We have long discussed the difficult questions raised by private and public employers punishing employees for postings on social media or controversies in their private lives. When employers are identified in the media, controversial statements or conduct can have an obvious backlash against the them, particularly if there is an allegation of racist or discriminatory views. For free speech advocates, this can raise a type of “Little Brother” problem but the First Amendment is focused on state, not private action. This ongoing debate over where to draw the line on private speech has a new controversy with the release of a truly shocking videotape of a woman, identified as Amy Cooper calling police on an African American bird watcher in Central Park. Her employer Franklin Templeton has put her on administrative leave while reviewing the incident. She is reportedly the head of insurance investment solutions at Franklin Templeton. Others have called for animal abuse charges to be filed as Cooper was shown yanking around her hapless dog during her tirade. The dog was surrendered to a local shelter for its protection. Update: Amy Cooper was fired shortly after she was put on administrative leave.
The police arrived but found neither Cooper nor the man were present.
It is not clear if Cooper would be charged though it is unlikely. She clearly clearly suggesting an imminent attack and says falsely that Christian Cooper is threatening her. Section 240.50 allows a charge for anyone who “initiates or circulates a false report” or, “gratuitously reports to a law enforcement officer or agency…an allegedly impending occurrence of an offense or incident which in fact is not about to occur.” However, such a charge might deter other people from calling police when they are in fear of an attack.
Cooper, 41, later apologized for the incident in a phone interview with NBC New York. She also returned her Cocker Spaniel to a rescue shelter where she adopted him a couple years ago. According to Heavy.com, Christian Cooper, 57, is a former Marvel Comics editor who graduated from Harvard and now works as the senior biomedical editor at Health Science Communications. He is an avid bird watcher.
Amy Cooper is a vice president and head of investment solutions at Franklin Templeton Investments in New York City and a native of Canada. She received a degree in actuarial science from the University of Waterloo in Ontario and a master’s in business administration in analytical finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business in 2009.
We have addressed an array of such incidents, including social media controversies involving academics. In some cases, racially charged comments have been treated as free speech while in others they have resulted in discipline or termination. It is that lack of a consistent standard that has magnified free speech concerns. We have previously discussed the issue of when it is appropriate to punishment people for conduct outside of the work place. We have followed cases where people have been fired after boorish or insulting conduct once their names and employers are made known. (here and here and here and here and here and here).
The fact is that Franklin Templeton has now been drawn into the controversy by association. This case does not raise the type of political speech that we have previously discussed as a growing concern. This is not political speech but an unhinged and deeply disturbing use of what Christian Cooper called “the race card.” Courts are likely to support employers in holding employees accountable for such controversies.
Behold. A woman apparently fabricating a false allegation against a man, weaponizing an accusation she’d been threatened.
Now, children, when the next allegation comes around, put politics aside, and you just might be more interested in evidence than the political affiliation or identity scale of the accused.
#WoofToo believe the dog!
What has politics got to do with this ?
This is NYC We are talking about two slightly different flavor lefties.
Both of whom made a series of mistakes.
None of which are all that serious or warrant national attention.
As to evidence – we have a video shot by one of the participants, possibly edited.
We have only their words what came before.
And the video really does not show us much beyond two people with slightly different values verbally sparring.
I think this is a perfect example of what is wrong with the left.
We must identify a victim.
Instead of looking at the facts and saying – move along people – nothing to see.
We must weigh out the relative oppression points of a white woman and a dog vs. a black man.
Interestingly – as has been the case with women for decades.
The only position for women in the movement is ‘prone’
Stokely Carmichael 1964
In the lefts oppression calculus women ALWAYS lose.
Unless Amy is a post op transexual, she must be the villian – she is white, and while the oppression of women dates to the caves, and they continue to be slaves accross the planet – he is black, and black oppression trumps almost everything.
See you even have me sucked into this nonsense.
There is no big story here. Just two people squabling in the park. Both of which made some mistakes.
Walk Away. There is nothing here to see.
“Walk Away. There is nothing here to see.”
Please. Do it.
I told them that when they threatened Trump was Putin’s puppet they didn’t listen.
She accuses the black man of threatening her dog, while strangling her Bichon Frise mix or Goldendoodle, or whatever poor dog she had. The dog even jumped on her and fell on the ground in desperation, choking and making strangled cries.
I have no idea what happened before the camera started rolling, but based off of what was filmed, the lady has a problem. Smart man not to engage, and to just film her self destruct.
As I’ve mentioned before, a business can be affected by employees’ behavior, outside of work, if it impacts its reputation or profits, or puts customers in danger.
For example, if someone brags on social media that they long to steal from rich people, a contractor would be negligent if they allowed that person unfettered access to a rich person’s home during a remodel.
The State won’t imprison you for your speech, but an employer should always have the right to fire or discipline an employee if their behavior jeopardizes the business. That includes universities, where professors brag that they want all white people to die, and then go teach a class of white students. Or insert whatever threatening statement that you want. If parents had any ethical backbone, they would not financially support institutions that made SJW and persecuting or brainwashing their offspring, over academic excellence. If people voted more often with their wallets, universities might care about the product they produce, i.e. an education in an environment of higher learning, and not political brainwashing. But they won’t. How many parents decided not to send their kids to Harvard or USC because of the enrollment scandal, or the ongoing discrimination against Asian students? They still view the university name as cache, so no matter what they do, they still pay. And the universities know it.
Yes, this can be abused, to the point that employees are fired or harassed over political opinions. That is wrong. However, an employer’s right to hire and fire whom they choose should be protected, because that’s their livelihood. There should only be very limited protections that interfere with an employer’s right to choose whom they want working for them.
My God! Are you trying to say…that all women shouldn’t be believed?!
Or is it that on the identity politics scale, the word of a black cis gendered straight man trumps that of a white woman?
Or, and I’m just spit balling here, we could just look at the evidence, disregard race and gender, and judge fairly…
Should we find out the sexual orientation and gender identity of each person, first?
My God, are you trying to say you cannot witness any event without trying to pidgeon hole it into your narrow political stereotypes and partisan interests.
How boring.
My God, is bythebook still confused by the fact that not all women should be believed, based on gender alone, and that this is evidence of it?
Would a flow chart help? Venn diagram? Small words?
Karen S – a Venn diagram would help. 😉
Is Karen S…a Karen?
He’s reportedly a gay black man who is involved in “queer stand-up comedy.” In any case, Franklin Templeton fired the white female today. The company made the business decision that appeasing black activists is more important than allowing white women some leeway in calling the police if they feel threatened. There was a similar case in NY where a white woman was fired because she questioned a black man whom she didn’t recognize entering her apartment building. At my office, we’re required to “challenge” anyone we don’t recognize as a fellow-employee, to ascertain whether he or she should be in the building. Personally, I would never challenge a black person, because the blow-back would be on me, regardless of the circumstances. Years ago, I was walking down a corridor past a section of offices under renovation. There was a young black male in there sleeping on the floor! I had no idea who he was or if he should be in the building, but as a white person, I wasn’t about to say anything to him or anyone else about his presence. If I did, the Twitter Mob would savage me, and my employer and other timid whites would all buckle under. So screw it. If I see any black doing anything criminal or even suspicious I’m not getting involved. Just ignore it and preserve my job and privacy.
what one could do is let building security know that there is a possible trespasser. or even just “someone I didnt recognize.” good enough. but yes don’t identify race. or you could give them the hand signal that it’s a black dude and don’t say anything about race. the hand signal is very subtle. it can be passed off as nothing. i wont spell it out. i learned what the signal was years ago from a Chicago PD guy. if you don’t know it, you could ask a cop. like one you trust. younger security staff might not know it, but they will probably guess.
this is how the world works kids. you can punish people for generalizations but if the generalizations still are supported by facts they will persist and smart people will make use of them
.TIN says:
May 26, 2020 at 5:33 PM
“He’s reportedly a gay black man who is involved in “queer stand-up comedy.”
JT in his posting:
“According to Heavy.com, Christian Cooper, 57, is a former Marvel Comics editor who graduated from Harvard and now works as the senior biomedical editor at Health Science Communications. He is an avid bird watcher.”
It was reported in The Advocate (gay media) and even on Wikipedia that he’s gay, a comedian, and when at Marvel comics he introduced the first gay character in the X Men superhero series. Do you really think your typical Tyrone is an “avid birder”? No, he is an overly dramatic queen who made a big issue of something a regular guy would ignore. He played the black privilege card to the hilt and is reveling in all the attention his victimhood is bringing him.
TIN – just because he is gay does not mean he is going to be a drama queen.
Except when he is one……like in this situation.
TIN – he seems to met the drama empress.
Who cares if the guy is gay?
This is about a woman who could have just leashed her dog and walked away. If it wasn’t between 6 and 9 a.m., the dog should have been leashed. And she was pulling the dog around by its collar while yelling at the guy. There’s clearly something wrong with her.
You’re really gonna defend this woman? Wow. Gotta laugh.
You seem to think the world must be perfect.
Have you ever owned a dog ? How about had a toddler out of control ?
No, yes, and yes.
this kind of worker is why marvel comics now stinks ‘
bring back stan lee the man who made marvel great
well, we can’t. so we have to have this kind fabricating the “heroes’ for the youths
Update:
Franklin Templeton (@FTI_US):
“Following our internal review of the incident in Central Park yesterday, we have made the decision to terminate the employee involved, effective immediately. We do not tolerate racism of any kind at Franklin Templeton.”
I remember 20 years ago when a real racist used to get fired from a job.
now it’s actuaries who work on wall street. lol. karens who are getting fussy over bird sanctuary rules and can’t leash their dogs properly. wow.
my how far we’ve come
in another 20 years it may be illegal to keep white folks on staff, just because they’re white. oh wait we already have that it’s called affirmative action.
watch for it whitey, itz comin. know who’s got your back when it all jumps off.
Oh, poor you.
Yes, they’ve gone nuts. Muh russia muh racism muh TDS.
Then it’s totally unfairly and politically applied in one direction by lunatics.
Mr Kurtz……..great comment!
Did you not read the story? She was fired because she called the cops and falsely reported that he was threatening her.
this is to “ya, I know, but I had to make the story about me” kurtzie
Mr.ka
Mark – I am going to agree with you on this one.
Paul – did you read Tyrone’s Facebook post? He describes the conversation prior to the filming. He told the woman, “You do what you want and I’ll do what I want, but you’re not going to like it.” She asked what he meant. Then he says he took some dog treats out of his pocket and began calling her dog, trying to get her dog away from her. That’s when she freaked out. It’s all on his FB page.
TIN – you ever work with a woman who did not like what you were doing. That is what is going on here, a clash of wills. Tyrone is trying to keep the unleashed dog out of the bushes where the birds are and Ms Cooper is trying to let the dog run free.
Now, I do not let people give treats to my dog because my dog will take your arm off. However, her dog seems playful and would take the treat.
Paul – I’ve purchased my last three dogs from dog training schools that contract with law enforcement. The dogs I purchased flunked out of police dog school. They’re good, protective dogs for my wife and kids, but didn’t quite make the cut to be canine officers. The first thing a dog trainer will tell you is that you NEVER let someone lure your dog away from you with treats, or whatever. He doesn’t give a crap about your dog. He is trying to disarm you. Taking away your protection. This women instinctively knew what was going on. He outright admits on Facebook that he told her she’s “not going to like” what he does to her. Then he proceeds to start luring her dog away. That’s why she freaked out. She was essentially alone in the park with him, disarmed, and didn’t know what was going to happen next that she “wasn’t going to like.”
TIN – he never moves from the spot he is in when the camera is on, he tells to call the police and thanks her for doing it.
My last two dogs are/were feral, the first one took me a year of hand feeding to get it to come to me. I know the feeding trick on dogs, but his is a one time thing, not a long term thing. He is not trying to break into her apt.
Would you make assumptions about another persons dog ?
Di not approach a strange dog in the presence of its owner without the owners (and dogs) permission. Maybe the dog was playful and maybe it ends well.
And maybe you get bit, or the woman attacks you.
Because if you attempt to do anything with my dog without my permission – one of us is attacking you.
From what other posters have written here – if True Mr. Cooper was not trying to be friendly with the dog, he was using the treat as a means of luring the dog away from its owner. If True that is theft.
But even if false it is STUPID.
If you get bit by a dog – this is going to be a mess for everyone. Frankly I think if you get bit approaching a strange dog with a treat, that is a self punishing act.
But the law does not view it that way. Almost without regard for what mr. cooper did, if the dog bit him the dog and the woman would be at fault.
The woman would be in less trouble if she bit “tyrone” herself.
It will be expensive, and could easily result in the dog getting killed.
Do not approach other peoples dogs – not without the permission of the owner AND the dog. It is stupid and it is not likely to end well. I am not surprised that the woman felt threatened.
She was.
John Say – dogs must (shall) be on a leash in the Ramble. Any dog not on a leash is a loose and ownerless dog. Mr Cooper gave Ms Cooper the opportunity to put her dog on the lead or leash. She refused. The dog therefore is a loose and ownerless dog. Mr Cooper attempted to capture it with treats he keeps for these purposes. Ms Cooper goes bonkers and pretends to be threatened by an African-American male, all the while abusing her dog.
“Any dog not on a leash is a loose and ownerless dog.”
False. The fact that you are not at this moment in possession and full control of your property does not surrender your ownership.
If you encounter a dog, or a briefcase or a car without its owner present – you are not free to take ownership of it.
Regardless, if the owner is present and you do not have permission to do so it is theft.
“Mr Cooper gave Ms Cooper the opportunity to put her dog on the lead or leash. She refused. ”
Does not matter.
That is relevant if you are trying to prosecute here for having her dog off the leash.
It has nothing to do with prosecuting him.
double park my car on a public road – the police can have the car taken away – if I am not present. But a private party taking the car is stealing it.
“The dog therefore is a loose”
Yes
“and ownerless dog”
nope
“Mr Cooper attempted to capture it with treats he keeps for these purposes.”
The only thing we know about Mr. Coopers actions are the actions themselves and he own words. Regardless the purposes he keeps treats for – presuming you know them are irrelevant. If I have a knife for the purpose of peeling oranges and I stab you with it – that is still assault with a deadly weapon. Why I had the knife is not relevant – unless we are arguing premeditation.
I am not sure that there is a premeditated theft statute in NY – but if there was you are making the case that Mr. Cooper is guilty of it.
YOUR claim is that he brought treats to the park for the purpose of luring loose dogs away from their owners.
“Ms Cooper goes bonkers and pretends to be threatened”
Christian threatened to take the dog – there is no pretend here.
He might have beleived he was free to do so – as you clearly do.
But that does not change the actual facts.
Dogs are property. You can not take someone else’s property without there permission.
Her mishandling of the property does not change that at all.
Your supposition that “loose dogs” are no longer owned is legal nonsense.
Even the police – who could legally catch her dog without her permission would NOT be able to take ownership of it, thought they might be able to take CUSTODY of it.
Regardless, Mr. Cooper is not law enforcement.
“by an African-American male”
There is no law I am aware of that says “African american males” are free to threaten to steal your dog.
An enormous portion of this idiocy is the presumption that because Mr. Cooper was identified as African american that somehow this is racist.
That is false, it is also irrelevant. Ms. Cooper had the minimum requisite conditions to call the police. Even if her description of Cooper was racist – which it was not.
It changes nothing.
If Mr. Cooper had stabbed her with a knife and she used the N word to describe him to the police – that would be racist. And Mr. Cooper would still be guilty of assault.
“all the while abusing her dog.”
I though you said you had experience with dogs before ?
I have seen dogs abused. I rescued several abused dogs. This was not abuse – except to people who are clueless about dogs and think every pet owner is Ceasar Milan.
This was a woman with poor pet skills trying to handle a poorly trained pet in a stressful situation with many things going on at once.
In otherwords she was a typical pet owner.
The dog was in an ordinary collar, not a choker – not that it matters regarding intent.
And was in no danger.
My current dog will pull harder on a leash and choke herself, and there is nothing that will stop her.
John Say – you are very vested in white knighting for this woman. Are you dating her? Again, where does Christian say he is going to steal the dog? Do you read minds at parties? Do you have brochures?
“John Say – you are very vested in white knighting for this woman. Are you dating her? Again, where does Christian say he is going to steal the dog? Do you read minds at parties? Do you have brochures?”
All false and all not arguments.
These two people had a complex encounter involving stress and conflict, and they handled it badly.
Guess what that is real world. No one is sainting Amy. But that does not make her a clear racist either.
Frankly the racism claim is stupid on its face. Are you really going to claim that most of the single women in NYC are racist ?
The wise thing for both of them would be to go home and forget about the event.
Christian choose to make this into a global issue.
What I am pointing out is that by his own account his actions are more seriously wrong than hers.
Regardless, he chose not to walk away, and he is providing the proof that her perception that he was a threat is justified.
You are the one that keeps repeating this nonsense.
John Say – I am not tilting at this windmill.
Not an argument either.
You keep shucking and jiving.
The facts here are simple. Christian – in his own account threatened her and her dog, both in his words and in his actions.
We can speculate regarding what might have happened. Had she not somehow regained control of the dog.
Maybe his hypothetical actions would have been innocent. Maybe they would have been evil. But we do not know.
Christians threat does NOT justify her initiating violent actions, but it does justify calling the police.
Her report to the police on the video matches his own FaceBook post.
She said he issued a threat. He quotes his own threat.
The facts Christian’s facts, are not on your side.
This is not the crime of the century. It is not a big deal.
A woman alone in the park walking her dog was threatened by a man.
And you beleive that fact pattern hinges on the race of the participants.
John Say – pick a new subject, I am tired of this one.
It is the topic of the post.
regardless, I am tired of the debate is not an argument.
“Again, where does Christian say he is going to steal the dog? ”
You keep repating this fallacious argument over and over as if it is meaningful.
I have clearly refuted it a dozen times in different ways.
It is not necescary to narate your threats and actions for them to be criminal.
It you encounter someone on the street and say
“Do as I ask or you will regret it” – nearly exactly what Christian said – that is a threat.
If you then thrust a knife at that person – that is an attempted assault with a deadly weapon.
“Do you read minds at parties? Do you have brochures?”
I have made no claim to know christian’s mind, or the dog’s or amy’s.
I have relied exclusively on their words and actions.
Christian made a threat.
He made clear that his subsequent actions were premeditated,
Then he took action to take possession of Amy’s dog.
In many places that is sufficient to convict.
Subtitute kid for dog and lolipop for treat, and you will get a kidnapping conviction nearly everywhere.
But ultimately being able to convict is NOT the standard.
The relevant standard here – because it is Amy that is being glibally dragged through the mud is did christian’s words and actions create reasonable suspicion that she or her dog was in danger.
The answer to that is clearly yes.
Reasonable suspicion is a low standard.
John Say – stick with what Christian said in the Ramble, he was trying to control the dog which would do damage to the undergrowth and the ground dwelling birds. Amy, who you are white knighting for some reason, is breaking the rules of the Ramble (maybe even the law) by having her dog off the leash. Amy is the proximate cause of everything that happens.
“John Say – stick with what Christian said in the Ramble, he was trying to control the dog which would do damage to the undergrowth and the ground dwelling birds.”
First – that is not what Christian said. we have to stick with the facts we have not make up ones to suit
Second – that is irrelevant. Christian is not law enforcement, and the dog was not attacking him or another person. There is no defense of birds exception to the prohibition against taking control over the person or property of others.
He was free to call the police.
“Amy, who you are white knighting for some reason”
Nope, as others have not posted, and was to be expected to start, Amy is a progressive.
Not even close to my cup of tea.
I keep refering to this as blue on blue for a reason.
Amy should not have had her dog off the leash. That misconduct on her part justifies SOME responses by Christian. It justifies calling the police. It justifes requesting that she leash her dog. It does not justify a threat – other than calling the police, and it does not justify attempting to control another person or there property.
“is breaking the rules of the Ramble (maybe even the law) by having her dog off the leash.”
Correct and irrelevant.
“Amy is the proximate cause of everything that happens.”
Was christian entitled to shoot Amy because her dog was off the leash ?
Could he poison the dog ?
Clearly the answer is no.
Amy’s misconduct justifies SOME responses by Christian.
It does not justify the threat he issued, and it does not justify attempting to lure the dog.
This is not difficult.
This not about amy or even christian.
It is about how progressives are so fixated on race that they are blind to reality.
“My current dog will pull harder on a leash and choke herself, and there is nothing that will stop her.”
Try a Gentle Leader or a harness. The dog can damage its trachea. Don’t use a long leash.
Thank you for the advice. She is 12, and we do not walk her very much anymore for reasons such as these, also because she does not have the stamina for a walk anymore.
She spends little time on a leash – mostly vet visist because short of sitting on her she will pull and choke herself. Nor is she the only dog I have had that would do that, though she is the most persistent.
Seriously – that is HIS story ? If that is correct, that inverts this entire thing.
White black, male, female, gay straight, you attempt to take my dog – you are committing a crime, you are engaged in attempted theft.
At the same time, once the woman retreived her dog, she should have retreated.
John Say – he would have retrieved a “loose dog” in the Ramble. That is not theft.
When the owner is present and has not asked for your help – and in fact has specifically rejected it – that is theft.
AS I understand what he admitted to saying – that is a clear threat to take the dog.
He did not say “I am going to use this treat to lure your dog and return it to you”.
I can assure you that in my town – if you use a dog treat to lure a dog away from its owner – you will be prosecuted and convicted of theft.
Whether you are black or white.
Normally something like this would not be prosecuted – because it would be his word against hers. But my understanding is that he has opening admitted to threatening to use the treat to get the dog from her.
You want to say this should not be treated all that seriously – I am OK with that.
But it is much more serious than having a dog off the leash.
I would further note that though I do not know the law in NYC,
In my state even if the police will not prosecute – she can file a private criminal complaint.
In fact she has a number of possible causes of action.
Depending on exactly what he has posted on social media, she could have a significant defamation claim. She may also have one against the media and her employer, possibly even Audubon.
Further her life has been destroyed – what does she have to lose ?
John Say – again, at what point does he say he is going to steal the dog?
Again – read Christian’s FB post – it is readily available, there are several links here.
Regardless, you keep arguing the same fallacies.
First the standard regarding Amy’s actions is did she have reasonable suspicion.
That does not require all the constraints you are imposing.
The choices is not Christian is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, or Amy is.
There is more than sufficient threat that Amy’s actions are justified.
With respect to christian AGAIN AND AGAIN it is not necescary to telegraph in detail what you are going to do.
If a man with offers a lolipop to a child to get them away from their mother – are you requiring him to specifically verbalize that he is going to kidnap the child ?
I can assure you that in my country – and I would bet than in NYC if we substituted a child for the dog that Christian would be in jail now, and would be convicted.
If Amy came to the park with a child and the child got away from her and was disturbing Chrisitan’s birds, and Christian told the woman to get control of her child or he would and she would not like it, and then he pulled out a lolipop and offered it to the child if they would come to him. Nearly all of us would recognize Christian as a threat and his actions as a crime, even though he never says “I am going to kidnap your child”.
Something is not a crime only if you announce it in great detail ahead of time.
Christian made a threat. He followed that threat with ACTION, and that action attempted to separate the dog from its owner.
All of this is from Christian’s own recounting of his own words and actions in his FB post.
It is not from anything from Amy.
John Say – I am no longer going to tilt at that windmill.
Tilting at windmills would be more productive.
Christian posted his own account of events.
He is not shy about the fact that he threatened her.
You want to quibble because he did not verbally telegraph the specifics of the threat.
Yes he should have but he did not. She tried to scare him off but it didn’t work so she backed away, quite away.
He was threatening her. He may not have intended to be, but that does not matter.
John Say – I do not threaten people, I promise. I am pretty sure that is what he was doing.
“I do not threaten people, I promise. ”
Your conduct is not at issue here. I have addressed your arguments. not some conduct I know nothing about.
“I am pretty sure that is what he was doing.”
Here is HIS FB post
“ME: Look, if you’re going to do what you want, I’m going to do what I want, but you’re not going to like it.
HER: What’s that?
ME (to the dog): Come here, puppy!
HER: He won’t come to you.
ME: We’ll see about that…
I pull out the dog treats I carry for just for such intransigence. I didn’t even get a chance to toss any treats to the pooch before Karen scrambled to grab the dog.
HER: DON’T YOU TOUCH MY DOG!!!!!”
In what world is “But your not going to like it” not a threat ?
His words. Not hers, not mine.
Next he is crystal clear that he is attempting to take possession of the dog.
You can fight over whether that constitutes attempted theft of not.
But I would love to know where you get the idea that it is moral, ethical, or even legal to do as he attempted. Even if she was violating the law – this is vigilante action.
Further he explicitly notes he carries dog treats “just for this kind of intransigence”.
i.e. to act to enforce the law on his own. Premeditated vigilante action.
https://www.facebook.com/christian.cooper1/posts/10158742137255229
John Say – if Christian was a serial dog thief, the police would have noted it. He probably just controls the animal until a leash can be put on.
Right, Paul. He stated that he offers a treat to loose dogs because the owners don’t like that, and it prompts the owner to secure her dog on a leash. His objective is to get the the owner to leash her loose dog. Apparently it works.
No one cares what opinion is on his past conduct, so much of it speculation and hidden, and it doesn’t matter anyway. She doesn’t have an hour to peruse his internet history and come to a conclusion in the woods with no one else around.
A clear threat was presented. the dog could have just as easily ran to the thief, then you’d be singing a very different tune. He didn’t have control of the dog, nor the woman’s actions, so his stated intent was to get the dog himself and he took action to do so. That’s a threat no matter what happens next. He convicted himself as 100% guilty in the matter.
She knew it and we know it.
His words are a threat, he is not equivocal about that.
The threat in his words is not specific.
It does not need to be.
Elsewhere I read the possibility that he poisoned the dog treats.
I think the odds of that are small. But it is still a potential threat to Amy’s dog.
How many times does one have to say:
You do not approach or lure or treat a strangers dog without both the permission of the dog and the owner if present, and she was.
There are numerous ways the dog could react – few of them good.
And based on his FaceBook – Christian is someone who I could suspect of poisoning dogs.
But it is not necescary for the threat to be specific. It is merely necescary that the threat was made.
Even if Christian had not made a threat – approaching the dog without permission is also a threat.
“Right, Paul. He stated that he offers a treat to loose dogs because the owners don’t like that,”
Reasonable surmise from his words.
” and it prompts the owner to secure her dog on a leash.”
Zero evidence of that – you are reading mind.
Regardless, he CLEARLY threatens an outcome they will not like if they do not comply.
He does not specify what that outcome is, but it involves his use of treats to lure the dogs he makes that clear.
“His objective is to get the the owner to leash her loose dog.”
His objective is not the question.
Can he threaten to shoot the dog to get the woman to put it on a leash ?
The existance of a legitimate objective does not justify all possible actions to secure that objective.
“Apparently it works.”
We do not know that. We only know that his carrying treat is premeditated and that he intends to use those treats to compel conformance.
I do not know how he can legitimately use dog treats to compel conformance with leash laws. If someone wishes to postulate a way I would be interested to hear.
Luring the dog away from the owner is not legitimate.
But the existance of a hypothetically legitimate response MIGHT provide a non-criminal option for Christians conduct – though he did not take that hypothetical whatever it is.
But such a hypothetical does not alter whether Amy is legitimately threatened.
If I say “Leash your dog or I am going to do something you will not like”.
And my intention is to make fart sounds, I am not threatening a crime.
But Amy does not know that. It is reasonable for her to presume that my threat is criminal. That may not be true, But Amy is allowed to call the police in response to an unclear threat that probably includes real harm to her or her property, but might be something begnign.
Responding to Christian with actual force – would require that she meet a higher standard. She would need to be more certain that his threatened acts would cause harm and that her response was proportionate to the harm
“John Say – if Christian was a serial dog thief, the police would have noted it. He probably just controls the animal until a leash can be put on.”
Talk about mind reading and assumptions.
Regardless, if in the presence of its parent and without permission you lure a child into your car with a lolipop with the claimed intention of taking it to children and youth – you are still going to be arrested.
Next, Christian did not say – “leash your dog or I will”.
He said you will not like what I do if you do not do what I want.
That pretty much rules out the benign possibilities you have telepathically presumed.
Next – why do you beleive police would have noted ?
It is reasonable to presume Christian is a serial actor – his own remarks confirm that he has done things like this before. That should set off all kinds of creepy red flags.
But I can easily construct hypotheticals where Christian’s conduct is bad, but the police are not drawn in.
But we do not get to posit hypotheticals. We must deal with the facts as we know them, and Chrisitans words as he documents them.
…and did you see the way that she was treating the poor dog?
Anonymous – she does not know how to handle her dog.
Clearly.
Most people don’t.
That is not a crime either.
John Say – you forget that case where the lawyer couple was raising dogs for a prisoner and the dogs got loose and killed a neighbor. Think they were charged with murder.
I am not forgetting anything.
As I have noted before – no matter what stupid behavior Christian engages in with respect to the Dog – Amy and the dog are going to pay.
That is just another reason for Christian to be less of an ass.
Do you own a dog ? Or perhaps have a child ?
It is difficult to get them to do what you expect them to.
Perfectly trained dogs (and children) exist primarily in the movies.
The dog was out of control – likely because the situation was tense and dogs sense that.
She was in a difficult circumstance and not sufficiently skilled to deal with it.
These are NOT uncommon things.
One of the problems with this entire mess is that so many are trying to overlay politics and race and other nonsense on what is just a messy situtaiton that two people handled poorly – an ordinary occurance.
The world is NOT perfect. Maybe after we plumb the depth’s of Ms. cooper’s social media we will find she is a latent KKK member, more likely we will find a typical NYC left wing white woman who has likely just been massively red pilled.
I am not especially defending her – she made alot of mistakes – so did he. Ordinary people do that all the time.
That is one of the reasons it is generaly unwise to confront strangers, over minor things.
I would also ask do you think that Mr. Cooper would have been as confrontational if this were Mr. Tee with a loose rotweiler ?
Some people have suggested he should have called the police.
What was wrong with doing NOTHING ?
It is not necescary to force every stupid rule in the world down other peoples throats.
It is also not wise.
I rant and rave and curse about the bad driving of others – from inside my car, with the windows up. I do not beep at them, I do not roll my windows down and give them the finger, I do not ever get out of my car. I do not care how stupid their driving was.
When you confront another person about their conduct – YOU ARE A THREAT – and so are they. It is possible they will respond – “sorry, it will never happen again”. It is about as likely they will get angry and possibly violent.
Do not buy trouble you do not need. Leave strangers alone – especially if all you are looking to do is piss on them.
John Say – I think that dog wanted that treat that Mr. Cooper was offering. 😉
“John Say – I think that dog wanted that treat that Mr. Cooper was offering. 😉”
Again a “bad fact” for Mr. Cooper.
But otherwise irrelevant.
And I do not try to read the minds of people – why would I read the mind of a dog ?
The dog is Ms. Cooper’s property. Not Mr. Cooper’s.
Mr. Cooper is NOT law enforcement. He is a vigilante.
One of the problems with vigilante’s is that often their actions are themselves crimes more serious than those they are acting against – ask the McMichels
John Say – Christian is a Karen. Amy is a Karen. Tim Pool called it. I still do not know why you are white knighting Amy. She is the proximate cause. You can ask your wife what that means.
You keep claiming I am “defending Amy”.
Only specific actions, and even there only against claims that they are obvious examples of racism.
Everyone could have handled this better.
Amy could have leashed her dog.
Christian could have done nothing or called the police rather than personally confront her.
Even confronting he is just obnoxiousness.
But he went past obnoxious and moved to threatening.
Amy is the proximate cause for LEGITIMATE actions on Christians part.
But if I deficate on the side walk, you are not free to threaten my property or safety in retailiation. You are free to call the police. You are free to ask that I correct my misconduct, you are NOT free to compel that – you are not the police.
If you try to treat my dog without the dogs or my permission – you are a threat.
There are a large number of bad outcomes that follow from that.
I am a dog lover and a dog owner. I will carefully approach strays and I have separated dogs that were fighting.
But I would not do as Christian Cooper did. Some dogs will be respond friendly to treats from strangers, some will attack you, most will key of the emotional state of their owners – and particularly women with dogs expect their dogs to be protection from strangers.
A dog who might be approachable alone could justifiably attack you in the presence of its owner.
Further a woman alone in the park who brought her dog for protection is likely to treat a man who is approaching her dog with treats as a threat – and reasonably so.
Mr. Cooper may not have intended to be threatening. But he was, and he was lucky that the dog did not attack. And the dog is not racist.
The dog does not know anything about leash laws or bird sanctuaries. But most dogs treat strangers aproaching their owners as threats – because quite often they are.
John Say – Cocker Spaniels are not attack dogs.
They bite.
John Say – I bite, too.
Not an argument.
But in some context it would be a threat.
Kurtz – Nobody’s got whitey’s back. The blacks stick together. The whites destroy each other. So be ready to defend yourself when another Sheldon Francis comes for you, because nobody else is going to give a 💩.
TIN’s got a mighty big chip on his or her shoulder.
All she had to do was leash the dog and walk away.
Was she being racist to her dog or to her accuser?
Just a spat. No actual evidence of racism whatsoever. If they were both Caucasian her behavior would still be objectionable.
Both of their behavior was problematic.
Guess what, that is the real world.
All interactions are not perfect.
And frankly, I do not care if she was racist.
The police and government are there for protection against unwanted force.
Not objectionalable speech. That goes for both of them.
Americans also summarily and completely reject and “do not tolerate racism of any kind.”
Americans have made the decision to terminate the coerced-under-the-duress-of-brutal-post-war-military-occupation, improperly
ratified and unconstitutional “Reconstruction Amendments” resulting from the tirade and the racist “Reign of Terror” of “Crazy Abe”
Lincoln.
By Lincoln’s own witnessed affidavit:
“If all earthly power were given me,” said Lincoln in a speech delivered in Peoria, Illinois, on October 16, 1854, “I should not know what to do, as to the existing institution [of slavery]. My first impulse would be to free all the slaves, and send them to Liberia, to their own native land.” After acknowledging that this plan’s “sudden execution is impossible,” he asked whether freed blacks should be made “politically and socially our equals?” “My own feelings will not admit of this,” he said, “and [even] if mine would, we well know that those of the great mass of white people will not … We can not, then, make them equals.”
“One of Lincoln’s most representative public statements on the question of racial relations was given in a speech at Springfield, Illinois, on June 26, 1857.6 In this address, he explained why he opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which would have admitted Kansas into the Union as a slave state:
“There is a natural disgust in the minds of nearly all white people to the idea of indiscriminate amalgamation of the white and black races … A separation of the races is the only perfect preventive of amalgamation, but as an immediate separation is impossible, the next best thing is to keep them apart where they are not already together. If white and black people never get together in Kansas, they will never mix blood in Kansas …
“Racial separation, Lincoln went on to say, “must be effected by colonization” of the country’s blacks to a foreign land. “The enterprise is a difficult one,” he acknowledged,
“but “where there is a will there is a way,” and what colonization needs most is a hearty will. Will springs from the two elements of moral sense and self-interest. Let us be brought to believe it is morally right, and, at the same time, favorable to, or, at least, not against, our interest, to transfer the African to his native clime, and we shall find a way to do it, however great the task may be.”
– Abraham Lincoln
This is in response to “Cindy Bragg”. Like most Trump disciples, you can twist around a factual secenario to excuse racism and make black and brown people look bad. Fact is, this white woman refused to leash her dog, which was bothering birds in a bush, and a bird watcher asked her to comply. Now, according to “Cindy Bragg”, when this woman, with fantastically poor judgment and overwhelming arrogance starts dragging around her dog by the collar and calling the police and falsely accusing the man who requested her compliance with committing a crime, the real issue is that the man is trying “to take advantage and be a victim”. Cindy is a true Trump disciple, proven by her warped view of this incident. If there is an incident between a black and white person, the black person is automatically wrong, but if the facts don’t establish fault, then the black person is trying to take advantage of the situation by playing victim.
Natacha:
“This is in response to “Cindy Bragg”. Like most Trump disciples, you can twist around a factual secenario to excuse racism and make black and brown people look bad.”
*************************
Well shades of complexion did a pretty good job on their own here. Is Cooper the Lorax and now speaks not only for the trees but their inhabitants? Both of them should have walked on and done nothing. Cooper had no right to admonish our tightly wound loon nor feed her dog and she had no call to phone the cops on the antics of Dr. Doolittle here. Move along and let others be.
“both shades’
The dog was in the midst of a planned and planted bird habitat which requires dogs on a leash. As a serious birder he asked her to get the dog out of there. He was within his rights when she resisted and being reasonable. His race has nothing to do with anything here except her brandishing that as threatening in her phony police call
Here’s a link to the park regulations stating “Dogs must be leashed at all times in the following locations: … The Ramble …” – https://www.centralparknyc.org/rules
How ludicrous for anyone to suggest that someone lacks the free speech rights on city land to ask someone to abide by the rules.
Committed:
Show me the regulation where it says “anyone observing a violation automatically becomes a cop if he’s a ‘serious birder'”! PETA people and their ilk are weird.
bookie:
Like most Leftists, he dreamed of being a power mad tyrant. Call the cops and move along. What’s a serious “birder”? Some guy with feathers?
We do not actually know as certain any of this.
What we know is what people have said.
The concept of some managed bird habitat does say something about those involved.
Actual nature – where birds really live, has preditors and prey, it is not managed. It just is.
There are dogs, and wolves, and hawks and foxes and groundhogs.
Real nature is messy and dangerous – to humans, to dogs, to birds.
What is being described is not nature, it is a zoo for birds. It might be a nice zoo,
but it is artificial and just made to look like someone’s fanciful idea of nature.
New Yorkers should go somewhere and try living in real nature for sometime.
Central Park is many things – even nice.
But it is not actual nature.
Natch….I’m married to an attorney and therefore want to know what transpired before Christian Cooper selected an appropriate time to start recording. What else happened between them?
Watch the link to the ABC News article in JT’s column. She resisted putting her dog on the leash and reacted harshly to his feeding uit a treat to get it out of the bushes. He stops the recording and says “Thank you ” when she finishes leashing the dog.
I can find no video of the sort. Help-.
Do not ever feed another person’s dog without the permission if the dog AND the owner.
There are an enormous number of reasons this is a bad even dangerous idea.
Nothing this woman did comes close to that stupid.
For many people – particularly women alone their dog is their protector. Trying to make friends with their dog makes you a threat.
John Say – that dog does not look like a protecter but it does look like a bird hunter.
I agree, BUT
Are you ready to bet the possibility of getting bit on that ?
I have a lab. She is friendly and behaves very similar to the dog in this clip, except she is bigger. If I was not present – treats are love and she would take “tyrones” treat and hive him a long lick. But if my daughter were present the Lab would take “tyrones” hand off.
Even when the owner is present and I ask first and receive permission from both the owner and the dog I am incredibly careful approaching a strange dog.
It is always dangerous, and if it goes badly – you get bit, but the dog may be killed.
Before the lab I had a black Shepard mix. If you approached my wife while the dog was present without her permission – she would shred you.
And she liked to chase and hunt birds too.
There is no way of knowning for certain.
Further it is self evident from “tyrone’s” own story that there was tension between the two over the dog BEFORE he approached.
Almost all dogs are sensitive to that.
I have seen dogs that were animated mops attack fearlessly and futilely when they thought their were threatened.
Anyway there is plenty of stupid to go around here.
One need not make this about race to find rampant stupidity on all sides.
At the same time – we do not generally criminalize obnoxiousness and stupidity.
The fact this has people – even Turley’s attention proves how tremendously bored we all are.
This is nothing.
John Say – do you understand what the dog is doing to the birds?
“John Say – do you understand what the dog is doing to the birds?”
I do not care. It is not a relevant fact, neither birds nor dogs have rights.
Regardless, the dog is doing what dogs do in nature.
The birds are doing what birds do in nature.
We do not charge dogs or birds with crimes.
And nature does not give a frack about our laws.
John Say – what dogs are doing to the underbrush, etc. are key to why the dogs have to be on a leash. BTW, there is the Law of the Jungle.
“John Say – what dogs are doing to the underbrush, etc. are key to why the dogs have to be on a leash. BTW, there is the Law of the Jungle.”
Does this “law of the jungle” specifiy that dogs may not deficate in the woods, or hunt birds ?
I think not.
I do not mostly give a crap what rules new yorkers have for Central park.
But I do take odds with some presumption that those rules follow from nature or some inherently correct set of principles.
NY has leash laws because it values the safety of others and the protection of birds over the freedom of dogs and the convenience of their owners.
NY may be entitled to do so, but it is still an arbitrary elevation of one set of values over another. There is no objective truth at interest, nor does this have anything at all to do with Nature.
Central Park is not nature. It is a place where humans have imposed their will on nature, and arbitrarily re-structure the rules.
Again i have no problem with that. But I do have a problem with claiming that those rules based on subjective values represent objective truth.
But that is an entirely different argument that is much much broader.
back when i had dogs, they used to dislike black people. lots of dogs seem to have such an instinct. one wonders why
then again my dogs were never taught to “like” strangers. they were taught to obey and that means heel, sit, etc. until told otherwise.
say is right, it’s foolish to try and make friends with stranger’s dogs without permission. it’s poor etiquette for people unfamiliar with dog handling. that mexican american guy cesar was fantastic about dogs. i remember him from when i used to watch tv like a decade ago. and rarely even then, since it’s worthless and has been for a long time
The woman was not very good with her dog.
But the vast majority of people aren’t.
I have had numerous dogs my entire life – all different characters.
Some have been better trained than others. But ultimately I am NOT Ceasar Milan.
My dogs listen – when they want to.
I do not walk my lab much anymore – she is old, and when she goes out for a walk on a leash she pulls incredibly hard and is straining against her collar and sounds like I am choking her. And all she has to do is not pull and she would be fine. But short of my jogging, she is going to be gasping as if I am killing her.
I had another lab that was quite friendly – she would jump and spin and lunge, and foam and froth and bark on a leash. If you encountered her – you would be sure she was rapid. But all she wanted was to make freinds – with anyone. She was not agressive, she was physically exhuberant. Happy. If someone tried to rob us – she would show them the silver.
Every dog is different. Do not make assumptions about other peoples dogs.
One in 100,000 dog owners is Ceasar Milan. The overwhelming majority are like this woman – incapable of controling their dog in a complex situation.
I would also note people do not all want the same thing from their dogs.
While my dogs are protectors, they are also friends – man’s best friend.
My lab jumps into bedrolls over with her belly up and her tougue hanging smiling insanely saying “rub my belly, that will make the whole world better” and it does.
And that despite the fact that she is old and deaf and blind and arthritic and can barely make it onto the bed anymore.
But for all her innate Labrador – I will be anyone’s friend qualities – she will try to kill you if you approach my daughter unwanted.
Do not make assumptions about other people and their dogs. It is unlikely to end well.
And unless you have a dog or an unruly toddler – close to the same, do not cast judgement on someone else’s handling of their dog.
We are just not mostly Ceasar.
In my view she was keeping a tight hand on the collar so he couldn’t snatch the dog. After all he already tried to.
When she approached him and told him to stop filming her threats didn’t work so she backed away again, obviously scared, keeping an eye on him and facing him.
She did get the leash attached I believe toward the end of the video (and why did it end there ?), but didn’t let the dog reel out on it, because he could then snatch the dog release the leash and boogie.
It is not necescary to speculate.
He threatened to take the dog.
He is a threat. She has reason to see him as a threat after she retrieved the dog.
Frankly this should have ended when they separated.
There is an entirely separate matter regarding his posting the video.
I do not know the law here, but he did not have her permission.
It is highly likely he has no right to post the video of her.
It is pretty clear from the video that she gave him no right to record her.
There might be some issues because it is in public. But she pretty explicitly denied him the right to record her.
Further there is a difference between recording and publishing. Maybe you have a right to record people in public, but publishing after they have explicitly denied permission is dicier.
I do not think the video alone constitutes defamation – but depending on his comments along with the post, it could easily be defamatory.
Anyway she needs a good laywer – I would suggest the firm that represented Nicholas Sandman. In addition to Mr. Cooper there is a raft of other targets for a defamation lawsuit, as well as several others.
She should also file a DMCA takedown notice.
Just to be clear – short of her engaging in clear misconduct, I do not care if her behavior on the video is perfect.
We are obligated not to commit crimes. We are not obligated to handle every encounter with others perfectly.
As I have noted – she is not Ceasar Milan. She is an ordinary dog owner with a poorly trained dog, and poor ability to manage the dog. Like I said an ordinary dog owner.
She is not required to be Ceasar Milan either.
Few of us are.
There is possibly a single small act of actual misconduct on her part – having an unleashed dog where the dog was required to be leashed.
That is the least consequential wrong in this entire mess.
Everything else on her part and most everything else on his,
is ordinary people blundering imperfectly through a conflict.
When they separated they all should have walked away and forgotten this.
Christian posting this is on a completely different level.
It may constitute a variety of torts and crimes.
It is certainly not the act of someone letting it go.
Breaking news: Condor vultures terrorize poodle dogs during China virus lockdown
I speak condor:
“Food, glorious food! We’re anxious to try it!”
He was trying to draw the dog out of some bushes where there were birds.
This was posted by Christian Cooper’s sister Melody, who thinks it’s fine to use a racist derogatory term like “Karen” when describing Amy Cooper.. I am sick of the double standard. The black privilege posses have NO desire for us to all live in harmony and unity! They are liars if they say that…..Look at their actions. They HATE white people more than they love unity.
Melody Cooper @melodyMcooper
Oh, when Karens take a walk with their dogs off leash in the famous Bramble in NY’s Central Park, where it is clearly posted on signs that dogs MUST be leashed at all times, and someone like my brother (an avid birder) politely asks her to put her dog on the leash.
Cindy Bragg – Melody Christian is correct. Amy Cooper is a Karen, a racist Karen, a scofflaw Karen.
Et tu, Paulte’ ? 😉
Paul:
I find her merely neurotic – none of the rest. What’s a Karen anyhow?
mespo – a Karen is a person who reports you to your manager, your boss, the HOA, the police, etc.
Everybody loves a snitch!
mespo – Tim Pool titled his blog on this as Two Karens Clash in Central Park. 🙂
Oh so good. But how do we know they’re female or male or whatever! Maybe he’s a she and he’s a she. And the dog who knows?
mespo – shockingly, Karens can be men. 😉
But can they be black men, asian men or just honkies?
Cindy Bragg – Karens come in all races and genders. God made them all equally annoying.
And the blog has its very own “Karen.”
Come to think of it…more than one.
Anonymous – we used to some real Karens of both sexes. I think we are down to a few now.
Paul’s a Karen.
Anonymous – Paul’s a Mary Sue.
a “karen” is a middle aged white woman who has a sense of entitlement and is obnoxious and often calls the managers to complain about the workers.
this is now an internet meme
but a “karen” is also the kind of woman who attacks her own husband and then calls the cops — on him. the type exists.
just like other “stereotypes” they emerge from facts
Live and learn. Around home, we just called them beeatches!
Some black chick came up with the name “Karen” to stereotype this kind of behavior, and in response, whites are referring to black men who engage in stereotypical behavior as “Tyrones.” It’s childish either way.
Yeah, we need more people of good will like Cindy who look at people as people, not racial stereotypes. Maybe she and Sqeaky can bake Mr Cooper a cake and welcome him into the neighborhood.
bythebook…….You misspelled “Squeeky”.
Son, I’ve told you before: Stay in school, dammit 🤓
You know Cindy Bragg when you write Black people hate White people more than we love unity, that’s true because you (White people) don’t stop your hate. You hate Blacks systematically, politically, economically, socially, culturally, religiously, physically. No matter what we achieve you seek to tear it down and you don’t stop until you do. You don’t stop your whiteness, we are reminded of your sh*t everyday in our normal everyday lives. We can’t just live our lives without you interrupting it in some egregious way. You hate us as much as we hate you. If this planet was relinquished of White people this world would be a much better place. White people are subhuman species who possess a subset of genomes so bellicose and wanton-like with a fragile mental mind. White women hate Black women but love a Black man’s dick. White men hate Black men because of their penile incompetencies but secretly lose all control of their loins for Black women. Your species are jealous, hateful and you add nothing substantial to human kind but your diseases. Whites are the cankersore of human beings.
Jae….I was generalizing….I know it’s not ALL blacks, like the two black men I dated when I was single.They liked whites and white women.
You’re not taking up that much rent-free space in anyone’s head. Quit thinking the world revolves around your a**.
Jae’s obscene, racist anti-white racist screed shows exactly why whites need to stick together
WPWW ORION
Jae……Dr. King would be ashamed of you. Your toxic attitude would make him vomit.
Jae- “Whites are the cankersore of human beings.”
You just proved some of the comments above about blacks hating whites. On average, they seem to do. They don’t much care for Asians either. Essentially all of the hate-crime attacks on Asians the media try to blame Trump for are committed by blacks. Somehow that fact is often left out of the narrative.
You do have a point, though, all of the places where whites are few are paradises on Earth–Haiti, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Detroit….
Young👍
I’m thinking Liberia would be an excellent place for Jae. The country was founded by 5,000 former American slaves who were repatriated to Africa following the Civil War. They can’t feed themselves, despite the lush growing conditions of the African coast, and YouTube has videos of them reverting to cannibalism. Yum yum 🍽
Jae has some real issues. Maybe she should get her counseling in some country more to her liking?
mespo………Ya know, the one thing that really impresses me about current black activists, is their total embrace of the act of forgiveness.
It’s a beautiful thing to watch .
😉
Cindy:
“mespo………Ya know, the one thing that really impresses me about current black activists, is their total embrace of the act of forgiveness.”
****************************
Oh they’re “turn the other cheek” crowd for sure. I think it’s now called twerking! 😀
Mespo– “Maybe she should get her counseling in some country more to her liking?”
Very good idea and from what Jae says about whites we can be sure it will be a lovely country indeed with no pesky whites around.
I do wonder what they will eat. White farmers in America and Europe provide a lot of the food they consume. They need it after killing or evicting the white farmers who used to feed them before.
“f this planet was relinquished of White people this world would be a much better place.”
So there would be utopia?
Who will feed and house the blacks if the sucker whites aren’t around? Asians? Hispanics? Don’t count on it, HaHaHaHa!!!!
Well Jae, you should lose your job, have a twitterstorm and national msm rip you to shreds, be labelled a racist forever, and take the same spot they put the woman with the dog in. Congratulations.
I also congratulate Seth and CTHD and the rest of them who didn’t have a fit and type up a tirade against Jae, your immense hypocrisy seems to be ever present even when your texts are not.
Laughing
My god, Turley is actually making this a free speech issue?!! I can’t believe it. The problem isn’t what the woman said, it’s that she said it to the police. She said she was being threatened when she clearly wasn’t. Freedom of speech doesn’t included the right to falsely accuse someone of a crime. And this is after his silly post on Ilhan Omar.
Turley is having a very bad day.
yyy:
“Freedom of speech doesn’t included the right to falsely accuse someone of a crime. And this is after his silly post on Ilhan Omar.”
************************
She’s a hyper loon but I don’t see where she is racist. Identifying him by race doesn’t make you a racist anymore than identifying his male gender makes you a misandrist. Now if you heard an epithet or some other overt derogatory claim like oh say “I’m being harassed by a weenie” now maybe you’ve got something to complain about. Oh and “silly” is not a word I’d associate with Ilhan Omar; I’d prefer “subversive.”
I’m not commenting on whether or not she exhibited racism. I commented because I’m astounded that Turley would paint this as a free speech (off the job) issue. And ‘silly’ is my description of Turley’s post on Ilhan Omar (‘Rep. Omar Declares That She Believes Biden Is A Rapist But Should Be The Next President’). You can look for my comment there if you wish.
yyy:
I totally agree this isn’t a free speech issue — more a freedom to be stupid issue. I’ll find your Ilhan Omar comment, too.
Everyone is free to be stupid. We all occasionally exercise that freedom. But as ‘This is absurd’ mentioned earlier, “calling the police for frivolous reasons is an offense under New York law.” I’m not saying she should have been charged; the point is that her call to the police is not protected speech. Given that, I don’t understand why Turley would examine this incident as a (possible) violation of the woman’s freedom of speech.
The woman was objectively wrong about several things – but she was subjectively right.
Actually criminal speech requires that the speaker knows they are wrong.
This woman felt threatened more than the objective circumstances permitted.
That is not a crime. It is poor judgement. Reporting an amplified threat is more poor judgement.
Just as beleiving that birds have rights and that there is no place for dogs in nature is objectively nonsense.
There is greater objective error on the part of the woman.
But mostly this is a conflict of personal – not societal values gone mildly wrong.
If this is our idea of systemic racism – then racism in this country is nearly gone.
Both of them should have just left each other alone.
What I find quite interesting is that in another era, the black man would have been in serious trouble. A white woman in a park claiming fear of a black man – even in new york not all that long ago could have had serious negative consequences for that black man.
No One sane doubts that – and just as the womans fears were not objectively justified – similar fears on the part of the black man were not justified TODAY.
But lets look at the outcome of this. In a minor conflict where both parties were wrong though not equally – the white woman is being derided all over the internet, she has lost her dog, she has lost her job, people are calling for her to be arrested.
Sounds to me like the white woman is experiencing much the same irrational response that the black man would have a few decades ago.
John – I totally agree. The female overreacted. We don’t know why. Maybe the covid lock-down made her stir crazy or she is on the autism spectrum or is just hyper-sensitive. The black guy had no business threatening that “she’s not going to like what he’s going to do” and then trying to lure her dog away from her. But in the end, it’s all been blown out of proportion. Both exhibited poor judgement, and mild shaming might be useful. But she’s had a ton of bricks dropped on her because she’s a white female. She’s lost her job, her dog, is being trashed all over the Internet, people are calling for her arrest and the black guy is planning to sue her. Where is the proportionality? Will the mob not be satiated until she is utterly destroyed, driven to suicide? There’s something seriously wrong with the savage bullying we see here. Especially when practiced by whites against their own kind. The sheer seething hatred spewing her way by blacks is not surprising. They live a very violent existence. But what’s wrong with these white people who are joining the mob? They disgust me the most.
I generally assume that women who are in public alone with dogs have the dog for protection because they already feel threatened.
We are fixated on all the layers of history and oppression regarding the black guy.
He is a black guy – so all less than friendly responses to him must be racism.
Further as he is black we entitle him to presume he lives in a racist world and use instances like this as proof of racism.
It is trivial to invert this. This was a woman out in public alone. Women have been oppressed far longer than blacks. If we must view everything in the world through the lens of oppression. Why not her view ?
One in 7 women are raped. That happens today – it is not about slavery 2 centuries ago.
If Christian is free to beleive every white woman who does not kowtow to him is a racist – why can’t amy be afraid that every man who approaches her unwanted in a park is a potential rapist ? It is not like women never get raped in Central Park.
My point is that if we have to layer some conflict of values in a public park with centuries of oppression and try to pretend this is more than it is, there is a perfectly good narative of oppression that works for Amy here.
In fact if Christian was not black it is near certain almost everyone who see this completely differently.
Christian and the rest of us are all free to see this through some lens of racism if we wish – despite no evidence to support that.
But that is not the only lens that can be applied.
Good point Cindy! The follow up questions to anyone saying that the man was just trying to protect the birds is, who distributed this video and why?
I always try to feed stranger’s dogs in the park after I accuse them of murdering birds.
I get bad reactions, I can’t imagine why.
I can’t imagine why your killer canine is allowed to destroy birds…
Here, little bird killer… eat this…!!!!
My other question is what happened to these birds? Is the bird population so fragile that they can’t handle seeing a cocker spaniel sniff through their territory? Are they no longer able to hop to a branch beyond the dog’s reach? Are birds so fragile now that if humans don’t step in, they will flee our favorite bird watching grounds? The obvious answers to all of these questions is no. Ms. Cooper overreacted, and she should be held to account for it in some way. The idea that she should be suspended, or fired, is between her and her employer. Mr. Cooper overreacted too, however, as this particular confrontation did not have to happen. It involved a busybody interceding in a private citizen’s life who happened to be breaking an ordinance. This incident should’ve been between the park attendants and Ms. Cooper.
Rilaly…..but how is Christian Cooper going to take advantage and be a victim if only the park rangers and Amy are involved?
“.. he said he was concerned over the dog ruining the habitat for birds. When she refused, he pulled out a treat to pull the dog away from the underbrush.”
Let’s all pretend we read and comprehended the article before going into partisan racist idiocies. Too late.
Translation: I’m stealing your dog by giving it this “food” to lure it to ME.
At youtube the claimed brother of the filmer posts, and whines about the dog being unleashed but leaves out the part where his claimed brother tries to steal the dog with who knows what kind of “treat”. Perhaps something that would have hurt the dog had the dog eaten it. A proper diet often includes dog food without corn, a common additive in treats.
Let’s further analyze. This crazy black man is going on a rant that the dog is ruining life for the birds, when the dog is merely on the ground or walking between bushes.
I guess I’d be wondering what kind of psycho I had encountered when they started babbling the birds lives are in danger because a dog is in the park on hoof?
Right? I mean is everyone a mind controlled bot here ?
Just think of it – some whacko comes up and starts wailing your dog is killing the birds he loves- your dog is just doing it’s thing, no feathers or dead bird carcasses anywhere. Then the whacko pulls out some food and is trying to get your dog to come eat it ! He just said your dog is a bird murderer, and now he has something in his hand he wants your dog to consume!
Later, being a stupid woman, and the black fool being a stupid idiot too, a stupid idiot cut short clip by another stupid idiot is posted for stupid idiots who can’t understand what happened.
I’m stealing your dog by giving it this “food” to lure it to ME
______________________________________________________________
If he was trying to take the dog, the proper terminology would not be “stealing the dog”, it would be rescuing the dog.
Badumbump.
I hate to give lawyerly defense advice but…
Are you certain she wasn’t trying keep the dog from swallowing whatever the perp fed it ? That explains the choke hold on the collar. She initially was trying to get to the dogs mouth to remove whatever it was the weirdo fed it it seems to me – right at the beginning of the video with the dog lying in between fer feet. So she holds on to keep the dog from swallowing as it jumps up while she tries to get the guy to flee so she can safely remove the ‘you’re a bird killer’ treat from the dogs mouth.
Oh, speaking of that, are choke collars outlawed because of ‘abuse’ ?
Looks like we have a concerned pet owner defending herself and her beautiful cocker spaniel from some crazed birdy wacko feeding the dog God knows what.
Should a person’s life be destroyed because of a tirade in a park? Viral video without full context is always suspect. What happened before the video started to prompt such a reaction from the woman? There is more to this ‘story.’
I would have fired her for being mean to the dog. I like dogs.
I like dogs too. But her treatment of the dog was NOT unusual.
She was in a tense situation. The man was clearly confrontational, and she had to bring the dog under control, control herself and keep herself safe.
She should not have had the dog off the leash, but once that was the case, she had a lot to deal with
She did it badly. But most of us do not behave perfectly under stress.
Conversely the man CHOSE to start a confrontation.
While he was right about the dog being required to be leashed,
and regardless he was right to ask for his own safety – though he should not have approached the dog.
I am also deeply suspicious of someone who does not own a dog who carries dog treats to a park.
Would he have offered a treat to a fox ? A Ground Hog ? All animals domesticated or otherwise should be assumed dangerous. Many dogs are teritorial and even trained to be protective of their masters. A third party can not predict their response.
No should the presume to be able to.
jbsay – he may carry the treats because he has encountered other New Yorkers who have their dog off the leash and are bothering the birds. And he, himself, may own a dog, but not bring it because it disturbs the birds.
Did anyone see any birds in the video ? I don’t think so.
“he may carry the treats because he has encountered other New Yorkers who have their dog off the leash and are bothering the birds. And he, himself, may own a dog, but not bring it because it disturbs the birds.”
All possibly true. All proof of idiocy.
I would further note that while your hypothetical is not established.
If true it still reflects a values conflict with the woman.
Christian values birds – more than dogs.
Amy values dogs more than birds.
The ten commandments does not resolve that conflict of values.
It is possible based on other posts here that New York law might.
But even that does not really mean there is a Right resolution of that conflict.
One of the core problems with this whole story is that under the ordinary everyday stupidity of each party, is near certain a conflict of values.
That conflict does not have a resolution. There is not a right answer to whose values are correct. Thought there MIGHT be an answer to whose values are reflected by the law.
There is also alot we do not know. I pretty much always assume when a woman has a dog in public that the dog is going to be very protective.
I also assume that women with dogs in public have the dog atleast partly for protection.
That is not always true. It is often True.
My wife was the victim of a violent crime decades ago. For about 20 years after she did not go anywhere without two dogs.
She would have been threatened by anyone who tried to approach her with her dogs.
She would especially be threatened by a black man – as the person who assaulted her was a black man.
Is that completely rational ? No. But it is not racist either.
We do not know about either this woman or this man. We should not be making assumptions about their motives.
I do not know much about what Christian was up to. I do not care about his love of birds, or whether he is gay. or black.
I do not know about Amy.
But I do know that any man who approaches a woman with a dog in a park without her permission is going to be perceived by that woman as a threat.
Whether the dog should have been on the leash or not. Whether the dog was disturbing a bird sanctuary or not.
This is not so much about “right and wrong” as about lots of stupidity by all, and lots of near certain false assumptions by both.
And the perfect example of something that everyone should have walked away from and breathed a sigh of releif when it was over.
Turning this into a great internet phenom – we must be bored silly,
Either that or our standards of outrage are incredibly low.
I am sure I can find a half dozen real crimes in my small city today that merit more attention than this.
John Say – first, Amy was originally in the wrong having her dog off the leash. Second, Amy’s dog is a danger to the wildlife. Third, as a ranking member of the New York Audubon Society, Christian was trying to protect the Ramble. Fourth, as stated by Christian, this sort of thing had happened before which is why he carried dog treats. Fifth, Amy did not leash her dog when requested and per the regulations of the Ramble. Sixth, the s$$t hit the fan.
“Amy was originally in the wrong having her dog off the leash.”
There is some debate over that, but lets accept that as true.
It is a tiny offense.
“Second, Amy’s dog is a danger to the wildlife.”
There is not such thing – nature is a danger to wildlife. Dogs are a part of nature.
Government protection of “wildlife” is inherently idiocy.
Nature is dangerous to itself and all those in it all the time.
Amy’s dog was a danger to a bird sanctuary – that is NOT wildlife.
It is more like a zoo. It is NOT nature.
Central Park is NOT nature. it is a park managed by the city of new york.
In real nature there are not rules about dogs on leashes.
“Third, as a ranking member of the New York Audubon Society”
That is not a public office and it comes with no police powers.
His membership in Audubon is meaningless.
“Christian was trying to protect the Ramble.”
He is neither law enforcement nor the owner of the Ramble, he has no power or authority to protect it.
“Fourth, as stated by Christian, this sort of thing had happened before which is why he carried dog treats.”
So he is a serial thief. This is not a good fact for you.
He MIGHT have a limited priviledge to try to secure unleashed and unattended dogs.
Note MIGHT, he would still be obligated to return them to their owners.
They are not his property.
Further he is NOT law enforcement so he has no power to take them into “custody” against the will of the owner.
“Fifth, Amy did not leash her dog when requested and per the regulations of the Ramble.”
Christian if he was so inclinded could ask law enforcement to fine her and retreive the dog. But he has no right to steal the dog. So long as she is present – he must have her permission. Which he clearly did not.
“Sixth, the s$$t hit the fan.”
Judge, I stole the dog because ” the s$$t hit the fan” is not a valid theft defense.
So long as this was a he-said she said – there would be little chance of it being prosecuted.
But as I understand it he has admitted to trying to lure the dog – he explictly threatened her with that consequence if she did not do as he said.
You can not as an example say “leash your dog or I will stab you”.
Most of us understand you can not commit assualt to mitigate a summary offense.
You also can not threaten a felony.
Further once you make a threat – you are a threat.
Ms. Cooper justifiably felt threatened by Christian because he had threatened her.
Was her conduct “beyond reproach” nope. But his was worse.
She committed a minor summary offense.
And she eventually leashed the dog.
He threatened theft. I do not know NY law, so I do not know if a threat to commit theft is a crime – I suspect it is.
Regardless, he was a clear threat, and she legitimately called the police.
John Say – you are really white knighting for Amy. Do you have the hots for her? What is going on here?
Not an argument.
I have stuck to the facts – what each of them did, what they said.
I have specifically used Christians record of his own words and actions.
Regardless, this is not about Christian and Amy – you are the one fixated on what is in others heads, or things not in evidence. Or the persons rather than their words and actions.
I suspect that in person I would find both of them dreadful people.
I doubt there are many people in NYC that I would find tolerable.
As I have noted repeatedly, the odds of finding anyone in central park that is not a left wing progressive are small. I could bet heavily that both Christian and Amy are typical NYC left wing progressives with a miniscule chance of loosing.
But for Christians own words documenting the threat and the use of the Dog Treat – if Christian had been arrested under this fact pattern I would be defending him.
And as I have said repeately – this is just blue on blue. This is two progressives behaving mildly badly in central park.
“it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
We are here discussing it because progressives seem to think this is some egregious proof of racism.
Numerous posts here reference Trump or Texas or … making it clear that somehow this is political.
It is only political because the left is trying to layer politics in where they do not exist.
This is not some glaring act of systemic racism and white privildge.
This is a woman justifiably scared when her dog and therefore her safety are threatened, who responded less that perfectly – as normal people due under stress.
But there is a fundimental difference between Amy and Christian.
If you want to prosecute Amy for letting her dog of the leash – go to it.
But beyond that her actions are RESPONSES to Christians.
Christian INITIATES all other actions.
The first threat is from Christian.
The first act to carry out a threat is from Christian.
Christian was NOT subject to stress when he made his choices.
He has no excuse for poor choices.
“Fourth, as stated by Christian, this sort of thing had happened before which is why he carried dog treats. ”
Paul, I have been following this discussion somewhat surprised. I thought this morning when I read this that it was a near meaningless post and now I see the replies amount to over 400. Why I don’t know but I added a reply discussing the deaths in Chicago which are a big deal. This is a garbage dispute between two people. (I followed it because John Say’s responses were so on target.)
If Christian carries dog treats and gives them to dogs without the owner’s permission because he is angry then we have a man who needs therapy (she does a well) and needs to be told to stop. I find his type of justice far more dangerous than what is not uncommon in the bramble, dogs off leash. His kind of justice for insignificant actions can lead to someone getting killed.
Allan – I agree with you about the violence in Chicago this weekend and I have been trying to disengage from tilting at this windmill. I think much earlier in this massive conversation I mentioned walking my dog in a bird sanctuary. Well,that is a sanctuary for ground owls. Or it was until people decided to drop off their excess cats there and the cats ate the owls. No more ground owls. We had to clean out the cats, which was a mess, because the place is not trimmed and then reseed the owls. They are hanging in and people and not dropping off as many cats these days.
The Ramble requires dogs to be on a leash. It is a requirement, not sure if it is a law. Uncontrolled dogs screw with the ground birds, which is a problem for both the birds and the birders. So, Amy Cooper, with her unleashed dog is the proximate cause of all the problems. Then she makes a racist phone call, and even I, a translucent white guy, can figure out that it is racist. We saw what happened in Minneapolis. It could have happened to Christian Cooper because of the actions of Amy Cooper.
“The Ramble requires dogs to be on a leash.”
NYC requires that dogs be on a leash though at certain hours dogs are permitted to be off leash in Central Park or at least in certain places in Central Park. I think it is wise in NYC to keep one’s dog leashed but one can see dogs unleashed. So what? Is it new that people don’t follow all the rules?
In NYC there are laws against jay walking. Is that an excuse for a person to take his car and scare the daylights out of a foolish person crossing in the middle of the block because the driver has to put up with people that don’t strictly abide by the rules? When the light turns at a corner so the driver can make a right hand turn and people keep crossing in front of him does that give him the right to push the pedestrians out of the way with his bumper?
Don’t you think there are a lot more important things going on?
“Uncontrolled dogs screw with the ground birds, which is a problem for both the birds and the birders.”
Just like jaywalkers are to cars. The solution to the problem is not for an individual to take the law into his own hands especially in an area where no other people may be in sight and the act committed by the other person is nearly insignificant. Do you really believe he should have acted like an idiot because the other person acted like an idiot by not leashing her dog?
“So, Amy Cooper, with her unleashed dog is the proximate cause of all the problems. ”
Is she the cause? She was stupid, but it sounds like he planned to get even with all those people that have unleashed dogs in the bramble. If so his actions were premeditated. Which is worse, a premeditated action that leads to a bad encounter or a foolish woman that didn’t leash her dog?
“Then she makes a racist phone call”
What was racist about what she said? Let’s say you saw a young male steal your bike and you report it to the officer nearby. You point to the area where three young men are all of the same size wearing similar clothing. The policeman asks you which one, the Chinese guy, the black guy or the white guy. Is that a racist question?
Allan – all she had to do is keep her dog on the leash. Or later, when calling 911, just say there is a man threatening me. According to John Say, Christian was threatening the dog, so she was wrong there to.
I admit that during my early years I was a scofflaw. I drove on an expired license for 3 years. I piled up 200 parking tickets (which I got out of, btw), I have jaywalked and I even lived in sin.
Still, Amy is the proximate cause of all the problems.
Paul, when she reported to the police “There’s an African American man threatening my life,” she deliberately lied, escalating the relatively innocuous confrontation to the level of a death threat. There is absolutely no evidence that he made any serious threat to her. She certainly could be criminally prosecuted for making a false police report that a crime (the “death threat”) had been committed by him.
What was the lie ?
He was african american.
He did threaten her.
She was a woman much smaller than him alone in the woods with her dog,
And he threatened the dog who is their for her safety.
If this is your idea of a lie, you have a very bizarre idea of falsehood.
I will also give you some free advice.
The cost to factual errors is low, If you make enough factual errors your credibility diminishes, but you can rebuild credibility by avoiding errors.
Most of the time factual errors are not moral errors.
When you levy moral accusations – “she lied”, you enter an entirely different domain.
The burden of proof for a moral accusation is on you, and it is high, all gray areas go to the person you accuse. If the only thing you do is fail to prove a moral accusation that costs you your credibility AND your integrity. The most certain way to be permanently labeled a liar is not to lie about facts, But to falsely accuse others.
However much care you take with facts, take 100 times as much care about leveling moral accusations at others.
It is tempting to lob moral accusations thoughlessly. But the cost for being wrong is very high.
The odds of a criminal prosecution here are near zero.
Even if charges were filed – it would be political and they would be dropped over time.
Further this does not even come close to a good false reports claim.
do you really want women in the woods alone to think twice about calling the police when they are threatened ?
We do not expect the kind of precision you are demanding from 911 calls. or police reports.
“Allan – all she had to do is keep her dog on the leash. ”
All the pedestrian had to do was wait for the light to change in her favor. Is that an excuse for a car to push her out of the way with his bumper?
“Or later, when calling 911, just say there is a man threatening me. ”
Doesn’t one normally identify an assailant with the best possible information? Is the policeman supposed to arrest everyone because the only identifiable feature you can provide so happens to be the most distinctive? I don’t condone any of the woman’s actions but I don’t accept the premeditated actions of (am I permited to provide the gender?) the man.
“According to John Say, Christian was threatening the dog, so she was wrong there to.”
Ridiculous if I am correct about the point you were trying to make..
“Still, Amy is the proximate cause of all the problems.”
To you Amy is the proximate cause. To me the man wanted a hostile encounter with someone he could intimidate. If it were three big men carrying bats I don’t think he would have acted in the same fashion. So if my guess is correct the man was preying on women or someone he perceived to be weak. Which is worse a woman walking a dog unleashed or a man preying on women?
Allan – have you seen the pics of Christian? He could probably handle himself against three guys with bats. Christian is noted for helping new birders, not preying on the weak.Besides, they would have to have their dogs off the leash for him to have a problem with them.
What you say is irrelevant or unknown. He might be the nicest guy, but based on what was shown and reported by Turley he acted improperly. He was carrying dog treats. For what? It looks like it was a premeditated action to promote a hostile encounter with another because he was angry about unleashed dogs. If it were three men with bats despite what you say it is doubtful he would have acted the same. Therefore, I can’t conclude that he wasn’t preying on a woman or anyone that appeared weak to him.
Allan – Chrisitian’s own account of events confirm that his carrying dog treats was specifically to deal with this type of occurance.
There is no question there was premeditation.
The only question is what response is it that Christian had planned.
John, whatever plan Christian had was not well thought out. That is the lesson here. Confrontations have unpredictable results and since the two were strangers they had no way of judging what was meant by the other person’s statements or actions. She says she wanted the dog to run and I could see why she chose the bramble. He could have stated why he thought her actions were improper (even that can be dangerous) but he chose to take it one step further heightening the risk of a more dangerous confrontation.
These things aren’t worth it. There are far more important things going on in the world. I thought this post of Turley’s was almost a joke because an unleashed dog blew up big time when 10 kids were killed in Chicago with 40 wounded. There is something wrong with our priorities.
Very wise observations.
I go ballistic at the stupid driving behavior of others. I shout and froth and fume and foam.
I do so entirely from inside my car with the windows up and I never touch the horn.
No matter my anger and my venting and my righteous indignation, I am NOT going to trigger a confrontation.
These get entirely out of control fast. They are unpredictable. They do not tend to end in sane ways or with rational vindications.
I think the outcome of this was entirely wrong – and quite obviously.
At the same time the truth, the facts, the law, were never going to be the determining factors in the outcome.
Amy has been thoroughly destoryed. She is going to have to rebuild her life from ash.
For what ? Letting a dog off a leash ? Calling 911 when she was threatened by a big black man ?
Many people observed that this could have gone the other way. Amy’s call could have brought Police storm troopers and ended with Christian dead.
The news right now makes it quite clear that outcome is possible.
We can blame that on racism. Though I would note that Police coming in as storm troopers and killing people over trivial offenses – though rare happens, and it happens even to white people.
Christian’s confrontation with Amy could have ended unbeleivably badly for him to.
Confrontations are unpredictable and impossible to control.
So do not piss on people when it is not important.
Confronting Amy over her dog was dangerous to all – even if Christian was right.
Dog treats? Have you ever been attacked by an unleashed dog? I have, when walking through a park. The owner was 200 yards away. If I had had a dog treat for the beast it would have been distracted and not come after me. Carry dog treats? A great idea if you want to avoid being chewed up.
Christian was not being attacked, and he made it clear he did not have treats to protect himself.
Frankly he is an idiot. No sane person deliberately tries to attract a strange dog.
As you noted it can be dangerous.
Wrong! He said he had treats because when he encounters a dog off-leash (a frequent occurrence) he finds that if he offers a treat the owner does not like it (naturally) and the owner then leashes up the dog. Objective obtained.
RDKAY – we have Christian’s own words. We do not need your interpretation of them.
“Dog treats? Have you ever been attacked by an unleashed dog? I have, when walking through a park.”
My dog was almost killed by an unleashed dog. It was near impossible to get the other dog off him until someone familiar with the dog gained control. Afterwards I carried bear spray and a police stick. We notified the authorities and finally traced the dog to his owners and then had to push the prosecutor to prosecute. I would not have created a confict with the owners if I had seen them. People with such violent dogs can be violent themselves.
You are providing a reason for carrying them but not for using them in this situation. We have to deal with the present situation not one that didn’t exist.
Allan – Didn’t you read the man’s explanation? Once again, he carries treats so that when he sees an unleashed dog, he offers a treat. This prompts the owner – who does not want his dog eating a strange treat – to leash up the animal and take it away. This is simple and effective, and does not warrant a false police report that the man is threatening the lives of the owner and the dog.
RDKAY, “Allan – Didn’t you read the man’s explanation? Once again, he carries treats so that when he sees an unleashed dog, he offers a treat. This prompts the owner – who does not want his dog eating a strange treat – to leash up the animal and take it away. ”
I thought I already answered this but I don’t see it. You have proven the case against Christian that he premeditated a conflict where he thought he would prevail without any significant objection. That is the problem with making assumptions about how others will react when you do things you ought not to do (touch or feed another person or their property without permission). His premeditation if so demonstrates he was being a jerk and enterring dangerous territory.
Allan – how much of a scofflaw are you? How many regulations have you broken during the coof?
Paul, it makes not the slightest bit of difference how many regulations I broke or didn’t broke to the story under discussion. All it does is confuse the issue and potentially make you more confused than you already are. 🙂
Allan – just answer the question. Your answer as to your scofflawitry goes to your defense of Amy and her killer dog.
“Allan – just answer the question. Your answer as to your scofflawitry goes to your defense of Amy and her killer dog.”
Paul, this has nothing to do with the question at hand.
Allan – Your Honor, would you order the defendant to answer the question.
“Allan – Your Honor, would you order the defendant to answer the question.”
Paul, ‘your honor, would throw you out of court for wasting the courts time.
Allan – you are no considered unreliable.
“Allan – you are no considered unreliable.”
Paul, now you are not even making any sense.
If this were a court your question would be struck as irrelevant.
John Say – you would be amazed at what I have gotten past judges. 😉
Admitting violating the rules of criminal or civil procedure is not a compelling argument.
And please do not tell me that you are actually a lawyer.
My oppinion of most lawyers is already too low.
No it does not Paul.
This is a fallacy.
Vallid arguments rest on the FACTS.
Not emotions.
Not the person arguing against you.
Allan’s motives, his character, or anything about him is irrelevant to the truth of error in his argument.
A true argument is valid even if made by Hitler.
Confine yourself to the actual facts.
John Say – first person to mention Hitler to win an argument, loses the argument.
Once more: I was attacked by an unleashed dog. I would have liked to have been smart enough to carry with me a dog treat so that I could have distracted the beast. This is SELF-DEFENSE. It is not a premeditated attack against a dog. Anticipatory SELF-DEFENSE. Got it, Allan?
“Once more: I was attacked by an unleashed dog. I would have liked to have been smart enough to carry with me a dog treat so that I could have distracted the beast. This is SELF-DEFENSE. It is not a premeditated attack against a dog. Anticipatory SELF-DEFENSE. Got it, Allan?”
That would be fine if you were acting in self defense. There was no threat to Christian and if there were he would be throwing the food. You can listen to the tape and what Christian said. Got it, RDKAY?
Where is the evidence that he actually gave the treat to the dog? So far as we know, he was only ready to offer it. But she grabbed and leashed the dog after a minute. Mission accomplished. Of course she went into her hysterics act. She wasn’t so frightened (not at at all, actually) that she backed away from the scary black man. Instead, she aggressively advanced ON HIM and angrily pointed her finger in his face – the poor terrified woman.
RDKAY, listen to his words later on. What you are doing is creating a scenario to suit the outcome you desire.
She was wrong to not leash her dog.
He was wrong to threaten her and if it was premeditated then he is “doubly” wrong.
All the other stuff is essentially meaningless. Can’t you separate the legal facts from all the craziness?
Why do you want to support either of them? Are you the type that only wants to get even?
“Where is the evidence that he actually gave the treat to the dog? So far as we know, he was only ready to offer it.”
That is all that is necescary – an attempt, which he admitted to.
“But she grabbed and leashed the dog after a minute. Mission accomplished.”
accomplishing a goal – even an arguably legitimate one does not justify illegitimate acts.
” Of course she went into her hysterics act.”
So. Her emotional state is relatively irrelevant.
” She wasn’t so frightened (not at at all, actually) that she backed away from the scary black man. Instead, she aggressively advanced ON HIM and angrily pointed her finger in his face – the poor terrified woman.”
And then backed away.
Yes, Both of them should have left.
“I was attacked by an unleashed dog. I would have liked to have been smart enough to carry with me a dog treat so that I could have distracted the beast. This is SELF-DEFENSE. It is not a premeditated attack against a dog. Anticipatory SELF-DEFENSE. ”
Not the fact pattern of this matter.
There is no claim that the dog “attacked” anyone.
Christian did not claim his use of treats was to defend himself,
but to lure the dog to punish the owner for their “intransigience”.
That is vigilantism. It is also theft. It could be robbery.
If it was a child it would be kidnapping.
The relevant standard here is did Amy have reasonable suspicion to beleive that Christian was a threat.
That is trivially true. That is all that is necescary to make Amy’s call legitimate.
You can paste whatever emotional labels you want. The facts are what matters.
If a jury sought to convict Christian the standard would be is there reasonable doubt that Chrisitian illegally threatened Amy and her dog.
Christian clearly threatened Amy and her dog.
But the actual threat is deliberately nebulous.
Is there a possible reading of Christian’s threat that is not a criminal threat ?
The most obvious legal threat is “I will have the police prosecute you for a dog off its leash”. That is a real threat, and a legal one.
It is also unfortunately for Christian not consistent with his remarks.
But a jury would be perfectly free to find that Amy felt criminally threatened,
but it is not proven beyond a reasonable doubt that christian criminally threatened Amy.
All threats are not crimes.
There is a complication here – because Christian acted on the threat – he attempted to lure the dog with a treat.
That and his comments on the treat are all “bad facts”
Instead of telling us what he said
Quote what he actually said.
The media does this all the time.
Your paraphrase is inaccurate.
Though I would note, yours is STILL problematic.
You seem to understand that dog owners would not want dogs to eat treats from strangers.
You do not seem to grasp that is because it is a potention THREAT.
It is simple and effective to shoot people who have their dogs unleashed.
It is also illegal.
What part of Amy’s call to 911 is false ?
Chritian is african american.
He did threaten her and her dog.
Saying that Christian could have handled three guys with bats does not help your case.
It gives Amy more reason to be concerned. She would have been well aware that she was significantly overmatched. She could not fight, she could not run, she could not protect herself or her dog and the dog could not protect her.
You claim that Christian has a record as a good person.
I am not sure that people who threaten others and who plan ahead as he clearly did for this kind of encounter are “good people” but lets assume he is.
How does Amy know that ?
How can she determine whether the person who has just threatened her is gentle jim or Mike Tyson on a rage ?
You say that Christian would only have problems with people whose dogs were off a leash.
Your back to reading minds – badly.
While we must judge this instance based on the information available to Christian and Amy at the time – not there entire CV, Christian seems to me the type of person who is certain that his values trump all others and that he is free to impose them.
Why do I think that – because he says pretty much that.
“You will do as I demand or I will act and you will not like what I do.”
Only in your brain is that not a threat.
You claim he did not mean anything serious by it.
How do we know that ?
You say he was not specific enough.
You have the standard backwards.
When threatened, it is not the role of the threatened party to rewrite the threat in the most benign possible way.
Allan,
Your making alot of assumptions about Christian. Based on the additional information we are getting – those assumptions sound reasonable.
But fundimentally Christian and Amy must be judged based on the information (and lack thereof) that each had at the time.
Amy’s dog should not have been off the leash. That is a legitimate proximate cause for SOME responses. It is NOT for all conceivable ones.
Christian’s own record of events has him threatening her.
The threat is not specific, but he makes it clear she will not like it.
Paul makes a big deal about its not being specific. But he is 180 wrong.
Had Christian said – if you do not leash your dog I will call the police – that would have been a legitimate threat.
But because Christian was not specific Amy must guess, does he intent to call the police ? Attack me ? Attack the Dog ? Poison the dog ?
I would further note that even making friends with the dog without the permission of the owner is an escalating threat. A woman alone in the park with a dog – even a coccker spaniel, is likely to consider that dog protection. And any strange male as a threat – regardless of race. A strange male is not sufficient threat to call the police. But is still a threat. Making friends with the dog can be perceived with disarming your protection.
And that is giving Christian credit. “You will not like it” does not sound like “making freinds with the dog”.
Anyway we do not need to speculate about Christian or Amy.
We have the facts at the time, and their actions must be judged based on what each knew, not what we know now.
Given what we have learned – I think your assumptions are all reasonable.
But when examining this event we mostly must deal with the knowledge that each of the parties had at the time – not what we have learned since.
I am not sure how much the lockdown effected the events in the park.
But our tremendous boredom must be a factor in our amplifying this non-event into something that has cost this woman her job. and her dog and her future.
Initially I was concerned that she gave up the dog. To me that seemed callous.
But then I realized – that to keep the dog, she must leave NYC.
She can not possibly walk that dog anywhere near her current home.
This has made her a target.
Frankly I think she is going to have a rough time staying in NYC.
John, her first problem is she no longer has a job and her reputation may have been severely damaged. I don’t think she should have been fired for that single incident but that is up to her company. I think her company is afraid of what will happen to them if they dont fire her. That is not a good thing. Now a days it seems too many decisions are made for the wrong reasons
She had one hope after this.
Take the red pill.
This was a red pill moment for her.
It would have cost her all her friends, it would have required starting a new life with new friends somewhere else. Taking the red pill would have opened up an entirely new life.
But she chose the blue pill.
The problem with that is – it will still likely cost her her friends and job but it will not bring new friends and a new life.
So long as she sticks with the blue pill she is a paria.
“Allan – all she had to do is keep her dog on the leash.”
You do not seem to understand the concept of time.
She made that mistake. That ship sailed.
Contra to your claims before – that sole fact is NOT the proximate cause of everything after.
We are not entitled to murder someone because they jaywalked.
Christian was not free to threaten anything beyond calling the authorties to enforce the law. Assuming they even gave a damn, which appears to be another left out part of the story – the authorities in Central Park do not give a damn about the Ramble, and Christian took it upon himself to remedy that.
“Or later, when calling 911, just say there is a man threatening me.”
Of I am threatened by a black man I am going to say black man to 911,
If he is hispanic, I will say hispanic. Whatever the most obvious characteristic of that person will be used to describe them.
That is not racism, it is information.
“According to John Say, Christian was threatening the dog, so she was wrong there to.”
A threat to the dog of a woman alone in the park is a threat to her.
Even mop dogs are going to be viewed by their owners as protection.
No matter how little they are.
If Amy had mace for personal protection and Christian attempted to take that from her – that would be a clear threat.
“I admit that during my early years I was a scofflaw. I drove on an expired license for 3 years. I piled up 200 parking tickets (which I got out of, btw), I have jaywalked and I even lived in sin.”
So what.
“Still, Amy is the proximate cause of all the problems.”
Nope. Amy’s actions justify only a limited response on Christians part and he exceeded that. That is his mistake, not hers.
John Say – this has now reached the point of OCD. You need a therapy session.
Yes, you keep making the same long ago refuted arguments over and over.
Mixed with a small assortment of fallacies.
If you have a better argument to make – make it.
I am responding to you. If this is repetitive, it is because you repeat the same poor arguments. If you think this is OCD you are accusing yourself.
Paul can not distinguish between his personal values and facts.
Dogs screw with the underbrush – SO ?
Dogs do in nature what dogs do in nature.
Nature does not give a shit about human laws or human values.
We see the same thing in his rant about cats and owls.
He values birds – which is fine. But he not only expects all others to share his values, but beleives he is entitled to impose those values on nature and that it will comply.
Facts about birds and dogs do not alter the story. The relative value of birds and dogs to some people do not alter the story.
Amy broke the rules of the bird sanctuary – from what I can tell rules that are honored entirely in the breech.
But even if that were not so. She broke the rules. That is not a mortal sin. She is not going to hell for it, and Christian is not free to threaten her or her dog for that sin.
If I were to guess christian and Paul share some traits.
The both oppose the death penalty – except for people who bring dogs or cats into a bird sanctuary.
John Say – the NY Park Service does not want dogs in the underbrush of the Ramble, so they require dogs be on leashes at all times.
“John Say – the NY Park Service does not want dogs in the underbrush of the Ramble, so they require dogs be on leashes at all times.”
So ? You are totally off topic. There are myriads of places I can take that
why is there even a new york park service ? Parks are not a legitimate function of government.
Does NYPS actually enforce those rules ? From what i am reading they do not.
Any government edict that is not enforced is dangerous. If you are going to make law you are obligated to enforce it. If you will not, then do not make law.
Why are you fixated on the intentions of the regulation ? We can debate the merits of the law if you want.
But in this case we clearly have a law that Amy violated. It is a minor law. and aparently not one that is enforced, but still a law.
No one has argued that she did not violate it.
No one would be completely freaked out it Christian called enforcement and they fined her.
But that is the limits of the consequences for that, and Christians only legitimate response was to call for enforcement. He is not the bird police, he is not free to enforce it himself. Honestly neither he nor you should be lecturing about it either that is so very “Karen”. Call enforcement or let go. No moral posturing, no lectures presumptive that your values are supperuior to those of others because they are backed by a law no one enforces.
Certainly no threats – beyond calling enforcement.
““John Say – the NY Park Service does not want dogs in the underbrush of the Ramble, so they require dogs be on leashes at all times.”
Paul, during certain times and in certain areas every time a light changes one can have thirty people violating the law by crossing the street in front of cars. when they were supposed to wait. Does that give the car owner who has the right of way the legal justification to put his hand on the horn and leave it there while moving the car in such a way that it might touch and push some of those pedestrians?
In both cases Christian and the driver, those upset by an infraction of the law are taking threatening action against other people. Can you tell us the theoretical difference between the two? Do you know what most drivers do? They slowly move waiting as the crowd of people crossing stops. That sometimes costs a couple of lights.
Allan – if the motorist went through the intersection on a green and a pedestrian stepped out in front of him, the motorist would not be held liable for the accident.
Paul, you are answering your own questions not the questions under discussion. You completely neglected what I said about the realities in NYC. If the motorist continued driving under the circumstances mentioned above and hurt or killed one or more people he likely would be indicted.
Whether it be pedestrians jay walking when the light isn’t in their favor or walking an unleashed dog, those that are upset by those wrongful actions have no right to threaten or injure the other party.
Allan – I live in a state where the person next to you may be armed to the teeth. The fact that New Yorkers, in my opinion, are rude and insane, has nothing to do with who is in the right. Central Park has a set of regulations for which you can be fined. Amy was committing a fineable offense. Christian was trying to get Amy to comply with the law/regulations of the Park. Amy is the proximate cause.
Paul, no one has said Amy shouldn’t have kept her dog on a leash, but that does not give Christian the right to threaten her, give her dog a pet treat, touch the dog or Amy. What makes his actions worse is they sound like they were premeditated with the intention of creating hostility where he felt he had the power to force people to do his bidding which isn’t a right Christian has even though Amy should have leashed the dog. The rest of the stuff has nothing to do with the question at hand.
Allan – Christian never attempted to touch Amy, his entire goal was to get her to leash her dog. Something she eventually did.
Paul, you are making excuses for Christian’s bad and likely premeditated behavior. He attempted to separate her dog from her, give the dog a treat which since he could be a nut might have had poison, and potentially take the dog. None of that is acceptable behavior. He was taking the law into his own hands and since he was bigger and stronger than she we can see cause for significant concern on her part.
The fact that she didn’t leash the dog is not a reason for him to do those things just like a driver doesn’t have a good reason to run over a jay walker.
Allan – according to you, Central Park and NYC is the Wild West. Of course Christian is taking the law into his own hands. It quickly solves the problem and life goes on.
“Allan – according to you, Central Park and NYC is the Wild West. ”
That is not true. Will you show me where I compared NYC to the Wild West? If you don’t do I do what you have been doing to david Benson for months? 🙂 Retract or prove your claim.
“Christian is taking the law into his own hands. It quickly solves the problem ”
It didn’t solve the problem. People will continue to walk their dogs off leash in the bramble. Will some trouble makers walk their dog off leash just to have a bit of violent fun at Christian’s expense?
Allan – I do not retract
Paul said: ““Allan – according to you, Central Park and NYC is the Wild West. ” but he refuses to show where I compared NYC to the Wild West. He needs to stop making accusations he cannot prove.
https://jonathanturley.org/2020/05/26/insurance-executive-put-on-leave-after-tirade-in-central-park-against-african-american-bird-watcher/comment-page-2/#comment-1957594 The actual statement is 2 replies above.
Allan – do you understand hyperbole?
“Allan – do you understand hyperbole?”
Do you really want to go there ?
Do we know have to look at every statement on this – yours, mine, christians amy’s and determine if they are hyperbolee ?
Regardless, there is plenty of evidence that Amy is stressed out, and not completely rational. That is a common response to stress.
We do not expect perfection from people.
There is little evidence that Christian is stressed, All his actions seem to be thought out and intentional, some even planned.
That is NOT a good fact for him.
Finally none of them appear to be engaged in hyperbolee.
But if either was – it would be Amy.
John Say – stay in your own conversations. The hyperbole was about a Wild West comment.
Paul said: ““Allan – according to you, Central Park and NYC is the Wild West. ” but he refuses to show where I compared NYC to the Wild West. He needs to stop making accusations he cannot prove.
https://jonathanturley.org/2020/05/26/insurance-executive-put-on-leave-after-tirade-in-central-park-against-african-american-bird-watcher/comment-page-2/#comment-1957594 The actual statement is 2 replies above.
“Allan – do you understand hyperbole?”
Of course I understand hyperbole, Paul. Do you know what facts are? When you are creating a case you use fact. When you are arguing a case you can use hyperbole but it can bite you in the a$$ because no one can tell when the facts stop and hyperbole begins. Then both your hyperbole and facts can be torn apart as has occurred here.
I believe that in your case even you no longer recognize the facts because you tried to prove yourself correct using hyperbole instead of facts. You didn’t confuse me. You confused yourself.
Allan – I never confuse myself. 🙂
“Allan – I never confuse myself. 🙂”
Paul, confused persons seldom recognize their own confusion. 🙂
Allan – I take several high level trivia tests every day and I get most of them right. Are you sure you are not the one who is confused and is doesn’t recognize it.. 🙂
“Allan – I take several high level trivia tests every day and I get most of them right. Are you sure you are not the one who is confused and is doesn’t recognize it.. 🙂”
Perhaps you got so used to trivia you forgot how to think. 🙂
Allan – nup 😉
“Allan – nup 😉”
Paul said: ““Allan – according to you, Central Park and NYC is the Wild West. ” but he refuses to show where I compared NYC to the Wild West. He needs to stop making accusations he cannot prove. Paul -yup 🙂
https://jonathanturley.org/2020/05/26/insurance-executive-put-on-leave-after-tirade-in-central-park-against-african-american-bird-watcher/comment-page-2/#comment-1957594 The actual statement is 2 replies above.
Allan – are you trying to set a world’s record for the number of responses on a subject on a Turley blog? My understanding is that the number is over 800 now. How high do you have to get?
“trying to set a world’s record”
Paul, you are the main contributing factor so ask yourself that question. You got tangled up in trying to prove a bad position right and you haven’t stopped since. Doesn’t make you look good my friend. Just admit when you are wrong and things will get better. 🙂
Allan – my initial stand is that Amy needs to put her dog on the leash and it all end. What is wrong about that?
“Allan – my initial stand is that Amy needs to put her dog on the leash and it all end. What is wrong about that?”
Paul after traveling into space and getting lost you have finally made it to the first statement along with a bit of space nuttiness.
I think everyone agrees that Amy broke the rules and didn’t leash her dog. Bad Amy. That is not ” and it all end. ” as you put it. Christian didn’t like that and acted in a way that was also bad. Bad Christian. It appears more and more that Christian’s actions were pre-meditated. Doubly bad Christian.
You made some statements that were wrong. Do you know how we know they were wrong. Anonymous agreed with you giving you the kiss of death. Bad Paul. 🙂
Allan – there are so many Anonymous that I am not sure who is supporting me.
The one at the bottom of the barrel
Allan – did you know we added a new Anonymous last night?
“Allan – did you know we added a new Anonymous last night?”
Paul, At least the new anonymous can feel secure that the old anonymous will always stand holding his place at the bottom of the barrel.
What is wrong with that is that you are not accurately stating your own position.
Separately you are probably innaccurate. It is pretty evident from the many remarks that Christian has made that this is an issue for him, that he has deputized himself as the Ramble leash law enforcer and that Amy just had the misfortune to be his first victim
So no Amy leashing her dog would have only ended this for Amy.
Beyond your “position” is true(ish) but not correct.
My family was in an autimobile accident a year ago that nearly killed them all (they are fine now), Had they left 5 minutes earlier or later the accident would not have occured.
But no one would call their departure time the proximate cause of the accident,
despite the fact that “but for”leaving when they did they would not have had the accident.
Further your “position” is a deliberate effort to obfuscate Christian’s culpabilty.
If I do a rolling stop at an intersection and you blast through at 80mph the other direction and kill me, is my failure to stop the proximate cause of my death ?
This is not even fundimentally a legal question such as stop signs and speed limits.
It is a moral one.
So let me ask it to you bluntly and simply.
Does a small error on the part of a person allow the person who observes it to respond in any way they want ?
Amy’s actions were volitional – choices.
Christians actions were volitional – choices.
Christians actions while in response to Amy’s were still free choices.
And you are responsible for your own free choices, – not matter what might have provoked you.
I am libertarian – individual liberty is a core value for me – as it was for those who created this government, and the most significant thinkers on government from the 18th centruy forward.
But we are not free to do whatever we please – we are specificaly barred from initiating force against others. We can respond (proportionaly) to force with force, but not initiate it.
Amy’s leaving her dog run was at the very worst a dimunative use of force.
Any force response by Christian was morally obligated to be proportionate.
Christians response was NOT proportionate. It was also not self defense.
It is therefore a violations (a small one) of the Non-Aggression principle. Which is both a libertarian foundational principle and the foundation of criminal law and government.
Christians choice/response dances very close to a crime – a minor one, but still a crime.
If the law requires your bank to clear snow withing 24hrs, and they fail to do so are you justified in committing armed bank robbery ?
The chain of causality you presume requires either no free choice on the part of Chrisitan or a justified and proportionate response.
Amy’s conduct can not be the cause of all possible outcomes that come after it.
John Say – keep to the facts, dude. You are emotionally involved.
How so ? If you are going to make an assertion – you should be able to support that assertion.
I have actually completely stick to the facts. You are the one who keeps getting into areas of emotion.
I do not know Amy, I do not know Christian. I do not like either of them.
I can not see any emotional attachment to either.
But if some argument I have made is an appeal to emotion – point that out.
John Say – you have told us your life story. What does that have to do with the facts? You are spending so much time defending Amy, regardless of whether you like her or not, it is evident you are emotionally involved.
“John Say – you have told us your life story. What does that have to do with the facts? ”
There was but a single purpose to that – to rebutt your nonsensical claims to know my own past, thoughts, or experiences. You made radically false assumptions about me with no basis. My life story is not relevant EXCEPT the rebut your efforts to pretend that you know me, and that your false presumptions about me are relevant.
“You are spending so much time defending Amy,”
I am not defending Amy at all. I am addressing bad facts, bad arguments and fallacies argued by others such as you.
“regardless of whether you like her or not, it is evident you are emotionally involved.”
Back to reading minds, and idiotic arguments that feelings are relevant.
Your claims about my “emotional involvement” are both false and irrelevant.
Just as every other claim you have made to know or understand me.
What does it take before you grasp that pretending to know the mental state, emotional state, or life experience of the person you are arguing with is ludicrously stupid and near certain to be wrong.
Need I refresh your memory about how horribly wrong you have been in your guesses regarding me already ?
If you do not want my life story – do not pretend to know my life story.
If you make a fallacious argument based on the pretense of knowledge that you can not have, you should expect the possiblity that you will step on landmines and blow yourself up.
Regardless, most every venture afeild we have had has been follow irrelevant claims by you.
He does not need to admit error.
Just quit trying to rehash the same ground and get different results.
The real scope of this issue is rather small.
Much of this debate is extraneous.
The entire debate over the leash and the law is mostly extraneous.
The park rules require the dog leashed (or under control).
I highly doubt either Amy or Christian knew the nuances of the law.
But they both knew the dog was not free to run around in the Ramble – which it probably was doing – though we have no direct evidence of that.
I will be happy to thrash the leash law for another 100 comments,
but even if the law specified exactly a 6ft leash – which it does not, and specified lethal injection as punishment. that would not change the issues.
This is not an argument.
John Say – stay in your lane.
Which lane would that be ?
Still not an argument.
Paul, you constantly try to make this about the people, me, allan, yourself, rather than the facts.
I know nothing about you, except what you write, and I have no way of knowing whether that is true.
I have written of myself, you have no way of knowing if any of that is true.
While it is, that is irrelvant to the argument.
The facts are what matters. This is not about you or allan or me.
Trying to make it so is narcisist and a logical fallacy.
amen
“Allan – Christian never attempted to touch Amy,:”
Unknown. We have only Christians account of anything prior to the video.
“his entire goal was to get her to leash her dog.”
Back to mind reading.
Also irrelevant.
A legitimate goal is not a justification for an illegitimate act.
John Say – according to Melody, after the dog was leashed, Christian went back to birding. Amy has not said Christian threatened her after she leashed the dog.
I do not care what Christian did later.
It is irrelevant whether he saved infants from a fire or robbed a bank.
It is also irrelevant whether Christian further threatened her after she leashed the dog.
You seem completely unable to confine yourself to the small set of actual facts.
There is a very small possibility that something Melody says that Christian says can be used to impeach Christian. But in all other ways Melody is not a witness.
Complying with a threat does not change the fact that the threat was issued – and acted on. What happened after is irrelevant.
I do not care whether christian is black or white, gay or straight male or female.
Nor do I care of the same an many other attributes regarding amy.
I do not like either of them. But that is irrelevant.
NO!!!
Your concept of proximate cause is infinite.
Summary violations do not ever justify private parties from any enforcement beyond calling the police PERIOD.
There is no “You jaywalked, I get on free murder” proximate cause rule.
You have pushed this claim since the start.
It is OBVIOUSLY stupid.
By your logic the police were free to murder Floyd – because he committed some minor offense.
Even the police – who can do much more to enforce the law, than Christian can, are still limited in what their response is.
IF the police were free to do anything they wanted once the observed a summary offense, our jails would be empty, no one would make it to trial without being killed.
John Say – ask your smarty-pants wife if reductio ad absurdum is a logical fallacy? Now you are just being silly.
“John Say – ask your smarty-pants wife if reductio ad absurdum is a logical fallacy? Now you are just being silly.”
My Wife is an appellate criminal defense lawyer. Regardless you dragged her into this with your assumption that i had zero understanding of violence against women, or racial discrimination. You have stepped deep into dog shit every time you pretend to know my life, my motives or my thoughts. In addition to being wrong, both your life and mine are irrelevant to the debate. Facts, logic reason.
My profession is logic.
reduction ad absurdem is a valid logical method more than 2000 years old.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_absurdum
Goodwin’s law is about comparisons to Nazi’s it does not apply when the reference is to real nazi’s.
Hitler is a real, I did not compare to Hitler or Nazi’s
I asserted an actual logical truth.
A true statement does not become false because Hitler made it.
If Hilter troubles you substitute anyone else you think is evil and wrong.
Stalin, Mao, Trump, Obama.
Or more simply – guilt by associations is a fallacy.
You should acquant yourself with logical fallacies.
Or maybe not, because if you removed logical fallacies from your arguments you would have nothing to say.
“Allan – if the motorist went through the intersection on a green and a pedestrian stepped out in front of him, the motorist would not be held liable for the accident.”
Probably false.
In much of the country pedestrians always have right away.
That said. I will also provide the advice I gave my son and daughter while teaching them defensive driving.
If you try to look for the mistakes of others then:
Maybe they will look out for yours.
Maybe you will avoid a accident that is not your fault, but will still take up your time.
Maybe someone will not be hurt.
Put simply, “Its not my fault” is not the response of a good person.
The decription of this as “Two Karen’s in the park” is excellent.
As Allan noted – I have not defended Amy with respect to misconduct it is pretty likely she
did – though I did realize more recently that the only evidence the dog was ever off the leash is Christian words in his FB post.
We do not have any of the misconduct that lead to the video in the video.
We have only Christian’s FB posts to rely on.
“Paul can not distinguish between his personal values and facts.”
John, when people live in such close quarters these more trivial questions arise with enhanced vigor and frequency. The question becomes how do we meet the needs of citizens where rights are continuously conflicting with one another. We live in an approximate similar spectrum but I believe are on different sides of that spectrum so I don’t want to get into a long drawn out discussion as to our differences. Our similarities are far more important in the present situation we face.
For NYC to function it has to live in a special world where we both have objections otherwise such a city could not possibly exist. Those special needs create even more craziness and outright fraudulant behavior. The only way to survive is to accept the Constitution and the fact that states can have their own Constitutions that do stupid things and reflect ideas that conflict with the ideas in the DOI.
Central Park and the Park System of NYState are very important to the people that live in proximity to these areas. Ask any New Yorker how they feel about Central Park and virtually all will opt for such a park even though they have their own personal difficulties with the rules and how it is set up. Understand that underneath the government agency are also private agencies funded by private donations that help maintain aspects of the park that otherwise would be on a downhill trend. It is that type of private money, ideas and workproduct that is very much responsible for the Park, the High Line, the Museums and many other things that make NYC and enjoyable place to be. An unleashed dog in the bramble is an infraction very low on the list.
I don’t know how you would solve the conflicts inherent in a NYC environment. I live with them when I am there even to the extent of who is permitted to do things in my own apartment and what can be done but prefer the freedoms I have elsewhere.
What I see with Central Park and your exegesis of it is another example of how things go wrong when government acts outside its legitimate domain.
Our values are provided privately.
So you are clear I am not attacking the things that make New York attractive.
There are many museums and parks and theaters and …. in my community – probably more on a per capital basis by far than NYC.
They are private. They are also substantially cheaper than their NYC equivalents.
I am aware of the number of Museums in Manhattan – are you aware of the number of people ? And do not get me started on Parks.
Convicted sex offenders are not allowed to live within 200′ of a park or a school. The local PD’s mapped the city and found there was almost no where that a sex offender could legally live.
In my country probably 1/5 of the entire country is parks. maybe more.
Huge ones and tiny ones, Private ones and public ones.
I am a 10m drive from a wildlife sancturary where possibly millions of geese and ducks stop for a bit headed north or south each year. And that does not count the permanent residents.
People are free to value whatever they personally wish.
If museums are your thing – Manhattan is probably a better choice – as good as any here might be, they can not afford the art in Manhattan.
But if you want nature, birds, …. Manhattan is a poor choice.
Aside from all else I mentioned, I am 30min from a gigantic Boyscout camp (private),
and 45min from private campgrounds that abut the apalachian trail and are nearly as large as my country. If you are patient along with the birds you can spot bears.
And if you are so inclinded you can hike all the way to Georgia – or Canada.
Each of us is free to value whatever we want. And if what you want is in Manhattan – live there. But if you are really into birds – you are in the wrong place.
John Say – Canada says their border to the US is closed, especially NY.
So ?
People are free to value whatever they want. I am sure there are alot of parks in NYC.
But they are not nature or natural. In nature dogs chase birds, dig holes, and poop,
and it is not called destruction – it is called nature.
Some of the parks near me are so large that if I take my dogs to them they can run free for hours, and never meet a person or another dog. They can poop and dig and chase birds, and no one needs to clean up after them – because it is nature, it is huge and it will not notice a bit of poop and a couple of holes in a couple of thousand acres
“But they are not nature or natural.”
John, NYC is a densly populated area but is relatively tiny. One doesn’t have to stay in Manhattan if one wants the country. That is why many well to do New Yorkers have other homes close by either in the mountains or on the beaches. NYC is not a good place for people that do not like crowds and like a lot of woods surrounding them.
When I was a kid I used to go across the Hudson to NJ where I would hike through the hills overlooking NYC. I like the mountains and woods so I go out west and visit nature in the wild doing some crazy things that I remember today with horror. Until recently when at home in NY I used to take my dog to what is now called Roosevelt Island right across the river that my building was on. It had a huge empty area where my dog could run and play with only a rare passer by. That ended when they built the FDR Freedom Park some years ago. It wasn’t huge,4-5 acres but I’m not that big needing such a large area. It was convenient.
I am not trying to make this some contest.
NYC will wax and wane as it appeals to more or less people.
My entire county has a fraction of the people in NYC, and frankly I think it is overcrowded.
We each have our own values.
My personal skills are in high demand in places like NYC and CA.
I could double my income trivially. But I would also double my cost of living.
My home is about 5500 sq ft on 2 acres in the woods. My brother owns a home in Berkley. It is probably 5 times the price, and 1/4 the size. He spent more for earthquake proof foundations for a tiny addition than I paid for my entire property.
I could make much more in SF or NYC but much would cost more, I would gain somethings and lose others. I am happy.
That is what counts.
“No. NYC cannot be built in a purely Libertarian environment. ”
Exactly as is – probably not. When people are free to persue their own individual values you do not end up with exactly the same thing as when values must be acheived by manipulating force.
Does that mean that a city the size of NYC could not exist and in fact be better with less government and more accomplished through private efforts to reach values ?
Absolutely. Without the slightest doubt.
Regardless, my goal is not to change NYC,
But “Don’t tread on me”
John, I focused on museums because there are state parks and federal parks whose area is far bigger than NYC. I also explained that one’s view depended on how one observed the variables. Do you wish to look at a museum based on numbers, square footage, what they contain etc. Even the NY Public Library contains a museum aside from the building and its furnishings which is a museum by itself.
“In my country probably 1/5 of the entire country is parks. maybe more.”
Is that country or county? How about in your city? How many museums and how many square feet of museum. In your city how much of it is park? 14% of NYC (30,000 acres) is operated by the Department of Parks. That does not include any parks owned by developments, State or Federal Parks. I am not sure if that includes the parks maintained by private buildings where the public is free to use at will.
AS I told you I have more than one home. I have one in Manhattan because I love Manhattan or used to, but I choose to live elsewhere chosing one place as my permanent residence. The home I call home is different than NYC.
There are lots of museums in my county (not country, sorry).
It is a tourist mecca and there is an enormous number of museums wrapped arround our unique tourist draw. I have little interest in those as they litterally drill local history into you starting in grade school and drag you off to local museums all focused on some facett of that local history and culture. Further nearly all our museums are private, they are explictly intended to make money – though they are still far cheaper than most in NYC and that is ignoring that parking in manhattan costs more than a family visit to a local museum where parking is free.
But this is not a contest. I do go to NYC (or more likely DC) to see things that are just not here. And New Yorkers come here in hordes to experince out local culture, history, and art. But they are not coming for Cezanne or the ballet. and though we have good ordestra’s and theater – all privately supported, No one would come here for them if they could go to NYC.
If NYC has 30,000 acres for 10M people then to be comparable my city should have 180Acres. We have cemetaries that large. There are two major parks in the city that are probably 4-5 times that, there are innumerable smaller parks. And not far outside the city are parks with more total acreage than NYC parks. And slightly further than that are parks the size of Manhattan.
Regardless, this is not some contest. No one sane doubts NYC has some attractive and relatively unique features. Nor do I doubt you can find trees.
But you are not going to find actual Nature in NYC. You will find “managed nature” where humans decide what matters and then must expend significant energy to bring that to the fore.
And that is the conflict of values that is at the core of this. Amy – and I would venture an enormous number of manhattanites want a place to safely let their dogs run.
Christian wants a place where birds are not disturbed by dogs.
Those two values are not compatible in the density of NYC.
New York government has paid lips service to Christian – giving him a part of the park and laws to preserve it. But does not really appear to be expending the energy necescary to truly give Christian what he wants. NYC is wisely choosing to ignore the leash laws – because there are far more people with dogs that need to run than birders, and not enough space for both.
Christian – and too many others are blaming Amy for ignoring the rules.
But that did not happen in a vaccuum. The combination of giving the birders what the wanted while failing to enforce the rules allowed the government to appear to be meeting the needs of multiple groups without the resources needed to actually do so.
Christian appears to have won a great victory for birders.
But that is likely to be a phyric victory. There are just not enough birders and far too many dog owners, and not enough space for both.
In some form or another this conflict will return.
John Say – thought you would appreciate this article from the NY Post’
The NYPD is working with the Manhattan DA’s Office to determine whether any charges could be brought against the white woman who called cops on a black man in Central Park, a police official said Friday.
https://nypost.com/2020/05/29/nypd-discussing-charges-for-central-park-karen-amy-cooper-with-da/
Why do I care ? There are no charges that can or should be brought, against Amy.
There are charges that can be brought against Christian but probably should not.
Regardless if NYC thinks that it is policitally wise to send a message to women that they must place their own safety second to progressive political correctness – then go for it.
I am sure Trump will be happy to regain the women’s vote.
John Say – you are in denial, buddy. You are heavily emotional vested in this subject and defending Amy.
Untrue, irrelevant, and not an argument.
“If NYC has 30,000 acres for 10M people then to be comparable my city should have 180Acres.”
The proper comparison would be the number of acres within your city’s limits to the number of acres of park. All of NYC might just fit into a tiny corner of your city. It is not big enough to have large acreage of forest land. It is not meant as a natural nature preserve. It is a financial center among other things and in Manhattan alone somewhere up to 2 million enter daily to go to work. Add to that 65 plus million tourists a year plus the >1.6 million that live in Manhattan. I don’t know if that includes those that have residencies elsewhere.
“Christian wants a place where birds are not disturbed by dogs.”
Everybody wants more than they have whether in your hamlet or the megalopolis of NYC. In fact many that live in NYC have multiple homes that can include large ranches, forests etc. in one of their other homes. People don’t pay NYC prices if they don’t like it despite the lack of space for the dogs to run.
I’ve been in the bramble a lot of times and there is plenty of space for both. Most of the times I see very few people if any. The two of them need therapy or they should live with anonymous and learn how lucky they are with what they have.
My county – not my city is just about 3 times the size of NYC according to Wikipedia.
I find that hard to beleive as it takes very little time to drive accross my county in either direction and far more to cross just manhattan.
I have criticised the government ownership and operation of the amenities in NYC that new yorkers value.
I do not expect new york to change. The entire world knows that Rent control is disasterous and corrupt – yet NYC has had it far longer than I have been alive.
I doubt NYC gets fixed.
But the least we can do is to not replicated the failures of NYC to the rest of the country.
“I can understand that but it has improved the lives of millions”
Of course it has. Cuba has not actually failed – yet, and even the USSR collapsed only because it was unable to improve standard of living as fast as the west.
If we disregard the constant bloodshed Socialism works – often. Standards of living rise, people are better off relative to where they were before.
But they are inarguably worse off than any system closer to a free market.
Not only that but we have very good data on this. We have two separate measures that almost certainly are interdependent.
We know that across almost any interval of time for which we have data, that rise in standard of living inversely correlates to size of government – down to government sizes of 19% of GDP – we can follow the same trends down to government sizes of about 5% of GDP with 19th century data of poorer quality.
We do not know the lower bounds – though it is certainly below government size of 19% of GDP.
Basically for every 10% of GDP that government spend the rate of increase of standard of living decreases by 1%.
We get very similar results when we look at the impact of freedom and growth in standard of living.
Government size is just a substitute for reduced freedom.
Does NYC improve over time – absolutely.
Would the rate of improvement increase with less govenrment and more freedom.
That is what the data says.
There are multiple other ways to demonstrate the same result.
The same outcome can be demonstrated not just by real world data,
but by applying the laws of economics – which are just immutable patterns of human behavior.
John, there is no country of any size that exists with a pure economic system. They are almost all if not al hybrids. We have no choice but be pragmatic and compromise. That is how the 13 States were able to get together and create the USA. I do not believe in socialism and know it doesn’t work. Capitalism has its problems but it is the best system that exists. NYC is far to socialized but not because of parks and museums rather things like rent control and an overbearing government with too many regulations an an inability today to do anything without paying immense amounts of money to satisfy all the rent seekers.
In the next election I can chose to throw my vote away and vote for a third party or vote for the candidate that is closest to what I believe while pushing Congress and other leaders in my direction. I don’t choose to vote for perfection. Perfection is the enemy of good.
When you bring up Cuba the way you did it sounds to me that you believe only in black and white. There is a whole spectrum in between and I can concentrate almost 100% of my abilities on moving the nation in your direction (since we are so far to the left now) that it doesn’t make sense for me to say if it isn’t my way I’m leaving. That kind of attitude will insure the nation’s movement towards the left.
In NYC’s case a change in mayor (Giuliani) created a wonderful shift in NYC but NYC is on the left so now we have another mayor that is destroying the city. Understand that large congested urban areas are more likely to move in a leftward direction. That is because there is more social interaction so one can’t just throw up their hands rather they should work towards a better city.
Does that mean outright socialism? No. Rent Control that you mentioned failed miserably and caused hardship for the poor as well as the city. WE know it doesn’t work yet those with leftist ideas based on a type of religious faith can’t learn lessons from the past and certain aspects of rent control are being put back in.
I don’t find anything wrong with significant city involvement in the major parks. They are public goods. I am concerned with the corruption involved along with the politics and the inability for the city to make things work. The classic example of that is the Wolman’s Rink that was out of service for years even though the city paid huge sums of money to reopen it. Trump did that task with his own money in record time under his own budget far less than city expenditures. He recouped the capital he put into it with the money paid to buy tickets and after that money was returned the ice skating rink was returned to the city. Not a bad deal for the people of NY.
Do you think Central Park, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the other large museums are complete products of the city. They aren’t. Donations and citizen groups keep the cash flow and things working in a way that could not be accomplished by the city.
I appreciate you libertarian viewpoints and probably support most of them to a point. However, I’m not going to go for perfection at the expense of the good.
Government and particularly democracy are structurally incentivized to grow.
It is irrelevant whether that is actually in peoples best interests.
I do not know what a “pure” system is. We do have a pretty good idea what works and what does not. The problem is that in markets the incentives near universally work towards our betterment. In government the nearly universally work towards our detriment.
But for all its problems some govenrment is necescary.
“the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.”
There were compromises involved in creating this country. But with one glaring example they were small and fundimentally there was just disagreement on how to best accomplish a near unifromly shared objectect. Government sufficiently powerful to actually government and yet sufficiently constrained to allow individual liberty.
There was little disagreement on that. Today we are not close to agreement on the scope of government much less how to attain it.
The evidence I used was not specific to socialism. Socialism is merely one form of big government. The core reason socialism fails is that government fails more as it grows.
The specific form is not critical.
Absolutely bigger failures of government are more consequential than smaller ones.
The city will not collapse over the failure of park rules. While it might over housing rules.
But it all adds up. One big failure, may have less net impact than 10,000 small ones.
“Today we are not close to agreement on the scope of government much less how to attain it.”
John, The failure is that we have permitted society to fragment and the elites to run the governent. That is what makes Trump so refreshing yet at the same time so hated. He threatens the elites in government whose existence is based on payoffs of one type or another. Trump is not an insider so he threatens the entire system or representitives use for their own advantage.
The “public goods” argument is circular.
We can call parks public goods, we have called education a public good and that has worked abysmally. The left wants to make higher education a public good and yet for all the problems of our higher education system it is far superior to that of Europe which was once the best in the world, but now it is a poor quality public good.
We seek to make healthcare into a public good, Housing, nothing prevents food from becoming a public good.
Calling something a public good, is just saying – we are going to have a little bit of socialism.
Are public parks the hill I want to die on ? No.. But lets not pretend that they actually would not function better if they were not a public good.
There is a single criteria determining what must be a government function, and what must not. That is a very simple test.
Is force necescary ?
If a problem can not be solved without the use of force, it is within the exclusive domain of government. National defence, punishment of crime. Enforcement of contracts, enforcement of torts – these are not things that can be accomplished without force.
“The “public goods” argument is circular.”
John, the public goods argument is a touchy thing because of a vision by some that everything can be a public good so we therefore can’t have any. That type of logic fails in the long run and that is why no pure libertarian world can exist because it would have to depend solely on the good will of other persons most of the time.
Think of a moderate sized city where the sidewalks and streets aren’t considered pubic goods. Each store would have a different side walk perhaps on a different level and some might not have any at all building their store right up to the street. Are you assuming the the streets lined with moving cars is not a public good and each street can be a private entity? Perhaps we could have toll booths for every store.
Yes, the idea of a public good has to be restrained as does the idea of purely libertarian country. I don’t care if your city does things that are crazy as long as your city/ state are working within the boundaries of the Constitution which by the way gives power to the states under our federalist system. All I have to do is choose the best location for me to live in.
Understand, just because I believe in our federalist system I don’t give up recognizing that governments should be severely limited. I believe a lot of things that we designate in part or in the whole as public goods have negative effects not positive ones. I am simply accepting reality.
Provide a bright line definition of what constitutes a public good ?
Your attack on my argument only works logically if there really is such a thing as a public good, and it is sufficiently clearly identifiable that we can all agree on it.
Otherwise noting that public goods is circular and always will fail a reductio ad absurdem EXCEPT for those that beleive everything is a public good, is a valid argument.
“Provide a bright line definition of what constitutes a public good ?”
John, there is no bright line and there is always creep so indeed a problem exists in defining public goods, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist or might exist at one time but might not exist in another.
Perhaps the line should be drawn as to what is not a public good and I leave that in your good hands. In the process you can tell us how to manage the zigzagged streets that are mixed with cars and pedestrians. Don’t you think that should be a local issue?
“John, there is no bright line and there is always creep so indeed a problem exists in defining public goods, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist or might exist at one time but might not exist in another.”
Law and government are about bright lines.
Government is force. there is no room for “creep” in the use of force.
The social contract is explicitly about the legitimate and illegitimate use of force.
We vest MOST of our natural right to use force in govenrment – reserving only self defence and defence of others. In return we expect that government will only use force when justified. Justification is NOT some vague concept. It requires bright lines.
“Perhaps the line should be drawn as to what is not a public good ”
Absolutely positively NOT!
The domain of human behavior is near infinite. Within that domain the overwhelming majority of possible behavior is the legitimate free choice of the individual.
The central premise of the social contract is that the domain of government is small.
We are clear and specific in what is prohibited and everything else is permitted.
As to zig-zagging streets and pedestrians – try TORTS.
An enormous amount of law and especially regulation can be handled by torts.
A major advantage of torts is that it is a posteriori not a priori.
There is no tort for a harm that MIGHT have happened.
Specific conduct is not prohibited. Harming others is.
You keep making the assumption that because something is done in a specific way by government in your experience, that it was always done that way and that there is no other way to do it.
Most problems have many solutions. Some better than others.
The use of force is rarely the best solution.
Any government solution is always the use of force.
“Law and government are about bright lines.”
John, that is why there is no law defining what a public good is. There are also no specific rules and definitions of force by government though non-specifically we can see laws that frequently need to be adjudicated. Both the concepts of public goods and unlawful excessive government force belong in the same box. One might claim you will know it when you see it.
“The social contract is explicitly about the legitimate and illegitimate use of force.”
Where is the “social contract” defined or put into law in the Constitution?
“As to zig-zagging streets and pedestrians – try TORTS.”
How do torts come into play? Torts exist in contract law. No one signed on the bottom line that the streets would be straight.
“You keep making the assumption that because something is done in a specific way by government in your experience, that it was always done that way and that there is no other way to do it.”
Why do you keep making that claim when over and over again I nave said there are different ways of handling things. Sometimes a common good exists and is needed in a particular time frame and a particular location. If the streets end up zigzagged it is because the owners of each individual property chose the way they would look unless they made a contract with one another. Unfortunately there are frequently holdouts so that decisions can become a free for all. This is where your particular arguments fail, not that I want them to fail, but they do.
You are the one that says you don’t like the idea of public goods so tell us specifically how you will manage the problem in a reasonably effective manner. If you can then I guess we can say that that particular needed solution was not a public good.
So we agree there is no clear definition of public good.
I am going to return to this.
I am going to divide government use of force into two parts.
Each must be proper.
The first is what constitutes legitimate law.
I would have defined that by specific principles.
I think that is relative easy to do.
First a law must not merely claim a public purpose, it must accomplish it.
I will call this the utilitarian principle
Government may not use force except to produce a greater good.
O do not use greater good in an abstract sense, Claiming a good purpose for a law is insufficient. I am using greater good in the utilitarian way. the sum of the benefits must be greater than the sum of the harms – direct and indirect.
Criminal laws. Contract laws, torts all meet that quite easily.
Little if anything else does.
And that is a bright line.
Utility is necescary but not sufficient.
The use of force mus always be structured to infringe on rights to the least possible extent while still meeting the utility requirement.
This is a pretty bright line too.
If a less infringing way to acheive the same ends exists, then the law is invalid and immoral.
Last a law must have and maintain super majority support.
I am not talking about voting.
I mean that nearly all people must choose to obey the low without the use of force.
You could call this the efficiency standard, or you could say that the law must reflect established norms. Essentially the law may only proscribe people from doing what few people actually do. Few people murder others.
The efficiency part is relevant because if laws were generally disregarded but for enforcement then the cost of the law is high and government becomes a serious burden to society. This is fundimentally the same as saying a law must proscribe what nearly all of us already accept as immoral.
Maybe there are other criteria for justified law, but that is a solid start.
The tests above are bright lines or close.
Returning briefly to public goods, A bright line definition of a public good would be something that government can provide while conforming to all the above proscriptions.
That would be national defense, law enforcement, courts and prisons.
I do not hink anything else can meet the criteria above.
Returning to Law creation.
Our constitution chose a different approach. Rather than defining principles,
It directed that the constitutionally specified government powers were within the domain of government.
I think the end result is close to the same. but this requires that the constitution be understood as written.
I would note that the constitution itself enshrines the principle of least infringment by specifying that rights exist and that government must infringe on those the least possible.
Once we have made clear bright line law we must enforce it.
One of the reasons we must be very careful about the laws we right is that all law is imposed by FORCE.
Was the police officer who killed George Floyd permitted to do so while enforcing a counterfeiting law ?
The answer is yes. And it must be. If a Law can not be enforced it it requires killing the person violating it, then most will resist to the point that the police can not enforce.
But the police are not free to kill everyone accused of counterfeiting.
But they are allowed to respond to those refusing to comply with the law with proportionate force to that being used to resist.
Bright lines – atleast far brighter than we have now.
Further rooted in principles and concepts that are near universally held.
“First a law must not merely claim a public purpose, it must accomplish it.
I will call this the utilitarian principle”
John, laws exist for many reasons and sometimes the reason is wrong. The greater good might not be served because the definition of the greater good varies with the individual who may not have your understanding of what the greater good is. You have put into conflict your rationale with the democratic process.
“Last a law must have and maintain super majority support.
I am not talking about voting.
I mean that nearly all people must choose to obey the low without the use of force.”
Rules of basic behavior as I have said numerous times before are developed over the millennia. Hammurabi didn’t create the rules, he codified them. You seem to be willing to replace the years with a static opinion that occurs at an instant. That opinion could change the next day, week or year so I don’t find your rational as satisfying as you do though I believe it can be a starting off point where a different ending might occur.
“Returning briefly to public goods, A bright line definition of a public good would be something that government can provide while conforming to all the above proscriptions.
That would be national defense, law enforcement, courts and prisons.
I do not hink anything else can meet the criteria above.”
What about zigzagging roads in a highly populated area that becomes more populated by the day or the Seatle problem? There was no workable market answer that you cared to suggest for either of these problems.
“specified government powers were within the domain of government.”
Federalism and even the 9th amendment did not hold the states to that criteria.
“Once we have made clear bright line law we must enforce it.”
There may be a clear bright line for an instant but that line is not assured to remain so bright at another time or at another place. Bright lines in justice due to the inability of man to recognize all the variables can lead to total injustice.
Dave: “You keep making the assumption that because something is done in a specific way by government in your experience, that it was always done that way and that there is no other way to do it.”
Allan: Why do you keep making that claim when over and over again I nave said there are different ways of handling things.
…
Allan: You are the one that says you don’t like the idea of public goods so tell us specifically how you will manage the problem in a reasonably effective manner. If you can then I guess we can say that that particular needed solution was not a public good.”
Your first and second statement contradict.
There a many ways to solve these problems outside government. I do not know them all, they are not all known. There is no requirement to specify how a problem will be solved.
There is not even a requirement that a problem is solveable. Because there is no currently known answer to faster than speed of light travel does not mean it is a government problem.
Regardless, you have inverted the burden of proof. Government must demonstrate when it wishes to enact law, that it meets the criteria about.
“Your first and second statement contradict.”
How,? John I don’t see it as a contradiction. There are different ways of handling things but if something must be handled within a time frame there must be a time when the decision is made. If a solution will be figured out many generations away that is not a solution for the generations in close proximity to the problem.
A man is drowning while two lifeguards decide the best way of rescuing him. They might actually come up with a better solution than they would have initially but that man is long dead. That delay represents perfection being the enemy of good.
Seattle is waiting for an answer. Your answer was insufficient. That leads to the city’s death where the capital for replacement might not be available. The capitalists, based on what they would have seen, thought investing in a new city would be too risky based on the former actions.
“Regardless, you have inverted the burden of proof. Government must demonstrate when it wishes to enact law, that it meets the criteria about.”
Did you forget that government is the people?
Allan – that is a bad analogy. As a former Water Safety Instructor there are ways of saving someone depending on how far they are from you. That is the only decision you have to make.
“Allan – that is a bad analogy. ”
Paul, obviously you missed the point behind the analogy. There are times to act and there are times to discuss things. The drowning man needed to be rescued immediately and not have to wait until the method of rescue is fully debated.
Allan – lifeguards are usually assigned a section that is theirs. They do not discuss it.
“Allan – lifeguards are usually assigned a section that is theirs. They do not discuss it.”
Yes, Paul, that is exactly the way it is generally managed and that was the point of my using the analogy. It was pointing out a style of management that was wrong.
“Think of a moderate sized city where the sidewalks and streets aren’t considered pubic goods. Each store would have a different side walk perhaps on a different level and some might not have any at all building their store right up to the street”
I do not have to imagine it – such places are real.
Some people think they are quaint.
Regardless business owners in particular have an interest in attracting customers – that means among many other things provide access in an attractive and appreciated way.
Businesses spend enormous sums making their facilities attractive and accessible to customers.
Do you think that would end without government ?
“Businesses spend enormous sums making their facilities attractive and accessible to customers. Do you think that would end without government ?”
You live where there is lots of space. That is not true for everyone. Not all businesses or people think the same and some think their smoke stacks to be beautiful.
“You live where there is lots of space. That is not true for everyone.”
The amount of space does not matter. The need/desire for businesses to do the best possible under the circumstances to appeal to customers is universal.
Living densely is a choice too.
“Not all businesses or people think the same and some think their smoke stacks to be beautiful.”
Absolutely – and my point. If a business does not “think” they way its customers do, it will not last long.
Using your example if a business thinks a smoke stack is appealing and its customers mostly do not and that is important to them or another identical business does nto have a smokestack – that business will fail.
Conversely if an private individual thinks differently than the community he is free to do as he pleases so long as he does not actually harm others.
The business actual has the same right. But its need for customers compels it (without force) to respond to the wishes of others.
Every reasonable regulation ever conceived was preceded by people and businesses acting in the way they were ultimately forced to.
Humans switched from wood to coal – because coal was actually cleaner and safer, even though it was more expensive.
They switched from coal to oil – because it was cleaner – paying a premium for oil.
They switched from oil to gas – because it was cleaner.
They switched from gas to electric – even though more expensive because it was cleaner.
I am a big environmentalist, but I do not agree with the specific purportedly environmental choices of many so called greens. CO2 as an example is good for the planet, even warming should it actually occur is a large net positive for most life on earth.
But if you personally choose differently. If you wish to leave carbon free – that is OK – your choice. If most people wish to live off so called green energy – whether I think that is good or bad – they are free to choose to do so. If their free choices result in the markets slowly either increasing the price of my preferences or less and less providing it, compelling me to change – that is fine. But if others – in minority or majority come together through government and force me to behave as they wish – that is not fine. That is immoral. And you cannot acheive purportedly moral ends through immoral means.
“The amount of space does not matter. The need/desire for businesses to do the best possible under the circumstances to appeal to customers is universal.”
John, that is not realistic. People appeal to customers in different ways and sometimes one person’s appeal hurts another person’s interests. What do you do then? Certainly you don’t believe that all businesses have the same interests, do you? Your examples do not deal with one to one human interaction where they both disagree. Your examples are not pertinent to the discussion.
“John, that is not realistic.”
Completely realitic. Businesses do it all the time in those ares government does not interfere
“People appeal to customers in different ways and sometimes one person’s appeal hurts another person’s interests. What do you do then?”
Are you talking about Actual harm to another ?
I am not as an example free to poison your water to serve my customers.
That would be a tort.
Or are you just talking about not providing one potential customer with what they want.
A rich man and a poor man enter the Ferrari dealership both after a car.
One many not get what they want.
That is how things work.
Though I would note that it the Masseratti deal can produce a car as appealing to all as the Ferrari, but both the rich man and poor man can afford it.
Then Ferrari loses, that is how markets work.
“Certainly you don’t believe that all businesses have the same interests, do you?”
Nope but so long as they are complying with justified laws (see other post).
Each is free to balance the interests of select potential customers with its own interests to try to profit the most while delivering on promises.
“Your examples do not deal with one to one human interaction where they both disagree. Your examples are not pertinent to the discussion.”
Of course they are. The entire purpose of free markets is to solve exactly the type of problem you note, and to do so maximizing utility. And nothing ever devised comes close to matching market performance on that.
Specifically the type of problem you say markets are bad at – are the ones they are best at and the ones government is worst at.
When values differ, Government choses winners and losers, always in the way that benefits those in power the most. Sometimes that means responding to a majority of the electorate. Sometimes that means responding to a powerful special interest.
But pretty much never as a gigantic system designed to optimize utility (the common good) – that is how free markets work.
“Completely realitic. Businesses do it all the time in those ares government does not interfere”
John, I didn’t realize that you believed all businesses thought alike and would therefore reach the same conclusion. Hogwash, but I don’t want to try and change that opinion.
The Ferrari is a direct purchase. Solving the city’s problems involves a lot of areas of thought not just who bids the highest price. Surely your understanding of business matters is far greater. Take it to Seattle. Take it to how capital is obtained.
“Are you assuming the the streets lined with moving cars is not a public good and each street can be a private entity? Perhaps we could have toll booths for every store.”
In much of the world infrastructure is private.
There are several cities in China right now where everything is handled privately – roads, sewer everything. It works quite well.
You should not assume that just because you have not seen a different approach that it does not exist.
Even in NYC what we now call public transportation was entirely private until the 30’s I beleive. Busses in the US were nearly entirely private until the 60’s.
Prior to the brooklynn bridge all suspension bridges – possibly all bridges in this country were private. Brooklyn bridge was started privately. But Tamny hall stepped in and took over. That should not be an argument for bridges being public goods.
“In much of the world infrastructure is private.”
John, which large country has the best overall economy?
“There are several cities in China right now where everything is handled privately – roads, sewer everything. It works quite well.”
I’ve spent a good amount of time in Asia. My last recent trip to China was for over a month. They have done miraculous things especially in areas formerly unbuilt and not heavily populated. Don’t think for a minute that what you see is totally private. In the end the private persons follow the lead of the government and when there is conflict the government wins.
“You should not assume that just because you have not seen a different approach that it does not exist.”
Why do you say that? I don’t. I don’t even object to private roads. There are toll roads that are quasi private. There are PUDs where all the roads are totally private. That is their business until they obstruct the ability of others to get from one place to another.
“Even in NYC what we now call public transportation was entirely private until the 30’s I beleive. Busses in the US were nearly entirely private until the 60’s.
I have no objection to private transportation systems. Take the system included in the Constitution, the Post Office. Should it continue? There are arguments pro and con but IMO private concerns should be able to compete on a level playing field. I believe in todays world where government expands everywhere that we should permit private competition. I don’t wish to live in a world where we can press a button and everything is turned into private hands. We would have anarchy.
“Prior to the brooklynn bridge all suspension bridges – possibly all bridges in this country were private. Brooklyn bridge was started privately. But Tamny hall stepped in and took over. That should not be an argument for bridges being public goods.”
You have to look at time and place. The railroads going east to west went through areas where there was virtually no population. They built their own bridges and that was great. If I have a choice between government and private doing the same thing with the same results I always pick private.
Are you advocating the sale of all NY bridges to private companies? They can sell the bridge and the tolls can be divided between the new owners and the legislators that assisted in the transfer of the bridge to a private entity. (You do realize that not all the bridges leading in and out of Manhattan have tolls, right?)
That large country with the amazing economy had double the improvement in standard of living in the 19th century compared to the 20th with less regulation. And double the improvement in standard of living in the 20th compared to the 1st.
Nor is that pattern time or technology constrained – i.e. the decline in growth we see in advanced societies is NOT inevitable or the product of advanced society.
China and india have enormous populations. Both have had explosive growth in the last 50 years. Both have done so in the modern world. Both have risen from abject poverty to relative prosperity. But China has outpaced india with double the growth because even though they have a totalitarian govenrment they have had far less regulation.
India started with a tradition of mass bureaucracy and has increased growth as it has overcome that. Meanwhile China is becoming more totalitarian rapidly and there are strong signs of very serious economic weakness.
Regardless both have experience the same kind of growth the US experienced in the 19th century – or even more, but while mostly growing modern 21st century businesses.
Put simply the slow growth of the US and Europe is NOT normal.
It is NOT a natural outcome of higher standards of living.
I would further note – I used some examples from China. These are NOT the norm for china. They are artifacts of the growth of the country and the response of businesses in areas where government did not keep up. But more importantly even if not pervasive they are proof that the problems you keep raising are and have been successfully resolved in the past and the present without governent.
I am NOT in any instance saying that – THIS particular solution is the best way to solve any problem. I am saying that government should stay out of it, and many different solutions will be found and the best ones will prevail and that may change over time.
I am not trying to sell china. Only examples that what we view as the way things must be aren’t set in concrete.
Elenore Olstrom won a Nobel prize for demonstrating that most “tragedy of the commons” problems have actually been solve perfectly well – better, without government than with.
Mist people find it very hard to get past the fact that the government solutions that they see all arround them are NOT the norm historically, and infact would not be the norm now BUT FOR FORCE.
“That large country with the amazing economy had double the improvement in standard of living in the 19th century compared to the 20th with less regulation. And double the improvement in standard of living in the 20th compared to the 1st.”
John, that improvement didn’t avoid a lot of government interference. I am not for large government. I am for smaller government but I can’t claim there was no benefit from the actions of government. You lay claim to the incredible economic growth in China when government pulls all the strings even when they let limited capitalism exist. That is entirely wrong. Recent posts are basing too many arguments on examples that aren’t even pertinent. It is extremely difficult to defend a position with few if any exceptions in a world where conflict is more natural than its lack.
If you wish to lay claim to lack of regulations having a stimulatory effect on economies then we have no disagreement and you will surely vote for Trump. He has done tremendous deregulation while the opposite party and some from his own party tried to remove him from office.
“I would further note – I used some examples from China. … they are proof that the problems you keep raising are and have been successfully resolved in the past and the present without governent.” Certainly not in China where if you pose a threat you can be killed or incarcerated. I don’t doubt that in many cases we would have done better without so much government. You are creating arguments from me that don’t exist so you can knock them down. So can I because those are not my arguments.
Peak 19th Century TOTAL US government never exceeded 8% of GDP – during the civil war. It was closer to 3% of GDP for most of the 19th century. That is TOTAL government, not federal government
And standard of living rose 4 times as fast as under Bush/Obama.
John, though I agree with the substance of your argument, growth is impaired by too much government involvement, due to the many different variables I don’t find your argument satisfactory.
What is it you do not like ?
I would notes there is massive amounts of data to back this up.
I am not committing my vote.
But if you are asking me whether Trump is a better president than Bush/Obama, there is no contest.
If you are asking me whether Any of the 2019 democrat contenders is even close to as good a choice – no contest.
It is possible that I might pick one or two of the 2016 GOP candidates over Trump.
I would further note – and several leading libertarains who were anti-trum in 2016 have noted, that Trump has been more libertarain in accomplishment than it is likely that any actual libertarain who was magically elected could have been.
I voted for Johnson in 2016. On every issue Johnson remains a better choice.
I can further list several major areas Trump is bad.
But I doubt Johnson would have appointed as libertarain a gaggle of judges – he would have nominated better people, they would not have gotten approved.
I doubt he would have cut as much regulation.
He would have tried. But the courts, the “deep state” would have owned him.
I expect trump to win in 2020, and if he can start an economic recovery, he will win in a landslide.
That is a prediction not an endorsement.
I am not a Trump supporter.
I am not black and white. I can criticise him when he is wrong and praise him when he is right.
Nor am I stupid.
I attacked Trump in 2016 for being too fawning over Putin, it was a very bad look and uncharacteristically politically stupid of him.
At the same time when the first nonsense that Putin helped Trump and that Trump colluded with Russia was pushed I called bullshit.
Trumps core policies weaken Putin.
Trump is Not a retread cold warrior or a neo-con reliving the glory of standing toe to toe
with the USSR.
But he will do what is in the US interest and several major US interests are detrimental to Putin. Trump is capable of calling Putin a “great guy” and still “releasing the fracken”
ir demanding that Europe start working to defend itself, or guaranteeing European natural gas so they could stand up to Putins fossil fuel blackmail.
Trump si Putin’s nightmare – not hostile, and damaging.
No rational person could buy the Trump/Russia nonsense.
And now we are learning that Brennan, Clapper, Comey – the rest of the purveyors of this garbage – they knew it was false too, and sold it too us anyway.
That is not Trump support.
That is just not idiocy.
“I am not committing my vote.”
Earlier you did. You are making progress.
I don’t find an objection to your opinions on Trump. They are valid. I might have some different opinions but they are valid as well. Your comment “Trump is capable of calling Putin a “great guy” and still “releasing the fracken”
ir demanding that Europe start working to defend itself, or guaranteeing European natural gas so they could stand up to Putins fossil fuel blackmail.” demonstrates that you are thoughtful and recognize that Trump acts in certain ways for a reason and one has to think deeper than one level.
On a different subject, Russia is not the Big enemy nor has it been the Big enemy for quite awhile. Outside of nuclear weapons its power is continuously diminishing. The Chinese are the Big threat and their power has increased tremendously over the years. Trump recognized that early on while people like Biden and the powerful Democrat supporters are in the hands of the Chinese though not necessarily totally happy about it.
“Earlier you did. You are making progress.”
No, I have said if you gave me specific choices and put a gun to my head. I would pick trump.
There are no guns to my heard and I have more than 2 choices.
I have never committed to how I will vote in the world we actually have.
I voted for Johnson in 2016.
I will likely vote for Jorgensen in 2020.
But that is not set in concrete. There are circumstances I could vote for Trump.
At this time there are none that would get me to vote for Biden, but the election is 5 months away. Things could change.
“No, I have said if you gave me specific choices and put a gun to my head. I would pick trump.”
Yes, that sounds like something you could have said but I believe you said more here and in our prior discussions when you used the alias dhilli. I seem to remember a discussion about that with you under the dhili alias.
“I will likely vote for Jorgensen in 2020.”
John, in essence a big part of the vote is based on what SCOTUS will look like. That seems to be where you direct a lot of your anger, activist judges. That is a major place where our country lives or dies. It will be one of the two candidates so a vote for anyone else is the same as not voting especially since the issues are so clear cut. When one votes they are voting for what is likely to be done. A Biden vote means a Sotomayor or worse since the party continues to degenerate. It means more government and HERO type legislation as proposed by the Democratic House. A vote for Trump means another Gorsuch type on SCOTUS and deregulation along with a better economy. I hope my type of legislators will replace the old and should Trump win along with both houses that the next concern will be a combination of fixing America rather than the world and a permanent plan to become financially responsible. (Balanced budget amendment, term limits, making our legislators change the nature of their stripes from self-serving to serving the nation)
Allan;
with respect – I will decide my own vote. I will do so for my own reasons.
Some of those you and I share. Some we do not.
“so a vote for anyone else is the same as not voting”
Nope. The TP took power because they made it clear, the GOP would meet their needs or lose elections – democrats would win. They were unwilling to have rhino’s to avoid democrats. The far left wing of the democratic party is posing a similar problem for democrats at the moment. Biden must get the votes of both moderates and sandersnista’s to win. Good luck.
If either party wants the libertarian vote, they had better pitch to libertarian values.
If I vote for Jorgensen and as you fear Trump loses. Two big things happen
first it is clear my vote counts ALOT – because had trump gotten it he would have won.
Next, Biden is elected and F;s up by the numbers.
Long ago there was a book called “the devils advocate” I beleive. It was a sort of orwellian dystopia where the hero/anti-hero joined the oppressive govenrment and became the most oppressive of all – deliberately, to cause it to fail. big government fails – the bigger and more oppressive it the faster and harder it fails. I would prefer a less brutal transition. But I am not affraid of the left. The bear the seeds of their own destruction.
Trump is president as a response to Obama. The post 2008 GOP recovery from oblivion was because Obama and Dems tilted left. Had they government more moderately we would have a permanent democratic majority.
Instead the democratic party is coming apart at the seams. They learned nothing from 2016. I honestly think the odds of a democrat victory in 2020 are slim to none.
I suspect the GOP will make gains in the house – maybe retake it, and hold the senate.
And Trump will be strongly re-elected.
That is my guess.
But say I am completely wrong.
You are right – many things will go to hell.
Which will assure that democrats tenure is short lived.
For me to be wrong, Biden would have to do what Obama did not – successfully govern from the center.
What are the odds of that ?
Next,
I have no problem with Judicial activism. I hope Trump’s appointments are “activist” as hell. I want them to strike down laws and regulations that have been around for 100 years. The constitution tasks the courts with enforcing the limits on government in the constitution. They are also tasked with protecting our rights – not merely enumerated ones. That is highly activist.
I do not want them to defer to congress – which Scalia frequently did. I want them to follow the constitution.
” I will decide my own vote.”
John, of course you will. What I was providing was my reasons for voting for Trump even though he doesn’t fulfill all my criteria.
“Trump is president as a response to Obama. ”
When Obama was running your logic was the logic of some of the libertarians that thought like you. Obama won. Do you think we are better off today then we were pre Obama?
At the very least I am voting for the Supreme Court to help stop the bleeding. I understand all about sending messages but IMO they should be sent at a lower level for at the very least the court system needs to be protected from furhter deterioration.
“When Obama was running your logic was the logic of some of the libertarians that thought like you. Obama won. Do you think we are better off today then we were pre Obama?”
Your going to have to explain that.
Obama was not a response to Trump, nor to Bush. He was elected because of the financial crisis.
Neither argument is particularly libertarain.
Every argument I make is not libertarain.
There is no correct libertarain response to what color do you prefer.
The basis of my comment was how much you liked the win of Obama over a bad alternative. It has to do with Trump’s selection of Supreme Court Justices over the selection made by a Biden. The selection will not be made by the libertarian candidate except through any influence he might have on Trump if Trump wins.
I am not interested in continuing a discussion of how I will vote or what I should think about voting or what I might have thought about other choices, or how much I value the courts relative to other issues.
It is likely we come close to agreeing on Trump’s merits and demerits.
We do not agree on their weight.
You are free to weight things your way and I mine.
“I am not interested in continuing a discussion of how I will vote ”
I don’t particularly care, but you talk so much about original intent and then back off of it to promote your own type of Libertarianism. You are full of conflicts.
If something is not constitutional, can government do it ?
I hope we are both agreed it can not.
We might have slight differences on the criteria for constitutional.
If something is constitutional.
Does that make it:
Wise
efficient
moral ?
Each of these are independent criteria.
The constitution stops unconstitutional acts.
It does not stop all unwise, immoral, or inefficient government acts.
Not addressing this again
OOPs, checking the time stamp I see you weren’t done with this discussion when you said you were.
“If something is constitutional.
Does that make it:
Wise
efficient
moral ?”
It makes it constitutional.
John, stop trying to justify your arguments that have failed over and over again. This last attempt wasn’t any better than the former ones, but your next to the last paragraph might indicate that you have taken a giant step in the learning process.
>“You keep talking about an originalist interpretation of the Constitution but when I talk about the Constitution, Federalism and the founding fathers you refuse to accept the original prinicples of Federalism.”
>>False. I refuse to accept that we are writing supreme court briefs – because we are not.
—
False, false and false. The discussion significantly revolves around the constitutions written by the states and whether those states have a right to involve themselves in the construction of state roads. We don’t need Supreme Court briefs to discuss that. All 50 states have dealt with road building. I don’t think there are any Supreme Court cases that dispute the states ability to be involved. There may be tangential cases but you can skip them because we are talking about a the generalized ability states have.
“Why do you say that ?”
Because you default to government sollutions to your “public goods” problems and assume there are few alternatives – such as toll roads.
ultimately consumers pay for everything – either provided publicly or privately.
It is a tautology that consumption comes from production.
But HOW is infinitely variable.
We are here posting on Turley’s blog. Government is not paying for it.
I am not paying for it directly, Turley is not. Yet a “public good” is being provided privately, and in this instance not as a fee for service proposition.
That is merely one way to privately pay for things.
I am not advocated for toll roads or private bridge companies
HOW goods and services are privided and paid for is an issue for the market to resolve.
That is actually extremely important.
The internet is as an example typically a fixed monthly fee for unlimited service.
Telephone WAS traditionally pay for what you use.
For decades I was told the internet was going to be metered eventually.
In the end Telephone became a fixed fee unlimited service.
It is possible we are seeing the same occur in medicine.
More and more we are seeing subscription medical services.
If I can cadilac insurance for my family for 23K/year, or the same service with a 10K deductible for 10K/year – which should I buy ?
If I now have an HSA to cover the 10K deductible and my doctor offers a monthly service family package at $200/month I have about 7K for tests and specialists, and emergencies. Better still more efficient and better service is inccentivized.
And there is no government in 100miles.
Is that the answer ? I do not know. I do not care. It is not for me to figure that out.
It is for the market. There might be an even better wat I have not thought of.
One of the problems with “public goods” being provided by government is that even looking for better ways is completely stiffled.
Innovation NEVER occurs in government and rarely if ever even in big business.
Innovation occurs near the bottom. It occurs with the people who have an abundance of ideas and few resources. It occurs with people who are not already well off but are driven to be wealthy. It occurs among the people we most desparately crave to regulate, the ones most likely to break the rules, to take risks, even with other peoples lives.
It occurs among the people we most want to and least ought to regulate.
And it does not occur at all in piblicly provided public goods.
““Why do you say that ?”
Because you default to government sollutions to your “public goods” problems and assume there are few alternatives – such as toll roads.”
But I don’t, John. My comment with regard to a public good is that sometimes a public good exists. I have even stated that if a severe problem exists that can be solved privately I would opt for the private solution. Your response to the zigzagged roads was tort law. But that is not a response until a contract exists unless one wants to make up contracts out of thin air. You have taken a hard-line Libertarian solution but are unable to defend it in all circumstances. That should tell you that the hard-line should be softened a bit. You don’t want to soften it at all so you have been making up scenarios that you blame me for when those scenarios are not mine. Along with that you are providing theory substantially unrelated to the discussion that I don’t disagree with.
You discussion has led to HSA’s. Do you think I disagree? In the past I was in part responsible for advertising that Congress should not get rid of MSA’s so certainly I like the idea behind HSA’s but what does that have to do with our discussion?
Off topic you say: “Innovation NEVER occurs in government” Your realize the space program led to tremendous innovation that is used by the public on a regular basis. NASA was in part privitized and I think that is good.
As is being noted with SpaceX.
We are merely dealing with a slightly different model.
The innovation in the space program the entire program has always been private.
What is different with SpaceX is even less government control.
NASA did not innovate. NASA told the markets what it wanted.
Markets innovated.
But I want to go one step further – eliminate NASA.
We have numerous competing private space companies. They do not need and should not have any government funding. They do not need and should not have any government regulation.
“The innovation in the space program the entire program has always been private.
What is different with SpaceX is even less government control.”
Without the government program the innovation no matter who produced it would not have been necessary at that time. The government set the objective and it was fulfilled by government and private industry. When faced with the zigzagged roads government set the direction and private concerns fulfilled the objective.
“Without the government program the innovation no matter who produced it would not have been necessary at that time. The government set the objective and it was fulfilled by government and private industry. When faced with the zigzagged roads government set the direction and private concerns fulfilled the objective.”
All correct, and unless there is a legitimate purpose associated with the protection of individual rights, then both correct and wrong.
The govenrment may demand our wealth and redirect resources and innovation for a legitimate govenment function – I have adressed what those are already.
Going to the moon is not among them, defense of the nation is.
When government decides to redirect innovation and resources and wealth for a purpose outside the domain of government then it steasl from us what we would have done on our own – whatever that was, in return for what it has chosen for us.
You say the certain innovation would not have been necescary at the time. I do not honestly know that is true and neither do you.
But I do know that free markest will focus innovation on what ordinary people most value.
Government will focus on the choices of powerful politiicans.
Innovation will happen regardless, but government driven innovation crowds out the private innovation we want more.
We are seeing private space programs now. We are also seeing that they innovate significantly different from government programs. Must as an example is not affraid of breaking things. And in fact the secret to Musks ability to developer much faster than government is his willingness to break things.
The government has produced the SLS as the means of getting us back to the moon.
In innumerable ways it is little advance beyond the Saturn V.
And the SLS is not here yet. The Falcon 9 heavy is not quite as capable as Saturn V or SLS, But it is far far far cheaper and reusable. Musks current return to the moon plan involves multiple Falcon 9 Heavy’s – but at lower total cast than SLS or Saturn V.
And Must is following with Projects in varying state of completion that are much bigger and more powerful that SLS and Saturn V and will get us to Mars. It is likely they will be radically different before complete, but they are still progressing rapidly, and much farther along than a government program.
And personally we should just get NASA and government out of it entirely.
Musk seems to think he can make money in the space business, and given that is cost to put a ton into space is already far below that of SLS and SLS does not yet exists, and when it does will be competitive with delivery systems 60 years old.
Would we have gotten here earlier without government ? Who knows ? Who cares ?
We are supposed to get here when people acting though the market value it sufficiently for the market to provide. Not before,
Or to paraphrase an old commercial – I am not going to pay alot for that rocket.
John, I’m not sure of your point in this latest posting. I am going to try and respond putting pieces in their proper place.
The federal government should function based on the Constitution. It has gone beyond the Constitution and we both agree with that.
You talk about going to the moon. That has both a military component and other. The military component cannot be separated from the other so it is a legitimate function of government according to the Constitution. There will be no clear point between military and other so it will be dealt with politically.
Moving on to zigzagging streets and Seattle flooding. Contrary to some of your arguments the Federal Constitution has nothing to do with those improvements. Those improvements are based on state constitutions that conform with the Federal Constitution. the 9 justices have little or nothing to do with these projects.
The space program has a military component,
Going to the moon does not.
“The military component cannot be separated”
It can quite easily.
The saturn V has an LEO payload of 140,000KG.
That is more than 2 M1A2C Tanks.
5 Minuteman III’s – that is the entire rocket.
of 600+ of the nuclear warheads carried by the Minuteman III
Approximatly the equivalent of 10 KH-11 spy satelites.
About 5 times the payload of the space shuttle.
There is just plain no possible military need for that.
And the entire rest of the space program had no military purpose.
“The space program has a military component,
Going to the moon does not.
That all depends on the military advantages of using the moon as a base. You look at the world in terms of things and money. The military component of space is the technology one has and our desire should be a technological advantage that protects the nation. Technology is developed by the creation of new things. What things should or should not be built by government end up being debateable but protecting our nation from potential enemies is a primary duty of our government.
“That all depends on the military advantages of using the moon as a base. ”
if is 50 years later. We still have no military base on the moon.
I think that my case that our trip to the money was in all ways premature is established.
“You look at the world in terms of things and money.”
Nope, value, money is just a proxy for value.
“The military component of space is the technology one has and our desire should be a technological advantage that protects the nation.”
i.e. a value
“Technology is developed by the creation of new things.”
Things we value
“What things should or should not be built by government end up being debateable”
Government does not build things, it pays for them.
“but protecting our nation from potential enemies is a primary duty of our government.”
Are their enemies on the moon ?
It has been 50 years since we were there, no one else has been their since.
Any fear of attacks from the moon was incredibly premature
I would not with respect to HSA’s
There should not be such a thing – or more accurately government should have nothing to do with healthcare.
It should be between me and the market how to provide myself the best healthcare at the lowest cost.
Subscription medicine is just the market inovating to destory the inefficiency and moral hazard of insurance covering something that is really a commodity not a risk.
“There should not be such a thing – or more accurately government should have nothing to do with healthcare.”
I agree. The federal government should have nothing to do with healthcare. But government has involved itself and has caused harm to people. We have seen this involvement get worse over the past 3/4 of a century without any likelihood that government will bow out of healthcare. HSA’s were offered to move the dial back and help people at the same time in an attempt to partially recreate a temporarty free market substitute while dialing things back. Do you have an all or non attitude or are you willing to dial things back incrementally? Doing absolutely nothing is not acceptable.
“You do realize that not all the bridges leading in and out of Manhattan have tolls, right?”
I do not care. I do not presume that tolls will be the way that the costs are paid for.
Maybe CNN will pay for a bridge and to maintain it for the naming rights and advertising value.
Maybe it will be a subscription service.
Maybe businesses will get together to pay to have bridges built to bring in more traffic.
There are infinite possibilities – more than either of us can imagine.
And that is the point. Or atleast one of them.
“Maybe CNN will pay for a bridge and to maintain it for the naming rights and advertising value.”
I think you are getting tired John. Do you really think that CNN can afford to buy the 59th street bridge, the Brooklyn Bridge or any of the others? Of course not. However, let’s assume we have to build one of these bridges over again without government involvement. How would you accomplish that feat?
The brooklynn bridge and every US suspension bridge built before it was built priviately.
Further as noted regarding NASA, Nothing is built in this country publicly.
Some things are paid for publicly, and their construction Controlled publicly.
Even the public payment is iffy. Governments borrow massive amounts of money from PRIVATE lendors, And then pay the lendors back over time.
So the actual functions of govenrment are merely control and moving money that is not theirs arround.
I beleive it was during the bush administration An atlantic weather satellite started to fail prematurely. NASA had no unscheduled space on the shuttle and no other avialable launch capacity. They had a spare weather sattelite but no means to get it up.
The private reinsurance industry – the people who write the policies that back the insurance companies if a huricane strikes. came up with a couple of billion to get a launch slot on Arriane. But NASA refused to turn over the satelite.
So the raised more money to fast track the construction of a private weather satellite.
When that looked like it was going to be successful, NASA found room on the Space Shuttle and the spare went up, and there was no loss of coverage in the area where Huricanes form.
All of this was because the value of even a few days extra warning of a huricane along the US coast is PRIVATELY worth billions a year.
I don’t disagree with reducing government’s size and restricting what it does. However, you still haven’t solved the problem of zigzagging roads. However, whereever there is a solution to that problem or the Seatle type problem I would prefer the private solution. In the meantime the inferior government solution sometimes has to suffice.
You keep positing this zigzagging roads problem and demanding I solve it.
There are so many false premises.
Why am I to beleive there is a problem ?
Why am I to beleive it must be solved ? Or solved now ?
Why am I obligated to solve it for you ?
We do not demand that govenrment have the answers before we give them hudreds of billions.
You used the space program. Government did not start with the solution for going to the moon. It started by claiming a problem only government could solve existed and then demanding our wealth to solve it.
I do not accept that you have presented a problem – life is not perfect, Things can stay as they are until the markets decide a specific problem is worth solving – and that may be never and I am fine with that.
Free markets do not start with “the answer”. They start by deciding if a problem can be profitably solved. If it can’t it should not be PERIOD. We have infinite problems facing us
We will not solve most of them. We will solve those that we are best able to and able to afford to and value the most. That is how markets work.
Markets may eliminate the zigzagging roads problem but straightening them, or reducing the need for roads ? Maybe we all fly ? or we radically increase our use of the internet and mail order and drive less. Maybe Drones, maybe rockets maybe replicators,
Who knows. nor does it matter.
“You keep positing this zigzagging roads problem and demanding I solve it.”
John, I don’t demand you solve it. I demand the problem be solved and though I prefer private solutions the government is one of the solutions. State constitutions permit such actions. You cannot blame the 9 SCOTUS judges for that public solution.
“You used the space program. Government did not start with the solution for going to the moon. It started by claiming a problem only government could solve existed and then demanding our wealth to solve it.”
I don’t ask our government to take us to the moon. I ask that our government protect us based on its Constitutional duties to see to it that the protection the government offers is sufficient.
“I do not accept that you have presented a problem”
You are putting words in my mouth that I never uttered. Do you not see that you are creating arguments you are comfortable slaying but those are not my arguments.
” I demand the problem be solved ”
It was, if the problem was not solved privately the free market had determined that people were unwilling to pay the cost to acheive the desired benefit.
We do not wish to do this – is a solution.
“You cannot blame the 9 SCOTUS judges for that public solution.”
Actually I can. SCOTUS shotdown myriads of efforts by states to interfere in the economy on federal constitutional grounds – primarily the contracts clause in the constitution.
Prior to Wickard the contracts clause was read as written.
Today it is one of those portions of the constitution that has been erased.
Among many uses, the contracts clause was used by early civil rights attorneys to preclude states from creating building codes that limited black home ownership.
Prior to wickard zoning and building codes were unconstitutional or limited.
You should read wickard sometimes. It is one of the most goad awful bad supreme court decisions ever. Without it – much of federal and state regulation is unconstitutional.
But I will go a bit farther if the constitution allows it – it is wrong.
“I don’t ask our government to take us to the moon. I ask that our government protect us based on its Constitutional duties to see to it that the protection the government offers is sufficient.”
But you told me that going to the moon was necescary for those purposes – and it isn’t.
“I do not accept that you have presented a problem”
>You are putting words in my mouth that I never uttered. Do you not see that you are >creating arguments you are comfortable slaying but those are not my arguments.
My statement did not put words into your mouth. It specifically said your argument fails because it does not demonstrate that an actual problem exists that requires solving.
You have not solve the problem of putting man safely on the surface of the sun.
Can I justify anything I want based on that ?
You keep raising this zigzag thing.
You claim government solved it. That inherently means that it could have been solved privately.
You claim solving it was necescary – why ? Solving putting a man on the surface of the sun is not necescary.
the zigzag’s existed before – obviously eliminating them is a preference not a necescity.
That is what I mean what i say you have not presented a problem.
The Russians are about to invade – that is an existential threat to the country and to the social contract. Americans will have less rights and liberty should they succeed.
Allowing the russians to defeat our government is an existential threat to our liberty.
Therefore government action is justified – a problem exists.
Absent criminal laws, and law enforcement and courts, people use force to infringe on the rights of others. That is a problem. it violates the social contract. It can not be solved without force, government must act.
John, let me again provide the full quote, “John, I don’t demand you solve it. I demand the problem be solved and though I prefer private solutions the government is one of the solutions. State constitutions permit such actions. You cannot blame the 9 SCOTUS judges for that public solution.”
You have taken the liberty of travelling over distant tangents so let me bring you back to earth from the moon and outer space. My requests are that we live based on the Constitution and that includes the idea of Federalism. If you forget the states altogether like you have been doing then you certainly aren’t living up to the original intentions of the founding fathers and all you have written about originalists is meaningless.
“I demand the problem be solved”
You may use whatever resources you have to solve for yourself any problems you wish.
You may not use force against others, outside of narrow conditions.
Government is FORCE.
John Say – the militia is force.
The militia is government.
John Say – the militia is NOT government.
Read the constitution and the laws of the time.
Every male over the age of 16 was required to own a gun,
they could be called up as need by government to form “the millitia”.
The revolutionary, post revolutionary and early post constitutional federal government did not have a standing army. Prior to WWII the army was almost entirely dissolved after the war.
The militia was the citizen army.
>”I demand the problem be solved”
>>You may use whatever resources you have to solve for yourself any problems you wish.”
—
Where in the Constitution were the states denied the right to see to it that the state roads did not zigzag? That is the question at hand.
Government does not have rights – it has powers.
“Government does not have rights – it has powers.”
If you wish to apply that to the states it is fine with me. The state government has the power to involve itself in the building of roads.
Do you see how simple that is? You can try and quote authority and perhaps the more appropriate use of words but you cant get by the fact that the state government can involve itself in the building of roads.
“Nope. That is the OUTSIDE limit to what can be done by government.”
John, are you telling us that all 50 states are violating the Constitution by making sure state roads don’t zigzag all over the place? Are you kidding?
Allan, I am done with this.
I have addressed your constitutional claim over and over add nasuem.
I do not care whether this hypothetical you want to die on is constitutional or not.
I have said that over and over.
It is still a bad idea.
As scalia noted – which you are more than intelligent enough to grasp.
Constitutional != good idea.
When you meet either my criteria to justify what you seek to do,
OR argue some other credible justification scheme, then there is something to continue.
Until then you are seeking to use force against others without justification.
Is that unconstitutional ? often. Is that immoral ? Always.
This is not complex.
Given that I know you are smarter than this,
that leaves deliberately obtuse.
If you do not want “insulted” – though I am not sure how you think I insulted you.
Do not make insultingly bad arguments.
repeatedly
Regadless, I am deleting all further responses on the constitutionality of zigzag roads, and related arguments of federalism.
They have been beaten to death.
Both issues are irrelevant. meaningless tangents.
“Allan, I am done with this.”
John, you were done with this from the start. You just didn’t know it. That is OK. Maybe you learned something from the discussion. Maybe not.
Lots of things are bad ideas but many are good. Government has the ability to help enact certain ideas stupid or not. That is what this debate has been all about.
“Until then you are seeking to use force against others without justification.
Is that unconstitutional ? often. Is that immoral ? Always”
But what I have talked about is not unconstitutional even though you used constitutional arguments and originalist interpretations against me. You even tried to tell me Hayek didn’t mean what he said and then in the next reply that Hayek was wrong along with a whole bunch of other attempts to ressurect your ideas of what libertarianism might be to Hayek.
As far as force and morality are concerned, you brought up 7 million Jews that were killed. It took force to stop the Nazi’s from killing even more people so that word “Always” was obviously misplaced.
“Regadless, I am deleting all further responses on the constitutionality of zigzag roads, and related arguments of federalism.”
It is best you do that because you have lost the ability to discuss this logically based on the Constitution and Federalism. Perhaps one day your blinders will be removed and you will look around and see a piece of iron being used in heavy construction. You will say use steel instead. Iron breaks, steel bends.
“My requests are that we live based on the Constitution and that includes the idea of Federalism. ”
Nope. That is the OUTSIDE limit to what can be done by government.
Anything constitutional is not inherently either good or reasonable.
Being unconstitutional requires NOT doing something.
Beign constitutional does not require doing it.
John Say – do you have any advanced degrees? Did any of them required you to learn to spell check? You are getting as bad as JT.
I have lots of sheepskin.
I do this for fun. I do not give a crap about spelling here.
When I am paid to write, then I deliver what I am paid for.
One other note about the possibility that a project is so large that only government can pay for it.
If that were true then that project would fail my utility requirement.
Anything that is of sufficient value to people to do in the first place, will find private financing BECAUSE it is of sufficient value.
If only government can come up with the money for something that means that it is not actually as valueable to people as it is costly.
“If only government can come up with the money”
The logic and/or reasoning is faulty. It is not just money. It involves risk, desire. etc. The zigzagging road situation has not been resolved.
No problem at all with my logic.
If there is a risk issue – then this is not a government problem.
I have made that point already
If the issue is desire that makes the problem a market problem not a govenrment problem.
If we desire something sufficiently markets deliver.
If we do not – then government stepping in is perverting our desires,
it is giving us something we want less in return for losing something we want more.
The answer to the zigzag road problem is trrivial – if the market does not solve it, it is not an important enough problem.
You keep circumventing that.
“No problem at all with my logic.”
John, you limited the reason for government action to money. That was wrong. More than money is involved.
“The answer to the zigzag road prob”lem is trrivial – if the market does not solve it, it is not an important enough problem.”
Zigzagging roads is not trivial. The market didn’t solve the problem but relied on the proper function of state and local governments.
“you limited the reason for government action to money.”
If that is not the case demonstrate.
Regardless, you do not understand money. Money is just a proxy for value.
if you can not justify something monetarially, you can not justify it at all.
If I spend $100 to go to dinner with my wife – I did not buy wine and a steak. I bought the entire experience. the $100 is not the value of the food, it is the value of everything.
Further government action is almost entirely about money.
Government does almost nothing.
It moves money arround to make others do something.
There is clearly no problem getting done anything government wants done privately.
The only issue is money.
“That was wrong. More than money is involved.”
False – money is a proxy for all our values
“Zigzagging roads is not trivial. The market didn’t solve the problem”
Of course it did. It did nothing. Just as we have chosen not to try to put a man safely on the surface of the sun, the market decided not to solve this problem YOU think is compelling. The market – that is all of us – not just you, or those able to weild govenrment power, said we do not value this problem enough to do anything about it.
That is a solution.
“but relied on the proper function of state and local governments.”
The market relies on govenrment for prohibitions to the initiation of violence and enforcement of contracts.
When government acts outside of that, it is not markets relying on government it is government overriding markets – us – our wishes.
You do not seem to grasp that the market is many things one of those is a ranked preference voting system. We each vote what we produced against what we want.
The free markets counts the votes and determines who gets what and what should and should not be produced – and yes it is both circular and infinitely recursive.
John Say – I just hate when I pay $100 for bad food and bad service. It is almost like you didn’t get your monies worth.
“I just hate when I pay $100 for bad food and bad service. It is almost like you didn’t get your monies worth.”
Then go elsewhere.
My first date with my wife, I slipped on the ice and fell flat on my back.
The concert was not that good – and yet still I have wonderful thoughts every time I here the artist.
It was worth every penny.
John Say – “here” the artist?
The odds of your knowing the artist are small.
It was the lead from I think it was the “hondels” appearing as a solo gig.
He does very beach boys like music.
But for the internet you would never be able to fin anything by him.
He is a no bit wonder.
Regardless, whenever I here him I have found memories of a time 40 years ago.
“Regardless, you do not understand money. Money is just a proxy for value. if you can not justify something monetarially, you can not justify it at all.”
John, how can you say I don’t understand money? It’s almost insulting my intelligence but I will accept it in a more pleasant manner. Reading and understanding “I Pencil” is a relatively easy task and essentially explains the reasons money is important but you are taking money to a new level. One can attempt to buy power with money but power can take all that money away.
“One can attempt to buy power with money but power can take all that money away.”
Does not change the fact that money is just a proxy for value.
“Does not change the fact that money is just a proxy for value.”
So what? The answer is it destroys your argument. Power can determine value. You can be the richest man in the world and the most powerful man can put you in jail.
“So what? The answer is it destroys your argument.”
“Power can determine value.”
nope.
“You can be the richest man in the world and the most powerful man can put you in jail.”
True – but the social constract limits the power of government and preserves most power with the people.
Your argument is circular – or maybe recursive.
Without the public goods you posit the government does not have the power you posit.
and no private individual ever has the power to jail me.
“>Power can determine value.”
>>nope.
Tell that to Saddam Hussein
The military develops new technologies it values. So much for value when the military pays $500 for a hammer. Your value argument is meaningless in the context of our discussion.
You have travelled away from the Constitution and originalism.
“You have travelled away from the Constitution and originalism.”
The constitution determines the outside limits of what government can do.
It never dictates what it must.
Nor does it tell us what it ought,
or what will work.
You continue to artifically try to constrain the argument to the constitution.
If you can demonstrate that you can not do something constitutionally – the argument is over, I must change the constitution to do it.
But if you demonstrate constitutionally that you can,
you are still miles away from “you should”
It’s possible for a law to be really stupid, but still constitutional, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia
“It’s possible for a law to be really stupid, but still constitutional, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia”
That is entirely correct. Even stupid laws can be Constitutional. I don’t argue against that but I argue against stupid laws while supporting the Federal Constitution and the idea of federalism.
Do I think that CNN Or someone else, is big enough to ….
Anything that people want badly enough the market will figure out how to deliver.
That is quite literally the purpose of the free market – to deliver to people what they value as closely as possible to the extent that they value it.
More money is spent every year in the US on snack foods – potato chips, than on politics in a presidential election year.
That tells us the relative value people have of potato chips and politics.
It also puts back into perspective the money in politics – it is actually quite small in reality.
Our economy is 20T. the political spending is 1/10000th of the economy.
“Anything that people want badly enough the market will figure out how to deliver.”
John, I guess that means people like zigzagged roads.
Though I have brought it up more than once I’ve been holding off saying that our use of the term government includes state government. The Constitution leaves power to the states and the people so where the federal government cannot act according to the Constitution doesn’t mean the states can’t act unless you disagree with the fundamental idea of federalism. It appears that you do disagree because most of the road building is on a state level as was the elevation of the city of Seatle.
“John, I guess that means people like zigzagged roads.”
Maybe, or maybe they are just not important enough to people to alter.
You specifically brought up desire. Desire is precisely why govenrment answers are wrong.
If people desire a problem is solved sufficiently to pay whatever the current cost to solve that problem – the market would.
Whenever government acts it is because we do not want something bad enough to pay the market price. Instead government overrides our choice and makes us pay it anyway.
“Whenever government acts it is because we do not want something bad enough to pay the market price. Instead government overrides our choice and makes us pay it anyway.”
John, in our county we had multiple fatalities at an intersection. The people wanted a traffic light placed at the intersection. That is a proper function of government on a local level. We also had something similar to a zigzagging road and because of public pressure the problem was solved.
“in our county we had multiple fatalities at an intersection.”
You start with a problem government created and then I am supposed to solve it to your satisfaction.
If the road did not belong to government – there would be tort claims, and probably breach of contract claims, The problem would be solved.
“You start with a problem government created “… “If the road did not belong to government – there would be tort claims, and probably breach of contract claims, The problem would be solved
In other words John, stop signs and traffic lights should all be private as should the roads. That doesn’t sound like the world most would choose to live in. In fact that doesn’t sound like the world the founders chose. The Constitution deals with federal issues. State constitutions deal with more local issues but according to you the states have no right to build roadways. Are you tossing out the Constitution and Federalism?
“In other words John, stop signs and traffic lights should all be private as should the roads. That doesn’t sound like the world most would choose to live in.”
And yet in much of the world and through much of history that has been the case.
“In fact that doesn’t sound like the world the founders chose.”
And yet they did.
“The Constitution deals with federal issues. State constitutions deal with more local issues but according to you the states have no right to build roadways.”
Yes
“Are you tossing out the Constitution and Federalism?”
Nope, read the contracts clause – it applies to the states too.
As to federalism. The 10th amendment is the cornerstone of federalism.
What are its last 4 words ?
“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
You are the originalist. What was the original intent of our founders with regard to the states. They wanted state power and founders along with others in the state created their own independent constitutions. Those constitutions govern things such as road building. Everything else you are saying is an attempt at obfuscating the founding ideas that radically differ with your own.
You continue to argue this odd delusion that because it might be constitutional for a state to do something – that resolves the issue.
While our legislatures are overall pretty bad at logic.
They are allowed to do anything constitutional.
They are not required to do so.
If the oposing party demonstrates something is within the power of the state – that is not the end of the argument.
what you should do is a subset of what you are allowed
“You continue to argue this odd delusion that because it might be constitutional for a state to do something – that resolves the issue.”
Again you are being somewhat insulting while not dealing with the issue at hand. States have a Constitutional right if they wish to be involved in the building of roads. You sidestep this issue on a continuous basis like a horse wearing blinders so he doesn’t see the stuff to his left or to his right.
“You really can’t seem to get past the critical problem with all your answers.
“I would define it”
“I want ”
“my value is””
John, you have been throwing out definitions and opinions. I have the same right. I also have a right to ‘want’ but that doesn’t mean that I get what I want whether or not my values (that I have a right to) are good.
But you may not force others to pay for what you value.”
I can only force others through government if the action is legal. Therefore government can fill Seattle and zigzagged roads can be corrected. If a person stands in front of the back hoe to prevent that legal action he can be legally removed.
“you have been throwing out definitions and opinions.”
Mostly no.
“I have the same right. I also have a right to ‘want’ but that doesn’t mean that I get what I want whether or not my values (that I have a right to) are good.”
But you may not force others to pay for what you value.”
“I can only force others through government if the action is legal.”
1) Moral failure.
The immorality of using force against others to get what you want, is the foundation of the social contract. You do not have government, you do not have legal without it.
The entire purpose of government is the legitimate use of force against those who would use force to infringe on rights. No other use of force is legitimate – moral.
Your ability to excercise political power to make something legal does not alter whether it is moral.
circular argument.
You end up with anything that 51% of the people want – the greek failure,
Which BTW ultiuimately must degenerate to anything a few powerful people want as successively smaller minorities as each disenfrancises the prior minority.
While super majority consent is necescary for law, government action to be justified it is not alone sufficient. This is very important.
While I am not restricting my self to the constitution or declarations ideas of legitimacy – even though they are sufficient here, the entire constitutional concept of rights rests on the foundation that all laws and actions of govenrment can not be legitimate.
Majoritarianism completely obliterates the existance of rights.
“Therefore government can fill Seattle and zigzagged roads can be corrected.”
Because what ? Government decided it was legal ?
Come on you are much smarter than this.
Do I need to note that Hitler won a plebecite in 1938 with 80% of the vote ?
And yet at Nuremberg we rejected the argument that “legal” was sufficient.
“If a person stands in front of the back hoe to prevent that legal action he can be legally removed.”
Slavery was once legal. It was never moral. It was never legitimate.
“You end up with anything that 51% “…. et al.
John, you are creating strawman arguments that come out of your mouth, not mine. However, I do see that you do not believe in the Constitution or Federalism. If I am wrong then let me know why.
“John, you are creating strawman arguments”
Not a straw many a well know failure of democracy.
“However, I do see that you do not believe in the Constitution or Federalism.”
Strange observation. I like them. I do not think they are perfect – neither did our founders. Further the constitution is like the specs for a building.
It is useful and informative.
It is not the design or the principles.
I have discussed with you what the constitution says. even what it means.
Whether it is right or not can not be determined by the text.
It is not the role of the courts to decide if the constitution is right on some issue. They are obligated to determine accurately what it says.
I am free to decide on the rare occasions that is important that it is wrong.
You keep talking about an originalist interpretation of the Constitution but when I talk about the Constitution, Federalism and the founding fathers you refuse to accept the original prinicples of Federalism. You won’t even comment even though when building a local street discussed in multiple replies building a street is a state concern according to our Federalist principles.
That tells me you want to create your own Constitution. I am happy with the imperfect one we have.
“You keep talking about an originalist interpretation of the Constitution but when I talk about the Constitution, Federalism and the founding fathers you refuse to accept the original prinicples of Federalism.”
False. I refuse to accept that we are writing supreme court briefs – because we are not.
It does not work – is never a valid argument in court.
It is always a valid argument everywhere.
“You won’t even comment even though when building a local street discussed in multiple replies building a street is a state concern according to our Federalist principles.”
I think that is neither correct nor relevant.
The constitution does not bar a state from spending 100% of its GDP on militias.
Am I prohibited from arguing that it should not ?
“That tells me you want to create your own Constitution.”
True, and irrelevant.
“I am happy with the imperfect one we have.”
Mostly I am – but still irrelevant.
It is not unclear that most of the arguments you and I are making are not constitutional.
We are not infront of a federal judge.
It does not work is a valid argument in the world, not in court.
I like the constitution. But I do not presume that it is the perfection of a model of government. Equally important, it was written quite clearly one way, and has almost from the start been read often entirely differently.
Quite clear language in the constitution that limits government is completely ignored or even turned on its head.
We can get into a constitutional debate if you want. But I will warn you ahead:
I am going to read the constitution literally, I do not give the slightest crap that the courts have failed to do so.
I am going to note the 9th amendment, the priviledges and immunities clause in the constitution and the separate one in the 14th amendment.
I am going to point out how the meaning of these was addressed by the founders, by the federalist papers and by the authors of the 14th amendment.
“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. ”
All of the above reflect a constitutional understanding that is foreign to most today.
Each individually and all together specify that the scope of government is defined narrowly by the constitution and everything else is the domain of the people.
While the 9th amendment uses rights, the constitution and the 14th amendment use the term “privileges and immunities”
That choice was not accidental it was deliberate. To the founders and the authors of the 14th amendment privileges and immunites meant MORE that rights.
They were saying the domain of government is limited, and even within that domain, governments right to step on the toes of citizens – even where there are no rights in question is still constrained.
I would suggest Randy Barnet’s Restoring the lost constitution. That will give you vast historical information from the early days of the country to confirm that the meaning of those clauses and the constitution was quite different than today.
In fact the 14h amendment was a deliberate bitch slap to the courts which has since the founding Rejected exactly that understanding of the scope of government that our founders and the authors of the 14th amendment intended.
I would also note that the 14th amendment is different from those that precede it, in that it unequivocally binds the states.
So if you want to get into a constitutional debate with me, be forewarned ahead of time.
I am going to apply the constitution in an originalist way that even Gorsuch is not going to be prepared to. I am prepared to wipe out 250 years of supreme court precedent as plainly mistaken.
If you want to have a discussion about how we get from where we are to someplace better – you will find I can be quite moderate, and even willing to compromise – toward my principles.
But while you may get me to accept the political reality that we will not have government conforming to my principles in my lifetime or possibly ever. I am not going to give an inch on the actual principles.
In otherwords I am not going to change my arguments about what government should be. But I will tolerate even work toward government that offends those principles, so long as it does so LESS.
“I like the constitution. But I do not presume that it is the perfection of a model of government.”
We need an anchor and a reference point. The Constitution provided both. It was a compromise and if we did not compromise the US would likely not exist.
It offers a way of change. Some uncompromising people that like individual freedoms won’t vote for Trump because some of the things he does or says doesn’t agree with them. That helps open the door for Biden who today is pushing socialism when he is lucid enough to speak. At another time I will deal with your Constitutional issues point by point. Take note that I lean towards textulism and originalism. My favorite Justice was Scalia then Thomas, Gorsuch (I don’t know well enough), Alito and finally Kavanaugh who would not have been my first choice. However, right now my main cncern is not how we have failed to maintain the Constitution but to put in place Supreme Court Justices that adhere to the Constitution as written and recognize Amerndent not judicial activism as a way of change. That means all including those supporting the Libertarian Party should be voting for Trump, and not wasting their ballots increasing the chances of Socialism to increase its power so it can eventually enslave the people.
I will give Scalia credit for being an early originalist. but his form of originalism is neither originalist nor rational.
Even Gorsuch who is far more originalist, if far from actually originalist.
Scalia is too deferential to the legislature. And far too unwilling to grasp that the constitution severely limits government.
If you can read the 9th amendment (and the federalist papers) and say you are going to ignore all rights not enumerated in the Bill of rights – you are not an originalist.
The original meaning of the 9th amendment is there are far more rights than specified, and government can not infringe on any.
I also have a problem with the multiple layers of scrutiny.
If something is a right – strict scrutiny applies.
The Federalists, the AntiFederalists – EVERYONE agreed that the people had broad rights and government had limited powers to infringe. They disagreed on how to accomplish that. Iutside of Slavery every constitutional compromise was NOT about the ends, but the means to accomplish those.
Entirely the opposite of any modern understanding of the constiitution.
As noted even Scalia was not even close to reading the constitution as written.
And THAT is the core of originalism. Scalia was absolutely a step in a positive direction. but he was not even close to an originalist by any meaningful version of the name.
So many of us do not like the constution are written – the constitution has a remedy for that – amendment. The originalist position is that each amendment must be understood as the people who ratified that amendment intended – not our founders.
We own the constitution – we can change it. Our founders did not claim we were stuck forever with the constitution as they wrote and intended it.
Only that changes had to meet the same conditions as were in place to bring it into existance ratification by 3/4 of the states. Not 5 of 9 judges.
You say the world has changed, I am OK with that. If the long history of judicial mangling of the constitutions words reflects the actual views of people.
They should have no problem amending it to their liking.
It is not the courts job to amend the constitution by judicial fiat.
But they have been doing that for 250 years.
This is not about a decision to go back to the 18th century – the 14th amendment was mid/late 19th.
It si not even a dbate about limited governmet.
If people want a more powerful government they have it in their power to amend it.
“They disagreed on how to accomplish that. Iutside of Slavery every constitutional compromise was NOT about the ends, but the means to accomplish those.”
John, I don’t know that what you say is true, but the compromise over Slavery is good enough to prove my point about compromise.
As far as Scalia goes, I don’t think he expected anyone to agree with him on every decision. I think he believed in the amendment process.
“the compromise over Slavery is good enough to prove my point about compromise.”
Well I think it pretty much proved my point. The one issue the founders were forced to compromise they got completely wrong and I do not think anyone disagrees.
Even most of them at the time understood it was a mistake.
Scalia is to originalism what Freud is to psychology – important, and foundational.
but no one should take him as dogma.
Further the core problem with “living constitution” doctrine, and the failure of Scalia’s orignalism, is that you can not fix it by amendment.
Once judges can decide that the constitution does not mean what it says, then they can decide amendments do not mean what they say.
the 9th amendment being the obvious example.
If Scalia beleived in the amendment process he would have applied the constitution as written.
>>”“the compromise over Slavery is good enough to prove my point about compromise.”
>”Well I think it pretty much proved my point. The one issue the founders were forced to compromise they got completely wrong and I do not think anyone disagrees.”
John, that essentially is what compromise is. Neither side wins the point so both sides have disagreement with the solution.
Should the allies have compormised with Hitler and allowed the killing of 3M jews instead of 7 ?
Some things are wrong.
That is a hypothetical that wouldn’t have solved the problem. However, if the compromise was that we wouldn’t bomb Dresden’s non military sites in exchange for saving 4 million lives, I would accept that.
The question about moral compromise
rewriting it is not an option.
Join you provided a hypothetical Slavery so I provided another one Dresden and answered the question directly.
This was your reply that is open ended and couched in saying very little.
“The question about moral compromise rewriting it is not an option.”
The point was some compromises are immoral.
Your ability to construct a different hypothetical does not change that.
“The question about moral compromise rewriting it is not an option.”
Clear
“The point was some compromises are immoral.
Your ability to construct a different hypothetical does not change that.”
John I don’t know that you have any better idea of defining the limits of morality than you do of defining the limits of the Constitution.
“John I don’t know that you have any better idea of defining the limits of morality than you do of defining the limits of the Constitution.”
I did not define the limits of morality.
I pointed out that compromise can be immoral.
You do not need to make my arguments orders of magnitude larger than they are.
“I did not define the limits of morality.”
I did not and don’t think you can define the limits on morality any better than you have defined the limits of the Constitution. Behind your blinders you have your own beliefs similar in scope to what a partially blind person is able to see. That vision is very incomplete so you fill in the gaps with your own desires.
I demonstrated that compromise can result in a moral wrong.
That was my only objective.
The rest of your remark is tangent to that point.
It may be true, it might not. I did not try to determine that.
“I demonstrated that compromise can result in a moral wrong.”
…And lack of compromise can cause a moral wrong. That gets you nowhere.
Everytime I do a business deal it is a compromise. Sometimes unexpected questions of the law (or morality) arise. What do we do? Do you think we go to a priest or rabbi? Do you think we go to the law books and lawyers? No we generally compromise and leave as friends ready to do business again. That is how the world works best.
“I demonstrated that compromise can result in a moral wrong.”
“…And lack of compromise can cause a moral wrong.”
Possible, but you have not demonstrated that.
I have not thoroughly considered that but I suspect that it is either wrong, or rarely true.
>“…And lack of compromise can cause a moral wrong.”
>>Possible, but you have not demonstrated that.
I have not thoroughly considered that but I suspect that it is either wrong, or rarely true.
—-
John, It’s not difficult but no one can help you until you take your blinders off.
“Everytime I do a business deal it is a compromise.”
Or more accurately you negotiate. Not getting what you did not expect is not much of a compromise.
“Sometimes unexpected questions of the law (or morality) arise. What do we do?”
As best as I can tell in Allan world you go lawless and immoral.
I am going to skip the law – because while I value conforming to the law, Obediance to the law is not ALWAYS a moral requirement.
As to morality – I do not compromise morality – I would hope you do not either.
Fortunately actual moral impediments in business are quite rare.
“Do you think we go to a priest or rabbi? Do you think we go to the law books and lawyers? ”
I am going to remind you of a point I made regarding the justified use of force.
One of the requirements was that the law or use of force conformed to what the overwhelming majority of us intuitively understood as “right and wrong”
It is rare that you should have to consult a lawyer to know right and wrong.
>“Everytime I do a business deal it is a compromise.”
>>Or more accurately you negotiate. Not getting what you did not expect is not much of a compromise.
—-
John, there is tremendous similarity between compromise and a good negotiation. When one negotiates one needs to know what the person on the other side of the table needs. That is what Hayek recognized. Good people needed something and so did the marketplace. In the end he advocated solutions where the good people get what they absolutely needed and the marketplace was to be minimially interferred with. In that way both parties were able to function without hurting one another.
“Not getting what you did not expect is not much of a compromise.”
That is a sign of greed. In most negotiations I have ever been involved in there was always compormise. When there wasn’t there was generally lawyers and the costs in time and money weren’t worth it.
“As best as I can tell in Allan world you go lawless and immoral.”
I believe every thinking person except you knows that isn’t true.
You have a long and mostly irrelevant discussion about compromise vs. negotiation.
I would contemplate the similarties and differences – but they do not really matter.
There are some clear errors in your remarks, but they are small, and the whole digression is irrelevant.
And anyone who raises “greed” has lost me.
Are your choices moral ? Are they legal ?
If so do not talk to me about greed.
Nearly every time someone uses greed, they are jealous.
If something is immoral – say that.
If it is illegal – say that.
If it is both moral and legal, I do not care what you have to say about “greed”.
“You have a long and mostly irrelevant discussion about compromise vs. negotiation.”
You denied the similarities of the two so I decided to help you out. But you seem to have a problem in understanding these human ways of behavior. That is OK because you couldn’t pick up the meaning of ‘greed’ either in the context being used. In some negotiations the other individual cannot negotiate or compromise, much like you. They generally don’t do well because they have this belief that a compromise, negotiation etc. is a one way street. That exists perhaps where despots are concerned but when we are dealing with free Americans we expect more flexibility. Generally if there is more than one owner the “greedy” one is replaced with one that has more flexibility. The reason he is replaced is because he can’t get a deal from anyone, not just me. Prices are set by the marketplace but it is not a one price fits all deal.
“There are some clear errors in your remarks, but they are small, and the whole digression is irrelevant.”
If they are irrelevant why mention them? The only reason is that they don’t exist and you can’t quote them so you choose a new road and call them irrelevant. If that boosts your ego then go ahead and litter the blog with that type of nonsense.
My use of the word “greed” has nothing to do with jealousy. It has more to do with stupidity that can destroy a company or send a person to jail for no other reason than the last penny has to be his no matter who it rightfully belongs to.
“You denied the similarities of the two ”
I do not care if they are similar.
they are not the same,
and the form you are fixated on is irrelevant to the argument.
“so I decided to help you out.”
Why do I want help exploring something irrelevant that I do not care about ?
You may be right, you may be wrong. I do not care, the digression is irrelevant to the argument.
I am not even interested in figuring out whether you are right or wrong.
“But you seem to have a problem in understanding these human ways of behavior.”
Now off on another tangent as well as back to this mind reading again.
Stick to what is written, not what you think I mean, or think or feel.
“That is OK because you couldn’t pick up the meaning of ‘greed’ either in the context being used.”
You haf virtually no context and what little you had strongly suffested you were missusing it.
Regardless, I will ignore any argument anyone makes using the word greed.
It is almost never used correctly,
and there is always a better what of referencing the problem – if there even is one.
Greed is typically used when an action is legal and moral and they wish to pretend it is therefore wrong. Usually because it was beyond their abilities to come up with on their own.
It is extremely difficult to legally and morally benefit from a free market transaction without delivering atleast the value you received to the other party.
Regardless if the transaction was free – the other party did it voluntarily.
They clearly beleive they got as much as they gave.
“In some negotiations the other individual cannot negotiate or compromise, much like you. ”
This is not a negotiation, it is a debate,
You can persuade or you can fail.
“They generally don’t do well because they have this belief that a compromise, negotiation etc. is a one way street. ”
Make a real argument – you are back to reading other peoples minds.
You do not know the beleifs of fictitious others.
“There are some clear errors in your remarks, but they are small, and the whole digression is irrelevant.”
“If they are irrelevant why mention them?”
Because they are there.
“The only reason is that they don’t exist”
Mind reading again, and a false assumption.
” and you can’t quote them”
mind reading and assumption
“so you choose a new road and call them irrelevant.”
mind reading and assumption.
I said the digression is irrelevant.
“My use of the word “greed” has nothing to do with jealousy.”
I did not say it did. I said that is frequently the case.
You provided almost no context.
“It has more to do with stupidity that can destroy a company”
The call it that.
” or send a person to jail for no other reason than the last penny has to be his no matter who it rightfully belongs to.”
If you take what is not yours that is theft.
Greed is your mind reading as to why.
John, you call what I said tangents. Why? Because the tangents agree with Hayek and you disagree with Hayek using three different conflicting lines of attack and a lot of words.
“John, you call what I said tangents. Why? Because the tangents agree with Hayek and you disagree with Hayek using three different conflicting lines of attack and a lot of words.”
You introduced the Hayek Quote.
First it is a fallacious appeal to authority – tangent.
Next it is a statement of opinion on something we now have facts – tangent.
Last arguments based on claims of adjective disagreement are …. TANGENTS.
Yes, it often takes alot of words to address fallacies and tangents.
Done with this.
“You introduced the Hayek Quote. First it is a fallacious appeal to authority – tangent.
In argument I told you what Hayek said. You didn’t believe it and you told me to prove it. Your problem is I proved it.
“Next it is a statement of opinion on something we now have facts – tangent.”
The opinion was from Hayek and your so called new data didn’t prove anything and if you choose to believe it does then you have to rid yourself of all of the greatest experts you relied on your entire life. Your house is falling apart. BE careful that the last beam to fall doesn’t hit you on the head.
Last arguments based on claims of adjective disagreement are …. TANGENTS.
It was based on your disbelief. Though your simple solution was to call my argument ‘adjectives’ I actually quoted from Hayek and then to further bolster what I said I quoted three statements from you that all conficted with one another.
“Done with this.”
Even your last words cannot be counted on because you said them before and then went right back into the arguement. Face it. Your whole problem revolves around zigzagging streets and the fact that Hayek was a Nobel Prize winner and you are not. Calling quotes from Hayek’s own book to prove the legitimacy of the words Hayek wrote is not an appeal to authority but you believe it is because you believe you are the authority not Hayek.
plink
“plink”
This is no better than the last.
The reason that fallacies are prohibited in argument is that they pretty much always degenerate into personal attacks.
Just stick to facts and valid arguments.
I have no wish to get into some personal conflict with you.
But that is where reliance on fallacies tends to lead.
“The reason that fallacies are prohibited in argument is that they pretty much always degenerate into personal attacks.”
Yes, that is true and you have moved in that direction but no insult taken. There was no fallacy. I repeated what Hayek said and then I had to prove it by copying word for word what he said. You then provided three different explanations that I quoted for what Hayek said. That is not a fallacy.
The fallacies – appeal to authority, etc. are yours.
And you are incapable of letting go.
You have made a wide variety of claims.
I have rebutted them repeatedly.
Doing so another 10 times serves no purpose.
Anyone who wants can read the comments.
“The fallacies – appeal to authority, etc. are yours.”
I guess you like to live in a world where the only expert is yourself. We learn from the people that we have mentioned and to my recollection you are big about reading these great minds. Wasn’t it you that suggested reading material to Cindy? If I recall you mentioned Bastiat, Hayek and a couple of others. If we could not use them as authorities why bring them up to Cindy?
“And you are incapable of letting go.”
Let’s see where we went:
Unleashed dog
Central park
Constitution
Originalism
Federalism
Then we went to a whole slew of other topics where you based your opinion on the Constitution until I brought up the fact that zigzagged roads can be controlled by the states. I finally had to bring in federalism to show that state constitutions conforming with the Federal Consitution can involve the states in road building. At that point you brought in the purity argument of the free market and that the free market had to be as white as snow. We got into Hayek and your opinion of what Hayek said diverged into three different directions.
You ask me if I am ” incapable of letting go”? That is a strange question for you to ask of me since you are still dealing with Paul on the issue of an Unleashed dog in Central Park.
“I guess you like to live in a world where the only expert is yourself.”
Arguments are not about experts,
When you are referencing experts you are debating opinions.
“We learn”
That is right – learn.
Like how to think critically.
“If we could not use them as authorities why bring them up to Cindy?”
There is no other use for Bastiat than as an authority ?
This is not fundimentalist christianity. Hayek is not the inerrant word of god.
Citing the most infamous example of an error by Hayek suggests you think it is.
I can not tell you or Cindy what to do, but I would hope that whoever you read, you test what they say against reality.
“Constitution
Originalism
Federalism”
Those topics were your choices. We appear to hold similar but not identical views.
Again you seem to treat the constitution like holy scripture.
I treat it as the law defining the limits and powers of government.
Like all law I expect that it will be read narrowly regarding the power of government and broadly regarding the rights of individuals.
In fact all law MUST be understood that way and there will be too much inconsistency and conflict otherwise.
“finally had to bring in federalism to show …”
That you treat the constitution as scripture.
“At that point you brought in the purity argument of the free market and that the free market had to be as white as snow. ”
Nope.
Markets are not pure
I do not even know what that means.
They are not even efficient.
They are just more efficient than anything else, in solving problems that do not require force.
“We got into Hayek and your opinion”
Their is no “opinion” here.
Hayek said what he said – that is a fact, not an oppinion.
Some of what he said is his oppinion,
His statement on social safety nets is an oppinion,
and one that facts since have falsified.
Hayek said other things that contradict his oppinion on safetynets,
But we did not get into those
Beyond some word play on your part.
My statements on Hayek were completely consistent.
You tried to convert Hayek’s inconsistency into my own.
“You ask me if I am ” incapable of letting go”? ”
Your not.
“That is a strange question for you to ask of me since you are still dealing with Paul on the issue of an Unleashed dog in Central Park.”
No Like you, Paul keeps looping through the same issues over and over hoping for a different outcome.
Nothing has actually changed for days.
The facts are what they are, the law is what it is.
John, let me unwrap this last response of yours from the bottom to the top. I said “you are still dealing with Paul “ That is a fact. That “Paul keeps looping through the same issues over and over “does not force you to follow suit but you do because in your own words you are “incapable of letting go”
“The facts are what they are, the law is what it is.”
That is a fact, and that law is based on agreement from the thirteen original states. The underlying document is the Constitution of the United States where each State has its own constitution that permits the state to intervene in road building. I find that advantageous, you might not. However, that is the law so the States have the right to intervene. Both of us might dislike a lot of the intervention but that is decided in a legal fashion that we accept because the alternative is worse.
That originally you used the Constitution and the originalist interpretation as the basis for not having government involved in zigzaggy roads was a wrong assumption of yours. You left out the entire idea of federalism and state constitutions. When finally I corrected that misimpression on your part you switched to marketplace theory.
That is fine with me because I too believe in the free marketplace. Where we really differ is in how we feel about the idea that perfection is the evil of good. At least where the marketplace and human beings are concerned I believe that phrase to be accurate. You seem to disagree. To you perfection leads to the best outcome. You assume your criteria for the outcome is the best one. I look at human beings and their lifespan. They can’t wait 100 years for a slight adjustment in the marketplace that improves their lives for the better today.
Hayek recognizes that the marketplace in relationship to human beings is not just a balance sheet and that there is more than just a number at stake. Because of that you think Hayek is wrong and likely Adam Smith is wrong as well but in this case whether something is right or wrong is dependent on what outcome you are striving for.
Hayek might say a very rich country can afford $1 to make that human life better for the rest of his life. You say that human life can wait for a generation or two or three. Yes there is a bit of inconsistency in Hayek’s approach but he looks towards the marketplace as a solution to be used for the betterment of the human population not for the betterment of the free marketplace.
>>“As best as I can tell in Allan world you go lawless and immoral.”
>I believe every thinking person except you knows that isn’t true.
Probably true, but what I know intuitively and what I conclude from your remarks is not the same. If you have not figured that out, I am going to take you at your word, even when I am pretty sure you did not mean what you said.
Sometimes that is small and nit picky. others it is more significant.
The reason for the conflict between the two statements above is significant.
Either there is a contradiction in your arguments, because the conclusion that Allan world is lawless and immoral flows logically from your argument.
Or the alternative is your response is false, and the direst statement is true.
John>>>“As best as I can tell in Allan world you go lawless and immoral.”
Allan>>I believe every thinking person except you knows that isn’t true.
John>Probably true
—-
The only answer I can readily see to this twister of a puzzle is that you think yourself beyond all other people because thinking people know what you said isn’t true and you agreed. Why? One can only surmise that as a thinking person you differ from all others in that your believe your thoughts superior to the thoughts of all other people. That is why you say it is true but only probably so because you are the one person that might choose to disagree.
Of course I can be totally wrong because I am dealing with one whose thoughts are all tied up like a pretzel and difficult to separate.
Of course this is a twister – you keep expanding far beyond the context of the debate.
And you keep arguing fallaciously.
One of the reasons you do not try to read minds is that drags the argument away from the facts and events and issues and it makes it about the person and it makes it personal.
“is that you think yourself beyond all other people because thinking people know what you said isn’t true and you agreed.:
Aside from being a muddy statement – what part of that is NOT you drawing conclusions about what I think ?
Why is that every relevant to ANY argument ?
“Why? ”
That’s right Why ? Why have you tried to make this argument about how or what I think ?
It is not totally irrelevant to this argument – it is totally irrelevant to ANY argument.
“One can only surmise that as a thinking person you differ from all others in that your believe your thoughts superior to the thoughts of all other people. That is why you say it is true but only probably so because you are the one person that might choose to disagree.”
Again – where in any of the above is the actual issue being considered ?
Totally gone. Your entire response is this digression involving speculation about how I think.
It is both wrong and irrelevant.
What is your purpose in commenting ? To find the truth, to express your opinion on a subject ? Or to analyse the thought processes of someone you do not know ?
The first two I am interested in.
The latter is fallacy and irrelevant.
“Of course I can be totally wrong because I am dealing” – something irrelevant and unknowable – another persons thought process.
“with one whose thoughts are all tied up like a pretzel and difficult to separate.”
Why would you imagine that you are able to know much less understand another persons thoughts ?
Why do you think you can evaluate and judge ANY other persons thought process ?
Your entire posts is a pretty classic example of what is wrong with “ad hominem”.
Most equate ad hominem with argument by insult. Ad Hominem means “To The Person”
Your argument is an “ad hominem” fallacy when it leaves the issues and shifts to assertions about the person you are arguing with.
Your speculation about their thought processes.
When you do that things always go off the rails. It is near impossible to avoid the argument devolving into exchanged insults.
If your responses are speculation about my thinking – they are fallacy, and they are outside what you can possibly know.
“Of course this is a twister”
Right and that is because you are trying to follow all the zigzagged streets you do not wish to straighten out. I am not reading minds, I am reading your words similarly pretzel shaped.
“Right and that is because you are trying to follow all the zigzagged streets you do not wish to straighten out. I am not reading minds, I am reading your words similarly pretzel shaped.”
No, you are reading minds. I have never said anything about my desired outcome regarding streets. All I have said is that you can not use force to acheive your desired outcome – whatever that is, without justification.
I might prefer zigzig streets, or I might give money to have the straightened – regardless, that is my choice – I have not expressed it, and you do not know it.
When you say “you do not wish”, absent my actually saying “this is what I wish” you are reading my mind, not my words.
So long as your argument keeps asserting your speculation regarding what I think, feel, wish, it is fallacy.
“No, you are reading minds. I have never said anything about my desired outcome regarding streets.”
I was relating your spin in this discussion to the zigzagging of roads, but as we see with your three conflicting quotes that is enough to make you dizzy as you follow your own pretzel shaped arguments.
plink
Hayek made no error in the paragraph I cited. He was brilliant as was the solution he offered when strct adherence to the marketplace wasn’t adhered to. He set a brilliant path and moved libertarianism further to its goal. You have moved it in the opposite direction because your solution is weak and Darwin sees to it your solution doesn’t grow.
and yet real world data over the past 80 years says he was unequivically wrong on this one thing.
The versions of the 9th amendment are irrelevant. What other thoughts were had were irrelevant. your perspective and mine is irrelevant. All that matters is what did in mean when it was ratified.
I would not the constitution itself has a priviledges and immunities clause one of the antifederalist argument against the bill of rights was that it weakened the priviledges and immunities clause by allowing the false assumption that those were the only rights we have. I would further note the priviledges and imunities clause in the 14th amendment.
That was INTENDED to be the 9th amendment ON STERIODS – there is no question the 14th amendment binds the states too.
So we are not talking about the importance of a single paragraph.
We are talking 250 years history of the courts rejecting over and over what the founders and the authors of the 14th amendment said over and over.
Limited government, nearly limitless rights.
We have changed that – not by amending the constitution.
Not even by a vote of the majroity rather the supermajorities necescary to impose normative law, But by fiat of simple majorities of 9 old men. Doing what they were prohibited from doing.
“All that matters is what did in mean when it was ratified.”
John, we can only guess. If were to bring back all those that signed the Constitution then they could rate our guesses but the problem is that likely they themselves would have disagreements as to what was meant in the original document. Where there was agreement one might claim that the agreement was broken because the other isn’t living up to his part of the compromise. Your holy grail is perfection which doesn’t mix well with human beings along with the fact that as I have stated many times ‘perfection is the enemy of good.
“John, we can only guess. If were to bring back all those that signed the Constitution then they could rate our guesses but the problem is that likely they themselves would have disagreements as to what was meant in the original document. Where there was agreement one might claim that the agreement was broken because the other isn’t living up to his part of the compromise. Your holy grail is perfection which doesn’t mix well with human beings along with the fact that as I have stated many times ‘perfection is the enemy of good.”
You would be surprised at how easy this is. What is surprising is that it has not been done much before.
We have done it for centuries with statues, and even longer with common law.
The recent radical shift in 2A law is the consequence of scholarship into our founders.
The authors of the 2A were actually a bit squishy – northerners and southerners did NOT intend that it means the same thing. the odd construction of the 2A is the consequence of that. I would not call it a “compromise” but more the deliberate choice of language that northerners could pretend meant what they intended and southerners could beleive meant what they intended.
And this flew because the federal government did not regulate guns until the 1930’s.
And the 2A at the time of the founders did not apply to the states.
BUT the 14th amendment changed everything.
There is ZERO question that the reconstruction republicans specifically intended that the priviledges and immunities clause was there to give individual blacks in the south the right to own guns. This was debated loudly and vocally, There was no games about militias. The history of the 14th amendment is the real reason that not only did SCOTUS take a big step towards guarantining an individual right to bear arms, but applied it to the states.
The only question being debated today is whether that right is subject to strict of intermediate scrutiny. SCOTUS is improperly leaning towards the latter.
All rights are subject to strict scrutiny – even unenumerated ones.
Regardless, it has never been difficult to grasp the meaning of the constitution.
It is actually rare that the plain meaning of the words today and that 200 years ago is significantly different.
Myriads of bad SCOTUS decisions do not involve any attempt at all to understand the meaning of our founders. They primarily involve ignoring large parts of the constitution.
If you claim the 9th amendment is not perfectly clear – it still without any doubt means that there are lots of unenumerated rights.
But no SCOTUS decision EVER has rested on a 9th amendment claim.
Even the right to privacy had to be found in the 4th amendment.
I have noted the 9th amendment. But i have also noted that the immunities and priviledges cluase in the constitution and the separate one in the 14th amendment were ALL there to say the same thing – that government is limited to the powers in the consitution and that everything else belongs to the individual.
The “priviledges and immunities” language was a choice made specifically to assure that it mean MORE than just rights.
The only secret to this – is that we choose not to find out.
And even that – while we can find exactly what was meant, it is not at odds with the language of the constitution or amendments.
We rarely need to sus out older meanings.
“You would be surprised at how easy this is. ”
John, the reason you think it easy is you have rid yourself of all competing arguments as if they dont exist. You have trashing so many ideas in recent posts that it looks like you have trashed federalism as well. (see my prior comments.)
The constitution and the system of federalism reflect the principles of the founders.
But neither the constitution NOR federalism ARE those principles.
I do not have a problem with federalism.
Nor do I grasp where you think I have rejected it.
The tenth amendment does not say all power not granted the federal govenrment belongs to the states.
Regardless, I am not an advocate for unlimited state government and limited federal government.
I advocate for limited government. Period.
“I do not have a problem with federalism.”
Then Seattle can rightly raise the level of the city and other places can rightfuly correct the zigzagged streets. That is the power our original founders gave to the states.
non sequtur.
I have addressed this repeatedly.
“Barnet does nto provide a theory. All he does is document the original meaning of the constitution, all the way through and including the reconstruction amendments.”
John, Is Barnet the psuedonym for God because if it isn’t then it is just Barnet’s personal opinion that you strongly agree with.
“John, Is Barnet the psuedonym for God because if it isn’t then it is just Barnet’s personal opinion that you strongly agree with.”
Nope, he provides hundreds of pages of the discussions of the very people who drafted the specific clauses and amendments.
When the constitution was ratified there was the federalist papers, there were editorials in news papers. In myriads of instances the others of the clauses testified in state ratification hearings explaining in great detail what each clause meant.
In the case of the 14th amendment there is actually several decades of chaffing and grousing about bad supreme court decisions, and extensive discussions in congress about specifically how to use the 14th amendment to undo those. To restore the 9th amendment, to restore the priviledges and immunities clause.
As noted in another post – the discussion regarding the 14th amendment specific to the priviledges and immunsities clause directly addressed an individual right to own guns for black men.
All that was unique when Heller went before the supreme court was we had 5 justices with originalist bents and lawyers who were incredibly familiar with the creation and ratification of the 2A and 14A.
They had some advantage – because there had been very very few 2A cases, so there was not enormous precident they had to overcome. Most of what they had to overcome was that gun control laws had grown since the 30’s and no one dared take them to SCOTUS – wisely, they would have lost in the Warren court.
But by the time Heller hit the court, there was little strong binding precident, and a strong originalist case. And the big deal was the 14th amendment not the 2A.
Because the 14A authors made absolutely no secret that it was their intention to make it impossible for southern states to deprive blacks of guns.
This did not require iuija boards or mind reading.
>>“John, Is Barnet the psuedonym for God because if it isn’t then it is just Barnet’s personal opinion that you strongly agree with.”
>Nope, he provides hundreds of pages of the discussions of the very people who drafted the specific clauses and amendments.
—-
John, does Barnet agree with the Constitution and Federalism?
You keep trying to pretend that the constitution is a set of principles.
It is not. Barnet is a lawyer arguing for a return to an originalist application of the constitution. That precludes him from making arguments outside the constitution, and supporting documents of the time.
You and I are not preparing a brief for SCOTUS.
I would have to argue differently there – as would you.
No one would care about Hayek.
The constitution makes small allowance for public goods.
I can not argue to SCOTUS that they are unconstitutional because they fail.
SCOTUS does not make emprical decisions. They decide based on the constitution and the law. That is how they should.
We are arguing in a domain where “this fails” is a valid refutation.
“You keep trying to pretend that the constitution is a set of principles.”
No such thing in my response. Again you are creating strawman. My question in the previous response was
“John, does Barnet agree with the Constitution and Federalism?” That has nothing to do with what you say above.
>>“John, does Barnet agree with the Constitution and Federalism?” That has nothing to do with what you say above.
Asked, and answered, (yes) and irrelevant.
I know you think this is solely a debate about the constitutional and federalism, but that is barely relevant.
Trying again.
It is incredibly important to you whether your “public good” is something the states can constitutionally do.
I do not know, I do not care.
Specific to your zigzag roads – there would likely be a takings issue too.
Further I beleive postal roads may be an enumerated federal power.
Regardless, It is not my expectation that I can persuade even a incredibly strict originalist that roads are outside the domain of government.
Our founders allowed states to build canals and that proved disasterous.
Regardless, while I am happy that a proper reading of the constitution prohibits much of the nonsense the state and federal governments do, it does not prohibit all of it.
This discussion started over your proposition that public goods existed.
That is not a constitutional question.
If your framing of the question is that men with guns can meddle with the economy if the courts do not stop them – then yes, Public goods exist – because your definition of a public good is something government is constitutionally permitted to do.
My claim that they do not rests primarily on Scalia’s answer.
Stupid and constitutional are not mutually exclusive.
The constitution does – especially strictly read prohibit the vast majority of public goods.
Of course that does not mean they do not exist – only that the US govenrment is barred from them.
But the important question is is there something that could be a public good that is not stupid for government to do.
Outside of “the rule of law” – the courts, law enforcement and national defense” there is nothing that is not stupid for government to do.
Further I would address principles – rather than the constitution.
You may use force – indidivually or collectively against others when you can justify it.
There are several criteria to be justified. Each is necescary but no sufficient.
The first is utility – the greatest good for the greatest number. You lose most of the time there. You can not beat the free market for utility. Therefore you can never produce the greatest good for the greatest number – the market always does better.
The 2nd is that you must be normative – it must match essentially instinctual precepts.
As ignorance of the law is not an excuse, they law must be what 80-90% of use would understand it to be even if it was not written.
The next is it must infringe the least possible on existing rights.
Next it must be something that can not be accomplished without the use of force.
All of those and possible more must be met to be justified.
Laws against murder – meet these requirements.
Laws against 64oz sodas do not.
Nor does government straightening zigzag roads.
The arrangement above is one of principle, not constitution – though this is close to the principles of government in the declaration of independence.
I would also suggest that significant portions of these principle are accepted by most conservatives – atleast until they interfere with something they want.
“Asked, and answered, (yes) and irrelevant.”
John, it is neither irrelevant nor was the question answered. You didn’t even bother responding to what I said. You used Barnet as YOUR authority and just like with Hayek you are finding that you have to back track because his philosophy has not disagreed with states being involved in road building. John, you are zigzagging all over the place and getting yourself dizzy.
You are so dizzy that the next sentence says: “I know you think this is solely a debate about the constitutional and federalism, but that is barely relevant.”
You are backtracking again. We were talking about the Constitution and federalism along with the states legal ability to involve themselves in building roads. Now you want to prove a point that is long agreed on that the free market generally works best. The Gish Gallop is alive in this reply of yours as you travel far and wide saying little on the subject at hand except perhaps when you create a phony argument I didn’t make that you feltl you had the ability to answer.
You have tarnished your understanding of Hayek and probably Barnet. You have failed in your attempts at strawman arguments and putting words in my mouth. Even the Gish Gallop will not save you. Remove your blinders and start all over.
Barnet does nto provide a theory.
All he does is document the original meaning of the constitution, all the way through and including the reconstruction amendments.
Originalism BTW is not an “oppinion” it is actually the standard rules of statutory construction that predate the constitution by centuries.
WE act as if originalism is something new. It is not.
Absolutely the courts have failed at it – particularly starting with the FDR courts.
But the principles of originalism are the way lawyers were taught all law was to be understood for as long as there has been english law.
Just as we can amend the constitution when we change our minds, we can pass new law. We understand ALL LAW not just the constitution first by the literal meaning of the words of the law, and where that is ambiguous of changin over time – by the meaning at the time it was passed.
I would note – this is NOT the same as looking into legislative intent or legislative history.
What matters is the meaning of the words at the time as understood by the people at the time – not the lawmakers. It is the people who the law binds. It is the people who could change the law markers if they did not like the results.
The centuries old standard rules of statutory interpretation apply to the constitution too.
That is all actual originalists are saying.
But one further point. Even if “originalism” is “wrong” whatever that means.
An absolute requirement of the rule of law, is that the meaning of the law – not to judges and lawyers but to all must be clear. Anything else is anarchy and lawlessness.
It is not critical that we agree on what the law should be. Only what it says
nor is it acceptable to game the process of determining the meanig to acheive our outcome. That is lawlessness.
This is not about a direction I favor.
We are in no better shape if we end up with a constitution I hate, but courts that interpret it as I wish it to be. It is still lawlessness.
BTW this is also why government must be limited.
Each of us are universally required to follow the law.
That can not be done if the meaning of the law is not clear, or if there is so much law we can not know it.
The claim that ignorance of the law is no excuse is immoral unless the law is knowable to all. This is also why law must ultimately reflect the norms or the vast majority of people.
Ultimately the law (and constitution) are the concepts of right and wrong carved on our hearts – not parchment. In most instances we do not have the opportunity to consult with a lawyer before acting
When we are confronted by a threat on the streets – or in Central park. We do not refer to the NY State law concerning what constitutes legitimate self defense. We do not contemplate stand your ground or castle doctrine. We have to KNOW based on core principles or even instincts.
Ultimately the constitution, the law, the means of interpretting them the reasons for limited govenrment all devolve to the same thing.
“Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.”
Kant
Your argument that we can not go from Chapter 19 back to chapter 1 is wrong.
That is precisely what we must do when wne have constructed a sand castle that has foundations unable to support it.
It is coming down. One way or another.
“It is coming down. One way or another.”
John, that is not going back from Chapter 19 to Chapter 1. That is rebuilding the entire structure.
“It is coming down. One way or another.”
>John, that is not going back from Chapter 19 to Chapter 1. That is rebuilding the entire >structure.
Do not care
What we have is unsustainable and growing. Failure is inevitable.
“What we have is unsustainable and growing. Failure is inevitable.”
John, nothing is sustainable and eventually all things fail. It seems you don’t want the Constitution read by an originalist. You want to replace the Constitution and the ideas behind our Federalist system.
You continue to think we are arguing in front of SCOTUS.
We are not. you are entirely wrong about public goods.
You are not entirely constitutionally wrong, only mostly.
You may not argue principles or Economics or empiracly before SCOTUS,
I am not going to preclude my best arguments, because you can not seem to grasp that
“It is unconstitutional” is not the only argument, or that “It is constitutional” is a good reason to do something that will not work.
Even Scalia understood the constitution did not preclude stupid.
“You continue to think we are arguing in front of SCOTUS.”
John, where do you come off saying that? None of your post deals with what I said in my response. You did read my response, didn’t you? I’ll repeat everything I said. “John, nothing is sustainable and eventually all things fail. It seems you don’t want the Constitution read by an originalist. You want to replace the Constitution and the ideas behind our Federalist system.”
Then you become insulting for no good reason. You say, “I am not going to preclude my best arguments, because you can not seem to grasp that…” using as example “Even Scalia understood the constitution did not preclude stupid.” Where did Scalia ever argue that road building and making sure roads weren’t zigzagging all over the place was stupid and something the states should not engage in?
“You continue to think we are arguing in front of SCOTUS.”
“John, where do you come off saying that? ”
Because you keep trying reframe the debate on constitutional terms which are only relevant in the context of constitutionality.
AGAIN it is possible to be stupid AND constitutional.
Then you become insulting for no good reason. You say, “I am not going to preclude my best arguments, because you can not seem to grasp that…” using as example “Even Scalia understood the constitution did not preclude stupid.” Where did Scalia ever argue that road building and making sure roads weren’t zigzagging all over the place was stupid and something the states should not engage in?
Allan,
I do not know what to say. This whole line of argument is much less than I would expect out of you.
LET GO OF THE CONSTUTIONAL NONSENSE.
I have never made a constitutional claim regarding your zigzag hypothetical.
Except correcting some overbredth in your claims for the power of states.
I have no idea how you think you have been insulted.
As to your “when did scalia” …
I am pretty sure there is a formal logical fallacy there, there is certainly atleast one non sequitur.
Scalia said the constitution does not preclude stupid.
that is a generalization – his generallization.
It includes anything stupid, but still constitutional
You are correct he did not itemize every stupid thing the constitution does not prevent.
“Because you keep trying reframe the debate on constitutional terms which are only relevant in the context of constitutionality.”
John, this is ridiculous. I stated the states have the power to involve themselves in building roads. Early on you were saying it wasn’t Constitutional. You said that many times. You discussed originalism and how Scalia wasn’t originalist enough.I then decided to point out that states have the power to involve themselves in building roads. You then relied on a multiplicy of arguments none of which dealt with the idea of federalism or the Constitution. After federalism was brought up you Gish Galloped all over the place and provided lame arguments.
The basic issue was whether or not the state could involve itself in the building of roads . You wanted to deny that just like you wanted to deny the paragraph I quoted from Hayek. Not everyone of your heros wears blinders.
The most significant force in the judiciary today is the federalist society.
The federalist society is far closer to libertarian than conservative.
You can thank libertarians for whatever damages Trump’s jurists repair.
One of the most influential federalists today is Randy Barnett.
I would recommend “Restoring the lost constitution” or most anything he has written.
Why do you presume that because something like sidewalks and streets are necessary that the only means outside of government to provide them is through tolls ?
Throughout history private actors, often businesses have built infrastructure when that was benefiical to them. And often provided that infrastructure at no cost to others, because that was beneficial to them.
Pick something you think is a public good that must be provided by government and I will find you a successful example where it was not.
Why don’t we see more of that ? Because government hates competition and does not easily cede power once it has it.
Lysander Spooner started a service to deliver letter anywhere in the United States.
It was successful and cheaper than the USPS.
So congress passed a law putting him out of business. He took this to SCOTUS which decided against prior precident, that the provision in the constitution for post offices was an EXCLUSIVE grant of that power to the federal government.
When government provides something – it is rare that anyone else does, no matter what that thing is. Because government can not compete, and it does not like to lose.
And the government can always pass laws to give it monopoly.
“Why do you presume that because something like sidewalks and streets are necessary that the only means outside of government to provide them is through tolls ?”
John, I don’t. In fact I provided you examples of private roads and bridges. There are many mechanisms available for dealing with these things outside of government.
Let’s take an example of a populated city that needed to to raise the elevation of the entire city, Seatle Washington. During rainy times the entire city would be innundatated with water. The eventual plan was to raise the level of the city by raising the streets and sidewalks. The first floor would then become the basement.
You are now the project engineer talking to all the individuals involved The various owners have different ideas where some were happy to keep their sidewalks and streets the way they were. Many had different ideas as to how the street should look in front of them. You tell us how we solve the problem of hundreds (or perhaps thousands) of different voices where many would refuse to cooperate in doing anything. Remember no force on any individual owner perhaps including those that had valid leases of ownership that might extend 20 or 100 years.
Lets take your example.
Why are you making so many assumptions ?
You have assumed a specific way to solve the problem.
Why is there only one way ?
You have assumed I am the project engineer.
I am a smart person with engineering among the many things in my background.
I could probably come up with a good plan to solve the problem.
But I am more than smart enough to know that given no constraints, someone else will come up with a better one.
One of the problems with “public goods” being government problems is that that assumption all buy itself destroys innovation and dictates that only one relatively traditional approach will be employed.
BTW in your approach in rainy times the basements (old first floors) will be flooded
Raising floors does not solve problems. You must get rid of or store the excess water.
Left on their own maybe people dig deep cisterns and store the water from their roofs and and streets and then use that during the dry season.
Or someone comes up with an entirely different way that is even better.
What I can assure you is that little or no creativity will be applied so long as you call it a “public good”.
John Seattle lived with the problem for a long time and no one person managed to fix it. That is when government got involved. The city was growing and leaving things alone would be akin to the zigzagged streets you had difficulty dealing with. A plan had to be made where some people had objections. I guess on the sidewalks one could have had stairs where the objectors refused to engage in raising the height of the sidewalk system. But, what do we do with the road? I don’t assume there weren’t better solutions. No one provided a better solution and it appeared no one person could fix the problem where everyone owning those buildings would eventually benefit.
“BTW in your approach in rainy times the basements (old first floors) will be flooded
Raising floors does not solve problems. You must get rid of or store the excess water.”
Seatle, I believe, was built on low land so I think the problem was that water flowed to Seatle. They could have abandoned the city but they chose to stay and convert the second floor of the buildings to the first floor while the first floor became the basement. There are basements all over and they don’t flood and neither do the basements in Seatle. Other options like you mention might have been considered, but I don’t think that would solve the problem of road flooding. The buildings existed and they weren’t two story buildings. They gave up one floor but added a basement.
Why while the city was potentially starting to die didn’t someone other than goveernment come up with a solution? The answer to that tells us why a public good exists.
“John Seattle lived with the problem for a long time and no one person managed to fix it.”
Then it was not a problem. As noted before – we have not solved the problem of faster than light travel either.
AGAIN the entire function of the free market is to produce and distribute what we wish to consume proportionate to our value of that thing.
Anything that people want badly enough to pay for the free market will provide – that is litterally what it is there for.
“That is when government got involved.”
To solve a problem that people on their own had decided they are unwilling to pay for.
That is precisely the problem with your idea of public goods.
I would define a public good today as something expensive that is not wanted by the market – all of us, enough for us to pay for, but is wanted by some special interest enough to force all of us to pay for.
” The city was growing and leaving things alone would be akin to the zigzagged streets you had difficulty dealing with”
I have no oppinion on zigzagged streets, If that is something people value we will get them. If it is something people strongly disvalue, they will disappear.
Same with your storm water problem
“That is precisely the problem with your idea of public goods.
I would define a public good today as something expensive that is not wanted by the market ”
I would define a public good differently as one used by everyone but doesn’t dimish with use. Even that is very imperfect so I will state that in public areas a road would be considered a public good. In contrast a zigzaged road would be a public ‘bad’.
Bad public policy regarding things like roads leads to a decline in economic activity and leads to less money available to pay for the roads for future generations. Your viewpoint is too static.
Actually as we learned from the PA Turnpike long straight roads are a public bad.
You really can’t seem to get past the critical problem with all your answers.
“I would define it”
“I want ”
“my value is”
All well and good, and you are free to direct your own reseources to your own wants desires values.
You are free to persuade others to do the same.
But you may not force others to pay for what you value.
You say I have not solved some problem. It is not my or governments problem to solve.
Whether and how it is solve and what we are willing to pay are things we decide in our own.
You can do whatever you want about zigzag roads
You can nto force other to pay for it.
Markets do not always have one person solve a problem.
In fact they rarely have one person solve a problem they have myriads of people – sometimes as individuals sometimes in various sized groups.
If people value solving the problem enough others will find a solution.
That is again quite litterly what the market does.
And nothing does it better.
“That is again quite litterly what the market does.”
John, there is no disagreement there, but sometimes markets have difficulty functioning yet the problem is vital and must be solved. It is at that time one looks to the markets and then to government (hopefully in the least intrusive way possible) if the situation is dire enough. That is not the time to base your argument on faith.
“sometimes markets have difficulty functioning yet the problem is vital and must be solved.”
When have markets failed independently of government failure ? Never.
Who gets to decide that a problem is vital and must be solved ?
Markets are pretty good at exactly that.
Government always imposes the will of a few on all.
“That is not the time to base your argument on faith.”
Lets see Government pretty much always falls short of fails when it messes with markets.
There are few if any example of market failure without government failure.
Whose argument rests on faith ?
“When have markets failed independently of government failure ? Never.”
John, the market is a system that doesn’t fail. It simply exists everywhere. What you are doing is playing a catch 22 game animating markets and providing them with your own personal rules with which you control success and failure. If governments fail and a market “fails” (it didn’t really fail) you can blame it on the government. If the market doesn’t provide for human needs you can say we need to wait longer or provide another explanation that also doesn’t provide for human needs. The purpose of markets to us is to provide for human need.
“Whose argument rests on faith ?”
Your argument rests on faith. You have even animated markets in your discussion. Visualization is important to faith,
“John, the market is a system that doesn’t fail.”
Sorry Allan but failure – creative destruction is a necescary part of free markets.
But Systemic failure requires govenrment.
“It simply exists everywhere.”
In varrying states of freedom, and we can use those differences to determine the effects of more and less freedom on markets and even specific govenrment actions.
Statistics do not support government intervention.
“What you are doing is playing a catch 22 game animating markets and providing them with your own personal rules with which you control success and failure.”
Well beyond my power to do. You really think that markets listen to me ?
Presumably you are trying to say that I am trying to recast the actual behavior of real world markets to appear to conform to my ideas of how it should.
That is really really difficult to fake – Climate models can not seem to get the earth to follow their models – you think I can fake conform the global economy to falsely conform to mine ?
There is a simpler explanation. These are not “my rules”, these are the actual behavior of markets as determined by 250 years of economists from Smith to Say to Bastiat to Ricardo to Hayek to Friedmen to coase to Barro, to Olstrom to ….
“If governments fail and a market “fails” (it didn’t really fail) you can blame it on the government.”
Because ? this is just a naked assertion. Why can’t I blame systemic Failure on govenrment when it flearly conincides with govenrment action ?
“If the market doesn’t provide for human needs you can say we need to wait longer or provide another explanation that also doesn’t provide for human needs. The purpose of markets to us is to provide for human need.”
Not clear what your argument is. But you keep missing the point.
Human needs are infinite. They can never be met.
But the market can provide us the most optimized possible result given what we have produced and our values. Everything else – like govenrment is suboptimal.
That BTW is a tautology. Markets are optimal because they are free and are determined by out weighted values. Any other result will by definition be something we did not freely choose by our weighted values and therefore suboptimal.
BTW none of this is “my ideas” or my gaming, it is just standard economics – much of it established for over 100 years.
“Your argument rests on faith. You have even animated markets in your discussion. Visualization is important to faith,”
That markets produce very nearly the best possible results is not a question of faith. It is how they work. It has actually been demonstrated, there are even relatively trivial experiments to crudely demonstrate it for classes.
Take a group – lets say 5 people to keep it simple – but this works for all sizes.
Go to the dollar store and buy lots of junk. Enough so that each person can have 5 items.
distribute them randomly. but so each person gets the same number.
Ask each person to asign a value to each item they have – for 1-10.
record the values.
Now allow everyone to trade what they have for anything else they might want.
When all trading stops ask each person to place a value on what they have – same as before.
Every person or nearly every person will value what they have at the end more than at the start. The ending total value will be much higher that the starting total value.
Yet nothing will have changed except who holds what.
But this is of fundimental importance – government can not do this.
Why ? Because government does not and can not know what each person values.
This experiment is repeatable anywhere at any scale up to the entire market itself.
And it performs better as it scales larger and everything else performs worse.
This demonstrates many facets of economics. But one of them is called “The knowledge problem” – or sometimes the socialist calculation problem, it is the reason socialism fails. It is one of the reasons government in the economy fails.
Each human has different values. You can not externally optimize the agregate increase in value through re-arrangement better or even close to as well as a free market – because you can never know enough, and the problem gets larger exponentially with the size of the market.
You tell me libertarianism fails except simple systems. The opposite is true. Only free markets work at scale. The greater the scale and complexity the farther away anything else is.
>>“John, the market is a system that doesn’t fail.”
>Sorry Allan but failure – creative destruction is a necescary part of free markets.
John, you are talking about a specific industry. I am talking about the concept of the marketplace. (“the market is a system that doesn’t fail. It simply exists everywhere.”)
“These are not “my rules”, these are the actual behavior of markets as determined by 250 years of economists from Smith to Say to Bastiat to Ricardo to Hayek to Friedmen to coase to Barro, to Olstrom to ….”
You already misread Hayek and even tried to downplay what he said when he was serious about what he said so no, I can’t agree with your unbreakable set of rules that discounts the unpredictability and needs of human beings.
Your argument rests on your faith in what you believe. It certainly doesn’t rest with Hayek.
“Why while the city was potentially starting to die”
While I doubt that – if actually true that that is what should have happened.
In free markets things fail all the time. Failure is a part of how the economy works.
It occurs when we have made a mistake and allocated resources incorrectly and we realize that.
What we do not want is failure in government. Therefore we do not want the government to participate in the economy – because the economy involves lots of failure.
“While I doubt that – if actually true that that is what should have happened.”
John, we live in a pluralistic country so one cannot satisfy all the people yet you do not see the need to compromise. In business when I am the sole responsible person I can make whatever decision I wish, but if a lot of money is needed others join in and one learns to compromise or fail. Time for a market solution sometimes doesn’t exist when a public good is involved. You are willing to let generations suffer and die until the market can fix the problem. Along with not creating a good environment to live that type of rigid attitude affects the economies abilities to grow. Iron breaks, steal bends.
“John, we live in a pluralistic country so one cannot satisfy all the people yet you do not see the need to compromise.”
That is precisely what markets do, evaluate the values of all preferentially ranked and deliver the greatest good to the greatest number. the perfect compromise.
All govenrment action ALWAYS distorts that. It ALWAYS produces suboptimal results.
” In business when I am the sole responsible person I can make whatever decision I wish”
One business is not a market. It is a tiny part of a market, competitiors and consumers are major other factors.
“but if a lot of money is needed others join in and one learns to compromise or fail. Time for a market solution sometimes doesn’t exist”
Because you say so ? first government never acts quickly – have you paid the slightest attention to the recent epidemic ? We are up to our asses in toilet paper, hand sanitizer and masks. We had very brief shortages. Government spun arround like a chicken with its head cut off and the problem was solved.
” when a public good is involved.”
Still no such thing.
This is a circular argument.
“You are willing to let generations suffer and die until the market can fix the problem.”
Of course. Again look at the moment.
We just tanked the economy – deliberately to save lives.
But look at the data. Has the US done better than Sweden ? Have blue states done better than red ? There are a few instances where some countries MIGHT have done better than others – Singapore, Taiwan, Japan – for the most part they succeeded by stopping C19 at their borders (or very near). Further their success is tenuous. Until C19 is gone forever they must be eternally vigilant.
But there is no evidence that lockdowns, or even social distancing did anything.
Even the purported claim they would flatten the curve – which only means less deaths if the healthcare system would be overrun otherwise, even that does not appear to have happened. It appears this has progressed through every nation at close to the same rate.
So we are paying trillions of dollars to “not save anyone”.
The fact is humans suffer and die. That is inevitable. SOMETIMES at great cost we can delay that. But we can not stop it.
But even that cost is important. If we spend too much to save one life we cause death and suffering elsewhere.
Overall life expectance does not correlate to what we spend fighting one problem.
It corelates ONLY to standard of living.
If we could spend $2T in the next 5 years and be assured of beating cancer.
We could still end up killing more people than we save.
The economy is $20T. That is all it is. That is what we can produce at this moment, and that has to meet every need we have. If we direct 10% of it in one direction unnaturally, we guarantee that some other need is short changed – and people suffer and die.
You are not stopping suffering and dying, you are just changing who.
And you are likely increasing how many
“All govenrment action ALWAYS distorts that. It ALWAYS produces suboptimal results.”
There is no argument by Hayek or myself that government distorts and produces suboptimal results from your perspective. That is why I quoted the same thing twice.
“We just tanked the economy – deliberately to save lives.”
This has virtually nothing to do with the discussion at hand. You are providing examples that would mimic many of my own but still in this discussion these examles aren’t pertinent.
“This has virtually nothing to do with the discussion at hand. You are providing examples that would mimic many of my own but still in this discussion these examles aren’t pertinent.”
Because you say so ?
“Because you say so ?”
No because you have claimed to be an originalist with regard to the Constitution but it seems you reject the founders ideas behind Federalism
No because you claim Hayek is great until a paragraph is quoted that disagrees with what you have been saying.
No because I could show you that Adam Smith will differ with you on similar points.
You have based your arguments on the authority of others including the founders but none of them seem to agree with you.
asked an answered.
We are not arguing before SCOTUS.
Constitutionality is required but not sufficient
“You tell us how we solve the problem of hundreds (or perhaps thousands) of different voices where many would refuse to cooperate in doing anything.”
Easy – look at the free market. It solves exactly those types of problems all the time.
People “cooperate” when the cost is low enough and the value is high enough.
“Remember no force on any individual owner perhaps including those that had valid leases of ownership that might extend 20 or 100 years.” what has this got to do with anything ?
>>”“You tell us how we solve the problem of hundreds (or perhaps thousands) of different voices where many would refuse to cooperate in doing anything.”
>”Easy – look at the free market. It solves exactly those types of problems all the time.”
Your telling us that the free market will solve the problem every time is not convincing. It sounds more like faith and if I want to do things based on faith I would rather do them in the religious institution of my choice.
How was the free market without government considering the problem a public good handling the city of Seatle? It wasn’t and perhaps The old Seatle would have become a dump with old delapidated buildings. Some might have considered building a new Seatle somewhere else but if the mindset were the same would they feel their capital was protected? I don’t think so. Maybe the entire area would have been better off? That depends on who is viewing the situation. MAybe the entire area would today be woodlands and forests where its harbors were underutilized. I don’t know but neither do you.
it is not faith. It is fact.
Our government is only about to spend $4T/yr because the free market creates $20T in value every year.
You keep telling me some problems are too big for anything but government – well government is smaller than the economy, and is fundimentally a parasite on the economy. If the economy dies – government dies.
The only article of faith here is in government itself.
Look arround you. Look at everything that the free market has given you ?
In 1969 no one but Gene roddenbury knew you wanted a communicator.
Now you have something even he could not imagine.
You tell me how amazing the space program is – not that it was created by government innovation. You must understand how phenomenally difficult a modern CPU is
I beleive the most complex CPU today is just shy of 50Billion Transistors.
There are several billion in the cell phone in your pocket.
I used to work in DoD software. Right in the midst of the DoD COTS revolution.
COTS means Commerical off the shelf.
When I was young you could by commercial grade of military grade chips.
But overtime Commercial demand and commercial quality outstripped the Military.
Vendors stopped making chips for the military and if they did they were not as good and more expensive.
Do you know how much a modern CPU foundary costs to build ?
And they have a fairly short life before the next generation makes them out dated.
The Big Dig – the most expensive public construction project ever was supposed to be 2.8B it completed at 8.8B,
The latest 7nm chip foundary costs $12B all privately funded.
CityCenter on the los vegas strip is privately funded at $8B
And took far less time than the Big Dig and had much less cost overruns.
The ability to privately fund anything is limited only by the value of what is being funded.
Government only funds things that are not worth what they cost.
The Big Dig will ultimately cost $20B – that is because it is finaced over half of forever.
It will not be paid off under 2038.
Do you thing there is anything built privately with a 50year payoff ?
That is the definition of “not worth it”
Mist private projects must pay off in 7 years. Why, because anything that can not pay off its cost in 7 years is NOT WORTH IT.
We have very good ideas about what the time value of money is.
“it is not faith. It is fact.”
John, fact and faith often get confused. In this case I believe you are confused.
” well government is smaller than the economy,”
That is a meaningless statement. In my world which favors federalism and small governments I recognize, like Hayek, that there are times that needs are such that government can be involved. However, when such a rare thing happens the government action should have the least effect on the marketplace as possible. (Money might not even be the issue.)
I don’t recommend government’s entry into all the spaces you discuss in the rest of your post. You are looking for payoff’s. I think the purchase of Alaska by the government was a great idea. How much is all of Alaska worth today if put on the open market.
I demonstrated that it was fact not faith.
There is no basis for faith in government market actions – yet you keep pushing that dogma.
“I demonstrated that it was fact not faith.
There is no basis for faith in government market actions – yet you keep pushing that dogma.”
No, John, You confused fact with faith.
You have repeatedly agreed that government produces suboptimal results – except in this mythical case where the thing is a “public good” – which has no meaningful defintion.
You have no explanation for why this particular unicorn is a market failure – you appear to have rejected the possibility that some problem you posit might not be best solved right now.
SciFy fans like to discuss the possibility of building a starship now.
That is probably not possible. but even if it was, it would require all the wealth in the world. No matter how wonderful the starship, that would be a bad choice today.
And yet – your model, presumes that if the market says a choice should not happen now, Our values do not justify that expenditure of resources. that still – because this is a public good, which quite clearly is defined as something we have chosen not to provide for ourselves yet. that we should go ahead anyway through government by force.
You are a smart person and this is not difficult.
Government may not be buying us an impossible starship, but it quite litterally bought us a moon landing that no matter how exciting it might have sounded, and appealing. is not what each of us, or all of us together would have voluntarily chosen – at the time.
Yet it is fairly clear that today we are much closer to that being a free choice that the market would make.
It is likely we will return to the moon more because government still wants to than because we have reached the point where enough people value that highly enough to bring it about through the market.
But it is also clear that would happen soon regardless.
Your public good apears to be nothing more than something we have rejected voluntarily for now.
Your not even operating on faith. You are just implimenting a force override to deliver something to those who wanted it. but did not have the market clout yet to get what they wanted. And you are just as certainly depriving others of something they could have otherwise had.
“like Hayek, that there are times that needs are such that government can be involved. ”
That is not what Hayek said.
He said that we can make emotional choices to suit our emotional values, but that government solutions in the economy while emotionally fullfilling would never produce the same degree of positive results.
Hayek was not equivocal. He was clear, government intervention in the economy will never produce economically superior results.
As I noted before the free market is essentially an optimizing function. It optimizes what we are capable of producing to maximize the total value that we produce.
The only way to produce more value to to improve productivity PERIOD.
You will never have more value by forcibly redistributing resources.
You can override the economy to say – reduce cancer deaths. but not to acheive higher net life expectancy.
You can override to acheive a better emotional result – atleast for some.
I am not really convinced that you can even acheive a net superior emotional result.
I beleive in that Chapter of “the road to serfdom” it slipped Hayek’s mind that emotional values are reflected in the economy too.
“That is not what Hayek said.” …”Hayek was not equivocal. ”
Road to Serfdom: (PDF found at Mises)
“There is no reason why, in a society which has reached the general level of wealth ours has, the first kind of security should not be guaranteed to all without endangering general freedom; that is: some minimum of food, shelter and clothing, sufficient to preserve health. Nor is there any reason why the state should not help to organize a comprehensive system of social insurance in providing for those common hazards of life against which few can make adequate provision.”
I am familiar with the quote leftists cite it all the time.
Hayek also said very near that something to the effect that circumventing the market will ALWAYS produce a suboptimal result.
Hayek specifically states the suboptimal result will be economically suboptimal – and that based on other values it might still be a superior result.
And that is where Hayek makes his error.
There are not economic and non-economic values.
I think my life is priceless. But the world is not going to pay a trillion dollars to keep me alive a few more days. Everything in existance has a value.
Economics, money are just the units we use to compare those values.
You can make a long list of everything you think is priceless,
You can still rank them relative to each other.
Nothing is priceless, there are just things we would prefer not to price and that is where Hayek failed.
I would further note that in the world today – the conditions Hayek mentions
“some minimum of food, shelter and clothing, sufficient to preserve health”
All exist today everywhere in the world. In the vast majority of the world they are delivered by the free market because standard of living has risen sufficiently.
Starvation today only exists as a function of politics or war. Further there is nowhere in the world that absent war and violence is not capable of producing sufficient food for its people. Hayek’s wish has been met – by the market – not government.
While the scheme he wrote about 80 years ago, was supposed to be provided by government – for most of the worlds 7B people – it is provided – but not by government.
Only the wealthiest nations do this. Most of the world it has been delivered by the market.
“I am familiar with the quote leftists cite it all the time.”
I don’t care who cites it. I care what Hayek said and Hayek made a lot of sense causing me to adopt this type of thinking instead of using rigid iron thinking that when stressed breaks. Somewhere else he explains how to deal outside of that very tiny box you seem to live in. When bending, because there is no other choice (for whatever reason), do so with the least impact on the marketplace.
It sounds like you made an excuse for what Hayek said instead of listening to what he actually said there and elsewhere.
“circumventing the market will ALWAYS produce a suboptimal result.”
Don’t misinterpret what he says. Even in the paragraph I quoted he recognizes benefits at the expense of certain suboptimal results. Iron breaks steal bends.
And that is where Hayek makes his error.”
I dont’ think Hayek is making a mistake. You are because you do not recognize all the variables at work including time, lifespan, revolutions, and thousands of other details. You need to read Hayek again and perhaps Adam Smith. The goal is not the perfect marketplace rather a better life for people.
Overall the free market delivers better economies and higher welfare for more people but one sometimes has to sacrifice a portion of that economy for the people that will not be alive tomorrow. As a caveat don’t forget that there is always interence in the marketplace so looking for perfection is an impossibility.
There are possibly 3 paragraphs in the entirety of The Road to Serfdom where Hayek id not absolutely rigorously faithful to logic.
“The goal is not the perfect marketplace rather a better life for people.”
Correct, but they are inextricable.
The error Hayek makes in the paragraph you cite is pretending that there is such a thing as economic and non-economic value.
There is just value.
Elsewhere – I beleive relatively close, Hayek asserts correctly that government can never out perform the free market with respect to economic value.
That assertion is absolutely correct, but the work economic is superfluous.
All human value is the same
2 pts.
Hayek never backed down from the assertion that government interferance int he economy – beyond securing the rule of law and protecting rights, would always produce an economically inferior outcome.
next, my argument is not an appeal to authority. If I were actually to be at odds with Hayek – which I am not, then Hayek is wrong.
Free markets do NOT optimize economic outcome.
They optimize the ability of humans to acheive their values with the resources currently at their disposal. That is ALL human values not merely economic ones.
At each end of every single chain of purportedly purely economic transactions is a non-economic goal. Going to a movie with your kids, dinner with your wife.
When you mess with the economy – you mess with rights and values that are not generally thought of as economic.
“Hayek never backed down from the assertion that government interferance int he economy – beyond securing the rule of law and protecting rights, would always produce an economically inferior outcome.”
We do not live in a unipolar universe. Hayek recognized that and so do I. You don’t.
On this point Hayek was wrong.
We do not live in a unipolar universe.
BUT,
True is true, regardless of where you are on ideological spectrums.
Just to be clear – Hayek was wrong. But doing what he said did not fail – it just significantly underperformed.
In nearly every issue you and I joust on relative to govenrment, The data is out there.
We can see the results of govenrment stepping in, and it not.
The results are uniquivocal. Government underperforms in everything economic relative to free markets, so long as the fundimental requirements of the social contract are met.
Sometimes that means government fails. But not always.
“Lysander Spooner started a service to deliver letter anywhere in the United States.”
Didn’t I bring up the example of the Post Office because it was mentioned in the Constitution? Didn’t I say that at the very least we should consider competition?
Here is what I said:
“I have no objection to private transportation systems. Take the system included in the Constitution, the Post Office. Should it continue? There are arguments pro and con but IMO private concerns should be able to compete on a level playing field. I believe in todays world where government expands everywhere that we should permit private competition. I don’t wish to live in a world where we can press a button and everything is turned into private hands. We would have anarchy.”
What is separating us is that you look at something you consider a “public good”,.
and then you say is there some specific solution that is not public.
“Should we sell the Post office to Jeff Bezos ?” and then – “How should he be required to run it and would that work ?” or “if it was not regulated exactly what would the result be ?”
You want to have control of the uncontrolable, Before you are prepared to beleive something is possible.
The objective is not to replace each public good with some specific private soluution.
That would be a small improvement. I am not looking at small.
I keep providing you with alternate private solitions – not to say that is what will happen, but to demonstrate that private solutions can work.
I am libertarian not ancap. But I am not immune to the possibility that even services like policing courts, government can not be provided by the market.
That is a more complex problem and has significant philosophical concerns.
Further, if we can not stop the ever growing government encroachment in healthcare and the ever increasing failure of healthcare as a consequence. What is the chance we can get to market provided government ?
As I said before I am not compromising principles. But I can tolerate government provided roads, as we work to get government out of schools and healthcare – areas it has encroached on an ruined.
I have no problem saving streets and sidewalks for another time – maybe never,
But that does nto meant I am going to concede they SHOULD be provided by government, nor that free markets would not do a far better job – in ways that right now I can not even dream of.
In 1977 I started to build my first micro-computer – a cosmac elf.
Today I have in my pocket a device that is 100,000 times more powerful than the biggest super computer of that time. It has more storage than existed on the entire planet many times over in 1977. It is able to do things that were not dreams at the time.
Star Trek had communicators. While those were able to reach near space from a planet, they did not play videos, they did not globally locate you or guide you to your destination. they did not give you instant access to the knowledge of the world, or the news of the moment. nor the ability to buy and sell whatever you want, they did not manage your schedule. not even science fiction imagined what free markets have delivered.
It is impossible to conceive what markets will create for us.
If I was even the smallest part good at that – I would be as rich as jobs of gates or bezos.
“I keep providing you with alternate private solitions – not to say that is what will happen, but to demonstrate that private solutions can work.”
How did you provide me a private solution with the zigzagged roads or Seatle? You didn’t. You provided me with a faith based religious institution. That doesn’t solve the problem unless you believe that when you don’t have an answer one turns to religion. Nothing against religion. It has its place, but not where you wish to put it.
Look at the similarities between the unanswered questions
How did man come to be? Have faith. God put him on earth.
How do we solve all problems? Have faith. The free market.
How do we solve all problems? Have faith. Socialism.
I believe in the free market but I don’t believe in faith when it comes to markets. I believe in small government and I encourage private solutions instead of public ones but I am not going to have an infinite number of generations pass waiting for a free market solution when there is a reasonable solution by considering a very important and significant problem a public good.
Please read what I wrote.
I SOMETIMES provide you solutions just to prove it is possible.
But all problems have many. not one solution, and it is highly unlikely I know the best, but the market always finds the best eventually, or more accurately it always slowly closes in on the best forever.
At the same time there are problems the market will not solve or will not solve now.
Those are the problems where the solutions that are possible today cost more than people are willing to spend.
I do not know if faster than light travel is possible.
But if it is, we will one day be able to do so.
But we will not anytime soon, because if it is possible at all today the cost is more than all human wealth.
When you say a problem was not solve privately that means one of several things.
Government constrained the acceptable solutions and the market could not solve the problem within those constraints at a value people would pay.
The problem is not solveable today.
The problem is not solvable in a way people will pay for.
In all cases above, the problem SHOULD NOT be solved today.
Everything you call a public good, is something that either should not have happened or should not have happened now,
So we are clear – government does not ever actually solve problems,
the sollution – atleast in capitalist countries comes from the free market.
Government just moves money arround to make us pay for things we chose not to.
“Please read what I wrote. I SOMETIMES provide you solutions just to prove it is possible.”
John, it’s not the solutions you provide that leads me to a government solution for a public good that is necessary. The problem is that neither you nor others were able to provide solutions to the zigzagging streets or Seattle’s severe flooding problem. I think both of those fall under the category of a public good so I consider some government involvement that has least effect on the marketplace.
You cannot demonstrate that our Constitution forbids it so if the state constitution permits it then it is legal. The objection has little to do with the Federalist Papers or Constitutional law. It has to do with your ideology that is inflexible and refuses to recognize anything as a public good. If the founders were as rigid as you I think the Thirteen Colonies would have been taken over by European powers.
In substance I don’t disagree with the endpoint you are looking for. It cannot exist except perhaps in low density areas where people are mostly self sufficient. Maybe that would be a good world but that is not the world we live in.
Again I do not need to provide alternate solutions.
The claim I have failed to do so is completely irrelevant.
I can not provide a solution to allow man to visit the surface of the sun – nor can government. Some problems are insoluable at the moment.
But the more insidious situation is the one you address – where a problem is solvable, but people acting in the free market have chosen not to, and you through government have forced their hand.
You have overriden the values of people, for the values of a few.
So you have reduced standard of living.
Solutions are NEVER created by government.
Government did not take us to the moon.
It merely overrode the market decision that was not economically justifiable – it was not valued by all of us enough to pay for it.
Government did not solve anything – it never does.
Your streets problem is the perfect example.
Everything that occured as a result of government stepping in was possible the moment before. It did not occur before – because people did not want it sufficiently.
So all you did was override all peoples preferences to accomplish some peoples preference. You made us poorer.
The streets were straightened because SOME people wanted that enough to force government to do so. But by definition enough people did not wish that strongly enough to persuade the market to.
“Again I do not need to provide alternate solutions.
The claim I have failed to do so is completely irrelevant.”
John, it is not irrelevant. I will repeat Hayek who sees things differently when it comes to the most basic needs in a rich country.
“There is no reason why, in a society which has reached the general level of wealth ours has, the first kind of security should not be guaranteed to all without endangering general freedom; that is: some minimum of food, shelter and clothing, sufficient to preserve health. Nor is there any reason why the state should not help to organize a comprehensive system of social insurance in providing for those common hazards of life against which few can make adequate provision.
You are free to have your own opinion as I am free to have mine. Though you disagree with what Hayek says, I agree with Hayek and am not so rigid as you that I break instead of bend.
“Solutions are NEVER created by government.” Statements using the word NEVER are weak statements because most of the time the one so confident in the word NEVER will spend the rest of his time backsliding and redefining his concepts until the word NEVER shrinks and starts to disappear.
quoting the same thing twice does not alter the fact that it is wrong from the reasons I explained before you quoted it the first time.
And 80 years ago Hayek is saying rich countries should be able to do this.
Today poor countries have this – without the government Hayek claimed should provide it.
The Road To Serfdom is brilliant. It is not perfect.
“quoting the same thing twice does not alter the fact that it is wrong from the reasons I explained before you quoted it the first time.”
I couldn’t help but quote him twice. Your statement was wrong at least based on what Hayek said. Not only that but if you make the same statement again it will be wrong again and quoting Hayek is the correct answer.
“And 80 years ago Hayek is saying rich countries should be able to do this.
Today poor countries have this – without the government Hayek claimed should provide it.”
I dont’ get your point. Are you saying Hayek was wrong? I think recognizing what Hayek recognized and setting out a plan to deal with it was brilliant. That is why Hayek shines so brightly. I would have quoted from Adam Smith who was also a philospher but finding a satisfactory quote in Hayek was easier.
My statement is SLIGHTLY at odds with What Hayek said.
I would note if read further he fully agrees with me that all of what he is talking about will still be done inefficiently by government.
The disagreement with Hayek is small and Hayek is wrong and did not at the time he wrote that have the benefit of 80 years of experience with what he proposed.
I stated before that we have robust data that every 10% of GDP that government consumes reduces the growth of standard of living by 1%. There is suplimentary information to that – Social Safety net spending has an ADDITIONAL 0.25% negative impact for each 10%. This is primarily do to the disruption of incentives from Social safety nets.
Since 1940, we have seen socialism and socialism lite fail to different degrees throughout the world.
BBC/PBS did a series
Commanding Heights: The Battle for the world economy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfRTpoYpHfw
This is an excellent series, there is also a book, which goes into far more detail with far more examples.
But the gist is that both the ideas of socialists and even keynes have failed.
While the free market has from the end of WWII to the present benefited humanity beyond beleif – accomplished everything that socialists claimed they would, while socialists have failed.
This has been true in developed countries – like europe, and undeveloped countries like most of asia.
Hong Kong and Singapore have gone from poverty to higher standards of living than the US.
There is nowhere in the world that socialism – or even the socialism lite in this Hayek quite has worked well and no where in the world that free market have not guaranteed people food, shelther and improved health.
In the poorest countries in the world life expectancy is a decade higher than in the richest countries in the world in 1900.
Everything Hayek said could be provided by government has come about accross the world without government from the free market.
As I said – Hayek was wrong – and so are you.
The overwhelming majority of The Road to Serfdom has proven correct in the subsequent 80 years – but not all of it.
Specifically not the paragraph you cite.
Yes, I am saying in THIS specific instance Hayek was wrong.
I am also saying that he is incontrovertably wrong on this.
The data is beyond dispute. ‘
Do I really need to share with you graphs of 80 years of life expectancy in poor countires or average calories consumed in poor countries, or rise in standard of living in poor countries ?
Again you are a smart person, you should already be familiar with this.
You can google it or find it from OECD or World Bank sources, or from Human Progress org, or frazier institute or CAPX, or …
“Yes, I am saying in THIS specific instance Hayek was wrong.”
Hayek wasn’t wrong. You are, John. You have tunnel vision.
Tell that to reality.
The data is incotrovertable.
Free markets delivered what Hayek asked for
Government did not
“Free markets delivered what Hayek asked for
Government did not”
John, Hayek delivered ideas whether or not government liked them. As my quoted paragraph written by Hayek indicates Hayek could bend and try to reduce any damage at the same time. You cannot. That is why we read Hayek.
I do not need to bend. Reality bent to me.
“I do not need to bend. Reality bent to me.”
You must be something special. Hayek bent to reality and light bends to gravitational pull, but somewhere along the line you believe you do not need to bend. Perhaps that is because you already snapped in half and haven’t yet figured that out.
Hayek tried to bend reality.
The data shows reality did not bent.
“Hayek tried to bend reality. The data shows reality did not bent.”
John, you need to get out more. Reality is not in some dinky office. Outside in the real streets where real people live and die is reality.
Reality is that everything Hayek wished for was accomplished by free markets in most of the world not govenrment.
That is reality. It is not some virtual reality in my office.
You can confirm it by traveling the world,
or by OECD Data, or World Bank Data,
or infinite numbers of sources – whose value is that they reflect reality accurately
“On this point Hayek was wrong.”
And a statement on an earlier post: “My statement is SLIGHTLY at odds with What Hayek said. conflict with one another and reality. …And then another statement in another post on Hayek “and yet real world data over the past 80 years says he was unequivically wrong on this one thing.” It really burns you that the word NEVER with regard to social beings is not in Hayek’s vocabulary.
You can point to whatever data you wish but all you are doing is pointing to data that supports a free economy. That has little to do with a functioning government, a happy people, etc. As said earlier you have tunnel vision.
Your arguments are made of iron instead of steel so instead of bending your arguments broke apart.
Your support for the Constitution and originalism was shown to be less than what you say and your arguments argue against the original intent of the founders when they created a Federalist system. Everythink you say is mixed with aboslutes like “NEVER” which immediately tell a person to beware of anything that follows. Seldom are absolutes true in the interactions of social individuals.
“It really burns you that the word NEVER with regard to social beings is not in Hayek’s vocabulary.”
It does ? Allan you are better than this. Quit presuming to read my mind. my heart my emotions.
BTW Hayek did say that a top down solution would NEVER produce as good an outcome as the free market – those are not his exact words, but you should be able to find them within a few pages of what you cited.
I fault Hayek for a logic error here – this remark contradicts much of TRTS.
But Hayek did not have the data we have now. In the 40’s he did not have the increadible results that backing away from Socialism had on the world economy.
“You can point to whatever data you wish but all you are doing is pointing to data that supports a free economy.”
Yup.
“That has little to do with a functioning government”
Nope. Actual read TRTS. Not one paragraph the whole thing.
“a happy people”
Free markets optimize what people value – if they value happiness, it will optomize it proportionate to everything else they value.
“etc. As said earlier you have tunnel vision.”
Pretty much the opposite.
Limited government leaves a vast open field of opportunity well beyond what either of us can conceive.
“Your arguments are made of iron instead of steel so instead of bending your arguments broke apart.”
Probably more like titanium or carbon fiber.
The domain of government is small with the brightest lines possible.
Everything else is free and open and flexible.
History should make it self evident to you that government will always fill whatever space you give it and then some.
“Your support for the Constitution and originalism was shown to be less than what you say and your arguments argue against the original intent of the founders when they created a Federalist system.”
Still beating this dead horse.
We are not briefing scotus.
Paraphrasing scalia – just because it is constitutional does not mean it is not stupid.
“Everythink you say is mixed with aboslutes like “NEVER” which immediately tell a person to beware of anything that follows. Seldom are absolutes true in the interactions of social individuals.”
AGAIN Absolutes are a challenge to you. If there is the slightest problem with an absolute – you should be able to trivially falsify it.
You haven’t. That does not prove it is absolutely true. But it does prove it is very nearly so.
Though I am going to stick to absolutes – the brightest possible lines.
Because as I said – any room you give government it will fill.
If I tell you something is “mostly true” you will immediately Grow the maybe two exceptions to fill the gulf of mexico.
But using absolutes, the burden of proving the exceptions is yours and I am going to make you fight for every one.
I would further note I am just following the writing advice of George Orwell.
Do not waste time qualifying your remarks. It weakens your argument.
“Quit presuming to read my mind. my heart my emotions.”
John, I am not reading your mind. I am reading your words
“BTW Hayek did say that a top down solution would NEVER produce as good an outcome as the free market”
Of course he did but is it your habit to read only the words you wish to hear?
“I fault Hayek”
I am sure Hayek would be devastated and then offer you a class in remedial thinking.
It really burns you that the word NEVER with regard to social beings is not in Hayek’s vocabulary.
No you are reading into my words.
You said something “burns me”
completely without evidence – and with the presumption that making judgements about my emotions are relevant to argument.
I do not have an emotional reaction to Hayek. He is brilliant, right an incredible amount, and dead. The point you fixated on was a minor one, where he contradicts himself, and that was not as clear looking toward the past 80 years ago as it is today.
What I have an emotional reaction to is covering the same ground over and over, with the hope to get a different result.
When a person is interogated their attorneys advise them to answer questions about each facet ONCE. It is a common technique to go over the same ground repeatedly because people do not say exactly the same thing every time and then try to leverage small differences as meaningful in attempting to break down and argument.
We addressed constitutiuonal interpretation. My views were clear.
But you went back over and over on an issue where the constitution was ONE of many facetts of the problem trying to create a conflict between the outcome of a constitutional analysis and a utilitarian one.
This is the same stuff that Paul and Anonymous were doing.
After the actual correct leash law was determined – the leash argument could be evaluated and the issue was resolved. Amy did not and could not violate the law – there was no law enforcement involved – and refusing law enforcement was an element of the offence. Further in the evidence we have the dog was never out of her control – again a required element. Last the place element – the Ramble is a posting at CP, not part of the law. That issue it dead.
Anonymous is still trying to debate it with me.
Absent new facts, that is bad form.
Why would you wish to be compared to Anonymous and Paul ?
If an argument fails to persuade – find new facts, make a different argument or move on.
John Say – you need to look in the mirror and examine yourself. I, took yesterday off of the blogs, mostly. However, this is just idiotic. I do not care how many sheep were killed to make you feel good about yourself, you need some help.
You continue to make your posts about me.
How am I relevant ?
Why are your guesses about my feelings, thoughts and intentions relevant ?
Why do I need to “look in the mirror”
Arguments are about facts logic, reason. I do not expect to see them in the mirror.
I have made no claims about you personally – I do not know you.
I know your assertions, and your arguments.
I have addressed those. Many or your assertions are incorrect, others irrelevant.
and you almost never make actual arguments.
Regardless this is not about me, or you.
I have corrected the errors I have made. There were few and they were not large, but that is mostly the result of experience. But big or little when you are wrong, correct your position and move on.
Facts, logic reason. That is how we get to the Truth.
And that is the goal.
If I had some special objective here – if I sought an outcome different from that that arises from the facts, I would argue quite differently.
but I am just following the facts to where they lead.
John Say – Amy Cooper is required to have her dog on a leash when in The Ramble. I do not want to hear they don’t enforce it, or any other b.s. Just deal with that one argument.
“Amy Cooper is required to have her dog on a leash when in The Ramble.”
That is the central park rule. I have confirmed that myriads of times.
I should only have to do so ONCE.
“I do not want to hear:”
I do not care what you want to hear.
You are not obligated to listen.
“they don’t enforce it”
That is an independent issue, and it is not B.S.
It is a common practice of government to over promise and resolve the matter by failing to deliver.
Ultimately an unenforced law or rule is the same as no law at all.
“Just deal with that one argument.”
Did – hundreds of comments ago.
BTW, you can try to step your way through this – it will not change the results.
You are an the wrong side of the facts and rules of logic.
John Say – you couldn’t logically deal with the one issue, could you? I don’t care how many sheep they killed to put degrees on your walls, you cannot handle the truth.
“I don’t care how many sheep they killed to put degrees on your walls”
Then do not make an issue of it. You made a fallacious argument and got called out not only for the fallacy, but because you were wrong.
You are correct – my credentials and expertise do not matter, only facts, logic, reason.
But YOU tried to make a fallacious appeal to authority.
“you cannot handle the truth.”
False and irrelevant.
this is about facts, and the law, they are not things to be “handled”.
They are what they are.
“you couldn’t logically deal with the one issue, could you? ”
There are very few “issues” here, there are few relevant facts for each.
The logic is simple and absolute.
It is not common for issues to be this clear cut.
Amy likely broke a rule and had her dog our of her control in the Ramble.
The only actual evidence we have of that is Christian’s account.
Chrisitians justifiable responses were to call authorites, and to protect himself.
He did neither.
Instead he issues a clear but nonspecific threat.
And lets be perfectly clear – the threat was to Amy. “You not going to like that”.
By the start of the video – the evidence we have that is NOT Christian’s accounting,
Amy has the dog by the collar – the requirements of the rule and the law to be under control are met.
BTW prior to returning the dog to Amy the rescue agency evaluated the video and found no abuse.
On video Amy threatens to call the police if Christian does not stop recording her.
That is a stupid threat – she is not entitled to control whether Christian takes video’s.
Though it does constitute an explict demand that he not video her.
Which means he had no right to publish her image.
But the threat was both clear and specific.
She did not threaten him with unknown harm.
She subsequently called 911.
Her report was hysterical. But most 911 reports are.
You are free to conclude that there was no actual threat to her life.
But that is an opinion.
Christian’s clear but unspecific threat to her meets the minimum standard – reasonable suspicion, for her to beleive her life might be in danger.
That is the facts.
Can you dislike Amy – I do not like her very much.
Should she have retreated ? Absolutely. So should Christian.
Did they both make numerous mistakes ? Yup.
But you keep reaching for things that are not part of the facts.
You are free to psycho-analyze amy or christian to your hearts content.
But your analysis – even if I agree with it, is not evidence.
John Say – You still cannot answer a simple question in under 200 words. So, back to basics. Is Amy Cooper required to leash her dog before entering The Ramble? Yes or No. Those are your two choices.
“John Say – You still cannot answer a simple question in under 200 words. So, back to basics. Is Amy Cooper required to leash her dog before entering The Ramble? Yes or No. Those are your two choices.”
Asked and answered. AGAIN AND AGAIN.
I beleive in the first sentence of last post,
as well as days ago.
John Say – has anyone told you that you were Oppositionally Defiant?
“John Say – has anyone told you that you were Oppositionally Defiant?”
No, but how would that be relevant.
To quite you – answer the questions “yes, or no?”
Actually you are not obligated to – nor am I.
But it is easier to make that argument by impossing the same fallacious burden on you as you do on me.
John Say – supposedly your wife is an appellate attorney. As such she probably reads a trial transcript from time to time. Ask her if attorneys ask for yes or no answers?
“John Say – supposedly your wife is an appellate attorney. As such she probably reads a trial transcript from time to time. Ask her if attorneys ask for yes or no answers?”
Are we in court ? Am I being deposed ?
You continually presume to have control over the public sphere that you do not.
“John Say – has anyone told you that you were Oppositionally Defiant?”
Posters unhappy with the way their arguments have gone have diagnosed me with about everything in the DSM.
Actual psychologists have found me well adjusted and normal.
But again – how is that relevant ?
Facts, logic, reason.
Ad Hominem is not argument.
John Say – you did not get your monies worth in those sessions. I do not find Oppositionally Defiant to be an ad hominem. It was more of an intellectual curiosity.
“you did not get your monies worth in those sessions. ”
Did I say there were sessions ?
I adopted two children. I was required to be assessed to do so.
The assessment was normal.
“I do not find Oppositionally Defiant to be an ad hominem. It was more of an intellectual curiosity.”
Ad Hominem means “to the person”.
It does not require an insult.
It is any argument that diverts debate from the issue debated to the attributes of the person you are arguing against.
Ad Hominem is fallacy specifically because it is irrelevant, and often inflamitory.
The standard for what is ad hominem is NOT your feelings.
You made an argument about the person arguing with you, not about the matter being debated,.
That is ad hominem.
John Say – 1) being oppositionally defiant would not stop you from adopting 2) you just made an extended ad hominem response. You should be ashamed!!!
“1) being oppositionally defiant would not stop you from adopting”
Your an expert on psychology and adoption ?
ODD is a diagnosis for kids, it frequently resolves before adulthood. When it does not it turns into sociopathy.
What adoption agency is going to approve placing a child with a sociopath ?
Regardless, as I said the evaluation was normal. Your speculation is irrelevant.
Still ad hominem.
“2) you just made an extended ad hominem response. You should be ashamed!!!”
No. I did not attack you. I attacked your fallacious argument.
Paul
Turnabout is fair play.
“Yes, or No” – do you have evidence Amy broke the law ? If so what is that evidence.
“Yes, or No” – Is Christian law enforcement ?
“Yes, or No” – Can Christian threaten harm to Amy or her dog ?
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian threaten Amy ?
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian retreat ?
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian attempt to lure Amy’s dog in her presence ?
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian publish a video of another private person without their permission ?
“Yes, or No” – Do you have actual evidence that Amy’s dog was not under her control as required by law at any time ?
John Say –
“Yes, or No” – do you have evidence Amy broke the law ? If so what is that evidence.
Yes, video and leash law
“Yes, or No” – Is Christian law enforcement ?
Do not know
“Yes, or No” – Can Christian threaten harm to Amy or her dog ?
No
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian threaten Amy ?
No
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian retreat ?
No – at least not during the video.
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian attempt to lure Amy’s dog in her presence ?
Yes
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian publish a video of another private person without their permission ?
No
“Yes, or No” – Do you have actual evidence that Amy’s dog was not under her control as required by law at any time ?
Yes
We have been over all of this before
Yes, or No” – do you have evidence Amy broke the law ? If so what is that evidence.
Yes, video and leash law
Nope, Amy has the dog’s collar in her hand through the video. That meets the requirement of the law, The specific aplicable law has been cited, links are provided, it requires the owner to have physical control of the dog.
Amy does. The criteria are not ambiguous – law is not supposed to be a matter of judgement.
Further the law does not specify “the Ramble” – only the park sign does, that is a rule, not a law,
Finally the law specifically states that a violation occurs when law enforcement asks her to control her dog and she refuses. That never occured.
No violation of the law occured.
You do not get to spin law. Law is supposed to be as objective and clear as possible.
“Yes, or No” – Is Christian law enforcement ?
Do not know
Disengenous. Was he in uniform ? did he have a badge ? Is he employed by NYPD or NYPS ?
Did he threaten to Cite Amy ?
The answer to all of the above is no.
In the highly unlikely event that by some impossible miracle Christian was an on duty law enforcement officer, he failed to act as one.
The truth is Christian was a vigalente.
“Yes, or No” – Can Christian threaten harm to Amy or her dog ?
No
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian threaten Amy ?
No
From Chritians FB account
ME: Look, if you’re going to do what you want, I’m going to do what I want, but you’re not going to like it.
HER: What’s that?
ME (to the dog): Come here, puppy!
HER: He won’t come to you.
ME: We’ll see about that…
I pull out the dog treats I carry for just for such intransigence. I didn’t even get a chance to toss any treats to the pooch before Karen scrambled to grab the dog.
HER: DON’T YOU TOUCH MY DOG!!!!!
That is not only a threat, it is acting on the threatr.
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian retreat ?
No – at least not during the video.
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian attempt to lure Amy’s dog in her presence ?
Yes
that is acting on a threat,
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian publish a video of another private person without their permission ?
No
So a video that Christian took went public and viral miraculously ?
“Yes, or No” – Do you have actual evidence that Amy’s dog was not under her control as required by law at any time ?
Yes
What would that be ? On the video Amy has her hand on the collar.
That meets the requirement of the law.
The law does not require the dog to be well behaved and calm.
It requires the dog to be phsycially constrained from getting more than 6ft from Amy.
That condition is met.
Again law is not subjective – if it is – then it is unconstitutionally vague.
You can read the law – the link was provided.
But lets assume that the law actually was written as you assume.
That it required a 6ft leash, and only that was acceptable.
3ft leashes would be vilations of the law.
Dogs in caged, crates or carriers would be violations.
Dogs being held by the owners would be violations.
I would assume that you can grasp that the law would not be written that way.
And if you read it – you will find it isn’t.
Next “in physical control of the owner” can not mean “well behaved” – or again almost all dog owners would be in violation.
“In control” means the dog may not go whereever it pleases.
It does not mean it can not thrash and rebel.
John Say –
Yes, or No” – do you have evidence Amy broke the law ? If so what is that evidence.
Yes, video and leash law
Nope, Amy has the dog’s collar in her hand through the video. That meets the requirement of the law, The specific aplicable law has been cited, links are provided, it requires the owner to have physical control of the dog.
Amy does. The criteria are not ambiguous – law is not supposed to be a matter of judgement.
Further the law does not specify “the Ramble” – only the park sign does, that is a rule, not a law,
Finally the law specifically states that a violation occurs when law enforcement asks her to control her dog and she refuses. That never occured.
No violation of the law occured.
You do not get to spin law. Law is supposed to be as objective and clear as possible.
I have posted the Park Rules and The Ramble and several other locations require dogs to be on a leash
“Yes, or No” – Is Christian law enforcement ?
Do not know
Disengenous. Was he in uniform ? did he have a badge ? Is he employed by NYPD or NYPS ?
Did he threaten to Cite Amy ?
The answer to all of the above is no.
In the highly unlikely event that by some impossible miracle Christian was an on duty law enforcement officer, he failed to act as one.
The truth is Christian was a vigalente.
I know this will come as a shock to you, but Amy probably used her white privilege to get out of a ticket
“Yes, or No” – Can Christian threaten harm to Amy or her dog ?
No
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian threaten Amy ?
No
From Chritians FB account
ME: Look, if you’re going to do what you want, I’m going to do what I want, but you’re not going to like it.
HER: What’s that?
ME (to the dog): Come here, puppy!
HER: He won’t come to you.
ME: We’ll see about that…
I pull out the dog treats I carry for just for such intransigence. I didn’t even get a chance to toss any treats to the pooch before Karen scrambled to grab the dog.
HER: DON’T YOU TOUCH MY DOG!!!!!
That is not only a threat, it is acting on the threatr.
Christian was attempting to get her to get the dog on the leash
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian retreat ?
No – at least not during the video.
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian attempt to lure Amy’s dog in her presence ?
Yes
that is acting on a threat,
No,, that is trying to get Amy to comply with the law
“Yes, or No” – Did Christian publish a video of another private person without their permission ?
No
So a video that Christian took went public and viral miraculously ?
His sister posted it
“Yes, or No” – Do you have actual evidence that Amy’s dog was not under her control as required by law at any time ?
Yes
What would that be ? On the video Amy has her hand on the collar.
That meets the requirement of the law.
The law does not require the dog to be well behaved and calm.
It requires the dog to be phsycially constrained from getting more than 6ft from Amy.
That condition is met.
Again law is not subjective – if it is – then it is unconstitutionally vague.
You can read the law – the link was provided.
But lets assume that the law actually was written as you assume.
That it required a 6ft leash, and only that was acceptable.
3ft leashes would be vilations of the law.
Dogs in caged, crates or carriers would be violations.
Dogs being held by the owners would be violations.
I would assume that you can grasp that the law would not be written that way.
And if you read it – you will find it isn’t.
Next “in physical control of the owner” can not mean “well behaved” – or again almost all dog owners would be in violation.
“In control” means the dog may not go whereever it pleases.
It does not mean it can not thrash and rebel.
ME: We’ll see about that…
I pull out the dog treats I carry for just for such intransigence. I didn’t even get a chance to toss any treats to the pooch before Karen scrambled to grab the dog.
“I have posted the Park Rules and The Ramble and several other locations require dogs to be on a leash”
The park rules are not the law. I asked if amy broke the law.
Your answer was yes, it is incorrect.
As a separate matter – ask the park police if they bar dogs in carries from the park ?
If not then you are using an overly litteral reading of the rules.
There is a reason that the park does not post the law on the sign – because getting things precise is complicated.
John Say – have you every been pulled over for going 1 mile over the speed limit? That is a literal reading of the rules.
Use words accurately
Speed limits are laws, not rules.
The law (lots of words) specifies what you may not do – striving for accuracy.
In my state and in the case of speed limits there is a fair amount of words regarding how the police must establish that you broke the law.
You can not get convicted in my state for exceeding the speed limit by 1mph.
Paul,
When you make your arguments – do you consider before you post what the counter might be ?
“He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. “
John Say – I know that you will never give me a straight answer. So, I know you do not know either side of the case.
“John Say – I know that you will never give me a straight answer. So, I know you do not know either side of the case.”
What I know of “the other side” is what you have offered.
informal logical fallacies are not valid arguments.
“I know this will come as a shock to you, but Amy probably used her white privilege to get out of a ticket”
Assumes facts not in evidence.
Further not the answer the the question.
“Yes, or No” – Is Christian law enforcement ?
If yes – what is your evidence ?
If no – he is a vigilante.
If you do not know – then everything else you say is uninformed speculation.
“Christian was attempting to get her to get the dog on the leash”
Maybe, but still speculation.
Regardless, can Christian threaten to murder Amy to get her to leash the dog ?
Can he threaten to poision the dog ?
He threatened an outcome she would not like.
That is certainly not innocuous.
Should a woman alone int he park wait until someone who threatens her produces a knife or gun before taking them seriously ?
Can you only call the police when you are threatened if the threat is a specific criminal act ?
“No,, that is trying to get Amy to comply with the law”
Possibly, but he did not threaten to call the police.
Can he use a knife to get her to leash the dog ?
You do not seem to grasp that just because Christian is permitted to request the dog be leashed does not mean has has the authority to use force or threat of force to compel that action.
If I am illegally parked – can you threaten to call the police ? Yes,
To puncture my tires ? No.
“His sister posted it”
Christian shared it on FB – that is publishing.
“You said something “burns me” completely without evidence…”
John you accuse me of saying something without evidence because of “your habit to read only the words you wish to hear” It seemed to burn so badly that you said many things about the Hayek paragraph that conflicted with one another. For example you said, “On this point Hayek was wrong.” “My statement is SLIGHTLY at odds with What Hayek said” “real world data… says he was unequivically wrong”
You twisted and turned trying to justify Hayek who needs no justification (perhaps you were justifying yourself). Then on successive responses said the discussion regarding the Constitution, federalisim et. al. was over even though Hayek was discussing the basics of society which involves any nations legal statutes.
What I think most likely hit you the worst was my comment, “It really burns you that the word NEVER with regard to social beings is not in Hayek’s vocabulary. That is a direct affront on your inability to compromise. That doesn’t make you less of a man or a bad person rather it restricts you to a tiny corner of the room.
Go back through the comments – what you said is their.
I am not putting words in your mouth.
The rest of your comment is therefore irrelevant.
“Go back through the comments – what you said is their. I am not putting words in your mouth.The rest of your comment is therefore irrelevant.”
John, who should anyone believe? When I explained why you were wrong I copied your own words: ” For example you said, “On this point Hayek was wrong.” “My statement is SLIGHTLY at odds with What Hayek said” “real world data… says he was unequivically wrong” ”
You tell me to go back to the comments but quote nothing. I can’t fine what you say to be true. Why? Because it doesn’t exist and is therefore not in the comments. But your words exist loud and clear. Who should anyone believe? “Your habit to read only the words you wish to hear” is something that ties you forever to a place no one wants to be.
“John, who should anyone believe? ”
No one, they should check the facts.
>>“John, who should anyone believe? ”
>No one, they should check the facts.
That is why I responded with factual quotations and not just empty rhetoric.
I quoted Hayek and you.
“That is why I responded with factual quotations and not just empty rhetoric.”
All quotes are not facts – beyond proof of what was said.
Hayek stated an opinion.
That oppinion was demonstrably in conflict with the rest of TRTS.
But more importantly it was proved wrong by facts in the next 80 years.
“I quoted Hayek and you.”
So ?
You also demonstrated that Hayek and I did not agree on this issue.
Something I was open about from the start.
You proved something that was not in contention.
“You proved something that was not in contention.”
John of course it was in contention you even asked me for proof and I then provided you with the Hayek quote. Later when essentially the same question of proof was asked I again provided quotes that you made, three of them to be exact.
I guess when the proof exists you simply disavow your question or you refuse to believe the answer.
“John of course it was in contention”
What Hayek said was not in contention.
All else was irrelevant.
In fact what Hayek said is irrelevant.
As we have reality/
“you even asked me for proof and I then provided you with the Hayek quote.”
am not sure what you are claiming – but it is false.
I have never asked you for proof that Hayek wrote a single paragraph in support of limited govenrment social safetynets. Every half educated left wing nut on the planet uses that one paragraph out of thousands of pages Hayek wrote.
I do not need anyone to prove to me that he wrote it.
“Later when essentially the same question of proof was asked”
Being as gracious as possible – you clearly as misunderstanding me.
I think we agree on 2 things.
1) Hayek said what he said about social safetynets.
I have never said he did not. I have said he said other things that contradict that.
2) I said Hayek was wrong.
You seem to fixate on “slightly”. I have not idea what. Slightly pregnant is still pregnant.
But there is a 3rd.
3). Reality says Hayek was wrong – free markets can and have more efficiently provided all that Hayek asked for in the past 80 years.
It is only the 3rd that matters – it is a fact.
John, I think the simple answer is to repeat what I said before, “I guess when the proof exists you simply disavow your question or you refuse to believe the answer.”
But in a poof John declares, “In fact what Hayek said is irrelevant.” I was thinking of moving onto others like Adam Smith who is also known as a philosopher but then I realized if I spend the time doing so you will only tell me that “what” Adam Smith “said is irrelevant.” A lot of the people you revere disagree with your belief that one should break instead of bend. I admit some of the people that might quote the Hayek paragraph are poorly educated but I actually read Hayek and his rationals along with other notable persons. My bet is that most of the people you revere would disagree with you.
“1) Hayek said what he said about social safetynets.
I have never said he did not. ”
That is why when I paraphrased that idea along with some others your response made me have to spend time downloading the book and then finding the particular paragraphs. Somewhere along the line one would have thought that you would have told me that you recognized the paraphrase ( and subsequent quotes) but you didn’t do so. After a multiiplicity of responses you now say, “I have never said he did not. ” I’ll leave it up to your words to prove what you said or didn’t say even though based on the length of discussion on this one point you are placed in a bad light.
“2) I said Hayek was wrong.”
Yes, after questioning me when I paraphrased Hayek and then copied his actual words you did say “Hayek was wrong.” along with two other conflicting statements.
“3). Reality says Hayek was wrong – free markets can and have more efficiently provided all that Hayek asked for in the past 80 years. It is only the 3rd that matters – it is a fact.”
Hayek wasn’t wrong because free markets actually work, but that was not his point. You are trying to distort his point so you can say the words ” it is a fact.”. Unfortuantely for you Hayek was correct and you are wrong. What you consider fact is merely your opinion trying to bolster an argument you lost days ago. Do you think any of this places you in a better light? The more you dig the deeper you go.
plink
“plink”
It’s a ‘plinky’ way of responding.
Since you are into Austrian Economists
“Egalitarianism, in every form and shape, is incompatible with the idea of private property.”
Hans-Hermann Hoppe
Public goods, come at the expense of private property – always
“Since you are into Austrian Economists”
I don’t think so. But who knows. After all Ludwig Van Mises used to have discussions with anyone that wanted to attend (after his letures at NYU) at a place a short walk from where I lived at one time. No I am not an expert of Austrian Economics and aside from the facts that multiple schools of thought believe in many of the same things I can’t say I am into Austrian Economics.
I don’t have any significant disagreement with the rest of your reply which is pretty generalized.
“I don’t have any significant disagreement with the rest of your reply which is pretty generalized”
Then the argument is over.
“Then the argument is over.”
That is correct. It ended awhile back but sometimes a bit of time is needed for recognition.
Hayek can now rest in peace. No one will have to zigzag to his grave site.
“When I explained why you were wrong I copied your own words: ” For example you said, “On this point Hayek was wrong.” “My statement is SLIGHTLY at odds with What Hayek said” “real world data… says he was unequivically wrong” ””
Are you actually trying to make an argument that my adjectives are not perfectly in agreement ?
Really ?
That is the scale of your point ?
What the Hell.
“On this point Hayek was wrong.”
Correct
“real world data… says he was unequivically wrong” ””
Is there a contradiction between wrong and unequivocally wrong ?
Is there a contradiction between red and unequivocally red ?
There isn’t, but lets say there is.
Who Cares ?
“My statement is SLIGHTLY at odds with What Hayek said”
This is a characterization of MY statement, not Hayeks, but involves a comparison to Hayek’s
P implies Q, P, therefore Q
is SLIGHTLY at odds with
P implies Q, Q, therefore P
One is a rule of formal logic, the other is a formal fallacy.
It is both slightly at odds with and unequivocally wrong.
Why are you trying to play words games. ?
“Are you actually trying to make an argument that my adjectives are not perfectly in agreement ?”
John, of course not. I am just demonstrating three conflicting statements trying to bolster an arument that failed thousands of words ago.
Hayek was right but like the buggy and horse with blinders you can only go in one direction. That is OK for if you keep going you will eventually end up in the same spot.
>>“Are you actually trying to make an argument that my adjectives are not perfectly in >>agreement ?”
>John, of course not.
Then stop.
>I am just demonstrating three conflicting statements trying to bolster an arument that failed thousands of words ago.
But you failed at that.
“Hayek was right”
Reality says otherwise.
“but like the buggy and horse with blinders you can only go in one direction. That is OK for if you keep going you will eventually end up in the same spot.”
I am not the one denying reality. Hayek had the excuse that it was not obvious by the facts he was wrong 80 years ago. It is today.
>>>“Are you actually trying to make an argument that my adjectives are not perfectly in >>agreement ?”
>>John, of course not.
>Then stop.
It wasn’t your adjectives. It was all your contradictions that I quoted including the quote of Hayek.
“I am not the one denying reality. Hayek had the excuse that it was not obvious by the facts he was wrong 80 years ago. It is today.”
The only reason you can say Hayek is wrong today is because Hayek is dead and you have the floor, but that is all you have. You have been proven wrong from the start to the end and that really burns you.
plink
“plink”
John, your instrument needs to be tuned.
To Quite Danial Patrick Moynihan.
You are free to your own oppinions, you are not free to have your own facts.
But I will go a step further, nor are you free to have separate logic.
If the premises are correct and the rules of logic are followed, there can be many routes to the conclusion, but there is only one conclusion.
“Statements using the word NEVER are weak statements because most of the time the one so confident in the word NEVER will spend the rest of his time backsliding and redefining his concepts until the word NEVER shrinks and starts to disappear.”
Precisely wrong. absolute statements are the easiest to disprove if they are wrong.
But even should you succeed – which you have not, absent myriads of counter examples all you have done is turn an absolute statement into an accurate generalization.
If the truth is almost never, then never might be to strong. but it is not weak.
Regardless, no claim is weak because you postulate it is.
It is weakened when you can demonstrate it.
“If the founders were as rigid as you I think the Thirteen Colonies would have been taken over by European powers.”
Assertion not argument, all the way through to Wilson the country followed much more closely to my values than any alternatives, and that was a period of growth and prosperity. By WWI the US was a world power. By the start of WWII the US was the pre-eminit super power in the world, even though it had not excercised that power before.
“It cannot exist except perhaps in low density areas where people are mostly self sufficient.”
Naked assertion.
Also easily arguably false.
As society grows ever more complex we more and more outstrip govenrments ability to regulate.
Regulation in the US and much of the world has been growing rapidly, and at the same time by every measure freedom has grown faster.
John Glimore noted “The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it.”
I would expand, the economy interprets government interference as damage and routes around it”.
This is less efficient than if govenrment stayed out. But the market will always seek to acheive the maximum of what humans value given whatever the conditions, and freedom is very high in those values.
The greater the complexity the more, not less we need limited govenrment.
Government is very bad at complexity.
Maybe that would be a good world but that is not the world we live in.
John, let me provide you with the entire quote of mine. “You cannot demonstrate that our Constitution forbids it so if the state constitution permits it then it is legal. The objection has little to do with the Federalist Papers or Constitutional law. It has to do with your ideology that is inflexible and refuses to recognize anything as a public good. If the founders were as rigid as you I think the Thirteen Colonies would have been taken over by European powers.”
You are not dealing with our Constitution nor Federalism in your response. You are dealing with your personal ideology and how you interpret the signals in the world around you.
The first thing that needs to be resolved is whether or not you agree with the Constitution and the idea of Federalism. That was a major part of my discussion totally left out in your response.
“You cannot demonstrate that our Constitution forbids it ”
Wrong. There are many prohibitions on the state in the constitution. The Contracts clause is an obvious one that is applicable. The commerce clause also.
Both federal and state govenrments are barred from infringing on rights – regardless of state constitutions. The 14th amendment bars states from infringing on priviledges and immunities which is BROADER than rights.
“so if the state constitution permits it then it is legal.”
The state is subject to pretty much all the limitations regarding infringing on rights that the federal govenrment is.
States have powers the federal government does not, but no more ability to infringe on rights.
“The objection has little to do with the Federalist Papers or Constitutional law. ”
You do not seem to grasp that the constitution and various amendments explicitly impose limits on the states.
“It has to do with your ideology that is inflexible”
Of course my ideology is inflexible – the justified use of force requires bright lines and clear limits. You do not want to be flexible about when we can takes someones propeerty, freedom or life ?
“and refuses to recognize anything as a public good.”
As if yet you have not demonstrated such a thing exists.
You examples fail both the empriacally and logically.
” If the founders were as rigid as you I think the Thirteen Colonies would have been taken over by European powers.”
Because you say so ?
No an argument
“You are not dealing with our Constitution nor Federalism in your response.”
Mostly I am. Though I do not limit my arguments to the constitution of federalism.
A bad idea remains bad – even if constitutional
“You are dealing with your personal ideology”
An ideology shared by some of the most brilliant thinkers of the past 250 years.
It is not personal, it is not new. It is falsiable, and never falisifed.
That is better that can be said of anythign else.
“and how you interpret the signals in the world around you.”
If you do not agree with my facts and analysis – show their error.
“The first thing that needs to be resolved is whether or not you agree with the Constitution and the idea of Federalism.”
Why ? Already answered.
The constitution is NOT (mostly) a system of principles.
It desribes a system of government. It does not tell you Why that system is as it is
My foundations are principles. To a large extent the constitution conforms with those.
To the extent it does not – it is wrong and should be fixed.
Our government is required to confine itself within the bounds of the constitution.
I am not.
“That was a major part of my discussion totally left out in your response.”
I have responded repeatedly.
But lets return to your concept of Public Good.
From a purely constitutional perspective.
Wickard v Filburn was wrongly decided.
Get rid of WvF and nearly everything you think is a public good is constitutionally outside of the power of state or federal govenrment.
A few things are left. Those too are not actually public goods, but they are unfortunately inside the constitutional domain of govenrment. If we could get back to that that would be a major improvement. But I would not be stopping from shrinking government further.
The constitution is a tool, as is federalism. It is not a set of principles.
“Wrong. There are many prohibitions on the state in the constitution. “
Wrong, wrong, and wrong. You are trying to argue with yourself so that you can prevail in argument. That is wrong for many reasons.
I agree that the Constitution limits the states but that is not the question. Federalism permits the states to have Constitutions that comply with the Federal Constitution. You are not happy about that because every state in the union has built roads based based on that concept. You objected post after post to the states being involved in zigzagged roads. You are hiding behind a lot verbiage that doesn’t pertain to the rights not denied to the states such as road building.
Let us deal with this simple concept of federalism where states are involved in road building and skip all the verbiage meant to distract. (Skip your alterations of what I have stated. That only demonstrates that you are unable to defend your position unless you alter what the other person said.)
“I agree that the Constitution limits the states”
End of debate.
>>“I agree that the Constitution limits the states”
>End of debate.
John, Again you are trying to end the debate with a cheap supposedly quip type remark. Your problem is that the state has the ability to build roads under the Constitution so the quip was more like a “Hail Mary’ than a considered answer in an intellectual debate.
Power corrupts.
That is just a given.
Whatever power you give government the more vigilant you must be.
Even small government is difficult to control corruption. and by its nature power seeks to grow.
My immediate goal is not perfection but improvement.
But that does not mean I am going to lie to myself or you.
You think parks are a public good – or should be.
That is false. They are not the worst thing that government can do.
They are probably not where to start.
Libertopia is not attainable or sustainable – not because it does nto actually work better than anything else. But so long as any government is necescary it will ultimately be impossible to permanently preclude it from growing.
“You think parks are a public good – or should be.
That is false.”
John, I didn’t say that. However, I believe Central Park was a good thing for NYC. Could the people of NYC created something different? Of course but it could have ended up worse than Central Park.
All we can do is recognize limited government is best and recognize that government generally grows rather than stepping back so it is best to err on the side of too little than too much.
That something is a good thing does not mean it is a public good
The entire function of free markets is to provide a ranked choice system to deliver our values to us proportionate to our value of them.
The free market is the means by which we transform the wealth we can create into the wealth that we value in proportion to our value of it.
When government delivers a good that is ALWAYS some interest group saying they do not trust the free market – the people, to deliver their values, to they will leverage government to do so. Government action does not EVER represent the voice of the people. The people do not need government to decide what they want and how badly they want it. That is no only precisely what free markets do, it is what they unquestionably do better than anything else.
Government action is always some people imposing their will on others by force.
I think Central park is a value. And it or something like it would exist so long as people valued it sufficiently.
It might exist in a different form because it would reflect our values, not those of some interest group. Just to be clear – interest groups values do get express by the free market. But that expression comes with no guarantee – nothing in the free market is guaranteed,
One of the things about free markets people grasp the least is that they do not strive to meet the needs of the powerful, the rich. but of ordinary people.
Even the most rich and powerful strive to meet the needs of ordinary people.
Who is richer – Sam Walton of Harry Winston ? Is it meeting the needs of the working class or the uber rich that will make you into a multibillionaire.
Look at Gates and Bezos. At the billionaires minted by delivering Cell Serivce accross the world even to incredibly poor countries.
“That something is a good thing does not mean it is a public good”
Have I said it was? Of course not.
You noted disdain for Rent Control.
That is just one means that government distorts markets.
If markets are known to be distorted, then it is hard to compare inside and outside of NY.
But I will try a different example to make this clearer.
The price (both nominal and real) of the vast majority of goods and services have declined over the past 5 decades.
For a small portion of goods – like autmobiles the nominal price is higher but the real price is not.
For those goods and services which government is most heavily involved – education and medical services, the real price is much higher than 5 decades ago.
Yet over that time period – the quality of education has not improved. Probably it has declined.
It is possible that the quality of healthcare has improved – but not even close to the inflation adjusted change in price.
Overall standard of living has doubled over 5 decades. but not uniformly.
Is healthcare and education far more expensive because we value it more ?
Or because the price is distorted ?
I have cited (from economics and law) that the price of anything is what a willing buyer will pay to a willing seller. That price only exists by definition is a free market.
The more distorted the market the more meaningless the nominal price is.
Further increasing prices DO NOT mean rising standard of living.
Standard of living rose twice as fast in the 19th century in the US as the 20th.
But prices from the start of the 19th century to the end actually declined.
What from the start of the 20th to the end prices increased exponentially.
We do not have a good means to measure wealth except money,
but trying to measure things with money is like trying to measure a building using a scale made out of chewing gum.
Probably the best way to measure wealth is the amount of work required to acquire it.
It takes me 9 hrs of work to buy a refridgerator today. A poorer value fridge required about 120 hours of work in 1980.
Wages are greater in NYC than elsewhere. Opportunities are greater, But cost of living is higher.
There are all kinds of other factors.
Christian Cooper clearly places a high value on birds.
So high he is welling to dance awfully close to criminal acts to protect birding – despite the fact that it is evident that despite laws to the contrary NYC does not really value birding. They have given birders the sanctuary they want, but they are not enforcing the laws to protect it forcing him to take the law into his own hands resulting in this mess.
I do not place much value on birds, But I would bet I have more and more different birds almost at arms length than Mr. Cooper.
Who is more wealthy ? I have what he wants, but I do not value it.
And he is force to take the law into his own hands to hold onto what he has.
While I need to do nothing.
NYC and cities in general have a higher standard of living than elsewhere.
But not nearly so different as some prices would indicate.
“You noted disdain for Rent Control.
That is just one means that government distorts markets.”
John, I have no disagreement with your assessment of government interference in education, healthcare and elsewhere. In a market system prices would fall tremendously while the quality would drastically increase. You don’t have to convice me of those things. That is why I will vote for Trump over Biden because Trump will decrease regulation and increase the marketplace in the economy. He will do some things I don’t like and perhaps one of the third parties reflects my ideology better. Unfortunately, voting for the third party instead of Trump, that moves things in my direction, means that Biden will have one less vote against him and if he wins he will push everything I don’t like. I don’t want to suggest that your voting habits lead to more of what you hate most, but they do.
I have no problems saying that Trump – for all his innumerable problems is the best possible choice of any choices that are actually possible.
But that is not a glowing endorsement.
“I have no problems saying that Trump – for all his innumerable problems is the best possible choice of any choices that are actually possible.
But that is not a glowing endorsement.”
No one is perfect. Perfect is the enemy of good. Trump moves the needle in the right direction in a lot of ways. Biden moves it in the wrong direction. No other candidate is viable so in essence your vote either counts or doesn’t.
If having to vote for someone that is not satisfactory enough for your liking then you have to look long term and start advocating at the local level helping the right person get on the school boards and things of that nature so they can work their way up to national power. The problem is people like to think they are power brokers when they vote so they make their ideological stand at the presidency which hurts their cause rather than helping it.
What is this pile of complicated verbal pretzel logic from John Say on here now and why argue with him?
Libeterianism is fine when you’re a starry eyed 20 year old but once you’ve seen anarchy in action as we have the past week, liberterianism is obviously a rhetorical and political dead end
nothing could be more stupid for Republicans or conservatives or average law abiding people now, than to drink the liberterian kool aid at this time when social atomization is so obviously making us weak, at the very same time social cohesion and demonstration is so obviously making the adversaries of the people so strong.
Get limperterians away from me. They smell like anarchists. i am not listening anymore.
“If you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism.”
Ronald Reagan
Libertarians are minarchists.
Regardless, the vast majority of limited government individual liberty, fiscal conservatism comes from libertarians.
“What is this pile of complicated verbal pretzel logic from John Say on here now and why argue with him?”
Kurtz, Why not? I learn a lot about people talking to them and I have plenty of time. I frequently talk to strangers when I am out walking. People are interesting and how they say things is very revealing. You are an attorney so you should be one that focuses on that. You can learn more than one can imagine.
In any event, I am sorry to say that John revealed himself. I held off for awhile trying to see if he couldn’t see his logic failing and thereby alter his rhetoric. He didn’t take note of the obvious.
“Get limperterians away from me.”
I don’t consider that a smart thing to say. The libertarian viewpoint is very much in synch with our founding fathers if kept away from extremes.Though they might not pidgeon hole themselves into the libertarian movement many great minds are libertarian. Milton Friedman referred to himself as a libertarian and a classical liberal though stated that he had no fixed ideology but they came close. Hayek is considered a libertarian and to some extent I am as well. Purity doesn’t exist except in closed minds.
When (if you dare) reading my posts to John, take note how many times I mention zigzagged roads, federalism and the states. John is stymied by all the zigzagging he has to do to make us forget about these things. Nonetheless he is an intelligent fellow and one can learn a lot from him if one is aware of the traps and the fallacies.
I am the furthest thing from an anarchist.
This kind of mental disconnect is a real problem: ” blah blah blah racist…We saw what happened in Minneapolis. It could have happened to Christian Cooper because of the actions of Amy Cooper. ”
It could have happened to anyone she called on. Minneapolis has nothing to do with the ramble. Police will stomp anyone who resists. We have a Harvard educated “cultured” person, and you think he’s going to dive toward the police screaming obscenities ?
You people have gone nuts. Now in your case, it’s a “should recuse problem.” You just related your brambled ground owls and the stray cats who ate them now you had to replace them…
So all your frustration of your personal issue is now “it’s all her she’s a racist !” Well, that will show the cat dumpers once and for all !!! She would kill your precious owls, and have police execute someone at her command ! She’s TERRIBLE you scream inside !
Judges should recuse themselves too. They often do not. There is a reason they should. Because dog leash lady killed all their owls and caused the huge problem, and that racist bleeeeep needs to be punished !
Thanks for helping me to understand. You usually post sound and sober comments.
Shakdi D – I am not putting the owls on Amy, but put out an example of what can happen and why the dog should be on a leash.
The dog should be on a leash.
There is not a whole lot of debate about that.
The problem is with your assertion that Amy is therefore the cause for anything that might follow.
Does having the dog off the leash justify Christian
breaking the dogs neck ?
Poisoning it ?
Shooting Amy ?
Amy’s mistake justifies specific responses, Not all responses.
Christian issued a vague but ominous threat and then followed through with an act that was outside his authority and not justified by events.
You are describing what happens when humans think they can manufacture nature.
Nature is what happens when you leave things alone.
Not what happens when you deliberately try to recreate something.
Call a bird sancturary what it is – a zoo for birds. It is an unnatural habitat deliberately constructed to favor whatever it is you are keeping in it.
It will require significant amounts of constantly sustained energy to fake being nature.
Put simply it is UNnatural. The proof in the energy needed to keep it.
From what I can tell the “ramble” is much like your own sanctuary – after the cats moved in. There might be lots of different birds there, but for the most part it is not maintained – extra energy is not input and it is only a bird sanctuary to the extent that some species can actually survive in the unmaintanted chaos of the ramble.
It also appears to be an sanctuary – for lots of undesirable things that are not birds.
Asumming that the reports I read are correct – lots of people release their dogs in the ramble, Amy is doing what many many nearby dog owners do.
There are signs requiring dogs be leashed, But aside from Christian who appears to have self appointed himself as official guardian of the Ramble there is no enforcement.
My comments are not from direct observation, but what I have read in other editorials.
So I could be wrong.
But I would be surprised if that is the case. ‘
Just like with your Owl sanctuary – govenrment creates these things and then loses interest. It will not provide the energy necescary to sustain them.
And frankly SHOULD NOT.
If you want an owl santurary – form a private group to do so, buy land and enforce your own rules on your property.
Sanctuaries are not the legitimate business of government. They are a choice to favor specific special interests such as yourself and Christian.
John Say – you probably don’t think concert halls are the legitimate business of government or museums, etc.
“John Say – you probably don’t think concert halls are the legitimate business of government or museums, etc.”
Nope.
I like museums. as I value them, I should pay for them myself, along with others who share my value.
I regularly go to two theaters, One of which is a sort of experimental feeder for NYC,
Both are entirely private, paid for by ticket sales, and private donations.
As they should be.
Your owl sanctuary comments are illuminating.
They explain your responses.
You are likely more emotionally attached to and knowledgeable about wild birds than pets.
You share some of Christians values, and you are unable to grasp that is all they are personal values. You are free to have them, but not free to force them on others.
Christian will likely be a long time hero for birders, even after his stature as a SJW vaporizes.
Christian likely identifies more with Jane Goodall than Rosa Parks.
John Say – we all have personal values and the mote in your eye has become a boulder. You are attached to your dog, so, big deal. I understand how sanctuaries work since I go to a couple infrequently. You don’t.
“John Say – we all have personal values and the mote in your eye has become a boulder. You are attached to your dog, so, big deal. I understand how sanctuaries work since I go to a couple infrequently. You don’t.”
You keep making false presumptions. This is why you are wrong about Amy and Chrisitan. You think you know other people and you make judgements based on your emotional connections not facts.
There is an enormous bird sanctuary not far from me. I visit it regularly
Further I live in the woods and wake up to the sounds of various birds almost every day.
I am not a birder, but I enjoy them from tiny birds through hawks and barn owls.
Right now there are half a dozen different birds I can hear.
But I am not in a sanctuary. I am in the real world. Nature. No energy is needed to maintain this. There are stray cats all over – and still birds, I do not need to act to assure their will be birds – nature does that for me for free, because I leave it be. I do not try to control it.
The point Paul is you do not know me. You do not know Christian, you do not know Amy.
I do not know these people either, nor you. I do not presume to.
I make decisions based on facts, not some presumed emotional identification with participants I think I know but do not really.
John Say – OCD
“John Say – we all have personal values ”
Paul, you are totally missing the point and focusing on the wrong things. No one claims that Amy shouldn’t have leashed her dog and violated a rule.
Allan – actually John slips back and forth between allowing her to have the dog unleashed and her having to leash the dog. My claim has been that if Amy followed the leashing rule, NONE of this would have happened.
“Allan – actually John slips back and forth between allowing her to have the dog unleashed and her having to leash the dog.”
Paul, I don’t think that is a fair characterization. John has continuously stated that she was wrong to leave the dog off leash. That is not the issue. Both parties acted poorly.
Allan – no that is not an unfair characterization. He defends her actions by saying everybody does it, then agrees she should not have done it. I probably spent 28 hours discussing this with him.
“He defends her actions by saying everybody does it, then agrees she should not have done it. ”
Paul John doesn’t defend Amy’s actions. He said they were wrong. Her wrongful actions doesn’t give Christian the right to threaten her or have contact with her or her dog. It’s not that difficult.
Allan – his threat was that he was going to try to take control of her dog.
“Allan – his threat was that he was going to try to take control of her dog.”
Paul, There was no imminent danger providing him the right to do such a thing. He had no right to take control of her dog.
Allan – Amy does not have control of her dog which is evident by her grabbing the collar and trying to choke it out. Since she does not have control and it is off the leash, the dog is “loose” and fair game. Hence, the treats which cause the owner to realize they are about to lose their chattel, so they put it on the leash as required.
So, yes, Christian does have the right to lure a “loose” dog in the Ramble. There. I said it. 🙂
“Amy does not have control of her dog ”
Paul that does not give Christian the right to threaten Amy. Jaywalking doesn’t give the auto driver the right to run the pedestrian over.
“Allan – Amy does not have control of her dog which is evident by her grabbing the collar and trying to choke it out. Since she does not have control and it is off the leash”
You have a timeline problem. In the video the dog is on the leash.
You also have a fact problem, if Amy has grabbed the collar of the dog – it is “in her control”
“the dog is “loose” and fair game.”
There is no “fair game” exception to theft.
“Hence, the treats which cause the owner to realize they are about to lose their chattel, so they put it on the leash as required.”
AGAIN your speculation as to Christians goal does not justify whatever act you wish.
“So, yes, Christian does have the right to lure a “loose” dog in the Ramble. There. I said it. 🙂”
And you are quite obviously wrong.
Amy was present, responsibility for the dog was HERS. Ownership of the Dog was HERS, Christian may not act to accomplish his goal or the law without her permission.
He is not law enforcement.
Substitute kid for dog, and lolipop for treat and Christian is headed for jail for YEARS.
The same fallacious argument repeated dozens of times is no better than the first.
John Say – you say to keep with the facts however you want change to dog to a kid. Stick to the facts.
Taking control of another persons property when they are present without their permission is theft. Under many circumstances it is Robbery.
“Robbery is the crime of taking or attempting to take anything of value by force, threat of force, or by putting the victim in fear.”
In response to a summary offense you are not free to commit a crime.
John Say – show me how it is robbery. Prove it to your wife first.
Having been proven an ass by making false assumptions about my life, you are doubling down ?
“Robbery is the crime of taking or attempting to take anything of value by force, threat of force, or by putting the victim in fear.”
Robbery is a more serious form of theft requiring force or the threat of force.
There is probably insufficient evidence that Christian sought to use force.
There is more than sufficient for attempted theft.
New York Penal Code 155.05 Larceny
1. A person steals property and commits larceny when, with intent to deprive another of property or to appropriate the same to himself or to a third person, he wrongfully takes, obtains or withholds such property from an owner thereof.
In NY there is no separate crime of attempted theft or larceny.
An attempt IS the crime of larceny, you do not need to be successful.
“Everybody does it” – is a claim made by others. I do not have proof of it, though I suspect it is true. If true it is mitigation.
Put simply it is wrong not to follow the law.
But every violation of the law is not consequential.
I also want to be clear. Law or not – and even that has not been completely established.
If Amy’s dog is unleashed she is responsible for it.
Absolutely. That is also the law.
She is responsible if it is allowed to be unleashed.
She is responsible if it is not.
She is responsible if it bites Christian – under just about all circumstances.
The huge problem with Paul’s argument is that he asserts that if Amy broke a minor law she is the proximate cause for everything that follows.
That is ludicrous.
That is trivial disproven by reductio ad absurdem.
If Christian raped Amy would she be responsible, because her dog was off the leash ?
If course not.
No matter what Amy’s actions – legal or not. Christian is ALWAYS responsible for his actions.
You can threaten to report people who violate small laws. You can not threaten them with unspecified punishment imposed by you.
You can not do so regardless what preceded your threat.
“Everybody does it” – that appears to be the evidence we have at this point.
and yes it is relevant. Laws that are not enforced should not exist.
That is not a failure on the part of Christian. It is a failure on the part of NYC.
I noted before that the Sanctuary in CP takes energy to sustain. It is NOT nature.
If NYC does not put in that energy, then the Ramble is a sanctuary in name only.
I strongly suspect that is an undercurrent to this.
To be clear this is speculation.
But it appears NYC created the sanctuary and the rules to protect it in response to the wishes of birders like Christian. But that “gift” is pyhric as NYC is unwilling to expend the energy needed to maintain the sanctuary.
Christian is attempting to enforce the law that NYC will not on his own – that makes him a vigilantee – and his own posts admit that.
So you are trying to make a giant crime out of Amy failing to obey a law NYC chooses not to enforce and that myriads of people ignore, while one private person has taken the law into his own hands and is acting as police, prosecutor, judge and jury.
Christian was free to call the police on Amy – and report that a white woman was letting her dog run unleashed in the Ramble.
He was not free to enforce the law himself.
To be clear part of the above is speculation. The last two statments are facts.
And to be clear
“every body does it” appears to be a fact.
If a fact mitigates Amy’s misconduct – your dislike of that fact changes nothing.
Yes, I have said over and over “Amy should have leashed her dog.”
Just as I should come to a complete stop every single time I come to a stop sign – even at intersections where there is no traffic and no police.
If I roll through a stop sign and something bad happens in the intersection – it is my fault.
If I roll through the stop sign and I am hit by a speeding driver at the next intersection,
the fact that I rolled through a stop sign previously is NOT the proximate cause for the accident.
With or without the leash law Amy is legally responsible for the actions of her dog.
If Christian’s conduct is completely innocent., and he tries to treat the dog and the dog bites him Amy will be held responsible.
That is part of why Christian may not try to lure the dog with treats.
In the most innocent version of this possible, Christian is taking a risk that Amy will have to pay for if it goes badly.
That is immoral.
Regardless, there is absolutely no possible innocent way Christian can lure the dog with a treat without Amy’s permission.
You may not act when another person will have to pay if your act goes bad.
Paul,
You continue to sell false naratives.
I do not think Central Park should be owned and operated by government.
I do not actually have a problem with bird sanctuaries in NYC or Central park.
But I have attacked the presumption they are “nature”.
Private or public the rules against unleashed dogs are “unnatural”.
That does nto inherently make them wrong. But it does make them expensive to enforce.
Much of what I am reading indicates that this leash law exists in the Ramble, and that it is entirely unenforced.
This particularly even demonstrates the problem with unnatural laws that are not enforced – probably because doing so is actually expensive – because they are unnatural.
Unenforced laws are a very bad idea, they undermine the rule of law.
They create situations like this and those Allan described where many people feel arguably legitimately that they can ignore the law. Then the law becomes arbitrary and capricious.
I strongly suspect one of the reasons that Christian is engaged in this conduct and why he did not call the police is they would not come. They have no interest in enforcing the leash law.
My position is enforce the law or get rid of it.
If you do not you end up with messes like this. Where people like Amy ignore the law – knowing the law is routinely ignored and uneforced, and people like Christian who value the law try to enforce it on their own – act as vigalantees.
And the result is bad outcome.
i have never said Amy was right to ignore the law
I am saying her behavior appears to be commonplace.
And like it or not that diminishes the seriousness of the offense – an already unserious offense.
Your argument that “if Amy had followed the law, this would not have happened”.
Is disingenous.
If she had decided to sleep in, this would not have happened either.
There are many things that if changed would have avoided this.
That does not make those things causes.
Amy is responsible for her acts.
If the consequence of her action had been a citation for an unleashed dog,
there would be no issue.
Christian as a private party threatened Amy with a different consequence.
That is vigilantism, and that is more properly the proximate cause.
Further, both Christian and Amy had the ability to walk away at most any time.
Amy’s call to the police was justified.
But her failure to retreat was NOT.
John Say – Amy’s call to the police was the clarion call of a Karen. She got caught with her hand in the cookie jar and it really cost her. Christian got to be on The View. I have not seen the appearance since I hate The View, however you might check it out. I am sure they grilled him over this incident.
The one time I was in NYC, it was under Rudy Guiliani’s leadership and it was a cultureshock. I was short-changed 10 dollars at a book store (btw I love The Strand), I saw a guy muscle a water heater onto the subway and no one blinked an eye, I went to a Chinese restaurant at 2am where I got the worst service I have ever gotten in my entire life and then was told I had to tip 20%, I stayed up in Harlem and the people could not have been nicer, I saw some good Broadway and off-Broadway theatre.
The one thing I noticed was that people seemed to be obeying the law, considering the bizarre laws NYC has (i.e. parking). I never saw anyone arrested and I never heard anyone say they were going to call the cops on someone.
So, when you tell me that (and I will take your word for it) scofflaws are loosing their dogs into the Ramble, then NYC is now the Wild West. It is lawless. Since it is lawless Christian, now of The View fame, can take the law into his own hands.
“John Say – Amy’s call to the police was the clarion call of a Karen.”
I am not sure the evidence we have is sufficient to label Amy a Karen.
Regardless, she does not come off in an appealing fashion.
“She got caught with her hand in the cookie jar and it really cost her.”
The cookie jar ?
She got caught with a dog off a leash – MAYBE. That seems to be agreed to, but we actually have no evidence aside from Christians statements.
Do not assume facts you can not prove.
Still I will give you this as it is small and irrelevant.
If dog’s off of leashes was rare – this would be small potatoes
But it appears to be common place.
“Christian got to be on The View. I have not seen the appearance since I hate The View, however you might check it out. I am sure they grilled him over this incident.”
Really ? You think they grilled him ? I have not seen it, but the odds of a tough question of christian on the view are about zero.
“The one time I was in NYC, it was under Rudy Guiliani’s leadership and it was a cultureshock. I was short-changed 10 dollars at a book store (btw I love The Strand), I saw a guy muscle a water heater onto the subway and no one blinked an eye, I went to a Chinese restaurant at 2am where I got the worst service I have ever gotten in my entire life and then was told I had to tip 20%, I stayed up in Harlem and the people could not have been nicer, I saw some good Broadway and off-Broadway theatre.”
And this is meaningful in what way ?
I have probably spent 1000 hours in NYC over the years.
I have been in Central Park many times.
I have eaten at excellent restaurants. Including incredible chinese ones.
“The one thing I noticed was that people seemed to be obeying the law,”
In New York ? Really ? I have nearly been run down many times in NY by people running red lights or going 60mph between lights. Jaywalking is the rule.
Is there a street in Manhattan that is not fully double parked ?
“I never saw anyone arrested and I never heard anyone say they were going to call the cops on someone.”
Really ? Try youtube ? There are dozens of videos of people be arrested for violating (or often not violating) deblasios social distancing orders.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MQfDsmYS_s
So in your two days in NYC you did not hear anyone threaten to call the cops ?
There are 5500 911 calls per day in NYC.
Pretty sure New Yorkers “call the cops”
“So, when you tell me that (and I will take your word for it) scofflaws are loosing their dogs into the Ramble, then NYC is now the Wild West. It is lawless. Since it is lawless Christian, now of The View fame, can take the law into his own hands.”
Nope. Not how it works.
I would further note that when the law is not obeyed and the law is not enforced, the law does not exist. Enforcing a law that is not obeyed or enforced is actually lawlessness.
Regardless, do not try to sell law and order when you are defending threats to steal a dog.
John Say – Look you are emotionally locked into the dog theft story and I am not. This is my last post on this subject with you, I hope.
more fallacies. I have given you the facts,
I have given you the definition of theft and robbery.
I have given you the NY penal code on larceny.
All the required elements are present.
This is not about emotion.
The strongest argument in Christians favor is prosecutorial discretion – essentially this is too small to prosecute. That is likely true.
But that is entirely irrelevant to the merits of Amy’s 911 call.
You claimed to be a “trumpster” well to quote Trump
“This was a perfect call”.
I would further note that the longer this debate goes on the deeper the hole you dig.
You went into this nonsense about 6′ leashes.
I can not find and I am unlikely to find a leash law that applies.
What I have found is a leash rule – no defintions, no statutory authority.
It is no different for a “pool rule” – you get barred for failing to follow it.
Certainly Christian has absolutely zero authority to enforce it.
Paul C Schulte says:
May 28, 2020 at 8:38 AM John Say – OCD
Paul is projecting and it’s only 6:45 AM
eye roll please
I think this particular topic is amazing.
Something so tiny has so massively hooked so many.
There was a good editorial somewhere about “two karens”.
We have two progressives – blue on blue conflict, and Central park no less,
And we are trying to manufacture an Emitt Till story from thin air.
Absolutely what is going on in Minesota, and apparelty LA is more significant – and yet, on numerous agregators – this story is getting all the airtime.
Mostly I think the story is apolitical. Amy’s infraction is walking a dog without a leash.
Christian’s is threatening Amy and starting to act on that threat.
The racial element is nonsense – progressive theater. I find it amazing that so many people are wigging out because Amy described the person who threatened her as “African american”. She also described him as a man – is that sexist ?
Elsewhere I have learned that the leash rule in the Ramble is apparently universally disregarded, and that the portrayal of the Ramble as some bird sancturary might be true as a matter of law, but it is nonsense as a matter of fact, that the Ramble is just a chaotic lawless portion of central park. I have been to NYC and Central Park, but I am not a New Yorker and will have to take the word of others for that.
Regardless, I find it fascinating that so massively many people can get so incredibly wrong such a simple story.
At the same time there are political elements.
Progressives are very loud and clear sending a message to women accross the country – the only position for women in the movement is prone.
This is not getting talked media attention. But this is little different from Biden’s recent “you aint black” remark.
There is an absolute truth of progressivism being spoken loud and clear in this.
Women – a group that has been oppressed through all of human history, still has not acheived the intersectional victim status sufficient that the fear and stress of a woman encountering a big and threatening male alone in the park is allowed to feel threatened – atleast if he is black.
Pay attention to the media. Amy is racist – not just because she identifies him as african american – but because she claims to be threatened.
Anyway, it will be interesting to see if this has a political effect.
Beyond that – I do not really care very much about either Amy or Christian. Neither are espeically sympathetic.
“I think this particular topic is amazing.Something so tiny has so massively hooked so many.”
When it was first posted I saw it and thought it too trivial to bother with. Later when I read the article on 10 blacks killed in Chicago I remembered that posting and how little noise there is surrounding the killings of our youth, drug overdoses, suicide and the like. I posted the article and was shocked that so many replies had been written. I scanned the comments to see where all that noise came from and then I had to reckon with the fact that the wrong discussion was taking place and might not have taken place at all if the man wasn’t African American. There are a lot better ways to point out the problems faced by African Americans than this story. Therefore though you might say “Mostly I think the story is apolitical” to me it is very political.
The bramble is a more natural setting in Central Park than the rest. It is too small to be a real bird sanctuary but if you are in Manhattan that is the closest on will get. Almost all homes are small in Manhattan and the ‘bird sanctuary’ reflects the tiny quarters available. I have seen dogs off leash in the bramble and would prefer otherwise but I wouldn’t want a hostile confrontation. I walked my 14 pound dog there when in NYC and I always worry about some larger dog rarely off leash getting excited and jumping on my own hurting him. It is not the dog’s fault rather it is the master’s for not being able to control their dog.
The Progressivism you describe is sickening and oppressing. Those that carry the mantra of Progressivism might as well be part of the Pea Pod People from the movie.
I agree with you and don’t wish to associate with either of them.
George Floyd was just killed by a police officer.
The facts I am aware of are pretty bad.
I am not sure if the action was racist – I do not know enough yet.
But it was certainly an egregious abuse of power from an office with a track record of similar bad acts.
It is near certain that story is a far more sane platform to explore possible racism,
that some stupid conflict between two over privlidged progressive new yorkers.
Yet, Amy is somehow the new Grand Dragon of the KKK.
I am still commenting – obviously I find aspects fascinating.
One of the interesting facets, is that the only thing needed to avoid this blow up was either of them to walk away at pretty much any time.
That is equally on George and Amy.
It appears neither of them ever considered that. Why ?
My speculation is that is a progressive cultural thing.
The left does not teach avoiding or resolving conflict. They teach appealing to authority.
Students on campus do not avoid people they strongly disagree with. And they do not debate them. They shout them down and they demand that some authority silence them.
George is old enough he should know better.
Regardless neither of the two of them every considered the possibility that confrontation could lead to disaster for either of them.
Mostly I think the deck was stacked against Amy from the start – in the progressive victimhood heirarchy white woman lose out to everything but straight white men.
At the same time the huge “winner” of this is most clearly the person who best controlled the narative and had nothing to do with the actual facts.
Is this political ? I think there are potential read/blue consequences of this story.
Single women just got incredibly strongly Dissed by progressivism.
As Stokely Charmicheal said, the only position for women in the movement is prone.
That message has been sent loud and clear.
I doubt many in NYC – even single women got that message, they all seem to be too heavily engaged in checking their priviledge, and thanking god they were not amy.
But I am less sure what message is being heard by women further from Peoples republics.
In the narrowest sense this is blue on blue. None outside progressive bastions is part of this.
But yes, it may have political ramifications.
I also find examing what this means regarding progressive culture interesting.
paywall blocks it. allan can you sample the text? curious here
Apparently the article is paywalled.
My daughter was born in LianZiang in 1996, My son in Pusan in 1999, he has a Scholarship to TUJ in Japan and we hope he will be able to start in August.
There are many people with more knowledge of Asia and China than I,
But there are many more with less. Our family is mixed.
And chinese orphanages in the 90’s were hellish places.
” Our family is mixed.”
John, you are not the only one to have family that is “mixed”. Sometimes I wonder if our friends on the left have any mixing at all so they pretend with words and accusations that they are open to all different races and types of people. They wear that so called openess (frequently a type of racism) as a badge of honor while those that live it think nothing of it.
Meanwhile, “Disturbing video shows a black man dying in police custody in Minneapolis on Monday night after he repeatedly said “I can’t breathe” as a white police officer pushed a knee into his neck,” remaining on the man’s neck even after he becomes unconscious.
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/amphtml/amberjamieson/black-man-died-police-custody-minneapolis
In its more than two centuries of existence, our country still hasn’t dealt with its systemic racism or police abuse problems.
Committ – did this happen because he was black or because he didn’t believe the suspect?
You can watch the video there and answer your own question.
Not sure how you excuse an officer not getting off the neck of someone who has become **unconscious**.
Committ – I tend to believe that adrenaline starts flowing and the cops are ramped up. Stopping is not an option. The color of the skin is not an option.
In the video, they don’t look “ramped up” to me. Do they look “ramped up” to you? Stopping is always an option. Especially when the people nearby are asking you to stop, pointing out that he’s started bleeding, …
If a copy cannot stop when appropriate, s/he’s a danger to the community and shouldn’t be on the force.
Committ – you ever been under enormous stress in a life or death situation? If not, I do not think you should be giving the cops advice.
The only person in “a life or death situation” in that video was Mr. Floyd, who died.
The police chief has fired the 4 cops. Are you going to argue that he doesn’t understand the work of being a cop well enough?
Committed:
“The police chief has fired the 4 cops. Are you going to argue that he doesn’t understand the work of being a cop well enough?”
**********************************
I wouldn’t. I just argue that you have rebutted your original argument that this was “systemic racism.”
Committ – have you heard of calming the mob? That cop who hid at Parkland got his job back with back pay.
4 cops were fired after the Parkland shooting. AFAIK, only 1 got his job back.
Committ – it was the one that was hiding that was fired who got his job back with pay. This is why their are lawyers chomping at the bit to get to these cops and take their cases. Easy money. And Minneapolis has deep pockets.
Another who hid outside is facing multiple charges of criminal child neglect, as well as a civil negligence suit.
Police choose their profession, it is not forced on them.
They would be entitled to more than the ordinary degree of respect from the rest of us for undertaking a difficult job – if they had a solid track record of doing it well.
But the job is what it is, and if a parson can not take the stress and risk without killing others unnecessarily – they should get another job.
BTW Policing is NOT among the top 10 most dangerous jobs.
Farming and fishing are both more dangerous.
i don’t understand 2 things
a) iof he was conscious then how was he talking?
b) if he was being choked then how could he say “i cant breathe
i mean in jiu jitsu we tap because when a good choke is laid in, you can’t talk
perhaps the poor fellow simply had a heart attack after the arrest procedure?
Thanks for making clear that you didn’t watch the video to answer your own questions. He was talking initially and a few minutes later lost consciousness, and even then, the cop didn’t take his knee off the guy’s neck.
Kurtz– I suspect the comment about not being able to breathe was false. If you can’t breathe you can’t talk. But he was in trouble. Pressure on the side of the neck can cut off blood flow to the brain and cause unconsciousness in a matter of seconds. I saw it demonstrated and would not have believed it otherwise. A hold used by the LA PD commonly worked safely with whites but for some reason tended to cause the death of black men so it was discontinued. Joseph Wambaugh remembered that the Chief at that time incautiously remarked that the hold seemed to kill more blacks than ‘normal people’. For awhile police officers mockingly called their Black And White patrol cars ‘Black and Normal’ cars.
Yes, if you are in respiratory distress, you can still talk. Right up to the point that you lose consciousness. It’s not the same as someone pressing their thumbs into your windpipe so you cannot expel any air at all over your vocal cords. Your chest feels like an elephant is sitting on it. Your airway slowly squeezes shut. An inhaler only works on lung tissue it can touch. It can’t get into airways that are swollen shut. Another possibility is a cardiac event. Your heart moves blood through your body, bringing oxygenated blood to your brain and the rest of your tissues. If the heart does’t work, your tissues starve of oxygen, and your O2 levels plummet, too. You’re breathing but you’re still not getting any oxygen. That also might have caused a pressure in his chest and rapid breathing.
That misunderstanding that if you can talk, you can breathe needs to get thrown into the Mariana Trench.
The man was obviously right, because he passed out and died.
I already mentioned the woman I knew who died of an asthma attack. In another instance, I was in the waiting room of urgent care, when someone came in suffering respiratory distress. The brought a wheelchair out, because they had to walk her next door to the ER. (By the way, respiratory distress is for the emergency room. An urgent care is just like any doctors office. If you can’t breathe, go to a hospital, not the doctors office, urgent care or otherwise.) It didn’t take that long, but she was straining to sit as straight as she could, sucking in as hard as possible to get any air in, saying, “oh, oh, oh, oh” as they wheeled her away. She was on the verge of collapse. You bet it was life threatening, yet she could still form words. She was talking to her daughter while this unfolded, just using small words.
And, yes, vascular neck restraint can cause someone to lose consciousness. This guy could have had an underlying medical condition, including organ damage from a recent Covid-19 infection.
If you even find yourself in a position where someone says they can’t breathe, it’s probably either a panic attack/hyperventilation, or a medical emergency like respiratory distress or heart attack, etc. Assure them that you will help and that, right there, will ease their distress a bit.
If the cop asked for his medical history, or tried to adjust his position to see if it helped, I did not see it.
Kurtz: you can still talk up to the point that you pass out. If you are getting even a breath of air over your vocal cords, oxygen levels plummeting, you can still say that you can’t breathe.
If someone has you in a chokehold, the vocal cords might be pressed. You can still make noise. The airway would have to be completely cut off for no words at all to make it out. A narrowing airway, or plummeting O2 levels due to heart failure or a heart attack, would allow words to escape for a while. What the man was saying was essentially his efforts to tap out.
I knew someone who died saying, “no” over and over again as an asthma attack killed her in front of her kids and husband.
If it was a heart attack, his oxygen levels would plummet while his lungs worked fine. Blood through his nose could mean something ruptured, and he was drowning.
Clearly, the man was right, because he passed out and died.
Perhaps the cop thought, since he had his knee on the back of the neck, it was not impeding on his windpipe in any way. So maybe he thought the guy was lying. Maybe he had resisted arrest for a while before this, and then, for real, started having a medical emergency, right at the point that the cop didn’t give a damn anymore what he said. I don’t know what happened for the duration of the incident.
From my biased point of view as an asthmatic, I think if a suspect says he can’t breathe, if at all possible, the cop should sit him up. If it’s safe, put his hands above his head to help open up his diaphragm. Call for an ambulance. It is best to err on the side of caution. I’ll bet now he wish he had, as he’s faced with having to defend his actions with a dead arrestee.
Of course it’s wrong for people to assume this was racist, or deliberate. It could have been a training issue. The guy might have fought like hell before. Or maybe the cop hated him. One can’t tell without looking at evidence.
well guys i am no expert but i do have the experience of rolling on the mat for years. of having been choked out unconscious several times and having choked people out a few more times yet. luckily i never died nor did any of my partners. but for all the times I was choked I could not talk not even when the chokes were all blood chokes and not airway chokes. as most of them are in martial arts practice. that’s why we “tap” before we go to sleep and train to let people out when they tap.
anyhow perhaps allow the cop a presumption of innocence like every other taxpayer and wait and see what the pathologists say
Commitable:
“In its more than two centuries of existence, our country still hasn’t dealt with its systemic racism or police abuse problems.”
*************************
Please detail every instance of “systemic” racism since the 60s. I’ll help you by defining the term “systemic” for you as “relating to a system, especially as opposed to a particular part.” What part of being a Minneapolis cop makes you indicative of the entire “system” of anything at all?
I’ll help you further by refining your nebulous phrase to a more coherent one, “institutional racism” which is de jure racism codified by law or policy. Again, give me every example of that since the 60s.
You know Marxists used to be better thinkers. Now they just recite talking points.
mespo…….”now they just recite talking points”
Except for Harpo! 🎩
More bullsh!t racissst hogswaddle. The cop was doing his job and if he had his knee on the dude’s throat, the dude was probably resisting arrest.
The Democrats don’t care any more about blacks than they do women. It is just something to use to try to get votes.
Plus, nobody yet knows what the dude died from. It might have been whatever he ingested.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Four killed and 19 shot in St. Louis over the weekend and the mayor went on television to complain about a party at Lake of the Ozarks. You are right. They don’t really care what happens to blacks so long as they can harvest their votes, dead or alive. Oh yes, 4 killed and 27 shot and wounded in Chicago. And Al Sharpton will protest . . . . never.
In its more than two centuries of existence, our country still hasn’t dealt with its systemic racism or police abuse problems.
There is no such thing as ‘systemic racism’.
As for police abuse, if you comply with legitimate orders and don’t attack the officer and try to take his duty gun away from him, you greatly reduce your chances of being shot by the officer. If you take passable care of your health and don’t leave yourself a morbidly obese diabetic at age 45, you greatly reduce your chances of having a fatal heart attack when you are subject to an ordinary police tackle. In fact, if you just comply with lawful instructions, you greatly reduce your chances of being tackled.
Absurd says: “There is no such thing as ‘systemic racism’.”
Not here. But you can see the real thing in Mexico. A friend of mine of Mexican descent but American with American values worked for awhile at a resort in Mexico. She was shocked at the systematic discrimination against Oaxacans in Mexico. Paid less than others for the same work and, generally, treated shamefully by other Mexicans who tend to regard them as being inferior. They tend to be shorter and darker than other Mexicans and are recognizable. There is such a thing as ‘systemic racism’ but the real thing does not exist here unless you count affirmative action, diversity initiatives that discriminate by race, government contract set asides for minorities, separate dorms and facilities for minorities in universities, and the like.
Come to think of it, there is systemic racism in this country, just not where everyone is looking for it.
CommitToHonestDiscussion:
I saw a snippet of that video on the news. As an asthmatic, I felt chills when I heard him saying he can’t breathe. I have no idea what happened prior, if he was throwing fists or elbows, brandishing a gun, or what. The fight was over at that point. I don’t know if they were waiting for a bus, and help was on the way, or not.
If someone can’t breathe, they could be having an asthma attack, heart attack, or their windpipe might be damaged. Remove any obstruction, like a knee, prop them upright, and even put their hands on top of their heads to open up the diaphragm, if safe to do so.
Cops aren’t doctors. They deal with people who lie to them and fight them. They need to be trained on what to do in a medical emergency. So many cops are first on the scene to traffic accidents, and render first aid.
I have not seen the entire video of the incident. I don’t know if this is a training issue, deliberate, or what. It needs to be investigated. If someone says, “I can’t breathe,” err on the side of caution and get medical help.
The saying, “if you can talk, you can breathe” is an old wives tale that I despise. The only thing worse than having respiratory distress is having to argue with someone that it’s real and you’re in trouble while you run out of air. I knew someone who died of an asthma attack. She died gasping out, “No! No! No!” right in front of her kids and husband. If there is a breath of air at all over vocal chords, they can make sound. Dying animals make noises. Sound does not mean a medical crisis isn’t deadly serious.
CommitToHonestDiscussion:
SARS-CoV-2 has been shown to cause damage to internal organs, including the heart. People are showing up with astounding hypoxia, oxygen levels in the 30s, yet somehow still conscious and talking. They breathe rapidly, but don’t feel like their lungs are closing up. This happens when the virus enters through ACE2 receptors, present in the lungs, heart, brain, and other critical organs. It’s their hearts that are being affected, which is why they don’t feel like their lungs are smothering. They are already failing by the time they think maybe they could possibly use a visit to the ER.
If this man recovered from Covid-19 just a month ago, he might have been suffering either heart or lung damage, or both. This is what people don’t understand. Young people may not be fine after getting Covid-19. They might feel okay, but not be.
This guy who looked young and strong might have been medically vulnerable.
Just breaks my heart. I have had to argue with people before, when I’ve had an asthma attack, though nothing that bad, thank God. I can’t tell you how it feels to have people around you, you can’t breathe, and you have to sit there arguing with them that you’re in trouble. It makes you more afraid, and that speeds your heart up, which requires even more air. If his problem was either cardiovascular or pulmonary, fruitlessly pleading for help would have compounded it.
There definitely needs to be an investigation. I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion that race had anything to do with it, just because the cop was white and the victim black.
“I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion…” — Karen S
Says the woman (Karen S) who frequently jumps to conclusions.
The police chief has now fired the 4 cops involved:
https://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2020/05/26/mpd-chief-arradondo-4-police-officers-fired-following-death-of-george-floyd/
Committed to Talking Nonsense:
“The police chief has now fired the 4 cops involved”
***********************************
Guess it ain’t systemic then, eh?
Commit: “The police chief has now fired the 4 cops involved:”
The police chief is black and it looks like he made a race-based decision. I suspect that at least three of the cops will get there jobs back if they sue–that or money..
Meanwhile, why would police officers even attempt to enforce laws when black people commit crimes if every incident is going to be treated as racist and every cop bigoted. Take away race here and you have a suspect fighting the police and dying because of what? Perhaps the autopsy will explain it.
The police have backed away in Baltimore and the place is a slaughterhouse with mostly other blacks getting killed. How is that working out for ya?
Commit:
“In its more than two centuries of existence, our country still hasn’t dealt with its systemic racism or police abuse problems.”
Based on what? Race is not a detriment to getting into school unless you are Asian or white. No one may deny a minority housing, employment, or university admittance without violating the law.
I cannot think of a single instance of systemic racism. If you can name one, that would help.
Just remember that racial inequality does not mean that it is due to systemic or structural racism. For example, less blacks are homeowners than whites, not because real estate agents are racist and refuse to cater to blacks, but because more minorities are poor than whites.
More blacks are poor than whites, because one of the highest risk factors for poverty and crime is to become a single mother, with an absentee father. Black single motherhood is over 75% in some areas. Yet, black women are not the victim of The Handmaid’s Tale and forced to become single mothers against their will. The best chance of getting out of poverty is to finish high school, get a job, wait to have kids until you are married, and to stay married. That’s it. This formula works for blacks, Latinas, Latvians…It is not race specific. When more black people become single mothers, and more black fathers skip out, then more black families live in poverty. It’s math.
When black kids grow up in single parent homes, they have a higher risk of dropping out of school, doing drugs, joining a gang, getting arrested, going to prison, and/or getting killed. This is undeniable in the studies. Obama mentioned this when he was in office.
What is especially troubling is that when you take this cohort of kids, with the higher crime and drugs and violence, and you fill a school with them, in areas with high rates of single motherhood, then you create an intense pressure on other kids to get violent or get beat. It becomes almost impossible to learn and have values in a school like that, which ruins the chances of some kids who what to get the heck out. And how do you make something of your life when that’s how you’re raised? It’s a vicious cycle. I care deeply about kids issues, and I hope there is some way to fix it. Somehow, I don’t think a white woman standing on the periphery, named Karen, is going to have any luck telling people they aren’t living their best lives.
How are you going to get kids out of poverty when their schools are like this, and how the heck do you fix it?
https://youtu.be/-SRCY8FqoyQ
Also, there is a system in place to handle police abuse. Of course there are bad apples. And there are good cops who snap. There are Internal Affairs review, and the justice system. If a cop has gone rogue, and there is not justice, then you have to prove your case. White cop + black suspect does not equal racism without proof. That’s not fair.
If you can think of a single area where racism is systemic, and the cause of a disparity, then we will discuss it honestly. I just can’t think of one where current racism was the cause.
“Systemic racism” / “structural racism” / “institutional racism” tend to be used interchangeably.
Here’s research from the criminal justice system:
parc.info/blog/2018/9/19/is-the-criminal-justice-system-racist
And research from health care:
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28402827
I like Radley alot, he is atleast quasi libertarain so he should know better.
Equal outcome inherently runs afoul of equal liberty and equal rights.
Nature does not treat us the same. We are not equal. We do nto have the same intelligence, or other gifts. We are not ants or bees with each of us being indentical. We are each unique, blessed differently, and we will inherently have different outcomes.
We are equal in our rights, and liberties – though not inherenly equal in our ability to take advantage of those.
If as Balkco claims a system of not especially racist people following an ordered system of laws, produces a disparate outcome relative to race – that does not mean the “system” is wholely or even partly to blame.
It has long ago been established that arrests are directly proportionate to police calls.
There is more crime in black communities are reported by black people.
To the extent their might be systemic racism, it is that law enforcement has not stamped out crime in black neighborhoods.
Sentencing in the US is fundimentally a mathematical process, blacks do tend to get more screwed by drug laws – because black community leaders decades ago were more angry about the scourge of drugs in their communities and sought higher sentences for crack as an example. Are black congressmen racist against blacks ?
Absolutely there are instances of individual racism in the courts and prosecutions.
But those are increasingly rare and not what Radley is talking about.
From the time I received a drivers license until my hair turned gray I was constantly pulled over by police – and I am male and white. Those encounters were not pleasant.
I do not have an especially good view of the average police officer as a result. I have found that the police lie alot. And I have alot of friends who are police.
Even today – I still get pulled over – but a grey main and respectable attire usually results in a much more polite encounter, and usually a warning. Is that a “systemic problem” ? absolutely, but it is not racism. And I would have put some grey in my hair a few decades ago if I grasped the respect it would get me from police.
“I cannot think of a single instance of systemic racism.”
Let me guess: Karen S is white.
https://www.benjerry.com/home/whats-new/2016/systemic-racism-is-real
“Arbery case exemplifies abuse of ‘stand your ground,’ but the damage is broad and systemic”
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/arbery-case-exemplifies-abuse-stand-your-ground-damage-broad-systemic-n1212816
“For example, less blacks are homeowners than whites, not because real estate agents are racist and refuse to cater to blacks, but because more minorities are poor than whites. ”
Actually, both of those factors contribute to it. It’s silly to suggest that it’s either-or.
“More blacks are poor than whites, because one of the highest risk factors for poverty and crime is to become a single mother, with an absentee father.”
Now look at how our criminal justice system increases the likelihood of black fathers being jailed and the length of their prison terms for the same crimes (like crack vs. powder cocaine), how this also works in the other direction: where poverty makes it harder for people to pay bail when they haven’t been tried yet (so because a larger fraction of the black population is poor, they’re more likely to be in jail rather than out on bail), …
And once again, it’s not a single-factor issue. A key reason that blacks on average are poorer than whites is that people inherit from their parents, but many blacks had their labor stolen from them for centuries (so they’ve had less wealth to pass along on average), had their kids sold away from them for centuries (so they couldn’t give their kids an inheritance), had to live with a century of Jim Crow laws after slavery ended (making it harder to make as much money), …
I’m not going to analyze your entire comment, but it’s flawed.
just dont buy ben and jerrys folks. the ice cream tastes like dog feces and it’s overpriced. you may get sick from eating too much ben and jerry’s antiwhite ice cream. it’s bad for you.
folks, you’re going to forget this story about the insurance lady who lost her job. and you’re going to forget you read this comment. but you will remember this:
ben and jerry’s ice cream is bad for you,
eating ben and jerryi’s ice cream may cause sickness
ben and jerry’s tastes like dog dung
that’s right, that’s what you will remember, and it’s too expensive even if you are tempted to try it. because it may taste like dog waste. that’s what you’ll remember, after all of this is forgotten. you might as well pick some up squishy dog waste out of the yard and sample it as eat ben and jerry’s. at least the stinking brown log in the yard is free. unlike ben and jerry’s ice cream which is expensive and it stinks and may make you sick.
Ben & Jerry’s had a niche when premium ice creams first came out years ago. But there are a lot of better choices now. The quality has declined and the prices have stayed sky-high. There are so many good ice creams now; no need to buy some over-priced B&J that causes diarrhea.
Committed:
“And once again, it’s not a single-factor issue. A key reason that blacks on average are poorer than whites is that people inherit from their parents, but many blacks had their labor stolen from them for centuries (so they’ve had less wealth to pass along on average), had their kids sold away from them for centuries (so they couldn’t give their kids an inheritance), had to live with a century of Jim Crow laws after slavery ended (making it harder to make as much money), …”
************************
Want a farce. Not a single factor and the n state it as such. Slavery ended 5 generations ago and Jim Crow ended 2 generations ago IN THE SOUTH. Many Americans of European and Asian descent have been here for about 3-4 generations and many of them started with nothing and suffered horrific discrimination as did many African-Americans. There has been a tremendous differences in the economic/social progress each group has made. And it’s not merely a matter of discrimination either. It’s ethnic support of small business in the European-American and Asian communities compared to little to none in the African-American communities due to liberal government policies that destroyed the black family and then their communities. When my great uncle built bridges in NYC, Italians immigrants were paid $1.00 an hour. The Irish made $2.75 an hour and African-Americans made $2.00 an hour. Cry me a river. Get a grip or a history book. Your ignorance of American history is laughable.
And then there are the Hispanics who come here with nothing and start out mowing lawns and doing pick-up labor. They don’t speak English but within 10 years, many in my area have their own small businesses in the various trades, restaurants, bakeries, etc., own their homes and send their kids to Catholic schools. The blacks who can’t get it together despite generations of Affirmative Action are basically the bottom of the racial barrel. Due to low IQs and low impulse control, there will always be some who simply can’t succeed, just like there will always be poor whites.
mespo……wahoooooo!! Preach on, Brother Mez! You’re exactly right……and historically factual, and there’s nuthin “they” can do about that!
I’d say the case can be made that the company is justified in firing her simply because she’s obviously unhinged. Unless the “African American man” became remarkably calmer after he started recording, it’s obvious that she was misrepresenting what happened and objected to him recording because there would be evidence of it.
Unethical at the least. Possibly illegal? False Statements to police? I don’t know the laws in New York…probably not illegal, but definitely shows poor judgment and poor ethics.
Both of which, in my opinion, would be an excellent reason to relive her of duties at a senior position at a prestigious firm. Potential bad publicity aside, would you want someone like that working for you? I wouldn’t.
Looked to me like a classic case of “how dare you question my behavior…the rules are for the little people”.
test
The liberals are now running this country, judges, schools, courts, employers, government, etc. The HELL with the constitution as long as it is politically correct. It may soon be time for “Lock and Load”. Just my opinion.
I forgot the most obvious, the media.
boogaloo finna jump off
You have my attention 😊
Ah; another keyboard warrior. None of your timid, frightened ilk will so much as “have a word” with anyone in the real world. So just keep reading your “close combat” training book, order some more cammo under wear and invest in silver or whatever the shills are hawking to your types this week. Puke.
this is to “I have a stencil of a neato rifle that I’m gonna have tattooed on me some day” ray ray
“I’ll tell the police there’s an African American man threatening my life” — no one becomes that fluent in false accusation without a lifetime of experience, and a society that empowers her to lie. Dear readers, think about that the next time you clap and cheer and mindlessly proclaim that you “believe women”.
The video starts too late, so it is clipped after the threat was made. What was that threat?
The media has played the race card, not the lady with the abused dog.
” Christian Cooper tried to get Amy Cooper to leash her dog because he said he was concerned over the dog ruining the habitat for birds. When she refused, he pulled out a treat to pull the dog away from the underbrush. ” (what? they both have the same last names?)
So by her view, he tried to steal her dog after he was screaming at her the birds are in danger and she’s a bleeeeep ?
Here, let me give some candy to your child, and coax it away from you.
Well, that’s why she was freaking out.
Also I’d imagine it’s against the law to not have a pet leashed – but without that in the cut short lie of a video, we don’t know what really happened unless someone finds the rest of it.
Her life was clearly under threat. That’s why she was walking toward the threat, and the dog was more concerned with being choked to death by its owner than by the man she was “threatened” by.
She backed up quite a lot when she couldn’t scare him away. You forgot that part.
The media ALWAYS whips up the racial angle, that is, if they can find a real or imagined black “victim.” The media has made sure that you’ve all heard about the Ahmed Arbery story out of Georgia. How many of you have heard of Sheldon Francis? He was a 29 y/o black male, who dressed in all black and drove to a veterans’ cemetery in Delaware, where he took cover in a ditch, holding a hunting rifle with a scope, and proceeded to shoot and kill an elderly white couple in their mid-80s who were visiting the grave of their son. The media has essentially ignored this story of a an intentional murder of two whites by a black man. Apparently it’s not as important as some dispute between a white female dog-walker and a tragically oppressed black male Harvard graduate whose hobbies are bird watching and performing “queer stand-up comedy.”
Sheldon Francis was a recent example. But the gold standard of a horrifying black on white rape- murder scenario was this one
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murders_of_Channon_Christian_and_Christopher_Newsom
fact is the black male population does actually produce a disproportionate lot of, um, what did Bill Clinton call them?
“Super Predators”
now this fellow in the video was probably a decent chap, but there’s a reason why “stereotypes persist.”
Because of facts!
The aftermath of that horror gave all and sundry a master class in the talents of the East Tennessee court system.
And both of these events, as well as the recent news of 20 y/o black male beating the crap out of 75 y/o bed ridden white man in a nursing home, all have one thing in common. Not a whisper of a hate-crime investigation. Even under Trump’s DOJ, there’s absolutely zero interest in investigating, much less prosecuting, hate crimes committed by blacks against other races, be it white, Asian or Hispanic. I’ve seen a videos on YouTube of clearly identifiable black men in NY walking up to elderly Asians and Jews and literally beating them to the ground and walking off laughing. Where is the FBI? Where is the DOJ? Bottom line, they don’t represent us. They only take our tax dollars.