We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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“The only problem is that it can’t be done …” I like this comment:
The economic platform most voters seem to want is lower taxes (or lower taxes on everyone except the “rich”), more jobs, more government benefits, and no deficits. Which, come to think of it, was Obama’s platform in 2008. The only problem is that it can’t be done, which makes it hard to run on that platform two times in a row.
It’s from “Larry3435”, and is attached to a piece by Jennifer Rubin entitled Obama’s economic approach a dud with voters.
It is important for libertarians like me not to confuse a bunch of people who think we probably shouldn’t have very much more government than we can pay for with people who think we definitely should have a lot less government than we can pay for, which is what we libertarians reckon, among other things.
Still, it’s a start.
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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As has been posted elsewhere:
Normative Libertarianism is framed by the impacts of the functions of governments on Liberty and thus to limit those impacts by limiting those functions.
The following is thought to be correct, but has not been verified:
.”
Voltaire
First Voltaire – he did not live to see the calling of the Estates General. But yes the first thing it did (when it mutated into the National Assembly) was to abolish many of the old taxes (August the 4th 1789 – the only good day of the Revolution).
But it did not reduce government spending – on the contrary they wanted to spend more (apart from on the “luxury of the Court” – they believed their own propaganda that most money went on new whigs and so on).
How to finance this?
Steal the land of the Church (and others….) and introduce paper money – and thus the Revolution went bad.
Still back to Barack…. (born on August the 5th – when the bad stuff was about to start, although 1961 not 1789).
I am not sure that most voters ever wanted more spending – after all Barack Obama actually said he would REDUCE spending (all that was by the old mantra of cutting “waste” – if someone tells you that he is not serious about cutting spending, only cutting FUNCTIONS really reduces government spending).
However, the rest is true – Barack is now promising more benefits, no increase in taxation other than for “the rich” (I wonder how many people are going to suddenly find the government considers them “rich”, if not Kulacks then at least “henchmen of the Kulacks”).
And yes he is promising to reduce the deficit – just like he promised to halve the deficit in 2008.
Also the media (and academia) lie machine is operating.
Increasing taxes has been turned into “opposing tax cuts on the rich” or even opposing spending money on tax cuts”.
Increasing taxes is opposing “spending money on taxcuts” – George Orwell would be impressed.
Romney – he is not libertarian but he does know all this Obama stuff is nuts.
Not that Barack actually believes any of this stuff of course….
He is just doing the standard Cloward-and-Piven destroy-the-West thing.
First Voltaire – he did not live to see the calling of the Estates General. But yes the first thing it did (when it mutated into the National Assembly) was to abolish many of the old taxes (August the 4th 1789 – the only good day of the Revolution).
But it did not reduce government spending – on the contrary they wanted to spend more (apart from on the “luxury of the Court” – they believed their own propaganda that most money went on new whigs and so on).
How to finance this?
Steal the land of the Church (and others….) and introduce paper money – and thus the Revolution went bad.
Still back to Barack…. (born on August the 5th – when the bad stuff was about to start, although 1961 not 1789).
I am not sure that most voters ever wanted more spending – after all Barack Obama actually said he would REDUCE spending (all that was by the old mantra of cutting “waste” – if someone tells you that he is not serious about cutting spending, only cutting FUNCTIONS really reduces government spending).
However, the rest is true – Barack is now promising more benefits, no increase in taxation other than for “the rich” (I wonder how many people are going to suddenly find the government considers them “rich”, if not Kulacks then at least “henchmen of the Kulacks”).
And yes he is promising to reduce the deficit – just like he promised to halve the deficit in 2008.
Also the media (and academia) lie machine is operating.
Increasing taxes has been turned into “opposing tax cuts on the rich” or even opposing spending money on tax cuts”.
Increasing taxes is opposing “spending money on taxcuts” – George Orwell would be impressed.
Romney – he is not libertarian but he does know all this Obama stuff is nuts.
Not that Barack actually believes any of this stuff of course….
He is just doing the standard Cloward-and-Piven destroy-the-West thing.
I can’t help but notice, whenever someone new is elected into a position of political leadership, they spend their first couple of weeks looking a bit tired and somewhat “haunted”.
Sure, when they go through whichever famous door and close it behind them, to be faced with a new staff and an awful lot of briefings, they have a whole new routine to adjust to and a colossal amount of information to take on board. However, I think the reason behind the haunted look comes from a realisation that, after all the briefings have sunk in, if they’d known on the hustings what they learn in the first week or two of office, they’d never have written their manifesto the way they did.
Getting into power for the first time must be right up at the top of life’s “oh sh*t” moments.
Inexperience might be proffered as an excuse, once (though even that is marginal when professional politicians tout their “experience” at every turn).
The moment that the little shit runs a second time, on a similar platform, however, that excuse is lost and one must conclude that he is, in fact, a lying, cynical, opportunistic con-man.
why should politicians let a little thing like reality get in the way of their grand programs? Let’s just repeal the old laws of nature, and put better ones in their place!
As someone (in)famous once said:
You can evade reality. You can’t evade the consequences of evading reality.
More government + fewer taxes is the defining reality-evading construction of our times.
It can’t be done, but it CAN be promised. Over and over again…
And the Republican platform is:
1. Never shrink the defense budget.
2. Never raise taxes.
And that cannot be done either.
“The only problem is that it can’t be done, which makes it hard to run on that platform two times in a row.”
Slacker.
Sure, it HASN’T YET been done, but as you pick up your gym bag and quit and walk away, The Obama (pbuh) rolls up his sleeves and gets to work on it.
He’s completely willing to spend serious time during his second term making this work. All we have to do is re-elect him, and he’ll really go to work on this for us.
The man just gives and gives and gives . . .
Craig – the United States armed forces is already in decline, and will contiune to decline.
As for tax rates – the idea that higher tax rates will mean higher revenue (the matra of the “mainstream” media) is absurd.
On “loopholes”.
O.K.
Two of the biggest loopholes are…..
The deductablility of State and local income taxes from the income that is subject to the Federal income tax.
And.
The favourable treatment of government debt (bonds, securities, call government IOUs what you will) in relation to the Federal income tax.
O.K. let those “loopholes” be abolished.
No?
Why not?
Please tell me media people.
People who live in New York and California (and deduct the income taxes from their income before it is taxed by the Feds) and invest their income in government debt paper.
Come on media people (and academics) let us campaign for the end of THESE “loopholes”.