Lanval wrote:
Well, I won't disagree that there is more than one way to characterize the gov't. When I was an undergrad many years ago at the University of Oregon, I took US gov't as a required course. Ah, but here's the kicker. It was taught by a visiting professor from mainland China. So the entire theme of the class was:
"Democracy serves ONLY the needs/desires of the wealthy"
The problem that I had with that was this: What gov't doesn't work that way?! Is the Soviet/Cuban/Chinese Communist model better? 16th century Absolute Monarchy?
If you want to ascribe simple greed/duplicity to Obama, go ahead. To me, that's overly simplistic.
L.
Thanks for your post, interesting. My wheels are turning in an attempt to reply.
I can see where a democracy leads to that, and the others you mention obviously (excerpt Libertarian, will cover later), I don't know if there are other ways it leads to serving the wealthy, but the way I think it has in this country is the Collectivism vs Individualism argument. That argument in short is this. If you just honor individual rights there is no need for groups to get any laws, etc. IE, the group is nothing more than people and if you are protecting each persons rights, everyone in the group still has his rights protected. But when Collectivism is done, people fight for laws to aid there group, and this erodes away at the individuals rights and ends up counter productive. Many of us also say those with money can influence via TV and by supporting politicians to get groups to let them make more laws, and more laws, so this is where the wealthy end up getting served.
I don't agree with you on the Libertarian/limited gov part. For one I don't think it ever really has had a chance, about as close to that would be right after the constitution. I also think it is the best defense against the wealthy running a government. This form of government didn't exist as the form of gov when there was no gov.
Why I think Libertarian/very limited gov is best.
If a gov is set up to protect individual freedoms and liberty, to protect people from being hurt, killed, or stolen from, and not much else. Then how can this serve the rich? If no laws are ever to be added that stack the cards either way, if money isn't forced from some to help others, how can this be a gov serving the rich? Granted their will still be richer people, but they wouldn't have the govs help in doing this. People would learn to be more able to live an exist without being at the mercy of a few fat cats in town.
Each person, although the task would be great, would be able to work towards wealth if he wanted, the only things hindering him would be natural things already in place, not laws, rules, regulations, tax codes, etc, etc. These things created by gov only makes things harder. To attempt to do any work/business outside of being employed becomes very tough because the time and money needed due to laws makes in almost impossible in some cases. With a limited gov you would have the natural obstacles only, resources, time, your skill, ability, desire, etc. Not testing, certifications, workmans comp ins, auto ins, liability ins, business license, etc, etc. What could the wealthy do? It would be a waste of their money to get Politician in office, he couldn't make any laws to favor them. He could try to influence via TV, but couldn't get people to vote for laws that only enslave. The wealthy couldn't use the gov for help, they could make things hard for us other ways. To continue in that direction would depend on how we switched or went to that form of government. Certain people could currently own corporations and land of value, so that is where we would have it tough at first. But each person needs to learn to live as free and independent from such things anyway. Utilize the goods produced by big corps, but don't let your livelyhood become dependent on it.