*promote the master!
welcome back @blankfist
ya'all need to start taking notes.

this guy was super entertaining,i thought he was gonna have an embolism at the halfway mark.

hiiiiilarious!!!

look,no matter which direction you approach this situation the REAL dynamic is simply:power vs powerlessness.

we also should establish which form of libertarianism we are speaking.cultofdusty criticizes the bastardized american version and this dude come from a more classic libertarian (sans the unbridled capitalism).so there should be no surprise they are at odds in their opinion.this man is defending a libertarianism that cultofdusty may not even be aware of at all.

libertarianism has little or nothing in common with the republican party.

so when this dude posits that the corporation is the fault of government,while not entirely accurate,it is also not entirely wrong.corporations in the distant past were temporary alliances of companies,with the blessing of the people (government) to achieve a specific job or project and once that project was complete,the corporation was dissolved.

it was a cadre of clever lawyers,representing powerful interests who convinced the supreme court that corporations were people and hence began the long road leading us to where we are now.

so it was partly the government that fascillitated the birth of the corporation.

i do take issue with this mans assessment of public education.his commentary is the height of ignorance.while i would agree that what we have now can hardly be called 'education".his blanket and broad statements in regards to public education TOTALLY ignores the incredible benefits that come from an educated public.he ignores the history of public education,as if this system has been unchanging for 100 years.

that is just flat out...stupid..or more likely just lazy,regurgitating the maniacal rants of his heroes without ever once giving that 100 years some critical study.

so let me point to the the late 50's and 60's here in the USA where our public education was bar-none the best in the world.what were the consequences of this stellar public education?
well,...civil rights marches,anti-war movement,womens rights movement and a whole generation that not only questioned authority and the entrenched power structures but openly DEFIED those structures.

this absolutely petrified the powered elite.
during the height of the anti-war movement nixon was forced to baricade the white house with school buses and was quoted as saying to kissinger " henry,they are coming for me".

again,the fundamental premise is,and has always been -power vs powerlessness.

so over the nest few decades public education was manipulated and transformed into a subtle indoctrination to teach young minds to tacitly submit to authority.

which this man addresses and i agree,i just disagree with his overly generalized non-historically accurate puke-vomit.

my final point,and its always the point where libertarians lose their shit on me like an offended westboro baptist acolyte (its actually two points) is this:
1.if we can blame the government for much of the problems in regards to concentrated power and the abuse that goes with that power,then we MUST also address the abusive (and corrosive) power of the corporation.many libertarians i discuss with seem to be under the impression that if we take away the symbiotic relationship between corporations and government that somehow..miraculously..the corporation will all of a sudden become the benign and productive member of society.

this is utter fiction.
this is magical thinking.
many corporations have a larger GDP than many nation states.this is about POWER and there is ZERO evidence any corporation will be willing to relinquish that power just because there is no government to influence,manipulate or corrupt.

which brings me to point number 2:
my libertarian friends.
you live in a thing called a society.
a community where other people also live.
so please stop with this rabid individualism as somehow being the pinnacle of human endeavour.im all for personal responsibility but nobody lives in a vacuum and nobody rides this train alone.the world does not revolve around YOU.

but i do understand,and agree,that the heart of the libertarian argument is more power to the people.i also understand their arguments against governments,which directly and oftimes indirectly disempowers people.

i get that.its a good argument..
BUT...for fucks sake please admit that the corporation in its current state has GOT TO FUCKING GO!

because if you dont then ultimately you are trading one tyrant for another and in my humble opinion,ill stick with the one i can at least vote on or protest.

there aint nothing democratic about a multi-national corporation.they are,by design,dictatorships.

so i will agree to wittle the government down and restrict its powers to defense (NOT war),law and fraud police,if you agree to dismantle and restructure the seven headed leviathan that is todays corporation.

deal?

The wizard had mostly retired by the time of the quakes.

And yeah, it reminded me of New Orleans too.

The day after the quake hit I was talking with some friends, and we were discussing the future of Christchurch. Some people left, some people felt there was no future, but most of us thought some good could come out of it. We could have a future city, built around sustainability; somewhere that would attract people to live in it.

Right now, I don't see that happening. In some ways, this needed a dictatorship, but instead everything has been buried in committees and insurance companies have tried to weasel out of everything and made peoples lives a misery.

I still hope we'll get something cool out of it, but I'm no longer as confident as I once was. Too much short term thinking and bitching about spending too much money.

At some point, this amount of disagreement does nothing but push us all down collectively to a level that is enough evidence that none of us are worthy of choosing what is right and good for the collective of the human race, versus what is wrong and should be avoidable.

That says more for those of us who supposedly represent the authority than it does for citizens reacting to these crimes, but it still goes for all of us.

There is so much blindness in this thread on every side, and that does not exclude my own. Ultimately we're all swayed by our personal experiences. The sum of all arguments is nearly impossible to calculate, but it's there.
I don't care much for "law" as it's practiced today, and there is plenty of evidence online to support any orderly or bigoted perspective if you care to weigh it that subjectively, but pertaining to videos such as these, here is what you cannot deny regardless of your position:

Minorities will always have the lesser voice, and be exploited, intentionally or unintentionally, by the authority.

Around the world, at all times, though perhaps more now than the last few decades, the majority of government authority is responding to the fear that has been shown prevalently in media and culture for at least a generation.

The proper solution for all of our kind is a way for authoritative powers to understand that when there is a diplomatic minority large enough to warrant force as a response, force is no longer the appropriate answer. Otherwise, at this point, you have to allow voice to this community or you are a verifiable dictatorship/tyrant/oppressor or despot, and no longer the best representation of your collective people.

In the end, the discussions that all forums ultimately fall into is one that simply tries to snuff the other out. Lantern53 is a a verifiable, uneducated menace, ass, and an example of the ignorance that is readily welcomed by an all-to-eager agency whose present desire is to employ thugs more than representatives of the people.

However we, collectively, need that voice. We need to know who in our society has such widely disparate views in order to regulate and balance our own perspectives. It is healthy to encounter perspectives that are not your own, and it's up to everyone and each individual to temperate our reactions, despite how offensive they might be. In that sense, people such as Lantern, BobKnight, Shiny, Choggie, and all the other "assholes" who've sifted through the sift, possess a little more bravery than most of us. (Or they're trolls, but in communities such as the sift, they're more likely just angry people with a drastically alternate perspective from the majority).

The next time you encounter someone like Lantern, just take their perspective and defeat them with logic and reason. If you don't have the knowledge to do so, research factual evidence to do it. If you cannot find factual evidence to do so, you may well be in the wrong.

I have; everyone has. It just comes down to trying to shout into submission those with different views - or - converting them to an understanding perspective with reason and evidence. It's not a one-side versus the other, either. It must go back and forth to a certain extent, because that is how you reach mutual understanding.

If all else fails, y'know, find out their address and bring a tire-iron.

@dagg

Sorry, but this place is still a fucking dictatorship. Sheesh man. Don't punish or prevent people for trying to do good.

No sir. Sensible sane and rational people(sarcasm intended) would treat sponsorship of Olympic games similarly if sayyy, the Olympic committee used child labor or trashed the environment building the arena and got corporate sponsors behind them....Wouldn't we then have to listen to the same type of gimps, the same who trash their own powers of reason, come out of the wood-works to protest that horrifying scenario!?? Watch them boycott coco-cola and mc donalds then?



WHAT CREATES THE LOWER-CLASS PEOPLE anyway, duh???

All governments work the same dude, a few people force the masses to perform according to their rules or be fined or imprisoned.

Draaakonian bullshit.

Personally, I boycott coke and mc donalds because their food is non-nutritive shit that causes diabetic epidemics in adults and children-Less is more.

Besides, corporate sponsorship of anything is a waste of resources when the same could be used for advancement both physically and spiritually of the entire species.

It's 2014 sir, and pretty much ALL governments and law enforcement works on the same arcane model, be they called democracies or dictatorships....po-tay-to, fucking pa-tah-to

Jocosity bordering on delirium?

The glorious leader Karimov is slowly fading-out with his crew of personal soldiers and his own family members vying to hold on to the absolute(ish) power over their little criminal empire with the formidable SNB and their jack-booted thug national security arm wanting to rape the place into a massive police-state private party....Hard to imagine a more protracted scenario of a complete clusterfuck.

Can they oust every cadre there who keeps the place so wound-tight? Prospects look grim seeing as how the model for their little microcosmic experiment in dictatorship and total control over resources is but a reflection of how in macro, the entire world is being run.

Actually, the proof that something did not end up in the hands of the Chinese, the Russians, or myself for that matter, is quite difficult, given that evidence of absence is impossible to obtain. However, the absence of evidence to the claim that they have gained access to information through Snowden himself is reason enough for me.

You want proof that nothing was transfered to them? Might as well try to prove the non-existance of the famous tea pot in orbit.

So the basic argument boils down to motivation as well as credibility of claims.

His motivation to keep access to his material restricted to the selected group of journalists is apparent from his own interviews. They are supposed to be the check on the government, they lack the information to fullfil the role, they need access to correct (what he perceived to be) a wrong, namely a grave breach of your consitution on a previously unheard of scale.
Providing access to Russia or China would instantly negate all hope of ever not drawing the short straw in this mess, as the US is the only country on the planet who can provide him with amnesty and therefore safety.

So why would he do it? For a shot at asylum? You know as well as I do that (permanent) asylum in China/Russia is worthless if the US is after you. Europe could guarantee one's safety, but given the lack of sovereignty vis-a-vis the US, it would not be an option.

That leaves credibility of claims. And that's where my first reason comes into play, the one you put down as "naive". His opponents, those in positions of power, be it inside government or the press, have a track record of being... let's not mince words here, lying sacks of shit. James Clapper's act of perjury on front of Congress is just the most prominent manifestation of it. The entire bunch lied their asses off during the preparation of the invasion of Iraq, they lied their asses off during the revelations triggered by Chelsea Manning and they lied their asses off about the total und unrelenting surveillance of American citizens in violation of their constitutional rights.

If you think supervision of the NSA by the Select Committee on Intelligence is actually working, I suggest you take a look at statements by Senator Wyden. The NSA even plays them for fools. Hell, Bruce Schneier was recently approached by members of Congress to explain to them what the NSA was doing, because the NSA refused to. Great oversight, works like a charm. By the way, it's the same fucking deal with GCHQ and the BND.

So yes, the fella who "stole" data is actually a trustworthy figure, because a) his claims were true and b) his actions pulled off the veil that covered the fact that 320 million Americans had their private data stolen and were sold out by agencies of their own government in conjunction with private intelligence contractors.

What else...

Ah, yeah. "Sloppy" and "stupid". Again, if he was sloppy and stupid, what does that say about the internal control structure of the intelligence industry? They didn't notice shit, they still claim to be unaware of what precisely he took with him. Great security, fellas.

"He could have allowed the press to do it's job without disclosing a much of what has been released."

He disclosed nothing. He is not an experienced journalist and therefore, by his own admission, not qualified to make the call what to publish and how. That's why he handed it over to Barton Gellman at the WaPo, Glenn Greenwald at the Guardian and Laura Poitras, who worked closely with Der Spiegel.

If Spiegel, WaPo and Guardian are not reputable institutions of journalism, none are. So he did precisely what you claim he should have done: he allowed the press to do its bloody job and released fuck all himself.

As for the cheap shot at not being an American: seventy years ago, your folks liberated us from the plague of fascism, brought us freedom. Am I supposed to just sit here and watch my brothers and sisters in the US become the subjects of total surveillance, the kind my country suffered from during two dictatorships in the last century?

Ironically, that would be un-American, at least the way I understand it.

And there's nothing gleeful about my concerns. I am deeply furious about this shit and even more so about the apathy of people all around the world. You think I want Americans to suffer from the same shit we went through as a petty form of payback?

Fuck that. It's the intelligence industry that I'm gunning for. Your nationality doesn't mean squat, some intelligence agency has its crosshairs on you wherever you live. It just happens to be an American citizen who had the balls to provide us with the info to finally try and protect citizens in all countries from the overreaching abuse by the intelligence industry.

In fact, I'd rather worry about our own massive problems within Europe (rise of fascism in Greece, 60% youth unemployment, unelected governments, etc). So can we please just dismantle all these spy agencies and get on with our lives?

Sorry if this is incoherent, but it's late and I'm even more pissed off than usual.

The talk by Jacob Appelbaum and Julian Assange yesterday opened up with a surprise guest: Sarah Harrison, the WL lawyer/journalist/activist who got Snowden out of Hong Kong. I thought I saw her earlier in the day, but then again, there were at least three blokes who bear a striking resemblence to Snowden.

Also, a former MI5 analyst turned whistleblower gave a surprisingly harsh summary of the current state of affairs in western democracies. I'll submit that one later today, should be able to attract at least a couple of views.

I didn't make it in time for the talk by the ACLU's Chris Soghoian on government hacking and the next crypto wars. But I did get into the room for a marvelous talk about European companies (Gamma Group/HackingTeam) who provide the tools for dictatorships to control their population with regards to the internet, aka surveillance suits.

Don't correct my inaccuracy with another one. Iran is NOT a democracy, it is an Islamic theocracy. My referencing Ahmadinejad as a 'dictator' was only used in the same sense that folks use when referring to Bush, Cheney or Obama as 'dictators'. None of them came to power through a coup or by birth right, and each stepped down in normal course.

Calling Iran a democracy though is just wrong, and is about as accurate as referring to America as a dictatorship, In Iran the presidential candidates must ALL be approved by the Islamic council or nobody gets to even try to vote for them. The highest position of power in the country is not the President, but the Supreme Leader who is appointed by a small group of Islamic 'experts'. There is no room in the Iranian system for the election of an non-Muslim, or even a Sunni muslim, to even attempt to hold the position of President let alone Supreme Leader.

And given the choice between moral and legal I'd like to think I'll never hesitate in choosing moral every time.

Your argument about nation's blood stained hands making any moral argument hypocritical I think goes to far. Your plenty right it's hypocritical for any nation state to declare "that was wrong and must be punished" when in virtually any given case every nation has likely got as bad and worse written throughout it's history. I object when you go further and then throw out the declaration "that was wrong and must punished" as not merely hypocritical to have been said, but acting as if the statement is then made false.

In the end the facts seem to clearly indicate that Assad used chemical weapons(with Russian made rockets) against his own people to hold onto his dictatorship. Personally, I believe that those of us who still listen to conscience are beholden to side against Assad. We needn't embrace any and all enemies of Assad, but at the least we should show solidarity with the moderates who started things off through peaceful protests. If America comes in and notes the exact same things, the hypocrisy of that DOES NOT make any of those facts less true.

Can you honestly tell me you deeply and truly believe it is in the best interests of the Syrian people for America and the rest of the world for that matter, to continue on the path of doing nothing but talk? You seem to have been around enough to appreciate that the UN will NEVER under any circumstances authorize force against Assad. Demanding we wait for UN approval is identical to demanding we do nothing to aid the Syrian people fighting Assad's forces which I just can't agree with.

That only seems to address the option of a military strike. What of the deployment of chemical weapons against Syrian civilians? The evidence from the UN report seems to remove any doubt to the fact that hundreds, maybe better than a thousand died in the chemical attacks on Aug. 21 alone. The evidence even further shows the trajectory from several craters point towards one of Assad's military bases. If the previous evidence had not already been sufficient, surely the conclusion can at least be made that the burden of evidence clearly suggests that Assad's forces committed the attack. That evidence as well is about as strong as it could possibly get. Even videotaped evidence of Assad's forces loading and firing said rockets would be hard to be declared more conclusive. After all, maybe it's just fake footage by America, or has been misrepresented or some other possible fault.

My trouble when speaking to the next generation is how exactly do you tell them that yes, Assad is a dictator deploying chemical weapons to maintain his hold on power, but the good and moral path is for us to not get involved with anything but words. Why? Well, because we might make the situation for Syria's civilians even worse. I just don't subscribe to the world view that ignoring in all but word such a dictatorship is the 'right thing'. When a dictator is deploying chemical weapons to hold onto power I support and advocate for the use of force against that dictator, and the absence of such by the entirety of the UN is to me a crime as well.

@Trancecoach @enoch

Enoch's questions:

1. People should be producing something if they are getting paid for it - whether that is a good, service, etc. If someone else pays them to create or perform they are owed exactly what they have been promised to be compensated.

2. Enoch I think you are misunderstanding what a free market is. A free market is not a marketplace without regulations. A free market is not anarchy - there are still rules. Instead a free market is a market without a centralized or directing authority. To clarify a free market is one in which government policy does not set pricing.

3. You don't believe or disbelieve in democracy. It isn't a religion, it is a form of government. There is nothing inherently wrong with regulations. The devil is in the details. Regulations can be good or bad for a marketplace.

4. Enoch, I think that is a gross oversimplification of why corporate profits have been as high as they are. Many things have led to large corporate profits including globalization, expanding markets, etc. Yes, here in the USA corporations exercise influence on government, but its only one part of the bigger picture.

5. Completely incorrect. A free market has nothing to do with the existence of copyrights or patents.

6. Democracy is a form of government. A Free Market is a type of market structure. You could have a dictatorship and a free market. A monarch and a free market. A republic and a free market. A Theocracy and a free market.

Furthermore you could have a "Free Market" for automobiles but a "regulated" or "controlled" market for electricity within one country.

For example:

In the USA I would argue automobiles operate in a "Free Market". Yes there are certain standards the government sets (safety, fuel efficiency, etc) but the pricing is determined by the automakers. You can argue about the restrictions. Do they go far enough? Do they go too far? etc.

Conversely, most electric companies prices are regulated by the government and they are required to provide services to certain areas.

Lastly, a free market does not mean the market operates without laws. Copyright and patent law being just a small part of those laws.

I hope this clarifies some of these questions for you.


Best,

Kgrr

Um, Ok, then go ahead and stop them.


Whoever controls the government, controls everyone else.
The problem with plutocracy: the plutocrats rule over you.
The problem with monarchy: the monarch rules over you.
The problem with 'democracy:' the mob (the supposed "majority") rules over you.
The problem with republics: the "people's representatives" rule over you.
The problem with dictatorships: the dictator rules over you.
The 'problem' with anarchy: no one rules over you.

So if you think you can take over the government and rule over everyone else, go ahead, try. Let me know how it goes.


Most (granted not all) so-called crime has more to do with law enforcement than with 'criminals.' Don't believe me? Check out this recently sifted video about the enforcement of the so-called war on drugs.

You do recall that those "reports" calling this a CIA induced uprising were written by Assad? Are you aware that the ONLY ones claiming uncertainty who was behind the attack are Assad and the Russians? Assad being the one who actively blocked the UN from investigating the site he claimed would prove his innocence?

You are advocating we do nothing as a dictator uses chemical weapons against his own people. How is it humanly possible to have any more certainty than we already do about what is happening within a war zone? This isn't the first time Assad's family annihilated a people. His father put down a rebellion in his time by taking an entire city and simply turning it into a parking lot and mass grave of the residents. Assad has been deliberately targeting civilians and unarmed protesters from the very beginning. This latest attack isn't some lonely isolated charge, it's the icing on a very horrific cake of war crimes.

None of that is to say anything positive about the rebel forces, disparate and varied as they are. Yes, they include people I would declare our allies in the region who from the start were protesting and advocating for a Syria free of dictatorship and the Assad crime family. Unfortunately, the rebels most effective/powerful fighting forces largely seem to be jihadi fighters back by Saudi money, or even worse, Al Qaida and like minded foreigners coming over from Iraq to take on a hated Shia led military in Assads forces. Al Qaida sees a chance to win hearts and minds among Syria rebels, and we play right into that by doing nothing.

More over, with all that Assad is doing, you need to stop and think before apologizing for him. You need to at least admit that when advocating that we do nothing you are up front and honest with the horrific crimes you are demanding we ignore.

Lets not forget who has skin in this game. China and Russia liked the stats quo. Much like the West, dictatorships in the middle east suite them as long as it maintains stability - and resources flowing out. They have their interests there the same as the West and arguably in this case they are more invested than the US+allies.

I'm not certain intervention is the right course. I question what exactly would be sufficient evidence and whether there is any reasonable expectation it could have been or will be obtained, given the degree to which inspectors have been blocked. I think Russia is banking that evidence won't be found and not because they don't believe Assad was to blame.