Ayn Rand's Influence on Alan Greenspan
In The Age of Turbulence, Alan Greenspan describes the influence that Ayn Rand had on his intellectual development.

Ayn Rand became a stabilizing force in my life. It hadn't taken long for us to have a meeting of the minds -- mostly my mind meeting hers -- and in the fifties and early sixties I became a regular at the weekly gatherings at her apartment. She was a wholly original thinker, sharply analytical, strong-willed, highly principled, and very insistent on rationality as the highest value. In that regard, our values were congruent -- we agreed on the importance of mathematics and intellectual rigor.

But she had gone far beyond that, thinking more broadly than I had ever dared. She was a devoted Aristotelian -- the central idea being that there exists an objective reality that is separate from consciousness and capable of being known. Thus she called her philosophy objectivism. And she applied key tenets of Aristotelian ethics -- namely, that individuals have innate nobility and that the highest duty of every individual is to flourish by realizing that potential. Exploring ideas with her was a remarkable course in logic and epistemology. I was able to keep up with her most of the time.

Rand's Collective became my first social circle outside the university and the economics profession. I engaged in the all-night debates and wrote spirited commentary for her newsletter with the fervor of a young acolyte drawn to a whole new set of ideas. Like any new convert, I tended to frame the concepts in their starkest, simplest terms. Most everyone sees the simple outline of an idea before complexity and qualification set in. If we didn't, there would be nothing to qualify, nothing to learn. It was only as contradictions inherent in my new notions began to emerge that the fervor receded.

One contradiction I found particularly enlightening. According to objectivist precepts, taxation was immoral because it allowed for government appropriation of private property by force. Yet if taxation was wrong, how could you reliably finance the essential functions of government, including the protection of individuals' rights through police power? The Randian answer, that those who rationally saw the need for government would contribute voluntarily, was inadequate. People have free will; suppose they refused?

I still found the broader philosophy of unfettered market competition compelling, as I do to this day, but I reluctantly began to realize that if there were qualifications to my intellectual edifice, I couldn't argue that others should readily accept it. [...]

Ayn Rand and I remained close until she died in 1982, and I'm grateful for the influence she had on my life. I was intellectually limited until I met her. All of my work had been empirical and numbers-based, never values-oriented. I was a talented technician, but that was all. My logical positivism had discounted history and literature -- if you'd asked me whether Chaucer was worth reading, I'd have said, "Don't bother." Rand persuaded me to look at human beings, their values, how they work, what they do and why they do it, and how they think and why they think. This broadened my horizons far beyond the models of economics I'd learned. I began to study how societies form and how cultures behave, and to realize that economics and forecasting depend on such knowledge -- different cultures grow and create material wealth in profoundly different ways. All of this started for me with Ayn Rand. She introduced me to a vast realm from which I'd shut myself off.

From The Age of Turbulence, pp. 51-53. Omissions from the text are shown with bracketed ellipses. All other punctuation and spelling is from the original.

http://www.noblesoul.com/orc/bio/turbulence.html

i was disappointed when i saw Bill talking on the issue... uninformed and with that lack of information, making wrong declarative statements

SOPA makes you guilty on assumption, and you are forced to prove your innocence...
and for MOST non-media conglomerates, that means you go out of business.. because your website is shutdown until you fight it out in court...

this isn't about copyright protection... its about competition elimination

and the scope of this bill lends itself quite well to being misused... this site is speaking out against the government, or an ally of the government, or talking about things we don't like? we'll just have SOPA shut the site down, maybe go to the amount of effort required to post a comment on the site that "justifies" the action... and the status quo goes on uninterupted

its the boundary line, its the point that when we cross it, the concept of FREE information over the internet ceases to exist... because any single country that takes action because of SOPA, it affects everyone else on the planet (who's government has also signed onto SOPA)

the uprisings that took place in the middle east due to social networks would be a thing of the past only... they'd NOT be allowed to happen anywhere else (most especially in the WESTERN world - I take it back partly, if there was oil/resource interests for the WEST in that country, it'd still be allowed)

and as for Bill's, "people just like to steal shit" comment... please, demonstrate that a person who downloaded Religulous would have bought it if they had no other option... you can't... its alot easier to show examples of people who DID buy it because they downloaded it in the first place

take a look at the VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY... while there are some big companies whose sole purpose is to rate/review/preview upcoming video games, you'll see alot of these are closing down... why? because fan created, by donation alternatives are providing a valid and sustainable alternative... that's ALOT of free advertising (dbl edged because it could be bad reviews) these companies get... and for some of the smaller video game companies/independant game companies, the ONLY advertising they get

how easily would all that be squashed with SOPA? didn't like your review... your site gets shut down. we only give permission to sites we KNOW will give us good reviews... etc etc

that's not protecting internet creativity... that's killing off internet creativity... and the ability for non-media conglomerates to compete

make sure your government knows the distinction between small business and monopolies
make sure they are serving your interests, and not their own pockets
businesses spending lobbying money and offering jobs to representatives to influence the creation of laws IS the end result of UNFETTERED MARKETS... the laws that they complain about, that hurt their ability to "compete", are laws that were enacted to protect YOU the consumer

change the USA to the UCA... United Corporations of America... they'll lobby to get rid of the America part... too restrictive

^Freedom means different things to different people. While unfettered markets might provide liberty for the very rich, it comes at the expense of the liberty of others. People liberty > Money liberty

Why do markets allow people to suffer?

1. Better system than capitalism would be a balanced hybrid system of capitalism and socialism controlled by people in a true democracy - as opposed to the plutocratic charade we live under now. Think Finland, Switzerland, Nordic Slavic type social democracies. These systems are infinitely better than our capitalist nightmare by any metric.

2. All the think tanks that tell you what to think are funded by deep corporate pockets. Your guru milton Friedman was chummmy with all the neocons - Reagan, Rummy and some pretty nasty dictators. David Koch was even on the libertarian ticket. Open your eyes to reality, friend.

3. Feudalism is only freedom for the wealthy elite. You don't seem to understand that you have a very subjective and limited concept of 'liberty'.

7. Free market reforms are terrible to labor, as we are seeing right now, where libertarians are calling on American labor to 'get competitive' with Chinese slaves. No fucking thank you.

8. There's no shortage of excuses for your belief system, and never any empirical data. This is why I deride your political beliefs as religious beliefs.

9. It's nice that you used 'Corporatist America' as a way of refuting my contention that European social democracies are superior.

It's amazing to me that someone with such a tenuous grasp on reality could call anyone else ignorant. Time and time again your politics are debunked on this site, only for you to redouble your efforts. I hope one day you are able to overcome your indoctrination.


In reply to this comment by blankfist:
I'm an atheist. When I attribute things to God and say things like, "Why does God allow the his devout followers to suffer?" I don't mean, "Why does the ancient fictional religious construct that you based your life around allow his devout followers to suffer?" What I do mean is, "Why does your personal god that you believe in allow his devout followers to suffer?"

Most atheists, I think, tend to use God in this way, not because they believe in the existence of a personal god, but because it's the widely held understanding of God (if not the original definition). It's irrelevant to our conversation, so I'm not sure why you keep bringing it up. Your analogy is bad, IMO.

And you and I will continue to disagree what free markets are, and that's something I cannot change.

1. The claim was "[A free market] states that altruism and empathy are bad; greed and selfishness are good." That's what I was responding to. Still ridiculous. I've said constant that if you could find a better system than Capitalism, I'd be on board, but there IS NONE. All of this tap dancing around definitions is obfuscation.

2. Patently false. An absolutely disingenuous and false statement. What's pathetic about this comment is how you continue to twist this bastardized government legitimized entity back on free exchanges when we've covered this a billion times. Again, corporations are antithetical to free markets, because they enjoy a government created reduction of competition, government subsidies, corporate welfare, and so on. In short, they enjoy intervention in the marketplace, which is what YOU'RE touting, not me. So, it's YOUR concepts of government that have been and continues to be shaped by corporations?

3. I think people claim the free market is "self-correcting" more than "self-regulation", but that's a digression. But listen to what you wrote. "Claims of freedom, liberty" will spring forth in a free market? Yes. Yes very much. Why, you ask? One must only look to the definition of a free market: the voluntary exchange between people without coercion. That is liberty and freedom on its face. The opposite, your idea of regulated and interventionist markets, is coercive and authoritarian. The opposite of free.

5. Good for them.

7. What? No, I'm saying you're associating things like lowering taxes and "taking away power from labor" with free markets, which is ridiculous.

8. Failed states caused by the failure of statism (and the pilfering of government employed opportunists) is not the free market in action. Nice try.

9. Says you. California is a perfect example. It's struggling at the moment to pay for the huge number of government pensions for those unionized "heros" that retired at age 55 and get 90% of their income for the rest of their long lives. But then just recently the LA city council, a haven for modern liberalism and your capitalist/social-democratic utopia, cleared a 1.2 billion dollar construction project to build a fucking luxury hotel. According to this article, "overtime pay for the Los Angeles Fire Department soared 60 percent over the last decade", and "the department's top earner racked up a total of $570,276 in overtime in the last three years, including $206,685 in 2006." And that's just overtime. I could go on, but I've already been over this with NetRunner. Suffice it to say, this is your utopian hybrid in action, and it's a complete failure. And it's slowly going bankrupt. In fact, California has asked the Federal government repeatedly for a bailout.

Do go on, though. I like to watch you dig that grave a little deeper.

Ignorance is not a moral high ground.

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
It's very common in arguments of religion for atheists to attribute things to "God". Why does God cause so much pain and suffering? Why doesn't God heal amputees?, etc. It rolls off the tongue a lot better than 'Why doesn't the ancient fictional religious construct that you based your life around heal amputees.?'

It's not the definition of 'free market' that I question, it's all the wide eyed, miracle elixer promises that are used to entice gullible followers. For instance, there is no evidence that free markets self-regulate. There is no evidence that living under unfettered markets would create a desirable political climate for anyone but the super rich. All that stuff about 'voting with your wallet' is naive.

Free Markets do not equal free people. This is the big lie that gives this ideology its (fake) moral center. Under a free market economy, there would be a huge power imbalance between business and labor, which is why corporations champion (if disengenuously in your eyes) the free market. Deregulation, privatization, gutting social welfare programs and other "Free Market" inspired austerity measures always result in low wages, unemployment, poverty and labor abuse. Free Dumb.

1. Friedman has praised greed. Rand has praised selfishness. You have complained about the dangers of government programs motivated by compassion. Do you dispute this?

2. My point is that corporations, regardless of how you feel about them, are the driving force behind American styled libertarianism. Doesn't it give you a moment of pause that your concept of liberty has been, and continues to be shaped by corporations?

3. Again, it's not the definition I object to, it's the wild ass claims of freedom, liberty, self-regulation and other doctrinal bullshit that is supposed to mysteriously spring forth somehow once a set of arbitrary conditions are met. When I talk about lack of evidence, I'm talking about these pie in the sky promises.

5. It is funny that liberalism and libertarianism have swapped meanings in this country. American libertarians are always so confused when Chomsky calls himself a libertarian.

7. So you are saying that deregulation, privatization and the cutting of social programs would not function as intended if they were implemented by force? Why is that? Can you understand my skepticism when individual elements of free marketism fail on their own, and then I'm told that we need even more elements of free marketism for everything to work correctly? It's like a homeopathic doctor saying "of course these homeopathic remedies are making your cancer worse, you forgot the ginseng. You can't cure cancer without ginseng, silly fool."

8. Failed states with no taxation or government should be free market wonderlands, no? It's a common swipe at free market partisans that never gets addressed. Care to give it a go?

9. The most successful states are currently capitalist/socialist hybrids. We trail behind other states (European states) with a more even balance of state and business. If I believed in utopia, I wouldn't be a liberal, because compassion and empathy would be unnecessary in a true utopia.

http://videosift.com/video/The-evolution-of-empathy

For a rugged individualist, you sure do love your little categories and boxes. Do you ever notice your need to be defined and to define others? I don't share your need for precise definition. I like to keep my options open.

"Ignorance is not a moral high ground." I like this quote, especially when you use it to defend an irrational belief system. I'm stealing this quote.

I'm an atheist. When I attribute things to God and say things like, "Why does God allow the his devout followers to suffer?" I don't mean, "Why does the ancient fictional religious construct that you based your life around allow his devout followers to suffer?" What I do mean is, "Why does your personal god that you believe in allow his devout followers to suffer?"

Most atheists, I think, tend to use God in this way, not because they believe in the existence of a personal god, but because it's the widely held understanding of God (if not the original definition). It's irrelevant to our conversation, so I'm not sure why you keep bringing it up. Your analogy is bad, IMO.

And you and I will continue to disagree what free markets are, and that's something I cannot change.

1. The claim was "[A free market] states that altruism and empathy are bad; greed and selfishness are good." That's what I was responding to. Still ridiculous. I've said constant that if you could find a better system than Capitalism, I'd be on board, but there IS NONE. All of this tap dancing around definitions is obfuscation.

2. Patently false. An absolutely disingenuous and false statement. What's pathetic about this comment is how you continue to twist this bastardized government legitimized entity back on free exchanges when we've covered this a billion times. Again, corporations are antithetical to free markets, because they enjoy a government created reduction of competition, government subsidies, corporate welfare, and so on. In short, they enjoy intervention in the marketplace, which is what YOU'RE touting, not me. So, it's YOUR concepts of government that have been and continues to be shaped by corporations?

3. I think people claim the free market is "self-correcting" more than "self-regulation", but that's a digression. But listen to what you wrote. "Claims of freedom, liberty" will spring forth in a free market? Yes. Yes very much. Why, you ask? One must only look to the definition of a free market: the voluntary exchange between people without coercion. That is liberty and freedom on its face. The opposite, your idea of regulated and interventionist markets, is coercive and authoritarian. The opposite of free.

5. Good for them.

7. What? No, I'm saying you're associating things like lowering taxes and "taking away power from labor" with free markets, which is ridiculous.

8. Failed states caused by the failure of statism (and the pilfering of government employed opportunists) is not the free market in action. Nice try.

9. Says you. California is a perfect example. It's struggling at the moment to pay for the huge number of government pensions for those unionized "heros" that retired at age 55 and get 90% of their income for the rest of their long lives. But then just recently the LA city council, a haven for modern liberalism and your capitalist/social-democratic utopia, cleared a 1.2 billion dollar construction project to build a fucking luxury hotel. According to this article, "overtime pay for the Los Angeles Fire Department soared 60 percent over the last decade", and "the department's top earner racked up a total of $570,276 in overtime in the last three years, including $206,685 in 2006." And that's just overtime. I could go on, but I've already been over this with NetRunner. Suffice it to say, this is your utopian hybrid in action, and it's a complete failure. And it's slowly going bankrupt. In fact, California has asked the Federal government repeatedly for a bailout.

Do go on, though. I like to watch you dig that grave a little deeper.

Ignorance is not a moral high ground.

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
It's very common in arguments of religion for atheists to attribute things to "God". Why does God cause so much pain and suffering? Why doesn't God heal amputees?, etc. It rolls off the tongue a lot better than 'Why doesn't the ancient fictional religious construct that you based your life around heal amputees.?'

It's not the definition of 'free market' that I question, it's all the wide eyed, miracle elixer promises that are used to entice gullible followers. For instance, there is no evidence that free markets self-regulate. There is no evidence that living under unfettered markets would create a desirable political climate for anyone but the super rich. All that stuff about 'voting with your wallet' is naive.

Free Markets do not equal free people. This is the big lie that gives this ideology its (fake) moral center. Under a free market economy, there would be a huge power imbalance between business and labor, which is why corporations champion (if disengenuously in your eyes) the free market. Deregulation, privatization, gutting social welfare programs and other "Free Market" inspired austerity measures always result in low wages, unemployment, poverty and labor abuse. Free Dumb.

1. Friedman has praised greed. Rand has praised selfishness. You have complained about the dangers of government programs motivated by compassion. Do you dispute this?

2. My point is that corporations, regardless of how you feel about them, are the driving force behind American styled libertarianism. Doesn't it give you a moment of pause that your concept of liberty has been, and continues to be shaped by corporations?

3. Again, it's not the definition I object to, it's the wild ass claims of freedom, liberty, self-regulation and other doctrinal bullshit that is supposed to mysteriously spring forth somehow once a set of arbitrary conditions are met. When I talk about lack of evidence, I'm talking about these pie in the sky promises.

5. It is funny that liberalism and libertarianism have swapped meanings in this country. American libertarians are always so confused when Chomsky calls himself a libertarian.

7. So you are saying that deregulation, privatization and the cutting of social programs would not function as intended if they were implemented by force? Why is that? Can you understand my skepticism when individual elements of free marketism fail on their own, and then I'm told that we need even more elements of free marketism for everything to work correctly? It's like a homeopathic doctor saying "of course these homeopathic remedies are making your cancer worse, you forgot the ginseng. You can't cure cancer without ginseng, silly fool."

8. Failed states with no taxation or government should be free market wonderlands, no? It's a common swipe at free market partisans that never gets addressed. Care to give it a go?

9. The most successful states are currently capitalist/socialist hybrids. We trail behind other states (European states) with a more even balance of state and business. If I believed in utopia, I wouldn't be a liberal, because compassion and empathy would be unnecessary in a true utopia.

http://videosift.com/video/The-evolution-of-empathy

For a rugged individualist, you sure do love your little categories and boxes. Do you ever notice your need to be defined and to define others? I don't share your need for precise definition. I like to keep my options open.

"Ignorance is not a moral high ground." I like this quote, especially when you use it to defend an irrational belief system. I'm stealing this quote.

It's very common in arguments of religion for atheists to attribute things to "God". Why does God cause so much pain and suffering? Why doesn't God heal amputees?, etc. It rolls off the tongue a lot better than 'Why doesn't the ancient fictional religious construct that you based your life around heal amputees.?'

It's not the definition of 'free market' that I question, it's all the wide eyed, miracle elixer promises that are used to entice gullible followers. For instance, there is no evidence that free markets self-regulate. There is no evidence that living under unfettered markets would create a desirable political climate for anyone but the super rich. All that stuff about 'voting with your wallet' is naive.

Free Markets do not equal free people. This is the big lie that gives this ideology its (fake) moral center. Under a free market economy, there would be a huge power imbalance between business and labor, which is why corporations champion (if disengenuously in your eyes) the free market. Deregulation, privatization, gutting social welfare programs and other "Free Market" inspired austerity measures always result in low wages, unemployment, poverty and labor abuse. Free Dumb.

1. Friedman has praised greed. Rand has praised selfishness. You have complained about the dangers of government programs motivated by compassion. Do you dispute this?

2. My point is that corporations, regardless of how you feel about them, are the driving force behind American styled libertarianism. Doesn't it give you a moment of pause that your concept of liberty has been, and continues to be shaped by corporations?

3. Again, it's not the definition I object to, it's the wild ass claims of freedom, liberty, self-regulation and other doctrinal bullshit that is supposed to mysteriously spring forth somehow once a set of arbitrary conditions are met. When I talk about lack of evidence, I'm talking about these pie in the sky promises.

5. It is funny that liberalism and libertarianism have swapped meanings in this country. American libertarians are always so confused when Chomsky calls himself a libertarian.

7. So you are saying that deregulation, privatization and the cutting of social programs would not function as intended if they were implemented by force? Why is that? Can you understand my skepticism when individual elements of free marketism fail on their own, and then I'm told that we need even more elements of free marketism for everything to work correctly? It's like a homeopathic doctor saying "of course these homeopathic remedies are making your cancer worse, you forgot the ginseng. You can't cure cancer without ginseng, silly fool."

8. Failed states with no taxation or government should be free market wonderlands, no? It's a common swipe at free market partisans that never gets addressed. Care to give it a go?

9. The most successful states are currently capitalist/socialist hybrids. We trail behind other states (European states) with a more even balance of state and business. If I believed in utopia, I wouldn't be a liberal, because compassion and empathy would be unnecessary in a true utopia.

http://videosift.com/video/The-evolution-of-empathy

For a rugged individualist, you sure do love your little categories and boxes. Do you ever notice your need to be defined and to define others? I don't share your need for precise definition. I like to keep my options open.

"Ignorance is not a moral high ground." I like this quote, especially when you use it to defend an irrational belief system. I'm stealing this quote.

When I speak of "God" to Christians, I usually speak to them in terms of a colloquial personal god, and sometimes I use the Einsteinian meaning of creation or nature. I find it bizarre, and frankly a bit misleading, to use it to mean their fundamental teachings and their effects. That's very bizarre indeed.

Quick point of information: it's not volunteerist society; it's voluntaryist society. I don't want you thinking I'm talking about people volunteering out of the goodness of their hearts to run some form of public works projects.

Just like your bizarre and revisionist definition of God, you're also following a bad trend of modern society to change the definitions of free markets to suit a political end; in your case, conflating free markets with the negative impacts of corporatists. When I point out the differences, you loudly profess that you don't care if you're painting the two with the same broad brush. That's where ignorance begins, dft. And ignorance isn't a moral high ground.

Free markets are as idealistic and utopian as freedom itself. There's no more an invisible deity that guides free people to make free choices than there's an invisible hand guiding their free exchanges.

1. Wait, wait, wait. I never said selfishness was a virtue while empathy and compassion was evil. Please don't put words in my mouth. That said, what assertions in favor of free markets require evidence? That they've helped humanity? I think you mean capitalism. There are loads of examples, dft. The entire industrialized revolution which lifted poorer generations out of poverty is a good place to start. Today live longer, healthier lives which is the result of capitalism. Even Karl Marx understood the necessity of capitalism in the betterment of human lives and saw it as an evolution.

2. Corporations are fair-weather. They enjoy regulated markets as long as they're regulated in a way that benefits them. Corporations hate competition, which is the cornerstone of free markets. There's absolutely zero connection between corporations and free markets (i.e., the free and voluntary exchange of people without coercion).

3. My view isn't "utopic"; it's the real definition. You speak here again about capitalism, which is dangerous, I agree. Corporations collude with government to use unilateral aggression in areas of the world that have plentiful natural resources. It's robbery. It's greed. And it's horrendous. And I stand in open opposition to it. But to me this is ultimately the failing of government and the centralized bank system, but that's a whole other conversation.

4. Meh.

5. Doesn't matter. If we have to change the definition of free markets, then so be it. We had to change the definition of liberal from it's original meaning to now embody anti-liberals like yourself.

6. Surely. But go back and read what you initially wrote. Comes off as alarmist and paranoid.

7. No. This was about government "implementing" reforms as being part of the free market. You're changing the criteria now. I would NOT agree that "taking power away from labor" is a principle of the free markets. Remember, free markets are voluntary exchanges between people without coercion.

8. I have no idea what you're getting at. This started with a comment about chaos where there's no taxation. Still irrelevant.

9. Hahaha. Talk about utopian! That's what we have today.

Nah, you don't need to purchase the book for me. I can do that myself. And, to be honest, I don't want to give you a reading assignment, because I doubt that will benefit our differences in world beliefs.

And I know you're more of a Social Democrat than a Docialist. Funny thing, the social democrat is disliked by both the Libertarians and the Marxists equally. Marxists tend to think Social Democrats perverted the socialist movement. Marxists and Libertarians (don't think the party) have a lot in common in terms of how they view human interactions and the evolution of human society. Tangent.

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
When I argue with Christians, I sometimes use the word God, which is occasionally confusing to them considering the fact that I don't believe in God. When I refer to God, I'm not really talking about God, but rather Biblical doctrine, it's real world effects and the words and attitudes of its adherents. Abstractly I don't object to an all knowing, all loving God that answers prayers and reunites you with your loved ones after death, but I do object to all the real world suffering and strife that seems to be done in the name of God. If you were to say, "it's not God's fault", you would be correct.

Similarly, when I speak of "free markets", I am not talking about your idealized utopic vision of a volunteerist sociecty, I am actually referring to market doctrine, it's real world effects and the words and attitudes of it's adherents. Abstractly I don't object to a volunteerist utopia. Abstractly I don't object to any utopia. The problem is that I don't believe in utopia - be it one with invisible hands or one with invisible deities. I do object to all the real world suffering and strife that seems to be done in the name of unfettered markets.

It's not the Free Market's fault.

1. Concepts do not have the capacity for thought or emotion, nor the ability to speak, so I agree with you that free markets do not state anything, however, it's adherents - Milton Friedman, Ayn Rand and yourself - in defense of free markets assert their affection for greed and selfishness, while cursing the evils of empathy, compassion and dogooderism. They never provide any evidence to support these assertions, and real world evidence seems to contradict these assertions.

2. I understand that corporatism has no place in your utopic vision of a free market, but that doesn't seem to stop corporations from bankrolling the free market movement. I'm not sure if corporations think they exist within the spirit of the free market or if they are just using the free market as a tool to manipulate people into supporting plutocracy. Either way, corporatism and the free market are in completely solidarity on subjects of taxes, deregulation, privatization and organized labor.

3. Again, I understand that violence and coercion have no place in your utopic vision, but in the real world, as illustrated in great detail in The Shock Doctrine, coercion and force seem to be the only reliable methods of forcing market principles of austerity on an unwilling public.

4. Again, I understand that concepts are not capable of promoting ideals, but adherents to free market ideology use anti-scientific arguments against climate change regulation. I would respect their arguments more if they were based on the principle that regulations should not be used, even in the face of environmental disaster. It wouldn't be a very persuasive argument, but at least it would have some integrity.

5. Write off corporatists and Republicans all you like, but they outnumber you by the billions. If you are all fighting for 'free markets', whose vision of the free market do you think will win the day? Probably not yours.

6. Keeping people from joining together is a time honored totalitarian tactic. I can cite you examples if you need them.

7. Would you agree that deregulation, privatization, taking power away from labor and lowering taxes are free market principals? Is there some reason why these principles should not function as you intend them to if they are implemented by force? Milton Friedman has lavished much praise on the free market reforms put in place by authoritarian regimes. Only one of you can be correct, and I'm siding with you on this one.

8. An unregulated market is an unregulated market is an unregulated market.

9. A better system: A balance of 'pro employee' socialism with 'pro employer' capitalism where free enterprise is allowed to thrive, but abuse of labor, the economy, the political system or the environment is not.

10. This is pretty much the same as 5, but I wanted to make it an even 10, so....

11. Why don't you just make ten louder and make ten be the top number and make that a little louder?


I know you said you didn't want to be spoonfed by a liberal, which I took to mean you don't want to read about "The Shock Doctrine" from the person who wrote "The Shock Doctrine". How's about a bargain, if you read the book, I'll promise to read something you care about of similar length. Freidman? Adam Smith? Selma Von Heyak? Whatever you want me to read, so long as it is a legit, important mainstream book. Also, I'd send you the book in the mail so you don't have to give your money to some pinko commie bitch, and I'll use my own cash to buy 'Road to Serfdom' or whatever it is you want me to read. It's only appropriate for the socialist* to give his book away, while purchasing the capitalist book.

Fair?

In all honesty, I think you'd get a lot out of the book. All of the dirty deeds are carried out by governments, corporations and Chicago based economists. None of it lives up to your ideal of a free market and all of it could be correctly defined as statism. It really makes sense of our foreign policy; which nations are chosen and why; why every president seems to have to have his own conflict... I'm officially anti-Libya now (I'm sure your happy to hear this) because the CIA is a recurring theme in all of these tales and they are usually the ones that teach strategic foreign allies how to torture, kill and disappear anyone who stands up to the despotic puppet of choice. The only negative you might get out of the book is seeing how closely Friedman works with the government, the right wing and despotic dictators. It's all cited and footnoted. If Chomsky were into some nasty shit, I wouldn't be happy about it, but I'd want to know.

Have a bitchen summer. - dft

*dft is not really a socialist. He wants a system that balances the rights of the worker with the rights of the boss.

When I argue with Christians, I sometimes use the word God, which is occasionally confusing to them considering the fact that I don't believe in God. When I refer to God, I'm not really talking about God, but rather Biblical doctrine, it's real world effects and the words and attitudes of its adherents. Abstractly I don't object to an all knowing, all loving God that answers prayers and reunites you with your loved ones after death, but I do object to all the real world suffering and strife that seems to be done in the name of God. If you were to say, "it's not God's fault", you would be correct.

Similarly, when I speak of "free markets", I am not talking about your idealized utopic vision of a volunteerist sociecty, I am actually referring to market doctrine, it's real world effects and the words and attitudes of it's adherents. Abstractly I don't object to a volunteerist utopia. Abstractly I don't object to any utopia. The problem is that I don't believe in utopia - be it one with invisible hands or one with invisible deities. I do object to all the real world suffering and strife that seems to be done in the name of unfettered markets.

It's not the Free Market's fault.

1. Concepts do not have the capacity for thought or emotion, nor the ability to speak, so I agree with you that free markets do not state anything, however, it's adherents - Milton Friedman, Ayn Rand and yourself - in defense of free markets assert their affection for greed and selfishness, while cursing the evils of empathy, compassion and dogooderism. They never provide any evidence to support these assertions, and real world evidence seems to contradict these assertions.

2. I understand that corporatism has no place in your utopic vision of a free market, but that doesn't seem to stop corporations from bankrolling the free market movement. I'm not sure if corporations think they exist within the spirit of the free market or if they are just using the free market as a tool to manipulate people into supporting plutocracy. Either way, corporatism and the free market are in completely solidarity on subjects of taxes, deregulation, privatization and organized labor.

3. Again, I understand that violence and coercion have no place in your utopic vision, but in the real world, as illustrated in great detail in The Shock Doctrine, coercion and force seem to be the only reliable methods of forcing market principles of austerity on an unwilling public.

4. Again, I understand that concepts are not capable of promoting ideals, but adherents to free market ideology use anti-scientific arguments against climate change regulation. I would respect their arguments more if they were based on the principle that regulations should not be used, even in the face of environmental disaster. It wouldn't be a very persuasive argument, but at least it would have some integrity.

5. Write off corporatists and Republicans all you like, but they outnumber you by the billions. If you are all fighting for 'free markets', whose vision of the free market do you think will win the day? Probably not yours.

6. Keeping people from joining together is a time honored totalitarian tactic. I can cite you examples if you need them.

7. Would you agree that deregulation, privatization, taking power away from labor and lowering taxes are free market principals? Is there some reason why these principles should not function as you intend them to if they are implemented by force? Milton Friedman has lavished much praise on the free market reforms put in place by authoritarian regimes. Only one of you can be correct, and I'm siding with you on this one.

8. An unregulated market is an unregulated market is an unregulated market.

9. A better system: A balance of 'pro employee' socialism with 'pro employer' capitalism where free enterprise is allowed to thrive, but abuse of labor, the economy, the political system or the environment is not.

10. This is pretty much the same as 5, but I wanted to make it an even 10, so....

11. Why don't you just make ten louder and make ten be the top number and make that a little louder?


I know you said you didn't want to be spoonfed by a liberal, which I took to mean you don't want to read about "The Shock Doctrine" from the person who wrote "The Shock Doctrine". How's about a bargain, if you read the book, I'll promise to read something you care about of similar length. Freidman? Adam Smith? Selma Von Heyak? Whatever you want me to read, so long as it is a legit, important mainstream book. Also, I'd send you the book in the mail so you don't have to give your money to some pinko commie bitch, and I'll use my own cash to buy 'Road to Serfdom' or whatever it is you want me to read. It's only appropriate for the socialist* to give his book away, while purchasing the capitalist book.

Fair?

In all honesty, I think you'd get a lot out of the book. All of the dirty deeds are carried out by governments, corporations and Chicago based economists. None of it lives up to your ideal of a free market and all of it could be correctly defined as statism. It really makes sense of our foreign policy; which nations are chosen and why; why every president seems to have to have his own conflict... I'm officially anti-Libya now (I'm sure your happy to hear this) because the CIA is a recurring theme in all of these tales and they are usually the ones that teach strategic foreign allies how to torture, kill and disappear anyone who stands up to the despotic puppet of choice. The only negative you might get out of the book is seeing how closely Friedman works with the government, the right wing and despotic dictators. It's all cited and footnoted. If Chomsky were into some nasty shit, I wouldn't be happy about it, but I'd want to know.

Have a bitchen summer. - dft

*dft is not really a socialist. He wants a system that balances the rights of the worker with the rights of the boss.

When I argue with Christians, I sometimes use the word God, which is occasionally confusing to them considering the fact that I don't believe in God. When I refer to God, I'm not really talking about God, but rather Biblical doctrine, it's real world effects and the words and attitudes of its adherents. Abstractly I don't object to an all knowing, all loving God that answers prayers and reunites you with your loved ones after death, but I do object to all the real world suffering and strife that seems to be done in the name of God. If you were to say, "it's not God's fault", you would be correct.

Similarly, when I speak of "free markets", I am not talking about your idealized utopic vision of a volunteerist sociecty, I am actually referring to market doctrine, it's real world effects and the words and attitudes of it's adherents. Abstractly I don't object to a volunteerist utopia. Abstractly I don't object to any utopia. The problem is that I don't believe in utopia - be it one with invisible hands or one with invisible deities. I do object to all the real world suffering and strife that seems to be done in the name of unfettered markets.

It's not the Free Market's fault.

1. Concepts do not have the capacity for thought or emotion, nor the ability to speak, so I agree with you that free markets do not state anything, however, it's adherents - Milton Friedman, Ayn Rand and yourself - in defense of free markets assert their affection for greed and selfishness, while cursing the evils of empathy, compassion and dogooderism. They never provide any evidence to support these assertions, and real world evidence seems to contradict these assertions.

2. I understand that corporatism has no place in your utopic vision of a free market, but that doesn't seem to stop corporations from bankrolling the free market movement. I'm not sure if corporations think they exist within the spirit of the free market or if they are just using the free market as a tool to manipulate people into supporting plutocracy. Either way, corporatism and the free market are in completely solidarity on subjects of taxes, deregulation, privatization and organized labor.

3. Again, I understand that violence and coercion have no place in your utopic vision, but in the real world, as illustrated in great detail in The Shock Doctrine, coercion and force seem to be the only reliable methods of forcing market principles of austerity on an unwilling public.

4. Again, I understand that concepts are not capable of promoting ideals, but adherents to free market ideology use anti-scientific arguments against climate change regulation. I would respect their arguments more if they were based on the principle that regulations should not be used, even in the face of environmental disaster. It wouldn't be a very persuasive argument, but at least it would have some integrity.

5. Write off corporatists and Republicans all you like, but they outnumber you by the billions. If you are all fighting for 'free markets', whose vision of the free market do you think will win the day? Probably not yours.

6. Keeping people from joining together is a time honored totalitarian tactic. I can cite you examples if you need them.

7. Would you agree that deregulation, privatization, taking power away from labor and lowering taxes are free market principals? Is there some reason why these principles should not function as you intend them to if they are implemented by force? Milton Friedman has lavished much praise on the free market reforms put in place by authoritarian regimes. Only one of you can be correct, and I'm siding with you on this one.

8. An unregulated market is an unregulated market is an unregulated market.

9. A better system: A balance of 'pro employee' socialism with 'pro employer' capitalism where free enterprise is allowed to thrive, but abuse of labor, the economy, the political system or the environment is not.

10. This is pretty much the same as 5, but I wanted to make it an even 10, so....

11. Why don't you just make ten louder and make ten be the top number and make that a little louder?


I know you said you didn't want to be spoonfed by a liberal, which I took to mean you don't want to read about "The Shock Doctrine" from the person who wrote "The Shock Doctrine". How's about a bargain, if you read the book, I'll promise to read something you care about of similar length. Freidman? Adam Smith? Selma Von Heyak? Whatever you want me to read, so long as it is a legit, important mainstream book. Also, I'd send you the book in the mail so you don't have to give your money to some pinko commie bitch, and I'll use my own cash to buy 'Road to Serfdom' or whatever it is you want me to read. It's only appropriate for the socialist* to give his book away, while purchasing the capitalist book.

Fair?

In all honesty, I think you'd get a lot out of the book. All of the dirty deeds are carried out by governments, corporations and Chicago based economists. None of it lives up to your ideal of a free market and all of it could be correctly defined as statism. It really makes sense of our foreign policy; which nations are chosen and why; why every president seems to have to have his own conflict... I'm officially anti-Libya now (I'm sure your happy to hear this) because the CIA is a recurring theme in all of these tales and they are usually the ones that teach strategic foreign allies how to torture, kill and disappear anyone who stands up to the despotic puppet of choice. The only negative you might get out of the book is seeing how closely Friedman works with the government, the right wing and despotic dictators. It's all cited and footnoted. If Chomsky were into some nasty shit, I wouldn't be happy about it, but I'd want to know.

Have a bitchen summer. - dft

*dft is not really a socialist. He wants a system that balances the rights of the worker with the rights of the boss.

In reply to this comment by blankfist:
Response to your 10 reasons list below.

1. Patently false. Free markets do not "state" anything, as it's a system of free exchange between people without coercion. Free markets do not have an opinion of altruism or empathy or greed or selfishness anymore than it can of Biblical literalism, axiology, utilitarianism, happiness, Chinese philosophy and so on.

2. Also false. Corporations enjoy corporate welfare, government subsidies, franchise monopolies and crony-capitalism. All of those things are not part of a free market, as they constitute intervention.

3. Ridiculous on its face. How can voluntary interactions without coercion (aka, a free market) be implemented through "force" and "terror"? Here again, you're conflating free markets with government/corporate collusion.

4. Free markets don't promote anything. It's the free exchanges between people without coercion, and was used effectively to aid science in the past. Jonas Salk gave the polio vaccine away without a patent. He was free to patent it and charge through the nose for it, which is what a corporation would do, but he chose to voluntarily give it away. Free market in action.

5. Meh. Republicans speak the rhetoric of free markets, but they believe in them as much as the Democrats do.

6. Sounds like someone is paranoid.

7. False. Government "implementing" anything is not free in nature. Government uses the threat of violence to "implement" their policies, which is antithetical to free markets.

8. I like how you added this to the list. Irrelevant to free markets, except at least as far as governments encroach on free markets by regulating private exchanges among the people.

9. Free markets are capable of faults. So is capitalism. I'd charge you to offer a better system. An ad hoc system of government plus capitalism is a regulated market, and we've seen those fail countless times in the past 100 years. Our current economic mess comes from central planning and interventionism, not free markets.

10. I don't listen to those people, so I cannot respond.

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
Top ten clues that the Free Market movement is a racket.

1. It states that altruism and empathy are bad; greed and selfishness are good.
2. It claims to be anti-corporate, yet is completely funded by corporations from the ground up.
3. It claims to be about liberty, volunteerism and non-aggression, but can only be implemented through force and terror.
4. It promotes irrational/anti-scientific thinking when science gets in the way of business. (read: Global Climate Change).
5. It is largely embraced by Republicans, whom are easily manipulated into believing corporatist falsehoods on a regular basis.
6. It is obsessed with keeping people from organizing, under the guise of 'individualism'. Corporatists know that we are much easier to dominate as separate individuals.
7. In cases where free market reforms have been implemented by a government, it has resulted in plutocracy.
8. In failed states where no government or taxes exist, chaos reigns. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vmn9asN-8AE
9. There is no empirical evidence to prove the merit of Free Market doctrine, and plenty of evidence against.
10. It is embraced by the biggest propagandists of our times, Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter, Ayn Rand, etc.

I think things will get worse before they get better. Some of the poorer countries in South America and now the middle east are starting to reject the influence of the US and its puppets. I think this will spread to Europe and when it hits critical mass, we will be forced to change our ways. If some huge crisis (economic collapse, nuclear explosion, resource shortage, global warming related crisis) comes along before that, I think it will go one of two ways. 1) The people will take back their government 2) The powers that be will use the crisis to transform our country into a fascist nightmare, like 911 on steroids.

You and I taking a stand for what we believe in is important, despite the fact that it will probably have little or no effect on the big picture. There are very few in our society willing to speak up about the things we speak up about, and a comment or video on this site might get a few hundred views, which isn't too shabby. If a couple of those hundred people find wisdom in something we say and pass it along, then I think we've done something worthwhile. Also, I don't know about you, but my conscience forces me to speak out. My rants on this site serve as a pressure release valve, keeping me from going insane.

It's also important that we balance positive and happy experiences with our political frustrations. Living in mental misery all of the time is no way to live, but a little sturm and drang is healthy and human, if only because they make the happy days happier by contrast.

As far as our back and forth, we'd probably be better off just stating our position once and then moving on. You are never going to convince me that unfettered markets will self regulate, and I'm never going to convince you that democracy is a force for good. Then again, arguing with you is fun and challenging. It's probably good for the brain. We could also probably stand to be more intellectual and less insulting. We've both grown up in a country where we've been taught by the media that proper political discourse involves shouting and name calling. I'm trying to take a more zen approach to argument. More substance, less ego.

Chris Hedges says there is great virtue in fighting a fight you know you can't win. I agree.


In reply to this comment by blankfist:
Sometimes I think we're arguing different sides to an argument that cannot pan out in either of our favors. If energy is a finite resource, which it has to be, and oil is passing or has passed its peak, then we could be facing the most amazing transformation in human civilization, and all this talk of who builds the roads will be pointless.

Why did the Bush Administration take us into Iraq? Could it be because the neocons know that the world's oil reserve is entering a decline, which means the supply will not meet demand of the industrialized world.
What'll happen when the decline is truly known and felt and understood and accepted? For sure oil prices will skyrocket. $5 a gal. $10 a gal. $150 a gal. More? Maybe way more? Then what happens? Less energy will need to be used, so planes will stop flying, and maintenance will stop, and infrastructure will fail, and soon nations will go bankrupt, including the US.

Then what? Riots. People frustrated with the collapse of the system, and they'll riot. The world will turn dangerous. Peaceful neighborhoods will be places of despair and destruction. A great many people will die around the world. We'll no longer be 7 billion. Then what? Will it matter that I'm arguing against statism? Will socialism still work? Will captialism work? Of course not. Maybe all of this energy we spend arguing and debating will be lost as well.

About The Political Compass

In the introduction, we explained the inadequacies of the traditional left-right line.

If we recognise that this is essentially an economic line it's fine, as far as it goes. We can show, for example, Stalin, Mao Tse Tung and Pol Pot, with their commitment to a totally controlled economy, on the hard left. Socialists like Mahatma Gandhi and Robert Mugabe would occupy a less extreme leftist position. Margaret Thatcher would be well over to the right, but further right still would be someone like that ultimate free marketeer, General Pinochet.

That deals with economics, but the social dimension is also important in politics. That's the one that the mere left-right scale doesn't adequately address. So we've added one, ranging in positions from extreme authoritarian to extreme libertarian.

Both an economic dimension and a social dimension are important factors for a proper political analysis. By adding the social dimension you can show that Stalin was an authoritarian leftist (ie the state is more important than the individual) and that Gandhi, believing in the supreme value of each individual, is a liberal leftist. While the former involves state-imposed arbitary collectivism in the extreme top left, on the extreme bottom left is voluntary collectivism at regional level, with no state involved. Hundreds of such anarchist communities exisited in Spain during the civil war period

You can also put Pinochet, who was prepared to sanction mass killing for the sake of the free market, on the far right as well as in a hardcore authoritarian position. On the non-socialist side you can distinguish someone like Milton Friedman, who is anti-state for fiscal rather than social reasons, from Hitler, who wanted to make the state stronger, even if he wiped out half of humanity in the process.

The chart also makes clear that, despite popular perceptions, the opposite of fascism is not communism but anarchism (ie liberal socialism), and that the opposite of communism ( i.e. an entirely state-planned economy) is neo-liberalism (i.e. extreme deregulated economy)

The usual understanding of anarchism as a left wing ideology does not take into account the neo-liberal "anarchism" championed by the likes of Ayn Rand, Milton Friedman and America's Libertarian Party, which couples social Darwinian right-wing economics with liberal positions on most social issues. Often their libertarian impulses stop short of opposition to strong law and order positions, and are more economic in substance (ie no taxes) so they are not as extremely libertarian as they are extremely right wing. On the other hand, the classical libertarian collectivism of anarcho-syndicalism ( libertarian socialism) belongs in the bottom left hand corner.

In our home page we demolished the myth that authoritarianism is necessarily "right wing", with the examples of Robert Mugabe, Pol Pot and Stalin. Similarly Hitler, on an economic scale, was not an extreme right-winger. His economic policies were broadly Keynesian, and to the left of some of today's Labour parties. If you could get Hitler and Stalin to sit down together and avoid economics, the two diehard authoritarians would find plenty of common ground.
A Word about Neo-cons and Neo-libs

U.S.neo-conservatives, with their commitment to high military spending and the global assertion of national values, tend to be more authoritarian than hard right. By contrast, neo-liberals, opposed to such moral leadership and, more especially, the ensuing demands on the tax payer, belong to a further right but less authoritarian region. Paradoxically, the "free market", in neo-con parlance, also allows for the large-scale subsidy of the military-industrial complex, a considerable degree of corporate welfare, and protectionism when deemed in the national interest. These are viewed by neo-libs as impediments to the unfettered market forces that they champion.


International Chart

A diverse professional team has assessed the words and actions of internationally known contemporary leaders to give you an idea of how they relate to each other on the political compass.

We regret the present exclusion of some major leaders, especially in the developing world. This is due to our inability so far to contact independent experts.


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Thanks from the Political Compass team.
US Primaries 2007
A few words about "The Extreme Right", and a look at the parties in England's local elections
ICONOCHASMS: How well do you know your political icons ?

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