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"Since commerce and manufacture attain their most complete development in these great towns, their influence upon the proletariat is also most clearly observable here. Here the centralization of property has reached the highest point; here the morals and customs of the good old times are most completely obliterated; here it has gone so far that the name Merry Old England conveys no meaning, for Old England itself is unknown to memory and to the tales of our grandfathers. Hence, too, there exist here only a rich and a poor class, for the lower middle-class vanishes more completely with every passing day." - Friedrich Engels
How does that make you feel?
Also this from George Orwell's, "England your England".
"In England patriotism takes different forms in different classes, but it runs like a connecting thread through nearly all of them. Only the Europeanized intelligentsia are really immune to it. As a positive emotion it is stronger in the middle class than in the upper class – the cheap public schools, for instance, are more given to patriotic demonstrations than the expensive ones – but the number of definitely treacherous rich men, the Laval-Quisling type, is probably very small. In the working class patriotism is profound, but it is unconscious. The working man's heart does not leap when he sees a Union Jack. But the famous ‘insularity’ and ‘xenophobia’ of the English is far stronger in the working class than in the bourgeoisie. In all countries the poor are more national than the rich, but the English working class are outstanding in their abhorrence of foreign habits. Even when they are obliged to live abroad for years they refuse either to accustom themselves to foreign food or to learn foreign languages. Nearly every Englishman of working-class origin considers it effeminate to pronounce a foreign word correctly. During the war of 1914-18 the English working class were in contact with foreigners to an extent that is rarely possible. The sole result was that they brought back a hatred of all Europeans, except the Germans, whose courage they admired. In four years on French soil they did not even acquire a liking for wine. The insularity of the English, their refusal to take foreigners seriously, is a folly that has to be paid for very heavily from time to time. But it plays its part in the English mystique, and the intellectuals who have tried to break it down have generally done more harm than good. At bottom it is the same quality in the English character that repels the tourist and keeps out the invader." - George Orwell
And this one?
Yes they are two quotes from Engels and Orwell, one in which Engels is critical of industrialisation and the changes to society it caused, whilst the other ius merely Orwell highlighting the lack of education in relation to the working classes in England at the time. However this wasn't confined to England, indeed industrialisation spread across the globe and education generally was very poor in relation to the working classes in most countries at the time.
Your point being other than posting pointless quotesm generally being obnoxious and having such a poor grasp of history you actually thought Chrchiull declared war on Germany.
Your point being other than posting pointless quotes and generally being obnoxious and having such a poor grasp of history you actually thought Chrchiull declared war on Germany.
Please, for the love of god, show me the thread where I said Churchill declared War on Germany, because I have never said that.
Now please, good sir, will you answer my question. How do those quotes make you feel?
Especially this part... "Here it has gone so far that the name Merry Old England conveys no meaning, for Old England itself is unknown to memory and to the tales of our grandfathers."
WW 2 was a checkers game.......our goal was to destroy Germany and Japan until their unconditional surrender. But the A-bomb changed the rules and the Cold War was a chess game. We fought that war with 1 hand tied behind our backs to avoid a global nuclear war. That's the reason North Vietnam and North Korea are not parking lots today.
The Communists were testing us in many places and if We didn't fight in Vietnam or Korea or show them we were willing to use force then where and when? When and where you draw the line and fight against communist aggression during the Cold War?
Sure, we lost 50,000 lives in NAM but how many other wars it avoided by showing our enemies that we were willing to fight you anywhere and anytime and for each life we lose they would lose 3 times that..........this is what chess tactics is all about and the Soviets and Chinese were playing it like we were and at the end We won by avoiding a nuclear global war.
Quote:
Originally Posted by banjomike
The United States was close to bankrupt by the last of 1945.
It was do or die.
The civilian population was closer to exhaustion than our military was and could not keep up supporting the war much longer, no matter how hard they all tried.
Back in the day I subscribed to this view. However I no longer do. We could and should have turned the USSR into a parking lot for proceeding with a nuclear program, or otherwise snuffed it out. This is what Israel did very successfully with Iraq in 1981 and will eventually do with Iran. As a result of FDR's and Eleanor's very equivocal anti-Communism their nuclear development became our nightmare. If we were broke the USSR was even more broke. The USSR could have been given a choice; keep stirring the pot and starve or be beaten, or accept what became detente.
Our nearness to being broke was a large part of the reason we used nuclear weapons against Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In plain terms, it worked. And worked well
Quote:
Originally Posted by banjomike
We have never been in that position since, and we had only been in it once before, during the Civil War.
Because we triumphed in the end was most naturally sentimentalized and glorified. Giving our all did not end with the fighting. Far from it. Once we were victorious, we had to move very quickly to set things right, and if we failed, more war was sure to break out that would come to us.
That meant more suffering for our civilians, but they could foresee an end coming to the suffering. And the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan both worked so well the suffering ended sooner than our people expected. The peace was better than envisioned.
So we celebrated ourselves for a long time afterward. Rightly so. We had tried our best to avoid falling into that war, but we did fall and we did emerge intact. And we returned to prosperity.
I never thought of the Civil War analogy but that's quite true. As far as "setting things right" not so fast. We basically gave Germany all it wanted, pre-Hitler. The U.S. didn't have to squander its new-found wealth, and set the stage for the economic crackup that began with the monetary expansion leading to the collapse of Bretton Woods. That, in turn, led to Nixon's Phase I, Phase II and Phase III price controls, and with it hyperinflation, gas lines and ultimately surging unemployment.
There was no reason to support a European social-welfare state so that they could lecture us about our lack of "compassion."
Quote:
Originally Posted by banjomike
It's unlikely that any future struggle would yield the same results again. The Greatest Generation understood that, but their kids never did because they never went through the desperation.
So, while our people in Viet Nam were fighting and dying, the party at home never stopped. In the end, the Axis defeated us from the national hubris they generated in us just as much as Ho Chi Min's people defeated us.
We failed to realize for the Vietnamese, their war was do or die for them. And that they were just as resolute as we had been a generation before when we fought our own war for survival.
The failure in Vietnam was the failure to fight to win. If you face an opponent that wants to win and won't stop, the choice is either to lose, or make them lose.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LibertyandJusticeforAll
because the jews run hollywood since we decided that is the common war thread we got.
History and public op is now about movies, and entertainment for generations to come.
What? How does 1.9% of the population dominate the nation? Only if the rest of the nation doesn't bring up its children to go to school and succeed.
"Founding government altogether on the consent of the people supposes that there is a kind of original contract by which the subjects have tacitly reserved the power of resisting their sovereign, whenever they find themselves aggrieved by that authority with which they have for certain purposes voluntarily entrusted him... My intention here is not to exclude the consent of the people from being one just foundation of government where it has place. It is surely the best and most sacred of any. I only contend that it has very seldom had place in any degree and never almost in its full extent."
"Nothing appears more surprising to those, who consider human affairs with a philosophical eye, than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few; and the implicit submission, with which men resign their own sentiments and passions to those of their rulers. When we inquire by what means this wonder is effected, we shall find, that, as Force is always on the side of the governed, the governors have nothing to support them but opinion. It is therefore, on opinion only that government is founded; and this maxim extends to the most despotic and most military governments, as well as to the most free and most popular. The soldan of Egypt, or the emperor of Rome, might drive his harmless subjects, like brute beasts, against their sentiments and inclination: But he must, at least, have led his mamalukes, or prætorian bands, like men, by their opinion."
This is a good article on the Social Contract Theory.
If someone is using something that others are also using (such as public spaces, etc.) they are implicitly joined to the agreement made on the usage of that thing.
If someone moved into your house, they are just as responsible to the rules that were agreed upon before their entrance, but only they have a say to change it if they so wish.
I both agree and disagree. I oppose the costs imposed by externalities from "free-riders". But while you reject private-property(IE individual ownership), you presuppose a kind of rational collective-ownership.
But again, who is this collective? How did they enter the collective? Did they enter on an equal basis, or did they feel compelled to enter? What if they want to leave? What land, if any, do they get to take with them? Can they leave as individuals, or only on a majority vote? What if the vote goes 51-49% to split?
Basically, we all know the theory of how people should be forced to "accept" the Social Contract, but there is no theory on how to leave it, because it is like the Mafia, you're in for life(and almost-always from birth).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Winterfall8324
When the government taxes an individual, they are not taking physical paper from their hands (even though they may do this in practice), the more relevant thing is that they are taking numerical value that you lay claim to.
To be fair, money just translates into resources, goods, etc. When the government takes some of your money, it is actually redirecting a certain amount of resources/production to the government which otherwise would have been consumed by you.
Of course, most of the resources/production consumed by the government are used ostensibly on "society's" behalf.
To give you some better context. People have always had to pay taxes, but if you go back far enough, taxes weren't always in the form of money. In much of the dark ages, the vast-majority of people had no money at all, so they would pay their taxes directly from what they produced.
So, instead of 10% of your wages, you would pay 10% of your grain.
Through much of the history of civilization, about 90% of the people had always been employed in agriculture. Because without machines, it took that many laborers to grow enough crops to feed everyone. The 90% produced what is called a "food surplus". And this ~10% of their food could be used to feed people not directly employed in agriculture, such as soldiers, the clergy, merchants, the monarchs and other nobles, etc.
In simple terms, the bigger the food surplus, the stronger the state, because it allowed them to develop a larger army, and to divert labor to production of things like weapons, technology, etc.
Throughout most of history, Armies were relatively-small because there simply wasn't enough food-surplus to feed many people. But as agricultural yields increased, and with development of tractors and other machines, the number of people required in agricultural has plummeted to only 2%.
Taxes, in the modern sense, are just the same as before. So when the government taxes you 10%, all they are doing is redirecting 10% of your production/consumption to them. Which they use for things like feeding and supplying their armies and supporting the bureaucracy(directly or indirectly).
But it is actually even more complicated than that.
As you know, while money can be used to buy resources, money itself is not a resource. Basically, printing more money doesn't create more resources. And so taxes can only be paid in one form, work.
Someone who signs a check but who has produced nothing, isn't in any real sense paying anything. Only those who do work can pay taxes.
For example, let us pretend that because the Federal Reserve comes out and lowers interest rates, or does another round of "Quantitative-easing" and Wall-Street stocks rise 50%; Then literally trillions of dollars of "wealth" would be created, right?
Now, let us pretend that these stock traders cash their stocks in, and are thus liable for the "capital gains" tax. And so these stock traders pay hundreds of billions in taxes on their capital gains. But what work did they actually do? What did they produce? What resources did they create?
Another example, the corporate tax. Who pays the corporate tax? When Taco Bell pays $10 billion in taxes to the government where did that $10 billion come from? It can only come from one place, their customers. Who themselves do work elsewhere for that money.
So when the Chief-Financial Officer at Taco Bell signs a check to the Federal Government, he is merely redirecting a small amount of the labor of the millions of customers who patronize Taco Bell(as well as his own employees) to the Federal Government.
Basically, it is always "the people" who pay taxes, because it is only people who can do work. And owners/speculators, even if they're signing the checks, produce nothing, and pay nothing.
Of course, most people are too stupid to understand how anything works, so when they see a graph about how the top 1% pays all the taxes, and the bottom 50% pays no taxes, they just take it at face value.
Last edited by Redshadowz; 12-07-2018 at 08:15 PM..
"Founding government altogether on the consent of the people supposes that there is a kind of original contract by which the subjects have tacitly reserved the power of resisting their sovereign, whenever they find themselves aggrieved by that authority with which they have for certain purposes voluntarily entrusted him... My intention here is not to exclude the consent of the people from being one just foundation of government where it has place. It is surely the best and most sacred of any. I only contend that it has very seldom had place in any degree and never almost in its full extent."
"Nothing appears more surprising to those, who consider human affairs with a philosophical eye, than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few; and the implicit submission, with which men resign their own sentiments and passions to those of their rulers. When we inquire by what means this wonder is effected, we shall find, that, as Force is always on the side of the governed, the governors have nothing to support them but opinion. It is therefore, on opinion only that government is founded; and this maxim extends to the most despotic and most military governments, as well as to the most free and most popular. The soldan of Egypt, or the emperor of Rome, might drive his harmless subjects, like brute beasts, against their sentiments and inclination: But he must, at least, have led his mamalukes, or prætorian bands, like men, by their opinion."
This is a good article on the Social Contract Theory.
I both agree and disagree. I oppose the costs imposed by externalities from "free-riders". But while you reject private-property(IE individual ownership), you presuppose a kind of rational collective-ownership.
But again, who is this collective? How did they enter the collective? Did they enter on an equal basis, or did they feel compelled to enter? What if they want to leave? What land, if any, do they get to take with them? Can they leave as individuals, or only on a majority vote? What if the vote goes 51-49% to split?
Basically, we all know the theory of how people should be forced to "accept" the Social Contract, but there is no theory on how to leave it, because it is like the Mafia, you're in for life(and almost-always from birth).
To be fair, money just translates into resources, goods, etc. When the government takes some of your money, it is actually redirecting a certain amount of resources/production to the government which otherwise would have been consumed by you.
Of course, most of the resources/production consumed by the government are used ostensibly on "society's" behalf.
To give you some better context. People have always had to pay taxes, but if you go back far enough, taxes weren't always in the form of money. In much of the dark ages, the vast-majority of people had no money at all, so they would pay their taxes directly from what they produced.
So, instead of 10% of your wages, you would pay 10% of your grain.
Through much of the history of civilization, about 90% of the people had always been employed in agriculture. Because without machines, it took that many laborers to grow enough crops to feed everyone. The 90% produced what is called a "food surplus". And this ~10% of their food could be used to feed people not directly employed in agriculture, such as soldiers, the clergy, merchants, the monarchs and other nobles, etc.
In simple terms, the bigger the food surplus, the stronger the state, because it allowed them to develop a larger army, and to divert labor to production of things like weapons, technology, etc.
Throughout most of history, Armies were relatively-small because there simply wasn't enough food-surplus to feed many people. But as agricultural yields increased, and with development of tractors and other machines, the number of people required in agricultural has plummeted to only 2%.
Taxes, in the modern sense, are just the same as before. So when the government taxes you 10%, all they are doing is redirecting 10% of your production/consumption to them. Which they use for things like feeding and supplying their armies and supporting the bureaucracy(directly or indirectly).
But it is actually even more complicated than that.
As you know, while money can be used to buy resources, money itself is not a resource. Basically, printing more money doesn't create more resources. And so taxes can only be paid in one form, work.
Someone who signs a check but who has produced nothing, isn't in any real sense paying anything. Only those who do work can pay taxes.
For example, let us pretend that because the Federal Reserve comes out and lowers interest rates, or does another round of "Quantitative-easing" and Wall-Street stocks rise 50%; Then literally trillions of dollars of "wealth" would be created, right?
Now, let us pretend that these stock traders cash their stocks in, and are thus liable for the "capital gains" tax. And so these stock traders pay hundreds of billions in taxes on their capital gains. But what work did they actually do? What did they produce? What resources did they create?
Another example, the corporate tax. Who pays the corporate tax? When Taco Bell pays $10 billion in taxes to the government where did that $10 billion come from? It can only come from one place, their customers. Who themselves do work elsewhere for that money.
So when the Chief-Financial Officer at Taco Bell signs a check to the Federal Government, he is merely redirecting a small amount of the labor of the millions of customers who patronize Taco Bell to the Federal Government.
Basically, it is always "the people" who pay taxes, because it is only people who can do work. And speculators, even if they're signing the checks, produce nothing, and pay nothing.
Of course, most people are too stupid to understand how anything works, so when they see a graph about how the top 1% pays all the taxes, and the bottom 50% pays no taxes, they just take it at face value.
1. Democracy: control of an organization or group by the majority of its members.
2. Democracy: the practice or principles of social equality.
Mutual agreements on things people use is a form of democracy, it doesn't just have to be a state function. When you ask in terms of membership and when someone can "leave" the answer is self explanatory.
People are interconnected and they end up utilizing similar infrastructure out of ease of access. Take a water/irrigation system. It is more functional to use a system that transports water from a source then going directly to the source and transporting the water yourself.
In fact there was a report I was just reading that Tehran is sinking into the ground, and one reason is that people are using their own personal water pumps to juice out ground water for their own usage. That is not a case where people should be forced to stop, but they can be incentivized through two means:
1. Lower the consumption of water by lowering consumption and production
2. Create a more central water system
Now anyone who uses it in any capacity (degree doesn't matter) should, just by the laws of local democracy, operate fairly like everyone else as not to sabotage it for everyone else. Should someone who sabotages a road through their usage by not following some guidelines in some area, then the need for some level of mutual understanding arises.
Just like in a factory or house, people can't each do their own thing, as that would mean no one could do anything. The solution people consider is a state enforcer, but again that is not necessary. Direct democracy offers regulations confined to whatever capital is being utilized. It is not the same as having to pay taxes to fund construction (that is a capitalist model of investment despite it being state run) of public utilities, it is only in terms of usage. If you decide not to use such systems (not have your house connected to an irrigation system, etc.) then that is your way out.
And neither is it some form of corporate investment to increase economic growth as they won't be profitable, but functional. Without private ownership of goods and money, no institution can form that could legitimately value a good by it's potential profit, instead the investments (if that is the term we use) of a community will only be derived by labor participation and public demand.
As for majority voting, I would say yes. But still, without state institutions to enforce participation, democracy will have no practical tyranny. The motivation to improve the function of a community will rely on that community, and no other source of power (state, private, money based, or otherwise). The concepts of jail, punishment, etc. won't be practiced. At worse sanctions could be agreed upon on some person, but that is the worse of it.
I agree with what you said about money but one thing on production taxes of old. Firstly I don't make these arguments out of support of a tax meant to be utilized by some higher power, but merely out of social argument:
The input of a worker is rightfully theirs, but not the output. Even in neanderthal societies goods weren't able to be stored for extensive periods of time and as such value was placed on production abilities, not temporary output.
In the same light farmers (as the example you used) could produce a high level crop yield, but what rightful ownership do they have to it besides what they can consume and store (themselves, not in some joint facility that is not operated by one person)?
Sure if they have a family that would increase consumption levels and as such increase the amount of said output they use, the underlying concept of ownership by usage, not claim remains. And as such the need for state distributions, or good will between a man and his community are not needed as all excess production (as there is plenty) becomes a public good just out of nature of it being left untouched. If you take away the tools of accumulating capital (money, investment, private ownership, private storage of produce, etc.) all the capital that is not in use will feed the public population and allow for greater community investment.
Democracy: control of an organization or group by the majority of its members.
You have to stop worshiping democracy my friend. Democracy is crap. Consensus is good. Democracy is not consensus.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Winterfall8324
When you ask in terms of membership and when someone can "leave" the answer is self explanatory.
Let us pretend that there were 100 people, each owning two acres of land each, and they joined a "society" together. Now they have 200 acres of land between them. And they, collectively, through democracy, set aside 20 acres of that land as public space, 50 acres for grazing animals, 100 acres for growing crops, and 30 acres for housing. They also build roads, ditches, bridges, etc.
Fast-forward ten years, many of the members realize that they lose in every single vote/election, and they strongly disagree with the direction the "collective" has taken on public-policy. How would they go about leaving?
The simple answer is, they can't. There is no getting out of the so-called "social-contract", short of revolution/war. And the only way out even then, is to win. The "south" tried to get out, and they got their buttholes pushed in. The Natives never wanted in at all, and they also got their buttholes pushed in.
But most-importantly, what we think of as "society" was never created voluntarily by all members anyway. At best a given society was created by a bare majority of those within its authority. And almost always, it was a minority of conquerors, emperors, kings, and others, who imposed their will upon the rest.
The United States was by no means created by democracy, nor did the founders even create a democracy. Less than 10% of the people were eligible to vote in 1787, and nearly as many people opposed it as supported it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Winterfall8324
People are interconnected and they end up utilizing similar infrastructure out of ease of access.
Most people claim you are under the social-contract merely because your parents enrolled you in a public-school.
Several years back, my uncle lost a really good job when the economy crashed, and he was basically working minimum-wage for a while, and his two sons were just graduating from high school. He told my mother how his kids probably wouldn't be able to go to college ATM because he didn't have the money to pay for it. My mother asked him why he didn't just have them apply for FAFSA. He said he refused to take a handout from the government. She said that he already paid for it with his taxes with all the years he worked.
My point is, if I drive on a public road, I already paid for it, so if I use it, I'm merely using that which I already paid for. The idea that because I do use, or have used a public road in my lifetime that I am forever entitled to maintain every public road in the country is a fiction. A tyrannical fiction.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Winterfall8324
Take a water/irrigation system. It is more functional to use a system that transports water from a source then going directly to the source and transporting the water yourself.
Environmental concerns are in a different basket though, because these create externalities. The difficulty is always in the enforcement.
Take for instance the Ogallala Aquifer. It is more than 900 miles long, and extends across seven American states.
The management of such an aquifer would require the cooperation of millions of people. And even those who aren't sitting on top of it could depend on it in some fashion(IE their food is grown there).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Winterfall8324
In fact there was a report I was just reading that Tehran is sinking into the ground, and one reason is that people are using their own personal water pumps to juice out ground water for their own usage.
Many cities are sinking for similar reasons. The reason New Orleans is "below sea-level" isn't because of sea-level rise, but because we pumped the water out of the ground, so it compacted.
In the same light farmers (as the example you used) could produce a high level crop yield, but what rightful ownership do they have to it besides what they can consume and store (themselves, not in some joint facility that is not operated by one person)?
But if you take their surplus, why would they bother to grow a surplus?
Regardless, ignore everything I said before and just try to understand this. The original idea behind "socialism" was basically the "manor" minus the lord and the church.
Prior to the rise of capitalism, people mostly lived in villages in something like the "manorial system"(picture below).
The men worked the fields, which were cut into long strips, because it was difficult to turn a plow team around(usually oxen, but later horses). They got to keep most of what they produced, but a certain percentage went to both the church(IE tithes), and to the lord(IE the government).
The Church was more than just a religious organization. All social life was organized around it, and they were the social safety-net.
Much of the lands were called "the commons", on which everyone had access(although there were rules governing it). This was usually pasture land for animals, as well as the wooded areas for firewood for heating/cooking, as well as for orchards and the like.
The purpose of serfdom was to make sure there was always enough labor to work the farmland. If there weren't enough people to work the land then the crops either wouldn't be grown, or wouldn't be harvested. Which means the "lord of the land"(IE landlord) wouldn't have anything to pay his lord, the King. And if the King wasn't getting paid, then he couldn't pay/feed his Army, which would weaken the country.
After the Black Plague there was a severe shortage of labor, and the losses weren't evenly spread out. One village may have been largely untouched, while another was nearly wiped out. The lords, desperate for labor, began to offer actual wages to the serfs from neighboring villages. This drove up the cost of labor, which meant that labor-saving agricultural techniques were sought. As agricultural techniques got better, and as people had more money(from wages), demand for things like wool increased(there was no cotton back then, only linen), both domestically and internationally(wool was by far Britain's largest export in the late middle-ages). And so the landowners began to grow sheep instead of crops. In large part because the sheep required almost no labor relative crops.
As more and more land was needed for sheep, the land was "enclosed" and many of the serfs were effectively thrown off the land(including the commons) which they had depended on. Having no land and no livelihoods, the peasants moved to the cities looking for work. The peasants once in the cities at first became beggars, which is why Britain instituted the "Poor-laws".
These laws required the poor to work. If you didn't work, and were able to work, then you would be forced to work. At first this meant working basically for the government or for the church, but it would be expanded to be something kind of like prison labor(renting you out to "capitalists").
Many of these peasants who were suddenly forced to work in the cities, romanticized their old villages, especially the commons. And they had envisioned returning to the old English village(IE Merry Old England), but without their Lord, and in some cases, without the church, which they felt stole from them.
It wasn't until much later that people began to associate socialism with "progress". The early attempts at socialism were literally just people starting up quasi-medieval villages on the frontiers of the "New World".
This is why the Monty Python sketch Constitutional-Peasants is so funny. They are an "anarcho-syndicalist collective", but they are really just dirt-farmers(IE subsistence farmers). And that is all they'll ever be. A medieval village with no lord or church.
So is that a bad thing? I really enjoyed the video below. I know I overwhelm you with videos and other links.
My overarching point is that industry(IE modernism) requires centralization. Or as libertarians might say, "Big-business requires big-government". You seem to want to have your cake an eat it too. You want to keep "progress" but get rid of centralization. You must choose one or the other, you cannot have both.
Please, for the love of god, show me the thread where I said Churchill declared War on Germany, because I have never said that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Redshadowz
If Britain was going to go to war merely over an invasion, then why did Britain only go to war with Germany? And why did it ally with the Soviet Union who also did the invading?
You are skirting the issue by simplifying the narrative. Britain didn't just go to war because Hitler invaded. They went to war because Germany was becoming too strong, and if they took Poland, they would become even stronger, and that would threaten the British Empire. Because the only purpose of Britain's involvement in WWII was the preservation of the British Empire.
If you believe Churchill and the British Empire were behaving in a benevolent fashion, merely because of their love and concern for the Poles, you are delusional.
Chirchill had nothing to do with Britain going to war with Germany over Poland, the Prime Minister was Neville Chamberlain and Churchill had spent most of the 1930's in political isolation after falling out with the Conservative leadership. The period is often described as Churchill's 'Wilderness Years'. Chamberlein tried to secure 'peace' but drew a red line by forming an alliance with Poland, and once Hitler invaded Poland Chamberlain had no choice but to declare war.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Redshadowz
Now please, good sir, will you answer my question. How do those quotes make you feel?
Especially this part... "Here it has gone so far that the name Merry Old England conveys no meaning, for Old England itself is unknown to memory and to the tales of our grandfathers."
Do you ever feel like you've lost something?
I wasn't around in 1844 when Engels wrote the 'The Condition of the Working Class in England', and since Engles published his study of the working class in England, living and working conditions have improved considerable. There is now social welfare and universal healthcare for all, and life expenctancy has increased substantially. We have therefore gained a good deal since the Beveridge Report and the Post WW2 welfare state and NHS.
Last edited by Brave New World; 12-08-2018 at 07:00 AM..
You have to stop worshiping democracy my friend. Democracy is crap. Consensus is good. Democracy is not consensus.
Let us pretend that there were 100 people, each owning two acres of land each, and they joined a "society" together. Now they have 200 acres of land between them. And they, collectively, through democracy, set aside 20 acres of that land as public space, 50 acres for grazing animals, 100 acres for growing crops, and 30 acres for housing. They also build roads, ditches, bridges, etc.
Fast-forward ten years, many of the members realize that they lose in every single vote/election, and they strongly disagree with the direction the "collective" has taken on public-policy. How would they go about leaving?
My overarching point is that industry(IE modernism) requires centralization. Or as libertarians might say, "Big-business requires big-government". You seem to want to have your cake an eat it too. You want to keep "progress" but get rid of centralization. You must choose one or the other, you cannot have both.
Consensus requires a unanimous vote, while democracy requires a majority.
But the two aren't mutually exclusive as they both need each other to defend against central power:
"Without this principle of proportionality in decision-making, whether enunciated or merely understood, consensus becomes a form of totalitarianism. Democracy without consensus is hollow, consensus without democracy is a prison." http://wiki.c2.com/?ConsensusVsDemocracy
There is the borda count method for when more than two options are discussed, and then there are multiple ways to organize opinion and value vote counting.
"So if a decision affects me crucially but affects no one else, then I should have the only say in it. Meanwhile, if a decision affects everyone equally, everyone should have an equal say in it. By following this principle, one can categorize decisions as requiring a single person, minority approval, simple majority, overwhelming majority, or even unanimity."
2. Progress is not necessary to maintain in its totality, just in its potential. For example modern forms of infrastructure or technology don't have to be utilized, and the pressure to do so like in current day society would subside as the accumulation of wealth is no longer a motivator. The Japanese for example use older technology because they wish to, not because they don't have access to similar more modern technology. In the same way one could say they are falling behind competition, but competition is only relevant if wealth can be controlled and accumulated in mass (and without private property, money, or state that would be impossible to accomplish).
Churchill had nothing to do with Britain going to war with Germany over Poland, the Prime Minister was Neville Chamberlain and Churchill had spent most of the 1930's in political isolation after falling out with the Conservative leadership.
1) What I said by no means implied that I believed it was Churchill who declared War on Germany. Chamberlain basically backed himself into a corner after Hitler broke the Munich agreement, where politically he had no choice but to do something to stop further Hitler expansionism. He gave Poland the war guarantee because he had to, but I think it was a bluff, because he had no interest in carrying it out. Everything he did was more about projecting power as a deterrent, rather than imposing force(IE he didn't immediately declare war on Germany, he gave Germany an ultimatum that if Germany didn't leave Poland by a certain date, that Britain would declare war on Germany).
2) Churchill had been agitating for War with Germany since long before the invasion of Poland. He was the one who was responsible for the blunder in Norway. And throughout the "Phoney-War", he agitated against Chamberlain while clamoring for war. He was appointed Prime-Minister once war became inevitable, and Chamberlain had lost confidence even before the real war began in 1940.
Everyone serious about WWII realizes that Churchill, both as PM and behind the scenes or in the admiralty, was the one that really pushed Britain into carrying out the war to its end. Churchill wanted to crush Germany, and he did.
Which is why people like Pat Buchanan write books called "Churchill, Hitler, and the unnecessary war". And no one talks about Chamberlain at all.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Brave New World
It wasn't around in 1844 when Engels wrote the 'The Condition of the Working Class in England', and since Engles published his study of the working class in England, living and working conditions have improved considerable. There is now social welfare and universal healthcare for all, and life expenctancy has increased substantially. We have therefore gained a good deal since the Beveridge Report and the Post WW2 welfare state and NHS.
But that isn't what the quotes are about at all. The quotes were about how wealth has been centralized, and with capitalism, how the elect of the middle-class rose to the throne(IE the capitalists took control of the whole country). And that this division has grown to the extent that, almost all that there is left in the country are the rich and the poor. And that old England(IE Merry Old England) was lost, forever.
I was mainly wondering what you thought about "Merry Old England".
And about the Orwell quote on English patriotism. It doesn't seem like England of today is quite the same place as it was when Orwell wrote that essay. But I just wonder, in reading it, does it fill your heart with pride? Or do you feeling nothing?
Last edited by Redshadowz; 12-08-2018 at 02:00 PM..
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