The proper role and scope of government
 

What is the proper role of government?

I have wrestled with this thought for a very long time. I have struggled with how to express my thoughts on the topic and I've decided how to open a conversation in this thread. I don't have answers, I do have some opinions, and a perspective. It differs from much of the nonsense I hear in the media and I can't stand it anymore. These are my unpolished thoughts. Perhaps we can help each other's understanding just as iron sharpens iron.

What is the proper role of government?

I want my government to be representative and accountable. I want them to behave this way as they *do* what I want done. This is the "royal" I, so to speak, what the electorate has decided to be done. I think government is the right entity to undertake endeavors that I can't get done by myself. Things that are too big for me to take care of. There are other entities that can do things that require "big", notably corporations.

Governments and corporations are similar in some remarkable ways. They're immortal, they've got leaders, they've got followers, customers, and stakeholders. There is some representation of the stakeholders by the leaders. They can be quite large and get big things done. Both are defined by and constrained by rules and laws. Both exist in our society.

And crucially, when it comes to government, I want it to provide things that I don't want to exist only in a for profit context.

In this way I've been able to identify some things I want the government to provide, things that I believe are important, and ones I don't want available only commercially. Most of these work on a national/federal level as well as a state/local level.

PUBLIC National defense.
If we only had mercenary armies, that would be very very bad. The same is true with our National Guard, the closest thing we have to a militia.

Note, there are effectively private armies out there. Security firms that answer to their paymasters. I am not the paymaster for any of these firms and as such, I have zero control or defense against their potential force. This alarms me.

PUBLIC Police
This is important for the same reasons listed above but for law enforcement at a local or state level. I want police that work for me, not gangs or mafiosi that work for someone else.

PUBLIC Education

PUBLIC Health

PUBLIC Parks

PUBLIC Libraries

PUBLIC Airwaves, including PUBLIC Broadcasting and PUBLIC Radio

PUBLIC Health, including PUBLIC Food inspection, PUBLIC healthcare (right now, just emergency room treatment for all, Medicare/Medicaid for some more.)
PUBLIC Environmental.

PUBLIC Highways

These are things that I believe we need a government presence for. Please keep in mind, NONE of these preclude the existence of PRIVATE entities doing these things, though private national defense squicks me out. The thought that any of these aspects of our society would ONLY be available through PRIVATE corporate access kinda freaks me out. Would you want all roads to be toll roads? Would you want all schools to be for profit organizations? Would you want the environment monitored by those who would applying the tragedy to the commons?

What do you think about the government's role in our society?

Thanks V, that's an great start on a good discussion.

Sometimes, it's hard to separate the "what" from the "how",
But for me the easiest way to describe "good" government is in a short phrase:

"Government does what people can't or won't do for themselves"

Many of the "what's" are among the things you listed,
and that's likely because they are things people "can't do".
Or, maybe we have already decided it would be a poor idea if individuals were allowed to do them.

My interests are among those things "people won't do".
These are things like religious and civil rights for each person,
and the right to be protected from various sorts of harm.

Then, often we can and do agree or disagree among ourselves on the "how's" and "when's".

Interesting. I'd say i pretty much agree with that list. There's one more I'd add though: communication, power and transport infrastructures.

The UK used to have nationally owned utilities, communication, and transport infrastructure: gas, electric, water, telephone, railways. It baffles me that we have privatised these things. Setting aside the fairness/unfairness of limiting access to vital services, what if we end up at war in the future? Properly at war, not jaunts off in some far corner of the world. What if our land was actually under threat? Who owns our essential services and infrastucture?

Well, a lot of it is owned now by foreign corporations. Much of it, I think is US owned, but some of it is owned by other Euro nationals as well. Friends now, but how do we know that will always be so? How easy would it be to shut us down or cause critical disruption to essential services?

What's truly depressing is all that stuff got sold off at knockdown prices, to encourage private participation (apparently: actually in order to make it easier for the governing party's friends to purchase). Garage sale prices for the nation's veins and arteries. Now we have higher prices and lesser service than in most comparable countries. The nation's coffers are regularly made to carry the cost when it goes wrong or subsidise the running of these privately owned national necessities. But the profit all goes to multi-nationals.

They bought us up with beads and blankets.

I too agree with most of the list.

Especially:

I think we need to go back to having a citizen's army (yes - gasp - the draft). At this point something like one half percent of all Americans have served in the volunteer army. That means that the vast majority of Americans have no stake in whatever latest foreign "democratization" process is going on. If more Americans were impacted or potentially impacted by our foreign excursions, the government would be forced to be more responsible in carrying them out and deciding if they should be carried out in the first place.

It is not the place of Halliburten et al to provide essential services for our troops. That is the government's (military's) job. I grew up an Army brat and, back in the day, the military did just fine if not better without these private outfits which have simply become instruments used by politicians to make a profit from our continual round of wars and "peace-keeping missions."

Education - this should be so obvious, yet many want to sharply curtail or even cease funding for education on every level - from elementary to college. An educated work force will make the US a more viable competitor in the global economy. It will also mean that citizens can make more informed choices at the polls. Knowledge is power and corporate America seems to want to make sure that the people have as little power as possible. Education should not be privatized. This will only lead to education for a select (wealthy) few.

Government should not be involved in the care and feeding of mega-corporations. What hypocrites the CEO's of these outfits are - spewing the words "free market" while behind the scenes buying government influence which ensures the market is anything but free.

It is not the place of government to contrive at the enrichment of those who "serve" in Congress. Contributions to politicians should be severely limited and corporations should not be considered "people." It probably wouldn't hurt either to have members of both the House and Senate serve for one 6 year term only.

The Constitution says that Congress should promote the GENERAL welfare - not that of special interests.

It is not the place of the government to legislate matters of private morality or religion. If I am a lesbian who attends a mosque and grew up in the Mormon church, it is no one's business but my own. The government has better things to do, or it should.

The government's job is to preserve the Republic, not contrive at the creation of a plutocracy.

That is all.

Let me echo your thoughts about the privatization of the military,
and also add the "corpor-ization" of prisons.

It's not the place of Halliburten-wannabees to provide essential services for inmates.
Inmates housed on private property are out of sight and out of mind, and a sure opportunity for corruption.
It's a job only the government should be doing with public oversight.

I think it would be good if we had mandatory military service like many other countries do. Aside from character building and vocational training, I think it gives everyone a good sense of being part of a nation.

I generally view nationalism as a negative thing.

Why do we always have to join a group so we can compete against the other groups?

Sometimes there is clearly an outside group that we need to join together against, but why force it if it isn't necessary? Can't we all get along?

"What is the proper role of government?"
 

In my view: to not exist.


Governance, by definition, is about the transaction between those who govern and those who are governed.

I don't know about you, but I'm pretty sure the only one qualified to govern me is 'me'.


This, "Government does what people can't or won't do for themselves", seems to me, almost on the mark ('cept for that pesky little word 'government').

So: let's replace 'government' with 'proxies', making the statement, 'proxies do what people can't or won't do for themselves'.

A proxy, by the way, is nothing more or less than 'a person authorized or hired to act on behalf of another'.

The American Constitutional Republic is supposed to be about proxies/employees, not elected/appointed nobility*.

As I said in another thread: the president should be nothing more than hired help, not 'the leader of the free world'.

The President (and Congress and the Supreme Court) are supposed to managers, plumbers, janitors and maintenance folk for the physical and esoteric infrastructures of the republic**.

The whole point of limited governance (proxyhood) is for those managers, plumbers, janitors and maintenance folk to attend to that which is difficult for any one to tackle on his or her own*** (and otherwise to leave folks ALONE to rise or ****fall as each is capable or liable).

As long as the question remains, "What is the proper role of government?" (a nice way of asking 'what's the proper way for the governors to direct the governed?'), then folks are guaranteed to remain 'kept' and 'led' and 'cared for' (and sent, occasionally, to the abattoir).





*And: sure as hell the American Constitutional Republic is not supposed to be about mob rule dressed in finery ('democracy')!

**As one descends the levels (federal, state, regional, county/parish, municipality, and on and on), the same principle of proxyhood applies...right down to Joe hiring a lawn care service.

***The question of what exactly falls into the category of 'difficult for any one to tackle on his or her own' is fodder for another thread, perhaps, as it -- the question -- is subtly different from "What is the proper role of government?"

****And some will most definitely FALL...too bad...adios...pffftt!

I have gotten the distinct impression from you that you live off the grid, on an island, alone. That's cool, but that's not where I live.


Ok, so far, so good.
Time out. You've some lovely words, henry, but I will thank you to keep them out of my mouth. The two questions you equate are not the same, and I am not saying, nicely or otherwise "How should I be bossed around?". Go back up to the top and look for the part where I said I want the government to do work that the electorate has decided needs to be done that I can't do. I am not your comrade in anarchy, nor am I a subject to be controlled, "kept", "led", "cared for" or slaughtered.

Thanks, it is a crucial distinction to make and a difficult one, and one that is often overlooked or confused. I want to focus on the what for now, because if the what is "not at all", then the how becomes moot. Lots of discussion about our deficit and debt and projections into the future could be simplified this way. Indeed, some of the more radical discussions from the right wing of the political conversation advocate this as the main method of closing our gaps.

I like this point very much. It is the compliment to PUBLIC Police. Law enforcement needs a judicial branch if we aspire to rise above vigilantes and lynchings. I'd add PUBLIC Judiciary to the list.

Here in the US we have private utilities, private communication infrastructure, and ... ok, we have a very different transportation infrastructure, but what we have is largely private. Transportation in a minute, the others first.

Utilities like power, water, sewer, garbage, gas, etc. these are largely private enterprises in the US, but they are subject to heavy regulation. Still, they're profitable despite the regulation. Interestingly, my city, Seattle, has a publicly owned electric utility. It works just fine.

I think this fits the qualificiations for a need that is BIG, requiring BIG to deal with it. But in lots of places here, this has succeeded as a PRIVATE venture. Let me add this. Where there is a captive consumer base, no competition and no regulation, private providers's hunger for profits will always outweigh the individual's interest. A corporations self interest is in maximizing profit and that must be paramount, or they will soon cease to exist.

PUBLIC transit is not something I think *has* to be done by the government, but I think it is in the best interest of the local populations to make PUBLIC transit available.

I wonder if the growth of the military industrial complex to the extent that the cooks aren't also soldiers hasn't hollowed out our armed services. It has certainly enriched the corporations that have grown these businesses. I also don't think that the army should be in the business of producing weapons. I don't have a problem with this as a PRIVATE venture, with limits and conditions, the same kinds of conditions I expect from my government in other areas, responsibility and accountability.

PUBLIC EDUCATION.

There isn't an item on the list that is a more obvious No Brainer. Not to the exclusion of private schools, fine, but there must be Public Schools. I also strenuously disagree with the current trend of local school districts allowing charter schools to recieve public money thereby high grading (cherry picking) students from the local population. This is a very bad idea that exacerbates all the problems in these areas. Like that idiot in the video, don't pay your federal loans, that'll show 'em. Culling the best students, the most affluent students from the public system... yeah. That's gonna strengthen our nation.

Good point. When it comes to risk a hybrid plan like PRIVATE gains and PUBLIC losses is unacceptable. See Volker act.

Here's an aspect of our society I think the government should have NO business. Marriage is a contract. We have contract law, including limits. Minors can't enter into contracts. But do we have laws that say white can't contract with black? No, because that's stupid. Do we have laws that say Jew can't contract with Gentile? No, because that's stupid. Do we have laws that says a man can't have a contract with a man? No, because that's stupid. But we have a law that says a man can't marry a man and a woman can't marry a woman. And that is also stupid.

Alarming verging on depressing. I, for one, DO NOT welcome our new Plutocratic Overlords. Screw that.

GOOD POINT, a very good point. How is it that private prisons exist anyhow? Tell me how a business (that isn't producing soylent green) can make a go of it in the prison business, AND ASTONISHINGLY, with just one customer, the government? This is definitely a job for government ONLY. PUBLIC incarceration a natural component of PUBLIC Justice.

The draft has a lot of things going for it, including the main point you mention. I haven't given a return to the draft much critical thought in many years though so my brains are rusty on this score.

"I will thank you to keep them out of my mouth"
 

My assessment of questions is mine and mine alone.

My interpretation of questions is mine and mine alone.

My response to questions is mine and mine alone.

My apologies if this wasn't clear.

#

"anarchy"

I'm not an anarchist (at least: not in formal, capital 'A', sense).

I think in a vast nation like the USA, a national transit system might be unmanageable. In the UK, we're so damn small, that parcelling up the rail network to different companies just creates a complex jigsaw. When they privatised the national rail, they made a mess of it. You'd have stretches of tracks oned by one company, the stations by another, the catering by another and several competing providers running trains. All in the same basic space.

Repairs and maintenance lost out i the restructuring. Surprise, surprise, privately run companies are more interested in maximising profit and less interested in nailing down the satey element than publicly accountable organisations. Several major train crashes and a damning report into the condition of the nation's railways and rail stock later, and it became clear that major repairs and upgrades were needed.

Guess who subsidises that stuff? Yep, the taxpayer. We pay more for our tickets and get a shittier service than we did when it was publicly owned; on top of sky-high ticket prices we also still pay subsidies through our taxes, and the profit all goes into the shareholders' pockets.

Funny (not) how things that go around, come around... and the pendulum swings back and forth.

The US had a similar history of railroad jigsaw pieces that did not fit together,
until the late 1880's when the cats were herded via our Interstate Commerce Commission.
Then they were nationalized for WWI
Then they were re-privatized in the 30's
US time zones were a result of the jigsaws, but they are ruled by state government.

Locally, Portland pushed through a small multi-county "coordinating council"
called Metro based on area-wide auto and truck transportation needs.
This "council" has now grown to a dominate force over the region
controlling all manner of transportation (buses, streetcars),
garbage and recycling, natural areas (parks, greenways, rivers and streams, trees, invasive plants),
on and on, to even tourist destinations such as the Oregon Zoo.

My personal belief is that a government is in place only to create a system of laws which are there for the benefit of the whole society, not just sections of it. As the society evolves, so must the laws.

This evolution certainly happens, but the evolution is not always to the benefit of all citizens.

About railroad privatization, we had the same trouble in Australia with different guage tracks. I'm not sure, but I think this is still an issue or was until quite recently (last 30 yrs or so).

The problem was that the different guages weren't because of privatization though. It was the different state governments causing the problems.

My wife and I go round this often, and we wholeheartedly endorse Sam's argument.
But the military seems to be pleased with their "all volunteer army",
and probably would resist a permanent draft, as is likely for the general public.
All the time while recent demands on US National Guard and military families have been terrible.

The draft during the Viet Nam war did help to bring that war to a close,
but not until after the troops on the ground were overly represented
by Blacks, Hispanics, and the poor who could not find a way to avoid conscription.
The more well-to-do managed to get into a different branch of service (e.g., Air Force),
a deferment, or went to a foreign country in one guise or another.

Now back to the "HOW's" issue...
A temporary national draft before or during a military excursion would serve
a useful purpose, but would need very strong safeguards against discriminatory inductions.
.

Totally against any draft. To risk life and limb should be a choice. It should not be imposed by the state.

And the notion that any draft would ever be so well managed as to make it fair carries very little weight for me.

Bottom line, at what cost?

Once you attempt a policy of Wealth Redistribution we are no longer a Democracy.

Would you want all supermarkets to be public?

For privatisation in Australia, ditto pretty much everything Dana said about it in Britain.

For our rail gauges, at the moment of Federation in 1901, every state in Australia had rail gauges incompatible with any state it had a border with. :facepalm: Different Colonial governments talking more to London than each other, vested business interests in each state and general stupidity are to blame.

It took 90 years for the federal Government to "herd the cats". In the meantime we found it was easiest to build a machine that could remove and replace the bogeys on a railcar while it was still moving.

[quote=henry quirk;762687I'm not an anarchist (at least: not in formal, capital 'A', sense).[/QUOTE]

By definition, you are.

"By definition, you are."
 

For the record there's (formal, political, philosophical) Anarchism and then there's ('get out of my way and leave me be') anarchism.

But -- okay -- I'm anarchistic.

*shrug*

No sir, I would not.

I don't really understand your question. By the examples I listed, I tried to explain my reasons for having PUBLIC options for these enterprises. I tried to show my thinking that a society that had ONLY private toll roads, ONLY private for profit schools would not be a good idea, therefore, I conclude that government should have a hand in roads and in schools.

Your phrasing "would I want all xyz to be public?" turns my logic on its head. I am not trying to figure out what things that should be undertaken ONLY by the government, though I have discovered a couple in the course of the conversation here: the military, prisons, judiciary. I'm trying to find out what kinds of things I believe the government should be involved in, things I think the government should not be excluded from.

Bigs, what I would like to know is what quality something has that makes it a government task. You say EDUCATION, and I can surely see the argument for it; a society is far better off with all people educated regardless of cost.

But not FOOD, despite the fact that if one cannot afford food one will die.

What traits does each need have that make them good or bad candidates for public operation?

Well, I don't completely know the answer to your question yet. I am working that out continuously, including here in this conversation. I have identified a couple recurring qualities. One is the prospect of the opposite, as I explained above. If I imagine a society with xyz that is ONLY provided by business and I think that's a very bad idea, then I calculate that government should be involved in xyz at some level. I have also identified that government is BIG (or can be big) and some things need BIG. Again this is more a situation of what needs to be done that I can't do and that I don't think is a good idea to have done by business only.

Hm. Maybe that's why I (semi-consciously) rejected your suggestion of public supermarkets. A grocery store, getting food to people is not something that requires BIG to happen. Of course, neither does schooling. More thinking out loud... I think that an uneducated child can be overlooked far more easily than a starving child. I think that our society would find starvation a hard limit. Even society zoomed in to the maximum level, a single individual. I, myself, have given food to others who were in need.

Your question, I don't want to stray far from it.I am working, thinking about this. Cliche though it may be, I think each one should be considered on its own merits, and that there isn't a mechanical formula to arrive at a definitive answer. I know this is not simple, or maybe not even clear. I'm working on it, we're working on it.

More thoughts.

I don't believe government is evil, that government is the enemy, that the gooberment wants all my money or to control me. I think that the structures of government, that the people in government are there MOSTLY for good reasons. Both good for the individual government employee and good for the people the individuals serve. Dammit. Still not the same on the page as it is in my heart.

Something else, like any other growing organism, unchecked growth can (usually) be bad. There's a completely valid perspective for reducing the footprint of government, and that should be subject to the same kind of examination that growth is subject to (or should be subject to). I don't think that "people" in the "government" sit around a big table thinking "what can we do to extend our reach into the private lives of the citizenry?" It's not happening like that. But I can see how it can feel that way. I do think that some folks come up with an idea, (like we're doing but on a smaller scale) and say, Hey, there oughta be a law. And a law or policy or regulation is created--boom--more government has been born. Ideally, the same kind of process could be applied to our laws and departments, Hey, xyz situation no longer exists, and since it was the justification for xyz law, let's get rid of it. That could happen.

That does happen. We've recently retired a tax here in Seattle, the justification for the tax was gone, and so was the tax. I think that there are some current laws that need to be in place, even though that ... thing... hasn't happened today. As an (extreme) example, I think murder should remain illegal, though there hasn't been a murder in my neighborhood in a long time. The same for civil rights legislation or environmental protection laws.

I also recognize that those nice people in government are sometimes power hungry (they are, after all, regular people). Laws can be made, and used, and enforced to gain, exert, and maintain power. This should be considered in my assessments.

...It's a lot to think about. I appreciate your help!

It's a tough question. I enjoy your thinking out loud.

Thank you for the encouragement and thank you for your input. I really meant it when I said "iron sharpens iron".

How about a Constitutional amendment that every law must include a "sunset clause".

Time is a unique asset/resource that seems to actuate people to review and improve.

We'll call it the BigV Amendment
.

ooooooooo

Famous ... interesting. :)

However, being one of those system guys (mentioned by UT in a different thread) I find a logical inconsistency in your proposition. Should we have, forever, a rule (a potent rule--a Constitutional amendment) that says we have to periodically revisit the need for a rule? What about this amendment? What about pre-existing laws? What about the Constitution itself? *boom* my head just exploded.

Seriously though, let's leave aside for a moment the level at which you suggest this rule be established. The basic idea of "Hey, is this still working?" is solid gold. Putting new rules into place with a built in expiration date has strong appeal, especially given that our government shows a FAR STRONGER tendency toward accretion than it does toward erosion. This is one way growth happens, and that's ok. Another way we deal with the aspects of government that no longer apply is that it's no longer obeyed or enforced. Though I am drawing a blank (understandable, since my point is we ignore them) in an effort to find a good example, sometimes laws just die, sink to the bottom and transmorgrify into bedrock. That's ok too.

But sometimes the situation changes and these bedrock pieces become hazards to navigation. I have heard attempts to characterize different networks across the country as information services, and not communication networks and are thereby exempt from some rule or other. I don't know the details just now, my point is that sometimes old and busted laws just die away, sometimes they present a problem.

You've made an excellent suggestion. Thanks.

OK open thoughts: society works best when it encourages people to have self-motivation and self-discipline. The ideal society is one where people value work and self-governance to the point where there is no need for much government involvement.

We know from seeing the actual results of public HOUSING that a lack of self-interest created bad citizens and shitty living conditions. One might say that public FOOD could have a similar result and could be disastrous.

But public EDUCATION hasn't worked that way; nobody sees it as a free ride of any kind. So perhaps there's some kind of essential difference.

You still have to work (study) to get an education. Even if it is free. In fact, in college my parents and I paid for my education and I didn't work nearly as hard as I did for the free education I got in high school.

It can be done... but it takes some forethought, as discussed in the link
Blue Oregon
.

stream of consciousness posting follows. buckle up.

I completely agree with your opening statement UT. That's the best society. In your second paragraph I get tangled up trying to discern cause and effect. I don't think it's as simple as you've described, and I don't think it is just one linear arc, bad citizens because xyz, including public housing. I also completely agree with your closing sentence that there is some kind of essential difference.

...sneaking up on the thought so it doesn't escape....

I think it is imperative to consider, to invoke a person's self interest, and keeping in mind that most folks want to do the minimum needed to achieve their desires. The desires that really count are the ones that are internal. Things that are important to **ME**. Me. (well, you too, you get my point). It's possible to implant those desires. I was utterly indoctrinated when it came to college. College was, you know, like 13th grade. It was gonna happen, period. And it did. I have my parents to thank for that and I'm indoctrinating my kids that way too. Two down, one to go. Anyhow, the individual's self interest must be engaged.

oh oh as for motivations, I keep in mind that there are positive motivations I want to move toward and negative motivations I want to move away from. Also, there are motivations that require a certain chain of events. Like the chimp in the room with boxes and bananas hanging from the ceiling. ChimpV couldn't care less about boxes, but loves yummy bananas. So, now I'm interested in boxes as far as they can help me get to my goal, bananas. School was like that. School, meh. Money from job to get yummy fun stuff, yeah! Job requires education, so, ok, school, what[i]evar]/i].

I don't know how to make a more self-motivated, self-disciplined society. I agree more is better, but hells bells, lots of times, I can't even be more self-motivated and self-disciplined MY OWN DAMN SELF. I can barely get ME to work better on a consistent basis, I don't know how to make it happen for society at large.

BUT. I think at least one of the methods described earlier applies: find out something that doesn't work and try to eliminate that. Doing too much for a person DOES diminish their incentive to do for themselves. No question. I know this is true from my own life, from my life as a growing child, and my life as a parent. You betcha. Like before, there isn't a mechanical formula for the right answer to do I help or do I stand by (or better: How can I best help, even if it means doing nothing?).

Another thing that is important is knowledge. Knowledge starts with information. I can't know the whole world from my own empirical experience, I have to read, and listen and observe to learn at a pace that allows me to keep up like I want to keep up. I have a hungry mind. Back to society.... Access to information to make knowledge possible is crucial. PSAs to Don't be a Fool, Stay in School or This is Your Brain on Drugs or whatever.... I think people need facts to make informed decisions about what is needed (or even possible) when it comes to reaching their goals. Like home ownership instead of public housing, etc.

Ok, recapping. Self interest (both positive and negative). Information and knowledge. Avoiding "giving" too much; hunger (that's not phrased very well). A sense of what is possible; opportunity. What else nurtures a self motivated and self disciplined citizenry?

I blabbed about self interest up there... another observation on self interest.

I beat my breast and tear my hair reading about people who (in my opinion) vote against their self interest. It boggles my small smooth brain why o why they would ever do that (those dumbasses). I think a couple things are involved.

1 -- motivations and interests are often mixed and conflicted. Rarely are they crystalline pure. Ok.

2 -- Misinformation (cue Snidley Whiplash image/laugh here) has been around forever, but it is the golden fucking age of misinformation. It's easy to tell lies effectively, loudly, repeatedly, ... ugh. It makes me sick. Anyhow... I think lots of times people are misled into acting against their self interest.

3 -- Short term self interest can be opposed to long term self interest. Likewise, individual self interest can be opposed to group self interest. Conflict ensues.

Quite true
Maybe corporate Boards of Directors have not yet read #3

And long term interests only affect future PH45, not current PH45. Screw future PH45...

Absolutly, we've seen it here in PA. Children too. :mad2:

Oh yes.

that is completely fucked up.

PUBLIC Justice, PUBLIC Law Enforcement, PUBLIC Incarceration. Not private. This is not a space where the free market should have any business.

Gov figures the Corps can do it cheaper or the time required to create another bloated inefficient public bureaucracy would not be worth the time and effort.

Bloodyhell V, that was excellent. You have a real flair for writing.

Thank you Dana. Tha's just my thinking up thar, I can actually write more better, if I slow down some. But my thoughts often escape when I do that. I can't write as fast (or as well) as I think. So I was shooting for more of my thoughts at the expense of writing quality. Thank you for the nice compliment. There is lots more here, not just in my head, but in all our heads. I want to learn all of it.

Please listen to this interview with Jeffery Sachs, economist.

http://www.kuow.washington.edu/program.php?id=24764

excerpts from a review of his new book The Price of Civilization from The Financial Times:

High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/a26e325e-f...#ixzz1asQW3Yxa

I only just now read this post, and I agree with your first paragraph.

However, I think you are off base in the second. I have never seen the housing projects back East, but from other people's descriptions, they sound like real hell holes that should just be torn down.

The story is quite different in rural areas like the one I live in. While we have apartment complexes that are given over to low income families, they are all neat and well taken care of. The local Housing Authority requires that at least one adult in each family have a job in order to qualify for assisted housing. Most folks are deeply grateful to be awarded a spot in such complexes which are not very big. Most have around 20 apartments or so. I think one may have 30.

We also have special housing units for Seniors and the disabled only. Again, these places are well kept and the people who live in them feel very lucky that they qualified for an apartment. The availability of such housing assistance makes the difference between being homeless or not for many people.

Housing assistance allows people here to keep their dignity and self respect. It gives them the chance to get job and voc rehab training, so that they may better their lot and eventually some will no longer need to live in public housing. Meanwhile, their children have a decent place to live and get to attend the same schools as their more affluent peers.

I don't know what the answer is in big cities. I think the problem is racial in part with an African American cliental whose families have lived in the projects for generations and can't envision any other sort of life. The schools in the neighborhoods where the projects are located tend to be substandard and do little to prepare a child for high school and college or even a vo-tech program. From what I read, drugs and violence are rampant. Public Housing in the big cities sounds like a complete failure.

Even so, don't be so quick to make such a harsh judgement of the housing assistance program. It works well in towns like mine and there are enough creative, caring people around who could come up with some ideas to improve urban housing if only HUD weren't so moribund with regulations and a steadily declining budget.

There are many reasons why a person may benefit from housing assistance. Please don't consign them all to the streets because of the gang banger crowd.

Measured by the ratio of important truths expressed to words used, this may be the best paragraph ever. The first sentence shows what is wrong with contemporary capitalism, and the second shows this, and also what is wrong with libertarianism.

[Applause]

One of the problems with UK housing estates and US projects is that they end up as sink places into which most the troubled and alienated members of society descend. There are plenty of working-class and middle-class people who couldn't give a flying fuck about their neighbourhood, or the state of their gardens and homes. But in a sink estate the balance is skewed so that they can, if not carefully managed, become the majority culture.

Add to that a number of other factors: the stigma of an estate/project with a bad rep begins at a very, very young age. I remember very clearly when i was at school, there was an expectation of trouble from kids who attended from the Johnson Fold Estate. I can't be wholly sure, but from memory they were pretty shabbily treated sometimes. I doubt trouble makers who didn't have that tag were punished as harshly or as often as those who did. I have a very clear memory of one of those lads being forced to sit under the music teachers desk, blocked in by a chair. If he was going to act like an animal then she was going to treat him like one. We were 12 years old, can you imagine how humiliating that must have been?

This follows on into later life. Job applications from a known estate are prejudiced. There's some evidence to suggest that it can have an impact on things like sentencing in the event of criminal conviction.

Geographically such estates are often very separate from the mainstream. Exacerbating the sense cultual divorce. They often have significantly higher levels of unemployment and fewer opportunities to engage with other economic classes except in terms of the adversarial relationships forged between those in social housing and their landlords, those on benefits with the benefits advisors, those involved in minor crime with the police and criminal justice system.

One of the ways to try and get around that is a system called 'pepper potting'. Instead of building massive estates, separated from private housing by distance, style and access, social housing is set in amongst private housing. We've had quite a few developments in my borough, where some of the housing is intended for private sale, and some intended for social rent or half equity assistaed ownership. If you walk into that new build estate, you would not know which were the private houses and which not.

We have enough land, mostly, to do that.
In South Australia, the government organisation, the Housing Trust, builds regular (maybe a bit smallish and cheapish) houses which are rented out to people at social and income disadvantage. These houses are scattered amongst regular suburbs (although not the more expensive - aim for cheaper land). The residents usually stay long term, and many eventually buy the house from the government.
By and large, this avoids or reduces the problems associated with big "projects". There are still some bad neighborhoods, and the housing trust tenants are frequently involved, but nothing on the scale of the projects in US cities.

This Cartoon Seemed Far-Fetched In 1948

Ism INC. yeah, we ARE selling our country to corporations. What are YOU going to do about it, merc? What is your plan to fix the entirely legal but fundamentally corrupting flow of money to congress?

Elect someone willing to overhaul the tax law and turn it on it's head. That would be a good start.
Oh, and this:

Appealing, but with no pensions, congressfolks will have an even stronger incentive to cuddle up to lobby groups and such to make sure they get nice fat "consultancy" positions afterwards.

It isn't just the fact that Congressfolk are willing to take "campaign contributions" and such, it is also the fact that lobby groups are allowed to give them, and misuse that privilege.

I have an easy simple effective solution, which is to mumble mumble mublemumble.

Give them a military style pension only after they have served 20 years, if they can get re-elected that many times.

Doesn't matter ... Its not stopping them now.

My Town - Working For Gov't Small Enough To Fit In Your Doghouse

Did you say we need to require all election campaigns to be waged with flat-rate public funds, no donations allowed at all? I mean, that's what I thought I heard, but it was hard with all that mumbling.

May I join your fantasy, CF? I'd like to restrict the content of those messages to truthful statements only.

ooooo fantasy...

"Your" perceived "truth"? or the real truth?

Yes.

Just checking.

No! I am Truthicus!