Comments by "Ōkami-san" (@mweibleii) on "The REAL "austerity" agenda is to privatize the commons" video.

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  2. Gordon Bradley China. S. Korea. Taiwan. Vietnam. E. Germany. Russia. Much of Africa. As we've hemorrhaged civil liberties the people of these nations across the last 50 years have gained personal civil liberties and the corresponding economic prosperity. Don't worry, we're getting more Progressive taxation, more progressive regulations, more progressive licencing and we will become poorer. Oh, and to make sure everyone pays their 'fair share' for the 'good of society' we all get to lose our personal privacy and live in a Police State.   I grew up in the USA and I've lived in many countries and I'll tell you now, I've only experienced the Police presence like in the USSA in a few Communist countries I've visited. I was only in the USSA for a day and I drove past 15 State police on the highway and was almost run off the road by one within 5 minutes of leaving the airport in a rental car. Literally, I looked into my mirror and was so startled to see a State Police car, on a country road (teeny airport), nearly a foot off my back bumper I nearly swerved into a ditch.   See, you don't get to redistribute wealth without a Police State. And when you try, it's going to be the poor and middle class who are the one's having their wealthy redistributed to the richest most well connected in society. All your regulations only make it nearly impossible for the poor to start a business, while at the same time making it easy for franchises to corner the market. Thus the poor are stuck as workers in low end jobs instead of owners of their own businesses.  Your good intentions are destroying, and will eventually destroy, society. The more you turn to the Government to fix problems - the worse you make those very same problems. Example: Progressives wanted 'free' education. Now we pay more than most nations for Government Schooling and 1 in 5 Government School graduates are functionally illiterate. Literacy rates among Blacks is lower NOW (in come areas) than it was 105 years ago. A century of "FREE" education has nearly destroyed education.  The Road to HELL is paved with Good Intentions.  You'll see. This is going to be playing out for decades to come. Life in the USA is going to get worse. 
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  5. bohemianwriter1 Let me repeat myself: In Australia there's a Public Healthcare system where ANYONE can go to for FREE. And there's a Private Healthcare network where everyone WANTS to go.  Why is that? Ohhhh.... .that's right, because when you're going in for surgery, you really don't give two shits about the interpersonal disposition of your surgeon and her/his personal motivation. What you care about, the ONLY THING, you care about - is competence. Can they do the surgery. Guess what? When given the choice, people are more than happy to pay for private healthcare to ensure they get treated by a competent doctor rather than take a chance with a FREE Public Healthcare provided doctor. These are the facts.   I personally find Japanese private doctors to be both of high quality, competent, and of a reasonable price. We paid $5400 for 3.5 week stay in a PRIVATE hospital in Japan PLUS the actual procedure. The procedure alone would have cost $12,500 in the USA and in Australia it would cost $15,500. That's not counting the full 3.5 weeks in hospital bed hooked up to IV. Of course, Japan trains the most doctors per population, builds the technology use in the hospitals (fMRI etc...) and develops pretty much all of their own pharmaceuticals - all of which massively lower costs of healthcare. Anyway, the fact is Australia has FREE healthcare. All citizens are covered. Yet, when offered a choice, almost everyone who can afford to, goes to Private hospitals. See, much like our over-budget expensive Government Schools with the 1 in 5 functional illiteracy graduate rate, subpar may be good enough for Government Work, but when it comes to health, most people want a bit better. 
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  7. bohemianwriter1 The first thing I'd ask is if Noraway is multicultureal? Do you have no-go zones in your cities? You know, full-on ghettos where the police don't go to unless in riot gear? DO you have 5 generation single mother farms? Where one mother has had children by 5 different men and many children don't know their fathers? Is your nation one that makes up phony reasons to invade other nations? You know, pretend to be attacked and then invade Vietnam. Wait a generation and rinse and repeat with the middle east? Is is possible in your nation to ride a bicycle without a helmet? Are teens allowed to snowball fight without being shot by a cop? If a man was selling a $0.20 cent cigarette would he be strangled to death by the police?  Do Government School GRADUATES pass without being able to read and write? In the USA, Government School graduates have a functional illiteracy rate of 1 in 5. Oh, and the general population reads (and thinks) at the 8th grade level. Oh, and 1 in 6 are totally illiterate and cannot read or write. I'll tell you what. Why don't we agree that what works in oil-rich (nearly monocultureal) Norway probably isn't going to work in pop-culture USA. You want to know what the American dream is? Getting on disability and playing video games while watching pop culture on your smart phone.  Yes, I agree that healthcare doesn't work in the USA. NOT because it's not Public Healthcare, but because it's Fascistic Healthcare where a small cartel control the numbers of healthcare providers, hospitals, etc... and use their State-given monopoly to rent-seek and regulatory capture the hyper-regulated healthcare markets.  How about this? We open up the flood gates and let all these functional illiterate thieves move to Norway? Then you you can see how well Norway' system works at providing healthcare and other benefits to lying, cheating, scamming Americans who will say and do anything to take as much as possible from the "Commons" without giving anything in return. Yeah, I'm all for it. Is tomorrow good for you? Because, we can send over 10s of millions of functional illiterate Americans. I promise, your 'free' healthcare will collapse within a month.  What works in Norway works in Norway because most Norwegians are hardworking honest people who probably care for one another. Don't make the mistake of thinking other's think like this. Your culture didn't just POOF into existence. The same is true of monocultureal Japan - it's pretty good. But, as I've lived in both (as well as others) I can tell you right now, it will NOT WORK IN THE USA. What works in the USA is freedom and free markets. This is the ONLY way to keep Americans honest. The day you let the Government provide a service, is the day you embark on becoming a neo-Fascist warmongering State that we actually ARE today. Again, the USA government is spending $600 BILLION losing the Wars for another year. THIS is what Americans want - kill people, take their resources, and consume pop-culture. 
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  9. bohemianwriter1  I actually think we agree on many things. Although I'd choose Finland over Norway in terms of Government structured education. That said, currently Norway is no where near a multicultural country - at least not relative to the USA, Australia or England. According to a 2012 survey 86.2% of the total population have at least one parent who is born in Norway and of the immigrants most come from Europe or other western nations.  I've been in no-go zones in England as well as Australia and both of these countries are structured quite similar to Norway with Government provided healthcare and education (of course, the education is crap compared with Norway, but that's down to Norwegians themselves and how they value education). Talk to me when 50% of Norway is immigrants. Or when Norway has no-go zones where you're likely to be shot at night for walking around in areas you do not belong. Just wait until you have multi-generational welfare ghettos. Then you'll see the system you enjoy no longer functions cost-effectively. Then you will need to either raise taxes higher, until a point where you cannot afford to raise them any higher, or you'll have to cut services. It's that simple. There's no 'magic' way of doing things - IMO. Things are done by people, you just happen to have a lot of good honest hard-working ones. Society must have built in bullshit detectors that shut down the bad apples (this happens in Japan quite effectively via shaming and shunning).   Not to mention, Norway's oil-fund is an added bonus. When that's defunct, then you'll have a harder time paying for the social services you enjoy. Include healthcare and education. UAE and KSA also offer a lot of social services - I remember when Kuwait used to give everyone that was a citizen a ton of money. I knew people who were paid $35,000 a year just for being born in UAE. So? Why don't you do that they'd say? I mean, it seemed to work for them. Maybe the USA would work better with a Sultan? Of course, they were all as lazy as could be - and just had the good fortune of living on top of an oil supply. Dumb luck. But, if you asked them, it was insert some irrational post-hoc justification. Norway works because of geographical location and resources, but most importantly because it has a lot of Norwegians.  When that changes, then it will not longer function. I've seen it many many times, over and over, again and again. When its done, its done. I'm very happy Japan has politely resisted too much immigration - although there certainly is immigration. Just a small amount. And people are expected to integrate, NOT retain their own culture. If they want they're own culture, they can just as easily leave. Note: Everyone wants a society that has good inexpensive healthcare, good education and is safe. Everyone wants to live where they have lots of opportunity.  This comes by maximizing personal civil liberty. Not by more regulation, but by more freedom.  
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  10. bohemianwriter1 I certainly do not disagree that religious fundamentalists are a nuisance. But that's it. They cannot use the State against other's who are atheist. This is not true when it comes to another religious Theocracy: Progressive Socialists. See, the Progressive CAN use the State to murder me if I attempt to live a life, as an adult, in a manner that does not harm others, but runs counter to their superstitious ideas about what's 'good for society'. As an example, suppose I wanted to open a eatery where people can smoke? Well well. The Progressive says this is bad for society and thus is illegal. See? They're the new Morality Police. The other side of the Theocracy coin, but still the same coin. If I attempted to open a smoking eatery I'd be put in jail - maybe even killed if I resisted being put in a State-run cage. So, I like everyone else just shuts up and never opens a smoking eatery. Of course, I don't smoke, but that's my example. Big State, Little God Big God, Little State - People need their superstition, one way or the other. Life in the USA is going to probably get worse on many levels. I think technology will advance, and those will high-level skills will do well, but most will be poorer. They'll work longer and for a lot less. It's pretty sad. Particularly when everything we needed was laid out and working well by the middle-late 1800s. But, much like everything else, people just can't leave well enough enough and will violate any and every moral rule for the "Good of Society". The Road straight into Hell is clearly paved with good intentions
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  12. bohemianwriter1 I'm not "demonizing" immigrants. I'm saying that when you live in a monoculture, you can enjoy some level of the Commons due to the monoculture. When you don't - you can't.  This means, when you live in a multicultureal society, it's structure must be different. History shows quite clearly that multicultureal societies are best run when people who live in them are free to trade with one another with limited, very limited, government interference. This forces the people in these societies to deal with the inherent problems that arise when living in such a society.  Example: In Japan it's common to have beer vending machines - all around town. You can walk over to a vending machine and buy a beer pretty much any time you'd like. You're free to do that. You can also drink it right there on the street. No one does, because in a monocultural there's pressure not to. And young people rarely buy beer. Why? Because in a monoculture this is shameful. Oh, and they're never pilfered. Why? Because Japanese just don't do that sort of thing. Now, just how long do you think vending machines with beer would last in the USA before kids where buying beer and criminals where breaking into them and stealing? A day maybe - at best. So in the USA the government simply outlaws these machines. This means society never has to deal with the underlying issues. Are you seeing my point yet? I'm saying that in multicultreal societies we need LESS government and we need to deal with these issues. That can ONLY happen through free markets - which is to say, free people. Sure, maybe the vending machines disappear from the market. Or maybe they don't. But it's up to free people to decide. NOT a Police State. I hope I made myself clearer. I've been an immigrant in 5 countries, I have no problem with immigration. I also have no problem with the lack of it either. 
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  13. bohemianwriter1 Oh, I should mention, my family is not white. You seem to have come to the conclusion my family is European in origin, half of it is Japanese. The other half is mixed Irish, German, Jewish, Christian, etc.... some people in my immediate family do not speak English. Or, very limited at best. I don't disagree that poverty is linked to violence. And free-markets create prosperity thus, we should maximize freedom if we want to live in a less violent world. The USA is NOT a free-market. Did you know in some states you need a liscence to fix a PC, or to cut hair, or even to go out of business? The USA is a Fascist State with Progressive written all over it. We're war mongers too. We have a central banking cartel that just bailed out those richest 1%.  IF we lived in a true free-market, many of those richest 1% would be totally wiped out. Broke. But this isn't what happened. The State everyone loves bailed them out. That's Fascism, not free-markets.  The oil was luck, not a virtue. Yes, your oil fund can be spent wisely. But it doesn't have to be spent wisely. If could just as easily be squandered. Now, here I note you used the word "We" - as in we Norwegians. That's interesting, give the other half of your post. Suppose most of the immigrants would like to spend all of that oil money here and now. I know many Americans would. We blow through $100 billion a year just in our Government run education system - only to produce a 1 in 5 functionally illiterate graduating class each year. Oh, and we blow through $600 billion a year losing the War and have done so for over a decade.  Must be nice to live in a society where everyone is on the same page regarding how to save and invest - I bet you like that, huh?
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  21. bohemianwriter1 Corporations do not 'own' Government. This simply is not factually true. No one 'owns' the Government. To be clear, what you meant to say was the people hired for the Government, often make policy decisions in the favour of Corporations and/or Businesses and/or other Private groups of individuals. YES! This is why we need to LIMIT government's ability to interfere in our lives - particularly around the ability to trade.  But, this is the thing, you support Government doing this. For example, one hundred and twenty years ago most people were educated at home and by private schools and private tutors. Interestingly enough, Black Americans living in Chicago in 1910 had a hire literacy rate THEN compared with NOW. But, people want "Free" - right? And, whenever people want something but don't want to pay for it, they simply ask the Government to provide it and call it "Progressive". This may be Schooling, it may be War, it may be Water - pretty much anything. Well, guess what? When the Government stepped into the education-market, it put a lot of private businesses OUT of business. This means, as a School, you either became a Public School or you could try desperately to remain Private and compete against 'Free' education (and some did, but most went bankrupt or they lobbied Government to ensure they were funded too). Worse still, we haven't seen hardly any innovation in education - if anything it's getting worse with 1 in 5 Government Schools graduates functionally illiterate. So? IS this an example of 'Corporations' (in this case schools) buying off Government? Or, now that Government Schooling seems 'normal' is it just a 'public service'? The same is true of the American Medical Association. This is a private fraternity of medical doctors who now, through the Government, have the legal right to bar entry into their market. The AMA uses the Government to ensure they regulatory-capture the once-upon-a-time-free markets (this is called rent-seeking by way). However, I'm sure you support having the AMA decide for you, who can be a State licensed doctor. Well, given this actually IS part of what I do - I can safely tell you, it's not ideal. It's both unfair to many more than capable students and it's also immoral as it leave the decision up to a handful of people who, most of time, don't HAVE the time to properly ensure the best are 'chosen'. As a matter of fact - this is an impossible task. It's unknowable who will make a good doctor. The only sound method is a free-market. But, again, you prefer we decide. You do know Universities are run like Corporations - right? So, here we have yet another example where you probably support "Corporations". And I could list many many many MANY examples of where this occurs. And, I will tell you right now, the ONLY (and I mean ONLY) way to eliminate corporations, be they a net gain or net loss to society, from using Government is by LIMITING government. Limiting government is the ONLY way. Oh, and as for medicine, you have a 1 in 12 chance of being misdiagnosed, 1 in 23 chance of seeing someone incompetent and a 1 in 76 chance of seeing someone who chose medicine because they, seem to, enjoy when people die - possibly even outright misdiagnosing and purposefully killing people. Preventable Death caused by medicine (unintentional) was 90,000 in 1990, in 2010 it jumped to 480,000 EACH YEAR. Add an additional 3 - 5 MILLION seriously harmed for life. EACH YEAR. Yet, I bet you like having 'free' healthcare? I bet you like the idea of affordable safe medicine. Well, sorry, but the ONLY way to provide that is a free-market. Likewise with education. Likewise with internet, electronics, automation, pharmaceuticals, relationships, everything. The answer is MORE freedom - NOT LESS.
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  26. bohemianwriter1 My employer does not 'own' me. I own my body and I sell my body's labor.  We freely attempt to sell our labor IF we are laborers and then it's up to someone to freely decide if they do or do not want to buy that labor. If you have a highly marketable skill, and you're honest, and you work productively, then you'll have no difficulty selling your labor hours into the market making an easy 6 figures a year. My cousin recently graduated from University with a computer programming degree (only girl to graduate with actual computer programming skills that year - most do webdesign etc...) and yes, it took her about 8 months to find a job. Yes, she was depressed. But guess what, 1 year later and she's offered jobs at a rate of one a month. She's known a hard worker, speaks fluent Japanese, and is very productive and efficient at her job. She also scored the highest score on the companies logic test in it's history (based in London).  See, she's not a slave. AND in free-markets people like her are free to quit and go start up their own competing company. This means that the labor pool shrinks and the price of labor goes up due to limited supply. But, in our Progressive hyper-Regulated Social paradise, millions and millions and millions of regualtions, unsound fiat currency, high minimum labor price and a zillion other laws prevent people from even bothering to try to open up a business. And why would you bother? All you'd get is accused that you 'OWN' people - this is how you opened your post. Thus, labor supply is over-supplied and the price of labor is low (particuarly if you don't have a high skill set) and this is actually what we do see in our society. If you think it's so easy being an owner - go start a business. I've had to manage people who were so lazy I paid them for 8 months NOT to come into work just to finish off their contract. At my level, I pay people for the job they do, some like to come in at 6am and leave at 1 pm, others like to come in at 11am and leave at 6 pm. I really don't care.  Let's not pretend I 'own' them. They own me, I depend on them. I work much harder and much longer than they do. I also worry about their futures because I know times are tight and soon they won't be working for me. I work hard FOR them so that they are able to do well for themselves.  People spend 12-30 years just preparing the skills to sell their labor. AND you pretend the corporations 'owns' them?! Come off it. Anyone can quite and go try their luck at starting a company. See how quickly you finf life on the 'Owners' side of the fence a lot more work, effort and risk, with a lot less reward. There's no 'free' time either. You work to keep the business going 7 days a week, 12-14 hours a day. No vacation time off. At least, not mentally. When you walk past a Starbucks and choose not buy a coffee - YOU may be putting a barista our of business because you chose not to buy from them that day. Does this mean you OWN them? No, it doesn't. It means you do not want to buy what they are selling. And guess what? They don't have to sell to you. If you BOTH agree, then this is the free-markets. Win-Win. Value for Value. The exact same principle holds true for labor and corporations. 
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  28. silat13 Still with the strawman? Don't you get tired of your fallacious reasoning? Doesn't unreasonable babble-thinking give you a headache? Anyway, limited government is what works and limited government enforced common law, property rights and contract law. As for corporations 'buying' their way out of the law. This simply doesn't happen when a random jury is used. If Steve Jobs were to stab someone, and it went to jury, he'd most likely be sent to prison (if her were alive) - regardless of if he was CEO of the world's largest corporation.  Further, quite frankly I think you'd have to be paranoid to think you need to give up your personal privacy (NSA spying) and civil liberties (Drug War) and pay the State a tax on labor (Income Tax) all because you're scared big scary Apply Inc, Microsoft, Toyota, Sony, etc... and going to somehow harm you. Frankly, I'd suggest growing a pair of balls and manning up. I mean Jesus f*cking Christ. Your mama still spoon feeding you too? I think, as adults, I can negotiate the big scary Honda without having to live in a Police State. Which is why, one day, hopefully, States within the USA will succeed from the Union. That way, you can go live with the Progressive Socialists and Warmongers who will keep you safe from yourself with millions and millions of regulations and those of use who are competent adults will use limited Law and Limited Government together with sound money to create prosperity. In the meantime, enjoy the Police State, it's never going away in your life time, so, you don't need to worry about it.
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