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>Something being funded by the Kochs doesn't automatically make it a Koch propaganda outfit. When that something is a "think tank", adults understand that what

>Something being funded by the Kochs doesn't automatically make it a Koch propaganda outfit. When that something is a "think tank", adults understand that what it produces is intellectual ammunition for increased privatization and reduced protections for consumers, employees and neighbors of business. In this case, very low-grade ammunition. >Vague, unscientific claims of class victimization, with no statistical support provided, is the bread and butter of socialist demagoguery And the bread and butter of right-wing pro-business "think tanks" is the prompting of voluntary red-baiting such as you just offered. Fact: on the basis of influence, there is no socialist or pro-cooperative-ownership analog to Mises or Manhattan Institute nor to any one of the dozens of pro-market / libertarian think tanks cranking out "science" that always finds in favor of capitalist boardrooms. That indisputable fact alone means you have no business invoking science -- all you're doing is literally standing up to defend the world's most entrenched, powerful interests. Someone actually interested in science, unlike yourself, would, on principle, be skeptical toward purveyors of "science" that never comes to different conclusions no matter the problem domain.

rvdavis 10y ago
> When that something is a "think tank", adults understand that what it produces... > That indisputable fact alone means you have no business invoking science -- all you're doing is literally standing up to defend the world's most entrenched, powerful interests. Someone actually interested in science, unlike yourself, would, on principle, be skeptical toward purveyors of "science" that never comes to different conclusions no matter the problem domain. I think you could have made your point without the ad hominem.
- harrumph 10y ago
  >I think you could have made your point without the ad hominem. Fair enough. I hope that everybody involved will survive the encounter.
aminok 10y ago
>When that something is a "think tank", adults understand that what it produces is intellectual ammunition for increased privatization and reduced protections for consumers, employees and neighbors of business. In this case, very low-grade ammunition. Only a mental child would believe in this caricature. And authoritarian prohibitions against consenting adults engaging in voluntary interactions, like buying an experimental drug not approved by the FDA, or working a job that doesn't provide some mandated benefit like statutory holidays, do not "protect" consumers or workers. It restricts their rights and forces them to follow government preferences over their own. Only a child would buy the socialist propaganda and believe that violating people's human rights by punishing those who don't abide by some intrusive mandate, is "protecting" them. >Fact: on the basis of influence, there is no socialist or pro-cooperative-ownership analog to Mises or Manhattan Institute nor to any one of the dozens of pro-market / libertarian think tanks cranking out "science" that always finds in favor of capitalist boardrooms. How delusional you are. There are a ton of statist and/or left wing think tanks and public policy research institutions. The Economic Policy Institute, the Center for American Progress, and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities are a few of many organizations that promote highly anti-libertarian policies. The Hamilton Project, heavily funded by banks, supports a government backed central banking cartel that violates essential rights to free exchange, and numerous leftist programs designed to buy votes. Massively funded academic institutions lean heavily leftist as well.
- harrumph 10y ago
  > [Consumer and worker protections] restrict their rights and forces them to follow government preferences over their own. The problem is this adorable libertarian dedication to freedom and voluntary interactions naturally ends the second any employer or commercial neighbor says it ends. Such an arrangement produces freedom for the boardroom and nobody else. No thanks - we can all see through this horseshit by now. >How delusional you are. There are a ton of statist and/or left wing think tanks and public policy research institutions. And on the basis of influence over public policy, your argument is that these think tanks you name are somehow responsible for the really existing world under late capitalism: its skyrocketing levels of privatization, plummeting protections for workers, employees and neighbors, all-time lows in union membership, increasing latitude for business interests, monumental struggles to merely obtain wages that match the heightened productivity of modern workers, etc. That's a, uh, novel argument you've got there. Might even be delusional.

rvdavis 10y ago

> When that something is a "think tank", adults understand that what it produces... > That indisputable fact alone means you have no business invoking science -- all you're doing is literally standing up to defend the world's most entrenched, powerful interests. Someone actually interested in science, unlike yourself, would, on principle, be skeptical toward purveyors of "science" that never comes to different conclusions no matter the problem domain. I think you could have made your point without the ad hominem.

harrumph 10y ago
>I think you could have made your point without the ad hominem. Fair enough. I hope that everybody involved will survive the encounter.

aminok 10y ago

>When that something is a "think tank", adults understand that what it produces is intellectual ammunition for increased privatization and reduced protections for consumers, employees and neighbors of business. In this case, very low-grade ammunition. Only a mental child would believe in this caricature. And authoritarian prohibitions against consenting adults engaging in voluntary interactions, like buying an experimental drug not approved by the FDA, or working a job that doesn't provide some mandated benefit like statutory holidays, do not "protect" consumers or workers. It restricts their rights and forces them to follow government preferences over their own. Only a child would buy the socialist propaganda and believe that violating people's human rights by punishing those who don't abide by some intrusive mandate, is "protecting" them. >Fact: on the basis of influence, there is no socialist or pro-cooperative-ownership analog to Mises or Manhattan Institute nor to any one of the dozens of pro-market / libertarian think tanks cranking out "science" that always finds in favor of capitalist boardrooms. How delusional you are. There are a ton of statist and/or left wing think tanks and public policy research institutions. The Economic Policy Institute, the Center for American Progress, and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities are a few of many organizations that promote highly anti-libertarian policies. The Hamilton Project, heavily funded by banks, supports a government backed central banking cartel that violates essential rights to free exchange, and numerous leftist programs designed to buy votes. Massively funded academic institutions lean heavily leftist as well.

harrumph 10y ago
> [Consumer and worker protections] restrict their rights and forces them to follow government preferences over their own. The problem is this adorable libertarian dedication to freedom and voluntary interactions naturally ends the second any employer or commercial neighbor says it ends. Such an arrangement produces freedom for the boardroom and nobody else. No thanks - we can all see through this horseshit by now. >How delusional you are. There are a ton of statist and/or left wing think tanks and public policy research institutions. And on the basis of influence over public policy, your argument is that these think tanks you name are somehow responsible for the really existing world under late capitalism: its skyrocketing levels of privatization, plummeting protections for workers, employees and neighbors, all-time lows in union membership, increasing latitude for business interests, monumental struggles to merely obtain wages that match the heightened productivity of modern workers, etc. That's a, uh, novel argument you've got there. Might even be delusional.