[Poll] How Long Will DJ Trump Stay in Office?

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No. He was very much a liberal. He love Obama. Championed equal rights for everyone and equal access to all services offered to everyone else, public and private. If you wanted to not make a gay wedding cake, then you would to publicly advertise as such. (In that sense, he believed in the market) He was very much for a single payer health insurance scheme. He saw capitalism as a scam. He also lived in Texas.

He served in Vietnam and was rather proud of that. He despised people who used political favors to avoid service, (Clinton, W) or weak-ass excuses like “bone spurs”, but he understood those who ran because they were scared and later admitted as such, or was a genuine objector.

But, he did favor private ownership of nuclear weapons. That is not being sarcastic. When he passed, we had to make an inventory of all his weapons. Yeah, that was fun.

I did and do agree with him on private ownership of WMDs. Hey, you are for freedom, right?

But you’re talking about government interference here. The businesses can’t put 90% tariffs on China cement without their buddies in government. This is corruption and it is this interference by government that makes possible the power of corporations to eliminate competition.

To be fair, I was using the term “unregulated”, ironically.

“Monopolies are a natural end to an unregulated market” meaning companies, particularly larger ones can easily out-price the newer ones, out of a market. They have the established capital to do so.

They don’t have the freedom to take prices to exorbitant levels, or new competition will easily appear, and the more competition there is, the lower the price goes down. If prices get too low, then competition gets eliminated as some companies can’t afford to operate under such low prices. The supply-demand dynamic keeps things in balance in general.

Your case only works if all the larger ones get together and agree to out-price new competitors, which is illegal, but often happens with government interference. And I agree with you that government interference is not free market. This is also a libertarian viewpoint.

But I don’t agree that all monopolies are bad, just the state-owned or state-supported monopolies. This goes all the way to Adams Smith, who made a distinction between economic monopolies and state monopolies. For instance, when Microsoft had a huge share of the market in the late 90s, it was because they were excellent and provided systems that were affordable and valued by customers. Others argued that other companies were better at this or that, but in general, their ideas were not revolutionary enough to sufficiently uproot the monopoly. People were still being served and satisfied at that time. In fact, IBM was being investigated for being a monopoly in 1969 before Microsoft revolutionized the field and overtook their monopoly. These were not state-assisted monopolies.

You either have 100% regulated, or 100% unregulated market. But, even that is a fallacy. How would you make sure an unregulated market stays unregulated?

It isn’t 100%. It’s often 50%, some countries are much more restrictive than others. A 100% free market is very rare in history, but there are pockets here and there, and Great Britain practiced it more or less consistently in the Victorian Era because of Adams Smith’s ideas, and was the greatest commercial country at the time, which is how English became so prominent, coupled with American free markets, again more-or-less, depending on the president.

Correction, he won the election BECAUSE of his ridiculous talks and controversies. His antagonists have loud voices, the media, government elitists, and they roar like lions and like to make you think they are the majority, or the reasonable voice, but they don’t outnumber the people.

The 2nd amendment was drawn up so the people could feel secure and defend themselves against an unjust, tyrannical government should the American government become so. Just as we defended our ragged-tagged minutemen against the professional British army. So it does seem to stand to reason that whatever the government has, the people, or militias should also have in the spirit of the 2nd amendment. Not certain individuals should own nuclear weapons though, ha.

Monopolies can use the state to maintain their monopolies.

A state owned monopoly, would have to answer to the people. A private would not. Or they are both the same, depending on your POV. Try this, does the state own the monopoly, or does the monopoly own the state?

Capitalism exists to serve those who already have the wealth and allows them to control who does and does not get any of it. Sure, they throw people bones every now and then and allow a “mom and pop” to come in, but eventually, they will push them out. Either economically, or politically.

The only difference between socialism and capitalism is that one at least gives the illusion of freedom.

But the government does have nuclear weapons. :confused:

The 2nd amendment was an after-thought added in to get the southern states to go along with this notion of a constitution.

When courts pass rulings, some jurists try to look for intent. Be it original, framer’s, founder’s, author’s or whoever’s…what was their intent when coming up with the amendments. The writings of Monroe and Madison, as well as Jefferson and Adams, pretty much made it clear that any and all weapons should be made available to all citizens to protect the state. There is no reason to believe that they could not have believed that weaponry would advance to such a level that it is today.

And since there is nothing that says I cannot protect myself against my neighbor, or anyone else for that matter, then…the ban on private ownership of nuclear weapons is not only unconstitutional, but unpatriotic, too.

But, alas, since the argument cannot be seen as a constitutional one, it has to be framed as a moral argument. Is it moral for any citizen to have the right, without obstacle, to own, manufacture, possess, or even use materials of mass destruction?

Yes, this is corruption, and it is contrary to free markets and should be avoided. Where it exists, the price mechanism becomes thwarted.

No, a monopoly owned by the state has the state for its boss, and the state begins regulating a corporation, when government officials rarely have experience in the real world and couldn’t possibly run a company with entrepreneurism in mind. A government could use its vast government powers to ensure it’s monopoly enjoys the market and squeeze out (by outpricing or regulations) or outlaw competition. A private company would have to obey the laws of supply and demand, which is governed by customers and suppliers.

Capitalism allows those entrepreneurial individuals with capital who are best equipped to predict and serve the needs of the people to be the best rewarded in the marketplace.

Under socialism, whether you are talented or entrepreneurial plays no role whatsoever in being rewarded. Those best rewarded are those who are lucky enough to be in government or know someone in government.

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Capitalists created governments to serve them, not the other way around.

As I said, capitalism and socialism are just two means to the same end. They can both be enforced tyrannically. They are both nothing but salves to the people the think they can do this or that, when in reality, they cannot. You know the saying, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer? Governments in action.

I dont know your definition of capitalism, but under free markets, society rises, and yes, as the rich get richer, the poor improve as well. We saw this during the Industrial Revolution when economies got away from the old aristocratic feudal system.

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How, without using the state, do you stop a monopoly from arising?

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No. There is no such thing as a free-market. Trump attempting to save the coal industry is proof of that. Trump wanting to introduce government tariffs will see to that.

See, Trump got money from coal. (capitalism controlling the government to serve its own need).

Lets say the “free market” decided not to use coal anymore (which is happening, anyway) then what would happen? Ah, the coal people would use their influence to get government to save them. Force contracts to buy coal. Then use government to enforce those contracts.

Whether it is a regulation for, or against, it is detrimental to a truly free market.

An economic monopoly isn’t the monster to beware. It is a monopoly anyway at all linked to the state.

Under a free market, industries come and go, such as happened with the horse and buggy. These changes will be much more gradual and allow people to adjust. When government tries to do it with a wave of a wand, it isn’t neccesarily according to the needs of society, but political whim, and done so suddenly, that human lives are caught up in a devastating , hopeless whirlwind, such as West Virginia demonstrates.

There are cheap alternatives to coal, such as nuclear and what fracking is creating for cheap cleaner gas, but coal is still very viable choice on a free market without government interference. Trump just returned the coal question back to the market to decide instead of government.

They are one in the same! Monopolies support the state that supports them and reverse.

Think about it. There is the capitalism you learn in school, and then there is the real life.

If I read you correctly, a pure monopoly with no taint of state involvement (such as lobbying) should have no negative effects on the economy whatsoever. :rainbow:

Where can we find these pure jewels of economic freedom? :unicorn:

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No, that is surreptitious Marxism trying to tell you what capitalism is. I don’t believe IBM was acting against the interests of consumers back in 1969, or Microscoft in 1997. They were a monopoly in the sense that they had a great share of the market, but only because they were excellent at serving the consumer. They were not raising prices, or any competitor would easily take up the slack, and they knew it.

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Marxism and capitalism are the same thing. Again, just candy for the masses to make them think that getting screwed is good.

They were good in that they were the only gig in town. They didn’t compete with products, they forced contracts onto customers requiring them to use their products. MS wrote an OS that was very unfriendly to competing software installed on a machine. That all changed in 1998 after the federal government began to force them to split. That was good. After that, software and hardware companies were free to write for competing OSes.

Having worked with computers damn near my whole life, Windows is the worst OS out there. It is only convenient for the lazy.