Charles Anthony

What exactly do you not get?

Without addressing the barbarism of such a policy, I would question its effectiveness. China still has orphanages and foreigners buy abandoned Chinese children. The effect of this one-child policy may be a little more complicated. I see nothing cruel about bringing up a child in poverty. How do you define poor?

I do not think you can draw a line. The message is obvious to me: agents of the government and their crony-friends exert their force upon everybody else. The results are horrifyingly demonic acts against humanity and the environment. What do you expect the youth to think??? I would not say that is right. However, I believe it is foolish to expect people to be complacent.

You do not provide any suggestions of what those barriers might be in either case. I will adopt your assumptions and make the following recommendation: reduce income taxes for both the rich and the poor. Reducing taxes on the poor will lead them to rise above poverty and approach the rich. Ergo, they have less children. Reducing taxes on the rich will make it easier for them to give up working time and choose having children time. Ergo, they have more children.

Does that help them weed out the underground economy?

Welcome, Mrs.H, to the forum.

People can take a private plane or they can get insurance. Therefore, I have a question: Are people able to afford the safety they demand? I will stretch the question out further and ask: Should airlines be free to fly over other people without any guarantee that their airplanes are safe? How would your argument differ if you found out that the airplanes were a century old and falling apart? Should air travel be subsidized?

Yes, I forgot to mention that I have a set five digits (two of them miraculously being opposable) attached to each of my limbs with which to clutch objects. Thank you. I should have been more clear.

Replied in the Not enough cops -- Why does crime go unpunished? thread.

redirected from the Hollywood muscles Canada -- Movie piracy thread A few things: 1) that can certainly be possible if you are only looking at NUMBERS of cops per area but that would still not require public control 2) everyone would not need to hire their own bodyguard; they could pool resources as they choose. People should be allowed to organize themselves any way they want. 3) are you suggesting that all neighborhoods are treated equally??? I have not lived in every single place in Canada but I have driven through each major city from the furthest East to the furthest West and I am quite comfortable saying that cops do not supervise all parts of town equally. 4) if you are looking at quality of service delivered, there is no reason why the service should be publicly monopolized. I say this often but it is worth repeating: people condemn anarchy as being unworkable, yet, all they have to do is look at the street and observe it in action, live and well. It seems like we accept anarchy for poor people but at the same time refuse it exists. Remember: there is very little that prevents public cops from avoiding doing their job. In that case, those services would be directed by a market force. I do not mean to brush off that topic but rather I still see no compelling reason why they should be publicly monopolized. If those markets were private and with free entry, the service provider would always have the incentive to provide the service the consumers want. Where I live, in the case of an emergency, you have better chances of hitch-hiking to a hospital instead of waiting for an ambulance. Why? What is unique about the "law and order" market that makes you think so? Also, what right do you have to impose that value judgment on everybody?? Let me expose you to a particular view on life by comparing the "law and order" services to insurance services. What if I told you that I would rather give up ALL "law and order" service premiums so that I may load up on life insurance instead. My reasoning would be that if I ever die as a result of a lack of "law and order" services, my loved ones would get a huge pay-out. Sure, I would be dead but my loved ones would have absolutely no debt and a healthy annuity to ensure that neither they nor my descendants would ever have to work again in their entire lives. Should I not have the right to spend my money as I see fit? That is a feeble objection. You should be able to do better. The following things prevent me from hiring additional protection: 1) the loss in taxes I must pay to throw into the funding of the public "law and order" services 2) the distortion in the market created by monopolized "law and order" services Try to make an analogy with books. Imagine a public library opening up right beside a private book store. What do you think in such a system will prevent YOU from being able to buy a book? You sound like you have a vested interest in demonizing pot. Nothing confuses the Left-Right divide better than the crime/punishment/revenge/just-us/security/policing/defense industry. I am sure public police officers would be happy to get your support for extra funding. Would that make them Lefties or Righties? Just out of curiosity: How would you label an approach of letting crooks go free, publicly advertizing their crimes and letting them be subject to the fury of the masses? Would that be a Lefty policy or a Righty policy?

You mean: What are some of the great disadvantages of anonymity on the internet? I think this first trade-off between ease of use is completely destroyed by cashiers who give change by handing the paper bills in your palm and then piling the coins ON TOP of the paper. This always boggles my mind. Can somebody explain this to me?

When they re-surface, will they be more secret or less secret than before?

The advantage of coinage over paper currency is that it is practically indestructible. The Federal Reserve can blow up tomorrow or the minting stopped by raging anarchists but the existing currency can still circulate successfully forever and ever amen. How would that weed out the underground economy?

Wilber, I agree with everything you say and you used the following word "reputable" which is very important. Reputation is a crucial element in a market for both services and goods.

Why does that prove that Climate Change is BAD on a global scale? There is nothing in the linked article that says so.

What makes that BAD on a global scale? That can only make sense if it is physically impossible to grow crops otherwise. The North American automobile market is dropping too. Does that make it BAD on a global scale??? Your logic says it would. That is not what I said. I said it is possible. That possibility alone is enough to make your association between crop yields and BAD to be wrong on a global scale.

You are kidding. You think the Iraqi people are free? You have NO right to make any of your claims until the foreign invaders are out of Iraq.

I defended it too. The thread speaks for itself. Thanks, Teach. Are you just going to give me an F or a chance to write a supplemental? Neverththeless, I was right: you can NOT meet my challenge to ignore everything I said and prove that Climate Change is BAD. I am reminded of this thread: Is Global Warming a Leftist Urban Legend? -- A Skeptical Litany Just as a point of order: you repeated my entire post just to add a tiny response to one of my lines. Check out these threads: NEW RULE! - Trim Your Posts, Please take the time to remove the bulk of the post your quoting Trim Your Posts and Quotes, Don't just hit "Reply" Using the [ Quote ] Feature:, Avoid using more too many quotes!

Obfuscate? Quite the contrary: I have clarified my position. Let me be blunt with the following short challenge to you: ignore EVERYTHING I said, discard EVERYTHING I said as being the ravings of a lunatic and prove that Climate Change is BAD. Can you prove that Climate Change is BAD? I bet you can not even meet my challenge to ignore everything I said. Oh and before you try, I would like to remind you of the title of this thread: Is Climate Change is BAD? Big deal. Those minute details are irrelevent to the principle at hand. I am suggesting that people always pick and choose what aspects of the environment to sacrifice and sometimes that involves destroying arable land. The onus is not on me to prove what changes are GOOD or BAD or BEST but rather on the politicians who insist on judging it to be only one way. I was faced with "decreasing crops" as a feeble attempt to prove that Climate Change is BAD! when it is not automatically logical on a global scale. In that case, what do you suggest we do in the face of Climate Change? unconditionally follow the orders of politicians who can not justify their commands???

extracted from Hollywood muscles Canada -- Movie piracy To be fair, it behooves us to clearly identify what we mean by "work" with respect to the justice/law/order/punishment/security/defense service market. For me, these services are just like any other. The best comparative analogy is with the insurance market. We can agree that everybody is better off with insurance for life, automobiles, disability, critical illness, pets, home, whatever. Right? However, not everybody can afford it all. Furthermore, there is NEVER a one-size-fits-all policy across the board. People pick and choose according to what suits them and what they can afford. We do not make these tax-payer funded essential services. Now look at private security companies. We can also agree that everybody is better off with a private security alarm company 24hour guard watching their homes. However, not everybody can afford it. Now look at the concept of divorce and the new fad of reality television courts. Most disputes are settled privately without the need for public money. Public humiliation (reality shows) and the possibility of public humiliation (divorce settlements) keep things in order. These can be expanded. To understand my concept of justice, you must understand that you (and everybody else) has the right to self-defense. That must be an absolute. When I say absolute, I even grant you (and everybody else) the right to carry concealed weapons. I also believe that you (and again everybody else) have the right to own a patch of land. This forum has a fine thread What is land ownership anyways -- Can you really own land? which examines this concept from all sides. If you take the above two principles for granted -- I am not expecting you to adopt them, just try to do a thought exercise -- I believe that invariably people will look beyond monopolized state law and enforcement to settle their disputes or to protect themselves. A state monopolized justice/law/order/punishment/security/defense system distorts the free market. Without it, people would procure the services of private police and private courts on their own. It would be different because it forces rich people to pay ENTIRELY for what they get and, since poor people get nothing, poor people pay nothing. Sounds fair to me. My question to you is now: why are you forcing poor people to fund police service when poor people get ZERO service? Please understand that my rhetorical question comes from the fact that public servants do NOT have a profit motive to entice them to provide ongoing better service. I can not possibly think of publicly funded services do anything other than get worse and worse with time. Now, I understand the following question: what about the poor people who can not afford ANY private police? My answer is simple: their police service will necessarily be bundled into other services. If we try to be practical and creative, we can imagine poor people being tenants on somebody else's property. Their landlord will provide their services to stay competitive. A landlord can not continue to make profit if their is no law and order on his land. If all land was privately owned, in other words, there are no public parks and no public highways, O.J.Simpson would not have been able to escape his property so readily. Somebody would have to harbor him and protect him. Ultimately, he would have been in self-imposed exile or house arrest with ZERO means to acquire an income. Whoever would harbor him would face the same fate. This is where the importance of clearly delineated private property comes in and the damage created by public goods. With respect, I believe you are down-playing the way poor people are treated in the eyes of the law. He was also subject to an expensive trial paid by tax-payers. That is an injustice that not many people consider. I agree that up to a certain point, money may not matter. We are looking at the same stick. However, I insist that you are only looking at the long end. I ask you to look at the short end of the stick. Relative to rich people, poor people get virtually ZERO protection on the street and virtually ZERO defense in courts. You are actually investigating two different things.1) Personally, I DO NOT believe might makes right. I believe it is wrong to grab something that is not yours. 2) Unfortunately, I am convinced that most people behave otherwise. I believe people DO grab what is not theirs. Having a state monopolized solution is not a fair way for people to defend themselves against people who grab.

Your example proves my point: rich people get rich law and poor people get ZERO law. CAVEAT: I beg all lawyers (most particularly lawyers who take on legal-aid cases) not to take offense. I am not suggesting that they do nothing. I am saying that they get virtually ZERO resources with which to defend their clients. Despite my disdain for our public monopolization of the court system, I have a LOT of respect for lawyers. I understand why people want a lawyer in the family. Hesitate? You are making a mistake. My answer is a resounding YES: stop subsidizing health care, child care, waiting in line care, stealing and wasting tax-payer's money care, etc. To be realistic, I do not care what the Government subsidizes but rather I deny the Government the right to take our property. I am curious: Why do you treat biological life differently? Your ability to enforce your monopoly of your product (book/IP/copywrite/whatever) and your marketing is subsidized by tax-payers -- people who might not care about your product. That is not fair. Wait a minute. Why do you think it is not right? For the record, I would like to insert a reference to the following thread: Are you a thief? -- Do you or have you used pirated music, software, or movies? which further examines these issues. Guy and Ghost, since some of your questions to me are expanding into the realm of law in general (and since my opinions are not originally my own -- you could say that I pirated them!) permit me to address some of them in a different thread: Not enough cops -- Why does crime go unpunished? which, for partisan reasons, I particularly like but more importantly provides a concise foundation for my peculiar line of thought.

Why should I? Let me remind you of the question again: Is Climate Change BAD? You say it is but you have not proven it. I wonder how you would handle a radio interview instead. What does that matter? I am suggesting a possibile different outcome. I could have simply said "Somebody will invent the roto-tiller and make production more efficient on the reduced lands that we have." or "Somebody will invent hydroponic farming." or better yet "After the artificial government-supported agriculture market crumbles, the free market will permit hydroponic farming to be profitable." or anything else. You are the one who says Climate Change is BAD without proof. What is that supposed to mean? Is that a different way of saying "Do not ask me to prove my belief that Climate Change is BAD" or "Do not show fallacies in my logic!"? Even though the onus is not on my side of the debate to prove that Climate Change is GOOD, I will entertain your request here: Here you go: The Fiasco of the Common Agricultural Policy Guthrie, I find it appalling, disingenuous and unbelievable that you would quote some article about crop production without having a single clue about farming quotas and marketing boards. I do not believe that you are ignorant.

Repeat after me: My electricity comes from the flooding of land. Do you really? Can you recognize when YOU twist an argument? I beg your pardon???!!??? Where did I claim that reduced crop production was good? Just because crops are reduced does not mean that crops can not be grown elsewhere in the world. Climate change can possibly expose previously unused arable land. Just in case the title is not more than obvious at the top of every page, permit me to re-align this thread. The question happens to be: Is climate change BAD? Evidence of reduced crop production does not substantiate the claim that it is BAD unless evidence can also be provided that crops can not be grown elsewhere in the world. The onus to provide proof is on the person who says climate change is BAD not the person who asks for proof.

Protect the poor from what exactly? crime? or having to subsidize other people's "intellectual property"? Saying "bigger is better" is slightly ambiguous. Do you mean rich people get better treatment and poor people get worse treatment? I want you to explain what you mean by "equality in the eyes of the law" too. Do you mean, for instance, how O.J.Simpson gets the same treatment as most other males in America who share his ethnicity? Please forgive my sarcasm but I am very serious. Today, poor people get ZERO protection from the law and rich people get the law they can afford. The rest get subsidized one-law-fits-all dished out by civil servants who have no incentive to provide good service and practically non-existent accountability. Be careful of what you use as a baseline.

My ancestors lived in caves on the side of mountains and ate grubs, roots, mushrooms and bats. One of them took the chance of being eaten by a wildcat by going down the hill and cultivating the lands. That ancestor CHANGED the natural habitat to suit his needs. Many moons later, an other ancestor of mine decided to build a dam to harvest hydro-electric power. In the process, arable land was flooded. Do you have any clue how YOU get the electricity you so enjoy?