine is only working on the backs of drugs and equipment created international companies based here in the USA.

long-run, you should be for the market. it's why overall the health of human beings have gone up over the years, and why last year, after Obamacare's defunding of insurance companies created cascading rate spikes, was the first time in over 20 years the life expectancy dropped in the USA.


"Every example you've given me of a "democracy gone wrong" has really been the story of unaccountable authoritarian power."

when you say democracy, you mean one of two things. a government the people vote for, or a society where everything is voted for.

if you mean the prior, then i propose we've never seen a state-single pure democracy, but also that any state is susceptible to corruption.

if you mean a society where everything is in the hands of the people:


i return to earlier:

socrates' death for "corrupting the youth." the first democracy ever (a pure. direct. democracy), and it killed possibly the greatest philosopher ever for speech they did not find acceptable.

JK: "Please elaborate on why you think property is the most contentious of those three."

JY: "um... i just did? scarcity of resources, and the constant challenging of inheritance and family structure."

Here's the thing: Property exists either by threat of force or by good will among strangers. That's is how fundamental it is. I have it.You don't. Deal with it.

It sounds like you'd be happy to send us back to feudal systems where whoever had the largest family could wage war more effectively and simply control whatever they wanted. Good times...

Propoetry is more complicated than that. Ownership is a set of socially recognized rights. You have a set of rights over your property because others recently gnome them. The set of rights you have may be limited in various ways by social convention (e.g. Laws).

@JK

what a reductionist argument. property exists by a capacity to control it. this is not an overt threat of force. if i say "this is my wheel" it is my wheel because i have enacted a labor upon it that allows me to control it. if someone attempts to take my wheel, then i will REACT in force.

this is not a THREAT. threat implies aggression, my position is one of nonaggressions. your equivocation of defense and aggression is hilariously bad.

furthermore, you go onto say "It sounds like you'd be happy to send us back to feudal systems where whoever had the largest family could wage war more effectively and simply control whatever they wanted."

well quite frankly that COULD happen evening the modern age. SHOULD it happen: no. because libertarianism is centered around the non-aggression principle. we also understand the difference between defending something, and acting with aggression against others. i'm sorry if that's too nuanced for you


@Ogion

ah the moral relativist comes back again. what did the Nazis do wrong? the social rights of the time weren't given to Jews. why is this bad? nobody recognized the Jews' right to live, so they didn't have it.

if you treat every right as "socially recognized" then in theory, the holocaust is entirely justifiable. ANY horrendous act in history can be justified through such subjective lenses.

of all rights are social convention, than rape and murder could theoretically be OK. this is what the core of your ideology allows.


i take a more scientific approach. there is either objective truth or not. do you accept this? objective purpose would be a better phrase. in a state of non-knowledge determining the truth regarding whether or not objective purpose exists is necessary. thus to determine purpose in life, we must be allowed to live. (right to life). if we must search for purpose in life, we must have the freedom to do so. (right to freedom/liberty).

these things are not entirely socially constructed: they lie in the fabric of existence. if you're too caught up in ideology to see that then there's nothing more to discuss with you

@Yanick

Everyone in Athens didn't vote on Socrates' death. There was a trial and he was (wrongfully) convicted. Tragedy. But Athens was not a pure democracy. Women and slaves couldn't vote.

Here's the thing though: even if people all voting sometimes make the wrong decision, I'd still rather have that than an unaccountable elite.

I think this goes back to what political values you think are most important. My top 3 are democracy, egalitarianism and non-violence. You don't take this view. I'd be interested to know what they are.

Obviously, people should create a society that respects certain rights and prevents government or private action that goes against these rights. You never answered me: who decides what individual values we base our society on? Is it just you? Do we live in Yanicktopia?

@JY: That non-aggression principle only works if you live in Galt's Gulch and no one knows where it is.

@SamWest

so you think EVERY decision should go to the ENTIRE population? Never mind, there's no examples ever in history of this happening on any occasion, and on basis of practicality cannot work, unless if done on an exceedingly small level. furthermore, the implementation of such a system might actually be against the wishes of individuals: they might like republics and having politicians represent them. either you give people the freedom to go against your system, or you force them to have an inefficient system.

not a good dichotomy.

out of your three, i reverse it:

non-violence, egalitarianism, democracy.

forcing people to do stuff against their will, is a form of violence (or threat thereof). i find it amazing you rate the will of the people more highly over non-violence. would you accept the masses participating in.. oh, say, witch burnings? if you say "no that's violent" WELL YOU JUST MADE MY POINT

furthermore, as to your question "You never answered me: who decides what individual values we base our society on?"

I DID answer it. NO ONE ENTITY DECIDES. we as individuals act, influenced by our human interactions, environment and biology to act the way we do.

do you mean what RIGHTS we should initially adopt? because that was already decided by the constitution, and if you do not like those rights, there is a process to amend it.

@JK

Herodotus theorized that commerce replaced warfare as the primary method of getting what you wanted, and his analysis seems to be quite true, even for his ancient time period. now that we're in the modern era, warfare is rarely ever over resources, and much more over ideology.

but if you still want to cling on to the infantile notion that humans have devolved and always resort to violence in interactions, go ahead. i'm just sorry that you have such a weak grasp with where the human race is at

@Yanick

I think the system should be as democratic as possible. Pure direct democracy might be impractical on a large scale, but with the advances in technology and communication, it might be more possible than you think. And if people did want representatives that'd be okay.

Also, I didn't mean that I ranked those political values. I don't see them as one taking precedent over the other. I would not be okay with people voting to kill/attack an individual or another group.

So to you, the rights instilled in the constitution are flawless? No problems with them whatsoever? I just don't feel that way. I think there's some good stuff in there but on the whole... nah. Even Thomas Jefferson said there should be a revolution every twenty years.

@SamWest

Jefferson was speaking of the activism of people to keep the government in check, but he also believed that if they followed the constitution, then we could avoid most problems.

i don't think we differ as much on some primary moral sentiments, however i think your pro democracy attitude allows for abuses of minorities, and should always be put behind a set standard of rights.

i've already explained why the founders chose life/liberty etc. as the rights they put in the constitution, do you think that these should be subject to votes by the masses?

and for the original that was set off by all of this, what part of my analysis of the failures of socialized healthcare do you think was wrong?

@JY: You're serious? You feel justified in hand-waving away 2500 years of warfare on this planet since Herodotus?

Yeah...I'm not the one with a poor grasp on where the world is at right now.

@JK

you're very good at strawmanning. VERY good. the simple fact is human society BEFORE 500 BCE was MUCH more violent, especially on a day to day basis.

i'm not saying we didn't Regress in the dark ages, but we came out of it with warfare being replaced by commerce in cases of resources.

when was the last war that was fought solely for resources that involved developed, commerce orientated nations? the simple fact is that warfare is much more ideology or politically driven nowadays.

are you... ignoring that fact?

i mean honestly Jeff. that was a pretty horrendous straw man. please apologize in your next post, it's very obvious that i wasn't talking about all war, but just war over resources

here's what i said:

"Herodotus theorized that commerce replaced warfare as the primary method of getting what you wanted, and his analysis seems to be quite true, even for his ancient time period. now that we're in the modern era, warfare is rarely ever over resources, and much more over ideology."

this is a statement that is entirely backed up by history. the Iraq war was political and ideological, vietnam was political and ideological, the korean war was political, WWII was political and ideological, WWI was political and ideological, the russo japanese was was political... i mean when major nations fight wars, the initial reason is not because of lack of resources. not in recent history at least

so please try to address my actual argument instead of saying silly things i never claimed. it's embarrassing

Mengzi gave the best argument as to why human nature is good. Here's a really good summation:

https://www.khanacademy.org/partner-content/wi-phi/wiphi-history/wiphi-ancient/v/history-of-philosophy-mengzi-on-human-nature

@Yanick

I do think the rights should be subject to vote/change by the masses every once in a while. Could be done through amendments. Times and attitudes change. I can't remotely imagine people voting against free speech, free assembly, or voting in favor of discrimination. Tbh it would disappoint many on the left but if you put the second amendment to a vote, it'd probably win by big margins. I think people generally have a pretty good idea about how to govern themselves.

As for healthcare, you know, we've had this debate before and I think we just fundamentally don't agree about certain things. I think a healthcare system that has universal access is better than one that doesn't. Like I've said before, there's scarcity in every system, that's economics, it's about who assumes this burden. In America the poor suffer all the rationing and inefficiency. In countries with nationalized healthcare, everyone assumes a little of this burden. The wait time in England for a treatment is a few weeks; in America it's either zero or infinity depending on whether you have insurance.

You pointed out some inefficiencies of the NHS; I think it's important to remember England has been under conservative governance for the past several years, so it's suffered a lot of cuts by the Tories. There are of course problems with socialized medicine, as I said there are problems with any system, but I think it's telling that nowhere in the world has ever established a single-payer system and then gotten rid of it. People like having healthcare taken care of by the government. You would say this is an affront to property rights; I don't agree. If these programs are so disastrous, it's hard for me to get why they are so broadly popular.

And I think from a purely economic perspective, healthcare doesn't work like other things. People need it or they die, so competition doesn't work the same way. If my arm gets chopped off I'm not going to shop around for what's the cheapest hospital in my area. I'm gonna say, get me to a fucking doctor.

Lots of statistics show Americans pay more for care and get worse outcomes than in other countries.

As for scientific research/drugs, I'm not an expert in this, I will freely admit. I don't see why the government couldn't fund research just as efficiently as the market, however.

Never going to be a perfect system, I'd rather have everyone taken care of than some people privileged over others. That's where we disagree.

@SamWest

"I can't remotely imagine people voting against free speech, free assembly, or voting in favor of discrimination."

https://www.thefire.org/spotlight-on-speech-codes-2017/

this is over 130 schools with speech codes

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/02/free-speech-isnt-free/283672/

https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/04/the-harm-in-free-speech/

http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/dark-side-free-speech

Yale... the New York Times... wake up Sam. these people are here.


as for your points on healthcare, i understand where you're coming from and if you want to, we can end the debate here. however there are a few things i must address.

"Lots of statistics show Americans pay more for care and get worse outcomes than in other countries."

actually the best treatments are in the USA, by far. the question is IF you can afford the treatment, i understand, but the quality is far superior in the USA. Pneumonia death rates are 5X in the UK WITH TREATMENT than they are here.


"As for scientific research/drugs, I'm not an expert in this, I will freely admit. I don't see why the government couldn't fund research just as efficiently as the market, however."

i've addressed this in other threads, but the idea of nationalization of pharmaceutical companies had several problems:

1. most of them are international companies, making a massive legal dispute inevitable
2. most new drugs come from pharmaceutical companies or biotechs, with most new innovative drugs coming from biotechs. universities make up less than a quarter of new drugs, and the government controlled pharmaceutical world would be depleted from new drugs. universities with grants and funds are MASSIVELY less efficient that of the private sector.

https://www.aol.com/2010/11/30/where-do-new-drugs-come-from-u-s-biotechs-lead-the-way/

if you nationalize pharmaceuticals you're going to have a MASSIVE decrease in the quality and number of new drugs coming onto market. in an age of super-bugs that are resistant to antibiotics... not having the capacity to create new quality drugs fast leads us open to another pandemic level event.


"Never going to be a perfect system, I'd rather have everyone taken care of than some people privileged over others. That's where we disagree."

well.... no. i just don't want the government involved to such a large extent, i mean we're talking about the middle class in Britain paying significant amounts of income, that measurably CANNOT be replaced by increasing the tax on the rich... but i volunteer every week at a local homeless shelter, and if every member of the american labor force took 1 hour every week (out of 168 hours) to help the homeless and poor: poverty in america would be practically solved.

for all the talk of legislation, it's amazing what is REALLY comes down to. if able bodied people, took 1 hour every week to help out, with just a LITTLE BIT of self responsibility, i mean 1 hour a week is almost Nothing... kids play videos games at 20X that rate. it's cultural change we need, so many in our culture are uncaring and lazy, but it's not my place to create government policy, under the threat of force and jail time, to try to force altruism upon them. these policies are rarely effective.

"if 51% of the population wants to take away my right to free speech, they can go fuck themselves" (с)

brilliant ! I`d add that the result is the same even with 99,99%

@SamWest

"Every example you've given me of a "democracy gone wrong" has really been the story of unaccountable authoritarian power"

It is just your concept of democracy that combines ideas of majority will, people`s control, individual rights etc. Too complex, not natural. And you must somehow deal with theorethical possibility of majority deciding to establish an "unaccountable authoritarian power". It is paradox that can not be solved. Yes your vision of democracy is popular and useful for mankind. Democracy has strong positive connotations in culture and this is good. But if we want truly understand the nature of reality we must find pure, simple and elevated ideal. It is ideal of individual freedom. Democracy can not be such ideal because it is consisted of different parts that can be perversely recombined. Then democracy turns into tyranny, "totalitarian democracy" (Talmon). To sum up, I praise western liberal democracy and criticize totalitarian democracy. It is good that democracy itself is generally associated with western variant but we must understand what things really are

"who decides what individual values we base our society on? Is it just you?"

Basically yes but it always turns out that there are plenty of people agree on certain system of values. The sequence is: 1) I think (for example) freedom of speech is cool 2) Chat with other people, many of them agree with me. So freedom of speech is a precious ideal of our group 3) Then we need to make this freedom a law for whole society. So we persuade others and win the election, or make the direct order (if we live in some kind of monarchy), or fail and leave this country to achieve our dreams elsewhere.

i'm sure you're a nice guy @SamWest but i'd much rather live in a free society that does good because it's the right thing to do, than live in a society where we're forced to help others because we can't be trusted to on our own.

and that's why libertarians are so upset by the idea of collective agreements, most libertarians i know are EXTREMELY generous but not even very wealthy. and people turn around and say they're not helping out enough... it's attacking people who aren't to blame for the current societal ills.

Oil didn't play a part in our invasion of Iraq. Purely ideological. Gimme a break, JY. EVERY WAR IS ABOUT RESOURCES.

@JK

well i kind of new you'd go after that, but i also notice you ignored EVERY OTHER ONE.

well, let me address Iraq, i agree with christopher hitchens on the situation there: we should have gone in sooner. the new york times on multiple occasions have shown that there were still chemical weapons in iraq.

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/16/world/cia-is-said-to-have-bought-and-destroyed-iraqi-chemical-weapons.html

look up operation Avarice. furthermore, we had international agreements saying we must stop genocide where it occurred. we also had agreements saying we must step in if a foreign power funds terrorists, and if they harbor known terrorists. we also had agreements to intervene if chemical weapons were used on unarmed citizens. ANY ONE OF THESE and we are bound to go in. Saddam hussein had done all four of these things.

the haliburton oil contracts did not start until 2 years INTO the war. they were not the STARTING REASON for the war.

so I ASK YOU AGAIN JEFF KUTA. what war has been STARTED due to resources? You have straw manned me THIS ENTIRE THREAD, but i'm not going to take your shit any longer. read what i have said, and respond to what i have said.

and stop ignoring everything i say, that is inconvenient to your narrative.

The invasion of Iraq was about overestimating a threat to international security and a continuation of Bush Sr and Clinton's post-Cold War policy of united military efforts to correct things that large international communities saw as wrong.

@Yanik

I think a lot of stuff college kids do is counterproductive, but I think the vast majority of Americans support free speech. It's a very fringe position to be against it. People like rights and liberties. When being against free speech starts polling at a majority, give me a call.

As to your final statement, I too would like to live in a world where people do good things out of the kindness of their hearts, but we don't. The idea that individual moral actions can solve the world's problems is I think incorrect. People need to come together and change the system, and eliminate institutions of hierarchy, inequality and coercion. I'm sorry y'all are upset by collective agreements, but people are really suffering, and I don't think the solution is optional private charity. Systemic change is the only way in my view.

With that I think I'll end my part of our conversation. I've enjoyed talking to you even if we don't agree.

@SamWest

well it's 2:00 AM in the morning, and there's nothing of great significance to argue about that can be achieved right now. i know Jeff Kuta's going to try tot take another bite so i'll stay on this thread, but i always appreciate people willing to have the conversation

@JY: You know, whatever sort of willful ignorance you're cultivating is pretty impressive.

How many wars were fought during the colonization of the Americas and Africa? Those were all ideological in your twisted world view?
Just what do you think lebensraum was referring to??

I'm not even going to bother to tackle your sophomoric "argument" on this point.

So many casus belli over the millennia have been full of LIES to manipulate citizens to go to war so the elites could benefit--citizens blood for elites treasure.

@Jeff Kuta

"@JY: You know, whatever sort of willful ignorance you're cultivating is pretty impressive."

ad hominem? check. at least we know nobody has hacked JK's account, he's right on form here.


"How many wars were fought during the colonization of the Americas and Africa? Those were all ideological in your twisted world view?"

this is a good point, but still supports my overall theme. these occurred centuries ago, and we have seen such conquest since. last century, despite being full of wars, not full of resource driven war. furthermore, you can't even find an example of one industrialized nation fighting a war against another, you can ONLY find what are essentially bands of natives. frankly, the colonization of the Americas and Africa were just that: armed colonization. hardly all out warfare. still, i also see you've omitted the ideal of manifest destiny: the IDEOLOGICAL movement that said we should move west as it was our divine destiny. sure greed was a factor, i'm not denying that, but in actual WARS, ideology has become the modern medium.


"Just what do you think lebensraum was referring to??"

Hitler's lebensraum was just as much ideological as it was greedy. in fact, the core reason why he wanted land in russia was because he believed the german people needed to expand and thrive. the core reasoning was an ideological one. the expansion idea wasn't simply let's get rich, or using force as a means of acquiring something you want, it stemmed off of his superiority ideology.

but you STILL have buried the lead: Hitler went to war, and DIDNT try to go east en masse. sure he had the invasion of Poland, but much of Hitler's premise for claiming these lands was that it was a natural German right. my whole argument is predicated on the fact that Hitler was an ideologue first, greedy second. and i'm right. WWII was not a war just so he could get resources, it was a war of race and ideology FIRST AND FOREMOST.


"I'm not even going to bother to tackle your sophomoric "argument" on this point."

the intellectual cowering of a defeated man. i accept your surrender.


"So many casus belli over the millennia have been full of LIES to manipulate citizens to go to war so the elites could benefit--citizens blood for elites treasure."

this sounds strangely antigovernment. why aren't you pro libertarian again? but besides, i wasn't talking about the entire millennia, was i? no... i was talking about a trend that's accumulated in the last century, where war is no longer the NATURAL medium of acquiring wealth: rather commerce is.

and the funny thing is, even INN THE DARK AGES i'm still correct. commerce and trade were MUCH more common than war. commerce and trade metastasized into DAILY activities, whereas some more backwards cultures (vikings perhaps) could only rely off of warfare. even the mongols who started off as warlords, accepted commerce because it was SOOOOO much more profitable.

you simply can't disprove my point, because my point is actually an observation of history: commerce and trade have become a more widespread mechanism of accumulating wealth than warfare, ESPECIALLY in the modern age.

I agree with 95% of what you say Yanik, but I have to disagree with you and Prado on the Iraq war. It was oil, nothing else. The politicians whose reelection coffers were funded by the oil companies ponied up what they owed them and initiated the war solely to cause the price of oil to spike. The whole weapons thing was BS from the start. Every

Again, I reiterate for the umpteenth time the need for an "are you sure" pop-up after clicking submit.

There was no conclusive proof of the weapons, there was no plan for what to do about the leadership of the country, it was a half-assed invasion with the only real goal being to disrupt the world supply of oil. It doesn't make sense that Iraq was singled out in a world where you have places like North Korea and Syria and nothing is done about those until you consider the oil.