[MD] Sin Part 1

[Platt Holden]

> [Platt]
> Government cannot spend what it hasn't borrowed, taxed or otherwise
> fleeced from productive members of society.  
> 
> [Case]
> Taxation has been used from the dawn of time to invest in public
> resources and the pay for projects in the public interest. Get used to
> it.

[Platt]
When a politician proposes a law "in the public interest," run for your 
life. All tyrannies torture, murder and enslave in the name of the 
"public interest."  

> [Platt]
> Do you want bureaucrats in the public or private sector setting values.
> Or elected government officials? Not me. For example, elected officials
> determine the value of money. Look what has happened to its value in the
> last 100 years.
> 
> [Case]
> In our society is it the job of the legislature to establish public
> priorities and to set the rules of the game. This is explained at
> considerable length in the Constitution.


[Platt]
To be overruled by the Supreme Court when found to violate individual 
rights.

> [Platt]
> There are various totalitarian regimes whose economic systems
> do not recognize the concept of private property, communism being the
> most recent. 
> 
> [Case]
> You seem to know more about communism than I do but I recall people in
> communist Russia standing in line for toilet paper. Once they got their
> roll is was theirs. It became private property.

[Platt]
Be permission of a commissar. In the U.S. private property is a right, 
not a grant from government.

> [Case]
> As I mentioned the Declaration was not the law of the land but even the
> passage you mention claims a collective right not an individual right to
> over through the government. Are you suggesting that the current
> government it corrosive to individual rights? Are you advocating the
> overthrow of our government?
> 
> [Platt]
> Scary? If it wasn't for the concept of a corporation you would be still
> be digging potatoes like most of the peasants throughout history.
> 
> [Case]
> Yes, granting personhood to a social institution is scary. I am not
> alone. As I said before, Jefferson and Adam Smith were both fearful of
> the unrestrained accumulation of economic power this represents.
> 
> "I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed
> corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial
> of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." - Thomas
> Jefferson, 1812
> 
> "The directors of such [joint-stock] companies, however, being the
> managers rather of other people's money than of their own, it cannot
> well be expected, that they should watch over it with the same anxious
> vigilance with which the partners in a private copartnery frequently
> watch over their own.... Negligence and profusion, therefore, must
> always prevail, more or less, in the management of the affairs of such a
> company." -Adam Smith - The Wealth of Nations

[Platt}
History has proved both wrong.

> [Platt]
> Then how come researchers and academics are always begging government
> for more handouts?
> 
> [Case]
> You can haggle this one our with Arlo if you like I can only add that
> much of the research which fueled the economy of the western world for
> the past 50 years was conducted at public expense. As you say
> practitioners of pure scientific research are now reduced to begging for
> handouts. There is no cleared example of the poverty of conservative
> thought.

[Platt]
Examples of research done at public expense? The space program perhaps?
I'm sure you are are aware that many companies have research 
departments, especially drug companies who have saved countless lives 
not to mention the suffering they've relieved. 

> [Platt]
> Ever hear of private non-profit organizations?
> 
> [Case]
> Yes, these are economic entities for whom money is a means not an end. I
> hold them if very high regard. So does the governments. Many grants for
> public projects and services can only be awarded to non-profits. In this
> Christmas season I encourage everyone to toss a few extra bucks into the
> Salvation Army's kettles.

[Platt]
Me too.

> [Platt]
> So now you are anti-profit, too? Why don't you just admit you want
> to live in a communist state and be done with it?
> 
> [Case said earlier]
> I am not saying that waste doesn't exist or that profit is bad or that
> people shouldn't squeeze whatever they can out of the system. But waste
> is a fact of life not the ultimate evil.
> 
> [Case]
> I don't have anything to add to what I originally said on this other
> than to point out that I am not the one advocating the overthrow of the
> government.
> 
> [Platt]
> Oh, so now you realize the hole you were digging. Now profit is a "fact
> of life" -- right? I wonder if "facts of life" can be considered
> immoral. Interesting question don't you think? How does the MOQ answer?
> 
> [Case] 
> When money becomes an end in itself rather than a means to an end I
> consider it immoral. Capitalism succeeds because it appeals to
> individual greed and selfishness. I accept this as a "fact of life". It
> is tacky but not necessarily immoral. In any event I certainly would not
> elevate it to the status of Virtue.

I would. Capitalism recognizes human nature and directs it towards  
beneficial ends. I call that highly moral.

Platt