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Seems like there's an awful lot of polemical posts on Hacker News lately from Conservative political organizations. Guess they figured out that here they could

Seems like there's an awful lot of polemical posts on Hacker News lately from Conservative political organizations. Guess they figured out that here they could promote their agenda for free. Is that really what Hacker News wants to be? A political forum? If so, I'll encourage the folks at Media Matters, Center for American Progress, and Campaign for America's Future to start posting here. It's bad enough that Conservative political groups are hijacking a startup news aggregator. It's worse that the ideas they're pushing don't work. Conservatism--the political philosophy promoted by AEI, Hoover, Heritage et al--is the flip side of Communism. With Communism, the purpose of people is to serve The State. In Conservatism, the purpose of people is to serve The Market. Thus, popular New Deal programs such as Social Security are anathema to them. Both Communism and Conservatism work badly, producing similar effects. Our unregulated Conservative markets have crashed and burned just as badly as the Russians' hyper-regulated Communist markets did. States and countries run on Conservative principles are typically backward and stagnant: --Mississippi and Alabama have Conservative state governments, and have practically no startup activity. Massachusetts and New York are not Conservative, which makes them capable of spawning MIT and Silicon Alley. --Conservatives say that the keys to a strong economy is low taxes on rich people and unregulated markets. We've had them for the past decade, just as we did in the 1920s, and just as it did in the 1920s, our economy has melted down. What happened when we had sky-high taxes on rich people, and highly regulated markets? We got the U.S. economic boom of the 40s, 50s, and 60s, and built the world's biggest middle class. The fact that their political philosophy has produced poor results doesn't give the folks at AEI/Hoover/Heritage pause, however. Just like the old Communists, these Conservatives are now complaining that "Conservatism DOES work! It's just never been tried!" Just as with Communism, Conservatism never fails, it is only failed. As for the ideas of Milton Friedman that these Hacker News Hijackers are pushing, we may want to read what a Nobel Prize-winning economist has to say about them: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/19857 http://www.nybooks.com/articles/19857

byrneseyeview 18y ago
I have seen a lot from libertarians; few from conservatives or Conservatives. Which particular anti-abortion, pro-war, pro-Drug War, traditionalist, or otherwise conservative articles were you referring to? I think it's really funny that when you see some viewpoints with which you disagree, it is because some big, anonymous agglomeration ("Conservatives!") must be abusing their freedom of speech by saying things with which many HN readers agree (and your solution -- telling an actual big, anonymous agglomeration to push their viewpoints here -- just seems to exacerbate the problem). A few other points: In Conservatism, the purpose of people is to serve The Market. What does it mean to 'serve' the market? The market is an abstraction -- you can't make 'it' better or worse-off, though you can do that to participants. Our unregulated Conservative markets You're referring to how the unregulated hedge funds produced much worse returns than the highly-regulated commercial- and investment-banking industries -- and how the only safe spot in the current financial turmoil is the highly-regulated, government-created, government-subsidized mortgage industry, right? Right? Mississippi and Alabama have Conservative state governments, and have practically no startup activity. Massachusetts and New York are not Conservative, which makes them capable of spawning MIT and Silicon Alley. Has it not occurred to you that you have the cause and effect wrong, here? New York and California can have more abusive governments because even if you pay 50% of your marginal income in taxes, you're still better off starting a startup in CA than in Mississippi, or trading derivatives in New York rather than Alabama. What happened when we had sky-high taxes on rich people, and highly regulated markets? Some day, you will be introduced to the term 'loophole'. You will wonder why the three-martini lunch and the company car used to be so common, and are now so rare. You will run the numbers on the Reagan tax cuts and find that the reduction in nominal rates would imply gigantic cuts in total income received, which is not what happened -- and then you'll realize that, in general, tax cuts are accompanied by loophole-closing, and tax increases are accompanied by loophole creation. That's just how things work. Thank you for linking to Paul Krugman, well-known as the first person to be awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize for his political rants in a popular newspaper, rather than his academic papers. I haven't actually read what the prize committee said about him, but everyone I've met who agrees with Krugman's polemics seems to see the prize as new evidence in their favor, so I am assuming that this is what the award was for. Right?
chaostheory 18y ago
for the record I am not a conservative, nor was my account just created today (specifically just a few minutes ago like your account. Let me guess, your past yc news account was NSX2?). I just feel that hacker news is a forum for posting a wide range of ideas. If you don't agree with an article you can do one of two things: 1) post a logical counter argument like some people already have. 2) ignore it. I really hate posts that really have nothing to do with the general ideas that articles convey. it tends to become useless noise. This isn't about conservatism vs liberalism. This is about US Social Security. Please stick with the subject.
- tokenadult 18y ago
  "I really hate posts that really have nothing to do with the general ideas that articles convey." Agreed. You gave us the courtesy of titling the thread in a way that made clear what the thread was about. Anyone commenting here can express one opinion about Social Security or another, preferably with evidence, and then we can all learn something. I just found a link from Harvard http://www.law.harvard.edu/faculty/hjackson/UnfundedMandates_7.pdf http://www.law.harvard.edu/faculty/hjackson/UnfundedMandates... mentioning that Congress has exempted Social Security from a law designed to identify programs that set up "unfunded mandates." That's food for thought.
lionhearted 18y ago
In a site populated by hackers and entrepreneurs, you're going to get people with a strong preference for individualism over collectivism - that's the nature of the beast here. People are going to be very free action-oriented, anti-paternalistic, and not too many of us are going to like the government. We've also got the smart people thing going on where we think politicians are numbskills that spend more time politicking than doing anything intelligent. So you've got that. But past that, it's hard to find intelligent discussion on economics, government, and society, and a bit coming into HN is healthy for the discussion. What I'm impressed about is that we get practically no political current events here - and that's pretty cool. Most of the ideas we talk about in terms of economics, society, and government are pretty broad, intellectual strokes instead of inflamed stuff. And for the record, I'm all up for talking about market failure, monopolozation, and unfair initial distribution of resources. And we can have some good discussion. Edit: This was originally a reply to someone who said HN was being invaded by Conservative lobbyists getting free publicity or some such. byrneseyeview replied to the same guy quoting some of it before he deleted it if you're curious as to the gist of it.
- tptacek 18y ago
  A social safety net isn't "collectivism". "Collectivism" is an emotional button hard libertarians try to push. Agree or disagree with Social Security, but please don't tar "hackers and entrepreneurs" with a single political brush.
  - lionhearted 18y ago
    Pardon me, I didn't know it was a politically-loaded term these days. I meant it as a more general term the way people would make the broad statement that "Eastern societies are more collectivist, and Western societies are more individualist." More responsibility to the group, with the associated pros and cons of that. I was making the point to the original poster who said HN has a conservative lean. My point was you're going to tend to see more individualistic people on the whole here, and more individualistic people tend to dislike the government having a larger role in their lives. That's true on the whole in my experience, but certainly not for everyone. Anyway, thanks for pointing that out. I'm just here for good discussion and the free cookies, not to push any emotional buttons or tar people I respect with a single political brush :)
dantheman 18y ago
MIT started long before it was in the people's republic of cambridge. Serving the market doesn't make any sense, the market is letting people voluntary interact with each other.

byrneseyeview 18y ago

I have seen a lot from libertarians; few from conservatives or Conservatives. Which particular anti-abortion, pro-war, pro-Drug War, traditionalist, or otherwise conservative articles were you referring to? I think it's really funny that when you see some viewpoints with which you disagree, it is because some big, anonymous agglomeration ("Conservatives!") must be abusing their freedom of speech by saying things with which many HN readers agree (and your solution -- telling an actual big, anonymous agglomeration to push their viewpoints here -- just seems to exacerbate the problem). A few other points: In Conservatism, the purpose of people is to serve The Market. What does it mean to 'serve' the market? The market is an abstraction -- you can't make 'it' better or worse-off, though you can do that to participants. Our unregulated Conservative markets You're referring to how the unregulated hedge funds produced much worse returns than the highly-regulated commercial- and investment-banking industries -- and how the only safe spot in the current financial turmoil is the highly-regulated, government-created, government-subsidized mortgage industry, right? Right? Mississippi and Alabama have Conservative state governments, and have practically no startup activity. Massachusetts and New York are not Conservative, which makes them capable of spawning MIT and Silicon Alley. Has it not occurred to you that you have the cause and effect wrong, here? New York and California can have more abusive governments because even if you pay 50% of your marginal income in taxes, you're still better off starting a startup in CA than in Mississippi, or trading derivatives in New York rather than Alabama. What happened when we had sky-high taxes on rich people, and highly regulated markets? Some day, you will be introduced to the term 'loophole'. You will wonder why the three-martini lunch and the company car used to be so common, and are now so rare. You will run the numbers on the Reagan tax cuts and find that the reduction in nominal rates would imply gigantic cuts in total income received, which is not what happened -- and then you'll realize that, in general, tax cuts are accompanied by loophole-closing, and tax increases are accompanied by loophole creation. That's just how things work. Thank you for linking to Paul Krugman, well-known as the first person to be awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize for his political rants in a popular newspaper, rather than his academic papers. I haven't actually read what the prize committee said about him, but everyone I've met who agrees with Krugman's polemics seems to see the prize as new evidence in their favor, so I am assuming that this is what the award was for. Right?

chaostheory 18y ago

for the record I am not a conservative, nor was my account just created today (specifically just a few minutes ago like your account. Let me guess, your past yc news account was NSX2?). I just feel that hacker news is a forum for posting a wide range of ideas. If you don't agree with an article you can do one of two things: 1) post a logical counter argument like some people already have. 2) ignore it. I really hate posts that really have nothing to do with the general ideas that articles convey. it tends to become useless noise. This isn't about conservatism vs liberalism. This is about US Social Security. Please stick with the subject.

tokenadult 18y ago
"I really hate posts that really have nothing to do with the general ideas that articles convey." Agreed. You gave us the courtesy of titling the thread in a way that made clear what the thread was about. Anyone commenting here can express one opinion about Social Security or another, preferably with evidence, and then we can all learn something. I just found a link from Harvard http://www.law.harvard.edu/faculty/hjackson/UnfundedMandates_7.pdf http://www.law.harvard.edu/faculty/hjackson/UnfundedMandates... mentioning that Congress has exempted Social Security from a law designed to identify programs that set up "unfunded mandates." That's food for thought.

lionhearted 18y ago

In a site populated by hackers and entrepreneurs, you're going to get people with a strong preference for individualism over collectivism - that's the nature of the beast here. People are going to be very free action-oriented, anti-paternalistic, and not too many of us are going to like the government. We've also got the smart people thing going on where we think politicians are numbskills that spend more time politicking than doing anything intelligent. So you've got that. But past that, it's hard to find intelligent discussion on economics, government, and society, and a bit coming into HN is healthy for the discussion. What I'm impressed about is that we get practically no political current events here - and that's pretty cool. Most of the ideas we talk about in terms of economics, society, and government are pretty broad, intellectual strokes instead of inflamed stuff. And for the record, I'm all up for talking about market failure, monopolozation, and unfair initial distribution of resources. And we can have some good discussion. Edit: This was originally a reply to someone who said HN was being invaded by Conservative lobbyists getting free publicity or some such. byrneseyeview replied to the same guy quoting some of it before he deleted it if you're curious as to the gist of it.

tptacek 18y ago
A social safety net isn't "collectivism". "Collectivism" is an emotional button hard libertarians try to push. Agree or disagree with Social Security, but please don't tar "hackers and entrepreneurs" with a single political brush.
- lionhearted 18y ago
  Pardon me, I didn't know it was a politically-loaded term these days. I meant it as a more general term the way people would make the broad statement that "Eastern societies are more collectivist, and Western societies are more individualist." More responsibility to the group, with the associated pros and cons of that. I was making the point to the original poster who said HN has a conservative lean. My point was you're going to tend to see more individualistic people on the whole here, and more individualistic people tend to dislike the government having a larger role in their lives. That's true on the whole in my experience, but certainly not for everyone. Anyway, thanks for pointing that out. I'm just here for good discussion and the free cookies, not to push any emotional buttons or tar people I respect with a single political brush :)

dantheman 18y ago

MIT started long before it was in the people's republic of cambridge. Serving the market doesn't make any sense, the market is letting people voluntary interact with each other.