Tuesday, August 26, 2008

The Case for Obama

As I was looking over grandpa's shoulder reading what he was writing for the blog I let out a small gasp. Grandma, walking by and hearing my gasp, looked over and read what grandpa was writing and when she finished she just looked at me and gave me a big grin. this was what grandpa wrote;

1. The struggle to gain voting support from as many working-class voters as possible is and always has been a goal of the Republican Party. Republican Party leaders see the registration figures, and Democrats far out number them. And, working-class people especially are registered Democrats.

All Republicans, not just Karl Rove, plot ways to siphon off working-class voters. The Republican’s cynical appeal to workers, their class enemies, has been, historically, militaristic and pro-war slogans and conservative, religious appeals, especially in the Bush period. They promote fears of immigrant job seekers, and typically use a straight up anti-woman, anti-Black appeal.

While John McCain on many levels is a very weak candidate, when the campaign gets heated up, he won’t be by himself. He will be bolstered by support from Colin Powell and other Black Republican leaders who are not pro-Bush; they will selectively utilize Condoleezza Rice. Bobby Jindal, Louisiana governor, of Indian decent will be an effective campaigner, nullifying, to some extent the use of Katrina against the Republicans. You get the picture.

But, then the Republicans can roll in their big monopoly corporate hitters from the oil industry, real estate interests; Wall Street financiers and the rest to support their own self-interest. These will not be displayed in the CNN and MSNBC circles, but behind the scenes with money and influence.

Everyone In No One Out” must be our view. We know that every worker is worth struggling for. Slinging epithets at workers who may have voted Republican in the past or may exhibit anti-woman and racist ideas is not the answer. Demonizing voters from West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Ohio won’t work. The mass media will divide and highlight outrageous behavior on the part of a few to provoke news worth activity. Workers and their unions who chose sides in the Obama/Clinton primaries must be brought together.

The unintended or intended outcome of this kind of union solidarity can be a re-igniting of a labor lead working class party that can engage and win local and state elections and up to the congressional and White House levels. 2. This is the best way that Obama can challenge the racism that remains the Republicans ace in the hole--by pledging to the people that he is much closer in his values and aspirations, in the struggles that he has experienced in his life, than Bush or McCain or Cheney.

That should be a no brainer. McCain represents an administration that even centrist analysts have put on the short list of the very worst in U.S. history. His militarism is unabashed. He hasn't a clue to the way a large majority of Americans live paycheck to paycheck on the installment plan. He is still "Johnny McCain" trying to prove to everyone that he is right and they are wrong and he can beat them in any game of chicken whoever they are, the Iranians, the North Koreans, the Russians.

Obama must lead in bringing the fight to McCain and the Republican right, throwing them back on their heels by making it clear over and over again that this election is about a chasm of inequality obscured by a mountain of public and consumer debt, a government which has literally sold out the American people to transnational corporations, banks and insurance companies, and military contractors--a government that has fought wars for oil and profit and is now putting up as its presidential candidate a man who is likely to fight wars for the hell of it.

With this, grandpa hit the publish button, checked it out on the blog then said, "time for bed, boy, a big day tomorrow."

UPDATE:
Grandpa just grinned as he read the comments to this post.
"Well, folks I got caught trying to mislead you. As you will see in comments, BB-Idaho brought my deception out in the open. Yes, the above is a Marxist argument for voting for Obama rather than voting for McCain. But they are exerpts of two Marxists not just one. The primary one is as BB says, from an article (How the Media got "Class" wrong in the Democratic Primaries")written by Mike Tolochko. The last part is from Norman Markowitz, (Its time for Obama to come out fighting). The articles can both be found, as BB says, over at Political Affairs.net. I separated the two with the numbers 1 and 2.

The point was that I could not help but see how closely the Liberal argument is to the Marxist argument. Considering that the Marxist wants to turn this into a Communist state, I can only assume that they see Obama as leading us down the political path to Marxism that they are promoting and McCain or the Republicans are not. Its almost as if they see Obama as a pawn in the great game of political chess. It will be up to you, the voter, to decide."

A smile crosses grandpa's face as he says, "Congratulations BB, well done."

46 comments:

dcat said...

I have hope! Saw a McCain bumper sticker on an old BMW yesterday!

That is the first one for this neck of the woods.

However I don’t put on bumper stickers it is good to see the ones that are big fans of them having the right one on their car. It put a smile on my face.

As for the damn folks calling, on the phone…like they have an influence? No! Neither do bumper stickers really.

I point and laugh at the obaaaabaaaa stickers.

dcat said...

I have hope! Saw a McCain bumper sticker on an old BMW yesterday!

That is the first one for this neck of the woods.

However I don’t put on bumper stickers it is good to see the ones that are big fans of them having the right one on their car. It put a smile on my face.

As for the damn folks calling, on the phone…like they have an influence? No! Neither do bumper stickers really.

I point and laugh at the obaaaabaaaa stickers.

The Griper said...

mornin, dcat,

that is all bumper stickers are good for, to give someone a good laugh.

tweetey30 said...

I have to admit we havent had anyone calling our house yet for who we want to support for President. Thank Goodness for that though. I think I would tell them all to shove it where the sun dont shine... I dont care for either of them really.

BB-Idaho said...

Looks like Grandpa has been reading
'Political Affairs' again. (heh)
More specificially, the writing of one Mike Tolochko on 6-16-08 at
http://www.politicalaffairs.net/article/view/7017/1/340/ Paragraphs
17-18, 24-25, 31-32. Grandpa is way to old to plagerize, so I assume he just 'borrowed' from those marxist folk? :)

The Griper said...

ahhhhhhhhh you are good, bb, then grins. what gave me away?

BB-Idaho said...

Grandpa's breadth of reading is wide and always something of an enigma. Hence the challenge to those of us who like mysteries and puzzles. (and have plenty of time to light up the Prince Albert and
ponder) What gave Grandpa away was the subtle but noticeable change in style & content..plus the squeak under his rocking chair sounded unusual. :)

The Griper said...

he laughs. then looks at his rocker, "damn, gonna have to fix that squeak"

anyways, good job, amigo.

The Griper said...

hope you enjoyed this little puzzle, BB.

The WordSmith from Nantucket said...

He will be bolstered by support from Colin Powell and other Black Republican leaders who are not pro-Bush;

I heard a rumor that Powell might be supporting Obama. Anything to that?

The Griper said...

have no idea, Wordsmith. but given his past history of staying out of politics, at least on a public level, i wouldn't place any bets on that. he has shown himself to be a soldier through and through, even when he was in the administration.

Gayle said...

I'm glad I got here late, Griper. I might have thought you had lost your mind. LOL! Nothing much gets by BB though, does it? :)

The Griper said...

chuckling, grandpa says, "just gonna have to work a little harder to get by him, gayle. but regardless it was a fun post though it does bring out something to think about seriously. lol"

Anonymous said...

WHEW! When I first read this, I was like, "Nu-uh!" Thankfully I read the update, ha.

Obama is, as a black Orthodox friend of mine wrote in his blog, socialism incarnate. If we think things are bad NOW, just see what happens if Glibama gets elected. There'll be "change" all right.

The Griper said...

karen,
Obama can't do anything on his own regardless of the power of the presidency. he has to convince Congress to follow him. and Congress is going to have to convince their constituents if they wish to be reelected.

the people did it once they can do it again. and if they don't then our kids and grandkids will probably have to suffer for it.

The Griper said...

would have liked to have been a fly up on your wall to have seen your face, karen, lolol

Lista said...

Well, I hope that Obama doesn't get elected and now that McCain has chosen a Pro-Life running mate, I can vote for him now in good conscience.

Lista said...

Griper,
Obama will probably be able to accomplish quite a bit, because the Democrats have the majority in the Congress right now.

BB-Idaho said...

I am sure Grandpa is struck by the coincidental parallels of views on labor and Illinois politicians.
While K. Marx was laboring over
'Das Kapital', a fellow from Illinois, a one-term congressman
noted
"Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital, and deserves much the higher consideration."
Dec 3, 1861 -Abraham Lincoln
..nor, would Grandpa suspect Marx the source for
"I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to
tremble for the safety of my country; corporations have been enthroned, an era of
corruption in High Places will follow, and the Money Power of the Country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the People, until
the wealth is aggregated in a few hands, and the Republic is destroyed."
Abraham Lincoln
..and being just slightly younger than the original 'celebrity' from Illinois, Grandpa no doubt chuckles
that views on labor & capital are slippery to categorize. :)

Lista said...

BB,
How can you give credit to K. Marx for the words of Abraham Lincoln? I distrust socialism because I've heard such negative things about the Socialized Medicine Program in Canada. It seems that it is hard to motive people to do quality work and offer quality services when there are no financial incentives to do so and really no way to get ahead.

Also, anything that is run by the Government always seems to be laden with waist and inefficiency. The Private sector is much more efficient in their use of both money and resources.

Hey Griper,
Now you've done a post that I will back you on totally.

The Griper said...

yes he does chuckle at the slipperiness of the terms. and while our esteemed President has separated the terms, even labor can be placed in the catagory of capital. for the labor of a man can be considered as an asset or a liability to a business. and the labor of a man can be classified as being worthless or of great worth and value. and in doing so, define the man himself. and we do classify people as such whether it be of a business or of a community.

and in a downturn of the economy labor is one of the first asset/liability that a business cuts to fit the economic condiditions. and that seems to be self-contradictory to some. for it would appear to create a condition of less capital to spend on the capital of business which they are exchanging for.

The Griper said...

then again, of our esteemed President in reference we must remember that as a businessman he was a failure too.

BB-Idaho said...

"How can you give credit to K. Marx for the words of Abraham Lincoln?" I didn't.
"it is hard to motive people to do quality work and offer quality services when there are no financial incentives." It is.
My motivations were not financial, other than necessities, I loved my work, took pride in it, sought the acknowledgement of my peers and was rewarded by the satisfaction of a job well done. My employees were renumerated at scale, set by
corporate. They were excellent, responding to respect, being listened to and given credit for
their ideas and treated as persons of value in their own right. True, some are motivated by $$ only. Equally true you can find MDs working in the deserts and jungles for little..Doctors Without Borders, for example, Doctors in free clinics in the Ghettos.
'Capital' is the difference between our pay and our value to
our employer. Dr. Roth at Pfizer, for example invented lipitor, worth $10 billion in 2004 alone. As Griper notes, workers may contribute negatively, for example Ken Lay of Enron, motivated by $$, cost his company $780 million.
Perhaps somewhere in that is the reason Lincoln was not a 'good businessman'. :)

The Griper said...

lista,
bb didn't give credit to Marx for Lincoln's remarks. he was just noting a similarity of the two in regards to economics terms.

and i'd probably agree with bb as to why Lincoln was not a good businessman. motivation has big part to do with it especially in regards to ownership of a business. for no business or very very few starts out with instant profits.

The Griper said...

to paraphrase a gambler, profits are only a means to measure a man's ability to read people. but this is all philosophical in context too.

i don't think there can ever be a time when profit can be totally eliminated as an incentive when it comes to business as I have read some socialists say. it is part of the equation of business.

dcat said...

Sarah is with the NRA!

That is good enough for me! ;)

Lista said...

I don't think that the two quotes that BB gave are really the same. One focuses on the value of labor and the other on the corruption of power. The reason why "the corruption of power" is wrong is because of "the value of labor", so the two ideas can be connected, but each of these statements taken by themselves are not the same.

I could probably say more, but for now I'm quite tired.

The Griper said...

same as what, lista? now you do have me confused.

Lista said...

In BB's comment that he wrote on 8/29/08 at 3:04 PM he included two quotes. He wrote the name Abraham Lincoln after each of these quotes. You said that he was noting "similarity of the two in regards to economics". To me, they seem like two totally separate quotes referring to two different things. I fail to see the connection. The two quotes are not the same.

The first quote relates to the value of labor and the second to the corruption of power. These are two separate ideas except in the fact that the truth of the first makes the reality of the second all that much more horrible.

The Griper said...

the similarity lista was not in the quotes but in how both Lincoln and Marx saw labor and capital.

Lista said...

I guess I'm still not getting it. I guess it's because I haven't really studied Karl Marx. BB is comparing Lincoln Quotes to something else that I haven't really studied. All I know is that the way he applied those ideas, in the form of communism, turned out to be a real negative. In actuality, Marx, just like Lincoln, had some very good ideas. Just because he applied them wrong and sought the wrong sort of solutions, does not mean that his original observations were not correct.

When you think about it, I'm sure Hitler had an occasional correct idea or two as well, but that does not mean that his over all philosophy is correct. No one gets absolutely all of it wrong and most of what's evil starts out with something that's true and then distorts it.

As to Karl Marx, I bet if I studied him, I'd agree with a lot of what he says, but he took the information and went down a wrong path with it, resulting in Communism.

The Griper said...

are you sure there was another path for him to take?

BB-Idaho said...

I'm admittedly dim when it comes to economic systems, but many years back I taught a course in the
'Evils Of Communism' in the army; the thrust of which was total centralized gov't control, totalitarianism and loss of economic freedoms (as well as most others) + spreading the terrible gosple to other countries. We in the US interchange communism and socialism to our delight (and often confusion). My thoughts are that degrees of socialism exist..eg. government provided fire, police etc (gov't employees make up a considerable
percentage in this country). There is more 'socialism' in some European countries, such as mandated vacation (ususally working up to 30 days a year), whereas the US is the sole first world country where business determines the figure (and 25% of US workers receive no paid vacation); other social situations such as health and retirement are
government regulated or run..yet these countries also have private
businesses which do quite well..and they are not totalitarian..the population elects their politicians as we do.
We tend to fear socialism because
business fears socialism (like unions it tends to empower workers)
because it is inefficient for them.
We tend to fear it because it costs tax money and no one likes taxes. I would submit, however, that the oft-quoted 'business is more efficient than gov't' can and is neutralized in some cases by
profit. Example, the county runs a home for the aged. The purpose is of course care of the aged. It sells the home to a company. The purpose of the company is to make money (care of the aged is no longer the purpose).
Cost cutting begins, jobs are cut, services are cut, patients die..but money is made. Until the lawyers show up. They close the place and buy another. So, business is good at many things, but not so good at others. Efficiency is not people friendly. Consider we do not bid out our military service to mercenaries
(or DO we?), nor the national parks, etc. Long-winded, but the point is business is good and so is government..just at different things. As to socialism vs communism, a thoughtful discussion occurs here: http://episteme.arstechnica.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/28609695/m/264007855831/inc/-1 IMO, we may have a little, we may get a little more or less, but the US population is too diverse, too polyglot, too independent and too well off to accept much in the way of socialism. Should wealth distribution become too skewed, of course, bets are off..history is cluttered with peasant revolts. :)

Lista said...

Not having studied Karl Marx, I can only go with what's been quoted above and I assume Marx must have said something similar, or BB would not have used the quotes to point out the similarities, so let's look at it.

"Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital."

When I read this, the "therefore" that comes to my mind is that bosses need to appreciate their workers, not "therefore" we need to become communistic. That's a different conclusion and a different path.

"I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. Corporations have been enthroned. An era of corruption in High Places will follow and the Money Power of the Country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the People, until the wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed."

When I read this, the "therefore" that comes to my mind is that there needs to be some government regulation, such as breaking up monopoles and creating laws relating to the rights of workers, not that "therefore" we need communism.

The only thing that prevents you from seeing more than one possible conclusion to the above ideas, Griper, is your black and white thinking. You take everything to it's furthest extreme and see nothing in the middle.

The Griper said...

lista,
i said similarities of the use of terms not similarities of ideology.

BB-Idaho said...

In fairness, many of these ideas, be they Marx, working from a theoretical philosophical standpoint, or Lincoln making political statements, were a reaction to the 'Robber Baron' era: laissez faire capitalism run amock. Marx in relation to the
deplorable labor practices of the European industrial revolution..
child labor, 12 hour days, subsistance pay, etc. Lincoln in frustration with fortunes made by overcharging the Union Army for
shoddy clothing, arms and foodstuffs. Later would come the
logging 'barons', the railroad
'barons', the oil 'barons' etc.
Hence TR's big stick against cartels and monopolies and the rise of the trade union movements.
While most of this is water under the bridge, the natural tendencies remain..the average Joe seeks not a free ride...just a fair shake. Marx and Lincoln cannot be confused...Lincoln was the humorous one :)

The Griper said...

bb,
when government competes with private enterprise as per your example the odds of probability is in the favor of private enterprise when it come to the care of those they are in charge of.

are there those who place profit above the care of people? the answer is yes but the same thing can be said of government but more so. they place power above the care also. the difference being is that government can regulate and punish private enterprise but there is no one to regulate and who is there to punish government?

i do not fear communism or socialism per say. i fear government, any government, especially when the power is centralized.

and socialism or communism does not give greater power to the worker except in theory. in practice power is denied of the businessman but in denying power does not empower the worker. it empowers the entity that does the denying of that power, government. and in doing so denys the people power over its government even more.

communism or socialism are not natural forms of economics. the only way they can exist is through laws imposed upon the people. they will not nor cannot come into existence naturally and on their own. they must be imposed upon the people by man's law. and with laws who is in control besides government? in both cases it is man attempting to defy nature and create the perfect society. and you know how jealous Mother nature is of her own powers.

and i'll agree business is good and government can be good as long as they are separated with each serving the people as they were intended by creation. but neither should attempt to believe it can do the purpose of the other better.

in practice they can only fail because they are not self-sustainable. and when they fail the society as a whole suffers not just segments of it as happens in private enterprise.

in a so-called mixed economy it is private enterprise that supports the socialized sector of the economy as well as itself.

a

BB-Idaho said...

Well said Griper. The concept of
economic/political development from the dawn of civilization is
interesting and instructive, if somewhat nebulous. We know (or think) that even the most primitive of tribal societies faced something of a 'mixed economy' where the division of labor was gender-based and under the guidance or direction of either a leader or council of elders. Such early groups were
nomadic hunters, tightly bound by tradition (which precluded total anarchy). Long after agriculture,
villages and even nation concepts,
labor was a homebound personal or family operation. Even after the
transition to kings and priests
(whose labor value was organizational leadership) economics was relatively simple.
The introduction of slavery perhaps saw the concept of value
addition..eg productivity, where the output value was greater than the input vavlue..adding complication (such as displacement of the poor by cheaper labor and hence the concept of the 'dole'). The later introduction of coinage, foreign markets and more powerful states required the first formal regulatory rules....as well as the generation, collection and use of wealth. But the last few generations have witnessed the machine, then automation, stocks
& bonds and finally instant communication. Concomitantly,
labor/value perceptions have grown complex (how does Paris Hilton make millions?)(why are there
stock bubbles?) (why are US soldiers on foodstamps?) Of necessity, society attempts to
moderate, regulate economic activity, which since social groups (nations) are so huge, government gets involved. Thus
terms arise, (capitalism, free market, socialism, communism,
laissaz faire, Dept of commerce, Dept of Agriculture, Federal Trade Commission, etc) applied in varying degrees, with varying success. With 'globalization' we have coporations with bigger revenue & cash flow than some countries..with resulting powerful influence. We assign positive or negative attributes to the various
'control systems'..we in the US
are leery of socialism, while in N Europe it is accepted and works well. Free market democracies are
actually difficult to begin and maintain (modern Soviet Union) and even more confusing when stacked
with politics (modern China. I agree that small business is where most wealth is generated; not sure why, but they are generally more productive and innovative as well as employee friendly..perhaps the
intimate nature of smaller groupings. How often do we see
a thriving small business gobbled up and managed from Wall Street
slowly fade and utlimately fail?
Would we expect our tax dollars to be wasted? What percent end up with General Dynmamics or Boeing?
Governments at all levels are big consumers, driving private enterprise (well, except for Paris Hilton) and for better or worse,
government and business are rather intertangled. ..I think :)

The Griper said...

bb,
"Governments at all levels are big consumers..."

there is the problem and difference as i see it. government are consumers not producers of goods and services. its only product that was meant to be beneficial are laws. now, who those laws benefits is another story. in theory, it can only benefit the existing government or the people it rules over as a society. it can never truly be beneficial to the individual per se unless that person is the government itself. we define these forms of government either as a dictatorship or a monarcharcy.

this differs from free enterprise where a business is both, a consumer and a producer. thus, by its nature, benefits both itself(owners) and society. we see the owners as the greater beneficiaries only because the benefits are concentrated to the few whereas the benefits to society are dispersed among the many. and we look at both from an individual point of view instead of there being two separate groups, one smaller than the other.

we see the owner of the business as the only beneficiary but in reality it is not only the owner that benefits but also the employees and eventually society itself. this is the result of how we do accounting. we place the benefits to employees into expense accounts but see the benefits to owners in the profit column. we could very easily erase the benefits to employees from the expense column thus creating a sense of greater (illusionary)profits then dispersing those profits, accordingly, to the employer and employees as it was agreed upon by both, the employer and his employees. thus creating a sense of profit sharing.

there is only one problem with this though. people see business only from the view of profits. that is not true. businesses have losses too.

that is why they have a profit/loss sheet that is a part of the accounting system of business. it is not just a profit sheet.

thus if we have a profit sharing form of accounting as i illustrated above then, in all fairness, the employees would also have to be willing to kick back some of their pay when a business is in the red. this is what would occur in an employee owned business.

we must also remember that "property rights" for the individual is a verily new term also. in fact, at one time in the past, taxes could be said as being synonymous with the word rent. for it was the king that had property rights over the entire of his realm. and when new territory was claimed it was claimed in the name of the king that the person was under.

and this has always puzzled me in regards to our declaration of independence. why did jefferson reword Locke's God-given rights on that issue?

BB-Idaho said...

In response to "why did jefferson reword Locke's God-given rights on that issue?" I was going to note
that ol Thomas needed to square the 'natural right to the fruits of our own labor' with his ownership of slaves. But, it turns out ol John was a major investor in the Royal African Co.
allround purveyor of slaves.
(did this make them that maligned charactor 'the overseer'?) In hindsight and overfairness, they apparently believed that all men were created by nature free, except some.

The Griper said...

yes, one could interpret it in that manner. or it could be that they thought that freedom like everything else in life had to be earned and only those who were willing to die for it deserved freedom. it seems like this would be the prevailing thought of those days and throughout history. slave taking was one of the spoils of war. and while i will not attempt to prove it, it was probably one of the reasons people gathered together as a society, in recognition, that in numbers there was strength.

i think also that people back then understood that at any time they could end up as a slave too. slavery wasn't just a black issue. in fact people, in essense sold themselves also.

Lista said...

Wow! Quite a few comments have come in since I was last here.

Giper,
I guess I fail to see the significance of "similarities of the use of terms".

BB,
The comment you wrote on the 30th at 8:01 is a good example of how people tend to react to extremes with opposite extremes. I agree with your statement that "The average Joe seeks not a free ride, just a fair shake."

Griper,
It's not entirely true that "There is no one to regulate....government." The votes of the people do have an effect, just as apparently, there are still enough Pro-life Conservatives in this country to influence who McCain chose as a VP Running Mate. Praise God!!

I only fear government when the media works in their favor and people are deceived. Deception is the tool that cripples the power of intelligent voters and prevents them from keeping the government in line.

I agree with what you said about Communism and Socialism.

It would really be neat if businesses viewed themselves as "serving the people", as you have suggested. That is not generally, though, how business people think.

"When they" (Governments) "fail, the society as a whole suffers, not just segments of it, as happens in private enterprise." and "In a so called mixed economy, it is private enterprise that supports the socialized sector." These are both interesting statements, Griper.

It's not true that laws do not benefit people. They do. Laws relating to crime create an atmosphere that is more safe and other laws are designed to protect one group from another, such as workers from their employers. These laws benefit the workers, not the government, though I do agree with you that businesses do benefit society. In fact, this is something that a lot of Democrats don't seem to understand. Shoot! We need businesses or there would not be any Gross National Product or jobs.

We need government too, though, because people are not always fair to each other.

The Griper said...

lista,
this will be my last comment in this post. the thread is getting too long and i'm too lazy. lol

"It's not true that laws do not benefit people."
i never said that laws do not benefit people. in fact i said they did. but they benefit people as a society not as individuals.
how do those laws benefit those individuals that were killed or robbed? when laws are broken, lista, only government benefits from those laws. for it is the law that permits government to punish those who broke the law. the individual still must protect himself and his property from those who would take it from him.

"It's not entirely true that "There is no one to regulate....government"

it is true, lista. the people may have an influence on governmental decisions but influence and regulate are not synomynous.

government, lista, has been called a "necessary evil" just as i believe war is. and evil is always something to fear regardless of its necessity.

in the creation of government, man has given a few men all the authority of a god with the exception of the power to create. and men have never been able to handle that much authority without abusing it sooner or later.

Lista said...

I'm getting a little tired too, yet I can't seem to stop talking anyway. I guess that's my nature.

A society can not be benefited without the individuals in that society being benefited. The goal is for the benefit to be spread to as many people as possible.

The statement "Only government benefits from those laws." implies that the law does not also benefit the people, so you are contradicting yourself when you claim "I never said that laws do not benefit people."

Why does anyone have to regulate anyone. Perhaps influence is enough. I'm grateful for it.

Government in itself is not evil, only the desire for power that exists in some of its leaders. There are some checks in balances in our Government. The very fact that there are three branches, whether than only one and also the fact that we have the right to vote does limit their power at least to some small degree and we have to pray that this will be enough.

Lista said...

I guess when I said that "I'm getting tired too.", I did sort mean it because after writing and publishing my last comment and than hitting the "Home" link below, I realized that you have written another post, but I'm not going to read it just yet. I'm just too tired, but I'll be back.

I always hope when you say "This is my last comment.", what you really mean is "Let's rap it up." and not "I'm hanging up now."; Click.

The Griper said...

lista,
ok, i lied. lol
your hope has been granted. that is what i mean.

"Government in itself is not evil..."

it is the people who hold the positions of government that gives government meaning,lista. there is no such thing as government without them.

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