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Sounds reasonable to me, but the far Left want a lot more than what many would view as reasonable.
That's one of the (many) problems with the Left in this country.
They don't want to be held back by the restraints carefully built into the Constitution, which is a fundamentally conservative document. So they simply ignore it when they can get away with it, and/or stack the courts with "judges" who do the same.
Once they start ignoring the restraints of the Constitution, they have no restraints whatsoever. Nothing but today's opinion that such-and-such may be going a little too far - an opinion which is likely to change by tomorrow.
To be very frank, the Pilgrims were corporate financed (by a stock company).
So the "socialist" group of them is no different than a department at any corporation. Don't they have common bathrooms, a water cooler, HVAC, a roof, etc, at other "stock companies".
They were ignorant and unprepared. They were immoral for stealing the Indians corn that first year.
Many missions (thousands) such as this were the fate of mankind through the ages. Only through the "luck" of some friendly Indians did any survive at all - and, of course, the white people turned on the Indians and killed or drove out many of them as soon as they could (King Phillips War).
But the Pilgrims are not America and have nothing to do with our present politics. They were Fundies. It was only later when American became enlightened under EDUCATED men such as Madison, Hamilton, Franklin and Jefferson that they decided they wanted freedom FROM religion and freedom from "corporations and stock companies". They wanted instead to set up their own system which borrowed the best from history.
They largely succeeded and if it wouldn't have been for the "slave thing", I think this country would be a truly amazing place and just be hitting it's stride. But we are spending hundreds of years arguing about whether or not the buying and selling of human beings was righteous (this includes whether we deserve title to their work....and whether they deserve equal rights, etc.)- and, so, that is the USA of today.
The rest of the world looks on and shakes their head. Just at a time when much of the world is coming together (China, TPP, etc.), the USA has decided to go it alone......a strategy that doesn't work and has never worked.
This is what Authoritarianism is. A percentage of the people decide they have had enough and ANYONE - no matter how useless, clueless, immoral, unethical or untruthful walks on water....and will be their savior.
I'll give to a hard working and honest person when they fall on hard times but the drunks, the weasels and the lazy will get nothing from me.
It's one of the reasons I like Russians so much. They have little in the way of welfare from the government/state aside from medical and education stuff like that. If you want to improve yourself and your life you need to work. They help one another out. A family who is on hard times will be helped by the COMMUNITY but there is an expectation of that being returned if needed and an expectation that the state the family is in will not be permanent.
I think all systems have aspects of socialism and I think the way Russian people do it is not too bad.
I'll give to a hard working and honest person when they fall on hard times but the drunks, the weasels and the lazy will get nothing from me.
It's one of the reasons I like Russians so much. They have little in the way of welfare from the government/state aside from medical and education stuff like that.
To be very frank, the Pilgrims were corporate financed (by a stock company).
So the "socialist" group of them is no different than a department at any corporation. Don't they have common bathrooms, a water cooler, HVAC, a roof, etc, at other "stock companies".
They were ignorant and unprepared. They were immoral for stealing the Indians corn that first year.
Many missions (thousands) such as this were the fate of mankind through the ages. Only through the "luck" of some friendly Indians did any survive at all - and, of course, the white people turned on the Indians and killed or drove out many of them as soon as they could (King Phillips War).
But the Pilgrims are not America and have nothing to do with our present politics. They were Fundies. It was only later when American became enlightened under EDUCATED men such as Madison, Hamilton, Franklin and Jefferson that they decided they wanted freedom FROM religion and freedom from "corporations and stock companies". They wanted instead to set up their own system which borrowed the best from history.
They largely succeeded and if it wouldn't have been for the "slave thing", I think this country would be a truly amazing place and just be hitting it's stride. But we are spending hundreds of years arguing about whether or not the buying and selling of human beings was righteous (this includes whether we deserve title to their work....and whether they deserve equal rights, etc.)- and, so, that is the USA of today.
The rest of the world looks on and shakes their head. Just at a time when much of the world is coming together (China, TPP, etc.), the USA has decided to go it alone......a strategy that doesn't work and has never worked.
This is what Authoritarianism is. A percentage of the people decide they have had enough and ANYONE - no matter how useless, clueless, immoral, unethical or untruthful walks on water....and will be their savior.
Sorta has an old testament feel to it.
Well said. There's more to it than the ops article.
Therein lies the rub. I think any civilized country/state should provide some basics for its people such as education and healthcare. Seems America is too busy policing the world and fighting for corporate interests throughout the world to get it's chit together.
The Pilgrim socialism story is just that, a story. In other words it's a very loose and reckless interpretation of what really happened in order to frame a narrative that fits with the Mises Austrian economic theory.
The truth of what really happened has been pointed out several times by several posters but stubbornly defend the Mises fairytale. Here's a few excerpts from a NY Times article:
"As for Jamestown, there was famine. But historians dispute the characterization of the colony as a collectivist society. “To call it socialism is wildly inaccurate,” said Karen Ordahl Kupperman, a historian at New York University and the author of “The Jamestown Project.” “It was a contracted company, and everybody worked for the company. I mean, is Halliburton a socialist scheme?” The widespread deaths resulted mostly from malaria. Tree ring studies suggest that the settlement was also plagued by drought.
But the biggest problem, Professor Kupperman said, was the lack of planning. The Virginia settlers came to the New World thinking that they could find gold or a route to the Pacific Ocean via the Chesapeake Bay, and make a quick buck by setting up a trading station like others were establishing in the East Indies.
Professor Kupperman, for instance, said the Jamestown story reminded her mostly of the Iraq war. “It was kind of like the idea that the Iraqis would greet us with flowers,” she said."
Therein lies the rub. I think any civilized country/state should provide some basics for its people such as education and healthcare. Seems America is too busy policing the world and fighting for corporate interests throughout the world to get it's chit together.
It's one of the reasons I like Russians so much. They have little in the way of welfare from the government/state aside from medical and education stuff like that. If you want to improve yourself and your life you need to work. They help one another out. A family who is on hard times will be helped by the COMMUNITY but there is an expectation of that being returned if needed and an expectation that the state the family is in will not be permanent. I think all systems have aspects of socialism and I think the way Russian people do it is not too bad.
I don't think your claims about social benefits in Russia is correct. This is from 2014 but it seems like they have quite a wide safety net for their citizens, including universal health care (it's supposed to be free but the gov't keeps cutting $ from it to give to the oligarchs so now citizens are required to purchase private health insurance), paid maternity leave, paid sick leave and a government run pension program:
As fervently as I believe that personal and economic freedoms are inseparable, and as much as I tire of the Lefties' constant whining, stereotyping, and love of power, I can't side with the OP in this particular case; here's why:
English speaking settlements had been established further south for a decade at the time of the Plymouth settlement and while it's seldom mentioned, summer-seasonal fishing camps. salting and shipping large cargoes of cod back to England, had been in operation further up the Atlantic Coast for a couple of years. So the colonists weren't in complete ignorance of what they faced.
Furthermore, feudalism, rather than individualism and the pursuit of autonomy and self-reliance, were still the rule in all of Europe -- less so, of course, on the Iberian Peninsula due to the discovery of precious metals easily brought back. The first stirrings of what would come to be called the Enlightenment were still fifty years in the future. Too many of the early settlers were convinced they could either live off the land or prospect for gold, trap for furs, etc. -- and that a supposedly-benevolent aristocracy would rescue them should the need arise; hope, (and false optimism) springs eternal. As it turned out, they were wrong, and paid a heavy price.
And finally, all but the most fervent libertarians recognize a need for strong, and consistent actions when the stakes are high and the chips are down. The governing boards of most private enterprises usually call for a unanimous endorsement of a difficult decision once the issue is settled, and a dissident who refuses can usually say good-bye to his/her future if he/she persists, and is proven wrong. The stakes were as high as they could go in this case.
Last edited by 2nd trick op; 11-24-2017 at 09:40 PM..
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