Freedom or leisure is about as cosmically important as the dark matter, or dark energy, of the universe. It’s just that our minds have been darkened by economists like Milton Friedman. Yet Friedman himself had half an idea of who is better off (Barbara v. Isabel), even when he was writing libertarian-type tracts like Free to Choose. Freidman’s very life was an indictment of the ideas in the book. As a professor with tenure, he lived like Isabel, not Barbara. He had tenure, and three months off, and no one could fire him. He had a big TIAA-CREF pension, which a teachers’ union helped expand. It was a pretty nice life, even by Isabel’s standards.To the extent that Friedman was “free to choose,” he chose to live like a European in a social democracy. I wish that every one of us was free to live like Milton Friedman.
Piece of Mindful 
Exactly, Mark.
Those that preach that others suffer to the benefit of the unearned tend to avail themselves of the benefits of such arrangements, and not the suffering.
Friedman was a Statist/Monetarist – his paycheck came from government, and he supported them with neat and tidy (but horrifically wrong) justifications for more government action.
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“Darkened minds”? As in the opposite of enlightened?
No doubt Milton could have fled the public dole, but instead like all great teachers, satisfaction comes in the realization that your students “see the light” or in your (and Geoghegan) case “put out the light”.
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He’s saying the the result of Friedman’s ideas in this country has led to a stressed people who work too hard for too little reward. The product of their labor is siphoned upward. That has darkened our lives.
In the European model, they broker out health care and education at all levels, and also child care and pensions. Since government is more efficient at these things, those services cost less. The result is higher taxes, of course, but when you combine our taxes, our health care, our higher education, our child care with theirs, they are getting a buy, we are getting screwed. And, they have more peace of mind and freedom to move about. A typical European will take six weeks vacation and can quit work, change jobs, become self-employed without losing everything.
And oddly, Germany, for instance, has no debt, massive exports and a high wage economy. Despite globalization, they have maintained a high standard of living. Go figure, Mr. Free Market guy.
That would make them enlightened. They take the wealth they create, buy their basic services at wholesale via government, and enjoy life with the rest.
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“He’s saying the the result of Friedman’s ideas in this country has led to a stressed people who work too hard for too little reward.”
As in the more you earn the more they take?
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As in wages have been flat since 1980, but productivity is up umpteenfold.
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Wouldn’t ya think technology plays a large part in that?
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No, absolutely not. Progress is an illusion. We are the same people we have always been, but power has shifted to the wealthy classes, and away from workers. Unions are a joke now. So workers don’t have the ability to grab more for themselves as they once did.
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Mark,
The workers cannot steal like they could 40 years ago because of technology and the changes in the economy.
Workers could steal because they could kidnap the business. They could strike the mine or the factory and stop production by preventing other workers from filling their jobs.
Since the mine or factory could not be moved (avodiance), the owners had to pay the ransom.
Today, owners -due to technology- avoid the thieves and “move” (avoid) them. They ship their plants to less hostile shores.
The power of kidnapping is reduced. The thieves do not receive ransom.
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So the workers should now assist in building the cage. Gotcha.
You have no notion of freedom.
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Mark,
I disagree.
You believe that “freedom” contains the ability to stop others from earning a living.
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It is much more basic: About 4% of us are obsessed with accumulating wealth, while the rest of us are about life and community. If we do not keep check on that 4%, they take control of everything, and we are their slaves.
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Mark,
It’s easy.
Simply watch for those that believe non-violent human problems are best solved by violence.
Those are the ones that create the worse problems.
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Your metaphoric violence is no match for the real violence of rule by wealth. Real people, Dead. See, for instance, Iraq, Afpak, and soon to follow, Iran.
That’s not ordinary people doing that. That is the power-class, the plutocrats, the 4%, the sociopaths. Put them in a cage, and it is a better world.
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Mark,
“Metaphoric”!!! You jest!
You confuse the “whip” of a dollar across your back as the same as the whip of cat’o’nine tails!!
Obviously, you have not faced that ‘cat’ in your life for you would not suffer such confusion afterward.
You point to death by violence by men of violence.
I point to their guns, you point to their wallets.
I have yet in my life seen a bullet fired from a dollar bill.
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The solution to your problems can be summed up in one word:
Travel.
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Mark,
I have lived in India, Caribbean and South America, Congo for more years than any other place, and have traveled to every continent and a hundred other countries.
Never seen a bullet come out of a dollar bill.
Seen plenty come out of guns.
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Name names. Which countries are making war right now? Start with the really big one, the one under your feet … and how, pray tell is that connected to countries that don’t make war – socialist countries of Northern and Western Europe?
Your metaphoric violence does not exist, and for that reason, your whole philosophy is undermined. Hence you resort to hyperbole, as you have nothing else.
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Mark,
So you are pointing to the largest gun’s on Earth and claiming…. they are using them???
Are you claiming Socialist countries do not make war?
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Germany, Canada and Denmark are all in Afghanistan (or have been there)
France has brutally repressed Algeria and supported the genocidal rulers of Rwanda et al.
Belgium has brutally repressed the Congo.
The consistent theme: those that hold the guns use them.
A man with money and no guns does not shoot people.
A man with money and guns shoots people.
A man with no money and no guns does not shoot people.
A man with no money and guns shoots people.
Consistent requirement: the gun.
Your argument: men must have guns to protect themselves from men with money.
Your consequence: men with guns shoot people.
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Perhaps so, as any description of human behavior in the world is necessarily reductionist.
Great Britain was operating at US instructions.
Generally speaking, we seek to distribute power among various groups so as to create balance and reduce strife.
Your way leads to concentrated power and is therefore quite dangerous to our well-being.
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Currently-existing socialist countries are not at war, with the exception of Great Britain. Before you throw National socialism at me, or the USSR, let’s stipulate that Hitler used socialism to legitimize his fascism, and that the USSR was a warlike prison. The countries I am talking about are nothing like those – Sweden, Denmark, Canada, Germany, France et al.
The one country that does have a gun pointed at the rest of the planet is this one, which is a plutocracy.
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Great Britain was operating at US instructions…
So now the argument is Socialist nations are dupes of Empires..
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No, that is not the argument. That is just something that is true about Great Britain. Their leaders have decided, for better or for worse, that they should cast their lot with the US. They are a junior partner.
It was just an aside.
And since Maggie Mae, Great Britain has been shedding socialism. Miles to go before she is totally cooked, but she’s made great progress.
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History is what it is, and colonial powers have always behaved badly. That’s not ideology – that’s just the power equation. People who have power abuse power.
France and Belgium lost their colonies, and hence their ability to abuse. The post-war governments of those countries had experienced war at its worst, and so constructed social democracies that are working, thank you, quite well.
NATO is nothing more than the US vehicle to control the European states. Countries that belong to it are obliged to do as instructed.
Can’t fix that.
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Mark,
I refer back to your claim that Socialism stifles gun abuse. I show that it does not.
France was (still is) machinating in Algeria and Africa.
NATO still invades Afghanistan.
Britain bombed and burned Iraq.
Obviously something more fundamental is at work then a superficial review of political economics.
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Big Swede
Scores!
Completely correct. The productivity of labor has increased due to specialization brought about by technology.
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In which circle do you belong Mark?
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Good one. My circle is even smaller: I say that economics is not even a science, as they cannot agree on basic principles or conduct meaningful experiments. No matter the public policy issue, you will find economists on both sides of it.
It is cloaked ideology.
I feel like I repeat myself a lot with you.
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Mark,
Economics is a science, but most practice it like it was astrology.
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Most of your prose does play like a broken record.
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Big Swede,
That happens because no matter what day of the week, or year of the century….
…the Truth remains the Truth.
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My comment was aimed toward Mark.
But as far as the “truth’ is concerned I’m deferring to Goebbels.
“If you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes the truth.”
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Swede,
Actually Goebels said no such thing.
Hitler referred to it in Chapter 10 of Mein Kampf:
All this was inspired by the principle–which is quite true within itself–that in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously.
Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation.
For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.
—Adolf Hitler , Mein Kampf, vol. I, ch. X[1]
Joseph Goebbels said:
The essential English leadership secret does not depend on particular intelligence. Rather, it depends on a remarkably stupid thick-headedness. The English follow the principle that when one lies, one should lie big, and stick to it. They keep up their lies, even at the risk of looking ridiculous.
Richard Belzer defines The Big Lie, in his book UFOs, JFK, and Elvis: Conspiracies You Don’t Have To Be Crazy To Believe, this way: “If you tell a lie that’s big enough, and you tell it often enough, people will believe you are telling the truth, even when what you are saying is total crap.”
The key point is believe –
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As long as we’re being anal I can do you one better.
Whatever Goebbels said it was said in the German language.
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Swede,
I pointed that out because a lot that is attributed to Nazi’s really isn’t.
It should sounds more “sinister” to say that “the Nazis said/did this”.
But it has been a known thing for 5,000 years – used long before Nazi’s and will be used long after we’re long dead and buried.
People are embarrassed when they are caught with their White Lies, so naturally assume that if they are caught with big lies, there is a magnification of embarrassment to suicide. Therefore, they can’t believe anyone would try to tell a Big Lie.
This assumption flips the onus upside down.
If a Big Lie would cause suicide, the Big Lie cannot be a Lie but the truth.
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A group of guys, by the point of a gun, will decide who has power, what is “balanced” and will, by shooting non-violent people, reduce strife.
Wealth accumulates but cannot kill without a gun.
People with guns can kill without wealth.
And you think people with wealth are more dangerous than people with guns.
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