Submitted by Lawrence Rafferty, (rafflaw), Guest Blogger
Since Professor Turley is snowbound in the Winter Wonderland, the weekend warriors are back to bring your blood pressure up!
I have been critical of the Right Wing Mass Media for its continual banging of the drum of hate towards President Obama and the Democrats in general. Now, there are times that the Democrats and President Obama should be called on the carpet. For instance, for not confronting the Bush torture crowd and for claiming that the President has the authority to kill American citizens without due process, just to name a couple. However, the civility that President Obama has asked for in his latest speeches, have gone unheeded by many on the Right and some on the Left.
We all succumb to the emotion at times and say things that we shouldn’t, but the Right seems to carry these statements to an extreme and they are unapologetic for it. Yesterday, fans of Rush Limbaugh faxed death threats to California State Representative and San Francisco Mayoral candidate, Leland Yee, because Lee had requested Rush to apologize for Rush’s ill-tempered and racially charged comments about the Chinese President during his recent visit to the United States. Rush mocked President Hu Jintao’s speech and Mr. Yee “..said Limbaugh owes the Chinese community an apology for his “pointless and ugly offense.” ‘. http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/crime/2011/01/leland-yee-receives-racist-death-threat
You can guess the result of State Rep. Lee’s request for an apology from Rush Limbaugh. He continued his rant and mocked Rep. Lee on the next program. I know some of you will want to know why the authorities believe that Rush’s fans are behind the death threats. Take a look at one of the faxes on the link below and you will understand. Rep. Lee received similar threats in April of last year that are also being investigated.
I would put the fax on here, but the language is a bit “rough”. See below for a link to the faxes in question. Those who continue to voice their ugly rhetoric in the mass media have a responsibility for the result of that rhetoric. I for one think they are getting the response that they are looking for. What do you think?
http://www.sfexaminer.com/files/blog_files/Yee%20threat%20flier.pdf
Submitted by Lawrence Rafferty, (rafflaw), Guest Blogger
Chan,
Excuse me, I misunderstood what you wrote. I apologize.
Of course my original point still stands. What Locke wrote was distinctly not ME ME ME. It was “Me, but only after others are considered.”
Chan,
have a nice life with that philosophy of dealing with people.
Stamford Liberal:
so what? I dont accept your idea of morality.
Buddha:
you make me laugh.
I am sure you could tell me all about “champagne wishes and caviar dreams”. I imagine you havent made it. At least I still have the possibility. Go piss on a fire, it will be more effective.
Damn straight I intend to exploit the shit out of anyone I can. If I can make a buck off someone elses labor, I will be all over it. That is what they teach us here, exploit the commie workers and make them buy their work gloves at the company store. And only give them off on Sunday. Only holidays would be July 4, Thanksgiving, Christmas and Memorial Day. Screw labor day, they should work double time that day to make up for all the thievery they engage in.
Like what you are doing to your boss by taking so much time on this blog. I would fire you for screwing me out of a dollar.
Chan:
I don’t call being morally and ethically bankrupt complimentary. Only one with a small mind and even smaller soul would.
Congrats. You’ve managed to sink beneath the pond scum.
“It is all about me, it is my life after all.”
Screw the other 6.8 billion people, eh, boy? Who needs them as long as you’re happy? Except to exploit, of course.
Smith didn’t believe in unlimited greed or the right to exploit others. “As much as any one can make use of to any advantage of life before it spoils; so much he may by his labour fix a Property in. Whatever is beyond this, is more than his share, and belongs to others. Nothing was made by God for Man to spoil or destroy. And thus considering the plenty of natural Provisions there was a long time in the World, and the few spenders, and to how small a part of that provision the industry of one Man could extend it self, and ingross it to the prejudice of others; especially keeping within the bounds, set by reason of what might serve for his use; there could be then little room for Quarrels or Contentions about Property so establish’d.” But when people take more than their equitable share, quarrels do arise. The legal system exists in part for this very reason.
Nor was Smith for an environment of total government non-intervention, but rather reasoned intervention that served both the common good and fostered competition, but not at the expense of the common good as Gyges earlier quote shows.
A long time ago, mespo turned me on to an interesting essay written by the Former Chair of the President’s Council of Economics Advisors under Nixon and UVA Professor Herbert Stein titled, “Adam Smith Did Not Wear an Adam Smith Necktie”. It had one of the most concise and accurate readings of The Wealth of Nations I had ever seen. Here is a relevant passage . . .
“[P]eople who wear the Adam Smith tie are not doing so to honor literary genius. They are doing so to make a statement of their devotion to the idea of free markets and limited government. What stands out in WofN, however, is that their patron saint was not pure or doctrinaire about this idea. He viewed government intervention in the market with great skepticism. He regarded his exposition of the virtues of the free market as his main contribution to policy, and the purpose for which his economic analysis was developed.
Yet he was prepared to accept or propose qualifications to that policy in the specific cases where he judged that their net effect would be beneficial and would not undermine the basically free character of the system. He did not wear the Adam Smith necktie.
These cases were numerous, and some of them are surprising. I give here a list, certainly incomplete, largely derived from Viner’s article on Smith written for the sesquicentennial of the WofN. (The parentheses are mine.)
The government could legitimately do the following:
– Protect the merchant marine and give bounties to defense-related manufacturing industries.
– Impose tariffs on imports in order to bargain for reduction of tariffs by other countries.
– Punish, and take steps to prevent, dishonesty, violence and fraud. (Does this include the SEC, and would prevention of violence justify measures to assist ghetto youth?)
– Establish indicators of quality of goods, such as the sterling mark for silver. (Does this justify the Food and Drug Administration, the Federal Trade Commission and the Consumer Product Safety Commission?)
– Require employers to pay wages in cash rather than in kind. (Could the government conversely require employers to pay part of wages in the form of health benefits?)
– Regulate banking.
– Provide public goods, such as highways, harbors, bridges and canals. (What about railways, airlines?)
– Run the post office. (Also telephone, the information highway?)
– Grant patents and copyrights.
– Give a temporary monopoly to a trading company developing commerce in new and risky regions. (Is this industrial policy, managed trade?)
– Require children to have a certain level of education.
– Provide protection against communicable diseases.
– Require the streets to be kept clean. (Environmentalism?)
– Set a ceiling on interest rates.
– Impose discriminatory taxation to deter improper or luxurious behavior.”
But none of that about Smith matters when the entire sum of your “education” is simply used as a rationalization for being greedy. You were so persuasive that the only person who bought your line of bullshit was yourself, Chan. Could it be that *gasp* people read your arguments and think you’re full of self-rationalizing shit?
Thanks for further demonstrating your shallow emotion, complete disregard for the rights of others, selfishness, self-justifying and evasive nature, callous lack of remorse at the suffering of others, overinflated sense of self-worth, pathological lying and a complete failure to accept that your actions have consequences. Thinking there is nothing wrong with you when everyone else thinks there is something wrong with you? That’s not a sign of impudence as much as it is a sign of mental illness.
You prove nothing of what you claim about the virtues of greed and almost all of what I claim about you being a sociopath by your very actions.
You are a one trick pony and that pony is simple greed fueled by narcissism.
You don’t stand a fucking chance in the real world.
You’re not smart enough to be a successful businessman let alone a criminal. You have all the greed and callousness required, sure. Just not enough brains to carry out your champagne wishes and caviar dreams before some bigger fish eats you for a snack.
Read a book? Why bother. You’ve proven you don’t understand the ones you have read. You’re as evolved as you’re ever gonna get. Which isn’t much.
Slartibartfast:
I never said that and you know exactly what I mean. But if you want to get into it about ghetto children being malnourished, I think you may want to look into that.
And yes I have read Don Quixote, the scene at the dinner table was very funny. I am sure you know the one I am talking about.
maybe you should go read a book. Maybe one that challenges your hide bound progressive view of existence.
Chan,
So every child growing up malnourished in the ghetto can go to Harvard if he or she just works hard enough – I guess I need to add ‘naive’ to your description… and it’s ‘TILTING at windmills’ (the reference is to Don Quixote, since you apparently don’t get it).
READ A BOOK!
Chan,
You cannot insult me more than I allow myself to be insulted…your education it appears is a sham and waste…Thank God taxpayer dollars are not being used….god knows the others needed….
Also, I went to two state schools….Texas and Michigan….yeah the one about 3 hours due east of Hillbilly land…did the man ever get out of prison for convincing his 13 year old daughter to bare his children…
Slartibarfast:
That statement amazes me. There are so many colleges and so much money available for college. If you work hard there is always opportunity.
Annoy Yours:
How do people of privilege get there? Most of the time they work real hard unless they were lucky enough to have someone else do the heavy lifting.
Maybe your parents should get their money back.
Slartibartfast:
I agree, I have had enough tipping at windmills. But it was educational nonetheless.
Chan,
If there was such a thing as a level playing field…then people of privilege would not be 15 points ahead of the rest of society…that they would be equal to the person on the street…now is that socialism, Marxism… or Utopian…
The boy knows some words but apparently not the meaning or how to use them…..such a waste of education and money spent…I hope mommy and daddy are not footing the bill…it would be better spent building a bar….
Chan,
‘Equality of opportunity’ doesn’t mean changing people’s grades – it things like giving everyone a basic education and allowing them the same chance to succeed based on their merits rather than some people having privileges that others lack. Anyway, I’ve tilted at the windmill of your ignorance enough today…
Stamford Liberal:
“you are incomprehensibly selfish, obnoxiously petulant and so devoid of compassion that it is positively stunning.”
thanks for the compliment but I am not petulant, impudent maybe but not petulant.
Slartibarfast:
I am for a level playing field. If some excel, that is the result of natural ability and hard work. I do not make straight A’s but I do not want to be given “equality of opportunity” that changing my grades would do, nor do I think it fair that someone more able than I should be penalized because of my lack of ability.
You should try to figure out the logical implications of your positions – it might save you from making so many ignorant mistakes…
Chan:
“Seems to me I bother you. I don’t care to kick you at all, in fact I wouldn’t even have thought about it.”
You think too much of yourself sport. The only reason I’d kick you is because self-important little turds like you need a good kick in the ass.
“Liberals are sure violent people. Must be all that pent up rage from self denial and selflessness in the service of others.”
If that’s your attempt at wit, I suggest that you do not consider a career in comedy.
No matter how hard you try to spin it, the end result is always the same, kid – you are incomprehensibly selfish, obnoxiously petulant and so devoid of compassion that it is positively stunning. So much so that I actually feel a tinge of sadness for you. But, I’ll get over it by the time I post this.
Gyges:
I never said it was. go read what I wrote under the Locke quote above.
Ooops.
Chan,
If you aren’t for equality of opportunity (and I don’t think you are) then you are arguing that some people should be privileged over others (for whatever reason). You should try to figure out the logical implications of your positions – it might save you from making so many ignorant mistakes…
Chan,
http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/v1ch16s3.html
You either have a fundamental misunderstanding of the use of quotation marks or are bald faced, and incredibly incapable, liar. I’ll let you choose, but what you wrote is in no way the end of the Locke quote.
Gyges:
“But that doesn’t mean you cant take a couple of apples and save the seeds and grow your own orchard. And he would say the apples from the orchard you planted and tended are yours and no one has a right to them. Because you put your labor into them.”
Maybe you ought to read to the end.
Oooops.
Slartibarfast:
“I am for minimums in both opportunity and outcome as opposed to being all about privilege like you”
and you know that how? I don’t think you can point to one thing I have said that points to privilege over effort.
Your lack of comprehension is stunning in light of the large body of evidence to the contrary.