i'd like to think people would stick together in a crisis ;-/ apparently not.

Hell, in a situation like that i'd like to have black people in my group even if just to put a friendly face forward to talk to people we meet ;-/

>> ^randomize:
>> ^Sarzy:
The kittens of the sift stick together, I see.

We can't be defeated. Your time is up monkey-man.



Oh randomize, clearly you have yet to experience the sweet tender delights of a real monkey

>> ^Sarzy:
The kittens of the sift stick together, I see.


We can't be defeated. Your time is up monkey-man.

The kittens of the sift stick together, I see.

Ew. I find this very unpleasant. No one in the clip seems to have a problem with this behavior. The woman encourages it (perhaps "ring girls" are used to it) and then she thanks him for both the interview and the dry humping. "Yes, I am an attractive female dressed in sexy clothing. You therefore have permission to violate me in any way you wish. I have no problem with sexual harrassment, because I am an object of pleasure." I think they are both kind of perverse and have little to no respect for themselves. As long as they stick together and stay away from me and mine, they are welcome to behave like *ehem* idiots.

^ Perhaps Pulitzer is aiming a bit too high. Still, he's doing a fantastic job.

Us "professional posters" working for our "specific, financed agenda" have to stick together.

Goodness knows we'd never speak out for what we believe in unless someone paid us to!

I was also a longtime lurker like you, and we both ended our sift virginity at approximately the same time. Us semi-younglings gotta stick together, you know! Well done!

Providing that you love each other and can foresee yourselves sticking together until one of you dies, why not? Then you can call her "the wife" and she can call you her "old man."

Otherwise, I've never seen anything wrong with living in sin, especially if you're older and you don't see any kids on the horizon.

I have met people who lived together for extended periods, then got married, and watched their relationship come apart at the seams.

You can't anyway, prop 8 passed.

I know what you're thinking though, blankfist. Why complicate a relationship? Why would you take the beauty out of a relationship where you're there because you care for the other person but your choice to leave is as easy as a decision and a rough couple of weeks following the break up? Why would you make it so that if one day, you didn't feel like you wanted to be with somebody, you don't want to leave because of how intertwined your life is with that person?

In my opinion marriage forces people to stick together despite their relationship being unhealthy or dysfunctional because it's too much of a pain in the ass to get a divorce (and getting a divorce would be admitting a failure). This compounds the unhealthy relationship until it gets so ugly, there's no choice. The future is not a certain thing, especially when you're dealing with people so why give a promise to somebody who may one day change? Hell, you're gonna change too.

One of the arguments for marriage (usually by females) is that it's a commitment, and a promise to them. I think it's more of a romantic sentiment that you're with somebody because you care about them and even though you can leave at any time, you decide to stay. In marriage, you make that initial commitment, but after a while, there's a possibility you're only there because you're married and it's too much of a pain in your ass to get a divorce.

That might be just me though...

Incidentally, I think it breaks as soon as they start rolling. The stresses on the corners are too great for the legos to stay attached and when they have as big "chunks" instead of a rounder ball, there is no way it's gonna stick together.

Seamen sticks together...



hur hur.

Dear god man! My feathers are sticking together already... get off me!

^NetRunner,

If you are honestly interested in learning a different perspective, then we can talk it through. As a disclaimer, you aren't going to learn as much if you've already made up your mind before we even start a discussion.

When solving a problem, one invariably has to make assumptions. The problem is what assumptions need to be made? Economic theory is valuable when it can make accurate predictions. If it cannot make accurate predictions it is not very useful. A robust economic theory should explain all situations -- especially simple ones like my lemonade example.

Let me respond to your points so we can continue the discussion.

You said "In my mind, you're forgetting the sidewalk the kids built their stand next to, that makes their enterprise possible. That's part of what that tax money is for."

That is a valid assumption, but doesn't it just add an extra layer of complexity? Sure, we can include it in an analysis, but shouldn't a good theory be able to make accurate predictions without that assumption?

You said "Can you deny that the Interstate Highway program created wealth? Incentives for a transcontinental railroad spurred growth? Trust busting of the oil and rail companies in the early 20th century restored competition? The invention of the internet?

To answer those questions we first have to know and understand what wealth is. You are asking here the definition of wealth. To ask what creates it without knowing what it is would be putting the horse in front of the cart.

Why don't we focus on that first, as I still think there is some confusion

Here are some definitions of wealth:

"the annual produce of the land and labour of the society"
"anything that has utility and is capable of being appropriated or exchanged."
"rich or valuable contents or produce"

Essentially, wealth is a measure of the value or utility of an object. Essentially, all objects are valuable (given the correct knowledge) so when you think of wealth, you should just think of "tangible goods." For example, bread, milk, cars, houses, land, cows, computers, metals, factories, paper, roads, etc. Money is different because it is an object that can be exchanged for something else more valuable than what it is itself. This is not a problem, but if you really want to understand what wealth is, try to ignore money for the time being.

Wealth is created when the value or utility of objects are increased. This is done only by physical labor. New ideas or inventions can be used to find new ways of creating value with labor, but ideas alone do not create wealth. For example, wealth is created when a farmer sows a lemon seed and grows a lemon tree, and again when he picks a bushel of lemons, and once more when his children make lemonade. In each step, wealth was only created by physical labor. The lemons did not arrange themselves into bushels, nor squeeze themselves into glasses. Lemons cannot create wealth because lemons cannot perform labor.

So now that we have defined wealth, I will attempt to answer some of your questions. Let me preface this by saying that the answers to these questions should not depend on ideological affiliation. I am going to be strict in my answers because that is what science requires.

1. "Can you deny that the Interstate Highway program created wealth."
The highway program undoubtedly created wealth because people where hired to perform labor: they built roads. However, in the context of this question what you are really asking is, was more wealth created with this money than would have been created in the hands of individuals? I will come back to this, but for now it is important to remember that wealth can be measured in all items, not just roads.

2. "Railroad spurred growth?"
A railroad is wealth. Wealth can most certainly be used to fuel growth. Another example is food.

3. "Trust busting of the oil and rail companies in the early 20th century restored competition?"
I don't think this is pertinent here so I'll save it for another time, if you don't mind.

4. "The invention of the internet?"
An invention is an idea which provides a new way to use existing materials. It is a new plan for labor. The idea of the internet can be used to create wealth, but it does not in and of itself create wealth. Another example is the invention of fire. The idea of "fire" gave a new plan for labor: rubbing sticks together, but the idea of fire itself is not enough to create a flame. Someone must actually perform the labor to create fire, which is wealth.

6. "NASA, The space race and all the discoveries they've brought about?"
Nasa is a group of people who in part, physically build space ships which are wealth. They are performing labor, so NASA does in fact create wealth. As with the interstate program, the context in which you ask this is, was more wealth created with this money that would have been created in the hands of individuals?

8. "the much maligned public education system?"
Teachers perform labor when they impart knowledge to students. Ideas alone are not wealth, as they do not alter the value of existing materials until they physical manifest themselves in the form of work. However, if one views a person as an object, then a person may be considered "more valuable" if they have greater knowledge, for example. Educators can be said to create wealth, but only in this abstract way--as ideas do not have real utility until they manifest themselves as work.

9. "national healthcare systems seem to play a similar role in optimizing their human resources."
Doctors create wealth because the body is an object which has value. For example, a broken leg may be of less value than a functional leg, so when a doctor performs work (setting the bone, creating a cast) he is doing work to increase the value of the leg--he is creating wealth.

If we are on the same page about what wealth is and how is created, we can try to answer the question "can the government create wealth?" As I alluded to in #1, the question is, technically, "can labor in the hands of the government create greater wealth than labor in the hands of individuals?" If we are not on the same page, and there is still confusion or contention, lets get that out of the way first.

Always. We got our awesome hats.

In reply to this comment by schmawy:
Whatever happens, let's stick together, okay?

>> ^ElJardinero:
Free healthcare for all isn't socialism, it's called "sticking together". Where I live you pay the same amount for a strained knee, brain cancer e.t.c. , 30-40 dollars I think. No insurance needed, just being a citizen.


There's no such thing as a free lunch. Want to work for me for free? Didn't think so. Socialist health care is paid by taxes (nominal appropriations) and inflation (wage and savings value appropriations). Those are both forced methods of payment, there's no opting out.

Say, for example, your neighbor decides to smoke his whole life. He comes down with lung cancer and undergoes numerous operations, receives numerous drugs and therapy, all totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars. Now let's take several people who paid the same amount into the system and got nothing because they never smoked. Those people effectively paid for his costs. A complete transfer of wealth, despite having no control over that person's personal decisions. Money that could have gone to a better home for themselves, another child for themselves, better food for themselves. Gone, given to the guy who smoked under the idealistic notion of coerced charity for the public good.

In fact, if everything were provided to you based on other people's money, why would you work at all? And if people don't work, where does the money come from? Now you now why the USSR fell and every other country who became too socialist. When you have an incentive model that says, no matter how hard you work, you're gauranteed the same share as the next guy, why excel? Or no matter how many risks you take with your health of your own volition, you will be subsidized by others who didn't. It completely perverts incentive.

In capitalism, on the other hand, where money is market determined (gold), and you have no central bank price fixing interest rates, and government is only funded to the extent that it protects rights and offers courts, people just... trade with one another with the effect of benefiting both parties. Two people acting in their own self-interest will make mutually beneficial trades even if they were only thinking of their own welfare.

>> ^MINK:
socialism is just a word.
america is not a word, neither was the USSR, nor is Sweden. you're all arguing about a word ffs.
I guess Obama is trying to distance himself from the word because it was subverted by fucking idiots for 100 years.
I repeat... if you are not a socialist, what are you? Antisocialist?


Socialism is simply the opposite of capitalism. Socialism is the percentage of capital controlled "communally" via the government. Capitalism is the percentage of capital controlled by its earner. We are probably 60% socialist at the moment, and it should be around 10%.