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Originally Posted by Kuhb

I'm not sure about Derek, but what I meant by 'Fox News talking points' is the immediate deflection of anything mildly resembling 'big government' to Soviet/Chinese famines. It's a regularly used tactic by disingenuous right wing pundits and the 'don't tread on me' crowd, and now a tactic used by liberals to attempt to attack the social democratic wing of the Democratic party.

oh, that, fair enough, if we use the same comparisons then we do. i do not watch fox because i do not like it, but on your recommendation maybe i should start ha ha ha

Originally Posted by Kuhb

If you're into your logic and reason, claiming that this deflection is valid because you've lived or worked in nationalised industries etc is both an anecdotal fallacy and an appeal to authority fallacy.

yes, again, fair enough. in my defense i’ll just say that i was not attempting to deduce any conclusions, because for me the disaster of statism and central planning are more of an empirical and historical matter. my preference for market solutions is the same way. i find them empirically superior in most cases.

there are logical/theoretical proofs of why those systems do not work, but i did not attempt them here.

thanks for pointing that out

Originally Posted by Kuhb

I'm Polish, I've known my fair share of authoritarian government... it wouldn't make a claim that reinstituting New Deal-like reforms will lead to famines any more valid on account of my Polish-ness. But I think this is a pedantic way of conducting a debate... it's just that you seemed to be insisting.

well, sure, im pedantic, won’t deny. a personality flaw. at some point i have to own it. i don’t know another way, but i’d rather do this than lie.

also i believe i mostly offered you an explanation of why i think why i think. yes?

but about the new deal: we don’t need a new deal or new deal-like policies.

the new deal was actually the american response to rising communist and socialist parties during the depression era. it adopted some of their programs and rhetoric and in doing so it coopted their membership and took the wind out of their sails. it replaced the ideology of international socialism with a more nationalistic one.

the new deal created a number of jobs programs and a huge government bureaucracy to deal with unemployment. it was full of good intentions, but in retrospect it looks like it prolonged the great depression instead of ending it.

now we have full employment and monetary solutions to fiscal problems that were not understood in the 30s.

we can fix capitalism without destroying its productivity or disrupting markets. we can get big money out of writing laws and it will be hard but it starts by recognizing that corporations are not people. we can have a fairer and simpler tax system. we can we can have social programs that help people with actual problems without creating perverse incentives. we can have universal health care without having to establish a government monopoly. we can improve education without having runaway costs and debts. we can help workers deal with economic dislocation without hurting the consumer. we can have market solutions to climate and environmental problems that unleash more creativity and ingenuity than any government entity. we can get billionaires to pay more taxes without unrealistically treating them like the infinite resource they aren’t.

this is of course all a matter of discussion, but now it’s monday morning for me and i have the same problems you had earlier.

anyway i appreciate the exchange, i do, always glad to test things out in a fair discussion, as long as it is a fair discussion. so if we can keep it that way, great.

ok happy mondays.