Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

[Malacite]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

I dunno, I've read Libertarian philosophy and heard enough of 'em on various shows & interviews to conclude they're a bunch of selfish morons personally.

I mean do they really, REALLY believe that the free market is the answer to everything, that corporations will play nice without major oversight and that there's no need for any govt. services other than the Police and Army because we're such good natured people that charity will take care of the rest? It all sounds wonderful on paper, but so did Karl Marx's ideals.

Cutting off all foreign aid is a load of shit too. All told, it amounts to less than 2% of the annual budget. That's not to say there isn't some trimming needed, especially it comes to assholes like Egpyt and Pakistan, but to cut it off completely? Foreign Aid might be one of the only good things Bush did as president helping deal with AIDS in Africa... I also agree with closing down the majority (but not all) of foreign military bases. As Jesse rightly pointed out last night, the U.S. Army can be anywhere in the world in a matter of hours or less. There's no need to over-extend like Rome and police the world. But I do think it's reckless to pull out of the truly troublesome areas (Israel, South Korea, etc) where there's either real violence going on now, or serious tensions that could escalate.

Basically my core issue with Libertarians is the misguided belief that the freemarket can solve everything, and placing too much emphasis on individual freedom above all else. FDR proved that a competent government with good intentions can do great things for its people. The problem is there are just too many self-serving assholes playing in a system that's become rigged & corrupt. Lobbying needs to be constitutionally barred forever, along with real campaign finance reforms like we have here in Canada or the U.K. (which harper is trying to undo the asshole...)

In the U.K. each party has roughly the equivalent of $50k to spend for the entire election, over the course of 2 months. Now, granted it's a much smaller country geographically and population-wise, so the numbers would need to be adjusted but still! Restoring the FCC's powers wouldn't be a bad idea either (tyvm Reagan for fucking that up) - It USED to be illegal to lie in the news, but not anymore.

BTW, did you know there's roughly 7 lobbyists per Senator or Congressman, and that they almost never lose their cases? Pretty disturbing shit.

[Taskmage]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

Sure, I'll agree to that. But to extend your metaphor ever further, games with highly emergent systems are often the easiest to balance. In a game like Starcraft or M:tG, as certain strategies become dominant, new strategies emerge and become viable based on the vulnerabilities of the current metagame. Persistent dominance only occurs when there's something major wrong on the ground floor, at which point the simplicity of the system makes the problem easier to identify and correct.

What we have now is more like a heavily overdesigned MMORPG, where the developers micromanage every facet of design to try to force the players into their preconceived notions of "correct play."

[cidbahamut]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

A Libertarian game designer's idea of a game with minimalistic rules

Now all I can think of is Ron Paul playing Calvinball.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

Life's like a multiplayer video game, or a trading card game. Okay, maybe not, but the players are essentially the same. Always, there are people who play just to have fun, and then there are people who are the problem. Your power-gamers, your min-maxers, your people who generally exploit the system to their fullest possible extent. Rules and mechanics are built (and in some cases patched) to minimize the degeneracy of the game the latter group can cause. Of course, game developers being human, this can not-infrequently lead to all together new exploits and dominant strategies.

A Libertarian game designer's idea of a game with minimalistic rules seems novel at first blush, but it can be pretty dangerous if not handled very carefully with knowledge of why those rules were implemented in the first place, lest the people with the shotguns end up dominating those of us left with only rocks, papers, and scissors.

[Taskmage]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

And then watch them crumble again and again and again because they're human.

C'est la vie.

There's a lot of government red tape that needs to be removed to let corporations do what they do. Part of the whole reason we had health insurers being as screwy as they were was all these red tape the federal government put into the system and then you had bad people in the insurance sector abusing it. Are we seeing a pattern here? Its almost like the federal government creates these regulations to tempt people into doing bad things just so they can force down even more regulation when thing go wrong.

I'm sure someone will rightly say that in the absence of regulation those people would be exploitative anyway, but the point stands that regulations aren't able to prevent exploitation so much as influence the shape of it.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

Don't Libertarians believe in laissez-faire capitalism? You know, that thing that kind of fell flat when excessive deregulation of the banks led to that whole housing debacle in the first place? The thing that historically made trade unions a necessity and, most importantly, the thing that let big trusts have their way with the government anyway?

There are a lot of factors that lead to the housing bubble, particularly the Franklin-Dodd act which Clinton signed and expanded on and then Bush also expanded on twice more. The act was more or less a bully pulpit used to intimidate banks into giving out loans to people that could never possibly pay them back. This also did lead to bankers gaming the system, which was also bad.

There's a lot of government red tape that needs to be removed to let corporations do what they do. Part of the whole reason we had health insurers being as screwy as they were was all these red tape the federal government put into the system and then you had bad people in the insurance sector abusing it. Are we seeing a pattern here? Its almost like the federal government creates these regulations to tempt people into doing bad things just so they can force down even more regulation when things go wrong.

Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.”

Its just amazing how much foresight guys like this had. The system they created is not perfect, but its the best damn thing we have and those in power are a like a gas fire that pours water on itself and opens up doors to gain more oxygen. The thing is, its harder for us to ignore what these people do in an age of social media and such high internet connectivity. We can see what they do at almost every turn now.

There are things like Romney just said that Clinton or Bush could have said that would have gone under the radar. Obama and Romney have never had this kind of luxury and I'm inclined to see this as a good thing. I like knowing Obama misses tons of security meetings. I like knowing this flippant shit Romney says. If it doesn't force them to hold themselves accountable we can see what a failure the two-party system really is.

[cidbahamut]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

And then watch them crumble again and again and again because they're human.

[Taskmage]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

I think it's fair to question whether the vigor and purity of libertarian philosophy would stand up to the seduction of power, but knowing that whoever we put in office is going to be affected by those forces, we should at least install someone who is in principle against them.

[Icemage]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

Don't Libertarians believe in laissez-faire capitalism? You know, that thing that kind of fell flat when excessive deregulation of the banks led to that whole housing debacle in the first place? The thing that historically made trade unions a necessity and, most importantly, the thing that let big trusts have their way with the government anyway?

Yup. I consider myself pretty moderate across the board, and I like the idea of capitalism, but in practice it doesn't quite work when the sums of money being made are so large that the profits can be used to change the rules (and that's true of a lot of industries, from tech, to energy, to health care, to banking). If there were a practical way to keep that from happening with the views that the libertarians hold, I would be more comfortable with it, but the hard truth is that once there's enough money in the system, the moral and ethical compasses start breaking.

To me, libertarians are right about fiscal conservatism (I mean seriously, who in their right mind isn't behind a balanced budget?) and certainly are correct about needing somewhat less government intrusion into everyday life, but the stances go a little too far off the deep end into dangerous waters.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a fiscal moderate, and Libertarians have tons of valid points (that Republicans could definitely stand to improve themselves by embracing instead of shunning, looking at you Santorum), but "both parties are bought out by corporate interests, therefore I'm voting Libertarian" seems like a non-sequitur to me.

Agreed. The only reason the libertarians remain intellectually "purer" is because they're not in power, and aren't within shouting distance. If they were, they'd also be under pressure from all that money (see above).


Icemage

[Taskmage]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

Don't Libertarians believe in laissez-faire capitalism? You know, that thing that kind of fell flat when excessive deregulation of the banks led to that whole housing debacle in the first place? The thing that historically made trade unions a necessity and, most importantly, the thing that let big trusts have their way with the government anyway?

I think you're oversimplifying the housing crisis. There were a lot of factors that contributed to the event, most of which I don't feel qualified to expound on. I do think it's fair to say that the crisis took place in spite of the regulations already in place, and exposes the inability of regulations to deal with circumstances that aren't well understood and predicted. After the fact, the government swooped in with measures that played directly to the interests of the troubled corporations, which it wouldn't have the power to do if libertarians had their way.

I don't see why the rise of trade unions is a condemnation. That strikes me as a solid free-market response by workers to the growing power of corporations. Imo, the issues with trade unions arise when they are given the same opportunities to collude with government that corporations have. For example, it's my understanding that in some states it is illegal to work in certain fields if you are not a union member. That eliminates the power of individuals to bargain for what they believe is fair compensation for their labor. Control over the labor market is shifted from unbalanced control by monumental corporations to unbalanced control by another monolithic organization that purports to support the interests of workers. If libertarian philosophy prevailed at the state level, neither of these situations could occur.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

They are fiscally conservative - Me (ignoring the whole game spending thing. I'm aiming to fix that.)
They believe in less government rather than just say they do like republicans - That's me.

Don't Libertarians believe in laissez-faire capitalism? You know, that thing that kind of fell flat when excessive deregulation of the banks led to that whole housing debacle in the first place? The thing that historically made trade unions a necessity and, most importantly, the thing that let big trusts have their way with the government anyway?

Don't get me wrong, I'm a fiscal moderate, and Libertarians have tons of valid points (that Republicans could definitely stand to improve themselves by embracing instead of shunning, looking at you Santorum), but "both parties are bought out by corporate interests, therefore I'm voting Libertarian" seems like a non-sequitur to me.

[Taskmage]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

Yeah, and Libertarians are totally all about shutting down corporate interests--oh wait.

(Of course, otherwise I agree.)

Libertarians are all about shutting down special treatment, which is the area in which we find "corporate interest" so distasteful. They'd give corporations more freedom, yes, and that makes people understandably uneasy. There would be less regulation but also less collusion and corruption. It's hard to know whether the highly unregulated system they want to work towards would produce a situation we all find acceptable, but I contend that's because it's never been given a fair shot, and if it did work the result would be preferable to what we have now.

About the 47% number, I found this article which breaks it down with some good infographics: Romney's 47% Who Don't Pay Federal Taxes - Business Insider
Of that 47% who pay no federal income tax, 28% still pay payroll tax, and the remaining 18% are either impoverished, elderly, or both. The math on federal income tax is complicated and difficult to accurately generalize, but for people making $40k/yr or less, if your tax return was greater than ~10% of your gross income, you're probably one of the 47%.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

Yeah, and Libertarians are totally all about shutting down corporate interests--oh wait.

(Of course, otherwise I agree.)

We've never really given them a chance politically, so how do we know how it'd play out?

They are fiscally conservative - Me (ignoring the whole game spending thing. I'm aiming to fix that.)
They believe in less government rather than just say they do like republicans - That's me.
They believe in s strong military, but not that we're The World Police - Me, again (except for Ron Paul on that whole "ignore Iran" thing).
They believe you should be able to marry who you please, live as you please - Also me.
They're about personal liberty in general (property rights, legalizing MJ, etc.) - Me, me and me.



So mostly libertarian and I also find plenty in common with independents as well. What I can't identify with is being liberal or conservative.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

Yeah, and Libertarians are totally all about shutting down corporate interests--oh wait.

(Of course, otherwise I agree.)

[cidbahamut]

Re: Melody's Melodramatic Meltdown on Mitt Romney (Tounge Twister?)

I think it says a lot about Americans that we can say so many bad things about the other candidate, but nothing good about our preferred one.

It also says a lot about our political system as a whole.

You know something has gone terribly wrong when the population is voting not to pick a candidate who can help with the issues we're facing, but rather we're voting based on how we can mitigate the most damage to our nation.