Conversations with a statist, part II

Perry, you of all people, prosetilize your economics and if in power will impose it on others. Value judgment is certainly correct. It's all about values.

This is the very source of your confusion! I do not wish to impose my "values" upon others. So how could I possibly force others into my value system by allowing them to choose their own?

The people I want to see "in power" are those who don't want to exercise any power over others. After 16 months, do you still not understand that?

You have your own values, and others have their own. You are not God. Let them live according to their own consciences -- that is a moral value worth having.

>
> "The ultimate goal of human action is always the satisfaction of
> the acting
> man's desire.
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Materialism? The accumulation of wealth? I thought you said you believed in materialism.

[Note: the quote is from Mises' Human Action.]

That is not materialism. It is merely stating a fact about the general purpose behind every individual's actions, whether it's scratching a nose, working in an office, or cooking a meal.

I never said I believed in materialism. You are again putting words into my mouth. Good lord, are you so relatively young that you cannot remember things properly? I have said that I am a bit materialistic, but that does not mean I believe it is a proper course of action.

For some people, materialism is a way of life. I have never said that is the right way to live, but that is how they choose. I leave it up to them to live their lives as they see fit, and I leave it up to God to judge them.

And I ask, who the hell are you to set yourself as equal with the Most High, that you can judge others? That was Lucifer's thinking.

There is no standard of greater or lesser
> satisfaction other
> than individual judgments of value, different for various people
> and for the
> same people at various times. What makes a man feel uneasy and
> less uneasy
> is established by him from the standard of his own will and
> judgment, from
> his personal and subjective valuation. Nobody is in a position
> to decree
> what should make a fellow man happier."
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Motherhood statements. Your arguments are full if them. I believe in freedom. Who does not?

Clearly, you do not. Your concept of freedom has such vast constraints of forced morality that it's more properly called expanded servitude.

> You really do not understand what I am saying, do you? You have your
> opinions, I have mine, others have their own.
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I certainly do. And, I disagree with your policies. You and I are poles apart intellectually and in terms of human values and background.

The key difference is that you wish to impose your values on others, whether they like it or not. And if they refuse, you and the rest of the majority will have them thrown into prison and/or fined. Such arrogance is sin, and it leads straight to hell.

There are, what,
> 5 billion
> people on this planet who don't believe Jesus had any authority?
> I am not
> saying they are correct, merely that you cannot appeal to what
> is a matter
> of opinio
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Again, a non-position. Do you believe in Jesus? This is the central difference between the two of us. I believe in his authority. You say you do at one time, quoting left and right. Then, the next hour you say you don't. We are not talking about what other people think. This discussion is about what you believe and what I believe. Perry, you are brainwashed and confused.

If you believed in his authority, then why is your very life about blaspheming the entirety of Matthew 25?

My religious beliefs, and yours, are completely irrelevant, and if you think I reverse myself in the course of an hour, then you are in complete fantasy about what I am saying.

What you just cannot understand is that just because I believe people should have the freedom to live a certain way, that doesn't mean I believe it is the right way for them to live. Once again, I am not arguing what is right in an absolute sense, only that others should have the freedom of conscience. Clearly, you don't believe that. That is what this discussion is about. Leave the other 6+ billion people on this planet to live their lives without you dictating to them.

> And if people find what they perceive is happiness from their own
> materialistic endeavors, what is that to you? Why are you such
> a busybody
> about other people's lives? You have such a misguided sense of saving
> others' souls when you need to worry about the beam in your own
> eye. I
> recognize the one in my own, which is why I strive toward the
> libertarianideal of leaving others be with their own lives.
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If I see an incorrect policy, I say so. Like forever since we've been arguing. I never say "not necessarily", do I? I am not a busybody. Now, saving souls, that's another matter. I see you as misguided and directionless (the absence of values or better still the confusion of values). Again, with your preaching about libertarian economics, you are not leaving other people alone. If you really want to leave other people alone, you would not say a thing.

When I see incorrect policies, I likewise say so. So what is your point there? That I say "Not necessarily" at times? I say "Not necessarily" to mean, "It depends," because the answer is not going to be in an absolute sense.

You are not even talking about saving souls. There is a difference between talking to people about religion, and using the force of government to make them live according to your ideals. You support taxation as "fulfilling the doctrine of Jesus Christ," and I ask again: how do you support that when there are 5 billion non-Christians on this planet?

And how can you possibly say I not leaving others alone? You are the one who wants to tax people and give their money to others. I'm the one who wants to let people keep their wealth, and make peaceful economic transactions with those they choose.

"If you really want to leave other people alone, you would not say a thing." Do you not realize the illogic there? It is you and the rest of society who will not leave me alone, because the majority of them want to take a percentage of my wealth at every turn. If they left me alone as they properly should, then I wouldn't need to say anything at all.

Walter Williams' challenge is this: "What's just has been debated for centuries but let me offer you my definition of social justice: I keep what I earn and you keep what you earn. Do you disagree? Well then tell me how much of what I earn belongs to you – and why?"