August1991

Note to Argus about written English: Amen.

I agree conscription would be a form of enslavement. But there is no conscription in Canada and it would be of questionable constitutionality now, I believe.If you believe that conscription is a form of "enslavement", then you would have to agree that any taxation is a form of "enslavement". Whether the State takes your money or your time, it is still a tax. No, the state charges you the prescribed fee for the benefits you receive as a resident.Hugo calls it a "tax", TS calls it a "fee".The issue, it seems to me, is whether the payment (fee or tax) is "voluntary" or not. There are different ways to view this: Ultimately, citizens voluntarily pay taxes because they choose voluntarily to be subject to the jurisdiction. As in a marriage contract, we frequently agree to conditions in a long term contract which are imprecise and turn out to be very constraining. In viewing the role of the State, I would go with the second view and ask: what contract conditions would I have accepted before my birth?

This is the nightmare scenario of every strongly risk-averse bureaucrat. They go public with the information because they fear accusations of a cover-up. But they don't name names because they fear liability claims if the specific information is false. This is the proverbial hot potato no one wants to touch. "I wasn't there; I didn't do it. That's my line; and I'm sticking to it."

This comment is off topic but this article is interesting to read. The "value" would be closer to $10 million.It is one thing to take risks with one's own life and quite another to do this with someone else's. Hugo might say that is the inherent immorality of the State. But people delegate such decisions to medical doctors every day.

That could be done privately too. The problem is not there. It's elsewhere.Consider this: It is 1922. I set up a radio station at 93.5 FM. You set up another radio station and also broadcast on 93.5 but with a stronger signal! Who owns 93.5? The one with the strongest signal? The first person to set up a radio station? BTW, this happened with domain names on the Internet. There's a mad scramble to be the first occupier. This problem is more complex and a State solution is not always better. So I avoided it. Before private ownership is defined, it makes sense that it is auctioned off for the collective benefit. So, I guess in theory Canada does or did own it. (Native Indians might object...) Huh? Marriage, corporations and governments arise because high transaction costs cause free markets to fail. (Or is that what you meant?) I guess you've never got your brother-in-law to fix your car rather than the garage on the corner. But then I've always suspected my brother-in-law lives in a parallel universe.

Hugo will hit you down on that by suggesting that roads used to be private and some (eg. many bridges in the US and the 407 near Toronto) are now.I would argue that collecting tolls is cumbersome and costly. This means it is more sensible (but imperfect) to have a single road building agency which assesses a "flat toll" (road tax) to all potential users. But technology changes. It may well become possible to install a microchip inside every vehicle. Now toll collection is no longer so cumbersome and costly. Maybe private roads will be possible again. Now consider planes flying over head. If airlines had to negotiate with each landowner overflight rights, the cost of negotiation would be prohibitive. One person could potentially hold up the whole arrangement. For negotiation, it is less cumbersome and costly to mandate one agent to represent all landowners' interests. (All landowners would have to agree on the same agent of course.) Call the winning agent "the government" and call competing agents "political parties". I could give numerous other examples. Hugo is an ideologue Libertarian. Such people believe that the State is unnecessary. And in theory, it can be shown that indeed the State is not necessary to achieve perfect co-operation between all individuals in a society. But the conditions for this result are so restrictive as to make them of theoretical interest only. In addition, this result also says nothing about what each individual gets out of the deal. IOW, no marshmallows will fall in the fire but I can't guarantee that everyone will get the same number of marshmallows.

I'm with Chantal Hebert on this one: Toronto StarI know that the Inkless Well thinks otherwise: However, I think Dion's reaction is notable: CTV NewsI've seen nothing public from Jean Lapierre about this accord but it's got his paw prints all over it. Check out Harper's comment: This health accord may be a tentative first step into a new type of Canada. And we may well be facing more minority governments.

In addition to the Bank of Canada's actions, the Canadian dollar tracks fairly closely the world price of crude. But a warning: I noticed a sign today at Tim Horton's. They are raising their prices "because of rising operational costs". The Bank should stop fiddling with the knob. It doesn't really do anything; it confuses people and everyone knows what happens if you fiddle with something.

So now you blame Bourrassa for Pierre Laporte's death? (And it was his fault because he was a wimp?) Which is the apple and which is the orange? It would have been a lot easier (and cheaper) to buy the oil at the world market price - which is what American corporations will do anyway. The only people who believe the war was about oil are people who don't understand how markets work. People like Linda McQuaig.

It is a way to improve your written English. Yoou my findthat usefull.

Did you mean 'as of now', or always? Revolutionary war? Hiroshima? Dresden? No, but I see a difference between premeditated murder and manslaughter. No argument from me, whatsoever. But would you have killed Adolf Hitler in 1935 if you could have? I have wondered the same question.

The Kurds have so far not made efforts to secede. I think that is the indication that this provisional government is on the right track.Bush in his UN speech made a direct reference to an Iraqi federal state. Lebanon, to a degree, is an example of a functioning Arab "democratic" state. IMV, I honestly see no reason why Iraq cannot become a functioning, pluralist federal state with a leader who is not in position for life. Arabic Sikh? Huh?I am happy to see this thread get back to the original question: whether Iraq will ever be democratic. Hugo, I'll start another thread in the Philosophy section to respond to points in your post above. I will note here though that I agree with your idea of secession. The State derives its utility (and I guess its legitimacy) from our willingness to pay taxes. That is, we choose not to secede.

Do you also blame Putin for the murder of those children?MS, do you blame Trudeau for the murder of Pierre Laporte?

Fine, it's a principle. But I still don't know what your definition of it is. So, the Rule of Law binds people to obey the law. (Huh?)It prohibits "arbitrary" actions. (Do you mean that "equals" should be treated "equally"?) You mean Legislative - Executive - Judiciary? These are checks on the power of the State itself. (What is the State?)

April, you mean you voted for, ulp, Bob Dole? Jnr's Dad? You didn't vote for Ronnie, did you?And who did you vote for in 2000? Nader?

Please define "Rule of Law". Can you copy/paste or at least provide a link to the post? Huh?

You give examples from Iran (25 years ago) and Antarctica (1 sick man; we had a plane there). Your example of 11 September 2001 is interesting because it is unprecedented in history. I think ordinary Newfoundlanders were the most hospitable.I find it extremely smug on your part to suggest that ordinary Americans would not do the same for us. I suggest, for example, that you search on activities of the USCG saving Canadians. Kyoto is seriously flawed and specifically targets the US. Russia has not signed on to Kyoto. India and China are exempted from it. US foreign aid? Are they blamed for that too now? I'm glad you note that the UK sides with the US. You didn't mention Australia, Italy, Poland and many others.As to the UN, you seem to be under the delusion that it is a world council with authority to use force. I prefer your comparison to the League of Nations. The UN survived so long because of the Cold War. The relationship between the US and the Soviet Union was such that the UN provided on occasion a useful venue. The world changed in August 1991 when the attempted coup in Moscow failed. The UN as it existed is moribund. It had numerous flaws anyway, not the least of which is that it named countries like Libya, pre-Iraq invasion, to head up Human Rights Commissions. Incidentally, the US taxpayer is the largest single contributor to the UN (about 25% of its budget). Huh? Where have you been for the past 50 years or so? You have probably never dealt with a street gang, nor a diplomat for that matter. IME, politicians in democracies are far more concerned about voters than diplomats are concerned about taxpayers. (BTW, UN diplomats are in a class of their own.) In a few years, Castro will die and all his reforms will die shortly after. He will be forgotten the same way young Russians know little and care less about Stalin or Lenin.Bush may win re-election in a few weeks, or he may lose. In five years, he will not be President. But the principles of the US constitution will still be around.

I'm waiting for the resident "underdog defenders" to refer to the deaths provoked by the US military. "What is different between a beheading and a fatal gunshot?" The US military does not deliberately and methodically target or kill non-combattants. This is a centuries old battle. Let us be on the side of light, not darkness. Go read The Name of the Rose or you can see the DVD (with Sean Connery) if you're a slow reader.

That Michael Moore message is truly pathetic. I get the impression that the Dems prefer to be "marginal" rather than "commercial". imdb has fahrenheit 9/11 grossing $118 million in the US by 20 September. So, I guess about 10-15 million saw the movie - about 80% of whom are registered Democrats. Schwarzenegger got more undecided to cross over with his "girly man" line. I'm glad to see that you have such a high esteem for ordinary people. Or is it rather that you like your smug position of superiority, being different from the hoi-polloi, above the chubby, Wal Mart masses.

I'll agree. The proof is in the pudding.The Left said that the Taliban and the cruel Afghan winter were no match for the US. "Look what happened to the British in the 19th century!" The Left said Iraq's Republican Guard would be hellish to fight. "The war will last for months." The Left said that dysentery, disease and hunger would decimate the Iraqi population. The Left says little about Qaddafi or the recent Syrian troop pullback. This game is far from over. We'll learn the truth in the fullness of time.

He has a point, maybe. But let's wait for the parliamentary session to start. The situation of the Conservative Party in Canada has never been easy.

Eureka, avoid the unbecoming innuendo. Huh? Article? Where? And you are citing the failure of Middle Eastern state police to stop this as a reason why we need state police?The Middle East is a good example of your private militias - effective in enforcing other types of criminal behaviour but not this sort. The failures of a private police force would probably be greater. Hugo, screw ups happen, things go wrong.Information plays a large part in transaction costs and criminality is often a question of information. Well, this runs completely counter to everything else you've ever argued in this forum. You have always said that the free market provides more and better for less, but suddenly when it comes to security (which is a commodity like any other), you do a complete about-face and argue that only the state can provide more and better for less.Because I'm not a single-minded ideologue. I take a pragmatic view of social problems.In an ideal world, everything could be transacted through costless spot markets. Well, that is obviously impossible because we need to deal with time. So, we need forward transactions - but now we face a problem of costly information. Because of these costs, otherwise good deals fall through. So, people start looking for other ways to transact. For example, they trade within a family, within a corporation or through a government. Markets fail for a reason. These non-market solutions are imperfect but better than no solution at all. That is the essence of my argument in favour of a State judiciary. That plus the fact that there are judgment-proof individuals. Hugo, are you that thick? Even free markets are costly to transact through.It would be prohibitively expensive given current technology to transact through free markets for all the activities required in the manufacture of a car. As a result, voluntarily people sign long term contracts and enter into master-slave (employer-employee) relationships. Internally, General Motors ressembles a Soviet Ministry of Automobile Production. Here's an idea Hugo: Why do firms have in-house legal counsel on salary? Why not contract out? Everyone has an incentive to reduce transaction costs because their reduction amounts to free lunch for the State or you or me. Now whether the incentives are accurate or not is another question. Guns don't kill people. People kill people. Negate risk? Tell that to the creditors in the case of bankruptcy and the shareholders at all times.If I lend you my car, and you kill someone with it, should I be held responsible? Well, if I were, people wouldn't lend cars very often, would they. Otherwise good deals wouldn't occur. The world would be a poorer place. Limited liability solves that problem. My liability is limited to the loss of a car. Dumb example. The fine, in a private judicial system, would be based on damages. If the damage is less than the prevention cost, the Niagara Textile would be wise to pollute - the world would be a better place.I think what you mean is that a corporation could incur greater damages than its entire value. Forced into bankruptcy and liquidated (note that shareholders and creditors lose everything), there would still be insufficient value to pay a fine. (I think this happened to Cessna.) This refers to being judgment-proof. It happens now in many civil suit cases. If it were a criminal case, then the convicted person would go to jail. Limited liability does not absolve people from criminal liability. My sense of a social contract is the one you would have signed before you were born, and before knowing what the conditions of your birth would be. For example, we don't choose our parents and we don't choose our body. You could have been born blind to alcoholic parents. And I presume you'd argue that segregation laws were perfectly alright, because blacks were free to move to California or New England?How do you feel about gated communities, Hugo? What about private clubs that restrict membership?Let me be more direct: You choose in part the jurisdiction you wish to live in - and the State provided benefits/taxes that go with your choice. There is probably more choice in the US than in Canada. Of course, your choice is based on may other factors too. You object to the coercive nature of State-citizen relations. It must be so because that is why the State exists. The State allows citizens to sign long term contracts collectively. Like marriage, and corporations, this is beneficial in some circumstances where markets don't function because of high transaction costs. Let me give you a very practical example: State-organized health insurance. I am willing to admit that changes in technology may change market transaction costs in the future. Markets are the ideal way to co-operate, but they are sometimes a prohibitively costly method. I wonder why the world is the way it is as well as imagining a better world.I think the State in modern societies is too preponderant. But the State nevertheless offers a way to transact beneficially when free markets fail.

I gather, April, that you are going to vote Democrat. [April, have you ever voted for a Republican candidate at any level?] Now, April, how do you feel when you see W. on TV? I rest my case. The British generals/politicians in World War I and the US military/politicians during the Vietnam War prevaricated, hid behind mumbo-jumbo and rationalized. In comparison, Bush Jnr. has been forthcoming and has a decent case to make. Jnr. even has a "vision thing".A hoity-toity heiress-marrying Boston-brahmin is unlikely to take Jnr down. The Dems do best with a plain vanilla Southern boy who aligns on the centre. The Dems lose when they lose the trailer trash vote.

I will agree that Bush Jr gets up the Dems' nose. (I think it's his smirk. For some reason, that really bothers the Left.) Well, Clinton drove the Right nuts too. (I think it was the way Clinton could get away with it.) Of course, this is all about style. Nixon was more vilified than Bush or Clinton. The Left had no respect whatsoever for Reagan. "Hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today..." IOW, I don't think there is anything radically new going on. As to your examples of evident lies, I think rather that Bush has some connection to reality. He is beatable but I don't think Kerry can do it.

Another point: I like the absence of icons, photos and images here. I also like the way it is possible to edit posts, to jump to the most recent post, etc. IOW, I like the overall formatting of this forum.