(note to self: besides the "Honey Wrestling," Lithuania is looking more and more appealing...)

I do not have faith that a competitive free market is a workable scenario for ALL services and/or products, even. Fact of the matter remains that, for many services offered under a competitive free market, the efficiency is actually quite low.

Yaroslavvb - you mentioned health care...do you realize that, for many URGENT procedures, here in the U.S.(cancer treatment, for one), in many cases there's no real "waiting list," but many patients often die waiting for their insurance companies to negotiate the terms of the treatment with the hospitals?

Cancer treatment is, of course, only an example - many other examples can be found with a simple craigslist ad, as often the most urgent cases do not reach the hospital until all of the details between insurance companies and service providers get resolved.

In my opinion, the insurance system is an incredible fraud. It exists to minimize risk, essentially, which allows many conspicuously expensive lawsuits to occur simply because, when it comes to court, it ends up being one person and his lawyer versus somebody else's insurance company. The risk to be minimized is often not explained, and falls on the "common person" to pay the penalties of, as the insurance companies often do not explain the technicalities of the risks they cover(nor do "common people" expect their language to be convoluted in such a way as to deny them service on a technicality).

It is also another opinion of mine to have noticed that the risk that is often to be minimized by such fraudulent insurance companies is often the risk of loss of stability - a stability which never existed in the first place, and still does not exist, no matter how much insurance a person has.

No - I think that the answer to American health care problems can not be solved by private industry. To me, the entire system that we are upholding, in such a way, makes an excellent analogy to Isaac Asimov's conception of Trantor in his "Foundation" series of books - that the United States is, in essence, a country mostly devoid of manufacturing and production capabilities(except for many insignificant, and essentially useless products like movies and music), and exists only to attempt to serve as a bureaucratic "glue" for what may some day become a global empire.

There's just one catch - the "common person" can not see beyond the forest for the trees, so a "global empire," to them, is quite nonexistent - even if those humans that do not represent the "common person" perceive it any differently. For this reason, a system to minimize risk, to attempt to hold onto "stability" as desperately as it can, can not exist for long.

Please note that "common people" represent 99.x% of the population of this planet. When it comes time that they are truly fed up, they tend to act with swift, and often painful, consequences.

One could generalize and say that they are not "civilized," but I ask you - what benefits have we gained from subscribing to this wonderful invention known as "civilization?"

I think the Founders realized the potential problem of the mob rule, which is why they setup this "caste system" that you are referring to. We don't live in a democracy, but a republic, where common people can influence politicians and courts, but can't make laws directly. In order to be in the position of power, you have to be well educated, which essentially shuts the ignorant masses out of politics. The Founders didn't even trust the common people to elect the president themselves, hence the electoral college system.

So my point is that this "master/slave" arrangement has been put in place by the Founders of the United States, and it's worked well so far, better than the places that tried more egalitarian arrangements.

As far as interest rate on National Debt goes, the figures are misleading. Most of US debt is internal. This means that United States owes money to itself, so it's not debt in the traditional sense. There's disagreement over how much foreign debt there is, because there's no reliable way of measuring it. According to one measure, US is actually a net creditor, in other words, the world owes more money to US than the other way round -- http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/ksgnews/Features/opeds/120805_hausmann.htm

Thanks for the explanation of the caste system, mate.

From the date this country was founded, I'm sure you can find laws that were created that courts were obligated to abide by. If "order and justice" is so difficult to maintain that ANY given caste of people must remain outside of it, this country has been incredibly deceived for quite a long time.

I happen to believe it's time that ends. I do not believe that you or I are any more intelligent than "common people" due to the way we interpret the legal system...as a matter of fact, I find that there are many areas of study that I could simply not comprehend, but others are expert in, because of the differences in our lives. I believe we are "common people," and I have yet to meet any person that could claim they are not(yes, even the incredibly rich and/or educated).

Essentially, you're saying that facts are arbitrary to opinion, and while that's true in a philosophical sense, in the physical sense(which is the universe we live in), when I give a person one apple, even though they have the potential to grow a whole tree from it, they currently only have one physical apple. Their opinion of what they currently have does not change the fact that they are only holding one physical apple, and not an entire tree, at the moment.


To put it simply, my friend - to have a view of the human race as essentially master/slave the way you state above, that "common people tend to be uneducated, and shouldn't be trusted with such legal matters," I can only speculate that you do not take consideration into the technicalities of things you consider to be "common knowledge."

The Constitution was written with the intention that the common person could interpret it, and that the interpretation of it, by ANYBODY, would not be construed as to deny or disparage rights retained by the people. I understand that they screwed up on many things, like not giving women or blacks the right to vote, etc., but they did understand that it would be revised(and even created the Amendment process, to give it the ability to be revised). I believe their intention was that any revisions would not deny American citizens their rights, however, as is stated in the Bill of Rights.

Now, of course, you are addressing how the law is practiced right now, and I am addressing how the law should be practiced, but is that not what this documentary, and many others that we debate on the forums of, is about? - that somewhere along the line of American History, the system that was created to work in our interests started working against us, that we must now subscribe to systems that we neither believe to to benefit us, nor do we desire.

Like the Federal Income Tax. Surely you understand that almost every cent we pay toward the Federal Income Tax goes toward interest accrued on the national debt? How, then, does it benefit you to pay Federal Income Tax, when you neither receive service for it, nor is the government required(nor do they have a plan) to lower the national debt so we could use our Federal Income Tax dollars for something that would benefit us(unless, of course, you receive dividends from the Federal Reserve )?

I do understand, in incredible detail, how the system currently operates. How do you think it should operate, and more importantly - why do you think it should operate that way?

There really isn't a set of "their own rules" that courts must follow. "The law" is an evolving set of standards that's used by agents charged with maintaining order and justice. Some parts of "the law" aren't even written down anywhere, for instance look at traffic law -- in many places in US there's an unspoken rule that 10 mph over the speed limit is normal and expected.

As far as jury nullification goes, the current interpretation of the law seems to be that jury are arbiters of facts and not law, and hence cases where they decide to interpret the law themselves, can be declared a mistrial. I tend to agree with this view because common people tend to be uneducated, and shouldn't be trusted with such legal matters

What a crock of shit! This is about as meaningful and substantiated as the religious text it quotes. Speaks volumes about religion too: "usury is a sin ... wait, it's handy, never mind, usury is cool." There is $666B in circulation, whoo, the world will end. I suspect we'll manage. And we won't invade Iran any time soon, the political situation is way too negative.

"Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful." -- Seneca the Younger 4 BC - 65 AD.

-------------------------------------
> Paul Volcker is one such exception, but as you yourself pointed out - Greenspan made 180k per year. I don't know if you quite get this, but the average American makes around 33k per year.
Average American doesn't have Greenspan's qualifications. The point is that someone like Greenspan could make over a million per year by accepting a position in private sector. And a quick google search shows that Greenspan's family wasn't rich either.
http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/m/martin-greenspan.html



> "The Congress would always be pressured to lower the interest rates and stimulate the economy, regardless of long-term consequences."
> Here's one question for you - assuming the Congress took over control of the monetary system(as they have the right to do), what would be the purpose of an interest rate? The interest rate only sustains the profits and dividends of member shareholders of the Fed - operating costs are covered by the budget of money the Fed has allotted itself to print. So why would there be a need for an interest rate?

The Fed could loan money at 0% interest rate. Since the Fed can print money, that means it would hand out free money to any bank that asks. Surely you don't think that would be a good idea?


> FYI - I do not sustain any faith for the Capitalist system, as the end result of Capitalism is ultimately Plutocracy(which is what we are currently living under today - people that represent the richest 5% of the population control 95% of the population) - so, just so you know, I would have no qualms with abandoning the Capitalist system entirely.

Abandoning the system for what? Soviet-style Gulags? A lot of the inventions you are using right now are here thanks to capitalism. Take your computer for instance. Proof of concept transistor was developed in Bell Labs, and brought to the masses through capital ventures Shockley Semiconductors and Fairchild Semiconductors. Intel was one of the the child ventures. Those were all possible because of large investment. You need to have a workable alternative to capitalism, or admit that you don't care about progress. Neither communism, nor anarchy have proven themselves workable over long term.


> Bank runs are only a bad thing for the banks in most cases, because it shows, to their clients, exactly the level of corruption of a central banking system. Yes, people will lose faith - and they should. Yes, people will take what little money the bank has left for them out of the bank - AND THEY SHOULD.

It's not the banks that are hurt the most by bank runs, but the people who keep money in the banks. Banks are required to only keep 1/6th of the money it loans out on hand. So if everyone decides to take their money out, 83% of the people will be left holding an empty bag.

And when the people lose faith in banks and stop depositing money there, all the loan-takers will be hurt. How will someone get a mortage for a house? Or take an inventor with a bright idea who needs a large loan to develop it?

A worse thing would happen if public loses confidence in the Fed itself. The currency that we use are the Fed promissory notes. Without confidence in the currency, how will people continue their economic transactions? We could go back to barter, but that is annoyingly inefficient. Imagine having to find 2 goats, a hub-cap and a pile of dirt that someone wants in exchange for a new coat.


> They should be able to, as an exercise of power over the banks. In what is professed to be an ultimately Capitalist system, where is the competition to the banking industry that, should they mess something up, the public will exercise power over them?

What is the competition to the banking industry? The role of banking industry is to accumulate a large amounts of resources to direct into various areas of development. The capital is amassed because of people volunteering to store their capital is the banks. The main advantage of banking is that capital formation is done through volunteer means. One competition to this system is the Soviet-style system -- the government amasses resources through forceful means -- ie, by telling a million people to come together and dig a hole here and there. And if they don't want to dig a hole? Too bad, they should've been born in America.


> If there is to be a central bank, it must be addressable by the people themselves, SOMEHOW. The public themselves must be able to exercise some form of power over the bank in order to keep that very system in check...otherwise, the public is not responsible for what happens, and must not be legally bound to abide by such a corrupt system.


> Ultimately, if the banks are to be private, as the Federal Reserve currently is, the people should be allowed - encouraged, even, to create their own forms of currency to challenge the private form of currency.

What's stopping you from creating your own currency? Fed notes started by being promissory notes -- it was a note that you could exchange for a certain amount of gold if you brought to the bank. So likewise, you could hand out slips of paper, in promise to exchange them for something tangible if a person brings it back. In essence, shops handing out gift certificates are in essence issuing their own currency. There was a period of time in US when there was no universally accepted paper money. Each bank would issue their own promissory notes. However, because banks failed often, people would trust notes from bigger banks more. Eventually the "currency" from the biggest banks would outcompete everyone else.

> T-bonds/bills - what is a bond? The OED essentially defines it as an "Obligation," or a "promise to pay."

That's not the kind of bonds that government issues. The bonds are that the government issues are papers that US government promises to pay interest on. They don't promise to buy it back, and in fact, it's unlikely that the government will EVER buy it back. The government hasn't bought back any bonds since WWII.

> Can you imagine a form of currency that is not interest-bearing, that the people themselves CAN be held responsible for the rise or the fall of?

You really put a lot of trust in "the people". If people were so responsible, we could give each person a printing press and let them be directly in charge of the monetary policy. They would then rely on their superior knowledge of monetary policy and print more money exactly when it is needed. However, the reality of it is that people are greedy and irresponsible. In the scenario above, everybody would start cranking out money with no regard to economic harm that causes. That's a prime instance of the "tragedy of the commons"

The ideas you are advocating are far from new. People are by nature suspicious of rich people, especially bankers, and there have been many instances in the history when "the people" stepped in to "reign in their power of bankers." For instance, when Lenin carried out the revolution in then-capitalist Russia, his first targets were to take control of the railroads, the telegraph and the banks. The banks became the "property of the people", but that didn't help the people much when their savings have evaporated. My uncle worked as a pilot in Soviet far north for a decade and saved up an equivalent of $60,000 over the years, the savings that disappeared through governments mismanagement. Good politicians make bad bankers.

Or look at early American history. The ideas you are advocating are the credo of the Populist party, whose main ideal is to represent the rights of "the common people." Andrew Jackson was elected on the populist platform, and when he came to power, he destroyed the Central Bank by vetoing the renewal of it's charter. The government's money was then taken out of the bank, and distributed among various private banks. Needless to say it didn't work out too well, and US was back with a national bank 30 years later. You can read more about immediate effects here: http://www.maths.tcd.ie/local/JUNK/econrev/ser/html/destruction.html. Or read about "1837-1862: Free Banking Era" on "history of central banking" in Wikipedia.

The bottom line is that populist philosophy looks good in theory, but doesn't work well in practice, mainly because "the common people" are greedy and stupid. The current system isn't perfect, but it's better than the alternatives.


----

"The Constitution is also very deliberate in mentioning that it gives power to the statutes and regulations we live under" --
No, the Constitution is deliberately vague so that the government can fill in the details. Just look at the language it uses -- "cruel and unusual punishment", "just compensation", "excessive bail" . No dictionary will tell you what those phrases mean.

Do you really think the Founders intended common people to interpret the Constitution? When Constitution was set down, most people in America couldn't read. The Founders didn't even trust common people to elect the president

The section 861 argument is wacky because nobody really thinks the Founders or the Congress meant to make taxes illegal. The courts are there to make sure the spirit of the law is obeyed, which is why they'll never side with the likes of Larken Rose

"Some people believe with great fervor preposterous things that just happen to coincide with their self-interest." Judge Frank Easterbrook, Coleman v. CIR (7th Cir 1986)

There are many other weird ways people try to twist the law to their advantage, for instance people like sometimes argue that their indictment should be thrown out because the name was capitalized. And apparently some tax protester even sued Rush Limbaugh to try to make him declare 16th Amendment illegal: http://www.adl.org/mwd/suss1.asp

From the OED Online:

Democracy
1. Government by the people; that form of government in which the sovereign power resides in the people as a whole, and is exercised either directly by them (as in the small republics of antiquity) or by officers elected by them. In mod. use often more vaguely denoting a social state in which all have equal rights, without hereditary or arbitrary differences of rank or privilege.
    b. A state or community in which the government is vested in the people as a whole.
    c. fig.
2. That class of the people which has no hereditary or special rank or privilege; the common people (in reference to their political power).
3. Democratism. rare.
4. U.S. politics. a. The principles of the Democratic party; b. The members of the Democratic party collectively.

Republic
1. The state, the common weal. Obs.
2. a. A state in which the supreme power rests in the people and their elected representatives or officers, as opposed to one governed by a king or similar ruler; a commonwealth. Now also applied loosely to any state which claims this designation.
    b. Applied to particular states having this form of constitution.
    c. Without article: Republican constitution or government. rare{em}1.
3. fig. and transf. a. Any community of persons, animals, etc., in which there is a certain equality among the members.
    b. the republic of letters, the collective body of those engaged in literary pursuits; the field of literature itself.
4. attrib. (passing into adj.) Of the nature of, characteristic of, pertaining to, a republic or republics; republican. Now rare or Obs.

You're right.

"Often more vaguely denoting a social state in which all have equal rights" is not represented in the etymology of the 1776 definitions, which is what I was picking apart before(from the 1979 edition of the printed OED, even), but you are right - I must have meant True Democracy and Representative Democracy, as "Republic" implies the organization of the state, and democracy implies the form of government.

Thank you for correcting me.

I know, obviously it's all on us... not on the 'beloved leader' who is forcing farmers to grow opium for export instead of food and denying the common people UN relief goods... he's so totally innocent.

1995 saw the peak of Pulp's fame, with the release of their No.2 UK Hit single "Common People", their much loved performance at the Glastonbury Festival (standing in for the Stone Roses at the last minute) and their Mercury award winning album Different Class (the first album featuring Pulp fan-club president Mark Webber, who became a permanent member of the band on guitar and keyboards). This album, with its disco-infused pop-rock, and the trademark sordid yet witty lyrics about sexual encounters and working class life, is for most fans what Pulp are about.

Quiz time!, who said this:

“Naturally the common people don’t want war. But after all, it is the
leaders of a country who determine the policy, and it’s always a
simple matter to drag people along whether it is a democracy or a
fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship.
Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of
the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are
being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and
for exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every
country."

I consider religion to be nothing more than a tool used to maintain a subservient populace, and therefore intolerable and unacceptable.

People are free to believe whatever they want (as the woman in this clip proves), but when you blindly agree with archaic and irrational myths that have directly caused the deaths of millions of people throughout history, you shouldn't really expect your beliefs to be respected.

"Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful." - Lucius Annaeus Seneca (born 5 BC, died 65 AD)

The assertive atheist: http://www.flamewarrior.com/index.htm

He has a nice view of the Jefferson Memorial. Too bad he can't soak up Jefferson's character and wisdom by osmosis.

Giving the devil his due, though, Bush is a great campaigner. And he is brilliant at connecting with Southerners, Walmart shoppers, farmers, and the rest of Jarvis Cocker's Common People.

I'll go with faith in mankind.

Not leaders, but the common people.

They're definitely not getting their fair share of those profits, I'd say.

Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful. -- Seneca the Younger 4 bc- 65 ad

With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion. -- Steven Weinberg

Men never commit evil so fully and joyfuly as when they do it for religious convictions -- Blaise Pascal

Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet -- Napoleon Bonaparte

I still say a church steeple with a lightning rod on top shows a lack of confidence -- Doug McLeod

The more I study religions the more I am convinced that man never worshipped anything but himself. -- Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890)

The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason -- Benjamin Franklin