[MD] Zen

[pholden at davtv.com]

Quoting Christoffer Ivarsson <IvarssonChristoffer at hotmail.com>:

> 
> P> [Chris]
> >> What the hell is this? This throwing around mindless quotes might work 
> >> with
> >> someone who doesn't actually study history and knows nothing about it 
> >> (200
> >> years, now where did THAT rabbit come from?). I mean, I see your point, 
> >> but
> >> you have no real arguments, you just have random quotes that doesn't add 
> >> up.
> >>
> >> Have a look at this one for example:
> >> > Ben Franklin also said: "I think the best way of doing good to the 
> >> > poor,
> >> > is
> >> > not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of 
> >> > it."
> 
> [Platt]
> > Mindless? Ben Franklin is mindless? Surely you jest.
> 
> Oh, quit it. I never said that.

You said "mindless quotes." I quoted Ben Franklin. What other conclusion am
I suppose to draw?

> 
> [Chris]
> >> Well, what happened was that the poor, the workers, the farmers etc took 
> >> the
> >> initiative to create a political movement to create a more humane and 
> >> safer
> >> society for themselves. This was pretty much achieved as soon as 
> >> everybody
> >> gained the right to vote (something they didn't do by doing nothing I'll
> >> tell you). This is the beginning of the Scandinavian model, the success 
> >> of
> >> which is undisputed.
> 
> > Hardly "undisputed."
> 
> Not "undisputed" perhaps (since people like you dispute it :P), but it 
> works, and people are happy with it.
> 
> [Platt]
>  >According to a study by the Swedish Institute of Trade,
> > the "median household income in Sweden at the end of the 1990s was 
> > equivalent
> > to $26,800 compared with a median of $39,400 for U.S. households." The 
> > study
> > concluded: average income in Sweden is less than the average income for 
> > black
> > Americans which comprise the lowest income group in the U.S.
> 
> This could to someone who just glance at it seem like really something. But 
> unfortunately I know the nature of statistic, and this is yet again a great 
> example of nothingness. First of all, "Black Americans are bunched up 
> together as one homogeny group. As pointed out before, there is a great deal 
> of difference between Oprah and a black worker in the ghetto.   And Median:
> 
> Wiki:
> "In probability theory and statistics, a median is described as the number 
> separating the higher half of a sample, a population, or a probability 
> distribution, from the lower half. The median of a finite list of numbers 
> can be found by arranging all the observations from lowest value to highest 
> value and picking the middle one. If there is an even number of 
> observations, the median is not unique, so one often takes the mean of the 
> two middle values.
> 
> Example: X,Y,Z median= Y Example: W,X,Y,Z median = mean(X, Y) = (X+Y)/2"
> 
> So you see it doesn't really say anything about this particular issue.  And 
> this is a measure of income, only. This doesn't take into account the 
> expenses.  I mean, since we get h whole lot of more stuff paid for us - 
> Public healthcare, schools, education and social welfare - this isn't taken 
> into account. Purely economically speaking the US is a stronger economy, 
> that has more of both super-rich people and super-poor people. So, this 
> statistic doesn't really say anything about the Quality of life within each 
> state. And that is the important thing.

OK. I hope you will so inform the Swedish Institute of Trade. But you realize
I hope that all those goodies paid to you come out of your pocket, or forced
out of someone else's pocket. Your taxes aren't voluntary are they?

> [chris]
> >> So then you have a system where people can get cheap,
> >> good healthcare, good education, and that, because there is a social 
> >> safety
> >> net,  reduces crime far better then in those countries that haven't. 
> >> What
> >> happens is that overall one get's a more stable base to build upon. And I 
> >> am
> >> sorry to disappoint you, but within this model there is no repression of 
> >> the
> >> mind or body, and yes, there is a free market and all that - it works 
> >> fine
> >> as long as one realizes that everything isn't black and white. I might 
> >> also
> >> add that at the moment (since 2006) we have a right-wing government (you
> >> would probably call them liberals anyway) but not even they want to 
> >> remove
> >> the system, only modify it. No one wants to remove the system, and the 
> >> worst
> >> thing anyone can be accused of in a political debate is to what to have 
> >> it
> >> the way it is in the US (now that the Soviet is gone).
> 
> [Platt]
> > See above. Also, what is your tax rate?
> 
> Higher than yours because we Value things like
> Public healthcare, schools, education and social welfare. Quite simple.

OK. I value liberty more.  

> >> I'm just saying, things aren't black and white, either or. The middle way 
> >> is
> >> almost always the best.
> 
> [Platt]
> > When it comes to defending individual liberty, I don't think the middle 
> > way is
> > almost always the best. Sometimes you have to stand and fight. Don't you 
> > agree?
> 
> Sometimes, sometimes not.

Good. Sometimes you do. We agree. 




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