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Messages - Universe Prince

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3361
3DHS / Re: Craigslist Exec To Soon Catch Bullet With His Forehead
« on: December 14, 2006, 08:41:38 AM »
Quote from: Brassmask on December 12, 2006, 03:24:20 PM

This sure sounds like a move towards an RBE type situation.

[...]

Furthermore, my subject line was something of a funny when I posted it but as I have typed, it seems to me that this may not happen literally, but could potentially happen figuratively. Corporatists in America can't sit idly by as an upstart brings communism into the mainstream of financial America. This could lead to widespread TRUE Communism in America. 

Seriously.


You know, I think you are serious. But you're only showing your lack of understanding of capitalism. You speak of "serving the customers" as if such were purely a communist concept. Here's a hint: no, it isn't. There is nothing at all un-capitalistic about putting customer service ahead of profits. Serving the customer is good business and does not require one to operate a business as a non-profit. I feel I should point out here I cannot find anywhere that Jim Buckmaster says he wants to eliminate revenue, only that he isn't trying to maximize it. Over at a ZD Net blog, however, I did find this:
Quote
On allowing text ads for the greater good: Buckmaster was asked why wouldn't Craigslist maximize revenue and profit for the good of the world. The general idea: Funnel the money from a text ad bonanza into philanthropy. Buckmaster didn't really have a good answer. "It's a valid argument," says Buckmaster. "You can make the argument that we could raise revenue to do good in the third world." Again, the decision would rest with users, who haven't really posed the idea or requested such a move. Craigslist would consider such a move if it began "hearing from users that we should raise revenue and plow it into charity."

I should also note that Jim Buckmaster has not spoken out against making a profit. All he really said was that it wasn't his top priority. Great. As a supporter of capitalism, I am quite happy to see someone say such a thing. I believe serving the customer should always be the top priority. So perhaps you ought to rethink the RBE/"TRUE Communism" cheerleading thing. It doesn't suit the situation, imo.

3362
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 14, 2006, 08:12:06 AM »
Quote from: _JS on December 13, 2006, 11:11:04 AM

In this case the government was a detriment to the social good, or even more severe - the social need of the people. So there was a massive obstacle in the way of these individuals and groups providing aid to a destroyed community.


Personally, I think this is a situation more pervasive in our society than just this one instance.

Quote from: _JS on December 13, 2006, 11:11:04 AM

The obstacle was circumvented and help was brought regardless. There is absolutely no reason that local communities, churches, or individuals cannot bring aid as well as any large organization.


You may be the first socialist I've encountered who gets that. I've tried explaining that to people before, and I always get told, essentially, if local communities, churches, or individuals could bring aid effectively then we wouldn't need government to do any of it, but they can't and therefore we do.

Quote from: _JS on December 13, 2006, 11:11:04 AM

Another way of looking at it is at the worker's level. Imagine a situation where a government and a large business work together to erode many workers' rights in a given area. The community might work together, across different sectors to form a Workers Council and take industrial action. It might not be legal, but I would certainly support it if there was collusion between the given government organisation and company (or companies). If they had to circumvent some roadblocks or other obstacles, that wouldn't bother me.


Damn. I'm agreeing with you, again. In that situation, I would definitely support people working together to stand up for their rights. Though I should add, I think that situation of government and large business working together already exists to a degree. Not to the extent in your example exactly, but it exists in the form or regulations that are needlessly burdensome, hinder entrepreneurship and inhibit competition for large businesses. Which, I suspect, may be were we stop being in agreement.

3363
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 13, 2006, 12:42:19 AM »
Quote from: Amianthus on December 13, 2006, 12:28:18 AM

You know, I got a ticket once for stopping to help a stranded motorist (with children) in a blizzard. And the cop didn't even bother to call for help after giving me my ticket, he just left.


There is something wrong with society when helping someone is a punishable offense. And this society seems to be so focused on acting like government is the only way to help people that it makes helping people without government nearly a crime. It's just bass ackwards.

3364
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 13, 2006, 12:24:13 AM »
Quote from: Amianthus on December 12, 2006, 07:35:24 PM

That is actually the most telling thing about our society. They had to break the law to help out others in need.


I know. How screwed up is that?

3365
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 12, 2006, 06:58:05 PM »
That you like the article so much is interesting to me. Because the whole situation, to me, smacks of libertarian style thinking. I have no idea what the political positions are of those involved in the relief efforts, but the whole notion that they were doing what the government either could not or would not do and even disobeying FEMA and the law to do it, that seems the epitome of "we don't need government" thinking in our culture. It was all done voluntarily and cooperatively without some government central planning and oversight committee making sure it all happened just so. Even the part in the article about "mutual aid", what better possible example could there be of people making voluntary exchange for mutual benefit? It's beautiful.

So how is it that a socialist and a libertarian seem to both like that article for similar reasons? I expect any time now word that hell is rapidly dropping in temperature.

3366
3DHS / Re: The Reason The Knutester Wins All His Debates: He graduated from CSUF
« on: December 12, 2006, 06:43:12 PM »
So students are learning to win debates not by making a better argument but by making better performance art. Topic, logic, reason, facts be damned, as long as they can create a style of performance that the judges like. In other words, performance sophistry. No wonder Mucho likes it.

3367
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 11, 2006, 11:11:13 PM »
Quote from: _JS on December 11, 2006, 11:50:39 AM

As a sidenote, UP we'll have to eventually stop this socialist/libertarian agreement stuff. It might permanently damage reputations ;)


I know. If you would just stop being so reasonable all the time and start talking irrational gibberish like a real socialist... No, I'm kidding. I don't want that at all.

By the by, there is an article over at Reason Online you might be interested in reading. It's called "A Healthy Dose of Anarchy", and is about local, decentralized relief efforts in New Orleans. I'd be interested in reading your opinion of it, JS.

3368
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 11, 2006, 10:54:22 AM »
Way to go, Xavier. You tell 'em. Need to keep American security in the hands of Americans. We can't trust them foreigners. Them pinko commie terrorist son of bitches better not mess with us, right Jim Bob?

(Yeah, that was all sarcasm.)

3369
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 11, 2006, 10:43:57 AM »
Quote from: hnumpah on December 11, 2006, 09:16:48 AM

So what part of what I said was wrong?

1.  Bush and company hadn't even bothered to review the deal...

2.  ...folks just wanted them to put the deal on hold until they could review the deal and be sure we weren't handing the henhouse over to the foxes.

3.  Before that could happen, though, DPW decided to pull out of the deal, or at least thepart of it involving the American ports in question.


You're exactly right, except for parts 1, 2 and 3. 1) As I recall, Bush et al. had looked over the deal and okay with it. 2) The "folks just wanted them to put the deal on hold" bit was quickly surpassed by the part where folks just just wanted to shoot down the deal. 3) DP World was willing to delay the deal and did not decide to simply hand over the operations to a U.S. group until Congress essentially said "no f---ing way". And quite frankly, the deal was reviewed plenty, and there was zero evidence that it would have been the equivalent of handing the henhouse to the foxes. But the people who objected didn't give a damn. It was Dubai and that was enough for them to oppose it. Dubai is no more a haven for terrorists than is the U.K. or the U.S. but that didn't matter. Republicans and Democrats united in xenophobia to kill a deal that is exactly the sort of deal we should have been encouraging.

Quote from: hnumpah on December 11, 2006, 09:16:48 AM

That Bush tried to blow it off at first and allowed the calls for a security review to become calls for the deal to be quashed altogether simply shows how badly he and his administration mishandled the affair.


I agree that Bush mishandled it, but that doesn't excuse the rest of what happened.

Quote from: hnumpah on December 11, 2006, 09:16:48 AM

And now Plane wants to paint those who opposed just giving away the keys to our ports to a company owned by a government that has a record of acting against us, without an adequate security review, as 'racist', and you're ashamed of your country. I'm not. I'm glad they stood up to the idiot in the White House and let him know he can no longer just have everything his way with impunity. That it took this issue to bring that about was the luck of the draw.


Have everything his way? It wasn't his deal. He isn't the one that took the hit. It was a legitimate deal between P&O and DP World, and DP World took the hit. They were ready to bend over backwards to assuage security concerns, and we would have none of it. Blame whomever or whatever you want to blame, but we fearfully slammed shut what should have been a door open to peaceful cooperation and trade. Not because we feared peaceful cooperation or trade, but because we feared the people with whom the peaceful cooperation and trade would have occurred. Feared them because they were not to be trusted, because they were Them, because they were foreigners from (cue spooky music) the Middle East. Yeah, that made me feel ashamed for my country. As I said, I thought we were better than that, and I was wrong.

3370
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 11, 2006, 01:40:08 AM »
Thanks, Amianthus. I skimmed that already to make sure my recollection wasn't completely off. There is also a brief timeline of the fiasco at the other end of this link.

3371
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 11, 2006, 01:01:57 AM »
Quote from: hnumpah on December 11, 2006, 12:23:28 AM

Seemed to me folks just wanted them to put the deal on hold until they could review the deal and be sure we weren't handing the henhouse over to the foxes. Before that could happen, though, DPW decided to pull out of the deal, or at least thepart of it involving the American ports in question.


That isn't the way I recall it going down. People were insisting that Dubai was a haven for terrorists, and that letting them have anything to do with our ports was like letting terrorists run our port security. Republicans and Democrats were in agreement that DP World would be a threat to our national security. Yes, a few days after DP World won the bidding for Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O), there was a push in Congress for a review of the deal. But a a day or so after that the push to entirely block the deal began (initiated by Democrats as I recall.) DP World volunteered to halt the process of it taking over operations at various U.S. seaports to allow for time to prove that DP World was not going to create an increased risk for terrorism. But by then Republicans and Democrats had united behind the notion that Dubai was not to be trusted and in no way should the deal be allowed to happen. And DP World said it would hand over operations in U.S. seaports to a U.S. group because the U.S. Congress had said that there was no way they were going to allow the deal of DP World taking over the operations from the U.K. based P&O.

3372
3DHS / Re: Jerry Falwell as enabler of Pagan proselytizing
« on: December 11, 2006, 12:29:21 AM »
Quote from: Plane on December 10, 2006, 11:03:33 PM

I guess it is funny , but either you are proposeing a ban on religious discussion , or I am misunderstanding you badly.


Clearly you are misunderstanding me. Who said anything about a ban on religious discussion? How did you pull "proposing a ban on religious discussion" out of "no Christian fliers and no Pagan ones either"? I did not say a word about banning discussion or free speech. What I proposed was the school not approving the use of the school's "backpack mail" for the distribution of fliers promoting religion oriented events. This would not constitute a ban on religious discussion, a removal of free speech or a quashing of a religion. And I have no idea how it is you could have concluded otherwise. So either you're pulling my leg on this one, or you're misunderstanding me because you've jumped to completely erroneous conclusions for no apparent reason.

3373
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 11, 2006, 12:12:00 AM »
Quote from: Amianthus on December 10, 2006, 03:18:02 PM

I think it was just a case of being against anything proposed by the Republicans.


Perhaps. I saw an awful lot of fear mongering about it being Dubai from both parties. I felt ashamed for my country for the first time in my life. Not just the government, mind you, or the politicians or some policy decision. But my country. I could see no good intentions, though many claimed such. All I could see was people reacting in fear to something that was essentially an imaginary mountain made from a nonexistent molehill. Maybe that was a fault of my perspective, but I lost a lot of faith in my fellow countrymen as a result. I thought we were better than that. I was wrong.

3374
3DHS / Re: Racists take note
« on: December 10, 2006, 02:32:46 PM »
Oh no. Are we going to go through this nonsense again of how we can't trust DP World? Please, let's not. I promise I will go outside and bang my head against a brick wall if we can avoid that conversation. Banging my head against the brick wall would be less painful. And I won't have to watch people unite in xenophobia again. Apparently nothing brings people together like a common irrational fear.

3375
3DHS / Re: Jerry Falwell as enabler of Pagan proselytizing
« on: December 10, 2006, 02:11:53 PM »
Quote from: Plane on December 10, 2006, 07:04:15 AM

I misunderstood you then , I thought you were going to remove the right of free speech from a large group of citizens for the length of time that they were students.


G'HUH? What could possibly have given you that idea? Are you making a joke?

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