sanjavalen

A man who runs a supermarket, and a thug who insists I buy a loaf of breaf from him at prices he (or the neighborhood) dictates, are not comparable in moral stature.

I saw an ad on youtube in response to that. For those wondering why McCain lost, here's a clue. The ad said: I'm surprised McCain didn't lose by more than he did, to be honest....

The US was making noises about including Georgia in NATO.

To answer the original question, no. Since there would be no legal imperative to help others, they are not, strictly speaking, a "free rider," any more than there is a "free rider" problem today with, say, Goodwill or any other charity.

I dunno, what if I'm starving?

The poor won't die in droves under Objectivism - but not because of the benevolence of men saving others. The view of human beings as incompetent animals, constantly getting themselves into trouble - and the task of life, of constantly getting you or someone else out of that trouble - is a worldview directly opposed to Objectivism. The poor WILL NOT die in droves under Objectivism, because every human being is capable of sustaining themselves in some manner.

Zip, Rand meant that emergency situations are not the basis on which you should build ethical systems; they are complicated and often have no "good" choice. So to start with that as a reasoning point for any ethical question is like trying to start your studies of physics by figuring out how to calculate the orbit of the moon. First you must have a strong grasp of ethical principles, and then, as with the orbits of any heavenly body, each situation is unique and complicated. Anyway, I think this qualifies as a "complicated" problem. Does the doctor have bills to pay? Will he be responsible for the bills of the patient if the patient defaults? Is this a repeat bum who constantly puts him/herself in danger? etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum. A thousand different small variables will change the answer one way or another. Which illustrates a simple point: its not required of any human to sacrifice his life, or any portion of it, to another if they do not think it is in their best interests. So no, no man has an 'obligation' to become destitute, or starve, or lose his or her practice, or any other negative effect, for another human. I agree that men of good morals have a general benevolence towards other men, but that does not mean that there is any obligation between them. Such men will be more inclined to help each other, if the costs are not too great, but no men can claim others must help him or be immoral. To give a simple example, I once helped to rescue a man from a burning car. It was late at night, and I was wide awake. I passed a wreck on the side of the highway, and noticed one of the cars was on fire, and still had a person in it. Other cars were already pulling or pulled over - so I did the same and hopped out. I helped get the door open while some others got the guy out and carried him a safe distance from the car. My considerations: 1) Cost to myself - a little bit of time. Negligible. 2) Danger to myself - unlike in the movies, I don't believe cars are very likely to explode when on fire. Negligible, again. 3) Payoff - satisfaction of playing a small role in quite possibly saving a human life. High. Now, some other things. I don't know who caused the wreck; if it was the individual's fault and I knew it, I may have kept on speeding. Given the circumstances, however, and the low cost of the act, I thought it best to assume the best circumstances; ie, that some third driver or some legitimate problem related to driving late at night caused the wreck, and not negligence on the part of any of the people involved. I beat it before the cops and paramedics arrived and never pursued information about the wreck. So I can't tell you what actually happened or if the guy even survived - he didn't look too beat up but he was unconscious. I just did what I thought was best under the circumstances.

Ahh, rereading them, I think I must have. I thought your suggestions for backign some banks was an endorsement of bailout plans. Nevermind, I think we agree in substance, if not in detail - and details are for working out when it seems feasible that the substance can be implemented.

SN, I think you are in error, and here is why: It is true that you do not immediately go from statist controls to complete freedom overnight (without dire consequences to the economy.) This is why, for example, the government cannot simply say "Okay, paper money is worthless, better barter for some gold guys." But that is not the situation here. The situation is that the government has caused a gigantic mess, due to its intervention. The answer, however, is not more government intervention. The government cannot fix this mess without creating more problems than we have already. Even in a government taken over by Dr. Brook and anyone else he chose to name for congress, the senate and the presidency, I would not say that is a good idea. First off, not bailing the banks out would not change the law at all - as you will note, the bailout required a new law, not an application of existing law. All talks of implications aside, no private company has any legal (or moral) claim to being bailed out by the government. So your comparison to going "completely free" overnight is ridiculous - it is simply abstaining from more of the same. I believe it's already been touched on, on why it is impossible to implement any bailout that isn't, in substance, either completely unselective or completely subjective in nature. If you bail out any bank that is in trouble, you don't really help, because the assistance itself sends signals to the market that the bank is poorly run (this is the raitonale behind Paulson partially nationalizing Wells Fargo and other healthy banks along with bad ones; an attempt to fool the market,) which will have negative effects on the bank. In addition, it brings up questions that cannot be objectively answered - which banks are doing poorly due to government intervention, and not their own incompetence? What is "doing poorly"? What is the cutoff line for aid? How much aid does xyz bank justify? And so forth. Again - even with a government staffed by Objectivists, even with banks also staffed by Objectivists - all this would lead to is another pull-war in Washington. The implementors of a bailout would have no objective standard of judging competence, how badly the banks are doing, etc. Banks who both legitimately could say the government had caused their woes and ones that did not both would have very strong incentives to lobby these individuals with their woes. It would be business as usual in Washington - which is what we want to stop. The proper response to the crisis is not "one last hurrah for statism, then lets get freer." It is to get freer. Take proper responsibility for the bailout, then acknowledge that any "solution" implemented would simply cause more problems. Let the devaluation of the banking industry begin and let the most successful banks come out on top. Begin to deregulate as quickly as possible. And leave this as yet another example of why, when mixing economics and state, only bad can come of it.

I can't find any news item showing that the Tokyo stock exchange was closed indefinitely. Can you provide a link? Closest thing I can find is: http://biz.thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?f...mp;sec=business

Kane is currently without inet access, or at least with very sporadic inet access, iirc. Still, I hope he's having a good birthday. Cheers!

The cheif problem here is that force is involved. There was a time when volunteers could leave the army fairly painlessly. An officer in particularly could merely resign his commission and leave. Unfortunately, now, there is a legal contract who's terms do not stipulate a financial penalty if you leave early (extrememly reasonable, given how much the military invests in each soldier,) but jail time. Plus, of course, try to get any kind of job above grocery bagger after a DD and you'll find it difficult at best. So, you're facing jail time if you go. There is no real good choice here, for such a person. My thoughts would be that it would be best to be as incompetent at your job as you possibly can, and desert at the first opportunity.

They are calling it Jerryworld, for the owner of the Cowboys. Its pretty cool. I want to go to a game there, some day.

Ships passing in the night, really. We met at an Objectivist party in Dallas while she was passing through down to Houston for the holidays. We hit it off and started chatting, and eventually started flying back and forth, and now I'm all moved in with her.

My rationale for keeping separate finances would be to ease the ability to make personal purchases that the other partner may not be interested in - a hobby that only one of the two has, or just anything that only one person really is going to be using. For example, suppose one person makes 25k a year and the other 50k. They both contribute to the house's finances in a manner satisfactory with both people. Suppose I am the guy making 25k, though. If we have 1 bank account, how much of the extra money at the end of the month is mine to spend on whatever I choose? Must I consult with my partner for everything I want to get for myself? I would not have a problem with, say, having a shared bank account in which we both deposit a set amount of money each month for expenses, shared savings to eventually purchase a house, etc. But a separate account for personal expenses - eating out at lunch, gassing up my truck, hobby materials, and so on and so forth - seems very reasonable to me.

This is something of comparing apples to oranges. What kind of objective standard can you establish when the amount, skill and equipment of the troops in the given time period varied by quite a lot? That in mind, I can't really say.

As the dissenting opinion notes:

Sigh... “Thus, we do not read the Second Amendment to protect the right of citizens to carry arms for any sort of confrontation, just as we do not read the First Amendment to protect the right of citizens to speak for any purpose.” “Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited.” “Although we do not undertake an exhaustive historical analysis today of the full scope of the Second Amendment, nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.” “We also recognize another important limitation on the right to keep and carry arms. Miller said, as we have explained, that the sorts of weapons protected were those ‘in common use at the time.’ 307 U. S., at 179.” Why hello, status quo.

Scalia's opinion can be seen here. I have work, but I'll comment on it tonight.

http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/ Heller affirmed Victory for individual rights. We'll see how much of a victory when the opinions are read at length.

And K-mac never said that guns alone ensure freedom.

75 or so I'd say. Depends on how the next 10-15 years go. I am also "100 percent certain" that this exact same argument was used in virtually every instance that a tyrant took power. It is a slow process up to the point at which the government holds enough arbitrary power that a vocal minority can grab the reins of government long enough to change all the rules in their favor. At that point its only a matter of time and it will happen frighteningly quickly. Those unhappy circumstances do not exist in America today. We are creeping closer and closer, though - and I think we are far closer than you'd realize. They will ban guns long, long before they severely restrict your freedom of expression. Is your plan then to beg for mercy? Edit: This thread needs a little humor interjected into it.

Would the American revolutionists' ideals, no matter how consistent with reality, have availed them had they been disarmed? Edit: To elaborate, while the proper ideological base is an integral part of becoming free, having the status of disarmed victim will not help you at all. To those who say "But we are still free here!" the answer is "For now." While we are still free, disarmament is a vital part in any statist's plans to instate tyranny. A disarmed people can do nothing when tyranny actually comes - even if its rammed down our throats by a vocal minority (as it always has been.) An armed people can. The proper ideological base is still a precondition to any successful fight against tyranny - with words or with guns. But without guns any actual physical fight against tyranny is a non-starter.

How is "Did the child hurt him/herself?" a "subjective" law? I was under the impression that "subjective law" meant its execution was by someone's whim. I guess now it means something else? Edit: Looking back at my post, I wasn't sufficiently clear. Nothing is illegal in an Oist society until it is an implicit threat OR actual damage has occurred. Since leaving your kid at home isn't an obvious "threat" to them, the actual illegal act is leaving them home and they being harmed via your neglect (ie starving to death, overheating and dying in a car, etc.)

I believe they call this "child neglect." In a rational society, inaction on the parents' part that results in harm to the child (whether it be not taking them to the hospital when you are able to or leaving them in a car or at home when they are not mentally fit to) would be illegal. There would not be any silly, arbitrary age "cut-offs," where if you leave a kid at home one day it would be illegal, but the next perfectly legal. The principle here is: can the child actually survive in the circumstances they are left under? If the answer is no, then its illegal, regardless of age. As far as age of consent/adulthood, I would suppose whenever the kid gets their first job would be a good enough time to call it.