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>>Government is less powerful nowadays than it has ever been since WW2. I absolutely disagree with this. Under what metric and what government are you referri

by syshum 5y ago

>>Government is less powerful nowadays than it has ever been since WW2. I absolutely disagree with this. Under what metric and what government are you referring to. US Federal Government has continually and unabatedly has increased and centralized its power since at least the Great Depression, Taking power from local and State governments transferring it to the Federal Government. Under no metric can one say government in the US is less powerful today. >The fight should be against the source of power, not against their powerless representatives. The Source of government power is it monopoly on the initiation of violence, last I check it was only government with the legal power to steal, plunder, arrest, jail, and even kill people that disobey. I think it is fine the fight against both

coliveira 5y ago
> Under what metric and what government are you referring to. In the metric that matters: who bought the US government. Current US government is bought by corporate interests and does absolutely nothing that goes against big corporate power. This indicates that government is subjugated to the capitalist oligarchy, and the crimes it commits are allowed or supported by the same capitalist oligarchy.
- int_19h 5y ago
  This doesn't make it any smaller, though. When you concentrate so much power in one place, everyone who craves power will go after it, so its subjugation was inevitable. That's one of the reasons why centralization is bad - and this is completely orthogonal to capitalism and other economic modes. Strong centralized government without capitalism gets you authoritarian (if you're lucky) or totalitarian (if you're not) socialism.
- syshum 5y ago
  So we have come full circle, and you are basically restating my original thesis. Government created corporations, corporations are not a free market invention. With out government there can be no corporations as they are simply a fictitious legal entity created by government for the purposes of liability protections, and investment You seem to have this impression that Corporations hate regulation, this is false, I mean hell Amazon, Facebook, even Google has BEGGED for regulations at various points because the know it kills competition in the market. But yes, keep blaming capitalism for problems created by government, I am sure more government will solve those problems....
  - coliveira 5y ago
    > corporations are not a free market invention Well, if a "free" market cannot create corporations, then what can it really do? You're talking about a fantasy created by your head, not about a free market.
    - nybble41 5y ago
      The argument is that limited liability is something which can only come from a government and not a free market—not companies in general. To a small degree this is probably true, but you can get very close through ordinary contracts. For the most part limited liability only shields you when it comes to your creditors and ordinary business dealings; if you harm someone deliberately, or through negligence, your status as an agent of a limited liability corporation will not prevent you from being found personally liable. And it's not difficult to specify in a contract that any compensation for breach of contract is limited to the assets of the company and not its owners, so that much does not require any government intervention. That leaves a "grey area" limited to accidental harm not involving negligence where the corporation lacks sufficient resources to cover the liability—which is a tiny minority of all cases where corporations probably receive more protection than the corresponding organizations would in a free market, and really not something worth obsessing over.
      - coliveira 5y ago
        This may be correct only in the sense that, without a government, there would be zero liability (instead of limited liability) for big companies. After all who could go against, for example, Microsoft if it decided to screw their customers and suppliers?
        nybble41 5y ago
        Even the largest companies are dependent on maintaining their reputations as organizations which uphold their ends of any agreements. A company which no one will contract with might as well not exist. They're not going to just turn outlaw and repudiate their liability as determined by a fair arbitration process; that would be tantamount to corporate suicide.
thrashh 5y ago
I have to disagree with you too. Government is more weak now because people have become very distrustful of it (reasonable given Vietnam and the events since). Because of that, the government has a lot less teeth nowadays to implement policies. I know people talk about things like abortion and vaccine mandates and these issues are extremely important, but IMO they are extremely small scale topics that are more related to current cultural norms than long term policies. We’re not dealing with the cultural issues of the 1960s these days. What we deal with are the 100 year old bridges, infrastructure projects, processes and programs that previous generations built. To me, these issues are much more important than anything else because they require investment now and yet their returns don’t realize until much later. Yet our corporate tax rate is the lowest in a very long time and corporate tax evasion is huge, yet the government hasn’t had the support they need to do much about it. At the same time, people are (understandably) hugely distrustful of politicians, but all that does long term is hamper the policy making that we need now to set the stage for our grandchildren. I think people vehemently taking pride and fighting over a lot of the current issues now is so short sighted.
- syshum 5y ago
  I see the fundamental issue here. You are looking at from a perspective of what the government should be doing for you, where I do not believe the government should do anything for me. I look at from what the government is or can do to me, what freedoms they take from me, you mention vaccine mandates and call it a "small issue". However from my perspective it is a HUGE issue, mandates to me are a complete intrusion into my body autonomy, if I loose that I cease being a free individual. I look at things like the War on Drugs, War on Gun Rights, War on Terror, and 1000's laws that attempt end runs around the constitution and individual rights as an extreme expansion of government power Where you look at crumbling bridges, a service I do not believe should be in the purview of the federal government at all in the first place, as seen a weakened government. Roads at best should be a Local and State government issue not Federal Government. The fact that the federal government as taken over that function is an example of Expansion of government power.
  - cycomanic 5y ago

by syshum 5y ago

coliveira 5y ago

> Under what metric and what government are you referring to. In the metric that matters: who bought the US government. Current US government is bought by corporate interests and does absolutely nothing that goes against big corporate power. This indicates that government is subjugated to the capitalist oligarchy, and the crimes it commits are allowed or supported by the same capitalist oligarchy.

int_19h 5y ago
This doesn't make it any smaller, though. When you concentrate so much power in one place, everyone who craves power will go after it, so its subjugation was inevitable. That's one of the reasons why centralization is bad - and this is completely orthogonal to capitalism and other economic modes. Strong centralized government without capitalism gets you authoritarian (if you're lucky) or totalitarian (if you're not) socialism.
syshum 5y ago
So we have come full circle, and you are basically restating my original thesis. Government created corporations, corporations are not a free market invention. With out government there can be no corporations as they are simply a fictitious legal entity created by government for the purposes of liability protections, and investment You seem to have this impression that Corporations hate regulation, this is false, I mean hell Amazon, Facebook, even Google has BEGGED for regulations at various points because the know it kills competition in the market. But yes, keep blaming capitalism for problems created by government, I am sure more government will solve those problems....
- coliveira 5y ago
  > corporations are not a free market invention Well, if a "free" market cannot create corporations, then what can it really do? You're talking about a fantasy created by your head, not about a free market.
  - nybble41 5y ago
    The argument is that limited liability is something which can only come from a government and not a free market—not companies in general. To a small degree this is probably true, but you can get very close through ordinary contracts. For the most part limited liability only shields you when it comes to your creditors and ordinary business dealings; if you harm someone deliberately, or through negligence, your status as an agent of a limited liability corporation will not prevent you from being found personally liable. And it's not difficult to specify in a contract that any compensation for breach of contract is limited to the assets of the company and not its owners, so that much does not require any government intervention. That leaves a "grey area" limited to accidental harm not involving negligence where the corporation lacks sufficient resources to cover the liability—which is a tiny minority of all cases where corporations probably receive more protection than the corresponding organizations would in a free market, and really not something worth obsessing over.
    - coliveira 5y ago
      This may be correct only in the sense that, without a government, there would be zero liability (instead of limited liability) for big companies. After all who could go against, for example, Microsoft if it decided to screw their customers and suppliers?
      - nybble41 5y ago
        Even the largest companies are dependent on maintaining their reputations as organizations which uphold their ends of any agreements. A company which no one will contract with might as well not exist. They're not going to just turn outlaw and repudiate their liability as determined by a fair arbitration process; that would be tantamount to corporate suicide.

thrashh 5y ago

I have to disagree with you too. Government is more weak now because people have become very distrustful of it (reasonable given Vietnam and the events since). Because of that, the government has a lot less teeth nowadays to implement policies. I know people talk about things like abortion and vaccine mandates and these issues are extremely important, but IMO they are extremely small scale topics that are more related to current cultural norms than long term policies. We’re not dealing with the cultural issues of the 1960s these days. What we deal with are the 100 year old bridges, infrastructure projects, processes and programs that previous generations built. To me, these issues are much more important than anything else because they require investment now and yet their returns don’t realize until much later. Yet our corporate tax rate is the lowest in a very long time and corporate tax evasion is huge, yet the government hasn’t had the support they need to do much about it. At the same time, people are (understandably) hugely distrustful of politicians, but all that does long term is hamper the policy making that we need now to set the stage for our grandchildren. I think people vehemently taking pride and fighting over a lot of the current issues now is so short sighted.

syshum 5y ago
I see the fundamental issue here. You are looking at from a perspective of what the government should be doing for you, where I do not believe the government should do anything for me. I look at from what the government is or can do to me, what freedoms they take from me, you mention vaccine mandates and call it a "small issue". However from my perspective it is a HUGE issue, mandates to me are a complete intrusion into my body autonomy, if I loose that I cease being a free individual. I look at things like the War on Drugs, War on Gun Rights, War on Terror, and 1000's laws that attempt end runs around the constitution and individual rights as an extreme expansion of government power Where you look at crumbling bridges, a service I do not believe should be in the purview of the federal government at all in the first place, as seen a weakened government. Roads at best should be a Local and State government issue not Federal Government. The fact that the federal government as taken over that function is an example of Expansion of government power.
- cycomanic 5y ago