Mexico must change. They tax their business by only 5%, while the U.S. taxes at 38%. The low tax rate on businesses is great for the businesses but provides little to the infrastructure of Mexico. You can condemn the U.S. all you want, but you are a hypocrite at best and deceitful at worst if you don’t call attention to the unfavorable conditions that the Mexican Government’s creates for it’s own citizen.s Patient heal thyself.

Once again the bleeding hearts reach into our pockets to help all the 3rd world nations. Dude, 3rd world is called that for a reason. As a kid did you ever walk by a cake shop of bakery that has delicious pastries in the window? What would you have done had the glass not been there? Chances are you would take some of the delectable tid-bits. That is exactly what is happening at our boarders. They look into that bakery window and want a piece of that cake. Dude, you can give them YOUR cake, but don’t be giving away mine. And don’t going around B.S.‘n about the filthy rich. It’s the filthy rich that provide jobs for those immigrants coming across the boarder. Take away the cheep labor by closing down the boarders, and guess what, the filthy rich start loosing money because Unions force employers to pay way more then the out put, so they just move their factories to the other side of the boarder, so the immigrant keep their jobs while, while American suffer, which is exactly what you were hoping for.

I oppose police protection for Don Schrader. But Don
Schrader does not require protection. He has no locks on the doors and windows of his home. He has a sign outside that invites everyone to move in and set up housekeeping. Everyone is welcome to take any or all of his resources and he formally adopts all who take him up on his offer! He feels obligated because one of his black sheep ancestors from centuries ago was naughty to a neighbor!
Or is Don an hypocrite?

I’m opposed to people who think our laws aren’t worth enforcement.

Anyone who is against enforcement of the laws of legal immigration is in a criminal conspiracy to defraud the American taxpayer. We are being robbed. Our children are being robbed and the open borders, amnesty advocates are acting against the interest of AMERICA and it’s citizens. If you encourage illegal immigrants to come here and subvert the immigration process, breaking every law they want to stay here and take American jobs away from Americans, you deserve to be arrested. This is a land of laws. GET IT? LEAVE, before we catch you and throw you out.

NO JOBS for illegal immigrants and they will go home the same way they came here.

Deportation by attrition.

Hey Don aren’t you the nut that runs around w/o any clothes?

To the other respondents- this line of debate is just about worn out. The illegal immigrants that come to NM from Mexico do so because they cannot make a decent living in Mexico for the most part. As a result, they are most often the very poor and uneducated Mexico has to offer. The successful Mexican National stay in Mexico leading quite a nice life. The dregs come over to the USA.

In any situation, regardless of whether it is a business, political organization, state, city, country; adding new members who are poor and uneducated rarely benefits the group. But it definitely benefits the individual because they have nothing and bring nothing to the table. They benefit by acquiring some of the groups resources, this is a SUBTRACTION from the group’s resources. It may be in the form of work, food stamps, free health care, housing, etc.

In time, the illegal immigrant may contribute to the group; however, there is an equal chance that they will continue or increase what they subtract, i.e. stay on welfare or turn to crime. It is typical to assign criminal or illegal labels to individuals who break the law, and by breaking the law as there initial act and anti-contribution to our society they immediately begin to suck up resources as well as encourage others to become complicit in their crime.

I don’t know why the Lobo would publish another post from Don if he’s the nut with no clothes.

lobo readers: see what I mean about the daily loser? just this past two weeks, two letters each from salami and schrader. What? No one else writes letters to the editor? No contributing columns? Jeeez, please diasabuse of of these crazies and print something that makes a modicum of sense.

You say illegals are treated as criminals because they don’t have legal papers… That’s right! Because they stole some poor Americans’ identities. Therfore, they most definitely criminals.

Please don’t print anymore letters from Schrader. I’m pretty liberal about immigration, but Schrader is just a hypocrite. Not to mention the fact he has nothing to bring to the table as far as constructive argument. He just rants about “american crap”.

He says he wants nothing to do with the American government and he doesn’t want to pay taxes yet he bases his life around a government sponsored and tax funded institution. He contributes nothing to this community by not contributing to it, yet has no problem freeloading off of campus services. Well guess what? the rest of us do contribute so get the fuck off our campus and shut your trap.

Andalusia?!!?!! Wow! Go get ‘em girl! Next time, don’t hold back!

“freeloading off of campus services” Do you know of any particular instances of this? Proof? Please understand, I ask only to establish the authority of this guy to critique “America.”

He sure has the right to speak his mind, but for the those of us who are reading his drivel, we must determine the veracity of his words and question his motives. I have no doubt he’s sincere, but so what; Im sure stalin, and mao and lenin and gayvara etc etc, etc . . . were also sincere. Didn’t/doesn’t make them right.

If schrader is nothing but a leech on the ass of America, then why should anyone care what he thinks? And I ask the daily loser again, PLEASE disabuse us of these local loonies and consider the intellects and sensibilities of your readers.

you see him using our libraries that we pay for, using the computers we pay for, in the art galleries we pay for, etc etc etc just generally lurking about on campus. but he still has the cojones to write letters like this to lobo calling everone here (who are his benefactors to some extent) “greedy”.

I think that his opinions are valid and he does practice what he preaches to a certain extent. but he is comfortable exploiting unm whenever it suits him. only when that stops does he have a right to draft letters like this.

I think the main point that he forgot to mention was that the mass production of corn and other farming products has been shipped to Mexico and thus outsourced the Mexican farming population and all those that benefited from it; this coupled with instability of Mexican security has caused a surge in immigration. The instability in the Mexican security comes from poor people who lost their jobs that sought money through the powerful drug cartels in Mexico. Those are the main reasons we see a rise in crime and drug trafficking around the border of mexico.

So we are to blame for this problem because we out produced Mexico and subsequently eliminated that market in their country so that the only good they can offer are the illegal drugs they manufacture and the cheap labor that walks across the border.

That’s whats up peeps…

The Don makes you crazy because deep down you know he’s right. So what if he uses the computers at UNM? This editorial wasn’t about HIM! People are so incredibly selfish and non-empathetic sometimes it really blows my mind. They live in a world of borders and money that don’t even really exist. Don is a small piece of the puzzle. He is trying to change lives for the better the only way he know’s how. What are you doing??? It seems as though your misguided American pride is feeding your egos too much. Take that energy that you generate toward anger, and do something pro-active that will make this world a better place for everyone, not just yourself.

p.s. you’re not as smart as you think you are, keep learning…

p.p.s you don’t know what my life views are so please don’t retort with a “bleeding heart liberal” comment, it only makes me laugh.

Sen. Durbin D-IL has reined supreme in oratory guile that has a strong foundations in Congress. Dick Durbin’s speeches supposedly a defender of unemployed Americans, while behind the lines he makes Americans jobless. As with Sen.Harry Reid D-NV, Assistant majority leader Durbin, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has given there assurance to promote E-Verify, but also heavily approved a need for a path to citizenship or AMNESTY for the 20 to 30 million already squatting here. Although he commiserates the 125,000 who have recently lost their unemployment benefits, he disregards the fact that his immigration policies now in place has awarded 125,000 brand new work permits to foreign nationals this last month. Such is the capability for self-deception in Congress that I wonder if Sen. Durbin and his foreign-labor-in-shoring conspirators have any inkling of awareness in counter-production. Sen. Durbin, Sen. Harry Reid is just one of the dozen Members of Congress utterly accountable for seeing to it that ANOTHER 125,000 Americans each month are kept out of a work. Its this politicians uncouth insistence on providing cheap labor to pariah employers, that draws millions—no matter the danger—into America. Call your own Senators or Congressman 202-224-3121 and demand they make sure that the unemployment benefit extension keeps money out of the hands of illegal aliens. Sen. Sessions amendment uses E-Verify to authenticate a US workers right to 14 more weeks of these benefits.

Then although California is a sanctuary state, not all cities believe in these refuge policies, such as San Diego. It seems that the federal contractors in Southernmost California city appreciate the new E-Verify ruling. The federal mandate requires all businesses with federal contracts of at least $100,000 and lasting longer than 120 days to use E-Verify and that all new hires must go through a verification procedure. San Diego industries receive a large portion of contracts, and it’s proximity to the Mexican border makes it vulnerable to volumes of illegal workers. Currently more than 160,000 businesses are operating E-Verify with close to 13,000 of them in the State of California. In the recently passed Homeland Security spending bill, Congress re-authorized E-Verify for three more years. Now E-Verify has shown a powerful ally in removing foreign nationals in working establishments nationwide. It’s success and easy access by employers has shown its immigration enforcement ability.

NOW IS THE TIME TO MAKE E-VERIFY PERMANENT , BEFORE CORRUPT LAWMAKERS SOMEHOW WEAKEN IT? ITS VERY LIKELY A NEW IMMIGRATION BILL WILL BE IN THE HANDS OF OUR POLITICIANS EARLY NEXT YEAR. WE ALREADY HAVE THE 1986 IMMIGRATION BILL, WHICH HAS BEEN INTENTIONALLY ENGINEERED FOR BUSINESSES & OPEN BORDER ZEALOTS. IF IT PASSES A THIRD OF THE INDIGENT WORLD, WILL SWARM OUR UNDERMANNED BORDERS. E-VERIFY WORKS! BY ATTRITION OR SELF-DEPORTATION ILLEGAL WORKERS AND FAMILIES WILL LEAVE IF NO JOBS ARE AVAILABLE. VIOLATIONS OF IMMIGRATION LAWS MUST CARRY STRICT PENALTIES, INCLUDING PRISON TERMS & HEAVY FINES.

In regards 2010 census in 6 months? Those who entered without—THE PEOPLE’S—permission, have violated our laws, and should not, must not be allowed to be enumerated in the decennial census? Is Washington so sure that they will pass this 2nd Amnesty, when Ted Kennedy previous comprehensive immigration reform turned into fraudulent travesty? As I see it nobody by their skin color, religion or if they are homosexual who are legally in this nation, who have been inspected and entered with work visas should be welcomed. They as other honest new arrivals did not cheat our immigration system, but perhaps waited for years to be recognized as a permanent resident?

Read more information about the ugly consequences of illegal immigration, its costs to taxpayer, the danger to our national language and our culture at NUMBERSUSA. Find undisclosed details of corruption within our government and rampant dishonesty in ACORN at JUDICIAL WATCH. Learn about irreversible OVERPOPULATION and the complete indifference to our failing infrastructure at CAPSWEB. This week the Bay Bridge between San Francisco and Oakland needed repair when rusted cables ripped apart. The Bay Bridge was originally constructed in 1936 and carries 270.000 vehicles a day,

I reject just about everything in this article. There is a big difference between illegal aliens and immigrants. An immigrant wants to move to the US permanently and become an American. Immigrants follow the law and must pass a physical and background check. Immigrants must have a means of support by a sponsor or employer so they are not a burden on taxpayers. Immigrants desire to assimilate and are loyal to their new country. Illegal aliens go thru none of this. They remain loyal to their country of origin, break our immigration laws, drain resources meant for citizens, refuse to assimilate or learn english. Illegal aliens take whatever they can get without regard to the impact on the US. American must demand a ZERO tolerance towards ALL illegal immigration. There is no such thing as a law abiding illegal alien.

Native Americans are the only non-immigrants? Really? I’m pretty sure it is well established that the ancestors of todays ‘Native’ Americans were immigrants from the Asian continent.

Sir,

As a legal immigrant, I find you to be just another troll in the illegal immigration debate. You never even considered how legal immigrants feels when people like you advocate for the rights of Illegal Immigrants. Quite simply, it is a slap in the face to compare the legal law abiding English speaking intelligent immigrant (who needs to wait 10-20 years for citizenship) vs an illegal immigrant.

You are advocating the legalization / acceptance of Illegal (almost completely) Hispanic Immigrants. You are against legal immigrants and might be a racist.

Other than the fact that illegal immigration is, well, illegal. it has repercussions not only in our country, but in the country left behind. Before I delve into the issues, let me state for the record that I am not a racist nor am I against controlled legal immigration; this country was built that way.

We have immigration laws for a reason; they let use filter out who we want in our country and how many (for the idiot-statists out there: a nation and the people of that nation have a right to dictate who enters their country, the people attempting to enter have no right to enter illegally. Much like your neighbor has nor right to enter your house any time he pleases). These laws allow the U.S. (and other nations) to give priority to people who will have the most beneficial impact on our society (e.g. doctors, engineers).

Let me point out a few of the victims of illegal immigration that statists like Mr. Schrader ignore. There are essentially two groups of people that illegal immigration harms. The first is the working poor in America (dismantling Mr. Schrader’s argument of, “they do the jobs Americans don’t want to do” (this is a non-sensical argument and he knows it). Let us face the fact, people who enter this country are far more likely to have low education and minimal useful skills.

In Maricopa county (Pheonix area), a place that has rampant illegal immigration issues, the average wage for entry-level jobs is 4.7 cents less than if illegal immigration were a non-issue. Studies by Harvard economist George Borjas found that illegals in the Maricopa county coast workers $1.4 billion in 2005 alone. This is because employers (some unscrupulous, others not) know that illegal aliens are willing to work for far less money (hey who are they going to complain to, I.C.E.?).

People like Mr. Schrader and his ilk, say that we should just accept the situation and stop criminalizing these boarder jumpers. Well this does a great disservice to the country that these people are leaving (second group of people harmed). Let’s take Mexico for example. The underlying reason that many Mexicans flood across the boarder to come to the U.S. is because the conditions in their country are grotesque (hey idiots! If the U.S. is so bad, why the hell are so many people trying to get IN?!). Illegal immigration works as a relief valve for the Mexican government, taking pressure off of the government to change its policies (why do you think Mexican government types don’t like the U.S. enforcing boarder laws?).
If these illegal aliens were deported back to Mexico, it could cause and uprising and, God forbid, change.”

Now let us look at Schraders misguided statements of an illegal boarder. By 1938 (before the Spanish Wars) Texas was an independent nation, separate from Mexico.

The Republic of Texas had established diplomatic ties to Britain, France, and the U.S. At the time, many Texans were in favor of the U.S. annexing Texas. Mexico, still fuming from the Texas seceding, claimed that if the U.S annexed Texas, it would mean war. After many attempts from the U.S. to make peaceful resolutions (one of which was an offering of $25 million dollars for the disputed lands) the U.S finally annexed Texas, without Mexican approval. Eventually Mexico was forced to surrender its claims to Texas in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (a legal and lawful document). Try doing some freaking research, Schrader, you freaking idiot!

I’ve read some disgusting letters, but this takes cake! When are you going to stop pandering to illegal aliens? Illegal aliens are criminals and they are destroying this Country everyday they are here. One would have to be blind not to see this.

Illegal aliens have made America the dumping ground for all their illegal alien children, then we have to school them and give them free medical care.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSe3C5vMafM&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_ZnX9JRo5M&NR=1

I for one, am sick and tired of these illegal aliens snubbing their nose at our immigration laws and the many other laws of this Country. If our Federal Government can not ENFORCE our immigration laws, and get these illegal aliens out of this Country, then let the States do it! One way or another, an end has to come to this illegal immigration, and not with AMNESTY! Amnesty will only encourage more illegal aliens to invade our Country and reward those who broke our laws and raped the American taxpayer in many ways…depressing our wages, taking our jobs, overwhelming our schools with their ILLEGAL ALIEN children, driving without a license or car insurance, all the crime from stolen identities to rape, drugs and everything else.

It’s time for ZERO TOLERENCE with these illegal aliens. It’s time for them get out of this Country and back in their own Country where they belong. When we get rid of the illegal aliens, we will get rid of all the problems that go with them. THAT IS A FACT!

WAKE UP, New Mexico! Get a State Illegal Immigration Law like Arizona, Oklahoma, Mississippi, Utah and a number of other States.

Here is a factual description of one town’s battle with illegal aliens.

Victoria, Texas (pop.55,000) is a town about 80 miles west of Houston. Local Hispanic leaders there, in opposition to pending Immigration Legislation, boycotted all Caucasian owned businesses in the Victoria area this past weekend as a demonstration of their economic impact on the community. The boycott was declared a success by the Hispanic community, noting that revenue in Caucasian owned businesses was down by 19%. Business owners declared the boycott a success as well, pointing out that shoplifting was reduced by 77%, money orders sent out of the country were down by 97%, and the cost of daily clean-up and trash collection was down by 84%. Shoppers reported that they could actually hear English being spoken throughout the community for the first time in recent memory, and customers actually paid for purchases with real money, not government debit cards.

For more and a discussion, see http://www.topix.com/forum/city/ulysses-ks/TB4N5PJ78IARSR2V7. This newspaper story is true; I have the original.

Don Schrader, what are you thinking. Open borders? The southwest still belongs to Mexico?

The US paid for the land dude,and Mexico was quick to take it. Go ask Mexico what they did with the money and who got it?

So should America give the land back to England, France and Spain also Don Schrader?

Before the southwest was developed as it is today there were few illegals crossing over. Now that it is developed here they come.

Don Schrader, do you smoke pot? It ain’t workin for you bro!

Don Schrader,you must be writing this as a publicity stunt. If not,you better go read a little more history. Not just the BS you hear from other ILLEGAL ALIENS that think this is their land.

The land was actually paid for to a government that the USA recognized as a government at that time.

“themage” you make me laugh as well. If we were all “bleeding heart liberals” we would be writing to defend this man not writing in defiance!Let me add another item in here as well. You ask what we do out here?

Who the hell do you think props up the food banks and Goodwill stores and makes millions in donations to the poor ,or Cancer,or Heart diseases,or Lung Diseases,or Alzheimers. Who do you think pays for many of the benefits these ILLEGAL ALIENS use up?

Who the hell do you think pays their taxes so this government can shift the money to other countries to help them out in hunger,floods,education,medicines and sunamis.

And I do not remember voting for the NAFTA Trade either!!! So take the bleeding heart some where else. If Mexico can not compete then they should close the trade agreement. I know America would also be better for it.

Props to Don for this letter. I echo his sentiments. I’m once again horrified to see so many reactionary responses. The internets are an ugly place. Current US immigration policy allows the exploitation of an underclass of workers, enforced by terror via ethnic cleansing. We’ve got to dismantle this oppressive apparatus.

¡Ningún Ser Humano es Ilegal!

Raid!

China is building up its military, is causing the biggest of global warming, and abusing its own people and that on top of its inactions in North Korea and Iran and their nuclear programs. My suspicions that the Chinese even gave North Korea a few nukes to keep the North in its “sphere of influence” and away from the South, the U.S., and Japan. This was also done with the knowledge and permission of Putin and Russia.

WE ALL KNOW HOW MANY GOODS ARE MADE IN CHINA and our dollars are funding our own downfall as they bought our debt and they will eventually blackmail us. SO, LET’S KILL TWO BIRDS WITH ONE STONE: MOVE ALL CHINESE FACTORIES TO MEXICO, CENTRAL AMERICA, AND HAITI. IF THEY HAVE JOBS THERE, MAYBE THEY WON’T COME HERE.

ISN’T IT CHEAPER TO SHIP GOODS ACROSS THE RIO GRANDE THAN IT IS TO SHIP THEM ACROSS THE PACIFIC AND EVEN THROUGH THE PANAMA CANAL, OR AROUND ARGENTINA, TO GET THE GOODS TO THE EAST COAST OF THE U.S.???

Many of those jobs can also come here to make our own goods which would stop the flood of imports and the export of our dollars. American’s can and will do these jobs.

Mexican’s are extremely hard workers and a very proud people. Even little kids work as you see them selling all types of goods including Chicklets. I’m sure they would rather work in their countries if there were jobs at least for a couple of their family members. You also have to realize that the dollar goes a long way there and two dollars an hour is equal to our ten so that is not exploitation but a balance. If the factory owners have to pay ten dollars, they might as well move the factories here, to Europe, or Canada. HOW DOES THAT HELP OUR NEIGHBORS TO THE SOUTH?

THERE IS ONE FACTOR THAT IS NEVER DISCUSSED: OLD MEXICAN WORKERS AND THE NEW ONES COMING IN. Many of the Mexican’s that have been here for at least a decade ARE THREATENED BY THE NEW MEXICAN’S. FOR EXAMPLE, the old Mexican came to a job site and the boss said to dig a twenty foot ditch. He works, barely takes a break, and in three days the job is finished. THE AMERICAN WORKERS TAKE THREE WEEKS SO THE BOSS TELLS THE AMERICANS TO WORK HARDER BUT THEY DON’T SO THEY ARE LET GO. The boss hires more Mexicans and productivity goes up. THEN MEXICAN’S REALIZE THAT THEY CAN WORK SLOWER AND TAKE LONGER. THEY BECOME AMERICANIZED AND IT SOON TAKES THEM THREE WEEKS TO DIG THE DITCH. Then a NEW Mexican worker comes to the site and he digs the ditch in three days. THE OLD MEXICAN WORKERS ARE THREATENED. TALK TO ANY MEXICAN THAT HAS BEEN HERE, OWNS A TRUCK, HAS A FAMILY, AND HE’LL BE THE FIRST TO TELL YOU THAT THEY SHOULD “STOP THE ILLEGALS FROM COMING HERE.”

One comment about The Wall. I proposed that when they started coming up with designs for the fence, that they make a Reality Show about it. There would be companies who make a ten foot wide proto-type of their fence. THEN YOU GET REAL MEXICANS TO TRY TO CROSS IT. The rules are that they have to be able to carry whatever they need across the desert. THE WINNERS, OR ANY GROUP THAT CROSSES IT, GETS CITIZENSHIP. That would save billion$ wouldn’t it? What if they build a fence and a week later we see them climb it with a rope ladder? The fence that stops them is the fence they build. THIS DOES NOT MEAN I WANT A FENCE BUT IF THEY’RE GOING TO SPEND BILLIONS ON SOMETHING THAT DOESN’T WORK, THEN IT WILL BE A WASTE!

Al Qaeda in Mexico to come here? HOW STUPID CAN THE U.S. BE? THEY WOULD STICK OUT DON’T YOU THINK? THE MEXICAN POLICE WOULD STOP THEM IMMEDIATELY!

IMMIGRANTS OR ILLEGALS? If they come here without papers THEY ARE ILLEGALS. If they come here with papers, they are IMMIGRANTS.

DON IS WACK JOB AND HE’S ACTUALLY GOT A SERIOUS MENTAL PROBLEM AND HIS REASONING MAKES NO SENSE. HE COULD TRY GOING TO MEXICO “AS AN IMMIGRANT” AND SEE HOW FAR HE GETS. HE COULD MAKE HIS ARGUMENT ABOUT THE SOUTHWEST BEING STOLEN FROM MEXICO AND ON AND ON AND SOON HE’LL BE LIVING HIS DREAM IN A 12X14 PADDED CELL, EQUAL TO HIS CURRENT HOME, NO ELECTRICITY, A HOLE IN THE GROUND TO POOP SO AS NOT TO WASTE WATER, NO TOILET PAPER, NO TOOTHBRUSH OR TOOTHPASTE, RAW FOOD, AND PLENTY OF FREE LOVE BETWEEN MAN AND MAN WHICH HE LIKES TO PREACH ABOUT!

Our Government, past & present, Republican & Democrat, have allowed the invasion of 20 to 30 million criminals and uneducated peons which is the largest invasion of any Nation, at any time, by any means & in direct violation of Article IV, Section IV of our Constitution.

This refusal to abide by our Constitution or enforce our Immigration Laws should be classified as Treason of the most foul kind, & as grounds for impeachment & trials for Treason!

Not only have they allowed the invasion, they force American tax payers to pay Billions on Billions of dollars to provide Welfare, Prison cells, Educate the invaders numerous children, and free medical care, at the same time the invading horde break numerous laws and massive document fraud, & are destroying our schools, hospitals, communities, culture and standard of living while Robbing, Raping, Killing & Assaulting American Citizens WAKE UP PEOPLE!

“Summerspeaker”
¡Ningún Ser Humano es Ilegal! meaning No Human is Illegal!

Well they are if it is the law of this country!! And as it is in other countries across the globe. And I agree there are some ugly remarks made on some web sites but I do not see any here. Some of the stuff you read and do not like may be for the simple reason that it is the truth. That is why you find it offensive.

Evidentally the illegals must be treated with more passion in this country then your own. Why else would you have left the homeland? Some want to wave their flags but still want to take the helping hand from our social benefits system. If you feel so muistreated then the door is open to go back to your own country.

The illegals in some instances have more rights than the American citizens. I can not sue them but in turn they could sue American citizens or other organizations JUST BECAUSE THEY ARE ILLEGAL and feel they have been prejudiced against!!! I feel I have been prejudiced against just because I get called a “racist“because I WANT MY LAWS ENFORCED!!! And the “KKK” thing. Who the hell came up with that piece of work?
Ethnic cleansing? You have got to be joking? Who is doing the cleansing?

So you are horrified? Well so am I that you would even write what you did.

It’s no surprise that Don and Summerspeaker are on the same page, two of a kind, pissing in the same latrine, cut from the same cloth, blind people walking in the rain.

I oppose people who break our laws and people who support those people that break our laws…its criminal and I don’t care what you say DON! PFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFT

uniteasone, ICE raids and the like often amount to ethnic cleansing.The entire Hispanic population of rural communities can be expelled, terrifying other undocumented workers and Hispanics in general. It’s a campaign of terror. I attended an excellent presentation here at UNM explaining the dynamics of this abuse.

Yer all a bunch of IMMIGRANTS or TRANSPLANTS. Almost every one of ya, except the Native American people who lived up and down the Rio Grande originally.

SHEEESH!

I was a Democrat all my life until recently when I registered as an independent.

Don while you and your far left cohorts are trying to make Illegals both emotionally and financially (Welfare) dependent on Dems a great many Americans are working hard to help these people stay in their home countries and make a decent living,which is what they truely want to do.

NAFTA (Bill Clinton who I voted for) is partly to blame for the mass exodus from Mexico and other countries.So helping people in their home countries with interest free Micro Loans so they can start their own businesses and be self sufficient makes a lot more sense then you trying to put the blame WRONGLY on the Americans citizens who have no say in how IA’s countries are governed.

My suggestion to you Don is stop blaming the United States Citizens and find a way to help people stay in the beloved countries of origin.Be part of the solution instead of a whinning part of the problem !!

summerspeaker, those that are picked up by ICE are the ones that hide in the shadows of our nation (words used by even our President Obama and manmy others including Hispanic organizations). If they were here legally they would not have to FEAR THE LAW! And I wonder who gave you the presentation on the raids and dynamics of abuse. LaRaza,MALDEF,ACLU,Southern Poverty Law. These illegal aliens have created the problem by coming here under the wire and continue to break the laws while being here. I have no sympathy for people who blame American citizens for their problems or their countries of origins problems.

And a BIG SHAME on corporate America for hiring illegals when it is against the LAW! Their bosses need to be sent away also for breaking the laws.

Yes, reading about Obama’s comments on immigration has given me chills. His policies are even worse than I would have expected. Your (and his) view of the law as innately worthy means nothing to me. By their nature, most if not all laws repress. Any law that sanctions expulsion and imprisonment for crossing a line the sand stands as manifestly immoral. It’s the duty of all people who value freedom and equality to oppose such abuses.

Don: “I reject the term “illegal aliens.” All immigrants are our sisters and brothers. The U.S. invaded Mexico and waged war in Mexico more than 150 years ago. Besides slaughtering many people in Mexico, the U.S. stole from Mexico most of what s the U.S. southwest today. So today’s U.S. border with Mexico is illegal and resulted from the U.S. invasion, war and massive theft from Mexico in 1848. The only people in the U.S. who are not immigrants or the descendants of immigrants are full-blooded Native Americans.”

Well, I’m not sure where to start but I’ll try logic with you even though I think that it won’t dent you ! The ‘spoils’ of war are just that…read your History books ole boy ! Then there was the Gadsen Purchase of 1852 which brought land south of the Gila River in Arizona to the Unites States. These are the facts, yes the facts as would be stated in a court of law. Secondly, there is a thing in America that you & I must adhere to or pay the price, it’s the Law. Agree or not 65mph is 65 mph in anyones book. Illegal immigration is just that “ILLEGAl”.Is this a difficult concept for you or do you always bypass the Law ? If you don’t like the current laws, then get them changed but I gotta tell ya…..I’ll be there to stop your conintued insanity !!

Good Luck
Chuck

Schrader…Fool,Knock it off! It can No longer be denied that Mexico is doing everything
it can to create an Illegal Mexican Nation within the borders
of the USA. By aiding,abetting and even urging its people to
illegally emigrate to the USA, calling them “heroes”,and
“*Those who will think Mexico First into the 7th Generation”! Carrying Mexican Flags at their marches,why do you think?
This is NOT immigration of olde. In England two new political
parties have gained seats just to stop immigration anarchy there
and their problem is a fraction of ours!

• Juan Hernandez…Mexico’s Minister of Mexicans Abroad

america was founded by illegal aliens. the ‘founding fathers’ of this country came here illegally, didn’t they?

Unlike today’s immigrants, Europeans came to the Americas as invaders intent on either the domination or expulsion of indigenous peoples. That’s what an actual invasion looks like, folks. Calling current immigrants invaders is a bad joke.

No, the Pilgrims and early European settlers were not illegal immigrants, for the indigenous people had no immigration laws at that time. Perhaps that was unwise, but not a present equivalency. Now, we DO have IMMIGRATION LAWS, and they are being broken. And, BYW, I am so tired of hearing it said over and over, ad nauseum, that our immigration laws are broken! That is such a damnable lie because the immigration laws are not broken, our laws are being broken, ignored, flouted, spurned, violated, etc. and I, also many other citizens, are so sick of it and have had more than enough.

Most came not as invaders but explorers and to seek religious and other freedoms. The indigenous populations were already having war amongst themselves, some to establish dominance and a hierarchy. Some tribes were more peaceful than others who were more aggressive and desired to dominate and rule.

You are comparing apples and oranges to try to compare and contrast the times then and now. No possible comparison. we have laws regarding immigration and you are breaking them at your own peril! Listen and learn! Then, go home now!

Just make sure that businesses where you are a customer, displays the E-VERIFY placard. It informs the public that they are using the Federal program to detect the majority of illegal immigrants? It’s highly successful, but was nearly tabled by Sen. Harry Reid D-NV, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Both states are overwhelmed with illegal aliens feeding from the government financial trough. My ancestors were Inuit from Russian Alaska, my great grandfather was the Captain of a Dutch Whaler. I hate to think of America if the Pilgrims had not landed and this great land didn’t receive the majority of settlers from Western Europe. Incidentally, if any country has title to this Northern continent, its the nation of Spain. Not Mexico or anyplace South of our national border. I joined NUMBERSUSA and was welcomed, even though my tribal family is from Alaska. There is no racism in this organization? There all about survival, the economy, overpopulation The US Census Bureau has not denied that America’s population could climb to projections of a 50-percent increase in the domestic population by the year 2050. Up from 255 million to 383 million. The next 100 million will suffocate our ability to maintain water, energy, food, communication, infrastructure and a balanced environment. It will put out of reach any chance for a stable and sustainable population within the USA. It will also create horrific water shortages and exacerbate the energy and climate destabilization crises. My suggestion is GOOGLE keywords – not separated by comma’s, such as “illegal immigration costs California” and learn the frightening truth for yourself. Not the lies and propaganda that seem to permeate from the desks of Liberal editors.

angry rhetoric and hateful finger-pointing is not going to solve the illegal immigration problem. as long as there is poverty in our home countries and america is the richest country in the world, we will continue to come. and no, this is not a defiant stance nor a threat, it is a fact. the complexity of this problem prevents its solution by simplistic means such as border strengthening, ice raids or employer verification systems. this problem must be addressed at its roots, and these are only palliative measures, definitely not the solution. our host countries (whether the u.s.a or rich european countries) have a moral obligation to help remedy the very same poverty that compels us to immigrate, otherwise we will continue to “invade” you forced by desperation and a legitimate desire to provide a decent living to our families.

Definitely, el mojado, though I wonder about the implications of the working for greater economic justice in order to keep foreigners at home. I don’t like that motivation. Everyone deserves a comfortable living situation wherever they go, be it their place of origin or the other side of the planet. Immigration and the associated cultural mixing aren’t inherently undesirable.

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this guys posting is total bait, trying to upset you and make you post something irrational.. simply because nobody can be that stupid.

seriously.. come on, any person with 2 fingers and a forehead know better than that..

i completely agree with you, summerspeaker. we all deserve to be treated with dignity and respect wherever we may go, and that of course includes us, undocumented immigrants. but the issue here is that we are forced to leave our countries, families, and all that we hold dear behind for economic reasons. note that the keyword is “forced”, it is really not optional for most of us. we truly DO NOT want to risk our lives crossing the desert or the sea in search of what appears to be a chimera; we will stay home, where we’d rather be, if we are able to provide for our families. most of us would rather come to this wonderful country as tourists, go to disneyland and then go back home :-)

Mexico is not a poor country, yet it turns its back on its poor and basically shoves its poor across our border. We hear again and again who the illegals only come here to make a better living for themselves, yet Mexico is not a poor country. Mexico’s plan has always been to invade and overwhelm this country with its poor and install a loyalty in them to Mexico. Thus with future voting generations, Mexico will have control of the western third of this country. Mexico has used and install the excuse in its people that this land was stolen, that the Treaty of Guadalupe wasn’t real. Mexico is a poor excuse of a country and refuses to care for its own. Now it is practically a failed nation. They are getting what they deserve. Look at the bigger picture and who really is to blame for this invasion, and the picture is of Mexico.

I don’t believe you are from Mexico and you shouldn’t be acting like one by saying “we” and “us!” You may know a few words that will try to fool us but you are the biggest fake and an insult to real Mexicans, their heritage, their culture, and their honor!

wow… i am, for once, speechless! f.y.i, i’m an undocumented immigrant from mexico, but i happen to be educated and fluent in english. i guess this shows just how prejudiced people really are when they assume that all mexican immigrants are illiterate!

El Wetback? Isn’t that a racist name? If any person called someone who is “an undocumented immigrant” and they actually crossed the Rio Grande and got their body wet, a WETBACK, THEY WOULD BE CALLED A RACIST AND PROBABLY BE BROUGHT UP ON CHARGES OF SOME KIND BY LA RAZA OR SOME CHICANO GROUP. BUT I GUESS YOU’RE LIKE A BLACK MAN WHO CAN USE THE “N-WORD” AT WILL BUT IF A WHITE MAN CALLED HIM THE “N-WORD” THEY WOULD BE JAILED!

WHAT’S YOUR REAL NAME? AFRAID OF “LA MIGRA?”

ARE YOU ALWAYS LOOKING OVER YOUR SHOULDER? AFRAID OF THAT KNOCK ON THE DOOR? AFRAID OF GETTING STOPPED? AFRAID OF GETTING HIRED BY A COMPANY AND THEN GETTING FIRED BEFORE YOUR CHECK COMES LIKE DON SAID?

THERE IS ONE WAY TO FIX IT: BECOME A LEGAL IMMIGRANT!

el mojado, la mojada is correct about the economic situation in Mexico. Should the USA try to improve the economics in Mexico, absolutely. If 15M unskilled and uneducated illegal immigrants can come to the USA, find jobs, work and send millions of dollars back to Mexico does that indicate that many of the poor US Citizen welfare recipients are lazy and that welfare is a regressive policy, absolutely. Should we allow illegal immigrants to come into out country merely because the economics are harsh in Mexico and provide them with USA resources, absolutely not. They should be rounded up, placed in cattle cars or some other cheap mass transit vehicle and shipped back to Mexico.

This individual’s op-ed is absolutely absurd. I support anyone who comes the United States seeking opportunity and a better life, but how can the writer make this into class warfare? What is the writer really suggesting? That rather than illegal immigrants earn their money from the rich, that the government forcibly take it from the rich and redistribute it to whom they deem worthy? Its so absurd that its almost laughable.

On one hand, if an individual is willing to leave his family, quest hundreds of miles away to a foreign land, and work to raise money for a family in dire need, so be it, illegal or legal.

The employer also deserves the absolute freedom in who he would like to hire. The government has no authority to decide who has a privilege to a job.

The history of this country attests to the fact that, in the long run, immigration fosters economic growth. Even in the short run, however, the effect on wages and employment is an open question—it depends on how much capital and entrepreneurialship the new immigrants bring and create.

But to suggest that we put a gun to the head of those who have earned and redistribute is ridiculous, especially as explained here. Every American should consider this completely illogical and hope that such intellectually deficient people are never allowed any sort of authority otherwise it would lead to complete demise not just for the rich, but for everyone.

I doubt Don advocates violent redistribution, though I could be wrong. I want justice without guns. What we have now is manifestly unequal and thus unfair. I reject the notion that the rich deserve their privilege. Why is economic hierarchy considered necessary and even desirable? Thanks to productive technology, there’s plenty for all. We need nutritious food, comfortable housing, and effective health care for every single human being on this planet. It’s not a project beyond our physical means; the waste and extravagance of capitalism prevents it.

I would agree that those who receive millions and millions of dollars for running a company into the ground, as we have seen in some of the companies who have received bailouts- is unfair. Howver Summerspeaker is an obvious leech, and should indeed follow Mao or Stalin, both evil leaders. Rejecting the the notion that the rich deserve their privilege demonstrates a lack of knowledge, intelligence, understanding, wisdom, and above all common sense. SS is far far far away from reality and lives in a make-beleive realm.

The rich EARNED their privilege baby! They deserve it because they earned it, that’s the American way. If you want to demand or feel that you “should have stuff w/o working for it” then just go on back across the border and demand it there. Don’t darken the capitalist spirit and culture of the USA with your socialist gibberish.

Here’s some little advice, get educated and/or learn a trade, then work hard. What you GIVE an individual makes them weaker, what a person EARNS makes them stronger. You are a very mixed up individual. Being human does not entitle one to anything, it’s what you do that matters.

Hi Summerspeaker,

Thank you for your response. While this may be a little off subject I’d like to address your concern. I take it that you are a pacifist and there is nothing wrong with advocating peace and harmony as very high standard of value. However, I believe that the idea that people must be “equal” is false. People go to college, work harder, invent medicines, do things very very uniquely. In the animal kingdom, and with humans, everyone has a different level of ability.

To advocate that people must be “equal” requires force. One must use force, or use the threat of it, to take away money or strive to make things equal, this is hardly a peaceful way to coexist.

Just because someone else has more money, does not mean that you have less of it. Wealth is created, there is no finite source of it like a “piece of a pie”. If so, tell me, what is that number quantity?

In capitalism, one has free unfettered trade. If somone does not want something, they do not have to buy it. If so, they must trade for it. Its all voluntary, peaceful means, of coexisting…which is why it works so well. Every problem that you have ever seen is due to government coercion—wars, bail-outs, monopolies, etc. are mostly created by the absolute quest for power. Absolute corrupts all men absolutely and government has a monopoly on the use of force. CEOs can’t force anyone to buy their products unless government officials legislate laws to do so.

A great example is food. This is one of the last areas where, unlike medicine and housing, we have capitalism. Almost all Americans enjoy this as we have such a vast array of choices and competition AND it is cheap for everyone. Even the poor can find an abundancy of food or charitable food—its unrealistic to say otherwise. There is a giant market for people with little money in the food market—it would be foolish not to provide cheap fruit and vegetables or ramen noodles, rice, whatever it may be.

If you want peace and happiness you must embrace capitalism and liberty, as I do. There is good reason for it. It has brought our country from little to the leader in numerous areas of technology and development.

One should never advocate egalitarianism, it is evil and non-peaceful, as is exemplified through the centuries of human history. Give it a shot, read history, and understnad the real way to peaceful coexistence.

I could hardly disagree more, Damian. To begin with, one doesn’t need force to redistribute wealth. For example, there was no violence involved when somebody came into my house through the window and took my bike. That’s not the type of redistribution I advocate, but we’re all just trying to survive in this insane world. The point is, taking stuff doesn’t require anyone to get hurt or feel threatened. Property protection as practiced in this country, on the other hand, necessitates a vast apparatus of violence and terror. Grab that box of toothpaste and the cops might beat you up and/or throw you in jail. Skip a month or two on rent and they’ll forcibly expel you. And on and on. Capitalism wouldn’t exist without coercion. We don’t recognize this violence because it seems so natural to us.

Capitalism doesn’t create meaningful, physical wealth. A combination of machine and human labor does that, mostly machine these days. Ownership does nothing to make gears turn faster or plants grow larger. The market only provides human organization. Its inefficiencies and inequalities are manifest. Resources are, in fact, finite. We’re rapidly running out of many of them. The catastrophic decline of fisheries would be but one example. More fundamentally, consumerism allows bosses to turn profit from manufacturing bunches of disposable crap. Most products aren’t designed for efficiency or durability – many are specifically constructed to fail. Wanton use of fossil fuels enables this production of junk, causing global warming and harming public health. It’s not a wise system by any stretch of the imagination.

Yet, alongside all this irresponsible extravagance, much of the world’s population lacks the basics. I take issue with your characterization of the food situation. Considering the overwhelming importance of agricultural subsidies, even your claim of capitalism in looks suspect. Thanks to technology, we have ample productive ability. Indeed, farmers worry about producing too much. Hence the government interference (to use economist speak). In an equitable society, this abundance would be to everyone without restriction. In our case, the restrictions triumph and so much goes to waste. The poor have limited and inconsistent access to free food largely because of egalitarian spirit you attack. It doesn’t appear out of nowhere, but rather from deep religious and ideological convictions. If society as a whole were structured on the same principles of public good, we’d all live remarkably well. Workers need to seize control of the means of production and employ them to benefit humanity in a sustainable fashion.

Slowhike,

Even though we usually disagree, I’ll help you out here: to answer your question—yes, Don Schrader is indeed the long-haired protester who walks around campus nearly-naked. Advocating the simple life, non-materialism, and also loves to write about his personal sexual encounters.

How do I know this? Because I have lived here since 1990 and have been reading his letters to the editor since! Here’s one issue where I am agreement with you and the other right-wing posters: I have also grown weary of his tiresome screeds.

It isn’t just a Daily Lobo problem: he has regularly sent letters to all the other local papers for the past decade, each saying more or less the same thing. The ABQ Journal and the NM Business Weekly have finally wised up and stopped printing his epistles. The Alibi still publishes his letters, to the annoyance of most. I imagine that the Lobo, being a student paper, has way more turnover than the average daily and the students may have just come here from out of state, so they are unaware of who Schrader is and how long he’s been doing it.

Don certainly has the right to write and say what he wants, like any citizen. I agree that there is much wrong with our materialistic society, and he’s not the only one to ever criticize the unjust annexation of land (Texas) from Mexico and the war that followed.

But the point is, he does not practice what he preaches. I am not the first to note that he rails against the government, yet depends on the local publicly-funded services. I concur with andalusia: I have also seen him many times in UNM’s libraries and the local public libraries as well. He’s writing those letters somehow. I concede it’s possible he isn’t sending them via email; he could do it the old-fashioned way. But even then, he would somehow have to come up with about $1 for the stamp, paper and pen, and then deliver it by hand – lest he send it through the U.S. government mail.

If Schrader were sincere and not a hypocrite; if he really lived the life of a 60s idealist or anarchist, he would be out in the desert somewhere living in a commune, or perhaps walking across country like Johnny Appleseed – not living in a city using government services.

Wow Summerspeaker,

Good response. How would you classify your political philosophy? I thought I saw you once say that you were an anarchist. Is that so? It looks like it from your perspective on private property rights. IF it is, it may require some rethinking on this debate on my end as I would then need to debate the need for government (that which I have never done).

Lemme know, and thanks for the response…

Mr. Don Schrader,

Both of my parents were LEGAL immigrants from Mexico, I am a Mexican native myself…I became a permanent legal US resident in 2001 and a US citizen in 2007. We respected American immigration laws by entering the USA legally, by paying our dues, and by becoming legal US residents. On the contrary, illegal immigrants SHOULD and MUST be treated like criminals because they are in direct violation of US immigration laws. It all comes down to the LAW.

Regardless of your country of origin, everyone that comes to the USA should do so legally and respectfully.

You also have a lot of different points of view here that I cannot honestly keep up with—not that you are not able to support them—but I can only start somewhere. SO here it is:

I support capitalism, in the same sense that Ayn Rand has explained:

“When I say “capitalism,” I mean a full, pure, uncontrolled, unregulated laissez-faire capitalism—with a separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church.”

How is wealth created? Lets take the example of computers. Bill Gates (maybe others, which is beside the point) were able to make the computer easily used by billions of people. Bill Gates, in essence, has created wealth, he has created the ability of millions to establish business, to communicate, to help feed the poor, to make it easier to provide charity, to make it easier to find real answers and on and on, people bought his progam and his wealth, as well as the wealth of others, was created. The same can be said for new technologies and advents in technologies…where do you disagree?

Between the low cost of labor that immigrints provide for our country and the the beatiful color that is added to the melting pot of people who can really tell or care if the boarders or ownership of the land matters.Can’t we all just get along.

To Slowhike: This is SO pompous, it really gave me a laugh. “The rich EARNED their privilege baby! They deserve it because they earned it, that’s the American way.”

Have you ever heard of the word “opportunity”. This word is how almost all wealth in America is earned. Adding “that’s the American way.” is the icing on the LOL cake. Part of me REALLY wants to analyize this but I’ll just let the fact that I’m bringing it up speak for itself.

Capitalism creates wealth, and Damian accurately pointed out that wealth is not finite. In other words, wealth can be created in a capitalist society. Is having a strong military an advantage in international economics? Absolutely, however, it’s sheer folly to even conceive that military might creates wealth by itself. In the 1930s the communist nation fostered a “collectivist system”. In this system Summer Speaker would be oh lets say, a General or perhaps at least a Lieutenant because in this system the individual was encouraged to sacrifice himself for the state. My goodness, doesn’t that sound wonderful!!!!

The liberal group in today’s society is hell bent to reverese the idea that the individual has a right to live his own life but instead must work to provide service to others, particularly those who are non-productive. What does non-productive mean?? Predominantly it means you’ve made some bad choices buddy. I see kids in my practice all week long, and the ones who are having trouble in nearly every case [using drugs, not working, getting arrested for this and that] all have bad home situation,i.e. their parents did a poor job raising them. We can’t legislate good parenting, and any clown can have a kid. And this scenario puts these kids in a terrible jam, and to a degree they are handicapped due to their upbringing or lack of it. But they all have a chance, there are plent of kids out there who had it rough and managed to turn their life around. America is the place to do it too, and if it wasn’t – we wouldn’t have an immigration problem.

The immigration problem has nothing at all to do with Texas being annexed to the USA. There’s plenty of history, but I wont go into it here, aside from saying it’s an excuse, not a reason. If Texas has stayed part of Mexico then Okalahoma and Arkansas would be border states experiencing the same exact phenomenon.

Ask yourself, Why do they come? It’s a simple answer and it’s amusing to read character defect explanations of why it’s moraly right to illegally immigrate. If it wasn’t so sad and backwards it would be hilarious.

Yes the rich earned their money, and everyone earns what they can. Sure America isn’t perfect and families do pass on accumulated wealth to their children. Why else do you think parents work hard? But on the whole balance of things, America has way more good than bad in my right wing conservative opinion.

One other point is that by aculturation and assimilation illegal immigrants have the potential to be successful. Why cripple them with this communist mumbo jumbo about “I reject the notion that the rich deserve their privilege” Get real baby, smell the coffee! That’s why they immigrated.

WWLDD?

(what would lou dobbs do)

…

The Hispanic workers come to US to clean and pick fruits. They dont come here to do computer networking. In the present american system of maximising profit for businesses the above jobs are minimum jobs with a dead end.Even in this recession you cannot find Americans to do those jobs.
The businesses wont mechanise farming,it decreases profit. These silent people who will work without complaining are far better.
Remmember Reagen legalised millions of illegals to help small businesses.
This cycle of hispanics coming in what the Republicans really want. where else can they get thier nmaids and land scape and construction workers?

The republicans want is this.. Come here and work for a few years like this, save what you can go! Its a good logic, but they failed to correct ONE IMPORTANT LAW”.I dont have a clue how they were so stupid to not correct it. The law that says all children born in US will be US citizens. The intentions of the law was very opposite to what is now when it was not written.
For some cowardly reason they did not change it,and now EVERYONE HAS TO live with the consequences of it. Now the Republicans even the descendants of the hispanics who came over will continue to toil like thier parents. The displeasure and shock of a Hispanic woman coming up(Judge Sotomayor), was evident in the trials they did to her. I am of Indian origin, a Us citizen and I am too smart for some Americans, They are puzzled seeing me ! Did you come here because you lived in a slum?
Behind many white men’s tanned looks and shaved faces its easy to see the past slave trader. You have to throw the noose ahead of the running dog to deal with them. I do that because I am inherently smart, not all are that blessed!

First of all, this is ridiculous! You cannot repeatedly criticize the U.S. simply because we have lavish lifestyles. We have developed a type of living that works for us, and it is not our duty to assimilate to the rest of the world simply because they cannot afford the same luxuries as us. Life is not fair, and Americans should not be held responsible simply because we choose to accept those luxuries.

Mexico and other nations should strive to create a place where their own citizens want to stay and progress, instead of sitting back and allowing their people to immigrate to more prosperous regions. If they would work a little harder to rectify their own problems, it wouldn’t be such a priority for their citizens to leave.

I’m sick and tired of being chastised for being an American. Is it my fault I was born into a prosperous country with the means to provide stability and perhaps a little luxury? No!

Republicans made a mistake by caving to big business’ desire for cheap labor. This is certainly true, however it doesn’t change anything about the irresponsibility of illegal immigrants, it’s a well known fact. Drug dealers desire customers, and ply their trade in a manner that encourages people to make “bad decisions” and escape. That doesn’t excuse the people who make those bad decisions and use drugs. It’s free will.

Dick Morris thinks Mob-O-Care is dead after the Democrat electoral fiascos in the last week. I sincerely hope that Morris is right, but I’m not so sure.

The trouble is that Obama and the Democrats have no other game plan — their other ideas, like the suicidal Carbon Tax, are even more likely to get them tossed out of office. Obama’s power has peaked — and judging by the Clinton backlash of 1994, when the GOP won the House for the first time in forty years, it’s downhill from here on out. Nothing in politics is certain, and Obama will certainly try to recover power, as Bill Clinton did in the ’90s. But Obama and his dead-enders have to reckon with the likelihood that they will never have more power than right now.

So it’s not out of the question that the Democrats in the House and Senate will go for a kamikaze rush to push MediCoup through Congress as quickly as possible. It would not be difficult. Normal Americans think we can defeat the “Blue Dog Democrats” at the polls, and that is true. But Obama just has to pick up the phone and tell the Dogs he will guarantee them jobs even if they are defeated. How about Ambassador to Upper Slobbovia? How about a nice job in the Soros Empire? Or in the case of Leon Panetta, how about a university center named after you, and funded by the Feds to study, umm…the art of politics? For the real high flyers like Rahm Emanuel, there’s always a part-time job on the Board of Freddie Mac for several million bucks.

Everything we know about these people suggests that they are single-minded fanatics with basically only one game plan, which is to consolidate as much power as possible as quickly as possible. Everything flows from that. In Europe, the socialists have insulated themselves from elections. That’s how they can do outrageous things time and time again and still stay in power.

Right now the analogy to the Japanese at the end of WWII is strikingly apt. The Japanese Empire was at dead end. Emperor-worship was still the public face of Japan; everybody had to pretend they agreed, even if they privately thought it mad. Japanese defeat was therefore unthinkable, and rather than let the Emperor be defeated, thousands of young men were trained and indoctrinated into the logic of banzai charges and suicide dive-bombing on U.S. Navy ships. Those kamikazes were last-ditch warriors, but they took a bloody toll.

The Blue Dogs don’t even have to suicide electorally. All they have to do is vote for Mob-O-Care as soon as possible, knowing they will be defeated, but also knowing that the Machine always takes care of its own. Just ask Hizzoner da Mare. Or look at Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s nice retirement home.

That’s what’s got me worried right now.

Mob-O-Care is still the big banana. The Democrats can still carry it over the top and then take their losses in elections to come with the faith that no Republican Congress will dare to infuriate all the Victim Groups of the Left by repealing free medical care for forty percent of the population. Or whatever they settle on. Remember that the actual dollar figures have never been believable, and Medicare and Social Security are operating as accounting fictions even now. So this has all been media drivel from top to bottom. All they have to do is pass a shell of a bill, set up the bureaucracies, and expand them in future Democrat-dominated Congresses.

The socialist parties in Europe have done it by taking over the medical sectors of their economies. Once they control medical care for all, every political argument comes down to who makes bigger promises to buy more for the voters. The actual pie might shrink because of rationing, but that doesn’t matter. Most people don’t think long-term, but socialists do. In Britain, a Labourite just confessed what many of us have suspected for years: that the socialists deliberately imported hundreds of thousands of Third World people, including unnumbered Islamist radicals from the Northwest Territories of Pakistan with nothing but a tribal warrior culture. Using their control of the BBC and the media, the socialists accused every British critic of this practice of racism. That’s how they nailed the Conservative Party.

That is also why Britain today is covered with CCTV cameras wherever people live, and why the schools are sending in mandatory reports on racist remarks by children from the earliest years onward. It’s madness, and the only so-called solution, is for Britain to become the Western Province of the new European Union of Socialist Republics. That has been the goal all along for the Leftist radicals, and nobody knows how to stop them now.

Obama is the same. He is a third-world socialist, which is no different from all the other kinds. His real identification is not with this country, but with “transnationalism” — the corrupt and conscienceless elite of the U.N., the EU, and a Vast Left-Wing Corruptocracy around the world. Saul Alinsky was a big fan of the Chicago Mob, and the de facto alliance we see at the United Nations combines an awful lot of Islamists with Leftists with corruptocrats. Witness the Oil for Food Scam, run right out of the Secretary-General’s office at the U.N. during the Saddam years. Witness the criminal cases in France today against Dominique de Villepin and Jacques Chirac.

Don’t believe the Democrats don’t see that as a model. If it worked in Chicago, in Europe, and at the U.N., they figure it will work in Washington, D.C

One of the great mysteries in today’s United States is how a country founded on the principle of individual freedom, having achieved great wealth and world influence, could have developed a political class bent on transforming the nation into a collective dominated by a powerful central government.

The history of man is replete with the rise and fall of major civilizations. The downfall of these societies inevitably stemmed from a prolonged period without adversity, which in turn generated internal strife and political and monetary greed. In due course, these empires were easily conquered or dominated by others.

John Adams wrote in a letter to his wife of his need to study politics and war so his sons could study mathematics and philosophy and his grandchildren could study poetry and music. Surely this grand new experiment known as the United States, based on the rights of the individual and not the state, could avoid the pitfalls that plagued other nations.

The peace, prosperity, and lack of national adversity Adams envisioned came to pass, and future generations were able to study subjects other than war. Unfortunately, destructive modern political philosophies, such as Marxism and socialism, manipulated by the self-absorbed to achieve political power, were matters John Adams and his fellow founding fathers could not have anticipated.

The inherent basis of Marxism and socialism is no different from that of earlier monarchies — the domination of a state by a select class or individual. Today’s believers in these “-isms” are no different from those in the past who believed they were preordained to rule the masses. Modern society will not accept the concept of an authoritarian dictator or monarch; thus, a powerful central government, with its trappings of public legitimacy, serves as a substitute.

In order for this strategy to succeed, the public must be manipulated into accepting the premise that only government and not they can provide economic and personal security. This can best be done in a country such as the United States not in an era of adversity, but one of prosperity and good fortune.

The last period of what could be called true national adversity was the 1930s and the Great Depression. Franklin Roosevelt and his fellow travelers were unable to fully realize an all-powerful central government despite their best efforts. While he certainly made inroads, the people and circumstances were such that FDR could not achieve his ultimate goal.

However, in the nearly seventy years since, during which the United States became the most powerful economic and military force the world has ever seen, there has been an inexorable march to government domination of the citizenry at all levels. Parallel to this track has been the rise of the socialist Left, the most influential group of all political entities.

The lack of national adversity over these years allowed the adherents of Marxism and socialist philosophies to recruit among the college-aged and the middle class by citing the so-called inequities of American society and the need to remake the country. They fanned the egos of these gullible individuals by convincing them of their individual superiority and ability, not to mention the necessity that they govern and educate the huddled masses.

One need only watch many in the committed American Left make pilgrimages to those second- and third-world countries controlled by Marxist governments and fawn over their rulers. The diminished standard of living, the loss of liberty, and the bleak future for the people of these nations are ignored while the power achieved by the head of state is celebrated.

It is that acquisition of power which motivates the self-named “Progressives,” not the welfare of the general public, as they so loudly proclaim.

A strategy was needed on how a faction that represented less than 20% of the citizenry could elicit this endgame with a people overwhelmingly against the concept of powerful central government and within the framework of a written constitution.

Using the backdrop of overwhelming prosperity, the Left seized upon the concept of “fairness” to promote their agenda and intimidate the populace. This “fairness” strategy was further reinforced by the incessant promotion that the United States as a civilization was responsible for all manner of evils throughout its history.

On the surface, it appeared that there was nothing this country did not have the money for, nothing it could not accomplish. To make up for past sins by guaranteeing equal outcomes was the least that could be done. The argument became that with so much wealth, the United States could afford to (fill in the blank).

As a result, much of the citizenry quietly accepted the argument and simply dropped out of active participation in government. They assumed the nation was in reasonably good hands with the two political parties, whose motives or agenda were never questioned. Most did not realize that by the mid 1980’s, the Left had a stranglehold on the Democratic Party, and the Republicans, unable or unwilling to fully warn the population of the future consequences of an all-powerful central government, were only able to slow down the march to socialism — and that only when they were in power.

This march was not at gunpoint, but rather by the destruction of the economy and self-determination through massive spending programs which were unsustainable but became woven into the fabric of society.

In the 2008 election, the Left, with its ideal stealth candidate for President, actualized the culmination of their grand strategy. We now have the most radical government in our history. These people are unabashedly brazen in their triumph. While still assuming that the general public is asleep, they do not hesitate to openly advocate policies not wanted by the electorate, such as Cap and Trade and Health Care Reform. They do so not as a benefit for the country or its people, but to enhance and make permanent government power, regardless of the long-term consequences to the nation.

It is, however, this same megalomania, and the long-awaited awakening of the American people, that will be the downfall of this political class. The seizure of power for the sake of power is doomed to failure.

It is often claimed that the Left in the United States is simply trying to copy European socialism. However, the grand experiment of Euro-socialism, while now proven unsuccessful, stemmed from the unimaginable devastation of World War II. Victor and vanquished alike suffered a near-total loss of economic and social infrastructure which took nearly twenty years to overcome.

The motivation of the European political class was to promote the general welfare of the population, not self-aggrandizement. The failure of their brand of socialism was due to a determination to never repeat the circumstances which brought about two World Wars in the twentieth century. However, the political class and the populace did not fully appreciate the long-term economic consequences of the many social programs enacted. Many European societies, having realized their error, are moving back from the abyss and adopting more free-market principles.

Here in the United States, there has never been a similar devastating factor to justify a turn to a socialist state and a powerful central government. What is happening now is driven purely by arrogance and manipulation. It has the potential to end in national economic and social disaster, similar to so many empires of the past.

The American people are starting to understand the true motivations of those now in power. As shown in the 2009 elections in Virginia and New Jersey, the people can, by their participation in the electoral process, halt or stall the progress made by the Progressives to realize their socialist dream.

The country can return to the path of economic and social prosperity and relegate the Left to the background of the nation’s politics, where they belong, once and for all. The key is time, and time is something we have little of. The 2010 elections will be the most important midterm election in our history.

While John Adams and his fellow founders could not have anticipated what has happened to the country they established, they did give it a framework — a constitution — which can enable us to avoid the same egocentrism that led to the downfall of other major civilizations.

We need to close the southern border. We are losing our country.

to people like garth

Yes, I’m an anarchist, Damian. In your wealth example, we disagree on whether technological development should allow individual to gain vast privilege and how access to technology should be distributed. Computers would be far more beneficial to the species if not for capitalist inefficiencies. Intellectual property rights, for example, use to coercion to prevent virtually limitless reproduction for knowledge, culture, and entertainment. Instead, anarchist advocate free production and consumption. There’s plenty here for everyone.

I’m dumbfounded at SS’s lack of cognitive powers. I.T. examples of intellectual property are an essential component of economics, even communist economics. Production and consumption are anything but free, the old adage that “there’s no free lunch” is age old wisdom applicable today.

One cannot educate the uneducatable and there are two human forces that constantly force us back to the dark ages: Ignorance and Want. Both of which are apparently worn like a straight-jacket by Summerspeaker. It can’t be unfastened and taken off.

[and] While it is our responsibility to fight against these two negative forces, bashing one’s head against a brick wall is not wisdom.

Wealth and material worth and value are not magically created, and there’s never been enough to go around. Westernized agriculture born of capitalist profit and scientific advancement have contributed more to providing the world’s population with adequate food than any other country in the world. To drool and dribble over intellectual property rights is an indication of a lack of creativity, intellect and fairness. Such hostility to humanity should not be encouraged.

To the contrary, restricting digital abundance is demonstrably harmful to the common good. The cost of copying a song or book barely registers. It would be trivial to make vastly more information available through the internet. Indeed, people already do this for free, only to be stopped by thugs enforcing absurd and unjust laws.

summerspeaker the common good is a communist word, used in your language context. The goal in telecommunication, wireless, internet and radio is not “the common good” we live in American where the “common good” is attained through the pursuit of individual rights and capitalism. If you were smart enough to create some IT derivitive or device that was marketable and worth millions then you would have the individual right to give it away and not profit. On the other hand if you decided to profit, you would also have that right. These are inalienable rights that cannot be taken away.

Thanks Summerspeaker,

SLowhike did provide a great challenge to you with your view of “the common good” but I have a different angle.

How should intellectual technology be distributed? I may share a lot of the same sentiments that you do, however, I believe that individual rights are supreme, and must be protected.

As for individual intellectual rights, this is a difficult argument, and one of deep philosophical context. Again, at the core, it is all about your belief in private property rights. WHen I say property, I mean the private property of a man’s mind. Therefore, if you can bear with me, I want to consider private property rights first and then anarchism, as applied, in general.

I do not want to be a plagarist here so I will quote my favorite philosopher, Ayn Rand. I can defend objectivism to the hilt though:

“The right to life is the source of all rights—and the right to property is their only implementation. Without property rights, no other rights are possible. Since man has to sustain his life by his own effort, the man who has no right to the product of his effort has no means to sustain his life. The man who produces while others dispose of his product, is a slave.

Bear in mind that the right to property is a right to action, like all the others: it is not the right to an object, but to the action and the consequences of producing or earning that object. It is not a guarantee that a man will earn any property, but only a guarantee that he will own it if he earns it. It is the right to gain, to keep, to use and to dispose of material values. (Virtue of Selfishness, 1964)

You see, if you do prefer to live in a society where brute force is supreme, then by all means do so—but it is not moral. Imagine such a backwards, chaotic society, there must be some form of law—some form of objective order. We have advanced past this primitive lifestyle, granted it took centuries, but the U.S. is the first of its kind in this ability.

One other quote on anarchism, and I admit, I am not yet good enough at this argument but rather am learning quickly:

“If a society provided no organized protection against force, it would compel every citizen to go about armed, to turn his home into a fortress, to shoot any strangers approaching his door—or to join a protective gang of citizens who would fight other gangs, formed for the same purpose, and thus bring about the degeneration of that society into the chaos of gang-rule, i.e., rule by brute force, into perpetual tribal warfare of prehistorical savages.

The use of physical force—even its retaliatory use—cannot be left at the discretion of individual citizens. Peaceful coexistence is impossible if a man has to live under the constant threat of force to be unleashed against him by any of his neighbors at any moment. Whether his neighbors’ intentions are good or bad, whether their judgment is rational or irrational, whether they are motivated by a sense of justice or by ignorance or by prejudice or by malice—the use of force against one man cannot be left to the arbitrary decision of another.”

I would love to hear a response.

I’ve been reading that anarchism is a new trend on college campuses. Please see my challenge above.

slowhike, the supposed right to make a profit from an idea relies a vast coercive apparatus. It’s not natural and can easily be taken away. Without thugs to enforce the law, patent holders aren’t likely to get much. As I said, capitalism measurably fails provide the greatest benefit to everyone. Owners of intellectual property gain while the rest of us lose. Our system invents scarcity out of abundance in order to maintain privilege for the few.

Damian, your quote attribute paranoia and alienation to everyone in this hypothetical society. To the contrary, an anarchist community have a culture of connection and fellowship. Furthermore, it exaggerates the level of protection provided by authority. We all live under the threat of force from neighbors at this very moment. The existence of police in no way prevents me from grabbing a kitchen knife and assaulting one of my housemates. Social values already form the basis for safety.

With that clear, I should note that anarchism isn’t a system based on security. As Shevek says in Ursula Le Guin’s The Dispossessed, “Freedom is never very safe.”

Intellectual properties relies on the law, and substituting “vast coercive apparatus” for the legal system terminology is not a plausible defense for your position. Aditionally I would mention that there is a distinct variance in your writing syntax and language across several blogs indicating that summerspeaker is not one person. Your utilization of the victimhood stance in phrases like “Owners of intellectual property gain while the rest of us lose” is the only constant theme I perceive.

I for one consider music, poetry, art, copyrights and so on to be legal intellectual property. In order to better understand your position, do you advocate for free downloading of copyrighted music collections and movies? Additionally if you were to have things your way for a period of time, where would you get the funding to push out intellectual property to your constituents?

Some say that one bad apple spoilos the barrel, this may be true for apples but I don’t beleive it’s true for civil servants. As a whole, firemen, police officers, military, border patrol, coast guard, and sherrifs are all providing laudable service and protecting society. A reference to them like “thugs” is insulting to me, and to everyone of them.

“The existence of police in no way prevents me from grabbing a kitchen knife and assaulting one of my housemates”

No, but a laoded .45 will.

“Social values already form the basis for safety.”

Only if everyone agrees on the same values, then things like honor killings, etc. wouldn’t happen.

Slowhike, you have the patience of a saint, this guy doesn’t have a clue. Has there ever been a successful anarchist society? And did someone say that this goofy philosophy is a trend amongst younger folk? Not with me and my pals.

Liberty, not tyranny

The only thing I have to say is that you are so right, migrants are not alliens like many people in USA like Michael savage is sad to hear one man talking of that way about mexicans and all the migrants they dont have anthens and they dont have color green, they only want to live better, unfortunately Mexico always have had very bad governments full of corruption thay only care about full their wallets and they are not worried about create opportunities for their citizens and also other countries have abused of Mexico in the past like Spain, France, USA. The United States stole mexico all that territory and they never have had the attention to Mexico like a Neighbor a friend a partner an old friend, but when they want to use Mexicans to work they pay them less they abuse of them the same thing does Canada they always use people that has just a little of education that they dont speak the language or illegals because of this way they cant call for justice is the new sclavitude in their so loved free land and the most of them never want to undestand it because they are not in that situation, they pay less or disccount taxes and some quotas that they dont have to pay and the dont give them the money back like Canada does.
I am not saying They are guilty of all our problems but YESSS ladies and Gentlemen they have a great responsibility in this great problemm ignored by years, I think everyboy is reponsability of this and We most change this together.

A distinct variance in syntax, huh? Alright, you caught us. Yes, slowhike, we are legion. We do in fact support downloading copyrighted material. We advocate a society that freely shares information and provides the physical necessities for all.

Well Legion would you like to share your budget strategy?

But wait Summerspeaker, what hypothetical are you talking about? What society exists with anarchy? Only in the U.S. can such a society exist because their liberty to do such things are protected.

It is anarchy that is hypothetical, and cannot exist, it is completely susceptible to the group that has the the biggest guns. And how could it not be?

Stealing the intellectual property of another human being is immoral. Stealing another human’s work, their life, all that they have worked for is not civilized….it is weak.

If you must live as a parasite off of those that produce, so be it. But I would not expect to pull your wagon for very long.

To the contrary, I can think few acts more moral than sharing information. The entire notion of intellectual property is an absurdity. Copying a song, for example, does nothing to the original recording. No one loses access to the song in this supposed theft. I cannot think of strong enough curses to hurl at the stupidity of manufacturing scarcity out of abundance.

With regards to big guns, anarchism does run into problems against determined and bloodthirsty opponents. See what fascists and Stalinist did to anarchists in the Spanish Civil War. Traditionally, anarchism has embraced violence, yet free military organizations have never had tremendous success. I have my doubts about the ability of the principles of liberty and equality to lead to a powerful army; that seems contradictory. As such, I prefer nonviolent tactics. As Gandhi showed, such movement can produce great effects. The current Zapatista struggle also offers an example of revolution with minimal fighting. An advantage in guns isn’t necessarily enough to defeat popular mobilization.

Immigration is greater than “illegal immigrants”. Not every immigrant is illegal, as well as there are different classes of immigrants and different standards apply, some less fair than others.

For one, I personally find the Cuban-US wetfoot-dryfoot policy is unfair. Touch dry land and claim asylum, but only for one country’s people.

Marriages from mail order brides, who meet their spouses for the first time usually at the altar, need only last 2 years “on good faith”, but marriages between a man and a woman who know each other longer than the period of mail-order brides (with 2 or 3 years of dating) must last a period of 5 years in good faith.

Immigration is the last thing that is black or white.

Sure, the share of information, such as sharing a song, is fine. However, there is no need for protection in this case.

Hypothetically, what if I were very ugly yet was a brilliant composer. What if I spent my life’s work composing the most beautiful piece of music. I share that work with a production company who essentially wants to maximize profits and sees no reason and has no obligation but to use that song to promote an attractive female artist (who has no real skills anyhow)—they have no obligation, in your society, to me whatsoever. Sound like justice?

The same can be said for inventions on pharmaceuticals, medical devices, and countless other inventions made, for a profit, that better human life.

All of these things would be subject to theft by the strongest individuals in anarchy.

I understand that you want a non-violent society, as do I, and most other people. But unfortunately there are power hungry fiends that are willing to use brute force to get it (as do our politicians in government). Which is why we have the establishment of individual rights—a supreme value to live by, and how all rights extend from this value.

Anarchy does not account for individual rights but rather hopes that everyone will live harmoniously—unfortunately the evil in this world will rule against the pacifism—its in human nature to compete, and many will cheat to get there.

Nobody would maximizing profits in an anarchist society, Damian. Profits wouldn’t exist. While folks would surely still come into conflict over similar issues, the separation of material concerns from artistic ones would remove a lot of the bitterness. While you might get snubbed by your peers, you’d never had to worry getting food to eat or a place to sleep.

Now, because of our absurd distribution system, many rely on intellectual property protection to get by. I don’t fault them for it. We’re all just trying to survive in an insane world. This doesn’t make manufactured scarcity any better on the whole. Current intellectual property laws deserve condemnation even within the framework of much more mainstream political thought. For example, check out the following report from the CEPR:

http://www.paecon.net/PAEReview/issue32/Baker32.htm

I would rather have government funded and freely available research and art than the inefficient and oppressive restrictions we have now.

What I like about the capitalist system is its ability to separate the wheat from the chaff. It’s agreat feeling to know you are in competition and win, at least some of the time if not all the time. Competition is right at the top of my list of good things I like about the USA.

There’s nothing better than the feeling you get from earning what you get, as in profit, salary, and the spoils of the game. It’s survival of the fittest in a lot of ways. The rules of play are available and for those who get an education, and/or learn a skill and work hard it’s a fantastic system that the fathers set up. This is the world’s greatest political and economic system. It’s what allowed less than 6% of the human family on earth to become the richest industrial nation on earth! It also allowed us to originate more than 50% of the worlds total production and enjoy the highest standard of living in the history of the world. Is this a great country and system or what. Gimme more baby!

What I like about the capitalist system is its ability to separate the wheat from the chaff. It’s agreat feeling to know you are in competition and win, at least some of the time if not all the time. Competition is right at the top of my list of good things I like about the USA.

There’s nothing better than the feeling you get from earning what you get, as in profit, salary, and the spoils of the game. It’s survival of the fittest in a lot of ways. The rules of play are available and for those who get an education, and/or learn a skill and work hard it’s a fantastic system that the fathers set up. This is the world’s greatest political and economic system. It’s what allowed less than 6% of the human family on earth to become the richest industrial nation on earth! It also allowed us to originate more than 50% of the worlds total production and enjoy the highest standard of living in the history of the world. Is this a great country and system or what. Gimme more baby!

Nice Summerpeaker, at least you are consistent.

As an objectivist, I probably do share a lot of your same philosophy on freedom. There really are only 2 problems that I have (or can think of).

1) Anarchism, as you describe it, relies very heavily on the idea that there will be a fantastic mutual agreement on absolutely no physical coercion by anyone. I believe that it is virtually impossible, and it is contradictory to the idea that in anarchism, anything really goes. You are very susceptible, as it has been historically proven, to coercion by the first gang introduced with a strong arm.

2) Man has to work and produce in order to support his life. He has to support his life by his own effort and by the guidance of his own mind. If he cannot dispose of the product of his effort, he cannot dispose of his effort; if he cannot dispose of his effort, he cannot dispose of his life. Without property rights, no other rights can be practiced.

I leave a quote here:

“The modern mystics of muscle (anarchists in this case) who offer you the fraudulent alternative of “human rights” versus “property rights,” as if one could exist without the other, are making a last, grotesque attempt to revive the doctrine of soul versus body. Only a ghost can exist without material property; only a slave can work with no right to the product of his effort. The doctrine that “human rights” are superior to “property rights” simply means that some human beings have the right to make property out of others; since the competent have nothing to gain from the incompetent, it means the right of the incompetent to own their betters and to use them as productive cattle. Whoever regards this as human and right, has no right to the title of “human.””(Rand 1962)

I look forward to your response.

“It’s what allowed less than 6% of the human family on earth to become the richest industrial nation on earth! It also allowed us to originate more than 50% of the worlds total production and enjoy the highest standard of living in the history of the world. Is this a great country and system or what. Gimme more baby!”

You realize that people starve, die, live in indescribably bad situations, etc. because of this competition? So that you can have that nice feeling of earning and buying? And what about the environment? Capitalism is a system in which the destruction of the environment becomes a competition; its continuation also depends on an infinite amount of new resources. We will run out some day, be it sooner or later. And then what? We should learn to live with less, tread more lightly on the earth. The destruction of the natural world and the hunger, disease, and strife that plagues the rest of the world is not worth “that great feeling you get when you earn money.”

To respond to your first point, Damian, I hope and suspect that sufficiently mobilized campaigns of direct action would enough to counter forceful suppression. I should say that I’m not opposed to violent personal self-defense. Throw that in as necessary. Even the fascists need to win a propaganda war to operate. For the time being, at least, they need folks to drive the tanks and fly the planes. If large numbers of people resisted, sabotaging their machines and undermining their efforts at every turn, I think we just might succeed.

I only see a jumble of normative assertions in your second point. I don’t share these ideas with you. Humans need air, water, food, and a safe environment to live. Work and production are optional. Many of us in the industrialized world already do hardly any of the physical labor required to sustain life. That’s done by machines and the poor. I look to a world of increasing automation and even distribution of any lingering toil.

With that said, I’ll agree people should control over the products of their labor – in the traditional anarchist fashion. Workers should take over factories and operate them for the common good. That’s key to the revolution. This couldn’t be further from bourgeois conceptions of property. Nor does your argument lead there. No one person produces a factory, much less a piece of land. It’s absurd for individuals to lord over these things.

Your quote makes similar claims that I reject. Rand has perverse view of humanity as divided between the worthy and unworthy, the producers and looters, the supermen and scum. Again, human beings need the use of things, not property. The capitalist conception of property is a specific cultural invention. I propose a society of sharing instead.

Exposed.

One, anarchist philosophy cannot mobilize anything. That requires order. Sacrificing

Two, define the common good. I bet that you do not know what that is. Do you mean that some men should live as slaves to others. That if I farm and work to produce more food, that it should only be shared. In anarchy, who is going to force me me to share? You say I have an obligation, but must I share your same sentiment, even if I worked harder to get there?

You mean force and stealing of those who create the factories. Your society is one of physical coercion and brute force.

You are indeed no anarchist, but a wolf in sheep’s clothing. You pretend to embrace freedom but reject systems that are the highest examples of that freedom, capitalism. You want to control lives to suit your vision of “the common good”. So quit with the BS.

Summerspeaker, you are no anarchist. You support a revolution for communist purposes. Here is an example:

“Workers should take over factories and operate them for the common good. That’s key to the revolution. This couldn’t be further from bourgeois conceptions of property. Nor does your argument lead there. No one person produces a factory, much less a piece of land. It’s absurd for individuals to lord over these things.”

Which contradicts your statement here:

“With that said, I’ll agree people should control over the products of their labor – in the traditional anarchist fashion.” The traditional anarchist fashion being? Anarchy?

These are failed ideas and are very old ones as well. The Soviet Union, Cuba, N. Korea, E. Germany are all great examples of this complete failure of “ This couldn’t be further from bourgeois conceptions of property.”

Fake and fraudulent, discredited and illogical.

close-minded and bullying, hypocritical and resorting to ad hominem attacks.
Just making one for you, damian, since you made one for SS. You’re welcome!

Examples please lame-o, oh sorry, nuther ad hominem, didn’t mean to hurt your feelers—pussy.

An individual in America has always had the right to their own life, and the ability to reason has been our way of gaining knowledge. Furthermore the purpose of government has been predetermined to protect the individual’s rights. Our government has strayed off that mark. Perhaps some straying has been necessary, but the whole income tax thing is really a prime example of straying too far. In America all progress has been due to rational thinking. For example we have cured diseases, learned to fly, erected sky scrapers, invented the telephone, computers and grown a huge food supply. If we abandoned the incentives that make intelligent people pursue creativity and progress we could easily slip back into the dark ages like on Mad Max.

=D (to Damian)
I don’t really care, and I didn’t really think that you would care. Just pointing out that your post would have been better w/o the name-calling at the end.
And I thought I’d just add my opinion that name-calling detracts from one’s message even if the name-calling is warranted. Kinda still brings the level of the debate down a notch. Like to the level of American politics. Maybe the level directly above, I dunno, it’s pretty bad right now…

Slowhike, you didn’t really respond to my point, about the glory of the current situation in the U.S. being dependent upon desolation elsewhere (and of the environment here at home). What are your thoughts on that?

I’m an anarchist in the tradition of Kropotkin, Flores Magón, Goldman, and Chomsky. We’re not opposed to order or the common good. Quite the contrary. I’ve never claimed to anarcho-capitalist. While various strands of anarchism exist, the collectivist one has at least as much claim to the term as any other. My use matches in the historical record. Communist states are far from anarchism; anarchists such as Goldman were early critics of the Russian Revolution

I don’t see destruction as a necessary component of successful capitalism, although AJB is correct that linear thinking has been practiced by several industries like mining and the oil industry. Capitalism is dependent on creativity and incentives. People are not starving in the world because America is successful, that’s ann incorrectly drawn conclusion. In fact, just the opposite is true due to our benevolence and inspiration.

As I’ve said before only idiots or uncaring individuals would refuse to take care of our earth.

In other words Summerspeaker, you apply the so-called philosophy of anarchy when it suits your premise, as do your examples. Chomsky is also a fraud, lets take this example:

First, Chomsky says the U.S. tax code is rigged with “complicated devices for ensuring that the poor — like 80% of the population — pay off the rich.”

But wait Noam! Trusts can’t be all bad. After all, you have a net worth north of US$2-million, and decided to create one for yourself! Capitalist!

A few years back he went to Boston’s infamous white-shoe law firm, Palmer and Dodge, and, with the help of a tax attorney specializing in “income-tax planning,” set up a trust to protect his assets from Uncle Sam (common good?). He named his tax attorney (every socialist radical needs one!) and a daughter as trustees. To the Diane Chomsky Irrevocable Trust (named for another daughter) he has assigned the copyright of several of his books, including multiple international editions. Yeah… thats right, fully embracing the protection of intellectual property!! Ha! Chomsky, you fraud.

Chomsky favors massive income redistribution — just not the redistribution of his income. No reason to let radical politics get in the way of sound estate planning.

This guy is a fraud and this philosophy is a fraud.

Damian, I know little about Chomsky’s personal finances. Your charge of hypocrisy may well apply. However, it says nothing about other notable anarchists, much less the philosophy itself. Kropotkin, Goldman, and Magón all spent time in behind bars for their revolutionary belief. The latter died in US prison.

Ok so Chomsky is out. That at least shows how it is impossible for someone to proclaim to be an anarchist and uphold that philosophy—so it absolutely does.

If I were to show you how the other three also were hypocrites would you believe the philosophy to be unsustainable? Probably not.

Anarchy has bred absolute violence, that is essentially its revolutionary purpose, which is in conflict with your claim that you do not support atrocities.

Its almost comical to hear all of the argument between so-called intellectual anarchists, each attempting to grab their piece of the philosophy and rationalizing to fit their worldly views. There’s peaceful anarchy, anarchy anarchy, social anarchy, traditional anarchy, individual anarchy, collective anarchy etc. Its a jumble of misconcepts with no real central understanding. I suppose if you are of the Kantian philosophy it can be so—but Kant was anti-reason.

Anarchy is anarchy, the absence of government. Paint it what you will but it does not validate any part of its core philosophy—its merely an individual interpretation, as you have expressed clearly.

Trendy? Maybe. Will you grow out of it? Most likely.

It must be hard to argue for something that you do not understand, then advocate for the “common good”—whatever that really is…I guess we should only adhere to your interpretation of it.

Here Summerspeaker, this will really help.

A very short video…its not propaganda either, trust me:

www.wimp.com/thegovernment/

There’s no good way to live in an oppressive system, damian. Collectivist anarchism isn’t merely a personal philosophy. While, as Emma Goldman wrote, we should manifest our beliefs as much we can, we’re all constrained by circumstances. I’m not interested in your disingenuous demands for purity; that’s not what I look for in an intellectual tradition.

Attacking anarchism because of its variation accomplishes even less than throwing an ad hominem argument at Chomsky. I detect more dishonesty here. Every philosophy has countless different advocates and interpretations. Such is the nature of thought. This does not preclude critical unifying principles and affinity between adherents.

Look, if you oppose anarchism, oppose anarchism. Say that loud and clear. Stop wasting your time telling me I’m not anarchist or that the ideology doesn’t exist.

I oppose anarchy, liberalism, communism, and socialism.

Capitalism doesn’t oppress you.

Emma Goldman was mostly about women’s sufferage and justifiably so. She was however confused about capitalism and declared that that was the problem, however, capitalism is merely the open free market—it has no power over individual’s choices.

I expected the “disingenuous demands for purity comment”, and it wasn’t disingenuous. No worries, I get that all the time.
You could just say that you do not want to be challenged on your so-called “philosophy” because you do not know what it really is. Just a lot of emotional rhetoric.

Furthermore, to prove you wrong again, I am an objectivist, my philosophy does not have “countless advocates and imterpretations” so you are wrong there. And I do have absolutely unifying principles and am not a sea of emotion. Try me.

And you are not an anarchist, for you do not know what it means and cannot define it.

Back to the purity, please consider the following objectivist philosophy:

1) In any conflict between two men (two groups) who hold the same basic principles, it is the more consistent one who wins.

2) IN any collaboration between two men (or two groups) who hold different basic principles, it is the more irrational one who wins. (No consistency to challenge).

3) When opposite basic principles are clearly and openly defined, it works to the advantage of the rational side; when they are not clearly defined, but are hidden or evaded (as you are doing), it works to the advantage of the irrational side

Long story short, you really need to provide something that we can disagree or agree on…not just a mess of statements.

And you should try the video www.wimp.com/thegovernment/

YOu may like it, it does talk very fairly about anarchy.

You also did ask me where you were being inconsistent etc.

Capitalism does in fact oppress me, Damian. I experience this every day of my life, with each lock and price tag. And, contrary to your repeated attacks, I’m intimately familiar with anarchism. You seem to lack knowledge of the historical tradition, though that could be affected position. While we’re a small community, anarchism has meaning and unifying power in the scene.

Coming from the perspective of objectivism, I can see how you would find anarchism chaotic. That philosophy almost begins and ends with Rand. You have David Kelley splitting the movement, but not much that I know of beyond that. However, compare anarchism with liberalism, socialism, or conservatism and you’ll see my point. Major ideology have regular revisions and controversies.

Your contention that Goldman was mostly about women’s suffrage baffles me. It’s entirely false, as anything more than quick internet search will reveal. As an anarchist opposed to government and a feminist desiring deeper liberation for women, she actually rejected the struggle for suffrage. Where are you getting your information?

So you want everything for free? Hmmm, sounds like a civil society. What unifying power?

You have yet to define a single term other than, “I am an anarchist.” What does that mean.

Its pretty standard that you cannot answer a question and avoid any challenges. I have corrected you, even about your own philosophy, at least 4 times above, yet you would like to engange in some sort of debate about GOldman—which I have vague knowledge.

I can argue with you on any issue, but I must understand where you stand, otherwise, as in point #3 above (on argument) it is virtually impossible to argue with irrationality.

And it does not begin and end with Rand, it starts wit—what is anarchy?? What is it, what are its goals and are its goals aligned with its perpetrators? No, its a mess and its followers, as you are proving, do not even know how to espouse it. It sounds cool.

I originally had some repect for your belief and was thrilled to actually be able to engage an anarchist, yet as it was unraveled, it is disappointingly so that you are just another collectivist advocating for the common good. WHich, by the way is contradictory in terms of anarchy and collectivism. ANarchy is a vessel for reaching socialism but cannot stand on its own. Its better and more suited to term your willingness to revolt a revolution.

Until you can define your philosophy, I cannot get anywhere in terms of an argument because there are no principles or standards to determine anything. Its like argueing whether or not there is a god.

Anarchy is the absence of government? WHat is “historical tradition” as you describe it and how is that different from classical anarchy or communism?

I can’t recall a single time you’ve corrected me, Damian. If you have only vague knowledge about Goldman, why did you make such an strong assertion about her views? This sort of thing gives me the impression that you aren’t debating in good faith. Your refusal to accept explanations and insist on your own definitions is starting to make me weary. At this point, if you wish to know more about anarchism, I suggest doing research yourself. Read a bit of Goldman or Kropotkin and you’ll see the basis of my political thought. Once you’re familiar with the ideology, you’ll understand why I use the label. My interpretation stems from two basic principles: liberty and equality. Everything proceeds from there.

I’m going off some vague memory. And actually, I suggest you understand her a little betterm either that or you are purposly being unclear about your proclamations. From your assertion that she rejected woman’s sufferage—thats not true. She was actually in line with numerous suffrage icons in that suffrage would not be the only thing to the full liberation of women. In her own word’s:

“Needless to say, I am not opposed to woman suffrage on the conventional ground that she is not equal to it. I see neither physical, psychological, nor mental reasons why woman should not have the equal right to vote with man.”

My corrections to you were on Chomsky for one. Logical reasoning leads me to believe that if you do not understand the hypocricy of those you cite why should I believe that you know about the others?

Another would be the idea that you asked for me to point out your inconsistency, then when I did, you said that you have no interest in purity.

Look, our two philosophies boil down to this: You contend that by owning property it is somehow oppressive. I contend that a man’s mind is his property and may dispose of it how he can (similar to a woman’s body). Rand, by far, would have beat Goldman on the idea that collectivism and liberty are not unifying principles. And how can they be? Egalitarianism, in a society of people with various capabilities, cannot exist without forcing people into it. That’s not freedom, that’s oppression. You are now free, in our country, to create any commune of collective anarchists that you want. Just don’t force the rest of us into it. Because you do want to work to sustain your own life, you should perish, and those of us who do want to work to survive, have a right to our lives as so.

Where do you disagree?

Furthermore, any factory worker is free to leave his job and collaborate with others to create a separate “collective” factory. How that is going to work without any management or heirarchy is not my business. However, you have no right to an establishment someone has created. Had those workers not wanted to work there, they didn’t have to. They are free to start their own factory.

You cannot advocate for the “common good” if it excludes the minority. And you have yet to define this term as you use it frequently. Maybe you know that it is contradictory to liberty yet do not want to go there—a rejection of reality.

Anyhow, maybe this conversation is finished. I still really do not believe that you are an anarchist, an anarchist must believe in brute force since there is no repect for private property—or they must believe in an oppressive authority to keep “equality”. There are contradictions.

Objectivism most likely embraces your core values and it would help your inconsistency.

I believe that your dislike of capitalism (or jealousy for the rich) is where this revolutionary thought stems from. You justify it by claiming that it is in tune with anarchy, which it really isn’t.

Because there were very intellectual anarchists in the past, still does not validate the philosophy, especially if they tend to be hypocritical about it.

The notion that ‘any factory worker is free to leave his job’, denies the reality that in most societies, including those in this country, individuals are nearly always bound by an income to stay alive. Just like how a hungry man is not free, one that has no other option but to work the job he has or starve, is not free either.

They are free to start their own factory? Collective ownership is super excellent. But the truth is, without an economy built on the foundation of cooperative ownership, the only way to achieve those ends is by seizing pre-existing capital.

Anyways, it’s been fun to read this discourse between the two of you. Let’s not let it degrade into name calling; understanding can be had!

Good point robotluv,

In other words, workers need rely on others to create the factories for them to work in. Then betray the owners and steal it as if it were theirs to begin with. Then they have to assume that they could actually run the company by themselves.

I didn’t finish.

…Which is hardly the case because this has been tried time and time again, its called communism. That has failed yet the left stubbornly refuses to believe so. WHy? Because their emotions lead their rationalizations.

Damian, the very passage you quote from Goldman shows her opposition to the suffrage movement. You’re either performing a dangerously casual reading or intentionally distorting the text. Why? A quick will internet search will give you numerous articles on Goldman’s controversial position.

You didn’t correct me on Chomsky. He’s part of the anarchist tradition of thought regardless of his net worth. And you’re conflating my alleged inconsistency with Chomsky’s personal purity. Again, why? Is that the only way you can defend the claim that you corrected me?

I disagree with Objectivism because I believe in equality and oppose suffering. Rand had only contempt for most of humanity, calling the masses lice and parasites. In stark contrast, I consider compassion a core value. I want good things for every human being on the planet. This is an irreconcilable difference. While I respect of some of Objectivist thought on freedom, I can’t overlook the extreme misanthropy.

Summerspeaker,

SImply claiming something with no evidence, no support other than “it is so”. Is a bad way to reason. I highly recommend that you support any of your statements. This is a trend through just about everything that you have posted. A good argument introduces exhibit “a” then provides support.

Here this is how you stood corrected “I know little about Chomsky’s personal finances. Your charge of hypocrisy may well apply.” WHile backpeddling on what you didn’t know about your own philosophical advocates that you are “intimately involved with” you attempted to go here. “However, it says nothing about other notable anarchists, much less the philosophy itself.” Oh really?

My point here is that your supposed philosophy of “collective anarchism” which you still fail to define, is a fraud. Why? Well, I could say that I am not a murderer, even though I have shot and killed someone—just because I say it doesn’t make it so. Chomsky said he was an anarchist, but protects his intellectual property.

Your assessment of objectivism is so ridiculous that I do not even want to begin to discuss it. Again when I critiqued Goldman I showed you evidence yet you still said it was in support of your assumption that she did not support women’s right to vote—if I am wrong here, please explain. Your criticism of Rand is just absurd, again you do not provide evidence to your claims. You say that I do quick internet searches which leads me to believe that this is, in fact your style.

You also evade questions like the plague. When you attempt to do not support anything that you say, it discredits you with the aura of a cowardice and evasion.

While you introduced me to new information on Chomsky, that’s not a correction. Repeatedly claiming it is does not help your case.

I’ll again suggest that you’re wasting your time asserting the collectivist anarchist tradition isn’t true anarchism. Modern usage of the term started with Proudhon, Bakunin, and Kropotkin.

With regards to Goldman, your evidence, the quotation, contradicts your argument. Read it again if you don’t believe me. Read the entire piece and you’ll get a fuller grasp of her position.

My understanding of Rand comes from both her work and accounts of her life. Since you refuse to do basic research, I’ll give you a website, though I doubt you’ll like it:

http://www.slate.com/id/2233966/

Damian, while I believe in the old saying that one should “keep your friends close and your enemies closer” there is a point of deminishing returns when talking to those who lack logic. For instance in the anarchist philosophies, anarchy means a society where individuals are free from coercion. This situations is alive and well in places like Somalia. The basic philosophy is terribly flawed, resutling in the dim wit of it’s followers. The rush to unseat legitimate authority in favor of chaos only results in restablishment of a different authority. At best the only potential positive outcome would be that the restablished authority would govern better than the previous. This is a terribly expensive endeavor, not to mention dangerously violent and chaotic as the definition infers.

Still some believers create a magical chaos fantasy that they perpetually long for due to their basic psychological problems with authority and authority figures. Civilization requires rules and laws and rules and laws require enforcment and so on.

The truth is, we do not live in a purely capitalist society. It is also a democracy and there are elements of socialism and arguably theocracy and dictatorship. Capitalism unchecked can create create monopolies which can control and rape consumers. Capitalism run amok can result in virtual slave labor.

I think some of you who make statements like “those who have problems with capitalism are jealous of the rich” look down on those who are less fortuante for whatever reason and are spiteful towards them. Some of you have really nasty attitudes. What always amazes me is that so many of these kinds of people are in actuality far from rich themselves and often vote and make arguements that would seem to go against their own personal interests. It’s like living a fantasy – they cherish the possibility of becoming filthy rich although they aren’t likely to attain such wealth. They seem to relish the huge gap between rich and poor.

Individuals are free from coercion in Somalia, slowhike? Do you even read what you type? You go on contradict yourself in the next few sentences. Keep up the good work, I guess.

Right on Rich, now we’re talking! That’s what I’m looking for.

Summerspeaker, you want to argue about Goldman? Fine, she is somebody I admittedly know little about. I am honestly going off of old knowledge and, yes, some quick internet searches which is easily done at the tip of my fingers. I would need to read her a bit more to understand her contradictions, but I have seen more of what I like than dislike, other than the “collectivism” and “anti-capitalism”.

Please just answer the question; was she against women’s right to vote? (women’s suffrage). Yes or no? That may have been my original misunderstanding and will stand corrected if she was against it.

I honestly do not understand your philosophy and have been trying to get it out of you for a good debate. I’m not attempting to play gotcha, just to discuss anarchism. I do not see anything wrong with someone changing a position or redeveloping a philosophy—its actually ridiculous to assume that we know everything. It makes our viewpoints stronger if we figure out where we share the same principles and standards. Its foolish to be stubborn about everything we think we know (close-minded). Chomsky is a fraud because he espouses such things but turns around and completely behaves differently. There is nothing more disgusting than someone who capitalizes off of hate for capitalism.

I see similarities, in anarchy, in my absolute belief in that every man (or woman) should have the absolute right to do whatever he may want as long as it does not physically hurt someone else. I loved the term “you are your own master”(brilliant)…I see things that Emma Goldman espoused that are in complete tune with objectivism and beautifully said—I do not see her as an enemy, just that she had some of her issues wrong (from what I understand currently). Understand that because someone is rich, it does not hurt me. Wealth, as I have said before, is created, its not a giant pie because nobody can claim how big that pie is.

A man without the opportunity at a factory job must work at something else to survive. He makes the choice to work for that factory.

I also believe in resistance and revolution to the current government. However, I believe that it must happen for reasons that we have strayed too far from individualism, what the founding fathers intended, and respect for each and every person’s unique ability. One can see this sort of tension building within current tea parties (although the left tries to marginalize them).

This is why I am confused with your philosophy: Collectivism is usually associated with the ideologies of fascism, communism and dictatorships. Collectivism holds that the group is supreme to the individual and the “common good” applies to the whole of that group (which I still cannot define the term). I know that I despise the idea of having to belong to a group and I am adamantly against violence—which I know peace can be found through respect for individual rights. But egalitarianism and equality require force to do so. Every man is unique in his ability.

IF I am wrong, please describe how. I want to join our common principles and find a common ground for peace. You originally seemed like you have the will power for liberty, which I appreciate. Its the equality that I need to understand.

Yay Rich,

OK, I agree with everything in first two sentences. The second two (3rd and 4th) are difficult. If you don’t mind lets start with how capitalism creates monopolies. I personally contend that monopolies are created by government by incorporating laws and regualations that small companies cannot compete with.

The rich stuff is pretty subjective and difficult—who cares if someone looks down on you? “What an asshole.” Is what I say. Right? People who behave this way tend not to have good relationships, but I may be wrong. I always have believed that the richest man is as happy as the poorest man—they just learn to appreciate different things. In other words, money does not bring happiness, its a shallow point of view.

Please just respond to the first part about monopolies.

Damian, as I mentioned earlier, Goldman opposed the suffrage movement because she considered voting useless. “If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal,” she famously said. As such, she thought fighting to extend the vote was a waste of time.

I’m not sure what I think of Chomsky’s wealth, but I’m confident the condemnation you’ve taken from Peter Schweizer is overblown. As I said, there’s no right way to live in an insane and oppressive system. I think Chomsky screwed up by having children – I can see how that would lead a person to horde cash. His speaking fees, if reported accurately, seem ridiculous and do suggest a certain cynicism or egotism. It definitely doesn’t work that way for lesser-known activists, who typically only ask for a plane ticket, a place to stay, and food to eat. In sum, I still respect his thought though I might relieve him of a few excess possession if I got the opportunity.

Getting to our major philosophical difference, anarchists consider property beyond personal possessions to be a form of coercion. We regard a capitalist’s claim to a factory or piece of land as you would regard my claim to own New Mexico. In many cases these days, owners hardly even see the properties they control, much less use them. This sort of domination is distinct from use of personal items and resembles the state on smaller scale. Bosses rule as petty tyrants, exiling employees who disobey. Government violence traditionally backs up the system, and how could it be otherwise? Why would workers submit to bosses without cops to prevent them from running the factories themselves? Without the law, capitalists would have tenuous existence based on either private thugs or social acceptance.

The worker’s ability to quit hardly makes this situation acceptable. The choice of masters is not freedom. Little exists outside the domain of either the state or capitalists. While my ideal would be individual self-sufficiency, humans live precariously without cooperation at present. Given this reality, we anarchists advocate liberating the means of production from the bosses and operating them to produce the necessities for everyone. Freedom means nothing without the basics of life.

Working together for mutual benefit does not require force. As free people we can decide to embrace fellowship and kindness. Assuming a lack of violence, would you rather live in a society based on competition and selfishness or cooperation and sharing? It’s not a difficult choice for me.

Good, now we are getting somewhere.

I have no problem with working within the “constraints of the system” as you stated. And Chomsky does do more harm than good to his following.

I agree, as a free people we can decide to embrace fellowship and kindness—yet as you said, we must live within the constraints of the system. ANd in capitalism people must work together for mutual benefit, bosses and employees alike. I contend that there a numerous great companies to work for out there, like the one I work for now. Actually, I own a portion of its stock. Thats not to say that it has its problems, like, using politicians to enact laws like “The Sunshine Act” that essentially limits any competition from smaller companies, the competition that keeps them in check. You see, there is competition for the best employees, in order to get them, you must provide incentive for them to work there.

If the master’s company goes bankrupt, say due to treating employees like shit, the boss is out that investment in the company—and should have been kinder from the beginning. The employees? Well, they can go elsewhere and are out a paycheck (or a few now) rather than an entire investment. Not to say that it takes them time to build this capital. Providing jobs is a good thing and a mutual benefit. Equating it to slavery is, do I dare say, a little dillusional.

And employees are an investment, by hiring one must train them, and if the employee leaves, that boss is out that investment as well.

Its difficult to make the case that bosses “hardly see” the properties that they control when a majority of businesses are small businesses and they would not make any money if they abandon it.

It pays off for them to treat their employees very well.

Rich Latta is correct, in essence we have phases and stages of a variation of government. It’s important to emphasize that regardless of the type of government in power, people still are at the helm. A bad person or person w/o skill, experience or insight can make a perfectly good government perform badly. Bush did this in Iraq, he made greivous strategy mistakes because he listed to Rumsfeld and Cheney. We see this most often today in the USA with politicians consumed with greed.

Anyway the anarchist vote for chaos or disruption of government and typically will switch horses in midstream when talk of coercion by authorities vs War Lord coercion in Somalia. It’s pretty much a trap or trick to get too involved in discussing the theory of anarchy; Goldman this and Chomsy that does make for an interesting discussion though. Pointless as it is. The issue is simple enough, even for me! Imagine we are playing poker and one of the players happens to be very good at it and wins most of my money. I come back night after night and play with a lot of players but my skill level is not on par with the winners. As a result I become frustrated and decide that after all it’s not fair that just because they have the talent to win and I don’t I should be “a winner”. As a matter of fact not only should I be a winner, but all the dregs in the casino should be winners. The only people who shouldn’t be winners are “the real winners” and the casino owners. So I just have to change the rules of the game, perhaps create a diversion, set off a bomb, maybe I’ll do many things or maybe I’ll just whine. The rest of the details about anarchacnoidism is just minor details.

Most people, like you or me, are good—even business owners, many of them are exactly like you or I. Making a profit does not make them evil neither does being rich. I admit I can’t stand some of the VPs at my company, as they do not know squat about business, and are arrogant about their status to the underlings. Thats their problem because most people can see through the bullshit, and people go out of their way to support those that are genuine.

Most people do want cooperation and sharing and these are not mutually exclusive from competition and selfishness—especially as a company. A company run by equal employees can easily out compete those of heirarchy and cutthroat competition, thats the beauty of it.

But there needs to be an incentive, and it is difficult to make it some sort of “peace and harmony” because people quickly take advantage of that—people are of different capabilities.

Damian, existing within the system doesn’t imply accepting its legitimacy. I’ll take a nice boss over a jerk, sure, but I’ll still struggle to free myself from all masters. Competition between bosses produces similar results to competition between monarchs – that’s no path to liberation.

slowhike, add one thing to your example it’s about on the money: everyone has to poker.

“slowhike, add one thing to your example it’s about on the money: everyone has to poker.”

How embarrassing. Let’s try this again, shall we?

slowhike, add one thing to your example and it’s about on the money: everyone has to play poker.

My apologies to all those harmed by my butchery of the English language.

Yes profit is evil and anarcy is blessed. Ho aha ha.
Right…….

But Summerspeaker,

You do not have to work for a master. In your proposed system, with collectivism as a standard, you either a) must depend on everyone always assuming that they are being treated equal, which is actually impossible if you think about it. or b) Must use force to make sure everyone is equal which usually ends up with having an elite status of the enforcers (or as history has proven).

Altruism is really a fake standard to imply. Everyone is selfish, it is buried in the genes of human nature. From charitable giving to earning a heap of wealth, everyone is “greedy” and its always those who have more than we do that we resent for it.

Get over it. Learn to coexist.

DO you really think that your system is realistic?? Or do you simply take your rebellious nature to its possible extreme without giving up your leftist viewpoints. You see, next to anarchy is a limited government, not communism, not fascism, and not collectivism. What you, and those that espouse, collective anarchism are really doing is taking two concepts from opposite sides of the spectrum and attempting to converge them. This is why is it so difficult to define terms, such as “the common good” or why it is so difficult to think past the revolutionary moment. It leaves you and me asking: Ok, now that we destroyed the lives of the competent— What next?

No, Damian, those aren’t the only options. While absolute equality may be unattainable or undesirable, the current hierarchy harms billions. The world desperately needs a heavy dose of egalitarianism. We’re in no danger going to far in that direction.

Note that I’m not advocating altruism but rather mutual aid and the individual right to decent life.

The common good I’m most interested in concerns consumption. I want everyone to have access to healthful food, comfortable housing, and quality medical care. Capitalism funnels human resources into extravagant luxuries while these basics go unmet.

I have a wealth of ideas about the structure of society I want to see, but you should keep in mind that the revolution never ends.

Yes the revolution continues but to what end? conmtinuous revolution?

The end of “mutual aid and the individual right to decent life,” or “access to healthful food, comfortable housing, and quality medical care.” Did you miss those parts of the post?

Clarification: “the end” as in response to “but to what end,” not “the end” as in the termination.

AJB, are you telling me that you actually, really and truly believe that there is some anarchist revolution currently operating that will, in the end, provide everyone with mutual aid (I’m not exactly sure what you mean by mutual aid) and the individual’s right to a decent life, access to health food, comfortable housing and quality medical care?

The revolution can already provide you with free food and, if you’re lucky and not picky, shelter.

Come by Food Not Bombs in front the UNM bookstore around noon Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for a bit of the former.

How would your society differ from all of the other societies founded on egalitarianism (which requires force).

Why does it require the use of force? Cause misery? Well because egalitarianism denies the laws of nature. Humans are not ants but rather think differently, work differently, desire different things—command different things for happiness.

How can one incorporate the laws of nature with egalitarianism? Specifically? Its quite difficult without oppression and misery. Its hardly the “oppression” because you can’t have everything that you want.

No answer? Good, I can see where we can agree on your ideas of egalitarianism falling flat.

not responding doesn’t equal giving in. you should know that, damian. You’ve not responded to me for a while in three posts now, but in none have I gone back to the post and childishly taunted you that you must know you are wrong because you don’t answer.

America is falling and is loseing it’s place,it’s identity, it’s culture. I live in Canada and it’s happening here too. Multi Culture, Multi Language, Multi Loyalty. It’s all falling apart.

~Sigh~Sure AJB.

You can claim victory if you like. I felt like the discussion was falling flat.

I’m attempting to get a response about a philosophy that I do not understand. Not trying to “win” anything. I don’t think either side is willing to concede defeat ever.

Like I said, its for fun, and I enjoy critical thinking. Free speech is a wonderful thing. I enjoy reading about the latest trendy philosopies of younger generations—anarchy is one of them.

What you need, Mr. Editor, is a chill pill and a wake up call. You are anti-immigrant if you think the only reason why people immigrate to the US if for “fancy cars and big houses.” Of course the only way to get those things is through the types of freedsoms we take for granted every day in the US. Freedom of speech can make you filthy rich (just ask Michael Moore), but it also can keep you from being shot. Try expressing your anti-government views even in mild volatile Mexico without fear of being targeted by armed gangs. In many if not most parts of the world it’s even worse. We in America have a basic right other than “crazy consumer crap” that millions of people seek: basically, it’s the right to be left alone.

Mario…
gangs do not = government in mexico. The gangs often express “anti-government views” all the time. Your point there is not well thought out. As for violence in Mexico, I’d also appreciate it if you thought a bit on that one too. The situation in Mexico has deteriorated exponentially since the signing of NAFTA, an agreement that exemplifies the consumerist, capitalist mentality that Don is deploring. So even if Mexicans are trying to escape the extra violence in their home country, and not for monetary gain at all, the problem is rooted in consumerism.
Mexico also has a history of freedom of expression. I’ve lived there, gone to school there, and I know that they treasure freedom of expression just as much as we do. The main reason they don’t have it (because they did, for a while) now, and they are in the economic state they are in, is consumerism, an ideal imported from the U.S., one that the U.S. excells at, and Mexico doesn’t.

OK,

First of all, don’t expect me to respond to your SPECIFIC points as if I’m supposed to understand your worldview.

Its not common knowledge if pop-culture icon Howard Zinn writes it either. I really feel old if thats where your worldview is coming from. The man is a propagandist. And he stands alone in a lot of his revision of history—your high school teachers should have taught you that (well, on second thought, mine didn’t either). His negative take on what the U.S. stands for says it all.

Look at this absurd claim:

“Objectivity is impossible,” Zinn once remarked, “and it is also undesirable. That is, if it were possible it would be undesirable, because if you have any kind of a social aim, if you think history should serve society in some way; should serve the progress of the human race; should serve justice in some way, then it requires that you make your selection on the basis of what you think will advance causes of humanity.”

Essentially he saying that history is not objective and one cannot really be sure of its true reality but [history] should be used to create social movements…thats propaganda…and you are falling for it (just like many do to Hannity). It couldn’t be anymore clear.

The reason that I am pointing this out is because I cannot win an argument with you. The core of what you believe is flawed and you want it badly to make sense—to be real—at any cost. ANd it is to an extent, but it puts focus on areas rather than a grasp for the entire picture. It teaches you to do the same in an argument.

For example, You are angry because I will not repond to the specific bleeding practices by Europeans. By elobarating on some detail that has little relevance to the entire civilization, its like pointing out some small feature to the entire Enlightment, Renaissance, and Age of Reason.

I simply enforcing the point that the Indian civilization (overall) has advanced by leaps and bounds since the landing of Columbus. The indians did far more than just ate each other, thats one small example of what existed prior to his landing and says only a fraction of the true picture. Life was comparbly miserable prior to what westerners brought them. They definately were not in some little Indian paradise, respecting private property, and living peacefully ( I know that you know this). They were comparably savage. The evidence is ovewhelming.

I’m not going to argue on your subjective viewpoints—Zinn, your source, even admits to these absurd rationalizations. You have a view that is not uncommon, but it happens in college because it is a cool and different way to view the world—one that teaches you that things can be viewed differently. I did the same, so I understand it clearly. If you are going to continue to attempt to convince me of some sort of cultural superiority of early native americans to the Europeans, we are finished.

In years past, the anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s 1492 voyage was an occasion to honor the explorer’s courage and to rejoice in the spread of Western civilization across a savage wilderness. More recently, however, advocates like Zinn, of multiculturalism have damned Columbus and the New World’s settlers as brutal conquerors who destroyed a pristine Indian paradise. Columbus Day, we are told, should be spent in atonement and repentance-or be discarded in favor of “Indigenous Peoples Day.”

Unjustifed guilt-mongering about Columbus Day improperly blackens the reputation of Western civilization while obscuring the harsh realities of life in the Stone Age of early America.

I support the objective superiority of western civilization to savagery. On Columbus Day, individuals of ALL ancestries should guiltlessly celebrate Western civilization’s core values—reason, science, technology, progress, capitalism, individual rights, law and the selfish pursuit of individual happiness here on earth.

I support treating immigrants as criminals and sending them packing. These mainly economic refugees from the corrupt country of Mexico are not our problem.

You are a buffoon AJB. Show us your citizenship papers.