That is how many governments seem to operate, so what is your point?Quote:
Originally Posted by Eki
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That is how many governments seem to operate, so what is your point?Quote:
Originally Posted by Eki
I agree with the very basic premises here. Defining all that is where the fight starts!Quote:
Originally Posted by Eki
I think to an extent Government should protect society from outside forces, and regulate and help the needy. Provide infrastructure within reason....
Where we fight is how much of all this we do...but at some point, there is a tipping point. Tax too much to help too many with too much, and you lose society and you lose your best and brightest often. The fact is, the ability make a living and make money is what motivates most people. You tax people too much, and even the most liberal and open minded will object and take their money elsewhere. Anyone who saw the Beatles taking their money offshore in the 60's saw that...and I would hardly put Paul McCartney or John Lennon on a list of right wing anti government types.
Notice how U2 took their business dealings to the Netherlands to avoid Irish taxes.
No, we all agree we need some form of government, but what makes us different is what we expect from it, and what we think it can do...
Why does government necessarily come to mean that of nations? Companies have government, as do loads of other organisations. My football club has its own constitution and even that has rules about its governance.
Before you even ask the question of how power is used, what it should be used on and whom should wield it, you need to define what government is; that is the solidification of "rule of authority". The further you get away from what government actually is, the further you are away from defining its purpose.
Well I'm getting a lot of what I expected. Loads of "high minded" opinions on how government should do this, and how they should do that. But no one has seriously address the question I've asked. What is the reason to have a government? What is at it's core?
The reason for government is really very simple. It is to protect personal property rights. That's all. The very core of all laws should always be looking at ways to protect personal property.
Clearly that is not the case anymore with most governments. And honestly I believe that is the cause for much of the unrest/protests/etc. in this country (the US) and around the world. And I include the left and the right, it's just that the two sides are looking at things a bit differently. The left somehow thinks that corporations or "the rich" have somehow stolen what is rightfully that of "the working man", and they want governments to redistribute, through punitive taxes, what they believe is their's. The right believes that (in most cases, there are some cases of outright theft) corporations and "the rich" have worked hard to get where they are, that they have honestly earned all they have, and just want governments to leave them alone to continue on oporating in the free market.
I know most of you will probably think that I'm being too simplistic. But I ask you to take a step back and think about things honestly for a minute. Isn't that really what most arguments boil down to, who has a right to what property?
I believe I addressed it in one sentence:Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck34
Nothing more and nothing less.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rollo
You can't very well tell me that Robert Mugabe, the Soviet Union under Khrushchev, the board of General Electric, or even my local football club, are/were even the slightest bit concerned about personal property rights or protecting personal property. Yet all are concerned with government of sorts.Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck34
To Govern by definition is to "rule with authority; conduct the affairs of a country or organisation"(OED2). Government is concerned with the act of governing.
Everything else might be a consquence but is actually irrelevant to the question you've asked.
The question of property rights itself is a consequence of the operation of power. See above.Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck34
Maintenance of power is a perversion of property rights. Those who let power go to their heads, believe that all property is theirs, to do with as they see fit.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rollo
I very well can tell you that. I don't know a lot about Mugabe, but I believe his motivation is to hold all the property. Krushchev, Lennin, Stalin and the other Soviets all thought that property had been stolen from the people by the evil capitalist system. So they imposed their idea of giving everyone their property at the point of a gun. If you didn't agree with their ideas of who should own property, you got the gun.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rollo
GE and your football club are not governments. They have systems of rules, but are not governments.
Never use a word to define it. "Government is concerned with the act of governing" is nonsence. "rule with authority; conduct the affairs of a country or organisation" Is a good start. But to what end? Who gives them the authority to conduct what affairs? Government is a contract that people enter into where-by they agree to give up limited amounts of freedom such that the greater freedom (property rights) can be protected.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rollo
Property rights are the basis of the power. See above.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rollo
Property Rights are not the basis of power.
"Power" in the philosophical sense is the ability of an entity to control either its circumstances or its environment and/or the circumstances or the environment of other entities.
Issues such as the rights freedom of thought, conscience, religion and free speech also fall under the ability of governments to exert control, but whether or not you want to include intangible property in this really blows open a much broader range of issues.
Why do you think that the act of governance limited to national or provincial governments? Doesn't Corporate Governance fall under your definition of government? If not, why not?Quote:
Originally Posted by chuck34
Here's my opinion of what the purposes of government should be, in a basic and vague sense:
At the federal level, the purpose of government is to be responsible for infrastructure, military, foreign policy, and scientific research.
At the local and state level, the purpose of government is to be empowered to make their own laws. The way in which local and state governments make laws should be influenced by their populations' behaviors and beliefs (culture).
From the US Constitution:
Article One: Legislative Power
Article Two: Executive Power
Article Three: Judicial Power
Article Four: States' Powers and Limits
Article Six: Federal Power
Five of the seven Articles of the US Constitution explicity deal with power, who controls it and what they can and can't do with it. In fact "property rights" in the tangible sense are only even briefly touched on in the Fifth Amendment. If the vast bulk of the very document which defines the operation of a government, deals with the subject of power and its application, then doesn't that suggest something?
What is the US Constitution mainly concerned with if it isn't power?
As much as I hate to agree with you, you do have an excellent point.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rollo
As to who has the power and how that is used is where the differences lie......One could say the honorable Chairman Mao was right when he said, "all power comes out of the barrell of a gun".......or when madison wrote the second amendment, or when Lenin said "power to the people" and so on and so on....or when the good king of england said, "off with his head and forfeit all his possesions to the Crown...."