Rethinking America

As it is the Fourth of July and I have a lot on my mind regarding the policies of our lovely federal government I thought I would start this thread as a positive space for people to voice their opinions...

I will start by saying that as a native born American, our country has terrible policies regarding immigration. We mistreat our neighbors and tear families apart over this issue. I have many close friends who have relatives or immediate family who cannot enter our borders due to immigration laws and the fact that so many of my American-born friends seem to think that "immigrants are stealing away jobs for Americans" is preposterous to me! If American companies so wanted, they could pick up all operations within the USA and move them abroad to outsource and save money on labor. Furthermore, many of my "friends" who say such things are too lazy to keep the jobs they "lost to immigrants".
What a racist way of looking at the world...

Love conquers all and no laws will keep families from being together!

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

As it is the Fourth of July and I have a lot on my mind regarding the policies of our lovely federal government I thought I would start this thread as a positive space for people to voice their opinions...

I will start by saying that as a native born American, our country has terrible policies regarding immigration. We mistreat our neighbors and tear families apart over this issue. I have many close friends who have relatives or immediate family who cannot enter our borders due to immigration laws and the fact that so many of my American-born friends seem to think that "immigrants are stealing away jobs for Americans" is preposterous to me! If American companies so wanted, they could pick up all operations within the USA and move them abroad to outsource and save money on labor. Furthermore, many of my "friends" who say such things are too lazy to keep the jobs they "lost to immigrants".
What a racist way of looking at the world...

Love conquers all and no laws will keep families from being together!

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Umm.... Lots and lots of American companies have already moved their operations overseas for cheap labor and more continue to follow (Thanks Al Baby!)...... Why do you think the only jobs for us citizens anymore basically are service sector jobs? Hint: We don't hardly make anything here anymore! So when an American who doesn't have a job and sees a criminal (illegal alien) get a job like its nothing (because they are basically slaves working for slave wages), it is definitely not racist for them to be angry. It is humane and natural for them to be upset when they are being screwed over by companies who hire slaves and perpetuate slavery.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

Umm.... Lots and lots of American companies have already moved their operations overseas for cheap labor and more continue to follow (Thanks Al Baby!)...... Why do you think the only jobs for us citizens anymore basically are service sector jobs? Hint: We don't hardly make anything here anymore! So when an American who doesn't have a job and sees a criminal (illegal alien) get a job like its nothing (because they are basically slaves working for slave wages), it is definitely not racist for them to be angry. It is humane and natural for them to be upset when they are being screwed over by companies who hire slaves and perpetuate slavery.

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Okay you are entitled to your own opinion, but your opinion is racist and prejudiced.
Yes companies leave the USA for other countries where they can hire cheaper labor. Yes, some people work for less pay than others. It is supply and demand in the personnel sector. Supply and demand is the essence of capitalism, which is the current foundation of American (and much of the world's -- all of the democratic world's) economic system. And America will fight to the death to protect (and convert the rest of the world) to this economic system.
Is that the fault of our neighbors in Mexico who work at maquilas along the border to supply the country with "Made in the USA" goods? I think not! Or the fault of legal immigrants, with their green cards or even
citizenship papers, to the USA? Again, I don't think so!
If the only jobs available to you good sir are service jobs, then maybe you should consider getting a higher education. Here in the United States upward mobility is very achievable, which is a huge part of why so many people want to be here. If you chose not to study in school and not to go on to a college or university to be competitive in today's job market, that is entirely your own problem.
The point of this thread is not to argue -- there is enough crap coming from the point's of view of people like you. This thread is to rethink the way we think about things.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

Okay you are entitled to your own opinion, but your opinion is racist and prejudiced.
Yes companies leave the USA for other countries where they can hire cheaper labor. Yes, some people work for less pay than others. It is supply and demand in the personnel sector. Supply and demand is the essence of capitalism, which is the current foundation of American (and much of the world's -- all of the democratic world's) economic system. And America will fight to the death to protect (and convert the rest of the world) to this economic system.
Is that the fault of our neighbors in Mexico who work at maquilas along the border to supply the country with "Made in the USA" goods? I think not! Or the fault of legal immigrants, with their green cards or even
citizenship papers, to the USA? Again, I don't think so!
If the only jobs available to you good sir are service jobs, then maybe you should consider getting a higher education. Here in the United States upward mobility is very achievable, which is a huge part of why so many people want to be here. If you chose not to study in school and not to go on to a college or university to be competitive in today's job market, that is entirely your own problem.
The point of this thread is not to argue -- there is enough crap coming from the point's of view of people like you. This thread is to rethink the way we think about things.

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Racist? Prejudiced? How so? Your the only one bringing race into the picture, maybe your the racist? I certainly am not. Why are we Americans so quick to judge people as racist? Maybe that is something we should be rethinking?

Its not just me that cant find a good job that is not in the service sector, its about 20% of our population!! And that is not all their fault! You see, Ive met several people who are highly trained and educated, yet have been out of work for up to two years now! They are overqualified for the small amount of jobs available, and overwhelmed with applicants for those few jobs that actually correlate with their education and skill level. You see, its not as simple as going to school and making yourself into whatever you want.

You talk about supply and demand as though the American companies who hire illegal immigrants are doing so legally.... Wrong. This isn't simply supply and demand, it is breaking the law! And it is inhumane and not a part of our economic or social structure, hence it being against the law!

I'm just trying to help people rethink the way they think about these things too.... Starting with people who choose to call people racists without even knowing them or taking the time to understand them, such as yourself.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

Racist? Prejudiced? How so? Your the only one bringing race into the picture, maybe your the racist? I certainly am not. Why are we Americans so quick to judge people as racist? Maybe that is something we should be rethinking?

Its not just me that cant find a good job that is not in the service sector, its about 20% of our population!! And that is not all their fault! You see, Ive met several people who are highly trained and educated, yet have been out of work for up to two years now! They are overqualified for the small amount of jobs available, and overwhelmed with applicants for those few jobs that actually correlate with their education and skill level. You see, its not as simple as going to school and making yourself into whatever you want.

You talk about supply and demand as though the American companies who hire illegal immigrants are doing so legally.... Wrong. This isn't simply supply and demand, it is breaking the law! And it is inhumane and not a part of our economic or social structure, hence it being against the law!

I'm just trying to help people rethink the way they think about these things too.... Starting with people who choose to call people racists without even knowing them or taking the time to understand them, such as yourself.

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I called you a racist because you are justifying anger against innocent people who are merely trying to put food on the table like anyone else.
Yes, we should be angry at the corporations and the lawmakers, not at the individuals who are a pawn in this system.
Yes it is against the law! And yes it is unethical!
And sadly, yes we are going through hard times right now, but playing the blame game with people who are not at all to blame is not acceptable to me. I was upset with your post because you were justifying this angry sentiment towards innocent folks who happen to be in the position to work for cheaper wages. Plus some immigrants do NOT work service sector jobs -- some are very highly educated professionals. So to say because one person has a green card, they will be working excliusively in service jobs is completely racist.
Actually now that you bring it up the concept of race is racist! So yes it was wrong for me to call you a racist, I think prejudiced is a better word.
I am glad this discussion is starting to go somewhere.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

Umm.... Lots and lots of American companies have already moved their operations overseas for cheap labor and more continue to follow (Thanks Al Baby...

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Deindustrialization and shipping jobs out of the country to cheaper labor markets, has been going on since the decline of manufacturing and the creation of the "Rust Belt" in the 1970's. You can't lay all that at the door of Al Gore.

What is the basis of this vendetta you seem to have going against him?

I'm not his fan, I think he was a terrible candidate in 2000 (not that I cared much since I was working for Nader, so the Green Party might qualify for Federal matching funds and have to resources to build a real organization in the years after. We didn't make it, but it wasn't "Al's" fault.) and didn't fight for a full vote recount that would have put him in office. Lately he's in trouble for an alleged sexual assault in Oregon that was supposed to have taken place four years ago. (Innocent until proven guilty, hence my use of "alleged" and "supposed".)

But laying the problems of post-industrial economic decline at his feet? Makes no sense, and is factually innacurate. Bill Clinton was a full on neo-liberal globalizationist. I doubt he took his marching orders from his Vice President. If you want to blame a U.S. leader for job destruction, why not him? And the Bush's? And Reagan? And Carter? And Ford? And Nixon?

But if "anyone" is fundamentally responsible, it is an economic system that privileges the market over the needs of people. When that is seen as inevitable, unavoidable and the best possible arrangement, then everyone who buys that and acts accordingly, is responsible. In particular the CEO's, CFO's and Board of Directors members who call the shots. But of course, they're only maximising profits for their shareholders, doing what they were hired to do in the case of the first two categories and what is best for their own wealth accumulation and maintenance in the latter group. In other words they're playing the game, according to the rules, and are just the most successful at it. So things can't be their fault either. Right?

Your assertions here would be more persuasive if you didn't keep making claims that are not congruent with the facts known by any observer or historian. You must be getting this stuff from some biased source. What is it? Could the renewed Randist fringe movement have anything to do with it?

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Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

Deindustrialization and shipping jobs out of the country to cheaper labor markets, has been going on since the decline of manufacturing and the creation of the "Rust Belt" in the 1970's. You can't lay all that at the door of Al Gore.

What is the basis of this vendetta you seem to have going against him?

I'm not his fan, I think he was a terrible candidate in 2000 (not that I cared much since I was working for Nader, so the Green Party might qualify for Federal matching funds and have to resources to build a real organization in the years after. We didn't make it, but it wasn't "Al's" fault.) and didn't fight for a full vote recount that would have put him in office. Lately he's in trouble for an alleged sexual assault in Oregon that was supposed to have taken place four years ago. (Innocent until proven guilty, hence my use of "alleged" and "supposed".)

But laying the problems of post-industrial economic decline at his feet? Makes no sense, and is factually innacurate. Bill Clinton was a full on neo-liberal globalizationist. I doubt he took his marching orders from his Vice President. If you want to blame a U.S. leader for job destruction, why not him? And the Bush's? And Reagan? And Carter? And Ford? And Nixon?

But if "anyone" is fundamentally responsible, it is an economic system that privileges the market over the needs of people. When that is seen as inevitable, unavoidable and the best possible arrangement, then everyone who buys that and acts accordingly, is responsible. In particular the CEO's, CFO's and Board of Directors members who call the shots. But of course, they're only maximising profits for their shareholders, doing what they were hired to do in the case of the first two categories and what is best for their own wealth accumulation and maintenance in the latter group. In other words they're playing the game, according to the rules, and are just the most successful at it. So things can't be their fault either. Right?

Your assertions here would be more persuasive if you didn't keep making claims that are not congruent with the facts known by any observer or historian. You must be getting this stuff from some biased source. What is it? Could the renewed Randist fringe movement have anything to do with it?

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I say Al, who does bear as much blame as Reagan, Bush and all the rest of them, because he was the main man who sold us on Nafta. And I know Nafta was the catalyst that brought about this enormous problem.

YouTube - NAFTA: Ross Perot and Al Gore Debate 1993

Remember that.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

I called you a racist because you are justifying anger against innocent people who are merely trying to put food on the table like anyone else.
Yes, we should be angry at the corporations and the lawmakers, not at the individuals who are a pawn in this system.
Yes it is against the law! And yes it is unethical!
And sadly, yes we are going through hard times right now, but playing the blame game with people who are not at all to blame is not acceptable to me. I was upset with your post because you were justifying this angry sentiment towards innocent folks who happen to be in the position to work for cheaper wages. Plus some immigrants do NOT work service sector jobs -- some are very highly educated professionals. So to say because one person has a green card, they will be working excliusively in service jobs is completely racist.
Actually now that you bring it up the concept of race is racist! So yes it was wrong for me to call you a racist, I think prejudiced is a better word.
I am glad this discussion is starting to go somewhere.

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I didnt say because one person has a green card, they will be working exclusively in service jobs. I said nothing of the sort. Okay? Re-read what I said. I also never justified anger against people trying to put food on the table, I justify the anger they have because these illegals, along with these companies who break the law, are cheating the system and cheating law-abiding citizens. It has nothing to do with race, gender, creed, or any other designation.

The rest isn't even worth responding too. Its just so ridiculous.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

I didnt say because one person has a green card, they will be working exclusively in service jobs. I said nothing of the sort. Okay? Re-read what I said.

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You implied it by saying you are mad at all immigrants for "taking" your job away, and the jobs of other Americans.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

I also never justified anger against people trying to put food on the table, I justify the anger they have because these illegals,

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They may or may NOT be illegal -- many immigrants have green cards and are here legally. So please stop referring to all immigrants as illegals that is prejudiced as well.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

along with these companies who break the law, are cheating the system and cheating law-abiding citizens. It has nothing to do with race, gender, creed, or any other designation.

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Yes it has to do with nationality. You are angry at people because they were born in another country.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

The rest isn't even worth responding too. Its just so ridiculous.

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No, it is not ridiculous -- you are just too thick-headed to wrap your mind around it.



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Now that ive responded to that mess I would like to point out that the underlying issue is about empathy. Those with the ability to empathize with others will not have anger toward those people who were born in other countries but have made there way to the USA to work and live the American dream.
Were all of our ancestors not once immigrants of this country?????

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

You implied it by saying you are mad at all immigrants for "taking" your job away, and the jobs of other Americans.


They may or may NOT be illegal -- many immigrants have green cards and are here legally. So please stop referring to all immigrants as illegals that is prejudiced as well.




Yes it has to do with nationality. You are angry at people because they were born in another country.




No, it is not ridiculous -- you are just too thick-headed to wrap your mind around it.



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Now that ive responded to that mess I would like to point out that the underlying issue is about empathy. Those with the ability to empathize with others will not have anger toward those people who were born in other countries but have made there way to the USA to work and live the American dream.
Were all of our ancestors not once immigrants of this country?????

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I never said the first alleged statement about being mad at all immigrants for taking my job away. Hey guess what, Im an immigrant!! A legal one at that! I have no problem with legal immigrants. They follow the law and theres nothing at all wrong with that. Stop misinterpreting me. This entire time Ive been on this thread Ive only been talking about illegal immigrants!

So your saying its racist to be angry at people who break the law (by coming here illegally) and undercut the wages of our workforce, and create a slave-like system in our own nation? Im a racist if I think American companies who have decided to establish there business here break American law by hiring illegal immigrants? Im supposedly a racist if I want immigrants to come over to this country the same way my mother did?

Lastly, I am not angry because of their nationality, I am angry because they broke the law! Get that through your thick head!

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

So your saying its racist to be angry at people who break the law (by coming here illegally) and undercut the wages of our workforce, and create a slave-like system in our own nation?

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The biggest problem I have with your reasoning -- and why i have been calling you prejudiced -- is summed up in your own rhetorical question. Yes, I strongly feel that it is wrong to be angry at these said people because I feel that they are NOT the ones "creating a slave-like system" it is the employers, lawmakers, heads of corporations, etc. who create the system of slavery, NOT the slaves! That is like saying slavery exists because the slaves, not the slave-masters.
It is extremely frustrating to me that you keep blaming the innocent party, who are merely pawns in this game.
Don't you see there are people who are making millions of dollars each through this illegal process and they are NOT the immigrants, but the CEO's and business owners who play into this system that are to blame. To think otherwise is ridiculous.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

I say Al, who does bear as much blame as Reagan, Bush and all the rest of them, because he was the main man who sold us on Nafta. And I know Nafta was the catalyst that brought about this enormous problem.
Remember that.

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No matter what "you know" you are wrong and seem to be suffering from some kind of short term historical memory syndrome that has you in blinders.

As I said in my previous reply, deindustrialization and job flight started long before the nineties, by at least two decades. That's what I "remember," and so would anyone else who has paid attention for the last thirty, forty, or more years. And it's in the books for anyone who wasn't alive, or not yet fully conscious then.

So Nafta was, at the time Gore was "selling it", just the latest stage of globalizing economic policies initiated in the seventies by conservative, free market ideologues (in both parts of the duopoly) inspired by the ideas of Milton Friedman and his acolytes.

Remember post-coup 1973 Chile? That was when these policies were being test marketed before they were brought back to the U.S. for implementation.

The fact that you do not acknowledge this, and focus your ire on Gore is indicative of your narrow view and your lack of historical, sociological, theoretical and political knowledge. A lack which you have consistently demonstrated on this board.

You can't just make shit up because it fits your predisposed view of the world. And least you can't if you want anybody who has a clue about these matters to respect your views.

Admo, good point about empathy. By the way, the question of immigration, legal, sans papier, etc. has been ably, vociferously and regularly debated on waccobb.net. There are several long threads to be found. Just use the search engine.

Out for now, didn't read the papers yesterday, gotta catch up,

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Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

No matter what "you know" you are wrong and seem to be suffering from some kind of short term historical memory syndrome that has you in blinders.

As I said in my previous reply, deindustrialization and job flight started long before the nineties, by at least two decades.

So Nafta was, at the time Gore was "selling it", just the latest stage of globalizing economic policies initiated in the seventies by conservative, free market ideologues (in both parts of the duopoly) inspired by the ideas of Milton Friedman and his acolytes.

Remember post-coup 1973 Chile? That was when these policies were being test marketed before they were brought back to the U.S. for implementation.

The fact that you do not acknowledge this, and focus your ire on Gore is indicative of your narrow views and your lack of historical, sociological, theoretical and political knowledge. A lack which you have consistently demonstrated on this board.

You can't just make shit up because it fits your predisposed view of the world. And least you can't if you want anybody who has a clue about these matters to respect your views.

Edmo, good point about empathy. By the way the question of immigration, legal, sans papier, etc. has been ably, vociferously and regularly debated on waccobb.net. There are several long threads to be found. Just use the search engine.

Out for now, didn't read the papers yesterday, gotta catch up,

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Wait,didn't I say that you were right and others before Clinton/Gore were to blame as well? I just think that Nafta plays a big part in this current problem of globalization and, the loss of our manufacturing base. Whats wrong with that POV? How is that factually wrong? Are you saying that Nafta wasn't a big deal, and that if it weren't for Nafta we would be worse off?

I will admit that I have a special hatred for Man Bear Pig and his sly ways with wording and his snake like salesman tactics. And he used that epic style to sell Nafta to the American public. Same way he did with his fake Global Warming film. Still, I'm not sure where you are coming from? Is it unfair for me to place some blame on Gore, Miles? You act as though I made it sound like Gore is wholly to blame for all of our economic problems.... I did not. I made it clear that I agreed with your analysis of Regan, Bush, etc.... Whats the issue here?

The necessary legislation would be to penalize businesses that hire illegal immigrants in the first place.

This issue, to the best of my knowledge, has never been addressed through public policy implementation, at least not nearly as thoroughly as it should be. The reason being is because capitalists, the ruling classes, and the bourgeoisie control almost all legislation (yes, including legislation made by that other bourgeois party, the Democrats).

Fair laws that deal squarely with the problem of illegal immigration would indeed, and very effectively, reduce illegal immigration to a small percentage of what it is today. Penalize the private sector every time they hire an illegal worker. You'll see how quickly things change.

And guess what! You just might see the Right Wing in America start supporting immigrants all of sudden. The Republican Party might see itself in the midst of unending internal conflicts because, after all, "it's the economy, stupid." And business owners don't like being told that they can't make a buck.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

The biggest problem I have with your reasoning -- and why i have been calling you prejudiced -- is summed up in your own rhetorical question. Yes, I strongly feel that it is wrong to be angry at these said people because I feel that they are NOT the ones "creating a slave-like system" it is the employers, lawmakers, heads of corporations, etc. who create the system of slavery, NOT the slaves! That is like saying slavery exists because the slaves, not the slave-masters.
It is extremely frustrating to me that you keep blaming the innocent party, who are merely pawns in this game.
Don't you see there are people who are making millions of dollars each through this illegal process and they are NOT the immigrants, but the CEO's and business owners who play into this system that are to blame. To think otherwise is ridiculous.

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Sorry, but a (supposedly) quick divergence:
The issue of the BART police officer who shot and killed the young man, Oscar Grant, a couple of years ago in the East Bay has been bothering me deeply. I understand and completely agree with the fact that the officer should be tried in court, as any other person would, for murder. But that is not looking at the entire picture.
What has me boggled is there is an obvious (to me) huge underlying problem: why the heck do BART police need to be armed with lethal weapons? They obviously do not have the training required and I think many would agree that as a transit officer, nonlethal yet very powerful techniques should suffice. If there is a situation that requires guns, the police department should be called.
Any thoughts?

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

The biggest problem I have with your reasoning -- and why i have been calling you prejudiced -- is summed up in your own rhetorical question. Yes, I strongly feel that it is wrong to be angry at these said people because I feel that they are NOT the ones "creating a slave-like system" it is the employers, lawmakers, heads of corporations, etc. who create the system of slavery, NOT the slaves! That is like saying slavery exists because the slaves, not the slave-masters.
It is extremely frustrating to me that you keep blaming the innocent party, who are merely pawns in this game.
Don't you see there are people who are making millions of dollars each through this illegal process and they are NOT the immigrants, but the CEO's and business owners who play into this system that are to blame. To think otherwise is ridiculous.

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Dude, have I not been blaming the Corporations just as much as you have? I do see CEO's and business owners making millions, if not billions through this illegal process. I see politicians allowing this criminal ring to take place for political reasons. And I see us all (American and other) turning into slaves ourselves partly because of this illegal crime operation and I am going to oppose that.

For most of this thread I laid the blame only on corporations, and only once (in your quoted text) did I say it was justifiable to be angry at someone for breaking the law to take an unfair advantage over another. I don't see a problem with that.

The corporations and government have created this slave like system and used illegals as their pawns. Unfortunately their(illegal immigrants) lawlessness (which is something that law abiding citizens legitimately frown upon) is contributing to this slave system.

In other words, they are not helpless slaves being extracted from their homes and forced to work for pennies. They had to knowingly have broke the law to join in this racket. So they do have some responsibility to take on, and the people do have a right to be mad at others for breaking the law. And I really don't think that is such an extreme position.

I am by no means saying that we need to throw the book at these illegal offenders. But my god, we as a country need to rebuild and focus on ourselves for a while. We need some alone time to get our shit together basically. That means pulling our troops home, settling some debts, sending a few illegal folks home, and ending some of these bad policies that got us here in the first place. Then building up our factories, and creating jobs with green energy technology, or even creating a new transportation system. Anything to get us back on our feet again..... This couldn't come soon enough.

I still 'fail to see why you keep trying to pin the prejudice tail on me...... Get over that bunk shit, and start talking real. Unless you think its prejudice to have a different opinion.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

... I just think that Nafta plays a big part in this current problem of globalization and, the loss of our manufacturing base. Whats wrong with that POV? How is that factually wrong? Are you saying that Nafta wasn't a big deal, and that if it weren't for Nafta we would be worse off?

I will admit that I have a special hatred for Man Bear Pig and his sly ways with wording and his snake like salesman tactics. And he used that epic style to sell Nafta to the American public. Same way he did with his fake Global Warming film. Still, I'm not sure where you are coming from? Is it unfair for me to place some blame on Gore, Miles? ... Whats the issue here?

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Nafta was bad, but the policies it codified weren't new. You write as if they were. Nafta just expanded market globalization, it didn't start with it, and hasn't ended with it.

When I slam you for lack of historical knowledge, primarily it's because you regularly engage in one of the basic fallacies of understanding this stuff. You reduce complex social phenomena to a single cause, such as; Al, The Corporations, The FED, etc. That's called reductionism and it is a way to obscure the truth and to mislead the naive. Providing simplistic answers to complex questions does not help anyone to understand. And often, when done by those with influence and power, it leads to disasterous policies.

I may think the structure of the economy is very important to what happens to us, who benefits, who suffers. But I don't for a second think economics is the sole cause of everything that happens. It is in and of itself a highly complex system, and it interacts with other complex human systems, such as psychology, social issues (cultures of poverty, racism, exclusionism, anti-intellectualism), cultural differences, and so on.

There is no single simple cause for anything in life. Those who talk/write as if there is, don't impress me. And when they make false claims about the facts, to grind some political axe of theirs, it pisses me off because it's basically a lie, misinformation.

Opinions differ, that's cool. But claiming things that are false, isn't just a matter of opinion.

As for the issue of global warming. That's been visited here in the last year. You were very emphatic and voluble in your views. I wasn't actively involved in that debate, but it's one you lost, and I'm not interested in revisiting it.

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Posted in reply to the post by Valley Oak:

The necessary legislation would be to penalize businesses that hire illegal immigrants in the first place.

This issue, to the best of my knowledge, has never been addressed through public policy implementation, at least not nearly as thoroughly as it should be...

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The laws are on the books. They're just not enforced. For the reasons you mention in the rest of your post.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

...But my god, we as a country need to rebuild and focus on ourselves for a while. We need some alone time to get our shit together basically. That means pulling our troops home, settling some debts, sending a few illegal folks home, and ending some of these bad policies that got us here in the first place. Then building up our factories, and creating jobs with green energy technology, or even creating a new transportation system. Anything to get us back on our feet again..... This couldn't come soon enough...

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On your views of corporations having much of the responsibility for the structure of the American (U.S.) labor market, we're in the same ballpark.

But your position that I've excerpted above, is another example of what I have been criticizing you for today. It shows a very simplistic and naive understanding of the nature of the global economy, and the role of our country in it.

The capitalist marketplace is now global, has been for decades. Isolationism is a non-starter for both foreign and domestic policy. Ain't gonna happen. That fight was lost, that ship has sailed. Too many inter-connected and powerful interests benefit from globalisation for it to go away.

That is as long as there's petroleum to move stuff around. When that runs out, all bets are off and the least of our worries will be undocumented workers taking the jobs of citizens and legal residents. There won't be ANY jobs to take!

"Settling some debts" Yeah, like that's going to happen anytime soon.

"Pulling our troops home" I'm totally with you here. As the quagmire in Afghanistan festers and runs deeper with pus (Ick! I know, but compared to the reality that's a weak characterization of the horror), down the road the powers that be might start a real pullout. But that's not the policy for at least a year or two. And in the mean time the money keeps bleeding out of the system.

I was, and am, part of the anti-war movement, since prior to the invasion of Afghanistan. (actually for much longer, I organized against the Gulf War, in '91-'92) 9/11 should have been addressed by sanctions, blockade and a demand that criminals be turned over to international law.

Unless you're an arms manufacturer, or military services contractor, then you're on the gravy train and everything looks bright for the next eight quarters! That's long range strategic planning in corporate town.

As for Iraq, we broke it. I was very glad to see Saddam taken out, and the break up of the Baath Party. But at what price? The invasion of Iraq, based on lies justifying it, has been an unmitigated disaster overall. Unless you're one of those war profiteers of course. And trying to broker a viable government between Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds has proven to be a "problem".

Has everyone read today's article about us abandoning the boodoggle of a water treatment plant in Fallujah, because we're pulling our troops back from combat roles? I am all for pulling them back, they should never have gone in the first place. But the waste of money and Iraqi good will (little as there is) is enormous. SNAFU FUBAR.

"building up our factories and creating jobs" Good luck with that, for the complex reasons I've been hammering you on.

Rebuilding and expanding infrastructure, ala The New Deal and WPA, might be the way to go. I think it is. But that requires new programs funded with deficit spending and the tide is against that lately. Did you follow the G-8 news? Did you read Paul Krugman in yesterday's PD? The deficit hawks are in the drivers seat, for now. Aren't you a deficit hawk, someguy?

There was a good piece in yesterday's NYT's which summarized the immigration debate well. I'm about to go look for it and I'll post a link and the telling quote from the end of the article here. Give me a minute.

The Great Rupture
By PETER S. GOODMAN

Published: July 2, 2010

From the NYT's

The following is from the end of the article:

But in some communities, the downturn has torn at the social fabric, heightening divisions. At a job center in Orange County, Calif., six people gathered early this year to discuss the looming expiration of their unemployment benefits. Most had worked in the white-collar world. One had been a stockbroker with a $250,000 annual income. Another had earned $60,000 a year as an executive assistant at a Jaguar dealership. Several were homeowners. Nearly everyone agreed that illegal immigrants deserved much of the blame for their failure to land another job.
Multimedia

https://graphics8.nytimes.com/images...-thumbWide.jpgGraphic
How They’re Hurting







What sorts of jobs had they been seeking?
“I would take a gardening job,” said a 58-year-old woman who had earned $24 an hour as an office manager. “I would clean toilets if I could, but I can’t take that job. Millions of people in California are illegal and they’re taking our jobs.”
A long list of factors went into explaining what had happened to the American economy so that former professionals conversant in spreadsheets and mutual funds were now chagrined to be denied the opportunity to scrub toilets. To a student of macroeconomics, the arrival of illegal immigrants seemed far down the list, somewhere after weak long-term job growth and the near collapse of the financial system.
But to unemployed people trying to divine a cause through the miasmatic haze of their own situations, the presence of illegal immigrants was the explanation they could see most clearly. You could spot them on street corners, waiting for work. You could see them crammed into rental homes, or hear their music blaring from pickup trucks. Joblessness was disorienting. Illegal immigrants formed the only putative cause that lived next door.
And yet to travel the United States in this age of insecurity, with the basic bargain of middle-class life seemingly under assault, is to marvel at the persistence of faith in some larger system; belief that hard work must be rewarded, if only out of common decency.
At a Duane Reade drugstore on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, an African-American cashier in his early 20s working the night shift complained that he and his coworkers had not been told in advance that the chain had decided to sell itself to Walgreen’s. “We didn’t even hear about it until it was on the news,” he said, sounding hurt.
Companies today change hands like poker chips at a casino, in response to millionaire investment bankers indulging words like “synergy.” Low-wage workers are generally no harder to acquire or unload than a crate of paper towels. Yet despite all that, despite economic dysfunction and narrow corporate interests, this young man was aggrieved because he had assumed something else: an almost familial relationship with his employer, a bond of mutual concern.
It was hard to know whether to feel sad in the face of this sentiment —pained that a pawn in a larger drama saw himself as important enough to warrant inclusion — or perhaps inspired that even at the lowest depths of the American workforce, faith in a shared enterprise remains.

Quote:

---

Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

Nafta was bad, but the policies it codified weren't new. You write as if they were. Nafta just expanded market globalization, it didn't start with it, and hasn't ended with it.

When I slam you for lack of historical knowledge, primarily it's because you regularly engage in one of the basic fallacies of understanding this stuff. You reduce complex social phenomena to a single cause, such as; Al, The Corporations, The FED, etc. That's called reductionism and it is a way to obscure the truth and to mislead the naive. Providing simplistic answers to complex questions does not help anyone to understand. And often, when done by those with influence and power, it leads to disasterous policies.

---

Your first point I conceded to right away... So why are you saying that I said Al Gore started globalization?

Umm dude.... Are you listening to me? I just told you that Al Gore and Nafta weren't the sole cause of this globalization! Didn't I? Twice now? Why are you getting your panties in a knot over nothing? Is this your alleged humiliating and devastating retort you've bragged about? I hope not, because this is nothing but a strawman argument and not even something we should be discussing because I resolved this two posts ago.

When do I reduce complex social issues into one cause of our problems? Don't I make a wide variety of posts on many different subjects on a daily basis here at Wacco? Specifically when have I placed all the blame on corporations, the fed, or any other institution like that? When I endorse ending the FED, I dont claim it would solve all of our economic issues, but in my opinion, we would be a far better nation without it! You know, things like Nafta also contribute massively to this economic situation we find ourselves in. Am I being reductionist in saying that Nafta and the FED are hindrances to our economic prosperity? How about my attack on government regulations which keep small farmers, for example, from becoming prosperous? Does that fall under the umbrella of reductionism as well? Oh and I could bring up excessive taxation and the war!!!! Oh yeah, I never talk about that...... Your right Miles, I just blame it all on the FED. Or was it the corporations? I forget.

With a little more practice at twisting peoples words around, you could give Robert Gibbs a run for his money...... It would probably pay nicely. :wink: But seriously dude, your pissing me off with your lies. Cut it out.

Someguy,

My responses accusing you of reductionism were about your original posts on this thread, and your subsequent denials, and the "Al" slam on another thread. If one of my replies, is to a more recent post, I have excerpted relevant quotes to indicate what I'm talking about.

You have a habit of only responding to what you want to respond to. You do not answer many, if any, of the questions I ask you.

Pardon me if I can't take discussing these matters with you seriously, given your pattern of selective response and ignoring issues that I raise. Perhaps this is just a function of the limitations of online debate. And the lack of sufficient time in the day. But it comes off as evasion and cherry picking.

If you are not sure of what I'm referring to in the previous paragraph, re-read your early posts, and my replies to them. I tried to be as clear as I can without doing a point by point, quote by quote, refutation. Nobody is paying me to do this (nor you I suspect). I didn't go to law school, by choice, and my philosophy studies took place years ago. This is a loose discussion in a public arena, not a seminar in textual exegesis.

In some sense of the matter I'm not really arguing with you, that's a futile project. I'm trying to demonstrate to others the holes in your logic and the mistatements of provable fact that you consistently make.

I have thought that one way to give you the benefit of the doubt, is to chalk up our disagreements to differences in perspective and emphasis. But that's an easy out.

I'm not willing give that to someone who disseminates anti-semitic propaganda (an issue you never addressed, and an example of one of the things I'm calling you on in this post, i.e. not addressing significant points and not answering clear, distinct questions) and who bases their world view on small, hamstrung government, free market, Libertarian nonsense.

(Rest assured readers, I don't want any more government than is absolutely necessary. But someguy and I will probably never agree on the definition of "absolutely necessary government.")

As we've both stated, we disagree. I'm not really concerned about that.

I am concerned about historical accuracy as a basis for understanding the problems that face us, everybody. Significant parts of what you claim are obstacles to that project.

Rest assured, if I was targetting you with a devastating insult, you would know it. The limits of civil discourse here, and from my own sense of decorum, prevent me from doing so. At least not yet!


Done for now, I'm gonna finish clearing the waccobb traffic and shut down this box for the evening.

Quote:

---

Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

Someguy,

My responses accusing you of reductionism were about your original posts on this thread, and your subsequent denials, and the "Al" slam on another thread. If one of my replies, is to a more recent post, I have excerpted relevant quotes to indicate what I'm talking about.

You have a habit of only responding to what you want to respond to. You do not answer many, if any, of the questions I ask you.

Pardon me if I can't take discussing these matters with you seriously, given your pattern of selective response and ignoring issues that I raise. Perhaps this is just a function of the limitations of online debate. And the lack of sufficient time in the day. But it comes off as evasion and cherry picking.

If you are not sure of what I'm referring to in the previous paragraph, re-read your early posts, and my replies to them. I tried to be as clear as I can without doing a point by point, quote by quote, refutation. Nobody is paying me to do this (nor you I suspect). I didn't go to law school, by choice, and my philosophy studies took place years ago. This is a loose discussion in a public arena, not a seminar in textual exegesis.

In some sense of the matter I'm not really arguing with you, that's a futile project. I'm trying to demonstrate to others the holes in your logic and the mistatements of provable fact that you consistently make.

I have thought that one way to give you the benefit of the doubt, is to chalk up our disagreements to differences in perspective and emphasis. But that's an easy out.

I'm not willing give that to someone who disseminates anti-semitic propaganda (an issue you never addressed, and an example of one of the things I'm calling you on in this post, i.e. not addressing significant points and not answering clear, distinct questions) and who bases their world view on small, hamstrung government, free market, Libertarian nonsense.

(Rest assured readers, I don't want any more government than is absolutely necessary. But someguy and I will probably never agree on the definition of "absolutely necessary government.")

As we've both stated, we disagree. I'm not really concerned about that.

I am concerned about historical accuracy as a basis for understanding the problems that face us, everybody. Significant parts of what you claim are obstacles to that project.

Rest assured, if I was targetting you with a devastating insult, you would know it. The limits of civil discourse here, and from my own sense of decorum, prevent me from doing so. At least not yet!


Done for now, I'm gonna finish clearing the waccobb traffic and shut down this box for the evening.

---

Man id love to just talk it up with you in person. That way we could just discuss each point as they arise. Yes I did not address everything you stated, Im not cherry picking, but merely putting in as much effort as I want. Much like you focusing on things that only interest you, I focused on the parts of the post that I felt important to address. If you have any pressing concerns and want to question me about them please do so in the next post. I will be sure to answer them. Just make them clear.

I really want to address this made up anti-semitic claim youve got going on.... Where is that coming from? That Zombie video? Just because one clip in that video showed a guy that "looked" according to you, jewish when they mentioned global bankers, Im an anti-Semite? Are you serious? For your knowledge I never made that connection when I watched the video two times before posting.... And so if the guy in the picture were, arabic, would I then be a racist? Or if he were a lady, would I be sexist? I don't think you have sufficient information to make a claim such as that about me. Saying that I am disseminating anti-semitic propaganda by posting a video about how Americans are brainwashed into going with whatever they are told, doesn;t add up with me. And if you knew me, youd know I wasn;t anti-semitic, or racist, or anything like that.

You havent proven any holes in my logic as of yet. Your entire ranting is baseless as I already stated sooooo many times that globalization did start before Gore sold us Nafta. I expressed my opinions on Nafta and Gore and made clear my position, which you are distorting for god knows what reason.

Your basically saying that Nafta didn't have any real impact on our current economic status, right? You say that I am factually wrong for making that claim.... What else can I say? I think your wrong. And I think your misconstruing the entire situation, or else acting very deceptively.

Go ahead and ask away Miles... Ill answer anything you like.

I just wanted to add this. How could you think Im anti-semitic when you just told me the other day that a member here at wacco told you they met me in person and said I was a good guy? That person by the way had to have been Barry (as he is the only waccobb member Ive ever met in the real world), who just so happens to be jewish. If I were anti-semitic would I really be sitting down for tea and a lovely chit chat with a jew, a person you think I hate? Also, I'll add that I think Barry is a cool guy and not someone that I hate for any reason. I have mad respect for the dude in charge, not because of what religion or race he is, but for who he is, and I have expressed that on several occasions here. Like I said earlier in this thread maybe we should as a nation reconsider how we throw around words like racist, or anti-semite...

Quote:

---

Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

Someguy,


You have a habit of only responding to what you want to respond to. You do not answer many, if any, of the questions I ask you.

Pardon me if I can't take discussing these matters with you seriously, given your pattern of selective response and ignoring issues that I raise. Perhaps this is just a function of the limitations of online debate. And the lack of sufficient time in the day. But it comes off as evasion and cherry picking.

---

Hey Miles,

You are quick to accuse me of not responding to your quesitons as though you always answer all of mine.... Well how about this entire post that you ignored?

"Wait,didn't I say that you were right and others before Clinton/Gore were to blame as well? I just think that Nafta plays a big part in this current problem of globalization and, the loss of our manufacturing base. Whats wrong with that POV? How is that factually wrong? Are you saying that Nafta wasn't a big deal, and that if it weren't for Nafta we would be worse off?

I will admit that I have a special hatred for Man Bear Pig and his sly ways with wording and his snake like salesman tactics. And he used that epic style to sell Nafta to the American public. Same way he did with his fake Global Warming film. Still, I'm not sure where you are coming from? Is it unfair for me to place some blame on Gore, Miles? You act as though I made it sound like Gore is wholly to blame for all of our economic problems.... I did not. I made it clear that I agreed with your analysis of Regan, Bush, etc.... Whats the issue here?"

There are several questions in that post, none of which you answered. Why are you being so terribly hypocritical and obnoxious? I have to point out this apparent hypocrisy because I actually am inclined to think that you buy your own bullshit and think you are better than me and that your lies will be overlooked. Good luck with that, as I will call you on your lies in public like I should have that one time I private messaged you and you weaseled your way out of looking like weasel in public.....

Wow it amazes me these people are so ignorant that they blame immigrants for "taking their jobs away". The way I see it employers gave the jobs to the immigrants, that is who they need to be angry at.

The story you shared about the young man who worked at the drug store in Brooklyn really hits home -- I am in my early 20's and I was just laid-off and I too felt very insulted that I had no warning and that I was not treated with much respect when I was let go. Maybe it is a generational thing? Or maybe he and I are just still too naive to see that "the powers that be" don't give a rat's ass about us.
I guess the problem, at least for me, is that I worked my butt off for my employer, always putting their interests before my own even. And in the end, this is how they show they care?
As far as I can tell we are all just pawns in the game and the kings and queens will reap all the benefits and "trickle" it back down to us eventually. Correct me if I am wrong, but that doesn't sound like much of a fun game to me...

Quote:

---

Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

The Great Rupture
By PETER S. GOODMAN

Published: July 2, 2010

From the NYT's

The following is from the end of the article:

But in some communities, the downturn has torn at the social fabric, heightening divisions. At a job center in Orange County, Calif., six people gathered early this year to discuss the looming expiration of their unemployment benefits. Most had worked in the white-collar world. One had been a stockbroker with a $250,000 annual income. Another had earned $60,000 a year as an executive assistant at a Jaguar dealership. Several were homeowners. Nearly everyone agreed that illegal immigrants deserved much of the blame for their failure to land another job.
Multimedia

https://graphics8.nytimes.com/images...-thumbWide.jpgGraphic
How They’re Hurting







What sorts of jobs had they been seeking?
“I would take a gardening job,” said a 58-year-old woman who had earned $24 an hour as an office manager. “I would clean toilets if I could, but I can’t take that job. Millions of people in California are illegal and they’re taking our jobs.”
A long list of factors went into explaining what had happened to the American economy so that former professionals conversant in spreadsheets and mutual funds were now chagrined to be denied the opportunity to scrub toilets. To a student of macroeconomics, the arrival of illegal immigrants seemed far down the list, somewhere after weak long-term job growth and the near collapse of the financial system.
But to unemployed people trying to divine a cause through the miasmatic haze of their own situations, the presence of illegal immigrants was the explanation they could see most clearly. You could spot them on street corners, waiting for work. You could see them crammed into rental homes, or hear their music blaring from pickup trucks. Joblessness was disorienting. Illegal immigrants formed the only putative cause that lived next door.
And yet to travel the United States in this age of insecurity, with the basic bargain of middle-class life seemingly under assault, is to marvel at the persistence of faith in some larger system; belief that hard work must be rewarded, if only out of common decency.
At a Duane Reade drugstore on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, an African-American cashier in his early 20s working the night shift complained that he and his coworkers had not been told in advance that the chain had decided to sell itself to Walgreen’s. “We didn’t even hear about it until it was on the news,” he said, sounding hurt.
Companies today change hands like poker chips at a casino, in response to millionaire investment bankers indulging words like “synergy.” Low-wage workers are generally no harder to acquire or unload than a crate of paper towels. Yet despite all that, despite economic dysfunction and narrow corporate interests, this young man was aggrieved because he had assumed something else: an almost familial relationship with his employer, a bond of mutual concern.
It was hard to know whether to feel sad in the face of this sentiment —pained that a pawn in a larger drama saw himself as important enough to warrant inclusion — or perhaps inspired that even at the lowest depths of the American workforce, faith in a shared enterprise remains.

---

Admo,

Your description of how you felt about being laid off is a very good summary of the reasons why I have been a strong critic of the capitalist free market economic system since my late teens, early twenties. I'm fifty-four now, and haven't found many reasons to change my mind.

Changes in the structure of the labor market for the last thirty years have made any sense of idea of employer concern for or loyalty towards employees, pretty much non-existent. Not that it was all that great before those changes.

On the other hand I recognize the power and flexibility of market economic systems, so I'm not someone who calls for their total abolition.


Someguy,

I didn't call you an anti-semite. I said you distributed propaganda with anti-semitic content, the two images in the zombie video. If you had a habit of doing that, I would conclude you were anti-semitic. But you haven't and so I assume you just didn't see what I saw. I don't know you well, so I wouldn't conclude you were anti-semitic, or racist in any way, until I knew more.

That wasn't why I brought it up. Even if you didn't see it the way I did, once I criticized you for it, if I were you, I would have responded. It's a pretty serious issue. You didn't, that led me to conclude that you're more interested in disseminating your Paulist / Right Libertarian media, than in participating in discussions here.


You're right, I don't answer all of your questions. Who has the time? And many of your questions are leading and based upon such flimsy premises that I just don't bother. I figure an educated, perceptive reader, can see through them, without comment from me.


In one of your last two posts you ask pointedly if I don't agree that NAFTA was bad for American (U.S.) and Mexican workers. Of course it was. But it wasn't the beginning event in the history of screwing us, it wasn't the last event in that history. It was just one of the most notorious, recent events. Focusing on it, and its promoters, obscures the important issue.

What is wrong with our society is not reducible to individual actors, and discrete periods of history and the regimes from those periods. What is wrong is an inherited system of assumptions, practices, and institutions, which do not serve everyone, and privilege the rights of the few, the powerful and the wealthy over the rights and needs of everyone else.

The players change, the names of the programs and regimes change, but it's the same old shit, over and over again.

Your pattern of blaming individuals, powerful and influential as they may have been, or are now, obscures all that. Focusing on discrete government programs or policies, to the exclusion of the long term interests behind those policies is also obscurantist. They're what certain theorists from an oft-villified but still influential school of Social Theory call, mystification. Those are the big lies, inadvertent or intentional is irrelevant, that I'm calling you on.


Do I think I'm better than you? In what sense? Smarter? Better informed? Ethically? I don't think any of that other than I might claim to be better informed. I've seen nothing you shared here that I haven't known about, most of it for years. Have I ever put anything on this board that was new to you?

I try not to think in terms of better, worse. I'm an egalitarian, anti-elitist, I think everyone has value. And I resist quantifying our differences. If I come off as supercilious, it is not my intent. I like to write, comment, discuss, debate, and I have been a reader since eight years old, so my vocabulary is fairly extensive. The more academic and theoretically obscure words I know, I try to avoid using, especially in a popular forum such as this one. I copy edit my posts. I look up words that I'm not sure I have spelled correctly. If that comes off as arrogant, I'm not sure what I can do about that. I'm also not sure would I want to, even if I knew what the problem was!


As for whether or not you acknowledge the full history of globalization policies, removal of trade restraints, and their effect on the workers of our country and Mexico? I never said you didn't. What I said was, you started out writing as if it was all Al Gore's fault. Implying that NAFTA, as an example of globalization, started with the Clinton administration and ended with it.

That is factually incorrect. I said so. You didn't admit that (that you were reducing the problem to a single agent, and period in our history) you simply asserted that what you said didn't imply that you were attributing every change in trade policy, to Gore/Clinton. But you did. Then you corrected yourself.

I wasn't criticizing your self-corrections, I was criticizing your pattern of inflamatory, false claims. You can't take that back, no matter what you say afterwards. The only way to address the problem would be to stop your pattern of making false, villifying and alarmist statements.

By the way, I'm not accusing you of intentionally lieing. I'm sure you believe what you distribute here is genuine. I'm telling you that in several significant instances, that you're wrong. Wrong as in mistaken, ill-informed, naive, misguided.

Now, I know in arguments, that often someone is accused of speaking falsely, when they make a statement, because that statement is interpreted to also contradict its opposite and for leaving out important facts that should have been stated. I checked myself to see if I had fallen into that fallacy. I don't think I did. I focused on the specific things you've said here, and why they are not true, and how they're obfuscatory.

I'm not going to spend my time refuting every detail of what you put out here. What you've seen in the last day or so is as close as I'll come. And continuing this tit for tat discussion is not useful. Both of us have had our say on the matters involved. We're obviously not going to reach agreement.

I'll leave your little digs aside. Pissing matches just stink up the place.

Except to say, the pattern of your refutation, your argument, fits the logical structure of, "Same to you, but more of it!"

Been there, done that,

Quote:

---

Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

You didn't admit that (that you were reducing the problem to a single agent, and period in our history) you simply asserted that what you said didn't imply that you were attributing every change in trade policy, to Gore/Clinton. But you did. Then you corrected yourself. [/SIZE][/FONT]

[FONT=Garamond][SIZE=4]I wasn't criticizing your self-corrections, I was criticizing your pattern of inflamatory, false claims. \

---

Ahh yes, with three off the cuff words (thanks Al baby) I reduced an entire global economic crisis to one single person..... Maybe you could view it like that. To me, I was just getting in a shot at man bear pig. I speedily corrected the situation in the next post when you pointed it out... Big frigging deal!

All your ranting and flailing over three little words....? Wow! Good for you. Keep fighting that righteous battle Miles.

But maybe you should point out more of these alleged "consistent inflammatory and false claims" of mine. Hopefully you choose some real statements to take issue with in the future, not just some off the cuff joke about a douchie liar.

Now that I've had a good little while to think about your anti-semitic claims I have one thing that I want to bring up to you Miles. I'd love to do it in a private message (for the same reasons I wanted to before) but you have made it clear not to...

I re-read your thoughts this morning on that Zombie video I posted a few days back just to refresh my memory as to what you stated about it being anti-semitic propaganda. Frankly I was quite disturbed at what you had to say, and I am shocked that I didn't notice this the first time I read through your post.

Lets start by saying, that video was not in any way anti-semitic propaganda. It made no mention of Jewish people, and the subject matter was of a completely different nature. Yet when you saw the image of a shadowy figure, the one whom you described as being " a big nosed, bushy haired, swarthy caricature of a face", you immediately thought Jew! Doesn't that bother you? It doesn't matter if you were repulsed, or giddy about it, you apparently have the perception that Jewish people are "big nosed, bushy haired, swarthy" people, and that bugs the shit out of me. I'm sure it really pisses off Jewish people who don't want to be characterized in such a despicable manner.

Now mind you, I do not take the issue of racism lightly. Not at all. I would never throw these kinds of words at people without much meditation, and after thinking about this for some time now Ive got to say that if your knee jerk reaction to seeing an ugly character, like the one you described, as being Jewish, I think you may be anti-semitic. You may not hate Jews or even think unkindly of them, but for you to label that character as Jewish is totally illogical and perpetuates a racist stereotype that has obviously been embedded in your conditioning. I will not allow that to go unchecked, so check yourself.

This is not an attack but a genuine call for you to wake up and think deeply about what was said here in this post and more importantly of yourself. If someone were to point this out to me, I sure as hell would.

Quote:

---

Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

...Lets start by saying, that video was not in any way anti-semitic propaganda. It made no mention of Jewish people, and the subject matter was of a completely different nature. Yet when you saw the image of a shadowy figure, the one whom you described as being " a big nosed, bushy haired, swarthy caricature of a face", you immediately thought Jew! Doesn't that bother you? It doesn't matter if you were repulsed, or giddy about it, you apparently have the perception that Jewish people are "big nosed, bushy haired, swarthy" people, and that bugs the shit out of me. I'm sure it really pisses off Jewish people who don't want to be characterized in such a despicable manner...

---

Someguy,

You've been pressing me to provide a specific example of the kinds of things you say, and promote, here that I find so irritating and mendacious (whether conscious or not on your part).

Thanks for providing a fresh example!

If you're not familiar with the coded images and phrases that have been used over the last several hundred years (probably much longer) to express hatred for Jews, well, all I can say is your education in important matters of historical and social justice is sorely lacking. Of course you've been proving that consistently in your participation here. That's why I've taken you to task so vociferously in the past few days.

As for off board private conversations, I make it pretty clear to anyone who emails me directly, that I prefer to debate and discuss in public, here. Just not enough time or interest for me to carry on side conversations.

Back to your devastating analysis of my heretofore unrealized racism, your argument is tantamount to accusing someone who spots racist imagery in blackface, step and fetch it vaudeville shows of the pre-Civil Rights era, a hater of Black people. Surely only someone with those prejudices would see that message in a bit of harmless fun!

I made it clear what was anti-semitic in the two images and where and when those images have been used to express anti-semitism.

I'm done with you, fool. From now on my plan is to respond to a few of your more egregious assertions with single word retorts. That's all your stubborn ignorance deserves.

Quote:

---

Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

From now on my plan is to respond to a few of your more egregious assertions with single word retorts. [/SIZE][/FONT]

---

Good plan. Put up your barriers and retreat from any inner analysis. Live in constant denial and use your alleged intellect to weasel out of taking any true critique to heart.

Neither of those two things looked like anti-Jewish to me.... and one of them was shown not even in the context of international banking (an industry you seem to stereotype as completely Jewish). And how you could envision some arms holding puppet strings over a sign that says international banking as the person holding the strings as being Jewish is asinine to me. I looked up Nazi Jewish propaganda and couldn't find one image similar to those in the video. So I do not know where you are coming from when you spout that BS.

You can save your single word retorts for people who care to hear them, I do not. I don't listen to people who refuse to acknowledge their shortcomings, and I don't take kindly to people who make racist presumptions about people. None of those pictures were even close to a portrait of black face.... It was just a person.... Like I said before, if it were a woman, Id be sexist, if it were an Arab, Id be racist...... So can we only show pictures of people without any defining characteristics at all when we make media nowadays?

I spoke about this issue with several people I know and showed them all of the evidence. Nobody thought Jew when they saw those pictures flash across the screen. Everybody thought you were at least a weirdo, or possibly anti-semitic, for coming to that conclusion. I still don't feel I did you wrong and I stand by my assertion that you are at least somewhat anti-semitic in my eyes for stereotyping those pictures the way you did.

Pish Tosh!

P.S. Re: Black faces, it was an analogy, referring to your argument that I'm an anti-semite because of the way I interpreted the two Zombie video images. Not referring to the Zombie video images themselves. You don't really read carefully do you? And apparently your friends don't know shit either. Just look up "Anti-Semitic Coded Images / Phrases." I have no interest in disseminating them.

Finally, I never called you a racist, for the third time, I said the content of the video you forwarded had racist / anti-semitic imagery. I surmised that you weren't aware of the significance. I keep trying to give you an out. You won't take it.

Welcome to the dumbing down of America (U.S.)

Keep digging that hole you're in...

I hope I will not be putting my foot in my mouth later, but I will say this anyway.

Hello "Mad" Miles and someguy. I've been watching (lurking) your back and forth's with each other on this thread and decided to look some stuff up for myself.
After about an hour I started getting a little burned out on it but here is what I have found to be most pertinent so far.
I suggest (ask) both of you take a look at it and maybe it will help shed light on why "Mad" Miles is saying what he is saying.
Although this is really meant more for the information that someguy would be more enlightened by but I also think that "Mad" Miles should take a look at it too so; as to verify one way or the other and tell me/us if this kind of thing is some of what he was referring to regarding "anti-Semitic coded images / Phrases".

"Mad" Miles has some interesting points.
someguy has some valid statements, and I trust that he has not had the same experience educationally as "Mad" Miles or as I have had in personal experience with prejudice (which by the way [prejudice] was not necessarily directed at me, but was directed towards others in my presence when I was young).

I have had personal experience with individuals from both the Ku Klux Klan and the Black Panthers, for example.
My politically involved mother also had very good close friendships with Jewish politicians (and of course others). There are many more examples of opposites so to speak who were very close friends of mine, but I won't get into all that, because it would obfuscate the points I'm trying to make here.


Needless to say I have seen the gamut of prejudice from many different directions in my life since I was very young. My mother was very political. So I understand certain things that I would not expect most other people to know unless they were or are deeply into political science or some sort of deep social studies or college level studies in sociology.

Of course I realize that I am not the only one with such experience but I still believe that my experience is somewhat unique, and shed the light on things in front of me that allot of other people just never have had the opportunity to see up close and somewhat personal.

Some people have had the opportunity that I know of personally but (generally speaking) many of them were either too squeamish or too sidetracked to notice when the opportunities arose, if they (those unique opportunities) did, which they definitely did not; very often.

Anyway what I'm getting at is (that) I think there is a personality-based misunderstanding between you two on this thread (but of course, not limited to this thread) that took the form of attitudes (?) coming from both sides.

I also think I understand and have empathy of, to some extent, (although certainly not totally); both sides.

I can totally understand how you guys feel that you're pushing each other's buttons, so to speak, a little bit.

There most certainly are things in life and of course on this website that comes up that everybody will not agree upon 100%, that’s just natural, normal, human relations.

"Mad" Miles, I understand what you're getting at, but I think you're clobbering someguy with your education more than what makes for a cohesive understanding between the two of you of which I believe you're trying to achieve. Just a thought I'm not trying to over- judge, but that's the thought that comes to my mind right now.

someguy, I do believe that you are not a racist or an anti-Semite. I recommend that you take a look at the link I put on here. Maybe then you will understand a little more, where "Mad" Miles is coming from, because he does have some education in certain areas that goes far beyond either what I believe is your or (what I know mine is) (my) education, or my experience could compete with on the particular level from which he is coming at you with, specifically here on this thread.

"Mad" Miles said that he was 54 years old. I am not very much younger than that.
I do not know how old you (someguy) are/is, but I sense you’re not too much younger than I am.

Those of us that were born in the 1950’s, raised in the 1960’s and came of age in the 1970’s do have some unique experiences that previous living generations as well as those not too long after those times just simply could not have experienced in anywhere near the same way.
Just five years one way or the other makes a huge difference that most other people could not understand easily if at all. I'm not saying it absolutely can't happen. I'm saying that it usually doesn't and is not likely to happen.

Some of the older people that are in their 80s or 90s my have an idea, because they experienced certain things in the late 1930’s, where they could relate but other people just would not understand unless they are educated in a very special way.
Please don't get me wrong I'm not trying to be an elitist I am just trying to relate certain realities of the times and certain experiences that people have while they/we were growing up, which totally influences how they/we perceive things and the uniqueness of going (in the cultural sense), all the way from Ozzie and Harriet to Ozzy Osbourne (crude example) and such that is better suited for another thread.

Anyway here are a couple more links that are actually within the above aforementioned link that have some images and historical facts along with them regarding the specifics of the "anti-Semitic coded images / Phrases" issue that came up:
April 15, Sound Money
June 21, Denver New Road
August 6, Sound Money
August 20, Sound Money
October 15, Sound Money
October 22, Sound Money
November 5, Sound Money

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Posted in reply to the post by Hotspring 44:

[/FONT]"Mad" Miles said that he was 54 years old. I am not very much younger than that.
I do not know how old you (someguy) are/is, but I sense you’re not too much younger than I am.

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Thanks for the thoughtful and reasonable approach in an effort to keep the peace.... But I just wanted to let you know, that I am 24 years old, not in my fifties. Mad Miles knows that too. I'll be checking out your links right now!

After reading your article and looking at all of the images of anti-semitic political cartoons, I would ask you to please go the the American Zombie thread and watch that little piece and tell me if you think what Mad Miles mentioned was anti-semitic propaganda or if he was making that claim up out of thin air. Not one single thing that you posted had anything to do with that Zombie video in my opinion. And Id really like to know if you agree with me or not. Thanks.

Wow, this discussion turned into something it was definitely not intended to be by the person who started it, but what can ya do?
I feel partially responsible, because it was I that originally called someguy a racist, but I take it back entirely. Although some of what he was saying in the original post was semi-prejudiced in thought, I genuinely believe he (or she) is a good person and did not intend to prejudge those around him. Nor did he mean, in my opinion, to show a complete lack of empathy for the innocent party that is the "pawn" in the game of globalizing the world economy. The fact that he did not intentionally harbor or verbalize these beliefs is exactly the reason I started this thread!
The fact of the matter is, as a society, as a culture, we have conditioned ourselves (or more likely been conditioned by the "powers that be") to harbor these destructive, non-humanitarian views. Actually, these non-values have been shoved down our throats by the very wise (pardon my sarcasm) institutions of media and politics; and they have been shoving since we were born, so many of us are not even aware of the shitty way of thinking that fills our heads.
I fully excuse someguy for his (past) ignorance so long as he stops denying, and starts embracing the fact that there is more to the picture than pointing fingers at those who are actually suffering the most in this situation -- the poor immigrant (legal or otherwise). To say "they are illegal, and because they are here illegally and breaking the law they should suffer" is preposterous! Nobody deserves to be mistreated, period. Also to justify mistreating people with the law is absurd because at any time, the laws could be changed and anyone of us could become the new beating horse for society.
That is what happened in Europe (and almost the entire world) in the 1940's -- NAZI's changed the laws to make it legal and acceptable to torture and kill people. If we do not keep a strong moral prinicpality and if we fail to continue judging the laws and power of the state and federal governments against the backdrop of our ethically-correct moral fabric, we will fall right into the same trap as Europe did to the NAZI's. Fascism is when the government conveniently thinks and makes decisions for its people based on the government's needs and objectives. Quite the opposite of democracy, which is governed by the people and based on the needs and beliefs of the people themselves. However they are similar and to the naked eye, it is possible to hide a fascist regime under the guise of a democratic or semi-socialist regime -- that is exactly how Hitler came to power.
So we all need to rethink our way of thinking and take a long, deep look at our countries polices.
Finally, we cannot blame age for our ignorance. I am about the same age as you, someguy, maybe just a few months older than you, but I do not look at my age as a barrier to my understanding the world around me. I know that neither do you. We have to keep a "beginner's mind" as we look at the world around us, so our view doesn't get clouded by the lens that is social conditioning. We have to keep our infantile points of view so we can look innocently (not naively) at the world, and see it for what it is. With pure minds and pure hearts, before all the negative influence, I believe that all humans are good people and with this pure, innocent state of mind, we will make the best decisions about how to love and care for each other, not ostracize and hurt each other.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

To say "they are illegal, and because they are here illegally and breaking the law they should suffer" is preposterous! Nobody deserves to be mistreated, period.

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I never said that if they are illegal, and because they are here illegally they deserve to suffer.... Never. Not once. That is not what I believe at all. Okay? You have put many words in my mouth so far, and they are not appreciated. Speak for yourself and yourself only. Got it?

If nobody deserves to be mistreated, then what do you say to those who live here legally and are being mistreated by the illegals who choose to circumvent the rule of law and take jobs of the legal residents who deserve them according to our law? Are they not being mistreated? You seem to only express sympathy for those who you think deserve it, but I'm sorry to inform you that other people in this country, (law abiding people) deserve sympathy too. Moreover, they deserve a fair playing field, or in this case, a fair job market. Sound reasonable to you admo?

Hotspring44, Admo,

Great posts. Thanks for doing the research on the anti-semitic racism of American (U.S.) Populists (aka associated with The Progressives by the way.) Good reminder. And Admo, excellent point about how misguided it is to crap on the poor, desperate and powerless, rather than focusing on the architects and interests of those who benefit from undocumented labor, and don't give a rats anus for the problems of "documented" labor.

As someone who has been an anti-racist activist since my sophomore year in college (at least, my views were formed in late childhood, early adolescence) I am sensitive to racist subtexts in media, peoples writing etc. I stand by my claim that the two images, seen late in the zombie americans video, are coded anti-semitism. It's also why I don't take someguys projection of unconscious anti-semitism on to me seriously.

We're all conditioned by institutional racism, but some have strived to become aware of that, and make changes to combat it. In our own lives and in our communities. I've been more active than most, not as active as some others, but I've got the track record, the credentials if I may, to laugh uproariously at such an accusation. It didn't trouble me in the least.

I looked at the video again last night, but I can't do screen captures, or at least don't know how, so I couldn't post those images here alongside the many anti-semitic cartoons and propaganda hate illustrations available on the web, from Germany in the '30's to the American (U.S.) cartoons that Hotspring44 took the trouble to provide here. Pretty ugly stuff, right?

By the way, the Brit speaking in the zombie/sheeple vid is David Ickes, I remembered that later, not "Dennis" somebody, my bad. Anybody reading my stuff here knows I cop to terrible factual detail memory (names, dates, statistics, i.e. discrete facts) on a regular basis.

Have I been hard on someguy? Yes! And I've explained why in the process of doing it.

In a nutshell, his assertions of absurd social theories, as fact, his thin-skinned defensiveness, while projecting his own doubts and insecurities onto his critics (i.e. me, and Edward/VO occasionally) while evading any responsibility for mistakes on his part, makes him an easy target. (Saying what one said isn't what one said, and then tailoring your response to encompass the criticism being made and claiming that's what you meant all along, is not admitting error. It's denying it.)

There are plenty of "easy targets" posting on waccobb. I only shoot at the ones regurgitating ideological nonsense. And only if they have an unrelenting habit of doing so.

What makes this little pissing match a mite painful, is that on some large questions someguy and I agree. Corporate power ruining the future of humanity being the big one. But we analyse it differently. We assign culpability to different actors, or social forces in my case.

I was twenty-four once. I vividly remember the raw intensity of my rage against social injustice, my contempt for the misguided fools who either acquiesced to it (most people) or were either unconscious or conscious agents of it. I'd organized quite a few rallies and demonstrations by then, participated in many more, read a lot of history, political philosophy, sociology, anthropology, political fiction and more. I didn't think I knew it all, but I thought I knew quite a lot.

That period was the foundation of my life up to this point. I haven't changed my mind on the basics, I haven't lost my outrage. But I've read and experienced even more, the major change being that I have a perspective now that I didn't completely have then.

I'm less inclined to take personal offence when someone disagrees with me. I'm less inclined to attribute internal psychological motives to those I'm arguing with. And I'm even better at disparaging, slyly or directly, an opponent in an argument. And I was pretty good at it back then.

As Hotspring44 so ably described, I also have more direct experience of history, having lived as a curious and avid observor/participant in the politics and culture of the past forty years. I've been interested in history since childhood. One of my favorite forms of literature was/is the historical novel. I majored in History and Philosophy, I read histories and watch them on TV.

Like any social subject, it's "subject" to debate, interpretation and ideological bias. So whether we can achieve a "true" knowledge of history is a question oft debated and unlikely to be resolved. But there are respected schools of thought, and marginal, debunked schools. Paranoid, racist, conspiritorial claims generally fall into the latter category.

I'm not calling someguy a racist, just naive in propagating a video with racist content. I'll leave it up to Admo to argue the racism of someguy's dismissal and condemnation of undocumented workers.

For anyone interested in the issue of whether or not the two images in the zombie video are coded anti-semitism. Look at the video again. Freeze the image of the puppeteer hands on top of a large institutional building labeled "International Banking", then peruse a few of the websites, both racist and anti-racist, that come up from doing a search for "Jews and International Banking". It's painful information, but important for anyone not already hip to this odious shit.

Next freeze the image of the head and torso that comes up soon after in the video, the image with a name tag that says "Mind Control" (or is it "thought control"? It's the guy with the computer parts imbedded in his right temple, he's sort of sneering, with one eyebrow raised in contempt), then google images of "Menachem Begin", and stereotypical images of "The International Jew" from Nazi, or American (U.S.) KKK and Neo-Nazi sources, preferably sources debunking those racist sources, and compare the images.

Also note the way the two images in the zombie video are used, where they are placed in the narrative, what the commentary is focusing on when they are used, and the way they are faded in and out of focus, and only flashed for a second or two. Yet many other images are given longer shots and don't use the fade in, fade out, focus / unfocus method. Then read a treatise on propaganda techniques, subliminal seduction and how film and sound can be used to tap into the subconscious. Then decide if I have a point or not and get back to me/us.

Again, I did not accuse someguy of being anti-semitic. I originally wrote, in my criticism of the claims in the zombie video, that the images were an indicator that the video came from the political fringe of alarmist, conspiracist, extreme right and left wings of our political culture, and that made those claims suspect. I also explained, in detail, my contention that calling most people sheep, asleep, dupes, brain-washed, zombies, etc. was not a useful means to change our society for the better.

In watching the american zombie video last night, I also watched one labeled "illuminati images in the modern world" (or some such name, I'm paraphrasing) that came up in the Utube queue. It makes a case that satanists are behind most powerful corporations and political actors in recent history. Highly amusing, not news to me having researched political esoterica for several decades. But if you're curious, watch it and tell me if it's just paranoid propaganda, or a convincing argument that this world is ruled by the same, "thirteen families" for millenia and Satan is behind their power!

There's debate and discussion, and there's extremist, rumor-mongering couched as political criticism. There's a difference. I took someguy to task for confusing that difference. I'd do it again, with anyone who I thought was doing the same. Especially if they made a habit of doing it over and over and over in the same virtual community where I spend a good bit of my time.

Byee!

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

I never said that if they are illegal, and because they are here illegally they deserve to suffer.... Never. Not once. That is not what I believe at all. Okay? You have put many words in my mouth so far, and they are not appreciated. Speak for yourself and yourself only. Got it?

If nobody deserves to be mistreated, then what do you say to those who live here legally and are being mistreated by the illegals who choose to circumvent the rule of law and take jobs of the legal residents who deserve them according to our law? Are they not being mistreated? You seem to only express sympathy for those who you think deserve it, but I'm sorry to inform you that other people in this country, (law abiding people) deserve sympathy too. Moreover, they deserve a fair playing field, or in this case, a fair job market. Sound reasonable to you admo?

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Firstly, please calm down. I was trying to defend you (by saying that through your ignorance you were led to believe the wrong things), but you have twisted around and tried to bite me for trying to protect you. Your true colors have come out.
Next, I am not putting words in your mouth. I am reiterating your blather about your feelings of anger toward "these immigrants" for taking away American jobs.
Actually, you are putting words in my mouth -- I am ALL for sympathy for the American people, that is why I started this thread, out of sympathy. I do NOT however have any sympathy for those who bathe in ignorance and are proud of it, nor do I sympathize with those who justify their anger and hatred towards the wrong parties. You have been deceived if you really believe that the immigrants are "taking" away your jobs. As I have said before it is quite the contrary in that American employers are giving immigrants jobs, and they are the ones you should point your finger at. That is if you are mad about that sort of thing. The way I see it is there is more than enough to go around and the borders of the nations of the world are evil constructs used by the dominating powers to oppress people, to divide and conquer the resources of the globe, and to keep in order a system of oppression whereby these said powers can gain maximum benefit from the world. They rely on third world countries to provide cheap (or free) labor and natural resources to keep their system of dominance and power going. They need to have sweatshops in the East to keep the profit margins good in the West. And to keep their bank accounts, and their children's bank accounts, full to the brim.
You keep on blaming the poor immigrant (good Bob Dylan song) for the choices and conscious decisions of American businesses and corporations. I do NOT sympathize with that point of view in the least and moreover I believe that those who do are seriously misguided and misinformed.
I believe in open doors for all humanity, not just for those that can afford it or were born in the right nation. I think that all humanity is one people and we need to live and love as one. When we start saying our neighbors are not us and they don't deserve to eat from our blackberry bushes, we are living in hatred and that is a shame to me.
There are more than enough jobs out there, even despite the economy. If you cannot find a job you need to get off of the couch and get some ambition. Also, if you accepted lower wages and worse working conditions, you would have a job in no time. Sorry for the bad sarcasm, but many people of color, immigrants or not, have to settle for worse pay and worse working conditions that their caucasian American brothers. Sad isn't it. I know because I see it first hand.

I find that you are not bringing anything constructive to this thread and would like it if you stopped posting defensive replies to everyone else's posts on here -- this is supposed to be an open forum and it feels like you are trying to hijack my thread and be the only voice on it.
Please do not feel like I am asking you to leave, that is not the case at all. Just please loosen up and allow others to come in and discuss, not argue, about ideas and concepts and actions and dreams and hopes and fears, etc... :)
Thanks and hope you understand.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

As it is the Fourth of July and I have a lot on my mind regarding the policies of our lovely federal government I thought I would start this thread as a positive space for people to voice their opinions...

I will start by saying that as a native born American, our country has terrible policies regarding immigration. We mistreat our neighbors and tear families apart over this issue.

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I agree with that in the sense that our country has immigration policies that at times inadvertently tear families apart. Scapegoatism (unfortunately) is a condition that plagues our humanity (world wide) with a quasi-survivalist inertia that is based on prejudice, militant, adversarial, conditioning that frequently dehumanizes others whom are assumed to be “the antagonist”, sometimes leading into despair and sometimes even war where either of those consequences would otherwise be entirely uncalled for.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

I have many close friends who have relatives or immediate family who cannot enter our borders due to immigration laws and the fact that so many of my American-born friends seem to think that "immigrants are stealing away jobs for Americans" is preposterous to me!

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Most immigrants that come here for work do not come with the intention of “stealing” “our” jobs.

Scapegoatism towards the immigrants for our own Country’s political system of self-centered, intentional, greed, supporting built-in laws which have just about always throughout history favored the large Property holding, robber barons of the day which is one of the main keys to the success of the continuance of the hierarchical structuring of which all systems of governance depend on to one extent or another.
Scapegoatism is one facet that maintains control of the populace within the conformity to the hierarchical governance for the purpose of maintaining and bolstering status quo.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

If American companies so wanted, they could pick up all operations within the USA and move them abroad to outsource and save money on labor.

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Many have already done so, however; certain operations like farming, for example, have also done so, but they have limited geographical areas outside of the continental United States to fit within the perimeter of acceptable logistics to survive within their business model/s at this point in time.
But what you did say is essentially correct particularly, within the realm of global economics and to be more specific; geopolitics; (Geopolitics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Note also: (Anti-globalization movement)

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

Furthermore, many of my "friends" who say such things are too lazy to keep the jobs they "lost to immigrants".
What a racist way of looking at the world...

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I suppose that could be interpreted as a “racist” way of looking at the world but (I ask) which race is it that is being subjected to (the) criticism of being too lazy?
It seems to be common belief that it is white Anglo-Saxon European race whom are the ones that are usually referred to in this country as the ones being "too lazy" to take certain jobs that the stereotypical view (of) that immigrants will do the more unpleasant laborious jobs like seasonal farm work and room service maintenance jobs in motels and meatpacking plant processing etc.. Could that be considered a racist-based presumption? (about the ones who are "too lazy"; I'm referring to.).
I think that in some cases it could be interpreted as such. But of course it does not necessarily mean that it is actually racist, depending upon the actual context in which it is referred to and meant by the entities making that kind of statement because it could mean any American citizen in general terms are "too lazy". Then at that point it could be interpreted as nationalistic in a prejudicial sense couldn't it? but the pragmatist may not necessarily be nationalistic or racist. No, instead they may be viewing things from a limited amount of historical, educational, experience, and intellectual resources. "Too lazy" may also be a mis-judgment, and it really is a factor that looks sort of like; too lazy = < a "living wage".

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Posted in reply to the post by Hotspring 44:

It seems to be common belief that it is white Anglo-Saxon European race whom are the ones that are usually referred to in this country as the ones being "too lazy" to take certain jobs that the stereotypical view (of) that immigrants will do the more unpleasant laborious jobs like seasonal farm work and room service maintenance jobs in motels and meatpacking plant processing etc.. Could that be considered a racist-based presumption? (about the ones who are "too lazy"; I'm referring to.).
I think that in some cases it could be interpreted as such. But of course it does not necessarily mean that it is actually racist, depending upon the actual context in which it is referred to and meant by the entities making that kind of statement because it could mean any American citizen in general terms are "too lazy". Then at that point it could be interpreted as nationalistic in a prejudicial sense couldn't it? but the pragmatist may not necessarily be nationalistic or racist. No, instead they may be viewing things from a limited amount of historical, educational, experience, and intellectual resources. "Too lazy" may also be a mis-judgment, and it really is a factor that looks sort of like; too lazy = < a "living wage".

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I do not mean to sound rude, but many of my American-born friends -- be them of any color, culture, or race -- are much more "lazy" than my friends who have immigrated from overseas. I think that the competition to get to the USA is so high that my international friends would all be considered "overachievers" by our society's standards just to have the opportunity to come work or study here.
The question arises why does our culture have such a word and ideology of "overachiever". Is it possible to achieve too much? Certainly not by the standards of many of my international friends who beat themselves up over "A's" when they could have gotten an "A+".

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

Next, I am not putting words in your mouth. I am reiterating your blather about your feelings of anger toward "these immigrants" for taking away American jobs.

The way I see it is there is more than enough to go around


There are more than enough jobs out there, even despite the economy. If you cannot find a job you need to get off of the couch and get some ambition. Also, if you accepted lower wages and worse working conditions, you would have a job in no time. Sorry for the bad sarcasm, but many people of color, immigrants or not, have to settle for worse pay and worse working conditions that their caucasian American brothers. Sad isn't it. I know because I see it first hand.

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Excuse me for becoming defensive as you put words in quotations and attributed them to my name even though they weren't my words... You have yet to admit your wrong-doing. And believe me I am waiting for your apology.......

I'm sorry to tell you that the facts don't match your world view. With this country in the midst of massive unemployment and a economic depression sadly, there is not enough to go around. At least when were speaking of jobs that is.


I do have a job for your information, so no need to lecture me about how you think its should be so damn easy for me to find work.... BTW Its not easy for anyone to find work nowadays. And until you realize that major factor in this discussion you mind as well be living in a fantasy world, spouting a fantasy opinion.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

Excuse me for becoming defensive as you put words in quotations and attributed them to my name even though they weren't my words... You have yet to admit your wrong-doing. And believe me I am waiting for your apology.......

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Sorry you must not know me very well. Don't hold your breath waiting for an apology from me.

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

I'm sorry to tell you that the facts don't match your world view. With this country in the midst of massive unemployment and a economic depression sadly, there is not enough to go around. At least when were speaking of jobs that is. I do have a job for your information, so no need to lecture me about how you think its so damn easy to find work.... BTW Its not easy. And until you realize that major factor in this discussion you mind as well be living in a fantasy world.

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Once again you have been deceived my friend. There IS more than enough to go around in this country and the world at large -- it is a matter of using what we NEED, not what we WANT as well as allocating properly so there aren't those who are filthy rich and those who are starving to death.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

Once again you have been deceived my friend. There IS more than enough to go around in this country and the world at large -- it is a matter of using what we NEED, not what we WANT as well as allocating properly so there aren't those who are filthy rich and those who are starving to death.

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Thats so easy for you to say, but try saying that to the hundreds of thousands of people that were booted out of their homes because of this economic crisis, or to the ones who have lost their income and are still searching for another source of it. Your fantasy view of the world is not reflective of the world we live in.

You are right about one thing, there is enough resources on this planet to sustain us all. Unfortunately, for us in the US, and the real world at large, its not so simple. You can claim there are enough jobs to go around all you like, but that doesn't make it true. I guess what your saying is that 9.3% of our population just is too lazy to find work...... How empathetic of you. The jobs are just waiting there to be filled by those couple million lazy ass Americans. If only they'd pick there rear end up off the couch and be more like your international friends, we wouldn't be in this economic mess, right admo?

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

Sorry you must not know me very well. Don't hold your breath waiting for an apology from me.

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I guess it was silly of me to think that you'd admit to and apologize for lying without even knowing you. I guess I just tend to give strangers the benefit of the doubt......

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

There are more than enough jobs out there, even despite the economy. If you cannot find a job you need to get off of the couch and get some ambition.

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YouTube - We Need To Put An End To The Policies That Got Us Here! Pres Obama pt.1

If your interested, this is a speech Obama just gave today, a few minutes ago actually, and in that speech he said that for every job opening in America, we have 5 unemployed people to match it. Hmm... Does it take a rocket scientist to evaluate those numbers admo? Does that really fit into your world view?

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Posted in reply to the post by someguy:

Thats so easy for you to say, but try saying that to....the ones who have lost their income and are still searching for another source of it.

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I am one of those people. :(
This is why we need to rethink the way we think about things and maybe even redesign our global society.

I know you are mad, but please stop pointing the finger at me. Also, you are hiding from the truth. The truth is, even with the "bad" economy, many people are filthy rich to the point of having multi-billions of dollars in our state alone.
Less than 10% of the population of our world controls over 90% of the wealth.
There is MORE than enough to go around, the question is who will get some? And why? Because they were born into old wealth?
I do not have a world view, per se. But i do know that the way we as humanity are going about the problem of overpopulation is not right.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

I know you are mad, but please stop pointing the finger at me. Also, you are hiding from the truth. The truth is, even with the "bad" economy, many people are filthy rich to the point of having multi-billions of dollars in our state alone.
Less than 10% of the population of our world controls over 90% of the wealth.
There is MORE than enough to go around, the question is who will get some? And why? Because they were born into old wealth?
I do not have a world view, per se. But i do know that the way we as humanity are going about the problem of overpopulation is not right.

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I'd be very interested in hearing what you know about overpopulation. A subject that I spend a lot of time researching.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

I do not mean to sound rude, but many of my American-born friends -- be them of any color, culture, or race -- are much more "lazy" than my friends who have immigrated from overseas.

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:2cents:I do not construe what you just said as being rude. I actually concur to some extent with your observation of American-born people being too [fat and] (my interjection) lazy so to speak.

There is a litany of factors involved with “legal immigration” that requires a certain amount of education or prearranged job of/for the immigrant to meet the requirements.

In comparison our school system here in America is failing so many American citizens.

Just to compare; 1-. I'm assuming that the immigrants that you know personally are probably not the so-called illegal aliens that you have referred to as “stealing our jobs”. Is that correct?
2- Comparatively, were they come from; coming to America is probably a privilege for them, is it not?
3- Many other countries in which people are allowed to immigrate to America from have a greater amount of vocational experience than what is normally allowed or available in American public schools.

So comparatively, many of our fellow citizens do not have a high school diploma and also they do not have adequate training or experience in vocational skills , and usually do not have the resources to up their education to a college level either.

Another point I would like to make is that you live in Sonoma County California, which has a very high cost of living compared to most of the rest of the United States. Minimum wage in Sonoma County is not a living wage.

Then there are the cultural differences. Most youngsters in the United States either depend upon their parents for the first few years after they become 18 or they go out on their own.
When they go out on their own without the help of their parents they still have to pay rent, utilities, food, taxes, transportation to and from work, etc. etc., state minimum wage in this area is simply not enough to make ends meet.

Would you take a job that cost you more to do than what you get out of it? Of course not!

I am saying that a single person that has to use minimum wage in Sonoma, Marin, Napa, Lake, Mendocino, Sacramento Counties, etc. etc. is not going to financially make it by themselves without some kind of help/assistance.

The fact that certain employers throughout the history of the state of California and the history of the United States as well, have been taking advantage of immigrant laborers by paying them as little as they could and still get the work done for them.

Also, many immigrants have resources that come from outside to help them survive during the first few months of their residency here. Or they actually have a prearranged job that they go directly to (hence the green card) and also a prearranged place to reside. Just try to get that for a high school dropout American citizen of any race and for that same person to have enough money left out of each paycheck to send some of it back to a family somewhere like so many immigrants seem to be able to do.

There most definitely is a gap between the needs of a single person on their own and available wages for those low-paying jobs that immigrants are theoretically commonly taking.
Then there is the immigrants “taking” skilled labor (jobs) factor, which I believe was mentioned here on waccobb somewhere at some point in the recent past.

There are lots of socioeconomic circumstances that I think are easy to overlook whereas some (but definitely not all) of those people that are referred to as being too lazy are still aware of their circumstance enough to know that they would be unable to maintain a livelihood on their own with wages that immigrant families are able to sustain themselves with because of the strength in numbers factor many immigrants have been able to take advantage of.

I have seen people from international areas other than Mexico having jobs here in the United States that are not farm related labor and actually some of those jobs require some skills with some amount of training and minimally high school diploma (some are graduate college educated). Those combined with a reasonable amount of motivation and some form of savings or support to start with is likely more common than not.

I think that there is a lack of support for American people that work whom only receive minimum wage with no benefits because it is common now for it to be a temporary job and the market is flooded with workers.

That's where the robber baron comes in.

One of the tactics that the robber barons have used is to introduce somebody, usually from a distant place that is able to easily outpace everybody else in the field or wherever they're working as a threat to the workers whom are already working there that they better hurry up,shut up, put out, and put up!... ...(with substandard working conditions)... Or else!

Some people may appear to be “lazy”, but even if it's subconscious, many are very aware of that ( robber Baron circumstance) to the point where it is actually instinctual.

I remember one time when I was young; there were more people coming from Cambodia that were eligible for business loans, then there were Americans eligible/applying (successfully) for similar business loans, because of some sort of an international treaty.
Meanwhile, there were homeless veterans! What's up with that? I can only give you short answer at this point in time that answer is that it has to do with socioeconomics. There is/was a mentality that was/is deeply ingrained in people that were born in the 1940s and early 1950s that they would rather starve or die than get any of what they perceived to be as “handouts” from “the government”.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

I think that the competition to get to the USA is so high that my international friends would all be considered "overachievers" by our society's standards just to have the opportunity to come work or study here.

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Overachievers have a grotesque competition, instinct that I personally cannot stand!
I don't dislike those people, but if all employers expect every employee to be like that it ends up making the work environment and everything dependent upon it too stressful and there becomes too many tensions at work and in people's homes thus it makes virtually everybody absolutely miserable! Except maybe the boss, if the boss is taking a gain in profit from the competitiveness.
But the hyper-competitiveness also has drawbacks, which usually result in high turnover and injury rates. Note the high volume, meat processing plants in the Midwest as an example.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

The question arises why does our culture have such a word and ideology of "overachiever". Is it possible to achieve too much? Certainly not by the standards of many of my international friends who beat themselves up over "A's" when they could have gotten an "A+".

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Give me a break! They actually beat themselves up over not getting A+! Don't you get it?
“Overachiever” may not be the best explanation for me to be expressing my divergence to.

I think a better way to explain what I'm trying to get at would be called something like hyper-competitiveness.
There are limits to tolerable levels of everything in both directions high and low. Too much competition is equally as unhealthy as not enough motivation.
It (hyper-competitiveness) turns into a game of win and lose only instead of peaceful and successful symbiotic cooperative society.
Winner takes all is a horrible, inhumane, destructive, dehumanizing way to run a society!

In other words, hyper-competitive people have a mentality to win at all costs, which is highly destructive to society when it's not on a leash.
Remember the recent banking crisis? Bailouts? Goldman Sachs and the sort?
The people running those things could be considered "overachievers" or "hyper-competitive". Don't you think so? Without the leash,they ended up gambling our economy into a deep ditch, largely contributed to the recession if not downright depression (were not out of it yet). That's essentially what I think about when I hear the terms "overachiever" and competitive (in the context of being a good thing) being bandied about.

Are you referring to (from rich to poor) wealth redistribution?

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

There IS more than enough to go around in this country and the world at large -- it is a matter of using what we NEED, not what we WANT as well as allocating properly so there aren't those who are filthy rich and those who are starving to death.

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Posted in reply to the post by Hotspring 44:

Are you referring to (from rich to poor) wealth redistribution?

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.. that's only happening after the poor-to-rich redistribution has taken place, and it doesn't balance it out - the rich are keeping more than enough. I don't understand how some people seem to feel that those who siphon off nearly all the production of the workers in this country somehow are fully deserving of it. As admo said, clearly there's "more than enough to go around in this country and the world at large" at least in abstract terms. It's the distribution system that prevents that. Again, I don't see how that's debatable - all you could say is that those who don't share in it don't deserve to, whether because of their own personal failings (laziness, for example) or by their own bad fortunes. The system we live under, as most posters to this thread acknowledge, isn't inevitable. The discussions have centered around who's to blame for it. But take it one step farther - what are the values underlying it?
For some reason, one thing that clarified my thinking on this point was Bush's push to make everyone share in the "ownership society". This was touted as a good thing, and a sign that he was more than just a creature of his own monied class; he wanted everyone to benefit from the same system that his family does. To me it just highlights how strongly those principles are engrained in us - respect for acquisition of private property and the rights of people to hold on to, not just the objects, but the systems, that they've created. His vision is that we all 'own' things that bring us income, presumably more income than we'd get by our own work alone. That's a pyramid scheme. It's based on the idea that the initial contributions (setting up a business, occupying and improving land, or just having the foresight to grab something first) are so valuable that others will forever kick back a share of its earnings back to its owner. So the employees are in effect paying a tax to the one who owns the business, and no-one has the opportunity to produce anything from, or use land that's owned by someone else.
As a practical setup, it's probably the only way to go. It's easy to see the nice synergy between this system and most people's psychology. But to take this another step forward by making it an ideology and tying it into your definition of virtue is a mistake. For example, that's where the demonization of immigrants comes from. It defines the problem as competition between them and the 'legitimate' workers in this country, while only occasionally challenging the role of the businesses that are sitting on top of the flow of wealth either group produces. The hyper-competitiveness mentioned in this thread isn't good for anyone, but arises because of the way this system is designed (like evolution, it doesn't imply an "intelligent designer". The system is simpler if there are winners and losers, and simpler systems evolve more easily. So to circle back to the questions posed at the start of this thread: I agree it's preposterous to focus on the immigrants. I also don't think that laziness is all that evil. To me the problem is that we want to separate people into deserving/not-deserving and we're perfectly happy if the deserving ones come out ok and the non-deserving see the errors of their ways and are coerced to become more like us and the other deserving ones...

Excellent post. I have often thought that we should be rethinking the fundamental idea of property rights, but these are so embedded in the culture that questioning them is seen as a form of treason. Property rights are enshrined in the Constitution. I do not agree, however, that even as a practical matter we should accept the system we have. If we can reshape it into something more just and equitable then we should certainly at the very least discuss how that might be done.

I agree with you absolutely about the position of the so-called "ownership" interest in businesses. These people, who have done everything useful they are ever going to do, not only are given a share of the loot in perpetuity; that would be bad enough. Worse than that, they get to call all the shots. The whole enterprise is run for their benefit. By law the directors and managers of a corporation are bound by what is call fiscal duty to the shareholders to do everything in their power to increase shareholder value. No other consideration must be allowed to outweigh that one. If it makes the shareholders more money to break the law (and pay the resultant fines and penalties) than to obey the law, then the law must be broken. I do not believe they are required to personally break the law, but many crimes are corporate in nature and do not expose the directors or managers ot oersonal legal sanctions.

One might think that the workers and customers of the company should have their interests considered in the decision making process, and of course since shareholder value is to some extent enhanced by happy workers and customers this does sometimes happen, but when the chips are down, it is the shareholders that rule.

Patrick Brinton

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Posted in reply to the post by podfish:

.. that's only happening after the poor-to-rich redistribution has taken place, and it doesn't balance it out - the rich are keeping more than enough. I don't understand how some people seem to feel that those who siphon off nearly all the production of the workers in this country somehow are fully deserving of it. As admo said, clearly there's "more than enough to go around in this country and the world at large" at least in abstract terms. It's the distribution system that prevents that. Again, I don't see how that's debatable - all you could say is that those who don't share in it don't deserve to, whether because of their own personal failings (laziness, for example) or by their own bad fortunes. The system we live under, as most posters to this thread acknowledge, isn't inevitable. The discussions have centered around who's to blame for it. But take it one step farther - what are the values underlying it?
For some reason, one thing that clarified my thinking on this point was Bush's push to make everyone share in the "ownership society". This was touted as a good thing, and a sign that he was more than just a creature of his own monied class; he wanted everyone to benefit from the same system that his family does. To me it just highlights how strongly those principles are engrained in us - respect for acquisition of private property and the rights of people to hold on to, not just the objects, but the systems, that they've created. His vision is that we all 'own' things that bring us income, presumably more income than we'd get by our own work alone. That's a pyramid scheme. It's based on the idea that the initial contributions (setting up a business, occupying and improving land, or just having the foresight to grab something first) are so valuable that others will forever kick back a share of its earnings back to its owner. So the employees are in effect paying a tax to the one who owns the business, and no-one has the opportunity to produce anything from, or use land that's owned by someone else.
As a practical setup, it's probably the only way to go. It's easy to see the nice synergy between this system and most people's psychology. But to take this another step forward by making it an ideology and tying it into your definition of virtue is a mistake. For example, that's where the demonization of immigrants comes from. It defines the problem as competition between them and the 'legitimate' workers in this country, while only occasionally challenging the role of the businesses that are sitting on top of the flow of wealth either group produces. The hyper-competitiveness mentioned in this thread isn't good for anyone, but arises because of the way this system is designed (like evolution, it doesn't imply an "intelligent designer". The system is simpler if there are winners and losers, and simpler systems evolve more easily. So to circle back to the questions posed at the start of this thread: I agree it's preposterous to focus on the immigrants. I also don't think that laziness is all that evil. To me the problem is that we want to separate people into deserving/not-deserving and we're perfectly happy if the deserving ones come out ok and the non-deserving see the errors of their ways and are coerced to become more like us and the other deserving ones...

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By law the directors and managers of a corporation are bound by what is call fiscal duty to the shareholders to do everything in their power to increase shareholder value. No other consideration must be allowed to outweigh that one.

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Strangely enough, many corporations give generous amounts of money and other benefits to society at a cost to their shareholders. Bill Gates, the epitome of the Capitalist, has taken a huge amount of money from his corporation and used it to the great betterment of mankind both in America and abroad. Yes, he makes sure his shareholders also profit, as is his duty to them.

The beauty of the "ownership of property" system is that anyone can rise from owning nothing to fabulous wealth by their own efforts. They deserve it because they directly took action to make it happen. Nobody is GIVING it to them. They earn it, usually by bringing a lot of other people into great wealth along with them. Those people also earn it.

Who deserves to receive wealth stolen from a man who has earned it?

The Founders of this system insisted that Christian morality such as charity be taught in all the schools so that the truly needy would be cared for, voluntarily, without anyone having a gun put to their heads. They also stated that they made the redistribution of wealth by government absolutely illegal in every way they could, for it leads to great mischief when a politician is empowered to reach into one man's pocket to seize assets then hand those assets to his supporters.

If we stick to the original American system, there are most assuredly going to be those who have more than others, just as there are in every system ever tried. Fidel Castro does not stand in soup lines with his "comrades".

The difference is, in the American system, the deserving are those who make the effort to produce and to earn. Let them be the role model for all others.

Those who do not choose to follow the example of the successful are clearly not the deserving.

there's nothing strange about it; most people do have an intention to do "good". I take issue with your characterization of Bill Gate's charity, though - he deserves personal credit because his foundations are his, not Microsoft's.
The problem isn't that people are rewarded for their efforts and initiative, it's that the rewards are exorbitant. The problem is that many costs of their enterprises are borne by society as a whole, or their workers are exploited because of their inability to compete successfully as entrepreneurs themselves. Of course the workers aren't slaves - they usually could just walk out if they feel unfairly compensated. But the system as it stands devalues the contributions of those workers who don't have the skills to set up their own rival companies, and boosts the rewards for those who can. Again, I have no problem with giving respect and rewards to those who do indeed offer value to their society by creating jobs for others; in a world with this many people, the ability to organize, coordinate and plan is essential. The capitalist system discounts the value of those who don't have similar unique skills, or who don't have the personality traits that allow them to thrive in such a system. In what is claimed to be a Christian society, few Christian values are actually respected; you'd think we'd have spent the last two thousand years learning to better help the poor, encourage the meek, and assist the rich in fitting their camels through the eyes of needles.

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

Strangely enough, many corporations give generous amounts of money and other benefits to society at a cost to their shareholders. Bill Gates, the epitome of the Capitalist, has taken a huge amount of money from his corporation and used it to the great betterment of mankind both in America and abroad. ....
The beauty of the "ownership of property" system is that anyone can rise from owning nothing to fabulous wealth by their own efforts. They deserve it because they directly took action to make it happen....

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My major resistance to the language you use is when you say that "the system" does such and such. In a free capitalist system, it does not "do" anything to anyone. The system leaves people alone to achieve or fail on their own.

Socialism is a system that "does" things to people, to create results by forceful manipulation. Free-market capitalism is not.

So, I'll try to get around the phrasing to ponder the points...

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I take issue with your characterization of Bill Gate's charity, though - he deserves personal credit because his foundations are his, not Microsoft's.

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I worked at Microsoft for a bit. Bill Gates, the CEO, caused Microsoft to be benificent, to its employees and to humanity in general. Whether it was Gates' personal money, taken from MS the form of a salary, or the money was distributed directly by MS (to combat AIDS or to wire the entire nation for internet), it was still a direct result of Bill Gates, the poster child for benevolent capitalism, directing things.

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The problem isn't that people are rewarded for their efforts and initiative, it's that the rewards are exorbitant.

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If the rewards are honestly earned, from income generated fairly by the company, I have no problem with that. It is why the Founders insisted Christian morality be taught in the schools, so more men like Bill Gates would be running those corporations and we would all benefit from it. It is "the rich" who employ others, who give money to help others, who build infrastructure and do other good deeds to raise up the people in general. "The mediocre" do not do these things. Therefore, it makes sense to me to have as many people as possible do their best to follow the example of "the rich".

I agree with you that not everyone will achieve, even if they strive. But to seize assets earned by one man, forcefully, to help someone else get a leg up is immoral. I suggest those wealthy people insisting on such a policy instead give of themselves. Obama and Gore can certainly afford to as can many Hollywood celebrities. I'd like to give Angelina Jolie a huge hug. In part because of her generosity. :wink:

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The problem is that many costs of their enterprises are borne by society as a whole

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Only if corrupt government steps in. Then it's no longer free capitalism.

For example, when corrupt CEOs ran their companies into the ground, Obama seized assets from honest companies to stuff their pockets, making society as a whole bear the burden of their mistakes. That is defined as FASCISM.

If a corrupt company simply collapses because it is poorly managed and we are not robbed to pay off the crooks, that's fine by me. Sure, the emplolyees will be out of work, but that is not a cost burden to be borne by people working to make other companies and their own lives successful.

If those out of work people are in desperate need of charity, that's where Christian morality comes in. Bill Gates may be right there for 'em.

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But the system as it stands devalues the contributions of those workers who don't have the skills to set up their own rival companies, and boosts the rewards for those who can.

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Again, I insist, the "system" isn't doing anything to anybody. It is hands-off. Socialism devalues the contributions of those who achieve by direct intervention, so it would be fair to say that the Socialist system "does something" to people. At gunpoint, if they insist on being left alone.

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The capitalist system discounts the value of those who don't have similar unique skills, or who don't have the personality traits that allow them to thrive in such a system.

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The system does nothing to those people. What you are really saying is that people who don't have the particular ambition or skills do not achieve. That's natural. It is just the way they are.

A guy who is afraid of heights should not be paid like an airline pilot just because he can't become one, due to his particular makeup. We should not be forced to bear the burden of "equalizing" him with others by punishing those who really can achieve. I believe that is just wrong.

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In what is claimed to be a Christian society, few Christian values are actually respected

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I agree that is the situation today. Christian values are long-oppressed in this society and we have the Communist-founded ACLU fighting to crush them once and for all. However, back when this nation was founded and for quite a long time after, our laws and our national leaders did their best to uphold Christian values and this nation, with a small percentage of the world's population, became one of the most prosperous and free on the planet.

It seems clear to me that we should strive to return to the formula for proven success rather than allow further encroachment of the ideology that would destroy it here as it has destroyed success in so many other nations.

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you'd think we'd have spent the last two thousand years learning to better help the poor, encourage the meek, and assist the rich in fitting their camels through the eyes of needles.

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Now you're talking like Jesus! :heart: .... except he never insisted we "assist" the rich by putting a gun to their heads and taking their stuff.

Once politicians have the power to seize assets and redistribute, they ALWAYS redistribute to those who will give them more and more power. Great mischief ensues. We are watching the consequences of it today in our own country, in the riots in Greece and France, in the collapse of the Socialist Republics (USSR), in the murderous regimes of other Socialist nations like North Korea and China...

Let's not go down the proven path to destruction. Let's get back to the principles that worked before. That makes sense to me.

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

If we stick to the original American system, there are most assuredly going to be those who have more than others, just as there are in every system ever tried....The difference is, in the American system, the deserving are those who make the effort to produce and to earn.

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They (the founders) had a lot right but they also had a lot wrong. The Constitution explicitly allowed slavery, which wasn't made illegal until 1865. And thereafter we had apartheid until 1965. Likewise, half the population was denied the vote until the 19th Amendment was ratified in 1920.

I wouldn't want to live under the original Constitution.

Yet it was those founders who condemned slavery, tried to incorporate it into the Declaration of Independence and whose principles were ultimately responsible for undoing the African system of slavery that had been imported to the British Colonies.

I would agree with you - in the country's early days, not all their principles could be put into practice. The Founders and those who followed in their footsteps had to rearrange the new nation without punishing its Citizens too harshly for being inheritors of many evils.

Eventually, though, conservatives loyal to the founding principles went to war again to advance them, including the elimination of slavery.

I am happy to embrace the founding principles and the reasons they were established. All the progress this nation has made - and that spilled over to so many other nations - is a result of those principles.

As for the Constitution - may it never be amended in contradiction to those principles. That would be a dark day.

For a more clear understanding of what those principles were, try a book called "The 5000 Year Leap". I'm just going through it now and it uses the words of the founders and their contemporaries to explain terms that I formerly did not understand clearly, such as "Natural Rights". Good stuff!

So, S2T, you are a Glenn Beck fan?
Stolen from an Amazon book review of the book endorsed above:

Cleon Skousen, in a pathetically desperate attempt to connect American democracy to Biblical authority, makes the astonishing claim that the ancient Israelites invented representative democracy while wandering in the desert as described in the Book of Exodus. Two problems: the Exodus never occurred--at least not as described in the Old Testament, which states that 600,000 men of fighting age left Egypt. Adding in wives, children, parents, etc., we find that a mob approximating two million people somehow got away unnoticed. (Despite copious written records from ancient Egypt, there is no record of the sudden departure of two million slaves from the city of Rameses.) Not only that, archaeologists following the Biblical route have found no artifacts from this mass migration, so apparently two million people wandered in the desert for forty years and didn't lose anything, not a knife, a trinket, a bowl, pot, or worn out sandal. Second, Skousen's claim is not supported by his source. He claims that the Isrealites elected representatives for each ten families, each 100 families, each 1,000 families, etc. What Exodus actually says is that Moses was appointed the ruler of the people by God, but discovered that judging every petty disagreement that arose was simply too time consuming, so at the suggestion of his father-in-law, Jethro, he appointed not "representatives" but judges to arbitrate minor disputes. None were elected, not Moses, not his brother Aaron, not the judges, and not Joshua, who commanded the army. No elections, no voting, no democracy.
Cleon Skousen:
Cleon Skousen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

Yet it was those founders who condemned slavery, ...and whose principles were ultimately responsible for undoing the African system of slavery that had been imported to the British Colonies....

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Are you saying that the form of slavery practiced in the "New World" by various European colonial powers, was the same as the slavery practiced in Africa by black Africans?

Or are you saying that the system in the colonies was an "African system" because most of the slaves were black Africans kidnapped, sold into slavery and shipped (at a horrible "spoilage", death rate of between twenty to one hundred percent mortality per voyage, Capitalism ain't pretty sometimes, specially when those goddamn Socialists muck up the works with their sneaky lieing ways) to the Americas to work on the plantations run by the Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, French or English?

If you meant the first interpretation, you're even more woefully ignorant of World History than you've already shown here today.

If you meant the latter, then you're just guilty of poor, confusing syntax. Which, while not as great an intellectual lacunae, is still an indicator of confusion and poorly developed logic skills.

Don't worry, since the Mayan / Aztec Socialist Macheteros, commanded by that racist President Obama are looking for you. It doesn't really matter where your confusion lies. Time is short! The end is nigh!!

Goddamn Socialist Machetero Aztec Mayan elitist murderers sucking the life blood from this great nation....What's a patriot to do?

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Posted in reply to the post by Sylph:

So, S2T, you are a Glenn Beck fan?

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I'm becoming one. I've seen a lot of things "on the street" and I am glad he is talking about them on the air. Nobody else seems to have the balls to do so. I give credit to Beck for making a real effort to dig up facts and portray them accurately and honestly - as much as is possible with the limited time between shows.

Don't get me started on O'Reilly though - the man is a boor.

As for the book "5000 Year Leap" - I haven't seen anything in it about the Israelites except for the apparently true assertion that the original seal of the United States was to depict the pillar of fire that protected them from Pharaoh's troops. But then, I haven't finished the book.

I recommend reading the book for yourself. That's what we free thinkers do. We don't let other people tell us what not to read. Other people tend to have their own agendas. I'm recommending the book to you and suggesting you take it as an intellectual exercise.

As for artifacts of the Exodus, a group called Wyatt Research claims to have found quite a few. I got some of their video tapes a few years back. If what they portray is accurate, they're definitely onto something, including the crossing point at the Red Sea (name of it translates to "dry at low tide" - the oceans were lower back then), also an encampment that was established near a lake with wells dug to get water and some other things. I don't know if it's all TRUE, but the tapes are interesting.

Let's talk about the Israelites in another thread. That whole story about Moses and the Ark and Aaron and... well, it's very complicated. Cool stuff.

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

Are you saying that the form of slavery practiced in the "New World" by various European colonial powers, was the same as the slavery practiced in Africa by black Africans?

---

I'm saying that in Jamestown, the practice of Indentured Servitude allowed a person to work off their passage and become free, full members of society. Then a black African, a former indentured servant, bought some fellow Africans from a Portugese trading ship. He pretty much said, "screw this indentured servitude bit, I'm gonna make these people my property as is done in Africa". So, he started the system of making people permanent property.

It's hardly Pocahontas: new exhibits portray Jamestown colonists as killers and rapists
First black slaves were owned by a black former indentured servant
It's hardly Pocahontas: new exhibits portray Jamestown colonists as killers and rapists - Telegraph

Anthony Johnson, African indentured servant in Virginia, established African-style slavery in American Colonies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Johnson_(American_Colonial)

Notably, the system of slavery was not race-based. Many blacks owned slaves and ran companies that competed strongly against white-owned companies. One document I read indicated that in 1850, about 30% of slave owners in New Orleans were black.

Here's more info:

Dixie's Censored Subject - Black Slaveowners
https://americancivilwar.com/authors...laveowners.htm

As for the rest of your rant - I enjoy watching the meltdown. Keep it up. :thumbsup:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

I'm saying that in Jamestown, the practice of Indentured Servitude allowed a person to work off their passage and become free, full members of society. Then a black African, a former indentured servant, bought some fellow Africans from a Portugese trading ship. He pretty much said, "screw this indentured servitude bit, I'm gonna make these people my property as is done in Africa". So, he started the system of making people permanent property.

---

So if I read you correctly, you're claiming that chattel slavery was invented by a black man in the early sixteen hundreds at the Jamestown colony.

Portugeuse? Romans? Egyptians? Jews? Mesopotamians? Just to name a few "civilizations" with slave economies that predated British colonialism in the Americas.

I really think you need to re-check your sources. I am beginning to fear that you're one of the willing dupes of The Cabal (see several of my previous posts for a full list of elements involved) and you are unwittingly (I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt!) carrying out a "black propaganda" mission here on waccobb.net at the behest of Obama and the rest.

Watch out, those goddamn Socialists are tricky and have myriad ways to enveigle even the strongest willed and hyper vigilent into unwittingly furthering their plots and schemes! No one is exempt from their evil whiles!!

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

Yet it was those founders who condemned slavery, tried to incorporate it into the Declaration of Independence and whose principles were ultimately responsible ...

I would agree with you - in the country's early days, not all their principles could be put into practice. ...

I am happy to embrace the founding principles and the reasons they were established. All the progress this nation has made - and that spilled over to so many other nations - is a result of those principles.

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I thought at first you were saying the the country's principles are in the constitution. But I guess you're saying that the principles are elsewhere--and only some of those principles made it into the nation's founding documents. That makes sense, but then it becomes a matter of cherry-picking--which Founders, which of their documents (letters, writings, speeches)--are emblematic of "the principles".

For example, do we take as principal the part of Jefferson's Notes on the State of Virginia where he condemns slavery or the part where he advocates apartheid? Or the part where he says that black people are inferior to whites?

Where are these principals that aren't in the Constitution or the D of I, but should still guide us? As seems obvious in the larger political sphere--especially in the debates about the place of Christianity--people will pick documents that suit their views.

Anyway, it seems like a problematic position to hold.

I guess this is a good time as any to ask a few questions about what people believe is acceptable in the “free market”.

Is there any case, where slavery would be acceptable at this point in time?

Is indentured servitude OK as long as there is a contract between a servant and the served?

What happens when the served breaches a contract? What remedies to a breached contract would the servant have?

Would it be allowable to actually literally give the servant lashes for what the served believes is a breached contract? If so would there be any court hearings required prior to any whippings or could it be like they did to the slaves back in the Deep South in the 1700s? Who would have police powers in a situation like that?

What if the servant could not afford a lawyer, would there be a lawyer appointed for that servant?
Would there be any laws against abuse of servants? What would constitute as abuse, enough to break a contract legally?

Where would anybody draw the line between the difference of a contract of service and slavery?
What would be allowable proof? Would there be any laws for contracts to prevent severe abuses in the first place?

It's not really necessary to answer any or all of these questions, because I'm just trying to make a rhetorical point regarding implications that have been made on this thread about the "free market", indentured servitude, and slavery etc.

People used to travel across the ocean in sailboats, taking months to get from Europe to the United States, but now we use jet airplanes. People used to use horse and buggy to travel overland to get from point A to point B also. But now use cars, buses, motorcycles, and trains. People used to use the pony express then the telegraph for communications over long distances, but now use telephones, satellite, transcontinental fiber-optic teleconferencing, Internet etc.

We cannot change the facts of the past, but we certainly should not repeat certain aspects of it such as slavery and perpetual or inherited indentured servitude.

What I see going on here in America is systematic class warfare.

There are the moneyed class, there is a government class, and there is a working-class all of which have different levels within their own individual class groups.
Those competing factions didn't always work synergistically in fact; they sometimes are in direct competition. That is why I believe the founding fathers decided to put certain criteria within the Constitution.

They were seeking to limit individuals from becoming too powerful. That is why the three branches of government were created. Those checks and balances were created for a small colony compared to what we have today.
Things are more complicated today than they were then.
The reason I think things are so screwed up today is because we are underrepresented.
The ones with the vast majority of the money are more power-mongers than real true blue patriots.
Too much national treasure has been put in the hands of banker lords. I don't think we should worship them! They are thieves!
In this day and age, the term "free-market" can have different meanings for different people depending upon which one of the aforementioned classes that come from.
For some it means absolutely no regulations on industry.
Yet the same people that say such things would be appalled if a truck driver was not required to have a special license or have truck weighed that they had to share the road with.
It's kind of hypocritical to complain about all the “government” regulations that stymie business.
Yet the same people complain about things that endanger them personally, but don't seem to give a rat’s ass about other people's livelihoods, particularly the ones they have labeled as being liberal, communist, socialist, benefit recipients etc.

I hear such an emphasis on austerity, prosperity, and jobs.

There's more to life than just a damn job!

It seems like people are being manipulated into saying that they want a “job”.
People have been so manipulated to want that job with such a high unemployment rate that opens the door for predatory practices that will come down on them if they don't insist on having a living wage job.
There have actually been people on this website and even on this thread that have claimed that they want to work on farm and that they want to do farm work also known as agricultural labor, because they think the immigrant farm laborers are making so much (of what should be “their”) money.
I honestly don't think those people that signed up to take those jobs have ever done actual ,out in the field, intensive, farm labor any time in their lives.

They say they would take those jobs, but only for the pay they think they should have. I've got news for those who think that way; forget about that!
You'll most likely get paid piecework.

They rarely pay beginners by the hour, unless you are in a processing plant.

If you are out in the field they will pay you by the amount that you harvest.

You'll also be required to work way over 8 hours per day, but not get paid overtime. You can count on, between 10 and 14 hours of work every day until the harvest is complete.

You don't have to learn Spanish; you don't have to talk to anybody. All you are required to do is harvest and/or process that agricultural product, which you will be shown how to do.

It doesn't take allot of brains, but it takes a lot of stamina, persistence, and tolerance to some extreme weather and working conditions; particularly, heat, dust, noisy machinery and fast-paced work etc.. Yes even though it's piecework you do have to do a certain amount within a certain time-frame.

As far as rethinking America is concerned, I think there's a lot of reprogramming that needs to go on in people's minds before any real substantial changes for the better, could possibly occur.
So many people have been keyed up to be in competition mode that they don't even seem to have a concept of cooperation mode.
It seems to be all about me, me, me; mine, mine, mine; win vs. lose mentality. Until that way of thinking changes there will be no synergy of cooperative coexistence, instead there will be the continuance of the "New World" class warfare that we are experiencing today.
That's exactly what the money and power mongers are counting on and feed on. I think the money and power mongers should simultaneously, both be put on a strict diet!


I think that the new world free market enthusiasts and Marxists have more in common than either one of them would want to admit. It all boils down to the golden/power rules; he who has the gold/power rules.



the so-called free market without regulation is what is causing the economic meltdown that we are experiencing today that has not happened since the 1930s.
I think the people that are so pro-free-market should consider that the free market per se , is responsible for the electronic money system that they complain so loudly about. because they have been producing credit! Credit is a product! So those who produce it, own it, and speculate and trade it in the open market are the epitome of the free market system! So to the pro-free market enthusiasts; I say, next time you complain about the Federal Reserve or the I.M.F. just remember that it was the so-called "free-market" system and the leniency of government oversight based on free-market principles that got us there in the first place.

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

Notably, the system of slavery was not race-based.

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This is a disguisting lie. Even if many black Americans and Africans supported the slave system, indirectly and directly, to say the system of slavery in the Americas was not race based is an out and out LIE.
I am sure your white European forefathers were brought here in chains from Europe to work on Southern plantations right? NOT! White people were NEVER slaves in the American slavery system -- it was not socially acceptable because whites were considered people and us blacks were considered, um, less than a person.
Just because some blacks supported the system does not make it right. Some Jews in the holocaust cooperated with the NAZI's in the systematic killing of other European Jews, does this mean that the Holocaust was OK? Or not racially, ethnically, or religiously based in your eyes?

Furthermore, white supremacists love this lie because it tries to rewrite history and steal credit from the black slaves, on whose backs' our entire Western world was built! It tries to negate the positive, yet very painful history, of an enslaved group of people made to work and build the nation and entire New World. By making utterly false and hurtful statements like "the system of slavery was not race-based" discredits the blood, sweat, and tears shed by African slaves and their descendants who built this New World.
White supremacists also love to point out that "blacks owned and traded slaves too". This may be true in some instances, but this does not make the slave system of the New World any less racially-based. It was a slave system of black African people.
Also, the way we deal with race here in the USA is very different than in many other nations. In Mexico, there is a myth that there are NO black African-descended people left in Mexico. And if you look at virtually any other Latin-American nation you will hear a similar myth that also explains how their country has none left. In Chile, the commonly held belief (completely mythical) is that all "los negros" fled to Argentina after they were set free hundreds of years ago. In truth many Chileans are of African blood and the fact that they hide behind this myth is a way of ridding their culture of Africanism. They believe they are 100% Chilean. Same thing in Brazil -- there they have hundreds of "races" on a scale of different skin colors from very light to dark and all of them have specific names and dictate one's place in society. Don't take my word for it, ask your Latin American friends and they will all have different tales for why there are "no blacks" in their country. Its all a lie and there are many black Mexicans but they have been severed from their roots in an attempt to totally assimilate and destroy a very important part of history.

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Posted in reply to the post by seanpfister:

They (the founders) had a lot right but they also had a lot wrong. The Constitution explicitly allowed slavery, which wasn't made illegal until 1865. And thereafter we had apartheid until 1965. Likewise, half the population was denied the vote until the 19th Amendment was ratified in 1920.

I wouldn't want to live under the original Constitution.

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This is why we need to openly rethink things as a nation sometimes and adjust our path -- we are a great nation of great people and if we allow ourselves to become misdirected, we could head down horrible paths (as our history has shown us time and time again). I am very grateful our forefathers thought outside of the box when they decided that slavery was NOT okay and they picked up arms to defend that belief. This led to one of the most gruesome wars of American history in terms of both bloodshed and politics -- the Civil War. Many Americans died so the system of slavery could be put to an end.
The question is what are WE willing to sacrifice to make changes happen in our society happen today? Some of our wealth? Jobs? Time? Love? I think the changes are in motion and the sacrifices are happening whether we like it or not. The question is: Do we allow the "powers that be" to steer us as a society in any direction they see fit? Or do we, as good Americans, make informed decisions and amend our laws and structure to best direct us on the path toward freedom, equality, and justice for all? After all, America was founded to be the home of the free! I am very unclear on how slavery and indentured servitude fit into that mold.
It sounds like the America Speak2Truth would like to live in is NOT an America of freedom, equality, for justice for all...
Historically, America discounted some people as being inferior to humans and treated them like animals (who are also gravely mistreated in our Western world). Then, once this group of people is deemed as less-than-human to the general population through the social-political lens of the media, it becomes "fine" to enslave and to torture that group because they are "subhuman". This line of thinking is what justified slavery in our nation's past as well as in many other culture's histories and it is this flawed line of thinking that leads to horrible atrocities like the Holocaust or any other genocide.

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Thad wrote: ...out of your favorite sources could you pick an example that would become the reigning model of Logic in this attempt to Rethink America?

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Thad,

So kind of you to ask: The Green Party of the United States of America

In particular: The Ten Key Values

Quote:

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Quote:

Thad wrote: ...out of your favorite sources could you pick an example that would become the reigning model of Logic in this attempt to Rethink America?

Thad,

So kind of you to ask: The Green Party of the United States of America

In particular: The Ten Key Values __________________
"Mad" Miles

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I was thinking more in terms of this.

Someone made a comment as to errors in logical thinking and I went looking for a one liner that would model the logical process. I haven't found it but I do believe that what's below is an organic process and naturally unfolds in the same light that you don't have to teach a seed to grow. All that's needed is nutrients, water and light and also that you keep very heavy things off the head of the growing thing until it can bear their weight.

Logic is instinctual and arrives all by itself, but in the efforts for it to become it must counter the forces of those who wish to hide from its scrutiny. On a daily basis its corruption is perpetuated in the classrooms

Of all the flags that exist in our world I wonder where the Flag of Logic might be that the Patriots of Reason might Rally to the cause.

When it seems that The Truth finds itself adrift in a vast sea of contradictory Authorities then all becomes equal and ' fuzzy logic ' is all there is to work with. Truth becomes more so than not and what is most plausible becomes the Golden Rule.

“Not all that can be measured is important and not all that is important can be measured” - Albert Einstein

CriticalThinking.org - Learn the Elements and Standards


To Analyze Thinking, Identify and Question its Elemental Structures

Use the elements with sensitivity to Intellectual Standards »	Clarity	Accuracy	Precision	Relevance	Depth
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Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

So if I read you correctly, you're claiming that chattel slavery was invented by a black man in the early sixteen hundreds at the Jamestown colony.

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That's because you are not reading correctly. I spelled out exactly what I'm saying and it is NOT what you are making up all on your own. Go back and read what I wrote - again.

I don't need to correct you - you can do it all by yourself. My words on the matter are as clear as can be.

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Watch out, those goddamn Socialists are tricky and have myriad ways to enveigle even the strongest willed and hyper vigilent into unwittingly furthering their plots and schemes! No one is exempt from their evil whiles!!

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While that is correct, I suspect you are pretending to be facetious in stating it. A hundred million innocents murdered by Socialists last century are testament to its truth, along with entire nations enslaved by them this century.

When they have sufficient power, they punish people for trying to escape their clutches and punish those who are under their power. People do keep trying to escape, of course.

https://www.cubaverdad.net/images/mi...n/carboat3.jpg

Think about it.

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Posted in reply to the post by seanpfister:

I thought at first you were saying the the country's principles are in the constitution. But I guess you're saying that the principles are elsewhere--and only some of those principles made it into the nation's founding documents.

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Actually, THE founding document, the Declaration of Independence, is the key statement of national principles. The Constitution is a set of laws created to support and defend those principles against their natural enemy, Government Power.

Most important is the principle of "natural law", a term that I have only recently come to understand more fully by reading the statements of the guys who wrote the DI.

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That makes sense, but then it becomes a matter of cherry-picking--which Founders, which of their documents (letters, writings, speeches)--are emblematic of "the principles".

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To some extent, yes. The principles spelled out in the Declaration are the result of eliminating many ideas proposed but that failed to garner much support. Today, we tend to quote Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Ben Franklin, George Washington (who was very influential), John Adams and a few others for guiding the creation of our national principles.

The abolition of slavery was one of Thomas Jefferson's great motivations. However, the guys preparing to fight their own government to re-establish legitimacy in government knew they could not alienate the slave-owning colonies and still win that fight. So, it had to be put off.

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For example, do we take as principal the part of Jefferson's Notes on the State of Virginia where he condemns slavery or the part where he advocates apartheid? Or the part where he says that black people are inferior to whites?

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We take as principle that it is wrong for one person to own another, a principle stemming from the notion that all men are created equal by God. His racial observations are irrelevant to that principle.

By "created equal" they did NOT mean equal in mental capacities, equal in physical capacities, equal in health or ambition or possessions. They meant that all persons have equal Natural Rights endowed by God and that each person must therefore have equal freedom to exercise those natural Rights, and their own personal attributes, to better themselves and their status in life.

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

While that is correct, I suspect you are pretending to be facetious in stating it. A hundred million innocents murdered by Socialists last century are testament to its truth, along with entire nations enslaved by them this century.

When they have sufficient power, they punish people for trying to escape their clutches and punish those who are under their power. People do keep trying to escape, of course.

https://www.cubaverdad.net/images/mi...n/carboat3.jpg

Think about it.

---

Welcome back S2T,

I have thought about it. Long and hard. For about forty years. I've NEVER supported authoritarian, one-state, one-party, Marxist/Leninist groups, policies or goals. Ever.

The fact that you conflate all forms of Socialism with the excrescences of Marxist/Leninism, as most ideologues on the right do, is why I haven't really tried to hold a reasonable conversation with you. At least that's one of the reasons.

You're not interested in discussion. You're interested in asserting your views, and defending them. I've debated with True Believers from the right, left and center, and many points on the spectrum all along that way. It's not productive. It leads to nothing but repetition and vapid recriminations.

I've addressed many of these issues: What are the types of Socialism and other Leftist ideologies, What did Marx contribute to our understanding of the world and what are the limits of his and his intellectual descendents contributions, and other related topics, in my past writing here on waccobb. Feel free to look it all up.

You're not interested in that, you're interested in railing against the big, bad threat of Socialism. Didn't y/our side win the Cold War? Why are you still fighting the war after it's over?

Could it be that you can't think of anything better to do because your views of the world were fixed before 1989 and you can't really conceive of any other struggle worth investing your time in?

Not all Marxists are Authoritarians.

Not all Socialists are Marxist/Leninists.

Not all Socialists are Classical Orthodox Marxists.

And definitely not all Socialists celebrate Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Mao, Ho Chi Minh, Pol Pot, etc.

Anyone who claims they do, is an ignorant fool, or a stone liar with an ideological axe to grind.

The anti-authoritarian, democratic and relativistic, accomodationist with Capitalism, tendencies of Post-Marxist thought and practice are just as significant, if not more, than the boogyman Marxist/Socialist scarecrow that you instinctively trot out whenever you hear, "Socialist, Marxist, Critic of Capitalism, Free Market Myth, Big Government, Market Regulation, Liberal, Democrat, Liberal Democrat, etc."

But you aren't interested in nuances and shades of meaning. You're only interested in binary oppositional tropes left over from the last century.


So, I'm not interested in debating you. I'm not interesting in proving you wrong. I'm not interested in proving that I'm right to you.

I'm only interested in treating your claims for what they are: biased, ignorant, regressive, reactionary, stale, old nonsense which is completely out of touch with the reality of our times. And it was just as irrelevant to these questions thirty years ago.


When I came home during my second year of college and told my parents that I'd been reading some works by Karl Marx and his critics and followers, and that I found it interesting and relevant to what was happening in the world. My dad replied, "Oh so you've bought the Communist Party line?"

I found that utterly ridiculous, and told him so. Nobody was recruiting me. I was not going to be anybody's willing dupe. And I was nowhere close to becoming a communist in any sense of the word.

I'd had enough of a brush with True Believer nonsense in my time as a Jesus Freak in High School through my first year of college. (I've written about that here as well, look it up.)

I've never been uncritical of any set of ideas. I've always taken what works and rejected what didn't, especially if it contradicted my values.

Another little aside. Years later, while I was traveling/living in Europe from the end of May '81 to the beginning of April '82, in the depths of that historically hard winter (I didn't have heat in my room, granted, I chose to be there) my father sent me a card, in which he asked, in French, "How's the struggle for Freedom and Justice going?" He wasn't being facetious. It was the most direct act of sincere validation, approval and respect he'd ever shown me, to that date. I cherish it.


I reject your dubious claims because they have no place in my understanding of how the world works, what matters and what we should strive for to improve the human condition and preserve the natural and the wild.

So good luck with your Crusade/Jihad.

By the way, how's that fight to stop the God Damn Fucking Anarcho Maya/Aztec Socialist Illuminati Masonic Reptilian Overlord Cabal from destroying America (U.S.) and taking away all our hard won freedoms and enslaving us to their evil plan to ....

Aaaagggghhhh!!!!

We're doomed!!

Run for the hills!!!!

Pack some heat!!

I assure everyone reading this that I remain vigilent and when the God Damn Fucking Socialist Aztec/Mayan Macheteros in league with the One World Government Illuminati Bilderberg CFR Masonic Reptilian Overlord Cabalists are headed our way?

I'll be the first to sound the alarm.

I swear, I'll spot them a thousand miles out!!!

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Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

The fact that you conflate all forms of Socialism with the excrescences of Marxist/Leninism, as most ideologues on the right do, is why I haven't really tried to hold a reasonable conversation with you.

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Thanks for admitting you are not trying to hold a reasonable conversation.

You are mistaken in your assertion though. It is not the "forms" of Socialism to which I object. It is the underlying ideology and its objectives. The "forms" are merely their current stage in the process of achieving those universal objectives. When they reach their goal:

1) They own your stuff

2) They own the product of your labor

3) They forcefully control the public political conversation

4) They actively eliminate any competition such as Christianity or Judaism

5) When they screw up and millions of innocents die due to their mismanagement (or direct murder of whomever will not "fit in" and submit), they use whatever force is necessary against those who object

American Socialists are already well on their way to achieving these goals in direct violation of our Constitution that was created to protect us against their ilk. Do you want me to start posting examples?

Quote:

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You're not interested in discussion. You're interested in asserting your views, and defending them.

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If by discussion you mean airing our views and providing supporting evidence to help each other get closer to understanding what is most likely true, I'm most certainly interested in it.

If you instead mean airing views that are unsupportable by facts and demanding the other person respect them as equally valid...

Well, that's just a bunch of bullsh*tting and I'm not really interested in it.

I prefer honest discussion. That's why I engage in it.

Quote:

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Didn't your side win the Cold War? Why are you still fighting the war after it's over?

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No, actually, the USA lost the Cold War. That's why we have Communists in the highest positions of our government now. Think about it.

The strategy outlined by the KGB back in 1969 (the year Bill Clinton was invited to Moscow due to his organizing anti-American rallies when he fled to foreign soil to escape the draft) was rather simple. Give all appearances of "losing" the Cold War so that Americans will drop their (fully justified) wariness of Communists. Proclaim "communism is dead" - then move Communists into positions of control of American society.

While Americans play baseball, Communists play chess.

Quote:

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Could it be that you can't think of anything better to do because your views of the world were fixed before 1989

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I'm talking about what is happening today. My views continue to develop as I attend Democrat/Communist meetings, interview Communists at the May 1 marches and so on. I am dealing in current reality.

I'm sorry for you that you can't engage in honest discussion of reality.

While you pretend Communists went away decades ago, the Communists are laughing in your face and telling you exactly what they are doing today. This is just one example:

Illegal Immigration Socialist/Communist Agenda
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcwaQBOU_xI

S2T,

You must be really scared of those European Socialists who run the most successful countries on the planet at the moment. Whose lifestyle and quality of life are the envy of others and whose societies consistently make the top of the "best places to live" lists.

Oh wait, those lists are probably put together by the World Socialist Conspiracy to .... (see my previous posts.)

"The Communists won the Cold War."

And you insist that you're engaging in a rational discussion.

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Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

You must be really scared of those European Socialists who run the most successful countries on the planet at the moment.

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Who have run their countries into the ground with unsustainable Socialist economic practices, who face growing riots, who are kept afloat by money shoveled into their countries by the US (Greece, most recently), who are working quickly on schemes to squeeze more money out of the US to keep themselves afloat...

I hope we can be wise enough to return to our national principles and not go down the path of ruin as they have.


Those who "envy" the lifestyle in those Socialist countries are free to move there. They'll have to compete with the Islamists also moving there, taking advantage of the dole to build their strength and control at other people's expense.

The great tragedy in the USA is that Leftists here are dragging us down the same path as Leftists there. Huge mistake.

That's why our nation, like those controlled by European Socialists, is going bankrupt.

The Left cried about the deficit during the previous administration. Now they are intentionally multiplying it. This is not an accident.

"If that mischievous financial policy, which had its origin in the North American Republic, should become indurated down to a fixture, then that Government will furnish its own money without cost. It will pay off debts and be without a debt. It will have all the money necessary to carry on its commerce. It will become prosperous beyond precedent in the history of the civilized governments of the world. The brains and the wealth of all countries will go to North America. That government must be destroyed, or it will destroy every monarchy on the globe."

The goal of Socialists is not to spread freedom and prosperity. It is to destroy the country that has shown the benefits of such by saddling the USA with unsurvivable debt.

As for the Communists winning the Cold War, I've told you why that is true. If the opposite were true, we would not have Communists in power in our own government doing to this nation what brought disaster to so many other nations where they gained power.

You offer no rational argument to the contrary, no supporting evidence to show this is not true, no intellectual capacity to even engage in an honest discussion of the FACT that we now have our nation's sworn enemy in power in our government.

They once screamed "tear it all down, man!"

Now they are.

Rationality, Logic and Facts according to S2T and his ilk:

S2T, been reading, watching much Andrew Breitbart lately?

Back to the LOGIC & FACTS -

Liberal = Unions = Anti-Capitalist = Marxist = Socialist = Communist = Al Qaeda = Destroy America!!!! (U.S.)

Conservative = Capitalist = Freedom = Justice = Traditional American Values = Good = True = Factual = Logical = Indisputable

7= (below, means "does not equal". I don't have quick access to an equal sign with a slash through it.)

Conservative 7= Selfish 7= Reactionary 7= Racist 7= Regressive 7= Repressive 7= Fascist 7= Lies and Alarmism 7= Demagoguery, Fearmongering and Sliming of everything and everyone to the Left of Center, starting with Ronald Reagan representing the implied standard for what it means to be a middle of the road moderate.

Cracker? Please!!!!!

The coverage on Slate.com yesterday and today. Of who Andrew Breitbart is, and the latest from his sliming of the NAACP and Ms. Sherrod, is quite enlightening.

Don't miss the back and forth in the comments after William Saletan's article today. It pretty much replicates the ideological war here in Waccovia, but it has its own entertaining idiosyncratic elements.

This is what I enjoy most about discussions with those who have no rational argument to present - THE MELTDOWN!!

:thumbsup:

Now, if you can present a logical argument to convince readers that the US won the cold war...

... taking into account that Communists are now in the highest positions of power in our government...

... when the goal of Communists in the Cold War was to get their people into those positions of power and the goal of Joe McCarthy and other Americans was to get them out...

... you might gain some credibility for at least making a rational effort.

(Hint;> Tongue-in-cheek.):wink:.

:hello: wacco's! "Logic" and "facts":
The let’s keep score game.
Anyone want to play?
This one is: Who has or had, more Czars?...
...G.W. Bush Or Obama?
Could be that Obama may surpass G.W., but G.W. is ahead; but only by 3.

Note: the actual web page from link below has Links (that would not load here) that go to more specific info on the particulars.
“Czars” under the George W. Bush Administration and the Obama Administration

Czars Under the George W. Bush Administration The following is FactCheck.org’s count of Bush administration positions whose holders were dubbed “czars” in one or more news articles. We include only one name per position, though many positions were held by multiple people during the administration. In some cases, the same “czar” nickname (e.g. “cybersecurity czar”) was applied to more than one job title. In these cases we have counted the two separate positions as two “czars.” Senate-confirmed positions are marked with a star. Non-president-appointed positions are marked with a dagger. 1. *Abstinence Czar (Administrator, U.S. Agency for International Development) – Randall Tobias 2. AIDS Czar (Director, Office of National AIDS Policy) – Scott Evertz et al. 3. *AIDS Czar/Global AIDS Czar (Coordinator of U.S. government activities to combat HIV/AIDS globally) – Randall Tobias et al. 4. *Bailout Czar/TARP Czar (Assistant secretary for financial stability, United States Treasury) – Neel Kashkari 5. Bioethics Czar (Chairman, President’s Council on Bioethics) – Leon Kass 6. Bird Flu Czar (Assistant secretary for public health emergency preparedness, Department of Health and Human Services) – Stewart Simonson 7. Birth Control Czar (Deputy assistant secretary of population affairs, Department of Health and Human Services) – Eric Keroack 8. *Budget Czar (Director, Office of Management and Budget) – Mitchell Daniels et al. 9. *Cleanup Czar (Assistant secretary for environmental management, Department of Energy) – Jessie Roberson et al. 10. Communications Czar (Counselor to the president) – Dan Bartlett et al. 11. Counterterrorism Czar (National director for combating terrorism) – Gen. Wayne Downing 12. Counterterrorism Czar (White House counterterrorism coordinator) – Richard Clarke 13. Cybersecurity Czar (Special advisor to the president on cybersecurity, Office of Management and Budget) – Richard Clarke 14. Cybersecurity Czar (Director, National Cyber Security Center) – Rod Beckström 15. Democracy Czar (Deputy national security advisor for global democracy strategy) – Elliott Abrams 16. Domestic Policy Czar, also called Abstinence Czar (Assistant to the president for domestic policy) – Claude Allen 17. Domestic Policy Czar (Chief domestic policy coordinator) – Karl Rove 18. *Drug Czar (Director, Office of National Drug Control Policy) – John Walters 19. Faith Czar (Director, White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives) – John DiIulio et al. 20. Food Safety Czar (Assistant commissioner for food protection, Food and Drug Administration) – David Acheson 21. Gulf Coast Reconstruction Czar (Federal coordinator of Hurricane Katrina recovery efforts) – Donald Powell 22. †Health IT Czar (National coordinator for health information technology, Department of Health and Human Services) – David Brailer 23. *Homeland Security Czar (Assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism) – Tom Ridge 24. *Homeland Security Czar (Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security) – Michael Chertoff 25. Homelessness Czar (Executive director, United States Interagency Council on Homelessness) – Philip Mangano 26. *Intelligence Czar (Director of National Intelligence) – John Negroponte et al. 27. *Manufacturing Czar (Assistant secretary for manufacturing and services, Commerce Department) – Albert Frink et al. 28. Mine Safety Czar (Assistant Secretary for Mine Safety and Health Administration, Department of Labor) – Richard Stickler 29. Policy Czar (Assistant to the president for policy and strategic planning) – Michael Gerson 30. *Public Diplomacy Czar (Undersecretary for public diplomacy and public affairs, Department of State) – Karen Hughes et al. 31. Reading Czar (Advisor to the president on child development and education research and policies) – G. Reid Lyon 32. *Regulatory Czar (Director, White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs) – John Graham et al. 33. *Science Czar (Director, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy) – John Marburger 34. *War Czar (Deputy national security adviser for Iraq and Afghanistan policy and implementation) – Gen. Douglas Lute 35. World Trade Center Health Czar (WTC programs coordinator, Department of Health and Human Services) – John Howard

Czars Under the Obama Administration The following is FactCheck.org’s count of Obama administration positions whose holders were dubbed “czars” in one or more news articles. In some cases, the same “czar” nickname (e.g. “cybersecurity czar”) was applied to more than one job title. In these cases we have counted the two separate positions as two “czars.” In some cases, we could find no use of the term “czar” for the position except in news articles about the preponderance of czars in the Obama administration. We did not count these cases. Senate-confirmed positions are marked with a star. Non-president-appointed positions are marked with a dagger. 1. Afghanistan-Pakistan Czar (Special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan) – Richard Holbrooke 2. AIDS Czar (Director, Office of National AIDS Policy) – Jeffrey Crowley 3. Auto Recovery Czar (Director of recovery for auto communities and workers) – Ed Montgomery 4. †Border Czar (Special representative for border affairs, Department of Homeland Security) – Alan Bersin 5. *California Water Czar (Deputy interior secretary) – David Hayes 6. Car Czar (Advisor for the U.S. auto sector, United States Treasury) – Steven Rattner 7. †Climate Czar (Special envoy for climate change, Department of State) – Todd Stern 8. Counterterrorism Czar/Homeland Security Czar (Assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism) – John Brennan 9. Diversity Czar (Chief Diversity Officer, Federal Communications Commission) – Mark Lloyd 10. †Domestic Violence Czar (Advisor to the president and the vice president on domestic violence and sexual assault issues) – Lynn Rosenthal 11. *Drug Czar (Director, Office of National Drug Control Policy) – R. Gil Kerlikowske 12. Economics Czar (Director, National Economic Council) – Lawrence Summers 13. Energy Czar (Director, White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy) – Carol Browner 14. *Government Performance Czar (Chief performance officer) – Jeffrey Zients 15. †Great Lakes Czar (Special advisor overseeing the Great Lakes project, Environmental Protection Agency) – Cameron Davis 16. Green Jobs Czar (Special adviser for green jobs, enterprise and innovation, White House Council on Environmental Quality) – Van Jones 17. †Guantanamo Closure Czar (Special envoy to oversee the closure of Guantanamo Bay detention center, Department of State) – Daniel Fried 18. Health Czar (Director, White House Office of Health Reform) – Nancy-Ann DeParle 19. *Intelligence Czar (Director of national intelligence) – Dennis Blair 20. Iran Czar (Special advisor for the Persian Gulf and Southwest Asia) – Dennis Ross 21. Manufacturing Czar (Senior Counselor for Manufacturing Policy) – Ron Bloom 22. Mideast Czar (Special envoy for Middle East peace) – George Mitchell 23. Pay Czar (Special master for TARP executive compensation) – Kenneth Feinberg 24. *Regulatory Czar (Administrator, White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs) – Cass Sunstein 25. *Science Czar (Director, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy) – John Holdren 26. Stimulus Accountability Czar (Chairman, Recovery Act Transparency and Accountability Board) – Earl Devaney 27. *TARP Czar (Assistant secretary for financial stability, Treasury Department) – Herb Allison 28. *Technology Czar/Infotech Czar (Chief information officer) – Vivek Kundra 29. Technology Czar (Chief technology officer) – Aneesh Chopra 30. Urban Affairs Czar (Director of Urban Affairs) – Adolfo Carrion 31. *Weapons Czar (Undersecretary for acquisition, technology and logistics, Department of Defense) – Ashton Carter 32. Weapons of Mass Destruction Czar (White House coordinator for weapons of mass destruction, proliferation and terrorism) – Gary Samore

Ta-Da! G.W, "wins" the first round!Big Smile


Coming some time in the future, Invasion of privacy and homeland security; how do the Bush 2 and Obama Admins' compare?.

FICA? Or?:thinking:

Now if I can just get my tongue out of my cheek!... ...LOL!!

While I abhor this process of putting "czars" in power, I believe the next salient question is what their underlying ideologies are. That defines what they will do with such power.

How many Communists did GW appoint? How many who think Chairman Mao was one of their favorite philosophers?

If GW appointed patriotic Americans and Obama appoints people hostile to American principles, you will see a vastly different exercise of power from the two Administrations through those czars.

Think about it.


Obama's nuke agreements meant to disarm U.S.?
Science czar's magazine accused of disseminating Soviet propaganda - goal is to put US nuclear arsenal under international control
Obama's nuke agreements meant to disarm U.S.?

'Safe schools' Czar encouraged child sex with older man
Washington Times: Kevin Jennings should 'come clean'
'Safe schools' chief encouraged child sex with older man

Top Obama czar Cass Sunstein: Infiltrate all 'conspiracy theorists'
Presidential adviser wrote about crackdown on expressing opinions, banning or imposing special fines
Top Obama czar: Infiltrate all 'conspiracy theorists'

Sunstein: Americans too racist for socialism
Defends communism, welfare state but says 'white majority' oppose programs aiding blacks, Hispanics
Sunstein: Americans too racist for socialism

Cass Sunstein wants to spread America's wealth
Echoes Van Jones on using 'environmental justice' to redistribute money
Cass Sunstein wants to spread America's wealth

Obama intel pick Chas Freeman works for Chinese government
Company's deals were seen as attempt to expand communist nation's influence
Obama intel pick works for Chinese

Obama 'czar' on 9/11: Blame 'U.S. imperialism'!
White House 'rowdy communist' held vigil for Muslims
Obama 'czar' on 9/11: Blame 'U.S. imperialism'!

Czar: Education to make students 'revolutionaries'
New Princeton lecturer Van Jones slammed non-activist students as 'worthless people'
Czar: Education to make students 'revolutionaries'

Obama's 'green jobs czar' worked with terror founder
Van Jones served on board of activist group where ex-Weatherman serves as top director
Obama's 'green jobs czar' worked with terror founder

(Okay, Obama had to let Van Jones go once Glenn Beck exposed him)

Obama climate czar has socialist ties
Carol Browner from group insisting rich countries must shrink their economies to address climate change.
Obama climate czar has socialist ties - Washington Times

Holdren warned of coming ice age
Science chief argued for population control to limit 'global cooling'
Holdren warned of coming ice age

Obama czar John Holdren's shocking communist connections
Edited publication whose founders allegedly fed secrets to Soviet Union
Obama czar's shocking communist connections

Holdren's guru: Dispose of 'excess children' like puppies
Science chief acknowledges Brown as inspiration for career in ecology
Holdren's guru: Dispose of 'excess children' like puppies


Okay, now show us the radical anti-Americans on Bush's list.

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

..

... when the goal of Communists in the Cold War was to get their people into those positions of power and the goal of Joe McCarthy and other Americans was to get them out...

... you might gain some credibility for at least making a rational effort.

---

Joe McCarthy went way too far (He was noted for making claims that there were large numbers of Communists and Soviet spies and sympathizers inside the United States federal government and elsewhere. Ultimately, McCarthy's tactics and his inability to substantiate his claims led him to be censured by the United States Senate...
...Also: The term McCarthyism, coined in 1950 in reference to McCarthy's practices, was soon applied to similar anti-communist activities.
Today the term is used more generally to describe demagogic, reckless, and unsubstantiated accusations, as well as public attacks on the character or patriotism of political opponents.^[2]

So did John Birch: go to far.

Of course, S2T, I already have a sense that you will say something to the effect of the congress (1952-1954)...=...COMMIES!... ...Or unpatriotic LEFT WING sympathizer's!... ...Or; Bad Mistake!
I know the game... ...:poof:...S2T; I think maybe you are becoming (or at least one of) the wacco resident demagogic, reckless, and unsubstantiated McCarthyism accusers'.

So S2T, the "Left" "Right" aren't going away anytime soon; so what way do you think that will work or be a reasonable place to start
"Rethinking America" without annihilating the other with so-called "truth", logic", or any other verbiage of the baiting and inflammatory kind?
Are you up to the "task"?...
...Or are you more into the demagogic way of catharsis than actually being into a group of thinkers that must at times, yield to different perspectives in order to explore alternatives to the gridlock of demagogic loggerheads on opposing sides?

While McCarthy was driven to drink and irrationality by the ardent defense of Communists coming from many around him, in truth he did not go far enough. He was wrong - only in the sense that he seriously UNDER-estimated the extent of Soviet agents in the highest positions of power in our national government.

Remember those headlines from the 1990s?

Venona Project Vindicates McCarthy - Communist Penetration Extensive

More Communist Spies Than McCarthy Suspected

Well, okay, our national media kept real quiet about this. After all, they would not want to break the negative image of McCarthy as a Don Quixote carefully crafted by the Left in this nation...

The Hidden Truth About Joseph McCarthy - Venona Cables Decrypted
The Hidden Truth About Joseph McCarthy

David Kupelian - Why I'm Worse than Joe McCarthy
(McCarthy dared expose the ugly truth, proven by Venona transcripts, that Communis agents had reached high positions in US gov't.)
Why I'm 'worse than Joe McCarthy'

Alger Hiss, Roosevelt foreign policy advisor and first secretary general of the United Nations; Harry Dexter White, assistant secretary of the Treasury and Truman’s appointee as director of the International Monetary Fund; and Lauchlin Currie, administrative assistant to Presidents Roosevelt and Truman, have all been confirmed, among hundreds of others, to have been agents of the USSR. In addition to the multitudes of executive branch agents, we also know of at least three Congressmen working clandestinely for the Soviet Union during this time period.
Government was hardly the only domain targeted by Soviet espionage. Influential media figures like I.F. Stone of The Nation, Michael Straight, editor of The New Republic, and Pulitzer Prize Winner Walter Duranty of The New York Times were actually agents of the Soviet Union. Prominent unions like the Congress of Industrial Organizations and the Screen Actors Guild were dominated by Communists. Even major industrialists like Armand Hammer did their part by laundering Soviet money to domestic U.S. Communists.

The real tragedy is that Communists openly take control of our government today and nobody is dragging them out, tarring and feathering them. That is how effective the Left's strategy to de-moralize Americans has been.

THEY ARE YOUR ENEMIES yet they openly take control of your government.

Amazing, that Americans have been "feminized" this badly. That is a term Socialists use to describe their activities to bleed the spirit of 'manly resistance' out of a society that they control, to reduce the likelihood that the population will rise up against them.

You'll see it lamented in a Chinese film called "Ju Dou".

So, now that we can see McCarthy was correct, are you willing to yield to fact and reconsider the demagogic notions programmed into our society over the decades?

Going back a little ways....

Quote:

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This is a disguisting lie. Even if many black Americans and Africans supported the slave system, indirectly and directly, to say the system of slavery in the Americas was not race based is an out and out LIE.

---

I believe you are correct to assert that, as the system developed, whites could no longer be held as slaves (as they were in the early part of slavery on this continent). However, the modern assertion that black people are automatically the "victims" and whites the "oppressors" totally disguises the fact that many black slave owners prospered by enslaving other black persons - and that goes all the way back to the very first slave owner in the Colonies on this continent who was a black man.

Today's demagogues totally distort the issue to make it "black and white" when in fact a black slave owner began the practice of slavery on this continent and perpetrated it. Shame on those who pretend blacks were only the victims of the system of slavery.

Dixie's Censored Subject - Black Slaveowners
https://americancivilwar.com/authors...laveowners.htm

An African instituted slavery on this continent. Americans put an end to it.

Do you find any of this factually incorrect?

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

Going back a little ways....
An African instituted slavery on this continent. Americans put an end to it.

---

that's misleading in several ways. Anthony Johnson did not invent slavery in Virginia. Rather the Virginia House Courts passed legislation and made rulings, respectively, that created the institution of slavery (in Virginia) and created the structure, laws, etc that permittecd the institution to survive and thrive.

Your second sentence ("Americans put an end to it [slavery]") is even more misleading. One could just as easily say that "Americans supported slavery for 90 years after the Constitution, and fought tooth and nail to prevent black Americans from being freed." Or: "even after the Civil War, Americans continues to deny black Americans their civil rights , for another 100 years, under a system of legally sanctioned apartheid."

Your statement is factually correct, I guess. It's just not true.

It is my understanding that Anthony Johnson, a former indentured servant who earned his freedom, initiated the institution of African-style slavery in the Jamestown colony. It differed from indentured servitude in that the African concept was legal ownership of another human being, as property.


"Slavery was officially established in Virginia in 1654, when Anthony Johnson, a black man, convinced a court that his servant (also black) John Casor was his for life. Johnson himself had been brought to Virginia some years earlier as an indentured servant (a person who must work to repay a debt, or on contract for so many years in exchange for food and shelter) but he saved enough money to buy out the remainder of his contract and that of his wife. The court ruled in Johnson’s favor, and the very first officially state-recognized slave existed in Virginia. Johnson eventually became very wealthy and began importing his own black slaves from Africa."

I am unaware of all the legal processes that ensued to make it a legally recognized institution. My assertion is that the institution did not come from the European nations but from Africa itself, where slavery is still a common practice.

Do you know of the British having legally institutionalized slavery before this?

As for Americans putting an end to it:

I need to clarify my definition of Americans. They are the people who believe in and work to implement the founding principles of this nation. There are lots of folks who the law calls Americans but who play for the "other" team. The Democrats fought hard to keep slavery going. They continued to elect folks like KKK recruiter Robert Byrd for long after the practice was legally abolished.

Did they uphold the American principle that all men are created equal and therefore no man had the authority to own another? No.

I reiterate - when I speak of Americans in this matter I don't mean the broad definition of "people born in this country and legally recognized as Citizens thereof". I refer to people who actually believe in and uphold the clearly documented principles of this nation.

Republican leaders like Martin Luther King fought for those American principles. Robert Byrd... not so much.

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

It is my understanding that Anthony Johnson, a former indentured servant who earned his freedom, initiated the institution of African-style slavery in the Jamestown colony...

---

Earlier you said an African instituted slavery "on this continent"; then "in America"; now it's in Virginia. Keep in mind that the Portugese and the Spanish empires had around a million African slaves in their colonies (including Florida) well before Jamestown was founded. More generally, I really don't understand your point: most slaveowners in the Colonies were white; some were black; some were Native American. So what? By 1800 about 15 million black people were slaves in the US. That's our history and we still suffer from it.

In short, I think it's naive to think or suggest that one unlucky guy from Angola was responsible for the American system of slavery. It's probably more complicated than that

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth;119136I :

need to clarify my definition of Americans. They are the people who believe in and work to implement the founding principles of this nation. ...when I speak of Americans in this matter... I refer to people who actually believe in and uphold the clearly documented principles of this nation.

---

Ok, I understand that use of the terminology, but I think you should look for different words, because your usage has issues: the "clearly documented principles of this nation" are not clear, documented--and not always principles. The Declaration of Independance says all men are equal; the Constitution, for its first hundred years, said black men are 3/5 the value of white men. Is the idea of equality "clearly documented"?

Your personal understanding of the founding principles isn't "American", it's just your perspective. Might be right, might not. In all cases, we should remember that even people of good will and intent might disagree about what those principles are, or how they should be implemented.

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

While I abhor this process of putting "czars" in power, I believe the next salient question is what their underlying ideologies are. That defines what they will do with such power.

How many Communists did GW appoint? How many who think Chairman Mao was one of their favorite philosophers?

If GW appointed patriotic Americans and Obama appoints people hostile to American principles, you will see a vastly different exercise of power from the two Administrations through those czars.

Think about it.

---

I did, and I have.
It is obvious to me that would all depend upon what you mean by "hostile to American principles".
It could be argued that the Bush administration lied and exaggerated to get us into war for reasons other than what we were led to believe.
Then to use and or encourage McCarthyism type of tactics with intelligence gathering techniques that were minimally questionable, but most likely unlawful...
...FISA rules being ignored....
... spying on peaceful, nonviolent, antiwar activists etc..... ...the list goes on.
what about protest free zones?
Obama didn't do that!
I'm not so sure Obama would have under similar circumstances either.
I don't think Obama would have lied to the public like Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and George Bush did about Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass destruction etc.
I suppose your logic is, if it's against communism or for some sort of Capitol, strategic purpose that; it's okay to lie to the public for the purpose of invading a foreign country for hidden, in secret, capital / strategic gains for the "chosen special interests", Instead of telling the truth in the first place because they assumed the public and Congress would not have gone for it otherwise.

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

Obama's nuke agreements meant to disarm U.S.?
Science czar's magazine accused of disseminating Soviet propaganda - goal is to put US nuclear arsenal under international control
Obama's nuke agreements meant to disarm U.S.?

---

There is a big difference between a Treaty and actual "control", particularly when it comes to national security of any country, particularly the United States; everybody that has been paying attention already knows that.
To think that a president of the United States would do that is patently absurd, paranoid, and ridiculous.
It's just not going to happen.

'Safe schools' Czar encouraged child sex with older man
Washington Times: Kevin Jennings should 'come clean'
'Safe schools' chief encouraged child sex with older man

I seem to remember a year or two ago there was a Republican that actually did something like that I think it was a 17-year-old boy that he hired to do something of a sexual nature.
That doesn't make it right however.

But to say or even implicate that the Obama administration is going to hire somebody and your children are going to get raped as a direct result is absolutely, utterly, way over the top, inflammatory, character assassination of a whole group because of a mere accusation of an individual. That is most definitely a McCarthyism like tactic.

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

Top Obama czar Cass Sunstein: Infiltrate all 'conspiracy theorists'
Presidential adviser wrote about crackdown on expressing opinions, banning or imposing special fines
Top Obama czar: Infiltrate all 'conspiracy theorists'

Sunstein: Americans too racist for socialism
Defends communism, welfare state but says 'white majority' oppose programs aiding blacks, Hispanics
Sunstein: Americans too racist for socialism

Cass Sunstein wants to spread America's wealth
Echoes Van Jones on using 'environmental justice' to redistribute money
Cass Sunstein wants to spread America's wealth

---

Here's a quote right out of the link you provided:

• "The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;
• The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
• The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
• The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
• The right of every family to a decent home;
• The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
• The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
• The right to a good education."

Sounds like a modern day partial (incomplete) list of something like "The New Deal" from FDR. Was FDR a Commie?... ...After raiding a couple of your other links, I think you do believe that FDR was a communist. what a pity!

The bankster's, as we call them; did thief trillions of dollars, and in doing so made some others filthy wealthy; so a so-called "lawful redistribution of wealth" can be a bad term to use politically but, for the ones that were stolen from, receiving what they can get back of what was stolen from them by lies, dirty deals, and outright theft or usury, in my way of thinking is nether Communist nor anything of the sort of which you seem to claim. It is redress which is written into the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

I am not into Glean Beak's disgusting, conjecture or the red-baiting, prejudicial overtones either.

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

Okay, now show us the radical anti-Americans on Bush's list.

---

First of all, it was tongue in cheek.
Second of all, it was a list of Czars, not the highly controversial term "anti-Americans" that you conveniently interject for the sake of your fallacious argument.

If one of the founding reasons America is so great is because it's a country of laws, not of men or King. Then there are major laws that were broken in the Bush administration.

U.S. Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales / Legalization of torture.


Henry Kissinger 1

And Henry Kissinger 2

Elliott Abrams


John Negroponte

There are more that could be listed but I get the idea that you have no concern of what human rights abuses done in our name that undermine the very things that are the primary spirit of the constitution, the bill of rights and all that, which is supposed to represent as an example to the rest of the world to follow.

Your rigid viewpoint seems to me to be that it's okay to kill, maim, bomb, Invade, torture, ruin the land and waters of indigenous People's abroad, and inflict all the other horrors of war onto more innocents then combatants, because somehow that (those wars / battles) became for the best interest of America itself and America's "interests"! but you would prefer to blame all of that which is bad on others.

I've got news for you whether you or I or anybody else here on this board likes it or not; America also has blood of innocence on its hands.

Don't bother wasting your time trying to say that I'm against America, because I can tell you for sure, right here and now, I'm not against America in any way shape or form.

What I am against is human rights violations anywhere in my name as an American!
I am against going to war under false pretenses.
I am against legislation that goes against the main principles of the Constitution and Bill of Rights regardless of whether it comes from the left, right, center, or anywhere else!

I am also knowledgeable about, the reality that there is plenty of resources to go around and that some people aggressively hoard too much sometimes. That's why I think there should always be a progressive tax rate. Otherwise, eventually, people starve so that somebody else can be filthy rich.

That happens in communist countries that happens in dictatorships that happens in republics and that happens in democracies whether they be capitalistic or not.

To say that government of the United States is not suppose to regulate its monetary system is absolutely ludicrous. That would fly in the face of the meaning of government!
Yes believe it or not, there is supposed to be a government.

It's obvious to me that you're going to continue to blame the "liberals" blame the left, and call names like; "communists", "socialists", "traitor", "treasonous", pro "one world Government" "saboteurs" etc. etc. etc., all of which is feudalistic, paranoid right-wing quasi-religious, propaganda straight from the playbook of the far right agenda.
Even if you don't do all of that and you don't use those names to call people, the messages within the links that you provide do.

You seem to blame the "left" on having an agenda, but I think you also have an agenda of being confrontational to what you perceive as the "left", because somehow you believe that the "left" is your sworn enemy; and therefore declaring the "left" as your sworn enemy is your primary objective for "salvation"(?).... ... to (swiftly without hesitation without much consideration of "unintended consequences") "save the country from the communists" by any means "necessary";... ...and so what if innocent, peaceful, people, animals, the environment etc gets caught in the crossfire; because somehow the "free market" is God's will, and constitutionally mandated; or something to that effect.

I think; that NOT!

After I shutdown and walked away from this incessant hullabaloo over politics here, of which I've been a major contributor, I know...

I was flipping channels and chanced upon the Charlie Rose show,

(I teasingly call him Charlie Rodent, because he looks and acts like a sneaky lizard/rat, butter wouldn't melt in his mouth and all that, but he's by far the only intellectual interviewer on our national tube nowadays, and for years past. I don't watch him regularly, since the topics he and his guests cover are already quite familiar to me, but he does a damn fine job in bringing the ideas out in the open.)

where he was interviewing John Sexton, President of NYU. There was a great quote from Doctor Sexton, about the polarization of American (U.S.) political debate, that I wanted to share here. After a bit of "Bonnie & Clyde" I came back, did a lengthy search, and was unable to find the quote.

Tomorrow the show should be online, look for the printed text about half way in. Professor Sexton had much to say about the future of the University, as well. Maybe I'll do the search myself, and copy it here. We'll see.

Beware, he almost crushed the graduate student union, and he was Chair of the New York FED. So he's evil from both ends of the spectrum!!!

Still, the quote was quite good. And an astute comment apropos the style of debate that has been foisted upon us, here, and in the public arena in general.

Basically he said that the polarization and fixed positions endemic in our political discourse, are a threat to our Democracy, and to the very project that is America (U.S.).

But it was more eloquent and nuanced than my paraphrase here.

G,Night, Again,

Here's the link to Charlie Rose's interview with John Sexton last night.

The relevant section is from 41.21 - 47.07 in the video. The whole interview is interesting if you are intrigued by the unique career of a major university leader, the issues around founding an international university, and questions of undergraduate health, physical and mental, on today's college campuses.

I tried to find the articles for the two quotes Charlie uses in the section I've noted above. From the online journal, "Inside Higher Education" but that publications archive doesn't go back far enough to be able to pull them up. I'm not going to spend more time googling and binging for them. Anyone else is welcome to try.

I hesistate sharing video. For reasons previously stated I don't watch much internet video. But this is the only way I have to share Sexton's very apropos comments about the state of our public political culture and discourse. I think he's right on!

Interesting what he said about bloggers, but did you also know:

Charlie Rose - John Sexton John Edward Sexton is the fifteenth President of New York University, having held this position since May 17, 2002, and the Benjamin Butler Professor of Law at the NYU School of Law. From 1988 to 2002, he served as Dean of the NYU School of Law, which during his deanship became one of the top five law schools in the country according to U.S. News and World Report. From January 1, 2003 to January 1, 2007, he was the Chairman of the Board of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York; in 2006, he served as chair of the Federal Reserve System’s Council of Chairs. Source - John Sexton - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

?

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Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

Here's the link to Charlie Rose's interview with John Sexton last night.

The relevant section is from 41.21 - 47.07 in the video. The whole interview is interesting if you are intrigued by the unique career of a major university leader,...

... I think he's right on!

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Hotspring44,

Yes, I did know. I wrote this in Post #84 of this thread:

Beware, he almost crushed the graduate student union, and he was Chair of the New York FED. So he's evil from both ends of the spectrum!!!

Post #84, what was it we were talking about when this started?!

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Posted in reply to the post by Mad Miles:

...what was it we were talking about when this started?!

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This thread?... ...A> Rethinking America.

This trend on this thread: “putting "czars" in power”, “demagogic, reckless, and unsubstantiated McCarthyism” “demagogic loggerheads on opposing sides”, and some “Tongue-in-cheek” stuff...
...Links provided that go and refer to Glen Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and other anti left, Obama, Democrat, “progressive”; “Pundits” etc.
Some “finger pointing” and “blame-gaming” and (Facetiously speaking), comparing which politico is the biggest Dick-----tator.

Side note: Is there such a thing as a “Condom” that can be used; for the Blogosphere? LOL!!:rofl2::dance::biglaugh:

Dear Community,

It seems that many are confused with the terms of socialism and communism; neither is evident in the US government under any Administration.

Bad management and unending perks for certain special interests (dangerous nukes and dirty extraction/burn fuels; unlimited funding for the industrial war complex; unethical banking/stock market schemers - still in power, etc.) are leading to our dysfunction and destruction.

The petty arguments made here do nothing but separate us further.

What can we learn from this that is useful?

I have learned from a neighbor what both the Bush and Obama Administration (and some would say Clinton and others as well) have led to exist for America, is a new form of "fascism". That is, in this era, we have let our country go to the highest corporate bidder; and still, against the majority's will, somehow allowing our military to strike first, in defiance of UN agreements. More importantly, as per the US Constitution - without a declaration of war.

Wake up! Your division is killing what's left of our country. Whining, and pointing fingers at each other, taking no deliberate action towards workable solutions - serves the fascist nation builders very well.

In my belief system, every life on this planet has equal importance. What makes us different is how we use our time, in what we give our attention, money, power and talents to.

I know I signed up for the hardest, yet most important job in the world; ending unconstitutional use of force. I did not get all the training needed, still have almost no support; that's why allies are needed, it's very much a team effort.

Can you be a team player with me in saving the planet - for real, not just for a deal benefiting certain entities?

Let us please unite; it's the only way to get our country and our Constitution back!

I am planning 2 town hall meetings on this in Santa Rosa and San Rafael. Will you help too?

The unfunded "emergency" funding for the "surge" in Afghanistan will be before the House again soon.

Are you willing to enable this by staying silent, while the funding for basic and emergency services continue to be cut to the bone? Or, will you unite with those of color/party/religion you are not used to, so we can re-define what it is to be a good American in these UNITED States?

If not, it's time this country got a divorce.

Perhaps these town halls for City Care, NOT (unconstitutional)Warfare will serve as the start of the couples counseling we have been missing.

Thank you,

Colleen Fernald

:doc: :usflag:


From wikipedia

Fascism, pronounced /_fæ__z_m/, is a radical and authoritarian nationalist political ideology.[1][2][3][4] Fascists seek to organize a nation according to corporatist perspectives, values, and systems, including the political system and the economy.[5][6] Fascism was originally founded by Italian national syndicalists in World War I who combined left-wing and right-wing political views, but it gravitated to the political right in the early 1920s.[7][8] Scholars generally consider fascism to be on the far right of the conventional left-right political spectrum.[9][10][11][12][13][14]

Fascists believe that a nation is an organic community that requires strong leadership, singular collective identity, and the will and ability to commit violence and wage war in order to keep the nation strong.[15] They claim that culture is created by the collective national society and its state, that cultural ideas are what give individuals identity, and thus they reject individualism.[15]

Viewing the nation as an integrated collective community, they see pluralism as a dysfunctional aspect of society, and justify a totalitarian state as a means to represent the nation in its entirety.[16][17] They advocate the creation of a single-party state.[18] Fascists reject and resist the autonomy of cultural or ethnic groups who are not considered part of the fascists' nation and who refuse to assimilate or are unable to be assimilated.[19] They consider attempts to create such autonomy as an affront and a threat to the nation.[19] Fascist governments forbid and suppress opposition to the fascist state and the fascist movement.[20] They identify violence and war as actions that create national regeneration, spirit and vitality.[21]

Fascism is a byproduct of aspects of the Enlightenment, stemming from the Promethean, secular and modern ideals of the time, but rejecting the similarly modern concepts of egalitarianism, materialism, and rationalism as failed elements of the Enlightenment in favor of action, discipline, hierarchy, spirit, and will, which are also essentially modern.[22][23] They oppose liberalism — as a bourgeois movement — and Marxism — as a proletarian movement — for being exclusive economic class-based movements.[24]

Fascists present their ideology as that of an economically trans-class movement that promotes ending economic class conflict to secure national solidarity.[25] They believe that economic classes are not capable of properly governing a nation, and that a merit-based aristocracy of experienced military persons must rule through regimenting a nation's forces of production and securing the nation's independence.[26] Fascism perceives conservatism as partly valuable for its support of order in society but opposes its typical opposition to change and modernization.[27] Fascism presents itself as a solution to the perceived benefits and disadvantages of conservatism by advocating state-controlled modernization that promotes orderly change while resisting the dangers to order in society of pluralism and independent initiative.[27]

Fascists support a "Third Position" in economic policy, which they believe superior to both the rampant individualism of laissez-faire capitalism and the severe control of state socialism.[28][29] Italian Fascism and most other fascist movements promote a corporatist economy whereby, in theory, representatives of capital and labour interest groups work together within sectoral corporations to create both harmonious labour relations and maximization of production that would serve the national interest.[30] However other fascist movements and ideologies, such as Nazism, did not utilize this form of economy.[30]

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Posted in reply to the post by seanpfister:

Earlier you said an African instituted slavery "on this continent"; then "in America"; now it's in Virginia.

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I'm pretty sure I have not been that inconsistent. Following my original assertion, "the African system of slavery that had been imported to the British Colonies", I've been talking about the system of slavery that was eventually eliminated by the Americans (United States of America). It was not the Portugese who went on to found the United States. It was the British colonies.

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More generally, I really don't understand your point: most slaveowners in the Colonies were white; some were black; some were Native American. So what? By 1800 about 15 million black people were slaves in the US. That's our history and we still suffer from it.

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Not so much. In fact, black Americans are far better off than their African counterparts, even those whom President Monroe returned to Africa to create a brand new nation of their own (today called "Liberia" I think). I know, some folks whose minds are stuck on "politically correct" cannot address this rationally so I challenge them to prove this wrong: American blacks are far, FAR better off than their distant relatives in Africa.

What we suffer from today is the constant effort of race-baiters to keep racism alive (and their own pockets filled). People like Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton and other "trash". What we should glorify is black Americans willing to show the way to success, not those who try to talk blacks into a mindset of perpetual victimhood.

Let's put Bill Cosby, Condoleeza Rice and others on a pedestal and say, "Look what every American has the opportunity to become".

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In short, I think it's naive to think or suggest that one unlucky guy from Angola was responsible for the American system of slavery. It's probably more complicated than that

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I just did some further reading on it. He was not only a smart fellow, purchasing some other blacks to keep as slaves, he also went through the legal system to create the legal institution of slavery that became perpetuated throughout the British Colonies. He wasn't "unlucky" - the folks he purchased were.

I read a report that in 1850 about 30% of slave owners in the New Orleans area were black.

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the "clearly documented principles of this nation" are not clear, documented--and not always principles. The Declaration of Independance says all men are equal; the Constitution, for its first hundred years, said black men are 3/5 the value of white men.

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You are repeating exactly what I've been saying. Please forgive my emphasis here...

The PRINCIPLES of this nation are spelled out clearly in the Declaration of Independence.

The LAWS designed to uphold those principles are the US Constitution and it took time to build up that body of laws to actually uphold the founding principles. The Bill of Rights and other amendments have moved the nation closer and closer.

When Congress created the Constitution, they realized they could not fight to end slavery at that time, so that was not addressed at that time. Yet, founders like Thomas Jefferson (who tried to put abolition in the Declaration of Independence) were determined that, at some point, the nation MUST uphold the principles so clearly spelled out in the DOI.

So, after this lengthy discussion of basic facts, I'll distill my main point:

The assertion that black people are the "victims" of slavery and white people are the "perpetrators" is a willful Big Lie.

Period.

As to why the Left perpetrate this lie... we can get into that once the assertion above is taken as stipulated.

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Posted in reply to the post by Speak2Truth:

So, after this lengthy discussion of basic facts, I'll distill my main point:

The assertion that black people are the "victims" of slavery and white people are the "perpetrators" is a willful Big Lie.

Period.

As to why the Left perpetrate this lie... we can get into that once the assertion above is taken as stipulated.

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Wow this is completely racist. It is offensive and unacceptable. In the case of the Afrikan slave trade, Afrikans were and are the victims. Your statement of denial is like the neo-nazi belief that the holocaust is a lie.
I pray for you that you rethink your views.

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Posted in reply to the post by admo:

Wow this is completely racist. It is offensive and unacceptable. In the case of the Afrikan slave trade, Afrikans were and are the victims. Your statement of denial is like the neo-nazi belief that the holocaust is a lie.
I pray for you that you rethink your views.

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I am not providing "view", I am providing "facts".

In Africa, black Africans rounded up and sold their neighbors into slavery. An African successfully fought in the legal system in the British Colonies to establish legalized slavery.

In the mid 1800s, black slave owners competed very strongly against white slave owners, especially in the cotton and sugar trades.

Africans were the perpetrators as well as the victims.

The notion that this was a purely race-based issue, with Africans on one side and whites on the other, is in fact racist, offensive and unacceptable. We must form our worldviews based on facts. If our worldviews do not comply with the facts, they are "wrong".

https://americancivilwar.com/authors...laveowners.htm

"The country's leading African American historian, Duke University professor John Hope Franklin, records that in New Orleans over 3,000 free Negroes owned slaves, or 28 percent of the free Negroes in that city."

If you find facts to be offensive, that's fine. To each his own. I prefer to seek Truth with open eyes.

The article S2T is getting his "facts" from was first published by The Barnes Review.

Here's a relevant discussion about the article. Be sure to scroll down to the comments, the first part is just a copy of the article.

After wasting time googling the author of the article, Robert M. Grooms, all I could find for the most part were repeated postings of his article, mostly on Confederate sympathizer, or straight up racist, white supremacist sites. Nothing about the author himself.

I tried the Southern Poverty Law Center site but it only gave me discussions of the Neo-Confederate movement and related racists. No specifics on Mr. Groom or his article. Zero specific references to either in the articles that came up when searching their site. (At least not in the top few.)

What that leads me to think is that Mr. Groom is not exactly a renowned scholar on much of anything. Although I did find a blog that did not list his name, with various articles, other than the one in question, on related historical topics. Nothing remotely close to an author bio, or a list of credentials for him. The blog is called "Debunking The Myths" and there is no way to tell if the other articles are by him or not, they do not have bylines, except for his, the one found on numerous other sketchy websites.

That leads me to think that whoever is behind the "Debunking The Myths" blog, is either not very intelligent, or not particularly honest. Since the identity and background of any author is part of the authenticity of their work. It also is circumstantial evidence that the other articles in the blog are not by Grooms, and that it is not Grooms blog. Another dead end in trying to figure out who the guy is.

Groom's piece is popular on some other marginal conservative sites, which on the face of them are not overtly racist or white supremacist.

The Afro Punk site linked above has the most extant discussion I could find, that doesn't reek of race hatred.

It is known that some Free Blacks owned slaves. The Afro Punk discussion thread addresses this specifically.

That there is no easily found academic criticism, or praise, of Mr. Grooms claims, is also evidence that he is not taken seriously outside of some small, marginal circles which are associated with odious political partisanship, and have little or nothing to do with the work of professional historians.

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Posted in reply to the post by Mad" Miles;135535][FONT=Times New Roman]
[/FONT] [FONT=Times New Roman][SIZE=3]The article S2T is getting his "facts" from was first published by [URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnes_Review:

The Barnes Review[/URL].

That there is no easily found academic criticism, or praise, of Mr. Grooms claims, is also evidence that he is not taken seriously outside of some small, marginal circles which are associated with odious political partisanship, and have little or nothing to do with the work of professional historians.

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I would have been interested in seeing you (or anyone) present scholarly refutation to the information presented. You assert that the lack of refutation diminishes the credibility of the information presented? That's quite a stretch.

Yes, it is well known that even in the Deep South, free blacks were slave owners, ran large scale plantations and businesses powered by slave labor.

This is a fact.

It is also a fact that the African notion of slavery was legally established in the British Colonies by a black African.

Given these facts, the racist rants against whites, presuming black people were solely the "victims" in this long-gone period of history, are false. Such perversions of history are perpetrated by racists with political agendas, using the gullible as minions.

I present facts. You admit they are facts. Good enough for me.

I'll stick with my motto: Truth is Justice

Barry [edit - MILES! Sorry, Barry], to disparage the article because you could not find information on Mr. Grooms is disingenuous. If you were truly interested in the scholarly pursuit to which you pretended, you might have taken note of this key sentence:

"The country's leading African American historian, Duke University professor John Hope Franklin, records that in New Orleans over 3,000 free Negroes owned slaves, or 28 percent of the free Negroes in that city."

Then, pursue the referenced scholar who provided the Facts related to us by Mr. Grooms:

"John Hope Franklin is James B. Duke Professor Emeritus of History at Duke University and has also served on the faculties at St. Augustine's College, Howard University, Brooklyn College, and the University of Chicago. A former president of the Southern Historical Association, the American Historical Association, and the United Chapters of Phi Beta Kappa, he has received dozens of major awards and more than 100 honorary degrees. In 1995, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor. That same year the John Hope Franklin Research Center was founded at Duke as a repository for African and African American studies documentation. Last summer, the distinguished Duke historian was appointed by President Clinton to lead a panel of advisers on promoting racial understanding in the United States."

I hope this helps you get a little closer to Truth.