So, why is government regulation the worse option again?

[Greyblades]

(Pardon the source, some of thier guys are so stupidly american-liberal they think the falklands war should have ended in british surrender, but the guy presenting is one of their sane(ish) presenters.)

Well frags has set up multi page threads about random stuff he wont tell us about, so I dont think I have to say anything more than: discuss!

[Xiahou]

Because, you can't trust the fox to watch the hen house....

[gaelic cowboy]

except the problem according to the video is that the hen house is minded by foxes pretending to be the hens inside.

Simply put they should just make a law that bans them moving the metal from one warehouse to another, or better yet tax the movement of metals between warehouses.

the more times you move it the more you pay.

[gaelic cowboy]

banks be they investment or high street should simply be banned from investing in say primary industry.

[Xiahou]

Both sides blame the other for being in corporate America's pocket, but the reality is that it is prevalent on both sides. Goldman Sachs is an example of a company that should be torn down brick by brick, its executives barred from the industry forever and/or thrown in jail, and laws ought to be made to prevent such a stupid conflict of interest ever again.

Alas, both sides will play the blame game until everyone forgets instead.

I readily agree that both sides are in the pockets of corporate interests. If you're a major corporation and you don't have an army of lobbyists in DC buying influence, you're finished. As the saying goes, if you don't have a seat at the table- you're on the menu. Virtually every regulation that is passed is with the approval or even prodding of a lobbying group.

Government creates these behemoth organizations and then we expect government to fairly regulate them- it's not going to happen. Even if you think that new regulations will help- they won't. They just hurt the small players who can't afford to buy their own DC influence peddlers.

Goldman Sachs should have gone out of business instead of being bailed out. If it was "too big to fail", as was claimed, it should have been taken into conservatorship, broken up, and sold off to repay as many of its debtors as it could. Instead, it gets bailed out and has effectively no consequences for its poor choices.

[Montmorency]

The problem is, how do you get elected if you have no stake in the private sector?

Do we only appoint eccentric rich hermits from the 'gentry' to the legislature? Only those who have been homeless and destitute for at least 5 years?

Even coming from the other end and forbidding Congresspeople from ever working in the private sector again (after their terms are up) has clear problems.

[Xiahou]

Your pie chart could have used some Bush Administration/Haliburton ties. These sorts of things occur because businesses can get their tentacles into the government easier than ever. Money equals speech, super PACs are legitimized corruption, and there is no way to turn back the clock on campaign finance law when both parties are complicit.

Campaign finance laws are a restriction on free speech. From Wikipedia:

During the original oral argument, Deputy Solicitor General Malcolm L. Stewart (representing the FEC) argued that under Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce, the government would have the power to ban books if those books contained even one sentence expressly advocating the election or defeat of a candidate and were published or distributed by a corporation or union.[13] In response to this line of questioning, Stewart further argued that under Austin the government could ban the digital distribution of political books over the Amazon Kindle or prevent a union from hiring a writer to author a political book

It's madness. Book bans are the logical extension of these laws- the government lawyers made that argument themselves.

The regulation should be very simple: Members of the government should have no stake in the private sector. Public service should be something you are willing to sacrifice financial gain for. That's why congress gets paid so damned much, right? So that they don't have to turn to corruption? Right now they are having their cake and eating it too.

And what about the revolving door? Are you going to jail a politician for taking a job after they leave office? What about their staffers? family members? There's nothing simple about it.

[Montmorency]

A law preventing them from having any ties to lobbyists or big business would never pass, because it would step on what these guys do for a living

Small businesses that provide services or goods to, or receive from, big businesses? Which is to say, almost all of them? Or, ultimately, every one, because somewhere along the supply chain there's going to be a big business?

When you decide to run for office, you should be putting yourself in a position of extreme self-sacrifice.

But then, it's the same question: who actually runs, and whom do we actually elect?

Even stuff as simple as family in business should be enough to prevent it. Make it harder than getting a top secret clearance. Got family in the financial sector? Got stocks in Goldman Sachs? Are you currently working for Goldman Sachs? You can't run for office then (or receive a presidential appointment, for that matter), go screw yourself. Better safe than sorry.

I feel like at that point we would be better off just appointing the citizens who are left eligible to the legislature than even bothering to hold elections...

[HoreTore]

The problem is, how do you get elected if you have no stake in the private sector?

I have read very little in this thread, and I'm just butting my head in on this single issue:

How 'bout academia? What about letting the smart guys run the show, instead of the greedy idiots?

[Greyblades]

Who watches the watchers

[HoreTore]

American academia is also generally run by business. Certainly anyone who relies on research grants will be the opposite of unbiased.

I find it hard to imagine that the top professors at Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, etc are all corrupted and entangled with special interests.

Those are the guys who should be prime candidates for cabinet jobs, IMO.

The Chinese, who are rapidly owning your collective behinds, have been doing that since they shot Mao's drinking buddies to great success, even though it's been limited to just a few disciplines, ie. natural sciences(they're all engineers).

[Montmorency]

How 'bout academia? What about letting the smart guys run the show, instead of the greedy idiots?

There are plenty in academia who are avaricious, short-sighted, or even downright ignorant.

There are plenty outside it who aren't.

Anyway, just because someone's good at doing research in some narrow field with a few hundred colleagues around the world doesn't mean they'll be good at administering a broad range of legislative matters for hundreds of thousands to hundreds of millions of fellow citizens.

But you're not taking the Platonic angle of permitting only academics to run for public office, right?

Ultimately, there is the conflict of interest regarding kickbacks to and from academic institutions themselves. Then again, I suppose these can't cause nearly as much harm as trillion-dollar Big Finance...

Finally, only the politically motivated would run, and in the end that's the very same problem, isn't it?

I find it hard to imagine that the top professors at Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, etc are all corrupted and entangled with special interests.

Those are the guys who should be prime candidates for cabinet jobs, IMO.

They often are - it's just that, how would they do in the heights of the legislature rather than in the mid-executive?

If you rely on corporations to exist, you probably don't belong in the government.

Same complaint I raised before : who doesn't, really?

[a completely inoffensive name]

Because like everything else in this capitalistic society, public office is thought to be another commodity that can be bought and sold.

Americans have steadily rejected the idea of a public good, and now they must realize one by one that they will never become part of the oligarchy that has bought everything up.

[Montmorency]

There's no need to get semantically absurd with this.

It's not at all.

Every business relies on big business, ultimately. Even a run-down pizza parlor in Harlem, or a bait shop in rural Minnesota, would be susceptible to this influence somewhere along the line. You're the one who thinks even corporate ties with universities (in training, or jobs' fairs, or whatever) make academics as corruptible as big lawyers and corporate executives and financiers, after all...

If you rely on corporations to exist, you probably don't belong in the government.

And yes, perhaps Joe Blow off the street with a GED and a low-income service-sector job doesn't have any unacceptably strong ties, but:

*Why would he run at all, unless he were both extremely passionate and extremely confident that he could win?*
*Could he afford to run and fail?
*What would make him qualified to legislate, or at least more so than a lawyer or some-such individual?
*What makes you think he would be less, rather than more, corruptible to any of the naughtier stuff going on in the legislature?
*What makes you think he wouldn't seek to become a career politician, if not just because the benefits are so much better than in his old job?
*What makes you think he would, if a Rep, work for his district rather than his neighborhood, or if a Senator, for his state rather than his county?
*What makes you think he would be nationally-minded at all?

*The 'novelty' candidates - who typically run for very local positions - are irrelevant

[HoreTore]

But you're not taking the Platonic angle of permitting only academics to run for public office, right?

I'm talking about cabinet members, not people running for office.

And no, I'm not suggesting to restrict it to academia. What I'm saying is that there is a huge under-representation of leading Harvard(or similar) professors in cabinets. And not just in the US, but everywhere.

But one of the things that seems to rise from the euro crisis is the technocrat government - and I think it's a rather good idea.

Have Harvard's leading professor of law as justice minister, have their leading economics professors(but stay clear of chicago...) as finance minister, etc.

Narrow fields? That's only applicable to the lower-level ones. It doesn't apply at all to the true greats, like Dewey, Schumpeter, Habermas, etc.

[Montmorency]

No, my point was, why do you think Joe Blow would be a better politician than our current politicians?

[Major Robert Dump]

hey look at this

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/201...s-itself.shtml

[Xiahou]

I often joke that anyone who wants to run for elected office should be banned from holding it. Only people who want nothing to do with politics should be allowed into office.

But seriously, there is no practical way to stop people from getting into office and lining their pockets, practicing patronage, or whatever. Rules get passed, and they find ways around them. What we really need to be doing is having them wield less influence in the first place. As I've said, virtually any bill passed out of congress has lobbying interests behind it.

If congress didn't make such convoluted and far-reaching tax code and regulations, there would be nothing for the lobbyists to curry favor for.

[TheLastDays]

The only reason why democracy is better than a monarchy is because you aren't stuck with the current ruler for life and a lot of people have (to some extent) a say in politics.

The problem with human politics is that down in the bottom we only care for ourselves and as long as we don't even want to overcome that we will run into a wall whenever we try to make someone a "public servant" - yes I believe the highest leaders in a society should be the servants of said society, work for everyon'es good but the problem is, we just can't. We are selfish bastards and when presented with the possibility we will do what is best for ourselves whatever that means for someone else.

Now democracy puts it into the hands of a vast mass of selfish bastards to sorth things out and because there are so many goals and views of life that are for the most part contrary the ones that are currently the mighty members of society can't do all that much with their power, limiting the damage they can do while pursuing their selfish goals.

[HoreTore]

The only reason why democracy is better than a monarchy is because you aren't stuck with the current ruler for life and a lot of people have (to some extent) a say in politics.

That's actually two reasons, and they're far from the only ones.

[TheLastDays]

That's actually two reasons, and they're far from the only ones.

You're right it's two but you can scratch the first. You are actually stuck with the ruler(s) for life just that it's a lot of them...

[lars573]

The only reason why democracy is better than a monarchy is because you aren't stuck with the current ruler for life and a lot of people have (to some extent) a say in politics.

Monarchies can be, and are, democracies.

[TheLastDays]

It's nice that you all hang yourselves up on the semantics of the introduction to my post rather than answering the core of it. Alright then: Absolute Monarchies and even that's just a placeholder for any non democratical form of government.

[lars573]

First of all it's non-democratic. Second your opening sentence was offensive to me. The rest was a whole pile of no shit sherlock.

[TheLastDays]

First of all it's non-democratic.

Thank you

And offending you was definitely not my goal.

[HoreTore]

First of all it's non-democratic. Second your opening sentence was offensive to me. The rest was a whole pile of no shit sherlock.

Monarchy is, by its very definition, non-democratic. It flies in the face of everything that is democratic and just in this world.

That some democracies still contain that relic of an age we do not wish to return to, monarchy, does not in any way alter the fact that it is one of the least preferable forms of government in existence.

The sooner it disappears from this world, the better.

[lars573]

Wrong on everything. Presidential Republicanism is the least preferable form of government in existence. Monarchy doesn't fly in the face of all things democratic and just. It enhances them.

Republicanism is what needs to go.

[HoreTore]

Wrong on everything. Presidential Republicanism is the least preferable form of government in existence. Monarchy doesn't fly in the face of all things democratic and just. It enhances them.

Republicanism is what needs to go.

Democracy is founded on the notion that all men are equal and that the only legitimate source of power is the will of the people.

An unelected, hereditary position of power fits into that as well as a seagull in an opera.

A monarchy in its original form is just like a military dictatorship, whether it's absolute or not. It contains all the things we do not wish to see in society, like blatant favoritism of useless cronies and royal harlots, a ridiculous focus on war and aggressive foreign politics, botched public works projects, etc etc. It's fascism in both practice and theory. Luckily for all of us, the monarchs in the western world have zero power, and all they can do now is to support reactionary fascists(which they do in abundance) and spend our tax money on $100.000 hats(which they also do in abundance).

They are basically social welfare recipients. Now, I have nothing against social welfare recipients in general, but I do have a problem with them when they recieve millions and show no willingness to ever get a proper job.

Hopefully this relic of ancient times will soon die out. The sooner, the better.

[Montmorency]

Wrong on everything. Presidential Republicanism is the least preferable form of government in existence. Monarchy doesn't fly in the face of all things democratic and just. It enhances them.

Republicanism is what needs to go.

Well, it's a bit disingenuous to make claims like that and not elaborate on them, don't you think?

What exactly are you thinking of?

[TheLastDays]

Democracy is founded on the notion that all men are equal and that the only legitimate source of power is the will of the people.

An unelected, hereditary position of power fits into that as well as a seagull in an opera.

A monarchy in its original form is just like a military dictatorship, whether it's absolute or not. It contains all the things we do not wish to see in society, like blatant favoritism of useless cronies and royal harlots, a ridiculous focus on war and aggressive foreign politics, botched public works projects, etc etc. It's fascism in both practice and theory. Luckily for all of us, the monarchs in the western world have zero power, and all they can do now is to support reactionary fascists(which they do in abundance) and spend our tax money on $100.000 hats(which they also do in abundance).

They are basically social welfare recipients. Now, I have nothing against social welfare recipients in general, but I do have a problem with them when they recieve millions and show no willingness to ever get a proper job.

Hopefully this relic of ancient times will soon die out. The sooner, the better.

Depends... I'm not sure, if you put it to vote in let's say Great Britain that a majority would want the monarchy to go. So if a majority of voters wants to have a king on top of their democratic government who's to say they can't have one beause it's not democratic?