Originally Posted by NW Ponderer
I didn't get a chance to follow up fully (and still can't, yet), but here's more response[quote=Senator Hatrack]Apparently you have forgotten about the REAGAN DEMOCRATS.
Originally Posted by NW Ponderer
Wiff! Some democrats voted for Reagan in 1984, it is true, but that has nothing - absolutely nothing - to do with the Reagan-worship that pervades the current Republican party. I can't fathom how that is not obvious to you, unless it is willful blindness. Apples-zuchini.
Yes, the Reagan Democrats do have something to do with the "Reagan worship" that you mistakenly see as dominating the entire GOP. The Reagan Democrats were part of the reason he won 49 of the 50 states. The respect for, not the worship of, Reagan exists because of his landslide victory and his skillful diplomacy that brought about the end of the Cold War and the fall of the USSR. Those are accomplishments that deserve respect. Worship? No. Respect? Yes!

Originally Posted by Senator Hatrack
Laissez faire is an economic theorem. A theorem that rejects government interventions because the preferred expectations of government interventions cannot achieved in realty.
Originally Posted by NW Ponderer
I'm not sure you realize you directly contradicted your previous post, and confirmed my point entirely. I'll leave it at that, and thank you.
You seem to have a very strong tendency to see things as you want them to be not as they are. Here is the definition of laissez faire. Government intervention is rejected because the expected results cannot be achieved. The belief that "practical intelligence" is part of the laissez faire economic theorem is based on the erroneous idea that the free market can be controlled. There was no "practical intelligence" in the creation of personal computers. If "practical intelligence" had been there would not be the personal computers we have today. There wasn't a market for personal computers until they were created. "Practical intelligence" would not take the chance to make a product for which a market does not and may not exist.

Originally Posted by Senator Hatrack
That is a false analogy. When the US was using all of the concrete it did from 1901 – 2000 the decision of how and for what it was used was made mostly by the private sector. The decision of how and for what it the concrete is used for in China in the last three years was made by its government. Governments build large dams, like the Three Gorges Dam, the private sector doesn’t. Should China ever become a Capitalist country it probably will eat our lunch.
Originally Posted by NW Ponderer
Again, thanks for proving my point explicitly, although I'm not sure you realized it, given your opening comment. The point was that governments can do big economic projects efficiently (which you conceded), some things that capitalist efforts won't/can't do.
China's efficiency in building the big projects that it has is due to its authoritarian government and the use of slave labor. Are you in favor of an authoritarian government like China's? I'm not. I'll take the inefficiency and freedom of the private sector over China's efficient authoritarian government.

Originally Posted by NW Ponderer
I wish, my friend, you could just concede a point, rather than pretending it's still a fight.

More to come. Gotta run.
I thought you got off your high horse. I guess not. But then supporters of authoritarian governments don't like it when someone argues with them.

The state can never straighten the crooked timber of humanity.
I'm a conservative because I question authority.
Conservative Revolutionary