Political Compass test
03-13-2012, 02:16 PM
#167
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My original thesis was that the "pendulum was going to swing the other way" because the Fed Gov will default, and its budget cut. Power is going to return back to the States, closer to the Constitution. (Minarchy) As the U.S. Empire ends, this would be a favorable transition.
To briefly re-cap and summarize the thread so far:
Jason: It would be really nice if the US government just went away.
Me: And how do you propose that such a transition be implemented, from a practical standpoint?
Jason: You know, just let the Fed default and collapse and it'll all work out fine.
Me: Speaking from a position of historical precedent, dismantling large federal governments (or attempting to do so) has always resulted in some combination of civil war, economic chaos, the formation of an ever larger and more totalitarian central government, the collapse of western civilization and the beginning of the Dark Ages, etc.
Me: Furthermore, the trend in recent times, looking at the EU as an example, has generally been towards increased consolidation of monetary and economic power into a centralized, Federal-style authority, with more countries lining up every day voluntarily seeking admission into the EU / EMU.
Me: Given that, how do you propose that your plan be implemented such that the aforementioned perils (war / communism / dark ages / etc) be avoided? And how do you explain the apparent contradiction between the foundation of your argument (that de-centralized economic and monetary policy is good) vs. the fact that the majority of Europe seems to think quite the opposite, and are actively moving towards a more highly centralized model?
Jason: It would be really nice if the US government just went away.
Last edited by Joe Perez; 03-13-2012 at 03:21 PM.
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03-13-2012, 02:48 PM
#168
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Jason, to be perfectly honest I can't figure out whether you are completely missing the point (in which case I can try harder to explain, using clearer language), or whether you have been rendered speechless and unable to formulate a response, and have thus decided to change the vector of the conversation.
I'm calling it Gearhead's law.
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03-14-2012, 12:33 PM
#169
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Jason, to be perfectly honest I can't figure out whether you are completely missing the point (in which case I can try harder to explain, using clearer language), or whether you have been rendered speechless and unable to formulate a response, and have thus decided to change the vector of the conversation.
To briefly re-cap and summarize the thread so far:
Jason: It would be really nice if the US government just went away.
Joe: And how do you propose that such a transition be implemented, from a practical standpoint?
Jason: You know, just let the Fed default and collapse and it'll all work out fine.
To briefly re-cap and summarize the thread so far:
Jason: It would be really nice if the US government just went away.
Joe: And how do you propose that such a transition be implemented, from a practical standpoint?
Jason: You know, just let the Fed default and collapse and it'll all work out fine.
Joe: Speaking from a position of historical precedent, dismantling large federal governments (or attempting to do so) has always resulted in some combination of civil war, economic chaos, the formation of an ever larger and more totalitarian central government, the collapse of western civilization and the beginning of the Dark Ages, etc.
Joe: [/B]Furthermore, the trend in recent times, looking at the EU as an example, has generally been towards increased consolidation of monetary and economic power into a centralized, Federal-style authority, with more countries lining up every day voluntarily seeking admission into the EU / EMU.
The ONE and ONLY good thing about the efforts of the NWO types is the free trade (lack of tariffs). I understand you are a believer in tariffs (aka a tax paid by consumers on goods made overseas), and that's another story. I believe in de-centralizing power, and de-centralized power which has no authority nor clout to impose tariffs (e.g. Why should Apple in Cupertino be taxed for buying capacitors from Capxon in Shenzhen China?) The open borders between EU members is not something that you need a centralized gov't for. Free trade means individuals and companies are free to trade between borders, not a bunch of rules governing trade. The former doesn't require gov't oversight, the latter does. The EU uses open trade as a carrot for members to join, and applies tariffs to outsiders. If they didn't apply tariffs and different rules to immigrants and transactions from outsiders then there would be no incentive for outsiders to join.
Joe: Given that, how do you propose that your plan be implemented such that the aforementioned perils (war / communism / dark ages / etc) be avoided? And how do you explain the apparent contradiction between the foundation of your argument (that de-centralized economic and monetary policy is good) vs. the fact that the majority of Europe seems to think quite the opposite, and are actively moving towards a more highly centralized model?
If the Fed Gov loses budget and power the States merely follow the Constitution and exercise the 10th Amendment, and everything stays within the legal framework.
A Wyoming legislator attempted to pass a "Doomsday Bill" to deal with the "collapse" of the Fed Gov and the USD:
http://www.examiner.com/finance-exam...ollapse-the-us
"Doomsday" and "collapse" is IMO a misnomer because I think what's most likely is something closer to Greece (Scrappy's MMT notwithstanding). The Fed Gov budget effectively shrinks whether the politicians like it or not, and reduced budget means reduced power. DC's entitlement groups and gravy train recipients will be the first to suffer cuts - gov't union pensions, medicare, social security recipients, and the military budget are the easiest ones to cut. This will not lead to an "economic collapse", it means certain groups get stiffed and will have to go back to earning a productive living, or get their handouts from charity instead of from Uncle Sam.
I've lived in other countries and one thing I noted about the USA is that a good % of its people are pragmatic and hardworking. When faced with tough conditions they get down and work through it and don't complain so much. (welfare eaters notwithstanding). I also see that more and more people the past 10 years are starting to realize that the Fed Gov is a bunch of thieves and liars and that their promises are empty. I see that more of these people will not allow a more tyrannical form of central gov't to rise if this one loses power.
A successful revolution is one of ideas, a bloodless one.
Last edited by JasonC SBB; 03-14-2012 at 12:47 PM.
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03-22-2012, 09:33 PM
#174
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Took one o' theses years ago. Not much different. One choice missing in selections, 'neutral'. I'm usually closer to center.
Most Americans will fall in the left low quadrant. Euros are more right.
Frikkin' fascists.
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03-23-2012, 09:22 AM
#175
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then according to this chart, they'd plot more north & left, not nessecarily right. I plotted more right then anyone else here and I'm far from a facist. If I had to define myself, I'd fall into some Constitutionalist category...which is all about a limited government and the power of the people.
---dictatorship
statism + capitalism
----freedom
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03-27-2012, 02:38 PM
#176
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Fascism, according to the American Heritage Dictionary (1983) is A system of government that exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with belligerent nationalism. Italian philosopher Giovanni Gentile's entry in the Encyclopedia Italiana read: Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power. No less an authority on fascism than Mussolini was so pleased with that definition that he later claimed credit for it.
Nevertheless, within certain US circles,the misconception remains that fascism is essentially left wing, and that the ***** were socialists simply because of the "socialism" in their name. We wonder if respondents who insist on uncritically accepting the *****' cynical self-definition would be quite as eager to believe that the German Democratic Republic was democratic.
Nevertheless, within certain US circles,the misconception remains that fascism is essentially left wing, and that the ***** were socialists simply because of the "socialism" in their name. We wonder if respondents who insist on uncritically accepting the *****' cynical self-definition would be quite as eager to believe that the German Democratic Republic was democratic.
For Shyts&Giggles:
Right-wing: http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Right-wing
Left-Wing: http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Left-wing_politics
Last edited by RattleTrap; 03-27-2012 at 03:12 PM.
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03-27-2012, 02:43 PM
#177
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cool story. but:
Originally Posted by THIS TEST
The chart also makes clear that, despite popular perceptions, the opposite of fascism is not communism but anarchism (ie liberal socialism), and that the opposite of communism ( i.e. an entirely state-planned economy) is neo-liberalism (i.e. extreme deregulated economy)
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03-27-2012, 05:10 PM
#178
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They can't even get it together.
I get what you're saying anyway.
The 'Compass' probably has become inadequate. A waterfall or cube would probably be better.
There's also the question of ideology and practical application.
I get what you're saying anyway.
The 'Compass' probably has become inadequate. A waterfall or cube would probably be better.
There's also the question of ideology and practical application.
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03-31-2012, 02:21 PM
#179
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i agree.
but also the heritage dictionary gives this as the definition of fascism:
1. oftena. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
b. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.
I'd argue that the concept of it being "right" is somewhat off-base, especially if you look at the same heritage definition of conservatism which is something to the note of "opposing achieve social change though legislation"
but i digress and just leave you all with this:
If the term “statism” designates concentration of power in the state at the expense of individual liberty, then Nazism in politics was a form of statism. In principle, it did not represent a new approach to government; it was a continuation of the political absolutism—the absolute monarchies, the oligarchies, the theocracies, the random tyrannies—which has characterized most of human history.
In degree, however, the total state does differ from its predecessors: it represents statism pressed to its limits, in theory and in practice, devouring the last remnants of the individual. Although previous dictators (and many today, e.g., in Latin America) often preached the unlimited power of the state, they were on the whole unable to enforce such power. As a rule, citizens of such countries had a kind of partial “freedom,” not a freedom-on-principle, but at least a freedom-by-default.
Even the latter was effectively absent in **** Germany. The efficiency of the government in dominating its subjects, the all-encompassing character of its coercion, the complete mass regimentation on a scale involving millions of men—and, one might add, the enormity of the slaughter, the planned, systematic mass slaughter, in peacetime, initiated by a government against its own citizens—these are the insignia of twentieth-century totalitarianism (**** and communist), which are without parallel in recorded history. In the totalitarian regimes, as the Germans found out after only a few months of Hitler’s rule, every detail of life is prescribed, or proscribed. There is no longer any distinction between private matters and public matters. “There are to be no more private Germans,” said Friedrich Sieburg, a **** writer; “each is to attain significance only by his service to the state, and to find complete self-fulfillment in this service.” “The only person who is still a private individual in Germany,” boasted Robert Ley, a member of the **** hierarchy, after several years of **** rule, “is somebody who is asleep.”
In place of the despised “private individuals,” the Germans heard daily or hourly about a different kind of entity, a supreme entity, whose will, it was said, is what determines the course and actions of the state: the nation, the whole, the group. Over and over, the Germans heard the idea that underlies the advocacy of omnipotent government, the idea that totalitarians of every kind stress as the justification of their total states: collectivism.
Collectivism is the theory that the group (the collective) has primacy over the individual. Collectivism holds that, in human affairs, the collective—society, the community, the nation, the proletariat, the race, etc.—is the unit of reality and the standard of value. On this view, the individual has reality only as part of the group, and value only insofar as he serves it; on his own he has no political rights; he is to be sacrificed for the group whenever it—or its representative, the state—deems this desirable.
Contrary to the Marxists, the ***** did not advocate public ownership of the means of production. They did demand that the government oversee and run the nation’s economy. The issue of legal ownership, they explained, is secondary; what counts is the issue of control. Private citizens, therefore, may continue to hold titles to property—so long as the state reserves to itself the unqualified right to regulate the use of their property.
If “ownership” means the right to determine the use and disposal of material goods, then Nazism endowed the state with every real prerogative of ownership. What the individual retained was merely a formal deed, a contentless deed, which conferred no rights on its holder. Under communism, there is collective ownership of property de jure. Under Nazism, there is the same collective ownership de facto.
It took centuries and a brain-stopping chain of falsehoods to bring a whole people to the state of Hitler-worship. Modern German culture, including its **** climax, is the result of a complex development in the history of philosophy, involving dozens of figures stretching back to the beginnings of Western thought. The same figures helped to shape every Western nation; but in other countries, to varying extents, the results were mixed, because there was also an opposite influence or antidote at work. In Germany, by the turn of our century, the cultural atmosphere was unmixed; the traces of the antidote had long since disappeared, and the intellectual establishment was monolithic.
If we view the West’s philosophic development in terms of essentials, three fateful turning points stand out, three major philosophers who, above all others, are responsible for generating the disease of collectivism and transmitting it to the dictators of our century.
The three are: Plato—Kant—Hegel. (The antidote to them is: Aristotle.)
No weird cultural aberration produced Nazism. No intellectual lunatic fringe miraculously overwhelmed a civilized country. It is modern philosophy—not some peripheral aspect of it, but the most central of its mainstreams—which turned the Germans into a nation of killers.
The land of poets and philosophers was brought down by its poets and philosophers.
Twice in our century Germany fought to rule and impose its culture on the rest of the world. It lost both wars. But on a deeper level it is achieving its goal nevertheless. It is on the verge of winning the philosophical war against the West, with everything this implies.
and last and not least:
but also the heritage dictionary gives this as the definition of fascism:
1. oftena. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
b. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.
I'd argue that the concept of it being "right" is somewhat off-base, especially if you look at the same heritage definition of conservatism which is something to the note of "opposing achieve social change though legislation"
but i digress and just leave you all with this:
The difference between [socialism and fascism] is superficial and purely formal, but it is significant psychologically: it brings the authoritarian nature of a planned economy crudely into the open.
The main characteristic of socialism (and of communism) is public ownership of the means of production, and, therefore, the abolition of private property. The right to property is the right of use and disposal. Under fascism, men retain the semblance or pretense of private property, but the government holds total power over its use and disposal.
The dictionary definition of fascism is: “a governmental system with strong centralized power, permitting no opposition or criticism, controlling all affairs of the nation (industrial, commercial, etc.), emphasizing an aggressive nationalism . . .” [The American College Dictionary,
New York: Random House, 1957.]
Under fascism, citizens retain the responsibilities of owning property, without freedom to act and without any of the advantages of ownership. Under socialism, government officials acquire all the advantages of ownership, without any of the responsibilities, since they do not hold title to the property, but merely the right to use it—at least until the next purge. In either case, the government officials hold the economic, political and legal power of life or death over the citizens.
Needless to say, under either system, the inequalities of income and standard of living are greater than anything possible under a free economy—and a man’s position is determined, not by his productive ability and achievement, but by political pull and force.
Under both systems, sacrifice is invoked as a magic, omnipotent solution in any crisis—and “the public good” is the altar on which victims are immolated. But there are stylistic differences of emphasis. The socialist-communist axis keeps promising to achieve abundance, material comfort and security for its victims, in some indeterminate future. The fascist-**** axis scorns material comfort and security, and keeps extolling some undefined sort of spiritual duty, service and conquest. The socialist-communist axis offers its victims an alleged social ideal. The fascist-**** axis offers nothing but loose talk about some unspecified form of racial or national “greatness.” The socialist-communist axis proclaims some grandiose economic plan, which keeps receding year by year. The fascist-**** axis merely extols leadership—leadership without purpose, program or direction—and power for power’s sake.
The main characteristic of socialism (and of communism) is public ownership of the means of production, and, therefore, the abolition of private property. The right to property is the right of use and disposal. Under fascism, men retain the semblance or pretense of private property, but the government holds total power over its use and disposal.
The dictionary definition of fascism is: “a governmental system with strong centralized power, permitting no opposition or criticism, controlling all affairs of the nation (industrial, commercial, etc.), emphasizing an aggressive nationalism . . .” [The American College Dictionary,
New York: Random House, 1957.]
Under fascism, citizens retain the responsibilities of owning property, without freedom to act and without any of the advantages of ownership. Under socialism, government officials acquire all the advantages of ownership, without any of the responsibilities, since they do not hold title to the property, but merely the right to use it—at least until the next purge. In either case, the government officials hold the economic, political and legal power of life or death over the citizens.
Needless to say, under either system, the inequalities of income and standard of living are greater than anything possible under a free economy—and a man’s position is determined, not by his productive ability and achievement, but by political pull and force.
Under both systems, sacrifice is invoked as a magic, omnipotent solution in any crisis—and “the public good” is the altar on which victims are immolated. But there are stylistic differences of emphasis. The socialist-communist axis keeps promising to achieve abundance, material comfort and security for its victims, in some indeterminate future. The fascist-**** axis scorns material comfort and security, and keeps extolling some undefined sort of spiritual duty, service and conquest. The socialist-communist axis offers its victims an alleged social ideal. The fascist-**** axis offers nothing but loose talk about some unspecified form of racial or national “greatness.” The socialist-communist axis proclaims some grandiose economic plan, which keeps receding year by year. The fascist-**** axis merely extols leadership—leadership without purpose, program or direction—and power for power’s sake.
If the term “statism” designates concentration of power in the state at the expense of individual liberty, then Nazism in politics was a form of statism. In principle, it did not represent a new approach to government; it was a continuation of the political absolutism—the absolute monarchies, the oligarchies, the theocracies, the random tyrannies—which has characterized most of human history.
In degree, however, the total state does differ from its predecessors: it represents statism pressed to its limits, in theory and in practice, devouring the last remnants of the individual. Although previous dictators (and many today, e.g., in Latin America) often preached the unlimited power of the state, they were on the whole unable to enforce such power. As a rule, citizens of such countries had a kind of partial “freedom,” not a freedom-on-principle, but at least a freedom-by-default.
Even the latter was effectively absent in **** Germany. The efficiency of the government in dominating its subjects, the all-encompassing character of its coercion, the complete mass regimentation on a scale involving millions of men—and, one might add, the enormity of the slaughter, the planned, systematic mass slaughter, in peacetime, initiated by a government against its own citizens—these are the insignia of twentieth-century totalitarianism (**** and communist), which are without parallel in recorded history. In the totalitarian regimes, as the Germans found out after only a few months of Hitler’s rule, every detail of life is prescribed, or proscribed. There is no longer any distinction between private matters and public matters. “There are to be no more private Germans,” said Friedrich Sieburg, a **** writer; “each is to attain significance only by his service to the state, and to find complete self-fulfillment in this service.” “The only person who is still a private individual in Germany,” boasted Robert Ley, a member of the **** hierarchy, after several years of **** rule, “is somebody who is asleep.”
In place of the despised “private individuals,” the Germans heard daily or hourly about a different kind of entity, a supreme entity, whose will, it was said, is what determines the course and actions of the state: the nation, the whole, the group. Over and over, the Germans heard the idea that underlies the advocacy of omnipotent government, the idea that totalitarians of every kind stress as the justification of their total states: collectivism.
Collectivism is the theory that the group (the collective) has primacy over the individual. Collectivism holds that, in human affairs, the collective—society, the community, the nation, the proletariat, the race, etc.—is the unit of reality and the standard of value. On this view, the individual has reality only as part of the group, and value only insofar as he serves it; on his own he has no political rights; he is to be sacrificed for the group whenever it—or its representative, the state—deems this desirable.
Contrary to the Marxists, the ***** did not advocate public ownership of the means of production. They did demand that the government oversee and run the nation’s economy. The issue of legal ownership, they explained, is secondary; what counts is the issue of control. Private citizens, therefore, may continue to hold titles to property—so long as the state reserves to itself the unqualified right to regulate the use of their property.
If “ownership” means the right to determine the use and disposal of material goods, then Nazism endowed the state with every real prerogative of ownership. What the individual retained was merely a formal deed, a contentless deed, which conferred no rights on its holder. Under communism, there is collective ownership of property de jure. Under Nazism, there is the same collective ownership de facto.
It took centuries and a brain-stopping chain of falsehoods to bring a whole people to the state of Hitler-worship. Modern German culture, including its **** climax, is the result of a complex development in the history of philosophy, involving dozens of figures stretching back to the beginnings of Western thought. The same figures helped to shape every Western nation; but in other countries, to varying extents, the results were mixed, because there was also an opposite influence or antidote at work. In Germany, by the turn of our century, the cultural atmosphere was unmixed; the traces of the antidote had long since disappeared, and the intellectual establishment was monolithic.
If we view the West’s philosophic development in terms of essentials, three fateful turning points stand out, three major philosophers who, above all others, are responsible for generating the disease of collectivism and transmitting it to the dictators of our century.
The three are: Plato—Kant—Hegel. (The antidote to them is: Aristotle.)
No weird cultural aberration produced Nazism. No intellectual lunatic fringe miraculously overwhelmed a civilized country. It is modern philosophy—not some peripheral aspect of it, but the most central of its mainstreams—which turned the Germans into a nation of killers.
The land of poets and philosophers was brought down by its poets and philosophers.
Twice in our century Germany fought to rule and impose its culture on the rest of the world. It lost both wars. But on a deeper level it is achieving its goal nevertheless. It is on the verge of winning the philosophical war against the West, with everything this implies.
and last and not least:
I have stated repeatedly that the trend in this country is toward a fascist system with communist slogans. But what all of today’s pressure groups are busy evading is the fact that neither business nor labor nor anyone else, except the ruling clique, gains anything under fascism or communism or any form of statism—that all become victims of an impartial, egalitarian destruction.
Last edited by Braineack; 03-31-2012 at 02:36 PM.
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