I think Hegel stole from Newton the cause and effect construct you just posted.

That is unless Hegel somehow sublated himself to have lived before Newton.

And where in Hegel’s ditherings can I find his formula for which came first, the Chicken or the Egg?  Isn’t that one obvious?

What Hegel did was take the obvious and convulsed an explanation with un-needed language to arrive at a convoluted explanation for the obvious. And by Mathematical definition X always equals X.  It is the foundational construct of Algebra.  Please don’t tell Hegel.  Let him rest in peace.

And please God don’t try to explain it to me.  I already have a queasy stomach just typing this.

The work ethic is great but only if who you work for is moral and ethical( Company and Management).  But when you need a job even a lousy one is better than nothing.

Actually I think the “Work Ethic” is really meant to represent that a good moral and ethical person will work to support themselves and not lay back and depend on the charity of others to survive.  There is nothing wrong with that Ideal Work Ethic.

Therefore the Ideal of Work Ethic is good. That Ideal is that both you and your employer realize a mutual benefit.

MarthaA: “...but we call dialectic the higher movement of reason in which such seemingly utterly separate terms pass over into each other spontaneously, through that which they are, a movement in which the presupposition sublates itself.  It is the dialectical immanent nature of being and nothing themselves to manifest their unity, that is, becoming, as their truth.”

This is utterly meaningless! Its like listening to an art critic describing an awful painting in terms that he hopes will make it sound mystical and thought-provoking.

Reading Hegel’s book, if the above is any example of the wording used throughout, would teach me nothing save new ways to use word strings when I wanted to explain something I knew nothing about.

“...pass over into each other spontaneously, through that which they are…”

“It is the dialectical immanent nature of being and nothing themselves to manifest their unity, that is, becoming, as their truth.”

What on earth are these word strings supposed to mean??? That’s pure gibberish. It is purest sophisticated bullshit, or as you put it, Sophistry at its best.

This is EXACTLY what I’ve been saying to you for weeks MarthaA. If you cannot say this stuff in plain english without the poetic, artistic, embellishment crap used by cons to sell shit for shinola, that have no real meaning but sound real high fallutin and majorly mystical, then you can NEVER sell this Cure For Cancer. In fact, you can never even give it away.

You may attract a few followers who will sit at your feet and stare up in awe of your word strings without a clue as to their meaning, but you will never accomplish any sort of change on earth.

And if YOU cannot explain in plain english what Hegel has written in mystical metaphorical mumbo jumbo, then you are working from FAITH, not LOGIC.

And you failed utterly to explain how you plan to implement this new language base upon the MCPopulation, again.

“Linguistic analysis must be implemented to provide a way of defining and analyzing positive, negative, and balanced dialectic; AWARENESS will do the rest.”

This is not a plan of action. How do you plan to implement this linguistic analsys into the MCPopulation’s awareness, when they can’t understand your Hegel Quoted sentences any better than I?

If you really have no answer, please just don’t answer. You have already had more than adequate opportunity to put this shit into english and all you’ve accomplished is proving to the world that you cannot rephrase Hegel crap into sensible sentences.

In my book, that means that the mumbo jumbo is the message and the message cannot exist without it.

Gary Mont, June 12 at 12:58 pm,

If you want to understand, empty your cup, so that there is room
in your cup for what it is necessary for you to know in order for
you to understand, and then begin again with the following quote
from “Science of Logic” by G. W. F. Hegel:

“This style of reasoning which makes and clings to the false
presupposition of the absolute separateness of being and
non-being is to be named not dialectic but sophistry.  For sophistry
is an argument proceeding from a baseless presupposition which
is uncritically and unthinkingly adopted; but we call dialectic the
higher movement of reason in which such seemingly utterly
separate terms pass over into each other spontaneously, through
that which they are, a movement in which the presupposition
sublates itself.  It is the dialectical immanent nature of being and
nothing themselves to manifest their unity, that is, becoming, as
their truth.” —‘Science of Logic’ by G. W. F. Hegel”

What is it that you do not understand in the above paragraph
from Hegel’s book, “Science of Logic?”

“It has been apparent from the beginning that the language
has been altered to insure advantage for the upper 1% of the
population. It may even be that your magic formulae could actually
be a good part of the solution. —Gary Mont, June 12 at
12:58 pm

First of all, there is NO Magic Formula.  There are Linguistic Models
that are defined by singular ideological definition, as indicated by
Hegel in the above excerpt from his book, “Science of Logic” and
there are Linguistic Models based upon causal definition that
spans the beginning, the end, and all points in between of cause
and effect, so that the effect is the proof of the cause, and the
points in between lead to the proof; this is x=x
sublation, as also indicated by Hegel in the above excerpt
from his book, “Science of Logic.”

However, after weeks of trying to get you to elucidate beyond
the simplistic claim that “sublated unity of balance x=x dialectic is
the solution”, has failed completely, it has become obvious that
you cannot show how the solution can be applied to the problem
effectively.—Gary Mont, June 12 at 12:58 pm

I have explained over and over, and over, again.  As I have
previously said, —— The following in brackets
must be read from the last word backwards to
the first word; the Truthdig forum will not publish
this info written in normal left to right text: 
[  “Effect to cause from leads inexorably
that end the and beginning
the between relationship causal
a establish and, end an, EFFECT
an, beginning a, CAUSE a select to is
process the, language upon based dialectic
complex more establish To”] ———it can be used for negative
balance to demonize, positive
balance to glorify, or EQUAL
balance to avoid bias.  What is it
that you do not understand about this process? 

I suggest that you try to post this bracketed
backward text forwards on how to establish
dialectic on Truthdig forum in normal left to right
text, so that you will be aware of the problem of
posting this process as a matter of personal
experience.

How do we get the MCPopulation to A. accept that their
language needs to be repaired, and B. become adept at using the
language of the aristocracy?”—Gary Mont, June 12 at
12:58 pm

You can’t force anything off on anyone, force does not work.

Years ago I developed a three word process to be used for
propaganda analysis——binary emotional rhetoric.

Linguistic analysis must be implemented to provide a way of
defining and analyzing positive, negative, and balanced dialectic;
AWARENESS will do the rest.

Anarcissie: “So tell me what’s so great about the Work Ethic.”

Sorry. Wish I could, but I can’t.

The work ethic is, in my opinion, simply another indoctrinated traditional social myth designed to keep the peasants working in the fields in order to increase the wealth of the field owners.

I see neither morality, nor social benefit in the idea that work equals worth. I do not perceive that work builds character, prevents crime, creates happiness or any of the other mythological benefits it claims to bestow.

I have worked for many people, and hated every second, as I knew that for every dollar I earned, I created a 1000 dollars and more in revenue for my employer.

Every employer I have ever worked under, demanded at some point that I break the law in order to increase his profits. None offered recompense for the crimes they would have me perform. Instead, it was understood that my consent would merely insure my continued employment. I always refused and I was always fired, or laid off immediately thereafter.

Humanity was not designed nor destined to spend its days at toil for others; in my opinion, and the work ethic only makes sense for those A type workaholics that have no choice but to be busy every waking moment lest they stop and find themselves unhappy.

In my opinion only of course.

Well, I asked before why the Work Ethic was necessarily a Good Thing.  No answer so far.  It certainly comes from Calvinism, and it’s a long way from Genesis, a text supposedly revered by Calvinists, in which work is a curse fastened onto mankind for the disobedience of learning to know good and evil.  Work, suffering in childbirth, troubled relations with snakes, and death.  So tell me what’s so great about the Work Ethic.

Yes John
I look on it as a Conceptual Metaphor, an idea expressed as a clash of ideas.  Those who accept torture of an individual as a necessary thing to preserve a way of life for the many versus those who are so disgusted by the adoption of that idea that they refuse to debase themselves and visit cruelty and torture on another human being simply to enhance their personal life.

And John this is the paradox.  The value to the many versus the torture of the innocent.  And by the way, you mentioned girl, I believe that the narrator never mentions the sex, but does say that the sex is unknown to the narrator.

I draw a simile to our contemporary Society the majority of whom seems to buy into to the morality of indiscriminate torture as a way to preserve our lifestyle as we know it.  This could also be seen as an analogy.

Are you aware:  The Republican Party is as you read this pushing hard to get Congress to pass a bill that would give the President of the United States unlimited powers to wage war without limit on any Nation, or any person, including Citizens of the United States, living within the United States, for any reason that the President would construe as detrimental to the United States ( explicitly does not have to be a threat to the United States), at any time without notifying Congress, or getting permission from Congress,  until the President sees fit to do either.  Any person ( including American Citizens) detained would be detained within the Military Courts and would not have access to rights of Citizenship in a Court of law.  In other words this act would establish a Military Hunta.

John have you read the text of this abomination?
Thirty Six Democrats have approached the Republican Party and asked them to re-consider.

MarthaA: “For the American Aristocracy and the Middle Class to try to frame the Left, 70% of the population of the United States, the American
Populace, as the poor and disadvantaged is a ludicrous self serving frame, and it is about time that “you people” are starting to catch on.”

No MarthaA, we are not starting to catch on.

It has been apparent from the beginning that the language has been altered to insure advantage for the upper 1% of the population. It may even be that your magic formulae could actually be a good part of the solution.

However, after weeks of trying to get you to elucidate beyond the simplistic claim that
“sublated unity of balance x=x dialectic is the solution”, has failed completely, it has become obvious that you cannot show how the solution can be applied to the problem effectively.

How do we get the MCPopulation to A. accept that their language needs to be repaired, and B. become adept at using the language of the aristocracy?

                =====:)======

If I have a cure for cancer, but cannot convince anyone to try it out, the cure is utterly useless, regardless of its efficacy.

                ======:)=====

Until you can actually see this, I cannot have anything but disdain for your solution and doubt about your sincerity.

With regard to the “washed masses,” as opposed to the “unwashed
masses,” how many of the “washed masses” do you, John
Best, suppose are Genteel Peasants chasing a false sense of advantage on a
Payment Plan based upon the “capital” of someone elses dime?

I suspect, John, that YOU are one of those Genteel Peasants using
the capital of someone elses dime to wash, and like Beau Brummel
have a false sense of your own status.

Two things. 
1. I am not defending Calvinism, I am defending a work ethic, which may or may not be the so-called ‘protestant work ethic’, TBD.  The ethic is real today and is good regardless of the name.  It is being subverted by the ideology of the merchant class. 

2. The girl in the story is a metaphor.  If we come up with an accurate and actionable analogy to the girl, the story has power beyond this forum.  If not, well, it was a nice story.  I say start with the girls suffering being distributed over the slave classes, with a lot less of her suffering being distributed over the working poor, and far less over the poorly paid.

If the metaphor can be relate-able by the ‘unwashed masses’, then the story carries power to them, at least the power of realization.  That’s not a trivial thing.

Gary Mont, June 12 at 9:59 am,

”“The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to
make the law free”

The problem is the law. The solution is the law.” —Gary
Mont, June 12 at 9:59 am

‘Them’s mighty strong words Pilgrim;’ words that I agree with.

The problem is that the class in the middle, the Middle Class,
represents the Middle, and the Left is NOT REPRESENTED in the
making and enforcing of legislated LAW and order; this means that
the 70% majority Common Population of the United States is NOT
REPRESENTED in the making and enforcing of legislated law and
order that rules over them as SUBJECTS, rather than as CITIZENS.

Here in the United States we have minority rule of
duopolistic class and cultural interests of the American Aristocracy
and the Professional Middle Class, and the Left, the American
Populace as a 70% Majority Common Population, are subject to
their legislated law and order that is LEGISLATION WITHOUT
REPRESENTATION for the Left, the American Populace.

For the American Aristocracy and the Middle Class to try to frame
the Left, 70% of the population of the United States, the American
Populace, as the poor and disadvantaged is a ludicrous self
serving frame, and it is about time that “you people” are starting
to catch on.

Actually Calvin started Calvinism. It is harsh, brutal, dictatorial and fatalist. Only a very few will get that Heaven-on-Earth the rest will be tormented aud infanitum!

“The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to make the law free”

“Possession is 90% of the law.”

Our laws have nothing to do with equality and everything to do with property.

This is due entirely to the fact that those who make the laws are those who possess the greatest property.

The notion that “all men are created equal” is a con, used to convince people that the law has an altruistic base. It does not. The law protects those with, from those without.

The law is so dedicated to protecting the wealthy, that it can be used with only slight manipulations, as we see today, to make it legal for the wealthy to steal, lie, cheat and even murder.

As long as the law of the land contains nothing that protects equality, or even promotes equality, there can be no equality.

The problem is the law. The solution is the law.

Cliff Carson, June 12 at 6:16 am:
’... Would any Citizen choose to be a sacrificial lamb?
And if no citizen would volunteer to be that sacrifice, how then would the sacrificial lamb be chosen?
Would the chosen one then have the freedom to opt out of that responsibility?
The answer:
If not, then there is not equal freedom in the Society.
There can be a Utopian Society in reality in just one condition:
All society , each and every member of a Society , must bear equal responsibility and guilt for the actions of the Society. ...’

That illustrates part of the problem of liberalism, which tries to mix feudal ideas of property with anarchistic ideas of personal liberty.  If all members of a community bear equal responsibility for the actions of the community as a whole, which certainly seems reasonable since most of the actions of the individuals are interlocked with one another, and if ‘the worker is worthy of his hire’, then the only just distribution of the community’s production is a communist distribution.  Needless to say, most people, imbued with liberal notions of private property and privacy, don’t want to hear this.  So they make up stories like Calvinism, and divide the population into sheep and goats, the good (themselves) and the evil (those with less power, the welfarados and criminals and bums).  Then the more good divide themselves off from the less good….  and we are well on our way to a class system, a ruling class, and the ills and evils which such things engender.

And you are right John.
The nuance is different and the focus may be somewhat different.  Ardee your comments are also right on target on this issue.  I agree that the amount of Blue Collar (spell that poor or helpless, it doesn’t matter ) fraud is minuscule compared to Corporate fraud , however the problem is that a corrupt Government has legitimized the Corporate ( And also the Rich and Powerful), fraud as “necessary” for the good of our Society.

Which is why I was so caught up with Omelas, and I promise to move on to something different after this comment illustrating the value of that post by Anarcisse.

Copied from a review of “The ones who walk away from Omelas”

“To exchange all the goodness and grace of every life in Omelas for that single, small improvement: to throw away the happiness of thousands for the chance of the happiness of one: that would be to let guilt within the walls indeed” (830). It seems that the introduction of guilt to the people of Omelas would end their otherwise unchallenged happiness. Perhaps because of this, the child could be viewed as a personification of guilt. As long as he is kept locked away from the sunlight and the perfect streets of Omelas, the people can keep their own guilt locked up in the unacknowledged dark corners of their minds.”

My comment is that our people are being coaxed into putting the guilt on the “least of us” in order that the Corporate, the Rich, the Powerful, do not have to suffer the “Guilt” of their misconduct.

The Question:
Is every life equally important in a Society?
If affirmative, does this mean each in the Society have the equal freedom to choose their contribution and/or reward?
If not, how can each life be equally important in a Society?
But if this be so, why would not each citizen of the society choose the Idyllic life free of all guilt or responsibility?
And who would choose to receive a lesser reward?
Would any Citizen choose to be a sacrificial lamb?
And if no citizen would volunteer to be that sacrifice, how then would the sacrificial lamb be chosen?
Would the chosen one then have the freedom to opt out of that responsibility?
The answer:
If not, then there is not equal freedom in the Society.
There can be a Utopian Society in reality in just one condition:
All society , each and every member of a Society , must bear equal responsibility and guilt for the actions of the Society.
Therefore it is the duty of each and every Citizen of any Society to protect the freedom of each and every one of the Society.  From the least to the most powerful.
To assure that this happens, there must be a Standard.  That Standard is “The Law”.
The Law must apply to each Citizen of the Society equally.
The Society can only continue to exist as long as this Law remains intact and invoked equally.
If even one citizen of the Society is free to ignore the Law, the Society will cease to exist.
The Sacrifice is the freedom to accept or reject the Law.

As applicable to this thread , “This is What Resistance Looks Like”, in my opinion, all who claim to be members of a Society, for Example - the United States - all Citizens of the United States have an equal responsibility to resist the violation of “The Law” - our Constitution, by those who would sacrifice our Constitutionally Guaranteed Freedoms, so that they might place themselves outside the Law, and in doing so, take away our freedoms.

“The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to make the law free”

Anarchissie and Cliff,
Something I am not saying well is that some sort of ‘top-down’ solution is not what I am writing for.  Bureaucracies cannot separate theft by the lazy/opportunistic from the poor/needy/common good.

I am saying we can have a far better grassroots awareness of many, many forms of the aforementioned theft, and in some cases we can resist. 

A small example, when we see a rigged contract generating a municipal bond for frivolous construction that ultimately takes resources away from some school district, we can write a altte to the editor.  When we see a rapist sports super-star making 10’s of millions, we can stay away and encourage others.  When we are being forced to support deadbeat middlemen, ‘insurers’, brokers, etc, we can find alternatives.  When we see disposable goods, planned obsolescence crap, made from oil, which ravages the environment and fills landfills, we can seek alternatives.  And yes, when we see a teenage girl pregnant, starting on her life of popping out kids to expand the numbers of a perpetual uneducated slave class, we can at the least avoid affording her all the social status which is politically correct. Of course we must support the children, but that’s another topic. 

Awareness of all forms of corruption regardless of left or right leaning ‘corruption styles’, can be part of the public’s awareness.  The ethos.  It’s positive peer pressure.  The greater the public awareness, especially in an objective apolitical way, the greater the chance we might ‘ooze’ in a better direction. 

This is what we ignore…..that society does not act in a logical centrally planned fashion.  Rather, we ‘ooze’ in a general direction like an ameoba.  The general awareness and ethos is one force that acts on our collective.  If we condone frauds on one political side, it will perpetuate fraud by the other.  We can have a collective aversion to waste, extreme frivolity, ‘over the top’ showiness, certainly hubris.  This aversion might become palpable enough to affect discussion.  IT might become palpable enough to affect action. 

We might all ooze away from Omeals.  Individuals can walk, but the girl remains tortured by those that are left behind. 

This is my solution. Ideas.  Good memes .

Gary Mont, June 11 at 8:35 pm

Your dissertation on the reason for rampant criminality is a welcome change from the seemingly endless, and endlessly boring, attempts to make some sort of sense out of the obviously deranged babblings of our resident wing nut Martha/Thomas.

However, I see certain points within the aforementioned post that beg a response.

Fraud is a lucrtative industry because its hard to prosecute fraudsters. Why is that??

99% of the crime in America today occurs because there is abundant opportunity to get ahead without having to follow the socially acceptable path to wealth. Why is that??

Judges are assigned cases and seldom refuse them as that looks worse on their record than any outcome might.

Crime cannot be considered without breaking the statistics down into a more relevant-to- the-discussion shape. The crimes we should consider are of the white collar variety as the other such are products of a failing economy and a penal system that fails to rehabilitate and thus becomes both a warehouse and a school for criminality.

I believe that said white collar crime occurs in greater numbers and goes unpunished more frequently simply because our government’s own existence has been perverted from its original purpose, ensuring the welfare of the majority chiefly, and now seeks only to ensure the health of, and serve the needs of, our corporations, by any means necessary.

And beyond all of this, what is the precise difference between a woman living in poverty whose religion forces her to have a child every 12 months and a woman living in poverty who has seven kids in order to get a good size child support check??

This so smacks of the Reagan view of welfare that I trust you did not mean to infer that women on welfare actually live better the more children they bring into this world! Perhaps you might study the realities of welfare existence and then apologize to the recipients.

No matter how a child is brought into this world, it still needs support, unless one believes the child is as responsible for its birth as its parents.

It certainly does “take a village”, dont it?

Why I bother, I just don’t know, because I absolutely know this will go right over your head.

Nay the less…

MarthaA/B: “You, Gary Mont, have expounded
Lite-Right behavior as a condemnation, without condemnation of Hard-Right behavior, as a tactic apparently to enable BACKLASH to Hard-Right Governance; what is your point? ———You have advocated NO SOLUTION, other than “BACKLASH”!!!

Well I’ll be damned! You have been paying attention somewhat. And here I thought you posted simply because you loved to read your own prose and piss off as many people as possible.

I have no idea what your new labels, Backwash, Light-Bright and Hard-Night might mean, but I understand your love for using labels so you don’t get people confused with pets and furniture, however, to date, I’ve stated at least thrice, that:

I Do Not Have A Solution.
========================

I’ll reiterate that for those who are chronically reading challenged.

I Do Not Have A Solution.

If I had a solution, it would be in every post.

In fact, I doubt very much that a single solution exists that can do any more than bandaid the situation for a short period. I think it will necessitate a number of solutions being initiated together to fix the mess our wealthiest citizens have created for fun and profit.

The closest I’ve ever come to a solution to all this shit is to get rid of money, but every other person I have ever encountered on earth screams:

“No Way Hose’!!! Try taking away my money and I’ll kill ya dead where ye stand!!!”

My point is to iterate ALL the problems, because most people seem to miss most of them completely, or more commonly, they pick ONE problem (and sometimes a non problem) and pretend its the sole casuse of all human misery etc. - like racists for example - “just make all the non-whites slaves and everything will be hunky dory forever.”

My hope is to discover solutions by absorbing and extrapolating the thoughts of those who are trying also to come up with solutions.

The only reason I even bothered to respond to you was the simple fact that you claimed to have a viable solution. Since your comment that the MCPopulation was handicapped by an adulterated language was 100% correct, I thought I’d try and absorb your offered solution.

It turned out to be a social gaming formulae that you read in a book written by a human gameplay specialist, whose work has been used almost exclusively for evil so far by numerous tyrants and dictators.

But you already knew that didn’t you.

You, Gary Mont, have expounded
Light-Right behavior as a condemnation,
without condemnation of Hard-Right
behavior, as a tactic apparently to enable
BACKLASH to Hard-Right Governance; what is
your point? ———You have advocated NO
SOLUTION, other than “BACKLASH”!!!!

“Mart(a), you are incompetent.

I was going to ask you to enlighten us about the linguistic
conspiracy surrounding the inclosure movement, but you are
incompetent.” —John Best, June 9 at 6:09 pm

And what exactly does a rebuke of incompetence mean from you,
John Best, who claims ignorance and a lack of
understanding as a tactic of sophistry and propaganda for the
Hard-Right/Light-Right Duopoly that controls the existing
order of Right-Wing Governance of the United States? ————
NOTHING!!!!

The best you can do is to puke out recrimination, rather than
substance, and play ignorant as a tactic of avoidance to
meaningful dialogue;——— Tell me why YOUR childish opinion
should matter to anyone other than YOUR fellow sophist and
propagandists there in the Boiler Room.

Attempt 2
=========

John Best: Yes, of course I agree, I am saying though that we should also be aware of deadbeat corporations, deadbeat dads, deadbeat moms, medicare fraudsters (deadbeat doctors), and everyone who steals resources from the weakest…....the old and the very young, the infirm.

Or we could have someone besides the wealthiest and most criminal among us create the society’s laws, to prevent these situations from being available.

Fraud is a lucrtative industry because its hard to prosecute fraudsters. Why is that??

Judges often refuse to try fraud cases because it looks bad on their records if they lose a case. Why is that??

99% of the crime in America today occurs because there is abundant opportunity to get ahead without having to follow the socially acceptable path to wealth. Why is that??

And beyond all of this, what is the precise difference between a woman living in poverty whose religion forces her to have a child every 12 months and a woman living in poverty who has seven kids in order to get a good size child support check??

No matter how a child is brought into this world, it still needs support, unless one believes the child is as responsible for its birth as its parents.

A society based upon just laws and complete enforcement of those laws will automatically eliminate most crime of the types you mention above.

Instead, we have laws that have been twisted and bent by lawyers and politicians specifically to allow criminals a free lunch and a prize pony. We have a law enforcement system that is so busy searching out and destroying harmless plants and arresting those who smoke them, and arresting men who pay for sex and women that sell it, that they simply have no time for chasing criminals such as thieves and rapists and murderers and extortionists and banksters and crooked businessmen.

On top of that, we have a system of judicial corruption that allows anyone who has the money to simply buy a judge a vacation in Bali and be exonerated instantly.

And we have laws that let corporations murder whole neighborhoods, and then settle out of court for a bit of cash and thereby suffer no record of their crimes.

A just society would have very little of the poverty that causes the remainder of the crimes of the poor, such as stealing food, muggings, and B&E.

A just society is something we do not have today.

Because of this, all of those crimes you mention will be impossible to eliminate and will only escalate as the rich steal more from the poor, legally.

And that is absolutely guaranteed.

You, Gary Mont, have expounded
Lite-Right behavior as a condemnation,
without condemnation of Hard-Right
behavior, as a tactic apparently to enable
BACKLASH to Hard-Right Governance; what is
your point? ———You have advocated NO
SOLUTION, other than “BACKLASH”!!!!

John.  I agree with you about there being abusers of the good Samaritan’s gift of compassion.  Yes there are those who look for reasons NOT to be compassionate -  with all the needy using the excuse of the few that abuse.

Remember this doesn’t apply to Corporations because Corporations are soulless.

And if truth be known, most of those people are just looking for a reason - not to be compassionate.

Most people who are poor are not no-good-niks.  There are a growing number who are leaches, but look back at the Omelasians.  They were raised from childhood to believe that the torture of the defenseless child was a “duty” of theirs to continue the rest of their lives - because it was necessary to do in order that their life might be carfare and without want.  Were these people leaches by letting the tortured child suffer to provide their “Welfare”.  Think about it.

The questions remains:  What did the tortured child do to the people of Omelas?  I believe that if you think about it the child did nothing. The only function or purpose to continue the torture was to allow the Omelasians to continue their lifestyle.

Isn’t that the purpose of the propaganda put out by the War Mongers :  To get Americans to accept torture and robbery of our American Dream as the means to protect us?

Wasn’t the lies of the Bush Administration a ploy to get Americans to accept the brutalization of a nation that did nothing to America just so that the International Corporations and War Industry could fatten their bank accounts?

Today on TV I noticed a news story on CNN stating that 638 civilians had been killed in AFGHANISTAN this year.  You may remember earlier this year I mentioned that General McCrystal had stated on TV there there were about 100 Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.

If there are now zero Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, if Al-Qaeda have all been killed, then 638 civilians were killed to get rid of those 100 Al-Qaeda.

And if all the Ql-Qaeda in Afghanistan have been killed, why aren’t the Soldiers back home with their families, where they belong?

If they all haven’t been killed , how many more innocent people is the American people willing to kill to get the rest of them?

I think I wrote in some thread earlier this Spring that there are two absolutes:

1.  Excuses, which are nothing but spin to detract from the truth about the cause of an outcome and

2.  The reason, which is simply the truth about what caused the outcome.

America, we are the people of Omelas.

Some of us will walk away because we abhor the truth.

Some will try to bring change so that we don’t have to be ashamed of the truth.

The great majority of us will continue to make excuses so that we may continue the charade of the deserving who must torture the innocent.

Well, to begin with, some work is good and other work isn’t.  A lot of workers work hard at specifically doing evil.  Then there’s the fact that the results of work are seldom attributed correctly to the workers who produced them.  As Kropotkin and I mentioned previously, it may not be possible to locate responsibility, but in any case showmanship, charisma, prejudice and connections will beat truth at the office any day of the week.  Third, it’s pretty obvious that dividing people into sheep and goats (all those ‘hard workers’ versus all those ‘deadbeats’) opens up numerous opportunities to set people against one another and thus manipulate all of them.  That’s one part of the set of reasons working people often seem to vote against their own interests.  So there are just a few problems with the good old Protestant work ethic.

And some point, too, we might ask what all the work is for.  Don’t we have enough junk?  Hasn’t enough of our environment been destroyed?  Aren’t there enough people in prison?  Aren’t our roads choked with enough SUVs?  Don’t we burn enough oil?  Haven’t we invaded enough countries?  Do our rich folks really need yet more money?

Debs’s speech was a bit romantic, it’s true.  He could never have implemented it through the state, so I don’t know why he was running for president.  The whole point of the state is to create and identify a lower class, a criminal class, and build prisons to put them in.  But since they were putting him in jail we could allow him his little flight of fancy.

@Cliff—“We as a people need to be moral.  We need to understand the moral value of protecting the weakest among us, what ever the cost.”    Yes, of course I agree, I am saying though that we should also be aware of deadbeat corporations, deadbeat dads, deadbeat moms, medicare fraudsters (deadbeat doctors), and everyone who steals resources from the weakest…....the old and the very young, the infirm.  And the term ‘welfare’ has indeed been diluted our ability to address the general welfare, or the common good.  We are stupid if we can’t separate the lazy from the helpless.  It is exactly the trick of lazy corporations and individuals to use resources from the common good, which would have otherwise been used for the helpless.

Geez, what sorts of fraud exist, high level fraud, corporate and institution level, because they have loopholes originally justified to ‘help the children’ or ‘help the helpless’.  Gimme a freaking break. 

@Anarchissie
The Eugene Deb quote you reference was dramatic rhetoric, and not to put the mans life or work down, far from it, but the particular statement serves to provide cover among the helpless for the worthless.  I’m sick of the polarized discussions…....all problems should be exposed.  The culture of welfare mothers is insignificantly less damaging than that of welfare corporations.  They promote ignorance among their children.  The right and left wing are using them.  Their kids are the girl in Omelas.

That side of the ‘protestant work ethic’, is a perverted side, you are right there is a ‘predetermination’ by God to show the prosperous were deserving, but that is perverted to justify prosperity by any means, including usury, thievery, whatever.  The baby should not be thrown out with the bathwater.  The ‘work is good’ part of it, that essential part that says ‘prosperity by ones own work’, is the part that shouldn’t be thrown out. 

I think any ‘ism’, philosophy, or theology that is proposed is becomes quickly successful only if it can be bastardized to serve the merchant class. 

I’m not really defending Calvins writing or the other thinkers of his ilk, but did he/they actually write that if you’re rich by whatever means, it’s a sign from God that you’re better than the average shcmoe?  If os, what a suck-up Calvin was to the aristocracy.  This may be the case, and it would be nice to have the smoking gun from his work. 

That said, I reiterate that the Protestant work ethic is more than “God loves the rich that’s why he made them rich”, and I maintain that the sentiment quoted is a self-serving bastardization of the ethic.  I’m not a theologian, but I know what has sort of been passed down through the ‘Pennsylvania dutch’ community, and it goes something like “work hard and you’ll be blessed’.  More or less.  Usury is frowned upon, excess showing of wealth is frowned upon, etc.  I’m not talking about the Amish, I’m talking about regular blue and white collar people, farmers, people who no longer even go to their protestant church, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Methodist, but the ethos remains. 

So, I might be wrong, but I think you’re giving the ‘protestant work ethic’ a bad rap.  Oh, and check out Joel Osteen.  He preaches what you’re talking about, that Jesus wants you to be rich and wealth is a sign of being blessed.  Isn’t this the perfect way to feel sanctimonious about making money by whatever way you please regardless of it’s negative/positive affect on humanity. 

Another tool that’s required to pervert a perfectly decent work ethic is the notion that it’s nobodies business how I made the wealth I display.  Also the notion that any and all pursuits are equally valid, as valued by the market. 

In any case, it’s worth it to dig a bit and see who has it wrong about the ‘protestant work ethic’.  If I am wrong, I need to identify this ethic many of the farmers and farm communities still have out here in the stix.

Cliff Carson, June 11 at 5:03 am:

‘... We as a people need to be moral.  We need to understand the moral value of protecting the weakest among us, what ever the cost.’

You were complaining, though, about my use of the term ‘social welfare’ to cover both Social Security and aid to the destitute.  I believe there was some mention of welfare mothers, deadbeat dads, and so forth—the usual suspects.

There are different kinds of morality.  Calvinism is one kind.  This theory proposes that there are two kinds of people; the good, moral, people, who will be prosperous, at least in a just polity—the middle and working classes—and the bad, immoral people, who will be poor and miserable, the destitute, the welfarados, the criminals, the homeless. 

In the Calvinist system the better people can help the worse people, but they’d better not do it too much, because the separation between the good and the bad is ordained by God, or nature, or something.  And some Calvinists might want to help the poor in curious ways, as by bombing them, for example in Afghanistan, or by setting up a school-and-work system in which they are bound to fail.

Calvinism includes the famous Protestant work ethic.

Omelas can be applied to Calivnism.  Without the suffering and misery of the bad people, the good people would have no one to be better than.  They might stop working.  Everything would fall apart.

One can contrast Calvinism with another morality, Eugene Debs’s famous Statement to the Court: ‘Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.’  No mention of welfare mothers, and rather sypmathetic to criminals.  Rather communistic, in fact.  So that’s another possibility at the supermarket of the moralities.  Check the prices, and don’t forget to read the ingredients listed on the side of the package.

Anarcissie
Do not suggest that you may have chosen the wrong story.  You absolutely chose the correct one to illustrate “What Resistance Looks Like”.
Resistance absolutely does not look like walking away from Omelas.
To accept that a most vile sin ceases to be wrong if we would only mind our own business ( walking away) or if it benefits a multitude of people suggests evil personified.  To repeat a phrase I have heard somewhere before:  Evil is not wrong because we say it is; Evil is wrong because it is wrong.
Remember in the story that if just one person utters one kind word to the tortured child, the Utopia immediately ends.  The Omelasian Utopia exists ONLY because the child is tortured.  And the Omelasian Utopia continues to exist only because the children of Omelas are taught that the torture of the child is absolutely justified by their standard of living. 
Does this ring a bell about the World today?  Or the behavior of,  ummm lets say America?
Are we not bombarded 24/7 that torture is justified?  Are we not bombarded 24/7 that killing of the innocents say in Afghanistan , Iraq, Libya, and on and on is justified because of Humanitarian reasons?
Do we not hear preached from the Pulpit every Sunday that the torture of the Palestinians by the Israelis is justified because “God gave the land to Israel”?  Look at the facts :
Iraq was exploited by the U S through Saddam Hussein for a long time.  His killing of the innocents was just AOK with those who run our Government until he began to make noises about re-directing the Dinar away from the International Monetary Consortium - it was then that Saddam’s evilness was discovered, well we just couldn’t put up with evil could we.
We as a Nation condone the atrocities poured upon the Palestinians by the Israeli Nation because it benefits us in preserving our “Freedom to enjoy the spoils of others sacrifice”.  What was it the Palestinians did to suffer the misery brought to them because of a Religious dream of Eretz Israel or because of the Hegemony of an Arrogant Empire building America?
And we as a Nation wouldn’t be evil if we didn’t speak of the Evil now would we?
We who resist, do not walk away from Omelas, we do a kind action for the tortured, we protest, we resist evil even if it costs us materially, financially, physically, or even at the ultimate price.

We as a people need to be moral.  We need to understand the moral value of protecting the weakest among us, what ever the cost.

Oh Anarcissie, but they did have a choice, and “those who walk away from Omelas” made that choice.  The choice they made was not to enjoy “the good life” at the brutal torture of the helpless.

They left guaranteed happiness for the unknown life in the mountains.  Those made the statement ” If I have to condone torture to enjoy the good life, I’ll take my chances elsewhere.”  Of that there can be no doubt.

My wife and I discussed the morality of those who left.  How hard it must have been to refuse guaranteed never wanting, the only sacrifice to be made to keep the society as it was, would be to approve of the unthinkable - the torture of a defenseless child.  And knowing that the daily torture of that innocent child was their bargain freely made, that kept the status quo.  Remember the child pleading with the people - “Please, set me free from this, I will be good”, I promise I will be good”?  But if they set him free , they would break the bargain - and as a result lose everything they had.

The value of human life, the value of freedom, the value of moral conduct, is a thing to defend, at all costs, even when the threat of harm comes from within-our own fears.

Yes the mythical society of Omelas is a study in morality.  In a moral society freedom is never lost and being your brothers keeper in his time of need is the greatest gift that can be given.  It is done, without expectation of reward, and simply thru compassion.

“Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.” - Marcus Aurelius

I don’t know how a discussion of Calvinism helps.  If it wasn’t Calvinism, it would have been whatever ‘religious’ movement which could have been adapted, twisted, corrupted, to serve the purpose.  Said purpose being to coerce the masses to accept ‘their position’ of servitude. 

I maintain it is best to separate the theology from the implementation, but that’s an irrelevancy here.  So, if we say that Calvinism is the culprit, fine, we can seek out ‘calvanists’ as the ‘righties’ did communists.  The problem is the ‘implementation’, of calvanism can be applied to whatever ‘religious movement’ replaces it after the purge, and we’ll be right back where we started.  Actually, aren’t we already there with the born again evangelical crap?  Is a little compare/contrast is in order?

The use of Religion to opiate the masses is a tool that every generation of merchant class uses against the working class.  The poor are a tool of both. 

My vote?  Please go ahead with the ‘Calvanism’ discussion, and let’s get behind the ‘ism’ to see how the mechanics work(ed).  If we can extract the real history from what the ‘winnres’ have left us in the official version, it might be very interesting.

Cliff—I am glad you enjoyed Omelas.  I think the story is ambiguous as to its meaning; however, it is not about the moral failures of the people of Omelas, who according to the story have no choice about the suffering child if they wish to maintain their utopia, which, after all, is good for almost everybody.  As the story says, ‘They all know it is there, all the people of Omelas. Some of them have come to see it, others are content merely to know it is there. They all know that it has to be there. Some of them understand why, and some do not, but they all understand that their happiness, the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of their children, the wisdom of their scholars, the skill of their makers, even the abundance of their harvest and the kindly weathers of their skies, depend wholly on this child’s abominable misery.’  The idea is not unfamiliar.  Buddhism holds that all enjoyment and pleasure is dependent on suffering.  Christianity is centered on an individual who suffers abominably in order to buy salvation and paradise for those who believe in him. 

Those who walk away can be given a great many different interpretations.  In a Buddhist interpretation, for instance, they are incipient bodhisattvas, those who have understood that all that is good is dependent on suffering; they are on the road to becoming buddhas.  In Christianity, they are perhaps infidels or devils, who refuse the gift of salvation.  Marxists, if they ever got done arguing with one another, might demand that they return and overthrow the regime.

Perhaps the story is wrong in some way.  There are no utopias.  Utopia means ‘nowhere land’.

Anyway, I think it did not further my argument to present it.  We have a situation where a few live at the expense of the many, not many at the expense of a few.  I should have found a different story.  I wanted to complain about Calvinism, but I see that I have already done so three or four times.  Enough is enough.

Mart(a), you are incompetent.

I was going to ask you to enlighten us about the linguistic conspiracy surrounding the inclosure movement, but you are incompetent.

By the Gods! It worked!!

Part Two:

Revived “Prompt Global Strike” weapons system, considered too controversial by Bush Administration

Backed off on his promise to close the prison at Guantanamo

Reaffirmed his opposition to same-sex marriage

Announced over $8 billion in loan guarantees to promote nuclear power

Promised $30 billion in military aid to Israel over the next decade

Successfully prosecuted child soldier Omar Khadr using evidence obtained through torture

Granted 27 waivers to oil companies drilling in the few weeks following the Deepwater Horizon disaster

Operated a “black site” at Bagram airbase, where the Red Cross has reported detainee abuse

Won the right to deny habeas corpus to detainees

Once wrote: “I trust that you will continue to let me and other Democrats know when you believe we are screwing up. And I, in turn, will always try and show you the respect and candor one owes his friends and allies.”

Eased restrictions on the use of child soldiers in Africa

Blocked UN human rights investigations at Guantanamo

And its only his first term!!!

For Posterity sake - and to test my ability to post pasted text…

With thanks to:

http://witsendnj.blogspot.com/2011/06/another-day-another-outrage-from.html

Copied From:

http://whatthefuckhasobamadonesofar.com

What has Obama done so far?
===========================

Launched FBI raids on antiwar activists in Chicago and Minneapolis

Used a signing statement to ignore labor and environmental standards for the IMF and World Bank

Supports the coup government in Honduras

Reversed his position on drug reimportation to appease the pharmaceutical industry

Dropped charges against the CIA for destroying videotapes documenting torture of detainees

Violated his own ban on lobbyists working for the administration

Appointed Rahm Emanuel as his Chief of Staff

Deported record numbers of undocumented immigrants

Continued renditions of alleged terrorists to countries where they could be tortured

Opposed marriage equality by appealing challenges to DOMA, the so-called “Defense of Marriage Act”

Blocked the release of photos documenting the torture and abuse of detainees by the US military

Continued the practice of indefinite detentions for alleged terrorist

Refused to sign a treaty banning the use of landmines

Extended the Patriot Act without making any reforms

Pushed for mandatory DNA testing of those arrested for crimes, regardless of whether they have been convicted

Dramatically increased government secrecy, blocking more FOIA requests in 2009 than Bush did in 2008

Cut a secret deal to kill the public option, while campaigning on its behalf

Cut a deal to exempt abortion services from health care reform

Continued to defend the military’s “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Policy” from legal challenges

Granted waivers for 30 companies, including McDonald’s, exempting them from health care reform

Announced a $60 billion sale of arms to the Saudi Arabian dictatorship, the largest arms deal in history

Won the right to invoke “state secrets” protecting the Bush administration from criminal prosecution

Failed to disclose visits by industry executives while crafting health care reform legislation

Authorized the assassination of US citizens abroad, an unprecedented declaration of executive power

Censored reporters covering military tribunals at Guantanamo

Fought for government immunity in prosecutions for domestic spying

Awarded $250 million in government contracts to Blackwater

Dramatically increased the use of drone bombers in Pakistan, resulting in hundreds of civilian casualties

Won the right to keep identities of prisoners at Bagram “black site” a secret
Cracked down on government whistleblowers more than any President in history

Used cluster bombs in Yemen, resulting in the deaths of 14 militants, and 35 women and children

Continued Bush policy of blocking use of the Endangered Species Act to prevent climate change

Sent 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan

Gave permits to BP and other oil companies, exempting them from environmental protection laws

Appointed Lawrence Summers as his top economic adviser

Appointed Timothy Geithner to run the Treasury

Passed a massive bailout of Wall Street, at the taxpayers’ expense

Appointed Monsanto executive Michael Taylor to the FDA

Appointed former Monsanto lobbyist Islam Siddiqui as America’s Chief Agriculture Negotiator

Sided with utility companies in lawsuit to stop greenhouse gas emissions

Successfully protected Bush officials from prosecution for torture

Pushed for a 5 year prison term for Charles Lynch, the operator of a medical marijuana dispensary, legal under California law

Proposed a three year freeze on domestic spending, exempting cuts from the Pentagon and Homeland Security

Argued that the widespread use of Predator drones is a justifiable form of self-defense

End of part one

Anarcessie

I want to thank you for the link to “The Ones who walk away from Omelas”.  I have read that several times now since you provided the link.  I have even had my wife read it so that we could discuss the moral of the story. 

I find the link extremely pertinent to this thread “This is what Resistance Looks Like”. 

My wife and I discussed whether the ones who walked away were moral people.  Would a moral person have stood up to the people of the City of Happiness and brought to the peoples attention how evil they were to live the good life, at the expense of the defenseless?  And if that is so, are those who simply walked away under the cover of night immoral because they were, I suppose, cowards to face the happy multitude and detail their sin?

The City of Omelas was given the good life only as long as they tolerated the torture of a child. What a sad bunch of people those Omelians were, to know that their wonderful society would immediately end if they stopped the torture.  They made the decision to torture so they could continue the status quo.  Except for the ones who walked away.  And they never tried to stop it.
It the American Empire torturing the weaker of the world?  I think so.

In this country today we have those who turn a deaf ear to the needs of the unfortunate, we have those who believe taking from the weak is just the natural order of things and so be it, a modern day replica of the people of Omelas.

I sincerely believe the Moral Fiber of a Nation is measured by how the Strongest treat the Weakest, how the fortunate treat the unfortunate. 

I claim to be my brothers keeper in his time of need.  I am not ashamed to admit this.  I do say shame on those who claim the high road but who would also take the last livelihood of another human being - simply because he could take it.

What Resistance looks like is those who will stand up and identify the immoral and have the courage to bring the sins of the immorals to the light.

This is especially true when those immoral’s are our leaders in positions of power and trust.

What a wonderful and applicable short story for the ages you have provided in your link.

Clockwork Orange: “I have been following this thread for some time and all I have to say is to MarthA, “Go girl!”

Won’t do you any good. Everyone here has already asked her to go dozens of times, but she won’t.

That was a pun son.

She likes to shut down blogs by flooding the discussion with countless pointless posts about her magic formulae that will save the world if only someone somewhere can understand it, and then spend a decade or so wondering why she can’t get anyone except morons like you to listen to her.

You do understand what MarthaA/B’s magic formulae means I assume, unless you’re just rooting for her to continue being a disruption, like a common juvenile vandal.

So show us how well you understand her magic formulae. Rewrite it in plain understandable english.

Of course, if you’re really just MarthaA/B under a new alias, you’ll just write the same crap all over again, and again, and again, and again….

Or maybe, not respond as Clockwork Orange at all.

You, John Best, are, I suspect, a Genteel
Peasant, wanting a better life at the expense of your fellow
Peasants, with pretensions to Middle Class status
financed to the hilt on credit,  and on the treadmill running like a
hamster trying to maintain a false illusion of Middle Class status,
like the Yeoman Farmers of old that colluded with the Nobility
against their own Peasant Populace for self serving benefit
against the best interests of their own Peasant Populace as a
class and culture, and you are waiting for the 21st Century
Enclosure Movement to turn YOU out on the street hungry and
homeless as cheap labor for the New World Order Labor Market,
aren’t you, John?

If you are, don’t expect to come whining to the American Populace
to be taken care of by the American Populace that you threw
away, in pursuit of a false sense of advantage based upon YOUR
own self serving benefit, disadvantage of the American Populace,
and hoped for inclusion into Middle Class status based upon
overextended credit as a Genteel Peasant.

The United States is headed for NO Jobs, CHEAP Labor, and a
Rentier Economy that will NOT PAY the wages necessary for the
maintenance of a Genteel Lifestyle; YOU may want to
check the best bridge sites for a new home or find a rich patron
you can suck up to, because the Genteel Existence is going to be
very difficult to maintain in the coming Rentier Economy, and I
doubt that the American Peasant Populace will want to
take in Genteel Peasants that sold them down the river for their
own self serving and greedy wants, needs, and desires at the
expense of the American Peasant Populace.

I have read and thought about the content of your posts and your
posts DO NOT reflect either Aristocratic or actual Middle Class
bearing, and if you expect toadying to the Aristocracy and
Middle Class as a Genteel Peasant with pretensions to Middle
Class status based upon over extended credit means anything to
them, you are in for a big surprise——— In this regard, I cannot
even offer you ‘good luck with that,’ because I don’t see you as
worthy.

And the latest version…...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jun/08/us-universities-africa-land-grab

The ‘inclosure’ movement intrigues me.  Something like it happened in pre-christian Rome, though physical fences were not involved.  The modification to language/linguistics (not my area) is intriguing.  Where is there an overview of this aspect of the movement? 

And, I ask in advance for parallels wrt mineral rights here in the US.

I have been following this thread for some time and all I have to say is to MarthA, “Go girl!”

John Best: “Yes, the general attitude is lax.”

Sadly, methinks the world is just trying to get lucky and they think that Twitter and Facebook type social venues will aid them in meeting mister or missus right.

As the population grows and the morality gets more and more commecialized and legal-ized, the people get lonelier and more isolated and things like these social networks appeal to this lonliness and humanity see it as a new kind of meeting method.

The data miners love them like nothing else on earth.
They now get for free what they used to have to use spyware to get.

Yes, the general attitude is lax.  I’d also say the general public accepts the idea that any data which ‘gets out there’, by any legal means (no matter how obfuscated) is ‘out there’, and any use of the data is accepted.  And now…..with the terrorism thing, and ‘protecting the homeland’ and all….why don’t we just start calling it ‘The Fatherland’?  All it is going to take is another big damn terrorist attack (it’ll probably be faked) and we’ll have preemptive law enforcement, profiling, the end of probable cause.  Hell, it’s already gone….. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4756403

Yep, civil liberties and a good solid government that backs up the social contract.  What else do you need?

I’m very concerned about privacy myself, but apparently the overwhelming majority of my fellow citizens don’t give a rat.  Look at the popularity and content of Facebook, for example.

What about the right to privacy?  Apologies, another generic, multiple-meaning word, privacy.  Let me re-phrase…..What about the right to control the dissemination and uses of data about oneself?  This is just one of the many aspects of ‘Libertarianism’. 

You may be correct that ‘the use of force’ is of concern to some libertarians, but I say protection from unwanted intrusion, from either the public or private sector, is a widespread and legitimate enough concern to be considered. 

I’d also say that in the era of widespread use of private policing forces overseas…..xi (blackwater), wackenhut…...that it is a matter of time before you should be far more concerned about private sector intrusions and use of your data. 

The issue might be particularly relevant to ‘What Resistance Looks Like’, as the use of demographic/psychological profiling by political parties and corporate interests are severely affecting our political process.  I forward that understanding and resisting this abuse of our privacy should be disseminated to the public.  Unfortunately, the media is useless.  It has drown out the ‘free press’.

The libertarian question is about when it is right to use force, and for what.  Libertarians generally take a dim view of force, especially as embodied in the government.  But as they include the protection of private property among those things which righteously call for the use of force, they open a considerable can of worms (in my opinion).

I know when the Tea Party thing started up, many people of libertarian prejudices were attracted, but I think by now they’ve mostly been extruded or at least sidelined.

Oh, and I believe in a strong central government, if it is not corrupt and inefficient, and intrusive.  Yes, all this patriot act crap bugs me.  And, I am equally disgusted by the amount and use of privately acquired about individuals.  I do indeed have a libertarian streak.  So? 

If I were a farmer I could look at my database and pick out exactly which cattle to automatically direct down an automatic diverter gate when they come in to feed. They are ID’d by a big RFID tag on each cows neck.  They’ve been doing this for 20 years.  They know exactly how much milk each cow produces, how much they are eating, how much they weigh, etc.  When the cow falls within certain profile parameters, they go down the diverter gate to the veterinarian if they are economically salvageable, or they go to the butcher.  The illusion we humans suffer is that we all think we are farmers, especially the trolls. 

So, yes, I am a bit of a libertarian because if you simply look at the general attitude about the quality of our food supply, (not to mention hundreds of other factors) it is obvious that en masse we are no smarter than a herd of cattle, and we are being managed very much like a herd.  That, at some time, there was better recognition of human dignity, is probably an illusion, but in previous days, the farmers did not have modern technology.  So, yes, we need to have a far greater awareness of the danger of mixing the control freak side of human nature with modern data handling systems. http://www.eff.org/ 

‘Gentleman Libertarian’—I like it in theory, but ‘Libertarian’ has become tainted by the Tea Party sort of Libertarian.

Die Daily!  Great to hear from you.  I think you’re confused, it was Anarchissie who suggested ‘The ones who walk away from Omelas”, not I.

Also, I’m not sure you understood that in that series of comments, I am defending the ‘working class’ including the ‘working poor’ as being the foundation upon which wealth, luxury and comfort rests.  I also recognize society needs some structure because ignorant mobs obviously cannot really rule.  I admire the wealthy who practice something like the ‘Gospel of Wealth’, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gospel_of_Wealth
and am utterly disgusted by the wealthy who piss away wealth in counterproductive selfish fashion.  I am not blanket anti-corporate, rather, I am anti-corporate when the corporation is run by a shit-head CEO.  So, am I still a ‘gentleman libertarian’? 

Do you have any thoughts on the personality type and/or motivation of this type of troll?  As you’ve seen, there may be a significant statistical basis for identifying ‘trigger issues’.  In your spare time…

Well, that’s got to be my Truthdig top post of the
month. Anarcissie responds to John Best as the
Gentleman Libertarian, and I love it, so I quote it
below. The short reading he suggests at the end is a
fun, back to first principles story. Reading things
is a nice, almost de-douching variation in mental hygiene for anyone feeling a bit indolent, if not
outright intellectually and morally debauched, by
current affairs and the endless trollisms thereupon.
I quote, now, almost reverently:

——

God, you’re so right.  What we need are more
capitalists, stockbrokers, lawyers, landlords,
politicians, bureaucrats, advertising men, public
relations men, ‘content providers’, columnists, radio
personalities, celebrities,  trustifarians, judges,
cops, prison guards, hangmen, and preachers. 
Someone’s got to do the work!  And we know they’re
good because they have money.

But I’m here to tell you that the welfarados also
work.  Without the misery, terror, boredom and
stupidity of their lives, your Calvinist-capitalist
society wouldn’t last for a minute.  As the Tao Te
Ching says, ‘The low is the foundation of the high;
the heavy is the foundation of the light.’  Without
them, there would be no one for you-all Calvinists to
be better than.  Your superiors couldn’t use your
social status to manipulate you any more.  The whole
social order would fall apart!

Oh, well, try reading The Ones Who Walk Away From
Omelas.  Maybe it’ll give you some ideas.

——

True in one area. We must not use our enemies language or we have already been taken down to their game. We need to make sure we understand what they are really saying and explicate it as we also must give to those listening another means of perceiving what is being said. We need to make our stand first in language then in action. Time is very short.

Only paranoids see an enemy in every disagreement. Paranoids are all about themselves which is why they think there are others out to get them. Personally.

The need for change in America’s Linguistic System, which is based
upon ideological definition and sophist propaganda is important
because the Economic Cycle of boom, bust, and bailout of private
capital and privatized capitalism has been going on since the time
of the Enclosure Movement in Britain that dispossessed the British
Populace to enable the British Textile Industry and jump start
Capitalism.

It was a time when the British Government took everything away
from the British Peasantry and gave it to interests of private
capital to raise sheep and use the dispossessed peasantry as a
workforce that was expected to work for starvation wages or die.

This British System of Privatized Capitalism is what American
Privatized Capitalism was based upon, and the American System
of Privatized Capitalism, to this day, works according to the British
Enclosure Movement Pattern of Privatized Capitalism.

The problem in Britain and in America is the Linguistic System that
enables the whole Privatized Capitalism Dumb-Show.

In Britain during the Enclosure Movement and in America
afterwards, and continuing from the Colonial Period to the
present, America has had a Linguistic System based upon
ideological definition and sophism, as opposed to a Linguistic
System based upon logic.

If we are to have any real change in America, either economically
or politically, it will have to come by way of reform to the Linguistic
System that is used for communication of the problems and
solutions economically, politically, and socially.

We will have to reform linguistic communication in the United
States so that the present Linguistic System based upon
linguistics defined by ideological definition of sophist propaganda
gives way to linguistics based upon logic; this is where the
beginning of any real change in America that provides for real
democracy and benefit of the many, rather than benefit for the few
lies——all else is smoke and mirrors.

Who is it, John Best and Night-Gaunt, that a
paranoid schizophrenic is talking to when they say us, we, they,
you, and make reference to others in the first person?

It appears that you, John Best and Night-
Gaunt, have split personalities as well as one or more mice in
your pockets that you talk to on a regular basis, so that you can
avoid dealing with the reality of YOUR lives as Conservative
Right-Wing EXTREMIST Republicans lost in your delusional
world of American linguistics based upon ideologically defined
sophism and propaganda, so that you can avoid dealing with the
realities of the REAL WORLD of linguistics based upon logic.

I, however, am not a part of YOUR imaginary world and I doubt
seriously that the mice in your pockets would be either if they had
a choice.

Your therapist, however, is a part of YOUR WORLD and it is
his/her job to talk to you about your imaginary problems, so
———— Good luck with that is the best I can do for “you people.”

Is that dog thing YOU were talking about real or imaginary?
Which ever it was, John, if you are taking on the persona of a real
or imaginary dog, I believe they lick themselves after they do their
duty, never seen one pucker, you must be talking about where you
will be licking yourself after you do your duty.  This is my best
advice to you concerning your real or imaginary dog persona

Just trying to be helpful, John.

Pucker up and gimme a big kiss you psycho.

As the dirty dog that you are, John Best, I bow to your
Conservative Right-Wing EXTREMIST Republican expertise
at recognizing your own behavior on this Truthdig thread as looking
and smelling like a dog turd.  In this regard, I agree with your
assessment of your own behavior and of the value of that same
behavior.

Just don’t try to engage them. They are there to muck us up. To divert our attentions. It works too.

But as long as we are on the receiving end of a more powerful foe. It doesn’t matter if they have fewer numbers and want to destroy what’s left of our Republic because that is part of their ultimate plan.

Consider it like being a boat that has over time sprung many leaks (most made by them) and that is just for part of the boat. In the other part the rich and their slaves and minions are making sure we can go no where and they themselves are protected from sinking. They plan on offering us life rings that are also yokes around our necks. Most will gladly take it to live normally again. Even if they have no rights but do have a job and electricity and running water. That is what is being laid in front of us very soon. They want to make sure we are rats in the maze of their design and will have only two places to go. Their cage or into the water to drown. What choice do you think 99% of people will make?

Mart(a) calling the kettle black again.  Republican trick.  If it looks like a dog turd and smells like a dog turd…...

“Exactly Mart(a)!  Exactly right!  That’s exactly
what I said.  Good God you’re such a genius, I
bow before you.”—John Best, June 8 at 2:58
pm

And, bowing as an expression of Hitleresque dialectic and sophism
that advocates linguistics based upon ideological sophist definition
to enable American Style Propaganda and rejects linguistics based
upon logic means exactly what, John Best? ? ———
NOTHING!!!

I am neither wanting nor expecting you to do anything other than
what a Conservative Right-Wing EXTREMIST Republican
Hitleresque sophist practicing the use of American Style
Hitleresque sophism and dialectic does in the pursuit of their Boiler
Room duties.

My role is not to contend with you, but to make certain that you
are known for what you are.

It is solely up to YOU to reform YOUR ways,——or not.

I suspect that the pay is good and that there is no incentive,
therefore, to reform your ways, and, that in time you will fade
away and come back with a new persona doing the same old thing
in the same old way for the same old paycheck.

Exactly Mart(a)!  Exactly right!  That’s exactly what I said.  Good God you’re such a genius, I bow before you.

So, John Best, in your June 8 at 11:44 am post you favor
cultural suppression, education deprivation of anything other than
savant education for wage slavery, so that the American Populace
can be forced to use their bodies as their only capital asset,
without cultural capital, and be made to have to rely upon charity
when their bodies become broken, used up, and worn out, should
be overlooked, and the victims should be blamed for their own
cultural and actual oppression and tryanny by the Nobles and
Nearly Nobles of the American Aristocracy and the American Middle
Class———RIGHT?

This sounds to me to be a good Conservative Right-Wing
EXTREMIST Republican attitude, that I am certain would get
full cooperation from the Middle Class toadies to
the Right, and American Aristocrats like
Rupert Murdoch and the Koch Brothers.

“You cling-ons have been trying to get yourself credibility this way
ever since the Enlightenment.” —John Best, June 8 at 10:12
am

So, John Best——Now you are against the Enlightenment
in support of the Feudalism of the Dark Ages, RIGHT?

What was the “common good”that you perceive with
regard to the Dark Ages,——the Common Good of the Nobles and
the Nearly Nobles, perhaps,  to rape and pillage the Common
Population?

We were talking agri-business at one point…check this out:
http://www.truth-out.org/food-sovereignty-responds-corporate-takeover-food-production/1307457766

What the Hell happened to you, Anarcissie?   Did you have a
stroke or a psychotic episode just prior to your June 8 at 11:25 am post
——something that provided a moment of clarity before your mind
descends back down into the pit of Boiler Room servitude?

I know there has to be some explanation, other than ingenuous behavior,
because you are busy here on the Truthdig forum trying to cast an
antic disposition upon the actions and behavior of Adolph Hitler
and Nazi Germany during the World War II Era of Nazi Holocaust on the
“Electronic Brownshirts” thread.

Gary, you are right about this ‘welfare mom’ misdirection and I didn’t mean to go specifically at them, I intended to make the example of the mis-use of the term ‘welfare’.  The mis-direction or mis-emphasis on this sort of ‘give-away’ taints the overall notion of ‘social welfare’, or ‘public good’, or ‘common good’. 

That is not to say though that the “culture of the welfare” (in the welfare mom sense) is not a serious issue.  These folks are a part of the group that is anti-education, and they drag their offspring down into that culture.  It’s serious not because of the amount of money spent…...I concede completely we waste thousands of times more on spare engines for fighters, and various subsidies…..but it’s serious in that the ‘sense of ‘entitlement’ (in the perverted sense of the word entitlement) does not motivate these kids to do much with their lives.  It demotivates teachers, I can say with certainty. 

So, this group, the welfare mothers, and the deadbeat dads, and the fakers who are living on a disability check are a group to contend with.  They are the mirrors reflection of the “Corporate welfare” crowd. 

And Anarchissie, in my quote, what makes you think I am not referring to the blue collar and working poor?  That is who I meant dear.  The crowd you mention, the “....stockbrokers, lawyers, landlords, politicians, bureaucrats, advertising men, public relations men, ‘content providers’, columnists, radio personalities, celebrities,  trustifarians, judges, cops, prison guards, hangmen, and preachers…”  are not at all who I consider carrying the load, they are being carried and more often than not carry away (to piss away) far, far more than they contribute in my little algebra below.  Loss column all the way.  I’m arguing from some sort of center-ish position that is repulsed by both extremes.

John Best, June 8 at 9:25 am:

‘... Well Anarcissie, call it what you will, but by some mechanism, somebody does have to do the work of society….’

God, you’re so right.  What we need are more capitalists, stockbrokers, lawyers, landlords, politicians, bureaucrats, advertising men, public relations men, ‘content providers’, columnists, radio personalities, celebrities,  trustifarians, judges, cops, prison guards, hangmen, and preachers.  Someone’s got to do the work!  And we know they’re good because they have money.

But I’m here to tell you that the welfarados also work.  Without the misery, terror, boredom and stupidity of their lives, your Calvinist-capitalist society wouldn’t last for a minute.  As the Tao Te Ching says, ‘The low is the foundation of the high; the heavy is the foundation of the light.’  Without them, there would be no one for you-all Calvinists to be better than.  Your superiors couldn’t use your social status to manipulate you any more.  The whole social order would fall apart!

Oh, well, try reading The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas.  Maybe it’ll give you some ideas.

How many welfare mothers would it take to equal the the amount of money paid by taxpayers to any single mega-corporation in the energy, financial or military industrial class for one year?

I hear a lot about how welfare moms are destroying the nation, but a single megacorp gets a billion dollar tax break with 10 million dollar tax refund in a year. And there are literaly hundreds if not thousands of these meg-corps feeding at tax-payers expense.

I’m thinking all the welfare moms in the nation are a mere drop in the bucket when compared to the yearly “welfare” windfalls being extracted by American corporations through tax breaks, subsidies and tax refunds.

In fact, I’m starting to think that the whole notion of welfare moms is an emotional misdirection either created by the mega-corps, or at least promoted in their owned press by them.

It’d be real nice to see some numbers that could be verified easily.

In your soft (headed) pseudo-sciences, you can’t adequately validate premises, so no, your professional societies self-serving definition of logic is indeed bullshit. 

You cling-ons have been trying to get yourself credibility this way ever since the Enlightenment.  Now go away.

“This is physics, one of the only places where the math of ‘unity of
balance’ isn’t bullshit.”—John Best, June 8 at 9:25 am

You, John Best, have advocated linguistics based upon
the ideological definition of sophism, the American Standard of
Linguistics of the United States as a Nation; and NOW you say
that linguistics based upon logic is “bullshit,” YOUR words, not
mine.

If YOU perceive language based upon logic as “bullshit,” YOU have,
in saying so, said that everything you are advocating IS
“bullshit” that it is based upon sophism and the false dialectic of
propaganda, because what you have stated is a rejection of
a unity of equal balance that IS logic.

year1: work in(0) + gains(1) - losses(1) = work out(1)
year 2: work in(1) + gains(2) - losses(2) = work out(2)
year 3: work in(2) + gains(3) - losses(3) = work out(3)
year 4: work in(3) + gains(4) - losses(4) = work out(4)
.
.
.
and so on…......

Happy?

by the way Anarchissie, I think you are referring to the ‘protestant work ethos’?  I think it is somehow intertwined with Calvinism, but Calvinism seems more of a theological theory than the sort of practical applied work ethic that came out of the rest of the reformation.  Don’t know, I’m not up on it.  All I know is somebody does indeed have to do the work.

So, John Best,  how is your advocation of the
“common good” in yourJune 8 at 3:48 am post served by
the use of linguistics based upon the sophism of ideological
definition, to the exclusion of linguistics based upon logic, as
indicated on this thread?

It seems to me that if the “common good” is going to be
served, it would have to be in a logical “BALANCED”
manner, so that ALL could determine that the “common
good” was being served by a uniformly balanced
STANDARD; you claim otherwise, so I ask that YOU explain,
without the use of linguistics based upon the sophism of
ideological definition, how it is that YOU advocate serving the
“common good” in the absense of a unity of equal
balance that is “Common Logic.”

Well Anarcissie, call it what you will, but by some mechanism, somebody does have to do the work of society, and if capitol is used for productive ventures, it ends up allowing us to carry the high and mighty, while breaking and debilitating a lot fewer backs.  Freeloading, cleverly disguised at every level, will be transferred to peoples backs as energy becomes more expensive to extract.  This is physics, one of the only places where the math of ‘unity of balance’ isn’t bullshit.

Inquiring minds really do want, and have a need to know from
someone, any responsible party, how it is that posters on this blog
can make a claim to any kind of authority to make posts on this
Truthdig forum, when, at the same time, they claim to be equivalent
to the intellectual capacity of a gate post, with regard to
understanding of linguistics based upon sophist definition, as
opposed to linguistics based upon logic???

Throwing away logic and then claiming to know something seems to
me to be antithetic.

Who knew there was a nest of Calvinists here?

The term “Government Charity” could also be applied to private interests receiving those various earmarks and tax breaks which do not benefit the ‘general welfare’, and I use the term ‘welfare’ knowing it may be ambiguous, especially considering the previous discussion, so, perhaps the term ‘common good’ might do here. 

This interest, ‘the common good’, that which benefits everyone in general, and no-one in particular is no longer adequately represented.  There is no particular visible constituency, or lobbying group.  Yet, it is this ‘common good’ from which all taxes are drained, and returned to private interests, both individual and corporate, both recipients of ‘welfare’ or ‘handouts’ veiled as tax breaks, inadequate taxes for certain classes, and with ‘public assistance’, or classic ‘Welfare’  going to the lowest rung. 

The example of ‘welfare mothers’ should indeed be balanced by examples of those corporate handouts, tobacco subsidies are a good example, where not only is the sense of ‘entitlement’ involved, but the word is then perverted and applied to those programs which are funded by and for the general welfare or common good, namely social security, medicare, education.  However, let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater…....government can indeed fund public works and even private project which have enormous public benefit if proper accounting and controls assure monies are not siphoned off for illegitimate purposes, (typically ending up buying yard signs to advertise the reelection of politicians)

If you, John Best, are against the Aristocracy, you don’t
support the class in the middle, the Middle Class, and you don’t
recognize the American Populace, the 70% Majority Common
Population of the United States as the Left,——Who the Hell are you
talking about that is YOUR constituent group? ——Oh yes, it’s the
Right-Wing Conservative EXTREMIST Republican Cockroaches
that hide in cabinets and walls when the lights come on——RIGHT?

“We use a term ‘public assistance’, which is given to support single
mothers who’ve never paid in a dime, and repeatedly became
pregnant specifically to live off the system.  I hate the softened
term ‘public assistance’.  It should be ‘government charity’. ” —
John Best, June 7 at 4:07 am

How does your declaration apply to the Economic Cycle and the
Recapitalization of Private Capital at Taxpayer Expense without
benefit to the Taxpayer??

Should the term “Government Charity” also be applied to
Privatized Capitalism, with regard to the Cyclical Recapitalization of
Private Capital at Taxpayer Expense without benefit to the
Taxpayers?? —— Or, should this term only be applied to welfare
mothers trying to raise their children?

I agree Cliff, troubleshooting algorithms are one thing, implementing corrective action is another.  There are exponential s of development and learning here.  Machines may be developed to do this on a pure software sort of system, they may learn to ‘swap things out till it works’, but for serious manufacturing, the ratio of machines to humans who service them can only go so far.  There will just never be enough really smart people to make that ratio (machines per man) too high. 

This is not to say it can’t be high enough to throw huge swaths of the population off the ladder…..that’s already happened, but there will always be a place for a technical person to be absorbed into the larger machine of the merchant class.

As a Hitleresque sophist that supports the use of Hitleresque
dialectic, I suspect that there will always be a job opening for you
and John, even in the coming Rentier Economy.

Those are mighty enlightened words to come from
someone who claims to be dumber than a door
knob, Cliff Carson, with regard to the
understanding of linguistics based upon sophism,
as opposed to linguistics based upon logic——What
do we have going on here, SELECTIVE and
CONVENIENT UNDERSTANDING?—or what?

Here’s a link about Social Security Insurance:

http://www.accumulatingmoney.com/social-security-
insurance/

Robotic machines are quite prevalent today.  But no robot to my knowledge can “think”.

We have Smart Cameras, PLC’s, Smart eye Sensors, Computer Driven conveyors reacting to Barcodes, all matter of machines doing work for example years ago many complex assemblies began to be assembled without ever being touched by humans (Automobile Generators for one).

These type devices follow their program, and there is great flexibility when they are organized into a working automatic assembly line, but remove the human input and it is dumb as a rock.

But the fact is - not one machine can write its own initial program.  And no robot machine can properly function without such.

I believe John Best said he was an Engineer and possibly into automation - so John you might agree with this.  I see lots of automated stuff and it can seem amazing when everything is running smooth.  Some of those machines can shut everything down when all is not working “As PROGRAMED”.  I don’t believe I can live long enough to see a machine with imagination.  For this it would have to posses life.  And highly intelligent life at that.

I work with this stuff quite a bit, and there are exponential magnifications of Murpheys law that increase as you step away from the most basic of fabrication.  In other words, machines to fix a production line, possibly, and at 100 times the overhead cost of the production machines it is to fix.  But to fix those machines, twice removed from production, the fixers of the fixers….fugettaboutit. 

You’ve hit one nail very squarely on the head regarding the “merchant class” their incessant greed and indirect goal to subjugate all productive classes.  Their priority and limit of their interest is the profit margin, so, buy cheap sell high drives everything else if these people are in control, which they are.  Of course buying money cheap and selling it high is a particularly low overhead operation, especially if you can make the money out of thin air.  This is what enslaves people, the usury on the very stuff people make themselves.  End the FED….a good first step. 

And you are right, the merchant class will always seduce enough productive people to shore up their rule.  I’ve often thought of the early blacksmiths and machinists who had to make torture equipment in the middle ages.  Now, the ratio of ‘blacksmiths’ to slaves is vastly reduced…. http://www.positiveidcorp.com/index.html

John Best “I don’t think there will ever be enough smart humans to develop any significant amount of machinery that repairs machinery.”

While I’ve never actually looked into it, as its not in my area of interest, I suspect that a diligent search would indeed show that it is already in the works and is already showing some success.

I don’t think it will be extremely visible as an area of research as it pretty much states loudly that the end of human labor is near, but I think that it will be findable simply in order to attract others of like mind to aid in the research.

Since the successful results would be extraordinarily lucrative for those who were leaders in the field, I would assume that a great number of people would be more than willing to get in on the bottom floor so to speak, even if it does mean an end to labor as we know it.

Moreover, as it has been a long-held dream of the wealthy merchant-class; forever, a cost free slave species, even if entirely mechanical, is something that would attract enourmous support from the very people who can offer the smartest among us, a real chance to grab the golden ring.

In my experience, people are willing to do absolutely anything, regardless of consequences, as long as they can harvest the necessities of the good life from the action.

They can always fall back on the standard memes of “Its my job.” and “Its just business, nothing personal.” to alleviate any sense of guilt, or remorse.

I think you under-estimate both human ingenuity and human greed.

The sheep and the goats, eh?  Divide and rule.

Cliff….I agree completely…..Social Security and Medicare are completely self supporting programs.  We pay in, and are entitled to the benefits when we retire or need medical care.  They are socialized insurance policies and retirement funds, backed by the government. 

I take issue with those who do smear the word ‘entitlement’, and confuse it with ‘handout’, or ‘charity’, and I’ve written below ( June 6 at 1:22 pm) that I think the term ‘welfare’ has become fuzzy enough that it should be dropped. 

We use a term ‘public assistance’, which is given to support single mothers who’ve never paid in a dime, and repeatedly became pregnant specifically to live off the system.  I hate the softened term ‘public assistance’.  It should be ‘government charity’. 

It is that blurring of words which allows one group, a working group, to be sneered at as if they were freeloaders, and I agree with you this is BS and must end.  We must simply take control of the vocabulary.

Gary: I don’t think there will ever be enough smart humans to develop any significant amount of machinery that repairs machinery.  In software, yes, but serious manufacturing machinery?  I can’t see it.  Been wrong before though.

John Best: “Gary: Agreed except for one point: many of those those machines do require expensive maintenance, but it’s well worth it.

Simply a matter of time before machinery is developed that maintains machinery.

The huge savings in replacing the workforce with automated minions will increase many fold the amount of research money available for just this sort of development in mechanical technology.

Once full automation becomes commonplace, it won’t be long before self-repairing and self-maintenancing machinery becomes the norm, since its nearly the same as having a disposable, self-replicating, slave work-force, which has always been the true dream of fascist tycoons everywhere throughout time.

The only exception - which will put off many fascists until they see the bottom line profits - being that they can’t rape and torture the machinery.

A completely autonomous mechanical workforce is actually a better deal for fascists, as they don’t have to find uses for, or ways of disposing of the dead slaves, or of housing and feeding them till their old enough to work.

The time of the work ethic is, in my opinion, almost over and thus the concept of a man’s value being equal to his level of productivity is also at an end.

Considering that the whole work ethic was designed to insure that the slaves would continue to create vast wealth for the few families who owned the land, I feel it may indeed be a good thing to see it go.

I have no idea however what might replace it.

Cliff Carson, June 6 at 8:09 pm:

‘... I have to take issue with anyone who says Social Security or Medicare is Welfare.  And those words are freely used to denigrate those who draw such. ...’

But it’s the unjust deprecation of Welfare and those who receive it that enables them to do that.

Well John

I have to take issue with anyone who says Social Security or Medicare is Welfare.  And those words are freely used to denigrate those who draw such.

When there is a program that deducts money from the wage earners paycheck for the explicit purpose of funding the specific program, any payments to these payee’s are definitely “entitlements”.  It is something owed to those who payed.

It is kind of like an Insurance Policy.  Insurance Companies are not Philanthropists, they are in it for the profit.  Apparently so was the United States Government since Social Security and Medicare recipients have paid in Trillions of dollars that the trustees of those funds have embezzled.

So to get out of having to repay the stolen trillions, Republicans have led the charge to identify those programs as Welfare.  Barnyard manure.  Those people should be safely tucked away in prison, not the hero of some bloggers on here.

John Best, June 6 at 6:13 pm,

Blather.

Bingo!  If my Marth(a) shitstorm hypothesis is correct, there is something significant in the posts Gary and Anarchisse left immediately below. 

Being the ‘right wing boiler room operator’ she accuses others of, when she sees something of significance, she has to spew a babble-load of nonsense to try and push it down through the list. 

Mart(a), what if we’re having parallel conversations elsewhere?

To ALL Hard-Right and Lite-Right Boiler Room Workers on Truthdig
forum, inclusive of John Best, Gary Mont, Cliff Carson, Anarcissie,
Ardee, OzarkMichael, Night-Gaunt, Leefeller and all other paid
sophists and propagandists on Truthdig forum:

What we have here on this Truthdig thread, “This Is What
Resistance Looks Like” is a Right-Wing Boiler Room Operation.

This Right-Wing Boiler Room Operation is reminiscent of
the old days on the “Liberal Forum,” and numerous other forums
such as the “Ankle Biting Pundits” where the same sort of activity
and methods of dialogue have been used to spread
Conservative Right-Wing REPUBLICAN Sophism and
Propaganda.

The way these Right-Wing Boiler Room Operations work is that
the Boiler Room Operatives express EXTREME
Right-Wing confidence without merit and NEVER back away
from defending their “confidence without merit” positions until one
day the whole Boiler Room Operation closes down and the
forum ceases to exist.

In this particular Right-Wing Boiler Room Operation
instance, I suspect only that threads on the Truthdig.com forum
have been infested, and that hopefully Truthdig, as a forum is not
involved.

The process of closing down a Right-Wing Boiler Room
Operation can take as little as a few months, or as long as a
few years.  I give credit to the Truthdig forum as a Left-Wing forum
and suspect that in this instance that the only option for the
Right-Wing Boiler Room Operatives will be to, like
OzarkMichael, threaten to run away when confidence
without merit proves ineffective.

This Truthdig forum Right-Wing Boiler Room Operation, as
Right-Wing Boiler Room operations go, does not seem to me to be
up to the standards of past Right-Wing Boiler Room
Operations, that I have experienced dialoging with, and I would
expect, therefore, that longevity will be on the short end of the
scale, rather than the long. 

Time will tell.  It is the start of the 2012 Election Cycle, and we,
the Left, should expect that Conservative Right-Wing
Republican EXTREMIST roaches will come out from their nests
and infest the House and everything with it, if they can.  It is
common for roaches to run when the lights come on.

If you are a part of the Left, shine the light of the
Left on the Right-Wing Roaches, and you too can
watch the Conservative Right-Wing Republican EXTREMIST
Roaches run.

It sounds to me like you, Night-Gaunt June 5 at 6:56 pm,
have a lot of personal experience in personality disorders,
and that YOUR personal experience came from YOUR
therapist; sorry about YOUR problem, but
displacement of YOUR problem off onto others does not
work.

Be a mench.  Face up to YOUR personality disorder and deal
with it, rather than to try to put YOUR personality disorder
off onto me.

Gary: Agreed except for one point: many of those those machines do require expensive maintenance, but it’s well worth it. 

Anarchisse: You point out one of the uses of the term, ‘social welfare’, but it might also mean the ‘well-being of the social fabric’.  This means not having to do with the ‘payoff’ of the destitute classes, but rather having to do with the numbers in that class and the numbers in the class above it.  The true ‘working class’ is indispensable, all real wealth is created by it.  By having a certain quality (productivity) in the working class, you produce a robust wealth making society, hence, you have strength in the social fabric, and the efforts to have that healthy, adequately trained, eager to work class means the wealthier classes can enjoy a better life.  So, in that sense of the term, ‘social welfare’ is good for all, high to low. 

This dovetails nicely with what Gary posted, because at present, this entire ‘working class’ just found itself obsolete, so they drift to the lowest rungs, the destitute poor and the working poor.  There is enough productivity in our new automated age to provide for the wealthy and the ‘technical working class’, people more highly trained than the working class of the previous generation, but, there is not so much wealth as to throw the sort of payoff (the other meaning of ‘social welfare’ to the newly expanded ranks of the poor. 

This is why the numbers are such that ‘Social programs’, the ‘entitlement’ sort, medicare, social security, etc, the ‘pay-as-you-go’ sorts of social contract entitlements, are in danger. 

The language, the meaning of words, must be continuously preserved.  There may or may not be am effort to ‘kill off the bottom rung’, and indeed there may be a “conspirator-less conspiracy” to do this, and use of language will be a tool, perhaps the key tool to get people to willingly agree to a governance which effectively kills them off.  Frankly, I’m not so sure that might not be best, but unfortunately, the ‘new promise’ to the ranks of productive people above the ‘bottom rung’, is not so clear or agreeable. Will today’s low-level techies be tomorrows ‘suppliers of drugs, prostitutes, and fashion ideas’?

Something else nobody seems to be including in their views of tomorrow, is the work ethic itself.

One of the primary reasons the wealthy are trying to kill off as much of the bottom rung of humanity as possible, is simply because they’re no longer needed for anything and thus pose an idle hands threat to the elite and are no longer considered as the necessary surplus of cheap labor and soldier fodder.

Automation has been improving steadily since the sixties and is easily the real choice of business owners everywhere in areas such as farming, factory and manufacturing, etc..

No need to pay, house or feed the beasts, they can work 24/7 at almost any task without need for safety rules or coffee breaks and beyond the one time pay-out, they’re pretty much maintenance free.

The work ethos is going to have to undergo a huge alteration simply because the future holds little hope for most low level, low paying jobs to remain in human hands.

Till now, the work ethos has been the gospel of civilization, as seen in this discussion’s beginnings about whether or not a person’s productivity should be the mneasure of his or her value to society.

This will be moot when 90% of all simple labor, manufacturing, faming and military operations are handled by machines.

I didn’t know the term ‘(social) welfare’ was so controversial.  Terms like ‘social justice’ and ‘social democracy’ are often used more or less synonymously, but I don’t like them because (for example) unemployment insurance has little to do with either issues of justice or of political control of the government.  The ruling class, observing that raw, naked capitalism can be pretty rough on the working class, created various means of mitigating it through government programs, mostly payouts the workers have to beg an authoritarian bureaucracy for.  Clearly, their purpose was to raise the welfare, the well-being, of the workers to the point where they would be less likely to rebel, turn to crime, or die.  When the ruling class had to fend off fascists and Communists, this social welfare was thought to be a good thing, but now that there are no big monsters on the horizon they’re getting rid of it, aren’t they?

I don’t see a great difference between payments to working-class people and payments to the destitute, although the connection of the workers to the payments is more visible.  The destitute also contribute to our economy, as a sort of reserve pool of casual labor and consumption, and, through the awfulness of their lives, as a collective boogie-man to keep the workers obediently working.  Plus they also supply us with drugs, prostitutes, and fashion ideas.  And as punching bags for the cops.  Let’s give them some credit along with their pittances.

@Anarchissi and Cliff…... What about just dropping the term ‘welfare’ altogether.  Completely.  Use either ‘entitilement’, for Social Security & Medicare & education subsidies & limited unemployment comp.  And use a word like ‘charity’ perhaps for medicaide, support of the hopelessly poor and destitute, support of the truly helpless, and other cases where the receiver has no chance of making a significant contribution at any point in their life.  It’s not a perfect solution to that loaded word ‘welfare’, there are still gray areas. 

Gary, in your post of June 5 at 10:32 am, you missed the important word…..‘preceding’.  It’s my hypothesis the post which precedes marth(a)‘s, is the one to look at.  The ‘triggering event’. 

Agreed, Martha’s a waste as Ardee says.  AS soon as I see a Marth(a) post, I skip over it to the preceeing post to see what triggered Mart(a), and there are often a few very good ‘nuggets’ as I call them. 

Thanks for the comments on water.  Will look deeper.

Alan, you are really on the ball in so many ways, but
there are a couple things I’d like you to consider:

When Donna Fritz (and Hedges) single out Goldman
Sachs as a worthy and useful target of protest, and
point out the futility of protesting “empire”,
they’re right. You take out the banks/corps, and you
win. “Hedges, Parenti, Negri, Chomsky, Bacevich,
Zinn, Chalmers Johnson, Taibbi” DO NOT disagree. The
banks are not symptoms. Not even a wee little bit,
not even in any far-stretched sense.

Second, in your gusty diatribe that starts “What?”
you make the other big, fundamental error that will
render useless all of your otherwise very well-
educated and thoughtful ideas. If you fail to get the
following through your head, you will be utterly
doomed: There is no benefit, and every danger, if we
“get together under one banner”. It’s suicide. If we
create the single suitcase, someone will co-opt the
handle and it’s over. Instead, we want maximum
diversity of opposition. If you can get a few million
people to go to a protest and they are all, say,
Moonies, Tea Partiers, Democrats, or for that matter,
Podiatrists, the even is worse than useless. Playing
the role of the “Rich Elite Empire Leader-type” I
would take you apart in mere weeks. There is no case
in which a unified, popular movement under a single
umbrella has failed to be co-opted at the top (or
simple disbanded by assassinating the leader or the
leader’s character).

So, while you are spot on in so many ways, you have
so sophisticatedly recognized the need to do
something, and even what to do, your way of doing it
will simply empower the empire. Say, you create a
huge group and 60% of Americans join it. Then game
over. Then we just lost, and we just lost BIG.

I would like to see “4th dimensional thought” described since it would be a boon to human kind if we could. But then time is considered the “4th dimension” and we do think that way as a factor…

Funny that I have been accused of being a Conservative or anything like it since I have never evinced or supported such ideas in my writings here or anywhere else. The acts of someone deluded and probably suffering from one or more psychological maladies would do so as a means of attacking anyone who disagrees in their world view or even their particular nomenclature. Someone in need of psychiatric help in my opinion. (Sounds much like Schizo typal personality disorder to me.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJRQGxvTeT8
—-
http://my.clevelandclinic.org/disorders/personality_disorders/hic_schizoid_personality_disorder.aspx

People with personality disorders have long-standing patterns of thinking and acting that differ from what society considers usual or normal. The inflexibility of their personality can cause great distress, and can interfere with many areas of life, including social and work functioning. People with personality disorders generally also have poor coping skills and difficulty forming healthy relationships.

Unlike people with anxiety disorders, who know they have a problem but are unable to control it, people with personality disorders generally are not aware that they have a problem and do not believe they have anything to control. Because they do not believe they have a disorder, people with personality disorders often do not seek treatment.

Cliff Carson, June 5 at 4:38 pm:
’... Could you in as simple words as you can command state whether you believe Social Security and Medicare to be Social Contracts or welfare?’

Probably not without carrying on about frameworks, definitions, points of view, interests, interpretations, etc.  They’re complicated ideas and mean different things to different people.  Plus, the idea of the social contract is itself rather controversial—as I pointed out, at least in the framework of Western liberalism, valid contracts can only be made between informed, consenting, competent parties, but the ‘social contract’ is imposed on everyone at birth by force.  ‘Contract’ is a metaphor at best and a pretty vague one, too.

But, anyway, what would be the point of determining whether Medicare and Social Security were ‘welfare’ or not?  This is not a rhetorical question—I’m interested in the purpose of the analysis.

Gary Mont, June 5 at 4:39 pm,

Propagandistic Structural Blather.

ardee: “...she only stated that I was making a rather wise choice.”

Actually, I’m beginning to think that disruption is its only goal and possibly, its primary entertainment.

Very much like a vandal who desicrates things they fear, in order to make them seem less threatening and prevent them from being viewed by others.

By posting this latest blather about China, it has definitely shown that it really has no idea of the consequences of its Magic Formulae, since there is certainly no Majority Common Population participation in China’s repressive statist regime, yet it holds up China as if it was the perfect glowing example of the proof of its x=x unity of balance dialectic claim.

I suppose, since its goal seems mainly to interfere with all other discussions, that the best policy would indeed be to not even read the posts at all.

So be it.

Anarcissie

I am not really sure how you intend to come across.  If you say you were writing about Social Contracts from the Liberal Frame, I think I have to disagree with you.  I’m not sure whether you really meant what you wrote or possibly that you were trying to cast sarcasm on Liberal thought concerning Welfare.

And you did say that Welfare had two meanings to you depending on the context of your writing.

I took issue when you mentioned Social Security and Medicare leaving an inference that they were a form of Welfare.  Again I have to disagree with you about that.

But possibly I have mis-understood your beliefs.

Could you in as simple words as you can command state whether you believe Social Security and Medicare to be Social Contracts or welfare?

John Best, Gary Mont, Cliff Carson, Ardee, Anarcissie,
OzarkMichael, NightGaunt, Leefeller and all others of like minds
in/out of the Conservative Koch/Murdoch Boiler Room:

The foundation of American Linguistics in the United States is that
of singularly defined structuralism, together with negatively
balanced dialectic used to accuse, condemn, denounce, and
destroy political opposition and positively balanced dialectic to
glorify a false sense of advantage as a benefit of American
ideology; this is the formula used by Adolph Hitler, and this is
the formula being used by the Conservative Right-Wing Republican
EXTREMISTS and their Democratic Middle Class allies throughout
the United States, just as the same linguistic foundation was
used throughout Nazi Germany.

Henry Kissinger, to his credit, has taken a step at getting past the
use of this type of framing of linguistics and stated the reason why
it is necessary, that it will lead to WAR with China, because China
will NEVER accept the American Linguistic Frame of Singularly
Defined Structuralism, and America will NEVER give up the
Linguistic Frame of Singularly Defined Structuralism, because the
American Linguistic Frame of Singularly Defined Structuralism has
been effective for 235 years of power and control over the Native
Peoples, slaves, and the American Populace; America’s existing
order that politically control the United States see no reason to
change something that has worked so effectively for them in both
domestic and foreign affairs for 235 years, and the United States
will NEVER willingly acknowledge the use of America’s Linguistic
Frame of Singularly Defined Structuralism as an integral part of
America’s base of power and control that was used to establish
National control of privatized capital, privatized capitalism,
privatized commerce, privatized WAR, and privatized
governance of a Hitleresque nature that acts under a cover of
a false sense of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness with
freedom and justice for all as a trope; with the United States
presently having more people imprisoned by laws that DO NOT
represent life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness with freedom
and justice for all than CHINA, a nation with a population of ONE
BILLION (1,000,000,000) more people than the United States.

It is time for the American Populace, the 70% Majority Common
Population of the United States to ask the question——Life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness with freedom and justice for
all of WHO? ——because all we, the American Populace, are
getting is wage slavery, criminalization by legislated law and
order, that we are made subject to by legislation without
American Populace Representation, and tyranny and
oppression by commercial interests and government power and
control that does not serve the best interests of the American
Populace.

Gary Mont, June 5 at 10:32 am,

More examples of singularly defined structuralism from one who
obviously has three dimensional thought and does not have the
intellectual capability of achieving the perspective of four dimensional
thought.