Liz, are you thinking of the disastrous communism experiment at Jamestown, VA? That wasn’t the Pilgrims.
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The only loooonngg part is Francisco’s speech. Otherwise, it is very interesting.
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Ha! Francisco, AND the two other guys!
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Yes, that was probably the one. Thanks for the correction!
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Oh, but Francisco… Why would anyone at that dinner party hang around and listen as he droned on and on and on? That was simply not a feasible scenario. He wasn’t that stimulatingly fascinating. He wasn’t Trump. He was rather a self-righteous bore, that should have been able to make his very worthwhile point in a much, much, much shorter speech.
As I remember it anyway, I turned page after page after page (of very small print in a huge book) and he was still going on and on and on. I skipped to the end…finally.
Do you remember the most recent incarnation in film? I was so excited by the first one, and then they changed all the actors and the second one was really bad and cheap. And, then, by gawd!, they outdid themselves with a backyard set, even worse acting and directing and filmography …and it was an absolute dog of a movie. Totally embarrassing suckiness for anyone with an ounce of respect for the book and author.
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Doug:
Co-operation among neighbors to purchase good roads, sewers, street lighting, parks, police, schools, gas water and electricity piped into their homes etc. - the customary unspoken agreement to share the cost of utilities and facilities that neighbors all need - is NOT socialism.
An army navy and airforce trained to defend a nation state and paid for by all tax-payers is NOT socialism.
“Forcing people to behave sensibly” - what you think is “sensibly” - is dictatorship.
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Okay … so you are in favor of forcing your neighbors “to purchase good roads, sewers, street lighting, parks, police, schools, gas water and electricity” … or should it be voluntary? You use the phrase 'customary unspoken agreement to share the cost" of these things, but in fact, if you don’t pay your taxes, you’ll go to jail. Is this right? Should we force people to share these costs?
And so you are against, in principle, minimum wage laws, the Social Security system, Medicare, etc? What about child labor laws, and workplace safety laws?
And the National Parks? Why should someone who has no interest in them, never goes there, have to pay taxes to support them?
Didn’t see the movie (good thing I guess) but there is an aspect of the plot that really annoys me, which if removed would not only improve the plot but shorten the book, while still getting the point across, in my opinion. She drags out the plot thru three romantic relationships, the first two of which the men are made to pronounce ridiculous speeches about how justified she was to dump them for the next guy.
(Eye roll) By the time she ends up with Galt, I’m like, ok, whatever…
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Yes, the book is too long, and has some serious faults. But it is a necessary book. It is not only a splendid defense of individualism, freedom, and capitalism, it is a monument to those greatest of ideals.
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Yes, it is. In spite of its flaws, it does get that great message across.
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You really are not a conservative are you, Doug? You obviously still think like a Leftist: sociologically. Wanting to solve the problems of “the world”, “make a better world”. Those young people you have mentioned could contribute to the support of a good and prosperous world by becoming good engineers, doctors, scientists, inventors, businessmen, fathers.
I do not enjoy the role of instructor, but since you ask:
No, you don’t go to jail for not paying your taxes.
From the internet:
There is no “debtor’s prison” for people who haven’t paid their taxes . If the IRS believes that you have committed fraud or evasion, it can assess civil fraud penalties against you. These penalties are 75% of the tax owed.
Now to deal with your other points:
Laws against the abuse of children are among the many laws that protect the people. The protection of the people and their liberty is the first and only essential duty of government. For that the justice system must exist - the enforcement of the rule of law. And the military must be kept strong to defend the people and their liberty from external enemies.
In addition to criminal law for the protection of the people, there is civil law. Most essential is the enforcement of the law of contract. Persons damaged by unsafe working conditions can seek justice in the courts by bringing civil suit.
Minimum wage laws are among the most destructive of the welfare state. They are a ball-and-chain on business and employment. They handicap the market.
The whole Social Security system is civilizational poison, a formula for economic woe. The decay of the West is directly attributable to welfare. Why do we pay high taxes? So that governments can rob industrious Peter to give a grant to idle Paul. That is extreme injustice.
Private medical insurance would cost far less if medical institutions weren’t fattening recklessly on the teat of the government milch cow.
City planning is not a bad thing. Sorry you have a beef about parks.
You say you have read Adam Smith, Hayek, Milton Friedman. But you obviously do not agree with them. Maybe you will find Atlas Shrugged more persuasive. Please put it at the top of your list.
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I also - in fact, more strongly - recommend to you the books of Thomas Sowell. I suggest starting with The Vision of the Anointed.
If you are already familiar with them, I apologize for assuming otherwise.
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Just thinking about how roads, street lighting, parks, schools, police/fire departments, and electricity came to towns and rural areas and how most of it was done voluntarily in the beginning. To get electricity to the rural areas, farmers cut down the trees and donated the land, so electric crews could then work with them to put up the poles and do the wiring. Fire departments were all volunteer with community fund raising for equipment and police the same. Parks…community volunteering. Schools, the same. Roads were scraped and filled and cleared by communities.
Sure, when state and federal taxes began to be used for community improvements to towns and rural areas that made a big difference, but still there was a lot of community fund raising and volunteer work done even in the last decades of the 20th century.
National Parks has turned into a bit of a different situation, with the feds and state governments taking private lands through often nefarious means…and the practice has become very concerning. I remember when the state “forced” farmers to give up their land and forests along the Pocomoke River by repeatedly raising taxes and regulating so much that it became futile for the farmers to continue to hold onto it. It is a nice state park…but… And the practice continues, as the government gathers more and more of private citizens land, forests, and waters.
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Always well-formed and enlightening on the history and ways of the real America, are the messages from you, Jeanne. Thank you.
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Don’t know about how much my experience jives with others experience. Did anybody else grow up with rural roads that were mostly dirt? We had some main county roads and main single lane state roads, but outside of towns and off that main drag, most roads were dirt until I was in high school…that was 7th grade around here.
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Yes, alot of rural county roads around here are still dirt, and maintained by the county.
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I am surprised by that information.
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Yup, there are still some in this locale.
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“Enlightened self-interest” is not the same as “self-ness” . (Don’t you mean “selfishness”?) The individual (who practices enlightened self-interest) is not interchangeable with the “self” in pro-liberty, free-market political philosophy. Rand pointed out that the “selfish” ( ambitious, competitive, wealth-creating, success-driven) capitalist does more good for more people than the (self-styled) “altruists” of church and state doling out charity or welfare. The “self” is a feature of religious, Marxist, Freudian, socialist and identitarian dogma - appearing as soul, political consciousness, and social construct. These leftists concepts would constitute a theory of “self-ness.” There is nothing “individual” or particular about the leftist self. It is a typical or categorical representation, all the better to be boxed up and managed by the state for a “better world”. The new altruism taken up by young people is to forgo (sacrifice) individuality to concentrate entirely on self and to which identity categories and quota blocs it belongs. “Effective altruism” (see SBF) is realized best through greasing the wheels of big state Democrat officeholders.
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