tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post3329983732769830836..comments2024-03-28T13:08:04.959-07:00Comments on CONTRARY BRIN: The masterful art of manipulationDavid Brinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comBlogger82125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-24727256798265039452017-07-22T10:16:41.618-07:002017-07-22T10:16:41.618-07:00Dr. Brin, I enjoy this blog and hope you continue ...Dr. Brin, I enjoy this blog and hope you continue it.I am interested in your position on the officer corps being the salvation of our form of government. Although I have respect for most of the senior staff there are exceptions; William Boykin and Michael Flynn come to mind. I am also concerned with the evangelical networking in the USAF that started at the Air Force academy years ago. The senior staff may have a sense of honor and duty but their beliefs may not coincide with yours. As to lower ranking officers I would point out that Tom Cotton and Mike Coffman have not shown any spine regarding the present administration. As I was only an enlisted man (USN) my experience was with the junior officer class some of whose qualifications appeared to only be a BA from any school that can award one. Some of them were dumber than a box of rocks but when passed over they left and some, help us, got into politics. Mr. Driscollhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03148745475908676210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-35384863765532684982017-07-20T13:22:00.586-07:002017-07-20T13:22:00.586-07:00Larryhart, my special virtues are that I'm aus...Larryhart, my special virtues are that I'm australian and I don't use social media much.J.L.Mcnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-43383065481406692372017-07-20T11:14:04.472-07:002017-07-20T11:14:04.472-07:00onward
onwardonward<br /><br />onwardDavid Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-2702731251842046312017-07-20T10:52:07.049-07:002017-07-20T10:52:07.049-07:00I checked out the ecosophia blog and comment secti...I checked out the ecosophia blog and comment section and found it amusing. Part of me wanted to comment and point out the irony/absurdity of using an online blog to complain about the evils of science and technology, but I figured that trying to start a nerd version of the Biggie/Tupac fued would be rather silly. Phaedrusnailfilehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09496149647457655733noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-53516658477177327942017-07-20T10:42:20.941-07:002017-07-20T10:42:20.941-07:00Carl there is a reason why libertarians tend to b...Carl there is a reason why libertarians tend to be more sympathetic to conservatives. Conservative intellectuals tend to pander much more and soothe "yes, yes, your enemies are MY enemies, and hence (here's a nice dinner) MY enemies should be YOUR enemies! (Here's a nice Cato grant.)"<br /><br />I am not "kneejerk" in the face of libertarian ideas. I am among the only ones reminding you guys of your CORE idea! That COMPETITION is the central and most powerful concept and the most creative force in the universe.<br /><br />Carl... that C-Word is almost never, ever mentioned amid today's Rothbard-Rand-Koch-Cato maelstrom. It is all propertarianism and hate-all-government-all-the-time-no-matter-what. <br /><br />The right also hates on science and every other fact-user profession, but they know libertarians won't follow them down that rat hole, so they emphasize hate-all-government-all-the-time-no-matter-what. Yep. Hate on the oligarchs' chief rivals. Crush em! So that the oligarchs will have nothing standing in their way.<br /><br />If COMPETITION were revived as the core Libertarian idea (along with its partner freedom) then you guys would realize:<br /><br />- 6000 years prove that oligarchs are the LAST folks you should ally with. They have always always always crushed competition.<br /><br />- Liberals can be negotiated with and about half of what they do increases freedom and competition, which flourish when they are in charge. The other half can be fought or negotiated as adults since most of them want the same goal.<br /><br />- Rightists do nothing for freedom and competition EVER!<br /><br />Oh, but they pander to some LP buzz words! Oh! I am shot down. You're right. The oligarchs are so, so libertarian.<br /><br />===<br /><br />I am still waiting for you to even nod toward the central fact of 6000 years.David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-48455684391627250752017-07-20T10:39:16.183-07:002017-07-20T10:39:16.183-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.Phaedrusnailfilehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09496149647457655733noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-46858885048247855402017-07-20T10:27:58.294-07:002017-07-20T10:27:58.294-07:00There is a reason why libertarians tend to be more...There is a reason why libertarians tend to be more sympathetic to conservatives. Conservative intellectuals tend to be less quick to knee jerk in the presence of libertarian ideas. (Actually, many of the radical progressives are also more open minded. The crowd at opednews.com is far more friendly than the crowd at dailykos or New York Times. And I got a generally better reception for my ideas at one of Jim Hightower's Rolling Thunder events than I get here.) <br /><br />Did I accuse you of wanting to revive the Byzantine Empire, or adopt a Chinese imperial style of government? They had civil servants too.<br /><br />I referred back to pre-feudal England, because that is one of the last examples of competitive government in the [semi] civilized world. <br /><br />And no, I am not advocating such a system. I said libertarians are. I am a postlibertarian, if anything. These days I'm pushing for radical federalism and range voting to make government better approximate the will of the people.Carl M.https://www.blogger.com/profile/01278814334603631598noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-76604960064629755442017-07-20T09:41:12.266-07:002017-07-20T09:41:12.266-07:00Aw man. I never expected to see Carl M drift into ...Aw man. I never expected to see Carl M drift into romantic nostalgia and making excuses for the grinding, oppressive, freedom-limiting and creativity crushing and competition-quashing regimes that nearly all of ou ancestors endured. But there he is, quibbling and nitpicking and squirming to escape that fundamental question…<br /><br />…that I’ll repeat over and over and over. Sir. Did not nearly all past societies see flat-open-fair competition and markets and freedom suppressed by inherited oligarchies who used force and ownership and religion to ensure that their sons would have unfair and unearned advantage over others? And weren’t those 99%+ of societies far more freedom and competition-repressed than Sweden or the U.S. under their “horrible” civil servants? In fact, didn’t Adam Smith recommend civil servants as counterbalance to the oligarchs whom he deemed to be the worst repressors and cheaters of markets? And wasn’t oligarchy the enemy of the American Founders?<br /><br />Repeating doesn’t work with these guys. Alas, they squirrel and distract. But here’s that repetition, anyway.<br /><br />Did not nearly all past societies see flat-open-fair competition and markets and freedom suppressed by inherited oligarchies who used force and ownership and religion to ensure that their sons would have unfair and unearned advantage over others? And weren’t those 99%+ of societies far more freedom and competition-repressed than Sweden or the U.S. under their “horrible” civil servants? In fact, didn’t Adam Smith recommend civil servants as counterbalance to the oligarchs whom he deemed to be the worst repressors and cheaters of markets? And wasn’t oligarchy the enemy of the American Founders?David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-16657273469660390482017-07-20T09:28:09.271-07:002017-07-20T09:28:09.271-07:00Something rotten always smells from under the door...Something rotten always smells from under the door of the reactionaries who have removed themselves from the Catholic church in protest of lost strictness and liberal encroachments. Bannon, blogger Greer, et al.<br /><br />Here is Philip Glass's music to accompany a movie about Yukio Mishima, who, if you don't know, attempted an ultra-right coup in Japan a while back, (he had the fine medieval values of a poet, wrote 34 novels, about 50 plays, about 25 books of short stories, and at least 35 books of essays) and committed honorable seppuku upon its failure..<br /><br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXf77yY8qVg&list=PLdbQSpw5EkxDUVaFRtpmVaOklKX5h2BpK&index=5Jumperhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11794110173836133321noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-91067727552802284142017-07-20T08:39:49.052-07:002017-07-20T08:39:49.052-07:00From today's www.electoral-vote.com :
Angry c...From today's www.electoral-vote.com :<br /><i><br />Angry conservatives are threatening to primary opponents of the health-care bill, but they have the same problem Trump does: None of the three women are up in 2018. They could primary two senators who are up in 2018, Heller and Jeff Flake (R-AZ), but an unsuccessful primary campaign will only convince the senator that he doesn't need the conservatives and a successful one will create an open seat in the general election race, thereby giving up the Republicans' biggest advantage: incumbency. Besides, both Heller and Flake know very well that moving to the right will only make their general election efforts much more difficult.<br /></i><br /><br />That last sentence is indeed what has me scratching my head. The only reason Republican senators are not voting for this thing in the first place is because heat is being put on them by their constituents not to. How is a threat of "If you don't repeal the ACA, we'll challenge you with someone who will!" supposed to work when the constituents who would vote in the primary are clearly against repealing the ACA? If the idea is that only hard right-wingers vote in primaries, well then the party is threatening to nominate someone who will likely lose in the general.<br /><br />LarryHartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-44454562672872753642017-07-20T08:13:41.387-07:002017-07-20T08:13:41.387-07:00J.L.Mc:
I just want everyone to know how grateful...J.L.Mc:<br /><i><br />I just want everyone to know how grateful I am that I shall not be controlled by Christian dominionists or even the Russians, for I have special virtues that make me resistant to their dickeries.<br /></i><br /><br />I presume there's a bit of sarcasm there, but I've actually wondered the same thing--what possible advertisements or fake news could anyone send me which would make me vote Republican, or even vote in a manner that helps a Republican to win. I realize that Commissioner Gordon had his "Like so many others, I'm afraid I've...lost faith in the Dynamic Duo" moment, but I didn't believe it then either.<br />LarryHartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-45352210964346850712017-07-20T07:34:09.154-07:002017-07-20T07:34:09.154-07:00I suppose you think the difference between slavery...I suppose you think the difference between slavery and tenant farming was a mere nit pick as well.<br /><br />Today we pay for protection services from insurance companies and lawyers...as well as from several layers of government.<br /><br />The key word is Shop. Similar words are Choose and Quit.<br /><br />(From a libertarian perspective, the societies in your recent books -- look rather medieval. Recall that the first socialists were looking <i>backwards</i>. The Middle Ages that most people remember was a society of guilds and mutual obligations. Many economic ties were akin to marriage. Benefits, lifetime employment, welfare programs...these too were part of the system.)<br /><br />For those who despise methodological individualism, how about we go ALL the way back to the natural state of humans. Our hard wiring is for societies with both communal and libertarian elements. This article nails it:<br /><br />https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201304/the-most-basic-freedom-is-freedom-quit<br /><br />It is an impossible ideal in our heavily populated world, but it is worth dreaming of approximations -- while being careful not to overoptimize on a subset of the aspects. Carl M.https://www.blogger.com/profile/01278814334603631598noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-27741021215684324772017-07-20T06:21:42.880-07:002017-07-20T06:21:42.880-07:00Hi everyone, I just want everyone to know how grat...Hi everyone, I just want everyone to know how grateful I am that I shall not be controlled by Christian dominionists or even the Russians, for I have special virtues that make me resistant to their dickeries.J.L.Mcnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-70871806179348493662017-07-20T05:39:53.775-07:002017-07-20T05:39:53.775-07:00George Carty, that makes it sound vile & inces...George Carty, that makes it sound vile & incestuous, Good Work!Tim H.noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-23081214809709769872017-07-20T04:04:54.328-07:002017-07-20T04:04:54.328-07:00What about calling our enemy "hereditary olig...What about calling our enemy "hereditary oligarchy"?George Cartyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12170378024031141482noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-84088185591587290162017-07-20T03:34:54.784-07:002017-07-20T03:34:54.784-07:00dr. Brin,
ancient temple/palace civilizations lik...dr. Brin, <br />ancient temple/palace civilizations like Fertile Crescent or Egypt weren't feudal, and not a nice place to live...<br />slave societies weren't feudal, and they were even worse: serfs had some limited rights, slaves were commodities. <br />Asian bureaucracies a.ka. Wittfogel's hydraulic despotism ("they had two ministries: finance, for internal plunder, and war, for foreign plunder", good ol' Karl wrote) weren't feudal, but would you choose between being a serf in Europe or a peasant in China? a choice between bad and worse.And so on. Overall, I'd prefer a generic "high coercion/low surplus societies". At least in theory feudalism proper involved bilateral obligations and mutual "advice and consent", the Magna Charta came from that background. It was more democratic than God King autocracies, allowed some embryonic rule of law, the development of towns, ("bourgesie", those who live in the town). It even gave us the way we think about love...<br /><br />I understand why you use it, and in which meaning. "Oligarchy & exploitation" would be better. But as long it's a blog on politics and not Medieval History 101, you're aquitted :-) <br />Marinonoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-41381771011277899542017-07-20T02:01:58.970-07:002017-07-20T02:01:58.970-07:00DT's sick disparagement of McCain ("I lik...DT's sick disparagement of McCain ("I like guys who aren't captured) should have been one of a thousand statements that disqualified him. But they were features, not bugs! BECAUSE they offended America's grownups.<br />David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-13958993454735625452017-07-20T02:00:29.333-07:002017-07-20T02:00:29.333-07:00Marino, then you too. I ask that you and Carl and...Marino, then you too. I ask that you and Carl and all the others who nitpick over the definition of feudalism provide another word that stands for pyramidal, hierarchical societies that quashed competition by ensuring that the sons of the owner caste would be inherently advantaged by inherited lordship imposed by sword, tradition and religion.<br /><br />Give us a name, so we can force nitpickers to admit that the crushing of competition by owner-oligarchs was THE great enemy of enterprise and freedom across 99.99% of 6000 years. <br /><br /> The enemy directly denounced by Adam Smith. <br /><br />The enemy that the American founders rebelled against. <br /><br />The real foes of the real-actual tea party. <br /><br />The must also be a word for how desperately they writhe and squirm to avoid facing this, the most blatant fact of all human history.David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-11324200747088765812017-07-20T01:40:29.468-07:002017-07-20T01:40:29.468-07:00last and final: a guy who posts on a US politics/c...last and final: a guy who posts on a US politics/current affairs list gave the news of McCain having brain cancer dubbing him <b>McLame.</b>:<br />[LidlessEye] McLame has brain cancer<br /><br />I think it's an object lesson about how Trump supporters see decent, reasonable conservatives and moderate Republicans. <br />Well, we walked that walk first under Berlusconi, and now with mr. Grillo so we're accustomed.<br />Now, try to imagine all those <i>barren childless EU leaders</i> like Merkel, Macron or Gentiloni using that language against their opponents...(in this case, not even "opponents", the guy I quoted is a GOP voter) Marinohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09619311709894008389noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-15641908990902937902017-07-20T01:29:41.704-07:002017-07-20T01:29:41.704-07:00"Regarding the repeated feudalism charge: the..."Regarding the repeated feudalism charge: the system that the anarcho-capitalists advocates most resembles PRE-feudal England; that is, England before William the Conqueror. Then, the aristocrats sold protection services. They competed for clients. Peasants were not bound to thanes"<br /><br />you know I've often nitpicked with use of "feudalism", as it applies imho only to Carolingian Europe and maybe Japan, but there are a lot of low surplus/high coercion societal systems while not being truly feudal, are nasty enough for the common folk to live in.<br />Usually "selling protection service" means that someone else is threatening the recipients of the offer, or that the wannabe sellers also threaten themselves the perspective clients about using violence against them. ("Nice shop you got there, pity if something bad happens to it", common request for protection in Sicily and elsewhere... ) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pizzo_(extortion)<br /><br />Now, really could such a system be useful to an high-tech civ with high levels of personal freedom? To me it seems a fallback to personal bonds of fealty (see Niven's Oath of fealthy..) and I'd leave Libertarian utopias in the pages of Neil Smith and Vernor Vinge, where thya are amusing to read and hurt no one... :-)<br />Marinohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09619311709894008389noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-28881095238625328282017-07-20T01:16:43.094-07:002017-07-20T01:16:43.094-07:00dear dr. Brin,
if you want to wake some Randroids ...dear dr. Brin,<br />if you want to wake some Randroids from their "dogmatic sleep" (like another David, Hume, did to Kant) may I suggest you a prank? Skim thru' Lenin's State and the Revolution, there are enough scathing indictments of the <i>evil oppressive state</i> to make any Libertarian all warm and fuzzy, then shout "It was Vladimir frickin' Lenin, you twits..." :-) <br /><br />And, given we're speaking about Enlightenment, there is a nice issue with the history of the word "socialist"*. It appeared for the first time in Latin, in a book by a Dominican preacher in the 1740s, here in Italy. He minted the term to label those impious heretics who dare to assume that men were sociable and could arrange their own government without religious sanction, using just reason. His target was the Enlightenment in Italy, but the label applies perfectly also to Scottish Enlightenment, so technically speaking you could state that Adam Smith was "socialist". And then look at the faces of your listeners...<br /><br />*the history has been explained in full by our major historian of Enlightenment, Franco Venturi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franco_Venturi, somewhere in his <i>The End of the Old Regime in Europe, 1768-1776</i><br /><br /><br />Marinohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09619311709894008389noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-72936243021342206662017-07-20T00:54:04.503-07:002017-07-20T00:54:04.503-07:00David,
or to put it another way, his justificatio...David,<br /> or to put it another way, his justification of anarcho-capitalism is that it is more like the mafia than noblesse oblige. So he is planning to move to Russia?reasonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06594313655855683716noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-20447129712148537602017-07-19T23:59:55.771-07:002017-07-19T23:59:55.771-07:00“Regarding the repeated feudalism charge: the syst...“Regarding the repeated feudalism charge: the system that the anarcho-capitalists advocates most resembles PRE-feudal England; that is, England before William the Conqueror. Then, the aristocrats sold protection services. They competed for clients. Peasants were not bound to thanes.”<br /><br />Bah, Carl, all you have is nit pickery. Are you saying ownership and estates and power and unfair advantage weren’t passed from father to son? Or are you proclaiming “feudalism wasn’t pervasive, because I’ll fixate on a nit-picked formal definition of “feudalism!””<br /><br />Feh! YOU give us a name for what happened in 99.9% of societies that got agriculture… and most of the others. Tough males repressing competitors and grabbing the women and the property and making sure their sons would start out with vast, unearned advantages. Cabals of cheaters who made sure that Markets, Science, Politics, Courts etc. were warped in their favor…<br /><br />…in other words, the plantation lords for whom libertarianism (as it now stands) has become a lickspittle servant?<br /><br />You pick a name for that. Then finally, finally answer my question about why today’s wholly bought version of libertarianism ignores all that, instead chanting exactly what the lords want to hear.<br />David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-72547865125420441432017-07-19T23:14:57.199-07:002017-07-19T23:14:57.199-07:00"One of the last issues of Cerebus was a pseu...<i>"One of the last issues of Cerebus was a pseudo-religious text which attempted to demonstrate that we are all like particles, and our entanglements with each other end up causing us to get crushed by gravity into the center of the earth or maybe even into the sun. The goal as proposed by Dave was to remain free from entanglements and go into the afterlife as a neutrino which is free to travel throughout the universe without touching or being touched by anything."</i><br /><br />I thought you said he was trying to <i>avoid</i> Hell? Because that existence sounds pretty Hellish to me.<br /><br />Kal, you (surprisingly for someone reading this blog) ignore the fact that the limitations of this one Earth are not necessarily the limits humanity must face. After all, there are a <i>lot</i> of resources Out There - we don't <i>have</i> to stay stuck crawling across the surface of this one ball of dirt and water. Living in free space, or beneath the surface of Mars or the Moon, or inside an asteroid, would not be simple or easy to commence - but "not easy" =/= "impossible".<br /><br />And even before that, we're pretty good at making the resources on this planet stretch. Of course, that process works best in high-tech areas...Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11903687674146271189noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-40722883935333699262017-07-19T20:37:56.750-07:002017-07-19T20:37:56.750-07:00Jumper:
On the issue of our host's rather scr...Jumper:<br /><i><br />On the issue of our host's rather screechy demeanor of late, I must concur. I can assure you I feel like screeching, or rather full-throated screaming, pretty much 24-7 these days, but I am pretty sure it's of limited effectiveness. Make that "very sure."<br /></i><br /><br />It sure works for the Republicans, though.<br /><br />LarryHartnoreply@blogger.com