How Ron Paul Deconstructed the Phony Baloney Left-Right Paradigm

[ubaru]

How Ron Paul Deconstructed the Phony Baloney Left-Right Paradigm

The Republican primary season was a hoot with its seedy cast of characters that included Bat Shit Crazy Bachmann, Sanitorium the Sanctimonious, Slick Rick ‘the Oops candidate’, the Angry Little Lunar Attack Muffin and a dude named Mittens whose claim to fame is that he had the holding power to just wait for his crazy competitors to self-destruct.

The only sane guy in the Republican sea of insanity was Ron Paul, a guy who campaigned on peace, liberty and prosperity but he was rejected and got booed by a psychopathic Republican debate audience for suggesting that America invoke the Golden Rule when it comes to foreign policy. Republicans don’t like sane and their affinity for the psychopathic is truly mindboggling. But in the end Republican voters quit bickering about who is the craziest candidate and just hold their noses and vote for the most boring candidate that praises Jesus, promises more wars and commits to advancing Republican socialism and crony capitalism.

The legacy of the 2012 primary season should worry the Dems because it spawned a liberty movement consisting of disgruntled Republicans, disgruntled Democrats, independents and other disaffected voting blocks. The Ron Paul Revolution crossed party lines because it focused on how the damn wars have bankrupted the nation and destroyed the economic but the defining characteristic of the Ron Paul Campaign is that it raised public awareness about the thieving banksters who operate the biggest ongoing crime syndicate in human history through the Federal Reserve.

The Occupy Movement jumped into the political fray with added sparks by emphasizing the difference between the 99% and the 1%.

The Democrat enthusiastically supported Obama in 2008 because he was perceived as anti-war and in opposition to all the things that progressives despise about governance. At least, that’s how Obama waged his magical campaign. But at the end of the day, the Dems just got Obushma, just another elitist bought and paid for New World Order hack that is clearly a wholly owned subsidiary of the banksters, military industrial complex and rent seeking crony capitalists.

Glenn Greenwald, a progressive I greatly admire on many issues, wrote about Ron Paul and his campaign:

The benefits of his candidacy are widely ignored, as are the Democrats' own evils.

Ron Paul’s candidacy is a mirror held up in front of the face of America’s Democratic Party and its progressive wing, and the image that is reflected is an ugly one; more to the point, it’s one they do not want to see because it so violently conflicts with their desired self-perception...

The fallacy in this reasoning is glaring. The candidate supported by progressives — President Obama — himself holds heinous views on a slew of critical issues and himself has done heinous things with the power he has been vested. He has slaughtered civilians — Muslim children by the dozens — not once or twice, but continuously in numerous nations withdrones, cluster bombs and other forms of attack. He has soughtto overturn a global ban on cluster bombs. He has institutionalized the power of Presidents — in secret and with no checks — to target American citizens for assassination-by-CIA, far from any battlefield. He has waged an unprecedented war against whistleblowers, the protection of which was once a liberal shibboleth. He rendered permanently irrelevant the War Powers Resolution, a crown jewel in the list of post-Vietnam liberal accomplishments, and thus enshrined the power of Presidents to wage war even in the face of a Congressional voteagainst it. His obsession with secrecy is so extreme that it has become darkly laughable in its manifestations, and he even worked to amend the Freedom of Information Act (another crown jewel of liberal legislative successes) when compliance became inconvenient.

He has entrenched for a generation the once-reviled, once-radical Bush/Cheney Terrorism powers of indefinite detention, military commissions, and the state secret privilege as a weapon to immunize political leaders from the rule of law. He has shielded Bush era criminals from every last form of accountability. He has vigorously prosecuted the cruel and supremely racist War on Drugs, including those parts he vowed during the campaign to relinquish — a war which devastates minority communities and encages and converts into felons huge numbers of minority youth for no good reason. He has empowered thieving bankers through the Wall Street bailout, Fed secrecy, efforts to shield mortgage defrauders from prosecution, and the appointment of an endless roster of former Goldman, Sachs executives and lobbyists. He’s brought the nation to a full-on Cold War and a covert hot war with Iran, on the brink of far greater hostilities. He has made the U.S. assubservient as ever to the destructive agenda of the right-wing Israeli government. His support for some of the Arab world’smost repressive regimes is as strong as ever.

Read the rest here
Salon

The words of Glenn Greenwald are indeed a scathing indictment of Obama and the Democratic administration and conclusively prove that there really isn't a spit of difference between the Republican and the Democratic parties, despite the pathetic but vociferous rants at election time that attempt to highlight the differences between the parties. The only differences lie with the Republican and Democratic voting bases. The Republicans want things to remain the same - big wars, big bankster bailouts, big government, big assaults on civil liberties, big entitlements and big government powers. The Dems generally oppose the wars, the crushing of civil liberties and the big bankster bailouts. The Dems really do want change but Republicans are totally averse to change.

In the Romney candidacy, Republicans reluctantly agreed that he would continue in the footsteps of Bush/Cheney and while Republicans don't exactly trust Romney they decided to trust him more than they trust Obama.

Another progressive, Matt Stoller, wrote one of the best pieces on Ron Paul from the progressive prospective as Stoller delves into Libertarianism to reconcile prevailing progressive ideology with the Ron Paul movement. Stoller isn't a guy who haphazardly tosses out words nor does he fall into the typical liberal trap of justifying Obama's actions. Stoller has been on a soul searching mission to understand the Ron Paul movement and its vast appeal to frustrated Americans. Stoller actually accomplishes something that few progressives can comprehend, namely, that the American Empire and the wars that they so despise are indeed a direct result of the Federal Reserve that they tend to worship because it facilitates a monstrous nanny state federal government and its social entitlements.

The most perplexing character in Congress, ideologically speaking, is Ron Paul....

And as I’ve drilled into Paul’s ideas, his ideas forced me to acknowledge some deep contradictions in American liberalism (pointed out years ago by Christopher Laesch) and what is a long-standing, disturbing, and unacknowledged affinity liberals have with centralized war financing. So while I have my views of Ron Paul, I believe that the anger he inspires comes not from his positions, but from the tensions that modern American liberals bear within their own worldview.....

Now, if you’re a libertarian, and you believe that centralized power is dangerous, then it’s obvious that state control over finance and mass mobilization of social resources for warfare or other ends are two sides of the same coin....

Modern liberalism is a mixture of two elements. One is a support of Federal power – what came out of the late 1930s, World War II, and the civil rights era where a social safety net and warfare were financed by Wall Street, the Federal Reserve and the RFC, and human rights were enforced by a Federal government, unions, and a cadre of corporate, journalistic and technocratic experts (and cheap oil made the whole system run.) America mobilized militarily for national priorities, be they war-like or social in nature....

This is why Ron Paul can critique the Federal Reserve and American empire, and why liberals have essentially no answer to his ideas, arguing instead over Paul having character defects. Ron Paul’s stance should be seen as a challenge to better create a coherent structural critique of the American political order. It’s quite obvious that there isn’t one coming from the left, otherwise the figure challenging the war on drugs and American empire wouldn’t be in the Republican primary as the libertarian candidate. To get there, liberals must grapple with big finance and war, two topics that are difficult to handle in any but a glib manner that separates us from our actual traditional and problematic affinity for both. War financing has a specific tradition in American culture, but there is no guarantee war financing must continue the way it has.

Read the rest here
Naked Capitalism

It's abundantly clear that while thinking progressives are perplexed by Ron Paul, they also deeply respect him on many levels because there's a lot about Ron Paul that is hugely appealing to progressives.

As a libertarian, I don't share progressive views on most issues but I most assuredly do sympathize with their frustration on big issues like foreign policy and how the Federal Reserve actually expanded and consolidated raw and absolute power into the hands of the 1%. Furthermore, I cling to the hope that if we can achieve sound money that isn't manipulated by Wall Street and end the perpetual wars by slaying the military industrial complex, then America will definitely be a far more prosperous and freer place. We'd solve about 75% of our problems and we could fight about the rest of the stuff later.

Progressives definitely have a vested interest in listening to and learning from Ron Paul and his supporters. If the Democratic Party can be forced into the same ideological battle that liberty activists within the Republican party advanced with courage and conviction, then the Democratic Party will be the big winner, along with the American people.

Posted byJudy Morrisat8:19 PMEmail ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to Facebook


Labels:Democrats,independents,left-right paradigm,Republicans,Ron Paul

[Hotspring 44]

I was mostly with this conversation until the buzz term “nanny state”.
But then I considered the possibility that I should check out where it came from and how it is referenced in the political landscape today, so I decided to search the term “nanny state” and discovered this free Internet publication titled:
The conservative Nanny State
How the Wealthy Use the Government to Stay Rich and Get Richer By Dean Baker

Published by the Center for Economic and Policy Research
1611 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 400
Washington, DC 20009
202.293.5380
www.cepr.net

After reading some of it, I realized this could be what somr Ron Paul supporters (?) are talking about... ... but I am not so sure that's the way that Ron Paul is thinking, and I'm absolutely certain it's not the way that the so-called right-wingers are thinking when they use the buzz term “nanny state". Gee Whiz, what a derogatory sound-bite it has become.

In any event, I have yet to see or hear anything that Ron Paul has to say that goes along with what the author and Dean Baker says regarding possible solutions in the Dean Baker's writing mentioned above and quoted later below.

I have been turned-off by Ron Paul because the things I have heard him say are things that would remove the safety net from a lot of American people who are already stressed and in hardship, which would cause inevitable, irreparable, harm to a number of them.

Ubaru or any other pro-Ron Paul (?) person for that matter, If you know of a specific place, link, webpage etc. to point me to where Ron Paul actually says anything, in detail more than just political rhetoric which is aimed at Obama as in a campaign with the opposing party as a target, that is also along the lines of what Dean Baker states in the form of real possible solutions, then I am willing to check that out.

To be clearer on what I mean, I will copy and paste some of the things which I am referring to because the document is 119 pages long and I don't expect anybody to read all of that just to answer my question here... ...(I have not even read all of it).
Even though what I posted here is quite long, it only summarizes the gist of what kinds of explanations that I have not been able to get from Ron Paul's website or any other links that I have seen.

I would rather be sure of Ron Paul's actual meanings are when he, and his supporters for that matter, refers to the buzz terms “free-market” and “nanny state” and see if they really differ from what I already bilieve they mean when they use those and other buzz words and terms, or if they just further support what I already think they mean.

Note: I edited by separating different paragraphs, pages and segments starting at page 103 of the document (page 109 on my Acrobat reader page in the toolbar), the page title of the chapter is: “CONCLUSION”, the heading At the top of the page is: “CONCLUSION Beyond the Conservative Nanny State”.

It starts out by saying:

"Political possibilities look very different if we move beyond the nanny state
conservatives’ framing of the world. They do not want us to even discuss the
really important factors that determine who gets rich and who ends up poor:
Federal Reserve Board policy, free trade for doctors and lawyers, copyrights and
patents. Once we insist that everything must be placed on the table, it is easy to
design policies that offer substantial rewards in terms of higher growth and will
also lead to a more equal distribution of income.

Freeing trade in professional services should be an easy one. The economic
gains from having free access to doctors and other professionals from India,
China, and other developing countries vastly exceed the potential gains from
trade deals like NAFTA and CAFTA that make the “free traders” so excited.

The savings on these services will make health care much more affordable and
make other prices lower, effectively raising the real wages of the workers who
are already facing competition from workers in developing countries
One key economic fact that the nanny state conservatives understand very
well, and that confuses many progressives, is that one person’s income is a cost
to another person. Nanny state conservatives clearly recognize that when they
make the wages of autoworkers and nannies lower, they make themselves
richer, because the goods and services produced by autoworkers and nannies
will cost less"....

The following: (p-104 { p-110 Acrobat reader page in the toolbar }) ...."Of course, many people may not want to subject some or all of our highly
paid professionals to global competition. Perhaps they think it is important that
doctors earn more money in a month than restaurant workers earn in a year"....

... "If the public determines that higher income for doctors is a good use
of their money, then they are of course free to support the government
protections that ensure these high incomes"....

The following: (p-105 { p-111 Acrobat reader page in the toolbar })... "Given the enormous costs of higher unemployment, it is reasonable to
look for alternative mechanisms to contain inflation. Other countries have had
success with centralized bargaining processes as a way of keeping wage growth
from pushing a wage-price spiral. There is no easy way to transport this system
to a country like the United States, with low unionization rates and no real
history of centralized bargaining. But since the losses from the excess
unemployment used to contain inflation run into the hundreds of billions a year,
it is worth some effort exploring possible alternative mechanisms that could
accomplish the same end. In the quarter century following World War II most
economists thought that some type of wage-price guidelines/controls could be
effective in containing inflation. In spite of the current conventional wisdom
within the economic profession, it is possible that the earlier generation of
economists was not completely wrong.

If it turns out that our economists are not smart enough to think of a less
expensive way to contain inflation that produces less human suffering, we
should at least be aware of the sacrifices that the unemployed are making on our
behalf. It is their suffering that is restraining wage growth for tens of millions of
other workers, thereby allowing the economy to continue to grow without
excessive inflation. At the very least, the unemployed deserve some recognition
for the sacrifice they endure so that the rest of us can enjoy economic
prosperity.

This brings up a third issue that should be central on any progressive
agenda: national health care insurance. There is overwhelming public support
for some type of national health care insurance, since few people believe that
the uninsured should just be left to die when they get a serious illness. The
argument for national health care insurance becomes even stronger when we
consider that as a matter of government policy, millions of people might be
forced out of work. Since most health insurance is provided through employers,
and most of the unemployed lack the resources to pay for insurance themselves
for any substantial period of time, it seems the least that we could do for them –
in exchange for their efforts to keep inflation under control – is to provide them
and their family with health care insurance.

Even if there is general support for the idea of national health care
insurance, transitioning from the current system to a system of universal health
care insurance is not an easy task. Health care costs have been out-of-control
for decades, and efforts to extend public sector coverage are soon overwhelmed
by the decline in private sector coverage due to ever-rising costs. Unless the
system is transformed and costs are contained, there is no way to provide
universal coverage".



The following: (p-106 { p-112 Acrobat reader page in the toolbar })..."As discussed in Chapter 9, the market may well provide an answer to this
problem. If we allowed every employer and individual in the country to
voluntarily buy into the Medicare program, we would be building on the most
efficient component of the nation’s health care system. An expanded Medicare
program would allow employers to buy into a plan that offers lower costs than
most private insurers, due to both its low administrative expenses and also its
ability to negotiate price reductions with health care providers. Employers could
also be assured that Medicare would not send their rates soaring if an employee
developed a serious illness. While buying into Medicare would be voluntary, if
the system is properly structured it is likely that most employers would quickly
go this route to insure their workers. Individuals would have the same option to
buy into Medicare.2

By itself, this would not be sufficient to achieve universal coverage. It
would be necessary to have some additional subsidies in place that would pay
for much or all of the insurance costs for low- and moderate-income families."

["Mad" Miles]

Thanks for bothering Hotspring, but this is what clued me into the latest piece of Paulite spam from his enegetic acolyte. "Phony Baloney Left - Right Paradigm". That claim, that the Left/Right Political Spectrum is some kind of fake divide and conquer tactic by the "......" (name your poison, Banksters? Illuminati? Saurians?) has taken on some popular currency in recent years.

The claim ignores the fact that it's just a general descriptive trope for the range of ideological opinion about the benefits of Capitalism and Governmental Authority. It also refers to the Class War. And it's a well established, historical, time honored and legitimate descriptor.

It's a dull tool, indeed, as are all binary oppositional tropes, but it is a start to accurately describing real and significant political differences.

I like The Political Compass, since it has two axes. Pro/Anti Capitalism, Pro/Anti Authority. I'd add one more, Social Liberal vs. Social Conservative (Guess where the Conservative Libertarians fall down on that one?) But I don't have the time, and inclination to redesign it.

I think one of the strategic reasons for attacking the Left/Right descriptor, other than a Lakoffian attempt to change reality by changing language, is that by denying there is any real difference between the Left and Right, it sidelines the Left and the critics of Capitalism. Which is a very juicy fruit for Laissez Fairylanders.

The thing is, the "article" below equates the Left with the Democratic Party, and the Right with the Republicans. That's a very limited and deceptive use of the descriptor. Leaves out many other options. Which is part of the game.

The game is to claim that the only legitimate radical critique is the Conservative Libertarian camp. It's a gross deception. Transparent to those with a knowledge of history, economics and political theory, but it works on the uninformed. And once it becomes a mantra, well then, it's True, right?

Disparaging the Left/Right label also usefully links those who deny it to all economic and social class interests. It's a conscious evasion. At least for those who promulgated it to begin with. The followers, well they actually believe it makes sense.

My liberal Democratic Party Partisan sister said a few years ago, that it's no longer left vs. right, it's the Corporations vs. the rest of us. I have some sympathy with that. But what the broad left wants to do about the Corporatocracy is not the same as what the Far Rightists want.

No matter how much they claim the distinction is fake, irrelevant and passé. So, when I see that little nugget of poo, I know to check under the hood. Where most often I find one or more of the anti-intellectual rightwing tendencies that want to dominate the public discourse. About nine times out of twelve. The other three come from Anarchists, who like to think they're not Leftists.

"You have a right to your own opinion. You do not have a right to your own facts."

[Hotspring 44]

..."You have a right to your own opinion. You do not have a right to your own facts."

Yes I agree.

[ubaru]

Hotspring44, I appreciate your open mind here.

I'm not familiar with the term conservative nanny state as opposed to a plain vanilla nanny state.

On first read of Dean Baker, I'm not recognizing anything that resembles Ron Paul's philosophy. This guy is a macroeconomist. Paul is influenced by Austrian economics.

I'm not anywhere close to a spokesperson for Paul, but what I'm hearing from him and when I look at one aspect of the big picture, from the globalist's perspective, or the United Nations, the United States is being forced/used to play the role of being planetary security, thus our grossly bloated military that is in everyone else's business. The result is so much wealth is being siphoned from the US people to pay for this. Paul is emphasizing stopping the use of our military for anything other than defending from attack, (and not phony inside jobs such as 9/11), not stripping people of their social security. He'd like to revamp social security for sure, because it badly needs it, but not at the expense of anyone currently being paid by it. (I'd certainly like to see this, as I hear the toilet flush every time I am forced to pay in to it. I know I'll never see a dime of it, and that I'll have to save on my own for retirement, on top of what I'm paying in to social security). This one change alone, of using our military for defense only, would resolve the majority of our economic problems. That and auditing the Fed and then phasing it out. There's plenty more, and I realize you are asking for a specific link (which is asking for a LOT) but that will have to suffice for now.

I'd take this question to the Daily Paul forum and see what kind of answers you get. Also search around the weekly updates I've posted where Paul is talking in detail about many issues.

BTW, we haven't heard any political rhetoric from Ron Paul. That's a big reason why so many people like him. He's such a straight shooting, no nonsense, non-politician.

I was mostly with this conversation until the buzz term “nanny state”.
But then I considered the possibility that I should check out where it came from and how it is referenced in the political landscape today, so I decided to search the term “nanny state” and discovered this free Internet publication titled:
The conservative Nanny State
How the Wealthy Use the Government to Stay Rich and Get Richer By Dean Baker

Published by the Center for Economic and Policy Research
1611 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 400
Washington, DC 20009
202.293.5380
www.cepr.net

After reading some of it, I realized this could be what somr Ron Paul supporters (?) are talking about... ... but I am not so sure that's the way that Ron Paul is thinking, and I'm absolutely certain it's not the way that the so-called right-wingers are thinking when they use the buzz term “nanny state". Gee Whiz, what a derogatory sound-bite it has become.

In any event, I have yet to see or hear anything that Ron Paul has to say that goes along with what the author and Dean Baker says regarding possible solutions in the Dean Baker's writing mentioned above and quoted later below.

I have been turned-off by Ron Paul because the things I have heard him say are things that would remove the safety net from a lot of American people who are already stressed and in hardship, which would cause inevitable, irreparable, harm to a number of them.

Ubaru or any other pro-Ron Paul (?) person for that matter, If you know of a specific place, link, webpage etc. to point me to where Ron Paul actually says anything, in detail more than just political rhetoric which is aimed at Obama as in a campaign with the opposing party as a target, that is also along the lines of what Dean Baker states in the form of real possible solutions, then I am willing to check that out.

[Hotspring 44]

Hotspring44, I appreciate your open mind here.

I'm not familiar with the term conservative nanny state as opposed to a plain vanilla nanny state.

On first read of Dean Baker, I'm not recognizing anything that resembles Ron Paul's philosophy. This guy is a macroeconomist. Paul is influenced by Austrian economics.

Thanks for the answer. I appreciate the fact that you do recognize and acknowledge that there is a difference.

I'm not anywhere close to a spokesperson for Paul, but what I'm hearing from him and when I look at one aspect of the big picture, from the globalist's perspective, or the United Nations, the United States is being forced/used to play the role of being planetary security, thus our grossly bloated military that is in everyone else's business...

I know what you're saying but I think it's more of a choice than being forced.

...The result is so much wealth is being siphoned from the US people to pay for this.

Yes, unfortunately; wealth in more ways than just money.

Paul is emphasizing stopping the use of our military for anything other than defending from attack, (and not phony inside jobs such as 9/11), not stripping people of their social security. He'd like to revamp social security for sure, because it badly needs it, but not at the expense of anyone currently being paid by it. (I'd certainly like to see this, as I hear the toilet flush every time I am forced to pay in to it. I know I'll never see a dime of it, and that I'll have to save on my own for retirement, on top of what I'm paying in to social security)....

I've been through this before, regarding the Social Security many times on this website, and I don't know why people don't understand that' all that needs to be done is basically raise the cap somewhere in the range of of half again more than it is now to up to 1 million dollars. That would mitigate the Social Security problem for quite a while.

...This one change alone, of using our military for defense only, would resolve the majority of our economic problems....

That does require a completely different mindset in the American public.
It's a daunting task to accomplish, but I do agree with the premise.

...That and auditing the Fed and then phasing it out.

Just getting to the point where the FED would actually be audited would be an impressive milestone in and of itself.
I'm not so sure that completely phasing it out is the best approach but it should be an option because all things should be on the table so we don't overlook any good opportunities or potential pitfalls.

There's plenty more, and I realize you are asking for a specific link (which is asking for a LOT) but that will have to suffice for now.

Considering what was said about "progressives" in the article of the first post, I think it's only fair to ask for such specifics as I have.

I'd take this question to the Daily Paul forum and see what kind of answers you get. Also search around the weekly updates I've posted where Paul is talking in detail about many issues.

That's a good idea, since you've been bringing up Ron Paul so much I think you're the one that should ask and not just expect someone else to do it because you said or posted something.
I'm just asking you to, so I don't have to spend days searching for something that I thought you already knew where was.

BTW, we haven't heard any political rhetoric from Ron Paul. That's a big reason why so many people like him. He's such a straight shooting, no nonsense, non-politician.

Albeit is quite sophisticated, I think Ron Paul's stand on the Fed, what he said about Social Security, women's rights, (anti-abortion) etc. has been kind of rhetorical at times and was definitely political. (BTW "Political rhetoric" does not necessarily nor should it mean "extreme exaggerations" or "lies") But to be fair, that's the nature of the situation. Just because it's not flaming, like 99% of the other politicians doesn't mean it's not at times "political rhetoric".
Like I said; that's the nature of the situation and sometimes it has to be able to be categorized within the realm of political rhetoric regardless of whatever other categories it could share.

[ubaru]

I'm keep the thread thus far here and responding in blue.

ubaru wrote:
Hotspring44, I appreciate your open mind here.

I'm not familiar with the term conservative nanny state as opposed to a plain vanilla nanny state.

On first read of Dean Baker, I'm not recognizing anything that resembles Ron Paul's philosophy. This guy is a macroeconomist. Paul is influenced by Austrian economics.


Hotspring 44 wrote:
Thanks for the answer. I appreciate the fact that you do recognize and acknowledge that there is a difference.


ubaru wrote:
I'm not anywhere close to a spokesperson for Paul, but what I'm hearing from him and when I look at one aspect of the big picture, from the globalist's perspective, or the United Nations, the United States is being forced/used to play the role of being planetary security, thus our grossly bloated military that is in everyone else's business...


Hotspring 44 wrote:
I know what you're saying but I think it's more of a choice than being forced.

Whose choice? Can you pinpoint whose choice it is? Keep it in the back of your mind as a possibility that the US is being forced to play the role of security forces in the world, and keep watching as things play out. Right now the US goes to war when the UN tells them to, not when Congress tells them to. And certainly not when the people tell them to. Here's a clip of a General being questioned in Congress about whom he takes orders from. He said the UN. The globalists, or the 1%, see nations as pawns and all resources as theirs to do with as they please.

ubaru wrote:
...The result is so much wealth is being siphoned from the US people to pay for this.

Hotspring 44 wrote:

Yes, unfortunately; wealth in more ways than just money.

Nodding head. Indeed.

ubaru wrote:
Paul is emphasizing stopping the use of our military for anything other than defending from attack, (and not phony inside jobs such as 9/11), not stripping people of their social security. He'd like to revamp social security for sure, because it badly needs it, but not at the expense of anyone currently being paid by it. (I'd certainly like to see this, as I hear the toilet flush every time I am forced to pay in to it. I know I'll never see a dime of it, and that I'll have to save on my own for retirement, on top of what I'm paying in to social security)....


Hotspring 44 wrote:
I've been through this before, regarding the Social Security many times on this website, and I don't know why people don't understand that' all that needs to be done is basically raise the cap somewhere in the range of of half again more than it is now to up to 1 million dollars. That would mitigate the Social Security problem for quite a while.

I question the assumption that people need the government to control their retirement savings. That's a massive transfer of authority outside of oneself. I'd like to see the people control their own retirement savings with high school and other education curriculums that include classes on how to invest well. I think investment should be taught at all levels of education, grade school through college. It was certainly missing from my schooling. It'd certainly be a welcomed step away from our debt-based culture which is the opposite of a savings-based culture that we could have instead. But since when is the government interested in teaching wealth accumulation in public schools? Get the federal government out of schools so our children will not be conditioned to be obedient cogs in the wheel (slaves).

ubaru wrote:
...This one change alone, of using our military for defense only, would resolve the majority of our economic problems....


Hotspring 44 wrote:
That does require a completely different mindset in the American public.
It's a daunting task to accomplish, but I do agree with the premise.

Well, the American public is told lies about why what's happening is happening. AKA propaganda. Tell them the truth and things could change in short order.

ubaru wrote:
...That and auditing the Fed and then phasing it out.


Hotspring 44 wrote:
Just getting to the point where the FED would actually be audited would be an impressive milestone in and of itself.
I'm not so sure that completely phasing it out is the best approach but it should be an option because all things should be on the table so we don't overlook any good opportunities or potential pitfalls.

A bill to audit the Fed is already on the table for a vote in the House in July where it has an impressive number of co-sponsors, almost enough for a win. The Senate has 20 co-sponsors, last I heard many weeks ago. So this is not pie in the sky.

ubaru wrote:
There's plenty more, and I realize you are asking for a specific link (which is asking for a LOT) but that will have to suffice for now.


Hotspring 44 wrote:
Considering what was said about "progressives" in the article of the first post, I think it's only fair to ask for such specifics as I have.

Yes, but I didn't write that article. I am not a representative of it. I am a messenger of it. I have heard men on this board assume that I am responsible for defending the points in the articles I post. I have no interest in doing so, nor do I think I should. I have no interest in debating. I'm interesting in relating which comes from agreeing, collaborating, and creating. Is that a masculine vs. feminine perspective? My studies show it is. If I were designed for debating and carrying that much responsibility on my shoulders, I'd have a lot more testosterone than I do.

When someone wants to debate with me, my whole instinctual self feels threatened. It's hardwired in women at the deepest instinctual cavewomen level, that if others are not in agreement with us, we are not safe, not part of the clan, will be left out in the cold dark night to fend for ourselves. That's why I've left the conversation feeling quite unsafe and traumatized when I get challenged (challenge is a masculine thing) and that's why I cannot think of any other women on this board who will debate with the men. On the other hand, I'm thinking it's true that men find debate natural and a relaxing way to wind down. It is so different for estrogen beings. It takes a tremendous amount of energy for us, it's stressful and psychologically it's far from natural, it's hard work. It takes testosterone to do it easily. Sure, women are quite capable of being CEO's but by the time they retire they so often have adrenal exhaustion from pulling on hormones they don't have. And that's why I always have in the back of my mind the question if being here more than to make a simple post is a waste of my time when so many projects involving agreeing, relating, collaborating, and creating need to be done in my community. But since you are being so acknowledging, and respectful, I chose to respond. Thank you for that.

I'm going to go off on a tangent here (that has nothing to do with you) which leads right back to topic. Men are supposed to protect women. Last week Barry had an opportunity to protect me when another poster went over the line and said something he would hopefully have never said to my face. I cited Barry's guidelines for communication on Wacco, and instead of protecting me, he polarized on the left-right paradigm and challenged me on the basis of that, which is an excellent example of the destructiveness of dividing on polarizations. You can see it here. If he had protected me I would have felt supported in doing my work that day which was volunteering in the Latino community to educate about opting out of smart meters. But as it was the effect was that I felt off for two days and was temporarily derailed/ineffective/delayed/energy wasted, in giving my gift to the community because I had to deal with the shock and trauma of feeling extremely unsafe in having a bunch of men challenge me and giving each other gratitude for the challenge given (a gang). This might seem hard to understand if you are a man or very masculine, but it's a deeply instinctual feminine response. To the men, do you want to support me in doing that kind of work in the Latino community? Do you want to support women? If so, be there for them when they need protection. It means a whole whole lot to us. More than you may realize. And we can accomplish much when we have it, and operate in a very compromised way when we don't.

And this left-right paradigm really sucks. I certainly can see the harm done, and the power lost by buying in to separation. It'd be great to drop it and never look back. (Or maybe that's how men express their values and opinions when they debate)? Hmm... Let me know if this is so, perhaps by cutting/pasting this in the Conscious Relationships category. I'm hard pressed to find any merit or usefulness in the left-right paradigm, but I'll keep an open mind.

ubaru wrote:
I'd take this question to the Daily Paul forum and see what kind of answers you get. Also search around the weekly updates I've posted where Paul is talking in detail about many issues.


Hotspring 44 wrote:
That's a good idea, since you've been bringing up Ron Paul so much I think you're the one that should ask and not just expect someone else to do it because you said or posted something.
I'm just asking you to, so I don't have to spend days searching for something that I thought you already knew where was.

I may look like a big Ron Paul fish at Wacco. But take me out of this pond into the Ron Paul ocean and I am a mere sardine! I have a good understanding of the general philosophy of Ron Paul but not of all of the finer points such as conservative nanny states. Though I can speak about regular nanny states in general terms such as big government is a wasteful, inefficient, power-hungry, self-serving thug that we shouldn't be looking to for our sustenance and welfare. Ron Paul says that the only proper role of government is to protect our liberties. Imagine that!

To fulfill what I think you are asking, I would have to have a great deal of knowledge about Dean Baker and read a lot more of him to understand him (118 pages) and then go searching for someone else who also happens to understand Dean Baker who also knows what Ron Paul thinks about Dean Baker, if such a person even exists, and that would take days and a lot of desire to do this research for you for free, and I don't have either.

ubaru wrote:
BTW, we haven't heard any political rhetoric from Ron Paul. That's a big reason why so many people like him. He's such a straight shooting, no nonsense, non-politician.


Hotspring 44 wrote:
Albeit is quite sophisticated, I think Ron Paul's stand on the Fed, what he said about Social Security, women's rights, (anti-abortion) etc. has been kind of rhetorical at times and was definitely political. (BTW "Political rhetoric" does not necessarily nor should it mean "extreme exaggerations" or "lies") But to be fair, that's the nature of the situation. Just because it's not flaming, like 99% of the other politicians doesn't mean it's not at times "political rhetoric".
Like I said; that's the nature of the situation and sometimes it has to be able to be categorized within the realm of political rhetoric regardless of whatever other categories it could share.

I would change the word sophisticated, which implies a shallow intellect common among the slimy variety of politicians, to competent, well-versed, a great orator who speaks from a deep river of principle, and with a great deal of common sense. If you think about other revolutionaries such as Martin Luther King you can find the same qualities. I don't think people who say Ron Paul uses rhetoric understand him very deeply.

To reply in a meaningful way, I'd have to see the same clips you did about social security, women's rights, abortion, etc. Without this, responding feels rather amorphous.

Thanks for this conversation. (I don't see myself taking this amount of time or energy to do so again for a while).

[theindependenteye]

>>>I have heard men on this board assume that I am responsible for defending the points in the articles I post. I have no interest in doing so, nor do I think I should.

Dear Ubaru--

Since I was one of those who asked you to offer your own opinions about what you posted, I need to respond. I promise I won't address you personally after this.

If I were to post an article that you felt was blatantly sexist, obscene or in some way highly objectionable, I think you'd be within bounds to ask me why I posted it, what of it I agreed with, etc. For me simply to fling meat into the arena to see what the beasts do would seem to be the ploy of a frivolous troll.

The voices you bring into this forum are sometimes interestingly provocative, sometimes (IMO) highly toxic. Now that it's clear to me that you don't want to "debate" any of the points and feel genuinely threatened, I won't address you directly again. I'll just respond third-person to any points the writer makes, if it feels worthwhile to do so. I'm sorry you feel these are personal attacks.

But please understand that some of these posts bring up strong emotional responses for some of us. For my part I find your male/female comments really upsetting and offensive:

>>>(challenge is a masculine thing) ... I'm thinking it's true that men find debate natural and a relaxing way to wind down. It is so different for estrogen beings. It takes a tremendous amount of energy for us, it's stressful and psychologically it's far from natural, it's hard work. It takes testosterone to do it easily.
>>>I felt off for two days and was temporarily derailed/ineffective/delayed/energy wasted, in giving my gift to the community because I had to deal with the shock and trauma of feeling extremely unsafe in having a bunch of men challenge me and giving each other gratitude for the challenge given (a gang).

Well, the fact is that when I read some of the material you post it grinds on me for a day or so, and finally I have to get up from work that I love and think is important in order to write something in response. And I do that not in order to "wind down" or because I love to batter women or because my testosterone is high (it's not, if you care to know) -- It's because it hits me right in the gut: stupid, rote-ideologue stuff feeding the destruction of this country and my kids' future. Wind down!??? Don't I wish.

The sad thing is that when you're writing in your own voice I feel that our values are probably very similar, despite our differing politics.

>>>I'm interesting in relating which comes from agreeing, collaborating, and creating.

I've spent most of my life in creative collaboration with my artistic partner/mate and with other theatre ensembles, so I can relate to that very strongly. But collaboration involves putting yourself out there, not coming to the meeting with your big brother to speak for you. I feel as vulnerable as you describe when one of my colleagues says that my favorite scene in our screenplay needs a total rewrite, but I respect them enough to listen to them, and usually the result is something better than either of us expected. But that's a slowly evolving process, and it does involve great vulnerability. How to get to that point with total strangers in an email forum, I have no idea. But please don't assume that you're the only one with an emotional life, or only women.

As I said, I won't address you directly again in any discussions in this forum. I'm sorry to have caused you pain.

Peace & joy--
Conrad

[ubaru]

>>>I have heard men on this board assume that I am responsible for defending the points in the articles I post. I have no interest in doing so, nor do I think I should.

Dear Ubaru--

Since I was one of those who asked you to offer your own opinions about what you posted, I need to respond. I promise I won't address you personally after this.

If I were to post an article that you felt was blatantly sexist, obscene or in some way highly objectionable, I think you'd be within bounds to ask me why I posted it, what of it I agreed with, etc. For me simply to fling meat into the arena to see what the beasts do would seem to be the ploy of a frivolous troll.

The voices you bring into this forum are sometimes interestingly provocative, sometimes (IMO) highly toxic. Now that it's clear to me that you don't want to "debate" any of the points and feel genuinely threatened, I won't address you directly again. I'll just respond third-person to any points the writer makes, if it feels worthwhile to do so. I'm sorry you feel these are personal attacks.

But please understand that some of these posts bring up strong emotional responses for some of us. For my part I find your male/female comments really upsetting and offensive:

>>>(challenge is a masculine thing) ... I'm thinking it's true that men find debate natural and a relaxing way to wind down. It is so different for estrogen beings. It takes a tremendous amount of energy for us, it's stressful and psychologically it's far from natural, it's hard work. It takes testosterone to do it easily.
>>>I felt off for two days and was temporarily derailed/ineffective/delayed/energy wasted, in giving my gift to the community because I had to deal with the shock and trauma of feeling extremely unsafe in having a bunch of men challenge me and giving each other gratitude for the challenge given (a gang).

Well, the fact is that when I read some of the material you post it grinds on me for a day or so, and finally I have to get up from work that I love and think is important in order to write something in response. And I do that not in order to "wind down" or because I love to batter women or because my testosterone is high (it's not, if you care to know) -- It's because it hits me right in the gut: stupid, rote-ideologue stuff feeding the destruction of this country and my kids' future. Wind down!??? Don't I wish.

The sad thing is that when you're writing in your own voice I feel that our values are probably very similar, despite our differing politics.

>>>I'm interesting in relating which comes from agreeing, collaborating, and creating.

I've spent most of my life in creative collaboration with my artistic partner/mate and with other theatre ensembles, so I can relate to that very strongly. But collaboration involves putting yourself out there, not coming to the meeting with your big brother to speak for you. I feel as vulnerable as you describe when one of my colleagues says that my favorite scene in our screenplay needs a total rewrite, but I respect them enough to listen to them, and usually the result is something better than either of us expected. But that's a slowly evolving process, and it does involve great vulnerability. How to get to that point with total strangers in an email forum, I have no idea. But please don't assume that you're the only one with an emotional life, or only women.

As I said, I won't address you directly again in any discussions in this forum. I'm sorry to have caused you pain.

Peace & joy--
Conrad

Hi Conrad,

Thanks for respecting my need for safety by saying you won't address me personally in the future. Yes, as soon as I see my name at the top of a post, I panic.

I don't think you understood where I'm coming from on men and women. But it's such a huge topic, that one post could not possibly convey it. It's a special interest of mine to put energy towards healing the rift between men and women or healing the masculine and feminine within all of us. I've written about it here and here and I think you'll appreciate it.

I recognize that the masculine gets hurt too, and badly, but in different ways than the feminine does. The masculine feels unsafe when it is not trusted or respected. That totally impedes a man's ability to produce a result. Or very commonly men get crushed when a woman has emasculated him or dissed his ability in some way. The feminine feels unsafe because someone has kicked her out of the clan or because someone has hurt her feelings which reside right in the middle of her chest. Men have feelings too, but they don't reside front and center in the body.

I don't think this relates to you in this situation, but it's very interesting. Why do a crew of construction workers objectify a woman by whistling at her? And why do women emasculate men? My studies have shown both sexes do it as an attempt to tame or bring the power down of the other when we are overwhelmed by them. The construction workers are overwhelmed by her sexuality so they make her a more manageable object. The woman is feeling overwhelmed by a man's show of masculinity and power so she makes a comment that emasculates him to remedy her overwhelm. But once we understand and own our overwhelm we can stop doing these wounding behaviors.

My reaction to being ganged up on was that very instinctual feeling that I'm unsafe. Panic. Unable to read the whole post and running and maybe coming back in a few days to read, or maybe never. By one man is bad. By many is really intense. I didn't take it as a personal attack, as you really don't know me. It's something just about every woman would experience in the same situation. So it feels like an opportunity for men to understand how women are wired.

I recognize that some of the things I post may be things that others disagree with, and I try to discern what to and not to post for this audience with that in mind. In the case of the 30 days to a free market society post, I was marveling at what a positive difference getting government out of our lives would make, but I was not buying all of it, particularly the minimum wage part. But there are states such as Alabama where one can rent a 3 bedroom house for $250...a whopping one tenth or greater of what one would pay here, so it's a complex topic and I would venture to say it'd be best that individual states mandate minimum wages. I still get surprised that others here think big government is positive and that getting rid of it would be horrifying. So I'm truly not trying to provoke. It just feels like common sense to me and I'm not a fan of bureaucracy and red tape and fees and laws about every little thing never mind totalitarian executive orders such as NDAA and NDPA. Liberty becomes even more important to me in this context.

The difference between the masculine and the feminine is that if you posted something objectionable in public, I would not confront you on it. I'd just move on. If you wrote me personally and were objectionable, I may confront you. That's my personal feminine style. And women in general are not interested in disagreeing. They create relationship with each other by finding stuff in common, and this is a very high priority for them. The masculine generally expresses their opinions as an expression of their values, and does so quite vigorously.

I don't expect you to behave as a woman. That would be about the worst thing that could happen. I think testosterone is great in men. The more the better. But I do expect men to protect women out of a sense of honor and duty. You guys are amazing. If a woman is truly in danger, your instinct makes you willing literally to put your life on the line to protect her. And your sense of honor and duty, discernment, and your desire to make women happy are some of the things that make me truly admire men.

I'm glad you feel you can relate to me when I'm writing in my own voice. Yes, we all have more in common than we realize most of the time.

Peace and healing to us and to all men and women,
Liz

[Hotspring 44]

After I wrote this I noticed what you said about feeling very uncomfortable seeing your name on the top of somebody else's post so I am writing this paragraph here so that your name is at least not at the very top of the page.
The reason it appears near the top is because I'm starting from that point to maintain the order of posts.

Previuosly:

ubaru wrote:
I'm not anywhere close to a spokesperson for Paul, but what I'm hearing from him and when I look at one aspect of the big picture, from the globalist's perspective, or the United Nations, the United States is being forced/used to play the role of being planetary security, thus our grossly bloated military that is in everyone else's business...

Hotspring 44 wrote:
I know what you're saying but I think it's more of a choice than being forced.

Whose choice? Can you pinpoint whose choice it is?...

Simply put; all three branches of the United States government...

...Keep it in the back of your mind as a possibility that the US is being forced to play the role of security forces in the world, and keep watching as things play out. Right now the US goes to war when the UN tells them to, not when Congress tells them to. And certainly not when the people tell them to. Here's a clip of a General being questioned in Congress about whom he takes orders from. He said the UN. The globalists, or the 1%, see nations as pawns and all resources as theirs to do with as they please.

1- Under certain conditions, the executive branch is. In other words, the President of the United States when he or she believes that our country is in imminent danger of being either attacked (or has already been attacked) directly or crippled, because certain strategic national interests are being gravely threatened and or are under attack.
There is a certain amount of time, the president is allowed to deploy and keep troops in combat without having to get permission from Congress, albeit that amount of time is limited.

2- I listened to that clip, very carefully and at about 6 minutes 55 seconds near the end of it, Mr. Panetta’s statement repudiates 100% what Mr. Sessions was apparently attempting to infer.

I think you may want to go back to that clip and check it out and pay very close attention to it starting at 6 minutes 55 seconds till the end of the clip.
In that clip, it was obvious to me that Mr. Sessions was being very manipulative with his line of questioning and had an agenda which was obviously a sovereignty issue.
That being said it was obvious to me that there was really no conflict with our sovereignty within the context of that hearing, but Mr. Sessions was insinuating there was or could be one.
Mr. Sessions was being extremely aggressive with it and he was getting nowhere because there was nowhere in the direction Sessions was heading in to go.

Some people, particularly if they are not paying close attention to what was going on in that clip, and if they are biased to begin with, they could then, I suppose, develop the conclusion that somehow NATO or the UN is somehow ordering, mandating or whatever you want to call it, the US to do something militarily... ... In your words: “the US is being forced to play the role of security forces in the world”

Personally I think that the notion that the UN or NATO is somehow ordering in any way the US military to, how or when to put boots on the ground is inconsistent with what happens and totally incorrect. The US is not being forced. The US chooses to be like world cops.

Getting back to NATO and the UN for a minute; there are treaties we have signed with other nations. In those treaties there are conditions that we and other nations have agreed to adhere to that are referred to as international law. That (international law) is what Mr. Panetta was referring to. As I think many of us know, the United States ignores international law from time to time.

There was absolutely no statement whatsoever in that whole video clip where Mr. Panetta states anything anywhere near the United States taking orders from any foreign entity whatsoever, nor did I hear the word “globalists” within that whole video clip.

When I see the word (buzzword?) “Globalists” in your writings I'm at this point, after watching and listening to the video clip, realizing that it's more so your interpretation and not what was actually said in the clip.
I think in this case, you interjected your own interpretation of what you heard more-so then you have reported what was actually happening in that clip. Therefore, I can only at this point disagree with your stated (what I believe to be) interpretation, as expressed in your words.

I know that is a technicality but contextually an important one.
.

I question the assumption that people need the government to control their retirement savings. That's a massive transfer of authority outside of oneself...

You’re stating that as if the government controls all of individual Americans’ personal retirement savings. That is not the case, it never has been. There still are numerous people (Americans’) that stash money and assets away in various forms for their own personal retirement savings or whatever else they want to freely spend, trade or whatever they choose to do with their assets.

Considering the broad statement you just made in regards to Social Security, I think you should study and do some homework on why and how the Social Security started in the first place.

Social Security is a safety net for those who have not been fortunate enough to be able to acquire enough assets to succeed in the endeavor of securing enough assets to survive at all or with at least some reasonable standard of dignity by the time they become feeble or are no longer able to compete in the workplace.

I'd like to see the people control their own retirement savings with high school and other education curriculums that include classes on how to invest well. I think investment should be taught at all levels of education, grade school through college. It was certainly missing from my schooling. It'd certainly be a welcomed step away from our debt-based culture which is the opposite of a savings-based culture that we could have instead. But since when is the government interested in teaching wealth accumulation in public schools? Get the federal government out of schools so our children will not be conditioned to be obedient cogs in the wheel (slaves).

I think by having a different approach in public schools involving financial assistance from the federal government instead of privatizing them like what would inevitably happen across the country in so many states and counties would be a far better approach because the public would have more control.

This country was so privatized during the first stages of its inception that slavery was the norm. After the Civil War and slavery was no longer accepted, there were other insidious ways that the Anglo-American property owning majority took advantage of everybody else, particularly people of dark colored skin, Jim Crow laws come to mind.
Unfortunately, the privatization craze these days is just going to end up being a modernized version of Jim Crow laws:
https://academic.udayton.edu/race/02rights/jcrow02.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Crow_laws#Courts Along with Jim Crow laws, by which the state compelled segregation of the races, private parties such as businesses, political parties and unions created their own Jim Crow arrangements, barring blacks from buying homes in certain neighborhoods, from shopping or working in certain stores, from working at certain trades, etc. The Supreme Court outlawed some forms of private discrimination in Shelley v. Kraemer 334 US 1 (1948), in which it held that restrictive covenants that barred sale of homes to blacks or Jews or Asians were unconstitutional, because they represented state-sponsored discrimination, in that they were only effective if the courts enforced them. The Supreme Court was unwilling, however, to attack other forms of private discrimination. It reasoned that private parties did not violate the Equal Protection clause of the Constitution when they discriminated, because they were not "state actors" covered by that clause.

Well, the American public is told lies about why what's happening is happening. AKA propaganda. Tell them the truth and things could change in short order.

The sad and frightening truth is that Americans have to demand the truth in mass otherwise they'll be spoon-fed manure and think it's chocolate pudding because they are told that's what it is!
It's up to the American public in mass to absolutely unequivocally demand, not ask for, but demand the truth in which you are talking about; so far, unfortunately that has not happened.

A bill to audit the Fed is already on the table for a vote in the House in July where it has an impressive number of co-sponsors, almost enough for a win. The Senate has 20 co-sponsors, last I heard many weeks ago. So this is not pie in the sky.

I did have a lot to say about that,it's a whole topic in of itself. I've already said so much in this posting so I will say this: It's a good idea to audit the Fed but an audit by itself isn't really all of what should be done.
The timing, if it happens during this election year, could not be worse.

Yes, but I didn't write that article. I am not a representative of it. I am a messenger of it. I have heard men on this board assume that I am responsible for defending the points in the articles I post.

Okay, I hope you don't take it personally, but the way that the ‘message’ was presented is, unsupported by the evidence that it was presented with.
Also, I might add, there is a difference between paid messengers, the press, and volunteer messengers.

I'm not trying to pick on you here, however I think, (correct me if I'm wrong) that you are in the category of volunteer messenger, in which case I think volunteer messengers bear some responsibility for what they post and are to some extent representative also.

...I have no interest in doing so, nor do I think I should. I have no interest in debating. I'm interesting in relating which comes from agreeing, collaborating, and creating.

I think I understand what you're saying. I think you're saying that you're looking for people in the community that first agree with you so then you can collaborate with them, then utilizing that collaboration would create something.

Considering what and where you post on this board and if “agreeing, collaborating, and creating” are your ultimate goals, I can understand that you would sometimes feel offended.
Some people write things that are rebuttals to things that were posted that weren't even asking for nor expecting any rebuttals.

When someone wants to debate with me, my whole instinctual self feels threatened. It's hardwired in women at the deepest instinctual cavewomen level, that if others are not in agreement with us, we are not safe, not part of the clan, will be left out in the cold dark night to fend for ourselves.

I think you're putting too much emphasis on agreeing as far as these political discussions are concerned.
Just because somebody disagrees with your opinion or analysis of something doesn't mean that they would literally put you out in the cold.
It sounds to me like you see yourself there, (“out in the cold dark night to fend for...(”)...) yourself; more than people from this board would actually put you there in a situation like that, either literally or metaphorically.

That's why I've left the conversation feeling quite unsafe and traumatized when I get challenged (challenge is a masculine thing) and that's why I cannot think of any other women on this board who will debate with the men...

I don't remember exactly who or when or what the subject matter was, but I can assure you that there have been women on this board that have had debates with men.
Of course I do not know if there were any affects like what you have described you felt on any of them.

Anyway, there are challenges in science and politics, particularly in science were it is a given that others will deliberately try to disprove a theory so that it can ultimately be proved one way or the other.

I believe people on this board practice what you could categorize as “political science” where one person makes a statement about something that may be more along the lines of their personal opinion rather than fact, particularly when it comes to where somebody uses something in history or something that somebody said on YouTube or whatever media and somebody else questions whether or not it is fact or opinion; to some people that may be considered a “challenge” to others it may just be a question that was begging to be answered.

Maybe certain questions pose a challenge, because they are hard to answer or the way that they were asked but on the other hand, it may be just an honest question somebody has and not at all a testosterone charged challenge.

Besides that men and women each make emotionally charged statements, which sometimes are opinionated, inquisitive or sometimes offensive.
I don't know exactly what connection there is between emotion and hormone but there most definitely are differences between men and women, and I think that both men and women have to acknowledge those differences and do as best we can to comprehend what those differences are to be able to better communicate with each other.

On the other hand, I'm thinking it's true that men find debate natural and a relaxing way to wind down. It is so different for estrogen beings. It takes a tremendous amount of energy for us, it's stressful and psychologically it's far from natural, it's hard work. It takes testosterone to do it easily.

I did not really think of it that way, but I will definitely keep that in mind from now on.
Thanks for that input.

Sure, women are quite capable of being CEO's but by the time they retire they so often have adrenal exhaustion from pulling on hormones they don't have. And that's why I always have in the back of my mind the question if being here more than to make a simple post is a waste of my time when so many projects involving agreeing, relating, collaborating, and creating need to be done in my community. But since you are being so acknowledging, and respectful, I chose to respond. Thank you for that.

I can't speak for other people on the board, but I think many of us expect some level of response from people who post on this bulletin board, particularly wacko talk, and national politics, and some of the local posts too.

I think it would be disrespectful of the people on this bulletin board for someone who posts something; particularly when they post an opinion or a comment attached to a series of links or a YouTube clip etc., for them not to reply to some of the posts from people that directly ask questions to something that they posted, otherwise at some point the those posts become spam.

I'm going to go off on a tangent here (that has nothing to do with you) which leads right back to topic. Men are supposed to protect women. Last week Barry had an opportunity to protect me when another poster went over the line and said something he would hopefully have never said to my face. I cited Barry's guidelines for communication on Wacco, and instead of protecting me, he polarized on the left-right paradigm and challenged me on the basis of that, which is an excellent example of the destructiveness of dividing on polarizations. You can see it here...

Re: “You can see it here”: Okay, so I checked it out. I understand that sometimes things people post in response to what you said, the way they worded it made you feel extremely uncomfortable. I honestly think you misinterpreted what was meant and you likely (I'm not a doctor, so I'm going out on a limb here) experienced an adrenaline spike.
I am personally all too familiar with adrenaline spikes; (more on that in my next statements).

...If he had protected me I would have felt supported in doing my work that day which was volunteering in the Latino community to educate about opting out of smart meters. But as it was the effect was that I felt off for two days and was temporarily derailed/ineffective/delayed/energy wasted, in giving my gift to the community because I had to deal with the shock and trauma of feeling extremely unsafe in having a bunch of men challenge me and giving each other gratitude for the challenge given (a gang)...

I don't want to get too personal here, so I will just state that I have been diagnosed by professionals to have PTSD and because of that, I intimately understand feelings and the debilitation's like the ones you mentioned all too well.
That being said, it took me many years to get help. And I'm still (with help from time to time) working on it.

...This might seem hard to understand if you are a man or very masculine, but it's a deeply instinctual feminine response.

Those feelings are universal and can be experienced in any one or combination of the following; fright, fight, flight, or freeze , which can and often times does coincided with other major feelings of insecurity which are very common and almost universal in people that have PTSD.

You may be surprised to find out how many of us men with PTSD (diagnosed or not) actually end up in the freeze zone. It's not so often fight as some people think, but the adrenaline is still there. I can tell you that in my own experiences, the unanticipated adrenaline spikes are undesirable and extremely uncomfortable to say the least... ... the feeling of or actual panic? Yes sometimes.

To the men, do you want to support me in doing that kind of work in the Latino community? Do you want to support women? If so, be there for them when they need protection. It means a whole whole lot to us. More than you may realize. And we can accomplish much when we have it, and operate in a very compromised way when we don't.

There are many of us (men); I would say, the vast majority of progressive men do stand up for women's rights (all peoples rights really) in many ways, but there's one thing that many of us men find it extremely difficult if not impossible to do is to know if and or when we should “stand up” for someone else's emotions other than within the realm of human rights and dignity.

I don't know if I said that very well, so I apologize if that was offensive because it most certainly was not meant to be... ...I did the best I could.

It might help for me to say this: I think there is strong evidence to suggest that men are hardwired for the exact defense which you are referring to.
Sometimes at first glance, we (many of us men anyway) see strong emotional expression as the potential for (or even a precursor to) an attack regardless of what sex the person that is expressing a strong emotion is.
That instantaneous hardwired response is where more often times than not, the adrenaline comes rushing in.

In that adrenaline situation, normal people that do not have PTSD or those with PTSD when that particular situation didn't trigger the PTSD are in the position where they have to decide in a very small amount of time, whether or not, that emotion that is being expressed by somebody else is an attack or not; (Those of us with PTSD, where it does get triggered in those situations, (usually beginning with the adrenaline spike) can succumb to our particular form of PTSD symptoms and have a much more difficult time coping.

I think more than testosterone; as far as the Internet is concerned, a person's (male or female, but I am mostly referring to men here) individual ego influences what they say more than the testosterone.

However there is no doubt that sometimes adrenaline could also have something to do with it when somebody gets offensive and posts a statement that they vehemently disagree with, or (within that post) outright attacks somebody, their opinion or the post on the Internet, and because of that there may be some kind of synergistic side effects between testosterone (“roid-rage”), ego and adrenaline.

That being said, I don't think neither you or I have the medical background to psychoanalyze ego / emotion hormone responses.
At best most of us can only form our opinions based on what little scientific things we were able to (correctly) comprehend and our personal experiences.

And this left-right paradigm really sucks. I certainly can see the harm done, and the power lost by buying in to separation. It'd be great to drop it and never look back. (Or maybe that's how men express their values and opinions when they debate)? Hmm... Let me know if this is so, perhaps by cutting/pasting this in the Conscious Relationships category. I'm hard pressed to find any merit or usefulness in the left-right paradigm, but I'll keep an open mind.

I think the left right paradigm is a ditch that those at the helm sometime in the past drove us into that we haven't got ourselves out of yet.

I can only suggest to you if you can when there is a discussion that starts to look like a debate brewing here on this board and you are already involved in it, try not to take it personally when somebody disagrees with you and uses various idiom in their vocabulary to express and describe their disagreement.

Some people are passionate about their opinions and some of them express it with extraordinary emphasis. Other times, some of us get a little frustrated, because we know somebody's trying to say something that might matter to us, but we have a hard time understanding it the way it was presented so we try as best we can to ask in our own individual and hopefully inoffensive way but, unfortunately that is not always the case.

Just hang in there as best you can when you're comfortable, get away from the computer screen or go somewhere else if you need to so that you feel right within your own skin. And if worse comes to worse, and somebody is too offensive, tell Barry he will deal with them.

I may look like a big Ron Paul fish at Wacco. But take me out of this pond into the Ron Paul ocean and I am a mere sardine! I have a good understanding of the general philosophy of Ron Paul but not of all of the finer points such as conservative nanny states. Though I can speak about regular nanny states in general terms such as big government is a wasteful, inefficient, power-hungry, self-serving thug that we shouldn't be looking to for our sustenance and welfare.

We the people by the people and for the people are what the government is supposed to be founded on.

To think of this government in mere terms of being the “wasteful, inefficient, power-hungry, self-serving thug” in terms of sustenance and welfare is, I believe, counterproductive.

On the other hand, the corporate takeover of the government is the “wasteful, inefficient, power-hungry, self-serving thug” which I think you are referring to.

Some form of redistributing the equity of wealth is what I think we are really looking for...

Ron Paul says that the only proper role of government is to protect our liberties. Imagine that!

...I think we as a society have yet to define what all those “liberties” are supposed to be. We are not done with that yet. That is why the debate is so passionate.

To fulfill what I think you are asking, I would have to have a great deal of knowledge about Dean Baker and read a lot more of him to understand him (118 pages) and then go searching for someone else who also happens to understand Dean Baker who also knows what Ron Paul thinks about Dean Baker, if such a person even exists, and that would take days and a lot of desire to do this research for you for free, and I don't have either.

I don't think either of us wants to read all of those 118 pages.
I don't claim to know all of what Dean Baker’s ideas are even in so much as within those 118 pages, nonetheless, what Dean Baker , himself and all of his writings are all about. I just discovered them the other day when I was looking up “nanny state” because it was within a post that you posted.
I actually learned some things that I was not aware of before, and a one of those were that the buzz term “conservative nanny state” amongst others.
And I also found out that there is more than one way that the buzz term “nanny state” has been used.

Thanks for this conversation. (I don't see myself taking this amount of time or energy to do so again for a while).

That is most certainly understandable.

[podfish]

When someone wants to debate with me, my whole instinctual self feels threatened. It's hardwired in women at the deepest instinctual cavewomen level, that if others are not in agreement with us, we are not safe, not part of the clan, will be left out in the cold dark night to fend for ourselves. That's why I've left the conversation feeling quite unsafe and traumatized when I get challenged (challenge is a masculine thing) and that's why I cannot think of any other women on this board who will debate with the men.
....
I'm going to go off on a tangent here (that has nothing to do with you) which leads right back to topic. Men are supposed to protect women.

I'm sorry, but I'm totally confused now. I don't want to touch the validity of the premise (as far as gender based differences in thought/perception) but I don't understand how someone who feels the way you describe can be so virulently libertarian. The whole basis of libertarian philosophy is that the individual should be able to be unconstrained and consequentially be unsupported by the society as a whole. I'm surprised that someone who expects protection and support, or even advocates limits and boundaries on competition, would be attracted by such a political philosophy.

One of your earlier posts implied that you have a line in mind where these principles start and stop - for example, I'm sure you have a clear expectation that government should provide for individual's physical safety through police activity. I'm curious as to where those boundaries lie, and why you would think there'd be much agreement about where they stop. There's a lot of room between the caricatures of the Obama nanny-state and the world portrayed by many RP supporters. The end near RP doesn't sound like it's a very warm or supportive place.