Democrats Suck

Originally Posted by Bradylama

The Austrian view aside, what do you think about the Democratic tendency to bill society as a system of constantly competing demographics? Do you even think they have such tendencies?

It's certainly how I've been educated at my liberal arts school. The Marxist model, or at the very least an ideological model under Althussier's revision, is one that makes a great deal of sense to me. I tend to see things in terms of constant conflict as a result.

Originally Posted by Article

life under freedom is a prize fight in which everyone is throwing punches. All appearances of contentment are illusory. The job of the state is to decide winners and losers, while our job is to obey the authority and come to a consciousness that the expropriators must be expropriated.

Though, I would say that the job of the state is more a way of providing contingency plans, rather than constant enforcement. If something is brought to the state's attention as a point of contention, then it gets taken care of. If not, then it's worked out without federal management. I think that's how most dems would represent the function of a government.

Quote:

So it is in every area of life. Even the most long-lasting institutions, such as the family, are seen as fundamentally pathological and exploitative. The same is true in international relations: they don't like Republican wars that much, but offer no model of internationalism that can replace the view that it is always and everywhere war by someone against someone, and so the only way to stop war is to wage one.

I'm not sure how the author got here, though. It doesn't seem to take into account efforts at diplomacy by both parties, which have only become tertiary to war in recent years. Even Nixon went to China.
Nor does it seem to take into account that a socialist view under the banner of the democrats would say the family is more sacred than the government itself. In that sense, it's no more exploitative than church or school.

Of course, that brings us back to using the Marxist base.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

We weren't at war with China.

Well, we were at war with communism, and China must have known it, so at least in my mind it was a generous and preventative gesture. And then in the midst of it he secretly bombed the North Vietnamese while telling the American public they would be pulling out. So at the very least I think we can agree it's not so much a democratic state of mind as a purely political one, LBJ not withstanding.

You know, I'm not sure what I was thinking saying that family was valued more than government under Marxism. But I think the tendency these days is for people to want to be self-sufficient rather than to rely on the government. It's a question of whether people actually realize that Social Security is going to be drained dry. Most people know it, in a peripheral sense, but to what extent they know it is up for debate.

And I would say that being self-sufficient doesn't have to indicate a destruction of the family so much as a change in what is considered "natural."

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

Right, but I'm saying that the change in what is conisdered "natural" is due to artificial influences, such as the welfare state. It used to be that having children was an insurance policy for old age, but now that everybody fronts the bill for each other, people only have children and raise families because they want to.

Actually I think I'm kinda confused by what you mean when you say "self-sufficient."

Well, I'm talking about middle-class, average Joe American who doesn't necessarily rely on things like welfare. It makes sense for him to cooperate with a corporation that will give him as many benefits as he can manage, and government never really gets involved. Hopefully Joe's smart enough to be saving for retirement by age 30, but if not, well, yeah, then he's going to appeal to the government.

But, since things aren't looking up for Joe in that case (back to social security), he's gonna want to make sure as much of his money as possible gets into a 401K, and he's not going to want to have kids (or at least, not many) because he doesn't meet the requirements for welfare.

In other words, self-sufficient means his labor equates to his dollar, as much as possible.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.