WRT: The sodomy case

I suppose he could just be trying to make a point about how any loose interpretation of the constitution is a bad thing because, even if for a good end, it sets precedent for it to happen towards bad ends and could lead to the loss of liberties. But the constitution is not a perfect protector of individual liberty. It is sometimes a convenient document for libertarians because it can be strictly interpreted in a manner which is very supportive to many libertarian positions but if it doesn't protect people's right to "privacy" from their state authorizing to police arrest them for what goes on in their own bedroom then how good is it? Not very. This in a vacuum does sound like the tyranny of the states. I don't really understand how Paul could do something to counteract legal precedent of this sort. But if he could, just for the blank purpose of returning what are supposedly rightful constitutional powers to the states, I wonder if he would support constitutional amendments to protect people from the government and ensure that the constitution actually does ensure liberty.

I wonder too ....


http://www.ronpaul.com/congress/legi...r-dignity-act/

Hey RP fanboys, here is how reasonable people talk about taxes, even if they are republicans:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FBQ4D74Kt4

From 5:30. Do you hear "theft" or similar nonsense there ?

You are suggesting that the United States military has some necessary role in "stabilizing" other parts of the world. What if the only way these areas of the world will ever approach stability is if the major military presence, with its tens of thousands of troops and weapons of crushing force, leaves? What if the destruction and mayhem caused by the wars waged in their villages and bombs dropped on their homes is engendering even more unrest and instability than there was before? What if this state of chaos and foreign presence in their believed-to-be holy lands is actually enough to drive everyday civilians to take up arms against the invaders in what they believe to be defense? And what if when they eventually are killed by the superior force, the grief and anguish from those they knew is enough to draw more in, and so on and so on, creating an endless war whose limit is only the number of civilians left still standing? And what if all this bloodshed only increases the hatred for the occupying country and drives more people to plot terror and death for those who have ravaged their lands (or their own innocent people)?

Tell me this is "nonsense".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gfth22IuyXU&t=10m17s

Whether you want to call taxes "theft" or not, you cannot deny that they are a coercive expropriation of funds and are not voluntary and that the end result of not acquiescing is jail (and if you attempt to resist that, possibly getting shot). It doesn't matter what the end is for. You can argue that there is no alternative that allows for a stable society and that coercive governments are the best and only option. And you can say that taxes are absolutely necessary and benefit the individual paying them with essential services, OK. But do not delude yourself into thinking there isn't a shotgun involved, because that is bull****.

Not only that, but Ron Paul is spot on when he says it's based on the assumption that the government owns you and your income and lets you keep a certain percentage. The government can make your tax rate anything it wants. At one point the effective tax rate for some people in this country was like 90%.

Can I sue someone on an Internet forum for libel?

True. Tons of laws are violated all the time...Ohms Law and Boyle's law for example. Historically, laws have often been phenomenological gibberish...things that were observed but that had no real explanation. Often time theories were developed later that explained the laws (and more importantly why they sometimes failed), like quantum mechanics explained Ohms Law.

But it is silly to say something is "just a theory" because theories are the most certain to be true descriptions of nature that we have. It would be like saying I don't believe the Poincare Conjecture is correct because it is just a theorem.

Yes I think it's total gibberish. I don't know what's the dumbest thing there but I would go with following order:
a)taxation immoral and theft
b)income tax = government owns you
c)people opting out of social security (something I used to believe in when I was 14 but then I noticed people will do everything for short term profit and if you allow them to opt out you will be left with big number people without any means to live in their 60)

Overall I believe only idealist completely departed of reality could support those ideas.
Btw I am not a fan of income tax for most people. I would make it 0% below say 1M and 50% above 1M or say 25% above 250k and 50% above 1M. If any deficit arises I would prefer making up in other taxes like sales for example or rising corporate tax (again , mainly for those who really make a lot of money).

A bit OT:

Judge Napolitano on the Lew Rockwell show

http://www.lewrockwell.com/lewrockwe...Napolitano.mp3

Well I think your opinion on things is pretty dumb.

a) taxation IS theft and IS immoral. As AKSpartan pointed out, which you neglected to comment on, it is done essentially behind the gun of the government. "GIVE US MONEY OR WE WILL PUT YOU IN JAIL WAKKA WAKKA!" This is not immoral to you? How about if you were walking down the street and some criminal mugged you, and told you he needed it for some food? Would that be immoral? Clearly it would, right? So just because it's the great and beautiful government, it makes it ok?

b) yes, the government owns you and your property and your money. Is there any work, any sort of income which isn't subject to taxation? Do you have any choice in what the tax rate you pay is? Do you have any choice in what your taxes are used for? Can you own land without being taxed for it?

c) if people opt out of social security and don't plan for their retirement, that's their problem, and they should have planned for it, and they shouldn't be bailed out at the expense of other people. Most people would probably plan for their retirement, and could use their money saved from not paying SS any way they see fit to meet that goal. For instance, I wish I could opt out of SS, and all money saved, I would invest in gold and silver, and probably some other good investments. The government spends spends spends, and prints prints prints, and inflates inflates inflates, and the dollar loses and loses and loses value, so the money that I pay into SS, when the time comes that I'm eligible for benefits, IF I'm still around, IF SS is still around, the dollars I get back will be worth less than the dollars I put in, but if I had made wise investments, it would have appreciated.

Im saying its clear where he stands on policies that matter, and the good clearly outweighs the bad. Frankly I couldnt give a **** what he believes or how illogical it is.

I agree that he is wrong on this issue. But everyone's implication is basically that if he can be wrong on this issue then he must be an idiot / not have the faculty to be president. That's just straight up wrong because him being wrong on this issue is basically an aberration and there are a lot more things in play (like upbringing, christianity being very popular and having a large influence on daily life, etc.) that is clouding this specifically. His ability to reason and think critically is still intact. You cant be a doctor without being able to think and pass a test etc.

But honestly, even if he is completely brain dead, you should STILL vote for him because he is the most effective viable candidate for bringing down the empire, and that is by far and away the most important issue for the US.

People don't give a ****. They're just complacent, and it's sad as ****.

Ok if that's your view I rest my case on this one. To convince you otherwise would require so much work I just don't want to go into it. I can only offer for your consideration that the view is so radical that finding reasonable person who isn't Tea-Partier agreeing with it is very hard. Most reasonable people (I mean people you and I would consider reasonable like random economy/political science professor etc.) would find the view completely ridiculous.

That only support my suspicion that Ron Paul supporters don't get reality. Most people wouldn't plan for retirement. Most would go for instant profit of not paying now and worry later. People suck at saving and planning, they go for instant reward about always. People who can plan and make commitments for 40+years ahead are very very rare.

How do you know gold and silver is good investment ? It could well be completely worthless in 40 years. Finding "good investments" is difficult thing, experts paid millions struggle with it. Average Joe Blow may start collecting six packs of beer to make a killing once beer runs out and another super bowl comes. You honestly think most people would make wise, rational decisions when it comes to investing and saving money for decades to come?

I just want to emphasize that I understand this. It is, on its face, not a terrible argument, and Paul supporters can (with some justification, as far as I know) point to his consistency in raising this point (even if I think it is a bad one).

But if that's Paul's position, then he has a very wide choice in selecting examples from the federal courts to point to, so the fact that Paul selected those three is, itself, informative, and in a starkly negative way.

That's certainly one point of view.

Maybe people just don't want an idiot for president. Sometimes those guys need to make decisions on new stuff, and it's good to know their thought process is legitimate.

Presidents appoint a lot of people to do things. It's good to know that they surround themselves with quality people. Etc., etc.

It's hard to support a politician when I know that finding him saying something I find objectionable, or which is manifestly dumb, about a huge range of topics is just a question of whether that material has been indexed by Google, because I know that he's said or written it in the past.

*

But really, it just comes down to this: "even if he is completely brain dead, you should STILL vote for him".

Being brain dead seems disqualifying for my vote for the presidency, and, moreover, to do this, one needs to be very confident that the people surrounding Paul are going to make great decisions. I don't see that, either.

It's reasonable to believe some of that is due to the current environment. People didn't think things through when buying a home or companies made risky loans. A freer market would've done a better job of keeping expensive homes away from people who couldn't afford it.

As for saving for retirement, it's easier to do when you have less taxes, more jobs, and without programs like SS, people would have more incentives to pay attention to it. There would be a competitive market for companies to make a profit to ensure a good retirement package for people.

I think you're underestimating all the forces at play in a free market.

First of all, I'm not a tea partier.

Secondly,

How about if you were walking down the street and some criminal mugged you, and told you he needed your money for some food? Would that be immoral?


Maybe someone like Murray Rothbard? An Austrian economist who, like Ron Paul, believed taxation was theft and immoral.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Rothbard

Or Milton Friedman, who I'm sure felt similarly, though I cannot find a quote right now. He won a nobel prize in economics fwiw.

Here's a judge, and a research fellow at the independent institute who feel the same.




It's only unreasonable because you disagree with the position, amirite?



First of all, what does "go for instant profit" even mean? Secondly, citation please.




I don't give a **** what most people would do, I am not responsible for them. I am only responsible for myself, and I shouldn't bear the costs of others not being responsible for themselves, it's unfair to me. What's the problem with people being responsible for themselves, and paying the costs if they are not?

Regarding gold:

Not sure who said even if he was brain dead you should still vote for him.


I have a request. Make a list of the top 5 most important issues this country and its citizens face iyo, and post it.

1. The fight between evolution and creationism.

2. Abortion

3. Not bailing out enough corporations to fix this economy.

4. Evil banks aren't giving people enough housing loans.

5. Sarah Palin

but I could say i dont think general relativity will be the ultimate explanation. This is essentially what Paul is saying wrt evolution. It doesn't go far enough to explain human nature and its full capacity to him. I've read a fair amount of evolutionary psychology and studied some neuroscience and there are TONS of gaps in understanding the most major of phenomena which are most important to religious people. Given these insufficiencies I dont think they are necessarily erring in doubting the full scope of the theories when used to imply there was no creator.

That said, I think Paul's alternative explanations have no extraordinary grounding either, but neither does he which is why he attributes them to faith. We all know there is something more than we know, so its best to stay humble IMO.

Uhm, no..... that would be laws....

Yes. Social agreements and robbery are completely different.

I said most people, like in 95% or w/e that is.

No, you are wrong.
I mean, it's basic stuff. There are social agreements out there and I am sure you can see how taxes could be one of those rules. Imagine 100 dudes landing on an island and planning their society. New rules new laws. They are completely new to the island and without any social roles. Isn't it natural for them to agree on: "those of you who will have a lot of wealth after 10 years will help those who didn't make it and everybody will contribute % of their wealth to build roads and other stuff?". It's fair, nobody is discriminated, everybody has equal chances, equal rights and responsibilities.
In contrast the rule of "if someone put the gun to your head you have to give him money" is not reasonable in a sense that it would never be approved of those 100 people in initial situation.
I really feel helpless. People who say taxation = theft are like creationist to me. Completely ignorant and unable to see beyond their simplest moral instinct.

Because most people feel it's bad to live in society where people who made mistakes or got unlucky are homeless, sick and may die on the street ?
Or that they realize that if there are many of them they will stop respecting your property and other rights and just take your stuff away (like happened many times in history of the world)? This is after all natural state: strong takes things from the weak. The role of society is to ensure some basic rules like for example respect for property of others and helping those who need help.

??????
You claim you can make prediction of gold prizes in 40 years based on what happened in past 100 years. Are you serious about it ?

lol they're completely different. Got it!


Pretty sure I never agreed to pay any taxes, I was just forced to.