Wolves and Lambs

[Superman]

C'mon, Jeff. Elections are still fifteen months away. Plenty of time.

[Superman]

C'mon, Jeff. Elections are still fifteen months away. Plenty of time.

[Jeff Higgins]

I'm not eligable; I actually inhaled. A lot.

[MRM]

Federalist Number 5 discussed the issue of the tyrany of the majority and the identical but oposite problem of the tyrany of the minority. Madison and Hamilton pointed out that both the interests of the majority and minority must be ballanced to reach a just society. Ya think those guys might have read The Republic?

Our country works because it was set up by our forefathers to work on the principle of enlightened self interest, and each individual was given the oportunity and freedom to pursue his own self interest, making the others around him better off as he improved his own situation. The more we get away from this principle the worse off we are.

[Superman]

We have, supposedly, never had a President who inhaled. Perhaps that's the problem.

[Jeff Higgins]

Originally Posted by Superman

We have, supposedly, never had a President who inhaled. Perhaps that's the problem.

I'm sure it is. Think about how "squeaky clean" a guy would have to be when growing up to pass muster in front of the other party and the press these days. Then think of the kids you remember that actually were. Would you really want any one of them in any kind of position of leadership and power?

[sammyg2]

MRM nailed it, I knew there was a reason I liked that guy's posts.
I have to admit that I struggle with the federalist papers' wordiness, I have to read some passages several times in order to comprehend but it's time well spent. I prefer Madison's work over Hamilton's but they were both profound. The paper MRM was refering to was written by John Jay IIRC. I should learn more about that guy. I don't have a clue who he was.
They did more to create this country than any other, including George Washington. It's all there, just as if you were stting at a table watching our founding fathers argue about what this government should be and should not be and how they came to the decisions they did. It also sheds light on the interpretation of the constitution and how they imagined it should be.
I'm surprised the anti-gun people don't use it more. With a tad bit of a slant they could say that the right to bear arms wasn't intended to be a personal right but instead a right for the states to form and maintain their own militias independent from the national army. Kind of like a bit of freedom in case the federal government got out of control. The debate of whether we should have a strong or weak federal government is all through the federalist papers.

[legion]

Originally Posted by Superman

We have, supposedly, never had a President who inhaled. Perhaps that's the problem.

The last one said he never inhaled.

The current one said he hasn't inhaled in the last 30 years.

[sammyg2]

Wow. A quick wiki search came up with the following. Seems our Mr. Jay was a very important person, more than most of our founding fathers. President of the continental congress, first supreme court chief justice, mayor of new York, wrote the treaty with Britain, and started the emancipation movement which eventually led to the civil war. I wonder why his name was left out of the history books I studied? Doesn't seem right to me. Conspiracy I tell you. Maybe i did learn about him and my CRSS is kicking in (can't remember ***** syndrome). Maybe the government put something in the water to mess with my memory. Yeah, that must be it. Where's my tin foil hat?

John Jay (December 12, 1745 – May 17, 1829) was an American politician, statesman, revolutionary, diplomat, and jurist. Considered one of the "founding fathers" of the United States, Jay served in the Continental Congress, and was elected President of that body in 1778. During and after the American Revolution, he was a minister (ambassador) to Spain and France, helping to fashion American foreign policy and to secure favorable peace terms from the British and French. He co-wrote the Federalist Papers with Alexander Hamilton and James Madison. Jay served on the U.S. Supreme Court as the first Chief Justice of the United States from 1789 to 1795. In 1794 he negotiated the Jay Treaty with the British. A leader of the new Federalist party, Jay was elected Governor of New York state, 1795-1801. He was the leading opponent of slavery and the slave trade in New York. His first attempt to pass emancipation legislation failed in 1777, and failed again in 1785, but he succeeded in 1799, signing the law that eventually emancipated the slaves of New York; the last were freed before his death.

[pmajka]

i like wolves, and i ate lamb last night for dinner. YUMMY

[MRM]

The key is "enlightened self interest". This really is a uniquely American mindset and was a big factor in the Founding Fathers' thinking. It comes from reading a lot of Locke and Hobbes and Adam Smith and the rest.

Enlightened self interest is a recognition that we all get better off when one of us improves his situation. The significance of this is two-fold: First, it means that our society recognizes that gain is not a zero sum game. When the we do better as individuals we make the pie bigger so we all have bigger slices of the pie. The pre-American mindset was that there was a finite amount of resources so if someone got better off it had to be done at the expense of someone else. The American way is to improve our society's situation by improving our individual lives. This is much more efficient because we are best able to tell how we can improve our situation, and it speaks of personal freedom and individual liberty to make our own decisions. This is the link between efficient markets and personal freedom. It's no coincidence that the most prosperous nations are the most free.

Second, it recognizes that freedom, and the right to self determination in the pursuit of improving the public and private situation, comes when we do not hurt others or take advantage of them. Enron was not an example of enlightened self interest. That was just plain theft on the lines of a Ponzi scheme. There is a tension between my freedom and yours, but the balance is that as long as I don't do anything that hurts you or is unfair to you (like create a monopoly, adulturate food,steal trade secrets, dump sewage in the river) I should be allowed great personal freedom in deciding my personal and economic life.

The government can do a lot to enhance freedom and foster public/private good. Roads and bridges that get crops to market give us a secure food supply at prices that the world envies. Land grant universities, student loans, the GI bill created an educated middle class. You can give other examples of ways the government has intruded on our lives in a way that has improved our personal lives and society at large. I may not harvest maple syrup in Mane, but I can buy it in Minnesota because some flannel clad lumberjack does and is able to get his product to the market before it spoils. Does maple syrup spoil? Milk does, and I'm from Wisconsin, so we can use that analogy.

In my opinion there is a role for government to play, and it always gets back to enlightened self interest and public/private benefits. Will this road make the citizens of the state better off or is it a boondoggle for contractors and the unions? Will this anti-poverty program feed and educate kids who would have otherwise gone hungry and not had a chance at life or is a waste of resources? Is the EEOC making sure that people have a fair chance at all available jobs, regardless of their skin color or are they forcing a new form of discrimination through quotas?

I remeber the national dialog in the 80s to be along these lines. Maybe I was just younger and more naive then. But I really don't see thenational debate as anything more that two factions fighting over who's turn it is at the trough. And that's sad. The Founding Fathers got it right. They created a government that had a moral foundation that was supported by the economic reality that free men are more prosperous than serfs or slaves. We need to remember that.

[scottmandue]